Hey, folks, Yello castroles and red white and blue cakes. The things I'm learning about the Fourth of July in this episode of Amy and DJ. This is not how we plan on star robes or we're talking about the fourth. Everybody's getting ready for the Fourth, of course, I heeart getting ready for the fourth as well, But just in the discussion here in the room, I did not know
it was a thing or tradition to some degree. Maybe it's yours, maybe not, but it's some people's to have a a what that's decorated red white and blue.
Well, basically you just take you know, if you're at some sort of a pot luck, you know, neighborhood party, which is what I grew up going to. Everyone would bring different dishes and among them would be desserts, and so it's very easy to decorate a dessert with red white and blue strawberries, blueberries, white frosting. You can play around with that however you'd like. But yeah, I remember those kind of cupcakes or jello casseroles or cheesecake.
We'll stop you on the jello casserole. What's that?
You know? What? I don't even really know, and I've never replicated in my adult life, but as a kid, I remember my mind making some dish with jello with cream. There might have been walnuts in it. I don't think we put the raisins in it, but I think some people do, probably disgusting.
No, I hate raisins, but I don't think white raisins.
I didn't say that.
You said it with your eyes to me, make raisin eyes.
Like you were making raisin eyes in me.
So I've never recreated that dish, but I remember kind of liking it and kind of being grossed out by it at the same time. And since it was full of sugar, I just went ahead and.
Ate it with it. Okay, I did not know those things. But what were you all? You and I are been going back and forth for day and maybe even weeks now trying to figure out what we want to do for the Fourth. We are throwing around some possibilities and options. But what did you all do growing up? What was the fourth for you got? And even how big of a day was it compared to Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas? How big of a holiday?
Yeah, I mean Fourth of July was huge.
So when I was younger, I was living in right outside of Saint Louis, Missouri, and we lived on one of those cold sacks where the whole street would all get together at I remember our neighbor Charlie, and everybody would bring a dish or two, The barbecue grill would be fired up, there'd be some sort of like kittie pool.
We weren't in some fancy neighborhood.
There were no inground pools, but we would take any body of water because it was hot, hot, hot in Saint Louis, and yeah, just have fun. And I remember my mom would let us drink unlimited amounts of grape and orange soda.
These are the things I remember. It was chock full of sugar.
And then sparklers and Roman candles at night, you know those fireworks that make shift fireworks.
Yeah, but what were the main dishes you said? The grill would be going, what is y'all.
Each for hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken like? I remember drumsticks, that kind of a thing. But yeah, the basic stuff that kids liked.
To isn't that wild? During my growing up, every four fourth was huge for us, always at my granddad's house. Granddad owned a barbecue restaurant. Every dude in my family can go on the grill. I do not remember a single fourth in I had a hamburger or hot dog. It was ribs, ribs, ribs, ribs, pork, full pork, full pork all the time.
I say, Memphis, Memphis. That makes a lot of sense.
Notice a single hot dog? Do I remember on the fourth?
Oh yeah, we ate a lot of hot dogs.
I don't think any of my there, None of them were grill masters like your dad, Like, you have to talk about the setup he has at his house. It's I've only seen pictures. I haven't been there yet. But we're talking one grill and basic stuff. You guys are like, like grill masters.
Well I'm not. I didn't get that. I didn't pick that up. You know I can. I'm not a slow cooker, so I don't know how to do ribs very well and all of that. I've gotten better at it. Recently. We had a place here in town. We had a grill, so you I used to just practice. I would just buy ribs to practice and wasn't eating them right.
I was trying to push them on everybody who came in. You guys want some ribs. We've got some great ribs here. More than we could possibly eat.
But I didn't get that skill. But yes, my dad in the backyard in West Memphis right now has at least six and that he might be up to seven. And they're a huge, huge couple of smokers back there. You name it, he's got it and he uses all of them. They're not sitting in a corner somewhere collecting dust. So these guys can cook. And my granddad is the one who was, like I said, he had a barbecue
joint grew up around him. They with every single holiday and time, they would go to that grill at whatever, five six in the morning, put stuff on all I know, at noon or one o'clock, everything was falling off the bone. I don't know how it happened. I didn't have the patience for it at the time.
Well, it's I love that you have that tradition, and I love that you've tried to pick it up. And you're very good at most things you cook, and you got better and better and better as you were practicing. But it was so sweet to hear you on the phone with your sister, who apparently is a great grill or two. It's not just for the men in the family. Your sister is a great griller, and yeah, it's just what a great skill to have.
How many people were you feeding or was he feeding your dad?
Oh, my dad has six brothers and sisters. So all those uncles and all those cousins would come, and so you're talking easy. We could have fifty people, but this was it was an automatic. We didn't have to call anybody a few days, a few weeks, or the month ahead of time, say where are we doing the fourth your Granddad's house for the fourth? What are you bringing? What are you bringing? We know who's where the meat's coming from. So it was just who's bringing this, who's
bringing that. There was not a lot of yellow castle roles.
Have a potato salad, potato salad.
There might have been one potato.
Salad because we had a lot of potato salad.
No castle roles for us, Yeah, we didn't do castle.
It was the German potato salad for us.
What makes it German?
It's like a vinegar base with red onions. I think you don't really like potatoes, But if you were to like a potato salad, I think it might be this one.
Well, would you make it for me? Tonight.
Okay, tonight.
I'm sorry. I didn't realize the prep it took.
I thought we were talking about the fourth of July.
Oh, okay, it's cute you say that, because I also when we finally moved down to Atlanta, where all my family kind of gathered and migrated from Michigan, it was the same thing we knew there was going to be. We actually went to a park, Brisco Park, and we got one of the grills that was already there, like you know, they have those things at the park, and we would just go to town all day and this is I went about to Debbie down. Are you well.
I just so all of those traditions.
Kind of fell off because of one fourth of July when I was fourteen. Okay, well, no, I mean it's actually really serious. Like that's when my parents got struck by lightning and my uncle did too. So it happened on the fourth of July. We were all gathered at Brisco Park and it was it was, it was. It changed the fourth of July for us.
Okay, I'm reacting a certain way because I've heard the story fifty times. Everybody else. The folks in the room were going like what the hell is going on? So you go ahead, I'll just h I'll.
Say so, the Fourth of July is always I am aware of thunderstorms. It always makes me a little nervous because it was a very traumatic thing. But my parents, my mom and dad, got seriously injured. They were in the hospital for weeks. My mom was in the hospital for weeks, my dad was in the ICU. But their tennis shoes got blown off of their feet, their clothes had to be cut off of them, they were my dad went into had to have CPR performed on him,
and my uncle Jack actually ultimately died. He was up against the tree that hit and my parents were blown standing next to him, and he just crumbled. So, yes, lightning kills and the Fourth of July is one of those holidays where everybody's out and about and it tends to be a thunderstorm heavy holidays. So yes, things in my house changed after after that. But and I kind of got into a habit of traveling around the Fourth
of July. Just I haven't even been in the country during the Fourth of July for many, many years, but we're going to for the first time this year.
We were well still up in the air.
Well, we're going to be in the country, Yes, in the air.
Both of my daughters are continuing the tradition and are going to be out of the country on the fourth of July.
Sing it is probably gonna be with us, and.
What are we gonna do?
We're looking at a couple of the fireworks to play here in town is actually quite nice, but we also considering getting to a lake, getting a boat, doing something else, and just getting out of town. I kind of want to be out of New York for the fourth But the fireworks display is awesome.
It's awesome, but we we can find other fireworks displays. They're all around and they're fun and you can even I like sparklers, be careful. They still can be dangerous. But I like sparklers.
What uh what, I don't think I read the warning on the package of sparklers. What happens with the Sparkler's dangerous?
I need to be aware, I guess if you hold on to them for too long. Yeah, and then the little sparks. I don't think it's like dangerous, but they could ignite something else, I guess. So just parental supervision is certainly a part of it.
Wow, you are just doing a full on public service.
I amn't, I am, but no, but fire like, there are so many cautionary tales of people doing their own fireworks displays.
So from mother nature to human error, it's.
Always good to remember that we want to be safe above beyond everything else.
Would you like to give people grilling tips?
No?
I would not, That is not my love.
No, safety wise, safety wise, not have it inside, make sure you don't ignite while it's inside or even in the garage. Right, yes, what else that's correct? I don't know.
I don't use the grill very often.
What about pool and water shapey stuff?
We're all adults in this room right now. No, but I told you I was going to be a little bit of a DeBie down ter.
Sorry.
Would you like to let people know that alcohol consumption on the fourth of July should probably keep to a minimum.
All of those things are all very important to remember.
Yes, and certainly don't drive after No. I mean I didn't know the episode was going to be about how to stay safe for the fourth I digress.
You know. I tend to go off in tangents sometimes, and honestly, I didn't even know I was gonna.
Even say any of those things. They just came out. Sorry, I apologize if that just was a downer freak.
And also people shouldn't over eat. I hear you should use smaller place because that helps you with portion control on holiday.
Good tip Tjerious.
Woman's owe me that live and an inner few once on the air, and I laughed at her.
The problem is the other day I was just actually when we got in here, I was talking about overeating and I had a small plate. The problem is I made six trips back to fill my small plate up until I could eat no more.
Wow. I think you're probably in a really good mood because you're able to talk about I don't know why this stuff is coming out, because you are in a great mood today and our ways of the studio, everything's fine. But no, I'm sure people will appreciate this episode of the podcast. We're thinking about doing more right into us. How else you would like us to help you stay safe as you go about your life and next week crossing busy streets.
Oh, we just want everybody to have a happy for the July. And we found this fun fact out. You were asking how many years our country has been celebrating, and it turns out we're about to embark on a pretty big milestone. This is your two hundred and forty eight, so twenty twenty six will be two hundred and fifty years and I'm sure we'll have a huge celebration.
We should plan that now.
Yes, because as big as that one's going to be, we probably need to double down on our safety episode.
All right, I hope everyone out there has a happy, and of course safe fourth of July.
We're going to take a couple of days off to enjoy, but thank you
For listening, and you can always catch us on Instagram, at AB and TJ Podcast For now, Happy fourth everyone, for