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Food For Thought: Nance Picks Sticknic

I started this week's episode with a whine/rant about judging cooking competitions.  But all Nancy Lesonhad to do was say "Archie McPhee" and "cooking contest" in the same sentence and I was sold.

"I can step right in here, Stein, and tell you about judging the only cooking contest that I'm willing to do – Sticknics at Archie McPhee World Headquarters."  It's a cooking contest just for McPhee staff, Nancy explained, "Judged on taste, presentation, and 'stickness' – how the food lends itself to staying on, and being eaten off, a stick."

She then confirmed my assumption that Jell-O in any form was a non-starter.

It's the kind of fun you'd expect from the madcaps at Archie McPhee, a local company creating and selling hilariously nutball novelties worldwide.  I myself owe a great debt of gratitude to founder and CEO Mark Pahlow who years ago turned me on to Louis C.K. and his observation that "the meal isn't over when I'm full;  the meal is over when I hate myself." 

And the Winnah Is...

Credit Archie McPhee
Jeanie from the Fantastyx team, with her shrimp Mermaids and Sasquatch smoked salmon topped with a blackberry over goat cheese.

Now that's the way a cooking contest ought to be.

"The second mouse gets the cheese." – Willie Nelson

Dick Stein joined KNKX in January 1992. He retired in 2020 after three decades on air. During his storied radio career, he hosted the morning jazz show, co-hosted and produced "Food for Thought" with Nancy Leson and wrote and directed the Jimmy Jazzoid live radio musical comedies and 100 episodes of Jazz Kitchen.