Fried Biscuit and Mango Cup
Crushed cookies browned in butter, layered with dried mango and reconstituted cream.
- calories
- 620
- weight
- 4 oz
- cal / oz
- 155
- protein
- 6 g
- serves
- 2, scales
- prep
- 5 min
- cook
- 6 min
- total time
- 11 min
- water
- 90 ml cold
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dessert
- Canister stove
- Liquid fuel
- Backpacking
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Canoe / raft
- Vegetarian
- Nut free
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Dried mango | 2 oz | the soft sweet kind, not the leathery slabs |
|---|---|---|
| Plain oat or wheat biscuits | 2.6 oz | digestives or Kornmo-style; anything crisp |
| Butter or ghee | 2 tbsp | ghee if it will be warm out |
| Sugar | 2 tsp | optional |
| Whipping cream powder | 1/4 cup | |
| Cold water | 90 ml | for the cream |
Method
- At home, cut the dried mango into small pieces and bag it with a splash-proof seal. Bag the biscuits separately.
- In camp, knead the biscuit bag until you have a mix of crumbs and pea-sized chunks. Both textures matter.
- Put the mango in a cup or bag with about 60 ml of cold water and leave it to sit while you cook.
- Melt the butter in the pot over medium heat. Add the crumbs and stir constantly until they smell toasted and turn a shade darker. Two to three minutes. They burn fast.
- Dust the sugar over the crumbs, stir once, and pull the pot off the heat.
- Shake the cream powder with 30 ml of cold water in a bottle or bag until it thickens. Roughly a minute of hard shaking.
- Divide the crumbs into two cups, spoon the soaked mango over, and finish with the cream.
The original uses frozen mango and a tub of whipped cream, neither of which survives a trailhead. Dried mango soaked in cold water gets close, and whipping cream powder shaken with a little cold water sets up thick enough to sit on top instead of running off. Use less water than the package says. Runny cream ruins the crumbs.
Frying the biscuit crumbs in butter is the step worth doing properly. Raw crumbs are just dry biscuit; browned in fat they go crisp and nutty and hold their texture under the wet mango for the few minutes it takes to eat. Keep the crumbs moving and take the pot off the heat early, because the residual heat in an aluminum pot will keep cooking them.
Packing
Biscuits go in a rigid container or they arrive as sand. Butter travels in a small screw-top jar; ghee if the days are hot.
Variations
- Skip the pan entirely and layer everything dry for a no-cook version. You lose the toasted flavor and half the reason to make it.
- A pinch of cardamom in the crumbs goes well with mango.
https://www.friluftsmat.no/post/mangodessert