At Benjamin Nugent's 13th birthday party, he invited all the friends with whom he had bonded over sci-fi, Dungeons & Dragons, and computers. They sang the 2001: A Space Odyssey theme as the cake appeared, and told each other nerdy jokes.
What must his parents have thought? Perhaps they were simply glad that he had friends. But still . . .
"Do you tell him to ditch his friends because as long as he's one of them, he may not kiss a girl for a very long time? Or do you tell him to stick with them? Do you let him figure it out on his own even though you feel pretty certain he understands neither the nature of the dilemma nor what is at stake?"
Nugent, now a recovering nerd (if such a thing is possible), combs through literature and looks up a few of his old buddies to form a once-and-for-all definition of what a nerd is. In American Nerd: A Story of My People, he finds them in books as disparate as Frankenstein and Pride and Prejudice. He hangs out at their weekend events, where they gather to discuss frames-per-second in their favorite sci-fi flick, or where they dress up in tights and chain mail and play out the heroic fantasies in their heads.
Even the Mormons show up when one of his skinny grade-school friend's mother finds the missionaries. Thank you, former-hippie mom, for making us all look like nutters.
After reading Nugent, you will definitely be able to spot a nerd. But then, you probably already can.
Frequent cow patties.
As for your recipe, maybe we should pay tribute to what nerds eat. But here at Bye-Bye Nesquik, it is beneath our standards to instruct you to order pizza, or to stuff yourself with Coke and Doritos. If you're going to eat the junky stuff, at least put some effort into it. The recipe below shouldn't overtax you:
Cocoa Munch Mix
Showing posts with label candies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label candies. Show all posts
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Friday, December 7, 2012
Locatopia
I keep picking up books about local eating. Don't think I've gone all farmer's-market-&-organic or anything. I still love me some food straight out of plastic-y wrappings, and the sweeter the better.
But I also must have a soft spot for dipping into the world of people who get all misty over pastoral scenery, who love to dig in the deep black dirt and make tasty dinners from the carrots and kohlrabi that they grew themselves. Yep, kids who grew up in the suburbs are spending their summers out on the farm, and loving it. As for me, I'm sitting safely in the suburbs, reading about it, via Jonah Raskin's Field Days: A Year of Farming, Eating, and Drinking Wine in California.
Raskin's memoir covers a year in Sonoma County, California, where he hunts down the top organic farmers and visits the San Francisco restaurants that buy the farmers' boutique produce.
And you understand, don't you, that we aren't talking about the sunburnt sort of farm folks who are missing fingers from a long-ago accident with the combine? No, Raskin's farmers wear scruffy beards. Or long skirts, as the case may be. They discuss literature and wine. They smoke pot. And they occupy one of the most beautiful valleys on this planet.
Also one of the most expensive. Yeah, Raskin glossed very lightly over that part. I know somebody who considered moving to Santa Rosa, California, not too far from Sonoma. When she mentioned house prices, all of us in the room gasped in sympathy. And these were ladies accustomed to Chicago prices.
Raskin's farm world sounds so utopian. Does it really work as perfectly as Raskin tells it? Are the market days on the community square truly the bliss-fests that he describes? Do these anti-private-property, green-pepper-growers really have all the answers? Is this life within the grasp of the Wal-Mart set?
If these questions tire out your brain, maybe you need to eat something tastier than an organic tomato and far less naughty than Sonoma-grown pot. So let's talk about EASY FUDGE This is for people too lazy to make real fudge. I say, own your laziness and mix in a large bowl:
1 7-oz. Hershey bar, broken up
18 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 14-oz. Jar marshmallow creme
1 TB. vanilla
Set aside.
Mix in a sauce pan:
1 12-oz. can evaporated milk
four and a half cups sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup margarine
Bring to a boil; cook 6-8 minutes. Add to ingredients in bowl. Mix until blended. Pour into buttered 15x10-in. jelly roll pan.
Try not to eat too much of it yourself.(This will be hard.)
But I also must have a soft spot for dipping into the world of people who get all misty over pastoral scenery, who love to dig in the deep black dirt and make tasty dinners from the carrots and kohlrabi that they grew themselves. Yep, kids who grew up in the suburbs are spending their summers out on the farm, and loving it. As for me, I'm sitting safely in the suburbs, reading about it, via Jonah Raskin's Field Days: A Year of Farming, Eating, and Drinking Wine in California.
Raskin's memoir covers a year in Sonoma County, California, where he hunts down the top organic farmers and visits the San Francisco restaurants that buy the farmers' boutique produce.
And you understand, don't you, that we aren't talking about the sunburnt sort of farm folks who are missing fingers from a long-ago accident with the combine? No, Raskin's farmers wear scruffy beards. Or long skirts, as the case may be. They discuss literature and wine. They smoke pot. And they occupy one of the most beautiful valleys on this planet.
Also one of the most expensive. Yeah, Raskin glossed very lightly over that part. I know somebody who considered moving to Santa Rosa, California, not too far from Sonoma. When she mentioned house prices, all of us in the room gasped in sympathy. And these were ladies accustomed to Chicago prices.
Raskin's farm world sounds so utopian. Does it really work as perfectly as Raskin tells it? Are the market days on the community square truly the bliss-fests that he describes? Do these anti-private-property, green-pepper-growers really have all the answers? Is this life within the grasp of the Wal-Mart set?
If these questions tire out your brain, maybe you need to eat something tastier than an organic tomato and far less naughty than Sonoma-grown pot. So let's talk about EASY FUDGE This is for people too lazy to make real fudge. I say, own your laziness and mix in a large bowl:
1 7-oz. Hershey bar, broken up
18 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 14-oz. Jar marshmallow creme
1 TB. vanilla
Set aside.
Mix in a sauce pan:
1 12-oz. can evaporated milk
four and a half cups sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup margarine
Bring to a boil; cook 6-8 minutes. Add to ingredients in bowl. Mix until blended. Pour into buttered 15x10-in. jelly roll pan.
Try not to eat too much of it yourself.(This will be hard.)
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Forget the Flowers, Forget the Lacy Card
In case you still haven't thought of anything to give to your sweetie on Valentine's Day, I know that I would think kind thoughts about anyone who gave me a plate full of --
Cookie Dough Truffles
The first time I tried these, I used milk chocolate, then served them to guests. How polite humans can be. Those things were sweet enough to gag on, but my friends never let on with any actual gagging. But they didn't take seconds either.
The candy coating can be as simple as the 1-oz. squares of semisweet chocolate found in the baking aisle. I thought it would have to be something special. My mom used to dip chocolates and they would discolor once they cooled. But my truffles, stored in the refrigerator, stayed a rich chocolate brown. Some leftover chocolate left out at room temperature, though, hardened up and took on pale streaks.
Over on the Finished Book Pile, we have Solar by Ian McEwan.
McEwan's been a pretty hot writer for the last few years. He's the kind of guy that could probably call up Oprah or Larry King (oh, wait. Are those even on anymore?) and get on their shows without having to beg or anything.
In his latest novel, he presents a middle-aged protagonist, Michael Beard, who won the Nobel Prize for physics. But that was long ago, when he was young. He hasn't had an exciting idea in decades. And his fifth marriage is failing. And he's growing a pot belly.
Suddenly, a freak event changes his career luck.
Michael Beard isn't a likable man, but his drily funny misfortunes had me squawking out loud. This is a mild spoof on the panic and do-goodism inspired by global warming.
McEwan's weakness, this time around, is never quite tying up all the plot threads by the final page. But it was a fun ride nonetheless.
Cow patty count is 4 out of 10.
Cookie Dough Truffles
The first time I tried these, I used milk chocolate, then served them to guests. How polite humans can be. Those things were sweet enough to gag on, but my friends never let on with any actual gagging. But they didn't take seconds either.
The candy coating can be as simple as the 1-oz. squares of semisweet chocolate found in the baking aisle. I thought it would have to be something special. My mom used to dip chocolates and they would discolor once they cooled. But my truffles, stored in the refrigerator, stayed a rich chocolate brown. Some leftover chocolate left out at room temperature, though, hardened up and took on pale streaks.
Over on the Finished Book Pile, we have Solar by Ian McEwan.
McEwan's been a pretty hot writer for the last few years. He's the kind of guy that could probably call up Oprah or Larry King (oh, wait. Are those even on anymore?) and get on their shows without having to beg or anything.
In his latest novel, he presents a middle-aged protagonist, Michael Beard, who won the Nobel Prize for physics. But that was long ago, when he was young. He hasn't had an exciting idea in decades. And his fifth marriage is failing. And he's growing a pot belly.
Suddenly, a freak event changes his career luck.
Michael Beard isn't a likable man, but his drily funny misfortunes had me squawking out loud. This is a mild spoof on the panic and do-goodism inspired by global warming.
McEwan's weakness, this time around, is never quite tying up all the plot threads by the final page. But it was a fun ride nonetheless.
Cow patty count is 4 out of 10.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Please Try
Tonight, let's start with the Carson Christmas plate, part 2, in which we feature: Homemade Snickers!
This takes all day, sort of. You make it in four layers, taking time between each layer to let things set.
Chocolate Caramel Candy
Even better the second day. If they last that long.
I'm cheating on the Finished Book Pile, since it's taking me quite a long time to finish our featured selection: Model by Michael Gross. It's nonfiction, "the ugly business of beautiful women," weighing in at just under 500 pages.
The fun parts are the discovery stories of all these posing beauties; also a little bit about how modeling agencies started. John Robert Powers was an out-of-work actor who found himself running a clearing house for movie extras. He suddenly thought, "Hey, there are commercial photographers out there looking for models. And I know dozens of out-of-work actors and actresses. Why not bring them together?"
The book also details the wars between modeling agencies, stealing one another's girls. In fact, too much detail. Sometimes I get the feel that every paragraph equals an author's note card (must have been 3200 miles of note cards, laid end to end) and he tells me about agents, photographers, editors, names names names of people I never knew or needed to know.
But here I am, sticking with it. Right now, I'm in the '70s, where everybody is snorting coke while they work, although I notice that many of the real supermodels stayed away from the drugs, which seemed to contribute to the longevity of their careers. At any rate, a great deal of mischief goes on, but doesn't count as cow patties, because it is rendered such a reporter-like tone. And as the book progresses through the years, the pay rates keep going up, from $5/hr in the '30s to $25,000/day in the mid-'90s.
Even though I'm taken with the tarnished glamour of it all, I think one retired agent summed it up best when she said (and I paraphrase) We put these magazine pictures before the public and say, You will never look like this, but please try.
This takes all day, sort of. You make it in four layers, taking time between each layer to let things set.
Chocolate Caramel Candy
Even better the second day. If they last that long.
I'm cheating on the Finished Book Pile, since it's taking me quite a long time to finish our featured selection: Model by Michael Gross. It's nonfiction, "the ugly business of beautiful women," weighing in at just under 500 pages.
The fun parts are the discovery stories of all these posing beauties; also a little bit about how modeling agencies started. John Robert Powers was an out-of-work actor who found himself running a clearing house for movie extras. He suddenly thought, "Hey, there are commercial photographers out there looking for models. And I know dozens of out-of-work actors and actresses. Why not bring them together?"
The book also details the wars between modeling agencies, stealing one another's girls. In fact, too much detail. Sometimes I get the feel that every paragraph equals an author's note card (must have been 3200 miles of note cards, laid end to end) and he tells me about agents, photographers, editors, names names names of people I never knew or needed to know.
But here I am, sticking with it. Right now, I'm in the '70s, where everybody is snorting coke while they work, although I notice that many of the real supermodels stayed away from the drugs, which seemed to contribute to the longevity of their careers. At any rate, a great deal of mischief goes on, but doesn't count as cow patties, because it is rendered such a reporter-like tone. And as the book progresses through the years, the pay rates keep going up, from $5/hr in the '30s to $25,000/day in the mid-'90s.
Even though I'm taken with the tarnished glamour of it all, I think one retired agent summed it up best when she said (and I paraphrase) We put these magazine pictures before the public and say, You will never look like this, but please try.
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