I got a digital camera for Christmas! Now I can resume blogging. :)

I made potato curry on Christmas Eve. It was delicious, though it needed a generous pinch of salt to bring out the flavor. It was full of cauliflower and potato and crazy helpings of spices.







The finely-ground pepper is the product of my dad's new pepper grinder. It has a nice weight to it, a bit of heft. I can't wait to try his new rainbow peppercorns.

I ate my first passion fruit today. It was... a unique experience. I wish I had pictures right now! I took some photos with a disposable camera, but I won't have them developed for a while. When I get them, I'll upload them and whip up a post.

From my limited knowledge, I knew that passion fruit has to be cut in half. So I grabbed a plastic butter knife and started sawing away, expecting the flesh to give. But no! The fruit was hard and tough. As I pulled the knife away, I saw a shallow groove of purple running across the fruit's circumference like a girly belt.

With lack of other options, I stabbed it. Juice dribbled out from the stab wound and pooled on my roomie's dresser. In haste, I ran to grab a napkin and wiped up the mess. I pulled it open to reveal a bizarre sight: green seeds covered in sacs of yellow pulp, piled up inside the thick purple rind like a mound of frog's eggs. It certainly is the freakiest fruit I've ever seen!

The smell hit me at once. Passion fruit doesn't have a fruity aroma. Instead, it reminds me of pine sap! It's a strong scent that makes me strongly think of Christmas.

As for the taste: it's interesting. The fruit itself is semi-sweet and mostly pleasant. The oddness comes from the texture. I suppose the best comparison is crunchy caviar. There's no other way to describe it! While the seeds are hard and make loud crunching noises when eaten, the sacs around the seeds feel slimy. They're almost gelatin-like, but at least Jello has firmness(!).

Right now, I'm waiting for the roomie to come back so that I can show off my latest Weird Fruit Acquistion. She's going to freak.

I'm going to assume that all good little food bloggers know about FoodieView. But to those who don't: for shame!

FoodieView is an awesome recipe search engine. While some of the interface is a bit iffy, it's far better than trying to wade through Google's search results. FoodieView tends to link to major recipe sites; as a result, it acts as a far-reaching search for all of your recipe needs.

Now, it's not perfect. But it's pretty awesome. I found my Buck-eyes recipe from that site; I found plenty of fun ice cream recipes there, too. (My boss made light raspberry ice cream with a recipe found on FoodieView. Unfortunately, he neglected to give me any!)

FoodieView also has a "browse" function. So, if you're feeling up for Indian food, you can poke around in the Indian category and see if anyting strikes your fancy. My only gripe with FoodieView browsing is that it's somewhat disorganized. You're also likely to see the same recipe multiple times--with or without slight variations.

Nonetheless, I thought I'd share the love. I hope someone finds it useful.

My digital camera died. Woe!

My posting might be even more erratic than it is now; my lack of camera is really distressing. I want to take pictures of food!

Luckily, I got a picture of my Blogging By Mail package before my camera went kaput. Thanks to Tac-Tac-Tac! I'll post about it soon, I promise! It was lovely!

My roommate decided that ramen was not enough for her--she wanted a real pasta dinner. So, using available resources, she cobbled together a "chicken parmesan" facsimile.

I was both amused and hungered by her creation. She gave me a bite; it was surprisingly delicious.

-----

1 pack of ramen (the cheapest brand possible)
1 jar of tomato-based pasta sauce
1 hunk of cheese, grated
1 can of chicken (alternately, use leftover chicken strips from recent family dinner)

1) Remove ramen from package. Set noodle block in medium-sized bowl.
2) "Borrow" suitemate's hot-pot. Fill with water, then pour boiling water into bowl with the noodle block.
3) Let set for several minutes (approximately 5-7). The noodles should be al dente.
4) Spoon desired amount of pasta sauce over noodles.
5) Listen to your roommate laugh at you. Watch as she grabs her digital camera.
6) Stir in can of chicken, allowing sauce to completely cover the poultry bits.
7) Sprinkle grated cheese over the dish.
8) Enjoy!
9) Remember to return hot-pot.

My mom and I spent a Sunday afternoon creating mini Buck-eyes as thank you gifts for the people at her work. In return, I got to eat lots of doughy peanut butter and returned to college with dozens upon dozens of chocolate-covered morsels. Mmm!



There were hundreds of peanut butter balls that had to be rolled, frozen, and dipped. After rolling the first hundred balls, my hands smelled nutty and felt oily.



It was worth it in the end, though. All of my college buddies loved them--as did I. While they tasted kind of waxy the first day due to my heavy consumption of raw material (i.e., peanut butter and powdered sugar), they tasted fabulous the next day.

And the next. They disappeared not too long after that.

Wow! College is crazy. Food's definitely on my mind, but posting isn't. Sorry, gentle readers! I'll try to make it up to you.

OK, first of all: I joined the Blogging By Mail craziness that just recently ended. How fun! It was my first food blogging event, but hopefully it won't be my last. I sent off a package to a certain food blogger in Singapore. It hasn't arrived yet, but I remain hopeful. I still haven't gotten a package yet; I'm so impatient! I can't wait to receive it!

I learned from first-hand experience that shipping to Singapore is really, really expensive. I had an awesome four-pound package all ready to be shipped out two weeks ago; unfortunately, the tiny box would have cost me almost $40 to ship. So not affordable! I had to trim down the package to its bare minimum--how sad! Two pounds lighter, the package cost half as much.

I won't reveal all the goodies inside; I want it to remain a surprise. That said, I'll mention my favorite treat from the pack: a chocolate Moonpie! I was so excited to send that.

OK, here's another thing: cotton candy. Mm, mm. If that isn't typical southern fair food, I don't know what is! Speaking of fairs, our state fair is coming up soon. I'm hoping to get some fun pictures from that--deep-friend Oreos, anyone?

I packed the package up really nicely. I used paper ribbon and magazine ads and lots of fun stuff. I took some pictures of the first four-pound package. It's a nice spread. And even though my perfectly cropped and resized photos are in the My Documents folder at this very moment, I'm resisting the urge to post.

For now.

Sorry about the late post. I have about a hundred excuses, but I think I'd best leave them at the door.

Tonight, I cooked a red lentil soup. I got the recipe out of a nutrition magazine. Unfortunately, I had forgotten about one key facet of "nutritious" cuisine--the lack of salt. This isn't always a bad thing. It was tonight. Apparently, in red lentil soup, a lack of salt leads to a bland, albeit nutty, flavor. Ugh.



I had to improvise. I asked my parents what was missing. My dad said potatoes while my mom said sausage. With the help of my mini food processor, I threw both into the mix. My first thought as to the missing ingredient: cheese. My second thought was corn. I decided not to add the latter, instead opting to add some white aged cheddar and garlic.

I threw in garam masala! I threw in salt! I threw in more onions than the recipe suggested!

When I began, the clock read 5:30. It now read 7:20. I stared at the soup long and hard. By this point, my tongue was burnt and my taste buds had lost any ability to discern subtle changes in the soup's flavor. It was time to let my baby go and to heck with the consequences.



"Soup's up!"



Thankfully, my toiling paid off. The soup was delicious. We paired it with some homemade bread--lightly sweet and fluffy--and ate it lukewarm. The broth had turned green from the spinach; the nutty flavor of the red lentils was still apparent, but less overbearing. I was amazed by the transformation of the lentils. In the beginning, they were little orange disks, tiny and beadlike. After a long simmer, they had broken into crystalline shards. It was culinary magic.

The kitchen still smells like curry powder.

Summer is the best time of all to enjoy my favorite frozen treat.

Certainly, ice cream ranks up high on the list--as does every other country's form of ice cream, be it gelato or kulfi or shaved ice. But the sugars make me thirsty; the sticky clean-up is a chore. Let me tell you: for pure simple pleasure, nothing beats a Ziploc bag full of frozen grapes. No muss, no fuss, but totally delicious.

The grapes have a firm, solid texture that slow melts away to reveal soft, frigid fruit. The grapes' skin collects a layer of frost that sometimes grows to be inches thick. If you forget about the grapes and leave them in the freezer too long, the grapes turn into oddly-shaped, purple-or-green wads of ice.



The flavor is tart and sweet. At times, a frozen grape can be like an unripe persimmon in that the moisture is sucked from your mouth only to be replaced by the water from the melting ice. Other times, a frozen grape can alarm you with its sugary, granular texture.

Frozen grapes have no aroma; they burn your fingers with an icy touch if you hold them to long. But, man, are they good.



Other fruits that are good frozen include bananas (especially when coated in chocolate!) and most berries. Strawberries can turn out rather tart, so I tend to sprinkle them with a bit of Splenda before biting into them. I've tried to freeze oranges and apples--I love both--but neither turn out very well. How disappointing!

Freeze some grapes today! You'll be glad you did.

I had a whirlwind adventure today at World Market. I'd never been before, which may come as a surprise to those who know me. I'm such a junkie when it comes to foreign junkfood--especially candy!



I got quite a haul.



The Bernie Bott's Every Flavor Beans were interesting, to say the least. I'm doing a full write-up on those later--a short blurb would not do the flavors justice. Here's a preview: the bacon is burnt, the vomit is fruity, and the grass is oddly refreshing. I can't say I enjoyed eating the jellybeans, but I'm glad that I tried them.



The Deluxe Flake candy was a huge surprise. I've had it once before. The kind I had, however, wasn't "Deluxe." To separate it from the "normal' Flake candy, Deluxe Flake is coated with a chocolate shell, making the inside the flakiest part of the bar.

Flake candy is a great example of truth in advertising--the bar crumbles with every bite, leaving chocolate shrapnel in its wake. Unfortunately, this resulted in a messy floor which I'm sure will only exacerbate our ant problem. (Sigh.)

The chocolate was light and cloyingly sweet. I broke the bar in half to reveal a network of tunnels tracing through the bar. Inside, thin chocolate sheets had folded and curling into themselves, forming what looked like chocolate ant tunnels. It added a noticeable texture to the candy bar--pleasant, but unusual to my American tongue. (Unsurprisingly, Flake is an Austrailian candy bar.) I didn't really like the aftertaste, but the lightness of the bar was enough to satisfy me. For a gimmick--"Flake bars actually flake!"--it works well.

I bought two candies from Germany--a bag of "soft liquorice candy" and a bag of gummies. Both are produced by Katzen, a candy company with an adorable logo featuring a cat. Oh, yeah. Being that I love German food, I had high hopes. Besides: liquorice? Gummies? I'm so there!



The liquorice was the salty-sweet kind. Although I enjoy this type--to a certain extent--it was a bit unusual at first taste. After sampling a few squishy treats, my taste buds adjusted and I could enjoy the ride. The liquorice candies came in two shapes: straight-fish and arched-fish. I love the speckled, crystallized look the sugar gives the soft black candy.

The gummies were good, although I think the Japanese company Kasugai makes better ones in a wider variety of flavors. As is, these gummies came in various geometric shapes--diamonds, rectangles, and the like--and in varying shades of red, yellow, and orange. Each gummy had the German adjective describing their flavor embossed on the top. There were some cognates, the most notable being "Kiwi."

Sadly, many of the flavors were very similar to one another. The entire bag had a pan-tropical-fruit flavor that, while not unpleasant, wasn't anywhere near as awesome as I was hoping it would be. Still, they were tasty; I'll give props for that. I'm not sure I'd necessarily buy them again, however.

If I had a photo of the gummies, I'd put it here. Alas, the batteries of my camera died and I have to go sell an organ to afford some new ones.

The last candy, Aero, has yet to be devoured. I have high hopes for this chocolate bar. Other candy blogs have raved over Aero bars, kvetching about their unavailability on American shores. Well--we'll see! I have a sneaky suspicion that it will end up being another candy in which texture takes precedence over flavor (a la Flake).

Oh--I suppose you want to know how the Thai soup is? I haven't eaten it yet! I've always enjoyed Thai Spicy-Sour soup, though, so it's probably delicious. That's going to be my breakfast/lunch tomorrow--along with a delicious chicken sandwich. While making the sandwich, I got to break in my new mini food processor--hooray! It's both adorable and functional.

I have plenty of blog post ideas, so here's hoping to a long run for DBDtK!