Good Litchi, Bad Litchi

The sad truth about litchi is that, if you live in Europe or America, chances are you’ve only ever tasted the wrong kind, which I’ll call “bad litchi”. You probably think that it’s one of those strange tropical fruits that are, in fact, not so great.

I can’t blame you. You were tricked into thinking that the kind of litchi you had was good, honest-to-god stuff; it was not. There’s a better kind of litchi, the delicious kind, which I’ll call “good litchi”. Here’s how you tell the two apart.

Easy: They Don’t Look the Same

If you want to tell good and bad litchi apart,
The color of their peel you’ll watch.
Look, good litchi is red and looks yummy!
Bad litchi is brown and not so tasty.

How To Tell the Difference: the Details

Color is your best bet, but there’s more. From the outer look to the taste, here’s a layer-by-layer guide to differences between good and bad litchi:

1. Good litchi is red, bad litchi is brown.
   The skin of litchi chinensis is green to begin with, and becomes yellowish and then red as it matures. After it’s cut from the tree, it will turn brown within a few days. Note that even ripe litchi can have some greenish or brownish spots. It doesn’t have to be fully red to be good, but it must be more on the red side than on the green or brown side.

   (Also, the pulp of good litchi is translucent white, while the flesh of bad litchi is subtly more opaque and yellow.)

2. The skin of good litchi is firm and flexible.
   You can remove the skin by sinking your upper teeth in the fruit to make a crack, then easily part the two sides of the skin with your fingers. The peel should not stick to the pulp of the fruit, and you should be able to peel it in one piece. On the other side, the skin of bad litchi will be hard, it will crack and be harder to remove.

3. The flesh of good litchi is not sticky.
   Bad litchi will have a bit of sticky juice coming out when you remove the skin or bite the flesh of the fruit. Not so much with good litchi. This makes good litchi easier to eat.

4. Good litchi is tastier.
   Red litchi tastes sweeter, while brown litchi is a bit sour.

   Now some people tell me they still like the bad kind. This is crazy. We’re not the kind of people who settle for “good enough”, are we?

Where Can I Find Good Litchi?

You find good litchi where it grows. The truth is, good litchi and bad litchi are the exact same fruit (from the litchi chinensis tree). But once you pick it from the tree, it goes brown very quickly, in a few days at most. You can’t buy or pick litchi on Monday and eat it on Saturday.

Litchi is simply not suited for international export, it doesn’t travel well. Also, I suspect that producers pick the fruits while they’re still greenish, but this strategy doesn’t seem to work well.

Maybe you’ll be lucky and find some imported litchi that’s still good. But if you want to be safe, you have to be in litchi-land. In the late 1990s, I was lucky enough to live in La Réunion, and it’s all-you-can-eat litchi fest in December there. Heaven on earth. In America, it seems you can find some around Florida. Otherwise it’s imported fruit from Thailand, Vietnam, China or India.

Final Words: About Lychee and Longan

Lychee

A common spelling in English-speaking countries. But it’s ugly, so don’t use it. (See Google Trends for litchi v. lychee.)
The French tend to write letchi, though litchi is accepted too.

Longan (or longani)

A different fruit from the same family, smaller and yellow. The taste is quite different, but unlike litchi it does travel well. You should try it.