TheSnackHound

My mom used to make cabbage soup. I thought it was very bland, but she explained that it was part of a special diet. Madonna apparently lost a ton of weight or maintained her figure by eating this very recipe, or so mom said. From what I have read, I don’t really think Madonna had anything to do with the diet. She was just a popular star of the moment. In addition to the soup, you were supposed to consume one type of food a day in mass quantities. One day was all the beef and tomatos you cared to eat.

Sometimes I think there is just someone sitting back there in some room, coming up with the most outrageous diet they can think of, and marketing it just to see if people will jump in and do it.

There have been some pretty silly diets over the years.  In fact, “Weird Al” even wrote a song: Grapefruit Diet.

The most consistently promoted diet programs are Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers. There is so much publicity over their spokesladies that it obliterates what the company actually does. Weight Watchers used to be all about the points. In fact, I have a cousin who was quite annoying one holiday looking at her booklet to determine if she could eat a cucumber slice. Come on, now!

I have been reading the thefatlossguru.com and was shocked that a diet oriented site would actually mention that calorie deprivation was bad for you and even dangerous. In fact, the site advocates eating essentially like a diabetic: eating at the right times of the day. I have known that for a long time but do I always do it?

“No,” says daytime healthy eater/night time Cookies N Cream Ice cream hoarder (me).

If that is old hat, then what is the big deal? Apparently, the site, if you sign up, has a formula for what particular foods to eat at particular times and in what combos that help you burn fat in the most effficient or natural way. I agree with the eating style so far, but am of course, intrigued by the mysterious combinations.

If you try it, let me know what you think!

I have been told that I am easily entertained, and I also love dark chocolate.  Not only is it delicious, it has many health benefits, too.   Of course, that is null and void when you eat a bag in one sitting and then end up in a bad state of affairs and are confined to a certain small room of your home for several hours. Since this is a food blog, I will not mention the name of said room.

All segue aside, if you go to Coupons.Com, you can score yourself a two for one coupon.  Buy one 8.5 to 9.5 ounce bag of Dove chocolate and you will receive one free.  I was so psyched about that, that I was not prepared as to what happened next. 

We went to Kmart before the grocery store, and I had coupon in hand. The Dove chocolates were 3.69 instead of 3.99 at the grocery store.  At the register, I discovered the pleasant surprise that the current Kmart offer was 3 bags for 6 dollars!  NOT 3.69 as marked.   This, of course translated to $2.00 per bag.     When you consider that I had the coupon, it was like getting 2 bags for only a buck each!

I rattled on about my awesome bargain all the way to the car, into the grocery store, and halfway home.  By that time, my husband did not want to hear about it anymore because I was acting like I was the first person in the world to ever get a good deal, or maybe the chocolate addiction was talking and it was the ramblings of a junkie.

Either way, I was not selfish, and am relating my experiences here. Go to Coupons. Com, then get thee to Kmart!

The CA Wine Club is not just another “wine of the month” club, randomly selecting leftovers from a distribution list. They send their subscribers two bottles of artisan California wines every month, along with a current copy of Uncorked Magazine. Each month, it is not just a different variety, but a different winery. This is also a customizable gift, or a great way to treat yourself because you do get to exercise some choice over what you receive! You can also shop for the holidays now and you won’t be billed until your gift ships in December.

- Choose from monthly, bi-monthly, or quarterly shipments. You are not roped into a long contract. On the contrary, you can continue your relationship month-to-month.
- You can sign up and receive one bottle of white, one red, or two of the same, either white or red.

Right now, the first month is on them. If you use promo code ADVENTURE, you save $34.95 at checkout.

“Heh, Heh, Heh…Candygram!”

Okay, you might have to have something like this…

Standing mixers come in a variety of colors these days. Recently, there was even one that was pink for Breast Cancer Awareness. Colors? Shmolors! I just saw what they are doing over at FlameKA.com and you won’t be so proud of yourself for having a purple or pink mixer when you see you can have one with flames or made up like a bomber plane. I even saw some cow spots! You use your regular ol’ KitchenAid and buy special decals that can get you over the tragedy that KitchenAid does not offer this in its regular line.

I have been using stubbornly using a regular old handmixer for years, and this kind of craziness just may put me over the edge.  Kind of like how I made due with other dolls, and didn’t ask for a Barbie until they came out with her horse, Dallas. I guess I am a bit of an accessory person…

Check out more crazy ways to trick out a mixer HERE

A few of my cousins have gone on Wine Tours in various parts of the country. They really enjoyed them, as unlike other tours, they weren’t rushed in and out like cattle. A lot of tours promise to take you to several wineries and teach you how to make wine. They never used the information they learned because they are just the types to not slow down, but they did say that they sampled a little too much! Even so, you don’t have to go overboard on the tours, and you are also shown some beautiful areas of the countryside that you normally wouldn’t get to see. Partly because we are always worried about getting from point A to point b and don’t notice, but because much of it is private acerage that you would normally not get a peek at.

I am just an occasional drinker, but think there is a lot of value in learning to make your own, even if its just once in a blue moon, and a bottle or two at a time. You won’t get the various sulfites like some commercial wines, and can cater to food sensitivities when looking for a base for a delicious recipe.

There are many websites devoted to the preservation, mutilation, and transformation of Peeps, but not much to say about Skittles.  Yes, Skittles; the candy that announcers so haughtily demand for you to “TASTE THE RAINBOW.”

This command was a little more humble when Skittles were first introduced during my childhood.  Someone was probably just HOPING we wanted to try them.    To be accurate, Skittles were originally a British candy that was introduced in the United States in the early 70s, which was slightly before my time, but they were not made in the US until 1981, or 1982.  Thus, the marketing that went in to targetting children who would want to eat them did not commence until then.  My brother and I were some of the children who were sucked in by those various ploys.  I do believe they hit the drugstores counters of rural Wisconsin long before the commercials did, however.  Click Here to enjoy an 80s Skittles commercial.  What a dull world we would have lived in without them.

I always knew that my brother would have some sort of culinary destiny.  What his creations lacked in artistic “plating,” they transcended many levels of daringness and creativity.   In 1984, I think it was, on a snow day, a sick day, or a vacation day – my memory is foggy now – he first set his mind on the idea that Skittles could be so much more.  It perhaps was not until 1986 that his idea became a reality.   When our family got a microwave oven, his true muse was found.

I think the microwave was a JCPenney brand, if I am not mistaken.   Perhaps the last in our extended family to jump on the trend bandwagon,  we had been spared from owning the most giant of microwave ovens of earlier years (which really defeated the purpose of being smaller than a regular oven).  At any rate, that dial was turned to thirty seconds and the rest was history.      Little did we know that there was shellac in the American version of Skittles, and if we knew we probably would not have cared.

There are many recipes floating around on the web and in books, involving making M&M cookies or cupcakes, and then  substituting Skittles.   To my brother, that would have just been amateur hour.

The tangy smell of melted skittles mixed with the heady aroma of chocolate is still in my mind to this day, for better or for worse.   It all occured on top of several paper plates.   Luckily, there was no incident of fire or destruction, other than destroying his inhibitions of combining tangy, tart, and chocolatey all in one creative expression.

I have to admit, in editorial honesty, that we never actually did eat the creation.   The Skittle “shells,” if you call them that had cracked and broken and the gelatanous innards had oozed together with the chocolate.   The effect was similar looking to ”melted crayons and chocolate.”    I think we were a little afraid it was all quite radioactive.