Inside the Secretive, Semi-Illicit, High Stakes World of WhatsApp Mango Importing
Customs restrictions, high transport costs, and a short shelf life have made the world’s greatest mangoes — grown in Pakistan — difficult to come by in the U.S.
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Mangoes are among the most beloved fruits on the planet and inspire feverish devotion — especially on the Indian subcontinent, where they’ve been cultivated for thousands of years. Here, their popularity is only growing: Americans nearly doubled their mango consumption between 2000 and 2018.
As a generally tropical, hot-weather fruit, mangoes require copious sun; they suffer if they’re exposed to frost or freezing temperatures. This isn’t quite so true of the varieties sold in the U.S., where one of the most common is known as the Tommy Atkins. Like Red Delicious apples, mangoes in America are meant to thrive in supermarket fruit aisles. They don’t take ill easily, have a nice shape and color, and boast a great shelf life — a crucial attribute, given that the U.S. is the second largest importer of mangoes in the world, with the majority sourced from Mexico.
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But, as I learned after I tasted the mangoes I’d procured through WhatsApp, I was wrong. Whereas the supermarket mangoes I grew up eating are fibrous and weirdly crisp and have little discernible fragrance, Pakistan’s Anwar Ratol and Chaunsa mangoes — the kind I picked up from the Detroit airport’s cargo bay — smell strongly of flowers and have a custardlike creaminess that drips with sticky-sweet juice. A popular method of consumption involves rolling the small, yellow-green fruit around, slicing off the top, and sucking out the liquefied pale-yellow or ochre flesh, like you’re drinking a juice box from nature. These mangoes, Pakistanis contend, are among the best varieties in the world.
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https://www.eater.com/22618349/pakis...g-supply-chain