Culinary genius

I am a great fan of culinary experimentation - heck, it's how I learned to cook in the first place. Which reminds me, here is a little known fact. When I was a kid, one of my favourite after-school snacks was sauteed mushrooms. Now I had NO idea this is what it was. I just came home one day, found some mushrooms, sliced them and then decided to fry them in a nob of butter. I then ate this on toast ... ooohhh, bliss! I didn't know that I was essentially eating a fairly classic French delicacy. I just knew it tasted damn good - seriously drool worthy, especially on a circa 1970's bright orange square shaped plastic Tupperware plate. (Part of a set. The other three colours were brown, burnt orange, and mustard yellow.) While we're on the topic of "why Michelle has been fat her whole life" another of my favourite after school snacks was this: Take a mug and fill it about 3/4 full with milk. Then take a packet of (Original) Chips Ahoy cookies and shove about 5-6 in there. Wait a few minutes, and then mash those down with a spoon. Then put in another few cookies - maybe 3-4. Wait (but not quite as long) and mash. Then proceed to eat the entire mushy, milky, cookie-squashed mess, and take great excitement in the fact that most of the chocolate chips fall to the bottom. Reason # 3 would be Wonder Bread and Best Foods mayonnaise and Hebrew National bologna, but let's not go into that right now.

So my young self was right into the culinary experimentation, at least on a snack level. We were blessed to have a series of underpaid but well loved maids from various third world South American countries working for us, so I never did much in the way of actual COOKING a meal, per se. Snacks, though? Right up my alley. Actually this is true to this day - I adore snacks much more than actual meals. There is just something so comforting about snacks. Not pre-made, processed snacks - just the idea of having a tiny meal rather than a big one. Strangely, though, I never got into that "eat six small meals a day" diet thing. Where is the romance, the excitement, the thrill, the comfort and the joy if EVERY meal is a snack? PUH-leeze. I want to eat a steak with 3 veg and some carbs and then 30 minutes later have a 'snack' of ice cream and/or dry cereal.

But I digress. The point of this post is to say that if blogs and websites were as prevalent in the early 80's as they were today, I surely would have been addicted to this website. True genius, I tell you. TRUE genius. (I suggest starting your viewing with the Top 20 on the right hand side. I *heart* the Oreo one...)