A-Z Munchin' Monday: The "O" Foods

I have to admit off the bat that no food or drink starting with the letter O leapt out at me as being fundamental to the core of my very being, as much as, say, hamburger, or even graham crackers. So instead of hitting one much-loved item hard, I am going to survey several items and give them only brief mention.
We begin with olive oil. We have switched at our house, and use this stuff a lot in place of other oils, such as your vegetable, canola, 10-W-30, etc. I like those Italian restaurants where you can dip your bread into a pool of the oil. It is a nice touch, and I am led to believe that it is relatively good for you.
Second, I have to ask: What is the deal with okra? This slimy stuff looks like someone went a long way to say "yeah, it's edible; it should be a basic vegetable". Well, no, it shouldn't. It is bizarre. As I noted above, it has this slimy feel to it, and if you really study it on your plate, you can accurately make it out to be some alien pod that, left unchecked, could grow into some forboding creature that could quite possibly take over the earth and make our people slaves to do its bidding for centuries. No thanks.
I love a good orange. When the juiciness and sweetness converge, an orange is heavenly. I despise those dried out ones, and a bitter orange is not a good experience whatsoever. But when all the features are positive, it's good eating.
I prefer to slice my orange into quarters and peel off the skin. Others just peel and eat the whole thing, pulling off sections as they go. Some people even get their kicks out of jamming a straw into the orange and squishing the juice out of the poor thing. Whatever your method, I am pro-orange.
Like the orange, an onion can be a very good thing if it is "just right". I am not big on the strong ones that send people away, teary-eyed and gasping for breath. I like my onions fairly, let's say, weak flavored. But an onion can add some flair to that burger or brats or whatever, so I give the thing my props. My sister once grew an onion in the back yard. The onion went higher and higher until the whole plant structure just kind of fell over one day. What was that all about?

I am a seafood fan: I love those "boiled captain's platter" type meals where they give you all kinds of stuff. Among them can be oysters. I am not big into the whole oyster/clam/mollusk/"mussels alive-alive-o" thing. Speaking of alive, the legend has it that my Uncle John the biologist once took a stethoscope to a live oyster bar and let my mom, or his wife, or someone, hear the little oyster's heartbeat. Suffice it to say, Mom (or whoever) did not partake of the live oysters. I may have this story totally wrong, but it went something like that. If you knew Uncle John, it is totally within the realm of possibility.

"redneck calamari"

And I know that calamari is squid and not octopus, so it really should not be mentioned here, but I found this picture entitled "redneck calamari" that I thought was fairly humorous. They were clearly carving the wieners into octos and not squid.
I cannot conclude a survey of "O" foods without a shout out to oatmeal. It is about as exciting as the color change you observe when the paint is finally dry, but it is a mainstay and a resolute friend on those cold winter nights when you believe it would help to consume something that is believed to "stick to your ribs". When in fact, food that literally sticks to your ribs would be quite damaging to your health.

"opa!"

And finally, there is ouzo. I recall drinking one or two of these beverages in a Greek restaurant in Chicago many years ago with a number of fellow workers from several states. Potent beverage, as I recall. And the fact that I recall anything speaks well for me, I think. I know you are supposed to yell "opa!!!!" a lot when consuming the stuff. I found this definition for "opa!!!": "a word that Greek people use for no apparent reason at all. ... "Yeehaw!" " Seems like the appropriate word for Greek rednecks to holler while downing some ouzo and redneck calamari.

And speaking of the letter "O", the new picture up top there is of the Ohio River from a trip I took this past week to do some work down in steel/coal/God's country. The State of Ohio is on the left; West Virginia is on the right.