Costco nightmare

There was this funny cartoon in the New Yorker a few weeks ago; "Title: Costco Floss. Man with giant-sized floss dispenser flosses his teeth in the bathroom." And there is floss all over the bathroom.

That's Costco for ya - giant packages of stuff, with a low price per piece or pound - but the savings is offset by waste, because each package is too friggin' big to be consumed before it goes bad, unless you're running a small hotel or feeding lots of teenagers. It's American overabundance and love of a good deal grown to nightmare proportions.

And it's so easy to get seduced by it - on my last Costco adventure, I bought a 5-pound clamshell of strawberries - that did get all eaten; a case of oranges, that will; a case of Asian pears - only 2 left (only about 8 in the case); a clamshell of salad greens, mostly eaten - a little will probably end up in compost; and the kicker, a 4-pound cartons of kiwis. That were like little rocks. What was I thinking ....

I have been trying to put them in everything - and they've been giving me the bellyache. Sunday I made kiwi custard tart, based on a Saveur recipe, that calls for mulberries, and I am sure would be delicious with blueberries, and is pretty darn tasty with kiwi.

The tart's good, but now it's sitting in Mark's fridge with one slice out - who's coming over for a cup of tea, and a slice of tart? It's green ... maybe mossy liquor would be a more suitable companion than the tea.