USA's Ten Great Places for BBQ

July 16th USA Today.

Stephen Raichlen, chef and author of "Planet Barbecue! 309 Recipes, 60 Countries" shares his favorite places to sample the world of 'cue.

I've never been to any, but will probably stop at the one in North Carolina next time I'm through. Plus, it's right in the epicenter of Tarheel Country.


ABURIYA KINNOSUKE-- New York--a Japanese robatayaki bar (What?)

ALLEN & SON BARBECUE-- Chapel Hill, NC-- wood-smoked pork sandwiches. Carolina-style.

OKLAHOMA JOE'S-- Kansas City, Mo.--stands out in a city known for bbq.

COOPER'S OLD TIME PIT BAR-B-QUE-- Llano, Texas-- classic roadside barbecue.


SOOT BOOL JEEP-- Los Angeles-- Korean-style

CAMINO-- Oakland-- farm-to-table-style place

EAST COAST GRILL-- Cambridge, Mass.-- wood-burning grill. Grilled, blood-rare salmon steak.


POK POK-- Portland, Ore.-- best Thai street food this side of Bangkok.

DRESSING ROOM-- Westport, Conn.-- best wood-grilled hamburger in North America

AL FORNO-- Providence, RI-- birthplace of grilled pizza. Also, the Dirty Steak.

Some More BBQ Joints to Add to My List. --RoadDog

ILMOTOUR 2010-- Part 3

Back in June, we drove to Iowa and then to Missouri where we did some cruising on Route 66 through that state to Pacific, Missouri, where we checked in for the 2010 Illinois Route 66 Motor Tour on that Saturday and Sunday, June 12th and 13th.

Thia is our trip there. Right now, it is June 9th and we're in the Bridge City, Ottumwa, Iowa.

While waiting for Liz to get going (Big Surprise there), I took a ride east on the road, which was the original US-34. You can tell because of the two motels on the east edge of town (we stayed at the Stardust Motel). The old alignment of US-34 goes only a half mile east before it dead ends. You can see the new US-34 at the bottom of the hill. There must have been quite an incline back in the old days.

The Stardust Motel has seen better days, but still is alright even with probably the worst laid-out bathroom I've ever seen. It is small and the toilet and sink are directly across from each other with about a foot in between. No wi-fi, either.

The Royal Rest Motel is across the road and in pretty bad shape. I wasn't sure if it was open or not.

We talked with several people at the motel bar Benchwarmer's last night. One was in town working construction (as were most of the people staying at the motel). He was a fan of Route 66 and has a sixteen year-old-son who has a Mustang which has mechanical problems. He has his dog with him, a beagle/rat terrier mix who had door duty at the place.

On leaving for Lake of the Ozarks, the odometer read 338 miles for the trip so far.

Show Me Mo. --RoadDog

Cars.com Top Ten Car Songs-- Part 3

And, now, their Top Four Car Songs, all of which I know.

4. LOW RIDER-- WAR-- With its distinctive bass line and singer's deep growl "this song begs to be blasted while cruising." You've got to love those hydraulically-altered classic cars. It's been covered and sampled many times. (A good way to rattle your brain in those jumping cars.)


3. FUN, FUN, FUN-- BEACH BOYS-- The list could have easily included three ot four Beach Boys songs, but they limited it to the most universal. "For many teens, car keys equal freedom." (Yeah, lots of fun till it breaks down or you go to the pump.)


2. PINK CADILLAC-- BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN-- Originally the "B" side to "Dancing in the Dark." Many Springsteen songs feature car imagery. (I couldn't afford one, even if it was pink.)


1. LITTLE RED CORVETTE-- PRINCE-- It "isn't the only song to equate a woman with a car, but it is probably one of the most blatantly sexual of those songs." (I never realized it. Guess I'll have to give it another listen. And, I might add, another vehicle I can't afford.)

Let's Get to Cruisin'. --RoadDog

Drinking Wine Out in Northwest Illinois

While out on our Mississippi River trip earlier this month, we found out about two new local wineries thanks to the Street Rod driving tour. We already knew about Galena Cellars which grow their grapes and bottle outside of the town.


ROCKY WATERS VINEYARD AND WINERY

The first new place is outside of the town of Hanover, about fifteen miles south of Galena. Rocky Waters Vineyard and Winery (2003 West Hanover Road) is where we met up with a lot of the street rods out on the tour. If there is really such a winery as a "perfect spot" to sample and drink your wine, this has to be the place. You have the view of a valley and hills off beyond as well as what could best be described as a north woods lodge with high ceilings and rough-hewn logs.

This is a place on our to-visit list as they were so busy we decided to leave. But, as the gov says, we'll be back.


MASSBACH RIDGE WINERY

It's listed as being in Elizabeth, Illinois, but it is really about eight miles out of town, closer to a cluster of buildings that goes by the name Massbach (8837 South Massbach Road). We really got lost going here, but there is signage if you go a different way (which we didn't).

We did stop here and did some tasting ($3) along with another couple who must have bought ten bottles. We bought a bottle of Elizabeth Wine with the grapiest grape taste ever. We also purchased a bottle of Blushing Pink which came the closest to our favorite wine, pink catawba.

Liz and I always like to give our business to small, local wineries whenever we come across them. We especially like the variety of flavors you can get.

Little Ol' Wine Drinker Me. --RoadDog

Cars.com Top 10 Car Songs-- Part 2

7. LET ME RIDE-- DR. DRE-- The lyrics definitely aren't g-rated "but that doesn't diminish its importance as a song about cars." (Never heard of it and with language like you usually hear in rap songs, doubt that I ever will. Plus, I'm sure he used the dreaded "N" word that I find offensive.)


6. DRIVE MY CAR-- BEATLES-- "How do you know you've made it? According to John Lennon and Paul McCartney, it's when you can afford to hire a chauffeur. (From my favorite Beatles, the early Beatles.)


5. MUSTANG SALLY-- WILSON PICKETT-- "Pickett wasn't the first to record 'Mustang Sally,' but he's the one who put it on the map." (This has been recorded by many, many, many artists and I like all the versions I've heard. And, of course, one of my favorite all-time soul singers is the "Wicked" Pickett.)

Four More to Go. --RoadDog

The Red Barchetta

OK, I've just spent the last hour finding out about this song and the one by the Dead Milkmen. I gave both a listen.

RED BARCHETTA-- RUSH

I had never heard of it although I am somewhat familiar with Rush. I found out that I had the song on my "RUSH CHRONICLES" double cassette and on my "Rush The Spirit of Radio Greatest Hits 1974-1987" CD. I'm listening to it right now.

There were several videos on YouTube, plus, I found the lyrics on another site.

This is one really great song and I'm glad I finally got the opportunity to listen to it. That sure was a lot of words to remember to sing in one song. I wonder how Geddy Lee remembered all of them.

And, it is a long one clocking in at 6:14 and from the 1981 "Moving Pictures" album. The song takes place in a post-petroleum future where gasoline-powered sports cars are illegal. His uncle has kept one hidden and Geddy takes it out for a cruise only to be chased by future cars.

"Wind in my hair
Shifting and drifting
Mechanical music
Adrenaline surge"

I then had to find out what a Barchetti was. Never heard of one. It is an Italian sports car.

Warning, this song can cause speeding tickets. Do not play while driving. Oh well, I'd chance it. "Honest officer, I was only driving fast because of Rush."

I'll definitely be putting this on my cruising list. As a matter of fact I'm recording it on my "On the Road Again" cassette as I get ready for Bob Stroud's Ten at Ten on the Drive.

Thanks Cars.com.

VROOOM, VROOOMMMM!!! --RoadDog

Cars.com Top Ten Car Songs-- Part 1

From the July 24th Chicago Tribune Auto Mart section.

While looking for ads for a 2010 Ford Mustang (well, thinking about one anyway), I came across this article by Amanda Wegrzn "Top 10 car songs."

"Ever since radios started popping up in cars, music and car culture have been inextricably (Big Word!) linked, and everyone has a strong opinion about both. Feeling a bit nostalgic during the summer cruising season, we thought we'd play tribute to the top 10 classic songs written about cars."

No mention was made about how they arrived at this list, and I've never heard of three of them, and I consider myself somewhat of a car song nut and have made about ten cassette tapes with favorites.

Here is Cars.com's list and their comments:

10. RED BARCHETTA-- RUSH-- Lots of reckless driving mentioned but with new regulations about fuel efficiency, pollution and what-not "it's a scary future for any sports-car nut...."

9. I CAN'T DRIVE 55-- SAMMY HAGAR-- "Some musicians use their talent to rail against political injustice, war and poverty" but not Sammy Hagar.

8. BITCHIN' CAMARO-- DEAD MILKMEN-- Includes a two-minute dialog about going to the shore and watching a Doors cover band. "...we dare you to listen to the song and not want to do doughnuts on your neighbor's lawn." (Hey, you can do it on mine if you run over those lousy Japanese beetles.)

I'd never heard of #10 or #8. Reckon I'll have to go to You Tube and listen to these two songs.

Driving and Tunes Just Kinda Go Together. --RoadDog

Perhaps a Trip on the Blue Ridge Parkway?

As summer winds down (hey, they're selling school supplies already and started even before the 4th of July), the July 11th Chicago Tribune had a list of trips by Jay Jones "Last blast" you can still fit into the waning days.

One has been on my list of "To-Dos" for a long time, and that is the Blue Ridge Parkway that links two national parks, the Shenandoah in Virginia and Great Smoky Mountains in North Carolina.

And, this year marks the 75th anniversary. It was a Depression-era project designed to bring jobs to the Appalachian Mountains.

"The 469-mile route twists around the mountain ridges and traverses dozens of bridges and several tunnels, providing breathtaking vistas all the while."

Places with names like Blowing Rock and Fancy Gap are having festivals to honor the 75th featuring everything from bluegrass, banjos to barbecue.

The official 75th anniversary celebration kicks off September 10th in and around Cumberland Knob where the building project started.

You can get information at www.blueridgeparkway75.org.

Maybe I'll Just Have to to a Little Drive. --RoadDog

ILMOTOUR 2010-- Part 2

I-88 joins I-80 and then on to Iowa. Still I-80 to Iowa City where we picked up US-218 to Mt. Pleasant where we got on US-34. Along US-218, we saw lots of barns with those neat designs on them.

Once heading west out of Mt. Pleasant on US-34 we saw lots of roads named after trees. One named Varnish Tree Road particularly was an interesting name. We also saw a sign for the American Gothic House made famous in the painting by Grant Wood. That would definitely be worth a trip some time. Maybe even have to find me a pitchfork and do a little posing. "I'm a farmer and I don't know how to speak in front of a roomful of people, much less 400,000." Who said that and where?

We got to the City of Bridges, Ottumwa, Iowa, and checked into the Stardust Motel along the original US-34 east of town. There is another small motel , the Royal Rest) across the road as well, definitely what you'd expect to find along the old US highways, motels at the far sides of any town.

Mostly construction workers stay at the Stardust Motel as the rooms are around $50 a night. The place is getting a bit run-down, but is still clean and there is a bar right on site. (AND, IT HAS NTN!!! even a better deal for us.)

We drove around town and way out west (about three miles) to another bar that has NTN. We then went back to the bar by the motel.

I wrote about these back in June on NTN Cruisin'.

MASH's Radar O'Reilly was from this town on the show. We always kid and say we're looking for Radar.

Never Have Seen Radar O'Reilly in Ottumwa, However. --RoadDog

July 1970 Cruising-- Part 2

Ready for some more memories back 40 years ago. Again, I'll give the name of the song, you tell who sang it. Answers are at the www.wdrv.com on-air site and at my http://roaddogsroadlog.blogspot.com site.


TWO OF US
I'VE GOT A FEELING
MISSISSIPPI
MISSISSIPPI QUEEN
BALL OF CONFUSION

HI-DE-HO
CARRY ON
DHARMA FOR ONE/WOODEN SHIPS (not CSN)
RUN THROUGH THE JUNGLE
CECILIA

YOU BETTER THINK TWICE
MAMA TOLD ME NOT TO COME
OO YOU
RIDE CAPTAIN RIDE
THE WITCH

MAKE ME SMILE
MOONDANCE
FOR YOU BLUE
SPILL THE WINE
PROPER STRANGER

(LAY DOWN) CANDLES IN THE RAIN
THE LOVE YOU SAVE (This was #1 in Chicago July 4, 1970)

How Many Did You Guess Correctly? --RoadDog

July 1970 Cruising

OK, what were you driving and what were you listening to back in July during the Summer of 1970?

I was going to be a sophomore at Northern Illinois University and still living at home during the summer. My parents let my brother and I share a 1964 Chevy Bel Air. You can't believe the arguments over whose turn it was to put in gas.

Bob Stroud did a Time Warp back to July 4, 1970 on his Rock and Roll Roots show (Sundays 7 to 10 am on WDRV-FM 96.9 and 97.1 and streaming on www.wdrv.com). This was the second installment and there will be two more the first Sundays in August and September.

I go into Stroud's comments as well as my own on my Down Da Road I Go blog (http://downdaroadigo.blogspot.com), but for here, it is going to be Name That Group.

You can also see the play list for this one at the WDRV website, just click on Rock and Roll Roots.

These are all songs playing on the radio or in our RECORD collections back then.


Are You Ready
Get Ready
Hitchin' a Ride
Question
Gasoline Alley
Make It With You
Uncle John's Band
In the Summertime
Take Me to the Pilot
Tighter and Tighter

These were played in the first hour.

Second and Third Hours Tomorrow. --RoadDog

ILMOTOUR 2010-- Part 1

About Time to Finish This Up Since It Was About Seven Weeks Ago.

We left home June 8th and even thought about leaving a day later because of the rain predicted in Illinois and Iowa for all day, and it was raining this morning. At least I didn't have to get out and water the plants outside (I had also watered heavily last evening).

Odometer at 93,585. We arrived home June 13th after driving 1,224 miles.

It rained on us all the way through Illinois.

Stopped for lunch in Dekalb, Illinois, and ate at Tom & Jerry's which boasts about how great their gyros are. And, they are every bit as good as advertised, especially with a $5.99 special price right now.

Got gas at $2.75 in Dekalb, then got on I-88, the Ronald Reagan Tollway. Had to pay tolls twice for a total of $3.80 to drive from Dekalb to Dixon where the tollway stops, about 40 miles. That's about 10 cents a mile, a bit steep. It used to be half that until the state came up with their latest money-making scheme several years back to charge double if you don't have an EZ-Pass so you can zoom through the toll stations.

Normally, we don't have to pay this because we take the Lincoln Highway, but we were running way behind schedule due to the late start and wanted to get to Ottumwa, Iowa, where we wanted to continue our search for Radar O'Reilly.

On the Road. --RoadDog

Class A Street Rods Natives 2010-- Part 5

I had never seen that statue before. We also took a ride to Lorado Taft Campus where potential teachers at Northern Illinois University in Dekalb have outdoors education classes with students. Liz spent quite a bit of time out here when she was at Northern. She especially recalls the songs "Benny & the Jets" by Elton John and "You're So Vain" by Carly Simon, two songs the students played incessantly on their radios while they were out there.

It got so bad that she and other NIU students were trying to figure out how they could get into Oregon, the nearest town, and get some beer. I can hear it now, the kids drove us to drink!!

I never had a class out there, however.

Went into Oregon next and took some time to look at the court house, an impressive structure built in 1891. Two Civil War cannons are mounted in front, an 1864 six and a half inch Naval Parrott gun weighing 9,722 pounds and an 1846 Columbiad made in Boston, Massachusetts.

There is also a Soldiers' Monument built in 1911 by Lorado Taft, who also made the Black Hawk statue at Lowden State Park. It honors military personnel from the War of 1812, Mexican War, Civil War and World War I.

An Impressive Array at the Courthouse. --RoadDog

Class A Street Rods Natives 2010-- Part 4-- Why the Name?-- Chief Black Hawk

WHY THE NAME?

I'm calling this the Class A Street Rods Nativs because we'll be going to see the Class A Midwest League Clinton Lumber Kings on Thursday, "Class A." Then Friday, Saturday and Sunday, we'll be seeing pre-1949 street rods in and around Galena, Illinois. Later Sunday, we'll drive to Oregon, Illinois for their Oregon Trail Days festival at Lowden State Park along the Rock River where they will be celebrating Indian heritage.


THE CHIEF

When we were at Lowden Stae Park north of Oregon, we took a drive through it. They were setting up a lot on Indian teepees near the entrance for Oregon Trail Days (even though the real Oregon Trail was nowhere close to here, but the name Oregon). Drove a short twisting drive out to the Rock River and the huge statue of what people call Chief Black Hawk, although famous sculptor Lorado Taft made it to honor Native Americans.

I had just seen it for the first time a few weeks ago when we took the cruise aboard the Spirit of Oregon steamboat and had that great lunch buffet. I've lived this long in Illinois and never seen it. Go figure that out.

It is as impressive up on the bluff as it is from the river. It is 99 years old and definitely showing its age when you get up close to it. Taft made it out of concrete and up close you can see lots of cracks resulting from all those Illinois winters.

One of the reasons for the Oregon Trail Days is to raise money for restoration.

One Impressive Indian. --RoadDog

Number 900th NTN Site

We've been playing NTN way too much since the 1990s. I mean, way TOO MUCH.

Yesterday we visited our 900th new place. I doubt that any other NTN Buzztime Player has played at that many sites, especially anybody with the "corporation." Fortunately, I started keeping track of sites right away so have the whole number listed by state, when we visited and date.

Anytime we go traveling, we always make it a point to visit as many places as we can along the way.

The most recent trip was out to the Mississippi River, Iowa and Illinois. We went to five new NTN sites that we had never been to before. One was in Iowa and four in Illinois.

They were:

DUBUQUE , Iowa-- Courtside Pub
GALENA, Illinois-- The Flying Horse
MOUNT MORRIS-- Maggie's Idle Hour
LOVE'S PARK (by Rockford)-- Casey's Pub
Machesney Park-- B-Dub (Buffalo Wild Wings)

That makes a total of 42 new NTN sites for the year.

Playing this Dumb Game Way Too Much!! --RoadDog