the definitive mandarin taste test

mandarin madness

what’s that? another seasonal fruit taste test? we’ve had apple, we’ve had mango, now it’s time for the lunchbox classic, the mandarin!

i was doing the Big Shop™ when i got over-excited in the citrus aisle. i’m not sure when we got so many varieties of mandarin in stores but i loved it and bought one of each i could find

i got:

• amorette

• phoenix

• imperial

• afourer

• tangold

• murcott

• royal honey murcott

they were scored on all the important aspects of a mandarin: peelability, amount of pith, seeded or seedless, sweetness, tang, and juiciness

the line up

seven varieties, one evening, a lot of peel under the fingernails

unlike the apples, there was no baking involved here. mandarins are a snacking fruit and they were judged as such

the results

starting from the top

amorette was the runaway winner and it wasn’t close. yes the peel put up a fight, yes there were crusty bits of pith, but none of that mattered once it was in. incredible sweetness, incredible juiciness, the kind of mandarin you eat and then immediately want another one of. incredible!! so moreish

tangold, murcott and royal honey murcott all landed in a tidy little cluster just behind. typical peel, fine pith, seedless, good on sweetness and tang, acceptably juicy. tangold got a note for tasting a bit floral, murcott and its royal honey cousin were both just described as delish. reliable, satisfying, exactly what you want in a mandarin and nothing more dramatic than that. i’d be very happy to find one in my office fruit bowl

phoenix was good on paper too, same solid scores across sweetness, tang and juiciness, but the peel was a genuine struggle and it’s more like a miniature orange that a mandarin. excellent, but not the same vibe

phoenix (left) v afourer (right)

afourer is the one that hurts. buttery, good flavour, could have been right up there with amorette, but seeded, and the seeds ruined it. a real shame. maybe good for juicing?

imperial brought up the rear by a mile. self-peeling, which sounds promising, but everything else fell flat. insipid, flat, dry, seeded. tasting notes describe it, somewhat brutally, as “office mandarin” and honestly that’s the whole review