Hi folks,
Sorry I've not posted recently, but I've been travelling. I'm currently in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on a USAID-funded consulting trip.

The jackfruit are ripe in Bangladesh just now, and they are everywhere. They are considered the national fruit. They are the largest fruit I've ever seen. In south Florida, they may approach 40 lb, occasionally, but they're bigger than that, here. I haven't weighed a big one, but I'm guessing 60 or more lb.

Also, it's peak mango season, and Bangladeshi mangos, while a rather unattractive yellowish-green in color, are excellently flavored.

Also, going through Bangkok, the rambutan and mangosteen were ripe and for sale all around. I go back through there on Wednesday, and hope to "pig out" appropriately!

Malcolm M.

The wonderful life of a college professor during summer break. - Millet

I had to go and look this one up. Interesting the Jackfruit can weigh up to 80lbs. Would'nt want to be walking under one of those when it decided it was really ripe and it let go of its tree limb! It said the outside when ripe smells like decaying onions and the inside like pineapple or banana's.

Jackfruits come in various shapes and sizes. We had one in the Philippines and I call it solo type because the fruit size is just about 2 lbs. The unusually big fruits of some cultivars, some of them ripen underground!

Too bad I can't really grow them here, they need outdoors growing and impossible with our weather. They are hardy down to 29 deg F at the trunk but the leaves will fry out.

Holy Cow -- 40 - 60 lb fruits!
Malcolm, I hope you post some pics...am really looking FWD. Be safe.

I do get the decaying onions scent from durian (a similar-looking but unrelated fruit), but not from jackfruit. I'd say the smell of a jackfruit is more essence of not-very-clean lockerroom, or sweaty socks. And the interior scent and flavor are somewhere among banana, pineapple, mango, and starch. If I can figure out how to post a pic here, I shall.

Jackfruit is developing into an important commercial industry in south Florida, these days, with a major market of Indian and Bangladeshi immigrants. They do quite well in the Homestead area.
Malcolm