Yes, we are all locked down - down but not out! Each day brings a battle of its own. But it is almost summer now; nature heedless of man, unfolds at its own exquisite pace. We are fortunate to have garden with a few fruit trees, some herbs, plenty of bees, squirrels, monkeys and an occasional snake to break the monotony.
We had many eventful moments yesterday. The not so great ones were our cycle valve tubes getting leaky and our new car battery dying. Now only my son is able to cycle about and fortunately our old yellow car is still trudging along.
I have been working on a live yeast (and bacteria) culture for bread (as we are running out of baker's yeast). I was all set to start the bread early yesterday morning when we suddenly decided that we should get down the mangoes from our trees. In hindsight, this was a very good idea because we had a terrific storm today and the monkeys came this morning searching for fruit. (They found no mangoes left but threw down some hefty jackfruit, which I am still clearing up.)
Anyway, the mangoes had to be brought down with a hooked stick and they fell (or we caught them) in our bedsheet. We got three bucketfuls of mangoes and my son was busy handing them out to neighbours who wanted some. Most people nowadays assume you get ripe orange mangoes from markets and that's how they like them. Not green and waiting to be covered up in straw and ripened, so there were not many takers for our fruit. But we are busy wrapping them up and they should ripen in a while. The fragrance is incredible and I wish we could preserve it on our bedsheets too..
So, I was late by a couple of hours to start the bread. Anyway, it was fun to make, and I and made a loaf from the Tartine recipe book. It was so crusty outside that I had to saw through it and inside it was a bit like sourdough bread, but I think it is not a bad beginning (only my husband has taken the plunge and eaten it so far!).
And, tomorrow is another day, hopefully filled with - better bread, mango chutney and eventually- ripe mangoes!
