A quiet night
posted in Alaska, Chinese culture, Cooking, Crafts, Food, Holidays and Festivals, OmegaDad, OmegaDotter, Politics |OmegaDotter is off spending the night at a friend’s house, so OmegaDad and I took the opportunity to Get Things Done.
What this consisted of this evening is me wielding a hair dryer to warm up wax paper stuck to slabs of chocolate Rice Krispie treats, and OmegaDad carefully cutting and gluing them together with buttercream frosting.
Why?
It is time for OmegaDad’s Christmas gingerbread house. This time, he is doing a pagoda on top of a Guilin-esque hill, beside a stream. The great secret behind many a creation here is the structural use of Rice Krispie treats; in this case, the hill is made of layers of them. He had made three cookie sheets full, then covered them with wax paper while they “cured”; the problem is that the wax paper had adhered completely. The first slab, we picked the wax paper off veeeerrrry carefully. Then OmegaDad had his flash of brilliance, scurried off to the bathroom, returned with my hair dryer, and voila, the deed was done quickly and handily.
Now, I realize that many adult adoptees will cringe at the decor ideas for this year’s gingerbread fantasy, but keep in mind that these particular ideas come straight from OmegaDotter:
There will be pandas made of fondant. Here’s one of the pandas, already made:
Isn’t he squee-fully cute?!
Then, OmegaDotter insisted that there be ninjas. She likes ninjas, so ninjas there will be. She and OmegaDad spent a happy evening researching how to make fondant ninjas on Google images.
There will be a stream of vivid blue rock sugar.
There may be a Chinese-style bridge over the stream. It is in the plans, but OmegaDad sounds kind of dubious about it.
The pagoda will be a round pagoda, somewhat like this hexagonal one.
OmegaDad told me this afternoon, while surrounded by heaps of dirty dishes and carrying the last slab off to the dining table, that The Food Network was letting everyone down, because their Cake Challenge show never showed the immense work that had to be done in the background to allow the stars to do their stylin’ cakes—the people who made the fondant, the royal icing, the buttercream, the layers of cake. All you see is the finished pieces being carved and put together, but behind all that is the unsung work of many others.
And while we were doing that, the Senate was voting to repeal Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. It’s about time! And both of Alaska’s senators voted for the repeal—yay!
