Bombing Recipes and Licking Loofa

Hiiiyeeeeeeeee

Well…

It’s been a hot minute since I posted a blog.

…and I’m sure you’ve heard the rumors about jail time and rehab.

Let me just put the record straight…  I did NOT go to Grammar Jail.  That’s not a real thing regardless of what you’ve been told.  Maybe it should be, but that’s not for me to decide.

…and no, I did NOT go to Meme Rehab.  I love a good meme as much as the next person, but I can quit anytime I want.  I stopped using GIF’s…  I can totally walk away from memes too…

If you aren’t singing it in your head right now I’ve failed miserably in life.

So if I wasn’t in Grammar Jail, and not in Meme Rehab, where was I?

Well, I’ve been on an inner journey.

You know…

I’ve been to Nice and the Isle of Greece while I’ve sipped champagne on a yacht… I’ve moved like Harlow in Monte Carlo and showed ’em what I’ve got. I’ve been undressed by kings and I’ve seen some things that a woman ain’t supposed to see… I’ve been to paradise,but I’ve never been to me..

Soooo, yeah.  I’ve been sitting on the couch mostly.

My dog Dingo got sick and was nearly gone several times.

 

My time has been spent on sleepless nights and terrified trips to the doggie ER at 3AM…

Somewhere along the way I caught a complex meniscus tear.  yeah.  yay. I am determined I can fix it myself with sheer will power and a 2ft long ace bandage.

Stress eating + couch sitting + sleepless nights = weight gain too.

Oh yeah.

Fun times…

 

left knee pain has me walking weird… and my right foot is taking the brunt of it all.  It decided to act up with plantar fasciitis.

If you are unfamiliar with plantar fasciitis…  lucky.

Plantar fasciitis feels like someone beat the bottom of your foot with a hot bag of nickels.

It’s the only way to describe it, and I’m equally shocked about a plantar fasciitis gif…

So…  yeah.

Dingo is 4 billion percent better now.

Thank you for asking.

Through a combination of me having an incredibly hard head, and two different wonderful Vets… we found a cocktail of drugs to control Dingo’s “whatever it was” going on in his gut + his collapsing trachea. We may never know what the issue was, but if it comes up again we know how to treat it.

And…

-To the Vets who wasted almost 2 weeks of his life trying to convince us it was “neck pain” and prescribing ketamine… Special K…  (Mark was particularly aghast at me telling the vet I didn’t like Dingo being on the Date Rape Drug.)

and…

-To the Vet who told me at 4AM that I should start thinking about his “quality of life”…

This is for you…

It was NOT neck pain.

His quality of life is amazing.

🤨

I feel better.

It’s all a blur now, except one very vivid night…

Dingo was finally responding to his meds, and I had been awake with him for 3 straight days.

The drugs were working and I finally felt I could allow myself to sleep.  2 hours into a nice deep sleep Dingo wakes me up.

Panting.

Gazing off the side of the bed.

That’s when the words of the vet came back to me…

“Now, this medicine may cause upset stomach, bloating and diarrhea.”

Oh sure, it’s funny now to think about “12 AM me” trying to get a torn meniscus knee, plantar fasciitis foot and a loaded dog down a flight of stairs and out a door in time.

We made it down the stairs and out the door without any… eruptions, in case you were wondering. It wasn’t pretty or graceful, but it worked.

In case you think I totally abandoned food for these many months I didn’t.  I had an amazingly creative run in which nothing really worked out right.

That’s Black Sapote Jelly.

This is a Black Sapote.  Looks good doesn’t it?  When it gets rotten, it tastes like Chocolate. That’s when it’s “good.”

It made my innurds unhappy.

That’s all I’ll say about that.

I’m just thankful I didn’t have to rely on some joker with a bum knee and beat feet to get me down some stairs to the bathroom.

This is Rambutan.  It’s a very very mild tasting exotic fruit.  See how funny and furry they look?

Yeah, I wondered how the furry part tasted. As one does…

That sounds way dirtier than I meant it to.

Fried and candied.

For the record the hairs become brittle and break off…

in your throat…

and into your tongue…

and into the roof of your mouth.

It’s every bit as pleasant as you are imagining right now.  I guess that’s why fried candied rambutan skin isn’t a thing.

Who knew?

Well, I do, and now so do you.

I did something with Prickly Pears but for the life of me I don’t remember what I did.  There they are on my camera roll.

Pretty colors…

I think I tried a Prickly Pear  White Chocolate Ganache?

Apparently is was unspectacular in nature.

I definitely remember trying a Roasted Garlic White Chocolate Ganache which was a SPECTACULAR failure!

Don’t tell Mark but I spent an entire day trying to carbonate fruits with his SodaStream.  I’m not really sure what I was expecting, but nothing really happened.

Great, now he’s going to say “You didn’t tell me you did that!”

Right…

You didn’t ask.  As all my divorced friends tell me… “It’s easier to ask for forgiveness than permission.”

There were a few ideas that are almost there…

ALMOST…

A little playing around with these ingredients and I’ll be able to unleash something delicious.

Oven roasted ginger…

 

Candied Kalamata Olives…

Hey!  These are actually DELICIOUS! They just didn’t work in the cake I put them into…

Clemintine Candied Kalamata Olive Cake isn’t a thing yet.

The squirrels went CRAZY for this cake.

Theres something here, something fabulous… I just need to suss it out.

 

I see you all making that face.  Things only sound weird till it’s delicious.

Look at the egg.

WHO watched a bird lay an egg and thought “Humm.  I bet that’s good?”

Then there’s the loofa story…

I love shopping at stores which carry exotic foods and spices.  I love it if I literally have to google every label just to see if it’s something edible or not.  I was in one of those type stores recently and right smack dab in the middle of the produce isle was a huge cardboard bin full of loofa. I know in some parts of the world loofa is eaten…  so I assumed I’d stumbled onto the rich loofa harvest which was in season…

This loofa was no small shower loofa.  It was at least 2 foot long! What a prize! Gleefully I sent pictures to my foodie friend “Tara” (name changed to protect the innocent). She whole heartedly encouraged me to cook it up!

Somewhere along the line I got cold feet and started researching loofa consumption.

Yes, loofas can be eaten, but only when they are very young and tender.  They are usually cut up and stewed when they are still melons. When they get large, like this one, they are not edible.

“Tara” encouraged me to cook it up anyway.  I was hesitant, but thought to myself “what the hell…”

I decided to ease my way into the world of loofa cuisine with a lick first, you know, to test the waters.

Yup…

I gave it a full tongued hearty enthusiastic lick.

I also got my tongue totally exfoliated.

If it hadn’t been for “Tara” egging me on I’d never have done it.

…ok. So…  “Tara” didn’t actually egg me on.  She totally told me not to, and even had anxiety about me saying I was going to lick a loofa. I mean, who wouldn’t?

…but, I was sorta already committed.  I was there.  The loofa was there.  Why not?

WHAT IF IT WAS AMAZING?

I encourage you all to go lick a loofa. (…and by loofa I mean, whatever it is that will spark your creativity. …and by lick I mean, you know, don’t actually lick something dangerous.  Don’t lick a stranger either.  Well…  I’ll leave that part up to you. Wow.  This got awkward.)

I also encourage you all to be on look out for a slew of new recipes coming at you.

I’ve been out in nature foraging for things, and eating them… (and nobody has died yet! …my eyes did swell shut though but I’m sure that was just an allergic reaction.)