I’ll report the Brix readings tomorrow and I’ll just give a quick description of a few Mangos that stood out for me today.
My favorite mango for today was Venus. I’ve had Venus Mangos the last several years and they have been consistently excellent but this year, they were absolutely incredible! The size of the Venus was similar to the size of a Sweet Tart and the fruit was extremely sweet with a Brix reading of 24-25%. This mango wasn’t just sweet, it had a deep rich, intense Indochinese flavor that surpassed even Sweet Tart. The Crazy strong Indochinese flavor intensified as you got closer to the skin. This mango was Perfect! I’ve had Venus when it was good-excellent but today’s sampling just rocked my world. It was that good.
We sampled 3 Venus fruit today. The first one had a Brix reading of 24% and dropped jaws, it was the first heavy hitter and there was unanimous consensus that it was the bomb. It tasted similar to a Sweet Tart from my memory and I thought to myself, “boy, I wish I could taste a Venus side by side with a Sweet Tart”. The mango tasting was very fast pace and before I could open my mouth to make my suggestion, another mango was already cut up and in my hand.
Let me step back for a minute now and explain how we do things at these mango tastings. We usually have at least one person cutting the fruit, one person taking pictures, one person taking Tasting notes, two people taking Brix readings and at least one person passing out cut fruit. We were a bit short handed today and with 52 varieties of Mangos to plow through, it was quite a daunting task.
Frank was frantically cutting the fruit and our tradition says that the first piece goes to the Brix tester. I’m usually one of the Brix testers but Warren was kind enough to offer his help which freed me up to take tasting notes. After the Brix tester gets a reading, he/she reads it out and I write it down along with a description of the flavor profile. I only write down descriptions of Mangos that pop out in terms of flavor as there is very little time between Mangos.
Thinking back, I don’t know how we made it through the day without anyone losing their fingers! Frank used a knife about as long as a Samurai sword to cut the Mangos and people were reaching in to grab a piece as he was still cutting. If you’ve seen the Sulcata Grove videos and worried that one of Greg’s family members would get cut, this was at least 100x more scary. Anyhow, where was I? Oh yeah, Venus is bomb!
We kept eating mangos and I was excited when Frank was about to cut another Venus. I was wondering if this Venus was going to be as good as the first and it was just as good. This second Venus has a slightly lower Brix reading of 23.5% but like the first Venus, it had the absolute Perfect sugar acid balance and intense Indochinese flavor. As I was beginning my thought about how wonderful it would be to compare this Venus to a Sweet..... I found myself with a CAC in my hand. Haha, I know, I know. CAC is AKA COC but I kid you not, it was in my hand before I could suggest Sweet Tart.
The day progressed and some people had to tap out. They couldn’t take so much sugar and mango in one day. Rookies. Anyways, I wasn’t sure if there were any more Venus Mangos but I decided to speak up and told Ashok “ boy, I wish we could taste the Venus and Sweet Tart side by side”. Then like magic, Frank and Ashok pulled out a Venus followed by a Sweet Tart, heck yeah!
They first cut open the Venus and gave a piece to Warren for the Brix reading but before Warren called out the Brix, Behl said, “wow, this is the best one of the day”. I immediately reached in for a piece, by this time, the samurai sword was swapped out for a more modest fruit knife. Warren then called out the Brix of 25% just as I took a bite of this mind altering mango. That sealed the deal, everyone just looked at each other and shook their head, nodding yes as a big grin fell on all our faces.
Yes it happened, we all experienced a simultaneous foodgasm! “Supremely delicious”, as Har would say. This third and final Venus was only 1% Brix higher than the first fruit but it was just that much sweeter and intensely flavored. I almost forgot about the Sweet Tart.
The first Sweet Tart that was cut was grown on Ataulfo rootstock. It had a Brix reading of 23% and the flesh had a deep orange color. The flesh was thick and dense and the juice was viscous from the sugars. Upon first bite, I thought it was delicious but kept thinking back on the last Venus that we just sampled not one minute ago. Hmmm, which one is better? My past experiences tell me that Sweet Tart is the better of the two siblings so it was difficult to admit that this Venus was better today but it was.
Don’t get me wrong, Sweet Tart was amazing and excellent but Venus had a better and more intense Indochinese flavor. It just hit all the notes that one would want in a mango. It was perfectly balanced in every sense. The sugars, acidity, depth of flavor profile, all perfectly balanced, I mean perfect!
Ok, I didn’t plan on raving about Venus at such length so I’m going to stop here and report about the other favorites tomorrow. We did also get to sample ZINC, the parent of both Sweet Tart and Venus, if I recall correctly, but the ZINC was harvested prematurely and had a Brix of 18% and tasted very watered down.
Keep in mind that weather was a bit cooler this year compared to last couple years and perhaps it was an “on year” for Venus and an “off year” for Sweet Tart. We know that Sweet Tarts can get to about 32% Brix and I wonder if we compared a Venus and Sweet Tart of the exact same Brix, which one would taste better?
Mangos vary year to year and as Leo Manuel says, “ that’s why we need to sample the fruit and compare them year to year”. I’m extremely excited about the Zill Indochinese progeny. We know that Sweet Tart and Venus are excellent and we are still waiting to evaluate Kathy(K3) but one thing is sure. We owe Gary Zill a big shout out for creating/selecting these awesome new mango varieties!
Not only are they incredibly delicious but they are also showing us that they can be very disease resistant when grown in SoCal. Even when my Lemon Zest tree was covered in Powdery Mildew, my Venus Graft held several fruit to maturity on a small graft. Yes, they can get some micro cracking on the skin but this seems to be rare.
I almost had second thoughts about posting how delicious the Venus is because I don’t want everyone ordering all the Venus scion, leaving nothing for me but some things are just too good to keep a secret. Please save me a few scions for next year whom ever is growing Venus and Kathy!
Simon