My good friend Grace Talma in Port of Spain, Trinidad once told me that, as a child, her mother used to undress her before feeding her mangoes as she made such a mess of herself eating them. Good advice as far as I can see. When mangoes are in season, they arrive en masse and there’s no reason to have anything get in the way of relentless gorging. Not even clothing.
There are over one thousand cultivars of mango and many of them are farmed. In fact, mango is the most cultivated tropical fruit in the world, with India being the biggest producer followed closely by China (bet you didn’t know that!)
They originated in India and Myanmar but have been adopted by all of world’s tropical zones. In India they are near mythic in nature, with Hindu Lord Ganesha (he of the blue elephantine face) often depicted holding a ripe mango as a symbol of attaining spiritual perfection.
Mangoes are packed with healthy doses of both Vitamin A and C and high in fibre. Enjoyed ripe as a chilled fruit, or in ice creams and smoothies, or unripe in chutneys, pickles, achars and salads, there seems to be no reason not to eat them. As tropical food maven Dr Tracy Berno says “ There’s no such thing as too many mangoes”
And there are many favourites. I’d put my money on the magnificent Julie mangoes in Jamaica, the Tommy Atkins growing in Saint Lucia (for some reason they seem to taste better here than the Florida Tommy’s), I love the parrot mangoes in Fiji and Samoa, and the beautiful Kensington Pride mangoes that are the mainstay of the mango industry on northern Australia.
I remember once being attacked over a mango! After a hurricane in Fiji had left the fruit trees mostly bare, a hungry fruit bat swooped on me and tried to take the mango that I was enjoying right out of my mouth!
No other food seems to elicit such lusty devotion. The Indian writer
Lavina Melwani gushes “It was a love affair long before we knew what love was. They were golden, dripping with a heavenly juice, fleshy and aromatic.”
Pretty raunchy stuff. I guess Grace Talma is right- mangoes are best eaten naked!
Mango Rum Chicken
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| Mango Rum Chicken photographed at Hamilton House in Shanghai |
This dish is great party food. Be sure to place a hibiscus behind your ear before you begin cooking this terrific mango rum chicken dish. It’s a mango-ey take on “Moa Samoa” on page 110 of Me’a Kai. My friend Richard Hall ran this as a special at his incredible restaurant in Shanghai, Hamilton House
www.hamiltonhouse.com.cn
Ingredients:
1. 1 whole chicken
2. 1 lime
3. 2/3 cup soy
4. 1 cup pineapple juice
5. ½ cup brown sugar
6. ½ cup rum (dark is good)
7. 1 bunch green onions (scallions) cut into lengths
8. 2 tablespoons minced ginger
9. 6 pieces of star anise
10.2 large ripe mangos, skin removed and cut into large chunks
Method:
1. rinse the chicken and then wash with lime juice. Cut into quarters
2. place the soy, pineapple juice, brown sugar, rum, ginger and star anise into pot and whisk well
3. remove half and pour into a bowl. This is your marinade
4. place the chicken in the marinade and marinate for as little as 2 hours or as long as overnight
5. simmer the remaining soy mix on a low heat to reduce by half, this is your glaze
6. Heat your oven to 340 ( 170c)
7. Remove the chicken from the marinade and place on a roasting tray. Bake for 35 minutes or until cooked, basting often with the remaining marinade
8. For the last 15 minutes of cooking time, add the mango and the scallion lengths to the roasting pan
9. When cooked, place the chicken on a serving platter and scatter the mango and scallions on top
10.Brush with the warm glaze from the pot and serve with coconut rice
Sweet Hot Mango Scampi
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| Jason Cui's Sweet Hot Mango Scampi |
My terrific assistant chef in Shanghai, Jason Cui, made this recipe for a calendar we are making for New Zealand scampi in China. Damn, it was good. Jason took the idea from the famous sweet hot dishes of Singapore and Malaysia and added some Chinese mangoes. So good. Shrimp are good for this, also lobster, and probably pork and chicken. But scampi is best, the sweetness of the flesh works well with all of the other flavours and the shell flavour infuses the finished sauce.
Ingredients:
1. 6 large scampi - split
2. 1 tablespoon peanut oil
3. 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
4. 1 tablespoon fresh minced garlic
5. 1 tablespoon fine minced chilli- optional
6. 2 tablespoon minced spring onions
7. 1 cup thai sweet chilli sauce
8. ¼ cup oyster sauce
9. 2 large mangoes cut into “ cheeks”
10.basil leaves
Method:
1. Heat the peanut oil in a large pan and add the scampi, flesh side down. Cook for about 1 minute
2. Turn the scampi over to just cook and then remove from the pan and set aside
3. In the same pan, add the ginger, garlic, chilli and spring onions and cook quickly, then add the sweet chilli sauce and the oyster sauce
4. Add the mangoes and scampi back to the pan to heat through, and then the basil leaves
5. Eat with coconut rice
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| Jason with a New Zealand Kingfish |
