eat here 2

Bicep vs. Pinky, round 1

2012-01-23T12:46:00.000-08:00

My latest on Huffington Post, in which I examine what power means when it comes to food.

I love my job

2011-12-09T14:40:00.001-08:00

How awesome is this?

The story behind your food (or, what I’m reading lately)

2011-12-05T13:55:00.000-08:00

Reading this article about bananas --and how they are stored green and hard in a big warehouse, then gassed to a soft yellow state, and then bought at a fruit cart, and then eaten by me on a peanut butter sandwich—is exactly the sort of food reporting I love. First of all, it’s damn interesting. You know on The Food Network how they have that candy show called “Unwrapped” and you get to see how Tootsie Rolls and Starburst are made? Even though it’s gross, it also scratches a very human itch to know the real story.

With candy, you know in advance that the story will involve wax and plastic and food dye and giant machines. What’s interesting about this here story is the complicated surprise of this simple fruit. This story is about bananas. Aren’t they just picked from a tree and put on a truck and then peeled and eaten? How much could they really need a whole article—or a whole “Unwrapped” episode to tell their story?

That’s why it’s my mission to help people find out the story behind their food. To help people develop critical skills and open eyes about where our food comes from and how it gets to us. Not to believe the simple story that is sold to us. To make informed choices. I still eat bananas (I try to get organic, I look for fair trade), even though I know they have a strange story, and that they have traveled millions of miles and hundreds of days before I eat them. But it’s so important to take the blinders from our eyes.

A few days after reading the banana article, I finally got around to the food issue of The New Yorker, and excitedly dove into the latest Calvin Trillin food piece (always a delicious treat). In his self-deprecating way, he talks about his limited cooking repertoire, how it consists of just a few items and in each case it seems to require little more than just buying or catching something really local and delicious and then just, like, cooking it or whatever. He mocks himself and in the process celebrates the great joke of it all: the simplicity of great, local ingredients and how they make the biggest of kitchen idiots into the most celebrated home cooks.

Neighborhood check-in

2011-11-23T13:45:00.000-08:00

So it's been about 4 months in the new apartment, and I've paused to ask myself:

Why do you love this neighborhood SO DAMN MUCH. What have you been eating here? Where have you been hanging out?

To the first question: I love it because it is a neighborhood. When I wake up in the morning and look out the window there are people jogging, walking dogs, eating at the outdoor tables of the cafe across the street. There is a big tree outside the window and no UPS depot. When I move through the neighborhood, I bump into people I know and like. They are friends, and now neighbors. When I have the itch to go out spontaneously, there is someone nearby who is having the same itch. When there is a hurricane passing through, and everyone is bracing for the worst, there are neighbors--inside and outside my building--who want to hang out and drink and talk through it all.

To the second question: I have been eating at Hibino (so so delicious. the agedashi tofu is really special); Henry Public (so it's trendy, so they are precious and wear handlebar moustaches, so what; they are nice and they make great cocktails and a super burger and an awesome salad); Iris (we know how I feel about this place); Char No. 4 (bacon, bourbon); Mile End (brunch); Waterfall Cafe (Middle Eastern, cheap and cheerful); and my own dinner table sometimes, though less than I'd like.

To the third question: I have been hanging out at 61 Local (lurve), Floyd, and Building on Bond when Matt has a say in it.

It feels like a happy return.

I need coffee

2011-11-07T08:38:00.001-08:00

In Barcelona I once got a perfect espresso from an airport cafeteria.

In Torino, any corner bar or cafe will make you a cappuccino to make your eyes roll back in your head.

In Cuba--Cuba! where food and drink are no luxury items--I was served a tremendous coffee in a tobacco farmer's kitchen. Plus we smoked hand rolled cigars, but that's a whole different story.

In NYC, city of gods (ahem), you can travel in a five block radius around your new office and be completely incapable of finding a decent espresso drink.

Blargh.

Inside my fridge

2011-11-01T08:43:00.000-07:00

Ever wondered what's inside my fridge? No, I didn't think so.

Even still, you can sneak a peek and hear my deep thoughts on compost and processed foods. Check me out on Well and Good.

Baguettes and boules

2011-10-22T21:26:00.000-07:00

Bread and pasta make my culinary world go 'round. When I close my eyes at night I think of baguettes and boules, spaghetti and fettucine.

I've written here before about my distaste for--and lack of belief in--fad diets. As well as my supreme devotion to carbs. Yet here I am, 3 weeks into a gluten-free experiment. Anyone read Michael Pollan's Q & A on the NY Times website last month? When asked about gluten free diets he said:

"It's hard to believe that the number of people suffering from these conditions has grown as fast as this product category. Gluten has become the bad nutrient of the moment, the evil twin of Omega 3 fatty acids. Could it really be that bread, a staple of Western civilization for 6,000 years, is suddenly making millions of us sick? I'm dubious."

I'm less dubious than he is. I was surprised by his lack of openness to it....and kinda surprised by own willingness to give all this a shot.

5 years ago, over the course of a few months, my eyebrows fell out hair by hair. No doctor told me to look at my diet, or to cut out wheat. Then again, no doctor has been able to tell me why or to make them come back.

Between a beanbag chair and a warm embrace

2011-08-31T14:11:00.001-07:00

What's the opposite of being between a rock and a hard place? I'm going with a beanbag chair and a warm embrace. That's how I feel these days. I am finishing up a job that has been a source of fulfillment, inspiration, stimulation, friends, food...

and heading over to one that has been and will continue to be a source of fulfillment, inspiration, stimulation...you get the idea. I've got a new job, that's what.

So I am working hard on a campaign I believe in--$5 Challenge-- and thinking ahead to FoodCorps and the road ahead.

In one week I wrote these two posts--they can give you a good sense of what cool stuff I get to work on, how lucky I've been....and how lucky I continue to be. To work on such important stuff and help tell the story of the incredible work that's being done out there to transform our broken food system.

Take Back the Value Meal: my piece for The Huffington Post.
FoodCorps members get their hand dirty: my piece for Civil Eats.

Interviews past

2011-07-26T14:24:00.000-07:00

I just had the occasion to scrounge up an interview I did nearly three years ago--with Slow Money founder, Woody Tasch. It reminded me that some of my favorite writing forays have been the chance to do interviews. Seemed like a good idea to repost some of them here.

Cuba Organic

2011-07-16T21:40:00.000-07:00

A belated round-up of articles about my time in Cuba.

1. In my own words: Organic in Cuba, something from nothing.

2. In this Long Island newspaper article I am quoted on my observations about Cuba, and am described as "NYC Foodie Jerusha Klemperer." Ayyyy, dios mio.

3. This NY Times travel section article is about our trip, and others that go to Cuba to study: agriculture, art etc. I appear in a photo making a "who farted?" face. Charming.

Oh the places I've been

2011-05-08T18:21:00.000-07:00

Frank's Trattoria: the other night my buddy C declared herself in the mood for a good old New York slice. C is my old NY homeslice so this was a perfectly delightful and appropriate request. We used to eat NY slices together from age 6 on up, but these days we tend to hit more restauranty fare when we get together. We made our way towards one of my old childhood pizzerias on 1st ave just below 23rd street and headed back into the dining room, a place I hadn't been since about 1990. The pizza is classic perfection, and the best part was the 85 year old man who chatted us up and told us how he's been eating there for 30 years. "Me too!" I said.

Brucie: Soon my old neighborhood will be my new neighborhood again (and I'm super psyched). The other night I hit one of the newer places there, on Court street. Aesthetically it's pitch perfect, and the food hit several great marks. Awesome salad, and my friend's pasta was tops. Mine--tagliatelle with tomato butter & brussels sprouts-- was totally weird & totally off but I am more than willing to head back there and try more stuff.

Hecho En DUMBO: Boy was I pissed when I walked into my favorite after work taco place about a year ago and found out that I couldn't get guacamole. Not because they were out of avocados, but because the place had up and changed identities when I wasn't looking. I mourned the loss of Hecho en DUMBO and was thrilled when it reopened on the Bowery. The name is funny, since it ain't in DUMBO no more, but the food is as good as ever. Make a point to get the rajas con crema tacos. Or three of them.

The Big New York Sandwich (Book)

2011-04-20T09:44:00.001-07:00

What is bigger than a NY Sandwich? Pretty much nothing. Think of a Second Avenue Deli corned beef sandwich that people under 150 pounds (me) usually need to remove 6 slices of meat from, in order to consume it. There's your proof.

There's a new book out called The Big New York Sandwich Book. It's got sandwich recipes from dang near everyone running a restaurant kitchen. It's even got a page on how to make a "slow" sandwich, penned by yours truly.

I leave you with this, a Socratic dialogue on sandwiches, from "Friends."

Happy Birthday, McDonald's!

2011-04-20T09:40:00.000-07:00

Don't be mad but I didn't get you anything.

Here's my love/hate letter to McD's, that ran on the HuffPost on the anniversary of the opening of the first McDonald's franchise.

Supertaster

2011-03-31T13:12:00.000-07:00

Reading this article about supertasters made me realize that I haven't ever blogged about what I call "my crazy tongue."

As a kid, when I would stick my tongue out at someone (not all the time, I wasn't a devil child, I swear) they would always remark on my super-textured tongue. When I got my wisdom teeth out the oral surgeon remarked on it, calling it a "topographic tongue." Cool--like a topographic map.

I started to notice that spicy food was pretty challenging for me, increasingly so over time. Certain chiles would make my tongue THROB. The taste is divine, but the sensation is murderous. The article on supertasters addresses this strange discrepancy, pointing out that spice is not a taste but a sensation--not sure I could have articulated that difference before reading the article.

I met a physician with a similarly affected tongue. She described it to me as the cracks and crevices of our tongues causing each taste bud to be more exposed to the food (more surface area) and therefore more sensitive. She confirmed that it gets more extreme with age. I forgot to ask her if she also sometimes tries to wrap her tongue in a flour tortilla as tears stream down her face. Didn't seem like Passover table conversation.

I'm getting older too

2011-03-09T11:18:00.001-08:00

Re: the title of this post, I've got "Landslide" on the brain, probably due to a "Glee" episode I watched last night. And apologies in advance if writing about lunch coop all the time is getting old. But this post is about getting old(er) so maybe that's a good thing.

Last night, for lunch coop, I cooked up a spinach barley gratin (a riff on a Deborah Madison recipe) accompanied by Baked Miso Onions. I first had these onions at Laurie's house--in the first apartment she shared with Will, her husband of almost 15 years now. It was in Swarthmore, PA across from the ball fields.

I think the recipe is from "Laurel's Kitchen" a cookbook that seemed a little old and hippie even then. I fell in love with the onions, begged for the recipe, and have been carrying it around on a pink sticky note tucked into an old wooden recipe box ever since. I have brought that wooden box from apartment to apartment to apartment and every few years I pull out the recipe and make miso onions and marvel at their rich complexity and sweetness.

When I think of things like this I am acutely aware of getting older. Of having friends who have been my dear friends for 20, 30 years. Of being the kind of wise old soul who has a darn good recipe for every occasion. Of having a sticky note that is as old as my interns.

Baked Miso Onions (a la Laurel's Kitchen?)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Peel and cut 4 Spanish/sweet onions into quarters
Mix 4 tbsp red miso paste, 4 tbsp olive oil, 3 tbsp tap water and 3tsp dried thyme in a bowl
Place onions in a casserole dish and pour the mixture over the top
Cover with foil and bake for 35 minutes
Don't eat them now.
Put them all in a tupperware, pour the liquid from the pan over the onions and let it all sit in the refrigerator overnight.
Then eat them the next day, heated up, over brown rice, or noodles, or polenta, or...spinach barley gratin.

Lunch Coop update

2011-02-14T14:55:00.000-08:00

As promised, I figured I'd check in about lunch coop and let you know how it's going. Mostly, it's pretty awesome. I go days on end without thinking about what's for lunch. I show up at the office knowing that someone will feed me, well.

But then there is that one day of scramble--and despite our google doc calendar, I have found it really sneaks up on me. Both times I stayed up way too late (and then slept in instead of making my morning gym journey) making food for myself and my coop buddies. We call this ACCOUNTABILITY. It is both the engine that drives the coop and the thing that is a royal pain in the arse.

I've cooked twice so far & both times I started my menu by thinking of my larder. First up was a giant batch of red lentils I had lying around. I picked a red lentil coconut soup from 101Cookbooks and then decided that would go really well with naan. Homemade naan. Because, hey, why keep it simple when you could keep yourself up til 1 am frying griddle bread and covering your entire kitchen with flour? Both were--dare I say it--delicious. I did struggle with portions though--7 is a very awkward number of mouths to feed.

Next time around I decided to tackle the bag of red quinoa I had. I was also inspired by a tweet from @MollieKatzen about a winter fennel/orange salad she made. Hence:

Fennel/Romaine/Ricotta Salata/Blood Orange/Pickled Onion Salad
and
Quinoa/New Potato/Roasted Carrot/Cumin/Shallot thingy

The salad is pretty straightforward (I made a vinaigrette with blood orange juice and white wine vinegar and nice olive oil); the quinoa thing went as follows:

I boiled the potatoes
I sauteed the shallots in olive oil and cumin
I roasted the carrots in olive oil with salt & pepper
I cooked the quinoa with water
I tossed it all together and added a little more salt

It was super simple but I actually liked it. And out of fear of not making enough, I basically drowned us in salad.

Lunch co-op

2011-01-27T11:26:00.000-08:00

For years I have been tossing out this idea to co-workers: a lunch co-op in which we each make one giant pot of something just one day of the week and share it. That way I am doing same amount of cooking but instead of being stuck eating the same thing every day, I have variety. Even at my office, where nearly everyone makes their lunch and it is all very tasty looking, people balked.

Last week I published a piece (on both WellandGoodNYC and Civil Eats--spread the love) about my friend Christine. For five years now she has been making lunch with her friend Joanne. They get together on Sunday and make six servings of two different dishes. They shop together, cook together, split the cost--and they eat really well and really affordably.

Christine emailed me that she "hoped the piece would inspire some people" to follow in their footsteps. Well guess what, Christine: I reintroduced the lunch co-op idea to my now-entirely-new-bunch of fellow staffers, and they bit! 7 of us are launching our food-coop next week. The ground rules are as follows:

Food must be vegetarian, though meat can be provided on the side
No tunafish salad, please
Food shouldn't be too spicy
Food should be mostly from scratch
use farm-fresh ingredients WHEN POSSIBLE
There is a cost ceiling of $5 per person per meal (or $35). People should not feel they have to spend that much, but for now that will be the upper limit.

Updates to follow.

7 things I learned about food in 2010

2010-12-27T09:00:00.001-08:00

Would I be human if I didn't create a round-up of 2010? If you prick me, do I not attempt to make bite-sized meaning out of the passage of time?

Here's my latest on the HuffPost: 7 things I learned about food in 2010.

Elephants

2010-12-05T19:49:00.000-08:00

I just read that The Elephant--a small little Thai-esque restaurant on 1st street--will be closing its doors. I only ate there once, in 1998. It was a date with a man who had chased me down the street to ask me out. Seriously!

I was in grad school at the time, and went to see a production of "Waiting for Godot" at Classic Stage Company, starring John Turturro and John Goodman (wait is that even right?). After the show, I used the payphone in the lobby, because--hello--it was 1998. When I finished my call, I stepped away, the guy behind me approached the phone and I heard him say "shoot!" The guy had no change for the phone so I offered him a quarter. He gazed at me, as if in a trance, and silently took the quarter.

Ten blocks up I felt a hand on my arm and heard panting.

"I'm the quarter guy (pant, pant)."

"Hi."

"Sorry, I just ran 10 blocks to catch up to you."

"Um, thanks?"

"I promise I'm not crazy, but I noticed you during the show, and then you gave me that quarter, and....I just had to follow you and see if you would give me your number and let me ask you out sometime."

And so we went to The Elephant. Apparently it's been around for 17 years and my visit there was 12 years ago. So it was a five year old neighborhood staple at that point, way cooler and more expensive than places I would ordinarily eat. My date was "old" (35?) and looking for a wife, it was perfectly plain. Which seemed about as far away from my life as a person could be.

I love New York because every neighborhood, every corner, every restaurant that stays open or shuts its doors holds a story from my life. Some strange, some amazing, some perfectly ordinary.

Italian feast

2010-11-23T19:34:00.000-08:00

In my suitcase back from Italy I brought several edible treats including one kilo parmagiano reggianno and one bag of Sicilian lentils. What I didn't do was save space in my bag for presents for friends. So I committed myself to use the foodstuffs I bought for myself to cook up dinners for my friends. I vowed to spread the love and tonight I got to make good on that promise for the first time.

Did I mention that my oil shipment arrived from Lorenzo last week?

Purva and David came over and I cooked up:

this easy fennel/sausage/lentil dish I love
a simple salad dressed with Lorenzo's oil, lemon juice and Maldon salt
a bowl of Calabro ricotta drizzled with the oil and covered in toasted pine nuts
a bowl full of cubed parmiagiano reggianno (oh lordy)
a loaf of ciabatta from Grandaisy bakery
a bowl of oil
a bowl of Maldon

And it was very very good. It bears repeating: if the ingredients are amazing, you don't have to do much to eat like a king.

Perche no?

2010-10-31T21:24:00.000-07:00

Back in NYC I don't ever eat out alone. Except maybe a slice at Joe's now and again as I make my way home. Not that I am so popular, but if I am alone, I stay home since I like to cook for myself and it's cheaper. I save my going out money for socializing.

In Rome, I was solo for most of my meals and I tried not to make them hurried little affairs. I tried to relish them. But I discovered that--in Rome at least--one gets mixed responses. I present case 1, at Da Lucia in Trastevere.

"Buona sera. Uno, per favore."

"Solo uno???"

"Si."

"Please wait outside." After 10 inexplicable minutes, the fellow came out and said "solo? ma, perche?"

"Perche no?" I asked, full aware of my larger metaphorical question.

"Lavoro? Vacazione?" He is still searching for some plausible reason. He seats me in a half empty restaurant and proceeds to rush me through my meal. Not only am I alone but I am not having 4 courses and I have ordered my water rubinetto (the word they don't want you to know: tap water. It's free! And tasty enough). He keeps coming over pityingly, trying to figure me out. Eventually I am given a bill with several incorrect overages (including aqua minerale). I leave not yet feeling the magic of eating alone.

Another meal is disastrous on many fronts. I headed to a pizzeria recommended by Amy (Pizzeria San Calisto). It was terrible. This made no sense since Amy is entirely trustworthy when it comes to food recs. It took me about 24 hours to sort it out; I went to the wrong place.

At this wrong place, I was pursued relentlessly by the waiter, who asked me out on a date and eventually was removed from my table by the manager. I had a magazine out. A glass of wine for crying out loud. His constant interruptions with questions asked in fast Italian I could not understand, were killing my mojo. I don't remember this scene in "Eat, Pray, Love."

I found the perfect solo meal at lunchtime one day--at another rec from Amy. It was a beautiful day but this place had no outdoor seating. I popped inside and it was quiet and cool. The other diners were all Italian--mostly businessmen, and one priest. The staff took good care of me but basically left me entirely alone to slurp down spaghetti alla vongole, verdure mista, fantastic focaccia and a nice little bottle of red (I asked for a bicchiero, I am sure of it, but....). I was not a pitiable mystery; I was not a woman looking for a man. I was a person, looking for good nourishment and some quality alone time.

Torino, Piemonte

2010-10-29T10:06:00.000-07:00

I have spent a fair amount of time in Torino at this point but to suggest I know the city is a laughably incorrect statement. To suggest that I have eaten what it has to offer is also quite off the mark. In my two times there I have mostly been marooned in a southern corridor of the city, mostly behind a desk, on my feet, slowly dehydrating myself into laryngitis.

There were short forays out, both in 2008 and now in 2010--which is a wonderful thing because Piemonte is a wonderful place to eat and an even more wonderful place to drink delicious, affordable red wine (Nebbiolo, Barbera d'Asti, Barbera d'Alba). They are my absolute favorite wines in the world.

We had our staff meal the first night at Tre Galli. The carne crudo, a specialty of the region, was a revelation. Yep, that's raw meat; this rendition had shaved truffles and sea salt on top and it was sitting in an egg-based sauce of some kind. It was terrific, as was the braised tongue. As was the vegetable tart. And basically everything else we had.

Its sister restaurant Tre Galline is also good--especially their pasta. The chestnut gnocchi was so so very good. It's a little fancier and required slightly softer voices (sotto voce).

I could not for the life of me find the neighborhood pizza place (near Corso Sebastopoli and Corso IV Novembre) that I fell in love with in 2008. That is what I get for having a bad sense of direction. But we did get farinate again from the lowkey place on our corner and it always makes me happy. Farinate = chickpea flour pancake. And we were directed to a very good Napolitano pizza place called Cammafa.

On the final morning, voiceless and exhausted, I headed to the rightfully famous Bicherin and alongside Jenny and Suzanne and Taylor (who has just launched Good Food Jobs) we sugar-bombed it with insanely light but rich zabaglione, the local specialty "bicherin" (a coffee and chocolate drink) and several other things but I am embarrassed to continue listing them. Pics of the bicherin and the zabaglione are up above.

Open Up

2010-10-13T18:37:00.000-07:00

Last Wednesday on my way out of work I passed a man with a few bags of CSA loot and a giant vegetable tucked under his arm. It was a majestic sight. I blurted out as I passed, "is that a daikon?"

"I guess, yeah," he said, drawing it out and handing it to me. "I don't know what to do with it--you take it." And with that I was the proud new owner of a marvelous daikon radish. He headed to his car and I, chuckling, headed up Jay street to the F train. He pulled up beside me in his car and called out the window, "what will you make?"

"Slaw? Refrigerator pickles?" I shrugged, smiling.

"Well, let me know...somehow..." and then he was off. And I was off, on my daikon adventures that led me to Back Forty where C and I were the recipients of magical treatment including comped pork jowl nuggets and glasses of wine. People on the street stopped to gawk and then ask questions. My cab driver was mesmerized by it.

I tweeted: "Am thinking I should bring a giant daikon radish with me everywhere. It really starts conversations."

Once home I turned it into Asian refrigerator pickles (per a recipe from Sherri Vinton's new book "Put em Up!"), and today brought one of the jars to the CSA pickup with a note for the guy that read "Did you give your daikon to a young woman last week?"

I got a high from the street conversation that led to my funny radish adventure. It made me think about how closed i can be, especially on the streets of NYC, but other places as well. I realized that there are ways in which I have lived my life closed like a fist, protecting something in its palm.

The last of the very good stuff: corn

2010-09-25T11:29:00.000-07:00

A week or two ago, on twitter, I bragged that the corn zucchini pancakes I'd made the night before were equally good, eaten cold the next day for lunch. Then I promised I'd write up the recipe. As time dragged on, I worried that I was missing the window for a post about corn to be relevant, but it looks like the last dribs and drabs of corn are still showing up at the market (and last night I had an amazing corn dish at Momofuku noodle bar--with miso butter. Yowza).

So here goes--I grabbed this easy little recipe off the internets because it didn't require buttermilk. The first time I made it I even substituted water for the milk (didn't have milk either, sad to say). Even without milk they were tasty, but they improved when I added milk the second time. Also I had some zucchini in the fridge and had just recently discovered how easy they are to grate on a box grater (oh yeah I should blog that raw zucchini salad I made up).

And so, here you have 'em, corn zucchini pancakes. Can I get a hallelujah?

1 cup all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar (scant or less)
1 tsp kosher salt
4 ears corn
1 small or medium zucchini, skin on, grated and drained
3/4 cup whole milk
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/2 stick unsalted butter, melted and cooled

Whisk together flour, baking powder, sugar, and 1 tsp salt in a medium bowl.

Cut kernels from cobs and use the back of a knife to scrape the pulp from the cobs--this is a marvelous technique that I can't believe I only started doing this summer. Add grated zucchini. Whisk in eggs, oil, and butter. Add to flour mixture.

Heat a griddle over medium heat until hot, then melt butter to grease the pan. And then make pancakes, you know what I'm saying? Wait until you see bubbles in the batter, that's how you know you're ready to flip them.

Just do it: a zucchini story

2010-08-29T17:32:00.000-07:00

1. What to bring to office potluck? Just take those zucchini in the fridge, grate them with the box grater; squeeze all the water out; add the zest and juice of a lemon; add several glugs of olive oil and one of white wine vinegar; add salt & pepper and some chopped mint from the windowsill plant I keep forgetting to make use of.

2. What to do about the fact that I haven't volunteered in several years despite my desire to? Just sign up to be a volunteer at God's Love We Deliver, even if it is a 6:30 am shift.

August Dinner Party

2010-08-29T17:19:00.000-07:00

For my latest post on WellandGoodNYC I wrote all about a dinner party I threw and how you can do it, too.

It features the terrific recipe web site Food52, as well as some serious seasonal produce. And some glam shots of me sweating it up over a hot stove.

What I learned on my summer vacation

2010-08-08T18:06:00.001-07:00

Each summer, in an (albeit abbreviated) Italian tradition called Ferragosto, my office closes for one week. I had big plans to go to Turkey. When those plans fell through I tried to create a week full of mini vacations along with some down time. I had a long wish list, and as I sit here typing on the eve of my return to the office, I feel happy and relaxed. And I learned a few things, too.

1. When you go away for a week in summer, you miss one week of peak produce shopping. Doh!

2. I don't see Mara enough. In addition to her other qualities, she is a wonderful cook.

3. Cape May is beautiful, with lovely beaches and charming architecture full of old farmhouses, beach bungalows and Victorian homes. Everyone grows tomatoes, making them the zucchini of the area. Roll up your car windows or people will leave some on your front seat. If you're a visitor from up North, be a good guest and you might get sent home with a small cardboard box full. Score!

4. Go off the beaten path there, to a local bar called Mayer's (Meyer's?). They are known for their scallops but I will remember them for the dude who tried to pick me up by offering me a plate of gravy fries. Also memorable was the weathered fisherman who explained how much less fun fishing is now that the fishing stocks have disappeared. He also told me that I am "beautiful," that I "look like Chelsea Clinton." Hmmm.

5. Leaving a buffer on the back end of vacation is a great idea. It leaves time for farmer's market shopping (corn, eggplant, ground cherries, peaches, nectarines), hanging out with bro/sis -in-law and nephew, painting the livingroom, laundry, yoga, birthday drinks, Brooklyn Flea, La Colombe coffee, etc.

6. There are so many delicious things you can do with tomatoes. BLT was terrific (Grandaisy bread, mayo, Dom's bacon, Cape May garden tomato); roasted tomatoes (with parmesan cheese, spinach ravioli and pesto) are also a great idea; snacking on cherry tomatoes is never a bad idea.

6. I said I would do some work, and I didn't do any work. i think this was probably a very good idea.

Easy breezy

2010-07-27T18:47:00.000-07:00

I headed out to Breezy Point last weekend for a day of wave watching and hanging with friends. The food Google map in my head went off: taco alert!

Rockaway Taco (and environs) made me feel like I was transported to Southern California, in a good way. And while I made the mistake of getting only one fish taco (the carnitas could not compete), I was a very happy camper. The elote (corn) was also perfect. And the watermelon juice was a delight. There were other things to be tried but--despite nightly wishes to be transformed into a cow--I have only one stomach. We pulled up to the curb, spilled onto the grass and got covered in crema and guac.

I will go again--next summer, certainly, when we return to Breezy, but maybe before then, too.

Freekah

2010-07-19T19:59:00.001-07:00

Check out my post about freekah, the serious grain with a silly name.

Emperors Need Mentors, too

2010-07-07T18:28:00.000-07:00

Oh dear, where have I been? Things got nutty, and blogging for pleasure went bye-bye.

In the meantime, I wrote this piece for Civil Eats, a sort of review, I guess, of a new book called My Empire of Dirt. It's about what it takes to learn to grow things. Last summer I learned to ride a bike, and this summer I promised myself I would learn to grow things.

As I wrote about earlier, I started with basil, anise hyssop and sungold tomatoes from seed. The anise and the tomatoes, sadly, didn't make it. I liken those losses to my early failed cooking & baking experiments.

So I bought a beautiful organic heirloom cherry tomato plant and a neato mint plant at the farmers market. I re-potted them with organic soil. I staked the tomato plant. I left town. I returned. I smelled something funny.

Soooooo my cat peed in the tomato plant (that damn pot was big enough for her to climb into. Blargh.). But the good news is that the mint plant isn't quite dead and the basil plant is thriving! I offer this night-time photo as evidence. I really am bursting with pride.

Too Much

2010-06-09T14:49:00.000-07:00

Our country has gotten really fat--troublingly, uncomfortably fat. Michelle Obama is worried. The CDC is worried. Parents are worried, doctors are worried. Even the military, experiencing a shortage of healthy-weight young people to serve, is worried. Or are they? Just saw this post on Eater about Guatanamo having a giant fast food mothership on it.

Also, just saw a piece on ABC about how we're making our pets obese as well. The culprits: over-feeding our animals as a substitute for love and the amount of crap pet food companies are loading into the food. n.b. the piece is called "Heavy petting," because apparently someone over there loves a good pun as much as I do.

A buddy forwarded me a link to an article about CSPI's Xtreme eating awards--which go not to competitive hot dog eaters but to restaurants that offer single servings that contain enough calories to feed a small family. This makes me really mad, it does.

I think about too muchness a lot. I sometimes joke that I am like a cow that you have to bring back from pasture because I will keep eating and eating. I am a completer. Leaving anything behind feels strange, so I empathize with the eater who finds themselves at the Cheesecake Factory polishing off a 1,400 calorie dish. Why the F is this restaurant serving such a thing? Wouldn't it be more economical for them to serve something smaller? Oh right, food is cheap.

I read all these stories (above) in the past week alone. With a few episodes of "Biggest Loser" and Jillian's new ridiculous weight loss show thrown in. I cry when I watch those shows, mostly because they have been genetically engineered to bring women to tears (like sugary, fatty foods engineered to make us crave them), but also because I see people trapped in a world where the food cards have been stacked against them, where too muchness is the easiest choice in every direction.

Going great together

2010-06-07T16:06:00.000-07:00

The combination of strawberry and rhubarb is so perfect, only nature could have invented it. Which is to say, by being ripe together at the exact same time, may be nature's way of saying "yo, you could eat these together."

For this reason, I decided making a dish with both radishes (pink lady variety) and peas was a very good idea, even if I couldn't picture how it might turn out. For good measure, decided to throw in spring garlic. Totally excellent combo--one greenmarket trip, one dish.

For the record, am still exploring what/who I go great together with.

Quinoa with spring garlic, radishes, and peas
(2 small servings)

3/4 cup quinoa
3 pieces spring garlic--white bulb up to light green--minced
1 small onion
3-4 tbsp olive oil
salt n pepa
1 cup white wine
1 cup water
2 cups shelled peas
1/2 bunch radishes, trimmed, sliced in half

Saute onion and spring garlic in 2 tbsp of olive oil over medium heat
pinch of salt with that as you soften until translucent
Add the quinoa (which you have already rinsed several times)
Add the wine, bring to a boil then simmer for a few minutes until wine evaporates
Add the water, bring to boil, then cover, lower heat to simmer
Let cook for 20 minutes or so
While that's happening, heat up the remaining olive oil in a pan
Also, bring some salted water up to a boil (this water is not in teh recipe above)
cook peas for 3 minutes
Brown radishes in heated oil, a minute or two on each side
When quinoa is cooked, and when peas and radishes are cooked, mix 'em all together

Grown & Cooked in Detroit

2010-05-18T21:23:00.000-07:00

Here I am in Detroit. In a really tall, very odd hotel with a sick view of Canada and its Caesar's Palace, taunting us with their Canadian gambling and free healthcare and whatnot.

Lots of inspiring stories here, people all over the country bringing kids into gardens and changing their lives in one way or another. And it sure makes me think of a line from a poem by my favorite poet, Mary Oliver: "Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"

Any way I wrote some of it up on the Slow Food USA blog, here.

Layer of fat

2010-05-12T14:02:00.001-07:00

"But I thought you were philosophically opposed to cleanses," Julie wrote to me, in an email yesterday. "It's true," I wrote back, "I am." WTF then? Why did I spend two days in agony, carb-less, sugar-less, caffeine-less, alcohol-less, meat-less and dairy-less?

Here's where it went awry:

1. I saw Gwyneth Paltrow on "The Marriage Ref," and suddenly after years of indifference, I swooned. Look at her amazing body! And that shiny blond hair! And the effortless, upper-crust charm! I went to her oft-mocked web site, GOOP, and decided I should do like Gwyneth and do a cleanse to rid myself of my winter layer of fat (n.b. on pork belly and short ribs, THIS IS THE BEST PART).

2. I had been traveling for work a fair amount and had a few too many airport meals, some of which consistent of double-wide packs of peanut M & Ms, one of the on-board snacks you can purchase on a Delta flight. I felt full of sugar and I hate how much I love sugar, how it rules me.

What I learned:

1. Everything I already knew. Exercise in extremes are a disaster.

2. Cleansing ain't for everyone.

3. Sometimes 5 ibuprofen are not enough.

4. Starting the day with a cool glass of lemon water is a delight! I will continue this.

5. Grandaisy Bakery's raisin walnut roll is AMAZING, and not just because I hadn't eaten carbs in 2.5 days. The crust is perfect, and I believe it has fresh ground peppercorns in it. Zing!

6. This kale salad is wonderful. I ate it two days running for lunch and I have no regrets! Inspired by a recipe on Eat Drink Better.

1 Cup uncooked quinoa
3 Stalks of kale
1 small Cucumber, peeled and diced
1/4 Cup pine nuts, toasted
1/2 avocado, diced
1 Tbsp sesame seeds
1 lemon's worth of lemon juice
1 Tbsp rice vinegar

Cook quinoa according to instructions on box or bag

Meanwhile, get rid of the thick stalk on the kale, and roughly chop the leaves

Toss them with the cucumber, the lemon juice and the vinegar

Then add cooled quinoa. Then sesame seeds and pine nuts. Mix to coat.

Then put diced avocado on top and sprinkle with sea salt

Growing Power

2010-05-05T20:44:00.000-07:00

Last week, I attended the WK Kellogg Foundation Food & Community conference in Phoenix AZ. What a chance to see the major players in the movement, and to understand who we are--in our samenesses and differences--and where we're going.

Fast forward to my plane ride home, via Detroit. In first class, the President of the foundation. Two rows behind me, in coach, Malik Yakini, head of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network. In other rows, lots of other Detroit-based food and community-growing hoi polloi. Next to me, a young woman from another Detroit urban farming program called Greening of Detroit. It's her second flight ever, the first being the one out to the conference. When the plane makes strange noises she turns to me, open and sweet, asking: "is that normal?"

Turbulence begins, worsens. Before I know it I have grabbed the sizable girl next to me and burrowed my face in her upper arm. Feeling pathetic I think about how I am 20 years older than she is, and how I have been on hundreds of flights in my lifetime. Quaking, fearful, I realize how much power there is in that plane--the future of the food movement (esp the local Detroit food movement) hung in the balance. I felt confident the world wasn't ready to lose all of them, that the plane just had to make it to Detroit safely, and so gradually let go of my death grip on the shoulder of the girl next to me.

* * * * *

Speaking of growing and speaking of power, adios to another friend from work. Julia heads off to be an intern at Growing Power in Chicago, a rather hot shit thing to do.

I myself am growing seedlings (can you see them in the picture above?) with the help of my fairy greenmother, Cerise. These are sungold tomatoes, before I culled out 1/3 of the sprouts. With handholding. When they're sturdy enough they'll go out on the fire escape so the cats can't eat them. The eating part will be for me.

How does twitter help grow food?

2010-04-21T12:52:00.001-07:00

That was the subtitle of my talk at Ohio University last night, where I was a guest speaker for earth month. I explained to the students how if you pour water on your computer while it's on the twitter homepage, actual food will grow out of your keyboard.

But seriously.

Sustainability coordinator/guru Sonia Marcus hosted me for a super fun day during which I visited an Environmental Journalism class, participated in a round table lunch discussion, chatted with a News Writing class, and gave a talk focused on Building Online Communities in the food movement (see above).

I really enjoyed talking with the students, and having the opportunity to reflect upon my writing, reflect upon this blog, and how it ended up being the foundation for allowing me to "become"/call myself a writer. In thinking about things, and in being asked to answer smart questions, I came up with answers that surprised me sometimes.

Professor Hans Meyer covered my talk here. My main takeaway: every time I see a photo of myself giving a talk, that is what I am doing with my hands. Also, n.b. that his students were assigned to live tweet my talk, and I really enjoyed reading their commentary once the talk was done. You can read the comments here, and please take note that I was described as "adorable." I will dine out on this for the next week at least.

Lastly, I mention Athens, the only town in Ohio that could make you forget the other lame places in Ohio. Super locavore, nestled in Appalachia, home to wild pawpaws and black walnuts, and a local cafe that has slow food posters all over the walls, and delicious homemade bialys-Athens, I heart you.

Bits & Pieces

2010-04-14T19:55:00.000-07:00

1. My friend John is famous! John is a great cook and a great guy. I just randomly found this piece about him on Apartment Therapy. He's too modest to have sung it from the rooftops, natch.

2. I sing from the rooftops. I wrote this piece on Gristle, a book edited by Moby, all about the negative impacts of industrial meat production.

3. Well and Good NYC covers what to bring for lunch. I bring my lunch almost every day--as do most people at my office. I love that I work in a place where that's the norm.

4. Just ate my first ramps of the season, at the end of a long, hard day. Thanks, Deena, for bringing them to me, and for 4 years of friendship & laughs (& for getting all of my "Friends" and "Seinfeld" references).

Crop Mob

2010-04-12T20:19:00.000-07:00

Well, Flash Mobs have already hit the mainstream (I saw one on a season 5 episode of "Weeds" last night); aren't we all ready for the Crop Mob now?

About 2 months ago the NY Times ran a piece on Crop Mobs in the Chapel Hill, NC area, describing it as a "monthly word-of-mouth (and -Web) event in which landless farmers and the agricurious descend on a farm for an afternoon." The food movement got giddy with excitement. Within a week or so, a CropMobNYC group popped up on Facebook and I signed on up.

This past Sunday 4 Crop Mobs were scheduled for four different urban farms around town. I went to Bed-Stuy Farm, where 20 of us met with the generous and inspiring Rev. Robert Jackson and Rev. DeVanie Jackson. We tilled, and clipped, composted and shoveled, hammered and sawed. Also we broke for snacks and ate DeVanie's homemade fig jam from last season's figs.

We brought our own work gloves, our own water bottles, and our own lunch. I left the house in a hurry, throwing together this curried chicken salad quickly, with what I had on hand--kind of like the Crop Mob itself.

Curried Chicken Salad

Leftover roast chicken, cut into chunks

1 large celery stalk, diced

2 tbsp raisins, dark or golden

1 cup Hawthorne Valley yogurt

1 tsp dijon mustard

1 tsp curry powder

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1 shake cayenne pepper

salt and pepper to taste

Mix together all ingredients except the chicken, celery and raisins

Then add the rest and stir well

Food Porn

2010-04-07T19:30:00.001-07:00

This article in the Times about people taking pics of their food and posting them on the interwebz made me think a few things.

1. Why are they always "breaking" trend news that broke like 5 years ago? Yawn.

2. I just can't get that excited about pictures of food.

You've probably noticed I don't have many pics on here (trying to be better about it). I don't have a fancy camera and/or a stand-along flash to get things just right. I appreciate the simple beauty of the pics on blogs like 101 cookbooks, Not Eating Out in NY, Smitten Kitchen, and Chocolate and Zucchini. But the charms of, say, Food Porn Daily are lost on me.

I like words more than pictures, I suppose.

My first day of spring

2010-04-04T06:39:00.001-07:00

Spring faked us out a few weeks ago, sunshine bursting through the clouds. I hope none of you fell for that. I did--sent my winter coat to the dry cleaners and everything.

Real spring was this weekend and I headed out to the farmers market hopeful, heady with excitement about ramps. I saw no ramps. But I did buy tulips and daffodils, knowing full well my cats will eat the leaves and make themselves sick. Also Flying Pigs eggs, with two pale green ones that I scrambled up for lunch.

For dinner, a giant Quattro's spring chicken, roasted with 2 different varieties of heirloom potatoes, including the Makah Ozette (a Slow Food Ark of Taste variety) which is delicious but hard to clean. I had to get inside all the nooks and crannies with the tip of a very sharp knife in order to pick out the dirt. Tried to rationalize the bits left behind by thinking about the article I read in the recent food issue of the Ox ford American, all about the Southern tradition of eating soil.

Next week, the hunt for ramps continues.

I am a svelte gourmand

2010-04-02T13:28:00.000-07:00

Check out my guest post "I used to eat weird things" over on Svelte Gourmand.

Highlights and new discoveries

2010-03-28T06:51:00.000-07:00

Some highlights and new discoveries. I love my regular places (Franny's, Marlowe and Sons,etc.) but sometimes its good to branch out:

The Jane Hotel: There's been a gradual renovation and evolution over at The Jane Hotel and I am loving it. Gone is the lobby theatre where I saw the marvelous "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" and the laughed-so-hard-I-peed "Debbie Does Dallas (the musical)." Now the lobby has been carved up into an actual hotel lobby for the super cheap and tiny rooms upstairs, as well as into a wood paneled old-timey bar and a larger, cooler version of NoLiTa's Cafe Gitane. It's vintagearrific and they make a great cappuccino. Plus great light from the Hudson.

Co.: Have now been to Jim Leahy's Co. on 24th and 9th four times. Which is enough to say, for absolute sure, that it rocks. I haven't checked out every pizza place that everyone's buzzing about (Motorino, I'm coming soon, I promise) but I put forth Co.'s slightly more doughy crust as one of the best. Plus I love the space and the servers are so nice.

DiFara's: Oh, speaking of pizza, did I mention I finally got my ass to DiFara's? HOT. DAMN. It always surprises me when something so hyped is actually that good.

Hundred Acres: This really shouldn't count as a new place since I have been going to brunch here on a regular basis for the past 2 years (in fact I reviewed it in the NY Post magazine!) But it's turned out that when friends come to visit from out of town they say: OMG can we go to the brunch place near your house? And that reminds me for a sec that I shouldn't take it for granted. It's good. The food is good, the space is nice, the bloody mary rocks. And they take reservations, and they never give you lip.

Iris Cafe: I am so proud of Rachel! She opened this adorable little cafe deep in Brooklyn Heights a few months ago. It seemed like a modest endeavor, even if she was meticulously curating the menu, and training her baristas to be hardcore experts in the Stumptown style. Fast forward and she is being reviewed by the heavy hitters, including "Best Cafe" in NY Mag 2 weeks ago. Totally deserved. Get yer ass there for a homemade stickybun, or a ham and cheddar biscuit with a soft boiled egg on top.

Chicken Chow Fun, for Dad, because of Dad

2010-03-21T18:27:00.001-07:00

5 years ago, I wrote this post, called "Dad." It was the five year anniversary of my dad dying, and so I made a pilgrimage to Chinatown and tried to recreate a dish I hadn't had the sense to learn from him, because I hadn't thought I'd need to.

5 years later, my nephew was here to eat it with us, and this time I'll write it down so that if he ever wants to make it, it's here in cyber space for him. Hell, he already loves to read cookbooks and he's only 18 months old.

1. Head to Chinatown via Vanessa's dumplings on Eldridge, where for a buck you can get 4 fried pork and chive dumplings.
2. Stop and watch the bike polo tournament on Chrystie and eat out of your styrofoam container.
3. Look for the rice noodle ladies. For a while.
4. Find them at Grand and Bowery on the Northeast corner and buy 1 bag of rice noodles for a buck and a bag of bean sprouts for 50 cents. Next door buy ginger, scallions, snow peas, garlic, onions.
5. Buy Murrays chicken thighs at Gourmet Garage.
6. Trim chicken into skinless chunks.
7. In a wok, heat up 2 tbsp canola oil.
8. Cook chicken pieces until cooked through, remove from wok.
9. Fry up some sliced half-moon-shaped onions; add minced garlic, add minced ginger.
10. Add a bunch of cleaned and trimmed snow peas, then a few tbsp soy sauce.
11. add in sliced scallions, rice noodles, more soy sauce.
12. Add chicken and bean sprouts, keep tossing until all is well coated.
13. Forget to take a picture; or if you want to do this whole recipe one better than me, you could actually remember to take a picture. That'd be awesome.

This dish is so insanely good. I want to say, for the record, that I appreciated the hell out of it, even when my Dad was alive, and that I appreciated the hell out of him, too.

Allora: Dad, for you, because of you.

The udder truth

2010-03-09T10:44:00.000-08:00

You walk into Whole Foods and you face a wall of milk. Depending on the branch, the selection will vary. Same thing with Gourmet Garage, Food Emporium, you name it. That’s because supermarkets each have their own buyers. So, how do you decide what to buy? What’s healthiest? What’s worth the extra money? Here we clarify some of milk’s greatest mysteries about rBGH, organics, expiration dates, farmers markets, and whether or not skirting the law for the unpasteurized raw stuff is worth it.

Read the whole post at WellandGoodNYC!

And while you're there, why don't you read their piece about the wonderful Mary Cleaver--owner chef at Chelsea Market's The Green table (and the catering company Cleaver & Co.) Mary catered my boss' wedding and in the rich tapestry of beautiful meals I have eaten in my life, it stands out as a dazzling and delicious thread.

Eating in: not so hard

2010-02-25T14:51:00.000-08:00

A week ago I wrote about Cathy Erway’s book The Art of Eating In and about HuffPost’s challenge to its readers to like Cathy did and eat in for one week. So, here goes my progress report, day 4.

For me—as for many of my colleagues—this isn’t so very different from a regular week. I usually make my lunch at least 3 days, if not all 5 workdays. Although lunch eats in DUMBO are better than in some neighborhoods, stuff I can make at home will almost always be better. It seems to be merely a matter of organization/planning, and making the time to prepare something. True, I’ve been eating kale salad for four days running, but it did have blood oranges and avocado on top, and those sweet potatoes I baked in the office toaster oven sure made the office smell good.

On Monday, Anna Lappe came to our office and wrote this lovely piece about the merits of eating in and how it made her lunch date with Josh (Viertel) more fun and more delicious.

I myself found that the challenge got me:
Eating at home with a friend in a very casual and potluck-y way that made both of us think: why don’t we do this more often?
Using up food in my fridge and not throwing out as much as I sometimes do (i.e. no produce was harmed/tossed in the making of this experiment)
Eating less
Spending less money

The bog trick will be the weekend, which is often structured around dinners and brunches and the like. Wish me luck.

Not Eating Out in NY

2010-02-22T14:00:00.000-08:00

Day 1:

Not only have I decided to follow the HuffPost's challenge to eat in for one week, I have also decided to try to eat healthier (every once in a while I must remind myself not to eat every single meal as though it were my last). Hence the baked sweet potato and kale/citrus salad I had for lunch. One hour later I felt like gnawing off my own fist.

Note to self: tomorrow, pack protein.

The Art of Eating In

2010-02-16T13:32:00.000-08:00

My latest, via the Huffington Post.

Apparently I am going to avoid restaurant eating for one whole week. Easy? Not sure yet. Reports will follow.

Biscuits, 2 ways

2010-02-13T16:49:00.000-08:00

Every few months I have the ladies over for dinner. I know lots of ladies, but for whatever reason, this group--mes soeurs--are called "the ladies." Making a nice home cooked meal is how I lure them to my apartment. "Bring wine," I say, and they do. Sometimes they bring their boyfriend/fiance/husband type person, and this is also nice. We have had these gatherings all over this city: in the East Village, in Cobble Hill, and here in UPS depot land (I have also supped with them in Los Angeles, Paris, Santa Fe, North Captiva and beyond but my dinner parties have remained in NYC).

Last weekend we gathered for chicken pot pie, something I hadn't made since an avant garde restaurant menu a couple of years back. After much hunting I found the red ribbon bookmark in The New Joy of Cooking right where I had left it--can you tell I don't use that cookbook much?

I topped it with buttermilk biscuits, a recipe torn out from an old Food and Wine magazine. I did the recipe wrong but liked what I came up with. They're insanely buttery and if you manage not to overwork them, they are flaky and light.

A few days later I made use of the remaining buttermilk and some Mountainview Farms bacon, plucked from the freezer, and made bacon shallot buttermilk biscuits for the 4th annual meat lovers an

d chocolate lovers potluck at my office.

Buttery Biscuits

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter (that's 10 tbsp. yup, you read correctly), chilled and cut into thick slices

1 cup buttermilk, chilled

Preheat oven to 425

whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt

cut the butter into the flour using two knives or this cool implement I have that I don't even know the name for

stir in buttermilk until dough is just moistened

dust a work surface with flour; make sure it's cat hair free

turn the dough out onto the surface and knead 2-3 times

pat it into a disk, about 1/2 inch thick

use a biscuit cutter, or the rim of a glass and cut out circles

put the biscuits on a baking sheet and sprinkle with Maldon sea salt

bake for 20 minutes, until golden

[to make the bacon ones, cut your bacon into small pieces, then fry it up, not too much since it will go in the oven later; saute minced shallot in the bacon fat; let both bacon and shallot cool; when you stir in buttermilk to the dough, also toss in bacon and shallots]

Cat food

2010-02-09T19:43:00.000-08:00

This is kind of a recipe post. A recipe for what cats won't eat, even if they're starving, apparently.

Came home late Monday night, empty handed (f*ck! forgot cat food!). 'Scool. Cats like people food--this I know because I can't eat a meal without them crawling on my plate.

So I grab two eggs--NICE eggs, farmers market eggs--and scramble them slowly over low heat. Divide them between 2 small plates, put them on the floor.

Cats are totally uninterested.

Open the fridge, grab a container of this lovely french whole milk yogurt, pour it over the eggs. Buddy is interested. Seymour, no. The tang is intriguing to him; this is the same cat who likes Listerine.

I grab a few hunks of homemade chicken pot pie, plop 'em on the plate. I am getting desperate now, as are the cats. In a final, pathetic bid, I grab 2 slices of Jenny's homemade cherry galette. After all, Buddy had sneakily mawed several pieces during my dinner party a few nights ago.

He licks excitedly but once the sprinkled crust sugar is gone, so is his enthusiasm. Seymour, long gone, empty-stomached, gazing out at the UPS depot.

Soda Savings

2010-02-03T14:30:00.001-08:00

My soda-less life: 1 month and counting. I just realized a perk, which is that I have saved $15 by eliminating my afternoon Diet Coke habit. That being said, I miss the nice guy at the deli downstairs. Maybe I should stop in and say hello.

Ma Famille, en Paris

2010-01-28T08:11:00.001-08:00

Yesterday's NY Times article on La Tour d'Argent, the old school fancy restaurant in Paris that lives on generations down the line, triggered some memories for me.

According to this web site I found, this restaurant has been around since the dawn of time--truly, for hundreds of years in some form or other. So, when my parents brought me and my brother there, circa 1985, it was--how do you say?--quite well-established.

To say we had no money back then isn't entirely true, I guess, since there we were, a family of four in Paris, on vacation. But this trip was certainly a luxury, and one that I imagine my parents had to budget for very carefully. They understood that France is about food. So in between Louvre visits and Tour Eiffel climbings, they scheduled in two fancy dinners, one of which was at the Michelin-starred La Tour d'Argent.

I will not forget that plate of food for as long as I live; I had never seen food presented before. 3 small medallions of beef arranged in a circle, interspersed with little bundles of buttered, julienned carrots, each tied with a chive. And a small dome of potatoes in the center. Amazing! And 6 waiters circling around the table like synchronized swimming swans.

On the way out we stopped in the gift shop and my father scrounged together the remaining francs in his pocket to buy an insanely overpriced ashtray as a reminder of this decadent French evening.

P.S. The next day I insisted on being brought to McDonald's on the Champs Elysees, declaring myself "sick of French food." A Canadian TV station snagged us on the way out, interviewing us to find out why in god's name we would travel to France, the home of fine dining, and go to eat at McDonald's. My parents were mortified, but said nothing, my father no doubt fingering the porcelain ashtray in his pocket.

Foodie miles

2010-01-21T18:16:00.000-08:00

It seems like whenever I travel somewhere I come back and say how I ate up the local food and am super psyched to come back to the variety of NYC.

I just spent a few days at a resort in Jamaica where the only good food was the jerk chicken, peas and rice, and plantains they served every day for lunch and dinner. When it was all hot, it was divine--but buffets are tricky.

Anyway, with all this talk of food miles, and competing studies about local food's ability to leave a smaller carbon footprint, I got thinking about foodie miles. What if I calculated the carbon footprint of the trips I've taken to eat the world's treats? Hell, I traveled all the way to Singapore --to see my friends, natch--but basically to eat at hawker centers. I think this gives me an F minus in the personal food miles department.

Michael Pollan wants you to eat food

2010-01-05T12:27:00.000-08:00

My latest on the HuffPost, on MP's new book.

Insta-party

2010-01-04T08:21:00.000-08:00

For NYE, I threw a last minute insta-party, and it went like this:

(Good friends and a moderately big apartment help, btw. I don't take either of those things for granted, even if it seems that way when I stick them in parentheses).

Stuffed Mushrooms (see Bittman's "How to Cook Everything"): they are very easy and very delicious and make use of pantry staples like bread crumbs, olive oil and grated parmigianno reggiano, which I keep in my freezer.

Stuffed Dates: slice open a date, stuff in a little blue cheese, pop a roasted almond on top. Repeat.

Pigs in Blankets: Mini Applegate Farms cocktail franks, a little biscuit dough, some good mustard.

Use what you have: I had a box of red velvet cake mix thanks to CC, so I bought cream cheese frosting ingredients and got to work the night before the party. I also had lots of leftover Rice Krispies and marshmallows from the Avant Garde Restaurant, so I made rice krispie treats.

Invite a chef: John is an amazing chef and generous to boot, so that meant beautiful creme caramel, a savory cheesecake that I'll call a "sformata," a white bean dip and chocolate truffles. I mean, hot damn.

Invite friends to bring stuff: You might get a cheese plate from Saxelby's, homemade deviled eggs, tons of good champagne, homemade pickled beets and homemade BBQ sauce. Hypothetically speaking.

And voila. Add a TV for watching the ball drop, and heat (my boiler punked out the next day) and you're all set.

In Praise of Food Kitsch

2009-12-29T09:27:00.001-08:00

At Xmas dinner, chez B-B, I was served a long-forgotten favorite of mine:

Ruffles Potato Chips w/
Lipton Onion Soup Dip

Even David Lebovitz, a favorite food blogger/tweeter of mine has been tweeting it up about Lipton Onion Soup dip. Apparently he is serving it to guests at is home in France, alors, c'est a la mode, non?

It's insanely off-the-charts delicious. I couldn't stop; honestly, I had to push away.

Goodbye Decade, Hello Sumthing Good

2009-12-23T13:38:00.000-08:00

Bring me sumthing goooooood, I say, and by "good" I mean tasty of course, but also bigger than that.

This decade began for me, quite literally, with a wail, and a howl, and a whimper, and a limp. It was not an auspicious beginning.

Foodwise, it began with one of the most delicious--if saddest--meals of my life. A New Year's eve tasting menu at the now defunct Bouley Bakery restaurant. Maybe that food was the augur, telling me that while this decade might kick my arse, it would feed me terribly well. It feels like a long long time ago, and this blog has seen me through a bit more than half of it.

Bring me sumthing good, I say. I'm ready.

Savory Rice Krispie Treats

2009-12-13T11:50:00.000-08:00

Although we call it the avant garde restaurant, we've not gone terribly avant garde with the food. UNTIL NOW.

Behold ye: savory rice krispie treats as passed hors d'ouevres. A little snooping on the internets revealed I am not the first person to have this idea. Mainly, I was worried about the marshmallows--would they be so sweet that no amount of savory introductions could balance them out? According to what I read, no, this is not a problem. I stole some ideas, for sure, and settled upon two versions to try today.

I have named them Vaguely Asian Savory Rice Krispie Treats and Crunchy Salty Savory Rice Krispie Treats.

C.S.S.R.K.:

melt 2 T butter in a medium sized saucepan

sprinkle a pinch of turmeric in as it melts

once it's all melted add 2 cups mini marshmallows

stir until they melt

add 1 tsp garlic powder

then 3 cups 365 brand Brown Rice Crisps (or the trad'l Kellogg's Rice Krispies)

then 2 cups crushed salt and pepper potato chips

stir, then press out into a brownie pan, pressing down and flattening

then sprinkle generously with paprika

V.A.S.R.K.:

Same as above but skip the turmeric

once marshmallows and butter are fully melted add one TBSP soy sauce, 1TBSP sesame oil and 1 tsp garlic powder

then 3 cups of the cereal and 3TBSP chopped roasted salted peanuts and two chopped scallions (not the white part)

stir, then press out into a brownie pan, pressing down and flattening

then sprinkle generously with ground ginger

I think these things might rock, in a weird kind of way.

Come Conni's Avant Garde Restaurant next weekend and checkitout for yourself!

post-game update: we went with the V.A.S.R.K. and they were enjoyed by most, if not all. P.L. declared them "gross" but then couldn't stop eating them saying they were "weirdly addictive."

Soda news

2009-12-09T15:06:00.000-08:00

You know I always come back to soda.

First things first: my Mama bought me a Soda Stream. Have been meaning to get one for oh-so-long now and am the happy owner of this spaceshipesque contraption. No more recycling of plastic seltzer bottles, a behavior that had been filling me with a lot of guilt. You can mix in flavor packets to your homemade seltzer, but I will not be doing that. That is weird. I will squeeze in a real live lemon.

And: speaking of a local supply of clean water, you might be interested in this op-ed piece from Jared Diamond about big companies--like Coca Cola--and how he doesn't think they are pure evil after all. We could go around the block about that one, I suppose. I myself believe in compassionate capitalism. Did I make that term up? I'll have my research intern check it out. OK, I have not research intern, you got me.

Anyway, it's really interesting to me how companies are getting in on the sustainability game because they damn well have to. Cocal-Cola is made of water, and water is becoming scarce in many parts of the world. Will Coke compete with agriculture for water use?

As Diamond explains: "Coca-Cola’s survival compels it to be deeply concerned with problems of water scarcity, energy, climate change and agriculture. One company goal is to make its plants water-neutral, returning to the environment water in quantities equal to the amount used in beverages and their production. Another goal is to work on the conservation of seven of the world’s river basins, including the Rio Grande, Yangtze, Mekong and Danube — all of them sites of major environmental concerns besides supplying water for Coca-Cola."

Marion Nestle takes him to task on her blog (I love her moxie and smarts and sass. Ahhhh): "We need some critical thinking here. If Diamond gave any thought at all to what Coca-Cola produces – bottled water and sodas – he would surely have to agree that less of both would be good for our own health and that of the planet."

What is your farmy restaurant really serving you?

2009-12-07T15:28:00.000-08:00

This piece by Jane Black really caught my eye, especially in the wake of my attendance at a young farmers conference last week at Stone Barns. She examines a restaurant in the DC area called Founding Farmers and how they are riding the local sustainable gravy train--sometimes making good on their promises, and sometimes not so much so.

It made me think about a fascinating workshop I attended at the conference, one about the relationship between farmer and chef, and led by some of the kitchen staff at Blue Hill at Stone Barns--those cooks who are responsible for purchasing and building relationships with farmers. Let me start by saying that those guys are as real deal as it gets (if you ever accidentally step on a pile of money and decide to make it yours, treat yourself to a meal at Blue Hill at Stone Barns). This is not a post in which I expose them for being fraudulent or farm-washers.

That being said: I think a lot of diners there have misconceptions about the experience. Think all the food is grown there and at their Berkshires farm? Think again. A quick look at the math would help you see that they just can't produce enough food on site to feed all of their diners. As a result they are purchasing from an additional 40 farmers or so, give or take. And the seafood? Do you think there is seafood in Westchester? They are flying it in from Nantucket etc. Also flown in on a regular basis? organic but industrial carrots, onions etc. used to make stock.

I think it's a question of, as a diner, removing blinders from your eyes. Just because you want to believe that the tomato on your burger is local and seasonal (because damn, a tomato slice on a burger is a fine thing indeed), just because you want asparagus risotto in January (a perfect dish when done right, no?) ask yourself: are tomatoes in season around here? Allow yourself to see the truth. Sometimes the restaurant is misleading you and sometimes you are contributing to the deception by misleading yourself.

Bits and pieces

2009-11-30T17:18:00.000-08:00

The Lunch Lady wishes you a belated Thanksgiving (via wellandgoodnyc.com)

There's lots to love in this Thanksgiving piece by Maira Kalman. I wish it wasn't so much the same familiar people (Pollan, Waters and her egg on a spoon, Canard, Edible Schoolyard, etc.) but I love how Kalman plays with pictures and words. In my next life (I'm pretty sure I still have like 6), I will create pieces like that.

Good for getting all that tryptophan out of your system: sweating and soaking it out at Spa Castle.

Good for a laugh: reading all of Sam Sifton's Thanksgiving advice, dispensed on the NY Times' Diner's Journal. I find this guy hilarious. One gem: "That sounds harsh, I realize, but Thanksgiving isn’t just punk rock and cranberries."

Thanksgiving redux

2009-11-27T14:18:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving was nice--small, casual, and full of ruckus (baby meets cat; cat runs away; baby searches relentlessly for terrified cats. Dog meets cat; cat runs away; dog searches relentlessly for terrified cats).

My first course was a tart I have served for two years running now. It's a riff on one I was served at my friend's house a few years ago. It might not be a perfect replica, but I think it comes close. And it's good, darn good. I started with a pie crust from Nick Malgieri's book "How to Bake." Them I sauteed one red onion in olive oil, with a dash of dried thyme, salt and pepper. So you roll the crust out, then make a bed with the onions. Then fan out one apple, sliced into half moons with the skin still on. I used a winesap, nice and sweet and crisp. Then I fill the circle in the middle with a generous crumbling of blue cheese--I used some Bayley Hazen blue, a little too dried out to eat by itself but perfect for baking. Then brush the crust with a little bit of beaten egg, then pop in a 375 degree oven, bake until crust is brown and cheese is melted and bubbling.

I neglected to take a picture of the SLAMMIN' turkey I made. Family pooh poohed last year's heritage bird (too gamey, too strange) so I went with a farm-raised, happy, hormone-less bird from Dickson Farmstand. I slathered it in Rosemary Maple Butter (holla!) per CC's suggestion, and you'll be shocked to hear that it was a VERY good idea. Even better on a leftover sandwich for lunch today.

Hearth, home

2009-11-25T17:53:00.000-08:00

It's the night before Thanksgiving and rather than starting my cooking prep, I'm pensive.

I hit the farmers market on my way home from work, braving the rain and the premature darkness and the last-minute shoppers. I was there buying the finishing touches--not food, per se, but eucalyptus and apple cider, to make my house homey and wintery tomorrow when I welcome my family for our turkey feast.

I'm reminded of Thanksgiving three years ago when, on my way to my family's house on Long Island, I stopped at the house of some friends of mine. They welcomed me in out of the cold, showered me in hugs and kisses and plopped me in a choice seat in front of a roaring fire, placed a mug of hot apple cider in one of my hands and a toasted buttered corn muffin in the other. This, I thought, is hospitality. This is home.

I have a big, comfortable apartment, with bits of me all over it, especially in the open kitchen, where I love to cook meals for people. And it feels like home when there are people here, and I turn on the christmas lights and make them a cocktail and fill their bellies, and plop them in front of the proverbial/metaphorical fireplace. I have learned hospitality from pros.

Is it a home, I find myself wondering, when it's just me here? A friend has a framed piece on her kitchen wall, something about how home is where "you" are. Without a you--even with hot cider and eucalyptus and two cats snuggled at your bum--is it home? Can it be?

Welcome to Fall, F*ckheads!

2009-10-26T13:49:00.000-07:00

It's always fall at my desk, winter even. In our office I sit by the window, by the A/C unit, bundled up in wool and hoodies all summer, all fall, all winter. That being said, in the great outdoors, where seasons really exist--even if they are all jumbled and pushed to unnatural extremes by climate change--it is finally fall.

I know this because I saw on the teevee, on a dunkin donuts commercial, that fall flavors have arrived; they even piled all the customers onto a hay-filled tractor and drove them off the farm over to a dunkin donuts so they could really taste fall in all its glory. True story.

I also know it's fall because of this f-ing hilarious piece in McSweeney's about decorative fall gourds (but really it's about so much more than that; I think that in its funny way it is also about xmas sweaters and window kreshes).

Another tell-tale sign the seasons are changing is that we have an office potluck on Wednesday and the theme is apples. I predict the presence of more bacon than apples, but so it goes.

Plus eucalyptus has arrived at the farmers market; I will perform my annual tradition of buying a ginormous bundle and plopping it on my dining room table for the next three months. At which point I'll look out the window (or turn on the teevee) and will see some other telltale clue that it's suddenly spring.

September Diary

2009-09-22T14:26:00.000-07:00

I was so busy being where I was, I forgot to blog.

What I've been up to:

Managing Slow Food USA's Time for Lunch campaign, thrilled by the success of our national day of action--300+ potlucks in all 50 states this past Labor Day!
Seeing movies, writing about them
Eating beef heart and oysters at Marlow and Sons
Stuffing zucchini blossoms with goat cheese and frying them
Attending New Amsterdam Market, already excited for the next one on October 25th
Supporting Just Food at their Let us Eat Local benefit, eating pork sliders, gazpacho and grilled cheese and Blue Marble's strawberry ice cream and anything else I could cram in my yapper
despairing occasionally at the state of the world (read: politics, yo)
Preserving 70 lbs of heirloom tomatoes

Whatchoo been up to?

Be where you are

2009-08-21T10:37:00.001-07:00

One of my favorite concepts (and practices) is that of eating place-based foods. Place-based foods are those that have a deep connection to the land where they grow. That connection is a physical one, as well as a historic one, and it is reflected in the taste, look, feel, and culture of the food.

Last weekend I spent my birthday--a milestone one, they say--on the North Fork of Long Island, and I focused my activities and my eating on place-based traditions.

I went wine-tasting and swirled in my mouth the product of the relatively new grape growing traditions of the East End. On the island only certain varieties grow well, and as a result, the menus are populated by Chardonnays and Merlots, with some Gruners and Rieslings mixed in. You don't go to Long Island to drink Pinot Grigio; be where you are. Drink where you are.

I ate corn. Lots of it. The North Fork's sweet summer corn is outstanding, and extra good when grilled in its husks by your big brother (hypothetically speaking, of course). I ate homemade lobster rolls, made with local lobster--Una's recipe, via Ethan, and outstandingly simple and good. Also, local wild striped bass, more than once, and tomatoes, tomatoes tomatoes (blight be damned). There were no local peaches, because it turns out all those peaches at Union Square all come from Jersey. So, I guess you don't go to Long Island to eat peaches; be where you are. Eat where you are.

And the birthday thing: I think I am meant to be scared by this birthday, by the fact that I haven't figured out my whole life yet, by the fact that I am getting older and nobody lives forever. But instead I walked on the beach, and I rode bikes with my friends, experiencing what it must feel like to be a kid in the suburbs, learning to feel comfortable on a bike, thrilling at the freedom of exploring the neighborhood, tooling around with your buddies, baking in the hot sun.

My birthday mantra: maintain a place-based tradition. Be where you are.

Julie & Julia

2009-08-09T20:00:00.000-07:00

6 years ago, after reading an article about it in the NY Times, I checked out a blog called "The Julie/Julia Project." It was my first time reading a food blog, and I was sucked in from the start.

At the time, I myself was sitting in a cubicle, half in my body, half outside of it--working on theatre projects, writing plays at my computer. Also, I was reading blogs, many of them, and after beginning with Julie Powell's, most of them were about food.

Tonight I watched the movie version of Julie Powell's food epiphany, how Julia Child--and writing about it--pulled her out from under the metaphorical waves as she (metaphorically) drowned. It gave me the opportunity to think about the time that's passed since I read her blog, and since I started mine.

I was on the heels of a break up with a boy, and on the verge of a break up with my life as I knew it. Since then a lot has changed: I am grateful for what I have figured out since then, and a bit baffled by the things I still haven't.

For Julie and for Julia both, the journey was one in which they discovered the joy they find in food--and me, too, I suppose. Why do I cook? At the end of an exhausting Avant Garde Restaurant run, 330 meals later, that joy is the only reason that has any legs.

In the meantime, my blog hasn't landed me a book deal, but it did help me find my food voice, and maybe helped build the bridge for me from where I was, to where I was headed.

52 Small Bites

2009-08-04T12:40:00.000-07:00

The brilliant Amy has a new blog called "52 Bites; a site to help change the way you eat." She, along with everyone else I know, recently moved down South and has been exploring how to eat fresh and local on a budget, in a place that isn't totally obsessed with fresh and local like her old home (Seattle) was.

It's a nuts and bolts guide and breaks down menu planing in a way I find really helpful. I myself go to the farmers market, grab random things that look tasty, then scramble about to turn them into meals. I shop at the supermarket haphazardly and overwhelmed and then do crazy blog-fueled experiments like "Eating down my larder."

Amy is here to help.

As she describes the new venture: "Weekly advice on changing the way you eat over the course of a year. Healthier, cleaner, kinder, better - and without breaking the bank."

Doing things a little bit weird

2009-08-01T17:48:00.000-07:00

This summer I learned to ride a bike. Most regular folks learn to do this in childhood and then spend their days as a youngster, tween, teen etc. tooling around the neighborhood on their hoopties, getting into trouble and feeling the freedom that comes with having their own set of wheels.

What was I waiting for? It turns out that not only is it easy but it's crazy fun. I remember I finally tried a mango when I was 21 years old and I couldn't stop kicking myself for waiting so long. All those years of missed mango eating! Sheesh!

Here I am again, whooping it up on the bike and kicking myself at the same time. 34.5 missed years of bike riding! I might be the stupidest person I know. Or, I guess I just do things a little bit weird.

A BLT is a classic, but because I guess I like to do things a little weird, tonight I made something I'll call:

BLT in a bowl

Several varieties (different colors, shapes, sizes) of summer tomatoes
Fresh basil leaves
Bacon
Summer corn
oil
baslamic vinegar
salt
pepper

Cut up tomatoes and dress with oil, vinegar, salt and pepper

Cook the corn and scrape the kernels from the cob

Rinse and then chiffonade the basil leaves

Fry up thick cut bacon (or, like me, random bacon chunks left over from sliced bacon, sold by Flying Pigs Farm) and slice it up

Toss everything together

Eat with a spoon

Milk and Soda

2009-07-28T14:22:00.000-07:00

This news that Coke is marketing fizzy milk is, at first, revolting. I look forward to the future articles debating whether “New Coke” or “Vio” was the more misguided effort on the company’s part. Only time will tell.

And yet.

As a child, I drank something my parents and brother and I called “milk and soda,” in improbable quantities. As I understand it, it was a “Laverne and Shirley” thing (and let us now take a moment to thank Mom and Dad for resisting the urge to put me in J monogrammed sweaters every day of my youth).

This is how you make it:

Take a tall glass
Fill it about an inch up with Coke, or Diet Coke (Laverne, listen up: Pepsi is not acceptable)
Fill the rest of the glass with skim milk

Once, at a friend’s house, her parents tried to make me feel at home by offering me my favorite drink. I took a sip and, horrified, spit it out. It was not Coke, it was seltzer and I was amazed at their stupidity. Had they never SEEN a milk and soda before? I finally understood at that moment (I was 6) that most people had not, as it turns out, seen this drink nor tasted it; I also understood that this was going to be the beginning of having to explain strange things about myself, like my crazy name and the elevator pass I had at school because of my screwy knees.

It was my parents’ way to get me to drink milk, just like I imagine it is Coke’s way to get you to drink milk, though not for the same reason--parents: healthy bones, Coke: milk is cheap right now. It just seems like a lost opportunity on their part. Why not mix the milk with the soda? It tastes so damn good.

TRY IT. You’ll like it.

Preserving the Dying Art of Cooking

2009-07-25T14:26:00.002-07:00

My latest on the Huffington Post.

Most of the comments are from people who somehow think that I don't know how to cook and are berating me for it. Which is confusing, since, um, I am saying the exact opposite in the post.

What the f-uh? Real food.

2009-07-13T19:04:00.000-07:00

In response to those of us encouraging people to learn about where their food comes from, to THINK about their food choices: here cometh the grammatically incorrect, anti-thought advertising campaign from KFC. "Unthink."

Before I start knocking Starbucks' "real food" campaign, I should actually go in there and try some of their new food, all HFCS-free and whatnot. Only problem is I can't bear to go buy any of that stuff--scarred by a few unsavory airport meals.

Hellmann's, too, is getting in on the action, having launched an ad campaign in Canada that touts the localness of their shelf-stable mayonnaise. The website is super creepy, in that you can't tell at first that it's a Hellmann's site. Apparently a few years ago, they were going for realness, too. Ummm, ok.

I know what's real, thank you very much. Like my lunch today:

early Long Island summer tomato. check.

greenhouse Long Island basil. check.

Tuscan olive oil. splash of Katz's wine vinegar. salt. pepper. checkkkkkk.

heaping tbsp Calabro ricotta.

Mix it all up in a bowl.

Almondine baguette.

Voila--le sandwich!

Obama, Healthcare, Food

2009-06-16T08:46:00.001-07:00

Check out my latest on the Huffington Post.

Some good news: right after I posted it, Obama did speak up saying “It also means cutting down on all the junk food that is fueling an epidemic of obesity, putting far too many Americans, young and old, at greater risk of costly, chronic conditions. That's a lesson Michelle and I have tried to instill in our daughters with the White House vegetable garden that Michelle planted. And that's a lesson that we should work with local school districts to incorporate into their school lunch programs.”

Let's just watch and see if this is a whole lotta B.S. or what.
I'll be holding him to this quote.

Singaporean dessert

2009-06-10T07:11:00.001-07:00

Before it's too late and I have forgotten everything, I must write about dessert. Dessert in Singapore/Malaysia/Indonesia is not like anything I have ever had before. Wheat flour makes few appearances, same with chocolate. You would think then that there was nothing good left to eat for dessert, but this would not be true.

Picture this:

a bowl full of chopped gummy bears, sweet corn, and beans. Topped with Italian ices.

This is called ice kachang and it's the picture I led with when I began this series. Here's another closeup so you can see the corn and stuff. Maybe it was all the satay and beer I had before it (or the week-long food orgy leading up to this, my final night in Asia), but this wasn't my favorite thing I had. My favorites were in Kuala Lumpur...

At a sweet little restaurant

called Precious, in the Central market, we had chendal, sago melaka and bubor chacha. The whole Malaysian gang I was with were very very excited to see these things on the menu and declared these renditions to be "very very very good." I myself had nothing to compare them to. They looked like nothing I had ever seen and I thought they were OUTSTANDING.

The one at the top of the pic is, I believe, the sago melaka, a divine mound of glutinous rice balls submerged in a sweet coconut broth. Does this even do it justice? Chendal is stranger, also incredible--a mound of shaved ice, with that same coconut liquid, and some brown stuff--brown

sugar? and then topped with these glutinous green stringy things. how do I make this sound appetizing? My food writing skills are failing me. You'd have to eat it to understand.

Weird Stuff (Street Food)

2009-05-24T17:31:00.000-07:00

In Bahasi Malay and Indonesian, warung means stall. I am a sucker for a food stall, as we all know. Like my hero Calvin Trillin, I've got the gene that makes me love buying street food and eating while standing up. In just 10 hours in Kuala Lumpur, I ate like a king. Malaysia beckons me back....I had goreng pisang (battered and fried banana, right), and some thin crispy crepe with peanuts (see below).

In Indonesia, I showed some uncharacteristic caution and resisted all food carts except the grilled corn being sold at the top of the mountain where we went to look at Mount Merapi (oh man what was that place called again...?).

In Singapore, the street food is housed inside, in hawker centres, where things are clean and tidy, and handily grouped all together. Calvin Trillin wrote famously about them in the New Yorker, and there's a guide to them you can pick up while in Singapore. I trusted Claire and Huzir as my guides, and didn't go wrong.

Highlights:

Carrot Cake. Which is not at all what it sounds like. Glutinous chunks of what Claire reported to be "grated root vegetable," sauteed in garlicky soy sauce. I couldn't stop eating it despite my overly full belly.

Teo Chew (braised duck with rice noodles): Man alive. So flavorful.

Rojak: We had a version of this peanut-sauced fruit salad while in Jogja, but this one was stranger and more delicious. I will list the ingredients but you'll think I am joking. Sliced guava, cucumber chunks, mango(?), and a few other fruits and vegetables, with chunks of giant fried churro. Doused in an incredible peanut sauce. Oddly, inexplicably divine.

Chwee Kueh (steamed rice cakes with minced something or other on top): There is no end to how many ways I can enjoy rice products, apparently.

Apologies to Huzir for not calling the Char Kway Teow a highlight.

Weird Stuff, part 3 (Rijsttafel)

2009-05-24T16:26:00.000-07:00

Rijsttafel meaning "rice table" in Dutch, ends up meaning a kind of lunch smorgasbord. Or that's what it meant for us, anyway, as we sweated it out in the courtyard of the Hotel Mertua, gorging ourselves on a series of small Javanese plates.

Sitting atop our beautiful Jogja batik table cloth, they included the local salad teran chan--fresh grated coconut, ginger, sliced long beans, bean sprouts, and something else or two; homemade tempeh, which we were having for the second time, and is on a level that industrial tempeh just can't touch; serunding--another grated coconut dish, this one spiced and toasted I think; various satays; fried rice, noodles, etc.

It is worth mentioning the distinctive taste of Javanese food. Before we left Singapore we were warned by one person that the food's no good, assured by another that it is good, but very simple. I agree with the second person, though truth be told we ate only at our lovely hotel, the Bale Raos royal restaurant at the Kraton, and here. And it's true--no sauces, nothing fancy, just simple ingredients, most of which we saw growing at some point, whether it be in the rice paddy fields in the local villages or up in the terraced mountains near Mt. Merapi.

weird stuff, part 2 (breakfast)

2009-05-21T20:04:00.000-07:00

My first day in Singapore, not 2 hours off the plane, we headed to Chinatown for dimsum. I earned my stripes sucking bbq sauce off of chicken feet. Slurping red bean steamed buns and shrimp dumplings, blinking off jetlag and enjoying my new discovery: non breakfast food for breakfast.

For the next two days, I drooled over nasi lemak: coconut rice with chili paste, little dried crunchy fish and then a big fried fish on top. Also good for breakfast is nasi goreng, javanese fried rice. Between all the breakfast rice and, well, the lunch and dinner rice (not to mention dessert rice--more to come on that), I am now basically one giant rice ball.

First day home and I am back on Cheerios and milk. What's up with that?

Another Singapore specialty is kaya toast, a kind of coconut custard spread on big fluffy white crustless bread, and lightly toasted. We had this only the once, but it was delicious, and compelling.

you eat weird stuff, part one

2009-05-20T19:32:00.001-07:00

For centuries, travelers and "discoverers" have encountered new countries and new cultures and they have thought or said: "you eat weird stuff here!" Some of those intrepid swashbucklers then add: "Can I taste?" I am one of said intrepid discoverers, leading with her tongue.

I have just returned from nearly two weeks traveling Singapore, Malaysia (for 10 food-filled hours), and Indonesia. Claire and Huzir took pains to introduce me to all of the important dishes, fruits, and tastes on offer. As Huzir feared I would, I am now publicly declaring that I have met my match in those two. They love food journeys as much as I do.

I took pictures of nearly everything, and will chronicle it all here in such detail that your eyes will bleed. Or your stomach growl. Whatevs. I begin tonight, when I should be asleep already, with:

DRINK.

Upon arrival in Jogja (that's the island of Java, hey now), our houseboys greeted us with a welcome drink. Last time I saw such a maneuver was on "Fantasy Island," and the gesture was lost on me. Suddenly, on that hot Indonesian patio, I understood why we greet visitors with a taste of their new home. This drink sought to transform us from the inside out, sending streams of rose syrup, cinnamon, tamarind and lemon grass through our veins, synching our pulses with those of the Javanese. This isn't it pictured here, but it's something similar.

In fact, at every turn, each time I reached for a Coca Light (see my recent HuffPo post on that ol' silly habit), Claire pushed me to try something new.

Including:

cincau: seaweed jelly cubes in syrup--was that coconut?

avocado "juice": basically an avocado smoothie. hello!

fresh squeezed sugar cane, with one of them mini limes

kickapoo joy juice: this is not a name I have made up. Seriously.

and the list goes on.

In fact, I took a pic of a menu at a coffee shop (not what we think of when we say coffee shop. Something else) and it gives you a sense of all the crazy beverages they've got going on.

Going Local/Going Abroad

2009-04-19T17:37:00.000-07:00

Local:

The reason I love the restaurants I love (generally of the seasonal ingredient-driven sort) is not because the politics line up; not because they have a super relaxed yet lovely vibe; not because I imagine the people in the kitchen have more fun, learning how to make new things all the time, even though all of that is true. It's that I love not knowing what I'll find there next--the menu changes with each day or week or season, and I am surprised every time.

I haven't yet written about Back Forty, Peter Hoffman's downscale East Village joint, a place that despite not always getting it right, has made it onto my short list of loves. The first time I went was last summer, on one of those sunny and amazing days--the pork jowl nuggets were not my thing; the lobster roll couldn't hold a candle to all the classic lobster roll joints we have going these days. But other things were excellent, and the beers were carefully chosen and crisp and cool. And the waitstaff was friendly and the vibe was excellent. So I have returned and each time I get better at ordering and each time I have things I adore.

Last night the toasted fregola salad was off the hook and there were ramps everywhere--which I am gathering must have been brought up from the Carolinas. Chicken liver mousse with pork cracklins, amazing rosemary french fries.

Abroad:

I am off to Asia in a few weeks and I needed some good travel guides. I am terrible at pre-trip reading. In fact, I have never visited a travel bookstore before. I was running errands in Chelsea this past sunny Saturday and the map on my iphone led me to Idlewild Bookstore on 19th street. The store is a quiet 2nd floor haven, replete with cute bookish sales guys, Tom Waits tunes and a lovingly curated selection. I love the way it's organized--it reflects an interdisciplinary style that I've long favored as a tutor. Categorized by country/region, there are, alongside the traditional travel guides, related fiction and non-fiction titles mixed in. Also, over by the travel writing, cookbooks. Also, they sell globes. I got 2 slim Singapore guides and a Nell Freudenberger short story collection set in Southeast Asia. 24 hours of plane ride to kill, and now, 3 books to read!

Carolina Gold

2009-03-30T12:33:00.000-07:00

2 months ago I went to visit my peeps in Columbia, South Carolina, and took a moment to visit Anson Mills (see my photo gallery on the SFUSA blog). Glenn Roberts--heritage grain genius, artisanal food entrepeneur, and all around great guy--handed us bags of rice on our way out, bags that have been idling in my freezer until last week's potluck lunch at the office.

I made two iterations; the first was the filling in Mark Bittman's stuffed peppers (or as I like to call them, "Amy's stuffed peppers"). The second, I made up, and darned if it wasn't good. Mostly, I think, because it showcased the rice-beautiful Carolina Gold.

1 leek, washed, trimmed, and sliced into thin half moons
1 cup Anson Mills Carolina Gold rice
2 cups water
3 tbsp Kerrygold butter
fresh basil leaves, chiffonaded (ribbons)
the zest and juice of one lemon
salt, pepper

In a big saucepan, saute the leeks in 2 tbsp of the butter until soft and transluscent, salting a bit as you go
add the rice, stirring to coat
add the two cups of water, bring to a boil, then cover and reduce heat to a simmer
cook 15 minutes or so until rice is moist and fluffy
take of heat and toss with remaining butter, lemon zest and juice, basil ribbons
more salt and pepper to taste
if you don't like it, add more butter!

The return of the White House Garden

2009-03-19T19:32:00.000-07:00

CHECK THIS OUT.

2 Breads whose Roots are Twin*

2009-03-18T09:00:00.000-07:00

Many a time I've wondered what the scoop is with Sullivan Street Bakery. One day I woke up and it looked the same in every way, down to the crumble of each and every bread, except it was called "Grandaisy." But they were still selling bread in Sullivan Street Bakery bags at Murray's, so it clearly wasn't a rebranding.

I heard rumors of a divorce.

Then, because I am slow like that, I finally just read an article from October's Atlantic Monthly, written by Corby Kummer, called "Half a Loaf," in which he explores what happened in this situation--as well as the larger issues including who has the rights to a recipe, who can claim a signature delicious loaf (especially if it is merely a subtle riff on a European classic).

A great read.

(Plus, Corby's got a whole new food section on Atlantic Monthly's website and it rocks).

* An oblique reference to an Alice Walker poem I love..."I am the woman offering two flowers whose roots are twin. Justice and Hope/ Hope and Justice/ Let us begin."

HuffPo

2009-03-18T08:56:00.000-07:00

Check me out in my new gig as a contributor to the Huffington Post blog.

Sustainable Farmers=Rockstars

2009-03-16T13:22:00.000-07:00

It's a sign that at least one thing is going right in our crazy world when small organic farmers get treated like rockstars. There's Rosie Perez....and Mena Suvari....and that giant gorgeous Inuit supermodel from the 90s...and a bunch of girls in stilettos drinking cocktails and not eating the marvelously artistic passed hors d'oevres...and my high school buddy Anna's rough-hewn and lovely portraits of sustainable farmers in the Pacific Northwest, shirtless in the fields, the center of all the fuss.

Last Thursday I attended the launch of the USA Network's Character Project, a photo exhibit, and a forthcoming book, as far as I can gather. And there were Anna's pics, alongside the works of luminaries such as Sylvia Plachy and Eric Ogden! The exhibit has left NYC but you can check it out in other locations.

And to gaze at more of Anna Mia Davidson's farmer portraits, including one of her husband John, click here.

Put your Insidious Big Ag Ads Here!

2009-03-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

Thanks to my buddy Jack for this one. We both agreed that these series of high fructose corn syrup ads that have hit the airwaves and the magazine pages are kind of douche-y (as in Massengill ads from the 80s, though also kind of douche(bag)-y as well).

Missing

2009-03-06T11:51:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I miss things so intensely, it's hard. It's such a basic human emotion, I realize, but it can be futile, especially if the person or place you're missing ain't ever coming back.

I miss Brooklyn.

But I work there! But I hang out there! But it still EXISTS! Can I still miss it? Well, I do.

Last night after work I headed deeper into Brooklyn with one of my favorite food buddies to Buttermilk Channel for a cocktail and some bacon nuts and other treats; then walked up to Black Mountain (a little gem) and sat by the fire eating truffle-y, mushroom-y mac and cheese and sipping red wine.

It was awesome, because how often do you get to scratch the missing itch like that?

Go Meat- and Dairyless One Day a Week

2009-03-04T11:19:00.000-08:00

From an article in the latest Mother Jones:

"According to a 2008 report from Carnegie Mellon University, going meat- and dairyless one day a week is more environmentally beneficial than eating locally every single day."

Eating From my Larder

2009-03-03T08:49:00.001-08:00

As posted on CivilEats.com today (and as pinged by Mark Bittman on his blog today--sweet!):

The fact that the cabinet door to my “pantry” is suddenly busted has made ignoring its contents difficult. For example: two cans of tuna packed in oil, and I cannot remember the last time I ate canned tuna. My concerns about seafood (un)sustainability have made me shy away from eating fish lately. When did I even buy those cans, and why?

Then there’s that half bag of quinoa. Um, how long until quinoa goes bad? Half bags, too, of pearl barley, lovely little green lentils, couscous, risotto….the list goes on.

Also, there’s the matter of my freezer, which given other freezers I’ve seen (like the one at my Mom’s house—sorry, Mom) isn’t so bad. But it’s got two big bags of corn kernels I froze in late August, and if I don’t eat them soon, they’ll be losing a competition against fresh summer corn at the market. Also, a plastic liter seltzer bottle full of whey, and about a dozen bagel halves from my nephew’s bris (n.b. he was born September 20th).

Eating what you have on hand has been a much-discussed topic these days for the food obsessed. For example, I’ve just discovered that our editor here at Civil Eats is also participating, via the Washington Post's blog "A Mighty Appetite," in what Kim O’Donnel is calling "Eating Down the Fridge," a title I like.

I discovered the idea on the New York Times Diner’s Journal blog, which alerted me to a contest brewing on eGullet: “National Eat the Stuff in our Freezers and Pantry Week.” I don’t have the stocks to participate in this contest full on (I love eGullet because it’s hard core—these people have boxes of Parmalat, powdered milk even, for crying out loud); but I decided to read about the contest and shadow, as best as I could.

First, there are rules, as explained by the staff at eGullet:

1 - No stockpiling.

2 - No endangering your children.

3 - No making yourself miserable.

4 - If you decide to participate in this experiment, you’re making a commitment to chronicle a week’s worth of meals starting on whatever day you normally shop.

5 - Have fun, and keep everyone posted on your progress!

SobaAddict70 shares a list of everything he had, and whoah—this dude must live in the suburbs, because where would I put all that? Steven Shaw (aka “Fat Guy”) discusses the merits of freezing milk and I feel like I am back in the scary wilds of my mom’s freezer; I may have a dozen bagels from 2008, but darnit, I have my limits.

OK, so first things first, I decide to use the quinoa. I cook up a half box and it makes an insanely large bowl of quinoa, more than I can imagine eating this year, let alone this week. I douse it with sesame oil from the pantry, and toss in some peanuts from my freezer (I keep a lot of nuts in the freezer: pecans, pignoli, hazelnuts, walnuts). It was pretty dull. The prospect of eating 85 servings of this makes me very sad indeed. So I go out and buy out-of-season-but-organic scallions and red bell pepper, and a small bottle of sake in which to sautee some onions from my fridge drawer. The first assignment and I have already broken the rules! In fact, these past few days, I keep learning this sad lesson again and again. I try to use the things in my larder, and to make anything halfway decent, I need to buy more things. And then to use those things, I need to buy even more things. It’s a vicious (if often delicious) cycle.

I take comfort in the loosey goosey goings-on over at eGullet. Plus, the photos are riveting. I cannot believe all the cool (and, well, strange) things people have kicking around. It kind of makes me want to live with some of them, or at least you know, hang out together at mealtime. One person harvested dandelion greens from their backyard in Texas! Also worth mentioning there seems to be a deep love of Costco over there on the boards.

OK, next dish. With the corn, a peak-of-summer corn chowder with a fridge drawer potato, some fridge drawer onions and celery, and the remainder of the red pepper. Then I buy some fresh basil—doh! I am really very bad at this indeed. (But, but, but, remember how Mark Bittman said dried basil is bad? I had agreed with him, but now I wish I had some so I didn’t have to transgress like this….)

But all is not lost; tonight I will defrost the pork chops from Bradley Farm, and with the rest of the frozen corn, a little of the precious remaining milk I’ve got, as well as the half bag of Wild Hive Farm stone ground cornmeal from my freezer (ohhh yeah, cornmeal and flour go in the freezer at my house) I will make a corn pudding.

I may not have much of a larder, and I may be buying a lot of supplements, but I am a) having a blast following the contest and b) doing a fine job of clearing out my stores, and c) spending less money as I do it.

This week I have made egg salad (very tasty on ancient toasted bagel); I have used those frozen overripe bananas to make a banana bread for my new parent friends; I have eaten down my fridge. I have looked it in the eye and shown it who’s boss.

Not about food but who doesn't love puppies?

2009-03-02T16:03:00.000-08:00

I heard that sites that have porn or post wacky pics of kittens and puppies get a lot of hits, so, uh, here goes. I don't know what you do at your job but at my job we play with puppies.

Avant Garde Restaurant Hits the Big Time

2009-02-26T11:25:00.001-08:00

It is with pride that I direct you to this piece in Time Out New York!

This weekend's event is sold out but I hope you'll come chew the scenery with the AVGR in April...?

PS also check out TONY's David Cote's blog post with our Butternut Squash soup recipe.

Peanut, peanut butter

2009-02-17T08:34:00.000-08:00

I am a good American, inasmuch as I really like peanut butter and I eat it an awful lot. As you can imagine, for this and other reasons, I have been following the peanut recall with more than idle curiosity.

Please see the Slow Food USA blog today for my woefully belated Peanut Butter Recall Redux.

Also, please see my old post, from the early days (4 years ago!), on Peanut Butter Bumpers. n.b. this week Whole Foods was having a sale, and now the top of my fridge looks like a PBB convention.

Death of a Salesman

2009-02-16T14:19:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago, the peeler guy from the Union Square Greenmarket died. Yes, I bought peelers from him, and yes, they work really really well.

I already miss his shpiel.

I spent my childhood watching my father's alter ego--antique book salesman--and admiring its unlikely bravado. My weekday policy/finance Dad wore a suit, carried a briefcase, and went to an office. I don't know exactly what his work persona was like--though a memorial service last year gave me the sense that he was more outgoing and more gregarious than I ever imagined--but his salesman persona always seemed like a funny role he was playing.

"Antiquarian bookseller" sounds genteel, I realize, but ofttimes this involved selling at streetfairs (back when NYC streetfairs were eclectic and interesting, not just sweatsocks and funnel cakes). On certain occasions, he was a carnival barker, calling passerbys to his booth, promising 50% off. I was usually plopped on a lawn chair at the front of the booth with my mother, making sure nobody stole anything, making transactions, and watching my father doing what he loved.

Somehow I think Joe Ades the vegetable peeler seller reminded me of that unabashed salesman spirit I used to see in my Dad...

Chocolate, chocolate, meat

2009-02-11T20:34:00.000-08:00

I have a dream job, and what you do in a dream office is have potlucks, ones where everyone who brings stuff in are really, really good cooks. Cool, right?

This week we had our 3rd Annual Meat Lovers and Chocolate Lovers lunch (in honor of Valentine's Day), for which Jenny and I made Sausage/Broccoli Rabe panini. It's a good thing, too, because everyone else practically brought chocolate (remember the old Sesame Street episode where they have a potluck picnic and neglect to plan who will bring what? Everyone brings watermelon. This wouldn't happen at our office because, hey, watermelon is NOT in season. But chocolate, chocolate is always in season).

Sausage/Broccoli Rabe Panini

Sweet Italian Fennel Sausage (OR John's homemade spicy italian sausage)

a little white wine (or red wine, whatever you have)

olive oil

broccoli rabe

garlic, minced

red pepper flakes

salt/pepper

thinly sliced fontina cheese

sliced sourdough

panini press

begin by blanching broccoli rabe in boiling water for about 2-3 minutes

drain

saute chopped garlic in olive oil

add cooked broocoli rabe, pinch salt, and one shake of red pepper flakes

toss to coat, cook 1 minute

at the same time (because multi tasking is fun) in a separate pan, heat a little more oil

add sausage links, letting them brown on all sides

add 1/2 cup white or red

cover, turn down heat and let cook fro about 12 minutes

assemble sandwiches: one layer cheese, one layer of sliced sausage, one layer of broccoli rabe

put on a lightly oiled, heated panini press and cook until cheese melts and bread crisps and browns.

cut into thirds and eat with 2 kinds of chocolate mousse, 2 kinds of chocolate cake, chocolate chip cookies, and a strong antacid.

Recreating Food Memories

2009-01-21T14:13:00.000-08:00

I have written here in the past about the the process of following my taste buds into the market, back into the kitchen, in an effort to recreate a delicious and meaningful dish. Once, it was my father's Chicken Chow Fun; this weekend it was the minestrone I had on the farm in Tuscania, rich with the property's wild boar and cheesy with parmigiano rinds.

Now the soup I ended up with does not taste like Laura Caponetti's minestrone, not even close, but yo it's really good!!

1/2 bag dried beans (I used Ojo de Cabra, kind of like pinto)
1/2 box orecchiete or any kind of smallish pasta
1 smoked ham hock (mine came from Ray at Bradley Farm, up near New Paltz)
1 rind from a wedge of parm.
1 can tomato paste
1 bunch kale, ribs removed and leaves chopped
4 carrots, peeled and trimmed and diced
3 stalks celery, cleaned and trimmed and diced
2 small onions, peeled and diced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
2 bay leaves
water
salt and pepper
olive oil

The night before, I soaked the beans in a bowl on my countertop
The next day in a very tall soup pot I sauteed the onions (in oil) until glassy and translucent
then added the garlic
After a minute I added the carrots and celery
After another minute I added the tomato paste and stirred it all around
Then I put in the giant ham hock, the drained beans, and about 8 cups (?) of water, basically up towards the top of the pot
And the two bay leaves, and the cheese rind
I brought it to a boil then down to a simmer
Cooked it, covered, for about 2 hours
(About an hour in, I added the kale)
Then I removed the ham hock and used a fork and sharp knife to remove all the meat from the bone and put the meat back in the soup
then I added a lot of salt and pepper and cooked it uncovered at a boil for another 30 minutes
Then I put in the pasta and cooked it, uncovered at a boil for about 12 minutes

Pull out beans, taste 'em--are they done?
Do you like the salinity?
Don't be afraid to taste your way to what you like...

Cabbage: past, present, future

2009-01-14T20:15:00.000-08:00

I am finding gift giving increasingly difficult. Between the recession and the fact that my family and I all have what we want, Chanukah felt challenging, until! One Sunday afternoon Steve mentioned a lost dish from his youth, his Grandmother's Hungarian comfort food--something with "egg noodles and cabbage."

A quick Google search revealed what mostly seemed to be called Haluska, a simple dish made awesome by copious amounts of butter. So, for Steve, for Chanukah (in addition to my annual potato latkes), a big bowl of Haluska.

Then, 2 weeks later, a fermentation workshop with the King of Fermentation, Sandor Katz. After an overview of the basics of fermentation, a lesson in basic sauerkraut, made from 2 kinds of cabbage, some carrots and some radishes.

Only problem is, cabbage now finally seems to be gone from the farmers market, goshdarnit, meaning the dead of winter is really totally finally here, and cabbage has to be shipped in from rosier climes. So, I am learning about sauerkraut now, so that next late fall I can preserve 09's cabbage Sandor-style.

Sandor Katz's Basic Sauerkraut

See his website and/or read his book, Wild Fermentation!

Haluska

1 bag egg noodles, cooked

1 large leek, white and light green parts only, well cleaned, halved lengthwise and sliced into half moons

3/4 head green cabbage, cored and diced

1 stick butter

several tbsp chicken broth

1 tbsp milk

salt

pepper

Melt the stick of butter over med heat

Saute leeks until soft

add 1/3 of the cabbage, and a pinch of salt, let it get soft

Add the next 1/3 and some more salt, let it cook down until soft

Add final 1/3 and a wee bit more salt and let it cook down

Then add the stock and the milk and let it cook a little longer, thickening and getting good

Then mix with the cooked noodles

Salt and pepper to taste but you really might not need any more salt

(you can make this with less butter and it will still taste good, but--is this too obvious to mention?--it's way better with all that butter).

More, with less

2009-01-02T09:34:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year, ye few faithful readers. As a reward for your staying power, a few links and a recipe (for CJR, who has always asked for more recipes):

We are in a financial panic, underemployed and underfunded, finally ready to stop shopping and do more with less (or as my buddy Woody Tasch said in his New Year's poem over on powells.com "Let us imagine a consumer putting down the purse").

For me this means trying to make new food out of old leftovers, though I haven't quite perfected this--every dish I want to make with leftovers requires the purchase of slightly more food, and the cycle persists.

That being said, old bread is a marvel (oh and speaking of bread, do check out the travel blog of the newest employee at my office, who spent last year on a Watson fellowship studying bread around the world. For real.)

Savory Bread Pudding (a riff on 101cookbooks asparagus bread pudding)

You've got half a loaf of Grand Daisy filone petrifying on your countertop. And half a head of Savoy cabbage in your crisper, starting to sag. Enter, milk/eggs/cheese to the rescue.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees
Cut the bread into cubes (you might feel like Rodin, chiseling at stone)
Beat three cups milk and 3 eggs and a cup of chicken broth
Shred the cabbage and cut a few shallots into slivers
Toss the bread and cabbage and shallots into the egg mixture
Grease a casserole dish with butter
Pour the mixture in
Cover with a generous layer of shredded Gruyere
Bake for 45 minutes

Seems to me you can do this with just about anything, from kale to asparagus, to mushrooms to whathaveyou.

what i'd like to get fat on

2008-12-11T19:55:00.000-08:00

My grandmother got fat on Stella D'oro cookies. Pictures reveal that in her youth she was svelte and curvy, with a thick mane of black curls and fire engine red lips. Stilettos, too.

By the time we met, in 1974, she was more grandmotherly, a tough shell with a warmth and devotion bubbling beneath. She was suffering quietly from a broken heart--the death of my grandfather 10 years earlier--listening to classical music on the radio and dunking Stella D'oros in Taster's Choice coffee.

I respect this--the choice to hunker down with sweets and pack it on; after all, at age 70 have we not earned it? But I will not be getting fat on Stella D'oros. At a staff meeting the other day, my bosses plied us with various croissants from my local fave Almondine bakery. As I nibbled on a chocolate almond one, I thought: this is what I'd like to get fat on.

Heritage Bird

2008-12-01T12:09:00.000-08:00

For a few years now, as part of my job, I have been preaching to others about eater-based conservation and the joys of keeping biodiversity alive by eating heirloom varieties, and heritage breeds. Conventional turkeys are not bred for flavor, don'tcha know; they're bred for big boobs and fast maturation, and ability to freeze well; and blah blah blah and yup sure, I hear ya.

Finally this year I myself cooked not just a free range bird but a heritage one--an American Bronze from Frank Reese's Good Shepherd Ranch in Kansas. Which for me is a bit like a football fan saying he ordered a football and it came from Brett Favre's backyard where Brett Favre himself stitched the pigskin together with his own two (giant) hands.

I proudly served the beautiful 9 pound bird at the Thanksgiving feast called by one enthusiastic guest "the most delicious, least emotionally complicated Thanksgiving I've ever had!" And I found that I was suddenly my own target audience; this bird was weird. There was no light fluffy, watery breast. It didn't taste like any turkey I have ever eaten before, and of course that was unnerving.

But by bite three I was won over by this flavorful, tenacious, lean meat, and finally understanding this idea of "real turkey flavor," that heritage bird proponents talk about. My initial dislike helped me understand how deeply ingrained our food preferences are--we like what we know, and what we know is a Butterball. If I am to be any kind of spokesperson at all for the importance of re-shaping our palates, I must begin with myself, no?

A few of my favorite things

2008-11-20T12:41:00.000-08:00

First things first: for a piece about my stay on an olive farm in Italy, click here. Oh, and hi again, after all this time. It was a really busy fall that culminated in one big sustainable food conference in Italy, followed by one trip to a olive farm near Rome (see link to post above).

Now I realize we're all unemployed, and poor, and freaked out by the crazy economic, er, downturn, but I know I'll be writing a few small checks this year for my favorite organizations, and thought you might be looking for some suggestions. Sick of giving to the same ol' same ol' places? I am your gal; read on...

Youth Development through Agriculture:

Added Value, in Red Hook, Brooklyn, employs neighborhood kids to grow organic food that is sold to community residents and local restaurants.
The Food Project, in Boston MA, is the grand-daddy of all youth development through agriculture programs, teaching inner city and suburban kids how to farm, how to coo, how to sell stuff, how to speak in public, etc. and on and on.

Hunger:

Food Bank of NYC: food banks are suffering, stocks are low. We eat lots, some have none.

Keeping good theatre alive in NYC:

Brooklyn Academy of Music: They just rock.
Target Margin Theater: My old friends, the prolific and smart and fun TMT.
Miss Conni's Avant Garde Restaurant: Need I say more?

A Perfect Marriage

2008-09-09T19:16:00.000-07:00

During the height of growing season, I like to make stuff myself. It's easy to look like a superstar chef when you slice up a perfect tomato and sprinkle some sea salt on it. However, I also like to take a break from that and let somebody else do a wickedly good job with summer's bounty. I can't afford to go to Blue Hill more than once a year, so instead I hit up Franny's every chance I get.

Two nights ago EPW and I supped on this divine combo: Dandelion greens, nectarines and guanciale. This is so...Franny's.

Salty, meet sweet.

Sweet, meat bitter.

This is how a good party works, right? There is someone there to introduce the disparate elements and help them figure out how they can go great together.

Will Work for Food

2008-09-03T20:15:00.000-07:00

So, there was this event you may have read about. For traditional highlights, you can read the Slow Food Nation blog; this page is for my personal highlights.

I mean, I did write about the American Raw Milk Cheese Workshop there (posted tomorrow I think), but there's other stuff.

Such as Jen's movie, "Pressure Cooker," which enjoyed a prime showing spot directly following preview clips of "Food, Inc." and a panel discussion with the heavy hitters: Le Pollan & McSchlosser. Jen's movie moved me, and I can't wait until it gets a distributor so you can see it too. Bring your tissues, I must forewarn you, and in the meantime you can read up on C-CAP, the program from which her subject was plucked.

Or my two dinners at Zuni cafe, the old stalwart I had never actually been to. Now, I have been there twice, because yo, that is a crazy good roast chicken and their Caesar salad reminded me what they're supposed to taste like.

Also, me likey meeting my heroes, like food security expert Mark Winne, new food writing superstar Raj Patel, and Northern California's amazing farmers, from whom I bought wheatberries, strawberries, peaches, jam, dried apricots, and pickles, etc. at the marketplace.

I am beat, but happy, and drained but full (the tamales and tlacoyos in the pic above were good stuff).