Asparagus Casserole by Mandy Sands - from "A Treasure Chest of Pirate Recipes" (1971)

 

RECIPE

(4 large servings)

14 1/2 oz. can asparagus spears

1 can Campbell's Cream Mushroom Soup

4 squares Kraft Pimento Cheese

2 hard boiled eggs

1/2 stick of butter in chunks

Ritz Crackers (crushed) / or potato chips (crushed)

Put asparagus spears in a row into a medium buttered casserole dish.  Slice hard boiled eggs over spears, dice butter chunks next.  Cover with strips of pimento cheese and finish layers of ingredients with the can of cream of mushroom soup completely covering the casserole.  Top with Ritz crackers or potato chips (crushed).  Place in oven 350F for 30 to 35 minutes - crackers will be browned and soup should be boiling around edges.  It's done and ready to be served immediately.

Charlie Sands' baseball career was short.  He appeared as a pinch hitter and backup catcher for four different teams, and played in 93 major league games spread over six seasons.

He did however have the good fortune to be traded as a prospect from the New York Yankees to the Pittsburgh Pirates in October 1970.  

In his rookie season at 23 years of age, he got into 28 games with the 1971 Pirates, batting .200 and hitting one home run.  He was able to come along for the Buccos' post-season ride, and made one plate appearance in the World Series (he struck out).

Despite his unimpressive record, he got himself a World Series ring, so who cares!

As for Charlie's culinary entry in the 1971 Pittsburgh Pirates cookbook, I'm going to declare this is probably the low point of my year-long effort.  Yes, it's only April, but no, I don't think I'm going to prepare anything as unappealing as this asparagus casserole.

This is vintage mid-century fare.  Canned ingredients slopped together, topped with crumbled junk food, and baked until any nutrients are but a memory.  Also, I was unable to locate any authentic Kraft Pimiento Cheese, so I shredded a small block of Monterey Jack with red chili peppers in its place.

I'd like to think that no one makes recipes like this any longer.  If so, you have my sympathies.  I know canned vegetables are essential in some places, but fresh asparagus should be available to most people these days, and breadcrumbs would work better than crumbled chips or crackers.

Anyway, I made this dish so you will never have to, to honour a player you have probably never heard of.  I think we're done here.

The Return of Tony La Russa and an Eight-Year-Old Slice of Cake

British people have lots of wild traditions.

One of those traditions is to preserve slices of cakes that were served at royal weddings.  Not as in, "Let's wrap this up to take home and enjoy tomorrow."  More like, "Let's put this in a sealed container so that someday far into the future, people not even born yet will be able to look upon this cake and consider the wonders of our empire."

The article in this link takes a deep dive into the tradition of preserving royal wedding cakes, a tradition that goes back to 1840.  People with gentle constitutions may find some of the cake images upsetting.

Pivot to 2013, the year I launched this website.  It was originally built around the 1983 Chicago White Sox cookbook, and I set out to make every recipe and post the results here.

"La Russa Gastronomique" was the perfect mashup name for this blog, and the perfect recipe to start off with was the one from Tony La Russa.  

The recipe that he submitted for the cookbook was for Tropical Delight Cake, a fruitcake with a decadent cream frosting.  Here's the photo of the finished cake in 2013.

After posting the write-up and photo, I remembered British tradition and on a whim, stowed a slice of this cake in the freezer.  That was in April, 2013.  I never imagined that eight years later, La Russa would return to manage the White Sox once again.  I also never imagined that after eight years, the cake would still be sitting in my freezer, but it was.

To mark the stunning return of this blog's namesake, what more appropriate time to thaw that slice and see what eight years in a cryochamber had done to it.

Would it have held up in stasis?  Would it immediately break down and liquefy like Poe's Valdemar?  Would I dare put some eight-year-old cake in my mouth?  The photographic recap follows.

Commence the thawing!  A skeptical Tony La Russa looks on.

Released from its frozen tomb and plated, the cake maintained its structural integrity.

Tony noted that the golden raisins, once plump and soft, now resembled dried walnut pieces.

The moment of truth.  Even a grizzled veteran like Tony La Russa couldn't bring himself to watch.

The cake tasted old.  Just old.  No life to it, no freshness at all.  It was still light and chewable, and the frosting was sweet, but that first mouthful was punctuated by overwhelming staleness and agedness.

No second mouthful was necessary.  The remainder of the cake went into the trash.

But the memories will last as long as this website does!

Final verdict: don't expect much from an eight-year-old cake that's been sitting in a freezer.  Go out and get yourself something fresh and nice, or better still make your own.