NEW YORK — The FBI today announced that the soup recipe pieced together by one New York family’s streak of suspicious Google searches does not pose a threat to national security. Authorities working jointly in Suffolk County and Nassau County have determined that Michele Catalano’s pressure cooker recipe for quinoa and lentil soup is not only harmless, but also delicious.
Catalano, a writer who lives in Long Island, described on her blog the morning that a “joint terrorism task force” visited her husband and son while she was at work. Catalano claimed that the visit was prompted by “a perfect storm of terrorism profiling” after suspecting that authorities had added her husband’s search for a new backpack to her search for a pressure cooker recipe and multiplied them by their son’s interest in the Boston Marathon bombing suspects.
Catalano at first believed that the investigation was initiated by “someone whose job it is to piece together the things people do on the Internet,” but in reality, police were acting on a tip from her husband’s former employer, who had noticed his suspicious searches and contacted the police.
“We received a tip about a family with an ethnic kind of name searching for some terrorist’s tools,” explained Inspector Aristides Mojica, Commanding Officer of Suffolk County’s 5th Precinct. “Our suspicions were raised when Ms. Catalano mentioned something about lentils and quinoa, which sounded like something foreigners would use to make a bomb.”
Catalano said that six armed men searched their house and then bombarded her husband with a series of questions. “They asked about me, where I was, where I work, where my parents live. Do you have any bombs?, they asked. Do you own a pressure cooker? My husband said no, but we have a rice cooker. Can you make a bomb with that? My husband said no, my wife uses it to make quinoa. What the hell is quinoa?,” they asked.
Police soon found out what the hell quinoa is when they investigated Catalano’s recipe at the 5th Precinct’s mess hall using a pressure cooker that was recently seized in a raid. “A lieutenant accidentally left a nail in the soup, but other than that it was delicious. It’s only dangerous if you let it burn your mouth,” Mojica decided, “and it’s a great alternative for those with gluten-free diets.”
Although Suffolk County officials declared the soup safe and legal, they reminded citizens that quinoa and lentils are capable of taking on a large amount of fluids. “If you want a true soup,” cautioned Mojica, “don’t be shy with the water.”
