Posts Tagged With: lutefisk

I Visit My Friend From Greek Mythology

Sisyphus, before I helped him

I woke up and headed over to my friend Sisyphus’ place, which was on the slope of a mountain. He was pushing a gigantic rock up a steep slope.

“Hi, Sisyphus, how it’s hanging?”

“Oh can’t complain, blog-writing Paul, except maybe for this eternal torment the gods gave me.”

“What did you do, Greek guy?”

“Oh the usual, pissing off the gods. I guess I was too much of a tyrant to my subjects. Zeus, in particular, thought I was overly cruel even.”

“Why are you pushing a big rock up this hill?”

“Oh spreadsheet flashing Paul, it’s my dread punishment. I must take this rock up to the top.”

“Well, that doesn’t seem too hard.”

He sighed. “Matching-socks, Paul. Just before I get the rock to the top,  the muscles in my arms burn with the fires of the underworld. I pause. I slip. My hands fall from the rock. The rock rolls, along with my hopes. all the way down to the bottom. I have to start again.”

I offer him a taco. Sisyphus takes it gratefully and devours it instantly. “Thanks, large-refrigerator-owning, Paul.”

“So, how many times have put your shoulder to the rock?”

“174.383 times.”

“Bummer, that’s a bummer, Sisyphus.”

The Greek tyrant looked so downcast, that I really thought he’d eat lutefisk with a murmur.

My synapses fired. “Say Sisyphus, how about I help you? You’ve been coming ever so close just by yourself. I bet if I helped you, we’d get that darned rock to the top.”

“Mighty man of Poway, I would be most grateful for your assistance.”

And so we pushed the rock to the top.

Sisyphus jumped up and down. “Cowabunga, my punishment is over. I thought I’d be here for all eternity, but now thanks to you, latch-hooking Paul, I’m a free man. Free, I tell you, free!”

The erstwhile rock pusher clasped my shoulders. “Let’s celebrate. I’m taking you to Happy Hera’s Gyro Heaven for some cooling lemonade and tasty gyros.”

“Sounds great, Sisyphus, Do you think this myth will be rewritten showing how I helped you?”

The Greek strongman tilted back his head and laughed so hard that even the Debbie Downers in Sparta heard and smiled just a little bit. “I hope so, cake-baking, Paul, I do hope so.”

And thus, I became ever so famous.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories: about me | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Paul’s Awesome English Dictionary – Today’s Word: Lodrunk

How many times has this happened to you? You’re a teetotaling introvert who got invited to to the local Petit Point and Tapestry’s weekly meeting. You decide to attend as you think this will be a rather sedate affair with everyone absorbed in their current project. You arrive. You say hello. Then cases and cases of whiskey arrive. Soon people are taking off their shirts and punching others in their big, stupid noses. One of them grabs you buy the collar to tell you how Sweden got screwed at the Treaty of Wespthalia in 1649. And you know the treaty was signed in 1649. But you don’t care anymore.

You feel your soul wilt to a mere wisp. You want to merge your molecules into that wall to avoid any more human contact. You need to go home. You yearn to recline in your chair, watch Lassie, and sip on a cooling lemonade. But if you up and leave, people will hate you, call you a snob, a lutefisk lover. If only there were a way to quickly leave party hell without becoming a social pariah.

This party poser leads us to

TODAY’S AWESOME WORD

Lodrunk

Awesome entry #27

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

 

 

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What I’m Giving Up For Lent

Giving this up for Lent

We’re encouraged to give up something for Lent. Doing so makes us a better person. So okay, I’ll forego something as well.

Sigh.

Okay, here’s my sacrifice.

I’m giving up lutefisk and mushrooms for the Lenten season.

What’s that you say? That must be hard.

It is, but I’m blessed with an iron will. Once I’ve gotten the Lenten bit between my teeth,  I keep going with my no lutefisk and no mushrooms vow until the start of next year’s Lent. Whereupon, I make a similar resolution. My resolve is in indeed unshakable. Happy Lent, everyone.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

Categories: about me | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

My New Year’s Resolutions

Resolution #22

I, like many of you, endeavor to become a better person for the next year. How do we do this? By making new year’s resolutions.

And keeping them.

“I’ve never strayed from all I believe.
“I’m blessed with an iron will.
“Had I been made the partner of Eve
“We’d be in Eden still.”

– from the musical Camelot

Ahem.

Anyway, here are my new year’s resolutions:

1)  Give up lutefisk.

2) Give up mushrooms.

3) Never murder anyone who blocks aisles in supermarkets with their cart.

4) Not even when a customer and a checker chat for ten minutes. Like today, for instance. They’re both alive because of the previous year’s resolutions.

5) Go to exercise classes twice a week.

6) Go to arts and crafts class once a week.

7) Learn a new word every day.

8) Forget a new word every day.

9) Take a positive attitude.

10) Especially with laundry. Always do my very best to make sure all my socks pair.

11) Accept my limitations and jettison resolution #9.

12) Read as many bath books as I can.

13) Limit my television watching to programs I like.

14) Say, “Bunny!” everytime I see a rabbit.

15) Same thing for cows.

16) Halve the number of hours I spend watching curling.

17) Never bring up at parties how Sweden got screwed at the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648.

18) No matter how many times people bring up the topic.

19) Join the At Least One Egg Eaten in a Year Club.

20) Eat tacos.

21) Limit spending to the things that cost money.

22) Have tea with a rabbit.

23) Make my resolution last from now until the end of 2023.

There.

Wish me luck.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

Categories: lifestyle | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Are You a Magnificent Sunbeam? – Part One: Negatives

We might think ourselves bad. We might think ourselves good. We’d very much like to be good. We aspire to be magnificent sunbeams.

But are we? Thanks to the amazingly accurate test below we can find out.

An amazing sunbeam will have very few negative traits.

1) Have committed a murder? Give yourself 1 point for each one, Be honest, you get a point for each murder, whether convicted or not. If you have more than ten murders, you might as well stop taking this test right now.

2) Have you committed grevious bodily harm? Give yourself a point for each indictment.

3) Do you habitually block supermarket aisles? One point, if yes.

4) Do you lie on your tax returns? One point, if yes. Our country has a lot of debt. If the treasury cannot pay the government’s debts, it will default on its loans. The financial system will collapse. Revolution will ensue and blood will run in the streets. And it will all be your fault.

5) Are you a spammer? One point, if yes.

6) Are you never bothered to put on the turn indicator before turning? One point if yes.

7) Do you back out of a parking spot without looking? One point if yes.

8) Do you leave the refrigerator open? One point if yes.

9) Do you refuse to have your check filled out as much as you can before getting to the cashier at a supermarket? One point, if yes.

10) Do you litter? One point if yes, Two points if habitually,

11) Do you drive more than ten miles under or ten miles over the speed limit? One point if yes.

12) Are you a telemarketer? One point if yes.

13) Are you a lutefisk vendor? Two points if yes. This is really bad.

14) Do you shoplift? One points if yes.

15) Have you been an owner or a general manager for a major league team that has played worse than .500 ball for each of the last six years? One point if yes.

16) Do  you continually talk with a loud voice in a movie theater? One point if yes.

17) Do you order your steaks well done? One point if yes.

18) Did you fail to say “thank you” on July 13? One point if yes.

19) Did you fail to pay your library fines? One point if yes.

20) Have you fomented revolution? One point for each time.

21) Do you misplace the TV remote and make someone else look for it? One point, if yes.

22) Do you come up to people’s front door to sell something? One point, if yes.

23) Are you a habitual rioter? One point if yes.

24) Do  you leave your dirty dishes at the table? One point if yes.

YOUR RESULTS

16 or more:  Not only are not a magnificent sunbeam, you’re also a throbbing dick. Check into your nearest jail, right away.

13 to 16: Not a throbbing dick, but nowhere near a magnificent sunbeam or even a plain sunbeam.

8 to 12: You could be a sunbeam, if your point total on the positive traits part of this test is good enough.

4 to 7: You could be a magnificent sunbeam, if your point total on the positive traits part of this test is really good.

1 to 3: You are already a sunbeam and most likely a magnificent sunbeam depending how perform on part two of the test.

0: Congratulations! You are already a magnicent sunbeam. You might even be a saint depending on your results from the part.

Well, now you know what you are. Reflect and learn.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

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Tomorrow Is World Leftovers Burrito Day

Feeding the world

Chosing the right, fresh ingredients and cooking to trusted recipes makes for a truly tasty burrito. These burritos so uplift your soul that you can face with a song in your heart at any horror that life might throw at you.

Then there are days when you open your fridge and discover 1,722,363 containers of leftovers. Voices from everyone of these leftovers squeak so piteously, “Please, please, I’m about to go bad. When I was a tiny seed, I fully expected to grow up to be an ingredient that would make a diner say, ‘Life is good. Life is so good.’ Now I’m just one day away from the trash bin. There’s lutefisk in that bin. Oh, the shame, the shame.”

Naturally, the mere fact that 1,722,363 containers squeaked at you, will startle you. However, the ernestness of their sorrow must melt your heart, even if you’re a brutal dictator.

So what do you do? Enter the mighty flour burrito. Put any number of forgotten fridge ingredients, perhaps ten, on the tortilla, fold in the sides, roll it up, and Bob’s your uncle, you made a large leftovers burrito. You may now give way to waves of virtue splashing over your soul as you’ve cleaned out your fridge to find Amelia Earhardt shivering. You’ve also put off a trip to the supermarket, thus slashing your food bill. And most of the fresh food that you delayed purchasing can now go to someone else who lives near you or even in far off Madagascar.

By constructing such a meal for World Leftovers Burrito Day, you will be feeding the world. You magnificent sunbeam, you.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

 

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Voting Advice

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

Categories: politics | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Lutefisk

Swedish Atrocity

LUTEFISK

Heck no, I wont make this.

INGREDIENTS

Dried cod
Lye
Water
Other stuff

PREPARATION

No! No, a thousand times, no. I will not give you a recipe for lutefisk. You bought my cookbook. I have a warm and fuzzy feeling for you. So, look at the ingredients. Lye is a poison.

Furthermore, lutefisk assaults the senses as no other widespread dish. It looks like glue or broiled phlegm; there is some debate on this. It smells like, like, a rat dried under the furnace supplying central heating. It has the texture of boogers. It tastes like fermented cod-liver oil. Fortunately, lutefisk cannot speak.

When I was little, my mother made me eat lutefisk to show what she had to go through when she was small. My grandmother fed lutefisk to my mother to show what she had to go through when she was little girl. My grandmother’s parents left Sweden in the 1880s to get away from lutefisk.

Vikings raided Europe with unparalleled ferocity stoked by lutefisk meal after lutefisk meal in the homeland. Many thousands of them never came back.

There are more disgusting dishes than lutefisk, but they are little known and regional. Let’s pray they stay that way.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

Categories: cuisine, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Foods to Avoid

I like a lot of different foods. However, I can’t stand the following dishes.

Icky Eats

FOODS TO AVOID

Haggis

Lutefisk
Rocky Mountain oysters
Haggis
Liver and onion
Chef’s surprise – a favorite at my college cafeteria
Any meat mass or cooked veggie that has been in your fridge for more than four days.

What foods do you avoid?

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, 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.

 

Categories: cuisine, observations, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Don’t Block the Aisle With Your Shopping Cart

You work hard all day. Things went wrong. You’re seething with barely suppressed anger. But food is needed at home. So off to the supermarke you go. The one particular item you need is all the way down the aisle. This aisle is so long you can barely see the other end for the curvature of the Earth. You almost make it to your package of squid-ink spaghetti you need for that meal you were going to make for your Venetian boss, where you were going to ask for a much needed raise.

But, but, but, there’s someone blocking your way with her cart. You summon your last reserves of patience and say, “Excuse me, would you please move your cart.” But no, the oaf, she doesn’t move her cart. She is oblivious. You shout at her, “Move your fecking cart.” She sneers at you. “How rude.”

Your self control evaporates. The two of you tussle. Another shopper has filmed the whole thing and posts it everywhere. Shoppers everywhere take this video as a license to attack other shoppers. Shopping-cart riots engulf our great nation. This unbridled anger spreads to politics. Soon, all of America descends into undeclared civil war. Lutefisk vendors take advanage of the widespread chaos to sell lutefisk at our grammar schools. My forward-looking mind shuts down at this point.

DON’T BLOCK THE AISLE WITH YOUR SHOPPING CART!

 

 

 

 

 

 

– Paul R. De Lancey

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.

Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

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