The veal of vegetables

Baby carrots are the venison of the vegetable world. This is because they are not grown into such a convenient shape and size like baby corn is. Rather, a regular carrot is chopped, shaved and whittled down to a fun sized snack. A similar process is used in making veal, which is the tasty result of a calf being ripped from the beating womb of a cow. Such waste.

Annually millions of pounds of carrot shavings are then discarded into the streets creating traffic jams or toasted and made into non-caffeinated coffee substitute. Furthermore, a bag of baby carrots can cost the consumer $7.99 or more while a few bunches of carrots that the buyer would have to wash and cut themselves costs less than $5.

It is in Maryland that sales of baby carrots are the most brisk. This immoral act of environmental crime is ameliorated by the fact that for the most part anything sharp enough to cut carrots in the state of Maryland is typically used for preparing meth or stabbing neighbors, or both, usually in the same evening. Baby carrots are most appealing to children and it would be wrong to use blood-stained, meth-permeated knives to cut up carrots and then feed them to kids.

So already prepared carrot pieces manufactured in a smarter region and imported are preferable to warping another generation of Maryland spawn by getting them hooked too early on drugs and the taste of blood. It is better to delay the inevitable until they can be securely housed in a Super-Max prison jail instead of the rotating doors of Juvenile Hall. Somebody has to think of the children.

Health and Safety

Anthropomorphic mascot promotes better health through improved nutrition and sports but not, apparently, physical safety and common sense as J. Slice' shattered skull and exposed brain can attest.

From the National Watermelon Promotion Board's J. Slice saves the Planet from Professor Junkfood (2003). I remember 2003. It was all about our precious snowflakes wearing protective equipment and preventing traumatic injury. How did this get approved?

To find out, click here for the The Senses-Shattering Secret Origin of J. Slice!

Guess who didn't get a tip?

That's right. I held back my green because the restaurant didn't hold theirs. I asked the server not to include any garnish or parsley with our meals. They included it anyways. Look at that horrible waste. It isn't like the parsley was taking up space on the plate that could have been occupied by real food as it was completely buried under my french fries and my wife's salad. Yes, the house salad included a garnish that was found under the lettuce.

Somewhere, a family of gun-toting Marylanders who always have plenty of money for bullets and beer but not soap or meals are staring at their empty food stamps envelope wishing they had something to nibble on. This parsley, added to other sprigs collected from all over the nation could have made a horrible if nutritious yet possibly health-threatening soup. Somewhere, a pasta sauce is denied little bits of green floating in it that might be basil or not. Or gnats, depending on if the kitchen window was open during food preparation.

Save the planet and Hold the Green!

Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Orange Nut Roll R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.

"In his house at R'lyeh the Orange Nut Roll waits dreaming." From H.P. Lovecraft, The Cult of C-Rat.

Where ever armies have marched and where ever crazed survivalist rednecks have squatted there remains behind scenes of devastation and horror. One of those horrors is the Orange Nut Roll.

A variety of nut rolls have long been a part of the soldier's meal while on the march. Historically they were a tasty treat to consume after eating the giant can of beef stew offered in C-Rations. The nut rolls were favored enough that they largely made a successful transition from the larger canned military rations to the lighter and more compact MRE or Meal, Ready-To-Eat of modern field supplies.

Anywhere a group of soldiers have gathered the evidence of their meals is left behind and used by the local population. The MRE was designed to be 100% useful in the field. The boxes, filled with sand or dirt, are packed tightly in a case and can slide into a sleeve. The packaging is water-resistant and filled with sand can be used to make bunkers, furniture and in some places in the world entire living quarters. The plastic pouches are used for storage and shingles on a roof. The cans are used for cooking or beaten down into knives or other useful items.

The exception being the Orange Nut Roll. The ONG is dry and has the consistency of a shoe. The taste resembles not so much an orange, but the wooden crate the oranges may have originally been shipped in. Fire that melts an 81mm mortar leaves the Orange Nut Roll unharmed. Insects, vultures and other opportunistic scavengers ignore and treat a found Orange Nut Roll as they would a piece of slate or length of bark they came across while wandering the forest. In places where the local population eagerly, desperately receives the leftovers of a soldier's meal either in food to feed their families or the useful packaging to build shelters the Orange Nut Roll is thrown away or refused. Entire rebellions have arisen in native populations because all they are given to win their hearts and minds are Orange Nut Roll packages from visiting soldiers. Give an Orange Nut Roll to a starving homeless person in any metropolitan city and they will sneer and possibly assault you.

There are beaches in Subic Bay covered in slowly rusting cans of discarded Orange Nut Rolls. Oddly shaped, orange hued rocks cover the sand and ocean floor in the region as Orange Nut Rolls tumble free from cans that disintegrate against the forces of nature. But the eternal majesty of the sea and wind are unable to breakdown the Orange Nut Roll. Like lava builds new land off the shores of Hawaiian islands so do Orange Nut Rolls serve as the foundation for reefs and future land bridges across the water. So imagine what one of those things, either in the old rounded or newer yet still inedible flat toaster pastry forms will do to the insides of a human.

Future archeologists will undoubtedly use as provenance of ancient battlefields the layers of uneaten Orange Nut Rolls that like ancient honey found in Egyptian tombs, will show no signs of rot or decomposition. Unlike 5000 year old honey though, the Orange Nut Roll is largely inedible as it comes fresh off the production line.

Hold It

"Hold The Green." That's the slogan for a new campaign against wasting food.

Take a look at this tasty seafood platter from a local restaurant. Notice anything missing?

That's right. The garnish isn't there. The reason the parsley is missing is because I requested the server not put any on the plate. Why? Because it is wasted. Hardly anyone eats the sprig of parsley, not even the curly Italian kind. It usually ends up in the trash or in the case of really cheap restaurant managers, re-used for another guest if it can pass a visual test for freshness.

According to the U.S. Parsley Council some 59,000 pounds of parsley is used yearly as garnish and in cooking. As a garnish parsley offers little except to take up platter space that could be filled with precious bacon and to add a hint of color on a plate consisting primarily of brown and gray hues. This is ridiculous and wasteful. Studies have proven that of the parsley-as-garnish that is eaten, 95% is consumed only by misbehaved children in restaurants who jump up and down on the chairs, scream, throw their fun-menu crayons in the iced tea of the people in the next booth. Parents, obliviously allow their children to eat the parsley even though there are health risks associated with extreme consumption of the herb. The remaining 5% who clean their plates are just cheap bastards who squeeze a nickle until it screams for mercy. Outside of the restaurant venue parsley is consumed in bunches by the stupid and those who believe in magic. They tout the homeopathic benefits of parsley but science says a diet high in parsley is pretty darn silly and is useless if not actually detrimental to a person's health.

PARSLEY MAKES IT CLASSY!
It is guesstimated that annually some 50,000 pounds of garnish-related parsley is wasted by being uneaten. That amount of green vegetable matter could feed 7,000 dairy cows for a year or a Maryland family of three for two months as a supplement to their food stamps. If there existed sin then such waste would be indeed sinful.

So be an Earth Warrior and do your part with very little effort at all. When dining out tell your server to "Hold The Green" and if they do not let them know you will be "Holding The Green" yourself, in the form of their tip, which they will not receive. If enough people decline parsley as a garnish then eventually restaurants all over America will stop ordering it and all that wasted food will be diverted to where it really should go, as the main ingredient in limited edition bobble-head statues based on the San Diego Padres or converted to cheap bio-fuel to run our cars. At the very least the parsley market will collapse and Italy will starve and then die before falling into the ocean.

As a side note savvy consumers also fight against the wasteful parsley scourge by frequenting those establishments that serve not the useless Petroselinum plant as a garnish but instead a crisp leaf of lettuce with a single cherry tomato placed onto it. Some people treat this lettuce and tomato combination similar to parsley and it goes uneaten. However the wise diner views this type of garnish not as future trash but as a potential bonus mini-salad. Most restaurants will freely and without question supply a customer with dressing of their choice on the side if they request some. Frugality for the win in this instance because making a tiny Caesar salad out of the spare and space-hogging veggies the customer gets more for their dollar by eating the typically unwanted garnish.

For more information click the Hold the Green search label.

CSI Sneak Peek

In a fashion similar to how other television shows do "cross-overs" from one franchise to another (example: Eureka and Warehouse 13, House and NCIS, etc) to spike ratings, police procedural drama CSI and popular cable cooking show Cake Teamsters have also joined forces in an effort to bring more viewers to the television. The cross-over event will be featured in the new season of CSI in place of the usual teaser that primes the viewer before the opening credits.

As described on the official CSI fan forum:

With Ray Langston (Laurence Fishburne) in critical condition from the cliffhanger events of last season the CSI squad reaches out to former boss Gil Grissom (William Petersen) to assist during a baffling mystery. To welcome him back to the team nerdy and annoying lab tech David Hodges (Wallace Langham) commissions a very special cake from none other than the chef and star of his own reality-based show "Big" Joey Vandolin of Cake Teamsters. As loyal viewers are aware "Big" Joey is given an "impossible task" each episode to create and deliver a custom-designed cake all while under the pressure of a ticking countdown and the sometimes zany and questionably helpful assistance of his well-meaning family, friends and bakery team.

In a montage of frantic cake baking and the carving of sheets of sugary fondant Carmine gets the CSI-themed cake done and delivered before the clock runs out. Grissom, however, is less than enthused as these exclusive sneak peek screen shots from the CSI website reveals.

CSI is all about the epithelials. Those chefs never wear gloves. Ever consider how much hair and skin is in those cakes they create?

Don't put that in your mouth, you don't know where it's been

Something was lost in translation, maybe? Found in a local San Diego store 5-26-10.

This is why you're fat

Oh, sure...The shovel is supposed to be for use with the bucket for sandbox play after all the snacks have been eaten but who they fooling?

Spotted in a San Diego store April 2010.

Things I've Eaten When Sober

Hot Kimchi

While it doesn't have the mystical healing powers that some attribute to it, kimchi is pretty good when you feel poorly. The spiciness of kimchi rather any magical properties is what clears up the chest and sinuses and the effectiveness of it is increased when it is served boiling hot.

Among the traditional condiments served tomorrow at the Christmas family meal will also be some fresh kimchi.

Everything Kimchi on Lady, That's My Skull!

Wow! That's a lot of kimchi!

Love That Kimchi!

Images of Kimchi
I don't know if Rule #34 applies to kimchi, but I wouldn't be surprised. Click carefully.

It's What's For Dinner

From Time To Run (1975).

Not shown: Nursing bottle filled with cola

A long time ago someone at Disney had the great idea that old American folk tales done in an animated style would make a great movie. The result was the 1946 live action and animated film Song of the South. Unfortunately, Hollywood and America of the 1940s was hardly a positive example of racial sensitivity and the execution of the Uncle Remus tales the film was based upon was, in hindsight, terribly managed. The main and wholly accurate complaints with the film is the depiction of African slaves as being happy, content and grateful for their subjugation. Caricatures that were fashionable and acceptable in popular entertainment of the era are numerous. Because of the way people were depicted and in spite of any artistic merits the film may contain it has not been fully released for the home audience in the intervening decades and only appears in the United States in heavily edited versions.

One of the more popular sequences was The Tar Baby, a tale in which the character of Brer Rabbit escapes from predators using reverse-psychology. For the uninitiated and anyone who grew up outside of the South after 1970 the term "Tar Baby" is a pejorative in relation to African-Americans. As a child in the late 60s watching this film in the drive-in I had no idea that the sticky trap represented anything other than what it appeared to be. In the Disney universe of walking, talking intelligent animals I didn't see anything unusual with Brer Rabbit engaging an inanimate object in conversation and expecting a reply. It is unlikely that the creators and audiences of the 40s thought the same and knew exactly what the sticky trap was supposed to represent, which is only one of the reasons the film was eventually pulled from syndication.

The marketing and exposure for some some sequences continued unabated. Stripped away from negative associations the fun and bouncy song Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah has regularly appeared in music collections and on various video releases since it was originally issued. Yet the mistakes of the past had a way of repeating into more contemporary times in spite of the decisions to suppress the less enlightened and insulting aspects of the film.

In 1958 Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies #8, under the Dell imprint, published a recipe for a "Tar Baby" treat as a one page fun feature. The snack, which kids could make at home or (I shudder to think) school, was a marshmallow creation covered with dark chocolate that resembles the sticky trap that Brer Rabbit ran afoul of in the Song of the South feature. In 1946 sheer ignorance and marketing inertia could explain the promotion of stereotyped caricatures of African-Americans though it would have been a little harder to justify in 1958. It could only have been utter stupidity when the decision was made to include the one-page recipe feature and reprint it in 1975 in Walt Disney's Showcase #28. By the 1970s everyone involved should have known better.

In the interest of parity I changed the recipe to make it more representative of the contemporary South and included it in this post, which you can click on to make double-wide size for easy viewing. For those who prefer the "warts and all" approach to history the original can be viewed here.

Note for people with IQ equal to their shoe size: Original recipe for educational purposes only. Please do not print out and share with your Cousin-Spouses, pals in the unemployment line or distribute at Sunday school gatherings.