That's the Way It Crumbles, Cookie-Wise

[Nancy Hart]

Speaking of flowcharts, I've run into an obstacle.

The worst thing that can happen from my point of view is these shutters arrive damaged. I can't stand the hassle of returning anything that large. I chose this company because the shutters are assembled in the USA. Home Depot shutters, for example, may be shipped assembled from China.

While the digital dealer in Arizona CAN order shutters from the Buford plant, they may NOT. According to Gemini (is that male or female?), they will likely send the order to whatever plant has the shortest turnaround time available.

I may stop by the C&I outfit in town Monday and see if they will match the price of the Arizona place (without doing C&I) and send the order to Buford. Have them delivered to their place. I wish I had more than one little window to use as leverage.

 

[Nancy Hart]

Saturday was not a good day. I blame it all on persimmons.

A friend stopped by and gave me 4 pounds of ripe wild persimmons. There must have been over a hundred of them, and they don't keep. I either had to make something that uses a lot of them, or freeze them. My first mistake was assuming you shouldn't freeze them without removing the seeds and skins.

It took forever to produce 4-1/2 cups of seedless skinless pulp. Half the battle had now been fought ( I assumed). Might as well go ahead and make some jam. The second mistake was watching 3 YouTube videos on how to make it. The third mistake was to skip the Sure-Jell, but not for the usual reasons.

In case anyone has read this far and hasn't tasted an un-ripe wild persimmon, it causes a physical reaction, called Pucker Mouth. ["Your tongue, cheeks, and gums feel dry, rough, and chalky, like your whole mouth is covered in talcum powder."] It's caused by massive amounts of tannins. But after wild persimmons ripen, magic happens. They have a mild sweet taste. Even one unripe persimmon in a batch can ruin everything. It happened when I tried this once before, so I was extra careful this time.

I followed the videos and began boiling the pulp down to thicken it. I tasted it at several intervals. Perfect. Things were going swimmingly. Next taste? Pucker Mouth! Maybe it should have raised a red flag that no one ever showed tasting their final product in those videos?

Gemini said that the tannins bind with other chemicals in persimmons when they ripen to form an entirely new compound. However, prolonged heat can cause the tannins to separate from that compound and be restored. Sure-Jell might have helped because it also binds with tannins. At this point the only possible remedy, if not too late, is take the pan off the stove ASAP and add baking soda to try and neutralize the tannic acid.

I added too much soda and it still didn't help. At this point I took a deep breath, poured the stuff into 2 canning jars, and put them in the freezer. I'll think about it tomorrow. Maybe another miracle will happen when it freezes?

Since I would have to wash pots and pans anyway, might as well make some drop biscuits and swirl what was left into the batter, like a persimmon biscuit cobbler. The persimmon pulp floated to the top and turned black when cooked.

The last straw of the day? I did a load of laundry, all dried and put away, then realized I forgot the detergent. It was the persimmon distraction. That's my excuse. It was a wasted day, except I learned to never try to make persimmon jam again. Life is too short. Hope my friend never asks how I liked the persimmons.

 

[Nancy Hart]

The braided rugs are ready to go out in the trash. These two rugs were from my Earth Tones Period.

Suddenly I have a hankering for cinnamon rolls.