“How can you talk if you haven´t got a brain?” (Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz”)

Not that it really helps my situation at all.

The Fart Game

A brain fart is “a lapse in the thought process; an inability to think or remember something clearly”.

My computer had a serious brain fart about a month ago. This is one of those brain farts where the things one once knew – never, ever come back. This lapse in the thought process is permanent; the inability to think or remember, again, permanent.

My computer died. It was a scary, Stephen King-kind-of-gory death. No returning zombies. No returning vampires. Just dead and gone, and I´m not happy about it.

To make a very long story very short: My hard disc crashed and burned, and worse, oh much worse, my supposedly hardworking backup disc was completely empty. After exhausting all possibilities of retrieving any information, I sit here now with a machine stripped of, well, pretty much everything.

Help me People!

To any of you who I have had e-mail contact with, I would appreciate your sending me the latest correspondence so that I can start the process of rebuilding. At this point there is no such thing as too much information. Any help is greatly appreciated.

In the meantime I still need to eat. I finished up a successful Gladmat festival last weekend, with perfect weather and loads of people. It´s always great to see the faces of folks you haven´t seen in ages. In addition to the usual pulled pork and Hot Links, we also served babyback ribs. And baked beans joined coleslaw and potato salad for the sides menu.

Working at the festival is fun but tiring, and the already iffy eating habits always take a turn for the worse. My standard meal last week was a hotdog bun with pulled pork. Good, oh you bet, but hey …

The week´s highlight came on Saturday. For breakfast I ate komle (traditional Norwegian potato dumplings – damn good) with salt lamb, sausage and purée of kohlrabi). One last pulled pork dog for lunch and a couple of bites of sushi to round off the day. Interesting.

Beans, beans, the magical fruit …

I´d give pretty much anything I could muster up if I could get back all the information that died with my computer. Exceptions here would be the first born and/or the left nut. But pretty much anything else.

Instead I´ll try to get my eating habits back to normal. And as always several of the featured dishes will include beans. Beans are one of the Great Gifts in the world of food. The Mexicans know this, but also the Italians, the French, the Germans, the Chinese and a bunch of other folks. And so do the Americans.

Suspicious Baked Beans

Here is the recipe for the Geir Johansen Memorial Memphis Baked Beans. The new name is his. You´re gonna love ´em.

3 oz. bacon, cut in pieces

1 medium onion, finely chopped

4 garlic cloves, finely chopped

8 cans Heinz baked beans

4 Tbs Worcestershire sauce

4 Tbs French´s mustard

2 Tbs chipotle chile purée

1 ts ground cumin

¾ cup tightly packed brown sugar

2 Tbs bacon fat

1 ts ground black pepper

1. Fry bacon bits in a frying pan until semi-crispy.

2. Add the onion and garlic, and cook for a couple minutes more.

5. Pour the bacon mixture in a casserolle.

6. Add the other ingredients, stir well, and bake in the oven or on the grill (with indirect heat). Even better if you´ve got a smoker!

7. Bake the beans for about an hour at 375 degrees F. You´ll need about the same amount of time on the grill, but closer to 3 hours on the smoker (at about 225 degrees F.). Stir occasionally and add i bit of water if the beans need more liquid.

Put the beans in an aluminum pan if you´re going to cook them on the grill or in the smoker.

Suspicious Baked Beans (den norske versjonen)

100 g bacon, skåret i terninger

1 middels løk, finhakket

4 hvitløkfedd, finhakket

8 bokser tomatbønner (Heinz)

4 ss Worcestershiresaus

4 ss French´s sennep

2 ss chipotle-chilipurée

1 ts malt spiskummen

1 dl tettpakket brunt sukker

2 ss baconfett

1 ts kvernet sort pepper

1. Stek baconterningene i en stekepanne til de er gylne og sprø.

2. Tilsett løk og hvitløk og stek videre i et par minutter.

5. Hell denne blandingen over i en ildfast form.

6. Tilsett bønnene og de andre ingrediensene, rør godt sammen, og sett formen i ovnen.

7. Bak bønnene i ca. 1 time til toppen er lettbrunet og bønnene bobler. Tilsett litt vann underveis hvis det er nødvendig.

Jeg liker godt å ha bønnene i en aluminiumsform, og ha dem på grillen (indirekte varme i en god times tid). Smaken av grill gjøre dem enda bedre.