Good morning and the top of the day to you.

Got to tell you that this is always my favorite time of year. I have two refrigerators stocked full of the finest and most unusual varieties of Mangoes money can buy. And to top it off a good friend of mine put about a bushel of fresh Kent Mangoes, right off the tree, on my doorstep when I was riding my bicycle today. I gave my Dentist friend, Dr. Roger Scott, who loves them as much as I do, a bunch of them so before he and his wife and two kids flew to Montana for a week, they had 3 different kinds to do them up and it was a real joy to see their faces light up when I cut them open for them this afternoon. So when I gave them some, here I come home to over a bushel of the only ones I didn't have and those were the Kent Variety. We are all so fortunate. Paraphrasing the altruism, when we give freely, we get abundantly!

Now on to this week's recipe.

The reason I started this message out this way is because I have so many Mangoes, I hate to see them rot and believe me it's rare when you see a Mango rot in my house or even my presence. I usually scoff it up. But another good friend of mine who is also one of my co-hosts on my Tele-seminar series, Dr. Douglas Graham, about 15 years ago made this fruit pie that I didn't get to eat, but it was made with a dried fruit crust if I'm not mistaken. So today I decided to take a thought from him and do up my own recipe called "The Mango Pie"!

Ingredients:

6-8 Large Ripe Mangoes
3 Bananas
15-20 Medjool Dates
10-15 Dried Apricots
5-10 Dried Pineapple Rings
1 Cup of Thompson Seedless Raisins
10 Dried Figs

Now the fun begins: Put the Dates (with the Pits removed), Apricots, Pineapple Rings, Raisins and Figs into your blender and blend well. It will seem like it will never blend, but keep poking around at it with a large wooden spoon until it just blends up into a thick chunky mixture. Now put that into a pie plate and freeze it over night. It will harden and then the next day blend up the Mangoes (removing the skins and the seeds of course) using absolutely no water. It will turn into a thick rich delicious pudding. Pour it into the frozen dried fruit piecrust and put back into the freezer for about 1 more hour. Remove from the freezer and put Banana slices over the top. Now shut my mouth! I'm in Fat City. Who says you need to count calories? NOT ME!

Lovin' Life in the sunny south and wishing you great things.

Wayne "The Mango Man" Pickering

PS This should be enough for two pies by the way! One for you and one for your spouse. Nobody touches MY PIE! Ha!

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