Baltimore Eats - In The Kitchen with Jerry Edwards at Chef Expressions

Mick Kipp's excitement for life is like a force field that radiates from his gregarious and animated persona.

Before he incarnated as Mick T. Pirate ten years ago, he was a stunt man in television and film. "One of my specialties was fire -being on fire, setting fires." Today he owns Whiskey Island Pirate Shop and specializes in creating unusual hot sauces. "Hence the transition from hot to hot," Mick explains. Mick hails from Cleveland, Ohio, where he grew up near the oily, Cuyahoga River which actually caught fire in 1969, inspiring Randy Newman's ironic, black-humored song, "Burn On, Big River." Newspaper reports of the day claim that the flames climbed as high as five stories! Now that HAD to make one hellava impression on any hometown boy!

Already an aspiring stunt man, Mick Kipp left Cleveland and hitchhiked to Los Angeles to attend a rock concert in 1983. Out in LA he became "a real stunt man... For the next 16 years I was working in films and TV in Atlanta and in LA."

But the work was sporadic and he knew he needed a back-up job. "In the stunt business, for every 15 jobs there are a thousand stunt men! So there's a small handful of guys out there who can make a living just doing stunt work year round. I wasn't one of them. I was what you call a 'B' -I didn't 'double' anybody, I did mostly background stuff... 'We need you to fall off this building... We need you to get hit by this car...' -indiscriminate stuff, in the background." So throughout his career, like so many in show business, Mick also worked in the restaurant business. One of his first jobs in LA was at Green Blatt's deli, across the street from the famous Schwabbs.

"That was my first real cooking gig and working there on The Strip was a BALL! All kinds of famous actors and actresses coming in and out... I've always loved to cook though. I guess from watching my mother and my grandmother, like at Christmas time you know, licking the batter off the beaters and stuff. My grandmother, she was Lebanese and in my mind she was the Master, she'd say to me: 'You need just a handful of this Mickey, and a handful of that...' That's where the fascination came from -just to watch her concoct these wonderful tasting things with such ease."

In Cleveland he worked at the Watermark. "That was my entrance into what you call 'Fine Dining.' I learned how to really 'present' the food and wait on people professionally."

Mick was moving back and forth from LA for several years, in Cleveland for a stint and later in Atlanta. "Finally I decided that, OK... I did my LA stint, time to do something else. I was ready to hit the East Coast." His parents moved to Lancaster, PA and while visiting them one time he took a drive down to Baltimore, more or less on a whim. "I said, 'Hey this looks a lot like Cleveland -it's kinda cool.' So I met with the film commission down in Annapolis, bought a special effects company here from a guy who was retiring. I settled in Baltimore."

In Baltimore he worked in a little bar over in Pigtown on South Carey Street, "We used to call it SCARY STREET!" He created a full-scale beer bar, carrying 287 different beers, and 15 on tap. "We got a 'Best of Baltimore' in 87. From that I wrote a book about beer: Mick's Beer Guide. I self-published it with a partner, Rosanne Benvenga and we sold it around town and through mail order." Mick started doing catering gigs, hosting barbeques and parties.

Then he was diagnosed with cancer and between 91 and 95 he went through nine surgeries, chemotherapy and radiation. "I found that, with my surgeries, doing stunts -well, I'm not going to say it wasn't still fun, but it HURT! I knew it was time to put my stunt career behind me. I wasn't made of rubber!"

In 96 he made the first version of the sauces that were to become his signature product line: Cuyahoga Hot Sauce, made with jalapeno and Serrano peppers. "It was actually just intended to be a Christmas gift," Mick laughs. When he started selling his sauces at the Waverly Farmers' Market in 2003, Mick became more and more excited about buying fresh ingredients directly from the farmers he met there.

He tells a story about roping his mother into a six-hour marathon cooking stint when he showed up suddenly with a full bushel of fresh tomatoes: "They were picked just that morning. Oh, the smell of those fresh tomatoes cooking! It's just amazing -and then you add just a little sugar and the oregano...Oh man! In that moment I KNEW: This is what I really want to do!" (His exhausted mom said: "Don't ever do this to me again!")

Working with Mama Vida's, a Baltimore company that does professional bottling for area culinary artisans, Mick developed his line of Whiskey Island products. He named his business after a favorite childhood haunt, Cleveland's notorious Whiskey Island, a long abandoned industrial site in the Cuyahoga flats boasting a rich mythology of bootlegging and pirating.

He's got Habahoga Fire, Swamp Pop, Pirate Gris Gris, Man On Fire Stunt Sauce, Red Hot Hon Sauce and more... All these are totally original concoctions, unique variations on a very specialized culinary theme.

And he does incredible salsas, like his Island Salsa, a scrumptious combination of pineapples, tomatoes, roasted peppers and onions with honey, cardamom, celery seed and cloves. Or his Mazin Crab Salsa made with tomatoes, corn and Maryland Blue Crabs: "Great right out of the jar, on omelets, or for making a flavorful Shrimp Ettouffee."

Mick is constantly creating new things... all kinds of sauces, spreads, rubs and dips... He's even launched a line of Whiskey Island Pirate Blend Coffee, a blend roasted by Zeke's Coffee Roasters, flavored with cinnamon, hazelnut and chicory!

"This business allows us to be so creative, to never stop trying to make people smile and say 'WOW! What's in that?'' -I love it! I love getting fresh stuff from the farmers every week and thinking up something new."

Perhaps harking back to all those years in show business, Mick has an extraordinary talent for creative marketing too. His product names, displays, logos, imagery and overall "branding" are delightful, eye-catching, consistently themed and impeccably professional.

After opening and closing a couple retail locations on the Avenue in Hampden, last year Mick opened up a stand in Cheryl and Dave Wade's Mill Valley Garden Center and Farmers' Market in Remington. Walk in and you'll immediately spot the colorful Whiskey Island Pirate Stand in the back of the Garden Center's big space. It's here that he hosts his "Bug Boils" on Friday nights during the winter months. These are wonderful community dinners of crayfish gumbo and fresh organic produce from local area farms. (Sorry, last one was April 20th - Catch them next year!) Sunday mornings from 8am to noon you can stop in for "Breakfast prepared to order by Mick T. Pirate." He supports the Buy Fresh - Buy Local concept with omelets made with free-range eggs from New Windsor, MD, organic milk and butter from Trickling Springs Creamery and hash browns made with potatoes from Tuscarora Organic Growers. "You bring the champagne, we've got the orange juice," Mick says.

His latest entrepreneurial venture is developing the pilot for a television series called "Eat My Stuff." This just may be the final meld of show biz and cooking for Mick. After spending an hour or so with this entertaining Pirate in his kitchen, I can't help but predict that it will be a total smash! Until then, look for Mick at the Waverley Farmer's Market on 32nd Street Saturday mornings -and at the Mill Valley Garden Center, Thursdays through Sundays.