Month: January 2014

Categories
We Recommend We Recommend

The Hard Stuff

“Alcohol is like love. The first kiss is magic, the second is intimate, the third is routine. After that you take the girl’s clothes off.”

— Raymond Chandler, The Long Goodbye

Attention all bourbon sippers, bottle blondes, and barstool detectives: Noir at the Bar is a national phenomenon combining two great tastes that taste great together, crime fiction and alcohol. “There will be booze flowing, plenty of it, and lots of good conversation,” says William Boyle, the Oxford Noir at the Bar organizer. “Other than that, the night will be a wildcard — with noir, you never know what doom you’ll fall into.”

You’d be hard-pressed to find a better collection of Noir at the Bar writers than those at the Oxford event: Readings will be given by Edgar Award-winner Megan Abbott (Dare Me; Bury Me Deep), New York Times best-sellers Ace Atkins (Dirty South; Robert B. Parker’s Lullaby) and Tom Franklin (Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter; Smonk), and Writers Guild nominee Chris Offutt (True Blood), along with Scott Phillips (The Ice Harvest); Jack Pendarvis (Cartoon Network’s Adventure Time); Derrick Harriell (Cotton); Jedidiah Ayres (Peckerwood); and Boyle (Gravesend).

Part of what makes this installment of Noir at the Bar so rich is that there’s an embarrassment of riches in the Ole Miss English Department. “I’ve been in Oxford since 2008, and I’ve wanted to organize a Noir since I got here,” Boyle says. “When Megan Abbott, one of my favorite writers, came to town to be the Grisham Writer-in-Residence, I knew it had to happen now.”

Chandler might advise you arrive early, too. “The first quiet drink of the evening in a quiet bar — that’s wonderful.”

Noir at the Bar at Proud Larry’s, 211 S Lamar, Oxford, MS, Wednesday, February 5th, 9 p.m. Free.

Categories
We Recommend We Recommend

Funny Business

Larry Clark says he has a very clear picture of who he is and who he isn’t. The lifelong performer who once juggled chainsaws on tour with Nine Inch Nails has been a sideshow geek, a circus clown, a daredevil, and a burlesque performer. A Memphian through and through, he got his start in show business working at Libertyland performing a jungle-themed comedy act.

“I’ve never really seen myself as an illusionist,” says Clark, who has been the host clown for Ringling Brothers and has driven nails up his nose for Jim Rose. “I’ve just never seen myself like that — up on stage with the wind blowing my hair around like David Copperfield. But when you’ve been doing something for a long time and you know who you are, you start to ask, ‘What if that was me?’ What would that sort of thing be like if I did it?'”

Clark will answer that question and give audiences a taste of life inside a circus sideshow when he opens “Theater Bizarre!” this week at TheatreWorks. It’s his second one-man show.

“There won’t be as much juggling this time,” says Clark, whose previous shows have attracted capacity crowds to see this world-renowned clown do his thing. “Most of the things I’m doing this time around are brand new. They’ve never been road-tested.” So there may not be any flying chainsaws, but there will be glass walking. And while there may be no wind machines to muss Clark’s pompadour, there will be illusions.

“JustLarry’s Theater Bizarre!” at TheatreWorks, Friday-Saturday, January 31st-February 2nd, 8 p.m. $10. theaterbizarre.brownpapertickets.com

Categories
Film Features Film/TV

Monster Mash

To nobody’s surprise, the loud and simple-minded new dead-zone casualty I, Frankenstein has little to do with Mary Shelley’s classic novel. It’s something much more common and much less fun — a battle-mad monster mash-up from the mind of Underworld writer Kevin Grevioux, who, along with director/co-writer Stuart Beattie, cheerfully scraps Shelley’s philosophical musings about family, loneliness, and scientific progress. They replace these things with muscles, glowering, flirtations with camp, and one of the biggest, loudest explosions of the year. If you ask me, it wasn’t a fair trade-off.

Like so many mediocre movies, the opening scenes of I, Frankenstein are the strongest. Frankenstein’s ruggedly handsome monster (Aaron Eckhart) gives us a bad SparkNotes summary of Shelley’s novel while cinematographer Ross Emery, who helped shoot The Matrix trilogy, supplies postcards of 18th-century gloom and Arctic desolation.

Unfortunately, this dark pastoral overture lasts about two minutes. Shortly after Frankenstein’s monster buries his creator in a grave, he’s assaulted by demons wearing rubber masks inspired by the Buffy The Vampire Slayer Fall 2000 collection. He dispatches — er,”descends” — these foes with some help from a group of shape-shifting gargoyle guardians locked in eternal combat with the demons over the fate of the human race. The Frankenstein monster is captured, re-christened “Adam” by the High Queen of The Gargoyle Order(!) and then set adrift for 200 years. Like Mongo in Blazing Saddles, Adam eventually discovers that “he is only pawn in game of life.”

There are dozens of questions about this premise that are better left unasked. But here’s the thing: If you can silence those voices of reason and logic and plausibility, I, Frankenstein is not a bad way to waste an afternoon. Watching a movie that does all the work for you is like getting a massage; it induces a pleasant state of anesthetized contentment. The only reason the characters open their mouths is to move the story along, and they repeat important information so often that the feeling of déjà vu never really lifts. The action scenes are reasonably clear and the pyrotechnics are agreeably over-the-top. Whenever a demon is killed, it explodes in a swirling comet of flames; whenever a gargoyle is slain, it rises to heaven on a beam of bluish-white light.

As an added bonus, Adam says to the comely “electrophysiologist” Terra (Yvonne Strahovski), “I think your boss might be a demon prince.” This immediately became one of my favorite random movie lines ever, rivaling Kevin McCarthy’s immortal voiceover observation from the original Invasion of The Body Snatchers: “A moment’s sleep, and the girl I loved was an inhuman enemy bent on my destruction.”

Now, I’m no connoisseur of bad movies; as Tom Bissell once noted, there are some movies so bad that they’re good, but there are no movies so good that they’re bad. Let everyone else ironically appreciate awful work, but sometimes attention must be paid, and that demon prince line is genius.

The sensory massage didn’t last as long as I’d hoped. Although the film’s battle scenes take place in impressive locales — like a Gothic church that sits in the center of a city like a granite tarantula or a giant silo where centuries of corpses hang like the salamini of the damned — they are, like the swooping, soaring, wacky demon-gargoyle brawls themselves, entirely CGI-designed and engineered. The film’s constant replacement of actual physical space with designed, computerized space renders meaningless any particularities of geography and architecture.

If the filmmakers had included a few specific, particular details about the people inhabiting the placeless European city where I, Frankenstein takes place, they would have given their movie some useful local color and flavor. If they’d included more than a handful of recognizable human types, they might have given their climactic showdown some weight. However, without these details, it’s often easy to forget that real people are onscreen. One character’s ringing cell phone accidentally provides the biggest, most incongruous scare in the whole movie.

The actors playing these future video-game avatars are okay. Eckhart, playing a handsome, soulless corpse, is perfectly cast. As usual, the always-watchable Bill Nighy skates into the movie, does a double Lutz/double Axel combo, and glides away unscathed. It’s the old Michael Caine trick, done to perfection. Nighy has taken to heart Caine’s famous quotation about Jaws: The Revenge: “I have never seen it, but by all accounts it is terrible. However, I have seen the house that it built, and it is terrific.”

I, Frankenstein

Now playing

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Categories
Opinion The Last Word

The Rant

CREDIT: Sbukley | Dreamstime.com

So I just learned that you, me, or anyone else can go online at
whitehouse.gov and create a petition to the government of the United States about almost anything. As part of the First Amendment of the Constitution, we have the right to petition the government. We’ve always had it, but the Obama Administration is the first to make it as easy as going online, creating an account, and getting it out there for the world to see.

Sbukley | Dreamstime.com

Justin Bieber

It’s serious business. I just checked the open petitions and these are two of the newest ones: “Hold the EPA and State of Utah accountable to protect public health and uphold the Clean Air Act.” That one was created on January 22, 2014, and at this writing, it has garnered 266 signatures toward the goal of 100,000, at which point the White House might address it. Also created on that day was: “Ask the United Nation to move peacekeeping troops contingent into Ukraine in reaction to police snipers murdering people.” At this writing, it has 745 signatures toward the same 100,000 goal. See? I told you this is serious business.

And here is one that was created on January 23, 2014: “Deport Justin Bieber, and revoke his green card.” That was on the day of his arrest in Florida for DUI, resisting arrest, and drag racing in a residential neighborhood. At this writing, it has 6,696 signatures, making those other two pathetic causes pale in comparison. Oops, make that 6,761 as of the past 45 seconds. President Obama, you better get a handle on the Bieber.

I never in a million years thought that I would be writing about Justin Bieber. And I should preface that by admitting that I have never heard one of his songs or seen him perform. I have, however, caught little bits and pieces of interviews with him when he was even younger than he is now (19) and was just starting to catapult to international stardom for whatever reason, and I always caught myself thinking that he seemed like a pretty decent kid. Now, I’m not so sure.

And it’s not that I really even care about what Justin Bieber does or doesn’t do, but the public relations professional in me just wants to say to him, “Shut the F up and hide, you little brat.” (Really, I am shocking even myself by writing about this. I am a portly, middle-aged man with a white beard who listens almost exclusively to music made by black artists between 1960 and 1978 with the occasional Cat Stevens and David Bowie hit in between.) I don’t know who the Spice Girls are, and they are probably already washed up and gone. I don’t know who Daft Punk is. I just looked at the nominees for GRAMMY Song of the Year and read this:

“Song title: ‘Roar;’ Songwriters: Lukasz Gottwald, Max Martin, Bonnie McKee, Katy Perry & Henry Walter; Artist: Katy Perry; Label: Capitol; Publishers: When I’m Rich You’ll Be My Bitch/Kasz Money Publishing/MXM/Kobalt Songs Music Publishing, Inc./Bonnie McKee Music/Where Da Kasz At?/Songs Of Pulse Recording/Oneirology Publishing/Prescription Songs.”

Not only do I not know who those people are, I don’t even know what language that is. It froze the spell-check device on my computer for a second. For the love of Sam & Dave, who are these people, and is “When I’m Rich You’ll Be My Bitch” the name of a publishing company? Really? Am I missing out on something here that the rest of the world is in on?

But back to Justin Bieber. Really, Justin? You got pulled over for drag racing while drunk in a Miami neighborhood, cursed at the police, and then told them you had also been smoking weed and popping pills? You are a bazillionaire superstar with something like 50 million followers on Twitter, and no one in your life has told you to shut the F up? And did you really get out of jail and, as you were being escorted from the pokey, jump on the top of your SUV and wave to your fans, or, as they are called, your “Beliebers?” Could one of your Beliebers not have told you that when you get pulled over for a DUI, you don’t volunteer that you’re also high on pot and Percocet, or whatever the pills were?

You need to come to Memphis and sit down for a minute and let Daddy-O here give you some advice. First of all, try to be a little more original. You’re already in trouble for actually “egging” your neighbor’s mansion and causing, apparently, thousands of dollars in damage. Really, JB? Egging houses? Yes, we all did that, but we were in the sixth grade, and we weren’t international stars. You can just stop that now, and don’t even think about soaping their windows or filling their mailbox with shaving cream. I know another famous artist whose name I won’t mention here but who uses a $ sign in it and even she has stopped placing bags of dog poop on fire at her friends’ doorsteps like she used to.

And stop drag racing around in a Lamborghini. That is so, so obnoxious. Yes, we did that in Parkway Village in our Chevy Vegas back in the day, but that was different. We had no future that we knew of, so it didn’t really matter. It was, after all, Parkway Village in Memphis, not exactly the playground of the rich and famous. And shut the F up. Quit talking and quit tweeting and tell your father to quit tweeting and stop jumping up and down and waving at your adoring, screaming fans. Do some community service. And do something about that haircut. You look like a lollipop. Same as a sucker.

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

The Game Plan

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

The New Year’s challenge — a vow among a group of friends to eat healthier for six weeks — had a built-in implosion date: February 2nd. Yep, the Super Bowl and Super Bowl parties … all those dips and beers and wings and weenies were set to demolish all discipline and clothesline this challenge just weeks in.

But, then, one of the friends, Tara Jones, suggested that they have their own party and supply their own less-Rotel-y snacks. “I figured throwing a healthy Super Bowl party would be better than us all sitting around drinking Michelob Ultra and not eating wings,” Jones says.

Among the members of this group are Amy Lawrence and Justin Fox Burks, authors of the Chubby Vegetarian blog and The Southern Vegetarian cookbook. The couple has shared hundreds of recipes on their blog, and, inspired by the challenge and upcoming party, they share with us their ideas for super Super Bowl dishes.

Better Jalapeño Poppers ➔

4 large or 6 medium jalapeño peppers

(halved lengthwise, seeds removed)

2 ounces neufchâtel cheese

1 cup shredded cheddar

1/4 teaspoon granulated garlic

1/4 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon chipotle pepper powder

Zest of 1/2 lime

1 large egg (beaten)

3/4 cup panko bread crumbs

1 teaspoon olive or canola oil

Sour cream and fresh chives (to garnish)

Place the seeded, cut peppers cut-side-up on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl, mix the neufchâtel, cheddar, garlic, cumin, chipotle, and lime zest together until well incorporated. Divide the mixture among the peppers by stuffing them until the mixture is even with the cut.

In a medium bowl, mix the egg with the panko until well incorporated. Place the mixture atop the cheese stuffed peppers until all of the panko is used. Drizzle peppers with olive oil. Bake for 20 minutes or until  golden brown. Garnish with sour cream and chives and serve immediately. (Makes 8 to 12 poppers.)

Meaty Portobello Chili with Cold-Oven Sweet Potato Fries

1 tablespoon coconut oil

2 cups diced onions (about 2 medium)

2 teaspoons ancho chili powder

2 teaspoons smoked paprika

2 teaspoons granulated garlic

2 teaspoons Kosher salt

2 teaspoons cracked black pepper

1 teaspoons cumin

1 1/2 cups diced bell peppers (about 2 medium)

8 cups cubed portobello (about 6 medium)

1 large can fire-roasted, crushed tomato

1 tablespoon dried, crumbled porcini

1/2 cup vegetable broth

2 tablespoons sherry vinegar

Sliced avocado to garnish

In a large soup pot or dutch oven over medium heat, melt the coconut oil and add the onion. Take your time with this step. You want to cook the onions for 15 minutes or so stirring occasionally until they are nice and brown. This is where much of the flavor comes from. Add the ancho, paprika, garlic, salt, pepper, and cumin, and cook for another 5 minutes or until a nice fond (the brown layer stuck to the bottom of the pot) has formed.

Add in the peppers, portobellos, tomatoes, crumbled porcini, broth, and vinegar. Using a wooden spoon, scrape up the fond from the bottom of the pot and stir it in. Bring pot to a low boil and then reduce to the lowest heat. Cover and cook for one hour.

Serve over Cold-Oven Sweet Potato Fries and garnish with sliced avocado and anything else you’d like. (Serves 6 to 8 as a main course.)

Cold-Oven Sweet Potato Fries

2 large sweet potatoes (peeled and cut into 1/4-inch batons)

2 teaspoons olive oil

Kosher salt and cracked black pepper (to taste)

In a large bowl, toss the sweet potatoes with the olive oil, salt, and pepper. Spread the potatoes out in a single layer on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Place into a cold oven and set the temperature to 415 degrees. Check them in 15 minutes or so. They should be golden and ready in 20-25 minutes. (Makes 2 servings, so you’ll have to make several batches if you’re serving lots of people.)

Justin Fox Burks

Baked Cauliflower Wings with

Black and Bleu Dressing ➔

1/2 cup crumbled bleu cheese

1/2 cup Greek yogurt (2% or 0%)

1 tablespoon sherry vinegar

1 teaspoon cracked black pepper

Kosher salt (to taste)

1 head cauliflower

(broken into large florets)

2 tablespoons canola oil

3/4 cup wing sauce*

1/4 cup ketchup

2 carrots (peeled and cut into matchsticks)

2 ribs of celery

(peeled and cut into matchsticks) Preheat oven to 425 degrees. In a medium bowl, whisk together the bleu cheese, yogurt, vinegar, and pepper. Add salt to taste and set aside in the fridge. 

In a large bowl, toss the cauliflower with the canola oil and place onto a large parchment-lined baking sheet. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes. 

In the same large bowl, whisk together the wing sauce and ketchup. Toss the roasted cauliflower in the wing sauce mixture. Return the cauliflower to the parchment-lined baking sheet and cook for another 15 minutes. 

Serve with the “Black and Bleu” dressing, carrots, and celery.

(Serves 4 as an appetizer.)

*You can use store-bought or follow the recipe for wing sauce at chubbyvegetarian.com.

Justin Fox Burks

Avocado-Walnut Brownies ➔

1 avocado (mashed)

3/4 cup cane sugar

3 tablespoons cocoa powder

2 1/2 ounces of a dark chocolate bar

(about 2/3 of bar; like Lindt 70%)

1/8 cup skim milk

2 large eggs

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon espresso powder

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 cup chopped walnuts (toasted)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a stand mixer, mix the avocado, sugar, and cocoa powder. Melt the chocolate and milk in the microwave for 30 seconds, stir, and melt for another 30 seconds. Stir again and add to the stand mixer ingredients. Mix until combined. Add eggs, flour, espresso, salt, and vanilla, and mix until combined. Stir in walnuts. Spread into a 5 x 8-inch pan that’s lined with parchment paper. Bake for 20 minutes. Let them cool for 30 minutes then lift them out using the edges of the paper and cut. Store them in a container on the counter or in the fridge. (Makes 8 large brownies.)

chubbyvegetarian.com

Categories
News The Fly-By

School’s Out?

The kids of Westhaven Elementary have likely learned the words to “One of These Things (Is Not Like the Others)” from Sesame Street. And they could apply those famed lyrics to the reason their school is one of 13 being considered for closure by Shelby County Schools (SCS).

At a meeting earlier this month, SCS Superintendent Dorsey Hopson said most of the schools on the list had low enrollment and poor academic achievement. But Westhaven made the list for a different reason.

“The issue with Westhaven is that the building is coming up on not being safe for these babies to be in,” Hopson told the room.

With 489 students enrolled for the 2013-2014 school year, Westhaven has the highest enrollment of the 13 schools on the list. The others, a mix of elementary, middle, and one high school, hover between 99 and 399 students.

Although Hopson blamed poor academic performance for the decision to include most of the schools on the closure list, Westhaven isn’t one of SCS’ “priority schools.” In those schools, academic achievement falls in the bottom five percent.

“They haven’t maintained the building at all. We asked for new windows in 1991, and we still have yet to get those,” said Bridget Baker, Westhaven parent-teacher organization president. “We need some flooring things done. We also need ceiling repair, and we need a new roof. They don’t want to spend the money to fix our school, but we’ve met all the criteria they’ve asked us to meet for enrollment and academics.”

A 2010 facilities assessment of Westhaven estimates the school needs about $4.6 million in repairs and upgrades, but some work listed doesn’t contribute to the sound structure of the building. For example, the assessment lists things such as a new intercom system alongside more crucial repairs such as replacing rotted ceiling tiles and asbestos-containing floor tiles.

Westhaven was built in 1956, and it would cost the district $55,000 to bring it into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Replacing aging boilers, ventilators, and hall radiators would cost $3.24 million.

If the school were closed, SCS would bus Westhaven students to Fairley and Raineshaven Elementary Schools. But Baker and other parents are demanding that SCS fix their building or build a new one. She said Westhaven has one of the largest special education programs in the school system, and “to uproot our special-ed students would be devastating for them.”

At the meeting on school closures, Westhaven third-grader Jade Jordan called on the board to save her school.

“We want our school to remain open. Repair it. Restore it. Or renovate it. Don’t close Westhaven. Just fix it,” Jordan said.

Hopson told attendees at that meeting that the proposed closures were not set in stone and, if parents and alumni developed plans for saving their schools, the SCS board would consider other options.

On Saturday, February 1st, at 10 a.m., parents and alumni are invited to a citywide meeting on all of the school closures at the Memphis Education Association (126 Flicker).

“We’ll be making plans so that we’re part of the process and our community voice is heard by the county school board,” said Claudette Boyd, an alumni who helped organize the meeting.

SCS is also hosting a meeting specifically for Westhaven parents and alumni on Tuesday, February 4th, at 5:30 p.m. at the school.

Categories
News The Fly-By

High Tide

CREDIT: Epicstock | Dreamstime.com

Riding the high of national wins for medical marijuana advocates, Representative Sherry Jones (D-Nashville) is sponsoring the Koozer-Kuhn Medical Cannabis Act, which would legalize medical marijuana use in Tennessee for specific medical conditions.

In 2012, a similar bill made it to committee before being withdrawn by the sponsor, former Democratic Representative Jeanne Richardson of Memphis. Since then, four additional states have legalized medical marijuana, bringing the total number of states with legalized medical pot to 21.

“We decided to make it strict because we wanted to be able to pass it and, considering that the state is Republican-controlled, we felt like that was the best way to go,” Jones said.

With the Koozer-Kuhn Medical Cannabis Act, in order to enroll in the Safe Access program, the patient’s doctor would have to complete a full medical history assessment along with a statement saying the patient would benefit from medical marijuana for his or her qualifying medical condition, which includes cancer, glaucoma, multiple sclerosis, HIV, AIDS, Crohn’s disease, Alzheimer’s, and — newest on the list — post-traumatic stress disorder, among others.

According to the bill, chronic diseases not named must produce “wasting syndrome; severe, debilitating, chronic pain; severe nausea; seizures; [and] severe and persistent muscle spasms.”

Medical conditions with required hospice care, toward the end of a patient’s life, could also qualify for medical marijuana. The bill also does not require insurance companies — either government-assisted or private — to reimburse patients for the cost of marijuana, nor does it force employers to accommodate marijuana in work environments.

Medical marijuana, if legalized through the bill, could not be used in any public place or any space that “significantly and adversely affects the health” of children.

The bill also specifies regulations for growers and dispensaries that would be operating from the newfound legality of marijuana, including oversight rules from the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Health.

Paul Kuhn, who sits on the Board of Directors for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, is a marijuana advocate in Nashville. His wife, Jeanne, used marijuana during chemotherapy before passing away from breast cancer in 1996 — a story that is all too common with cancer patients, Kuhn said.

“We’re hopeful that since there is such a national movement that we might be able to get some movement here in Tennessee, but we’re going to present it, and we’re going to do the best we can with it,” Jones said. “I think the national politicians see where this is going. I hope that Tennessee politicians will see where this needs to go.”

Categories
Editorial Opinion

Alive and Well

For some decades, the medical world — and those lay people whose destinies brought them in contact with it sadly, apropos potential responses to cancer — has been acquainted with a phenomenon called HeLa cells.

These were malignant cells — used for research and medical experimentation the world over — that derived originally from a single tumor that had belonged to a patient whose name was believed to have been Helen Lane.

The cells were unusually virulent — so much so as to serve so distinct and widespread a purpose. Indeed, they were, and are, regarded as immortal, and by now have been cultivated and dispersed so widely for so many different purposes as to weigh, by informal estimate, the equivalent of 150 Empire State Buildings.

So far the story is interesting, even uniquely so. But it gets more so, in numerous ways. In 2010, an author/researcher named Rebecca Skloot published a book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, that transformed the way in which both the ubiqutous HeLa cells and the supposed “Helen Lane” herself were regarded.

Skloot was in Memphis this week as the featured speaker of the Memphis Rotary Club’s regular Tuesday luncheon — which this week was also a climactic focus of a “big club” national Rotary conference for which the Memphis club served as host. The conference began Sunday night at The Peabody with a spirited keynote address to the attendees by Dick Enberg, the well-known sports broadcaster.

Skloot, though, was the piece de resistance. Reminding those attendees who had read her book and explaining to those who hadn’t, she noted the first basic fact — that the soap-opera-sounding “Helen Lane” was a figment of some researcher’s imagination. The actual — unintentional — donor of the HeLa cells was one Henrietta Lacks, an African-American woman from an impoverished family in Maryland who developed cervical cancer and was admitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore as a charity patient.

The dime-sized tumor that was extracted from Lacks was a godsend to medicine. HeLa cells were vital not only in cancer research but in numerous other medical breakthroughs, including the development of early polio vaccines. But as Skloot documents, the saga of Henrietta Lacks (who died within six months of initial treatment) had analogues to more sordid medical researches — like that of the African-American syphilis patients in Tuskegee, Alabama, some of whom were purposely infected with syphilis, and all of whom were allowed to die without treatment while the progress of their disease was tracked.

Nothing that graphic happened in the case of Henrietta Lacks. Nor did such malpractive affect the members of her family, who subsequently also become medical subjects. Eventually — thanks in part to the efforts of Skloot, who now runs a foundation to benefit unwitting former subjects of medical experimentation — a protocol has been accepted in medical circles that expands the rights of such patients and has firmed up the concept of patient consent.

But ethical questions remain, and, considering the astounding number of ways in which medical samples are routinely collected from all of us, it remains true, as Skloot reminded the Rotarian conferees, that “in some way, everyone is a potential Henrietta Lacks.”

Categories
Food & Wine Food & Drink

Drink Up

CREDIT: Justin Fox Burks

April 23, 2013: Kings Spirits, Inc. was on the verge of becoming Shelby County’s first sanctioned distillery, at least since the Prohibition era.

Ryan Hanson and Matthew Brown, who had parted a sea of red tape in the process, were before the Tennessee Alcoholic Beverage Commission as one of the final steps toward building Roaring Tiger, a vodka with an identity that centers around the Bluff City.

But they had to answer one question first.

Hanson remembers a commission member asking, “Why would you use that dirty Mississippi River water to make vodka?” In reality, the water comes from the sand aquifer, and Hanson says it’s the key ingredient to the smooth Roaring Tiger vodka.

The pair imports and filters base spirits, which they dilute to 80 proof in batches no larger than five gallons. They focus on clarity, aroma, taste, and especially texture. The Memphis water is so effective, they have to take care the vodka doesn’t go down too easy.

Justin Fox Burks

Roaring Tiger Vodka

“I want the burn to be in the right place. I want it to be just a little in the back,” Hanson says, rubbing his throat under his jaw. “People who are drinking want to feel like they’re drinking.”

Hanson and Brown have been friends since high school, bonding over clandestine home beer brewing in the ’90s. They knew they wanted to get into the beverage industry and they knew they wanted to use Memphis water. And then they waited.

When the Tennessee General Assembly amended a state law in 2009, expanding the number of counties allowed to support distilleries from three to 44, they paid close attention.

Three years later, they decided to create their own distillery and make a Memphis-based vodka, resulting in 18 cases ready for a test run at last year’s Gonerfest.

“Things have been blowing up since,” Hanson says.

Roaring Tiger Vodka now is available in about 100 bars and 30 liquor stores, almost exclusively in the Memphis area. They’re producing roughly 150 to 170 cases per month and plan to continue expanding.

Naming their product created much angst before the friends, passionate Memphis Tigers basketball fans, decided to name it after the program.

Graphic artist Ronnie Lewis created the distinctive logo, which features a fang-filled view inside a Tiger’s mouth and the Memphis skyline showing the Hernando de Soto Bridge to the left of the Pyramid. And, sure enough, there’s no sign of the Mississippi River. Turns out the creators of Roaring Tiger Vodka agree with the commissioner: Given the available options, who’d want to drink from that muddy gusher?

roaringtigervodka.com; info@roaringtigervodka.com

If you’re bored with your favorite cocktail or want an education in drink architecture, track down Big River Bitters co-founders Michael Hughes and Dustin Cann.

Hughes and Cann can teach you how to make your favorite adult beverage taste better, or at least get you to try something new.

Their business depends on it: Most people think “bitter” is an adjective, but in this context, “bitters” refers to sophisticated additives often used to liven up an Old Fashioned or Sazerac. One can theoretically drink potable bitters in small measures, but the pair likens cocktail bitters to salt and other spices used to enhance foods.

“You’re not going to just have a spoonful of salt,” Cann says. “If you were to taste it by itself, it absolutely wouldn’t be very pleasant.”

Creating the bitters takes between three weeks and two months and starts with 190-proof spirits or glycerin. Next comes a bittering agent like wild cherry bark or gentian root and a flavoring agent like Central BBQ pork rinds. A long soak and an occasional stir later, and the bitters are ready to add a few potent drops to your drink.

Hughes and Cann scrounge local farmers markets for a multitude of ingredients for their creations, which include syrups, shrubs, tonics, and rim salts. Among the lineup is Big River’s signature bitter The Classico. Other items are seasonal depending on what local produce is available.

Big River Bitters are available for sale online at bigriverbitters.com and are used in drinks at South of Beale, Blind Bear, the Silly Goose Lounge, and the Second Line.

Hughes mentions the term “flavor balance” as a description of what the products provide, and the pair hopes to add to the discourse of drinks around Memphis. They gave a presentation at Ignite Memphis last summer titled “Bitters: The Salt and Pepper of the Educated Boozehound.”

“I like to see the light bulb go off for someone who has discovered a new culinary experience,” Cann says.

bigriverbitters.com

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San Francisco on the Fly

Bruce VanWyngarden writes about an internet newspaper conference in San Francisco.