Our friend Dani stopped by two days ago with some Alphonso mangoes–a real sacrifice on his part. One whiff and a long exhale and the thought, Now THAT is what a mango is supposed to be. Thank you, Dani!

Then I took the sad little wannabes from Costco that had been picked too early, chopped them up with a bunch of green onions and threw them in with some peanut satay sauce: playing vegetables was the best they could attain to.

Dani’s were the real thing. Peeled and devoured.

So my thought was I’d sprout the seeds from his. I know he doesn’t have space nor sun but maybe he’d love gifting a baby tree to someone who does. And maybe I just want to see what they do.

Mangoes come mono- or polyembryonic. You want the multiple embryos if you want one just like the parent whose fruit you ate, while monoembryonic is a genetic potluck–so of course the Alphonso is a mono type.

Googling ensued. Videos were watched. One person said let the pit dry for two days and then cut the seed covering here with scissors and pull the seed out.

I tried that. It was every internet hahahaaayouactuallybelievedthat?!! result.

The next video, the guy got a gouge going in that woody thing and then took needlenose pliers to try to slowly, forcefully, hopefully, with great effort, manhandle that thing open and off.

The camera cut away and they did not show you all of what he had to go through, but there it was. Voila. Seed.

My scissors had gone, What are you trying to DO to me! Back into the kitchen gadgets drawer.

My pruning shears went, I’m not going to try it, you try it! Okay, you tried it. I won’t do it. So there.

Huh. Well I do have those long-handle tree pruners where you pull down the string that pulls on the lever that moves the blade that cuts the limb a dozen feet over your head and hope you have a good helmet on; maybe I could manipulate that blade up close while pulling on the string way over thataway out of reach without, y’know, cutting my finger off or my skirt in half in the process. Dunno how well that would work for a precision cut on such a small piece. Where is that thing, anyway?

Remember the old Life cereal commercial, Let’s get Mikey to try it! He hates everything!

Yeah, well. Around here, Mikey seems to have gone into hiding. And that’s probably a good thing.