MASALA

Good goddamn has this noun been used ever which way but correctly. Any (unapproachably sultry)young woman with an Ivy League education and at least a summer spent in India can - and should - pen her bestseller; the gravy over this mess is always the fucking title, which must include "masala" in some shape, way, form. The "furrin" tongue is so much tastier, aint it?

Imagine how fucking totally gay restaurants would be, their appellations translated, laid bare, boring, bullshit... To wit: Per Se (with respect to its inherent nature); Sotto Sotto (Soft tone, soft tone); Fritti (fried); Ad Hoc (to this); Bouchon (restaurant specalizing in Lyonnaise cuisine); Babbo, (papa), etc.

Masala defined is a spice mixture, usually consisting of dried or roasted spices. Some may refer to masala as the bricks of curry. Not me. It's the gas that burns the goddamn house down. And regardless of what that joyless bitch Kakutani may write, it's neither suitable as book title nor organizing narrative principle... 'nuff sed.

We got a Autumn "scare" a week or two ago. Night lows dipped into the 40s. Soup was served. I like spice, which means I like masala. Cumin, corriander, fennel, mustard, cardamom, cinnamon, paprika, asafoetida, tumeric, fenugreek. All roasted. All fragrant. Nothing even close to a NYT bestseller you'd see draped conspicuously across the breasts of a Vassar grad feigning sleep in a Delta first class throne. Masala is your base. From there you can do no wrong.

Boil some chicken. Strain the cooking liquid. There's your soup stock. Let the bird cool and then pull the meat from its bones. Chopped onions, sweet potatoes, greens, tomatoes, ceci, peppers. A short simmmer. Mustard oil to finish. Christ, it's good. A spoon of chili pickle is required. So are a few Taj Mahal to keep your tongue from catching fire.

LET THE POISON TAKE

Must have been five or six. Out in granddad's backyard slashing various perennials to bits with highland sword - a gift from a shadowy figure in granddad's past that managed to remain in unshifting crepuscle. Grandma slid the glass door aside. Set the tray down. Granddad in his frayed L.L. Bean cords and Sperry topsiders and wool tattersall shirt perforated by moth.

Gin to shaker. A circular slosh. Ice forms round sides and colorless liquid slips into ancient stemware. The third LP side of Gounod's Faust waking in startled baritone on intervals always unexpected. First sip. Me bothering him. No, not now, Stew. I have to let the poison take.

What kind of drunk martinis usher in... Not a question. Like poison a stiffening, concretized demobilization. If the mind is a badger on methamphetamine minutes after third or fourth high-octane espresso, the same fatty mass on gin is a matador's flag rippling under stimuli so horrific and lewd decorum prohibits mention even here.

Never understood the martini/cigar bar popping up like fungus on cowshit in the mid- to late-90s. Elegant drink, yes. Inelegant reactions to a few elegant drinks are assured. I've seen no less than five grown men piss themselves after eight quick shots of gin. Maybe I'll mum's the word regarding the Joe Namath knows more genital tricks than David Yow bit. Maybe. Reason, yes, exist why the concoction was coddled by the Cotton Club crowd. A prop no different from the Tommy Gun, Clara Bow coiffure. Few knew/know how to effectively dispatch the Tommy Gun or said haircut. Few will. Most blow on figurative dice and hope to hell they can get a cab home.

Fuck it. I'll sit here with Beefeater and Noilly Pratt. Ancient stemware. Olives. Lemon peel. Shaker and ice. I'll drink and drink and drink and let the poison take. I've got that 4LP set of Faust now. Maybe I'll pop that on the turntable and make a deal with the devil.

TAPPED

The Highland Tap is one of those steakhouses that gets its rocks off by coming into being, dropping anchor, holding its ground through all shape and form of phantasmic trend. Dining room's darker than a whore's heart. Bar's one of those wood and leather upholstered horseshoes manned by career booze jockeys; the clientele it attracts spread the spectrum. Not unusual to see college flunkies, granddads, members of the GA legislature all sucking back hooch far before five p.m. Smells of blood and meat and things fried add to the cigarette and cigar smoke; I've even seen pensive night manager allow a resilient dad his pipe after supper - in the bar area, of course. It's that kind of place for those kind of people.

I've enjoyed the Tap since I was in high school. A pre-graduation supper was made memorable by unsolicited advice from sundry and esteemed members of ATL bourgeoisie and a minute recognition ("Nice H. Stockton oxford, kid"). These were the sort of lifers who broke the Tap well in by noon. Ollie North haircuts, Duckhead slacks, wash-n-wear Brooks Brothers shirts, delapidated saddle oxfords. They may have all been bellied-up to the bar and bone-soaked in drink, but all came armed with their own flasks - those Orvis or Filson ones part leather, part silver - weathered, mitted drunk buckets that had seen the better half of every back nine from Bobby Jones to Augusta National. ("Classic, kid. Classic never goes outta style. Hence the name. - Hey, Willie... 'nother ol' fashioned, heavy bitters...)I was bound for college that fall. Everything rubbery around the edges and sparkled with erotic stardust of possibility. (I puked in the shitter than night before dessert came. Too many Natty Lites from a silver monogrammed coozie from three to six. A gift from the Caddy-mogul "family" in Mobile. Came with a note aping Pat O'Brien: 'Have Fun.' Need I mention the swallowed Skoal?)

I see lots of my 18-yr-old doppelganger at the Tap. I see their parents. I see grizzled pediatricians still in fruity-drink colored polo golf-shirts, no socks, Weejuns. The place smells like a 400 gallon English Leather bottle pissed itself. College flunkies, check. Granddads zooted on Beefeater and Pall Malls, check. The greaser and Bettie Page couple, check. Sugar Mama and her He-still-fucks-lika-15-yr-old date, check. GA legislature, check. The cooks/chefs only fill up the place after one a.m. When I walked the earth as a college flunkie and "sabbatical'd" on various line with under-the-table "aliens" the Tap was the decompression chamber. Six or seven bourbons later even Dean Martin wasn't so bad (the old juke was a cholostomy bag that held fluid faves: Louis Prima, Sammy D, Roy Fuckin' Orbison...). We got to know the waitstaff, the bartenders. Martinis that were already doubles became triples. Sides of anchovy-stuffed olives. Kitchen "mistakes": Calamari, onion rings, snails. I got so sloshed there after a shift once I walked the train-tracks all the way to Decatur with a friend. We stopped only to piss and spit and once to attempt identification of deceased animal life. The Tap's likely still the same decompression chamber. If I wasn't watching Sports Center and sipping bourbon from the comfort of my own home, perhaps I'd know for sure.

The Tap is a cellar. Of sorts. Rocky, unfinished walls. Wood. No light save the conical laterns swung above the bar. Their wells nail-dented, light blaring through in constellations planned and improvised. Smoke hangs a debris field above heads. There's a guy wearing a fucking fedora. His laughter is the loudest, deepest, bluest. America's on the juke. "Heat was hot / ground was dry / But the air was fulla sound." Guy always on Neil Young's dick. Bartender's got five, six martini glasses lined up. Flash of vermouth. Gin. Olives. Smells like lemon peel. Brine. Medicine. Herbs. There are no less than four mustaches arguing about potential outcome of Georgia v. Vanderbilt. These things matter.

How many places still serve an Iceberg lettuce wedge with bacon dressing? The prime rib so paradisial I want to eat the fat it comes webbed in. Au jus as good as the French Onion soup's stock. Horseradish creamed, fragrant. Blood-soaked plates lit by candlelight are easy fetish. Waiters are torn from the Cutty Sark ads that adorned your dad's Playboy's pages. Some kid's gotten early admission to Cornell. Is it that time of year? Already? Young couple missed the memo re: Recession. They are Wolfean creature, molded without thought, assembled automatically via catalog pages, private school, Emily Post. Two dads with shetland Ralph Lauren sweaters on, camp mocs, cords, waltzing out of mid-80s with easy acumen. Mom's got a herringbone jacket on. She's unfortunately on her third margarita. Frowning. Thinking. Kids are likely part of the "progressive" (read: gradeless) school movement. Daughter's cute, countryside galoshes - in ATL. No, honey, the prime rib is good. But it's not better than sex. Anyone who says that has never really fucked - or been fucked - well enough. Tap makes you think about fucking. Every square inch of the place. Why wouldn't it?

STEERS & QUEERS

I don't want to get into splitting hairs on this, but let's just say it's understood "chili" means a stew of meat and spices. Beans are not a part of this dish. They were asked to join the pot when the folks doing the cooking didn't even have a shirt on their back, much less a happy and well-fed bovine to butcher out. The Italians, Spanish, and French use bread to extend their soups and stews. Americans and Hispanics use beans. Beans play no part in Texas Red. If you taste said chili and still want beans added, you'll not be invited back for supper.

My buddy Tim and I made a chili similar to Texas Red for a local chili cookoff years ago. We showed up with nada experience on the chili circuit, drank a case of schlitz in a hour or two, and then went home with the prize. Ever since then, I've been chasing that recipe. We kind of know what we put in it, but not really. Assembly was a bit hazy. The schlitz and whisky was flowing freely. Texas Red, a chili heavy on spice, works in absentia of the real deal. I think the original recipe exists somewhere, scribbled in a drunken hand on the back of a student loan envelope.

Texas Red is meat and spice. Ground chuck - nothing fancy. The fattier the better. If you can get local beef then, Jesus Harold Christ, go with it. The spice mixture is simple. I use one tablespoon per pound. Cumin, sweet paprika, smoked paprika, ancho chili, garlic, black pepper, sea salt. I roast the cumin and ancho and then grind them up. A half tablespoon of cayenne goes in at the end, too. Onions are needed. About one per pound of meat. Minced fine as a Franchi 12GA patterns out. Tomatoes - some huff about their inclusion. Muir Glen has a good fire roasted canned tomato. If you use homegrown, peel and de-seed them. I use one large can of tomatoes per three pounds of beef and nearly 16 oz of tomato puree.

Onions are cooked to nothing. Meat is browned and seasoned. Spice goes in. Tomatoes. Cayenne. A long simmer while the cornbread cooks. That's it. Ladled into a bone white bowl it resembles a lower demon's scat. Red, thick, steaming. It's hot going down, hotter coming out. But if you don't lick the bowl clean like a starving dog you just aren't good people.