I’m a Californian, born & raised. This, by sheer definition, means I don’t know what barbecue is. I can live with that, but it isn’t easy. I’ve fought through teeth & nails to read, listen and scour the net for help. Most of this I did back in 1998, as far as the net is concerned. In the traditional sense, I just did what I thought was right and to hell with the rest. If my rack of ribs cooked slowly for 5 hours with real wood, that was good enough for me. But I wanted more, I wanted to taste the regional sauces of the Carolinas, Texas and/or St. Louis. I tried, but didn’t come up with anything that was worth doing a second time. Until yesterday …
Happy Father’s Day !!! – I mean it, cause I am one.
Yes, I am working on a new barbecue sauce. Yes, am planning on smoking a slab of pork ribs. But since it’s father’s day? I get to hug dearly what I love most, my speaker.
It’s our nature.
xo, Biggles
Catahoula’s Open Aire Market – Saturday 6/14/08 10am-2pm
Just a friendly reminder: Saturday 6/14/08 10am-2pm
Timber says,
I’ve gone all fancy on you….I added a “e” onto “Air”….So it’ll be that much better. Urban Tilth, RHS YME Club, Liana’s Cake Kitchen, Pit Boss BBQ, Grande Finale Flowers (Be careful of your plants…Tracy might snag some of your flowers) Brookebot Tees, Jessica’s Jewelry and Others will be there…will you!?
If you are a Richmond Resident and an Artist….There’s still time. Please don’t hesitate to join in the festivities.
Biggles here, I visited the last and first of his markets and it was pretty darned cool. Fresh veggies, sweet goodies, plants ready to plant and fresh roasted coffee. This time there will be more people attending, so stop by and have a gander.
Biggles
Catahoula Coffee
12472 San Pablo Avenue
Richmond, CA 94805
(510) 235-0525
The Blog & Website Cuss-O-Meter!
Created by OnePlusYou
Hmm, well, while I have had my rants I’ve attempted to keep Meathenge fairly clean and ready for everyone, even vegetarians. So, it didn’t surprise me that I rated so low on the cuss-o-meater. But it was fun! For a moment, I think. Thank you to Dagny for showing me the way.
Happy Friday !!!
Pork Spines – A Meathenge Grill Session on a Wednesday Evening
MmMmMmm, spiiiiine.
They aren’t easy to find, you have to really look and even ask around to find them. But when you do? There’s nothing like fresh pork spine grilled over a real fire.
How best to grill thine spine?
Got Wood? It does make a difference, you know.
I feel about as inspired as a white 3×5 index card. With nothing on it. Not even a stack of cards, just 1 card, laying in a pile of clutter. Yeah, just like that. Sitting down at Meathenge is about as easy for me these days as ridding the world of all known diseases at a glance. Heck, at this point I’d be happy with just curing cancer, ya know?
Well, ol’ CB stopped by the other day and said I should either go on a Meat Adventure (regular gas is at about $4.50 for 9/10ths of a gallon as of 7:14 am this morning), so that’s out. Or fire up the grill?
I can do that, I know how.
Happy Birthday Meathenge !!!
Well, okay it was actually the 29th, Thursday. And since then, this is the first time I’ve had a usable moment to sit down, and pat myself on the back.
When I started Meathenge, I promised myself Meathenge would be me. No pretending to be someone or something I wasn’t. I knew if I spent my efforts on something that wasn’t in my veins, it’d be my undoing. While I admit to a few “shit posts” (diatribe, moving towards pointless), I think I’ve done exceptionally well over the years and am quite pleased with myself.
When Amanda was interviewing me for the article in the Chronicle she asked me what I wanted out of all this. “I want to meet people, make some friends and enjoy myself.” And in this, I have gone way past my expectations.
Take a moment, stand back and think how many food blogs can say they’ve been up and running for 5 years? Then compare that with how many food blogs exist today? I’m special, and handsome. I’m a leo, could you tell.
Meathenge is here to stay another 5 years! Hoist a cool, refreshing beverage in Meathenge’s honor this weekend.
Cheers,
Biggles
A Sunday Project – Refinish Wooden Cuttin’ Table
Wood is so cool, I loves it. Your only limitation is your imagination and skill level. Which is why I didn’t build this one, Cousin Bob did way back in the day. The maple top is from an old portable dishwasher, they’ve got to plastic tops these days.
The problem? I last time I put a finish on it was over 10 years ago, probably closer to 15. Do you think sitting in the Meathenge Lab kitchens for those years it looks as it did when new? Ha! It really is quite nasty, if I do say so myself. So, today? Am going to yank the sucker, sand it and oil it back up. Yay for wood!
Will stop by later and give you the finished product.
xo, Biggles
ps – Updates available. Wish I knew how to format this !@#$% photographs so they behaved. Nope, they’re all over the place no matter what I tell them.
Sopa de Garrobo – El Salvadorean Iguana Soup
So far, everytime I visit Joya de Ceren in Richmond, Omar has something new to show me. Today it was fresh watermelons from Mexico, they looked wonderful. I’ll return tomorrow and grab me one. A week ago he handed me a can of Doňa Lisa’s Sopa de Garrobo. With a price tag of $6.99 I thanked him and said, “Maybe next time, not today.” He shook his head and waved his hands and said, “Take it and try it, see what you think, maybe you’ll like it. It helps make you strong and virile!” Oh great, what am I going to do with that? I dunno, maybe something will pop up.
I wouldn’t accept the gift without a recipe. “If you give me a little recipe, I’ll make it.”
Meathenge Labs – Taking care of business
Dang, I noticed my last post had just rolled right off the board there, not a good thing. We’re still here, doing better and taking care of business. Just hang tight, we’ll be resuming production here in the not too distant future.
The picture there is off an oven roasted tri-tip roast with mashed taters (heavy cream used) and a nice, robust gravy.
Cheers and apologize for the lack,
xo, Biggles
Swamped? Overwhelmed? Scatterbrained?
All that and more, much more. Wanted to stop by and let you know we’re okay, just can’t get to that webernet thingy. We attempt, but don’t bring no fruit.
I love ya’ll, hang tight and goodies will roll, this way or that.
xo, Biggles
Monterey – I’m going, bye!
Yup, as we speak the wagon is getting loaded up and the cooler packed. There’s a dozen El Salvadorean chorizos in there, a pork loin roast (Thanks CB!) and a dozen 1″ thick pork chops. I needs muh snacks!
bye bye
dot dot dot, we’re baaack! Well, okay we got back yesterday about 11am. I went through some of the images I took and thought I’d share.
Here you can see Z, waaaay up on the top of the dune there. The boys spent several hours climbing up and down these dunes. This was the largest and Tiny E decided that maybe when he was older he’d attempt it. Just so you know, the right side of the dune is far less aggressive and not so scary.
And yes, the aquarium is awesome. Changed a lot over the years though, they have penguins now. When I visited years ago they were showcasing Monterey Bay marine life only, now it’s all over the map. And they’ve added 9 million activities for kids. So, obviously it’s packed with tons of families enjoying themselves. This isn’t necessarilly a bad thing, but damned those strollers are evil. I counted at least 3 gift shops and 1 of which is about the size of a large market. Ahhh, the mighty dollar wins again. Go during the week, not on the weekends.
xo, Biggles
Cook for me !!! The contest is over, and we have a winner!
Ya know, it was really nice to host this little contest for ya’ll. It isn’t very often that a blogger gets to have a two-way conversation with the readers (that’s you). I’ve found over the years it can really bring a sense of closeness that I enjoy, like coming by for a beverage and a snack treat.
Well, we didn’t exactly set a record with the number of entries (you’re just not used to it here), but the absolute quality of the entries? Second to none, easy.
Move along …
cool, wet, april, night
9:30pm, sun is down and the bedroom window is open. I removed the screen so I could get max flow of nose flavors. Fresh, wet, weeds, grass, bark, oil, traffic, calm, goodness with a touch of who knows.
The flavor from my bedroom window caused me to grab the tripod and the camera to this shot. Yes there are a few details, but suffice it to say I used a much moved flashlight to highlight the windmill against the barn. The barn is half-lit from the neighbor’s rear porch light. Other than that, this is out-of-camera action with all the late spring smells that give me the happy shivers.
Grab the one you’re with and make fun, it’s worth the effort.
xo, Biggles
ps – Color temperature rules.
Crawdad Boil – Meathenge cooks mudbugs! – a review
On March 25th CajunGrocer.com contacted me and asked if I’d like 10 pounds of mudbugs for ‘review’. Oh, let me think, YES. Remember them? They were the ones that sent Meathenge Labs a Turducken, yeah that’s them.
The little guys come delivered to your door alive, moving, and making this clicking sound like rice crispies in milk. The party wasn’t until Saturday, said crawdads arrived on Friday, not a problem. Hose them down, toss into cooler with a bag of ice (drain open), easy enough. But it didn’t say whether to leave them all tied up in their sack or not, I decided to let them out in to the cooler. Free range crawdads … dumb Californian. Wanna come see how it turned out?