Only days after seeing an article in a fishing magazine about proper nutrition and how fellows like me should take along carrot sticks, celery stalks and broccoli crowns instead of “wrong” foods like huge ham sandwiches, a friend told me about a fancy dinner party he recently attended in an upscale suburb of Atlanta.
“Talk about some hoity-toity hors d’oeuvres that were served,” he said. “I don’t believe those things you call hors d’oeuvres when we’re in a Canadian bear-hunting or fishing camp would have made the cut,” he said, dripping with sarcasm.
I beg your pardon, sir. My appetizers that are guaranteed to titillate the tastebuds of spoiled millionaires were taught to me by a dear, departed, friend and frequent hunting companion, William “Buddy” Norman.
Buddy hated the words hors d’oeuvres. It either had something to do with the goshawful way it’s spelled or his dislike for the French. “As a Southern gentleman,” he’d say, “I do not think it’s proper to use the word hors in mixed company, so I’ve come up with a term more in keeping with my upbringing in old Raleigh. From here on we’ll refer to these taste delights as hoo-de-hoovies.”
Let me tell you, Buddy’s hoo-de-hoovies started something. Now a half dozen of us who answer the horn of the hunter or wet a line in streams and bays look forward to opening paper sleeves filled with crackers or standard saltines. While others pop open bottles of Dortmunder Union or St. Pauli Girl beer, I smear potted meat onto a cracker and add an olive or a cocktail onion to top off the concoction. (Does anybody know what potted meat consists of? I mean really consists of?)
Next comes a saltine covered with sardines in mustard, plus a slice of sweet pickle and onion. Hmmm!
What about crackers covered with split-down-the-middle Vienna sausages and sweet pickle relish? Buddy would call the nondescript little hot dogs “Viennies,” which seems to be the proper way to pronounce the cholesterol-laden meat thingies down South. (By the way, does anybody know what Vienna sausages are made of? Is potted meat a ground-up, squashed version of a Vienna sausage?)
Then there’s kippered herring on crackers that first were slathered with cream cheese. Add an olive or a slice of sweet pickle on each one, and the moment you pop one into your mouth you’ll think you died and went to heaven.
Of course, all this comes from a fellow — me — who loves to dine on fried sacs of perch roe that have been doused with Crystal hot sauce. Not only that, I’ll walk a mile for pan-fried, lightly breaded calf or pork brains. No, I don’t want them mixed with scrambled eggs.
I’ve also eaten goose and duck eggs, and if you love egg yolks, these are the ones you’ll fall in love with.
For a main dinner course over a camp fire, a cabin stove or a modern range at home, I prefer venison tenderloins over beef filet mignon, venison or elk roasts over roast beef, smoked bluefish over store-bought smoked salmon, moose or cow tongue over anything served in chain restaurants, and trot-lined, steamed crabs in my backyard over the fanciest lobster dinner at the Palm.
Finally, if you plan to spend a day with me and you volunteer to bring the sandwiches, let me tell you how I like them. Start with freshly baked slices of rye bread or a big hoagie roll, add some mayo, lay on whole handfuls of shaved Virginia ham, spread it around, add another handful of shaved turkey breast, add plenty of thin tomato slices and Bermuda onion, then top that with five or six very thin slices of Italian salami. Add a little more Bermuda onion and a generous amount of Mt. Olive hot pepper rings (they’re not really hot but very tasty). Throw on a little more shaved ham and then put on the bread lid.
Now that’s a sandwich — a perfect partner for such things as moose tongue, elk liver and Buddy Norman’s hoo-de-hoovies.
• Look for Gene Mueller’s Outdoors column every Sunday, Wednesday and Thursday, only in The Washington Times. E-mail: gmueller@washingtontimes.com.
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