April 11 2009
Nothing much happened this week gang, so here’s a repeat of a report from March 6th 2004.
That week, Fred Gormay, always in search of a new recipe, assembled what he figured was the makings for a really nice pot of green chile pork stew. The recipe can’t be revealed here, but let it suffice to say that that he was using Hatch green chiles from New Mexico.
He was about halfway through the first six pack when he got out the old aluminum stew pot, turned it upside down, and beat on the bottom of it to knock out any foreign material that may have crawled into it and failed to leave.
Manys the time he had come home late at night and started cooking something in that pot, only to fall asleep. He would wake up with a house full of smoke, and spend the next day or two cleaning the carbon out of the bottom of the pot. Finally, one time, four or five years ago, it sprung a leak. That didn’t bother old Fred. He just patched it with JB Weld, and it still works just fine.
At any rate, he really nursed that pot of green chile stew. Browned the pork, just so. Selected each spice and how much of it, with the concentration of an alchemist.
After a couple hours of chopping, dicing, and sprinkling and stirring, the stew was perfect. He was working on his third six pack. As we all know, there is no aperitif quite like a half case of beer or so.
All that was needed was a little cornstarch to thicken a little.
He reached into the cupboard for the familiar golden box, poured some in a cup, and added a little water. It mixed an up a little easier than usual, but he didn’t notice.
But he did notice that when he poured it into the pork stew, it foamed up quite a bit.
He looked at the golden box.
It said "BAKING SODA" on it.
"Well," he reasoned, "if it’s for baking, it can’t be too bad. I’ll try a little taste. Maybe I’ve discovered something new. What the hell, it’s used for baking. Right?"
Have you ever seen a little baby taste something really vile? How their little faces scroonch way up, and how a great spasm rips explosively up and down their spine?
Well, if you happen to see Fred walking around in a neck brace, don’t ask him what happened, because now you know what happened, and he’s pretty embarrassed about it.
Cooking can be pretty dangerous, gang.

Till next week
Helga Biermeister
Secretary