Mangoes continue to surprise and delight me. They are a lot like people. Whenever I think I know something about them, they prove me wrong. Things that grow are complex by nature, and taking a cookie cutter approach to defining them always fails.
As I proceed on my mango-centric food education mission, I have a responsibility to admit when I am wrong and when I too am guilty of being “scripted” along the way.
It’s peak kent mango season in Mexico and kent mangoes are incredibly juicy and sweet with vibrant orange flesh. Personally, they are not my favorite eating mangoes, they are far too sweet. But I quite like them for juicier and sweeter endeavors, like popsicles and slushies!
Even though I would never recommend juicing mangoes; their flesh makes puree more than it makes juice, the kent varietal works incredible well in a juicer. Because it has so few fibers and is extremely juicy, the puree just glides right through the juicer instead of getting held up in the pulp section as it does with most other varietals. The final consistency ends up being more of a thick, silky nectar, which is perfect for this healthy and bold looking mango and turmeric slushy!
We currently inhabit a digital age, where the constant barrage of messaging can feel overwhelming, jarring and a bit manipulative. We crave instant gratification. Easy outlets for this include food and shopping. We desire the lowest price possible. When we get a deal, we tell ourselves that we are smart shoppers. We feel fulfilled by dabbling in novel and varied shopping experiences.
As we get comfortable subscribing to meal delivery kits and ingesting our daily dose of produce by way of morning juice, produce merchandising seems like an archaic concept. All the while, more and more research shows that, regardless of all the virtual and rapid reward delivery trends, consumers continue to seek real life, in-the-flesh experiences, like choosing fruits and vegetables by hand. The old world way of showcasing fruits and vegetables in abundant, vibrant displays, is still one of the most successful sales tools in produce. Attracting customers to your product at the store level takes skill, passion, and creativity, and, of course, a clear understanding of your customers.
Kids, adults, and even dogs, love the refreshing, ice-cold flavor of fresh fruit popsicles on a steamy summer day. A mango’s natural sweetness and tropical vibrancy is the perfect component for healthy, naturally sweet popsicles that you can eat day and night!
In my current life surrounded by mangoes, I meet countless mango lovers who fell head over heels through their excursions around the globe. (I personally discovered mangoes as a little girl in Nicaragua.) The mango embodies flavors of nostalgia, awakening the feeling of those far off exotic places with every bite. The most devout members of this mango lover tribe seem to be those who discovered mangoes while in Thailand. These mango lovers have tasted mangoes with a more dynamic richness and more stages of ripeness than anywhere else in the world. They also seem to be the only mango connoisseurs that know the sweet green mango!
Under The Mango Tree is a sweet spot, where I, a long time mango industry crackerjack, share everything I know. A place to find mango centric, agricultural, food and culture knowledge and a few juicy industry secrets and lies.
