Any friend of Alphonso the Mango is a friend of mine!

I adore alphonso mangoes, I really do! I've loved them as long as I can remember and they come right at the very top of my (very long) list of favourite foods. They used to be harder to find in the UK when I was a kid but these days, not only does nearly every Indian grocer and cash and carry in the country sell them, so too do some of the major supermarkets.

Only in season for 2-3 months alphonso mangoes are to those fat red and green simulacrums what the sun is to a 30 watt lightbulb. They put them to shame. Alphonso Mango for president!

Having remembered that the season was here at last, my number one plan for this morning was to head out and find my own box of manna from heaven. Luckily, our small local Indian grocery didn't disappoint.

Having bought my prize home, I managed to resist diving in until after we got back home from a (fruitless) excursion to find a small square cast iron garden table, made less disappointing by diverting for a very tasty country pub lunch.

For those who've never enjoyed an alphonso mango (also known as the afoos or hapoos mango) the flavour is so wonderfully sweet, so perfumed and heady that you will, on trying your first one, surely fall as deeply in love with them as me.

Be warned though that they ripen quickly and have a short shelf life. I'll be polishing off my box of 12 pretty fast!