For Jeni Townsend, eating a mango is the complete sensory experience. The description she sent to Home Truths leaves nothing unsaid ...
"A week ago the mango was chosen. Selected with great care. Then came the wait. Every day it was picked out of the fruit bowl and smelt, gently squeezed, its blushing skin caressed in anticipation. And now it's ready. The cool skin yielding slightly to the pressure of my thumb, suggesting soft succulent flesh beneath.
No-one's home. I take a deep breath.
The mango smells sweet and exotic, like no other fruit. You can't tell from smelling it what it tastes like. I draw the knife towards me and orange-yellow juice runs down the mango's sides onto the whiteness of the plate. There's a particular flavour you get, not from the main body of the fruit but from the last remaining bit of flesh left on the skin. This is removed by drawing the teeth across the skin and sucking. It's almost soapy and not unpleasant....
The juice is running down my chin and is all over my face. My hands are covered with this liquid sunshine and I make loud sucking and slurping noises as I eat. I caress and kiss the flesh hungrily from the skin until nothing remains but the large stone. This is now scraped with the teeth to salvage any remaining pulp. The taste is more acid here, near the heart of the fruit. Citrusy.
Now, it's over.
I'm left feeling slightly guilty, as though I've been doing something I shouldn't. Nothing to be done but get another one and wait..."
