Ken, wish I could make it. I have never had real pastrami; just that stuff from the grocery store that is blister packed.
My Dad spent some time around New York City during WW2(the big one). He always talked about hot pastrami sandwiches and pizza pie. He said it was best washed down with dago red. I had my first pizza at age 18. I soon found out what happens to the roof of a mouth when you bite down on some hot cheese. Yeah, I had been drinking beer.
While I was in Seattle for the summer, my jumping worms just about died out from the heat. However, the W VA immigrants did real well. I'm starting to feed and cover the top of the bed with grass clippings so they seem to be coming back. Right now they're pretty runty but fattening up and growing.
Dave -- and Sunil,
Not having real pastrami !!!!????
This is just about unbelievable. In the US, there are a few places that consider themselves the "capitol of pastrami."
After New York City, I would have to grade New Braunfels (for non-Texans, it is New Braufulls") as #2. There are too many others for me to mention, who consider them next in line.
I'll make sure I have some venison pastrami at our next conference. Maybe I can even find some "dago red." I think we will try to make it Sunil's responsibility to drag it in.
As for pizza burns and "blister packs" -- I worked for a wonderful Italian family while in high school and early college. When we were college freshmen, one of my cousins, and some friends, came in for a pizza after a football game.
My cousin asked for lots of extra cheese on the pizza. In recent years, it would have been a major lawsuit. But in those days, he just went to the emergency room, where other relatives treated him.
The family I worked for made nearly all the pizza ingredients, except for the anchovies, mushrooms, and olives. We made our own sauce, mozzarella, dough, pepperoni, sausage, Parmesan, etc. No two batches were exactly the same.
To finish the story, my cousin's pizza had about three layers of mozzarella. He didn't let it cool before taking a bite of the first piece. The first bite brought a big avalanche of hot greasy cheese down his chin and throat. Monday morning, in class -- my cousin was "blister packed"
His dad was our town's major insurance agent. Nobody sued anybody, unless it was really serious.
To this day, only a few of us know why cousin Wally's chin is scared and red.
Cousin Wally and I downed more than a few brews as we caught family fish dinners.
Ken
