Excuse me, you dropped your liver

5/30/2007

Every once in a while, you hear one of those stories that ranks right up there in the you-don’t-hear-that-every-day department. It happened to me on the weekend, when I heard a story about a family who got together for a meal.
The food was delicious, the company excellent, and the laughter easy. In the end, one of the dinner guests, the practical sort who tends not to waste a thing, asked for some tasty leftovers to take home.
The host generously obliged, coffee was poured, and the meal was declared a success. Upon leaving, however, the guest had misplaced her care package. There was a brief panic, until the night was rescued with a friendly:
“Excuse me, you dropped your liver.”
The whole story struck me as incredibly funny, not because it sounds like a Monty Python sketch, but due to the fact that someone actually served liver to a guest.
I happen to love liver—and I’m not alone.
Some people even order it in restaurants. One man told me he orders liver because it is cheap, and no one else orders it, so you usually get a lot of it on your plate.
For most people, however, liver is a curse. On the list of most requested foods at a birthday party, liver would be at the bottom, well behind such champions as pizza and hot dogs, and suffering with the eggplant and asparagus.
Just don’t let anyone tell you that eating liver is bad for you. It is probably the second best tasting organ, a distant second best that is, to Kentucky fried chicken skin.
If chicken joints ever develop the market for skinless fried yardbird, and they need a way to get rid of all that unwanted by-product, I will get up extra early just to wait in line to buy the first Bucket-O-Skin plucked from the deep fryer. Then, I’ll get right back in line and eat chicken skin until I make it back up to the counter.
You might think I’m kidding but, at a dinner party not long ago, I noticed the menu included skinless chicken breasts. I asked our hostess what became of the skin, and she produced a large bowl, nearly overflowing, and said it could go in the garbage. Nonsense! I said, and got to work.
After the pieces were seasoned and breaded, I spread them on trays in the oven and cranked up the heat.
For health and safety reasons, the trays had to be drained several times, until the appetizers were crispy enough to be served. By the time the bowl was empty again, there wasn’t a person in the room who didn’t want the recipe. Even the girls were interested, as I had them believing in the whole “baked, not fried” approach.
No need to worry, though. I still enjoy the odd batch of liver. Serve it up with onions, mushrooms and a caesar, and you can get away with calling it health food. Throw in some mint ice cream, and you have one more serving of veggies, due to a vegetable-based dye that makes it green.
There is something special about eating an animal’s liver. It is primal, and honest. I would certainly rather eat liver than see it wasted, and it’s hard to argue with that.
Somebody call Al Gore and tell him I’m making the world a better place for our children. One liver at a time.

Beer is the foundation of civilization

5/23/2007

There are those who would argue it is the discovery of fire, perhaps the development of language, or even the spread of agriculture; but, the truth of it is, the foundation of civilization can be only one thing. Beer.
Back in the early days, when humans were hairy little things scratching around in the dirt, we roamed around in small bands of hunters and gatherers. Early humans lived on roots and berries, deer when they could catch them, and fish and lobster if they hung out on the coast.
Upwards of 15,000 years ago, humans discontinued their nomadic hunting and gathering and settled down to farm. This is because they needed to grow grain to make beer. Grain became the first domesticated crop to kick start the farming process, and agriculture was born.
The two most important events in all of history are the invention of beer and the invention of the wheel, in that order, because the wheel was invented to get man closer to the beer in time for last call. Bottles and cans were yet to be invented, so early drinkers sat together around the brewery. This is how towns and villages were formed.
The oldest proven records of brewing are about 6,000 years old and refer to the Sumerians, near the ancient city of Babylon. A 4,000 year old Sumerian hymn to Ninkasi, the goddess of brewing, is also a recipe for making beer.
It details the earliest account of what is easily barley, followed by a description of bread being baked, crumbled into water to form a mash, and then made into a drink that made people feel "exhilarated, wonderful and blissful."
It should be obvious, then, to any historian, that baked bread was invented as a convenient method for storing and transporting the ingredients required to make beer.
In ancient times, beer was cloudy and unfiltered. The first drinking straws were invented to avoid getting the brewing residue, which was very bitter, in the mouth. Beer from Babylon was eventually exported and distributed as far away as Egypt, making it the first form of free trade.
Hammurabi, an important Babylonian king, decreed the oldest known collection of laws. One of those laws established a daily beer ration, and the ration was directly dependent on the social standing of the individual.
A normal worker received two litres, civil servants earned three litres, while administrators and high priests could claim five litres per day. This gave rise to the class system, and furthered the notion that a person’s worth can be measured in how well stocked their beer fridge is.
As beer drinking progressed, so did civilization.
It was one of the earliest forms of currency, prompted better sanitation, and encouraged the early days of comedy and culture through jokes and finger pulling. Beer also made possible the cultivation of corn for nachos, and the domestication of livestock for ribs and chicken wings.
Clearly, we owe a lot to the invention of beer.
Without it, we might still be wandering around, picking berries, throwing stones, and drinking water downriver from where the goats were standing. Which, by the way, is a good guess as to how American beer was invented.

Remembering the greatest little champion

5/9/2007

“The tenth round. The champion, Tommy Burns is now definitely in charge. Moir’s face is bloody. Two right-hand blasts by Tommy, and Gunner goes down.
Gamely, the battered challenger struggles to his feet. Burns gets in with a delayed-action punch. Moir crumples. Gunner again struggles to his feet. Not to be denied, Tommy sends the Englishman reeling against the ropes, and unloads a final dynamite right hand. Wham!
Tommy Burns may be small, but he’s the little giant of the heavyweight division. Gunner Moir is in no condition to beat the count. Burns wins by a smashing knockout.”
That was the call on Dec. 2, 1907, when world heavyweight boxing champion Tommy Burns squared off in London, England, against the massive “Gunner” James Moir, then British Isles Heavyweight Champion.
Burns was on a worldwide tour at the time, to solidify his standing as world champion, and he was unbeatable.
He was also a long way from his childhood home near Ayton, right here in far away Normanby Township, where he was born Noah Brusso, on June 17, 1881.
Considering his rough and rowdy early years, and his share of hard and lean later years, Burns lived a full life. He passed away 52 years ago this week, on May 10, 1955.
Noah Brusso was born into an impoverished family of 13 children, and began his prizefighting career in 1900. Four years later he opted for the more Irish-sounding name of Tommy Burns, and never looked back.
When Burns met Marvin Hart for the heavyweight championship of the world in 1906, he was a 2:1 underdog and was given no chance of toppling the champ. He did, and defended his title 11 times over the next two years.
At only 5’ 7” and around 175 pounds, Burns was then, and remains to this day, the smallest heavyweight boxing champion of all time. His unassuming size, however, did not stop him from becoming one of the most dominant fighters of his day. His powerful right hand was a weapon every opponent feared, or felt squarely on their chin.
In 1908, Burns became the first fighter to agree to a title bout with a black boxer, Jack Johnson. Mighty Jack won the fight, when the police stepped in to stop it in round 14.
Burns continued to box occasionally after dropping the title, and suffered his only official knockout loss in 1920 to champ Joe Beckett, one month before his 39th birthday.
After retirement, hardworking Tommy Burns promoted a few boxing shows. He moved to New York City in 1928 and operated a speakeasy, an illegal bar during the dry days of prohibition. Although he was a wealthy man from his boxing days, the Wall Street crash of 1929, and the Great Depression wiped out the bulk of his fortune.
Burns then worked as an insurance salesman and security guard, among other jobs. In 1948, he was ordained as a minister, and became an evangelist, living in California.
Tommy Burns, 73, died of a heart attack while visiting a church friend in Vancouver. Only four people attended his burial, into an unmarked pauper’s grave. A memorial was finally placed on the great champion’s grave in 1961.