That said, I've been on a fruit salad kick lately. It's just one of those magical things where you take a mish-mash of otherwise uninteresting food, cut it up, stir it in a bowl, and suddenly it's an amazing culinary masterpiece. Chefs throughout history have taken advantage of this kitchen hocus-pocus to make eating interesting, fun, enjoyable, and DELICIOUS. And I have been tricking people into thinking I'm a good cook for years by doing just the same thing.
Take, for example, tonight's Bible study potluck.
I remembered approximately 2 hours before the event that I'd promised to bring a dish to pass. Mind you, this epiphany came just before I was about to take a midterm exam. I think of the craziest stuff right before tests.
Obviously I began to panic a little. Not about the test, but about the potluck. At this point in my life I'm much more frightened by my peers' critiquing taste-buds than my professor's red pen. Judge me as you will, I'm just speakin' the truth here, folks.
My anxiety, dulled for the half hour I spent filling in bubbles on my test paper, returned in full strength as I exited the classroom. What was I going to make, considering I only had one short hour?
And then it was as if I heard the very voice of God booming over the clatter of recipes swirling madly around my frantic brain:
"FRUIT SALAD!"
It was an epiphany, and just in the nick of time, for my mind had already begun wandering down the shameful path of store-bought bean dip and a 2-liter of Diet Coke. (shudder)
Bopping over to Jewel-Osco, I selected (practically at random) several otherwise boring types of fruit, and upon my arrival home chopped them into bite-sized chunks and tossed them into a bowl. What emerged from this utter chaos was a sight to behold: pieces of golden nectarine nestled next to bright staccato kiwi, delicate pear offset by bold raspberries, the entire composition dotted here and there by plump blueberries... it was a work of art.
And the thing about fruit salad is that 1 + 1 does NOT equal 2 in the taste department. A stupid peach thrown together with a handful of dumb blackberries miraculously multiplies the "wow factor" of each individual fruit by 10! So when the girls in my Bible study group dug into my 30-second fruit conglomeration, the result was the same as if I'd spent all day creating my dish. They couldn't get enough!
"For some reason, the fruit is especially good." One of the more perceptive ladies commented, her opinion seconded by "mmm's" of approval from the rest of the group.
"Well, it's fresh!" I said modestly, not wanting to lead anyone to believe it actually took skill to create a yummy fruit salad. Because that would be lying. And everyone knows it's not a good idea to lie at Bible study.
Besides, technically fruit salad was God's idea, not mine.
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