Feliz dia del los muertos! Or All Saints Day or whatever reason you employ to extend the costume and makeup wearing season. And a rather busy season it has been! (These are what I call excuses to prevaricate on why I don't have a well thought out foodly post)
Indeed! So we're fresh from the festivities at the beloved City Arts Gallery in the Tower. Fresh off of several hours of standing and slinging of drinks. And I discovered a new and interesting aspect of recipe making and general taste creation. You're only truly creative when you are lacking in the optimum components for your art.
It's something I have been experimenting alot with on the Central Valley Buzz with our food segments and other types of culinary endeavors. I grab or invent on the fly, entirely foreign recipes or dishes, that I read up on the style and technique, but have never attempted before except NOW on live webish TV.
I guess in a way, that's my own special cheap thrill. Lacking the urge to break many bones attempting to ape the Jackass crew, instead I offer up my ego should I ultimately fail in making a fairly simple, yet new dish in my given 15 minutes. So far, I'd say I'm 50/50 on ultimate success. Of course, you keep smiling for the camera, but I often notice a forgotten ingredient or the rare outright screwup that I have to backpedal quickly from, since I don't have "back up food" or one of those handy dandy proper chefs to cook offscreen for me.
And really, where I am now in my foodventures, I wouldn't want all of that theatrical artifice. This is where the actual fun lives, in these moments of discovery, while you're still trying to produce banter. Gabbling madly about this or that, that you know by rote while your upper brain is going "FUCK! I'm burning this! Crap! The other burner is too cold! Shit, do I add the cumin now? What fucking camera is on screen at the moment?"
Oh yeah. I promised to kick down that coconut green curry soup recipe. Well, I'm thinking it's time to make it again sometime this week, so not only can we enjoy it again and not waste all of the green curry paste, but I think it'll be mighty tasty again once we snag some lemon grass and figure out what galangal looks like. If we're going to rant about it, might as well fake it as right and proper as possible. I hate to make promises, since they're easily broken. But expect a double post this week, I need me some Thai penicillin.
-Pook
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Eating Out Brandy On A Sunday Morn
Gordon Ramsey is the type of boss that, if I was at a pub and was on my way to take a painfully monster piss and he was on fire, directly in my path to the pisser. I would pinch the end of my wiener and stop to look soulfully into his eyes, so he could see my teeth floating behind my corneas. Then I would doff my hat and walk quietly to the pisser while I listened to his fat sizzle outside the door.
That’s not to say that I hate pro chefs or successful restaurateurs. Just that flavor of knowitall, the "so much better than thou", types. I know why the idea sells in the U.S. It’s the same reason that NASCAR does. We’re all waiting for the eventual assassination of Gordon Ramsey. And all I can be is thankful, that I didn’t graduate culinary school to wind up on that bastard's show to eventually become America's culinary Dick Trickle and metaphorically wreck a wok of boiling sea uchins up his rectum.
Normally it would be hard to identify with Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs. But deep in your heart...picture having a deep, dark, unscaleable well, in which you kept Gordon Ramsey. And you would just lower some basil, garlic, pine nuts and olive oil, then bellow “Put the pesto in the basket bitch! Or else it gets the hose again!” You just got a little orgasmic shudder down your spine, didn’t you?
And that’s one thing that I don’t get at the end of the day. From Mel’s Diner on Alice to today’s modern food reality shows, the resplendent bastard of small mindedness is allowed, nay, expected to rule the kitchen with a cocksucker’s hand. It’s the law that the slower and weaker elements in the kitchen be marginalized and mocked in favor of the self proclaimed “Ferraris of Fire and Grease” jealously hiding simple techniques and skills, to play at back of house politics; letting talent go to waste rather than train them properly.
In it’s own sick way, working in a crappy chain kitchen is like running for local office. Better hope you never dated the head Chef’s daughter but didn’t have the good graces to knock her up. The mid-range, quasi chains are even moreso, in that you need a resume AND a hookup with someone more prestigious than a 3 year dishwasher. And then there are the tippy tops, where you’ve essentially got to be either a legitimate culinary genius at the right cocktail party/cocainestravaganza, or the middle child of a financier who is a 52% shareholders of the restaurant’s LLC and the last head chef got fired for OD’ing at the Christmas party right after he got his profit share.
So what does that leave for the wee, short order cook, with a gleam in his eye and a small down payment? Fuckall. Why? #1, it’s a rare bird that can afford to own their own restaurant space anymore. Why again? Because, it’s easier to rent the space to a succession of failing restaurants, rather than try to make it on your own. So the only way you’re buying a place with seats and a stove is in the least likely to succeed of areas where humans live. Why tertiarily? Because they can wait it out for another desperate sucker with a dream to tank his savings and happily burn his credit to cinders while feeding it into their commercial black hole (with a roof leak).
Those places from the days of yore? The one’s that your parents and their parents loved? Businesses that were started on property those plucky go getter’s were able to buy and finance with their average and modest business? Gone. Today, there is next to nothing to own for the less than uber-rich without entering into high risk, shady deals with financiers from “now legitimate enterprises” or have part of the local government in pocket for whatever reason. Permits, permits, permits! What’s right changes by the inspector and whom you’ve “made friends with” versus those you can’t afford to socialize with because you can’t support your overhead and the racket too. Conditional use may well have conditions depending on your yearly donorship, if youse knows whats bein implied. Per se.
It’s to the point where you’ve gotta suck a long dick just to have a roving hippymobile lunch truck, because fresh ingredients don’t jibe with the “City Plan”. But at the same time, in high school I was eating off of one of the most non-NSF trucks around and it was approved to feed young Fresno Christian minds at $4.00 per tepid, mayo laden, chicken sandwich, sitting in a 90 degree warmer for 2 lunch hours. And I never saw the health department show up to ensure our youthful culinary health(s).
Wait…what’s that you say? Because it’s sexy and on Food Network, the city thinks it can generate some REAL income off the backs of penniless grub slinging hopefuls, struggling to make a small business work in a hostile economy? Yeah, that sounds like the Fresno I grew up in. Small industries can’t afford to make Bubba the mayor. But if they’re fashionable and making a buck, we’re gonna make sure we get our’s, motherfucker! Who cares about stifling new commercial potential?
Better to pick a corpse now than wait for it to grow full term and attempt some type of mutually beneficial symbiosis. Suck the bastard dry today, because it might not be there tomorrow. Now there’s a platform a politician can win with!
Vote bipartisan this year. It's the right thing to do for Wal-Mart, McDonalds and people richer than you could ever imagine becoming.
-Pook
That’s not to say that I hate pro chefs or successful restaurateurs. Just that flavor of knowitall, the "so much better than thou", types. I know why the idea sells in the U.S. It’s the same reason that NASCAR does. We’re all waiting for the eventual assassination of Gordon Ramsey. And all I can be is thankful, that I didn’t graduate culinary school to wind up on that bastard's show to eventually become America's culinary Dick Trickle and metaphorically wreck a wok of boiling sea uchins up his rectum.
Normally it would be hard to identify with Buffalo Bill from Silence of the Lambs. But deep in your heart...picture having a deep, dark, unscaleable well, in which you kept Gordon Ramsey. And you would just lower some basil, garlic, pine nuts and olive oil, then bellow “Put the pesto in the basket bitch! Or else it gets the hose again!” You just got a little orgasmic shudder down your spine, didn’t you?
And that’s one thing that I don’t get at the end of the day. From Mel’s Diner on Alice to today’s modern food reality shows, the resplendent bastard of small mindedness is allowed, nay, expected to rule the kitchen with a cocksucker’s hand. It’s the law that the slower and weaker elements in the kitchen be marginalized and mocked in favor of the self proclaimed “Ferraris of Fire and Grease” jealously hiding simple techniques and skills, to play at back of house politics; letting talent go to waste rather than train them properly.
In it’s own sick way, working in a crappy chain kitchen is like running for local office. Better hope you never dated the head Chef’s daughter but didn’t have the good graces to knock her up. The mid-range, quasi chains are even moreso, in that you need a resume AND a hookup with someone more prestigious than a 3 year dishwasher. And then there are the tippy tops, where you’ve essentially got to be either a legitimate culinary genius at the right cocktail party/cocainestravaganza, or the middle child of a financier who is a 52% shareholders of the restaurant’s LLC and the last head chef got fired for OD’ing at the Christmas party right after he got his profit share.
So what does that leave for the wee, short order cook, with a gleam in his eye and a small down payment? Fuckall. Why? #1, it’s a rare bird that can afford to own their own restaurant space anymore. Why again? Because, it’s easier to rent the space to a succession of failing restaurants, rather than try to make it on your own. So the only way you’re buying a place with seats and a stove is in the least likely to succeed of areas where humans live. Why tertiarily? Because they can wait it out for another desperate sucker with a dream to tank his savings and happily burn his credit to cinders while feeding it into their commercial black hole (with a roof leak).
Those places from the days of yore? The one’s that your parents and their parents loved? Businesses that were started on property those plucky go getter’s were able to buy and finance with their average and modest business? Gone. Today, there is next to nothing to own for the less than uber-rich without entering into high risk, shady deals with financiers from “now legitimate enterprises” or have part of the local government in pocket for whatever reason. Permits, permits, permits! What’s right changes by the inspector and whom you’ve “made friends with” versus those you can’t afford to socialize with because you can’t support your overhead and the racket too. Conditional use may well have conditions depending on your yearly donorship, if youse knows whats bein implied. Per se.
It’s to the point where you’ve gotta suck a long dick just to have a roving hippymobile lunch truck, because fresh ingredients don’t jibe with the “City Plan”. But at the same time, in high school I was eating off of one of the most non-NSF trucks around and it was approved to feed young Fresno Christian minds at $4.00 per tepid, mayo laden, chicken sandwich, sitting in a 90 degree warmer for 2 lunch hours. And I never saw the health department show up to ensure our youthful culinary health(s).
Wait…what’s that you say? Because it’s sexy and on Food Network, the city thinks it can generate some REAL income off the backs of penniless grub slinging hopefuls, struggling to make a small business work in a hostile economy? Yeah, that sounds like the Fresno I grew up in. Small industries can’t afford to make Bubba the mayor. But if they’re fashionable and making a buck, we’re gonna make sure we get our’s, motherfucker! Who cares about stifling new commercial potential?
Better to pick a corpse now than wait for it to grow full term and attempt some type of mutually beneficial symbiosis. Suck the bastard dry today, because it might not be there tomorrow. Now there’s a platform a politician can win with!
Vote bipartisan this year. It's the right thing to do for Wal-Mart, McDonalds and people richer than you could ever imagine becoming.
-Pook
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Eating Out My Asian Secret
Want some fish sauce? They’ve got 4-5 different varieties. Need some sambal oelek? How about 2 freaking gallons?!? Not to mention dozens of different and interesting tinned items, from pickled shallots to tamarind sauces to fearsome fermented fish concoctions. There is a veritable rainbow of new, interesting and downright frightening items available as potential ingredients for kitchen madness.
Then we moved on, threading through the aisles and nosing through each section like Indiana Jones, looking to steal cultural artifacts from their native peoples to “preserve” them in a London museum. Ok, maybe not quite that obtusely misguided. Afterall, this is a funtime weekend shopping romp that started out as a quest for green peppercorns so that I can finally make proper Steak Diane, that exploded into a full blown culinary adventure. Certainly more entertaining than going to the movies.
We found a lot of other fun items, green tea mochi, various flavors of shrimp chips (the cheese are actually pretty tasty!), a bunch of different sambals and hot sauces, cookies, wafers and the coolest looking peeler/finger-mangler/lockjaw delivery device I’ve seen in a while. Plus we grabbed some items for curries, udon, rice and some fresh Chinese noodles. AND! We found my guilty pleasure…the Pepsi Throwbacks! And a buck cheaper per 12 pack than anywhere else in town! So, we certainly cleaned them out of those.
The final lap was through the meat and freezer areas. First off, the butcher was fairly well stocked. Not so much in the New York steak area, but more along the lines of stew meats, a few basic steaks and simpler cuts. One big plus is that they carry uncured pork belly, otherwise known as bacon before it hits the smokehouse. I’ve been looking forward to experimenting a bit with this in the future. And of course the fish area was delightfully fresh. And I say that without irony. Too often a fresh fishmonger ruins your appetite with the less pleasant odors of the sea. But their whole meat area smelled like…nothing! Just like a clean butcherey should. Their fresh fish included the usual catfish, shrimp and also bass and a few trout that looked from around these parts. One of them had a bulldog tattoo at least.
And the frozen area was even more insane. Fishcicles from waters all over the world. Some of which I’ve only seen on National Geographic much less on a plate. And a wide selection of varied quick frozen Asian specialties, like dumplings, spring rolls and tons of frozen ingredients, side dishes and desserts. Not to mention here is where they keep their sho jou, which I’m told is pretty much the widowmaker of blackout drunks. We even saw a jug labled: Cooking Liquor; NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION! Which sorta blew my mind, since if you’re cooking with it, wouldn’t it be consumed by a human? But then again, I’ve tasted a few bottles of booze that probably should have carried the same label. Lucky Lager anyone?
Anyway though. After our deep and thorough rooting through their stock, we finally pushed our overburdened cart to the checkout stand. Scant minutes before they were preparing to arm themselves to chase us out so they could finally close up shop. Here’s where I’m really impressed. Not so much at the checker, who was fairly cool, all things considered. But the bill total that she handed us. We exercised nothing resembling restraint. We grabbed anything that appeared shiny or interesting, including medieval vegetable torture devices and new teapots. But after all of that and 3 hours of shopping, our total was only about $150. In a regular market we would have easily been out double that amount and came out with less actual food.
If you’ve been searching for a 1 stop shop for all your Asian cooking needs, or if you’re looking for some obscure ingredients for your favorite dish, you can do a lot worse than stopping into the R-N Market for a minute or 180. Not only do they have a wide and varied selection of Asian dishes and ingredients, they also carry a decent selection of regular Western market items like cereals, bbq sauces and all that. And even if you’re not an adventurous cook, their fresh produce alone is the perfect excuse to find oneself north of Shaw.
-Pook
P.S. Oh yeah, and the green coconut curry soup we made for dinner that night curled our toes in Tom Kha Gai rapture. (recipe to come)
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