Determined To Succeed

How many of you went to your 20-year high school reunion? Show of hands…anyone…anyone…Bueller…Bueller… Two years ago in August was my 20th anniversary of graduating high school and I didn’t go primarily because, one, it was expensive, and two, because of Facebook. Yes, that nifty little thing called Facebook connected me with so many wonderful people from those days I thought it would be unnecessary to attend.

Well, that was then and this is now.

Recently I learned that good ‘ol Kenwood Academy was hosting an all-class 40-year reunion today, actually held at the school. You know, just like in the movies. In “Superman III,” “Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion,” “Zack and Miri,” and so many more the heroes go back to their respective high schools and the wackiness ensued from there. I always secretly thought that was cool since I was nerdy enough to like certain aspects of my schooling particularly the bricks and mortar that made up my “homes away from home.”

So it was with (mild) reckless abandon that I quickly packed a bag and headed to Chicago today to attend tonight’s festivities. Another thing that is making me happy is the fact that the monies collected actually go to programs at the school, not some cheesy banquet hall, hotel or other facility (and it’s cheaper – God, I am getting old).

Now as you guys know, Chicago food hits you as soon as you get off the plane, but I was good and avoided the temptations of my sweet home Chicago Chicago-style hot dogs (and no offense intended toward my friends in and around Philly. Hot dogs, Italian Beef sandwiches, pizza and Chinese food is all different – and better – here, like when you guys get a cheesesteak from your favorite places). However, I didn’t avoid that temptation for long and had a couple, with everything, fries and (sigh) a Coke.

But it was goooooooooooood!

OK, with the craving for hot dogs out of my system I have to both go for a workout today AND avoid over-indulgence. The latter shouldn’t be too hard, although I do want to eat before I get to the reunion which is tonight because I need to avoid the sweet food temptations of my old neighborhood (Harold’s Chicken or Valois anyone?) as well as the foods being served at the reunion, itself. While I am sure the food will be good, I get in trouble with all-you-could-eat situations like that and want to avoid that if I can.

So where is the middle ground?

Middle ground (and I don’t know why but Middle Earth somehow came to my mind – my PRECIOUS!!!) comes in the form of egg rolls from my favorite place in the world right now for Chinese food. It’s on Michigan Avenue downtown called Sixty-Five Seafood and they have egg rolls, bbq pork noodles, kung pao chicken and pepper steak to die for. They are PRECIOUS!!!!

This means I will be swinging by there later today for a combination late lunch/grab some hometown egg rolls/stave off the other bad foods run. I am so looking forward to it. Then I will be off to the reunion.

I am feeling a bit goofy today. I feel younger. I think about so many things from those many long-put-away days from 1984 – 1988 especially food, when I ate whatever I wanted seemingly without consequence. I think about what I wanted to do in life. I think about where I’d thought I’d be…

…I think about my mom, JoAnn (and you can bet your bottom dollar I will be swinging by the park where I spread her ashes to say HI).

Most of all I think about time and how precious (no reference intended…this time) a gift it is. I may be slightly more than two decades removed from gym period, english class, history, driver’s ed, biology and (ick), trigonometry, but I nowe have a grasp on one thing I didn’t back then – myself and how I eat. I want to be around for a good, long time and losing the weight I did has dramatically helped me prolong my life. It helped me not goive into the self-fulling prophecies of obesity – poor quality of life, immobility and potential sudden medical “episodes” like strokes and heart attacks. It also helped me become more active so I can enjoy things I never could before – like even sitting on a plane, in the middle seat (it was what was available) and not have to worry if I’d be making people uncomfortable on either side, and dancing and bopping to my favorite 80s songs from time to time (I hope they play some tonight).

That is why I am no longer worried about food when I come home. Sure it’s better (it’s always better in your hometown) but nothing – NOTHING – is better than the taste of adding years and quality to your own life.

Now, bring on that reunion and let’s “Wang Chung” tonight, and I will tell Clark Kent, Romy and Michelle, Zack, Miri and Ferris you say HI.

A plain milk chocolate Hershey bar. That was one of my mom, JoAnn’s, favorite treats.

Today is June 9th, the one-year anniversary of her passing. It is also the last of the firsts without her physically being present on Earth (you know, the first set of holidays, my first birthday, her first birthday, Mother’s Day, etc.) and you guys know I have been thinking about this day for quite some time now, sometimes with a bit of sadness and sometimes with a smile from a wonderful memory.

And sometimes, like today, with the strongest taste for a plain milk chocolate Hershey bar.

I have shared many things about my mom with you but I don’t think I’ve ever shared with you some of her favorite foods. The foods that made her happy. The foods that made us both heavy. Hell, even the foods we didn’t have sometimes. The foods we could (and couldn’t) afford. So today I am going to celebrate my mom’s life by talking about her favorite foods (and some of my own, too). It may not be the healthiest blog post I’ve ever done but it will be fun…and slightly mouth watering.

My mom, JoAnn Larson, was always fond of saying how much she loved to eat two things when she was pregnant with me – Chinese food, and chocolate and vanilla ice-cream. She used to eat so much ice-cream in fact that she was convinced that was why my tummy is slightly lighter on one side than the other (my birthmark – a chocolate ice-cream half and a vanilla half). I have to laugh at that one given my half-white/half-black bi-racial make-up. It always seemed corny but I could never disprove it, especially since I had physical proof.

She also loved her some beef chop suey.

When my mom was kicked out of her home in Cicero, Illinois for daring to date and bear the child of a black man (gasp, the drama) she moved to Hyde Park on Chicago’s South Side. This was a wonderful place because it was so mixed in terms of it’s population. It also had the best kick-ass Chinese food on the planet from Lung Wah Chop Suey. It was there she found her love for beef chop suey (and gave me mine). My mom had it when she was pregnant with me and treated us to it all the time (when we had the money) when I was growing up. It was our fast food of choice, over McDonald’s, Wendy’s and even Harold’s Chicken. An order of beef chop suey and three egg rolls is what we used to get. Damn, those were the days.

There was also Pat’s Pizza, the pizza joint right across the street from where we lived (and where my mom established credit for us during our leanest times). I don’t know how the name just came to me (I couldn’t remember the name for the longest time) but I am thankful it did (thanks for the reminder, ma). Even if we didn’t have money my mama made sure we, and I, ate and there were many a night when we had either meatball sandwiches or a large sausage pizza. Sure there were times we got sick of it (because we had it a lot) but damn it was good, and their pizza had such a distinctive taste that when I found Al’s Italian restaurant and Pizzeria one year ago as my mom lay in hospice I cried because it tasted exactly the same. I needed that taste of childhood at this time last year.

Then there was Valois, the cafeteria-style staple of Hyde Park. This was truly a place where the melting pot of Hyde Park’s eclectic community came to make soup. My mom loved their breakfast – sausage, two eggs over easy and potatoes with white bread toast – and their lunch – pot roast, with mashed potatoes and gravy and fruit Jello for dessert (there’s always room for Jello). On Saturday’s Valois had spaghetti and meat sauce. We used to get that with a side order of “mash and gravy” (don’t ask why we had potatoes with spaghetti. Just roll with it). And many a Thanksgiving was spent there, if not at my mom’s best friend, Rosalyn’s, house, having their “traditional” Thanksgiving dinner (turkey and all the trimmings). And did I tell you this place has grits for breakfast? Awesome!!!

My mama also loved her fish, and we visited the Cafe Enrico frequently to take advantage of their “all you can eat” fried perch dinner. Hell no, it wasn’t good for us but it was damned good and damned cheap, too. In later years, when she lived with me for a while on the City’s North Side, we got fried fish and fries from a place called the Fish Keg on Howard Street. Again, not healthy at all, but some damned good-tasting food.

Rosalyn was an awesome cook, too. She’d make us fried chicken, spaghetti, greens, corn bread, beans and rice…everything. She even fried up some chicken wings and made spaghetti one night when we were so broke all my mom had was bus fare to get back and forth to work. My mom called Rosalyn in what had to be a pride-breaking moment and asked if she could make us something to eat – and she did. Thank God for Rosalyn. That night we ate and didn’t go hungry, and it was also that night I firmly remember saying to myself I’d never EVER go that hungry again. That I’d help my mom any way I could understand how to make money stretch so we’d never have to feel that poor. That was when I began my truest understanding of how cold money could be. If you have it, great. But when you don’t have it…

…but this is not a sad talk. It’s a talk about food, and no food conversation about my mom would be complete without memtioning her love of fried chicken, speaking of chicken. We used to eat at Harold’s Chicken all the time, but her first love was Kentucky Fried Chicken. For as far back as I can remember she loved (and therefore I loved) their extra crispy chicken (until they messed it all up and made it spicy crispy. ick.), mashed potatoes and gravy (noticing a trend?) and cole slaw (which I am now sure contains a level of crack cocaine or other addictive narcotic). Even when she was diagnosed diabetic in her later years I used to bring her the occasional KFC meal and sit and enjoy it with her, and she loved every bite. her and the cat, that is.

On Sunday’s we used to get sweet rolls and other pastries from the fresh bakery that was perfectly placed between where we lived and the park we went to every week. We used to get danishes, and she’d get her coffee (extra cream, no sugar) and we’d enjoy decadent sweets while sitting in the park or reading the paper at home. It was in this park I scattered her ashes almost a year ago.

Lastly, my mom loved her Pepsi. Back in the day, pop could be purchased in actual glass bottles (still the best-tasting way to enjoy an ice-cold soda) and we used to save our pennies, nickles, dimes and quarters to be able to afford a case of “the good stuff.” We’d put it right in the fridge and, when it was cold, would pop open a bottle and enjoy it together. Or we’d sit outside on the benches a couple of blocks away and enjoy a cold one on a hot summer night. Those were awesome times. And even though I have switched and am now a Coke man, I will occasionally have a Pepsi and think of my mom. For old time’s sake.

Well, as they say times change and you can’t go home again. Lung Wah Chop Suey, Pat’s Pizza and the bakery no longer exist. When I spread her ashes almost a year ago I would have given anything to have at least an egg roll from Lung Wah just to ease the pain a bit. But no dice. Or maybe that’s a good thing. Harold’s is still just as active as ever and I do have it from time to way occasional time when I visit, and there is nothing like trying to find a table in the now-double-the-size Valois for a taste of breakfast served just the same way as when I was a kid.And if I ever get a hankerin’ for pizza, I’ll always (hopefully) have Al’s.

But no matter where I go in the U.S., no matter what time of day and no matter what convenience store in which I shop I can always have the first and best thing that reminds me most, culinarily speaking) of my 0f my sweet and beautiful mama…

…that simple, wonderful and amazing plain milk chocolate Hershey bar.

My friends, good morning.

It’s been a whirlwind last couple of days to be sure. Remember when I told you I lost out on a contest opportunity, and how I was having a sort of down day because of it? Well, my luck turned around and I am now in the contest and a participant in the conference surrounding it. So, as you read this, I will be winging my way to Atlanta, Georgia.- home of greens, grits and wonderful southern fried chicken (God help me).

Yesterday, Saturday, I didn’t do all that well with eating to be honest. I was in the process of getting ready for my trip and I indulged in – wait for it – Beef Fried Rice and a couple of egg rolls, washed down by some diet orange pop (soda). For dinner (which I had late because I was sooooo full from lunch) I had a meatball sandwich from Wawa (which, believe me, is very good).

Now this would be the point in the blog where I would say “grrrrrrr,” and kind of slap myself around a bit feeling guilty and mad for the food I consumed. Well, not today. Today, as part of the new Zen me, I am taking a deep breath and being cool about it. Do I know I shouldn’t have eaten a large beef fried rice, egg rolls and several glasses of (yummy) orange pop? Of course. But will I get right back up and eat healthier today and the rest of my stay in Atlanta? Yes. Definitively, yes.

That is not to say, however, I won’t be having a sample of southern cuisine. I do want some of the afore-mentioned grits (with butter and salt is best) and good greens (with hot sauce sprinkled in – yum). The fried chicken on the other hand I might leave alone. After all, a leg leads to a wing. A wing leads to a breast. A breast leads to a thigh and before I know it I’ve eaten a whole half fried chicken (which I’ve done before at my fave friend chicken joints in Chicago, Harold’s Chicken).

And, please know I am taking my workout clothes with me on my trip so I can get up early before each day’s seminars, workshops and speeches to hit the gym to do some elliptical and/or treadmill, free weights and, hopefully, the steam room. Fat and calories don’t take days off and neither will I. And I will report all the culinary treats I try while in a city I’ve never been to before.

My first temptations, though, lie not with southern food in Atlanta but with hot dogs in Chicago. Yeah, I have to fly into Chicago to connect to Atlanta and you all know what that means…

…tasty, tempting and delicious Chicago-style hot dogs.

Tomorrow’s going to be a long day. Wish me luck.

Have you guys ever been to Las Vegas? If you have you know that the opportunity to gamble hits you as soon as you get off the plane. Near every gate slot machines welcome you much like the wonderful hula dancers do in Hawai’i. Except instead of Leis and the sounds of island music you are welcomed with the pings, dings and electronic sounds that beckon you to come a “throw a few in” before hitting “the Strip.”

For me going home to Chicago is the same kind of experience, except instead of really cool flowered necklaces or blinky “one-armed bandits” I am welcomed by the temptations of Chicago food, starting with the Chicago-style hot dog. I don’t remember if I’ve ever described to you how absolutely yummy a Chicago-style hot dog is so I’ll start with it’s ingredients:

One sesame seed hot dog bun steamed to perfect softness, one Vienna Beef frank, mustard (and absolutely never, under penalty of being shown to the next departing flight, do you EVER add ketchup), onions, nuclear green relish (Chicagoans know what I mean when I say nuclear green), hot peppers, cucumbers, tomato slices and a pickle wedge topped off with a sprinkle of celery salt. Now that’s good eatin’, and the beginning of my visit home.

Some of you might be saying “that’s too much crap to put on a hot dog.” Well, no it’s not. That’s why hot dogs are famous in Chicago.  They are absolutely delicious, and like the Sears Tower or Wrigley Field (my Field of Dreams), a part of the city itself. But the beauty of this is equal to the problem with it – it begins in the airport and it ends in the airport.

Whenever I go home my friends here in the Philadelphia/South Jersey area ask me “so Bill. Are you going to have any Chicago pizza when you get home? Or that Italian Beef sandwich you keep talking about?” And the answer is never easy. I say “Nah. This trip I’m going to have my favorite Chinese food (at least an egg roll or two). Maybe a hot dog.” You see I have to be sooooo careful whenever I go home because a trip home usually means being tempted by the same foods that helped me grow to be over 400 pounds.

Today, I was lucky enough to have one of my hometown papers, the Chicago Sun-Times, do a story on me and weight loss and that’s what got me thinking about going home and eating. It’s so automatic. It’s so instant. It’s so tempting. Most of all, it’s so dangerous. All the foods I love in my favorite place in the entire world – home. It’s comforting and dangerous and so very tempting to have my home food experience begin as soon as I get off that plane.

But do I enjoy myself? You bet your a – er, I mean, bottom dollar – I do. But now I have to be almost hyper aware of my surroundings, situations and emotions whenever I’m near my favorite places – like 65 Seafood Restaurant, my favorite Chinese Food and egg roll in the city, near the corner of Michigan Avenue & Wacker (Wacker. Wacker. It is funny sounding, I know, but a street name, nonetheless).The legendary Superdawg on the corner of Milwaukee and Devon (pronounced de-VAHN by us natives), or Portillos in the heart of downtown on the corner of Ontario and Clark. Even Gene & Jude Red Hot Stand on River Road who hand-cut their delicious french fries right in front of ya’. That’s tasty eatin’, indeed. Not to mention my South Side/Hyde Park favorites – Harold’s Chicken (best damn fried chicken in the city), Ribs ‘N Bibs and Valois, a restaurant known as much for its wonderful all-walks-of-life clientele as it is for its “see your food” cafeteria-style method of serving.

You can see how a Chicago boy like me could grow up to grow out so much. This is what I have to be hyper aware of when I go home – the cravings for all these foods bombarding me like the beautiful neon and lighted signs and pings, dings and blinks of the slot machines that are abound in Las Vegas.

Nowadays, I am better. Not perfect, but better, about eating if/when I go home. I certainly give myself a big pep talk before stepping foot on my homeward bound plane saying “OK, Larson. You know you need to make smart choices. If you’re gonna have this you can’t have that. Got it?” And if I am lucky I do avoid giving in to the culinary temptations that surround me almost at every corner.

However I do admit having slot machines in the airport is a smart deal. They may not get you coming in, but, ideally, you’ve had so much fun you want just one last taste of it before heading back to reality, especially when waiting for your flight. This is the exact thing I feel in C Terminal at O’Hare International Airport. Whenever I’m home I have a blast just walking the streets that I want one more Taste of Chicago before heading back to Philly…

…one more hot dog for the road.

And for those history buffs out there…

The “Chicago Style” hot dog got its start from street cart hot dog vendors during the hard times of the Great Depression. Money was scarce, but business was booming for these entrepreneurs who offered a delicious hot meal on a bun for only a nickel. The famous Chicago Style Hot Dog was born! They’d start with a Vienna Beef hot dog, nestle it in a steamed poppyseed bun and cover it with a wonderful combination of toppings: yellow mustard, bright green relish, fresh chopped onions, juicy red tomato wedges, a kosher-style pickle spear, a couple of spicy sport peppers, cucumber and finally, a dash of celery salt. This unique hot dog creation with a “salad on top” and its memorable interplay of hot and cold, crisp and soft, sharp and smooth, became America’s original fast food and a true Chicago institution.