6 Restaurant Review: MATTI SCANNELL ae@technewsiit.com TechNews | Tuesday, March 5, 2013 Impallaria Bakery satisfies sweet tooth with treats Matti Scannell A&E EDITOR I was standing in the snowstorm, waiting for the Wallace bus to take me to work. The bus tracker said the bus would be there in four minutes. I waited. Six minutes later, I checked the bus tracker again. This time it said fourteen minutes. I stepped out into the street and looked north at the stretch of Wallace. It was busless. I have stood at this bus stop at least once a week (usually more) for the past seven months. Over the course of those seven months, I had seen the “Impallaria Bakery” sign which promised both a bakery, deli, and coffee. I had wondered about the pronuncia— tion of the name (is the second “a” pronounced in a hard Chicago fashion?) I had marveled at the number of people who left their cars un— locked and running with the hazard lights on as they ran inside to get a box of cookies and some coffee. And now, with twelve minutes be— fore the bus arrived, I was finally going to give in to my sweet tooth and give the “Impallaria Bakery” a chance. Tech[nology]N The first thing I noticed is that the deli part of this deli—bakery—coffee consortium is absent. As both a vegetarian and as a patron only interested in coffee and donuts, this was a nonissue. The second thing I noticed is that the wall across from the display case is entirely mirrors. This second thing was a little more disconcerting than the absence of deli meats as I was suddenly made aware of the fact that a small layer of snow had collected on top of my hair. Finally my attention was diverted to the two display cases. One of the cases had cakes and pies, most of which had large amounts of clear jelly—like fruit fillings and fluffy white merengue frosting. I did not try any of these pies, so it may be unfair of me to judge them on first glance (but that won’t stop me from doing so.) These cakes and pies reminded me of the kind of store—bought pies that my grandma often force feeds me along— side flat soda when I visit her home. The eclairs looked pretty decent. The other display case had a variety of cookies. A large percentage of these cookies seem to be of the same shortbread variety but with varied colored sprinkle combinations. Between the two display cases there is a small variety of donuts. On the recommendation of the woman working there, I selected both a chocolate long john and an apricot log, which was a sort oflong shaped coffeecake—esque cre— ation with strudel topping, along with a small coffee. My total was $3.75, which is pretty good considering that at some coffee shops that is the cost ofcoffee alone. I can’t really attest for the quality of the coffee as I do not have a very discerning taste for coffee and I was really just pleased to have something warm to drink while waiting in the cold for the bus to arrive. Once I arrived at work I ate the donut and apricot log and would have to say that while both were good I would recommend getting either the donut or the apricot log and not both as I felt kind of sick after finishing both of them. The frosting on the long john was my favorite part of the long john. It had the perfect mix of a crisp top layer of frosting that gives way to a thin, meltier layer underneath. The apricot log was flaky and had a good bal— ance of strudel and fruit topping. I don’t think that it’s fair of me to blame the apricot log for making me feel a little nauseous as this was probably due to its being consumed directly after the long john. Later that afternoon, I returned to Impallaria to pick up some cookies for a road trip with some friends. We got an assortment of crescent cookies with nuts and powdered sugar, some shortbread shells with chocolate and vanilla sprinkles, and some thin short— bread cookies with pink frosting on the out— side and chocolate on the inside. Our total was around $6.00 which is far cheaper than I ex— pected. The cookies were less nausea—induc— ing than my breakfast had been, though pos— sibly (probably) this is because I ate far less of them over a longer period of time. As the cookies were purchased late in the afternoon I was slightly concerned that their quality would not be as high as it would have been had we purchased them in the morning. Happily, my worries were unfounded and we later discov— ered that the cookies were even good the next morning. Overall, I would highly recommend making a trip to Impallaria as the products I sampled were very good quality and came at a very reasonable co st. Reddit.com promotes freedom of speech, entertainment Melanie Decelles STAFF WRITER Do you like ponies? What about video games? Do you like SCUBA diving? Whatever it is that you might have an interest in, I assure you that there is a subreddit ab out it. A subreddit is a sub—section of the very popular website Redditcom and if there isn’t a subreddit about your favorite topic you are allowed to start your own. Reddit is an online forum that works hard for its community as— pect. The way it works is that people all over the Internet submit photos, links, and gifs, and the reddit community as a whole votes on them. You can either upvote, saying you like the content, or downvote, saying you don’t like it. The links that receive the most upvotes make it to the front page of the web— site, which leads to Reddit calling itself the ‘front page of the internet’. Among everything that can be submitted to Reddit, there are sub— reddits based on specific interests, like ponies and SCUBA diving. Any Reddit members, who call themselves “redditors”, can create a subreddit so long as they are willing to main— tain and moderate it. Reddit can boast some fairly im— pressive numbers due to its large popular— ity. The website receives thousands of viewers each day from 178 different countries. Reddit can be viewed in countless different languages and is open source, meaning that anyone is al- lowed to work on the website, translating and improving whatever needs the work done. Reddit also has a many—paged FAQ section that outlines everything from manners to sub— missions in an effort to create a cohesive com— munity. The problem with Reddit, if there is one at all, is the same problem with all pub— lic forums that emphasize freedom of speech above all else. With the ability of every reddi— tor to create a their own subreddit you allow awesome things like r/aww, which is a subred— dit about adorable things; but you also allow r/beatingwomen which is about, yeah, beating women. To Reddit’s credit they stand by their subreddits and declare that they all have the right to exist. Everything about that type offreedom is appealing to me and would nor— mally draw me to the Reddit website as an avid fan. However, as previously mentioned, when you open a door like that you don’t get to control who uses it. There are subreddits concerning underage girls, photos of women that were taken without their knowledge, one focused on photos of abortions, a subreddit for almost every hate group you can think of as well as one dedicated to photos of deceased children. I strongly encourage everyone read— ing this to take my word for it and not go search for these subreddits themselves; any— one who does hunt them down and finds their content offensive will receive my most little sisterly response of “I told you so.” Reddit’s commitment to freedom of speech on their forum has lead to the website defending the rights of r/jailbait and various other subreddits that post sexualized photos of minors. Clearly there is a flaw in this log— ic. Reddit has always aimed to be a place of community but is now most often associated with the legal troubles garnered by tasteless subreddits that barely classify as legal. Most recently Reddit had to take down a subred— dit based around posting photos of young girls who didn’t know they were being pho— tographed when it became apparent that one submitter was the teacher of the girls he was photographing. While Reddit has subreddits based on suicide prevention, finding lost family members and all other manner of awesome community services, it does it on a server that contains subreddits dedicated to hat— ing minorities and promoting rape as a rea- sonable action. My friends have told me that it IS possible to have a fun and entertaining experience on Reddit. Only subscribe to sub— reddits based on your interests, never venture into questionable territory, stay away from the comment sections of links you know will lead to unsavory conversations etc. For some people, that level of screening might be acceptable to receive all that Reddit offers them; they’re willing to do the work to not be offended by a site they love. Whether or not that holds true for you is something for you to find out for yourself Personally though, I’m not willing to ignore offensive and disgusting content that could show up on the front page and become my job to avoid. I will find my funny cat pictures somewhere else. Theatrical documentary, ‘Crime Scene,’ misses the mark August Lysy STAFF WRITE R “Crime Scene: A Chicago Anthol— ogy” is a vignette of stories focusing on Chi— cago’s history of violence, concentrating in the last fifteen years. These vignettes were co—de— vised by over fifteen creative minds. Together, they deliver a finely crafted theatrical docu— mentary. By finely crafted, I mean they have succeeded in blending six or so stories into a more or less cohesive whole. This by no means implies I recommend the show. The trouble I find in reviewing this show is that it is more a documentary than a play. The further trouble I find is that it misses the mark in both regards. Regarding it as a documentary, the show dramatizes real—life events, thereby giv— ing the viewer a (rather grim) picture of the state of violence in Chicago, as well as a look in to some of the efforts being made to coun— teract this culture of violence (i.e. a priest and a violence interrupter). The show fails, however, to offer anything new to the conversation; the dramatizations did not add anything to my un— derstanding of the violence, or the people who perpetrate it. If the show wished to humanize the stories, it fell short there, as each dramati— zation lasted only about ten minutes and never allowed me to become emotionally involved. Were I to regard this show as a play, the ab ove—mentioned brevity and the lack of an over—arching plot and character development prevented it from being successful dramati— cally. Despite the relevance—by—proximity of the stories told, I never really began to care for the characters themselves; even their motiva— tions seemed submerged beyond the range of sympathy (although there are some incredibly strong performances by Medina Perine and Lisandra Tena). For example, in Chapter 2, Marlon Porter shoots and kills Orlando Patterson be— cause his friend insists (emphatically) that he was responsible for an insult. As it turns out, Orlando Patterson had nothing to do with the insult. What lesson can one find in this story? It is full of ignorance and irrationality—who can make sense of such senseless violence? Thus, I am filled not with pity for these charac— ters, but with anger—the worst kind of anger, the insatiable anger of living in a world where humans, without a value for the sacredness of life, act like animals. While the show certainly has an agenda, what that agenda is never becomes clear. Although the ensemble sings about “hope” several times throughout the piece, the show as a whole offers no reason to hope: in fact, the show offers more in terms of cynicism than hope. Several times the ensemble exhorts the audience to take action, claiming that the (ever nebulously—invoked) “community” must lead with action; but they never define what that action might be, or explain how the “com— munity” can meet the responsibilities neglect— ed by the parents. Instead of hope, the only emotion the show inspired in me was outraged incre— dulity at how social—conscious people think eighty minutes of yelling and lecturing can be twisted into some rallying call for peace and hope. (In its defense, Chris Jones highly-recommends this show. I’ll let you guess for what reason. A Collaboraction Theatre Company production, “Crime Scene: A Chicago Anthology” is playing now through March 10th at the Flat Iron Arts Building located at 1579 N. Milwaukee Ave, stepsfrom the Damen Blue Line. Student tickets are available.)