Cooking With Ideas

Eating Children?

Jonathan Swift was born on November 30. 1667. A long time ago. But his work remains important. And I do not just mean Gulliver's Travels. Have you read A Modest Proposal lately? Yes, this has to do with food -- if you think selling children to be eaten would help with the horrors of poverty. And, of course, the children in question were Irish and the poverty included a famine. Swift, of course, was an Irish priest and arguing against the practices that led to the famine and to the starvation of many Irish. I recommend a read, particularly if you have had a lot of experiences lately where people fail to understand satire and/or irony (I have).  Pass it along to someone who wants a cookbook and has no sense of irony. (You can obtain it free here.) Swift suggests good preparations for cooking children. Watch the irony-challenged struggle. And worry about why.

Ottawa Eats

A recent trip to Ottawa (where we stayed at the Lord Elgin Hotel) brought lots of food related fun. Watch here for magazine-related commentary (two non-food periodicals with food themed issues purchased at Mags and Fags), a mystery with truffles at its root, and etcetera. Meanwhile, a few bits and bites of restaurant reviews.

Domus is a favorite, though I just learned that its restaurant and kitchen gadget stores are separate, unrelated businesses these days. Too bad. Anyway, the restaurant does regional Canadian cuisine. And, it is a key site on the best soups ever highlight trip across the universe. Yes, they do soup exceptionally well. I can remember a fresh pea soup there that drove me into attempts to reproduce it (failed attempts, let me be clear). This visit I had a mushroom soup that was the most mushroom-y tasting liquid ever. The chives on top were tasty too. Not too heavy on the cream. Lovely. And then I followed it with a small tart with goat cheese and duck confit. The accompanying microgreens deserve rave reviews. Swell. Not to mention dessert --

Beckta was a new place to visit in an old house right there on Nepean. Only after making our reservation -- and arriving in Ottawa -- did we discover this year's "Best of Ottawa" lists Beckta as "best splurge." I agree. We went with the chef's 5 course tasting menu (preceded by a cosmopolitan for me and champagne for. . . . ), adding the wine tastings and a cheese course (for which we also added wine). We began circa 6:20 or so and left for our hotel close to 11 -- so, no, they did not rush us simply because we were 20 minutes late. The service was absolutely great; knowledgeable about wine and food. And the amuse bouche that started us was both tasty and humorous -- a waffled thin potato crisp with foie gras mousse and currant jelly. Talk about chip & dip! The cheese course had 4 canadian cheeses and two french. Their bread was ok -- but we still love Dustin's right here in Geneva. But what did we eat you ask? Here's the menu and wine pairing (which they thoughtfully printed out for us when we were about to leave):

To Start (after the amuse.. . ): Smoked House Salmon, Mango Caviar, 2 year old Manchego, horseradish wafer, shoestring beet salad with apple cider viagrette. So, this came on a single plate that looked as if it were pleated into four sections. A white plate -- which made the colors of the various dishes really stand out. The mango "caviar" was a puzzle -- until its creation from mango juice and various chemical processes (today's new version of cooking) revealed its secret. The taste (and consistency) was much more memorable than the procedure. The beet salad was beautiful -- truly curls of beet with the apple cider vinagrette. And the salmon was chunky with the cheese mingled within it. . . . Not to mention the lovely horseradish crackers that appeared caddy corner to the salmon presentation. The wine: Cave Spring Chenin Blanc, VQA Niagara 2005.

And next: Lobster and Foie. Sounds rich, but was perfect. Here we had a tiny bit of lobster, appearing above sunchoke and roasted garlic puree and topped with seared (very and thus very lovely) foie gras. Next to it, a glass of lobster consomme. Wowzers. And served with it a french alsatian gerwirtraminer, Mittnacht Klack, 2003.

Then: free form ravioli. This turns out to be the top of a ravioli and the bottom of a ravioli (not attached to one another) -- with lovelies strewn between them. In this case, the lovelies were escargots (not usually my fave but swell -- truly swell), smoked pork belly and some thises and thats. The wine: Ladybug Rose, VQA Niagara 2004.

And what next? An Intermezzo! And I have to say, this was surprisingly swell. A lemon-passionfruit sorbet in a glass, into which was poured (by the very accommodating server) elderflower water and red currant "ice cubes." A true palate cleanser.

And then on to the "main course." And what was it? A short rib cassoulet -- taragon braised, served over a white bean puree. And the wine? Old Vines Foch, Malivore, VQA Niagara, 2004.

Yes, we wanted more. So: a selection of artisanal cheeses. We got one serving for us both (and I admit, we didn't finish all of them). The selections: delice de bourgogne, sheep's milk morbiere, sauvagine, 9 years old Forbar cheddar, Snow Road, and Le Bleu Benedictin. As I said, two french and 4 canadian. And all delicious. (For details on the cheeses, see e.g. this site on the bleu -- though you'll likely need to translate it into English -- I did -- or this site for the Snow Road.)

To conclude: dessert was a lemon-lime panna cotta, with a swirl of avocado mousse, a small heap of (now this was both wonderful and odd) salty caramel corn, and lemoncello gelato. Served with wine? Yes: Coteaux du Layon, Domaine des Baumard, Loire 2004.

Then -- something not on the menu arrived to send us off into the night -- small glasses of eggnog with rum, and tiny beignet to dip into . . . I have forgotten what. But I remember -- it was wonderful!

Ottawa. Hurrah!

Faye Kellerman's Short Stories

I "met" Faye Kellerman when I read her early mystery, Ritual Bath, years ago. I loved it -- and its focus on Orthodox Judaism. (The plot involved a mikveh, for example.) Her writing was superb and the use of Judaism informed and smart. When her main characters married later in the series, and then a daughter became a cop, the place of Judaism shifted and shifted again. But, throughout these many changes, Kellerman's emphasis has been very different from her husband Jonathan's. Reading The Garden of Eden and Other Criminal Delights was fun -- and sort of light weight. The volume includes short stories both new and previously published as well as a bit of autobiographical reflection. Nothing challenging -- and yet Kellerman does manage to show you her capacity to write in different ways. She also provides a glimpse of her moral commitments beyond those contained in her novels. (Though like many mystery authors, hers are morality tales as well.) Alas, the stories -- like her more recent novels in my experience -- are thinner in some ways than that early novel. (That seems to be a widespread trend; startlingly wonderful debut novels are followed by thinner writing and plotting. Maybe the terrible impact of market success? And depending on one's name to sell rather than one's writing? The failure seems endemic -- and the counterexamples relatively few. Sometimes the best hope is for unevenness -- rather than a mere down hioll trajectory.) Despite this, I enjoyed the book -- and read it quickly!

But what does this have to do with food? Kellerman concludes the anthology with a piece entitled "The Summer of My Womanhood," an autobiographical look at her teen years (before dental school and before murder mysteries) working alongside her father in his deli. She begins small (both physically and in terms of the work allotted to her) and eventually runs the bakery section. Reading this alongside her mystery stories helps them resonate a bit more -- with the smells and sounds of a deli, and with the brisk nostalgia of Kellerman's reflections on her father, dead at 53, and quite obviously mourned. I found myself drifting into nostalgia for my own father, dead at 63, and still a voice in my life. I never worked alongside him (though I did eat plenty of hoagies we bought together). When I look back, though, I know I carry him with me as Kellerman quite obviously carries her father. And this time of year, I think of him. I think of cooking turkeys when I came home from college (complete with my grandmother's bread stuffing recipe and my aunt making gravy) while my mother typed my papers. I think of being spoiled. With nostalgia.

Eat Over Your Sink

Wow. There's a day for everything. And today, November 24, 2006, is Sinkie Day, sponsored by the folks at www.sinkie.com. They're also known as the "International Association of People who Dine Over the Kitchen Sink," established in 1991. Yep, SInkie Day is a day to eat standing over your sink. Not, perhaps, a cause for celebration -- but a release for a little guilty pleasure in doing so?  Nut the big news is: on sinkie day, the folks at the web site announce their 6 suspected closet sinkies of the year. Will you be one?

Daily (Reading) Supplements

Sorting through a pile that looked a bit like this, I found a new daily supplement! No, I don;t mean vitamins and minerals. In August 2006, Gourmet Magazine had a supplement when it arrived-- a special "reading supplement." A smallish pamphlet, it had short stories and essays, a photo essay and even a story written over what look like reproductions of watercolors. Monique Truong, author of The Book of Salt, writes about americanization through the lens of food. Pat Conroy visits Paris. Maira Kalman offers "Sunny-side Up" -- a lovely colorful set of pictures with a tale presented in typography imitating handwriting. Familiar names like Calvin Trillin and Jane Smiley, Jane and Michael Stern (here's their website), write about author tours and food, food, food. (Elsewhere, by the way, Smiley has written on "the unteachable ignorance of the red states" Check it out!)

My favorite, though, was an essay entitled "Some Pig" by David Rakoff where Rakoff writes of the relationship of food and Judaism. For those not Jewish (and I am not), perhaps the essay is about how we deal with rules. But it is also about the particularities of pork and shrimp and kashrut and growing up and taking God seriously and struggling with life and meaning. Rakoff writes of friends who simply cannot eat pork -- and of Rabbis who write that "Eating treyf signals a cessation of disgust for the Gentile world" (p. 41) Rakoff tells jokes and he makes serious, scholarly points. Judaism as religion, as culture, as politics, as the lived experience of Rakoff (who describes himself as "me, the -Jewish-homosexual writer: the ultimate degenerate" in describing his inclusion in an event in Germany -- where he sees the "extirpated culture" of Judaism as "fetishized." (see p. 41.) ) The subtitle tells it all: What is it about Jews and Pork? One Man Saves his Bacon by Invoking Sigmund Freud, Emma Goldman, and Irving Berlin." Even more so, these quotations that provoke thought:

The Judaism I feel connected to is more cultural than religious. But both are predicated on a spirit of dissent, of voluble, welcome disagreement, and an institutionalized and fiercely protected duty to question authority. (p. 40)

When I eat a piece of bacon, aside from its preposterous, heart-stopping deliciousness, I taste all of that: all those years and all those migrations that brought me to that museum in Munich, to this privileged place in space and time. I taste Max Beckmann lithographs, Freud case histories, Emma Goldman exhortations, the tunes of Irving Berlin and his Tin Pan Alley chums. Just behind the bacon's bracing jolt of salt and its comforting embrace of fat and smoke, even more than its shattering crispness and tenacious, leathery pull, I taste the World. (p. 41)

Best Meals Ever??

I was sifting through a pile of things sitting next to my desk -- a pile which began when this blog began. It has newspaper articles and magazines, little pamphlets aquired here and there that refer to food. It includes a page on the Fellenz Family Farm, a community sponsored agriculture program near Geneva and the recipes from Le Cordon Bleu classes I took a few years ago in Ottawa during American thanksgiving. Sifting through it made me think of all the wonderful meals I have had over the years, so I thought I would offer a few recommendations of absolutely over-the-top-but-absolutely-worth-it places I have eaten . . . . Here are a few "best meals ever," made that way by the company and the food. The appear below in no particular order.

Le Toque in Montreal: Absolutely the most amazing meal ever. We arrived circa 5:30 and left many hours later. Ok, why 5:30 -- poor planning and a wonderful concierge who got us a reservation anyway. And we stayed and stayed. The food was modified to fit a low fat diet for one of us -- and included a small cream soup in a shot glass garnished with microgreens that still reverberate on my tongue.Who knew that such small phenomena could taste so much?!??! In cruising the web, I discovered that the place I went likely is the "old" Toque which has since closed; the new one sounds less over the top but still worth the trip. And, the owners are the same, just the location has changed. . . . . Here's a review of the new place.

Charlie Trotter's in Chicago is a place I have always wanted to visit. And, this past year we did. I had a terrific migraine the days before, which made the meal risky. But it turned out to be delicious. I even had the non-wine, non-alcoholic juices along with the meal -- and have become a convert. Among the delightful aspects of the meal itself were the bright beautiful green sorbet accompanying one fish dish, burgeoning with the taste of parsley and greens. We left with a bit of a treat awarded to all diners on their way out (in this case gingerbread) and I was heady from the brief kitchen tour and meeting Charlie Trotter himself.

Frasca Food and Wine is a restaurant in Boulder, Colorado that I went to in May 2006. Among other things, the sommelier was trained at the French Laundry (a restaurant in Napa I dream of visiting someday) and talked us into a splendiferous (yes, it is not a word, but words failed me) Chardonnay. I ordinarily am not rah rah Chardonnay -- but this was a truly unusual wine. I had pork belly. And I loved it.

Other possibilities: Bistro Bis in Washington DC. The Zuni Cafe (where I ate on my own, had the best chicken ever what seems like decades ago, spilled my beer and a stranger bought my meal) in San Francisco. I impulsively jumped out of a bus to eat at Zuni (okay, I got off when the bus stopped) years later and had an equally wonderful meal -- not the case with Chez Panisse which, I have to admit, has been wildly uneven over the years, despite being one of those pilgrimage sites for us all. Now Greens, though. That's where I discovered vegetarian food that was not weighty. Not to mention the view of sunsets.

Best meals. And. . . . your favorite neighborhood joint. Best meals ever. Yes.

Breakfast is Soooo Under-rated!

Ages ago, there was a comment on this blog about breakfast. So, in honor of an early comment, here's Cole Porter on breakfast (from Eat, Drink, and Be Merry, a fine little book of poems on food and drink).

SUNDAY MORNING BREAKFAST TIME

Here's to the piping porridge,
Here's to the biscuits hot,
Here's to the java
Flowing like lava
Out of the coffee pot.
Here's to the eggs and bacon,
Here's to the waffle unique,
And here's and here's
Three rousing cheers
For the best meal of the week!

For it's Sunday morning breakfast time,
The time all men adore!
Why don't the poets go into rhyme
And rave about it more?
For only then can a man forget
The sweat and worries of his bane-
Ful lot as he calmly enjoys his toast
And most of Arthur Brisbane.
Breakfast time on other days
Means bolting at fever heat,
But on Sunday morning, there's the time
When a men has time to eat -- and eat,
When a man has time to. . .
[Cakewalk]
. . . Breakfast is served.

For more on this book, click here . . . or here.

Poetic Food

Ok, I read poetry. I like poetry. So, I have included poetry now and then -- Sylvia Plath on mushrooms, for example. And the only poem I know by heart is an Ogden Nash one -- which I will spare you -- and that I cannot even remember reading (or hearing) it for the first time. (It seems to have been bred into me.) So; one day, I put food poetry into google. And what did I find? The Poetry Society presents: Food Poetry Bookshelf! It doesn't quite do it for me -- no Sylvia Plath on mushrooms, for example. But you can recommend poetry to them easily. There are also lots of poems at other sites ranging from Shel Silverstein (with a bear in the frigidaire) to . . . . much more serious possibilities.

What's your favorite food poem?

Beyond Retro

Some things are retro. Some things are antiques. Some people are geezers. Some perspectives are ageist. And some things are simply old. I bought a bok on old/antique cookbooks at the Flea Market in Wellfleet a while back and am struggling through it. It cost a measly little bit, and is in good shape.But, sometimes it is a struggle to read. Try these paragraphs from fairly early on (okay, the first few paragraphs of chapter 1):

The art of cookery stretches back in time to primordial man. It is as old as his first scientific discovery-- the knowledge that he had harnessed fire and made it a servant to do his will.

Together with Man's use of the earliest rudimentary methods of kindling flame came his awareness that cooked food often tastes better than raw. A bloody hunk of fresh-killed meat, accidentally or experimentally dropped into the crackling flames of the open fire at his cave's mouth, led to his realization that the flesh of animals, birds, and fishes was tenderized and rendered vastly more palatable when subjected to prolonged heat. Hooked out from the embers by an antler or smoking stick, it provided the first cooked meal prepared for human consumption. Cookery, the subtle art of rendering food appetizing and more attractive for eating, dates back to that sizzling episode. The aroma lingers as it is wafted by imagination back to us through hundreds of thousands of years of time.

Aeons were to pass before the first crude recipes forpreparation of food were painstakingly written on skins of parchment and vellum. Yet the basic rules of culinary good behavior were already being laid down, later to be etched in the traditions of the family and tribe. Rules and methods that endured for centuries were memorized, and were passed on orally and by example to succeeding generations struggling to exist in environments hostile to human survival. The most economical use of the available food and its short-term preservation by cooking were some of the earliest lessons learned, and how to tenderize a leg of bison without at the same time charring it to a cinder, or the broiling of the tribal steak of elk, came as naturally to Stone Age woman as the preparation of a mixed grill to her modern counterpart.

Source: Eric Quayle's Old Cookbooks: An Illustrated History (New York: E.P. Dutton, A brandywine Press Book, 1978), p. 9.

On reading the quotation, of course, you see my problem. And yet, who can resist a book with all these truly OLD recipes, including "Stuffed Dormice" ( a recipe from Imperial Rome).

Cookie Contest

In conjunction with the 2nd Annual HWS Book and Craft Fair (11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday, November 19 at Bristol Field House In Geneva), William Smith and Hobart Colleges are sponsoring a “Cookie Bake-Off Contest”. Join the fun and submit a cookie known to be a family favorite, a personal best, a unique presentation, or just a fun cookie to make. The choice is yours. Many people will be attending the HWS Book and Craft Fair. We hope you will be one of them! We will be offering first, second and third prizes with a special panel of judges.

This event is open to the public. Featured will be handcrafted items, a variety of artworks and booths staffed by HWS or civic groups. Independent booksellers, authors, HWS crafters and artists, Geneva area service groups, and HWS student groups are all invited to participate. Activities for children are also planned, including games, a story reading, music and food. For details email Lucille Smart.

Wouldn’t it be fun to make this into a competition between . . . . you pick! Local bloggers or cookie monsters or bakers with a passion or. . . .