Chaunsa

Intensely sweet, aromatic, and so juicy the napkin is part of the recipe. Named Chaunsa selections have their own harvest windows.

How it tastes

Honey · Fragrant · Very sweet

Texture: juicy
Fibre: Low fibre
Eating styles: Get sticky
Harvest: See regional calendars

How to enjoy it

Chaunsa brings intense sweetness and a lingering perfume. This profile is an introduction to the familiar name: Samar Bahisht, White, Black and Azeem Chaunsa are named selections with different harvest windows. Ask which one is in the box. A knife can open the ripe fruit, but a bowl catches the best part.

Let it soften, cut over a bowl, then scoop the flesh and collect every spoonful of juice.

When it is ripe

Follow a strong stem-end perfume and a gently yielding shoulder; colour varies by selection.

Flavour notes are subjective. Ripeness, handling and growing conditions change the fruit.

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Names, history & sources

Recorded names

A shared name does not by itself establish an identical cultivar. Place, language and source matter.

Chaunsa

Pakistan

Chounsa

Pakistan

Existing catalogue label. It may be an alternate name, translation or market nickname; it is not an assertion of genetic identity.

Chausa

Pakistan

Existing catalogue label. It may be an alternate name, translation or market nickname; it is not an assertion of genetic identity.

Chonsa

Pakistan

Chausa / Chaunsa

Spellings used in India and Pakistan for this celebrated mango family.

Samarbehisht Chausa

Name used by TNAU for the Sandila seedling account.

Sumer Bahist / Summer Bahist

Alternative forms encountered in reporting and trade; naming alone does not establish that every marketed strain is identical.

A battle in the telling, an orchard in the record

Local tradition: an attributed account, with uncertainty preserved.

One much-loved account says Sher Shah Suri named his favourite mango after his victory over Humayun at Chausa in 1539. It is a powerful name story, carried across India and Pakistan. We present the ruler’s act of naming as tradition, rather than a verified event in the life of a particular tree.

Tamil Nadu Agricultural University gives a more specific horticultural account for Samarbehisht Chausa: a chance seedling in a landholder’s orchard at Sandila, in present-day Hardoi. These accounts should sit beside one another without pretending they say the same thing. Today the spelling Chaunsa is especially familiar in Pakistan, where the fruit has its own devoted following.

Read the full story

Places in this record

Country associations alone do not establish botanical origin.

Pakistan
Catalogue association
Associated place in the tasting catalogue; this does not establish botanical origin.
- Trade Development Authority of Pakistan: Mango sector (2025)
- Mango Research Institute, Multan: varieties and harvest windows
Sandila, Hardoi, Uttar Pradesh; also celebrated in Pakistan’s Punjab
A place in the story
Setting of “A battle in the telling, an orchard in the record”. Read the story for its evidence and qualifications.
India
A recorded historical connection
Place associated in the cited history; this is not a claim of botanical origin.

Harvest calendars by growing place. These regional calendars do not specify this cultivar’s exact season.

Sources

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