The simplest of decisions

After quite a few months of completely unchecked eating, I was told by my brother that I resembled famed movie villain Jabba the Hut perhaps more strongly than was my intention. Thus began deprivation cycle followed by little, probably poorly chosen treats. For the week after Thanksgiving I would eschew things like bread or fat or any of the things that make life good for the reward of tucking into a slice of mom's pumpkin pie at the end of the day.

The main problem has been that I have had little time to prepare food. The past couple of months have been busy and I'm just exhausted at the end of the day and far more prone to order a quesadilla from the corner and wash it down with half a box of Entemmann's chocolate chip cookies than make sure I had anything resembling real food.

So last week I stopped by the Whole Foods, picked up some boneless chicken, and vowed I would cook it before it went bad. At 7:30 last night I put up my brown rice on the stove flavored with a little bouillon. I took out my chicken breasts, got some olive oil and a small pat of butter going in the pan, and sauteed them with a little pepper. The problem was that the breasts were very thick and I could tell that they would not be cooking through in time to save the consistency of the exteriors. Not wishing for my only full meal of the day to be disgusting, and not wishing to poach the chicken in heavy cream (though that is the only liquid guaranteed to be in my fridge), I did what any sensible person would do:

I decided we'd be having wine for dinner.

I opened a bottle from the fridge, a really nice white burgundy that had been served at a friend's wedding, and dumped a cup into the pot, put the lid on, and let it cook in the wine until the pink parts were no longer festering pools of salmonella.

And you know what? I'm never forgetting to add wine again. It was just the little kick that the chicken needed to go from mandatory protein consumption to actual meal.

For years I was of the opinion that the wine I cooked with should be cheap and not something I would ever drink until the obvious struck me: if I didn't want to drink it, why would I want my food to? For in reality, the two of us weren't going to drink a full bottle of win on a school night, and the cup I used in the chicken transformed the meal. Plus, when we drank the same wine while eating, everything tasted better. I have been overly liberal with my wine expenditures as of late and the house is more full of wine than it ever has been before. I have to remind myself that at $20 a bottle, I'm not looking to preserve these wines for my grandchildren and that I should be drinking them - and cooking with them.

Putting the Prius Through its Paces - A California Story

The other weekend we were in Sonoma for a family wedding. I have my reservations about California in general (being a stuck-up New Yorker), but am not immune to the charms of beautiful countryside and delicious wine. Spending time with pseudo-in-laws was the price to be paid, but I figured the bounteous goodness of Northern California would ameliorate that nicely.

Oooh, there's just one thing: I know nothing about California wines.

I wanted a day of wine tasting and I hadn't done any research. The Man of the House just wanted to keep everyone happy and out of his hair. So I sat down with ye olde trusty laptop and went to work albeit belatedly. I decided to cheat, figuring if some of the best sommeliers in New York were selecting Sonoma County wines for their restaurants, they'd be good enough for me to do some casual tasting.

This was a mistake. The best sommeliers selected a great number of, no doubt, wonderful wines from wonderful wineries that...didn't have tastings. Only one stood out from the list of thousands and that was Martinelli. Helen Turley, of the can't be missed Turley vineyards, has now devoted her ample talent to this single vineyard.

I regret to say I didn't taste a single wine I would buy - not even the one the woman pouring suggested I pick up for pizza (are there people who buy cases of $25 wine for pizza night?). Dejected we toured around the towns and stopped for hard cider (in the midst of wine country this must be some sort of blasphemy) before taking our scenic drive.

Which, surprisingly, involved four loaves of bread. Nearly causing some sort of accident, we veered onto a road delineated by a sign that said Organic Brick Oven French Bread and ended up at the ohmygodunbelievable Wild Flour Bread. The smell was overpowering and as a self-avowed bread addict I was in a little bit of nirvana. I'm surprised me managed to only buy four loaves (more on that later). We bought basic wheat and white, a goat cheese and herb bread that became lunch, and a walnut cinnamon raising sticky bun concoction that was maybe a million times better than Cinnabon and was still warm hours later.



We made it to the coast literally each day we were there for no particular reason save if was so frickin' beautiful.

The food I ate (as it was all planned for me) was not so good. I resisted the urge to see if the French Laundry had a last minute cancellation as I am well aware it is bad form to skip a wedding for even Thomas Keller.

The morning of the wedding, seeing as within ten minutes of our house there were only fifty or so wineries, I dragged all the pseudo-in-laws to Mendocino County to visit a winery from which I had enjoyed an amazing Sauvignon Blanc two years earlier and could not find anywhere in New York.

Yorkville Cellars is an organic winery up a beautiful, but fraught with switchbacks Americans hardly ever encounter, road and for me, at least did not disappoint. They had yet to finish their harvest which I found unusual (it being October), but afforded us the chance to see grapes on vines whose colors were already turning.



The Sauvignon Blanc was as I remembered it and I eagerly tasted the rest of the offerings. Surprisingly, I was bowled over by two of the red wines on offer. It has been my limited experience that if a vineyard makes a white I adore, I generally think less of its reds and vice versa. The Cabernet Sauvignon was excellent and, in the mid 20-s, a terrific value. But the crown jewel had to be a wine they call Richard the Lion-Hearted, a cab-blend that uses a but from their other red plantings. It was rich and complex and even had the Man of the House, a notorious sticker-up-of-his-nose at things like "rich and complex" wines pulling out his wallet. I was so enthused I signed up for their thrice-annual shipments. My first one arrives next week!

Grossly misjudging actual distances between points, and traveling without aid of a map, we managed to see Point Reyes



but got back to change for the wedding 34 minutes before the wedding started.

Our rental, a lovely earth-friendly Prius was not speaking to us at this point. We had pushed her a little much around the single-lane backroads we navigated to and from, seemingly, everything.

The following day it was off to San Francisco for some quality time with cousins from the other side of the family - need I mention we took the scenic route?



And that's a story for tomorrow. We ate at a just-opened restaurant and took many pictures.

Our First Chicken

The elusive roast chicken. The dish that culls the wheat from the chaff. I confess I'd never done it. My only previous whole bird experience was with the turkey that wasn't quite done for the First Dijonaise Thanksgiving we tried in 2000. Yet it was the Man of the House who suggested that we learn to roast a chicken together. Dutifully he followed me to Union Square in the rain Saturday morning where we selected our veggies and picked out our charming 5-pound bird.

While we waited for dinner time to approach I amused myself by starting a vat of vanilla extract:



Then I sacrificed these lovely apples:



to this:



to this:



I'll be canning it this afternoon and then eating apple butter for the rest of the year. Thanks to 101 Cookbooks for the recipe I used this year.

I also tried my hand at pumpkin hazelnut gelato, but it didn't turn out as I wanted. It was too hazlenut-ey, not sweet enough, and not pumpkin-ey enough.

So then it was time to get down to business.



Nothing loves a roasted bird more than olive oil and butter do. This would be the first couple of turns' basting liquid.

Man of the House was on prep and slather:





We used Julia Child's plain and simple recipe. We, mistakenly, didn't truss the chicken, though one of us, and it wasn't me, did trek around the neighborhood desperately searching for butcher's twine (our neighborhood is more of the bologna sandwiches and fried food persuasion). The recipe didn't mention trussing, though we'll definitely do it the next time.

So it was pretty simple. Chop veg, butter bird, cook, and baste frequently.



Halfway through, so far so good. It was the later innings where things went awry. There wasn't enough liquid pooling in the bottom, the veg were burning, and I had to continually add more butter and oil just to have something to baste with. I don't know why this was the case or how to rectify it in the future. The result was that the wings started sticking to the bottom. Then they decided they would prefer to be affixed to the bottom and not to the rest of the bird. C'est la vie, the rest of our chicken was looking ok.

I followed the instructions to a T and I should have been a little more flexible because the chicken was about 10 minutes overcooked. The meat wasn't yet dry, but neither was it moist. I made the gravy while he carved, and we ended up with this:



Man of the House gave it a 7 out of 10, I'd give it a 6. We're excited to try again!

New Camera Tryout

I bought a new camera the other week, a cheapo that was on sale and I figured, hey, for 100 bucks let's see how she flies.

Below are scenes from a dinner. The first shots are taken with my surprisingly trusty Canon A85, a shockingly good camera even in these days when its paltry four megapixels seem ancient; the second with the newcomer, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LS70, a smaller seven megapixel camera.

All attempts were made to take the same shot with the same settings. Alas, as the evening wore on and the drinks accumulated, I don't know how faithful we were.

As for the dinner: superb! I am not at liberty to extol its virtues or reveal its name as I have a weighty conflict of interest. Suffice it to say, were I free to gush, gush I would.

Part 1: Bread.

- Canon

- Lumix

The colors of the Canon are definitely more true to life and the flash - which I am often loathe to use, created more distortion in the Panasonic. I do not immediately detect a quality difference given the number of megapixels in the Panasonic model.

Part 2: Tarte Flambee.

- Canon

- Lumix

Notoriously unphotographable, that Tarte, the Lumix beat out the Canon on this one because the picture I took with Canon and flash was so bright I thought the cheese might have been radioactive. I didn't touch these photos up in any way though now I'm tempted to do some levels adjustments to see which photo looks better post-edit.

Part 3: Foie Gras.

- Canon

- Lumix

My dinner date, Ed, pointed out to me that the Panasonic models have a special shooting mode for food, so we tried it out. I don't think there's any question which photo is better. The detail on the Canon shot is pretty out of this world. Both the greens and the sea salt have exceptional clarity and the color is spot-on.

Part 4: Lamb.

- Canon

- Lumix

The food scene mode is suffering mightily as trusty Canon trots out another bang up shot. The shots are a little small on the screen, but the Canon succeeds in capturing the grains of couscous as well as the glistening hunks of lamb. The Lumix - not so much. It looks like a big unappetizing blur.

Part 5: Dessert.

- Canon

- Lumix

Ouch. Yet again one of these cameras is bitchslapping the other. In the top shots I can see grains of cocoa powder, berries, and color differentiation. In the second I can't.

Final verdict: I won't be using the Lumix for food shots. In fact, I won't be using the Lumix. It's a perfectly serviceable point and shoot that I suspect will be better suited to daylight and the casual shooter. As such, it will be gifted to mom and dad (who currently do not own a digital camera), and I will return to lusting after a DSLR while contemplating simply moving to the Canon A-series older brother the 7-megapixel A570.

Depression in Aisle 8

Yesterday I did something I haven't done in quite some time: I went to my local supermarket.

I live in a bad neighborhood. In order to preserve my unbroken record of living in New York, I have opted to live in a less than ideal locale, calmly coping with the drug dealers, the occasional shooting, the lackluster food delivery options, and the absence of many of the amenities the rest of my home borough rightly takes for granted. It was Sunday, we had been spending a lazy long weekend, punctuated by some frivolous eating out and dressing up (as documented earlier), and I just wanted something to eat. Right. Now.

That's what the local supermarket is for.

So, with a vague notion of something quick to heat and eat, I entered. I've lived in this apartment for four years and have made my way to the supermarket loads of times to stock up on garbage bags, sugar, parchment paper, light bulbs, etc., but I can't remember the last time I went in here for food. I do most of my shopping at the Whole Foods near my office and the Union Square Greenmarket. I am the girl on the subway laden with bags. By the way, please give me your seat when you see me - this stuff is heavy.

As I walked up and down the aisles, though, I felt myself grow more and more dissatisfied and vaguely ill. The man of the house had requested a hard sausage, and the options available to me were Oscar Meyer - meat of uncertain provenance (or uncertainly meat) stuffed to the gills with freshenators, colorizers, and starchatives (he is far less demanding than I (and often dismissive of my food fascism) and accepted the Hormel pre-sliced pepperoni like a champ, though I was pleased to see the majority of the package in the trash this morning.

The produce aisle looked like something out of a documentary on starving children in war zones - the fruits and vegetables donated by rich countries left to spoil on a tarmac somewhere while 14-year olds with uzis prevent people from taking it. There was no fresh bread to speak of, unless you count the spanish style rolls which are without taste or nutrients. There was no cheese save packaged cheese (forgive me I bought Polly-O String cheese as I know he likes it) - and I'll have more to say on that later. The frozen foods were plentiful, but not a single product worth looking twice at. Frivolously I read some packages noting that there were far more ingredients than strictly necessary or preferable, and that, more often than not, simple things were labeled as flavored i.e. chicken parmesan made with chicken flavor, macaroni and cheese with real cheese flavor. What is real cheese flavor?

I saw the Top Chef-hawked Bertoli frozen skillet meals and almost took one with me, but the idea of cooking it made me ill - there were just too many mystery inclusions. I did discover organic milk, but many of the cartons (of both organic and conventional) were either past or nearly past their expiration.

I ended up buying a frozen pizza and I did, in fact eat it. There was nothing wrong with its taste (bland vaguely tomato), but it didn't really taste like anything going down. It was so clearly designed to make me full without nourishing me. I took home a bag of Pepperidge Farm bagels which had a more natural feel to them than the Thomas's ones (which are a consistency no bread product should be - a very very disturbing squishiness), but couldn't really commit to eating one so I threw them in the freezer.

Had I wanted chips and soda, I would have had limitless choices. There were three separate chip displays including the new, and incredibly grotesque sounding, crab flavored Lays. There was an entire half aisle (in a four aisle supermarket) devoted to soda (though, in fairness, they did have some Izze).

I get a lot of grief at home for my shopping habits. The man of the house doesn't understand why we need to pay twelve dollars a pound for flank steak from the market and why I won't just buy an apple in the store in June. Since he does none of the shopping and is clearly pleased with what he eats in our home, these little disagreements crop up only on the rare occasions we go shopping together (when ample fun is made of me for convenience purchases like organic bouillon). And, to be perfectly honest, until yesterday, part of me felt as though my shopping habits had a fair amount to do with conscious choices and politics (though anyone who has eaten supermarket meat recently will back me up when I say that taste plays a major role in how I shop). Now, having seen that the poorest people are supplied with food that is bereft of nutrients and stuffed to the gills with white flour, white sugar, high fructose corn syrup, and methylethylwhatevrylmimicyrlfalserylcolorylickyryl - food that lets you know you've eaten but does nothing but stuff you with simple carbohydrates and, presumably, cancer, I realize that health is now trumping politics in my mind as I shop for our household. I don't ever want to go to that supermarket again for something that isn't a household cleanser or paper good. It made me not a little sick.

Now back to that cheese:

A 15oz. package of Polly-O Extra Long String Cheese set me back $5.99. Read that again to make sure you got it, please. Even at Whole Foods, which can be a little pricey, a pound of fresh mozzarella is, I believe, $5.99. It certainly was $4.99 at Fairway, and the bocconcini I bought at Citarella a couple of weeks ago was $7.99, and that's a prepared food. When I hear people lament that buying and eating good food is too expensive, I'm going to remember the mozzarella.

I Want to be a Daring Baker

I am a lurker. A shameless, shameless lurker. But one who is full of wonder.

Every month I patiently await the Daring Bakers Challenge, finding it so fascinating and wonderful that a group of bakers around the world have found a forum within which to experiment. The results are so different and each so lovely (yes, even the mistakes are wonderful) that it becomes my favorite day of the month when the posts are revealed.

Today, however, I wonder if I might cease my ceaseless lurking. I have a small home on the internet now. A poorly trafficked, mostly self-indulgent home, but a home nonetheless. Perhaps this coterie would accept my humble application to join their ranks and perhaps next month I could dare a little. In the meantime, these were the tarts that appealed most to me this month (and yes, my tastes skew to the modern):

- Alpineberry's tart is simple and unadorned and the mousse and caramel layers look really well defined and seem to be the perfect consistency.

- Foodbeam's individual tarts with spun sugar have a beautiful lip caused by the protrusion of the crust (I must find out how everyone else in the world removes tarts from mini tart pans without breakage, because I can never manage it).

- vanille & chocolat's look just about ready for a pastry case (again, my knife skills must be utterly lacking as I either smush or rip when I try to cut in straight lines - perhaps it's a continuation of being unable to paint within the lines).

- the barmy baker found the perfect piece of broken caramel with which to adorn this slice of tart. I also found her step by step photos gorgeous and I liked that she too makes fingerprints in her tart shells when filling them.

- but Dessert First is my favorite because I, too, am a sucker for the long rectangular tart pans. I don't have one, but I'm getting one as soon as I finish this post.

So thank you, Daring Bakers, for inspiring me to make this tart over the weekend. Know you'll be receiving a letter from me soon asking if there's room for one more.

Bed Picnic

I love 'em, he hates 'em. I know why I love picnics in bed, though. I grew up in a one-bedroom apartment on the upper east side and my parents' bedroom was in the living room. They ate in bed all the time, really complex meals like hot dogs, french fries, and baked beans, while watching Miss America, the Yankees, or dad's favorite Entertainment Tonight. When my brother and I got to eat dinner in their bed it was the kind of fun that only emerges from something you know you're not supposed to be doing - eating in bed. My mother would lay out towels so we wouldn't spill on their sheets and I don't remember what we did with our glasses, but I do remember fighting with my brother over the fries and the feeling that while our living situation might have been less than ideal, we were a family that loved each other and managed not to kill one another even though we shared one bathroom and gave little thought to modesty.

So now I live in a much bigger apartment in a much worse neighborhood and we still manage to eat all our meals in bed. The living room is both uncomfortable and un-airconditioned, and there's no real table to speak of suitable for plates - also that table is more of a storage piece than a dining piece. We're getting a new couch in a couple of weeks and, its comfort pending, I might be convinced to eat more meals out of bed, but sitting cross-legged across from the man I love seems more intimate than sitting side by side on a couch hunched over a coffee table.

Friday afternoon I was craving something luxurious, I almost wanted to go out to dinner save for the fact that Friday at 3 is no time to go searching for Friday at 8 reservations and I hadn't taken a shower and I was wearing jeans, an Old Navy T, and flip flops. So instead I decided we'd have the Catalan tomato sandwiches from Figs Olives Wine. Whole Foods, for those keeping score, does not carry Serrano ham. After a couple of phone calls, however, it was determined that Citarella did and so I took the subway two stops during a late lunch break to pick up provisions including, the ham, the bread (a pugliese), and some unthought of delicacies. I thought there should be some variety so I bought a St. Marcellin cheese and a small hunk of foie gras.

So that evening, we spread out on our bed and started slicing bread. I had a box of unusual dark red, almost purple, larger than cherry, smaller than plum tomatoes leftover from Wednesday's market, and we destroyed those utterly as we ground them into our bread. The taste was perfect, and the foie and cheese were nice alternates as well - not as good as the oozing-with-unctuous-yellow-fat foie I had in France when last I visited (it was the only time I think I have ever played the "guest" card with my friends and took them up on their offer to finish up the last of the foie grsa).

We drank an absolutely fantastic rose which, obviously, I can now not find. A 2006 vin gris from producer Robert Sinskey which was so light in color as to be an almost yellow/peach color, and which was a perfect accompaniment to our sandwiches.



We were relaxed, we were looking forward to a weekend of few responsibilities, it was a good picnic.

And I didn't have two bratty kids trying to steal all the good food. Sorry mom and dad!

A Tale of Two Fruit Deliveries

From October through March, I have the good fortune of spending my money on beautiful California citrus (and a couple of pomegranates as well). The farm, Rising C. Ranches, provides me with awesome Meyer lemons, pink lemons, various limes, and the amazing Moro blood oranges. I may well buy 150 pounds of citrus per season. The stuff shows up when I schedule it too, they make arrangements to ship on specific days so that it can arrive on specific days, occasionally they throw in a sample of something I haven't ordered before (Bergamot anyone?), and are generally really attentive and customer driven. And not really all that expensive when you remember that Meyer lemons can top 5 bucks a pound at various fancy markets.

This summer I wanted figs. We really aren't in the proper climate for local figs, so I looked westward again. I only found two places shipping fresh black mission figs, and I chose the less expensive of the two. And less expensive is a highly relative term. The price range for a single box of figs was 8-20 dollars - per pint sized box, so I was pretty hopeful that the money would be well spent. I called the company before I placed my order to determine what shipping company they used so that I could prepare for the delivery on my side (I know the driver for one of the shipping companies and he arranges to personally schedule delivery times with me to ensure I am there to receive packages - I love you Terrence, man!). After being assured that all was copacetic, I placed my order while trying to inwardly justify the price.

Then I plotted the wonderful things I was going to do with my bounty: would I make a chocolate fig cake like the one the pastry chef at Grocery was once known for? Would I make fig ice cream, fig tart, fig cheesecake? I was psyched for whatever would get made and also pretty jacked for merely sinking my teeth into the first fig savoring the texture and the taste.

The first thing that went wrong was that my shipping confirmation arrived with tracking information for the other shipping company, the one I didn't have a personal relationship, the one that was under no obligation to wait until I was home from work before delivering. The farm was closed so I called the shipping company and mercifully was allowed to waive the signature requirement over the phone and authorize the leaving of the package on my doorstep unattended.

So I got home yesterday evening to find that my nice next door neighbor had taken the box from my unattended doorstep into her apartment and now gave it back to me, demurring when I offered her some figs of her own. I eagerly opened the box.

The first thing I noticed was that the pound of pluots I had thrown onto the order on a whim were packed in a plastic bag wrapped in paper and tossed next to a large box full of figs. So, basically, completely vulnerable to the movement that is national shipping. As a result, each was severely bruised and battered and susceptible to bacteria. In other words, I wasn't eating them. I opened the box within the box to find my figs which were packed very well atop several cool packs. Unfortunately, the cool packs weren't insulated and condensation was everywhere. Moisture content is the enemy.

The figs, upon first glance, looked fine. I started unpacking them to remove any that were moisture damaged and to make the others were toweled off to prevent spoilage. What greeted me was truly disheartening. In each of the seven boxes I bought, 1/3-1/2 of the figs were unusable. Some had holes that looked astonishingly similar to animal teeth marks; some were so overripe they had burst, and yes, some were already molding. Of those that were salvageable, more than half were way riper than I thought they should have been given the mandatory next day shipping requirement which, for me, implied that they were picked and packed on the same day.

I angrily called the company and to its credit I was refunded for about half of the figs, but they sounded both suspicious and uncaring. Much as they were when I mentioned the shipping company issue and was asked, "well what do you want me to do?" Uh, lady, an apology might be a good start. I tasted my first fig and it was ordinary. I'm still going to use the salvageable ones and be happy for fresh figs of any stripe, but I'm looking at the guy on the corner with the 2 dollar boxes of figs with more friendliness in my gaze.

I haven't named names here because I'm not out to ruin someone's business. Perhaps got a bum crop and a bum customer service representative, and I certainly don't need to prejudice anyone based on my experience (an experience that will not be repeated, mind you, and the idea of repeating it filled me with suppressed mirth as the representative asked me if I wanted the credit back on my credit card or applied to a future order - as if), but you'll be able to figure it out based on the limited number of people selling figs, if you are so inclined. I was just really pissed and really disappointed.

But do check out Rising C. Ranches - they're amazing.

Some opening thoughts

I thought there was an idea behind people who didn't know each other going out for good dinners in Manhattan. Not a blind date, not an excuse to get quickly liquored up and quickly paired up, but something for people like me: a person who loves food living with someone who would sooner get a roast beef from the corner bodega than sit beneath a cloth napkin awaiting foie gras torchon with gooseberry compote. My friends told me it was a horrible idea. In retrospect, I imagine they were correct, but the blogger account lingered.

Fast-forward several months. I'm sitting in my dreaded office, surrounded by a leaning tower of greenmarket goodies wishing the office would experience a massive gas leak so I could go home and cook. I spend the useless days reading about food, thinking about food, and planning the food I will make, only to arrive home at 8:00pm, demoralized and exhausted, and calling a handful of tomatoes and leftover cherry clafoutis dinner.

But if I were to write about food throughout the day, perhaps get those dinner ideas out into the ether, it would be almost like cooking them when I got home. Or maybe it would focus me for the weekends when I do cook. Maybe it would motivate me to upgrade my damn digital camera and remember to bring it with me when I go out to eat (because the garganelli at del posto's was arranged in the cutest little windmill pattern). It also, I imagine, will make the day go by a little more quickly, and allow me to put my daydreaming to good use.