One of my pleasures in life—one that combines in a strategic way my humanistic impulses with my unbecoming “Told ya so!” competitiveness—is proving to people that they will in fact enjoy foods they now despise, so long as they have them my way.

Dark greens like kale and collards are prime catalysts for achieving this conflation of the altruistic and the vain, but so are peas, an early treat from the year’s bounty.

Most of us know peas as at best little green balls filling up a freezer bag best used as an ice pack and at worst mushy gray globs taking up plate space next to the mashed potatoes.  This is a travesty.

I have witnessed no greater evidence of this travesty and the triumph of trumping it than when Shannon, an ardent foe of peas, declined those picked fresh from the West Virginia garden of a friend.  She tasted one at my insistence and then revealed new horizons in the level of surprise that can be registered in the human eye.  She ate all of those we had picked.  She’s been talking about them ever since.  They are just that smack-you-‘cross-the-cheek good.

So this week’s Concrete Jungle project was to spread some of that goodness down to a high-traffic area, the stoplight where bicyclists heading over the Manhattan Bridge into the City must wait their turn to cross the intersection.  If you happen to be one of those cyclists, give them some water from your bottle while you wait for the light to go green.  If you too can’t help loving being in the right, take some and share them with friends.

Then tell us who you shared them with.