Wednesday, August 30, 2006
I'm off later today to Linz, Austria for the 2006 Ars Electronica Festival. My husband will be speaking at the conference, and I (for once) will not be. Yay! This means more time for me to explore the home of the Linzertorte and perhaps locate the very best one in town. Afterwards, we'll be doing some traveling in the region, where I hope to eat all sorts of delicious local delights that I can report about when I return.
Until I do, there will be no updates on the site. I'm not even bringing my computer. So enjoy your last days of summer, and I'll see you back here on September 10th, full of sausage stories and Linzertorte tales.
I had some kettle corn for the first time a few weeks ago in Wisconsin. Mmm, mmm, it was good. Ever since, I've been looking for a recipe to make some at home. I found this Kettle Corn Recipe but haven't tried it yet. Seems like it's missing salt, as the stuff I tried was both sweet and salty. And that seemed to be the magic of it.
Tuesday, August 29, 2006
Did the previous link get you wondering why you'd even want dry aged beef? Dry-Aged Beef: Try a Little Tenderness explains the fuss behind dry aged beef. [via delicious merlin]
Looking for that delicious dry aged beef, but can't find it in your local supermarket? Have a look at the following links: How to dry age beef at home and Is it possible to dry age beef at home? [via delicious merlin]
Iron Chef Morimoto's recommendations for Tokyo. Now you know where to get the best omakase, fugu, and knives on your next trip.
Monday, August 28, 2006
The R-months are coming, and that means it's time to eat oysters! Up and down the east coast of the US, bivalve lovers come together to celebrate with oyster festivals. I'd like to attend the Wellfleet OysterFest. Wellfleets are one of my favorite oysters, and the town (and the Cape) is beautiful in autumn.
As a tribute to the last days of summer, photos of ice cream trucks of Los Angeles. Ice cream trucks remind me of visiting my grandmother when I was little. We didn't have any trucks where I lived, but one frequented her street in the summer. The sound of its sing-song bell would send me and my brother into a frenzy, pleading with the nearest adult for some change. I was always so worried we'd miss it and it would drive right by. And then the choices! Oh, what to pick on that special day? An old stand-by like Fudgsicle? Something with ice cream? Or Italian ice, which I recall was the trendy and popular thing to get on the block. Ice cream trucks are always parked at corners in Manhattan in the summer, but I've yet to buy something from one. Now if they turned on that siren and drove slowly down my street, I'm sure I'd be the first one out my door.
Identifying the additives in processed foods. If these items are listed in the ingredients, "they are strong indicators that the food we are eating is far from fresh."
Friday, August 25, 2006
Jack from Fork & Bottle writes in about the grape juice that tastes like wine that I linked yesterday.
Sorry, but I'm not liking your most recent post because these grape juices don't at all taste like wine. Not even Navarro wine. I've had both a bunch of times (six times at least of each over the years). In fact, it's just the opposite - I'm always disappointed on how they taste so much like grape juice and so nothing like wine. Grape juice from grapes commonly used for making wine still taste like grape juice, not wine.
I quizzed my wife about these juices (as she likes them more than I do). She describes them as the best grape juices most people will have every tasted. But not at all wine-like. She doubts that anyone could pick out the Pinot Noir juice as being made from the Pinot Noir grape. The Gewürztraminer, being a very aromatic grape, does have hints that it might be made from the Gewürztraminer grape - but again, this drink is not at all wine-like, and totally grape-juice-like.
If these juices could somewhat pass for wine they'd be very popular and many wineries would be making them with their lesser juice. Instead, they're a hard sell and hardly anyone makes them. Navarro's two are the most popular in good restaurants.
Oh well, it was a nice dream while it lasted.
Back in April, I wrote about Jeffrey Steingarten's foie gras article in Men's Vogue. At the time it wasn't online, so I quoted some passages from it. Now it's up on their site. I recommend reading it if you have any interest in the issue.
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Robust grape juices that taste like wine, without the alcohol. Gewürztraminer and Pinot Noir juices are produced by Navarro Vineyards and available to order online.
In France, an éclade de moules is a kind of ritualized mussel-roast. "The mussels are arranged on a plank of pine that has been soaked in seawater, then covered with pine branches or grape vines that are set alight." Sounds delicious and makes me want to hop a plane right now to the Île de Ré.
An ice cream sandwich taste test yields NYC's eight best. Oddly, most are filled with gelato, which I guess is just a fancier ice cream with less air. Seems like they should have said "gelato sandwich" instead. Of course, this doesn't mean I won't be trying them out very very soon.
Wonderful photographs of Los Angelese fast food joints over the years. Includes taco stands and burger spots, hoagies and BBQ. These are some of my favorite kind of places to eat. [via jason]
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
I've eaten my share of tentacled things, and normally I'm OK with the larger-than-bite-size calamari, or the round slice of calamari in Spain that's the size of an onion ring. I'm even OK with octopus, when it's around the size of calamari. But these pulpo, photographed by my friend Jim from his trip to Sicily, might be too much for me. His description: "These were scary and tasty." Scary is right.
Tom Colicchio is leaving Gramercy Tavern to focus on Craft and all the Craft derivatives (Craftbar, Craftsteak, ’Wichcraft, etc.) While I'm sure Colicchio hasn't been in the kitchen at GT in a very long time, I can't help but worry that something might change there anyway. Gramercy Tavern is one of my favorite restaurants, and eating in the Tavern room, whether with friends or just my husband, always makes for a wonderful evening. I really hope that continues to be true.
Last year, Pim made delicious french fries with horse fat. Wondering what made them so good, she wrote to Harold McGee for an answer. I am a fan of french fries, but something about the idea of horse fat turns my stomach a bit. I'm not sure I could knowingly eat them, never mind render the fat and prepare them myself.
A review of an interesting-sounding book on the history of vegetarianism. The Observer looks at The Bloodless Revolution: Radical Vegetarians and the Discovery of India by Tristram Stuart. (Note: book doesn't seem to be available at Amazon's US store at this time.) I never realized the long-standing historical relationship between vegetarianism and political activism. Could be a good read.
Diary of a Foodie is a delicious new public television series that looks at the world of food first.Gourmet's Ruth Reichl and her team of editors host the show (from what I can tell on the limited web site) and the series premiers October 7.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
So, just how unethical is your supper? Not a list of what you'd suspect, and foie gras doesn't even appear.
The research makes it clear that when soy foods are consumed, traditional preparation methods...are best when it comes to our health. A useful look at the health benefits of fermented soy (traditionally found in Asian cuisine) versus the American approach of using only part of the soybean in packaged food and as a meat substitute, and rarely using fermented soy.
In defiance of the foie gras ban, which goes into effect today, Chicago restaurants that never serve foie gras offer it today.
Another look at helping children eat healthy lunch from author Eric Schlosser (of Fast Food Nation fame). Includes great suggestions and recipes for what to pack for lunch. Of course, there's no guarantee that what you pack will get eaten. My mom sent me to school with a piece of fruit every day for years before I ever ate one. I'll never forget the stench of the apple I left in my locker for a month back in second grade.
From the New York Times Magazine, a long article on attempts to improve school lunch. There's a lot in there I hadn't realized about how public school food is prepared (tons of government surplus food is used, for example, and the school system needs to basically run a break-even restaurant) and made me realize the challenge to improve the food children eat in school.
Monday, August 21, 2006
The August issue of Gourmet contained a food writing supplement and now they've supplemented the supplement with podcast interviews with the writers and subjects of those pieces. They're up to the 3rd episode already, an interview with Calvin Trillin.
Thursday, August 17, 2006
A friend of mine headed to the Union Square Whole Foods recently for some meat. She was interested in getting grass-fed stuff, and I told her that I knew they had grass-fed lamb from New Zealand, but wasn't sure about the beef offerings. Later she reported back about her experience (after purchasing lamb steaks and some ground beef). She says the butcher kept insisting that the beef was grass-fed, saying "See, it says, 'organic,' which means 'grass-fed.'"
Note to Whole Foods butchers: Organic does not mean grass-fed. Some organic may be grass-fed, some grass-fed beef may be organic. But it's not the same thing. It's confusing enough to figure out what's going on with our food supply. You'd expect someone who's selling it to you to at least have an understanding about what the labels mean.
A designer wonders if the dials on stoves could be better designed. The proposed redesign makes sense but doesn't seem that practical to me. My stove has a little picture next to each dial demonstrating which burner it controls. After nearly ten months of constant use, I still have to check to make sure I'm lighting the correct one.
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
While I was in Minneapolis, I visited the Mill City museum (details about this great place over at my husband's site). In the gift shop, I spotted this retro apron from Bella Pamella. Even though I always use a plain white apron and have several of them, I wanted this. There's something so homey and cozy about it. I can just imagine wearing it as I take my roast goose out of the oven for Christmas dinner.
Mayonnaise turns 250 years old this summer and NPR has some information about its history. Also useful is the sidebar with information about whether mayo in the potato salad at the picnic will make everyone sick if it sits out for a while.
What makes a tomato an heirloom tomato? Barbara at Tigers & Strawberries has a nice post all about heirlooms.
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
I'm on something of a banana-eating roll lately. I'm trying to eat very healthful food these days, so I've added more fruit to my diet. Now I'm eating a banana a day and wondering why I didn't before. They're so easy to eat and yummy, full of carbs (which I do not eschew), vitamins A, B, and C, and they contain high levels of potassium. Also they have fiber, and most people don't get enough fiber. They're almost like the perfect food. So when I spotted this recipe for Chocolate-Covered Bananas, I thought, "Hmm...maybe I can add more bananas to my diet!" I know chocolate goes against the healthful claim above, but bittersweet chocolate is supposed to be good for you. So in some ways, by making a chocolate-covered banana, you're making an extra-healthy banana!
There's not a lot to report from my visit to America's heartland except this astounding fact: heirloom tomatoes are cheaper than regular tomatoes! The first night we were in Wisconsin, we went to the local farmer's market. One stand was selling both heirloom and regular tomatoes. The regulars were $2/lb and the heirlooms were $1/lb. $1 a pound! Can you believe it? At Union Square, they're between $4-5/lb, depending on the vendor. I guess they're cheaper than regulars because they're less popular out there. We took advantage of the price and bought a bunch for dinner the next night, and they were mighty tasty.
While I was away, Eater scored a picture of Times restaurant critic Frank Bruni. Funny, it's not how I imagined him looking at all. He looks like some 70s TV star, like maybe a buddy of the Six Million Dollar Man.
Update: Via email a reader points out that the photo of Bruni isn't much of a scoop. You can see it here on the HarperCollins website.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Bill Buford gushes about Harold McGee over at NPR. If you don't have McGee's On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen in your kitchen, you are missing a critical component of your food library. Every time I open it, I lose myself and just want to read forever. It's perfect for melding of my geeky side and my food side.
Frank Bruni questions whether seasonal eating is all that everyone claims but a commenter says it best: "Unseasonal eating is fine, depending on what season you’re talking about: Sausages in summer is a matter of taste, while tomatoes in January is unsustainable eating." Of course, in place of "unsustainable eating," I would have simply said "gross."
Is soy the next corn? A long, detailed report from the Guardian questions the health claims of soy, looks at the broad use of soy in processed foods and its extensive planting and destruction of our natural resources, and wonders if this miracle bean is as miraculous as we've been told. I drink soy milk every day, now this article's got me wondering if I should. [thanks Augie]
Thursday, August 10, 2006
What is Biodynamics? I thought something that was biodynamic was basically organic, but it's not. Biodynamics is much stricter and a more complicated system for growing things.
10 kitchen tips from the pros. Of all of them, I think knife skills (and a sharp knife) is the most important.
Wednesday, August 9, 2006
Things will be pretty slow around here for the next few days. Ruhlman's no longer around to pick up my slack, and I'm heading out of town for a long weekend visit with family. If time permits and inspiration hits, there will be updates. Otherwise, things will get back on track next week.
Tuesday, August 8, 2006
Two beautiful words come together at last: bacon mayo. You read that right, mayonnaise made with bacon fat! Mmm...[via kiplog]
If you're looking for a new t-shirt (and really, who isn't?), this Hooray Cholesterol! tee from Threadless could be just the thing. All those fats attacking the heart?! Brilliant.
I can't live without freshly ground salt and pepper in my kitchen, so I have two of these Nantucket Pepperguns: one in white for salt, one in black for pepper. The simple design lets you grind with one hand, so that you can use your other hand for stirring if you want. Another ingenious aspect of its design is the way you fill it. You twist the tube to reveal a hole, and in doing so, rotate the "ears" towards he back. Then you can lay the peppergun on the counter, supported by the ears at the back, with the hole pointed toward you, and easily fill with sea salt or whole peppercorns. I've used lots of different pepper grinders in my day, but this is far and away my favorite. Easy to use. Easy to refill. Easy to clean. I love it.
Previous gadget: Foil Cutter
Monday, August 7, 2006
I've created an archive page of all of Michael Ruhlman's post for this site. So you can access everything he wrote during his visit on one page.
Make your own wine with custom wine and custom crush services. You can blend varietals, determine the style, pick the kind of press, and many other things related to winemaking. In the end, you have your own custom wine. It sounds cool, if you can avoid screwing up and wasting $5000 to bottle your own bitter grape juice.
Of course, Americans eat too much salt and should reduce their intake. The article talks about the large amount of salt in processed food as the enemy. Not the small amount of salt used to sprinkle on eggs or in pasta water. Phew! I hardly ever eat processed food, so I think I'm OK for now.
The Perfect Pantry writes about the history of sea salt and recommends Portuguese Flor de Sal over Breton Fleur de Sel.
The simple joy of growing tomatoes. I sure wish I had some outdoor space so I could grow my own tomatoes. I tried one indoors this summer but it isn't doing well and I've finally given up on it.
Friday, August 4, 2006
New York Times restaurant reviewer (and getting really good) food blogger Frank Bruni has been sampling burgers all over New York City. In his most recent, Two Burgers, One Dip and a Happy Carnivore, he visits a chain I've never heard of called Houston's. Apparently their burger is pretty good.
All the burger talk (and my frequent summer visits to the Shake Shack) makes me miss one of my favorite burgers in Manhattan. It never appears on anyone's list, but for me it's perfect. It's the "cheeseburger delux" at La Bonbonniere, a small diner in the West Village. I think what makes it so perfect is they put cheese on both side of the bun, so the juicy, flavorful meat is sandwiched between bread and cheese. I used to live nearby and went there often. Now it's not so convenient, so I don't just drop in for lunch. I really miss that burger.
Thoughtful review of Nina Planck's Real Food. It sounds like a good read, but I'm suffering from food book overload at the moment.
US Congress takes head out of ass, puts 'French' back on menu. The days of "Freedom Toast" are behind us. Let us never speak of them again.
Time to say farewell, and to thank you, Meg, for your great hospitality and generosity in allowing me to post on your blog. It's been a great experience, and has allowed me to explore some ideas I'd never have pursued in traditional media while using a voice that is only appropriate to a blog. I'm very much a believer in the how-do-I-know-what-I-think-till-I-read-what-I-write effect, so the freedom of the blog has helped me to figure some things out. Such as why the foie issue is so troubling to me.
In the end it's not about the foie. Life would be diminished in a very small way without foie gras but not drastically so (they way it would be, say, if pork were outlawed). It's that it represents another way uninformed people are trying to legislate what I am or am not allowed to eat. Government is happy to subsidize corn and encourage horrific treatment of billions of cows, pigs and chickens, to encourage through big business processed food that is bad for us, and then tell me that I'm not allowed to eat a natural product from an animal that has (in my opinion, as of now, though this may change) been humanely raised. When people tell me what I can or cannot eat based on a moral contention of their own, that really pisses me off. It's happening throughout our society. The foie issue embodies this troubling trend in America.
I believe that the issues about food that are discussed on the food blogs are important because how we eat determines how we live, literally and metaphorically. How we eat, and the decisions we make, shape the world. From an evolutionary standpoint, humans are a dangerous species--a wickedly smart predator that has so far managed to avoid the ecological disasters of its own predation. I hope we continue to do so, for my kids' sake, but it's going to get harder and harder. We're trashing our livestock; through genetic engineering and the creation of a monoculture, creating powerful bugs that can kill; we're fishing out our oceans, working our way down the food chain, and we're pretty much at the bottom feeders now; we're creating massive dead zones in our oceans from agricultural pollutants, bankrupting our fossil fuel supply and burning holes in the atmosphere.
So yes, dammit, that's why foie gras is important: because it's NOT important. Does that make sense? It shouldn't be important, but it has become important, and that is the shame of it.
See, there I go. I start out thanking Meg, and I tumble into another rant. But it seems to be the only way to be heard. Flannery O'Connor once explained that all her characters were in effect caricatures because it was the only way to make people see. Blogs seem to be particularly good at this as well. Food is important, arguably the most important thing there is, that and water. And blogging well and intelligently about food is important. Maybe it can change things. I hope.
So many thanks to all the excellent readers who commented on the issues, elevating and enhancing them and giving them perspective and balance. And again, many thanks for the opportunity to hang out for a short time on your excellent blog, Meg. I'll be reading.
Onward.
Popular curry spice is a brain booster. Eat curry, improve cognitive function.
A taste test of various salts to determine the best. British Maldon sea salt comes out on top. Brittany's fleur de sel comes in second.
Thursday, August 3, 2006
Last week when I guest blogged over at Epicurious, I wrote about Brittany, France, and fleur de sel. As I wrote about it, I realized I owned some fleur de sel but hadn't opened it. And I am here to tell you now that I was a fool! This is the best salt I've ever tasted, and I should know. I eat a lot of salt. In fact, I'm kind of a salt addict, and so really I am over the moon about my new "discovery."
What's lovely about fleur de sel is that its crystals are various sizes, so some dissolve upon contact with whatever it is you're eating (in my case tomatoes and soft boiled eggs, not at the same time) while other, larger crystals remain intact. So you get a nice crunch when you bite. But not the annoying, overly aggressive salty crunch from a large chunk of sea or kosher salt. This is milder, it crunches and imparts a lovely salinity, then dissolves. I am on the verge of becoming the kind of person I always thought was ridiculous: someone who travels with her own personal salt supply.
Amazon sells Le Saunier de Camargue salt that I have (which is from the South of France), along with other salts from Hawaii and Brittany. Oh fleur de sel, how did I live so long without you?!
When I first spent time at the CIA, one course I took was taught by a woman named Eve Felder. I wrote about the class, and her, and by the time I returned to the CIA she'd become one of the academic deans. Eve, a former Chez Panisse chef, is probably the most humane-minded chef I've ever met. The depth of her care for students, for chefs, for our food, for cooking and for the earth seemed to me then and now to be boundless.
So I asked her where she stood on the foie gras issue, and here's what she emailed back:
Thanks, Michael. No, I do not have an issue with foie gras. My philosophy in most everything is that one has to experience what another person (or animal) is experiencing prior to making an informed judgement.
When I was a young chef, I spent about a week on a foie gras farm in the Dordogne valley in France. I spent days force feeding ducks.
The experience I had in France is that they fed the ducks a warm mash of corn, water and duck fat that was administered through a funnel.
The funnel had a wire in it that helped to expedite the mash from the sides and through the tube. The wire moved when you pressed a peddle with your foot. Sort of like a sewing machine.
I sat in a comfortable small straw lined corral with 6 ducks in 6 corrals on a small stool. The warm mash was poured into the funnel. I held the duck under one of my legs and extended its' neck upwards and gently opened its' mouth and inserted the tube to about the top of the chest. As I pressed the machine with my foot, I gently pulled the funnel up until the bird's throat was filled with mash.The funnel moved across
the ceiling from corral to corral.
It was an extremely gentle and intimate experience. The animal does not have a gag reflex. They always waddled away perfectly happy and full and ready for a nap.
As you know, I'm sure, ducks naturally gorge prior to migration. They are genetically programmed to make sure they are full for their ultimate flight. People who are taking issue with this have attacked a very small artisinal industry that is easy to target. I am actually heartsick that they have made such inroads. What will be next?
Gourmet baby food is all the rage. They mention "puréed peas with fresh mint" as an example. That sounds like something you could make at home so easily. [via The Food Section]
Now you can get your bottled water on the rocks. Purified ice cubes are here at last! No more tap water sullying your single malt or your Evian.
Wednesday, August 2, 2006
Finally! I got the recipes ported over from my old site and you can now see them here. The design isn't so hot, need to do some more tweaking, but at least they're there. Now that they are, I recommend you make a bread salad or heirloom tomato salad for dinner tonight.
It's broiling hot today in New York City, and as I scurried around the greenmarket attempting to buy some tomatoes before I burst into flame, I noticed a sign at Tamarack Hollow Farm. Tamarack is one of the nicest vendors at the market. When I bought my first pork shoulder, I asked the vendor how to prepare it. He gave me some directions, then pointed to the label on the package. "If you have any problems, call my wife. She'll walk you through it." Culinary phone support included in pork purchase price! Who knew?
Anyway, today's sign said something to the effect that orders were now being taken for duck, goose, smoked ham, and suckling pig for delivery from September 1 through the end of the year. As I walked home, I imagined what I could do with a suckling pig. Then in the stifling heat, my thoughts drifted to goose and I longingly imagined December's snow and icy air, the scent of pine trees, and the fun of having family over for a lovely Tamarak roast goose for Christmas dinner. A huge bead of sweat stung my eye and snapped me from my reverie. It's a 102° and I'm thinking about Christmas goose. I'm tempted to head right back over there and place my order, if only it weren't so hot outside.
Apparently yesterday's meat cake is not the only meat cake in the world. Mark McClusky emailed to share a picture of his annual meat cake. Since 1997, he's been making one for a friend's birthday. This idea is so genius, I will get started on one as soon as the heat wave breaks. I'm picturing an all-cake dinner party starting with some kind of baby appetizer cakes, then meat cake, then dessert cake. Maybe a cheese cake (ha ha) in between?
Update: I've received two emails since posting this. One had the subject "sympathetically beefy" and I thought it must be someone interested in meat cakes. Alas, it was spam. The second pointed out that Martha makes meat cakes too! Those peas in the frosting are too much.
Grass-Fed Rule Angers Farmers reported the New York Times last week. Includes addresses for submitting comments to the Agriculture Department regarding grass-fed legislation. If I'm going to spend the extra money for something that's labeled grass-fed, I want to be sure it's actually out in the pasture grazing for its meal, not standing in a feed lot eating "grass" harvested from unripe corn.
Good wine now comes in boxes and tubes. Between this and all the screw tops, wine is becoming pretty accessible these days.
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
There's a reason you only eat oysters in the R months: 74 Become Ill After Eating Raw Oysters. Last time I checked, it wasn't Jurly. Nor is today Argust 1st. [via Eater]
Seattle-based DRY Soda offers four flavors of "culinary" soda that were created to be paired with food. They're offered in kumquat, rhubarb, lavender, and lemongrass. Hmmm, I think I might like rhubarb soda. I don't really like soda much because it's too sweet, so something fizzy but more tangy could be right up my alley.
Why Make Homemade Baby Food for Your Baby? I suppose it's easier said than done, what with balancing work and home life and just getting food on the table. But it seems like a good way to ensure your baby's getting healthy, yummy food from an early age.
It hit me as I listened to last week's charming 92nd Street Y roundtable on Gourmet's August Summer Reading digest: It is really, really nice, when you hear smart writers having a conversation. And it is even nicer (as a distinctly amateur food enthusiast) when you hear smart writers having a conversation when their steel-trap brains are turned to the subject of food.
Leonard Lopate of WNYC moderated the roundtable. The participants were Gourmet editor-in-chief Ruth Reichl and four of the contributors to the Gourmet digest: author Ann Patchett, humorist David Rakoff, and Road Foodies Jane and Michael Stern.
The ground covered was not particularly new--or actually related to the practice of food writing--but it was fun. The conversation ranged over food loves and hates, the rebirth of pork in the U.S., favorite restaurants, and a brief, expected riff on the politics of eating and the American diet. Patchett talked about her hysterical objection to a gold leaf-cloaked risotto ("I mean, no little gold family had to die, but still"). Rakoff talked about the food community's reaction to his veiled slam against Chez Panisse ("It was like I was coming out against motherhood"). When Jane and Michael Stern mentioned the food specialty of Akron Ohio--sauerkraut balls--Rakoff politely inquired, "Are we talking cotillions or spheres?"
The idea for the supplement, Reichl explained, grew out of the August, 2004 Consider the Lobster (.pdf) article David Foster Wallace wrote for Gourmet. Reichl admitted she didn't know how readers would respond to the article, considering its denseness and length (and rant-ey DFW-ness)--but she loved it. The supplement, then, was designed to be about more than just enjoying food--it should be about the meaning of the act of eating.
She mentioned how Gourmet has traditionally asked writers who don't necessarily write about food to do food writing; Ray Bradbury's Dandelion Wine, for example, came from a piece for Gourmet. "I trust writers," Reichl said. "We got a lot of different voices. I just asked them, what do you feel like doing? And what I got back was great; things like Jane and Michael Stern's piece about their first book tour, which happens to be one of the funniest things I've read in my life." (PS: It is. When I started reading it, on my way to a restaurant in a cab, I had to stall under a streetlamp for five minutes so I could finish the thing in one go. There's a story about Walter Cronkite's faulty hearing aid that's just, oh, brilliant.)
Things we learned: Ann Patchett is a bad eater. Rakoff started the talk by exposing her secret comfort food, Spaghetti-Os ("Thanks," she said. "Pal."), and the poor woman spent the rest of the talk fending off friendly needling about her food habits. Turns out she hasn't eaten red meat since her 9th birthday present of a pet pig: "You're scotched as a food writer, if you don't eat the hoof." Patchett's essay is, in fact, the least food-related of the bunch. Reichl assigned her the label of "the fine living person," and sent her to the Hotel Bel Air for a week to write about what it means to be left alone. ("I was out there doing the hard work of fine living for the American people," Patchett said, straight-faced.)
The conversation pivoted for a while around Rakoff's piece on Jews and pork, a subject I'm pretty ignorant about. There was talk about the pork-friendly dispensation given by the Pittsburgh reform platform in the 1880s, and the funny transgressional waltz that modern day Jews have with treyf foods (if the Chinese food is eaten right from the carton, does it count?). Rakoff also mentioned something one of his interview subjects, Rabbi X, head rabbi from a prominent Reform congregation, said to him: that the very idea of kosher veal is an oxymoron, as it's inherently cruel.
Rakoff also made the point (thank god!) about how we're treating Gourmet salt like a sexual fetish. "I mean, would I rather not eat things impregnated with lead, with mechanical pencils?" he said. "Sure….But you're picking your salt, you're not choosing an oncologist." Reichl's vaguely arch response, as one who obviously knows her pink Hawaiian from her fleur de sel: She likes arguments about food, she loves the idea of someone saying it's absurd to get 12 types of salt at a restaurant: "I don't care what people think about food as long as they think about it." (Throughout the talk Reichl seemed to veer towards didactic…Her attempt to make it a more sober-minded, thoughtful discussion, I suppose?)
Jane and Michael Stern were breezy, delightful fonts of obscure food information, spouting exactly the stuff you want from a couple who's spent the past twenty years trolling the country for good meals. They talked about the hand-ground paprika they'd found in a Hungarian butcher shop in Akron, Ohio, the fried chicken from Bon Ton Minimart in Henderson, Kentucky, the chili rellenos from the carwash-meets-taco-joint in El Paso, TX, the excellent ribs from Curtis' Barbecue in Putney, Vermont. The only problem at Curtis', Jane said, is that you have to eat the ribs while avoiding eye contact with Mr. Curtis' massive pet pig, Isabel. "The meat really is great, though," Michael said. (Patchett looked ill.)
Reichl mentioned she found all of Jane and Michael's pieces political, as they're so clearly in love with the people they meet on the road--the Sterns are saving a disappearing piece of American culture, she said, by writing about these people and their food. (The thing I would have liked answered (something that was actually asked twice, but neatly sidestepped both times): How do the Sterns manage to write together as a pair? I mean: Are they sitting across a table from each other, lobbing sentences at each other? Are they tag-teaming paragraph by paragraph, restaurant review by restaurant review, or what?)
Here, the things each of the panelists admitted they absolutely won't eat (Patchett abstained):
Reichl [after much hesitation]: honey [cue smothered audience gasp!]. "I just, I just can't go near it," she said, visibly uncomfortable.
Rakoff [from a National Geographic street food article he discovered when he was little]: salamander skewers. "I remember reading and shrieking, tiny little shrieks," he said. "Years later I did try tiny grilled octopi, which were delicious; but at a certain point you get close to what can only be described as… the beak…. And they start getting clacky and cartilaginous."
Michael Stern: chitlins steamed in vinegar. (Well. No debates there.)
Jane Stern: On a sweltering trip to St. Louis, she and Michael stopped at a restaurant--and noticed the door prop was… a raw chicken. (Patchett: "What, so, what you won't eat is raw chicken?" JS: "No, what I won't eat is a doorstop.")
Politically, the discussion touched (of course) on Pollan's book. "It's true what he says," Reichl said. "We ought to have glass abattoirs. We would eat differently if we did, and we would think differently." She talked about a time (not so long ago) when you went to the Essex Street market and pointed at the chicken you wanted for your dinner; the rule was, give animals an honorable life and then kill them decently.
On the subject of organics: "I never thought I would be saying this, but I'm very worried that as organics become more mainstream, we'll be importing more and more, and it will be the death of US farmers," Reichl said. "Buy locally as much as you can, buy American as much as you can." (This prompted a smattering of applause; funny, though, the studied avoidance of Wal-Mart's organic policy in all this. There was a moment when Lopate mentioned it, and all the panelists seemed to become, uh, very interested in their water glasses. I get it: I understand it's a different discussion. Not to mention I'd imagine Wal-Mart's arm is pretty far-reaching: I'd rather not be on the receiving end of a Wal-Mart slap.)
At a certain point, the inevitable question came in: How do you make a living out of food writing? Patchett's response (kind of neither here nor there, though the question was pretty unanswerable, anyhow): You put in your time, she said. You have to spend the eight years at Seventeen magazine writing about "What's in your locker???" and then gradually work your way up to, you know, all-expenses-paid week-long stints at the Bel Air.
Well. Thanks, Ann.
What Reichl finished with: the sort of food writing that makes up the summer digest isn't just about food, really. At least, not to the exclusion of other subjects--food is just the common denominator, the entry point to the stories. Junot Diaz's piece isn't about eating sushi, Reichl pointed out, it's about his relationship with his father. Pat Conroy's piece is a hazy, magical little ode to Paris in the 70s. Monique Truong writes about acculturation and motherhood. And Thomas Beller talks about how selling egg creams as a teenager in New York saved his life.
Which is all to say: This is a collection of damn good writing, period. Not surprising, given the sharp conversational skills of the authors. I'm hoping Gourmet sponsors more events like this in the future.
Guest reviewer Cristina Mueller grew up in Berkeley and now lives in New York. Her fridge stayed Californian: Humboldt Fog, cilantro, half an avocado, and a ream of Trader Joes corn tortillas. As writing goes, she does a lot on perfumes and de-wrinklifying serums. She also thinks she would make a pretty successful deli florist if it ever came down to it, and would like to find somewhere within driving distance for pick-your-own blackberries. Once, she spied on Ruth Reichl as she got her breakfast muffin (a corn one) toasted and buttered at the cafeteria grill station. She is sorry for spying, but she did find her—and the corn muffin—very charming.
