Happy Birthday, King!

Chowing Down with Elvis

By Rick Horowitz

So there we were celebrating Elvis's birthday a few days early, and Elvis reaches across the table and says to me, "Here, try this." And so then I --

I know what you're thinking: It didn't happen that way. It couldn't possibly happen that way. You're right: A guy like Elvis is way too busy to celebrate his birthday with the likes of me, not with all those malls and 7-11's he has to visit and be sighted in and the records and the concerts and such, not to mention being seriously dead for the past however-many years.

But his spirit was there anyhow, right there in the kitchen, the closer we got to January 8th. A man turns a new page -- even a man who doesn't turn things for himself anymore -- he deserves a moment's contemplation, even reevaluation, which is exactly what I was doing with the jar of peanut butter and the two bananas. I figured it was time.

They used to poke fun at Elvis. Funny name. Dressed funny. Moved funny. Then he got big and famous and people didn't laugh so much anymore, until he got dead -- then the stories started, and people started laughing again. And what did they laugh about the most? (Other than the sex and the drugs and the guns, I mean.) They laughed about the food -- huge quantities, and strange combinations.

And what was one of the strangest combinations, maybe Elvis's most famous favorite food? That's right: fried peanut-butter-and-mashed-banana sandwiches. People heard about Elvis's fried peanut-butter-and-mashed-banana sandwiches and they said, "That boy is weird." (Other than the sex and the drugs and the guns, they meant.)

That's exactly how I felt, too, until just the other day with his birthday approaching, when I had a revelation: Of course peanut-butter-and-banana sandwiches! Only a genius would have seen the possibilities -- but wasn't that Elvis exactly? The first guy to pull together white country swing and black rhythm-and-blues -- of course he'd be the one to bring peanut butter and bananas together and change the face of sandwichdom forever.

I'd been skeptical. I'd seen sandwiches come and go. I once knew a restaurant that had hamburgers topped with peanuts and fried oysters; it never tasted half as good as it sounded. But now I reconsidered; the line between visionary and flop is a thin one. Instead of peanuts, there'd be peanut butter. Instead of hamburger, bananas. And instead of breaded oysters, breaded bread.

So I was willing, but I wanted to do it right. Up to now, I had rumors instead of facts -- there were vital details missing. So I did the only thing I could do:

I called Graceland.

True: I called Memphis, called the Mansion itself, and a woman named Bonnie helped me out. "It's like a grilled cheese sandwich," she told me. (What inspiration! Starting with something so common...) Oil or butter? "A little butter on the outside," she said, "then you put your peanut butter and banana in between." You mash the bananas, right? "Slice 'em, probably," she said. ("Probably"? Is there doubt even in Graceland?) And the bread -- any particular kind of bread? "Just plain ol' bread," Bonnie said.

It doesn't get any plainer than Wonder Bread. And Peter Pan peanut butter, and two bananas -- one to slice, one to mash, just to be sure. I even decided to butter one sandwich, the way Bonnie said, and quick-fry a second one in oil, in case "fried" really meant "fried."

For one glorious night, my kitchen was Graceland North -- Elvis on the stereo, peanut butter and bananas in the pan. I cooked, I flipped. Then I tasted: The man knew.

And for one glorious moment, I felt -- can I say this? -- a little like The King himself. Fat, but happy. The buttered was better than the quick-fried, definitely, though I have to admit I liked the mashed bananas even better than the sliced. Elvis will forgive me.

I know what you're thinking.

Don't be cruel.