Produce!

Its getting delightfully cool here (finally!) and I am beginning to really enjoy living in the tropics. At night Colin and I are opening the doors to the porches and letting a nice 65 degree breeze blow through the apartment. As the weather cools down, new fall crops are showing up at the farmers markets and in local stores. Some of these I knew about, like persimmons and pomegranates, but others like mirliton and satsumas are new to me.

Mirlitons are a type of small green squash that I am betting made it here during either the Spanish rule of Louisiana, or during slave times brought by Caribbean and Haitians. It is originally from South America and Mexico, and it is grown in many small farms here in Louisiana. It is used quite a bit in Creole cooking , and I am looking forward to making more dinners with local flavor. I haven't yet bought one, but I hear that they taste somewhat like a cucumber crossed with a potato. I will update you on the accuracy of that description once I get my hands on one.

Satsumas are originally from Japan, and are a type of seedless tangerine. The ones we have gotten in the last two weeks are green on the outside, but are wonderfully sweet on the inside. This morning I stopped by a farmer selling satsumas out of the back of his truck on St. Charles. For those of you who cannot try a satsuma from Louisiana, I found this wonderful web page on them, with a great description and photos. (Besides the video of peeling the satsuma with one hand is hilarious!)