Flatbread with Mustard Greens

This is one of those "fusion" recipes that a friend of CC's found in some magazine more than a few years ago.

The results of years of tinkering are presented for your collective delectation.

Ingredients

Topping

3" ginger
5 garlic cloves
1 large serrano

1 stick cinnamon
2 tsp whole coriander
1 tbsp whole cumin
1 tbsp ground cloves
1/2 tbsp whole peppercorns

5 shallots (or 1 large red onion, finely diced)
4 tomatoes (finely diced)
2 1/2 cups chopped mustard greens

crumbled feta

Dough

1/4 cup rye flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
2 cups white flour
1 tsp dried yeast
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 1/4 cups water
minced cilantro (or minced mint leaves)
ground pepper

Recipe

First up, the mise-en-scène.

Diced Onions
Chopped cilantro
Diced tomatoes
Chopped mustard greens
Crumbled feta

Ginger-garlic-green-chilli paste
The ginger-garlic-green chilli paste was just ground together in a food processor.

The poolish
This is a critical part of good bread. Mix together, the yeast, the rye flour, and just enough water to make a paste. Let it sit for 30 mins.

Rye flour is like crack cocaine for yeast (the science awaits a future post.) They are going to reproduce like crazy. This is an old baker's trick, and a very good one, the CC may add.


Dough
Then, we mix together the various flours along with salt, lots of ground pepper (look at the picture closely!), and the chopped cilantro to make a dough.

Feel free to change the proportion of wheat to white flour. Just remember, you will need a longer rise for whole wheat flour.

The dough needs to rise for at least 2 hours.

Dry roasting the spices
This is a critical component of using Indian spices. You need to dry roast them. The idea is simple -- roast them till they smell "good". Start with the bigger pieces and work your way down to the smallest. In this recipe, that would be cumin (not shown in the above picture.)

Fry the onions at a medium-low heat. The goal is to soften them not to caramelize them.

This is what the onions will look like.

Add the ginger-garlic-green-chilli paste, and fry for a bit.

This would be the end result.

Add the homemade tomato paste, and fry for a bit.

Then, in go the tomatoes. Do not turn up the heat. Let them reduce at the same medium-low temperature.

Add the ground spices.

You can see the color darken from both the tomato reduction, and the masses of brown spices. This takes a while. Do not attempt to hurry the process.

In go the mustard greens.

They will wilt exceedingly quickly in the heat. This picture was taken barely 30 seconds after the previous one.

The Finished Topping
Roll out the dough with a rolling pin, and top it with the topping, followed by the crumbled feta.

Bake this in an oven at 450F for 8-12 minutes. (You will need to check when it's done.)

The Final Product

Mystery Mushrooms

The CC was in Chinatown recently, and he spotted what could only be dried mushrooms except he hasn't a clue of what they are, or how they could be used.

Any clues, fellow foodies?

On Bouillabaisse

Right after she gives the recipe, the lovable Paula Wolfert had something to say in her book "Mediterranean Cooking" on why one could never make a true bouillabaisse in America.

1. For a true bouillabaisse, people will tell you that it must be made in sight of the Mediterranean and, at the very least, cooked within 100 kilometres of Marseilles. There are even purists who proclaim that the water in the soup must be taken from the fishing grounds off Cacalaire. The fact that this air and these waters are now polluted is, to the fanatic gastronome, utterly beside the point.
   
   
2. For a true bouillabaisse, as I noted above, you need rascasse. A scorpion fish is hideous and you should touch it unless its poisonous fins have been removed. A variant, Heliconlenus dactylopterus, is found in North American waters but fishermen ususally toss it back.
   
   
3. For a true bouillabaisse you need a base broth made from at least a hundred tiny Mediterranean rockfish and clam juice simply won’t do.
   
   
4. Finally, no matter what you do there will be some silly snob who will say “This is a rather nice fish soup, my dear — but, of course, NOT a true bouilabaisse.”

Pumpkin Risotto

Well, it's the season and all so what better way to spend a bitterly cold evening than cooking a delicious pumpkin risotto?

First, the CC hied himself to the farmers' market where two small pumpkins, and two leeks were sourced.

After that, the CC made a jaunty saunter to his freezer where previously frozen vegetable stock could be obtained.

Ingredients

1 red onion (diced fine)
2 leeks (diced fine)
2 small pumpkins (or 1 large one)
1 stick cinnamon

2 cups vialone nano, or carnaroli rice

freshly shaved parmigiano-reggiano

Recipe

We roast cut the pumpkins, sprinkle salt and pepper over them, invert them over some water, and roast at 400F for 45 mins in a tightly covered pan.


When they are cool, scrape out the flesh. It should be roasted and very soft. Mash it to a pulp.

Here's the mise-en-scène.

First, the roasted mashed pumpkin.


Here are the diced onions and leeks.


Here is the grated parmigiano-reggiano.


Add the stick of cinnamon to the vegetable broth, and keep on a low simmer.


Sauté the onions on a medium-low heat. The point is soften them by evaporating their water. Do not let them brown.


Add the leeks, and sauté for a bit.


Then, add the rice and let the oil coat each grain. Do not worry if they toast just a little bit.


Now, here's the trick. You want to ladle hot broth into the rice so that the temperature does not fall. Plus, you would like to add the pumpkin.

So alternate! Broth, pumpkin; broth, pumpkin.



Finally, the mantecura. Tasty milk fats to finish off the risotto. First take the pot off the fire, then add the shaved parmigiano-reggiano.


Doesn't that look gorgeously yummy?

Special-ized Equipment

A martini maker.

Now the CC has seen everything.

It's "special" alright, just like the Special Olympics!

A martini is not exactly hard to make as the recipe here points out. Of course, we've seen our share of silly ideas like here.

"Deconstructed" Gazpacho

Before we proceed on this deconstruction, let's just observe what makes the gazpacho so tasty.

First off, the overwhelming purity of the tomato taste. Secondly, the textural crunch of the vegetables (onions, bell peppers, cucumber.) Thirdly, the starch via the bread (which makes it "filling"), and lastly, the sharp tartness of the vinegar (which makes it "vibrant" or "alive".)

So all we have to do is capture the above flavors. The "deconstruction" is going to consist of the fact that we are going to keep each of the ingredients separate and blend them so they are clearly observable.

The heart of it is capturing the tomato flavor. Enter tomato water.

Ingredients (tomato water)

2 lbs ripe tomatoes

Recipe (tomato water)

Pass the tomatoes through the finest screen of a food mill.

Line a fine sieve with multiple layers of cheese cloth. Put the apparatus over a bowl. Pour the above tomato puree into it.

Cover, and leave overnight.

You will see that the puree splits into two components: the tomato water below, and a solid gelée in the cheese cloth/sieve above.

Just taste the water. You will see that it has an intense tomato-ey flavor.

(Save the gelée for later. It makes a delicious "savory tomato sorbet"; or just salt it and gobble it up!)

Ingredients ("deconstructed" gazpacho)

tomato water
1/2 spanish onion
1/2 red bell pepper
1/2 green bell pepper
1/2 english cucumber
5-6 dried sourdough croutons (per serving)
salt and pepper
champagne vinegar
extra virgin olive oil

Recipe ("deconstructed" gazpacho)

You still need to dice the onions, bell peppers, and cucumber as the original gazpacho. (Note the "half"; the rest is not needed.)

Note how the croutons fit the pattern of dicing too. This time you need the real deal. Real sourdough bread cut up into an appropriate size before allowing it to dry out.

Whisk together a vinaigrette with the olive oil and the champagne vinegar. (This is an O/W in the classification scheme.)

Mix everything but the croutons. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Chill.

Add the croutons right before serving.

"Traditional" Gazpacho

Before even beginning, the CC should note that gazpacho does not refer to the just the traditional "cold tomato" soup that is justly famous but really a family of cold soups from Andalusia.

In fact, one of the joys of life emanating from Andalusia is a "gazpacho bianca" made with almonds, garlic and grapes (sounds delicious, doesn't it?)

Secondly, there are as many recipes for "gazpacho" as there are Spanish mamacita's so there will always be some silly sausagey snob who will object to whatever is given below.

In fact, they will scoff at a very specific thing below which is that everything needs to be hand-pounded. Well yes, if the CC had super-ripe tomatoes, and a day to kill but there's reality and there's "reality" (see?!? those scary deconstruction quotes do actually work!)

However, they are not completely wrong. There's a method in their madness in their demand for hand-poundage.

What's given below is what the CC feels is a suitable compromise between spending a day pounding, and just tossing everything in the blender (which would just bring out the howls from the purists, and not give a very good result either, the CC may add.)

Also remember the recipe below is super-approximate so feel free to deviate. Just don't destroy the recipe's soul.

Ingredients

2 lbs tomatoes (left to ripen till nearly over-ripe)
8-10 slices dried bread (read below!)
1 medium spanish onion
1 english cucumber
1 large green bell pepper
1 large red bell pepper
2 cloves garlic
champagne vinegar
salt and pepper
olive oil

Recipe

The dried bread is something that is essential, and your gazpacho is only going to be as good as this bread. Ideally, you'd get a traditional sourdough (which will dry out.) This doesn't refer to the crap you get in a supermarket called sourdough. We are talking about bread that is "naturally fermented". (There's a scientific logic here that must wait for a later post.) Otherwise, just get the best baguette or Italian bread you can, cut it into pieces, and let it dry out for a few days.

Prep work

Peel the skin off the bell peppers with a peeler. (yeah! you heard that right!)

Peel the cucumber. (this should not be a surprise.)

Dice half of the bell peppers into uniform squares. Retain the other two halves.

Dice half the onion into the same sized squares. Retain the other half.

Dice half of the cucumber into the same sized squares. Retain the rest (see the pattern?)

Pass all the tomatoes through the finest screen of a food mill. This is labor-intensive work but is totally necessary.

Prep

Take the tomato pulp, the bread slices, the three halves that were not diced (onion, bell peppers, cucumber), the garlic cloves, and a slug of olive oil and blend them in the blender.

Go easy on the garlic. Raw garlic packs a fierce punch so tone it down.

Now, pass this mixture through the finest screen of a food mill a second time. Yep, this is hard work too.

Mix the diced stuff above with this mixture. Add salt, pepper, and the champagne vinegar to taste. There should be a slight vinegarish bite but overall the flavor should be balanced.

Chill and serve.

Obsessive Failure

So the CC seems to have lied albeit inadvertently. He has not sourced that elusive cuttlefish ink.

They lied. They always do!

Armed with a map of the Upper West Side, the CC scoured every single store between 72nd and 96th St, and nary a store carried it. The closest he came was one store that "usually" carries it. Ironically, this store is among the closest to the CC's apartment.

Yes, the CC is aware that he takes "obsessive compulsive" to a new level but what better way to spend a Friday evening than searching for "black nectar"?

After that, he called every single fancy store in town, and only one had it, and that too for nose-bleed prices.

There's always the internet but the CC remains optimistic. New York's reputation as a foodie town is on the line here!

Lemongrass Sorbet

This was the other wonder the CC encountered at the restaurant in San Francisco in August.

This is truly an object of greedy lust, and any of you who know that the CC is not that fond of dessert should know that when a dessert item inspires food lust in the CC, well...

Ingredients

7-8 stalks lemongrass (outer leaves peeled)
2 cups water
2/3 cup fine sugar
1 cup mint (torn into pieces by hand)
1/4 cup fresh lime juice
large pinch of salt

Recipe

Cut the lemon grass into vague rounds. Smash them once with a pestle.

Add the water, sugar, and lemon grass together. Bring to a rolling boil.

Do not boil. Remove from the flame immediately.

Toss in the mint leaves, and let it steep for at least 20 minutes (until cool.)

Add the lime juice and salt, and blend in a blender.

If you want a sweeter presence, tone this down. If you want a traditional "sorbet", leave it tart. Remember that as it chills, the acid is going to lose a large portion of its edge so the solution may be quite tart but the sorbet will be "refreshing".

Line a sieve with several layers of cheese cloth, and filter the mixture. Toss the residue. (Yes! you need both the cloth and a fine sieve.)

Now, do the "sorbet" thing. Freeze, and every 30 minutes break up the mixture with a whisk/fork until you get fine crystals.

Langoustines

Also known as the Norway Lobster. A denizen of colder waters which you may have encountered under the Italian name of scampi.

It's quite delicious grilled, and in the spirit of Halloween, be sure to eat the salty succulent meat near the head and the eyes.

Don't be un Americain, as they say in France.

Food Deconstruction

Well, it's trendy and all but is it any good?

The CC having consumed a "deconstructed burger" at a cocktail party (mini-bun, meat, tomato, onion on a toothpick like a mini-kebab) and a "deconstructed gazpacho" at a fancy restaurant in San Francisco can say, "Yes, provided it's well thought out."

In fact, the CC was so impressed by the above "deconstructed gazpacho" that he spent a whole day making a "traditional gazpacho" and the "deconstructed version" side by side.

Just for the record, the scary quotes ("") are de rigeur. There's a difference between deconstruction, deconstruction, and "deconstruction" (insert literary theory joke here; or is that "literary theory"?)

Which brings us to a food riddle:

Q: Why is Derrida like a piece of wilted lettuce?

A: Because they are both wrinkled and rank-led.

(Get it?)

Anyway, back to the gazpachos. They were made a few months ago but in the spirit of exuberant discovery, and in the fading memory of a vanished summer, the CC will post the recipes soon.

Nero di seppia

Nectar of the gods assuming they like an iodized salty flavor. Rich, intense, over-the-top, and unforgettable.

For the record, this is not squid ink. Seppia is cuttlefish; squid would be calamari. They are quite different.

The CC has just sourced this after two weeks of trying in New York (which is borderline unthinkable) so there may be recipes forthcoming.

Strange Succulent Snacks

The CC is quite fond of these.

First up, we have tiny dried crabs in a faintly sugary glaze. You can just pop these like peanuts.

Dried Whole Crabs

Next up is dried shredded squid. Wonderfully chewy like jerky except it's tastier. Great with a beer or three.

Dried Squid

Sicilian Pasta with Broccoli

This is a sensational recipe marrying classic Italian technique with North African influences. A complete hit especially after a hard day's work.

In case you're wondering, the anchovies are critical.

A couple of points of note:

You should unambiguously see the medieval influence by the presence of the raisins. You can also see the influence of the New World via the tomato. Of course, the North African influence should be obvious.

Ingredients

1 large onion (finely diced)
4 anchovies
1/4 cup raisins
1/8 cup pine nuts
1 large broccoli (cut into small florets)
2 tbsp tomato paste (homemade)
1 large pinch saffron
salt and pepper
olive oil

shaved pecorino (or parmigiano-reggiano)

1 cup penne.

Recipe

Fry the onion at a medium-low heat until soffrito. Add the anchovies and fry for about another minute. Add the tomato paste, fry for a bit, and add some water along with the raisins and pine nuts, salt and pepper to taste.

Add the broccoli and cook until slightly under done. The saffron should go in towards the very end otherwise its delicate fragrance will disappear.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta slightly under al dente, and add it to the sauce. Heat, and serve.

The pasta should be thoroughly covered with the delicate saffron sauce, and will be tinged golden because of it.

Shave a modest amount of cheese over each serving. The dish has a really delicate taste where all flavors are key partners so be careful not to overwhelm.

Harmony is key!

French Classical Sauces

Escoffier may list hundreds but there are only 23.

W
O
W/S
O/W
S/W
(O + S)/W
(W/S)/W
O + (W/S)
(G + O)/W
(G + O + S)/W
(O + (W/S))/W
(S + (W/S))/W
((W + S)/O)/S
(O + S + (W/S))/W
((W/S) + (S ⊂ W))/W
(O + (W/S)/W)/S
((O + (W/S))/W)/S
(O/W) + ((G + O)/W)
(O + (W/S) + (S ⊂ W))/W
(S + (W/S) + (S ⊂ W))/W
(((W/S) + (S ⊂ W))/W)/S
(O + S +(W/S) + (S ⊂ W))/W
(O + S +((G + O)/W))/W

Key (letters): O = oil, W = water, G = gas, S = solid
Key (operators): + = mixed into, / = dispersed into, ⊂ = included into

For example, both broth or vinegar are just W, and butter is (W/O)/S.

Note that in a given formula, the multiple W's and S'es may be different.

This is the work of the magnificent Hervé This, co-inventor of the field of molecular gastronomy.

See if you can come up with examples of the above sauces, fellow gastronauts!

Garnish

When the CC looks back on Wall St. in his anec-dotage, he will be pondering one eternal question:

Who, in their right mind, would garnish a bowl of cut fruits with parsley?

Comparing Parsi Cookbooks

Well, a few months ago, the CC was cooking traditional dhan-saak (recipe to follow) for some friends, and had the opportunity to actually sit down and compare all his Parsi cookbooks.

There were three in all.

A tiny book by Bapsi Nariman, a recent one by Niloufer Ichaporia-King, and two books published in India by Katy Dalal.

Right off the bat, the CC noticed that Katy Dalal's books are written for other Parsis so you can only understand it if you already know how to do it, or have eaten it before. There is no hope for a beginner here.

Niloufer Ichaporia's is excellent but she has lived in the US way too long starting at a time where things were not easily available. Now that they are trivially available everywhere, she has not actually gone back to the originals. The recipes are top-notch, and the explanation of technique is impeccable but why substitute when you don't need to?

For example, she excludes vaal from the dhan-saak recipe. The CC considers it utterly crucial. While the CC agrees that the soul of dhan-saak comes from the masoor, the sweetness comes from the vaal so to get that effect, she adds sweet potatoes but starch has very little place in a meat-lentil dish.

No matter what she thinks, balsamic vinegar is not a substitute for tamarind + sugar. It just isn't. No one would ever confuse the different tartnesses of lemon, lime, vinegar, and tamarind. They are just too different. And fine vinegars taste nothing like the much cruder coconut vinegar necessary for certain Indian dishes.

She only states the importance of masoor in a traditional Parsi household in a throwaway sentence or two on page 302. If you were someone who already knew what masoor was, you'd probably just miss the sentence. The CC only found it because he went looking for that sentence, and that particular cultural interpretation.

The other two state it upfront.

Many Parsis will simply not eat a meal without a side helping of masoor, and they have tons of creative ways of cooking it to avoid boredom. Virtually every culture or sub-culture has a signature dish, and it behooves a good cook to know cultural details of this nature.

Bapsi Nariman, on the other hand, gives the recipe straight. No messing around, very minimalist but he takes other short-cuts which are not right. For example, it is important that the meat and vegetables be cooked separately, and then combined. The CC knows why his short-cut would work in India but it won't work here because you have fattier meat.

Oddly enough, Ichaporia's masalas are much more detailed and authentic, and "correct". However, she makes them in industrial sizes. Anything that starts with 1/4 cup of cumin is doomed. You'll never use that up in this lifetime.

But they are absolutely amazing and delicious!

The CC also hopes her readers know that if you toast cloves, cumin and poppy seeds, you need three rounds of roasting because if you toss them all in, the poppy seeds will burn. (It's a simple size thing.)

So what's a beginner to do?

Use Ichaporia but cross-check with Nariman. Adopt her techniques for the spices but check his basic ingredients first.

Vaal

Also known as "split lablab beans". They have a unique sweetish taste, and silky texture.

The CC was known to compose odes to this bean at a very young age.

Gingered Cauliflower

One of the CC's favorite "home" recipes. Particularly good when served with parathas.

Ingredients

1 large cauliflower (cut into florets)
5-6" ginger
4-5 Thai green chillies (substitute with serranos.)
1 tbsp roasted cumin (ground into a powder)
1 tsp red chilli powder
1 tbsp garam masala
oil
salt to taste

Recipe

Grind the ginger and green chillies into a paste. (This is where food processors rock! Just try and use the minimum amount of water to get a paste with some texture.)

Fry some oil. Fry the ginger paste. Toss in the spices, and the cauliflower. Sautée for a while. Add some water, and let it cook until done.

Sometimes the CC adds fresh beans.

Oddly enough, this is one of the few cauliflower recipes that does not work with broccoli.

Orange Cauliflower

Bounty from the Farmers' Market!

Professionals v/s Non-professionals

A brief throwaway comment by a friend sent the CC into a reverie about the distinction between the two. The CC was talking about a gazpacho (forthcoming entry) and the CC was explaining the pains it took to get there.

It was pointed out to the CC that commercial kitchens couldn't possibly do that.

Well, they can, and they can't.

If they charge enough, they can. If not, they can't.

Commercial kitchens also have all these little Jamies running around all thinking they are going to be the next celebrity chef but they're just all earning a pittance, and truly a pittance it is.

No home chef can possibly have the luxury of the help, and symmetrically, no commercial kitchen has the luxury of detail.

The CC would love to have industrial-strength stoves ("BTU's, baby!!!") and an army of little minions but reality is neither going to be forthcoming nor obliging.

On the other hand, no commercial kitchen can afford to take the kind of care and detail that even an average home cook lavishes on their meals. They are ultimately a commercial enterprise, and have to get a return on their investment.

So why does their food "appear" better? They do have an army of minions, and they do have an army of tricks but they may or may not have the wealth of detail (not unless you pay steeply for it, and even then it's a bit of an illusion.)

So what's the CC's point?

The two enterprises are truly different, and it seldom behooves anyone to compare them.

Kitchen Instruments (The List)

Promised before the CC went on vacation, here are:

"The Indefensibles"

Prep work

French chef's knife
trimmer
kitchen peeler
mortar & pestle
kitchen scissors

Pots & pans

stock pot
any ol' pot
skillet

Miscellaneous

coffee grinder
food mill
food processor
blender
measuring cup

Pre-serving instruments

cheese grater

Everything else is icing on the cake; there are tons of items that would be "useful" but they are not "necessary".

Dips, Raitas, and other assorted goodies

Virtually every country that consumes milk has some variations on this theme.

The CC had a lot of leftover yogurt (don't ask!), and some assorted stuff (cucumbers, carrots, mint, curry leaves) in his refrigerator. His thoughts turned to how to consume most of it efficiently, but also leave it in a form that could be easily stored for later consumption.

Inspiration struck, and out came the thought of making a bunch of yogurt-based foods.

There are more recipes here than humans. Writing a book on these would be the ultimate waste of time. Who'd read all these basic variations on the same theme?

Tzatziki

Ingredients

1 english cucumber (grated)
2 cloves garlic (minced fine)
mint (chopped into ribbons)
strained yogurt
salt and pepper

Recipe

Mix everything, and let it sit for an hour.

South-Indian Carrot Raita

Ingredients

carrots (grated)
1 tsp mustard seeds
1 tbsp urad
5-7 curry leaves
strained yogurt
salt

Recipe

Heat a tiny amount of oil in a pan. Toss in the mustard seeds. When they splutter, toss in the urad. When they turn light brown, toss in the curry leaves. Add the carrots and sautee for about a minute. Let it cool.

Mix everything together, and let it sit for at least an hour.

HaT3rZ!!!

There's always going to be things you hate.

You can't like everything, and if as they say, you are what you like, then you are just as much as what you hate.

Or as Goethe put it more poetically, "I hate everything Egyptian."

Please note that these are not things that you dislike. These are things that you hate. The difference lies in the intensity of the feeling.

So here are the list of the CC's hates:

Fast-food restaurants

"Kill me! Kill me now."

Rice pudding (and variants)

Vile texture. Utter failure as rice; utter failure as dessert.

Most Indian sweets

Too sweet. Failure at a balance in taste. Why not just eat sugar?

Soft-boiled eggs

Too yolk-y early in the morning. Worse after a bender. Would like to like them but can't.

Brownie-Coffee combo

Bad enough being "wired". This is like being "wired", and wanting to throw up. Can't imagine how bad it'd be after a bender. Wouldn't care to try.

The CC is sure there are more but this will do for a start.

Audience participation welcomed!

Dated-ness

Well, recently the CC has been making some of the older recipes on this blog (pure coincidence) and he notices that the recipes are kinda dated.

It's not really dated in the traditional sense ("ooooh! that is soooo 1997".)

While the ingredients are exactly what they should be, the description of the execution is not quite what the CC does in reality. He takes extra steps, or even skips some which he realizes are not that important. It's really a deepening of technique not a dating of the blog.

For the record, the two most important things the CC seems to have learnt in the last five years is how to "fry vegetables" (look for an upcoming post), in regards to all kinds of dishes; and the importance of texture in a dish. Controlling texture is very very important even for something that is eaten daily (a little harder to post about.)

Saffron Roasted Potatoes

The CC never thought that anything could give properly made french fries a run for their money.

If you find new potatoes, by all means use them!

Ingredients

new potatoes halved, or roasting potatoes cut into large cubes
tomatoes
saffron
salt & pepper

Recipe

First you need to dunk the tomatoes in boiling water, and pass them through a food mill to collect the pulp.

Heat some olive oil, and when hot, toss in the tomato pulp. Add salt, and lots of pepper. Let it reduce at a very low heat for at least 30-35 mins. If it thickens too much, you can always add water later.

Towards the end, toss is two large pinches of saffron, stir it, and take it off the heat.

Lay the potatoes in a baking sheet, pour the liquid all over it, and bake at 400°F for 30-40 minutes until the potatoes are lightly browned.

Roasted Brussel Sprouts with Walnuts

Well, the CC was never fond of brussel sprouts until he actually figured out how to make them well.

Well, the chief problem with cooking anything of the brassica family is that overcooking will make it smell bad, taste like nothing, and flabby to boot.

No taste; bad smell; no texture. How much worse can it get?

Moral? Don't overcook.

There's a simple way to handle it. Boil some water, and when it has come to a boil, dunk them, and cook for no more than 3 mins. Cool; cut each in half; then roast them.

Verdict? Very gobblicious.

Ingredients

1 lb brussel sprouts
balsamic vinegar (we used a fig vinegar)
walnuts (coarsely broken/chopped)
salt and pepper

Recipe

Boil the brussel sprouts as above. Cut them in half.

Lay them in a baking pan. Sprinkle with olive oil, salt and pepper. (Alternately, you can mix them with the above in a bowl, and then lay them out.)

Sprinkle with balsamic vinegar, and chopped walnuts.

Roast at 425°F for about 20 mins. Check if they have caramelized. If not, roast for another 5 mins or so.

Blistered Shishito Peppers

This is one of those concepts that almost every culture has a version of.

The idea is to serve blistered peppers, lightly pan-fried, and sprinkled with coarse sea salt. If you have very mild peppers, you don't need to control the heat. Otherwise you need to slit it, and scoop away part of the inside to control it.

Naturally, in some masochistic cultures (there's one in India), they amp up the heat by using the hottest peppers, but we need not go there.

The CC encountered some lovely shishito peppers (quite mild, with a modest heat) at the farmers market. You can also use cubanelles, or even bell peppers (provided you peel them first.)

This is one of those "Greedy Gus" recipes. No matter how much the CC makes, there's never any left so plan accordingly.


Ingredients

shishito peppers (count at least 7-8 per guest)
olive oil
coarse sea salt.

Recipe

First, you need to individually roast the peppers over an open gas flame till they are blistered and charred in spots (This is the point of the recipe at which you can store them for a few hours. Just put a paper napkin to absorb the moisture so that they don't get soggy.)

Just before you serve, sautee them in a little olive oil.

Serve them hot in a serving dish, and sprinkle coarse sea salt quite generously all over them.

Your guests will gobble them up!

Popcorn

Well, you may or may not have been reading about the ridiculous "microwave popcorn", and the chemical diacetyl causing cancer, etc, whoop-dee-doodle-doo, blahtee-bloody-blah.

Popcorn making is trivial. In fact, the CC is a big fan so he makes it often, and no funny chemicals need apply.

Let not these complete fools dissuade you. Follow these instructions, and you will have glorious golden popcorn every single time (unless you use red or blue corn.)

Ingredients

popcorn kernels
olive oil (or any vegetable oil)
salt

Recipe

First, note the ingredient list. Do you see anything funny?

No? Then the "microwave popcorn"-people are just nebbishes and clueless retards.

Pour a smallish amount of oil into a pot, something sturdy. Turn the heat to medium-low, definitely less than medium high, and toss in three to four corn kernels, and cover the pan (you need a sturdy cover too.)

Wait for the first pop or two. (this is the "hard" part.)

When they do, and the CC assures you, they will eventually, open the pan, toss in the salt, and the rest of the kernels, cover the pan again, lift the pan with gloves, shake horizontally vigorously (to cover the kernels in the oil and salt), put them back on the stove, and wait.

Wait. Wait. Wait.

Do not turn the heat up. Just wait.

When they "finish" popping, pour them into a bowl, and enjoy. You may need to add extra salt or seasoning to taste.

Shiso

English name is Perilla, or Beefsteak Plant but the CC almost always sees it referred to by the Japanese name.

You may have eaten it with your sushi most likely as ikashiso (ika = squid; shiso = shiso.)

It has a very minty taste, and a certain sharpness that takes some getting used to.

Storing Food

The CC doesn't want to turn this into one of those self-help columns, you know, Fourteen Fast Foods, Nine Nightly Noshes, or even Help for Hapless Harried Housewives but feels a bit compelled to write this after having several conversations with supposedly intelligent people.

The CC is a firm believer in causality: you know, A causes B which causes C, etc. There isn't no magic but umami, and we are but its humble servants.

It all started one day, a long time ago, when the CC was packing something into a plastic bag, and squeezing out the air before he sealed the ziplock.

A friend asked why the CC was doing that, and the CC said, it'll increase the chances of the food not going bad (or equivalently, the food will not rot as fast.)

Firstly, scorn was heaped upon the CC for believing "old wives' tales", etc. while the CC just stood there with his characteristic supercilious save-me-from-this-village-idiot grin.

Some of you are likely to have experienced this grin yourself.

The CC asked the friend, "So why does food rot?"

The answer which the highly-intelligent, over-educated scientist did manage to come up with was "Because there are fungus and bacteria which attack the food."

The CC then asked, "So where are these fungus and bacteria?"

There was a nonplussed silence.

The CC was relentless, "So where are they?"

The CC invoked the sacred Socratic silence, tapped his foot, and waited impatiently for realization to strike.

It did strike as it always does, "All around us."

After that, the coup de grâce was delivered, "So if they are all around us, then it stands to reason that their numbers are proportional to the volume of air, and hence if you squeeze out the air, you're increasing the chances of your food not going bad."

This is not like coming up with a quantum theory of gravity, you know!

Anyway, now that he's gotten that off his chest, the CC will make a segue to talking about storing food.

The CC is a realist, and realizes that the need for fabulous food must be balanced with other concerns of modern society like making money to pay for the food, etc. And anything that can promote the cause of fabulous food is then a victory.

So how does one increase the chances of vegetables in the refrigerator?

As we have clearly noted, the process of rotting isn't magic. All vegetables are covered in gook when you buy them so wash them. Next, dry them completely. Wrap them in paper towels, and put them in open bags, and put them in the vegetable crisper. (The paper towels absorb the moisture that they give off; and you will need to change the towels every few days.)

The CC assures you that this works, and you will prolong the life of your vegetables by a few days.

And, never ever put tomatoes in the fridge. They lose their smell, and tomatoes that don't have an aroma are good for only one thing. Tossing in the garbage.

There is also no need to refrigerate onions, shallots, garlic, etc. This should be obvious.

Freezing also works but it also totally destroys the texture. The ice shards formed from the water content penetrates the walls of the cellular structure totally turning them into mush.

Happy vegetable eating. That's all, folks!

The "Right" Restaurants

Well, the CC hied himself to one of his favorite restaurants in the Bay Area, a hole-in-the-wall. We've already heard about this in an earlier entry.

The owner (who's also the server) has the right attitude to food. When he goes on vacation, the place shuts down. If he thinks something is better, he tells you that you should change your order (which brings the CC to question why the original item is on the order but let's not get too analytical about these things.)

The absence of a certain I-wont-eat-pork-or-chicken-ista provided the rare indulgence of a feast of flesh. We had catfish (amok), beef, and catfish topped with shredded chicken.

The CC was told in no uncertain terms that he should upgrade to a different catfish dish from the one he ordered, and the CC did so unhesitatingly. Only the need to look dignified stopped the CC from licking the plate clean of the wondrous lemongrass sauce.

Frittering away time with a summer frittata

Well, the CC and his friends were ambling away in sunny, freezin'-cold San Francisco, and what did we see?

A farmers' market!

Well, we had no plans, and even though it was just before noon, we decided to see if we could salvage a late lunch.

Copious amounts of fresh vegetables were obtained; a quick trip to the next-door cheese store netted some buffalo mozarella, and a loaf of bread; and eggs were obtained from a nearby grocery store.

The CC should mention the existence of a sprightly, middle-aged, white-haired lady who held a rotating chakra over all the vegetables. The CC wondered whether it would rotate, vibrate or sing? Apparently, the asparagus did not speak to her inner chakra but the kiwi fruits did.

The asparagus definitely spoke to the CC who was happy to get some for the summer frittata.

We had:

a salad with a lemon-clementine dressing,

olive bread,

chopped heirloom tomatoes (with salt),

a tomato-basil-mozarella hors d'oeuvre, and

a summer vegetable frittata

During the preparation, a few of the heirloom tomatoes were inhaled by the worker bees. If you don't know what inhale means in this context, this is where someone stands near a tomato, and whoooosh! the tomato is gone. Only happens with good tomatoes.

Much fuss was made about how many eggs the CC used to make the frittata (twenty-two, in case you were wondering) but there was nothing left of the huge repast which we ate out in a lovely outdoor backyard garden.

(Recipes to follow.)

Kitchen Instruments

Well, the CC wasn't going to post after the holiday announcement but who the hell is the CC kidding?

A brief conversation with a friend, and a Buñuel Martini threw the CC into a full-blown reverie about kitchen instruments.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the CC has reveries about kitchen instruments.

The CC has noted that the Pareto principle (a.k.a. the 80-20 rule) applies to kitchen instruments as well.

There are a very small number of instruments that are absolutely indispensable. The rest one would manage somehow even if one didn't have them.

The CC will leave the list for a later date. Think of it as an "upcoming feature" on this blog.

Holiday Break

Well, the CC is off to culinary adventures on the West Coast, and he'll be gone for the rest of the month.

Have fun, and have some tomatoes on my behalf!

Culantro

Not cilantro. Culantro.

The CC hasn't lost his marbles (yet.)

Culantro (or eryngium foetidum, if you wanna get all technical.)


It's delicious. More aggressively coriandery and peppery in taste, and absolutely crucial for certain Mexican dishes.

Well, now that the CC has finally figured out how to source it without having to wander all the way to "distant" Queens, he'll be using it a lot more.

Sprouting (An Addendum)

The CC should mention that normally you won't need to mist the cheese cloth more than once even in the height of a brutal summer because the sprouting process releases so much moisture.

This once again emphasises the advantage of cloth over plastic. The ability to evaporate, and effectively reach an equilibrium with the surrounding air.

In winter, whatever you do, do not mist the cheesecloth. You will end up with mold.

Here's a classic Gujarati recipe for sprouted moth/matki beans. The word is hard to transcribe so here's a picture instead:


The beans sprout easily, and are crazy delicious.

For the record, the CC hates the commercial sprouts. For one they are "over-sprouted" (they are almost plants.) The taste doesn't compare to the mild delicate taste of freshly sprouted beans (and the CC will go into the science in a future post.)

But let's get back to the recipe.

The recipe is a classic breakfast recipe. Yep, the vast majority of the world prefers freshly made breakfast, and the CC is one of them. Eat your heart out, land of peace and granola!

Ingredients

2-3 cups sprouted moth
1 tbsp dhanajeeru (roasted coriander+cumin, powdered)
1 tsp red chilli powder (go easy!)
pinch of asafoetida
salt (to taste)
lots of lime juice (to taste)

Recipe

The recipe is kinda trivial.

Fry some oil in a pan. Toss in the asafoetida; wait 5 seconds; toss in the dhanajeeru and the red chilli powder, and the sprouts. Saute for 10-20 seconds. Add water (about 1 1/2 cup.)

Let it simmer on low heat until the beans are edible. You may need to add more water. You're going to have to play this one by mouth.

Toss in the lime juice at the end.

The stuff is supposed to be slightly watery (but not soupy) at the end. The taste should consist of the spices, a very mild heat, and enough tartness to cut the heat, and just a tad more. None should dominate (this is still breakfast we're talking about!)

You can just eat it by itself but the CC loves to soak up the juices with a nice crusty baguette (how's that for multiculturism?)

Sprouting

Well, the CC loves sprouts, and many a year ago, he was presented with a sprouter by one of his aunts.

It's one of these plastic trays where you can place the sprouting beans in the top two trays, and a tiny amount of water in the lowest tray, and the whole thing is supposed to work out.

Except it doesn't.

It's warm enough in New York in the summer but the CC's apartment doesn't get enough direct sunlight for the whole thing to work out. If the CC lived in Italy, or India, or Mexico, it would work out but it doesn't.

So the CC has come up with an alternate plan. Unsurprisingly, this is modern take on a classic method which brings the CC to ask the eternal question, "Why on earth do we fuck with perfection?"

Soak the beans overnight. Wash them again. Put them in a cheese cloth, and lay them where they get plenty of sunlight. Every 12 hours or whenever the cheese cloth gets dry, mist it, drain it again, and leave it well alone. Different beans will sprout in different cycles. Some take 36 hours, and others 60 hours from start to finish.

The cheese cloth is cloth enough to stay wet, and porous enough to not retain enough water to allow it to get moldy. (The classic technique was to use a linen cloth. Same idea.)

You'll get perfect sprouts each time. No plastics need apply.

Rules for buying cookbooks

1. Never ever buy a cookbook for the pictures. Never, ever!
   
2. Remember that techniques and culture count more than specific recipes.
   
3. Never buy a book with too broad a mandate (World Cuisine, Fish & Shellfish), or too narrow a one (Oysters, Dum Pukht).
   
4. Never buy "celebrity" books unless they offer technique, and even in that case be cynical, very cynical!
   
5. Remember that most cookbook authors like amateur novelists only have one book in them.

Ramps

They are not garlic. They are not spring garlic. They are not leeks. They are not even wild onions.

Capiche?!?

They are very hard to get but the CC desperately wants some. Anyone here wanna hook the CC up?

Farmers' Market Sweep (Part 2)

The recipe for your delectable pleasure:

Ingredients

Pesto

basil leaves
spring garlic
walnuts (yep! it's more traditional)
olive oil
salt

peeled fava beans (prepped as described here.)

linguini or spaghetti (cooked al dente)

Recipe

Should be obvious but here goes nothing.

Grind the pesto.

Mix. Serve. Slurp. Enjoy.

An Immodest Apologia

As the years have evolved, and the CC looks back upon earlier post entries (and before that, emails), he notes that some of the recipes are surprisingly jejune.

"Did I really used to make that?"

As the CC's knowledge of food, and particularly technique deepens, it goes without saying earlier blog entries start looking either insubstantial, or incorrect, or horrors! horribly wrong.

But that's how knowledge works. We wish we were born knowing this information but we are not, and hence, no surprise O surprises, we must learn the hard way.

What's surprising is that, in looking back, you find that a surprising amount of emotional energy and psychological history is tied up to food.

"Remember the time ... was made? And for X!"

The CC has entire dishes that he seldom revisits because of evenings that went horribly wrong (for reasons that seldom involve food.)

Food and cooking form a strange personal trajectory of discovery and knowledge. Certain pasts are best not revisited, just as other pasts are to be rightly celebrated.

Perhaps it's best to not apologize for our juvenilia.

Book Blitz

Well, the CC was taken by his friend to this wonderful store uptown in Manhattan which is devoted solely to books on food.

It was like leading a diabetic into a pastry shop. Within the first five minutes, the CC had mentally spent his quarterly salary, and after 20 minutes, he was contemplating the prospect of bankruptcy.

Thankfully, cooler heads prevailed, and the CC escaped with only a dent to his wallet. (The rest of the books were a present from the friend to the CC.)

(For those of you familiar with Chicago, this is the Seminary Co-op of food books. For those of you who don't understand, your lives are the poorer for it.)

Those of you not passing through Manhattan may want to check out the online store.

Farmers' Market Sweep (Part 1)

Waking up is hard to do. Waking up really early is harder to do. Waking up to go to the farmers' market when you're cooking just for yourself is hardest to do.

Well, the CC hied himself to the market, but today the food gods were scowling.

Oh well! Sometimes you're the windshield, and sometimes you're the bug. Sometimes you're even the guy who gets to clean off the splat of the bug off the windshield.

Inventory of Haul

spring garlic (bought 3, and the guy said, "Take one more! It's $5 for 4.")
basil (very good!!!)
applemint
fava beans
yellow zucchini

Everything else kinda sucked.

"You call this a swiss chard? I've seen terminally-ill great-grandmothers with more life in them!", etc. etc.

Anyway, it was back to the apartment, and dinner decisions had to be made sans desperation.

Basil and spring garlic suggested pesto, and the fava beans suggested themselves. The rest of the items suggested nothing.

Well, it was hey-ho-off-we-go, and what do we have here?

Linguini con pesto e fave

Recipe to follow.

Thackeray on Curry

William Makepeace Thackeray, whose grandfather (of identical name) earned all of his fortune in India (in the elephant trade), was so enamored by "curry" that a wrote a "Poem to Curry" in the literary (and satirical) magazine "Punch".

Incidentally, the recipe is "accurate" inasmuch as it depicts the stereotypical view of "curry" that was marketed to the British in the 18th and 19th century.

Yep, "curry" in England was a product of marketing! (and predictably, around the time of Queen Victoria becoming "Empress of India", the British went nuts about all things Indian.)

Once you understand this, the concept of Jubilee Chicken and Coronation Chicken will no longer seem that mysterious.

Three pounds of veal my darling girl prepares,
And chops it nicely into little squares;
Five onions next prures the little minx
(The biggest are the best, her Samiwel thinks),
And Epping butter nearly half a pound,
And stews them in a pan until they’re brown’d.
What’s next my dexterous little girl will do?
She pops the meat into the savoury stew,
With curry-powder table-spoonfuls three,
And milk a pint (the richest that may be),
And, when the dish has stewed for half an hour,
A lemon’s ready juice she’ll o’er it pour.
Then, bless her! Then she gives the luscious pot
A very gentle boil - and serves quite hot.
PS - Beef, mutton, rabbit, if you wish,
Lobsters, or prawns, or any kind fish,
Are fit to make a CURRY. ‘Tis, when done,
A dish for Emperors to feed upon.

Preparing Fresh Fava Beans

The CC simply loves fava beans, and can eat them fresh or dried all day long.

In the summer, of course, there's no substitute for the fresh variety.

In the interest of perfectionism in the culinary arts, here's how to prepare them. Perhaps this is obvious to every child in the Mediterranean but the CC didn't grow up there.

These are definitely demanding beans but they are worth it!

Firstly, understand the scale. Five pounds of fresh fava beans will barely yield enough for a "green" risotto. This is because the pods are heavy, and the skin over the fava bean (which is also discarded) is also heavy.

Peal the beans off the pods. Yes, this is boring. Deal!

In a pot of salted boiling water, dump the beans. If they are small, boil for less than 3 minutes; for larger ones, no more than 5 minutes. (These times are crucial!)

Drain, and immediately dump them in a bowl of heavily iced water. When they are cool (less than a minute); immediately drain the water (otherwise they will get soggy. Try and dry them as best you can.

At this point, you can just pop the beans out of the skin. They will be slimy, so wash them once more, and dry immediately (otherwise they will get soggy too!)

Fresh fava beans!

Bloomsday

Without a doubt, this is the CC's favorite description of food in literature. It's from Joyce's "Ulysses":

Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liver slices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencod's roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine.

Happiness is...

... ten pounds of good tomatoes.

And they say the CC is hard to please?

BAH!!!

The Form of Cookbooks

We have already noted the tendency of cookbook writers to be optimists. They also tend to be deeply romantic with a tendency towards the pastoral.

Their imaginations are filled with villages and farmers living off the land; cows and herdmen; folk foraging for herbs in the wild; a mythical sort of Arcadia harking back to some unstated golden age of food making.

Reality is seldom so kind.

Where they have you visualize the gentle mooing of cows in a grass-spread expanse, is really earth-shattering methane-laden farts for anyone who has actually visited a farm. Where they would have you picking herbs along Mediterranean coasts should be counter-indicated with the brutal and vicious poverty that lines those lands, along with a deep distrust of strange foreigners who invade wanting to talk about food.

Recipes too are not just procedural. They contain obvious and hidden metaphors, as much about tantalizing the reader's sense of space ("Ah, Firenze!"), light ("sunrise over the Adriatic"), time ("once when we were young"), and sense ("wafting aroma from a colorful melange"), as they are about the actual execution ("try it! you know you want to!")

It is this romanticization that partly explains why certain meals tend to linger in our imagination.

Sentiment here freely mixes with nostalgia ("my mother's recipe"), transports us ("eating mangoes with juices dripping"), allows us to live vicariously in both space and time ("the royal chef prepared..."), and allows wild optimism to turn into outright absurdity.

Jane Grigson tried to imagine a neo-pastoral world: "Now we might extend the picture to include high-rise blocks, patched with vegetation on every balcony - Marmande and plum tomatoes in pots, herbs in window-boxes, courgettes and squashes trailing round the doors. Inside, there could be aubergine, pepper, chilli and basil plants on the window sill, jars of sprouting seeds, dishes of mustard and cress, with mushroom buckets and blanching chicory in the dark broom and airing cupboards."

The CC thinks we can safely say, in retrospect, that the problems of inner-cities do not emanate from the lovely odors of freshly growing herbs (a different kind of herb, maybe!)

Escapism also plays a role.

How many can truly afford a life of leisure traipsing along the Mediterranean, stopping for an omelette and a glass of wine here, and sampling onion jam there? And wouldn't it get boring after the first few weeks?

Elizabeth David freely admits this about her books written just after World War II with rationing in effect. The chances that her readers could even obtain a handful of those ingredients was negligible. The books are explicit escapist fantasies in a troubled world (however excellent the recipes might be.)

The seduction of this mythical past where food was unadulterated by chemicals, and presented without sham or pretentiousness is a heady mix, and hardly anyone is immune from the potency of the image.

These books are truly the last gasp of the Romantic movement. They provide a concentrated sense of drama in a short space (a recipe is as brief as a sonnet,) and the allure of heaven.

If only we too had the right ingredients, and the right company in the right setting, then we too could be gambolling around like fox cubs in dappled sunlight.

Why Carrots are Orange?

Carrots in ancient times used to be white, yellow or purple.

The orange carrot is a relatively recent phenomenon. Dutch growers bred the orange carrot in the 1500's to be sweeter and less bitter than the yellow varieties. They were trying to "nationalize" the carrot by cross-breeding yellow carrots with the purple variety.

All of this was done to impress the House of Orange which returned the honor by adopting the carrot as the Royal vegetable.

This sweet orange carrot is now the dominant species across the globe although one does run into the other kinds in farmers' markets.

Adventurous (fictitious) Eating

Captain Nemo from Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, as a response to Prof. Aronnax's queries:

What you believe to be red meat, Professor, is nothing other than loin of sea turtle. Similarly, here are some dolphin livers you might mistake for stewed pork. My chef is a skilful food processor who excels at pickling and preserving these various exhibits from the ocean. Feel free to sample all of these foods. Here are some preserves of sea cucumber that a Malaysian would declare to be unrivaled in the entire world, here's cream from milk furnished by the udders of cetaceans, and sugar from the huge fucus plants in the North Sea; and finally, allow me to offer you some marmalade of sea anemone, equal to that from the tastiest fruits.

More Musings on Umami

There are three sources of umami known.

The ones that were first discovered historically were glutamates (present in konbu, parmesan, sun-dried tomatoes, tomato paste.) Others found in short order were various isosinates (present in broths made of dried bonito flakes,) and guanylates (found in high concentrations amongst shiitake mushrooms.)

The key idea here seems to be a sort of synergy. A small amount of any of them enhances the small quantities of natural umami substances already found in hundreds of foods, and the most important point is that when glutamates and isosinates are combined, they have a powerful multiplier effect, which enhances the umami-ness of the underlying food.

This pretty much explains a huge number of historical phenomena, from all over the world.

Consider the Japanese dashi. It's made from both konbu, and dried bonito flakes (katsuobushi.) You're getting a potent mix of glutamates, and isosinates. Sometimes, they add shiitake mushrooms to further enhance the mix.

Same goes for the simple pasta sauce recipe of fried pancetta, tomatoes, and dried porcini mushrooms. Talk about a triple whammy!

We can also explain the powerful spread of the tomato. In a few hundred years, it radically transformed ancient cuisines (Italy and India.) The point is that the local recipes were already very attractive before the tomato, but the addition of the tomato unleashed more of the umami qualities that were already present in minute quantities in the underlying substances.

It also explains certain truths that chefs hold dear -- young peas over older ones, ripe tomatoes over fresh ones, aged cheeses over unaged ones, and oysters in winter over summer (the latter has a health component but one that has been irrelevant for at least half a century.) Same with aged hams, and dry-aged beef, and sun-dried tomatoes (even when fresh ones are available.) Your palate is selecting for the more powerfully concentrated glutamates (and drying is just one way of achieving that.)

It should be clear why fermented fish sauces (garum/liquamen in Roman times, nahm pla in Thai food, nuoc mam in Vietnamese food), fish pastes (allec in Roman times, gkapi in Thai food), dried shrimp, and intense meat products have been popular for millenia. Likewise meat extracts (Bovril), and autolyzed yeast extracts.

This is why pizza (tomato paste and parmesan), and hamburgers, french fries, and ketchup practically constitute two religions in and of themselves.

Free glutamates are most commonly found in vegetables. Isosinic acid most commonly in meat, and animal products. This is responsible for the strong intensification when meat and vegetables are cooked together.

This is why certain Italian recipes start with "fry the pancetta, or the prosciutto" even when the ingredients are all vegetarian, and the instructions call for the pancetta to be fished out after the frying. Even a relatively poor family could afford the modest amount of meat required, but the combination of meat and vegetables is a powerful one.

That's why anchovies have been popular through the millenia, and why Thai curries and pastes can never truly be approximated in vegetarian terms. They are too dependent on the grammar of seafood and its umami. There is simply no mechanism to substitute the intense mouthfulness (= umami-ness) of gkapi (shrimp paste.)

The Paradox of Simplicity

One of the most difficult dishes to make is a Roman classic, spaghetti aio e oio (you'll also see it spelled spaghettia aglio e olio.)

The CC will make this perfectly some day, or else he will die trying.

On the surface, the recipe is as simple as it gets. Fry lots of chopped garlic in olive oil, add in parsley and red pepper flakes, some salt and lots of pepper, toss in spaghetti, mix and serve.

So you're probably thinking, what's the freakin' holdup? Just do it!

The problem is the Platonic Ideal.

The dish has to be just so: flavored but not overwhelming, slippery but neither greasy nor wet, intense but not over-powering; the spaghetti must be just under al dente so that when it is tossed, it is still cooking and will become al dente; the garlic must not burn; timing needs to be perfect etc., etc., etc.

Additionally, the problem is that there are so few ingredients that errors cannot be reversed. It is relatively easy to hide things in a large stew; a dish which is so naked has no room for error.

Hence, the paradox of simplicity.

This recipe is as simple as it gets, and yet the CC will never ever serve it in front of an audience. Murphy's Law prevails in those situations, and the CC has both impossibly high standards, and every once in a while, severe stage-fright.

"So enough about the theorizing, O CC; when you make it for yourself, how does it turn out?"

Fuckin' delicious!

"So what's the freakin' holdup?"

The Platonic Ideal still awaits. Sigh!

Food and Celebrities

"The rich are different from you and me."
Celebrities of all ages have always had food made in their honor. After all, they were the ones who could always afford it, and blew inordinate amounts on it.

More interesting are the cases when chefs were so moved so as to name dishes after their supposed inspirers.

Opera singers used to be the Hollywood celebrities of their day and age. Escoffier goes crazy over a soprano, and we are lucky to have two dishes -- "Melba Toast", and "Peach Melba". Next century, a San Francisco restauranteur goes ga-ga, and thus was born "Turkey Tetrazzini", and more recently, "Lamb Kallas".

Movie stars are the next order of business, and hence the "Shirley Temple".

Financiers, in their own way, were celebrities of their time. Hence, "Oysters Rockefeller", and "Eggs Benedict" (the latter a hangover cure after the kind of drunken debauchery that only Wall Streeters are capable of.)

Kings and their mistresses have been naturals for scandal long before the current pileup at Windsor Castle. Thank them for the existence of "Crêpes Suzette".

And every once in a while, an artist makes his way into the culinary vocabulary -- "Beef Carpaccio". The conversion of the latter word into an adjective borders on the absurd, as it specifically refers to the pale pinks in his paintings.

The Rossini roster ("Tournedos Rossini", "Maccheroni Rossini") seems to have waned from the culinary catalog just as his music seems to have waned from the standard operatic repertoire. Perhaps shift of contemporary tastes away from foie gras also had something to do with it.

"They just don't make them like they used to."
Somehow, a "Hilton Hoagie" or a "Anna's Banana" doesn't quite cut it.

They may have the scandal but they lack the sizzle and the sex appeal. Why bother to symbolically consume something when you can get it on YouTube?

And now that chefs are celebrities in their own right, a few narcissistic names may come along. Maybe, "Puck Pockets" or "Natto à la Nobu".

The CC doubts it'll catch on though.

On Naivete

Chefs and food lovers, by their very nature, are born optimists. After all, the thought, "I'll cook you a meal but it will probably be lousy" is not very likely to sit well with an audience, either public or private. The idea of making a commercial career out of the same sentiment can safely be consigned to the failed ideas of history.

The article that set the CC off on this reverie was a recent one in the New York Times where it was revealed with a grand flourish that "truffle oil" was far from natural; in fact, most commercial truffle oils were just "concocted by mixing olive oil with one or more compounds like 2,4-dithiapentane (the most prominent of the hundreds of aromatic molecules that make the flavor of white truffles so exciting.)"

Well, to invoke the vernacular, "DUH!"

The world doesn't produce enough truffles to satisfy the ongoing craze of "truffle oil", and most importantly, since truffles are near impossible to produce commercially (although a few entrepreneurs in Australia are trying), the logical conceit should be that it would be near impossible to ensure a steady supply year after year.

No, no, the CC was distinctly NOT shocked by that particular revelation. What took him by surprise was the surprising naivete of chefs (whom he would've expected to know better.)

“I thought that it was made from dried bits and pieces of truffles steeped in olive oil,” said Vincent Nargi of Cafe Cluny in Manhattan."

Pauvre petite!

The naivete extends to other domains.

Witness the rise of "organic" food. Or as a French friend of the CC's once said in a delightful accent, "Ze French word ees equally stoopide. Biologique! Az oppozed to what? Metallique?!?"

Stare at a label in the marketplace.

"Natural? As opposed to what? Unnatural?!?"

The CC pines to have the first taste of "unnatural" food (perhaps Twinkies qualify?) and has a similar opinion on "unnatural" thoughts (How unnatural could they be if the CC actually thought about them? They could be illegal, distasteful, or even immoral but "unnatural"? The CC thinks not!)

No, no, the CC knows that food is both natural and unnatural.

Take raw ingredients whose sole aim was Darwinian survival from predators, carry out the afore-mentioned predation (this applies to vegetables as well), subject them too all kinds of processes (boiling, baking, braising), and produce an article that ensures both survival of the species and a tickling of the senses.

What could be more unnatural than that?

Cooking, mes pauvres petites, is a deeply unnatural act.

However, there is still something distasteful about the "truffle oil".

Social Consquences of Truth

In case, anyone has not noticed, the CC is sort of obsessed with this semi-fluid line between authenticity, and the lack thereof.

All identities are constructed, and there are tremendous, and powerful social mechanisms in place trying to propagate these constructs. This could hardly be considered a revelation.

However, the social consequences of uncovering people's deeply held beliefs as inauthentic can prove to be problematic.

A few years ago, the CC was having dinner with an aunt, and a friend.

Over Oaxacan food, the conversation veered hither and thither to nopales, and chillies, and how the New World had invaded the Old (foodwise.)

The CC having had a margarita (or two) steered the conversation to how chillies never really existed in Indian cooking (just black pepper), and how tomatoes were a "recent" import to Italy, and from there on to India, and how most of the things that Indians considered "Indian", and Italians considered "Italian" were just New World constructs, and since the New World hadn't been discovered for all that long, how authentic could they possibly be?

Well, the CC was greeted with the same response he would've had, had he just mentioned that he had spent the last evening sodomizing his dead grandmother.

Short moral: talking about food can be dangerous.

Authenticity (or the lack thereof)

Ever wondered what ingredients made their way into Indian cuisine after the discovery of the New World?

Most Indians would consider these "native" but they don't exist in 16th century cookbooks. They are all New World imports.

maize
cocoa
guavas
chillies
tapioca
peaches
walnuts
papayas
peanuts
almonds
potatoes
tomatoes
avocados
sunflower
pistachios
pineapples
cashewnuts
passion fruits
custard apples (sitaphal)
bullock's heart (ramphal)

Whither authenticity?

A True Scholar

Ever wondered what Indians ate before New World food arrived? Ever wonder how it arrived? (answer: two completely distinct routes.)

All of this is based on the scholarly work of K. T. Achaya: "Indian Food : A Historical Companion" (published by Oxford India.)

The book is obsessively researched, and requires a substantial knowledge of linguistics, history (both culinary and otherwise,) and food. There are twenty pages of two-column 8-point references, and an index which requires the full knowledge of Indo-European (and then some!)

It's far from dry; it's funny, witty, engaging, in short, thoroughly entertaining. However, it's a very taxing read. the CC could barely read more than ten pages a day (and the book is 250+ pages.) The CC literally has tens of pages of detailed notes on ideas/references to chase down.

Even the very few facts that are wrong are due to the fact that the research was done after the author died. This is a staggeringly brilliant piece of research. (It clearly is the magnum opus of a lifetime of work.)

(Incidentally, he published a separate book called, "A Historical
Dictionary of Indian Food" just to guide people trying to read this
book.)

The book is completely out of control -- it has in-depth discussion of 16th century Gujarati dishes (what is the formal distinction between naashto and farsan?), documented evidence of what is claimed to be the Buddha's last dinner (and what it really consisted of,) what food terms made their way into Sanskrit from older Munda languages (answer: most of them,) and what chandala really means (answer: dog-eater.)

Anyone who's interested in Indian food simply must read this book!

On Champagne

Madame Lily Bollinger (heir of the Bollinger estate) on champagne:

I drink it when I'm happy and when I'm sad.
Sometimes I drink it when I'm alone.
When I have company I consider it obligatory.
I trifle with it if I'm not hungry and I drink it when I am.
Otherwise I never touch it, unless I'm thirsty.

Shopping with the Stars

The CC is most emphatically not a starfucker.

However, he was tickled pink when he found himself at Kalustyan's, and right behind Zarela Martinez (her of authentic Mexican cooking fame.)

For the record, Ms. Martinez was buying all the classic ingredients of Italian cooking (dried chanterelles, etc.)

Hah! even the stars eat differently than what they're good at.

Asparagus Odors

The CC loves it, but the aftermath is well-known. The body metabolizes it, and the sulphur-containing compounds (thiols and thioesters) are excreted in the urine.

The funny part is that even though everyone metabolizes the product the same way, only 40% of the population have the genes to actually smell it.

Put it differently -- everyone stinks, but only 40% recognize that they stink.

The CC will make the obvious warning about eating asparagus before an energetic bout of oral sex.

Penne with Tomato and Nutmeg

Well, summer is fast approaching so the CC thought he would write up his absolutely favorite recipe ahead of time.

The CC hopes that at least one reader will implement it, and send "fan mail" (or "hate mail".)

Mail is like publicity; bad mail is better than no mail; a stony silence is just boring.

Ingredients

4 lbs cherry tomatoes (quartered)
5-6 cloves garlic (finely minced)
2 tbsp ground nutmeg (fresh obviously!)
olive oil
salt
pepper (lots)
basil (shredded into pieces by hand)

penne (cooked al dente)

Recipe

The recipe is simplicity itself. Your guests will think you worked hard while all you did is be utterly patient while enjoying a dry martini.

Fry the garlic soffrito. The garlic should be a pale golden but NOT burn.

Add the tomatoes; turn down the heat to a very low heat; add in the salt and fresh pepper, and let simmer for at least 40 minutes. (You may need to add a little water towards the end.)

Toss in the nutmeg, and basil right at the end. Serve over the penne.

Food, Sex, and Professionalism

Julian Barnes talks about constructing recipes from cookbooks by famous chefs:

Lesson Two: that the relationship between professional and domestic chef has similarities to a sexual encounter. One party is normally more experienced than the other; and either party should have the right, at any moment, to say, "No, I'm not going to do that."

Precisely!

Parmesan Crisps

Last weekend, the CC and a friend had lunch al fresco up in the northern parts of Manhattan.

The CC encountered an unusual item with his ravioli, a "parmesan crisp". The CC is reasonably sure that this was first invented by Thomas Keller (he of French Laundry fame -- for his "deconstructed" Caesar salad, actually.)

It's quite amazing that this invention has entered the conventional vocabulary of modest (albeit upscale) cafés.

So the CC was curious enough to see how it's made (expect to be experimented upon, ye who eat at the CC's!) Readers, you will either need parchment paper or silpat.

Ingredients

parmigiano-reggiano (grated by hand)

Recipe

Lay the grated cheese in 2-2.5" heaped rounds upon parchment paper.


Bake 8-10 mins at 275F.


Cool for 30 seconds, and lift off with a spatula.

Dirty Tricks

The investigation of umami leads you inevitably into the dirty, dark world of commercial, haut cuisine trickery.

It turns out (and the reason is obvious) that many a fancy chef "brighten up" or "tangify" the flavors by adding a dash of fish sauce (or the vegetarian equivalent, diluted strained miso.)

Nobu's black cod with miso no longer looks very impressive to the CC.

Consider this the haut cuisine equivalent of the average Chinese takeout adding MSG (same scientific principle at stake except MSG is an industrial product.)

Hmmm... the CC seems to have started at a food principle, and ended up opening a can of worms!

The Economics of Food

There was an excellent article on the economics of food by Michael Pollan in the New York Times Magazine a little while ago.

He has provided the entire article on his website: link.

The article asks the correct question (ed: rephrasing is mine)

How can it be that an processed product with 39 ingredients, packaging, shipping, and a marketing budget be cheaper than a bunch of carrots (which are, basically, nothing more than roots pulled out of the ground?)

The article is bang on target, and it pretty much explains why there's such a strong negative correlation between income and obesity.

Gelato outside Italy

This blog has never done an endorsement but the CC is going to make an extreme exception for this company.

They make, hands down, the best gelatos and granitas the CC has eaten either inside or outside Italy, and this Italian boutique just opened a chain up the street from the CC.

Yes, it's super pricy (but cheaper than a flight to Italy,) and it's packed with a line of yuppies out the door (but you get the same yuppies in Milan!)

They are called GROM.

Tomato Risotto with Saffron and Vegetables

Well, the early summer vegetables looked gorgeous, and the weather called for a early summer risotto so the CC complied.

(A conversation with a reader of this blog about this resulted in the reader exclaiming, "umami-rich" about this recipe, and while the CC didn't quite plan that, the astute observation of the reader is both appreciated and commended.)

Ingredients
1 lb shallots (diced finely, or just use the food processor)
4 lbs tomatoes (dunked in boiling water, passed through a food mill)
1 tbsp homemade tomato paste
2 cups Carnaroli or Arborio rice (the CC used the former)
1/2 lb asparagus (tips separated, cut into thin rounds)
1/2 lb young carrots (cut into thin rounds)
1/2 cup tender peas
1 large pinch saffron
olive oil
parmigiano-reggiano
black pepper
dry vermouth (optional)

Recipe

Dilute the tomato pulp with water, and keep it simmering on a low flame in a separate vessel.

Fry the shallots in olive oil soffrito. Fry the tomato paste until the oil separates. Toss in the asparagus rounds, and carrot rounds and fry for a bit. Fry the rice till it is fully coated with the mixture, and the white kernel is clearly visible. Toss in the saffron and then do the risotto thing.

Add a ladleful of boiling tomato broth while stirring. When absorbed, add more, and repeat until the rice is tender.

The asparagus tips and the peas should go in near the end. The CC also adds a dash of dry vermouth towards the end.

The CC couldn't find good basil so he did without it, but ideally he would've garnished it with torn basil leaves.

Serve, with freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano, and black pepper.

Salsify

No, the CC is not further enriching the English language by turning nouns into verbs (a tendency that is as old as English itself.)

The CC came across while browsing through some Southern oyster recipes, and since the CC has turned blasé and so seldom runs across new stuff in cookbooks, he hied himself to the net to find out what this was?

Surprise! It's a plant with roots.


The root supposedly has the texture of carrots, and the taste of oysters (which probably means umami, and now the CC wants to find it!)