We recently spilled several pixels over the glut of food holidays vying for the month of May. You helped us sift through National Asparagus Month, National Gazpacho Month and National Chocolate Custard Month to determine that, from now on and for all time, May is National Barbecue Month.

But the calendar is still full of daily food holidays. Just this week, for example, National Quiche Lorraine Day is Monday, National Strawberries and Cream Day is Tuesday, and National Escargot Day is Friday. We're very excited about National Mint Julep Day on May 30, but still, this is a lot to take in.

Luckily there will be at least one fewer holiday starting in 2014: World Nutella Day, February 5, is dead.

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Peep-lic Transportation

Last year it wasn't until 10 p.m. the night before Easter Sunday that I remembered it was absolutely definitely time to round up some Peeps and chocolate peanut butter eggs to fill baskets, which is partially on account of me not wanting to spend money on things that will be obliterated within one hour of being received. Procastination with silly expenditures, if you will.

So, at the store, I was carefully taking stock of the Peep selection when a really loud shopper went to check out. She wasn't being mean or anything, just yelling instead of talking.

Meanwhile, another lady at a register about 15 feet away was busy getting her credit card declined or something like that. She was clearly pissed. Funny thing happened then, Credit Card Denied Lady got real irritated with Loud Lady.

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Traditional hamantaschen

This Saturday and Sunday is the Jewish holiday of Purim. What's Purim? The short answer, "Jewish Halloween" is also the wrong answer. But there are costumes involved as well as a lot of drinking, so it's easy to see where folks could get confused.

So real quick: Purim is the biblical story of Queen Esther and how she saved all the Jews by being the most beautiful and appealing to her husband the king's sensibilities regarding mass murder. It's a familiar story: Some guy (in this case, Haman) tried to kill all the Jews (a goal that never seems to get old). Some good guys (King Ahasuerus, Queen Esther and her uncle Mordechai) work it out so the bad guy pays in the end. Then we drink, and eat.

Specifically, we drink until we can't tell the difference from the good guy and the bad guy in the story (which is hard to do, considering every time someone says the bad guy's name everybody starts making noise like it's going out of style). And we eat hamantaschen, which are little triangular-shaped shortbread cookies filled with jam, poppy seeds or most anything, really. Just no bacon, OK guys?

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Sara Kerens

Good news, those of you whose New Year's resolutions have expired, this Wednesday is National Pie Day! Not to be confused with Pi Day, which is on March 14, or 3.14 for you nerds out there, Pie Day is the day in which we celebrate the miracle of pie.

Pie was first invented by Sir Alexandris Pie, of Greece. Except not at all. And honestly, who the fuck cares where pie came from? All that matters is that it is delicious. And beautiful. And, well, pie.

And as I've always said, pie is a thing that is good. It can be good or really good or really fucking good. It's rarely ever bad unless it's a chart that contains bad news. This is the truth.

Emporium Pies' Facebook page

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Village Baking Company - Kouign Amanns

If you haven't started your holiday shopping, then good for you! I think we all perform best under the pressure of deadlines, so just let it happen. Wait another few days, then get around to it. Most places will be open on Christmas Eve anyway. And a lot of gas stations are open 365. Lotto and scratch off tickets make herald angels do a remix. Hark!

See Also:
-- A Craft Beer Mixed Six

Bread
If want to really woo Santa or any Judgy McJudger on your list, put your running pants on (the ones with an elastic waist) and hoof-it over to the Village Baking Company on Christmas Eve for a dozen kouign amanns, which are succulent buttery pastries made from angel wings. Eat four on Christmas Eve, another four Christmas morning and give away two - saving two for yourself. You've earned them on account of your spot-on gifting skills. Proprietor and baker Clint Cooper will also make a few special holiday goodies like vanilla bean caramels, marshmallows and hot cocoa mix and, of course, stollen. Village Baking Company will have extended hours this week: Wednesday through Saturday 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., then Christmas Eve from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

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LDD

A mixed six pack from The Bottle Shop.

On Wednesday the Beer Institute announced that the number of permitted breweries in the U.S. has reached an all-time high of 2,751, up from 2,309 in 2011. Not that we needed a stat to validate this craft beer resurgence, but it's reassuring nonetheless. "Resurgence", you say? Yes, our forefathers were all about local beer. The brewery record we just broke was originally set in 1887.

See also:
- A Guide to North Texas Craft Beers

You know what that means, right? Picking a beer will continue to be fraught with anxiety. But, the holidays present a golden opportunity to work through this predicament.

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Heads up, gentiles, Chanukah starts tomorrow night . I hope you have all your gifts picked out for all your Jewish friends. You know that's eight gifts per friend, right? No? You sonofabitch. Better click over to Amazon or something, quick. But first, read the rest of this post.

See also: Let There Be Latkes: Eight Reasons Gentiles Should Appreciate Hanukkah, Too

How about I help you out? Instead of giving you a guilt trip about the whole eight gifts thing, I'm going to give you eight ways to impress your Jewish friends at all your various Christmahanukkakwanzaakah celebrations this year. Ready? Go.

1. Fry up some really crispy latkes.
Latkes are basically fried potato pancakes (with a side of onion or no-onion controversy.) Some folks have gotten crrrrazy and substituted sweet potato or even added vegetables, but the simplest way tends to go over best. Shredded potatoes, egg, flour, salt and pepper. Fry those babies up. Bonus points if you don't burn your house down. A recipe I discovered recently advocates boiling, draining, overnight refrigerating, peeling, shredding and draining your potatoes -- in that order. The oil needs to be the perfect temperature (between 350 and 370 degrees), but the most important thing you can do to guarantee a good latke fry is to squeeze. Squeeze the eff out of the shredded potato mixture and then squeeze again. And then squeeze some more. Pretend to be angered by the so-called "war on Christmas," and then squeeze harder. Good. Voila: crispy latkes.

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Bull City Homebrew

When you were a kid, were you able to ever make it through an advent calendar just one day at a time, or did you have tendencies to work ahead a bit? Don't feel bad if you did. It was just your ambitious overachiever qualities rising up.

Good news, advent calendars aren't just for kids anymore. There are few new options out there, like the whiskey advent calendar from The Master of Malt in England who sell fine single malt Scotch whiskies and specialize in tracking down rare malts around the world.

From the site:

Masters of Malt

"Behind each of the 24 doors is a different 3cl sample of delicious whisky! We'll keep the contents a surprise, but we can tell you that behind one of the doors is a sample of 50-year old Scotch whisky, the full-sized bottle of which is worth £350!"

The whisky calendar cost $240.

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Nailed it!

Twitter

#turkey held together with #bacon 100% #badass #thanksgiving done right #cool #art instagr.am/p/SWd74nFJVd/

— Julien Hemmendinger (@JulienTheDinger) November 22, 2012

Warning: If you read this, you will sing it all day.

Twitter

#howithappened #thanksgiving #indians #pilgrims #callmemaybe #instafunny #instagood #turkey #carlyrae #lol instagr.am/p/SW5i9XQGmK/

— Andres Aquino (@Andrewboii4) November 23, 2012

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Nope. That's not what's it's like. Not even close.

Thanksgiving appears to me the same way a hostage situation does. In both cases, unwilling captives are fed strange food by their captors, there is political debate among the ring leaders (often liquored and loud), one or more fires are guaranteed to ignite somewhere (I once saw asparagus combust) and too often threats of knife violence seem a bit too realistic to be played off as a joke (relax Mom, it's just a flat soufflé, put down the sharp carving metal.)

As a product of a divorced home, this means that by the time Snoopy floats across New York, I will have had no fewer than 16 different dishes to dig into: turkey at both homes, ham, stuffing, at least four different pies, a few casseroles, potatoes (sweet, and double baked), vegetables, greens (which are the greasy cousins of vegetables), canned cranberries, beans, bacon, ice cream and enough tryptophan to sedate an offensive lineman. I will have stuffed myself beyond comfort, to the diabetic point of replacing my stomach lining with brown gravy. I will consider purchasing a scooter ala Walmart to compensate for actual movement and blame my gushing love handles on a "glandular" problem. So, when my girlfriend told me that we would also be traveling to Lumberton, Texas, a small town outside of Beaumont, for two additional meals with her split parents, my heart stopped as it prepared for the oncoming clot. It's been nice knowing you, regular sized jeans. Sayonara, six pack. In the next three days I will eat four thanksgiving meals, travel 10 hours by car, watch three football games and sidestep the opportunity to arm wrestle a drunken uncle at least twice.

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