I hate to admit this, but I have eaten an animal we hit during a rainstorm as we were driving down the road. Truth is, I have eaten more than one. It’s been a long time, and it was in Alabama, but I still remember the deer staring us down before leaping to its death [...]
I get a lot of catalogs this time of year. They are filled with fruitcakes, hams, smoked turkeys, cheese, jelly, cookies shaped like Santa, etc. So what do they do with this stuff come January? Hopefully they don’t save it until next year and put it in the next catalog. But since the half-life on [...]
Recently, I have been hearing about government cheese, a code word for federal assistance. I remember real government cheese from 80’s (started by Reagan, of all presidents). The feds bought up excess dairy farmers’ cheese and stored it, finally giving it away. If you were elderly or didn’t make enough money, you got government cheese [...]
Have you tried reducing your salt intake? Try it. Go to the grocery store and read the ingredients chart on the back of anything you may find remotely edible. It’s filled with sodium. Ever tried sodium-free ketchup? Give it a shot. It tastes like a mouth full of pennies. Tried salt-free peanut butter? It sucks [...]
Today, I heard something that proves people have no idea what they are putting into their mouths. If I start laughing before I finish, forgive me.
My son told me this story. The topic of conversation was pimento cheese sandwiches, a triangular staple of Southern church socials, at least from my recollection. During a conversation about [...]
I have seen the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile on America’s highways for years. As you can see from the picture, it looks like a yellow, 1960’s Cadillac loaded down with a trailer-sized wiener. Seeing the orange wiener protruding from the home of Nick Krup in Racine, Wisconsin, however, didn’t exactly make me want a hot dog. [...]
Even before I saw Food, Inc., my family and I had started a garden to produce some of our own food. We thought it would be healthier. No good deed goes unpunished.
I created some seriously pungent compost from kitchen leftovers. Our tomato plants started out like normal horticulture. Then they grew to be huge – [...]
Flipping through channels the other night I noticed that Toby McGuire was in both Spiderman and The Ciderhouse Rules. Not that Mr. McGuire ‘s roles have anything to do with this story, but it connected synapses in my brain that conjured up memories of a man in California selling apple cider near the mountain town [...]
It is not often that people drive forty miles to get a loaf of bread. We did.
I’ve known Mark McIntyre, the owner, chef and chief baker at Norwood Cottage Bakery for years. His homemade artesian bread was rumored (on Facebook) to be sinful. As I recall, Mark was the one doing the rumoring. After roaming [...]
Back when I spent a lot of time in drive-thru lanes waiting for fast food that I didn’t order, I pondered the impressive mistakery. It was consistent, almost every trip. Checking the bag became a ritual. The order was wrong at least 7 out of ten times. You have to have hours of training to [...]
Food is food. Drugs are drugs. We need someone watching out for each category individually instead of together. The job is just too big. The Food and Drug Administration has to ride herd on all of our drugs and our food at the same time? Those have become two pretty different groups. But if we [...]
Some people love water. They drink it 24-7. I have always looked at water as something you bath in, swim through, boat over, fish in or make iced tea with. I am not a big fan of drinking water even though it makes up 98% of my body. Juice is good. Cokes are amazing (especially [...]
Not long ago, I took a little tour of the house of pain. Details are not necessary. Suffice it to say no one wants to go there. Promise.
As a result of that ugly trip, I am no longer able to participate in several things that made me uniquely Southern. Whole categories of Southern entrees have [...]
I ordered the regular hotdog. That is not exactly what I got.
I watched the woman put on the rubber gloves and extract a bun from a metal box. The wieners were rolling lazily on top of the ubiquitous wiener roller warmer.
As I waited, I thought about hotdogs past – hundreds of them. The dogs I [...]
If you have ever had your stomach pumped, you know it is not something you volunteer for. Usually, this violent procedure follows what Webster’s would simply call “bad.” Bad can take several forms, but if a stomach pump is the cure, this type of bad is near the top of the bad category. My particular strain [...]