Climbing the Mango Trees: A Memoir of a Childhood in India by Madhur Jaffrey

Climbing the Mango Trees: A Memoir of a Childhood in India Reviews

• 
  Jennifer

  For fans of Madhur Jaffrey's cookbooks, this memoir will be, well, ... weird. I have been a fan for years, ever since I picked up one of her cookbooks while living in London. She has come to feel very much of a household presence for me, and I have felt intimately acquainted with her for years through cooking and eating her family's recipes. (Which are all DELICIOUS, by the way....) I had seen some excellent reviews of this memoir on amazon, and confidently suggested it to my book club when I saw it on a list of available books in our library's book club kits. I don't regret reading it, but I also don't regret the fact that this is a book that will go back to the library instead of on my bookshelf at home. It showed such promise in the onset, but in the end, felt like one of those 4th of July firecrackers that is just a dud. A big rocket of light into the sky and then "pffffffszzzzz"--a quiet, empty poof. I am not sure what happened for me here.......I love memoirs, and I love Madhur Jaffrey, so what could go wrong?
  
  First of all, I strongly suspect that I would have liked this more had it not come on the heels of two very excellent book club reads, Jeanette Walls "The Glass Castle" and Jhumpa Lahiri's "The Namesake". These works are hard acts to follow for any memoir or book about an Indian family story. Having said this, I found myself frustrated because this book was not introspective enough for me. I always feel that there is a fine line with memoirs, between an author's self-focused indulgence of sharing their own inner process and story versus an external focus on their own memories of people in their lives that the reader doesn't care about. For me, this book suffers from the latter indulgence. To be quite honest, I wanted to learn about Madhur's experiences, thoughts, and feelings....not about her extended family members and what they wore and ate and said. I kept waiting for Madhur's personal story, and it never came. In fairness to the book, it IS exactly what it says......a Memoir OF A CHILDHOOD in India. Unfortunately for readers, this book isn't about the development of her interest in cooking, or the story of meeting her husband or finding her way in life, or growing old......it was about her childhood and her family lore, which left one with the distinct feeling that this book would be far more enjoyable to those who are mentioned in it than it was to me. This book is so WEIRD..... it is the equivalent of Lance Armstrong writing a book about his childhood in which he mentions riding a tricycle one day, but then focuses on anecdotes about his parents and cousins and grandparents. Who cares?
  
  I am admittedly disappointed, but am excited about cooking some of the recipes in the back of the book for my book club. In the future, I will stick to Madhur Jaffrey's cookbooks, my favorite of which is "World Vegetarian".
  
  On a positive note, I love the photographs interspersed throughout the book. Without them, the reader would truly struggle to even care or keep up with the extended family. Additionally, the recipes in the back are a nice touch. She does such a delightful job reminiscing about the foods they ate, and describing the aromas and flavors, that it is a treat to see that the reader may experience this too. Indeed, this is the real bread and butter of the book for me. (no pun intended!)
  
  
• 
  Aubrey

  This was an unexpectedly delightful breath of fresh air. Much like my most enjoyed Netflix show of the moment, 'Ugly Delicious', this work takes on my recently developed passion for cooking in a way that actually acknowledges the real world, refusing to confine the spectrum of food to a stance wholly white and wholly male. True, the cooking only really came near the end with Jaffrey's litany of recipes, but there was such a wonderful mingling of history, family meals, and coming of age in the rest of the narrative that I never felt that I was missing out on much. Indeed, considering the expense and work that goes into these recipes, I can't see myself having the means to make them any time soon. As such, I feel that I did better to come to Jaffrey without having previously known her for her culinary fame, as I had more of an eye on a holistic memoir than something completely devoted to food. It just goes to show that I haven't completely lost my heart when it comes to the more casual genres of writing. My tastes are just more globally comprehensive than most.
  
  India's one of those many countries that I've spent a good amount of time attempting to become familiar with and failing miserably for the most part. Jaffrey's memoir was more of a casual stroll compared to works that I've previously engaged with such as
  The Discovery of India and
  Women Writing in India, and so it was rather rewarding to learn about the Mughals and the Partition and the various strains of food collectively known as "Indian" without too much of a struggle. It's a shame that a large portion of this work's audience didn't appreciate this part as much. I suppose they want their chai tea and their naan bread and their tikki masala (I don't think there was even any mention of this last one) without the politics of bloodshed and imperialism that drove such cuisines to become what they are today. For example, if rendered monolinguistic, naan bread and chai tea become, respectively, bread bread and tea tea. India's large enough and old enough to fend for itself these days, but it wouldn't hurt for the average reader on this site to have a deeper appreciation of what made "curry" powder pop up in the "ethnic" section of their grocery market in the first place. It'd help prevent linguistic tragedies like the ones above, that's for sure.
  
  One last thing I want to mention is the surprising and gratifying mention of the artist
  Amrita Sher-Gil, whose autobiographical compendium I've been on the look out for for some time. It's small shout outs like these that tell me I'm on the right path when it comes to autodidactism beyond the customarily narrow span of things, even if it's as simple as an esoteric name drop in a memoir written by a popular celebrity chef. Food can never be cut off from its origins, however hard white people stuffing quinoa into bahn mi may try, and it's works like these and the show 'Ugly Delicious' that gives food back to the people who worked and sweated and often literally bled to both create edible splendors and, more simply, feed the people. I doubt I'll be able to make Jaffrey's recipes any time soon, but the next time I eat "Indian" food, I'll at least be able to better appreciate it.
• 
  Zumi

  I devoured this book. This was a nostalgic journey through the privileged India of the early twentieth century. I got so engrossed, it was as if I had metamorphosed into the young girl who ran around orchids and kitchens and large rooms, ever inquisitive and all-absorbing. This book has rich descriptions of the food, heritage, lifestyle and architecture of the older India. One amusing thing is that, so far I was under the impression that Madhur Jaffrey is a famous Indian male chef and I was shocked to see the young girl in the various photographs and it was news to me that she had dabbled with the Indian theatre before diverting to cookery and cookbooks. Even now I dont know much about Madhur Jaffrey as the book abruptly ended at her early adulthood. I am eager to know of her further journey. I am planning to Google and find out more about her and I fervently wish she wrote more books (other than cookery books). This book will have a prominent place in my to-read-again shelf.
• 
  Rebecca

  A warm and comforting read . I was reminded of my own ancestral home and the variety of dishes I had in my childhood. Loved the chapter construction (small chapters) and the titles of the chapters..
• 
  زينب مرهون

  يقول أورهان باموق:( الأدب هو موهبة أن نحكي حكايتنا الخاصة كما لو كانت تخص آخرين، وأن نحكي حكايات الآخرين كما لو كانت حكايتنا الخاصة)..ماذا يعني لك أنت تنتهي من سيرة وتجد نفسك بين دفة سطورها؟..هذا ماحدث معي وأنا أقرأ هذه المذكرات، المذكرات التي وهبتني في استذكار طفولتي التي مضت..أؤمن جداً أن السير الذاتية وحدها من تمنح للأمكنة وهجها..في هذا الكتاب تسترجع مادور جافري تفاصيل طفولتها العذبة لتنقل لنا بصور مكثفة عن الحياة التي عاشتها مع عائلتها تحت ظل شجرة المانغا، الشجرة التي حملت سيرة تاريخ العائلة بتاريخ ثري جداً وحافل يمتد من جيلٍ إلى جيل..إنّ أكثر ما أعجبني في قراءة هذه السيرة الروح المتسامحة التي تحملها مادور نحو أبناء بلدها برغم اختلاف الطوائف، ناشرة لنا معنى الحب و الوفاء الذي تحمله لبلدها برغم التمزق الذي حدث في فترة انقسام الهند بعد خروج بريطانيا، وبين التوترات التي حدثت بين أبناء الهند أنفسهم ( المسلمين والهندوس ) وكيف غزت هذه التوترات داخل المدارس وفرّقت بين الطلبة، لتنسج مادور من هذه السيرة مشاعرها وقوتها وعدم تعصبها من خلال تأثرها بالأب الروحي" غاندي " حيث كان مطلبه الأساسي أن لا يتم تقسيم الوطن..في هذا الكتاب تحدّثت مادور عن الاختلافات التي كانت منصبة بكل مايختص بالتراث الهندي والقصص الأسطورية مروراً بالزي التقليدي الهندي إلى الاحتفالات الدينية والرقص الخاص بهم لتنتهي بأسرار الط��خ الهندي ورائحة التوابل العالقة في الذهن..( أكثر ما آثر في داخلي وتركته لي مادور من هذه السيرة؛ بأنها جعلتني أحن إلى طفولتي والتمني بأن لا أكبُر..عندما كنتُ في سن السابعة كنتُ مع كل صباح أصحو فيه وأذهب إلى المدرسة، اعتدتُ أن أذهب إلى خلف المنزل وأصبّح نفسي برؤية الشجر الأخضر الممتد وهو يُظلِّل جميع منزلنا، كانت روحي تنتشي برؤية هذا الشجر وهو يكبر مع كل سنة أكبرُ فيها ، إنّ وجود اللون الأخضر في المنزل كان أشبه بالقصيدة التي تهب لي أسمى معاني الحياة..كما اعتاد والداي في كل صباح عندّ ذهابي إلى المدرسة أن يقدما لي رسالة تذكيرية " لا تنسي اقتناء الزبيب "،فكان عند والداي إيمانٌ راسخ بأن إذا لم آكل سبع حبات من الزبيب لن تركز المعلومة وسأنساها حين أتسلم ورقة الإمتحان، الاهتمام الذي جعلني أشعر بأني أميرة حقاً..كانت مكافئتي في كل عصرية: أمي وهي تغزل لي أنا وأخواتي أطواق من الياسمين، كانت أمي تدركُ جيداً ببناتها و بماذا يفكرن أو يريدن، كانت فرحتي أنا وأخواتي لا تُضاهى، مع الأسف الشديد أنّ كل هذا الشجر تم اقتلاعه من منزلنا، الاقتلاع الذي ترك في منزلنا معنى الفراغ الموحش..وأنا أرى الصور التي حملتها مادور من ذاكرة رائعة كنتُ أتذكر في كل جمعة من كلِّ مساء أمي وهي تخرج جميع صورنا، الصور التي حملت الكثير من خزائن الذكريات الرائعة، فبالرغم من تكرار مشاهدتنا للصور في كلِّ مرة لم نشعر بالملل أبداً أو فقدان متعة المطالعة، لا أعرف لماذا الآن اختفت هذه العادة، أو لماذا فقدنا كل هذه التفاصيل الدافئة؟..في نهاية الكتاب تقدِّم مادور لقرائها مكافئة ثمينة ولذيذة جداً؛ وصفات من المطبخ الهندي، الوصفات التي أخذت مقاديرها من أفراد عائلتها ومن التقت بهم في مسيرة حياتها..في هذا الفصل بالتحديد تُعيد بي مادور إلى أول مرة حينما دخلتُ فيها المطبخ وكيف فشلت في اتقان الوصفات، كنتُ كثيراً ما أعبّر استيائي لأمي التي كانت تقول لي دائما: حاولي مرة واثنتان، صدّقيني لن تفشلي في هذه المرّة..اتبعي دائما حواسك حينما تقومين بالطهي، إنّ من أسباب نجاح الطهي هو اختيارك الجيّد للتوابل، ثمَّ لا تنسي ياصغيرتي أن مسألة الطّهي فعل حُب إذا لم تحبي هذا الشيء مُطلقاً مؤكداً أنّكِ ستفشلين فيه حتماً..في الفترة التي كنتُ أقرأ فيها الكتاب، كنتُ أسمح لنفسي بالاستمتاع بين كل فصل رؤية الهند من زواية " الجزيرة الوثائقية " و عدسة رحلات باب " المشروع الكويتي المتخصص في الرحلات الثقافية وتحويل الكتب إلى سفرات حقيقية تقرّب جداً من القارئ، فبمجرد رؤيتي لتلك الصور تحت وسم #الهند_المثلث_الذهبي في "الانستغرام" أو مشاهدتي للأفلام الوثائقية أشعر أن فعلاً روحي سافرت وتعرفت على الكثير من الأسرار التي تحملها هذه البلدة.. )أخيراً..مهما تكن الأماكن التي نعيشها مع كل كاتب من خلال هذا السفر الروحي ويتركون في دواخلنا ذكريات مدهشة لاتغيب من الذاكرة، سنعود لواقعنا ونحن مؤمنين تماماً أنّ الذكريات التي حملناها ونحن أطفال صغار وتركت فينا أثراً بالغاً من الحنين أجمل بكثير ولا شيء يمكن أن نستطيع وصفه فهو أعمق بكثير جداً..( سيرة تستحق أن أقضي وقتي فيها بكل متعة )..
• 
  Adina

  I like books about food. I like books about India. and I like a good "growing up in ___" story. But this book didn't really any of these things well. There are many ellipses and allusions when it comes to the real drama. They are taken up but then brushed aside with a description of tomato ginger potatoes.
  I loved the food description, and even how the culinary tradition of Delhi changed after partition (from dominantly muslim cuisine of the old city to creamy Punjabi). But partition, which she notes killed 1 million people, is only touched upon. The riots literally happen a street over but never come to her home. Real drama happens in the other room or is touched upon "they waged a war against my family", she says, ominously, but never details. I suspect there are living people she does not want to offend.
  
  It left me hungry for Indian food (yay! there were recipes in the back!) and hungry for more details of the dramas of her life that lead her to leave india, pursue acting, and then become one of the first voices of Indian culinary tradition in the West.
• 
  shruti

  We all know Madhur Jaffrey can write a mean cookbook and we all know she can act. But did you know she can write beautiful prose too? This memoir of her childhood is richly evocative, sprinkled with memories of family and food and everything in between. And food, oh the food. Do NOT read this book hungry, it will cause you to arrive at your destination and demand to be fed immediately (not that I did that or anything.)
• 
  شيماء الوطني

  هنا أنت تفتح حواسك لتتذوق وتشم وترى وتحس وتسمع ، أنت لا تقرأ تاريخ عائلة ولكنك تقرأ تاريخ أمة !
• 
  Suzanne

  “My grandfather had built his house in what was once a thriving orchard of jujubes, mulberries, tamarinds, and mangoes. His numerous grandchildren, like hungry flocks of birds, attacked the mangoes while they were still green and sour. As grown-ups snored through the hot afternoons in rooms cooled with weeded, sweet-smelling vetiver curtains, the unsupervised children were on every branch of every mango tree, armed with a ground mixture of salt, pepper, red chilies, and roasted cumin.”
  
  Is your mouth watering yet? Reading Climbing the Mango Trees is as much a culinary expedition as it is a childhood memoir. Madhur Jaffrey’s upbringing as a child of a higher-caste family in India is fascinating for it’s social and historical details, but the icing of the autobiographical cake, has got to be the food.
  
  A food writer/actress by profession, Jaffrey knows how to appeal to our all our senses with a flair for entertainment. I enjoyed the stories of her family and her childhood. With her grandparents firmly at the center of the large household, Jaffrey grew up in the same dwelling as aunts, uncles and numerous cousins. As a reader, we get a glimpse of the challenges of navigating the egos of a large family, as well as the cultural and religious differences of her private school classmates. When India becomes an independent state, with a separate Muslim state called Pakistan, those differences have a large impact on India as a whole, and on the young Madhur Jaffrey. It’s these insights that make this memoir especially appealing to me.
  
  Her stories, interwoven with her memories of the wonderful meals she enjoyed, make this a delectable read. I’ll have to keep my copy of Climbing the Mango Trees shelved with my cookbooks now because Jaffrey includes over 30 family recipes in the book. I am eager to try them! 3 1/2 stars.
• 
  thelastword

  I regretted buying this book. The title, cover, and synopsis were all massively deceiving. The story is incoherent and the recipes are so sparse and simple that I felt cheated even though I bought it on sale. The writer could not stop droning on about how proud she was of the particular 'caste' she belongs to. A system that no-one should ever be allowed to talk about with such disturbing relish. At one point she managed a disparaging remark about Hijabis and that was pretty much all we saw about anything outside of her Hindu 'caste'.
  
  Perhaps she appeals to the Indians of India is some way, but if the rest of the world has to judge her by her 'memoir', she sounds like a self-centered racist brat whose never lived beyond the boundaries of her family and her family's house.
  
  Because I could not bear to look at this deceiving cover, I donated it to a Library. I regret that too; some poor soul is going to borrow it and be subjected to pages filled with nonsensical rambling and silly recipes.
  
  Strictly for her fans or for people with low blood pressure looking for new methods to heighten their blood pressure levels.
• 
  Jennifer

  3.7
  
  Mood: Watercolor-ed memories of a unique childhood in India.
  
  Caveat: Do not expect Madhur Jaffrey to air her family's laundry, things are alluded to but never fully come into light. Some readers are going to find that puzzling, but honestly considering Madhur provided lovely descriptions of India and her experience of growing up there, I was okay with it. Clearly she wanted to write something but decided not to take the road of airing family grievances.
  
  Read if you want/need: delicious food descriptions, like food memoirs, something that won't leave you full of dread, a little slice of life that is not really interested in teaching you lesson but just telling you their story as they want to, need some armchair traveling.
• 
  Rhode PVD

  I got this as a gift and turned my nose up at it, until one day had absolutely nothing else... So it was a desperation read for me. Within a few pages I realized what a fool I had been! It's a marvelous book with family lore, regional history and women's history all wrapped up in a tasty feast.
• 
  Lujain

  سيرة جميلة للغاية ، سرد رائع مُفص��ّل بمهارة ولا يتخلله أي ملل.
  لم أتوقع أن أحُبّ الكتاب إلى هذه الدرجة أم أن النهاية
  جعلتني عاطفيَّة؟
  حياة مادور فاتنة مما جعلني أغبطها قليلًا، أتمنى أن يصل الكتاب لعدد أكبر من القرّاء لأنه مظلوم ويستحق الشهرة .
• 
  فاطم♡

  بعد أربعمائة صفحة تحت ظلال الهند بين دلهي وكانبور حيث تقطن مع ‏عائلة هندية لترى أسرارها ، تقاليدها ، طريقة العيش والأعياد والزيجات وكل تلك الطقوس والرحلات نحو جبال الهملايا ومراحل الحياة لمادور من الطفولة للمراهقة وسن الشباب ، الى ان أصبحت طباخة وأم مبهرة ، الكثير من الدهشة والأطباق اللذيذة بين طيات تسلق اشجار المانغا ، سيرة ذاتية لن تندم على قرائتها يوماً ما .
• 
  Morgan

  Beautiful story of an abnormal childhood in India. Jaffrey's variety of influences is unique and the way she expresses these influences through taste is truly engaging. I learned a lot about foods, history, and Indian culture.
• 
  Catullus2

  A fascinating memoir which also serves as a social history of upper-middle class family life during mid century India. The descriptions of food made me hungry!
• 
  Rachel C.

  A lovely memoir from Madhur Jaffrey, groundbreaking food writer and actress. As expected, the culinary details were vivid and mouthwatering.
• 
  Beth E

  I really enjoyed this book and had trouble putting it down. It's an interesting look at like in Delhi and India pre-Partition.
• 
  Lori

  I dare u to read this book without the desire for Indian food. I didn’t know about this authority on Indian food prior to reading this book but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I learned about history(and religions)of India, Madhur’s large extended family and food. There is a large recipe section and I look forward to attempting some of these recipes.
• 
  Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all)

  An enjoyable read with some mouth-watering family recipes (or near equivalents) at the back. I only knew Jaffrey from her cooking programmes of the 1980s on the BBC--and her publishers' penchant for re-issuing the same collection of recipes over and over at ten-year intervals, under different titles and with slight differences in illustrations and front matter.
  
  The child of privileged parents of the administrative caste in Delhi, Jaffrey takes us into their world of family compounds, shared meals and festivals, picnics and parties--and food, glorious food. It's interesting that while she enjoyed hanging around in the kitchen and watching it all happen, she never got stuck in and helped out. They had many servants, and yet her mum and aunties did a lot of the cooking to get it all just right. She never seems to have actively participated until after she failed a cooking exam in highschool.
  
  And that's what's missing here. We learn absolutely nothing about her adult life, how she became the Madhur Jaffrey of the cooking shows etc. In fact, as autobiographies go, it's very superficial in spots. Partition is touched upon, but we are given the impression that it didn't have much impact on her family. Oh, yes, they were apprehensive and scared, and one of their neighbours was shot dead (!) but the greatest impact on her little world seems to have been the self-segregation of the girls at her school.
  
  However, Jaffrey freely admits that in her Hindi composition class she romanced instead of writing the serious compositions required, inventing people she admired, inventing "perfect" summer holidays instead of saying "We stayed in town and hung around devastated by the heat" or whatever. So how much of this autobiography was edited, sanitised, or invented? We are made aware of hostile undercurrents in the extended family (Shibudadda's disastrous marriage and cavalier manipulation of the children's loyalties) but she is content to hint and nod and say no more. I'm not saying I wanted all the gory details, but it shows a certain passive aggression on her own part that she brought it up at all, if she wasn't willing to discuss it.
  
  I had hoped to know more about her professional career and move away from India, but the book comes to an abrupt end just as she stands on the brink of adulthood--not rounded but chopped off short. Disappointing.
• 
  Rachel Brown

  A food-centric memoir of growing up in a huge Indian family in and around Delhi. Jaffrey became a teenager when India got its independence - a time of joy and horror, as the country gained its freedom and then tore itself apart in the violence that came with Partition.
  
  But Jaffrey's childhood was more happy than not, despite the presence of a low-key but appalling family rift caused by an uncle's emotional abuse of his own children and favoritism of some of his nieces and nephews. There's not a lot of drama but a great deal of humor, well-observed family dynamics, and a wonderful sense of place and time.
  
  Jaffrey grew up to a famous food writer, and her memories are full of the scents and tastes and family rituals surrounding food. It's impossible to read without getting hungry. And by relating the food to its role in culture, family history, and personality, the food itself becomes the story.
  
  Though she mentions some horrifying accidents and tragedies, albeit in an understated way, the overall mood of the story is one of nostalgia for a flavorful and largely fondly-recalled childhood. Though Jaffrey was something of a misfit, by the end of the book she's beginning to find her own voice and destiny. Amusingly, she never cooks anything good in the entire book - but she eats well, and remembers well. The rest, we know, is history.
• 
  Liza

  What on earth... so many favorable reviews. I had to give it one star because there wasn't a BARF option. I'm quite mature and eloquent, I know - no need to respond.
  
  This book as concept sounds great - portrait of an extended family living on one compound under a patriarch, during partition and told from the p.o.v. of a foodie (as I understand it, Jaffrey is the Martha Stewart of Indian cookbooks). So far, I'm totally on board.
  
  And then I have to read the words as Jaffrey has assembled them and good god... if I ever read another metaphor about 'the taste of honey on my tongue'. Her writing is mechanical, yet flowery. The majority of her paragraphs end with a 'profound' line (ie. "I could even hear the honey on my tongue."). They never felt natural, more like she had built the book outward from a few favored, flowery sentences.
  
  The book jacket, paper & typeset are beautiful (and I don't usually go for that sort of thing). For those reasons alone I'll be keeping this book on the shelf.
  
  
• 
  Patricia

  Madhur Jaffrey's clear, delicious, and reliable recipes are much loved at our house. The memoir also reflects her talent for clear and evocative writing. Jaffrey vividly conveys pleasures of taste and color. The memoir was frustratingly choppy though. Even the frequently evoked themes of learning and taste didn't quite manage to hold to together fascinating but disparate themes. The chapters usually fell into short chunks that often skimmed across topics that deserved more thorough development. The personal, child's eye view of Partition, for instance, was potentially powerful but much too brief.
• 
  Amanda

  After coming to the near-end of chapter seven and still not finding the story compelling, I have decided to stop climbing the mango trees. I rarely stop reading a book with the intention of never picking it up again but I don't think I will continue this one. If you have read it and think I should keep going, let me know!
  
  It was interesting to read about the lives of wealthy Indians, as so many stories focus on the tragic poor of that nation. The family was sweet and the food references were fun. For now, I will look for mangoes in greener orchards.
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  Sofia

  An entertaining glimpse into Brahmin Indian life with, as expected, a dominant interplay of food. What a period to have grown up in India - the time of Partition - and what a lifestyle - picnics of 50 caravanning with servants to the hill country; extensive, planned gardens with flowers, fruits and vegetables galore; private performances of music, dance and theater... And as expected, the traditional, multi-generation, extended-family living virtually together with the resulting joys and complexities.