Dewalt Power Tools Rule!

We’ve about run out of things to do around here that won’t cost much, so today was a day of investigation and brainstorming. While Tom was doing some work on the computer this morning, I decided to play with coconuts. I picked up three brown coconuts from the ground, testing to make sure they were good by shaking them and listening for water inside. As I was looking for coconuts to test, I was amazed by how quickly they sprout. The brown ones fall out of the tree, and it seemed like coconuts I had kicked around a week ago now had six inches of roots coming out one end, and a three or four inch green spout out the other. They’re so big they look like alien seed pods. I finally found three that weren’t sprouting and that made the right noise when shaken, and carted them back to the camper. I then took my fruit picker and went in search of green coconuts in the trees that I could reach. I found a tree that had coconuts that were low enough for me to bang, and that had a bunch that were ripe enough that they would fall off when I banged them, so I knocked down three of them and took them back to the camper.

The girls had told me that the green ones were good for the water, and the brown ones were good for the meat used to make coconut milk, which we had made for the coconut rice last week. Being modern and brilliant, I wanted to see if there was an easier way to get the milk than the thoroughly manual scrape, wash, hand grate, and rinse method Ofelia, Rosa, and Iris had shown me. The answer is no. Tom split the coconuts with his machete, then I sat outside the camper and picked the meat out of the three brown coconuts. I took it inside and rinsed it, then, since the generator was running, I dug out my Cuisinart, put the coconut meat in, and let it rip. I then added some water, and strained it into a bowl, just like we did the other night after hand grating it. The results were awful. The “milk” was sort of grayish brown, and the fat had congealed into tiny particles that stuck to everything, which left just the grayish brown water; think of how the kitchen sink looks after you wash a roasting pan and then let the water go down the drain. I think part of the problem is that when it’s hand grated, only the white part is grated, but I threw everything into the food processor, so the thin layer of brown that comes off on the meat from the shell was also pulverized, which changed the color. When you eat the coconut in pieces, you don’t even know the brown is there, but it seems to ruin the milk. I also think the speed of the food processor probably separated the liquid and the fat, which is why two distinctly different icky substances poured off the pulverized coconut. I dumped the results, and I’ll try one coconut at a time and do it the right way next time. One thing I did discover from this experiment is that after a whole lifetime of hating coconut, the coconut that comes right out of the shell is pretty good. It’s crunchy and moist and has a really nice flavor – like, errr, coconut. The shredded stuff that we buy in bags and that people put in and on food is basically the dried waste after the good stuff is strained out.



The other thing I found out is that there IS a good use for Tom’s 18v DeWalt cordless drill. It’s the nuts for drilling two holes in the top of a green coconut so the coconut water can be poured into a glass. The fresh coconut water is almost clear and doesn’t have a strong flavor; it’s like rich water, if that’s something you can imagine. Three coconuts made two big (probably 16 oz. each) glasses of coconut water, to which I added a splash of citrus concentrate, and Tom and I had a nice mid-morning refresher. It would be great with a splash of rum, but we didn’t have any, and Sunday morning isn’t the time to get it around here.



The other fun thing that happened today was that we both rode Esmerelda. We went into San Antonio with Thelma, one of the daughters of Salvadorian Marta, and her little brother Giovanni, and when we dropped them off back at their house, a very clean little grey horse was grazing in their yard. Tom and I both looked twice, and checked the white feet and markings to make sure it was Esmerelda, because she was clean and all the burrs and been pulled out of her mane and tail. We were barely back in the driveway and we heard hoofbeats on the road, and George came in riding the mare. I was like a little kid at the fair, just about jumping up and down saying, “Can I ride her? Can I ride her? I can ride, really. Really, I can ride.” George looked at me and said he didn’t have a saddle, I of course didn’t care, and my excitement must have overpowered George’s good sense in not wanting some stranger to jump on his greenbroke horse just because she says she can ride. I’ve been in George’s shoes and have usually regretted letting the self proclaimed “rider” on my horses, especially after said “rider” usually ends up on their butt in the grass. But George gave in, I hopped on, and clamped on my legs. After years of listening to Karin say “more leg,” I automatically get on and wrap my legs around, and Esmerelda isn’t used to that. She crow hopped a few times, George told me stop kicking her, and I just gave her a little squeeze and we went up the driveway and wandered around for a few minutes. She is certainly not a warmblood. I think my feet are about a foot from the ground when I’m on her, and she’s as skinny or skinnier than Patrick, but she carries herself well and is very balanced, and I feel less like my weight might unbalance her than I do on Patrick. Then I let Tom have a turn, and then we turned her loose and showed George and Ronnie, his brother, some of our horse pictures so he knew we had really had horses and really have ridden. We told him to keep his ears open for any more, preferably bigger, horses for sale, so we’re expecting a parade of sale horses in the next week or so.