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Mango Passion Fruit Lassi

Believe it or not, I’m getting ready for my 4th trip to India next year… We will be visiting at early in the year to ensure we do not combust from the India heat felt April on. You would think that growing up in the Caribbean would prepare you for the Indian heat – NOOOOOO!!! We have breezes and sea around us… the heat in India feels 200 times hotter than any summer in Puerto Rico.

But I do love to visit India, especially for spiritual trips like the one I am about to make. Our love for mangos is something both our cultures, India and Caribbean, coincide in. Lassis are one of the first things I learned about Indian cuisine and I just love to drink them (the sweet kind, of course) when I travel there. They’re a great way to keep the heat at bay – the heat from the climate and the heat from the spicy food you eat. And as much as I love eating a mango just as a fruit… I also love to make it into a smoothie.

This version of a lassi yogurt drink is something I came up with the other day as an experiment. The combination is tangy and not too sweet, just like a refreshing drink should be. It’s like India and Puerto Rico combined in a glass… maybe not too traditional but very, very delicious.

MANGO PASSION FRUIT LASSI

1 cup of mango, cut into small pieces

1 cup passion fruit nectar or juice

½ cup greek yogurt

2 tbs agave nectar

3 ice cubes

Place all the ingredients in a blender and blend at a high speed until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

Enjoy as part of your breakfast or as a snack.

Tags: food, mango, passion fruit, vegetarian, yogurt

Comments 13 Comments
Categories beverages, breakfast, snacks

Mango Strawberry Smoothie

12 Nov

We had a great season for mango’s this year and we froze a lot of it for out-of-season enjoyment.

Mangos and strawberries pair very well together… and ripe mangos provide a touch of tropical goodness to any breakfast smoothie. This has been my smoothie of choice for the last few weeks.

Hope you enjoy it as well…

MANGO STRAWBERRY SMOOTHIE

1 cup of mango pieces

½ cup of strawberries

½ cup pineapple or orange juice

½ cup water

2 tbs plain yogurt

1 tbs agave nectar

4-5 ice cubes – I use these if the fruits are fresh and not frozen

In a blender mix together all ingredients…

Enjoy all its deliciousness. It’s tangy and sweet all at the same time… you don’t taste the pineapple at all, but if in a pinch, you can use only water.

Tags: food, mango, pineapple, strawberry, vegetarian

Comments 9 Comments
Categories beverages, breakfast

Papaya Mango Fruit Cup

8 Aug

Here’s the fruit cup… redefined. Ever since I finished my July 4th retreat I’ve been on a fruit thing. I have always mentioned you how I need and want to eat more fruits, but I am sometimes lazy. I’m getting over the laziness now. I am trying to have 3-4 fresh fruits on hand to eat as breakfast or a a snack while watching TV. Costco helps because I need to buy fruit in bulk and makes me eat fruit every day, several times a day before they spoil on me…

My favorite fruit salads are made from acidic and sub-acidic fruits… citrus, berries, kiwis, pineapple, grapes, peaches, plums, etc. I have made two of these Acid Fruit Salads for you already… But I also sometimes enjoy a sweet fruit combination – Papaya and Mango.

Papaya and Mango are both very soothing fruits to your system. They’re perfect when you’re feeling under the weather stomach-wise. I like this combination when finishing my days of fasting.

PAPAYA AND MANGO FRUIT CUP

Papaya, cut into small pieces, about ¼ of a small papaya

Mango, cut into small pieces

Hanfdul of raisins

Drizzle of Honey or Agave Nectar

Sliced almonds, optional but highly recommended

You determine how much is enough for your appetite…is I never measure, as you already know. This is more assembling the components than a recipe, really.

Mix all the fruits together in a bowl. Drizzle with a bit of honey to add a tad of sweetness.
Sprinkle with sliced almonds. I didn’t have any the other day, but I wanted to share this with all of you…

What’s your favorite fruit salad combination? Please share yours…

Tags: almonds, food, honey, mango, papaya, raisins, vegetarian

Comments 3 Comments
Categories breakfast, Puerto Rican delicacies, Salad, snacks

Mango Ginger Granita

4 Jul

Another one of the desserts we attempted to serve at the Italian Dinner at the Yoga Center recently was a Granita…

The granita name might transport you to Italy, but we have our own versions all the same. In Puerto Rico we grew up eating “limbers” and “piraguas”. Limbers are basically sweetened and frozen juice and you eat it directly from the small plastic cup in which you freeze it in. Piraguas on the other hand is the traditional shaved ice with flavored syrup on top served on a paper or plastic cone. In essence, granitas are a hybrid of these two local Puerto Rican treats.

I use the help of my trusty food processor to help with the shaving… I am just too anxious to shave the ice by hand. Technology exists for a purpose… let’s take full advantage of it, no??

MANGO GINGER GRANITA

3 cups mango nectar

1 cup water

½ cup raw turbinado or brown sugar

3-inch piece of fresh ginger, sliced

We make the ginger simple syrup first… just bring the water, ginger pieces and sugar to a boil in a saucepan until the sugar dissolves completely. Let the ginger steep in the simple syrup while the liquid cools off.
When the simple syrup has come to room temperature, strain the ginger pieces. Mix together the ginger simple syrup and the mango nectar in a glass 9 x 11 container.
Place in the freezer for about 6-8 hours for it to fully harden.
When you’re ready to serve, remove the frozen mango juice mixture from freezer and using a sharp tool, pry it away from the mold and break it off into pieces you can fit into your food processor. Pulse a few times and process until you have a slushy.

Serve in individual cups and enjoy.

If you’d like a more pronounced ginger flavor, I suggest you peel the ginger before steeping it in the simple syrup and do not strain the ginger pieces before mixing in the mango nectar. This way, you can process the frozen ginger pieces together with the rest of the frozen juice and you’ll get a very interesting prominent ginger flavor.

Tags: brown sugar, Egg-free, egg-less, eggless, food, ginger, mango, vegetarian

Comments 12 Comments
Categories desserts

How to Peel and Eat a Mango

29 Aug

I’ve seen the chefs at the Food Network do it… I’ve seen contraptions at Williams-Sonoma to help people separate their flesh from the pit. And still I do not understand why people are so confused or baffled about the way to peel a mango.

To peel and eat a mango raw, as a fruit, all you need is a nice serrated knife. Huh… maybe a napkin too, because if the mango is juicy and delicious I can bet that some juice will run down your arm and the sides of your mouth. But besides that, no other implement needs to be used or dirtied to peel and eat a mango.

This is a photo of a mango from my godfather’s tree in Miami… isn’t it beautiful??? Whenever I go to Miami, my uncle Felo always makes us eat and bring with us on the plane a mangoes and a avocados. Once, I had to buy a new suitcase so I could carry the small farmer’s market he wanted me to bring along.

Back to our mango peeling class… this method was taught to me by my Puerto Rican grandma, Marianita. Funny thing, that she taught the grandkids and not her daughters, because when I told my mom about writing this post, she was in the dark as many of you may be now. I am amazed that my mom had never seen me eat a mango like this… I think she needs some gingko biloba to jig her memory STAT!!!!

PEELING AND EATING A MANGO

What we will do is to peel the mango skin so you will end up first with a peeled top 2/3 of mango, keeping the skin on the bottom 1/3 so you have something to hold on to. Then, you will turn the mango upside down, peel the remaining skin and use the pit to hold on to the remaining mango, kind of like a popsicle.

All you need to do is three cuts with a serrated knife.

Take the mango in one hand upright. The stem end facing towards you.

You’ll make one cut across the mango, towards the bottom third. All the way around the mango, but only through the skin, no need to go any deeper.

Now the next cut goes from the cut you already made going up from one side of the mango continuing in one single swoop all the way to the cut on the other side of the mango. Now repeat in a cross like fashion. You must have ended up with a mango that still has the skin on but with 4 sections of cut skin on top.

Take one corner of the skin and pull it to peel. The whole peel will remove leaving you with a nice edible mango with the bottom still with skin so you can hold on to it and not be slippery.

When you’re done eating that side of the mango, just turn it upside down. Hold the pit in your hand and pull the rest of the peel to expose the remaining mango flesh.