VEGEMITE.

I would like to introduce to you... the one and only...

VEGEMITE.

I haven't had this in ages. In a decade. In over a decade. The last time I had tried this nonchalantly was in 2000, in Kingswood, NSW, Australia, where my family and I used to live. Back then, Vegemite was no big deal... I didn't really like the taste, actually. In Hong Kong, I promptly forgot all about Vegemite and Maggi noodles and Chiko rolls and meat pies...

However, in the blatantly stark life in the U.S., I've gotten used to reminiscing about everything I used to have. In AUS. In HK. I miss eggettes, HK waffles, egg tarts, vegemite, fairy cake, weird wine gums [at least, I think that's what they were? I honestly have no idea], etc. Even though I'm a vegetarian, I miss Australian meat pies, and HK fish balls next to the taxis and double decker buses...

So anyway, last Saturday I went to NYC, and hung out with KC and DS. It was extremely eventful in the aspect of food. Why? Well, we went to Chinatown, and I tried the first taro flavoured bubble tea of my life. It was really creamy, and I think there was this hint of vanilla... It was utterly awesome and the tapioca balls were a bit overcooked but they were still really chewy, so that was fantastic. Then, on the way out of Chinatown, I found this street cart selling eggettes. In my head, I was thinking, Wh-Wh-WH-WHAT?! True, in HK, eggettes are still intact and are rolled up into half a hollow cylinder [basically, it looks like you placed a waffle on a cylinder; here is a picture that doesn't belong to me], but these were better than nothing... after 4 years. Actually, I think that the vendors cheated me out of some because they were supposed to give me 15, and I don't think that there was 15. Yes, silly reason, but I have intuition. But, do YOU see 15 eggettes, in the picture?

The worst part was locating the Tuck Shop, which is this Australian restaurant, at which Vegemite is sold. I. Want. Vegemite. So... we spent two hours walking around, looking for 115, St Mark's Place. We actually ended up literally 2 streets away from it when KC's friend told us we were going in the wrong direction. So... we ended up walking to a place called the Top Shop, which sells clothes, and this would've been hilarious had it not been for the fact that, dude, we had walked for a zillion hours. Luckily, though, the weather was really nice. There was a gentle breeze... the sun didn't want to melt us...

So, after having realised our mistake, we retraced our steps [well, more like they followed me... because I find NYC easier to navigate than they do] and we ended up two streets to the right of where we had started off. And... there was this:

And this:

DO YOU SEE THAT KANGAROO?! Australia it IS! This is the Tuck Shop.... and I got some Vegemite [$7 for 150g. Which truly sucks. But what other food would I want in the world, anyway?] and two pies for my brother. KC tried some Vegemite and he literally spat it out and said, "THAT'S dis-GUST-ing!!" Maybe it's just me, but I found it really rude. Especially as we were right outside the store, and the store-owner heard us. But since I rarely see KC anyway, I decided not to hold a grudge against him.

We then went to Starbucks and got some Frappucinos, and then we went to Outback Steakhouse [which is absolutely NOT Australian.] and I tried the blooming onion, which was... eh. The mustard sauce thing was cool. The onion itself... I feel as though nature was manipulated. Drastically. However, the bread was nice.

And here is the Vegemite and toast, the next day:

Yes I resent the fact that it is made by Kraft.

Art Shows Cookies

Sup? Persimmon. SUP PERsimmon?
Supper. @ Simon Mall Company. aka our town mall.
Well, I had already had dinner, but I went to volunteer anyway, for NAHS. Art show today...my art piece was the bread [above] from my concentration...the show itself, though, wasn't that great in the sense I got hit with reality [again]. Usually, I'm the crowd, spoiled with free food... hogging the corner of the table in order to get the second cookie [Well, truth be told, I'm not hogging the table, but if there's leftover food I'm willing to take it.] But... today was just people swarming, picking and dropping cookies and grabbing apple juice. Weird... how we all know this stuff kills us yet we go taking and taking and taking... and hoarding...
This is why stuff costs $$. If we were allowed to take what we wanted, we'd all get fat and grumpy, like the mice in experiments [which, to put it out there, saves YOU from whatever illness you have/had. So don't go all PETA-crappin' on me].
So... voici des photos.
Well, this is what we started with, along with 3 jugs of apple juice.
This is the third tray of cookies. I didn't have the camera for the other trays because my mum had it, and they were gone wayyy too fast.
This is a few minutes later. I sampled [with A, so we split them] the chocolate chip [typical good], cranberry [very buttery.], jam [very buttery], nut [okay.], oatmeal [instant oatmeal? It was chewier than I had expected], and brownie [literally a brownie in the shape of a cookie.].

Bread'n'Backerr.

Hey. I'm back. From AP exams and mental instability [studying]. I had 5 AP exams. which was utterly terrible. Especially as I've been obsessed with the Harry Potter series in the past few months... I wish that I could get a memory charm on all my Harry Potter memories... so that I wouldn't CRAVE magic. I think I've read each book at least 7 times. haha.... 7 is such a special number...

Anyway, I was done yesterday, so I went to Shoprite for the first time in ages and I got some Greek Yoghurt, and cocoa powder, among other stuff that I will consume in the future. After dinner, I made some gingerbread with my sister, using this recipe: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Gingerbread-Biscotti/Detail.aspx This has to be my favourite recipe site because you can narrow stuff down to ingredients you want/don't want, there are reviews, and there are PICTURES!! [So I suppose you've realised that I don't care for cooks.com]. Anyway, I gingerly tweaked it a bit...

You shall require:
0.25 cup oil. I used olive oil.
0.5 cup sugar. White sugar.
0.4 cup honey. My honey happened to separate into the liquidy part and the solidy-liquidy part. I used the solidy-liquidy part at the bottom, because it looked more treacly.
3 eggs.
2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar. I dunno why, it just seems to work in whatever I bake.
3.2 cups of flour. I think. It could've been 2.2 cups, which would explain why my dough wasn't stiff.
leftover baking powder. I don't know how much I used.
2 big tablespoons of ginger powder. I think I should've added one more, but at the moment it tastes gingery enough.
tiny bit of salt.

What to do:
1. Mix oil, sugar, honey, egg, vinegar.
2. Mix flour, salt, baking powder, ginger.
3.Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes. Remove from oven, and set aside to cool.
4. Mix dry stuff into wet stuff 3 large tbsp at a time. Use figure 8s.
5. Spread into two slabs of approximately equal length and width and height [aka volume] and decorate with whatever you want [my sister wanted pixie stix and chocolate].
6. Bake for 17 minutes at 375F on the near-bottom rack [I hate it when recipes don't tell me what rack I'm supposed to use]. Then, get all nervous and add another 3 minutes.
7. Leave pan in the oven [which is off] for 5 minutes.
8. Stick a fork in the middle off the slab. If it comes out clean'n shiny, you're done. Get those mitts on. The edges, by now, are probably dark brown, but the middle is yellowy gold.
9. Cut into whatever shapes you wanna. Biscotti shape kinda killed it for me so I just did squares.
10. Eat. I didn't stick these on the cooling rack and they were fine.

If I had baked it for a little more, it would've been biscotti-ish. I don't like biscotti, but my mum loves it... It's weird coloured because my sister insisted on putting coloured sugar over it.

So much for them being the same volume...

The dough was the most delicious raw cookie dough I have ever had. Ever.

Pot of Poop...

I got duped today.
Well, I didn't. I just was naive enough to eat something without reading the ingredients, because I trusted the company. Hershey's. I TRUSTED them. But I guess I was wrong.
HFCS is the second ingredient. PHO is the third ingredient.
The first ingredient is sugar. DO YOU CALL THAT CHOCOLATE?!?!?!?
... I guess in the U.S. of A they call it "chocolate". Sigh.
So halfway through consuming one, I read the ingredients, and then became extremely biased against them.

So, in order to give a less biased review of these "Pot-of-Gold" candies, I guess I have to revert back to what I was thinking when I took my first few bites. In all honesty, I could not taste any chocolate. None. Zip. Zero. No chocolate taste at all. I could taste a bit of the pecan, though there was no strong aroma or anything... it was in little pieces which added a nice crunch, but it was not chunky. The caramel was the majority of the piece; it was sweet, very gooey... quite nice, I guess. It's... about 48 calories per piece which kinda sucks. Overall... I regret having eaten one. :(

Potato Poem + Work

I have a poetry "unproject" for English, so I've been spending the day doing it, going to track, and going to my doctor for a checkup because my track times are getting seriously abnormal. Apparently, there's nothing wrong with my heart rate or blood pressure [even though I personally feel that my blood pressure is irregularily high for a track athlete].
Anyway, I found a few food poems that I'm going to use for my "poetry anthology" since, out of all poems [not including songs], food poems are the best. My first meaningful food poem has to be Carol Ann Duffy's Valentine. [Yeah, it sounds cheesy, but the poem is NOT cliche or sappy. It's onion-y :)]. Today, I found a poem about potatoes, onions, a sandwich, and Thin Mints [I despise Girl Scout Cookies on a moral basis - why sell cookies loaded with CRAP?!?!? - so they will never be talked about again!]. I think there's going to be a copyright issue if I just paste the poems here, so here are the MLA cited parts for the three of the [yes, three. not four.] poems; go rummage through the internet fridge.

Hamby, Barbara. "Ode to the Potato." Babel. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh, 2004. The Writer's Alliance. American Public Media, 14 Mar. 2009. Web. 30 Mar. 2010. .

Neruda, Pablo, and George D. Schade. "Ode to the Onion." Fifty Odes. Austin, Texas: Host Publications, 1996. 145-48. Google Books. Google. Web. 30 Mar. 2010.

Oh and I totally forgot about this one: http://catandgirl.com/?p=728

It's a villanelle, about a sandwich. I just hope that it's soy or gluten "animal" pieces in there.