ChefCarey

Privately and quietly.

While you guys must needs possess a granite-like epidermis, that is also true of us chefs. I must admit I have on occasion taken vociferous exception to a novice critic's presumption. As when a critic ,searching desperately for something to criticize in a restaurant where I was chef in san Francisco, said there was too much cheese in the soupe a l'oignon gratinee. This, after having praised all the items on my menu that required "touch." When I first came to this culinary backwater (Memphis) and opened a restaurant the local paper sent me a critic who had never seen a sun-dried tomato and likened it in print to a "tomato raisin." Oh, and I had a carefully tailored 200-bottle wine list. She was a teetotaler. Not a word there. But, on the other hand, you guys who have done your homework - and educated your palates - warm my cockles and mussels. I feel quite comfortable with knowledgeable critics in the building.

Your canyon denizen roster sounds a lot like Topanga Canyon. I was once quite close to someone from there. Your caprese sounds great. The best I ever had was in a home in the Latin Quarter in Paris - it and bread and wine were lunch.

While some fish produced by aquaculture are lame, and some aquaculture methods are damaging to the environment, I think it's fair to say that aquaculture -- like most things -- is a mixed bag. It produces plenty of delicious fish as well. To use the salmon example you raised, I find Bay of Fundy farmed salmon to be delicious. Also, a lot of "wild" salmon are sort of hybrids in that they're born in hatcheries. Plenty of wild fish are lousy, by the way. They sit for too long on boats, are poorly handled, etc. Farmed fish tend to be more reliable and consistent, without the high highs or low lows of wild -- that's pretty much how agriculture goes. In any event, no matter how fisheries are regulated, I don't think it's realistic to expect the future to happen without aquaculture being the primary source of fish. I mean, human civilization can't subsist off mostly wild food. Aquaculture is just the natural evolution of agriculture. Wild species can provide for some of our needs but the bulk of our food has to be raised by us. ← I had the good fortune when I was executive chef at Mudd's - in 1980 - to be invited down to Pigeon Point, one of the first West Coast aquaculturing programs. Bill Marinelli (I think he's in Seattle now) was the manager at that time and gave me an exhaustive tour of the facility. I was impressed. It was an ambitious project. The "labs" where the spat were nurtured contained huge clear vats of oyster seed in various colored algae baths. I was literally walked through the procedure from start to finish. The finish occurring in Bill's office where we popped and consumed a few dozen. They were wonderful. Somewhat skeptical when I went down there - having been raised on "wild" oysters in New Orleans - I was now convinced that this was the wave of the future - for oysters, anyway. They were also experimenting with the aquaculture of abalone and scallops at the time. They cleaned the water, they were delicious, hey, what more could a man ask of any bivalve? Sadly, they did not do a thorough enough job of cleansing. The facility ultimately failed because of water quality. I bought the oysters as long as they were available. Incidentally, much of the same data in the starchefs.com article is identical to that in my introduction to shucking oysters in my 2004 book, Creole Nouvelle. Here's an excerpt: (Note: The Belon and Kumomoto oysters were not widely available at the time of the writing. Pigeon Point had raised Kumamoto seed for years, though.) OYSTERS AND SHUCKING THEM A British clergyman named William Butler was the first to enjoin us, in the late 16th century, not to eat oysters during the months that do not have an “r” in their names. His reasons for this were quite sound. European oysters were full of sand in the summer months—not necessarily unwholesome, just not tasty. American oysters spawn during the early summer, and some oyster lovers actually enjoy them more during this period. As the summer wears on, the oysters finish spawning and are quite exhausted and underweight. This is the time of year when they are least succulent. A varmint called Gonyaulax catenella, a dinoflagellate (sounds sort of like a venereal disease transmitted by energetic, masochistic mollusks), has caused a quarantine on wild bivalve harvesting in the waters off the coast of California from May through October. This one-celled organism can cause shellfish poisoning. In Louisiana and the warmer eastern waters of the United States in recent years, the culprit most often has been Vibrio vulnificus. Bacteria that like oysters (but don’t especially like us) seem to thrive in warmer waters. Nearly all these bacteria are neutralized by heat, so if you plan to cook them, you have few worries. If you are a raw-oyster aficionado, as I am, stick to oysters harvested in the coldest winter months. These will be the plumpest and tastiest anyway. All oysters sold in the United States are from government-certified oyster beds. Of the three commonly available types of oysters available in U.S. coastal waters, only two are easy to find: the Pacific, or Japanese oyster, and the Eastern, or Blue Point oyster. The “Eastern” oyster is found all up and down the Atlantic coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. Today you will find many “artisan” oysters or oysters with a geographic nomenclature attached indicative of some special culinary note or trait. Oysters like bays and estuaries, and these waterway designations often constitute the nom de table. The third, another West Coast oyster, the Olympia, is in short supply. The Eastern and Olympia oysters are indigenous, and the Pacific was introduced to American waters around 1930. If at all possible, buy oysters in the shell and shuck them yourself. I have taught hundreds of students how to shuck oysters quickly and easily without wounding themselves using the following method. The large Pacific oysters show themselves to best advantage when baked. For oysters on the half shell, stick with the Eastern type or, should you be lucky enough to find them, the Olympia Oysters are quite high in protein, calcium, and zinc (the latter possibly accounting for their reputation as an aphrodisiac).

Well put. With apologies to John Prine: We are living in the future I'll tell you how I know I read it in the paper Fifteen years ago We're all driving rocket ships And talking with our minds And wearing turquoise jewelry And standing in soup lines We are standing in soup lines

Speaking of which...what the hell ever happened to soft boiled eggs? I remember cups, cutters and all kinds of gear to deal with them. At least two or three days a week this was what my mother made me for breakfast. She was a definite believer in breaking the fast, fast. She worked and was always running behind. Can't get a much quicker fastbreaker than a three-minute egg or two... ← Because nobody can be bothered to figure out *exactly* how long to cook their particular preference for the things .. and in some places it's impossible to buy egg cups! I was looking at some in Kitchen Kaboodle yesterday, and the price ... can you say 'l-o-o-n-e-y ..? But you're dissembling ... we still haven't heard the rest of the story! Tell! Tell! ← It's coming. I'm under a literary injunction - I can't leave Indiana yet. Actually, there are a couple of more episodes - after I escape The Hoosier State - coming up in The Dailly Gullet. Catch up on your weaving.

Maybe you can help me out here...I've been racking what's left of my brain trying to remember the name of a joint, a bar/restaurant. Right acrosss the state line, in New Paris, Ohio. I went there with my stepfather's family on a few occasions and I took the cheerleader there because minors (under 21, but over 18) could buy 3.2 beer. I even remember hearing Connie Francis on the jukebox singing "Where the Boys Are." Is it still there? Do you have a clue what I'm talking about? ← Eureka! I found it! It was called the Lampost! Here is a brief excerpt from a review of it's new incarnation as a barbecue joint: But most of his attention will be focused on sustaining and building the clientele that have visited the restaurant on the south edge of New Paris that has been around since 1945. Joe DiFederico, Uncle Joe to most, started it. The name was held through subsequent owners because of the business that built up over the years and the special spaghetti sauce and 3.2 beer. Generations of 18-year-old Hoosiers slipped across the state line to quaff some 3.2 beer, a less potent beer that was at one time available to people at age 18, three years before they were allowed the sample a sip of sin in their home state. During those teenage years, DiFederico's Lampost was the place they came if they had a date. It was a more upscale than most of the smoky bars that catered to the interstate bar business. Baumbach's place is smoke free.

Thanks, DG. Maybe Maggie will chime in and let us know when she will be running the next segment of my saga????

Speaking of which...what the hell ever happened to soft boiled eggs? I remember cups, cutters and all kinds of gear to deal with them. At least two or three days a week this was what my mother made me for breakfast. She was a definite believer in breaking the fast, fast. She worked and was always running behind. Can't get a much quicker fastbreaker than a three-minute egg or two...

Disclaimer: I actually read this entire thread - maybe a first for me. Let me begin by saying I ain't a Flay fan - do those who consider themselves so call themselves "Flans?" Haven't watched a single episode and have no plans to do so. I actually watched one of his shows a few years ago. He was attempting to commit some kind of New Orleans cookery involving crabs, doling out several uninformed pieces of advice and The Bimbette assistant asked him at one point if he knew what a "buster" was. He didn't. She did. He was clueless. Cerebrally outgunned by the Bimbette with the greater knowledge base. I changed the channel and have zipped through him while channel surfing ever since. I'd rather, in the words of Swift, be flayed alive than forced to watch this stuff. But, back to my point. Apparently these challengers are not making the media splash they had all dearly, no doubt, hoped for. And I would have wished for them. Throughout this thread is Flay, Flay, Flay and more Flay. Also, throughout this thread is "Marine," Marine Captain," etc. It's the Unknown Soldier all over again. Poor soldier who doesn't have a name might as well have been wearing a bag over his head during the taping. I'm not going to do my research here - once through the thread is all I can do. In fact, I seem to recall that not a single challenger's name is mentioned. Flay on parade. Mingling with the little nameless people. You Flans enjoy.

Thanks for waiting. Would that I could give free rein to my febrile (feeble?) ranting. I inked a legally binding, ironclad, pleated, and neatly hemmed document indicating I would include at least one ort per paragraph. So, my writing here will be much more ortful in future. Future fulminations, though, will, include misadventures in Paris, Berkley, Chicago, San Francisco and culminate in - tada - Oakland.

I love Leisuresuit Larry! Hated it when Al Loeb stopped doing them and Sierra sold.

Actually think he may have been up to something gustatory with the blue-bleak embers of the baker's oven and the gash gold-vermillion of the diagonal slashes in the baguette. Of course, 4 or 5 generations of critics might disagree with me and take the wind out of my sails...

Thanks for this, Diane. I enjoyed it. You had an experience I was never able to enjoy, gave me a new perspective. I grew up in a bakery. A small Jewish bakery. I worked in bakeries. I always took this stuff for granted. It was just always *there.* Baguettes, rye bread, salt-rising bread, coffee cakes, Vienna loaves, Danish, challah. And the ever-present doughnuts. All there, all the time. I actually longed for the insipid balloon bread my peers enjoyed at home. The bread we never had. I was a true philistine in every sense of the word. Only later did I come to appreciate what I had. Thanks again.

I wonder how many folks here actually remember the "Man on the Street" segments on the old Steve Allen Show -with Don Knotts, Louis Nye and Tom Poston? I think that was where Knotts first developed that personality he displayed on The Andy Griffith Show.

Maybe you can help me out here...I've been racking what's left of my brain trying to remember the name of a joint, a bar/restaurant. Right acrosss the state line, in New Paris, Ohio. I went there with my stepfather's family on a few occasions and I took the cheerleader there because minors (under 21, but over 18) could buy 3.2 beer. I even remember hearing Connie Francis on the jukebox singing "Where the Boys Are." Is it still there? Do you have a clue what I'm talking about?

Let me join the others whose suspicion is that the original, hand-beaten paellas were, no doubt, pebbly, as were the hand-formed woks. I've been making - and teaching folks to make - paella for over 30 years and here are a few observations. (Oh, and that interesting web site notwithstanding, I find the term "paella *pan*" redundant, since a paella is a pan. As is the dish made in it.) I've had both the earthenware and steel paellas. The earthenware did not survive long. It was dropped and broken by a student. Stick with the metal. Don't worry about pebbles. You don't need a rice grown in a secluded glen on the southeastern slope of the Pyrenees. Any medium grain rice will do - arborio works just dandy. While the original may well have contained snails, I have not found this a popular choice for a modern paella. Most folks prefer shellfish. Either peas or beans work fine. I usually include chiles in the sofrito, but they are not necessary.

Hmm, I don't seem to be getting much feedback from those you who have also cleaned out whorehouses and worked in baby caskets factories. C'mon! Speak up! Don't be shy!

A can? A *can* of coffee? Unlike you, my experience with coffee in Paris was quite pleasureable. I spent much of my time in Paris in a small hotel in the Latin Quarter where the coffee was made from dark, freshly ground beans every morning. The rest of my time was also spent in the Latin Quarter in private homes. Again, the coffee was excellent. As a matter of fact, this time in Paris turned me into a coffee addict. I could take it ot leave it before that. Now, re. the espresso - I, too, love good espresso. That being said, those of us who are truly addicted and don't just sip a little coffee in the morning or after a meal, cannot drink espresso all the time. Were that so, the kitchens of the world would be hotbeds of cardiac disrhythmia (and there are already enough problems in the kitchen, anyway). Those of us who have run restaurant kitchens tend to run on caffeine - and lots of it. Many, many cups per day. Okay, my recommendation would be this: Buy a good burr grinder. Buy a good French press. Buy good, freshly dark roasted Arabica beans. Play with the grind (but never too fine for a French press.) This should provide you with excellent coffee.

Okay, my short-lived English major fugue is over. What happened? Back to food. I worked in bars and pizza joints in Bloomington, Indiana where I attended Indiana University for the next few years. My bartending gig was in the closest bar to the Indiana University campus, Nick’s English Hut. Never not busy. Hit the bar mats running when I came through the front door. I had the fortune to work with Nick’s most famous employee, Ruthie. Ruthie was ruthless. There was a definite schism in Bloomington, there were the students and faculty and then there were the "Stonecutters" or "Stonies." Read, locals. Ruthie was definitely a Stonie. (For more elaboration on this topic I refer you to the film Breaking Away. Although, he calls them "Cutters" in the film. We went swimming in those same stripper pits.) Those of us who were not members of fraternities or sororities, by choice, and were moderately politically aware, were torn. Liberal arts majors all. We thought we understood the locals (a pretentious proletarian conceit, as I now know) and sympathized with them. We named our Quiz Bowl team "Town X." One of the members of our four-man team, John Crowley went on to become a well-respected fantasy writer and another a congressman from Indiana. Oh, yeah, and one went on to become a cook. We kicked ass and won – the final score was something like 380 to 40. Beat a fraternity. (The guy who wrote the screenplay for Breaking Away said he based his idea on our Quiz Bowl team -four man team from town kicking a fraternity’s ass. He just substituted bicycles for brains. And switched venues, substituting The Little 500 in Memorial Stadium for the auditorium where the Quiz Bowl competition was held.) She was legendary, Ruthie was, literally for decades. In that era we sold beer. And more beer. No liquor. Notice I didn’t mention what kind of fortune. Ruthie was a mixed bag, if she liked you and you were 21, no problem. All those under 21 were the enemy. Craggy, careworn features, bowed back, tremors and a walker would not prevent her from asking for your ID. The owner paid her by the piece for false ID’s. She once got stuck under a booth going for a quarter on the floor and it took one of us on either leg to pull her out. She was a munchkin, could barely see over the bar as she called out for "Two Schlitz, three Pabst and a large cheese." The bartender had to call the pizza orders in. I schlepped oceans of beer, attended most of my classes and was probably the last person on the planet to find out John F. Kennedy had been shot on November 22, 1963. I was taking a make-up exam in modern American literature, alone, in a professor’s office most of the afternoon. I came out of that office and the world had changed. There was a pizza joint up the street owned by the same guy that owned Nicks. There was no kitchen in Nick’s, so we served their pizzas. I became friends with the manager and learned how to make pizzas and ride horses (he was into horses) yet a couple of other vastly underrated skills. One year a bunch of us hopped in the manager's van and headed up to Indianapolis to watch the Indy 500 qualifying. It was very hot for May. We were traveling light - just a garbage can full of iced beer and a sack full of (canned) salmon salad sandwiches one of the guys mothers had been kind enough to make for us. Parked in the infield and wandered around watching cars drive fast. After a few hours of beer-drinking in the hot sun we were starving, so I retrieved the sandwiches from the van and we all wolfed them down. After all they'd only been in the back of the van in 90 degree plus heat with no refrigeration for a mere few hours. Yep, you got it. A bacteriologist could not have done a better job had he set up perfect laboratory conditions to develop as many strains of food borne illness as possible. The resulting broad spectrum of mass technicolor yawns was truly awe inspiring. We all survived. I still remember the pizza place as having the best American-style sausage pizza I’ve ever had. I still make a version of it today. My kids loved it growing up. I use about a pound each of Italian sausage and fresh mozzarella (buffalo if I have it) and fresh tomato sauce on each pizza. Maybe a little provolone and Parmigiano-Reggiano, along with some fresh basil leaves. That’s it. At the pizza joint, several full-size, industrial strength, banded, roasting pans of ground pork and spices went in the ovens early every morning to become Italian sausage. The meat, not the pans, but you knew that. They could smell it up the block at Nick’s. Undoubtedly sold some pizzas. Oh, no, this pizza is nothing like those specified in the petition to the Italian Ministry of Agriculture from the Genuine Pizza Napoletana and Pizza Napoletana Associations of Naples in Articles 1-13 of EEC Regulation 2082/92 in May of 2004. (In case you were wondering and about to point that out to me.) Nor does it resemble the thin-crusted New York classic or the cornucopic Chicago concoctions. Both of which I love, by the bye. This is strictly, stick-to-the-ribs and, whatever else is handy, American grub. About two inches thick. I still make a mean pizza. And a couple of relatively tame ones, too. I can also deliver a mean pizza - just not as far as I used to - as that was another of my collegiate jobs. Don’t like riding mean horses. My first wife, Suzan was quite a horsewoman, though. She actually won the Arabian costume class at the Grand Nationals at the Cow Palace one year. Today, she and her husband live near Lodi and raise and show quarter horses. More on Suzan in installment two when our antihero arrives in California. Right after I graduated in 1966, I was drafted. Two years in the army and a year in Vietnam brings us to…or almost to, The Ordinary. Stay tuned...

You asked where I was in 1965. Warning, Will Robinson! Really bad thread drift approaching. I promise I'll get right back to food! Really! Any time you folks have had enough, just tell me, I'm really pretty easy to shut up. This is just part of one week in Bloomington - I was there five years. Bloomington, Indiana – Mid-1960’s It was getting late – around midnight. I was half – well, maybe ¾ or possibly even a little more – drunk, and sitting cross-legged on the floor of Gerry Rabkin’s living room plunking on a guitar while Suzan, my girlfriend and wife-to-be, was singing “He Was a Friend of Mine,” a la Dave Van Ronk. It had been a pretty good party with a few hills and valleys. Valleys to follow. The front door burst open and it was Allen Ginsberg, who had just departed moments before. He stuck only his head in the door, and stretching his neck out, opened his eyes wide, glaring at me and spat, “Goodnight, inarticulate prose writer!” Slammed the door and left. Whoa! Let me back up a little. Ginsberg and Peter Orlovsky had been in Bloomington all week. The Fugs were in town, too. Package deal. The Fugs were staying at my friend Denis’ apartment, as was I. I had just returned from my abortive attempt to get published by Random House in New York. Ran across the Fugs there. Lived on East 10th Street just up the block from Ed Sanders Peace Eye Bookstore. Ed, a poet, was the front man for the Fugs. The week started with a party to welcome all the above, well, not me, in an English department type’s knotty-pine-paneled basement. In the corner of the room was a keg of beer and standing by it was a besuited, tied, nattily dressed man with a beard, plastic tankard in hand. Actually looked quite out of place with all the rest of us chic-shabby dressed liberal arts degenerates. The irresistible magnetic field of the beer keg soon had me in the corner. I nodded at the dapper gent and said hello, mentioning my name, as I tipped my glass and drew the beer. He stood there, glass in hand, grinning ear to ear and remained mute, staring straight ahead, wouldn’t even make eye contact. How fucking rude! Topped off my brew and said, “Well, it was nice chatting with you.” Drifted away. Host took me to meet Ginsberg, who barely acknowledged me in passing, what was I but a moronic underclass English major – he was busy rapping. Drifted away and mumbled something to a fellow English departmenter about the rude bastard in the corner. She pointed out to me that that was Julius Orlovsky, Peter’s brother who had only recently been released from a decade or so in a mental institution – and that he didn’t function terribly well, but went everywhere with Allen and Peter, Allen’s wife. What a surprise, yet again I had misread my environment. A bunch of boring English department cocktail party bullshit ensued. I happened to get off in a corner and began talking with a guy I had never seen before. He had unusually long hair for this era. At this time, as a nation, we were just creeping up on acid rock. A handsome, soft-spoken guy, with, it seemed to me, a hint of a Brooklyn accent. We must have chatted idly, mostly about the people in the room, for about an hour. Oddly, we never introduced ourselves to each other, conversation just flowed. Certainly wasn’t the first time I’d talked to someone at length with no particular place to go – over few beers. About this time, much to my surprise, Ginsberg walked right up to us, kinda glancing at me and turning his back on me and hooking his hand under the guy’s arm right above the elbow. “Let’s go Peter,” he said. Thus began a long week. There was a round of parties every night that week and a few seminars. I’ll just give you a few highlights so we can get on with this. A couple of days elapse. I think it was on the fourth floor of Ballantine Hall. A small seminar room. Only about 10 folks. Two or three department types, couple of Beat wannabes, some knee-socked, plaid-skirted, squeaky clean, straight-A-getting coeds (you knew some, didn’t you?) and me, all of us around a rectangular table. Special, hastily-called seminar on modern American poetry and literature with special focus on beatniks - with Ginsberg and Orlovsky in attendance. The guy leading the seminar led us through the usual academic rigmarole where we all pretend to know what we’re talking about. Honestly, I didn’t know a hell of a lot about the Beats at the time – still fascinated with and kinda stuck in, the 18th century. I was slow coming up to modern literary speed. So, I was mostly mum. And I only came close to blowing my coffee all over the standard-collegiate-issue-non-athletic-department light oak conference table one time that morning. The almost spirited discussion had bounced around, Kerouac, Corso, William Carlos Williams, Ferlinghetti, Burroughs, nothing one would not expect. We Howled a little. Place in the American literature canon, social significance, blah, blah, blah. When our leader, seminar that is, turned to Peter, who had also been relatively quiet – oh, except when we were discussing the lyrics to Dylan’s Mr., Tambourine Man, he waxed moderately eloquent about the “take me disappearing through the smokerings of my mind” line – asked if he had anything to add about Burroughs, about whom Ginsberg had just been expostulating. He looked down, thought a minute, lifted his eyes and his face brightened and said, “Yeah, he can’t have an orgasm unless you fuck him in the ass.” Have you ever been a room with a bunch of people where it was really quiet? You can hear breathing? Have you seen those cartoons where a character’s tongue and jaw drop to the floor when they are totally surprised by something? I swear two of the inevitably A-getting coeds panties bounced off their knee socks with a cartoonish boing before they retreated to the netherworld of the plaid-skirted confluence of their ivory thighs. Okay I don’t really know for sure about the ivory part. It actually got hotter in the room from the heat generated by the red faces. I thought I was going to choke stifling my laughter. I couldn’t look at Gerry Rabkin as I knew he would be in the same state. He was a savvy Brooklynite, Ohio State grad who taught history of film and protest drama. And was doing some research (yeah, right) at The Kinsey Institute. Let’s skip the rest of the week, okay? Some other stuff did happen. Denis and I cooked a Greek meal etc. I had a cameo in an art film where I sat in the middle of the room on the floor – in the room where I slept at Denis’ - and a naked belly dancer with flame-red pubic hair – waving at my eye level - danced around me, to Middle Eastern music she had brought with her, while I read the Marquis de Sade and ignored her. We had to shoot that ignoring part a few times. Usual 60’s stuff. We’re at Gerry and Joan Rabkin’s place. Last party of the week. Joan was a good barber and usually cut my hair. Somewhere around mid party we were in their bedroom and she was cutting my hair. A bunch of folks were in there with us. Amiable moderately drunken party rapping transpiring as she snipped. She said she was finished in her spiffy British accent, and I was ready to get up when Peter came in the room and said, “Joan, aren’t you going to shave his neck? Nevermind, I will.” He returned from the bathroom, next room over, with some shaving cream and a razor and a towel. “Take your shirt off.” I did. He lathered me up and began shaving. One of those bizarre coincidences occurred that I’m sure you’ve all experienced. All of a sudden, it was just the two of us in the room. Peter and me. Strangely, everyone had drifted away to something they thought more interesting than watching a haircut. Last person out of the room had closed the door. Peter was wrapping up and wiping me down with a towel when the door burst open. Ginsberg! I was half-naked and Peter was abluting me. Had an uneasy feeling about the upshot of this. Have you ever had someone really say “AHA!” to you? I hadn’t either. Until then. He slammed the door behind him as he left. Oh, no, we ain’t done yet. An hour or so elapsed, party time, so who knows how long it really was. I had to pee. Knocked on the bathroom door. Voice said for me to come in. I did. Julius was on the porcelain throne, suit pants and shorts around his ankles. Peter was bending over him, counseling him to take a dump. Apparently Julius was somewhat…er… defecation challenged and needed to be coaxed to perform in an acceptable location like, say, for instance, a toilet. He was recalcitrant. Peter asked if I would help him in his exhortations. Hey, I’m a team player! I sat down on the edge of the bathtub and we began cheering and encouraging evacuation. Clapping of hands and words of sustenance. Door to the bathroom flew open. Ginsberg. Damn, this was the only two- “Aha!” night of my entire life! Another door slam. More party elapsed. Some folks asked Suzan and me to do some songs. We were all in a circle on the living room floor, maybe a dozen of us. Suzan singing and me playing and singing harmony. Ginsberg had been paying particular attention to Suzan. Gosh, I wonder why. He was sitting between us on the floor. Never turned to me. Clapped wildly when she would finish a song and embraced her. Once told me to shut up when I was singing harmony as he couldn’t hear her. About an hour of this stuff. Finally, Ginsberg finally turned to me and said. “Someone told me you are a writer. Tell me what you write.” I was somewhat taken aback. When I was young and even stupider than I am now, I had this conviction that I could not talk about something while I was working on it or I would never finish it. I told him that. Told him the name of what I was working on - Prometheus Rebound- and that it was an absurd novelette and said that was all I was going to say. He said something like – I’m not really sure – “Pah!” He stood up and went and got Peter. They said their good-byes to everyone in the room but me. Oh, Peter did wave at me. Closed the door behind them and left. Door burst open…a few words, door slammed, loop tape. Okay, I got that off my chest, next entry, food, I promise!

I bid you to continue telling us about your early Hoosier culinary training -- just don't leave the state! ← Well, okay, then! Just as soon as I catch up on a little real work here, I'll continue with my episodic misadventures in Indiana!

Thanks for the kudzus, Rachel. At that age most of my mantras revolved, not in the orbital sense, around women. March 1965? Bloomington, Indiana. Part of most days was spent bartending in Nick's English Hut. And parts of every weekday were spent in Ballentine Hall, home of the English Dept., on the Indiana University campus. Attempting to wrest a degree from them. Also cooked a lot with my old friend Denis Kelly, among others. (He has authored some really neat cookbooks - look him up on Amazon.) I do have some stories from here. If Maggie is not going to use them in my series, I'll do some elucidation in this thread. Maggie? I await your bidding.

I made the glazed doughnuts in my stepfather's bakeries in both Evansville and Richmond. Cranked out toroids of batter from a hopper over a vat of fat. Turned them with charred wooden sticks. lifted them out on their rack and then glazed them with a gallon pitcher over a large stainless bowl. I smelled like doughnuts all the time. Couldn't stand looking at doughnuts for many years thereafter. I like 'em fine now.

Nope, not the Leland - this was a bona fide *motel.* All right, maybe this will help segue to the next segment. There was Dieter, the chef, Gunther, the manager, Dwayne, the ample-bellied sous chef and me. No waiters, just waitresses. Dieter and Gunther often spoke German knowing none of the locals could parlez. I got a lot of insight here, for I had not listed the fact on my application that I studied German for four years in high school. Hid my linguistic lights under a barrel. A lot of the time I couldn’t figure out what language Dwayne was attempting to speak. His favorite joke was “I got the (sp.?) moscus – everything I eat turns to shit.” Dieter had quite a temper. He was not overfond of the waitresses. The menu tended toward the Midwestern and the Teutonic. Heavy on meat and potatoes. I learned how to grill some steaks here (a highly underrated skill) . Ate my first rare New York strip here. There was no going back to the exsanguine leather of my youth. I learned how to bake a potato – no foil ever. I learned how to sauté vegetables and a few seafood dishes. Just those three bits of knowledge started me off on the right foot. Even though I was underage, I also learned how to tend bar here, a skill which served me in good stead during my college career (I lied on my application.) On slow nights, because I earned much less than the real bartender. Gunther was nothing if not frugal. Gunther and Dieter used to say really nasty things about the waitresses, auf Deutsche, of course. I would occasionally clue the waitresses in when this or that hammer was about to fall. I actually endeared myself to a couple of them. Getting involved with waitresses, though, most often proves a Sisyphean endeavor. Trust me on this one. I almost (I think) had the 13-year old American boy’s ultimate fantasy realized. I think this is more or less still the theme is just about every second porn movie made today (I haven't realy kept up with this genre as assiduously as I should have, I must admit); this was certainly true of the black and white’s I saw in the grimy basement of the VFW on Sunday afternoons during my misspent youth. There was a mysterious, attractive middle-aged woman staying in one of the motel rooms. I would take her steak and potato to her every evening. (Oh, yeah, I did room service, too.) She was very pleasant and a very good tipper. She usually wanted me to stay and chat. These talks were cut short because I had to get back to the kitchen or the dining room. Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention I also bused the tables. Which leads us to the almost denouement. I was out front bussing one evening when her order came in. Dwayne, who had been unrelenting in his salacious remarks about the Mystery Lady and me, decided he would take the food to her room and check her out. A half-hour later the girl from the motel’s front desk was up in Gunther’s face asking who he had take the food to the room. The woman was outraged and wanted her “regular” room service waiter. Sigh. I think Dwayne scared her away. The next night she was gone. After work Dieter, Dwayne and I would head out to a local tavern sorta cum restaurant, I think it was called Connie’s, owned by a Greek. Their menu was, you guessed it, steaks, but with the addition of Greek salads, and their beer on tap was Wurzburger, a dark, frothy locally brewed quaff. I liked it. A lot. This beer was not at all what one gets in Europe. It was ice cold and served in a huge frosted stein. I used to pick Dieter’s brain at these sessions. I’d ask him questions about some of the things I’d seen him doing throughout the evening. It was culinary school. Dwayne told dirty jokes. Dieter was a good chef and his strong suit in my mind was his work ethic. But, there was that temper. I left the Bide-a-Wee Steak and Potato Emporium after he threw a 10-inch chef’s knife at one of the swinging doors between the kitchen and dining room – it stuck, vibrating, right behind the waitress who had just exited. Aren't you sorry you asked? Oh, the name is the same I remember - The Spudnut Shop. But, the facade looks much more handsome than the kinda shoddy joint I frequented.