Hot popcorn tradition

My husband stood in the doorway of the room looking at me with his eyebrow raised questioningly, flicking his fingers higher and higher in the air in front of his ace. It’s the only word in sign language that he knows: Popcorn, I nodded.
He left, went down the hall and pulled out the four-quart stainless steel pan, a jug of oil, stick margarine and canister of popcorn.
Popcorn kernels pinged against the hard metal pan bottom, followed with a metallic, shuffling swish as he swirled the kernels around with a wooden spoon to insure even heating. The kernels swelled visibly, warning him to pop on the lid before the explosions began. For the next couple minutes, he vigorously shook the pan across the electric burners.
From my comfortable chair, I smiled in anticipation of fresh, hot popcorn. His anxious voice called, “I need a pan to put this in. It’s going to burn if I don’t dump it out.”
Years of making popcorn and he still occasionally forgets to set out the big, white enamel, wash basin we use for serving hot popcorn before he turns on the heat.
I went to the kitchen. He was holding the pan of popped corn with a folded towel, shaking vigorously to keep it from scorching.
I bent down, reached deep in the corner cupboard, pulled out the oversized enamel basin and placed it in front of him. He sighed and dumped hot, crisp, white kernels into the old, wash basin, measured salt into the palm of his hand and sprinkled it over the hot corn.
I grabbed a handful.
“Wait! I haven’t finished yet.”
“Tastes great to me,” I said chewing a mouthful of his favorite: Cajun Corn.
His recipe for Cajun Corn came from sheer necessity after he came home with a very large bottle of hot pepper sauce. He purchased it after visiting the island in southern Louisiana where the hot pepper plants are grown, processed and bottled. I had no use for tear-jerking, tongue-burning pepper sauce.
My husband was determined to use up that jug of sauce. He added a few drops to any food he could find. The kids agreed that a tad of sauce was perfect with tacos. They tolerated a couple drops on hamburgers. But, when he added the stuff to the mashed potatoes, there was a sit-down strike at the supper table.
Most of the original fluid remained in his vat of hot sauce. He turned to his specialty: Popcorn.
First, he tried a few drops. No one noticed the difference. The hot sauce slid under the hot oil and scorched the bottom of the pan.
He added more. The popcorn was spicier. The bottom of the pan scorched blacker. The popcorn was worse.
One evening he added hot pepper sauce when we asked for buttered popcorn. He dropped hot sauce on top of the stick of margarine he adds before the corn starts popping.
The margarine melted and carried the sauce directly to the surface of the popped corn instead of the pan surface. We liked it.
It hits the spot on a cool fall evening.
Excuse me, I gotta go flick my fingers at the popcorn chef.


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