Amy Winehouse's amazing voice

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5LsdEqSQO4

Chiquita banana

Some say she is a terrorist, I just terrorized my parents growing up by singing this over and over again...

Miss Chiquita Banana - Female banana character (first drawn by artist Dik Browne) who wore a headdress of fruit and sang the trademark Chiquita Banana song (voice first provided by singer Patti Clayton) that began "Hello Amigo...I'm Chiquita Banana and I've come to say/You eat the banana in a special way/And when it's fleck with brown and has a golden hue/That's when bananas are the best for you...." (Music © 1945 Shawnee Press Inc.) The Chiquita Banana jingle was created in 1944 for the United Fruit Company by a BBDO advertising team headed by Robert Foreman. The song's lyrics, written by Garth Montgomery and music composed by co-worker Ken MacKenzie, instructed Americans on how to ripen and properly use this golden tropical fruit, for example, putting them in pies, or salads and to never to put the equator grown fruit in the refrigerator. In 1945 and 1946, Puerto Rico-born Elsa Miranda portrayed Miss Chiquita in numerous personal appearances in the movies, in radio commercials. June Valli (popular for her 1954 hit song "Crying in the Chapel) was the singing voice of Chiquita Banana in the TV commercials in the 1950s. In 1987, the image of Miss Chiquita changed from a banana character when artist Oscar Grillo, creator of the Pink Panther, transformed her into a beautiful brown skinned woman with a teasing smile who wore the traditional fruit-filled sombrero, gold loop earrings along with a blue dress adorned with ruffled sleeves and hems edged in yellow. In 1997, Chiquita held a consumer contest to update their lyrics. Joyce Appelquist, a fifth grade teacher from San Mateo, California, won the contest. To access film clips and printed ads produced by the company from the 1940s to the present, contact the Chiquita Company.

From http://www.tvacres.com/admascots_misschiquita.htm

Beach-based found art

An article on beach art on the south fork of long island...

Green flowers

Dishing over dhosas...

Tonight was great - dinner with friends - "dishing" on various topics (is that a 50s term or what?). Dhosas are one of my favorite (south?) Indian dishes - many happy memories of a now defunct dhosa spot in the off-season Hamptons many years ago...wish I could say I had dined on true-blue Indian sub-continent-created dhosas, but maybe someday...

...a thin, crispy-ish rice pancake (thin as a crepe) with a savory filling...my favorite, masala dosa, involves a curried potato and lentil mix...

This blogger dishes on obtaining the perfect dhosa...

Evocative of summer on a cold winter's night - vinho verde

I have a real penchant for this very inexpensive wine - it is white, slightly effervescent, and reminds me of summer - so what if it is 20 degrees F out! Viva vinho verde!

This is a wine from Portugal...see the history of the wine here:

http://www.vinhoverde.pt/en/historia/default.htm

:)

Spiced chai with peanut butter cookies

My muse of the moment, the cookies are thanks to my mom, who found an excellent and old-fashioned way to use the overstock of peanut butter in her kitchen that remains from last summer's visit from 7 grandchildren! The chai, of course is a postmodern blend of my brother's kenyan chai recipe and my austro-nepali friends' approach to chai (though as of late I prefer the addition of rose-scented black tea to the traditional assam-darjeeling mix they use)...

Unexpected beauty from an ice storm

Grassy typewriter