Ingredients
Procedure
Cut the canteloupe in half, remove the seeds, and take the melon
baller to it. Whee! Put the canteloupe balls on a cooling rack and put
the cooling rack on a parchment-paper-lined sheet pan. Sprinkle sugar
over them and put the sheet pan in the freezer for at least half an
hour. (Note: the cooling rack and sheet pan are just a thing I made
up so the canteloupe balls won't come out embedded in frozen canteloupe
juice. You can just put them in a bowl but it'll get a little
messy. Maybe you could set something up with a strainer over a bowl.)
So flavor #1 is the canteloupe. Flavor #2 is the pepper and flavor #3 is the balsamic vinegar. The important events in the life of any given canteloupe ball are a) being formed from the primordial canteloupe; b) having a toothpick jabbed into it; c) being frozen; d) being rolled in pepper; e) being dipped in balsamic vinegar; f) being eaten. How exactly you put them together depends on the scenario. The constraints are that you want the canteloupe to be as cold as possible when eaten, and that I don't think balsamic vinegar will freeze well.
For a party scenario you might do it a-b-d-c-e-f, providing a dish of vinegar for people to dip the canteloupe in. Or if it turns out balsamic vinegar freezes well, you could do it a-b-e-d-c-f and omit the need for a separate dish of vinegar.
The way I eat it is a-c-b-d-e-f, reusing the same toothpick for every canteloupe ball. Also, I'm usually standing over the kitchen counter while I'm doing it. Even though I got good at cooking, I'm still a slob.
This is a controversial recipe, and not all people accept it. Sumana does not like the cracked pepper, and thinks it should be omitted from the recipe. This might argue for a party-time preparation of a-b-c-d-e-f, providing a dish of cracked pepper as well as one of vinegar, so as to satisfy picky people like her.
Note about balsamic vinegar: the best kind is the generic brand sold at Whole Foods, which is really good and really cheap. Also, you can make balsamic vinegar taste twice as expensive by putting it in a saucepan and reducing it by half. I learn things from cooking shows and give you the important bits.
![[Comments]](/nb//themes/Default/comments.png "3 comments")
(3) Sat Dec 04 2004 16:34 PST Melon Baller Melon Balls:
More dang recipes. Why not? I just got a melon baller from Sur La
Table thanks to a gift card I got for my birthday (thanks,
Andrew/Claudia) and it's great. Now, no melon is safe from my circular
scalpel. I made the following recipe and tried to sell them to Sumana
as "fake Dippin' Dots". She didn't buy it, but the
liked the results. It is a simple yet ritzy appetizer, at least if my
notions as to what is 'ritzy' are accurate, which they probably
aren't.
- Comments:
Posted by Frances at Sat Dec 04 2004 20:56
Would also be good with the Mexican chile/salt/lemon sprinkle powder--the stuff they use on cucumbers.
I almost got run out of the lunchroom for putting pepper on a cantaloupe earlier this fall.
Posted by Tim May at Wed Dec 08 2004 10:57
...you can make balsamic vinegar taste twice as expensive by putting it in a saucepan and reducing it by half...
If you have to buy twice the volume of balsamic vinegar that you need, then it is twice as expensive. (OK, in practice it works if you only need a small quantity and the expensive kind doesn't come in bottles smaller than half the size of the smallest bottles of the inexpensive kind.)
Unless you mean the reduced vinegar tastes four times as expensive (by volume) as the unreduced form.Posted by Leonard at Wed Dec 08 2004 11:23
It probably actually comes out to four times as expensive or more. I've never really had expensive balsamic vinegar, but $8.00 balsamic vinegar doesn't taste as good as Whole Foods $4.00 balsamic vinegar reduced by half.
