StreetVerse

Da Illest Story About Watercress

Posted By: The Rational Investor
Filed Under: Comedy, Food, Movies on February 13, 2010

Verse I: The Homegrown

It’s a mild October night, I’m starving. It’s around half past eight. I’ve just been let out from a Master Gardener class and our lesson over the past month or so had been ‘how to cultivate your own homegrown.’  Friday is our show-n-tell night. The majority of the class chose to grow for medicinal and spiritual purposes (many growers are part of the Kapnobatai clan). It’s no surprise here in Southern California where it is the number one cash crop. In fact, this class wouldn’t be around if it wasn’t for Mary Jane. Although I fully support the federal legalization of qannabos, food is my only drug, and I chose to cultivate watercress. Why? Well that MF grows fast as fuck and is mad nutritious, and while cannabinoids do add one helluva kick to brownies, they don’t really add to the flavor. Watercress got mad flavor. Also, the ancient Greeks believed that “Eating cress makes one witty” and I’ve been fairly dry and dull ever since I moved to Southern California. Self-deprecation? Self-deprecation.

So back to the class, my show-n-tell went as I expected. Only the fat soccer moms admired my fleshy, shiny, heart-shaped leaves. All the unkempt kids in the class didn’t have shit for growth on their psychoactive bullshit plants. Not even a THC bud yet. I was the winner and Shakesperean cultivation champion, but I was hungry.

I left the class and made haste in my black M3. Mazda3 that is. My stomach was thinking outside the bun and laced in MSG. Vietnamese (or Vietnese as some of the Caucasian folks say) sounded about right.

My Idea of What the Aysya Fridge Looks Like

There’s this Viet/French/Thai spot down the block from me that I haven’t been to ever since I saw the Ratatouille rat enter it by escaping from the KFC across the street. It’s called Aysya and this night is Bikini night. How delightful. Just what I need after a night of hanging out with characterless Swedish housewives and frat boys talking about plants. So I arrive at Aysya and its popping. The music is bumping loud enough to make a gang of guidos start their fist pumps to bang the beat. There were mad herds of white boys ogling the scenery, tipping big and satisfying their yellow fever for the night. Mad Vietnamese MFs hanging out at the bar fully furnished in Armani Exchange suits financed by their parents. For the most part,  it is a sausage fest and the only girls there are the ones wearing about 4 inches of fabric hiding only the body parts, which if revealed would require a bouncer at the door. I take a seat right by the dance floor.

Verse II: The Order

One of the half-nekkid legal hookers asks if I want a drink. I tell her I’m going all out tonight and want a glass of milk. She smiles at me awkwardly and thinks I’m trying to be cute. She must have thought I was giving her a line she’s heard a million times, given that her pale mammaries are pasted directly in my line of sight. I tell her, “Nah, I’m being serious.” And through the music that is now banging loudly, I say, “milk please.”

Aysya Waitress Résumé Photo

The stereo speaker is directly to the left of me and my table is starting to thump every time the bass kicks in. The legal harlot comes back with my drink and asks if I’m ready to order. With my watercress garden class trophy for Best Growth glimmering in my mind, I tell her I want a Banh Mi swich with watercress in it.

“Can you guys hook me up with it something special? I have an itch for it.”

She says, “For real? How many do you want?”

“Enough for two so you can join me (my lame attempt at flirting).”

“Alright meet me at the bar when I call you over.”

The EPIC FAIL flirt attempt turn out to be an be EPIC NGUYEN! I’m surprised the girl could hear me clearly with all the fucking guido music playing. Basking in my glory of being watercress champion of the evening and using it to pick up girls, I decide to sit back in my chair and enjoy my glass of “bovinic rum” and keep my eye on the bar. Within a few minutes, the legal tramp calls me over and there’s a plate with a Banh Mi sandwich sitting on it.

” Where’s the second one?” I ask her.

“Check under the plate,” she says. I look under the plate and see a baggy with 2 pills chillin’ inside. She looks at me as if I’m suppose to do something. “What is that?” I ask her. She says it’s mitsu. “Huh?”

“Mitsubishi x,” she responds.

It takes me about 10 seconds of a stupid dazed look at the baggy to realize what’s going on. I leave a green paper photo of Lincoln for the milk and am Audi 5000, leaving the (now) illegal Jezebel and her drugs back at the bar. I never get around to asking why she offered me the drugs, my guess is I said some kind of keyword: ‘watercress’ maybe?

Verse III: The Sandwich Millionaire

My Recollection of Slumdog Millionaire.

So it was a fun night despite the drug deal that I almost got involved in. I’m still hungry as fuck, so I head back home. Fuck man what can I make? All I got is this half grown watercress and whatever’s in the fridge. What’s in the fridge and how can I make a recipe out of it all? Let’s do this shit Slumdog Millionaire style. Question: What’s da illest sandwich you can put together using watercress?

*WARP BACK IN TIME TO THE YEAR 1987*

Context: I’m sitting in front of a fly I recently disected with a Silverhawks toy.

Me: Tio Loulou, your mustard sandwiches are great can you make me one.
Tio Loulou: Ok, Mr. cool.

*WARP BACK TO PRESENT*.

A couple of key scenes happen with me trying to find something complementing the mustard while a cop punches me, and I fall into a pile of shit.

*WARP BACK IN TIME TO THE YEAR 1997*

Context: Walking around the ghettos of Paris, France with a McDonald’s meal in my hand.

French Ghetto Kid: So which part of New York you from? Brookyln, Bronx?
Me: Bronx. You guys seriously eat mayonnaise with your McDonald’s fries?
French Ghetto Kid: Yes my American friend, we put crushed garlic in it.
Me: This shit tastes dope.
French Ghetto Kid: Yes, very fly.

*WARP BACK TO PRESENT*

Sandwich ingredients still a bit too dry for my tastes. So, I look for another wet item to throw in there and this rich fat guy named Javed tries to eat my sandwich and ends up spitting it out.

*WARP BACK IN TIME TO THE YEAR 2004*

Context: At an Italian-American household with Italian-American friend who just announced he was marrying an African-American woman to his Italian-American mega-conservative grandparents (don’t ask me why I wrote this memory with so much political correctness).

Italian-American Friend: Na, Pa, yea so this is my girl we’re gonna get married her name’s Lakeisha.
Grandparents stare at each other uncomfortably.
Me: Mr. Vanzetti this pasta sauce is incredible, what’d you put in it?
Mr. Vanzetti: Nothing just tomati e olio. ‘Tony you’re out of your mind. Is she even Catholic?

*WARP BACK TO PRESENT*

Hmm, need a protein. Egg? Nah. What else we got? I try to eat my sandwich at a train station but my childhood friend and his thugs stomachblock me.

*WARP BACK IN TIME TO YESTERDAY*

Context: I open refrigerator. My gilfriend is sewing next to me.

Me: What the fuck kinda bread is this? Has mad mold.
IndoSage: It’s not mold it’s flax seed and onion. It’s Flax-seed Onion Bread.
Me: What’s your beef with wheat?
IndoSage: Shutup, eff outta here.
Me: Da fuck is this!
IndoSage: Oil browned turkey.
Me: Why you gotta buy everything brown? You mad racist.

*WARP BACK TO PRESENT*

I spread the mayo and mustard on the toasted onion bread with the the turkey placed on the bread first. Outside, my childhood friend shoots himself in a tub of money, gangsta styles.

*WARP BACK IN TIME TO THE YEAR 1990*

Context: Sitting at my aunt’s coffee table eating a ham and cheese sandwich.

Me: This cheese is EWWWWWW.
Aunt: Et teeeeeh ["and ummm" to the English speaking world] it’s not called ewww, it’s… como se dice….. et teeeeeehhh.
Aunt #2: It’s called Heidi Ann…
Aunt: Heidi Ann Swiss Cheese. I’m on a diet.
Me: I like the monster cheese not this one.
Aunt: It’s called…. et tehhhhhh, muenster cheese not monster. When you get to be my age you’ll understand good cheese is not based on its name.

*WARP BACK TO PRESENT*

I throw the swiss cheese on the turkey, add the tomatoes and close it off with the FRESH watercress that I grew over the past few weeks. I end up with THE phat sandwich that I should’ve made at home in the first place. Every bite of it is an ode to my bitter, sweet, delicious memories.

Verse IV: The Recipe

1 handfull of fresh watercress
2 slices of flax-laced onion bread lightly toasted
2 slices Heidi Ann swiss cheese
1/4 thinly sliced romano tomato drizzled in olive oil
2 slices oil-browned turkey breast
5 pickle slices
pepper to taste
mayonnaise with roasted crushed garlic
yellow mustard

No Mitsubishi X required.

Verse V: The Pics to Prove

Verse VI: The Resolution

Watercress sandwich is a Nguyen for me. Mitsubishi X is FAIL for girl and vietnamese restaurant. My girlfriend ends up kicking me out for flirting with bikini waitress. I hope some of those Swedish mom’s from my class are single cuz I can tell they already like to eat.

About the Author

The Rational Investor whirlwinds through streetverse at a crazy rate. He holds a G.E.D. in Illness.