Mango season has arrived and huge ripe Bowen mangos are cheap. Summer in
Australia is wonderful!
I just made some Mango Dulce. Mmmmm. Here is the I used, adapted from one
posted to SOAR by Stephen Ceideberg in 1993, originally from "Raw
Materials", Sydney Morning Herald, by Meryl Constance.
Dulces (literally sweets) like this one are common all over Latin
America. They are firm, sliceable pastes made from fruit, a classic example
being quinces.
Peel and remove the flesh from the stone and process enough ripe mangoes
(2-3) to provide 2 cups of mango puree. (Spend the next few minutes
nibbling all the leftovers off the stone. Mmmm.)
Scrape the puree into a saucepan and add 1 1/2 to 2 cups of white sugar and
a tablespoon of lime juice. (I used my Braun hand processor to mush it a
bit. Try increasing the lime juice to 2 tablespoons, and reducing the sugar
a little.)
Cook over a medium heat, stirring all the time until the mixture thickens
sufficiently so that you can see the bottom of the saucepan in the wake of
the spoon. Should be thicker than jam, but still glossy looking. Don't
burn it!
Moisten the inside of a mould--a cake or loaf tin will do--blob the
paste into it, flatten with a spatula and leave to cool. When it is cold,
turn out. It will (supposedly) keep very well wrapped in plastic and
refrigerated, however I gets eaten too fast at my house for storage to be a
problem. Slice it into 1 cm by 2 cm squares.
Laura Barwick
Canberra, ACT, Australia
laurab@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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