Author: paulette

Actually, if there had been a “spit, don’t swallow” category, it would be a lot more appropriate to some of the exhibits in the Potted Meat Museum than “yum” but I work within the constraints I am given. At least it’s not nearly as frightening as Pete’s hats of meat last week.

Now admittedly, there is a place for potted meat (and saying “potted meat” gives me a weird little pleasure–perhaps something akin to how Perry feels about “toast points”). I mean, we would have no tuna sandwiches without potted meat, and, hmmm…ok, well, maybe that’s the only one I can think of that doesn’t really spook me. Because, yeah, I’m kinda spooked by beef and iron wine and pork brains with milk gravy. Actually, I’m more than a little spooked by those. Spooked we’ll leave to the realm of canned steak and kidney pie, which seems something iffy enough in its fresh form that it really oughtn’t to be consumed from a can. I’d say the same goes for turtle soup.

And I’m assuming (or is hoping a more appropriate word here) that the armadillo meat–sundried and road tenderized–is a joke, which is why it’s listed under “exotic and other.” Now there’s a category for you! Jay, can we add that one to nonfamous, for newsbits that just don’t work in any of the other established genres?

In honor of the upcoming inauguration of Swallow Don’t Spit’s monthly or bimonthly (Have we decided this one? Maybe it should be scheduled to coincide with phases of the moon or meetings of the Federal Reserve Board), I thought we could all use a little primer in describing i vini that will be the focal point of these events.

Not since the heady days of my mother’s infamous creation “hot dog soup” have I been so frightened by the appearance of something purporting to be dinner. Well, there was also Doctor Zabdiel Boylston’s Honeycomb Pudding, which had too long a name not involving food products that I should have been suspicious well before making it, but I was young, my dad was the head chef that day, and all I know is that the name was only descriptive if either the good doctor or a honeycomb generally resemble the title creature from the Blob. And can move by it’s own willpower. Yeah, it really did that. Right off the cutting board and across the counter. I still get nightmares about it.

But I digress, which I do a lot, because, well, probably because I’ve got a serious and undiagnosed attention deficit disorder. Or because I’ve killed enough brain cells with alcohol, stress, and other such nonhealthy nonsmartening pursuits, that I’m incapable of staying on point for more than the first four or five words of a given sentence. See?

So where was I? Oh yes, I was being disturbed by food. Which is hard. I’m the kind of gal who actually seeks out such generally frightening dishes as sweetbreads, tripe, salt cod, and pickled fish. Hell, I ate a wide array of unidentifiable floral and faunal squiggly items in Japan without flinching. I ate fish face, eyeballs and all. So, you know, I’m hard to freak out when it comes to food. Unless, of course, the food in question is hot dog soup which is just sick and wrong, or something called Fluffy Mackeral Pudding which is even sicker and wronger. Yeah, the name is scary ok, but not half so scary as the image of “onion sauce” which really looks more like A Fish Named Carrie if you ask me.

What the hell? That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it? Well, I mean, unless you’ve already seen this site and know what the deal is. But basically, some guy posted all these recipe cards that Weight Watchers put out back in the ’70s with amusing commentary, which couldn’t have been that hard to come up with because, well, the cards are pretty fucking disturbing on their own. I mean, do you really need someone to tell you that anything called inspiration soup would be anything but to the tastebuds, or that rosy perfection salad must have been created by someone who understood the meaning of the word irony much better than Alanis Morissette?

Now, I’m a fan of Weight Watchers. I recommend them like crazy because, well, you know, they kind of saved me and all, got me back on the straight and narrow, or at least, thinner, and I never really thought of them as some weirdass “Here drink this…uhm…Kool-aid” kind of an organization that pulls you in and exerts weird mind control over you, but these cards are kind of making me wonder if Jim Jones didn’t go on to take over their culinary design division after making such a mess in Guyana.

Thanks to my dear friends at Chowhound I’ve recently discovered a new favorite blog (sorry, Jay, but this one is too up my alley). The Julie/Julia Project is the daily adventures of a woman who is trying to work her way through Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cookery and have a life at the same time. I felt a particular kinship with her while reading of her unfortunately textured orange mousse; her liquid mess seemed like the perfect complement to the solid mass of cornmeal and buttermilk that took two extra cooks and all of the remaining milk and eggs in the house to turn into cornbread last Sunday.
Continue reading “Next it will have to be the Paulette\Paul (Prudhomme) project I suppose”