Mangosteen

Garcinia mangostana

Clusiaceae

The white-segmented fruit under a purple shell — a Malay dessert, not a bottled ‘superfruit’ rind.

Ripe segments are food. The thick rind is a traditional dye and astringent, not a miracle pericarp supplement.

Parts used: Ripe inner segments
Traditional notes: Kitchen fruit · Traditional Malay and Thai dessert
Grow · USDA 6b: Tropical tree, USDA 11. Shade when young, years to fruit. A nursery tree in the wet tropics. Seed is recalcitrant and short-lived. In work: Jun · Jul · Aug
Harvest: When the shell is deep purple and yields slightly. Green is useless.

The USDA once banned fresh import; that era ended. A good fruit still travels badly.
Brown spots are bruises.

Safety

Rind as a daily supplement A fermented, leaking fruit

Lore

Queen Victoria is supposed to have offered a reward for a fresh one. The story is better than the paperwork. Malay manggis. The 2000s supplement boom sold the rind to people who had never tasted the fruit. That is a branding tragedy, not a kitchen.

The Herbarium — a teaching catalog, not a clinic. Traditional use is history, not a prescription. USDA 6b dates are a week either way, not a promise. Do not eat, drink, or harvest a plant you cannot name.