Cooking Prep: Ted Nugent is about as 'merican as 'merican gets. Forged on a cold winter Detroit night in 1948, legend has it that he emerged from the womb with a hunting bow in one hand and a guitar in the other. You probably know Ted from his wildly successful 70's hits Cat Scratch Fever and Stranglehold, but he's also a founding member of the late-80's 'supergroup' Damn Yankees (with co-founders Jack Blades of Night Ranger and Tommy Shaw of Styx). This short clip sums up Ted Nugent better than words (production quality and all):
I didn't know bow hunting was allowed in middle school gymnasiums
Ted may be a bit older today, but he's just as active. He can be found (or not found) in the wilds hunting anything that moves (probably bordering on Most Dangerous Game territory), hanging out with Glen Beck at tea party rallies, advocating for gun rights on any Fox show that will have him as a guest, choking out PETA members, and selling out middle school gymnasiums while on tour. And also penning delectable cookbooks with his wife Shemane.
Cookbook:
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| $4.94 on Amazon may have been a reach |
For my first cooking challenge, it appeared that I was in way over my head. I honestly thought Ted Nugent would balance out the wild game recipes with normal recipes like deviled eggs or peach cobbler. Nope. Thumbing through the pages was like a walk through a taxidermy shop: deer, elk, pheasant, duck, moose, black bear, wild boar...even squirrels. And he really did emphasize the 'Kill It' part of the book title, with helpful tips on how to skin and prepare your own animals for cooking. Mercifully, the second-to-last recipe Ted (or most likely his wife) included in the book was for Santa Fe Soup - just about the only recipe that didn't call on me to turn my kitchen into a butcher shop.
Assistance: I will be doing this recipe solo, as it's very simple...and I would never endanger my friends with the amount of processed cheese for which this recipe calls.
Recipe: Santa Fe Soup
This might be one of the easiest recipes of all time. Prep time took about 5 minutes - three minutes to open a few canned ingredients and chop an onion, and two more to find an 'appropriate' Ted Nugent album on Spotify. Please note the 'ground beast' ingredient. I chose to interpret this as 'ground beef', but god knows what else Ted Nugent could have been hunting in Santa Fe when he came up with horror show. Realistically, this recipe should be called cheese soup, mostly from the 1LB VELVEETA CHEESE BRICK that it calls for. I even checked the side of the Velveeta box a couple times for a Surgeon General's warning before adding it to the rest of the ingredients:
One brick of Velveeta cheese is roughly the equivalent of 843 Kraft 'singles', which in turn is roughly the equivalent of a horribly painful gastrointestinal death. The red ingredient that you see in the top left picture under the cheese brick is Ro-tel. Ro-tel is a lazy man's cooking salsa; hardly a Velveeta recipe goes without it, essentially making it Dr. Jekyll to Velveeta's Mr. Hyde.
After 'heating through', I guess we have dinner:
Verdict: It tastes exactly like how you'd expect soup made with a Velveeta cheese brick to taste. Like Cheeseburger Helper. Otherwise, it's a bit bland, and I had to use some Sriracha sauce and some salt and pepper to liven it up. Once I did that it upgraded to spicy Cheeseburger Helper. Don't get me wrong - there's a time and a place for this type of comfort food, although I had a hard time forgetting about the 700 calories/spoonful. I guess if you're out in the field bow hunting moose and boar like Ted Nugent, you tend to burn a few more calories. The only hunting I do happens between the deli and the meat department of the local Stop and Shop. I took Ted's advice and ate it with Food Should Taste Good tortilla chips. This combination is like a hobo wearing a top hat, and the tortilla chips were definitely the belle of this ball.
Grades:
Cookbook Variety: F+ (A+++ if I bow hunted)
Cost: A- (a brick of Velveeta is not as inexpensive as one might think. Minimal ingredients, however)
Ease & Time of Preparation: A+
Taste: C- (this is the hospice care of comfort foods. Watch out!)
Overall Grade: C+ (A- if I bow hunted)
Thank you for making me laugh on a groggy T ride into work!
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