how now, flat cow?

i've mentioned that i have a temp job; i haven't mentioned that it's among commodities journalists.  Dad worked here till retirement (which is how i learned of the opening) and i remember him working on Christmas Eve when mad cow disease was found in the US.  i remember him bringing home swag from pork conventions [like a t-shirt with a pig in sneakers--"hogs are trendier than you thought"] and i was the only kid in my Spanish class that knew that beef was a big export of Argentina.  it's an interesting corner of the world to sit in for 8 hours a day.  i hear one-sided phone conversations about fertilizer, and livestock reproduction.  i heard about MF Global before you did.  and i have fine minds all around me that deliver breaking news about the journey our food takes. 
this area in the food-writing spectrum is much more interesting to me than recipes for fried candy bars, or whatever novelty is trending lately. i remember when kiwis were exotic. i grew up with a government that says ketchup in a school lunch counts as a vegetable. i know the difference between saturated and trans fats. and lately my attention will linger over stories about "pink slime," Monsanto, or what's going on with honeybees.  food isn't just something that happens between the store and your mouth. it's worth a little research time.  so for the dedicated reporters that translate farm calls and crop reports into easily digested (pun!) news stories, i made some beef chart cookies, and cow-print circles, in their honor.
i call it, "cow-modities."  i suppose if i used primary colors, they'd be Piet Moooondrian cow charts? (wink)
i piped in the colors so that they dried flat, then outlined them with edible marker. the circles were airbrushed with another yogurt-lid stencil.  folks were cracking up--there's something quite strange about a "beef cookie," and i enjoyed this design much more than a regular cow-in-profile image. i could do all kinds of diagrams. maybe for next Halloween i should do animal skeletons? meanwhile i have lizards on the way, and i found out there are baby shower and retirement party cookies in my future, details forthcoming. stay tuned...