More drowned food

NOTE: THE PHOTO LINKED HERE HAS BEEN CHANGED BY THE BLOGGER. Wimp. Your nachos are still ugly--even if they're not drowning in sour cream.

This one does, in fact, use fat free sour cream, but man that's a shitload of sour cream.

The recipe says "fat free sour cream (to taste)." However I think it should say "fat free sour cream (enough so you can't taste anything else)".

Where's the beef?

Even if it is low fat sour cream, this one sent me in search of a much-loved commercial.



Am I showing my age?

It reminds me of when I eat corn for dinner

You just can't go wrong with poo in a can.

Would you eat this...recipe?

mmm mmm mmm mmm mmm...vomit.

So far no one has chimed in with a "Wow, that sounds awesome. I can't wait to try it for my next party."
I wonder why.

Pickle Dip

2 packages dried beef (Cut into small squares)
1 jar baby dill pickles (chop in food processor until you have small pieces)
16 oz whipped cream cheese
16 oz sour cream
1 tbsp water

mix all inredients [sic] with a hand mixer on low until well blended. serve with torilla [sic] chips. scoops work best.

A little specificity never hurt anyone

Just posted on What's Cooking?

"What do you serve at dinner parties?"

Um, food?

(I really want to post with that reply, but I won't)

Stupid Questions

As filler, while I'm in search of more ugly photos (I think people are working hard to either avoid me or try to get in on purpose, and that doesn't work; not to mention the fact that now everyone is saying "it's a bad picture but...") I'd like to mention a few of the incredibly imbecilic questions that get asked on the What's Cooking board. Before I started this blog--when I was contemplating a WC-related blog, I cut and pasted a few stupid posts into a word document that I keep on my desktop.

The other day someone actually asked if shrimp was protein.

I don't have a link for this one, but someone asked a few weeks ago whether they were supposed to put water under the crock in their slow cooker. Why yes, of course, if you want to electrocute yourself and burn your house down in the process.

Sure, I understand that it's supposed to be a place to ask questions about food, but some of the questions are just stupid. Most of the time I just want to reply with "Google!"

I can't get over how many people come on and say "I am going on a diet. Can you please share some healthy recipes?" or this one, which I don't think got any replies:

"My moms birthday is Halloween and they are coming here for dinner. I want to make her a great dinner but i need help. She doesn't eat red meat..and she is on Weight Watchers..Please help..Beth"

Beth really needs help, but it would help if she were a little more specific. How about "Do you have a favorite chicken weight watchers recipe that would make a great birthday dinner for my mom"? Is it really that hard to find a recipe without red meat that is low fat? Beth did not have a picture in her profile, so I could not see what she looks like and make my own assumptions about whether she lives on chicken fried steak.

It reminds me of that Canadian PSA

FOLKS...QUIT WIMPING OUT AND DELETING YOUR ENTRIES. WHERE'S THE FUN IN THAT??

I'm sure this half-eaten Cranberry-Pear Oatmeal tasted yummy, but the first thing I thought of was the woman's burned face in that Canadian kitchen safety video. (The one floating around on the Nest today.)

You can watch that here if you haven't already, but I warn you...it's disturbing. I suppose that's the point.

Ok, so maybe the oatmeal doesn't look that nasty.

chili pie and a chia pet?

No, it's a Pecan Pie Tartlet and a stuffed pumpkin.

It's just hard to tell because the brown stuff in question is very blurry and my eyes are hurting trying to focus on whatever it is.

The pumpkin stuffing apparently was not enjoyed, so I guess they really wouldn't eat it given the choice. I think I would have been forced to put a face on that pumpkin for the full effect. The pecan pie tartlet, on the other hand, probably was pretty tasty. I'm jealous because I didn't get any pecan pie this year, so I would have eaten it in spite of the blurry picture.

Things slowly return to normal

In-law invasion 2007 ended today. This means I can get back to work here. I have a long list of things to go through in my Google Reader, and several pages of Nest postings to scroll through. Thanksgiving makes everyone snap-happy.

For the time being, however, a nap is sounding really good.

On quick glance, I did find a picture in one blog that kind of reminds me of a weird movie shot, where they white everything out under a bright light. I realize that makes no sense when you read it, but look for the Garlic Mashed Redskins.

The rush of comments

It appears I have been outed, as I'm getting comments from people I have not linked to. I'm soooooooooooooooooooooo excited. I think I might go make a pumpkin roll.

I just got home so I haven't had a chance to go looking for the post yet, but I'm sure it was fun. Did I make anyone cry? I must have made at least one person laugh. Please keep up the good work so I can have more to write about, and for those of you who have started new blogs, keep up with them too. Some of them are promising, and I mean that in all seriousness. Not all links on my site are bad. The new blog listing was simply to show how many new blogs pop up in a short period of time.

Happy Thanksgiving! Let's all practice our food photography on some of the gazillion things we'll eat on Thursday.

And here we show the lack of originality

This post cannot be a criticism of ugly food, it's more just a Nestie blog observation. Every so often there is a recipe that shows up in one blog and then is immediately copied and recreated by other blogs. A few weeks ago it was the blondie, and a little while after that, the pumpkin roll. The one that I keep seeing at the moment is the homemade soft pretzel.

I admit that I love soft pretzels, have made them before, and I can't say I won't ever make this recipe, but it gets old seeing the same item on every blog.

The most recent (with nice photos, however) is here.

Others (in no particular order)

I shot the chef (this is the one who has a photographer husband),
another and another (perhaps the original source of the pretzel craze), and another. Or maybe this is the original one. Someone commented on that posting and linked to her own pretzel blog entry.

This may be it for a few days. I'm getting ready to move into crazy holiday mode. Feel free to leave a comment if you spot something good (meaning bad)!

I don't think I'd invest 20 minutes in this

Frozen dinner and instant mashed potatoes=definite blogworthiness. Sure, she's explaining how her goal is a quick dinner with little work, and I too have those evenings, but did we really need to see a picture of it? If you're going to take a picture of this, at least try to make it look more appetizing. Mmm...turkey on toast.

Beer me strength

The Beer Butt Chicken. It was such a phenomenon a few years back. I can't actually say that I've had one, or even seen one in person, but I do think that it must be more appetizing than this photo leads me to believe.

For best results, leave the poo off your plate

I'm just going to start linking to the specific entries I'm referring to. While I do love the shock value of having the pictures on my blog, I don't want to get in trouble for stealing other people's pictures. That would not be a good thing.

This afternoon I present "Poo on Plate"

Yes, I realize those are sausage links, but in the strange yellow glow shared by all of her images, it really looks like the stuff I scoop from my cats' litter box!

The composition would have been much nicer had she simply arranged the four waffles on the plate. The ready-whip does not do enough to distract me from those little logs.

The downside of this blog

It means I now have to actually open the "BU" (blog update) posts on The Nest.

(Ooh! Someone else made the pumpkin roll today!)

Sometimes I think "BU" should stand for "Butt Ugly"...

I also have a correction to make. Peabody, mentioned below, left a comment to let me know that she takes her own food photos, and not her husband as I had written. Clearly I must do more research next time!

This week in New Blogs

I went back as far as I could in old posts and did a ctrlF for "blog" in search of "new blog" announcements.

I found eight. By posting them here, I am not saying they are good or bad, I'm just saying they're new. I want to see how long the excitement of food blogging lasts.

Candice's Culinary Creations (I may have posted one of her pictures above, but at least she admits that she is learning how to use her camera)

Love is Sweet (That's one blurry brownie)

Relish Today....Catchup Tomorrow (ah, Garlic Cheesy Chicken...how original!)

Tameka's Table (it's too early to form an opinion)

Spice of Life (A decent gumbo photo. If others are of similar quality she won't be on here again.)

Lose Yourself:WW and Time Friendly Food Blog (Weight watchers recipes; this one has no photos, so it won't be a possible target until she gets a digital camera)

Spice N' It Up (This one is the source of the photo that hurts my eyes. She definitely needs to activate Macro and kill the flash)

Jenn's Jumpin' Kitchen (I can't get this one to load, but I'll leave it here for a bit)

The rise and fall of the food blog

When blogging first started, people started blogging about food, and many amazing food blogs came about--several leading to published books. That's good food blogging.

What isn't good food blogging, you ask? Just about everything else out there.

I like to lurk on the food board at The Nest. There are some good recipes there, and it's fun to read about people who love to cook as much as I do. It is no surprise that many of the regular posters have blogs.

There are some very creative cooks on the board:

There's Joelen's Culinary Adventures, and Culinary Creations by Peabody. Elly says opa! is another popular one, as is Cara's Cravings.

These, however, are not the ones I'm here to discuss.

Every day (or so it seems) there is a new post entitled "I have a food blog!!!!" The overall quality of the food blog world has really been watered down by discussions of chili-mac and horrid (horrid) food photography. It is clear that many people are not aware of--or do not understand--the macro setting on their digital camera, and do not realize that flash is bad:



It seriously hurts my eyes to look at that one. They keep trying to focus--unsuccessfully!

Others just take pictures of things that don't look good. I understand that you're posting pictures of everything you eat, but one of the most appealing things about food blogs is looking at pictures of things that actually look appetizing. I don't care how delicious that dish was, if it looks ugly why take a picture of it?



That's all for now. I have to go and read more blogs.