Sheer Khurma, a Ramadan feast food

At the sighting of the new moon, Muslims around the world began the holy month of Ramadan. I’m familiar with the holiday because of my friends and former Post workers Rahman Gholam, originally from Bangladesh, and C.B. Hanif, former oped editor from the U.S.

Both are practicing Muslims and both active in interfaith councils and activities here in South Florida. From them, I learned a great deal about the religion and the foods used in their holiday feasts.

Ramadan requires participants to fast daily sunrise until sundown, when families break the fast with a fairly light meal, shared with friends and extended family, and spend time in prayer and spiritual reflection.

One of the dishes served during this time is Sheer Khurma (or sheer korma, meaning “milk with dates”), a sweet custardy dish, made with vermicelli noodles, rice, and dried fruits. Exotically spiced with cardamom and saffron, and with a crunchy nut garnish, it’s a taste of the Middle East that’s seldom served in restaurants.

There are a plethora of variations on this recipe as different parts of the Muslim world make it using ingredients indigenous to their own lands.

Here’s one English adaptation, using sweetened condensed milk. You can cut back on the sugar by 1/2 cup if you like, without ruining the texture. The spices and other ingredients can be found in Middle Eastern or international markets.

Shahi Sheer Khurma

• 1 teaspoon oil
• 1 tablespoon butter (ghee is traditionally used)
  
• 1 teaspoon cardamom powder or 6 to 8 green cardomom seeds, crushed
  
• 1 cup dry vermicelli, broken
• 1 quart whole milk
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 6 to 8 dry dates, chopped
• 2 tablespoons basmati or jasmine rice, ground slightly
  
• ½ cup sweetened condensed milk
• 1 tablespoon raisins or
  For garnish:
• 1/2 cup dried fruits (golden raisins, chopped apricots, currants)
• Pinch of saffron
• Slivered blanched almonds, cashews or pistachios, optional

In a skillet over medium heat, put oil and butter; stir till melted and heated. Add cardamom powder or seeds. When cardamom becomes aromatic, add vermicelli and fry until lightly browned. Remove from heat.

In a saucpan, combine whole milk and sugar; cook over medium heat until milk starts boiling and sugar dissolves. Add chopped dry dates and rice powder, and cook until rice is well done. Add fried vermicelli and condensed milk and mix well. Add raisins and cook, stirring, until mixture thickens slightly, approximately 15 minutes. Garnish with saffron and chopped dry fruits and nuts.

Variations: Other ingredients commonly used to flavor this dish include aniseseeds, cloves or rose water.

Makes 4-6 servings.

Once again I was invited to help judge the now-annual Steinhoff Chili Cookoff at the West Palm Beach home of Adam and Carly Steinhoff. (And soon-to-be-Steinhoff; Carly’s due Feb. 12.) It was a smaller-than-usual crowd, since several parties here recently had worn out the guest list, and several would-be guests were out of town, but we were no less enthusiastic a group.

Carly always makes Bloody Marys to start – I had my tastebuds set for one, but she switched this year to a pitcher of Tequila Sunrises. Apropos for Adam’s parents, Ken and Lila, who had greeted the sunrise on Lake Worth Beach for New Year’s Day.

Pittsburgh traditions

Pork and sauerkraut /photo by Ken Steinhoff

Photo by Ken Steinhoff

Ashley Kint and Nick Roberts /photo by Ken Steinhoff

Before the chili fun, however, we were treated to a huge crock of pork and sauerkraut  – and mashed potatoes – from Nick Roberts. He and reigning chili champ Ashley Kint are from Pittsburgh, and these foods are traditional there in a very big way. “The whole city eats pork and sauerkraut on New Year’s Day,” Roberts said. “I just talked to my grandmother, and she’s cooking hers right now.”

The mashed potatoes are optional.

Here’s how Roberts makes his pork and sauerkraut: “I got two small pork roasts from WalMart – they come preseasoned. So first you put in a can of Bavarian style sauerkraut, then the pork roasts, then another can of sauerkraut, then 1 onion, chopped up, 2 peeled apples, cored and chopped, and 2 potatoes, peeled and cubed. Then you put on more sauerkraut. Then sprinkle in some brown sugar, pour in a little maple syrup and let it cook for 4or 6 hours.”

The result is delicious tender pork, sweet sauerkraut with a few potatoes, and a wonderful juice that Roberts sops up with mashed potatoes in the bowl underneath it all.

It might become one of my traditions soon, just for dinner.

Chili today, hot tomorrow

The weather was shirt-sleeve friendly, though windy, welcome after many freezing days down here. The Chambers of Commerce around Florida are probably still working on spin control.

Only five chili makers brought their stuff  – we’ve had nearly three times that many in the past. Ashley Kint retained her title of No. 1 chili, with a turkey chili spiked with cinnamon. She explains the recipe: “It has ground turkey, chick peas, black beans, kidney beans, cumin, cinnamon, pepper, a jar of salsa and a block of pepper Jack cheese.”

It was all fun, including the failed attempt at an 11-soda bottle-Mentos rocket salute to 2011. (Wrong Mentos and soda used, but a valiant attempt at unique revelry.)

Home for peas and greens

Back at home for supper, I cooked up the Southern traditions for this day: black-eyed peas, collard greens and baked some thick center-loin pork chops, with only a sprinkling of herbs, to go along with a skillet of cornbread (no sugar). The secret to great loin chops, by the way, is to look for the large tenderloin piece in each chop – it’s tender, delicious and you’re getting what you are paying for.

The meat man at the Winn Dixie on U.S. 1 at Silver Beach Road in Riviera Beach was very helpful in choosing the chops for me (and suggested grilling them). They were on sale, BOGO, even more good luck for my New Year.

I had an extra spoonful of collards, and left the leaves whole this year, hoping for a little more “folding green money” in my coffers in 2011. But still, I’m rich without it, having great family, friends and readers all over the place to share stories and good times. You can’t buy those!

Happy New Year!

Van Aken

Good buddy of mine, Norman Van Aken, is rather erudite for a chef. (I hearing him laughing as we speak, but sorry, having worked with tons of chefs for more than two decades, I’ll allow that their talent is largely in the kitchen – not at a keyboard. Yes, there are exceptions…but it’s not the norm.)

I got caught up in the story he posted on his blog, about fried chicken, Thomas Wolfe, and traveling to the South.

At the end, he posts a recipe for a fried chicken salad. Looks good, and it’s a tasty fried chicken going on there, but it’s not my mom’s.

Fried chicken once a week

Van Aken writes about not eating fried chicken as a child; it wasn’t in his mom’s repertoire.

My household was the exact opposite. When all else failed, eat something fried, and chicken or steak worked equally well. Itwas a staple as in every other Southern household across L.A., ( Lower Alabama), where she grew up. Actually, it was Pensacola, but that part of the state should be annexed over to Alabama, for its affinity to Dixie.

Butterbeans and biscuits

I digress. We ate fried chicken with a plate of biscuits, another plate of sliced ripe tomatoes, and either fried corn, or yellow squash fried with onions, or those fat butterbeans that Norman quotes from the Wolfe story. Fat limas, actually, until summer when we would bring home from Pensacola a freezer full of field peas, and speckled gray butterbeans shared from my Aunt Eleanor’s garden. These were gunmetal gray on the outside, and green on the inside. Aunt Eleanor picked them young – they were a pain to shell. They were so delicious, cooked with a little bacon and a heavy hand of salt – my mother’s trademark – they were well worth the effort.

We’d have mashed potatoes sometimes, but my mother favored rice with chicken. She didn’t bother with gravy for it; we had buttered rice – cooked rather sticky, as I recall. “Rice is nasty — you have to wash it,” she’d say. Within an inch of its life, of course. She always made enough for leftovers to make rice pudding for my father. (I cannot stand the texture of that one dish – it’s likely the only food other than canned fish, or beef liver I won’t eat.)

The Chicken Frying Rules

There are rules to frying a chicken. Use a whole fryer that you cut up yourself. You should have 9 pieces: 2 pieces of breast ; 2 drumsticks; 2 wings; 2 thighs; 1 back. Don’t argue. (Keep the gizzards and liver for a night when you eat fried chicken livers with grits and gravy.)

 Use an iron skillet chicken fryer – it’s 14 inches across and deeper than normal. Don’t argue. Well, OK: You may use one of those Sunbeam electric frying pans from the ’60s. The trick is to maintain an even temperature on the oil (360F.  is ideal). Don’t overcrowd the pan. Don’t be in a rush to turn the chicken, either, once you have it in the pan; let it brown nicely. Use peanut or vegetable oil or a little bacon fat mixed with vegetable oil. Never olive oil and never butter.

Southern fried chicken

• 1 fryer, skin on, cut into pieces
• Milk or buttermilk, 2 or 3 cups
• 1 egg, beaten into the milk
• All-purpose flour, seasoned with salt and black pepper
• Optional: a pinch each of cayenne or garlic powder
• Vegetable or peanut oil for frying

Rinse and pat-dry the chicken. Heat 1 inch of vegetable oil in a 14-inch cast-iron chicken fryer over medium-high heat. If using an electric skillet, set it to 360 degrees.

Pour milk or buttermilk with beaten egg over the chicken in a large bowl. Turn pieces well. Lift pieces of chicken, draining milk back into bowl. Dredge each piece in flour, knocking excess off on side of bowl. Put flour-dredged chicken pieces on a baking sheet, separately.

When oil is hot, dredge chicken again in flour, knocking off excess, a piece at a time. Put chicken into hot oil. Do not crowd the pan; four or five pieces at a time will fit in a 14-inch skillet.

Allow chicken to fry for at least 3 minutes before turning with tongs If oil seems too hot, adjust heat under pan, or move pan off the burner for about 45 seconds. Turn chicken, and continue to fry until nicely browned on all sides.

Remove chicken to newspaper or paper toweling to drain well – do not cover, however, or chicken will steam, making the crust soggy.

If you are making several batches, heat the oven to 200 degrees and place the cooked, drained chicken on a foil-lined baking pan in the oven, uncovered, to keep warm.

Continue to cook until all chicken is cooked; serve with hot, buttered mashed potatoes, and butterbeans or fried corn or fried squash and onions, with hot buttermilk biscuits.

Serves 4 to 8.

Here’s an unusual stuffing, submitted by my friend and a food blogger, Robyn Kalajian.

Robyn Kalajian

She writes: ”Here’s the Armenian version of turkey – or chicken- stuffing that we make every year at Thanksgiving, Christmas, or any time we wish! My mother-in-law, Sylvia Kalajian, made this on a regular basis, as do we, but somehow it tastes extra special when stuffed inside a Thanksgiving or Christmas turkey.”

Armenian Stuffing

• 1/2  lb. ground lamb, beef or turkey
• 1-1/2 cup rice (traditional Uncle Ben’s parboiled rice works well)
• Salt, pepper, and allspice, to taste
• 3 cups warm chicken or beef broth
• 2 tablespoons butter

Brown the meat in a large pot with a little salt, pepper and one tablespoon of water. Drain off any grease.

Add the rice, hot liquid, and butter. Cook, covered, until liquid is absorbed, and rice is tender.

Add the allspice, and more salt and pepper, if desired.

NOTE: This recipe is used as a stuffing for chicken or turkey, but it makes a delicious side dish, as well.

(Robin Kalajian writes about Armenian food and culture on her web site: TheArmenianKitchen.com)

Susan Brustman

By Susan Brustman, Guest Columnist

 When you live in New York, pretty much everything tastes better in the summer.

I remember my dad giving me $5 to get whatever I wanted at Nathan’s in Coney Island. That was a helluva lot of money back in the day.

Nathan's in Coney Island, 1949

I’d go first for the hot dog — popped off a sizzling grill and served in really fresh, warm, soft bun with onions, slightly sweet sauerkraut and Gulden’s mustard – incredibly crisp French fries, cut with a serrated edge to hold the salt and ketchup and served overflowing in a paper cone –  a flat little hamburger with a delicious beefy bite, buried in an avalanche of griddled onions with a touch of sweet pickle relish on a smushy slightly toasted hamburger bun – and, of course, a humongous icy purple grape drink to wash it all down.

A family dinner

It helped that this was a family affair, with my mother, father, sister and I scurrying off in different directions to get our food then meeting in the middle to savor it all together.

The night air — fragrant with cotton candy, steamed corn and frying onions, and the distant sound of a calliope in the background — did much to enhance the experience.

 * * *

Susan Brustman is president of Brustman Carrino Public Relations in Miami, Fl.

By Jane Milza, Guest columnist

It was a sultry, sunny Saturday afternoon when, for the first time, I encountered a slithery, soft-shell crab.

“Here, have one,” said the fish lover standing next to me. In his hand, the legs of the shell-less critter wiggled free of its bread blanket, temptingly shook its naked body, and with a dangling leg seemed to wave to the crowd.

Dubious introduction to this delicacy

My first meeting with a soft-shell crab was a real shocker. The memories have stayed with me for almost a lifetime. All those writhing legs, reaching out in a half-dozen directions as it was lifted from a sizzling grill and gently placed in a soft bun – I had never seen anything quite like it. The sight made me cringe.

It wasn’t until several years later that I decided to write about my experience in the food section I edited for the Staten Island Advance newspaper.

I chose the soft-shell crab as the main topic because it is such a great favorite along the East Coast, especially among New Yorkers.

On the day of the encounter with the soft-shell crab, I didn’t realize the experience would create such a long lasting impression. Some food memories die hard.

It was the first time I met my beau’s family. (At that point, the future was not that certain, but…) The relatives had gotten together for their annual cookout, and the backyard was filled with a dozen cheerful, smiling faces. As a guest, I had been introduced all around.

A wink from the wrong one

Anyway, I barely had time to meet half the folks when this sassy soft-shell crab danced smartly off the grill. Tangoing boldly across the plate, it looked me squarely in the eye — and winked. At that point, I thought, “I can stare down this creature.”

Its beady eyes rolled in my direction as it smugly curled up, snuggling against the soft, warm roll. Okay, so I have a quirky imagination.

Turning to me, the uncle manning the grill said, “This one’s yours!”

“No, I don’t think so,” I politely said, in my best school-girl voice.

“Why, it’s delicious,” said another new-found friendly relative, hoping to bolster my courage. By this time I began to realize, I really was the only outsider. They all loved soft-shell crabs.

The ball by then was in my court, conversationally speaking, so I bit the bullet.

Head, eyes and legs — oh my!

 “How do you eat it?” I asked, still smiling as I glanced sideways at the sly, wiggling crab.

“The whole thing,” was the quick response.

“Legs, head, eyes and all?” I asked, still not believing anyone could or would actually do it.

“Yup!”

“No, I don’t think so,” I said, sounding uncharacteristically demure for the first time in my life.

I had made a full circle, again conversationally speaking, but had advanced not an inch in making friends with these nice people who had invited me to their home.

The “squishiness,” if there is such a word, and the sheer guts needed to chew “the whole thing” – gangling claws, flippers and trailing legs – was just too much for my young mind to fathom.

That day ended without a single snippet of soft-shell crab crossing my lips.

Romance takes time

Yet, life is strange. Little did I know that one day – many years later – I would meet just such another conniving crab who would sweep me off my feet. This sea creature’s line would be to promise me titillating flavor, a siren-like aroma and succulent texture.

On that day, I finally surrendered, gathered up my courage and took my first bite; I found the taste to be surprisingly extraordinary.

The memory of that first tantalizing taste is still with me all these years later.

Oh, by the way, the son in that hospitable, barbecuing family eventually became my husband; and we’ve shared many soft-shell crabs every summer since then.

As the molting season draws near each spring, I look forward to readying the first soft-shell crabs for the grill or watching them sputter in the skillet, all glistening with butter. It’s become an obsession.

Crabs and marriage still sizzling – so to speak

So, if you don’t mind, it’s that time of year again. I think I’ll just ‘toss another soft-shell crab on the barbie’. They taste sooo good.

To this day, I often wonder whether that first sassy, winking shell-less blue claw crab had a hand, not only in my new love of this mouth watering delicacy, but in my long-lasting happy marriage as well.

For those interested in duplicating my experience, I turn to Steven Raichlen’s suggestion for grilling soft-shell crabs at home. His recipe is featured in The Barbecue! Bible. Serve the grilled crabs with your favorite tangy tartar sauce.

Grilled soft-shelled crabs

• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted, or ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• 12 soft-shell crabs, cleaned
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Ask your fish retailer to clean the crabs. Combine the melted butter and lemon juice in a small bowl; whisk to blend. Brush the crabs on both sides with some of the lemon butter and season generously with salt and pepper.

Set up the grill for direct grilling; pre-heat to high.

When ready to cook, brush and oil the grill grate. Arrange the crabs on the hot grate and grill, turning with tongs, until the shells are bright red, about 3 – 6 minutes per side. Brush the crabs with the remaining lemon butter once or twice as they cook.

Transfer the crabs to serving plates or a platter and serve immediately. Accompany with tartar sauce and soft buns, if desired.

(Recipe from Stephen Raichlen’s The Barbecue! Bible, Workman Publishing.)

***

Jane Milza is the long-time food and wine editor of the Staten Island Advance. She’s now freelancing and doing restaurant consultant work, as well as teaching culinary classes.

Scott Simmons

My great-grandmother, Lilla Chason Griffin, was a practical woman.

Granny, born in 1888, made her own mops from cornhusks, and brooms from the broomstraw that grew along the roadsides. She matched her feed and flour sacks to fabric she already had to make dresses, aprons and such.

Lilla Chason Griffin (left) and Lizzie Chason Thompson as teenagers

It wasn’t easy living on the farm in south Georgia. She might’ve already collected eggs and milked a cow or two before breakfast. Evenings would find her sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of her dogtrot farmhouse shelling butter beans or field peas, all the while gossiping with her twin sister, Lizzie, who lived just up the road.

And if her hands weren’t busy doing that, they would have been holding a jar of cream.

Homemade butter churn

Granny didn’t have a churn. Instead, she rocked back and forth, gently shaking a Mason or Ball jar full of cream until it turned to butter.

Once the cream had thickened, she would have salted the butter and spooned it into this mold, patented in 1950 by T.R. Hall of Burlington, N.C.:

The company’s claim to fame: The wing handle made it easy to turn the butter from the mold, and the striped pattern on the inside of the plunger kept the butter from sticking to the plunger.

Vintage – not antique

Chason twins on their 87th birthday

I always had imagined the mold hailed from the early days of aluminum kitchenware, in the 1920s and ’30s, so I was surprised when I learned it was made after 1950.

Granny’s daughter, my grandmother Dorothy, always had the mold proudly displayed on a bookcase, as though it were some treasured artifact. Internet searches find them priced around $20.

It’s not ancient, but what a treasure it is! One look at the mold, and I hear the creak of a rocker and get a hankering for cornbread slathered with homemade butter.

***

Scott Simmons is a South Florida writer whose passion is antique china and glassware. He has written about collectibles for more than 10 years as The Palm Beach Post’s “Look What We Found” columnist. His Kitchen Kollectibles column highlights food and dining ephemera. Write him at scott.simmons.writer@gmail.com.

Family Picnic a Feast – and a Feat

By Regina Messina, guest columnist

My fondest childhood memories involve summertime, food and our annual family picnics.

I’m not talking about your average hamburger and hot dog fete. We are pure-blood Italians.

I mean the break-down and reassembly of my mother’s Brooklyn kitchen into the Anthony Wayne State Park in upstate New York.

The strategic planning involved in executing this yearly event was paramount to the Allies landing on Omaha Beach. We took everything one could possibly need — and then some.

It was all stuffed into my father’s 1952 sky-blue DeSoto along with assorted relatives, and off we would go. In the dark.

A pre-dawn start

We would usually leave about 5 a.m. to make sure we would get a “good spot. To this day, I have no idea what a bad spot would be.

We would drive for what seemed forever. Being a child, I was sure we were somewhere near the Canadian border. The park would just be opening when we would arrive. There were usually about 30 to 40 people in all.

The Messina family - Regina on the right

A cacophony of food

Within five minutes of our arrival the food would begin to flow. It started slow, with potato and roasted pepper frittatas, assorted focaccia, hard rolls and bacon. It would build to a crescendo as the day wore on. The macaroni pots (we didn’t call it pasta back then) were up on the park grills alongside the sauce pots for the homemade ravioli.

The sausage came in three varieties: hot, sweet, and cheese and parsley. There were pots of veal and mushrooms, chicken pesto, Italian potato salad, peppers and onions and something called giamborte — a Genovese vegetable dish similar to a stew. Of course there was plenty of wine and beer to wash everything down.

Pinochle by candlelight

After hours of eating, dessert was served. This course filled an entire table with care taken to ensure that every category was fairly represented.

Darkness would fall but the pinochle games would go on with the glow of candlelight. We didn’t leave until the ranger came to close the park.

Farther when I was young

Years later I bought my first house 45 miles north of Brooklyn in a quiet hamlet outside the city. One day, while driving on the Palisades Parkway two exits north of my new home, I spied a sign that said “Anthony Wayne Recreation Area next exit.”

I guess we didn’t drive to Canada after all.

By Larry Carrino, Guest Columnist

Kon-Tiki Resort

Though growing up in Miami Shores I had a family of my own, as a teenager I was blessed to be “adopted” by my friend Steve’s mother and father.  He has an amazing, tight-knit Southern family – full of great cooks and outdoorsmen.

Those two specialties merged beautifully each summer when his entire clan practically rented out the Kon-Tiki Resort in Islamorada, Fla. 

Fishing in the Keys

I had never been to the Keys and was thrilled to be invited along. In the morning I’d wake and climb on Uncle Glenn’s boat and hit the water, fishing for snapper. Even as a novice fisherman I did okay, but was more successful cutting bait fish, I think, than hauling in fish. 

After a full day in the sun and with coolers brimming with our fresh catch, we’d head back to the resort for showers, ice cold drinks and the tastiest fish fry I’ve ever experienced. 

 Fish and hush puppies -nothing better

The snappers were filleted, rolled in a glorious mix of flour and cornmeal and dropped into vats of bubbling oil.  Steve’s mother and grandmother would dish up the delights – scooped out of the oil onto plates lined with paper towels – along with homemade hush puppies, tartar sauce, fresh veggies, mac n’ cheese and coleslaw. 

Dessert was usually a buttery pound cake served with homemade vanilla ice cream. 

Back then and probably to this day, it doesn’t get any better. 

 Larry Carrino is vice president of Brustman Carrino Public Relations in Miami.  The company specializes in culinary and hospitality public relations and marketing.  www.brustmancarrinopr.com  

Turkey’s for Thanksgiving – not bratwurst

I got a note this week from my buddy Tom Sears – a former colleague (sports desk copy chief ) at The Palm Beach Post. He’s a die-hard Wisconsin native, Milwaukee born, and is as passionate about his beautiful, green, lake-flecked state as I am about my Florida.

The Packers, the Brewers, hating Chicago, loving cheese, ice fishing, and of course, bratwurst — they’re very much a part of Tom.

‘Yuck’

That was the subject of his e-mail. I opened it, and my hand holding my Blackberry was scorched by Tom’s invectives. He was truly fired up.

Here’s the sanitized, expletive-deleted version:

I should have known better, but yesterday I bought a package of turkey bratwurst from Winn-Dixie. Shady Brook Farms makes them. I cooked two on my grill for supper; I ate half of one, threw out the other one I cooked and then immediately tossed the rest of the package.

It was perhaps the worst-tasting piece of (bleep) I’ve ever eaten.

 If you get the temptation to buy any, please resist. It gives bratwursts everywhere a bad name.

I cannot allow these things to be sold under the name of bratwurst! People who buy them may get a complete misperception of Wisconsin and its residents. No self-respecting Wisconsinite would ever eat one of those things. I should be assassinated for even buying them.

First five words says it all

You just don’t mess with some foods — or the natives who eat them. Leave Chicago pizza alone – and don’t try to sell a Yank from New Haven, Conn., on it. Don’t fool with Virginia ham. California may grow peaches, but a Georgian won’t even acknowledge them.

And for heaven’s sake, don’t make green or (she shudders) flamingo pink Key lime pie and try to get me to eat it.

So: He of all people should have known better. Brats are pork and beef (sometimes the veal version of beef).  Turkey is for Thanksgiving. So says Tom, the Wisconsin son.

Now for his story.

Summer means brats on the grill and a ball game

By Tom Sears, guest columnist

Old County Stadium

Ah, I have wonderful memories of grilling brats with my dad after a ball game on Sunday afternoon in Milwaukee at old County Stadium.

Grilling bratwursts (aka Wisconsin’s soul food) is a tradition much like Friday night fish fries at the corner tavern and even top-flight restaurants.

For me, the fondest memories were after the games of the old Milwaukee Braves while I was growing up and then later the Milwaukee Brewers at old County Stadium. Both my folks died before the new stadium, Miller Park (whose naming rights were bought by the brewery, as you probably could guess) was built.

A cribbage board

When we were kids, the gathering would include the whole family (dad, mom, sister and my two brothers, and all six of us would go to the game). After us kids grew up and moved away, the gatherings as a family became less frequent, but that made the cookouts more special. For me, my summer vacations, and those Sunday afternoon games with my dad and then cooking out afterward, followed by a couple of games of cribbage, are memories that will stay with me forever.

Treat brats gently!

After we got home from the game, my dad would get the grill going in the driveway or in the garage (with the door open, of course) and my mom would start working on the side dishes, which she had prepared in advance. After lighting the charcoal, you gently simmer –  never, ever boil, just simmer — the brats in the liquid of your choice (it’s usually beer) and a chopped up onion. My dad would also occasionally chop up a couple of cloves of garlic and drop them in the liquid.

After simmering the brats for 20 minutes, they are ready to go on the grill. The charcoal, by this time, should be white hot. The brats should be turned occasionally with tongs until they are a golden brown. I cook mine for about 10 minutes. My dad always said it was important to stand and watch the brats cook (all the while holding a bottle of beer, of course). This was to guard against any sudden burst of flame, which could burn and ruin the bratwursts. Brats should never be cooked until the skins are black. This is not good.

 A ban on yellow mustard

While the brats were cooking, my mom would set up the picnic table on the east side of the house, where we would be in the shade. Side dishes would include macaroni salad (made with Miracle Whip, never mayo!!!), perhaps baked beans, either German or American potato salad, a relish plate of green onions, pickles, olives, celery and carrot sticks, etc., and potato chips. When the brats were done, they were put in a bratwurst bun  — never a hot dog bun; you MUST use a bratwurst bun, which is a little bigger than a hot dog bun.

For condiments, I always just use chopped up raw onions and brown mustard (never, ever, ever yellow mustard and never, ever ketchup. That is a no-no). Some people use hot dog relish, but I never did. Many people also put sauerkraut on their brats, but we didn’t. At Miller Park (and before that County Stadium), however, it is quite acceptable, even chic, to put Stadium Secret Sauce on your brat (or Polish, Italian or hot dog). Yellow mustard is not available anywhere in the stadium. Yellow mustard is an insult to any Wisconsinite.

For dessert, what else but watermelon?

It’s always bratwurst season

You do not need a reason or a season to grill bratwursts outside. Any ballgame (Brewers, Packers, Badgers) is a reason to grill out. Maybe people grill out in their back yards before Packers game, and they have a couple of bratwursts before the game starts, so they feel they are at the stadium and they have their own little backyard tailgate party before watching the game on TV.

A nice spring, summer or fall weekend day is a good reason to cook out. Picnics and neighborhood cookouts are always an excuse. And of course there are the many lakefront festivals in Milwaukee during the summer. Neighbors have been known to take turns on weekends cooking out and having four or five couples and their kids over.

Buy brats like a native: Usinger’s or Klement’s

The best brats to buy are Usinger’s or Klement’s, both based in Milwaukee. However, they are not sold nationally but they can be ordered and shipped from their Web sites. Sheboygan Bratwurst, based in Sheboygan Falls, Wis., also is good.

I’m not sure, but Cher-Make, another sausage-maker based in Manitowoc, Wis., also may have brats (Editor’s note: they do). If they don’t, though, they make the best wieners in their casings this side of Munich. If you insist, and can’t find any of these brats, go ahead and buy Johnsonville, which is sold nationally (Publix and Winn-Dixie have them occasionally). However, few self-respecting Wisconsinites would admit to eating Johnsonville. If you buy them, you hope a neighbor doesn’t see you at the grocery store.

You would never be able to find a Johnsonville brat at any of Milwaukee’s lakefront summer festivals, at Brewers games, at Packers games, or at Wisconsin Badgers games. And if they aren’t sold there, they aren’t worth buying. There also may be some small local sausage makers who cater only to their part of Wisconsin, but those four are the main ones.

 Resources:

The following Web sites should be helpful. The first two give you a sense of what brats mean to people from Wisconsin.

www.bratwurstpages.com/brats.html

www.onmilwaukee.com/dining/articles/restaurantbrats.html

Stadium Secret Sauce (read about it at OnMilwaukee - an online magazine for the city) is available for $5.99 a bottle at brewcityonline.com or for $3 a bottle at the Brewers Fan Zone store at Miller Park . It is a tomato based sauce with just a hint of spiciness to it.