Exhibit A - 2004-12-24 00:22:17
I know. I'm overly fastidious, if not borderline crotchety. But good cooking isn't about desperately ingenious fussiness. It's about time and good ingredients.
Now that that's settled, I offer you (below) edible ornaments.
This item is breathlessly presented as a novel new way of decorating your tree. But edible? Who's going to eat a rock-hard cookie that's been soaking up sneezes and secondhand smoke for three weeks? Not me.
Also, it is flat immoral to use food that won't be eaten as a decoration when a third of the world goes to sleep hungry each night. Food waste is epidemic in this country, and the tree should not showcase a heedless lack of concern for this problem.
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I don't know a soul who hankers after popcorn balls. I like popcorn. I had popcorn for lunch today at work--after being sufficiently distracted by the snow to forget to pack a lunch, popcorn was the only forageable food item at work, so I made do.
But popcorn balls, which require handling at the 1. ball-formation and again at the 2. stick-insertion stages, (pictured is a "bouquet" of popcorn balls on sticks) are likely crawling with flu viri by the time they're wrapped in cellophane. Avoid them.
Just nuke the bag and be content with that.
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What do we have here? Why, it's fruit bread, baked in a soup can. How clever.
But all the soup cans Ypsidixit is acquainted with have indentation-rings on the side. So how do you get the bread-cylinder out without reducing it to crumbs, while swearing profusely? Answer: you can't. Just bake the damn bread in a pan, already.
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Holiday weirdness is particularly marked in the strange seasonal drinks that people concoct. Eggnog offers a short road to salmonella poisoning, and "mulled" items are often spiked with cornea-threatening cinnamon sticks.
This unappetizing punch (below) combines pineapple pulp, rum, brandy, and "inexpensive" champagne.
Let's mull this over. In Ypsidixit's experience, straight champagne was never unwelcome at any gathering. Its delightful exuberant fizz erases social inhibitions in a froth of nose-tickling bubbles. And it's delicious. Why water it down with all this other schmutz?
Also, Ypsidixit is unenthusiastic about any drink secreting a layer of fibery pineapple silt.
Here concludes my grim and humorless take on contrived seasonal foods.
Happy Holidays.
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That's funny. Don't forget the fruitcake you can use to hammer a nail in.* * * * * * * * * * * * Dan Arbor - 2004-12-24 02:12:51
Fruitcake is considered a lethal weapon in 14 states. * * * * * * * * * * * * Laura - 2004-12-24 02:20:01
Well, I have to say I like good fruitcake. Good fruitcake. The rare kind. Washed down with plenty of wine.* * * * * * * * * * * * raymond - 2004-12-24 09:52:08
Fruitcake? Yeah, I am, so what?* * * * * * * * * * * * Laura - 2004-12-24 12:21:25
I have to say that one exception to the holiday Food That's Been Handled Too Much category is home-made macaroons. I adore coconut macaroons, which I find so good I don't even stop to question their mode of construction ("things formed into balls" subcategory).* * * * * * * * * * * * add your comment: