I can’t count the number of times when I  think of my daughter and  – bang – within seconds she calls me.

“Hi Ma,” her cheery voice carries over the miles, immediately lifting up my spirits.

Similarly whenever I think of my mother, she gives me a call and I hear her ask tentatively,

” So what are you doing?” wondering if she is disturbing me at all.

It is uncanny how sometimes we cook the same food – all three of us in different parts of the world –  or at least think of cooking the same kind of food. Or we go to see the same movie almost at the same time……..

Last night I thought of making Mango Chutney an old family recipe that I managed to inveigle out of my mom all those years ago. She was reluctant to part with it initially, as it was a family secret passed on to her by her mother-in-law, my grandma who lived in the days when a woman’s worth was measured by her girth. She was re-knowned for her cooking, and even though my father believes that the only reason all people think their mother’s food is the best because  that is the first and sometimes only food they are weaned on, my father and his siblings were not the only ones who thought so. So when I hear that anything tastes the way my grandma made it, I know that it is good.

As with all women, My mother learnt a few of my grandma’s recipes , especially the ones my father particularly liked and even though I am not half as good as either of them, I enjoy cooking and trying out new recipes from time to time.

Inspired by the big fat mangoes in Bhaji Gully last week, I  made a huge jar Mango Pickle for the first time in my life. And seeing those succulent pieces of mango wallow in the oil and spice, I was further inspired to try out the Secret Mango Chutney yet again. After my initial forays in making it, I stopped  simply because no one really wanted to eat it –
it’s too rich,
it’s too sour,
it’s not like what my mother made.

With these tepid responses, I obviously stayed clear of making any chutney and it was only last night that I thought I’d give it a try.

So off I went to Bhaji Gully yet again ( I’m becoming like those persnickety housewives who insist on fresh veg every time!!!!) and got down to buying Rajapuri Mangoes this time. These huge big mangoes are less tart than the Ladva mangoes I had bought for the pickle and particularly lend themselves well to making the Secret Mango Chutney.

Dwarka, the friendly mango lady volunteered to peel and grate them for me, assuring me that as long as the seed was left inside the grated mango it wouldn’t discolour. I then picked up the rest of the ingredients I needed – garlic, ginger, dried red chilli, dry fruit and a bottle of white vinegar.

It took about an hour to cook everything down to a glistening sweet and sour chutney.  While it cooled I toodled off to buy some jars and then this morning, after it cooled,  I filled up jar by jar to gift each friend of mine with this special taste of summer…….

p.s. This morning my mother called to say that she was going to the Bazaar to buy Rajapuri Mangoes to make the Secret Mango Chutney. She too hadn’t made this for quite  a while and was inspired to do so this year.  So are we telepathetic or what?