I Don’t Know If You Know This About Me, but I love all things orange, but more on that later. Here’s what’s crazy about life: you never ever know if today will be the day you meet the new most important person in your life, or if later this afternoon, you’ll make a discovery that will change how you make decisions, or even if tonight will be the night you bridge a logical connection in your thoughts that lifts untold weight from your shoulders and stress from your chest. It is due to this unknowing that you must be constantly vigilent; ready to take in and react to anything the world might throw at you. Many years ago, on just any old day, I was given a gift that has stayed with me every day, and has even grown and developed with me as I’ve gotten older and wiser. To understand the impact of this gift, let’s consider for a moment the epic pairings of our time:
Ground coffee beans and hot water
Jobs and Woz
Peanut butter and burgers
Cheese and anything
This list obviously could not be complete without adding spinach and feta.
Feta – crumbly, sharp, salty, perfect.
Spinach – subtle flavor base, almost creamy, and Popeye. Hello?
Ultimately the Greeks win, as they have long held onto one of the hightest plateau’s in the culinary world — inventor of Spanikopita. Layers of phyllo dough (buttery, flaky amazingness – think outer croissant layer) seperate layers of more butter, spinach, and feta. Perfection. If you know a greek family, see if they make it. My high school girlfriend was greek. Her Mema (grandma) was off-the-boat Greek. No english, yes mustache, and I estimate 3.5 ft tall and 3 ft wide. Picture a wrinklier Danny Devito, but with hair. The things they did with feta in that house still bring a smile to my face. (see also Tiropitakia) But let’s get back to my gift.
I was in the kitchen of my aunt’s house. She at the time was big into weight watchers, and had a low-points recipe she thought I might enjoy. (my immediate family spent a lot of my youth trying to talk to me about my weight without talking about my weight). Let’s take a minute to examine different world views. People in weight watchers see the world as a series of points, and eat food like they play golf — always trying to shave points and get the lowest score possible. Fat kids see the world as a series of flavor profiles and textures, endlessly focused on finding new favorites, while shoving as many of the existing favorites into our faces as we can. The sheer volume of Mountain Dew I would consume in a day was a gentle combination of awesome and suicidal. And orange Gatorade. Oh, my! Orange gatorade.
Quick side note: So the average sized human might reach for a 20 oz. after a workout.
Lots of sugar and calories. Electrolytes, which apparently are important, and a size that should satiate most. This looked like a shot glass back in the day to me.
A long, enduring day spelunking or mountain climbing or preseason two-a-day practices or something like that might call for something a little more substantial. 32 oz. This used to be cracked open, tilted back, and it was gone before it left my lips again.
The 64 oz is the one you’d buy and throw in the fridge for the week. I was putting down 15/week. Thats on top of the Mountain Dew. (again, I’m not proud, merely reporting)
x15
Additional side note, and this particular topic will get more attention when the time comes, but for the moment it’s important for you to understand that orange is far and away the greatest color/flavor for food ever.
Ever.
EVER.
I’m not supposing. I’m not estimating. I’m stating a fact. Fruit. Starbursts. Gatorade. Skittles. Scented markers. Don’t even get me started on Tic Tacs. Everything is better when flavored orange. I know my homeslice Morris knows what I’m talking about… Point being – as I was listening to my Aunt describe what, at the time, was probably an incredibly healthy item, all I could hear were opportunities to fatten it up.
Here is what it has become: Cottage Cheese, a metric ton of shredded cheese, flour, and eggs give this a quishe-y quality. It’s sorta soufflé-ish. Kinda casserole-y. Add diced tomato, sun dried or otherwise, depending on preference, onion, spinach, feta, seasoned appropriately, baked until the top and edges get golden and crispy perfect. In a 9×13 it’s shorter and has more surface area so it will be more firm. In an 8×8 it will be taller and mushier in the middle. Both are delicious and neither are the wrong decision. Another phenomenal choice would be to line the pan with phyllo dough. Simply incredible.
Now, for those of you who have stuck around, I’ll unlock another secret for you: you were NOT reading a typo, but rather one of the most important social and scientific discoveries of our time, when you noticed I recommended pairing peanut butter and cheeseburgers. West Lafayette, Indiana is home to many things: The Purdue Boilermakers (Go Boilers!), The Boilermaker Special(which I have had the honor of driving), and XXX Burger (On the hill, but on the level since 1929). XXX is a all day diner, and where one might end up after a night at Harry’s (read about Harry’s in this post). XXX is home to another of my greatest discoveries, the Duane E. Purvis All American Burger.
A burger for the more adventurous! A 1/4 lb. of 100% ground sirloin with thick,
creamy peanut butter served on a toasted sesame seed bun with melted
American cheese, lettuce, tomato, pickle, and onion. A very special treat!
I’m not one for bold statements, but I have only two words: life changing.
Now for those of you who are cursing my name, or wrinkling your face in disgust, know this: that face you’re making is NOT cute, and you need to stop. Second – you’re wrong and the sooner you know it, the sooner you can move into a life where you benefit from such incredible knowledge. Knowledge is power, and more on that soon, but for those of you who are into history and causation, I’m fairly certain that when Steve and Steve melded minds and created the company that brought you the device you’re most likely reading this on (or the device you wish you were reading this on) they had sat down moments before and feasted on burgers with peanut butter, and some or several combinations of spinach and feta.