And now with EVEN MORE colour

I suspect that I have no small number of posts that could be filed under the category "Only in Brazil." My energy bill arrived this afternoon with a spiffy new look with an explanatory note attached to explain the changes. In essence, the note went something like this:

YOUR ENERGY BILL
IS NOW MORE COLOURFUL,
SIMPLE AND EASY TO READ.

Like I said, only in Brazil! Makes my life in beige fairly bleak indeed.

Mangos - Part VI and VII

Part VI

Mango Chutney Makes Friends: The mango chutney was a huge success! I took a rather large bowl-full over to an afternoon barbeque today. While people were arriving, the host remarked that it sure was a lot of chutney -- at least one and a half to two litres. In fact, I had imagined that I would be returning home with at least half of the chutney. But no! The chutney was a raving success. I now have a dozen new best friends and no chutney left. Hurray!

Part VII

You Knew it Couldn't Last: Sunday evening I went out with my friend with the mango trees and gained four new mangos! She said that they only gave me a few since they knew that I would be travelling soon. It turns out the twenty mangos a day that I referenced earlier was rather incorrect. It turns out that their six trees produce fifty to one hundred mangos a day! FIFTY TO ONE HUNDRED!!!! All of a sudden, my two dozen mangos seem a pittance!

Four More Down

I feel like I have been chopping mangos all day long. Oh wait, I have been chopping mangos all day long! I just finished the mega-batch of chutney and it makes my kitchen smell rather delicious. Only four mangos left! Totally manageable, if I do say so myself. Another positive result is that I currently have the best smelling garbage in the building. Surely that counts for something?

I disbelieve

One of my mango/kitchen break activities this afternoon was sorting through my winter clothes trying to decide which will accompany me home and which will stay behind. Looking through my sweater collection I notice a whole variety of thicknesses and bulk, from light knitted turtlenecks to heavy wool blends, and I end of wondering how can it be that any country can get cold enough to deserve such intense sweaters. I suspect that soon enough I am going to rediscover the answer to this question!

Three Down, Eight to Go

It's only 2:30pm and I have already managed to make a three-mango dent in my supply - one being sacrificed for breakfast and the rest for mousse. I'm taking a quick mango/kitchen break before embarking on the mega-batch of chutney. Just to shake things up a little, I bought two persimmons , or caqui as they are called in Brazil, at the grocery store today. That's me, living on the edge!

Do Three Mangos a Day Keep the Doctor Away?

Just when I thought that I was getting my mango supply under control, I came home from work this afternoon only to find a new bag of lovely mangos waiting for me at my back door. Six perfectly ripe, perfectly rosey, perfectly shaped mangos. The challenge being that I am off travelling in less than a week and won't be back before the mangos go off. The plan, as are all good plans, is to divide and conquer. Between now and next week, I will make at least one breakfast of french toast and mangos, a new mega-batch of mango chutney to take to a barbeque party on Sunday, and a mango mousse to take to a going away party on Saturday. That's a lot of parties you might be thinking, but trust me, it is even more mangos! I would say that this will be the final mango-based post for a while, but I suspect that it won't be! At least it is not like the time, this past August, when I talked almost exclusively about a whole lot of garbage for days on end.