YangMei and Mangosteens

The rainy season is officially over.   That's what a colleague told me today.  According to the weatherman in Shanghai, the rainy season ended last week and it is now officially summer.

Oddly enough, it rained today.

If you remember from a previous post, the rainy season in June is called the "plum rain".  ("MeiYu" in Chinese.)  They say that when the rains come then the plums will ripen.  And it seems they do.

The markets are now full of Chinese Plums....called "Yang Mei".  I've never seen a plum like this before.  As can be seen in the top-most photo, it barely resembles what we would call a plum.  It is all prickly, like a sea anemone.  It doesn't have spines of stingers, mind you, but when you pop them in your mouth its texture is a bit like a raspberry on steroids.

Anyway, I tried to find out the English translation and I'm not sure there is a good one.  I've been told that these are waxberries and bayberries and yumberries.  Wikipedia says that they're Myrica Rubra .  They grow like crazy in this area, on the South banks of the Yangtze River and around Taihu Lake.  These are the fruits of the plum trees that were blooming in February when I first arrived.   The taste and the texture is a lot like a strawberry...but with a little deeper and darker flavor.  Maybe a strawberry with a little bit of black plum in it.   But they are very good.  Folks have been bringing bowls of them into work to share.  The bowls are gobbled up quickly.  Theresa likes them too.

Half the fun of shopping in the local street markets is learning the rhythm of the seasons.  The different fruits and vegetables appear and then disappear as the growing season moves from spring to summer to autumn.  There are a couple of other local fruits that are also in abundance in the markets right now.  One is the Chinese cherry - shown above.   These are all over the place right now and are much like a sweet Bing cherry in the US.  (Not the dark black cherries.  You can buy those here but they're imported from the U.S. and cost $12 a pound.)

The other is the more exotic mangosteen, shown below.  Two weeks ago, I'd never seen nor heard of a mangosteen.  Now they are every place I turn.

The mangosteen is a strange fruit.  Though it looks like a big berry, the dark exterior is actually a husk.  The fruit lies within.   You carefully cut through the outer shell and then pop it open to reveal the fruit inside.  The photo below shows the prized interior.  It's kind of like an orange or a tangerine in that the fruit is subdivided into sections.  But the fruit is white and the texture is more mushy and the taste is nothing like a citrus.  It's sweet, but not overly sweet. It tastes to me like a mixture of peach and banana and vanilla.

It seems I'm late to the game on the mangosteen.  It has long been available only in Asia.  Now though, it is becoming all the rage in the West.  Chefs, evidently, are clamoring for the limited supply that can be had in the United States.  Some are saying it is the king of all fruits.  And the health folks are promoting it as the next best thing to the fountain of youth.

For me, I wouldn't say it's the best thing I've ever eaten.  But it's different.  Maybe even exotic.  Certainly in fashion.   And it tastes good....which is not always the case for things exotic or in fashion.