Eat Well Live Well

Vegetable Stock Recipe

2007-09-10T07:41:00.001-07:00

A couple years ago I quite serendipitously had dinner in a small bistro-style restaurant called Le Petit Blanc (now Brasserie Blanc) in Oxford UK.

I had been given a coupon for a two-course dinner for 10 British pounds by my client. Since he was paying my travel expenses, I felt compelled to use it but wasn't expecting very much from the restaurant.

To my surprise, I had a superb meal and came away with a recipe for vegetable stock that I've used several times since with great success.

I ordered poached fish (dorade) as a starter - it was bathed in an intensely flavorful sauce that had the barest hint of cream in it. The cream added a slight richness but the flavors clearly emanated from the stock - what I incorrectly thought was chicken stock.

I complemented my server on the dish and asked her what the tasty broth was made from. She went into the kitchen to find out, returning moments later to inform me it was vegetable stock. I was stunned - surely vegetable stock could not be this intensely flavored! So I asked if she could find out what ingredients they used to make it. After about 10 minutes she returned just as I was polishing off my lamb main course with the entire recipe written on a slip of paper!!

Here it is below - I suggest using it to poach fish or chicken and to inject flavor without fat or added calories into just about any recipe calling for broth. For example, this stock is superb in risotto - it lightens the dish up but without sacrificing one iota of flavor. It is also an excellent addition to legume based soups and even some pasta dishes.

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon pepper corns
1 teaspon dried thyme
1 tablespoon coriander seeds
1 tablespoon salt
5 star anise

3 carrots chopped
3 ribs of celery chopped
3 garlic gloves
3 leeks or one large onion chopped
1 cup of fresh coriander leaves
1 cup chopped fennel (optional)
5 quarts of water

Directions:
1. Fill large saucepot with 5 quarts of water
2. Add fresh ingredients and bring to a boil.
3. Simmer for about 30 minutes then add dried ingredients
4. Simmer for 4-5 hours adding some additional water every now and then if needed.
5. Take off heat and set aside overnight.
6. Drain and strain through sieve next day.

Will keep 6-12 months frozen.

20 Spice Pork Shoulder with Coffee Barbeque Sauce

2007-07-24T16:48:00.000-07:00

I'm not a big fan of cooking traditional styles of American BBQ - don't get me wrong, I like to eat BBQ, but for some reason it doesn't turn me on from a culinary standpoint. Every now and then though, I feel like cooking something in the traditional BBQ style. This time around I couldn't resist trying to create something new (at least to me) .

In this case, the dish I created calls for 20 spices. Why 20? Because 19 is too few and 21 too many. I don't know....20 just seemed like a nice round number. And with so many spices I couldn't possibly be constrained by the ingredients of a single cuisine. In this case, I had no choice but to draw on spices from several different regions of the world.

The result? Let's just say my kids loved it (hard to please daughter included) and surprisingly my wife loved it too. And she can be very finicky. (Don't tell her I said so).

Anyway, here's the recipe for a dish that I developed this past Sunday afternoon inspired by some recipes I've seen incorporating tea (smoked ribs) and coffee (I can't remember what in the heck it was other than it called for brewed coffee).

Don't be intimidated by the list of ingredients. It's worth going out and getting what you don't have as your pantry will be fully stocked to cook many different cuisines as a result.

This recipe may look complicated but it isn't very difficult to prepare and doesn't take a great deal of time to pull together. Simmering the BBQ sauce is the main time component.

Ingredients
6 pounds of boneless pork shoulder cut into 8-10 oz. filets or boneless pork spare ribs'

For the Meat Rub:
1 tablespoon of peanut oil
3 tablespoons of coriander seeds
3 tablespoons of fennel seeds
2 tablespoons of cumin seeds
1 tablespoon of cardomon powder
1 tablespoon of Spanish smoked paprika
1 tablespoon of mustard powder
1 tablespoon of ground ginger
1 tablespoon of red anatto powder
1 tablespoon of fennegreek powder
2 tablespoons of good quality ground chilis
1 teaspoon of allspice
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
1 teaspoon of ground cloves
1 teaspoon of ground sumac
1 teaspoon of dried thyme
1 teaspoon of cayenne powder
i teaspoon of galangal powder
1 teaspoon of lemongrass powder
i teaspoon of dried chipoltle flakces
2 teaspoons of fine sea salt

For the BBQ Sauce:
5 gloves of garlic
1 small sweet onion
2-3 inch piece of peeled ginger
1 medium red bell pepper
3-6 dried chilis depending on level of 'hotness' desired
5 star anise
4-6 oz. (1/2 cup to 3/4 cup) of good quality honey
1/3 cup apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup dry sherry
1/3 cup dark rum
3 tablespoons of tomato paste
8 oz. of brewed dark roast coffee (preferrably prepared using drip method)
2-3 tablespoons of cocoa powder or on quarter-half cup of grated unsweetened dark chocolate

Directions:

1. Place 1 tablespoon of oil in pyrex dish large enough to hold pork lined up. Coat pork with oil.
2. Grind cumin, fennel seed, and coriander seed in a coffee grinder.
3. Add it and rest of 20 spices into a large mixing bowl. Mix together with fingers or using fork.
4. Sprinkle some of mixture on each of the pork filets. Then using hands rub it in and flip over. Repeat again with other side. Rub in well to all of pork is coated. Put plastic wrap over dish and set aside in refrigerator until 1 hour before grilling.
5. Add onion, pepper, garlic and ginger into food processor and pulse until finely minced and somwhat like a paste.
6. Heat 2 tablespoons of peanut oil in 12 inch fry pan at medium. Add paste and cook for 7 minutes at medium heat and then reduce to low for another 5-7 minutes or until carmelized but not burned.
7. Add vingears and cook for a few minutes.
8. Add star anise
9. Add sherry and cook off alcohol.
10. Add rum and cook off alchohol.
11. Have mixture at low simmer. Add tomato paste, stirring in well.
12. Add honey and stir in well. Cook for about five minutes.
13. Prepared coffee. Add to pan. Mix well. Let simmer for about 5 minutes.
14. Add cocoa powder or chocolate. Stir in.
15 . Simmer entire mixture for about 90 minutes. Consistency should be like a nice tomato paste but not too thick.
16. Set aside to cool.
17. Get barbecue grill up to about 425-450 degrees fahrenheit. Avoid a hotter temperature. Grill pork fillets about 6-8 minutes a side. Brush on BBQ sauce at end to both sides and cook each side for 2-3 minutes.
18. Take filets off grill and let rest on plate or cutting board with alum foil over them for 5-7 minutes.
19. Put rest of Coffee BBQ sauce in bowl and serve at table with the pork.

Serves 12 to 18 people as main course. Consume with a hearty red wine, something robust - not too subtle or sophisticated, which will stand up to the sweet, spicy and smoky flavor of the pork and BBQ sauce. Recommend a syrah or grenache from whatever country you fancy. Also could serve with a Primitivo from Italy.

Clam Pepper Spaghetti

2007-07-08T12:33:00.000-07:00

This is one of my little food inventions. Somewhere along the line I tasted clams with peppers and really liked how the two flavors seemed to marry really well. I've been making this dish for a couple years now and vary the recipe each time. For instance, this particular recipe contains fresh spring peas that I purchased at a local farm. But below is the basic set of ingredients that are used and the procedure for cooking. You can use almost any type of spaghetti but I like fettucine, linguini or perchitelli best.

Ingredients:

2 oz. olive oil
5 garlic cloves coarsely chopped
2 red bell peppers (orange, yellow can be used as well or a mix of colors) coarsely chopped
2 oz. of fennel coarsely chopped
1 medium size sweet onion coarsely chopped
10 oz. can of whole clams plus juice (I used Geisha brand wild caught whole baby clams)
3/4 cup of fruity white wine (Colombelle, a tart and fruity wine from Gascony is my preferred choice but any other fruity white will do)
3/4 cup of fresh spring peas or frozen petit pois
8 oz. of whole wheat linguini
1.2 tbsp. sea salt

1. Add garlic, pepper, onion and fennel to a food processor - pulse blend adding 1 oz. of olive oil to smooth slightly
2. Heat 12 inch pan to medium and add rest of olive oil
3. Add garlic, pepper, onion, fennel mix plus salt and saute at low to medium heat until slightly caramelized about 15-20 minutes
4. Turn up heat to medium and add wine - adjust to simmer and cook for 10-15 minutes
5. Add clams and clam juice and simmer for another 10-15 minutes
6. Add peas during last five minutes of cooking
6. Cook pasta to al dente (slightly undercooked) in large pot of boiling water - when cooked use tongs to remove pasta and add it to the pepper clam mixture. Mix it together and let it simmer at low heat for 5-10 minutes to allow the pasta to absorb some of the liquid and flavors.
7. Serve in bowls with chopped fresh basil or mint for garnish.

I typically drink a fruity white wine with this - pinot grigio works well but any other fruity white (no oak) can be used. Rose also goes well with this dish.

Serves 6-8 as an appetizer or starter course and four as main course.

Constant Crap: Food Advertising Aimed At Children

2007-03-30T05:14:00.000-07:00

The Kaiser Family Foundation released a report yesterday of its study of television advertising in America aimed at children.

The findings showed that American kids view several commericals a day on average, the largest proportion of which are for food products. Below are the shocking numbers:

What's even more troubling is the kind of so-called food that is being marketed to children - almost all of it is artifical, processed and unhealthy.

What level of damage is this massive barrage of marketing mind control doing to our children?

As a parent of three children below the age of 15, I sometimes find myself struggling to help them develop the attitudes and knowledge they need to make smart choices about eating. And my kids DO NOT watch very much television, so they are not being exposed to these food ads for the most part.

Unfortunately, advertising crap to children is just the tip of the iceberg of a bigger problem that this country has with its dysfunctional perceptions and attitudes about food. McDonald's is revered more than reviled as an icon of American values - i.e., the quick, the easy, the convenient, the standardized and the profitable.

It's free enterprise. Anything goes. Let the market decide. Freedom of speech. Allow the consumer to choose. Yeah right. Continue using advertising to seduce kids and adults into consuming nutritionally deficient and unhealthy food. Let big corporations define our values. Make a bundle doing it. That's the American way.

A Promising Innovation in Local Agriculture

2007-03-28T08:31:00.000-07:00

Today's Boston Globe Food section features an article about a new greenhouse operation in Maine run by one of my Carlise, MA neighbors, Paul Sellew.

They grow tomatoes, known as Backyard Beauties, year round in an in-door nursery/greenhouse.

This is a very intriguing idea with great potential to expand the supply of locally-grown fruits and vegetables particularly in areas of the country with a limited growing season.

Despite my Utopian yearning for the return of lots of small family farms across America, economic realities make it unlikely that enough land can ever reclaimed for this purpose.

But creating nurseries and greenhouses using sustainable energy and agricultural methods might just be the thing to dramatically increase local produce production.

Quantity Over Quality

2007-03-25T08:25:00.000-07:00

Portion sizes, like American waistlines, have been slowly but relentlessly inching outward. Despite all the happy talk about healthy and balanced eating that you hear, many Americans seem to prefer quantity over quality when they go out to a restaurant.

And according to an article in today's New York Times, "Will Diners Still Swallow This?", the profit models of many restaurant chains are built around the notion of providing diners with massive amounts of cheap calories. Apparently, the bigger the portion sizes they provide, the more they charge and the greater profits they make.

The article contains a wonderful graphic which shows that a typical chain restaurant main dinner course of pasta contains almost the entire daily allowance of calories for an adult.

The article also talks about how one chain, TGI Friday's, is taking what the restaurant industry considers to be a bold and risky step - reducing portion sizes and charging less for them.

Just another of the crazy consequences that result from applying mass production models to food production and consumption.

Michael Pollan Nails It

2007-01-28T08:33:00.000-08:00

Today's New York Times Magazine cover article, "The Age of Nutritionism", by Michael Pollan is a must read for anyone with the slightest interest in health and food.

This is a brilliant essay that gets to the very heart of all that is wrong with America's industrial and scientifically dominated food philosophy and production system.

And at the end, he offers nine simple pieces of advice that could - were people to actually practice them- not only kill the likes of McDonalds, Monsanto, and the weight-loss/diet book industry but reinstitute a common-sense and sustainable approach to producing and consuming food.

Eat food (real food that is)
Avoid even those food products that come bearing health claims
Especially avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable c) more than five in number — or that contain high-fructose corn syrup.
Get out of the supermarket whenever possible
Pay more, eat less
Eat mostly plants, especially leaves.
Eat more like the French. Or the Japanese. Or the Italians. Or the Greeks.
Cook. And if you can, plant a garden - Cooking and growing food allows us to rediscover that food is not merely fuel but communion - with the environment and our very identities as human beings (This last sentence added by me)
Eat like an omnivore

A Gastronomic Tour of Italy

2006-11-10T10:49:00.000-08:00

Last weekend we prepared and served an eight-course dinner with matching wines to a group of ten people who submitted the extremely generous winning bid at this year's Carlisle School Association auction.

Here is the menu:

A Gastronomic Tour of Italy

November 4, 2006

Predinner Panini – Veneto

Panini with Assorted Toppings of Fava Bean, Chickpea and Sage, Fig and Olive, Tuna, Lemon and Capers

Adriano Adami, Proscecco di Valdobbiandene, Bosco di Gica

Antipasti – Emilia Romagna

Antipasti Plate of Grilled Eggplant, Pepper, Portabello Mushroom and Zucchini with Proscuitto, Copa and Culitello

Corleto, Lambrusco, Villa di Corlo

Piatti di Pesce - Liguria

Shrimp and Chickpea Cake with Agrodolce Sauce

Bisson, vino Intrigoso, Vermentino, Golfo del tugillio, 2003
Piatti di Carne - Umbria

Rabbit with White Wine and Figs served in Acorn Squash cup

Paolo bea, montefalco, rosso reserva, 1999

Piatti di Pasta - Piedmonte

Risotto with Pumpkin and Porcini Mushrooms

Albino rocca, langhe bianco la rocca, 2003

Piatti di Carne - Toscana

Tenderloins of Beef in Wine and Balsamic Reduction
Lentil Puree and Cauliflower Medley

di diego molanari, Brunello di Montalcino, Cerbaiona, 1996

Insalata - Sicilia

Butter Lettuce, Arugula and Radicchio with Pine Nuts, Sultanas and Oranges with Citrus Dressing

Planeta, cometa, bianco, 2005

Formaggio - Piedmonte

Selected Piedmontese Cheeses with Fruit and Nuts

Cantina del pino, Barbaresco, ovello, 2000

Marziano abbona, barolo, pressenda, 2000

Dolce - Campagnia

Lemon Almond Cake

G. Bertagnoli, Limoncello

Transfat ban

2006-09-27T12:43:00.000-07:00

Well - I've been out of circulation for most of the summer but the announcement that the city of New York was seeking to ban the use of transfats in restaurants shook me out of my inertia.

This is whip up the free marketeers and libertarians into a frenzy. Go ahead, scream all you want about the nanny state, bureaucrats impeding business, freedom of choice etc.

You may not agree with what they are proposing but you certainly can't argue with their desire to see people stop consuming transfats.

Best quote - "Human life is much more important than shelf life".

Right on! I have wondered for several years about the logic of putting ingredients into products that extend their lives but reduce the lives of the people that buy them. Is hastening the death of your customers really a good business practice?

Lunch in Arezzo - Osteria l'Againa

2006-07-03T16:35:00.000-07:00

This was my first visit to Tuscany and how appropriate it was that we would consume the best meal of the entire trip. And this is saying a lot because every meal we had during our stay in Italy was at minimum very good and in several cases outstanding.

Arezzo is one of many wall cities in Italy. It is located on a hill with a castle at the top which we visited after lunch. The views were stunning. But let's get to the really important stuff - the meal!

We dined at a tiny pedestrian looking trattoria called Osteria l'Againa (pictured above along with my friends Tony and Marie Francoise). It looked cliched - like some American tourist's idea of an Italian restaurant with checkered table cloths. But its modest appearance was a deceptive cover for what turned out to be a keeper (one of many) of the culinary heart and soul of Italy. Nothing fancy or unusual on the menu. Just basic everyday Italian (real Italian) food with of course a Tuscan accent. The experience - nirvana.

I ordered only two courses. The first, a taglialini with wild boar was so intense in color, aroma and flavor that it literally touched my soul. This was food that a loving grand mother cooks for their favorite grand child. The smell brought me back forty odd years to my Aunt Fil's house in South Philadephia. She never cooked anything with wild boar, but still her 'gravy' consisting of meatballs made from ground pork and veal and a hand-made pork sausage procured by my Uncle Charlie from the Reading Terminal market produced a similar bouquet that has stayed with me for these many years.

So when the plate was presented before me - fresh thin yellow noodles just like the "home mades" I used to get at my Aunt Fil's. I nearly gasped - it's effect resonated so deeply within my core. And this was just the smell! One taste and I was transported back to those long lost days that are the foundation of my food appreciation today. They even put out a bowl of freshly grated sharp cheese - no doubt a Tuscan pecorino that just amplified the nostalgic experience.

I took my time eating this pasta dish, savoring every whiff and each delightful bite. I had ordeed a caraffa of vino rosso and it was fruity with nice body and went very well with the mythical dish I was consuming.

My second and final course was a insalata Caprese. This is one of the simplest dishes of the Italian cuisine and one that can be literally tasteless if the ingredients are not right. But there was no danger of that here. This Caprese provided a transcendental moment - the tomatoes - a greenish red variety were sugar sweet with immense character. The mozzarella was milky and sweet. It was accented with arugala and a rich and flavorful olive oil. I've never had a Caprese like this and I dare say I probably never will again unless I go back to this culinary temple of all that wonderful about everyday Italian food.

And this is one of the stunning revelations about eating in Italy. The quality and flavor of their everyday cuisine - what typical Italians eat - bread, pasta, vegetables, coffee, wine etc. was simply extraordinary. Take bread for example. I have eaten a lot of good fresh baked artisan bread in my day but I have never tasted anything like the bread I consumed in Italy. And the quality, even in the supermarkets was outstanding! Wonderful- incredibly crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside. Some of it has semolina because of a light yellowish color. One cannot resist eating far more bread than normal when it is of this quality. A lesson is that the quality of everyday food in

Italy

is beyond even up-market gourmet shops in the States.

This bread was so good that I consumed several pieces soaking up the wonderful tomato olive oil and salt remnants of my Caprese. There is nothing like this!

As I sat waxing nostalgically after this wonderful feast , I remarked to my friends that this food had to be prepared by an Italian grandmother. As if on cue, not 30 seconds later , a rather stout , youngish but still no dount a nona woman emerged from the kitchen!

Dinner at Old Emilia in Rapallo

2006-06-29T16:40:00.001-07:00

Now this was a great spot for a meal. Outside right on the main road across from the harbor. Mild temperatures, no wind - a perfect night for outdoor dining. And this was the place to be.

After walking down the main harbor-front street and inspecting several menus, we decided that old Emilia was the place for us. They had loads of fresh fish specials on the board and the "coniglio cacciatoria" (rabbit stew) was the clincher for me.

I began with an exquisite Spada carpaccio (thin slices of raw swordfish) served with fresh Roma tomatos and arugula. Drizzled on the plate was some wonderfully flavorful olive oil and sea salt. This was a superb starter. The swordfish was melt-in-your-mouth. The tomatos were at peak ripeness - (there is nothing quite like a fresh, real Italian tomato) and the rocket was peppery. We had a wonderful Ligurian frizzante - Crenzada de Ma - with it which went down delightfully.

Next I dug into a heartly plate of Gnocchi with Gamberi. Better to show this to you as the photo tells it all. This was excellent - it tasted as if it was prepared on the spot by a home cook. With this plate, we chose the Redure - Terra Bianche - Dolcetto d'Alba. It was smooth and cherry like and went well with this dish but even better with the third course of rabbit.

The rabbit looked and smelled homemade - it was piping hot; the meat was tender and flavorful and it came with braised vegetables - pepper, celery and carrots that were cooked nicely and sweet. A heavenly dish that I can only hope to replicate at some point in my own cooking efforts. But what a benchmark!

My friends order Dolci but I was too full - I just took coffee and of course, the first of what would be many post-meal grappas throughout my stay in Italy.

One last note, my friend Tony M. (yes that Tony M!) ordered the house speciality for a starter - something called "Chizze" which was some sort of deep-fried dough with cheese inside. They were huge and five of them came in a basket! Talk about abbondanza!

Lunch in Ventimiglia

2006-06-29T05:44:00.000-07:00

This was our very first stop - literally the first town over the Italian - French border.

We departed by car from my friends' house in Aix-en-Provence about mid-morning. Our plan was to drive to the Italian border and then stop at the first town we came to for lunch.

This turned out to be Ventimiglia, a rather large town and it took us awhile to find some restaurants. Eventually we came upon a road running along a beach and found a tiny cafe.

We sat outside and ordered lunch as best we could - our halting Italian and the young wait-person's meager English.

I ended up eating a sandwich - parma ham and melted mozzarella cheese served on a crunchy role washed down with a glass of vino rosso which turned out to be delicious.

My companions orded pasta alla salmone and salad Nicoise respectively.

This was exactly the kind of quick and tasty meal we needed before resuming our journey by car to our first destination - the Italian Riveria town of Rapallo.

The Gastronomic Joys of Italy

2006-06-29T04:57:00.000-07:00

I recently returned from a week travelling through northwest and central Italy. It was a tremendous time - offering me gastronomic inspiration and memories that will last a life time.

I tried to take pictures and record notes on all of my meals - but sometimes I got so engrossed with what I was eating that I simply forgot! Unfortunately this happened during the best meal of my trip - a lunch at a fantastic little trattoria in the Tuscan town of Arezzo.

During my five days in Italy, I managed to visit the towns of Ventimigli (for lunch), Rapallo (two nights and several meals), Arezzo (lunch), Citte di Castello (several days and meals) , Lucca (lunch) and finally San Remo (lunch).

I intend to describe these meals and my observations generally about Italy in several future blog entries.

Gardens and Vaults, Oxford UK

2006-06-05T15:00:00.000-07:00

I enjoyed a lovely dinner with my team mates from Career Innovation this evening at the Gardens and Vaults restaurant in Oxford UK. We dined in what I was told is a former crypt in a 500 plus year old church on the campus of Oxford University.

Needless to say the facility was an architecturally fascinating place to visit.

I am also happy to say that the food was quite good - they use only natural and organic ingredients. The dishes were well constructed, presented with flair and of course, delicious to consume.

We began with a starterplate of assorted little nibbles - featuring chick pea cake with roasted yellow pepper, hummus, pickled zucchini, goat cheese and olive. Quite tasty. Each table had a basket of freshly baked white and dark bread.

Then on to a chicken and shrimp paella with a side salad. It had a North African touch - perhaps more tumeric than saffron but it was very well done.

We finished with a lovely pear and pistachio tart with a side of sour cream. Heavenly.

All washed down with a pleasant semillon/chardonnay blend from Australia (which reminds me why can't we easily find pure semillons anywhere in the US these days? They are an absolute delight when young and intense and sophisticated when aged. Either way I would love to drink them more but have not seen a bottle of wine made from pure semillon in any wine shop in the States in several years!)

A Slow Journey Through Fast Food

2006-05-24T12:16:00.000-07:00

The NY Times features an article today "Life in the Fast Food Lane", by its restaurant critic Frank Bruni. It details an 9-day coast-to-coast excursion in which he and his companions eat fast food morning, noon and night. Along the way they traveled 3640 miles and made 42 stops.

The ground rules - the restaurant must be a part of a chain and it must have a drive-through window.

The trip turns out to be not nearly as scary as Morgan Spurlock's Supersize me. Still, I wonder what it says about the fast-food America in which we live. Fast, cheap, calorie-laden food consumed in cars. Bruni keeps alluding to how awful his car smells and all the trash he accumulated during his cross-country trek.

Here are the author's 10 favorite meals from the trip:

1. Four-piece Original Recipe combo from KFC (Mechanicsburg, Pa.)

2. Chili from Wendy’s (Morgantown, W. Va.)

3. Tots from Sonic (Georgetown, Ky.)

4. Chili slaw dog from the Varsity (Atlanta, Ga.)

5. Onion rings from the Varsity.

6. Classic chicken sandwich from Chick-fil-A (Birmingham, Ala.)

7. Georgia Mud Fudge Blizzard from Dairy Queen (Shreveport, La.)

8. Cheddar burger from Culver’s (Rockwall, Tex.)

9. Frozen vanilla custard, Culver’s.

10. Burrito Ultimo from Taco Cabana (Dallas)

I was in a Culver's once in Jackson Wisconsin with a couple locals who raved about it. I couldn't bring myself to taste their ice cream, not because I thought it was foul (it actually looked really good) but because I had just finished consuming four slices of pizza and about a gallon of beer, so I didn't have any room for it.

This article would have been alot more interesting if instead of chain, drive-in restaurants, Bruni had eaten in locally-owned restaurants serving authentic, non-massed produced food.

Now there's an idea.....

Feed Cars Industrial Corn Not People

2006-05-05T11:33:00.000-07:00

A interesting shift appears in progress. America's industrial agriculture complex is moving into the corn-based fuel business. Amen, I say. Wouldn't it be nice if all the industrial corn that currently gets turned into corn syrup or fed to livestock, instead is processed into fuel for vehicles.

Archer Daniels Midland (known as ADM or by me as "The Great Satan") just hired an oil industry executive as their new CEO. She is targeting corn-based fuel as their key area of growth. Terrific. But already, pundits are warning of an ethanol glut - forecasting profits to drop from 1.05 a gallon today to 75 cents a gallon by 2012. Gee, that's sounds normal for a business that goes from hot startup growth to a more mature growth rate.

Still, venture money seems to be pouring into this industry and the good news is that corn refining plants cost about one-tenth the price of what it takes to build gasoline refineries and they will be coming on line quickly too - before 2010.

Switching big time to corn-based fuel makes sense to me - it will reduce our dependence on petroleum which puts us far less at the mercy of unstable countries and leaders, allow us to burn environmentally cleaner fuel thus helping to ward off the environmental disaster we're heading for, let us switch to renewable energy so we don't have to worry so much about running out of fuel and generally put industrial corn to a positive use instead of poisoning the food chain and people along with it.

What's not to like about this idea?

The Vanity of Bonfire

2006-05-01T07:41:00.000-07:00

My wife and I had reservations for dinner last Friday evening at Bonfire, Todd English's new Boston restaurant in the Park Plaza Hotel.

It was pre-theater so we were in a hurry. This is not the place to dine if you have a show to catch. Or for that matter, if you want authentic, well-prepared food, competent service and value for money.

The service was slow and inattentive and it took almost an hour to get our main courses, which was regretably about 12 minutes before curtain up.

The food was mediocre - a mish-mash of cuisines from Mexico to Argentina.

And the prices were stiff. Dinner for two - appetizer and main course - with a modest bottle of wine is in the $100 plus range. That's not exorbitant but it is alot to pay for mediocre fare and spotty service.

I had to make a decision - the opening act of Massenet's ephermeral opera Thais or Todd English's steak tacos? I chose Thais and believe me it went down far better than Todd's mixed up degustations.

I used to like Todd English way back when. He trained in Italy and seemed to know how to produce creative yet authentic cuisine. But then he became a rock star and food empirist and from media reports his ego has turned him into a bloated and stale shadow of his former self.

That just about describes Bonfire - a place that should be up in smoke.

By the way, I'm not the first or the most knowledgeable person to pan Todd - see food blog super chefs.

Bizarre Brazilian

2006-04-27T12:00:00.000-07:00

The restaurant is Fogo De Chao Churrascaria. It is located in the Buckhead section of Atlanta (there are other locations in the U.S. and Brazil). I dined there one evening last week while in town on business.

It wasn't my first choice. But the directions I had to my preferred dining spots were inaccurate. I decided to dine at Fogo De Chao out of desperation to eat. I had been driving around for about an hour (I expected 10 minutes), it was getting dark and I was really hungry.

The restaurant claims to serve "Brazilian Gaucho Cuisine". Call me ignorant but I thought gauchos were Argentinian cowboys roaming the Pampas. Apparently there are lots of gauchos in southern Brazil as well.

This is a restaurant for serious carnivores. The focus is grilled meats and about 15 of them are on offer. No you do not order a single dish, rather waiters dressed in Gaucho attire circulate the room with massive hunks of beef, lamb, pork or chicken on a steel sword-like spits. Each diner has a little chip on the table with one side colored green and the other red. Green signals to the waiter to stop and offer you a slab of protein. Red means you are taking a break.

Fogo De Chao also features a huge 'salad bar' in the center of the room. Once seated patrons are immediately invited to go to it and help themselves. It is groaning with food, mostly cold or room temperature. But all sorts of dishes. In addition to all the usual salad greens and fixings, there are a broad array of vegetables, as well as cold seafood, fruit, breads, soups, and cheeses.

With such a bounty, it was very hard not to overfill my plate. Having so much to choose from was extremely distracting as it was quite hard to focus on each item because they all melded together on the plate. I supposed I could have gone up to the salad bar for one thing at a time., but having completed a four-mile run not long before, I was in the mood to stay seated and limited myself to one slightly overstuffed plate.

As I was diving in, one of the servers brought out a basket of bread rolls filled with a mild cheese.

Once I finished my salad plate, another server brought out the accompaniments for the meats. Featured were mashed potatos with cheese, sauteed polenta squares, and fried bananas.

Here's my take on the meal - a nearly irresistable invitation to gluttony and indigestion. In my view, this place is a 1970's vintage steak and salad bar emporium dressed in Brazilian drag (or perhaps more appropriately gaucho bloomers).

There is just too much food here of inconsistent quality. Worst of all is the overall dining experience. You end up eating the equivalant of a 15 course meal way too fast. The room is huge and noisy which detracts further from the dining experience.

And it ain't cheap. The tab for this all-you-can-eat Brazilian buffet runs to about $60 per person not counting the beer and wonderful glass of Cousin-Macul Reserve that I downed with my hunks of meat.

In fairness to the restaurant, I can see the appeal of this place to the market it serves. It was packed to the gills with people, presumably those ubiquitous Americans that demand heapin helpins of food when they dine out. And their operating concept is probably a huge money maker. It is built around a buffet with nothing to order other than dessert, so I suspect the restaurant is far less complicated and costly to run than other mid-tier restaurants offering cooked-to-order cuisine. And it no doubt appeals to the American market - great slabs of meat arriving at the table like clockwork for Fred Flinstone and a huge salad bar for Wilma. Hell, there is even plenty to go round for Dino as well!

How appropriate - because from a gastronomic standpoint, this restaurant takes us back to the Stone Age.

Family Meals, At Home, Everybody, Most Every Night??? - Just Do It - It's Worth It!

2006-04-05T07:09:00.000-07:00

The New York Times today has a front-page article, "Familes With Full Plates, Sitting Down to Dinner" extolling the virtues of families eating dinner together.

The article is a bit of a hodge-podge - a basic broth of tales of a couple families going to great lengths to eat together as a family most nights despite hectic and conflicting schedules seasoned with sprinklings of statistics and quotes from experts regarding the health and emotional benefits of families eating together.

A nice starter, but not nearly satisfying enough for anyone with a healthy appetite regarding this important topic.

If you really want something substantive to sink your teeth into, I recommend reading the book:

"The Surprising Power of Family Meals: How Eating Together Makes Us Smarter, Stronger, Healthier and Happier" by Miriam Weinstein, Steerforth Press, 2005. This is a well-researched work that is surprisingly easy to read given its thorough discussion of numerous research studies and the author's own field visits with families.

Best of all, it is written in an empathetic tone (not preachy like yours truly!) and contains loads of practical tips for making family dinners a daily reality in your own life.

The Latest US Obesity Statistics - Still Troubling

2006-04-05T06:15:00.000-07:00

USA Today reports on the latest obesity statistics released by the US Center for Disease Control.

They are not pretty. While obesity in adult women appears to have leveled off, it grew in adult men and children. Not good.

Worse, two-thirds of adults and one-third of children are overweight.

Meal Assembly Centers - An Illusion of Home Cooking

2006-03-26T13:57:00.000-08:00

The NY Times ran an article today- Meals That Moms Can Almost Call Their Own - describing a new trend - places where people can go to assemble meals. They provide the kitchen, the meal planning, the ingredients, the prep, and the instructions and the clean up.

Apparently this is aimed at people who are tired of take out and restaurant food but who don't have the time and/or ability to cook.

According to the article, "The centers are opening at a rate of about 40 a month, mostly in strip malls and office parks in the nation's suburbs and smaller cities, and are projected to earn $270 million this year, according to the Easy Meal Prep Association, the industry's trade group."

Good idea or just another example of how low American eating culture has sunk? With a blog with the address backtothekitchen.blogspot, you know my opinion.

But I'll leave it to Indian food goddess, Madhur Jaffrey to have the final word:

"People basically don't want to cook but they don't want to be told they are not cooking..It's an illusion."

An Afternoon at the Reform Club with Tony M.

2006-03-06T09:26:00.000-08:00

Every now and then I get to spend an afternoon away from work and other obligations. Instead of business or children, I am focused on food, specifically a very long lunch with friends. Invariably these kinds of moments always seem to be spent with my very good friend - Tony Manley. He is British and is as worldly as any person you’re likely to meet (he’s visited over 60 countries in his lifetime). He is also one of the few people I know who loves good food and wine as much as I do.

Tony and his wife currently live in Aix-en-Provence and I have been lucky enough to visit him there about once per year. But I’ve also had a couple opportunities to meet up with Tony when he’s back visiting his children in the UK. In late February, we were able to rendezvous in London for what turned out to be an extended and very memorable lunch together.

We met at the Reform Club and had lunch in the dining room. The Reform Club is a VERY British institution. It was founded in the 1830’s and was the seat of the Reform political movement in England. It describes itself as:

"The first home of classical liberalism, where the spirits of Winston Churchill, George Bernard Shaw, G. K. Chesterton, H. G. Wells, Hilaire Belloc, and other intellectual adventurers live on. To all those of fair argument and good cheer, our doors open wide."

Nowadays, it’s a place for business and government movers and shakers to meet and do deals or whatever they do. Not exactly the kind of culinary or gastronomic locale Tony and I would usually visit. But this is where Tony often hangs out when he visits London. The food is surprisingly good. The accommodations are quite comfortable and the location is in the heart of central London, close to the West End theatres and Royal Opera House that Tony so enjoys frequenting.

The building is stunning. I’m told that it was modeled after a Venetian palace. Upon arriving, you are required to walk up several steps and enter a great opeb cathedral-like first floor hall. Look up about five stories and there is a huge glass ceiling/skylight. Along the four corners of the room are great pillars and the walls are covered with paintings and portraits.

The dining room is very long and somewhat narrow with a view of the back garden. Like every room in the Reform Club, it has very high ceilings. Like England itself, it is venerable, majestic and steeped in tradition. It is also oddly comforting.

Now on to the meal:

I had a chicken and corn soup starter with coriander cake that sounded quite tasty but turned out to be a scrawny nibble. Tony started with the Coquille St. Jacques (scallops) that looked a whole lot better.

We both had the chef’s special “saddle of lamb’’ – it seemed like the shoulder cut to me, but it was very good nonetheless. Tender and juicy, although a tad bit fatty. Alongside the lamb we indulged in more traditional fare - mashed potatoes, peas and spinach. Rib-sticking stuff. We washed down the first and second courses with a bottle and a half of the ‘Reform Club Claret’, a nice cherry like Bordeaux.

For our 'pudding', I had a trifle – very rich – and Tony had a plate of cheese. He chose several English cheeses and one French, a Banon, which is non-pasteurized and difficult to come by in the US. Of course, I expressed interest in the Banon and Tony had them serve me a piece. Stinky. Gooey. Sublime.

We repaired to the upper level for coffees and two Armagnacs each - a very civilized way to finish a proper lunch. After much conversation we looked at the clock and realized it was tea time – 5 p.m.! So of course, we set off for the library for a pot of tea and tea cakes – in this case something that looked like a hamburger roll with raisins in it. It was sliced in half, toasted and served with melted butter.

By six p.m. we were off to get our respective tube trains – me to Paddington Station and the train to Oxford and Tony to Richmond, no doubt for a nice dinner with his son and family!

Just another afternoon with Tony M!

Free Enterprise Yes, Brainwashing and Deception No

2006-03-02T14:52:00.000-08:00

I believe in free enterprise.....
I believe in consumer choice.....
I believe that parents are primarily responsible for decisions about what their children eat and drink.....
I am not a proponent of legislation by lawsuit.....

HOWEVER....

We cannot continue to allow food companies to brainwash our youth and poison our population peddling products promoted through pervasive advertising without challenging their blatant and all-consuming attempts at creating demand (some would say mind control) - aimed particularly at young children and calling attention to the disasterous societal consequences caused by over consumption of their products.

Talk About Disinformation
This blog entry was triggered by an "In All Fairness" 'commentarmercial' entitled, "Cartoons Spark Outrage" that appeared in the New York Times on February 27, 2006. It was written by Daniel J. Popeo, Chairman of the Washington Legal Foundation, a group advocating and lobbying for the agenda of large corporations.

You can read the full commentary on WLF's website.

The title of the piece is a not-so-subtle and rather undiplomatic comparison to the recent uproar and violence sparked by the cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed published in Denmark. The author seems to be implying that food fanatics belong in the same camp as violent and crazed religious fanatics.

Popping Off At Popeo
Okay, now that I've gotten these courtesies out of the way, I'm taking the gloves off. Mr. Popeo is a professional big business lobbyist trying to portray cartoon characters used to aggressively market junk foods to kids as benign and beloved children's characters. He assails two groups in particular- The Center for Science in the Public Interest and the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood - as anti-business, lawsuit happy, food fascists.

I'm not in favor of making junk food illegal or banning its advertising (although some very responsible medical professionals such as the head of the World Health Organization are advocating the latter action). But anyone who has ever watched kids programming on commerical TV or looked at the packaging of food products for children knows that many large food conglomerates are irresponsible in their marketing, advertising and product formulation practices.

Mr. Popeo casts these groups confronting the big food companies for their marketing practices as loonies visciously attacking beloved and benign cartoon characters such as Tony the Tiger and Toucan Sam. After all, what right-minded person could see Ronald McDonald as a threat to humanity? Well, on the surface these commerical characters certainly seem harmless - until they are gotten hold of by the marketing hype machines of the big food conglomerates. That's when they are turned into pushers.

Mr. Popeo doesn't stop at raising his alarm against attacks on allegedly innocent cartoons. He also lists several seemingly beloved products that he claims are on the food fascist's hit list such as 2% milk and whole milk, Eggo frozen waffles, and Campbell's soups. As he says, "Yes, even chicken noodle soup".

After all, what person in his right mind could ever attack something as wholesome as chicken noodle soup? Excuse me Mr. Popeo, but you are obviously in the thrall (if not the pockets) of companies like Campbells who advertise soups like tomato, chicken noodle and mushroom as some sort of `condensed maternal love in a can'. Give me a break! Have you ever looked at the ingredients in this stuff? Absolute crap - a day's worth of sodium and enough additives to keep chemical process plants running 24/7 year round. "Gee thanks Mom for going to all the trouble to open and heat up this delicious bowl of artificial ingredients. This proves you love me."

While products like canned soup and other processed foods are indeed junk, they shouldn't be made illegal. That is going way too far - if you like this stuff or don't care what's in it then have at it. And of course sadly, this kind of food is all some people can afford or have access to.

But what needs to be regulated is the food companies' deceptive marketing practices that mislead and misinform the public- and especially children - about their products. I'm not in favor of going after big companies with lawsuits simply because they have deep pockets, but in a few cases it may be the only way to get their attention and to establish some leverage against their money and power.

But according to Mr. Popeo, any attempts to put restrictions on food companies will simply kill free enterprise and limit individual choice. Well, I certainly don't want anyone - advocacy groups, government or food companies dictating what I can and cannot eat. But this country is in a terrible state - what numerous health professionals and organizations are calling a crisis - largely because many consumers are ignorant about nutrition, conditioned by pervasive and insidious advertising and confused by the conflicting information about food and health produced by the media. And kids in particular are being brainwashed - pure and simple. Something has to be done.

Out With Idealogy, In With Common Sense
This isn't an idealogical agenda - it's common sense. Look at the health care crisis that is now exploding in the US and in other parts of the developed world as a result of eating too many empty calories. Teenage type 2 diabetics - unheard of before the 1990s are now common for crying out loud! If obesity continues to grow at its current rate, health care costs will bankrupt the entire country in the next decade or so.

Okay, so maybe its going too far to heap ALL of the blame for this dire situation on food companies like McDonalds, Nabisco or Nestle's, but they are a big part of the problem. Using a drug pusher's defense - we're only selling people what they want - doesn't change that. Wouldn't it be great if we could take some of the $10 billion a year they spend on advertising junk food to kids and use it to provide nutritional education programs to kids and parents? Or start up edibile school yard projects so that kids can learn about and grow real food? Or provide more choice in school cafeterias such as organic and natural foods?

Alice Waters' Vision of Food and Agriculture

2006-02-27T07:48:00.000-08:00

In my opinion, Alice Waters is the most eloquent and visionary voice in America for the kinds of changes we need to make to how we produce, procure and consume food.

Below is a statement published in the current issue of Fast Company magazine that says it all much better than I ever could!

"We have to teach eco-gastronomy: a hands-on understanding of where our food comes from, how it's produced, and the traditions and rituals of eating it. When people know what the chickens are being fed, all of a sudden the chickens taste better. Food doesn't have to be fancy - we're talking about a bowl of soup. It's where you get all those ingredients for that soup and how it's made that's important. Once kids are educated, they eat in different ways. They think about farming as an important occupation. They make choices about food based on biodiversity. They become more sophisticated tasters. I think we can have a generation of kids that grow up with a different set of values.

We're all hungry for this kind of experience - I don't mean just physically hungry but psychologically hungry for it. We need to feel as though we are a part of the natural world again, and this is a beautiful, delicious way of doing it.

There are businesses that can spring from this idea, but not big businesses. Plenty of things in this world can be scaled up, but food isn't one of them. We need to buy food that was grown or raised close by rather than support national or global conglomerates. To do so, we need to build local communities of farmers. If we can make the right choices about food, we can change the world."

America's Food Fad Seesaw

2006-02-13T07:42:00.000-08:00

Did you notice the firestorm that blew across the U.S. last week? Well, actually it wasn't a real firestorm but a metaphorical one.

The results of a 10-year, $415 millon study of women between the age of 50-70 years old was published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The popular interpretation of the findings was this - eating a low fat diet had no statisically measurable deterrent effect on a woman's chance of getting heart disease or colon cancer.

Since its release last Tuesday there have been a spate of reports in the news media speculating on the implications of this study. Some health and nutritional professionals criticized the study's design, pointing out that it didn't distinguish between good and bad fats and that this older population of women needed more than 8 years of study to show the effects of changed diet on their health. Many also warned that people might jump to the wrong conclusion - i.e that you don't have to worry anymore about loading up on Big Mac's and doughnuts because this study showed it won't make any difference to whether or not you develop heart disease or cancer.

Some segments of the food industry, especially fast food joints, are probably ecstatic about these findings. But others, particularly packaged foods companies like Kraft etc. are concerned because they will now have to rethink their decade long campaign to market low-fat products as healthy. The weight-control industry finds itself in a similar dilemma because most diets are built around the principle of consuming low-fat foods.

An article in Today's Boston Globe offers the sound perspectives of professional nutritionists on this hullaballou - pointing out the limitations and flaws of this study and why it is downright dangerous to draw any general conclusions about the health effects of diet from it. There are also several sage nuggets of advice about eating offered by the nutritionists. Here are the best ones:

"Eating well never has been, is not, and never will be about deciding which of only three nutrient classes to abandon," says Katz. ''Rather . . . it always will be about making good choices within all three." He emphasizes plenty of fruit and vegetables, whole grains, lean protein, healthy oils from nuts, seeds, olives, and avocados, plus a ''modest" amount of wine and dark chocolate."

"You have to find the balance," says Brennan of the Mass. General clinic, where clients have been referred by physicians for weight loss. Diet alone doesn't determine success, she says, but ''how much you're eating." All the attention in the last decade on low-fat vs. low-carb tended to obscure one important element of weight loss, she says. Calories in, calories out is still the key."

"So for a while dieters concentrated on low fat or fat substitutes but ate just as many calories in sugar and other carbohydrates. Then they turned to high-fat, low-carb programs, which are difficult to sustain and not recommended for heart health. Now the worry is trans fats. But, Brennan cautions, just because a product has no trans fats does not make it calorie-free. She gives the example of a trans-fat-free muffin that instead has saturated fats and plenty of calories."

"Judy Phillips, senior nutritionist at the South End Community Health Center's Weight Initiative Now program, agrees that moderate changes have more long-lasting effect. But despite the constant barrage of information about various diets, the general public has a huge knowledge gap. ''People know they shouldn't be giving kids Cokes, but they don't know about calories in juice."

"Katz wonders if many people seize on the apparent confusion about diets to give them license to eat the way they want. If the experts can't seem to make up their minds, he says, the public view is sometimes, 'I'll be in Burger King when you guys sort it out.'

''I think science and anthropology converge on a dietary pattern of roughly 55 percent of calories from almost exclusively complex carbohydrates," foods that include fruit, vegetables, legumes, and whole grains. Protein (20 percent) and fat (25 percent) make up the rest."

Carlisle School Association Auction Dinner

2006-02-07T18:42:00.000-08:00

Shown below is the menu of a dinner I prepared last year for a group of ten people who submitted the winning bid (a very generous one I might add) at the Carlisle School Association Fund-Raising Auction.

A similar dinner plus wine tasting will again be featured on this year's CSA auction docket. The auction itself will be held on Friday, March 24 at the Hyatt Regency Westford.

Gastronomic Tour of Italy

September 24, 2005

Panini – Veneto

Panini with Assorted Toppings of Basil Pesto and Dried Tomato, Chickpea and Sage Puree, and Red Pepper and Clam

Proscecco Brut, Desiderio, Jeio Bisol

Antipasti – Emilia Romagna

Antipasti Plate of Cantaloupe, Honey Dew and Casaba Melons wrapped with Prosciutto, Soppressata and Capicola

Lambrusco Grasparossa, di Castelvetro, Tanuta Pederzana

Piatti di Pasta - Sicilia

Rigatoni with Eggplant, Pepper and Tomato Sauce

Nero D’Avola, Sedara, Donna Fugata, Sicilia 2oo3

Piatti di Pesce - Campagnia

Grilled Swordfish with Tomato, Lemon and Caper Salsa

Casta d’ Amalfi, Ravello Bianco, Furore, 2003

Piatti di Carne - Tuscana

Grilled Rib Eye Steak with Carmelized Onions
Fava Bean Puree
Sauteed Rapini and Broccoli

Brunello di Montalcino, Ciacci Piccolomini, D’Aragona, 1999

Insalata - Liguria

Organic butter lettuce, radicchio and endive with fig and olive tapenade and fig vinaigrette

Golfodel Tigullio Cilegiolo, Bisson, 2004

Formaggio - Piedmonte

Selected Piedmontese Cheeses – Raschera, Toma, Robiola Castagna Cora, Vera Pagliettini Luigi Giuffanti

San Fereolo, Langhe Bianco, 2oo3
Produttori del Barbaresco, Vignetti in Pora, 1996

Dolce - Friuli

Zambaglione with White Peaches

Moscato D’Asti, Elio Perrone, 2004

"Good Lord, What Are You Trying to Do Here?"

2006-02-06T07:15:00.000-08:00

This is what nurse and diabetes educator Stephanie Rose is quoted to have said when she learned of her alma mater Idaho Falls High School's latest cafeteria promotion - two corn dogs for a dollar.

Many would probably dismiss Rose as some snooty food Nazi. I salute her as a courageous David flinging stones at the Goliathian commercial and cultural forces that have pushed America to the brink of an obesity-driven health catastrophe.

The so-called "Battle over Junk Food" is apparently heating up throughout America (or at least in Idaho, the supplier of the key ingredient of just about everyone's favorite junk food - French fries).

Rose and her fellow school Wellness Committee member Tracie Miller are campaigning to rid Idaho Falls High of junk food and in the process restore sanity to a small part of a country that is otherwise rife with food dysfunctionality.

There are some gems in this article that shed light on our misplaced priorities. In one instance, the principal of the school, Randy Hurley, says he wants students to eat well but his main concern is to keep the school clean. "If we become more restrictive here, within a half block the kids can go purchase what they're interested in....One of our greatest concerns is they'll bring in big beverage cups. You spill a 44-ounce drink, and you have a half-gallon of liquid to clean up."

Where did they get this character - from the custodial ranks?

Another part of the article points out that the school as well as the Parent Teacher Organization and other school groups depend on sales of junk food such as cookie dough, candy and cheesecakes to raise money. Tracie Miller questions the premise of school snack sales, noting that companies providing the products make a profit. She suggests that asking people to give money directly to the school makes more sense than selling a tub of cookie dough for $12 and splitting the profit with the vendor.

Right on!! I couldn't agree more. I have long been perplexed at what has become a booming industry in America - companies that provide B-grade food products and other junk to schools for fund raising. This seems like a racket to me - just a way for companies to wrap their crappy products in the cloak of some worthy cause. In my town for example, the school band raises money for its annual trip by selling citrus. The first year we moved into town, I gladly bought a case when approached by one of the band members. When it arrived I was astounded to discover 12 scawny oranges not much bigger than walnuts and a dozen undernourished grapefruits barely the size of lacrosse balls. They tasted even worse than they looked. The cost - $24!! This is about two-and-a-half times what you would pay for an equal quantity of top quality citrus in any supermarket.

The cynical side of me suspects this sort of thing is a scam cooked up by some sleazy produce distributor to get rid of fruit he could not otherwise sell. A even more egregious example is - okay dare I have the courage to say it - Girl Scout cookies!! Look I don't have anything against Girl Scouts or cookies, but have you ever looked at the ingredients listed on a typical box of Girl Scout cookies?! They are filled with the cheapest and most unhealthy ingredients imaginable. I'm sorry but I don't see the logic of teaching young girls to sell products that poison people's health in order to raise money. Why can't they sell something made with real wholesome ingredients instead of the rank effluent of America's Agri-Industrial complex?

Props to Stephanie Rose and Tracie Miller!!!!! May there be more people like them willing to stand up and ask the question of schools, governments and corporations, "Good Lord, what are you trying to do here".

My Worst Nightmare

2006-02-02T09:10:00.000-08:00

In an very entertaining article- "Land of the McFree" by a British journalist about McDonald's and his visit to Hamburger University, the author concludes with this absolutely warped and scary fusion of McDonald's ingredients and a gourmet menu:

"As if to prove the point, we round off the day with perhaps the weirdest meal I've ever eaten - and I've eaten live eel, mind you. It's dubbed McGourmet and it's a 10-course banquet of dishes all prepared using ingredients found in a standard McDonald's. It includes such delicacies as a Big Tasty Meatloaf with cream cheese sauce and a Coca-Cola reduction and a McCrispy Chicken confitted in citrus sauce. It's strangely convincing and yet very, very, odd. A bit like the folk at Oak Brook, Illinois."

UGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

French Women Actually Do Get Fat - But Only When Living American Lifestyles

2006-01-25T12:10:00.000-08:00

Mireille Guiliano's surprise best selling book, "French Women Don't Get Fat" caused quite a stir last year in America. Some saw it as yet another condecending swipe at Americans by the tres-arrogant French. A cynical few even challenged the title's assertion by claiming that the reason French women are svelte is that they smoke far more than their American counterparts.

But arguing about whether the title is 100% accurate is missing the fundamental point of the book. It would be more accurately although less provocatively titled, "French people who eat a balance of high quality food, take time to sit down and eat meals properly, walk a great deal and drink lots of water don't become overweight". Obviously this tongue-twister on the cover would have killed sales. But that's the essence of the book. And it's good advice in my view. If you do what Guiliano recommends you will not get fat. And if you are already fat, the odds are good that you will lose weight and keep it off. Best of all, you will maximize the pleasure and joy of your eating experience. Purchasing, preparing and eating food involve rituals that we should learn to cherish. And the majority of French people do.

But apparently French lifestyles and eating habits are changing - unfortunately for the worse. Today's New York Times article, "France Battles a Problem That Grows and Grows: Fat" shows that many French, especially children are now getting fat and the country is experiencing the health consequences of obesity that American's have been facing for several years now.

The cause? Adopting American eating (fast and prepared foods) and exercise habits (i.e., little or none).

The Diabetes Epidemic - A Consequence of Our Culture

2006-01-17T05:53:00.000-08:00

Diabetes is a disease I am painfully familiar with. My 13-year old son has had Type 1 (insulin-dependent) diabetes since he was 13 months old. There are about 2 million Type 1 diabetics in the U.S. The cause is unknown but it is believed to be connected to an immune system disorder.

Type-2 diabetes afflicts at least 18 million (health experts say there are millions more undiagnosed cases). It is caused primarily by poor diet and lack of exercise, although genetic factors strongly affect one's predisposition to the disease.

This terrible disease is rightfully getting a great deal of attention. Last week the New York Times ran an excellent series of articles examining the impact of diabetes on people in East Harlem and the affects on the health care system.

Today, the Boston Globe's lead editoral deals with the topic.

I can talk all day about the diabetes epidemic in America. But I just want to make one point here. Everyone focuses on the causes - processed foods, poor diets, too many calories, lack of regular exercise, too much marketing of junk foods. And they should. But the remedies offered usually focus only on changing eating and exercise habits.

Both are necessary but not sufficient. Diabetes is the consequence of America's convenience culture and the stigma attached to spending time in the kitchen cooking. An entire generation of Americans believe that preparing meals from scratch takes too much time and work. Until this belief changes, the fight against obsesity and its terrible consequences like diabetes will be a losing battle.

Real food 1, McDonald's 0

2006-01-15T13:48:00.000-08:00

A great article about how a small Italian baker put McDonald's out of business in the Italian town of Altamura. This shows that the little guy providing quickly prepared but real food can compete against the big guys selling fast industrialized food. (at least in Italy)

Tony's Ragu Recipe

2006-01-15T13:35:00.000-08:00

This is a favorite among my kids although my wife finds it a bit too heavy. Still, its a simple peasant dish with a few basic ingredients that produces a rich concentrated flavor.

Ingredients:

10 cloves of garlic
1 small onion
2 cans of whole tomatos (preferably San Marzano)
1/2 cup of red wine (preferably Italian and fruity - e.g., Salice Salentio or Primitivo)
3 lbs of ground beef (you can use other meats - I often do a combination of beef, duck and buffalo)
2 tablespoons of olive oil

Cooking:

Mince garlic and onions and sautee at medium high for about ten minutes or until carmelized in 12 inch high edged fry pan.
Add meat and cook until brown.
Pour off excess fat.
Add wine and cook for 5 minutes.
Chop tomatos in blender or food processor and add to pan.
Cook at low for 5 hours stirring occasionally. The key is to simmer it long and slow and gradually reduce all the liquid until meat and tomato are concentrated.
Serve on pasta - the best is penne or rigatoni. Sprinkle freshly grated pecorino romano cheese to taste and garnish with chopped fresh basil

Recommended wine - A robust red wine goes best with this hearty fare - I suggest any southern Italian such as Salice Salentino, Primitivo, Montepulciano D'abruzzi or Sicilian Nero d'avola or even a Sardinian Cannonau.

Feeding Kids Right From The Start

2006-01-15T09:05:00.000-08:00

A great little piece puncturing the myths about kids and food appears in today's New York Times magazine. Check it out: Generation Pad Thai

This piece should be must reading for any parent concerned about raising children to have a healthy attitude toward food.

The recommendations are especially good:

Make your children eat at the table from a very young age - This sets the tone for kids that dining is something the family does together - that means everybody.
Make them eat what you do, even if you have to purée it. - Okay this is a little over the top with babies, but I agree that pureed real food is better than anything in the jar including organic baby food. Remember, children's palettes are formed very early, so the sooner they get exposed to a variety of tastes and textures the better.
Pack lunches fashioned from leftovers. - This means you need to cook meals in the first place - but there is nothing better than a sandwich made from a leftover roast, or as my kids love, left over pasta and ragu
Eschew Baggies filled with Goldfish - The key here is to not fill up kids with junk between meals.
Buy them the most expensive chocolate you can afford. No this is not crazy advice! The sooner kids learn what real food and even the best foods taste like, the sooner they will understand the difference between the authentic good stuff and the industrially produced erzatz food that permeates American groceries and tables.

My favorite quote from the article:

"I look in people's fridges and it appalls me," said Hugo Matheson, a chef at the Kitchen in Boulder, Colo. "The demographic around here doesn't have financial issues, but they still buy prepackaged lasagna from Whole Foods when all the kid really needs to eat is half a chicken breast."

Some will note that all this advice comes from professional chefs - but believe me you do not need to be one to feed your kids good, wholesome food. It doesn't need to be fancy but only needs to be made with love, care and good basic ingredients.

Beyond Organic - Recreating Local Agriculture and Food Production

2006-01-04T09:28:00.000-08:00

On Christmas Day my wife, three children and I sat down to a home-cooked 7-course meal. One of the dishes featured a standing rib roast. This is a wonderfully flavorful cut of beef so we knew it would be good. However, there was something else special about it. It was locally produced. In fact, it came literally from "the steer down the street"! Our wonderful beef was raised at Mill Iron Farm which is located near enough to our home that we sometimes hear the contented nightly moos and bellows of our bovine neighbors.

The steer was grass fed, allowed to roam all day in the field and received no anti-biotics, hormones or anything else save for an annual worming pill. As they say, you could really taste the difference. It was absolutely superb - a rich, tender and juicy flavor that one would have to pay three times the amount in a restaurant to experience.

Such food ecstacy raises the question - why can't we have more locally raised and produced food products? I'll take organic products produced from afar any day over conventional ones but the aesthetic, environmental, health and flavor benefits of locally produced food make a strong case for communities to promote them.

I'm lucky to live in Carlisle Massachusetts where in addition to locally raised beef, we are also able to get a weekly delivery of fresh eggs from chickens cared for by a friend's 14-year old daughter, a wide variety of vegetables from local gardens in summer, honey, cranberries from the town bog and cheese made from the milk of goats raised by another neighbor! I don't expect that every community can produce this sort of bounty but it sure would be nice if more were able to reestablish local food production.

Fortunately there are many people ahead of me on this quest. For example, I recently heard a report on PBS radio's "The World" entitled 100 Mile Diet about a couple in British Columbia that have undertaken an ambitious one-year experiment. They are eating only food grown within 100 miles of where they live. I applaud them for their courage - no coffee or tea for a year! Sure this is a bit extreme, but they make the point just how much local food has disappeared over the years and that it's possible to reintroduce some of it.

Another interesting piece on the locally-produced movement appeared today in the New York Times Dining Out section (0ne of my favorite things to read). "In Oregon, Thinking Local" describes how this trend is taking off in the Portland Oregon area thanks to a local grocer called New Seasons specializing in "home grown" food.

This reminded me of another attempt to recreate a local, self-contained food ecosystem in Vermont called the Farmer's Diner. The idea is to feature only locally produced products on their menu of traditional diner fare. This wasn't easy - much of the local food production infrastructure had disappeared and needed to be recreated. For example, they joint ventured with a pig farmer to build a factory to produce bacon.

These different reports really hit home just how much our food production system has become nationalized and internationalized, to the detriment of the environment, and of course to the palate. Imagine the aesthetic, health and taste benefits to our communities if there were more real Olive Gardens and less ersatz ones.

Food for Thought

2006-01-04T08:55:00.000-08:00

I originally wrote this in 2004. It gives a business perspective on one of my American food heros - Alice Waters. One correction, I don't believe she invented the mesculin mix as I claim in the article, but rather popularized it in America.

Alice Waters, the founder of Chez Panisse, is a business visionary that transformed the American restaurant industry and changed our eating experience forever. She pioneered the preparation of cuisines based entirely on local ingredients. She invented a new way of working with suppliers by cultivating collaborative relationships with local organic farmers. Waters is responsible for introducing many of the innovations in restaurant cuisine that we take for granted today. For example, she worked with local farmers to cultivate obscure varieties of lettuce that few if any people had ever heard of or eaten before. Today the “mesculin mix”, which she invented, is served in restaurants everywhere and is widely available in supermarkets.

Alice Waters is now taking on a new challenge. She is raising the $400,000 annual budget for the Edible Schoolyard program (http://www.edibleschoolyard.org/homepage.html ). It provides urban public school students with a one-acre organic garden and a kitchen classroom. Here’s how the organization describes its mission, “Using food systems as a unifying concept, students learn how to grow, harvest, and prepare nutritious seasonal produce. Experiences in the kitchen and garden foster a better understanding of how the natural world sustains us, and promote the environmental and social well being of our school community”.

Why is Waters leading such an effort? A piece in the Sunday March 7, 2004, New York Times magazine (see http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/07/magazine/07WATERS.html) explains that Waters wants to reverse the obesity epidemic among American children that she believes is a symptom of the deeper issue of how fast food and industrial agriculture are destroying the environment and our culture. “The way children are eating now is teaching them about disposability, about sameness, about fast, cheap and easy. They learn that work is to be avoided, that preparation is drudgery”.

One could say the same things about how many corporations operate today. They are built for disposability, dominated by numbing sameness and obsessed with the endless pursuit of the fastest, cheapest and easiest way of doing business. But the success of Alice Waters proves that business doesn’t have to be this way – there is an alternative. It’s possible to improve people’s lives and make a profit. How? Chez Panisse shows the way. It treats suppliers and employees like real partners not adversaries or chumps. Waters has worked in a mode of collaborative interdependence with the same group of local farmers for over thirty years. The farmers grow and supply an ever evolving mix of organic produce for the restaurant. They benefit by having a strong and committed partner that plays a leadership role in the marketplace. Chez Panisse gains by having a loyal supplier network dedicated to providing quality ingredients and changing its product mix to enable Chez Panisse to steadily produce new culinary innovations.

Inside the company, Waters runs her kitchen along the same collaborative principles. Morning menu planning meetings are exercises in group participation and decision making. The day’s deliveries of fresh ingredients are inspected by the entire culinary team. Ideas for dishes are proposed by everyone, test batches are prepared and evaluated, and the group decides the menu through a process of collaborative consensus.

In Chez Panisse, Alice Waters has created a prosperous and self-sustaining business ecosystem held together by a powerful common vision, shared goals and communal values. It exhibits real commitment to its mission and purpose and to all the stakeholders who make the system work. These are Next Generation Company principles in action. And they are just as applicable to a bank or a manufacturer or a professional services organization.

But for this alternative approach to business to work, it takes leaders with the courage and conviction to stick to these principles. When Waters started her restaurant in the 1971 people told her she was crazy. The tables were too close together. The atmosphere was too casual. Finding a reliable network of local farmers who used sustainable methods was inconceivable. And serving just a single fixed price menu for dinner was absurd. But she stuck to her beliefs and swam against the tide. Eventually the rest of the country began to follow. This is the fundamental challenge of Next Generation Leadership. It demands the courage to take an alternative path and to stick to an ennobling vision and core set of principles despite the skepticism and even scorn of others. Creating Next Generation Companies will never be easy – but the rewards are worth it. Think about this the next time you dig into that nice bowl of fresh mesculin salad.

The Choice is Ours

2006-01-04T08:31:00.000-08:00

I wrote this originally at the end of 2004. It reflects some of my core beliefs and philosophy about food and life as well as the importance and consequences of the choices we make.

Philosopher Bertram Russell said, “Change is scientific, progress is ethical, change is indubitable, whereas progress is a matter of controversy.” And here’s one way the battle between change and progress plays out somewhere in America everyday. A huge retail chain moves into the area. It offers product variety and one-stop-shopping at a level unmatched by any competitors. Its goods are so inexpensive that it soon begins putting local shops out of business. One by one, Main Street stores close and are replaced by down market businesses or national chain outlets. Has the community merely changed or progressed?

Many economists would argue that the town is better off. The standard of living is increased. Locals now spend less for essentials and can afford more discretionary purchases. Growth is fueled as savings are redirected to more productive uses. Small business owners and community advocates on the other hand would take the opposite view. A far smaller portion of every sales dollar brought in by a national chain stays in the community than does with a locally-owned business. And behemoth businesses threaten commercial diversity and local authenticity. Before you know it, every town center or shopping plaza looks the same. An important piece of the community’s physical and social identity is lost.

Regardless of which side of this debate you are on, it is important to understand that changes like these happening in communities and in the workplace result from choices that we make each and every day as consumers. We have the freedom to choose what we buy and with whom we do business. And those decisions have far-reaching impacts on the economic health and aesthetic quality of our communities.

Many Americans can’t seem to get enough of stores like Walmart, Home Depot, Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts or Costco. If you are one of them then by all means keep shopping in these places. But don’t be upset when local merchants go bust. Would you miss businesses such as Ferns, Carlisle Auto Repair, West Concord Supermarket, Idlewylde, The Cheese Shop and West Concord 5 & 10 (These are businesses in Concord and Carlisle, Massachusetts where I live. Please substitute them with the beloved local establishments in your area) were they to disappear? If so then make sure you patronize them too. Don’t calculate value purely on price. Is saving two bucks a pound on ground beef at the Walmart Supercenter or three dollars on a bottle of merlot at Costco worth the larger price of decimating local businesses?

America, for better or for worse, is one giant marketplace where the customer is king or queen. We may feel powerless as workers and ignored as voters, but as customers we rule. Our influence is vast. So think twice about what kind of locality and region you wish to live in the next time you set off shopping. Because where you shop, and what you buy affects the make up of our community. Favor chain stores and big box outlets? Keep shopping in these places - more will pour into the area. Love local merchants, farmers and artisans? The best way to ensure they are here tomorrow is to buy from them today.

Some might assert that locally-owned businesses like the ones I’ve mentioned are an anachronistic luxury that only well-off people in communities like Concord and Carlisle can afford to keep going. Maybe so - but there is evidence that businesses that compete on authenticity and quality can more than hold their own even when they go up against big and powerful national firms. During the 1950’s and 1960’s national bakery and brewing corporations became dominant. Local and regional bakeries and brewers got acquired or went bust. Soon the big players began producing standardized products to reap efficiency and cost advantages. Quality standards plunged (remember Wonder Bread?) Were these changes for the better or worse? It took more than two decades to answer this question but eventually consumers voted with their pocketbooks. Today many communities have locally-owned bakeries producing top-notch breads, pastries and cakes. Local breweries and brew pubs producing a wide variety of high quality beers and ales are now common in many regions and cities around the country.

Is this change or progress? We decide – every time we reach for our wallets. The choice is ours.