Dac Crossley's Western Blog

Tasting Texas

I’m quite content with the Southern cuisine here in Georgia where I’ve lived for the past 45 years. There are times, though, when I crave the food of my Texas childhood. When I first arrived in Athens there was only one Mexican restaurant in town, and the owner was from California. Today there are several dozen places that sell some variety of Mexican cooking.

Here’s how I cope when I want something really Tex-Mex:

Chili. Not really a problem; you can make your own. All ingredients are available locally. There’s even one grocery in town that sells cans of Wolf Brand Chili, a childhood memory (named for Kaiser Bill, Lyman T. Davis’s pet wolf). I make chili myself with beans. Sometimes I long for that watery, nondescript chili served in little Texas cafés. It had a unique flavor.

Enchiladas. Wouldn’t it be nice to find a platter of south Texas enchiladas, swimming in American cheese and smothered in raw onions? Many varieties are available in Athens. My fav here is Enchiladas de Mole garnished with Avocado.

Tamales. There’s problem number one. Tamales aren’t popular with our local eateries. The ones they serve are outsized, mealy things. But you can order tamales from Texas, frozen, delivered to your door. Right now I order from the Texas Tamale Warehouse. Just great!

Tacos. A viejo once sold tacos outside Rex Wright’s grocery in Kingsville. The tortilla shells were somewhere between hard and soft. Special sauces he made himself, three of them, he carefully added to each taco. Those tacos are the benchmark. Nothing here comes close.

Chicken-fried steak. Well, you can just forget that! No place known to me this side of the Neches River sells a decent chicken-fried steak. It’s just something that southern cooks have yet to conquer – that special batter and the right fry pan.

Whataburger. The ultimate hamburger, that originated in Corpus Christi. Are they sold anyplace outside of Texas? When I met Tometta H. in San Antonio – first thing she wanted was a Whataburger. Nothing else like it.

Hey, I’m not starving here, but I can find plenty of reasons to visit Texas. Such as the tortilla soup at Rosario’s on south Alamo in San Antonio.

Dac Crossley
February 19, 2012

“Happiness is a destination we reach only when we are trying to get someplace else.” – Matthew Syed.

Stings and Arrows

Stingers and stickers were a part of growing up in south Texas. Your mother ran you down and pried thorns out of the soles of your feet, using a needle and shushing you the whole time. It didn’t hurt much. Going barefoot made tough feet. The really bad thorns called for a bacon poultice. Remember those?

Texas has its share of spiders and scorpions and such. We were all terrified of those big hairy tarantulas taking their twilight strolls (they’re harmless). And we thought scorpions were deadly, too. No Texas scorpion will kill you but it will wake you up if you roll over on one at night. (And it’s interesting – here in Georgia I sometimes find scorpions in my house. I’ve never been stung once, during my forty years here).

Most of my childhood stings came from red ants. I guess it was because they were so fascinating to watch. They cleared a big circular area around their nest opening. My brother and I would squat down and survey their comings and goings. Trails ran out in several directions. How did an ant know which one to take? Throw a Frito into the trail and the ants would tussle over ownership – the largest ant usually won possession. And into the nest went the Frito. Maybe you’d find a horned toad feeding on red ants. (We weren’t scared of horned toads at all).

If you squatted there too long you were bound to get stung. The sting of one red ant is painful enough but doesn’t last too long. Sometimes the dog would get a sting between his toes, and that was amusing, too.

I can recall instances of stumbling on a red ant nest in the dark. The first sting might be on the back of your neck – and you soon found yourself removing clothing as fast as you could. Multiple red ant stings are no small torment.

Red ants in Texas are fading into history, possibly due to overuse of agricultural insecticides. With them go the horned toads too, although pet collectors have played a role.

I’m told that fire ants are replacing red ants in Texas.

And they are worse.

Dac Crossley
February 14, 2012

“The only truly serious questions are the ones that even a child can formulate.” – Milan Kundera

How Did You Write That?

Okay, that's actually a FAQ. How do you write novels? And I say – “Sit butt in chair, turn on computer, open Microsoft Word, begin typing.” It isn't difficult.

To Tell the truth, most of my fiction starts with a question - “What if?” For example: What if one of the Alamo defenders managed to survive? Since the Texans insisted ”They all gave their lives for freedom,” the lone survivor couldn’t go home. His friends thought he’d died for Texas. What could he do? Where could he go? That question is what started me on Escape from the Alamo, my recent novel.

I don’t work from an outline. I know that some writers do that. Like Hemingway, I write scenes first, then assemble them. I have a general idea about where the story is going but no fixed plan to get there. Among other things, it depends on what the characters tell me as the story progresses. My hero Possum, in Escape from the Alamo, started life as an old Tennessee long-rifle woodsman, a “dirty shirt.” As the story developed he started getting younger and younger. At last, I went back and made him a teenager. he was happier with that.

And yes, you might find some part of yourself in a character in one of my stories, but it’s not likely. That is, unless you lived in South Texas, where most of my characters come from. The old Texas Ranger Whitey Wilson is based on a lanky, raw-boned electrician I worked for at the Kingsville Naval Air Station. He was unique in real life. I added a little Clint Eastwood.

Yes, you can do it, too. If you can dream a dream, you can write a story.

How about it? Start now?

Dac Crossley
February 7, 2012 (Happy Birthday, Mac!)

“Words are like money: There is nothing so useless, except when put to use.” – Samuel Johnson.