Sunday, April 27, 2008

palmarian update

How things come together: just a few days ago, I actually heard a Passamaquoddy speaker spontaneously use the word "dulse". And as expected, he used it in the plural. Since masses of discrete (typically stringy) objects are consistently spoken of in the plural in this language, rather than the singular used in corresponding English terms like grass, hair, spaghetti, macaroni, rice, and seaweed.

The last of these is presumably a model for dulse-ol, which is what I heard, the -ol being the expected plural ending.

Oh, and yes, I really have heard the plurals spaghettiwol and macaroniwol used hereabouts, the latter while we were at the elementary school cafeteria.

Again, this is what I do.

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

palmarian joy

I'm so happy: yesterday at the Eastport IGA, they had dulse for sale!

As you head up to the northern Atlantic coast, it's a popular snack, but this is the first I've seen it this far south in a non-health-food-store context. Just a big wad of dulse, in a regular styrofoam-and-saran-wrap setup, like any other produce. It's hands-down my favorite kind of seaweed so far, all salty and purple. Last had it, I think, in my patrilineally ancestral town of Cill Chaoi (Kilkee) a couple summers back: there was a girl my age selling it as "dillisk" (cf. Irish duileasc---sounds kind of Scandanavian...is it a loan? Indo-Europeanists?) on the beach in little brown paper bags.

So now I have a big mound of sea-reeking mauveness to deal with. Almost a quarter pound of it. Which is a hefty bit of snackery when you're talking dried seaweed.

Now here's the tasty possibility: somewhere online I ran into a recipe for dulse which involves frying it up with oatmeal. Or am I confusing that with a recipe for boiling down carrageenan (cf. Irish carraigĂ­n) into a pleasant goo? Oh well, I'm sure something salty plus oatmeal is bound to be good, especially if you toss some lipids into the mix.