Summer is back, and so are mangoes

Recently, an article about king of fruits, mangoes, caught my attention as finally looks like, it would be available in US soon too. After most summers of my childhood chasing this special king of fruits, I have special liking for aam. Mouth just starts watering if I imagine ek khatta aam. When I was a kid of around 9-10 years, I used to travel miles in and around my village in Nalanda with bunch of friends on bare foot in shorts and a baniyan in scorching summer heat to quench the palatal yearning of mangoes, for the khatte aam in the early summers and later for the luscious and divine pake hue aam. Broiling and tropical loo didn't bother, school and parents were dismissed as a minor irritant, gardeners and mango tree owners were just another obstacle barricading me from that taste of divinity. After marshaling all my intelligence, boundless enthusiasm, fearless spirit and never-say-die attitude for these mangoes, I would find myself happily climbing these huge mango trees and jumping from one razor-thin branches to another. Up there on the top of the mango tree, I felt like I am in the middle of heaven and all the pleasure is mine. I would invariably eat so many khatte aam that my teeth would give away. How could you control yourself when you are ensconced with all these mangoes all around yourself. No one can eat just one. Many evenings I used to get good thrashing from my mom for all this vagabond adventure of mine in such sweltering summer. However who was I to resist this unstoppable force of yearning and few days later, I would be back scouring miles for that perfect taste of khatte aur meethe aam. The funny part is I didn't even know today what breed of aam it was. To my despair, my adventure was cut short when I had to move out to the city and then to my amazement, I found out that there are so many breed of mangoes out there. More famous cousins I should say. Malda, Langra, Dusehari, Neelum, Safeda, Fazali, Vanraj, yada yada yada and more yada yada. If Malda flavor was sweetest, then Langra was long lasting and so on. It appeared all very confusing and to my horror, if I had one of these famous cousins of my gaon wala aam, my cravings would just dwindle. I could eat just one. Apparently I had grown up and grudgingly, I compromised for Dudhiya Malda as my first choice. I still loved the king of fruit, but I had lost the sight of kingdom of heavenly taste to which I used to be transcended whenever I had these mangoes. Mango was slowly becoming like any other fruit to me. Mango was more and more appearing like oranges. You got to eat since its good for health. It was all like this till one fine day I was hooked on to Alphonso. When I was in IIT Bombay, I was gifted a basket of these Alphonsoes and I was like alright here is one more famous cousin of my gaon wala aam. Reluctantly, I tried a bite and hmm...it was good, it was like a shot of hemoglobin up my spine, the taste was back and once again, I couldn't just eat one. I had to have more and pretty soon, there was none left.... I was swept off once again by this king of fruit and once again looks like my summer honeymoon with king of fruit is going to back on the menu again. Am waiting for Alphonso to cross the Atlantic barrier and come once again within the reach of my dollars. Well not exactly the same thrill of good old glory days but still, a cheap thrill is better than no thrill :-)

Thank God for Mangifera indica L