my two day project

I present the results of two days of work, the coconut cake. It is made with the finest flour, eggs and sugar. The coconut was harvested fresh from the shell, chopped and grated, and the coconut cream and milk were made from scratch. Coconut water was liberally spritzed. Frosting was beaten for seven minutes to achieve marshmallow-y fluffiness.



Maybe the cake was a good luck charm. It rained last night, actual rain that soaked the ground. It's nearly 10am and we haven't broken eighty degrees, so I'm hoping to air the house out a little.

want some peppers?

So my vegetable parcel arrived, in a gorgeous reusable shopping bag with pockets. (The brown and blue bag from Blue Avocado) It had a nice card, and a tiny little rosemary plant that I've potted and put on the window sill by my work space.

The fresh green beans look so good. They also sent two dozen peppers, including some fearsome looking scotch bonnets. I am trying to think of what I can do with all these jalapenos without killing Mike.

rain, peppers, mail box

Sweet gods above, those jalapenos are hot. Even de-seeded, roasted and pureed with lime juice they sting. I'm thinking those scotch bonnets must be deadly. Given how brutal and dry the summer has been, I probably shouldn't be surprised. But it has been some time since a taste of a jalapeno made me cough.

I'm thinking about drying most of them now, and saving for various things over the year.

Tonight's menu: tilapia marinated in lime juice, peppers and tequila with a side of black beans, rice & bell peppers, served with a coconut lime jalapeno cream sauce.

Just as I was thinking I should take Mike's blanket off the clothes line, it started raining. There was a nice ten minute shower.

Before the rain, I walked down to the mail box and experienced my first weird moment of suburban aggression. Walking back from the mail box was a middle aged woman who lived two doors down. She has two black and white, medium size dogs. (Think Australian shepard for the general size and shape.) She had both on leashes. When I was about one driveway ahead of her and she was almost to her home, she threw down the leashes. Both dogs bolted towards me. Fortunately I'm not so afraid of dogs and I've been around much bigger and scarier animals, even when one of them jumped up at me. But it made me wonder just what the hell that woman was thinking. For someone less comfortable with animals or even nervous, it probably would have been terrifying. Did she think they would run straight into the house? Or was it some weird act of aggression? Either way, it was ridiculous.

I greeted them with my standard "Hello puppies!" and petted each one. The woman impatiently called her dogs. Not once did she make eye contact or even look directly at me, nor speak. I wonder if it was because I was wearing my "Legalize Gay Cupcakes" shirt from Cupcake Royale.

My thumb is burning, burning from having peeled the roasted peppers. The burning!