FOOD ON THE FOOD

I Made Pim’s Pad Thai

And it rocked.  It took a while to get through the multi-page tutorial, but it was worth it.  I had to make a few changes since I seem to have misplaced my wok (as well as the bottom of my Springform pan — anyone seen it?), I couldn’t find pickled turnips, and I steadfastly refused to cook up one portion at a time.  I’m cooking four portions at the same time, and you’ll like it.  We really did, actually!

I have the technique and amounts I used written down, but I’m not posting it because I’m not sure what the etiquette is for riffing on other people’s blog recipes without permission.  I riff on magazine recipes all the time, so I know those rules: adapt it slightly, credit conspicuously, and then hope Condé Nast has bigger fish to fry than suing me and my stupid blog. 

But since blogs have no hard and fast rules, I’m armed with only my own bad judgment as a guide.  And bloggers are a feisty bunch.  I’m not sure we’d take it to the courtroom, but we just might take it to the playground.  So the big question is: Can Pim kick my ass? 

I’m pretty sure she can, so I’m not posting it until either I hear back from her, or someone convinces me that attribution and linkage is enough.  Or I start lifting weights.

Something for the Men

I love when my dad comes over because it means I won’t have to think too hard afterwards to come up with a blog entry.  His latest visit was no exception:

Him: When are you going to post some real recipes?

Me: What do you mean?

Him: You know, some manly recipes.  Nothing crazy like Mulliga-whatever-it-was.

Me: You think my recipes are...too girly?

Him: Yes, too girly.  Where’s the meat?

At first, I was offended.  There was a little bit of chicken in the mulligatawny, after all.  And, okay, maybe coconut milk is a tad girly, but that’s what the spices are for.  To put some hair on those breasts.  But, I mean, this is coming from a man who takes his margaritas frozen with no salt, and only when piña coladas and strawberry daiquiris aren’t on the menu.  Who are you calling a girl?

But then, I realized he had a point.  Where is the meat?  I checked my recipe archives and the only things containing meat were the borscht and the Chinese dumplings.  Except they're meat mixed with vegetables, which might as well be tofu. 

Have I gone stark raving mad?  Have the Californians finally forced upon me the Kool-Aid?  Because I can totally put away Sloppy Joes like nobody’s business.  We just haven’t gotten to that part of the family cookbook, yet.

Anyway, I’m somewhat ashamed of myself.  So, to make amends, here’s a manly recipe of the manliest sort.  It’s something even my dad should be able to master.

Sink Dogs

1 hot dog (or more)
Hot tap water

Jab hot dog with fork.  Run under hot water until it’s, you know, hot.  Eat straight from the fork.

Suggestion: Use Hebrew National if you want God on your side.

By the Transitive Property. Or Something.

Maybe if my blog were prettier, I’d have won an Oscar. 

Oh, wait, I do have a pretty blog now.  Woo hoo!  Thanks Ximena of La Brigada Langostera (Translation: Lobstersquad).  Joder, tia, que tipo de drogas estas tomando?  (Translation: You rock!). 

It seems only fitting that my Oscar-worthy new masthead was illustrated by someone whose blog name references Annie Hall.  And, as everyone knows, but I still had to look up, Annie Hall won four Oscars in 1977.

I dare say next year may be my year to break out that Oscar speech, after all.

Everyone Should Have An Oscar Speech

Everyone should have an Oscar speech prepared and ready, just in case.  You never know when you might need it.  It doesn’t matter if you’re not in the film industry — there are other awards out there you can win.  It’s your job to win them.  You can bring your own red carpet.

I’ve had my Oscar speech ready for years.  Never mind that I can’t act and, in fact, hate it when people so much as look at me.  Who cares that I’m two years behind everyone else when it comes to watching the latest movies because someone keeps inserting Leprechaun in the Hood in front of my picks in the Netflix queue.  Yeah, I wrote a screenplay.  Big deal.  Who hasn’t?

But, little did I know that my opportunity to break out my Oscar speech passed me by fairly recently.  It happened at culinary school.  At the graduation ceremony, they gave out a very special “Blossom Award” (no joke, that’s what it was called) to someone who showed exceptional progress over the course of the year.  In my case, it was the realization that cooking is not, in fact, magic as I had previously thought. 

The Blossom Award, though cute when you’re in second grade, isn’t so much when you’re 30.  Anyway, I won, and by running up, grabbing my award without so much as a handshake, and then running back to my chair to hide, I squandered what may have been my only opportunity to bask in the glory of a major award. 

Here’s what I should have done:

I should have worn my Oscar dress.  I bought it on eBay.  It has lots of sequins. 

When I inevitably tripped on the heels of my Payless flats, I would say something about how I do my own stunts.  After a few seconds of awkward silence, during which I survey the 40 or so pairs of eyes looking in my direction, I would mutter something incomprehensible, and then put a shout out to my public school teachers.  All of them, by name, because they never get their due.  People like:

Ms. Cottrell, kindergarten, Mattaponi Elementary School
Ms. Trafiro, 1st grade, Mattaponi Elementary School
Ms. Johnson, 2nd grade, Mattaponi Elementary School
Mrs. Miller, 3rd grade, Mattaponi Elementary School
Mr. Cameron, music, Mattaponi Elementary School
Mrs. Morrissey, 4th grade, Fulton School
Mr. Fay, 5th grade, Fulton School
Mrs. McElligott, 6th grade, Fulton School
Mrs. Day, Spanish, South Braintree Middle School
Mrs. Sollugub, art, South Braintree Middle School
Ms. Skill, algebra and trigonometry, Braintree High School
Ms. Driscoll, Spanish, Braintree High School
Ms. Cosgrove, English, Braintree High School
Mrs. Cunningham, English, Braintree High School
Ms. Devaney, English, Braintree High School

I would talk about how I hated Ms. Devaney because she gave me the C that I deserved.  And I was so mad about it that I totally applied myself and worked hard ever since.  What a bitch.  I sure showed her.

Then I’d thank pancakes for improving my life.  And tequila.  Ditto for bourbon.  Of course, I’d thank my family because they’re sitting two feet in front of me in the audience.  I mean, to forget them, how rude would that be?

I’ll tell you who I wouldn’t thank.  I wouldn’t thank the producers, directors, and fellow cast members at my culinary school.  Because I can tell them in person over Champagne and caviar at the after-party.  Or with a hand-written note that they can cherish forever.  They like it much better than way.  And if they don’t, then they have their millions to help ease the sting.  Okay, hundreds?

Then I’d somehow finish with one second left on the clock just to get the conductor guy off his high horse (even though, let’s face it, thank goodness for the conductor guy).  Of course, I’d trip again on the way back to my seat.  From there, I’d just sit back and let the vicious assault on my outfit unfold.

Cookbook Friday: Passatellis

A park in New Haven circa 1941.  From left, Dora Barbaresi (my grandmother), pregnant sister Jean [Barbaresi] Borrelli, mother Lydia Barbaresi, and sister Edith [Barbaresi] Piccolo.  Lydia died when I was a baby, but I do remember my Auntie Jean and Aunt Edith (both great-aunts to me).  I thought Jean was very nice, but Edith scared the hell out of me!

What, you’ve never heard of passatellis?  Neither has anyone else.  Nonni pronounces it “passa-TAYS.”  It’s a tubular pasta made from breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese that is served in chicken soup.  This is another old recipe from the 1800's, passed down from the Polverari/Belbusti families of Castelvecchio in the Marches region.  It evolved as an ingenious way of using up stale bread. 

Growing up in the 1980's, I got used to the inevitable blank stares I'd receive when describing the Italian food that Nonni cooked for us.  Sauceless pasta?  In soup?  It was as if I were Laotian trying to pass myself off as Italian.  But, what of lasagna, manicotti, and ziti, they would inquire at recess?  Well, Nonni made those, too, I clarified, but the pasta we hold most dear comes in soup.  Then, they would beat me up.

Only a small handful of people in our family know how to make passatellis.  Nonni freezes and bags them in big batches, but only the lucky ones get to bring them home!

Passatellis

I’m not sure how they shape them in Italy, but Nonni uses a meat grinder to extrude the noodles.  You could also use the meat grinding attachment on your stand mixer.

4 cups plain breadcrumbs
3 cups Parmesan cheese
Pinch of nutmeg
Pinch of lemon zest
8 large eggs

In a large bowl or pot, mix breadcrumbs with cheese, nutmeg, and zest.  Add eggs and mix thoroughly until cohesive dough forms.  Make into small balls (about 2 inches in diameter) and set aside in a covered bowl. 

One by one, put balls through a meat grinder to form thick strands.  Cut strings to about 4- to 6-inch lengths and lay them out on the table to dry for several hours before cooking.  To freeze, let them dry overnight before storing. 

Serve in Nonni’s chicken soup.  To cook, bring soup to a boil and add fresh or frozen strands (no need to defrost).  Cook until done, about 3 minutes.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Nonni’s homemade passatellis.  Photo by Trish Barker.

Next Recipe: Tomato Sauce

     (Previous Recipe: Chicken Soup)

Paris Hilton Reads My Blog?

I had a dream that Paris Hilton commented on my blog.  Wow, the most talented person in Hollywood, reading my humble blog?  Of all the wildest fantasies my subconscious chose to indulge.

First of all, I’m pretty sure Paris Hilton can’t read.  Secondly, I’m doubly sure Paris Hilton can’t cook.  Finally, I’m almost positive she can’t afford a computer (but maybe someone told her about the public library).  So why would she even be reading my blog?  The pretty pictures?

But, she was going on and on in the comment section, in uncharacteristically articulate fashion.  Wish I could remember what she was saying.  But, unfortunately, I was roused by screaming in the other room, and when I clawed my way back into bed for leftover dreams, Ms. Hilton had morphed into a bikini-clad circus bear on a unicycle who kept jabbing me with a hot poker every time I tried to sit down.  I have no idea what that means.

Now, I’m not much for celebrity gossip, usually.  It makes me insanely jealous just thinking about all of the delicious food that big-name celebrities get to eat, if only with their eyes.  Needless to say, I’m not really up on who’s having whose love child, or what color hair Britney Spears has these days.  So, I was pretty pissed that Paris Hilton even made it into my dream.  The screening process is getting looser and looser, it seems. 

Where’s Simon Cowell when you really need him?

Paint Chips Are Delicious

Lately, I'€™ve been doing some painting.  Not artistic, watercolor-on-paper type of painting.  I don't have those kinds of mad skills.  No, just the application of a single color onto a few walls in more or less of a straight line.  I'm not skilled in this, either, but with enough "shits" and "goddamnits," the paint eventually sticks.

So, I recently painted both our bathrooms.  I wasn't going to mention it because it didn't seem particularly relevant to the very strict food theme I follow in this here blog.  But, actually, it is.

It all started with a very conspicuous cotton-candy-pink bathroom.  I like the occasional cotton candy served up in a carnival setting, but I never like it on my walls.  I hate pink.  Can'€™t bear it.  And as soon as my one-year-old started pretending like he was going to sleep through the night, I committed myself to trading in those Pepto-Bismol walls for something more along the lines of a cool, refreshing green.  Not cucumber or lime, but maybe...apple green.  That was it. 

Off I went to my local Benjamin Moore supplier, and returned with a variety of delectable paint chips: APPLE GREEN.  PEAR GREEN.  GRAPE GREEN.  DILL PICKLE.  I made myself a little snack, and decided to go with the brightest of the four: APPLE GREEN.  Why not?

Wrong question. 

Neon green, as it turned out to be, is nearly as putrid as the aforementioned pink.  And in the windowless closet that is my bathroom, the effect was disturbing.  As if some secret, radioactive experiment had gone horribly wrong. 

But, since my one-year-old really had no intention of sleeping through the night, then or ever, I had plenty of quality time to repaint.  My downstairs bathroom is now a lovely shade of PEAR GREEN, which is vibrant and airy and doesn'€™t sear my retinas.

On the wall, Benjamin Moore's PEAR GREEN.  In the frame, Robert Spellman's yellow banana.

Moving on to my upstairs bathroom, I decided to veer away from scary bright colors and instead delve into scary dark colors.  Like brown.  That'€™s right, brown in the bathroom.  I live with three boys.  Might as well get used to it.  We narrowed it down to three: CHOCOLATE TRUFFLE.  MORNING COFFEE.  WARM BROWNIE.  Snack break, anyone?  My husband pushed hard for the coffee flavor, and so now I have to take back everything I said about caffeine.  It looks awesome smeared all over the walls.

Benjamin Moore's MORNING COFFEE.  On ice.

Which got me thinking about my kitchen.  Actually, my friend Erin, who knows about all things tasteful, got me thinking about my kitchen and how ugly my cabinets are.  Tactfully, of course.  Why not paint them?  Well, why not.  And while you'€™re at it, a fresh coat of paint on the walls wouldn't hurt, either?  Right, you are.

Six thousand yellow and off-white paint chips later, I've picked a cabinet color.  VANILLA ICE CREAM, naturally.  But, I'm still flummoxed by the wall color possibilities.  While HAWTHORNE YELLOW, WESTON FLAX, and CONCORD IVORY are lovely hues with proper New England names, I'€™m inexplicably drawn to FRESH BUTTER and GOLDEN HONEY.  It seems the only fair thing to do would be: FRESH BUTTER for the first coat, GOLDEN HONEY for the second coat, the same way I take my morning toast. 

Maybe I shouldn'€™t be picking my paint colors on an empty stomach? 

Or should I?  Come to think of it, we painted our dining room a sultry shade of SANGRIA, and I've never looked back.  The living room is LIGHT COCOA.  Our bedroom, SANDCASTLE.  Mmmm, gritty.

This might sound crazy, but have you ever wanted to lick your walls?  If so, I can testify that, under the right circumstances, plaster'€™s yummy.

Noble Rot

Okay, I have something to say and it’s not going to make me popular.  You see, everywhere I look — blogs, magazines, TV shows if I watched them — they all send the same message: Always use the freshest ingredients you can find.  And I think we’re taking this idea just a little bit too far. 

Yes, fresh ingredients are good.  Yes, they taste better.  But isn’t ALWAYS using them just a little extreme.  You can’t always have the epitomy of freshness.  Sooner or later, your greens are going to experience that not-so-fresh feeling and even the most absorbent Roca-Pads with wings aren’t going to be able to help.  So, are we just throwing these wilty greens away?  Nonsense.  (Actually, yes, my husband threw them away and I cursed him.)

So, from now on, let’s just amend ourselves to say: Use the freshest of ingredients only when it matters.  Like if you have one opportunity, and only one, to impress someone (like your insufferable mother-in-law!!!).  Or, if it’s your last supper.  Or if it’s summertime and fresh produce keeps dropping from the sky and hitting you in the face.  This is okay.  But for your average winter weekday meal for your dumb family?  I don’t think so.

Take last week.  I wasn’t going to say anything, but that rice pudding in the photo was made with expired cream.  That’s right: expired AND previously opened.  It smelled…a little funky.  But I suspected it was just the congealed stuff on the inside of the carton, and, lo and behold, once I poured it through a strainer to get rid of the lumps, it tasted totally fine.  (Kind of like when you’re making a crème anglaise and you cook it until just a few curdles form, you strain them out, and it’s totally way better than when those curdles were just a glimmer in your eye.  Don’t pretend like you don’t know what I’m talking about.)

Now, some of you might find yourself jumping to conclusions about the vomiting that wracked our household around the same time as the rice pudding consumption.  You can’t prove anything.  It was a virus, and do you know how I know?  Because I do this kind of thing all the time.  And rarely, if ever, do I vomit from my own cooking.  I only vomit in swanky, high-end restaurants where they use the freshest of ingredients.

So, the moral of this story is: stop being such a bunch of food snobs, you food snobs.  And, additionally, I’m now off the hook for having to cook for any of my friends or family ever again!

Yet Another Letter to Dunkin' Donuts

Dear Dunkin’ Donuts:

Okay, DD (can I call you that for short, now?), your time is up.  It has now been a very generous 60 days since my last letter and, still, your doughnuts are crap.  I take this to mean that you have no intention of improving your doughnuts and that, in fact, you were mocking me with your earlier letter. 

Fine.  Two can play that game.

Actually, I stink at that game.  So, I’ll make a deal with you.  Hand over the recipe for your original chocolate honey-dipped doughnuts, and I’ll stop with the letters.  If you’re not using it, you might as well donate it to a worthy cause.  And I can think of no cause more worthy than me: she who represents the doughnut-loving population you ignore. 

To sweeten the deal, I’ll even help you rename your coffee franchise to something more appropriate.  Something that takes the emphasis off the edible doughnuts you no longer possess.  I’ve already begun brainstorming.  To keep signage costs low, I’ve made every effort to build off of the existing words.  As a gesture of goodwill, here’s a sampling of what I’ve come up with so far:

For college towns:  Flunkin’ Donuts

Urban enclaves: Ain’t Dunkin’ No Donuts

Professional office buildings: Junk ‘n Joe…Nuts!

Everywhere else:  Just Coffee, OK.  What Do We Look Like, Rosie’s Bakery Or Something?

And while you’re at it, if you happen to have the original recipe for Chock Full o’ Nuts’ whole wheat doughnuts, I’ll take that, too.  Thanks.

Your Friend,

Tammy Donroe

There Are No Rules in Bread-Baking

I made some very weird bread the other day.  I used my usual French boule recipe from Julia Child (the one with all that unnecessary kneading, but I humored her anyway, rest her soul).  Everything started out okay.  But then, between doctor’s appointments and a wailing child, the timing wasn’t going to work out for baking it, so I punched it down (the dough, not the child) and put it for a second rise. 

Well, one errand led to another and by the time we got back, the dough was threatening to proof itself right through the kitchen windows.  By then, I needed bread-within-the-hour.  There was no time to deflate it and let it rise again.  Crap, I wondered, what would Jim Lahey of Sullivan Street Bakery do? 

So, I grabbed my still-untested copy of the now-ubiquitous No-Knead Bread recipe.  According to Step 4, he would dump it into a hot Dutch oven, cover with lid, and bake it at 425ºF.  What the hell, I thought, there are no rules in bread-baking anymore.  The results: a very weird loaf of bread.  Ridiculously crusty.  Short and stout.  Chewy, springy, holey, but not in a good way.  It was odd.  It did not look like this. 

Guess I shouldn’t have kneaded it, after all.

Note: This is not indicative of how the recipe would turn out if you followed more than just Step 4.  One should always go through all the steps of a seemingly endless 4-step process, no matter how ridiculous they might seem at the time.  And then blog about it at length.

Cookbook Friday: Chicken Soup

Or when your cable Internet goes down, Saturday (thanks, RCN).

Dora Barbaresi (my grandmother), on the right, around 1941, with her father, George, and older sister, Eva Blasi.

It’s hard to believe that Nonni (Dora) is younger in this picture than I am now, but I guess the camera doesn’t lie.  Is this the same woman who, in my recent memory, would feign a heart attack when the cops pulled her over for speeding?  Sure is.

She’d be in her early twenties here.  She spoke English and Italian fluently, although her parents got by speaking hardly any English.  New Haven was very Italian back then and her father was a member of the Marchigiano Club.  No ladies were allowed, and you peed into a trough right there at the bar.  Ah, the good old days.

Like the rest of her sisters, Dora couldn’t finish high school because she needed to help support the family.  All of the girls were smart, but their mother insisted that they go to work as soon as the law said they could.  Rumor has it that on more than one occasion, Dora fought to keep what she had worked so hard to earn in the dress shop. 

Several of her sisters, like Eva, were already married and starting families.  World War II was heating up, and Dora’s boyfriend, Freddie (whom she would later marry), was considering enlisting in the Army. 

Around this time, Dora’s sister, Anne, a platinum blonde, was sitting in the audience of the Miss New Haven beauty pageant when the judges pulled her onstage with the other contestants.  Their father, usually a mild-mannered man, was horrified.  “You’re beautiful,” he would say to his girls, “but you’re not supposed to brag.  You’re supposed to be quiet.  Act like a lady.”  But they made Anne go up, and she won.

 

Chicken Soup

This simple soup goes hand in hand with two of the family’s favorite pasta recipes coming up.  Nonni isn’t big on amounts, as she just uses what she has around the house, but this recipe will get you where you want to be.  She cuts her whole chicken in half because her pot isn’t big enough to accommodate a whole one.  She freezes the other for later use.

1 whole chicken (3-4 lb.), cut in half
2 cloves, pressed into chicken (not garlic cloves, actual spice cloves)
2 small onions, peeled and halved
2 ribs celery, cut into large pieces
2 carrots, cut into large pieces
Small can (14.5 oz.) of stewed tomatoes
Salt and pepper

Add all ingredients to a large pot and cover with water by two inches.  Bring to a boil, then cover, lower heat, and simmer for 1 hour.  Strain soup and set aside.  Reserve carrots and chicken (remove the cloves).  Cut carrots into chunks and pull off shreds of chicken meat with a fork to add to soup.  Season with salt and pepper.  Serve with cappellettis or passatellis, or freeze. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Next Recipe: Passatellis

     (Previous Recipe: Friselles)

Of Chickens and Morons

I used to think that the people who swarm to the grocery store at the first mention of snow were morons.  Can’t you live without your Ho Ho’s for a mere 24 hours?  Don’t you have a few cans of tuna fish somewhere? 

But I was wrong.  There is a worse kind of moron.  The sort of moron that knows we’re running low on milk, bread, feminine products, etc. a week before the snow is set to hit, and, still, no trips to the grocery store are made.  And when that special brand of New England slush starts falling from the sky, fusing itself to every possible surface, and then freezing solid so you’re encased in your own personal life-sized snow globe prison, well by then I’m too much of a wuss to fishtail my way to the moron store to stock up on all the moronic products that, apparently, only morons don’t have.

So, that’s how I found myself with nothing even remotely delicious in the house, trying to concoct dinner from the slim pickings I had in the pantry.  Rice.  Coconut milk.  Pumpkin pie filling.  Except that I can’t touch the pumpkin pie filling or an irate engineer will spontaneously crash through the ceiling with a ridiculous but fierce display of Kung Fu-ish flailing.  You can’t mess with the man’s pumpkin pie ingredients.

The refrigerator was completely empty.  We had finished off the condiments during our afternoon snack.  In the freezer, there were all kinds of mysterious things, but all I could immediately recognize were: 1) a lone freezer-burned chicken breast, and 2) a million kinds of stock.  So, what can you make with rice, coconut milk, chicken, and how about duck stock? 

Chicken Mulligatawny

1 Tbsp. canola oil
1 yellow onion, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1½ Sambhar curry powder
½ tsp. ground cumin
½ tsp. ground coriander
½ tsp. ground ginger
6 cups homemade yummy poultry stock of your choice
½ cup basmati rice
1 large chicken breast, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 cup coconut milk
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
¼ tsp. salt
¼ tsp. pepper
3 Tbsp. toasted, sliced almonds, optional

Heat oil in a large pot over medium-high heat.  Add onion, celery, and garlic, and cook, stirring often, until softened, about 5 minutes.  Add curry powder, cumin, coriander, and ginger, and cook a minute or two.  Add the stock and rice.  Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook uncovered for 12 minutes.

Add chicken, return to a simmer, and cook until chicken is done and rice is tender, about 8-10 minutes more.  Stir in coconut milk and return to a simmer.  Remove from heat, and stir in lemon juice, salt, and pepper.  Garnish with almonds, unless you’re a moron.

Source: Adapted from Eating Well.  The original recipe called for 2 diced Granny Smith apples, but the moron didn’t have any apples.  Plus, she wasn’t so sure about apples in her Mulligatawny.  So, instead, she decided to use full-fat coconut milk in place of the “lite” coconut milk originally listed in the recipe, and just call it even.

Un Dia Muy Especial

My husband sure knows how to sweet-talk me.

So, power to my Spanish-speaking readers!  To continue the theme on this very special day, a little link love while I attempt to give my dad his money’s worth from my very expensive and somewhat useless college education. 

Here is a guide to some fun food blogs with their names translated neatly into Spanish.  The list is in no particular order, except for the first one, which I love, and I'm not ashamed to say it.

Un Introduccion a Los Blogos de Comida Que Ya Conocemos

I’m Mad and I Eat:  Estoy Muy Enfadado con el Presidente, pero Todavia Tengo Hambre

Matt Bites: Mateo le Gusta Masticar Todas Las Cosas

Smitten Kitchen: Estoy Muy Enamorada de Mi Propia Cocina

Is My Blog Burning?: Ayudame.  Mi Blogo Esta Quemando.  Donde Estan Los Bomberos?

Jumbo Empanada: Empanada Gigante (she had a leg up on this one)

A Finger in Every Pie: Los Dedos en Todos Los Pasteles

Chubby Hubby: Esposo Gordito (Look, I even made it rhyme!)

A Chicken in Every Granny Cart: Un Pollo en Los Carros de Todos Los Abuelos

Urban Drivel: Yo Vivo en la Ciudad y a Veces la Comida se Cae de la Boca

Diary of the Food Whore: El Diario de La Puta de Comida

Eggbeater: Dando Patadas y Punetazos a Todos Los Huevos

Steve, Don’t Eat It: Esteban, No Lo Come.  Ostia, Que es Eso.  Esteban, Por Favor.  Aye, Que Barbaridad.  Jesucristo. 

Lobstersquad: La Policia de los Langostinos

Fancy Toast: Pan Tostada con Diamantes

The Ethicurean: (Plays on words are a little more difficult, but I’ll give it a try)  Les Gusta Comer pero Todavia Les Gusta Discutir Las Noticias Y Cosas Filosoficas que Tienen que Ver con el Futuro de Comida en Este Pais y el Mundo.  Pero no es aburrida.  Joder, me rie mucho.

If you're not on this list, it doesn't mean I don't love you.  Just that the translation was too hard.  Remember, no dictionaries allowed in this game. 

Feliz Dia de San Valentin, maricones.

Don’t speak Spanish?  Me, neither.  Google can help.

How Not To Pitch a Story

It’s funny how sometimes you can write something and think it’s so brilliant, witty, and overall completely bulletproof.  And you wonder why things didn’t work out.  Then, a few years later, you stumble across the same piece of writing, and you can’t stop laughing at its ridiculousness, both in concept and execution.  Was I serious?  Yes.  Yes, I was.

I have one such piece of writing to share.  Actually, I have a stack of such writing, but not to share.  This is not a joke.  The following is an excerpt from a real query I pitched to more than one national food magazine three years ago about a story on vegetable-based party dips:

At any given party, you can be sure of two things.  The obligatory crudité platter, jewel-toned and geometrically arranged, will look just as pristine at the end of the party as it did at the start.  Meanwhile, the chips and dip that were haphazardly flung into the nearest open containers will appear as though they were ravaged by wolves.

I am interested in submitting a story idea to [redacted] magazine about healthy party dips for the vegetable-averse.  The problem with veggie platters is that they’re backwards.  Party food has always been about the dip.  But ribbony red peppers don’t want to wait in the wings while Hidden Valley Ranch steals the show.  Cauliflower doesn’t want to be the wallflower in the crudité chorus line.  And, frankly, it shows.

Let’s just stop the insanity right here.  Hmmm.  I wonder why this idea was rejected?  Let’s review.

Rules broken = 32 (but we’ll just focus on the top 5):

1. Highbrow magazines don’t like their writers to drop names like Hidden Valley Ranch.

2. Highbrow magazines try to avoid comparing foodstuffs to chorus girls and/or anything show-tunish.

3. Highbrow magazines don’t like to anthropomorphize food in any other way, either. 

Actually, this was corroborated by another source.  In an article I wrote for Boston Magazine years ago, my editor axed a suicidal hot dog from my opener.  When I asked him why, he said, “Hot dogs don’t commit suicide.” 

Oh. 

However, on food blogs, suicidal food is a-okay and, in fact, highly encouraged (see Fancy Toast for a pictorial account of a despondent Brussels sprout.)

4. Highbrow magazines think vegetables are swell.

5. Highbrow magazines don’t like it when you act like a dumb-ass in your query letter. 

Oh.

Ah, the hilarious life of a struggling freelance writer.

(It should be noted that one editor of the highbrow magazines in question handled the rejection of said query with great tact and professionalism, free from the spirit-crushing techniques usually associated with the industry.  In return, said editor was rewarded with…more of the same.)

I Almost Forgot…

Regarding the rice pudding of my previous post, I nearly forgot about the conversation I had with my dad.  I don’t know how it could have slipped my mind, especially because he specifically told me not to write about it on this very blog.  I’ll have to remember to be more punctual in my acts of disobedience.

Now, I didn’t really want to share the rice pudding with my dad, truth be told, but he did take the kids off my hands for a few hours so that I could, you know, blog instead of taking the nap I so desperately needed.  This is more or less how it went:

Me: Do you want to take some rice pudding home? (please say no, please say no)

Him: What’s for dessert?

Me: Rice. Pudding.

Him: Come on, that’s not dessert.  It’s a vegetable.

A vegetable? 

Okay, fine, a vegetable.  If that’s my free ticket, I’ll take it!

Survival Via Rice Pudding

One of my favorite forms of sleep-deprivation, which I had almost forgotten about until just recently, is the kind where you’ve finally fallen asleep for all of one minute, maybe three, and then comes the screaming.  Your child’s, most likely, but maybe also your own.  And it happens over and over again for hours, each time after only the tiniest fraction of an REM cycle has been achieved, until you can no longer will yourself to fall asleep, and sweet, relaxing death is the most welcome alternative. 

If our government ever decides to add torture to its list of terrorist-interrogation methods (what’s taking so long?), I’m going to go ahead and okay this one.  If it’s good enough for me and new parents everywhere, it’s good enough for al-Qaeda.

Before all hell broke loose in our house last week (fevers, bloody gashes, invisible but extremely painful foreign bodies in eye, vomit on top of projectile vomit and, oh yeah, more vomit), I had made a big pot of rice pudding.  Boy, was I glad I did.  I needed some serious comfort food, and lots of it.  The kids had two corpses for parents for their comfort; the corpses had rice pudding.

Our Favorite Rice Pudding

2 quarts milk (I like to substitute a cup or two of cream in here because I’m just that kind of girl)
1 scant cup jasmine rice
2 cinnamon sticks
1 cup sugar

In a medium pot, combine milk, rice, and cinnamon sticks and bring to a boil, stirring now and then.  Reduce heat and simmer uncovered for about 25 minutes.  Stir in sugar and cook, stirring occasionally, about 35 minutes.  Discard cinnamon sticks and serve warm or cold.

Cookbook Friday: Friselles

The Barbaresi family in 1925.  Clockwise from left: Dora, George, Jean, Eva, Anne, Lydia, Edith, Septimina, and Dava Barbaresi.  According to Dora (my grandmother), she is pouting because she didn’t get to sit in a chair like her younger sisters.  Septimina died of pneumonia within months of this photograph.  Gerry, the only surviving son, was born two years later.

In Italy, there is a saying: “Better a corpse in the house than a Marchigiano at the door.” 

They couldn’t be more right.  Marchigianos are my people.  Northern Italians who hail from the often-overlooked Marches region of Italy, just across the tracks (in this case, mountains), from Tuscany.  I say northern Italian, but really it’s about five paces north of the Italian equator, if there were such a thing, but somehow this makes a big difference to my grandmother.

Anyway, the reputation Marchigianos had, as I understand it, was due to the fact that they comprised the vast majority of tax collectors at one time in the Old Country.  If the taxes weren’t paid, then there would be hell to pay instead.  And I can believe it. 

But my relatives weren’t tax collectors; they were farmers in the little town of Castelvecchio.  And they cooked in the true peasant style.  Suffice it to say that there wouldn’t be a corpse in the house if there were a Marchigiano in the kitchen.

George Barbaresi and Lydia Belbusti, in the photo above, were both born in the Marches and immigrated to the U.S. independently of each other by way of New Haven, Connecticut.  In some pre-Internet, trans-Atlantic feat of communication that only Italians could pull off, they were set up on a blind date/arranged marriage in this country by their families back in Italy, or so it goes.  When they met for the first time, George reportedly offered Lydia the following proposal: “Will you have my babies?” 

It appears that she agreed.  They were married in 1910, and raised seven children (two others died very young).  They lived in a rented flat in New Haven during the Depression.  The daughters went to school until about age 14, when they were old enough to work in the dress factories to help support the family.  Their everyday dresses were made from flour sacks.  Only the youngest child, a son, was able to go to college.

Most of the recipes I have came from the little girl on the left, Dora (my grandmother, who I’ve always called Nonni), who learned the dishes from her mother, who learned them from her mother.  I’m not sure of the extent to which these recipes have diverged over time from the original Marches recipes, but they have not changed much over the lifetimes of my relatives who grew up on them. 

They would never let that happen!

Friselles

These peppery little biscuits are an acquired taste to many.  But once you’re bit, they’re addictive.  We keep bags in the freezer (courtesy of Nonni) and wash them down with non-Italian beer.

3½ cups flour
3 Tbsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
1½ Tbsp. black pepper, coarsely ground
1 cup water
¾ cup oil

Preheat oven to 300 F.  Grease a large sheet pan.

In a large bowl, mix flour, baking powder, salt, and pepper.  Make a well and add water and oil.  Mix well (the dough will be soft and oily).  Form dough into several thin logs (about the diameter of a nickel) by rolling against the countertop.  Slice into pieces about 1/4-inch thick and set on pan.  Press thumb into the center of each coin to form a large indentation.  Bake for 25-30 minutes, flipping once halfway through before bottoms start to color.  Cool. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Next Recipe: Chicken Soup

Intro to my Family Recipes

So anyway, about this family recipe collection of mine.  It started out as a family history project to document the food and stories of the immigrants in my family.  A sort of family album of American cooking and life.  I did a little bit of genealogy, collected old photographs, and started raiding my relatives’ recipe boxes, trying to recreate old dishes.  Some go as far back as the 1800s. 

I also sat down and tried to get people talking about things like World War II, the Depression, the family dynamics of the time.  Things that had a huge impact on how we ate and lived.  I also excerpted old memoirs from the family and had some people write down their stories.  What I ended up with is a fascinating glimpse into food and family life before today.  And I think it’s not just interesting because these people are my family, but because they’re characters, and a lot of how they lived is applicable to other immigrant families. 

So, I started with the Italian side.  Luckily, my grandmother (Nonni) is still around to help me document these recipes (most of which aren’t written down), so we can have conversations like this:

Her: You put potatoes in this?  Why did you put potatoes in here?

Me: I thought that’s what you did.

Her: I don’t put potatoes in this.

Me: You don’t?  But you told me you did.  See, I wrote it down.  Two potatoes.

Her: No, not in this.  I would never say that.

Later, although the grandparents on the other side of my family are gone, I began doing the same thing for my relatives with roots in Appalachia, as well as my Acadian relatives who emigrated from Nova Scotia and settled around Boston.  Lots of people contributed, so I have a good collection of old recipes from both the North and South of the Mason-Dixon line.  And as our family grew, new immigrants joined the ranks, from South Africa to Armenia.

For the purposes of this blog, I won’t bore you with the details nobody cares about but me.  I will, however, bore you with the recipes because, well, why stop now.

Since this is a blog and there are no rules, I’m going to do this my way.  I’m starting with the Italians.  Why?  Because they rule.  I declare Fridays to be Cookbook Fridays, wherein I will post one page from this virtual family cookbook.  That way the octogenarians in my family have the whole weekend to get their high-speed modems in order, check out all the porn that’s accumulated in their inbox during the week, and finally meander their way over to my web site.

Oh look, tomorrow’s Friday.  Guess I’ll have to get my rear in gear.  However, you should know that if my relatives are going to be visiting this site, there are going to have to be some changes around here.  For one thing, there’s going to have to be a LOT more swearing.

First Recipe: Friselles

An American Immigrant Cookbook

Well, it has come to my attention that the cookbook I’ve been working on for two years doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of getting published in the mainstream.  Nobody put it into exactly those terms, but like I’ve said before, I can read between lines. 

These days, it seems, only celebrities get to publish cookbooks.  And last I checked, short, bespectacled brunettes of the non-buxom variety are precluded from becoming celebrities.  Oh well, at least I dodged that bullet.

Now, let me just interject to say that I’m still planning on inflicting my book proposal on a few unlucky publishers.  This is part of the freelance writer’s job, to bring down their own morale, and hopefully those of others, as often and as mercilessly as possible. 

One of the many gifts my parents gave me was a staunch perseverance in the face of unreasonable odds.  Not unlike our Iraq policy.  When I was growing up, my father’s motto was: Aim very high…but don’t get your hopes up.  Over the years, I revised this to become: Aim high, get your hopes up, and then get super-pissed when things don’t go your way.  To each, his own.

On the other hand, if there’s anything that society has taught me, it’s when the going gets tough, post nude pictures of yourself on the Internet.  Or questionable video.  After serious consideration, I have decided that this will not help my cause.  In fact, it may even induce blindness in prospective publishers, and my manuscript doesn’t come in Braille.  So instead, I’m going to post fully clothed pictures of other people on the Internet, with their express permission.  Not biting?  All right, I’ll even throw in a few recipes. 

In other words, you all get to read my cookbook for free.  Score!

Who’s actually scoring has yet to be determined.  My husband would like to go on record to say, not him.  I would also add, not the Ivy League schools to which I was hoping to send my children.  One potential scorer might be the cleaning lady I hire to sweep up the remnants of my shattered hopes and dreams.  And also Dunkin’ Donuts, which will have the sweetest revenge of all when I’m forced to apply for a job.

More to come…

Last Week’s To Do List

Finish freelance article. --CHECK

Aim impossibly high with queries for future work. --CHECK

Write letter to editor of Boston Globe re. there are more than 10 food blogs in the universe, why do we have to read about the same ones over and over again for god’s sakes geez. --CHECK

Write letter to the Today Show asking where all the sorority-like, drunken-Mommy benders are taking place and why wasn’t I invited. --CHECK

Take photography class.

Write nice things about husband on blog.

Win hearts, minds of potential Spanish-speaking readership.

Think of new, surprising way to say “delicious.”

Apparently, I still have some work to do.

Great, Just What We Needed

Now that we have the whole Lite-Brite situation under control here in Boston, we can all emerge from our makeshift bomb shelters (lit, ironically, by Lite-Brites) and discuss some serious news.

I don’t know about you, but I have trouble getting my daily recommended allowance of caffeine.  Sure, there’s coffee, tea, soft drinks, chocolate, Red Bull, Jolt gum, etc.  But all of these caffeinated items are really hard to find.  And only come in limited quantities.  And are very, very expensive.

I often find myself thinking, how can I get even more caffeine than what three cups of coffee has to offer?  A caffeine-laden doughnut on top of it all would really help.

Wish granted.  A North Carolina scientist has finally answered the foremost question in everyone’s minds: how to cram caffeine into baked goods (I guess someone forgot to show him the Pollan article).  To read more about the Buzz Donut, which packs the punch of two cups of Joe, treat yourself to the comedic stylings of CNN.

But what really got me going was the news that my favorite “donut” establishment, in lieu of improving the flavor, texture, and overall appeal of its doughnuts, is considering the addition of the Buzz Donut to its repertoire.  Because, perhaps, then you won’t notice that their doughnuts suck.  And maybe, just maybe, you can set a personal best for caffeine consumption with fewer trips to the loo. 

It looks like Dunkin’ Donuts may well be on its way to a menu composed of 100% caffeine.  Next in their product line: delicious, sugar-coated needles.

(A special thanks to Harrison3 for keeping me up-to-date on current events.)

Perdido en Traduccion (Lost in Translation) (Not the Movie)

My dad recently shared with me a great idea for my blog.  Translating my entries into Spanish. 

Wow, the entire Latin American market (plus Spain) at my disposal, which I’m sure is just dying to read my most recent letters of harassment to Dunkin’ Donuts.  Plus, I’m sure everyone’s tiring of Lobstersquad’s charming illustrations, not to mention having to translate everything from English back into Spanish. 

More likely, my dad was just trying to figure out a way to rationalize being $100K in the hole in college tuition.  Tuition wasted on a daughter who majored in Spanish instead of one of the many noble sciences.  Well, I’m sorry, but scientists don’t know how to party like the Spaniards.  There’s really no comparing majors.

So I thought maybe I’d cut the guy a break and humor him, do a translation or two the same way I send him home with food occasionally just to get a short respite from the constant complaining.  Just one problem: my Spanish stinks. 

I used to be somewhat fluent after studying for a year in Madrid during college, eschewing my lame American classmates in favor of handsome Latin ones.  Ones who would bring me for boquerones (anchovies) in smoky bars and dance until 5 a.m.  Luckily for me, the Europeans don’t like to discuss religion, politics, or complex intergovernmental relations, but instead like to focus their conversations around how to get to which museum and how to ask for the check.  So my meager vocabulary and I got by just fine.

For some reason, though, language skills don’t improve after 15 years of disuse.  Go figure.

Still, I’m going to give it a try just this once.  I make no guarantees with regard to grammar, usage, punctuation, accents, tildes, factual integrity, or anything else.  I am limited by a second grader’s understanding of the language and the maturity of a European toddler.  Plus, I’m not sure of the extent to which sarcasm translates from one language to another. 

In other words, don’t expect too much.  Here goes…

Hola.  Mi padre tuvo un gran idea.  El idea mas bueno en la planeta entera.  De traducir mi blogo en espanol desde ingles.  Porque tengo demasiado personas que quieren leer mis palabras brillantes en ingles, que claro, hay mas personas que viven en Latinoamerica (y Espana).  Y es un hecho que latinoamericanos les quieren a los norteamericanos tanto, tanto, tanto, demasiado.  Entonces, aqui estoy.

Pero mira, en realidad no voy a traducir este ensayo.  Mi padre es un poco loco.  Simplemente voy a pretender hacerlo, pero no voy a hacerlo.  Por que?  Porque para traducirlo, necesito un diccionario.  Y mi diccionario esta por alla, en otro lado del cuarto.  Soy un poco vaga.  Que?  Si, yo se que haya un diccionario en el ordenador, pero el no lo sabe.  Callate.  El no habla espanol.  Ademas, tengo mucho sueno.  Quiero dormir.

En vez, voy a escribir a maquina unas palabras para que aparezca traducirlo.  Por ejemplo, mariposa.  Mariposa es una palabra bonita.  Mariposa, mariposa, mariposa.  Tambien, maricon.  Mi esposo siempre me llama maricon.  El no sabe lo que significa, y yo tampoco, pero pienso que sea lo mismo que mariposa. 

Vamos a ver.  Necesito por lo menos un parafo mas.  Que puedo escribir?  Oh, necesito una receta buena para tortilla Espanola.  Pero buena.  Alguien?