Friday, July 23, 2010

The County Fair


I swear, sometimes I think I am a hick at heart.
But no, I am also a bit of a snob.
Maybe I am just socially bi-polar.
To explain, I have always loved the good stuff. Cashmere when I was 8, Jaguars when I was 9, the list goes on. Now it is Aston Martins. I pretty much thought that I had been born to rich people and poor people stole me. Once at work, we were looking at the covers of the rag mags. On the cover of one enquiring minds sort was an older glamorous movie star, a Kathryn Hepburn type. The title said that the star was looking for her daughter that she had given up at birth. I yelled.... "Mama!".
I have no trouble visualizing myself lounging on a beautiful yacht, in the South Pacific islands, with a crew of gorgeous 25 year old men, the wonderful and amazing man who owns the yacht adores me and is feeding me strawberries from his lips as he begs me to marry him. And I weigh 125 pounds again, of course.
I despise hunting, I don't like camping, I hate housework, and morons and white trash. Except that I probably qualify as white trash when the fair comes. I am 52 and I still like to eat fried food, see who is at the beer booth again and go to the destruction derby. I am so embarrassed. Yep, if you have never been to a destruction derby, you haven't been to America. Sitting in the stands full of, let's say 'interesting people', beer buckets and beer bellies all around, the air thick with dust, cars slamming into each other over and over until smoke billows out, and what comes screaming from my mouth at a pitch unheard before? "GET HIM!!!!" What? There is something that just rips down into the trenches of my gut, words from a time living on the wrong side of the tracks that I would prefer to forget. Okay, I am going to just say it and crawl under the rug later....Destruction Derby? Hella' fun!
There you have it, socially bi-polar.


I got to work at the beer booth again with a bunch of friends from work. I have never ever liked beer. Ask any ex-boyfriend.
Have you ever been to a kegger? A party with beer in plastic cups, guys in white t-shirts, usually in an orchard, always a fight and no bathroom. Spank my butt and call me Charlie. I hated those parties back then but I went. At 18 I wanted to be at the symphony. Great, all I had to do was date 70 year olds.


Okay, back to working in the beer booth. It is a blast! You get to see everyone. You get to see everyone drinking too much. You get to see everyone kiss their neighbor, kiss their ex and kiss the guy they met 90 seconds ago. You get to see jeans that are too tight, boobs that are too naked and cowboy hats on everyone who doesn't have a cow. If you are lucky, which I was last time, you can get a guy to flash you his chest and belly for your Budweiser beads. Woo hoo doggie!


Ahh, the bright lights of the fried food walkway.
Too bad I can't hop the fence & sneak in like I used to.


One of the nicest things this evening was a gentleman asking about us working there. I said we volunteer this night for the American Legion. He told me he was a member and thanked me for helping.
It was my honor.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Diana Torte


"My woman times have started".
That is probably the funniest thing I have heard in quite a while.

It sort of makes you feel like a strong woman.
A log choppin' woman.
Livin' out of a covered wagon out on the prairie.

Spittin' chaw.

Guttin' things.


**********

P.M.S.
What does it stand for?
There is a whole slew of pretty funny terms but these are my favorites.

Every one of which I have felt at one time or another.


*Plainly, Men Suck

*Pass My Shotgun

*People Make me Sick

*Putting up with Men's Shit

*Pardon My Sobbing


**********

I love this next joke because I understand it, PMS or not.

It just sometimes requires PMS to spew out the evil we are storing that normally we are too polite to say.


Q: How many women with PMS does it take to screw in a light bulb?


A: One.
ONE!!
And do you know WHY it only takes ONE?
Because no one else in this house knows HOW to change a F&@k#!g light bulb.
They don't even know the bulb is BURNED OUT.
They would sit in this house in the dark for THREE DAYS before they figured it OUT.
And once they figured it out they wouldn't be able to find the light bulbs despite the fact that they've been in the SAME CUPBOARD for the past SEVENTEEN YEARS.

But if they did, by some miracle, actually find the light bulbs, TWO DAYS LATER the chair that they dragged from two rooms over to stand on to change the STUPID light bulb would STILL BE IN THE SAME SPOT!!
AND UNDERNEATH IT WOULD BE THE CRUMPLED WRAPPER THE STUPID @*!#$% LIGHT BULBS CAME IN!
WHY?!
BECAUSE NO ONE IN THIS HOUSE EVER CARRIES OUT D@*% THE TRASH!!


I'm sorry... what did you ask me?


**********

This blog has lost all dignity today.

Damn!

Oops.


So what is your comfort food during your woman times?

Mine for the past 30 years has been a 'banana royal two scoop sundae' from Baskin Robbins with mint chocolate chip, banana, hot fudge, whipped cream, almonds and a cherry.

Works every time.


We have a little bistro in town.

This dessert is the reason I go.

It works also.


I tried making it with See's toffee more than once, which is much better in large part because of the great almonds they use, but I just ate most of the candy so there was never enough left to make the torte.
This is a great dessert for company, impressive, rich, easy, and make ahead.

DIANA TORTE

Rewritten for simplicity
From A Treasury of Great Recipes by Mary and Vincent Price
Serves 8-12

24 crisp macaroon cookies, such as 'Mothers'
1 quart chocolate ice cream, Baskin Robbins or Haagen Dazs
1 quart coffee ice cream, see above
4-8 T dark chocolate sauce, Hersheys dark syrup works well
1 1/2 c English toffee candy roughly chopped, See's or Almond Rocha(about 15 pieces)
More dark chocolate sauce
Fresh whipped cream

Lightly oil an 8 inch spring form pan.
Crush macaroon cookies and spread half on the bottom of the pan.
Slightly soften 1 quart chocolate ice cream and spread on top of the crushed macaroons.
Drizzle 2-4 T dark chocolate sauce over the ice cream.
Spread the other half of the crushed macaroons on top of the chocolate ice cream layer lightly pressing into the ice cream.
Freeze about 1 hour.
Slightly soften 1 quart of coffee ice cream and spread on top of the second layer of macaroons.
Drizzle 2-4 T dark chocolate sauce over the ice cream.
Crush 1 1/2 cups of English toffee candy and spread over the top lightly pressing into the ice cream.
Freeze approximately 4-5 hours or until very firm.

To serve
Set at room temperature about 10 minutes.
Loosen the sides of the spring form pan and run a knife around the sides.
Place on a large round serving platter.
Leave at room temperature for approximately 10-15 minutes before slicing and serving.

This is 'before' adding a last drizzle of dark chocolate syrup.


Drizzle a little chocolate sauce onto each plate and place a slice of torte on top or drizzle the sauce on top of each slice.
A bit of whipped cream of course.
Chocolate curls if you like (I like).
And the best hot coffee you can make.

And this is 'after'.
I think the photo speaks for itself.
However, for those on a diet, you can skip this part.


This freezes well for about a week, just wrap very well.



Ice Cream on Foodista