Flabbergasted

Around 430pm I received a text from my husband "is there any dinner planned?" - initially I was a little confused, so I called him; he repeated his question...I told him that I planned to make the eggplant; so he said what else; I said maybe some rice; he wanted to know what kind of rice and what else we were going to have.  I qualified my response saying that I didn't want to prepare a lot of food because there were some miscellaneous leftovers in the fridge.  He said ok. 

I wasn't sure why he posed the question; perhaps he wanted to save me the hassle and take us out to dinner; it certainly couldn't be because dinners are few and far between.  Whatever the reason, I had an overwhelming sense of pressure to prepare a decent meal and all I had to work with is eggplant. 

Generally I fry lightly battered eggplant - the kids love it and will eat it any time of the day.  I had envisioned frying the eggplant and making some rice & beans.  All of sudden, that seemed like a bad plan.  I thought about some sort of Thai fried rice but I didn't think I had the appropriate ingredients on hand.  I pulled an Asian cookbook off the shelf and looked up aubergine - everything seemed to involve more effort than I was willing to put forth. 

I mixed up a sauce similar to what I use for escebeche and then started chopping onions, garlic, ginger, and scallions.  I cut the eggplant into strips (kind of like french fries), fried them, removed from pan, sauteed the veggies, added crushed red pepper, then seitan, the sauce, corn starch, and then the eggplant.  We ate it topped with scallions over rice.  I think I used a little too much sauce, but everyone happily ate every bit. 

They say the sons of Adam can never be satisfied...they always want a little more.

Scrap soup

I think I'm coming down with something...I'm beat, my nose is runny, and my throat is starting to itch...instead of doing something constructive or resting, I made duck soup.  I simmered the heads and feet for about an hour or so...then I sauteed onions, garlic, scallions, and ginger...I added celery and carrots, let that simmer a bit more with the carcass and then added the half head of cabbage.  I pulled some old wonton skins out of the freezer and made a filling out of the remaining duck (back), scallions, cilantro, soy sauce, and rice vinegar. 

Although my soup was not as robust as the peking duck soup I get in Yonkers; I am especially pleased that no part of that duck went to waste.

Ordinary organ

Last night I mentioned that liver would've been on the menu in the 18th century and just about everyone commented that they like liver.  I asked my husband to go to Whole Foods to pick up the grass fed local beef liver I saw for $3.99/lb...they only had two pieces, which ended up being plenty.
I soaked the liver in milk while I made a pot of jasmine rice; sauteed onions; and heated up the pepper pot.  I drained the liver, seasoned, and popped it in the marinator for a few minutes.  I coated it with the pan searing flour I picked up from Wegmans and pan fried with butter and olive oil.  I made a little gravy, quickly smothered the liver and served. 

My son's soccer buddy exclaimed that the pepper pot was the best soup he ever tasted; he also enjoyed the meat and requested seconds...only then did we reveal that it was liver. 

Underlying concern

Clearly the average person knows that something is not quite right with our food; they just don't know why.

After dinner I showed the guests the duck pieces and it stimulated a very interesting conversation.  My mom was excited that I had a fresh duck; my grandmother mentioned how cooking poultry is faster now because animals don't walk around on the ground anymore; they all started wondering about the huge breasts on chicken.  My grandmother also wondered why they are making us eat grain fed beef.  I took the opportunity to enlighten them about meat and dairy production.  As I described the feedlots and chicken houses, my mom wondered if any food was safe to eat. Eureka...she now understands why I shop where I do.  But as I discovered Friday, even that is romanticized...it's no wonder why my Indonesian friend travels from King of Prussia to South Philadelphia to go grocery shopping. 

The conversation shifted to produce; no one could recall the last time they had a real tomato, plum, or nectarine. They hadn't realized that most of the produce has undergone some genetic modification because our food production system has been hijacked by industry and chemical companies.  We have shed the shackles of agrarian life..welcome to post-industrial society.

We talked about the whole gamut, from factory farm to table. My mom wondered why the food wasn't labeled to keep us informed. They said no wonder everyone has all these unexplained illnesses. They couldn't fathom why this would be done to the food that is supposed to sustain us.

Overly ambitious

The menus at the A Taste of History exhibit provided lots of insight into colonial fare.  In the colonial period, meals would have been influenced by seasonality, economic status, and cultural interpretations.  Philadelphia, as the birthplace of the nation, was at the crossroads of cultures - English, French, West Indian/African, and Native American - as well as influences from the many ethnic groups that called Philadelphia home.  With that in mind, I planned what I initially thought to be a straightforward meal - crab cakes, pepper pot, fish, duck, and root vegetables. 

I got started around 10am, however despite spending $130 yesterday for this meal, I needed a few items, so my husband went to Acme; in the interim I made up the crab cakes (back fin) and simmered the beef brisket.  My daughter made the chocolate cake and then got started chopping vegetables.  For the pepper pot, I simmered onions, garlic, scallions, shallots, and ginger; then added tomatoes, yuca, jicama, calabaza, the brisket, cabbage, and spinach.  It was after 2pm and I still had a lot more to do. 

I cut the head and the feet off of the ducks (my son wants to take them in for show and tell) and seasoned inside in out; for enhanced flavor I put celery, garlic, shallots, thyme, ginger, lemon, and dried cherries in the cavity and roasted that on high convection heat (not quite the 600 degree fire but close enough).  It was getting late and I was beginning to worry that my meal would not be ready by the time my 4 guests arrived.  It seemed so simple when I conceptualized it.  I reminded myself that it was simple considering that in the 18th century I would have been doing this daily with a wood fire instead of the luxury of a convection oven.

When I got started with the fish, it was clear that I was over doing it but I proceeded as planned.  I seasoned the bass inside and out then stuffed with peppers, scallions, garlic, shallots, celery, and thyme.  When the duck was finished I put the fish in the oven and low and behold there was grease fire (now we're talking 18th century); I kept slicing the root vegetables (turnips, rutabagas, parsnips, carrots) while my husband battled the flames.  I seasoned and tossed the vegetables with the garlic et al.  The fire was out so I put the veggies in the fish in the oven and hoped that everything would be ready by 5pm. 

My grandmother arrived with a cake and some cookies, so we set up a dessert table.  At 515pm I melted butter so that I could make the crab cakes for the first course.  I served the pepperpot in a tureen with the crab cakes on a platter alongside of it; I totally forgot about the symmetry when I placed the food on the table.  I also forgot that the second course should have been pies; instead it was fish, vegetables, and duck.  My grandmother reminded me that I told her I wasn't making anything complicated; theoretically it wasn't complicated, it just required more prep than I considered.

We followed our meal with dessert, cider, eggnog, and hot tea.  Everyone enjoyed the food and the accompanying history lesson; I'm just not sure where this meal, with only 5 dishes, would rank on the 18th century socioeconomic hierarchy.

Traumatized

The supermarket totally disconnects us from food production (and seasonality).  When you walk into a Whole Foods, you are greeted by flowers and embraced with a warm sense of home. The produce is colorful and inviting.  As much as I am constantly talking about getting connected with the source of food, I don't think I had any idea what that really meant until I went to the Hung Vuong supermarket for some bargain shopping.

Initially I was excited; I was able to procure the authentic vegetables for my pepper pot, including calabaza, jicama, and real spinach and I got a whole bag of scotch bonnet for $1.39.  The excitement quickly dissipated when I approached the seafood department.  I went over to the fish counter and was greeted by a pseudo aquarium. Fish, eel, and mollusks swimming in water. I wanted trout but settled for striped bass, as it was the only wild fish available.  I looked at the meat counter and was mortified; no part of the pig goes to waste, including the blood, the uteri, and the stomach - waste not want not. 

At this point I was beginning to feel a bit too connected to food. The poultry section had old and young chickens and of course duck. The duck were reasonable, $2.49 per pound. It was at this moment that it was clear that I am just as disconnected from my food as the next person.  I have never hunted nor gathered anything. I buy food in nice packaging, shielded from reality.  Well reality is a duck in a plastic bag and when I say duck, that's exactly what I mean, beak and webbed feet included.

All in the family

In 1621 there was a gathering; the pilgrims and Wampanoag people shared in the harvest and signed a treaty.  It is in this romantic spirit that thanksgiving is remembered, as a time of sharing...no one mentions a broken treaty and subsequent wars - 1621 was actually a harvest festival and the first thanksgiving was declared following the massacre of the Pequot tribe in 1637. 

In the United States people have been giving thanks on the fourth Thursday in November since 1863; it became a national holiday in 1941, and has traditionally marked the onset of the Christmas shopping season.  Philadelphia has the nation's oldest thanksgiving day parade - it began in 1920 by Gimbel's department store...thanksgiving has been historically enmeshed in consumption - land, food, and consumer goods (mostly electronics in modern times). 

To the average family, none of this really matters - thanksgiving is a time for sharing, spending time with family, and being thankful for the many blessings of the previous years.  It has also become a time of remembrance and generosity - many families do not have the luxury to sit down at a table overflowing with food.

When we returned from the parade I made puttanesca.  My son asked if we were going to my Aunt Mary's - I said I would call her - he said, why do you have to call her, we can go there anytime...it was at that moment that I understood what thanksgiving meant for my children.  He was absolutely right; on any given "holiday" my Aunt Mary prepared a table full of food and had a house full of people - an open invitation.  I immediately dashed downstairs, made a key lime pie - my daughter suggested that i make cookies because key lime pie is an acquired taste, so I baked a batch of cookies.

We had a great time as usual at Aunt Mary's, lots of good food (turkey, roast beef, ham, greens, string beans, candied yams, mac & cheese, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and rolls)  and hilarious conversation.  I exchanged the cookies for a sweet potato pie (she makes at least 10 every thanksgiving).  We then went to my mother-in-law's - at 7pm they were just sitting down to eat (turkey, ham, fried chicken, greens, string beans, mashed sweet potatoes, mac & cheese, pasta salad, fried eggplant, sauteed zucchini, and rolls).  We chit-chatted, watched the football game, and then I pulled out the key lime pie - although some wondered why it wasn't green, it was a hit. 

Tomorrow I'll make turkey salad from the remaining 1/2 breast...although cranberries are a northern hemisphere bog fruit, sadly there wasn't any sauce on either table.

What's for dinner?

I was pleasantly surprised when I stumbled across "A Taste of History," an exhibit at the Rosenbach Museum & Library.  This museum is in a 19th century townhouse and is rich in print material. 

The exhibit uses these materials (novels, children's books, handbooks, menus, receipt books, prints) to provide a glimpse into what people ate and how it was prepared in the 18th century.  The lecture was timely because we are approaching the annual multi-course meal that we call Thanksgiving which is reminiscent of everyday life in the 18th century, only without modern conveniences such as refrigeration and ovens; instead people used fire for cooking and salt (sugar, drying, and smoking) for preservation.  In addition, the answer to that question was based on what had been preserved or was seasonally available; the modern time/space compression of agriculture did not exist.

The lecture conjured up memories of baking in a Dutch oven over a camp fire; salt fish; brine roasted chicken; duck, and game meat.  This may be an oxymoron but I'm ready to pull out my bread machine and the dehydrator attachment for my oven - I want to bake artisan bread and dry fruit but I certainly have no inclination to do it the old fashioned way. 

Imagine my surprise when I heard that oysters and lobsters were considered poor food. Shelling out big bucks for a lobster tail or oysters on the half shell  is telling of modern times, especially when considering the relatively low cost of oysters in Bluffton and lobster in Maine.

Modernity and Its Discontents is the title of a political science course that examines the impact the IR (Industrial Revolution) and the FR (French Revolution) had on everyday life, particularly the rising bourgeoisie.  This exhibit added another dimension - food. 

Regional fare

To categorize food as African is a bit of a folly because Africa is not a country, it's a continent.  More importantly, the political boundaries that were imposed during the Scramble for Africa do not reflect the cultural realities of the landscape.  The cuisine that exists is a hybrid of the original cultures with a hint of influence from the colonial powers that dominated the continent for so long.  Though there are similarities within regions (east, north, west, south); each country has its own flare.  I'm going to classify tonight's dinner as West African.  The move from South America to Africa is not that drastic considering that both continents are south of 30 degrees latitude; hence not only is the vegetation similar, but the legacy of extraction, exploitation, and purposeful underdevelopment is also a commonality.

We finished off the Eid last night by having dinner at a rodizio. I was shocked that my son aka "carb boy" exhibited a more carnivorous side as he devoured flank steak, leg of lamb, and beef ribs.  Although I was stuffed, I was underimpressed with my picanha (largely because I kept wondering about where/how it's produced) and I knew I had to do something to put our bodies back in balance.  Unfortunately I couldn't attempt a vegetarian cleanse because I had taken lamb chops out of the freezer.  However, I could attempt to balance all of that meat with some alkaline vegetables.

That's how I crossed the pond to the gateway of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.   

I marinated the chops in bizaara, garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, and cilantro.  For the veggies I wanted to go heavy on garlic and onions so I did kale (with colored peppers) and okra (with ginger)...and for good measure I pressure cooked yams and acorn squash in coconut milk and ginger. I also made a side salad, which my son devoured.   He later exclaimed that dinner was delicious.  Not only did it taste good, it smelled good - my neighbor called to ask what I was cooking because she smelled it when she pulled into her driveway. 

Although tasty, the lamb was an accompaniment, with the vegetables taking center stage.  This is probably more in line with how dinner should be.  If we had to hunt and gather everything we ate, dinner would take on a entirely different form.

Aji y pollo

Peruvian food seems to be underrepresented (and possibly misrepresented) online. Based on what I had in Miami, the online recipes seem to have way too much going on. Today I searched for the green sauce and found a range of recipes, which again didn't quite seem like what I had. I'm not claiming to be an expert after having one lunch, but I will be contacting my friend so I can get some insight into authenticity (her father is Peruvian).


Since the soup was such a big hit, I went with roasted chicken (again recipes varied widely so I made up my own thing). I scored drumsticks then added garlic, paprika, cumin, olive oil, vinegar, lime - I couldn't resist adding a bit of my standard seasonings as well...I put that in the marinator and let it sit in the fridge for 2 hours. For the green sauce I blended jalapeno, scallion, cilantro, lime, garlic, olive oil, salt - in the back of my mind I was thinking of hara masala and green seasoning and wondering if you can find a variant of this condiment around the world.

I served the soup from yesterday with salad (I transformed a traditional garden salad into Peruvian fare by adding corn and I made a guava vinaigrette - olive oil, guava nectar, vinegar, seasonings) and some Portuguese bread. Then I brought out the chicken (convection roasted) which I topped with sauteed onions and peppers. We ate the aji with everything (I wish I had added another pepper).  We thoroughly enjoyed this vibrant meal...now we just need to confirm the authenticity. 

A taste of Peru

On the way home from our Girl Scout program, I realized that not only did I not prepare anything for dinner, but my daughter led song workshops for 2 hours with nothing to drink.  She requested chicken soup with big noodles like my mom makes when I get sick.  I had a better idea.

I started by sauteeing mirepoix (purchased from TJ for convenience sake); added a chopped head of garlic; semi-minced ginger; and a sliver of a habanero.  I added some broth and some boneless thighs from the freezer and then the yuca.  I seasoned and let it simmer...after I added the cilantro, the family was drawn in, in anxious anticipation they kept asking when it would be ready. 

As soon as my husband tasted the aguadito de pollo, he remembered our pit stop in Miami...this time we used lime, habanero, and scallions as condiments.  Sitting at the table, I remembered picking up a pack of frozen guanabana pulp from Wegmans.  I blended that with evaporated milk, water, and sugar and although I think it smells a little funky, it's very good.  The kids were thrilled to share our vacation memory.

Amazing aroma

When sauteed, onions and tomatoes produce amazing aromas.  Many people say that you eat with your eyes first - the food should look appealing.  While I tend to stay away from food that looks blah, it is my nose that entices me.  The olfactory receptor is essentially how we "taste" food, so it makes sense that aroma draws people in...hence puttanesca. 

That tangy sauce just tantalizes me...preparing it, smelling it, tasting it...it has become one of my favorites.  Yesterday I had it over Ronzoni Smart Taste thin spaghetti (don't get me started again about how complicated pasta has become).  I have a new quick recipe that is bursting with flavor.  I was in Wegman's and realized that at $7.49/lb the Mediterranean Olive Bar was a much better choice than jarred olives...I also picked up some roasted garlic - not only was that a time saver, but it was an excellent flavor enhancer.  I cut yet another corner by purchasing canned crushed tomatoes with Italian seasonings...needless to say, all I had to do was saute the onion, olives, capers, and anchovies, and toss everything else in the pot...I simmered for a bit and voila - a pleasurable dish.

Today, it was onions and tomatoes again.  I wanted to thank my colleagues for their support so I made timtimo.  It was a crowd pleaser.  Not only is it a great vegetarian option, but it's aromatic and flavorful.  I brought it in a crock pot, which drew passersby into my office with inquiries.  Sharing this food brought me joy, particularly because everyone willingly used their injera as a utensil.  The injera was so fresh that I never used the kisra that I bought.

Of course I had to make another batch for the family...now I must explore the food of the neighboring countrymen that occupy the Horn (yes, I'm including Sudan).

Comforting cookies

Somehow I have fallen victim to this notion of comfort food.  This idea is reproduced in many ways in our everyday lives.  There's a host of foods that elicit warm and fuzzy feelings:  chicken soup for colds; homemade baked goods for school events; hot chocolate on a cold day; and of course apple pie.  We are embarking on that time of year - egg nog, tins of cookies, and turkey soup...comfort food season - we will plump up as we prepare for the cold weather in the midst. 

I have been wanting a fresh baked good for days.  In a state of desperation I made a batch of Pillsbury Simply cookies last Thursday.  My daughter called me out.  She wanted to know the origin of the uniformed shaped cookies...she kept saying, they're on your plate, but you don't make chocolate chip cookies without oatmeal...she also said that the aroma was different.  I had to confess - I said I did it for the box top. 

This morning I ran into a stumbling block and the only cure I could think of was to make a batch of Doubletree cookies.  I had everything I needed at home except oats and eggs.  I whipped the cookies together threw them in the oven and smiled as I was enveloped by the aroma. 

As I ate several cookies grinning like a chessy cat, it occurred to me that this may be a recipe for an eating disorder. 

Souper

I was feeling a bit defeated today but I knew that was no excuse to order out.  I tried to think of something I could prepare relatively quickly that would be comforting as well...soup is a food that soothes the senses.  I had asked my husband to pick up a butternut squash and an acorn squash; instead he bought 4 butternuts and 2 acorns.  Clearly I had no choice but to make butternut squash soup.

I am certain that I have made this soup many times in the past...but my soup making days were almost a decade ago...so I gave it my best shot.  Sauteed onions in butter (of course), added celery, then peeled and cubed two squash...I decided to get daring and added a potato and an apple.  I wasn't sure if I was going for sweet or savory, so I decided to make the seasonings savory. 

Once the vegetables were tender, I pureed with my stick blender (leaving a little texture) and was too tickled with my creation.  The aroma filled the air and I was overcome by a sense of relief.  I ladled some soup into a bowl and folded in a little heavy cream and topped with nutmeg. 

The soup is pleasant and has dimension...for a moment, the complexity of the soup allowed me to escape the complexity of my life.