Friday, May 2, 2008

Bake Sale Tirade! 50 cents each!


I made it myself!

You know that old bumper sticker about how it will be a great day when schools have all the money they need and the Pentagon has to hold bake sale to buy a bomb? I do agree, but I would like to add on the following:
It will be a great day when a school has a bake sale that sells things that someone actually baked.

This is obviously much less important than the world of fully funded education and peaceful living advocated in the first version, but this is nevertheless my rant of the day. My gainful employer had a bake sale today and this is what was on the table:

cans of soda
individual bags of potato chips
Dunkin' Donuts
Oreos put in sandwich bags
a dozen or so sad Toll House cookies that may or may not have been from a tube
A pan of Rice Crispy treats.

Does anyone else think this is a bad message on so many levels? Get beyond the obvious tendency towards childhood obesity, and you also have consumerism, and the missing message of the whole bake sale thing: If you put in a little sweat equity, you earn money and can feel good about giving it to your cause. Not to mention the important childhood memories of learning to make a real cookie, smelling it bake, licking the bowl , etc. I know people are busy. I know you could say, "What the hell do you know? You're not trying to run a household of 1 to 4.3 kids", but really? No one knows how to bake? No one's nanny knows how to bake? They should just call it a "Snack Sale". Or a "Junk Food Sale". And of course they made lots of money. But they didn't make memories! Oh no they didn't, dammit!

If I were to make something for a bake sale right now I would make this or this. But I guess that's just me.

2 comments:

Mama said...

Especially when there are so many good bakeries around and the cupcake craze is in full swing - buy those and put them on a paper plate, is that so hard? Or go to Trader Joe's and doctor up a pie or tart with some extra powdered sugar and some fruit. I mean, if you're going to cheat, cheat well.

Unknown said...

Does no one understand the concept of a "BAKE" sale? With the Food Channel going strong, some one must have a Paula Deen cookbok! She has cookie recioes with only 4 ingrediients.
YoMama