I really wanted to hate this.
But being a hater is easy. Admitting that you own, and have used MORE THAN THREE TIMES, a Rachael Ray Make Your Own Take Out Recipe Deck is so much harder.
It was sent to me by the publisher, so no, I didn't go out and buy it. And I wish I could sneer at ol' Jokerface, but … I've cooked four recipes from it so far, two of them a couple of times, and they worked pretty well, were easy and fast, and it was really convenient to just magnet the card onto the fridge instead of consulting an open book on the counter.
What can I say? She wins this round. But I will never say yumm-o.
lunchless and trapped.
So much for our plans for Friday lunch out — we were stuck in our downtown office building because of THIS. (Traffic was locked down for the whole downtown area, with helicopters overhead and cop cars on corners.) Ordering in turned out to be complicated too; no one wanted to send their delivery guys into the Wild West hail of bullets presumed to be blanketing downtown.
Jimmy John's to the rescue! Not only did they deliver, they did it with their usual hang-up-and-they're-in-the-lobby speed. JJ, we hail thee (and PS, your tuna rocks)!
holiday gift guide: fatten your friends and family
Holiday food gifts are great, but for most non-professional cooks there's a bit of a gap between aspiration and achievement. And the gourmet stuff is usually really expensive — but you can cut out the middleman with Etsy's Holiday Food Gift Guide, a bonanza of homemade goodies at mostly very reasonable prices: pumpkin toffee cheesecake, fall-spiced macarons (pictured at right), vegan gingerbread and plenty more. Fire up that Paypal account and start shopping.
boingboing and rick ross take on supreme master tv.
We've made plenty of passing references to Supreme Master Ching Hai before, but frankly, we're all just a little too scared of her to poke serious fun. (Plus, we're afraid we'll get 86'ed from the Loving Hut, and then where will we score delicious Sea Wonders?) 
No such qualms for BoingBoing, who called out the Tammy Faye Bakker of Veganland on their site last night: "She sells hair extensions and stuff … She sings spiritual lounge music. She designs 'celestial clothes and sleeping mattresses' for dogs." There's even a link to the Rick Ross website, which has a bazillion articles on Miss Ching, including "Immaterial Girl" and "Clinton's Buddhist Martha Stewart" and "Sect Leader's Island Is Awash in Mystery."
Good for y'all. We'll just be over here with our Heavenly Salads, agreeing with you vigorously but silently.
turkey time.
Halloween's over; time to start planning Thanksgiving dinner. Here are some websites to visit if you're trying to break out of the same old green bean casserole, marshmallow sweet potatoes, and pumpkin pie mold — these are all good places to start, but I'll post more as I run across them and the day approaches. Feel free to comment or e-mail me with your own resources.
Martha Stewart is the first, the best and the reigning champ in the turkey category, and on her website, there's a special Thanksgiving section. Her recipes can be complicated, but they mostly give stellar results that make hand-tying a rosemary-needle butter brush worthwhile. Also good for obsessive-compulsives and those with too much time on their hands.
Serious Eats offers a mix of articles and recipes: Classic, Healthy or Easy Thanksgiving menus; a boxed stuffing taste-off; a wine guide; "Thanksgiving Foods We Love to Hate"; celeb cookbook reviews and more. This group of turkey alternatives (heretical!) ranges from Ham in Coca-Cola to Festive Chickpea Tart.
If you have vegetarians in the mix — and what family group doesn't at this point? — 101 Cookbooks is an amazing source for thoughtful, delicious, creative dishes: mostly vegetarian, though not all. This is food no one will feel deprived eating, veg or not, and it's always nice when no one is singled out in a "this is YOUR food, weirdo" way on holidays. (This recipe for Roasted Pumpkin Salad looks delicious and festive.)
Another common food restriction is gluten intolerance, and Thanksgiving pies can be hellishly tempting to sufferers. If you or someone you love is new to the disorder, a trip to the delightful and inspiring Gluten-Free Girl blog is the first order of business. This entry on "Your First Gluten-Free Thanksgiving" will steady the nerves and stop you from feeling cheated, and it also contains a recipe for some killer chocolate cupcakes. This one and this one are also full of helpful advice and wise words.
terrifying tacos: FREE on halloween night.
I'm still not sure why it's black. Much less HOW it's black … but whatevs. Free food, right?
"Creep in" to Taco Bell between 6pm and midnight on Halloween (Saturday night!) to get ONE FREE BLACK JACK TACO zOMG. (not 89 cents!!!)
Gastroenterologists: You're welcome.
red right hand.
Anyone can hand out miniature Snickers bars for Halloween. Wouldn't you rather give away slices of a DELICIOUS MEAT HAND?
Meat Hand recipe, via Not Martha — "gruesome and delicious"
You're welcome, trick-or-treaters.
cheap thursday: $1 chicken edition.
Boston Market, the faux-home-cookin' chain, is offering $1 meals through Sunday: one piece of white or three pieces of dark chicken*, mashed potatoes, and cornbread for one thin buck.
You can download your own coupon here, but their servers have been overloaded all morning and I haven't been able to get on their site. I'm guessing they were unprepared for how many people have dwindling food budgets and are therefore willing/desperate to eat cheap delicious corporate salt-lick ChickieNobs. I've reproduced the e-mail coupon below, which may or may not work at the store — give it a shot.
Also, here is a hilarious tale of "My $1 Boston Market Chicken Experience": "The top of my mouth feels very dry and I have intermittent tingling in my arms and legs …" Consider yourself forewarned.
* … and by the way, what is up with the white meat–dark meat racism? I know BM (terrible initials for a restaurant) is just following customer patterns, so I want you all to look within yourselves, people. In the meantime, you can take advantage of it to maximize this deal, I guess.
krona crash kills icelandic mcdonald's.
The only McDonald's franchise in the island nation of Iceland will close next week, reported, like, every news outlet today. Between the collapse of their national economy and the cost of importing all the ingredients (as required by McDonald's corp.) to Reykjavik, it's no longer financially viable to supersize the meals of trolls, walking stones and these people. (As Björk says, "Have have have some salad! Bite bite bite an apple!" Clearly not a Big Mac fan.)
In an NPR story, they mentioned that the franchise owner planned to open a new burger restaurant using locally sourced meat, cheese, etc., which would be cheaper but also healthier — for diners and for the environment. Interesting that the end result of globalization seems to be going back to the old way. Apparently we just needed to make a few people very rich and a lot of people very poor before we went back to doing things that make sense — like not shipping pre-cut french fries halfway around the world.
anthony bourdain creates animated series (SNEAK PEEK)
Starring … himself!
Says the man: "These dark, nasty, frequently foul TWO MINUTE LONG web extras are not a replacement for NO RESERVATIONS. They are not a pilot for some new, family friendly, watered down follow on. They are instead brief, often violent, alt versions of NO RES--representing things we could never have done on the actual show-or the way things should have gone on the show--or animated acknowledgments of what already went terribly wrong on the show."
Here's the trailer:
And the first episode, "Robo Chef," is already up on YouTube! Take a look — nuclear chesticles and all.
rest in peaches.
The final word on Gourmet's sad demise: this article in Brown University's Post- magazine by our fashionable former intern, Marshall Katheder.
Perhaps rapper Biggie Smalls said it best when he emceed, “It was all a dream, I used to read Gourmet magazine, Salt n’ Pepa and Heavy D up in the limousine.” Since its founding in 1941 and before its untimely demise last week, Gourmet
was an inspiration to people of many walks of life: domestic shut-ins,
patients waiting at the podiatrist’s office, food fanatics and people
with way too much thyme on their hands.
Ah, impetuous youth! MK, we miss your unpaid labor; we miss your puns; but most of all we miss your mint-green polyester leisure suit.
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