Beverages « V I R U N D H U

24th
JUL

David Davidar’s ‘The House of Blue Mangoes’ and my Cuban Mango Batido

Posted by Mathy Kandasamy | Filed under Mangoes, Beverages, Archives

I’m now reading a wonderful book by David Davidar. It was the title that caught my attention a few years ago. And I had it on my list of ‘to read books’. And all the talk of mangoes in the food blogs reminded me of this book. And I got it from the library.

I was hooked from the first chapter itself. It sure does make one’s heart sing when familiar things and surroundings appear in a book. Made me think about Shyam Selvadurai’s Cinnamon Garden. Cinnamon Garden was set in Tamil milieu in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Both the books are set in early 1900s. David Davidar’s ‘The House of Blue Mangoes’ was set in Southern Tamil Nadu, bordering Kerala. Do read the book if you get the chance.

Here is my favorite chapter from the book.

‘Do you really believe the Chevathar Neelam is the best mango in the world?’ Daniel asked Ramdoss.

‘I believe it’s the best I’ve eaten.’

‘I wonder what makes it so remarkable,’ Daniel said thoughtfully.

‘Could it be the soil?’

‘Probably. But certainly there was some grafting done a long time ago.’

It was the summer of Daniel’s second year in Doraipuram and Ramdoss and he were supervising the harvest of blue mangoes.

It was four in the morning, the time at which the Chevathar Neelams were traditionally picked to ensure their sweetness was retained, and that they ripened evenly.

‘I’d like to decide for myself,’ Daniel said abruptly.

‘Decide what?’ Ramdoss asked.

‘That the Chevathar Neelam is the best mango in the world.’

In his years with Daniel, Ramdoss had learned that when his brother-in-law was enthused by a new idea it was very hard to deflect his . ‘What did you have in mind?’ he asked.

Daniel didn’t reply for a while, silently watching the men harvesting the mangoes flit like ghosts thought the pre-dawn hush, gently picking the fruit with what looked like giant butterfly nets and depositing them in cane baskets filled with straw.

‘I’d like to taste the finest mangoes available to satisfy myself that the Chevathar Neelam is the best!’

Ramdoss’s heart sank. The time, the cost, the travel! ‘But, anna, Doraipuram needs your guiding hand, we can’t wander the wold tasting mangoes.’

‘India has the world’s greatest mangoes, there’s no need to leave its shores. I’ve always wanted to eat Alphonsos, Langdas, Chausas and Maldas. There’s no point trying to make me change my mind, Ramdoss, it’s made up and we’re going.’

He was as good as his word. The great mango yatra began in Kerala, where Daniel, Ramdoss and the four gardeners who made up the part tasted the Ollour, a fruit with thick yellow skin and flesh and a faintly resimous after-taste. It was a fruit they were all familiar with, as it was found in the bazaars of Nagercoil and Meenakshikoil.

As summer progressed, dozens of varieties of mangoes began to ripen. The group from Doraipuram trailed through the fruit markets of the south, making the acquaintance of many well-known mangoes such as the regal Jehangiri, named from an emperor, the Banganapalli with its sweet, pale whitish-yellow pulp, and the rare and delicious Himayuddin with a taste in the upper registers of the palate. In the fruit markets of Madurai, they ate Rumanis round as cricket balls and so thin-skinned a baby could peel them, Mulgoas so enormous that they often tipped the scales at three kilograms and the highly prized Cherukurasam.

Then they had to hurry west, for the fruiting season of the Alphonso was at its peak. Deciding that it was not practical to journey to Ratnagiri, Bulsad and Belgaum, where the celebrated Alphonso orchard perfumed the air, even infusing the rice paddies, they headed instead for Bombay. Straight off the train, they made for Crawford Market. Long before they caught sight of the country’s most famous mango, they could smell it, its scent rising above the odours of rotting cabbage and corn, sweat and kerosene. They turned a corner and suddenly there they were - row upon row of gilded Alphonsos arranged in tiers behind gesticulating, yelling mango traders and their equally vociferous customers. Daniel ate his first Alphonso, and as thetaste - a touch of tartness, a spill of honey, a profusion of fresh light notes on a deep bass foundation - sank into his palate he understood why it was so coveted. He would have liked to have lingered longer in the west, but there was still much ground to cover during the short season, and they were soon on a train heading east, their last memory of the great western mangoes being a glass of juice, thick and sweet as clarified sunlight, made from that other classic Pairi.

As they made their journeys, Daniel steeped himself in mango lore. He discovered that the mango grew nearly everywhere on the subcontinent and that there were over a thousand recognized varieties. Ramdoss successfully dissuaded his friend from even thinking of sampling them all, suggesting instead that for practical reasons they limit themselves to the most renowned. He learnt that Mangifera indica, to give its proper name, had evolved somewhere in the mysterous northeastern corner of the country over two thousand years before, and had been spread by travellers and other carriers throughout Southeast Asia, China and the Malay Archipalago. Greedy Portuguese traders and adventurers were the first pale skins to encounter it in the early years of sixteenth century. Immiediatly falling under its spell, they had introduced the fruit to Africa and South America. About the same time, it had travelled by another route to the West Indies, the Philippines and thence to Mexico. In the nineteenth century, it had appeared in the orchards of California, Florida and Hawaii.

Everywhere they traveled, there were fascinating stories about the fruit, a delicacy so prized among the connosseurs that it drove its admirers to all sorts of excess. The Mughal emperor Akbar’s romance with the mango made even the Dorais’ obsession with it pale in comparison. Never one to do things by halves, he had ordered an army of malis to raise an orchard of a hundred thousand trees in Darbhanga. Even more dedicated to the cause of the fruit was Nawab Wajid Ali Shah of Lucknow who was feted throughout the land for the excellence of his mango orchards where nearly thirteen hundred varieties were raised; the prince’s mango marriages were famous, as were his mango parties where, to the sound of tabla and santoor, the nobility gathered in pavilions constructed in the orchards, and tasted mangoes plucked from trees by women specially selected for their long tapering fingers, the better to grasp the fruit.

They spent a week in the east acquainting themselves with the finer points of the Malda, also called the Bombay Green, which had a subtle taste that seemed almost aneamic until it expanded to fill the senses. They sampled the exceedingly sweet, thin-skinned Himsagar and the Bombai, not to be confused with the Bombay Green. And Daniel was thrilled to be invited to a mango-tasting festival by an ageing Murshidabad nawab. Graciously inviting his guests to take their places at the head table, the Nawab showed Daniel how he ate the fruit. He first munched on a spicy, coarsely ground kabab so that his plate was completely fresh and then delicately picked as a little of the heard flesh of the Gulabkhas, a mango that tasted of roses.

‘Truly an unusual way to eat the fruit,’ Daniel remarked to Ramdoss. ‘Why didn’t we think of something like that?’

They had one other major mango-growing region to visit before the long journey home. Daniel had heard a lot about the Malihabadi Dussehri, and when he tasted it, he was quick to accept its claims to greatness. But he discovered that its claim to being the finest mango in the country was by no means secure, for there were those who would bestow that honour on the Langda, which according to legend was first grown by a lame fakir from the holy city of Banares. When Daniel encountered it, he was overwhelmed by its qualities - the pale green skin, the orange-yellow flesh and above all the taste: a distinctive sweetness balanced by its slight tartness. They decided not to wait for the late-fruiting Chausa to arrive in the markets.

Ramdoss managed to persuade Daniel to abandon his plans to visit Lahore and Rangood and they took the train home. On the way back, Daniel discussed the dozens of varieties they had tasted. He referred to the notes he’d made, he recalled their distinctive qualities, and he tried as fairly as he could to determine the greatest mango he had encountered in the course of his yatra.

A week after he’d returned to Doraipuram, Daniel still could’nt pick the winner. That evening, when he and Ramdoss took their daily walk, he said, ‘You know, Ramu, we’ve spent months trying to find out whether the Chevathar Neelam is finer than any other mango.’

‘Yes,’ Ramdoss said cautiously. But Daniel didn’t pick up the conversation for he was lost in a reverie. He saw himself reach up to pick a Chevathar Neelam from his father’s orchard, the fruit invested with the golden light of the sun. He tore at the warm fragrant skin with his teeth, then bit down into the flesh, the nectar running in yellow rivulets down his face, neck, even his arms, its unmatched flavour overwhelming him. ‘Ramu,’ Daniel said slowly, ‘we went a long way to know what I’ve always known. There’s no question that the Chevathar Neelam is the greatest mango in the world.’ Then, to Ramdoss’s disquiet, he added, ‘Now that we know that, we need to proclaim its glories far and wide.’

As always when in the grip of an obsession, Dr Dorai worked single-mindedly in pursuit of his objective. He lavished money and attention on the mango topes, enriching the soil, guarding against common diseases and infections. Startled stem-borers and mango hoppers, shoot-borers and blossom midges died by the thousand as an army of gardeners attacked them, with their bare hands if necessary.

By the time the next fruiting season came round, Daniel was ready to inaugurate Doraipuram’s first Blue Mango Festival. The finest mangoes had already been carefully harvested and left to ripen in enormous storerooms at the rear of Neelam Illam. On the appointed day they were taken from the densely scented rooms and carried to the pandal that had been erected on the banks of the Chevathar. For the celebrations, Daniel had copied many details from the mango-tasting ceremony he had attended in Murshidabad, but there were some touches that were unique.

He had commisioned the legendary weavers of the region to weave a hundred mats with a special mango pattern, and these covered the red earth of the river, bank. The Collector, who was the chief guest (the Murshidabad nawab had been unable to make the journey), sat at the head table along with Daniel, Ramdoss, Narasimhan, other local dignitaries and the heads of the founding families. A band played soft music and lamps lit the mango groves. As the heart flesh of the Neelam was ceremoniously served on small plates, each guest munched first on a hot vadai (a variant that Daniel was rather proud of) before tasting the fruit. Once the formal tasting of the Neelam was over, other varieties were presented, seventy-seven in all.

The Collector gave up after tasting twenty-two types of mango, Narasimhan managed twelve more, and only Daniel and Ramdoss tasted them all.

The formal tasting was only a part of the festivities. The mango groves echoed with laughter and excitement as the settlers and hundred of visitors participated in mango-eating competitions and other feats of skill, endurance and frolic.

After typing up the chapter from ‘The House of Blue Mangoes’ by David Davidar. I needed to satisfy my cravings. And tried out Cuban Mango Batido from here. I used jaggery instead of brown sugar. Aside from that kept the recipe the same. Next time I’m planning to substitute lime juice with pineapples (fruit or juice). I loved the tangy taste.