There are no frogs in Guacamole!
Why do you keep searching for frogs in guacamole? Why? I can see the search terms used to reach my blog, and you have been searching for this answer for such a very long time!
Hello person who has been trying to find out if frogs were ever put in guacamole. (Yes, you!)
I noticed that you often end up finding my guacamole recipe, because I use the slur ‘frogs’ to describe the French.
Why do you keep searching for frogs in guacamole? And why do you keep going to my blog, when you know it will not answer your amphibian-related question? I know you’ve been looking for this answer for close to a year, maybe longer.
I will tell you now that I am a librarian and, if you want, I will look up if frogs were ever historically an ingredient used in the preparing of guacamole for you.
There are all kinds of reference books that would mention that kind of thing. But I’m pretty sure the green stuff is avocado, not frog flesh.
Awaiting your response.
- [d]an
New Stealth Blog
Coworkers went wild over “Inf in Revolt”–so much so that I didn’t have a moment’s peace when posting there. Also, a few students found it and began following it. Weirdness! (It’s been retired even though it says hiatus.) Also, the truth is that I’m kinda sick of all the citing of information. Save it for the research papers, amiright? I just want to flout outmoded copyright laws.
I’ll be sending out the link to my new stealth blog soon.
“Oh, y’know I think this resource needs s’more descriptive metadata…”
Pornography has become part of mainstream culture. As such, it has become a subject of academic research, and this, in turn, has implications for university libraries. Focusing on adult Internet pornography, this study suggests that academic libraries should provide access to adult pornographic Web sites by including them in their online catalogs.
- Dilevko, Juris, and Lisa Gottlieb. 2004. “Selection and Cataloging of Adult Pornography Web Sites for Academic Libraries.” Journal of Academic Librarianship 30, no. 1: 36-50. (accessed May 22, 2009).
MoPgh
Uf. The poster for The Mysteries of Pittsburgh is everywhere in NYC. They’re finally pushing it out to the masses.
The book was rubbish. Michael Chabon was clearly an outsider writing about a city he had only an imperfect understanding of–a city that he tried to transform into something it’s not.
I met a girl just Monday night – in NYC, not State College – who was introduced to me as “The Queen of Pittsburgh” before either the introducer or the introduced knew that I’m from Pittsburgh. (I was heartily reminded of Chabon, because both he and the girl claimed Pittsburgh as their own only because they went to college there.) I couldn’t help but laugh a bit at her expense; the hyperbole of her introduction coupled with her profound ignorance of the city was painful to witness.
Despite the poor source material and the fact that Sienna Miller (the bikini-clad, vacuous smiler, above, in case you didn’t know) talked some serious smack on Pittsburgh, I’ll probably go see it. There should at least be some great, familiar views of the city.
Image via The Mysteries of Pittsburgh Poster – Sienna Miller – Empire Movies.
Easter, Laundromat, Snowstorm
Waiting for the drying cycle to end she began to feel a vague dread, but it wasn’t until she was at the warm, lint-speckled folding table that she figured it out: she didn’t want to go home. And it wasn’t the drive through snow and ice she dreaded, it was going home to Jack.
It’s always a source of wonderment when I read fiction and come across a sentiment so akin to one I’ve felt, keenly, that I have to sit and think about it for a few minutes, or maybe even put the book down. Was it three Easters ago that I was in a laundromat in snowy Regent Square feeling precisely the same way?
I can’t remember why I decided to reread The Easter Parade, but it’s been in my house for weeks, collecting dust. I zipped through it again and was amazed at how poorly I remembered not only the narrative, but the themes. I totally glossed over the entire religious discourse, which springs out so plainly now.
Now I remember why I had it checked out. I’d read Yates’ collected short stories a short time ago. The thing that stays with me from both books is the way he writes about writing–the anxiety associated with the creative act and the inevitable feeling that the resultant written work is ‘passable’, but never ‘right’. He must have fretted terribly over his own manuscripts, given all the fretting over manuscripts that his characters do.
:: Bibliography ::
- Yates, Richard. The Easter Parade: A Novel. New York: Delacorte Press, 1976. Page 104.
Nut Cups (Obscene Cuisine, Recipe No. 32)
This wonderfully versatile recipe can be made with just about any type of nut (and even some types of seeds). I usually use walnuts because they’re an economical choice, but spring for pecans if I’ve the money. This recipe will make about 4 dozen cups.
:: Walnut Cups ::
Filling ingredients:
3 eggs, well beaten
1 cup brown sugar
1 3/4 cup Walnuts, chopped
1/2 teaspoon Vanilla
2 1/2 Tablespoons Butter, melted
- Combine eggs, melted butter, brown sugar, and vanilla. Stir well. (Do not cook filling before putting into shell.)
Dough ingredients:
1 1/2 cups + 3 Tablespoons Flour
1 1/2 Sticks of Butter, room temp
5 1/2 oz Cream Cheese, room temp
1/8 teaspoon Salt
- Cream butter and cream cheese cheese. Add salt and flour. Mix (by hand).
- Roll into 1” balls and chill for at least 20 minutes.
- Press dough into mini-cup pans and fill with 1 teaspoon of filling.
- Bake at 350 degrees F. for 20-25 minutes.
- Let cool for a while in their pan, until set, then remove (with the assistance of a knife if necessary) to finish cooling.
Be sure to use a tool to press the dough into the pan. (You’ve probably seen the tool I’m talking about; it’s usually a wooden rod that has a larger bobble on either end.) Flour it before each press to make sure it doesn’t begin to stick to the dough. The tool will make sure that the openings are uniform in shape. Constant, slowly applied pressure will make sure they’re relatively uniform in depth. Having an eye for it and practice will result in uniformly centered nut cups.
I made these for Christmas and drafted a post, but forgot it. Today I was poking round and found it. Enjoy! This is my father’s favorite cookie. I’m not sure where the recipe comes from, so no citation today.
No more Neko Case after this, I promise.
How about Neko Case getting all these amazing reviews for Middle Cyclone? Color me incredulous. I like it, don’t get me wrong. The new record seems less affected than, if not as good as, Fox Confessor. There’s some plain old fun instrumentation, which is a type of enjoyment I rarely get from any type of music as of late. (I think I’ve been trying – artificially – to achieve that sense of wonder with electronic music.) And the remarkable thing is that it’s perfectly highlighted by the fact that the songs aren’t ‘catchy’ in the traditional sense of the word.
Yeow!
As Sean mentioned, many of Middle Cyclone’s songs are eyebrow-raisingly short. As a songwriter, Case seems barely able to sustain 2 1/2 minutes of recorded music this go-round. Seven of the fifteen tracks fall under the 3 min mark, with another just a hair above (”Middle Cyclone”) and yet another not even a song (”Marais la Nuit”). At fist I reacted with “I don’t mind the brevity of the songs; verse-chorus and AABA form doesn’t seem to be her cup of tea, so I’ll settle for a shorter song.” Now I feel the short songs impact the quality of the album as a whole (if not as individual units).
“Prison Girls” is a love/hate track. When she sings about incarcerated girls appearing “pushing mops and kicking pails” I want to laugh out loud. It seems like a line out of a musical set in a women’s prison (Chicago?). It sort of reveals that Case has reached the limits of the ‘country noir’ (or whatever-the-hell you want to call it) genre. It has moved from eerie and atmospheric to unintentionally comical. (Imagine listening to “Dirty Knife” and thinking “Gee, that diction’s just plain silly, isn’t it?”) The irony is that the refrain is a perfect example of her nailing those old conventions: “I love your long shadows and your gunpowder eyes.” Alas “prison girls are not impressed / they’re the ones who have to clean this mess.”
The covers on this album are problematic. Case can usually appropriate a song like nobody, turning a mediocre tune into something that’s almost entirely her own–integrating another’s intellectual material flawlessly into the whole (see Blacklisted). The problem with “Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth” is that it doesn’t achieve this ‘fit’ with the rest of the record and glaringly fails to showcase Case’s greatest asset: her oft-lauded voice. “Don’t Forget Me”, meanwhile, is such a tour de force – those pianos! - that it overshadows her original material. “People Got A Lotta Nerve” may be a toe-tapper, but “Don’t Forget Me” is a sing-into-your-hairbrush anthem. No two ways about it. (A strange criticism, that.)
I’ve proba definitely lied about no more Neko after today. But people don’t really read posts all the way to the bottom, do they? Blogs are so deliciously self-indulgent.
:: Bibliography ::
-
Gina. Neko Case In-Store at Amoeba Hollywood. ANTI- Blog. ANTI-. http://www.antilabelblog.com/?p=1465 (3 March 2009).
