Mango Nectar Taste Test

I came across a can of Philippine Brand Mango Nectar today, in my local asian market. I thought that the time was right for a taste test, so I gathered up my kids and had them sample the Philippine Brand Mango Nectar vs. the Kerns Mango Nectar. The winner was the Philippine Brand. It was confirmed in my mind when I saw that Mango pulp was the second ingrediant after water, versus the Kerns brand which had Mango as the third ingrediant behind water and sugar. Now I have to figure out what kind of drink to make with it. Below is the product link.

http://www.profoodcorp.com/products2.html

Cheers,

KT

I've always been a JuMex girl myself (Mexican brand, hence pronounced "Who Mex", as in "jugo" (juice), not "Jew Mex"!). It's cheap and tasty. I'll have to try the Phillipino stuff; no sacrifice - I LOVE mango (as mentioned on Swanky's how-to-dice-your-mango thread)!

Hey Kreaky Tiki, it just dawned on me:

We met out at Oceanic Arts in late July, when I was at the store along with Arty (Stentiki) and Terry (Trader Pup). You were buying some goodies, along with a custom-made goodie, for your home bar. How did it turn out? Got any pics?

http://www.ladyofthecake.com/mel/saddles/sounds/herecome.wav

Formikahini, I'll have to try JuMex, and search the central american grocery stores as well, for exotic mixers! I hope that you had a good time while in Los Angeles.

As for the bar, I am still acquiring parts, such as some nice copper tiki torches to adorn the sides provide some nice lighting. I have been hung up on making the template for the bar top. I have a exotic wood shop in town that will laminate and plane some Koa wood for me, but I have to first figure out the dimensions. I want it to have a nice curve, rather than be a simple rectangle. I think that I will go work on my design now.

Cheers,

KT

I found four different brands of mango nectar at three different stores and opened them all up this morning. Keeping in mind that neither my wife nor I have tasted an actual mango in some time, here are our impressions of each:

Looza Mango Nectar 1L "35% Juice" Ingredients: Water, mango puree, sugar. Found in the bottled juice aisle.

Has the characteristic Looza "canned" flavor and is the most sweetened of all, but seems to have the richest fruit flavor.

Galil Mango Nectar 330 mL "50% Fruit Juice - All Natural - No Colorants - No Preservatives" Ingredients: Water, mango puree, sugar acidulant, thickner: pectin, vitamin C, natural flavorings. Found in the Kosher foods aisle.

The least processed-tasting but slightly more watered down than the others. The weaker flavor might mean that you'd need to add more of it to mango drinks. Since this one contained a thickener and the Looza didn't, we were surprised this one poured a bit thinner, although that's probably due to the higher sugar content in the Looza. (The Looza has 50% more sugar per ounce.)

Del Valle Mango Juice Nectar 335 mL "19% Fruit Juice - No Preservatives Added" Ingredients: Water, mango puree from concentrate, high fructose corn syrup, concentrated Mexican hawthorn puree as stabilizer, less than 0.5% of: citric acid, natural flavor, vitamin C. Found in the Mexican foods aisle.

Tastes rather different than the others, with a lot more of a tart flavor. If it was labeled with a different fruit I would have believed it. It's probably just all the additives I'm tasting. Not entirely unpleasant, but not our preference.

Jumex Mango Nectar 335 mL"30% Juice" Ingredients: water, mango puree from concentrate, sugar and/or high fructose corn syrup, citric acid, ascorbic acid (preservative), beta carotene (color). Found in the Mexican foods aisle.

Bad artificial/chemical aftertaste. Our least favorite.

Conclusion: we'll be using Looza or Galil in our tiki drinks. Any of them should be fine, though, if mango isn't the dominant flavor in the drink.

I haven't found Hansen's or Kern's nectars around here, although I haven't looked very hard. If TCers think these two or some other brand is a big improvement over the four I listed above, I'll make an effort to find it.

[ Edited by: oysterschnapps 2008-09-07 13:10 ]

Of course, homesqueezed mango juice is the best. If you don't have a juicer, but have access to mangos, then putting them in the blender and straining out the stringiest of the pulp is second best. Third best is finding Goya mango pulp in the frozen food section where they keep the Goya frozen products (while your at it, pick up some Passion Fruit pulp if they carry it).

I've tried just about every brand of Passion Fruit, Mango, Guanabana, and Guava nectar/juice/drink available in the local mainstream and international markets. They are all very distant fourths (last resorts).

If you can get mangos with some kind of regularity, get yourself a mango cutter from Bed-Bath-&-Beyond, and a standard plastic pumpkin scoop from a Halloween jack-o-lantern carving kit. With the mango cutter from BB&B you can split a mango into two halves and a pit in about 1 second. The pumpkin scoop is just the right shape and material for scooping the mango away from the skin in one large chunk (I call them mango steaks). Mango steaks are great on the grill.

That's what I use. And when the mangos at the store are small or don't look that good, I just pop open a bag of Goya mango pulp.

The fresh juice and pulp are suitable for mixological masterpieces. I would not waste any decent rum by using a nectar of any sort. If you're desperate enough to use a nectar, then use really cheap rum.

On 2008-09-08 12:10, The Gnomon wrote:
Of course, homesqueezed mango juice is the best. If you don't have a juicer, but have access to mangos, then putting them in the blender and straining out the stringiest of the pulp is second best. Third best is finding Goya mango pulp in the frozen food section where they keep the Goya frozen products (while your at it, pick up some Passion Fruit pulp if they carry it).

I've tried just about every brand of Passion Fruit, Mango, Guanabana, and Guava nectar/juice/drink available in the local mainstream and international markets. They are all very distant fourths (last resorts).

If you can get mangos with some kind of regularity, get yourself a mango cutter from Bed-Bath-&-Beyond, and a standard plastic pumpkin scoop from a Halloween jack-o-lantern carving kit. With the mango cutter from BB&B you can split a mango into two halves and a pit in about 1 second. The pumpkin scoop is just the right shape and material for scooping the mango away from the skin in one large chunk (I call them mango steaks). Mango steaks are great on the grill.

That's what I use. And when the mangos at the store are small or don't look that good, I just pop open a bag of Goya mango pulp.

The fresh juice and pulp are suitable for mixological masterpieces. I would not waste any decent rum by using a nectar of any sort. If you're desperate enough to use a nectar, then use really cheap rum.

Certainly your methods are making a tastier, more natural mixer, but that does not mean that is what is called for in a recipe to make it properly. If that were the case, not many places have ever made these drinks properly or do so today.

And certainly your drinks may be better than those made with a can of nectar off the shelf, but they also may not be recognizable by Donn or The Bum, as the recipe they invented or remastered.

I don't think anyone should not bother making a recipe because they have Goya or Looza mango nectar in the fridge instead of hand squeezed mango juice. The recipes The Bum makes call for Mango Nectar and not fresh squeezed mango juice.

I'm a cocktail pragmatist. Do the best with what you have and make it work. For main ingredients like lime juice, fresh is doable. For a rarely used ingredient like mango nectar, I'll take the expedient and more reasonable approach.

I'd also gladly enjoy your efforts any day of the week.

Gnomon, I picked up some of the frozen passion fruit pulp a while back at my local hispanic food market. What's the best use for it?

I tend to gravitate to the Kerns nectar, they seem readily available and are not as "heavy" as some of the others. I don't like sludge at the bottom of my glass. All this talk is making me hungry for mangoes.

Hi Gnomon,

We're not especially fond of mango, so I was just planning on keeping around a can of something commercially-produced for those occasions where I want to test a new drink that calls for some small quantity of mango nectar. If I was more keen on the flavor, I'd try making something from fresh fruit for sure. The frozen Goya pulps are probably a good compromise, although I have yet to locate them here.

On 2008-09-08 15:11, MadDogMike wrote:
Gnomon, I picked up some of the frozen passion fruit pulp a while back at my local hispanic food market. What's the best use for it?

Homemade passion fruit syrup mainly.

On the labor intensive end, you can strain it to separate the juice from the pulp. On the opposite end, you can just leave all the pulp mixed in with the juice. The latter is effortless and tastes essentially the same. It's main drawback is that it clouds up otherwise clear drinks. When you make your own PF syrup you can control how sweet you make it.

I also like to dump the thawed pulp directly into drinks for flavor and tartness. Most passion fruit "juice," nectar or drink you buy in the store is heavily pre-sweetened and usually with pear juice added to it. Unadulterated PF juice is really tart. The Goya pulp is unadulterated.

My favorite storebought PF syrup is Aunty Lilikoi, but sometimes that makes a drink sweeter than I want. Occasionally we get fresh passion fruits in the stores here. No rhyme or reason. They just show up, then vanish as quickly. I buy them all up as soon as I see them (they never get more than a dozen it seems). The fresh PF has the best pulp, of course, but the Goya frozen is better overall for other reasons: 1) fresh is expensive and Goya frozen is not, 2) the frozen is pretty darn close in flavor to the fresh, 3) the supply of Goya is pretty steady, and 4) with Goya you don't have to wait for the fruits to ripen, then go through the mess of cleaning out the seeds and scooping out the pulp.

On 2008-09-08 12:35, Swanky wrote:
Certainly your methods are making a tastier, more natural mixer, but that does not mean that is what is called for in a recipe to make it properly. If that were the case, not many places have ever made these drinks properly or do so today.

And certainly your drinks may be better than those made with a can of nectar off the shelf, but they also may not be recognizable by Donn or The Bum, as the recipe they invented or remastered.

I don't think anyone should not bother making a recipe because they have Goya or Looza mango nectar in the fridge instead of hand squeezed mango juice. The recipes The Bum makes call for Mango Nectar and not fresh squeezed mango juice.

I'm a cocktail pragmatist. Do the best with what you have and make it work. For main ingredients like lime juice, fresh is doable. For a rarely used ingredient like mango nectar, I'll take the expedient and more reasonable approach.

I'd also gladly enjoy your efforts any day of the week.

I make potions.

Anyway, I had to end my previous post abruptly as I was interrupted by the inconvenience of work.

After I got through my usual "make-your-own-if-you-can" soap box I got snagged away and never got around to answering the question about the best mango nectar.

I haven't tried them all because I'm not into nectars per se as long as there is fresh or Goya pulp available. But among the ones in our mainstream supermarkets, there are three popular brands other than Goya ('nectar' in a can; or 'drink' in a bottle): Jumex, Mira, and Mi Casa.

Jumex has the highest juice content among the three (30%), but tastes the least like mango juice. It also is sweetend with HFCS.

Mira has 25% juice and has somewhat of a mango flavor, but it has a "slimy" consistency and a very "canned" taste.

The best among them is Mi Casa. With only 23% juice it actually tastes more like fresh mango juice than the others; plus, it's the cheapest at 99¢.

Unfortunately, the only flavors of the Mi Casa brand I've found around here that I'd use are mango and guava. The guava, similarly, tastes like guava and has bits of guava grit in it.

...freakin spelling...

[ Edited by: The Gnomon 2008-09-10 08:35 ]

It seems to be a standard for Passionfruit juice/syrup, etc. to be mixed with grape juice. I think Ahu make shi by rendering down the passionfruit juice and grape juice mix. Is that the case? Is there grape juice in passionfruit syrup or am I imagining I read that?

On 2008-09-10 08:49, Swanky wrote:
It seems to be a standard for Passionfruit juice/syrup, etc. to be mixed with grape juice. I think Ahu make shi by rendering down the passionfruit juice and grape juice mix. Is that the case? Is there grape juice in passionfruit syrup or am I imagining I read that?

There isn't in Aunty Lilikoi's, nor in my own homemade. Other than that, I couldn't tell you as these are the only two I've had for ages.

As for storebought juice, companies use lots of grape juice and pear juice to dilute the more expensive "marquee" product. I refer to it that way because it can be called Passion Fruit Juice on the front but in the list of ingredients a blend is indicated.

In big letters on the front they often say 100% juice (from concentrate) and then on the back they tell you that some of the juice is pear or grape. I don't know if they pull that stunt on some brands of PF syrup as well.

Gnomon, thanks for the pulp advice. I think I'll pull it out of the freezer and give it a shot. Do you strain it before or after it's syrup?

On 2008-09-10 12:31, MadDogMike wrote:
Gnomon, thanks for the pulp advice. I think I'll pull it out of the freezer and give it a shot. Do you strain it before or after it's syrup?

Before.

I'd get some nylon straining bags if you like making your own. The cheesecloth readily available in the grocery store breaks too easily. You can still order heavy duty only, but Scottes came up with the idea of using the nylon bags that are available in stores/site that cater to home brewing.

There are only three ingredients. Sugar, water, and passion fruit juice. Aunty Lilikoi has a fourth ingredient, Pectin, but that's a commercial outfit.

Can I use a pair of my wife's pantyhose for a nylon strainer bag :lol:

There's a different kind of yummy passion fruit juice that goes well through panty hose, but not the kind you use to make syrup. :roll:

:lol: :lol: :lol: :blush: :lol: :lol: :lol:

In the "Greenwise" section of my local Publix market I've found a very good "Organic" Mango Nectar by Walnut Acres.
Ingredients:
Filtered water, organic mango puree,organic evaporated cane juice, natural flavor, ascorbic acid (vitamin C)

Now to search for a good drink recipe to use it in.

Mango Splitter

Mango

Position splitter over tip of the mango with the stem end resting on your dish/bowl.

Shove the splitter down past the pit until it stops at the dish.

Discard the pit. Eating the mango like meat off a bone (optional).

Use the remaining mango halves for mango steaks or for juicing.

This one was riper than you'd typically use for mango steaks, dumping quite a bit of juice from the splitting process. This juice shown here is far superior to any mango nectar made by anyone anywhere. This was poured into a half consumed Mai Tai, then topped with an AE Extra float.

But I was going to grill them anyway, somehow, even though they were too ripe to stay firm. So out comes the Hallowe'en pumpkin scoop, which is just the right size, shape, and material for separating mango fruit from its skin.

Finally, what would normally be mango steaks that I'd throw directly on the grill, were mango blobs that had to be grilled up in a pan for a while before I could toss them directly onto the grate so they could char a bit.

If you're going to use them for mango juice, then you don't scoop them out if you have a lever-type squeeze juicer or similar; or you do scoop them out if you have a grind-centrifuge juicer. If you're going to squeeze the juice out by hand through cheesecloth or a straining bag, you can scoop out the mango or leave it in the skin depending on your technique.

Splitting and scooping out one mango probably takes less than one minute. So in 10 minutes you can do 10-12 easily.

I'm with Swanky on this one. If I could taste the difference between brands in a classic tropical drink, I may bother with hand squeezing, but I'm lazy so I'll probably go with Looza after my cans of Kerns run out. It just wish the Looza came in smaller sizes. That's what's nice about Kerns, you don't have tons leftover. I also wish my supermarkets carried anything like you found in yours. We don't have all those Mexican products in the supermarket. I could probably find them in the Latin mercado though, but I like one-stop-shopping with the price of gas these days.