gifts from the tropics

I have a new favorite recipe!

It's an easy-peasy gem from one of my favorite food websites: Mennonite Girls Can Cook.

If you like coconut, I strongly recommend clicking the above link and giving this crustless coconut custard pie a whirl.

I wish I had taken better pictures, but it's too late now as the pie has been eaten. Maybe I'd better make another one?

Flashback! Years ago I did field work in the Caribbean National Forest. I remember driving up and down narrow, winding, mountain roads, and at one point, seeing a coconut vendor by the side of the road near a waterfall. A person, a machete, and a pile of fresh coconuts: a complete roadside stand.

~~~

If there is an obvious association between the pie in my kitchen and a heap of coconuts in Puerto Rico, this one will be more obscure: a broken tooth and an orchid.

Sunday I broke a tooth. Apparently my life has reached a point where, in addition to lots of things aching, other things are going to simply fall off with no warning. Like half a tooth.

Don't worry - there will be no photograph of the broken tooth. Or of any teeth whatsoever. You're welcome.

But here is a preview of the orchid:

My truly lovely dentist made time for me to come to the office Monday morning, for some very welcome smoothing of sharp edges. (Welcome and successful: further treatment in the form of a crown can be postponed for a while, I am happy to say.)

So I left the office with good news, the ability to speak without wincing, and the bonus image of this orchid which was brightening the pristine treatment room: 

Is it not a beauty?

~~~~~