Recently, while at the APGA (American Public Garden Association) conference in Pasadena, some of the conference participants were treated to exotic fruits that are grown in California. I was not expecting to see mangosteens being offered. This is rare tropical fruit here in the US. The last time I was treated to this delicacy was at a meeting of entomolgists in Penang, Malaysia. Orignially from Southeast Asia, the mangosteen is a fabulously deep aubergine colored, sweet fruit that is unlike any other I’ve tasted. The closest I can compare it to in consistency would be the lychee, but mangosteens flavor is richer and more buttery in my opinion. You can usually find them canned in syrup in specialty Chinese markets. The fresh fruit has only recently been allowed by USDA to be imported into the US because of fears that the asian fruit fly would be imported with it. Furthermore, the mangosteen can only be grown in areas where the temperatures do not fall below 40 degrees F. They are extremely sensitive to cold. I expect we’ll see more of these delicious fruits as they become more widely known in the US.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 7th, 2008 at 9:03 am and is filed under Cynthia Druckenbrod, Exotic fruits. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.