Charentais melon
Cucumis melo · Fruit
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Charentais is the small, intensely perfumed French cantaloupe — a true European melon (var. cantalupensis) with a smooth, pale grey-green rind faintly scored by shallow sutures, weighing little more than half a kilo, that encloses dense, fragrant, deep-orange flesh of exceptional sweetness. Widely held up as the gold standard of melons, it is the benchmark against which the eating quality and aroma of every other dessert melon is judged.
Picking a good onedrag
Hard, scentless, green groundSlack, weeping, boozy
Firm ripeBuy itA little give at the blossom end, clear scent. Cuts into clean wedges, balls and batons; the prosciutto stage.
Stem scarScar dished, a short stub left
Blossom endSprings back under the thumb
Net and ground colourNet proud, ground turning cream
Smell at the scarFaint melon, only up close
These cues are Cantaloupe's, and hold across its varieties; where this one differs, its own page says so.
What you get from one
51%
Edible part
552 g flesh · rind and seeds out
1082 g
Weight each
each one
Keeping ittap a temperature
A domestic fridge holds it about 2× longer than the counter.
95%
Humidity
Open air, not sealed
Airflow