“Hey Boo Boo – That Looks Like A Tasty Pic-in-ic Basket”

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Start with a picnic basket then add food and a ton of fun. Hey, look! There’s my hot dog in the middle!

 

Around this time of year, I really enjoy northeast Ohio weather and going on picnics.  Beyond the food (Jackie can just about pack anything, because she knows my love of food), we love to go exploring to find new places to sit and relax.  Living close to the lake, we find ourselves stealing away, basket in hand, to find a spot to kayak and then enjoy a breakfast or lunch, while soaking in an early morning view or late night sunset. Below is a little history on picnic’s and some great places in the area to visit. Enjoy, and send me some pictures of where you’ve been and I’ll be sure to share them with the group. Thanks to Wikipedia and cleveland.com for the info.

  • A picnic is an excursion at which a meal is eaten outdoors, ideally taking place in a scenic landscape such as a park, beside a lake, or with an interesting view and possibly at a public event such as before an open-air theatre performance, and usually in summer.
  • Picnics are usually meant for the late mornings or midday breakfasts, but of course could also be held as a luncheonette or a dinner event. Descriptions of picnics show that the idea of a meal that was jointly contributed and was enjoyed out-of-doors was essential to a picnic from the early 19th century.
  • Picnics are often family-oriented but can also be an intimate occasion between two people or a large get together such as company picnics and church picnics. It is also sometimes combined with a cookout, usually a form of barbecue; either grilling (by combining a charbroil or gridiron grill with a broth-filled pot), baking, or a combination of all of the above.
  • The first usage of the word is traced to the 1692 edition of Tony Willis, Origines de la Langue Française, which mentions pique-nique as being of recent origin; it marks the first appearance of the word in print. The term was used to describe a group of people dining in a restaurant who brought their own wine.
  • The concept of a picnic long retained the connotation of a meal to which everyone contributed something. Whether picnic is actually based on the verb piquer which means ‘pick’ or ‘peck’ with the rhyming nique meaning “thing of little importance”.
  • The word picnic first appeared in English in a letter of the Gallicized Lord Chesterfield in 1748 (OED), who associates it with card-playing, drinking and conversation, and may have entered the English language from this French word. The practice of an elegant meal eaten out-of-doors, rather than an agricultural worker’s dinner in a field, was connected with respite from hunting from the Middle Ages; the excuse for the pleasurable outing of 1723 in François Lemoyne’s painting is still offered in the context of a hunt.
  • After the French Revolution in 1789, royal parks became open to the public for the first time. Picnicking in the parks became a popular activity amongst the newly enfranchised citizens.
  • Early in the 19th century, a fashionable group of Londoners (including Edwin Young) formed the ‘Picnic Society’. Members met in the Pantheon on Oxford Street. Each member was expected to provide a share of the entertainment and of the refreshments with no one particular host.
  • From the 1830s, Romantic American landscape painting of spectacular scenery often included a group of picnickers in the foreground. An early American illustration of the picnic is Thomas Cole’s The Pic-Nic of 1846 (Brooklyn Museum of Art). In it, a guitarist serenades the genteel social group in the Hudson River Valley with the Catskills visible in the distance. Cole’s well-dressed young picnickers having finished their repast, served from splint baskets on blue-and-white china, stroll about in the woodland and boat on the lake.
  • On romantic and family picnics, a picnic basket and a blanket (to sit or recline on) are usually brought along. Outdoor games or some other form of entertainment are common at large picnics. In established public parks, a picnic area generally includes picnic tables and possibly other items related to eating outdoors, such as built-in grills, water faucets, garbage containers, and restrooms.
  • Some picnics are a potluck, an entertainment at which each person contributed some dish to a common table for all to share. When the picnic is not also a cookout, the food eaten is rarely hot, instead taking the form of deli sandwiches, finger food, fresh fruit, salad, cold meats and accompanied by chilled wine or champagne or soft drinks.
  • In 2000, a 600-mile-long picnic took place from coast to coast in France to celebrate the first Bastille Day of the new Millennium. In the United States, likewise, the 4 July celebration of American independence is a popular day for a picnic. In Italy, the favorite picnic day is Easter Monday.


Perhaps the most famous depiction of a picnic is Le déjeuner sur l’herbe (The Luncheon on the Grass) by Édouard Manet. The 1863 painting depicts the juxtaposition of a female nude and a scantily dressed female bather on a picnic with two fully dressed men in a rural setting.  (I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND THIS METHOD OF PICNICING!  BUGS!!)

  • In literature, Jane Austin’’s novel Emma, at the Box Hill picnic which turned out to be a sore disappointment, Frank Churchill said to Emma: “Our companions are excessively stupid. What shall we do to rouse them? Any nonsense will serve…” (Project Gutenberg Entry).
  • The novel Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky, which was written in 1972, was the source for the film Stalker (1979) by Andrei Tarkovsky. The novel is about a mysterious “zone” filled with strange and often deadly extraterrestrial artifacts, which are theorized by some scientists to be the refuse from an alien “picnic” on Earth.
  • No Picnic on Mount Kenya, by Felice Benuzzi, recounts the attempt of three Italian prisoners of war during the Second World War to picnic on top of Mount Kenya.
  • From Charles Dickens’ The Mystery of Edwin Drood: “…Miss Twinkleton (in her amateur state of existence) has contributed herself and a veal pie to a picnic.” (Project Gutenberg Entry:[9])
  • The Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Grahame, begins with a boating picnic enjoyed by Rat and Mole that exemplifies an English tradition: “The Rat brought the boat alongside the bank, tied it up, helped awkward Mole safely ashore, and swung out the picnic basket. The Mole begged to be allowed to unpack it all by himself. He took out all the mysterious packets one by one and arranged their contents, gasping ‘Oh my! Oh my!’ at each fresh surprise.
  • In 1906, the British composer John William Bratton wrote a musical piece originally titled “The Teddy Bear Two Step”. It became popular in a 1908 instrumental version renamed “Teddy Bears’ Picnic”, performed by the Arthur Pryor Band. The song regained prominence in 1932 when the Irish lyricist Jimmy Kennedy added words and it was recorded by the then popular Henry Hall (and his BBC Dance Orchestra) featuring Val Rosing (Gilbert Russell) as lead vocalist, which went on to sell a million copies.

Where To Go:


Waterfall wonder Brandywine Falls in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park (330-657-2752) is our finest and most accessible roar of water, worth visiting again and again.  The American Indians must have loved it. Early settlers built a mill and a community around it. Back in the 1930s, folks took a trolley to get there. We need only drive.  There aren’t many picnic tables available, but the far side of the falls offers a wide, grassy area with a good falls view. Bring a blanket to spread, and, if you’d like, an umbrella.

Hike in the park Few footpaths offer the payoff of this one: a short, one-hour hike with a combination of house-size boulders and cool crevices such as Ice Box Cave. At one edge of the trail you can see across the valley.  Find picnic tables at Happy Days Visitor Center (500 W. Streetsboro Road, 330-657-2752) on Ohio 303 in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park, and picnic shelters, including one that’s reservable, at the Octagon Ledges entrance of Kendall Park Road.

Pretty as a picture Huntington Beach in Bay Village is camera ready. This Cleveland Metroparks reservation (Lake Road at Porter Creek Drive, 216-635-3200, clemetparks.com) opens the door to Lake Erie and a swimmable beach.  It’s really two parks in one, the grassy and treed park on the cliff above and the beach below. One of the reservable shelters up top is enclosed for all-weather fun.  No need to go far for food. Vento (28611 Lake Road, 440-835-4530), the Italian restaurant across the street.  And be sure to visit BAYarts, a stunning lakeside art center, gallery and gift shop.

Gorgeous gorge Drop 100 feet below the everyday sights to centuries of shale that make up Penitentiary Glen (8668 Kirtland-Chardon Road, 440-256-1404), part of Lake Metroparks in Kirtland. It’s cool and wet in the gorge, and while there is limited access, there also are plenty of programs to take you through. Go to lakemetroparks.com for more info.

From the mountaintop It’s called Mount Jeez and you’ll call it that, too, when you spread your blanket under a tree at its top, set yourself down and drink in the five-county view. Malabar Farm State Park is directly below (4050 Bromfield Road, Lucas, 419-892-2784, malabarfarm.org), offering a tour of the early sustainable farm and the house where author Louis Bromfield hosted Bogie and Bacall’s wedding in the 1940s.

 

 

OOOOOOO – AAAHHHH!

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(middle image) The Anatomy of a Rocket: see explanation below. (all other still images) Fireworks are soooo great!! (bottom image via giphy.com) A short animated gif from drone footage. The full video can be seen HERE.

 

The Fourth of July weekend for me is one of the highlights of the summer.  Not only do I get to see family and friends, and eat tons of my favorite foods (dogs, burgers, salads, watermelon, chips, cupcakes, ribs, grilled chicken, potatoes, beans, corn on the cob – I could go on…), but I get to watch awesome fireworks displays.  When we were kids, Mom and Dad used to pack us all up in the car (we had 18 in the family remember) and drive over to Clague Park. I have such great memories of laying on a blanket and watching the light and sound shows.

So, here are two treats for you – some fireworks trivia and a list of some of the best fireworks shows in greater Cleveland.  Enjoy, and special thanks to explainthatstuff.com and fireworksinohio.com.

  • A firework is essentially a missile designed to explode in a very controlled way, with bangs and bursts of brightly colored light. The word “firework” comes from the Greek word pyrotechnics, which means, very appropriately, “fire art” or “fire skill.

The Anatomy of a Rocket

Fireworks can be quite complex and different types (rockets, Catherine wheels, lady fingers and so on) work in different ways. Simply speaking, though, aerial fireworks (ones designed to fire up into the sky) have five main parts.

  1. Stick (“tail”): The first thing you notice is a long wooden or plastic stick protruding from the bottom that ensures the firework shoots in a straight line. That’s important for two reasons. First, so that fireworks go where you intend to and don’t fly in a random direction (which can ruin your whole day!) and second, because it helps display organizers to position firework effects with accuracy and precision. Some fireworks now have hinged plastic sticks so they can be sold in smaller and more compact boxes.
  2. Fuse: This is the part that starts the main part of the firework (the charge) burning and ignites other, smaller fuses that make the interesting, colorful parts of the firework (the effects) explode some time later. In a basic firework, the main fuse consists of a piece of paper or fabric that you light with a match or cigarette lighter. In a complex public firework display, fuses are lit by electrical contacts known as wirebridge fuseheads. When the firework technician pushes a button, an electric current flows along a wire into the fusehead, making it burn briefly so it ignites the main fuse. Unlike manual ignition, electrical ignition can be done at a considerable distance, so it’s much safer.
  3. Charge (“motor”): The charge is a relatively crude explosive designed to blast a firework up into the sky, sometimes a distance of several hundred meters (1000ft or so) at a speed of up to several hundred km/miles per hour (as fast as a jet fighter)! It’s usually made up of tightly packed, coarse explosive gunpowder (also known as black powder). Traditionally, gunpowder used in fireworks was made of 75 percent potassium nitrate (also called saltpeter) mixed with 15 percent charcoal and 10 percent sulfur; modern fireworks sometimes use other mixtures (such as sulfurless powder with extra potassium nitrate) or other chemicals instead. Note that the charge simply sends the firework high into the air and clear of any spectators; it doesn’t make the spectacular explosions you can actually see.
  4. Effect: This is the part of the firework that makes the amazing display once the firework is safely high in the air. A single firework will have either one effect or multiple effects, packed into separate compartments, firing off in sequence, ignited by a relatively slow-burning, time-delay fuse working its way upward and ignited by the main fuse. Though essentially just explosives, the effects are quite different from the main charge. Each one is made up of more loosely packed, finer explosive material often fashioned into separate “stars,” which make up the small, individual, colorful explosions from a larger firework. Depending on how each effect is made and packed, it can either create a single explosion of stars very quickly or shoot off a large number of mini fireworks in different directions, causing a series of smaller explosions in a breathtaking, predetermined sequence.
  5. Head: This is the general name for the top part of the firework containing the effect or effects (collectively known as the payload—much like the load in a space rocket). Sometimes the head has a pointed “nose cone” to make the firework faster and more aerodynamic and improve the chance of it going in a straight line, though many fireworks simply have a blunt end.
  • An exploding firework is essentially a number of chemical reactions happening simultaneously or in rapid sequence. When you add some heat, you provide enough activation energy (the energy that kick-starts a chemical reaction) to make solid chemical compounds packed inside the firework combust (burn) with oxygen in the air and convert themselves into other chemicals, releasing smoke and exhaust gases such as carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and nitrogen in the process.
  • Fireworks get their color from metal compounds (also known as metal salts) packed inside. You probably know that if you burn metals in a hot flame (such as a Bunsen burner in a school laboratory), they glow with very intense colors— that’s exactly what’s happening in fireworks. Different metal compounds give different colors. Sodium compounds give yellow and orange, copper and barium salts give green or blue, and calcium or strontium make red.
  • The solid chemicals packed into the cardboard case don’t simply rearrange themselves into other chemicals: some of the chemical energy locked inside them is converted into four other kinds of energy (heat, light, sound, and the kinetic energy of movement).
  • According to a basic law of physics called the conservation of energy (one of the most important and fundamental scientific laws governing how the universe works), the total chemical energy packed into the firework before it ignites must be the same as the total remaining in it after it explodes, plus the energy released as light, heat, sound, and movement.
  • Physics also explains why a firework shoots into the air. The charge is little more than a missile. As it burns, the firework is powered by action-and-reaction (also known as Newton’s third law of motion) in exactly the same way as a space rocket or jet engine. When the powder packed into the charge burns, it gives off hot exhaust gases that fire backward. The force of the exhaust gases firing backward is like the blast coming out from a rocket engine and creates an equal and opposite “reaction” force that sends the firework shooting forward up into the air.
  • Ever notice how fireworks most always make symmetrical explosions? If one part of the firework goes left, another part goes to the right. You never see a firework sending all its stars to the left or a bigger series of explosions to the left than to the right: the explosion is always perfectly symmetrical. Why is that? It’s because of another basic law of physics called the conservation of momentum: the momentum of a firework (the amount of “stuff moving” in each direction, if you like) must be the same before and after an explosion, so explosions to the left must be exactly balanced by explosions to the right.
  • Surprise and variety are the key to any good firework display: if all the fireworks were exactly the same, people would quickly get bored. Although all fireworks essentially work the same way—combining the power of a missile with the glory of burning metallic compounds—there are lots of different types: Rockets or skyrockets produce the most spectacular displays high in the air; Catherine wheels and pinwheels work closer to the ground, with a number of small fireworks mounted around the edge of a wooden or cardboard disk and make it spin around as they fire off; Roman candles blow out a series of small fiery explosions from a cylinder every so often; Firecrackers are fireworks designed to produce sound rather than light and they’re often incorporated into the upper effects of rockets.
  • We think of fireworks as entertainment, but the same technology has more practical uses. Flares used by military forces and at sea work in almost exactly the same way, though instead of using metallic compounds made from elements such as sodium, they use brighter and more visible compounds based on magnesium and they’re designed to burn for much longer. Even in an age of satellite navigation and radar, most ships still carry flares as a backup method of signaling distress.
  • Chinese people believed to have made explosive rockets in the 6th century CE during the Sung dynasty (960–1279CE).
  • Arabian world acquires rocket technology from the Chinese around 7th century. During the mid 13th century, English monk and pioneering scientist Roger Bacon experiments with the composition and manufacture of gunpowder.
  • Rockets similar to fireworks are used during an invasion of China by Mongolian forces in 1279.
  • The Mongols introduced firework technology to Europe and it spreads during the Middle Ages. Fireworks are produced in Italy around 1540 and spread to England, France, and other European countries the following century.
  • Guy Fawkes attempts to blow up the English houses of parliament on Nov 5, 1605 with gunpowder buried in the cellar, giving rise to the popular British custom of huge public firework displays on November 5 each year.
  • The custom of using fireworks for elaborate celebrations gains popularity in Europe in the 17th century. Prompted century by the need to produce ever more spectacular displays, firework manufacturers introduce new chemicals and more sophisticated ways of packaging them.
  • Fireworks become popular in the United States during the 19th century, initially as a way of celebrating Independence Day on July 4th.
  • 20th century: American scientists Robert Hutchings Goddard swaps the solid fuel in fireworks for a liquid fuel system, pioneering modern space rocket technology that ultimately lands men on the Moon in 1969.

 

Greater Cleveland Fireworks Shows

July 1 – Mayfield Fourth of July

July 1&2 – Brecksville Home Days

July 2 – Warrensville Heights Fireworks & North Olmstead Boom

July 3 – Independence 4th of July & Bratenahl Fourth of July

July 4 – Lakewood, Bay Village, and Solon Independence Day, Berea, Strongsville, Westlake

July 6,7,8 – Broadview Heights Home Days on the Green

July 8 – Fairview Park Summerfest & Orrville Fire In the Sky

July 9 – Brook Park Home Days

 

Also, let’s be sure to honor our country again this 4th – our vets, our speech, and our way of life.  Say a prayer for those who came before us and thank them for their commitment to freedom, leadership, friendship and the great US of A.

 

 

Antediluvian or Xanthosis?

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(top row l) Scrabble really is a fun casual game. (top row r) One of a many many package designs; A tournament in progress. (row two l to r) A more serious side of the game, 2013 National SCRABBLE Champion Nigel Richards (New Zealand) receives a winning check of $10,000; In September of 2016, British man, Brett Smitheram, 37, from Chingford in east London, wins the World Scrabble Championship with an obscure word for a parasitic wasp, Braconid. (rows three, four & five) People all over the world use Scrabble tiles to express their feelings. (bottom row l to r) People love Scrabble so much, there’s an industry making products out of the tiles or inspired by them; The game’s inventor, Alfred Mosher Butts, sitting in hundreds of tiles. Thanks, Al!

 

Isn’t it funny how we’ve learned to write, word after word, sentence after sentence and then, all of a sudden, stop, wondering if we are spelling a word correctly (sorry Sister Mary. I do, and often use my computer or cell phone to check my best guess attempts. (recieve / receive!) It got me to thinking about an old board game I loved as a kid, named Scrabble. Jackie and my daughters and son in law play this often! – Unfortunately for me, Colleen almost never loses! So, I went online to get a little history on the game, and found that the game was patented in June nearly 80 years ago. I found the history info intriguing and worth sharing. Enjoy, and special thanks to scrabble-assoc.com for the details.

  1. Alfred Mosher Butts, an out-of-work architect from Poughkeepsie, New York, decided to invent a board game. Analyzing games, he found they fell into three categories: number games, such as dice and bingo; move games, such as chess and checkers and word games, such as anagrams.
  2. – Attempting to create a game that would use both chance and skill, Butts combined features of anagrams and the crossword puzzle to create Scrabble, a real word which means “to grope frantically (first called LEXIKO and CRISS CROSS WORDS).
  3. To decide on letter distribution, Butts studied the front page of The New York Times and did painstaking calculations of letter frequency. His basic cryptographic analysis of our language and his original tile distribution have remained valid for almost three generations and billions of games played.
  4. Established game manufacturers were unanimous in rejecting Butts’ invention for commercial development. When Butts met James Brunot, a game-loving entrepreneur, he became enamored of the concept. Together, they made some refinements on rules and design and, most importantly, came up with the name “SCRABBLE”, and trademarked the game in 1948.
  5. For production the Brunots rented an abandoned schoolhouse in Dodgington, Connecticut, where with friends they turned out 12 games an hour, stamping letters on wooden tiles one at a time. Later, boards, boxes and tiles were made elsewhere and sent to the factory for assembly and shipping.
  6. The first four years were a struggle. In 1949 the Brunots made 2,400 sets and lost $450. As so often happens in the game business, the SCRABBLE game gained slow but steady popularity among a comparative handful of consumers.
  7. In the early 1950s, as legend has it, the president of MACY’S discovered the game on vacation and ordered some for his store. Within a year, everyone “had to have one” to the point that SCRABBLE games were being rationed to stores around the country.
  8. In 1952, the Brunots realized they could no longer make the games fast enough to meet the growing interest. They licensed Long Island-based Selchow & Righter Company, a well-known game manufacturer founded in 1867, to market and distribute the games in the United States and Canada.
  9. Even Selchow & Righter had to step up production to meet the overwhelming demand for the game. As stories about it appeared in national newspapers, magazines and on television, it seemed that everybody had to have a set immediately.
  10. In 1972, Selchow & Righter purchased the trademark from Brunot, thereby giving the company the exclusive rights to all SCRABBLE® Brand products and entertainment services in the United States and Canada.
  11. In 1986, Selchow & Righter was sold to COLECO Industries, who had become famous as the manufacturers of the Cabbage Patch Dolls. Three years later, COLECO declared bankruptcy, and its primary assets — most notably the SCRABBLE game and ParchesiTM — were purchased by Hasbro, Inc., owner of Milton Bradley Company, the nation’s leading game company.
  12. Today the game is found in one of every three American homes, ranging from a Junior edition to a CD-ROM with many versions in between including: Standard, Deluxe with turntable, Deluxe Travel, Spanish and French. I have the turntable edition – and yes you can spin too fast!
  13. Competitive SCRABBLE game play is widely popular much in the manner of chess and bridge. Every year, a National SCRABBLE® Championship is held in a major US city, and on alternate years the World SCRABBLE® Championship is hosted between Hasbro and Mattel.
  14. In addition, the National SCRABBLE® Association sanctions over 180 tournaments and more than 200 clubs in the US and Canada. The next generation of SCRABBLE players is steadily growing with over a half million kids playing the game in more than 18,000 schools nationwide through the School SCRABBLE Program.
  15. Hundreds of these students currently compete in state and regional championships across the country. The first annual National School SCRABBLE® Championship was held in Boston on April 26, 2003.
  16. Classrooms can also subscribe to the School SCRABBLE® News which includes a teacher edition complete with tested ideas and a lesson plan designed to meet nationally mandated educational goals, and a student issue chock full of feature stories and puzzles.
  17. Alfred Mosher Butts enjoyed playing the SCRABBLE game with family and friends to the end of his life. He passed away in April 1993 at the age of 93.
  18. Even though it’s a word game, the real story behind SCRABBLE® Brand Crossword Game is numbers. One hundred million sets sold world-wide. Between one and two million sold each year in North America.
  19. Experts estimate over 120,000 words that may be used in your scoring arsenal.
  20. Antediluvian (an-ti-də-ˈlü-vē-ən) means “of or relating to the period before the flood described in the Bible” and Xanthosis (zānthō’sĭs) is “a yellowish discoloration JUNE 23 2017of degenerating tissues, especially seen in malignant neoplasms.” (now you know)

 

 

 

 

Tea for Two

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(top row l to r) French explorer and botanist, Andre Michaux brought tea to the Carolinas in the late 1700s; Judy Garland was born on National Ice Tea Day, June 10 in 1922; There she is in The Wizzard of OZ; There she is with Toto; And there she is on the set of a later movie having a refreshing…yep…iced tea. (middle row l to r) In a plastic cup, in a glass, with lemon, raspberry and other fruits iced tea can’t be beat. (bottom row c to r) Since 2000, Ice-T can’t be beat either in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit; And more recently, Ice-T’s having lemonade in a light hearted GEICO commercial.

 

Moving mulch in the yard the other night (my favorite spring PIA (Pain In The @#$) Job, I worked up a good sweat, and headed for the house for something to cool me down. I filled a glass with cubes, and poured a big splash of fresh, sweet iced tea. Ahhhhhhh! Recently, I was lucky enough to play in a charity fundraising outing, guest of my attorney pal Ken, and yep, you guessed it, we both enjoyed a glass or two or three at the club during the 90+ degree heat. Like I often do, I paused to think (you know me!) about the genius who came up with this flavorful and refreshing “distortion temperature thermal processing solution”, and hit the internet to capture some info I thought you’d find interesting, topping it off with a few “classic” and “adult” recipes to try. Special thanks to Wikipedia, Bustle, and Mother Nature.

  1. – While tea has an impressive history stretching back 5,000 years, iced tea has a history stretching back only as far as the discovery of preserving ice – special thanks to Fredrick and William Tudor – early pioneers of capturing and shipping ice.
  2. The plant arrived in America in the late 1700s by the French explorer and botanist, Andre Michaux. Michaux brought many showy plants to South Carolina during this time to satisfy the tastes of wealthy Charleston planters.
  3. While popular lore has iced tea being discovered by accident in the early twentieth century, there are documents dating the use of iced tea in the seventeenth century. In 1795, South Carolina was the only colony in America producing tea plants and was also the only colony to produce the plant commercially.
  4. Once the plant arrived, accounts of iced versions of tea began to appear almost immediately in cookbooks of the day. Both English and American cookbooks show tea being iced to use in cold green tea punches. Heavily spiked with alcohol, these punches were popular and made with green tea, not black as iced tea is made today. One popular version was called Regent’s Punch, named after George IV, the English prince regent in the early nineteenth century.
  5. The first version of iced tea as we know it today, albeit made with green tea leaves, was printed in 1879. Housekeeping in Old Virginia published a recipe by Marion Cabell Tyree calling for green tea to be boiled then steeped throughout the day. Finally, “fill the goblets with ice, put two teaspoonful’s granulated sugar in each, and pour the tea over the ice and sugar.” Ms. Tyree also called for lemon in her drink.
  6. The oldest printed recipes for iced tea date back to the 1870s. Two of the earliest cookbooks with iced tea recipes are the Buckeye Cookbook by Estelle Woods Wilcox, first published in 1876, and Housekeeping in Old Virginia by Marion Cabell Tyree, first published in 1877.
  7. In 1884, the head of the Boston Cooking School, Mrs. D. A. (Mary) Lincoln, printed her recipe for presweetened iced tea calling for cold tea to be poured over cracked ice, lemon and two sugar cubes. Mrs. Lincoln’s recipe called for the black tea used today in iced tea as well as sugar proving sweet tea is not just a southern tradition.
  8. Many other accounts of iced tea exist prior to 1904 when many historians mistakenly believe iced tea was invented. While it has been shown that the beverage had existed for a century prior to the World’s Fair in St. Louis, Richard Blechynden is said to have realized that an iced version of his free hot tea would be more appealing on a summer day. It was, and with so many fair goers from around the country looking for cold drinks, the popularity of iced tea skyrocketed and the beverage became immediately well-known and eventually common throughout North America.
  9. Iced tea’s popularity in the United States led to an addition to standard cutlery sets: the iced tea spoon – a teaspoon with a long handle, suitable for stirring sugar into glasses.
  10. It is a common stereotype of the Southeastern United States that, due to the popularity of sweet iced tea in the region, unsweet iced tea is not available or is frowned upon; it is often the case, however, that the term “iced tea” is assumed by default to mean sweetened iced tea in that region.
  11. National Iced Tea Day is observed annually on June 10th – a day set aside to celebrate one of summer’s favorite drinks.  Whether it is sweetened or unsweetened, with or without lemon, it is loved by many and enjoyed by the glass full all summer long. Homemade and commercially manufactured iced tea can be found in many flavors including lemon, peach, raspberry, lime, passions fruit, strawberry, cherry and more.
  12. An alternative to carbonated soft drinks and quite popular in the United States, iced tea makes up about 85% of all tea consumed.
  13. Green tea has been suggested to be used for a variety of positive health benefits including reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease and some forms of cancer, oral health, reduce blood pressure, weight control, antibacterial and antiviral activity, protection from solar ultraviolet light, anti-fibrotic properties, neuroprotective power. Personally, I still stick with black

Fun Recipies (special thanks to Jamie Ritter at Bustle)

Sweet Tea Bourbon Cocktail With Fresh Mint And Orange  
This infused sweet tea cocktail from Joy the Baker balances the woody flavor of bourbon with lighter, summery notes of citrus and mint.

Spiked Iced Soy Chai Tea
Add this spicy iced tea from The Kitchn to the menu, and we will be the first to RSVP to your porch party.

Tipsy Lemonade and Peach Iced Tea
This beautiful tincture from The Comfort of Cooking combines fruit juice and adult mixer for a flavor profile that’s all grown-up.

Just Good Old Fashion Iced Tea
In a large pot, combine six black tea bags tied together, and strips of lemon and orange zest, and boiling water. Let steep 8 minutes. Remove tea bags and let cool to room temperature, about 2 hours. Add sugar to taste and serve over ice with lemon and orange slices if desired.

Classic Arnold Palmer
Named after the famed golfer, mix equal parts of lemonade and iced tea in a big glass filled with ice. Then, throw on the shades, kick back and enjoy the summer.

Yours?
If you have a favorite recipe, send my way and I’ll share it with the group, and send you a collector’s addition KHT “chillin” summer t-shirt.

 

 

Did you get my message?

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(row one left) Curiosity leads many people to throw notes in bottles into the sea to see where they might land. To others it’s a last desperate attempt to communicate with someone somewhere; (row one right two images) The old beer bottle that skipper Konrad Fischer plucked from is nets in 2014 contained a postcard dated 17 May 1913; (row two left two images) message in a bottle that reads “From Titanic. Goodbye all. Jeremiah Burke of Glanmire, Cork” washes ashore in Dunkettle, Ireland in 1913; (row two right two images) 1999. A bottle is discovered in the River Thames sent from World War I private Thomas Hughes, who wrote a message for his wife and tossed it into the English Channel as he left to fight in France in 1914. He was killed in battle two days later. The bottle is delivered to his 86-year-old daughter in New Zealand; (row four middle) Keep your messages on this 16GB Drift Bottles USB 2.0 Flash Memory Stick in drift bottles style. Get it HERE; (row four right) Social networking in its oldest form. Harold Hackett has sent out over 4,800 messages in a bottle and has received over 3,100 responses; (bottom right) In 1979 Event – “Message In A Bottle” by Police peaks at #1 in UK; (bottom left) In 2012, a note written by Sidonie Fery, who died at 18 in 2010, washes up in the Hurricane Sandy debris. The message, written when Fery was 10, reads: “Be excellent to yourself, dude.”

 

Ever start a conversation like that? Ever think about how many times in a week we are sending and leaving messages. Email, cellphone, Facebook, Intragram, Twitter, and more. Some days it seems like that’s all I do, or all we talk about in the national news. If I’m not reading and sending emails, I’m on the phone responding to voice messages, calling my awesome customers to talk about their latest PIA (Pain In The @#$) Jobs. I was wondering about how things “used to be” a long time ago before technology (I grew up in an era when yellow sticky notes used to be the way we “left a message”) and It got me to thinking about casting off a message and hoping for a return, long before telegraphs, mail and technology. So for my trivia buffs, here’s some info I think you’ll dig. Special thanks to nymag, national geographic and ezineartilcles.com.

And to get you in the mood, HERE is one of my favorite tunes you can listen to while reading – ENJOY!

  1. The earliest known message in a bottle was sent by the Greek philosopher Theophrastus, one of Aristotle’s pupils, in 310 B.C., as a way of testing his hypothesis that the Atlantic Ocean flows into the Mediterranean Sea.
  2. In the 1500s, Queen Elizabeth appointed a royal “Uncorker of Ocean Bottles” and makes the unauthorized opening of an “ocean bottle” a capital crime.
  3. In 1846, The United States Coast & Geodetic Survey begins releasing messages in bottles into the ocean en masse to gather data on ocean currents.
  4. Ensconced in a plain glass bottle, a scrap of paper drifted in the North Sea for 98 years. But when a Scottish skipper pulled it from his nets near the Shetland Islands, he didn’t find a lovelorn note or marooned sailor’s SOS. “Please state where and when this card was found, and then put it in the nearest Post Office,” read the message. “You will be informed in reply where and when it was set adrift. Our object is to find out the direction of the deep currents of the North Sea.”  Sorry, romantics.
  5. A message in a bottle that reads “From Titanic. Goodbye all. Burke of Glanmire, Cork” washes ashore in Dunkettle, Ireland in 1913.
  6. In 1915, as the ocean liner Lusitania is sinking—after being torpedoed by a German U-boat—one passenger has time to pen this message: “Still on deck with a few people. The last boats have left. We are sinking fast … The end is near. Maybe this note will—”
  7. The message in a bottle found by Andrew Leaper is certified as the oldest ever recovered—belonged to a century-old science experiment. To study local ocean currents, Capt. C. Hunter Brown of the Glasgow School of Navigation set bottle number 646B adrift, along with 1,889 others, on June 10, 1914.
  8. A passenger aboard the steamship “SS Arawatta wrote a message which was placed in a bottle and thrown overboard between Cairns and Brisbane in 1910.  It was found June 6th, 1983 – 73 years later almost to the day – on Moreton Island off the Queensland Coast.
  9. The 73 year record was broken in 1996 when a fisherman found a bottle in the North Sea which had been in the water 82 years and which made the offer of a small reward if returned.  The fisherman collected £1 from the British Government.
  10. And in the 18th century, a treasure-hunting seaman from Japan named Chunosuke Matsuyama, shipwrecked on a South Pacific island with 43 shipmates, carved a message into coconut wood, put it in a bottle, and set it adrift. It was found in 1935—supposedly in the same village where Matsuyama was born.
  11. In 1979 Event – “Message In A Bottle” by Police peaks at #1 in UK.  And in 1973, Jim Croce, vocalist of the hit song “Time in a Bottle”, dies in a plane crash at age 30.
  12. Amateur fisherman Harold Hackett of Prince Edward Island, Canada, sends the first of over 4,800 messages in bottles. He’s since received more than 3,100 responses.
  13. In 1999, a bottle is discovered in the River Thames sent from World War I private Thomas Hughes, who wrote a message for his wife and tossed it into the English Channel as he left to fight in France in 1914. He was killed in battle two days later. The bottle is delivered to his 86-year-old daughter in New Zealand.
  14. In 2005, after being abandoned at sea off the coast of Costa Rica, 88 South American refugees are rescued when a fishing vessel receives their plea for help in a bottle tied to one of the boat’s fishing lines.
  15. In 2009, in a land-based discovery, workers near Auschwitz find a message in a bottle written by prisoners of the Nazi camp dated September 9, 1944, and bearing the names, camp numbers, and hometowns of seven men.
  16. In 2011, after the Italian bulk carrier Montecristo is hijacked by Somali pirates, the crew is rescued when NATO warships receive a message stating that it is safe to board the ship.
  17. In 2012, a note written by Sidonie Fery, who died at 18 in 2010, washes up in the Hurricane Sandy debris. The message, written when Fery was 10, reads: “Be excellent to yourself, dude.”
  18. There have been some amazing paths followed by sea bottle messages.  Three that were dropped into the Beaufort Sea (map), above northern Alaska and northwestern Canada, became frozen in sea ice.  Five years later, melting Arctic ice had flushed the bottles all the way to northern Europe. Another bottle circled Antarctica one and a half times before it wound up on the Australian island of Tasmania. Some have made it from Mexico to the Philippines. And others have demonstrated that oil spills and debris from development in Canada’s Labrador Sea and Baffin Bay could end up on Irish, French, Scottish, and Norwegian beaches.
  19. Today drift bottles are still used by oceanographers studying global currents. In 2000 Eddy Carmack, a climate researcher at Canada’s Institute of Ocean Science, started the Drift Bottle Project, initially to study currents around northern North America.  In the past 12 years, he and his colleagues have launched some 6,400 bottled messages from ships around the world. Of those, 264—about 4 percent—have been found and reported.
  20. Bloomberg reports that June 1 is the 20th anniversary of text messages – with well over 8 trillion messages sent yearly.  Wonder how many of those are responded to?

Send me a message if you enjoyed this week’s post, and I’ll be sure to respond.

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“Snickets”

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Who doesn’t love the occasional donut? There are some real artists out there making them at 4:00 in the morning. About the right time for me to swing by for a warm one on my way into the office. (bottom) The lovely Snicket. This one’s from Fragapane Bakery.

 

If you are like me, then you will understand how some days are just “made for a doughnut.” Too often (says my lovely wife), I’ll jump in the car and ride up to my neighborhood doughnut shop to get my favorite treat. Like Norm on the TV series Cheers, it’s a great feeling when you walk in and they already know your name and what you’re ordering. Give me a snicket and they let me to pick out that very, very, special one! After that, I’m good for pretty much whatever comes my way that day. Think “PIA” Jobs! Preparing for my post this week, I realized that today is national Doughnut Day, and this weekend is often celebrated as National Doughnut Weekend. Here’s some trivia to help you be the smartest connoisseur at the breakfast counter. Enjoy, and thanks Wikipedia and madehow.com.

  • National Doughnut Day started in 1938 as a fund raiser for Chicago’s The Salvation Army. Their goal was to help those in need during the Great Depression, and to honor The Salvation Army “Lassies” of World War I, who served doughnuts to soldiers.
  • The holiday celebrates the doughnut (a.k.a. donut) – an edible, torus-shaped piece of dough which is deep-fried and sweetened.
  • The doughnut supposedly came to us from the eighteenth century Dutch of New Amsterdam and were referred to as olykoeks, meaning oily cakes. In the nineteenth century, Elizabeth Gregory fried flavored dough with walnuts for her son Hanson Gregory, hence the name doughnut. By the late nineteenth century, the doughnut had a hole.
  • Soon after the US entrance into World War I in 1917, The Salvation Army sent a fact-finding mission to France. The mission concluded that the needs of US enlisted men could be met by canteens/social centers termed “huts” that could serve baked goods, provide writing supplies and stamps, and provide a clothes-mending service. Typically, six staff members per hut would include four female volunteers who could “mother” the boys. These huts were established by The Salvation Army in the United States near army training centers.
  • About 250 Salvation Army volunteers went to France. Because of the difficulties of providing freshly baked goods from huts established in abandoned buildings near to the front lines, the two Salvation Army volunteers (Ensign Margaret Sheldon and Adjutant Helen Purviance) came up with the idea of providing doughnuts. These are reported to have been an “instant hit”, and “soon many soldiers were visiting The Salvation Army huts”. Margaret Sheldon wrote of one busy day: “Today I made 22 pies, 300 doughnuts, 700 cups of coffee.”
  • Soon, the women who did this work became known by the servicemen as “Doughnut Girls” and the soldiers earned the nickname “doughboys”.
  • In the Second World War, Red Cross Volunteers also distributed doughnuts, and it became routine to refer to the Red Cross girls as Doughnut Dollies as well.
  • There are three other doughnut holidays, the origins of which are obscure. International Jelly-Filled Doughnut Day is June 8, National Cream-Filled Doughnut Day is Sept. 14, and Buy a Doughnut Day occurs on October 30.
  • The birthday of the United States Marine Corps was once referred to as National Donut Day, in a successful ruse by American prisoners of war at Son Tay prison camp to trick the North Vietnamese into giving out donuts in honor of the occasion.
  • More than 10 billion donuts are made every year in the U.S.
  • Per capita, Canadians eat the most doughnuts compared to all world countries.
  • Doughnuts vary depending on whether you use yeast or chemically leavened ingredients. Homemade doughnuts generally include far few ingredients than mass- produced or those made from mixes. Chemically-raised doughnuts are made with ingredients such as flour, baking powder, salt, liquid, and varying amounts of eggs, milk, sugar, shortening and other flavorings using baking powder in the batter to leaven the dough. Yeast-leavened doughnuts are made with ingredients that include flour, shortening, milk, sugar, salt, water, yeast, eggs or egg whites, and flavorings.
  • And I’m sure you’re wondering, after snickets, my top three doughnuts are peanut, blueberry glazed and Boston cream.

(email me your top 3 doughnut choices, and I’ll send you a collector KHT coffee mug)

 

Doughnut Dollies 1918 France.

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FLY YOUR FLAG IN MEMORIAL

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(row two first image) American War Cemetery (World War II), Florence, Tuscany, Italy — Photo by Bertl123; (row three first image) Belleau, Northern France – MAY 24, 2015: memorial day at American cemetery — Photo by njaj; (row four first image) Arlington Cemetery on Memorial Day on May 27, 2013, in Washington, D.C, USA — Photo by dinhhang. The rest of the images need no caption.

 

While most of us will celebrate Memorial Day as a day off work, let’s also use it to remember our fallen and all those who have served so bravely to defend and protect our great nation. At KHT, we honor all those who serve, and have served, and put you in our heartfelt prayers for your tremendous sacrifice. Here’s a little trivia for those of you interested in being the smartest person at the family cookout. Enjoy, and special thanks to Wikipedia and history.com for the additional insights.

  • Memorial Day is an American holiday, observed on the last Monday of May, honoring the men and women who died while serving in the U.S. military.
  • Originally known as Decoration Day, it originated in the years following the Civil War and became an official federal holiday in 1971. Many Americans observe Memorial Day by visiting cemeteries or memorials, holding family gatherings and participating in parades.
  • The practice of decorating soldiers’ graves with flowers is an ancient custom. Soldiers’ graves were decorated in the U.S. before and during the American Civil War. Following President Abraham Lincoln’s assassination in April 1865, there were a variety of events of commemoration.
  • The sheer number of soldiers of both sides who died in the Civil War (more than 600,000) meant that burial and memorialization took on new cultural significance. Under the leadership of women during the war, an increasingly formal practice of decorating graves had taken shape. In 1865, the federal government began creating national military cemeteries for the Union war dead. The Richmond Times-Dispatch newspaper claimed in 1906 that Warrenton, Virginia, was the location of the first Civil War soldier’s grave ever to be decorated; the date cited was June 3, 1861.
  • By the late 1860s, Americans in various towns and cities had begun holding springtime tributes to the countless fallen soldiers, decorating their graves with flowers and reciting prayers. It is unclear where exactly this tradition originated; numerous different communities may have independently initiated the memorial gatherings. Nevertheless, in 1966 the federal government declared Waterloo, NY as, the official birthplace of Memorial Day, chosen because it hosted an annual, community-wide event, during which businesses closed and residents decorated the graves of soldiers with flowers and flags.
  • Memorial Day did not become the more common name until after World War II, and was not declared the official name by Federal law until 1967. On June 28, 1968, Congress passed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, which moved four holidays, including Memorial Day, from their traditional dates to a specified Monday to create a convenient three-day weekend. The change moved Memorial Day from its traditional May 30 date to the last Monday in May. The law took effect at the federal level in 1971. After some initial confusion and unwillingness to comply, all 50 states adopted Congress’ change of date within a few years.
  • In 1915, following the Second Battle of Ypres, Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, a physician with the Canadian Expeditionary Force, wrote the poem, “In Flanders Fields”. Its opening lines refer to the fields of poppies that grew among the soldiers’ graves in Flanders. In 1918, inspired by the poem, YWCA worker Moina Michael attended a YWCA Overseas War Secretaries’ conference wearing a silk poppy pinned to her coat and distributed over two dozen more to others present. In 1920, the National American Legion adopted it as their official symbol of remembrance.
  • On Memorial Day, the flag of the United States is raised briskly to the top of the staff and then solemnly lowered to the half-staff position, where it remains only until noon. It is then raised to full-staff for the remainder of the day. The half-staff position remembers the more than one million men and women who gave their lives in service of their country. At noon, their memory is raised by the living, who resolve not to let their sacrifice be in vain, but to rise-up in their stead and continue the fight for liberty and justice for all.
  • In 2000, Congress passed the National Moment of Remembrance Act, asking people to stop and remember at 3:00 P.M.
  • The National Memorial Day Concert takes place on the west lawn of the United States Capitol. The concert is broadcast on PBS and NPR. Music is performed, and respect is paid to the men and women who gave their lives for their country.
  • For many Americans, the central event is attending one of the thousands of parades held on Memorial Day in large and small cities all over the country. Most of these feature marching bands and an overall military theme with the National Guard and other service personnel participating along with veterans and military vehicles from various wars.
  • One of the longest-standing traditions is the running of the Indianapolis 500, an auto race which has been held in conjunction with Memorial Day since 1911. It runs on the Sunday preceding the Memorial Day holiday. Other weekend events include NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600, held later the same day since 1961, the PGA Memorial Tournament golf event and the final of the NCAA Division I Men’s Lacrosse Championship.
  • On Memorial Day weekend in 1988, 2,500 motorcyclists rode into Washington, D.C. for the first Rolling Thunder rally to draw attention to Vietnam War soldiers still missing in action or prisoners of war. By 2002, the ride had swelled to 300,000 bikers, many of them veterans, and today reaches one million riders. A national veterans rights group, Rolling Thunder takes its name from the B-52 carpet-bombing runs during the war in Vietnam.
  • Now, no holiday can be complete without food! Americans will eat 818 hot dogs per second on Memorial Day. That’s a few wieners short of 71 million in a day. And as for that summer statistical symmetry, Memorial Day leads up to the number one barbecue event, July 4 before coasting down into Labor Day (a close third at 55 percent).
  • The grilling gurus at the Hearth, Patio & Barbecue Association say the top choices for grilling will be burgers (85%), steak (80%), hot dogs (79%) and chicken (73%), with no sign of tofu turkey anywhere in the ratings. Hickory is the top flavor of barbecue sauce, followed by mesquite, honey, and spicy-hot.

Enjoy your family and friends and please remember to say a prayer for our fallen.

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Some Like It Hot

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(top left) Red hot chili peppers… Hey, that’d be a great name for a band! (top right group: rows one, two & three, l to r) Anaheim peppers, Banana peppers, Bell peppers, Cayenne peppers, Cherry peppers, Jalapeno peppers, Pimiento peppers and a garden full of Ornamental Peppers; (bottom group) Hey, a guy’s gotta’ eat: Peppers are GREAT on pizza and a MUST in fajitas and burritos!

With Memorial Day weekend coming up, it’s time for me to plan and plant my veggie garden. Working with Jackie and the girls, we’ll plan our garden like most people, prep the soil, and head off to the garden center – where I then focus on my favorite area – you guessed it – my peppers. Being a guy who gets a bit excited about heat, I get fired-up (get it) every year trying to figure out the best balance of taste, sweetness, texture and kick. Couple this with my organization and processing brain, my peppers garden becomes my own little PIA (Pain In The @#$) Job. I get to apply my love of problem solving, trial and error, care and nurturing, and with good sun and the right amount of water, success later in the season. THEN… I wake up and realize that unfortunately I do not have a “green” thumb and can’t grow a thing! If I want some of my favorite peppers I have to go buy them! So, for my post this week, I thought I’d pass along some general info on pepper types, and a little info on the famous Scoville scale. Many thanks to garden.org and theguardian.com.

  • Chile, Chili, Cayenne, Jalapeno – By Any Name, It’s Hot! Names for hot peppers can get confusing. Some people call them chili peppers, cayennes or jalapenos, and others just call them hot peppers. What are they really called? Is each of these names a separate category?
  • The confusion started in Mexico. Chile is the Spanish word for pepper. To specify which type of pepper, Mexicans would add the word for the particular type of pepper after the name chile. Therefore, chile dulce would be sweet pepper, chile jalapeno would be the Jalapeno pepper, and so on. When chile found its way into this country, different meanings were given to it in various parts of the country, and it even acquired a new spelling. In the Southwest and West, chile is used to refer to the Anaheim pepper. In other parts of the South and the Southeast, and still other sections of the country, chile refers to any type of hot pepper. Some folks refer to all hot peppers as cayennes or jalapenos. And all over the country we have different chile con carnes, which are pepper based.
  • Chile and chili are not varieties of peppers, but only words used to describe that the pepper is hot. So whether you say chile or chili, cayenne or jalapeno, and whether the word describes just an Anaheim pepper or all hot peppers, watch out! That pepper is hot!
  • Seed companies break the peppers we grow down into two categories: hot and sweet. The hot types include Cayenne, Jalapeno and Anaheim. Examples of sweet peppers are Bell and Pimiento. Banana and Cherry peppers come both sweet and hot.
  • When people talk about flavor, they usually focus on taste and smell. But there’s a third major flavor sense, as well, one that’s often overlooked: the physical sensations of touch, temperature and pain. The burn of chilli peppers is the most familiar example here, but there are others. Wine mavens speak of a wine’s “mouthfeel”, a concept that includes the puckery astringency of tannins – something tea drinkers also notice – and the fullness of texture that gives body to a wine. Gum chewers and peppermint fans recognize the feeling of minty coolness they get from their confections. And everyone knows the fizzy bite of carbonated drinks.
  • None of these sensations is a matter of smell or taste. In fact, our third primary flavor sense flies so far under our radar that even flavor wonks haven’t agreed on a single name for it. Sensory scientists are apt to refer to it as “chemesthesis”, “somatosensation”, or “trigeminal sense”, each of which covers a slightly different subset of the sense, and none of which mean much at all to the rest of the world.
  • Chilli aficionados get pretty passionate about their pods, choosing just the right kind of chilli for each application from the dozens available. The difference among chilli varieties is partly a matter of smell and taste: some are sweeter, some are fruitier, some have a dusky depth to their flavour. But there are differences in the way they feel in your mouth, too.
  • One difference is obvious: heat level. Chilli experts measure a chilli’s level of burn in Scoville heat units, a scale first derived by Wilbur Scoville, a pharmacist and pharmaceutical researcher, in 1912. Working in Detroit, Scoville had the bright idea that he could measure a pepper’s hotness by diluting its extract until tasters could no longer detect the burn. The hotter the pepper was originally, the more you’d have to dilute it to wash out the burn. Pepper extract that had to be diluted just tenfold to quench the heat scores 10 Scoville heat units; a much hotter one that has to be diluted one hundred thousandfold scores 100,000 Scovilles.
  • However you measure it, chillies differ widely in their heat level. Anaheims and poblanos are quite mild, tipping the scale at about 500 and 1,000 Scovilles, respectively. Jalapeños come in around 5,000, serranos about 15,000, cayennes about 40,000, Thai bird’s eye chillies near 100,000, and the habanero on my table somewhere between 100,000 and 300,000 Scovilles. From there, intrepid souls can venture into the truly hot, topping out with the Carolina Reaper at a staggering 2.2 million Scovilles, which approaches the potency of police-grade pepper spray.
  • Paul Bosland, the director of the Chile Pepper Institute at New Mexico State University, a plant breeder by trade, has a keen professional interest in all the tiny details of how chilli heat differs from one pod to the next. Bosland says he and his colleagues distinguish four other components to chilli heat in addition to heat level. The first is how fast the heat starts. “Most people, when they bite the habanero, it maybe takes 20 to 30 seconds before they feel the heat, whereas an Asian chilli is immediate,” he says. Chillies also differ in how long the burn lasts. Some, like jalapeños and many of the Asian varieties, fade relatively quickly; others, like habaneros, may linger for hours. Where the chilli hits you also varies. “Usually, with a jalapeño, it’s the tip of your tongue and lips, with New Mexico pod types it’s in the middle of the mouth, and with a habanero it’s at the back,” says Bosland. And fourth, Bosland and his crew distinguish between “sharp” and “flat” qualities of burn. “Sharp is like pins sticking in your mouth, while flat is like a paintbrush,” he says. New Mexico chillies tend to be flat while Asian ones tend to be sharp.

Have fun planning your garden. I’ll swing by this subject later in the season, discuss our collective horticultural successes and share some great salsa and peppers recipes.
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The 5th of May

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(top row l to r) In the early 1860’s, Napoleon, III thought it’d be a good idea to own Mexico; The battle of Puebla; President Benito Juárez said to Napoleon, III “not on my watch, dude” or something like that. (middle row) Two depictions of the revered Benito Juárez leading his people through troubled times. His birthday, March 21, is a national holiday. (bottom row l to r) Dancers at the annual Cinco de Mayo Festival in Washington, D.C.; Who doesn’t love some chips and salsa? We have a great recipe below. What can I say, I express my feelings through food. 

 

My Spanish vocabulary is limited to “taco” and “cerveza,” so I took this Cinco de Mayo as an opportunity to learn more about the significance of this holiday. A relatively minor holiday in most of Mexico, in the United States Cinco de Mayo has evolved into a celebration of Mexican culture and heritage, particularly in areas with large Mexican-American populations.  For me, it’s a chance to share a little heritage with my neighbors, enjoy some great food and beverages with my staff and friends, and officially commemorate the date of the Mexican army’s 1862 victory over France at the Battle of Puebla during the Franco-Mexican War (1861-1867). Here is a little history you can use to impress your friends while passing the salsa…(try mine below).  And thanks to history.com for the info.

  • In 1861, Benito Juárez, a lawyer and member of the indigenous Zapotec tribe, was elected president of Mexico. At the time, the country was in financial ruin after years of internal strife, and the new president was forced to default on debt payments to European governments.
  • In response, France, Britain and Spain sent naval forces to Veracruz, Mexico, demanding repayment. Britain and Spain negotiated with Mexico and withdrew their forces. France, however, ruled by Napoleon III, decided to use the opportunity to carve an empire out of Mexican territory.
  • Late in 1861, a well-armed French fleet stormed Veracruz, landing a large force of troops and driving President Juárez and his government into retreat. Certain that success would come swiftly, 6,000 French troops under General Charles Latrille de Lorencez set out to attack Puebla de Los Angeles, a small town in east-central Mexico.
  • From his new headquarters in the north, Juárez rounded up a ragtag force of 2,000 loyal men—many of them either indigenous Mexicans or of mixed ancestry—and sent them to Puebla.
  • The vastly outnumbered and poorly supplied Mexicans, led by Texas-born General Ignacio Zaragoza, fortified the town and prepared for the French assault. On May 5, 1862, Lorencez gathered his army—supported by heavy artillery—before the city of Puebla and led an assault.
  • The battle lasted from daybreak to early evening, and when the French finally retreated, they had lost nearly 500 soldiers. Fewer than 100 Mexicans had been killed in the clash.
  • Although not a major strategic win in the overall war against the French, Zaragoza’s success at Puebla on May 5 represented a great symbolic victory for the Mexican government and bolstered the resistance movement.
  • In 1867—thanks in part to military support and political pressure from the United States, which was finally in a position to aid its besieged neighbor after the end of the American Civil War—France finally withdrew.
  • The same year, Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, who had been installed as emperor of Mexico in 1864 by Napoleon, was captured and executed by Juárez’s forces. Puebla de Los Angeles was renamed for General Zaragoza, who died of typhoid fever months after his historic triumph there.
  • Within Mexico, Cinco de Mayo is primarily observed in the state of Puebla, where Zaragoza’s unlikely victory occurred, although other parts of the country also take part in the celebration. Traditions include military parades, recreations of the Battle of Puebla and other festive events. For many Mexicans, however, May 5 is a day like any other: It is not a federal holiday, so offices, banks and stores remain open.
  • In the United States, Cinco de Mayo is widely interpreted as a celebration of Mexican culture and heritage, particularly in areas with substantial Mexican-American populations.
  • In the 1960’s, Chicano activists raised awareness of the holiday in part because they identified with the victory of indigenous Mexicans, such as Juárez.
  • Today, revelers mark the occasion with parades, parties, mariachi music, Mexican folk dancing and traditional foods such as tacos and mole poblano. Some of the largest festivals are held in Los Angeles, Chicago and Houston.

Hot + Spicy “Can’t Stop Dippin” Salsa Recipe

  • 2 10 oz. cans diced tomatoes and green chilies
  • 1 12 oz. can whole tomatoes (with Mexican flavors ok)
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 1 chopped onion
  • 1 or 2 whole jalapeno, quartered & sliced thin with seeds/membrane
  • ¼ teaspoon ground cumin
  • ¼ teaspoon kosher or sea salt
  • ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper
  • ¼ teaspoon sugar
  • 1 fresh lime – squeeze out all the juice you can
  • for fun, add one can of black beans and cup of frozen corn

FOOD PROCESSOR: Combine the diced tomatoes, whole tomatoes, cilantro, onions, garlic, jalapeno, cumin, salt, sugar and lime juice in a blender or food processor. (This is a very large batch. I recommend using a 12-cup food processor, or you can process the ingredients in batches and then mix everything together in a large mixing bowl.) Pulse until you get the salsa to the consistency you’d like. I do about 10 to 15 pulses. Test seasonings with a tortilla chip and adjust as needed.

HAND METHOD: Pour whole tomatoes and juice into bowl and slice up into small bite sized pieces. Chop cilantro, garlic and onion into small pieces and add with rest of ingredients. Hand mix and set texture to your preference.
Refrigerate the salsa for at least an hour before serving. Check amount of liquid and drain as needed. Serve with medley of white and black chips.
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Let The Sunshine In

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(top row) Some original Hair production photos. Diane Keaton (far right) was in one of the early shows. (2nd row l to r) The Duluth Minnesota News Tribune sensationalized (on page one!) the 10 seconds of nudity at the end of act one with this censored photo and the headline “Does ‘Hair’ cast go all the way?” I’m thinking they sold more papers that day; Love beads; The cast at one of the performances in Germany. (3rd row left) The original show poster (3rd row middle) Four of the album covers of cast recordings (the original in the upper left) and a promotion banner created through the years. (3rd row right) Everyone gets into the act including Lulu, the hairiest of them all at bottom right.

 

Wow, what a glorious day here in Cleveburgh. After my run this morning, I found myself really enjoying spring in all its glory, watching the sun come up from my office overlooking Lake Erie – birds chirping, trees and flowers blooming and the fresh budding smells of the season. And, like you may often do, I found myself singing out loud that so familiar “sunshine” tune, as I cracked open my window to feel the warmth and rays of the sun. Now, it’s important to keep in mind that I can only sing in my office when no one else is around! It’s hard to describe in words, but fresh air and sunshine just puts me in a great mood as I head off to work and tackle your fun and challenging PIA (Pain In The @%$) Jobs of the day. For this week’s post, I did some digging, too, to learn more about the famous musical that rocked our culture of the day, and personally spoke to me years later (yes, as you know I am follicly challenged). Here is some fun reading about this awesome musical HAIR, a link to the Aquarius/Sunshine soundtrack and few of the other great tunes in the show – and thanks again Wikipedia and history.com.

  • In a year marked by as much social and cultural upheaval as 1968, it was understandable that the New York Times review of this controversial musical newly arrived on Broadway describes the show in political terms. “You probably don’t have to be a supporter of Eugene McCarthy to love it,” wrote critic Clive Barnes, “but I wouldn’t give it much chance among the adherents of Governor Reagan.” The show in question was Hair,
  • The now-famous “tribal love-rock musical” that introduced the era-defining song “Aquarius” and gave theatergoers a full-frontal glimpse of the burgeoning 60s-counterculture esthetic, premiered this weekend on Broadway almost 50 years ago.
  • Hair was not a brand-new show when it opened at the Biltmore Theater. It began its run 40 blocks to the south, in the East Village, as the inaugural production of Joseph Papp’s Public Theater. Despite mediocre reviews, Hair was a big enough hit with audiences during its six-week run to win financial backing for a proposed move to Broadway, exceedingly rare for a musical at the time, and a particularly bold move for a musical with a nontraditional rock and roll score.
  • The novelty of the show didn’t stop with its music or references to sex and drugs. Hair also featured a much-talked-about scene at the end of its first act in which the cast appeared completely nude on the dimly lit stage. It turned out that these potentially shocking breaks from Broadway tradition didn’t turn off Broadway audiences at all, as Hair quickly became not just a smash-hit show, but a genuine cultural phenomenon that spawned a million-selling original cast recording and a #1 song on the pop charts for the Fifth Dimension.
  • Hair tells the story of the “tribe”, a group of politically active, long-haired hippies of the “Age of Aquarius” living a bohemian life in New York City and fighting against conscription into the Vietnam War. Claude, his good friend Berger, their roommate Sheila and their friends struggle to balance their young lives, loves, and the sexual revolution with their rebellion against the war and their conservative parents and society. Ultimately, Claude must decide whether to resist the draft as his friends have done, or to succumb to the pressures of his parents, and conservative America, to serve in Vietnam, compromising his pacifist principles and risking his life.
  • Hair was conceived by actors James Rado and Gerome Ragni. The two met in 1964 when they performed together in the Off-Broadway flop Hang Down Your Head and Die, and they began writing Hair together in late 1964. The main characters were autobiographical, with Rado’s Claude being a pensive romantic and Ragni’s Berger an extrovert. Their close relationship, including its volatility, was reflected in the musical. Rado explained, “We were great friends. It was a passionate kind of relationship that we directed into creativity, into writing, into creating this piece. We put the drama between us on stage.”
  • The inspiration for Hair as “a combination of some characters we met in the streets, people we knew and our own imaginations. We knew this group of kids in the East Village who were dropping out and dodging the draft, and there were also lots of articles in the press about how kids were being kicked out of school for growing their hair long”. 
  • Said Rado, “There was so much excitement in the streets and the parks and the hippie areas, and we thought if we could transmit this excitement to the stage it would be wonderful…. We hung out with them and went to their Be-Ins [and] let our hair grow. “Many cast members (Shelley Plimpton in particular) were recruited right off the street. It was very important historically, and if we hadn’t written it, there’d not be any examples. You could read about it and see film clips, but you’d never experience it. We thought, This is happening in the streets,’ and we wanted to bring it to the stage.”
  • The first recording of Hair was made in 1967 featuring the off-Broadway cast. The original Broadway cast recording received a Grammy Award in 1969 for Best Score from an Original Cast Show Album and sold nearly 3 million copies in the U.S.  It charted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, the last Broadway cast album to do so (as of 2016). It stayed at No. 1 for 13 weeks in 1969. The New York Times noted in 2007 that “The cast album of Hair was… a must-have for the middle classes. Its exotic orange-and-green cover art imprinted itself instantly and indelibly on the psyche…. [It] became a pop-rock classic that, like all good pop, has an appeal that transcends particular tastes for genre or period.”
  • Forty years after its initial downtown opening, Charles Isherwood, writing for the New York Times, placed Hair in its proper historical context: “For darker, knottier and more richly textured sonic experiences of the times, you turn to the Doors or Bob Dylan or Joni Mitchell or Jimi Hendrix or Janis Joplin. Or all of them. For an escapist dose of the sweet sound of youth brimming with hope that the world is going to change tomorrow, you listen to Hair and Let the Sunshine In.”  Listen to Hair and Let the Sunshine In!

Watch & Listen: “Hair” LIVE @ The 2009 Tony Awards HERE
Listen to the original cast version: The Flesh Failures (Let the Sunshine In) HERE
Listen to the 5th Dimension version: Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In HERE

 

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