Episode: Fortune Cookie
Fortune Cookies

While trying to settle on what food to cover this week, I looked up to find my Spunky stuffed animal staring me in the face. (Talk about an “Aha!” moment.) So, I’m taking on Rocko’s Modern Life. I love this show! It’s totally whacked, but that’s part of the fun. I know that like, a million things went way over my head when I watched it as a kid, but I didn’t know or care. I just watched it for that cute, little wallaby. The stuff that I did pick up though, I added to my own modern life. On my worst days, I can become such a Filburt. (“I’m nauseous. I’m nauseous. I’m nauseous.”) And I can’t tell you how many times I’ve messed up my neck acting like Dr. Hutchison. (’Kay?) But one of the easiest ways to tell that I grew up with Rocko (Besides asking me to sing about recycling.) is to hand me a fortune cookie.

When thumbing through my favorite episodes of Rocko’s Modern Life, it doesn’t take me long to get to “Fortune Cookie.” Leave it to Filburt to get a fortune that reads, “Bad luck and extreme misfortune will infest your pathetic soul for all eternity.” (That “extreme” went missing for a while there and got me all sorts of confused.) Every time I break open a fortune cookie I half expect to find that very same fortune. I joke about it enough that one of these days it probably will happen. I just want the paper, not the bad luck that comes with it. (“It’s only a stupid fortune cookie. You can’t take these things seriously.” Right?) If I ended up with that fortune, I’m sure my life would play out just like the episode. (Minus Really Really Big Man.) I’d freak out. Then the townspeople would freak out. Then I’d freak out some more. So what does Filburt do? He returns to the Chinese restaurant for a fortune cookie redo and goes through a great big pile of fortune cookies, but every one he touches has the same fortune. It’s not a pretty situation to be in, but it’s happening to Filburt, not me. So I can sit here comfortably and focus more on the actual cookies than the paper inside them.

Recipe makes about 45 fortune cookies.

Ingredients

1 cup cake flour, sifted

½ cup sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

3 large egg whites

1/3 cup vegetable oil

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

2 tablespoons water

 

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Prepare fortunes. Line a cookie sheet with a silicone mat or spray with nonstick cooking spray.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the egg whites and sugar until well combined. Add cake flour and salt and mix until just combined. Add vegetable oil, vanilla extract, and water and mix until smooth.

Drop teaspoons of batter on the cookie sheet and spread the batter into 3.5 inch circles. Bake until the cookies begin to brown, 6-8 minutes. Remove from oven and use an offset spatula to lift a cookie off the sheet. Place a fortune in the center of the cookie and loosely fold the cookie in half. Press the center of the cookie to the lip of a cup or edge of a pan and fold the ends down to shape. Place the cookie in a muffin tin to hold its shape while it cools. Repeat with the other cookies. The cookies will begin to harden immediately, so you’ll need to work quickly. If a cookie hardens before you are able to shape it, place it back in the oven for 1 minute. These cookies are coming out of a very hot oven, so wearing heat resistant gloves will save your poor fingers. Once the cookies have fully cooled, you can break them open!

Whenever I get fortune cookies, I get just as excited as Heffer does about reading them. I haven’t attacked anyone, but I’ve come close. I just have to know what everyone’s fortunes are! Whether or not they come true is a different story. And even though Filburt got a not-so-nice fortune, everything worked out for “Mr. Lucky” in the end. (I can’t say the same for the rest of O-Town.) But I made my own cookies, so I know what I’ll find on the inside. Just for fun, I’ll break open one more fortune cookie for the road. *Crack.* Hmm. Let’s see. It reads, “Bad luck and extreme misfortune…” I didn’t write this. Uh-oh. I’m going to collect all of my good luck charms just in case. I can’t be too careful. After all, blog day is a very dangerous day.

 

Tune in next week for more Cartoon Cravings!