A washed-up tropical vacation

Aaaand now, the early spring is gone. I knew it would be, but that doesn't make the departure any easier. That means today we're taking a vacation to some warmer places with Good Housekeeping's Foods with Foreign Flavor booklet (1971).

Want to vacation on the beach?

I can't help feeling like Chicken in Pineapple Shells looks like some poor creature that lives on the ocean floor but got washed in during high tide and parched in the sun when the water receded. Gaze upon all the shades of brown and bleached yellow and despair! (And it even looks as if the filling got a nice, gritty layer of sand on top.)

As an avowed sweet-and-savory hater, the idea of chicken baked in pineapple, honey, and barbecue sauce flavored rice makes me gag. Your mileage may vary. (This totally sounds like something my grandma who liked weird recipes would have fixed in an attempt to impress the family, and it would have ended with a lot of shouting about picky little girls.)

If the dried-out sea creature look isn't your vacation ideal, then how about this alternative?

I call it "Mound of Fertilizer Surrounded by Circle of Venus Fly Traps that Just Ate a Few Too Many Bad Bugs and Are Starting to Get the Sweats."

The recipe itself is not too terrible:

It's just stuffed peppers. Really greasy stuffed peppers from the looks of it, with the ground chuck cooked in half a cup of olive oil and then everything deep fried. At least it's got some actual seasoning-- tomato paste, garlic, and chili powder. Dumping a couple cans of red beans in the middle of the whole shebang does not exactly help sell this dish, but the mound does look like it would attract flies if the little flytraps decide to press their luck and just go for more.

Happy Saturday! Do something sort of tropical. I'm off to eat a few flies. (I'd like them better than that chicken.)