Mangosteen!!!

It isn't so often that I discover heretofore unknown (to me) foods that I can casually discount them. My introduction to mangosteen, however, far outweighed even the expected reaction to a delicious new substance. This:

(Thanks, wiki!)

"queen of fruits" truly deserves its name. It's sweet, light, similar but different to peach/mango/?? flavor and custardy orangeish texture is hard to describe as anything but sublime. I was terribly disappointed to find out that these jewels, given out by the Thai Embassy for a very successful and (at least by me!) well-received Thai restaurant week (ages and ages ago, but still worth recalling), were in very short supply. I called several restaurants to see if they were still giving them out later in the week, but alas, a fruitless search. I've yet to see them in the store, and I'm not sure the average-of-$7-a-fruit cost before gas prices started skyrocketing is really in my price range. Thus, I was delighted to find that TJ's has a freeze-dried version. I procured a bag:

and I have to say that, while fresh mangosteen = SO DELICIOUS!!!! (must use caps and exclamation points), the freeze-dried fruits = SO NOT DELICIOUS#$%^&*@! (must use caps and other modifiers). The texture is, well, freeze dried - gritty, coarse, with a baked-in (freeze baking?) nut (well, that was interesting). The flavor was pretty spot on, but the overall experience couldn't even compare.

Sad now :(