Mama Nikki was hollering from somewhere back in the kitchen, her kitchen, at Pimlico Race Course. "I don't have a lot of food out yet!" she barked, less as an apology than an explanation.
The smell of fried goodness said otherwise. So did the row of metal pans glistening with golden-brown salmon cakes, fried chicken, liver and onions, collards and corn.
Her name is Goldie Morris, but for decades she's been known around Pimlico simply as Mama Nikki. Since 1969, she's been whipping up filling meals for trainers, track employees, media types and jockeys. (OK, not so much for the jockeys. Usually, they buy just a slice of cinnamon toast or half a bagel.)
At 74, Mama Nikki remains very much in charge of the little cafeteria in the green building between the horse barns and the track. Her kitchen once ran year-round. Now it fires up only for Preakness, and for those few days, she cooks as if she's trying to squeeze in a year's worth of griddling.
"Granny gets down in the kitchen," explained her 26-year-old granddaughter, Teonna Lynch, who staffs the cash register. "You might hear her cuss you out, but she still loves you. It's just a stressful situation."
Glancing out at the cafeteria, Mama Nikki spotted two familiar faces: mutuel clerks from Texas who fly to Baltimore every May to handle bets at the Preakness.
"Hey, sweetheart!" Mama Nikki shouted to one. "Good seeing you."
"Good seeing you."
"All right, baby," she replied, smiling. "Thank you."
A minute later, she went out to give big hugs to the pair, Rosalynn Fruge and Paulette Brown. Fruge met Mama Nikki five years ago when she tried to order breakfast, only to be told breakfast was definitely over and that she'd better settle on a lunch choice.
"She told me what I was going to have," Fruge recalled with a laugh. "I've been in love with her ever since."
Mama Nikki not only gives customers the mother-knows-best treatment; she has made the kitchen operation a family enterprise during Preakness.
Her 46-year-old daughter, April Branch - Lynch's mother - takes time off from her financial coordinator job to help. Her 50-year-old son, James Pinder, an upholsterer, runs food trays out from the kitchen. And there is Lynch, a soldier due to return to Iraq in August.
Rounding out the cast of kin is Shirley Gee, 73. Though she isn't actually related, they call her Aunt Shirley. She ladles generous portions of food into Styrofoam containers for a line of customers that on Preakness Day reliably stretches out the door.
