Where to buy mangosteen

[christianpfc]

(Food-related, therefore I post it here.) My favourite fruit is mangusteen (with pomelo a close second). I had to find out that mangosteen is not in season now and therefore can be found only at a few places, some times my search for mangusteen was unsuccessful. Since I arrived here (01.12.2010), I found it to be sold on Surawong (the area between Patpong and Thaniya) for 80 or 100THB/kg, on Rama 4 (near Lumpini tower) for 60 and in front of Lumpini boxing stadium for 80. Anyone else who shares my liking for mangosteen and knows where to buy it and for what price? I bought one pomelo on Khlong Toei market but found it's worth buying peeled pomelo for a slightly higher price (the price on Silom seems to be the same as in areas with fewer tourists) as the peeling is quite a mess.

[painai2]

The mangosteen you are getting right now is coming from far south Thailand. The actual season is a couple of months away. In May you can get it for 15 baht a kilo. I read that someone tried exporting it to New York City, where they were getting close to 50 US dollars a kilo.

[windwalker]

I saw them for sale at Wat Chai market in Pattaya but did not see the price.

[christianpfc]

The last three weeks, no problems finding good quality mangosteen at decent prices (30-60 Baht/kg) in Bangkok. The highest price was on Walking street for 380 Baht/kg.

[painai2]

I bought some this week in Pattaya off a truck selling them at 5 kilos for 100 baht.

[christianpfc]

Until mid of February, there was good quality mangosteen at low prices (down to 25 Baht per kg) available at my local market, but since then none any more.

In Pattaya, I saw reasonably priced mangosteen (60 - 80 Baht per kg, good quality) in several locations, but didn't buy because I was travelling around.

Another observation about mangosteen (and mango as well): you can either pick your own or the seller picks the, checking by hand and rejecting some (putting them back into the pile). Assuming that all will be sold by the end of the day, what's the purpose of doing so? Will I as a Farang get the good or the bad ones?

Do mango and mangosteen ripen after harvesting? (The scientific term is "climacteric" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climacteric_%28botany%29). That would make sense, to sell the ripe and keep the others for the following day. For bananas you can see on the color of the skin how ripe they are, and I buy and eat bananas according to color.

[bao-bao]

I bought one pomelo on Khlong Toei market but found it's worth buying peeled pomelo for a slightly higher price (the price on Silom seems to be the same as in areas with fewer tourists) as the peeling is quite a mess.

No kidding! Well worth the extra to have it prepped and ready to eat. Mangosteen's delicious, but I'd choose pomello any day, given the choice.

For those taking statins for cholesterol note that pomello (like it's brother grapefruit) can lessen the effectiveness of the drug and are usually on the "don't eat" list - but I happily take the chance when I'm in LOS. What we get sold in the US as pomello isn't worth the bother: picked too early and flavorless.

[Alex]

Do mango and mangosteen ripen after harvesting? (The scientific term is "climacteric" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climacteric_%28botany%29). That would make sense, to sell the ripe and keep the others for the following day. For bananas you can see on the color of the skin how ripe they are, and I buy and eat bananas according to color.

Mango is a climacteric fruit. I'm not sure about Mangosteen, I think I remember it shares some characteristics of climacteric fruits but might not really fall into that category?!

[christianpfc]

Mangosteen is back!

Since two weeks ago, there has been ample supply of mangosteen at my local market, good quality at low prices. This coincides with appearance of salak (snake fruit) and lychee and with begin of rainy season.

[lvdkeyes]

Rambutan are in season now too.