Flowers & Fruit Salad

Does this chocolate make my butt look fat?

I have recently been accused of making everybody around me chunky with my cooking. Thing is, I'm just as guilty of taking in calories as everybody else, as I'm the one stuck with all this food at the end of the day. So what if I bring a platter of brownies to the office every now and then? I have to spread the
fatlove around.

But yes, I suppose a little fruit here and there is in order. And it's the perfect excuse for me to buy a new gadget that I've been eyeing lately. Ladies and Gentlemen, feast your eyes on (drumroll please)

A pineapple slicer! Actually, Williams-Sonoma calls it a Pineapple Easy Slicer, but that name is a complete crock. If you follow the link and watch the video, when it comes time to pull the pineapple rings out, you can see in that woman's eyes a glimmer of, "are you kidding me?" And it's true: this thing is not really easy. It helps to take a knife and run it around the edges after you've twisted it down into the fruit, but you should still expect to come out of this experience sticky and to have let fly a few expletives.

But it makes this possible:

I do love a crisp fruit salad. They're pretty, they're easy, and gosh darn it, you can't have a decent brunch without one. This one included the following:

1 pineapple

1/2 pound strawberries

1 pound black grapes

1 green pear

5-6 sprigs fresh mint

2-3 sprigs fresh basil

5-6 leaves fresh lavender

Chop it all up and throw it in a bowl. Or a pineapple.

Yesterday was neon limey green from all the pollen. Every year it's this way - the great equalizer, as everybody's car is covered in green - but yesterday was especially different as I could actually see the stuff in the atmosphere. Swirling, settling, puffing out from everywhere. It's strange, as last week it snowed on my tomatoes.

I had to work, so Mike scrambled around the backyard protecting them. The man must love me.
But spring is most definitely in the air.