The current and first issue of the new food magazine Lucky Peach has an article about yakamee in New Orleans. This further supports my belief that Baltimore and New Orleans were siblings separated at birth.
Yakamee is a crappy Chinese take-out noodle dish. I ordered it once, to the amazement of the woman behind the plexiglas and pretty much every white cop I worked with. It happens to be very soupy, so not good for eating in a cop car. It also just happens to not be very good.
But yakamee is part of all the various foods in Baltimore that I had never heard of or eaten before I was a cop. In order of deliciousness.
1) Blue crabs, both steamed and as crab cakes. Now technically I hadheard of crabs, but I’m still including they because they’re so good in Baltimore and such a part of their culture.
2) Pit beef. Like roast beef, but smoked. If it’s hinting of pink it’s called “rare.”
3) Lake trout. Famously neither lake nor trout. Also a bit ghetto, but I make no apologies for loving me some fried whiting with hot sauce on white bread.
4) Yakamee. It’s not good, but interesting in that it can also be the generic name for Chinese take-out. Took me awhile to figure out what the hell the word was and a bit longer what it meant (and I spell it like it sounds, not like it’s written).
All these go well with Boh.
And Bull and Oyster Roasts deserve very special mention.
And I should also point out that Lexington Market has the largest chicken wings I’ve every seen. I think they’re all on steroids.
Can you tell the annual crab feast is coming up? Cause I’m thinking about food.
Pedro,
U may be thinking about food, but I'm thinking your flogging ideas have hit the mainstream.
When the most successful blogger out there covers you then the word is getting out.
andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2011/08/prisons-still-broken.html
I refuse to hyperlink as your ideas on flogging offend me.
You've taken what should be a loving, caring and compensated act between a man and a woman dressed as Wonder Woman and brought the state into the process.
Damn you to hell.
Well said, Pirate. Well said.
Of course it's well said. It came from me. I'm the Michelle Bachmann of online trolls. I believe everything I say because Jesus is on my side.
Seriously, I should have used the word "therapist" instead of the first use of the word "woman" in that comment.
I'm engaged in the never ending search for comedic perfection.
I'll have to buy the book now. If it's written in the same easy to read style as "Cop in the Hood" you'll never get tenure, but you will have served the Republic well.
I think "woman" is better than "therapist," because if you say therapist it takes the joke out of "compensated."
As to the book, I can't believe you haven't bought it already. If not you, who?
It's even easier to read than Cop. Luckily I already have tenure.
I just bought it on Amazon. So you should see it on your stats. Woo hoo.
I also purchased a 14 dollar pair of earrings for my 10 year old niece in order to get free super saver shipping.
filleritem.com/
She should thank you.
If I have half the reaction to the book as she will have to the earrings you'll have done a fine job.
I'm glad you have tenure. Considering your apparent aversion to pretentious academic lingo in "Cop in the Hood" I'm happily surprised.
Perhaps you make up for that in your scholarly papers.
You're getting plenty of write ups out there on the book.
If you do a second edition I suggest using something like this on the cover. That should up the sales numbers.
cgi.ebay.com/VINTAGE-SLEAZE-PAPERBACK-shame-market-WHIPPING-FLOGGING-/120635820511?pt=Antiquarian_Collectible&hash=item1c167489df
I should hyperlink it, but I might get too excited.
Vintage Sleaze Paperbacks! My favorite. Because I used to sell those when I was a cop. Police officer by night; smut peddler by day.
Seriously.
I found a huge cache of those in perfect condition. (Oh, Baltimore.)
I bought in bulk (dusty bulk) for about 50 cents each. I sold them in bulk to a book store for about $5 each. Most the resold for about $10 for kitschy cover value. Value increased for any cover featuring cars, homosexuality, and S&M (I never found one with all three).
A few were really valuable. These I sold on ebay. I forget the author's name, but he wrote under his own name (which was rare) and later wrote some best selling crime novels, one of which was turned into a movie. I want to say "Miami Heat"… but that's a basketball team. I think I got $600 for one book and sold a few others for $250.
These books with good covers (which had nothing to do with the lame material inside) existed only for a few years… from when somebody got the idea (mid 1960s, I want to say) till when you could publish real porn in 1969. Real porn killed the sleazy-cover paperback book market.
Imagine that.
And who would have guessed I'm an expert in the field. Glad I already have that tenure.
What's left of the original stash is probably still there… but I cleared out a good chunk of them. There were thousands.
Charles Willeford. That's his name!
"No Experience Necessary" and "The Woman Chaser." I made big bucks on those. Especially the former. Never even read them.
I was going to reminisce about Bull & Oyster Roasts and Crab Feasts in B'more back in the day but just can't think of the words to follow the above….
Pedroopolos,
your Greek ancestors would be proud of your money making skills. Perhaps you can find a secondary gig in a restaurant.
Hell, you could do that gig and still sell the sleazy paperbacks at the restaurant.
No matter what at least you have the tenure to fall back on.
Baltimore blue crab is hard to beat – when you're on the beat.