Character flaws — I have my share. Among them, I can be boastful and I’m very, very, incredibly stubborn. But those factors combined do have an interesting side effect, and it’s both a blessing and a curse. I always follow through on a bet, no matter the level of inebriation nor the absurdity involved at the time of the wager.

Case in point my latest foray into the culinary dark arts: the Onion Dog. Before you pass judgment, let me explain how this aberration came to be, and my role in facilitating this process.

A crime against nature

For those of you keeping track at home, yes, you are in fact looking at an onion, pierced by seven hot dogs, wrapped in bacon, skewered and grilled. And yes, it’s perfectly natural to be repulsed by this. But no, I cannot take credit for the evil, maniacal genius needed to conjure such a thing out of the mind’s darkest recesses. That distinction goes to one Adam Schabow.

It must have been about a month ago now that Schabow’s band the Shabelles and the band I was drumming for at the time performed a moderately successful gig at the High Noon Saloon. Following the show, I invited members of both groups over to my place for the customary grilling of meat/imitation-meat-for-those-who-prefer and drinking of beer. Schabow attended, as did keys player Nate Tredinnick, and we consumed vast quantities of each commodity.

The coup de foudre of the evening occurred as Schabow was loading up yet another hot dog, heaping it with diced onions. When I commented on the abundance of his onions, he replied, “Man, I love onions on hot dogs so much. If I could just take a hot dog and, like, infuse it through an onion, I’d grill it and eat it like an apple.”

Nate was incredulous. He insisted Schabow’s idea had no grounding in reality whatsoever. When I pointed out it would be possible for one to use a drill to hollow a suitable-sized hole in an onion, he scoffed at the notion, claiming onions lacked the structural integrity to withstand that kind of manipulation.

I thought about it for a moment, putting my engineer’s-brain-two-generations-removed to work and turning the design around in my head, then remarked, “No, I bet if we drilled holes in it like the cylinder on a revolver, we could fit up to… five hot dogs in a good-sized onion.”

The gauntlet had been thrown. Schabow’s love of onions on hot dogs, Nate’s doubt and my lust to achieve the unachievable formed a perfect storm of male testosterone, and we established the terms of the bet. Nate refused to take odds in his favor, insisting ours was a fool’s errand, and ten dollars was established as the winning party’s take. I was to acquire three onions (for three attempts, though only one was needed), a power drill and a suitable bit, and we would reconvene at a date to be determined later.

I don’t know about the other guys, but I had no doubt in my mind the final showdown would occur. Eventually, we settled on last Saturday for a date with destiny.

For the record, a good-sized onion can hold five onions, drilled and mounted parallel to each other in a circle around the outer edge of the onion. In fact, a good-sized onion can hold  seven hot dogs if the holes are drilled precisely. While it’s a figure I’m sure can be topped, and I welcome anyone to try, I’m confident in saying seven was my best effort on that particular night. Between my rusty carpentry skills and the copious tears brought on by the powerful reek of onion hitting me like pepper spray from the project two feet in front of my face, I’m just happy to have completed it with all my fingers intact.

Drill, Baby, Drill!

Upon completion of the drilling, we stuffed the hot dogs into the onions. And then, because the project had suddenly taken on a vile and malevolent life of its own, we wrapped the newly formed “Onion Dogs” in bacon and skewered them for grilling. Then we sat back and wondered at the horrific abominations we had created.

Grill, Baby, Grill!

A very smart, albeit fictional, man once said, “Now I know what it feels like to be God!” And while my desire to see this project come to fruition was very powerful, it was similarly, purely academic. I didn’t actually want to eat the thing (though I felt obligated to try it), and I certainly wasn’t in it for my share of the ten dollars. I did know what a pieced-together, unnatural terror I was unleashing onto a very vulnerable world, and I simply didn’t care. I wanted to prove that it could be done, and I wanted to claim this ugly accomplishment as my own.

I don’t yet know if I will feel any remorse for what I did. There’s a muted sense of awe, coupled with a dash of perverse pride and a dollop of indigestion, but no remorse yet.

Awestruck

One thing’s for sure — witnessing the genesis of the Onion Dog had a profound effect on everyone who was present. I watched the color gradually drain from Nate’s face as the project progressed. I think it had more to do with his sense of right and wrong than it did with his vegetarianism or his fear of losing ten dollars. Reem was so appalled, she documented the whole thing and posted it for the world to see on her blog, to which I owe credit for these lovely pictures I borrowed (Thank you!). Others in the room expressed varying degrees of discomfort or nausea.

And of course Schabow documented the whole thing on video. If you gird your loins and say a little oath, you can watch the complete genesis of the Onion Dog at Dane101.

So, I guess if there’s a moral to this story (and rest assured morals were not used judiciously in the creation of the Onion Dog), it’s that I don’t make a bet I can’t win. And I always follow through.

Finally, since I know everyone is headed home for the holidays and it’s often necessary to bring a dish to pass, here is the recipe for the Onion Dog. Use it responsibly.

Madison Onion Dogs

1        Good-sized Onion

5-7   Bun-length hot dogs

2        Strips of bacon

1        Pat of butter (optional)

1        Kebab skewer stick

1        Power drill with 13/16″ wood drill bit

Barbecue sauce, ketchup or other condiments as desired

1. Peel outer layer from onion. Use drill to make 5-7 parallel holes through the onion, making a ring around its outer edge.
2. Insert hot dogs into holes, using butter if necessary as lubricant.
3. Wrap the onion in bacon, and secure with the kebab skewer
4. Grill for 20-30 minutes, keeping hot dogs perpendicular to the flames and turning every five minutes.
5. Brush with barbecue sauce or dip in ketchup. Have a friend or family member dial nine and one on the phone, then stand-by. Eat as you would an apple.
6. Dusty Weis and Adam Schabow are not responsible for stroke, heart failure, stomach rupture or brain explosion (from sheer terror) associated with the consumption of the Onion Dog.

Happy holidays, everyone!

Labor Day’s bittersweet. Wisconsin giveth and Wisconsin taketh away, so I know there’s anywhere between one and two months of decent outdoor weather left. But I’ll be damned if it’s not easy to get into a very deep denial about it during a good Labor Day picnic.

This year’s was maybe the best ever. Thanks to my co-hosts, Michelle and Kati, and everybody that came out. It’s no fun cooking enough food for 40 people if I’m the only one there to eat it.

Too tired for more words, just pictures… courtesy of Kati.

The afternoon started with kickball — the Terrordactyls versus the Wangdoodles. Here, Steve-o demonstrates the Terrordactyl spirit screech. We were intimidating as hell.

Base hit.

Bridget barks out orders from the “pitcher’s mound.” Somebody’s comfortable in a leadership role!

Brittingham Park has a lot of advantages when it comes to organizing a kickball game — lots of open space, scenic views, proximity to Michelle, Tim and Kati’s places… The only major drawback is the city’s ban on alcohol consumption there. Fortunately, we were able to determine where the property line was and visit “the beer tree” between innings…     …and if you can’t tell from this photo, the other side of the sidewalk is the “beer-friendly” zone.

The game was called in the top of the eighth inning on account of a flat. We were all pretty dismayed when this particular Wangdoodle slugger literally popped one foul, and the ball hit the ground with a thud. Oh well. My Terrordactyls won the day in a solid 8-3 victory.

The crew settled into their brews and card games, and I got down to the serious business of making dinner for a crowd of 30-ish… I won’t lie — I love manning a charcoal grill. It’s about as far from a chore as cooking can get, in my estimation. I had packed my Weber in the back seat of my car and the apartment building had another grill bolted to the ground, so I had plenty of room to practice the craft. The menu was “bring whatever,” so I had an interesting array to work with, too. I believe the final count on tubed meat products came out to 42 brats, sausages and polishes, but I also grilled half a chicken, eight (homemade) chicken sandwiches, four veggie burgers and eight cobs of corn. Katie (with an E, not Kati) helped me out as associate griller.

But my crowning achievement of the day was the two-and-a-half racks of ribs I made using my old man’s “indirect beer heat” technique. He’d've had to wipe a tear from his eye if he’d seen me man the Weber using every technique he imparted, both through patient instruction and simple genetics.

“It’s Le Pig de Résistance!” I kept crowing as I worked on the ribs for an hour (not counting the previous night’s prep time), waiting for someone to get the Simpsons reference or at least tell me I was running it into the ground.

I don’t want to brag, so we’ll say they went over well. I’m sorry if you couldn’t make it out.

I’m now more determined than ever to find some way to prevent winter from setting in — or at least get one more good afternoon ballgame and cookout in before the frozen hell sets in.