Buttered buns, Maid-Rites and Southern chili

          I believe it was the summer of 1998.
        I hadn’t been in Iowa long when a storm brewed up in Iowa County, knocking down trees, powerlines and damaging homes.
          I was working in North English at the time and made the trek to Marengo to see how I could help with storm coverage.
           My first stop was the Sudbury Court Motel on Highway 6 to take some photos of the entire roof of the building laying in the parking lot. I then headed to Oxford where I took photos of storm damage for the next issue of the area papers.
            Later that evening, my editor, Al, invited me to his place in Marengo for a meal. He had a gas stove and I was put in charge of cooking hamburgers by flashlight.
            While the hamburgers sizzled in the skillet, I began digging through the refrigerator for a jar of mayo. There was none to be found.
            In fact, there wasn’t much of anything in his refrigerator, so asked about mayo.
            “Mayo,” he said. “I don’t have any mayo, but I do have butter.”
            “Butter,” I’m thinking. “Who puts butter on their hamburger buns for dressing?”
             I believe I passed on the butter and ate my hamburger dry.
            Growing up in the south, I’ve never heard of such a thing as using butter for dressing. Butter is for toast and popcorn, not a hamburger bun.
             Later, I was at my mother-in-law’s house and there on the kitchen table was a couple sticks butter on a dish.
            The Iowa family used the butter and left it on table – all day!
            My family used stick butter in Oklahoma, but we returned it to the refrigerator afterward. In fact, our refrigerator, and I am sure others, had a compartment with a butter tray to keep it cold.
            The idea of butter sitting out on the table all day was kind of foreign to me, but I didn’t let it bother me too much.
            How times have changed. A couple weeks ago, while at the Midwest Old Threshers Reunion, our oldest nephew was placing a couple sticks of butter in a clean Cool Whip container in the camper and placing the lid on it and leaving it on the counter top, not the refrigerator.
            It tasted good and I mentioned to Debbie that we probably should do away with tub butter and place a couple sticks in a bowl with a lid and leave it on the table. That way it will be safe from the bugs and soft for our toast.
            And it actually tastes better than tub butter.
Maid-Rites
         While in college at the University of Missouri – Columbia, there was a drive up eatery near downtown called the “Zip In.”
            I pulled in one day and checked out the menu and they offered a Zip Burger.
            “Sounds good,” I’m thinking.
I ordered two and when I opened up the first one, it was filled with crumbled meat and half of it fell on the floorboard of my truck.
            “What the heck is that?” I said out loud.
            I later figured out after moving to Iowa that it was the Zip In’s version of the famous Iowa-born Maid-Rite sandwich.
            I don’t recall eating a Maid-Rite growing up in Oklahoma. The closest thing we had was Sloppy Joes. Mom would cook some hamburger meat and added Sloppy Joe sauce or a Sloppy Joe mixture packet with water and then pour it over a toasted bun.
            Top it off with some fresh green beans or another vegetable and it tastes great. Sometimes I fix Sloppy Joes for supper. Most often I use Sloppy Joe mixture in a tin can and it is quite tasty.
            I’ve gotten more used to eating a Maid-Rite these days than when I first moved to the Hawkeye State. All one needs is a big spoon and lots of napkins.
Chili
            As I’ve mentioned in the past, chili is not a soup like Chicken Noodle, it’s a meat dish. 
           In my home state, good chili has no tomatoes or beans. Someone once asked about where the liquid in the chili comes from and I responded – the grease or suet, not tomatoes.
           And if you want beans in your chili, you cook them on the side and scoop them a bowl and add the chili and stir it together. It cuts down on the gas!
           The owner of my favorite eateries in Oklahoma always said that tomatoes belong in spaghetti sauce, not chili.
            He had a point as I always eat chili with a fork and not a spoon. Pour it over a cheeseburger and top it off with some freshly chopped onions and sprinkle a little cheese on top. Add in a side of fried okra, another southern favorite, or some cole slaw and a big glass of iced tea and one has a meal fit for king.
            Always remember that Good Things are Happening, every day and always.