Welcome back, Dungeon Meshi Maniacs! Did you finish off the rice balls and miso in time? I love both but neither are very fridge friendly. Best to eat your rice fresh out of the pot if you ask me. But this is the leftovers section. How can you do leftovers if you need to eat your food quickly? I mean, I could talk about the history of both onigiri and miso soup. How interesting could it be to hear about ancient people mashing things together? Seriously. These are old recipes, DMMs! So what to talk about? A quick look at the calendar shows that we have a spooky holiday coming up at the end of the week. So why don't we get into costume and talk about the scary side of cooking?
Not for nothing, I'm willing to bet frog based costumes are going to be very popular this Halloween season. So many sexy frogs! We are not here to talk the finer points of costumery, are we, DMMs? Nope. That's another hit blog that can be found here: https://aepayn.blogspot.com/ This is a cooking blog so we are here to talk about cooking. Little known Nih Fact, I grew up in Appalachia! Wait...that's a commonly known Nih Fact. Okay, little known Appalachia Fact. It's super weird and fully of unsolved mysteries.
Wait...that's another commonly known fact. Sorry, DMMs. I'm a font of things everyone already knows this week. So how about this. The common "magic" of Appalachia is old school witch magic. By that I mean herbalism. Knowing what weeds, nuts and mushrooms can help and upset tummy, maybe disinfect or get you super high. Of course anytime someone in the back of holler knows something weird it can only mean one thing.
What type of backwoods black magic should we talk about this week, DMMs? Trust me, there are tons of old remedies that could get you burned at any stake. Since this is a blog about cooking and eating why don't we talk about a job that combines both? How about the fun job of Sin Eater? Apparently this one isn't as secret as it used to be as it has shown up in a few tv shows over the years. And who can blame Hollywood? It's pretty cool! When a person has died you bake some bread and place the bread on the body. The sins that person has committed in life are transferred to the bread. This gives their soul a little more shine when it comes to the afterlife. The Sin Eater, a live human, eats the bread and the bread sins are transferred onto their soul. This is an old tradition, DMMs, that can trace way back to Wales. Good old Wales! Forever confused with Ireland until the end of time. Two things always bothered me about this story, DMMs. First, why not just leave the sin in the bread? It's already been transferred off the soul so it's just evil bread at this point. Why does someone need to eat it? Second, when the Sin Eater dies can you bake some bread and have all of their sins plus the extra they picked up doing their job into the bread? Would that make it super evil bread? Would you need an extra big loaf to soak up all that extra sin? Does this become a Ponzi scheme of sin transference until you need an entire evil bakery to take on the sins?
Okay, okay. I'm getting a bit off topic. What does this have to do with Appalachia? Simple. Appalachia has a strong Welsh heritage and a large portion of their beliefs came along with them. Of course time and a change in location always alters the original belief. In my case when I was told the story of the Sin Eater you didn't have to bake anything. A simple apple would work. And a living person didn't eat them. No, you put the apple on the tombstone of the decedent. You'd come back the next morning to find the apple had been eaten. A spirit called a Sin Eater clearly came by and took on the sins! Any reason it has to be an apple? I guess any fruit would work but apples are easy to find. Also, I'm willing to bet the Sin Eater has a similar bitemark to that of a squirrel. Either way those sins have transferred from the soul to the eater. I guess this could make a forest of evil squirrels but that's the hawk's problem.
Oh, don't give me that look. This is a real story that was told to me when I was a kid. And now I'm sharing it with you! I wouldn't recommend bringing apples to a graveyard, however. The groundskeepers don't take kindly to things that could attract wildlife. I can say if you ever see an apple on a grave best leave it alone. Or else you're likely to make things harder for you after you die. You don't want to be packing extra sins with you without your knowledge! That's it for this week, DMMs. Be sure to come back next week when I face down an old foe!
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