meatetarian eats the masters >> an illusion of simplicity

For 30 years, nearly every time I introduced myself as Dallas, I was asked if I was from Dallas or Texas.

“Nope, I’m from around Augusta, Georgia.”

“Oh! Augusta! That’s where the Masters is, right? Do you golf?”

I do not. I barely Putt-Putt, and I never found myself caught up in the hubbub of the golf tournament that calls my hometown its own. Growing up, Masters Week was also our spring break, so though I’d occasionally watch the final hole with my family, it’s never been the sport I drop everything I’m doing to put on TV {read: Georgia games}. But when you grow up surrounded by something like that, that even non-golf fans know about and think is a big deal, it’s hard to escape the lore of the course.
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Even our local baseball team is called the Augusta Greenjackets — a play on the prestigious green jackets that winners of the Masters earn and that are also worn by members of the Augusta National. No one but members know how to become members, and most of the membership list is hush-hush (although I did find this 2015 one on Bloomberg), so it’s kind of like the Masons … except with significantly fewer really cool movies, books, History Channel documentaries and an order to protect the Holy Grail. 

my personal favorite (and now retired) logo for the augusta greenjackets, found via google.

But there are some pretty legendary things associated with the Augusta National: the beauty of the course, particularly when all the azaleas are blooming; its awesome history as a peach orchard; the amount of exclusivity and experience given to patrons, even we peasants who aren’t members; and, of course, the food.
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I would be 100 percent surprised if this is the first time you’ve ever read anything about the food at Masters Week tournaments. More than anything, given that golf is not my favorite sport, I wanted to go to the course for the crème de la crème of US sporting events cuisine. 
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This year, I was lucky enough to be able to, thanks to my parents winning the coveted ticket 

lottery for the first-ever Augusta National Women’s Amateur tournament. The first few days of the tournament were held at another area golf course, Champion’s Retreat, but the final was held at the Augusta National. JE and I were given the tickets as part of my 30thbirthday present, and I could not wait to get my hands on a pin for my collection … and my mouth on pimento cheese and egg salad sandwiches.

The recipes for these, especially the pimento cheese, remain 1) an actual mystery and 2) a closely guarded secret. A man named Nick Rangos created the recipes for these two sandwiches and made the pimento cheese mixture himself. In the early 2000s, Augusta National executives decided to have the local restaurant Wife Saver {personal note: I promise I’ll write about this place too; it’s a hometown favorite} make the sandwiches. Well … Wife Saver makes some damn good fried chicken and sides, but its initial pimento cheese sandwich was not up to par — hey look! A golf pun! -- with Rangos’ original recipe. Rangos wasn’t tellin’ nobody his secret recipe, especially the owner of the business that now had his business, so the Wife Saver folks spent a hot minute getting things right. Rangos passed away, and his original pimento cheese recipe died with him. According to Newsweek, the National eventually moved all concession-creation in-house, so I cannot be sure how accurate this year’s sandwich was to the one Nick Rangos developed more than 40 years ago. 
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But I am very accurate when I say it was good. Like, went back and got seconds good. Rivals my Nanny’s pimento cheese good.

stacks on stacks of souvenir sandwiches, pimento cheese and egg salad, from the augusta national. note the impeccable and on-trend modern branding on the sandwich bags. yes y'all, i brought sandwiches home for photos since cameras are not allowed on the course during tournament days.

There was a tense moment when JE claimed he liked a particular brand of store-bought pimento cheese better, but I think that’s sacrilege. Personally, I think I have more expertise than he does in this situation, because I have tried numerous pimento cheeses over my 30 years and this is top three, for absolute certain. No. 1 is my Nanny’s, the No. 2 spot belongs to Proper Pepper out of Sandersville, Georgia. 

Pimento cheese, for all intents and purposes, is a blend of mayonnaise, cheeses, pimiento peppers and seasonings. Fun fact though, a lot of commercially made pimento cheeses use red bell peppers, not pimiento peppers, in their mixtures because it’s cheaper. Lame sauce, y’all. You gotta have the real thing. Improperly made pimento cheese can also be overly creamy and mushy, so having the right ratio of mayonnaise-to-cheese is muy importante. Especially when enjoyed in sandwich form, a soppy and liquid-y pimento cheese mixture can seep into the bread and cause it to be as great as that PB&J that got squished at the bottom of your lunch box that one day in first grade. The other way improper way pimento cheese can be made is too dry, either because there wasn’t enough mayonnaise to balance the cheese, or the cheese itself was poor quality and winds up with a mealy texture. Gross.

Whether it was Rangos’, Wife Saver’s or some sweetheart in the Augusta National kitchen’s recipe that was lovingly spread between two slices of soft white bread this Saturday, it was the perfect balance of all ingredients. There was texture from the cheeses — definitely some type of cheddar involved, and possibly a white cheese as well; my palate is sadly not that distinctive yet — but it was still creamy and light. The peppers themselves had a nice bite to them too, and the flavor wasn’t exactly spicy, but you could tell there was seasoning added other than salt. 
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Oh, and did I mention these bad boys are like, less than two bucks each? Yeah. Not a joke. That’s less than half the price of a bottle of water at a Georgia football game.

james edward and i at the founders circle photo op during the augusta national women's amateur this weekend.

The egg salad sandwiches, of which I may or may not have had three {stop giving me that judge-y look!}, were equally satisfying. Egg salad is a mixture of chopped or diced hard-boiled eggs, mayonnaise, seasoning and in some cases, spices or pickle relish. Maybe some mustard, too. There wasn’t any pickle relish in the egg salad sandwich at the Augusta National, and the egg salad was seasoned very lightly. What impressed me most about the mixture here was the texture. It almost seemed whipped, it was so airy! 

Neither sandwich seeped too far into the bread slices, and I swear whoever they had quality-controlling the bread here deserves a trophy too. The most magnificent part of these sandwiches is their simplicity: only a few ingredients, reminiscent of things most Southern 

mamas and cooks make on the reg; and there’s nothing pretentious about them, even though they’re sold at one of the most exclusive sporting event in the world. But the simplicity is almost an illusion.
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Think about it. Pimento cheese and egg salad are two very Southern things that you can find in a gazillion places and a basquillion different forms anywhere below the Mason-Dixon. The Augusta National could have hired the freakin’ Kroger across the street to commercially produce enough egg salad and pimento cheese to spread on enough Wonderbread slices for a cheap-enough price for multiple thousands of people to enjoy. Instead, they found a local man, then a local restauranteur, then their own staff to create, re-create and re-re-create Southern classics using ingredients so pristine and perfectly balanced that it adds to the grandeur of the experience of being one of the Chosen Ones to attend an event during Masters Week. I bet there’s not a stale piece of bread within three miles of Washington Road the week leading up to and the week of Masters.

The food is about where the simplicity ends at the Augusta National. Outside of the concession shops, where the most expensive thing is a souvenir cup of beer at five whole dollars, you’re in a different world. Perhaps you’ve been year after year, but this being my first time (and also, this being my website, lol) I’d like to indulge those who’ve never had the opportunity. 

You do not have to like golf to be part of the tournament. Golf on TV? B O R I N G. Golf when you’re there, when Anna Redding’s ball lands in the spectator area behind you in Amen Corner so you’re like five feet from one of the most amazing collegiate athletes, is definitely not boring. You get caught up in the tenseness of a shot. The hush of the crowd, the whistle of a ball flying through the air. The shock of the woman next to you hissing, “She marked it!” and you have no idea what that means, but apparently it’s important to what happened 

mom's post-tournament photo of us with our souvenirs, and of course my fur-sister ami dale. behind us are my parents' azaleas, similar to those we saw on the course.

between Jennifer Kupcho and Maria Fassi, the two leaders going into the tournament final. And you get caught up in the beauty of the course, the pinks and magentas and fuchsias of the azalaeas contrasting with the taupe sand-traps and perfect shades of green grass. Even, as my daddy pointed out, the pinestraw is manicured. You get caught up in clapping when everyone else does and gasping when everyone else does, and you wonder to yourself, “Is this what a football game is like for non-football fans and way too many freshman girls?”
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If you have the chance to go, go. Don’t scalp your tickets, those coveted passes that grant you entrance through the heavily guarded gates. Do eat the sandwiches, and the peach ice cream sandwiches they ran out of, and maybe the barbecue too.

​And if you think about it, make a dumb nerd joke about whether or not there are sarlaccs at the bottom of those pesky sand traps.