05-07-2025
The world of mango snobbery
Earlier this week, I learned that farmers in Greece are experimenting with mangoes and lychees. It's getting hotter and drier in the region, and that's just the right weather for tropical fruit cultivation. And it's easy to believe considering the heatwave conditions in Europe at the moment. A representative of the EU's Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development (which is running a More Than Food campaign in India to promote European produce in India) said that they're trying to 'find ways to adapt to climate change—how can we make it work for farmers without moving away from our own staples like olives.'
If you're a mango snob—and it's most likely you are—you've already spat fire in five different ways at the very idea of Greek mangoes. You've probably also thrown some shade at Mexican mangoes just to prove the point that Indian mangoes are the sweetest. And it is quite a sacrilegious thought—after all, India has more than 1,000 varietals of mango, each one sweeter or better than the other. And so, we have all sorts of arguments about mangoes—Alphonso versus Dashehri versus Rumani versus Imam Pasand (I'd argue endlessly in favour of the beautiful Banganapalli). We each also have a favourite way to slice, skin, dice or eat it.
These are defences of one's favourite fruit that are rooted in nostalgia, regional pride, memory and emotion, but as Sopan Joshi writes in a beautiful, meandering essay, we aren't always aware of the deep cultural connections we have to this fruit—and we are also unaware that our mad love for the mango is also contributing to its demise. All sorts of unscrupulous practices are employed to increase mango harvest and prices, and coupled with climate change and urbanisation, orchards are at risk. Lounge regular Sandip Roy complements it with a grumble about missing mangoes while living abroad.
This an issue with stories as eclectic as mango tastes—a look at why Indian hockey is faltering, a report on the representation of neurodivergence on screen, a kochuri trail in Kolkata, ideas to use peaches in weekend recipes, as well as our staples of what to watch, do, read, eat and lounge with.
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