Wednesday, November 14, 2007

What they said

Because I don't feel like doing my own thinking right now.

  • Income inequality. Molly Ivors proposes a New Millenium kind of WPA.
  • Universal health care. It'll kill our robust lead in medical innovation! No, it won't.
  • Thanksgiving. I've always disliked the idea of giving thanks by killing an animal and eating it.

8 comments:

Steve Bates said...

Instead of Thanksgiblets (wish I could claim that one, but Google shows a dozen or so uses out there), try a Tofurky™. We cooked one last year, and it was right tasty. Vegan (parve), organic, and tasty... what more could you ask!

hipparchia said...

what more could i ask for? alas, it is not gluten-free.

Anonymous said...

The only good turkey is a dead turkey. If you had ever been associated with raising turkeys you would understand that sentiment.

I have no problem with the wild variety, but domesticated turkeys really need to die for the good of the planet. It will raise the IQ of all animals a 100% as turkeys are extremely negative in the IQ sector.

Maybe if everyone switched to tofu, no one would raise turkeys, and the world would be a better place.

hipparchia said...

oh, i'm doing my part. i eat plenty of toad food, as some of my friends call it, but the fake meats usually have lots of wheat gluten, that being the closest vegetable-matter equivalent in taste and texture to real meat.

sure, the collective iq of domestic turkeys is lower than the scales on a snake's belly in a wagonwheel rut, but that just means that killing them for food has about the same squick factor as executing mentally retarded criminals.

otoh, turkey tastes way better than chicken.

Steve Bates said...

I remember a decade or so ago when Zsa Zsa Gabor gave a bunch of turkeys to a homeless shelter for Thanksgiving. I wrote doggerel, but the only line I remember is the last one: "At last, she's giving of herself."

hiparchia, can you eat the mushroom-based fake meat products, like those made by Quorn? They don't make fake turkey, but their breaded "chicken" nuggets and patties are respectable.

Steve Bates said...

(Damned cheap keyboard. Make that "hipParchia".)

hipparchia said...

nope.

no pies, cakes, cookies, bread, breaded coatings, flour tortillas, muffins, pasta, dumplings, doughnuts, bagels, biscuits, stuffing, granola bars, waffles, pancakes, cereals. ditto for most sauces, gravies, roux, cream-of-anything soups, and just to be on the safe side, no beer, hard liquor, or imported wines.

also, one should avoid extracts, like [real] vanilla, but i sometimes cheat on this one. the likely amount of gluten in a teaspoon or less of ethanol is tiny.

spices can be a problem too, as they're sometimes milled at the same places that mill wheat [and rye] flour, but i usually treat them like i do vanilla extract: use sparingly. i sometimes buy spices whole and grind them up in my coffee grinder, which can be a bit of a pain, but the kitchen smells good and it makes for an interesting pot of coffee afterwards.

there are gluten-free substitutes for a lot of these items, mostly using rice, but if you've ever eaten rice cakes, then you know that most of those substitutes are not worth eating.

nb: mcdonald's flavors their french fries and their chicken, even the non-breaded variety, with wheat gluten.

Steve Bates said...

Yikes! I don't believe I could manage to prepare you a meal from what I have on hand right now. Those are some severe allergies (?) you've got there!

[phuxute - do I even need to spell it out?]