This
a Romany Gypsy recipe for a cheap and filling sausage and potatoes
plate. It is sometimes called “Joe Grey” and would be served as
a runny stew, with crusty bread. Here we strengthen it up with some
spinach and dedicate it to a Gypsy LGBT hero known as Mikey Walsh.
Read about him after the recipe.
Sausages,
tomatoes, potatoes and onions plus a bit of spinach makes this hearty
healthy meal perfect for the weather.
Ingredients:
3 or
4 uncooked bratwurst
3
slices thick cut bacon
1
large onion
1 can
diced potatoes
1 can
diced tomatoes
32 oz
container low sodium beef broth
5-ounce
bag baby spinach
Directions:
Do
your cutting: chop onion into chunks
In
Dutch oven, brown the bratwurst, 8
to 10 minutes.
Remove and cut each in thirds.
Add
bacon to pot, cook until rendering grease,add onions and cook until
soft.
Return
meats to pot add drained tomatoes and drained potatoes. Cover with
heated beef broth.
Bring
to a simmer
Add
spinach by the handfuls as they wilt.
Let
cook, stirring occasionally, for about 30
to 40 minutes.
If you wish thicker dish, make a slurry with 3 Tbs cornstarch and
water, stir in in small amounts until it reaches the thickness you
wish.
Traditionally
served on a plate with a crust bread dunked in to sop up all the
liquid.
For
our music:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gU_GsIKxse0
What
an honor to dedicate this to Mikey Walsh!
socialslave
To
satisfy and restore.
To
nourish, support and maintain.
To
gratify, spoil, comfort and please,
to
nurture, assist, and sustain
…..I
cook!
Please
buy slave's cookbook:
The
Little Black Book of Indiscreet Recipes by Dan White
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00F315Y4I/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_vAT4sb0934RTMvia @amazon
==============================
Today's
LGBT hero is a surprising combination. The very fact that he
survives and even thrives should be an inspiration to us all.
Mikey
Walsh was brought up to be a bare-knuckle fighter in the Gypsy
community, but being gay, he was forced to leave his family and
culture in 1996.
Mikey
Walsh never wanted to be a fighter. His father was “fiercely
determined” to have a son that was a true fighter.
In
Romany culture, having a male child was everything — even more so
for the Walsh family, which was known for generations of manly
men who were good with their fists.
So,
going against their heart doctor's advice not to try for a second
child, Mikey followed his older sister Frankie. Upon the happy event,
Mr. Walsh hung golden boxing gloves around his newborn son’s neck.
Growing
up, Mikey loved the dramatic. He and his sister, enjoyed dress-up.
They loved watching TV and, largely unsupervised, they played outside
with their cousins, who lived on the same compound.
It
would have been a wonderful early childhood but at age four, his
father decided that it was time to start fight training, and the best
way to do it was to beat the boy. His disgust at Mikey’s cries
meant more punches.
By
age 13, Mikey realized that he was gay, which, he knew, would enrage
his father. He also knew that he needed to escape before it cost him
his life.
And
it wasn’t just the fact that Mikey was gay. “It is hard for
everyone who is different and comes from my community,” he says.
“If
you want to marry a non-gypsy or not follow the path that’s been
set out for you, it’s hard. It was always going to be difficult for
my father to accept what I am, especially in a community where
everyone feels like that.
Even
if he could have managed to survive his father’s blows and keep his
sexuality hidden in a community with few concealed truths, there was
an even darker secret that Mikey had to escape.
His
father’s brother Joseph had been sexually abusing him since he was
seven years old, but Mikey knew his family would never believe it.
He
still can’t dwell on this part of his story.
When
he was 15, there was a bounty on his head because he had run away
from his gypsy family. As a gay teenager, he knew the next beating he
got from his father might kill him.
Mikey’s
not his real name. It’s a character from The
Goonies, the
children’s film he watched over and over as a young boy. But that’s
the name he’s been known by for half of his life.
Mikey Walsh is a handsome young
man, but for more than a decade he’s known it would be too
dangerous for him to have his photograph taken.
More
than 15 years ago, he left one of Britain’s most private
communities and has since told many of its secrets.
Sometimes
Mikey even wonders if he made the right decision to leave. Like some
other gay gypsies, he could have taken the decision to stay and live
a lie.
“When
I think of being on the run I think how alive I was. When I was 15 I
would sit up all night praying not to be gay. But if I hadn’t been,
none of this would have happened.
“I
went on this journey to find normality. I wanted the most boring,
humdrum life.”
And
he has found a place in “normal” society, working as a teaching
assistant in a school for children with learning disabilities.
“I
love it,” he says. “And I’m getting the primary school
education that I never had – learning about things like the
Saxons.”
Mikey
pushed through adult education and taught himself to use a laptop.
Then he wrote the first chapter of his life story and sent it to all
the biggest publishers. One of them offered him a book deal.
The
story of his escape from his violent upbringing, Gypsy
Boy, became a number
one bestseller. His first book ended as Mikey left the camp and it’s
now being made into a film. X+Y director Morgan Matthews is set to
direct, and Benedict Cumberbatch is going to star, playing Walsh's
Father.
“I’m
hard on myself when I write, that’s my father always in my head,
pushing to do better,” he says. “But the books aren’t
ghostwritten – they are me.”
His
follow-up autobiogrpahy Gypsy
Boy on the Run
tells the story of what happened next – how Mikey hid for years
from gypsy hard men sent by his father.
It
is also a story of endless kindness, from the woman who helped him
open a bank account to the teacher who taught him to read.
Now,
incredibly, after everything that has happened, he is reconciled with
his family and there is no longer a bounty on his head. But other
people who claim to represent the gypsy community have threatened
him.
“I’m
happy to stay anonymous – I never wanted fame,” he says. So Mikey
remains a mass of contradictions. He is famous, but anonymous and for
years he had no formal education, but is the author of two books.
“Some
people actually thought I was a made-up person,” he
I’ve
had detractors saying I was the creation of a publisher. People think
you can’t not go to school and write a bestseller.”
Mikey
says the runaway success of Gypsy
Boy has brought
ups and downs. He worries that people reading his books might think
he isn’t proud to be a gypsy.
“I’m
very proud of who I am – being a gypsy is in your blood,” he
says. “There is this amazing sense of community and respect for
each other – a huge extended family. “And it is something I
really miss. There were so many colorful characters.”
He
doesn’t often visit his gypsy relatives but he is still close to
his mother and sister. “Mum just feels it’s easier I’m out of
it all. But she wrote me a really lovely letter recently. She drew
around her hand and sent it.”
“That’s
the final part of my story told,” he says.
“This
is me – I’m going to go off and be a grown-up.”
No comments:
Post a Comment