The Remarkable Legacy of Sammy the Bull

On February 25, the one-year anniversary of the Boss’ father Sam’s passing, his family gathered at Brewery Vivant to toast his legacy.

By Dominic Siciliano

All of us will at some point in our lives begin to consider our legacy. I find myself contemplating how people will remember me more and more now that I have a family and children of my own, and because for the first time in my life I have lost someone significant to me: February 25, 2014, marked the one-year anniversary of the death of my grandfather, Sam Siciliano.

A year to the day after his passing, the family gathered together at Brewery Vivant to enjoy a few rounds of ‘Sammy the Bull’, the beer my cousin Jacob brewed in his honor—Sammy the Bull was our grandfather's nickname as a boy.

The perfect beer to commemorate Grandpa, Sammy the Bull was a little boozy and, just like its namesake, if you spent too much time with it, you could easily find yourself three sheets to the wind.

Jacob and Grandma

That evening at Vivant, I was lucky enough to find myself siting across from my grandmother and Jacob. They are not expressive people like Grandpa, more on the artistic side. Grandma, who rarely drinks, took a sip of Jacob's beer. Folks were laughing at the novelty of it. But I caught a glance she gave Jacob. She knows how much it meant to him—to brew this beer for Grandpa, a tribute to his best friend.

I looked down one way, toward my dad, his brother Mark and their wives, both named Barb. Mark and Barb's kids were there as well as some close family friends. Down the other way my four kids were eating fries and coloring on napkins, and my wife Janelle was directing traffic. I looked across to Aunt Laurie, who was holding Jacob’s daughter Izzy, with Jacob’s sister Sarah sitting next to her. On a sleepy Tuesday night in February, this big goofy family had taken over the brewery and exploded it with food and beer and laughter.

What do you think about when you think of your legacy? How do want to be remembered and honored? I’d say on that Tuesday night we honored Sammy the Bull the right way.

Salute, Grandpa. We all miss you so much.

Sam Siciliano's Homemade Kapusta Recipe

Sam Siciliano

By Steve Siciliano

For the past ten years or so we have capped off our big fall sale during Customer Appreciation Week by setting up a make-shift hot dog stand and treating our loyal customers to German wieners, draught root beer and homemade sauerkraut, aka kapusta. While the dogs and suds always garner their share of accolades, it is the kapusta hand-crafted by my father, Sam Siciliano, that has emerged as the undisputed star of this annual event. Today we share Sam’s kapusta recipe in response to dozens of requests.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs. canned sauerkraut, drained 
• ¾ head of cabbage, shredded
• 1.5 cup onion, diced
• 1.5 cup celery, diced
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 15 oz. cans chicken broth
• Pork steak, pork roast or spareribs
• Brown sugar
• Salt & pepper to taste 

Directions: Sauté onions, celery, garlic and pork in oil. Add drained sauerkraut and chicken broth and simmer for fifteen minutes, Add bay leaves, salt and pepper to taste. Add shredded cabbage and simmer for one hour, Add brown sugar to taste.

*Special thanks to Neve Trumpeter for the great candid photo of Grandpa Sam. It was taken this summer on Sam's property up North.

Man's Weekend

By Chris Siciliano

On a Friday in February, 2011, fifteen men traveled up US-131 and converged for a two-night stay in a cottage not far from the Croton Hardy dam. The occasion was the third annual “Man’s Weekend”, a late-winter retreat for the beard-growing members of our species only. Those familiar with the hallowed tradition of camp de la deer (deer camp) would undoubtedly recognize several overlaps between it and our group’s private holiday: whiskey, cards, food, and farting were all in abundance, interrupted only for a few short hours Saturday, when half the company strapped on snowshoes to venture out into the forest, blazing trails through the snow where previously there were none. Even then we had beer with us, and good one’s at that, two bottles of cellar-aged Kentucky Bourbon Stout, which we passed from man to man while gazing out at the frozen surface of Hardy Pond.

Man’s Weekend. Those who might be offended that such a thing exists, rest assured: misogyny this ain’t. Besides a beard and beer gut, all who attend have at least one trait in common, great love and respect for the women in our lives (go ahead, ask them). The fact is an event like Man’s Weekend is a deeply necessary thing, the kind of relief valve hardworking folks need this day and age. At its core, it’s nothing more than a chance to cut loose for a few short days, to drink beer and BS with the boys, to smoke cigars, to suck down bacon, to tell stories, to tromp around the woods, to stand around fires, to sit at poker tables, to curse and carry on in the exact way frowned upon—with good reason—by polite society. Without Man’s Weekend, without deer camp, without the man cave, without the fantasy football league, without whatever it is you and your friends do to stay sane (men and women both), who knows from where and how else that relief would come.

Highlighting specific incidents from man’s weekend is unnecessary—it’s just not that interesting to people who were not there. However, we can and should for reasons of posterity recount the food and drink, cataloging the tasty vittles and suds so that the bearded generations to come might know how to continue this tradition.

Kraut, meat, bread

Dinner Friday included six full pounds of kielbasa from Lewandowski’s Market, boiled first then roasted in the oven. We then sautéed 1.5 quarts of sauerkraut in olive oil, adding a pinch of sugar and maybe a little salt too. Though the sauerkraut was my contribution—I fermented it myself it over a period of months—my father, Steve (the boss), took control of its preparation. Whatever he did he did it well. The kraut was the best I ever had, with a touch of sweetness to take the edge off the otherwise pleasing sour tang.

Along with the kraut and kielbasa we ate thick slices of homemade sourdough wheat bread and washed it all down with many pints of beer, either Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale or Founders Endurance, both poured from icy-cold 1/6 barrel kegs (5.16 gallons) that we set outside in the snow. The beers were the perfect accompaniment for this kind of hearty meal. Though the Endurance was sharper and lighter than its maltier counterpart, each showed the necessary hop backbone to cut through the fatty richness of the kielbasa.

On Saturday, when we woke up hungry, former Siciliano’s employee Tommy Huizing took control of the kitchen, whipping up a classic breakfast of flapjacks, bacon, scrambled eggs, and fried potatoes. I sliced and toasted a loaf of my cheddar-jalapeno sourdough, which normally receives high praise. This morning however my old standby was overshadowed by a new invention—the Man’s Weekend breakfast taco. Former Siciliano’s employee Wes Eaton caught the wind of divine inspiration when he wrapped one of Tommy’s famous flapjacks around a strip of bacon and some banana. Liberally doused with home-rendered maple syrup, this hand-held delight proved to be one of the more remarkable culinary moments of the weekend. The salty, crispy bacon both tempered the syrup's sweetness and  complemented the soft "give" of the banana. Trust me, this is something you'll want to try—the result is true perfection.

Proof of the divine

Before breakfast was on the table, Wes was already making dinner—a venison roast that would slow cook for hours with various root vegetables until all individual components melded into a singular, fantastically earthy taste. When it was finally time to eat, the meat and veggies were so tender you could cut them with a spoon. The natural juicy drippings were rich and satisfying, especially when sopped up with yet more slices of homemade whole wheat sourdough.

As if that wasn’t enough, there were two huge pots of soup simmering all day on the stove. The first was Grandpa Sam's exceptional take on minestrone, a beefy, big-bodied alternative to the all-veggie version that did not disappoint. The second was a smoky, fiery jambalaya with loads of chilpolte peppers. This dish had heat to it, and not a little, and it made for a great excuse to return often to the third and final beer on tap: Founders Harvest Ale.

By Sunday we had all had our fill and it was time to put the wraps on another successful Man’s Weekend. We cleaned the cottage, collected our things, and said our goodbyes, slightly sad to be leaving, but ready too for real life again. Man’s weekend is long enough.

Cheers!

Special Thanks

To Kyle Dood for the Founders sixtels and maple syrup, to host Steve Siciliano for the Celebration Ale, to Greg 'Swig' Johnson for the kielbasa, to Doug, John, and Zack for the Jambalaya, to Jason 'the vet' Chudy for the roasted corn, to Wes for the venison, to Larry for teaching Wes to hunt, to Tommy and Brandon for breakfast, to Alex for the KBS, to Mark for the Stella Artois (Stella!), to Grandpa Sam for the soup and for refilling all our beers.

Chris "The Perch" Siciliano is a writer, teacher, and the managing editor of The Buzz. Recently he relocated to Grand Rapids with his fiance, Gena. Chris would like to apologize to all attendees of Man's Weekend he did not mention here by name. Likewise, he would like to apologize to all attendees of Man's Weekend mentioned here by name. He can be reached at cjsiciliano@gmail.com.

The old man's day out, Part III

In the third and final installment, Steve & company eat fried chicken gizzards, they run into friends at Brewery Vivant, they eventually make it home in one piece...almost. (To read the first and second installments go here and here, respectively.)

I think the Road House is the name of the next bar we hit, and I think the road on which it sits is M43. I’m not really sure of either. The beautiful thing about road trips is that, while you might not know where you are at the moment, rarely are you ever completely and hopelessly lost. I knew we were heading west and I knew that anytime I wanted I could take a right at some crossroads and eventually find the freeway. But sometimes it feels good to be a little lost. Too often our lives are overly regimented—we always seem to be dragging the past with one step and entering the future with the next. Too often we forget about living in the present. Sometimes it’s good to have no clear destination. That’s why I like road trips.

Whatever its name, that bar was a good one. We drank PBRs out of cans. We ate salted peanuts out of cellophane bags. We sat suspended in time, not worrying about the past, not looking toward the future, enjoying for a while the peace-filled present.

Sam Up North, in his element

Sam had a long conversation with the fellow sitting at the bar next to him. I think this fellow was a farmer but I really don’t know what they talked about. I think Sam bought him a drink or two. It felt good to be sitting in an unfamiliar place, my wife at my side, my eighty-year-old dad enjoying himself, my future nothing more than the cold can of PBR sitting on the bar in front of me.

I don’t know how long we were there. It might have been an hour, it might have been two. When we were back in the car heading west again Sam got a little edgy.

“Where in the hell are we?”

“Don’t know, pop,”

“Are we lost?”

“Maybe a little.”

At the next crossroads there was a sign indicating that a place called Sunfield was somewhere to the right. “All right,” I said aloud. “Next stop Sunfield”

We drove north for a few minutes then saw another sign. I turned right again and saw huge grain silos rising over a small cluster of store fronts. In that cluster was a bar.

It was another good bar but I can’t tell you much about it. When you're existing in the present moment it's easy to ignore your senses. I know that I drank High Life out of long neck bottles. I can't tell you what Barb and Sam drank. I know we spent a good amount of time there but I can't tell you how long. I know that we talked to the friendly bartender, that we ordered and ate deep fried pickles and jalapenos, that they tasted wonderful and that just as we were leaving the bartender told us we should come back sometime for dinner. I decided to look at the menu again and another appetizer caught my eye—deep fired chicken gizzards.

“Hey pop, they have gizzards.

“Boy that sounds good.”

We ordered another beer and ten minutes later a huge plate of gizzards was sitting before us. They too tasted wonderful.

When we were back in the car I headed north, found the freeway, and parked on the side of the road. My fellow travelers looked at me. “I need a nap,” I said.

One of the things I love about Barb is that she always has my back. She wouldn't be much help in a bar fight but she's always willing to drive when I get sleepy. She got in the driver's seat and both Sam and I fell asleep.

When I woke I saw the bright lights of the freeway. “Get off at Fuller,” I said.

“Why?”

“Let's take the old man to Vivant.

Sam hadn't been to Brewery Vivant even though his grandson, Jacob Derylo, is the head brewer. He woke up just as Barb was parking.

“Where are we?”

“Brewery Vivant,” I said.

“Where Jacob works?”

“Yup.”

“I'll be damned.”

Barb helped Sam out of the car and held his arm so he wouldn't slip on the icy sidewalk. Inside it was packed. There were no empty tables and there was no place to sit at the bar. We stood for a few minutes and just as I was ready to suggest that we leave the bartender got my attention.

“Dude down there wants to buy you guys a drink.”

I looked to where he was pointing and saw a young man wave at me. I had no idea who he was. I ordered the IPA for myself and Barb and a Farmhand for Sam. A few minutes later a man and a woman got up to leave and the man came over to Sam. “Sit down,” the man said.

Barb said she would stand so I sat next to my dad at the bar. A woman walked over and began talking to Barb. It was Kim, one of the Brewers On The Lake, a local homebrew club. She was with Brian, her husband, and Scott, another BOTL member. While Kim and Barb talked I walked over to their table.

“We just left your store,” Brian said. “I spent a lot of money.”

"God bless you," I said, jokingly.

“This is my wife,” said Scott.

“Pleased to meet you.”

When I made my way back to the bar Barb was sitting next to Sam. “Steve, I like this beer,” Sam said.

“Good for you, pop.”

I looked around the packed pub. It felt good to know all the people were enjoying my nephew Jacob's beer. I was proud of Jake. He had worked at the store during the lean years and was there when we first started selling beer- and wine-making supplies. I like telling people that I taught Jake everything he knows about brewing. It's a lie, of course, but I figure it's not really a lie when the person knows you are bullshitting. While I was feeling proud of Jake I heard a loud shout coming from my dad. “Heeyyy!”

I turned and saw my brother, Mark, his wife Barb, and Jeff and Robin Boorsma.

We left after a few more beers. I carefully made my way from the East side of Grand Rapids to the West. When I parked in front of Sam's house I helped him out of the car. I took hold of his arm but as we were walking on the sidewalk he slipped and fell face first into a snowbank.

“Are you okay, pop?”

“Hell yes,” he answered.

I walked with him into the house. My mother was watching television. “Where have you guys been?” she asked. And then, “Oh, Sam.”

I looked at my dad. He was bleeding from a cut on his nose. It was a small cut, not more than a scratch. Yet in the days ahead, on the mornings he worked at Siciliano's, it often reminded me of our trip to Lansing, and I couldn't help but smile.

The old man's day out, Part II

In the second installment of a three-part series, Steve & company drink beer in Grand Ledge. Steve explains his love for dive bars; Sam makes a new friend. (To read the first installment, click here.)

I like dive bars. Don’t get me wrong. I like classy bars too—the ones with polished wood and gleaming tap towers and the appropriate glassware for a barrel-aged barlywine, or a German heffe or a Belgian triple. But there’s something about sitting in a dive drinking watered-down American pilsners. If the beer you drink is out of aluminum cans or long necks bottles it makes it even better. I like hearing the hard crack of pool balls and listening to country music playing on ancient juke boxes. I like the faded tile and wooden floors, the dusty wall signs and the bar tops worn smooth by years of resting elbows. I like the long, trough-like urinals in the rest rooms, the smell of greasy hamburgers frying on back-bar grills, the packages of Slim Jims, the hanging bags of salted peanuts, pretzels and pork rinds, and the huge jars of pickled pigs’ feet, hard-boiled eggs and ring baloney. I like meeting the people in these bars. I like listening to their stories.

The first bar we hit that day was not a dive. Sometimes you can tell that a bar is a dive from the outside. Sometimes you can’t. The bar we went into on the downtown main street in Grand Ledge is one that you can’t. It’s a good bar but it’s not a dive. I was disappointed by the varnished log walls, the carpeted floor and the classic rock songs piped through speakers in the ceiling. No one was sitting on the padded stools. An aloof bartender walked up and asked if we wanted menus.

“We’re just here to drink,” I said. What’s on tap?”

“Bud, Bud Light, Busch, Amber Bock and MBC Pale.”

“I’ll have the pale.”

“Make it two,” said Barb.

“Make it three,” said my dad.

Sam will drink a craft beer but it’s not what he prefers. He prefers the watery pilsners. All those watery American pilsners except for Bud anyway. I have heard him say more than once that he doesn’t like Bud. I have often wondered what it was about Budweiser that he doesn’t like. Someday I’ll have to ask him. Whenever he drinks a craft beer he always says the same thing. “It’s good, but it’s heavy,”

Sam at wedding

When he finished his beer our glasses were still half full. He took out his thick wallet. “Let’s have another,” he said.

“Put your money away, pop. We need to pace ourselves.”

“Bullshit. I want to buy you guys a beer.”

“Okay, pop.”

We drank the second beer and when we left the bartender didn’t say goodbye.

The second place was also on the town’s downtown main street. This one turned out to be a dive and I was pleased. Every stool was occupied. There was a wooden floor and heads of dead animals on the walls. We sat at a table and after a minute I walked up to the bar.

“Sorry,” the bartender said. “I didn’t see you come in.”

“It’s okay. What’s on tap?”

“Coors, Bells Best Brown and Blue Moon.”

I couldn’t pass up the Best Brown. “Two Best Browns and a blue Moon.”

“This is good,” Sam said after taking a sip of his beer. “What is it?”

“Blue Moon,” I said.

“I like this.”

“I’m glad, pop.”

An old timer got up and shuffled over to the juke box. A few moments later we heard Hank Williams wailing about someone’s cheating heart. “Good choice!” my old man shouted after the man had sat back down. The old timer smiled. Sam got up and for a few minutes stood talking with the man at the bar. “I bought him a drink,” he said after he sat back down. I smiled while listening to Patsy Cline’s silky voice floating through the air.

“I’m having a good time,” Sam said. “I feel like I’m up north.”

We finished our beer. On the way out Sam said goodbye to his new friend. We got back in the car and continued making our way back to Grand Rapids. Fifteen minutes later I spotted a low building surrounded on three sides by snow covered fields. A scattering of dried corn stalks poked up through the snow. I turned into the parking lot.

The old man's day out, Part I

On a cold Friday in February, Steve (the boss) set out for Lansing with his wife and old man. They left Grand Rapids at noon. Ten hours and five bars later they returned home, one of them bloodied, all three of them happy. Below is the story, the first of three installments. 

“Man I hate this weather.”

My father had turned off the vacuum and was looking through Siciliano’s plate glass windows at the falling snow. It’s a statement he makes often during the months when he can’t drive up north to his cabin. There was a time when the winter didn’t bother him so much—when he could still drive two hours on slippery roads, when he could walk a half mile through knee-deep snow dragging supplies on a toboggan, when he could shovel a path to the door, when he could haul logs in from the woodpile and when he could sit for hours watching a bobber on a frozen lake. But he has learned how to accept the limitations of age. My father, Sam Siciliano, is eighty.

Sam & Steve, father & son

He went back to his work and I watched while he vacuumed up the scattering of grain around the grinders. During the springs, summers and falls he carefully sweeps up the grain and dumps it into paper bag. ‘The deer and turkey like it,” he told me once after asking about it.

He had finished vacuuming and was wiping malt extract off the scales when I called out to him. “Hey pop. Barb and I are going to Lansing tomorrow. Why don’t you come with us?”

“What are you doing in Lansing?”

“We have to drop off some paperwork to the LCC,” I said. “We have to get their okay for the expansion.”

“Why do you want me to go?”

“It’ll get you out of the house,” I said. “It might do you good.”

“Why would I want to go to Lansing?”

“Come on, pop. It’ll be fun. On the way home we’ll stop at some bars.”

“Okay,” he said. “Pick me up.”

Sam Siciliano likes to drink. He likes drinking beer and his home-made wine but he doesn’t like drinking alone. He likes people around him when he drinks and the more people there are the better he likes it. When people visit him and my mother at their West side home or at the cabin in Irons he is always eager to get them a drink. If their beer is half full he’ll get them another and if their wine glass is half empty he’ll fill it up. That’s just the way my old man is.

There’s something a little mysterious about that home-made wine. Every year we get grapes from California. I know he doesn’t add more sugar to the must but somehow his wine always seems to be more potent. Our family has learned to stay away from it but there have been many unsuspecting guests that the wine has destroyed; and whenever that destruction occurs, Sam gets in trouble with my mother.

The following day we picked him up at noon. He was waiting on the front porch.

On the way to Lansing I got him to talk about his brothers. My dad has five brothers that are still alive. Tony, the eldest brother, died about fifteen years ago. My dad claims that Tony was the toughest son-of-a-bitch in the neighborhood. I have heard the stories many times—about growing up on the Southeast side of Grand Rapids, about the street fights and bar fights, about stealing watermelons off the backs of trucks, how my grandmother would ignore complaining neighbors and then later beat the appropriate, mischievous son who elicited the complaint. But I never tire of hearing the stories, and while he talked I glanced over at Barb and would see her often smiling.

When we arrived at the Michigan Liquor Control Commission, we had to check in with security. Each of us had to present our drivers license. I watched my dad fumble through his thick wallet and wondered what the hell he was carrying. When we found the person we had to talk to she took the paperwork and looked at me incredulously.

“You came all this way for this? Why didn’t you just mail it?”

“I wanted to make sure you got it,” I replied. “Besides, it’s a nice day for a road trip. My dad hates the winter and we wanted to get him out. We’re going to hit some dive bars.”

I saw Barb give me a hard glance and I realized that telling the folks at the liquor control that we were going bar hopping was not very bright.

The lady looked over at my dad who was sitting and paging through a magazine. “I’m sure you’ll have a good time."

Stay tuned for the second of three installments, coming soon!