What are some odd food items to include in this basket?

Astronaut ice cream.

What is astronaut ice cream?

It’s dehydrated ice cream. Actually pretty good, but no idea how the hell you’d cook with it, unless you crumbled it on top of something else.

you should watch Chopped on the Food Network… that’s the premise of their show… you could get some good ideas from there.

Yes, I’ve seen Chopped. I guess that’s a part of the idea, yes. But we’re not insisting on a 30 minute or an hour time limit. It’s not really a competition, but it’s more of a challenge for fun between the two of us. Whatever you want to call it, I’m asking for suggestions.

If astronaut ice cream has to be super cooled, I can’t use it since we’re looking at up to a 24 hour lag time. But if that’s something else then I could totally go for that as an item. Keep them coming, folks.

@cyndyh: Oh, I know. they just come up with some really interesting ingredient combinations that I thought might help.

That’s a cute idea! My SO and I were talking about doing something like this, but he talks a lot of smack and says that I’m going DOWN!
@poofandmook is right about Chopped; it will give you a lot of off-the-wall ideas. One thing to think about when you’re creating your basket is to include ingredients where the textures and flavors will play off each other in interesting ways. So include something crunchy, something soft, something sweet, something savory, in the same dish. You could also try going to asian markets or farmers markets to find unusual ingredients or great fresh food. Look for ingredients you don’t usually think about. I’m just going off the top of my head here, but I’ve seen them use things like matzoh or grits in a dessert, apples or grapes in an entree, fresh crayfish, fiddlehead greens, etc.

I’ve had astronaut ice cream before! I think I remember it being crumbly, powdery, and room-temperature. It is freeze-dried, which just sucks out all the moisture. I could see it being great as a crumbly topping for something.

you need to put some vegemite in there and—of course some bovril

@trailsillustrated I can’t find that in the U.S. I almost forgot about my withdrawl from it after my dad brought a jar back from a trip. Thanks.

yes you can specialty store google one in your area oh yomyummononm i luv it

This is an awesome idea!!

I’d do: Dark chocolate, sweet onions, tomato paste, sardines (which can be good, I wasn’t adding them for a gross factor, just a strange factor!), almond flour, water chestnuts, croutons, starfruit and peanut sauce.

…Or something like that. :D

@fireinthepriory I like your basket! I would make a pasta with puttanesca sauce with the onions, tomato paste and sardines for the entree, a salad with the water chestnuts, croutons, and starfruit with a peanut dressing, and a dark chocolate/ starfruit dessert.

Ha! This is so fun.

I could go for:

Astronaut Ice Cream where do I find that?
Tripe We like it in Pho.
Red Snapper or Monkfish Never tried either but they look cool at the fish store I go to.
Marmite I haven’t seen vegemite in the states, but my Aussie raised husband might kill me for this one.
Starfruit I haven’t had it in a long time

Maybe some random sauce I pull off the shelf at our local Asian grocery store. We have dark chocolate, panko (for crunch), multiple standard greens,.... What else?

if you can find HP sauce, get that.

You might try broccoflower (it’s so weird). A new hybred of broccoli and cauliflower.
Or Kholrhabi a type of spicy turnip.

Broccoflower
Kholrhabi

Both are available in Oregon right now so should be available in Seattle.

A persimmon is uncommon for many people and absolutley lovely for a fruit. Also available currently.

Persimmon

How about some cow toungue (delicious!) sweetmeats and tripe. They are all very yummy.

Maybe cranberries, balsamic vinegar, scallops, cabbage, almonds…

Capers!

Great ideas folks! Keep them coming! :^>

animal crackers

@poofandmook: If I get animal crackers we’d have to have the “monkey pants” discussion. :^>

A jar of baby food.

A few others are starfruit, chicken livers, and maybe bugs? Mealworms, crickets and grasshoppers are healthy and delicious.

@rangerr : I think that’s the first bad suggestion so far. Remember this is going to end up being something we eat. Yikes!

Some baby food is delicious! I love the fruits for example :)

Really?!!!! Oh, wow. Maybe we’ve found something I have to rethink.

Pickled watermelon.

The little fruit jars are pretty good.. We used the organic pureed fruit in place of jelly one day. It was pretty damn great.

Ya I get baby food for snacks sometime. My favorite is bananas but I like the others too (fruits). Not brave enough to do the other types of foods, haha.

The little fruit puff things are good too.

Cumin – it’s one of my favorite spices.

Also, fresh cilantro.

@Haleth Oh man, that sounds so delicious! You can cook for me any time. :D

Life cereal

Not cocoa puffs?

@cyndyh: I thought about that, but Life cereal has such a great texture, and that tiny hint of sweetness… it could prove to be a really interesting ingredient.

@poofandmook: I’ve done buttered corn flakes on top of baked mac and cheese or instead of bread crumb on breaded chicken. Life would also slightly do the caramelizing thing. Oh, wow. I might have to try that.

Eggplant, Jicama, mint, marshmellows, kelp, arugula, mustard greens, squash blossoms, fava beans, bamboo shoots, lemon grass, rutabaga, kiwi

Oh ya I second Jicama! It is fabulous. And I heard Squash blossoms taste wonderful.

1 fresh coconut!

@jewels: The fresh coconut would definitely be challenging, but it’d also be scary. I do want my husband to have all of his fingers when he’s done. :^>

@YARNLADY: There are some wonderful ideas in there. I was lacking ideas in the veggies and greens.

Keep them coming folks. I’ll let you all know what I end up putting in this Friday’s basket.

@cyndyh Red snapper and monkfish are both great! Red snapper can be expensive, but it is very moist and has a wonderful texture. It is soo good baked whole, but that is a lot of food for just two people. It’s great with mango salsa and cilantro. I haven’t had monkfish in a while, but I seem to remember it having a kind of fluffy texture and a really nice mild taste. It would probably be good with a more savory or creamy preparation. I think I’ve had it with pasta and alfredo sauce, and with a sort of marsala-like sauce and winter vegetables.

As far as Asian sauces, there are a lot of really great ones! You should get fish sauce- it’s a great staple to make everything with, and it adds a great savoryness to dishes. You can also combine it with garlic, ginger, or fresh hot peppers to make a really good dipping sauce for meats. It’s good to include something like this in a dish because you can be creative with it. A lot of pre-made sauces really direct the outcome in the dish, like if you get korma sauce you have to make chicken korma. (I have a jar of this- it’s a kind of yellow coconut curry.) Chili-garlic sauce is also really good. At a lot of markets, you can buy canned coconut juice or fresh coconut that has been cut up. Lychee is a great ingredient that you could include. They come on branches and are about the size of a grape. They’re clear and gummy inside, and they have a brown case on the outside that you peel off. They are challenging to use because they are so sweet, but would be great in all kinds of desserts or a martini. You could also get bonito flakes- a kind of dried fish. You can use them as a topping on a dish to add a little bit of flavor and a slight bit of crunch, and then they dissolve on your tounge. You can also cook them down into a stock. I think bonito stock is used to make miso soup.

@Haleth: Thanks for your take on the fish. I was worried it might be too much for the two of us, but I’ve really wanted to try both of those for a long time. So, I’m going to see if there’s a reasonable way to do that soon. From what you’ve said I think I’d like both of them. So, the decision might come down to price when I get to the fish store.

On the sauces, we have fish sauce. He’s getting good at making Asian sauces since so many things he’s tried this past year have required them. I guess picking a sauce could direct things a lot. That’s true. I kind of don’t want to overly direct what he does. That’s one of the reasons he can ignore a few ingredients. Although we’ll be using the leftovers from the basket over the next day or two.

I like the idea of both the lychee and the bonito flakes. I don’t think I’ve ever had either of those.

This is going to be fun.

A chees cake.