It all started innocently enough. The week of New Year’s eve had me thinking about sauerkraut. This was something I didn’t experience much growing up in the ‘burbs just south of Akron, but once I met my wife it became a part of my New Year’s Eve celebrations. Her family would have a New Year’s Eve get together at their house in Ellet, and her dad would often take out his Civil War reproduction mortar and set off a nice loud boom to welcome in the New Year. (I really miss that guy. His name was Jack, but some people called him “Boomer” because of his canons. But that’s another post.)

I went mostly because a) I loved my girlfriend (now wife), and b) I loved the food.

One thing that also was commonly part of New Year’s during this era was having some sauerkraut balls. These fantastical balls of fried awesome were almost anywhere you went in Akron for New Year’s Eve. A little kraut, a little sausage, some cream cheese, and lots of breading. Then you dropped the balls into a fryer which turned into something magical that allows you to feel, even if only for a moment, that Counting Crows may have been right when they said “there’s reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last.”

So off we trundled to the large grocery chain near us that typically has everything. We asked the guy in the frozen foods section where we could find these happy treats. Blank stare. He whips out his trusty device and searched their website. Nothing.

So it seems to me that perhaps this is something best found in the deli area, where the chain sells maybe the best fried chicken in the country. Guy at the counter, blank stare: “You want what?” He goes off to find someone who’s worked there longer than he has, and then returns to report sadly that no one on staff has ever even heard of sauerkraut balls. NEVER HEARD OF THEM? I felt like Patrick Star on Sponge Bob during their ill fated visit to Rock Bottom.

I post a lament on Facebook, which prompts a hue and cry from my Akron friends: “How can this be?” “WHERE do you live again?” Then finally someone says, “You know that’s an Akron thing, right?”

Oh man. Smacked in the face again. “It’s an Akron thing.”

When I left Akron nearly a decade ago after spending all my life there, I was convinced it was time to do what George Bailey longed to do….”I know what I’m gonna do tomorrow, and the next day, and the next year, and the year after that. I’m shakin’ the dust of this little town off my feet and I’m gonna see the world.” But during this time away, I’ve found there are a ton of “Akron Things” that I took for granted. It’s like in Big Yellow Taxi….”you don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone.”

For example…when we lived in Missouri, we tried to get cremesticks. You know, those fabulous doughnuts filled with sweet creme? One stop at Ann’s Bakery in our adopted hometown of Wadsworth and I would have had all I wanted.

But no! In Missouri when I described what I was looking for, they said “Oh, you want Long John’s!” So I bought one. And let me go on record here as saying categorially that if you’re from Akron, you absolutely DO NOT want a Long John. Bah. Nassssty, precioussss. Then in Florida, I was thrilled when I saw that the big chain here had cremesticks! “Thank God,” I thought, “civilization again.”

Now let me just tell you how wrong I was. Oh, they are cremesticks all right. Lovely doughnut, sweet creme center, chocolate glaze on top. But to accomplish this, they don’t inject the cream filling, like you’d find in a Twinkie. Oh no, these animals slice the doughnut in half and spread it like butter in the center. Now I defy you to eat this without the filling squirting all over your car, your hair, your trunk, your neighbor’s house. It’s impossible to ingest properly. I literally had to take shower after eating one. Because apparently……

“It’s an Akron thing.”

So now it’s sauerkraut balls on New Year’s Eve. As my sadness overwhelmed me, facing the start of another year without ingesting fried delight, I felt like George Bailey running through Pottersville. Naturally, it was my Ellet girl who saved me. Again.

This is the same girl who can create exact replicas of White House hot sauce and Village Inn coleslaw. So she spends about 2 minutes online, and then says “I’m going to the store.” She runs out on the morning of New Year’s Eve and suddenly I find that rather than having plain old sauerkraut, which was an acceptable but disappointing solution to my sauerkraut ball sadness, I will instead BE HAVING SAUERKRUAT BALLS! As one should. On New Year’s Eve. A thousand miles away from Akron. Turns out kinda like Mary Bailey, as long as my Ellet girl is with me, I’m still in Akron. She made magic happen on this New Year’s Eve!

Now, if only Jack “Boomer” was here with his mortar, all would be right with the world.