The Lunch Encounter

PhillyGuy (whose mom makes a mean sandwich) wants to know: When are you going to write about scrapple? A salute to scrapple!! Hard to get here in NC and I wouldn’t try to cook it anyway – I leave that for mom.

And furthermore…

Thanks for the shout out and representing scrapple. Ahhh the memories. Suffering through Sunday morning mass at Immaculate Heart of Mary church, returning home to watch the 3 Stooges and then breakfast. Runny eggs, scrapple and english muffins. My Dad puts syrup on his scrapple – I never quite got that.

How could I have forgotten scrapple for so long? I knew the man who designed the package for Rapa Scrapple. Robbie Fulks sings about scrapple, “the pride of Pennsylvania”. “Hearty as a T-Bone, Slippery as a Tadpole” 10-the-scrapple-song2

How could this have slipped through the fine chinois of the Lunch Encounter?

Pork Mush – The Pennsylvania Treat
By Lynn Kerrigan

It’s dictionary defined as “cornmeal mush made with the meat and broth of pork, seasoned with onions, spices and herbs and shaped into loaves for slicing and frying.” The word, scrapple originates from “scrap” or “scrappy” meaning made up of odds and ends for that’s exactly what it is—boiled, ground leftover pig scraps with cornmeal and spices.

After the ham, bacon, chops and other cuts of meat are taken from the butchered pig—what remains are fixings for scrapple—including the meat scraped off the head. Scrapple may contain pork skin, pork heart, pork liver, pork tongue—even pork brains*.

I admit I have a fixation with socially questionable foods, including scrapple, sultz and Spam. Reverse snobbism for odd things porky.

Anyone who knows me knows that…were I to be killed for food…I want ALL of me to be eaten. Please don’t toss away the supposedly icky parts. Scrapple is like that. I mean, what the hell, pig is pig, why is the thigh so much more acceptable than, say, the tongue?

*With all due respect I believe the proper terminology is pig brains.

From Arlington Correspondent I-Do-My-Best-to-Suit-Myself Cindy:

Industrial designer Sung Bae Chang has finally given us mortals the ability to do that which was once considered a bona-fide miracle. Using the “Scan Toaster,” anyone with a PC and a USB cable can burn the likeness of the Blessed Virgin Mary (or any image or text that you wish) onto a slice of bread. The toaster utilizes a network of toasting “modules” — hot wires that rotate within a 30 degree radius — that burn the image or text you have selected onto the delicious slice of your choice. The peripheral is a finalist in a design competition run by the appliance manufacturer Electrolux, so as-of-yet there aren’t any plans to manufacture it on a mass scale. We’re guessing that Mr. Sun Bae Chang probably wants to keep the awesome power of the Scan Toaster for himself anyway.
Joseph L Flatley

Philadelphia’s Amoroso rolls breed Amoroso amore. I started to catch on to this from PhillyGuy, whose mother makes him sandwiches whenever he passes through his hometown.

The Charleston City Paper talks about Amoroso rolls and the expats in South Carolina who are devotees.

I am no role model. While I am filled with amore for this role I would not recommend it anyone. Not as an intentional pursuit, that is. How I got here was pre-intentional living. Parts of it, yes, parts of it I would not give up for, for, for… anything, not even better hair. Parts of it I would recommend not missing while you are on earth.

We are trying – make that I am trying – to be a family (click on this link for Linda Kulman’s insightful words about the fortress of family). My son doesn’t know anything about that and his part is automatic. He has no consciousness of what I think a family should be. Your family is your family is your family. I tell him so and he believes me. As a child you have no intimate basis of comparison and whatever goes on in your house passes for normal. Later on you get to dissect it, find the odd bits, the strange customs, the rubbish, the stuff you want to burn.

I am looking for our life’s natural order. It’s there, if I can just see it, reveal it. Flour, yeast, salt, water. The fundamentals are enough to make something sturdy and lifegiving – bread and rolls. Our fundamentals are there too, if I can just leave them alone long enough to rise.

We are enough. Why? Because I said so. And I am the mom.

Photo by Renee Comet
Styling by Me

The crabcake is just an excuse for bacon, arugula, tomato and mayo. Crabcake BLT. When I cooked at the Tabard Inn in the 80’s the line cooks joked that we could put Grilled Swordfish Steak au Merdre on the menu and still sell out. I believe the same is true of a BLT. Not to dis the crabcake, cause it was delish, but you might not miss it considering the company.

Photo by Renee Comet for Phillips Seafood
Styling by Me

The average American eats 1.8911917 sandwiches per day. I did the math.

The Sandwich Generation in Baltimore Magazine.

I’m going up the country, baby, don’t you wanna go
I’m going up the country, baby, don’t you wanna go
I’m going to some place where I’ve never been before

The Locke Modern Country Store was written up in the Washington Post recently and I read the story with great longing. Longing to take a ride out to the country on an Indian summer’s day and longing to have a general store of my own.

A great friend arrived from the land of gentle seasonal shift, Los Angelos, giving me the nudge I needed to drive west, where leaf-peeping precedes us by a week or so. Peak is still a ways off and while the orchestra of trees was just warming up, the top swaths of orange or occasional red flights of fancy were plenty. Maples are in the lead, as usual.

We got unlucky and lucky. I didn’t do my research and, whoops, the store, our lunch destination 65 miles out, was closed. On the stoop there stood a waist high single burner with an enormous pot steaming like mad. Somebody had to be home.

We begged (okay I begged). She led us through the kitchen, packed us lunch and sent us across to the meadow by the millstream. Paradise. No exaggeration. Meadow and millstream. And picnic tables. Paradise.

I’m going, I’m going where the water tastes like wine
I’m going where the water tastes like wine
We can jump in the water, stay drunk all the time

The Locke store makes a wonderful Turkey BLT. Himself was not happy about the lettuce and avocado. Extra for me! The bread was cushiony and slightly sweet, like limpa. Nice with salty country bacon. Jenn was not sure why I felt we needed three bags of Route 11 chips. She was right. One should always consult with Jenn before any undertaking. Believe me.

Route 11 Chips are grown and fried right out there in Virginia by the lovely folks who own the Tabard Inn in downtown DC. I know cause they first started slicing and frying on their farm when I was a chef at the Tabard about 20 years ago. Lord, I have eaten my share of Tabard chips. One morning I will wake up and every chip I should not have eaten will have materialized on my body.

I’m gonna leave this city, got to get away
I’m gonna leave this city, got to get away
All this fussing and fighting, man, you know I sure can’t stay

A rushing stream, loads of hard, green things, and a stick. Things from a tree that fell with a clump. They floated and were perfect for races. We could have left the boy there for days and our absence would have gone unnoticed.

Okay, I admit it, this post is just one big brag. We did have a great day out and I do think my son is the most amazing thing since sliced bread. And Jenn, well, every man who meets her is in love with her. There, I said it. And I’m not taking it back.

“Hold my stick, mom.” Did he take the picture? Who can tell? Waving the camera around, jumping up and down, crouching, smirking…

Whew. That was a close one. We would have gone hungry out there on the edge of the tundra. Next time you’re in Millwood, don’t make it a Monday.

I’m going up the country, baby, don’t you wanna go
I’m going up the country, baby, don’t you wanna go
I’m going to some place where I’ve never been before
Canned Heat

Just one more compelling reason to get your sandwich eating self to St Louis, the St Paul Sandwich. I am especially curious about the history of the St Paul sandwich. I wonder, does it have anything to do with Chinese railroad workers? I would say, after doing a tiny bit of research, yes. In 2007 there were 700 Chinese restaurants in St Louis. That would point, one would reason, to a long history of Chinese-American culture.

When you sit in Busch Stadium watching St. Louis Cardinals games, you may never imagine this location was once China Town. The first wave of Chinese came to St. Louis in 1869 when many of them lost their jobs as railroad construction workers. At the peak period, the Mid-Pacific Railroad Company hired over 10,000 Chinese laborers. When the westward railroad construction was completed, many became unemployed. Many of them chose to come to St. Louis that was then the 4th largest city in the US.

The Splendid Table Talks St Paul Sandwich
The St. Paul Sandwich
You Won’t Find in St. Paul
October 16, 1999

The St. Paul Sandwich is a culinary curiosity that has nothing to do with St. Paul, Minnesota. This quite wonderful specialty of St. Louis, Missouri, consists of egg foo yung on Wonder Bread, served up with lettuce, tomato and mayo. You’ll find a good one at Chinese Express.

Chinese Express
1230 Hampton Avenue
St. Louis, MO 63139
314-645-7014

Photo by Bill Keaggy

The St. Paul sandwich though, THAT’S the shit.
It’s a variation on the food Albert King used to request in his performance rider, which was…
A whole order of chicken chow mein, and one loaf of white bread.
Chinese food and white bread is an awesome combination.
I wouldn’t be one bit surprised to find out the St. Paul sandwich originated from the cross pollination of African American culture, and the plethora of local Chinese restaurants… I love me a St. Paul sandwich!
Gotta “eat in”, don’t “take out”.
The white bread turns to mush, if it travels more than 10 minutes.
Brian

Is this a great country or what? That sandwich is pretty high.
Dayton Andrews
(Oh sure, WHAT the heck. I LOOOOVE the name Dayton Andrews.)

And, my last thought for the day on this pressing topic is: Why in the name of Peter is it called a St Paul?

Photo by Dan Whipps Styling by Moi

This local operation, Roseda Beef, ages their beef and offers real meat. Meat that will make you forgot this is 2008, an advanced era of phony food. Roseda Beef is what you would eat were you to grow and nurture your own. Get me a mini-cow!

If I could look out my urb-sub-urb window and see chickens pecking at the base of the three story, three-color-sided Monstrous House Thingy that is my neighbor, I might feel a bit more at peace with the world. Were there a mini cow beside my black-and-white, cow-like mini dog I might feel a mini-bit more at peace with the world and with myself.

Yeehaw I finally made it to St Louis!

Reliable source, the Bottle Rockets message board hooked me up with the St Louis sandwich train.
Many say the best sandwich in St. Louis is the Amighetti’s Special, served with pride on The Hill (formerly Dago Hill), the old Italian neighborhood where baseball legends Joe Garagiola and Yogi Berra grew up.
lightnin

The neighborhood lay-out of St Louis took me by surprise because the town sprawls, distinct neighborhoods separated by long stretches of low-slung, unsigned buildings, freeways and seemingly unoccupied space. The Hill was like a little town of its own, randomly dotted with restaurants, markets and other small businesses, punctuating sentences of exceedingly tidy single or two-story homes.

So nicely wrapped, tight like a papoose.

I can’t say for 100% sure that this sandwich was the best on The Hill, not without further research, but I can say a) I wouldn’t doubt it and b) it was well worth the trip, including the interminable red light separating us from the ‘hood. According to what I read, it is Amighetti’s sauce that sets this sub apart. I have no reason to doubt the claims. The sauce was delicious and it seeped down my arms.

Speaking of well-known Italian Americans, we owe the quotation “all men are created equal”, arguably the best-known phrase in any of America’s political documents, to Phillip Mazzei, Thomas Jefferson’s friend and neighbor. Were all sandwiches created equal, my quest would end. The search gives a person a reason to strive, to think, to try, to look around the next corner with more curiosity than fear.

These Cuban Cristo Minis are tiny curtsies to Cuban-French fusion. When the MacKenzie catalog showed up on my doorstep today I thought, Oh, that food is pretty. Cha-cha-chá!

Photo by Dean Alexander. Styling by Yours Truly