Chocolate-Covered Macadamia Nuts

I know, I know.  Just last week, I said we had caught up. And here I am, one week later, with another post.  I did tell you we'd have sporadic updates, didn't I?

A few days ago, I brought in some chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. They'd been given to me as a gift. I don't actually like Macadamia nuts. In fact, I dislike most nuts most of the time. But that's a tale for a different blog.

So I did what I always do when someone gives me food I don't like: I brought it to work to share with the rest of the desk and/or the locusts in the warehouse (they'll eat anything).

I had no idea that Dasha had never had Macadamia nuts.

The box sat on the desk for about half an hour before I heard, "Okay, let's see what this is all about." And then there was the telltale rustling of the packaging being removed.  Her usual dubious look followed, before she took a bite.

"This is really good," she said, "It's probably very expensive, huh?"

I honestly don't know - a quick check on Amazon told me that it depends on the Macadamia nuts in question. Some of them are quite pricey. In some cases, it borders on the ridiculous. Looking closely, it looks like the chocolate covering brings down the price - nuts alone are around $25/lb.

While I was typing this out, she had another comment to add:

"If you think these won't be gone in an hour, you would be wrong."

The verdict: Win.

Caught Up

And, with that last post, we have caught up with reality.  We have introduced Dasha to a number of uniquely American things - and we hope to continue doing so, but the search for them is becoming more difficult.

New American Things now transitions from a weekly schedule to an occasional schedule.

If you have any suggestions for things that may be new to Dasha, please feel free to e-mail me or comment on this post and I'll check with Dasha to see if it's new to her or not.

As Dasha is introduced to new things, I will post them - but that will be less and less frequent.

Feel free to keep checking back, and thank you for reading to this point.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Banana Bread

This isn't so much an American thing as it is an Eric thing. See, my wife has this recipe for a chocolate peanut butter banana bread.  And yes, you read that correctly. It's a chocolate bread which contains both peanut butter and bananas.

A few weeks back, her office had a bake-off. She didn't win (I think she was robbed), but she did bake an extra loaf for my office. And I was kind enough to share (which I usually don't do when something is that good).


As we know, peanut butter is hit-or-miss outside of North America. It just hasn't caught on. So anything with the flavor of peanut butter is a risk when sharing with Dasha.

Now, I know she has a sweet tooth. And I know she likes chocolate. So I figured the bread was a safe bet, and I cut a slice for Dasha.

She poked at it a bit. "It seems very soft."  The way my wife makes it, it's very moist.  It's hard not to be, when cooking with bananas. Unless you screw something up. She then sniffed at it, before breaking a small piece off and tasting it.  "It's good!"

"Well of course it is," I told her, "My wife made it."  My wife - for the record - is an excellent cook.

"You should tell your wife to cook more often."

I am in complete agreement with this.  I should also cook more often. But that's beside the point.

A few minutes passed, and then, "Can I have the recipe?"

That was fairly easily done. I keep the recipe reasonably accessible, so I printed it out and gave it to her.  "Thank you for this.  I think I'm going to make it."

The verdict?  WIN. Not only did she like it, but if she makes it at home, I'm likely to get more. That's a win for all concerned.