Old habits are hard to break

By Rennie Phillips

When Marge and I butcher a beef, we have our hamburger put in one-pound packages so when we fry hamburgers we end up with three one-third pound burgers. Sometimes Marge will fry up the whole pound so we end up with one burger as leftovers. The other morning I was scrounging around in the ice box looking for breakfast and ran across the hamburger from the night before. But the hamburger just didn't sound all that good for breakfast. What sounded good was a piece of pork.

Now I don't have a thing against beef for breakfast and I do enjoy steak and eggs but it just seems like ham or sausage or bacon or sausage gravy is breakfast food. I've eaten chicken and deer for breakfast, but day after day, month after month, I prefer pork for breakfast.

Growing up we always had pork for breakfast. Always. Bacon was a staple in the Phillips home. Mom would fry up so many slices of bacon for each of us and that was your daily share. If left unchecked, Mick and I could have probably eaten a pound apiece. There were times we had ham or pork chops or sausage and it was awesome. But we had pork for breakfast. Many times the bacon was fresh without any curing, which is still my favorite way to eat bacon.

Once or twice a year, Dad would butcher a hog. He'd shoot the hog and then stick it. Normally he'd lift it with the tractor and splash some water on it to kind of clean it up. Then he was ready to skin the hog and then gut it. Most of the time he'd saw it down the backbone so there were two halves. He'd then carry the halves into a cold room and let them hang overnight. The next day Mom and Dad and us kids would start whacking up the hog. And invariably Mom would have a huge kettle on the stove, where she was rendering lard. One byproduct of lard is cracklings. Man, those are good with a little salt. Well, maybe a little more salt wouldn't hurt!

Many times during the summer our family here in Scott City will gather at Vic's for hamburgers, brats and a few hot dogs. Vic cooks them on his grill, and they are just awesome. When you take a grilled hamburger, add some mayo and some dill pickles and ketchup, you have an awesome sandwich. In days gone by I could eat several, but now days one will do me.

On picnics when I was a kid, we usually had fried chicken. When a bunch of us like the Bradens and Mom and Dad and others went to the Birdwood to pick chokecherries, it was usually fried chicken. This was the go-to meat. Along with the chicken there was probably potato salad and maybe pork and beans. I could have eaten pork and beans three meals a day and still can. Probably had potato chips and cookies of some kind, probably chocolate chip.

When we went ice fishing, we always took brown sugar sandwiches. Mom would butter the bread pretty heavy with home-churned butter and then add brown sugar. The brown sugar would soak into the butter and man that was good. We sometimes had peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, but brown sugar was still my favorite. These brown sugar sandwiches were also my favorite in our school lunches. Seems like I had dill pickles on mine but can't remember for sure. Back then I loved pork and beans and dill pickles. Still do.

We ate hot dogs now and then. Still do eat a few. Now and then we want a quick meal, so we put a package on and boil them. But we do like to build a fire and roast some dogs over the fire. Boy, that is good eating. Funny how camp fires and hot dogs go together. I like mine heated up and almost busting open and then get a good dark coat on them. Add some ketchup and a bun and go to it. Good eating but probably not the most healthy. Mick and I had roasted dogs using Mom's gas range as well. He and I'd skewer a couple dogs and roast them in the kitchen. Usually had some roasted marshmallows as well.

Back in the day, there was one place in Ogallala that had Made Right sandwiches. It was a kind of loose hamburger on a bun, and they were tasty. Marge has made them for me in the past several years, but the ones then seemed like they tasted better. Probably was hungrier back then after driving 40 plus miles to Ogallala. There was the added factor of anticipation. My mind was probably on the Made Rights clear down to Ogallala.

Why do we just keep doing the same year after year? Probably out of habit. I got to thinking, I'll bet a good bell pepper or poblano or jalapeño would taste good roasted over a camp fire? I know I like to burn the skin on a big bell pepper and turn that into a sandwich, so I'll bet a roasted pepper added to a hot dog would go good.

Or what about taking a round steak or sirloin steak and cutting it in one inch strips and sliding that down over the hot dog roaster? Add some seasoning and then roast it over the camp fire. Man I'll bet that would be tasty. Or make some one-inch-square pieces of meat and skewer them along with some chunks of pepper and onion and roast over the camp fire on a dog roaster. Bet that would be tasty. Wouldn't take that long either.

Several years ago I bought a heifer from a friend of ours and we couldn't keep her in. She would jump over or crawl through our fences, so she ended up on our neighbor's property. One morning Marge and I pulled our trailer over to where she was, shot and stuck her and hauled her home. She made some fine eating. Funny, but she never got out again. Our youngest son has been on me to get a fair-sized hog and process it out where we live. Shoot the hog out here, skin him, cure the hams, grind up the sausage kind of like when I was little. May have to do that.

Break out of the box now and then and try something new. Don't go and break the law, but be creative. Make some memories.