Dear friends,
Well, that didn't take long. I rediscovered my egg leitmotif on Friday, only to have LuthorCorp and Christmas (but mostly LuthorCorp) knock me flat on my tailbone. I'm not disappearing, just regrouping. There are too many interesting stories to tell. As soon as I get my own personal interesting back, you betcha I'll share them.
Here's a small rant to tie you over in the meantime, inspired by the good (dear Regina Schrambling, whose writing is like a vodka gimlet in a sea of Sex on the Beaches), the bad (the Wall Street Journal article she mentioned in last week's post -- scroll down a bit; you'll know it when you find it) and the ugly (a certain episode of a certain program on Food Network I caught while visiting my dad in Maryland last month). Dear food-industry-based friends: For the love of Mike Nelson, please stop doing dumbass things with your Thanksgiving Day leftovers. I have no issue with your putting cranberry sauce on your turkey sandwich. I have no issue with your making hot turkey sandwiches, and inserting a level of stuffing between the turkey and the bread. I do, however, draw the line at splitting a whole focaccia in half, throwing all your leftovers into it (and no, cold gravy is *not* a sandwich spread, like mayonnaise), grilling it and calling it "panini." It is not panini, and it is not a good idea. When even my father, whose motto is "If it tastes good, it doesn't have to be pretty", looks at that sandwich thing and says "that looks absolutely disgusting," then you know you've gone too far.
And for the love of god, leave the pie alone, already. Pie is a beautiful, grand dessert. If you have homemade pie for dessert, consider yourself lucky. If you have leftovers, consider yourself luckier, because then you can eat pie for breakfast. But if you look at that leftover pie and you honestly think, "Leftover pie is so boring! Let's strip the filling from the crust and pack the crust pieces into individual ramekins, and then let's fill up those ramekins with the pie filling, and then let's sprinkle brown sugar over the top and torch it, and then we'll have Individual Pumpkin Creme Brulees, which are so much better than plain old pumpkin pie!," then you, sir and/or madam, you do not deserve to have pie. Ever. I may sound harsh, but on this issue, I am not harsh. I am correct. To quote David Sedaris, "Ayatollahs are flexible. I am not." Leave the pies to the people who deserve them. Trust me, they're out there, and they know better than to take pie for granted. (To the diner mentioned in Pascale Le Draoulec's American Pie that makes a "pie shake" by throwing apple pie into a blender and zizzing it...nahhh, screw it. There's just nothing I can say.)