Unfortunately, it’s true. I, too, was a incredulous when I shopped for macapuno in the Asian stores here in the US and found it labeled “mutant coconut.” But all you have to do is do a Google search for “mutant coconut” or even just an image search and you’ll see how they label it here.

In the Philippines, as with other tropical countries, the coconut tree is so much a part of everyday life and hence we have dozens upon dozens of terms for every part of the coconut and for every stage of its growth. But in other places, they just have that one word for it (i.e. coconut) and they need to find other ways to qualify the term. If you think about it, what they call coconut ice cream here is made with coconut milk and bits of mature coconut, which is technically “niyog” in the Philippines and not “buko,” which specifically refers to young coconut. So even in that case, accuracy suffers due to an inadequacy in language.

So while I will not argue with you that the term “mutant coconut” is indeed a bit laughable, I wouldn’t go so far as to call it offensive. Especially when even Philippine agricultural blogs and the Manila Bulletin both refer to makapuno as “mutant coconut” or “mutant nut.”

Also, I don’t know where you’re getting your information, but ‘macapuno’ DOES NOT mean MUTANT COCONUT, of all things. It translates to ‘bountiful tree’.

Unbelievably ridiculous, vaguely offensive.