All you need to know about When is Avocado Season and how to know when avocado are ripe to pick, types of avocado and avocado nutrition facts.
When is Avocado Season
from January through March is the best time of year for flavor.
Types of Avocado
A-type cultivars
Though there are many more, below are some of the better-known A-type-cultivar avocados:
1. Choquette. The Choquette has smooth, glossy skin with watery flesh that often leaks when the fruit is cut. This variety comes from South Florida.
2. Lula. The Lula peaks during the summertime, has fewer natural oils, and contains more water than many other varieties. It’s resistant to cold but highly susceptible to fungi. The Lula grows to weigh around 1 pound (450 grams).
3. Hass. The Hass is the most popular variety. It’s available all year round and has a buttery, nutty flavor and spherical shape. Its skin turns from a bold green to a dark purplish-black as it ripens.
4. Reed. The Reed is only available during the summer months. It has a lighter, more subtle flavor and is about the size of a softball. As the Reed ripens, its skin remains the same green color, unlike other types.
5. Pinkerton. The Pinkerton has an oblong shape, rough skin that is easy to peel, and small seed inside of a creamy flesh. This type grows to 0.5–1.5 pounds (225–680 grams).
6. Gwen. The Gwen is similar to the Hass avocado in taste and appearance. This is a larger Guatemalan variety with a thick, dark-green skin that is easy to remove.
7. Maluma. The Maluma is a dark-purple avocado that was discovered in the 1990s in South Africa. This variety grows slowly, but the trees bear a lot of fruit.
B-type cultivars
Some of the B-type-cultivar avocados include:
8. Ettinger. The Ettinger is most often grown in Israel and has a bright green skin, large seed, and mild flavor.
9. Sharwil. The Sharwil is an Australian avocado with a rough, green peel and yellow flesh. It’s very oily with a bold flavor and is susceptible to frost.
10. Zutano. The Zutano is covered in a lighter, yellow-green skin and has a mild taste that’s unlike many other, more buttery varieties. It typically grows to around 0.5–1 pound (225–450 grams).
11. Brogden. The Brogden avocado is a dark-purple hybrid of West Indian and Mexican varieties. Though it’s very resistant to the cold, it’s hard to peel and thus not a popular commercial variety.
12. Fuerte. The Fuerte is distinctly pear-shaped and available for eight months of the year. Its name means “strong” in Spanish, and it has an oily texture similar to that of a hazelnut.
13. Cleopatra. The Cleopatra is a small dwarf avocado that is relatively new to the consumer market.
14. Bacon. The Bacon has a lighter taste than other varieties. Its light-brown skin is easy to peel.
15. Monroe. The Monroe is a large avocado that can weigh over 2 pounds (910 grams). It’s a firmer variety and has less watery flesh.
Avocado Nutrition Facts
Avocados are very nutritious and contain a wide variety of nutrients, including 20 different vitamins and minerals.
Here are some of the most abundant nutrients, in a single 3.5-ounce (100-gram) serving.
- Vitamin K: 26% of the daily value (DV) Folate: 20% of the DVVitamin C: 17% of the DVPotassium: 14% of the DVVitamin B5: 14% of the DVVitamin B6: 13% of the DVVitamin E: 10% of the DVIt also contains small amounts of magnesium, manganese, copper, iron, zinc, phosphorous and vitamins A, B1 (thiamine), B2 (riboflavin) and B3 (niacin).
12 Proven Health Benefits of Avocado
Here are 12 health benefits of avocado that are supported by scientific research.