are you my brother?

mom and i went krogerin' today. she doesn't need her own groceries, but she likes having a few snacks around. besides, it's good exercise for us both. getting her in and out of the car would be much easier with a trebuchet.

i think my favorite part of going to the grocery is all of the free samples available as we wander through the store. we munched it up quite a bit on this trip.

oh, & speaking of food...

on the way to krogers my brother called. (that's him on the left in the picture above.) he told us to be sure and check out a newspaper article about him when we got back. the article is all about him and his job. he's an awesome chef.

in case you don't want to read the whole thing (but you'd better, you turkeys) here's a clip that details just a FEW of the items on a recent menu of his:

"...(we) grilled 25 pounds of jumbo shrimp (each shrimp wrapped around a cheese-stuffed jalapeño, then wrapped in bacon), 25 pounds of country-style pork ribs, five pounds of pecan-smoked sausage, 10 pounds of lean chicken breasts, 40 pounds of baby-back ribs, 10 racks of lamb, a hundred chicken thighs, four "sides" of salmon, and 15 pounds of tilapia."

holy carnivore, batman!

so, after the phone call, mom said, "who would have thought my little baby john (luke) would become such a great cook?"

"hahahahahah! mom, your 'little baby' is a 41 year old man."

then we went into a fairly long trip down memory lane. i told her about a favorite memory of mine when she was 9 months pregnant and demonstrated her jitterbug to the amazement of my sisters and myself. she told me, as if i didn't already know, how she was embarrassed to be pregnant as such an old woman. i pointed out that she was only about 45 at the time. she allowed that was not old at all, but still said, "well, at the time it was embarrassing. old people aren't supposed to be having sex."

"why not?" i asked.

she chuckled and said something like, "oh, i don't know...i guess they do."

i said, " mom, i think this is the first time in my entire life i've ever heard you say the word 'sex.' are you gonna give me *the talk* now?"

you can bet we both had a good laugh over that one.

------------------------

here's a picture of a few of those shrimp/jalapeno/bacon grilled poppers from a campout last year. i think homie brought 200 of them. i'm serious. and they were just the appetizers for the weekend.



and here i'm holding a plate of hors d'oeuvres, with six of them grilled to perfection, to take to my son and his buddies who were rope swinging down at the river. (i'll have you know i readied that plate all by myself) if you're not drooling yet, click on the pic for a better view...



gosh, i can't even remember how many fresh oysters they brought. there were several ice cold coolers full of unshucked ones, though...



according to picasa, i have 368 pictures from that weekend. at least a hundred of which are of the food.
there were also a 1/2 dozen chefs there, a boatload of guitar pickers and a couple dozen kids of all ages from newborn to 55.

this is my brother and his family relaxing in the blanco river.




this next one's not from the camp out, but is a view out my brother's kitchen at the rock n' roll venue mentioned in the newspaper article. (the one you didn't read because yer a loser.)

a bit of stage roof scaffold can be seen in the far upper left corner of the window and speaks of a gajillion decibels of screaming guitars and raucous texas music and fans not 50 yards away, but the hammock stretched between these graceful old live oak trees pretty much tells the real story... wherever Luke cooks, it's pretty much like bein' in your own backyard on a quiet summer day.

you just want to be there.



now, back to the camp out on the river and a small portion of the other culinary delights brother luke, mr. olivia's dad and their chef friends brought to prepare for us all.

this is barnes. one of several real-life chefs who bear mention.
he's a crazy mofo and he sure knows how to cook it up, but...

this here is the man. (is he tweaking another recipe in his mind? or is he thinking about getting out of that chair and goin' down to the river to see what tracy and jacob are up to? alas, we'll never know, my friends. such is the mystery of true genius.)





(i think the sausage in this variety pack was hand made by the aforementioned mofo. and the fish was caught fresh at the campout. at least that's the way i remember it...)
[update: i'm told the "fish" is really ribs...whatever.]



but i don't eat meat, you say?
ok, so hows about a crab boil to knock yer socks off? (yep. same camp out.)



but i'm a vegan!!!!
nooo problem...here...try some of the tastiest food on the planet. made by real live artists.



in closing i ask you, please...support your local chef.
it'd be a crying shame if they all went bald.



goin' krogerin' for freebies comes in a far distant second place to any meal with that crowd.

congratulations on the well deserved and long overdue newspaper article, Luke.
you are the Best of the best.



(that's mom's little baby john luke in the driver's seat. i have no idea who the other guy is.)


[edit: nothing beyond the jump here because i screwed up again. D'OH!]