Plastic Killed the Radio Star

Plastic has revolutionized, well, everything.  Every aspect of life has been further simplified because of the progression and availability of plastic.  What used to be a heavy piece of metal, is now a much lighter piece of plastic.  What used to cause contamination concerns because of nooks and crannies is now worry free because of molded plastic.  The medical field is now leaps and bounds further than it was 50 years ago - because of plastic.  Hell it even makes sex 99.9% safer.

I don't deny any of this - but it also makes us LAZY...especially Americans.  Look at plastic silverware for example.  In my last two places of employment plastic silverware was the ONLY means to eating your meals, unless you were like me and brought your own reusable utensils.  My previous job had 300 employees crammed into a small building. 

Not eveyone brought their own meanls to work.  Many (the big ones) ordered food everyday (can't they see the trend here?  Mr. and Mrs. I eat processed food full of preservatives every day and can't lose weight).   Others brought food that did not require the use of utensils.  I would say that out of 300 employees, roughly 25% used plastic utensils on a daily basis - that's 75 people per day, not even including the utensils used from the people who ordered their food. 

For the sake of sake, let's say each of those 75 people used 1 piece of plastic ware per day.  That equals 375 forks, spoons, knives per week, 11,250 per month, and 135,000 PER YEAR!  And that does not even account for those who use 2 utensils for meals, or for weekend workers.  So we can honestly round that number up to 140,000 plastic utensils being used by one establishment througout the course of a year!

Some places do use the biodegradeable ware, but that is a low percentage of the industries in this country so also a moot point. 

I don't happen to have a scale at my desk so let's just assume that each piece of cutlery weighs 1 ounce.  That's 140,000 ounces or 8,750 pounds of plastic being thrown into our garbage dumps per year - and that's only from 1 little cable company in western PA!  You would vomit if we determined how much utensil waste we accumulated as a country.  It's absurd. 

Good God people!  Bring a fork and a spoon from home, and simply rinse it after each use!  Do you know what you're doing?  This is where the lazy part of us shines through like a big shiny zit, it is too much work for us to clean a little piece of stainless steel after eating so we simply grab a plastic fork from the drawer and throw it away when we're finished.  Never once thinking about the reprocussions.

Thanks for hating the planet, jerks. 

  

My Beef is From WHERE?? WTF COUNTRY MARKET!?!

Sad day in the Awesome household.  Our local "butcher" now only gets their beef from a chop house.  They had everything a health conscious, food connoisseur, taste driven, heavy eating family loved and enjoyed - and now, who knows where the beef is coming from, and most importantly, what is in it besides beef. 

They used to sell organic beef.  Well, they still do, but only by the 1/4, 1/2, or whole cow - which honestly we are now considering.  They used to butcher most of their own cows, and those that were not from their farm they got from local farms.  Now they're having beef shipped in from accross the country. 

Maybe it's time we finally purchase that extra large, energy sucking, can fit a frozen fat dude, deep freezer so we can have our home grown organic beef.  Maybe we will have to frequent our hour long trips to Whole Foods.  Maybe we'll become grass loving vegetarians.  Whatever the future holds for our carnivoric eating habits (oh my God Delmonicos.....[whipes drool off of face]) - it just became a little more difficult to avoid growth hormone injected, ozone destroying, chemically pumped beef which are housed in the most inhumane living conditions.  A salad sounds really good right now. 

Ok Schnur's, you're now on my shit list - also, i'll be calling about purchasing a 1/4 cow very soon.

Game Feast 2010

Hunting is and was the very first form of "natural" living.  The first humans didn't have farms.  Or ranches.  Or slaughter houses.  They hunted for their food in the wild, and being a hunter myself, I feel it to be one of the most humane ways of harvesting meat. 

Each and every year we have a gathering where we meet, drink, drink some more, and eat our game from the previous hunting season - and then we eat some more.  The creative side of us deemed it the "Game Feast," original, I know. 

The menu this year included lots of venision, some rabbit, a few pheasant, Pennsylvania trout, and even a wild boar.  A quick recap:

Venison Meatballs in Apricot Barbeque sauce - excellent.  Very flavorful and saucey.  Venision is a dry meat because of its low fat content, these meatballs stayed very moist.

Venison Cube Steaks w/Mushroom Gravy - ok, in a "Campbell's condensed soup" sort of way.  The venison was good.  The mushrooms were canned, and the gravy had the taste that it was from a mix or a jar.  I don't know if that is the truth, but it sure tasted that way.

Wild Boar Sausage Stuffed Shells - awesome.  If you didn't know it was Wild Boar, you still wouldn't have after eating the stuffed shells.  It was a hot sausage mix, so it mixed well with the Riccotta cheese and red sauce.

Garlic Butter Baked Rabbit - a very nice way to eat rabbit; right off of the bone.  The meat was cooked to perfection and the butter and garlic added just enough flavor to hide (but not completely remove) the wild game taste.

Venison Noodles - homecooked goodness.  Tasted like a meal you would eat on a weeknight with 24 inches of snow outside.

Roasted Pheasant, stuffed with sweet peppers and wrapped in Bacon - killer.  Dave makes these every year and they're always effin awesome.  The sweet of the pepper, mixed with the salty of the bacon and the tenderness of the pheasant makes for a great appetizer.

Curried Venison - I made this, and I think it tasted great.  The venison was super tender, and the sauce had just enough spice to excite the palat.

BBQ Venison Backstraps - always a treat.  Pops makes these every year.  I for one save my backstraps for cooking to a medium rare on the grill, but these are very tasty, and tender as heck.

Cajun Trout - slathered in butter and cajun seasonings.  There are two things that take trout to the next level of taste - butter and smokey hot - and this had both.

The biggest thing missing was my 25 lb. turkey that was killed in the Spring of 09.  Unfortunately a freezer malfunction in Pops' garage was the cause of that. 

It was a great feast of excellent home-cooked, all natural meat products.  Many beverages were consumed and it was a good night as usual. 

Until next year fellas, good hunting. 

  

BREAD...AND LIQUID BREAD

Now that we're settled down from the awesome holidays and a sad death in the family, Super Greeny and I are venturing into some uncharted - but long overdue - territory.  Homemade staples to our lives.  Bread and Beer. 

She had been making attempting to make homemade bread for a few years now and has had her ups and downs.  She makes some very good desert breads and a very good beer bread, but has not been able to master just a normal LOAF of bread.  It's tough.  The mixing, the kneading, do I have too little or too much yeast, how long should I let it rise, etc. 

So we received a bread maker for Christmas.  THE ANSWER TO ALL OF OUR PROBLEMS.  Or so we thought.  The first 8 batches turned out denser than a Tempur-Pedic mattress.

To this point - through trial and error and deductive reasoning we have baked 3 good loaves (just a normal white sandwich bread).  It's very good tasting, soft, and light.  Hopefully there are many more to come. 

I on the other hand, am jumping face first into the world of homemade liquid bread, or Home Brewing.  I have been wanting to do this for years now and it has finally happened.

Home brewing requires a lot more than you would seem to think to do it properly and with the most success, so I am currently turning a small room in my backroom in a "Brew room," with running water, temperature control, and plenty of storage for bottles.  Awesome.

Although I have been studying the art for a few years now, and have read probably 5 books on it, Super Greeny felt that for my first batch I shoud use a kit - and I agreed.  So I have a nice IPA kit that includes everything I need.  I do plan on using a yeast starter as opposed to simply adding it into the wort like the kit instructs, but other than that I'm going to follow their lead.

This is something I have been looking forward to for a long, long time so I'll definitely be sharing my adventures. 

Little Winger turned 2 on 12/31.  Greeny made her delicious apple cake (i'll share the recipe sometime) that he got to dive into.  He also had his first Lolli-pop.  Santa brought him some small organic pops, and he had it destroyed in 3 minutes.