Ninth Year Anniversary
My husband and I plus our little tiger celebrated our ninth year anniversary in France the summer 2010. We rented a car and covered  some provencal areas like Marseille, Apt, Focalquier, then some areas along the French Riviera like Roquebrune-Cap Martin, Montecarlo Monaco, St Maxime, St, Tropez and lastly Paris then back to Provence----all in two weeks which was not long enough.  On our anniversary day, we decided to celebrate with a lunch dinner to make sure our little one is up and about with enough energy and happy mood for us to enjoy a relaxing family meal. However I thought, why not do a pre-celebration that is homey, quiet and simple before lunch?  Afterall, there is still a breakfast time we have to reckon with. Fortunately, our hotel has a partial kitchen enough for me to whip up a hearty breakfast that will start our  beautiful day right. Thinking what to do, I took inspiration from this tomato that I bought the day before just because I was enchanted by its beauty.

And just like any gorgeous fruit that I am about to consume, I honor it with a portarit to immortalize and remember its beauty by.

So it ended on our breakfast plates along with fluffy scrambled eggs laced with smoked salmon, green and nicoise olives, a small round of cheese accompanied by ciabatta bread and a slice of cantaloupe.

For our drink, we had ice-cold coffee which the day before was our coffee granita. It complemented our savory breakfast which was quite hearty and healthful. My best memory  about this breakfast anniversary meal was that we ate it on our hotel's rooftop (which we had to ourselves) overlooking the Meditteranean.
What a blessed day!

As hot as habaneros are like summer, this carefree season will never be complete without them red-orange spicy jewels so I plant a few pots that give me my (habanero) provisions for the  year.  What I do with them primarily is infuse my apple cider vinegar to satisfy my everyday affair with "sawsawan". We Filipinos always have dipping sauce for our meat, veggies and fish. The habaneros take  vinegar to a new level of  sour sweetness.
On the side I make my spicy entrees and desserts laced with habaneros. YYEEOOWW!!!

                        Chicken Tikka Masala Biryani                   
                      

                     Jump-in-the-lake Shrimp Curry....Whoa!

               5-Alarm Habanero Heartburn                                 

On my lunchbreak I decided to stop by a Patel Brothers grocery to search for spices to make a tikka masala chicken biryani for my husband  Steve. As I passed through the vegetable section, I saw four baby jackfruits staring me in the face telepathecally screaming my name to pick them up and so I did. They did not look very pretty but they sure brought me back memories that made my mouth water. My mind whirled in excitement for it's been eons since I last ate young jackfruit salad that my sister-in-law Gina back home in the Philippines used to make a lot of. Driving home my thoughts rushed in a whirlwind trying to recall the ingredients for  young jackfruit salad.  I remember she used  to make this  scrumptuous salad extra spicy, I could not stop eating them. It's been years since I last had a bite of it and so re-creating this dish is somehow a feat for me.
Envisioning how the salad looks like, pictures of little squares of red bell pepper and spicy  pepper danced in my head, soon followed by the imangined scent of ginger and vinegar in my nose. Of course, the white milk of coconut and that makes up its sauce. Coming home, I went straight to the kitchen and started my adventure.

Young Jackfruit Salad

young jackfruit
a can of coconut milk
red bell pepper cut into small squares
spicy red pepper
ginger minced
half cup vinegar
salt

Peel the  jackfruit and slice into bite-sized pieces. Boil in water. When cooked, let cool down. Squeeze the water out of the jackfruit and reconstitute with the coconut milk. Add the rest of the ingredients . Add salt to taste.

Isn't she a beauty? I just had to feast my eyes on her awesome orangeness and repeatedly sniff  her citrusy scent . I marvelled at the touch and sight of her I thought  this beauty warrants a pictture.  My inner shutterbug got the better of me and did three -leveled shots. After I have immortalized her beauty, I feasted on Ms. Grapefruit and relished every juicy bite that bespoke of  a summer having more of them. I was in grapefruit heaven. Upon finishing my last bite, I stared at my pile of  peels and thought, "How can I throw this away (I was simply enamored with her color)."  The next thing I knew, I started scraping her pith and slicing the peels in slender strips. Grabbed a pan and boiled water to cook the peels in. Added sugar and  voila!

                                         Candied Grapefruit Peel

Months after, I came across the pictures of the  grapefruit that gave me  such delight, I thought to enjoy her beauty once more and everyday.

ADDENDUM:
I planted two of its seeds and now have this grapefruit  plant growing. Unfortunately I am in the East Coast and  I can't bear to leave it out in the cold so I put it in my kitchen table and hope that it will make do with the warmth in our house and the little light it gets  through the skylight.