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Trucker turns into St. Paddy's chef Photo by Bob Pennell Reggie Mugleston of Kennesaw, Ga., chops cabbage Tuesday in preparation for the St. Patrick's Day feast he traditionally cooks at Dilligaf's, a Medford bar. Cook o' the Irish serves it up today By MARK FREEMAN The smells of corned beef and the lure of blarney and beer beckon Reggie Mugleston back to Medford each mid-March to carry on a special St. Patrick's Day tradition. All roads in spring lead the Georgia long-haul trucker to a tiny Medford bar where the 51-year-old former caterer-to-the-stars whips up a bit o' the Irish for 200 of his closest friends. Mugleston parachutes into Dilligaf's Bar and Grill on North Pacific Highway to cook the traditional St. Patrick's Day feast of corned beef and cabbage. Tonight, Mugleston will cook and serve Dilligaf's holiday feast as he has each St. Patrick's Day this decade. For Mugleston, it's a chance to see old friends from his old hometown, push out that Irish barrel chest of his and parade his culinary craft on a day when everyone is Irish. "You can cook steaks every day," Mugleston says. "You can cook hamburgers or fish every day. But you only cook corned beef one day a year. "This is my day," he says, "and my place to cook corned beef and cabbage." And he'd better cook plenty, because Dilligaf's expects about 200 people to pay $3.50 each for Mugleston to carve a piece of corned beef from his makeshift buffet -- a pool table with a sheet of plywood on top. Dinner starts at 6 p.m., and it stops when all 84 pounds of corned beef, 40 pounds of cabbage, 35 pounds of boiled red potatoes and 20 pounds of boiled carrots are gone. The traditional return of Mugleston -- a former Central Point resident who moved to Georgia five years ago -- is a big to-do at Dilligaf's. Not as big, maybe, as when San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen wrote in 1990 about the bar's name being an acronym for "Do I Look Like I Give A ..." well, that last word is heard only in R-rated movies or the Ken Starr report. "I had to put a big sign outside that says Reggie's back," Dilligaf's manager Judy Williams says. "There are people who aren't beer drinkers, who aren't bar people, who come every year just for Reggie's corned beef and cabbage," Williams says. "I like that, too." The tradition started in 1990 when Gail Sewell, the bar's co-owner, was looking for someone to cook a St. Patrick's Day feast. She phoned Mugleston, who then operated a Central Point catering company that served on location at the sets of movies, TV commercials and rock videos. Mugleston, who is three-fourths Irish, jumped at the idea of mass-cooking the Irish feast. The meal consists of boiled corned beef -- which is a beef brisket with some pickled spices -- cabbage, red potatoes and carrots. The potatoes and carrots are cut and peeled, then cooked in boiling water all day beginning at 8 a.m. The corned beef is soaked in a marinade of beer and water, then boiled nine hours in the same beer-water mix over large gas burners both inside the bar and in the parking lot. The beer is that Irish traditional lager -- Budweiser. At 6 p.m., Mugleston starts serving and the party begins. "Everyone has a good time on St. Patrick's Day,"Mugleston says. "You get to wear the green shirt, the green hat and drink a lot of green beer." He has done the meal annually, dropping his $75 fee after Sewell died in 1995. The tradition has outlasted a marriage, Mugleston's dropping of his catering business after 22 years, his move to Georgia and even the addition of a new wife. After tonight's party, Mugleston will hop back into his big rig, pick up another load bound for Somewhere, U.S.A., and merge back onto the blacktop life of a Georgia trucker. But Mugleston plans on steering his way back to Dilligaf's next year. "This has become our little tradition," Mugleston says. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA