Due to overwhelming demand (and several thinly veiled threats from Dave Edmondson), Tuesday evening will find me hosting a Tennessee Slaw Dog cookout at the Trout Underground World Headquarters.
For those who can't make it but wish to simultaneously participate in this homage to Eastern Tennessee gas station food, the equipment list for the original slaw dog is as follows:
Thin, pink hot dog (boiled)
White hot dog bun
Bright yellow mustard from a bright yellow plastic squeeze bottle
Chopped white onions
Canned chili (no beans)
Creamy, sweet cole slaw chopped fine
Though the original gas station dog was boiled, we're going to grill a higher-quality (girthier) dog. Otherwise, we're going to stay true to the original ingredients (if I learned anything watching those sci-fi movies about giant radioactive ants, it's that playing god often has dire consequences). Whether this results in an authentic slaw dog remains to be seen, but since I may be the only person in attendance equipped to judge, I'm pretty sure we're going to hit it out of the park.
Of course, some will see this as simply a chance to eat bad food and wash it down with good beer. Others (people of vision like myself) see it in larger, more universal terms; it's a way to emphasize the essential humanity of all god's children, and to do this, we're going to connect the two widely divergent cultures of Eastern Tennessee and mountainous Northern California with a junk-food bridge.
Unlike other fly fishing sites – which provide little beyond information about catching fish - the Trout Underground has embarked on a far loftier mission: We're bringing humanity together – one bad meal at a time. See you Tuesday, TC.