Tastebuds

Mongeta del ganxet

A couple of years ago, in September of 2007, I had the privilege of going on a culinary tour of Spain organized by CUESA.  One of the more unique places we visited was the Gallecs, a small agricultural region just 15 kilometers outside of Barcelona.  This area truly represents an oasis in the midst of what seems like endless urban sprawl.  In fact, some 20 years ago, the Spanish government prepared to turn this historically important region into just that, a series of suburban condominium complexes interspersed with malls and other like institutions of capitalistic avarice.  Fortunately for us, and most importantly, the hardworking local Spaniards who were to be displaced by the new government urban plan, the project languished in red tape for years and was eventually scrapped.

The region now represents the largest area of organic farming in all of Catalonia. In 2006, a consortium in cooperation with 11 farmers created a model in which the farmers would diversify away from solely growing wheat and begin growing unique value products that they could then market with their own brand.  It stands as an agricultural business model that will hopefully be replicated throughout Spain.

I now must embarrassingly admit that the most unique product that I brought home from this region has sat on a shelf in my pantry for approximately 2 years.   Last week I finally got around to cooking these ancient Catalonian heirloom beans, Mongeta del ganxet.  As you can see from the photo, they are medium sized white beans with an extremely pronounced “kidney” shape.  As my purpose was to evaluate the taste and texture of the beans, I cooked them very simply in plain water and added salt about 75% of the way through the cooking process.   I planned on taking the texture of these beans with a grain of salt (pun intended) as I expected the texture to have deteriorated somewhat due to the fact that I left them on my shelf for the aforementioned two years.  The skin of freshly dried beans will typically remain tight when cooked, allowing the meat of the bean to cook evenly until it reaches that creamy custardy state.
Much to my surprise, the texture of the “aged” beans was perfect – a true testament to both the skill of the hard working farmers of the Gallecs region as well as the quality genetics of this most regal heirloom bean.  But the taste of these beans truly set it apart.  What a rich, earthy bean flavor!  Absolutely fantastic.

 
I am not sure if these beans have been imported and available in the United States yet, but I will certainly keep my eyes open.  I suggest everyone doing the same.  And by all means if you are traveling to Barcelona and/or Catalonia, I highly recommend purchasing these beans – look for them in specialty shops or farmers markets.  Two years later, I hope that the business model has been a success and the beans are easy to find.  I for one will not let another 2 years go by before I enjoy the SECOND BAG of Mongeta del ganxetes I brought home!

Eng and Chang…Kiwi?

I saw these mutant kiwi at a market on Irving and 23rd a few weeks ago.  Somewhere, these kiwi are local, and, quite possibly, sustainable.   But would you buy them?

 

Surrealistic Pillow

White Rabbits in the children’s section at Ikea.  Nola can’t get enough. Hunger pangs grow larger by the second.  Ooo!  A $2.99 clock for the kitchen office!  Sold.  Stay focused.  We’re here for a kiddy potty.  Potty time!  A kaleidoscope of colors.  We make a quick decision!  Blue and green.  Sweet.  Now we must eat, maybe.  Nap time is a calling.  Breakdown right around the corner.

Ikea.  80 West.  500 yards.  It’s now or nothing.  “The International food court?” says Sheila. Sure.  Fifteen or so ethnic food stalls.  No chains.  She’s been there.  Never mentioned it.  Strange.

Reno?  Hong Kong?  Sydney?  The last time I saw this much neon was Vegas.   But I’m all over it.  “You want to try a piece of sushi?” cries a hawker.  Uh…let’s see…sushi…hot day…Oakland food court.  Maybe not.  Free?  Really?  Crammed it in. Origato!

Smells.  Sounds.  A frenzy of activity.  Afghani.  Jamaican.  Hofbrau.  Indian.  Korean.  Hofbrau?  Damn I love Hofbrau!  Pasta.  Thai.  Vietnamese.  I know what you’re thinking.  Banh mi?  No.  There is pho though.  “Don’t you want somebody to love!”  I settle on Noodles, etc.  Tasty noodles, cooked to order.  $6.95 and pretty damn good.   All served in an eco friendly environment.  (Huh?)  EmeryBay Public Market. 

Be all end all?  Probably not.  Second visit?  Absolutely.   

Nap time.

The (Im)-Perfect Pea

I don’t espouse the Bourdainian philosophy of exposing the little secrets in the culinary “underbelly.”  After all, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.  Moreover, the motivation for such tactics now seems both entirely too avaricious and capitalistic for my own taste.  Nevertheless, with the bitter wind of winter now yielding to the gentle breeze of the season of rebirth, I have been inspired to do precisely that, for the decidedly simple, innocent reason of preventing the entire world from self-destructing from its own shortsightedness.

Just kidding.  This is no doomsday sermon.  But this issue is important to me, and certainly should be to all of my fellow chefs.  You see, I know many chefs, themselves inspired by the aforementioned wind of change, who eagerly await the arrival of the spring pea season…and then use frozen peas!  I myself have been guilty of this egregious lack of integrity in the past.  That is…before I saw the light, or more pertinently, tasted the light.  Chefs most commonly justify this deception by highlighting two supposed advantages to the frozen pea.  The first is sweetness.  It is true that English peas, once harvested, begin converting their stores of sugar into starch and/or energy in a desperate effort to strengthen their structure and stay alive.  Frozen pea producers the world over, from Clarence Birdseye to Trader Joe, are quick to emphasize and advertise that their peas are flash frozen within hours of picking, resulting in a sweeter, tastier product.  (It is not surprising that in this era of unprecedented levels of diabetes and obesity, sweetness has become the paradigm of flavor in this country.  Last I checked, it was just one of the four basic ‘tastes’.)  I can understand when chefs from Smalltown, USA use frozen peas, as their lack of access to local growers make this product, picked at the ideal time, the best choice.  (Then again, I guess I always assumed that peas were grown in Smalltown!) But this is certainly not applicable in the Greater San Francisco Bay Area, the proverbial Breadbasket of the World, with world-class growers such as Louis Iacopi in Half Moon Bay pumping super fresh peas into the San Francisco restaurant machine within days of harvest.  Pick up a sample next time you’re at his stand at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market.  I promise you will be rewarded with a subtly flavored vegetable with little to no resemblance to its bulk-frozen brethren.  Tiny orbs bursting with the greenness of the earth, delicately nuanced with hints of sugar, soil, and herbs.  Perfect.

Shucking open a fresh pea pod (an act in and of itself so tangible yet transcendental -- evoking within me the memory of warm spring evenings on the porch of my childhood home in the Deep South.  It’s funny how those memories are now utterly devoid of mosquitoes!), one often encounters an imperfect still life.  A mysterious gap here and there.  A slightly misshapen pea.  A dizzying array of sizes.  Therein lays the problem for many.  You see, chefs crave consistency with all of their being.  We want every single dish to be prepared the same way, every single time. We want every dish to look the same every time.  We want every dish to taste the same way every time.  Perfect.

But consistency does not necessarily have to equate with uniformity.  In fact, this imperfection reinforces the dynamic beauty of Mother Nature.  She is constantly changing – be it producing a little rain here to shorten an otherwise banner tomato season or spontaneously creating a hybrid that becomes a culinary star, such as the Meyer lemon.  She is clearly the most powerful force in the culinary realm (although I have encountered a few self important chefs who think otherwise).  It is our role to meet nature’s ever-evolving challenges head-on and transform her product into something always tasty…and occasionally magical.  It is this undertaking that constantly reminds me why I love to do what I do.  And what elevates what we do from a noble profession into a soaring art.  Perfect.

Le Pigeon

My wife, Sheila, daughter, Nola, and I traveled up to Portland, Oregon two weekends ago to both visit my best friend from high school (who has a daughter about the same age as mine) and celebrate my 36th birthday.  While we had a weekend full of activities, the trip centered on a Sunday dinner at Le Pigeon, widely considered to be the best restaurant in Portland.  We had a 5:30 reservation, as we were bringing my daughter to the dinner with us.  But at the last minute my friends volunteered to babysit our little angel so that we could enjoy the dinner by ourselves.

The restaurant bills itself as fine dining in a casual atmosphere, and so it was.  The room consists of 3 communal tables, and approximately 10 bar seats looking into the brass plated open kitchen.  There are no tablecloths, just rustic stained wood tables on which sit the antique mismatched silverware (a personal favorite of mine).  On the back wall of the restaurant, above the waiter’s station sit high shelves full of all manner of preserved and pickled foods.  While the menu is presented on a small 11 x 4 in. card stock page, both the dessert menu and cheese selections for the evening are written on small chalkboards on the walls of the restaurant.  I can honestly say that I was expecting the interior of the restaurant to be more elegant as befits what is billed as the best restaurant in the city, but after dining there I can say that the interior perfectly reflects the soulful nature of Chef Gabriel Rucker’s cuisine.

My wife and I shared two starters, both of which were delicious.  The first was a crisp pork belly on a bed of beans, tripe, and fennel jam.  The beans, the variety of which was not listed on the menu (they were small and white – perhaps a navy or marrow bean), were in a tomato based ragout with julienne pieces of tripe (another of my personal faves).  The tripe was particularly mild, but nonetheless added a richness to the bean ragout that was both subtle and restrained.  The pork belly was extremely crispy on the outside (about 5 seconds away from being too crispy, in my opinion), and yielded to a wonderfully fatty and creamy interior – just the way pork belly should be.   The second was grilled beef heart with beets, horseradish, and egg.  This dish was delicious and well balanced.  The beef heart was cooked perfectly medium rare and sliced on the plate.  The pasture egg was soft boiled, halved and presented upright on the plate very whimsically, looking like two marrow bones sitting next to the heart.  The color and richness of the beets were both a striking visual contrast and an acidic complement to the rich heart and egg components.  A real fun dish.

Our poussin entrée with black truffles and Brussels sprouts was a perfect stomach warmer on this cold, rainy Portland evening.  The aroma of black truffle filled the whole dining room and the poussin, which was served whole with crispy skin and a moist succulent interior, was simple and delicious.  I suppose some guests would be annoyed to have to break down the bird with no help from the kitchen (indeed it is rare to see a poussin served whole with the backbone still attached) but again I thought it reflected the nature of the food.  I loved getting my hands dirty eating the bird, and the periodic licks of my fingers yielded an absolutely delicious mixture of poussin juice, butter, and black truffle. 

Our second entrée was something of an impromptu choice.  We ordered the cod with dumplings, chorizo, and piquillo peppers.  My wife and I never order fish when we go out, usually for no better reason than we simply find the meat alternatives more enticing.  But my wife had fish on the brain (and the enormous steaks that we had for dinner the previous evening fresh in our minds and stomachs). So we went out on a limb.  It couldn’t have been a better choice.  For one the “dumplings” listed on the menu were in fact salt cod dumplings (another of my personal faves) and were light and airy like gnocchi.  The piquillo peppers appeared in the dish as the sauce – a wonderful subtle coulis with no shortage of butter to round out the acidity of the pepper.  And of course the cod was cooked perfectly.

To paraphrase an old idiom, “When in Rome, drink as the Romans do.”  And so we enjoyed a well priced Willamette Valley Pinot to accompany this meal.  Allow me to note the fact that all of the Oregon wines on the menu were extremely well priced.  I have a BIG problem with the fact that Napa and Sonoma wines are so expensive in the Bay Area.  We are being gouged!  In Oregon, just as it is in Europe, the local wines are cheaper – and for good reason as there is obviously not the transportation costs associated with shipping the product long distances.  But Napa wines cost the same in the Bay Area as they do at wine shops in New York, New Orleans, or even Los Angeles for that matter.  Shouldn’t they be cheaper in the Bay Area?  Of course they should.

We enjoyed a trio of Belgian Trappist cheddars for our cheese course.  Not cheeses that I am particularly familiar with, and while they don’t have the nuances of some of Europe’s more complex cheeses, I was very happy to familiarize myself with them.  And they were delicious.

For dessert, we certainly could not pass up the sound of Foie Gras Profiteroles with Salted Caramel.  In fact, I passed up the Foie Gras Pot au Feu on the starters menu because I knew that I would be ordering the profiteroles (not that I am limiting myself to one guise of foie per meal).  It was in fact a foie gras ice cream in the middle of the profiteroles, which slowly began to melt on the plate as it encountered the warm salted caramel.  Wow!  Can I have them for my birthday every year?  Sheila, can you please make this happen?

All said it was a wonderful experience, and the meal exceeded my expectations.  The price tag was cheaper than what one would pay in San Francisco for a comparable meal, as the bill after tax and tip was a tad under $200.  I highly recommend making a reservation at Le Pigeon if you are visiting the Portland area.

Mariquita Feast

A few months ago, I was lucky enough to be invited by my friend, Bruce Hill, executive chef and co-owner of both Bix and Picco restaurants, to the home of my favorite farmers, Andy and Julia Griffin of Mariquita Farms in Watsonville. In addition to growing what I consider to be the most flavorful produce in the Bay Area, Andy is a very astute and eloquent food and farming philosopher. His Ladybug Letter is one of the most popular food related blogs amongst the local culinary cognoscenti. Mariquita does not participate in the Saturday Ferry Building Farmer's Market, so I jump at any opportunity that arises to both personally thank the Griffins and listen to Andy expound about all things both culinary and agricultural. And the promised menu of spit roasted lamb didn't hurt either. 

    As I considered myself fortunate to receive an invitation to such an intimate affair and due to the fact that I was flying to New Orleans early the next morning to visit my family, I volunteered to be a driver. We caravanned down with ice chests full of a scary amount of assorted alcoholic beverages: champagne, wines, beers, Fernet, whiskey, (water too!). We chefs are a thirsty lot.

    I can't say enough as to how generous the Griffins are. They opened up their home and we were treated like kings. Andy took us on a tour of their farm. Their home is not by the main farm of Marquita, but nevertheless there was quite a variety of produce for us to see and for Andy to reflect upon.

The meal was spectacular. The spit roasted lamb was fantastic.  I warmed dozens and dozens of tortillas on an amazing wood burning comal that was fashioned out of an old tractor axle drum.  Julia made a variety of salsas using the tomatillos, tomatoes, and chilies grown on the farm. We all took turns tending to the pinto beans slow cooking in an unbelievably huge iron bean pot that has been in the Griffin family for generations. Julia also prepared a nopales salad that was the best I ever tasted. The vast majority of nopales that are available are the canned or jarred variety, and while I have enjoyed fresh nopales (which are vastly superior to the processed variety); I have never tasted them like this. The griffins had cut these nopales only a few hours before, from cacti that stood only a few feet from where we were enjoying this wonderful feast. To say that you could taste the difference would be an understatement. It was one of those food experiences that make you wonder whether or not you will ever be able to eat that food again, as future nopales almost certainly will not be able to measure up. Note: make sure to procure some Mariquita nopales next summer!

    I knew most of the chefs at the feast (all were mentored by Bruce and worked in his restaurants) as I had spent time with them on a culinary trip to Spain I took with CUESA in September of 2007. I relish any trip to Europe (or any other culinary destination for that matter), and certainly pride myself on the sheer volume of food that I eat there. I don't want to miss a thing – you never know if you are ever going to be back again. Needless to say, amongst this group, I have a certain image to uphold as a voracious eater, and with a spread such as this, I was happy to oblige. Five, six, seven lamb tacos (I lost count), a couple of helpings of nopales, pinto beans. The food coma sat in quick…and hard.  But I was not alone in my gluttony, as this picture of the aftermath can attest. Everyone did their part. The communal spirit and conviviality created by both Andy and Julia's conversation as well as their savory meal was truly an amazing experience. It was with a true sensation of satisfaction that I drove back up to the City, inspired by an afternoon and evening of food with chefs and farmers that I respect and admire. 

Tomales Bay Oysters - NOW!

Eat these. NOW!

The old culinary proverb advising the consumption of oysters only in months ending with ‘r’ is less important on the West Coast than in other places. On the Gulf and East coasts the water temperature rises considerably in the spring and summer months, resulting in a skinny, tasteless oyster. But the cold Pacific Ocean barely fluctuates in temperature throughout the year, and we all know how cold it is on the Bay Area coasts in the summer.

The beautiful weather in November this year has created the perfect environment for Tomales Bay oysters – RIGHT NOW. Rain is also the enemy of the Tomales Bay oyster, as runoff from the Marin Headlands affects the water composition in the bay and thus the flavor of the Point Reyes oysters. But with the temperature turning colder, the days becoming shorter, and the weather staying clear, there can be no better time to indulge in the local bivalves.

It was with this in my mind that we headed up to my friend Jeff’s house in Ross last Saturday. There was ultimately only one plan – to eat as many oysters as possible. Jeff and I took the lovely drive from his house up Sir Francis Drake Blvd. all the way to Point Reyes. The drive through Samuel Taylor State Park is particularly lovely this time of year, as the winter shadows cast their long glance amongst the redwoods.

I always buy my oysters in Tomales Bay from the Tomales Bay Oyster Company. We usually eat them up there at one of the many picnic areas with lovely tables and barbecue pits where you can prepare and enjoy your oysters. On the weekends in particular, whole families of farm workers turn the whole picnic area into one big party.

We purchased 150 oysters for 7 people! (Needless to say we ended up finishing them all. We got 75 large oysters for grilling and 75 small oysters for eating raw. After an hour round trip drive, we were back at Jeff’s and ready to go.  Jeff's wife, Sara, had just laid out a lovely spread of other antipasti including a wonderful salad of mixed chicories from nearby Marin Roots Farm when our other friends.
  I fired up the grill and away we went. I was just back in New Orleans and we grilled up some oysters, but they don’t come out as well (that species is better eaten raw). The fat and protein content on the oysters in Tomales Bay really lend themselves to grilling. I like to grill my oysters right in the shell, and the steam that build up inside forces the oyster to pop open.  Some people shuck them first and put the oyster on the grill open faced, adding whatever sauce they would like directly on the oyster as it cooks. That is perfectly acceptable as well – I just think the oyster has a meatier flavor cooked in the shell. The mineral flavors really permeate the oyster, making it taste like a small steak. We make a “cocktail” of thinly sliced jalapenos steeped in soy sauce to put over the warm oysters.   It is one of my favorite foods in the whole world. The standard accompaniments of cocktail sauce, Tabasco, and lemon also work well with the cooked oysters. Damn were they tasty! Fortunately for me, I can eat a lot of oysters, so when my friends one by one got their fill, I was able to do some serious eating. It certainly wasn’t pretty, but at least I was amongst friends.

The raw oysters were just as good. The perfect balance of fat and brine. And ice cold to boot. Sometimes the one negative of certain species of Tomales Bay oysters is the brittle nature of the shells. You shuck these raw and it is nearly impossible to get out all of the little bits of shell that have fractured off the edges. The oysters we had this day were a sturdier variety that made for easy shucking. I had no problem shucking 50 oysters. Of course, the hundred oysters that I shucked in NOLA two weeks ago helped build up my oyster calluses, so I was good to go. Here’s the shuckin’ machine in action! .

That’s as good as the Tomales Bay oyster can be. I can’t implore you enough to get up there for some oysters as quickly as possible before the winter’s rains come in full force. You won’t be disappointed. I’m headed up there again now – I’ll be there in one hour.

Gigande Beans with Lacinato Kale

When I told my wife that I was cooking some gigande beans with lacinato kale for our Tastebuds blog, she informed me that Emily Weinstein had that same day written about kale in Mark Bittman's popular New York Times blog.  I was struck by something that appears early on in that piece – that people visit the farmers market and wonder how to cook kale.  Many fine cooks have found that a simple sauté with a slight braise in a flavorful liquid brings out the rich and meaty flavor of this most wonderful of vegetables.

             Lacinato kale, Tuscan kale, or dinosaur kale (probably its most common moniker in the fancy grocery stores – named for the pebbly reptilian like appearance of its leaf) is of Italian origin. Cavelo Nero or black kale, as it’s known in Italy, first started appearing on menus in the Bay Area about 10 years ago.  And what a revelation it is.  Growing up in the South, I was familiar with the regular garden variety of kale; while that variety has its merits, I would tend to lump it in the family of collards and greens that are best served by relatively long braising in a flavorful ham hock or bacon infused stock.  Ultimately the final taste of these dishes, while delicious, reflects the taste of pork much more than the flavor of the vegetable.  No such preparation is necessary with Tuscan Kale.  Its flavor is extremely rich and quite meaty and often needs nothing more than a little garlic and lemon to complement it.

I wanted to introduce a less common way to prepare lacinato kale that also showcases this vegetable’s extraordinary flavor and versatility.  It involves a technique to which I was first introduced at the wonderful and famous restaurant in Florence, Cibreo.   It was simply white beans that had been cooked with some onion and garlic in chicken stock – there was no addition of pork flavor whatsoever.  Right before serving, some finely cut lacinato kale had been swirled into the beans and the entire dish finished with lovely Italian extra virgin olive oil.   In a sense the kale had been treated like an herb, as it had been added to the dish right before serving, and, like an herb, its aroma and flavor had permeated the dish.  I wouldn’t have thought of using the vegetable in this way, as a longer cooking time brings out more flavor.  But in this case, the fact that the kale had been so finely cut allowed the heat to essentially cook the vegetable almost instantly, so that the dish retained the raw aromatics of the vegetable but yet cooked the kale enough to bring out its fully developed flavor.  I recommend using a very sharp ‘Santoku’ style knife to chiffonade the kale without bruising and leeching flavor onto the cutting board. 

Click here for a simple and wonderful recipe for gigande beans with lacinato kale:

Lacinato Kale is available at most high end markets in the Bay Area these days (Whole Foods, Adronico’s, Bi-Rite). However, I highly recommend purchasing it at any of the farmer’s markets in the Bay Area. The fresher the kale, the more and meatier of a flavor it has and purchasing it directly from the farmer is the only way to guarantee it just came out of the ground! Or, grow your own! Tuscan Kale grows incredibly well in the Bay Area microclimate!