I’m under quite a bit of pressure to get this column done.

I wrote six columns a week when I worked for a newspaper. The reason I wrote six columns a week was because the guy in charge of the newsroom at the time was a moron who figured, since he wrote one column a week, it would be easy for me to write six a week.

I mean, I guess that’s what he figured, but I don’t know for sure what with him being a moron and all.

My point is when I wrote six columns a week, I never felt the sort of pressure as I do now to write this one column.

The reason I have to write this column is because my wife and our 24-year-old daughter said I have to and they put me under some intense deadline pressure.

 

Me: Why do I have to write a column?

Wife: Because.

Me: Well as long as there’s a good reason.

Emma: You have to write one because I’m going to tag you.

Me: I don’t know what that means.

Wife: JUST WRITE THE  @#$$@ COLUMN!

My wife and Emma told me they want to tag me in some sort of social media post that somehow ties into the store the two of them own.

My wife and Emma have owned their store for several months now and apparently “tagging” is very important in the social media campaign they use to promote their store and it doesn’t matter if I understand what that means or not.

What matters is “I JUST WRITE THE @#$$@ COLUMN!”

The name of the store my wife and Emma own is “The Artists Loft 404”.

The store is called the “The Artists Loft 404” even though it’s not actually located in a loft but rather inside a larger store called “The Yellow Umbrella” which is located on the north side of the Square here in Carthage.

“OK, Mike,” some of you are wondering. “Do you at least happen to know what the ‘404’ in the store name means?”

To some of you who are wondering that I say, “No. No, I do not.”

“Do you even care what the ‘404’ stands means?” some of you are wondering.

“No. No, I do not.”

Really about the only thing I know about the store is just about every day,  for the past several months, somewhere between two and 2,357 boxes show up on our porch.

It is my job, just about every day, to bring the somewhere between 2 and 7,452 boxes on our porch into our house and then step around them until my wife and Emma can “price them” and take them to their store.

Although, technically, I have no official role in my wife and Emma’s store I occasionally have to serve as the director or warehousing and distribution.

And by “occasionally” I mean “way more that I want to.”

And by “director of warehousing and distribution” I mean I have to haul stuff in my car from our house to the store on the north side of the Square.

But back to writing this column. As I understand it (and there is a very good chance that I don’t) I’m supposed to write a column about my hot buttered rum recipe.

Now, I’ve written thousands of columns in the past 21 years but I can honestly say that never in all of those thousands of columns have I written one about my hot buttered rum recipe.

And there is a good reason for that.

BECAUSE IT WOULD BE BORING.

I not even much of a fan of hot buttered rum. I’m more of a fan of cold bottled beer.

But my wife is a fan of hot buttered rum and she is particularly fond of my hot buttered rum recipe and asked me to make several batches for her this past Sunday.

Because I’m a nice guy and because the Kansas City Chiefs didn’t play until 3:25 Sunday I agreed to make the hot buttered rum batches.

When Emma found out I was going to make the hot buttered rum batches she said,  “Ooooh, I’ll take pictures and then I will tag you on social media. It will be good for our brand.”

To which I replied, “What?”

So Emma took a few pictures of me making hot buttered rum batches while I was wearing an apron and using a spatula that my wife and Emma sell at their store.

When I asked Emma if she needed my face in the pictures she said-and I swear this is true-“Uh, maybe after you’ve freshened up.”

Ouch.

Now, so Emma can tag me and do something with their brand, here are a couple of the pictures Emma took followed by the recipe for my hot buttered rum.

And just like that the pressure is gone.

Now, where is my beer?

 

Hot Buttered Rum

For the batter

 

1 LB brown sugar

2 sticks of butter at room temperature

2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 to 3 teaspoons fresh nutmeg

1 ½ teaspoons allspice

2 teaspoons vanilla extract.

For each drink

1 ½ ounces rum

Boiling water as needed.

Directions:

Beat together the brown sugar butter, spices and vanilla extract until combined. When finished use right away or  refrigerate until ready to use.

If using batter that has been refrigerated be sure to take it out of the refrigerator at least six hours before serving to allow it to soften.

For each drink combine two generous tablespoons of the batter and the rum into a warm coffee mug. Add boiling water to the top of the mug and stir well.

 

 

In the evening, when I’m watching sports in our living room and my wife and our 22-year-old daughter Emma are watching season 27 of some show on some streaming service I’ve never heard of, Emma will sometimes take a break to make popcorn.

Then, when it’s done, Emma will scoop some into a small bowl and bring the bowl into the living room and hand it to me.

And so the student has become the master.

See, I taught Emma how to make popcorn. Just as my dad taught me how to make popcorn.

I should be clear here and point out that unlike some people (and you know who you are) when we make popcorn we don’t just grab a bag, toss it in a microwave, hit a button, wait until the microwave stops and then pull out the bag which is half full of popcorn and half full of burned popcorn.

Not to be judgy here, but I think microwave popcorn is of the devil.

Want to know a sure way to tell microwave popcorn is not real popcorn? On most microwaves, the popcorn setting reads like this, “pop corn”.

That’s right. Pop corn.

No, the way my dad taught me to make popcorn and the way I taught Emma to make popcorn requires a little more work.

I mean, it’s not like coal mining or working in the oil fields but it does require a little work.

First, you pull out your special popcorn popping skillet, set it on a burner on the stovetop and turn the burner on to medium to medium high heat. You want the burner to be hot enough to pop the corn but not so hot that it burns the corn.

By the way, if you don’t yet have a special popcorn popping skillet, don’t worry, you soon will.

Trust me.

You then put about 2 tablespoons of oil into the pan and drop three or four kernels of corn in the heating oil. When the kernels pops, add a half-cup more kernels, then (and this is important) put a lid on the skillet and take it off the burner for 30 seconds.

You then put the skillet back on the burner and wait for the corn to start popping. When it does give it an occasional shake until the corn stops popping.

That’s it. That’s the basic popcorn recipe.

It is, however, a recipe that has evolved a bit over the years. For example, when my dad made his popcorn, he would use butter instead of oil. Later, I switched the butter out for oil because I thought the butter sometimes would burn.

Also, the trick of taking the skillet off the burner for 30 seconds was passed onto me, years ago, by a nice guy who used to read my newspaper column.

It is one of the greatest popcorn popping hacks I have ever come across. It almost completely eliminates the dreaded “bad batch” of popped corn. I don’t know how, or why, I just know it does.

When I first taught Emma how to make popcorn, she would sort of half pay attention to what I was saying. Mainly, Emma humored me so I would get on with the popping of the corn.

But as Emma got older, she realized if she paid attention, she eventually would be able to pop her own popcorn and not rely on me.

That’s right. She wanted to eliminate the middleman.

But Emma didn’t always want to eliminate the middleman. If she, for example, had friends over and didn’t want to pull herself away from whatever the important topic of the evening was, she would ask if I would be willing to pop the corn.

And I always was.

After Emma went off to college, her popcorn-making skills made her very popular with her roommates something I’m sure would make my dad happy.

I should point out here that over the years Emma has added her own twist to our popcorn recipe.

Her twist involves the salt/butter/popcorn distribution formula.

Rather than just pour all of the popcorn in the skilled directly into the popcorn bowl, add the salt and melted butter and stir it all together Emma decided to subdivide the formula.

Emma adds about 1/3 of the popcorn to the bowl, tops it with salt and butter and mixes it up. She then repeats the process two more times resulting in a more evenly salt/butter/popcorn distribution.

When Emma first explained her new formula I almost cried.

Relax. I said, “almost”.

Because of the Trump virus, Emma is doing much of her graduate school work online and, for now, only has to be at her workplace in Kansas City on Thursdays through Saturdays, Emma will be home a bit more often at least until sometime in January. As a result, there has been (and will be) much popping of corn in the house by Emma.

And I’m OK with that.

A couple of weeks ago, I was in the living room watching the Kansas City Chiefs play the Oakland/Los Angles/Oakland/ Las Vegas Raiders. During the game, Emma walking into the living room and handed me a bowl of freshly popped popcorn.

“Here,” Emma said. “I thought you could use this.”

I was touched by Emma’s generous act.

“Thank you, very much,” I said. “This is nice.”

“Yeah, well,” Emma said. “I thought it might keep you from screaming at the TV and scaring the dog for a while.”

Sigh.

Oh well. At least I got a bowl of popcorn.

 I can’t like olives.

Notice I didn’t say, “I don’t like olives.” Instead I said, “I can’t like olives.” The reason I said, “I can’t like olives” as opposed to, “I don’t like olives” is because I want to like olives.

But I can’t.

I want to like olives, in part, because I think should like them. People do neat stuff (Ha!) with olives. They stuff olives (thus the “Ha!”) with neat things which is one way to tell if you should like something.

If it’s stuffable.

They put olives on pizza. As far as I’m concerned if something can go on pizza it’s probably good. Well, except pineapple. I mean, I like pineapple in its place but let’s face it pineapple’s place is not on pizza.

Same goes for cauliflower.

And proof of all proof that I should like olives is because they put them in martinis.

I also want to like olives because so many people I know and whose tastes I respect love olives.

So I’ve tried to like them. Often.

I’ve tried to like olives more times than some people have tried to quit smoking. But I can’t.

Like olives I mean.

By the way, expressing a food taste opinion-solicitated or not-is a sure-fire way to have your opinion thrown right back into your face.

Figuratively speaking, of course.

Normally I try to avoid expressing food taste opinions in casual conversation. If someone offered me an olive, rather than say, “I don’t like olives” I would go with the more polite, “No thank you.”

But if the olive pusher declines to accept my polite refusal and, instead, continues to try and force an unwanted olive on me I might be forced to say “I don’t like olives” even though I know what the overly aggressive olive pusher will say.

“YOU DON’T LIKE OLIVES?!!!”

To which I’m always tempted to say, “Amazing how you were able to sort that out based solely on my cryptic statement “I don’t like olives.”

But I didn’t intend to talk about olives here, I intended to talk about the Josie’s Ristorante lunch my wife and I enjoyed in our outdoor kitchen Saturday afternoon.

Now, I know what some of you are thinking. Some of you are thinking, “But Mike, isn’t Josie’s Ristorante in Scammon, Kansas and not in your outdoor kitchen?”

To some of you thinking that I say, “We didn’t go to Scammon, Kansas to get our Josie’s Ristorante lunch we went to Macadoodle’s Fine Wine, Beer and Spirits in Joplin.”

I know what some of you are thinking. Some of you are thinking “Huh?”

What happened is my wife and I were in Joplin Saturday and decided to stop by Macadoodle’s to pick up some wine.

And beer.

As we pulled into the Macadoodle’s parking lot we noticed a trailer sitting on its south edge. It was the Josie’s Ristorante food truck. The one the nice folks at Josie’s use when they take their food on the road.

See, when the pandemic struck Josie’s, like a lot of restaurants, was forced to close for a while. While closed they decided to bring their great food to their customers and now, even though the restaurant is  open (and following proper mask and social distancing rules) they still occasionally take their food truck on the road.

The only catch is Josie’s encourages folks to pre-order their food via their Facebook page something we neglected to do.

Not to point fingers here but the fact we didn’t pre-order food from Josie’s was my wife’s fault.

I mean, she’s the Facebook person.

After admitting she missed Josie’s Facebook announcement about them being at Macadoodle’s Saturday my wife said, “Maybe they packed extra food.”

“I doubt it,” I said.

But my wife insisted we walked over to see if the Josie’s folks packed extra food.

They did.

So we wound buying some fried ravioli, some antipasto and several jars of the famous Josie’s sauce.

When we got home, I opened a bottle of Chianti while my wife heated the ravioli, some sauce and portioned some of the antipasto into two separate bowls being careful to try and keep olives out of my bowl.

We then sat outside, ate our lunch, sipped our wine and tried to ignore our dog Caicos begging for her cut of the meal.

 

I’ve had worse Saturday afternoons.

While we were eating, I noticed a couple of small pieces of black olives in my antipasto.

“What the heck,” I thought. “Maybe this time I’ll like them.”

But I didn’t like the olives and you want to know why?

Because I can’t.

 If you want to find out when and where the Josie’s food truck will be visit their Facebook page at Josie’s Ristorante.

Well, at least I’m not going to drone on and on about my sourdough bread starter.

Ever since the whole Corona virus thing pretty much shut down the country, people have been going crazy about making sourdough bread or sourdough bread starters and, for the life of me, I can’t understand why.

I mean, I guess sourdough bread is OK but why is everyone making it now? Is there some sort of sourdough bread cult out there luring unsuspecting, bored homebound people into their evil, yeast invested web?

Wine during a quarantine I get. But sourdough bread? Not so much.

So, no I’m not going to drone on and on about sourdough bread. Instead I’m going to drone on and on about German food.

And perhaps beer. And wine.

Several months ago, we discovered an on-line food deliver company at www.goldbelly.com.

Basically what they do at Goldbelly is arrange food deliveries from well-known restaurants and companies all across the country. What that means is, without leaving our home, we can order food from some of our favorite cities and restaurants.

Since discovering Goldbelly we’ve had lobster rolls from McLoon’s Lobster Shack in South Thomaston, Maine; seafood gumbo from Commander’s Palace in New Orleans, Louisiana; Key Lime Pie on a Stick from Kermitt’s Key West Lime Shoppe in Key West, Florida; a low country shrimp steamer from Topsail Steamer in Surf City, North Carolina and most recently Chicago-style hot dogs from Vienna Beef Dogs in Chicago, Illinois and Bavarian soft pretzels from the Milwaukee Pretzel Company in Milwaukee Wisconsin.

It’s neat is what it is.

Two weekends ago when our Chicago dogs and Bavarian pretzels were delivered my wife and I opted to have quasi German-style Saturday lunch even though we figured the hot dogs were probably more of Chicago-style lunch but what the heck it takes a village, right?

This past Saturday my wife and I decided to try a more authentic German-style lunch.

So, on Saturday I made a warm German potato salad in the kitchen while my wife whipped up a pot of homemade sauerkraut in our outdoor kitchen.

Once the potato salad was done, I let it simmer on the stove and went outside and tossed  some German-style bratwursts on the grill. I let the brats cook for about 15 minutes and then I plopped them into a pan of just barely boiling beer for another 10 more minutes and before you can say Angela Merkel we were eating.

Of course, because my wife never made a charcuterie board she didn’t like we didn’t just have a German-style lunch on Saturday. We also had a German-style charcuterie board for dinner Saturday night featuring a Bavarian pretzel, leftover bratwurst, some bacon, a few cheeses, homemade pickles, some fruit, homemade dill pickles and German mustard.

Oh and beer. And  wine.

Das ist gut, is what ist das.

 

Recipes

 

Since I had never whipped up a batch of German potato salad I decided to use this recipe from www.cookingclassy.com. It made for a dark and flavorful salad that is just a good cold as it is warm. It be good is what it be.

Ingredients

• 2 red potatoes or Yukon gold potatoes (each about the same size for even cooking)
• 6slices bacon, chopped
• 2cups chopped red onion
• 2tsp minced garlic
• 1/2cup chicken broth
• 1/4cup apple cider vinegar
• 1Tbsp Dijon mustard
• 2tsp granulated sugar
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1/2cup chopped fresh parsley
• 2Tbsp olive oil

Instructions

1. Place red potatoes on a steamer basket* set in a pot with about 1 1/2-inches of water. Bring water to a simmer over medium-high heat.
2. Cover pot with a snug lid and let steam until potatoes are tender, about 20 – 25 minutes (test for doneness by piercing potatoes through center with a knife, it should glide through). Set aside to cool just until warm enough to cut into chunks.
3. While potatoes are steaming, cook bacon in a 12-inch non-stick skillet over medium-high heat until crisp (about 6 – 7 minutes). Remove bacon, set aside and leave drippings in skillet.
4. Add onions to skillet with drippings and cook 5 minutes. Add garlic and cook 30 seconds longer.
5. Pour in chicken broth, vinegar, Dijon mustard and sugar. Bring to liquid to a simmer and let reduce by about half for a minute or two.
6. Add chopped potatoes, bacon and olive oil and toss. Season mixture with salt and pepper to taste.
7. Remove from heat, toss in parsley. Serve warm (or see notes to serve chilled). If mixture seems to be just slightly dry you can either toss in a little more olive oil or chicken broth.

Recipe Notes

• *If you don’t own a steamer basket potato can also be cooked in water. To do so:
• Place potatoes in a large pot  and cover with water by an inch or two. Season water with salt (about  1 Tbsp). Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover and simmer until potatoes are just tender all the way through, about 10 – 15 minutes (they should pierce easily with a knife, but you also don’t want them really tender/mushy). 
• So you know, we purchased the potatoes for the salad  Saturday morning at the Wilson Farm’s Greenhouse on Farmer’s Market stand on the Square in Carthage. The bacon we purchased at Cloud’s Meat Processing in Carthage and I picked up the bratwurst at Cramer’s Meat in Joplin.
• The pickle cucumbers in my wife’s pickle recipe also came from Wilson Farm’s Greenhouse

 

Lee’s Homemade Sauerkraut

Ingredients:

4 slices of thick bacon – chopped

1-2 Tbsp of Dijon Mustard

1 ½ Tbsp Whole Grain Mustard

1 Tbsp Chopped Garlic

½ red onion, copped

1 Tbsp sugar

1 bag tri color coleslaw

1 bottle Bud Light Lime

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

 

In a cast iron pot, drizzle about 3 Tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil.  Add the chopped bacon and cook until done, but not crispy.  Add whole grain mustard, garlic, mustard, onions and sugar.  Mix and cook about 2 minutes.  Add the entire bag of coleslaw mix and stir.  Add one bottle of Bud Light Lime.  Stir, cover and cook on medium heat for about 10 minutes or until the slaw cooks down.  Then lower heat and cook about 20-30 more minutes.  You can add your sausages or brats at this time if you wish and cook longer to mingle the flavors.

 

Lee’s Homemade Pickled Cucumbers and Onions

 

Ingredients:

Garden pickling cucumbers

Half a red onion – sliced and cut in half

Mizkan Rice Vinegar

1 Tbsp sugar

Flatiron Pepper Co. Sweet Heat peppers

About ½ tsp Celery Seed

Cracked pepper

 

Slice the cucumbers and cut the red onion slices in half.  Layer the cucumbers and onions and pack tightly.  Cover with celery seed, sugar and cracked pepper.  Cover with Mizkan Rice Vinegar.  Cover tightly and shake vigorously.   Chill in refrigerator for at least 4 hours – better if overnight.  Lasts for several days.  I use a glass jar with screw top lid for this little number.

 

 

 

 

It wasn’t meant to be a competition it was meant to be lunch.

In fairness, by comparing my lunch to the one she served the week before, I don’t think my wife meant it to be a competition as much as a compare and contrast kind of deal.

Also in fairness, when looking at the two lunches there was plenty to compare and to contrast. What it was, I think, was one of those Mars and Venus things.

It was Saturday and I was out running errands when I started pondering what I wanted to do for lunch. By the way, I’m not much of a ponderer. Assuming ponderer is a word.

Now that I look at it, I’m thinking it’s not a word. So let me rephrase things here and say I’m not one to ponder much.

That, right there, is one benefit of being your own editor. If I were still working for a newspaper an editor would make me cut out the paragraph where I wondered if ponderer was a word. But since I’m my own editor I just left it the way it was. I mean, life’s too short, right?

Now then, where was I?

Oh right, I was pondering what I wanted to do about lunch last Saturday. After pondering a minute I decided rather than stopping somewhere to pick something up I would just make do with what we had at home.

So, when I got home, I opened the refrigerator, grabbed some cheeses, Italian salami, and mustards and then I opened the pantry and took out some crackers.

I then sliced the cheeses, peeled off some salami and tossed them on a plate. I then added some chips, crackers, and mustards and just like that, I had a plate of food perfect to snack on while I watched a baseball game and sipped a glass of wine.

I should point out that I usually don’t sip wine while I watch baseball but it was Saturday afternoon and I decided to try watching baseball like they do in Europe. But in Europe, I think they call baseball football.

I think.

I should also point out that because I’m nothing but a kind and generous person I made sure to lay out enough food so my wife would be able to snack while she watched whatever cooking or decorating show she was watching.

The reason I should point that out is because my kind and generous nature is what turned my lunch into a compare and contrast event.

What happened was my wife came into the kitchen, saw my plate of food, and started laughing. Since I long ago got used to women walking into the same room I was in and laughing I didn’t even wonder what my wife was laughing about. I just assumed it had something to do with me.

“What?” I said.

“Your charcuterie board,” my wife said.

“My what?” I said.

“Your charcuterie board. It’s pathetic,” my wife said.

“Oh, OK,” I said and sat down to watch baseball.

See, I really didn’t care if my wife thought my charcuterie board was pathetic. The reason I didn’t care was because I wasn’t trying to make a charcuterie board. I was trying to make lunch. I was trying to make a plate of stuff we could snack on and I thought I did just that.

What I didn’t think about was what it looked like.

See, that’s the difference between my wife and me. She cares what things look like and I don’t.

Sort of makes you wonder why my wife agreed to marry me, doesn’t it?

I wrote about my wife’s love of charcuterie boards sometime last year. For many years my wife would occasionally lay out some food onto a plate and we would snack on that food. For all of those many years we never referred to the plate of food as a charcuterie board. We just called it a plate of food.

But then my wife found out about charcuterie boards and became obsessed with them. Sometimes my wife will even sketch out her charcuterie board on paper before she actually makes them.

That’s right. My wife sketches out her food plans.

That my friends is an obsession.

My wife thought the contrast between our two charcuterie boards was so funny she took a picture of mine and posted it on her Facebook page along with a picture of the charcuterie board she made the week before. Here are those pictures.

See if you can guess which one’s mine.

But keep in mind.

It’s not a competition.

Oh, and the wine was very good.

 

 

 

 

I think it was stress related.

Some sort of post traumatic sandwich stress syndrome if you will.

That’s the only reason I can explain the fact that for a certain period of my life I was uneasy with bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches.

It wasn’t that I disliked them when I was a kid it was the fact that whenever I found out we were having BLTs for dinner I would develop a nervous, hesitance I could never explain. Sure, I would eat a BLT but I never really enjoyed them the way I would later grow to enjoy them.

It wasn’t until I was in my teens and someone in my family mentioned how, when I was very young, my dad would get frustrated with me when we had BLTs. I was probably three or four-years-old, the story goes, and my dad would patiently build my BLT  and hand my plate to me.

Then, just as he was about to bite into his own sandwich, I would somehow manage to drop mine. Sometimes onto my plate but often onto the table and the floor. My dad would then have to put his sandwich down, pick up the pieces of mine and try to rebuild it knowing I was just going to drop it again.

My dad was not one to lose his temper much. But he was one to get frustrated occasionally and sometimes let that frustration show. Sometime like when he was trying to eat a BLT but had to stop three or four times to rebuild someone else’s BLT, for example.

See what I mean? Post traumatic sandwich syndrome.

But once I flashed back to my younger BLT days my uneasiness vanished and I became a BLT fanatic.

My wife shares my love of BLTs and whenever we’re having trouble deciding what to have for dinner one of us will eventually say, “How ‘bout BLTs?” and the dinner problem would be solved.

By the way, when asking about having BLTs for dinner, the correct way to ask is, “How ‘bout BLTs?”

In case you were wondering.

While my wife and I are willing to serve up BLTs most anytime of the year, the absolute best time to serve them is late spring and summer when we can get fresh tomatoes.

A BLT served with store-bought tomatoes is good but a BLT served with fresh tomatoes is something of the Gods. Which sort of begs a few questions: Is there a God of tomatoes?

Or BLTs?

And if there is what God or Gods would they be? And, really, when you think about it, how would a God react if he, or she, were asked to be the God of tomatoes?

Or BLTs?

Would they be insulted or honored?

I guess it would depend on the God.

Or Gods.

Before I go any further, I probably should admit my wife and I-technically speaking-don’t fix BLTs. Some years ago we decided that, although we liked lettuce, it just sort of got in the way of the essence of the tomato and the bacon.

That’s right. We dropped the “L” from the BLT. But for purpose of clarity we decided if we called BLTs “BTs” know one would know what in the world we were talking about.

Now, I’m sure, in some circles, dropping lettuce from a BLT might be considered heresy but, then again, we’re just talking about a sandwich here.

Oh, we also like to add Swiss cheese to our BLTs.

So chew on that.

Once, in Key West, Florida while on our honeymoon, my wife ordered a BLT with grilled onions.

She said it was the best part of our honeymoon.

I probably should have taken offense to that but I couldn’t.

I mean, it was a good sandwich.

When we have BLTs at home, we’re partial to marble rye bread, pepper bacon from Clouds Meat Processing here in Carthage, sliced tomatoes, Swiss cheese and, of course, Miracle Whip.

I know some people may be partial to regular mayonnaise but my wife and I come from Miracle Whip people.

By the way, mayonnaise is tough to spell.

In case you were wondering.

On Monday, when we served up BLTs, instead of using marble rye we opted for jalapeno cheese bread from the Circle E Market located five our six miles east of Carthage.

It were heaven is what it were.

And I didn’t drop my BLT.

Not even once.

This column first appeared in a newspaper in 2009

When it comes to rules for Super Bowl spreads, I tend to keep them simple.

Rule No. 1: Serve things from each of the five  food groups.

Rule No. 2: Here are the five food groups — beef, pork, poultry, dairy (cheese) and vegetable.

Rule No. 3: How many vegetables? Answer: One small carrot.

Like most people, I agree that we need to take a practical and healthy attitude when it comes to our diets. And, like most people, I have learned that certain vegetables are not only good for you, but they also taste good. I have also learned that I don’t have to have a 4-inch T-bone steak and a baked potato, loaded with butter, at every meal.

But, having said that, I must say that, in my opinion, health concerns should be tossed out the window on Super Bowl Sunday. The way I see it, 30 or 40 professional football players on Sunday will risk serious injury, such as a pulled groin, in order to bring us roughly 30 minutes of football wrapped around approximately 4,392 hours of commercials. The very least we can do, as a grateful nation, is to risk a little high cholesterol and elevated blood pressure for one day.

It’s the right thing to do.

The anchor

Any serious Super Bowl menu, in my opinion, must have an anchor. A dish that all the other dishes can feed off.

Think of your Super Bowl menu anchor as a major airport and the other Super Bowl dishes as smaller airports feeding into the major airport. And for my money, nothing anchors a Super Bowl meal like chili. A pot of chili offers Super Bowl grazers two things that they can’t get enough of: meat and spice. The meat fills the Super Bowl grazer up and the spice makes them want to drink beer. It’s a win-win situation.

Of course, there are as many recipes for chili as there are reasons why the Kansas City Chiefs will not be in the Super Bowl in our lifetime. The important thing to remember is that there is no such thing as a bad chili. Unless, of course, someone offers up something they call a “meatless, healthy” chili. That, by definition, would be a bad chili.

The only problem with chili is that no self-respecting chili cook would ever admit to using a recipe, so it’s almost impossible to pass on, with any accuracy, a chili recipe. For example, I have made the same basic chili for nearly 30 years, and never, in all those years, has it ever tasted the same way twice. My chili is like a snowflake, is what it is.

Counter the chili

To balance my Super Bowl feast, I like to counter chili with a batch of chicken wings.

Again, like chili, there is no shortage of wing recipes. For Super Bowl Sunday, I figure there is no real reason to reinvent the wheel so I keep my wings fairly basic. What I like to do is fry up a mess of wings, toss them in a bowl of Floyd Hackett’s hot-wing sauce (Hot and Honey is always good) and then put them in the oven just long enough to glaze the sauce.

If you’re looking for something easier but equally as unhealthy, you can always serve up a plate of mini-pizza squares. The two primary ingredients in the pizza squares are sausage and — from that fourth vital food group — Velveeta cheese. I recommend when you serve the pizza squares that you have 911 programmed into your speed-dial system.

The vegetable

And, finally, we come to the vegetable portion of our Super Bowl spread.

It would be wrong to invite folks over to your Super Bowl party without offering your guests a healthy alternative.

That’s why at every Super Bowl party I make sure to lay out one small carrot. Other people opt to lay out one small piece of broccoli, which is fine, but I find the green off-putting.

To flesh out your Super Bowl spread, you can add 27 bags of potato chips and 79 different dips.

Oh, and a cheese ball.

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Mike’s “it didn’t taste like this last time” chili

(measurements are all guesses)

2 pounds ground beef

1 pound sausage

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 (28-ounce) can tomato sauce

1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes

2 to 4 jalapeno peppers, seeded, stemmed and diced

2 cloves garlic, diced

1 medium onion, diced

1 green pepper, diced

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon cumin

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon black pepper

Spicy V-8 Juice or, if you can find it, Snappy Tom

In large skillet, brown ground beef and sausage and drain. While meats are draining, add vegetable oil to skillet and sauté peppers, garlic cloves, onion and green pepper over medium heat. While vegetables are sautéing, add tomatoes and tomato sauce to a large Dutch oven. Then add sautéed vegetables, meat and spices to the tomatoes and tomato sauce. If the chili is too thick, add V-8 juice or Snappy Tom to thin. But just a bit.

Bring to a boil over medium heat and then simmer over low heat for at least an hour. However the long the chili simmers the better. Garnish with grated cheese and green onions if you like. I suppose you can also garnish with sour cream, but personally I find that sort of thing disgusting.

Heart surgeon’s dream mini-pizza squares

1 pound hot Italian sausage

1 pound Velveeta spicy cheese

4 ounces butter

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 loaf party rye bread

Brown sausage in skillet. While sausage is browning, place cheese in a microwaveable bowl and until the cheese is melted. Approximately 5 to 8 minutes. When sausage in done drain a add to melted cheese mix ,stir thoroughly and return to the microwave for about 2 minutes.

When sausage and cheese mix is done melt the butter and garlic powder in the microwave. Lay out the rye bread slices on a baking sheet and brush with the garlic butter mixture. Then spoon out cheese and sausage mix evenly on bread slices. Bake in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 20 to 25 minutes.

Floyd Hackett-inspired chicken wings

36 chicken wings, cut and trimmed

Vegetable oil, for frying

1 bottle Hackett’s Hot and Honey Sauce

In Dutch oven or electric frying pan, pour up to 3 inches of oil and heat to 360 degrees. Add wings (in batches) to the oil and fry until crisp and brown, about 12 to 14 minutes. Drain on paper towels. The chicken may be fried several hours in advance of the party. If you do plan to fry the chicken in advance, once cooked and drained cover the chicken with foil and refrigerate.

Shortly before serving, toss wings in a bowl of Hackett’s sauce, place on a cookie sheet and then cook in an oven preheated to 350 degrees for about 5 minutes, until the sauce has glazed the wings and the wings are heated through.

Super Bowl Carrot

1 baby carrot

 

Take carrot, place on small plate.

Serve at room temperature.

 

 

 

Sometimes you just have to ignore the blatant reality.

And I’m not just talking about Republican Congress creatures here.

Ha!

No, I’m talking about what I did Sunday. I ignored the fact that it was almost 90 degrees outside and went ahead with a plan to whip up a big ol’ pot o’ soup.

In case you’re wondering when referring to whipping up a big old pot of soup it is permissible to write “big ol’ pot o’ soup.”

I just wouldn’t do it too often lest people think you’re nuts.

This might just be me but I think by the time the last weekend of September rolls around you are officially well into fall. And, at least at our house, when you’re well into fall it’s time to make a (Last time) big ol’ pot o’ soup.

A couple of weeks ago my wife got a jump on soup season by making a big old pot of (Is that better?) chicken stock.

My wife and I like making chicken stock for a couple of reasons.

Reason No. 1: It’s easy.

And,

Reason No. B: It gives us a chance to clear out all of the unused, slightly aging produce that has accumulated in our refrigerator.

When she was done, my wife put her chicken stock into several plastic containers (with two cups of stock in each) and stored them in the freezer to be used, later, in soup recipes that call for it.

As it turns out, it was a good thing my wife got a jump on soup season because the recipe I worked with  Sunday called for 12 cups of chicken stock.

Earlier in the week, I came across a group of recipes from Giada De Laurentiis on Twitter. One of the recipes was for an Italian Wedding soup which I thought sounded pretty good so I decided to try it on Sunday.

I like Italian Wedding soup but I’m not sure how it got its name. It might be because it’s served at Italian weddings but I’ve never been to an Italian wedding so I don’t know if that’s true.

I’m just guessing here but I’m thinking an Italian wedding would be fun. I was raised Catholic and, when I was older, attended a lot of Catholic weddings and most of them were fun.

I mean, I think they were fun but I don’t exactly remember what with the drinking and all.

I like Giada, by the way. For one thing, I always feel sophisticated when I say her name. It’s like I’m actually speaking Italian.

Sigh. I wish I had a sophisticated-sounding name. My name just sounds like a place where they keep stray Mikes.

I also like Giada because her recipes are always excellent and easy to follow. For someone with such a sophisticated name, Giada knows how to keep things relatively simple.

Also, when our 21-year-old daughter Emma studied in Florence, Italy last semester, my wife and I went over to visit her and took in not just Florence but also Rome and the Amalfi coast. So, really, Giada and I are practically family.

Here’s the deal about Italian Wedding soup: It’s not that hard to make.

Basically you just boil some chicken stock and toss in some meatballs along with some chopped endive and eggs. Sure, you have to make the meatballs, but who doesn’t like doing that?

I guess, to make things even simpler, you could just buy some premade meatballs but-come on-you don’t want to be a kitchen sissy, do you?

When I made the meatballs for the soup, I used a pound of Scimeca’s hot Italian sausage from Kansas City that I had stored in the freezer for just such an occasion.

 

I usually buy Scimeca’s sausage at the Brookside Cosentino’s in Kansas City but you can find it at most KC area grocery stores.

I don’t want to overstate things here but Scimeca’s is only the best Italian sausage in the history of history.

 

When I made the soup, I followed Giada’s meatball recipe. I could have used my own meatball recipe but you know what they say “When using a Giada recipe do what Giada does.”

I don’t know if they actually say that but they should.

As a bonus, and at no extra charge to you, I’m throwing in a recipe for pasta with clam sauce that I got from my Uncle Jim and Aunt Ev some 30 years ago.

I don’t want to toot my own horn here but when Emma first got to Florence, she ordered pasta with clam sauce at a restaurant and later told me that mine was better.

So, toot, toot.

The recipe calls for canned clams. Of course, fresh clams would be better but since we happen to be a ways from the beach here, we tend to work with what we’ve got.

The original recipe called for white wine but I use red wine because …well because I like red wine.

So the next time you want to feel sophisticated just whip up a big pot of Italian Wedding soup or pasta with clam sauce, pour yourself a glass of Chianti and practice saying Giada De Laurentiis.

Ciao.

 

 

GIADA’S ITALIAN WEDDING SOUP

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A couple of notes here: As you can see Giada calls for 8-ounces of beef and pork but to keep things simple I went with one pound each of beef and pork and then sort of eyeballed the other meatball ingredients to match.

Also, rather than using one piece of bread in the meatballs I opted to use about a cup of panko breadcrumbs because I had them on hand. Well, not actually on hand. That would be stupid. I had the breadcrumbs in our pantry.

One final note: Although it’s perfectly fine to serve the soup right away we found that its flavor was 10 times better the next night. I guess it’s because the meatballs have more time to sit in the soup. So, the next time I make this recipe (And there will be a next time) I will probably do so a day ahead. But this is America so you can do whatever you want. For now, I guess.

Serves 8

Ingredients

For the Meatballs:

1 small onion, grated

1/3 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley

1 large egg

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1 teaspoon salt

1 slice fresh white bread, crust trimmed bread torn into small pieces

1/2 cup grated Parmesan

8 ounces pound ground beef

8 ounces pound ground pork

Freshly ground black pepper

For the Soup:

12 cups low-sodium chicken broth

1-pound curly endive, coarsely chopped (1 pound of escarole would be a good substitution)

2 large eggs

2 tablespoon freshly grated Parmesan, plus extra for garnish

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Instructions:

To make the meatballs: Stir the first 6 ingredients in a large bowl to blend. Stir in the cheese, beef and pork. Using 1 1/2 teaspoons for each, shape the meat mixture into 1-inch-diameter meatballs. Place on a baking sheet.

To make the soup: Bring the broth to a boil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add the meatballs and curly endive and simmer until the meatballs are cooked through and the curly endive is tender, about 8 minutes. Whisk the eggs and cheese in a medium bowl to blend. Stir the soup in a circular motion. Gradually drizzle the egg mixture into the moving broth, stirring gently with a fork to form thin strands of egg, about 1 minute. Season the soup to taste with salt and pepper.

Ladle the soup into bowls and serve. Finish soup with parmesan cheese if desired.

 

Jim and Ev’s Pasta with Clam Sauce

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2-3 cloves garlic

2 tablespoons of butter

2 tablespoons olive oil

3-6.5 ounces cans of chopped clams

½ cup red wine

1 28-ounce can Italian plum tomatoes

¼ cup of fresh chopped parsley

2 tablespoons fresh basil

½ to 1 teaspoon of oregano

½ teaspoon of salt

½ teaspoon of sugar

½ teaspoon red pepper flakes

I lb. of your favorite pasta. I find that this works best with spaghetti noodles or linguine

 

Sautee garlic in the butter and olive oil. Meanwhile, drain clams and add the clam juice in with the garlic.

I probably shouldn’t have to mention this but try to remember to save the clams. They will come in handy later.

Boil the clam juice for one minute then chop and stir in the tomatoes.

Add parsley, basil, oregano, sugar, salt and red pepper flakes. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for at least 30 minutes.

When ready, add clams to sauce and heat through. Bring a pot of salted water to boil add pasta and cook until done to your preference.

I used to use the time-tested method of throwing a piece of pasta to the wall and seeing if it sticks but my wife doesn’t like pasta on the wall. Gee, some people.

Drain pasta and mix with the clam sauce. Serve with fresh-grated Parmesan, crusty bread and a glass to Chianti.

 

 

A friend of ours, Jan Crandall, used to always say, “Girls, have a plan!” and every time I met with her on work projects, she would say we needed a plan.

Mike and I always looked up to Jan and her husband Doug as parents and tried to model our parenting skills after them. Their three daughters turned out pretty well and I think our daughter Emma has, too. So, in memory of our friend Jan, and in honor of her daughters Kate Crandall Pickering, Sarah Crandall Angelette and Beth Crandall who don’t live here anymore, I made a plan for our Birthday Girls’ party. I know they all would be a part of our Birthday Girls group if they were here in town with us – but since the girls are away from their hometown, this one’s for you!

Our Birthday Girls’ group is actually a second generation reincarnation of a group of Carthage woman-who many years ago met once a month to celebrate their birthdays. The current group features several of the daughters of the women in that original group.

We meet once a month and there about 20 of us when we can all get together, which is rare. We celebrate whoever’s birthday it is that month with a card, food, drinks, and laughter. Lana, Tracy, and I along with our newest member Sharon- a.k.a. the Dance Moms – are hosting this month. Thanks to Lana’s sister Carrie, we’re able to use the party barn at her house. It’s a place that holds really special memories for our four girls and for the four of us. Lana suggested we have charcuterie, lemon bars, and – to celebrate the end of summer -lemonade. So we have two varieties of lemonades – a really yummy one that is non-alcoholic and one that is called a Sorrento Spritz.

Now, let’s talk Charcuterie boards. I first got hooked on them when I watched Bravo’s Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Heather Dubrow started doing charcuterie boards and all her friends were mesmerized by them. Basically a Charcuterie Board is a meat, cheese and veggie tray. But, if you put them on fancy boards and call it Charcuterie, it elevates the tone. I really don’t think there are any rules for the boards, and that’s what’s so fun about them.

For Birthday Girls I thought it might be fun to do a variety of Charcuterie boards instead of just one big one – and go crazy on some of them. So using Jan’s “you’ve got to have a plan”, I sketched the boards out and color coded them for two reasons – one to make sure the colors mixed well when I had it put together and two because I have to work the day of the event. If I have everything done ahead of time and in baggies with notes, the layout of food goes super fast in preparation for the party.

Because our Birthday Girls group has a variety of allergies and some members are gluten-free, I started off with a Keto Friendly board. I don’t personally do Keto, but research shows the following items that fall in that category: radishes, bell peppers, carrots, olives, tomatoes, walnuts, blueberries and strawberries, artichokes hearts, pea pods, pepperoni and herbed chèvre.

Then to celebrate our daughter, Emma’s spring semester studying in Italy, I did an All Things Italian board. It reminded me of some of the snacks they would give us when you had a glass of wine there. In Italy you don’t just have a glass of wine, it’s almost always served with a snack of chips, nuts, or cheeses; or sometimes olives and meats, so why not put it all together on one board and call it All Things Italian?

 

My favorite Charcuterie board we own have is one that I think looks rustic. I think it might actually be cut from a piece of tree and it has a logo is stamped on it. It was a more expensive piece and I never told Mike how much I paid for it because…well…because that’s how we’ve stayed married so long. I thought that board would be a good one to be called All Things Rustic. This board features foods that are hearty and remind you of just a casual, rustic time sitting outside with a glass of wine, or just chilling out in front of a fire on a cool day with a few great snacks.

To me food is art. You eat with your eyes first which sets the tone for how it’s going to taste. So why not use my artist palette board to create condiment art and make it simply All Things Condiments? It’s always fun to top off cheese with a dot of honey, use a fruit curd on a baguette, or have a coarse mustard with a pickle and a slice of salami. You can just build your own, and be your own artist.

The Yummo board is my favorite, because it’s all things that I think are yummy. Fruits, vegetables, and my favorite pickled carrots sold at Annie’s in the Woodshed on the Carthage Square are featured Yummo items. Add in some grapes, a mixture of cheeses and meats and of course, when you’re talking meats, there’s nothing better than candied bacon. Yummo is all my faves on one board.

Serve these with either Simply Lemonade floating slices of lemon, or a Sorento Spritz with a blackberry for a little kick.

Lana tops off the night with her amazing lemon bars – something I still struggle with making in the kitchen. She’s our baker-extraordinaire! She’ll be teaching us her baking skills in this space soon – and they are amazing!

So, our party is ready. And, thanks to Jan, for always telling me I needed a plan. I spent two days prepping in my downtime between laundry, spending time with Mike enjoying the last dog-days of summer, and catching up on my Soaps. Thanks to Mike for letting me commandeer the kitchen and his blog. I love to cook with him even though we have our own unique methods … and I think mine is always better.

No matter what, we’ve got a successful set of Charcuterie boards to celebrate the September birthdays – all prepped by The Dance Moms using the color-coded drawings. And the best thing about a plan – it’s a guide – and we changed up some contents on each board and everyone’s board was absolutely perfect – just like our friendship.

So eat up, Birthday Girls and let’s toast Jan for making me “make a plan!”
.

Sometime in early May when the newspaper I used to work for informed me that at the end of June they would no longer carry my column I wasn’t sure what to think.

I mean there isn’t really much you can do when someone says they no longer want to run your column.

I wondered how I would feel, after almost 18 years of writing columns and 22 years total at the paper, when I finished my last column. I also wondered what I would do on my first weekend of “retirement”.

Would I mope? Would I worry? Would I feel sorry for myself?

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA, sometimes I kill myself.

Here’s what my wife and I did on my first weekend of “retirement”. We got up early on Saturday morning and drove to the Webb City Farmers Market. On the way we decided we would let the Market determine our weekend meals.

That’s right. We reversed engineered our menus.

We strolled through the Market pavilion and bought whatever caught our eyes. Here are some of the things that caught our eyes: Plump, bright red tomatoes, large green cucumbers, purple and yellow onions, a breakfast pizza on a homemade crust, a crusty rye baguette, a spicy goat cheese spread, a jar of smoked cinnamon, six ears of sweet corn, a box of so-good-you-wanted-to-eat-them-right-out-of-the-box-blueberries and what I could only assume was a ripe, juicy watermelon.

Then we devised our meal plans.

My wife would use the onions and the cucumbers to make a-follow me here-onion and cucumber salad. I would use the tomatoes, some of the leftover onion, along with a few of my wife’s homegrown poblano peppers to make a grilled shrimp salsa.

The idea was to have the cucumber and onion salad for dinner on Sunday and have the shrimp salsa on Saturday along with the rye baguette, and spicy goat cheese.

Sadly they don’t sell shrimp at the Market but we happened to have a bag of some in our freezer.

When we got back to Carthage, we drove out to West Fairview Avenue and  stopped at Cloud’s Meat Processing to pick up something to go with my wife’s onion and cucumber salad on Sunday.

I love Cloud’s. Sometimes I go to Cloud’s with a specific a purpose and sometimes I let Cloud’s find my specific purpose for me.

In keeping with our reversed engineered menus, I decided to let Cloud’s find my specific purpose. It turns out on this particular Saturday my specific purpose was a 3-pound pork loin roast.

When we got home, we put our purchases away and, because it was still early, thought about we should do next.

It took us about a second to decide that we should drive down to the Square for bloody mary’s and breakfast at the Woodshed.

To paraphrase the late Dan Jenkins, “It can’t be all work and worry. Sometimes people need to unwind.”

About an hour  later, we returned home for a few hectic hours of lazing in our backyard. But before we lazed, I cut up some watermelon and my wife and I used it to make a pitcher of watermelon mojitos from a recipe we came across in a recent issue of “Southern Living”.

Have you ever had a fresh watermelon mojito on a warm summer Saturday afternoon?

You should. It’s good.

Then, I iced down a few bottles of Budweiser, and we commenced with our lazing.

After we lazed part of the afternoon away, I started a fire on one of our grills, then I went inside and started putting part of the shrimp salsa together. When the fire was ready, I grabbed one of my wife’s poblano peppers and grilled it until the skin was black and blistered. Then I put it in a large bowl, covered it with plastic wrap and let it cool. While the pepper cooled, I grilled a small mess o’ shrimp.

When the shrimp was done, I took it and the pepper inside, chopped them up, put them back in the bowl added the other salsa ingredients  I  prepared earlier, topped the whole thing off with plenty of fresh lime juice and put it in the refrigerator.

The whole process took about 40 minutes so, of course, when I was finished, I had to go back out and laze some more.

A few hours later, I took some fresh corn tortillas, cut then in the triangles and fried them in hot oil.  Meanwhile my wife made a fresh watermelon salad topped with goat cheese and, just like that, dinner was ready.

 

Early Sunday afternoon, my wife made her famous cucumber and onion salad and then joined me in the backyard for some more lazing.

Later that evening, I prepared the pork roast. I really didn’t have a recipe for the roast. I just seasoned it with salt, pepper, some rosemary and thyme. Then I placed some fresh lemons on the top of the roast and placed in a roasting pan on a bed of sliced lemons and put it in the oven.

While the roast cooked, I started a fire on one of the grills and, when it was ready, tossed six ears of corn on the fire. When the corn was done, I sprinkled a spicy barbecue rub I found in the same Southern Living magazine on the corn, cook it a few minutes more, then we served it with the roast, my wife’s cucumber and onion salad and a couple of glasses of Chardonnay.

Hey, again to paraphrase Mr. Jenkins “Nobody said life wasn’t going to be semi-tough.”

So, no, I don’t think I’m going to spend much time moping. Instead, I’m going to continue the reverse-engineering of my life.

And lazing.

 

As promised, here are a few recipes.

Watermelon-ginger mojitos

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This recipe is from the July 2019 issue of Southern Living. My wife only loves it.

1/2 cup granulated sugar

5 fresh mint sprigs, plus more for garnish

8 cups seedless watermelon cubes

3 cups (24 oz.) light rum chilled

1 (12-oz.) bottle ginger beer, chilled

1/2 cup fresh lime juice (from 4 limes)

Ice cubes

Small watermelon wedges, for garnish

Bring 1/2 cup water and sugar to a simmer in a small saucepan over high. Simmer, stirring often, until sugar dissolves, 1 to 2 minutes. Remove from heat; add mint and stir until submerged. Refrigerate until mixture is completely cool, 1 hour. Pour mint mixture through a fine wire-mesh strainer into a bowl; discard solids. Chill mint syrup until ready to use.

While syrup cools, place watermelon in a blender, and process until smooth, about 20 seconds. Pour through a fine wire-mesh strainer into a large measuring cup, pressing gently to squeeze out juice. Discard solids and refrigerate 15 minutes. Repeat straining procedure. (You should have about 4 cups juice.)

Stir together mint syrup, watermelon juice, rum, ginger beer, and lime juice in a large pitcher.

Pour evenly into 10 highball glasses filled with ice (or one really big glass); garnish each with a mint sprig and small watermelon wedge cut to sit on rim of glass.

 

Fiesta Shrimp Salsa

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I found this recipe, a few years ago, in Weber’s New Real Grilling cookbook.

1 poblano pepper

24 large shrimp (21/30 count) peeled and deveined, tales removed

Extra-virgin olive oil

2 medium tomatoes, seeded and finely diced

1 small Fresno chili pepper, seeded and diced

1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and diced

¼ cup finely diced red onion

1 large glove of garlic, minced or pushed through a press

3 tablespoons fresh lime juice

½ teaspoon kosher salt

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

¼ cup finely chopped fresh cilantro leaves

Tortilla chips

 

Grill the poblano over direct heat with the lid closed, until blackened and blistered all over (the pepper, not you) 10 to 12 minutes, turning occasionally. Put the pepper in a bowl and cover with plastic wrap to trap the steam. Let stand for 10 minutes. Peel away and discard the charred skin (Again, from the pepper, not from you) cut off and discard the stem and seeds, and then cut the poblano in a ¼ inch dice. Put the poblano back in the bowl.

Lightly brush the shrimp on both sides with olive oil. Grill over direct heat, until they are firm to the touch and just turning opaque in the center 4 to 5 minutes. Cut shrimp into ¼ inch pieces.

Then, to the bowl with the diced poblano, add the shrimp, 1 tablespoon oil, the tomatoes, Fresno and jalapeno peppers, the onion, garlic, lime juice, salt, pepper; toss to combine. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or up to 4 hours. Just before serving, stir in the cilantro. Serve the salsa immediately with tortilla chips.

Note: If I can’t find a Fresno pepper, I add another jalapeno pepper. Also you can settle for tortilla chips from a bag but I prefer to fry my own. To steal part of a Steve Martin joke “My doctor says I’m not getting enough fat.”

 

Mike’s Pork Loin Roast

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I took part of this recipe from a Giada De Laurentiis cooking show. I once saw Giada (I can call her that) roast a spatchcocked (not as dirty as it sounds) chicken on a bed of sliced lemons, so I figured it would also work with a pork loin roast. The lemons, not the spatchcocking.

1 pork loin roast, 2 to 3 pounds

Salt, pepper, rosemary and thyme. To taste. By the way, in recipe-speak “To taste” means “As much as you damn want”.

1 large lemon

Season the roast all over with the herbs and spices (Wasn’t there a music group in the 60’s called “Herbs and Spices?).

Slice the lemon into slices. Place half the slices in the bottom of the roasting pan and set the roast in the pan. Place the other half on the top of the roast and bake in a pre-heated 325-degree oven for about 1 to 2 hours or until the meat thermometer reaches 170 degrees.

 

Grilled Corn with Smokey Barbecue Rub

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This recipe also came from the July 2019 issue of Southern Living.

Working with six ears of corn take one ear  at a time, grab the silks at the top of the corn slowly peal back the silks and husks. Discard the silks; pull the husks together to form a pony-tail-handle. Tear off 1 small husk piece and use it to tie a knot around the husks.

I did this when I fixed this recipe but I think it’s mainly for show. If you wanted to you could just pull the husks all the way off.

Coat the corn with cooking spray and place on the grill. Grill, uncovered, turning occasionally until charred in spots. About 15 to 18 minutes and remove from grill, add the smoky barbecue rub to each ear and return to the grill, turning occasionally, until the sugar melts. About 4 to 5 minutes. Remove from grill and either serve immediately  or wrap each ear in foil with a generous pat of butter and keep warm until ready to serve.

 

Smoky Barbecue Rub

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Stir together 2 tablespoons dark brown sugar; 1 tablespoon smoked paprika; 1 teaspoon fresh lime zest; and ½ teaspoon each of ancho chili powder; kosher salt; black pepper; and garlic powder in a small bowl. Sprinkle mixture over the corn.

 

My Wife’s Cucumber and Onion Salad

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Since this is my wife’s recipe, she wrote all of it for you. For the record, when I asked her to include her recipe she said “You shouldn’t need a (bad word) to make cucumber and onion salad” Read at your own risk.

This is the way I cook – Mike’s eye roll here)

Take two cucumbers.  Wash and peel.  Cut off ends, cut in half and then slice down the middle. Take a table teaspoon and rake to remove the seeds.  Then slice the cucumbers into half moons.

Put them in a glass Anchor Hocking bowl.  Add 1/2 of a preferably red onion, by cutting in half and then slicing so they are pretty little half moon shapes.  Sprinkle lightly across the cucumbers.  Sprinkle veggies with celery seed to your liking.  You can add cracked black pepper, as well.

Cover the veggies with Nakano Rice Vinegar.  (Sounds fancy, but you can find it in a big-box store with the other vinegars.  You could use plain vinegar and add sugar, but if you can buy and use the Nakano Rice Vinegar, why not?)

Put the lid on and shake like hell so it’s mixed well.  Best when chilled at least all day while drinking beer outside, or overnight.

Enjoy!  “Mike’s Wife”

The key in situations like this is to stay calm.

My dad served in three wars and raised seven kids. Now, if you had to guess, which of those two things that my dad did caused him the most stress?

That’s right — the part about raising seven kids. Look, if my dad had just had to raise me, I’m pretty sure he would have gone crazy. Imagine raising seven of me.

I’m not saying that my three brothers and three sisters are exactly like me — that, of course, would be weird, if not some sort of freak of nature. I’m just saying that raising seven kids would take a toll on anyone, even a veteran of three wars.

One of my favorite pictures of my dad was taken on a Christmas morning. In the picture, my dad is sitting in his recliner, surrounded by what looks like a New York City-sized landfill of Christmas wrapping boxes and the sort of debris you would expect to see early on Christmas morning in a house occupied by seven kids. But my dad seemed oblivious to the chaos that surrounded him. He was just calmly reading a book as if he were sitting under a tree on a sunny, warm spring day.

So I’m trying to remain calm even though, as I’m typing this, there are at least four people scurrying around me cleaning, installing pictures and hauling stuff in and out of the room in which I’m currently working.

My wife is decorating a place at the Lake of the Ozarks, and I volunteered to help her. Well, I volunteered in the sense that when my wife said, “You’re coming with me to the Lake of the Ozarks. I need your help,” I said, “I don’t want to,” and she said, “Tough.”

You know, in that sense.

Because my wife believes in a decorating system known as “buy way too much crap,” we had to haul the stuff to the lake in a semilarge U-Haul truck.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but I’m not a semilarge U-Haul truck sort of guy. I’m, at best, a medium-sized SUV kind of guy. So driving a semilarge U-Haul full of way too much stuff to the Lake of the Ozarks was sort of stressful for me.

Well, it would have been if I were capable of stress, but I’m not. Well, at least not like my wife. My wife is always telling me how “stressed” she is. I’m not sure why my wife is stressed, but then again, I didn’t even know until I met my wife that “stress” could be used as a verb.

But just because I’m not capable of stress doesn’t mean sometimes I can’t at least get on edge. And driving a semilarge U-Haul full of too much stuff put me a bit on edge — until we got to the lake and I had a chance to get on the outside of a big bacon cheeseburger and a couple of beers at a Jimmy Buffett-themed establishment.

Getting on the outside of a big bacon cheeseburger and a couple of beers at a Jimmy Buffett-themed establishment is the sort of thing that can back me off of the edge.

So now I’m trying to write this column on Friday morning while chaos swirls around me, and I’m remarkably calm. Sure, in a little while I’m going to have to load some of the “way too much crap” my wife brought to the lake along with a mountain of cardboard back into the semilarge U-Haul and drive it back to Carthage, but that’s in the future. Granted, it’s in the very near future, but I believe in living in the now, and now I choose to be calm.

Besides, if I find myself on the edge again, I can always turn to cheeseburgers, beer and Jimmy Buffett.

I should have been able to get ahead of her and stop her from doing what she did.

But I wasn’t. In retrospect, I suppose I was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of items she brought into the house and just overlooked some of them.

Because had I noticed that hidden among all of the plastic bags she brought home from the large, 24-hour retail store in our town were ingredients for her chili, I would have headed her off at the culinary pass.

But I didn’t. So I didn’t.

It was Wednesday evening. Earlier, my wife had called me on her way home from work.

“I’m going to the large, 24-hour retail store in our town,” she said. “Do we need anything?”

“No,” I said, because — follow me here — we didn’t need anything.

Then I said, “So don’t buy a bunch of stuff just because we think we’re going to get snowed in.”

“I’m just going to get a few things,” my wife said.

“Sigh,” I said.

Any time my wife hears a weather report calling for as much as snow flurries, she acts as if we live on the frozen tundra in the Northwest Territories and buys enough supplies to last us until the spring thaw, which she somehow believes won’t come until late July.

I tried to tell my wife that the forecasted freezing rain was only supposed to last a little while, but she interrupted me.

“You never know,” is what she said.

I wanted to say: “You know what? I do know. I know that you always buy a bunch of stuff we don’t need, and then it sits in our pantry or our freezer until we have to throw it out to make room for all the stuff you buy the next time snow flurries are in the forecast.”

But I didn’t. Because whenever I’ve said that in the past, my wife hasn’t listened to me.

So about an hour and a half later, my wife walked into our kitchen carrying a bunch of plastic bags full of stuff we didn’t need and dropped them on the floor.

“I’ll be back,” she said and went back to her car and brought in more bags. She repeated this process about five more times.

To help out, I decided — while my wife was unloading her car — to make room in our refrigerator.

I took a beer out of the refrigerator.

As a veteran husband, I have developed a motto when it comes to my wife’s snow flurries shopping. Here is that motto: You bought it. You put it away.

It is, I think, a good motto.

The only problem with the motto is by not helping my wife put away the roughly six-month supply of food that she purchased, I didn’t notice her chili ingredients.

It’s important to note that there is a considerable difference between ingredients for my wife’s chili and ingredients for my chili.

Here is that considerable difference: I like my chili. I do not like my wife’s chili.

To be fair, my wife prefers her chili to mine. Although that hasn’t always been the case. For years, my wife said she loved my chili. Until she found the recipe for her chili. Then she dropped my chili like — well, like a bowl of hot chili.

Things like that happen in a marriage. At some point, a husband might — using a purely hypothetical example — announce that he can’t stand his wife’s roast beef. And the wife will not take it personally, understanding that her husband is merely reflecting the ebbs and flows of marriage.

He hopes.

So anyway, whenever one of us feels like chili, we say, “I’m going to make chili,” which means, “I’m going to make my chili, not yours,” turning the other person into a chili hostage.

All of this to explain why, Friday night, we had my wife’s chili for dinner.

Oh well. It could have been worse.

We could have had her roast beef.

 

I’m no  gumbo expert.

I don’t have colorful tales of spending my youth in my grandmother’s kitchen while she whipped up a big ol’ pot of gumbo on her wood-burning stove, telling me stories of growing up on the bayou and singing Hank Williams songs.

That’s probably because both of my grandmothers were from Kansas where, to my knowledge, there is no bayou and neither of them seemed to care much for Hank Williams.

I need to stop here and let you know that when referring to a pot of  gumbo the correct term is “big ol’”.

I  mean, why would anyone make a small pot of gumbo?

It was the great Justin Wilson who introduced me to gumbo. I was  in my 20s and was a big fan of Justin’s PBS show “Louisiana Cooking”. In one episode, Justin  made a big ol’ pot of  chicken gumbo. I was intrigued. And not just because Justin taught me how to pronounce “andouille”.

I don’t know why, but being able to pronounce andouille made me feel sophisticated.

You know, like being able to pronounce gyro or prosciutto.

Obviously, it doesn’t take much to make me feel sophisticated.

What intrigued me about Justin’s gumbo recipe was how much it reminded me of the comfort foods I was raised on. To me, Justin’s chicken gumbo seemed like a Louisiana version of my dad’s fried chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy.

But, still, it wasn’t until several years later, when my wife gave me a copy of Paul Prudhomme’s “Louisiana Kitchen”, that I finally attempted to make a big ol’ pot of gumbo my own self.

I don’t make gumbo a lot. Probably a couple times a year which may sound like a lot but real gumbo people are more likely to make it a couple times a month.

Because I still consider myself a gumbo novice , whenever I  make a big ol’ pot of gumbo I always  turn to an expert.

This past weekend the expert I turned to was Lucy Buffett the younger sister of Jimmy Buffett. It’s important to note, however, that in gumbo circles it’s Jimmy who is known as Lucy’s older brother.

First Gumbo Person: Who’s that guy with the guitar and margarita?

Second Gumbo Person: Him? Oh, that’s just Lucy Buffett’s older brother.

First Gumbo Person: He’s so lucky.

Lucy owns and operates three restaurants-Lulu’s Gulf Shores, in Gulf Shore, Alabama, Lulu’s Destin in Destin, Florida and Lulu’s in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

For more information about Lucy you can dial up her website at www.lucybuffett.com.

And while you’re there you can do what I did and pull up Lucy’s winter gumbo recipe. I’m not including the recipe here because I want you to check out Lucy’s webpage. It’s neat is what it is.

I’ve never met a gumbo that I didn’t like but I really like Lucy’s winter gumbo recipe. First of all, it’s what you call your traditional gumbo recipe. A deep, dark roux, onion, celery and green pepper (The Holy Trinity) the aforementioned andouille, chicken, stock ,shrimp, oysters and a mess of spices.

Of course, the key to any gumbo recipe is the roux. Basically, a roux is a mix of hot oil and flour that you stir for-as Lucy aptly put it in her recipe-“25 to 35 minutes or until your arm feels like it is about to fall off”.

 

Did I mention Lucy knows a thing or two about gumbo?

Every time I make a roux, I’m amazed at how the oil and flour slowly changes from a pale white to a light caramel to a dark mahogany. To me it’s sort of like the way the leaves change in the fall. One day they’re green and the next thing you know they’re a mixture of red, yellow and orange.

Because I’m a gumbo novice I’m sort of a conservative with the heat when I cook my roux. Sure, I make sure the oil is hot enough when I add the flour, I just tend to cook it a  lower temperature than I  probably should  because I don’t want to it to burn and have to start all over. Cooking at a lower temperature is fine, as long as it’s not too low, it just tends to take longer.

But, again, I’m lazy and would rather cook my roux a bit longer than have to start all over if I burn it.

I hope that’s not some sort of gumbo no-no.

Once the roux is done you carefully add the onions, cook them for a couple a minutes, then you add the celery and green pepper, the chicken and andouille, chicken stock and seasoning.

And then it’s time to  let the gumbo simmer uncovered for-again as Lucy aptly puts it “approximately 1 hour or an entire day”.

The fact that Lucy endorses the idea of simmering her gumbo all day makes her a woman after my own heart.

Nothing makes me feel better on a Sunday afternoon than having  a big o’ pot of gumbo, or chili, or spaghetti sauce or…well…anything simmering on the stove while I’m watching football, or basketball or baseball.

Last Sunday, I also made a loaf of Tuscan bread to go with the gumbo. That’s right. While I watched football Sunday afternoon, there was  gumbo simmering on the stove and bread cooking in the oven.

I’ve had worse days.

A quick note. My wife told me I better give her credit for taking the photos. Well, actually, what she said was “You (Bad Word Used As both a Noun and a Verb) you better give me a photo credit.”

So here we go: Photos by my wife.

 

The menu has been expanded.

At first, I wasn’t sure how I felt about that, but then I figured it wasn’t my place to stand in the way of progress.

It doesn’t matter if I happen to think that the only thing Rick Walker needs on the menu at Bernie’s roadside tavern in Avilla is the double cheeseburger with bacon and jalapenos. What matters is that Rick and his customers are happy, and as far as I can tell, they are.

I know for a fact that the two customers who were with me last Saturday at Bernie’s were happy because they said they were. Here is how that conversation went.

Me: Are you happy?

Wife: Yes.

Twenty-year-old daughter Emma: Leave me alone. I’m trying to eat my burger.

By the way, I’m proud to say that while my wife ordered the single

cheeseburger, Emma opted for the double. Although to be fair, Emma told me that I should have warned her how big the double was before she ordered it.

Oh well, live and learn.

For some reason my wife and I hadn’t made the short trek across Missouri Highway 96 to Avilla in some time, but now we’ve been twice in almost as many weeks.

I think that’s something.

Emma had never been to Bernie’s before last Saturday, and I wasn’t sure what she would think about the place. See, Emma runs in a sorority crowd at college, and, at least to me, Bernie’s doesn’t seem much like a sorority sort of place.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but when I was in college I didn’t hang around much with the sorority crowd.

I tended to hang out in places like Bernie’s. Last Saturday, I told Emma that much of my misspent youth had been spent in places like Bernie’s.

Emma gave me a look that said, “I don’t even know you anymore.”

But Emma also really liked Bernie’s. A lot.

I think that’s something.

I told Emma that years ago, when I was working in the oil fields around Pawhuska, Oklahoma, I took most of my meals in taverns like Bernie’s.

Emma only knows about Pawhuska because of that Pioneer Woman who cooks on the Food Channel. I told Emma that Pawhuska is a little different town now than it was when I worked there.

I don’t know, but there is just something about stopping in a roadside tavern after a long day on an oil rig and having an ice-cold beer followed by a burger and an order of fries.

I think some of my finest meals have been served up at roadside taverns.

Bernie’s has all the requirements that I look for in a roadside tavern. Beer, of course. The aforementioned excellent cheeseburgers. A great jukebox. A pool table, and friendly people.

A few weeks ago, when just my wife and I ate at Bernie’s, we sat at the bar while my wife played Keno. My wife said it was the best afternoon of her life, which I thought might have been an exaggeration.

But then again, she’s married to me.

So there is that.

Last Saturday, after we finished our burgers, Rick said he wanted me to try something new to his menu.

“We do wings now,” Rick said.

I have to admit I was uneasy with that news. “Why would a perfectly good burger tavern add wings to its menu?” is what I thought.

Sure, I love wings, but shouldn’t great cheeseburgers with bacon and jalapenos be enough?

Then I tried the wings.

And suddenly I was OK with adding wings to the menu. Rick served up a plate of stinging honey garlic wings and a plate of just really, really hot wings, and we finished them all.

After our cheeseburgers, fries and onion rings.

I guess sometimes progress is a good thing.

 

It was a fresh tomato-worthy weekend.

At our house, not every weekend is fresh tomato-worthy. In order for a weekend to be fresh tomato-worthy, it needs to be unencumbered. Now, an unencumbered weekend is not to be confused with an uncucumbered weekend. In fact, oftentimes a fresh tomato-worthy weekend is also a fresh cucumber-worthy weekend. Now I will leave it up to you to determine if “uncucumbered” is actually a word, but if it’s not, it should be.

Many times my wife will make a cucumber and tomato salad, which, as ol’ Ben Franklin may or may not have said about beer, “is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”

This past weekend was one of those rare times when we didn’t have any plans — a weekend when we had nothing to do and nowhere to go.

Two years ago, when our now-20-year-old daughter, Emma, left for college, my wife and I figured that finally, after years of school, sports and dance activities, our weekends would be free.

Turns out we figured wrong.

Looking back on this summer, I’m not sure what we did with our weekends. I just know that most of them were definitely not unencumbered.

But this past weekend was unencumbered, which is why, on Saturday morning, I drove over to the Webb City Farmers Market and picked up some fresh tomatoes. I also bought some jalapenos, onions and a box of peaches. My wife loves peaches. I do not. But when you’re married and you see something you think your spouse might like, you buy it.

You never know when you might need bonus points.

I planned to use the tomatoes in a recipe for pico de gallo that I found in the new “Margaritaville” cookbook.

We have too many cookbooks, and there is a reason for that: We like cookbooks and can’t stop buying them.

After I made the pico de gallo, I covered it and put it in the refrigerator. Later, that evening, I sliced some corn tortillas and fried them up. Then my wife and I sat outside and dipped the still-warm corn tortilla chips in the pico de gallo.

Have you ever had warm corn tortilla chips dipped in pico de gallo made with fresh tomatoes, onions and jalapeno?

You should.

Still later that evening I took out two slabs of baby back ribs and covered them with a rub that I made earlier.

Whenever someone asks me for the secret to my rib rub, I always say, “Come closer,” and when they do, I yell, “THERE IS NO DAMN SECRET. JUST ABOUT ALL RIB RUBS ARE BASICALLY THE SAME, AND ANYONE WHO TELLS YOU DIFFERENT IS LYING.”

Fortunately, not a lot of people ask me that question.

Still later on Saturday evening, my wife and I cut up the remaining tomatoes, onions and jalapenos to go with a mess o’ tacos.

In case you’re wondering, “mess o’” is the correct term when referring to tacos. And chicken wings. For baby back ribs, I stick to the traditional term, “slabs.”

On Sunday afternoon, I grabbed the ribs out of the refrigerator, took them outside, put them on my Weber water smoker, closed the lid, opened a beer, sat on our patio and watched the St. Louis Cardinals.

Hey, somebody had to do the cooking.

Have you ever sat on your patio, sipping beer and watching baseball while two slabs of ribs slowly smoke next to you?

You should.

Occasionally, I would get up to check the temperature on my smoker. Then I would go inside and grab another beer.

It was a fine weekend.

It was tomato-worthy, is what it was.

 

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Pico de Gallo

This recipe from Margaritaville: The Cookbook is easy and amazing. Of course, using fresh everything helps.

1 1/2 cups finely chopped tomatoes

1 small yellow onion, finely diced

Large handful of fresh cilantro leaves, finely chopped

I jalapeno, seeded and minced

2 tablespoons fresh lime juice, plus more if needed. (We always need more. We like lime juice).

1/2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more if needed.

Place all ingredients together in a large bowl and gently stir together. Taste for seasoning, adding more lime and/or salt as needed. Serve immediately.

I like to serve this with freshly fried corn tortilla chips. “But Mike” some of you are asking. “Is that healthy?”. To some of you who are asking that I say “No. No, it’s not.”

 

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Mike’s “THERE IS  NO DAMN SECRET. JUST ABOUT ALL RIB RUBS ARE BASICALLY THE SAME, AND ANYONE WHO TELLS YOU DIFFERENT IS LYING” Secret rib rub.

This your basic rib rub recipe. It is so basic I don’t even remember where it came from but I like it so that’s all the matters.

1/2 cup white sugar

1/3 cup brown sugar

1/3 cup kosher salt

1 1/2 tablespoons chili powder

1 tablespoon cumin

1 teaspoon onion powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon allspice

Mix the spices together then, after removing the membrane from the back side of the ribs, rub a generous amount of the mix onto the ribs. This, by the way, is why it’s called a rib rub. Bet you won’t get great culinary insight like that on the Food Channel. I guess you could also call it a rib pat because after you rub it onto the ribs you then pat it into the meat. But rib pat sounds sort of stupid. So never mind. Oh, I almost forgot: Cover the ribs and put them in the refrigerator for at least 4 hours but longer is always better. I shoot for 24  hours.

You can store the leftover rub (pat?) in a sealed container to use later. Or, you can do what I do and store it in a sealed container, put in the pantry and forget about it until you find it a year later and discover it’s as hard as whatever that thing on Trump’s head is.

You probably shouldn’t do that.

Sometimes I hear from people who tell me that I have an easy job.

And when I say “sometimes,” I mean “almost daily,” and when I say “people,” I mean “my wife.”

But to those “people,” I will offer up proof that I do not, in fact, have an easy job.

Here is that proof: Today, while preparing to write this column, I had to look up the correct spelling of charcuterie.

I know!

Do you have any idea how hard it is to look up the correct spelling of a word like charcuterie?

I knew going into my search that charcuterie began with the letter “c,” but beyond that, I was sort of flying blind.

So, I did what I always do when looking up the correct spelling of a word that I don’t know how to spell. I typed in the first letter followed by a bunch of other random letters and hoped that good ol’ Mr. Google would help me out.

Sometimes this takes a while. But after a couple of minutes of random typing, good ol’ Mr. Google finally showed me the correct spelling of charcuterie. Good ol’ Mr. Google also demonstrated the correct pronunciation of charcuterie, which I thought was nice.

But when I tried to pronounce “charcuterie,” I had the same problem I have whenever I try to pronounce “croissant.” I couldn’t stop.

That’s what happens whenever I try to pronounce a French word.

Nice Baker Person: What would you like?

Me: May I please have a croissannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnttttttt …

So, a few minutes ago, when good ol’ Mr. Google demonstrated the correct pronunciation of charcuterie, and I tried to repeat it, this is what happened.

Good ol’ Mr. Google: Char-cut-erie.

Me: Charcuterrrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiii …

If my wife hadn’t walked by and slapped me in the back, I would probably still be trying to pronounce it.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, my wife didn’t slap me in the back to save me from pronouncing “charcuterie.” She just likes to slap me in the back.

Actually, the fact that I’m wrestling with how to spell and pronounce charcuterie in the first place is because of my wife.

Recently, my wife has become charcuterie-crazy. A few years ago, my wife had never even used the word “charcuterie” in a sentence, and now it’s all she talks about.

Me: What sounds good for —

Wife: I know, let’s make a charcuterie board.

I can’t remember when or where we first had a charcuterie board; all I know is that my wife has become obsessed with them.

The thing is, my wife and I have been making charcuterie boards for years. We just didn’t call them charcuterie boards. We called them snack plates.

Say it was a Friday evening and my wife and I didn’t feel like cooking a big meal. What we would do was fill a plate with some meats, cheeses, fruits and bread and then snack on it all.

But we can’t do that now. Now what we do is fill a plate with some meats, cheeses, fruits and bread and call it a charcuterie board and feel sophisticated.

I’m uncomfortable feeling sophisticated.

I suppose the reason I’m uncomfortable feeling sophisticated is because I’m pretty much the exact opposite of sophisticated. I’m not just unsophisticated, I’m ununununununununsophisticated.

But my wife is sophisticated. It was my wife, for example, who told me what an armoire was and why we needed one.

See, I thought an armoire was some sort of sophisticated female undergarment from France, so when my wife suggested we get one, I immediately agreed. Imagine my disappointment when we brought the armoire home.

So thanks to my sophisticated wife, I now know the meaning of the words “armoire” and “charcuterie.”

If only I didn’t have to have someone around to slap me in the back when I try to pronounce them.

 

I’m writing this column right next to a large copy of a Mike Royko newspaper column.

I would like to say that there is a certain amount of symmetry to me writing my column right next to a Mike Royko column, but I can’t.

For one thing, I’m not sure what symmetry means, and for another thing, if it means what I think it means, saying that there is a certain amount of symmetry that I’m writing a column next to a Mike Royko column would imply that I was somehow on Mike’s level — and I’m not.

I don’t mind the fact that I’m nowhere near Mike Royko’s level. Nobody was, is or will be.

If you don’t know, Mike was a legendary newspaper columnist. Although he lived and wrote in Chicago, Mike’s column was syndicated in newspapers all across the country, including the Parsons Sun in Kansas, which is where I first read it.

The reason there is a large blowup of a Mike Royko column next to me is because I’m typing this in a back table in the Billy Goat Tavern, a bar that Mike was known to frequent a time or two.

Well, more than a time or two. A lot more.

That’s right. It’s Friday, and I’m working from the Billy Goat Tavern. A few minutes ago, I finished my double cheeseburger, got another beer and decided to pull out my computer and get to work.

“But Mike,” some of you are saying. “Do you always drink beer when you write? If so, that would explain a lot.”

To some of you, I say, “Hahahaha!” I would also say no, I don’t normally drink beer when I write. But my wife and I are on a mini vacation, so I decided it would be OK to have a beer while I write this. Besides, if I didn’t, Sam, the owner of the Billy Goat and nephew of original owner William “Billy Goat” Sianis, would likely toss me out.

I mean, I just spoke to Sam, and he’s a nice guy and all, but business is business.

Actually, Sam is sitting at a table right next to me.

I think that’s something.

The place is about three-quarters full, and most people are munching on cheeseburgers. The ones not on vacation are drinking sodas. At the bar are several guys who appeared to have been on vacation a long time drinking beer.

As I type this, I can hear one of the guys behind the grill at the Billy Goat hollering “CHEESEBURGER CHEESEBURGER.” I can also hear another guy say to a customer, “You want double. Double is best.” And most of the time, the customer orders a double.

I should point out that the Billy Goat was also the model for the classic “Saturday Night Live” “Cheeseburger, Cheeseburger” sketch.

There’s that symmetry again.

After my wife and I ordered our cheeseburgers (doubles, of course), a guy came in with his wife and ordered a single cheeseburger. When the guy behind the counter said, “No, double is best,” the guy who ordered the single said it would be bad for his cholesterol.

Man, it’s a good thing Sam didn’t hear that.

As I’ve been writing, an idea sort of popped in my head. The Billy Goat Tavern is one of my three favorite bars in the world. The other two are — in no particular order — Kelly’s Westport Inn in Kansas City and Captain Tony’s in Key West, Florida.

My idea: In the next couple of years, I’ll write columns while sitting in Kelly’s and in Captain Tony’s and sipping beer.

Sure, it will be hard work, but I’ve never been afraid of hard work. I’ve never done hard work, but I’m not afraid of it.

Now, if you will excuse me, I have a beer — I mean, a vacation — to finish.

 

It may not seem like it, what with the cool, wet weather, but we’re entering the summer cooking season.

Summer cooking, to me, is a mixture of the light and the heavy.

It is a time for sliced tomatoes, fresh cucumbers, fresh picked strawberries, blackberries and corn on the cob.

It also is a time for smoked ribs, briskets, steaks on the grill, thick pork chops and whole grilled chickens.

Summer also is a time for something in between, like the chicken salad that I’m going to whip up as soon as I finish this column.

When I was single, I made chicken salad all the time. But when I got married, I discovered that my wife and I came at chicken salad from two different directions. One of us was from Venus, and one of us was from Mars.

I like a hearty chicken salad with smoked chicken, lots of onions and spices. My wife likes a light chicken salad with tender chicken, little if any onion, and fruit.

“You don’t put fruit in chicken salad,” I told my wife.

“Yes, you do,” my wife said. “And you don’t need all of that onion.”

My wife and I agreed to disagree.

Awhile back, I came across a chicken salad that breaches our onion/fruit divide. It’s a recipe that offers the heartiness that I crave and the lightness my wife prefers.

The secret is bacon. Adding bacon to chicken salad is so smart I can’t believe I hadn’t heard about it before. To contrast the heartiness of the bacon, the recipe calls for grapes. Ordinarily, I wouldn’t be a fan of grapes in chicken salad, but in my mind the bacon cancels the fruit out. I also added onion to the chicken salad, but I used green onions instead of yellow and I didn’t add as much as I usually do. The result was a chicken salad that both my wife and I agree on.

Tuesday morning, I drove over to the Webb City Farmers Market for supplies. No offense to the people who work at the stores where I buy my beer, but the Webb City Farmers Market is my favorite place to shop.

There is something reassuring knowing where the food you are buying comes from. At the Webb City Farmers Market, not only can you be sure that what you are buying is fresh and grown locally, but in most cases you can talk to the people who produced what you’re buying.

It was raining when I pulled into the farmers market, but the place was as busy as ever. I stopped at one booth and picked up some fresh green onions. At another booth, I picked up some purple onions and cucumbers. At yet another booth, I picked up a small box of tomatoes. The cucumbers and purple onions will go into a salad my wife will make later, and the tomatoes … well, sliced tomatoes go well with anything.

I don’t know about you, but I like my sliced tomatoes chilled and with a bit of salt and pepper.

While I was there, I also picked up a couple of cherry tarts for my wife and our 15-year-old daughter. After I paid for the pastries, I walked back to my car and drove home.

It was time to write, but more importantly, it was time for chicken salad.

—

Originally published in the Joplin Globe on Jun 4, 2013

Originally published in the  Jan 26, 2011 edition of The Joplin Globe.

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Much like the old St. Louis Famous Barr French onion soup recipe, the Kansas City Plaza III steak soup recipe has found fame far beyond the community in which it was created.

Enter the words “Plaza III steak soup recipe” in an Internet search and some 10,000 listings will pop up. The hearty, thick soup has been a staple at the landmark Kansas City steakhouse almost since the day the restaurant opened in 1963.

Sometimes the term “comfort food” tends to get tossed around too casually, but when the term is applied to this steak soup, it is definitely appropriate. The combination of beef, vegetables, tomatoes and the soup’s deep, rich broth make it a perfect meal on a cold, blustery, winter evening. Add a glass of Cabernet and a loaf of crusty bread and you will almost forget that spring is still more than six weeks away.

Like many recipes, the Plaza III steak soup recipe has hundreds of variations. I happen to have a copy of the original recipe that was sent to me almost 20 years ago by my wife’s aunt and uncle who used to live on the Plaza in Kansas City. My older sister fixes a variation of the Plaza III recipe that she found in a cookbook called “A Cooking Affaire” by Jan Bertogilo and JoLe Hudson. The recipe that I use and have included, along with the Plaza III recipe, is a combination of both.

The main difference between the two recipes concerns the soup’s liquid base. The Plaza III recipe calls for a little more than a quart of water, while the recipe that I prefer calls for four cans of beef consommŽ. Either works, but I have found that the beef consommŽ gives the soup a stronger, beefier flavor.

In addition, the restaurant’s soup recipe calls for ground chuck while I use sirloin. I have prepared the soup both ways, and while ground chuck works well, I prefer the sirloin. My sister’s recipe calls for a combination of both ground chuck and sirloin.

The real strength of the recipe, I think, is that it lends itself to change. It’s the sort of recipe that allows you to add or subtract ingredients to suit your own tastes yet retains its same basic flavor.

The soup’s texture comes from the simple quick roux of butter and flour that serves as the base for the dish. Without the roux the soup would not have its slight thickness, nor would it have its distinctive color.

Fans of Louisiana cooking know that a traditional Cajun roux can take up to 30 minutes to prepare and must be done with the utmost care to avoid burning. While the Plaza III steak soup recipe’s roux takes much less time to prepare, it requires no less care.

To prepare the roux for the steak soup, melt a stick of butter over medium heat in a stock pot or Dutch over being careful not to let the butter brown. When the butter is melted, add the flour. Using a spoon or whisk, thoroughly mix the flour with the butter. When the flour and butter are mixed, continue cooking, stirring almost constantly for three minutes without allowing the mixture to brown. If you feel the roux is getting too hot, turn the heat down or simply lift the pan off the stove for a few seconds and then resume cooking.

Both recipes call for the soup to simmer for at least 30 minutes, but I have found that the longer it simmers the better the flavor. Besides the aroma of the simmer, steak soup makes me smile.

The soup can also be prepared a day ahead and then reheated, which tends to give the flavors more time to permeate through the soup. It also freezes well.

Plaza III steak soup

1 stick butter

1 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon Accent

1/2 cup chopped carrots

1 cup mixed vegetables

1 1/2 teaspoon Kitchen Bouquet

1 quart, plus 1 cup water

1/2 chopped celery

1 tablespoon beef base

1/2 chopped onions

1 cup chopped tomatoes

1/2 ground chuck sliced

Brown and drain ground chuck. Pan boil onions, celery, and carrots. Melt butter in a 2-quart pan and add flour. Mix well. Add water, stir until thickened. Add Accent, pepper, beef base and tomatoes. Cook one minute more, stirring constantly. Add Kitchen Bouquet, all other vegetables, and ground chuck. Cook over medium heat 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Makes 1 1/2 quarts.

Recipe: Plaza III Steak House, Kansas City, Mo.

 

Mike’s modified Plaza III steak soup

3 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 stick butter

1/2 cup flour

4 cans (10-ounce) beef consomme

1/2 cups diced fresh carrots

1/2 cups fresh celery

1/2 cups fresh onion

1 can (8-ounce) chopped tomatoes

1 1/2 teaspoons Kitchen Bouquet

1/2 cup red wine

2 beef bouillon cubes

1 1/2 teaspoons ground black pepper

1 teaspoon garlic

1 teaspoon thyme

2 bay leaves

1 package (16-ounce) frozen mixed vegetables

2 to 3 pounds sirloin sliced into small thin pieces

In a large skillet brown sirloin in oil, drain and set aside.

Melt butter in stock pot without browning. Add flour to butter and stir to form a paste. Cook over medium heat, without browning, for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Add consomme to flour and butter mixture and stir until smooth and slightly thickened. Bring to full boil.

Add fresh vegetables, tomatoes, Kitchen Bouquet, wine, bouillon cubes and spices. Allow soup to come to a boil again and then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Add frozen vegetables and sirloin. Bring to a boil once again and simmer 20 to 30 minutes.

Serves 8.