Budget Bread
(Diagram 5)
For the 99%
And Culinarily Challenged
Baby Boomers.
Sumtime, Sumhow I Hafta Get
My Favorite Singer/Songwriter Of The Female Persuasion's Song Onto
This Here Blog 'O Mine That Is
Dedicated to A Beetle (Not a Beatle) With MY Name:
Alexander Beetle
"I had a little beetle,
so that Beetle was his name.
And I called him Alexander,
And he answered just the same!
It's difficult to catch...
an excited Alexander,
If it's mistaken for a match!"
<3 Melanie <3
From The Unabashed Cookbook (Fer baby-boomin’ guys not allowed in the kitchen as kids)
By Steve Alexander
Ingredients:Fresh-baked Italian Bread (a single guy’s good friend, YES!)
Creamery Butter (margarine, if anybody’s looking. Or if you have genuine medical matters)
Garlic Powder (don’t let anyone foolya, in almost all circumstances it’ll pass as fresh garlic, and usually tastes better in everything, don’t kid yerself!)
Onion Powder (good seasoning, NEVER substitutes for the real deal!)
Oregano (whenever ya can lay yer hands on fresh herbs, do so, but the jarred stuff is great! One of the best sensory--sensory, NOT sensual, big difference here--was visiting an herb farm in upstate NY. I was in a field of several acres of oregano in August, and other herbs nearby. OMG, what a sensation – if you’re into it, indoor herb farming is a cool deal, my friends say).
Basil (same note applies to all the herbs as oregano)
Cracked Black Pepper
Crushed Red Pepper
The Commander-in-Chief, just lookin' fer trouble with Michelle.
I'm ok with him havin' some 'o this garlic bread,
Michelle likely ain't too keen on that.
Parsley (how a dish looks matters people, and fresh or jarred parsley sure spruces things up big-time! Think about it, if you’re picking up a date fer dinner and she ain’t got her teeth in, let's say, how’s your appetite for the evening gonna be? Hmmm? Just sayin!)
Yer welcome to invite Joe over fer sum, too! I'm sure he'll have seconds.
Celery Salt (good stuff, underrated and underused, also a good flavoring which really has nothing to do with the veggie itself).
Salt (sea salt or mined, don’t matter, except price--you'll need a mortgage for sea salt. Watch for whether the stuff is Iodized or not, depending on certain medical conditions ya may have – if you have bad blood pressure and the doc is REALLY on your case, don’t bother with it-it’s easy to 'unacquire' a taste for salt in everything!).
Parmesan Cheese (here we use the stuff in the jar, it’s a qualitatively different animal than fresh grated Parmesan, I look at the jarred stuff as yet another flavoring, and a cool one at that!)
Diagram 1
Mozzarella (THE best of the Italian soft cheeses, but sometimes yer gonna prefer provolone or sumthin’ else, depending upon whatchyer whippin’ up, grated. If ya can buy a chunk ‘o cheese of any sort, and have the time, it’s pretty much worth grating it yerself as somehow the taste is inevitably better. I don’t know why; but low moisture, part skim Moootz – as my ol’ man, who grew up in the Italian section of New Haven used to call it—seems just as good as thefull-fat variety, which is actually a rarity in most supermarkets). BTW, my ol’ man used to call pizzas Abeeeetzes! Gotta say it. Been missin’ the ol’ man since he left us in 2001. Hi Dad! : )
Don't let me catchya givin' Willard any bread!
Cheddar (just a smidgen to add a bit of kick to yer bread, I fresh grated it here, and had the orange variety in stock, which added to the color and appearance—see the parsley note—again, I remind ya, wouldn’t you be a bit more psyched picking up a date who, instead of a stained off-white holey t-shirt was sportin’ a designer low-cut instead? – same principle applies to food).
Rick Santorum doesn't like gay marriage.
Don't let him have any garlic bread either!
You’re gonna need a big oven, like that which comes with most stoves. But an additional REALY good pal of us single and adolescent culinary-deprived folks is whatchacall a TOASTER OVEN.
UNABASHED DEFINITION;
TOASTER OVEN: An oven a lot like the sucker underneath the burners on yer stove, ‘ceptin’ it just has a little oven and no burners and is portable in that it can sit on yer counter or kitchen table. Don’t make the mistake ‘o thinkin’ its portable enuff so’s ya can pick it up and cart the thing around when it’s on or been recently been used. BURN ALERT! You’re talking an embarrassing ER visit in this case.
Ya can give Rush some garlic bread, but ONLY ifya slip some
Limbaugher cheeze and enuff hot sauce to keep him on the toilet
fer a week. Ok?
Yer also gonna want some sharp knives, one long serrated one. OK. Definition time again:
Diagram 2
SERRATED: means a knife that has those tiny little bumps on it, like ya cut yer steaks with (see the definition elsewhere for STEAK KNIVES). Other knives don’t have the bumps and serve different purposes. A BREAD KNIFE is long, serrated and exactly the sorta thing yer gonna want to slice that loaf of Italian Bread in half lengthwise (LENGTHWISE, DON’T MAKE A MISTAKE HERE, IFYA CUT YER BREAD THE WRONG WAY, YOU’LL HAVE A REAL MESS ON YER HANDS).
Occupying City Squares, Winning the election of 2012 and
"Gettin' Into The Streets"
as Prescribed By Dr. Winston O'Boogie (John Lennon)
will require protein, calories and energy!
So eat plenty of Democratic Party Garlic Bread!
***IMPORTANT NOTE: Our goal is to cook things to eat that taste and look good. But ALMOST as important is avoiding several very easy to accomplish and extremely embarrassing kitchen calamities. These include:
1) House fires.2) Burns of oneself.
3) Cuts requiring stitches.
4) Burning of meals and creating a smoke situation, setting off alarms or worse (you REALLY want to avoid neighbors calling 911 and having emergency personnel arrive, local media and winding up with a microphone in front of yer face in front of a camera explaining what went wrong with yer Democratic Party Garlic Bread To Die For).
5) Emergency room visits.
If Karl Rove asksya fer any Garlic Bread, tell me where he is,
and I'll take it from there. :)
Other supplies that would be useful are a cutting board (a slab ‘o plastic or wood designed to cut food on), a butter knife, and a spatula. Ok, I see we’ll require us one more definition.
SPATULA: pronounced like SPA-CHOOOO-LUH. It’s a funny looking sorta kitchen tool, mostly made of this mostly non-burnable (but don’t make the mistake of leaving plastic SPA-CHOOOO-LUHS on any burners, cuz they WILL burn then, TRUST ME!) plastic these days, but often metal, too. It’s got a flat part and a handle. Commonly used to flip flap-jacks and burgers.
Dick Cheney is the only Republican allowed to have an ENTIRE LOAF
of Democratic Party Garlic Bread.
But.....
He has to allow you to cook it extra-extra-crispy (like a brick),
and he has to lay down on the kitchen floor with his mouth wide open and his
arms and legs tied down
while you cram the entire loaf down his throat in
one fell-swoop.
IT'S NOT TORTURE, YOU DICK!
REALLY, IT'S NOT!
OK, now we’re ready to go.
Diagram 3
As mentioned earlier, slice yer Italian loaf lengthwise. Turn yer big oven onto the BROIL setting and let it be.
1) Butter (or margarine-depending on who’s in the kitchen) it GENEROUSLY.
2) Sprinkle on the Garlic Powder (about a tablespoon or so), Onion Powder (a teaspoon and a half or so—the thing is that you eventually get the hang of things, and don’t hafta measure everything, you’ll be really scared at first, that’s natural; fight or flight, adrenaline is a good thing), Celery Salt (maybe half a teaspoon), Salt (maybe a teaspoon), Cracked Black Pepper (just a twist or two on the peppermill set so’s the peppers come out really big!), Crushed Red Pepper (maybe half a teaspoon), Parsley (probably a tablespoon). Take a gander at DIAGRAM 1 and yer bread should look like this at this point. If yer bread does NOT look like this, go back and review the prior steps up to now, and rectify yer error. DO NOT MERELY CONTINUE, FIGGERIN’ THINGS’LL FIX THEMSELVES. THEY WILL NOT FIX THEMSELVES. GUARANTEED. TRUST ME!
3) Put the entire buttered and seasoned loaf onto a middle rack in yer preheated BIG oven, and let ‘er ride till she turns slightly golden, remember you are gonna add more stuff and cook it again, so don’t overcook it now. It should look like DIAGRAM 2 at this point, NO DARKER. Err on the side of too light if anything here.
4) Now here’s a great secret fer makin’ grilled onions without the work or messin’ up pans, utensils or nuthin. Slice one onion using a chef knife, being VERY careful so as to avoid the necessity for an embarrassing ER visit. Take the solid tray outa yer Toaster Oven, and set the Toaster Oven (remember, that’s the LITTLE oven either on yer counter or the kitchen table, specifically NOT the big ‘un that has the bread broilin’ in it as we speak—careful, we’re gonna be gettin’ into that whole walkin’ and chewin’ gum thing at the same time; you know, the kinda thing Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry never mastered)to the ‘BROIL’ setting Put a slab ‘o aluminum foil on the tray. Smear about a tablespoon ‘o vegetable oil on the foil-covered tray. Put the tray on a middle or high rack on yer toaster.
5) Watch both ovens close. REAL CLOSE. BURN DANGER. FIRE DANGER. When the onions look good, flip them suckers right on over with your SPATULA (SPA-CHOOOOO-LUH). When the other side’s done, ya have great fried onions in a split instant, no mess, no muss, and nobody needs to know!
6) Ok. So now we have onions ready to go, the bread looking like DIAGRAM 2, and by now yer hungrier than all get-go! Relax. We’re almost there! Now whatcha do is sprinkle some ‘o the Parmesan cheese onto the toasted loaf (maybe 3 or 4 tablespoons); then you spread a whole bunch ‘o grated mozzarella (Mootz!) on there (half a cup, maybe 3/4ths of a cup or so, enuff to make it look like a pizza before the pizza guy throws his pie into the oven); next spread a bit ‘o cheddar on there (maybe a quarter cup?); artistically spread out about a dozen or so pepperoni slices on top ‘o them cheeses so’s it looks REAL perty (remember the dating analogy, ya don’t want it looking like it’s should be lying on a park bench instead of heading to the prom), and THEN, just as artistically load them beautiful onion rings on top ‘o them beautiful pepperoni slices. NOW it should look just like DIAGRAM 3! AGAIN IF IT DON’T LOOK LIKE THIS REVIEW PRIOR STEPS TO SEE WHERE YOU F___ED UP! DON’T TRY TO JUST KEEP GOING ON AND COVER UP. COVER-UPS DON’T WORK, REMEMBER WATERGATE!
7) Take that beauty and throw her into the BIG oven (you had left the broiler setting on before) to broil one more time. Keep a close eye on her. It should only take maybe 5 minutes or less for this fine product to be perfect. The onions’ll look delectable, the pepperonis’ll be shriveled a bit and a bit oily just like they look straight outa the oven at yer favorite ABEETZ take-out joint, and the cheeses’ll be bubbly and golden! TAKER ‘ER OUTA THE OVEN AND SHE’S LOOKIN’ FER ALL THE WORLD LIKE DIAGRAMS 4 AND 5!!! YESSSSS! Ya didit!
Democratic Party Garlic Bread
With MOOTZ!
Diagram 4
8) EAT UP, AND DON’T LET A REPUBLICAN, A TEA BAGGER, A ONE PERCENTER OR ANYONE OF THEIR ILK HAVE ANY. ANY AT ALL! IF SO, I’LL UNFRIENDYA ON FACEBOOK, IF YER A FRIEND THERE, I PROMISE! IF I EVER CATCHYA FEEDIN’ WILLARD ROMNEY, SANTORUM, ROVE OR CHENEY ANY ‘O THIS QUALITY MERCHANDISE YOU’LL BE BANNED FROM UNABASHED LEFT FOREVER. G - U - A - R - A - N - T - E - E - D ! ! ! YER WELCOMED TO SNEAK SUM TO BARACK, BUT IF THE FIRST LADY’S AROUND, USE DISCRETION PLEEZE, HE WILL GET IN TROUBLE!
And ifya want to make it a real party, re-elect our awesome incumbent President; but also let's elect a BIG Democratic majority in the U.S. House of Representatives and turn John Boehner, the undisputed worst Speaker in American history into a one-term memory! Click this link to help out:
And ifya want to make it a real party, re-elect our awesome incumbent President; but also let's elect a BIG Democratic majority in the U.S. House of Representatives and turn John Boehner, the undisputed worst Speaker in American history into a one-term memory! Click this link to help out:
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