Welcome to September. Happy Labor Day to those marking it.
We’re getting the tail end of Hurricane Erin. After a summer of heatwave, a bit cooler, heatwave, we’re now in beautiful sunny, incredible downpour. Rinse and repeat for the next five days. Boy, is it humid.
As I write I’m wearing Victoria Beckham 21:50 Reverie for the first time in months. This really is a very good and weird vanilla.
But, that’s not where we are today. Rather, fizz and mango.
Got ya. Not perfume. I bet you were expecting aldehydes and tropical fruit and was it any good?
No, today we’re looking at my home fizzy water maker from a UK cookery etc products company. I first experienced a seltzer machine when staying with my friends in Prague last September. Theirs is a fancy label one. This: not so much. But, it does the job.
Anyway, I grew up with seltzer – as opposed to tonic water, etc. It’s what my father would buy every once in a while and it’s what made vanilla egg creams at diners. Boy, do I miss real vanilla egg creams.
Anyway, Mark and Gabriela just used it to make fizzy water and usually added sliced cucumber, which is what I do too.
When it’s hot, there’s nothing more refreshing, even ice cream.
Here’s my machine with its bottle and the glass carafe that lives in the fridge.
Then, mango.
I recently read about a new Lush shower cream for Diwali, the Hindu autumn festival celebrating various gods. A big thing at Diwali is fireworks.
Where I used to live in London, we could see the big firework display at Wembley (a bit north of us, the sports stadium). It clearly was very loud, and very beautiful.
Mango Lassi is one of a number of seasonal specials. It’s mango, coconut, vanilla and orange oil. Like a mango lassi drink you get in Indian restaurants.
A good sweet lassi (as opposed to a salt lassi) isn’t really sweet. Rather, ever so slightly sour but juicy. Very more-ish.
The shower gel is a shape-shifter. When you squeeze on to the hand, it smells like orange creamsicle. This was never my ice cream as a kid. It was my mother’s however – and whenever something smells like one it’s her I see enjoying it. I liked those soft serve cones dipped in chocolate which cooled to a coated crunch, chocolate crackling with each bite.
Anyway, once the gel hits water it’s mango lassi all the way: tart yoghurt feel, almost sour mango, a bit of vanilla and a whisper of orange. Really nice.
Here, this is limited edition, and it had not quite been released at my local Lush – meaning they had it in the back but only in the huge bottles for £30. I got it in any case, clearly, and I’m glad I did. Between this and Sticky Dates, I’m good in the shower for quite some time.
Anyone into fizzy water? And does the idea of Mango Lassi float your boat?
Pics: Pexels, Wiki, mine
And just like that I need a fizzy water maker! Actually what I really want is one of those Qooker all singing, all dancing taps but the £££££ puts me off.
Not had a lassi in donkeys years! I have both Greek yoghurt, a mango & a blender. I foresee mango lassi for breakfast.
DH has a week off work & maybe a little trip to Megahell now the kids are back at school is in order. I’ll pop into Lush whilst there
I feel a bit iffy about Qookers. Just concerned that if I were distracted I’d put on the wrong water type (eg, the boiling one and burn self).
Yup, I’m going to look up a lassi recipe.
That & the cost are what are holding me back
I live fizzy water. With a slice of cucumber on a hot day? Heaven. I think I need to find out if LUSH USA has that orange..
Do people mark Diwali much in the US? Yup, fizzy water is a wonderful thing.
I can’t drink plain fizzy water such as tonic water and club soda. I get a very strong gag reflex when I try. It really doesn’t matter to me. I don’t often drink soda either.
I think I would love Mango Lassi!
I’m with your mother on creamsicles and with you on soft served cones dipped in chocolate. I have warm memories of my father taking me for rides and often stopping to buy me one at the local Dairy Queen.
I can’t drink either of those due to the additives. Seltzer is it. Ah, Dairy Queen. I recall you also get a red dip, maybe strawberry flavour? But the chocolate was the one I wanted.
I love fizzy water – it’s a household staple here.
Sadly, I’m deathly allergic to mangoes. Yes, they are delicious, or so I thought when I first tasted them. However, I like breathing even more, it turns out. The smell of them triggers a “danger” alert in my brain, so I can’t even enjoy them in a scent. But all of this sounds lovely, and I’m glad you all get such pleasure from them!
Omg!!!
Glad you learned this BEFORE they killed you!!!
No Mango would result in much wailing and lamentation!!! Luckily they are my BFFs, so y’all don’t have to hear me!!!
Wow, no, I wouldn’t be anywhere near something with that sort of reaction. I need to find some place local that will make me an egg cream.
I LOVE Mango Lassi and keep bottles of it in my fridge at all times!
This sounds St…U..NNING! and I’m a bit ‘salty’ that it wasn’t at LUSH when I was (just) there. Or even saltier if it was… and I overlooked it.
I would wear this in a nanosecond. And I’m thinking a trip to LUSH (AGAIN!) is in my near future.
I need to see if my local Indian offers them. I’ve actually never eaten in at the place — just gotten takeaway. Or just try to make my own…
Ooooooh this sounds like another Lush winner! Maybe I’ll make the drive to Albuquerque before I get my windshield replaced — it’s taken two gravel hits on that drive and is now completely cracked. Orrrrrr I take the lazy route and just order some. I’ll have to look at Harvest Gold since Dina and I like many of the same things. We are definitely shifting into fall here, weather-wise.
and I meant to add — we had a Soda Stream, my kids LOVED it. It went to Maine with them, I don’t know if they’re still using it.
I think my friends have a Soda Stream. They also had every coffee gadget under the sun 🙂
Can you drive with a cracked windshield? Here, you’re ok with a small chip but anything else will get you stopped if you’re unlucky enough to be caught.
I will try Harvest Gold next Lush visit. It was still school hols when I went and very busy. Schools return (state schools) this week.
Technically it’s illegal, and if I were pulled over for something else I’d get a citation. But given the overall state of vehicles (and everything else) here, they haven’t bothered.
Our local grocery sells bottled fizzy waters in a large variety of fruit flavors. My husband and son love them. I should get him a machine for a gift. It would save all that plastic.
I recently did an online Lush order and got Grass bath gel as well as Harvest Gold. I’m enjoying them both. Your Mango Lassi sounds very yummy. As a kid orange Creamsicle were never my favorite. To me orange and vanilla didn’t go together. I preferred the fudgsicle or the chocolate covered vanilla ice cream.
I believe, at least in NYC, you used to be to get seltzer deliveries of glass bottles in wooden boxes.
Ice cream sandwiches were great too 🙂
Loved ice cream sandwiches as a kid!
TOTALLY into fizzy water here Cinnamon. We had a Soda Stream when we were kids and loved it. I was reminiscing to Jin about it a few years ago and then got a surprise one for a Birthday/Xmas/Anniversary and it gets so much use in the house. We both love it, just plain fizzy water. Now our friends have started asking for it and many have bought their own.
MANGO LASSI! You have no idea how much I love them. In the mango season mornings in Delhi the mango man (Aahm Wallah) would walk down Varun’s street yelling AAHM! I’d be down buying the enormous, sweet, juicy, lightly sun warmed mangoes by the dozen. We’d eat them till we were full and then the house boy would make lassi for the afternoon. Blissful memories.
Portia xx
Wow! I am very behind the curve, it seems. They are great machines and I really do love the cake addition.
We have a really good Indian restaurant in the next town over but I’ve never had one of their lassis. Need to remedy that I think. That sounds amazing on the street vendor of mangos. What an experience.