Programming, espresso, and grumbling.

Jon and I just came back from eating at Cracker Barrel. It’s not a restaurant where we eat often, but sometimes I get this irresistible urge to eat biscuits and gravy, and Cracker Barrel is the best place to quell that urge because 1) IHOP is meh and 2) Waffle House food looks and tastes like it has been dipped in grease after cooking. So we went and waited for about twenty minutes before getting a table because that place was packed with old people, like always. When we finally got in and got our food, all went well until I noticed my lone sausage patty was still very pink inside, so I sent it back for replacement bacon. Mm, bacon. Beyond that, things went off without a hitch until I had finished my gravy-drenched biscuit and was about to prepare my jam-drenched biscuit. I am pathological about splitting my biscuit before doing any drenching with other foodstuffs, thereby getting a larger other-foodstuffs-to-biscuit ratio, but I immediately noticed something was awry when I split the last biscuit on our table. For one, biscuits aren’t normally resistant to splitting, unless you’ve got a week-old, rock-hard biscuit, and then you oughtn’t to be splitting it anyway, you should just gnaw at it plain or feed it to the dog. This biscuit, however, was special, and insisted on staying half unsplit. I looked at its innards and saw why: that jagged, plastic ring that is normally found beneath a milk jug lid was lodged there. Hm.

Jon and I had a good laugh about it because that’s never happened to either of us before. Sure, we’ll occasionally find hairs in food, and that’s definitely grosser than freshly baked plastic. A plastic milk jug ring in a biscuit, though, that’s not grody, that’s just the result of an overzealous milk-opener who has been given the task of mixing batter. I saw our waiter at a nearby table, so I leaned back and watched him, hoping to catch his eye. One of the managers (or so I assume; he was dressed nicer than the regular waiters and looked manager-y) saw me and came over. I pointed out the undercooked sausage and he started to go off to get me some bacon instead, but I caught his arm. “Wait, I have something funnier.” I held up the biscuit con plástico and said “I don’t think the milk ring is supposed to be here.” He got this dry, amused look on his face and said “That’s from a buttermilk jug.” Taking the biscuit, he went off to the kitchen in the back, and Jon guessed “Someone’s going to get an ass-chewing.” I bet he took it back there to show the cook.

Our waiter was a totally nice, friendly guy though, and kept me plied with sweet tea and Jon with coffee, so I left a good tip. He can’t help it if the biscuits are plastic-filled and the sausage is rawness-filled. Jon and I bought oodles of candy in the store part, and I’m looking forward to the Reese’s Cups. On a side note, it drives me bonkers when people say that as “ree-see cups”. Dude, it’s some guy’s name, just possessive. Do they pronounce the name “Reese” by itself as “ree-see”? Ugh, it’s “ree-sihz”.