The Popcorn Story

The first job I ever had was working the concession stand at a movie theater in Columbia, Maryland. 

The town itself has a nickname: “The Colum-bubble” earned its nickname for being a place completely off on its own little world separated from the two nearest major cities (Washington, D.C. and Baltimore, MD) where the ethics of suburban lifestyle held sway. The education system managed to be “one of the best in the country” while still managing to teach students surprisingly little about the real world ( Only one teacher I ever had actually brought up the concept of “critical thinking”). The most celebrated people were those parents who managed to crap out the most kids and simultaneously enroll those children in as many after school activities as possible. The 1 bedroom condos that cost $100,000 (in the Maryland suburbs, mind you) were considered the “poor” or the “rough” part of town. Fast food and chain restaurants abound - all to ease the burden on the overwrought self important housewife. Woe be upon the lowly movie theater conscript who gets in the way of the mother hen and her gaggle of pre-pubescent entitlement machines.

I mention this because one of the first experiences I had where I was actually responsible for preparing food for people outside of my family to eat was at this movie theater. Since it was a chain movie theater and hence had a) little food to prepare and b) strict guidelines as to how to prepare said food it became a bit of a game to see how far we could stretch the guidelines to make what our 16 year old palettes defined as “better” food.

The movie theater had pizza, and pretzels, and hot dogs - but these all had pretty standard cooking instructions that came along with them. The pizzas were a bit of a problem - they came in pre-frozen and the oven never quite worked right so we had to constantly adjust how we were making them. Plus they took five minutes to cook - an eternity to wait in a busy movie theater right before your show was about to start, so naturally there were always complaints along with the orders for them. They were a terrible product to serve to movie theater patrons, but they made decent food for us on our breaks.

The pizzas went away, though. (Although the corporate overlords eventually brought them back long after I quit) The big important item at a movie theater concession stand is and has pretty much always been popcorn. This is what my fellow employees and I liked to play with the most. There was a giant machine with an automatic agitator that would stir the popcorn as it cooked. Basically we were supposed to dump a load of popcorn in, put in a pre-measured scoop of salt, and click the oil button once to set the machine going. Because this is no fun, we pretty quickly decided to say “fuck it” and make the popcorn in the means which best suit our fancy at any given moment. 3 shots of oil? Fuck it you go to the movies to eat fatty food anyway. An extra measuring cup of salt? Why not - see the prior reason... Except replace fatty with salty. (duh) We became craftsmen in search of the perfect method of mass producing popcorn. Some times things held better in a warmer, sometimes our experiments failed so terribly we had to pop a regular batch and mix in it with the over-salted over-oiled batch to keep from getting yelled at by our supervisors. (Luckily they were most often too interested in the upper echelon’s version of “who’s screwing who” to care that much… or there was the guy who always ran to the office to play StarCraft. I kind of respect him more.) But either way this whole process engendered in me a desire to work to improve the products I’ve worked on. I like to think its because I take pride in what I’m producing, but some people might describe it as a degree of artistic flare (Oh no! Food + Art = never being hired by Anthony Bourdain according to “Kitchen Confidential”)

So I went to culinary school. Partially because of that, but also partially because this I thought this girl I wanted to nail in high school was going to go to one.

So then I got a job working at the previously mentioned “most ridiculously named hotel ever.” We made popcorn. I think I mentioned this. If I didn’t, whatever. Piss off. We didn’t have a giant machine or pre-measured standards or what-have-you, but I did get to play around with the recipes quite a bit more. This was fun. Of course I had to learn a new method of cooking popcorn. Instead of relying on the agitator, I had to do it myself. This is actually a pretty simple process - put a lid on the big pot and hold the handle and the lid down (using towels or sufficiently thick oven mitts) and then shake the pot around as you cook. Listen for the same clues you would for microwave popcorn, then take it off the heat. Pretty simple.

So anyway, I’m not sure where I’m going with that particular story except to say that Popcorn is probably one of my favorite go-to treats, and I’ll pretty much take any chance to gussy it up a little bit for no other reason then “because I can.” My dog appreciates this. She likes popcorn. Her name is Maralynn.

(I’ve found the easiest way to the Internet’s heart is to put up pictures of adorable animals)

So, I’ve mentioned Bacon popcorn before, but to be honest I’m kind of tired of talking about bacon. So here’s an other recipe.

CHILI POPCORN:

The Ingredients:
2 TBSP Olive Oil
1 TBSP Chili Oil
1 TSP Picante Sauce
2 TSP Kosher Salt
½ CUP Unpopped Popcorn Kernels

The Process:
1) Grab a sauce pot with a lid.
2) Place the pot on a medium-high burner.
3) Add the oil to the pot.
4) add the kosher salt and picante sauce.
5) add the popcorn, stir quickly to coat.
6) place the lid on the pot.
7) while holding the lid on tight, shake the pot to move the kernels around.
8) When the popping has peaked, then reduced to 1-2 pops per second, remove the pot from the heat.
9) wait several seconds for the popping to stop.
10) top with whatever toppings you desire (Salt, Butter, Your Mom)
11) Pour in a bowl and serve.