Aloha fellow mango aficionados,

For those of you who enjoy a good mango, I thought that you might enjoy reading this post. I’m new to this site and have only posted a couple of times, but I thought that this taste test was worth writing about.

My friend, Marie, and I share a mango obsession. We live in Hawaii and love to watch them grow throughout the seasons. In the summer, the trees are particularly beautiful with bursts of yellow, red, and orange mangoes dotted throughout their entire canopies. Before this taste test, we were not particularly picky about what type of mangoes we ate; we were simply happy to eat them as often as we could get our hands on them. Regarding different varieties, my curiosity was piqued when during a conversation about fruit trees, my home association contractor suggested that I plant a mango tree. Based on taste alone, he suggested a few varieties and advised against others. The search was on for a great mango.

The following weekend, Marie and I headed to the farmer’s market and we bought six different types. We could have bought at least three more varieties, but they were not ripe enough to have been eaten that day, so we settled on those six for now. While I understand that some of these mango varieties are not necessarily native to Hawaii, they are all grown here- from a single tree in a resident’s backyard to an actual mango farm.

These mango summaries are listed in the order we tasted them, and are not in “ranked” order. We do, however, identify our favorite and the runner-up. Below is our taste analysis:

TOMMY ATKINS- Large sized mango, yellow with an orange-red blush ripened skin. Good taste, sweet and extremely juicy. However, the fibers were overwhelming and were really stuck in between our teeth. We actually had to pick the fibers out before proceeding to the next mango.

HADEN (or Hayden on the mainland)- Large sized mango with an all-over yellow ripened skin. Less sweet than the Tommy, but no fibers getting stuck between our teeth. This particular mango did not have as much “mango” flavor nor was as juicy as the Tommy. This mango seems to be a very popular variety, but we were not necessarily blown away with a sweet greatness. Perhaps this particular mango needed a day or two to sweeten up.

GOUVEIA- A small-medium mango with a dark yellow-orangey skin. Maybe we got a bad one, but this mango was not good at all. Both of us took one bite and agreed that it tasted as if it was starting to sour. Maybe this is a “tart” mango, but it was an unpleasant taste for the both of us.

WHITE PIRIE- The smallest of the mangoes with a yellow ripened skin. Very good texture- biting into this mango was as soft as biting into butter, if you can imagine that texture without necessarily imagining the taste of a stick of butter! It was the Goldilocks of the actual mango flavor; its sweetness was just right. No fibers, but the mango fruit flesh was very lacking in color— a pale yellow— however, this is the best mango we have tasted during this taste test.

KOOK LOM KRONG- A medium, elongated mango with a yellow-greenish tinted skin. This was a unique mango. It was very firm, no fibers, but it did not have a sweet flavor; we quickly assumed that this is a mango that might be used for cooking. I recall that in the Philippines, I once ate at a restaurant in which I ordered “Grilled prawns in a mango sauce.” The sauce was thick and had perfectly square chunks of mango- I recall noticing how well the mango chunks held their shape. Perhaps, a mango of this firm texture was used to ensure that the mango chunks held their shape, even when cooked and simmered. Because of its lacking in sweetness, if this was the mango that a tourist purchased here, hoping to taste a sweet, Hawaiian-esque mango, they would be disappointed.

RAPOZA- A large mango- by far the prettiest and most colorful mango with a vibrant red ripened skin. The mango flesh was very juicy with an excellent mango taste and with no fibers. This mango was great because compared to its large size, the seed was very thin, therefore, there was a lot of mango that could be eaten. I cut slice after slice and the seed was still not in sight yet. I’ll bet that if I had peeled it completely, I could have taken a bite out of it like I would an apple and have not bitten into the seed. Regarding the best tasting mango— if ranked on taste alone, it really is a hard decision to pick our favorite mango between the White Pirie and the Rapoza. They were both very delicious. However, because of its large size and how much fruit could be eaten off a single mango, we picked our favorite mango to be this Rapoza mango. The White Pirie was our second favorite.

This mango-tasting party was so much fun! Obviously, this analysis was based off our very own tastebuds and not everyone will agree with our “findings.” As such, we hope to hear your opinions about our results and perhaps, even read about your very own mango tasting analysis!