Mango With Strings

Supermarkets have bottles of mango chutney. I’ve never bought it and have no intention of buying it because it is clean, polite and precise. Since it is in a bottle, it means I can measure it with a spoon. That is not mango. Real mango is messy, drips down my shirt and entangles itself in my teeth. Real mango makes me lick my fingers and wish for more but I remember mama’s standard warning for anything excessive: It will make you sick.

Bad news. Local farmers’ markets have packed their stands brimming with yellow green beans, beetroot, pumpkin as big as a tambourine, garden tomatoes with an attitude and cabbage that looks like lettuce. I was surprised when I saw it. Store cabbage is a tight ship, a dangerous weapon in fact. The ones I saw this summer had loose limbs, like a limbo dancer. Nature is a genius. There were no mangoes at the market for obvious reasons but they had corn, two for a dollar. I cannot imagine a farmers’ market without corn.

Corn is like mango, no manners at all. Chaos for my teeth but eye-closing goodness. I break corn in two, because I don’t play the harmonica, but many people love eating it like that instrument, especially roasted corn. There are still BBQ days left, so you ought to put in on the grill since you don’t live in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific, where they roast it on a fire.

Good things in life are not well-behaved. That’s why we only eat mango and corn at home because we must floss after the corn. My teeth do not complain. They love the work-out and my dentist is glad it’s not doughnuts. 

Nonqaba waka Msimang

Executive Blogger