Buy the whole garden of young mangosteens for sale
The mangosteen garden of Mr. Vo Van Hao’s family (Phu Tuc commune, Chau Thanh district, Ben Tre ) is nearly 2 hectares wide. This season, the weather is favorable, the trees bear fruit and there is no latex leakage… so it is expected that this year’s Doan Ngo Festival will harvest about 30 tons of fruit.
"The tree does not flower and bear fruit at the same time and is not harvested at the same time, so it usually takes a month to harvest all the fruit in the season," said Mr. Hao.
Mangosteen salad has become the most sought-after dish in the West today.
That was Mr. Hao's plan, but 3 days ago, a trader came to him and offered to buy his whole garden of young mangosteens for 50,000 VND/kg.
"It will be harvested in about a month. When the fruit is ripe, the selling price at the garden in previous years ranged from 50,000 - 100,000 VND/kg. The fruit is also heavier than the young fruit, but because the driver said he would buy the whole garden and harvest it all at once, I sold it right away. I sold it early to get money to take care of other work," said Mr. Hao.
Similar to Mr. Hao, most mangosteen garden owners in Chau Thanh and Cho Lach districts (Ben Tre) choose to sell young fruits. Because, currently, traders are bustling to buy young mangosteens to resell to restaurants and eateries in the Western provinces at prices ranging from 70,000 - 150,000 VND/kg. Particularly, the type that has been peeled and only has segments left costs up to 500,000 - 700,000 VND/kg.
Young mangosteen has a lot of latex.
"The young mangosteen season only lasts about 2 months (from mid-February to mid-April of the lunar calendar), so I have to take advantage of the time to find and buy. No matter how much I buy, I can sell it at a high price and very quickly. In general, the demand from restaurants and eateries is very high. On days when I can buy less, I take it to the market or post it on social networks and people buy it immediately," said Mr. Bui Van Hoc, a trader living in Cho Lach district.
What do diners say about mangosteen salad?
Before the "wave" of eating mangosteen salad, Thanh Nien Newspaper reporters talked with some diners at restaurants and eateries in Tien Giang and Ben Tre provinces...
"In general, sour salad with young mangosteen is beautifully decorated, and has a strange sour taste compared to sour salad made of cabbage, cucumber... But if I order a 1.5 kg free-range chicken boiled with sour salad with young mangosteen, I have to pay about 600,000 VND, while if I eat salad without mangosteen, I only have to pay 300,000 VND at most. In general, I see the trend so I just bought it to try. And I don't feel any nostalgia for this dish", said Mr. Luu Van An, a diner living in Ben Tre City (Ben Tre).
Even very small mangosteens are sought after by traders.
Meanwhile, Mr. Phan Van Dang, a customer living in Thanh Phu District (Ben Tre), said: "It's a trend so everyone can eat mangosteen salad, but I don't think it's worth waiting and paying a lot of money for such a dish. In general, nowadays people are passionate about something strange. The other day, I saw a restaurant selling fried paper flowers and it must have been a strange dish, so many customers ordered it. I'm not curious about such dishes," Mr. Dang shared.
Meanwhile, Ms. K., the owner of a restaurant in Ben Tre City, said: "Because we hired a chef who specializes in making shredded chicken with young mangosteen salad, the restaurant has been crowded with customers in the past month. Most tables order mangosteen salad and customers will be disappointed if the restaurant runs out of ingredients to make mangosteen salad," Ms. H. shared.
What does the agricultural industry say about young mangosteen?
On May 24, speaking with Thanh Nien, Dr. Bui Thanh Liem, Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Cho Lach District (Ben Tre), said that many years ago, people in many places where mangosteen trees are grown, such as Ben Tre and Tra Vinh, used young mangosteens to process into dishes. At that time, gardeners often picked mangosteens that were deformed in shape or had sap (likely to be hard when ripe) to eat, while the large, round fruits were left to ripen before harvesting. However, for many years, dishes prepared with young mangosteens have not received much attention.
Young mangosteens like this are purchased by traders at a price of 50,000 - 60,000 VND/kg.
In recent months, on some social networking sites, many promotional images and instructions on how to make them have appeared, which has started a movement of "hunting" for young mangosteens.
Regarding processing, Dr. Bui Thanh Liem said that young mangosteen is a fruit with a lot of milky white latex. When the young fruit is separated, it will quickly turn black due to interaction with the outside air environment. However, the latex of mangosteen will dissolve in water, so when processing, there is no need to use chemicals to treat the latex or prevent the pulp from turning black.
Regarding the information that picking all the young fruits on the mangosteen tree will cause the tree to become exhausted due to disease, Dr. Liem affirmed that this is not true. On the contrary, harvesting the fruit when it is young will help the tree grow better in the future.
The first mangosteens of the season are sold by Cho Lach gardeners for about 60,000 VND/kg, the quantity is very limited and the fruit is not beautiful.
In that context, Dr. Bui Thanh Liem, as well as many others in the famous Cai Mon fruit land, are concerned that the trend of eating mangosteen salad is too popular, leading to the annual Cho Lach fruit festival where it will be difficult to find round mangosteens to display. Although according to statistics from the agricultural sector, Ben Tre province has about 2,000 hectares of mangosteens, mainly grown in Chau Thanh, Cho Lach and Mo Cay Bac districts.
Mangosteen is one of the five famous fruits in the country with the Cai Mon fruit brand. According to Cho Lach gardeners, if durian is considered the "king" of fruit, then mangosteen is the "queen". However, in the current context, it is likely that Cai Mon will no longer have "queens" when the fruit festival is approaching.
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