Thai Mango Salad - a shrimp is all it takes

     

How do you like your mango?

I love mine yellow and sweet but it's also good a little greenish white, pale yellow, sour and a little hint of sweet here and there.

When I was littler, my sister introduced me to the delicious art of eating young mangos . 

And it is simple to make as well. After peeling and cutting the fruit into very thin strips, she mixed the fruit with sugar and black salty soy sauce in a bowl and let cool in the fridge. After an hour, voila, taste bud heaven awaits you in that fridge.

Since that first experience, I have tried several variations. With shrimp paste, chilli and lime; without the shrimp paste; just with sugar; plain (although hardly ever - too sour!!) and during my college years with Old El Paso salsa dip (the mild and hot range) and the extra hot Indonesian sambal oelek from Chinatown. Ooof, now that never failed to leave me with red swollen lips afterwards but well worth the taste trip!

I don't do sambal oelek these days - my poor matured digestive system couldn't handle it I think!  

But I still love the occasional spicy trip and I get it from Thai restaurants. I either get a squid salad, an extra hot tom yam soup (I could eat plates and plates of white rice to accompany it!!) or my all time Thai favourite ----- mango salad!!! And yes, they do leave me a swollen red burning lips!! And yes, it's well worth it!

At one of the restaurants, I discovered a new ingredient that goes very well with young mango - dried shrimp. They don't lend any flavour to the salad until you bite into one of those babies. And then it's yumm. A little flavour explosion occurs in your mouth. 

And you go back for more. 

And more. And more.

Oh, there is one ingredient that, in my books, does not go with mango - peanut chips, esp if they're burnt! Tell the guy to hold the peanuts.