my first bagel

This morning was unlike others.  Okay, unlike other weekdays in which I wake up, clean up, eat up, and dash out the door to work.  Woke a few hours early, so I made a bagel and then finished reading my book in the living room. But before all that I peeked out the rear door and saw dawn on the horizon. Reading in the morning is my favorite thing to do. Wake up and read. What else could compare? Maybe eating a buttery blueberry bagel.

Pooling with butter, as you can see. While I gorged on bagel, my thoughts hearkened back to my very first bagel. It was in 1985, I think. At that time, bagels were only available in East Tennessee grocery stores in the frozen or refrigerated sections. Lenders, I believe they were. And I had a bagel because my friend Sarah's mother was Jewish (Gentile father). And they had bagels in their house.

Baptists (and other Protestants) didn't do bagels for breakfast or for any meal.

Sarah and I lived a few blocks away from each other and from our middle school junior high (when our city's public school system was organized much more soundly back in the days when dinosaurs gasped their last breath). We walked to her home after school to watch The Guiding Light, and to eat bagels with cream cheese. We didn't have good snacks at my house. She usually dragged out the discarded GL script that her relative, who worked one of the cameras, or in production, somehow, had sent her, and we pawed through it during commercials.

Many years passed for unfrozen bagels to hit East Tennessee. By the early 1990s we had at least one bagel sandwich place. And then there was another that set up shop in an abandoned Jiffy market, but it went out of business soon, too. Now we have those chain bakeries that sell bagels. And mine? Sara Lee from the grocery store. Nothing fancy for me. I like bagels though.

Another memory: The original bagel sandwich place was run by Christians. And they made all their workers make a profession of faith before they were hired. Only in the South. Only in East Tennessee, right? Well, there was a short-lived coffee shop downtown that had the same set up and it didn't last either. Maybe it's location. Maybe it's something else. But I'm not sayin... exactly.

That reminds me of frozen yoghurt. I read about it in Norma Klein's books in the early eighties, publication date, probably the seventies,  but it wasn't until the late eighties that we got a TCBY.

And that brings me to cupcakes. Everything come down to them. Will we ever get a cupcake shop? Seems doubtful. By the time someone here brings it to fruition, the trend/desire for cupcakes will be long long gone.

Living in a culinary wasteland; so sad. Such deprivation.

Did I mention the crushing culinary homogeneity of this pocket of East Tennessee? No more chain restaurants, please. Out of the Tri-Cities, we have more chains than Bristol or Kingsport because our city leaders had the foresight to pass liquor-by-the-drink in the late 1980s.

Sometime this month I'm supposed to make cupcakes for work in celebration of St. Patrick's Day. I bought a RVC mix in a box from Fresh Market. Am thinking about making those, but tinting the icing green. Maybe I have time to find St. Patty's Day cupcake liners.

Comments

[LLA]

Ah - I was in college before I ever had a bagel. They were provided by University Food Services, and were kept refrigerated and were rubbery beyond all belief. Still - I sensed this was a food stuff that had promise.

I remember when the first TCBY opened up in the Food City Plaza in the mid80's. We all thought it was just a little local operation, "TriCities Best Yogurt"...

I was a senior in High School before I ate at an Arby's (Colonial Heights) and a sophmore in college before I'd ever heard of Taco Bell (E. Stone Drive) - my mom took me there when I came home for Spring Break that year. She was so excited...

Your morning sounds serene and lovely - and I did so appreciate the trip down EastTn culinary lane...

[rebecca]

anytime. i'll take you down that lane if you want to go there. whether you want to or not, i should say.

i remember everyone coming up with different meanings for TCBY, but am not sure i ever heard that one.

you poor arbys-deprived gal. didn't get out much, did you? the first one i ate at was in knoxville on kingston pike, and i think it may still have an original arby's road sign. the big hat all sparkly like.

i was lucky, really. my mom and step-dad introduced me to various available cuisines. i've always been adventurous when it comes to food. i love new. we ate artichokes and asparagus and other "fancy" veggies that a lot of people are afraid to try. Eggplant.

but you do have that great biscuit place. oh, heck, there are so many wonderful places to eat in atlanta. you must be spoiled. one of my colleagues attended a conference at Tech last week or so. He went to Varisty, his first time. He thought it sucked. and then he didn't find any good asian places. the Vietnamese noodle joint sucked. he didn't finish his bowl of noodles. with tiny shrimp, he said. i told him i had connections down there and could pull a few suggestions out for him, but he didn't take me up on it. oh well.....

[Juno888]

The bagel is mouth watering ..It is so delicious to look at ..Wanna try to cook it..