What They Eat In Science Fiction

A lot of Sci-Fi books have offhand references to what the folks in their alternate/future realities are eating. On Friday I finished COUNT ZERO by William Gibson. It's fantastic--fantastic enough that I'm going to have to post a "book review" here explaining just how excellent it was. But right now I'm just going to talk about the food in it. There were a lot of food references. Krill Balls were mentioned more than once--Krill Balls in Red Sauce, Krill Ball Pizza...I'm not planning to harvest/mash-up/cook any Krill Balls today. More interesting to me was a scene at the beginning, on a beach in (futuristic) Mexico, wherein Turner and his lady friend Allison are going for a walk. They have a picnic basket with them in which they have a six-pack of Carta Blanca and apparently this delicious-sounding snack--here's the excerpt: "He dug through the remains of their afternoon, finding his binoculars beneath a plastic bag of pineapple slices drenched in lime and dusted with cayenne."

This excited me. So this morning I made some. Note: I'm aware that this is probably some common snack for beachgoers who like spicy foods; I'm not saying Mr. Gibson invented this snack...I'm just sayin' I never heard of nor tasted it up till now....

INGREDIENTS

Pineapple sliced...

...Limes squeezed

...Cayenne dusting...

I took them along with me when I left the house. A few hours later I dug 'em out and ate 'em. They were wonderful. Sweet pineapple, tangy lime, followed by burning lips and mouth. 

 Thank you, William Gibson.