Last
summer someone told me the best watermelons had a hollow sound with thumped.
This year people stressed looking for yellow patches to show it had been on the
ground a long time. I picked a great yellow-bellied, hollow one and near the
end I recalled how much I loved watermelon rind preserves the two or three
times I ever tried them.
I’d
heard they were difficult to make, but the recipe sounded easy. I think the
hard part is peeling the outer green off the rind. Here’s how I made a jar
full. I think it’s like stone soup because I kept coming up with more ingredients
out of nowhere:
Cut
up chunks of the peeled rind and cover themw with sugar, overnight. This will
form a liquid. I added a bit of water, then cooked it on slow heat until
tender.
I
used up several of those sugar packets that accumulate, and used honey water
from the bear bottle I got from my mother’s house. She had added water to get
the last bit out. While it was cooking, I figured peel from an orange I had
would flavor it nicely and add color. Some recipes call for cinnamon. I’ll need
to stock up this pumpkin pie season. I found some chai tea spice that I had
mixed up and put into a vintage salt shake and it worked fine.
My
preserves went on some French bread my friend had brought over and the rest
looks lovely in a Mason jar. I served it in a small, oval Homer Laughlin plate
that I’d just got for 75 cents at a Young Life estate sale. The plate matched
four others I bought at an antique co-op in The Heights in Houston, because
they remind me of dining at Aunt Anne’s house.
That’s
my tale of how one thing lead to another to remind me of another and resulted in coffee and
breakfast on my patio as the sun came out on a Sunday morning.
Oils
of note
I’ve
heard that avocado was once referred to as poor man’s butter. Now it’s gourmet.
There’s another time to speak of a perfect separation of the flesh from the pit
and the skin for a firm, cool bite. This is about the oil.
Chosen
Foods has put avocado oil into a spray can that works while you’re grilling.
It’s a high-heat and non-propellant spray. Makers say they use safe air
pressure technology that eliminates chemical propellants
and
other harmful ingredients. Chosen Foods avocado oil spray can safely be
heated
up to 500 degrees. But guess what? A spray of it tasted great on some lightly
grilled French bread.
Also
look into Chosen Foods’ Sesame Oil, billed as expeller pressed flavorful
finishing oil. It has a 4,000-year old history and is best kept in the fridge
and used within 6 months. Once you breath in the aroma you’ll be busy drizzling
onto noodles, vegetables and salads. Oil up now.
