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Comment by sph | Hacker News Reader

> there are street vendors in major cities selling special fruit that supposedly helps protect people from the potentially damaging effects of above-normal temperatures. [...] "Instead of the regular synthetic fruits, you know, the ready-made fruit juice which is harm[ful] to the health, these are good for your health as well and these are the only way that you can manage the heat."

What's this mysterious special fruit the article strangely forgets to name?

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Most likely Ice Apple [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borassus_flabellifer

Yep, most certainly. This is the first thing that came to my mind along with Watermelons and Wax apples [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syzygium_samarangense

Thanks for linking this. I've had this fruit before, fond memories of a childhood visit to Mumbai in early 80s. It's known by the Marathi speakers as "targolay". Its taste can be roughly described as a mix between a slimey coconut flesh with a distinctive sweetness found maybe in litchi fruit, but not as intensely sweet. Some rumour that it is intoxicating after a certain quantity - not sure about this. But it's a taste sensation unlike anything I've ever experienced since. Recent visit to Mumbai (2016) in Dec yielded nothing as explained by a dismissive street hawker: "tadgolay won't be found in winter". Much disappointed!

Well, there are many summer drinks, depending on which region you are in. Some of them are:

Aam Panna, Bel ka Sharbat, JalJeera, Shikanji, Neera, Ragi ambli, Jigar Thanda, Nannari, Kokam Sharbat, Coconut water, Chaach/ButterMilk, Thandai, Roohafza,

and many more...

I thought the rest of the article was equally lousy.

Quoting Death Valley temperature as only “99F” to make a point that Delhi is really fricking hot at this time. Well, Death Valley currently isn’t at its peak temperature and the summer has barely begun. It’s also not experiencing a heat wave.

The whole article appears to be GPT’ed.

It was weird how they brought in a climate change quote from a normal Chennai resident. I would have expected an expert to be quoted on that. I have no idea whether she is right or wrong, this year has seen a lot of anomaly, including both the poles heating up by 30C at the same time[1], and the researchers just called it anomaly and did not blame it on climate change. Probably just that kind of year, although you can never be sure.

[1]https://phys.org/news/2022-03-hot-poles-antarctica-arctic-de...

As some other comments have mentioned, South Asia has this concept of hot and cold foods that basically map to one of the sides of the four humors[0]. This classification seeks to define what the reaction of the body is upon ingesting the food/drink and I've always somewhat associated it with foods that can be inflammatory (hot) vs more neutral refreshing drinks (cold). Interesting to see it mentioned on HN

[0]https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Humorism.svg#/media/...

Nongu had this reputation in India 20 years ago. Probably the same statement. There was also a lot of “hot foods” / “cold foods” (not relating to temperature, I think milk was always a “cold food”) or something like that. At least I heard that from multiple people in Chennai / Madras.

Some common Indian "cool-drinks": - Sugarcane juice - Chhaanch (Butter milk) - Coconut water

Yup "nongu" as it is called in southern parts of India is commonly sought after in summer.

I also wonder what a “regular synthetic fruit” is?

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