Nevada and West Virginia

At first glance, what stands out about Nevada are the amazing buffets in Las Vegas.  It would have been great fun to prepare a big buffet and invite lots of friends, but we just didn't have time.   On second glance, what appears is the influence of Basque Sheephearders in Northern Nevada.  Who knew?   Anyway, we decided to make Basque lamb stew for our main dish.

All of the recipes for Basque lamb stew boiled down to two basic variations.  One contained lamb, roasted red peppers, wine and paprika.  The other was more of a basic stew with lamb, some herbs and root vegetables.  I'm guessing the first is more authentic, but we went for the second since we wanted to include vegetables in the stew.

It turned out to be very easy to find a food particular to West Virginia.  Or least a food that we hadn't heard of before.   Pepperoni rolls (http://www.bobheffner.com/pepperoniroll/index.htm) are a popular snack in there.  There are a lot of variations, but the basic roll is white bread dough with pepperoni rolled up inside and baked.   What could be bad?!

The pepperoni rolls were embarrassingly easy to make.  We took a shortcut and used frozen bread dough.   After cutting it into 12 pieces, we flattened each piece and put 3-4 slices of pepperoni on it.   Roll up jellyroll style, pinch the ends shut and place on a lined or greased cookie sheet.   We then let them rise, and brushed them with a mixture of butter, egg and sugar before baking.  Definitely a hit!