How to Throw a "Miraculous" Party

Step 1: Have a baby.

Step 2: Wait many years until the baby morphs into a hairy teen with his own unique sense of style.

(This particular former-baby has declared Wednesday "suit day", so each week he dons his top hat, attaches his authentic pocket watch (no, seriously) to one of his thrift-store-purchased jackets and carries his brief case off to school with him.)

Step 3: When the (in our case) Abe Lincoln lookalike is about to turn 17, go here and get a hold of some of these:





(In case you aren't familiar with these, they are comprised of two ingredients: miracle berries and corn starch. Indigenous to West Africa, miracle berries, once eaten, have a surprising ability to affect one's taste buds in such a way that sour things suddenly taste sweet.)

Step 4: Invite your former-baby's friends over to celebrate his beginning of another year and to bewilder their taste buds.

Step 5: Prepare a tray of consumables.

WARNING: The following step is absolutely VITAL.

Step 6: To avoid confusion (and a possible police investigation), as party goers arrive, pull their parents aside. Explain to them what miracle berries are so that they'll understand when their child later tells them that you handed out pills with the promise of a really far out time.

Step7: Gather around the table and pass out the tablets.

Step 7: Pop them pills. Let them dissolve slowly, trying to contact as many of your taste buds as possible.























Some people won't like the taste of the tablets.

           And others will.















Step 8: Once the tablets have dissolved, dig in.

Enjoy some lemon, rind and all, now as sweet as candy.



Taste the sweetest blueberries you've ever had burst in your mouth.


















Sample the dill pickle slivers, but ONLY if you're a sweet pickle appreciator (which I am not).



Step 9: Once the bounty of the sample tray is spent, fling open your fridge and kitchen cupboards, searching for other edibles that might prove interesting.

Drink mouthfuls of apple cider vinegar like it's punch. Try a little dot of honey, sweet enough to make a whole hive of bees jealous. Sip hot sauce (but not straight from the bottle).

Step 10: Assess the party and decide how you'd do things differently next time.

If I did this again, I would provide more sour things to sample like rhubarb, limes, raw cranberries (not craisins), kumquats, etc. I wouldn't bother with non-sour offerings like cheddar cheese, bell peppers and mustard because there wasn't much difference in the taste of those.

This was fun. However, we all agreed that although there was a definite effect, none of us would describe the experience as anything close to miraculous. Admittedly though, it's unlikely that many tablets would be sold if they were called "Pretty Cool Berry Tablets".

*Note: Steps 1 and 2 are not mandatory in order to throw a "Pretty Cool" Party, but we're glad they were a part of the preparation for ours.