On the Road 2: Bon-Ton Mini Mart

fig. a: my kind of UFC

I haven't had a chance to test out Bon Appétit's "ultimate fried chicken" yet, but that damn cover image has had the appropriate Pavlovian effect on me. I need ultimate fried chicken now.

Thing is, good fried chicken takes a while. There's definitely a bit of commitment involved. So, I'm pretty sure I won't be frying up a batch of UFC tonight. And true fried chicken--the real deal--can be exceedingly difficult to find.

But that cover does have me thinking about fried chicken (obviously). And, these days, when I think about fried chicken, my thoughts tend to take me to Henderson, KY, sometime last August.

Nearby Owensboro, KY, is one of a number of American towns and cities that proudly proclaims itself the "BBQ Capital of the World." And they've certainly got a claim to that title. That town runs on hickory smoke (and bluegrass).

Henderson, too, is home to a number of reputable BBQ establishments, most of them specializing in the same mix of pork, beef, and mutton that has made Owensboro famous. But as soon as you get to Henderson, what really stands out is the unusual number of fried chicken joints they've got there. None of them major chains (at least, not that I saw). I mean, this town is swimming in Kentucky fried chicken.

Is Henderson the Fried Chicken Capital of the World? I can't rightly say. For one thing, I didn't get a chance to conduct a survey of Henderson's fried chicken scene.  For another, I haven't had the pleasure of visiting any of the Fried Chicken Capitals of the World (Barberton, OH? Gordonsville, VA?) yet. But Henderson certainly looks like it could be a Fried Chicken Capital of the World.

And I can tell you that there's at least one championship fried chicken joint there: Bon-Ton Mini Mart.

Great name. Bold, even. But it's a little hard to find, and it's the most nondescript place imaginable. Just look at it:

fig. b: Bon-Ton Mini Mart

Is there any indication whatsoever that this is a premium fried chicken joint?

I was going on good authority (Jane & Michael Stern), it certainly seemed legit, and it was pretty busy for 2:45 in the afternoon. But you never know.

I had a pretty good feeling when I entered the Mini Mart, though. It smelled good in there, and the set-up was home-style.

I had an even better feeling when I placed my order, however. I was told, "Go ahead and grab a seat. It's going to take about 25 minutes." In other words, real fried chicken, skillet-fried and made to order.

And I had the best feeling of all when those 25 minutes were up. I mean, just look at that crust.

fig. c: Bon-Ton's UFC

Those ladies know their fried chicken.

Oops. I did it again. I'm driving myself crazy. Kentucky Fried Crazy.

Bon-Ton Mini Mart, 2036 Madison Street, Henderson, KY, (270) 826-1207

aj

Dispatches from planet BBQ: Arthur Bryant's

fig. a: beans, ribs, fries, sauces

I would imagine we've all had the experience of going to a restaurant with high expectations, but going to a place like Arthur Bryant's in Kansas City, MO, is an altogether different experience. This is a barbecue joint--a "grease house," as Mr. Bryant used to put it--of the highest order, easily ranking among the 10 most famous in America.

fig. b: world famous

This is an establishment that Calvin Trillin once referred to as, "possibly the single best restaurant in the world," in the pages of Playboy (in an article that later appeared in American Fried). Of course, Trillin hails from K.C. originally, but there was a lot more than just hometown pride behind his claim. There were ribs, there was Arthur Bryant's legendary barbecue sauce, and, most importantly, there were burnt ends.

So when you got to a place like Arthur Bryant's and it actually manages to meet or exceed your expectations, you know you've experienced something special, and that's exactly what happened. I was blown away (which is pretty amazing for a place whose patriarch passed away almost 30 years ago).

I mean, just look at those ribs in the image up top. And you can't tell from the photo, but those beans are the real deal. Tender, smoky, savory, and laced with a major dose of Arthur Bryant's phenomenal burnt ends. Even their fries are excellent. And their brisket? Ridiculously succulent. I haven't had the pleasure of a barbecue tour of Texas (yet), so I'm hardly an expert, but this brisket was a work of beauty.

Arthur Bryant's being a serious barbecue joint, your ribs, your brisket, your bbq pork, etc., all come to you unsauced (unless you're taking them to go, in which case you'll be asked if you want them slathered or not). Arthur Bryant's is world famous, in part, for their sauce, but, generally, the saucing of the barbecue is left up to you, the customer. You take your tray to your table, and there you'll find a battery of Arthur Bryant's special brews: their original sauce, a sweet sauce, and a spicy sauce. Both the sweet sauce and the spicy sauce have their adherents (and with good reason: they're excellent), but Arthur Bryant's true believers all swear by the original recipe, and nothing but. Who can blame them? It's an utterly beguiling barbecue sauce, unlike any other I've ever tasted. Jane and Michael Stern have described the sauce as, "a gritty, red-orange blend of spice and sorcery that is not at all sweet,... packs a hot paprika wallop and tastes like a strange soul-food curry," and, as strange as that last part may sound, there's something to it.

fig. c: decor

The interior of Arthur Bryant's flagship restaurant is pure mid-20th-century soul,* from its no-nonsense decor, to its cafeteria-style service, to its low-key, down-tempo blues & soul soundtrack. It's also a true barbecue shrine. Arthur Bryant's website features photographs of Tom Watson, Calvin Trillin, and Jimmy Carter under the caption "Our Fans," but its walls feature images of fans like Steven Spielberg and Sally Field alongside African-American heroes like Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Charlie Parker.

That hickory-smoke flavor and the tang of that Arthur Bryant's original sauce lingered deliciously on my fingertips for hours after my visit, even after I'd washed up, but eventually, sadly, they faded away, like everything else in this mean, old world. And ever since, all I can think is: "how the heck will I ever be able to get back to K.C.?" Thank God I left Arthur Bryant's with a bottle of their magical elixir.

fig. d: Mister Bryant goes to heaven

Arthur Bryant's
1727 Brooklyn Ave.
Kansas City, MO
(816) 231-1123

fig. e: Arthur Bryant's is it!

aj

* While the Arthur Bryant's tradition has roots that date back to the early 20th century, the 1727 Brooklyn location was established in 1958.

Holiday High Jinks

Another year, another holiday special. Except that this one was a little extra-special. We weren't able to celebrate AEB's 5th anniversary in November when that momentous date passed on by, so our 5th annual holiday jam* doubled as our AEB 5th Anniversary Party.

Last year, our party's centerpiece was a ham twin-set--one Kentucky country ham served raw in thin slices, and one Virginia country ham that had been baked. This year we featured another country ham--this time from William Mulder's Fresh Meats of Fredericton, NB--but, frankly, the savory fare got overshadowed a bit by our first annual AEB gingerbread house.

I can honestly say that I had nothing to do with the gingerbread house, aside from a little consulting. The gingerbread house was the product of the Montreal Cake Club (M.C.C.), a local cell of cake-decorating extremists with reputed links to Laloux, the Preservation Society, and La Salle à manger. It didn't weigh 390 pounds, and it wasn't covered in white chocolate, but, like the 2009 White House Gingerbread House, it was modeled on an actual existing structure: the M.H. Merchant Stone House.

fig. a: M.H. Merchant Stone House

The finished product looked something like this,

fig. b: M.H. Merchant Gingerbread House 1

fig. c: M.H. Merchant Gingerbread House 2

and by the morning after, it was a little worse for wear (note the candied-almond "stones" missing from the walkway),

fig. d: M.H. Merchant Gingerbread House 3

but it was still pretty magical. In fact, if you took a close look and peered through the caramel "glass" windows, you'd swear there was someone inside taking advantage of the spacious two-story, 4 1/2-room interior.

fig. e: M.H. Merchant Gingerbread House 4

Anyway, the M.C.C.'s M.H. Merchant Gingerbread House was certainly an impressive sight, and it was 100% edible, but it wasn't really meant to be eaten (that didn't stop some of our guests from trying, though). Attending to the more immediate spiritual needs of our invited guests was the following vaguely Mad Men-inspired menu:

Coca-Cola- & Chipotle-Glazed Ham
Serious Mac & Cheese, Smothered w/ Cajun Gravy
Chicken & Sausage Gumbo
Cajun Deviled Eggs
Crudités
Crackers
Cucumber-Herb Dip
Baked Artichoke Dip
Clam Dip
Cheddar Cheese
Armadale Farm Cumin Gouda

Heineken
Punchbowl Old-Fashioneds
Martinican Rum Punch

Bourbon Chocolate Cookies
Vanilla Crescents
fresh clementines

We were dead-set on another baked ham. Ham has become something of a tradition at our holiday parties, and we'd managed to source a particularly good smoked ham in the Maritimes. Then we received our December issue of Saveur--"HAM FOR THE HOLIDAYS"--and it was as if the food gods (or at least the food press gods) were speaking directly to us (and about 600,000 others). Their cover story has plenty of great-looking ham-centric recipes, but the one that really caught our attention was the Pineapple-Chipotle-Glazed Ham (who knows, might have had something to do with the fact that that's the one featured on the cover). We'd always wanted to do a Coca-Cola ham, but this recipe's Coke, chipotle, and honey glaze sounded particularly tempting.

Coca-Cola- & Chipotle-Glazed Ham

1 15-lb whole smoked ham
8 fresh pineapple slices
whole cloves
2 3/4 cups Coca-Cola
1 rounded tbsp chipotle purée
1/3 cup honey

Put the ham into a large stockpot, cover with water, and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 60 minutes.

Heat oven to 350º. Transfer the ham to a roasting rack in a roasting pan. Using toothpicks, secure the pineapple slices to the surface of the ham. Stud the ham with cloves to taste [Saveur recommends 64 cloves, but we like our ham a little less clove-y, so we went with about half that many]. Pour 2 cups of the Coca-Cola over the ham, then add 1 cup of water to the bottom of the roasting pan. Cover loosely with foil and bake for 60 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine the remaining Coca-Cola, the chipotle purée, and the honey in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium, and cook, stirring frequently, until the glaze has reduced and become syrupy, roughly 12-15 minutes. Uncover the ham and brush it with some of the glaze. Increase the heat of the oven to 500º. Bake the ham, brushing occasionally with the glaze, until it has become browned and glossy, about 15-20 minutes. [Make sure to watch the ham carefully, though. If it starts to brown too quickly, you may want to protect it with that loose foil covering again.] Let cool for 20 minutes before carving.

As for the mac & cheese. This recipe was quite literally the product of hearsay. As in, a couple of weeks ago, I was motoring along on the Trans-Canada, listening to a podcast of American Public Media's The Splendid Table, when I heard Jane & Michael Stern gushing about Rocky & Carlo's in Chalmette, Louisiana. The segment was about the famed hybridity of Louisiana's cuisines, and the ways in which the Italian-American idiom has coupled with Cajun, Creole, and Southern cuisine in all kinds of interesting ways there, but mostly it was about Rocky & Carlo's as a prime example of this culinary bricolage. There was a lot about the Sterns' spiel that had me ready to veer off my easterly course and make a beeline for Chalmette, but the thing that stuck with me the most was their positively ecstatic descriptions of Rocky & Carlo's macaroni & cheese. They came out and anointed Rocky & Carlo's mac & cheese their very favorite mac & cheese in all of America (!). They had plenty of good reasons for naming Rocky & Carlo's mac & cheese #1, but a big part of its considerable charm had to do with the fact that you could get it smothered with either a red sauce or a Cajun brown sauce. For a split second there, I seriously thought about putting the pedal to the metal over the border and across 8 eight states all the way to Chalmette to give that smothered mac & cheese a try, but then I came up with a Plan B: put the pedal to the metal all the way to my kitchen so that I could improvise a batch of Mac & Cheese Smothered w/ Cajun Brown Sauce myself.

The following is what I came up with. Does it bear any resemblance to Rocky & Carlo's? I have no idea, but mac & cheese has rarely tasted so good.

Smothered Mac & Cheese

Make your preferred macaroni & cheese recipe, keeping in mind that you're going to smother it with a zesty roux-based brown sauce momentarily, so you might want to keep things simple and straightforward, and you might want to avoid a béchamel sauce and go with a cheese and milk/cream sauce instead (the logic: béchamel + roux + macaroni = flour + flour + flour).

Got your macaroni & cheese in the oven? Perfect. Now it's time to make your brown sauce:

1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 small onion, diced
1/2 celery stalk, diced
1/4 bell pepper (green or red), diced
2 tbsp mixed herbs (parsley, thyme, chives, etc.), finely minced
1 tbsp Cajun Magic (recipe follows)
2 cups vegetable or chicken stock (or 2 cups water, in a pinch) [we've been using vegetable stock and/or water, usually, meaning our smothered mac & cheese has been 100% vegetarian!]
salt & pepper to taste

Warm your stock in a separate saucepan.

Heat the oil over medium heat in a large non-stick frying pan or a properly seasoned skillet. When the oil is hot, add the flour all at once and begin stirring constantly. Make a deep Cajun roux. When your roux has reached your desired depth (I recommend going with a cappuccino-colored roux here), add the onion and sauté for 2-3 minutes. Add the celery and bell pepper and sauté for another 2-3 minutes. Add the herbs, stir, and add the Cajun Magic, sautéing for another minute. Add the stock in a slow stream, stirring constantly. Cook the gravy until it thickens, reaching your desired consistency. If it thickens too quickly and you want the flavors to meld a bit longer, add a bit more water or stock and cook it down some more over medium heat. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Serve your hot macaroni and cheese, smothering each helping with plenty of the brown sauce, and topping with a dash or two of Tabasco sauce, if you so desire.

Cajun Magic

1/4 Cup of salt
2 tbsp sweet paprika
2 tbsp cayenne pepper, espelette pepper, or hot paprika
1 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp black peppercorns
1 tbsp white peppercorns
2 tsp dried basil
1 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp dried thyme

Combine all the ingredients, and, using a mortar & pestle or an electric spice grinder, grind them together. The resultant spice blend should be lively and complex.

We knew we were making Martinican Rum Punch again this year--we've been rockin' that recipe for several years now, and it's a guaranteed crowd-pleaser. But this year we wanted to add a new drink to our arsenal of beverages. We thought about making Old-fashioneds to order, but then discovered this ingenious punchbowl version in the Esquire Party Book. Much, much easier to prepare, and our guests loved 'em. Maybe a little too much. They cleaned us out of the first batch in no seconds flat, and, the next thing we knew, a chant of "Make more punch! Make more punch!!" erupted throughout the apartment. You've been warned.

Punchbowl Old-fashioneds

8 lumps of sugar
2 tbsp bitters
1/3 cracked ice or 1 appropriately sized ice ring
1 quart bourbon or rye
16 slices of orange, lemon
16 cherries

Muddle the sugar, bitters, and ice together in a punch bowl. Add the bourbon or rye and stir well. Drink responsibly-ish.

How good were these Punchbowl Old-fashioneds? This good:

fig. f: Michelle loves Old-fashioneds

Thanks to all our guests for making our 5th anniversary bonanza such a blast and for participating so generously in our donations drive for Dans la rue.

fig. g: in the light of the miracle

Thanks to MS and CWI for packing pixels and helping us to document the festivities.

aj

* If you're particularly devoted to reading AEB and particularly good at math, you might be thinking: "seeing as you threw your first AEB holiday party just weeks after you started the blog, shouldn't this be your 6th holiday party?" And you'd be right. It should have been our 6th, but, if you must know, we skipped a year once.

Short Hop to Michigans and Back

No, that's not yet another egregious typo up there in the title. We only had about 4-5 hours to play with, so making it to Michigan and back was completely out of the question. Plus, for the kind of Michigan we were looking for, it's not clear crossing the Peace Bridge from Windsor into Detroit would have done us much good. We were in search of Michigans, the legendary hot dog concoctions, not Michigan, the state, so we headed to the town which, if it isn't the official Michigans capital of the world, most definitely is the Michigans capital of New York's North Country: Plattsburgh.

Prior to September of last year, we were pretty ignorant of Plattsburgh. We knew it sat on Lake Champlain and that it was a college town. We knew it had a pretty nice downtown core visible from Amtrak's Montreal-New York Adirondack Express, but, aside from that, our attitude towards Plattsburgh was one typical of a lot of Montrealers: we couldn't see past the strip malls, gas stations, and fast food chains on the edge of town. Then we received our October 2006 issue of Gourmet, read Jane and Michael Stern's "Roadfood" piece on Plattsburgh and its Michigans specialists, and suddenly we were seeing the town with new eyes. We started talking about Michigans with some frequency and Plattsburgh suddenly got vaulted towards the top of our road trip wish-list. Plattsburgh's Michigans became such an obsession, in fact, that in February, on our way down to New York City, I had to physically restrain Michelle when our train pulled into Plattsburgh because of her desperate attempts to disembark and blindly score "just one Michigan, just one lousy Michigan" before the train pulled out again (without her parka, I should add).

The strange thing about all this is that neither of us had ever met a chili dog (for that, in essence, is what a Michigan is) we really liked--it had never occurred to either of us that a chili dog could actually be a good thing. Then, suddenly, after reading the Sterns' account of this "small, porky frank bedded in a cream-soft bun and topped with mustard, onions, and a sauce made from a little tomato, a lot of spice, and finely ground beef" it all made sense. "Of course," we thought. "What's the problem?" Okay, the mustard seemed a little bizarre, and then there was that whole business with the nomenclature (why this hot dog + "Texas Red" became known as a Michigan in Plattsburgh is anybody's guess, although the Sterns' mention one credible story involving a transplanted Michigander who introduced the chili dog to Plattsburgh when sales on her mustard and sauerkraut-topped dogs went flat). But aside from that...

Anyway, after all that "talk, talk, talk" we finally made it down to Plattsburgh in search of Michigans yesterday, inspired by a Montreal-style Michigan we sampled earlier in the week, and intrigued by the vast differences between Michigans on opposite sides of the border (Montreal's are made with a meaty spaghetti sauce). Plus, it was nice out and we were in the mood for a drive along Lake Champlain, so we fired up our car and headed for the border.

fig. a: Chazy Orchards, Chazy, NY

Shortly after crossing into New York we came across the famous Chazy Orchards, the ones we'd heard about last year from Mr. Safian. If you look closely you'll notice three things: 1) that's our car there in the parking lot, 2) that's Michelle sitting in the passenger seat of our car, 3) and that sign for Chazy Orchards reads "Largest McIntosh Orchard..." What you can't see is that the bottom reads "In the World." The image, oddly, shows a map of North America on the face of a huge McIntosh. Stranger still, the map of North America is missing Canada. Very interesting...

fig. b: Boylan's root beer

A little further down the road we came across Conroy's Organics. We were hoping we might find some ramps that we could try to smuggle back into Quebec, but all we came across was some gorgeous, but pricey, asparagus. As a consolation prize I bought myself a Boylan's root beer, the first of three soft drinks I'd guzzle (completely uncharacteristically) during the course of our short hop, and easily the best.

fig. c: Clare & Carl's, Plattsburgh, NY

The Sterns mention three Michigans stands in their article: Gus's, McSweeney's, and Clare & Carl's. We had an unbelievably easy time finding the first two--they were within a 1/4 mile of each other--but locating Clare & Carl's was another matter. The article doesn't provide much in the way of directions, but we're usually pretty good at sussing these things out regardless. What added to the confusion this time around was that although Gus's is listed as being at 3 Cumberland Head Road, McSweeney's is listed at 535 N. Margaret Street, and Clare & Carl's is listed at 4729 U.S. Route 9, all three establishments are essentially on the very same stretch of road, U.S. Route 9. Two virtually side-by-side on the north end of town (Gus's and McSweeney's), and the other (Clare & Carl's) two miles to the south of downtown Plattsburgh. Anyway, although McSweeney's seemed to get the best rating when it came to their chili, the Sterns' description of Clare & Carl's was the one that had us the most intrigued, so that's where we went first and we were glad we did.

First stop: Clare & Carl's

Clare & Carl's is a wonderfully decrepit hot dog stand that dates back to 1942. It's so weather-beaten, in fact, that it looks like it's sinking back into the ground on which it was erected (a fact that the cartoon on the back of the Clare & Carl's t-shirts worn by the servers accentuates to hilarious effect). The interior is tiny: just a gorgeous vintage U-shaped counter and a small kitchen out back. There are also picnic tables for those who want to dine al fresco and you always have the option of getting carhop service, too. That's right: carhop service. In the 21st century.

fig. d: graffiti, Clare & Carl's, Plattsburgh, NY

The whole place is very photogenic.

fig. e: conveniences, Clare & Carl's, Plattsburgh, NY

Right down to their washrooms.

More importantly, though, their Michigans are outrageously good. Their chili is made with finely ground beef and it's rich and flavorful, with no sweet to it and just a little bit of heat. Onions are a must, and you have the option of having them as a topping or "buried" under the dog and the sauce. Mustard is provided on the side. I didn't dare add mustard--I was having too good a time already--but Michelle cleverly applied mustard to half of hers so she could run her very own taste test. Afterwards she swore the mustard had added "a little something" that actually took the combo to new heights.

Suffice to say, we left Clare & Carl's completely enamored. We promised each other then and there that Clare & Carl's would become a regular part of our travels between Montreal and points south.

fig. f: McSweeney's Michigan w/ onions, Plattsburgh, NY

Next stop: McSweeney's.

We thought we might find a cluster of lit-heads--online lit-heads, to be precise--archly nibbling their Michigans and slurping back their "sauceburgers" then irritating the staff by repeatedly asking, "Uh, is Timothy working today?" and then chortling, but instead we found ourselves in the presence of a car club. A Smart car club. A Canadian Smart car club. Who knew? We certainly didn't, and we were horrified to find out such things exist. This was certainly not the band of lovable eccentrics that take part in that London - Brighton antique car rally you see in Genevieve (1953). Here, instead, was a group of people who hadn't banded together out of a love of restoring cars, but simply because they'd happened to buy the same brand of car right off the showroom floor. Now that's kinship. Plus, they'd each taken their supposedly eco-friendly cars on a road trip--a group road trip. We couldn't help but think that maybe renting a van might have been friendlier on the environment. Anyway, the spectacle of this, er, Smart car club wasn't particularly easy on the stomach, but we had serious research to complete so we took a deep breath and soldiered on.

At only 16 years of age, McSweeney's is the youngest of Plattsburgh's red-hots stands. It's bright and spanky-looking on the outside and has all the charm of a Long John Silvers on the inside. We ordered our two Michigans and opted to sit outside at a picnic table even if the Smart car club was busy revving their engines. McSweeney's Michigans sauce was the most authentically chili-like of the Michigans we sampled. The ground beef was coarser than Clare & Carl's and the sauce was much spicier, more complex. Their Michigans came with mustard as a standard feature, and when I tasted the entire ensemble together I suddenly understood Michelle's preference. The mustard added yet another layer of spice, of warmth, and somehow it still worked. All in all, I was pretty impressed by my McSweeney's Michigan--and I couldn't get over the fact that they too offered carhop service (just check out that tray!)--but Michelle felt pretty strongly that Clare & Carl's had not been unseated. There was no question who was #1 on the ambiance front, that's for sure.

Final stop: Gus's.

Gus's was the place that intrigued us the least even if its history does date back to 1951. Reading over the Sterns' section on Gus's again, I'm not sure why. Our intuition turned out to be correct, though. Gus's Michigan (Michelle had bowed out by this time, leaving me with daunting challenge of completing the Plattsburgh Michigans trifecta solo) was very good, but it was sweeter than either of the previous two and somehow not quite as distinctive. Plus, nothing about Gus's indicated that it had been in business for 56 years. The interior was pure "family dining" at its most banal. But I didn't let any of that get to me--I polished off that Gus's red hot in seconds flat.

Final results:
Win: Clare & Carl's
Place: McSweeney's
Show: Gus's

Would we do it again? Absolutely. Do we need to go to all three ever again? Nah. You'll find us at Clare & Carl's with our Michigans, coleslaw, a Coke, and a smile.

aj