Category Archives: Uncategorized

Looking out to blowing, blizzarding, white-till-eternity, oh-no-snow, snomaggeddon, so-white-the-house looks grubby, SNOW, I see that the wind’s bending the icicles horizontal.

Peeling off the mental sweaters, hat, mittens, parka, boots and muffler to find a glimpse of gorgeous Wisconsin summer. Summer! Teddy and Along-for-the-Ride Heidi and I were there in August. We picked sour cherries in Door County and then made a Green Bay stop on our way back south to the Madison airport. John and Karin live in Green Bay, their welcoming door is always open, or at least unlocked, and they always know what to do and say with a boy. John likes to cook stuff.

Back from that morning’s farmer’s market, John had made, serendipitously, cherry soup. Zzzzrrrraaarrrrrzzzz, all our antennae were lifted and bent towards each others. The brainlovefood waves grasped, gained purchase, and sonared, etwined, merged, into lunch.

I don’t think the word “tablescape” has hit Green Bay yet. Perhaps that staunch and sturdy city in the crook of Wisconsin’s thumb will duck- ha, ha, you missed me! – and tablescaping will fly on by to North Dakota. Although, I sincerely doubt it will stick there either. See, the table scapes itself in places that know better than to assume pretense. Check out this 11 minute lunch we put together last August. Is it not beautiful? Was it not serendipitous? Did the clock read 10:43? A bit early for lunch. They are wild out there! Wild. And they don’t need no dang art director, catering guru, or party manager to scape it!

A sandwich script of Renard’s cheese, (they had it), nice white, firm, but not factory-firm, sliced bread (indigenous or carried in with the wayfarers? can’t remember), butter (we all had a stick in our pocketbooks),and the seasonal-only, do-not-travel-well, one-of-my-all-time-favorite-things, cherries. Wisconsin summer is the sound of a typewriter’s clacking drifting out of a window over silent, heat-glowering pavement. Wisconsin winter is the glare of sun off a snowdrift, the sound of car tires tearing into bulky clusters of snow. Nostalgia for either season is brought on in heavy waves by the smell of hot butter in a Revere Ware skillet.

The cherries were meant as a gift but, as luck would have it, they were what you call a “Judd Apatow” in the trade. In the words of Mr. Apatow’s wife, “A trip is something we do together. It is something we would do whether or not it was a present for me. You get to go, so it is for you also. That means it is not a present. It is an activity that would happen anyway.” Change the words ” a trip” to “cherries” and you get my drift. Cherries are most definitely an activity. An activity you would want to happen anyway, any way.

Holy linoleum, what a delicious combination! Before we got to the table, I wanted to shout, hit me again! Hit me with your grilled cheese and cherry stick!

Thank you, Karin and John. Got you on my mind in this Wisconsin-style blizzard. Style with substance, four white feet of it.

Of all the sandwiches in the world, the sub has, by far, the most sobriquets. Nothing like this particular shape to stir one’s imagination.

Spuckie, Grinder, Hero, Wedge, Hoagie, Torpedo, Sub.

We have been down this road before at the Lunch Encounter, with zest, while keeping our eyes to the skies for Zeppelins, as well.

My mom – a culinary historian who sticks to a lead like warm mozzarella to fat-flecked mortadella – put me on the spuckie trail. Not that I needed any pushing. Been sprinkling conversations with the word since I read it. You’d be surprised, or perhaps not, at how apropos a spuckie interjection is to daily interaction. Particularly on slow news days. And during blizzards. One can only discuss snow removal so much.

A letter to my mom from Kathleen Wall, the Colonial Foodways Culinarian for Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Massuchesetts:

Soooo…. I was at a museum conference at Mystic Seaport Museum, eating Indian Pudding and someone asked if anything out of the ordinary came up this week, and I mentioned spuckies. A table full of blank (yet polite) stares EXCEPT from Paulette, who is from Rhode Island. I told her I hadn’t thought of spuckies as a little Rhody thing, and she said she learned about them from her husband who is from South Boston. This is what he has to share:

“Re: spuckies

Hey, what a blast from the past! I’ve never heard anyone call them “spuckies” outside of Southie (South Boston)! I don’t really have any stories, they were just what you called those types of sandwiches. I never heard of grinders, subs or any other names for these until I went to junior high in the city. Of course most of the kids didn’t call them spuckies, but at least knew what they were. When I came to Rhode Island no one had a clue what I was talking about.

The place we got them was near the corner of L Street and Broadway. I have no idea what the name was as everyone just called it the spuckie shop. This was around the mid 60’s to early 70’s. Not sure when the place went out of business as it was a long time after I went to college before I revisited Southie. It was a big treat to go to the spuckie shop!

Steve “

BTW – I’m loving that I can work the word ‘spuckie’ into my daily conversation. (See, I am not the only one.)

Kathleen

Got a teensy bit sidetracked by the Zeppelin.

Men Will Like This Sandwich
June 4, 1959, Idaho State Journal

A sandwich inspired by the Graf Zeppelin has won recognition for a Norristown, Pa., restaurant man, Joseph Barone.

His hearty concoction vied against over 800 entries in the National Sandwich Idea Contest to place among the 20 Best Sandwiches of 1959.

Three variations of the “Zep Sanndwich” are featured on the menu of Barone’s Gate Canteen in Norristown. The original large “Zep” with its filling of salami, cheese, onion and tomato is served on a 10-inch loaf of hearth-baked Italian bread.

In Barone’s words, “It’s large enough to satisfy the entire family, or party guests.”

He sells half-sizes of the large “Zeps” to hungry construction workers and employees of two textile plants near his restaurant. The small “Zep on a Bun” proves popular with feminine customers.

Snap!

When did we start saying working “from” home and why? I work “at” home. Is it to differentiate between actual housework and actual billable-hour work?

As I was saying, my assistant is generous, thoughtful, hilarious AND, she makes lunch. A lunch that will grease your lips and make you squeal. Alls I hafta do is say,  “Make me us a sandwich, wouldya?” Oh my, I could get used to this.

Being the youngest, I never had a brother or sister to order about. From what I hear, bad siblingship in your youth can bite you back or, at the very least, be punctured, popped, burst, when age levels us all into adults. Barbara knows. I heard the story. Her younger brother, now an adult for countless years,  confessed, with great pleasure, that when 12-year-old Barb commanded, “PEEL ME A CARROT”, he did. Alone in the kitchen, he stuffed all the pieces in his mouth, swished them around, then passed them on to his dear, darling sister. She ate them while he smirked.

There is nothing that makes me quite as happy as having an assistant. Better than a little brother any day.

My sister Mara sent me sleuthing on a chipped chopped. I am intrigued.

Her informant, Ginger, provided these details:

• A restaurant (or was it a grocery?) invented chipped chopped.
• Super-thin-cut spicy ham meant as a sandwich filling. Cut so thin that it’s practically transparent
• Normally sold plain (no barbeque sauce).
• Available everywhere now in Pittsburgh, like in grocery stores and delis – and church lunches.
• Cheese and lettuce optional

A bit of sniffing around turned up this claim:

• Isaly’s invented the chipped chopped. (Inventor stories almost always seem apocryphal to me, but you never know.)

All info still in raw form. No agent sources or facts have been checked. MUST go out into the field for confirmation.

What to look for in the wild:

The Hot Brown entices me too. For that I have plans. The dashboard crystal ball shows the Brown Hotel in my near future. Sandwich Safari to Louisville. Gonna put that wich on my life list.

How did I live so long without a cleaver? More versatile than a Swiss army knife, more thrilling than a pocket fisherman. Whoop, zoop, swish ~~~ bread sliced, meat and cheese slivered, mustard smeared ~~~ smoosh, saw, sandwich!

My generous, thoughtful, hilarious assistant gave me this bad, bad tool for Christmas, and I can’t put it down. Get back!

I was hap-hap-happy with this slicing, dicing, chopping, whopping, cutting machine and then she said, “I didn’t just get you a dangerous Christmas gift (cleaver).” There was more. Hotcha! Was it a toque-tiara? Boss-of-the-year certificate? Nope and nope. Buttons and buckle (ho hum, I know, but not to me).

At any rate – a rate beyond the speed of light mayonnaise with this cleaver in my clutch – I am reborn. Kitchen crêche. The thing really does spread mustard like nobody’s bizness.

Happily glowing like a newly forged blade, I told my assistant about my cleaver crush and she grinned, “My father used to dip his 15-inch french knife into the mustard jar. That used to really piss my mother off.”

Has she got that knife? “Yep, I have the knife and it is a monster.” See exhibit ONION above.

Super-stringer Seemeenowich stopped by The Lunch Encounter today with these under her arm.

So glad leisure time was invented. Were we all still slaving away twenty-four-seven we’d have no time for mini-golf, bubble drinks, mani/pedis or Tom.

If you, like me, cannot get enough of this stuff, turn to SELLECK WATERFALL SANDWICH.

Eat the world?

Yes please, s’il vous plaît, por favor, onegai shimasu, min fadlek, be׳vakasha, uxolo, merher-bani seh, kon mahimo, putakhamnida, bitte, værsgo, balii.

SANDWICHES!

Right here on my own doorstep. The world.

DC does deliver, in ways I must continue to remind myself to remember to appreciate.

Thought brought to you by the Department of Redundancy Department.

Sauca, file under “Ideas I Wish I Had Had When I Was a LOT Younger”.

washingtonpostgoodtogostory here

Thank you to Superlative-Tipster-and-Travel Companion, Along-for-the-Ride Heidi!

Clearing out the backblog….

Tossing around ideas, I often say, “Dumb or good?”  You get far enough around on the dumb continuum and it osmoses into good. Lio is dumb and good. Me, sometimes dumb, sometimes good. Sometimes lost, sometimes found.

This Bottle Rockets song takes me OUT and leaves me both starved and sated.

The Bottle Rockets, Sometimes Found

And my tribute, a chimera of the original. A curtsy, deep and sincerely heartfelt.

Other things I have said many times with heartfelt sincerity.
“Needs salt.”
“Not my type.”
“It is so nice to be driven.”

Not that I have not eaten my share of words. “Not my type” is regularly so far around the continuum that it slaps me in the face with self-recognition. I’ve eaten enough of my own well-salted words to sink a submarine to the ocean floor and leave it there.

The Clean Plate Club

You know what stands between my son and dessert? His suspicious mind.

We’re caught in a trap
I can’t walk out
Because I love you too much baby

You must, I insist, must finish your sandwich. No, not the bones, too. Okay, okay, okay, throw them out on the grass for the squirrels. What happened to the boy who would say, “Do I like this, Mom?” (85% yes, 15% no, to retain believability).

Why can’t you see
What you’re doing to me
When you don’t believe a word I say?

Why don’t kids like breadcrusts? Who started it? What lurks in the mind of a child? Things I do not recall thinking and things that I will never understand.

We can’t go on together
With suspicious minds
And we can’t build our dreams
On suspicious minds

Suspicious minds. Were they born that way or have they been conditioned?

When honey, you know
I’ve never lied to you
Mmm yeah, yeah

Would I lie to you with dessert hanging in the balance? Hmmm? Mmm yeah yeah.

I had a busy year in 2009, workwise, and contributed to some well-done publications, including this one:

ClassicDessert Book

The lively, fanciful, talented Ritz pastry chefs put some sugar in my step. Yes sir. Trust from the depths of my sweet-leaning heart.

Here’s a little sugar from me, your ever-blogging, foodstyling, visioneer, foodist

Li3sa

For those who can’t be bothered to click on the link above, I am posting the ENTIRE (nearly) book right here. Smaller though. If you would like to actually READ it, I suggest using your mouse on the link above.

Oh, and, did I fail to give credit? And to take credit? We had a blast doing it.

Photography by Renee Comet, Styling by me, Lisa Cherkasky

My son loves to read. By way of saying that he loves to read comic books. Or graphic novels. But not chapter books. Shhhhh.

He comes by it honestly. My sisters and I scrambled for the “Green Sheet” in the Milwaukee Journal when I was a kid. Four pages of comics. The girls of Apartment 3-G made breakfast table headlines throughout high school. Rex Morgan, MD? Breaking news.

The biggest club in the world? Being a child. Done worrying about that and committed to carrying on the “funnies” legacy. The second biggest club in the world? Being a parent.

The most secret of all the secret societies? The secret society of things you never mention about your child. As in, he won’t read chapter books. No, you wouldn’t want to mention that to anyone. Like saying, I have always (some weird thing), and the person says, “You know, I never noticed that about you, but now that you mention it…” Doh!

Competitive parenting. Must not be new, shoulda seen it coming, but nope, nope, it had to be pointed out to me. Am I winning? Am I losing? Am I in the running, or am I just running?