The world is burning but at least I have a Ninja Creami

The news offers no comfort so here are some recipes

It’s been a minute, and I keep trying to write newsletters about our current political hellscape, but I’m trying to keep the tone here light, so…

I got a Ninja Creami for Christmas. I’m generally loathe to add another appliance to the dwindling space on my counterop, but I love ice cream.

Love as in I make my own ice cream. Love as in my first stop in Austin is Amy’s, and my first stop in Seattle is Molly Moon’s, and if I see a new Jeni’s flavor I will climb over barbed wire to try it. Love as in I will make ice cream an entire meal if left unsupervised.

Until recently.

Recently my body decided it no longer wanted to dance with dairy (or maybe it’s just been that way for a while and I was white-knuckling). Either way, no more lactose. Bodies are stupid. Aging is dumb. I hate it.

(Yeah, I understand what Lactaid is. Lactaid only works so much for so long.)

Hence the Ninja Creami. It’s basically a dumbed-down home version of a Pacojet, which is an $8,000 device that high-end professional kitchens use to make ice cream.

The basic principle of a Pacojet is you pour a bunch of stuff into a canister, freeze it solid, then insert it into the machine; a special blade shaves it, creating ice crystals smaller than you’d get from traditional churning (I could sit here for an hour and write about the science of ice cream, but I won’t; just trust that this is a good thing).

On the Ninja Creami, a lot of the parts are plastic and you’re not freezing it as cold as an industrial freezer would, and the model I have only costs $200 (thanks, Santa!), but you’re still left with a product that is incredibly smooth. Supernaturally smooth. It has no business being that smooth.

But no dairy for me. That’s fine. I start every day with a protein shake, usually with almond milk, since I lift a lot of weights. So now, I throw it in the Creami. Instead of drinking a lukewarm shake (not great), I eat a pint of ice cream (awesome).

And no, it’s obviously not ice cream-ice cream. But it’s not Halo Top, which tastes like the ghost of dead ice cream. Every single light ice cream I’ve ever tried has left permanent damage on my eternal soul.

So now, most mornings, I sit down with my pint of protein ice cream, and I catch up on the news, and it helps, a little, considering every single day is some new fresh hell inflicted upon us by the stupidest and cruelest people to ever live.

I’m prone to hyperbole but that is not hyperbole, I mean that in the most literal sense possible. And I’m getting to the point where I just hope the mess this administration creates can be repaired. That might not be possible.

There’s a lot to be upset about, and frightened of, and frustrated by, but the thing that’s really sending me right now is what they’re doing to the trans community. This whole “now there are only two genders!” thing.

And I want to sit here and write something really scathing and clever but the truth is that my heart breaks for all the people out there—friends out there—who have to live in a world where people hate them for no reason other than they want to. And the pseudo-scientists are bad enough, the worst ones are the ones who wrap themselves in religion, as if Jesus wouldn’t be down with trans people. This is the guy who said “love everyone.” Multiple times. It’s in a book that people believe is real even though it’s not but still, the fact that they think it’s real but ignore that shit just drives me nuts. Jesus liked everyone. The only people he didn’t like were the money lenders. He threw them out of the temple. I feel like Jesus would not be thrilled to see we are now ruled by money lenders, where entire swaths of people are being abused, tortured, and killed in his name. I say all this as a lapsed Catholic. It almost enough for me to find Jesus again because I feel like I could find a version better than this hateful totem these goons have created. It hurts my heart, raising my daughter in this world.

But at least I have a protein ice cream that is both satisfying and good for me. Here are a couple of recipes I’ve been developing.

(I use monkfruit sweetener because it’s the only artificial sweetener that doesnt’t taste funny to me. The sugar-free pudding mixes work as both flavoring and thickener; you can also use Xanthan gum [like 5 grams] but that messes with my stomach. Use a stick blender to mix all this stuff up, I see people using milk frothers but they’re just not powerful enough. When you churn stuff with the Creami you generally have to re-spin it at least once to get the right texture… just… go look on TikTok or YouTube or something, there are tons of videos…).

CHOCOLATE

• 60 g Gold Whey chocolate malt protein powder

• 5 g monkfruit sweetener

• 10 g Hershey cocoa powder

• 7 g Jello sugar-free chocolate pudding mix

• 2 g salt

• 3/4 cup lactose free 2 percent milk

• 1/4 cup almond milk

This is 346 calories, with 51 grams of protein (as well as 23 grams of carbs and eight grams of fat). This is very chocolatey and very delicious. I used the lactose free milk because I was experimenting; you could do the whole thing with almond milk.

NUTELLA

• 60 g Gold Whey chocolate hazelenut protein powder

• 5 g monkfruit sweetener

• 2 g salt

• 7 g Jello sugar-free chocolate pudding mix

• 300 g almond milk

This came out pretty thick but it was dope. Definitely a favorite. Only 295 calories, 45.5 grams of protein, 13 grams of carbs, and 5.8 grams of fat.

CAKE BATTER

• 300 g almond milk

• 40 g Gold Whey french vanilla creme protein

• 40 g Funfetti cake mix

• Capful of vanilla

• 10 g Jello sugar-free cheesecake pudding mix

• 2 g salt

• 5 g monkfruit sweetener

I’m obsessed with birthday cake-flavored ice cream because I have the palette of a toddler. This was pretty awesome. The first version used the 2 percent lactose-free milk but it didn’t bring a ton to the party, other than extra calories. This whole thing was 382 calories, with 33 grams of protein, 44 grams of carbs, and 8 grams of fat. I might play with the ratios a little but I like this a lot as it stands.

---

Anyway, that’s what I’ve got.

Also I just recently read two books coming out later this year: The Macabre by

Kosoko Jackon

, a fantasically imaginative and scary book about the power of art, as well as Fog and Fury by

Rachel Howzell Hall

, which the first in a new PI series and a fanstastic foundation for what I hope is a long-running saga. Both highly recommended and I’ll talk more about them as we get closer to release.

I'll also be on a panel at the

Open Secrets

live event in NYC in May. I am super excited for this—

Rachel Kramer Bussel

is brilliant and she’s building something special. I’m proud to be a part of it. Tickets are limited so get in there before they’re gone (click here if you don’t see the link, for some reason links aren’t showing up in drafts???).

Also, and finally, Assassins Anonymous was nominated for the Lefty Award for Best Novel at this year’s Left Coast Crime in Denver. That’s in March, and I’ll be there, and if you’re going too, I hope you vote for me, but if you don’t, I’ll understand, because there are a lot of very cool authors nominated:

• Claire Booth, Home Fires (Severn House)

• Margot Douaihy, Blessed Water (Zando, Gillian Flynn Books)

• Rob Hart, Assassins Anonymous (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)

• Leslie Karst, Molten Death (Severn House)

• James L’Etoile, Served Cold (Level Best Books)

• Duane Swierczynski, California Bear (Mulholland Books)

I know Margot and James and Duane and they are all very cool people. I’m sure the others are nice as well. Either way it’ll be a fun conference.

Okay bye for now.