Marzipan Brought Back My Memories–What Brings Back Yours?

german-memories — My parents’ wedding day and a few of their imported treats.

The break-room table in the lab has been filled with tantalizing goodies since the beginning of the month, and I have succumbed to a nibble on more than one afternoon when my energy was ebbing and the pile of prostate biopsies seemed to be growing faster than Pinocchio’s nose at a Trump rally. Today I passed up the tin filled with two types of popcorn–but no a “Chicago mix.” I resisted the 2-day old, stale dregs of what was once a dozen aromatic Dunkins. I didn’t look twice at the tin of tooth-cracking peanut brittle. Instead, I opted for the box of See’s Assorted Chocolate Candies.

This particular box lacked a road map or GPS, so I had no idea what I would be tasting after I bit into the rectangular piece of dark chocolate that I had selected. The first taste of the filling left me a bit perplexed until I recognized the sweet, almondy, flavor of marzipan. And the boyhood memories came back.

My mom and dad, immigrants from Austria and Germany respectively, were 90% Americanized in their tastes, but some European touches still found their way to our home and table. My mother would occasionally prepare rolladen, beef roll-ups flavored with mustard and a surprise pickle spear in the middle. I loved Mom’s Wiener Schnitzel, back when veal was still served in most homes–but avoided sauerbraten, which tasted as bad as it sounded.

But my memories today were more of the small things that my mother brought at two German grocery stores, Delicatessen Kuhn’s (the original in Chicago) and Delicatessen Meyers on Lincoln Avenue.

The marzipan came shaped like flowers or ripe fruit, decorated with bright, probably toxic, food coloring. Himbersäft, a raspberry syrup, was purchased in glass bottles of about 10 or 12 ounces. My father would pour a few drops into sparkling water for an evening refresher. Ice Cubes were small squares of German chocolate in a gold aluminum wrapper. I would place them in the freezer before enjoying one each night, a habit I still have with chocolate candy. And for crunch, there were Manner Schnitten, crumbly thin cookie wafers surrounding hazelnut filling, a particular favorite of my aunt. She handed them out to trick-or-treaters, making her apartment the least favorite stop on the block on Halloween.

But the biggest German treat did not come from any local store, in fact, it was illegal to sell in the USA–or so my adolescent self was told. Each year in early December my Swiss uncle would send Dad a special candy treat. I still remember the ceremonial feel as he slid the wooden box top along the grooves in the cheap wood box. Inside were two layers, each with about 30 candies–small, hollow dark chocolate balls, filled with different premium liqueurs. The wrapper on each candy demonstrated the logo of the treat inside. Dad would savor two pieces of candy each evening (just about the only time I saw him consume alcohol) while occasionally offering one to Mom, Linda, or me. My first taste of the good stuff! By the end of the year, the candies were gone, and the box became a knick-knack drawer. If any of you know the brand name of the chocolate box I am describing, let me know. I have forgotten the brand name and can’t find it on the Web.

Proust had his madeleine cakes to remind him of his past, now I have my marzipan–the link to memories that had long been buried. It is good to remember.

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Goodbye to a Fellow Pathologist, and to Mary Dixon Too.

Pathologists don’t retire easily.

We tend to age gracefully in place. We may need to adjust our seat height at the microscope to compensate for our compressing spinal columns and it may be a little harder to turn the focusing knobs on those ‘scopes as osteoarthritic changes afflict our joints. But we hang in there, perhaps pickled and pruned by constant exposure to formalin (always carefully measured and monitored to be below the legally permissible OSHA limit.)

So it is rare that I need to wish an associate a fond goodbye. Especially one that I have known since we were both raw residents, fumbling through autopsies and guessing at causes of death. In fact, it was just outside the autopsy suite (the upscale name for morgue) at Evanston Hospital that I first met George.

It was late in 1979 and I had just completed my first two-month pathology residency rotation. Those two months were marinated by stewing in 50 autopsies, assisted by two dieners (the upscale name for morgue attendants) who knew what they were doing and supervised by attending pathologists, who sometimes did not–particularly one blood banker who was better at cutting and pasting our list of diagnoses than he was cutting bodies.

I was thrilled to be able to wipe my hands (gloved, of course) of the morgue, only to be stopped outside my office by the department director, a stiff Teutonic gentleman who had just returned from a sabbatical. Pulling another young man into the hallway he said to me “This is Dr. Engel. He is new. You will teach him how to do autopsies.”

And I did. In so doing, I got to know George; his background, his East Coast upbringing (he shared an alma mater with my father-in-law,) his European education. and his lovely, very European, wife. I learned his favorite phrase was “to make a long story short.” In reality, the stories were seldom short, but what they lacked in brevity they made up for in entertainment value.

After our four year residencies, George and I each found work as staff pathologists with community hospitals, George in the city and me in the ‘burbs. It was only on rare occasions that our paths would cross. Yet I immediately recognized the voice on the line when George called me in the fall of 2005. He had heard through the pathvine that I was looking for a fellow pathologist to help me man a new venture, the UroPartners Laboratory. I was a day away from hiring a different pathologist, someone brusque and unfamiliar to me, but jumped at the opportunity to welcome an old friend instead.

George has been with me ever since, arriving at 4 a.m. most mornings, immersing himself in prostates, FISHing in the dark, listening to radio Français, and managing our safety program (it is always a wet occasion when he tests the emergency showers.)

When George cut back to part-time hours a few years ago, I knew that he was on the yellow-brick road to retirement. He is almost at the Emerald City and the 2020s will be sans George for us. But to make a long story short, although there is no place like home, George you will always be welcome here.

One more goodbye as WXRT shuffles its lineup. Mary Dixon, newsie and co-host with Lin Brehmer of the ‘XRT morning show, has been de-positioned off the station. As the Mistress of “3 for Free” Mary kept my ear-brain reflexes sharp and responded to some of my rare tweets, even when I wasn’t a winner.

Good luck to you Mary, and let us know where you will next make your radio home. #lesraff1

The opinions expressed above are of the author and not UroPartners LLC.

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My TV Top Ten. What is Yours?

Barb and I were almost home the other night when a familiar tune came on the car radio. “In my opinion, that’s the BEST TV SHOW EVER,” I said. And that got me thinking. What were my favorite TV shows of all time? So here, from #10 to #1 is my list. The only rule for selection is that there are no rules. It is my list, I get to say what goes on it. Feel free to disagree. I am sure you will!

#10-#7 My Early Years

10. The Dick Van Dyke Show: The classic work life-home life sitcom. Barb can still crack me up with an “Oh, Rob” or put me in my place with a “You’re no Albert Schweitzer.” I was young, Mary Tyler Moore was adorable, and Ritchie was getting attacked by birds. What was there not to like?

9. What’s My Line?: You thought Jeopardy! would be my favorite game show? Wrong again, reader. Another classic from my youth, no moderator was ever as smooth and urbane as John Charles Daley. And when the host has 3 names, I knew the celebrity panel had to be classy too, even if I had never heard of Bennett Cerf or Arlene Francis. And Dorothy Kilgallen was sort of hot to my 7-year-old eyes.

8. Saturday Night Blackhawks Hockey: Only a few Blackhawks games were televised in the ’60s. But every Saturday night during the season, I would knock on my next-door neighbor Jeff’s door at 6:30. We would play a game of table hockey (he had a great set with 3D plastic players and a ball-bearing puck) and then settle in to watch the Hawks play another “Original Six” opponent. The TV set was black and white, but there was no problem picking out the Golden Jet, as Bobby Hull, Stan Mikita, and Glenn Hall did their best to bring Chicago a winner.

7. Ray Raynor and Friends and The Dick Tracy Show: Ray Raynor, playing the jumpsuited host during the morning in the former and Officer Pettibone during the afternoon in the latter, had my full attention. White Sox (and Cubs) scores, Chelveston the Duck and some decent cartoons kept me entertained.

#6-#1 Adulthood

6. Breaking Bad: After starting to watch the family drama Parenthood in its 4th season, Barb and I decided to go back and watch the earlier seasons–our first binge-watch. Our next binge-watch: Breaking Bad, a very different family drama. Mr. White and Jessie had special chemistry together, and not just the crystal-meth kind. We did not watch El Camino, the recent sequel. Heard it wasn’t all that good!

5. Hill Street Blues: The greatest show of the ’80s, it was the cop show that stood above all other cop shows, before and after. FOMAE (fear of missing an episode) led us to buy our first VCR. VHS of course–we didn’t want no stinkin’ BetaMax.

4. Veep: Laugh out loud funny and bitingly mean and all-around magnificent. Julia Louis Dreyfuss and the whole ensemble cast made Washington D.C. seem as miserable as it truly must be. I loved it even before there was a real dramedy in the White House.

3. Game of Thrones: Maybe I would have ranked it higher before the final season, but come on, #3 isn’t all that bad. Love and hate. Red Weddings and Walks of Shame. And battles. Lots of battles. So why isn’t Arya Stark starring in a sequel?

2. Seinfeld: Yada, Yada, Yada. And Julia Louis Dreyfuss too.

1. The music I heard in the car that day was Alabama 3 talking and singing their way through “Woke Up This Morning.” I cannot hear that song without seeing James Gandolfini, cigar smoke swirling around his head, driving past the Meadowlands and Satriale’s Pork Store. Tony Soprano on the move, inviting us to New Jersey and The Sopranos, the greatest TV series ever made.

You agree with me on all of these, right? If not, let me hear about it.

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My Night with Abbey Road

“Alexa, play Abbey Road.”

Yes, the album cover is famous, it’s iconic, it is whatever you want to call it. Jesus-like John Lennon, barefoot (dead?) Paul, and George and Ringo too. How many of your friends and neighbors have used a picture of their family at a crosswalk for their Facebook cover photo or an annual holiday card? Maybe you have done it yourself (no, the Raffs have never given it a try!)

But it wasn’t for the visual effect that I asked my sound system to play the album last night. Barb was out at one of her many book clubs, I was going to do some reading, and I wanted a little background music. Background music? HAH! For the next 45 minutes or so, I didn’t read another word.

You can look up the rankings of Beatle albums (I looked at a bunch) and Abbey Road never falls below #4. But you can have your Revolver and Sgt Pepper and Rubber Soul. For my money (OK-I don’t pay for music with Alexa) there is no better Beatle listen than AR.

Let’s look at the record, as Al Smith (easy trivia) once said. What are the two most memorable George Harrison contributions to the Beatles? “Something” and “Here Comes the Sun.” Both there, and neither violating anyone else’s copyright. In need of Ringo’s second-best Beatles vocal (and his finest writing?) “Octopus’s Garden” does it for me. Want a couple of great numbers for Joe Cocker to grab? The aforementioned “Something” and side two’s “She Came in Through the Bathroom Window” are both ripe for the taking.

“I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” is trippy and doomy with its abrupt cut-off. “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” is banging fun. But it is the long medley to close the album that is astounding. Pam and Mustard and The Window Girl, the sweet lullaby of “Golden Slumbers,” Paul’s variation of the Golden Rule–taking love and making love.

Finally, after that long gap, a salute to the Queen. Who would have predicted in 1969 that 50 years later we would have lost half of the Beatles, but her Majesty would still be going strong. She was a pretty nice girl, but Paul never did make her his. Oh well, he has had his loves, and she has had Phillip.

When the album concluded, I did manage to read a few pages of my latest thriller but soon fell asleep to visions of octopuses and hammers. I’ll have to ask Barb if I was singing in my sleep.

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What’s Your Sign? Mine is Frango!

What’s your sign?

No. I’m not talking horoscope here. I only think about those signs when I am trying to come up with a ten-letter word for “Fire Sign” on the Sunday Crossword Puzzle. What is the first sign for you that the holiday season is upon us?

Forget about Thanksgiving. That’s an occasion all to itself. Turkey Day with its Macy’s Day Parade and National Dog Show may initiate the shopping season, but that’s not the same as the holiday season with all its pageantry and warm feelings. And to me, the radio stations that start playing Christmas music in November (or is it October?) aren’t a signal for the holidays, rather they are a large part of the reason I limit my radio listening to sports talk and NPR–and listening to congressional hearings is certainly no way to get into the holiday spirit (unless impeachment will be the best present you could find under the tree!)

So do the holidays begin for you with an advent calendar? An elf on a shelf? The anticipation of crunchy latkes, a brightly lit menorah, and a spinning dreidel? Or maybe the spirit doesn’t take hold for you until you are watching the Costanzas celebrate Festivus, or the 50th viewing of Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed happy at last in “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

For me, this is where the Frango Mints come in. Fourteen years ago the UroPartners Laboratory that I was creating was under construction. I was spending my days at the Oakbrook offices of our corporate consultant making plans and spending sleepless nights praying the equipment I had ordered would fit through the doors of the new lab space. Then one day in early December I walked into the consultant’s suite to be overwhelmed by the smell of chocolate.

Gerry, the receptionist, sat behind a counter stacked with piles and piles and piles of boxes of Frango Mints. She was wrapping and shipping boxes of the signature Chicago treat (Macy’s was still a year away from buying Fields,) attaching holiday cards signed by each of the firm’s partners. And there were hundreds of clients. The process took days, and the chocolatey aroma lingered for days beyond that. I think I could still smell it attending the employee holiday party that I had been invited to.

And every year since then, a box of Frango Mints has been delivered to the Lab the first week in December. Just like all of our equipment, the chocolates fit easily through the front door. Unlike the equipment, candies disappear within a day or two.

This year’s box arrived a few days ago. I have resisted so far, trying to limit sweets during the day. But whether I eat a Frango or not, with that delivery, and the attached card from the consulting partners (all different than the ones fourteen years ago) I know the holiday season has begun.

So what’s YOUR sign?

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