Dear Kid,

Once upon a time, there was no such thing as candy corn. There was candy. There was corn. But the two remained independent.

Then in the 1880s, George Renninger of the Philadelphia, PA-based Wunderle Candy Company got tired of keeping veggies and dessert separate and created candy corn (which of course has everything to do with candy and much less to do with corn).

George may have been the first, but Gustav Goelitz is the true father of candy corn. He’s the first candy maker to begin commercial production (1898) in – wait for it – Cincinnati, OH. Yep, candy corn’s real life began here in the Queen City.

Back in the Day, candy corn was made by cooking sugar, water, and corn syrup, adding fondant (for texture) and marshmallow (for softness) and then pouring the hot deliciousness into big buckets 45 pounds at a time. The 45 pounds was then applied directly to my hips. No, wait. It just seems that way.

The candy was poured (one color layer at a time) into molds (shaped like corn kernels—sort of), cooled, and sold. Turns out veggie candy was popular and the Goelitz Candy Company made other veggie shapes for a while. Fortunately, they got over that and vegetables went back to being made out of marzipan which is how it is supposed to be.

During WWI, Herman son of Gustav moved to California and formed the creatively named Herman Goelitz Candy Company. Continuing the creative process, Herman made candy corn. Lots and lots of candy corn.

These days over 25 million pounds of candy corn are sold annually. Most bypass retail locations and head directly for my hips. No, wait. It just seems that way.

“Indian corn” is candy corn with a chocolate bottom. This is an approved (by me) version of candy corn.

There are all kinds of imposter-type candy corn (candy corns? candies corn? yark! What’s the protocol here?) including a blackberry cobbler candy corn (in Canada), Christmas “reindeer corn,” Easter “bunny corn,” Valentine’s “cupid corn,” and patriotic “freedom corn.” These are all ridiculous, but probably require much research on my part. Especially the blackberry cobbler corn.

Candy corn has 3.57 calories per kernel. I estimate it takes about 4 calories to chew and digest a single candy corn. Which means this may be the greatest diet ever invented! I just love estimation.

And I love you, too.

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

As has been pointed out more than once (generally by me), you have a very smart mother.

So when it comes to having company, I get them to help.

And when it comes to serving soup at a formal dinner, I serve in the kitchen and allow (and by “allow” I mean conscript) guests to deliver filled bowls to the table.

Recently a Smart Young Man (who we shall hereafter refer to as SYM) was cheerfully helping (and by cheerfully, I do in this case mean cheerfully) and asked me why soup bowls have rims and why someone would design a fancy soup bowl that is the configuration most likely to spill. SYM may go on to be an engineer—I’m fairly certain he will not be a fashion designer if he continues to ask practical questions like that.

Since I adore answering interesting questions, I looked it up. (My original answer “because that’s the type of bowl that came with the china” didn’t seem sufficient.)

Guess what? My original answer is pretty darn close.

But because I’m that kind of mom, I’m filling in the blanks with lots of interesting soup bowl trivia.

And if that doesn’t make you happy, you should talk to the SYM who inspired this blog.

In general, the texture and temperature of the soup is what determines what kind of bowl should be used. For example, think about French Onion soup which is served in a lug soup bowl (if you want to know what a “lug soup bowl” is think about French Onion soup).

If you are ever going to appear on Jeopardy! you should probably be aware that there are 7 different kinds of soup bowls. (Not counting whatever kinds were used in The Tale of Despereaux.)

The exception to the texture/temperature rule is The Formal Meal at which one should only use the aforementioned easily spill-able soup plate. And soup plates always have rims. I repeat: Always. No one knows why. They just do. Let me know if your Foods teacher has anything useful to say on the subject.

The coupe soup (and isn’t that fun to say) bowl is a saucer-shaped bowl used only for informal dining. Because apparently one doesn’t want to spill on one’s informal clothes. I’m not saying it makes sense. The coupe soup bowl is also used when overthrowing governments.

The soup-cereal bowl is also used only at informal meals. This bowl is also known (at least in some circles) as the Oatmeal Bowl. Sometimes has a rim; sometimes is rimless. It’s the wild child of soup bowls.

The covered soup bowl is useful if your kitchen is several kilometers from the dining room. It is (stick with me now) a soup bowl with a cover. If you are ever served such a thing, the correct etiquette is to remove the lid (unless the waiter does it for you in which case you are not to wrestle it away from him) and place said lid, rim side down, on the side of the underplate (which I’ll get to momentarily). Then, before the soup course is cleared, you should be sure to replace the cover.

Do not ask me why one would have a waiter and a removable cover at anything other than a formal meal because frankly I don’t have a clue.

Moving along to number 6 (go count if you don’t believe me), we have the cream soup bowl (with saucer). The cream soup bowl (with saucer) is used to serve pureed and cream-based soups. It is bigger than the bouillon cup (and saucer) which is used to serve clear soups.

Manners Alert!

If you find yourself at an event where you are served clear soup in a bouillon cup (on its saucer), you must know that you are either to use a spoon or to drink from the cup but never, oh never, alternate because that’s just plain tacky.

A final note. Underplates are placed (are you still with me?) under the bowl of soup to help protect the table from heat and spillage. Also it looks better. Even bowls with saucers, go on an underplate. In my house, the underplate is just called a plate. But from now on maybe I’ll call it George.

You will note that the seven kinds of soup bowls can all be washed and therefore the bread bowl (yum) is not officially considered a type of soup bowl. Which I also don’t entirely understand.

Then there are bowls for miso soup and pho and all sorts of other things.

If I were you, I’d be very careful about answering soup bowl questions on Jeopardy!

Furthermore, this has nothing to do with the Orange Bowl and the Super Bowl. I’ll have to write another blog about the connection. Check back.

See what happens when you ask a question?

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

I’ve been thinking about horseradish. I’ve been thinking that I should suggest to Dad that he grow horseradish in the garden, but I decided that I should probably do some Helpful Research before making this suggestion.

The problem (of course) is that my idea of helpful research and Dad’s idea of helpful research tend not be related. In fact, they are generally not even on the same branch of the conversational tree.

Horseradish is a root plant and is part of the mustard family. Remind me to do some Helpful Research on growing mustard—I’m a little unclear about what keeps the glass jars from breaking as they grow.

One harvests horseradish root in the spring and fall. The root (when harvested) has almost no aroma. It’s not until one grates it up that it turns spicy. Chemistry alert! During the grating or grinding of the root, volatile oils (known as isothiocyanates) are released. Once released, they run around like crazy getting hotter and hotter until vinegar is poured on them to stop the reaction and stabilize the flavor. Less time between grating and vinegar = less heat. More time = Dad turns bright red and his head explodes. Also the more finely ground the horseradish is the more heat there will be.

When horseradish turns brown-ish (rather than white-ish) you should probably toss it because it has lost most of its flavor.

It takes about 4 pounds of horseradish roots to make a gallon of prepared horseradish.

If you want to grow horseradish, you should add potash to the soil.

80% of US horseradish is grown in southern Illinois. Guess what they have a lot of in their soil?

Horseradish leaves are edible. It’s amazing how “edible” and “delicious” are not interchangeable.

Some people believe rubbing horseradish on your forehead relieves headaches. It certainly can’t hurt, but I think I’ll stick to modern drugs. It is also sometimes used topically to treat wounds and sore joints and ingested to treat urinary tract infections and breathing problems. Who knew?

Happy Horseradish.

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

To those who are fasting, an easy fast. Happy New Year.

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

Have you ever noticed that History is full of Big Events (wars, natural disasters, the occasional Nobel Prize) but that life is made up of little events (breakfast, sunflowers, and the occasional hug from a child)?

In a way, that’s sort of a mismatch, don’t you think?

I understand the importance of mentioning Sir Frances Drake completing his circumnavigation of the world (1580) and the 1st Grand International Rifle match (1874) and several nuclear tests (a variety of years), but why don’t we ever mention something like “Bob Smith had a bowl of extremely satisfying oatmeal” or “James McKinney ended his craving by eating a pickle.”?

It’s important to remind ourselves of the big things that have been accomplished like NY District Court Judge Constance Baker Motley ruling that women sportswriters cannot be banned from locker rooms (1978). But why don’t the history books mention that On This Day In History MaryEllen Donett ruled that her two sons and a neighborhood boy couldn’t exclude their sister from their impromptu basketball game?

It’s a conundrum.

I was going to ask Booker about it, but he’s sleeping. Also his usual answers to questions like that range from “How about a tummy rub?” to “How about a snack?” so I’m unlikely to find an answer there.

Or, perhaps tummy rubs, snacks, and an extremely satisfying bowl of oatmeal are the real answers and History just hasn’t figured out the right questions.

Love, Mom

Dear Kid,

But wait, there’s more.

If you thought I had posted a sufficiently caffeinated blog the other day, you’d be correct. If you thought (as I did for a short time) that that would be the end of the caffeinated discussion, you’d be wrong.

Not only does caffeine come in the traditional liquid form (coffee, tea, diet coke) and the easily abused and sometimes lethal powdered form (stay away), turns out there are non-traditional liquids and—wait for it—aerosols. Clearly, I have been living under a rock.

Thank you to Cornell student Kyle and Boston University alum Greg for bringing all this to my attention.

Turns out, there are concentrated liquid caffeines out there. Liquid caffeine mixes nicely with no powdery aftertaste but there is enough caffeine in a gallon of the stuff to show 7 people the wrong side of the dirt. One of the joys (and by “joys” I mean not so much) of liquid caffeine is you can mix it with your favorite alcoholic beverage so that you can be awake while you get drunk and do stupid things.

The only things worse than a drunk idiot is a drunk idiot who refuses to pass out.

Did I mention that too much caffeine can KILL YOU!!!??? And that these concentrated forms of caffeine are the easiest to abuse? And (as we know from professional football) abuse is bad. Ergo, stay away from the concentrated stuff.

Have you heard of Death Wish Coffee? It has 200% more caffeine than standard coffee. Which won’t kill you (probably) but might make you so jittery and unable to sleep that you wish it would.

And the aforementioned aerosol caffeine delivery system. Yep, it exists. The regular dose won’t harm you (presumably) as it has about the same amount of caffeine as a cup of coffee. According to everything I read on line aero-caffeine (once known as aeroshot, but now under slightly different names) works fast, is extremely convenient, and tastes horrible. Authorities worry that because it’s so easy to ingest kids will do multiple shots in quick succession which could be dangerous.

All in all, I think I’ll get a cup of coffee and head back to bed.

Love, Mom