Assorted Goods

           Lately, I've taken an interest in baking. It all started with my mom randomly asking me one day if I wanted to make banana bread.Now, to fill you in on a major detail: I suck at and hate cooking. Everytime my mom would ask me to make dinner I would mess it up. Some of my less embarressing cooking screw-ups were: dropping the chicken in the corn, using metal spatulas on non-stick pans, (how in the what now?) and my personal favorite, serving hard romen with less seasoning on it than, well, something with no seasoning at all. Needless to say, I have a repution in my household of being a horrible, horrible cook. So when my mom asked me if I wanted to make banana bread, I looked at her like she was crazy.
"Well," I mumbled, thinking she was making fun of me. "I guess I could try."
            And I made banana bread. It tasted funny on the account of me and my conviction that the more the flour the merrier, but all in all it wasn't too bad. I liked baking, and I decided from there on out that I would continue baking.
          I once read a manga on baking, and the main character would always say: "I bake because I like to see the faces of the people who eat it, good or bad."
          I felt exactly the same. It's fun mixing it all together and putting it in the oven, but the best part is having people eat what you bake. That's why if I bake anything, I tend to give it all away to anyone who will eat it. And over these last few months (?) I have made lots and lots of food. There's banana bread, sweet bread, cupcakes for peer support, whipped chocolate pie, pumpkin pie, roasted pecan pumpkin custard and lots of cookies.
       There's a story for every one of these items, but my favorite is the whipped chocolate pie one, so I'll type it up for you. A while ago me and my mom were at the store when she decided that I was going to make pumpking pie to take over to my grandma's. (again, she's weird like that.) So we bought pumpkin puree, a frozen crust, and a small baking magazine that caught my mom's eye. When we got home, I realized that the frozen crust we got was actually two frozen crusts, and wondered exactly what I was going to do with the extra. So while the pie was baking, I flipped through the magazine and found a recipe for a delicious looking whipped chocolate pie.So that Sunday when I went to my grandparents, I went on another magical adventure to the store and bought baking chocolate and other assorted goods. I went back to my grandma's and found I had forgotten butter. So back I went. Then I had bought the wrong type of eggs. (they need to be pasteurized) I ended up going to the store four times that day, and I finally got everything I needed.
         So I started baking, and I found that this is the most challenging pie I have ever made. First you have to melt the chocolate without burning it, Then you have to use a hand-mixer to slowly whip the softened-not-melted butter and add the sugar gradually. In the end it took me three hours to make this pie, and my arm was still shaking from the vibrations when I put it in the fridge to firm up for another three hours. Although it was really hard, it was definitely worth it. My grandparents and my aunt loved it, along with the rest of my family.
         My mom found out that her work was having a pie contest, and she asked me if I wanted to enter. I was estatic! The timing was perfect, and I had a gold medal recipe. So in preparation, I ended up making four pies. Four! I was crazy excited, and I used up all my ingredients on those two deep-crust and those other two thin-crusted pies. I thought of course that she would take all of them, but she left the deep-crust home. So I cut it up and had my siblings help me eat one of them, and took the other one to Thanksgiving dinner at my grandma's. I also made a roasted pecan-pumpkin custard, wich was delicious.
          My mom also bought me another recipe book, this one for cakes. Looks like I'll have to find an excuse to bake a cake!

Internet & Sushi

             Has anyone ever said to you that they didn't realize what they had until it was gone? That is exactly how I felt these past few weeks. We had our internet canceled because we were a little low on cash, and every time I got an assignment that required going online, I would have to bike down to the library.
              You have no idea how many cold, lonely trips I made down there, fighting for a spot at one of the computers. And then when I actually got on a computer there was the timer that came up every five minutes saying, '15 minutes left' and so on. You see, to circulate the computers, you had thirty minutes on them and them someone from the waiting list would be automatically logged on if there was anyone waiting for a computer. Then you would have to gather your stuff, type in your login number and password on the waiting list, and wait for a computer to open up. If there wasn't anyone on the waiting list, you just had to log in again and continue whatever you were doing. There were lots of other complications of using those computers, which I won't go into here because it would be dreadfully boring.
              Anyway, my dad decided to get internet back, and instead of biking down to the library in all this snow, I'm sitting at home, warm and comfy, typing all this up. Now I can blog for as long as I want, without nosy people looking over my shoulder and an annoying timer in the bottom right hand corner.
           
               Also today, I'm going to Osaka to eat all the sushi I want. I just got my last paycheck as a Frightmares! employee, and I'm going to spend it on mouthwatering nori, rice, and assorted fish. For my birthday my Mom bought me a Asian cooking set with a rice maker, a bamboo mat, a ginger grater, and a lot of other cooking utensils.
                It also came with instructions and a recipe for sushi, so I made homemade sushi. Let me tell you, sushi is the hardest thing I've ever 'cooked'. First you need short grain rice, and of course I had to get long grained. The problem with that is that it cooks differently, looks bad, and doesn't fit nearly as well in or on the sushi. Then, you mix the freshly cooked rice with sugar, salt, and vinegar. It sounds weird, but it tastes delicious. The next part is the hardest, although it was slightly easier for me because I had a mold for the inside of the sushi. You have to take a sheet of nori (dried seaweed sheets) and pack rice on it, then whatever you want on the inside. You then fold it all up with the bamboo sheet, making sure that the edges of the nori touch and it stays a perfect circle. It sounds easy typed up here, but it was way hard. The nori wasn't long enough, There was too much rice, and the carrots and the fish wouldn't stay put. I made about five rolls with imitation crab meat, smoked salmon, and ginger. I also found a tube of wasabi that no one else but me would eat, on account of it's spiciness.
                Making my own sushi was a really fun experience, with a really tasty product. Lately I've been really interested in cooking, and you can even ask my friends. I always end up bringing them some of whatever I've made, which so far consists of sweet bread & banana bread.I have some frozen pie crusts in the freezer, and a brand new cookbook, so we'll see what I bake next.

Halloween and Whales

For Halloween this year, I dressed up in my entirely overdone vampire costume and went trick-or-treating with some of my besties. While walking up and down the street, knocking on every door with a light on, I noticed there was a lot of trash on the ground. Even though I was wearing a dressy ball gown and heels, plus the fact that I hurt my knees and it pained me to stoop down, I would pick up each and every piece of garbage that I saw. Now I know a lot of you are thinking, "what a hippy! she's going to start chanting 'save the whales' in some druggy voice any second now." And that's true. I am a hippy, but only because I realise that this planet is limited. We cannot just take all the resources and leave garbage in it's wake, or we'll be left with a giant planet full of junk, like in Wall-E. I'm not saying you should go all out and be, you know, a 'hippy' (another one of those unfortunate stereotypes). But I am saying you should balance out how much you take from the planet with how much you give back. Pick up random garbage, turn off lights and don't use gallons of water to take a shower (as my dad would say, "save some for the fishies!"). These are all small steps you can take to help out, even if you think that our Earth and it's resources will last forever. Anyway, my friends started teasing me about my weird habbit and one even went so far as to try and stop me from picking up some trash. (you know who you are! :D) I'm not mad at them for that, but I wish that teenagers would realise that there is more to life than being absolute slobs and expecting other people to clean up your messes. Don't forget that animals need ambassadors, just like other countries. They aren't present to speak for themselves, but they still matter. I mean, even if we could live without other species and life forms, (which we can't) would you really want to? Animals are great for soothing the mind, learning responsibility, and eating. And yes, I really did just say that. I'm no vegetarian, essentially because I like the taste of meat, but also because that's the natural order of things. Organisms eating other organisms. What I hate, is people who kill animals for NO REASON. If a lion were to chance upon another animal, which for arguments sake, isn't even it's normal prey, and it's not hungry, IT WOULD NOT KILL IT. It wouldn't kill it for sport, it wouldn't kill it out of spite, it would not kill it. Why should we kill animals for sport? Why destroy a life for any other reason except to use it in death? One of the reasons I love native americans so much is that they kill and animal, eat it, and then use it's bones, teeth, organs and anything else. They don't just leave it to rot, or only take the skin. They use every part they can. Anyway, as you are all munching your delicious Halloween candy, I hope you will take the time to think about exactly where your wrapper is going. Garbage can? Street? Under the couch? Then where-to a landfill? Do you even have any idea what is going to happen to it?

Diversity

For Honor's English, I had to enter a writing contest for first term. The topic of the contest was Diversity Means. . . And I wrote a poem talking about how racism and ignorance about a certain race isn't always from other people. Sometimes people even go as far as to 'bash' themselves. Like an example I hear just the other day: "...I should probably do something more Asian." Since when do people do things because they're Asian? You shouldn't let your nationality define you. I'm about and eighth Native American, Cherokee to be exact, yet I don't wear moccasins and have my hair in a long braid with feathers. It's alright if your tastes correspond with the usual tastes of your nationality, just don't say you like those things to make you appear more 'Asian'. (Or whatever nationality it my be) It also bugs me that we have certain stereptypes. We think that every tall African-American who walks by is a star basketball player. We also think that all Hispanics are poor and that they all work as Landscapers or work at McDonald's. Even though it's not usually true, we still rely upon these stereotypes and often follow them ourselves. I'm a white girl, so I don't have much firsthand experience with racism, but I know a lot of people whose second language is English. I have friends from the Phillipines, Brazil, and Mexico. I have more friends of different nationalities who were born in America, and they seem to bash themselves more than my friends who immigrated. Racism is such a big problem, and has been for such a long time, yet all we are doing is promoting it. We treat people with different features badly, or sometimes better than people who are like us. I've been made fun of for my wide feet and shoulders, and teased because I'm an 'Indian' with blonde hair. It doesn't bother me enough to go crazy and rant about it, or even resort to violence, but it's still stupid. Don't people always say that individuality is a good thing? Then why do we make fun of people who are different than us? What does it matter if it's their skin color or their personality that's different? I think that people should stop cracking jokes about 'how Asian he is', start accepting that they are different, and move on. Also I believe that some people use their nationality to gain popularity. Why should you be higher than other people on the social ladder becuase you're Brazilian? or because you speak Spanish? It makes absolutely no sense.