Category Archives: Uncategorized

Thy will be done.

I get it now. It’s a sort of mantra. Thy will be done. Yes, you will be done. I will use butter and add heat and be patient and turn you carefully and you will be done. Maybe not well done, but done. “Done is good,” sez a friend. Mebbe, if the getting there was lackluster.

In LA some years ago, at the Apple Pan, and ever since, she has asked for fries well done. Well done?! I thought. Huh? Kept it all in my head though. She was from New York and me, well, no point in mentioning where I was from cause your eyes will instantly glaze and your view will slide offa me like jello off hot mashed potatoes. She was from New York and she knew from fries.

Tell you what though. I knew how to pack. Two pair of underpants, nine pairs of shoes.

As + Always resonant so perfectly as an audio duo.

Combination = Mass = Energy = Comfort

Chef Ryan Morgan

Q: What is your comfort food?
A: Sandwiches … bologna, cream cheese, hot peppery jelly on Wonder bread.

Υ׃§ŒκÅ∞€ξΛñ∑߉∏¿Ω‡ζΘβΨÖθþÚ€€√∂ÞÝΔîΟΞ∫ÐÏÉÅ∞¦ß¶θΘΩλ∩φΤ

Old old math. Theory of sandwich relativity. 1+1=3

Relativity of simultaneity
Mass-energy equivalence

The only kind of society you will catch me dead in is a Society of Mutual Admiration. Two way streets, baby.

As always. Has always. Always has. Always as.

I got it from an inside source. A cop. Electronic brevity. The note read:

Get the g-man
13th and Penn

I’d been briefed so got the reference.

Mangialardo & Sons

Stay tuned for the take.

Last year I fell down on the Super Bowl. To put a more accurate point on it, I fell down under the Super Bowl. Left in the wild of football I am easy prey. Did not see the Bowl in my peripheral vision and it pounced. I don’t even know that Super Bowl is two words. Perhaps it is one, compound.

This year, Superbowl 09, I am going all out. Bought a cabbage! Appealed to some Steelers (“Do I know what a Steeler is? Sure mom, they steal stuff.”) fans who like us in spite of the gaping hole that is my football spirit. Boom chucka lucka lucka.

Who played last year? Who knows, but I betchyer bottom olive they did not portend a famous sandwich.

Primanti Bros. Sandwiches
The Washington Post, January 28, 2009

Anyone who has spent time in Pittsburgh probably has heard of Primanti Bros. The historic sandwich shop has been making its trademark fried-potatoes-and-coleslaw-topped sandwich since 1933. Now with locations across the city (and a couple in Florida), it’s hard to miss.

For this recipe we use a spicy capicola ham, stocked in Italian delis such as the Italian Store in Arlington and Vace in Northwest Washington. But don’t let that limit you: Nearly any deli meat can be substituted in this great Iron City creation.

That’s what she said. And then this card arrived in the mail.

The good life indeedy. The good life is elusive if you make mountains out of mole hills routinely.

So nice to just be boring. A lake rather than an ocean. She said that too.

Give em an inch, they’ll take a yard. Give em a yard, they’ll put in a pool.

And then you got a mess on your hands. Pool service. Kids climbing over your 8-foot fence, chemical imbalance. For a taste of the good life, keep it simple – bread, ham, yellow cheese and mustard.

Photo by Renee Comet, Styling by Me Of Course

It’s all about the beer actually, but the sandwich ain’t too shabby. Makes me hanker for a trip to the Central Grocery and a sunny spot on the curb. Spread a paper napkin across your knee and chew slowly while the parade passes.

The last time I had a true Central Grocery muffeletta was in 1983. I could swear that was just last week. Time warps will mess you up! Heading out of New Orleans, pointing north towards January in Wisconsin, we invested heavily in muffulettas. They keep like crazy, least ours did, improving in fact, over two solid days of driving. Going north was good, that Colt had overheating issues. Cruising around Miami with the heat on full blast was painful.

Provisions:
Four muffalettas = 514 olives, 217 capers, 1786 celery seeds, 1200 bites
One cassette = Trio =  238579485 da da das

Da da da, ich lieb dich nicht du liebst mich nicht aha aha aha (or simply “Da Da Da”), or its English version, Da Da Da I Don’t Love You You Don’t Love Me Aha Aha Aha.

I love, luuurve, loave, luff a muuurfeletta, moavelleta, muffeletta.

For the olive salad:
1 gallon large pimento stuffed green olives, slightly crushed and well drained
1 quart jar pickled cauliflower, drained and sliced
2 small jars capers, drained
1 whole stalk celery, sliced diagonally
4 large carrots, peeled and thinly sliced diagonally
1 small jar celery seeds
1 small jar oregano
1 large head fresh garlic, peeled and minced
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 jar pepperoncini, drained (small salad peppers) left whole
1 pound large Greek black olives
1 jar cocktail onions, drained
Combine all ingredients in a large bowl or pot and mix well. Place in a large jar and cover with 1/2 olive oil and 1/2 Crisco oil. Store tightly covered in refrigerator. Allow to marinate for at least 24 hours before using.

For the sandwich:
1 round loaf italian bread
1/4 pound mortadella, thinly sliced
1/4 pound ham, thinly sliced
1/4 pound hard Genoa salami, thinly sliced
1/4 pound Mozzarella cheese, sliced
1/4 pound Provolone cheese,sliced
1 cup olive salad with oil

And there you go. Love in bread. Travels well.

Sara Roahen‘s Gumbo Tales was thoughtfully gifted to me by my niece. Good choice. She always hits the nail on the head bookwise. I had read about it, can’t remember where, and thumbtacked a note to my memory.

Ms Roahen’s book opens with a bit on Liuzza’s Restaurant and Bar, a spot that was oozing juice all over my appetite thanks to dark, sensuous photos in the recent Gourmet. Under Gumbo A Higher Education, page 4, she writes, Not long after I moved to New Orleans, my younger sister, Stephanie, flew down from our home state of Wisconsin to evaluate the city as a prospective home. Exercising New Orleans most persuasive means of seduction – dinner – I took her to the great neighborhood restaurant Liuzza’s Restaurant & Bar and ordered like ma: Abita Amber beer in frosted schooners, fried green tomatoes with shrimp rémoulade, a stuffed artichoke, fried chicken, seafood gumbo.


The closest I could get to New Orleans on short notice was the Louisiana Kitchen. We did not, regrettably, sit in the kitchen. Had we been admitted to the land of the fryer we could have gone home with the scent of oysters in our hair. Crispy cornmeal fried oysters. Rub that on your pillow and dream of the bayou.

Leaving it would just be so boring. Why have a ~ yaaawwwwn ~ banh mi, when you can have

From My Main Sandwich Man in NYC, JAF, an alert to this story!
There’s Something New Inside talks about the pandora’s box of banh mi (Vietnamese), num pang (Korean) and other Asian sandwiches.

Who wouldn’t want to hop, skip and jump to a joint named Xie Xie, Num Pang or Baoguette? Porchetta or Xoco? Your ears sandwich the lyricism of those nomina into your brain, rendering you helpless.

Manny’s Cafeteria and Delicatessen
“Come into Manny’s …bulk items by the pound.” Ooooh, bulk items by the pound. Load me up. Bury me. Do me in. Two words, item and product, are such non-words that I can project my wildest dreams onto them.

While I’m at it, I’m going to project my wildest dreams onto Obama. Me and several billion others here and around the world. Our president elect has a tall pedestal under him and a tall order in front of him. He’s got bulk items by the ton. Bulk items that need attention.

The man is gonna need fuel to power his perfectly paced reasonableness. To go and go and go, breathing in and out deeply and evenly, brain synapses clicking smoothly. Apparently Obama is inclusive in his tastes. Aaah, what a breath of fresh air.

Scott Simon on NPR reported on Obama’s affection for Manny’s in Chicago where, the president-elect orders corned beef and cherry pie to go. Now there’s a stimulus package. Manny’s corned beef sandwiches are large enough to have their own electoral votes.

To read more about Obama’s frequent visits to Manny’s and the folks with whom he shares his sandwiches read Obama Foodorama.

Time Out Chicago is all over Obama’s love affair with Manny’s too. Take a peek in Where’s the Beef?

With the inauguration fast approaching and the air temperature dropping by leaps and bounds, weekend strategizing is reaching a fever pitch. With each new piece of information released on the front page of the Washington Post, the bus stop posse dissects the possibilities for maximum inaugural vibe-absorption. It’s a bad case of Water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink. Here in Virginia we are so close and yet so far, with bridges barring our entree to the festivities. There is no going around, only over, and we ponder the bus, foot or bike pros and cons.

To further exacerbate our agony a bus stop parent brought his Swearing In tickets for show and tell this am. There was talk of knocking him down and making a run for it, but we all just dug our hands deep into our pockets, gathered round and stared at the golden sheaf bouncing sunlight off its shiny surfaces.

Us, we are gonna pack provisions and brave the herd. Bus to foot. I won’t see much other than a sea of joyous faces. My son will see less, his eye view being middle button height. So we will munch on corned beef sandwiches in Obama’s honor, shuffle and hop to keep our blood moving, bump up happily with the masses and hoof it home.

Man!

A big old truck.

The Bottle Rockets, “Love Like a Truck”    
Kansas Explorer, International Harvester
Michael Perry in Truck, A Love Story (Harper Collins, 2006),

“Spam is lately available in a single serving pouch. In the saddlebags of the four horsemen of the apocalypse are sandwiches made of this.”