Salsa

Too long ago, I was making salsa together with one Cary Millsap and Miracle's very own Torben Holm (who has the best hair in all of Miracle), and with Mario Broodbakker and Frank Ives sitting at the oak table drinking beer.

Cary, Torben and I were also drinking beer while making salsa based on Cary's recepie and Torben's brother's homegrown chilies. Yes, we're talking chilies grown in a garden in Denmark. I know it sounds like building a snowman in your Texan garden in the middle of the Summer. Nevertheless, these chilies come out rather hot, and so we were ready for salsa.

We made several pots of the salsa, and they all turned out well - but different. So we decided to write down the strength of each batch on the lid of the small glasses we put it in.

It was Torben's idea to first sanitize the small glasses with Icelandig snaps (Brennevin) instead of some kitchen chemical, and it has worked very well.

The first one we tasted was rated at strength 42, of course, and then the others were rated relative to that.

For instance, I clearly remember the one we designated "10046 level 8".

So last night we had several teenagers for dinner: CarpenterTorben's son Nick, our new aupair from England Sarah, and Nick's friend Rikke (who happens to take care of little Viktor in our local nursery). So I served the last two batches of the salsa, and the two girls didn't really eat that much, while Nick loved it. Surprise. They were termed 35 and 8 on the lids, but I think a second digit was missing after the "8" after having tasted it carefully.

Hence this salute to Cary and Torben Holm: It was good salsa (thanks to Cary's recipie), and it lasted for a very long time (thanks to the Brennevin technique pioneered by Torben), but now it's all gone.

But back to the fateful evening when it was made in my kitchen: We had beers and tasted the various pots and had great fun. Then, around 2200 hours, Torben Holm and I decided that we should be better husbands and go and see our wives, who were chatting in the living room, seperated from us by a closed door.

We opened the door with smiles on our faces, but were immediately, and forcefully, informed from a distance of five meters, that we smelled absolutely awful and that we should stay way from them. Hmm. We tried to approach, but they insisted that we smelled worse than anything they had ever experienced, and that we should immediately close the door again - with us on the opposite side of it.

So we did, and I shall not talk much more about this, except perhaps mention the strange fact that both Torben Holm and I that night were banned from our usual beds and had to sleep in seperate rooms from our wives. In fact, Anette claimed that little Viktor's eyes actually watered because of my bad breath.

"Was it worth it?" (Copyright Pet Shop Boys).

"Yes, it's worth living for" (same).

Cary - is it time, perhaps, that you reveal the reciepie we used to the entire Wor.. Planet?

Torben Holm - how's the supply of chilies this year? Ready for another round?

Gunnar - do you have more Brennevin up there in Iceland?