Thursday, January 28, 2016

Mastering the Mango

Although many foods don't grow well in the drought, the mango trees have been prolific! So, today, I'm going to divulge the secrets of Mango Chopping!

Mangoes are tricky fruits--the giant pits, the slippery flesh, and the juice that gets everywhere! The skin tastes terrible, but it's also wretched to remove. Never fear! I will reveal all to you now!

Here in Papua New Guinea, we have dozens of different kinds of mangoes. I can reliably identify about three of them, and for your purposes, I suggest two categories: long ones and short ones. On the whole, the long ones tend to be less stringy and have a lot more delicious flesh.
 
A ripe mango should have a lovely mango smell from its ends and should be able to be indented lightly with a finger (but not soft and squishy).

Step 1: Wash your mango (we bleach ours...)

Step 2: Slice the mango lengthwise slightly off the midline.


Step 3: Continue to slice off long chunks on the mango slightly off centre--if you try to cut down the middle, you'll hit the rock-hard pit.

Step 4: Continue all the way around...and then gnaw on the pit to get the last little bits of delicious flesh...  (See how big it is? It's the part next to the knife.)

Step 5: Do not attempt to peel your mango like an apple. It will result in disaster. Instead, score the mango's flesh lengthwise and crosswise (but don't cut through the skin). The scoring allows all the curves of the mango to be flattened out, thus giving you maximum access to the fruit. You can either easily just eat the mango straight off the skin now or....


Step 6: ...slide your knife along the skin and release all the little mango squares.


 Step 7: And there you have it! Perfect little mango chunks for your eating pleasure!