Hi Liza,

>Do you think that coconuts from Chinatown (we have a Chinatown here, as
>well as many great Asian supermarkets) can be expected to be of better quality, or a
>different type, than those that we buy? I haven't been able to understand the
>differences in types from the recent descriptions on the list.

Supermarket coconuts are OK. There are two types. Mature ones are usually
fully husked, revealing a hard brown fiber-covered shell. The meat inside
is mature, that is, mostly fat. It's the stuff you shred for cooking or
blending with water and squeezed thru cheesecloth to make coconut milk for
curries and other deserts.

The immature coconut is usually carved into a circular hut shape. The
exterior color is like freshly cut pine or birch. The water inside is
delicious and so is the thin film of jelly that lines the interior of the
inner shell.

>Second question (a dumb one) - there are two, or sometimes three, dark spots
>(holes?) on the top, which I thought were some natural part of the coconut,
>that happen to be very convenient places to puncture in order to drain and
>drinkj the juice.  Do you think these might be the holes through which sugar
>is being injected inside? They are a darker color than the rest of the "husk,"
>and smoother, without the fibers. Sometimes they look like a face.

I believe there was an earlier post on sugar adulteration in which the
syringe is inserted from the lower end because of the greater porosity of
the outer fiber.

>Third question: Frequently the juice tastes fermented - bubbly, rancid. And
>the white meat sometimes seems mushy, jellyish on its surface, and tastes
>pretty bad.  Do these things mean the coconut has simply gone bad (rancid?).
>What, in fact, happens to a coconut over time if it is just left alone? I
>wouldn't have expected them to go rancid, since they grow in climates where
>this would happen too much if it could, and also because of their thick shell.
>So why do you think mine are rotten - or are they?

Immature coconut, the water and meat taste great! Sometimes the water
ferments. It's gone bad. The immature coconut on its own will slowly absorb
the water inside and the jelly flesh will slowly harden and thicken into
the mature meat.

>And last - often our cocnuts are not only tasteless, but so dry that after
>chewing the meat for a long while in order to get any taste or juice at all,
>we finally have to spit out the mealy, dry, waxy, yukky, indigestible-tasting
>stuff left behind. Is this because we're getting the 2-for-a-dollar variety?

Sounds like you're chewing on mature meat. Try the water, young meat and
ice cubes in a tall glass
and a long spoon.

Regards,
Jo