Thai Fruits

10 Thai fruits must try

1. Custard apple An interesting looking fruit that is heart shaped with green knobby skin. Squeeze open a soft, ripened fruit with your hand and eat the creamy white flesh with a spoon, then spit out the shiny black seeds. When cool, the taste is like a delicious ice cream.

2. Rambutan  Coming from an evergreen tree, the Rambutan fruit resembles the Lychees, have a leathery red skin and are covered with spines. Rambutan is a popular garden fruit tree and one of the most famous in Southeast Asia. The fruit is sweet and juicy, being commonly found in jams or available canned.

3. Mangosteen  is often called the Queen of Fruits, due to its “cooling” properties, in contrast to the King of Fruits, Durian, with it’s “heatiness”. The fruiting seasons of the two coincide and they make a very nice combination. The husk or exocarp of the Mangosteen is a leathery purple shell which, when opened, reveals the soft, white fruit which is quite delicate and consists of 4-8 segments, the larger of which contain seeds. The fragrant, fleshy fruit is both sweet and tangy.

4. Lychee  A Linchi is a plump, heart-shaped fruit with ruby red, thin spiked skin that is easily peeled with a knife, The translucent white flesh covering a black seed is sweet and very juicy.

5. Durian  The Turian is famous for its strong smell. Covered by a thick skin with sharp spikes, the large fruit has light yellow flesh that is sweet and custardy. Aficionados wait eagerly for Turian season between May and September. Many fly in from neighboring countries to enjoy Thailand’s “King of Fruits.”

6. Jackfruit If a Durian resembles a small bomb then the Jackfruit  must be the Mother of them all. Weighing up to 80 pounds and a yard long, the Jackfruit is the largest tree borne fruit in the world. Broken open, the Jackfruit reveals dozens of large seeds covered with a sweet yellow sheath which has a taste similar to pineapple but milder and less juicy. It is said that the flavor of Juicy Fruit chewing gum comes from the Jackfruit. The fruit is normally eaten raw but can also be dried and made into chips or cooked and added to curries. A dye from the heartwood of the Jackfruit tree is used by forest monks to give their robes the traditional off-brown color.

7. Dragon Fruit Dragon fruit, strawberry pear or pitaya is a fruit of several cactus species with a sweet delicate taste and creamy pulp. The most common dragon fruit is the red pitaya, but other varieties include the Costa Rica pataya and the yellow pataya. Juice or wine can be obtained from the fruit, while the flowers can be eaten or used for tea.

8. Sweet Tamarind The brown brittle tamarind shell shields the sticky brown flesh wrapped around hard dark brown seeds. The sweet and sour flesh is ideal as an ingredient for sauces and soups, or eaten fresh dipped in sugar and salt.

9. Pomelo The Thai version of the Grapefruit has a thick green skin and can weigh as much as a kilogram. The flesh is infinitely sweeter in taste and sometimes has a sour tang.

10. Passion Fruit The passion fruit has a soft, juicy interior full of seeds, being commonly found in juices to boost their flavors. There are two types of passion fruit: the golden one (maracuyá), similar to a grapefruit and the dark purple passion fruit (gulupa), comparable in terms of size with a lemon. However, the latter ones have been reported as being mildly poisonous.