October 30, 2012

Fact: Zombies Love Applesauce
(+ Roasted Applesauce)




Sometimes it's nice to sit back and let someone else be the crazy one in the relationship.  It's not that I don't take my responsibilities seriously, but all this neuroticism doesn't just happen; it's hard work.  And I've been a little tired lately.  So you can imagine how pleased I was when I made some applesauce last weekend and Mr. Bear's response was to worry that I was going to eat his brains.  You know.  Because, Obviously.

It started out with my Fall cravings for apples, nutmeg and cinnamon reaching epic proportions.  So I pulled out my favorite applesauce recipe, which roasts the fruit whole, which made the whole house smell like a Dickens novel (Obviously, not the the one with orphans and poorhouses.  No, not the one with child endangerment and recluses.  The nice one.  The one with a mahogany-roasted goose the size of a cripped child.  Geez, Dickens.  Even your pleasant similes are spiked with pneumonia and grime.  What a downer.).

October 11, 2012

Taking Candy from Babies, Part II:
An October Public Service Announcement

( + Fresh Mozzarella, Prosciutto, and Fig Jam Panini )





Earlier this week, I announced the Bearfrau's foolproof plan for reclaiming your lost youth.  I don't want to bore you with the high-tech details, but mostly it involves eating the Halloween candy you bought for the neighborhood kids.  Of course I'm not actually advocating taking candy from babies.  What am I, a monster?  I'm advocating taking it from grown children.  And not even really taking it - just creating a series of obstacles to it.  If the child decides the challenge isn't worth the reward, well, that's just a commentary on the decline of tenacity and drive in the youth of America today.  It's no fault of yours.

October 9, 2012

Taking Candy from Babies, Part I:
An October Public Service Announcement

( + Tuna Panini )




Imagine it's 1987.  An elementary-school cafeteria, the day after Halloween.  A swarming madhouse of glucose-addled children, gearing up for recess after a healthy meal of half a bologna sandwich and as many fun-sized Butterfingers as it takes to fill a Thundercats lunch box.  Gods and heroes are being made today.  Ryan Finnegan is telling the Homeric epic of how he grabbed an entire bowl of Sweet-Tarts off an unattended porch and ran.  Vanessa Simmons brought so many Chuckles that she can't finish them all - the entire 3rd-grade class is singing Tiffany's "I Think We're Alone Now" to compete for her leftovers.  Are you enjoying the nostalgia?  Good.  One of us should.

I myself have trouble enjoying Halloween because it always reminds me of the bleak hellscape of misery and despair that was my low-sugar childhood.  No Pop Rocks.  No Pop-Tarts.  No Ring Pops.  And definitely no pop.  It was a dark time, filled with lies and misdirection.  For years, my brother and I labored under the false impression that sliced dried pineapple was a "treat."  I didn't have my first Dorito until the age of 16.  And I still wake up sweating in the night with the taste of carob in my mouth.