An All-College Mascot Thanksgiving Dinner and How I'd Prepare Them

I did an original version of this at the Old Place and it was one of my favorite pieces I've ever written. Completely idiotic, totally unnecessary, exactly what we need around the Thanksgiving holiday to kill five minutes when you're trying to get out of a conversation with your uncle or your dipshit nephew. I'll preface the rules by noting that Thanksgiving meals don't need to be traditional, nor do they need to contain turkey. I don't care for it. We're going off-book with this one.

So with that, the rules and the menu!

The Rules

1. No human mascots. No cannibalism. It's a good baseline for pretty much anything!
2. No dogs/cats or dog/cat derivatives. I don't need a call from PETA.
3. No inanimate objects. I can't cook a golden hurricane or a rocket.
4. No copying the year before. So no Nebraska Cornhuskers, no Ohio State Buckeyes, no Delta State Fightin' Okra, no Syracuse Orange, no Arkansas Razorbacks. Damn shame. There are so few vegetables in the NCAA ranks.

The Menu

Appetizer:

The Wichita State Shocker Focaccia

Alright, first up is the Wichita State Shocker (no, not that shocker. Get your mind out of the gutter.) He's an anthropomorphized bundle of grain and appears to be chewing his own flesh or the flesh of another shocker? Alarming. Anyways! We're going to take this human-like sheaf of wheat and grind him up into a nice, finely milled flour, then add water and a scant amount of yeast. Give that an overnight preferment, then add more Shocker flour, more water, salt, and an additional infusion of yeast. 3 hours to rise, then slap that flour onto a heavily-oiled sheet pan. Add rosemary and sea salt on top, drizzle with more oil, and make the signature finger dents in the dough. (Leave the joke in your head, AO.) Bake for 12-15 at 425 degrees, and boom. The Wichita State Shock-coccia!

This is a midwestern blog. We can't have carbs without cheese. So we're going to lean on the D-III Williams College Ephs (rhymes with chief, not with chef) of Williamstown, Massachusetts ! Their mascot is a delightfully happy purple cow and their football rivalry with nearby Amherst College is so storied that they hosted College GameDay in 2007.

As most other college mascots are not milk-producing (seriously, I looked for too long on this point), this is a great opportunity to make some classic cow's milk cheese. How does one make cheese? Despite my family now living in Wisconsin, I don't have a damn clue. So we're going to buzz past this part and assume that you have some wonderfully salty and creamy cheese to put atop your Shock-coccia. Enjoy!

Fish Course:

Blackened Lakeland University Musky

A little non-traditional, but stick with me here. I think this fish course will pair well with our main course and our cocktail. Lakeland University is a fellow D-III program, this one based out of Herman, Wisconsin, up near Sheboygan and is the home of the Muskies!

Muskies are a pretty large freshwater predatory fish and are annoyingly bony to work with. But if you can filet them, they're pretty mild in flavor and take in whatever you add. We're going to adapt my dad's blackened Cajun tilapia recipe here and start with the primary rule for blackened fish: remove all batteries from your smoke detectors and open all of your windows. Then get the pan ripping hot, dredge the fish in a mix of cayenne, smoked paprika, cumin, dark chili powder, and some Tony Chachere's spice blend. Add some high smoke-point oil and chuck those musky filets into the pan for about 3-4 min per side, depending on thickness.

Main Course:

University of Texas-Austin Bevo Soy-Ginger Brisket

Hey, our first live mascot! Bevo the Longhorn (obligatory horns down hand motion) is the 15th of the long line of Bevo mascots for UT. Bevo is a piece of iconic college football lore and also a big-ass chunk of meat. He infamously nearly gored the poor Uga the Bulldog in 2019 and was banned from last year's SEC championship game. Various versions of the steer have attacked a parked car, charged the Baylor band, and ran loose on campus for days before being reclaimed. He's a big personality, which is why we're not going to make small things here.

We're going to take a large chunk of Bevo's posterior and let it hang out it in a soy sauce/ginger/garlic/sesame oil/rice wine vinegar marinade for 12-24 hours in the fridge. Once that's had time to soak in, we're going to remove it, dry it off, and rub it down with a brown sugar/gochugaru chili flake/seasame seed spcie blend. If you've got a smoker, use it. For those city folk like myself, we're going to cook this low and slow in the oven at around 300 degrees for 3-4 hours, depending on the size of the Bevo chunk. Let it rest, slice it up, enjoy over some rice with pickled green onions.

Signature Cocktail:

Stanford Cardinal Smoked Old Fashioned

The Stanford Cardinal was once much more offensive when they were known as the Stanford Indians. In the 1970s, Stanford changed their name to the Cardinal, referring to the color. But THE TREE became a thing. Despite being frequently featured on the worst mascots lists, I love the Tree. It's absurdist, it's student-led, it's fun as hell (and it's also inspired the Stanford gymnastics team's Stick Stick). Long live the tree.

It's going down. We're yelling timber. Let's make some hooch with our coniferous friend.

I'm assuming that the Stanford Tree is a redwood, as homage to El Palo Alto, the namesake of Palo Alto, CA. We're not cutting down a redwood. I don't want those bad vibes. But I'm fine with grabbing a chunk of oak or pine or whatever is semi-local to you! [EDITORS NOTE: Don't do this part if you've already had a few. We at OTR take no liability for you cutting yourself or burning any pets or loved ones.] Cut some slivers off of your wood chunk. We're not looking for anything too large, but we're not really intending to start a fire here either. Place them on a fireproof base, then hit the slivers with a lighter. Once you get some smoke coming off of the wood, flip a cocktail glass over top of the mini wood pile. Let it take in the smoke.

Once the flame has been extinguished and the smoke dissipated, quickly chuck a large ice cube into the glass. Add 2-3 oz of your favorite rye whiskey, a small hit of simple sugar syrup, a heavy-handed dash or two of Angostura bitters, an orange peel, and a cherry or two. Enjoy.

And there you have it! Another year of eating well and eating college mascots. Cheers to you and yours! And hit me with your own college mascot recipe ideas in the comments below. (Again, no humans! I shouldn't have to say this.)