Happy Thanksgiving – What a Year It Has Bean

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ELV note: Anyone who knows us, knows that Thanksgiving is our favorite day of the year.  It is a distinctly American holiday that, despite every retail and marketing effort to the contrary, has yet to be  co-opted by capitalism and bad taste. Thanksgiving is all about food, family and friends and that’s it. As much as we love the holiday, though, this year has been a tough one. Illness, death(s) in the family, a busted toe(!), and lots of angst over everything from politics to getting old — a year of false starts.

Still, there is much to be thankful for:

  •  I still have my eyesight.
  • I didn’t get any fatter in the last year, and may actually dropped a few pounds.
  • I’m more regular than a Swiss train.

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  • I took up golf again…and may be progressing past the “old man hacker” level.
  • I walk more in a day than most people do in a week.
  • Those funerals meant spending more time with my family — one of the ironies of growing old.
  • My kids and grand-kids are doing splendidly.
  • Making some new friends and continuing to enjoy many old ones.
  • I’m now drinking even more expensive wine — thanks to Mom and Dad.
  • My wife continues to grow more beautiful.
  • We’re cooking more and restauranting less. (It was time.)
  • Neither The Food Gal® nor I have lost our sense of adventure. We will not go gentle into that good night, and neither should you.
  • And finally, I’m thankful that, for the tenth year in a row, we will NOT be making a turkey. This year’s theme is Britsgiving: featuring a feast inspired by the countries from which the Pilgrims escaped and the foods they were fleeing. Pheasant and beef Wellington will be on the menu, plus Spotted Dick and a Stilton Cheese the size of my head. Turkey is for the birds.

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Regardless of the asperity sprinkled throughout the past months, Thanksgiving is a time to feast and remember all the good things, like “The World’s Greatest String Bean Recipe” — which we now publish for the 19th year in a row.  As usual, we do this by including not one, not two, but THREE recipes (from its origins in the 50s to an updated, more gastronomic version. Make them once, your Thanksgiving table will never again be without these sweet and sour luscious legumes.

And remember: satisfaction guaranteed or your money back!

Before we get to cookin’, you might like to tune in here, where, in 2010, we explore the origins of this essential T-Day feast.

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GRANDMA SCHROADER’S SOUR BEANS (KNPR Version)

1. Fry and crumble a pound of bacon….which is really more than you’ll need, but half of it will miraculously disappear as you complete the recipe.

2. Take one 10 oz. package of frozen, French cut green beans. Microwave them for a few minutes (drain) and put ‘em in a nice serving bowl.

3. Bring to a boil:
1/2 cup vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp. of salt
1 chopped up onion

4. Now this is the hard part so pay attention…Pour everything over the beans and garnish with whatever bacon hasn’t miraculously disappeared from your kitchen counter.

5. Serve hot, cold or any temperature in-between.

GRANDMA SCHROADER’S SOUR BEANS  (Authentic, Straight from the 50s Recipe):

2 cans green beans
1/4 lb. Bacon

Fry and crumble bacon

Bring to a boil:
1/4 cup vinegar
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. Salt
chopped onion

pour over green beans
garnish with bacon

 My Slightly More Gastronomic(?) Recipe

Fry and crumble a pound of good pepper-crusted bacon – which is more than you’ll need, but half of it will have miraculously disappeared before you use it as a garnish.

Trim and french-cut 12 oz. of fresh green beans. Cook (steam or par boil without salt) until tender. Drain and  put them in a nice serving bowl.

While the beans are steaming or simmering or microwaving, bring to a boil 1/2 cup red wine vinegar, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 teaspoon of salt and one medium chopped onion (chopped not too fine).

Now here’s the hard part so pay attention: after the sugar/vinegar/onion mixture has come to a full boil, pour the entire mixture over the cooked green beans and garnish with as much crumbled bacon as your cardiologist allows.

Serve hot, cold or any temperature in between. These beans co-exist wonderfully with any Thanksgiving dinner, and if you serve them once, you’ll serve them every year.

No matter which version you make, it is virtually idiot-proof, and won’t take you more than fifteen minutes. (Frying the bacon takes the longest and you can do that hours, or even days ahead. But good bacon is a must.)

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By now, you are probably besotted and bored by legumes. So we’ll beat it from beauteous beans soon enough pilgrim, but not before we refer you to one last homage to Phaseolus vulgaris– and reveal one final surprise.

As it turns out, neither Grandma Hazel Schroader, nor our mother, nor anyone related to the Schroader or Curtas clans had anything to do with Grandma Schroader’s Sour Beans. Turns out they came from a neighbor lady (Fran Kesler) who clipped out the recipe and gave it to our mother (Ruth Curtas) sometime in the late 50s while we were living on Via Venetia Avenue in Winter Park (Florida, not Colorado).

Ah the 50s….when cryptic recipes were clipped and shared across the back fence, to the sounds of kids getting dirty outdoors and moms mixing the martinis.

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No matter who invented them, Grandma Schroader’s Sour Beans is a recipe destined for your Thanksgiving table. They won’t taste the same this year without my mother telling me how I’ve done them wrong, but I’ll be serving them in her honor, nonetheless.

Happy Thanksgiving….and remember:

Every man is rich or poor according to the proportion between his desires and his enjoyments. – Samuel Johnson
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Happy F*cking Thanksgiving

Governor Sisolak signs bill ensuring mail-in voting for Nevadans next election | KSNV(Trust me, I’m the Gubernator)

God I wish there was more to be thankful for this year….but when it comes to being grateful, my toasting cup is almost empty.

For the past 6  years we’ve cooked increasingly elaborate meals for a crowd ranging from 15-20 hungry souls. This year there will be six of us.

Friends as diverse as a 70 year old regular to 40 year old couples to a and healthy-as-a-horse 25 year old Millennial have begged off, citing, “I really don’t feel comfortable going to people’s houses” as the reason.

In other words, boneheaded government and fear-stoking media have done their jobs well(?) — continuing to convince a large segment of the public that this “pandemic” is as dangerous as the Bubonic Plague and Polio rolled into one.

Groupthink and fear are powerful tools. Perspective takes time and thoughtfulness, two things politicians abhor. At this point it will take a mighty strong vise to break the grip of these things on people’s psyches. Or a vaccine.

All we at ELV know is that common sense and logic haven’t worked. Even if a statistically tiny portion of people are getting infected (67 per 100,000 population in Clark County, Nevada at last count), and an even tinier number are actually dying from it, people’s sense of health and safety has been shaken to the core.

We shudder to think how long it will take to return things to normal.

So, rather than giving thanks this year, mostly all we have to give is concern — worrying for the future of so many things we hold dear. But that doesn’t mean we can’t still raise a glass to those who deserve a chorus of huzzahs for all we’ve been through this year. And so, with all the enthusiasm of man being led to the gallows, here they are:

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A toast to Las Vegas! Sin City, the boulevard of broken dreams, now broken. Thirty years of progress reduced to a ghost town in mere months. Now, it is a sad shell of itself — a convention city without conventions, empty and without purpose. Though conventions may be gone, our giant, forlorn hotels still beckon them with empty rooms, unused spaces, and the defeated countenance of twenty vertical Titanics about slip beneath the waves and into the sands of time. (Mix. That. Metaphor!)

Three cheers to all of the restaurant owners and workers who have kept up a game face through one bone-headed shutdown order after another. More than anyone, they have seen and felt the insanity over the past nine months. How any of them can smile about anything at this juncture is beyond me.

Carolyn Goodman is mom before mayor for adopted children | Las Vegas Review-Journal(She’s everything Sisolak isn’t: smart and nice)

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A clink of the martinis to Carolyn Goodman (full disclosure: my client), who got things right back in the Spring and got crucified for it on social media. Las Vegas needed to open up and it did, to none of the plague-like, super-spreader consequences so many were predicting. To all of those who vilified her, we wish nothing more for you than a day of eating crow.

Let us hoist a cup (or three) to the nimrods and know-nothings, to the knuckledraggers and the MAGA hat-wearing, face mask dismissing, rock-hard conservatives who pointedly politicized this Covid crisis by objecting to the government ruining people’s lives (and livelihoods) in the name of keeping them “safe.” Not since the Vietnam logic of “We had to destroy the village in order to save it,” has government stupidity been writ so large before us. Without these noisy conservatives, no one would be calling out these continuing affronts to common sense and human freedom.

A Toast GIFs | Tenor

While we’re at it, let’s pop some corks tomorrow for all the liberals — those folks who really really care about everyone — who want government to do its utmost (at whatever cost) to fight the virus. Every yin needs a yang, and every selfish, libertarian asshole needs the counterpoint of some clueless do-gooder who thinks she can save the world.

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And speaking of cluelessness, let’s bend the elbow for our Gubernator in Chief, Steve Sisolak, who reminds us of a burly bear caught in the headlights of his own contradictions. He hasn’t gotten anything right yet, but dadgummit, he’s still trying to fight Mother Nature with the only tool he has: seating arrangements.

gif movie alfred hitchcock glass apartment toast 1954 james stewart Hitchcock rear window hollywoodmarcia •

Finally, let us drink to 2020, to the death counts, the infection rates, the curve-flattening, the hyperbolic media, and the gullible public. To social media that fanned these flames. To people jogging and driving with masks on. To those huddled in their caves. To the constant stream of fear-mongering that millions swallowed hook, line, and sinker, never thinking to ask, “Why don’t they show us all the people who have recovered from Covid? Or at least mention them?” Here’s to all of this and all of them, for they got exactly what they deserved…even if the rest of us didn’t.

And, because it IS Thanksgiving, we should take stock of how grateful we are for the things that we truly are thankful for. In my life, today, these would include:

A 96 year old mother who is as spry and sharp as she was at 50.

Two wonderful sons who have found two quality women to share their lives with.

Totally adorable grand-kids.

A wife who puts up with me.

A job that is a perfect fit for this time in my life.

A house that I love.

Good friends, both new and old.

All those who follow me on social media, and you who are reading these words right now. Though blogs and blogging have diminished across the board over the past ten years (and Covid will be the death of food writing), I still cherish what few “regs” I have who take the time to read my stuff and reach out to me when they can. G. B. Shaw once said, “There is no love sincerer than the love of food,” and by that token, there are no more fascinating people than those who share a love of good food and drink.

A closet full of decent wine whenever I’m thirsty.

Along those lines: Mail order wine…and food….because the selections in both in this town basically suck harder than a Sisolak presser.

My health.

My wife’s health.

My wife’s body.

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The restaurants of Las Vegas and all who work in them.

And for Las Vegas itself I am thankful — a town with which have have had a 40 year love-hate relationship, but has allowed me to pursue my passion for 25 years, and gain a great deal of notoriety in doing so.

For these and many other things I am eternally beholden for what they bring to my life on a daily basis.

On a sour note, for this year of Covid idiocy, I wish nothing more than a bucket of rancid natural wine, and a salmonella-infected slab of putrid headcheese. Here’s to you, 2020:

Happy F*cking Thanksgiving

A Very Chile Thanksgiving

I’m about as Mexican as Donald Trump.

Don’t speak Spanish and have only been to the country twice in my life.

The only Spanish I know is, “Dos cervezas, por favor,” “Buenos dias,” and “Muchos gracias.” (I guess I speak a little tequila too, but that’s a different subject.)

The only Mexicans I’ve ever interacted with are people who work in restaurants or on my house. To them, I do a lot of loud talking (because that ALWAYS makes them understand my English better), punctuated by many buenos diases and muchos graciases. No matter how stupid I sound, however, they invariably smile at me and keep working.

I think I fell in love with the Mexican people during a family road trip my family took through the country in 1965, and no amount of inflammatory immigration rhetoric, drug wars, or negative stereotypes will ever cool my ardor for the country.

Speaking of stereotypes, the only ones I think should apply are how great looking and hard working they are. Plus, they have the happiest music on earth.

And great soap operas.

The thing about Mexican soap operas is, you can watch any scene any time, and I guarantee there will be two or three of the best looking people on earth chatting about something. As you watch, you’ll be thinking to yourself, “Damn, I didn’t think human beings could get any better looking than that.” Then, two more people will walk into scene who are even prettier than the three you’ve been looking at! Try it sometime, with or without the sound on. (It works even if you’re looking at the men too, but I’m usually not paying attention to them.)

Our handyman Ulysses once told me I was a güero not a gringo and I considered this quite a compliment. (Gueros are white guys; gringos are white guys Mexicans don’t think much of, is how he put it.)

My closest connection to Mexico is through its food. It is a cuisine that both fascinates and intimidates me, with an inscrutability only the Chinese can match.

To say I love Mexican food would be a serious understatement. But the food captivating me has little to do with the tacos-burritos-enchiladas triumvirate most people associate with this cuisine — they being to true Mexican cuisine what hamburgers-hot dogs-pizzas are to American.

It is a shameful fact that most Americans have little knowledge of the Mexican states — areas as diverse as Montana is from Mississippi — and this ignorance extends to the food of these areas. Part of this sad state of affairs can be laid squarely at the feet of Mexican-American restaurateurs who, like their Italian, Greek, Indian, and Chinese counterparts, adapted the food of their native land to a one-size-fits-all template to pander to American tastes. As a result, with few exceptions in some big cities and barrios, you are as unlikely to find a Puebla, Oaxaca, or Yucatan  Mexican restaurant as you are a Republican in a sombrero.

That’s why I make my own.

And that’s why this Thanksgiving we are featuring the foods from Mexico and New Mexico at our table.

No canned cranberry sauce at the palatial Curtas manse. No sirree. This year we went all-in with chiles galore (see picture at top of page), with the centerpiece of our Thanksgiving table being a molé poblano.

And to cook such an ambitious dish (20+ separate ingredients and 10 different techniques) we started at Cardenas Market.

If you’ve never been, Cardenas is a revelation. Unlike American supermarkets, it’s aisles are stocked with foods made for people who actually cook. The produce department alone is twice the size of any gringo grocery store in town, and people’s carts are filled with fresh food, not ready-to-be-reheated crap.

Like I said, that produce is fascinating and inscrutable….but it’s also beautiful:

But there’s always a helpful employee on hand to explain things to you, and give you a taste. Whether you cook Latin American foods or not, if you’re into cooking or just great food, you ought to spend an hour strolling the aisles of Cardenas. It is, by far, the best Latin American market I’ve found in Las Vegas, and the house-made fresh tortillas are worth a trip all by themselves.

To make a molé, a trip to Cardenas is essential. It is the only place to gather the dizzying variety of chiles, nuts, spices and vegetables comprise this intense, multi-layered sauce. Before we get to those, an overview of how we spice up our Thanksgiving is in order. (As of this writing — two days before Thanksgiving — we’ve been three times and a forth trip is planned for tomorrow.) Here’s our menu as it stands now:

The Starters

Spiced jicama

Chile garbanzos

Fresh fried warm tortilla chips (so much better than what you get in a bag)

Guacamole (made at the last possible minute, as it should be)

Chile con queso (from scratch, natch)

Four salsas — tomatillo chile verde, tres chiles with red beans, roasted tomato “Romana”, and arbol-pasilla red chile

The Vegetables

Calabacitas — New Mexican zucchini-corn

Red chile mashed potatoes

Arroz Verde — Mexican Green Rice

Esquites — Corn con crema with epazote

Grandma Schroader’s sour beans (a German interloper, but essential at all my Thanksgivings)

Lots of tortillas (from Cardenas, of course!)

The Proteins

Traditional turkey with sausage stuffing

Ancho chile-rubbed turkey with poblano molé

New Mexican pork posole

New Mexican (beef) green chile stew (which contains a buttload of these deceptively fiery little monsters):

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The Desserts

Flan

Trés Leches cake

Chocolate Trés Leches cake

Mexican dark chocolate tart

As for that molé, all I can say is, I slaved away for an entire day, and I hope people eat it with a grand olé!

Seriously though, it was a lot of work. A labor of love if you like standing on your feet for hours on end, toasting spices, soaking chilies, chopping this and blending that. A pain in the ass if you do not.

The nuts alone will drive you nuts — toasting them, chopping them, cooking them, pureeing them, and straining them — all to make a smooth paste which gives the sauce that certain je n’ais ce quoi.

Without going all recipe nerd on you, I’ll recount the steps just to show you how labor intensive the process is:

First you toast the chiles, which gives you a mess of crackly brown stuff:

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Then you soak, toast, saute, blend and toss until your arms fall off.

After that is the batch cooking (of all of these disparate ingredients) that seems to take half a day.

What you end up with is a big ugly brew: a stew of three chiles, multiple nuts, fruit both dried and fresh, herbs out the yin yang, and spices galore. Various alliums add their accents, and three or four hours after you started, you’ve got a mess that looks like this:

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Which, after more cooking, looking, stewing and straining:

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…. will eventually look like this:

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The dish has more than a little in common with the great spiced stews of Indian cuisine (dots not feathers), and the complexity and intensity is almost overwhelming.

Is it worth it? To anyone who loves the alchemy of cooking, yes. To the average casual cook? Not in a million years. To the diner? Of course, even if 98% of them will have no clue what went into the making it. Some will note the depth, the complexity, the soul-warming essence filling their olfactories; others will be vaguely aware of these things in passing. Both groups will gobble it up in a few minutes. And therein lies the pleasure for the cook. As with any art or craft, the pleasure must come from the making of it, not the end result. If the final product is spectacular, more’s the better. But the satisfaction, as pure and deep as those flavors you created, is in having done it — in creating a whole greater than the sum of its parts. This is the cook’s reward.

Thanksgiving is the one holiday American media and marketing hasn’t managed to ruin. It is solely about food, family and friends, and no matter how hard they try, they can’t really commercialize it. Cultures the world over think about food 365 days a year, while America sets one day aside in late November. We should be thankful for this — for a holiday so tasty that the only people profiting from it are food purveyors. No matter what your table looks like, I hope you take some pleasure in creating it, and thank the people who made all that delicious food possible. Especially the Mexicans.

Happy Thanksgiving!

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