Episode 9: Coconut Green Beans

Episode nine of Lady Jupiter Podcast explains this month's "choice" to stay home, notes a blog milestone, announces a creative outlet swap, and shares a green bean recipe that might change your life. This episode closes with a quick list of black community supporting organizations and a simple hope for the future.

✧✧ Click here for the full transcript ✧✧

Here are today's links:

• Why I Stopped Wearing Makeup
• The 100th blog post was Intermittent Fasting, Month Six
• FoodandWine.com’s Caramelized Coconut Green Beans
• Naacp.org/Donate/
• Act.colorofchange.org/donate/donate/
• Donate.SPLCenter.org
• NUL.org/donate

Transcript

Episode Nine: Coconut Green Beans

Welcome back friends!

Lady Jupiter Podcast is the audio accompaniment to LadyJupiter.com a lifestyle blog where I write about my family’s military life, also travel, home stuff, and my low maintenance beauty and fashion. I’m happy that you’re here with me. 

Today I’ll share an update on our life as affected by the military, follow on with a blog update, then wrap up with my most recent domestic diversion. 

Today in our military affected lives I have nothing significant to update.

Mr. Jupiter’s Work has slowed down, and this is one of two times each year that we might maybe go out of town. Usually we stay at home in June if we’re not moving, but this time we’re going to stay at home because we are not allowed to travel beyond a certain mile radius of our air force base. Well, not freely and easily. There are defined radii where the farther we want to travel needs to be approved higher up the chain -the exact numbers doesn’t really matter because our families are all outside of the easily permissible range…so we’re just going to have a stay-cation.

This upcoming staycation will mostly be me doing things in the afternoon while Mister can be home with the toddler. I’m going to try to get a fresh eye exam. And if lady luck is truly by my side then I might even get my teeth cleaned, donate blood, and try on bike helmets - a handful of tasks that are nearly impossible to complete with a toddler in tow.

Otherwise in the military world PCS season is upon us as I have mentioned before. I am very happy that we’re not moving this summer, but I am jealous of all of the new things our friends will be experiencing. We’re not expecting to move for a few years, which is amazing, and needed. 

There are so many things in our city that are wonderful and worth seeing, but we haven’t been experiencing these things regularly because of Mister Jupiter’s work, combined with Kid Jupiter’s nap schedule, and then all of the COVID-19 closures. We really will need four years in place to take the Kid to excellent restaurants, museums, festivals, and more - assuming that said pandemic is eventually mitigated via inoculation, or infection. I sometimes feel a little guilty that Kid Jupiter rarely sees other people and places right now, but I know that staying in is keeping us safe. 

For today’s LadyJupiter.com blog talk…

Since last week I have added more photos on Why I Stopped Wearing Makeup. They are relevant photos of my face, and I cannot believe how wearing makeup irritated my face, and that my attempts to cover up was just making it worse. I’m so happy to be out of that cycle. In addition to the new photos I also published one entire blog post. And that one post happened to be the 100th post on LadyJupiter.com! Then, instead of finishing up more articles, I started four more, so now there are about 15 posts that need my attention, and they will just have to wait.

And now for my most recent domestic diversion

I have a declaration, and a recipe. The declaration is primarily for you friends and family who follow my comics, link in the show notes, or if you’re curious this moment - www.diurnatango.wordpress.com (that’s spelled d-i-u-r-n-a-t-a-n-g-o). For those unfamiliar I started documenting my weeks in comic form that is one page with eight panels. One panel providing the date range and comic number, and the seven remaining panels one for each day of the week, with a small notation. I started them the week that I turned 25 because shortly after that birthday I took an impromptu trip to South Korea where I stayed for a month. These comics were the easiest way for me to quickly show my friends what I was doing while I was out of the country. And when I came back I just never stopped. So now 11 years later I am stopping. What was once a source of joy has become a chore, and that’s not positive for anybody. Intrepid comic followers will know that I am approximately six months behind, but I will make those comics! But no new comics after my 36th birthday week, because that completes an 11 year run. So to you 190 followers to my comic blog - i’m super happy to have provided you a visual glimpse into my life, I hope it was fun for you, because it sure was for me. My last comic will be number 575 - meaning that I have documented 575 consecutive weeks of my life and now I am closing that chapter of my life.

I am leaving diurnatango.wordpress.com up until further notice. But we can pretty truthfully see that Lady Jupiter Podcast is my new creative weekly endeavor. Similarly I will not disclose upcoming plans or troop movement in any detail, but I’m happy to share about past events.

And now for the recipe that I have been obsessed with lately. It is a variation of foodandwine’s Caramelized Coconut Green Beans. I will link to the original recipe in the show notes. My shortcut version has slightly fewer spices, and isn’t always caramelized, but it is amazing!

It all starts with sautéing onions in coconut oil until translucent, then you add coconut flakes the fresher the better, but the shredded stuff in the baking aisle works just fine. When those get fragrant add fresh minced garlic, and 1 teaspoon of freshly crushed coriander seeds. As soon as that combination is impossibly fragrant, throw in 1 pound of fresh trimmed green beans, lightly toss in the oil and spices to coat just a little bit, then add a quarter cup of water, cover quickly with a lid, and turn off the heat. Let the green beans just steam while you set the table and uncork the wine. The end result is simple, and delicious. Coconuts and green beans are absolutely meant to be. If my abbreviated version of the original coconut green bean recipe is a bit much you can definitely pare it down and simply make a foil packet of fresh green beans, a dollop of coconut oil, with some slivered almonds, bake or grill until hot and the green beans are super bright green. That version is a lot faster, it has that same coconut and green bean magic, but it allows for more hands off time, because the garlic-onion-coconut-coriander mix can easily go from caramelizing to burning in no time, so it is best when you can devote your full attention to that pan.

Either way I’ve made my shortcut version twice in two days, and I will be going to the store later for more green beans to make a third batch for somebody else. I am just obsessed with them and I have to share my obsessions with friends like you. 

And that’s it for today’s show! 

Show notes and transcript will be up shortly on LadyJupiter.com/podcast. Normally I would plug my patreon page, but there are black communities that need your generosity more than I do. So if you’re able to give there are a lot of justice organizations that can use our support - NAACP, Color of Change, Southern Poverty Law Center, and National Urban League - just to name a few! They’ll be linked in the show notes too of course. These past few weeks have been emotional for the nation, and I hope we all emerge from this upheaval with a realistic expectation of human equality that respects and embraces people of color, non-binary genders, and all of the humans that just haven’t been treated with the dignity that they are due. Systemic oppression was never cool in the first place and I look forward to an equal future. When the world is open for business again I can’t wait to show Kid Jupiter the different colors and shapes of humanity - and how everyone deserves our respect and kindness. 

So, until next week, I hope you all are happy and healthy. Donate if you can, and I’ll talk to you soon!