just eat it

Yes, I live! Sorry I've been off the grid for a while, but I've been busy with a couple of projects that are OMG exciting. I'd tell you what they are, but they're both in the embryonic phase and I don't want to jinx them. Details to come when/if they pan out, of course.

Some news I CAN share, however: after spending 9 months in a department at work that I hate with every fiber of my being, I finally get to move back to my previous department. I can't even begin to tell you how much this thrills the shit out of me. I still have to finish up this month, but after that, I can bid adieu to Suckland forever.

::insert fist pump here::

Anyway, I'm trying to do as little work as possible today, so here's a survey on one of my favorite things in the world: food.

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1. What's the last thing you ate?

Half of a (five...five dollar...five dollar) footlong ham and cheese from Subway. I always pick Subway up on Monday mornings on the way to work, and I have half for lunch and half for dinner.

2. What's your favourite cheese?

Mmmm…American cheese, preferably melted between two perfectly toasted pieces of white bread. I also love mizithra cheese sprinkled over spaghetti with browned butter, but I've never been able to find that at the grocery store.

3. What's your favorite fish?

Not big on the seafood, but I’ll eat tuna out of the can (no comments from the peanut gallery) every now and then.

4. What's your favourite fruit?

Dried cherries. They must be desiccated almost beyond recognition or I shan’t touch them.

5. When, if ever, did you start liking olives?

::vomits profusely at mere thought of olives::

6. When, if ever, did you start liking beer?

::vomits profusely at mere thought of beer::

7. When, if ever, did you start liking shellfish?

Not too big on shellfish, although I like tempura shrimp. Also, a couple of weeks ago I went to Panda Express, and the woman behind the counter asked if I wanted a sample of their new honey walnut shrimp. Honey usually makes me want to gag, but everyone in front of me who'd tried it made porny noises and then immediately ordered it, so I figured I'd give it a try. It was so fucking GOOD. I think it would probably be a bit too rich for a full entree, but damn.

8. What was the best thing your mom/dad used to make?

My mom made a turkey tetrazzini that was the shizzle. Daddy-O isn’t much for the cookin’.

9. What's the native specialty of your hometown?

Um…Olive Garden?

10. What's your comfort food?

Anything that’s completely devoid of nutritional value. When I’m in a funk (as opposed to seriously depressed, when I can’t eat at all), my chow-down food of choice is ice cream. And oh, dear lord, if there’s anything much better to soothe a crappy mood than KFC mashed potatoes and gravy, I don’t know what it is. I also love Hostess Sno-Balls, even though they’re the exact texture and heft of a breast implant.

Christ, I’m ghetto.

11. What's your favorite type of chocolate?

Milk chocolate.

12. How do you like your steak?

Medium.

13. How do you like your burger?

Medium with ketchup, mustard, and pickles only.

14. How do you like your eggs?

Scrambled and fluffy.

15. How do you like your potatoes?

Fried and coated with an obscene amount of salt. I’m also very big on the mashed potatoes, as mentioned before.

16. How do you take your coffee?

I like my coffee like I like my men…sweet and white.

(Disclaimer: above comment is riffing on the famous joke and not to be taken seriously, though that IS how I drink coffee on the very rare occasions that I do.)

17. How do you take your tea?

Not a big tea drinker, although I get the urge for chai or Thai iced tea now and then.

18. What's your favourite mug?

My “Love Is Hell” mug, showing Binky the Rabbit looking down sadly at his cracked heart. Awww.

19. What's your biscuit or cookie of choice?

Petit Ecolier. They’re like shortbread cookies topped off with a thick layer of milk chocolate and hazelnuts. Go to Ralph’s right now and get some. Enjoy your orgasm.

20. What's your ideal breakfast?

When I stayed at the Paramount in NYC, there was a bakery next door that had the most amazing almond croissants; I almost wept from their sheer beauty. So I’d have to say those with a café latte and a side of bacon, or the Bailey's French toast that I had at a hotel in San Simeon.

21. What's your ideal sandwich?

Six inch ham and mustard on Italian from Subway.

22. What's your ideal pizza?

All I ask is that it have lots of cheese and super-thick crust.

23. What's your ideal pie (sweet or savoury)?

Mrs. Wick’s old-fashioned sugar cream pie. Even though it costs a ton to ship them, I’m thinking I may just have to bite the bullet and order a few, because they are the greatest thing on earth. Imagine crème brulee, only fifteen thousand times better.

24. What's your ideal salad?

Pffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffft.

25. What food do you always like to have in the fridge?

Coke Zero and yogurt.

26. What food do you always like to have in the freezer?

Peanut butter and grape jelly Uncrustables.

27. What food do you always like to have in the cupboard?

Cans of Campbell's spaghetti and ramen. I have the diet of a broke grad student.

28. What spices can you not live without?

Salt.

29. What sauces can you not live without?

Mustard, alfredo sauce, teriyaki sauce, and A-1 (or “Al sauce” as we call it in my family, because I thought the one was an L when I was little). If you put A-1 sauce on white bread, you have a tasty and nutritious snack!

…Okay, not nutritious. But it’s good in a really ghetto way.

30. Where do you buy most of your food?

Ralph’s or Vons. They're less than a half mile away from each other where I live, so I just pick one at random unless I know one of them has a good sale on something I want.

31. What piece of kitchen equipment could you not live without?

The refrigerator.

32. What meats have you eaten besides cow, pig, and poultry?

Ostrich, which was excellent; tasted like very lean beef.

33. What's the last thing you ate that you picked in the wild?

Well, since candy doesn't grow in the wild...nothing.

34. Arrange the following in order of preference: Italian, Mexican, Chinese, Indian, Thai, Sushi:

Chinese
Italian
Thai
Indian

I don’t eat sushi or Mexican food.

35. Arrange the following in order of preference: Vodka, Whiskey, Brandy, Rum:

Vodka
Rum
Brandy
Whiskey

36. Arrange the following in order of preference: Garlic, Basil, Caramel, Lime, Mint, Ginger:

Caramel (fuck, I LOVE caramel!)
Lime
Garlic
Ginger
Mint
Basil

For the record, the two flavors I cannot resist in any form are cinnamon and lemon. I would have said caramel as well, but I don't like caramel corn and I'm not huge on flan, so there's that.

37. Arrange the following in order of preference: Pineapple, Orange, Apple, Strawberry, Cherry, Watermelon, Banana:

You’re asking me to rate FRUIT now? Have you not learned that I don’t do healthy? I’m going to rate these by my Life Savers/Jolly Rancher preference.

Pineapple
Cherry
Apple
Orange
Watermelon
Strawberry
I hate bananas. Bleh.


39. What's your fast food restaurant of choice, and what do you usually order?

If Subway counts, then a 6” ham and mustard on Italian with a bag of Lay’s salt and vinegar potato chips and a Coke Zero. If you’re talking burger joint, then Wendy’s, and I get the hamburger kid’s meal with a Coke.

40. What's the next thing you'll eat?

I saved the salt and vinegar potato chips from my lunch, so I'll have those on my afternoon break.

41. What do you normally have for breakfast?

Either yogurt (flavors vary) or a brown sugar and cinnamon Bagelful. Occasionally I'll also have a Jimmy Dean D-Lite croissandwich with turkey sausage and egg whites.

42. What do you normally have for lunch?

An Uncrustable and a can of Coke Zero or bottle of water.

43. What do you normally have for dinner?

On Mondays, I have the rest of my Subway sandwich from lunch. The rest of the week I usually have a TV dinner, soup, or spaghetti. Weekends vary since G and I eat out or get something on Saturday that will also serve as Sunday's dinner (pizza, Chinese food, barbecue).

44. What do you normally have for snacks?

Pretzels or Fiber One oats and caramel bars (but only one a day or I fart like a Clydesdale).

45. The four veggies you like most are:

Potatoes, corn, and…that’s it.

46. What fruit and vegetable do you like the least?

Fruit: bananas because they have those icky strings, or durian, because they stink so much. Vegetable: oh, we all know it’s the evil monstrosity known as the onion.

47. What’s your favorite chocolate bar?

As far as something you can get in any drugstore, Milky Way. They also have a new caramel flavor that's the bomb dot com. Fancy: Vosges Gianduja (milk chocolate, hazelnut paste, and almonds) or Naga (sweet Indian curry, coconut, and milk chocolate) bars. Mid-range: Cadbury Top Deck bars, which are milk chocolate with little pillows of white chocolate on top. Even my work chum J, who ordinarily hates white chocolate, loves those.

48. What’s your favorite dessert?

Excluding the elusive old-fashioned sugar cream pie, crème brulee or bread pudding.

49. What’s your favorite drink?

Coke Zero. It used to be Coke Classic, but I very rarely drink it anymore, and when I do, it tastes like syrup. It's not so bad in restaurants because it's more watered down. I also drink at least 60 ounces of water a day. Yes, I pee a lot.

50. What’s your favorite snack?

Considering that I don't have a sweet tooth but a sweet jaw, you may be surprised to learn that I prefer salty stuff when I'm in a snacky mood.

51. What's your favorite gum?

Orbit bubblemint.

52. What’s your favorite ice cream flavour?

Archer Farms sea salt and caramel pretzel. Jesus take the wheel!

53. What’s your favorite potato chip flavour?

Salt and vinegar. Oh yeah.

54. What’s your favourite soup?

Greek avgolemono soup. It's chicken, orzo pasta, and lemon. Whenever I feel a cold coming on, I go get a bowl and I swear it nips that shit right in the bud. It's probably psychological, but whatever works, and besides, it's tasty.

55. What food do you hate?

There’s about a thousand of them, but onions are and always will be at the top of the list.

56. What’s your favourite restaurant?

Cafe Fiore. Best bread pudding in the world!