We, as a society, are accustomed to eating flesh. It goes without saying that this Western society eats animals. Culturally, pigs, cows, fowl, fish are all game. And yet, for the most part, we neglect the inside: the Offal. Kidneys, livers, heart, thyroid gland,........brain!
I know. Brain is no longer really an option. Not since Mad Cow. But I remember sitting in my cousin's kitchen as his wife prepared brain for his birthday. "It's his favorite!" she smiled at me. It smelled delicious. I went to play with the children.
Liver and onions was one of the first meals I learned to prepare by myself. It helped me through college. (Liver and onions is cheaper than McDonalds!) The blood bank marvelled at my iron count and asked me for more. (I obliged) Later I added balsamic and toasted pecans. Even Yummier!
Chicken livers are even better. Breaded and fried, I pop these in my mouth like candy. I roll them atop my salads, puree them into a pate, and, seriously, place some on a little plate with a cool white wine: tapas perfection!
And that thyroid gland. These are in my top 5. The thyroid gland of a sheep or veal is called sweetbreads (I know...What?!) My chef first introduced us in cooking school. He brought me a bowl full of sweetbreads soaking in milk, showed me how to carefully peel off the outer membrane, and then we coated them in flour and lightly sauteed them. Lightly browned, crunchy on the outside, creamy warm on the inside. I think I swooned! My chef beamed like I had passed some secret test.
I have dreamed about boudin since I first had it in the French countryside: black sausage with sauteed apples flambeed with Calvados and cream. Black boudin literally melts in your mouth. Sometimes it has tiny specks of Granny Smith apple in the sausage. You can find it with onion, too. My tablemates, including my French man, were smirking terribly as I asked for thirds, and then passed the blood sausage down the table. It took me a few minutes: Blood sausage? Really? My stomach started to lurch, but my brain and heart told me to get over it, and I managed that third helping quite fine.
Put a plate of andouillette sausage in front of me with a little pot of mustard and I'll enjoy it thoroughly: white sausage stuffed with chopped onions and intestine. Take me to a South American BBQ restaurant and show off those chicken hearts! Paper-thin tripe sauteed in brown butter and parsley...mmmm.
I realize that some people can't do it. They are Meat-Eaters, not Everything-Eaters. I get the whole texture issue, the smell, the idea in your head that keeps you from enjoying it even if it does taste good. I won't argue with you. I'll tell you this, though: putting offal on the menu is the sign of a knowing chef. Look for sweetbreads and you can have confidence in anything coming out of that kitchen. Not every chef can pull off tripe, and it takes belief in your clientele to put liver on your menu.
A suggestion? Pour yourself a red wine and put some little cornichons on a plate with some liver pate and toasted baguette slices. Close your eyes, breath a little, and there you are: Sitting in a little cafe next to the Farmer's Market, your basket of fruits and vegetables at your feet. You're taking a French break, thinking about dinner, but it's far away, and you've got your afternoon ahead of you. Everything is still possible.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Sack of Potatoes
My father-in-law is one of my favorite long-term visitors. He arrives with presents, eats whatever I place in front of him, walks my dog and plays with my kids. In exchange, I get his good company: great stories of the depression, forgotten French songs hummed in the car while we run errands and chauffeur children. Half of my French vocabulary came through this man. He spouts colliquialisms and proverbs at me. He has one for every occassion.
One of my favorites: "A sack of potatoes is much nicer to look at as a gratin." I have a sneaking suspicion he was talking about me, sitting next to him in my ratty jeans and favorite flannel shirt. I smiled. I am a Potato! Who knew? Do French woman grow up knowing, deep down, that they are a sack of potatoes, full of potential? Was that a compliment, somehow? After all, we've all sung the Meat and Potatoes song nightly. Woman is clearly essential....
Potatoes appear to be our favorite vegetable. Seventy-five percent of the vegetables Americans consume are potatoes. Most of those consumed potatoes appear on our plates dressed as French fries. (Am I, then, as an American, a French fry?! The irony!)
Potatoes. Pomme de Terre: Apples of the Earth. A staple, a starch, a tuber. They are steadfast, those spuds. They keep forever, sitting patiently in the dark, growing eyes. The potato is a member of the nightshade family, forever associated with danger. How like a woman!
Potatoes can be the simplest thing on the table: toss some baby potatoes with olive oil and sea salt (kosher works, table salt doesn't...), throw them in your cast iron pot and slide those in your oven. Forty-five minutes later, put your drink down and you have perfectly roasted potatoes with a crunchy exterior and fluffy flesh. Grate some stinky cheese, chop some salami, and put your ski sweater on. Add some chopped garlic and parsly and roll them right next to your medium-rare steak. Classic.
There are over 20 different kinds of potatoes. We know russets, yukon gold, Finn, fingerling, sweet potatoes and yams, red and blue, baby whites. Mash any of these. Smash those little ones! Add celery root to your russets and you've made the best mashed potatoes ever. (I promise!) Fold in olive oil and egg yolk to your yukon golds and your mashed potatoes become golden. Stir in sour cream and parsley and pipe them back into their brown skins. Sprinkle some bacon on top --you know it belongs there!-- and you've got sophisticated potato skins. A mashed potato works with beef in any form, turkey, chicken, pork. It's your little black dress: a sure thing.
Pull out your mandolin, or your sharpest knife, and slice those Yukon Golds really thin. Layer them in your casserole dish. Add heated milk and cream, salt, garlic. Let this meld an hour, an hour and a half in your oven, and you have a meal all by itself: gratin. Add some great grated cheese and you have gratin dauphinoise. Use chicken broth instead of dairy and you have gratin boulangere. These gratins make a mediocre meatloaf brilliant, overshadow your chop, inspire you to light candles and turn down the lights. This is the potato with cleavage. Yes, you can buy "potatoes au gratin" in a box: dehydrated potato slices, a packet of something mixed with your own milk. Not the same. Don't do it.
Dice those russets. Brown them in some oil and butter and add peppers. Cook that egg on top and you've got hangover breakfast. (Party girl...!) Add sweet potato squares to your russets. Maybe some cubed apples. Peter Brady was right. "Pork chops and apple sauce!" Make a quirkier marriage --menage a trois?!--with potatoes, apples, and quince. (Find it. Cook it. It's lovely.)
Am I a sack of potatoes? Do I resent that little observation from my father-in-law? I am grateful for this new friend I have through my French man. I giggle and think of me on the couch with my fuzzy slippers and sweats. I am a baked potato. Simple. Filling. Comfort. That's woman. I smile and slip on my short little sweater dress with my over-the-knee boots. I am "Potatoes Anna": a crown of paper thin potatoes browned in butter. Sexy. Elegant. That's woman. So many facets. So many looks. All of them work for me. Even fries!
One of my favorites: "A sack of potatoes is much nicer to look at as a gratin." I have a sneaking suspicion he was talking about me, sitting next to him in my ratty jeans and favorite flannel shirt. I smiled. I am a Potato! Who knew? Do French woman grow up knowing, deep down, that they are a sack of potatoes, full of potential? Was that a compliment, somehow? After all, we've all sung the Meat and Potatoes song nightly. Woman is clearly essential....
Potatoes appear to be our favorite vegetable. Seventy-five percent of the vegetables Americans consume are potatoes. Most of those consumed potatoes appear on our plates dressed as French fries. (Am I, then, as an American, a French fry?! The irony!)
Potatoes. Pomme de Terre: Apples of the Earth. A staple, a starch, a tuber. They are steadfast, those spuds. They keep forever, sitting patiently in the dark, growing eyes. The potato is a member of the nightshade family, forever associated with danger. How like a woman!
Potatoes can be the simplest thing on the table: toss some baby potatoes with olive oil and sea salt (kosher works, table salt doesn't...), throw them in your cast iron pot and slide those in your oven. Forty-five minutes later, put your drink down and you have perfectly roasted potatoes with a crunchy exterior and fluffy flesh. Grate some stinky cheese, chop some salami, and put your ski sweater on. Add some chopped garlic and parsly and roll them right next to your medium-rare steak. Classic.
There are over 20 different kinds of potatoes. We know russets, yukon gold, Finn, fingerling, sweet potatoes and yams, red and blue, baby whites. Mash any of these. Smash those little ones! Add celery root to your russets and you've made the best mashed potatoes ever. (I promise!) Fold in olive oil and egg yolk to your yukon golds and your mashed potatoes become golden. Stir in sour cream and parsley and pipe them back into their brown skins. Sprinkle some bacon on top --you know it belongs there!-- and you've got sophisticated potato skins. A mashed potato works with beef in any form, turkey, chicken, pork. It's your little black dress: a sure thing.
Pull out your mandolin, or your sharpest knife, and slice those Yukon Golds really thin. Layer them in your casserole dish. Add heated milk and cream, salt, garlic. Let this meld an hour, an hour and a half in your oven, and you have a meal all by itself: gratin. Add some great grated cheese and you have gratin dauphinoise. Use chicken broth instead of dairy and you have gratin boulangere. These gratins make a mediocre meatloaf brilliant, overshadow your chop, inspire you to light candles and turn down the lights. This is the potato with cleavage. Yes, you can buy "potatoes au gratin" in a box: dehydrated potato slices, a packet of something mixed with your own milk. Not the same. Don't do it.
Dice those russets. Brown them in some oil and butter and add peppers. Cook that egg on top and you've got hangover breakfast. (Party girl...!) Add sweet potato squares to your russets. Maybe some cubed apples. Peter Brady was right. "Pork chops and apple sauce!" Make a quirkier marriage --menage a trois?!--with potatoes, apples, and quince. (Find it. Cook it. It's lovely.)
Am I a sack of potatoes? Do I resent that little observation from my father-in-law? I am grateful for this new friend I have through my French man. I giggle and think of me on the couch with my fuzzy slippers and sweats. I am a baked potato. Simple. Filling. Comfort. That's woman. I smile and slip on my short little sweater dress with my over-the-knee boots. I am "Potatoes Anna": a crown of paper thin potatoes browned in butter. Sexy. Elegant. That's woman. So many facets. So many looks. All of them work for me. Even fries!
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Tea for Two
There are coffee people, and there are tea people. I am a Coffee Drinker. I'm not myself until I've had my first cup. I get irritated and remain groggy without it. The first thing I do every morning is start the water for my French press. (I encourage you to try your coffee "unplugged"....it changes everything.) Tea Drinkers, I've noticed, are a different sort. They sit and wait while their tea steeps. They can let their tea brew and smile at the same time. They don't excuse their behavior because "I haven't had my tea yet today!" No, I've never heard that one. They are Zen.
Tea, they say, was discovered serendipitously by a Chinese emporer relaxing under a tea tree. A sudden breeze whooshed a tea leaf into his cup of warm water and "Eureka!" ...there was tea. Whatever! Those British wanted their tea fix so bad they infiltrated China and started an Opium War, created a corporation to do their dirty work, and ended up occupying India first as the East Indian Trading Company and later as Great Britain. All for a cup of tea...
Tea sneaked up on me. My mother did the Sun Tea thing--Lipton tea bags (they are my standard! Don't knock Lipton!) and gently sang: "If you don't like the taste of tea, don't drink it." So I learned to drink it without sugar. Summer is not Summer to me without my iced tea in the fridge. I brew red tea with chocolate, green tea with apricots, black tea with berries. We won't talk about my mother's Russian Tea, even though I have such fond memories of that concoction. (Thank you, Astronauts!)
What fascinates me most about tea is the fact that, despite the various colors and flavors, all tea derives from the same leaf. This tea leaf is found in China, Japan, Sri Lanka, and India. This tea leaf can transform into green tea, black, white, lapsung, bird's nest, oolong...one leaf! It's all about the journey. The Japanese tend to just dry it: that's green. The Chinese like to dry it and smoke it: that's black. The Indians drink that black tea with milk and spices: that's Chai. Pick that tea leaf when it's just a baby: that's white. And here comes the fun part: Take any of these leaves and add dried something, toasted something, smoked something, and you change everything. Some nobleman in England found his favorite tea infused with dried orange peel (bergamot, acutally): that's Earl Grey. Even cooler: Take any edible flower or herb and dry it, smoke it, toast it, and you get a Tisane. Chamomile is just a little daisy-like flower. Mint! Hibiscus! Add hot water to that dried chyrsanthemum and watch the petals unfurl for its last time. Such beautiful magic!
Tea is still surprising me. I add loose leaf oolong into the steam bath for my halibut. I infuse my creme anglaise with earl grey for a subtle, flowery creme brulee. Lavendar ice cream (oh, yes!) and lapsung suchong in my handmade burgers for a smoky background. I stuff my roasting chicken with a lemon and push green tea under the skin.
Tea gives my French man and I ten minutes or so every day for just the two of us. Tea Time is our chat about whatever, a one-on-one that lasts as long as it takes to sip our tea face to face. We wait for the water, sometimes quietly, sometimes ready with our list of rants or sweet nothings, and then choose our tea depending on caffeine, taste, time. If we argue, I drink fast. If we are conspiring, I sip slowly. Sometimes it's in the early morning, sometimes the last thing before bed. It's our Zen Moment, we two. In a busy, chaotic day full of children, dog, chauffering and cooking, this is our Time Out. It keeps us together, on the same page, caught up. Tea is the perfect Pause Button.
Tea, they say, was discovered serendipitously by a Chinese emporer relaxing under a tea tree. A sudden breeze whooshed a tea leaf into his cup of warm water and "Eureka!" ...there was tea. Whatever! Those British wanted their tea fix so bad they infiltrated China and started an Opium War, created a corporation to do their dirty work, and ended up occupying India first as the East Indian Trading Company and later as Great Britain. All for a cup of tea...
Tea sneaked up on me. My mother did the Sun Tea thing--Lipton tea bags (they are my standard! Don't knock Lipton!) and gently sang: "If you don't like the taste of tea, don't drink it." So I learned to drink it without sugar. Summer is not Summer to me without my iced tea in the fridge. I brew red tea with chocolate, green tea with apricots, black tea with berries. We won't talk about my mother's Russian Tea, even though I have such fond memories of that concoction. (Thank you, Astronauts!)
What fascinates me most about tea is the fact that, despite the various colors and flavors, all tea derives from the same leaf. This tea leaf is found in China, Japan, Sri Lanka, and India. This tea leaf can transform into green tea, black, white, lapsung, bird's nest, oolong...one leaf! It's all about the journey. The Japanese tend to just dry it: that's green. The Chinese like to dry it and smoke it: that's black. The Indians drink that black tea with milk and spices: that's Chai. Pick that tea leaf when it's just a baby: that's white. And here comes the fun part: Take any of these leaves and add dried something, toasted something, smoked something, and you change everything. Some nobleman in England found his favorite tea infused with dried orange peel (bergamot, acutally): that's Earl Grey. Even cooler: Take any edible flower or herb and dry it, smoke it, toast it, and you get a Tisane. Chamomile is just a little daisy-like flower. Mint! Hibiscus! Add hot water to that dried chyrsanthemum and watch the petals unfurl for its last time. Such beautiful magic!
Tea is still surprising me. I add loose leaf oolong into the steam bath for my halibut. I infuse my creme anglaise with earl grey for a subtle, flowery creme brulee. Lavendar ice cream (oh, yes!) and lapsung suchong in my handmade burgers for a smoky background. I stuff my roasting chicken with a lemon and push green tea under the skin.
Tea gives my French man and I ten minutes or so every day for just the two of us. Tea Time is our chat about whatever, a one-on-one that lasts as long as it takes to sip our tea face to face. We wait for the water, sometimes quietly, sometimes ready with our list of rants or sweet nothings, and then choose our tea depending on caffeine, taste, time. If we argue, I drink fast. If we are conspiring, I sip slowly. Sometimes it's in the early morning, sometimes the last thing before bed. It's our Zen Moment, we two. In a busy, chaotic day full of children, dog, chauffering and cooking, this is our Time Out. It keeps us together, on the same page, caught up. Tea is the perfect Pause Button.
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Cheers!
My first drink, I'm pretty sure, was from my older cousin. A grown-up, he was visiting and I charmed a sip of his screwdriver. Yummy! That sloe gin! Much later, my brothers and I discovered that my father's bar had things like blackberry brandy, Cointreau, Galiano. I grew bolder, incredibly tall, and--showing my age, here!--since the drinking age in Iowa was only 19 at the time, I managed to walk into most gas stations and buy my own beer. Sometimes I managed Mad Dog or Boones Farm.
It's not that I liked it. Budweiser, the drink of choice for my age-group, tasted terrible. (Honestly, I still think it tastes terrible!) And cheap wine...well, the sugar I added to my glass to help me finish it didn't help at all! I remember cringing in college whenever someone yelled "Kegger!" I just knew it was going to be awful.
I feel lucky, now, that I didn't start really enjoying alcohol until I was out of college and living in the Pacific Northwest. Microbrews! I started with a small local brewery that used blueberries and apricots. Yum! I found Hefeweisen, and then learned how to say it...By the time I left for cooking school, I had established preferences for ambers and stouts, been initiated by Guiness, and collected three different sets of beer glasses: pilsner, lager, stout.
In France, I met a Belgian student who drank beer like water, and not just any beer. Belgium is the Mother of Beer. (And fries!) Forget Stella Artois. He passed me bottle after bottle of lambic, chimay, cider while we waxed philosophic on cooking, running, biking, life.
I know beer has a reputation: puking college kids, redneck tailgaters, beerbellies and beer bongs. That's not my beer. I don't chug. I don't guzzle. If I drink two in a night, I'm surprised. The beer I buy doesn't come in twelve packs. (The great ones are often only four to a pack!) It never appears in a can. I pass by the stacks of Bud and Miller that line the grocery shelves. I find myself making trips to beverage specialty stores to find something obscure, small, personal. My motto has become "Drink Artisan."
I know beer is not for everyone. (If this is you, I encourage you to try a Belgian lambic. Start with cranberry.) I know the Big Three (Budweiser, Miller, Coors) have taken this ancient art form and created a shadow of beer's former self. I know there are passionate people who resent this and spend their time and money creating beer as art.
A great beer can change a meal, enhance a gathering, bring closure to a bad day. Beer is the perfect partner to bratwurst, anything Mexican, smoked and grilled dishes. A beer is a remedy for a hot day. You can't visit the ball park without a beer, scoop up chili without also lifting that beer mug, manage hot wings or 3-star Phad Thai without a great lager.
Equally important, an artisan beer represents the struggle of David vs. Goliath, quality over quantity, the Little Man against Corporate America. Choosing microbrews supports someone's small business, someone's passion, someone's family. With every bottle of Dogfish (Check this guy out! He's amazing!), every glass of Pyramid, every sip of Red Trolley (local! Love it!), I get to walk my talk. Fight the Good Fight: Drink Artisan!
It's not that I liked it. Budweiser, the drink of choice for my age-group, tasted terrible. (Honestly, I still think it tastes terrible!) And cheap wine...well, the sugar I added to my glass to help me finish it didn't help at all! I remember cringing in college whenever someone yelled "Kegger!" I just knew it was going to be awful.
I feel lucky, now, that I didn't start really enjoying alcohol until I was out of college and living in the Pacific Northwest. Microbrews! I started with a small local brewery that used blueberries and apricots. Yum! I found Hefeweisen, and then learned how to say it...By the time I left for cooking school, I had established preferences for ambers and stouts, been initiated by Guiness, and collected three different sets of beer glasses: pilsner, lager, stout.
In France, I met a Belgian student who drank beer like water, and not just any beer. Belgium is the Mother of Beer. (And fries!) Forget Stella Artois. He passed me bottle after bottle of lambic, chimay, cider while we waxed philosophic on cooking, running, biking, life.
I know beer has a reputation: puking college kids, redneck tailgaters, beerbellies and beer bongs. That's not my beer. I don't chug. I don't guzzle. If I drink two in a night, I'm surprised. The beer I buy doesn't come in twelve packs. (The great ones are often only four to a pack!) It never appears in a can. I pass by the stacks of Bud and Miller that line the grocery shelves. I find myself making trips to beverage specialty stores to find something obscure, small, personal. My motto has become "Drink Artisan."
I know beer is not for everyone. (If this is you, I encourage you to try a Belgian lambic. Start with cranberry.) I know the Big Three (Budweiser, Miller, Coors) have taken this ancient art form and created a shadow of beer's former self. I know there are passionate people who resent this and spend their time and money creating beer as art.
A great beer can change a meal, enhance a gathering, bring closure to a bad day. Beer is the perfect partner to bratwurst, anything Mexican, smoked and grilled dishes. A beer is a remedy for a hot day. You can't visit the ball park without a beer, scoop up chili without also lifting that beer mug, manage hot wings or 3-star Phad Thai without a great lager.
Equally important, an artisan beer represents the struggle of David vs. Goliath, quality over quantity, the Little Man against Corporate America. Choosing microbrews supports someone's small business, someone's passion, someone's family. With every bottle of Dogfish (Check this guy out! He's amazing!), every glass of Pyramid, every sip of Red Trolley (local! Love it!), I get to walk my talk. Fight the Good Fight: Drink Artisan!
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