Eating Off a Human Body

Nyotaimori Body Sushi, Human Rights and Women’s Status

Increasingly, we are hearing about licking body shots of alcoholic beverages from someone’s bare body. Drinking alcohol is high risk behavior, health-wise, but still not exciting enough, so extreme drinking games and nudity have been added. Further, we are seeing such antics on the big screen – and the really big screen, IMAX – in more and more movies. For instance, Project X.

Project X is nothing like SpaceX, LunarX or the XPrize. It’s about under-aged house party drinking egged on by the older college crowd until 4 square blocks of an upscale neighborhood are demolished and then burned to the ground. It’s fiction based on a true event. But the bad part is that the teenager that was sucked into doing this was complimented on it by his dad in the film. We’ll see more and more of these kinds of films. We’ll see more of the behavior in the future, since parents took their elementary school kids to see this R-rater and they all laughed together. These families should not be surprised to see naked folks in their homes unexpectedly and their kids licking liquor from their bodies.

People eat dinner from nude people-tables, too. The practice did not catch on in the USA in 2003 and was abandoned. In 2007, it became acceptable. Nude sushi restaurants began to open around the nation with completely nude women and men lying on tables and partially covered with sushi, which was more expensive now, because it had a naked woman (or man) under it. In 2012, the practice is more widespread, but the “tables” wear skimpy clothing now.

What’s next for the human body?

In other countries, women are forced to become sushi serving tables in a form of human trafficking –

Nyotaimori Body Sushi, Human Rights and Women’s Status

Christmas Fun – Deliciously Different

A lot of these recipes can be prepared for an ocean of special occasions and they sparkle up any holiday season with something fresh and different. You can be sure that every 10 years, homemaking magazines come up with only slightly different versions of the same recipes of the past decade, hoping to attract new cooks. However, the rest of us get tired of “same same same.” You will not get tired of these dishes!

• Peppermint Stardust Ice Cream; Champagne Cookies and a Stardust Martini – cinnamon and a taste of chocolate, with glitter! See the first three recipes at Peppermint Stardust Ice Cream, Champagne Cookies and a Stardust Martini
• Mostaccioli Cookies – possibly served on a banquet table with chocolate diamonds for anniversaries. These cookies can be formed into spheres, flat rounds, or rolled and cut into diamonds as well.
• My Favorite Christmas Ice Cream Recipes – Why not try a little more spice?
• Christmas and Holiday Sugar Dusted Spice Cake
• Best Brownie Recipes – Add Fruit!
• The Best French Christmas Recipes

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Did you know that Christmas was once illegal in both the UK and the Thirteen Colonies? — The Irish and others used a code to celebrate anyway and we use it today.

• The Twelve Days of Christmas, An Irish Code and 12th Night

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Have you lost loved ones close to Christmas, making it a sad time of year? You can turn all that arond with some moving tributes to help you remember them:

• Memories of Christmas Past Can Comfort Loss and Create Joy

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Do you like Christmas Films? These are not the ones you’ve seen already 100 times, but they are funny, poignant, and memorable.

• The Meaning of Christmas on Film – A Gift of The Magi Christmas
• Best Books and Films of 2011 – We Bought a Zoo
• From the film critic - Top 8 Favorite Christmas Films of 2011

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How about Christmas Travel? -

• Christmas in Antarctica

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Historical Accuracy: 1621 Thanksgiving – No Pilgrims or Pie, But Beer

Museum documents in the form of correspondence and diary pages from settlers and the Mayflower; along with marketing records for smaller department stores,  F&R Lazarus, and the larger Federated Department Stores enterprise and big business in 1840 show that the scenario of black-and-white dressed Pilgrims and pies did not appear at the First Thanksgiving at all.  The first harvest failed.  The popular story is a marketing ploy invented by a female advertising person for a department store in the US East in 1840 – revisionist history written to make the English settlers more sympathetic and to garner more Holiday Shopping dollars. I had ancestors that saw it all happen. This need not ruin Thanksgiving, but many people are tired of the lies.

The Pilgrims stayed in England. The poorest of the poor  were sent to America and called themselves “saints.” They brought kegs of beer, according to historic records and eye-witness accounts, and no seed for crops.  They did not plan ahead, thinking everything they’d need would be in the New World,  and their governor was disgusted at one point – although he should have accepted some of the responsibility. His edict of He who does not work shall not eat was not only necessary, but NOT one that would have been used on disciplined and hard working Pilgrims.

Native Americans provided most of the food, along with 90 uninvited guests -  traditions that surprised the 1621  English. The natives provides all of the corn – 10 acres of it. There were no pies, because there was no wheat to grind into flour! Puddings of the day – like pies without crusts – were made instead. The food was good and we have the original recipes form The Ohio State University, whose staff researched the first gathering and the foods.

Please enjoy:

• Original Recipes From 1621 – But There Was No Pie At the First Thanksgiving

• Old Thanksgiving – Pie Nation and The Great Uninvited Guests

• How Mince Meat Became Meatless

French Tarragon Bean Casserole – A Better Thanksgiving

This is by far a tastier dish than the canned-soup-bean-canned-fried-onion bowl that some have seen overcooked for many years. Using real mushrooms, fresh green beans, and lite sour cream or Greek yogurt, this is a casserole  that takes just a little while longer to prepare than the usual fare. In fact, the longest step in the recipe is cooking for 10 minutes inside the oven.

Try this recipe and find out what tarragon has to do with a Dragon and the play Waiting for Godot!

A Fresh New Classic – The Little Dragon Alternative

And don’t miss this fascinating and delicious dessert:

Christmas and Holiday Sugar Dusted Tomato Spice Cake – Extra Moist and Delicious!

Brownies are good for any holiday and a lot of everyday affairs:

Best Unique Brownie Recipes for the Holidays – Add Fruit!

Mid-Ohio Festivals for July

Top 10 Best Mid-Ohio Festivals around July 4th

The State of Ohio celebrates festivals in nearly every one of its cities and towns, especially during the 4th of July Week.  Amish Country in mid-Ohio is no different. The counties of Richland and Holmes about an hour north of Franklin County and Columbus OH celebrate festivals every day of the week of July 4th and onward through the end of July.

Loudonville is particularly schedule with daily festivals, with some lasting 3 days or a week.  Classic Cars, Native American Pow Wow, Antiques,  Fireworks, Amish Food, and many other features of the area draw visitors every year.  We even have a Balloon Festival or two, alpaca farms, Chautauqua and a Halloween Haunt Night for adults in this area. It’s a great place for a family vacation or wedding trip with many sites for beautiful pictures among our State Parks and forests.

The Food Pyramid is Gone

The Food Pyramid is now a Pie Chart – or The Plate. 

MyPlate is new. And different. 

The Plate requires to be filled 50% with fruits and vegetables every day.  If US families, singles, and youth can change from consuming NO fruits and vegetables to eating SOME fruits and vegetables several times a week, then the change can lead to better health.  This is all provided that the people can afford the fruits and vegetables. During the months of January through May 2011, my local store brand canned green beans rose in price from 58 cents to 75 cents a can. Not expensive?  In 2010, they were 49 cents.

Fresh vegetables are expensive, but each week, the local Kroger and Marc’s puts two rotating vegetable selections on sale at lower prices. They also mark down vegetables several times a week at the end of the day and this helps people.

Changes can certainly help the groups of kids that are habitually overfed by parents, but can we afford fruits and vegetables?  Some can grow their own, but not everyone is able to do so.

Work and Life

A few topics to be considered at the end of Spring:

• Downtown Revitalization The Columbus Commons - How fast growing cities are redeveloping urban areas with green spaces, new businesses and new jobs, while entertaining families. It’s genius!
•  Spring and Summer Non-Alcoholic Punch Drinks - Some of these even contain fruit teas and one uses a coffee-ice cream punch. These are different, great for the whole family, but can be kicked up with alcohol for adults if desired. Very versatile. It’s been in the 90s F in Ohio during the last week of May, despite the deluge of rain storms. These beverages are not expensive to make, and just in time to break the heat spell.
•  How the Retail Marketing Calendar Swallowed Patriotic Holidays - Patriotic holidays were ripe for co-opting for retail sales promotions way back in 1840, when one woman made up a Thanksgiving Story that people ate without chewing -they inhaled it like a drug. In the 21st C, all our patriotic holidays are but stepping stones to Christmas Shopping, but plenty of Americans still honour our armed services people.      
• Series Capstone: Aboriginal Peoples In Canada - Many more bands of First Nations peoples are receiving recognition since the suceess of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics. Big changes are occuring in recording the histories of these peoples.

Ice Cream Sundaes – Long Before 1700

Ever hear of a leather ice cream cone? Keep reading

The wintertime farms in eastern Ohio, families made ice cream from the snow, adding sugar, or honey when they kept bees, vanilla, and some milk or fresh farm cream. This tradition went back before the American Civil War and probably farther.

For a big treat, they dribbled honey over fresh vanilla ice cream. For me, the ice cream sundae was invented the first time someone made ice cream from snow and put something on top: honey, home-canned friut, dried fruit, molasses, maple syrup, homemade mincemeat yes, and probably some other condiments.

We cannot place a date on that, but I know it was done at least as far back as 1840 in my fathers family, when the men were working on the National Road, Route 40.

When did the commerical ice cream sundae and cones first appear?

Ice Cream Sundaes and Cones - Fact or Fiction?.

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A Judge Bee Mystery: New Writer’s Awards

Interesting Journey (you know what “interesting” means in China…)

Our journey this week takes us on assignment to the Ancient China That Should Have Been, But Was Not, as described in author Barry HugHart’s trilogy. Indeed, it is also the land of the actual Judge Dee and his written case mysteries, one of the world’s first detectives as well as a judge.

Fortuitously, we have with us on the HubNugget Team one of his descendants, the Honorable Judge Bee. See her to the right as she feeds her geese while contemplating The Case of the 18 Purloined HubNugget Wannabes. They were nicked by someone with access to the vault…

A Judge Bee Mystery.

Do you like NBC’s Harry’s Law? –  Help us choose 6 winners in this Mystery set in Ancient China, filled with literary references and puns.

The Egg Beater Museum Piece

It is time for some new kitchen inventions, because we are mixing up the names of the ones we have – whisks, beaters, mixers — who can tell the difference any more?  

Inventions can lead to more jobs – like the  green algae that makes oil. Like plastic bottles made from corn.

I’d  like a table top that disposes of your empty meal vessels when you’re done eating — Just press a button and the items vaporize. A vent overhead could collect the vapors and redirect them to some other appliance that might recycle them into other items.

We are headed in such a direction with the plastic water bottles made from corn — they disintegrate easily in landfills or they can be recycled. Taco salad bowls are made of taco shells and soup in a bread bowl is entirely edible, so we as a people are approaching cup and plate extinction to a small degree already.

For some kitchen data and a movie of the Abracadabra Egg Beater Museum, read the following piece:

The Manual Egg Beater, A Museum Piece.