When is it Time to Disown Your Uncle?

Sometimes it has to be done. Tonight the decision was clear for me. I will never see that uncle again.

I could forgive the annoying trangressions that built up over time, things that seemed to heal with a little distance. But it just never got better. I heard it put something like this: Anyone can get survive a crisis; it’s the tiny, everyday ankle biting that will get you in the end.

So while there was nothing fatal with this uncle, tonight was enough, because he tampered with my food.

In the past, it was irritations like when I went hungry because he locked me out of the kitchen after ten p.m. It was “too late” to eat.

I forgave him when he ran up my credit card over what we agreed on, chalking it up to an innocent mistake.

It made me nervous, but I let it pass when his gang barked at me in whatever code they had, mocking me, I’m sure. They would pretend they couldn’t understand me, and stole my money when I tried to pay for food.

All under Uncle Jiang's direction.

On to tonight: Dinner.
Chicken Chow Mein. Exhibit A:

Uncle Jiang's Chinese Take Out

Chicken Chow Mein does not consist of a few spindly shreds from an anemic chicken (? somewhat suspect) smothered in onions. See the two bright orange threads there? Those are purely for medical reasons. They exist only so that the diner can rest assured that she has not suddenly gone color blind from the lack of real green chow mein vegetables.

On the other hand, Uncle Jiang may have been looking out for my best interests, knowing the wicked ways of men, perhaps he filled the chicken chow mein exclusively with onions to keep single men at a kilometer's distance. Oh Uncle Jiang! Have I completely misread you?

Exhibit B:

Egg Foo Young

Yes, that dark brown ca-ca on the upper left is the egg. Yes, I was so hungry that I hurried and ate some, lest Uncle Jiang chase me out of the kitchen at ten o'clock. Yes, my stomach is doing some Chinese martial art on itself.

See the brown "gravy" stuff? Egg Foo Young traditionally comes with a light brown gravy, thickened with a bit of cornstarch, and the barest hint of black pepper. Good gravy gives American style gravy a run for its money. This? Is sloppy, lazy bottled hoisin sauce poured into a styrofoam cup. You think I don't know, Uncle Jiang? You think you can pull the wool over my eyes and finely tuned palate? I have the taste buds of a thousand generations of picky eaters.

I think we're done here. 

Golden Lettuce, Who Knew?

So I went to Bagels del Sol because I had a coupon, and thank goodness I did, because if I had spent $17.68 for what we ate, I would have expected them to point and laugh as we walked out the door.
"Hot Ham and Cheese Sandwich" ? for $6.99, Little Daughter received exactly: 1 hard bagel
1 slice o' cheese
1 slice o' ham
and bagel chips. I'll get to them in a minute. Seriously, this place was ridiculously stingy. What are we, in some eastern bloc country in 1981? And after waiting nearly 15 minutes for her sandwich, you'd think at read more » least the cheese would be hot and melty, right?
Ha, ha! Did I say it was $6.99 and under the "specialty" section? That's not pesos, that's American dollars.
I ordered the ...oh heck I don't know what's called, but it's got turkey (Ha ha!) lettuce, and cucumbers and cream cheese in a wrap.
They just didn't tell us it was a scavenger hunt for the meat. Because really? It was a freaking lettuce and cucumber wrap. Also for $6.99. OK, so it was the super crispy lettuce, I think they call it "Iceberg." What's that go for these days, anyhow? Cause I have to admit, there was, like, a *wedge* of Iceberg lettuce in my wrap. Complete mouthfuls of Iceberg. So I really shouldn't complain because I haven't checked the markets and for all I know, that Iceberg Lettuce could be like those gourmet truffle mushrooms from France. In that sense, $6.99 for a wedge of lettuce wrap is most likely a steal.
I probably shouldn't even be reviewing that because the secret will be out and people will line up around the corner for Wrap a la Iceberg.

IMAGE: Honestly? I googled "lettuce filled wrap" and this was the closest pic I could find to what I had. Why? Because nobody outside of Bagels del Sol makes such a mockery of their customers.

OK...
The chips.
People? I'm all about recycling. Use what you can. So it doesn't bother me at all that Lettuce del Sol slices their (day old?) bagels to make chips from them. But they can't just toss whatever they have into a bag of cajun spices willy-nilly and call it "good."
What I mean is - leftover cinnamon raisin bagels? They do not get the garlic/salt/papper treatment and slapped in the basket with a lettuce wrap. Cinnamon and garlic is bad, bad juju.

In fact, how about you keep the hot pepper spices for people who like hot pepper spices, instead of the *plate of a first grader*?? That's pretty much a NO BRAINER that a six year old won't want hot, firey garlicky, cinnamon chips with her one slice o' ham sandwich.

Now, I'm not saying that proper handwashing techniques weren't followed here.
But I AM saying that previously, we ate the same things we've been eating at our house with no issues. But when we came back from Bagels del Sol, within about two hours, some wicked stomach cramps set in.
Montezuma's revenge of the Lettuce Cups.
And then once it was out of out systems, we were fine. So, yeah, I guess I'm pointing a finger.
Or ten.