{"id":7302,"date":"2010-05-12T04:00:48","date_gmt":"2010-05-12T08:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/?p=7302"},"modified":"2010-05-12T10:11:35","modified_gmt":"2010-05-12T14:11:35","slug":"ballpark-food-iii-cracker-jack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/?p=7302","title":{"rendered":"Ballpark Food III: Cracker Jack"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Today’s tribute to baseball food falls on the 85th birthday of Yogi Berra, the colorful player and manager whose propensity for malapropisms has made him the Sam Goldwyn of Baseball. <\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
My favorite, of course, is food related:\u00a0“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” Happy Birthday, Mr. Berra!<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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As a chanteuse I can\u2019t do a series on ballpark food without alluding to baseball\u2019s signature song, the 1908 hit \u201cTake Me Out to the Ball Game.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack,
\nI don\u2019t care if I never get back.<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Historians make much of the fact that neither the lyricist, Jack Norworth, nor the composer, Albert Von Tilzer, had ever\u00a0attended\u00a0a baseball game when they came up with the song.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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I\u2019ve never seen a professional baseball game in person, but I still understand the place of the sport in American culture\u2014and clearly so did Norworth and Von Tilzer.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\n

Nowadays few Americans recall that the song has verses. Here\u00a0they are as they\u00a0appeared in the 1908 sheet music (along with the more famous chorus, of course!) in an early Edison cylinder recording.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/object><\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Cracker Jack predated the song and this recording, making its mass-market debut in 1893 at the World\u2019s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. (It was then called \u201cCandied Popcorn and Peanuts,\u201d not receiving its name for a few more years.)<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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I love caramel corn\u2014and CJ is nothing but caramel corn with a hint of molasses.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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I’m afraid you’ll have to provide your own prizes……..<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Homemade Cracker Jack<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Ingredients:<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
2 quarts freshly popped popcorn
\n1 cup roasted shelled peanuts
\n3 tablespoons butter
\n1\/2 cup brown sugar, VERY firmly packed
\n5 tablespoons light corn syrup
\n1 generous tablespoon molasses
\n1\/4 teaspoon salt<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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Instructions:<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Preheat the oven to 250 degrees. Mix together the popcorn and peanuts and place them on a large jelly-roll pan (a cookie sheet with sides) in the preheated oven.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
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In a small saucepan combine the remaining ingredients. Over medium heat, bring the mixture to a boil, stirring. Cook, stirring frequently, until the liquid reaches about 260 degrees. It should form a definite but pliable ball when inserted into cold water.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Remove the popcorn and peanuts from the oven. Quickly but gently pour the caramel mixture over them and stir. Return the pan to the oven.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

\nCook for 45 minutes, stirring every 15 minutes and making sure that all of the solid material is covered with the coating. If it starts to stick to the pan earlier, remove it from the oven; you\u2019re aiming for Cracker Jack, not peanut\/popcorn brittle!<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
When you remove the pan from the oven, transfer the Cracker Jack to sheets covered with waxed paper to cool. Store in an airtight container.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
Makes about 2 quarts of candy-coated popcorn with peanuts. Don\u2019t forget to add a prize or two!<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>

This 1907 Cracker Jack postcard featured President Teddy Roosevelt (Courtesy of Yellowstone National Park)<\/p><\/div>\n

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If you enjoyed this post, please consider taking out an email subscription to my blog. Just click on the link below!<\/span><\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Subscribe to In Our Grandmothers’ Kitchens by Email<\/span><\/em><\/a>.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 Today’s tribute to baseball food falls on the 85th birthday of Yogi Berra, the colorful player and manager whose propensity for malapropisms has made him the Sam Goldwyn of Baseball. \u00a0 My favorite, of course, is food related:\u00a0“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” Happy Birthday, Mr. Berra! \u00a0 As […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[10],"tags":[1177,1176,1181,1182],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7302"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7302"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7302\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7325,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7302\/revisions\/7325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ourgrandmotherskitchens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}