I LIKE LIME

I had two sips of a Margarita tonight, after running a slice of lime around the rims of two glasses, dipping them into the handy little round plastic box of flaky salt, and setting a jaunty slice side-saddle on each rim.

I'm just not much of a drinker at all, and I set down the glass and wandered off somewhere else to put something on the table or grab the butter or heat something in the microwave. Then, when we finished dinner, there was my glass---no longer a bright, zingy green, courtesy of McCormick's finest, but a deep dull hue after all the ice had melted and left it just sorta muddy.

I DID pick up one of the squeezed halves and give a vigorous rub to the section of counter where Chris had carved the chicken. I'd already sprayed and wiped with the antibacterial stuff, but I thought another citrus wipedown couldn't hurt, and it smelled wonderful.

I've always liked limes, though they've never been as available as lemons. Lime in drinks, in limeade, in desserts and on a quick-seared fish or chicken filet. They are, as my Mammaw used to say, "The Makin'" of guacamole, with all the bright flash of the lime and the salt to jazz up the buttery unctuous green mush.

I love the peel, grated and stirred into a peppy cocktail sauce, vibrant with horseradish and tabasco, or as a gentle punctuation to a cheesecake batter or chess pie, or best of all, Ooey-Gooey Bars.

I have no idea where I was going with this, but I'm gonna go pare off another paper-thin curl of lime peel and rub it all around inside the rim of my tea glass, to inhale and savor as I sip. I'm not fond of any strong acid tang in my tea, and just the fragrance of the oils is perfect for an icy glass. You think you can taste it.

It's all in the perception.


Believe it?


The "limes" above are berries from the tree over the patio, and the pink dish would not cover a penny.

COOK'S TREAT

We planted the tomatoes this morning, before breakfast. GrandBaby Girl arrived in her pajamas, and when her Daddy offered to help her Ganner get all the tomato plants into the pots, she was ready to get out there in the dirt.

We've had SUCH excessive rain that the entire downstairs has been a swamp, with getting out the shop vac and the blowers, putting down great squares of rubber-backed carpet for the little one to walk on, etc. So the sun today was a welcome change, and we dug in the dirt for a bit. Sweetpea and her little snub-nosed green watering can christened each plant with a tiny sprinkle, and then we came in for breakfast.

We got all washed up, and while I was getting everything ready for the table, I set the plate of strawberries on, and handed her the shaker of powdered sugar.

"Sprinkle a little of this all over the strawberries," I said. "You're a GOOD helper when I cook."

And she did her part, with a little neat (comparatively speaking) snowfall of white in clumps and scatters across the plate.

When we all sat down, we noticed that each and every strawberry had a teensy nip taken out of the end. Cook's Treat.

Can't wait for Summer---she REALLY likes tomatoes.

SCENTS MEMORY

Woodhue Pure parfum is a gorgeous long discontinued sultry fragrance. Top notes include orange accord, zesty bergamot, and citrus sparkle. Middle notes feature Jasmine Base notes are a blend of sandalwood accord, vanilla, Cedar, and musks

From an ad for a Vintage bottle of perfume---half full.

Does anyone remember Woodhue? To me, it says crisp cold nights, heading out for a date, wearing a skirt-and-sweater outfit and my mouton jacket, scented with the above “accords” and sparkles of the wonderful stuff which smells like if you opened a cedar chest in which you’d spilt a Watkins vanilla bottle some time earlier.---now THAT’S an accord. I loved it.

Chantilly was a second favorite---it was a bit stronger, heavy on the vanilla as well, and much like a too-flowery seat in a funeral parlor, but pleasant. Girls poured it on, and at parties and in church, the group of us radiated the sweetness of honeysuckle cookies.

Royal Secret became a definite covet when a beautiful young woman moved to our town and went to work in the same office as I. She was tall (I was not), very slender (ditto), and had long black hair and exquisite manners; she could make you laugh til you cried with her slightly-bawdy sense of humor, and we all just loved her. I just remember it smells elegantly sweet, and I longed for some for a long time, then wore it proudly, cause that was what beautiful, elegant Penny wore.

Shalimar is of equal sweetness to all the above, with notes of vanilla (perhaps the drawing-card of all the ones I’ve ever really liked---my first experiments with fragrance were furtive visits to the baking cupboard. When Mother or Mammaw weren’t looking, I’d dab a bit behind my ears and in the “crooks of my elbows” and sail off to third grade, confident in my beautiful aura and aroma).

I haven’t bought Shalimar since that day in the 80’s that the duck flew down the chimney and broke the fancy bottle in my bathtub. Cleaning up duck poo and broken glass can change your mind about a lot of things.

Joy was the fragrance my Mother wore most; she DID have a long Estee’ period somewhere in the Sixties, when the Lauder coffers were being enriched by every woman South of the M/D line. There were a few years in there, when in any southern gathering, or even in church, you could float heavenward on the pure '"Esty Law-der" fumes, unadulterated by any other scent save for Brut and Old Spice and old Mr. Godbold’s comb-over Vitalis.

Arpege I remember strongly---that being the operative word, for my very first week at college was spent in a haze of saturating fumes. We were there for Rush, and my roommate wore gorgeous clothes and a cloud of Arpege which preceded her down the hall and out into the world. I hid my face when she picked up the bottle, and after the interminable atomizer hiss, held my breath til I could flee out for air. It was WAY too much of a good thing, and I wondered that she was invited back anywhere after Ice Water.

And then, there was Intimate---take Arpege Girl and multiply her by twenty, all living on your hall. Mornings were a feverish rush to get awake, showered, and OUT of there, before you smothered, and running the gauntlet past twelve rooms, all with open doors exuding a miasma of Kents and Intimate---OH, my. It was like everybody was smoking cigars dipped in Aqua-Velva.

Intimate was the epitome of what my Daddy always said about some perfume: It smells LOUD.

Then there was the crème de la crème: Blue Waltz. Several of my friends wore it and I thought it smelled lovely. It was for sale in the drugstore, in Woolworth’s and in the local Ben Franklin---well within a child’s saving-up range. I would walk by and open a bottle, inhaling an appreciative sniff; I’d turn the bottle back and forth, admiring the almost-heart-shape of its squat little body. Once I even removed the cap from the big display bottle---that thing probably held a pint, and my hopes were dashed when it didn’t smell like anything at all---just colored water. I’d just known it was enough Blue Waltz to keep me in fragrant bliss for the rest of my life.

I dared to sneak a sample only once---a tiny furtive dab onto each wrist when Miss Hazel was busy making milkshakes----nobody in the store seemed to notice, and I walked out with a gleam in my eye and the confidence of Audrey Hepburn---I was GORGEOUS. And then, my Mother caught a whiff of my contraband, and I was in TROUBLE.

“I’ve TOLD you about that cheap trashy STUFF!” she said. “I’d better not EVER smell that tacky mess on you again!” And so was my one foray into the world of Blue Waltz. It remains, like the exquisite fruit at Goblin Market, a never-found-again grail, a never-equalled perfection.

And since all those, I’ve had brief fling with Giorgio, a slight flirtation with Design, and besides the above "dresser set" of Shalimat from Chris, the only bottle on my shelf today is my Daddy’s bottle of Obsession for Men. The afternoon he died, I walked out of his house with his watch on my wrist, his teeth in a baggie, and the plump bottle from his bathroom shelf. I took the teeth to the Funeral Director and gave the watch to my son, and I still go spritz a little whiff of the Obsession onto the shower curtain for remembrance, or onto my shoes, if I’m going out. Full circle back to my third-grade love affair with Vanilla.

I coulda just married the Watkins man.

LILY GILDING

We've had steady storms and downpours and hardly-a-day-without-rain for what seems months now. We STILL haven't been able to get into that beautifully-tilled garden, now a great round lake, and these boxes of bulbs and baskets of seeds are languishing sadly.

Save for looking out the windows to see if any pairs of unicorns or dodos had been missed before we close the Ark doors, I've been mopping and soaking up damp carpets and trying to steer a lively little girl through the clear, dry paths snaking through most of the downstairs.

I found a few old posts from a recipe/cooking site I used to belong to; even to ME these sound over-the-top. Blame it on the company I kept, I suppose. When someone asked, "How do YOU Gild the Lily in the kitchen?"---I answered.

Sink the back of a spoon into a bowl of hot mashed potatoes, skins on or off; continue making a dozen or so little divots. Gently lay a pat of butter into each, Sprinkle top with crumbled bacon, chopped chives, snowing of cheese. Wait a moment for butter to melt into little golden lakes; carry it carefully to table.

Make a lovely cheeseburger to your own specifications, WITH a nice slice of chilled sweet onion. Garnish plate with about a dozen half-slices of cold crisp onion, which you will segment into crescents. salt lightly and eat crunchcrunch like chips, between bites of juicy burger.

Empty a can of Eagle Brand milk into a microwaveable bowl. Heat one minute, or til steamy. Stir in eight ounces of Valhrona dark, chopped, and a pinch of salt. Leave it alone another minute. Let it rest and get acquainted. Stir briskly until it coalesces into a silken, flowing mass of chocolate, folding back upon itself and beckoning with its shining wiles and enticing fragrance.

Spoon over ice cream. Lick the spoon. Dip fruit. Take a bite. Double dip.

If there are leftovers of the sauce, chill and dip onto parchment by teaspoons. Roll into truffles and do not tell that they're of such humble birth. Or reheat at midnight and eat without ice cream.

Make Stroganoff. Cut a cream cheese into one inch squares. Drop all over top of sauce; cover pot and leave five minutes. Stir cream cheese into sauce.

Do the same for a pot of cooked, drained potatoes; drop in a stick of butter and a whole cream cheese...put lid on, let soften, mash.

Make favorite brownie recipe; add a cup of chopped chocolate and pour into pan, reserving one cup. Stir reserved batter into 1 pack softened cream cheese--drop onto batter, swirl with tip of knife. Bake, cool, frost with chocolate frosting. Pipe lines of lighter or darker frosting on top; feather.

Make burritos, wraps, anything with flour tortillas. Serve with salsa, guacamole and Ranch. Hubby likes homemade "pink" dressing, made with mayo, ketchup, garlic, and a special-recipe vinegar/sugar spice mixture that we make by the quart. He likes it so well I smuggle a bottle of it into Mexican restaurants in my pocket.

Crisp-fry thin-sliced onions; drain, salt, and sprinkle on already-loaded baked potato.

Center bowls of chilled gazpacho with several spoonfuls of lump crabmeat or half a dozen peeled, tails-off shrimp. Center ANY hot soup with a dollop of sour cream, garnish of chives, grated cheese or buttered toast crumbs.

Kindergarten lunch: Give each child a slice of American cheese and to peel and center it in the bottom of an empty soup bowl. Allow them to tear it into fanciful shapes if they wish. Ladle in soup or chili.

On the above cheeseburger I mentioned: Five minutes before sitting down to the table, melt a pat of butter in a skillet, put the two halves of the bun cut-side down, leave for a few minutes to turn golden and crisp.


If doing more than one at a time, lay all tops or bottoms into butter, turn other half cut-side up on top to be heating, let crisp, reverse. We had these tonight, and our two guests kept telling Hubby what delicious burgers he grills. I can keep a secret.

MIZPAH

I haven’t seen what I think of as my MIZPAH heart in a long time---a half-heart, actually. The charms were cut in half, with a little pointy border, and on most of them, the word MIZPAH was written on the little bas-relief banner, sheared neatly in half.

The hearts were quite popular, worn by two-halves-of-a-steady-couple, or by almost-engaged pairs, or even by married folks---she’d wear her half proudly with her sweater set, and he’d tuck his discreetly beneath his T-shirt.

The word MIZPAH, as we all knew from seeing it, half and whole, meant “The Lord watch between me and thee when we are absent one from another.” But mine did not say that---it had the cryptic message "BE FRI," since it had been bought in conjunction with my best friend, on one of the MidSouth Fair trips we took together.

We’d been to Memphis to the regular school-day-out “Mississippi Day” for all our lives, most usually together, with one set of parents or the other, seeing the exhibits, marveling at the artistry and the craft of all those women whose quilts and pickles were so beautifully and artfully done. We’d strolled the MidWay countless times, repeatedly riding the TumbleBug, which would shake your bones and send you rocketing up against the thighs and sides of perfect strangers as it whirled your hair-do horizontal and your stomach sidewise.

We never DID ride the Pippin---the oldest rickety wooden roller-coaster outside Coney Island, I imagine. Even we, foolhardy and fourteen, did not trust the safety of that clattery thing---we’d STOOD beneath it as it roared overhead, the whole structure like a great nest of graying garden lattice, and you could SEE the nails shake in the peeled-paint holes. We’d waste several perfectly good hours of “fair-time” just sitting in the shade, looking pretty, or with the sun on our shining hair, tossing our ponytails and laughing gaily at imaginary jokes for the benefit of any boys walking by.

And the year we saw Elvis---up close and personal---that’s a story for another time.

The little half-hearts were quite popular in those days, coming along in the wake of the “mustard seed” craze---I also had one of those charms on my charm bracelet. And so, passing the booth of bright brassy gewgaws, chains swaying in the breeze from passersby and the clatter of the Pippin, we stopped and chose one. Since we’d seen all the MIZ and PAH swinging on the necks of so many boy/girl pairs, we got the one which said BEST FRIENDS.

We’d been friends-since-four, when I moved down the street from her big ole green house in town. We were walk-over friends, strolling into each other’s screen doors as if they were our own, and shared our love of books and music and piano lessons and perhaps a crush on a cute boy or two.

And we had our names “engraved” on the backs---skewed script almost run off the edge by the vibrations of that electric pen in the thin-squint man’s shaky hand. My half said, “BE FRI,” by mere chance of his grabbing that one first and scrawling my name on; hers got the most letters, and the oddest message, “ST ENDS,” which we thought hilarious, and even now makes me smile. We said it looked like a beat-up road sign, and it sounds to me today like the setting of a murder mystery with a plump little nosy woman as the village detective.

We wore them proudly to school the next day---not nearly as unique and clever as we’d thought, for half the girls there had parted with some of their Fair Money for the same tinkly garish things. We didn’t wear them for too long, for they soon fulfilled their destinies of making our necks green and our fingers smell like old pennies, but the friendship lasted way past high school. She went off to Nursing School in Memphis and I to Ole Miss, and we corresponded and both went home for a lot of weekends and caught up.

We both married, had children, saw each other when she’d come back from Arizona to visit her parents. I still miss her bright smile and her infectious laugh, and I think of her often, as my MIZPAH Friend.