More Cray-cray Fruit-Tay-Tay

In the first picture: Still Life, Jackfruit and Banana Blossom (or banana heart, or vaizhpoo, if you want to use the Tamil word).

 Both are labor intensive to prep, and I wear purple nitrile rubber gloves when handling both. Banana blossom tends to stain horribly, and the jackfruit is super sticky/resinous. Hence the gloves.

(And no, contrary to what my friends think, I am not enterprising enough to color coordinate my clothing with my cutting board with my gloves. It's colorful serendipity!)

Both are fabulous south Indian treats. The jackfruit itself is eaten (each of those golden globs are individual fruit inside the wedge, and inside those globs are arils or seeds which are ALSO treats.)

The third photo is vaizhpoo paruppu usili, which is a labor intensive, labor of love. My husband adores this dish, and allegedly, banana blossom is very uterus-friendly. My flaw here was not removing the right part of the banana blossom (see also: those long strands, the hard stamens should be removed. Totally edible, but they add a bit of bitter to the dish, and also, I am unable to chew them sufficiently for me to swallow them, given my gastric bypass, I don't want to run the risk of a blockage).

The recipe itself, I cannot lay claim to; however, this is the recipe I used. And the only alteration I did was to cook the batter in the microwave.