RESOLUTIONS HAIKU #1
I won’t eat any
Lutefisk, mushrooms, and haggis
No matter how tempted.
RESOLUTIONS HAIKU #2
I hereby resolve
Not to misplace my glasses
More than once daily.
– Paul R. De Lancey, Bad Artist
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
CHRISTMAS HAIKU #1
I will always know
Why this day is so special.
Thank you, Jesus.
CHRISTMAS HAIKU #2
Didn’t shop Walmart.
Christmas lights up for next year.
I must have been good.
– Paul R. De Lancey, Bad Artist
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
Ivory Coast
2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 eggplant
3 tomatoes
2 jalapeño or other hot peppers
3 garlic cloves
2 onions
3 tablespoons peanut oil
¾ cup chicken stock
1 bay leaf
1 tablespoon ginger
½ teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon thyme
Takes about 2 hours
makes 8 bowls
SPECIAL UTENSILS
large oven proof pot or casserole dish with tight fitting lid
tin foil, if lid does not fit tightly
PREPARATION
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Cut chicken into 1″ cubes. Peel and cut eggplant into ½” cubes. Seed and dice tomatoes. Dice chile peppers, garlic cloves, and onions.
Combine all ingredients into large, oven-proof pot. Stir. Cover pot with lid. If the lid doesn’t make a tight seal, cover pot with tin foil and then the lid. DO NOT remove lid while baking. Bake at 325 degrees for 90 minutes. Use oven mitt to shake pot every 10 minutes to prevent chicken and other ingredients from sticking to the bottom and sides.
After the 90 minutes of baking has passed, check to see if ingredients are tender. If not, replace foil and lid, bake for another 30 minutes, and check once more for doneness. Again, use oven mitt to shake pot every ten minutes. Goes well with rice or attiéké, made from grated, fermented cassava. Attiéké can be found in African food markets.
TIDBITS
1) This recipe call for skinless chicken breasts.
2) It would have been exciting if one of the ingredients were shinless chickens.
3) I don’t know if chickens have proper shins.
4) Or even improper shins.
5) You need to wear shin guards if you play soccer.
6) This advice holds if you are human or a chicken.
7) Have you ever beheld a chicken playing soccer without shin guards?
8) No, I don’t think so.
9) Ivorians, people from the Ivory Coast, love to play soccer and often play in the World Cup.
10) They also love chicken.
11) So we can conclude they love to see chicken play soccer.
12) Of course, chickens can play soccer. Their tiny size enables them to dribble the ball easily through the legs of any defender.
13) And my gosh, chickens sure can head the ball into the net. Their brain is so tiny that concussions really can’t damage their intellect. And the best chickens can fly for up to 200 feet. They can indeed get to any ball in the air. One flick of the hen’s head and there’s another goal for poultry.
14) Ivorian chicken soccer is of the highest level.
15) Ivorian chickens would play in the World Cup except for the fact that the men’s national soccer team is still somewhat better than the poultry squad and a nation may only enter one team in the tournament.
16) Greenland’s human soccer team garners few victories and never qualifies for any international tournaments. The land’s chickens hatch from the shell with moves that would have put Pele to shave. One would think that the Greenlandic chickens might have a good chance for soccer fame.
17) Unfortunately, it’s a tough life for any chick yearning for soccer glory. Actually, it’s a short life. Greenland’s arctic freezes one chicken after another. Sure, they could survive playing indoor soccer, but as of press time, no Greenlandic municipality has budgeted for an indoor poultry soccer arena.
18) This isn’t so much of a concern for human soccer players, but Greenlandic chickens are terrified of being eaten by polar bears on their way from the coop to the indoor soccer arena.
19) An obvious solution would be to send Greenland’s soccer chickens to a country without a top-level human team, Albania for example. However, the process of navigating the bureaucratic mazes to get poultry visas to Albania has stopped everyone so far. We can only dream.
– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
Some time ago*, Joe Biden, the Vice President, of this august land sent me a post titled, “I’ve had it up to here.” I don’t know what I’ve could have done to upset him. I’ve never even met him. If someone teepeed his house, all I can say is that I didn’t do it. Sure I ran for the presidency back in 2012, as part of the Bacon & Chocolate ticket. Sure I could have won. Sure, I could have taken enough votes away from the democrats for the republicans to have elected Romney. But I didn’t. Obama’s president and Biden’s vice president and I’m not and Candace Bowen isn’t the VP, and that’s that. We got over the election. I thought Obama and Biden could do the same.
And just when I thought it had all calmed down, I got the following post from the Vice President:
“Dig Deep, Paul”
Again, Joe, I protest. I didn’t do anything. If someone sent you a pizza to your home, I’m not paying for it. This is a typical college prank. I’m not digging deep.
My I suggest you calm down with a nice, cold root beer. Life’s too short.
* = I have no idea when. Indeed, the sequence of events might be off. Having a poor memory could be a good thing if I ever have to deny knowing anything.
– Paul R. De Lancey, presidential candidate for the Bacon & Chocolate Party.
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
MY WISH HAIKU #1
May 2015
Be as wonderful to you
As you are to me.
MY WISH HAIKU #2
You brighten my life,
Friend, with everything you do.
I am so grateful
– Paul R. De Lancey, Bad Artist
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
SCENARIO:
You’re at work. Lunch hour is coming up, and you are going to run an errand during lunch hour. Today, it involves finally getting the time to have that blood test stuff done that your doctor prescribed 4 1/2 weeks ago. So, 11:55 AM comes, you shut down your personal Facebook account early, and you head on over to this particular lab to get the blood draw done. You get there, and you see the sign in the pic above!!!!
C’mon! Does the WHOLE office really have to shut down at lunch time???
Do ya think they all go to McDonalds? Then all come back, realize there are no customers, so they decide to check their own LDL’s, HDL’s, HTML’s, EIEIO’s and LMNOP’s?
I think the person who decided Noon was a good time for all of the phlebotomists to take lunch was probably unsuccessful at their previous consulting jobs:
Suggesting grocery stores be closed on the weekends
Church closings on Sundays
And “POP ONLY” sales four hours before all NFL, NBA, MBL and NHL games.
Imagine if I would have actually wasted my 5 minute-vending-machine-stride-gum-lunch-break to get to this office, or worse, someone wasted their coveted SMOKE BREAK to get there!!!!
Hey, ABCD- phlebotomers, Dr. Lou Stool (my G.I. doctor) said I eat too much fast food and ordered me to get my blood tested. You’re closed before work. You’re closed AFTER work and you’re closed during our lunch break.
Here’s what I have determined out of all of this…you lab people have lunch with bank tellers and postal employees every day. I know this cuz, when I’ve had other errands to run at lunch…get some stamps, cash a check I received as a gift…GUESS WHO ELSE IS AT LUNCH DURING MY LUNCH HOUR??
As a heads up, I’m getting a job at your favorite office-delivery pizza place. And every time you call in for a lunchtime delivery, I’m gonna simply say, “Thanks for your order. I’ll just drop those pizzas off when it’s convenient for me…about 2am on my way home from work,” Ya Jagoffs!
Born and raised in the Pittsburgh area, loyal denizen John Chamberlin has carved out a niche writing and talking about Jagoffs, i.e. stupid politicians, awful sports officials, dumb criminals, bad drivers, ignorant people and so on. In his effort to teach the world about the meaning of the term Jagoff, Chamberlin has launched a campaign to add the word to the dictionary. His efforts have received support from Pittsburgh celebrities, local media and the Mayor. When he is not trying to alter vocabulary as we know it, Chamberlin writes with passion about Pittsburgh and brings to life the color of “The Steel City” on his blog http://www.YaJagoff.com. He has developed a cadre of worldwide “YaJagoff Catchers” who submit their own Jagoff finds which he posts on his site. When not writing on his own blog, Chamberlin writes for the popular online magazine, HumorOutcasts.com. He also speaks about social media and its importance in developing a brand–even a Jagoff brand.
American Dessert
INGREDIENTS
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup butter
1 cup sugar
½ cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
10 ounces peanut butter chips
no-stick spray
SPECIAL UTENSILS
electric beater
1-to-4 cookie sheets (You might have to bake in batches.)
makes about 36 cookies
PREPARATION
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Take butter out of the refrigerator and let it soften. Use whisk to blend flour, baking powder, and baking soda in large mixing bowl. Place butter, sugar, brown sugar, egg, vanilla extract, and peanut butter chips in second mixing bowl. Mix with electric beater set on cookies or medium high. Gradually add in the flour mixture from the first bowl. Blend thoroughly with electric beater set on whip or high. Fold in peanut butter chips. Mix with hands.
Roll dough into little balls about 1″ wide. Spray cookie sheets with no-stick spray. Leave a 2″ gap between peanut butter/dough balls. Bake at 375 degrees for 8 to 12 minutes or until golden brown. Let cookies cool for 2 minutes before transferring with a spatula to wire rack or cold plate. Cool for an additional 5-to-20 minutes or as long as you can stand waiting.
TIDBITS
1) The ancient Incas used peanuts in their religious ceremonies. The Incas built a mighty empire. Thomas Jefferson raised peanuts. He went onto write America’s Declaration of Independence. As president he doubled America’s size with the Louisiana Purchase. America is still the only country to send a peanut to the moon.
2) Peanut is awesome! Get your cat or dog to take its medicine by covering it with peanut butter. P.b. is the best bait for mousetraps. Put peanut butter in the pan after frying fish. The fishy smell will go away. This amazing food cleans your furniture and gives your house a nice peanut-buttery aroma. Use peanut butter when your shaving; it’s good for your skin.
– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
Guatemalan Entree
INGREDIENTS
1 yellow onion
⅛ head cabbage
2 chorizo sausages
4 foot-long hot dogs (or as long as you can get)
2 loganizas (white sausage, linguica)
¼ pound thinly sliced bacon
¼ pound thinly sliced ham
¼ pound thinly sliced salami
½ cup guacamole
½ cup mayonnaise
¼ cup mustard
1 teaspoon hot sauce (optional)
4 foot-long hot dog buns or 4 baguettes or 8 regular hot dog buns*
* = You may need to cut the sausages to fit the regular hot dog buns.
SPECIAL UTENSIL
electric grill
PREPARATION
Dice onion. Shred cabbage. Slice chorizos, hot dogs, and loganizas in half lengthwise. Put cabbage with enough water to cover and cook on medium heat for 5 minutes or until cabbage is tender.
Grill bacon, chorizo, hot dog, and loganiza halves on medium heat or at 350 degrees for about 5 minutes or until they look done. (Start grilling chorizo sausages and loganizas with casing side down. Flip them carefully.) Turn as often as necessary to avoid burning meat. Grill ham and salami for 1 minute. Flip meat slices after 30 seconds. Toast buns on grill or in toaster..
Place a chorizo, hot dog, and loganiza half on each bun bottom. Top with bacon and ham and salami slices. Sprinkle each bottom bun with equal amounts of onion and boiled cabbage. Spoon an equal amount of guacamole, mayonnaise, mustard and hot sauce over each top bun. Assemble top and bottom buns to make a delicious feat.
TIDBITS
1) This is the first tidbit.
2) As I recall, shuco means “dirty.”
3) All cooks, in addition to being hotties, are extremely organized and neat. So, calling this dish dirty is unfair. Perhaps some ancient royalty dropped his shuco on the ground and it got dirty. Indeed, some culinary historians think the king, being an oaf, ate the dirty shuco. Three of his nearest courtiers laughed at him. He had them beheaded. The fourth nearest courtier–We know his name. It’s Xatal.–started to laugh. Being a quick thinker, he changed and pretended to clear his throat.
4 The time limit for ancient Mayan royal secrets is 1,500 years. That limit lapsed exactly at the time I typed “pretended” in the previous tidbit. So, I know now the king’s name was Bongo. King Bongo played the bongos. Count Bassie originally toyed with playing bongos but didn’t wish to play second fiddle to Good King Bongo.
5 Some culinary historians take issue with the title Good King, pointing to the frequent executions he ordered.
6) Anyway, Xatal, who has been waiting patiently since tidbit 3 to play his part in culinary history, cleared his throat and said, “Good King Bongo is a medical genius as well as a brilliant musician. There is iron in dirt. Iron makes you strong. Let us all follow his illustrious lead and become strong by eating dirty hot dogs. Hey let’s call them shucos in honor of his son, Prince Shuco.”
7) The ancient Mayans threw their shucos on the ground, ate them, and grew strong. And these strong men formed strong armies and these strong armies conquered lands as far as the eye could see. King Bongo had really good eyesight and liked to stand atop his tall pyramids, so they conquered lots of really far away lands.
8) King Bongo’s eyesight was so keen that many culinary baseball historians think he could have been a better hitter than even the great Ted Williams if his highness had only been born in the 1920s. It’s frightening to think how many World Series the Boston Red Sox could have won in the 40s and 50s if they had had both Ted Williams and King Bongo in their lineup.
9) But the ancient Mayans, although being cracker-jack astronomers, never developed the time machines. Their princes grew up to be kings, not ball players. They’d bash in skulls in battle, not bash balls over the fence.
10) This happy state of Mayan conquest lasted for centuries for their warriors were strong from the iron in the dirt of their dirty hot dogs. In 1540, the Mayan Empire suffered a dirt shortage. Their warriors became weak. In 1541, the Spanish conquistadors attacked. The Spanish were strong from the iron they got from eating sautéed liver. The issue was never in doubt.
11) Vitamins and supplements became widely available to the populations of the world during the twentieth century. Countries that had had no access to Guatemalan suchos or were too disgusted by sautéed liver to eat it were suddenly able to get enough iron to raise armies of strong men. This is why we had two world wars in the last century.
12) Today’s Guatemalan shuco contains nothing but fine ingredients and is one of the ten best hot dogs of the world. Be strong!
– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
I got to the stop sign first.
Please do not kill me.
DRIVING HAIKU #2
You have a big car.
I’ve a sonic obliterator.
You will yield to me.
– Paul R. De Lancey, Bad Artist
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
“Insiders buy stocks for only one reason. They think the prices will go up.”
– From an online advertisement.
“Heat rises in Holland.”
– Dutch real estate agent
Whoa, slow down. Let me absorb this.
– Paul R. De Lancey – historian
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
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