Nick Jimenez

Sunday, October 15, 2000

What would you feed Al, George, Dick and Joe?

Al and George. Dick and Joe. We've had these guys over at the house now twice in the last two weeks and they're going to be in our homes one more time before the election. At first, we thought, boy, what a drag. These guys are like inviting that couple that would break up if they didn't enjoy fighting each other so much.
   But, no, this last Thursday, Al Gore and George W. Bush acted a whole lot better. They didn't break any furniture, didn't raise their voice and didn't mutter and sigh under their breath. They acted nice enough that we feel like inviting them back for dinner.
   What would be on the menu if you had Al Gore, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and Joe Liberman over for supper to talk a little politics?
   A good dinner party ought to have food that fits the character of the guests, morsels that fit the temper of the personality. Yes, such a menu ought to have political soul food.
   Obviously, based on the results of the last two debates, all four of the candidates, Republicans Bush and Cheney and Democrats Gore and Lieberman, do a whole lot better seated at a table than standing up. The vice presidential debate between Cheney and Lieberman was so amiable and so civil, it was like watching two guys sitting over at Price's Chef talking about the latest headlines in the Caller-Times. All they needed was two cups of coffee and the apple pie shoved beneath their elbows.
   If we had Bill Clinton over for dinner, it'd be easy to do a menu. We'd send out for Big Macs, or barbecue ribs, or glazed doughnuts, or all three at the same time. I gather Bill is sort of non-discriminating in a lot of his tastes.
   Our political guests on the upcoming ballot might be a little harder. Except for Cheney.
   Dick Cheney strikes me as a no-nonsense kind of guy, fullback into the line, brown shoes and no-pleats kind of politician. Yep, we're talking meat and potatoes. Red meat. And none of that au gratin business, either. No, just mashed potatoes with plenty of butter. And it's just a matter of whether it's steak or meat loaf. White bread, of course.
   Too much cholesterol for a man who's already had a heart operation? Naw. Cheney strikes me as someone who looks at cholesterol and just gets a knife and sticks it on a roll.
   George W. Bush looks like a chili man. Yep, a big bowl of red chili is what I'd serve for old George. Here's a man who comes out of West Texas, hung around with baseball players and thinks that subliminal has five (or six) syllables. Don't let that Andover and Yale patina fool you. George looks like a man who's at home with a big spoon and a bowl of five- alarm in front of him.
   Why, that's probably where he learned that "compassion" business. You have to have compassion for a man who's just downed a bowl of five-alarm chili. Either compassion or a cold long neck.
   The only question is beans or no beans. But he's no doubt a strict constructionist: no beans.
   The first reaction with Joe Lieberman is to go potluck and just wait for the matzo balls and potato latkes to show up. Good eating. But no; Joe's our guest, so I want to go with a food that, like the best Jewish food, is unique to the culture, central to family life and one of those foods others outside the clan look down their noses at but beloved at the ethnic table. That means menudo.
   Yes, a big bowl of steaming menudo chock full of honeycomb tripe would be Joe's meal. It's the moral equivalent of chopped chicken liver. We laugh in the face of the Surgeon General.
   The hard guy to cook for is Al Gore. Here's a man who needs to loosen up and act like more than a guy who fills up a suit. I go for the chicken en mole, the staple of the Mexican wedding. Any sauce made with peanut butter and chocolate is guaranteed to get anybody laid back. There's no way to eat a plate of chicken en mole without getting the stuff on your shirt, on your suit, on your shoes, on whatever. You may still be a stuffed shirt, but that streak of mole on your tie says, "I'm simpatico. And I need a napkin."
   OK, guys, we've got the stove going. It's time to chow down.
   (Nick Jimenez can be reached at 886-3787 or by e-mail at jimenezn@caller.com.)
  
  

 
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