What Are Pink Pineapples?

Pineapples apparently looked at their entire yellow-and-green career and decided they needed a rebrand. Pink pineapples are real, and the best-known version in stores is Fresh Del Monte Pinkglow® Pineapple, a pineapple with naturally pink-looking flesh created through bioengineering. Fresh Del Monte sent Famadillo a Pinkglow for editorial consideration, which is the sort of package that immediately makes every normal piece of fruit nearby seem as if it did not dress for the occasion. It is still a pineapple, but slicing into one reveals pale pink flesh instead of the familiar golden yellow. That naturally leads to the obvious question: what exactly made the pineapple pink?

The short answer is lycopene. The longer answer involves plant breeding, bioengineering, enzymes, years of development and the realization that produce can apparently have a luxury division now. Pinkglow took more than 16 years to develop before Fresh Del Monte launched it commercially in 2020. It is grown on a select farm in Costa Rica and is currently sold through select retailers in the United States and Canada. The color is not dye, a coating or a clever lighting trick. The pink is built into the fruit itself.

Why Pink Pineapples Are Pink

Regular pineapple naturally contains lycopene, the pigment that helps give tomatoes and watermelon their red or pink color. In a conventional pineapple, enzymes convert much of that lycopene into beta carotene, which contributes to the familiar yellow flesh. Pinkglow was bioengineered so that less of that conversion happens, allowing more lycopene to remain in the fruit. That retained pigment is what gives the inside its pink color. The FDA completed its consultation on Del Monte’s pink-flesh pineapple in 2016 and said it had no unresolved safety or regulatory questions after reviewing the information submitted by the company. In other words, the pineapple is not pink because somebody got overenthusiastic with food coloring; it is pink because the fruit was developed to retain more of a pigment it already naturally contains.

That also means Pinkglow is a bioengineered food, which is worth stating plainly because “mysterious designer pineapple” is not especially useful information. The product’s own website identifies it as made possible through bioengineering, and FDA records identify the Del Monte variety by its altered lycopene composition. The science is more interesting than the marketing shorthand because the goal was not simply to paint a pineapple pink. The changes affect pigment development inside the fruit itself. You end up with something that looks unusual while still behaving very much like the pineapple you already know how to slice, refrigerate and accidentally eat half of while standing at the kitchen counter.

How Pinkglow Is Different From Regular Pineapple

Fresh Del Monte describes Pinkglow as sweeter, juicier and less sour than a traditional pineapple, with candy-like pineapple aromatics. Taste will always depend somewhat on ripeness and personal preference, but the intended profile is clearly softer and less aggressively tart than the pineapple that occasionally makes your tongue wonder what it did to deserve this. The company says Pinkglow is harvested at peak ripeness, so it is meant to be eaten fairly soon after purchase rather than kept around as decorative produce for a week. Its FAQ recommends up to three days on the counter or two days refrigerated when whole, with cut pieces refrigerated for up to seven days. None of that requires a new pineapple skill set; it just means this is a specialty fruit that wants to be eaten, not admired indefinitely.

From a family-food perspective, the novelty actually has a practical side. Kids who already like pineapple are unlikely to object when the exact same snack suddenly turns pink, and anyone building a fruit board gets an easy visual upgrade without learning molecular gastronomy. It fits naturally alongside the sort of easy fruit and snack ideas we covered in our kid-friendly healthy snacks for school and home story. At the same time, Pinkglow is positioned as a premium specialty fruit, so it makes more sense as a fun treat, gift, party fruit or “look what I found” grocery purchase than something most families are going to replace every standard pineapple with. Sometimes novelty food is all novelty and no food. This one at least starts with an actual pineapple.

Why Pinkglow Arrives Without a Crown

The other thing people notice is that Pinkglow often arrives looking as though somebody already stole the top. That is intentional. Fresh Del Monte says the pineapples are harvested by hand and the crowns are removed so they can be replanted to grow future crops. Pineapple plants can be propagated from those crowns, so leaving the leafy top behind is part of the growing cycle rather than an unfortunate shipping accident. It also gives the packaged fruit a slightly strange, polished look, like a pineapple that went to a very specific salon. If you open the box and wonder where the traditional leafy crown went, it is not missing; it has another job.

So what are pink pineapples? They are real pineapples developed to retain more lycopene, creating pink flesh instead of the usual yellow, and Pinkglow is Fresh Del Monte’s commercial version of that idea. They are bioengineered, grown in Costa Rica, sold as a premium specialty fruit and designed to deliver a sweeter, less sour pineapple experience. The interesting part is that the color is not a surface gimmick—it comes from changing what happens to pigments already present in pineapple. The silly part is that we have reached a stage of civilization where a pineapple can arrive in premium packaging and make the regular pineapple feel underachieving. Frankly, the regular pineapple has been coasting on that crown for years anyway.