So, after considerable research into the “Greg Evans Diet Plan“, there has been a slight revision. Instead of subsisting solely on pie for an entire week each month, the new plan calls for dedicating just one day each month to pie-eating exclusivity.
This day shall, of course, be known as Pie Day. This is not to be confused with Pi Day, which just happens to coincide with my birthday. The annual triumvirate of these occasions (Pie Day, my birthday, and Pi Day) shall cause the festivities to be expanded into Pie Week, out of honor, respect, and appreciation for pie, pi, and the esteemed founder of Pie Day, yours truly.
I am confident that Pie Day observances will meet with much greater success than my previous failed, discredited, and subsequently abandoned research into ‘Beer Day’, ‘Vodka Day’, ‘Rum Day’, and the always exciting ‘Tequila Day’.
So yesterday I took the Pista out for a spin. I was feeling pretty good, hammering up the slight hill by the park Pantani-style. Some time later I noticed an odd pain in the back of my left knee (the “good” one). Analyzing the evidence I realized that I had, apparently, hyper-extended it, going all Marco P on that hill before I’d had a chance to warm up. I thought briefly about turning around and going home, or of stopping and flipping the back wheel around to the 17 to make things a bit easier. “Nah, screw that; I’m riding!” I decided, soldiering on. As my ride progressed I realized that I might have made a mistake, as the pain in the back of my knee grew more incessant. Still, though, I made no concessions (I’m stupid that way).
By the time I got back home I knew that I had definitely hyper-extended the knee (it’s a pretty specific pain, one that you remember), and that I probably shouldn’t have ridden (especially the fixed gear) on it. I also knew it would be fine, but that it would probably keep me off of the bike today (I’m not that stupid).
I consoled myself with the thought that it might rain, and overnight it did rain a bit. There was a front pushing through, so it was very windy all day, which was some solace. Then we had some pretty intense thunder storms this evening; even a tornado warning for a bit so, in the end, I felt much better about not getting to ride.
The good news? My house didn’t blow away, and my knee is much better, hardly hurts at all. Oh, and I ate tamales all day!
Those of you who have been keeping score at home know that I love tamales. Specifically, tamales from Bernard’s in Midland, Texas.
Those of you who are, like myself, conversationally illiterate in español probably have a pretty good idea what I got for my birthday.
Anyway… my wonderful, sainted step-mother, Terri (no, I’m not trying to butter anyone up!) called the other day to let me know to be expecting a belated birthday gift; a parcel of tamales, as per an earlier conversation. Then she dropped the bomb… she sent ten (10!) dozen!
I had to laugh when she was telling me how she was a bit grossed out by the ingredients listed on the case (yes, I’m now one step closer to mastery of the dark art of tamale making). Along with all of the expected players, they contain pork snouts.
“Snouts?” I thought to myself,
“They’d have to be made from brains and anuses before I’d be too grossed out to eat them.” Actually, I’m not entirely sure that would keep me from eating them, but it probably would squelch my desire to cook them.
Anyway… I was a little nervous about them arriving still semi-frozen, or at least somewhat cool, but assuaged my fears by reminding myself that tamales were originally created (at least in part) as a means of preserving meat in the days prior to refrigeration.
The package arrived, right on schedule; a case of 120 tamales packed with blue-ice packets, inside a larger box. Tearing into the box, I found that they were, indeed, still cold. Digging deeper I discovered that those in the center of the case were actually still frozen.
I decided that the first thing I needed to do was to divvy them up into freezer bags and get the reserves into the freezer. Immediately I realized the folly of this course of action and grabbed a pot, put some hot water in it, dropped in the steamer basket and loaded it up with precisely as many tamales as would fit and still allow the lid to go on. Then I busied myself with getting the rest packed up and stored safely away.
By the time I finished with this, my kitchen was filling with that most heavenly aroma and it was tamale time (it’s like Hammer Time only greasier and with less dancing). After inhaling 2 or 3, I had to call to share my elation with Terri. I got the machine, left an effusive, barely coherent message of thanks, then turned my attention back to my tamales. Before they knew what’d hit them I had devoured that steamer load and plopped down, satiated, to contemplate my bounty.
Life is good. Happy birthday to me!
…to drink cheap coffee! A while back I decided that I was going to invest in some premo coffee. Of the various coffees I’ve sampled through the years, Jamaican Blue Mountain is my favorite. So, I embarked on a quest to find JBM online at a (somewhat) reasonable price. I found bluemountaincoffee.com which has prices a bit lower than most.
“What the heck?” I thought, “even ‘cheap’ Jamaican Blue Mountain” is bound to be good.
So, I ordered myself a pound of their Blue Mountain Peaberry. It came a few days later, and as I expected, it wasn’t the best/freshest that I’ve had, but DAMN! It makes one fine cuppa joe!
Almost everytime I fix a pot, my mind replays the kitchen scene* from “Pulp Fiction”.
“Damn Jimmy! This is some serious gourmet shit!”
Thankfully, I never have to dispose of a bloody car and a headless corpse after I enjoy my cup of coffee!
* AKA: “The Bonnie Situation”, DVD fans.
Here’s how it works:
One week a month, you subsist exclusively on assorted varieties of pie (and yes, of course cheesecake counts as pie).
Now, I’m not claiming that this has any health benefits or weight-loss potential, but who the Hell cares? You get to eat pie!
So, a few days ago my lovely acrylic and stainless steel peppermill fell from the shelf above the sink and dropped all of 18 inches into the sink. I didn’t think much of it, put it back in its place and went about my business. Imagine my horror when I next tried to use it only to discover that the grinding mechanism had broken free from the body and it was beyond repair.
Anyway… I did some research and according to Cook’s Illustrated (From America’s Test Kitchen) and Alton Brown (who has never led me astray in the past) Unicorn’s Magnum Plus
is the absolute zenith of peppermill functionality.
I was somewhat non-plussed by its appearance (a big black plastic cylinder… I was hoping for something in stainless steel or copper), but it has a lifetime guarantee, and according to the experts it excels at what it does.
So, I went ahead and got it and let me tell you, this thing rocks! The coarse/fineness is infinitely (and easily) adjustable, it holds scads of peppercorns, and it cranks out an insane amount of pepper per twist.
One of my other concerns was that due to its design, you can’t do the old “remove the top and attach the cordless drill” trick (à la Alton Brown), but as it turns out, it grinds so much more efficiently than any mill I’ve used before I can’t imagine this ever being necessary (quite unlike my recently departed peppermill, which ground so slowly that I frequently resorted to this technique).
So, if you are in the market for a peppermill, or you’re just tired of cranking endlessly to deliver the appropriate dose of pepper; the Magnum Plus gets ‘Crazy Greg’s Seal of Approval’.
Those of you who’ve been following along (my family and imaginary fan-club) have no doubt read (or know) about my cross-country trek schlepping 20 dozen frozen tamales from Bernard’s in Midland, Texas back to Ohio. The original grand scheme was to set to work learning to make tamales myself and to hopefully be able to create a reasonable facsimile of the Bernard’s family recipe by the time I ran out of the real thing.
Well, you know what they say about best laid plans… anyway, it was with great trepidation and a touch of remorse that I thawed and subsequently devoured one of my 3 remaining dozen. Suddenly realizing the gravity of the situation, I decided I needed to do some further tamale research. I found this site which has a recipe that looks like a good starting point. This guy grew up on a ranch in west Texas and learned the fine art of tamale making from an hispanic “abuelita” (my word, not his) there on the ranch, so we’re at least speaking the same language, so to speak.
I figure there are three keys; first is perfecting the meat mixture. Second is the masa dough (and I know one of the secrets to this: Lard!). Third is the rolling technique, which appears to be a skill quite similar to that of rolling, ahem, cigarettes, so that’s a skill I hope will come back fairly quickly.
I’ll keep you apprised of my progress, wish me luck!
For those of you who are new here and wondering what, exactly, I’m babbling about here’s a post where I go into the tamale story in some depth, and here’s one where I mention it in passing.
So, the second weekend of my visit I had the fine pleasure of attending my 8 year old nephew’s basketball game, which really was great fun. Afterwards we (my two sisters, their husbands, the two nephews, and myself) go out to eat. I’m excited when they tell me we’re going to a Mexican restaurant, but wary and suspicious when they begin to sing the praises of the fajitas. We find a table and sit, it’s a nice enough place, but I’m still dubious of its, shall we say, authenticity. My suspicions are confirmed when the chips and salsa arrive. The salsa is the blandest I’ve ever tasted, they have spicier salsa in Ohio, for Heaven’s sake! Anyway, I get my huevos con chorizo (eggs with Mexican sausage) and it’s tasty, although also a little bland for my taste. I ask the waiter for some hot sauce, and he looks at me like I’ve just stepped from the mothership, then brings me another bowl of their flavorless “salsa”. I patiently explain that this is not what I was wanting, and he says, “You mean like Tabasco?”
“Yes, exactly like Tabasco, that would be great.”
He brings it, I apply it liberally and all is well. The food is quite good, it just needed a little pick-me-up.
The true comedy didn’t arrive until after our meal. My brother-in-law (whom I won’t name, to spare him further embarrassment) gets up to go visit the restroom. Quite some time passes and he hasn’t come back. My sister suggests that perhaps my nephew should go check on him. Brother-in-law #2 nixes this idea, saying; “He’s a big boy, he’s been using the bathroom by himself for 30 years, I’m sure he’s got it under control”.
As it turns out, this was not the case. He had gone into a stall, taken care of his business, then as he was washing his hands someone else walked in and disappeared into a stall. He got to thinking “Hmm… that looked like a woman…” Upon exiting the bathroom and looking at the sign on the door, he realized he had, in fact, been in the wrong bathroom (for, let us not forget, quite some time).
That was his first mistake. Telling us all of his folly was his second. So, Mr. Brother-in-law, if you’re reading this… Ha ha! Oh, and thanks for lunch!
If this were a TV (or radio) show, at this point they would cue “Ladies Room” by KISS and fade to commercial.
So, I arrived safe and sound in Midland. One of the first things I asked the family about was Bernard’s, a tortilla and tamale factory which sells (in my estimation) the world’s best tamales. No one knew if it was in the same place or even if they were still in business.
Sitting around with my Dad a few days later, he asks if I want to go for a ride. “Sure,” says I, and off we go. I’m just driving aimlessly, we swing by the house where I grew up, which was really quite sad; the neighborhood has taken a definate turn for the worse during the roughly 16 years since I last saw it. My boyhood home looks very weary and run-down and the Elm trees that once lined the streets are all gone, victims of Dutch Elm Disease, apparently.
As we wander through the downtown area, which is still surprisingly familiar, despite an abundance of ‘new’ buildings, I remark that it seems as though Bernard’s wasn’t too far from where we are. Dad agrees and asks if I want to try to find it. “Yes I do!” Now we have a mission! Dad seems unsure that he can actually find it, but then directs me right to it. Amazingly, it looks exactly the way I remember it! Stepping inside nothing has changed, it’s as though I’ve walked through a portal back in time. I can practically see myself, 10 years old, waiting nervously beside my Grandmother while they ring up our tamales.
Then came an even bigger shock, Mrs. Bernard, who was an old lady back way back when, in my youthful eyes, is still there! Of course, she’s older now, but unmistakably the same lady. The whole experience is so overwhelming, I literally am briefly reduced to a nervous 10 year old. “Un docena tamales, por favor”, the words tumble out, automatically, and even as I’m handing her my money I realize that this is not nearly enough tamales.
With my deliciously fragrant bundle in hand, I rejoin Dad in the car. I’m beaming, glowing… I’ve been dreaming of Bernard’s tamales for so long. Our mission now accomplished, we head back to the house. It’s all I can do to keep out of the tamales until we arrive, but unwrapping and eating greasy tamales while driving a stick shift would be a messy proposition.
The tamales are everything I’d hoped for. Spicy enough to make you sweat a little, just the right masa to meat ratio, and just fantastically; sinfully good. Of course now I have to have more, and finding coolers to load full of tamales and bring back becomes a top priority.
So anyway, If you like real Mexican food and you ever find yourself in Midland, Texas, stop at:
Bernard’s Tortilla Factory
511 N Tyler St.
Midland, Texas
Trust me, you won’t be sorry.
I can’t believe that I survived 38+ years deprived of this magical ambrosia! Seriously, it’s good stuff! On fruit, on toast, right out of the jar with a spoon, Nutella rules! It calls itself “Hazelnut Spread with Skim Milk & Cocoa”, but I find it to be more chocolaty than hazelnutty. Look for it at your grocer’s, near the peanut butter, jams and jellies. Be sure to save the gold seal from the jar after you open it, you can trade these in for valuable prizes at the Nutella website.
Now if only I could find a way to combine my new-found fixation with Nutella with my long-standing adoration of cooking Goddess Nigella Lawson, then I might be on to something.
Have you seen the TV ad for Jimmy Dean’s new breakfast snack thing where the woman says:
“the eggs come from real chickens, the cheese comes from real cows, and the sausage comes from Jimmy Dean”?
That’s right up there with the Metamucil-Old Faithful ad in the revolting imagery race. First off, there are several truly disgusting ways that “comes from Jimmy Dean” could be interpreted. Second, I don’t think it’s a good idea to get people pondering where sausage actually does come from.
What the hell are they thinking?
Yuck!
