It’s A Party! Put Toothpicks On The Fried Cheese Curds.

If anyone asks, the yacht club is not having a potluck. But it is.

So how do I host a summer evening gathering with friends who are not just casual but deeply revolted by the idea of any formalities except the baseball game streaming on TV?

I’ll ask the same question another way. How do I host an evening I would like that also has the falsifiability problem that other people have to like it, when they are aware of my hosting only as a matter of procedure? It’s cleaning an apartment enough to suggest that the clean is how you actually live and move around. If I call it a party, nobody I want to show up will show up. I’m not even officially saying there’s a gathering. But no one would pretend enough to call it a coincidence, either. There’s just a soccer game on TV. 

That’s all I have to say.

The fellas will arrive soon enough.

I keep the front door open and the screen door closed so the mosquitos don’t get in. A mosquito can't wait for a knock, but I can.

The beer is already in the fridge from overnight. If I only thought to put the beer in the fridge now, it is too late. I might as well serve lemonade instead. No one minds lemonade, even if it was the powder stuff instead of the good fruit from the tree, except it has already been too hot too quick in the season. No good fresh fruit will show up now, this late. The really polite thing is just a thanks for sticking with ice water. This is always possible, if I would ever offer it.

No one is here yet. So I have enough time to toss a bag of cheese curds from the cheese drawer into the freezer for just so they stay cold.

The pantry has a bag of flour and a box of baking powder. The fridge has an egg and one beer that is giving its life for a good cause as the batter.

I pull my big pot out of the drawer and pour in enough vegetable oil so it’s not shallow and not too much so it’s deep. That gets hot on the stove.

A little bowl gets the cracked egg, mixed up. No shell. I do want these people to come back sometime.

Then a big bowl, just a plain big bowl, not even the casserole dish, gets some flour, just a little pinch of baking powder, some salt, the egg. Mixed up again.

Ee must sacrifice one beer into the bowl for the batter. It’s for the greater good. Mixed up again. Again. If I was really a good cook, I would have two bowls for egg-beer and flour-baking powder. That’s a suspicious amount of effort today, so I ignore the impulse.

The cheese curds are cold by now. Good. Curds go into the bowl of batter, scooped with a slotted spoon until they stop dripping, then lowered into the hot oil. This is not the funny time. This is the do it slow and right time.

While they bubble in the oil, I get a plate and cover it with paper towel. The curds will come out of the pot with a lot of oil that’s tasty and a lot of oil that’s gross. Paper towel will soak up the gross oil.

When the curds are brown and poofy but before they explode, I scoop them back out. Onto the paper towel. I wait, let the paper towel do its job. I mean it. The cheese is soupy inside and needs to come back to melty goo instead of soup. Or it will burn someone's tongue. A little extra salt when the curds’re still really hot is never a bad idea.

And then every curd gets a toothpick, because that’s fancy. Keep them on the paper towel. We don’t want that much effort.

Do not dump the oil down the sink. It’ll be great for some cod later in the week.

An anchor or two drop outside.

I turn the TV on, find the right volume for the game’s background noise. There are fresh strawberries in the fridge, too, if anyone wants them.

I hear the screen door open. It might rain soon. The fellas are arriving. Soda, Bag of Chips, Ranch Dip. They smell cheese. If they ask, I'll just tell them I'm watching the game and bought too many cheese curds.