A price tag on a box of kurma is one number, but it stands for several things decided before the box reached the shelf: which variety is inside, how ripe it was when packed, how much fruit there is and what it is packed in. Take those apart one at a time and harga kurma gets a lot easier to read. To see real figures while you go through this, the Harga Kurma pages at Green Diamond list each product with its price in ringgit.
Read the name before the number
Every date sold in Malaysia is imported. There is no commercial date-growing trade here, so the label should tell you both the variety and the country it came from. Look for those two lines first.
Then compare only packs of the same variety. Four names you may come across:
- Ajwa, also sold as Kurma Nabi, is from Madinah. Small, roundish and near-black, with finely wrinkled skin, and soft.
- Safawi, from the Madinah region, is longer than Ajwa, dark brown to black, soft and chewy.
- Sukari comes from Al-Qassim in Saudi Arabia. It is golden-amber and very sweet.
- Medjool originated in Morocco. It is large and very soft, with a rich caramel taste.
Setting a box of Sukari against a box of Ajwa and calling one "cheaper" tells you nothing useful. They are different dates. If Ajwa is the one you want, there is a separate guide to purchasing date fruits of that one variety.
The date in the photo is Sayer, from Khuzestan in Iran. You may also see it labelled Stamaran. It is amber-brown and semi-dry, and it is not Shahani, which is a separate variety. Two names on two packs means two products.
Soft and dry are different buys
Rutab (or rotab) is the soft, fresh-ripe stage. Tamr (or tamar) is the fully ripe, drier stage. Sukari is sold both ways, so check which one the label says before you compare two Sukari prices.
Mazafati, often labelled Rotab Mazafati Bam or kurma madu, is from Bam in Kerman province, Iran. It is dark, very soft and high in moisture, and it has to go in the fridge. It is cold-stored and sold all year round, so seeing it on sale months after the harvest is normal. If you order it online, ask how it will be kept cold on the way to you.
Net weight, not box size
Boxes come in all sizes. Find the net weight on each one and work out the price per kilo before deciding anything. Say a 400g gift box and a 1kg plain bag of the same date carry the same price tag. The bag gives you two and a half times the fruit for that money.
A decorated gift box is paying for the box as well. That is fine when it is going on a hantaran tray. For dates you will eat at home through the week, compare plain packs with plain packs.
Grades are the seller's own labels
A, AA, AAA and Jumbo are not an international standard. Each importer sorts its own stock by size and names the sizes its own way, so an AA from one shop and an AA from another may not match. Use grades to choose within one seller's range. More on this in date prices and grading systems in Malaysia.
Buying online: add the delivery first
When the dates come by courier, the price you actually pay is the item price plus delivery. Add the two together, then divide by the net weight. A listing that looks cheaper can end up dearer per kilo once a delivery fee is on top, especially on a small order. The page on buying fresh dates online in Malaysia covers ordering in more detail.
When you are buying matters too
Demand peaks before and during Ramadan. Hari Raya, wedding hantaran, kenduri and umrah gifts bring other busy spells through the year. If you need a lot of dates for one of those, order early rather than in the last week.
Gulf and Middle-East dates are mostly harvested from late summer into autumn, roughly August to November, and the new season's stock lands in Malaysia some weeks later.
A quick routine at the shelf
Name and origin first. Soft or dry second. Then the price per kilo, with delivery added if it is coming by post, and grades compared only inside one shop. For a wider look at choosing well, see this guide to buying kurma in Malaysia, and the post on organic dates can help you narrow down your desired date fruit products.