Miracle Frootie Party and Drawing Winner!

Today we had our monthly team potluck, so I don’t have a bento. Instead, I’ve got a really cool experience to blog about that our family did last night: a Miracle Frootie Tasting Party! A couple weeks ago Mr. Pikko saw this article on CNN about the Miracle Fruit, which is a berry native to Africa that can be grown in Florida and Hawaii that when rubbed across one’s tongue, changes all sour things sweet for approximately 15-30 minutes.

Mr. Pikko found a site that sells the berry in candy form called Miracle Frooties. He had me buy some and when they came in, he began to build the anticipation about it and asked the family to come over to Grandma J’s for a tasting party. We went to Foodland and bought a wide variety of things to try. Update: Park Seed now sells miracle berry plants.

Each of us got a small tablet, which we then melted in our mouth and rubbed all around our tongues to coat the entire thing. After it was gone, we tried the lemons first. I have to admit, I didn’t think it was going to work. When I bit into the lemon though, it was like I was eating lemonade. I’d tried the strawberries while I was cutting them up and they were pretty sour. I ate one after eating the frootie and it was as if I was eating it coated in sugar.

We had blood orange, grapefruit, kumquats, apple, lemon, lime, kiwi, banana, Guiness, honey, pomegranate martinis, ale, tabasco, and the cheapest bottle of Chardonnay we could find. Overall, I loved the lime and strawberries the best. I rarely eat strawberries with sugar but I do it on occasion, so I know how good it can taste. They were so, so sweet after eating the frootie. The limes tasted the best for me, it was like eating heavily sugared limeade but with just the right amount of tart.

The inside flesh of the kumquat, which is normally face cringing, tasted sweeter than the rind. The grapefruit tasted sweeter than Ocean Spray Ruby Red and the kiwi still had a very light tart but was sweet in general. I didn’t try the bananas or the apples, but I was told they were very good.

The alcohol wasn’t as great an experiment. We didn’t open the wine or the ale, but we tried the Guiness and it tasted like coffee-beer. The pomegranate martini tasted like Benadryl and the honey tasted just like normal to me. Overall it was a very fun experience for me, but I think this had to do with the fact that I knew what the frootie was supposed to do. Mr. Pikko didn’t tell anyone else and so they weren’t really knowing what to expect. I had a blast, especially after the strawberries since I love strawberries so much that I once ate myself to the point of puking at a Sunday brunch. I must have eaten around 50 strawberries that day. =[

Anyway, if it sounds like something you’d like to try, I think you’d have fun with it. The candy seems a bit pricey, so if you want to host a party, I suggest asking people to pitch in a dollar and volunteer to bring in a fruit to the party. Either that or guests bring fruits and you sponsor the candy. It was certainly an interesting way to spend a birthday! 😀

As far as I know the frootie is made from the miracle berry itself and we felt no side effects from the berry. As always, exercise caution though and don’t overdo it. Don’t eat a ton of lemons and limes because after all, you’re still consuming acidic fruits. Definitely make a point to brush your teeth soon after, too!

I went through my entries and after picking out some duplicates, a post by me, and a couple invalid entries, I ended up with 186 entries. Using random.org I picked entry #152, who is Quanda! Quanda pledged to replace grocery bags with tote bags while going shopping for food.

This was a fantastic contest and I was truly overwhelmed by the responses I got to it. It really brought to light just how much plastic we use in our life and after asking Jay over at Life Without Plastic about what you DO with the plastic item since obviously throwing it away isn’t that great for the environment either. He said that the main thing is to keep it away from contact with food and find some other use for it if you can. With that in mind, I will give my plastic shamojis to the kids so that they can use them as canoe paddles in the bathtub. Try to think about what else you could use your plastic items for that would keep your family from consuming any leeched chemicals!