Note: the following is a fictional recipe blog about living through January 6th, 2021, with a very real recipe at the bottom.
The first time I made this recipe was January 6th, 2021.
A boring day in frosty January, perfect for trying a new pasta recipe. The certification of electoral votes was set to happen today — my history teacher had made a point of mentioning it — but it was one of those government processes designed to be dull. Important, sure, but not exactly riveting.
Deep in the era of Zoom school, my last class of the day had been canceled, and I only had a few minutes of so-called independent work time left before I was free. On the counter behind me, my computer was filled with black squares; even the teacher had turned her camera off.
I waited until I could feel heat radiating from the large saucepan I’d placed on the stove to add strips of bacon, each one sizzling as soon as it hit the pan. My phone dinged; always wash your hands after handling raw meat.
Hands clean, bacon cooking, now is the time to cut up your tomatoes and garlic. I prefer grape tomatoes, but whatever variety you have lying around works just fine. But my phone dinged again, and again, so I put down the knife.
Trump supporters are rioting at the US Capitol.
And here I thought electoral certification was supposed to be boring. I scrolled back through the news alerts from that morning: Donald Trump giving a speech at the Ellipse, Republicans chanting stop the steal, Proud Boys and Oath Keepers marching to the Capitol to — to what? What could they possibly be doing?
I pondered the question as I chopped the tomatoes into fine pieces. The goal of a riot sparked by the losing candidate over the certification of votes is not merely to challenge the results of an election — it’s to assume that an election is fraudulent and thus to assert violence as the solution.
The Brooks Brothers Riot in 2000, where rioters sought to stop the counting of votes in Florida, is often used in comparison to what unfolded on January 6th. No one had yet been certified as a winner, but that didn’t stop Bush’s supporters from feeling as if they were already victorious. The rioters were determined to stop the recount in Miami-Dade County because they believed Al Gore would steal the presidency away from their candidate. And now, on January 6th, despite overwhelming evidence that the election was legitimate, Trump’s supporters invaded the Capitol hoping to prove that they hadn’t lost — and if they couldn’t prove it, ready to steal the election instead.
Later, it would come out that Roger Stone, who had stoked and managed the Brooks Brothers Riot, had taken a picture with the Oath Keepers just hours before they stormed the capitol. Later, it would come out that January 6th was not as spontaneous as it appeared. Later, just minutes later, the rioters would break through the defenses of the Capitol Police and enter the building.
My Zoom class ended with a sad little ding, I flipped the bacon over in the pan, started a pot of water boiling on the stove, and then I turned on the news.
Nothing but the smell of bacon in the pan seemed real, at first. There were white supremacists at the US Capitol — people were smashing windows and attacking police — a gallows had been constructed outside and the insurrectionists were calling for Mike Pence’s head.
Violence over an election is not a wholly new concept in the US. The election of 1876 in Southern states was marked by violence as a tool for voter suppression, wherein Southern Democrats kept newly enfranchised Black voters from participating or running for office through unfettered violence. The anger over Reconstruction and Republican governments holding power in the South following the Civil War had simmered until it burned.
When the bacon is finished, remove it from the pan with a slotted spoon. Make sure to reserve the leftover fat; the rest of the sauce will be cooked in it. January 6th did not appear out of nowhere. It was cooked in the grease left behind from centuries of white supremacy and fears of election fraud hand-fed by the Republicans backing Donald Trump.
Once your water has come to a boil, add pasta of your choice; I chose penne because it holds the sauce well. Melt two tablespoons of butter in the leftover bacon grease, then add chopped tomatoes and chopped or minced garlic. Measure the amount of garlic you want in this recipe with your heart. I dislike chunks of tomatoes, so I mash the tomatoes in the pan as they cook. Let the tomatoes cook until some of the juice has evaporated, stirring occasionally, for about five minutes.
In those five or so minutes, the situation at the Capitol eroded even further. The rioters broke through the police barricades and forced their way inside. Videos emerged, posted by the insurrectionists who were proud of what they were doing, showing them forcing their way into offices of politicians, Democrat and Republican alike. Videos of them inside the chamber where Mike Pence had been in the process of counting the electoral votes from each state. Footage from news outlets of the crowd outside, swarming with Confederate flags. The news anchors, giving live updates every few seconds, while texts dinged my phone again and again, from friends asking Is this really happening? Are you watching this?
Of course I was watching it, but I was also cooking. Once some of the tomato juice has evaporated, add three tablespoons of flour. I wasn’t precisely measuring — glued to the footage playing out on my computer screen — and once added, I mixed the flour in to create a thick orange paste.
There were numerous points on January 6th where the resulting violence could’ve been stopped before it ever happened. One reason why January 6th was a flashpoint is because the white Republican rioters didn’t just feel cheated or hopeless — they felt empowered to act. They knew, like the southern Democrats who used violence to stop Black people from voting, that if they could get their candidate in power, he would protect and celebrate them.
Don’t leave the paste to cook too long — don’t, for instance, wait hours until the rioters have mostly been repelled or arrested to finally comment on the violence. After a minute or so, condemn the orange paste to being thinned with milk. Add the milk in one half cup at a time, stirring to ensure it’s fully incorporated.
Once all of the milk has been added, bring the mixture to a boil, then lower the heat and let it simmer until the sauce has thickened enough to coat the back of the spoon, about five more minutes. The first time I made this recipe, I didn’t believe it would thicken, that all the ingredients would coalesce into one dangerously delicious sauce.
I didn’t believe that a source loss would lead to bitter violence, either. Because for all of the trends we’ve seen in American political history surrounding contested presidential elections, trends of voter suppression, electoral chaos, fears over the legitimacy of elections, and white supremacy, not even in the Civil War did Confederate flags attack the US Capitol. As much as January 6th was the product of decades of extreme polarization and trends of doubt repeated in previous elections, it was also unprecedented.
Integral to the continuance of a democracy is that the losing candidate accepts their loss, something Donald Trump and his allies still refuse to do. Every contested presidential election prior to 2020 ended with a peaceful — albeit bitter — transfer of power.
Now that my sauce had thickened, I couldn’t ignore the final integral steps of the recipe. I crumbled the bacon back into the sauce, chopped up a few basil leaves, and gave the whole thing a final stir. I tasted to see if it needed more salt, then switched off the stove. I transferred the cooked, buttery pasta into my new bacon-y creation. Only one noodle missed the edge of the pan.
I sat down at the dining table with my lunch and my computer, seeking solace in the sauce. It was so good, I couldn’t resist a second portion.
Recipe for a Contested Presidential Election
Ingredients:
- Loss of faith and doubt in the validity of the election
- Electoral college confusion
- Balloting issues
- Voter suppression
- Governmental interference
- White supremacy
Directions:
- For best results, ensure voters doubt the validity of the election before election day.
- If you can’t use home-grown doubt, manufactured by the candidate is fine.
- Add confusion over how the electoral system works.
- Season with government interference (the courts, Congress, or an electoral commission) to simmer election distrust on medium heat.
- Fold in voter suppression using disenfranchisement, confusing ballots, and voter intimidation (if desired)
- Bring mixture to a boil by adding white supremacy.
- Heat until desired outcome is achieved or chef is stopped.
- If seeking a violent result, a peaceful transfer of power may be left out.
- If seeking a peaceful result, the loser must admit they lost.
- Do not enjoy.
Bacon & Tomato Cream Pasta
Ingredients:
- ½ to 1 pound of bacon
- 2 tbsp butter
- 1 ½ cups tomatoes
- 3-6 cloves garlic
- 3 tbsp flour
- 1 ½ cups milk
- Chopped basil
- Salt to taste
- Penne pasta
Directions:
- Start with a large saucepan over medium heat. Cook bacon until crispy. Leave leftover bacon fat in the pan.
- While the bacon cooks, chop tomatoes and garlic. Measure the garlic with your heart.
- Melt butter in leftover bacon grease.
- Add tomatoes and garlic. Cook, stirring occasionally, until some of the juice has evaporated (about 5 minutes).
- If you don’t like chunks of tomato, mash tomatoes while they cook.
- Add flour. The mixture should turn into a thick orange paste. Cook for one minute, then stir in milk ½ cup at a time. Make sure to fully incorporate paste into milk. The sauce should now be runny.
- Bring sauce to a boil, then lower to medium heat, stirring occasionally until the sauce thickens enough to coat the back of the spoon. This should take about five minutes, but you can cook it longer if you want it to be thicker.
- Crumble bacon into sauce. Wait to add salt until you’ve added the bacon back into the sauce.
- Add as much chopped basil as you want, then serve over penne or pasta of your choice. Enjoy!
