PINTS & UNION PORTFOLIO: Harvest Homecoming pub program for 2019.

Joe Phillips opted for a storefront booth at Harvest Homecoming this year, and so we'll be serving food to the throngs. The menu: Fish & Chips (to be added to the regular daily menu at fest's end), Scotch Egg, Burger and Currywurst Frites.

 

Inside we've shifted into bedlam mode; glassware is gone, plastic cups reign and because we're here to turn a profit, I've stashed a boatload of mass market lager behind lock and key throughout the premise.

But as I explained at social media earlier in the week, this doesn't mean the core mission is compromised. We just try to adapt, and if business is good, make a little bank. Here's what I wrote.

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There are multiple consumer demographics layered through Harvest Homecoming's annual downtown overlay, and as a beer programmer it can be challenging to navigate these often contradictory preferences.

But I rather enjoy challenges.

In 2019 at Pints&union we'll have the usual draft, canned and bottled staples; just know YOU CAN DRINK BETTER BEER DURING BOOTH DAYS if that's your thing.

There'll be at least two interesting one-off drafts, too: Samuel Adams Octoberfest (a fine lager at a reasonable price point) and Bloomington Brewing's Persimmon Ale, as appropriate a seasonal specialty as can be found.

Draft Samuel SMITH Perry (imported English pear cider) will still pouring during booth days, and perhaps a surprise will follow it on tap.

Since 2006 and the late, lamented Bistro New Albany's Harvest Homecoming outreach, I've done my best to encourage the notion that better beer belongs at the table during the festival. It's gratifying to note the extent to which this goal has come to pass since those early, parched days -- so much so that the festival itself is sponsoring a beer festival by the river in 2019. This would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.

I'm on the verge of completing six decades on planet earth, and if there's any one thing of which I'm sure, it's whenever someone says THIS is the way it's always been, THAT's how it has to work, or don't you even CONSIDER CHANGING these sacred rules -- well, my reaction is to toss a Metaphorical Molotov Cocktail at the tablets.

Come into Pints&union during booth days, and I'll do my best to have some fine beers ready and waiting.

Giant logs of offal rule! Consequently, the Stuffed Camel Spleen Walk is to be Develop New Albany's latest ambulatory street food fundraiser.

Anyone have the lyrics of the Frito Bandito theme song in Arabic?

Stuffed Camel Spleen, by Rachel Rummel (Atlas Obscura)

Giant logs of offal become satisfying street sandwiches in the old city of Fes.

Among the chaos of the Fes medina’s winding pedestrian walkways, street vendors slice and sear sausage-like entities that appear kindred to massive haggises.

They’re preparing pieces of spleen, stuffed taut with ground meat, spices, olives, and preserved lemon. These bulging loaves—which easily run more than a foot in length—sit alongside the griddle, set in a huge metal tray out in the open air. The offal casing is a camel’s spleen, called tehal, and the filling can contain a medley of camel, cow, and lamb meat. (Vendors offer the same fillings stuffed in a cow’s spleen, as well.) Traditionally, cooks prebake the filled log into a deep, dark shade using one of Morocco’s many communal bread ovens, then fry it to order ...

LIVE TO EAT: Two tasty documentaries about street food the world over.

I appreciate the sedate, measured pace of these two documentaries, as opposed to some of the more frantic Food Network extravaganzas. This comes as no surprise, given the documentaries are produced by Deutsche Welle (German public television), circa 2016.

Asia - Cradle of street food tradition

Asia is famous for its street food delicacies - especially scorpions and insects. Every region has a specialty, every street vendor a story to tell. Explore Asian culture through a culinary journey to China, Thailand, Japan and Vietnam.

The English language voice-overs are almost seamless, although in one of these films some German sneaks through -- and you'll notice the texting is in German, albeit spoken in English. 

Street food -Tales of Tacos and Burgers

A cross-continental street food journey – from Oregon in the USA to Peru via Mexico. On every street corner, chefs are busy frying, grilling and roasting. Each region has its own culinary delights and the filmmakers are keen to try everything.

In consideration of the Cornish pasty. That's PAH-stee.

Mrs. Confidential prepares pasties. 

Pictured above is a homemade pasty, fresh from the oven. To be more accurate, it was a homemade pasty, because it no longer exists.

While it is true that pasties are a staple in places like Michigan's Upper Peninsula, I'm compelled to remind the reader that my wife's mother was born in English port of Plymouth, which lies in the English county of Devon, just across the Tamar River from Cornwall -- and Cornwall is as much the heartland of pasties as Kentucky is bourbon.

Hence, the Cornish pasty.

In contrast to its earlier place amongst the wealthy, during the 17th and 18th centuries, the pasty became popular with working people in Cornwall, where tin miners and others adopted it due to its unique shape, forming a complete meal that could be carried easily and eaten without cutlery. In a mine, the pasty's dense, folded pastry could stay warm for several hours, and if it did get cold, it could easily be warmed on a shovel over a candle.

I've often wondered why a street food purveyor hasn't embraced the idea here in metro Louisville. To be sure, the classic Cornish pasty is blue collar sustenance, not intended for gentrification, though naturally pasties can and are being converted into hipster conveyances. In 2013, I ate a pasty with something curried inside. That's not a Cornwall thang at all.

The real problem probably results from uncertainties in pronunciation. A pasty (plural pasties) as a foodstuff is PAH-stee, while a pasty that covers a woman's nipples (thus enabling her to evade obscenity ordinances) is a PAY-stee. For obvious reasons, there are usually two of the latter, and thus PAY-steez (plural).

I cannot mention pasties without recommending the nine Devon locations (all on the seaward side of the Dartmoor) of Ivor Dewdney, a regional pasty producer since 1939, owned and operated by Ivor's grandchildren.

Stephen "Taco Steve" Powell, his taco cart, and downtown New Albany.

Meet Taco Steve of Powell's Pigs & Cows.

You may know him as Stephen Powell, formerly of NABC, and now a taco entrepreneur in downtown New Albany.

This is Stephen's Taco Cart, which he's setting up on the corner by Hugh E. Bir's on Fridays and Saturdays starting at 6 p.m., past midnight -- or until he runs out of food.

Stephen gets his smoked pork and chicken from Shawn Pitts, operator of Shawn's Southern BBQ on State Street.

The tacos look like this ...

 ... and Ed Needham is a satisfied customer.

On Tuesdays through the favorable weather season, Stephen will be setting up by Comfy Cow on Market Street between 11:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. Credit and debit cards are accepted, and he's been known to produce vegetarian black bean tacos.

Most of you know Stephen from his decades of bar service, so now you can visit him for all your taco needs.