Part 2: Does anyone have a rusty fork I can put in my eye?

Read Part 1 of this blog first. But only if you want to...

There's this really interesting new phenomenon that happens at outdoor festival type things nowadays. I guess it might not be that new. The beer garden. Deceptively named.

Beer Garden spectators at the SF Street Food Fest
"Don't the ani-mals look so sad and lonely?"

I experienced this at the last two outdoor events that I attempted, both of which included either a three mile line to the entrance and/or fighting with 20 year olds with feathers in their hair over where the line starts. And me crying.

I get it. It's a great way to try to keep the youngin's from gettin' their hands on a brewsky, and it keeps the neanderthals separated from the neo sapiens. It's a peace keeper in theory. But what about us aging neo sapiens who want to enjoy our beer and tacos like normal animals, walking down the street or sitting on the lawn at a concert, not trapped in a cage with fist-bumping frats?

If you ask me, it sounds more like a recipe for disaster. All the drunks are pinned in together in a tight little caged lump, instead of neatly dispersed amongst a crowd that comfortingly minimizes their power. It's like diluting your white wine with ice cubes.

You also have to stand in (another!) line to get your i.d. checked for a wristband. The line for this is really long, you can imagine. And then you stand in another very long line to get your beer. And then you just stand in the cage. Drinking your beer and fending off elbows, fringe and high-waisted shorts, not actually experiencing the event. The combination is kind of a deterrent. I didn't drink at either event, which is sad. I like beer.

Another note on crowds and why I shouldn't be allowed in them sometimes:

No kidding. We went to the Railroad Revival Tour a few months back at the Port of Oakland, and I swear to Pete that we walked in a line two miles long just to get to the entrance, all the while fighting off line cutters who stumbled along and just happened to stop in front of us and weasel their way in. Really?! I can see you!

After the third time it happened, I snapped. I got all passive-agressive snooty and started saying things like, "Oh, I'm sorry, we're actually in line. It starts back there," and "Oh, sorry! We're in line! Sorry!" which then progressed to crotchety and growly, "Hey! We're in line here! There's a line here, and we're in it, see?! Were you raised by wolves?!"

Also, not kidding: A group of four not-adolescents actually cut and stayed in front of us. So I snickered from behind them more than loud enough to be heard, inching my way in front of them whenever possible. My foot ahead of their's, them stumbling forward. My elbows inching out, them walking faster. Me giving my best evil eye, them ignoring me. It was an ugly dance. For two miles. And nobody else around us was alarmed, growling or attempting to stake claim on their place in line.I was the only one. I was that one.

Railroad Revival Tour @ The Port of Oakland

I should have known how big the crowd would be by how cool the tickets looked.
Isn't the Port of Oakland pretty?

Photos by my sweetums.

Sometimes the clouds are just right. 

It was a beautiful concert, though. We sat on the lawn with about 20 feet of vacant grass surrounding us because everyone else was in the beer garden. So there's that.

A little Edward Sharpe And The Magnetic Zeros for ya.

The End.

Read Part 1 of this blog now. But only if you want to...

EAT: Strawberry Coconut Cake for breakfast, lunch and dinner

I found this on Pinterest! Scroll all the way down for the recipe. . . 

Guess what I had for breakfast.

Ask me how I guilty I feel.

Zip. Zilch. Nada.


This is quite possibly the best recipe that I've ever tried.

Being a southern girl and all, I appreciate a good Strawberry Cake.

Ok, that's a little vulgar. 

But this loco woman did all kinds of crazy goodness to an already good thing.

I could fill a bathtub with this stuff.

I'm gonna make you scroll through

all the mouthwatering images

before you get

to the recipe. 

You're welcome.

**I found this through Pinterest, and boy am I so glad. That place is awesome. 

You should all join. Oh, and follow me.

EAT: On A Pulled Pork Mission

Photo: heartsnxj1.blogspot.com/

I'm southern. There's not much else I need to say to justify this post. 

When you're from Mississippi, just south of bar-b-que capital Memphis, TN, you have the sauce running in your veins. Your family reunions are bigger than a Skynyrd concert and may involve your Uncle Hambone cooking something on the engine of a beefed up pickup truck piled high on cinder blocks. You get lost in a sea of your cousins, know how to properly tip a cow and can smell kudzu in your sleep. You're southern. 

When I moved to California almost 11 years ago, I had no idea how much I would miss those parts of being from the south that were once second skin. Of all the sensory experiences that linger the most, southern food is the one I find myself trying to recreate often, albeit with a California touch.

Be not afraid - I have seen the light of California food. One of the first things that amazed me was seeing lemons, limes and avocados growing on trees. In people's backyards! Food growing on trees! Heading south along route 1, you're destined to find farmer's stands with heaps of brussel sprouts, greens, corn, tomatoes and strawberries stretching for miles along the fresh ocean breeze.

Southern food, which in my mind has always been based on what you grew in your garden or raised in the pastures, has seen a sad amount of fast food-washing over the years. My once small town two-lane road is now a six-lane congested McDonalds-BurgerKing-Applebees-SteakInShake thoroughfare, paving over what used to be green space, grass fields and my old trailer park. 

  

My Granny, Verneal Timmons

The southern food I miss is my Granny Timmons' homemade cinnamon buns, buckets of boiled peanuts, homemade breads, roasted chickens from the coup and good bbq. The fresh foods from her gardens and canned veggies from last season were torturous as a picky kid eater, but times are always achangin'. I find myself cooking more and more like my granny, and a good pulled pork sammich is definitely in order.

My fellow southern transplant friend Damion makes a capital M, Mean pulled pork, but he's holding on dearly to his recipe. I've asked him for it multiple times, and he just starts rattling off various ingredients with this charming, secretive smirk, saying, "Oh, honey! It's so simple. You just. . . brown sugar blah blah. . . pork butt blah blah. . . marinade. . . blah blah," until I've either lost interest or simply can't keep up. He never writes it down.

Luckily there's an awesome place up in Guerneville, CA by the Russian River that my friends have turned me on to. Stumptown Brewery has a yum-o-licious pulled pork sandwich, not to mention that good ole southern biker bar feel and fresh tap micro-brews for days. Sit out on the patio and watch the game or sprawl out on blankets in the large grassy area overlooking the river. This is fast becoming my favorite escape from the foggy city by the bay, and it is oddly always summer there.

Stumptown Brewery's fresh micro brews

Stumptown Brewery Patio

Also, fantastically there's a food truck that hangs out at City Hall on Fridays as a part of San Francisco's Off The Grid food truck movement that surprised the southern out of me with their undressed pulled pork (you add the sauce after, so weird!), fresh cabbage slaw and soft egg buns. Washed it right down with a large sweet iced tea and proceeded to sleep for an hour in the promenade.

Off The Grid, SF Food Trucks @ City Hall
Photo: cookwitheva.com

Of course there are tons of recipes online, but this is the one I'm probably going to try first, unless I can bribe Damion with sugar cubes. I usually default to Ina Garten's methods because she's not afraid of butter, but I go to her mostly for fresh yet indulgent, cape cod fantasy cooking, not down and dirty southern. Food 52 has one that looks simple and, shall we say, "interesting." Coke, really? 

Inarguably, there are different styles of bbq that must be considered - Texas, Carolina and Memphis-style, to name a few. Each has their own subtle and nuanced flavors, methods and fervent followers. I'll just say I'm a Memphis gal, and leave it at that. You can't go on a pulled pork mission without tasting these:

Photo: igougo.com

Rendezvous - the most famous bbq in Memphis. 

Neely's BBQ - three locations throughout Memphis & Nashville. YUM!!

Corky's BBQ - boasting "Slow-cooked over hickory wood and charcoal. As we say...cookin' the old fashion way!" 

Is there a mouth watering bbq hole in your neck of the woods?