There isn't much excuse for Whole Foods to not find a supplier since plenty are grown in Florida. However, try putting ripe star fruit in a box, ship it to the Whole Foods distribution center for a week then again to a store and you will probably find something not any better than the green ones, maybe pretty rotten fruit. Large chain grocers like that usually defer to buyers who seek to source a grower they know wil ship something every week and give them a constant secure price. Whole Foods likely doesn't deal with small growers. That is just the state of things with this fruit, very soft and nearly unshippable. Brooks Tropicals grows 40 acres here on Pine Island and supplies much of the US market, but all are picked green. At that stage they are mainly a decorative item like kale used to be 20-30 years ago where it was just a garnish to be thrown away, many didn't even know it was edible but compared to the bland Iceberg lettuce it may have been the healthiest thing on a plate of salad.
This is what Brooks did last year when the fruit could not be held on their trees any longer and ripened fully:
Topic: Yummy - Totally GREEN starfruit (carambola) at Whole Foods (yuck) (Read 1282 times)