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I have mastered cooking popcorn on the stove.

22 May

Popcorn is one of my favorite snacks. Ever since I was a kid, I would eat the microwave variety in between meals.

But I keep hearing and seeing things about dangerous chemicals lurking in the bags. Or how whatever-the-flavoring-is is soaked in death. Is swearing off of microwave popcorn being dramatic?

Who cares? It’s a shit-load cheaper than buying pre-bagged popcorn. Not to mention, I can flavor it however the hell I want to. Cinnamon? Do it. Cayenne pepper? Yes, please. Sea salt? Bring it on.

So if you’re a popcorn lover (as opposed to a popcorn fighter?), here’s the easy way to get popping.

  • In a small pot (don’t you dare ask me what constitutes small, I couldn’t tell a quart from a pint to save my life … let’s say quart), pour in a tablespoon or less of oil. I don’t give a shit what kind of oil you use. I like olive, but you may want to use grape. Just use something that doesn’t burn. What won’t burn? I’m not a real, trained chef. How would I know?
  • Smear it around with whatever spice you want. Then dump in like a tablespoon of popcorn. Don’t do more than two! That crap expands like nuts. Oh, and stir the kernels around in the oil a bit to get them all coated and shiny.
  • Cover the pot with aluminum foil and poke lots of holes in it. You want to keep popcorn from jumping out, but you also want steam to escape. If the steam stays in, you get soggy popcorn. No one likes soggy popcorn.
  • Turn on the heat. My stove gores from 1 (low) to 10 (high). I use 8.
  • LISTEN! It’ll take a minute or two to start popping depending on your stove (mine’s electric, you gas people are on your own). When the kernels start jumping, just move the pot around and shake them all up. That way they won’t burn and stick to the bottom.
  • When it’s done, it’ll stop popping. It won’t take long.

Now enjoy the best popcorn ever. Let me know how it goes.

 

I had an ice cream sandwich for lunch.

17 May

I haven’t been blogging a lot this week, and I apologize to the three of you who give a shit.

I could throw excuses at you all day about how I’m so busy, I barely have time for lunch (which I always eat lunch), so I had to pick eating over blogging for Yummy Awesome.

Blah blah blah.

But I am taking a moment to tell you about my lunch today. My inner five-year old got her wish and had ice cream and cookies for lunch.

Because Dallas finally got a Cool Haus truck, and I just couldn’t resist.

Just to give you the basic idea of what they sell, you pick a cookie and then you pick an ice cream. Then you gorge.

I had  chocolate chip cookies (my favorite) lovingly cradling Nutella and almond ice cream. It was almost too decadent. But since it’s all that I ate, I managed to lick the last bit off of my fingers without being disgusted at myself.

Don’t tell my doctor.

The only time I looked happier was on my wedding day … probably while eating pie.

Nice teeth, Mr. Wilson.

9 May

Have you seen the 1993 movie “Dennis the Menace?”

There’s this really silly part where Walter Matthau (R.I.P.) as Mr. Wilson has to use Chiclets in place of his front teeth.

I tawt I taw a puddy tat.

It’s been years since I’ve seen the movie, but I’m fairly certain that Dennis dropped his dentures and the front teeth went down the drain. Not sure how the Chiclets came into play, and I’m too lazy to look it up.

But that’s neither here nor there. I always wondered, even as a ten year old, why Mr. Wilson didn’t chop up that gum. Make some more realistic teeth.

I mean … they’re OBVIOUSLY CHICLETS!

And as an adult, I get it. Because common sense isn’t funny. But gigantic teeth are.

And Chiclets, despite their rapid flavor loss, are delicious.

 

What I Ate Over My Pre-Summer Vacation

7 May

Last week, I took time off from writing.

That’s a half-truth. I did a little writing. But I did way more eating than working, trust me. Because that’s what time off is for, enjoying food again.

I probably ate my weight in Newman’s Own cookies. Are they healthy? Fuck no. No cookie is good for you, no matter how much cookie-diets tell you they are and how much non-dairy ingredients are subbed in.

I emptied a few containers of  coco dusted almonds. Enjoyed a bag or two of  sun-dried tomatoes from Natural Grocers. And made a mess around me with rice cakes (say they taste like nothing all you want, I love them).

I made margaritas. Real margaritas, not shitty margaritas you get from mix. I squeezed at least thirty limes and emptied a bottle of tequila into a pitcher and mixed it up with love (Contreau). They were exactly what margaritas are supposed to taste like. I even salted the rims of my fancy-pants margarita glasses.

And you know what? I got very drunk. And I’m okay with that.

I also mashed up some avocados for homemade guacamole. And I lovingly added a hint of garlic and salt. And more limes. Man, there were a ton of limes.

I’m having flashbacks now of great meals I had over my hiatus. But there was some icky food in there, too. But I’m going to focus on and release the good. And start writing again. I guess.

Release the good.

Pavlov’s Gut Reaction

30 Apr
Image

Quintessential, Trader Joes? How about queasy? Because I don't feel like spraying the walls with my vomit today.

My quinoa allergy/bad reaction/intolerance is so bad, that whenever I hear about quinoa, I start to feel bad.

It’s like the little tinkling bell of Pavlov, only it’s more like a demonic gut boil. Whatever that sounds like.

Fuck that noise.

Read about my terrible experiences with nature’s number one super grain here: Quinoa Can Suck It

Serving Size: One Swimming Pool

24 Apr

When I was a kid, my favorite drink in the whole wide world was Cherry 7-Up.

My little sister and I drank way to much of it. You know, before the Internet made us hyper aware of how deadly soda can be for you. Although this may have been pre-high fructose corn syrup.

I digress.

We then came to the logical conclusion that if drinking Cherry 7-Up was so euphoric, swimming in it would be borderline ecstasy. So we dreamt of one day having jobs and enough money to fill our neighbor’s pool with Cherry 7-Up and doing cannonballs into the deep end.

When we’d share this fantasy with the other seven-to-nine year olds in our neighborhood, they all agreed that a pool full of soda would be the greatest thing in the world. The boy down the street wanted to fill his family’s pool with Dr Pepper. A girl from a few blocks over wanted to splash in Sprite. Then a boy down the alley blew us all away when he wanted to fill his dream pool with Mr. Pibb.

“Now pretend we’re in root beer!” someone would shout as we all sloshed around in the shallow end. Some kids would start cheering and others would jump out immediately while shouting, “Eww, root beer?”

“Now it’s Big Red!” another kid would yell as she leapt from the diving board with the grace of an ice cube before plopping into the Crystal Pepsi clear water.

When I tell people that this used to be my childhood, they usually stare at me funny. “Who would want a pool full of soda?” their eyes say. Sometimes they flat out tell me. “That’s fucked up.”

No, no it isn’t fucked up. It’s the fearless and admirable imagination of small children. And you know what, mother fuckers? Someday I’m going to get my swimming pool full of soda. And you can’t play in it.

Image stolen from the great Craig Cooper (craigcooper.com). Although this ad isn't a pool full of soda, per se, it's too good an image to not use. Click to visit his other advertising accomplishments. Click around enough and you'll see me advertising my boobs.

There isn’t anything primo about Primo’s Tex Mex.

23 Apr

What a fucking disaster dinner at Primo’s turned out to be. Before I get into the gory details of a meal gone to hell, I’m going to point out that our server was fantastic. He alone kept me from throwing our fucking table into Lake Ray Hubbard.

I met up with some folks one night at the second Primo’s Tex-Mex location in (duh duh duuuuh) Garland.

For starters, who knew that it’d be douchier than the Uptown location? Well, me, because I grew up in Garland and I’ve been purging myself of the urge to bedazzle my entire wardrobe for the last decade. (Although truth be told, I never fit in with my hair-gelled, overly tan, sparkle-loving brethren to begin with—Garland has always been like the Jersey Shore only sans beaches and even less money.)

But this isn’t about Garland and the Ray Hubbard Shore. It’s about god-awful Mexican food. We arrived at 7:30 and were told there’d be an hour and a half wait. No biggie; it was our fault for not calling ahead. So we went for a beer at the Flying Saucer. Twenty minutes later, our buzzer goes off.

FUCK. What were we supposed to do with these delicious, crazy beers? One just doesn’t chug Ommegang Wit! But we tried and then found our seats at the restaurant.

Here’s what went down in bullet form so this post doesn’t get too long.

  • 8:00 Drinks were ordered. Chips were brought.
  • 8:15 Food was ordered. I watched our waiter make careful notes about my order (all I did was request no beans and rice–they’re meaty, you know). More chips were brought.
  • 8:30 More drinks were ordered. More chips were brought. There’s a fan on us that we ask to be turned off. It’s blowing bugs into our drinks and chips.
  • 8:45 Waiter gets berated by neighboring table because kitchen really messed up their order.
  • 8:47 Waiter stops by and, looking puzzled, says something about our food not being there yet. He went to check.
  • 8:55 We weren’t really hungry anymore because we’d been eating so many chips. But more were brought anyway. With more drinks.
  • 9:00 My face itches. It is the bugs? The fan is still on and lake bugs are all over the place.
  • 9:15 Still no food. Waiter has apologized numerous times. But we do have chips and drinks. And bugs. And that fucking fan was still on.
  • 9:30 We’re all feeling good since we’re full of beer and corn chips. But still no dinner. I notice that of the 6 patio fans, only ours is on. Waiter says our ticket is the next one up.
  • 9:45 More chips. I don’t even think we’re eating them anymore. They’re just stacking up. But the bugs do seem to enjoy them.
  • 9:46 Two of us go to the restroom. I look in the mirror and am horrified to see smashed bugs all over my face. My friend’s contact has attacked her (I’m not convinced a bug didn’t fly into her eye), so we go to the car to get a new one.
  • 9:50 No joke, there is something black in the contact on her finger. It could be mascara. Hopefully it was mascara.
  • 10:00 We return to the table. No food. More bugs. Fan still on.
  • 10:15 Food arrives. Half of it. Two people don’t have their food yet and my order is wrong. I have rice and beans. Table speaks up for me. I’m starving and flick a bug off of a chip and eat that.
  • 10:17 My food returns. My enchilada is torn in half. I cut into it anyway. It’s hard.
  • 10:18 And cold.
  • 10:19 “No, it’s not just room temperature. It’s actually cold. Taste for yourself.” King of Awesome is horrified that my food felt like it had been in a fridge for an hour.
  • 10:22 Waiter returns. Table speaks up for me. Waiter looks like he wants to kill someone.
  • 10:30 Waiter comes back with a kick ass salad (for Primo’s). I eat the salad before the bugs can get to it and the can can blow my lettuce away.
  • 10:35 Bugs are avoiding the salad. They must be full on chips. Fan is still on, though, so they’re assaulting my face again.
  • 10:45 Manager comes by and apologizes for awful everything. Apparently the kitchen fell into a black hole. He gave us business cards.
  • 11:00 We pay and leave. Waiter comped my meal (cause he was really great despite the kitchen trying to end his career).
  • 11:05 We get into the car. I wipe bugs off of me. We go home and I eat dinner.

This all added to the sad fact that Primo’s is another restaurant that isn’t vegetarian friendly at all. So I wasn’t excited about the meal in the first place. So maybe it was my fault for putting negativity out into the universe. Or maybe it’s Primo’s fucking fault for being a shitty-ass restaurant. I’m thinking the latter.

The bugs and the crappiness attacking.

All of our food is killing us while keeping us alive.

18 Apr

Fruits are genetically engineered.

Meat isn’t really meat anymore.

Dairy is mainly  mushed up hormones … that are artificial!

Anything cooked is like poison to your body.

What the fuck is wrong here?

All of this stuff I’m ingesting from food safety documentaries, the press, my friends, rings true … to a certain point. But enough is enough.

Fine. I’ll try to buy local produce, since apparently an apple isn’t really an apple after five days. Or I just think it seems silly to ship the same items back and forth.

And I’ve already got my husband eating meat from hippie farmers instead of the big, nasty name brands. Because I don’t want his balls to fall off.

And I’ll even make sure some food isn’t heated over 130 degrees, or what the fuck ever it is, so they maintain ultimate vitamin content. Or maybe just because I think they taste better raw.

But I can’t keep track of all of the food news anymore. I can’t keep comparing all of the warring scientific studies. And I’m not learned enough, unfortunately, and government-funded enough to run my own fucking experiments and grow my own crops.

So I try to be an educated consumer. But now I may be over saturated instead.

I do think it’s fucked up that buying a few pieces of fruit at the grocery store costs more than a fast food burger. There’s no excuse for that. I do think it’s strange that we get our vegetables from thousands of miles away. And I’m not wild about the fact that most of the food I eat has been dipped in bleach or is coated with some lab-created membrane (that I only recently found out about).

I’d provide you with all of the frightening links, but I’m kind of at a loss where to start.

I eat food to stay alive. That’s the real reason to eat. Despite how delicious food can be, it is meant to keep us breathing. However, much of today’s food also seems to be … I don’t want to say “killing us,” because we’d sooner die of starvation not eating it … not keeping us in as good of condition as we could be in.

And this angry (and hungry) little food blogger doesn’t even know how to start fixing this dilemma.

 

Silence, food!

16 Apr

“Villians,” I shrieked, “dissemble no more! I admit the deed!—tear up the planks!—here, here!—it is the beating of his hideous heart!”

Perhaps using the last paragraph of Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” is a bit dramatic when writing about the food in my desk, but the insanity it fosters in me is dramatic.

I simply can’t have food in my desk without wanting to eat it. Even if I’m not hungry, all I want to do is snack on those almonds or eat that bananna. Even if lunch was only an hour and a half ago and I am beyond satisfied.

It’s like I can hear the food calling out to me. I’m delicious, it coos. I’m healthy, it tells me. I’m right here, it finally says.

And it won’t be quiet until it’s good and in my stomach and dead.

Why is this? Why is just knowing food is around make me want to eat it? Am I not getting enough nutrients in my diet? Am I bored? Are there tiny bits of nicotine or other addicting substances added to my food?

It’s possible. Or it could just be the beating of that delicious heart.

Hot dog-stuffed crust? You’ve crossed the line, Britain.

11 Apr

The Brits aren’t known for their stellar cuisine. They serve horrid stuff like mushy peas with mint and … well, to be honest I can’t get past that. Because peas are the worst food imaginable.

But then I happened across an article this morning about the newest Pizza Hut item on the east side of the pond: hot dog-stuffed crust pizza.

After jamming pizza crust with cheese and meat, is there really even a point to having the rest of the pizza? Why not just eat a hot dog?

Normally, I’m a huge fan of insanely gluttonous foods, even though they usually don’t follow my strict self-inflicted dietary restrictions.

The KFC Double Down: a breadless sandwich with two fried chicken breasts holding it together.

The Taco Bell Doritos Locos Tacos: a taco with a shell made out of the same artificial shit Doritos are made out of.

The McDonald’s McGangBang: an off-the-menu monstrosity featuring a McChicken sandwich stuffed inside of a double cheeseburger.

These foods make me laugh. And even though eating them every single day would no doubt kill you, a little indulgence after a particularly drunken night might actually be good for your soul.

But shoving a hotdog into pizza crust? It’s fucking insulting, really. Culinary treason!

Is this one of those examples of British humour? Something that we Americans wouldn’t understand? Is this really an elaborate Monty Python sketch?

I’m afraid not. It’s just another example that British food is pure shit. And that’s before you digest it.

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