160 for the 4OJ

That title looks like a vanity plate - allow me to explain. This is my 160th post to this blog, which seems like a pretty darn big number to me... and from urbandictionary.com I learned '4OJ' is the super-cool-way-hip way to say "the Fourth of July" - I think they made that up, but it doesn't matter.

None of that matters when there's food to talk about!

As has become our tradition, we celebrated the 4th by filling our apartment with non-Americans and feeding them silly. Our menu this year focused on hot dogs and all the fabulous ways you can eat them. We started with a tray of pigs in blankets as an appetizer (along with a bowl of onion dip since I've gotten all our friends hooked now.) For side items, I made pasta salad, potato salad, ambrosia salad, cole slaw, baked beans, corn salad, green salad, and fresh pickles. Taking my cues from a collection of cookbooks and a brief search of Wikipedia, we offered toppings and written directions for six different variations of hot dogs:

• the Willy Dog: (Alabama) ketchup, mustard, chili, sauerkraut, pickles
• the Kansas City Dog: sauerkraut and melted Swiss (emmentaler) cheese
• the Carolina/West Virginia Dog: chili, cole slaw, mustard, onions
• the classic Chicago-style Dog: tomato, cucumber, dill pickle, sweet relish, yellow mustard, celery salt and NO KETCHUP
• the Coney Island Dog: chili, onion, yellow mustard
• the 7-Eleven Dog: a pile of chili and canned cheese

Our toppings bar (supplemented with rare imports provided by my mama) consisted of Cincinnati chili, diced onion, sweet relish, dill pickles, chow chow, Emmentaler cheese, cheddar cheese, Easy Cheese, canned nacho cheese, ketchup, mayo, Miracel Whip, Dijon mustard, grainy mustard, French's yellow mustard, spicy mustard, sauerkraut, Cholula, Tabasco, celery salt, and Old Bay.

Most people tried one or two variations, with chili and cheese being the most popular toppings. Steph "freestyled" her hot dog, pioneering her own unique Swiss-style dog (I have no idea what she put on it.) The star of the evening, as usual, was Dani "the Fromaginator", who made it his personal mission of the evening to eat one of each variation. All got positive reactions but the 7-Eleven style... we'll see what he thinks of the real thing in November!

Obviously all that salt is going to make you a bit thirsty - in order to combat this, our friends were kind enough to bring rivers of beer and wine and various other drinks. Max went so far as to hunt down an exclusive import: Miller Genuine Draft. We added a couple libations of our own to the mix - Lynchburg Lemonade and three flavors of jello shots.

Around midnight we grabbed sparklers and descended on our small playground courtyard for a moving (as in full of awkward movements) tribute to the 4th. Our friends were kind enough to finish the dishes for me and bag up all the bottles for recycling, allowing Mr K and I a much needed day of rest on Sunday. And that's our 4OJ - how was yours?