Michelle Obama gives gifts from White House garden to U.N. spouses

Chicago Tribune ^ | September 26, 2010 | Stacy St. Clair

[Zakeet]

First lady presents dignitaries with pickled veggies from White House garden

When searching for the perfect goodie bag items for U.N. spouses, first lady Michelle Obama made like Peter Piper and picked some pickled peppers.

Obama presented foreign dignitaries visiting New York last week for the U.N. General Assembly with a Longaberger basket filled with items from the White House garden, aides said. The treats include a jar of hand-picked, pickled vegetables such as sun gold tomatoes, okra, cucumbers, chocolate bell peppers and carrots.

[Snip]

The gifts were presented in a one-of-a-kind Longaberger, pricey baskets that are a staple of at-home shopping parties. According to the White House, a nickel tag is affixed to the outside of each basket and engraved with the words, "Made Exclusively for Michelle Obama."

[Sarajevo]

MO: Serfs- tend my garden...........

[okie01]

It also sticks nicely to walls if flung properly.

Okra is also great eating when prepared properly. Like dredged in cornmeal and fried to a crispy finish. Stewed okra with tomatoes and onions is another Southern staple. Or try it pickled for a refreshing treat.

[Zakeet]

It's a fuzzy green vegetable about the size of Bill Clinton's appendage ...

It's also curved. Just like Big Bill's...appendage.

I think we best go no further with this discussion, especially with respect to some of the other characteristics common to both okra and Little Willie, lest we risk being banned from this forum for life.

[pops88]

“It’s actually a nice gift.”

It is a nice gift...if you’re family, a friend or aren’t facing international travel. I used to love to make gift baskets at Christmas, picking things specifically to please the recipient. Having lived over seas and having had to deal with diplomats, I can only see this gift as insulting. Are they supposed to go back to their hotel suite and microwave the peppers? They can’t take the vegetables with them through customs. And as far as classy...I don’t consider myself that, but really, giving a basket from a company that markets through house parties? Frankly, I think this gift was put together by an idiot or by someone calculating how to most insult these dignitaries.

[skintight buffoonery]

You’re right. I don’t know what the other characteristics you are alluding to are, and, again, I don’t want to know. I’m frankly already traumatised by the way you reminded me that I knew something about that man’s, uh, fella. That was buried in my memory.

Let’s never speak of that topic again. Although as revenge, I am going to remind you that Bill and Hillary - well, Chelsea didn’t come from nowhere. They DID things. Horrible things. Things that should not be. Things.

[yldstrk]

I agree it’s a nice gift. Surely all the recipients have enough bowls, spoons, and other stuff to get rid of.

What ticks me off is them not having the decency to dress well.

[yldstrk]

okra shall never pass my lips—it is nasty.

[Zakeet]

Although as revenge, I am going to remind you that Bill and Hillary - well, Chelsea didn’t come from nowhere.

Yep ... but that doesn't necessarily mean that Chelsea is Bubba's spawn

---

[Bill and Hillary] DID things. Horrible things. Things that should not be. Things.

As my lawyer friends would say, "You're assuming facts not in evidence"

[airedale]

They’re canned vegies not fresh and as diplomats they don’t go through customs at either end. The rules that apply to you and I don’t apply to them.

[FrogMom]

I thought the soil was contaminated and that you shouldn’t eat what’s grown there.

Did she buy and repackage the stuff, or is she trying to poison “foreign dignitaries”?

[pops88]

“They’re canned vegies not fresh and as diplomats they don’t go through customs at either end. The rules that apply to you and I don’t apply to them.”

That doesn’t make a home party basket any less tacky. I find it up there with giving DVDs to someone who’s almost legally blind. These people are either clueless or incredibly calculating.

[wiggen]

Day time talk show host. Okra Winfrey.

[alpo]

I wonder if Queen Elizabeth II ever listened to Nomobama’s speeches on the Ipod?

[snowsislander]

Having lived over seas and having had to deal with diplomats, I can only see this gift as insulting.

It is insulting.

I don't see why the rubes in the White House cannot at least hire someone who is competent.

[1951Boomer]

I can’t tolerate okra unless it’s fried. Fried okra is an absolutely delicious southern staple. About the garden—when have the Obamas EVER so much as put a fresh veggie into their mouths? I thought it was all ice cream all the time. And were these vegetables inspected by an official FDA inspector (complete with badge, sharp pencil,and clipboard), and approved for consumption?

[PennsylvaniaMom]

Here is a link to a thread HillBuzz had up over the weekend about this...

http://hillbuzz.org/2010/09/25/michelle-antoinette-gives-un-dignitaries-things-she-didnt-want-from-her-potemkin-garden/

Two things that stand out from the HB discussion...(as the Longaberger website, FaceBook page, etc. DO NOT MENTION A ‘MICHELLE OBAMA’ Basket)...did the Longabergers donate the baskets? Or, keeping in mind that Longaberger is NOT a Union shop, was it...’you folks really don’t want an audit, do you???’ And for the record, there is also another company that makes upscale custom baskets...Peterborough in New Hampshire.

And...you are ALL going to love this...there are ‘brushed nickel tags’ on the basket that PROUDLY proclaim....’THIS BASKET WAS MADE EXCLUSIVELY FOR MICHELLE OBAMA’

Kinda like that ‘Royal Seal’ used in Great Britain??? They really DO think they are royalty.

[Outlaw Woman]

I think this is the first time I’ve stood up for the Obams’s so you’ve done well.

Yes I can see how my post of "What an embarrassment" would cause such a passionate response.

[Ann Archy]

What a LOSER, CLASSLESS COUPLE!!

[Oztrich Boy]

The gifts were presented in a one-of-a-kind Longaberger, pricey baskets that are a staple of at-home shopping parties. According to the White House, a nickel tag is affixed to the outside of each basket

A nickel doesn't sound all the "pricey"

[Ax]

'Taint necessarily so. I traveled all over with a diplomatic passport. One year I was in Miami on a very short R&R just before Christmas and was going to escort my son to Havana to spend the holiday with us. I bought a fresh turkey and a spiral-cut ham at a Publix just before leaving for the airport. I put the items in a carry-on bag, and as we were going through customs in Havana, the officer asked me what was in the bag. Food, I told her. She asked what kind. I said "cheese" then mumbled something unintelligible. She asked if I would open the bag, so being a "diplomat," of course I complied. She looked at the ham and passed it. She said that she would have to confiscate the turkey as it was uncooked. She said that they had been alerted to the fact that there was a fowl-borne disease in the southeast USA. She said that it would be burned. My son, who had been with me in Panama when I offered a $5 gratuity to a traffic cop to avoid having to accompany him to the nearest precinct house, said, "bribe her, dad!" I informed him that that wouldn't work here.

We are to this day convinced that they did indeed burn the turkey - in a 325 oven for about three hours. Feliz Navidad, compa#eros.