Crispy Chicken
Tender Tacos

July. Nine o'clock at night and still eighty-six degrees. The air thick enough to lean on. The greens at PopStroke Fort Myers glowing under the lights like a stage set for a play about ambition.

My buddy Ray and I were all square through fifteen. On sixteen I had a slippery right-to-left putt off a ridge, maybe twenty feet. Ray said, "Don't think about it." So naturally I thought about nothing else.

I hit it. It curled. It dropped. Birdie. I may have shouted. A family on the next hole may have applauded. I may have bowed.

Victory demands a feast, even a victory that lasts exactly one hole. After the round, on the patio: the crispy chicken tender tacos.

A hand-breaded chicken tender, tossed in a bold hot BBQ sauce, sticky and smoky and unapologetically spicy. Nestled into a warm flour tortilla, soft as a handkerchief, over a crisp bed of citrus slaw that cools the fire just enough to keep you going. Cheddar jack cheese on top. A sliced jalapeno for a fiery finish, as if the sauce needed backup. Then shredded carrots and a pickled onion garnish, bright, tangy, a little bit of confetti for the occasion.

Ray ate his in three bites. I savored mine, as a champion savors crispy chicken tacos: slowly, and with witnesses.

He birdied seventeen and eighteen and beat me by two. I still had sauce on my thumb as I signed the scorecard, a small, spicy souvenir of glory.