I am happy.

Certain foods really make me happy. Mussels. Mushrooms. (Perhaps all foods that begin with Mu? Ha!)

Tonight, I fixed mirleton (what they call chayote here). I had it many times in Louisiana but never cooked one myself. I didn’t even know--is the skin of this chubby pale green pear-shaped squash edible like with yellow squash or does it need to be peeled like with white summer squash? To be safe, I peeled most of it but left the skin in the crannies so that I could test it and see.

Wow wow wow. I cooked the mirleton in cubes with onion which, through no fault of mine, very nicely caramelized. A little Chachere’s seasoning from home, and brown rice (which only ended up distracting from the marvelous mirleton), and a glass of cheap but lovely Smoking Loon merlot. Oh--how can such a funny looking squash taste so good?

Even raw it had a crisp entrancing fragrance. Like jicama but infinitely better.

Yes. It does need to be peeled. I had to discard the experimental bits of skin—as digestible as plastic.

Now someday, I’ll make it like at home. Mirleton stuffed with crawfish dressing. MMmmmm.