Experiments in Fudge Packing



A Fudge Packers Success Story

 I’ve had all these other posts planned to write. Another Scrabble Poetry post from a game played last Sunday; that awkward Rainbow Contra dance (sponsored by the LGBTQ community) I attended yesterday at Seattle's Historic Washington Hall (this dance I should explore as a philosophical blurb on that genderlessness twilight experienced before the child mind transforms into the adult mind; that moment when boy and girls first begin to have an inkling that there could be a difference between them); and then I could have written about last weeks poetry slam  where my friend Carla (a short story writer) competed for her first time--- she composed one of the best spiritual religious poetic narratives I've ever heard. Further, as a side note: love and religious poems are very difficult to do well (another possible future post).

However, with the rapidly approaching holiday madness and that intense drama to see how our glorious overlords would vote on (my fate) the continuance of the unemployment extension, taxes, and all that other DC anti-people war economic crap, I decided to write about my adventures in making holiday fudge. Below are two recipes I came up with (or modified) based upon a recipe I found while surfing the net.

I made four batches total, but only three turned out. The tastiest was the fruity booze fudge, but it didn’t set up properly. It had the consistency of a wet freestanding brownie. I would like to see if it were possible to perfect this into something that is chewy instead of pudding like. My question is this, can fudge be made without evaporated milk; can it be substituted for booze?



Loosely Packed Fudge


Fruity Booze Cake


1 (7 ounce) jar marshmallow crème (+ a few additional marshmallow’s)
½ cup maple syrup
½ cup evaporated milk
½ cup booze (rum / whiskey)
2/3-cup butter
3 cups dark chocolate chips
1 (4 ounce) unsweetened bar 100% pure chocolate
1 cup chopped nuts
1/3 to ¾ cup dried fruit




Put the butter, milk, booze, syrup, extra marshmallows, and marshmallow crème into a sauce pan on low heat (stirring constantly) until the individual marshmallow breakdown and blend into the mix. Add chocolate and stir more till the chocolate blends into the liquid creamy madness and then add the fruit & nuts. Then pour into your well-greased cooling pan and pray for the mixture to set up.

Freshly Packed Fudge

Bill’s Gravity Well Fudge


7-8 ounces of Kraft’s mini-Jet Puffed marshmallows (8/10 of a 10.5 ounce bag)
¾ cup dark brown sugar
¾ cup evaporated milk
1 tablespoon Sailor Jerry’s spiced rum
¼ cup butter
3 cups dark chocolate chips
1 (4 ounce) unsweetened bar 100% pure chocolate
3/4 cup chopped nuts (hazelnuts)
¼ cup dried cherries


Step one: grease cooling pan and gathered the ingredients.
Step two: put evaporated milk, marshmallows, brown sugar, rum, and butter in the pan and mixed the ingredients together
Step three: turned the gas stove on medium heat and kept stirring till the marshmallows broke down and dissolved into the mix
Step four: dumped the chocolate into the pan and stirred till everything gelled together and began to stiffen up.
Step five: mixed in the nuts and dried fruit.
Step six: turned off heat and dumped the chocolaty richness into the well-greased pan and covered it with aluminum foil.
Step seven: placed into the refrigerator and prayed for it to set up.




A Fudge Packers Success Story 2

Addendum...spin forward seven hours...wow...this piece of fudge is heavy, beautifully smooth like metal. I think I need to rename this hunk of chewy glassy richness from gravity well fudge to heavy black metal grunge. This tastes like how the gripping noose of Slipknot or the Black Magic nights of Slayer or the gothic girly band Tristania or the experimental metal band Byzantine or how those final gurgling warrior breaths of Neurosis tone in to my ear. After sampling a piece I felt the crushing gravity of it as I passed through the event horizon of a black hole.




Hopefully, my four nieces and two nephews will enjoy this fudge for Christmas better than the thoughtful gifts I gave them last year that they didn't know how to process (like uncle Bill's mixed metal cd; where I compiled all my favorite metal tunes for my oldest nephew; I thought it was time for him to stop listening to the pop, pop rock of Lady Gaga and enter into that driving maelstrom of masculinity and aggression experienced only within the realm of heavy effing metal).

Last thoughts: I'm wondering, if I had used one ounce less of marshmallows and molasses (like 1/4 cup) instead of the dark brown sugar, it might have turned out denser and more chewy like my very first try at fudge packing.


Merry Christmas

Pluto is too a planet in spite of what Dracula says

 
 
 

Toilet, all I needed was one more "T"
to be swirling down in it...


This week, we played on a different day. Couch surfers assembled on Sunday instead of the usual day. That must have been the reason why I was a little more on top of my game. The day prior I took care of my—and this may to some sound bad—Catholic obligations: I went to Mass at Immaculate Conception; I touched that Hebrew part of me that feels the Saturday Sabbath deep in the bones; it was all-in-all a holy day down to the moving conversations I had with others like me—unrighteous (in the eyes of the rule makers), but that’s another story.

I almost won this game. The spread of words was tight on the board. I was so excited through my exhaustion. Again, I got to lay down the first word, oxen, for twenty-two points. The secret to high scoring plays is to form multiple words. In one such round, I formed three accompanying words from laying down piety. Art Eddie won, because he was able to lay down all his tiles to score fifty-four points with the word wienies & els. In my shoe I had a complete word too, but Dracula was a proper noun, which is forbidden to use according to the official rules. I was robbed of a fifty-plus point play.

Those dam proper nouns!!
This would have been a great word too

The final scores were Art Eddie: 315 & slow-me: 296. I lost by nineteen points.



What the hell am I going to do with these tiles?


The words as they were played: Oxen, dee / do / ex / ee, jag / dog, jail, beer, Aas / aa / dogs, nod / ro, aloud, dour, node / hero, be / dance, oi / in / un, cage, am / cum, qat, tin / qi, lice, liners, zone / el, wienies / els, ‘ey / it / we / piety, licer / orey, oh / hail, flame, kit, of / lo / if, vows / skit, ut / lot, bunt, cager, pe / po

My whatever

“Ey po, po ex-ut dee” Pluto asked?
“Aa oh qi pe po oi,” Aas answered.
Pluto was a dour dog
Aloud in the zone
Lice liners bunt orey hail
Aas fed oxen in the tin cage
A dour jag of beer wienies
“Dance the hero without a kit,” Aas vows
“Be like Lot in the flame.”

Pluto stated, “Cum ey bunt dee we; qi node am ex ut.”
In piety, be not the hero of the skit;
if aloud, drink dour beer in jail.




ART Eddie and Pluto's Dance

aas jag dance pluto
aas ut oi pe

aas aloud we hail pluto
cum be tin dance, sail
aas flame aloud and hail pluto

no dour skit no qat kit
no bunt piety no un tin
no ee no dee

dour zone your cage your orey-flame
aas lice dee dogs and dance
aas cage aloud your jail
hero, be am pe dee
hero, beer am qi
wienies, wienies bunt piety
aas pluto aas qi
aas nod cum cager zones
aas hail your flames
aa cum sail cum sail pluto

Do you see any cool adventures in these words? Give it a try. There are plenty of spaces for comments.

Tavern Drama

On Saturday, November 27, three couch surfers gathered at Café Racer for another competitive game of scrabble poetry. I was hung-over from the previous night’s drama playing darts with contra dancers at a Wallingford tavern. Somehow I managed to play well enough even though I lost the match.

The final Scores were: Bill – 176, Ahmed – 193, Dan – 205

As you can see, at one point in the game, the scores were really close. But in the end, I fell behind, as usualy. Someday I will be the superior player, but this day it wasn't me. This day that player was Dan...

Words as they were played: Poet (this was my word), tweed, ef / ef / we, drama, bap, gun / ag / mu / an, wet, mut, ultra, aw / won, spiel / won, rob, zoo / so, yips / zoos, rho / yo, as / ox, detour, fed / age / mud, neck, revile, year / fa / ager, rager, tavern, zig, qat, na, joe, qi / hi, he / cage, jostle, send, sin, lax, sine, ee, in, son

My poem: The Hangover was all the Rage

The drama at the tavern was a rager
ef, ef, ee mu an rho
Yo, the sine of o
A spiel of so, said Joe
the lax poet in tweed


It was the year of the gun
Rob said, the son of sin
and bap, that wet ef-ing id
carried a heater into a zig

Joe was reviled at the zoo
he detoured Rob into a qat
he jostled the id in the cage
Yips the yo fed the mutt
and the ox with the thick neck


Ahmed’s Poem: a tweed poet's rage

tweed poet
drama spiel
yips me me yo yo
neck id sends
a qat jostle

ultra poet
sine sin, aw wet
wet rho tavern son
gun hi, lax vile
lax neck--qat-fed--
jostles ids

tweed poet caged
drama year rage
sine of the age ef ee ee
detoured me qi

na, detours reviled
mutt ef zoo
jostles cage

ultra poet,
mud mutt son,
vile spiel.

rage joe. rage.

Dan's Short: Tweed Joe Turned to his Son

     "Here's the spiel, boy. You're still a runt with a scrawny little neck, but today get your gun and we're gonna rob the tavern. There's a real rager going on and security's ultra lax."

     "But daaaaddd, robbery is a sin!!!"

     "No buts.... Son, you're going with me or your name is mud!"

     The cops jostled passerbys as they ran down a wet street that rainy night. "Tonight we catch Tweed Joe, the most reviled mutt in town. Better yet, the bounty will keep us fed for a year. Tonight, the battle against his criminal ways will be won!" They zigged and zagged through streets and ignored detour signs. Finally their flashlight beams shone upon the two masked me.

     Joe stared down the cops as his son cowered like a caged animal in a zoo. Joe yelled at his son, "dammit boy, why did you panic and get the yips!"

     "Aw, ef, dad. I can't take this drama. I want to be a poet!"

So the question is, what can you do with the words played in this game? Can you write something more clever? If so, put a clock on it. Fifteen minutes. See what you can pen, I dare you...