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Ask a European buyer to name Egyptian fruit and you will hear strawberries, then mangoes, then a pause. Guava rarely comes up, which is odd for a fruit that grows so well here and behaves so well in the freezer.

What Egyptian guava tastes like

The varieties grown around Ismailia and the Fayoum have pale pink to salmon flesh, a musky tropical aroma and a real acid backbone. Brix runs 9 to 12. The acidity is the useful part: it keeps colour and flavour stable after freezing and makes the fruit balance sweetness in blends.

Three formats that actually get used

• IQF halves, deseeded. For smoothie bowls and fruit-salad lines. The half keeps its shape and gives a visible piece.
• Aseptic or frozen purée, seedless. The workhorse for juice blends, nectars, sorbets and yoghurt fruit preps. Pink colour without any additive.
• Dice, 10 mm. For inclusion in ice cream and pastry fillings.

Handling notes

Guava has a thin skin and bruises easily, so it is picked slightly firm and held for 24 hours to reach full aroma before processing. Seeds are hard; our purée line passes the fruit through a 0.5 mm finisher twice. Halves are deseeded by hand.

Guava is the fruit that makes a mango blend taste like more than mango.

Season and availability

The main harvest runs from August to November, with a smaller spring flush. Because the fruit freezes so well, we hold purée and halves year-round; availability by month is on our harvest calendar.

If you develop products with tropical profiles, request a 2 kg sample of pink guava purée. Most product developers who try it find a place for it within a month.