Taste Of Cherries Quotes

His kisses tasted like forever soaked in always.

One must ask children and birds how cherries and strawberries taste.

Lips that have tasted the salt of tears always give the sweetest kiss.

We all eat a handful of dirt before we die, who cares if it tastes like cherries?

His lips tasted of cherry and some unique flavor that could only be described as Trey-licious.

Ten minutes to purchase her. One hour to get her lips wrapped around my cock. Three days to taste her juices. Four days to pop her cherry. Two weeks to lose my fucking mind. Shit.

Spring is the sound of birds chirping, the taste of cherry juice, the feel of grass on bare feet, the sight of pink roses and blue skies, and the feel of dandelion fuzz. Spring, in other words, is a welcome, wondrous sensory overload.

Hmm,” Logan hummed in his ear. “You don’t taste like a cherry anymore.” Tate turned his head on the pillow. “A cherry? I don’t—” “Yep,” Logan interrupted, kissing his cheek. “I popped it, sucked on the seed, then licked it all up, and made it mine.

From the sound of pattering raindrops I recaptured the scent of the lilacs at Combray; from the shifting of the sun's rays on the balcony the pigeons in the Champs-Elysées; from the muffling of sounds in the heat of the morning hours, the cool taste of cherries; the longing for Brittany or Venice from the noise of the wind and the return of Easter. Summer was at hand, the days were long, the weather was warm. It was the season when, early in the morning, pupils and teachers repair to the public gardens to prepare for the final examinations under the trees, seeking to extract the sole drop of coolness vouchsafed by a sky less ardent than in the midday heat but already as sterilely pure.

I wanted to hold her, but still have her move freely in my arms. I wanted to taste her lips and breathe in a part of her soul as I gave her a glimpse of mine.

Her lips taste like mint from toothpaste or gum, or sometimes like cherries or grapes from her lip gloss. She's soft when I hold her, with curves where my hands rest, and when I touch her I think stupid caveman things like, mine and totally mine—oh yeah, and all mine.

Back then life was simple and sweet. Everything was simple and sweet. The taste of cherries, the cool shade, the fresh smell of the river. That was how we lived, in a vale among the hills, sheltered from the storms. Ignorant of the world, as though on an island. Peaceful and untroubled. And then. Then everything changed.

The day was so wonderful that Bonaventure thought it would taste like cherry pie if he took a bite of it.

A great novel didn’t involve tossing together words that didn’t interconnect. In a great novel, each sentence mattered, each word had a meaning to the overall story arc. There was always forewarning to the plot twists and the different paths the novel would travel down, too. If a reader looked closely enough, they could always witness the warning signs. They could taste the heart of every word that bled on the page, and by the end, their palate would be satisfied.

She'd always known that if she'd picked the right man to pluck her cherry, he would appreciate her good taste. Gwen,Kiss Of The Highlander

On those luminous mornings Adela returned from the market, like Pomona emerging from the flames of day, spilling from her basket the coloful beauty of the sun –the shiny pink cherries full of juice under their transparent skins, the mysterious apricots in whose golden pulp lay the core of long afternoons. And next to that pure poetry of fruit, she unloaded sides of meat with their keyboard of ribs swollen with energy and strength, and seaweeds of vegetables like dead octopuses and squids–the raw material of meals with a yet undefined taste, the vegetative and terrestrial ingredients of dinner, exuding a wild and rustic smell.

To know how cherries and strawberries taste, ask children and birds. GOETHE

Only those who will love longer than they expected to can truly love pecan pie, which doesn't explain its status as death rows most requested last dessert, or why chopped pecans, corn syrup, directions from the Karo bottle's cherry-red side are what mercy taste like to some. But there you have it.

He stopped, resting his forehead on mine. “Kalista…” He sighed, cupping one side of my face. We remained like that, close to each other, waiting for our bated breaths to steady for countless minutes. Our lips warm and puffy from our kiss. He looked at me. “Your lips taste better than I imagined, like cherry,” he said, brushing his thumb over my bottom lip. He’d imagined our kiss. “That’s because of my cherry chapstick,” I smiled. He pulled me closer, looking down at my lips. “I doubt it,” he whispered in a low voice.

I can’t get the taste of your cherry kisses out of my head, little monster,” he purred,

Alice ventured to taste it, and finding it very nice, (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine-apple,

He leaned in and kissed her. The world didn’t stop dead on its axis. Nothing fell from the sky. It was a gentle meeting of flesh, not a melding of souls. Yet the taste of her lips was everything he remembered, and more. Without moving a muscle—without batting an eyelash—she managed to take ten years of simmering frustration and dissolve them as if they were nothing more than a spoonful of sugar in a pot of hot water. He straightened. A series of expressions tripped across her face in rapid succession. He caught shellshock, bemusement, and then a faint trace of…sadness. Definitely not one-sided. But not what he’d been looking for, either.

Pies are so much fun to make—and so simple! All it takes to make a tender, flaky crust is the right amount of vegetable shortening, cut into flour with a sprinkle of cold water, and just a pinch of salt. Cherries have the right sweet-to-tart taste—and are also a good source of poison! Just crush the pits or stems. There you’ll find prussic acid, also known as hydrogen cyanide: easy to sprinkle into both the filling and the crust. How sweet it is!

The children in my dreams speak in Gujarati turn their trusting faces to the sun say to me care for us nurture us in my dreams I shudder and I run. I am six in a playground of white children Darkie, sing us an Indian song! Eight in a roomful of elders all mock my broken Gujarati English girl! Twelve, I tunnel into books forge an armor of English words. Eighteen, shaved head combat boots - shamed by masis in white saris neon judgments singe my western head. Mother tongue. Matrubhasha tongue of the mother I murder in myself. Through the years I watch Gujarati swell the swaggering egos of men mirror them over and over at twice their natural size. Through the years I watch Gujarati dissolve bones and teeth of women, break them on anvils of duty and service, burn them to skeletal ash. Words that don't exist in Gujarati : Self-expression. Individual. Lesbian. English rises in my throat rapier flashed at yuppie boys who claim their people “civilized” mine. Thunderbolt hurled at cab drivers yelling Dirty black bastard! Force-field against teenage hoods hissing F****ing Paki bitch! Their tongue - or mine? Have I become the enemy? Listen: my father speaks Urdu language of dancing peacocks rosewater fountains even its curses are beautiful. He speaks Hindi suave and melodic earthy Punjabi salty rich as saag paneer coastal Kiswahili laced with Arabic, he speaks Gujarati solid ancestral pride. Five languages five different worlds yet English shrinks him down before white men who think their flat cold spiky words make the only reality. Words that don't exist in English: Najjar Garba Arati. If we cannot name it does it exist? When we lose language does culture die? What happens to a tongue of milk-heavy cows, earthen pots jingling anklets, temple bells, when its children grow up in Silicon Valley to become programmers? Then there's American: Kin'uh get some service? Dontcha have ice? Not: May I have please? Ben, mane madhath karso? Tafadhali nipe rafiki Donnez-moi, s'il vous plait Puedo tener….. Hello, I said can I get some service?! Like, where's the line for Ay-mericans in this goddamn airport? Words that atomized two hundred thousand Iraqis: Didja see how we kicked some major ass in the Gulf? Lit up Bagdad like the fourth a' July! Whupped those sand-niggers into a parking lot! The children in my dreams speak in Gujarati bright as butter succulent cherries sounds I can paint on the air with my breath dance through like a Sufi mystic words I can weep and howl and devour words I can kiss and taste and dream this tongue I take back.

Bertie opened the vial and drank the traded words down, tasting sour cherry syrup over shaved ice, bitter lemon peel, and spices that recalled a nameless sorrow.

Getting to finally touch her, taste her, claim her body, was just the cherry on top. She was the ice cream, the chocolate, and the sprinkles, and I would never get enough of her.

I stuff my mouth full of cherries. Say, this is the taste of love, and I will choke on it.

Purity, a concept that recalled flowers, the piquant mint taste of a mouthwash, a child clinging to its mother’s gentle breast, was something that joined all these directly to the concept of blood, the concept of swords cutting down iniquitous men, the concept of blades slashing down through the shoulder to spray the air with blood. And to the concept of seppuku. The moment that a samurai “fell like the cherry blossoms,” his blood-smeared corpse became at once like fragrant cherry blossoms. The concept of purity, then, could alter to the contrary with arbitrary swiftness. And so purity was the stuff of poetry. For Isao, to die purely seemed easy. But what about laughing purely? How to be pure in all respects was a problem that disturbed him. No matter how tight a rein he kept upon his emotions, there were times when some trivial thing would arise to make him laugh. Once, for example, he had laughed at a puppy frolicking at the side of the road, with a woman’s high-heeled shoe, of all things, in its mouth. It was the kind of laugh that he preferred others not to see.

Today...major actors and actresses develop their own projects or, at the very least, cherry-pick their roles carefully to suit not only their tastes but also whatever image they have cultivated to present to their public. Most major stars have their own production companies through which such projects are developed and even financed. While the biggest male stars of that time did in fact have their own production companies--Jimmy Stewart, Kirk Douglas, John Wayne, and Burt Lancaster, to name a few--and thus exerted creative and financial control over their careers, that was not the case with female stars. But Marilyn Monroe was about to change that.

Wild Peaches" When the world turns completely upside down You say we’ll emigrate to the Eastern Shore Aboard a river-boat from Baltimore; We’ll live among wild peach trees, miles from town, You’ll wear a coonskin cap, and I a gown Homespun, dyed butternut’s dark gold color. Lost, like your lotus-eating ancestor, We’ll swim in milk and honey till we drown. The winter will be short, the summer long, The autumn amber-hued, sunny and hot, Tasting of cider and of scuppernong; All seasons sweet, but autumn best of all. The squirrels in their silver fur will fall Like falling leaves, like fruit, before your shot. 2 The autumn frosts will lie upon the grass Like bloom on grapes of purple-brown and gold. The misted early mornings will be cold; The little puddles will be roofed with glass. The sun, which burns from copper into brass, Melts these at noon, and makes the boys unfold Their knitted mufflers; full as they can hold Fat pockets dribble chestnuts as they pass. Peaches grow wild, and pigs can live in clover; A barrel of salted herrings lasts a year; The spring begins before the winter’s over. By February you may find the skins Of garter snakes and water moccasins Dwindled and harsh, dead-white and cloudy-clear. 3 When April pours the colors of a shell Upon the hills, when every little creek Is shot with silver from the Chesapeake In shoals new-minted by the ocean swell, When strawberries go begging, and the sleek Blue plums lie open to the blackbird’s beak, We shall live well — we shall live very well. The months between the cherries and the peaches Are brimming cornucopias which spill Fruits red and purple, sombre-bloomed and black; Then, down rich fields and frosty river beaches We’ll trample bright persimmons, while you kill Bronze partridge, speckled quail, and canvasback. 4 Down to the Puritan marrow of my bones There’s something in this richness that I hate. I love the look, austere, immaculate, Of landscapes drawn in pearly monotones. There’s something in my very blood that owns Bare hills, cold silver on a sky of slate, A thread of water, churned to milky spate Streaming through slanted pastures fenced with stones. I love those skies, thin blue or snowy gray, Those fields sparse-planted, rendering meagre sheaves; That spring, briefer than apple-blossom’s breath, Summer, so much too beautiful to stay, Swift autumn, like a bonfire of leaves, And sleepy winter, like the sleep of death.

Everything about her is disastrous. She’s nothing more than a mess.” “And yet?” he urged me on. And yet, I wanted to be just like her. I wanted to be an odd character, a freak of nature. I wanted to stumble and laugh out loud. I wanted to find her beautiful disaster and mix it together with my own mess. I wanted the freedom she swam in, and her fearlessness of living in the moment. I wanted to know what it meant to be a part of her world. To be a man who felt everything. I wanted to hold her, but still have her move freely in my arms. I wanted to taste her lips and breathe in a part of her soul as I gave her a glimpse of mine. I didn’t want to be her friend – now. I wanted to be so much more.

However, this bottle was not marked 'poison,' so Alice ventured to taste it, and finding it very nice, (it had, in fact, a sort of mixed flavour of cherry-tart, custard, pine-apple, roast turkey, toffee, and hot buttered toast,) she very

I don't like it when the inside parts of you don't match up with what the brain part of you thinks. If there were a medicine to make this go away I would take it, even if it was cherry flavor, which tastes terrible and is not my favorite.

The balls were dry as wood, you had to lick and suck at them before they tasted like sour cherries. If you chewed them well, the pit felt very smooth and hot on the tongue. Those night cherries were a happy thing, but they only sharpened our hunger.

Dishes and receipts formed like starbursts in her mind, trailing myriad ingredients. For one she needed rosewater, cherries, and almonds, for another pistachios, chocolate, and cream- soon she lost her way, and ordered whatever her whimsy suggested.

Finally, we would have been offered either a spring takiawase, meaning "foods boiled or stewed together," or a wanmori (the apex of a tea kaiseki meal) featuring seasonal ingredients, such as a cherry blossom-pink dumpling of shrimp and egg white served in a dashi base accented with udo, a plant with a white stalk and leaves that tastes like asparagus and celery, and a sprig of fresh sansho, the aromatic young leaves from the same plant that bears the seedpods the Japanese grind into the tongue-numbing spice always served with fatty eel.

I entered a different world. You’ve felt yourself on the edge of it when a cherry song hits the radio. You’re driving, windows rolled down to the nubs, a warm breeze kissing your neck, the world tasting like hope and blue sky. Turn it up! Your hips can’t help but wiggle. Man, it feels like that song was written for you, like you’re gorgeous and loved and the entire planet is in order. But here’s the thing they don’t tell you: That magic, king-or-queen-of-the-world sensation? It’s a million times better when you’re the one playing the music. Maybe even a billion.

July" The figs we ate wrapped in bacon. The gelato we consumed greedily: coconut milk, clove, fresh pear. How we’d dump hot espresso on it just to watch it melt, licking our spoons clean. The potatoes fried in duck fat, the salt we’d suck off our fingers, the eggs we’d watch get beaten ’til they were a dizzying bright yellow, how their edges crisped in the pan. The pink salt blossom of prosciutto we pulled apart with our hands, melted on our eager tongues. The green herbs with goat cheese, the aged brie paired with a small pot of strawberry jam, the final sour cherry we kept politely pushing onto each other’s plate, saying, No, you. But it’s so good. No, it’s yours. How I finally put an end to it, plucked it from the plate, and stuck it in my mouth. How good it tasted: so sweet and so tart. How good it felt: to want something and pretend you don’t, and to get it anyway.

What a bore! Especially when the day had gone so well. She had no desire to read or listen to records. His taste would be like her father’s, old Peter Cheyneys and John Buchans, he used to read them over and over again. And music of the lighter sort, probably South Pacific. The steward brought in her tea, and this time there were cherry jam and scones, freshly baked, what’s more. She wolfed the lot. Then she pottered around the room, inspecting the shelves. No Peter Cheyney, no John Buchan, endless books on Ireland, which she expected anyway, Yeats forever, Synge, A.E., a volume on the Abbey Theatre.

. . . I bet I'm beginning to make some parents nervous - here I am, bragging of being a dropout, and unemployable, and about to make a pitch for you to follow your creative dreams, when what parents want is for their children to do well in their field, to make them look good, and maybe also to assemble a tasteful fortune . . . But that is not your problem. Your problem is how you are going to spend this one odd and precious life you have been issued. Whether you're going to live it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over people and circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it, and find out the truth about who you are . . . I do know you are not what you look like, or how much you weigh, or how you did in school, or whether you start a job next Monday or not. Spirit isn't what you do, it's . . . well, again, I don't actually know. They probably taught this junior year at Goucher; I should've stuck around. But I know that you feel best when you're not doing much - when you're in nature, when you're very quiet or, paradoxically, listening to music . . . We can see Spirit made visible when people are kind to one another, especially when it's a really busy person, like you, taking care of the needy, annoying, neurotic person, like you. In fact, that's often when we see Spirit most brightly . . . In my twenties I devised a school of relaxation that has unfortunately fallen out of favor in the ensuing years - it was called Prone Yoga. You just lay around as much as possible. You could read, listen to music, you could space out or sleep. But you had to be lying down. Maintaining the prone. You've graduated. You have nothing left to prove, and besides, it's a fool's game. If you agree to play, you've already lost. It's Charlie Brown and Lucy, with the football. If you keep getting back on the field, they win. There are so many great things to do right now. Write. Sing. Rest. Eat cherries. Register voters. And - oh my God - I nearly forgot the most important thing: refuse to wear uncomfortable pants, even if they make you look really thin. Promise me you'll never wear pants that bind or tug or hurt, pants that have an opinion about how much you've just eaten. The pants may be lying! There is way too much lying and scolding going on politically right now without having your pants get in on the act, too. So bless you. You've done an amazing thing. And you are loved; you're capable of lives of great joy and meaning. It's what you are made of. And it's what you're here for. Take care of yourselves; take care of one another. And give thanks, like this: Thank you.

But when who you are changes every day you get to touch the universal more. Even the most mundane details. You see how cherries taste different to different people. Blue looks different. You see all the strange rituals boys have to show affection without admitting it. You learn that if a parent reads to you at the end of the day, it's a good sign that it's a good parent, because you've seen so many other parents who don't make the time. You learn how much a day is truly worth, because they're all so different. If you ask most people what the difference was between Monday and Tuesday, they might tell you what they had for dinner each night. Not me. By seeing the world from so many angles, I get more of a sense of its dimensionality.

I put a sour cherry pastille on my tongue, but the combination jarred. A meaty, protein taste was called for. With a cool skin, sticky sweet fragrance in the nostrils, the aleatory drip of timeless water echoing in your ears, a limbo beyond the muscle spindles... you become a spiced mummy in a cool chamber beneath the Nile. This salt-surfeited breeze tingling every corpuscle of my skin set me adrift on a cool back eddy near a basser sea... but the wave lap and sibilance of the palm leaves was like the rustle of a costly veil... in what exotic world did a vortex of primary colours drain into the eyes?... did it all make me a taffeted plankter drinking substance from the spectrum of a fractured sun?" -"Cancerous Kisses of Crocodiles

It as mathematical, marriage, not, as one might expect, additional; it was exponential. This one man, nervous in a suite a size too small for his long, lean self, this woman, in a green lace dress cut to the upper thigh, with a white rose behind her ear. Christ, so young. The woman before them was a unitarian minister, and on her buzzed scalp, the grey hairs shone in a swab of sun through the lace in the window. Outside, Poughkeepsie was waking. Behind them, a man in a custodian's uniform cried softly beside a man in pajamas with a Dachshund, their witnesses, a shine in everyone's eye. One could taste the love on the air, or maybe that was sex, or maybe that was all the same then. 'I do,' she said. 'I do,' he said. They did. They would. Our children will be so fucking beautiful, he thought, looking at her. Home, she thought, looking at him. 'You may kiss,' said the officiant. They did, would. Now they thanked everyone and laughed, and papers were signed and congratulations offered, and all stood for a moment, unwilling to leave this gentile living room where there was such softness. The newlyweds thanked everyone again, shyly, and went out the door into the cool morning. They laughed, rosy. In they'd come integers, out they came, squared. Her life, in the window, the parakeet, scrap of blue midday in the London dusk, ages away from what had been most deeply lived. Day on a rocky beach, creatures in the tide pool. All those ordinary afternoons, listening to footsteps in the beams of the house, and knowing the feeling behind them. Because it was so true, more than the highlights and the bright events, it was in the daily where she'd found life. The hundreds of time she'd dug in her garden, each time the satisfying chew of spade through soil, so often that this action, the pressure and release and rich dirt smell delineated the warmth she'd felt in the cherry orchard. Or this, each day they woke in the same place, her husband waking her with a cup of coffee, the cream still swirling into the black. Almost unremarked upon this kindness, he would kiss her on the crown of her head before leaving, and she'd feel something in her rising in her body to meet him. These silent intimacies made their marriage, not the ceremonies or parties or opening nights or occasions, or spectacular fucks. Anyway, that part was finished. A pity...

Yesterday I just felt like eating my ass off so I did. I ate two Chef Boyardee pizzas, a Fifth Avenue candy bar, an entire package of fun size Snickers (that was fun!), several cherry sours (not the entire package, there are still a few left), an apple (apples don’t taste as good as they used to), several Slim Jims, a slice of burnt garlic toast, white cheddar popcorn and microwave popcorn. Today I will drink black coffee, eat a bowl of oatmeal (old school, boiled on the stove but no butter but lots of cinnamon and brown sugar) and dance to various YouTubes. I need to buy a pair of gloves, get my ass to the boxing gym and learn to love protein shakes. Also, I want to run a marathon. Then I want to get a backpack, stuff it with trail mix and the like and take to the road like the chick in that Wild book.

Meditteranean Summer Salad Serves:  5 Ingredients: 2 tablespoons lime juice 1 teaspoon oregano Pepper to taste ½ teaspoon salt 3 tablespoons olive oil ¼ cup crumbled cheese ½ cup chopped red bell peppers ½ cup sliced kalamata olives ½ cup diced cucumbers 1 cup halved cherry tomatoes 2 cups cooked quinoa Method: Mix all ingredients together Serve cold: Cooking Tips: Mix oil and juice before adding to salad Variation: Use lemon juice or vinegar in place of lime juice

Then it happens. His image appears again, skipping and scraping through the guy testifying. Web. Torn and broken. A face I'd previously only seen in the mirror. No projected back to me, because of me. And still he's smiling. Glommeting like a starfolk. Of course I've thought about every possible way to go back. To sneak away, hide, and wait. To apologize, or have him spit on my face. But I can't. I can't wonder what he's doing right now. And right now. And right now. I can't taste his cherry-candy lips, feel his heart pounding in my mouth. I can't. And I can't turn off the light switch he's flipped on inside me, no matter how hard I try. And I have tried. Tried so hard. But I can't. I know I'm not supposed to feel this way and I hate myself for it, but...I can't stop thinking about him- A jolt zings my thighs. I wince, but try not to flinch. I have to learn to live with this, because... Secret: I know now I can never be fixed.

I placed my hands on the edge of the table and leaned into her, extremely annoyed. “I’ve been cooking since I was a kid. I’ve been cooking this dish for three years straight through culinary school. I could make this food in my goddamn sleep and it would taste like something I’d feed to the president. My food isn’t bland. My food is flavorful, and delicious. And you are just nuts!” I hollered. “Why are you yelling?” she whispered. “I don’t know!” She laughed, making me want to kiss her.

My life in the kitchen began with my grandmother in the village of Champvert in the Tarn-et-Garonne department of southwestern France, the town so small you'd need a magnifying glass to find it on the map. I'd sit on a tall wooden stool, wide-eyed, watching Grand-mère Odette in her navy-blue dress and black ballerina flats, her apron adorned with les coquelicots (wild red poppies), mesmerized by the grace with which she danced around her kitchen, hypnotized by all the wonderful smells- the way the aromas were released from the herbs picked right from her garden as she chopped, becoming stronger as she set them in an olive oiled and buttered pan. She'd dip a spoon in a pot or slice up an onion in two seconds, making it look oh so easy, and for her it was. But my favorite part was when she'd let me taste whatever delight she was cooking up, sweet or savory. I'd close my eyes, lick my lips, and sigh with happiness. Sometimes Grand-mère Odette would blindfold me, and it wasn't long before I could pick out every ingredient by smell. All the other senses came to me, too- sight (glorious plating), taste (the delight of the unknown), touch (the way a cherry felt in my hand), and hearing (the way garlic sizzled in the pan).

Grace had turned to Leeza, Ken, her boyfriend, Brian, and baking. She started by baking the family recipes from her childhood. Cinnamon buns, gingersnaps, saffron bread, and lingonberry pancakes. Grace knew she didn't have her mother's talent, but she tried her best and hoped it might also bring her mother back to earth. Maybe even bring the two of them closer. One afternoon, Grace made a German chocolate cake. She decided to try something different, and added fresh local Door County sour cherries to the batter. When Ken tasted it, he'd fallen on the floor, exclaiming, "I'm dead, but at least I went to heaven: Death by chocolate!

In a blind taste test at the University of Bordeaux, students in the faculty of enology were given two glasses of wine, one red and one white. The wines were actually identical except that one had been made a rich red with an odorless and flavorless additive. The students without exception listed entirely different qualities for the two wines. That wasn’t because they were inexperienced or naive. It was because their sight led them to have entirely different expectations, and this powerfully influenced what they sensed when they took a sip from either glass. In exactly the same way, if an orange-flavored drink is colored red, you cannot help but taste it as cherry.

I can taste hints of coarse-ground cinnamon, cumin, cardamom and cloves!" "Not only that, he used apple wood for his smoke chips! Compared to cherry and other fruit trees, apple wood gives off a milder, sweeter smoke." "Aha! I see! So that's how he was able to smoke the ingredients without overpowering the curry spices!" "Correct! That was the perfect wood to use to highlight the coarse-ground spices he chose." "I added the spice mix to my curing compound too. You should be able to taste the curry spices in all of the smoked ingredients." "The toppings also show an excellent hand! The smoked egg was soft boiled to perfection, its umami flavors delectably concentrated. The yolk is practically jelly!

They set aside the quills and inspected the roasted pear, which was filled with mascarpone and scattered with pistachios. Leo considered. "The mascarpone's a good idea," he said. "It's not sweet. There's some cardamom in there too." Britt nodded. The tuiles that accompanied the pear were caramelized and sparkling with coarse dark sugar. He took a bite of pear and mascarpone and a bite of tuile and chewed, still nodding. Leo took one more bite. "That's actually really good. I hate a mushy pear, but this is just right." They moved on to the sour cherry cake, which was moist and fragrant with almond and some herbal note that quieted both of them. They sat, tasting and thinking, for several seconds, until Leo said, "Hyssop.

Because this tea kaiseki would be served so soon after breakfast, it would be considerably smaller than a traditional one. As a result, Stephen had decided to serve each mini tea kaiseki in a round stacking bento box, which looked like two miso soup bowls whose rims had been glued together. After lifting off the top dome-shaped cover the women would behold a little round tray sporting a tangle of raw squid strips and blanched scallions bound in a tahini-miso sauce pepped up with mustard. Underneath this seafood "salad" they would find a slightly deeper "tray" packed with pearly white rice garnished with a pink salted cherry blossom. Finally, under the rice would be their soup bowl containing the wanmori, the apex of the tea kaiseki. Inside the dashi base we had placed a large ball of fu (wheat gluten) shaped and colored to resemble a peach. Spongy and soft, it had a savory center of ground duck and sweet lily bulb. A cluster of fresh spinach leaves, to symbolize the budding of spring, accented the "peach," along with a shiitake mushroom cap simmered in mirin, sake, and soy. When the women had finished their meals, we served them tiny pink azuki bean paste sweets. David whipped them a bowl of thick green tea. For the dry sweets eaten before his thin tea, we served them flower-shaped refined sugar candies tinted pink. After all the women had left, Stephen, his helper, Mark, and I sat down to enjoy our own "Girl's Day" meal. And even though I was sitting in the corner of Stephen's dish-strewn kitchen in my T-shirt and rumpled khakis, that soft peach dumpling really did taste feminine and delicate.

Chandler runs up the steps two at a time, and when he’s out of sight, I put the pipe to my own lips and draw. Chandler’s tobacco smells of cherries and chocolate. It is cased with molasses and topped with vanilla but tastes—as all smoke does—like smoke. Only a nicer, classier kind of smoke. The kind you pay for. The kind that comes in little pouches and smells of gentlemen and scholars. Tobacco. There is no soot or ash, and I don’t bother trying to blow a ring. I simply stand at the bottom of the stairs and let the cloud rise around my head as I ponder what Chandler has told me. “Give me that,” Mrs. Ney says from behind me. For one moment I think the housekeeper is going to scold me. But instead she adds, “You’re doing it wrong.” Then the wiry old silver-haired woman puts the pipe to her lips, hollows her cheeks, pulls, puffs, and blows out a perfect smoke ring that grows and grows as it rises until—a foot wide—it dissipates altogether.

A misty vision of Francesca gazed down at me from a corner of the window. She gave me her wicked-sweet smile and the stars sparked in her pale hair. I wanted to call to her, but I had no voice. I smelled the mixed scents of her, and I imagined the lush, tropical feast I'd prepare for her on our wedding night. I'd slip raw oysters between her lips. We'd share ripe figs and plump, dewy cherries. I'd offer her sweetmeats and honeyed milk, blood oranges peeled and ready, salty artichokes stripped down to the heart. I'd pry open a lobster shell and feed her tender morsels of meat, slowly, slowly. The flavors would mingle and mount and burst inside us like soft explosions. I wanted to believe it would all be possible. I imagined her staring into my eyes while she dragged a buttered artichoke leaf between her teeth and sucked on the flesh. It was good. I rode through the long, lovely night on wave upon wave of pleasure, smelling her, tasting her, touching her... I heard myself moan, and in that fierce embrace, I believed.

A grown woman tasting a spoonful of Georgia's Mousse au Citron at a late afternoon lunch, then suddenly standing and announcing that she needed to reconcile with her estranged sister before it was too late. She'd hastened away, leaving her coat, one hundred euros to pay the bill, and the mostly uneaten mousse at the table. After devouring Georgia's beet and goat cheese tart one bitter winter evening, an American man with an engagement ring nestled on top of a slice of Georgia's cherry clafoutis looked across the table at his girlfriend and said later that he could suddenly see clearly that she was not the love of his life. He'd hastened back to the kitchen to remove the ring from the dessert where it was waiting to be served at the right moment. They left the restaurant with the ring in his pocket and his girlfriend in tears. There had been others. Many others, now that she thought of it. It had been a bit of a joke among the kitchen staff, that Georgia's dishes could cause more breakups and engagements and family feuds and reconciliations than the restaurant had ever seen. She'd never really put it all together before, but now that she thought of it... "I think my cooking might give people clarity somehow," Georgia said in surprise.

Being capable and productive feels somewhat beside the point these days. Either you're popular, and therefore exciting and successful and a winner, or you're unpopular, and therefore unimportant and invisible and devoid of redeeming value. Being capable was much more celebrated in the 1970s when I was growing up. People had real jobs that lasted a lifetime back then, and many workers seemed to embrace the promise that if you worked steadily and capably for years, you would be rewarded for it. Even without those rewards, working hard and knowing how to do things seemed like worthwhile enterprises in themselves. "Can she back a cherry pie, Billy Boy, Billy Boy?" my mom used to sing while rolling out pie crust with her swift, dexterous hands. Sexist as its message may have been, the modern version of that song might be worse. It would center around taking carefully staged and filtered photos of your pretty face next to a piece of cherry pie and posting it to your Instagram account, to be rewarded with two thousand red hearts for your efforts. Making food, tasting it, sharing it, understanding yourself as a human who can do things - all of this is flattened down to nothing, now, since only one or two people would ever know about it. Better to feed two thousand strangers an illusion than engage in real work to limited ends.

Pasta with Garlic Scapes and Fresh Tomatoes In Italy, you can find a garden anywhere there is a patch of soil, and in many areas, the growing season is nearly year round. It’s common to find an abundant tomato vine twining up the wall near someone’s front stoop, or a collection of herbs and greens adorning a window box. Other staples of an Italian kitchen garden include aubergine, summer squash varieties and peppers of all sorts. Perhaps that’s why the best dishes are so very simple. Gather the fresh ingredients from your garden or local farmers’ market, toss everything together with some hot pasta and serve. In the early summer and mid-autumn, look for garlic scapes, prized for their mild flavor and slight sweetness. Scapes are the willowy green stems and unopened flower buds of hardneck garlic varieties. Roasting garlic scapes with tomatoes and red onion brings out their sweet, rich flavor for a delightful summer meal. 2 swirls of olive oil 10 garlic scapes 1 pint multicolored cherry tomatoes 1 red onion, thinly sliced Sea salt and red pepper flakes, to taste ½ lb. pasta—fettuccine, tubini or spaghetti are good choices 1 cup baby spinach, arugula or fresh basil leaves, or a combination 1 lemon, zested and juiced Toasted pine nuts for garnish Heat oven to 400 ° F. Toss together olive oil, garlic scapes, tomatoes, onion, salt and pepper flakes and spread in an even layer on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Roast for 12–15 minutes, until tomatoes are just beginning to burst. If you have other garden vegetables, such as peppers, zucchini or aubergine, feel free to add that. Meanwhile, cook pasta according to package directions. Toss everything together with the greens, lemon zest and juice. Garnish with pine nuts. Serve immediately with a nice Barolo wine.

That’s right, whine,” said Katharine. “Children,” said their mother. “I,” said Mr. Smith, “suggest we stop and have lunch.” So they did, and it was a town called Angola, which interested Mark because it was named after one of the countries in his stamp album, but it turned out not to be very romantic, just red brick buildings and a drugstore that specialized in hairnets and rubber bathing caps and Allen’s Wild Cherry Extract. Half an hour later, replete with sandwiches and tasting of wild cherry, the four children were on the open road again. Only now it was a different road, one that kept changing as it went along. First it was loose crushed stone that slithered and banged pleasingly underwheel. Then it gave up all pretense of paving and became just red clay that got narrower and narrower and went up and down hill. There was no room to pass, and they had to back down most of the fourth hill and nearly into a ditch to let a car go by that was heading the other way. This was interestingly perilous, and Katharine and Martha shrieked in delighted terror. The people in the other car had luggage with them, and the four children felt sorry for them, going back to cities and sameness when their own vacation was just beginning. But they forgot the people as they faced the fifth hill. The fifth hill was higher and steeper than any of the others; as they came toward it the road seemed to go straight up in the air. And halfway up it the car balked, even though Mr. Smith used his lowest gear, and hung straining and groaning and motionless like a live and complaining thing. “Children, get out,” said their mother. So they did. And relieved of their cloying weight, the car leaped forward and mounted to the brow of the hill, and the four children had to run up the hill after it. That is, Jane and Mark and Katharine did.

Everywhere along the line there were people involved. Farmers who planted and monitored and cared for and pruned and fertilized their trees. Pickers who walked among the rows of plants, in the mountains’ thin air, taking the cherries, only the red cherries, placing them one by one in their buckets and baskets. Workers who processed the cherries, most of that work done by hand, too, fingers removing the sticky mucilage from each bean. There were the humans who dried the beans. Who turned them on the drying beds to make sure they dried evenly. Then those who sorted the dried beans, the good beans from the bad. Then the humans who bagged these sorted beans. Bagged them in bags that kept them fresh, bags that retained the flavor without adding unwanted tastes and aromas. The humans who tossed the bagged beans on trucks. The humans who took the bags off the trucks and put them into containers and onto ships. The humans who took the beans from the ships and put them on different trucks. The humans who took the bags from the trucks and brought them into the roasteries in Tokyo and Chicago and Trieste. The humans who roasted each batch. The humans who packed smaller batches into smaller bags for purchase by those who might want to grind and brew at home. Or the humans who did the grinding at the coffee shop and then painstakingly brewed and poured the coffee or espresso or cappuccino. Any given cup of coffee, then, might have been touched by twenty hands, from farm to cup, yet these cups only cost two or three dollars. Even a four-dollar cup was miraculous, given how many people were involved, and how much individual human attention and expertise was lavished on the beans dissolved in that four-dollar cup. So much human attention and expertise, in fact, that even at four dollars a cup, chances were some person—or many people, or hundreds of people—along the line were being taken, underpaid, exploited.

There is no fault that can’t be corrected [in natural wine] with one powder or another; no feature that can’t be engineered from a bottle, box, or bag. Wine too tannic? Fine it with Ovo-Pure (powdered egg whites), isinglass (granulate from fish bladders), gelatin (often derived from cow bones and pigskins), or if it’s a white, strip out pesky proteins that cause haziness with Puri-Bent (bentonite clay, the ingredient in kitty litter). Not tannic enough? Replace $1,000 barrels with a bag of oak chips (small wood nuggets toasted for flavor), “tank planks” (long oak staves), oak dust (what it sounds like), or a few drops of liquid oak tannin (pick between “mocha” and “vanilla”). Or simulate the texture of barrel-aged wines with powdered tannin, then double what you charge. (““Typically, the $8 to $12 bottle can be brought up to $15 to $20 per bottle because it gives you more of a barrel quality. . . . You’re dressing it up,” a sales rep explained.) Wine too thin? Build fullness in the mouth with gum arabic (an ingredient also found in frosting and watercolor paint). Too frothy? Add a few drops of antifoaming agent (food-grade silicone oil). Cut acidity with potassium carbonate (a white salt) or calcium carbonate (chalk). Crank it up again with a bag of tartaric acid (aka cream of tartar). Increase alcohol by mixing the pressed grape must with sugary grape concentrate, or just add sugar. Decrease alcohol with ConeTech’s spinning cone, or Vinovation’s reverse-osmosis machine, or water. Fake an aged Bordeaux with Lesaffre’s yeast and yeast derivative. Boost “fresh butter” and “honey” aromas by ordering the CY3079 designer yeast from a catalog, or go for “cherry-cola” with the Rhône 2226. Or just ask the “Yeast Whisperer,” a man with thick sideburns at the Lallemand stand, for the best yeast to meet your “stylistic goals.” (For a Sauvignon Blanc with citrus aromas, use the Uvaferm SVG. For pear and melon, do Lalvin Ba11. For passion fruit, add Vitilevure Elixir.) Kill off microbes with Velcorin (just be careful, because it’s toxic). And preserve the whole thing with sulfur dioxide. When it’s all over, if you still don’t like the wine, just add a few drops of Mega Purple—thick grape-juice concentrate that’s been called a “magical potion.” It can plump up a wine, make it sweeter on the finish, add richer color, cover up greenness, mask the horsey stink of Brett, and make fruit flavors pop. No one will admit to using it, but it ends up in an estimated 25 million bottles of red each year. “Virtually everyone is using it,” the president of a Monterey County winery confided to Wines and Vines magazine. “In just about every wine up to $20 a bottle anyway, but maybe not as much over that.

It’s just a kiss,” she says softly. “Why are you all torn up about a kiss?” She’s studying me way too closely. “I’m not torn up,” I protest. “You’ve been moping ever since I told you about the fundraiser, Sean,” she says. “What’s your problem? It’s for charity, for God’s sake.” She lays her free hand on her chest. “My kiss is going to feed victims of domestic violence. I’m doing my part for a better community.” I look down at her mouth. God, I could just slide my fingers into her hair, pull her to me, and kiss her right here and now. But I won’t. Because she doesn’t want me. “I can’t believe you’re going kiss some stranger,” I bite out. “Don’t do it.” “I’ve kissed men before, Sean,” she reminds me. I wish she would keep that shit to herself. “What if it’s some big, goofy guy with really bad breath?” I ask. “What if it’s some big, brawny guy who smells like you and kisses like a god?” she asks. She smiles, the corners of her lips tilting up so prettily. Her fingertips touch my forearm lightly, and she traces the tattoos that decorate my arm from wrist to shoulder. Every hair on my body stands up, and I lift my hand from her knee and thread my fingers with hers so she’ll stop. “If I’m lucky, he’ll be all tatted up, too.” She looks off into the distance, her gaze no longer on me. “Honey, if you want to kiss someone who looks like me and smells like me, I think I can accommodate you so you don’t have to kiss some stranger.” Her eyes shift back to meet mine, and she may as well have just punched me in the gut. She looks into my eyes and stares as if she’s looking into my soul. She can look into it anytime. Shit, I’d give it to her, if she wanted it. But it’s not me she wants. She’s made that abundantly clear. “If I ever kissed you, I would never be able to stop,” I say quietly. My voice sounds like it’s been dragged down a gravel road and back, and I fucking hate that she can affect me this way. “Prove it,” she says, and then she licks her cherry-red lips. She doesn’t break eye contact. I move quickly. This is the first time she’s ever made an offer like this, and my gut tells me that she’s going to take it back. I cup her neck with my palm and pull her toward me. My gentle tug brings her flush against my chest, and the weight of her settles against me and feels so right. Her lips are so close to mine that her inhale is my exhale. My hand quivers as it holds her nape, so I work my fingers into the hair at the back of her head. I hold her still and look into her green eyes. “Tell me you want me to kiss you and you got me, honey,” I whisper. She shivers and inches up my chest ever so slightly, her mouth moving closer to mine. So close. Just a little closer. I can almost taste her. “I want you to kiss me,” she whispers. “Please.” Suddenly, the door opens, and Lacey jumps up, separating us in one final, powerful leap. Fuck. I pull the pillow from behind my head and shove it in my lap, sitting up on the side of the bed. Friday,

Spaghetti alla puttanesca is typically made with tomatoes, olives, anchovies, capers, and garlic. It means, literally, "spaghetti in the style of a prostitute." It is a sloppy dish, the tomatoes and oil making the spaghetti lubricated and slippery. It is the sort of sauce that demands you slurp the noodles Goodfellas style, staining your cheeks with flecks of orange and red. It is very salty and very tangy and altogether very strong; after a small plate, you feel like you've had a visceral and significant experience. There are varying accounts as to when and how the dish originated- but the most likely explanation is that it became popular in the mid-twentieth century. The first documented mention of it is in Raffaele La Capria's 1961 novel, Ferito a Morte. According to the Italian Pasta Makers Union, spaghetti alla puttanesca was a very popular dish throughout the sixties, but its exact genesis is not quite known. Sandro Petti, a famous Napoli chef and co-owner of Ischian restaurant Rangio Fellone, claims to be its creator. Near closing time one evening, a group of customers sat at one of his tables and demanded to be served a meal. Running low on ingredients, Petti told them he didn't have enough to make anything, but they insisted. They were tired, and they were hungry, and they wanted pasta. "Facci una puttanata qualsiasi!" they cried. "Make any kind of garbage!" The late-night eater is not usually the most discerning. Petti raided the kitchen, finding four tomatoes, two olives, and a jar of capers, the base of the now-famous spaghetti dish; he included it on his menu the next day under the name spaghetti alla puttanesca. Others have their own origin myths. But the most common theory is that it was a quick, satisfying dish that the working girls of Naples could knock up with just a few key ingredients found at the back of the fridge- after a long and unforgiving night. As with all dishes containing tomatoes, there are lots of variations in technique. Some use a combination of tinned and fresh tomatoes, while others opt for a squirt of puree. Some require specifically cherry or plum tomatoes, while others go for a smooth, premade pasta. Many suggest that a teaspoon of sugar will "open up the flavor," though that has never really worked for me. I prefer fresh, chopped, and very ripe, cooked for a really long time. Tomatoes always take longer to cook than you think they will- I rarely go for anything less than an hour. This will make the sauce stronger, thicker, and less watery. Most recipes include onions, but I prefer to infuse the oil with onions, frying them until brown, then chucking them out. I like a little kick in most things, but especially in pasta, so I usually go for a generous dousing of chili flakes. I crush three or four cloves of garlic into the oil, then add any extras. The classic is olives, anchovies, and capers, though sometimes I add a handful of fresh spinach, which nicely soaks up any excess water- and the strange, metallic taste of cooked spinach adds an interesting extra dimension. The sauce is naturally quite salty, but I like to add a pinch of sea or Himalayan salt, too, which gives it a slightly more buttery taste, as opposed to the sharp, acrid salt of olives and anchovies. I once made this for a vegetarian friend, substituting braised tofu for anchovies. Usually a solid fish replacement, braised tofu is more like tuna than anchovy, so it was a mistake for puttanesca. It gave the dish an unpleasant solidity and heft. You want a fish that slips and melts into the pasta, not one that dominates it. In terms of garnishing, I go for dried oregano or fresh basil (never fresh oregano or dried basil) and a modest sprinkle of cheese. Oh, and I always use spaghetti. Not fettuccine. Not penne. Not farfalle. Not rigatoni. Not even linguine. Always spaghetti.

The Perfect Old-Fashioned Mix together –– but not too slowly… It’s best when there’s instant chemistry! 1 sugar cube –– an innocent virgin works best 2 to 3 dashes bitters –– an untamed mountain man if you can find one 2 ounces rye whiskey –– the stronger the better, just like our alphas 1 cherry to garnish –– an unpopped one will taste the sweetest

She was hungry for something much more substantial than sugar. It was time to put the cherry lollipops aside. The power games of her childhood were no longer enough. This kiss only proves that. Nox didn’t taste sweet. He tasted strong. Like steel and fire. Electrical fire. That was the taste of power. That’s what I want now. Isn’t it?

She takes a bite of the custardy penne cotta and it melts into a dozen separate flavors. She can smell oranges and lemons, cherry and wood, and even the soft silk and wool of Persian carpets, the smell that she thought came from Iraq.

The Owl & Moon would never lack for customers. If a person came in for Chocolate Bomb cookies for her daughter's birthday, while she waited to have them boxed she'd smell the paper-thin rosemary-garlic Cheese Pennies, and pick up two dozen. Then she'd ask for a taste of the gleaming slab of Chocolate Cherry Thunder fudge.

I turned that word—home—around in my mouth. It tasted like dust, ash, decomposed corpses, and simultaneously, like fresh mulberries, cherries ripened in the sun, rose water, pulverized saffron, dates.

If only you knew your worth wasn’t determined by the way he moaned as he tasted your skin. If Only — B

Finally, let's talk about those Kit Kat bars. There is no flavor that can be embodied in Kit Kat form and sold in Japanese stores. Green tea. Black tea. Miso. Cherry blossom. Soy sauce. Toasted soybean powder (kinako). Chile. Orange. Melon. Only a few are available at any given time, and right now, evil geniuses at Nestlé are coming up with new flavors. I'd like to suggest okonomiyaki flavor, which would consist of a bag of assorted flavors (ginger, squid, mountain yam, egg) that could be combined in the proportions of your choice, just like a real okonomiyaki. Sauce and Kewpie mayo optional. We bought a SkyTree orange Kit Kat, was a regular orange Kit Kat in a preposterously long box, and the Yubari melon Kit Kat, which tasted exactly like melon, was sold in a fancy gift box, and cost $200. Two-thirds of that is true.

Kai enlisted the help of some culinary students for prep work and serving, and pulled out all the stops for this party, skipping the sit-down dinner in favor of endless little nibbles, sort of like tapas or a wonderful tasting menu. Champagne laced with Pineau des Charentes, a light cognac with hints of apple that essentially puts a velvet smoking jacket around the dry sparkling wine. Perfect scallops, crispy on the outside, succulent and sweet within, with a vanilla aioli. Tiny two-bite Kobe sliders on little pretzel rolls with caramelized onions, horseradish cream, and melted fontina. Seared tuna in a spicy soy glaze, ingenious one-bite caprese salads made by hollowing out cherry tomatoes, dropping some olive oil and balsamic vinegar inside, and stuffing with a mozzarella ball wrapped in fresh basil. Espresso cups of chunky roasted tomato soup with grilled cheese croutons. The food is delicious and never-ending, supplemented with little bowls of nuts, olives, raw veggies, and homemade potato chips with lemon and rosemary.

She is never going to let me live down that stupid Thanksgiving," Kai says. I can't help but take the bait. "You made prime rib!" "It was delicious," Kai says, shrugging. "IT WAS BEEF! You can't have beef on Thanksgiving, except for appetizers like meatballs or something. You have TURKEY on Thanksgiving." Last Thanksgiving I spent with Phil and Kai, since I was orphaned and separated and Gilly couldn't make it from London. Everything was delicious, but it was like a dinner party and not Thanksgiving. The prime rib wasn't the only anomaly. No mashed potatoes or stuffing or sweet potatoes with marshmallows or green bean casserole. He had acorn squash with cippolini onions and balsamic glaze. Asparagus almondine. Corn custard with oyster mushrooms. Wild rice with currants and pistachios and mint. All amazing and perfectly cooked and balanced, and not remotely what I wanted for Thanksgiving. When I refused to take leftovers, his feelings were hurt, and when he got to the store two days later, he let me know. "Look," Kai says with infinite patience. "For a week we prepped for the Thanksgiving pickups." He ticks off on his fingers the classic menu we developed together for the customers who wanted a traditional meal without the guilt. "Herb-brined turkey breasts with apricot glaze and roasted shallot jus. Stuffing muffins with sage and pumpkin seeds. Cranberry sauce with dried cherries and port. Pumpkin soup, and healthy mashed potatoes, and glazed sweet potatoes with orange and thyme, and green beans with wild mushroom ragu, and roasted brussels sprouts, and pumpkin mousse and apple cake. We cooked Thanksgiving and tasted Thanksgiving and took Thanksgiving leftovers home at the end of the day. I just thought you would be SICK OF TURKEY!

So there was a martini- something he hadn't tasted since college- and there was wine, and there was a dinner most remarkable for a meal produced at a "camp": smoked mussels (gathered and smoked right there on the island, he learned), ratatouille, a salad with pears and blue cheese, and a three-layer chocolate cake with whipped cream and cherries, all of it made by Greenie's mother, who would not accept a bit of help.

Yeah, just what I needed, a massive three-day Hostess binge, followed by a week of trying to replicate recipes so that if no one decides to buy and reissue Twinkies and Suzy Q's, I'll be all set. It was a ridiculous endeavor, since most of the experience of Hostess is in the slightly plasticky tastes and textures, which cannot be replicated in a home kitchen. You can make a delicious moist yellow cake and fill it with a marshmallowy vanilla cream, and it will be spectacular, trust me; I ate at least a dozen. But it won't taste like a Twinkie. The cake won't have the springiness, the filling won't have the fluff, and it is impossible to get those three little dots in the bottom. Which would be fine, since I hadn't actually eaten a Hostess product for the better part of a decade, hadn't missed them either. But that little news item hit, and in a Pavlovian fit of nostalgia, I was off to the local gas station to load up on white boxes with blue and red details. Twinkies, Sno Balls, Ding Dongs... even a cherry Fruit Pie. All of them the flavors of my youth, and proof that there are certain things you should leave as fond memories, since they don't really hold up.

I can tell right away by looking at you what you want to eat," he says. "I can tell how many brothers and sisters you have." After divining my favorite color (blue) and my astrological sign (Aquarius), Nakamura pulls out an ivory stalk of takenoko, fresh young bamboo ubiquitous in Japan during the spring. "This came in this morning from Kagumi. It's so sweet that you can eat it raw." He peels off the outer layer, cuts a thin slice, and passes it across the counter. First, he scores an inch-thick bamboo steak with a ferocious santoku blade. Then he sears it in a dry sauté pan until the flesh softens and the natural sugars form a dark crust on the surface. While the bamboo cooks, he places two sacks of shirako, cod milt, under the broiler. ("Milt," by the way, is a euphemism for sperm. Cod sperm is everywhere in Japan in the winter and early spring, and despite the challenges its name might create for some, it's one of the most delicious things you can eat.) Nakamura brings it all together on a Meiji-era ceramic plate: caramelized bamboo brushed with soy, broiled cod milt topped with miso made from foraged mountain vegetables, and, for good measure, two lightly boiled fava beans. An edible postcard of spring. I take a bite, drop my chopsticks, and look up to find Nakamura staring right at me. "See, I told you I know what you want to eat." The rest of the dinner unfolds in a similar fashion: a little counter banter, a little product display, then back to transform my tastes and his ingredients into a cohesive unit. The hits keep coming: a staggering plate of sashimi filled with charbroiled tuna, surgically scored squid, thick circles of scallop, and tiny white shrimp blanketed in sea urchin: a lesson in the power of perfect product. A sparkling crab dashi topped with yuzu flowers: a meditation on the power of restraint. Warm mochi infused with cherry blossoms and topped with a crispy plank of broiled eel: a seasonal invention so delicious it defies explanation.

I’ll say I do! Can I have some of that funny-looking pie?” “Ssshh! Don’t let the Abbot hear you, that’s his new invention, wild cherry and glazed plum gateau with elderflower cream. He’s very proud of it.” “Mmmm, so he should be, tastes marvelous. D’you use paws or a spoon?” “Try using your mouth. Hahaha!

I began the day I was to dine at casa di Palone in the Vaticano kitchen, helping Antonio prepare the pope's meals. For noonday, we made barley soup, apples, and a little cheese and bread. For the evening meal, we prepared the same soup with bits of roasted capons, and I made a zabaglione egg dish with a little malmsey wine. I suspected the pope would not touch the custardy dessert, but I felt compelled to take a chance. The worst that might happen was that he would order me to go back to his regular menu. And at best, perhaps he would recognize the joy of food God gifted to us. Once we had finished the general preparations, Antonio helped me bake a crostata to take to the Palone house that evening. He set to work making the pastry as I cleaned the visciola cherries- fresh from the market- and coated them with sugar, cinnamon, and Neapolitan mostaccioli crumbs. I nestled the biscotti among several layers of dough that Antonio had pressed into thin sheets to line the pan. Atop the cherries, I laid another sheet of pastry cut into a rose petal pattern. Antonio brushed it with egg whites and rosewater, sugared it, and set the pie into the oven to bake. Francesco joined us just as I placed the finished crostata on the counter to cool. The cherries bubbled red through the cracks of the rose petals and the scalco gave a low whistle. "Madonna!" Antonio and I stared at him, shocked at the use of the word as a curse. Francesco laughed. "That pie is so beautiful I think even our Lord might swear." He clapped me on the shoulder. "It is good to see you cooking something besides barley soup, Gio. It's been too long since this kitchen has seen such a beautiful dessert." The fragrance was magnificent. I hoped the famiglia Palone would find the pie tasted as good as it looked.

She was a paragon of good health and didn't need to worry herself about the advice of doctors. She should instead worry about love. Love of the crumble of a lavender tourte against her tongue. Love of the delicate flavor of sole in a tarragon sauce. Love of the flaky crust of a prune and cherry crostata. Or love of the wine mingling with the taste of a pig freshly roasted on the spit.

It's time, you must bite of the cherry of life It'll taste like fear and hope and diet coke and rainbows But don't be surprised when the pain grows this is kinda gonna suck, you can't abstain though There is no "do not" There's no effin try There's no "I don't wanna" It's life...If you don't like it then die Wait no, I'm not condoning suicide Just trying to be motivational overly sensational You get it, I'm sure So I abjure

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She tip-toed up, brushing her lips over mine in that feather-light almost kiss that drove me to madness. “Can you taste cherries?” she breathed against my mouth. “No.” I brushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “I can taste my own soul, because it’s the exact same flavour as yours.

Joy that a handsome man was smiling at her, his hair stuck to his forehead, his T-shirt becoming more transparent. On a whim--- and Astra would later blame it on the Santa Claus shots--- she wrapped her arms around Jack's neck and pulled his lips to hers. The shock of it caused them both to stop dancing as the minty-cherry taste in her mouth mingled with the ginger on his breath. Tentative at first, her lips waited for him to respond, a sign he was open to sharing her joy. She was about to pull away, hot embarrassment kindling to life in her cheeks, when his hands when to her hips, and his lips moved with hers, and her mouth opened for him. Their kiss found its own rhythm on the dance floor, moving them closer together as the people bumped around them, but Astra didn't care. She only cared that this kiss reminded her that she liked kissing, she liked being touched, she liked feeling wanted. It had been so long. Her hands grabbed at his shirt as he moved his kisses to her neck. She moaned but too softly for anyone to hear over the music. Lights flashed and swirled on the ceiling; the air pulsated with heat. She was dizzy and breathless. Her hands pressed against him, savoring how well they molded to his curves and angles. Her lips found his again, and she wanted to be closer, wishing she could wrap her legs around him and have her way. Her knees quaked as his hands explored the way her jeans clung to her butt and hips, finding the hem of her shirt and touching her lower back, heated skin on heated skin. He wanted her as much as she wanted him. She broke the kiss long enough to look into his eyes: they flashed from blue to green to black with the disco lights, his hair dark with perspiration, and his breath coming as fast as her own. Now that they'd kissed, she knew what it was about the way he looked at her. He looked at her like this moment had been inevitable, a done deal, foretold years ago. And she believed it. The feeling left her even more light-headed.

She took another bite of the kringle, appreciating how she tasted just the right combination of flaky, tender pastry and scrumptious filling in each bite. She could see the layers in the dough, but they didn't flake off like a turnover or croissant. The almond cherry filling and cream cheese glaze were the perfect balance of sweet and tangy. With a man who could bake like this, she could almost see herself in another relationship.

As for the glaze, he took another bite to think as the intense sugar slapped his taste buds. Cream cheese. That would add a tanginess to counter the sweet. He mixed a new glaze, adding a pinch of cinnamon, and spread it on the unglazed halves so they could sample right away. "Should I keep the cherries whole or chop them up so you don't get a giant glob in your mouth?" Jack loved the flavor but didn't always like it when he took a bite and an entire cherry came out. For his taste, it was too much cherry in one chunk. "Chopped. Always chopped.

I know what easy gets a girl. The easy way produces cherry pies that taste like cardboard. There is no love in that path.

Love is a pear,’ Jaskier tells him and Geralt snorts. ‘How would you describe the shape of a pear? There’s nothing else like it, it’s pear-shaped. You know when you see it, it’s sweet, and can be sour, it has its own texture unlike anything else. It doesn’t taste like an apple. Or a cherry. And even when you consume it, there’s seeds that can be planted, and you’d never forget it. You can grow more, and there’s flowers, and offshoots, and when someone says ‘pear’ to you, you can still taste it. You can remember the juice breaking over your chin, and the smell of it as you bite into the skin…the odd texture of it, sort of grainy, but it’s a beautiful contrast to the fruit inside…

She wondered how the trees fought the chilling rush of the winter. Hot or cold, their endurance is limitless. They were like a tea bag--the longer you dip it into the water, the stronger its taste becomes.

Sartre gazed upon Freya's beauty, continuously reminding himself that he should not stare. Every time that he let his guard down, his eye wandered back to her cherry lips. He wanted to know if they tasted as good as they looked. He trailed down and noticed how the slight cleft in her chin served to accentuate the much deeper cleft between her breasts. Freya detected Sartre skimming her body. She liked it. This frail little man with the crazy eye was so much different than the strong, muscular brutes that she was used to. He was a cute little oddity.

His lips teased hers before moving to the pulse in her throat and tasting her there. She gasped and abandoned her apronful of cherries. “I love you,” he whispered. “You do?” Hope sprang anew in her heart. “I’ve just been an idiot and too proud to let myself admit it.” His declaration reflected in the clear blue of his eyes. “I can’t delude myself any longer. I have to confess. I’m madly and passionately in love with my wife.

Combine the following four categories of ingredients to taste: Green vegetable (use one or more): kale, spinach, bok choy, collard greens, cabbage greens, Swiss chard, beet greens, sprouts, cucumber, broccoli, celery, avocado Liquid (use one): water, tea, almond milk, coconut milk, coconut water, raw milk, kefir. Add ice if you like your smoothie chilled. Fruit (use one or more, fresh or frozen): strawberries, blueberries, bananas, apples, cherries, coconut, carrots, beets (top and root), lemon, gingerroot, pumpkin, tomatoes Add-ins: protein powder (with no added sugar), flax meal (for omega-3s), cinnamon (regulates blood sugar), stevia, spirulina, chlorella, hulled hemp seeds, chia seeds soaked in water, olive oil, powdered vitamin C

There were streets named Mulberry and Orchard and Cherry, streets bright and tart, streets with a color and a taste.

They didn’t, and now the room felt strangely empty without their grandmother rattling in the corners. They had been here before. Averlee couldn’t place it exactly, but the mix of cigarettes and coffee, the rose-scented air freshener was familiar. The cookie jar shaped like a clock on the kitchen counter. She had seen it, tasted lemon wafers from inside it. They had been here before they had enough words to remember it by. And now she’d left them alone. But it wasn’t her grandmother Averlee missed. It was the braided rug in her bedroom at home, smelling like the cherry sucker Quincy broke between her teeth and let fall like slivers of red glass between the seams. Her grandmother’s voice carried down the hall. “Hospital… Snake… These girls.” Averlee liked to flop onto her belly and read on that rug. She

The Milked Duck was empty, save for Dahlia’s two part-time helpers, but they were all rushing around, anticipating the first guests for her Risqué Flavor Tasting event any moment now. The up front freezers were stocked with Chocolate Orgasm, Peachy Passion, Sexual Favors, Mikey’s favorite Cherry Popper and more. She had a case of Sin on a Stick treats ready to go and a temporary menu up on the board behind her.

QUINOA SALAD 6-8 servings (recipe can be doubled. Makes a great workday lunch over arugula and/or spinach—protein, vegetables, vitamins, fiber, AND low-calorie!) 1 c. uncooked quinoa, rinsed very well and drained (the soapy substance tastes bitter if you don’t rinse it off) Vegetable or chicken broth, if desired 1/2 c. chopped green onions, white and pale green parts only (about 2 bunches) ¾ c. chopped fresh parsley 3-4 Tbsp. chopped fresh mint, to taste (optional) 1 clove minced garlic 1 c. grape or cherry tomatoes, cut in halves or quarters ½ cucumber, chopped ½ cup diced red or yellow pepper 1 can black beans, rinsed and drained (optional) ½ tsp. salt, or to taste (less if you are cooking quinoa in a salted broth) ¼ tsp. pepper, or to taste 3-4 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil 3-4 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice (1-2 lemons) Cook the quinoa as directed on package—normally about 15 minutes. If it is well rinsed, use about 1-3/4 cups water, or vegetable or chicken broth, for 1 cup of quinoa. It is done when the quinoa sprouts little curly “tails.” If all liquid is not absorbed, strain it to remove the liquid. Chill the cooked quinoa if possible; add vegetables and herbs (and beans, if using). Whisk olive oil, lemon juice, salt & pepper in a bowl with a fork until well blended. Add to salad and mix thoroughly. Taste & correct salt & pepper. Chill salad if possible; the flavors will blend as it sits. Other vegetable/herb choices: carrots, zucchini, cilantro (instead of mint).

He tasted like popcorn, cherry gummy bears, and every decadent, forbidden thing. He tasted like bad choices.

Luncheon was usually at about two o’clock, often at someone else’s house in a small party. In the afternoon they attended concerts or drove to Richmond or Hurlingham, or else made the necessary, more formal calls upon those ladies they knew only slightly, perching awkwardly around withdrawing rooms, backs stiff, and making idiotic chatter about people, gowns, and the weather. The men excused themselves from this last activity and retired to one or another of their clubs. At four there was afternoon tea, sometimes at home, sometimes out at a garden party. Once there was a game of croquet, at which George partnered Sybilla and lost hopelessly amid peals of laughter and a sense of delight that infinitely outweighed Emily’s, who won. The taste of victory was ashes in her mouth. Not even Eustace, who partnered her, seemed to notice her. All eyes were on Sybilla, dressed in cherry pink, her cheeks flushed, her eyes radiant, and laughing so easily at her own ineptitude everyone wished to laugh with her.

Our first kiss tastes like bourbon and cherries. A perfect union. She tastes like she was made just for me.

(I know, I know, many North Carolinians will go to bat for Cheerwine. I am not one of them. The stuff tastes like carbonated maraschino cherries.)

I can taste Aaron on my lips, like sweet cherries and heartache, that's what he tastes like, what he's always tasted like.

I lick my lips. They still taste like Aaron, like cherry cola and teenage fucking dreams.