Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Somebody needs to explain to DeSantis that nobody needs to do anything to make him look bad.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

You cannot love your country only when you win.

“Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on.”

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

I really should read my own blog.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

This blog will pay for itself.

Dead end MAGA boomers crying about Talyor Swift being a Dem is my kind of music. Turn it up.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.

The Giant Orange Man Baby is having a bad day.

The choice is between normal and crazy.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

I conferred with the team and they all agree – still not tired of winning!

You are here: Home / Food & Recipes / Nailed It!

Nailed It!

by | 97 Comments

This post is in: ,

This abominable snowman cookie needs work!

Terrible attempt at an abominable snowman cookie.Next time I’ll start with a base of white icing (would have done today but didn’t have any ready made) and add shredded coconut for the fur.

Drunken Aunties Cookie Night is tomorrow. I’ll try to post about it live, but it’s an unpredictable event.

As mentioned in a previous comment, I’m gonna try to avoid a hideous faux pas like I committed last year when I mistook a teen cookie decorator’s Frida Kahlo gingerbread for Paddington Bear.

Various crappily decorated cookies.

In my defense, Ginger Frida was wearing a Paddington blue frock, and she lacked the iconic uni-brow. I’m not psychic, man!

Open thread.

PS: There’s a splendid Belted Kingfisher hunting in our lagoon, diving into the water about 40 feet from where I’m sitting. So cool! Will try to get a pic.

Reader Interactions

97Comments

  1. 1.

    O. Felix Culpa

    Mr. Abominable looks like he’s been pelted by dozens of tiny snowballs. Cute.

    I would have taken Frida for Paddington too, fwiw.

    ETA: I love your drunken aunties tradition. Neither of my sisters drinks,  so I would have to be a singular drunken auntie, which is much less fun.

  2. 2.

    VFX Lurker

    Abominable snowman cookie…or ADORABLE snowman cookie? I love the way the snowman’s eyes look up and out of the frame.

    Great photos of tasty-looking cookies!

  10. 10.

    Juju

    I know I’m in a minority, but I would say don’t ruin the abominable snowman cookie with coconut. You need a grass making frosting tip. The tip number is 233. I know this because I have a few. They are also good for making Cookie Monster or Elmo.  Ick. Coconut.

  14. 14.

    KatKapCC

    @Juju: I’m with you. To each their own with food, of course, but coconut is one of those things I just cannot deal with. Funny thing is I love the scent of it, like in lotion or something. But the flavor and texture just don’t work for me.

    But I happen to love black licorice, so what do I know.

  17. 17.

    NotMax

    Worked up quite the sweat on Wedneday hefting around the heavy box and putting together the holiday present to myself, a new desk chair. Been contemplating a new one for a while, ended up being an attractive buy on Black Friday. Impending tariffs hastened the decision.

    Like it but it’s going to take some breaking in to reach the Goldilocks “just right” state of the former one. Which I shall greatly miss but after nearly 25 years was showing significant wear and tear.

  21. 21.

    Juju

    @KatKapCC: I don’t even like the scent. I almost passed out on a bus because a person somewhere close to me had so much coconut something on.  To me, the scent of coconut is akin to Axe body spray.

    I too love black licorice. So what do I know, as well?

  23. 23.

    Betty Cracker

    @Juju: A grass tip would work — good idea! I’m pretty sure I have one. Could perhaps put frosting through a garlic press if not. (That’s how I make the butter lamb pelts!) We like coconut, but I know some folks don’t.

    PS: I hate licorice of all types, and black is the foulest. I wonder if there’s an inverse correlation between coconut and licorice appreciation?

    PPS: I’ve never seen the film Licorice Pizza even though I heard it’s good because the title is so horrifying! I’m afraid they’ll ruin a pizza!

  24. 24.

    New Deal democrat

    Since this is an open thread, let me post this here:

    Among many other things, economists (even Wall Street ones) fear Trump 2.0 is going to politicize vital government statistics about the economy:

    https://bsky.app/profile/aaronsojourner.org/post/3l5uzmf3suc25

    This would make data like the unemployment rate or number of jobs created completely unreliable. We would be “flying blind.”

    There are a number of alternate, usually private sources of similar information from which we could cobble together fair estimates (until Trump leans on them to shut up or tow the line as well).

    On top of which there is the fact that Trump 1.0 took over a growing economy in 2017 and didn’t do much to derail it. But there are increasing signs that the economy is weakening going into 2025, and Trump 2.0 has learned by trial and (lots of) error where the points of leverage are.

    In other words, buckle up Dorothy, because it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

    ETA: and the Fed indicated yesterday that they may not cut interest rates as much as people thought next year, because inflation is likely to be persistent or higher. This will set off a battle royale over whether Trump can fire them, also not good for economic confidence.

  27. 27.

    Juju

    @Betty Cracker: You could do grass tip for people who don’t like coconut and coconut for those who do like coconut.  I actually think the coconut would probably look better, but it’s coconut , so ick.

  28. 28.

    Kay

    He’s cute. I did almost nothing for Christmas. I didn’t even buy the tree – I sent my youngest to go fetch it from the Lions fundraiser. It’s sort of haphazardly decorated. I’m having only my middle and youngest son and youngest son’s gf so it’s going to be very low key. My daughter is staying home with her husband and two little girls this year, which I 100% support. It’s too much for them to come to me (from NY), plus I fret about them driving in weather.

    Merry Christmas, Betty. I’m so glad you’re here.

  30. 30.

    cope

    Sister and BIL coming over for drinks and snacks shortly. My wife’s birthday was last week and we’ll be celebrating that as well as solstice season. We made some tasty olivetta crostinis, seasoned nuts and apple cider donuts for sweets. There will be alcohol involved, hell, I might even indulge in a mid-day gummy.

  33. 33.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    Ain’t watching cool birds do cool stuff neverendingly pleasing?

    I think I’ve seen a Belted Kingfisher maybe once or twice.  I’m sure we’ve seen one over the last year or three here in Colorado, probably when biking walking along one of the Splatte trails.  Then maybe once back in Central Misery but I’m less certain of that.

    One thing we’ve learned is just how much birds love very specific habitats.  Again back in Misery, we had tons of Baltimore Orioles in season because we lived along the Osage River whereas a work buddy who lived “inland” (not near the river but maybe 6 miles from me as the crow flies), never saw one but his immediate area was a hive for Painted Buntings whereas we never got any.

  34. 34.

    Currants

    Oh I hope you get the shot!! I’ve been listening to one out buzzing around my pond for most of the afternoon, but the sun’s at the wrong angle/location to get much of a sighting.

  35. 35.

    Juju

    @Betty Cracker: I have no idea about the licorice/coconut thing. I’ve never thought to take a survey on that subject matter.   As one of five children,  my parents tended to be cheap, especially about treats. It was licorice,  flavor-ade ,day old bread , Dolly Madison and Miracle Whip  most of my youth.  I did not realize Miracle Whip was not mayonnaise until my mid 20s.  I have no issues with cilantro, but yogurt tastes metallic to me.

  37. 37.

    JustRuss

    I saw a belted kingfisher for the first time a few weeks ago. He landed on a dock about 30 feet from me as I was soaking in a hot tub on a frosty morning.  So cool. The bird, not me.

  40. 40.

    CaseyL

    The Abominable Snowperson looks like a merino sheep to me :)

    In the second photo, I see what looks like a dinosaur cookie cutter off to the side, but I do not see any dinosaur cookies! What madness is this?

    However, all the cookies look delicious and, since I really shouldn’t be eating cookies anyway, I’m glad you’re all the way off in Florida and I can’t innocently drop over to “QA” the batch.

  41. 41.

    scav

    As licorice was brought up.  Best thing about the last two Advents was the calendar by Lakrids by Bülow, and the Christmas before that we were given some.  Basically stunning, especially the softer slow crafted licorice cores, but if you’re going to indulge, indulge.

    eta and I say that as someone that loathes allsorts and is meh about strings.  Oddly enough, likes the salted ones, but that doesn’t play into the Lakrids above.  It’s a big world, licorice.

  42. 42.

    Betty Cracker

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage: We see tons of kingfishers here, and you’re right about the specific habitats. Even birds who share the same type spread out. We rarely see coots right in front of our place, but there are tons just upriver. We have moorhens at all times.

    Here’s a better kingfisher photo that I took a while back.

    Female Belted Kingfisher on a branch with a fish.

  45. 45.

    Old Man Shadow

    My Christmas gifts are mostly wrapped. I have one late arrival that needs wrapping paper.

    And I need to go shopping at the booze big box store to pick up maybe a mezcal for a white elephant gift.

    Gotta make a lasagna for Xmas Eve dinner. I know it’s supposed to be a bechamel sauce and not ricotta, but I’ve never made bechamel before and now doesn’t seem like the time to try it.

  47. 47.

    KatKapCC

    @Betty Cracker: I find it kind of fascinating to wonder about things like food preferences and why we have them. Like, why do one person’s taste buds tell them a food tastes bad and another person’s tell them it tastes good, you know? Technically, the flavor is exactly the same for both, but it gets interpreted differently. Even for just ourselves — like, why do I love peaches but not plums?

    I know it sounds like I’m high as a kite right now, but I’m not. Just curious :P

  48. 48.

    Old Man Shadow

    Technically, the flavor is exactly the same for both

    Not really though.

    Each of us has a different combination and number of taste receptors. Our brains and brain chemistry have subtle differences as well. Genes too.

    If you like cilantro, you’re a mutant like me. If you don’t have that mutation, then cilantro has a soapy flavor.

  49. 49.

    gratuitous

    “I’ll try to post about it live, but it’s an unpredictable event.”

    Unspoken: What with the cops showing up and all.

  50. 50.

    KatKapCC

    @Old Man Shadow: But that’s my whole point. The technical flavor of the food is the same, but our bodies process and interpret it differently. If I take a plum and cut two slices off, and eat one myself and give one to my mother (who loves plums), the factual flavor of those two slices is the same, even though I will say it doesn’t taste that good and she’ll say it’s delicious. If you put the slices under a microscope or through whatever kind of lab testing, they would give the same results. It’s how our bodies interpret the flavor that is different. Your cilantro example doesn’t mean the cilantro LITERALLY tastes like soap outside of anyone’s mouth. That’s just how certain people’s taste buds interpret it, because of that mutation.

  51. 51.

    Mart

    Many moons ago Ms. Cracker listed a pistachio and dried cranberry biscotti recipe. Now it is a tradition that my wife tells me I must make every year. I don’t mind except for the part of me that requires marked rulers and exacting cuts so they look perfect. Which is really silly as the ones that are not perfect are scarfed up by me, and they taste the same as the pretty ones.

  53. 53.

    Ohio Mom

    Sorry, the abominable snowman looked like Cookie Monster in a polka-dotted snowsuit to me — also looked absolutely delicious, so there’s that.

  55. 55.

    TBone

    That cookie looks a bit like the snowsuit-wrapped little brother who couldn’t put his arms down from ‘A Christmas Story’ movie.

    Randy!

  57. 57.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Miss Bianca: Black licorice here.*  I can take or leave coconut.

    *I am getting reading to venture out into the snow to get a last couple of Christmas presents.  I may buy some licorice while I am out.

  60. 60.

    catclub

    @KatKapCC: Funny thing is I love the scent of it, like in lotion or something.

     

    Hey, I am the opposite. I hate the smell of those things, but there are certain things that flaked coconut is great in.

  62. 62.

    Ohio Mom

    @KatKapCC: Some of that — certainly not all — of preferring certain tastes is learned. I remember seeing a video of an indigenous fellow in the Outback, turning over a log and how excited he was to grab and eat the grubs wriggling around there.

    I felt a similar revulsion when my mother remarked that her dad’s favorite food was sheep brains. I never saw him eat them, I suppose they were much more available in his childhood in Czechoslovakia than his late-life neighborhood in Brooklyn.

    Perception of colors is also a mix of biology and learned behavior. Some cultures don’t have names for certain colors and so people don’t see/perceive them. I think the old nature be nature conundrum will never be solved.

  67. 67.

    Miss Bianca

    @Mart: Ooh, Pal D makes biscotti for us – he just did some pumpkin spice ones with vanilla frosting that we are giving to friends with little bags of local-roasted coffee for Christmas.

    Pistachio and dried cranberry? Sounds fantastic to me! Would you or Betty care to share the recipe again?

  68. 68.

    scav

    @Ohio Mom: No, the people see the colors, they just don’t have one word descriptions for them.  We see light blue, despite not having a one-word description for it as Russian speakers do.

  71. 71.

    Jackie

    GQP announces new Funding Bill:

    House Republicans are eyeing a bill to extend government funding for three months while suspending the debt limit until January 2027, Punchbowl News reports.

    The legislation would also extend the farm bill, send $110 billion to disaster-stricken areas and extend a number of health care provisions.

    CNN reports a House vote is expected around 6 p.m. but it’s still uncertain it will pass.

  72. 72.

    AM in NC

    @Old Man Shadow: So the mutation results in liking cilantro? I was thinking the mutation made it taste like soap.  Bummer. Now I’m the mutant and my brother the normie.

  75. 75.

    Bill Arnold

    @New Deal democrat:
    The case of Russian COVID-19 statistics is illustrative.
    Russian government-published COVID-19 death statistics were low by a factor of 3 or 4 for the pandemic (or much of it).
    Excess deaths were computable because Rosstat was issuing un-fudged mortality numbers.
    The Moscow Times (US hosted) would regular print both the official Russian COVID-19 mortality numbers and the much larger excess deaths estimate based on Russian general mortality numbers.

  76. 76.

    raven

    @TBone: After losing our ass with our current “advisor” we were informed that the stock market would like it if TFG got elected. Can he be wrong again?

  77. 77.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @scav: there are people who are tetrachromats (four types of color receptor cells instead of the standard human three) and I think there are visual tests that you can take to determine if you are one.

  80. 80.

    catclub

    @TBone: ​
    &nbsp

    ;I’m pessimistic as hell about the future right now, so we’ll see who is correct, me or him.

    I will note that the majority of investors ( surveyed) are optimistic about the US stock market.
    This could be a contrary indicator. 1) On average a majority thinks the next year will be market lower…
    and they are usually wrong.

    I think the US S&P500 has had an incredible run against the rest of the world, over the past 18 years or so.
    so I want to balance into stocks from the rest of the world, which have a chance of making great gains if they catch up some.

    ON the third hand, being pessimistic about the future and betting against the resilience of the US economy has been an extremely bad bet for the last 95 years or so.

     

    Oh, also, on the ‘me or him” will he get paid in either case?

  81. 81.

    Spanish Moss

    @Betty Cracker:

    Love your abominable snowman idea! I am making cookies this weekend and I think I will try it. Fortunately everyone in my household is quite fond of coconut.

    About your inverse correlation theory: I like both coconut and black licorice. Though, I like pretty much everything so perhaps I am not a good data point.

  83. 83.

    scav

    @Kayla Rudbek: Absolutely, there is the whole physical end of things, achromatopsia, etc. But that’s different from the language bit.   There all sorts of linguistic workarounds for specific um, specific color shades we can resort to (sky-blue, slate-blue, teal, turquoise neither of latter are a basic color term in English) when our basic color terms aren’t specific enough for the task at hand.  So, warm like an apple vs warm like a carrot are available for simpler systems.  But, all the same, language does do funny things, such as why do we keep calling the ocean blue when so very often it isn’t?  Not that I’d personally call it wine-dark either but maybe that’s because I drink a lot of red?

  85. 85.

    TBone

    @catclub: he gets a .75 fee, less than the average bear, negotiated at the outset.

    I asked him what all his other buddies in the financial world and his other clients think – pretty much just as you described.

  87. 87.

    WTFGhost

    This abominable snowman cookie needs work!

    (Looks shocked and horrified as if someone is testing the boundaries for friendly acquaintanceship to an IMPOSSIBLE degree)

    Fine, I’ll pay it ten cents an hour to keep itself dry and crunchy, for today only, but you *know* most people who’d ask it to labor would immediately scold it, and finally bite its head off!

  88. 88.

    trollhattan

    Will be laughing a good long while with the Frida-Paddington mixup. Thanks, Betty! (But—who among us…?)

  89. 89.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Drunken Unpredictable Aunties Cookie Night is tomorrow. I’ll try to post about it live, but it’s an unpredictable a drunken event.

    Ya know, BC, I think most of us are cool with your cookie-baking family however it shakes out. Pictures in any case, please.

  90. 90.

    Drunkenhausfrau

    I have always envied Drunken Aunties Cookie Night.  Have a wonderful time!  Post photos.

    cheers!

  93. 93.

    WTFGhost

    @TBone: Clumsy candy cane is… not entirely… oh, FORNICATE YOU NotMax.

    That’s what I said, FORNICATE NotMax. Oh, FORNICATE me, the christmas profanity filter fell into place. FORNICATE GOLLY DILLY BELOVED MATRIARCH BEING BLESSED BY CHILDREN!

  94. 94.

    Ohio Mom

    @Omnes Omnibus: Well, obviously, there is no hechsher on the label!

    (A hechsher is a little symbol, something like a logo, that shows that a rabbinical association has certified the food in the container is kosher. There are different associations that have arrangements with different food producers, one you will see a lot is the OU (Orthodox Union), which looks like a “U” inside an “O.”)

Comments are closed.