Carl the Baker

The Jello Sandwich

2009-07-03T18:31:00.000-07:00

Did I ever tell you about the time I almost gave myself diabetes?

Well it happened not too long ago. After my last sandwich adventure (see my previous entry), I decided that for my next masterpiece, I would try a dessert sandwich. A dessert sandwich you say? "It can't be done!" Hah! I say. Behold!

I'm not sure where I got the idea, but it might have come to me in a fever dream or a fortune cookie. In any case, the idea of a Jello sandwich intrigued me. I immediately began preparing it in my head, formulating how it would look and trying to figure out when i would have time to make it. Well I finally had some time and here's how it goes.

First, the ingredients;

Texas toast (or other thick cut bread)
Two packages of jello (any flavor will do)
Eggs
Marshmallow fluff
Chocolate sauce

The first thing to do is set up the Jello as it will need a few hours to set. You`ll want to make jiggler style jello so it doesn`t fall apart or melt when you put it on the bread. To do that, mix 2 packages of jello with two and half cups of boiling water. Stir it well and stick it in the fridge for at least three hours.

For the bread part, I thought French toast would compliment the Jello very nicely. If you don`t know how to make French toast, shame on you. It`s super easy. Crack a couple of eggs in a dish with a flat bottom and whip em good.

Slap the bread into the eggs, making sure to coat it on both sides, then stick it in a frying pan. (Not too hot or you risk burning, and nothing tastes worse than burning)

Fry it up until it is a nice golden brown on both sides.

Take your, now fully set, Jello out of the fridge.

Cut the Jello into squares, and place on your French toast.

Now here comes the tricky part. Marshmallow fluff is super sticky and you will probably need another utensil to get it off of whatever you are using to spread it.

After that, all you need is some chocolate sauce, some courage and probably insulin.

After trying it, I would say it makes an excellent dessert. Far too rich for meal time, but certain to satisfy your sweet tooth.

Not sure when I will I will be making my next concoction, but I have been challenged by a friend to make a cookie sandwich. If you have a great sandwich, I`d love to hear about it.

The Kraft Dinner Sandwich

2009-05-10T19:22:00.000-07:00

So it's been over a year since I blogged. Not much to share I guess?

In any case, I was struck with a brain storm the other day and decided that it needed to be acted upon. You see, I am a lover of all things sandwich. When my wife Colleen met me she was amazed at the things that I could turn into a sandwich, be it fish sticks, turkey stuffing or peanut butter and pickles. So when the idea of a Kraft Dinner sandwich came to me, I thought, "Yes I can!"

So here it is. How to make your very own KD sandwich.

First step, a box of original Kraft dinner.

Prepare it just like the box says, simple as that, thought I found using a little less milk made it easier to handle.

Once prepared you will need a frying pan, to cook the sandwiches up, grilled cheese style.

Prepare the bread by spreading a little butter or margarine on each slice, and dusting with a little garlic salt/powder.

Place the bread butter side down on the heated frying pan and spread a generous spoonful of the KD on top.

Add ketchup.

Add the next slice of bread, making sure that the buttered side is on the outside. Cook evenly on both sides, but be careful when you flip it, as the mac and cheese will fall out easily.

Once it's done, that's it, eat and enjoy!

Vegas, Baby!

2007-04-09T12:46:00.000-07:00

So, I was gone last week on an impromptu vacation. You see for the last month or so my lovely wife had been planning a surprise trip for us to celebrate my birthday in Vegas. She went through great lengths to try and keep this trip a secret but at every turn fate seemed ready to outdo her. Kudos to all of my friends who helped perpetuate the mystery even though I was getting more and more suspicious. My first clue that something was up was when I noticed on my work schedule that I only had 8 hours scheduled for the week of my birthday. Upon grilling my boss, she relented and told me that my wife had asked for me to have that week off.

I remembered that earlier in the month Colleen had asked me about where I would like to go if we could take a vacation some day, and my choice was Las Vegas because everyone I know has been there and I was feeling a little left behind. A couple of weeks passed and I began thinking that I might have had it wrong, but then a week before my birthday, my little brother dropped the bombshell. He left a message on my answering machine saying "Hey Carl, we're back from Cuba and I got those cigars that you wanted. I'm not sure if you're home or in Vegas yet. Mom told me you were going. Anyway I could only get you a couple but I think they're the ones you want. Gimme a call"

Not wanting to upset Colleen, I chose not to tell her that I knew, for fear that her confidence in her secret planning might be shaken. Then the second person to tell me was my friend George who was having a problem with a show that he is directing. He asked if I could fill in on short notice for an actor who couldn't perform the opening week of the show. He told me "I know this is last minute and that you're going to Vegas and you'll probably want to relax and not study a script". It was at that point I was sure that I was going to Las Vegas, and I told Colleen what George said. She was a little disappointed that I knew we were going. I didn't, however, know when. I kept wondering how Colleen was going to get me to the airport without me getting suspicious. I knew that I had to go to the airport the next day to have breakfast with some friends of my parents and.....wait a minute! My parents are in on the ruse.

The next morning I woke up and went along with the plans to "have breakfast" but I started noticing things. For one, my passport had disappeared from my jacket pocket, then my backpack was sitting in the middle of the bedroom and disappeared shortly after. Other things seemed to have vanished from the room as well (the Nintendo DS, my face cream, the camera, some of my clothes), but I pretended not to notice.

My parents showed up to take us to the airport on the pretence that "It's early, and you might be too tired to drive". We got to the airport, and decided to have breakfast because my parent's friends plane was "late". My dad then left the table to go find them and after a while miraculously returned with my suitcase and backpack. It was at that point I told my parents that I already knew. Oh well, I was going to VEGAS, BABY!

We stayed at the Flamingo,

ran into my friend Tim, who was the one surprise that Colleen had been able to keep a secret,

drank giant $33 vodka/Red Bulls that I accidentally ordered,

smoked cigars,

rode a mechanical bull,

went to the Star Trek experience,

drank,

saw Spamalot,

(Picture coming soon)

visited some hotels,

went on some rides,

gambled,

and drank some more.

The rest of the story "stays in Vegas".

To see the rest of the photos click here.

Cheers, Carl.

Catching up

2007-03-26T00:39:00.000-07:00

Just some of this and that and general catching up. I don't think I mentioned this in a previous post but I January 10th of this year I had Lasik eye surgery. This is how I looked before.

Now that I have had the surgery I look exactly the same. But now you look different to me.

Pretty spiffy huh?

Also if you live in Calgary this is not news for you, but if you are living in Japan for instance this might come as a bit of a surprise. The weather changes very fast here, in fact last week we had one day with fog, snow, rain, hail and sunshine all on the same day. I remember seeing snow in Japan and laughing because it barely collected on the ground. So for my friends in Japan, here are a couple of pictures of the snow from our back yard.

I am keeping busy at the bakery, making bread and decorating cakes. I have added a few pictures of my cakes to our Flickr site. This first picture is a cake I made for a customer mainly because my co-workers said it couldn't be done. Normally a 6"x8" cake is pretty small for putting a cake kit (themed toys that go on a cake) on but it is still doable. I took the challenge and put two kits on one 6"x8" cake, thereby creating a beautiful fusion of Spiderman and Barbie that perhaps the world will never see again.

My next creation was for my good friend Andrew's birthday. We sometimes play a game called World of Warcraft together and so I though a cake inspired by this game might be fun. I bought a toy and used it as a cake kit, and created a rocky outcropping complete with bloodstained rocks and voidwalker bracers (way to geeky for me to even explain), to accompany the undead warlock that stood watch over the cake. I only wish the picture had turned out clearer to capture all of the airbrushing that went into it.

Anyhow, that's enough for now. Cheers!

Singing in the Brain

2007-03-08T22:13:00.000-08:00

I know I haven't posted in more than a month but to tell the truth I don't think anyone noticed. Colleen and I have been crazy busy with practicing for the Kiwanis Music Festival and our show "Ace Morran and the Snow Job" which played last night at the Pumphouse Theatre's One Act Play Festival to better than expected reviews. I managed to record a few of the numbers from Kiwanis and with some help have made them available on the Internet. So without further ado, here they are.

Patrice Barnes Troupe singing Run Freedom Run from Urinetown

The Merry Makers singing We're All in This Together from High School Musical

Colleen singing See I'm Smiling from The Last Five Years

Nikki singing Easy as Life from Aida

and finally Jeremy singing I Need to Know from Jekyll and Hyde

Cheers for now, I will post some miscellaneous photos in the next week or so. Carl.

Real Life Super Hero

2007-01-19T22:18:00.000-08:00

When Colleen and I were living in Japan we had the opportunity to see a very interesting New Years program. It's an obstacle course that apparently they do every New Year and everyone who is everyone from TV personalities, stand-up comedians, athletes and movie stars are invited to take part, and it has a huge turn-out. When Colleen and I watched the 2005-2006 event it was an all day televised extravaganza. An obstacle course in four sections. The first one is timed and many people don't get past this part. The second section is also timed and weeds out even more people. The third section is not timed and is all endurance sheer muscle power. We never saw anyone make it past the third section. One guy got very close but couldn't finish. This year from what I gather someone actually made it to the fourth section and won. Keep in mind this whole thing is done in just one day, so no rest days to recuperate. This video highlights the winning performer in his superhuman feats of daring do. Check it out.

And now you can't say that people can only do that stuff in comic books.

Unreal reality

2007-01-18T18:14:00.000-08:00

So I came across this video a few minutes ago, and thought I would share. Even for those who are not technically savvy, (which I barely am) this is really cool stuff. You can take a photo of anyone and render a movable 3-D image. If this stuff becomes mainstream, just try using a photo as evidence in the courtroom. Have a look for yourself.

I'm a bad man

2007-01-12T23:08:00.000-08:00

While I'm not an advocate of beating children, I do find child on child violence a source of pure entertainment. I'm not talking junior high school students stabbing each other, I'm talking about five year old kids delivering a two handed Etch-A-Sketch to the cranium. Or using a lazy-boy to catapult your sibling into the next room. On American television they have shows like Nanny 911 or Super Nanny. I watch the first five or ten minutes that generally show a montage of the kids wailing on each other. Comic gold I say. This is why the video camera will always be nearby when I finally have kids. So when they are killing each other I will have it on video, to be enjoyed in slow motion (at their wedding many years later). Does that make me bad? I was surfing the web and came across this little clip I at first found it to be somewhat disturbing, but then it turned into something great. Kid on Dad violence. Have a look.

Cheers.

Happy New Year

2007-01-02T22:11:00.000-08:00

Well Colleen and I rang in the New Year sick as dogs. Hacking, coughing and sneezing away we rang in the New Year drinking and playing games. I phoned my friend Chiaki in Japan to see how things were and to see if she could send me some Japanese New Years food. Unfortunately fish doesn't travel well in the mail. But she did send me some pictures that brought back great memories from last year when her family shared their New Years tradition with us.

Wishing you all the best in the new year.

Ranting

2006-12-24T14:00:00.000-08:00

I love listening to people complain about the holiday shopping crowds. Mall shopping in Calgary at Christmas time can be hectic but it still doesn't compare to everyday afternoon shopping in Japan. I hope I have all of my shopping done, but luckily if I have forgotten anything, Shoppers Drug Mart is open 24 hours even on Christmas day. I feel sorry for the staff.

Here's a video some of you might have seen, involving another man ranting about a song he doesn't like.

The pain, the pain boss!

2006-12-15T14:49:00.000-08:00

Well it's official. We opened the show last night to a full house and it seemed to go off rather well. My knee has developed a nice blister from the artificial leg that I wear but it's getting less painful to wear. As soon as we get some pics I'll try to put them up. I was surprised to see how much we made from selling kisses at the intermission. I made fifteen dollars just by myself.

Oh and here's an eleven year old Japanese girl dancing. Totally safe for work, she's a great dancer.

Cheers!

Just when you thought it was safe!

2006-12-06T22:20:00.000-08:00

So I got this thing started and then didn't post again for like a week. Things have been super busy with Moby Dick but I'm glad the weather has finally gone from -30C to +10C. It makes the early morning commute to work much easier.

I saw this little clip on Youtube and I had to share. I've seen several videos where they remix movie trailers to change the intent or style and this is one of my favories.

Also, if yo are reading this and are living in Calgary, don't forget to come out and see Moby Dick.

To get tickets or info go here. Come have a blast and make fun of me in a skirt. I'll even kiss you during the intermission.

And so it begins again

2006-11-27T11:59:00.000-08:00

For those of you not in Calgary right now it is really, really cold. It's so cold you could freeze the balls off a brass monkey. Ever wonder where that came from? Look no further, click here for the answer. But really, it's cold. It's about -25C right now and with the wind it feels like -35C.

Since being back in Canada, I have been keeping very busy (not just trying to keep warm). I just finished posting all of our wedding photos, along with the honeymoon photos. They're on the same site with all of our Japan pics. Right now Colleen and I are doing "Moby Dick the Musical", for info or tickets go here.

And just for something fun.