Of Persimmons and Prickly Pears
I haven’t been doing my standard quota of wandering around outdoors this time of the year, but the two places I go to pick wild persimmons have both been developed over the last few years, and I’ve yet to find a new patch. So when I was wandering around the local Shoppers Food Whorehouse, and I ran across a patch, I bought one. It sat on the standard kitchen fruit plate until I noticed it was starting to go soft.
Now there are two main types of persimmons, the type that you have to let get mushy soft before you can eat them, and the type that you can eat firm. The wild ones I find are (I assume) the type that has to get mushy soft, usually after the first frost. The type sold in stores can be eaten while still firm.
Usually.
You can probably guess what happened. I got back from a little hike in the park and noticed said persimmon was getting a mite soft. Being the use-it-all-up-and-make-soup-from-the-bones person that I am, I started in on it. For the record, the first bite is sorta sweet, and then the sour cotton-mouth kicks in. Hard. Wow, I’ll never do that again.
For the record, the soft mushy part is a pretty good cure, but the pucker is still a bit around, now about a half hour later.
The other find this week was prickly pears over at a new store called ?Foodway? (not munged, because you would have no idea otherwise)
Foodway opened up in a store that was formally a tiny, obsolete Safeway (not munged either, I have no idea what to name it) that closed down a few months after the huge new Shoppers Food Whorehouse opened up down the street. I think it’s owned by Koreans, but targeted towards Hispanics.
It’s just inside the beltway. Some things there are really cheap, some things are extra expensive. Never buy pet food there when you can buy it next door for half the price, for instance.
It’s my first time trying prickly pears, and they’re really good. I slice them down the middle and scoop out the bright red flesh with a spoon. It looks like undifferentiated pomegranate, (I eat the seeds and all), but tastes closer to watermelon. Really good watermelon. I haven’t tried the green ones yet though. Perhaps they are for huevos ranchos, although I thought that dish used the the peeled pads.
Other cool stuff there include the live Tilapia fish tank, and my favorite fish sauce (Golden Boy brand) for only $1.29 a bottle. What a steal! I’d happily pay four times that amount.
