In Which James Outdoes Himself

Long time readers of this fantastic blog may remember that James made some pretty elaborate burgers a couple years ago. Well, he was back at it this weekend in the sequel to those burgers.

I had a pretty rough day working at a track meet where we were threatened by a thunderstorm, resulting in a pretty lame 30-minute delay as required by law, followed by some sideways rain. However, that pales in comparison to the Tough Mudder that James, Jen, Adam and about 5000 other people decided to subject themselves to up at Mount Snow. I didn't hear all the details, but I know it involved 10 miles of running/jogging/dragging your mutilated body along, getting shocked, swimming in ice water, climbing several consecutive 12-foot high walls, and carrying logs. Those people are nuts.

And then, after all that, James cooked food for us. What a nice guy. Also, there was bacon. Seriously, who doesn't like bacon? I mean, aside from Lindsay...

Yeah, that's my burger. Check out the volume of bacon on this thing! I got my serving of bacon, and I also got Lindsay's bacon because she wasn't going to eat it. There's also a slice of tomato and some red onion under the burger and pepperjack cheese on top. Can't go wrong with that combination.

I think that these burgers were even more delicious than the last ones. However, that could be because I was slightly wasted last time and my taste buds were not at their peak functioning. Regardless, these burgers were fantastic, and some of the best I've had in recent memory.

-Jon

Kim's Potential New Career?

Since lots of people were going to be around for Steve and Maura's Jack & Jill party Friday night, Jen scheduled a cookout for this afternoon. Actually, I was informed that Kim was actually the "organizer," except that she didn't plan the menu, or bring the beer, or do the cooking. Perhaps her idea to become an event planner should be put on hold temporarily.

Also, I won 3 raffle prizes at the Jack & Jill, bringing my total raffle prizes won lifetime to 4. The best prize was probably the grill plus friends set, which had a grill, grill tools, 22 spices, some towels, 2 cookbooks and possibly a couple other things that I forgot. I also won 2 beer-themed prizes. Score.

Now on to the cookout. I went with another triple-cheese burger, but I'm not sure which 3 cheeses it was this time. I am sure of American and provolone, but the 3rd one is a mystery. Last time it was Swiss cheese, but I don't think it was this time. My money is on cheddar. There was also tomato, which I was forced to cut using a paring knife. Have you ever tried cutting a tomato with a paring knife instead of something useful? I don't recommend it. Those slices were horribly uneven. I am actually a little embarrassed.

At least the burger was good. It seems that the more cheese options you have, the better the burger. I am pretty sure that there has to be a cap somewhere, because eventually there's going to be too much cheese. However, the limit is definitely not 3. I am excited to try the rarely mentioned quadruple-cheese burger in the near future.

Also, I was peer pressured into registering the name for Mmmm, Beers. You may be wondering why it's Mmmm, Beers and not Mmmm, Beer. Well, you can ask the douchebag who already took Mmmm, Beer and did absolutely nothing with it. Jerk. There's no beer-related content yet (as of this posting), but I'm sure it's only a matter of time. Stay tuned for all sorts of drunken rambling. You'll probably want to bookmark it now.

-Jon

The Luau Burger

In the quest for delicious burgers, sometimes we have to get a little wacky. At James and Nicole's luau, the menu started off with some skewers of bacon-wrapped chicken, mushrooms and pineapples before James started putting the burgers and hot dogs on the grill. Since there were some leftover skewers when it was time for the burgers, I thought that it might be a neat idea to put the stuff from one of the skewers on top of the burger.

Was it good? Good enough to do twice, so yes.

Obviously bacon goes great with burgers, and mushrooms as well. Chicken was a little suspicious, but it turned out pretty well. This bodes well for the Barnyard Burger that I will eventually develop. I was skeptical of the pineapple, but it was actually a nice addition. Maybe I'll have to try that pineapple burger at Red Robin, if I ever go back.

The rest of the party was also a good time. You can pretty much guarantee that if you have a keg of Sam Summer at your party, it's going to be a good one.

-Jon

That Was a Rainy Day

A lot of things happened today, so hopefully I don't forget any of them.

I woke up at a ridiculously early time (for a normal person), so I figured I might as well go for a little run. Good thing I did, because other than that run and a quick trip to the gym, I spent the rest of the day eating in a terribly unhealthy fashion. Actually, I ate a little fruit, but I am not sure that it counteracts everything else I did. Sorry, stomach.

I started off the day by going over to Kathryn's cousin's graduation party. This party had the interesting characteristic of being both BYOB (understandable due to it being a high school graduation party) and BYOC(hair). That 2nd one is just strange. Luckily for me, Kathryn knows all about chair acquisition, so I took care of the B and she took care of the C. Even the rain wasn't able to ruin the party due to the presence of a nice tent. And also of cheeseburgers, which I know is the only reason you're here.

I decided to try something new and exciting, so I took my burger and topped it with the BBQ baked beans. I also filled my plate up with them. Those were some quality beans! The BBQ Baked Bean Burger may have to may an appearance on the menu at Burger Bros, because it was delicious. So delicious, in fact, that it made up for the fact that the burger was pretty much as well done as it could be while still being called a burger. I should have asked for the recipe to add to our bean & chili menu. Besides the burger and beans, I also had a plate of fruit, some sweet & sour kielbasa, two of those little brownies with the white chocolate chips you can get a Big Y in the brownie platter, and 3 Magic Hat Wackos. Can you handle that?

After that, I may or may not have gone with Kathryn over to the mall to buy candles. My memory is fuzzy on this topic.

And what day is complete with only one party? Not this one, because it was then time to head over to Steve's surprise 28th party, where the shenanigans and beer were plentiful. And also the burgers. And hot dogs. And taco dip. And Doritos. And a handful of Summer Ales. Ok, so there was a lot of food here too. I ate another burger along with about infinity tortilla chips. My goal was to eat all of the taco dip, but other people were eating it too and I had to settle for as much as possible. I will have to make myself a plate of it some day and just go to town.

Both burgers were ok by burger standards, but there was nothing spectacular. Well, nothing other than my baked bean idea for the future. That is a good plan.

However, there were lots of hilarious stories to relate. Here they are, in no particular order.

• Dave threw at least 18 empty beer bottles into the pool. If you don't know why that's funny, then you probably don't know that most beer bottles will get mostly filled with water, then turn vertical and bob around the pool.
• I found golf clubs and attempted to chip a ping-pong ball into a beer cup. So close, and yet so far. I guess I should have stuck to golf.
• Jen had a bucket of small rubber duckies. No, I don't know why. Nicole and I took a bunch of them and hid them around her house. I think she still hasn't found the last 4.
• After Jen recovered the majority of the ducks, someone took the entire bucket of them and put them all over her car. Ok, it was me. I may refer to her car as the Duckmobile for the foreseeable future.
• Geoff "iced" Steve. This is the first time I've seen this in person.

So it turns out that even though we are all 28 or turning 28, we still haven't grown up. Well, most of us haven't. Growing up is highly overrated.

-Jon

All Sorts of Stories

Well, it's really only a couple stories, but they are fairly entertaining to me. Of course, I have the attention span and sense of humor of a 13-year old so that may explain a lot of it.

The annual birthday party of Nick took place yesterday, and it contained, among other things, grilled cheeseburgers. Or possibly grilled charcoal. Nick was a little bit intoxicated, so he may have possibly forgotten about the burgers for a while, which meant any burgers that were in the center of the grill looked a lot like Brillo pads. And I still ate two of them. I think I have a problem. . .

After eating those burger-like substances, I ended up getting into a few games of beer pong with James since either Nicole didn't want to play anymore or she was banned from the team for ineptitude. After a tough first game, we called for a rematch and things got real. We won the first game in fairly standard fashion, but it was game 2 that was truly impressive. In that game, we were able to both sink twice in a row (balls back!), and won the game in under 4 minutes. It was probably the greatest game of beer pong ever played (that night). Then we won a couple more games until things kind of wound down. Which leads to story number 2.

Nick has a pretty extensive bar in his (parents') basement. It's like being in an actual bar, just with better lighting. And I'm pretty sure this bar is the reason for the downfall of last night's beer pong, because after our last victory we found out that everyone was downstairs doing various shots. That's acceptable though, because shots are fun. The last one we ended up doing was a shot of absinthe, which I am fairly certain used to be illegal in the US. My guess is that it was banned because it is terrible. It was like bad licorice jelly beans, except the taste stays in your mouth. Plus I didn't even see any weird stuff like in Eurotrip. How silly.

Also, I am going to tell one more story even though it didn't happen last night, just because the main protagonist was at the party and that's good enough for me. Last week, or maybe the week before, or possibly sometime before that (the date is unimportant), we were at the Lighthouse enjoying a beer or 5 and just generally being silly. After a while, I decided it would be fun for Dan to talk to anyone around us, which ended up being a girl named Samantha. Despite all of Dan's charm, it just wasn't meant to be because after a while she finally told him that she had a boyfriend. His response was classic: "That's debatable." Since then, anything that is a fact we don't like has become debatable. Thanks, Dan.

-Jon

Probably Not New Jersey's Best Work . . .

This weekend was the big trip to Baltimore to see the Sox take on the lowly Orioles. First of all, Camden Yards is much too nice of a ballpark for a team like Baltimore to have. It's really not fair. Second of all, there is some sort of crazy outside drinking festival that apparently takes place after every game right across the street from the park. That was a fun time, mostly because James, Joe, Bill and myself decided to ask every guy who walked by if he had met Lindsay. If you haven't seen How I Met Your Mother, you won't get what was going on.

After having some gastrointestinal difficulties on Sunday morning (a burrito looks surprisingly similar coming back up as it does on its way down), I was really hungry by the time we were going home. The bus hit a rest stop somewhere in New Jersey, and our choices were Roy Rogers, Pizza Hut or Blimpie (which I am pretty sure was the cause of the vomiting from earlier in the day). I'm aware that Blimpie doesn't serve burritos, but I think the sandwich from Blimpie caused my stomach to reject the burrito I had for dinner. Regardless, I ended up choosing a bacon cheeseburger from Roy Rogers and then loading it up with tomatoes.

Boy was that a mediocre burger. Even with my incredibly low expectations, I was still disappointed. I have no idea where we were, but I hope we weren't in New Brunswick because that would mean I missed out on New Jersey's best burger.

On the plus side, the Sox won both games we attended, so we had that going for us. Which is nice.

-Jon

Just Pretend This Went Up Sunday

Oops, I forgot. The second run of cookouts at Jen & Melissa's was on Sunday in preparation for the actual birthday party coming up. There were a lot of similarities between this cookout and the last one. Most of the same people, lots of Summer Ale, nice weather, etc. There was one major difference, which was that this time we didn't put any of the bottles in the pool after we finished. I did try to throw them all on the lawn though (with help from Bill, Joe and James), because that is just fun.

We had burgers again, even though Melissa tried to ruin them by not letting Nicky put bleu cheese inside them because she claimed that some people might not like bleu cheese. Now this in and of itself is pretty much unacceptable, but I think it would be possible to maybe put the cheese inside some of the burgers and not others. Apparently her one-third* sized woman brain could not come up with this on her own. Unfortunately, the burgers were already formed by the time I had arrived and I could not correct this grievous error.

The burgers were probably good, but it's been several days since I ate it and I can't remember for sure. It's also possible that I ate 2 of them, but who can say. I am fairly certain that there was not bacon, but even that remains a mystery. I guess from now on I should take care of these things in a more timely fashion.

-Jon

*This is from Anchorman before all you women-folk fly off the handle.

Here Comes a New Challenger!!

All Street Fighter II references aside, James has stepped up to the burger challenge (which has apparently started, although I am not sure when) and definitely ended up in the top 2. I think it may be between James' burgers and Nicky's stuffed bleu cheese burgers at this point. Although, Nicky says she's got something else planned for the future. I am excited.

I am not exactly sure what the name of the night was, but it was something along the lines of the Best Burger Challenge, or close enough anyways. I am not sure of all the ingredients in these burgers, but we confirmed quite a few: onions, rosemary, garlic powder, Sweet Baby Ray's and I want to say Tabasco (?). There was also bacon and pepper jack cheese, widely regarded as one of the premier cheeses for burgers. James also did some kind of crazy thing with a red onion where he put some butter and beer inside it and then grilled it whole. Next time we'll have to start that process sooner, because apparently onions take a lot longer to grill than burgers.

These were some big burgers, but that didn't stop Bill, Joe or me from having 2. Or stop Dave from somehow hijacking Nicole's burger. We also had a tomato and mozzarella salad that I whipped up while rocking out to the musical stylings of Dexys Midnight Runners (Come On Eileen, while a great song, is probably not a course of action Eileen would appreciate) and Dropkick Murphys (I would say Tessie is probably the best song written about being a fan of the Red Sox (and possibly the only one?)). That's right, you just experienced the nested parentheses. Only found here. Back on topic though, of course there were ample Summer Ales, because this whole thing happened at our house.

I think there may be more uncooked burgers in the fridge. If that is the case, I am pretty sure what dinner will be on Sunday.

-Jon

Independence Day (Plus 1)

So maybe our timing was a little off, but after all the family related foolishness of the actual 4th of July, there was a burger- and beer-filled party on the 5th of July. And after having a "real" meal for the 4th, since it's also Mom's birthday, it was nice to have burgers since that just feels more appropriate. Sort of like turkey on Thanksgiving.

After several hours in the pool listening to the Sox game, we had successfully finished the first case of Sam Adams and left the bottles all across Jen's yard. James, Bill and I also found a really fun game where you take the ice cubes out of the cooler and whip them at whoever is currently crossing the yard. Of course, this game is only fun for us, but that's not really relevant. It was then time for some grilled meat.

Even though Nicky was there, Melissa took the reins and made some burgers that were ready in a reasonable amount of time and left the kitchen looking clean. If you don't know, Nicky's cooking is delicious, but the aftermath sort of resembles a hurricane, if a hurricane could be centralized entirely in one kitchen and only attacked pots and pans. The topping du jour was the spicy Montreal seasoning along with pepper jack cheese. This further lends proof to my theory that burgers with a little zip are just better. She also grilled up some red onions, and there were gigantic tomatoes for us normal folk.

I definitely have to get some of that Montreal stuff. I bet it would even make those frozen burgers that come 40 to a pack taste pretty good. Tomorrow I am heading off to try a new burger place on Mia's recommendation. I am not sure what to expect, mostly because she is a vegetarian. Should be interesting.

-Jon

Cookout Day

James', Nicole's and my first cookout at the new house came and went in a fairly successful fashion. Of course, I am defining success as: nothing caught on fire, no one was hospitalized and the police did not show up (other than the officers who were invited). In addition, many beverages were consumed and there was no damage to the house. After being involved in so many house-damaging and police-arriving incidents in college, it was a nice change of pace.

The clear highlight of the entire party was Mom's taco dip, which lasted approximately 19 minutes. After that, James took care of grilling duties, and we had some chicken wings, hot dogs (gross) and cheeseburgers. The wings were good, but the burgers were excellent. I am not sure how I ended up with one (it was on a plate and I decided it was mine; this might not have been the case), but I was pretty pleased with the decision. Next party we'll have to go with more burgers and fewer hot dogs, since we ran out of hot dog buns and people were using our precious burger buns with their nasty hot dogs.

Also, we had several cases of Summer Ale, so there was some nice progress on this year's Summer Ale Challenge. That may have also been responsible for the mysteriously appearing burger. Good times.

My Best Work Yet

Alright, now we're talking.  I think I'm finally getting the hand of this grilling thing.  Well, getting the hang of it again.  I guess taking the winter off really hurts your abilities.

Today there was no falling apart of burgers, nothing fell through the grating, and everything came out right.  The burger du jour was grass-fed local beef from lovely Shelburne Falls, courtesy of Kathryn.  I decided to get a little crazy and try to do something fancy, and it ended up working out pretty well.  I picked up a red onion at Randall's (since it is clearly the superior onion) and went with the Nicky S. plan of grilling a nice cross section of it.  Then I threw a little crushed red pepper on the meat along with a bit of Tuscan seasoning (which comes highly recommended by Nicole M.).  Finally, in a stroke of genius, I melted the cheese OVER the onion.  Seriously, from now on, all toppings will go under the cheese.  It's fantastic.

After all that preparation, the burgers were finally ready.  I will say this for the Tuscan stuff:  even if it doesn't make the burgers better (even though it does), it makes everything smell great when you open up the grill.  Maybe it's part potpourri?  The burgers came out nice and rare, and as of yet, there is no food poisoning.

Plus, I got to add to the Summer Ale Challenge (also courtesy of Kathryn).  Between beers and burgers, there isn't a whole lot that could ruin this night.

-Jon

Jimmy Would Not Approve

After a day spent almost entirely walking and drinking (James and I had our first beer at about 12:01 pm), we headed for Margaritaville for dinner. This later became a recurring joke for the rest of the week, but that is not the focus here. The first thing I learned was that mixing an NSAID with a day of drinking makes me a whole lot more twitchy than usual, and also keeps me from enjoying an alcoholic beverage while waiting for a table. But, like a true soldier, I managed to overcome the synergistic effects and get my Red Stripe on with the burger.

Speaking of which, if you call your burger the Cheeseburger in Paradise, you had damn well better be sure you know the song. Especially if you are serving a crazy customer (I am in that category). If the song claims the burger has an onion slice, and you serve the burger without an onion slice, people (me) may be upset. Fortunately, they did have Heinz 57 and French fried potatoes, so at least they paid some attention. And that 57 sauce is pretty good. We'll have to acquire some for the new pad.

Other than failing to actually follow the lyrics, the burger was good. I would eat more of them, but not in Vegas since there were way more awesome burgers to follow. On the plus side, James passed out at the table and there were several balloon hats around, and that's some amusing stuff. And the next day, the burgers started to really pick up.

-Jon

It's the cheese that does it. . .

It's pretty much a guarantee that a burger from a chain place will be pretty good, but not as good as one from a small place. With that in mind, we headed out to Paradise City Tavern in Northampton in a quest for burgers. And beer. I mean, come on, it's got tavern right in the title!

Those were some quality burgers. I went for the Bacon Cheddar Cheeseburger since I have a strong tendency to prefer burgers with bacon. And that was a good choice. There was some kind of super thick bacon (possibly Applewood smoked bacon if that's a brand name?) which you really can't go wrong with. Plus it had lettuce, tomato and red onion (vastly superior to boring old white onions) so I could pretend it was healthy. However, the best idea was using cheddar cheese, which is highly underrated in the cheese department due to the monopoly that American cheese has in people's minds. The fries were also pretty good, even though we seemed to get the dregs and I had to eat them with a fork, like a Frenchman*.

Melissa and Nicole also opted for the Bacon Cheddar Cheeseburger even though they both compromised it with what I can only assume is female silliness. Perhaps Melissa can be forgiven for taking the tomatoes off, but there is no excuse for switching to a whole wheat bun. The original bun was their signature bun! It even said so on the menu!! How can you argue with that? Nicole, on the other hand, got a turkey burger instead. Really? A turkey burger? Did I pull a Rip Van Winkle and sleep until Thanksgiving? I expect better things of her in the future.

In other news, Rogue Hazelnut Brown Ale and Troeggs Nugget Nectar are both beers I would try again. Especially the Rogue, since I seem to have a strange affinity for brown ales.

-Jon

*I actually have no idea how French people eat fries. I just thought it sounded funny.