Hey, remember when I said in a farm box post I was gonna do something special with banana peppers? You don't? Because nobody reads the farm box posts or gives a shit? Well, I got banana peppers in the farm box and decided to try something special with them.

You see, there's a food truck. I've mentioned it a couple of times. It's called Hola Arepas, and it's really good. And I have a professional colleague who is hooked on the place, and hooked on the mild version of their "Hola sauce". And when I mentioned I was going to try to make my own arepas, she challenged me to make my own Hola sauce, so I did some delicious research and a bit of Internet research and I took a pretty good stab at it over the course of two attempts and four banana peppers.

My Internet research told me that it was definitely mangoes and yellow peppers. Banana pepper are yellow. And about the right heat as the kind of yellow peppers often used in South American foods. From there I went by color and taste. My first attempt was brighter and less green, so I added parsley and cumin, which got the flavor more in line but ended up greener than the real thing. Close enough.

You'll need:

• 1 large mango (16 oz of chunks)
• 1.5 tsp salt
• 2 yellow banana peppers or medium Anaheims, seeded
• 1 large clove garlic
• 1 large shallot
• 1/3 cup white wine vinegar
• 1 tbsp cilantro leaves
• 1/3 c water
• 1 tbsp flat-leaf parsley leaves
• 1 tsp cumin

To make, just chop everything that needs chopping small enough to comfortably be blended, throw it in the blender, and puree the everl-loving shit out of it until it's smooth. You might need a little more water if your mango's not that ripe. It should be a fairly loose sauce.

Use on, well, anything where a mango-chile sauce would be good. I used some on Indian-tinged kabobs, and it was great.

Note that this is not the real thing, and should not be an excuse not to support a damn fine truck and get the real thing. This is methadone for locals who are between fixes, and a tasty treat for people who don't live here.