Hoo Boy
Welp. It’s been another week. Not much more to be said about that.
The story of David and Goliath is one that I’m sure we all know, whether you’re aware of it or not. Little guy throws a rock at a big guy. A tale as old as time, and for good reason. It’s a good one. More of us should be like that. We should be throwing more rocks.
"Dave and the Giant Pickle" is the first VeggieTales episodes that I remember seeing, and one of the few that I saw more than once. We owned this one on VHS in my home when I was a small child. I’m not quite sure why this one specifically. I’m sure there wasn’t any specific reason, it probably just made it’s way into our household somehow.
Even having not seen or thought about it in over 20 years, I was surprised how much of it I remembered, specifically the recurring “He’s big, I’m little” leitmotif. It’s funny how music ingrains itself into our brains like that.
What I didn’t remember were specific historical and geographic phrases, like “Philistines” and “King Saul” and “Israel.” Five year olds rarely pay attention to details like these. They tend to focus on more exciting things, like throwing rocks.
Something I’ve never really put much thought into regarding the story of David and Goliath is the Goliath aspect. In modern times, the word “goliath” has come to represent large, threatening, imposing figures. In this episode, the pickle version of Goliath is supposedly thirty feet tall.
But who was Goliath, originally?
Because my first introduction to this story was this show, naturally I thought that the biblical Goliath was also, you know, an abnormally large man. But depending on which historical text you’re looking at, Goliath was either four cubits and a span (6 feet, 9 inches) or six cubits and a span (9 feet, 9 inches). The latter, while unusual, still isn’t, you know, massive. That’s only a few feet taller than what the average height at the time probably was. Still, I, being 6’1”, would still be pretty freaked out seeing a man nearly ten-feet tall. And he would still be significantly taller than David, who was probably like four feet tall. But I digress. My point is, in spite of previous misconception, Goliath was just a super tall guy, not a fairy tale-style giant.
Still, the bigger they are, yada yada yada.
Anyway, pretty good ep.
I did something weird this week. I knew I wanted to use asparagus, squash, peas, and pickles, but I wasn’t sure what to do with that (Yes, there were also grapes in this episode, but I learned my lesson last time). Eventually I settled on just putting all that in a pot and seeing what happened. While I was at the story buying these things, a strange, unsettling thought popped into my head.
“Stir fry.”
Now, you might be thinking, what’s wrong with stir fry? Nothing. There’s nothing wrong with stir fry. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that are many things right with stir fry. But consider my list of ingredients:
Peas: Yes, absolutely
Squash: Sure, alright
Asparagus: Weird, but whatever
Pickles:
Pickles. In a stir fry? Surely not. Maybe there’s something I don’t know, maybe this is a thing in some instances, but something about it just didn’t sit right with me. And yet I was going to do it anyway. I ignored everything in my brain going against it and picked up a bottle of teriyaki sauce.
Another serendipitous thing that happened was that while I was doing this, I passed by a container of Israeli couscous. Since it is specifically stated that this story happened in Israel, I decided to use this instead of rice.
So I went home and began prepping my ingredients. I still had a bag of frozen peas leftover from the veggie pot pie a couple weeks ago, so that was easy. I chopped up the asparagus and the yellow squash and everything was going great. And then came the pickles.
Now, I have nothing against pickles. I like pickles a lot. My favorite thing about this recipe was that I had an entire jar of pickles left afterwards. But I don’t know if you’ve ever chopped up a pickled It is, in a word, unpleasant. And wet. And yet still I persisted.
Classic stir fry ingredients
And now for the fun part: the frying. I’ve made stir fry before, but never one like this. Mostly the process was fine, but this specific grouping of veg, namely the asparagus and pickles, added a certain… aroma that I didn’t particularly care for.
I continued to ignore that part of my brain and continued on with the process.
I’ve never made couscous before, so I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. Turns out it’s really easy. just boil water, add couscous, and let simmer. Not really much more to say there.
With the vegetables fried and the couscous couscoused, I added the sauce to the veggies and plated it up on a bed of the ‘cous. It was a strange sight indeed. I knew for a fact that no one had ever made anything like this before.
And here’s the thing: It wasn’t terrible. It was even, dare I say, kind of good. Weird as it was, the veggie combination grouped together fairly well. The pickles definitely stood out, but they weren’t bad. And the teriyaki sauce was a nice layer on top of everything else.
And the couscous was nice too. It’s a pretty good substitute for rice if you’re ever in a situation where that would be necessary. I don’t know… why that would be the case, though. Maybe you have whatever the opposite of a gluten intolerance is.
With all that being said, don’t do this. There is no reason to do this. There are dozens of better ways to make stir fry. Don’t do this.