Guava substitute

Best substitute

Frozen guava pulp or bottled guava nectar

1 cup pulp or nectar replaces about 2 medium fresh guavas, seeded and blended

Best for agua de guayaba

Close match

The real thing in a more convenient form, and by far the best option for drinks, sauces and desserts. Frozen pulp in particular is unsweetened and tastes strongly of the fruit.

Other guava substitutes

Ranked, with the exact amount to use

2Mango puree plus passion fruit puree
Different taste
3 parts mango to 1 part passion fruit, used 1:1 for guava pulp
The best improvised substitute, and worth knowing because both are widely available frozen.
What changes
Mango supplies the thick sweet tropical body, passion fruit supplies the sharp perfumed top note that makes guava smell like guava.
Best for
agua frescas, smoothies and batidos, sorbet, glazes, mousse and cake fillings, cocktails
Rounder and less musky than real guava, and the passion fruit reads as more citrusy than floral, so a glaze made this way tastes bright rather than heady. Add a squeeze of lime and a pinch of salt to sharpen it further.
3Guava paste or guava jelly, thinned
Different texture
⅓ cup guava paste melted with ¼ cup water replaces about ½ cup guava pulp plus its sugar
Excellent anywhere the guava is going to be cooked and sweetened anyway, since paste is simply guava pulp concentrated with sugar until it sets.
What changes
Best for
guava glaze for pork or ribs, cake fillings and pastelitos, sauces, cheese plates, thumbprint cookies
Very sweet, so you must cut the recipe's sugar substantially, roughly by the volume of paste you use. Melt it slowly with a splash of water and a squeeze of lime, whisking, and it becomes a smooth intense guava sauce that is arguably better than fresh for a glaze.
4Strawberry puree plus a little pear and lime
Different taste
Use 3 parts strawberry to 1 part pear puree, plus 1 tsp lime for every cup, used 1:1
A workable supermarket-only option.
What changes
Strawberry shares a surprising amount of guava's aromatic profile, pear supplies the soft grainy sweetness, and lime supplies the acidity.
Best for
agua frescas, smoothies, sorbet, jam, cake fillings, cocktails
Reads clearly as strawberry to anyone paying attention, and it is pinker and jammier than guava, which is faintly musky and more floral. Good enough for a drink, not good enough if guava is named in the title of the dish.
5Ripe pear or Asian pear with lime (for fresh diced guava)
Different taste
Use the same amount by volume, plus a generous squeeze of lime
The least-bad option when a recipe wants pieces of fresh fruit rather than pulp, matching the slightly grainy, gritty flesh that guava has and no other common fruit does.
What changes
Best for
fruit salad, salsas, fruit plates, chutney, grain bowls
This is a texture substitution, not a flavour one. Pear is mild and sweet with none of guava's perfume or its tartness, so the lime is essential and a few chopped strawberries alongside help. Be upfront that this is an approximation.
6Pineapple juice plus a splash of apple juice
Different taste
3 parts pineapple to 1 part apple juice, used 1:1 for guava nectar
An emergency swap for drinks and glazes when only supermarket juices are available, and better in savoury applications than you would expect.
What changes
Best for
glazes for pork and chicken, marinades, punch and cocktails, barbecue sauce
Considerably more acidic and sharper, with pineapple's distinctive bite instead of guava's mellow perfume. In a sweet dessert it is a poor match, but in a sticky glaze where soy, chilli and garlic are also involved, nobody will be able to tell.

What is Guava?

Guava is Guava, or guayaba, is a small round tropical fruit with thin green-to-yellow skin and pink or white flesh packed with hard seeds, and it has an unmistakable perfumed aroma somewhere between strawberry, pear and passion fruit, with enough acidity to taste tart even when very ripe.

Cooking tips

Guava seeds are genuinely hard, hard enough to worry about a filling, and there are dozens of them in every fruit. For any smooth application, blend the fruit with a little water and then push it through a fine sieve, pressing firmly. You will lose about a third of the volume as seed and fibre, which is why recipes that call for a cup of guava pulp need considerably more whole fruit than you would guess.
Ripe guava is powerfully fragrant, to the point where one fruit will perfume a whole kitchen and a whole refrigerator. That aroma is the best ripeness test: if you cannot smell it from a foot away, it is not ready. It should also yield to a gentle squeeze like a ripe plum, and the skin turns from dark green to pale yellow-green.
Guava is unusually high in natural pectin, especially the underripe fruit, which is why guava jelly and guava paste set so firmly. If you are substituting a low-pectin fruit such as mango into a guava jam recipe, expect a loose set and add pectin or a little lemon juice and grated apple.
In savoury Caribbean and Cuban cooking, the guava in a glaze is doing an acid-plus-sugar job against fatty pork, so any substitute must keep both. Do not swap in a purely sweet fruit puree without adding lime or vinegar, or the glaze will taste flat and candy-like on the plate.
For agua de guayaba the fruit is simmered, blended and strained rather than juiced raw, because that softens the seeds enough to separate cleanly and rounds out the astringency. If you substitute frozen pulp, you can skip the simmering entirely and just blend with water, lime and sugar.

Frequently asked questions

Can I just leave the guava out?

Not really, in any dish named after it, because guava is the entire flavour identity of an agua de guayaba, a guava glaze or a guava pastelito. In a mixed tropical fruit salad or a punch, yes, leave it out and add more mango or pineapple. If you need it gone from a glaze, apricot jam plus lime is a reasonable different-but-good direction rather than a substitute.

Is guava paste the same as fresh guava?

No, and this is the most common confusion. Guava paste, sold as pasta de guayaba or goiabada, is guava cooked with sugar until it sets into a firm sliceable block, so it is intensely sweet and used for pastries and cheese boards. Fresh guava, frozen pulp and nectar are the forms you want for drinks, sauces and salads. Paste can substitute for pulp if you thin it and slash the sugar.

What is the difference between pink and white guava?

Pink guava is sweeter, softer, more strongly perfumed and is what almost all juice, nectar and paste is made from. White guava is crisper, more acidic and greener-tasting, and is more often eaten fresh with salt and chilli. For recipes, assume pink unless told otherwise, and if you only have white, expect a tarter result and add a little more sugar.

Can I use guava juice instead of guava nectar?

Yes, with an adjustment. Nectar is thicker and contains pulp, so it has body that juice does not, and it is usually sweeter. If you use juice in place of nectar in a sauce or a glaze, reduce it a little longer to thicken, or add a spoonful of guava paste. Going the other way, thin nectar with water.

Do you eat guava skin and seeds?

The skin is edible and thin, and in Mexico and the Caribbean the fruit is often eaten whole out of hand, skin and all, sometimes with salt and chilli. The seeds are edible but very hard, so most people eat around them or strain them out for cooking. For anything blended, sieving is worth the trouble.

Related substitutes

More fruits substitutes

Guava substitute

Other guava substitutes

2Mango puree plus passion fruit puree

3Guava paste or guava jelly, thinned

4Strawberry puree plus a little pear and lime

5Ripe pear or Asian pear with lime (for fresh diced guava)

6Pineapple juice plus a splash of apple juice