Something Big This Way Came
Sometime Wednesday afternoon, an RV pulled into Rosenblum’s parking lot with a trailer behind it. And on that trailer was a giant armadillo. Now, I’m from Mississippi, and I have never seen an armadillo that big. Turns out, it’s from Texas (hence, the lone star on its tail) and as you’ve probably heard, everything is bigger in Texas…. This one is actually a grill and smoker, made by Ray—who drives up and over every year about this time. He barbeques ribs for the Good Eats portion of the ZAP extravaganza, and he’s well known around these parts. (Perhaps due, in part, to the armadillo’s giant cojones.) Good BBQ—and this is really good BBQ–and fruity Zinfandel is an amazing combination, you have to try.
Kent allows him to park his RV at the winery while he’s in town, and Ray returns the favor by cooking up some good eats for us lucky employees. I got a sneak preview on Wednesday when I took these pictures, which was fortunate, since it was pouring buckets all day Friday when we had the real shindig. Over the past few days, Ray and I had some quality chats about potato salad (find my recipe here), boiled peanuts (on which we don’t agree), and the lack of real BBQ here in California. And he might just be doing something about that if plans to open a place here pan out.
Hope to see you sooner than later, Ray. I’ll have the glasses ready.
giant armadillo, armadillo smoker, big things at Rosenblum
January 28th, 2008 at 11:24 pm
[...] I like my potato salad very smooth, almost like mashed potatoes and usually end up tasting and adding a little more of everything: salt, pepper, onions, olives, and condiments, just a bit. This was the way I always had it growing up and would seem weird to me when people left theirs in chunks. I actually couldn’t eat other versions of this side dish back then and to this day cannot eat the kind you find in plastic tubs in the deli section. Though I’ve made it other ways, now that I’m a cook and all, it’s still my favorite. And it had co-workers scraping the bowl when I got up the other morning to make it for a BBQ. [...]