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PCP: Baseball’s new concessions yield dining confessions

Jason Engelhart:

T.S. Eliot was being incredibly shortsighted when he wrote, “April is the cruellest (sic) month,” in “The Wasteland.” Certainly, his poem would not have been as powerful had he begun with, for example, “April is a swell time.” Still, Eliot may not have been so down about April had he considered the fact that it marks our national pastime’s annual awakening from hibernation.

After a long winter, there is nothing quite like walking into a stadium, smelling the freshly-mown grass and watching oversized men channel their steroidal rage into knocking around a five-ounce ball with a stick.

The game day experience is impossible to replicate, and it would not be complete without some good ballpark food. Whether one eats out of boredom caused by the length of the game or out of the hunger that inevitably follows spirited cheering, baseball and food go hand in hand.

A couple of decades ago, fans had few options when they went to the ballpark. Just as they are today, hot dogs were the most popular ballpark fare then, and they were essentially the same from ballpark to ballpark. Sure, the dogs may have had sport peppers on them in Chicago and green chiles on them in Denver, but that was pretty much the extent of the options for folks looking for hot food.

In the recent past, the hot dog-weary fan’s only alternative was something the friendly concession stand folks insisted were nachos. However, those who deviated from the processed meat norm received a plastic bowl of cold chips with a glob of lukewarm processed cheese unceremoniously plopped into a small compartment at the side of the container. This is a far cry from the warm tortilla chips covered in melted cheese and beans anyone who orders nachos deserves. Often, it was a safer bet to stick to the tube steak or else settle for a prepackaged snack like peanuts or Cracker Jack.

Fortunately for those finicky eaters who avoid franks, processed cheese and peanuts, ballparks have recently begun to take the advice of their brokers and diversify their culinary portfolios. In addition to the old mainstays, many ballparks today have begun to offer options like sushi, salads and specialty sandwiches.

Often, these exotic menu items represent regional variations in cuisine. The classic example of this is the “Rocky Mountain Oysters” served at Coors Field, home of the Colorado Rockies. I will not explicitly say what they are, but I can say that only “ballsy” fans order this Colorado delicacy. In fact, the concession stands only get about 25 orders per game.

Of course, other, less gross examples of regional ballpark fare exist as well. The concession stand menus at the country’s ballparks read like a food tour of the United States. There are boiled peanuts at Turner Field in Atlanta, fish tacos at Petco Park in San Diego and authentic St. Louis-style barbecued pork sandwiches at Busch Stadium.

Even for fans who do not like ballpark food of any kind, it is hard to go the entire game without at least grabbing something to drink from the concessions. There is nothing like standing in the hot summer sun for three hours to make one’s whistle feel very dry. When this happens, the reluctant fan must choose among three unsavory alternatives: an overpriced bottle of water, a comically overpriced six-gallon soda or a criminally overpriced beer.

For game day guzzlers who select the lattermost option, the likes of Budweiser and Miller have long dominated the ballpark beer market. Sure, there are some folks who prefer Old Style, but most connoisseurs would agree this David tastes even worse than either of the two insipid Goliaths of the beer world. Furthermore, most folks in the Old Style camp like the Cubs too, so their preference for quaint quaffs is more likely a result of deep-seated masochism than a desire for “indie” beer.

Luckily for baseball enthusiasts who genuinely wish to shy away from beer’s mass-produced and perverted cousins, the past few years have seen a craft beer explosion at stadiums all over North America. Cincinnati Reds fans can enjoy Red Legg Ale while the Colorado Rockies serve up Fat Tire and, not to be outdone, the Milwaukee Brewers offer a wide selection of beers including Miller, Leinenkugel’s, New Glarus and Sprecher.

The recent improvements in concessions at stadiums across the major leagues have made 2008 a great year to go to a ballpark and enjoy a game. Maybe if T.S. Eliot had had more ballpark menu options during the April that inspired “The Wasteland,” he would not have been so unkind to baseball season’s first month. It sounds ridiculous, but never underestimate the power of good sushi and a ballgame.

Jason Engelhart is a senior majoring in economics and history. Please send all Rocky Mountain Oyster recipes to jengelhart@badgerherald.spam. Send all other correspondence to jengelhart@badgerherald.com.

Ben Voelkel:

Jack Norworth, a singer and songwriter from the turn of the 19th century, had it right. In 1908, the Broadway performer left his mark on the landscape of American culture with a simply written tune that hits at the heart of the country’s love affair with the game of baseball: “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”

“Take me out to the ball game,/ Take me out with the crowd,” the tune goes, “Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack,/ I don’t care if I ever get back…”

It has been 100 years since Norworth wrote the tune, but fans still “Root, root, root for the home team” at ballparks all across the country during the seventh inning stretch as they enjoy their peanuts, Cracker Jack and other assorted ballpark favorites.

Nearly a century after Norworth, one of the great (baseball) thinkers of the late 20th century threw in his two cents when he quipped, “When we lose, I eat. When we win, I eat. I also eat when we’re rained out.” This modern-day Buddha — for he, like the common conception of an ancient philosopher, is on the portly side — is none other than former Los Angeles Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda.

He had great reason for his affinity for eating — he spent much of his life in the cradle of American cuisine, the baseball stadium.

Baseball is a game in which history is king, and the hot dog is a part of that history. At a 1902 New York Giants game at the Polo Grounds on a cold April day, as the story goes, a concessions seller was having trouble selling ice cream and cold soda, and he turned to selling hot sausages in buns. They were a hit, and the hot dog was born in one of baseball’s all-time holy grounds.

But there is a trend among some stadiums to begin catering to a more upscale audience, one that apparently is too good for the standard fare.

The sale and promotion of mystery meats and extravagant eats, such as Rocky Mountain Oysters (Colorado Rockies), grilled salmon (Seattle Mariners) and shrimp tacos as ballpark food flies in the face of more than 100 years of baseball cuisine.

“Oysters,” fish tacos and boiled peanuts? Seriously? To quote the Miller High Life man, “Y’all must be crazy!”

What is a baseball game without the deliciously salty aftertaste of peanuts and the quiet crunch of shells being stepped on, as the vendor snakes through the concourse pitching his own perfect game of tossing tubers to those who call? And what about the smell of a hot dog or brat as the wrapper is undone and the enjoyment of the first bite, which, somehow, tastes like a baseball game? Without that traditional food, the game loses a bit of what makes it so special.

And it’s not like you go to a baseball game for the food. It wouldn’t make any sense to do so. Spending gobs of money on transportation, parking and a ticket to the game just to order a gourmet meal does not fit anyone’s description of a smart dining habit.

So why pretend that is the case? Fans are there for the game, not the food, and as any baseball fan knows, enjoying traditional “baseball food” is as much a part of the game experience as catching a foul ball or swaying to “Roll Out the Barrel.”

For all of recorded history, when one has been seriously hungry at a baseball game, he has turned to a staple of mainstays at the concession stands.

If you go away from hot dogs, peanuts and popcorn, you lose a piece of what makes the baseball game the event that it is.

And that would leave everyone hungry for more.

Ben is a junior majoring in political science and journalism. He’ll be just fine with a hot dog and peanuts, thank you very much. He also backs the Italian (No. 3 in the program, No. 1 in your heart) in the Miller Park Sausage Race. He can be reached at bvoelkel@badgerherald.com.