The True Forbidden Fruit

Plus: How much would you pay for a mango?

Jack Floweree, the Mango Prophet

Hello, hungry people.

Down here in Florida, there’s been much recent debate about a topic of vital importance: How much would you pay for a grouper sandwich?

It all got started when Gov. Ron DeSantis visited a Panhandle seafood joint and was shocked to learn it charged $32 for what is arguably the favorite sandwich of Floridians. It’s a tossup with the Cuban sandwich, which presents yet a further dilemma regarding whether the Cuban should be pressed (yes!) or not (no!)

Judged purely by the pocketbook, the Cuban wins. You can get a decent one for $10.

While I love me a good Cuban, if forced to choose I’d go with grouper. Thing is, with black grouper weighing in at around $28 a pound these days, it’s a challenge to make a $10 grouper sandwich at home. Charging $32 for one at a restaurant is not altogether out of line.

“I love grouper sandwiches,” said DeSantis. “But I don’t know if I can pull the trigger on $32.”

Let the record show that this might be the only issue on which the governor and I agree.

***

But today’s topic is not grouper. It’s mangoes.

It’s the tail end of mango season in Florida and I have yet to satisfy my mango lust. Mangoes can be a fickle fruit and I’ve not found fulfillment this summer. Early in the season I bought a bunch of bad ones—too stringy, no flavor—for which I paid about $6 apiece.

Yes, I know. You can buy mangoes at Publix priced 3 for $5. But they are mangoes from Mexico, Brazil or Thailand. They are edible. But they come nowhere close to Florida mangoes which don’t travel well and are best from backyard trees.

Recently, at the local farmers market, I was lured in by some gorgeous Valencianas—teardrop-shaped with a sultry pink-yellow skin. They were going for $6.99 a pound. The one I chose cost $14. It was delicious. But $14 for a mango? A mango that was all gone in just a few minutes after I’d shared some with my lovely wife?

“You paid what?” she said between bites.

We both agreed that Jack Floweree would be rolling over in his grave.

***

Jack Floweree was nothing less than a mango prophet. Back in the 1960s, he planted a thousand or so mango trees on Pine Island, just north of Fort Myers. Floweree called his roadside stand the Mango Factory. He’s dead now, but his children and grandchildren still run the place.

I used to visit the Mango Factory a few times each season, not just to buy bushels of mangoes—they went for about a buck apiece back then—but to listen to Floweree preach the many healthful benefits of eating mangoes and share his unflinching belief that mangoes are indeed the Forbidden Fruit of the bible.

“Mangoes have both good and evil in them,” Floweree would say. “The skin is poison to some folks and can make them break out in the hives. But the fruit is heaven itself.”

In Floweree’s version of the Book of Genesis, Eve plucked a mango from the Tree of Knowledge and offered to share it with Adam.

“You know how it is when you peel a mango. You make a mess and get mango juice all over you,” Floweree said. “That’s the way it was for ol’ Eve. She peeled that mango and when she was done she was covered in mango juice. She gave some of the fruit to Adam and he devoured it, thought it was the best thing he’d ever eaten, just had to have some more. And so ol’ Adam, he started licking that mango juice off of Eve and, well, the two of them got to carrying on.

“That’s when the heavens parted, God pointed down and told Adam he had to leave the Garden of Eden,” Floweree said. “His voice boomed out: ‘Man, go!’ ”

***

Which leads us directly, with a few groans, to the very best way to eat a mango.

I have high hopes for these mangoes I recently bought from “Robert Is Here,” the legendary fruit stand/tourist attraction down in Homestead.

Lovely, aren’t they? They are Keitt mangoes, the late-fruiting variety, and it’ll be a few days before they’re fully ripe. The four of them cost me $34, so call it $8.50 apiece. A hefty price, yes, but they are the last mangoes of the season and I can’t let summer pass without eating a few good ones.

Here’s hoping you find some good mangoes too. And if you do, then here’s the best way to eat them:

Take your mango and a sharp knife and head for the bathroom. Take off all your clothes. Then get into the shower with your mango and your knife.

Slice the skin into four sections and peel it off. If, like me, you are a complete mango addict, then you will risk getting a little “poison” from the skin on your lips just so you can chew the fruit from the peel. Once the peel is dispatched, sit down in the shower. Hold the fruit in your hand and start gnawing, all the way to the pit, then gnaw on it too. If you want to share the mango with your honey, then go for it. Let that mango juice drip where it may. And luxuriate in the goodness. Turn on the shower when you’re done.

If the heavens part and a voice booms out, “Man, go!” then you’re on your own.

***

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