Sunday, May 26, 2013

Micklethwait Craft Meats.

Tom Micklethwait, moving meat. © Ryan Schierling
Barbecue in Central Texas is getting progressively more difficult.

Thanks to the telegraph, the telegram, the radio, the telephone, the television, the barbecue televangelists, the godless liberal media and the internet, there are no secrets anymore. Luling, Llano, Lexington, Lockhart? Austin. AUSTIN. This town is loaded with the new-guarde when it comes to the old-style, and we're wearing the biggest, baddest buckle in the barbecue belt. 

Julie and I drive up East 11th, passing a queue easily in the hundreds already at Franklin Barbecue. It's 9:30 in the morning… today, Sunday, and that's a regular thing. A week after a Franklin spread graced a gloriously glossy cover of Texas Monthly's issue with "The 50 Best BBQ Joints in Texas in the World!" I drive around the north side of the building, just to see where the line ends, and it's halfway around the block. I smile, because Aaron and Stacy are some of the nicest folks we've met in Austin, they deserve every bit of success, and also probably a good nap. We have a previous engagement with a man and some meat, so we continue up the street. 
If you come to the fork in the road at East 11th and Rosewood, take a left. You will pass East End Wines, Raymond Tatum's Three Little Pigs trailer, the RS Food Mart, and if you're not careful, you'll also pass Micklethwait Craft Meats. On the right side of the street, tucked into a bit of a dip in the landscape, is a pale yellow trailer with a smoker next to it. Follow your nose.

Friday, May 10, 2013

Oklahoma prime rib redux.

Fried smoked baloney sandwich with dill pickle spread. © Ryan Schierling
"What the hell are you smoking?"

I get that question from time to time, especially when I come up with oddities like Chicken-fried Chicken a la King Ranch Chicken or the unholy marriage of gas-station snack-pack jerky and cheese inside a homemade jalapeƱo popper. But today, since you asked, I'm actually smoking bologna, thank you.

Bologna, Italy would have been my first guess as to the genesis of smoked bologna. They probably figured out every way imaginable to prepare that mishmash meat loaf and I'm betting the guy that perfected it wasn't named Oscar Meyer. But, from what I've heard, Italy didn't want to have anything to do with this bastard-child treatment of their lard-studded mortadella. The Sooner State takes full responsibility for the further preparation of this one.

As with any legendary regional recipe, there are disputes when it comes to origins. Cheap and plentiful, fried bologna sandwiches have been around forever, and everyone from states south of the Mason-Dixon line probably has a fond childhood memory of their favorite version. Smoked bologna is another tall-tale altogether, with a pair of pushpins stuck squarely in a map of Oklahoma – one in Tulsa and the other in Oklahoma City. Stories go back fifty or sixty years about the creation of "Oklahoma prime rib" and wherever it started, you know there had to be some drinking involved. 

Sunday, May 5, 2013

The devil made me do it.

The fruits of the devil... vegetarian deviled ham spread on crackers. © Ryan Schierling
Deviled ham is disgusting. 

Wait, what? You don't agree? Okay, go get one of those tins of the deviled ham with Old Scratch on the side – the ones that have been manufactured by the same company since 1868. Oh, and walk over to the pet supplies aisle and fetch a can of dog food with pork in it. 

Put on a blindfold. Have someone crack both tins open and wave them around under your nose, one by one, then tell me which one is the deviled ham. You can't. Spread a little of each on a cracker and keep that blindfold on. Pop those crackers into your mouth and let me know what you think. Indistinguishable, no? 

I've prepared and eaten a lot of questionable foodstuffs in the name of research, and progress, and… boredom. I've never made a Beggin' Strips, lettuce and tomato sandwich, but I've taken a few shots in the gut for the team. I like the idea of deviled ham, and I've eaten it infrequently enough to have a sentimentality-fueled craving once every three or four years. Last week, I bought a couple little tins of Underwood® deviled ham and some buttery crackers to snack on, and boy was my nostalgia disappointed. It was beyond bland – nearly tasteless and textureless – with a scent that made our cats come running to the kitchen. I ignored the congealed yellow fat immediately under the pop-top lid. By this human's standards, it was nearly inedible. The kids have less discerning palates, and scarfing down the pork and associated gelatinous fat would probably give them a kitty cardiac event. 

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