Eaton’s is gone. Labatt’s was sold to an American corporation, which immediately deep sixed “The Rant.” The Bay now prefers to be known as HBC. Sometimes, it seems like Mounties and a smug sense of superiority towards Americans are the only things that bind Canadians together.
That, and Kraft Dinner.
Of the three, Kraft Dinner is the only one with an untarnished reputation. After all, most Canadians were brought up with KD (as we familiarly came to call it). It was our manna, our mother’s milk (except, of course, that it had a distinctive cheddar twang that cannot be found in the breast milk of any woman outside of Uzbekistan).
Properly prepared, KD contains milk and grains, two of the four food groups recommended by Health Canada in Canada’s Food Guide. If you add ketchup, you’ve got another food group – fruits and vegetables – covered. (If you prefer your KD pre-ketchuped – or, as aficionados call it, bloodied – not so much.) Not only that, but if you eat it with the right supplement, KD can give you 27 different vitamins and iron!
You might think that KD is simple enough to make, but, in fact, there is an art to it. Too much milk, and the cheese sauce will be thin and bland. Not enough milk, and the cheese sauce will be too thick and gloppy. (Yes, it’s a real word, gloppy – look it up on the Canada’s Food Guide Web site if you don’t believe me. Just don’t bother reading the rest of this article – KD is not for cynics.) And, that doesn’t even take into account the butter or margarine factor.
To help immigrants to Canada better integrate into our society, we have prepared the following algorithm which lays out exactly how to make this most Canadian of culinary delicacies. (Ask somebody who knows how to speak English what it means.) Just follow the instructions, and you’ll be feeling smugly superior to Americans in no time!
| 1. | Are you hungry? | |
| NO | 2. | Go back to doing whatever it was you were doing before you asked yourself if you were hungry. |
| YES | 3. | Are there leftovers from last night’s barbecue in the fridge? |
| YES | 4. | Warm the leftovers up and eat them. Yummy. |
| NO | 5. | Do you feel like making a gourmet dinner for yourself? |
| YES | 6. | Say goodbye to the next seven hours of your life, because you’ll have to go to the store to buy the ingredients, soak the meat in a special sauce, prepare the vegetables and, oh, my god, why does anybody feel like making a gourmet dinner for themselves? |
| NO | 7. | Put a pot of water on the stove, baby, and set it aboiling, because we’re having us some Kraft Dinner! |
| 8. | Is the water boiling? | |
| NO | 9. | Go read a book or something, because you’re not ready for the next step. |
| YES | 10. | Dump the noodles into the pot of boiling water. |
| 11. | Have the noodles stopped being crunchy? | |
| NO | 12. | Stir, then go play Katamari Damacy or something, because the noodles are not ready to be eaten. |
| YES | 13. | Are the noodles overcooked? |
| YES | 14. | Toss this batch – nobody likes mushy noodles. |
| NO | 15. | Strain those tasty little suckers and put them into a bowl. |
| 16. | Do you like your cheese sauce creamy and are not on a diet? | |
| YES | 17. | Add three tablespoons of butter and ¼ cup of milk to the noodles. |
| NO | 18. | Add one tablespoon of margarine and ½ cup of skim milk to the noodles. |
| 19. | Mix in the cheese sauce, stirring until the pasta is evenly coated. Then, enjoy the cheese and noodly goodness! |
Notes
The Yummy Canadian Food Preparation Algorithm is not endorsed by General Mills, Specific Mills, Hailey Mills, Darby Mills, ocean krills, Winter Kills or anybody else associated with Kraft Dinner, which is a registered trademark, copyrighted up the wazoo, and prone to litigate people who take any of their products for granted or their names in vain, people who love people, people just like you, only more interesting.The Yummy Canadian Food Preparation Algorithm takes no position on whether or not this is a good thing to eat. It merely shows how Kraft Dinner is made in households across the country. If in doubt, ignore your doctor.