Thursday, April 24, 2008

#100!

Last night was Sandwich Night and my 100th sandwich of 2008. How exciting!
We welcomed three newcomers to Sandwich Night, too. Karen brought her new roommate Lisa and Lisa's dog Sienna. Our friend Mel couldn't resist coming either. (Mel made a permanent friend of Sienna by slipping her a fair amount of loose meat. Hee hee!)
I made Maid-Rite style loose meat sandwiches in honor of our failed attempts to eat them in Iowa a week and a half ago. There are an abundance of Maid-Rite recipes on the web. Some have truly bizarre ingredients--chicken gumbo soup, beer, Pepsi? I decided to try a couple recipes so we could have a taste-off. One had ground beef, onions, Worcestershire sauce, water and salt. The other had ground beef, onions, Worcestershire sauce and Coca Cola.
They looked pretty much the same. The Coke one seemed too sweet when tasted plain. The non-Coke one was yummy plain. But, when we added the traditional condiments-yellow mustard, dill pickle slices and chopped onion-the Coke one really shined.
Karen brought roasted green beans and they were so delicious that we ate them all as an appetizer while the loose meat was simmering. We heckled America's Next Top Model while we ate our sandwiches. And while we were certain that plus size Whitney was going to get the boot, we were surprised to see Lauren go home instead. Oh Lauren, you had such potential. Oh well.

To finish the evening we made floats from Schlafly Coffee Stout, vanilla ice cream, maple syrup and a touch of cinnamon (Mel's brilliant suggestion). They tasted almost like chocolate. And contained one of our servings of dairy for the day!

2 comments:

Amy said...

Since I was unable to come to your Maid-Rite Night, I had my own. I used the "ground beef, diced onions, salt, pepper and chicken broth" recipe. My children thought they were dee-lish, and the adults seemed happy as well. I entertained all with my Hannibal, MO stories, and the "Bungelow" bar next to the library in rural MN where I first had these beauties growing up. I shed a tear. And then the "loose meat" jokes started, so I was not overcome. The kids and I all had mustard and pickles, Jay ate his with Bello Hot Pepper Sauce (http://www.bellobrand.com/sauces.htm). I guess there are always innovators.

vdaisy said...

Here's my funny..."You're not from around here, are you?" story. At a work potluck, I brought "maid-rites". No one knew what I meant, until I said "sloppy joes." As Rebecca has written, "maid rites" are an Iowa thing, or at least not a Minnesota thing. To make things even funnier, people were so impressed that my maid rites were homemade. I would hardly call mine homemade, as all I do is add ketchup, salt/pepper, onions, and oregano. But to these fascinating, Minnesota born, mamwich sloppy joe makers, I was the cooking goddess. Congratulations on your 100th!