Mamón frenesí - Mamón Chino

“Mamón frenesí” o “Mamón Manía” is what I call it. Starting in July, the mamón chino harvest begins in my community and lasts until mid-late September. I call it the “confite” or, candy of Costa Rica, as streets and yards are filled with the peelings of the fruit, similar to the large quantity of candy wrappers that can be found on the ground. Internationally, the fruit is known as Rambutan. However, in Costa Rica it is called “mamón chino.” The fruit itself is round, about the size of a ping-pong ball, and its flesh has a yellowish white color. To eat the fruit, one must break open the skin or cascara, which can either be done with one’s mouth or hands. There are two varieties, red and yellow, some of which are sweet and some of which are acid, depending on the quality of the mamón. Both varieties are surrounded by an outside skin which is covered with a leathery hair, which may appear prickly but is in reality harmless. The fruit is not indigenous to Costa Rica, and is said by many in my community to have been brought by the United Fruit Company. The actual origin of Rambutan is East Asia. The fruit is tropical and has many interesting qualities.

In my backyard, I have a mamón chino fruit tree. This year’s harvest was a good one. The fruit is harvested using what is called a “varilla,” which usually has long blades to cut the clusters (piñas) of mamones. Although I enjoy eating mamón chino, I mostly let my neighbors and kids in the neighborhood harvest the tree. You know it’s a frenesí when you come home in the afternoon from an activity and an 11 year old boy from my neighborhood is 25 feet up in the tree trying to lower himself some piñas de mamón.

Why am I not a “mamonero” (this is the term I use for a mamón addict)? First, I prefer many other tropical fruits that abound in my community, such as papaya or aguacate (mmmm guanabana). Second, many of my friends have mamón chino trees as well, so I have people constantly trying to give me mamón chinos to take home. I like to eat mamón chino in “conserva” instead of eating it in its raw state, as cooking it allows me to eat the seed as well. When cooked, the seed has a taste similar to almond or cashew.

The harvest in my community is so large that most people with a big harvests of mamones don’t know where to send them to be sold. In other words, there isn’t a large enough local market. I have always thought that with some further investigation, a market could be found somewhere in Costa Rica. Interestingly, one day I passed by the local MAG office, which is the agricultural department of Costa Rica, and two of the workers were taking tests of mamón chinos from local fincas that produce the fruit in large quantities. They were checking for features such as acidity, thickness of the fruit, size, weight, sweetness, etc. These tests were being taken to improve the future quality of the fruit.

It’s a true frenesí. There are tons of tropical, delicious fruits to be eaten in my community that are, in large part, not ever harvested and are left for the birds. Mamón chino, however, is one fruit that people in my community truly value and will spend the time to pull them down, or even climbing up in the tree to cut down the most difficult clusters of mamones.