a cure for summer (for adam & david & juan)

[foxtongue]

pluck nine shiny yellow lemons from the pile, put them in your basket, find the strawberries, try to decide through the clear plastic clamshell boxes which ones contain the best and most delicious strawberries, put two of them in your basket too, and one pink grapefruit, then purchase them and leave the store. peel what needs peeling, tear them apart, lick the tart juices running down to your elbows, smile, laugh, (try to find someone pretty to help), put them in a medium sized pot, then rummage through a kitchen drawer until you find a neglected potato masher, one rarely used no matter how delicious mashed potatoes are because there is just never find time in a busy life to make them, and use it to squish the pulpy sour lemons and the pink grapefruit that squirted while it was being skinned until they are mostly juice. while doing this, the pretty helper should have washed the strawberries in bracing cold water, clear and fresh and cool, and begun to pry the stems out with a fingernail, delicate and certain. they should then open the berries as if they were lips, something sweet to kiss, and toss the pieces in with the wet and acidic mess in the pot, brightening it with berry blood the colour of love and good music. when the first box of plump and perfect strawberries is gone, pressed into the rest of the liquid, take the pot, thanking the pretty assistant, fill it with beautiful water, enough to cover the mixture three times over, and put it on the stove to boil like a mysterious teenage dream of summer. when the mixture has begun to boil, possibly stir in with a wooden spoon, cracked perhaps from being left in the sink too long last month, a cup of the darkest demera sugar, as unprocessed as sugar can be, flavourful as honey. after thirty minutes of bubbling, making sure nothing sticks to the bottom, take the pot from the stove and place it inside the fridge, as arctic and pale as fake fox fur. the frost will lick it clean. when it is cold, it is ready to drink. enjoy.

Comments

[drcuriosity]

Ever considered writing a recipe book? If not...

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

I don't have that many. I have a chocolate sex pie, this strawberry lemonade, a cocoa brushed duck... you know? I'm thinking if I did a series, I should title it, "I kill diabetics as an incidental hobby".

[gunn.livejournal.com]

Bees. Bees. Bees. Bees. Bees. Bees.

so thus he spake

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

Buzz buzz buzz.

[michel-lacombe.livejournal.com]

Put someone pretty in a medium-sized pot?

You're *preserving* them now?

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, putting someone pretty in a medium-sized pot sounds like a waste of a perfectly good pretty person.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, putting someone pretty in a medium-sized pot sounds like a waste of a perfectly good pretty person.

Just what I was thinking.

[kindelingboy.livejournal.com]

Saving them for winter, obviously.