Bear Essentials: Mitten Noms - Michigan Classics ( + Coney Dogs )

There's no denying that the Coney Dog is a hot mess of a dish.  You take a hot dog and top it with a spiced ground-beef-gravy sort of sauce.  And then you layer on the mustard.  And the onions.  And if you're a bit of an iconoclast, you toss on some shredded Cheddar.  I did.  And I don't regret it one bit.  But you're going to want to double up on the napkins. 

Bear Essentials: Pineapple ( + Cinnamon-Poached Pineapple)

Until I was nine or ten and learned about Super Mario Brothers, the best thing I could imagine winning was the serving of fruit cocktail that held the one lipstick-colored, smashed half of a maraschino cherry.

If you don't understand this reference, canned fruit clearly didn't feature as heavily in your childhood as it did in mine.

Bear Essentials: Pudding( + Southwestern Corn Pudding )

The first thing that I ever cooked regularly was cornbread.  

We were a family of routine.  Fish sticks were eaten with Kraft Macaroni and Cheese.  Tacos were eaten with Spanish Rice.  And Beans & Franks (which is, in case you're wondering, exactly what it sounds like) was eaten with cornbread.

We ate a lot of franks.  We ate a lot of beans.  And we ate a lot of cornbread.