MANGOES or mangos, Whichever way you spell it, is a sweet treat happening in your fruit markets right now.
Not only are the wellknown Kensington Pride and Calypso varieties available a new wave of mangoes is also hitting the shelves with assorted colours and flavours.
Scarlet Delight and Hula varieties are currently being grown in the Northern Territory and far North Queensland.
Evidently 10 years in the making, the original root stock was imported from Israel.
The Scarlet delight is ready to eat before the skin goes soft unlike the varieties we know.
There are other varieties such as Mahachanok on the way, and another plantation in the Northern territory is growing a long sweet mango that originated in Thailand.
“Nutrano Produce” started trialing a different variety called Lady Jane and Lady Grace, back about 2013 and are now producing fruit around the world.
It appears that this mango is being grown in the Alicante region in Spain and is picked and sold within 24 hours unlike the four days it takes in the Northern Territory due to our vast distances.
Australia is on track to produce more than nine million trays this season.
It’s been a hard season with all the rain and delays in harvest which have caused some supply issues.
Magpie geese seem to like mangoes so much, that some growers have resorted to having staff on noisy quad bikes, chase them away.
The Darwin area has a lot of plantations and due to recent storms and violent wind gusts a lot of fruit was damaged with some plantations losing 60 per cent of their crop.
Finding willing labourers was also a challenge for the growers and hopefully this season there will be more workers available.
On one of our trips around Australia I remember calling in to a grower and had a ‘mango smoothie’ which was so deliciously nice and cool on a hot Darwin day that we trekked back the next day to have another one.
This is a decadent fruit, so velvety smooth, so rich in colour and flavour, it adds a mouthwatering addition to any dessert with ice cream.
Till next time.
TRY THIS MANGO SALAD
LOOSELY inspired by the Thai green mango salad, yum mamuang, this dish features golden curls of ripe mango enlivened by a squirt of bracing lime juice and fish sauce.
Store bought fried shallots bring an easy crunch and thin circles of sliced chili slap your senses awake. Lush champagne mangoes are the best here, but any preferred variety will suffice.
Arrange mangoes on a large plate.
Whisk oil, fish sauce and lime juice in a small bowl to combine.
Drizzle dressing over mangoes, then top with fried shallots, chili and basil.
Add a sparkling glass of your favourite white wine to the mix.
Other recipes featuring the heavenly mango are available on the internet should you like to experiment with different ingredients.
