Hot fun in the summer time. Pubs and Crats are having a steel cage death match over the debt ceiling. Why can't they argue about something important like beach pizza? I know it's boring, but there's a few choices on the table. One, we have some new taxes, then some new cuts to programs, social security and medicare need a good whacking, and everyone gets screwed a little bit. Yea democrats! Making mediocrity a trademark for over a hundred years. Two, we cut programs period, like social security and medicare. Yea republicans! Making war on the working class since 1982. Three, we default on our debt there by taking the economy over a cliff( the opinion of almost ever rich person out there). Yea Teabaggers! Bringing on the crazy since someone forgot to lock your Mom's cellar door. How's the sunlight treating you? Four, tax the bastards that have been robbing us forever, paying out huge bonuses with bailout money, sending our jobs over seas, crashing the economy for fun and profit, exploiting third world children so they can have all blue M+Ms in their lear jet, and just being the evil overlords they always aspired to. That last ones mine but I am a fat little blogger with 30 regular readers so I'm guessing not.
Ah hell, it's summer, it's hot, and there are more important things to argue about. For example, let's say you are at the beach and you want something more substantial than a piece of pizza but you also want to take part in the tribalism and endless one-upmanship that is the human condition. What do you do? Maybe go up 1A, bang a left at 286, and then get you some Brown's, or Markey's.
Mmmm! Brown's
Mmmm! Markey's
Forget that debt ceiling and all that political nonsense. Here we have clear and obvious differences to talk about. Markey's serves boiled and fried seafood, backs up to a marsh, and is BYOB. Mmmm BYOB! Browns on the other hand is BYOB, Mmmm BYOB! backs up to a marsh, and serves fried and boiled seafood. Browns is on the north side of 286. Markey's is on the south side of 286. Markey's smells like bilge. Browns smells like bilge. Browns has breath taking views of the Seabrook nuke plant. Markey's has... We have a winner! No Nukes! No Nukes!
So while the pols mud wrestle to see who can keep the middle class on life support the longest reach down into your cooler, grab a frosty PBR,( you heard me Case, you young whippersnapper) and wait patiently for your steamers. Just because clams are god's way of packaging sewage doesn't mean they aren't delicious. Oh, and have a lobster, just because. Hey, live for today!
I guess I could blog about the debt ceiling, about how an artificial number with an artificial deadline could cause the economy to tank. I guess I could blog about how three members of the New Hampshire Executive council shut down planned parenthood while making pithy asides about how all politics are local. I guess I could blog about how a candidate, a serious republican candidate for president, signed a pledge that included wording the suggested that many black children were better off under slavery. I guess I could blog about those things, or maybe I could blog about something important.
Beach Pizza, Yeah!
Mmmm! beach pizza!
The summer is here, the world is going to hell in a hand basket, but there is always beach pizza. A delicious creation that can only be found along the sandy stretch of ocean front between the Merrimac River and Rye Beach, NH. Plus Lawrence. At first glance it looks like a sicilian slice that someone forgot to put cheese on. Then you pick it up and you realize that it's thin like New York style pizza. Then you bite it for the first time and you say, "Meh, big deal". Then you keep eating and suddenly you realize you will be a slave to beach pizza for the rest of your life. The future will find you on an icy February Tuesday cruising the boulevard for a fix. Oh beach pizza, you are truly a treat for the down-trodden. Your sparse cheese, always add the slice of provolone, crispy crust, and simplicity make you both unique and universal. A food of the people.
It's a recent Sunday, ok last Sunday. You are having a cold adult beverage, ok I was, at the Upper Deck with some friends. It's Salisbury beach so you, yeah I did I'm not proud of it, start counting the tramp stamps on the boulevard.
Gratuitous girl picture to jazz up the blog.
The Salisbury beach house band is in full swing.
Jabba the Hut is nowhere to be seen.
It's hot, the PBR's in the 16 ounce cans are going down smooth, you feel an urge to buy a trailer home or watch NASCAR, because even though everything is perfect you need something more, then you glance across the street and low and behold...
Right next to each other! There is a God!
Now as hard as it is to disengage from the icy cold PBR's, as much as you want to share a meaningful experience with the 40 year old waitress that's dressed in biker boots and a leather bikini (wow, you could make a suitcase out of that skin. Excessive tanning sure makes a woman look good), as much as you want to wait for your selection of "Afternoon Delight" to play on the juke box, you know you need a slice.
I'm a proud Tripoli guy. Sauce is a little sweeter than Christy's, which was why Mark likes it better. Ally broke the tie with...Yes Tripoli's! High five, the woman has good taste. In the end I go for 3 slices with extra (provolone remember?). It's hard to believe that anything could be more important, Damn you debt ceiling, and pruned up bikini woman is still serving PBR's right from an ice bucket. The traffic is going to be killer, the sun's going down, what could be more important.
So before I was so rudely interrupted by three days of more work than I could handle ( sorry boss, I'll try to clean up the mess tomorrow), I was waxing poetic about my second favorite holiday. We have a seafood theme going he so I figured let's just go with it.
We already have the grill hot for the scallops from 2 posts ago so let's chug on ahead. It's the 4th, we're celebrating, so let's have a snack that is delicious and will help put a little lead in your pencil ( zinc is essential to proper pencil function ) .
Put a heavy pot on the grill.
Add a pound of butter. Mmmm, Butter!
While the butter melts chop some garlic fine, add it to the pot.
Shuck a bunch of oysters by putting a thick heavy blade into the opening by the back hinge and twisting. Or just throw them on the grill and close the lid, they'll open.
Lose the top shell, save the oyster and the nectar.
Sprinkle with a little parmesan cheese.
Close the lid for a couple of minutes till the cheese starts to melt.
Add a teaspoon of the garlic butter, Mmmm butter! to each oyster.
Give it another minute.
Serve with Tabasco and a squeeze of lemon
Still hungry? Add another pound of butter, Mmmm butter! to the pan. Time for turbo charged lobster rolls.
Now a good idea is a traditional lobster roll, lobster, mayo, hotdog bun. Perfect really. Still, why settle for perfect?
You needed to start a day early with 3 or 4 good sized lobsters.
Steam, do not boil, them.
After the first 3 minutes of steaming take the lobsters out and pull off all the legs. Return the rest to the pot and steam for 20 minutes.
We grabbed the legs because they are loaded with meat which you will never get to once the buggers are completely cooked.
In their current state you can lay the legs on a cutting board and using a rolling pin ( start at the claw end) you can roll the meat out of the shell.
Saute the meat in butter with lots of finely chopped shallots.
Clean the rest of the lobster meat from the shells, give it a rough chop, and save for the rolls.
Back to today: take a package of New England style hot dog buns. Brush one side with the garlic butter, Mmmm butter! and lay them on the grill. Brush the other side with more butter,Mmmm butter!
Dump the lobster meat into the remaining butter, Mmmm butter! add some fresh tarragon, and mix. Then get it away from the heat, you don't want any more cooking going on.
Flip the rolls when they get brown. They go from brown to burned really fast so be careful.
Load up the rolls with lobster.
Give it a squeeze of lemon and a grind of black pepper,
So while we are talking about good ideas.
My right wing friends think America is a religion, my left wing friends all too often think America is a problem, me, I think it's a good, no great, idea. Try this on for size.
The New Colossus
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
Emma Lazarus, 1883
Great stuff Huh? Suddenly it wasn't all about Kings and Queens. Heredity wasn't destiny anymore. We the people... hell yeah! There were bumps in the road, misery and all the follies that humans bring to the table, but it is still a great idea. (Not as good as grilled oysters, but close). Not a religion, sometimes a problem, but always a growing changing positive in a world where victories don't have to go to the powerful as long as the rest of us stick together.
Now as the last fireworks fizzle out and the kids are ready for bed, take a moment with the one who brang you. It's hot, steamy, summer weather today. I hear thunder off in the distance. Get her a cold one, reach way down in the barrel so it's really frosty. Turn on the stereo, an old scratchy turntable would really sell the mood,and drop on something steamy. How about...
There's sex music just as good, but nothing better. Dance her around slow so she doesn't spill her beer, take your time, always take your time, hold her firm but not too tight, and by that last sharp note you should be ready for a second round of fireworks. Unless the kids wake up. Hey this is America, it's about opportunity not guarantees. In the end you are always on your own.
