So many glistening condiments!
Tailgate Party, here I come. According to Wikipedia, I don’t even have to like sports to hang out in a parking lot with a portable slow cooker. SEE HERE. Nor do I have to own a vehicle with a tailgate. I just have to consume alcohol and grilled food in a social setting. DONE. As for the parking lot… If I get a parking permit I can drink beer and eat chicken wings in my car, parked right outside my house. And the bonus? No need for a port-a-potty as a real bathroom is just steps away (if you consider a 1970’s lavender toilet and sink a real bathroom).
I found this TAILGATE magazine at Wal-Mart (issued by Better Homes and Gardens). Right away I thought, if “Grab a chip! Nine ways to Dip!” doesn’t fit into my new vegetarian-ish lifestyle, then I don’t know what does. (Count ’em! 1. Spinach-dill 2. Roasted pepper hummus 3. Corn and black bean chutney guacamole 4. tomatillo salsa 5. Spinach-Articoke-Blue cheese and bacon (all vegetarians still eat bacon) 6. Mexican seven layer 7. Chocolate Fruit Dip and 8. something called Amaretto fluff…..hopefully there’s not a kitten involved)
OK, OK, #9 is a Cheeseburger dip, but if you’ve got 8 veggies dips, who’s going to notice?
Don't deny this cuteness
Once you see what’s inside this magazine may never need to by another cookbook:
**Recipe for Root Beer Float Cake
**Recipe for a White Chili made with chicken, sour cream and whipping cream (you can use 10% if you’re cutting back on fat)
**Recipe for Grilled Paella w/ sausage
**A “Timings and Temperatures” chart that covers beef, lamb, pork, chicken, turkey, fish and seafood (it’s colourful and you can tear it out!)
**And calorie and sodium reduction tips like, “pack your bun with only half the massive amount of Texas Beef Brisket that you usually do”
**Best of All– A taste-test of 16 hot sauces purchased at hotsaucedepot.com (it’s almost enough to have discovered a Hot Sauce Depot)
So laugh and feel superior as you eat your salmon hand-roll, but just know that you’re not having nearly as good a time as the gal eating the Ragin’ Cajun Wings while sipping a Bloody Mary in the back of her Subaru. (Also, I know you’re drooling over the magazine cover, not the nori wrap on your sushi.)
cheese and toast 
Do not deny the power of the tailgate. When NYC briefly considered putting a football stadium in midtown (a seriously horrible idea), one of the complaints along with traffic and parking concerns was that there would be no place to tailgate.
Plus, if your football team is terrible, you need to have something to cheer you on.
I do not deny the power. I bought the magazine on a lark and already have the ingredients for half the dips on my next shopping list.
This is all new to me, I’m kind of in a curious awe. I certainly have enough condiments in my fridge to host a jar party on the back of my Subaru, so the last thing I need is more fancy sauces. Does anyone need more? I wonder how/what others in north america eat.
I love the sodium and fat reduction tip. And as much as I like my bi-annual rootbeer, I can’t imagine making a float cake. Yes, I’m positively horrified and yes I’m a giant food snob, and yes- I’ll make exceptions and dig my silver fork in poutine when it suits me.
-J
I feel like if you and I hung out in the back of a Subaru we could get into float cakes and slow cooker paella. Maybe we should have a jar party…just get some hot dogs and line up all the condiments…wait, is this Subaru-condiment thing turning into a food cart?