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(Ed Note: Two days ago, a budding young journalist, whimsically named Mellow Yellow Bryck-Rode by her parents, knocked on our office door and asked for a tryout. She had just been terminated by The Bowdoin Orient for mentioning she knows a conservative. We decided to give her this assignment to see if she can make her bones with us. Let us know what you think. Note as well the quote of the day: “Just think what a dull world it would be if everyone was sensible.”)
The Glamorous Pig: Coming Soon
by Mellow Yellow Bryck-Rode, Other Side Intern
P. C. Poppycock, Editor of The Other Side, and local developer and entrepreneur, has issued a press release announcing he will open a new restaurant at Maine Street Station in Brunswick. Plans call for the restaurant to be named “The Glamorous Pig,” and Poppycock says “it will be a barrel themed establishment. Pork barrels, beer barrels, you name it; we’ll have it all.”
“We’re looking for a Polish Band for Wednesday nights so everyone can dance to The Pork Barrel Polka,” he noted.
Poppycock said his staff is trying to decide on an iconic image to symbolize the restaurant, and has not yet been able to agree on a choice. The two finalists at this point are these:
Asked what spurred the idea, Poppycock said he was contacted about a year ago by Porkbarrel Planning Developers, Inc (PPDI), a Portland consulting firm specializing in ferreting out government cash that can be leveraged to boost local economies. “They told me about resources available under the American Silliness, Speculation, and Subsidies Act (ASSS Act), and it seemed the perfect opportunity to turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse.”
“PPDI convinced me they had the juice to secure the funding for a project that could never advance and survive on its own merits. They said merit in such matters is passe, and added they know how to grease the rails in town offices as well.”
“It’s all part of the President’s plan to ‘spread the pork around’ so everybody gets a fair shot, they told me, and the pork might as well land in my restaurant,” Poppycock said.
Drawing on the theme made famous by TV Celebrity Chef Emeril Legassey,
the new restaurant will emphasize that ‘pork fat rules,’ a variation on the Washington axiom ‘pork rules.’ As any serious foodie knows, it’s not nice to mess with Chef Emeril.
Poppycock went on to say that he was inspired by the lusty aromas arising from the pig farms that dominated his growing up years in Secaucus, New Jersey in the middle decades of the past century. Not to mention “the joyful 24-7 squealing of the porkers as they waded in their slop, only to be transported a few months later to the nearby bacon-makin’ plant.”
He explained that the farms were located there because of the ample affordable local food supplies from New York City restaurants and hotels, and various food processors in the area, including Pepperidge Farm bakeries, a Life Saver plant, and numerous other specialties beloved by the porcine critters.
“It’s where I learned my marksmanship skills, plinking away at rats on the mountains of gently aging food supplies. That’s not easy while your eyes are watering, you’re holding your nose, and you’re gagging from time to time.”
“I want to bring those sounds, those smells, and those experiences here to Brunswick, where farm to table is a quasi-religion to devoted locavores. We’re drawing our inspiration from them, and will maintain our livestock in a pasture adjacent to the restaurant, so that patrons can be sure that the pork is locally sourced.”
When asked whether other nearby businesses and residences might be negatively effected by the sounds and smells, Poppycock responded that they were simply the sounds of nature, and that he is returning a fair share of the station property to the traditional uses of the past. He expects no problems with local authorities, who have shown little interest in restricting noise and fumes in the town. And he reminds us that those emanating from the pasture are fully organic. When told that residents in the area might complain, he said they should have thought about what the future might hold before they bought their property.
I reminded him that Brunswick already has a number of popular and viable dining options in the Station area, and Poppycock responded with a shrug, and said “well, Government is in the business of picking winners and losers. It’s what they do, and this time, I win. Buses, other restaurants – you roll the dice and the Government calls it as they see it.”
The Glamorous Pig will advertise a plate-to-farm-to-plate cycle of food supply, taking sustainability to a previously unknown level. “Think of the food chain as a circle,” he said.
“We’ll be collecting food waste from our neighbor restaurants and feeding it to our herd,” Poppycock said. “And when they’re fattened up real good, we’ll butcher them up for the restaurant. Leftovers and plate scrapings will get recycled right back into their food supply. Recycling, sustainability, organic sourcing, you name it. We’ve got it all right here, baby.”
The Glamorous Pig will also market by-products of the livestock operation. The first ones to be offered will be buckets of lard, and for the gourmands in the area, lardons. The lard will also be used for a new type of artisanal Gelato the restaurant will sell.
Poppycock says “you haven’t had Gelato until you’ve had lard based Gelato. It renders butter-fat content so ‘yesterday.’ And thinly sliced lardon is like fine prosciutto, but without the salty ham taste to distract from the silkiness.”
He plans to market bulk lard to nearby bakeries. “We’ll find out just how wild those bakers at Wild Oats are; imagine the increase in their pie sales once the public gets wind of the source for that tender and flaky crust.”
The developer also has plans to sell Pork Pie hats and Pork Pie wedding cakes. It’s time Brunswick shows it’s pride in Pork, he believes.
I inquired about what the menu will look like. Poppycock said he had just begun to lay that out. “Our signature item will be a sandwich we’ll call the Amtrak; stuffed with pulled pork” he snickered.
“We’ll also have a BBLT; the Brunswick Bacon, Lard, and Tomato sandwich. We don’t need no stinkin’ lettuce on this; we’ll give it to the pigs instead, and you can get your greens that way.” The sandwich will come on multi-grain bread that has been spread with lard and then gently grilled on the flat-top, and stuffed with nearly a half pound of chef-butchered bacon. It’ll be so fresh you might hear a squeal when you take the first bite,” he grinned.
We asked how much the items would cost, and he said they’d each sell for $3.00, including a generous side of pork fat fries. Or $4.00 with a bottomless pint of beer. His prices are targeted at working and non-working families in the area, and Bowdoin Students will get a dollar discount on each item.
Incredulous, we asked Poppycock to explain how his business model would allow him to sell his offerings so far below fair market value.
“Business model? Who needs that? The whole idea of the ASSS Act is that everyone benefits when someone gets a fair shot. I get my fair shot when the rest of you pay all of the costs of creating and sustaining our restaurant. Think of it as pork two ways.”
Poppycock explained that the initial ASSS allocation includes all the funds necessary to take this investment in Brunswick economic development to completion. More importantly, ASSS guarantees annual subsidies in perpetuity so The Glamorous Pig can always offer lower prices than other restaurants in town. “Competition is good for everybody” he added.
Not only that, he said the town has agreed to waive property taxes on the restaurant in perpetuity because of the traffic it will bring to the area. And the state is waiving the drinking age restriction so The Glamorous Pig can be a ‘home away from home’ for the students who attend the nearby College. “We’ll have a complete supply of first aid items on hand, in case anyone should cut their finger while eating a pickle, or stab themselves in the nose with their fork.”
As an added benefit to the state’s economy, the ASSS Act requires that at least half of our employees must be from the Portland area. To encourage this, the feds have also promised to pay for local livery expenses to taxi employees from Portland back and forth to work. “This is spreading the pork around in the finest sense,” the owner said.
Poppycock told us that after the Glamorous Pig opens, he’ll start planning a large refrigerated abattoir and indoor breeding facility. He’s hoping to use the eminent domain process to get access to a sizable plot of land in the Potter Street area, so that processing is convenient to the restaurant kitchens.
In order to facilitate that process, Poppycock said he’ll be asking Rep. Matthea Elisabeth Daughtry to propose legislation creating a quasi-governmental agency known as the Northern New England Artificially Priced Pork Restaurant Authority to oversee the constant flow of funds from the feds, to obtain the necessary regulatory waivers, and to provide another dozen or so jobs, or ‘pork by-products,’ as he called them.
I asked if Sen. Stan Gerzofsky was involved at all. Poppycock said his position is “me like pork, and the bigger and cheaper it is, the more I support it.” He promised to have his fellow Harley riders stop by on a regular basis, especially since we have unlimited coupons for half price ‘Amtraks.’ He also promises to order a special pair of Tony Lama’s for cavorting with ALL his new constituents in their digs. “And out of respect for them, I’ll make sure they’re not made of pigskin,” he added.
Poppycock told us another key supporter in this project has been Pork Pullers Northeast, and he wanted to make sure they know they’ll always find a welcome at The Glamorous Pig.
As I ended the interview, Poppycock said “don’t forget to tell the readers that our tag line is when you eat with us, you’ll be happy as a pig in slop!”
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