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by gansie

Top 9 Foods Found Only at SoCal Farmers’ Markets (and Not in DC)

While I didn’t catch a glimpse of an avocado orchard, or even an avocado tree, I did find a farmers market, Local Harvest at Marine Stadium, on my last day in Long Beach, California. The first stall displayed all fruits and vegetables that I easily find at my neighborhood far mar: zucchini and onions and peaches.

Jujube

But then I looked to my left and saw jujubes. The vendor had a sign proclaiming unattainable health benefits (cancer prevention, Zen-filled life). I bought a half pound. Frankly, though, jujubes may grant me 109 years on earth, but they still taste like blah. Total blah. At first I thought they were dried chilies but then I thought, hey, a sickly sweet candy is named after the dried fruit so it must be sweet. ERRRR. <buzzer sounds> It tastes like absolutely nothing.

Lime

What a radical notion. Citrus fruit is not only in white cartons marked with styles of “some pulp,” but apparently grow on trees. In California.

Dragon Fruit

Total alien fruit. Was this the punk rock cousin of an artichoke with its round shape and spiky leaves? No. It’s a beautiful fuchsia-fleshed fruit. The color, however, is more exciting than the taste.

Almond

There are some edibles out there that I have zero concept of how they grow. Nuts are one of them. Fresh almonds from the farmers market are particularly nutty and do have more flavor than their encased-in-bulk-bins selves.

Boiling Away Hate

I totally get why little kids would think spinach is gross. Most probably share my first vision of spinach: Popeye drinking dark green goo, out of a can, and then beating the shit out of people. It was totally weird and random. Did spinach bring out rage in sailors?

Eating vegetables, let alone drinking them, was just not on my things to do list (which included making my oma judge my many productions of a My Little Pony beauty pageant. Moondancer always won.)

But I still don’t get what gives veggies a bad rap in general. And some more than others. Carrots, cucumbers, zucchini, there’s really not that much angst against them. But brussels sprouts? It’s like they’re so hateful that they’d rather stop helping the homeless than let two consenting adults build a life together.

Why are brussels sprouts so hated?

They’re pretty cute, actually. Adorable little bulbs with pretty, pale green petals. They’re not scary, weapon-like spears like asparagus. They’re not slimy with a clinical and unappetizing sounding name—fungus—like mushrooms. They don’t splooge juice like a tomato. Brussels sprouts are small and neatly compact.

Why all the hate?

Cupcake Rampage: Arnold Palmer Cupcakes

_{“I want you to kill every golfer on this course.”}

Legend has it that one day at the height of his powers in the early 1960s, pro golfer Arnold Palmer was at the Cherry Hills Country Club in Cherry Hills, Colorado for one reason or another. Reportedly, Palmer asked one of the bartenders to mix him a special drink, the ingredients of which must have been so gauche that the Tom Cruise-wannabe behind the bar initially refused to sully his Boston shaker with the likes. At this, Palmer allegedly became so incensed with the mixologist’s cheek that he flew into a mild rage, threatened to get snooty, and, if his request was further denied, promised to get downright snotty.

Blanching at the prospects of facing down a murderously thirsty PGA Master and his posse, the barman wisely caved and quickly built Palmer’s beverage: a tall glass of ice, filled halfway with lemonade, and topped off with iced tea.

The drink has since earned the reputation of being the black-and-tan of the country club, the virgin Queen of 19th hole quaffers, and to this day, such a mixture is still known colloquially as an “Arnold Palmer.” Most barkeeps will know what you want when you order one by name, although some restaurant waitstaff may fix you with a funny look, since it is kind of a fusty old drink; something for teetotalers or closet lushes who want to keep their vice on the down-low. And while it hasn’t stopped marketers from pushing pre-packaged versions onto the masses, at least it comes with a readymade practical joke: