Musings

[jeshyr]

Sitting at the local park is good for the spirits I think. It does sometimes make me sad with might-have-beens but today it's just enjoyable and the weather is perfect.

Spotted a kid who I suspect had albinism - dead white hair, huge sunhat, very dark sunglasses with an elastic band to keep them on, and he moved as if he had low vision. It felt nice to spot 'one of us' playing, even though I didn't say hi.



Spotted this okra at the supermarket ... for the unbelievably expensive price of $13.88 per kilo. Flatmate almost died laughing at the price compared to the usual cost in Pakistan!! If it wasn't for pesky things like customs officials it'd almost be worth stuffing a suitcase full next time she went home, you could probably carry $350 worth of the stuff in one suitcase I think.

Will post this now - see if the post via email works.

R

Comments

[acelightning]

was that "small okra" perhaps "baby okra"? some people will pay ridiculous amounts of money for miniature tomatoes, capsicums, broccoli florets, etc. ("oh, aren't they cute?". or maybe it's all-natural organically-grown locally-farmed hand-picked, yadda yadda. or is it just out of season?

[jeshyr]

Nah it's more that Okra is not a standard vegetable we have in Australia, so it's "specially imported at enormous cost" Okra I suspect. Some indian/pakistani shops have frozen okra but the fresh stuff is almost never seen.

[acelightning]

i'm rather surprised, since it's ridiculously easy to grow okra. how do you like it cooked?

[jeshyr]

I've only ever eaten it fried from frozen and that was horrible honestly! My flatmate loves it thought, which is why I noticed the price.

And I must have been wrong about the imported stuff - when I look again the pic says PRODUCE OF AUSTRALIA so it isn't imported! Just specialty I guess :/

[acelightning]

yeah, okra is definitely an acquired taste, and i haven't acquired it either :-(

its juices turn very gluey or slimy when it's cooked in liquid, and the American "down South" stew called gumbo tries to turn that into an advantage, using it to thicken the stew. other people cook it very quickly, either breaded and deep-fried, or stir-fried, so the sliminess doesn't have a chance to develop. but no matter how it's cooked, your flatmate can have my share of the okra :-)

side note: i have always hated vegetables of any kind, and avoided eating them as much as possible ("i'm a grown-up; i don't have to eat my vegetables!"). but after Superstorm Sandy, there was a long period of time when i had no way to keep any kind of fresh food, nor any way to cook, and i was eating a lot of packaged junk food, simply because it was ready to eat without any preparation at all. and i got somewhat ill from a diet of partially hydrogenated this and high-fructose that and artificial everything else. i found myself actually craving watercress or snow peas in a stir-fry ("who are you, and what have you done with ace?"), and the first chance i got to actually cook some food, i made chicken stir-fried with watercress and cashews, in a fairly spicy sauce. i still find myself craving things like that more often than i used to, or maybe i'm just paying more attention to the craving.

[sheramil]

"produce of australia" could refer to the package, or even the label.

[torra]

Yes, but then if you did that, you'd be stuck eatting okra. Or the even worse crime of makeing other people eat okra, which I'm pretty sure counts as a Human Rites violation everywhere outside of the Southern US.

[sporky_rat]

Okra is delightful when cooked correctly. Freeze dried into chips is quite nice.

[jesse_the_k]

As far as posting goes: reading from mobile Safari on iPod touch via mobile DW, everyone's. icons are fine but I only see alt text and outline, no okra photo. Since I share what's clearly the local majority opinion re their taste, no hardship.

Know exactly that one of us eyeball. Sometimes the response is "ok, one of them is looking at me" Ah well, we learn at different rates!

[natf]

"Box of small okra on supermarket shelf"
That image file is just displaying as text for me on DW and LJ. If I try to do View Image (http://jeshyr.dreamwidth.org/file/380.jpg) I get "Not authorized". Strange.