Food is a very personal, and very emotional, topic. Ever try to tell someone from North Carolina that Kansas City BBQ is the best? You may find yourself in a fight. Or tell someone from Texas that you can, in fact, have any food that doesn't involve beef? You are likely to get shot (bad example: tell anyone from Texas that you disagree with anything they believe in and you'll get shot).
This tends to make us very boring people. I was at a dinner recently where a young woman (early 20's) was bouncing in her chair with anxiety at the prospect of trying a small bite of a scallop. She turned to her husband for support:
"I don't know!! Do I like them?"
"What's the worst that can happen? I'm eating it and I'm not dead. Just try it already!!"
(she did, I don't think she liked it--it was too new)
Recently I researched tips on making grits and I kept coming across the same online debate:
It seems that there are purists out there who firmly believe that you cannot make or serve grits in any way other than the one that they were raised on: with butter, salt, eggs, and bacon.
Anyone who tries to get all fancy with cheese or (god forbid!) spices can just go to hell.
Now, I'm all in favor of a well executed classic dish, but let's be clear about something: just because you were raised with a food done a certain way doesn't mean that is the *only* way it can be done. In fact, consider the possibility that your primary cook, when you were a child, was not actually a very good cook at all!
This is no slight to your childhood, your parents were probably like mine: very busy and not trained chefs. They probably just made what they could afford both in time and money and had to deal with finicky kids who didn't want to try anything new.
But as adults, can't we accept that there is a whole world of culinary experiences out there and we were probably not raised on many of them?
So please: mix and match, try something new, see what works and what doesn't. And if you find you only like the comfort foods of your childhood then go and make them and enjoy them, but don't get all defensive and tell the rest of us that we are somehow bringing about the apocalypse because we want to try shrimp with our grits.
Tag: cooking
Real Genius
I came across this YouTube of a guy making Kung Po chicken. An instructional video on how to make it "better than any Chinese restaurant." Based on the quality of that soupy mess he boiled up, I'd say he doesn't get out to many good restaurants. But his delusional assumption that
1-he makes great Kung Po
and
2-that he should be sharing his knowledge with the world
got me thinking about something MLEIV has obsessed over for years: what makes a person a genius?
We seem to give priority to the "Rock and Roll" style genius who struggles in his/her late teens, gets discovered in his/her 20's, takes the world by storm, and then flames out in a spectacular show of self-destruction (think Kurt Cobain or Janice Joplin). Mr. Kung Po here probably things he is that genius but just hasn't been discovered yet. Other people, like MLEIV, think they are complete failures because they see lucky, teenage one-shot wonders and compare themselves to that ideal.
But let's consider the other kind of genius, the Albert Einstein kind. This kind spends years building up foundational skills, works to understand themselves, their medium, and how to use that as an expression. They may never get discovered, but what they produce is a much higher quality with a better lifespan than the flame-outs. We don't value the Einstein genius nearly as much, but when we do it is an enduring love.
Take cooking (the only artistic expression I even remotely understand) for example. Any idiot can throw stuff in a pan and get lucky once or twice, but if you want to create true artistic expressions, you need to know how a wok is useful in the kitchen (again, just one example). You need to understand that it is a high-heat cooking surface that needs to have ingredients added one at a time, in small batches, so that they all get that contact with the searing hot outside of the wok. You do, in contrast to our friend Scott, have to know how to measure ingredients, prepare them beforehand, cut/clean them just right. These foundations allow you entry into the game. Only then can you start to do amazingly creative things: once you have built the foundation.
That doesn't mean you can't throw out all convention and blaze a new path, but make sure you know what you are throwing out and when you rebuild, make it better than before.
Thanksgiving 2007
As I explained to my trainer over the weekend: for most people Thanksgiving is all about the family and warm fuzzies. For me, its all about the FOOD!
Its why I'm still going to my workouts the Wednesday before and the Saturday after: I'll need the calorie burn.
MLEIV and I haven't done a family thanksgiving since the 1990's, but we've expanded our menu every year. This year I think we almost have it down to a science.
For 2007, the menu is:
It is a week-long event as I get everything ready. Here's my Journal.
Sunday
Today's tasks:
The cranberry sauce almost went off without a hitch. Its so easy and keeps for weeks, but first you have to buy enough cranberries (8 oz != 12 oz). Then, when the recipe calls for 1/2 cup of port wine, don't put in a full cup, no matter how much you love port. That mistake turned out OK, though, because I just had to drink the excess!
The cornbread started off really well (though I do need to invest in a 9x13 pan: using two smaller ceramic dishes is just too much mess). I love the buttermilk in the recipe, it makes the final product so very flavorful. The final stage calls for crumbling the bread on cookie sheets and baking again in order to get a nice browning. It never quite browns enough that way, so I switch it to broil at the end. This was while I was doing the Stuffing with a Twist (see below) so I got a bit distracted for the crucial 30 seconds...
The bottom pan was fine, but I almost had to toss the top one. Ovens need an internal smoke detector. I was able to pick out the burnt bits enough to use (and it wasn't all that black), but it was a close call!
Stuffing with a Twist is a recipe I got from chef Kerry Sear at Seattle's Cascadia restaurant (our favorite eatery in the Northwest). Usually once a year we go to a small cooking class that he offers (he has several during the year). The Thanksgiving one in 2005 he showed us this stuffing. MLEIV doesn't like it much, so it is really just for me. It is basically flavored bread surrounding sausage, wrapped in bacon, baked in a loaf pan.
The downside of having a printed recipe from a class like that is that it does not follow 100% what he did in the class, and is missing some key ingredients. The first year I made it I had just seen him do it and was able to adapt, but two years later (and my decision to half the recipe) and you have a disaster waiting to happen. Fortunately it is only Sunday and I have time to try again.
First, his printed recipe calls for thick bacon, but in the class he used proscuitto. Big difference in cooking time! Then he omits the part about the celery. Oh, and no one seems to sell chestnuts except Whole Foods and we're not going there till Monday night. So a bit flustered by missing some key ingredients (chef's school 101: mis en place: have everything chopped and measured before hand) I somehow managed to use twice the chicken broth called for (is that the cornbread I smell burning?).
It ended up being a soupy, bacony, chicken-sausagey mess. Even Ace didn't like it much and threw up what she did eat.
Thankfully MLEIV is getting me a new set of ingredients (proscuitto this time, no bacon!), including chestnuts, tonight.
4 days to go.
Its why I'm still going to my workouts the Wednesday before and the Saturday after: I'll need the calorie burn.
MLEIV and I haven't done a family thanksgiving since the 1990's, but we've expanded our menu every year. This year I think we almost have it down to a science.
For 2007, the menu is:
- Roasted Red Pepper Soup with Seared Scallops
- Brussels sprouts with chestnuts and bacon
- Chorizo stuffing with savory cornbread
- Stuffing with a twist
- Roast turkey
- Turkey gravy
- Whipped potatoes
- Port wine cranberry sauce
- Herb bubble loaf
- Bourbon pecan pumpkin pie
It is a week-long event as I get everything ready. Here's my Journal.
Sunday
Today's tasks:
- Make the port wine cranberry sauce
- Make the cornbread for the stuffing, freeze it
- Make the Stuffing With a Twist
The cranberry sauce almost went off without a hitch. Its so easy and keeps for weeks, but first you have to buy enough cranberries (8 oz != 12 oz). Then, when the recipe calls for 1/2 cup of port wine, don't put in a full cup, no matter how much you love port. That mistake turned out OK, though, because I just had to drink the excess!
The cornbread started off really well (though I do need to invest in a 9x13 pan: using two smaller ceramic dishes is just too much mess). I love the buttermilk in the recipe, it makes the final product so very flavorful. The final stage calls for crumbling the bread on cookie sheets and baking again in order to get a nice browning. It never quite browns enough that way, so I switch it to broil at the end. This was while I was doing the Stuffing with a Twist (see below) so I got a bit distracted for the crucial 30 seconds...
The bottom pan was fine, but I almost had to toss the top one. Ovens need an internal smoke detector. I was able to pick out the burnt bits enough to use (and it wasn't all that black), but it was a close call!
Stuffing with a Twist is a recipe I got from chef Kerry Sear at Seattle's Cascadia restaurant (our favorite eatery in the Northwest). Usually once a year we go to a small cooking class that he offers (he has several during the year). The Thanksgiving one in 2005 he showed us this stuffing. MLEIV doesn't like it much, so it is really just for me. It is basically flavored bread surrounding sausage, wrapped in bacon, baked in a loaf pan.
The downside of having a printed recipe from a class like that is that it does not follow 100% what he did in the class, and is missing some key ingredients. The first year I made it I had just seen him do it and was able to adapt, but two years later (and my decision to half the recipe) and you have a disaster waiting to happen. Fortunately it is only Sunday and I have time to try again.
First, his printed recipe calls for thick bacon, but in the class he used proscuitto. Big difference in cooking time! Then he omits the part about the celery. Oh, and no one seems to sell chestnuts except Whole Foods and we're not going there till Monday night. So a bit flustered by missing some key ingredients (chef's school 101: mis en place: have everything chopped and measured before hand) I somehow managed to use twice the chicken broth called for (is that the cornbread I smell burning?).
It ended up being a soupy, bacony, chicken-sausagey mess. Even Ace didn't like it much and threw up what she did eat.
Thankfully MLEIV is getting me a new set of ingredients (proscuitto this time, no bacon!), including chestnuts, tonight.
4 days to go.
Thanksgiving 2006
I think we both had many wistful ideas about Thanksgiving. MLE loved having enough food for one meal. I loved the idea of tastey foods that we didn't eat but once a year. But in both our families, the execution of that idea never went very well. MLE's mom was trying to feed a horde of children and grandchildren. By the time I met them, thanksgiving was a madhouse of screaming children and dietary restrictions. My own history was of boxed stuffing, a dry turkey, cranberry sauce from a can, and Don in love with mashed potatoes from scratch, with lumps of uncooked potato still in them fighting with me who wanted something smooth, even if it came from a box.
In 1998, MLE and I had our first thanksgiving alone, just the two of us. We had thrown off the culinary shackles of Mormonism and moved out of her parent's basement. We had a subscription to Food and Wine magazine and weren't afraid to use it! We still have a photo of that first Thanksgiving--the port-cranberry sauce (made from scratch), the brussels sprouts (never had those at the Sewell household), the stuffing and potatoes were from a box (hey, I needed to grow into the new role...) but it was a good start. And the wine! We had wine! I can't imagine now how people survive Thanksgiving without something to drink.
Our own personal Thanksgiving tradition started like all good ones--unintentionally. In 1999 I had to work, but we thought fondly of that first one and in 2000 had an even better spread. The thing that we liked was doing the basics well but then adding something new to the mix. For example, a few years ago I did some research on potatoes--how to prepare them, how to cook them, how to make them just right. This year, we had whipped potatoes. None of that grainy, half-cooked stuff; no, I cubed the raw potatoes into nice, even sizes, cooked them to perfection, put them through a food mill, whipped them with butter, milk, and cream in my Kitchen Aid until they were light and fluffy--MLE said that they reminded her of whipped cream!
I did two stuffings this year: my first attempt at a basic, classic bread and sausage stuffing; and a Chorizo-cornbread stuffing. The basic one was fine--well executed, tasty. But that chorizo-cornbread one... oh do DIE for! The recipe came from Food and Wine's Marcia Kiesel who is the first person I read, many years ago, criticize Emeril. I've loved her from that day on (let's face it, all he really does is say "bam" a lot--his food is crap). She also mentioned being a vegetarian. How she came up with chorizo stuffing I'll never know, but bless her for doing so! The cornbread is rich, made with buttermilk. The collards add the perfect touch. The colors alone make it worth having on the table. Turns out it tastes heavenly.
I forget when we first discovered bubble-herb loaf, but it's become a requirement for years now. Too much cheese and butter to be healthy, but those herbs add... vitamins? Anyway, it's a luscious, poppable bread that we eat all day long. I spent time over several years trying to figure out roasting and how that whole turkey thing works. I did deep-fried turkey in 1990, long before it was fashionable. It works well, but not really worth the time/danger/effort of the fryer. I tried brining them, marinating them, injecting them, you name it. In the end, I mostly just like putting a little butter and herbs on them and then roasting them till done--no longer. I've done it well enough in years past that this year we opted for the side dishes and just had a turkey breast that took all of 30 minutes to roast. I even roasted it to dryness because MLE still fondly remembers her mom's turkey...
One new classic is the burbon pumpkin pie with pecan streusel. We've had it every year since 2002. The Bourbon adds a nice flavor and that streusel gives it a crunch that is unbeatable.
We've also added a brussels sprouts/bacon/chestnuts to the mix. Not very cutting edge, but a well executed classic.The second brussels sprouts thing didn't go so well. It was ok, but just not very interesting.
I am mostly glad not to have to worry about the families. My memories of Thanksgiving are more along the lines of passive aggressive arguments about table manners, dad turning on a TV wherever he goes to watch a game that has no connection to him whatsoever, and all of us being required to compliment mom on her bland dinner. Sometime while I was on my Mormon mission, Wal-Mart moved to Taylorsville and suddenly Don and Donna had a "tradition" of going shopping at 6:00am the Friday after. They couldn't afford that when I was growing up, but after I left it became an essential part of their weekend. I guess they were just that desperate to enter the mainstream.
I wish them, and all of you, well at your shopping sprees. I'm sleeping in, then having a nice breakfast, then going to workout, then doing all my shopping the way God intended: online!
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