Odd Pop, Jim’s homemade mint-grape popsicle (recipe from
Self magazine), photo © 2008 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.
Minty Grape Pops
Adapted from the August 2008 issue of Self magazine. The original recipe is attributed to Jennifer Iserloh, founder of Skinny Chef Culinary Services in New York City.
1/2 cup fresh or bottled lime juice (Jim used a mix of lemon and lime)
1/4 cup honey
4 cups red (or black) grapes, halved
1/4 cup (or more, for the halitosis-afflicted) packed fresh mint
Whisk juice and honey until the honey dissolves. Add two cups cold water. Place grapes and mint into molds, then cover with liquid. Add sticks and freeze for six hours or overnight. (Perfect for first dates and pre-make-out sessions.)
The letters really made me smile and the popsicle looks good.
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Ditto Jo.
Upon first glance, however, I also wondered whether there was lettuce in them. 🙂
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I enjoyed your letters. I hope Martha does, too.
This was the best “…(although my breath was stellar).” lol!
The popsicle looks delicious. I’d really like to hear about the Mexican Chocolate Pop when Jim gets around to making them.
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I can’t quite get a handle on mint pops, but chocolate is another story. You will write another story (with recipe) – won’t you??????
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They look yummy. I should get a popsicle-mold. We always had them growing up, but I haven’t seen them since.
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Ahhh…finally something I can cook 😉
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The chocolate chili pops! …chili dilly’s… mmmmmmm …
chili dillies.
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Ah, you’re right, leslie, chili dilly bars…yum….(add the mint from Minty Grape, and they’re chili mint chocolate dilly bars, double yum…)
H, glad to help out. Add some rum and you got a modified Mojito pop. 8)
teaspoon, we had them, too, although not this fancy.
Yes, Bo and Robin, I’ll share the chocolate one as soon as he does it. My chile-loving girls are so excited about that one. I don’t know. Once Jim bought chile beer (made by local Santa Fe Brewery–LINK) and all I could say was Yuck.
Thanks, Jo and David. They really were refreshing.
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I think I’ve had that chili beer. It was, ummm, unusual.
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I’m not sure they make it any longer; I couldn’t find it on their website. Yeah, I just couldn’t get used to the heat in every sip of beer. Blech.
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I like the marbled character of the popsicle – sure could have used its cool-ness during the past 5 days, real scorchers. My first thought that the popsicle looked like a radiator, made me giggle. Martha needs such useful good suggestions, but she may be beyond your help. G
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YB,
Love your letters…they’re a hoot! The shape reminds me of the donut called “bear claws.”
You could call them “summer bear claws that cool with mini-calories.” A real fun post; and I can hardly wait to hear your reaction to the chocolate one. At our creamery in ND we made “fudgecicles” which were a very popular item!
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I love fudgecicles, oliverowl. Jim and I call them “fudgicles.” 8)
Yeah, bear claws or radiators. I can see the resemblance to both. I wonder if the ridges are designed to help with the de-molding of the pops or if it’s pure design. They sure do slip out easily. Oh, the latest news: Jim-slash-Martha made a bunch with Dixie cups and wooden popsicle sticks.
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What a fun post, yb! The letter format is great, especially how you started out with a sort of business complaint, and then go on to let Martha know all your popsicle adventures. We used to have molds around the house, but who knows where they’ve gone… I guess I’ll head over to Linens N’ Things. Better bring my coupon. I doubt I have Jim’s charm. 🙂
Extra creative way to share recipes!
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i love the letters. those popsicles look like they turned out great. you’ve inspired me to make my own treats. that way they’ll be healthier than all the artificial things in the store and i won’t feel so guilty about snacking.
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ybonesy, I really loved this post. As I mentioned when we talked on the phone yesterday, the Martha formatting is so great. And the first photo is beautiful in its simplicity and color. Really nice.
I showed this post to Liz last night and we were having a hard time wrapping our tongue brains around the mint. Jim really is a Renaissance Man, isn’t he?
I used to love when Mom made Popsicles when we were kids out of those Tupperware molds. What would we have done without Tupperware? That reminds me, we need a lettuce crisper. Do you know anyone who sells it? 8)
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yb, when I first looked at the photo my initial thought was that the mold resembled a radiator. They sound very yummy. I used to have the Tupperware molds, but got rid of them years ago. I’m anxious to hear how the Mexican Chocolate Pop turns out!
Loved the letters to Martha! Perfect for this post & very entertaining!:) D
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diddy, did those Tupperware molds come as a tray? We had tray molds as a kid; these ones Jim got are loose, which makes it easy to run under water and get the popsicle to slip out.
QM, thanks. Hey, I need a lettuce cleaner (the kind that zips around like a fair ride 8) ). That’s not the same as a lettuce crisper, is it? For a source, I’d try TJ Maxx. You know it’s one of my favorite stores for kitchen stuff. (And fun to say, to boot.)
Yay, Jim is kind of an odd fellow. He goes from making popsicles to weed-whacking all day long in his gators (so the chiggers don’t crawl up his pants). And this morning he had to bury one of our toms; it got attacked by a dog the other night. We ran out to see what was happening, but it was too late. The turkey had a big hole in its side. Poor thing; he was dead this morning. Jim buried him and made a little tombstone. 😦
Thanks, lissa. They’re so easy, you could even use ginger ale or almost any kind of juice, then add sliced strawberries. That kind of thing.
Christine, the first time Jim got the 20% discount WITHOUT the coupon, I was so pissed, I really did want to drive over there with him and file a complaint. They have never budged with me, and I’ve tried it several times. Maddening!
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yb, yes they came with a tray, but were very small in size compared to the ones Jim purchased. I was thinking frozen yogurt smoothies would work well with these molds! Peaches are in season here now, so hmmm…or perhaps blueberries! Yum! D
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ybonesy, oh, poor Tom Turkey! So sad for him. Glad you had a proper funeral. And the chiggers, we were just talking about them around the August Full Moon fire Saturday night. The trip to GA was the first time Liz was exposed to Spanish Moss and found out that chiggers live in it so you can’t really pick it up. Then Mom told us about the chigger flowers (I think that was it), a name her grandmother used to give to a certain flower – and now I’m forgetting the name — because they were beautiful but held chiggers. Hmmm. I have to ask Mom again!
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Oh, ybonesy, yeah, I mean a cleaner and a crisper. Don’t they make one that’s combined? Yeah, something that spins the water off, but then you can store the lettuce in it after that. Wouldn’t have thought of T.J. Maxx for kitchen stuff.
diddy, the peaches, YES, they are sure in season. We had some great ones in Georgia/South Carolina at a little fruit stand. There was one kind that was too mealy. Then we tried another that was great. Really good Georgia peaches. Makes me want peach ice cream. 8) Yum.
When we went back to the stand the day before we left GA to get your boiled peanuts, Mom tried the figs there. But she said they just didn’t compare to Aunt Cassie’s fig tree fresh figs. I wonder how fig ice cream would be? 8)
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Oh, OK. We need one, too, but it’s the kind of utility item that you can manage without, isn’t it? I use the ol’ towel wrap-n-shake method for drying after washing, and for now I don’t do much crisping.
I bet fig ice cream would be yummy. My new favorite food is fig yogurt (Greek strained, of course) from Trader Joe’s, thanks to a comment Heather (anuvue) left somewhere in one of our posts.
Also, we had no idea about the chiggers. We found out after Jim got his feet and ankles and chins all bit up that they live in Johnson grass, which is an aggressive grass that becomes a weed. (It’s the kind that cuts, too.)
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Make that “shins.” (I could have edited it — typo in the last comment — but thinking of skinny Jim with more than one chin made me chuckle.)
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Me, too. 8)
Hmm, fig yogurt. We don’t go to Trader Joe’s often. But they have the best food. Liz found a particular hummus there that we just love. And now that I say that, I can’t remember what kind it was. 8)
Yeah, with the lettuce, we use paper towels or a sterile cloth, wait until it dries, and then put it into storage bags. But I prefer not to have that storage bag flavor with it. (Hence the quest for a lettuce crisper!)
That Johnson grass sounds deadly. As if the chiggers weren’t enough.
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lol, oh so clever ybonesy, and I thought it was amazing how masculine Jim’s pops turned out.
They look like rambo pops- the color of a three day bruise.
Delightful.
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This makes me think about doing something domestic! Not only do they sound healthy, they are pleasing to the eye!
Condolences on your Tom. 😦
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amuirin, I hadn’t noticed but now that you bring that up, yes, bruise pops for sure! 8) It is true that the pops in the magazine photo are much more even than these; the mint and grapes are spread evenly throughout the length of the pop. Jim’s have the innards bunched up at the top, lending to that purple/green/yellow appearance. Good eye!
Thanks, suz. It was very sad, mostly the knowing he was dying. Jim lamented these past two days, asking me yesterday if he should put the turkey out of its misery. I didn’t think so; that is a misery in and of itself. Fortunately he died relatively quickly.
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ybonesy, is Jim making his famous Minty-Grape popsicles this Summer? Liz has been eating a ton of popsicles from a box we have in the freezer and it reminded me of this post. BTW, Linens-N-Things went out of business here in the Twin Cities. I hope he got all his popsicle molds before that happened there!
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Linen-N-Things also closed doors here, QM. We should have bought more popsicle molds during the liquidation.
But as for making pops, no, not yet. The weather hasn’t gotten very hot yet. Still low 80s most days, although we did have one week — I was in Portland, last week — when a few days got to 90+, I think. But right now it’s raining hard. I’m sure once we hit July and August, Jim will be moved to make his pops.
Oh, I have been on this coconut fruit bar craving. Yesterday I ate two. They’re creamy and full of coconut, not so much thirst quenchers as they are sweet-craving quenchers. I could easily eat a few a day. Got to be careful about that, though.
What kind of pops has Liz been eating?
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ybonesy, I had to ask her. She said she had a big box of Kemp’s Juniors popsicles (I guess sans “It’s The Cows!”). But she wouldn’t get them again. She said they seemed more like a diet popsicle, even though they weren’t. It’s been my experience that the Popsicle brand is the best (non-homemade) popsicle because they keep the flavors strong and tingling on the tongue. I do think that sometimes name brands ARE the best. Though in other instances, generics sure do the trick.
We have had pretty hot humid weather most of June. But today is the perfect temperature. It’s about 73, sunny and breezy. We are just heading outside after trying to get off the computer for a while. I’m going to chainsaw some old branches into shorter lengths of wood. Liz is going to mow our foot-long grass. It’s been way too wet to mow. Along with the hot weather, we had days of rain in June that led to high humidity and heat index. Best to stay inside on those days. Heading out!
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