NICK TOSCHES: Mit~With der~the Pistole~Pistol am~ät Tor~Gätes von~öf Gräcelänß~Graceland: HELLFIRE (GERMAN) + PARISIAN metro VIDEO with Nick Tosches

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Gottesfurcht und den Teufel im Leib. Das klingt nach Mittelalter und doch war dieser innere Zwiespalt der Motor für die wildesten Männer der Moderne. Einer von ihnen war und ist Jerry Lee Lewis. Zur Zeit ist der 73-Jährige wieder auf Europatournee, morgen tritt er mit Chuck Berry in Mannheim auf. Sein Leben ist eine Art Prototyp für einen Rock ’n’ Roller mit Hang zur Selbstzerstörung, wie Nick Tosches in seiner Biographie "Hellfire" eindrücklich schildert. Fear God and the devil is in the womb. That sounds like the Middle Ages and yet this inner conflict was the driving force for the wildest men of modernism. One of them was and still is Jerry Lee Lewis. Currently, the 73-year-old back on Europe tour, he meets tomorrow with Chuck Berry in Mannheim on. His life is a kind of prototype for a rock 'n' roller with a penchant for self, as Nick Tosches in his biography "Hellfire" impressively portrays.

Die wichtigsten Fakten zu Jerry Lee Lewis sind schnell erzählt: Mit seinen ersten Singles avancierte der "Killer" zum erfolgreichsten Rock ’n’ Roller der 50er-Jahre, "Great Balls Of Fire" und "Whole A Lotta Shaking Going On" verkauften sich mehr als zehn Millionen Mal. Der Sound war einzigartig – und Lewis’ Show die wildeste, die es zu sehen gab.The main facts about Jerry Lee Lewis are quickly told: With his first singles became the "killer" for the most successful rock 'n' Roller of the 50-year, "Great Balls Of Fire" and "A Whole Lotta Shaking Going On" sold more than ten million times the sound was unique - and Lewis' show the wildest, it can be seen there.

Dann der Knick: Als bekannt wurde, dass der 22-jährige Star seine 13-jährige Cousine Myra geheiratet hatte, wandte sich das Publikum ab. Erst Mitte der 60er gelang ihm ein Comeback als Country-Sänger, bevor der Hang zur Selbstzerstörung ihn wieder fast um Kopf und Kragen brachte.Then the kink: When it became known that the 22-year-old star's 13-year-old cousin, Myra married had turned to the audience. Until the mid-60s he succeeded a comeback as a country singer before the penchant for self him back almost to the head and collar brought.

Eine Aktion Mitte der 70er sorgte für Schlagzeilen: Eines Nachts fuhr Lewis von seinem Haus in Memphis raus zum Graceland. The Killer wollte The King sehen. Doch Elvis blieb im Bett, statt seiner kam die Polizei – Lewis hatte sich mit der Pistole Einlass verschaffen wollen.An action mid-70s caused headlines: One night, Lewis drove from his home in Memphis go to Graceland. The killer wanted to see the King. But Elvis stayed in bed instead of his, the police - Lewis had the gun inlet want to.

Mit dieser Szene beginnt Tosches sein Buch, sie illustriert Größenwahn und Verzweiflung des Killers – und sein Händchen für große Gesten. Tosches gräbt tief, umreißt die Geschichte der Familie Lewis in Lousiana. Während ein Zweig der Sippe den Sezessionskrieg unbeschadet überstand, rutschte der andere in die Unterschicht ab, schlug sich durch. Jerry Lees Vater Elmo musste wegen illegaler Schnapsbrennerei ins Gefängnis. Andererseits suchte die Familie ihr Heil bei den Assemblies Of God, einer äußerst puritanischen christlichen Sekte, in der die beim Gottesdienst Erweckten in fremden Zungen sprachen.With this scene Tosches begins his book, it illustrates megalomania and desperation of the Killers - and his hands for big gestures. Tosches digs deep, outlines the history of the Lewis family in Lousiana. While a branch of the clan secessionist war unscathed stood, slid into the other from the underclass, proposed by. Jerry Lee's father had Elmo for illegal liquor distillery to jail. The other, the family sought their salvation in the Assemblies of God, a very puritanical Christian sect in the church when awakened spoke in foreign tongues.

In der Kirche stand auch ein Klavier: Das erste Lied, das der achtjährige Jerry Lee spielen konnte, war "Stille Nacht". Der Kleine machte daraus einen Boogie, inspiriert von der Musik im Radio. Stundenlang saß er an dem scheppernden Wandklavier, das der stolze Vater flugs kaufte. Ansonsten entwickelte er sich zum Rabauken – die gewalttätige Erziehung dürfte das Ihre beigetragen haben.In the church was also a piano: The first song, the eight-year-old Jerry Lee could play, was "Silent Night". The Small made it a boogie, inspired by the music on the radio. Hours he sat at the piano scheppernden wall, the proud father bought flight. Otherwise, he developed for the hooligan - the violent upbringing is likely that your have contributed to it.

Sein Cousin wurde ein berühmter Prediger, und auch bei Jerry Lee wuchs der Hang zur Bigotterie, ein Mittel, um anfangs die Aggressionen, später den Sexualtrieb im Zaum zu halten. Musiker zu werden, war ein Ausweg: Da konnte der Heißsporn seine Persönlichkeit ausleben, wenn auch unter Leidensdruck. Essenziell natürlich war Jerry Lees Begegnung mit der schwarzen (Teufels-)Musik. Schließlich die ersten epochalen Aufnahmen in Memphis für das Plattenlabel Sun.His cousin was a famous preacher, and even when Jerry Lee grew up the slope to bigotry, a appropriation to the beginning of the aggression, and later the sex drive in the bridle to keep. To become a musician, was a way out: Since the Heißsporn could ausleben his personality, albeit under pressure suffering. Jerry was obviously essential Lees encounter with the black (devil-) music. Finally epochal first recordings in Memphis for the record label Sun.

Mit großer Wucht und Einfühlungsvermögen erzählt Tosches von den ersten Jahren des Jerry Lee Lewis und schafft eine Aura der Glaubwürdigkeit, die sich durchs ganze Buch zieht, obwohl die Kapitel über die von Skandalen und Exzessen geprägten späteren Jahre eher skizzenhaft bleiben.With great force and empathy Tosches tells of the early years of Jerry Lee Lewis and creates an aura of credibility, which moves through the entire book, although the chapter on the scandals and excesses influenced later years rather remain sketchy.

- Nick Tosches: Hellfire. From the American Jürgen Behrens. Edition Tiamat, Berlin 2008. 271 pages, 16 euros. Concert: Chuck Berry / Jerry Lee Lewis, tomorrow, 20 clock, Mannheim SAP Arena. 0621/1819 0333.

- Nick Tosches: Hellfire. From the American Jürgen Behrens. Edition Tiamat, Berlin 2008. 271 pages, 16 euros. Concert: Chuck Berry / Jerry Lee Lewis, tomorrow, 20 clock, Mannheim SAP Arena. 0621/1819 0333.

JERRY LEE LEWIS: HUEY MEAUX: Pedophilé Gumbeauxxx (Southern Roots Studio Outtakes)

George Jones via last.fm

"I'm going to record 'Old Shep' in rock and roll - only Old Shep is gonna die in my song. I think I'll send him up to Elvis's place and let it bite the hell out of him."-- Jerry Lee Lewis

Huey P. Meaux ~ The Crazy Cajun

---

Huey Meaux [b. March 10, 1929] grew up outside of Kaplan, Louisiana, a small community surrounded by rice fields near Lafayette. His parents and siblings were poor sharecroppers who spoke mainly Cajun French, worked hard in the fields all week, and played harder on Saturday night, when Creoles and Cajuns would push back the furniture in a house, get roaring drunk, and dance to a band all night long.
"Back in them days, my dad worked for the man-picked cotton, hoed, grew rice, shucked it, and harvested it," he told me one time. "We had four shotgun houses, two black families, two white families. Music was a release. If somebody didn't get cut up and beat the shit out of someone, the dance was considered bad. I was raised that way."
He moved with his family to Winnie [Texas] at the age of twelve, part of the Cajun migration west across the Sabine River to greener rice fields and better jobs. His father, Stanislaus Meaux (known to all as Pappy Te-Tan), played accordion and fronted a group with teenaged Huey as the drummer. "I wasn't worth a damn," Huey told me once, but the excitement of being in a band stayed with him. In his twenties, he cut hair at the barber shop by day. "A barber is like a bartender, he knows who is screwing whose wife, when, and what time. I dug all that because I was part of something," he said. After hours, he was a disc jockey, hosting teen hops in Beaumont [Texas] and promoting dances all over the Golden Triangle.
His colleagues on the local music scene included singer George Jones, pianist Moon Mullican, and disc jockey J. P. Richardson, a.k.a. the Big Bopper. ("I was riding with him in the back seat of a car from Port Arthur to the studio in Houston when he wrote the lyrics for the B side of a novelty song he was cutting called Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor. He called the B side Chantilly Lace," Huey told me back in the seventies.) A local promoter and record producer named Bill Hall taught Meaux the nuances of the business of music, mainly by never paying Meaux what he was owed. "That was my college education in the bidness. I didn't think people were supposed to get paid for having fun. So Hall would take my records, put his name on them, and take them to the record companies. When we'd go to Nashville, he'd tell me to keep my mouth shut. He said they'd laugh at my accent up there. And I believed him," Huey said.
In 1959 Meaux produced the first hit with his name on it, Breaking Up Is Hard to Do, a maudlin lament by Jivin' Gene, as Meaux had rechristened Gene Bourgeois. The song's hook, he liked to tell people, was the vocal's echo effect, which was accomplished by "sticking Gene back in the shitter, surrounded by all that porcelain." Subsequent hits such as Barbara Lynn's soul stirrer You'll Lose a Good Thing, Joe Barry's swinging I'm a Fool to Care, Rod Bernard's This Should Go on Forever, T. K. Hulin's As You Pass Me By Graduation Night, and Big Sambo and the Housewreckers' histrionic The Rains Came were all expressions of teen sincerity tailor-made for belly rubbing on the dance floor. The sound was dubbed swamp pop in honor of the region the artists came from.
Meaux was on his way to becoming a one-stop hit factory; eventually he would own many labels and Sugar Hill Recording Studios and manage artists; he would publish his artists' songs, collect their royalty checks, and promote their records to radio stations. The way Meaux told it, his first royalty check, $48,000 for Barbara Lynn's You'll Lose a Good Thing, attracted too much attention around Winnie. "Even today people think I made that money selling dope," he told me years ago. "I never sold any dope in my life. Sold some whiskey before, took some dope, but never did sell none." He shifted operations to Houston, where peers like Don Robey at Duke and Peacock Records and H. W. "Pappy" Daily at D Records were cutting and selling hits as if the town were Nashville and Memphis combined. Among such company, Huey was well known for his good ear and even better known for his promotional talents. "The song is number one. The singer is probably third or fourth," he explained to me. "The song makes the singer and the producer. Promotion makes all of it. It's up to the man behind the desk, spending money here and there, taking care of favors, just like you elect a president or governor."
As a promoter, his most brilliant stroke was co-opting the British invasion of the early sixties by finding a Tex-Mex rock band from San Antonio, dubbing them the Sir Douglas Quintet, dressing them up in British mod outfits, and even releasing their record on the London label. The record was She's About a Mover, which broke onto the Top Ten pop charts in 1965. Image was everything. "He used to make the married members of the band take off their wedding rings before going on stage," recalled organist Augie Meyers. "He didn't want to spoil the illusion."
Thanks to Meaux's relentless efforts, an all-Mexican San Antonio band called Sunny and the Sunliners broke the racial barrier on television's American Bandstand by performing a bluesy version of Little Willie John's Talk To Me in 1962. Soon after, Meaux had another hit--a slow and thoroughly teen rendering of Hank Williams' I'm So Lonesome, I Could Cry by a young white band from Rosenberg called the Triumphs, fronted by a pimplefaced kid named B. J. Thomas.
"The reason why I had so many hits was that around this part of the country, you've got a different kind of people every hundred miles--Czech, Mexican, Cajun, black," Meaux said. The names came and went--Roy Head, Chuck Jackson, Ronnie Milsap, Mickey Gilley, Lowell Fulson, Joey Long, Doug Kershaw, Clifton Chenier, Big Mama Thornton, Johnny Copeland, Lightnin' Hopkins, Archie Bell and the Drells, Tommy McLain, Cosimo Matassa, and Jerry Wexler--all of them made records or worked with Meaux at one time or another. For two generations of Gulf Coast rock and rollers--or any musicians from Baton Rouge to San Antonio--he was the pipeline to the big time.
But for every Dale and Grace topping the charts with perfect pop hits like I'm Leaving It Up to You, there were twenty failures. Meaux's magic never worked for two talented young boys from Beaumont, Johnny and Edgar Winter, whom he recorded under the names The Great Believers and Texas Guitar Slim. "We'd put them on a local television show called Jive at Five, and their records would stop selling like you turn a light switch off," Meaux said. "People would freak out, being as they was albinos." He said he never got credit for his part in the discovery of ZZ Top and years later took great pleasure in suing the band and manager Bill Ham on behalf of Linden Hudson, a songwriter who was never paid or credited for a song the band recorded. Huey had a copy of the settlement check framed on his wall.
The flip side of his skills as a producer and a promoter was his willingness to take advantage of his artists. An artful con man, Meaux would mockingly warn his acts, "I wouldn't sign that if I were you" at the contract table. Another time he said, "I like to keep my artists in the dark so their stars shine brighter." The artists, hungry for fame and fortune, never balked-and many enjoyed long friendships with Meaux even though he took advantage of them. Gulfport, Mississippi, songwriter Jimmy Donley was a sentimental lyricist who sung in what Meaux called the heartbreak key. Donley sold compositions such as Please Mr. Sandman, Hello! Remember Me, and I'm to Blame to Meaux (and to Fats Domino, among others) for $50 apiece because he needed the money and figured he could always write another song. Even though Donley hardly profited from the relationship, he and Meaux remained close friends; Donley called him Papa. In the liner notes Meaux wrote for the Donley memorial album, Born to Be a Loser, he says that in 1963 Donley called him to thank him for all he'd done for him; 45 minutes later, Donley committed suicide.
Huey's gift of gab made it possible to overlook the gray areas of his personality--the way he treated his artists, his open interest in young women, and his hedonism. The first time I walked into Sugar Hill Recording Studios, in 1974, two years after Meaux bought it, he regaled me for the entire day with the story behind each of the gold records, the publicity photographs, and other mementos hanging on the wall and cluttering the desk in his office. It was a history lesson about roots before the roots of rock were cool.
His showmanship peaked as the Crazy Cajun on his Friday night radio program on KPFT-FM [in Houston]. Huey didn't just announce records, he went wild-stomping his feet to the music, whooping, singing, and yakking nonstop: "Give it to me good, Houston, unh, you sure betta b'lieve it. Come close to the radio and give your papa some sugar, sweet cher ami." A good portion of the radio audience was "the men and women in white up in the TDC"-- prisoners in the state system, mostly up in Huntsville. Huey read their letters, sent them dedications (Release Me was a popular request), and visited with their relatives in the studio.
One night when I was in the studio watching him do the show, he auditioned two new singles he'd just released on his Crazy Cajun label--Country Ways, by Alvin Crow and the Pleasant Valley Boys, from Austin; and Before the Next Teardrop Falls, by Freddy Fender, a fifties-era Tex-Mex rocker from San Benito [see Music: Wasted Days, Texas Monthly, October, 1995]. The Crow tune never went very far, but the Fender cut was Meaux's biggest meal ticket of his career. Fender had a promising career interrupted by a stint in Angola State Prison in Louisiana for possession of two marijuana cigarettes in the early sixties. He had come to Meaux, citing the common bond of their experiences behind bars. The two had tried a variety of combinations, including Jamaican reggae sung in Spanish, to no avail until Meaux cajoled Fender into singing on top of an instrumental track recorded by an anonymous Nashville country band.
Before the Next Teardrop Falls was the unlikeliest country and pop hit of 1975, eventually reaching number one on Billboard's Hot 100. The follow-up, a remake of Fender's 1959 regional rock hit Wasted Days and Wasted Nights, went to number eight. Fender and Meaux had discovered a formula: recycle the swamp pop melodies into modern country music by replacing horn charts with steel guitar fills and female choruses. Meaux was Fender's producer and manager, meaning he received a bigger cut than his artist. Freddy didn't care because they were both getting rich with hits like Secret Love, You'll Lose a Good Thing, Living It Down, and Vaya Con Dios. Freddy bought a house on Ocean Drive in Corpus Christi, where he parked his custom hot rods on the front lawn. Huey bought himself a Beatles-style shag wig and a Lincoln Continental, paid off his note on Sugar Hill Studios, and received major record company funding for his custom record label with a growing stable of acts.
By the end of the ride, in 1980, Fender was strung out on dope and booze and bankrupt with $10 million in debts. He was also accusing Meaux of taking advantage of him through unscrupulous contracts. Huey, who had previously specialized in one-hit wonders, was ready to sever the relationship too, blaming Freddy for squandering his earnings. In 1981 Meaux survived a bout with throat cancer. Save for one last novelty hit--Rockin' Sidney Simien's 1985 zydeco ditty (Don't Mess With) My Toot-Toot-Huey more or less bailed out of the producer-manager-promoter realm and moved into music publishing. He augmented the Crazy Cajun song-publishing catalog by purchasing, among other tunes, Desi Arnaz's signature song, Babalu, and a number of soul composer Isaac Hayes' songs from the Memphis bank that assumed ownership of them after Hayes went bankrupt.

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[::]SCOOP! 10 Million is a WHOLE LOTTA GREAT BALLS OF 'LIFE MAGAZINE' ARCHIVE Photos GOIN' ON GOOGLE TODAY! NOT ALL OF JERRY LEE LEWIS! BUT THESE ARE!

SCOOP

I SAW THIS POSTED FROM THE OFFICIAL GOOGLE BLOG. OF COURSE, I SEARCHED 'THE KILLER,' AND BELOW YOU'LL SEE THAT THERE ARE A WHOLE LOT OF UNPUBLISHED PICTURES GOIN' ON THE LIFE MAGAZINE ARCHIVE--NOW AVAILABLE AND SEARCHABLE.

MOST OF THE JERRY LEE LEWIS RESULTS DELIVERED WERE THE WONDERFULLY INSANE PIX FROM HIS LUGOSI-LIKE, METHADONE COMPLEXIONED HAUNTING OF THE FIRST ROCK HALL INDUCTION CEREMONY.
IN THESE HE IS DONNING A PURPLE PROM TUXEDO AND IS ACCOMPANIED BY HIS LOVELY (AHEM) WIFE, KERRIE.
THERE'S A RARE BODILESS PHOTO OF JERRY LEE'S LONGTIME MANAGER, J.W. WHITTEN, WHO I WAS ALWAYS HAPPY TO SEE IN THE EARLY DAYS OF MY HONKYTONK FEVER. (I MANAGED TO RACK UP A CENTURY MARK OF CONCERTS ATTENDED BEFORE THE TURN OF THE CENTURY AND BEFORE THE KILLER LOST MOST OF HIS HELLRAISING HABIT, ONLY DUE TO POOR HEALTH, OF COURSE.)
THIS SCOOP DOES NOT POP MY CHERRY,THOUGH.
IN THE GREAT TRADITION OF OTHER LEWIS FAMILY MEMBERS, I SOLD "THE NATIONAL ENQUIRER" THE FAMOUS MUGSHOT & POLICE REPORT FROM MR. LEWIS'S INFAMOUS PLACIDYLLY ARREST AT THE GATES OF GRACELAND.
THIS ALSO RANKS BELOW PLAYING BUDDY HOLLY IN THE BIOPICOMEDY, "GREAT BALLS OF FIRE," DURING THE FILMING OF WHICH THE GREAT MAN HIMSELF IN FLIP-FLOPS INFORMED ME WHILE SMOKING A SHERLOCK HOLMES PIPE, "KILLER, YOU LOOK MORE LIKE BUDDY HOLLY THAN BUDDY HOLLY EVER DID!"
IT ALSO CAN'T RIVAL REDISCOVERING HIS SISTER, LINDA GAIL AND PRODUCING HER FIRST SOLO ALBUM IN 15 YEARS.

BUT IT'LL DO FOR TODAY.

OH, AND IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SCOOP SOMETHING JUST GO HERE AND SEARCH, BUT HURRY, IT JUST OPENED A FEW HOURS AGO!

TPA

Singer Jerry Lee Lewis getting out of car (w. son, Jerry Lee Lewis III, still in backseat)
arriving at party for film "Great Balls of Fire," based on his life story.

LIFE photo archive, hosted by Google

I DON'T CARE IF IT'S CUISINART, I'M SWEARIN' ON IT!

'WAIT, DID NICK TOSCHES WRITE A BOOK
ABOUT ME OR DEAN MARTIN?'

'WAIT, AM I DEAN MARTIN?'

According to Google, "only a very small percentage of these images have ever been published.

WHERE DID I PUT THE KEYS TO MY CHAINSAW?

The rest have been sitting in dusty archives in the form of negatives, slides, glass plates, etchings, and prints.

"OH, THAT'S RIGHT, I'M DOONESBURY! KILLER"

We're digitizing them so that everyone can easily experience these fascinating moments in time.

HEY, J.W., CAN YOU DO THAT SLINGBLADE IMPRESSION AND SING GREAT BALLS OF FIRE?

Today about 20 percent of the collection is online; during the next few months, we will be adding the entire LIFE archive — about 10 million photos."
According to Google Blogoscoped, "as many photos are quite old, this also means many should have passed into the public domain zone,

I'LL DO A PIANA-MEDLEY, FATS, BUT HAVE YOU EVER HEARD JAMES PLAY THE ORGAN?

meaning you may be allowed to copy, edit, and republish that portion of the photos any way you like, including for commercial uses.

LIFE FUCKED UP, BUT I PUT IT IN ANYWAY

Wikipedia says that “the copyright in a published work expires in all countries ... when ...The work was created and first published before January 1, 1923, or at least 95 years before January 1 of the current year, whichever is later.”

I WANT YOU TO TELL THE DOCTOR THAT I HAVE A headache AND AM ALLERGIC TO EVERYTHING BUT METHADONE...

A few examples of image searches for medical terms are
linked below click to see the photos:

- heart attack, for example, Vice President Richard M. Nixon visiting Senator Lyndon B. Johnson at Bethesda Naval Hospital after Johnson's heart attack.

- cough

- bronchitis

- allergy

- diabetes

MY GIRLFRIEND, LINDA GAIL AND BIG BROTHER

Ozark Jubilee Boys--Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On (roy hall)

Ozark Jubilee Boys--Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On (roy hall)
Video sent by mrjyn

jerry lee lewis: born Sept.25 1935:

whole lotta shakin' goin'on
roy hall

J'ai dit venu dessus au-dessus du bébé,
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus
Ouais j'ai dit venu dessus au-dessus du bébé,
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus
Puits nous ne sommes pas fakin',
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus

Mmm, j'ai dit venu dessus au-dessus du bébé,
nous avons obtenu le poulet dans la grange
À qui grange, quelle grange, ma grange
Venez dessus au-dessus du bébé,
nous avons obtenu le taureau par les klaxons
Ouais, nous ne sommes pas fakin',
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus

Bien, j'ai dit le bébé de secousse, secousse
J'ai dit la secousse, secousse de bébé maintenant
J'ai dit la secousse il bébé, le secoue
J'ai dit la secousse il bébé, secousse
Nous ne sommes pas fakin',
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus

Bien, j'ai dit venu dessus au-dessus du bébé,
goin un-entier du shakin sort-ta dessus
J'ai dit venu dessus au-dessus du bébé,
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus
Puits nous ne sommes pas fakin',
goin un-entier de shakin de lotta dessus

James Faye "Roy" Hall
was born on May 7, 1922, in Big Stone Gap, Virginia. An old colored man taught him to play piano, and to drink. By the time Roy turned twenty-one, he knew that he was the best drunken piano-player in Big Stone Gap, and armed with the pride and confidence that this knowledge gave him, he departed the town of his birth to seek fame. Roy made it to Bristol and farther, pumping boogie-woogie in every Virginia, Tennessee, or Alabama beer-joint that had a piano.

MEAT MEN & Smokestack Lightning & BBQ & MEMPHIS

meat man by the killer
(written by mack vickery)

Big S Grill

1179 Dunnavant Ave (at Dow)
Memphis TN
901.775-9127

map

I don't hide [my recipes]. I let them have them, but they tell me, "You're lying. That ain't the way you fix it." I say, "That's just the way I fix it." They don't want to believe it. God Give everybody so much. If barbecue is yours, that's it.
--J.C. Hardaway

The plywood pig hanging perpendicular to McLemore names the place: Candy Man Lounge. The few parking spaces in front are as empty as the lot next door. Black iron bars block all the entrances. Midday, midweek, and nothing is happening here.

Before the Candy Man moved in and crapped out, the store housed Hawkin's Grill. Started in 1938, Hawkin's turned out shoulder after slow-cooked shoulder for the better part of six decades. It was there that J. C. Hardaway, one of Memphis' world-renowned pit masters, got his start at the age of thirteen delivering orders on his bicycle.

Before long, J.C. traded in his pedals for the pits. He cooked hamburgers and chopped the meat as it came off the coals, all the while soaking up secrets and learning the tricks of a trade that would feed him and his community for years to come.

In 1993, J.C. took his tongs and walked around the corner and down Dunnavant to the Big "S" Grill. Now that J.C. sends his smoke up their stacks, they've added his name to the sign and his barbecue to the board, which for years sold only soul food. Listening to J.C., one wonders if there is a difference.

"God gives everybody so much. If barbecue is yours, that's it."

Oral History

Interview with J.C. Hardaway , 19 February 2002

Early Experiences

In the restaurant, Hawkins Grill. Eighteen, but I started at 13, 14, riding a bicycle delivering orders. At that time they didn't allow children [to work] in restaurants until they were of age. And, at the age of 18. So after I reached 18, I went inside and started working around, and started looking around and started cooking. Hawkins Grill, they were my godparents.

Did you try to spend time in the kitchen when you were younger? Did you get shooed away?

I think it might be that it was in my blood. Just in me that I would learn it. I was around it. I just picked it up.

Cook at home?

Nothing but regular food. Soul food. Home cooked food. No barbecue just home cooked food.

Beginnings in the Hawkins Kitchen Frying hamburgers and selling sandwiches, chopping up barbecue but I wasn't cooking it.

Profession from the Beginning?

Right.

Who did you learn to cook from at Hawkins?

No teacher. Just picked it up looking. Just looking. We didn't take time to teach you. You just picked it up.

They said here's the job?

Here's the job and if you couldn't do it you had to go I guess.

Who was in charge of barbecue at Hawkins?

Mrs. Hawkins

How Long Have You Been Cooking?

Since I was 18. 59 years.

How long was Hawkins Grill open?

From 1938 and I left in '93. Big S since '93. It'll be nine years in October.

Enjoy commercial cooking?

Yes. I enjoy cooking for the public. It's just a part of me. At the age I am now, I don't need nothing else but that basis.

A favorite part of cooking for the public?

I can do pastry. Most anything. But I do barbecue especially if I have a party I'll fix some barbecue beans, spaghetti, potato salad. That line of food, party food. Even cold plates, you know, if necessary.

Did you do catering at Hawkins?

No.

Where'd you learn to do catering? I just picked it up. I put it together myself. It just have been my style of life, cooking.

Most people just don't learn pastry. No, that's what my wife says. I've got so many cakes and pies on order now that they'll never get them. We'll I told her I'm not thinking about them. When'll he get to it? We say whenever he feels like it, he'll fix it but he ain't in no hurry. It's not my job. I let them know I stopped doing all that.

I took cake decorating at Sears back some years ago. Much, much, a long time ago. I don't even know where my utensils I use. I couldn't find them even if I wanted to.

Commercial cooking give experiences or connect you to parts of the world that you never thought about before you started cooking? I have them all over the country. Overseas and everywhere. Wanting to hear about me. They want to know how I do this and that.

Call or write?

They ask me am I going to be in and some of their friends send them by.

People call from all over the world?

When can I get with you? I want to taste that world famous barbecue. I never knew that I'd be world famous. They say, you put everything into yours. You don't throw it up and sell it. You take pride with you food and your orders and get them out right. Whether it's one sandwich or fifteen sandwiches, they all taste- I fix them all the same.

Has Your Cooking and Food Afforded You Chances to Travel?

Yes, I just back from New Orleans . October the 20th, I had to cook for a charity ball for the children. It was at a little college in New Orleans and the mission was J.C. Hardaway barbecue and ten dollars. Pay ten dollars and you get to see the movie- the movie Smokestack Lightening, which I'm in the movie- Cozy Corner is in the movie. The three Memphis people in the movie is Cozy Corner, Big S, that's me, and Charles Vergo. Cozy Corner and Charles Vergo is Rendezvous and Big S and J.C. and we're the only three in the movie. So the movie. The movie is on sale now.

Did you ever think that you'd be in a movie?

No. I was flattered when they come from California to make the movie and the book. I'm getting a lot from the book. Because if you buy the book or see the movie, you can get everything out of it.

Your food has gone way beyond Memphis .

I've had from Russia , everywhere. I think I've had some. There's no telling. I don't know. I'm just amazed. Some come up in here where I couldn't understand what they were saying. One man brought two people from overseas in here I couldn't understand- I forget what they were- but- I have a lot of them. Every day I get somebody from out of town.

How do they contact you? Call? Come by?

Pick it up on the Internet and they've heard about it.

How do they contact you?

They have the number. Using the Internet and the computer. Plus whoever they know in Memphis , they will bring them. I have quite a few customers bring people from out of town all the time.

Directions and Names from the 2000 SFS

Learned anything about people or customers?

Oh, yes. I have learned a lot about them. I know I have, sure.

Cooking and People

You meet all kinds every day. Every time you see. You have to have to have it this way or that way. If they have it your way it tastes better but-

Most Important Thing about the Food that goes out to customers.

Customer experiences. I let them tell me what they like about it. That the smoke and the sauce and the slaw without that they wouldn't have a barbecue sandwich. They've got it but no taste. Some sauce put on top of it. Sauce it too much and it still makes it worse.

What are you putting into your food that elicits customer statements such as "You put everything into your food." What gets customers to say this?

Time. I just don't throw it on the bun. I cook the sauce in.

Time- how long do you spend on a shoulder?

I tell everybody I don't have a certain time. I just smoke it until I feel like it's time. You know. Somewhere 6-8, 8 hours. The smoke is really what cooks the meat anyway. Hot smoke.

Wood

Hickory , white, or red oak. Hickory only comes one but oak comes white and red. So, either one. If you use white oak the meat is white. It never turns the pretty color. If you use hickory on red oak the meat- all the way through- has a very pretty color. The white oak will not give it [color] too it [meat]. Just give it white meat. I never use charcoal. Because you don't get as much flavor out of it. It's already been cooked all to pieces to make charcoal. It's not enough left in it to smoke and nothing to bring it out.

Dried cordwood. Hot fire. Flame. J.C. uses the flame. Get it hot with the flame. Brown it on both sides. Brown it. Keep your fire hot and the smoke'll cook it and then that wood will keep warm. It'll blaze up every once and a while. If you leave it open it'll burn up. But if you slow it down, you get a better piece of meat. I have no idea how they cook their meat with that charcoal. Slow process. In New Orleans they tell me the smoke is on one side and the meat is on the other [in the pit] and the smoke has to travel over there. There's not enough smoke in it. In New Orleans , they're putting the meat on one side of the pit and the fire on the other side. And the smoke comes over to the meat. That's where they get their smoke in it. But that's not enough smoke.

BBQ vs. Fast Food

It's not very good barbecue [fast food barbecue]. Why do folks pursue barbecue? Well they see it coming off the pits. They know how its cooked and they it's more expensive that way than making a hamburger patty and throwing on there already come in pre-cooked.

Seeing you cooking means something to customers?

It means that it's right out of the pit.

What do you hope customers say?

That they always' say, "That's the best I've ever eaten."

Has Cooking at Hawkins and the Big S allowed you to do something that you never imagined?

Yes, cause if anybody told me that I would still be in barbecue I would say no I wouldn't. I sure wouldn't. I didn't know- after it got to be a big thing after they come by to interview me for the book Smokestack Lightening then I thought there must be something good about it.

Movie?

That's right. I wouldn't. Never dreamed that I'd be in a movie about cooking barbecue. I just hate that they didn't get it all at the Hawkins Grill where I was raised, you know. I was there at the grill and I would loved for them to have had the praise but it didn't work out.

Hawkins Grill- did it close in 1993?

I left and they kept it open somebody else come and leased it.

Still called the Hawkins Grill?

No. Another man got it [after several leases] and changed it [name] the Candyman Lounge. He still advertises Hawkins Grill barbecue though. Commercial sent some men out after they heard about the barbecue I was doing and had them to taste it. Well it sure don't taste like no J.C. Hardaway barbecue. If it tastes like this I sure don't see how he got all the praise. The guy was posing as me. But it didn't taste like nothing. That's what I said. It didn't taste like what it should have tasted like. They didn't know my slaw and my barbecue sauce. None of that. They left and have made a nightclub out of it. Hawkins Grill 2. They didn't want to turn Hawkins Grill lose. They didn't make no hickory and he had to get out. And this last man was Candy Man. He wouldn't do right. Wouldn't pay his rent. So they had to let him go. Now it's up- I think they tried to buy it several times. My godmother wouldn't sell it. My godmother's 97, see, now and at that time she was a few years younger. Now she wants to sell it. But his young man he don't want to buy it, he wants to lease it to have a sports bar. So that's what they have down there now. If it ever opens. He's been over a year trying to get it open. I've never seen nothing take that long to open.

How Many Days a Week Do you still cook?

I'm here seven. I know that I can meet you this morning because I don't have any specific thing going. Most of my business that mean anything, are call ins. Like last night, if anybody wanted me to meet them today for lunch. I don't have a straight lunch period cause down in this area it's off beat it's not a through street where cars travel like McLemore. Now Hawkins was on McLemore, a through street. You could pick up all kinds of money. It's quieter down here. I have walk-ins [customers]. They'll smell me cooking and they'll come and after they'll call and get so many sandwiches.

Do you do walk-ins at night?

I would, but I got sick in '99 and I stayed off three months, March of 2000. I had a sugar attack. I'm diabetic and I didn't know it. I new I was messed up some kind of way about it. That bad. But I was putting up too much time- 24 hours. I didn't think I could break down. Now I come here at ten and today I will stay here until 7 or something like that. 'Til the people start dying.

Volume.

How much do you cook each week? Approximately 125 lbs. a week and no ribs. That's another thing. Ribs, they want me to have ribs, but they're not an everyday seller and they'll dry out. Shoulder will not dry out and sell every day.

James Willis

He cooked on the corner and I was the delivery boy. Leonard's was opposite Hawkins. They called it black barbecue. Leonard's was called, at that time, the white folks' barbecue. Where they had the black folks come over to Hawkins. At that time it was segregated. My mother wanted bought sandwiches from Leonard's before I was old enough to drive. Before Hawkins opened. People in the neighborhood, we had to go to the back steps or the side door.

Side.

This is a little hall and the window was there. You'd pick up your stuff and in there was dining room.

Custom Cooking

I do that now. Charge .50 or whatever you want a pound. When I was at Hawkins, it was .35 a pound. Now I'll get .50. I think that I started getting .50 before I came up here. But if you want me to cook you some ribs or a shoulder- a slab or two of ribs- I won't even fire my pit up for that. Now if I'm already cooking, but just to fire it up, somebody's got to have enough meat. I sell slaw. I sell barbecue sauce. Anything they want to buy. Sauce. Slaw. .50 a pound. A ten-pound piece meat. That's just $5. That's not worth it. But say if you're cooking for yourself and throw it in there, that's money. You've made something. If I've got enough people- like five people- I'd cook for that. That'd be all right $25. That's not bad while you're working. Don't take nothing to stick it in. But you don't' fire your pit for not 2 or 3 pounds of meat.

Still Make Your Own Sauce

Oh, yes. Sauce, slaw, everybody wants the secret. Do you have an understudy? You're going to ask me that part aren't you? I refuse to train. You can't get anything now but drugs and even they come in wanting to do, they walk off. I wouldn't want a girl. I know I'd want a man cause he would be more stable. He would be more holding a job up. A woman would get married and her husband tell her to come home. A man can't do that. Like me. I'm determined not to leave. I'm holding it down. You don't find many like- you broke the mold.

Recipes written down?

Oh, yes. They're supposed to have it, but they say you're lying. That's not what you put in it. I tell everybody to do everything and they tell people that they cannot get it to taste like yours. Just give some of yours. Make me a ball, because I don't want that mess that you told me to fix. My godmother always told me when I was growing up they would come into the café. Figure how long I've bee having this- experience- the people liking the barbecue. And, way before she thought about retiring and I supervised a couple of paper companies after I come out school I was working management at two paper companies. I never did leave two or three days at the grill [Hawkins]. I worked three or four nights, especially weekends. But I got married and just worked part time. But I never missed a week of being in that place [Hawkins Grill]. So, when I would go on vacation, when I started working a little bit more. People would come there and say- look in- and they didn't see me and they'd say can we help you? And my godmother would say they'd say no "we're looking for J.C." We'll he's on vacation but we be back when he come back. She's say we can fix it. No, uh, uh. You can't fix it. She'd come over. Now look, come here. This is the slaw. This is the barbecue sauce and this is everything that he uses. Now why would his taste different from mine? So she told me one day. Baby, I can't understand that. You use the same thing we use. There's something about that. My wife says it's just a gift to you- something about your hands. It's the same thing. Something with your hands that's not with everybody else's hands.

Recipes

I don't hide them. I let them have them but they tell me "you're lying." That ain't the way you fix it. I say that's just the way I fix it. They don't want to believe it. God Give everybody so much if barbecue is yours that's it.

Favorite Thing about Work

I like good times. I like to go out. But when I'm on the job, I'm on the job. When I leave I go dancing. When I'm messing around, I'm messing around. But, then, when I'm working, I'm working. People say come out here and talk to us. I say, I don't have time. I've got to have my slaw and barbecue sauce ready for the weekend. I don't have time. I don't drop my work and sit down and get behind then go look crazy. I never run out of nothing.

Sauce

I make a gallon every time. A hot gallon of barbecue sauce. I make three times as much mild as I do hot. My hot is hot. A drop is hot. Put me a little bit. J.C. you put more than a drop on there I can tell. A drop will do of yours they say.

Vacation

When I'm not there, they won't accept it. They couldn't make no money if I leave. When I go on vacation they lock the kitchen up. They close down. We're not going to try to fix that stuff J.C. We're not going to mess up nothing. We make it taste like his now. No.

Daily Volume

Some days I could have a hundred- a hundred barbecue sandwiches. And the least I fix is 25. I have man start coming. He comes every day. Now I said "please, don't make yourself sick." He wouldn't let me hurt his feelings. He came right back the next day. He used to be one of my customers down on Hawkins. He said I didn't know where you moved to. He was here yesterday. I said, Lord, you're going to hurt yourself. No I ain't. No I ain't. I've been out about 8 years now I'm getting back in it. I can't hurt myself right now. I've got a long time to go. I've got to get it back in my system.

J.C. Hardaway's pork art

Pitmaster J.C. Hardaway (left) with Lolis Eric Elie , author of Smokestack Lightning, was awarded the "Keeper of the Flame" award for his shoulder sandwich, which Elie describes as one of the best in America

(CNN) -- To Lolis Eric Elie, author of the cultural barbecue travelogue "Smokestack Lightning" (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), there is no better barbecue pork shoulder sandwich than one made by barbecue pit-master J.C. Hardaway, honored this year by the SFA with the "Keeper of the Flame" award.

Here is a "craftsman," says Elie, performing at the top of his form, bringing a simple sandwich of pork meat on a bun to the level of art.

Hardaway is a tall easygoing man of 76, given to wearing white baseball caps. He strides from the back of the hall, smiling shyly, to thunderous applause as he accepts his award. He seems bemused by all the attention. He accepts his plaque, but beyond "thanks" has little else to say.

"His food is the best expression of himself," says Elie. "What he does with a shoulder sandwich says more about him than what I could say and what he would say about himself."

And a few hours later, we can see for ourselves. Beneath tents set up on the borrowed lawn of one Oxford's antebellum mansions, Hardaway is dishing out big pans of pork barbecue.

There is a lot of confusion about barbecue. In Memphis, where Hardaway plies his trade over the barbecue pits at the Big "S" Grill, barbecue is not something cooked on a Weber. It's pork shoulders cooked long and slow by pungent wood smoke -- usually oak and hickory -- at temperatures that range from 200 to 225 degrees Fahrenheit.

A sliced pork shoulder sandwich in the hands of J.C. Hardaway is close to a work of art. Slow-cooked pork, meltingly tender, is served alongside tangy potato salad and homemade sweet tea

When asked why pork shoulders, Hardaway, who started cooking when he was 14, smiles in a way that conveys that he has forgotten more about barbecue than the questioner will ever know, and says, "It just the best."

Smoky Hale, a symposium participant and author of "The Great American Barbecue and Grilling Manual" (Abacus Publishing Company), says pork shoulder is one of the finest cuts a barbecue chef can use.

"The pork (shoulder) butt is to pork cookers what the beef brisket is to a Texan. Both cuts have layers of fat interspersed within the meat. When cooked low and slow, the fat melts while basting the meat to keep it moist until it gets done," explains Hale.

That's the way Hardaway's barbecue is cooked up -- moist and melting, flavored with hickory smoke. There were barbecue sauces -- one, a little vinegar with pepper and another, vinegar and a lot more pepper -- but real slow-cooked barbecue, particularly a shoulder sandwich, is not about sauce but about the meat itself.

Piled high so that the meat rolls out of their oversized buns, the shoulder sandwiches were served with mustardy potato salad, crunchy slaw and smoky baked beans. All of it was washed down with real homemade sweet tea as bluesman Robert Balfour strummed away, his rich baritone mixing with the wood smoke in the cool Mississippi evening.

Recipe By     : John Willingham's World Champion Bar-B-Q
Serving Size  : 1    Preparation Time :0:00
Categories    : Bbq Sauces

Amount  Measure       Ingredient -- Preparation Method
--------  ------------  --------------------------------
3/4  cup           Light brown sugar -- packed
1      each          1 1/4 oz package regular -- flavor chili seasoning
                  (I used GArry Howard's Chile Powder recipe)
2      teaspoons     Dry mustard
1      teaspoon      Ginger -- ground
1/2  teaspoon      Allspice -- ground
1/4  teaspoon      Cayenne pepper
1/4  teaspoon      Mace -- ground
1/4  teaspoon      Black peppper -- fresh ground
1      cup           White distilled vinegar
1/4  cup           Molasses
1/4  cup           Water
32      ounces        Ketchup
3      teaspoons     Liquid smoke (optional)

In a large saucepan, combine the brown sugar, chili seasoning, mustard, ginger,
allspice, cayenne, mace, and black pepper.  Add the vinegar, molasses, water,
and liquid smoke.  Stir until dry ingredients are dissolved.  Add the ketchup
and stir to mix.

Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring constantly to avoid spattering.

Reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes.

Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature.

Use immediately or cool to room temperature, cover, and refrigerate for up to 1
week.

BBQ basics at home

Barbecuers have a range of options: back-yard pits, piano-sized custom smokers with rotating racks, and even old refrigerators jerry-rigged as smokers. Most of us, though, will use our charcoal, gas or electric grills.

Using a grill can be a challenge, but it can be done. Look at your owner's manual, for starters, for manufacturer recommendations.

Going slow

The key is slow, even cooking at a relatively low temperature. "You want to keep the temperature just about the level that the meat will register when done," write Cheryl and Bill Jamison in "Smoke & Spice." "Since pork needs to be cooked to an internal temperature of at least 160 degrees, you barbecue it at 180 to 220."

Other authors insist such low temperatures are more the province of experienced barbecuers. Amateurs should expect grill temps closer to 350 degrees. While you should still expect slow cooking that will take hours, make sure to have an instant-read thermometer to check doneness.

Maintaining level heat is easier with gas- or electric-powered grills. Charcoal grills will need occasional replenishment. Jamie Purviance, author of "Weber's Charcoal Grilling: The Art of Cooking with Live Fire," recommends adding 10 to 12 unlit charcoal briquettes to the lighted charcoal every hour or so. What sort of charcoal to use is up for debate. Many prefer hardwood lump charcoal instead of briquettes because of the additives used to form the latter. Use a chimney starter or an electric charcoal starter; lighter fluid can leave an aftertaste.

Use indirect cooking

Set up the coals for indirect cooking. Some ring the outside of the grill, leaving the center free for the meat. Others pile coals on two sides or one side. It's your choice. Place a drip pan filled with water below where your meat will sit. When the coals are hot, sprinkle wood chips or chunks soaked in water over them.

Go easy on the wood

"A novice barbecue cook may not realize that the major heat source in barbecue should be the charcoal," writes Mike Mills, the Illinois-based restaurateur and champion barbecuer, in his "Peace, Love and Barbecue" cookbook. "People who get all of their heat directly from wood will oversmoke their meat. Smoke should be an ingredient, not the main taste you notice when you take a bite."

Close that grill

Still, when you close the grill keep it closed, said Ed Mitchell, who used to operate Mitchell's Ribs, Chicken and BBQ in Wilson, N.C.

"We don't peek,'' said Mitchell, who cooks up whole hogs in the eastern Carolina tradition." You want to maintain that steady heat and you want the smoke from the smoldering wood chips or chunks to do its job.

Sources: North Carolina State tourist sites: NorthCarolina.com; visitnc.com. Scott's Barbecue Sauce: Order from scottsbarbecuesauce.com. North Carolina Barbecue Society: ncbbqsociety.com Upcoming: Memphis, Kansas, Texas

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Recipes

Carolina 'red' pulled pork shoulder

Preparation time: 45 minutes
Grilling time: 5-7 hours
Yield: 12 servings

This recipe, adapted from "Weber's Charcoal Grilling: The Art of Cooking with Live Fire," by Jamie Purviance, is western North Carolina style in terms of the meat cut and sauce. These instructions are for grilling with charcoal; adapt where necessary for a gas grill.
1 tablespoon each: salt, light brown sugar
2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon chili pepper
1 boneless pork shoulder, 5-6 pounds
2 large handfuls hickory wood chips, soaked in water 30 minutes
Sauce:
1 cup each: apple cider vinegar, ketchup
1/4 cup lightly packed light brown sugar
1 teaspoon each: hot sauce, Worcestershire sauce, salt
12 hamburger buns

1. Mix the salt, brown sugar, paprika and chili pepper in a small bowl. Coat the pork shoulder all over with the rub, pressing it into the meat. Allow the pork to sit at room temperature 30-40 minutes before grilling. If necessary, tie the pork with 3 or 4 lengths of kitchen twine.
2. Prepare a charcoal grill for indirect heat. Push coals to one side of the grill. Place a large disposable drip pan on the empty side of the grill; fill pan halfway with warm water. Drain the wood chips; scatter over the hot coals. Cook the pork, fat side up over the drip pan, with the lid closed, until tender and almost falling apart, 5-7 hours, rotating the pork as needed for even cooking, until tender enough to tear apart with two forks and the pork registers 190 degrees. (Replenish the charcoal as needed to maintain indirect low heat, adding 10-12 unlit charcoal briquettes to the lit charcoal every 45 minutes-1 hour.)
3. Transfer the pork to a baking sheet; tightly cover with foil. Let pork rest 30 minutes. Pull the warm meat apart with your fingers or use two forks to shred the meat. Discard any large pieces of fat or sinew.
4. For the sauce, whisk together all the ingredients in a saucepan; simmer over medium heat 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Adjust the seasonings, if desired. Put the shredded meat in a bowl, moisten with sauce to taste. Pile the pork onto hamburger buns.

Nutrition information per serving:
524 calories, 40% of calories from fat, 23 g fat, 8 g saturated fat, 122 mg cholesterol, 32 g carbohydrates, 44 g protein, 1,305 mg sodium, 1 g fiber

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Dr. BBQ's vinegar-based barbecue sauce

Preparation time: 5 minutes
Standing time: 2 hours
Yield: 2 cups

"The difference between the sauces stems from the fact that the original settlers of the Piedmont, or eastern portion of North Carolina, believed that tomatoes were poisonous. The western portion of the state was settled after tomatoes became a common ingredient," writes native Chicagoan Ray Lampe in his "Dr. BBQ's Big-Time Barbecue Cookbook." This vinegar-based sauce is his take on the eastern North Carolina tradition. For a "rough idea" of the western North Carolina version, add 1 cup ketchup, 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon. "Serve over smoked pork in any form-chopped or pulled," he writes.

2 cups cider vinegar
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
3 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon each: black pepper, white pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground red pepper

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl; mix well. Let stand about 2 hours to blend flavors. Store, covered, in the refrigerator for up to 1 month.

Nutrition information per tablespoon:
10 calories, 1% of calories from fat, 0.01 g fat, 0 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 2 g carbohydrates, 0 g protein, 219 mg sodium, 0 g fiber