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Aroy Mak Mak

Santol

กระท้อน

Krathon: a sweet-sour fruit with fluffy white segments, also cooked in curries and pickled.

Santol

Santol is a round, yellow-brown fruit about the size of an apple. Inside are white, cottony segments around large seeds, sweet and sour like a peach crossed with a mangosteen. The thick rind is also edible and is used in cooking.

Pronunciationgra-ton
FlavourSweet, sour and peachy, with a cottony texture
SeasonMay to August
EatenFresh, in som tam krathon, pickled and candied

How it is used

Eaten fresh, sucking the sweet pulp from around the seeds. The sour rind is shredded for som tam krathon, a santol papaya salad, cooked into curries with pork, and pickled or candied as a snack. Pickled santol with chilli-salt is sold at markets everywhere in season.

Eating it safely

Never swallow santol seeds. They are large, hard and can cause serious intestinal blockages. Suck the pulp off and discard them.

Choosing and storing

Choose golden fruit that gives slightly when pressed. It keeps for a week at room temperature.

Varieties

  • Puifai: large, with thick, sweet, fluffy flesh; the best known and most planted, especially around Nonthaburi.
  • Tubtim: smaller than Puifai but valued for its sweetness.
  • Ela and Nimnuan: other named cultivars grown for eating fresh.
  • Wild and local types: smaller and much more sour, used mainly for cooking and pickling.

Outside Thailand

Fresh santol rarely reaches shops abroad, but Asian grocers stock it tinned in syrup and sometimes frozen. Tinned santol is usually the peeled rind, sweet and chewy, and is good chilled on its own or with shaved ice. In the Philippines santol is used as a souring agent in sinigang, a tamarind-style sour soup, which is another way to use the frozen fruit.

Cook’s tip

The Pui Fai variety from Nonthaburi is the sweetest and largest; look for it at Bangkok markets in early summer.

More Fruits

All Fruits