The Vegetable Medley and Other Work Cafeteria Abominations

We have a cafeteria here at work and sometimes they serve some whacked out vittles. And I'm here to complain about it.

I know what you are thinking. "Dim, quit your bellyaching! At least you HAVE a cafeteria at work! You're not stuck chomping on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (with the crusts cut off) and two-day-old leftover Hamburger Helper!" (hey, it "helps 'er make a great meal"...that's not sexist. Then again, if they assumed the guy made dinner, they would have call it Hamburger Helpim and who the fuck's gonna buy that? It makes no sense.)

So, I will not quit my bellyaching. Because my bellyaching is actually what led me to write this post.

So, in no particular order, here are my cafeteria's top 5 whacky things. One's new (as of today!) and there will be more to follow as the Frankensteinian chefs are bound to come up with something else (and any co-worker residents of Dim City are certain to remind me of ones I forgot):

1. The Sirloin Steak Soup.

This travesty sounded like a good idea on the surface. I figured it would be something like a Chunky Beef Stew or even like a tamer beef and vegetable. You know, "sirloin steak" sort of comes with its own natural pedigree. I think "beef".

What we got was day-old meatloaf cut up and put in beef-flavored brine. Now, meatloaf on its own totally sucks ass. Now imagine meatloaf sitting in this broth soaking it up. Yum-o! (Apologies to Rachael). So, it looked like someone left a pumpernickel out in a downpour and it tasted like the bottom of my boot heel (which happened to be inexplicably and liberally salted). "Someone left the sirloin steak soup out in the rain. I could tell a copper. Because I spent so long on the hopper..."

2. Chicken a la King

Now, I'm not Bobby Flay, so I do have to admit that I didn't know EXACTLY what was in Chicken a la King when I got it, but I was reasonably sure it didn't contain anything that was going to send me into anaphylactic shock.

I get this dish back to my desk and it looks like some sort of chicken thing with some type of supreme sauce on it. But there is something on top of it and I can't quite make it out because Paco was a little heavy-handed with the accompanying sauce. Dim takes a bite. Hmmm. Chicken. Hmm...well, I wouldn't know, because I am allergic to shellfish, but if I didn't know better, I would SWEAR that was crabmeat. I guess I should have read the fine print on the menu that said it was Chicken a la King Crab.

Now, ladies and germs, this internet gadget is a wonderful thing. I implore you to find on this internet thingy a single, solitary recipe for Chicken a la King that includes crabmeat (that wasn't written by either a raving lunatic or someone who was out to kill me).

Luckily, this was only imitation crabmeat, so my eyes gave the illusion that they swelled up, but for only a fraction of the cost.

3. The Mosquito Coast Salad Bar

I found a winged insect in my salad one time. I haven't eaten the salad bar since and have packed on about 10 pounds. Thanks a lot. You assholes ever hear of DDT?

4. The Buffalo Chicken Calzone <===NEW ENTRY!

I just finished eating up this scrumptious delicacy. On the outside, it looked like a normal calzone. Now, what would you think would be on the inside of a buffalo chicken calzone? Well, buffalo chicken is a good place to start. Even these guys couldn't screw that up. Bleu cheese? Oh no no no. We draw the line of traditional buffalo chicken at...the buffalo chicken.

I do give them points for creativity by actually putting in small pieces of carrot and celery. Usually, the carrot and the celery is consumed separately from the buffalo chicken. I can't recall anyone ever making a buffalo chicken veggie sandwich with the wing in between a celery stalk and a carrot stick and eating the whole thing at once. But I do appeciate the effort for trying to interject SOME standards into the calzone, as perverted and completely idiotic as it may be.

But in cutting a little deeper into the calzone, I discovered two things I have NEVER seen as part of a buffalo chicken anything, nevermind a calzone:

Peas.

Corn.

What the hell is that? Was that crap just lying around? Who made this? Some bonged-out college kid? I expected the next bite to be laden with Fritos, mac and cheese, and some Ramen noodles.

5. The Dreaded and Cursed Vegetable Medley

I like vegetables. I really do. I just don't like the caf's bland, boiled cornucopia of virtually every vegetable under the sun. The usual medley consists of broccoli, cauliflower, zucchini, summer squash, and carrots. I like 60% of the vegetables in that list. Invariably, 99% of my vegetable portion consists of the 20% of the vegetables from that list that I abhor. I swear that zucchini and summer squash must be cheaper to get around here than the clap, because they give that stuff out like it is going out of style. Zucchini and summer squash. Not the clap. At least, not to my knowledge. And what is it about those two vegetables? They go together like Ozzie and Harriet. Tom and Katie. Sigfried and Roy.

The other day, however, Chef Indecisive went absolutely apeshit and I counted no fewer than a baker's dozen of different vegetables in my medley. Now, you know those environmentally-hostile styrofoam containers with the constructive layout of a Hungry Man TV-dinner tray? The big section for the "entree" and the two smaller sections, one for the "starch" and one for the "fucking zucchini and summer squash"? That one? Well, you know how small one of those smaller sections are. This is a list of vegetables I found there. In no order, other than numeric, numbnuts:

1. Zucchini
2. Summer squash (did you really expect anything different?)
3. Broccoli (both florets and thinly sliced pieces of stalk, which has all the smoothness of birch tree bark)
4. Cauliflower (see broccoli)
5. Onions
6. Green beans
7. Red peppers
8. Green peppers (I'm not cheating...they are very different)
9. Carrots
10. Mushrooms (!)
11. Lima beans
12. Peas
13. Corn - 1 (one) kernel

What the hell is this gip? No parsnips? No turnip? No swiss chard? What kind of racket are they running here?

Oh, and all of these things were bathing gently in a shallow pool of steaming water that had the vague taste of, you guessed it, zucchini and summer squash.

I should keep my yap shut. I know there are starving children in China. But not even they could possibly like zucchini and summer squash.

Can I just get some extra rice with that?,

- Dim.