New Orleans Style Pimm’s Cups & Cucumber Tapas: 14 Days of Super Bowl Recipes

In my head, I already had picked out a theme for this post.  Wanted to talk about cheap hits in the post-season, not-so-cheap-hits in the post-season, and shut-you’re-mouth-that-was-totally-legit.

Unfortunately, I made the mistake of flipping on Kurt Warner’s press conference to announce his retirement.

Forty minutes later and I cannot put together a single cohesive thought to save my life.  I cannot think of any other profession where one person’s decision to leave a job — other than late night talk show hosts, and we can all admit that is a relatively rare occurrence  — receives as much press coverage as when an athlete retires.  Football fans love to trot out the overused canard “football is a team sport” and “play as a team, win as a team”, but deep down we know it is not true.  One player or one coach can change an entire team.  The foundation of talenljwrjklasdijpxamxsa’MKNFLDSndjkla HOW CAN PEOPLE WRITE THIS WAY?!?@!?@1

See up there? 20 seconds ago? Where I said “cannot put together a single cohesive thought to save my life” before the rambling started? Watching forty minutes of a football retirement speech has reduced me to nothing but a pile of cliches.  No wonder “your local sportswriter sucks” was such a hit a few years ago.  Where is the research on the damage caused by attending x-amount of pressers over the years?

Better get to the recipes.

14 Days of Super Bowl Recipes: New Orleans Style Pimm’s Cups & Cucumber Tapas

You will need…

You can stuff anything you want into a cucumber (yes, I know that is not usually how cucumber porn works), and for a simple salty snack.  (Put your own porn joke here.)

2-3 cucumbers
4-6 ounces of feta, depending on how much cheese you like
1-2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon Salt, preferably kosher
1-2 teaspoons ground pepper
1-2 tablespoons of fresh oregano, finely chopped

In place of oregano, you can also use dill, mint, or thyme.  Whatever you have around or is on sale at the store.

Cut your cucumbers lengthwise and remove the seeds.  If it is a waxy cucumber, peel off the skin.

Take half of your cucumber halves and chop.  Mix in the feta, olive oil, herbs and a dash of the salt and pepper.  Stuff the other half of the cucumbers with the mix, and then cut into bit sized pieces.  Top with just a little more ground pepper over the top of each piece to bring all the tastes together and serve.

New Orleans Style Pimm’s Cups

New Orleans is known for the Hurricane (diabetes in a glass), Sazerac cocktails (currently the favorite of hipster mixologists everywhere), and hand grenades.  Since I hate diabetes, hipsters and grain alcohol, (not necessarily in that order), we’re going to focus on the New Orleans take on one of my favorite British drinks, the Pimm’s Cup.  As an added bonus, we’re going to say screw New Orleans traditions and make what I believe is a far superior version of the Pimm’s Cup.

You will need-

Pimm’s No. 1
Cucumber
Lemon

For the New Orleans style Pimm’s Cup –
Lemon juice
Simple syrup
7Up or Sprite

For the awesome take on a Pimm’s Cup –
Bitter Lemons (Much a like a tonic water with lemons, but better.)

Fill a Tom Collins (or a high ball) glass halfway with ice, toss in a slice each of cucumber and lemon, and a shot of Pimm’s. (1 1/2 onces.)

For a New Orleans style Pimm’s Cup, add an ounce or two of lemon juice and an ounce of simple syrup.

Top with lemon-lime soda.

Drink.

For the awesome Pimm’s Cup, take your glass of Pimm’s and fill with bitter lemon.

Drink.

A civilized New Orleans cocktail that will save you from the indignation of begging for beads.

Day 4 – 14 Days of Super Bowl Recipes: Smokey Cowboy Caviar
Day 3 – 14 Days of Super Bowl Recipes: Citrus Marinated Warm Olives
Day 2 – 14 Days of Super Bowl Recipes: Fried Chickpeas (Ceci Fritos)
Day 1 – 14 Days of Super Bowl Recipes: Salted Honey Roasted Pecans