I'm going to be sick

This last pastry block really kills.

No, seriously.

We were working with gelatin, which in itself is disgusting enough on multiple levels, but I finally got around to trying to find the parent company for Cacao Noel (not so easy - they're French).

Through the distributor site, I was able to at least determine the country of origin of the beans. Cacao Noel proudly states they have a factory in equatorial Cote d'Ivoire. A previous roommate did her peace-corp service there, and aside from the stories of men being turned into chickens, the idea that the boxes of chocolate that we're blasting through are all the result of a likely chance of child slave labor (a 10-year old sold for $30?) hurts my very soul:

Following international media reports in 2000 and 2001 of widespread child labor abuses in West African cocoa farms, which produce 70 percent of the world's cocoa, the international human rights community investigated the problem. A 2002 joint study published by the ILO and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture found that an estimated 284,000 children on cocoa farms in West Africa were "either involved in hazardous work, unprotected or unfree, or have been trafficked." Most of the children were on cocoa farms in Cote d'Ivoire, the world's largest cocoa producer. The remaining children labored on farms in Ghana, the world's second-largest producer, and in Cameroon and Nigeria. (Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000: Trafficking in Persons Report 2007, US State Department, http://www.state.gov/g/tip/rls/tiprpt/2007/)

The industry stepped up rather quickly and forged an allegiance stating they would make the farms slave-labor free by 2005 (Harkin-Engel Protocol). Right. I can't find any follow-up report on statistics (although the one linked above is from 2007) stating what the current child labor statistics are, there is still no ban on child-slave-labor produced chocolate to the US, and knowing industry, this product we use hasn't suffered any harm from the aforementioned slap-on-the-hand industry self-regulated policy, if in fact they were using slave labor, which is probably the case since I can't find anything that says they aren't.

So what do I do? (Other than crosspost, of course)

World of Warcraft groomscake - kind of

World of Warcraft groomscake - kind of
Originally uploaded by carabou.

B&CD are getting married even as I type this. But me, who fell asleep last night while making a batch of brownies and totally burned them, managed to procrastinate just enough that I couldn't figure out how to make the warcraft cake work in the few remaining hours before we were supposed to leave to drive ALL THE WAY OUT to Cedar Park.

The original airbrush idea fell through and. although the backup looks passable, it only barely represents where I wanted it to go. My inspiration and desire are so much more advanced than my ability. I've been living in a digital world for so long that I'm betrayed by the lack of an undo button. Stupid autoshapes. Grr.

I am so glad they love us. I'll be the first to admit that I have sooooooo much to learn on my craft (but not warcraft -- that's a whole other world). Three more months before we start the celebration cake block. Three more months and I'll actually learn all of the techniques for putting together a wedding cake and fancy sugar flowers and towers of tempered chocolate. Three more months, and I will pwn pastillage.

If only they were getting married in November...

But I love them dearly, and they're getting married today in the rain and I still have to transport everything down to Bee Caves (in the humid rain - yay!) without destroying it too much (the N&D is crazy more nervous about this than I am). And I love them even more for letting me make one of the most important things about their wedding without worrying too much.

They're so cool. Love. Kittens. Rainbows. Pink fuzzies. All that.

Testing the tiers

Testing the tiers
Originally uploaded by carabou.

My first wedding cake! And LONG before we get to the wedding cake block in P&B, so I"m sure I"m making all kinds of stupid little mistakes as far as construction and time coordination.

But I have learned a lot. And this is kind of fun, but I realize why wedding cakes cost so much. There's a lot of structural engineering involved. And chemistry. Plus piping (as I'm learning from Chef Mary and Summer) is a zen-like experience that requires some sort of transcendence. Or perhaps just a shot of scotch.

Anyway. I was spending all my money at Whole Foods for the free-range, fair trade, shade grown, local, organic, preservative-free, local, holistic, enlightened etc. ingredients (because, you know, we live in Austin and that's just how we roll) before Casey-Dawn and Brian informed me that CostCo has a lot of the same stuff, and is much cheaper.

I am now a CostCo convert. It's like Target to Walmart for Sams. A little more trendy in the selections, not so much focused on the cheapness (in price) of the product as much as a lifestyle choice for the people who are shopping there. Dare I say a middle class Sams? We live in such a small house that buying things in bulk is silly unless we have a storage freezer.

Oh, wait ... we do. I stopped feeding the dogs raw, so there's no need to store 80# of rabbit and three cases of chicken necks in it. I'm not turning into a mormon, storing a year's supply worth of food, but if a case of paper towels ends up in the freezer, well ...

Central Market is EVIL!

When I was much younger, my mom had a giant fig bush in her yard that would annually produce fresh figs, preserves, filling for kolaches, and other delectable sweets. But mainly they would be eaten fresh, since the peak ripeness is so short, the flavor is so intensely subtle, and she would have to beat the wasps to the flowering fruit to enjoy the harvest.

I was five. And I didn't like them. Hate is a strong word, but the flavor was much too intense for me, and they had all of those seeds.

It wasn't until much, much later, when I was in college, that I found out that I actually liked figs. Okay, to be honest, I actually liked Fig Newtons. I would give blood once a month just for the cookie-and-orange-juice recovery to satisfy my craving for Nutter Butters since I didn't really want to buy them (I was on a limited budget, and I would rather give the money to the band tip jar than waste it on over-processed sweets). The blood bank was out of my favorite at one visit so I decided to give the Newtons a try. I was surprised at how good they tasted, although it could have been a craving for sugar since I had just given blood, but a post-visit purchase reaffirmed the change in my palate (seeds and all).

My love for figs emerged.

We're pretty lucky living in Austin because we can grow our own figs (and I plan to plant one once I find a suitable location). But we can also purchase fresh local figs at the farmers markets, small farms, and even grocery stores. Which is why Central Market is evil - in a good way.

Yesterday I went in looking for either a Meyer lemon or a fresh lychee (they had neither, so I bought a Daisy mandarin instead. Tasty! and it had the flavors I wanted to compliment my earl grey creme brulee for class). Right at the entrance was one of the CM staff foisting off warm figs centered with chevre, wrapped in pancetta and drizzled with honey. I'll use that presentation with dried figs or dates, and with bacon or gruyere, but the flavors were so amazing that I couldn't help snapping up a small bag of sliced pancetta, the figs, and the rosemary-infused imported honey (even though it wasn't local and we've got some good honey in the area, this particular jar was sweet, subtle, and slightly savory - perfect for the pancetta). I passed on the imported chevre for a local variety (which they were out of! so I got some that originated in Wisconsin) and looked forward to telling the N&D about the purchases.

Which he passed on in favor of the peanut-butter/chocolate cheesecake. He had that for dinner last night along with a hot dog since I was in class.

This morning I looked at the figs and tried to figure out how I could best take advantage of their yumminess, without making too heavy of a meal. Fresh - with a honey drizzle, sliced pancetta and ... something else. Here I had a dilemma. Pancakes would be too soft, biscuits or waffles wouldn't give the right accompaniment. I needed something simple, but different enough that it could be perceived as elegant. Popovers? I flipped through Fanny and found a recipe for scones. Of course! But I didn't have cream, so I substitute sour cream instead. Rich and amazing scones, and perfect for what I was after. I served medallions of the goat cheese instead of butter to spread, and put the whole thing on a plate and was amazed at how perfect it was for breakfast.

(and I started eating before I realized I wanted to take a picture, so it's a slice of life shot.)

Snakes and Ladders

Half asleep while I'm entering this. Not enough coffee yet, and dind't get much sleep last night.

Started classes again last night after a break, and we've got a bunch of prep work to do before each session. While the N&D watched "jeckyl" on the TV (a BBC show) I wrote out recipe formulas on index cards, and researched method for what we will be producing tomorrow. And I'm hitting the recipe books because not all of the methods are in the textbook and we're supposed to plan a timeline, too. So we didn't get to bed until long after 12:30 (and we're trying to get up at 5:30-6 to run).

As soon as the light was out in the bedroom (I'm reading a book on social class in England to complement my book on social class in America), I noticed Pico's stomache rumbling and grumbling. So I prod the N&D about food and what that crazy noise was (I had to pick up some EVO at Tomlinsons earlier and got a free sample of the raw medallion food from the distributor). Hope is doing fine, but poor Pico. She sounded like a gurgle machine. I wasn't too worried about it because I did the fast and gorge while raw feeding, so I know it's actually good for them every once in a while, but since she's on kibble, it's not so necessary to clean out the bones from the bowels. Then I noticed the security light was on next to the garage (actually, I noticed it when it went off). N&D let me prod him to go outside. But that took a while b/c then all the dogs had to go pee and do their doggy sniffy thing.

Also not sleeping well because of stress (even with acupuncture). The oven died last night and the N&D told me about it so I can get it fixed soon. I volunteered to make celebration cakes for friends and family next weekend. And we're throwing a lot of our spare cash at making the celebration cakes, fixing up the house, and the EV conversion. Plus we need to get some replacement parts for Kharmann Electra, and the editing job I've been doing has been going really slow because their scanning team sucks. Anyway, when I finally drift off (and have a horrid dream about adopting a ginger tabby that Chuy attacks and breaks its legs, and then while we're dealing with him and trying to decide if we need to rush it to the emergency hospital right then, and how we're going to pay for it, when Chuy (in the dream) eats the tiny kitten we're also kitten-sitting. Nice dream, eh?) when we're shocked by what sounds like a mouse getting strangled by a snake coming from our closet (not a dream. And I know the sound because I saw a mouse getting strangled by a snake at Natural Garden with neighbor while we were looking at their plants last year and getting an order of crushed gravel for the yard. Neighbor may be a golden gloves boxer, but does not like snakes). Esme is in the closet, but there is no mouse in either her jaws or paws. She's just staring at the corner. Again, N&D let me prod him to get a flashlight and shine in to make sure it's in the walls (I really don't think I could handle a snake in the closet. I've seen the snake. It bit one of the dogs on the face, a few weeks ago and it's HUGE!).

So we have a large snake eating the mice in our walls. It's a natural exterminator, but I'm really unsure what to do about this. I like snakes; I just don't want to share my living quarters with them. Mice are really destructive and we'd have to get them out of the house; most methods of extermination aren't guaranteed to work quickly and humanely. Especially after watching Ratatouille. So the snake is the most humane way of killing the mice, and once they're gone, it will leave, but I don't know if it will kill them fast enough (mice breed fast, and snakes only kill when they're hungry - even if they are large). And what if the snake has snakelings? And can I handle Chuy always trying to get under the house to get to the snake (he's already destroyed the side facing and we have a large tire, several pieces of wood and concrete blocks trying to keep him out. He's a strong, determined dog)? And then we'd have to send in an old lady who swallowed the fly ...

So that's my morning AGGGGH! And I just killed the third fly of the morning (still fewer than last year) and only drank about an inch of coffee in my caribou coffee mug. Why am I afraid of the day?