Let the Games Begin
The Friday Newsletter's in an Olympic mood--and I've got an old family recipe for summer, a French-inspired cocktail, great music, pets and more!
I am not typically an outwardly patriotic person.
I love my country, and I’m grateful for all the opportunities that being born here has afforded me in my life. Much as I love traveling abroad, I wouldn’t really want to live anywhere else; this is where I’m from. I’m clear-eyed about our faults, though. We are a work in progress as a nation, and still have a long way to go to live up to our founding ideals.
Too often these days, overt flag-waving patriotism is performed to signal a denial of these faults—a desire to close one’s ears to any criticism and revel in the sense that we can and should do whatever we want with no concern for others. A flag that should be waved in pride is instead brandished in belligerence. I can’t get behind that; that’s not what this country is supposed to be about.
Every fourth summer, though, my hesitation melts away.
This complicated sense of American pride gets moved to a back burner, replaced by two weeks of nuance-free patriotism—my inner monologue replaced by a bald eagle clutching a bundle of Roman candles in one set of talons and a triple cheeseburger in the other, screaming over the National Mall as “Freebird” plays.
Friends, it’s Olympics time.
I adore the Olympics. Sure—much like America, they’ve got their problems. The IOC is hugely corrupt, the games have often been used to burnish the image of repressive regimes, and a successful Olympics bid usually comes with billions of dollars of questionably-bid construction that leaves behind white elephants destined to sit unused for decades to come.
I know all that. But I still love them.
I love the Parade of Nations. I love the soft-focus human-interest stories about the athletes who’ve dedicated most of their young lives to arriving at this stage, today. I love seeing people do things that would be unfathomable for a normal person to do.
And yes—I love cheering full-throated for my country, willing them to dominate the world in the only venue where there’s no reason to feel any complexity about doing so.
The Dream Team in '92. Muhammad Ali and Michael Johnson in ‘96. Vince Carter’s dunk in 2000. Michael Phelps dominating in 2008. The women’s 4x100m race in 2012. Simone Biles and Katie Ledecky dominating in 2016. These are moments that last forever, and we have the promise of new ones happening right in front of us.
The 2020/21 Games were weird; there’s no such feeling this year.
The Olympics are back, and I couldn’t be happier.
You know what else is back? The ACBN Friday Newsletter.
This is my event, and I’m ready to go for the gold today.
This week, I’ve got an old family recipe that’s right in season, a cocktail perfect for pretending you’re sitting by the Seine, great new music, reader-submitted pets, and more!
The torch is lit. Let the games begin.
Tomato season, now and then
You know that scene at the end of Ratatouille where the curmudgeonly restaurant critic is transported back to his youth by a single bite of Remy’s ratatouille1?
I bet many of us have some dish like that—a family recipe that recalls a different time, a dish that we’ve known as long as we’ve been around.
For me, that’s Hot Sauce.
It’s not actually “hot sauce”, as you’d traditionally use those words—it’s more of a roughly-chopped gazpacho, a cold salad/soup made with fresh tomatoes and bell peppers. It’s a simple recipe, but it’s one that’s been a part of my life as long as I can remember. My great-grandfather made it for my father when he was a child, and I’ve made it for my kids—that’s five generations and counting on this recipe, and I couldn’t imagine changing a thing.
It’s not something I’d make in the dead of winter; it’s a dish meant for tomatoes and peppers that still smell of the vine. One bite, and back I’m in my grandparents’ back yard in Pennsylvania.
As my father wrote when I requested the recipe a few years ago:
The back story (which you have probably heard before) is as follows: My grandpa, C. E. Moore (your great-grandpa) always made his "hot sauce" (really a variation of today's Gazpacho) in August and September when he had tomatoes and peppers from his garden. He always used a mix of regular and hot peppers and liked to let it sit for 24-48 hours so the hot peppers could "work their magic". He fed me my 1st hot sauce in 1951 when I was just 13-14 months old - much to the chagrin and horror of my mother and grandmother. I've been eating it ever since. Grandpa Moore never had a written recipe and my mother was the only one of his four kids who ever learned how to make it. My 2 aunts and 1 uncle always wanted Mom to make hot sauce. My Mom also never had a written recipe but once, when she was making a batch, your Mom measured everything that went into the pot and came up with a written recipe for Grandpa Moore's Hot Sauce.
Great-Grandpa Moore’s “Hot Sauce”
12 large tomatoes, diced