Taste & Create - Mango & Cucumber Salad and Shopping

Here I am home again, with shopping. This is my Solomon Islands haul. A beautiful bowl carved from coconut and inlaid with shells. And some jewellery all carved from shells. The long strings are shell money, a traditional currency of exchange - used to pay for brides, land and pigs. I bought them at the local markets from some lovely women with the most amazing array of tattoos.

Unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to do much more during the day than work. In the evenings I did manage to get to some quite nice restaurants and see a traditional dance performance. Overall, I really enjoyed the trip.

Despite the cold blustery weather of Canberra, I have remained in a tropical frame of mind. So when I came to this month's Taste & Create challenge I chose this - mango and cucumber salad.



My partner for this month is Gay from A Scientist in the Kitchen. Her blog has lots of interestingly exotic recipes. I now have my beady little eyes on her papaya and coconut spring roll recipe.

This salad was very enjoyable. It was just so colourful, you couldn't help but be cheered by it. And I love adding fruit to salads. There's nothing like a lovely accent of sweetness to break up all those boring leaves and crunchy things.

The recipe can be found here. For those interested, the Taste and Create is hosted by Nicole over at For the Love of Food and details can be found here.