Upon arrival and way before the pandemonium of the football game starts my senses are peeled as we make our way to the parking spot and follow my nose with all the grilling, barbecues and party atmosphere that takes over the masses. It is a certainty that at most sporting events these days you will at least first smell, see, touch and finally maybe get to taste some tailgating. All your senses go into hyper-drive as you prepare for the excitement of the game and make sure your sausages are grilled to perfection with a few beers or your libation of choice. And if you happen to miss the tailgate fare outside, have no fear because there are plenty of vendors to make up for that once inside the venue.

Opportunities for attending local sporting events gratis happens 2 or 3 times a year for us, and we have been lucky enough as our third this season was last night at the NC State Wolf Pack vs. Florida State Seminoles football game, and it is only the middle of college football season 2008. Last night we get to the parking spot about 90 minutes prior to kickoff and I get the sense that all this tailgating started days ago, but I know it is only a few hours, some of them have complete food stations in full function. Some of these folks have multiple parking spots taken up with huge tents covering folding tables with chaffing dishes, grills, coolers, plates, napkins, utensils, and food, plenty of food and drink too. Oh, and some of these enterprising tailgaters have portable generators with flat LCD or plasma panel TV’s hooked up to satellite dish networks and of course, watching their favorite sporting channel too. A party atmosphere dissects the next aisle over where these folks are screaming their favorite music into the next parking section…”I love rock and roll…put another dime in the juke box baby….”

Last year we attended three NC State home football games and one of them was in a corporate suite with complimentary food and drink to boot! This was a football game that NC State actually won, so that was the icing on the cake! The fodder included fried chicken fingers with two sauces, pulled barbecue pork and fresh buns for sandwiches, Cole slaw, fried catfish with cocktail and tarter sauces, barbecue meatballs, fruit and cheese display, vegetable tray, cookies, brownies and rice crispy treats too. And plenty of soft drinks, bottled beer and some liquor too! How can you pass up an open bar and on the house feast?

Back to last night…out of the van and walking past all these great tailgating posts I ogle the great spreads and sundry displays each a personal exhibit of those who planned them in advance and created them with great pride and a little sweat too, as we hit a high temp record at 86° yesterday. Some spreads as simple as a box of chicken from the local fast food joint, or as elaborate as a grill attached to the back bumper of the SUV and some others loaded with pork ribs, sausages, kabobs, chicken, hot dogs, hamburgers, anything that can be grilled on an open flame. I would have paid some of them for a taste of their savory flavors, but it was only a thought. Maybe next time I will get up the courage to ask the gurus of tasty tailgate for a sampling or two, or three, or….

Speaking of boxed chicken, our only hands-on experience with tailgating was a few weeks ago at the NC State and Boston College football game, and was really not fully achieved in the true sense of the word as we were running late. Pulling into the parking spot just 10 minutes before kickoff with our Bojangles Chicken Tailgate Special we were scurrying in a mad dash to finish off the 12 pieces of fried chicken with biscuits, two sides and a ½ gallon of sweet tea. We made it to our seats 5 minutes before kickoff, whew!

Over the past three years most of the football tickets are compliments of Monique’s work where many of the staff are NC State alumni and possess season tickets. We also have a neighborhood friend who has NC State football season tickets and has obliged us with 2 games this year. We have been fortunate enough to also attend a few Carolina Hurricanes NHL hockey games on other folk’s tabs and those are fun too.

Once we walked past all the tailgating in the parking lots we headed on over to the pre-game area near the RBC Center with plenty of tents and activities for fun times. Among the ESPN 360 display and the EA Sports NCAA tent with 20+ NCAA football video games in progress we also got to sample some free Coke Zero and kettle corn that was being passed out to accepting folks. I likened this to the amuse, or free nibbles before the real meal. Then I found a tent selling bags of pork cracklings for only $2.00. I had to get a bag and only got a chance to eat two pieces of the fresh fried pork skins, yummy! What a deal a huge bag of fresh fried pork cracklings, but I had to toss it out as the checker would not allow them in the stands. Oh well! I did get a little taste, so the appetizer was done.

Once into the gates I got us all some fresh hot soft pretzels, one with cinnamon sugar and two with salt and mustard. Those were very tasty as they are warmed over hot open coals, and a nice treat as a second course in my football game meal. Then we found our seats and I noticed that we still had plenty of time before the game so we headed back out and I got everyone some of the Nathan’s hot dogs, I also got an Italian sausage with grilled peppers and onions. Added a little yellow mustard to that and I was set to go! I love Nathan’s hot dogs; they are the skinless and full meat that really has a good flavor. Okay, now with the entrée done and the game still not started, but I sure was full now! At half time I was hot and wanted to cool down so I went and got a portion of soft frozen lemonade concoction and that hit the spot, but might make a perfect set-up for a margarita with some smuggled tequila, yet in the virgin state it was sweet enough to be my dessert. Maybe next time!

The Wolf Pack lost 17 – 26, but win or lose it was a fun night and thanks to our neighborhood friends Michael, Eric and family for another great evening of food and football. “WOLF…PACK…WOLF…PACK”

*BBQ photo is from biewoef’s collection aka Hilde Vanstraelen from Hasselt, Limburg, Belgium.

I was reading a blog post this morning entitled the apple carrot juice recipe on Foodbuzz by miss v’s vegan cookbook where she used some granny smith apples and carrots to create a fresh juice and immediately I was reminded of my days with part-time work as a cook and server at Nature’s Way natural food restaurant.

The restaurant and associated store which was located in the 5900 block of Magazine Street in Uptown New Orleans went shuttered many moons ago and has since been replaced by a Mexican restaurant (Taqueria Corona), but the memories of my early New Orleans’ natural food restaurant days came alive again after reading about Miss V’s “the juice” blog post this morning.

At the behest of my friend Brad Ott I started working at Nature’s Way about 20 hours a week during the evening shift and only after I clocked out at the Hyatt Regency Hotel serving my culinary apprenticeship duties. I would put in my 8 hour shift at the hotel, hurry and change clothes in the locker room and peddle on over to the Way, which took about 35 minutes from downtown to uptown. I was supposed to arrive at 3:00 PM but the manager cut me some slack being 30 to 35 minutes late every day. Working on a paupers pay I did not own a powered vehicle as bicycling was my only transportation method. Believe it or not, there was a Green Movement back then, but I was not considered green. Go figure how times have changed, but that is another subject for another post. Making $4.25 an hour at the Hyatt and $3.75 an hour at the Way in 1984 was not the best money then, but I did not have big bills to pay either. It was tough getting started in the restaurant biz and taking a cut in pay as I had worked several previous summers in high school for a tree service company making $5.75 an hour. I was committed to making the sacrifices to learn a new trade, and it eventually paid off in dividends as I progressed in the restaurant industry.

So on to my inspiration for this post! Carrot juice! Yes, carrot juice was made fresh each and every day at the Way. A 50 lb. sack of carrots were juiced early each morning and stored in glass gallon jugs, and this was pure unfiltered carrot juice which would sell out at least every other day before I arrived for the evening shift. When I did get to have a taste of this delicate fresh juice it was heavenly. Today the only carrot juice I can find is in 1/2 gallons and produced in some far away factory. It takes a lot of carrots to make a gallon of carrot juice I have found, and I really appreciate being able to find fresh carrot juice.

Nature’s Way menu consisted of many fresh salads and vegan sandwiches and served only tuna and chicken as available meat proteins. Tofu was also available on the menu in limited amounts, but they made all their own dressings including their own tahini dressing. Lots of alfalfa sprouts were used in just about every dish, as it was still in the sprout head period. One of the popular warm dishes was Steamed Vegetables with Brown Rice. It was a combination of fresh carrots, broccoli and cauliflower steamed with a little turmeric spice on top and then served over a bed of fresh cooked brown rice. There was the option of having shredded white cheddar cheese on top of that too, which made a great meal when melted over the vegetables. This huge platter would fill you up too!

Of course the fresh made smoothies were to die for, they were so easy to make, very healthy and delicious, and yet so simple too! There were no protein powders or bulk up mixes back then, just plain and simple smoothies with fresh fruit, honey, ice and water. That was it! Now some folks would have nutritional yeast added if they wanted, but that was an extra charge up, maybe .50 cents. Some of the most popular smoothies were banana, strawberry, melon, and sometimes fig.

The typical smoothie recipe consisted of 1 cup of fruit, 1 glass (16 oz) full of ice, 2 Tbsp honey, and 1/2 cup water. Put all ingredients in the blender and buzz until smooth, pour out and add the straw and serve at once.

I can also remember serving some of the local music industry folks such as the likes of the Neville Brothers and the lead guitarist for Marcia Ball too would frequent the Way, it was a fun time and a place that I continue to cherish along the journey of my restaurant experience archives.

When I got home yesterday afternoon I glanced over to the kitchen prep table and I saw a package with a Foodbuzz return label on it, right then and there I knew that it was my turn to feel the joy! Yes!!! My much anticipated Foodbuzz apron and rubber spatula had arrived!

In celebration of the official public launch of Foodbuzz on the Internet the San Francisco, CA organization has been sending out these gifts to their Featured Publishers, who are foodie bloggers from around the world that make regular posts and contributions linking their blogs to the Foodbuzz site.

Since I started the Cajun Chef Ryan blog site in May of this year I have submitted over 100 posts to the Foodbuzz site and have built up a small community of like minded folks along the way, and I just joined Foodbuzz in July, or just two months ago. It is a great way to drive folks to your foodie blog site, and also a great way to learn new culinary treats and traditions from around the globe.

Yesterday I submitted an entry in the Foodbuzz October “24 Meals, 24 Hours, 24 Blog Posts” and hope to be selected with my proposed “State Fair Foods at the North Carolina State Fair”, the date for the event is Saturday, October 25, 2008. Have not heard back from them yet, but should I be selected there is a stipend award included with the selection to help fund the foodie event. Fingers and toes are all crossed!

I’m looking forward to using the new Foodbuzz tools when I get back into the kitchen.

Thanks go out to the Foodbuzz team for the neat kitchen tools!

Continuing with the fresh herbs series this segment will focus on chives, their varieties and some common uses for the herb as well as a recipe too.

The garlic chives variety shown in the photo are grown in a hanging basket that drops from a limb of the single diminutive Dogwood tree in our front yard. As you can see from the image the plant has started to flower, but the chives are still usable and quite tasty. I love the light garlic taste and fragrance these impart in any dish that calls for chives. The garlic flavor does not overwhelm the chive oniony flavor, but adds a delicate touch that combines into a unique garlic/onion taste. Garlic chives have a flatter leaf profile and produce a white flower, whereas the regular chives plant are distinguished by the rounded leaf pattern and by the production of pink to purplish flowers. Garlic chives are also known as Chinese chives due to their prolific use in Oriental cuisine dishes.

We purchased our garlic chive plant a few years back at the Wake Forest Herb Festival which is held every April in Wake Forest, NC.  

Chives¹ date back to about 5,000 years ago but were not cultivated until the Middle Ages, but the exact time frame within the ages is not known. The scientific classification name Allium schoenoprasum is derived from the Greek words for sedge and onion. The word Chive is and English name derived from the French word cive, which comes from the Latin word cepa which means onion. Besides being a great flavor addition to culinary preparations chives are also a great insect repellent in gardens to control plant eating pests.

Besides their obvious culinary uses there are some lesser known medicinal uses for chives, including similar beneficial properties of garlic, specifically helping to lower blood pressure. Chives contain vitamins A and C and also have trace minerals such as sulfur and iron.

Some of the popular culinary preparations that I’ve include chives as part of my arsenal are Salmon with Dill Lemon Sauce, Boursin Cheese, and Seven Onion Soup.

So here as promised is a recipe that includes chives and it is my homemade Boursin Cheese. This quick recipe uses cream cheese, however, you can use any soft and creamy type of cheese, in fact a soft goat cheese would really add another flavor profile and dimension.

Boursin Cheese ~ Homemade