Cashew Nut Fruit

When I was growing up, summer is my favorite time because I get to visit my grandparents. They have a small farm but it is surrounded with fruit trees like mangoes, jackfruits, guavas, manzanitas, bananas, and cashews. The cashew trees somehow served as demarcation lines between properties because they are situated in the fence line acting as posts. The fence is made of barbed wires. Anyways, every time I go there, my cousins would invite me to collect cashew nuts. Cashew fruits are edible and we eat it like regular fruits. Some types are sweet some are not but we used sugar to sweeten it. Then we gather the nuts. When we have enough, we would start a fire in a makeshift stove made of three rocks, gather some dried branches or sticks, then placed the cashew nuts in a tin pan, also a makeshift frying pan and roast the nuts. Because the shell of cashew nuts are caustic, it will burst in flames like fireworks so we are careful not to be closed to the fire. As soon as the fire dies down, time to remove the pan from the fire stove, then we put sand over them so it will not continue burning the nuts inside. Then we get a hammer or rocks we can use to crack open the nuts and enjoy them. We really have fun those days! Too bad it did not stay that way anymore. I miss those days. This is a painting I did when I went home on vacation. I look for places with cashew trees. I did not see much but I was able to capture this in camera in one of the houses of friends I visited. I was inspired to paint it as an ode to my grandparents who were so industrious and great farmers. They served as an inspiration for me that is why I started gardening to emulate what they started. Not only I learned how to garden, I also learned how to really appreciate Nature and its bounty.