Treat of the Day: Mangosteen

Former UCA colleague and great Indonesiaphile, Robin Higgins, has strongly recommended I try the tropical fruit mangosteen.  Finally, today, the grocery store in my compound offered mangosteen for purchase.

It's an odd looking fruit. You have to slice the bottom off to get to the fleshy white fruit inside. Robin was correct.  It is absolutely delicious, though the flavor is hard to describe.  It's sweet, but also a bit tart. One description I read says mangosteen tastes like a combination of strawberry, peach, and lychee.  Hmm. It's somewhat like that, but not exactly. I would simply say that it's tasty and it really is in its own distinctive category.

So thank you Robin for the tip. I never would have grabbed the peculiar looking mangosteen, the fruit that looks somewhat like a vegetable, a mutated round sort of eggplant, without your inside information.  And now I have enjoyed a positively delightful treat of the day.