Excuses are useless. I have been on a (little over a) year long hiatus, and I can come up with the most non exhaustive defenses, but lets just cut to the chase. my apologies for being sheer-ly lazy. I’m back now, with the love of food to share.
As summer settles in on the city, the only positive there is that summer beckons plenitudes of mango, in all forms, shapes, smells and sizes. Apart from the regular favourite aam ras (mango thickshake with mango pulp, a dash on milk and sugar), i tried something new last night. which was quite a refreshing cold, spicy and savoury appetizer to any Indian or Mexican meal. I present, the Mango Salsa. [applause]
To begin with, chop the tomatoes, onion and coriander finely and keep to chill in the fridge. Cut the green Serrano chilli lengthways, de-seed, and proceed to chop finely. Adjust the amount of chilli depending on your heat threshold.
Peel the mango, and hold it softly so as to avoid squeezing the juice out of it. The best way to deal with a mango is by treating it one half at a time. Make insertions lengthways on the half of the mango facing you, then make insertions sideways so as to cross diagonally against the lengthways insertions. Cut these little squares off in two equal rows. This will give you small neatly chopped golden pieces of heaven.
Mix in all the ingredients. Season with salt. I added my grand mum’s freshly made chilli powder, to add a bit of zing to the salsa. Some recipes for mango salsa add a touch of garlic to the salsa, but i chose to keep it out.
Serve chilled, as a dip, or over crackers or as i served it in delicate ready made corn cups. Enjoy!
Shopping bag for Mango Salsa
- 1-2 small tomatoes
- 1 ripe Alphonso mango
- 1 bunch cilantro/coriander
- 1 red onion
- 1 Serrano chilli
- almost negligible amount of lime juice to balance the flavours
Assembly Instructions:
Prep Time: 15 mins
- 1 cup ripe chopped, seeded tomato
- 1 cup mango, chopped into centimeter squares
- 1/2 cup finely chopped coriander or cilantro
- 1/2 cup onion finely chopped
- salt, to taste
- 1 Serrano chilli, seeded and veins removed, finely chopped
- 1/4 teaspoon red chilli powder
- quarter tea spoon of lime juice
Mix all the ingredients together. Season according to taste and serve chilled. Can be kept overnight to enhance flavours, but make sure to cover or else the entire fridge will smell of onions the next morning!
