Losing his liberty and the freedom of his people to Julius Caesar was one thing, but when people mispell gall as Gaul, King Vercingetorix, King of the Gauls gets hopping mad.
– Paul De Lancey, Ph.D.
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 family’s favorite brand of freedom
I love refried beans. They’re part of my heritage, my family’s culinary history, and an essential ingredients in the world’s greatest cuisine – Mexican. So you can imagine I’m picky about refried beans. They should not include jalapeno peppers. Nothing wrong about jalapenos, but are we such savages, that we cannot add our own fresh jalapenos to the beans? Are we to be denied the freedom to decide the exact, proper amount, perhaps none that day, to our refried beans?
GIVE ME LIBERTY TO ADD MY OWN JAPENOS OR GIVE ME DEATH.
(Not as exhilirating as John Patrick Henry’s famous slogan, but you get the idea.)
So, you can imagine my horror and outrage when the two major supermarkets only had refried beans with jalapenos. I had to order plain refried beans from Amazon. Yes, Amazon was freedom’s last line of defense.
Write your senator, gather your arms, and take to the streets. The apocalypse is at hand.
– Paul De Lancey, Ph.D.
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.
INGREDIENTS
1 pound chicken breasts
½ tablespoon corn starch
1 teaspoon grated ginger
4 teaspoons rice wine or sake
2 garlic cloves
2 shallots
2 tablespoons peanut oil or vegetable oil
½ teaspoon sesame oil
3 tablespoons black bean sauce (aka black bean paste)*
¼ cup chicken stock
¾ teaspoon sugar
1 green onion
1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds or sesame seeds
* = If you can’t find black bean sauce, you can substitute with hoisin sauce or miso. Alternatively, use your sonic obliterator on any guest complaining about your lack of authenticity. You don’t need that negativity in your life.
SPECIAL UTENSIL
sonic obliterator
Serves 3. Takes 40 minutes.
PREPARATION
Slice chicken breast crosswise into ¼” thin strips. Add corn starch, ginger, and rice wine to large mixing bowl. Mix with whisk until well blended. Add chicken strips. Mix with hands until chicken strips are thoroughly coated. Marinate for 15 minutes.
While chicken strips marinate, mince garlic cloves and shallots. Add peanut oil, sesame oil, garlic, and shallot to pan. Heat peanut oil using high heat. (Peanut oil is ready when a bit of shallot starts to dance in the oil.) Sauté at medium-high heat for 30 seconds. Stir constantly. Add black bean sauce. Sauté for another 30 seconds. Stir constantly.
Add chicken strips, chicken stock, and sugar. Bring to boil using high heat, stirring frequently. Reduce to low and simmer for 5 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink inside. Stir occasionally. While chicken simmers, chop green onion into thin slices. Garnish with green onion and toasted sesame seeds.
TIDBITS
1) Chickens are usually calm creatures. “Live and let live is their motto.”
2) Unless, they don’t get black beans to eat. Then things get ugly.
3) In 1848, farms all around Scotland ran out of black beans. It all came to a head in the great Paisley Chicken Riots.
4) In retrospect, Paisley’s authorities should have seen it coming. The local chickens had forsaken their usual, “Poc, poc, poc, poc” for “POC, POC, POC, POC!!” Since then, chickens speaking in all capital letters and exclamation points have become a byword for terror. But back then, the town’s constabulary was caught flat footed. Enraged Scottish hens broke into seed barrels everywhere.
5) Fortunately, it rains a lot in Scotland and rain seeped into barrel upon barrel filled with corn seed, or maize seeds as the local chickens would have said. These soaked seeds became fermented from the rain. The chicken got drunk, wobbled around with outstretched wings, and finally passed out in the streets.
6) “They need intervention,” said the bonnie Franchesca. Paisley’s mayor agreed. Just one week later work started on the World’s First* Chicken Alcohol Treatment cent or as WFCAT as it is more commonly goes by. * = As far as we know.
7) The Chicken Rebellion of 1848 fizzled out. Unrest in Great Britain died down. Isn’t amazing how many people take their lead from chickens?
8) But other European leaders learned nothing from this. Their poor people starved. Middle class people protested for more and more say in government. Chickens demanded the black beans their brethren in England got. European fowl ransacked seed stores in all major cites.
9) Orators everywhere exhorted the mobs. “Citizens, are we cowards? Are we going just sit at our tables eating mushroom mush while our fowl friends lead the charge towards liberty and equality?” “No!” shouted the seething masses. And so, Europe erupted into the Year of Revolution.
10) Finally governments responded to the crisis engulfing their lands. First, no succeeding year would ever be known as 1848 for, as we all know, there is lots of symbolism in numbers. Second, generous subsidies to farmers would ensure bumper crops of black beans for centuries to come. In fact, in1927 seed growers planted so many black-beans that its future market crashed. Economic depression loomed. Alert government chefs suggested a dish made of chicken and black beans to gobble up the seed surplus.
11) You might think the chickens would have objected to being eaten. But they never have, remaining docile as long as they got their black beans to eat, “Thank you very much.”
12) Then, in 1993, the Chinese Bikini Team visited Great Britain and later brought the dish back with them. Black bean chicken became enormously popular. It still is. This is why this entree is known as coming from China.
– 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.
American Dessert
INGREDIENTS
6 eggs
⅛ teaspoon salt
¾ cup sugar
4 cups full fat milk
1 cup heavy cream
½ teaspoon nutmeg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
SPECIAL UTENSIL
electric beater
Makes 7 cups. Takes 1 hour.
PREPARATION
Add eggs, salt, and sugar to large mixing bowl. Mix with whisk until salt and sugar dissolve. Add milk. Stir with whisk until thoroughly blended. Add this mixture to pot. Simmer on low heat for 10 minutes or until mixture coats a spoon. Stir frequently. Chill in refrigerator for 30 minutes or until liquid is cold.
Add heavy cream to small mixing bowl. Use medium-high setting on electric beater for 5 minutes or until peaks form on cream. Use whisk to fold heavy cream, nutmeg, and vanilla extract into large mixing bowl with milk/eggs mixture to form egg nog. Ladle egg nog into glasses or keep refrigerated for future use.
TIDBITS
1) Some say “nog” derives from “egg and grog.” a rum drink served in the American Colonies before the Revolution. The beverage was very popular. People had to have it.
2) In 1775, British forces stationed in Boston ran out of egg and grog. So the red coats marched to Lexington and Concord, egg and grog capitals of Massachusetts respectively, to seize ingredients. The local militia took up arms to stop them. I mean liberty and egg nog. The first shot was fired when some one dropped his musket while accepting a shot of egg nog from a local tavern keeper trying to drum up business. Another shot rang out. A battle broke out. The revolution had begun.
3) Culinary etymologists, however, say “obgyn” is an anagram for “by nog.” Truly successful obgyns know that their patients find visits unpleasant. So, these “egg” doctors keep a refreshing glass of egg nog by every chair in the waiting room so their patients can always sit “by nog.” Hence, “egg nog.”
– 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.
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