Fixin' Supper

I was at Dulles today on one of the people-movers. I noticed out the window, as we were unloading, this construction scene. There’s a lot going on at Dulles right now with various updates, and when you’re on the people-movers at a certain place, it looks like you’re riding on air instead of the ground b/c you can’t see any of the pavement out your window. Seriously creepy.

Well anyway, this is another view. What I missed in the frame with my camera phone was the walkway these columns are holding up, between some of the gates.

Side note: Who can tell me what the “MUFIDS” renovation is at BNA? I keep seeing it promoted on signs there. It’s not very effective promotion if they don’t even tell me what they’re updating.

Note to interstate travelers: Please reconsider using the Eisenhower interstate system if you can’t bring yourself to use cruise control, or if your car is not so equipped, if you can’t maintain a semi-regular rate of speed. I honestly don’t care how fast or slow you go; just go the same speed. It’s a great opportunity to improve upon your gas mileage.

Note to person in massive SUV driving on my bumper for a short while this afternoon: While I am already driving 78 in a 70 mph zone and I’m whizzing past cars in the slow lane, is it really necessary to get so close to me I can’t even see your lights? I didn’t think so, either.

Note to Nashville sister: Sorry I snapped at you when you called to inform me that everyone else wanted to move Thanksgiving dinner to 5 or 6 p.m. tomorrow evening, thus destroying your plans for the perfect day. I was previously unaware that the "right" time to have Thanksgiving is 1 p.m. [The rest of you are now so informed.] Next time I will try to muster more sympathy, but you know if you want help with the rules, you really should call NYC sister. You know I am more about breaking the rules.

Note to Hungry Toddler: I promise that once I work up my courage to get back in the car with you and get you home, I won’t make another 7.5 hour trip alone with you until you are at least old enough to watch videos on one of those fancy-schmancy back-of-the-headrest DVD players. Especially because if I have to endure another 4 or 5 hours of screaming [and 30 more minutes of barfing] I will be deaf and worn out.

Note to everyone else: Thanks for the glass of wine. Here’s to a great Thanksgiving!!

Or at least the largest in Fentress County, Tennessee.

So sorry to not have posted for so many days, but I have a really great reason. I spent four days this weekend totally off the grid. I actually even tried to use a cell phone from Pickett State Park but you can’t. Not even standing on top of a picnic table and shouting.

It may take me a while to get out all the food-related info from the weekend, but I’d better start by apologizing for forgetting my camera. I thought that the problem would be that I’d miss out on some cute shots of my kids — I did, but my dad brought his, so that was mitigated — but the biggest problem was that Saturday, we attended the Pumpkin Festival in Allardt, Tenn., and during the parade, we saw a 1,051-pound pumpkin and I couldn’t photograph it for you.

I am failing you miserably.

Here’s how it happened:

We went into town on Saturday to pick up some stuff at the grocery store. As we were checking out, we heard the cashier talking to her friend: "Have you been over to the pumpkin festival yet?" We were on our way out the door as we were overhearing this. I guess we could have turned around to say, "Hey, where is it?" But we were on no schedule, no agenda, so we just decided to get in the car and go look for said festival.

We drove around town and didn’t see anything pumpkin-y so we wandered out of town, and happened across the festival, in Allardt. We waited in a long line of cars and finally got to park in the field next to the post office, then walked a block to the big intersection in town and discovered we were just in time to see the parade.

The parade included every element I remembered from my childhood: people on horseback, lots of child beauty queens, many homemade floats with people throwing candy, all the local Girl and Boy Scout troops, local cheerleaders, people in funny costumes for no reason in particular.

What really amused me was the 7yo’s reaction. She was nonplussed by the candy-throwing. We were standing near many local children. I tried pushing her forward several times, saying, "Just get up there and grab some. You have to just get up there." She didn’t seem to grasp the concept, which the local kids were very clear about. A very nice man from the Fentress County Rescue Squad was standing near us and he’d pick up extra candy and give it to her and the 1yo. I later asked her, have you ever seen that at a parade? No. No clue about the candy. I think her dad has taken her to more parades than I have, but I’m guessing that if they throw candy at big-city parades, it’s not quite the happening it is in a small town, where the goal is to go home with your pockets stuffed like Halloween.

At any rate, the pumpkin. The "weigh-off" had been earlier in the day, and I later learned they started with pumpkins of 800 lbs. or greater. Eight hundred pounds. I have no idea how you grow an 800-lb. pumpkin, but I can tell you that an 1,051-lb. pumpkin is at least as tall as I am. I didn’t get to get up close — just saw it drive by — but the grooves must have been as deep as my hand is wide. Maybe deeper.

They drove it in the parade on a trailer pulled by a full-size pickup [as were most floats]. I mean, how did they weigh these things? Are there dozens of Fentress County farmers with hernias this week? Surely I am lacking in imagination somehow. I guess there’s a machine that was helping with all this.

At any rate, that’s my first weekend report. How many pumpkin pies you think you could make with that?

I just learned what two friends of mine have been up to recently. Kristin and Christian are on a great trip down the West Coast—including the redwood forest, LA and wine country. Their travel blog is so descriptive and vivid—and includes many pictures!! You’ll want to make your reservations right now. Or at least stop by the liquor store on the way home….read about their winery tour.

I know I said the last time I wrote on this topic that I wouldn’t be doing so again. In fact, I called it "The Last Post on Barbecue." But I’ve been reading David Plotz’s barbecue pilgrimmage diary all week in Slate and so I can’t just leave it out there without saying something.

A. The guy disses on Memphis big-time. I’m not sure why he expected to find real West Tennessee barbecue at two of the most touristy restaurants in the city. Sigh. Go with a native next time, will ya?

B. The best part of the whole series is the exchange between the author and some security agents at the Austin airport at the end of his trip. They’ve caught Plotz with a jar of Kansas City BBQ sauce in his bag and let him have it:

At the Austin airport, I was singled out for a special security screening. The TSA agent fingering through my bag pulled out a jar of barbecue sauce I had bought at Gates in Kansas City. "What’s this?" she asked.

"It’s barbecue sauce," I said.

"I know it’s barbecue sauce. I mean, what kind of sauce is it? I’ve never seen this kind before."

"It’s from Kansas City."

She grimaced at this. Holding the jar like it contained C-4 explosive, she showed it to another screener. "Look, this guy has some kind of barbecue sauce from New York City or something," she told the other screener derisively.

"Kansas City," I weakly interrupted.

She waved me off, then said in an ominous voice. "Now, why would you have that?"

"I was on a barbecue tour," I answered. "I started in Kansas City, and finished here."

"Did you go to Rudy’s?" she asked.

I shook my head.

"You came to Texas for barbecue, and you didn’t go to Rudy’s?" She turned to her partner. "He came to Texas, and he didn’t go to Rudy’s!" The partner shook his head.

"What about the Salt Lick?" she asked. I shook my head no again. She made a face.

The partner continued the interrogation. "How about the County Line?"

I shook my head.

"Well, where did you go?" the screener asked in an exasperated voice.

Heh. We all have our own ideas on this one, don’t we? You’re really only happy with your own barbecue. I still don’t know how to explain South Carolina mustard sauce, but hey, it’s not my barbecue.

My last night in Austin I went out with a friend of mine from college. He has lived there for several years and gave me a great tour of town, all around UT [enormous!], up Mount Bonnell, through West Lake Hills, neat neighborhoods in downtown and to several great views of the river that runs through town.

We wrapped up at the County Line, another barbecue restaurant that is inexplicably not near the county line. Again, an amazing variety of meat called "barbecue." But it was very good. I had the chicken and turkey. I actually think my favorite part of the whole meal was the appetizer: jalepeno jack poppers. Monterey Jack cheese, laced with jalepenos, breaded and fried. A little ranch dressing for dipping….mmmm.

I’ve written about barbecue before, but you can’t come to Texas without the subject coming up. Summer has been telling us how great The Salt Lick is for the longest time, and having put down Texas barbecue my whole life, I was eager to confirm my assertions.

The Salt Lick is near Driftwood, Texas, relatively near Austin. An easy drive for dinner for sure. I don’t think it’s near much else, but that isn’t a negative. I think they had to put it out there to accommodate the hundreds of cars that show up every night. Even when Cole [playing photographer here], Summer, Rex and I arrived last night around 7:30, we waited around an hour or so for a table. This at a restaurant with two enormous banquet halls to seat all the patrons.

S.L. is in a dry county, so it’s a bring-your-own place. The hanging-out atmosphere in the waiting area of the gravel parking lot really reminds you of a family reunion or a church picnic. For one, there are a million people there. Everyone’s drinking a beer, sitting on picnic tables or standing around talking, and dozens of little kids are running around, throwing rocks and jumping off the stone walls. Good times.

We were lucky because we got to eat on the side with the pit. It just sits right behind the cash register when you walk in the door. I guess there are lots of other barbecue restaurants with indoor pits, but it seems so odd to walk right in and see it there. It sure smells good, though. Yikes on the fire insurance. On the other hand, maybe they don’t have any. They’re in the middle of nowhere, so probably volunteer fire department. It’s a wooden building with a big stone pit in the middle? Hmmm.

The best part of the experience was dinner. Now, I’m not being untrue to my roots in saying this. While Texas "barbecue" is definitely meat cooked in a barbecue style, it’s just not barbecue. Barbecue is pulled pork. Period. You can also make barbecued ribs. To me, it’s even two different things to "go eat barbecue" and "go eat ribs." But here in Texas, barbecue is all meat.

We ate family style. The spread included cole slaw, potato salad, bread, sausage, brisket, ribs and onions. There was more than one comment along the lines of "the best sausage I’ve ever eaten." It was all good. But as we also observed, you keep us waiting and hour and a half, we’d eat an old tire.

I’m at SXSW for the next few days. Never been here before but it’s great to be here in Austin. What a great city. #1, it’s March and the high temperature today was around 82. Tell me that’s not perfect. My coworker and friend Summer and I did discover that signage related to parking is less than ideal, but otherwise, the trip is great so far. [Summer lives here.]

Well of course one nice part about this trip is getting to eat at all these great restaurants that Summer has been telling me about for years. I didn’t eat lunch on purpose and arrived starving today around 2 p.m. We went straight to Katz’s Deli. Awesome homemade potato chips and fried pickles. Plus sandwiches. I will say that though I’ve never tried to make fried pickles myself, I’m going to give folks the benefit of the doubt and say that it must not be easy. Because I’ve had some bad ones in my life. Greasy, soggy, you name it. But these today — divine. I could have eaten the whole plate. I managed not to.

Then we went to SXSW and heard a great speaker, Jason Fried of 37signals. This guy, he’s a genius. His philosophy dovetails dead-on with what we do at work, and his applications are solid. [Do we ALL think that people who agree with us are brilliant? I guess we must. But really, he is.] But back to the food.

We went to the Hula Hut for dinner with Summer’s husband Cole and our boss Rex, who’s also here. While we ate out by the river, Cole was trying to explain to us why the Colorado River is called "Lake Austin" and "Town Lake" here in Austin. Now I haven’t yet figured out why [surely I learned this at some point in school?] but it’s not the SAME river as THE Colorado River. These Texans are something else. Maybe they also have a Tennessee River and a Mississippi River running around here. I’ll check. I’m also trying to figure out why the "Hula Hut" serves Tex Mex, but it was great. I had roasted chicken enchiladas.

After dinner we headed for Amy’s, the Austin ice-cream institution. I was too stuffed from our earlier exploits to have any, but I snuck a bite of Summer’s cinnamon and graham-cracker ice cream. It was a lot fresher tasting than any other mix-in ice cream I’ve ever had before. No chemical aftertaste. Yum. Must eat less tomorrow to make room for ice cream.