Darienne

I was with my husband and two dogs, two hours out in a canyon in Utah (thus five hours from any help at all) when I thought I was stricken by a heart attack and was going to die. The pain was excruciating. I did not tell Ed. What would have been the point? I made my peace with the fact that at least I was dying in my favorite place in the world. Needless to say, I did not die. I suffered my first attack of GERD and nothing like it since. Prevacid was my drug of choice and I took it for a couple of months. That was 8 years ago, making me 61 at the time. Before that day I had NEVER EVER suffered any heartburnish upsets in my entire life. Never a Tums, never a Pepcid. Nada. I ate nails: I spit rust. Mostly I can get by by taking nothing, but just monitoring my foods. I can eat spicy, hot, acidic...what I can't eat is meat and legumes together. The day of my non-death, I had eaten a 'Cowboy Lunch' at a local Moab watering hole. However, having said that, I am currently on an obsessive Mexican kick which is giving me some trouble, so I have a trusty vial of Raniditine at hand for difficult times. Interesting enough, there is apparently no connection between legumes and GERD. Except for me. Borrowing from the British playwright, John Mortimer, 'I am still clinging to the wreckage'.

I freeze extra oranges quite regularly when we can't eat them in time. Zest the peel, break the oranges into sections, fast freeze them on a sheet, then pop into a bag. Later they'll be used in smoothies and Orange Juleps.

Waking up in the morning to the incredible smell of a pork shoulder cooking slowly all night in the slow cooker and knowing that pulled pork on a bun with smoky BBQ sauce could be for lunch.

Thanks for all the information, Theobroma. The farmer who plants our fields plants either hemp or ethanol corn and it's usually a surprise to us which he plants. Last year he told us corn...but then the hemp came up. We'll wait to see what it is this year. Maybe I can find someone locally who is planting cow corn if we don't have it. Then we can offer our unsuspecting guests Sleeping Excrement of the Lords for a tasty dinner dish.

Right. I was thinking of the meats and vegetables and all. My confectionery partner and friend Barbara cannot have anything with any pepper in it. Not even green peppers. I cannot imagine life without the numbing hotness of hot peppers. (Currently I have a container of DL's Aztec Hot Chocolate Ice Cream in the freezer. Not even my DH will eat it. I LOVE IT!) ps. We eat a lot of Chinese food at home and I was wondering what is the most important date of the Chinese New Year on which to celebrate?

How can anyone not like Hot Pot when it gives you such a vast array of choices?

And now today on Delanceyplace.com 'The cost of civilization'. Well worth reading.

I particularly like 'raven's excrement' as one of the possible sources for the word, Huitlacoche (Wikipedia). For two years, our hemp fields were planted in ethanol corn by the tenant farmer because of the glut on the market for his kind of hemp. Some of the cobs did have the amazing looking deformities on them and I had at the time no idea of what they were. Didn't touch them... Now I know. Now I could gather them and cook them. My question is: is there any other kind of deformed thing which grows on corn but which is poisonous? Or is it all smut?

Try this eGullet link for help with this problem.

If you count stuff found at our local transfer station, then we have found plenty. There's a large building at the transfer station in which you leave stuff you can't use and don't want, and pick up stuff you can use and do want. Like a free second-hand store. The list would be quite long in 15 years of dumping off our garbage and stuff we don't want, and includes a working VitaMix 3600 complete with manual.

Great idea...I never thought of it. Most of my recipes are printed, but not in plastic. The ones I use all the time are in plastic. However, at Staples, for about $.70, you can buy a heavy see-through plastic cover, open on two sides, and I simply take my recipe out of its binder and slip it into the plastic cover and then using a rare-earth magnet which is on a knob, I post the recipe on my stove hood to read it. But I do like the marker idea...

Black olives

Thanks Kerry, Strange that it's illegal in the state of NY, and yet is sold at the duty free. We'll pick some up in May I guess.

Hi Jaymes, Went back and looked at all the similar recipes online. Can't believe I've never even heard of such a dish. I see it is made a dozen different ways with pineapple in syrup and in juice. I think I'll hold on the maraschino cherries tho...hate them. Thanks.

I looked at this recipe over and over, thinking what on earth can this be? Sounds unlike anything I have ever made. Well, of course, I am going to make it. Oh, one question please: is the pineapple in syrup or in plain juice. Thanks.

Thanks so much for the durian photo. Someday I'll get one for sure. I know we have frozen durian in our local Asian market, but I can wait for the fresh. What an amazing life you have, living all over the world. Our son and his wife live in Halifax, one of the most civilized cities I have ever been in. Just love Halifax. The new buildings in your photo look just like the ones in Toronto.

Couldn't buy lotus nuts in the Asian market in Grand Junction last fall. In fact, they hadn't even heard of them. Next year, I take them with me. Love lotus nuts in soup!!

We can't buy Everclear in Ontario and most of the border states do not sell it either. Nor can we buy regular vodka in Ontario. All our vodka is triple distilled and the cheapest vodka you can buy is about $50.00 before taxes which are 13%. So that's that.

When it arrived, my husband said, "很黄很暴力" OK. What DID he say? Fascinating blog!

Have returned two misters because I couldn't get them to work, including a fairly expensive one. Now I'll buy one again and try it with the vodka trick. So ingenious!!!

Would this be the one? http://www.astray.com/recipes/?show=Tomato%20cheese%20souffle Kay Thanks Kay, There are lots of Tomato/Cheese Souffles, and I have made a couple. It was just my 'Mother's' Beaver Pudding I was looking for. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced it was simply my Father's nickname for it.

When I first joined eG, I asked about this recipe...but this is much later and here goes again. A tomato and cheese souffle my Mother used to make called Beaver Pudding. It might have been a family name for it...

Thanks Andie and Calypso for the information. I have bookmarked the website in my 'Mexican Cooking' folder. I began the process to register for RSS feed and gave up on page three or so of the requirements. I just don't understand the directions after a while and seeing as I have no 16 year lads in my life, I'll just give up and do it in a more manual fashion. There are a number of other blogs which I follow this way by bookmark. Thanks again.

For those who have never seen the inside of a Dragon Fruit:

Took a quick look at MexConnect and it looks good too. Now may be the time when I figure out how to get RSS feed. I see there is an explanation of how to do it.