Thoughts on food in life, and lifestyles. I am a holistic nutritionist, struggling with food in these Covid times, while playing video games and thinking of how quickly time has flown by.
Ever since Halloween was invented, I am sure that the parents of those occult children were wondering what to do with the abundance of candy and treats. Well, even though candy has enough sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup and chemical agents in it, it really doesn't last forever. So, what do you do with the candy you have left over or the candy you don't let your kids eat? (I admit it, my kids already have several thousands of dollars of work that has been put into their teeth and for them to eat a tootsie roll only to have their filling come out or to loosen their crown is enough for me.)
What I did, was take those candies that I don't give to my kids, like all fruit flavors of taffy and Starburst. I placed them in a pot, unwrapped of course, and threw in about a stick of butter. As soon as I turned on the stove, I was now slowly edging into candy-making territory. The thing with candy making and sugar, is that if you don't watch the temperature, it will turn into something different than what you had wanted. If the temperature gets too high, it will become brittle and crack. If it is too low, it will still be runny and soft. I wanted mine to be runny and soft so I got it just to a boil and then removed it from the heat.
I mixed my Blondie brownie recipe and then slowly mixed in my sugary mixture. I stuck it in the oven at 350 degrees for 25 minutes. When it came out, I checked it with a chop stick (instead of a tooth pick) and then set it aside to cool. It had taken on the color of the melted taffies and chewies. What it did also, was turn itself into a thick and chewy brownie; resembling a dump cake. (A dump cake is a recipe where you mix a packet of cake mix, 2 sticks of butter and a can of pie filling together and bake it. It creates a chewy, moist and flavorful cake.)
Whenever I think of a gingerbread house, I think of a happy moment from my childhood:
While I know that it was never shown or told that the house was made of candy and sweets, at least it lent the idea that it could have been and the kids were just thrown in a pot anyway.
Watching this, then made me think of a game I have recently played called Katamari Damacy:
If you are not familiar with this game, the point is that you have a ball that you basically roll stuff up with. Like a snowball rolling down a hill, the more your roll up, the larger your ball gets and then more that the perspective and scale shifts so that it appears that you are getting larger and larger. In this level, you had to roll up as much of this gingerbread house you could. It even comes complete with a witch riding a broomstick. As a fan of donuts and other great baked goods, a house made from real baked goods, does sound delicious.
Now we get to St. Louis, where to the side of the main hall of the River City Casino, they have this:
This past Saturday I was allowed to enjoy something straight from the fairy tales: the giant gingerbread house. I thought to myself, 'how can a gingerbread be that cool?" I was quickly surprised of exactly how large-scale this gingerbread is. Candice Coleman, sent me over the recipe and what was required to make this and I was shocked.
[
Gingerbread House
450 pounds of gingerbread dough
100 pounds of shortening,
100 pounds of granulated sugar,
90 pounds of corn syrup,
117 pounds flour.
Baked off 500 6 inches by 12 inches square bricks.
100 house made gum drops
400 fresh baked cookies
130 fresh baked cupcakes
300 pounds of royal icing
]
Okay, so imagine how big of a item you could make with 450 pounds of cookie dough! What they did, was create a wooden house and then using frosting, they glued these gingerbread cookie slabs on to the outside. While reading that list I also thought of how big it could be, with only 400 cookies, 130 cupcakes and 100 house made gum drops. My mind immediately thought of those store-bought gum drops and how 100 of them is hardly enough to decorate even the store-bought gingerbread houses. That is, until I saw them up close:
That large yellowish thing with the sugar on it, is the "house made gum drops". Really?!?!? Way to fool me Chef John. That thing is huge and looks to be about 3 inches tall and about 2.5 inches in diameter. It reminded me of those giant "novelty" gummi bears that you can buy at the World Market in Chesterfield and everyone sinks their face into. I'm surprised no one has taken this idea and made some kind of weird candy fetish video with giant gummi bears and huge gum drops. Take these into account with the normal sized cupcakes and those cookies look to be at least 6 inches across.
Now, while this house enough sugar to give every child in America a sugar rush and is cool to look at, there is special food that can be ordered. The gingerbread house has a special menu, which allows you to pick from your first course, your entre' and get your dessert all for one low price of $25.
I had the pumpkin pie soup, which had creme fraiche and toasted pepitas. It was great and sweet but not too, too sweet. It tasted like pumpkin with some sweet elements to it. A great way to judge a dish is to get a kid to eat it and my 6 year old loved it. He kept asking for more and he sat in front of his breakfast plate.
The soup was an easy 4 out of 5 for me.
Between the choice of the ham and the turkey breast, I chose the ham. (It is a pork product after all.) The ham had a 1904 Bourbon glaze, with a sweet potato and yellow potato gratin and then had some baby carrots. The carrots were as sweet as the soup, which is a good thing, for me. I prefer my vegetables with large amounts of butter and or brown sugar or maple or other sweet applications.
So, it was huge, a large amount of food was offered to me and presented and I was already ready, already. The ham was tender and juicy and flavorful. The gratin was tender and easy to eat and creamy. The carrots were awesome. The meal was an easy 4 out of 5.
There were others: Like the eggnog flan that came with this prefix meal. I'd give it a 4 out of 5. Then there was the egg and Canadian bacon sandwich with potatoes that my son ordered and ate his fill of, loving every bite of it. Even the Beignets came out correctly. They were light and fluffy and delicious. We ordered the traditional and plan on trying the maple bacon when we return.
While going to the casino and eating in a giant gingerbread house may be just regular average droll for you, it is important to note that doing so, helps a charity. To reserve your spot for a meal in this house, requires $20. This $20 goes straight to the Center for Hearing and Speech, which helps hearing impaired adults and children in the St. Louis area. This isn't some organization going to help people around the world or in some other city but takes care of the people HERE. Every cent of that $20 goes to the organization. Now, while you may be wondering, what you get for your $20 other than a spot in this edible house, here you go: activities for your kids. The gingerbread house is a great place to go with your kids. It seats 4 people comfortably and after ordering adults and kids alike, are given slabs of gingerbread with colored icing, with which you can decorate your tile. Tiles or slabs of cooked and decorated gingerbread can be donated to the house, where a chef will get to glue them on to the house, using frosting. So, you can make a funny picture, write your name, or even write the name of your website.
So, this holiday season, spend the $20, help someone hear for the first time and enjoy some great food.
A visit to Walgreens showed me something new and interesting, it is about time that a company makes candy that isn't full of junk. After all, candy is made with some pretty simple ingredients but thanks to The Corn Growers of America and other mafia-type organizations, things like High Fructose Corn Syrup and other corn derivatives and making their way into our candy. I love how people complain and think that there must be some secret ingredient "X" that people are eating that is making Americans fat and obese and no one bothers to think at the facts. The number one fact being that before HFCS was introduced into our food the obesity percentage was low and now after all these years it is high. I wonder why???
Anyway, while always looking for something new and fun, I came across a candy company doing something odd: they have candy made with no artificial anything, no hydrogenated anything, no corn syrups, no preservatives and no GMO's. What we have here, if sold in a little confectionary shop in New York City, would be some expensive candy. But, distributed and sold at Walgreens, you have a great tasting candy in a catchy package.
The first one I tried was a candy bar called "Unreal 8". What I love about this company, is that they don't give crazy names to their bar. It is not a Milky Way or a Mars. What we have here is called an "Unreal 8", and then under the name, it has some descriptors listed; "chocolate, caramel, peanut, and nougat bar". Then it has the brand name: "Unkunked." This is great because what they did do, is make candy that wasn't full of junk. The bar tastes like a Snickers bar with dark chocolate and is less sweet than the big name one. This one I like better.
What this company has also done, is by not using anything artificial, that means that when it made its "M&M's" copy, it uses natural colors. Their candy coated chocolate pieces are called "Unreal 41" and they are colored with such insane items like beetroot juice and turmeric root extract. Think of how insane that is! Someone using natural dyes from natural edible items to color candy. No crazy people here! No yellow #50 or red #4, this is all natural and gives the candies a nice shade of colors.
All four candy types are tasty. Nothing is too sweet and while it may still add inches to your waist if you are not careful, at least it will not lead to other complications like artificial dyes, chemicals and fake sugars do. So, I like these and it makes me feel as though, compared to what is out there, these Unjunked candies are healthy. I like them and as a former candy junkie, I think they taste great. I want to say that if you are eating healthy, don't waste it by eating something with 30 artificial ingredients. Try one of these instead.
In the immortal words of Garfield "Candy, candy, candy!"
Halloween is over and as kids all over the US get over their sugar hang-overs, I'm here at work, still munching on some of my favorite candies. I have a Twix, Snickers, 3 Musketeers and a Milky Way. I wanted to write about something so I figured, candy is a good idea. Everyone loves candy, even those who are not supposed to eat it still eat it. So, while I try to separate the good candy from the bad candy and then throw out the high fructose corn syrup laded candy, I tend to think, sometimes after my chocolate coma, about how the candy was made. Now, I have tried to make my own candy at home and it isn't an easy task.
So, anyway, Halloween is basically the American form of Samhain. Samhain is a Gaelic harvest festival that runs on October 31st and November 1st. In old Irish culture, Samhain was the end of the Fall and the beginning of Winter, which is characterized by the end of the fall harvest. In history, people gathered together, had harvest parties, made bonfires and slaughtered livestock before the winter. In the later centuries, people would wear masks and costumes in order to ward off any spirits or demons. I would guess then these people would then go door to door and offer to scare away the evil of the home or building in return for payment. Which is where trick-or-treating came from. Foods that we associate with Halloween were typical fall and harvest foods, like corn, apples and nuts.
Now, Halloween is basically, just the trick-or-treating part of Samhain. For instance, apparently the carving of pumpkins came from the Christians who carved turnips to resemble their dead family members for All Souls Day. Halloween, means the day before All Hallows Day, as in All Holy Day as in All Souls Day. There was also this old idea, and I think it has pagan ties, that the spirit world's barrier is thinnest on the day before All Saint's Day. This causes many spirits and ghosts to pass over or at least try to pass through. So, by dressing up, humans are able to scare these spirits back to their own side. This idea is the reason why the demons of many a horror movie and story, always seem to strike on Halloween.
Okay, back to the candy...
The four candy bars I have in front of me, are from the same company: Mars. Mars candy was started by Frank Mars, whose mother taught him to make candy when he was young and he started selling his own candies by age 19. The first time he started his company, it failed and it wasn't until he started a second company where it was later incorporated into the Mars company we have today. The company is still family owned and makes many numerous candies as well as other labels under their own, such as Uncle Ben's.
Snickers, brings in about $2 billion dollars a year, just from that one kind of candy bar. The bar was invented in 1930 and named after Frank's favorite horse.
Twix stands for twin sticks.
Milky Way was invented in 1923 as the first distributed filled chocolate bar. Its flavor comes from malted milk, like a milkshake. It is a milky way of making the candy bar and was named after this idea, not the galaxy.
3 Musketeers was invented in 1932 and originally the package had 3 small bars inside: a strawberry, vanilla and chocolate malt bar. During the war when sugar was tight, they phased out the strawberry and vanilla and kept the chocolate.
What is great to see, is as of today, on their website, Mars does not use High Fructose Corn Syrup in their candy bars. They use the same family secret recipes as Frank learned from his mom, probably almost a hundred years ago.
My family and I go shopping at Global Foods about once every two weeks. It is there that we buy our new produce for the most part as well as restock any Lebanese food we have used, since my wife is Lebanese. For those not familiar, Global Foods is perhaps St. Louis's best international grocery store. It has aisles devoted to a few countries and it is always fun going through the aisles. You can get foods at this store that you cannot get anywhere else in St. Louis. It is always fun for me to get some strange thing that I have never seen before and use it. It was at this store that I bought and then first used cactus leaf, cactus fruit as well as my most recent purchase: parsley root. Who would have thought that the root/tuber from the parsley plant could be used as a food ingredient? My wife's family is still in Lebanon and in this world where parsley is almost in every dish, parsley root isn't mentioned in their cook books.
While finding and making savory foods is fun, what I think is even more fun, is to pick up a few sweet items from some of the regional aisles. This time, I picked up two candy bars from the English aisle as well as some cookie like sweets from the South Asian aisle.
First we have the Yorkie. As you can see, it's not for girls. This candy bar comes from the UK and tastes like a chocolate bar. Nothing but pure milk chocolate make up this confectionery treat. I give it a 3 out of 5.
This is Boost, a candy bar from the UK as well. This one, on the wrapper, says "Get boosted with milk chocolate caramel & biscuit energy." Well, what is it? Its a Twix candy bar, but instead of having the caramel on top of the cookie, in the chocolate, they are side by side. It was good and a 3 out of 5 as well.
These little cookie things are made in the Philippines and have a savory crust with a semi-sweet peanut butter filling. The shell, the crust, is very much like a simple cracker, allowing the inside filling to overcome both with the flavor. Pretty tasty, the bag was like 39 cents and was tasty for a quick snack. I'd give it a 3 out of 5 as well.
This is a sherbet candy with a black licorice whip right down the middle. When you open it up, or at least my experience, the sherbet candy, which was supposed to be like a powder so you can lick the licorice and then dip in the candy. Well, it turned solid, like an almost solid candy but with every bite, it turned to powder.
This is what pulled out of the container. Now, the thing is this: While it wasn't what it was supposed to be or how it was supposed to be presented to me, the idea of having a candy powder that tasted amazing like lemon sherbet, worked well and that licorice was some of the best I had ever had. I think this was also under a $1. All in all, I would give this a 3 &1/2 and of 5, because of the quality of flavors.
Stay tuned for next time when I try some more different and unusual snacks.
