I MISSED WORLD NUTELLA DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!  Well on the bright side I can purchase a jar of the magical mystical spread for each day I was late for WORLD NUTELLA  DAY!!!!!!!!!!

NUTTY FOR NUTELLA: SPREADABLE JOY

by Amy Scattergood; Los Angeles Times

Do a Google search for "Nutella," the Italian hazelnut-chocolate spread that comes in a squat jar like peanut butter and is often found right next to it in grocery aisles, and you'll get about 5 million results. Which is about twice what you get when you Google "chocolate chip cookies"

Because Nutella isn't just junk food with a European pedigree. It can be an obsession, a habit, even a cult. If you think this is foodie hyperbole, you're just not among the initiated.

If, however, you're the sort of person who keeps a jar of Nutella hidden under the sink or the mattress; if you've ever carefully spooned all the Nutella out of the center of the jar so that it still looked full to outside observers; if you've asked friends to smuggle Nutella back from Europe (devotees swear European-made Nutella tastes different); if, for heaven's sake, you've ever bought 10 pounds of raw hazelnuts to try to make it at home, then welcome.

As members of Nutella's secret handshake society will tell you, it's a blend of hazelnuts and chocolate -- or rather, nuts, cocoa, sugar, skim milk, oil and a few other flavorings and emulsifiers -- that's been ground to a blissfully smooth, creamy spread. Knifed onto a slice of bread, or smeared over crepes or waffles, it's a simple snack that (as my children and the Ferrero Co., which makes the product, like to point out) is even vaguely wholesome.

Maybe it's the idea of spreadable chocolate, or maybe it's the deeply satisfying combination of chocolate and hazelnuts, but there's something about Nutella that inspires the kind of devotion usually reserved for federally banned substances.

Check out some of those Google results and you find eGullet threads, Flickr galleries, MySpace videos and rapturous blog posts, where recipes that make use of Nutella proliferate in a seemingly endless riff, like conspiracy theories or suggestions for what to name the Obama First Dog.

According to   allfacebook.com, Nutella's Facebook page ranks third in number of fans, having just moved past Homer J. Simpson with a little more than 2 million. (The two most popular pages, in order: Barack Obama and Coca-Cola.)

Two years ago, bloggers Sara Rosso and Michelle Fabio even designated Feb. 5 as World Nutella Day, which has a growing following.

I think I know how Rodent lost that eye!!!

 

 

"I thought it would be great to have a day where we could eat and cook with Nutella without shame . . . a bit like a meeting of the Nutella minds, or an NAA: Nutella Addicts Anonymous meeting," e-mailed Rosso, an American living in Italy.

Famous-fan recipes

All Nutella addicts are not underground -- or online. French pastry chef Pierre Hermé, English cookbook author Nigella Lawson and Berkeley pastry chef and cookbook author Alice Medrich have all created recipes that feature the spread.

In Southern California, Anisette Brasserie chef-owner Alain Giraud (who once confessed that his favorite way to eat Nutella was out of the jar) serves waffles with Nutella on his restaurant's weekend breakfast menu. Spago pastry chef Sherry Yard serves rolled tuilles stuffed with Nutella at Spago events.

Not bad for a children's snack that originated in postwar Italy as a thrifty answer to food rationing.

Nutella History

Nutella's origins date to 1946, when Pietro Ferrero, who owned a bakery in Alba, Italy, began grinding the hazelnuts that were plentiful in the Piedmont region to extend his cocoa supply.

This was neither a unique combination nor a unique situation. Chocolate and hazelnuts have been mixed together (gianduja, the term given to chocolate-hazelnut paste, is named after a Turin commedia dell'arte character) in the region since the 1800s, often to stretch an imported product with a local one.

But Ferrero took things one step further, blending the heady mixture into a spreadable confection that was even more economical and easy to use.

In 1964, the spread was officially renamed Nutella. World domination soon followed.

(The rest of the article, be sure and read page two containing, receipes, how to make your own, and links is at:  http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-nutella11-2009feb11,0,5739608.story

 
  

WE AMERCIANS DO NOT CARE ABOUT PORK BARREL SPENDING

The ‘Porky’ Trillion-Dollar Stimulus You Don’t Care About
 Friday, February 13, 2009
By Michelle Malkin

N.Y. Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer took to the floor on Tuesday to sneer at public outrage over the trillion-dollar porkulus. “The American people really don’t care,” he said, about those “little tiny, yes, porky amendments.” He punctuated his derision by pinching his pointer finger and thumb together. Only the “chattering classes” worry about such trivial matters, Schumer scoffed.

 

Well, we are all “chattering classes” now. Congressional phones and fax lines have been ringing off the hooks all week with complaints from angry constituents across the country. And just two days after Schumer declared that no one cares, the taxpayer group Americans for Prosperity delivered 400,000 petitions to the Senate protesting the behemoth bill. Those petitions were signed before the latest details of the House-Senate conference report negotiations had been disclosed—and before any final legislative text had been made available to the general public.
 
If the stimulus plan were a Thanksgiving dinner entree, it would be a Turbaconducken—the heart attack-inducing dish of roasted chicken stuffed inside a duck stuffed inside a turkey, all wrapped in endless slabs of bacon. But according to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s fantasyland “fact sheet” released early Thursday afternoon, “there are no earmarks or pet projects” in the final package.
 
Trust her no further than you could throw a pot-bellied pig. Despite the self-delusional declarations of Pelosi and President Obama that no pet projects exist, Hill staffers spilled the beans on several new set-asides tacked onto the bill. 
 
Thanks to Michigan’s Democratic Sens. Debbie Stabenow and Carl Levin, General Motors will receive a special tax break worth an estimated $7 billion to cover liabilities incurred when it accepted its $13.4 billion bailout from the Bush administration. The failing automaker has lined up for an addition $4 billion in bailout funds—at which time they’ll no doubt ask for another mega-tax liability waiver. The moochers’ cycle never ends.
 
Then there’s Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Railway to Sin City. Appointing yourself a Senate conferee has its perks. Roughly $8 billion in perks.
 
Reid, you see, needs to stimulate his re-election bid, so he haggled with President Obama to tuck in a teeny, tiny, yes, porky amendment for high-speed rail lines. Reid has his eyes—and paws—on a proposed Los Angeles-to-Las Vegas magnetic levitation train. He has already sunk $45 million in previous earmarks into his, yes, pet project. Wasn’t it earlier this week that Obama was lecturing companies not to travel to Las Vegas on the taxpayers’ dime? 
 
But I digress. Along with these not-earmarks, not-pet projects, there’s $2 billion for impeached Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s pet FutureGen near-zero emissions power plant project, $300 million for souped-up “green” golf carts for government workers, $30 million for “smart appliances” and $65 million for digital TV coupons. According to Hill Republicans, money for basic highways and bridges was cut by $1 billion from the House-passed level, but:
 
-- $9 billion for school construction was added back in (originally cut by the Nelson-Collins “compromise”);

-- $5 billion was added to the state fiscal stabilization fund (originally cut by Nelson-Collins), making it a grand total of $53.6 billion;

 

-- $1 billion was added back for Prevention & Wellness Programs, including STD education; and

-- $2 billion for neighborhood stabilization programs.
 
As I’ve reported previously, that “neighborhood stabilization” slush fund money will end up in the pockets of left-wing shakedown artists such as ACORN and the Massachusetts-based Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA), led by self-proclaimed “bank terrorist” Bruce Marks. There’s an additional $3.25 billion in HUD grants and Community Development Block Grants in the bill that will also inevitably find its way into the coffers of these housing-entitlement lobbying groups.

 
Another egregious not-earmark earmark that survived untouched: $2 billion for the National Parks Service championed by House Democratic conferee and Appropriations Chairman Rep. David Obey. A report by the GOP minority on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee revealed that Obey’s son, Craig, lobbied the panel and advocated for the stimulus plan on behalf of the National Parks Conservation Association.
 
All told—and safely assuming the major spending provisions become permanently enshrined—the final price tag of this government hogzilla of all hogzillas over the next 10 years will be a whopping $3.27 trillion with a capital “T.”
 
Not, ahem, that you care.

GALAXY HAS BILLIONS OF EARTHS

Maybe we can find one without a Nancy Pelosi?

There could be one hundred billion Earth-like planets in our galaxy, a US conference has heard.

BBC News  -- Science

Dr Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution of Science said many of these worlds could be inhabited by simple lifeforms.

He was speaking at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago.

So far, telescopes have been able to detect just over 300 planets outside our Solar System.

Very few of these would be capable of supporting life, however. Most are gas giants like our Jupiter; and many orbit so close to their parent stars that any microbes would have to survive roasting temperatures.

But, based on the limited numbers of planets found so far, Dr Boss has estimated that each Sun-like star has on average one "Earth-like" planet.

This simple calculation means there would be huge numbers capable of supporting life.

"Not only are they probably habitable but they probably are also going to be inhabited," Dr Boss told BBC News. "But I think that most likely the nearby 'Earths' are going to be inhabited with things which are perhaps more common to what Earth was like three or four billion years ago." That means bacterial lifeforms.

Dr Boss estimates that Nasa's Kepler mission, due for launch in March, should begin finding some of these Earth-like planets within the next few years.

Recent work at Edinburgh University tried to quantify how many intelligent civilisations might be out there. The research suggested there could be thousands of them.

PICTURES TO WORDS #6

Photo Credit to Sue

Through broken crystal

Spring Sky beckons the Sleeper

  Dancing Wings emerge.

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THOUGHTS AND PRAYERS FOR OUR AUSTRALIAN FRIENDS

We should all take a moment of quiet reflection for thoughts and prayers for The Australian people and their firefighters.  They are in the midst of a horrible outbreak of wild fires, some of which where deliberately set.  The death and injury toll continues to rise.

A link to an Australian News site with up to date information on the fires:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/08/2485609.htm?section=justin

And a link to a NASA updated Satellite image:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/fires/main/world/australiafire_20090209.html

I dug into my file to find the following Australian news article from 2008, I hope and pray this is not the case.

ISLAM GROUP URGES FOREST FIRE JIHAD

by Josh Gordon  THE AGE On Line, Theage.com.au, Sept. 7th, 2008

http://www.theage.com.au/national/islam-group-urges-forest-fire-jihad-20080906-4b53.html?page=-1

AUSTRALIA has been singled out as a target for "forest jihad" by a group of Islamic extremists urging Muslims to deliberately light bushfires as a weapon of terror.

US intelligence channels earlier this year (I did not find information like this in US outlets, only in the Australian paper and a short report from MEMRI-Middle East Media Research Institute)  identified a website calling on Muslims in Australia, the US, Europe and Russia to "start forest fires", claiming "scholars have justified chopping down and burning the infidels' forests when they do the same to our lands

The website, posted by a group called the Al-Ikhlas Islamic Network, argues in Arabic that lighting fires is an effective form of terrorism justified in Islamic law under the "eye for an eye" doctrine.

The posting — which instructs jihadis to remember "forest jihad" in summer months — says fires cause economic damage and pollution, tie up security agencies and can take months to extinguish so that "this terror will haunt them for an extended period of time".

"Imagine if, after all the losses caused by such an event, a jihadist organisation were to claim responsibility for the forest fires," the website says. "You can hardly begin to imagine the level of fear that would take hold of people in the United States, in Europe, in Russia and in Australia."

With the nation heading into another hot, dry summer, Australian intelligence agencies are treating the possibility that bushfires could be used as a weapon of terrorism as a serious concern.

Attorney-General Robert McClelland said the Federal Government remained "vigilant against such threats", warning that anyone caught lighting a fire as a weapon of terror would feel the wrath of anti-terror laws.

"Any information that suggests a threat to Australia's interests is investigated by relevant agencies as appropriate," Mr McClelland said.

Adam Dolnik, director of research at the University of Wollongong's Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention, said that bushfires (unlike suicide bombing) were generally not considered a glorious type of attack by jihadis, in keeping with a recent decline in the sophistication of terrorist operations.

"With attacks like bushfires, yes, it would be easy. It would be very damaging and we do see a decreasing sophistication as a part of terrorist attacks," Dr Dolnik said.

"In recent years, there have been quite a few attacks averted and it has become more and more difficult for groups to do something effective."

Dr Dolnik said he had observed an increase in traffic on jihadi websites calling for a simplification of terrorist attacks because the more complex operations had been failing. But starting bushfires was still often regarded as less effective than other operations because governments could easily deny terrorism as the cause.

The internet posting by the little-known group claimed the idea of forest fires had been attributed to imprisoned Al Qaeda leader Abu Musab Al-Suri. It said Al-Suri had urged terrorists to use sulphuric acid and petrol to start forest fires.