Simple Pleasures No. 1: The Banana Split Breakfast

In the middle of midterms week, overloaded with teaching, grading and reading, I found myself in the kitchen of my basement apartment across the street from campus, ready to make a late breakfast of eggs and spinach to curb the appetite which had crept up on me after a furious morning of reading.
When I entered the kitchen, my eyes went straight to the fresh bananas on the counter, a fitting and healthy side dish to my forthcoming egg-centric meal. But lo, my friends! This banana was the fulcrum of the see-saw that balanced between healthy breakfast and delicious, thigh-expanding indulgence! This banana was a temptress, a siren, a gateway food leading me down a nefarious path far from the savory, protein-packed eggs and spinach and towards the freezer, the frozen land where empty calories and sweet devilry live! The yellow fruit in my hand, my mind shot straight to the ice cream left over from a dinner party the night before and the chocolate sauce bought last semester, unused but still viable and deadly.
And so there it was folks, the banana split, hinging on that distant kin of my original breakfast--the banana--was now being prepared by yours truly, half aware of my morning madness! The banana, peeled and split in two created a boundary for three scoops of ice cream to rest between, all awaiting the chocolatey drizzle from the Hershey's Special Dark sauce. A simple three step process which requires little work, but provides a feeling of dessert satisfaction far beyond your typical bowl of ice cream. A poor man's banana split for sure, as there was no whipped cream, nuts or cherries, but a solid and most pleasurable experience which, given its ease of preparation, should be a staple for the collegiate dessert menu. While I would not recommend replacing meals with this delightful combination of fruit and ice cream, I would suggest that my sacrifice of a healthy breakfast may remind you what a wonderful and simple treat the classic banana split might be for you.

It all started with deviled eggs

Julian wanted them.  We can blame him.

Like most of our food nights, the germ of the idea behind this culinary escapade had its beginning in one of the many inane conversations we have while trying to avoid doing any sort of work related to our studies.  I think the phrase, "Deviled eggs are God's food" made an appearance at some point in the discussion.  That was enough to impel us to plan a night featuring this dish prominently, and everything kind of grew from there.  Things got out of hand rather quickly.

We're no strangers to unhealthy food.  But this was something else entirely.  Here's the menu:

16 deviled eggs (thanks, Julian)

• Important note: It's easy to think of deviled eggs as just hardboiled eggs.  This assumption, of course, is incorrect, in that it ignores that in addition to the cholesterol-laden eggs themselves, there's a sizable amount of mayonnaise involved in making any respectable version of egg-bedevilment.  We added four types of garnish: paprika, chives, basil, and dill.

2 boxes of Velveeta shells and cheese (Kirsty's choice)

• As a visitor to this country, Kirsty has had the distinct privilege to have never been exposed to the quasi-food that is Velveeta.  She's gotten her introduction to it recently, and she's appropriately horrified.

1 Little Caesar's cheese pizza (a joint venture)

• These cost $5, and Julian had been climbing all day, so all the other food we had planned on preparing didn't seem quite sufficient to sate his hunger.  Thus, pizza.

9 cups of muddy buddies (Molly's contribution)

• For the uninitiated, this food is simple to make.  All you need is Chex cereal, lots of melted chocolate, butter, and peanut butter, and powdered sugar.  Delicious.  Sublime, even.  At least for the first few handfuls.

We knew it was probably going to be a bad idea to eat all of this fare at once.  But sometimes, you just have to see bad ideas through to the end simply to prove something to yourself.  What we were trying to prove, I can't begin to imagine.  Maybe it was that we felt the need to remind ourselves in some existential way of our own mortality; we needed reminding that regardless of how educated, how cosmopolitan, how sophisticated we believe ourselves to be, mayonnaise, melted cheese (product), and powdered sugar--though delicious--will ALWAYS be able to make us feel terrible about ourselves.  That lesson was driven home with a vengeance on Saturday.  We're probably better--if not slightly fatter--people for it.

Molly

The End of Februany, plus a little bit more...

Yesterday marked the last day of an important month on the Laramie food scene.

February was both Classic Pie Month at Shari's, during which time you could buy any classic pie for just $7.99 or $1.35 a slice (assuming six slices per pie), compared to an average price of $3.99 per slice, and "Februany" at Subway, where all footlongs were under $6, and a selection of which cost just $5.

Naturally, the gang took greater advantage of the Shari's deal. It is estimated that we made at least five trips to this Mecca of baked goods, and now that we've joined the E-Club, providing us each with a certificate for a free slice of pie (except for Julian), I'm sure March will hold many more visits.

KC