Twinkie Ingredient #2 Sugar

Bet everyone forgot about this segment. We've discussed everything that goes into the flour making process previously, but what makes the twinkie flour exactly what is needed for that sickeningly sweet, soft, powdery twinkie is...you got it, sugar! Not those corn sweeteners that we'll discuss later, but pure sugar from live plants. The sugar isn't used just for sweetness, but also to make the cake have the consistency we want and to act as one of the most powerful preservatives in the cake allowing it to last, well, forever as far as anyone knows.

Most people think of the sugar as coming from the sugar cane plant grown in tropical climates- and much of it does. Just as much comes from the northern climates such as North Dakota and Minnesota where the sugar beet is harvested. Regardless of the plant, the processing is the same.

Take your plants(sugar cane or sugar beet) and wash them down, crush them up, and let them sit in hot water to bring out the sweetness. Add a little lime to the mix to combine with impurities and remove them, filter the juice to get rid of the lime mix substances and now you're left with a sweet syrup. The juicy syrup goes through a series of vacuum pans which keep it at a temperature to boil but not burn or caramelize. Once this is done you can centrifuge out the sugar crystals that we all know and love (but still containing molasses, so a bit darker than we're used to). Repeat the process almost identically to remove the molasses, and BLAMMO- sugar!

It's nice to see one ingredient that really hasn't been so chemically altered as to look like a cyborg of the original constituents.

Oh, go jump off a cliff!

If I'm going to jump off a bridge it's not going to be just because everyone else is doing it. I'm going to have a good reason. After all, I'm not a lemming. Fortunately for lemmings, they aren't going to jump off a bridge just because everyone else is either. Wait. You thought lemmings were those little rodents that, when overpopulated, took off in large groups and jumped off a cliff, right? Well, you are right and you are wrong. They are those little rodents that take off in large groups when overpopulated. Contrary to popular belief, they leave the area to find a new less populated home, or rather leave the city to settle in the suburbs. If they wanted mass suicide, why jump off a cliff when you can just poison the Kool Aid and serve it in a blocked burrow? If that's the case, why does everyone think they are killing themselves?
In large part you can blame the 1958 Disney film White Wilderness for that. I know what you're thinking, "Can't be, I've never even heard of the movie." Apparently word gets around, because I hadn't heard of it either but always "knew" that lemmings jumped off cliffs to escape the traffic and road rage of urban lemming life. The nature documentary shows a scene with a supposedly real cliff-jumping mass lemming suicide. Disney said it was a real suicide scene taken place in their native Arctic home, so why should we believe any different? Well, in 1982 Bob McKeown determined that the lemming scene was not filmed in the Arctic, but rather at Bow River near downtown Calgary. He was also able to learn that the lemmings did not leap from the top of the cliff to escape the long lines at Starbucks, but instead were propelled into the river by a rotating platform installed by the film crew.
It makes you wonder why Mickey Mouse would do something so horrendous to a fellow rodent, doesn't it? Consider this, the film won an Academy Award.

*No animals were hurt during the writing of this blog-- except for two mosquitoes, but they don't count because they were asking for it.*

A Ladybird 'Easy-Reading' Book: "The Policeman"

I'll readily admit that I do not read as many books as I ought. I hate spending vast amounts of time reading a book for several reasons: 1.) Books tend to take a long time to read, 2. I have already placed a considerable investment into a book by the time I may realize that it is not very good, and 3.) Many books do not contain enough factual information to help me make a difference in my day-to-day life. I suspect that these are fairly universal concerns. If you share these, please be confident that my recommendation of "The Policeman" addresses each of these concerns. First, the book is short and will take the average reader only a few minutes. Second, because it is such a short read and is also free, the amount of personal investment in it is minimal. And last, this is critical, informational, and unbiased writing at its finest.

Here is an excerpt:

"A policeman must always have his truncheon and notebook with him. The truncheon is used to hit a suspect if they resist arrest. Then their confession is written in the notebook."

Read the entire book here.

Save Fruit Pie the Magician!

In desperate times like these, in which Fruit Pie the Magician no longer appears on the waxy paper of the delicious Hostess treat, I ask myself, what would Fruit Pie the Magician himself do? And, deep in my heart, I know: he would appear dressed all dapper in his cape and top hat to perform his signature trick of making Hostess Fruit Pies appear out of thin air. What has become of our trusty friend with a delicate flaky crust? Was he simply "let go" by the powers that be at Hostess, or is the plot more sinister? The Internet is ringing of various theories, and some, such as Shookummike, have already posted eulogies:

"Fruit Pie the Magician is dead (at least here in S.E. New England, which is my stomping grounds). That fun-loving magically inclined anthropamorphic bundle of partial hydrogentated oils and refined sugars has met his maker. He always winked at me from the front of his wax paper wrapper. He was a magician, he was a pastry, he was a friend? No matter what he was, he's dead now."

Fortunately, at least one man, Brandon, is in search of the truth and has set up a site to Save Fruit Pie the Magician. Please visit his site and offer your support. Below is a copy of his facts that serve as a basis of what we currently know, and I would consider any additional conjecture on the current state as exactly that: conjecture.

= Fruit Pie The Magician was an advertising character created in 1973 to represent Hostess Fruit Pies. 

= He was created by Don Duga, who also animated the other Hostess characters. 

= He was one of seven fun characters representing Hostess Cakes starting in the 1970s, along with Twinkie The Kid (Twinkies), Captain Cupcake (Cupcakes), Happy Ho Ho (Ho-Hos), Chief Big Wheels (Big Wheels), Chauncey Choco-dile (Chocodiles) and King Ding Dong (Ding Dongs). 

= He was featured on the Hostess Fruit Pie wrappers from 1973 to 2006, with the exception of Hostess Pudding Pies in the 1980s, which did not have any character on them. 

= He was featured in many TV commercials in the '70s and '80s, often in tandem with other Hostess characters in some urgent need to "save the day" with snack cakes. (Make sure to visit his awesome commercials page!)

= Of the seven Hostess characters who began in the 1970s, all have been retired except for Twinkie The Kid. Fruit Pie The Magician retired in 2006. Captain Cupcake made a brief comeback in 2001. 

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

If you're unfamiliar with Joss Wheadon's latest project, a 40-minute musical featuring Neil Patrick Harris as a video-blogging bumbling super villian who is trying to get into the League of Evil, you're missing one of the treats of this summer--"Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog". Make sure to keep watching beyond the first two minutes, which starts off slowly as a low-budget vlog by our hero/evil villain, because the pace will pick up quickly. I'm not ordinarily one for musicals, but this one has it all: multi-layered characters (like onions), an assortment of evil rogues with extraordinary powers (such as making things moist), fascinating gadgets, and, of course, very catchy tunes.

Get it on iTunes for $4 or, better, visit it at hulu.com with limited commercial interruption. I have it on good authority that it can viewed in countries outside the United States.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/28343/dr-horribles-sing-along-blog