Can’t wait to try one of these fruits, they sound delicious.
Our friend recently gave us a couple of exotic fruit trees that we’ve never heard of before. They are Rollinia trees also known as a Biribá or lemon meringue pie tree. It’s a sweet tropical fruit that is in the same family as custard-apple and soursop. Supposedly, the flavor is described as a cross between lemon meringue pie, banana, pineapple and coconut. The texture is a translucent white pulp that is soft and creamy like custard. Hopefully the trees will start producing in a couple years, as we can’t wait to try it. This could become my new favorite fruit.
It looks like these might all be ready at the same time. Now we just need to keep the critters away from the fruit.
Our dragon fruit is doing very well this year. So far we’ve picked twenty or so and there are still more than a hundred big blooms on the plants. There are some small buds just starting that won’t bloom for another month or so. This year I was reading how to increase the amount of fruit on your plants. It suggested you spray your plants with potassium every week once the first buds appear. I did this for the first six weeks and I think that it really made a difference. This is the most dragon fruit blooms we’ve gotten so far. I know it might look like the plants are crowded, but so far this year we’ve trimmed off two full truckloads of branches from these plants.
Coffee and dragon fruit, my typical morning start for the next month or so.
Looks like our breakfast for the next month or so is going to be dragon fruit. With all this dragon fruit, you know we’ll be seeing what else we can do with it. Definitely combining it with more chocolate and maybe even some dragon fruit ice cream. The last few months we had pineapples, and now that they’re done, it’s dragon fruit season. There is a sweet spot sometimes when those two fruits will overlap in ripening, and we can enjoy them both for breakfast at the same time.
The first batch of pepperoni has turned out better than we expected.
It was time to check the weight of our pepperoni once again. After six weeks, it dried to just where we wanted it, so we pulled all seven sticks out of the chamber. I have to say, for our first attempt at dry salamis, they turned out great! They’re nice and dry with a good spicy zing. As for the other Italian salamis, they are in a much larger casing and will probably have to be in there another month or so until they lose the correct amount of weight. Next time we make a batch, all the salami will be in the smaller casings so they’ll all be ready right about the same time.
There is a major sargassum problem in Placencia.
We did manage to take a trip over to Placencia while Darren was here. The sargassum (stinky seaweed) was really bad this time on the beaches, and there was no way to get into the water. So we ended up spending a couple of days in swimming pools with some cold beers. We did have a couple of good scores on lobsters while we were there. One guy came into this beach bar with 7 lobsters and just needed some gas money, so we got those at a very good price. We also got 8 lbs of just lobster meat from someone else at an unbelievable price. Looks like we’ll be making some lobster raviolis, lobster chowder and a few other good things in the near future.
Snappers, Yellow Jacks, and Barracudas.
Kelley and I had planned on going out fishing one of the days, but my hand was still jacked up from moving all our rocks a few weeks ago. So I decided it was best not to go fishing and make my hand any worse than it was. Our friend and fishing guy knew we wanted to bring some fish back with us, so he went out one day by himself and caught a bunch of fish for us to bring back. Darrell @ Fin Obsession is the best fishing guide in Placencia and will always put you on fish. His wife Jolly just opened a new restaurant and bar near the airport called Jolly Time. If you are in Placencia, stop by Jolly Time for some great food and an ice-cold drink. While you are there, set up a trip to go fishing or island hopping with Darrel @ Fin Obsession, you won’t be disappointed.
A few weeks ago all the crotons looked great!
A few weeks ago we moved 45 or so big crotons in the driveway. They were doing very well in the new area and were looking great. Then one day I went to water them and there was not a single leaf left on any of the plants. This year we have had a giant grasshopper invasion, and they are eating everything. Some of these grasshoppers are 6″ long and will strip an entire plant in one day. We have also had a leafcutter ant invasion, and they are worse than the grasshoppers. We are trying to do what we can, but they are still destroying a lot of our plants. Between the grasshoppers and the leafcutters, I’m not sure how much longer our plants can take it. Hopefully, when the rains come they will go away before we have no plants left.
After the leafcutter ants and the grasshoppers got to them, all the leaves were gone in a couple of nights.
We have a ton of cohune palms around the property and when their nuts are ripe, they fall from the trees. They are a little bigger than a golf ball and animals love them. Currently, there are a couple of big bunches that are falling right above the house, and when they hit the metal roof they are very loud, especially in the middle of the night. The other evening we were watching TV and they seemed to be hitting the roof more frequently than normal. We went out to look and there was a big porcupine above the house eating and dropping the nuts. We tried to get a picture of him, but it was a little too dark.
Cohune nuts are very loud when they fall on a tin roof.
The past couple of days we’ve had six or so Collared Aracaris eating berries off of one of our trees in the driveway. Aracaris are one of three types of toucans native to Belize. They are very social birds that travel in family groups of 3-12 birds. They roost in tree cavities where up to six of them will squeeze in together, even though they are a good-sized bird at 16″. We do have a picture from a few years ago of three sticking their heads out of a woodpecker hole on one of our power poles. Even though they are common sightings, we still get excited when we see them.
An Aracaris’ unique bill markings can identify it from other Aricaries.
We see quite a few hawks and falcons around here, but the most common is the Roadside Hawk. We love having them around because they are always looking for rodents, snakes, etc. A couple of years ago I was standing by this big palm tree and one swooped towards me to the tree. A few seconds later, he flew out of that tree holding onto a snake. It was one of the coolest things I’ve seen.
A roadside hawk on a tree stump just off our front porch.
The past couple of weeks we’ve been going nonstop with neighbors in town, spending time in Placencia with friends and not getting the proper rest we needed. On top of that, we both caught some type of flu or something that’s hanging on for a few days. Then, to top it off, Kelley got into a wasp nest and got stung a few times; then the next day a scorpion got her on her hand. Hopefully in a few days we’ll start feeling better and get back to normal (whatever that might be).
The day this got posted, I was feeling good again, but Kelley was not quite there yet.
