"Excellent Chinese Noodle Cookies"

More on why I find that quote enraging and disconcerting on so many levels, but last week I appropriated two of Jessica’s Oatmeal Scotchie cookies for MGDub and Adam, who both loved them and said they were delicious. The following is a reconstructed conversation between MGDub and plasticann post Oatmeal Scotchie consumption:

MGDub: That butterscotch cookie was really yummy. They remind me of the best candies I've ever had. We made them in class in third grade and I’ve never had them since. We were only allowed to eat two each and I remember loving them so much I could eat them forever. I think you'll be very interested in these candies.
plasticann: (intrigued) Do you have a recipe? What's in them and how do you make them?
MGDub: Well, there are chocolate chips and butterscotch chips melted together and then these crunchies you dip in the melted mixture. These crunchies are…they're Asian.
plasticann: What are they? Are they sweet or savory?
MGDub: Neither, you know…they're these crunchy crunchies.
plasticann: Vermicelli?
MGDub: No, I'm not sure what they're called, but they're really good.

The next day during lunch, I was at the salad bar with Nina and Jessica relaying this cryptic conversation with MGDub hoping they might shed light on the mysterious “crunchies” MGDub spoke of. They were uncharacteristically clueless and of no help, but the woman in front of me interjected with, "I don't mean to eavesdrop, but I think they're Chow Mein Noodles."

Turns out, the recipe is simply melted chocolate chips, melted butterscotch chips with Chow Mein noodles thrown in there. You drop the mixture in clusters on wax paper, chill and eat the little clustered candies. No wonder they're yummy: sugar, fat, and fried carbohydrate food products. MGDub was right, sounds exactly like something I would enjoy.

The recipe MGDub sent me called them "Hobgoblins," but a simple web search yielded the following recipe titles: “Haystacks” (very Monet and I fully intend to use this name) and “Chow Mein Noodle Cookies.” When I found a review for one recipe titled "Excellent Chinese Noodle Cookies," I could feel the rage rising inside of me.

First of all, I'm offended as a cookie baker, these are clearly not "cookies" in my book, but "cluster" type candies. Next, I find offense culturally because there is nothing "Chinese" about these candy clusters they call “cookies.” Somehow, "Chow Mein Noodle Cookies" didn't bother me as much namely because I consider "Chow Mein Noodles" from a La Choy Can in the "international" aisle of my supermarket to be so universally Americanized that there is no question in my mind that they clearly are not "Chinese." Don't get me wrong, I enjoy "Chow Mein Noodles" as a crouton type topping on my salads, but "Chinese" they are not. I think calling them "Chinese Noodle Cookies" is crossing the line.

Nonetheless, I'm going to try to be open minded and I've purchased the requisite butterscotch morsels and a can of the La Choy "Chow Mein Noodles" (Incidentally, La Choy is owned by the ConAgra conglomerate and therefore very “authentic”…NOT!). I'm excited to try the recipe and I know my good friend MGDub will be so excited to revisit a nostalgically sweet memory from age eight, but I'll be calling them "Haystacks." Perhaps I'll even serve my "Haystacks" on one of those trays they sell at museums depicting haystacks by the great impressionist...now would that be metaphysical or just plain "whhed."