Miracle Fruits, wigs and all that jazz

Tongue-tripping fun!

A pill made from a magical berry that will turn your tastebuds on its head? Sounds like it belongs at a rave party and not on the tables of foodies! But as crazy as it sounds, miracle fruit is now the latest in food fads. It's said to trick your tastebuds and your brain into thinking that sour and bitter foods tasted sweet. This novelty has also led to another pop culture trend now that they’re readily available in tablet form; flavour tripping parties.

Suze's new kitchen!

Therefore no time was wasted in organising our own flavour tripping party (with lunch of course) to coincide with Chocolatesuze’s move to her brand spanking new house. And because it’s her party and she can do whatever she wants to, she ordered us all to wear wigs. Sorry you don't get to see any incriminating photos, but check us out here! Big thanks to Simon for the awesome artwork! 

 Top L-R: Chocolatesuze, Helen, Simon, Shez

Bottom L-R: Billy, Me (chanelling Pippi Longstocking), Yas, FFichiban, Howard 

Our flavour tripping party involved an array of sour and bitter foods, a few crazy condiments (that you wouldn’t dream of putting in your mouth on a daily basis!), and the fleeting hope that they would all taste like sunshine and lollipops.

Flavour tripping menu

A big thanks to our resident dealer, Billy for scoring our Miracle Frootie pills and to our hostess with the mostess, Chocolatesuze. The other pill poppers in attendance are Howard (eatshow&tell), FFichiban (herecomesthefood), Helen (grabyourfork), Yas (hungry.digital.elf), Shez (onebitemore) and Simon (theheartoffood).

I love food blogger lunches!

But before we risked disintegrating our stomach lining with citric acid and vinegar, real food must be had, and with a room full of food bloggers and a ‘hungry elf’, this is where we shine!

Suze's pumpkin, bocconcini, pear and pine nut salad

The star of our lunch was Mama Suze’s homemade curry and roti canai. For roti out of a packet (brand is Katoomba), it was deliciously fluffy thanks to Suze's amazing frying and fluffer skills. To top it off, Suze had sticky ribs in the oven. I’m loving the day already,

Puffed and fluffed roti canai

Big thanks to Mrs Thye for the delicious curry

Suze's sticky ribs

Shez made an ultra healthy lentil salad and Helen spoke to my heart with homemade sushi. But my groans were reserved for Simon’s incredible fried scallop and prawn dumplings, with a hoisin dipping sauce (recipe please Simon!). If I didn’t like these people so much, I would’ve just taken that whole crispy dumpling platter and went home to enjoy it.

Shez's lentil salad

Helen's homemade sushi

Simon's crispy fried prawn and scallop dumplings.

But the main event was tripping our tastebuds! On a serious note, there are many benefits to these pills, such as improving the taste of food and medicines for people who are ill or (more crazily) for diabetics or the weight-conscious to reduce their sugar consumption when cooking and eating (seriously, really?). But for people like us, it’s a chance to ingest foods we normally wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole!

Bitter Melon and Suze's fried mushrooms

You are suppose to let the pill dissolve in your mouth and coat your tongue – a feat harder than it sounds when it feels like you're eating chalk and cardboard and your saliva glands aren't cooperating. Too bad there isn’t a pill to make Miracle Frooties tasty.

Miracle Frooties

The ultimate personal test was a sour watermelon warhead, which I optimistically popped in my mouth only to spit it out immediately and rub my cheeks. The vinegar tasted like a backyard-shed vodka made in a bathtub, while the bitter melon and grapefruit tasted the same (cue sour face).

I think Suze's face summed up our reaction to the bitter melons!

But all was not lost. Lemons were amazingly palatable and soon we were devouring lemon wedges with gusto. Guiness beer tasted like coffee, while passionfruit pulp had a faint taste of toffee and caramel (chocolate according to Shez and Suze). Intriguingly the male contingent detected neither of these flavours in the passionfruit. End of season strawberries were luscious and oddly citric acid was like powdered candy. So much so, that Yas couldn’t stop devouring it. Let this be a lesson to you all: it may taste like candy, but it’s still citric acid! And yes, poor Yas paid for his excessive citric consumption later!

Grapefruit, lemon, pomegranate seeds and kiwi fruit

Other foods we had tested were sour cream, pomegranate, yoghurt, kiwi fruit, wasabi, dried sour prunes, ponzu sauce and more warheads. It was a strange way to spend a Sunday afternoon but it was flavour-triptastic.

The one candy I can't stomach - sour warheads

Desserts are always a highlight even when you're full from lunch and ill from vinegar. With no less than six desserts on the menu, we were seriously spoilt! Chocolate, fruit, pavlovas, cake, cupcakes and a tart, we had all sugar bases covered.

Lime and Chocolate Tart as made by me

Yas' pavlovas from Sideways Deli Cafe, Dulwich Hill

Cue the squeals...Billy made a chocolate Domo-kun cake!

It was tough to disembowel Domo-kun but Billy did some fine surgical work of it!

Simon's melt-in-your-mouth chocolate mousse

Helen's coca-cola cupcakes

Suze's homemade peach slice

Miracle Frooties are readily available online, so why not hold your own flavour tripping party? Just don't say I didn't warn you about citric acid overdoses!

Thanks for being a lovely hostess!

A big cheers to Suze for welcoming us to her house (hope you enjoyed your housewarming gift!), Billy for those crazy pills, and everybody else for making a fantastic lunch and a myriad of desserts.

Suze's sadistic looking housewarming gift