Mammo-Grahams

The original Mammo-Grahams

Every so often, I see images from a recipe I created eons ago, sometimes with attribution and sometimes without. They originated years before food blogging became a Thing, and I later shared them on a food blog I created in tandem with my mom (which is where the shared photos came from). After the latest sighting in the internet wilds, I thought it was high time I shared the recipe anew, via Fan Fare.

How these came to be: Back in about 2005, when I was first starting to get into party planning and theme catering just for fun, a friend asked me to cater a unique party. As a childhood cancer survivor, she and her mother had decided to throw a big bash celebrating two decades of being cancer-free. Having been to a few shindigs of mine before, she knew the kind of funky, funny theme food I loved to put together, and she wanted her own food to be really irreverent, sort of thumbing her nose and laughing in the face of cancer. An example she herself thought of was serving deviled eggs - with black olive "tumors" in them.

I asked if she really, REALLY wanted me to run with that concept, because if you want gallows humor, by god I will give you gallows humor. She insisted that she did, as long as it was still good food, so off I went, creating a whole menu devoted to giving a giant F-U to different kinds of cancer. It was a smash success, if I dare say so myself.

One of my favorite items I invented for that menu was the "Mammo-Graham", which I share with you here today as reminder to get your own done, if you have breasts yourself. As you can see, it's a fairly realistic edible depiction of the procedure, as anyone who has undergone one will attest.

They are actually very easy to put together, and, yes, inexpensive too, using potatoes as a base.  One option for the, er, fleshy part of the Mammo-Grahams was making them out of marzipan, but that could get very pricy very quickly (and it’s a pretty strong flavor to eat in such large chunks). So I based them on an old-fashioned recipe for potato candy; it's normally used to make Easter Egg shapes. To make about a dozen, depending on, uh,  cup size:

SQUISH. A closer look.

Potato Candy:

2 medium russet potatoes, peeled
1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, chopped
2 16 ounce boxes powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or almond, actually, if you really wanted faux-marzipan)
2-3 tablespoons peanut butter
1-2 tablespoons cocoa powder

Other Mammo-Graham materials:

6 regular graham cracker rectangles, each broken into 2 squares
6 chocolate graham cracker rectangles, each broken into 2 squares
about 1/4 cup milk chocolate chips
about a dozen pink, tan, and brown M&Ms, preferably a combination plain and peanut (nipples come in many sizes!)

Boil the potatoes just until soft. Drain, mash, and measure 1/2 cup out into a mixing bowl. Make a small snack of the excess with some sour cream and chives, I say. Add butter into mixing bowl, mix in thoroughly, and let cool completely(very important).  Add sugar and vanilla/almond extract, knead until smooth.

Roll some of the dough into various ball sizes. Then add the peanut butter and knead thoroughly again - you may want to make a few different complexions, so you can add it in in increments, make a couple more balls, and repeat. Follow the same process with the cocoa, adding incrementally to represent different skin tones!

Now gently squeeze each ball between a pair of the graham crackers. Melt the chocolate chips (either in a microwave in 30 second increments or in a double boiler). Transfer to a piping or ziploc bag, cut off the tip (as small as you can manage) and pipe some nice zigzaggy flourishes on top of each sandwich. Finally, complete each mammary with its own M&M nipple, using shades of pink and tan and brown as you please.

So if you find yourself at a cancer research fundraising event in the future, consider bringing these treats along - they were a huge hit at the original F*ck Cancer party! Share this post as liberally as you like. And please tag @fanfarethemecatering (Insta)/ @Culinerdy (Twitter) in your photos.

Finally, get your Mammos. May we all live long and prosper.

A few varieties. Forgive the early-aughts digital point & click camera quality!

For The Throne: It’s the Final Countdown

IT’S THE FINAL COUNTDOWN.

Only 3 more sleeps til the very. last. season. SOB. So at the end of this era, I’m going on the record with a few thoughts on possible outcomes.

Things I feel are a very strong possibility: Regarding Cersei, two candidates for her demise are often floated: either Arya gets to cross her off the List at last, or the valonqar (“little brother”) gets to kill her as per Maggy the Frog’s prophecy. I say why choose? I want to see Arya kill Cersei, either wearing Jaime or Tommen’s face. Best of both worlds! (P.S. It’s irrelevant if Cersei is or isn’t pregnant. Presumably she’d be offed before it becomes an issue, pun always intended.)

Another theory I hear a lot of: the notion that Bran “is” the Night King, based on time travel of some kind yadda yadda. I don’t buy it for a number of reasons, but I definitely DO like the idea of him warging into either the Night King or Viserion or both.

I’m also going to stan for NO ONE ruling via the Iron Throne. And not in a Faceless Men kind of way, I mean let’s put an end to this kind of monarchy altogether. Didn’t Dany say, in another context, that she was going to break the wheel? After everything they’ve all been through, how anticlimactic and frankly pointless would it be to just return to Targaryen succession? I want fair leaders in independent regions. (Only in a less boring way than I’m making it sound.)

Things I’m into but who knows: The Iron Throne does have a purpose, despite the above, though: How about we make good use of those swords, a good number of which must be Valyrian steel? Gendry breaks it down with his smithery skills (preferably shirtless again, forgive me) and they use them to fight the common enemy of the White Walkers.

Similarly, there’s the question of the tombs in Winterfell. HELL YES, I love the idea of Starks of generations past being revived, and hey, why couldn’t there be “good” White Walkers? We’ve already seen it with Coldhands Benjen. Could Melisandre make it happen? Could we see Ned again? (I’m not getting into the plausibility re: states of decomposition. IT’S MAGIC Y’ALL.)

You can see I’m a HUGE sucker for rewarding foreshadowing, for outcomes that (imaginatively) use the things that have been in front of us all along.

Pet theories that are probably unlikely but I’m into them anyway, as in basically, this is how I’D write it. (Shhh I know I know.) Here’s where rewatching pays off: Think way back to season one, after Bran had been pushed from the window. Cersei comes to visit Catelyn, who is sitting watch with him, and relates a story of her firstborn with Robert, a “blackhaired beauty” that didn’t survive. I initially thought she was bullshitting to appear empathetic, but then, later that season, she and Robert discuss it privately.

So, what if that blackhaired beauty didn’t actually die as a newborn, but Cersei had him relinquished and lied to Robert, not wanting his offspring at all, and what if that beauty is in fact Gendry? This would make him a trueborn Baratheon and the legitimate heir to the Throne - which, yeah, see above re: putting an end to it all anyway, but I’d love to see what the writers could do with that development.

Hopeless romantic moment: I also gotta say, it would be pretty goddamned heartwarming if Sansa and Tyrion ended up together after all, seeing and appreciating one another with fresh eyes. I could see that being deeply healthy and happy.

Side note: I also think Theon has come so far in his redemption journey that he deserves some peace and comfort (and that means he’s probably a goner).

Things they just BETTER NOT: Please, please, please let’s not have a Jon and Dany baby be the thing that ties it all up in a little bow. I can’t imagine anything more cliched and tired and annoying. Just NO. I also hate the notion that Tyrion is also a Secret Targaryen. MEH. Yes, I get the explanation, I just don’t like it. He’s an outstanding hero all on his own, we don’t need a copycat storyline from Jon (where it IS a truly satisfying reveal - I literally stood and cheered when our suspicions were finally confirmed).

Finally, and most important of all, I want all of our survivors to receive quality trauma-informed therapy.

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If you’re in the Portland area, consider joining Fan Fare and Pairings Portland Wine Shop for viewing parties! I’ll be providing a thematic dessert for each evening.