If you are an avid reader of my blog you will know that I have a love/hate relationship with holidays. If you are not an avid reader then I’ll just tell you – I love some; I hate some; I hate some so much that I make other one’s up to replace them (see my post on Fornicalia); and some I feel a just make fine reason to drink. Or eat. Or have sex.
The 4th of July is one I Hate. (Yes, I did mean that with a capitol H.) It’s not because I think freedom isn’t cool. It’s mainly the food (and the fact that doesn’t involve sex). Are people unaware of the saying, “knee-high by the 4th of July”? If not, I will gladly inform you that it refers to how high the corn should be in a good crop year in the mid-west. If you are smart you can then extrapolate from this information that the corn currently on you grill may be imported. How patriotic is that?
There there is a matter of hotdogs. They were invented in Ancient Greece. Well, at least they were popular there. Homer wrote about them in the Odyssey, saying “As when a man besides a great fire has filled a sausage with fat and blood and turns it this way and that and is very eager to get it quickly roasted. . .” Over the centuries, they made their way to the tables of American’s via Germany. Like many immigrants in the 1800’s, they came through New York when they arrived, so I guess that’s pretty American of them.
Maybe you’re a burger person, because there’s nothing more American than burgers and beer, right?
The hamburger, a ground meat patty between two slices of bread, was first created in America in 1900 by Louis Lassen, owner of Louis’ Lunch in New Haven, Connecticut. There have been rival claims by Charlie Nagreen, Frank and Charles Menches, Oscar Weber Bilby, and Fletcher David. White Castle traces the origin of the hamburger to Hamburg, Germany with its invention by Otto Kuase. However, it gained national recognition at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair when the New York Tribune namelessly attributed the hamburger as, “the innovation of a food vendor on the pike.” No conclusive claim has ever been made to end the dispute over the inventor of the hamburger with a variety of claims and evidence asserted since its creation. – wikipedia
Sorry, I have some bad news about the beer though – Egyptian.
Potato and Bean Burgers
(now we’re getting somewhere, at least potato’s are indigenous to the Americas)
- 1 cup canned black beans
- 1 carrot, grated
- 1/2 onion, diced
- 3 potatoes, grated
- 4 scallions, chopped
- 1 cup corn
- salt and pepper to taste
- oil for frying
Preparation:
Mash the beans with a fork or a potato masher. Add the remaining ingredients, except the oil and mix until well combined.Shape the mixture into patties. Heat about two tablespoons of olive oil and cook each patty until the veggie burgers are done, about 3 minutes on each side.
OlyEats 