Get your fill, and then some, for $40 a day
Rachael Ray has no idea how easy she has it.
Really, how difficult can it be to sit around a television studio, chatting with the noncontroversial and inconsequential while leaving the heavy fighting to the girls at The View?
Then, when she cooks for the Food Network, she does it in 30 minutes. Who's done with dinner in a half-hour, the executive chef at Checkers?
But neither of those is even the cushiest part of her job. That comes when she goes out on the road, exploring cities throughout the country and trying to find three satisfying meals for just $40. It's sometimes difficult in a New York or a Chicago, where brunch can cost twice that much.
But if she really wanted a challenge, she'd try to do the Masters Tournament on $40 a day.
That's where the test would be not to stay within a budget but to actually need one.
At most sporting events, 40 bucks won't get you to halftime. At a major league ballpark, it wouldn't fill a back tooth.
But at Augusta National Golf Club, where concession prices are stuck in the bygone era this place defines, you'll stretch a stomach long before stretching a dollar.
Besides, if you stay out of the clubhouse and stick to the traditional green-baggie Masters fare available on the course, options are limited. Especially by eliminating the most popular menu item at Augusta because you have always considered a pimento cheese sandwich to be earwax on white bread.
So eating your way to $40 takes a little work, a big gut and some really questionable judgment.
But it can be done.
Here's how:
BREAKFAST: Start with a couple of egg salad sandwiches (eggs, breakfast, why not?) and a Coke.
Quickly realize that, at $4, this first meal has consumed only 10 percent of your day's budget. So, decide that you're on the culinary equivalent of the first tee and allow yourself to reload.
You're on your way with four sandwiches and two Cokes. But there are a lot of strokes left.
Cost: $8
Total spent: $8
Total remaining: $32
BACKUP BREAKFAST: You'll quickly discover it's a long way to $40, one $1.50 sandwich at a time. So you're going to have to start hitting the big-ticket items.
At the Masters, that means the $2.50 chicken fillet sandwich. Add another Coke to this midmorning hold-me-over.
Cost: $3.50
Total spent: $11.50
Total remaining: $28.50
FIRST LUNCH: If you're actually going to do this, you're going to have to eat things you don't want to. Like lunch. Go light with two turkey sandwiches and a pink lemonade.
Cost: $4
Total spent: $15.50
Total remaining: $24.50
EARLY AFTERNOON SNACK: Commit to snacking.
With most meals, the side orders are what drive up the bill. And because they don't have a wine list at the little green concession stand next to No. 16, you'll have to find other pricey add-ons.
Good luck, because at the Masters, a la carte apparently translates to "on the cheap." By comparison, $1 chips and candy and $1.50 ice creams can seem as steep as off-the-menu specials.
So dig in with a bag of chips, a Snickers bar, a Klondike bar and a Coke.
Cost: $4.50
Total spent: $20
Total remaining: $20
LUNCH NO. 2: Like a 20-handicapper who just shot 60 on Augusta's front nine, you'll wonder whether this is really just the halfway point.
And you'll decide you're going to have to turn it on for the back nine. So get serious with two barbecue sandwiches and two Cokes as a lunch mulligan.
Cost: $5
Total spent: $25
Total remaining: $15
LATE AFTERNOON SNACK: It's time for a Nike meal. Just Do It with a chicken sandwich, a Klondike and a bottle of water.
Cost: $5
Total spent: $30
Total remaining: $10
EARLY EVENING GORGING: Here's where you decide that the next time you want a unique way to experience the flavor of the Masters, you'll simply eat an azalea.
But being so close - to your $40 total and the emergency room - you won't want to stop. So snack again with another Snickers, more chips and a Coke.
Then call 1-800-L-I-P-O-S-U-C-T-I-O-N and see whether they work weekends.
Cost: $3
Total spent: $33
Total remaining: $7
DINNER: Is this what Billy Joe Patton felt like when he had a Masters title in his hands on the back nine on Sunday? Is the end really in sight?
Convince yourself you just have to keep making good swings - through the food lines - and force down two ham and cheese sandwiches and a bottle of water.
Cost: $4.50
Total spent: $37.50
Total remaining: $2.50
FINAL STROKE (OF STUPIDITY): Having redefined Amen Corner as the area just past the last cash register, you'll both dread and celebrate reaching the end of one gastronomically uneasy round at Augusta.
But as you top the last hill on the course feeling greener than all the grass, trees and members' jackets combined, all that's left is a little tap-in. Make it a final bag of chips and a bottle of water.
Cost: $2.50
Total spent: $40
Total remaining: $0
Now, as you are rolled toward Washington Road, feeling as if you just swallowed a medicine ball, you will certainly question the course-management decisions for all of the nine courses it took to get where you are now.
After all, you've just consumed 12 sandwiches, three bags of chips, two candy bars, two ice cream bars and 11 drinks within 10 hours. You'll feel like a glutton. You'll feel like a lab experiment. You'll feel like a fool. A really bloated, uncomfortable fool.
And you'll figure there's got to be an easier way to do the Masters on $40 a Day next time.
Like, 19 $2 beers and a chicken sandwich.
Reach Tim Guidera at (912) 652-0352.
