You tap a maple, you get maple syrup. You cut into the flower buds of a palm tree, you get palm nectar that you can cook down into palm sugar. (Specifically, you can tap sugar date palms, sago palms, and coconut palms.) If you let the palm sugar dry out and go from a semi-liquid [...]
Continue reading about Skip the Sugar Beets and Go for the Palms
When I was a kid, every mall had an Orange Julius kiosk and every grocery store sported dry-mix packets of faux fruity milkshakes. (I absolutely loved those kiosks and those little packages.) I’m still a big fan of creamy fruit shakes, but nowadays I go the qualitarian route: whole milk plus suitable fruit (bananas, pears, [...]
Yes, when I get on a kick, I get on a kick. My current one is tiny plantains. They’re so cute! And so handily single-portion-sized. (Note: I mean “tiny plantains” as a descriptive term — you’ll find them under guises such as “manzano bananas” and “burro bananas” and any other official label attached to short, [...]
Continue reading about Plantains, Kiwis, and Other Tropical Treats
It’s always fun to discover new ways of using an established ingredient, like toasting almonds before using them (they’ll have a much deeper, nuttier flavor) or running sucanat through a coffee grinder to get a more natural form of powdered sugar (which you can use in chiffon cakes and meringues and icings exactly the same [...]
Continue reading about Toasting & Baking in a Tropical Kind of Way
“Oh, the weather outside is frightful”…so let’s pretend we’re someplace a bit more tropical with a refreshing smoothie in our hand. After this much snow, I’m okay with the idea of being a bit unseasonal and including a summery banana with a wintery pear. Using coconut milk rather than dairy is another good way to [...]
Continue reading about Sipping Summer & Winter Out of a Single Glass
Who cares about palm trees and sunny beaches when you’ve got wintery-white landscapes spread out before you and a mug of hot chocolate in your hand? (Though I admit it would be interesting to see snow-covered palm trees…okay, and I admit that it might be nicer to be on a sunny beach with a daiquiri…) [...]
When the weather gets chilly, the chilled make drinks with umbrellas in them so that we can pretend we’re lounging on a Caribbean beach…or at least imagine ourselves on a cruise ship heading towards the islands. The beauty of this drink is that you can make it as an exotic wake-me-up or add rum for [...]
This has to be the most interesting fruit I’ve come across in a while! It’s oblong-shaped, bright-hot pink, and the skin looks a bit like scales. (Think Stephen Cosgrove’s Serendipity dragon and you’ll get the idea.) It’s indigenous to Mexico and Central and South America, where it’s called pitaya. When the tips of the “scales” [...]
