Recipe: "The King's" Nutty Buddy Fried Elvis Sandwich

It was 56 years ago today that the world was first introduced to a motion picture starring Elvis Aaron Presley, things would never the same again.

The "King of Rock & Roll" led a long, industrious career, and is probably best known for his love of savory fried nut-based sandwiches.

In that vein, here is an Elvis-inspired recipe of my own concoction, that I think you will like very much.  The Sandwich has left the building, and entered your belly!

"The King's" Nutty Buddy Fried Elvis Sandwich
Ingredients:
Bread
Butter
Oil
Grated yellow cheese (or regular cheese sliced fine with a pocket knife)
Four or five packets of fast food condiment Mayonnaise
Three index fingers full of peanut butter
Half a handful of salted peanuts
Square of chocolate
Pan
Shallow bowl
Turning stick

Oil up a pan and get it nice and hot and sputtery.  Butter two slices of bread.  In the shallow bowl, mix the cheese, mayonnaise and peanut butter.  Slather the spread onto one slice of bread (non-buttered side).  Place the excess peanuts and chocolate on top.  Cover with the other slice of bread.

Lie one of the butter-sides of the sandwich down.  Leave to cook for a few minutes.  Use the stick to see when it begins to brown.  When it is ready, use the stick to turn it over.

Serve hot, so the cheese is gooey and the chocolate melted.  Enjoy!

In solidarity,

Train Tom

RECIPE: Summer Sizzlin' Pulled Pork

I talked recently about the wonderful, varied tastes of summer.  To this old bag-man, nothing accompanies a hot summer day better than some greasy and flavorful barbeque.

This one's a keeper, friends.  Why not give 'er a try tonight?

SUMMER SIZZLIN' PULLED PORK
Ingredients:
Pack of salted ham lunch-style sandwich slices
Three good handfuls of bbq sauce packets (free, with a little insistence, at most fast food restaurants and gas stations)
Two mustard packets
Taco sauce packet (optional)
Bread/Bun pieces (optional)
Tin foil
Small cup of water
Clean stick
Rag
Metal box with holes in the sides
Three good smears of grease or oil

Get a medium sized fire going.  Set the metal box on top of it.  Make sure holes are punched in the sides of the box so that the fire can stay good and hot underneath it.  Allow the box to get very hot to the touch.

Meanwhile, form a shallow bowl out of a few sheets of tin foil.  Smear the bowl down with a goodly amount of grease or oil.  Put the tin foil bowl on top of the box, and let it warm.  Drizzle a few swigs of water onto the tin foil bowl, it should sputter and steam up real nice.

Empty all of the condiment packets into the sputtering water.  Mix it up nice, so that it is a consistent light brown color.  Using the rag, carefully remove the bowl from the heat.

While the bowl and barbecue slurry is still good and warm, add all the meat slices to the bowl one at a time.  Mix the sauce so that it slathers both sides of all meat slices.

Put the bowl back on the metal box.  As it heats, add small amounts of water periodically so that it doesn't burn.  Allow the sauce to reduce and thicken.

Using the rag, remove the bowl a final time.  Lay out bread.  When the meat is cool enough to handle, pick up each piece and "pull" it apart into small chunks or strips.  Fill each bread piece with a generous amount of meat.  Drizzle sauce over the top of each, and add pepper to taste.

Yum, yum!  It's a lot of work, but it's well worth it.  I find it's best to cook this up just before nightfall, so I can sit back in front of my fire in the warm summer dusk, listening to the crickets and enjoying life.

In solidarity,

Train Tom

Bean Pottage

On those coldest of evenings when even a deflected wind wants to cut deep to your bones, warm yourself up a nice soupy bean pottage and stoke the kindling of your body's hearth.

I like to take a nice can of red beans--the kind that are nice and meaty with flesh that just sloughs right off the bean curd--and get a good fire going.  I'll take a knife a pop a tab-sized hole in the top of the tin and set the can right down on the fire.  You'll know it's done when the slurry begins bubbling up from the hole.

Carefully take the can, using an article of clothing or a handful of rags to protect your fingers from the flame. The hot can will soon warm these protestants and your hands below them.  After allowing the can to settle, drink the pottage straight from the can.  It will be nice and warm and bubbly, delicious.  Afterward you can choose to pop the lid and eat the dry ingredients right then and there, or save them for the next day's meal.  Anything to warm us from this bitter cold!

In solidarity,

Train Tom

TIP: Lip Balm Recipe

A common complaint during the cold, dry winter months is sore lips.  The arid air robs our smackers of their natural moisture, and it can get to the point where wetting them with saliva can become extremely painful.

Lip balm can be a luxurious comfort on these long winter nights.  However, we all know the feeling of trading away good food or potables for something seemingly unessential (although those suffering from chapped lips might argue that moniker!)

A simple, effective solution is to use a few common garbage scraps and resources you may have lying around to make up your own batch.  Plus, you're likely to even have some left over, to give away or for trade!

Vagrant Lip Balm
Ingredients:
1.5 inches of candle wax.
Smear of grease
Dollop of oil (preferably olive oil, but any will do)
Dollop of honey
Multivitamin
Heating stone
Stick
Individual tins

Get a small fire good and hot.  Smear a 3" diameter of grease on a heating stone.  Warm up the heating stone until it is hot enough to make the candle wax nice and malleable.  Add oil and honey.  Crunch up the multivitamin until it is a fine powder, incorporate into goo with stick.  Ladle individual servings into tins.  Allow to cool thoroughly before using.  Do not eat.

In solidarity,

Train Tom

RECIPE: Fried Ketchup Sandwiches

Ketchup packets are a gift from the vagrant gods...free, easily portable, nutritious and darn good.  They can serve as a lovely condiment, a delicious accouterment to a meal, or--in a pinch--a fist full of packets can make a damn fine dinner on their own.

Sometimes, though, it's nice to throw our standard dishes a curve ball and get some new ideas for dressing up old ingredients.  I'm going to kick us off with an easy, inexpensive alternative to straight ketchup, Fried Ketchup Sandwiches.  Feel free to send me other ideas and I'll publish them as well--the mail bag is always open, TrainTomOtt@Gmail.com.

Fried Ketchup Sandwiches
Ingredients:
3 ketchup packets (fast food style)
2 slices of bread
Oil/Grease
Pan

Lube up the pan with a fair slather of oil or grease.  Also wipe some on one side of each piece of bread. Heat the pan good and hot over a low open flame.  Apply contents of ketchup packets to ungreased side of one slice of bread.  Placed greased side down on pan.  Place other slice of bread on top of ketchup, greased side up.

Allow to fry for one full singing of Back Alley Kitty Cat (about 1.5 minutes).  Flip over sandwich, sing again.  Bread should be crispy and brown on both sides.  Enjoy!

Note: For a South-of-the-Border flare, replace one ketchup packet with a fast-food style mild taco sauce packet.

In solidarity,

Train Tom

RECIPE: Krabb Kakes

Neat little recipe I got from Beantown, who will be leaving for the Florida pan-handle this afternoon.  I'm going to give it a whirl tonight!

New England Style Krabb Kakes
Ingredients:
2 generous handfuls of fish meat, any type
Fish oil
1 handful of saltine cracker mash
1 chicken egg or 2 robins eggs
3 fast-food style Mayonnaise packets
1 dill pickle
Butter or lard
Stream water
Shallow bowl
Bucket
Metal grate
Pan or hot stone

Fill your bucket about halfway with stream water, place on an open flame. Add fish oil to water. Allow water to boil up good and hot so that steam bellows up.  Place metal grate over bucket and lay fish fillets over grate.  Let them steam for a full hour, flipping them every ten minutes or so.  After an hour, remove fillets from steam and allow them to cool until they can be handled.

Slather butter or lard onto the pan or hot stone, set aside.  Mash up the fillets and place the slurry in a shallow bowl.  Add crushed up saltine crackers, mayonnaise, egg and smashed pickle.  Mix thoroughly with hands, then form the paste into small cake-size portions.  Lay cakes out on pan or hot stone.

Place pan or hot stone on hot grate.  Allow to fry until cakes become golden brown.  Garnish with mayonnaise, relish or ketchup if available.

Bon appetit!

In solidarity,

Train Tom

RECIPE: Peppered Eggs

A number of you have requested the recipe for the peppered eggs that I mentioned I dined on last week with a transient named Bread.  I found Bread early yesterday afternoon rolling dice out behind the post office, and he was kind enough to transcribe the recipe for me on a Five Guys Burger wrapper.

Peppered Eggs
Ingredients:
Chicken (8-10) or Robin's (12-15) eggs, not too old
Large gallon size Zip-Loc bag
Crushed black pepper
Cooking pot (any size)
Pair of sticks
Stream water

Crack eggs (shells optional) into Zip-Loc bag.  Add black pepper, as much as you can spare ("There can never be too much!" says Bread).  Get your fire nice and hot and bring your stream water to a boil.  Submerge the bag of eggs completely in the hot water, boil vigorously for at least 30 minutes.  Use the pair of sticks to retrieve the bag, allow to cool slightly so that bag can be handled.  Depending on how you like your eggs, mash them up to desired consistency.  Add fresh pepper and serve directly from bag.

Note:  Single serving (1 chicken egg, 2 robin's eggs) can be prepared for light eaters.  A sandwich-size Zip-Loc bag or a CLEAN prophylactic can stand in for the full size bag.


In solidarity,

Train Tom

Turkey Day!

Well friends, tomorrow is Thanksgiving and the Library will be closed.  I wasn't even going to stop in today, I still have to pick up a few things for my own feast with a group of vagrants tomorrow.  Still, I thought maybe I'd try to contribute to your festivities by posting our first recipe.  Thanksgiving-themed, of course!

Simple Hobo Thanksgiving Dinner
Ingredients:
Four or five slices of turkey ham
Chicken broth (canned or fresh made)
Oil
Black pepper
Old bread
Stream water
Cooking pot (no smaller than a large tin can, no larger than a very small trash bin)
Wire strain
Spoon or short stick

Get your stream water nice and hot in your cooking pot over an open flame.  DO NOT BOIL.  Separate turkey ham into nice quarter-sized clumps and add to the pot.  When the meat is warmed, strain the water out but leave the meat in the bottom.  Add oil, chicken broth and black pepper.  Sop up the liquid and a couple good pieces of meat with your bread.  Enjoy!


In solidarity,

Train Tom