Sunday, March 20, 2011

Plastic Surgery Can't Fix Libya


Libya is run by a mad man, not a comedian, not a country singer that we all used to love.

Confusingly, they all seem to have the same plastic surgeon and have the same dead behind the eyes, evil stare. While we can't be sure why Joan Rivers is so dead behind the eyes, a glimpse into her reality show reveals a hard, crusty bitter, depressed, gross and tacky comedian with a lot of experience. Kenny Rogers, he just sold his soul to be the Gambler, not the Coward of the County. Oh, Lucille.

Gaddafi is dead behind the eyes because of the way he has run the country for all of these decades. It is actually a crime to have a political conversation with a foreigner in Libya, the most censored country in the Middle East,  according to FreedomHouse.org. Did I mention that he is killing non-violent protesters in the streets? He is supposed to face criminal charges, but he doesn't care because he looks tan and fabulous, ready for Jersey Shore. Holla!
I guess every dictator should manscape and go down with the ship, as he has vowed to die on Libyan soil, a martyr. Gangsta!! I think MTV should have the next Jersey Shore in Libya, let's bring the party to his house. He already looks like he fist pumps and stays up all night like a vampire. Or Charile Sheen!
I had to go there.

Sadly, we totally predicted in the Guavara house that the U.S. would intervene, and we launched missiles after Gaddafi supposedly agreed to a cease-fire, then betrayed it. Who knows what the truth is about this, it is hard to believe what the government tells us. Obama has kept his Presidential authority to torture, start wars and do everything and more than Bush did, regardless of the lies he told in his campaign.  My baker friends, maybe this has more to do with the giant reserves of oil in Libya than the UPrising. Convenient, no?

UPrising

We recommend for Gadaffi, that instead of getting that next laser peel he try this "Egg White Mask" from Planet Green. For those of us who want to eat our egg whites, let us bake an Angel Food Cake, fat free and delicious! We proudly add this to our list of freegan dishes as we did get the lemon for this sauce from a bag a neighbor left out.
We used a recipe from The America's Test Kitchen's Family Cookbook, which you can buy, and they are not very generous with their recipes. I am pretty sure, the standard Angel Food Cake google recipe will be A.OK.
I mixed freegan lemon juice and zest with confectioner's sugar and a touch of salt for the glaze.Organic blueberries finished it off. It didn't really need the sauce, the cake was so moist, but our freegan lemons have a different taste than the standard store bought variety, which added an earthy, herby, very satisfactory flavor. 

I cut out the parchment and greased the back
Cool on an empty wine bottle with water in the base!



Not sure if it sank a tiny bit? Still delicious for a 1st try!





ENJOY! 

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Walker, Wisconsin Ranger Mac 'n Cheese

Scott Walker has gone ape-nuts.

Walker has decided he will not back down at any cost, refuses to follow court orders to open the house, and does what he wants like a fat brat.  Currently lawyers salivating everywhere over the legality of what has happened in Wisconsin and I haven't seen the ACLU knock off their boots so fast ever, in my lifetime.
The Smithsonian is in Madison, collecting items, stories, photo and video to mark this event, as they know it is an historic moment.


On Wednesday, March 9, 2011, the Wisconsin senate "stripped" the bill that has caused so much attention, thus allowing them to vote with the Fab 14 still on the lam.
To sum it up, they are saying it no longer has to do with the budget, therefore the presence of the Fab 14 is not needed for the vote. By doing so they admit they are filthy liars, as they kept in the part of the bill stripping teachers and other union members of their rights. They had been saying all along it was due to money, then finally said they would take out the union at their knees and pulled this crap, in essence, admitting they lied.


My fellow bakers, without the unions in this country, we wouldn't even have a minimum wage. Do people really want their kids to go to a school where the teachers are paid terribly and have bad benefits? Why would anyone smart and decent take a low paying job with bad benefits? OH, that's right, they wouldn't. They would do something better and leave those crappy teaching jobs for the pervs and the twisted aholes who have an agenda they want to brainwash our kids with.

As they do so well, here is the Democracy Now Team, offering the side dish for us today, the Lowdown Hash with our Walker, Wisconsin Mac 'n Cheese!







So tonight, we hope that the ACLU and other lawyers keeping an eye out on this situation get something done about the illegalities that took place during this vote that should, hopefully, nullify it. But with this Johnny Cash, Rogue, John Wayne, Billy the Kid Governor, who knows how this will really end. He ignores the law, court orders and most importantly, the voices of those he governs. What a douche!


UPrising

Tonight we use our left over Wisconsin Blue Cheese and Wisconsin Jalepeno Cheddar, along with some parmesan to make a twist an the traditonal Mornay sauce.

about 6 oz shredded mixed cheese
about 3 oz Parmesan cheese
1 liter milk
1/4 cup flour
2 tbs butter

Warm the milk to a simmer. In another saucepan, make a roux, golden brown. Mix in the simmering milk and stir, over med/low for 30 minutes. Take off the heat, stir in the cheeses. Yum!

I parboiled 1/2 package of good macaroni. Poured into a casserole dish, covered with the Mornay sauce. After 30 minutes at 375, I topped with 1/2 cup of Parmesan seasoned homemade breadcrumbs and baked another 15 to golden brown.


Here's to you, Fab 14! And to you, the people of Wisconsin who won't stand for this!

Monday, March 7, 2011

The Fab 14 are Fab-Tastic! Go Wisconsin!


WISCONSIN!

It is so important what is happening in Wisconsin. I, Chef Guavara, feel terribly that I have been too busy with out of town trips, family responsibilities and work to get back to business!

The day after I heard that the Fab 14 democrats had fled the state of Wisconsin to avoid the vote to cease collective bargaining for the unions, I looked up recipes for Wisconsin. We also had a small party celebrating Wisconsin cheeses.

The thing about Wisconsin is that it highlights the media lying to us, denying us the real truth of this news. Their governor has gone ape-nuts, is totally in bed with the Koch brothers and is committing career suicide for all of  the aholes who intend on going along with this bill to kill collective bargaining rights. What are they getting in return? The promises must be great. Where are the media's investigative journalists telling us the background, or should I say lowdown?

I kind of dislike some aspects of unions and have fought against having them in my workplace because they weren't needed and would actually have caused our best employees to have pay deductions in an environment where we were paid for production. We didn't need the union because we already had competitive wages, we had benefits, we had 401k. We had these things thanks to the unions who had come before us and demanded fair wages and pensions. I get it. 

The eye opener in Wisconsin is that they have already sent our union jobs oversees for manufacturing, so now they go after those they can't outsource to China. Yup, I tie all of this back to our bad economic policies, allowing trade with countries like Vietnam and China who don't give a rats ass about human rights, and whose goons benefits greatly from the likes of Walmart, Nike, Target, Macy's, and really anyone who manufactures there. It is funny to me that in Hong Kong they play public service commercials asking people to consider where their clothes and shoes come from, indicating that your fancy basketball shoes were probably made by a child or slave worker. In the U.S., they would never show such a thing, if someone ever showed that commercial the greedy corporations who run our Republic would put a stop to it and our media, who for the most part, is in the pocket of our government and does what they are told, would never touch it. American's LOVE to live in denial while profiting from the skin off the backs of the downtrodden. It is historically our biggest shame, yet we still do it and call it PRIDE. 

Hendrik Hertzberg, in the New Yorker, points out in that the union decline is proportionate to the economic inequality that everyone is in such denial about. Trickle down has trickled up like spam fat and is sitting at the top for the uber-rich to slurp off while everyone else is having a decline in their standards of living. This truth sucks, but we need to see it to change it.

My question to my fellow bakers is, when given the choice between good and evil, why would anyone take the bad side? When a proposal is put before us, why can't we each look at it and see who will benefit? When something is benefiting our CHILDREN and the WOMEN of this country, that is good. If it only seems to benefit the OLD WHITE UBER-RICH MEN who absconded with trillions of dollars of OUR PENSIONS, then why in the world would the likes of you and I approve of this? 

Here is a really long video, but one worth watching where Michael Moore lays it out for the people, while supporting the protestors of Wisconsin:



UPrising


Let's break this bread, a Cheesy Wisconsin Bread. I made the sourdough from a starter I started with a freegan orange I found on the sidewalk. 
1 cup starter
3 cups flour
1 tsp salt
2 tbs butter

Rise for 2 hours. Punch down. Put in buttered bread pan, rise for one hour. Bake for 50 min at 375F.
The Wisconsin recipe I read called for a mush of mushrooms, cheese, onions and garlic smushed into the bread. So here it is:
I simply sauteed onions & mushrooms and beer, added a ton of garlic. I laid this into the bread which was sliced almost through. Added Wisconsin cheddar and Wisconsin blue cheese, then we popped it back into the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes, turning occasionally for even browning.

It really did taste like Wisconsin. Fatty, starchy, carbie, beery, overall indulgent. A good place to visit, but we wouldn't want to eat like this more than once per quarter.