The one with the really bad food

I do not consider myself a particularly picky eater. Certainly there are foods that I do not prefer, and I would never cook them at home nor would I order them off a menu. However, I must admit that there is one food that I despise more than any other on this planet: papaya.

My first encounter with papaya occurred when I was staying with the sisters in San Antonio. Until that point, I had never disliked a fruit, so I put a large helping on my plate. It only took one bite to realize that the fruit had the unmistakable aftertaste of vomit. I ate the other things on my plate, waiting for someone else to recognize that the papaya was obviously spoiled. As it turned out, one of the sisters exclaimed that the papaya was exceptionally good, and everyone else nodded in agreement. I vowed never to touch the stuff again in my life. I have actually walked through the produce section of the grocery store and felt my stomach church, only to realize that I have gotten too near the papaya display.

Fast forward to breakfast this morning with the Sisters. A bowl of papaya on the table. I had turned down the opportunity to engage in such a delight a few weeks ago because it was on the table in front of me (holding my breath...) but no one specifically asked me to take any and I filled my plate with other things. Today, however, I was passed the papaya with nobody else to pass it onto, thought it would be rude to turn it down. I took two small pieces and swallowed as quickly as possible. My stomach actually did a bit of a sick somersault as I was helping with clean up. The cutting board must certainly have been used in cutting up the dreadful fruit, and still held the smell of vomit.

On another note, I realized that I never provided a tiramisu update. You can probably guess that all did not go as planned or I would not be including it in this particular blog entry.

I used to believe that I was a relatively good cook. Taking into consideration the episodes with the hot pink cinnamon cake, the caving in fruity birthday cake, and the "healthy" brownies with pieces of grass and sticks, I have come to the realization that while I enjoy cooking, I am not really all that good at it. Still, I had recently made my first tiramisu which turned out well, so I had confidence that #2 would be no big deal. Perhaps this confidence is what led to my careless mistake that is the likely cause for this epic fail (ok, it wasn't quite an epic fail, but definitely not a winner either). I whipped my egg yolks for the specified amount of time, until they were thick and light yellow, then I mixed in the rest of the ingredients to make the creamy layers. The mixture was way too soupy, partially because I had decided that the mascarpone would be easier to blend if I let it soften while I whipped the egg yolks (a reasonable assumption), but mostly because I had left out the sugar, which was to be whipped with the egg yolks for a thicker consistency. I whipped some sugar into the mixture, but it really had no hope of survival. I poured (not spread) the mixture over the first layer of ladyfingers, and it just pooled at the bottom. I had the idea of whipping it more, and I also tried cooling it in the refrigerator to make it thick, but nothing would help.

Tiramisu is expensive to make, and combined with the late hour of this project, I looked for the next best fix to starting anew. I knew that the tiramisu would taste good, but it looked anything but appetizing. If I had made it for my friends, I would have told them the story, we would have had a good laugh, and everyone would eat it anyway. But this one was being served to my boss, the rest of the Sisters, the church staff, and the priest. When I told my boss what had happened, she suggested putting it in the freezer. She had not seen it yet. I told her that wouldn't work, because the underlying problems went way beyond temperature. Upon seeing my concoction, she agreed.

Luckily, I am a chocolate pudding fiend. My friends laugh about the massive amounts of chocolate pudding and cool whip that I consume on a daily basis, but I always secretly knew that my habit would have benefits. Because of this addiction, I buy cool whip in bulk, so I happened to have a brand new container in my freezer. I brought it to work, spread it over the tiramisu-like blob, sprinkled that with cocoa, and aside from the startlingly white color, no one could tell that they were eating a cooking disaster. I was even asked for the recipe.