I found this vintage serving piece — a quadruple condiment caddy — on eBay:

The last time I saw one of these was at The Stables, a Houston steakhouse that unfortunately closed in 2003.  It was used at the restaurant to tote toppings for baked potatoes — crumbled bacon, grated cheddar cheese, green onions, maybe sour cream (it might have only had three dishes — my memory has faded).

I’m sentimental about The Stables — it was the first “nice” restaurant I ate at in Houston. My roommates hadn’t made it down from New York yet, and I was dining by myself.  I remember that my meal was good, but what was really exciting about that dinner was that Tom Laughlin, star of the Billy Jack movies, and his wife Delores Taylor (who also starred in the Billy Jack movies), were also dining there.  No one believed me, but I’m positive it was them.  If only I’d had an iPhone 40 years ago.

Do you remember the Billy Jack movies?

Billy Jack was half American Navajo, a Green Beret Vietnam War vet, and a hapkido master.  His feet were lethal weapons.  He was very popular.

We could do worse

My husband and I loved The Stables.  The bar was always thick with smoke and packed with people — often with prominent Houstonians — kicking back drinks.  We discovered B-52s there — a layered drink consisting of shots of Kahlua, Bailey’s Irish Cream, and Grand Marnier.  We ordered one every time we went.  On one occasion our waitress asked, “do you want that frozen?”  McScuse me?  Turns out, with a scoop or two of vanilla ice cream, a B52 becomes a delicious boozy shake.  There was no looking back from that point on.

Inspired by the quadruple condiment caddy and memories of The Stables, we made a batch of frozen B-52s recently, except instead of grabbing Kahlua, I grabbed Frangelico by mistake.  Well, my oh my, that was a happy accident!  We dubbed our creation a B-24 Liberator.  It goes down really easy, and if you’re not careful, you may indeed end up bombed.  🙂

I said divide among four glasses!