TailGreater: Keeping Austin weird with the Longhorns
Well, it's finally happened. It's the season of scarves, sweaters, and stouts. This is peak tailgating season – when it's warm enough to wear your favorite jersey without a jacket, but cool enough to feel the comforting, warming effect of a perfect chili. This butter zone between too-hot and too-cold won't last long, so if you haven't made it to the lot yet, now is the time. Whether it's a preseason NBA or NHL game or a college football game, we'll give you all the tools you need to either host your own tailgate or be the hero of someone else's.
Playlist of the Week: Sweater Weather
The fact that Bon Iver just dropped a new album is as good a sign as any that fall is in full swing, so in that spirit, this week's Yardbarker tailgate playlist features indie-pop and indie dance hits from the past few years so you can truly get into the sweater weather mood. The tracks range from newer hits like M83's Go! and The 1975's The Sound to songs by pioneers of the genre like Phoenix and Foster The People. To complete the effect, make sure to go to Hair Cuttery and get yourself an undercut before the tailgate. Wear your favorite scarf, and bring a 6-pack of your favorite double IPA or lambic sour beer and tell everyone at the tailgate you knew all these songs before they got super popular.
Yes, the recipe sounds like something a college student scribbled in a notebook at 4 AM after having one too many of his roommate's "special" brownies, but don't let the name fool you. This recipe, courtesy of Lucky Peach's David Chang is the real deal, and it's pretty darn easy to make. It eschews the traditional fried chicken coating of flour for ground-up instant ramen noodles. The addition of the flavoring packets to the ramen flour gives the chicken an undercurrent of umami that is unlike, really, any other fried chicken I have ever had. The full recipe can be found here. If you're planning on making this for a tailgate, if at all possible, try to fry them at the tailgate itself. The chicken does taste just fine reheated, but the chicken is at its best fresh from the pot of oil. Just sprinkle some more seasoning on top after they're done and enjoy!
Invention of the Week: Cuisinart Petit Gourmet Portable Gas Grill
Image via Amazon
When Cuisinart says that this grill is portable, they mean it.
It's only 17 pounds, somehow. (Image via Amazon)If you prefer cooking with gas over charcoal and are in the market for a new grill to use exclusively for tailgating, you could do a whole lot worse than Cuisinart's super-convenient petit grill. Depending on whether you want the tabletop version or the version that includes a telescoping stand, this'll only set you back about 120 dollars, and despite its size, the actual grilling surface is big enough to cook 6 decent-sized burgers at once (8 if you squeeze them in). Plus, think about all of the other uses for a product like this! It's small enough to fit in your car, so the next time you're at a friend's dinner party and you hate their food, you can just break out your emergency grill and just fix yourself a steak. The grill is available on Amazon – it's $121 for the version with the stand and $98 for the tabletop version.
Tailgate of the Week: #20 Oklahoma @ Texas
Not only is this game huge in terms of the ongoing Sooner-Longhorn rivalry, but if Charlie Strong can't secure a win in the Red River Rivalry game at home, the conventional wisdom is that he's out at Texas. Given this game's importance not just for Texas's season, bur for their future, emotions will be running high. This always makes for great tailgating.
In the case of the University of Texas, pregame tailgates happen all over the Austin city center, meaning that Longhorn fans traveling in from out of town can both tailgate and experience the craziness of the city. You could presumably hop from bar to bar along Congress Avenue, making your way north to the UT-Austin stadium, or you could join one of the many established tailgates closer to the stadium (a handy list can be found here) and mooch delicious barbecue off of locals for a few hours. You are truly the master of your own destiny when it comes to tailgating a Longhorns game, which is more than I can say for the Longhorns in terms of their chances in the Big 12.
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