Thursday, May 17, 2007

Vitamin C

My fingers waft that reminiscent scent of tangerine at me, that even now connects in my brain with Christmas, those pathways etched irrevocably in my childhood and never reprogrammed on moving to the Southern Hemisphere. Now in South Africa they are rechristened naartjies (pronounced narchees) and herald a late autumn fruit bonanza.

My weekly shop, that I so ungratefully dismissed yesterday, yielded a veritable rainbow of vitamin C rich fruits to combat that lingering cold and raise the spirits: 5kg sacks of oranges for R9; 3kg bags of naartjies for R7; guavas that my youngest loves to eat and she carefully selected four just for herself;

grenadillas or passion fruit with their burst of fragrant pulp; Williams pears that will have to sit on the window sill for days but will eventually ripen to succulence; as well as those standard big bags of crisp apples – one royal gala and the other golden delicious to see us through a week of snacks; not to mention avos and bananas. A weekly supermarket shop has its highlights when you live in a country where all these fruits grow and come into season filling the shops with fresh, flavourful and cheap cold cures.

Smiles are better than Vitamin C for banishing colds!

6 comments:

  1. I can just taste your pictures! It is so nice to see and hear how much you enjoy the abundance of fruit and vegetables there! Have you tried prickly pears? I love them ice cold straight from the fridge... peeled CAREFULLY!
    Right now my favourite is meringues with freshly cubed ripe mango, sweet early strawberries and finely stripped mint and then freshly scooped granadilla pulp!

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  2. I haven't tried prickly pears here yet, though I've seen them in the shops recently. I remember those irritating little spikes though from when I worked in Italy.
    I like the sound of your fruit mix with merigues - no strawberries here right now though and mangos will be out of season by the time the strawberries come in...there are some taste benefits to all year round imported fruit then!

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  3. SO LUCKY! I can only dream of such luscious fruit!

    I completely understand the lack of motivation in the kitchen, I'm suffering the same...

    Your daughters are beautiful, by the by.

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  4. mmhh! guavas! haven't has that in ages... and passion fruit are my favourites! i wished i lived in warmer climes like you!

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  5. Ooh, these photos made my mouth water!

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  6. oooh, I'd love a guava now... best I can get is pineapple & guava juice though!

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Thanks for your comments - I appreciate every one!