Borderlands gig, yay!

It has taken a little shuffling & juggling, and I personally have had to do some back-and-forth organising stuff, which you will know is not quite my forte - but I think it's fixed now, that I have an event at Borderlands in San Francisco on Sunday November 9th. With - drumroll, please! - fabulous mysterious international bestsellery person Laurie R King. Shall we see you there?

Bodies: are they peculiar, or what?

The first time I made quince jelly with ghost peppers in it, I had no observable reaction at all to handling chopped ghost pepper with bare hands.

Second time, my hands were fine, but I had a red sore place on the inside of my right elbow, kinda like a steam-burn. Maybe it was a steam-burn; who knows?

This time, ten minutes after? The backs of both my hands are tingling fiercely. I was just as scrupulous about washing after contact, and the backs of my hands had no direct contact anyway. My fingers - which obviously did - are fine. This is odd. (I did note, in parenthesis, how particularly juicy a fresh pepper is. And I did scrub the board after chopping, but not with soap, for I will not have soap anywhere near my board; and capseicin is notoriously not soluble in water. Can I wash it with oil, I wonder? I have sweet oils, avocado and almond...)

Anyway, different method this time: two quinces chopped small, core and skin and all, boiled for about three hours in water-to-cover. Drained and squeezed through a conical seive, the juice then filtered through double cheesecloth. Now I'm boiling that up with sugar and lemon juice and the shredded half of a ghost pepper, and hoping for a natural set. Whatever happens, it should be pink.

Now I'm gonna do something else about my hands, because ouchie.

Further data. Hmm.

Maybe I just scalded 'em, washing under altogether-too-hot water? Certainly they're acting like they're burned; they don't like going anywhere near the oven. Which is unfortunate, as I'm not just boiling quince jelly, I'm roasting a chicken also. With spuds'n'carrots'n'sprouts. Lots of oven work. Hey-ho.

So pretty. So pretty. So hot. And so pretty.

(Helldamn, I forgot the rosewater. These are just straight Ghost Quince Jelly, then. Unless they don't actually set - a remote contingency, given all the pectin floating about in quinces and lemons too - in which case I'll splash a little rose in before I boil 'em up again...)