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Jul 27

The Trouble with Fennel Seeds & Couscous

Cosi_chicken_fennel_salad

I find it hard to believe that the nation’s still not ready for goat cheese (I knew there was no way Bonnie was going to win over high schoolers with breaded goat cheese on Monday’s Hell’s Kitchen). Which is why I find it strange that anyone would enjoy a handful of whole fennel seeds in their salad.
I never ever eat at Cosi and am not in the habit of spending eight bucks for a salad (though I’m currently coveting Starwich’s pricey citrus duck salad and debating whether or not to run out get it—heck, I’ve got a little birthday spending money burning a hole in my pocket) but it was Friday and I get loopy. I only chose it because it was the lowest fat of the three new low fat salads. And it’s certainly not a low fat meal if you eat the fluffy flat bread that comes on the side.

It tasted low fat, all right. It’s the kind of thing I’d make from Cooking Light and have trouble choking down the next night as leftovers. I liked the idea of tandoori chicken and pomegranate dressing. Those two components were fine. The lettuce was neutral. But toasted fennel seeds were foul. Maybe I was putting too much stock in the arugula-ification (MS Word doesn’t even recognize the word arugula) of America because I was hoping they meant fennel pollen. But they said seeds and that’s what they meant. It could be my own bias because I’m not licorice crazy but the anise flavor was completely overwhelming and the seeds kept getting stuck in my teeth. Sure, a little pinch of candy-coated seeds after an Indian meal is refreshing but you don’t necessarily want repeated mouthfuls. The toasted fennel seed and chicken salad nipped my Cosi experimentation right in the bud.

Starwich_citrus_duck_salad

Ok, I gave in to the Starwich urge and they managed to mess up my plan. I had been looking forward to “tender braised duck, torn peppercress, frisee, shaved carrots, Israeli couscous with orange-cherry vinaigrette” and I almost got all that. I tempered my initial desire for a sandwich and went for a salad instead. At least the couscous would add a little heft (to my meal not my body, duh). But after paying my $9.95 and waiting, it turned out that they didn’t have any of the little starchy orbs. The cashier asked the little Mexican guy making the salad what he’d recommend as a substitution and he ended up adding cucumbers and oranges. Not bad really–I barely missed the couscous. There was some serious foliage tangled up in my plastic container, though.  That peppercress is a tough customer and my plastic knife got a work out. It was certainly worth the extra two bucks to avoid fennel seed overload.

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Jul 25

Real Jeanius

Sally Brompton is useless. This “If Today is Your Birthday..” is as lamely generic as they come:

July 25, 2007 — Look back over the previous 12 months and accept everything that happened. Then turn your back on the past and start with a fresh account. Any day can be a new beginning but a birthday is special in that it is easier to draw a line, one that represents both an end and a start. Draw that line today.

I do like the part in the general leo horoscope about “Your blood pressure should improve as well.” No one needs a coronary on their birthday.

35_2 
Obligatory annual birthday photo: this is 35. Don't worry, you won't have to see this mug again for another 365 days.

So, I wasn’t far off. I’ll be going to Aquavit tonight. Oddly, it was chosen in part because “I’d like the design.” Perhaps, but it strikes me as the type of place that’s intimidating in its stiffness (demeanor and pricing—there was hardly a bottle of wine under $100 on their website, which I find nerve-wracking). All I can recall about Aquavit was a woman I used to work with years ago at a culinary website saying, “the portions were aggressively small.” We’ll see what that Inner Chef is up to.

GapjeanNot related: I do love the bizarrely flattering brown and aqua Target dress I bought this weekend. Though when you spend $34 (it wasn’t on sale in-store) on clothing, it’s tough to justify tripling the figure for a couple glasses of wine.

I’ve been a faux bois freak for a few years now. And my favorite (only?) blog dedicated to the woodsy pattern tipped me off to Martha Stewart’s new home collection at Macy’s. I already have woodgrain sheets, but I see a duvet and bath towels in my future.

I’m so, so happy to see that pants/jeans have crept back near the natural waistline (though, the high-waisted trend is illogically as unkind to curves as the whole tired low-rise debacle). I’ve been buying trousers and jeans a size large for like the past four years to compensate for the snug, hip-hugging fit. So, when I bought an Old Navy version (why pay $69 for the Gap’s rendition, never mind the $300+ category, when the ON has similar styles for $29?) Saturday, I was shocked to realize I’m now a size smaller. Not that I actually am a size smaller, but it’s nice to wear my real size again, large as it may be.

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Jul 25

Sunday Night Special: Red Snapper with Tomatoes and Cream

Red_snapper_with_tomatoes_and_cream
Yes, there should probably be a vegetable on the side rather than a hunk of French bread but that’s how I eat.

At least on the surface, it seems like the country has gone eco-crazy in 2007. And I’ve been feeling inadequate because I eat factory farmed meat and cheap produce. For me, the leap from grocery store to greenmarket is like getting manicures and paying to have your laundry done. Better taste and higher quality are appealing but I can’t get jazzed about local sourcing or even organic processes. Maybe in 2008.

Sunday night we stopped by Fairway and picked up red snapper, cream, tomatoes, red onions and chives of no provenance. I definitely would’ve preferred ripe heirloom tomatoes–it is the height of summer–but it’s not like there’s anyplace to impulsively purchase them at the end of the weekend in South Brooklyn.

We made do (don’t tell me it’s due) just fine and turned to last week’s Fast Food My Way episode for a very simple (it was genuinely fast where some of these recipes aren’t so swift, at least not in our kitchen) red snapper recipe. Jacques Pepin is James’s fetish (I just stumbled upon Jacques’s Playa del Carmen condo that he appears to be renting out and now James is all into that. It would be kind of crazy to go to the Yucatan and hang out at Jacques Pepin’s house when he’s not there, right?) and I think I ruined his fun by buying the companion book. He prefers starting and stopping recorded episodes while cooking. I actually like things spelled out; you can still improvise.

Red Snapper with Tomatoes and Cream
2 cups sliced red onions
2 teaspoons good olive oil
1/3 cup water
1 ½ cups diced (1-inch) tomato, from 1 large or 2 medium peeled and seeded tomatoes
4 red snapper fillets (each about 6 ounces)
¾ cup dry white wine
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon salt
½ cup heavy cream
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon potato starch dissolved in 1 tablespoon water
1 tablespoon chopped fresh chives

Put the onions and olive oil in a large skillet with the water. Cook over high heat for about 3 minutes, or until the liquid is gone and the onions are lightly browned. Add the diced tomato, sauté for 1 minute, then set aside and keep warm.

Arrange the fish fillets in one layer in another large skillet and add the wine and ½ teaspoon of the salt. Cover, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and boil very gently for about 2 minutes, or until the fish is tender but not overcooked. (The timing will depend on the thickness of the fillets.)

Transfer the fish to a platter and set aside in a warm place. Add the cream to the liquid remaining in the skillet used to cook the fish and boil over high heat for a few minutes to reduce it to 1 cup. Add the remaining ½ teaspoon salt, pepper, and dissolved potato starch and mix well.

To serve, divide the warm red onion-tomato mixture among four plates and arrange a piece of fish on top. Coat with the cream sauce, sprinkle with the chives, and serve immediately.

Serves 4

Recipe from Jacques Pepin’s Fast Food My Way Houghton Mifflin, 2004

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Jul 24

Gift Horses

Gifthorse_2I like surprises. I never understood eager beaver kids who’d scout out their Christmas presents before they were wrapped. If I had a baby, which is highly unlikely, I wouldn’t want to know its sex until it was born. I hate it when people don’t take surprises seriously (what I think is a birthday present was left in its clearly marked shipping box on our dining room table all last week and drove me batty—and to add insult to injury, if I’m to believe the packaging, the color of the not-so-secret object isn’t really my first choice. Am I ungrateful or what?).

I do get antsy this time of year because I get wound up trying to deduce where my birthday dinner will be (my party is Saturday at Sheepshead Bay gem, Clemente’s, though it’s looking like rain will thwart my dockside dining plans). All I know as of last night is that it’s a restaurant above 14th Street, has a well-known chef, is upscale, has cuisine from the European continent but I can’t know the country because it would give it away (wha?) but that it’s not Italian, and there was uncertainty whether the restaurant was less than a year old.

Um, those are pretty useless clues. So, I’m racking my brain trying to come up with sparse European cuisines: Swedish, Portuguese, Greek (not really underrepresented but James might think it is)? Aquavit? Anthos? Can't think of a Portuguese other than Tintol and that doesn't seem right. I suspect Eastern Europe is out, at least I hope so because I don’t want to end up at the Russian Tea Room.

Second guessing James isn’t easy because his thought process is way different than mine and he’s not super up on dining trends and openings (me either, really, but I seem plugged in by comparison). I was all, “did you read about this restaurant or did someone tell you about it?” His coworkers are strangely foodie (mine not so much) so it wouldn’t necessarily by a bad thing if he got his idea from one of them. Last year he picked Cookshop, which I never would’ve guessed.

Despite saying that I enjoy surprises, I’m also a bit of a worrier and an obnoxious control freak so I always have pent up fear that I’ll end up someplace wretched. Is this what not looking a gift horse in the mouth is about?

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Jul 24

Green Around the Gills

Apparently, I had a little (they chopped it in half) eco-friendly round-up, “10 Best Websites to Get You Started Going Green” in Friday’s New York Post. It’s online but I didn’t see it (or any of the other eleven “green” articles on their site) in the paper so it’s a mystery to me when and if it ran. I do feel the need to mention it, regardless.

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Jul 23

The Madeline Myth

I’ve always felt a little sore because I don’t have a pivotal (good) food memory. A meal or single ingredient that shaped you into the human you are today. You know, the fodder for like 85% of all food related essays. “Going home” literally and figuratively. Discovering yourself through family or life changing travels, and all the better if your tale involves a rustic village on the European continent.

(In fact, I was a little weirded out yesterday when I opened the new Gourmet to discover an article from the woman who does (did?) the Bruni Digest—about an ancestral home in Finland and the cuisine that accompanies these summer sojourns. I absolutely do not know the path that takes one from blogging smart, satire of a New York Times food critic to writing intergenerational food pieces in highly coveted venue. But then, such leaps have always mystified me.)

But it turns out that I do have a foreign food memory (I’m still working on the family component), albeit minor, and didn’t even realize it. Last century, when I still spent lots of weekends in the East Village, I would frequent the East Village Cheese Shop. Sure, everything was on the verge of turning bad but it was cheap as hell. The dollar selections up front would charm me and I always fell victim to Castello Blue, a little half circle, wrapped in gold foil and boxed in cardboard. One buck for the creamiest, brie-blue hybrid ever.

It was so good that it had to be trashy. At least that’s my nonsensical logic. A purist would just eat full on piquant blue cheese or triple cream brie unadorned. Blue Castello is the anti-Cabrales. Someone that would enjoy tempering one with the other has no respect. I’ve never been respectful, though.

I never knew such a two-in-one treat existed, at least I didn’t think so until I remembered bleu de bresse. Eighteen years ago I spent a miserable July in a 17th century country home in Southwestern France. My attempt at being a summer exchange student was not a success. I didn’t appreciate my bucolic environs one bit, could barely communicate and was bored out of my mind. But I did like the bleu de bresse when the after dinner cheese plate came out.

Well, it was a Tupperware container of cheeses, some past their prime. My host mom (who I described in my diary at the time as looking like Peg Bundy with Rod Stewart’s face, and I would stick with that assessement today) considered herself to be “modern,” which meant we ate frozen food (even the baguettes) and watched TV during dinner. Two things I had been led to believe were absolute no-nos in France. Honestly, I could’ve cared less about either at sixteen (and got a kick out of Dana Hill being in like every TV movie. I currently get a kick out of the fact that there's a guy mysteriously named Dana Hill who works remotely at my company) but did notice the discrepancies.

The creamy bleu de bresse was the only edible that demanded an inquisitive qu'est-ce que c'est from me. I’ve never sought it out since and never see it anyway. I’m not sure that it’s even sold in the U.S. But I’ve been eating approximations for years without realizing where I got the taste for the style in the first place.

Whenever I’m presented with an opportunity to try a creamy blue, it’s impossible to pass up. I’ve been trying to limit my cheese intake (when I go on healthy eating binges, I don’t miss sweets so much as rich dairy products) but soft blues are my weakness. I’ve bought two wedges in the past two weeks. See, no self-control. And it fits into my fetish for blue food.

Sliced_mountain_top_bleu

As long as I’m unable to resist my urges I may as well sample the variations I encounter. First up is an odd cheese to start with because it doesn’t completely fit into this category.

Last week I read about Mountain Top Blue on The Kitchen and felt inspired to track it down because the store mentioned in the post happens to be walkable from my apartment. I’m not one for going all that out of my way for comestibles so this was like a cheesey siren song I couldn’t tune out.

This pyramid shaped cheese doesn’t fit my M.O. because it’s an artisanal goat milk concoction and the blue aspect is minimal. Also, at $15 a pop, it's pricier than my usual snacky impulse purchases. It’s more like a very good mild and nutty goat cheese with a hint of tanginess from the blue. It’s also more substantial and less melting than the styles I normally relish. You can cut a slice without it buckling under its own melting texture. I suspect that with age, this cheese would soften up in the center, but it didn’t last long enough to get that gooey. Purchased on a Friday evening, it was history by Monday morning. I might buy it to share at a party, but it almost felt obscene to pick at the blob solo over a weekend.

More soft blues:
Saga
Cambozola

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Jul 18

Eat Your Greens (and Blues)

Rainbow_chardIt’s not as if backwards phrases like freedom fries would ever cross my lips but I’m definitely not gaga over everything Gallic. I fail to understand the foodie obsession with French culture. Blind romantic notions about the European country seem about as clichéd as our gun toting, fatso, junk food gorging image. It’s all misguided—just ask the Japanese.

However, Sunday’s New York Times profile of Frédérick E. Grasser-Hermé had an appeal I normally don’t find in subjects of “The Way We Eat” column. Who else but an eccentrically stylish (I do admire the way older European women tend to resist surgerizing their faces into supposed youthfulness—of course, their age appropriate visages sit atop a frighteningly svelte figure) middle aged French woman could go crazy with unnatural colors and combos and make it chic instead of kitsch?

BluelobsterI’d like to see her set of books, Serial Colors, each devoted to recipes using a single color. As she describes in the Times “the rainbow of my dreams: a white polar-bear cocktail, a black truffle pizza, a blue lobster roll, violet mashed potatoes with cassis. . . .” Blue lobster? Naturally blue crustaceans are incredibly rare (about one in a million) so she must mean that the flesh has been rendered azure somehow. This is something I need to know more about.

Freakishly colored food has always brought joy into my life, and the more shades of blue employed the better. Of course, my dabbling leans more towards tasty monstrosities like blue velvet cake not “cobalt blue flying-fish roe mounded on top of a marrow bone and peas and grated carrots suspended in a square of agar-agar.” Preservative laden or certified organic, it doesn’t matter to me—I’ll take green Hostess Sno-Balls and rainbow chard.

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Jul 16

Melts in Your Mouth, Not on Your Hand

I don’t make a habit out of watching I Propose. In fact, I’d never seen an episode until Friday while flipping through the channels. With a description like, “A man makes a memorable dinner,”  I knew there would be high likelihood of a food-ring combo. There was, but I have to say that frugal as I tend to be, this wannabe groom's $1,000 jewelry budget was a little dismaying.

I_propose_box

Apparently, these chocolate boxes are commonplace so I’ll be desensitized when I inevitably encounter the next cocoa-based vessel.

While only indirectly using food as a ruse, at least #11 on this list of marriage proposal ideas doesn't involve chocolate (starch-lovers might also enjoy #26, involving a baked potato).

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Jul 13

Dressler

M.Y.O.B. shouldn’t be an acronym flitting through your mind while dining. I was off put and on edge during nearly my entire meal at Dressler and it had nothing to do with the food or service.

Sometimes context is everything. Dressler is the second venture in my recent mission to try brand new and no longer new but avoided-by-me restaurants. Momofuku Ssam has yet to be braved. The modly ornate room (I did appreciate the streamlined metalwork chandeliers and backlit curlicues) was only about a third full at 9pm on a Saturday. Hardly jumping. Maybe that’s why being seated one foot from two human irritants felt more pronounced.

If you think I’m about to embark on an anti-hipster tirade, you would be wrong. Sure, that ilk can be a nuisance but they’re too self-absorbed to concern themselves with others in the manner of the unpleasant middle aged New Jersey couple (or Brooklyn Brooklyn or Staten Island. I can’t tell my regional accents apart—or certain ethnicities. This implies deep idiocy on my part but I find a lot of crossover between vaguely suburban Italians and Jews. Think of the Costanzas. These two could’ve been either) I was saddled with. The male half wouldn’t stop staring at us and the definitely-not-his-better half couldn’t stop commenting on everyone around us, particularly the couple on our other side with a similarly strong accent. The second we sat down my mood started darkening.

I’ve always attributed staring and speaking disparagingly of other diners as a French trait (it’s happened more times than you’d ever imagine). Who else would have the audacity to pen a book about why they don’t get fat. Keep ze eyes on ze own plate, n’est pas?

Salmon_saladThey clearly weren’t thrilled to have me squeezing my ass past their nearly touching table (and I made quite a point of scrutinizing the female’s derriere when she uncomfortably squeaked through the same narrow space when leaving). But the woman really couldn’t contain her horror when the easy going forty-something couple on my left began splitting three desserts. In between the not-so-stifled grumbling I made out, “she needs to work out.”  The dessert-and-a-half eater was tall and large but definitely not fat.

My blood start boiling. It’s creepy to see grown women who so clearly deprive themselves on daily basis (and no one cares) to look “good” i.e. skinny, haggard and old (taking butterface to a new level) get obviously unraveled at a female of a similar age having fun with no thought to their figure.

HalibutI’d had a few drinks before arriving, started off with a mint julep-esque Coal Miner’s Daughter (Old Grand Dad Bourbon, mint, lemon), and consequently wasn’t doing a good job of hiding my own disgust. I really don’t like confrontation, and James hates it more than anything, we’re a great passive couple. But it was all I could do to keep from asking the petty clientele to please shut the fuck up.

James and I both ended up ordering uncharacteristically. Heirloom tomatoes with tapanade? So not him. I never ever order greenmarket porno dishes like the halibut with fava beans, sugar snap peas and asparagus. Light, girly, a bit too springy for July. Even my glass of Gruner Veltliner felt strange—I tend to drink darker, heavier wines. Subconsciously, I was scared of the wrath on my right side if I’d ordered the fresh bacon like I normally might. That’s how distracted I was by our gauche neighbors.

Peanutbrittle My rich smoked salmon and crème fraiche salad did remedy things a bit. Our shared peanut brittle ice cream, chocolate cake mélange was straight desserty. I needed something soothing (I also had a glass of sherry) and it wasn’t the evening for black pepper ice cream or rhubarb rose soup. Thankfully, the too concerned twosome had left by this point so there was no need to avoid evil eyes and barely audible chiding.

TrufflesI left feeling like something was amiss. The food was solid but when I dine at this price I want that intangible extra. There must be a reason why Dressler was sparsely populated when Diner and Marlow and Sons down the street were at full capacity (not that it’s a good reason—I don’t feel inclined to tap into that whole unfancy fancy schtick…yet). They suffer from a bit of an identity crisis. What do you do with the older crews who dismissively proclaim aloud “next time I’m reading the reviews first” and the clueless youngsters who sit, see the menu and promptly leave?

Dressler * 149 Broadway, Brooklyn, NY

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Jul 11

Can You ‘Stand’ One More?

Last month I was convinced that the last thing the world needed was another Red Hook ball fields article. Or so I thought until I was asked to write one (actually the second for the same publication but whatever). Allow me to present you with “Stand and Deliver” (I’m not putting their quotes around Stand). Ok, I’ll be the first to admit the round up breaks no new ground (I wrote way more than what’s included and the photographer took hundreds of photos). But short and snappy is what the ol’ New York Post is known for, so no surprises.

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