Taste Test: Exotic Fruits

Despite my love for food, I refuse to drive for more than 5 minutes to go to a grocery store. That means that trips to the farmer's market, which is 20-30 min away, are a very rare occurrence for me. But when I go, I make it an occasion and buy a bunch of things I don't usually get. At my last trip to the Asian farmer's market in town, I decided to try fruits that I have never had before. I went all out and picked some things that I hadn't even heard of and some fruits that I have always wanted to try. My selection is pictured here:

Top (left to right): Thai guava, zapote, cherimoya
Bottom: dragon fruit, kumquats

The first to go were the kumquats. I don't know if the rinds are edible, but I did eat them. The kumquats did have a pretty acidic flavor, reminiscent of oranges, but a lot more acidic. The rinds weren't bitter. I found this fruit very refreshing and delicious. I loved how they little pieces exploded in my mouth after biting into them.

I was very curious about the zapote and cherimoya because I had never even heard of them. So, I cut into them the first day. The cherimoya was soooo good! I read that it's also called a custard apple, and I see how it gets its name. It is very soft and melts in your mouth. The taste is sweet, but not cloying. It does feel like eating pudding, but with even better, fresher taste. Unfortunately, I was kind of disappointed from the zapote. The one I had was half ripe, half too hard. I couldn't even cut into the unripe part, and the rest was on the point of being mushy. The taste was kind of bland too. But I made the best of it by mixing it with the cherimoya in a fruit salad :) The two different tastes balanced each other very well. In the picture above, the cherimoya is the white mush on the bottom, and the zapote is the orange pieces.

(Important note! I did look up all fruits before I tried them. Turns out the seeds in the cherimoya contain toxic compounds and are inedible. I made sure to remove all of them. If you do decide to try any unfamiliar fruit, please look it up before tasting it.)

At that point I was also anxious to try the dragon fruit. Just like I had heard, it looks pretty, but it has a very mild taste. It indeed is pretty, with its black seeds and bright magenta outer pulp. The texture has some bite to it, it's not all mushy and soft. So I added it to my fruit salad to add almost like a little crunch to the soft cherimoya and zapote. The final product was delicious!

A couple of days later I tried the guava as well. The Thai variety has white flesh, while the Mexican variety is pink. The Thai guava didn't impress me at all. It was very bland, with a slightly tangy flavor. I was hoping to something sweeter and resembling the guava candy they give out in some Asian restaurants. I just want to point out that my guava was ripe to the touch, so the lack of flavor is not due to it being unripe. But now I'm really curious to try the pink guava, which is supposed to be sweeter. Maybe I'll pick it up during my next trip to the grocery store, along with more cherimoya :)

Taste test: Flavored yogurt

As promised, I did a taste test with flavored yogurt as well. Oh, the sacrifices I have to make for this blog... And this in not fully sarcastic. I do not like purchased flavored yogurt because it tends to have too much sugar and be too sweet. I eat plain yogurt with jam, but I add just a little bit of jams I like.

So, I found a way to cheat in this flavored yogurt test :P Instead of buying the popular Chobani, I tried the flavors of Fage. The Fage 0% plain yogurt is my favorite anyway. And what's really amazing is that the "flavored" varieties come in special divided containers that keep the flavoring and the yogurt separated. This way you can mix in as much as you want. What confuses me, though, is why the container says not to mix them... Are we supposed to take a bit of jam and then a bit of yogurt with each spoonful? Anyway, I mixed them because that's how I like it :)

I was pleasantly surprised by the variety of flavors available, probably around ten in total. I picked only six of them for this taste test. I think the flavors I picked are representative of what Fage offers. And many of the flavors I didn't try are single-ingredient jams that I have in one of the combination below. In order of preference, here are the reviews:

Honey: surprisingly, this was my least favorite. After all, honey and (Greek) yogurt is such a classic combination! Well, it all depends on the quality on the honey, and the one in the Fage yogurt didn't cut it. It was so think that I couldn't mix it at all into the yogurt. At least it tasted ok.

Blueberry/acai: classic example of what I consider "too sweet." I probably added only half of the jam, but it was still sweet. Plus, there were only a few whole berries in the sugary blueberry syrup.

Cherry/pomegranate: not as sweet as the blueberry/acai, but just as syrupy. Again, I wish there was more whole fruit. Plus, it had a little bit of an artificial cherry flavor (think, cough syrup) even though Fage doesn't use any artificial ingredients. I couldn't detect any pomegranate taste.

Raspberry: the jam has the right sweetness and consistency, but no chunks of fruit. I actually like the seeds in raspberries, so I missed them. But I'm sure the majority of the people would prefer the seedless version that Fage used.

Peach: I was pleasantly surprised with this one. Peaches can be very bland if not ripe enough or too sweet in some desserts. I didn't know which one I would get. But the jam in this case was perfect. It wasn't too sweet, but with intense peach flavor and lots of peach pieces.

Strawberry/goji: Goji? What's that? According to Wikipedia, it's a type of berry common in Asia. The strawberry/goji jam did have a pronounced strawberry flavor, but also hints of something new and unique that I haven't tried before. I can't even explain what it tastes like. The reason I loved this flavor the most is because it made me want to try goji berries. Does anyone know where I can find them?

Yogurt

Everyone who's ever stopped in front of the yogurt display in a grocery store must have seen the large variety of yogurt flavors available. Some have fruit in them, some just the flavor, some have mousse-like texture, and so on, and so on, and so on. Eating Greek yogurt is the few fad, so it isn't surprising that many different flavors have popped up as well. Well, variety is good, right? Yes, but I often find myself spending a looong time choosing a type of yogurt to buy. And that's true even though I usually stay away from the flavored varieties because they can be too sweet for me.

I'm a huge fan of plain yogurt, but even there the options are amazing. Over the years, I've done unofficial taste tests to find brands I like. I judge yogurt based on the following criteria:

1. Whey (the liquid in yogurt) - as little as possible
2. Taste - more tart is better
3. Texture - needs to be creamy

So here are my favorites in several categories:

Plain non-fat yogurt - Dannon. It has very little whey and good, firm texture. The tartness is good for a plain yogurt. Publix-brand yogurts are also good.

Flavored yogurt - I like the Yoplait Whips for their mousse-like texture. They can be as indulgent as desserts, but hey, they still have some health benefits

Plain non-fat Greek yogurt - Fage. I love everything about it. It's pretty tart, firm, and creamy. Chobani is actually creamier, but I prefer Fage for its tartness.

Because of the popularity of Greek yogurt, some more exotic types of yogurt have also appeared. For now they are primarily found in organic food stores like Whole Foods, but I can see some of them jumping to the mass market. Today I decided to do an official tasting of some plain yogurt varieties I saw at Whole foods: Greek (Eros), Icelandic (Siggi's), New Zealand (Dreaming Cow), soy milk (WholeSoy & Co.) and coconut milk (So Delicious). So here are my reviews:

1. The Eros Greek-style yogurt wasn't as good as my favorite Fage. The taste was a little milder, but it was similar in texture. I think it represented the Greek yogurt category very well. And for people who care about this, the milk comes from cows certified to be raised and handled in a humane way...
2. The Siggi's Icelandic-style yogurt (also called skyr) was amazing! It was incredibly creamy and thick. Like Greek yogurt, it's strained. I'm guessing it's strained for longer to achieve this texture. It wasn't as tart as Fage, but I'm still a huge fan. And the best part is that it is surprisingly low in calories for such creaminess (80 calories for a 150 g container). And just like Greek yogurt, it has a whooping 15 g of protein.
3. I have mixed feelings about the Dreaming Cow New Zealand-style yogurt. My initial reaction was that I hated the cream layer on top. It is just that: maybe 1 mm-thick layer of cream. I'm not sure of it forms naturally on top of the yogurt (it probably does in New Zealand), or if it's artificially added to the commercial product. Well, after you get past the cream, the yogurt is actually pretty good. It's tart and firm, probably from straining. It resembles Greek yogurt, but with only 1/3 of the protein. And as an added bonus, the milk comes from free-range cows here in Georgia. (The Wallaby brand of Australian yogurt didn't come in plain variety, but maybe it tastes similar to New Zealand-style yogurt without the cream top layer?)
4. The WholeSoy soy milk yogurt is dairy-free, thus vegan friendly and good for people with lactose intolerance. I do drink soy milk on a daily basis, but I wasn't a huge fan of the yogurt. It did taste just like soy milk, but also came with the grittiness/starchiness of bad soy milks. I might have liked it if the starting milk was better quality. Btw, it's surprisingly high in calories and low in protein (150 calories in 170 g, 8 g protein).
5. The So Delicious Coconut milk yogurt is targeted to the same user as the soy yogurt - vegans or people with allergies. The coconut taste was very very mild, and I actually wish it was stronger. It wasn't as starchy as the almond yogurt, but the texture was just off for me. It looked like apple butter, but a light brown color. Or non-strained ricotta. The only reason I finished it is because I don't like throwing away food. 

Btw, in my numerous hours in front of the yogurt sections, I've noticed that Chobani has a pretty good variety of flavored Greek-style yogurts. Maybe for my next taste test I need to try them all?

P.S. Start reading the names of the bacterial cultures that the yogurts are made from. The different brands differ somewhat, but they ALL contain L. bulgaricus, a bacterial strain originally isolated from Bulgarian yogurt :) I can't wait for the time when Bulgarian-style yogurt will become available in the US :)