(Blog) What Appetizer Could Have Gotten Two People Stabbed in the Hand Saturday?

The crowd was shoulder-to-shoulder inside New Bo City Market last Saturday. I was there at 10 a.m. and waited in a line to get inside the building. I was back at 1:30 p.m. to start prepping for my 2:30-4:00 p.m. class promotion and sampling gig in the kitchen. I had asked my friend, Mollie (who had been there since dawn volunteering as a City Seeder) to help me and for some reason, tired as she had to be, she agreed.

By 2:30 p.m., the line for those tiny bacon bites was deep. I tried to count, but stopped at one hundred. I had four hundred toothpicks to hold those little bites together, and we managed to run out of chicken, bacon, and toothpicks all at the same time right at 4:00 p.m. People were excited to be there and I guess they were excited about the heirloom bacon from Big Boy Meats, because Mollie and I were moving as fast as we could.

Crowds are funny. Even when there's a line, people wander like lost cattle. They bump into each other with awestruck facial expressions and the occasional spontaneous question. A lot of people brought little kids with them on Saturday. For that reason, and the wandering-awestruck-crowd dynamic, I carefully positioned two rather large floral arrangements between the "people" and my large baking sheet of raw chicken and raw bacon bites as I assembled the samples.

Mollie and I had a nice little system going on. I was putting together the food and putting in the oven. She was taking it out of the oven when it was done and handing the bites out to those patient people waiting in the very long line.

About an hour into this frenzy, I saw something amazing happen. A flicker of motion caught my eye on the corner of the tray I was filling and I looked up just in time to see a man holding one of my tiny raw bacon bites, perfectly assembled, by the toothpick. He had just lifted it to his open mouth and I screamed. I'm sorry, but I really did scream. Maybe it was more like a screech.

"THAT'S RAW!"

He jumped and looked at me like I was crazy.

"Put that DOWN IT'S RAW." I tried to compose myself by taking a deep breath. "There's a line. I know it's long, but you need to get in it if you want a cooked one."

The second time it happened (yes. it did.) I screamed a little less, but startled the woman. She looked at me and exclaimed, "I didn't know!"

This time I was ready. "You reached between two huge flower arrangements and there's no line where you are standing. Go Get In Line."

Sorry. I can't have people getting all....dead. Or even sick. Sometimes the Mom-Voice has to make an appearance.

Someone in my "Bacon!" class Monday night observed that I should have stabbed them both in the hand.

I commented that personally, I'd rather be stabbed in the hand than get salmonella poisoning.

I stand by it.

Here's the appetizer we served on Saturday. Be ready to defend the raw bites from roving hands. I suggest that you try the Mom-voice before you stab anyone.

chili-spiced-brown-sugar-rubbed-bacon-wrapped-chicken-bites

• 1 lb heirloom bacon
• 1 1/2 lb boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1” pieces
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon chili powder (not the spicy kind!)

Cut each bacon slice in half. Mix together chili powder and sugar, press bacon into the mixture to cover both sides. Wrap each chicken piece in a slice of bacon. Secure with toothpick. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake in 350 degree oven for 20 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and bacon is crisp around the edges.

I’ve got a class this Thursday night in the Kirkwood Culinary Kitchen at New Bo City Market. There are seats available, unlike the "Bacon!" class, which was sold out. Even though it's not a Bacon class we will eat heirloom bacon from Big Boy Meats Thursday night. I promise.

More information about upcoming cooking classes at New Bo City Market can be found here.

Register for the class I'm teaching Thursday, November 1st, here.

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