Art Imitating Life

Trips to Northern California always seem to inspire me to write. It’s a rich area for anyone who is food inclined. Obviously with the wineries and San Francisco clustered so close together a food scene is bound to thrive, and the proximity to farms that benefit from the temperate weather that prevails for most of the year doesn’t hurt either. I had some awesome food and wine on my annual jaunt this year. Lovely fancy restaurants, innovative chic casual ones, some damn good Puerto Rican food, local olive oils and everything in between (with the exception of a sad oyster fail on the coast due to odd scheduling, fyi apparently everything closes on Tuesdays). 

But what got me thinking when I was flipping through pictures after returning home was an art exhibit Shea and I stumbled on out on Point Reyes. And I do mean stumbled on: there was no museum, no well advertised art gallery to draw attention to the exhibit. At the back of a “general” store in what counts for Point Reyes Station’s downtown strip there was a display of canned goods.

These were canned goods as art. Canned goods as commentary in many ways. The room felt sort of like wandering into someone’s pantry, and sort of like stumbling into a pretentious art gallery. I was, and still am, torn on how I feel about the exhibit.

Aesthetically it was right up my alley: rough wooden shelves, natural light, natural fibers. The subject matter was also in many ways right up my alley, I’ve been playing around with canning on and off for the last couple years from a purely practical standpoint as a way to survive abundant CSA shares.

In many ways I loved the exhibit; in the same way that I love most folk art exhibits because they celebrate a tradition of functional art mostly created by women in eras when artistic expression wasn’t encouraged if you were female. It’s the same thing that drew me to focus on social and cultural history over military strategy and politics when declaring a major in college. Until relatively recent decades the history of women was woven into the fabric of the textiles they wove and stirred into the recipes they made.

I was reminded again of this in reading a (sort of terrible) book I’ve had on my reading list for a while that reimagines some elements of the Salem witch trials. The book isn’t great, so it doesn’t bear mentioning except that watching the modern character in the book try to reconstruct the history of all these 17^th century women from probate records because women didn’t really write things down reminded me about why cultural and social history matter.

Because of that, part of me loved this exhibit on preserving food. (I’m sure there’s an analysis in there about preservation of tradition and literal preservation of food for survival or something, but I’ll leave that to art critics.) The part of me that couldn’t wholeheartedly get behind the exhibit is the contrarian that rolls its eyes every time some “olde tyme” tradition gets popular.

I’m happy these traditions are surviving in such a technologically focused age, I am. And the more people who are moving away from buying processed food and scary prepared items, the better. But these traditions survived in many areas before they were trendy. Maybe it’s the herd mentality that irks me. Or maybe it was the $150 price tag stuck on one of the canned works of art in the back of the Point Reyes Station general store. As a whole, the exhibit might have some meaning. As individual works of art I can’t help but think that a $150 jar of dilly beans is just an overpriced jar of dilly beans that someone could have made on their own. 

Things Gleaned From the AP

Several months ago the newest edition of the AP style guide landed on my desk at work. For anyone who doesn't know it's a quintessential resource for writers. It helps keep track of the millions of specific, counter intuitive rules journalists follow. It's a way to ensure continuity. Grammar geeks like myself dig books like this. And because it's used by the writers and editors who produce a lot of what we all read, it's interesting to see what makes the list. What terms are so important or so often questioned that they need to be included in the book everyone consults when copyediting their work? Which is why I noticed that the 2011 edition of the style guide includes--for the first time--a section dedicated to food.

Separate sections have existed for years for business and sports writers, but there has not been a dedicated section for food writers, restaurant reviewers, etc. It could be a sign that food has crossed into the realm where it's equated with sports as an acceptable hobby (read: obsession). Of course, arguably that status was achieved years ago and the AP is just now catching up. Regardless, I found the words and terms that were included in the guide an interesting, if at times bewildering read.

In no particular order they are:

• Balogna is undefinable. Described only as "lunch meat," it is a terrifyingly vague definition, especially when compared with prosciutto, "a salt-cured Italian ham, served thinly sliced."
• You want to be labeled a gourmet, not a gourmand (someone who likes good food, who tends to eat to excess, aka a glutton). A gourmet is "a person who likes fine food and is an excellent judge of food and drink."
• Corn dog is 2 words.
• You can call it a colander, but strainer is "preferred." (Preferred by whom the book does not specify.)
• Carnaroli is an Italian rice similar to arborio, both used to make risotto. (Personally I'd say carnaroli is superior, but let's not split hairs. I'm just impressed it made it onto the list at all.)
• There is NO apostrophe in farmers market. Unless of course a singular farmer owns the market in question.
• The term frankfurter is still apparently used. (Really?!?)
• Filet-O-Fish earned its own entry. (!)
• Filet mignon, that super tender beef cut, is usually 1-2 inches thick and cooked by a brief searing, then finished in the oven or under a broiler. The definition is that specific. 
• Crock-Pot is a brand, not an appliance. Unless it says those words on it what you have is a slow cooker. (other brand vs. object entries include: Fluff vs. marshmallow spread and zip-close bag vs. Ziploc. However, that thing you put hot beverages in can be a thermos or a Thermos.)
• Dr Pepper does not have punctuation in it. (Dr not Dr.)
• Note: French dressing, french fries, French toast. Capitalization counts. The "french" in french fries refers to the cut, not the country of origin. (Freedom fries do not rate an entry.)
• Grits make the cut. Polenta does not.
• Huitlacoche is a fungus that grows on corn and is considered a delicacy in Mexico. It's flavor is smoky-sweet. (Is this a term that comes up a lot?)
• It's Jamaica rum, not Jamaican.
• Ketchup, not catsup.
• Locavore is in there. (ugh!)
• Kool-Aid is still apparently considered food.
• Mustard=the condiment. Dry mustard=the powder. Specificity counts.
• Red onions are also apparently called Italian onions. (Who knew.)
• Skillet is preferred to frying pan.

Don't you all feel more prepared now?

On The Perils of Working Outside

DC’s 80 degree spring weather has arrived, and with it the temptation to throw over all productive activities in favor of drowsy, lazy afternoons outside. 

Today I arrived at a compromise: utilizing the shade provided by the tree behind my apartment I have discovered a way to both work near enough to my internet connection to actually do work and work outside while still seeing my computer screen. Big win.

What I did not count on was the temptation this beautiful day would provide to anyone with a penchant for cooking outdoors over fire. The smells of herds of DC grills all heating up steak is driving me mad.

Even the last of my latest cheese splurge wasn’t enough to satiate the grill induced hunger. 

What is it about meals cooked over fires? They are almost always perfection. And the first few of the season are downright inspirational. 

I guess I shouldn’t complain, my house was the house of grill temptation on Easter when MN grilled a butterflied leg of lamb for a tasty twist on Easter tradition. It was delicious. As was the new brussel sprout treatment I discovered (hint: it involves bacon and lemon and can be found here). 

I’ll just have to settle for the knowledge that grilling season has begun and we have two full months of grilling fun before DC gets too hot to cook in. And since I can see a wood fired Argentinian style grill and a massive oil drum smoker from my current perch, it shouldn't be too long now.

Food for Thought

I read an article over the weekend that provoked some questions about what we should value in food. The article’s three-way conversation (between two chefs and one well known author and television personality) came down in the end to a debate over ingredients or technique as paramount. 

Unsurprisingly given the cutting edge techniques employed by one of the chefs, he argued strongly that the tendency to exalt the ingredients over the chef is leading to mediocrity. It is a mistake to focus on just ingredients, he suggested. He asserted that if one is paying a certain amount of money to eat in a certain caliber of restaurant one should assume the ingredients are going to be high quality but what makes a meal rise above mediocrity is what the chef does. That the cooking is what counts. 

I so see the point. It’s bound to come up in every creative outlet in some form. In writing: if you have a good subject matter for a stellar story, how much is attributable to the word gifts of the author? If a photograph depicts something beautiful, how much value is placed on the eye of the person behind the lense? Etc. etc.  In essence he seemed to be arguing that quality cooking is about what the creative artist (here the chef) does with the raw materials he or she is given. 

Which is true. Except it obliterates some sad realities about our current food system. Leave aside for a moment that whether or not we “should” be able to assume a certain quality of taste in ingredients in a certain class of restaurant, I don’t think we always can do that. And leave aside for a minute that the kind of food this particular chef cooks is to the food most of us eat as haute courture is to jeans and a t-shirt. 

I’m not entirely sure where I come down in this particular argument. Being someone who both enjoys supporting local farms and purveyors and someone who is frustrated and infuriated by the trendy lemming-like rush to “farm-to-table” concepts, I get the frustration. Simply sourcing hard to find heirloom ingredients for a restaurant does not a five-star dining experience make. But at the same time, democratizing the awareness that foods grown, cultivated and bred in certain ways improves both the quality of those foods and their impact on the world seems like a positive step.

This Little Pig

At lunch today at a local restaurant I had a visceral reminder of how much food culture has shifted since I grew up the child of 60's-era hippies (as previously referenced and illustrated here, I mean really look at that hair! the lapels!), primarily in the figure of the enormous half pig carried through the dining room and plunked on the counter of the open kitchen. I was psyched, but suffice to say my semi-back to the land parental units gave us a childhood that wasn't entirely mainstream. Wonderful, yes. Mainstream? Not so much.

The fact that we ate eggs from our own chickens and raised pigs and a cow to eat isn't really your usual 1980s childhood tale. Granted, in rural Vermont where I grew up it was. Southern Vermont is steeped in rural familiarity with small farming enterprises; rural areas held on to those memories of where our food came from long after it became a styrofoam wrapped commodity in most places.

But for mainstream U.S. society food became something that seemed to sprout out of thin air in the refrigerated case at the supermarket. That divide was very clear to me in the decade since I left Vermont for urban areas. Apparently it was unusual that we had a cow, incidentally named Roast Beef (RB for short-a tag my father and I each steadfastly blame on the other). Unusual also were the chickens. And the pigs. The flock of very mean geese. The rabbits. The pheasants. The occasional goat. Horses, bantam hens (smaller than the regular ones), araucana chickens (they lay smaller, pastel eggs), homing pigeons. And a partridge in a pear tree. Just kidding, but only about the partridge. The rest were real.

It's not exactly a scene from Family Ties or the Cosby Family. And yet today I watched diners calmly eat their lunch in a vaguely upscale trendy restaurant inches away from a chef butchering half of a very large pig. The first thing that came off was the head. Out came the iPhones, but aside from that she could have been slicing lemons for the bar. Okay, they were a little more interested than if she was just cutting citrus, but you see my point. It's pretty hard to ignore that your brussel sprouts sauteed in bacon (which were fantastic btw) aren't connected to the 400 pound pig being carved up before you.

Or is it? Part of me wants to say, bravo. We've normalized the food chain again. But the cynic in me has to ask, have we really? Or are we just fetishizing our food and turning it into dinner theater? To be fair the restaurant didn't seem to be deliberately putting on a show. It was well after the lunch rush and the concept of the place is that all its kitchens are wide open. There really isn't anywhere else to do basic prep, even if it does involve carving up a pig. I just hope those diners watching also take the time to gain transparency into the food they buy, eat and cook at home.

Lazy Ratatouille Recap

Digging through e-files today I discovered a long lost post written but never published. So despite the transition from tomatoes to apples and all that autumn entails, here's where I was at for July and August. Plus it seemed to fit with our handy dandy new header (thanks Shea). Love the tomatoes.

Julia Child (JC) is adamant about a number of things. Among them she insists that the elements of ratatouille (tomatoes, onion, garlic, peppers, zucchini and eggplant) MUST be cooked separately before they are combined. It has something to do with integrity of flavor I suppose. I’ve made JC’s version. It’s fantastic, and I must admit worth the extra effort if you have the leisure time.

However, on a Tuesday night after work I’m usually uninterested in the prospect of turning a potentially one pot, quick dinner into a 50 minute labor-of-love-homage to French cooking. Sorry, JC.

And really, while her version is outstanding there’s a million ways of deliciously combining tomatoes, onion, garlic, peppers, eggplant and zucchini. (Or aubergine and courgette if you prefer. Such pretty words.) Add to that the seasonal felicity of all those items and basil appearing at the same time in my CSA haul. With the exception of peppers: when faced with a choice between taking one less heirloom Cherokee purple (unthinkable) and an unexciting green pepper, I made the obvious choice.

Given the Tuesday-state of things I opted to violate JC’s cardinal rule of ratatouille making, and horror of horrors cooked everything in one pot. Hopefully the fact that I used my very best and prettiest pot (Le Creuset to be exact) will help make up for my sins.

And the results, while not strictly traditional, were awesome both hot and cold when incorporated into a pot of Israeli couscous cooked in broth. I don’t usually measure when I’m cooking out of my head but roughly speaking I think I used equal amounts of the aubergine and courgette; an onion; two cloves of minced garlic; most of a large container of grape tomatoes; salt; olive oil; a tablespoon-ish each of anchovy paste and tomato paste; and a sizable handful of basil leaves.

Chop the courgette into bite size pieces, toss with salt in a colander and leave in sink to drain while prepping other ingredients, stirring it occasionally. After chopping all necessary ingredients to give the eggplant time to do its thing (i.e. releasing some of its bitterness) sautée onions in oil. When they're soft add the garlic and cook until just fragrant. Add eggplant and cook until it loses some of it’s resistance. Add zucchini and sauté until crisp tender. I added anchovy and tomato paste here, stirring to fully incorporate. Then tomatoes. Turn heat to low and simmer while couscous cooks (a 2:1 broth to couscous ratio boiled in a pan until liquid is almost entirely absorbed). When couscous is done I turned off the vegetables, tossed in some chopped basil. And mixed the two pots together. Finis. 

It may not be traditional, but it was certainly delicious. This is what I love most about having a csa, the abundance of fresh ingredients that I'm forced to do something with. It's made me very appreciative of how well seasonally symbiotic crops go together. (See above recipe.) Even lacking in one typical ingredient things still taste right. 

Evolution of an Eater

I just finished reading a Mark Bittman excerpt about how he learned to cook at Salon.com. His was a largely accidental and practical journey. It’s a path that I would assume resonates with a lot of people. And from the perspective of a child of parents of his generation who had a very similar approach to cooking I think I learned from my parental units the same way Bittman's eldest daughter learned from him. My parents were no fuss, fresh ingredient oriented, aging hippies as well.

My father went through various cooking “phases” where he would become enamored of the cooking styles of his Italian ancestry (kicking off a Marcella Hazan exploration that I was unappreciative of until I was much older) or lavish annual Memorial Day and Christmas Eve parties (which could account for my masochistic urge to host dozens of friends for sit down dinners). In our house however, my father was the “special occasion” cook (although to be fair that has completely shifted in recent years).

When my siblings and I were children my mother was responsible for the day-to-day nourishment of the family. It was a skill she didn’t pick up until she was an adult. It was my father who taught her to cook in the early days of their relationship. My father-the product of a woman who was decades ahead of her time as a working mother in the 1950s and thought that there were more interesting things a woman should do than just cook and entertain (go Gram!)-taught himself to cook mostly out of self-preservation. My paternal grandmother is a spitfire, a fantastic dancer and so vivacious at 90+ that I feel old by comparison, but a stellar cook she is not.

My mother grew up in the exact opposite environment. My maternal grandmother is a fantastic cook, incapable of cooking for a group smaller than 20. Another skill I may have inherited, but in her case a well-justified habit. She fed a family of 10 three meals every day. The sheer logistics involved in that scale of cooking meant my mother never learned how to cook from her mother. My guess is it was easier for my grandmother to delegate care of my mother’s seven younger siblings and household chores to the elder kids than it was to teach them how to use knives and fire safely.

By the time I was old enough to register what was entailed in cooking, my mother was a very proficient cook with an experimental streak that grew as we got older. I don’t remember specifically being taught to cook. I do remember messing around periodically in the kitchen. Our first microwave was particularly entertaining—like an easy bake oven on steroids. In high school my best friend from down the street and I experimented a lot with stir frys for a full summer. And there were a lot of “fancy dinner” parties with my friends that had more to do with dressing up than cooking.

What really launched my interest in cooking were too rather pedestrian impulses: I like to eat and was too poor to eat out as a recent grad living in New York and I hate doing dishes. The first was a rather obvious impetus: survival. The second was a literal cause and reaction. The rule at our large family gatherings is the cooks don’t do the dishes. I hate doing dishes. It seemed only logical to start volunteering to cook side dishes. Which evolved into increasing experimentation, a cooking club with friends, the eventual masochistic urge to take over family holiday dinners and so on. The rest, as they say, is history.

Bounties of Spring

It's official: spring is here. Farmer's markets start this week. CSA pick-up kicks off next week. And my tangled bunch of herbs awaits a new patch of earth to make themselves at home in.

Summer in D.C. is a thing to be avoided at all costs. But the fantastic springiness of the transition from winter to summer here makes it all worthwhile. (At least until August hits in all its swampy glory.)

Having grown up in VT where the season between snow and summer is aptly called mud season I revel in the true spring I get here complete with cherry blossom, azaleas, lilacs, dogwoods and all manner of allergy inducing pretties. And best of all: some of the edible signs of spring that I'd only heard tales of before moving here.

We're poised on the cusp of that moment when all the teasing flowers and rain will come to fruition and life will be delicious (and local) again. I've already splurged on early ramps. Now I'm chomping at the bit for more local arugula, early greens, perfect asparagus and the tumble of vegetables to follow.

I have visions of farmers markets dancing in my head. I'm happy to let someone else express it for me.

Today by Billy Collins

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze

that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary's cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.

Embracing My Hippie Roots

What is it about making something with your own two hands that is so satisfying? Why is it so down-deep pleasing to look at something and say: I made that?

The high you get from making things fully from scratch would seem to fly in the face of talk about how Americans don't cook anymore and how the Food Network and its ilk turned food into a spectator sport .

I blogged a year or two back about the idea that cooking is one of the few "dirty" jobs we still do. And I still think that, although I've begun to suspect that cooking is just the tip of the iceberg--the gateway drug. See: recent spate of hipsters learning how to butcher things. And as much as I hate to admit it, I totally get it. I spent the last 6 months looking for posters that show all the butcher cuts. I found them, and now they're taunting me. Isn't the next logical step learning how to break down a cow?

I would not be the first, or only, amateur to take this path. But really, short of ponying up for a class I think my hands on experiments will have to stay on the tamer side for now. (Heads up for the buried lead.)

In that spirit, I made yogurt last week. From scratch, like actually from a gallon of milk! I'm hardly breaking new ground here, I have friends who have routinely done this for years, but I'm still basking in the glow of accomplishment. It was embarrassingly easy, but even that can't diminish my sense of pride. I was dancing-literally-around the kitchen when the texture finally came together. Winner!

The only hitch: there is now a full gallon of yogurt in my fridge. Any suggestions?? It's a lot of yogurt. The obvious short term solution was to embrace my hippie roots, so batch one of yogurt was quickly followed by a massive batch of granola. Yes, I admit my transformation back to the crunchy Vermont hippie roots is nearly complete. I fought it as long as I could, and finally caved. But I still draw the line at Birkenstocks.

But really, despite it's "crunchy" stigma, both the yogurt making and the granola were so. much. fun. Really, you should try it. I'm officially hooked. And ridiculously excited about breakfast every morning. I'm almost as giddy about this as I was about a successful pasta making experiment with LD last month. Another "I made that" moment of euphoria and self-congratulatory back slapping.

I'm feeling quite cocky now. Next stop: cured meat. Now if only I could find saltpeter (which is apparently also an ingredient in some truly frightening explosives-who knew?!?).

California

Two days back from a trip to California and I'm still sorting through all the deliciousness. The best food images from part of my trip are most definitely to be found at Shea's blog, I can't even pretend to get visuals close to this. (and yes I have fully lifted one of his pix to catch your interest.) I only wish he'd been there for the rest of the week to catch a few of the other meals we had (I'll get to those later).

There was some amazing food, but what will linger long after I forget the precise taste of the Parkside fried chicken benedict(it was outrageously delicious) or how puckeringly, deliciously, lemony the ice box pie Shea trekked from Lois the Piemaker was (and it alone was arguably worth the price of my plane ticket)was the people all those meals allowed me to connect with.

It was one of the humbler home cooked meals last week that clarified why I love not just the experience of eating well but the conversations and relationships that take place around it. Abby and Paul had two friends over, brothers from Mexico. A and I cooked, one of those "what's in the fridge" meals that turned out surprisingly well.

A, P and I were talking about a New Year's meal from last year when I made carnitas a la Shea, which is a fabulous winner of a meal. LL and I won a sandwich competition based around it earlier this month. Which is all to say I'm kind of proud I've mastered this recipe. Until last Tuesday that is. Martine, the younger of the two brothers schooled me about carnitas. Apparently he's been helping his father cook carnitas back home all his life. Hard to compete with that.

Midway through the conversation (as translated through his brother as my Spanish skills are nonexistent) what struck me about the conversation was less the actual recipe, although it really sounds amazing, and more that we were completely bonding over the "right" way to make the dish. I'm going to concede defeat to the lifelong practice Martine has on me, but in spite of the difference in experience and language we had a long conversation about how you cook carnitas.

It got me thinking about how many times I've done just that, connected with a virtual stranger across whatever barriers might exist around food. Which leads next to how many connections I have with the people I love that are also bound up in and intertwined with food experience.

San Francisco has many amazing food options, but what really made them all memorable was getting to share them with friends and family. As always it's not just about what we eat, but how, where and who we are eating with....of course that won't stop me from dreaming about both the fried chicken benedict and the lemon pie. And saving my pennies for my next flight west.

Resolute Relish

I don't go in much for New Year's Resolutions. I support the notion of goals and self improvement, but the act of making a resolution rings false to me. If you want to do something, just do it. It's possible my personality is more inclined towards contemplation interrupted by bursts of impulsiveness. Yearly goal setting is a tad to regular for my taste. With that said I'm thrilled to bid 2010 goodbye and good riddance and move into 2011. So in the spirit of starting over what I can get behind are some reasonable food and eating goals. So here goes.

1) Learn how to make fresh pasta.
2) Conquer my fear of pie crusts (just in time for what every food paper, blog, smoke signal and what have you calls the year of the pie in 2011)
3) Catch up on my food lit: namely the MFK Fisher compendium and the New Yorker food tome collected dust on my bedside table.
4) Cook more complete meals
5) Eat more vegetables
6) Try more food trucks before the bubble bursts in DC
7) Find more local sources for food to carry through the farmer's market off season
8) Can something
9) Bake something, anything, from the pretty "My Bread" book I've avoided all year
10) Blog more

Happy New Year!

T-minus to Turkey

Cranberry orange relish, check. Gingered butternut squash soup, check. Pumpkin ginger cheesecake pie, check. All that's left is the cauliflower gratin, the roasted brussels and the herb butter basted bird. And of course the table setting, the gravy, the last minute inevitable chaos. And accommodating the seven other sides being supplied by others.

Only six for Thanksgiving this year. I'm so used to cooking for crowds that this feels ironically more challenging. Note to self: do not make a vat of anything.

My family is one of the "you don't mess with classics" variety. For many years I found that stifling and bland. I always introduced one new dish to the classic line up, on principle. It was also in hindsight what spawned my growing obsession with cooking. Thanksgiving for me was a time to try things out in a safe environment where my experimenets were backed by many, many other tried and true recipes to fill in if I failed.

All these years later, and hosting another Thanksgiving with friends instead of family (albeit only the second time I've ever not been with my family) I find the menu I gravitated towards to be a mix of favorites, experiments and dishes I've tried but are on their way to being classics.

Ironically it's not the turkey that inspires nerves. Can I do the cauliflower the way my mother, grandmother and aunt have? I've never done it solo. What if it's not the same? It's the one dish that's a nod to my family traditions this year. The butternut squash soup is a favorite of mine, easy, delicious and healthy. The pumpkin ginger cheesecake pie was a hit at a few events last year, courtesy of another blogger friend. The roasted brussels are a common table adornment around here, having emerged as the only way I like the veg. And the potluck component of most meals at 1660 ensures that there will be plenty of new dishes to try.

In some ways my Thanksgiving table resembles my approach to life these days, a nod to tradition but the curiosity to keep experimenting.

Happy Turkey Day.

Vacation, in the Vernacular

Vernacular: of, relating to, or characteristic of a period, place or group. In essence, native.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how travel and food intersect. Not just because I’ve only recently returned from a fabulously food filled vacation, although I have, but more because I find the two interests so intertwined as to be nearly inseparable. And then today, voila, an online chat about the New Yorker’s food issue with three writers supplied the term I’ve been searching for. Writer Calvin Trillin said he mostly writes about vernacular food, food attached to a specific place. He said his dislike of fancy restaurants often comes from the sameness you can encounter.

It’s perfect. Yes, I can eat Turkish food in the U.S. versus traveling there, and have done so deliciously twice in the last seven days, but what I loved about both meals was how firmly grounded they were in being Turkish. I might not NEED to travel to Turkey to eat those foods (though I would love to) but I do want the meal to make me feel as though I did.

I think I’d take Trillins thought one step further to include the totality of what vernacular means, essentially that a meal can be tied not only to place, but to the when and who of a meal as well. The experience of eating something is inextricably bound up in where you are when you consume it, when you consume it and who you share it with. Eating is about things that taste good, but as I’ve said on this blog before I don’t believe it’s only about what tastes good.

October brought a wonderful two week vacation that was very much about vernacular food and encompassed a trio of locales. A pitch perfect week in London with BOG /W, a long weekend in Kent for the wedding of PA/A, and four days in Barcelona to round it out. It was far flung and wonderful and full of fun, dear friends and delicious food.

In fourteen days we ate more than I could possibly include in one blog post, I’ll have to dissect and describe the culinary compendium later. But suffice to say highlights, in addition to the seaside paella, included: curry near Brick Lane; pad thai at a restaurant that features chilies so hot they brought the fire department, literally; grilled razor clams at a tapas bar inside La Boqueria; partridge cooked in a pear cider sauce in a 17th century inn in Kent; wonderful, lemony Afghani food in a tiny London storefront; churros and chocolate during a festival celebrating a saint represented by flies (long story involving French invaders and swarms of defensive insects supposedly sent by a dead saint); cozy soup in a cook book store turned café; and countless other meals.

Why is it that food tastes so much better when we’re traveling or on vacation? Even basic things seem luxurious. Is that because we’re paying more attention? Because drinking that bottle of wine at lunch on a Tuesday seems just a wee bit naughty? Whatever the reason I seem to find all my meals memorable when I’m traveling. And this trip was no different. The multi-cheese picnic consumed on the train after strolling around Borough Market stands out in my brain just as clearly as the two fantastic tapas meals I had at Tapas 24 in Barcelona. Go figure.

Wanton Chicken

I was vindicated today to find that Julia Child’s recipe for basic roasted chicken is almost the same as the one I’ve been using. Simple. Delicious. Humble. I can’t imagine anything better than the smell of a chicken stuffed with lemons, rosemary, thyme et al roasting away. Perhaps I can’t imagine it because right now that’s all I smell.

JC and I differ on one element. She trusses her chicken, tying the legs together to make for a better presentation. She’s quite adamant that to leave the legs swinging free is wrong. She makes some noise about overcooked drumsticks but her main concern seems to be keeping up appearance. Actually, the word she uses is “wanton”…. Leaving the legs splayed “gives the chicken a rather wanton look,” JC says in her lovely cookbook co-written with Jacques Pepin. I love that that’s the word she chooses. I usually can’t be bothered to dig out my cooking twine. So wanton chicken it is.

I’ll admit that roasting a chicken is an odd activity for a lazy, gorgeous Saturday when lunch is past and it’s not quite dinner time. But this was a: when the oven was free in my cook crowded home today, sandwiched between the farmer’s market inspired breakfast cooked by one housemate and the zucchini cake baking frenzy of another who is valiantly trying to tame our CSA share. And b: if I didn’t make this chicken today it was going to be a lost cause.

Hence roast chicken at 3pm.

My approach to roast chicken is simple. Having never owned the proper v-shaped roasting rack I strew the bottom of the roasting pan with onions, potatoes, carrots, celery, leeks: whatever’s in the house and will lift the chicken off the bottom of the pan. Rub the bird’s skin with butter or olive oil, s&p, put some in the cavity as well. (JC calls this a “generous butter massage,” wanton indeed!). Cut a couple lemons (or a mix of lemon and orange if there are oranges to be had) into thick slices. Squeeze the lemons over the chicken and stuff the cavity with them and fresh herbs. We always have rosemary and thyme so those tend to be my preference. Whatever lemons don’t fit in the cavity I toss into the bottom of the pan. Roast at 425 for 15 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350 for somewhere in the neighborhood of an hour.

That’s it. It makes for very simple, delicious chicken. With some yummy roasted veggies in the bottom that basically basted in butter and chicken fat…. Really what’s not to like. Although the “veggie rack” I use might not be universally appealing. They are very mushy and very intensely flavored and can end up on the salty side as basting washes some of the salt from the skin into the pan. I love it. But it might not be for everyone.

And I have to say that JC’s system for testing chicken’s “doneness” is preferable to my mind. If I cooked a chicken until the meat thermometer said it was done it’d be sawdust. I swear that’s why chicken has such a bad rap. Stuffing the cavity with citrus does slow the cooking time if, like me, you’re over exuberant about citrus. But I just allow for extra cooking time—a necessity with 1660 Hobart’s ghetto oven anyway. Julia says the chicken’s done when the juices run clear and the legs move easily in their socket.

Bon appétit!

I think I may have found the cure for my pathological fear of baking. Booze! LL’s birthday was Aug. 27 and per the birthday girl’s request I was charged with making an ice cream cake. In keeping with LL’s tastes I decided on chocolate stout cake for the “cake” layer of the ice cream cake and used a Hobart favorite: Milk Stout. I have to admit I did not make the ice cream myself. I need to log quite a few more hours on the Dixie Bell (our aptly named retro ice cream maker) before I’d venture to include one of my own creations in something as important as a birthday cake. I chickened out in other words and bought Haagen Daz. Vanilla.

As an aside have you ever read the ingredients of most ice creams? I did the other day and it is truly terrifying. The vast majority are most definitely not Fit For Human Consumption. Why on earth are there so many unpronounceable ingredients in them? Having now made our own ice cream I can attest that it’s a refreshingly simple recipe. Cream. Ice. Salt (for melting the ice). Whatever fruits or flavors strike your fancy. In an entire case of ice cream at Whole Foods the ONLY brand that had just ingredients I could identify without a periodic table or a degree in food science was Haagen Daz. Ridiculous.

So ice cream purchased all that remained was the topping. I again relied on a Hobart favorite: bourbon whipped cream. I worried in the days leading up to Laura’s birthday that the stout, chocolate, ice cream, bourbon combo would be overwhelming, that there was too much going on. But if the reports of those who ate the cake are to be believed it all married surprisingly well. The bourbon notes in the vanilla dovetailed nicely with the bourbon whipped cream. And the dense chocolate stout cake seemed to benefit from the cool smooth vanilla flavor of the ice cream. I’m going to try the cake solo for guests this weekend as a comparison, so we’ll see how the recipe does at room temperature with nothing to distract from it. I think the cake definitely benefitted from sitting a day or two. The milk stout gave the chocolate cake an almost sour taste which while not entirely unappealing really mellowed out over time.

I don’t have the attention to detail required for light fluffy baking. Dense, intense flavor I seem to be able to manage. Chocolate stout cake definitely falls into the latter category.

Hobart St. Boozy Birthday Cake

Cake recipe (courtesy of the NYT, adapted from Epicurious)

Butter for pan
1 cup Guinness stout
10 tablespoons (1 stick plus 2 tablespoons) unsalted butter
3/8 cup unsweetened cocoa
2 cups superfine sugar
3/8 cup sour cream
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking soda


1. For the cake: heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9-inch springform pan and line with parchment paper. In a large saucepan, combine Guinness and butter. Place over medium-low heat until butter melts, then remove from heat. Add cocoa and superfine sugar, and whisk to blend.

2. In a small bowl, combine sour cream, eggs and vanilla; mix well. Add to Guinness mixture. Add flour and baking soda, and whisk again until smooth. Pour into buttered pan, and bake until risen and firm, 45 minutes to one hour. Place pan on a wire rack and cool completely in pan.

Ice Cream layer:

Allow a container of ice cream, recommended flavor vanilla with bourbon notes, to soften at room temperature. Line an 8 inch spring form pan with plastic wrap. Pour or scoop ice cream into the pan and smooth into an even layer. Freeze until hard.

When hard, put cake layer on top and freeze again. (Note: my intention was to do 2 layers of cake with ice cream in the middle. Using the above cake recipe you would need to double it, the one cake isn’t tall enough to split horizontally. But the single layers of cake and ice cream worked just fine.)

Topping:

1 pint whipping cream, powdered sugar and bourbon to taste (Buffalo Trace worked nicely). Mine was a little too bourbon-y so be careful not to over pour. If there’s a “right” time to add liquid to whipped cream I don’t know what it is-I dump the powdered sugar and the bourbon into the cream in the stand mixer and flip the switch. For topping a cake stiffer whipped cream, practically butter texture, is preferable. It was easier to use as frosting.

Cover cake with whipped cream frosting. For frosting technique I recommend getting lessons as I did over the weekend from a trained cake decorator! I would’ve been a train wreck on my own. (Thanks AM.) Otherwise do the best you can. My philosophy is that taste matters more than aesthetics anyway.

The assembled ice cream cake is best if you allow it all to freeze again. Perhaps even overnight. Day 2 and 3 of LL’s cake outstripped day 1 hands down. The whipped cream sets up more like frosting and the flavors seem to meld better. But if you’re antsy (or like me perpetually running behind) it can be eaten in the ooey gooey stage right after frosting. The flavors are all there.

Tomato Tomahto

I always have trouble answering that ubiquitous “what would your last meal be” question. On premise it bothers me to narrow down an answer. And in reality who can pick just one thing?!? That is, until late summer hits and brings with it the bounty of lush tomatoes and fragrant basil. Ask me now, and I definitely know my answer.

I have to come clean, I’m a tomato addict. I blame my father. When tomatoes were in season when we were kids every dinner and many lunches were accompanied by a plate of glistening tomato slices. No dressing, no fancified cheese and basil stacks. Just. Tomatoes. Maybe salt. It’s simplicity and appreciation for good ingredients at its unvarnished best. Sometimes, the best times, the tomatoes would hit the table still slightly hot from the sun.

I’m violently opposed to refrigerating tomatoes. I’m also violently opposed to any tomato someone tries to sell me out of season (with the exception of those imported grape tomatoes I purchase with all the shame of a junkie looking for a fix). Pink, mealy January tomatoes shouldn’t be eaten. And they certainly don’t deserve to be classed together with the gorgeous beauties rolling into my kitchen right now.

After the tomato blight heartbreak of last year, I’ve hedged my bets in 2010. Good thing too since this year’s garden is once again suffering. This year the twin pillars of my fabulous CSA and the MtP farmers market have kept my habit well supplied. This weekend was even better, a visit to see BG staying with her family in Pennsylvania was totally tomato focused and once they recognized my…obsession they sent me home well kitted out to keep my three tomato a day habit humming along.

And they outfitted me with a sizable bouquet of basil to go with it. BG’s dad tried one of those aero gardens that I would’ve dismissed as a gimmick until I saw this basil plant. The size of a tree ya’ll, without getting woody or making the basil bitter! Amazing. I am so getting one of those, because if there’s anything that can improve on an in-season ripe tomato it would be its favorite companion, basil.

I have to cop to sometimes slightly fancifying my tomato dinner platter from my dad’s version. If I have access to good cheese, which I did this week in the form of a mozzarella braid from Calander’s dairy in Nazareth PA, it’s hard not to add that to my tomatoes and basil. Olive oil, salt, pepper. Perfetto. Although I’m more inclined towards a bite size chop of the ingredients than the large, round stacks of caprese typically offered in the U.S. Just a personal preference.

This year I can’t get enough of the raw unadulterated tomatoes but soon I’ll make some sauce to store. Maybe a tomato tart (there’s a recipe for one with gruyere that is delicious). And WaPo ran an intriguing article about homemade ketchup today. We’ll see. As long as I can keep the tomatoes coming I’m a happy woman.

Zucchini, Take One

The oppressive heat of a Washington summer arrived early this year. The District has been a sticky, sweaty, humid, hot mess on and off since May. The only added bonus of all this early heat and humidity is that it’s pushing a lot of my favorite summer crops onto an earlier timetable. And apparently into a supersized realm.

1660 Hobart got its first monstrous zucchini of the season from our fabulous CSA the week before I headed out on vacation in Costa Rica (more on that at a later date). It rivaled some of the late summer fruit from last year, longer than my forearm and almost twice as wide. Big honking zucchini always spell zucchini bread for me. It’s delicious, and freezes well. And knocks out a large zucchini that might be past it’s flavor prime. My favorite recipe is an Epicurious standby for spiced zucchini bread, lots of cinnamon and allspice and tweaked to add chocolate chips. Delicious. The loaves that came from last year’s steroidal zucchini lasted us well into the epic blizzard last winter. And made a lovely breakfast pre-sledding if I do say so myself.

Under a time crunch from my impending vacation departure and AK's bday at all you can eat Korean BBQ (clearly not to be missed) I chose to bake my first batch of zucchini bread on an unbearably hot night. Ugh. But had to be done. The heat addled my brain however and one whole batch of bread made it into the oven missing one crucial ingredient (oil) and with significantly less than was called for of another (sugar). There’s a reason Liza doesn’t bake very often people, being easily distracted is a hard problem to fix in finicky baking recipes.

On JB’s suggestion I decided to call it an experiment since inadvertently I’d made a healthier version. The final result needs some significant tweaks to improve the texture, but all in all the verdict was it wasn’t half bad. Worth playing with if the zucchini keep rolling in. The second batch was spot on: dense, gooey, chocolate-y zucchini goodness. And with a truly frightening amount of vegetable oil in it, anything but healthy.

Six loaves later there was still a massive quantity of shredded zucchini so JB and I had a zucchini pancake showdown the next night. We tried two competing recipes: one with mint and feta, the other with curry. Both were super easy and delicious, although it was agreed that some texture issues needed to be ironed out. In an effort to retain the health benefits of the zucchini we tried to minimize the oil used which meant the crispness they would’ve had from being deep fried wasn’t there. But the flavor was. A fair trade off in my mind. If we keep getting zucchini the size of baseball bats we’ll need some healthier options to dispose of the bounty-even I can't eat that much zucchini bread.

Curried Zucchini Pancakes
1 large zucchini, shredded with a grater or food processor
1 sm. Onion, shredded with a grater or food processor
¼ C egg white
¼ C cottage cheese
¼ C matzoh meal or bread crumbs (more if the mixture seems impossibly wet)
1t curry powder (choose your favorite)
Salt and pepper to taste
Mix all the ingredients together and use a quarter cup measure to make the pancakes. Cook until brown on both sides, pushing down on the pancakes to flatten them. Benefits greatly from the addition of Greek yogurt to balance out the curry. (A yogurt sauce of some kind with some cool mint or cilantro, maybe tzatziki style might also work here.) Also the addition of shredded carrots might give it a little more flavor depth.

Spring Has Sprung

I’m not a very patient person. It’s what makes me infinitely more suited to the farmers market than the garden. I’m working on it, but it’s admittedly harder to get inspired by something that won’t come to fruition, literally, for months.

That being said I think I’ve achieved a good balance this year. Saturday was the second farmer’s market, I stocked up on enough asparagus to make a super easy vibrant green soup to chase away Sunday’s blustery early spring feel and more rhubarb and strawberries to start stockpiling batches of my new favorite compote. (thanks Shea).

I also managed to spend upwards of 30 dollars on seedlings for our much improved communal garden, despite exhibiting an unusual level of self control buying herbs to plant. Managed to contain myself to just buying lavender, lemon balm, spearmint, tarragon, African blue basil and thyme to join the thriving rosemary and parsley in the herb bed.

I think the herbs are the best way to combat my impatience with gardening. Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited for tomatoes. I love tomatoes. But after last year’s blight plague on the east coast stunted our success I don’t know if I can take the heartbreak again. I needed a solid plan b. Or multiples.

That’s why I love our farmers market and the proximity of DC to farm country. This year 1660 also joined a CSA that involves visiting a farm once a week. (As a Vermonter who's dwelled in cities for the last decade I find this part especially exciting.) The farm share we have includes pick your own opportunities on top of a weekly share. Plus the farm does some really neat work to keep their program accessible for those with no disposable income. I’m sure I’ll wax on about the CSA quite a bit this summer. Our first pick up is next weekend, and I’ll miss it due to a family obligation but I can’t wait to see what we get.

I think the balance of surprises from the CSA and what comes out of the yard, with the support of the far more dependable offerings from the farmers market should make for a delicious summer. Asparagus soup recipe below--it's kept me a happy eater all week. Keep in mind I don’t really measure when I cook…. Consider all these numbers in the “ish” range.

Herbed Asparagus Soup

(heavily improvised and adapted from Eating Well to match existing refrigerator contents)

NOTE: this makes a large quantity of soup. I appear to have inherited a family gene that makes it impossible for me to cook for less than an army. The skill serves me well on Hobart, but obviously adjust measurements according to quantity and taste.

2 medium leeks or onion, chopped

2-4 cloves garlic, minced

2lbs asparagus (trimmed and cut into inch long pieces)

1 and 1/3 cups green peas (frozen or fresh)

4 cups chicken broth

4 small to medium sized potatoes (peeled and diced)

4-5 T finely chopped herbs: dill, parsley, chives (any combo you like, i went heavy on the dill).

½ C crème fraiche

S&P to taste

T or 2 of lemon juice

Saute leeks/onion in olive oil until tender but not browned. Add garlic and sauté, stirring, until fragrant 1 minute or so. Add chicken broth and potatoes, simmer until potatoes are tender. Add asparagus and peas and cook until just tender but still bright green. Remove from heat, stir in herbs, salt and pepper to taste. Puree soup (I used an immersion blender which if you don’t own you really should. Fantastic kitchen toy.) Add crème fraiche and incorporate well using immersion blender. Bring soup back up to temperature. Just before serving add lemon. Top with herbs and Greek yogurt or more crème fraiche if you like.

Loads of Lemons

I'm having a citrus moment. Ok, it might border more on an obsessive compulsion these days. It started with my discovery that these Meyer lemons I'd been reading about for years that all the lucky food types in warmer climes waxed on about were available for a very reasonable price in the P Street Whole Foods.

I've come late to the Meyer lemon party, but for anyone who hasn't seen them they are both delicious and truly lovely looking. They're smaller than a regular lemon and smoother and they glow with the most intense yellow lemon-ness. They also smell and taste divine-like a cross between a lemon and a clementine or tangerine, lemon but sweet enough to eat alone. You get the picture.

I bought them by the dozen for as long as I could find them. Then friends started buying them for me and delivering them to me. They're irresistible.

I made good use of the bounty of Meyer lemons that came my way. In salad dressing,in intensely lemony shortbread, as a marinade with oranges and parsley for fantastic grilled chicken. I froze juice, I candied lemon peels. I even made some preserved lemons despite never having cooked with them before. I had Meyer lemon fever, which gave way to a very citrusy winter/spring in general when the Meyer lemons were no more.

When forced to move on to more pedestrian citrus the results were still pretty great. The roast chicken we served for a part of passover seder this year was heavenly, basted in a combo of lemon and orange juice. And you've already heard about the grapefruit marmalade which we just ran out of sadly.

It's nice to have something bright and fresh to tide you over these last few weeks before growing season really hits. Washington's season starts earlier than the brief summers in VT, but not early enough for me. I'm positively itching for the neighborhood (producer only) farmers' market to start and our CSA kicks in at the end of the month. The citrus filled the hole admirably, but despite my inclination to buy local whenever possible I'm not ready to give up on lemony recipes. The pasta with tuna, capers, basil and lemon zest that I made for a recent barbecue served as a good reminder of lemon uses in summer. Mmmmmm.

Bacon Cake

Appropriately, albeit accidentally, we observed National Pig Day early this year. (Yes there is a National Pig Day and it happens to be today.) Bacon cake actually had another name. It's something along the lines of bocconcini stuffed Mediterranean bacon pull apart bread. But it should be called Bacon Cake.

It is every bit as decadent as it sounds. Herb bread rolled and sealed around tiny balls of fresh mozzarella, rolled in butter, bacon fat and parmesan cheese and baked in layers, in a bundt pan, with a mixture of bacon, green onions, olives and sundried tomatoes sprinkled between layers.

"Bacon cake" sounds appropriately decadent and just a little bit dirty. As it should. This is a naughty cake. You feel just a little bit dirty eating it. This is a cake you pretend not to like, because you shouldn't. This is a cake that looks sweet but is in reality salty, tart and indulgent. It's a surprise, this cake. It's nuanced, with just the right dash of naughtiness.

This is a cake you should make. But a word of caution. It is not to be trifled with. It is also a cake that should be made when it can be easily disposed of on willing guests. Otherwise you're likely to wake up in the middle of the night dreaming about sneaking down for just one more bite. It's hard to resist, this cake. You'll want to eat the whole thing. And really, no one needs to be that naughty....not whole bacon cake naughty.

The illicit thrill fades when you over indulge. And really, the fatty, salty, slightly dirty bacon-ness of it all should be savored--good behavior be damned.

Here's the recipe. And I'm linking to it rather than retyping the recipe so you can see the flights of obsession it inspires in others. Namely the author of the blog that kindly supplied us with the recipe. So you'll know I'm not crazy.

The inaugural bacon cake was consumed as part of a Foodie Films night featuring "Mostly Martha," which I am at this very moment watching. Again. The movie is also indulgent and a little bit decadent. It's fabulous. And it's a movie that I suspect would totally get bacon cake, seeing as it's a movie all about the naughty, slightly-dirty-in-the-best-way, sensual appreciation of food and what that can do for people. I recommend it (just ignore the dated sax music and focus on the food. And the bursts of Louis Prima.). And clearly I also recommend the bacon cake.