Project: Fun with Food

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The mangosteen is the fruit of a tropical tree originating in Southeast Asia. The fragrant edible flesh is creamy and citrus with some peach flavor. Both Mangosteens and strawberries have a sweet flavor and can be eaten fresh with breakfast, as a dessert, or as juice.

The mangosteen and the strawberry are typically advertised and marketed as part of an emerging category of novel functional foods sometimes called “super fruits” presumed to have a combination of appealing subjective characteristics, such as taste, fragrance and visual qualities. They are also a sodium-free and fat-free food that could potentially lower the risk of brain and nerve disorders and other human diseases.

Both fruits are considered feminine in part because they come from flowers that once open become a fruit and also because they are both called the “Queen Fruit”. Queen Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VIII had a strawberry shaped birthmark on her neck, which some claimed proved she was a witch. In Asia the mangosteen fruit is known as the "Queen of Fruits" because of a legend that Queen Victoria was offering a cash reward to anyone who could deliver to her the fabled fruit.

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The strawberry originates in North and South America, it grows both as a wild plant and as a cultivated plant unlike the mangosteen, which comes from the Southeast Asia and is a tropical tree that takes a lot of care and time to grow.

The flesh of the strawberry has yellow seeds piercing its surface, they are meant to be eaten along with the fruit which is not the case in the mangosteen where the seeds are in the inside of the flesh and die quickly when they dry. Strawberries have become increasingly available year-round and the peak of their season is from April through July when they are the most delicious and most abundant. Mangosteen on the other hand has an irregular season and the yield varies from tree to tree and from season to season.

The delicate heart-shaped berry has always connoted purity and passion. It has been used in literature and painting to symbolize perfection and righteousness. Medieval stone masons carved strawberry designs on altars in churches and cathedrals.