Cooking with Jack: Air Pudding

Welcome to "Cooking with Jack", the cooking show sponsored by... well, this is me practicing for when "Cooking with Jack" is actually sponsored by somebody.

I was trying to come up with a fantastic recipe that's low-fat, low-sugar, low-calorie and low-everything and then I remembered a dish that my buddy Stephen at Who Ate My Blog just raves about... my famous Air Pudding.

 

Take two cups of distilled water. If you don't have distilled water, you can substitute tap water, rain water, snow water,
filtered water, soft water, hard water or de-ionized water.

 

 

Now pour the water into a pot and cook at medium high-low heat until it's boiling.

Boil for 20 minutes or so, until the water is completely evaporated.

Pour the remaining mixture into a bowl.

Add a half cup of nada.

 

Pour in three-quarters cup of zilch.

A couple of squirts of diddley-squat.

One tablespoon of nought.

And one half teaspoon of nothing-at-all.

Whisk in one fresh goose egg.

And that's all there is to is. A fresh, airy, delightful dish that you can have as much of as you want and not gain weight. 

Bon air petit!

Next on "Cooking with Jack":

What To Do In a Kitchen Emergency

(Such As When You Squirt Ketchup All Over Your Hand)

The Real History of Candy Corn

October 30th is National Candy Corn Day and internet history tells us it was created in the 1800s by the Wunderlee Candy Company.  Later (say the various histories) it was made by the Goelitz Candy Company (who became Jelly Belly), and they have produced it ever since.



Nowhere but here can you learn the true history of candy corn.  You see, it was actually created by witches around the beginning of the 15th century.  Back then, witches were struggling with a lot of bad press and suffering a lot of persecution.  People feared them, distrusted them, and suspected them whenever anything went wrong.  Being the 15th century, of course, PLENTY went wrong on a daily basis.



So a coven of woodland witches west of Warsaw started brewing different concoctions in their cauldrons.  They wanted to create something tasty and utterly lacking in any meaning that could be interpreted in an anti-witch fashion.  Using mystical dyes and sugar imported by broomstick, they started making candies.  The shapes were problematic since most any shape they came up with could end up even more witch anti-witch connotations.



But one day a witch named Xochitl, who flew in from South America, brought some ears of corn.  The witches in question figured the shape of a corn kernel was safe, and they created a candy shaped like a very large kernel of corn.

Since red and green had more symbolic connotations, all of which could be used against witches, they made their candies orange, yellow, and white, with sucessive teams of witches creating each layer.

Just as they were about to premier their concoction in France, there was a new wave of witch-burnings.  The witches decided to keep the candy corn for themselves and find a nice quiet place to live until the uproar died down.  They found a quiet little town in the south of France, disguised themselves as nuns, and pretended they had taken a vow of silence until life became safer for them.



The anti-witch uproar, of course, did not die down for centuries, and eventually the recipe was lost.

Finally, while searching for cave paintings, an explorer in the south of France came across the recipe.  He sent it to a maiden aunt in Wichita who the neighborhood children suspected of being a witch.  He thought it would cheer her up and perhaps, with it, she could allay the fears of the suspicious youths.  She made a batch but, while her candy corn was cooling, the recipe blew out the door, ending up at the Wunderlee Candy Company.



The Wunderlees never suspected it of being a witch recipe, and merely thought it to be a wonderful bit of good fortune.  And the rest is internet history.

This candy corn, by the way, is not edible.  The witches tested it to be sure.

Cooking with Jack

I blame this post on Hungry Girl, because she stole my idea of having a line of super-successful cookbooks and then parlaying that to worldwide fame and your own TV show. That was totally my idea, Lisa!

This recipe came from the newest addition to my cookbook collection Moosewood Restaurant Cooking for Health. So far, everything in it has been outstanding. It even has a section of Raw Food recipes (where this raw slaw concoction came from, as a matter of fact).

But just so you cookbook publishers reading this know... I can make up my own recipes, too. And they'd probably be even better than this one. And definitely better than anything Hungry Girl has ever whomped up. Have your people call my people!

Raw Slaw

Start with three galloops of olive oil (note: a galloop is what you approximate a tablespoon to be if you're too lazy to dig around for measuring spoons).

Add a couple of galoops of apple cider vinegar.



Mmmmmm... apple cider.



Man, apple cider sure tasted better when I was a kid!



Just this much salt: smidge.



And this much pepper: loads.


What thyme is it?



Time to chop up some thyme and throw it into the mix (you can tell it's thyme because it doesn't look like rosemary).



Add a dash of evil.



And whisk it all together with a whisk. Set it aside.



Take one beardfull of kale.



Chop, chop, chop.



Get you some red cabbage. Interesting fact about red cabbage: it's red color comes from a flavonoid called anthocyanin, which is also found in blueberries and flower petals (Flavonoids are actually a kick-ass antioxidant).



Chop til you drop. Related interesting fact: typing the word "flavonoid" made me think of my favorite Saturday morning cartoon when I was a kid: The Herculoids.



Third interesting fact: I don't know when my parent's wedding anniversary is, but I can still name all the Herculoids (Zandor, Tarra, Dorno, Zok, Igoo, Tundro and Gloop & Gleep).



Furiously grate three or so carrots; grate them as if the very fate of the land of Amzot on the planet Quasar depended on it.



While you're grating, toss in a couple of nice apples.



Mix it all together. Now you're cooking! (well, technically you're NOT cooking, but you get my drift).



Pour on your whisked-up dressing.

You may want to add some more thyme or black pepper.

It's raw slaw, ya'll.

Next on Cooking with Jack:
Jack's secret to the freshest scrambled eggs you've ever tasted!