grit

In the face of inconvenience, sentimentality and grit prevail.

This is the first Christmas that my childhood best friend will soldier
through without her mother who passed away suddenly in May. It will be a
season of memories that cannot be reshaped, only burnished with the
acknowledgement that things just won't be the same. This doesn't keep the
snow from falling or the lights from twinkling. It is the unmovable and
natural movement of the world.

I sent her a note a couple of weeks ago asking if she might want to do a
foreign gift exchange. It wasn't a request without its considerations of
the logistics and the cost and the guessing game played by two very faraway
albeit longtime friends. I wanted to send her something to comfort her and
bring her a bit of joy and knowing that she would want to do the same, an
exchange would be necessary.

She agreed that it would be a fine tradition to resurrect after a few latent
years. Ideas were rallied back and forth. A massage, a robe, a good book
perhaps. We settled on two very different items that we each needed in our
own ways. I was to send a bottle of wine and she was to send a sharpening
stone for my knives. One takes the edge off while the other puts it on.

The grit of a sharpening stone is determined by the nearly microscopic
particle size of the stone. They are measured in microns which are
one-thousandths of a millimeter. Tiny. I have a 1000 grit (about 11
microns) stone from Osaka and needed a 5000 grit (2.5 microns) or higher to
really a polished edge on my knives. The higher the grit number, the
smaller the particles and the sharper the knife. But, stones are easy.

How does one measure the grit of a woman with multiple university degrees, a
full-time job and a little girl? How narrowly do we have to squint to see
the indomitable spirit of my childhood friend as she gave her mother's
eulogy, her future sister-in-law occupying her daughter in the lobby of the
funeral home? In her speech, she said that her mother had become a
transcendent force, able to not only move through space and time but able to
grow and shrink. I sat in the front row, my friend in white as is our
tradition, thinking about her mother zooming into the nucleus of a cell.
Perhaps in the needle of a Christmas pine. Perhaps in the organized lattice
work of a snowflake on her daughter's lapel or in a raw sugar crystal on a
butter cookie. Or maybe she's as big as the goodwill of men.

I will smile and bow my head as my friend toasts her mother this holiday
with well-traveled cabernet that will chill on her doorstep until she
retrieves it. "[My daughter] has more toys than she can shake a stick at.
But what she really needs are a mom and a dad, extended family to love her,
good food, sunshine, health care when she needs it and kindness and
boundaries. It doesn't change after your grow up, either." A few thousand
miles away, the soft, rhythmic brushing of Japanese steel on smooth ceramic
will herald a new year of refocus. It is the steel that is scraped away
which leaves the steel that remains in the shape that will best serve its
purpose.

out of the shell

In my office, there is a protective layer of smooth stone that shelters me from the travails of manual labor. In cubicles and in front of screens, we toil away for hours, plotting the destiny of our stores and the customers who walk through the glass doors. Glass doors with hours on them, a sure sign of retail.

Today, I along with my "corporate" office staff members walked into our stores as helpers and, really, grocery bitches. We were there to do whatever was necessary to make things easier on our store team members as Thanksgiving encroaches. We tidied displays, pulled stock from back rooms and found products for customers. I ran around the store looking for a bearded man who wanted buttermilk that we thought was out but was actually hidden. I would walk a thousand miles for any man who is buying buttermilk to cook with.

Aside from meeting friendly store employees who were bemused by our presence and my ineptitude, the dairy case was my favorite part of the day. I stood in the chilled room with boxes and boxes of egg nog, heavy whipping cream, unpasteurized orange juice, chocolate milk... it was wonderful. The glass doors would open for the searching hands of customers and I would be the shadowy figure shuffling behind the Organic Vanilla Silk Soy Milk. There was something wholesome about stocking the shelves with dairy for the thirsty public. Lactose-free dairy too. And soy. And whatever Coffee-mate is made of.

I was on my feet for most of the day and I came home exhausted. I need to sleep early but I took the time to slice up some tuna and salmon and, get excited, shuck my first oysters. Kumamotos to be exact. I was given a demonstration by Karen and I took my Swiss Army knife to the mollusks with tentative pokes. I actually cut myself but not while shucking an oyster, of course. I knicked my pinky while trying to unfold the blade. That's classic me.

The soft, creamy bodies of the oysters were dipped in variations of ponzu with green onion and lemon juice with Kosher salt and pepper. I prefered the ponzu and sat at my kitchen table, my feet aching, my eyes heavy with the briny, fruity oysters slowly disappearing. All of us out of our shells today. I suppose the body scanners at the airport won't be necessary.

food borne

My father is a chef. He is a chef of frugal ambitions because he grew up eating meals made of the cheapest ingredients. Perhaps this requires him to be a better chef than most because he has had to make low quality meat, fish, poultry, vegetable and spices into dishes that would keep his family happy, not just nourished.

I get my food love from him and today, I realized that my sister Kelly didn't get the same food love. She asked me what I had for brunch and then asked if arugula was a cheese and what brioche is and where it comes from. We came from the same two people, yet our curiosities are so vastly different. But, to my surprise, it was she who explained my love of food to my father in a way that he understood. He doesn't get spending money on food. She helped him to realize that in my world, dollar signs don't equal stars. Taste equals stars. He can understand this, can't he? Since a dearth of dollar signs may not equate a less-than-stellar meal, so does a surplus of those $$$$ not guarantee a splendid dinner.

So thank you, Kelly. And for you, I did a little page flipping of culinary reference books (at last count I have 6). Arugula is a type of lettuce also known as Italian cress or rocket. It's got a bit of spiciness to it and is mainly used by Italians but appears in the modern cuisine of other countries like America, France and Japan. Brioche comes from France and is a yeasty dough that's supposed to be shaped by one ball on top of another larger ball. It's usually a bit sweet and is said to have been made with Brie cheese way back in the day.

poultry with a pause - part II

The chicken has been roasted.

I'd pretty much eaten the four potatoes that were diced and roasted underneath the chicken and the five tomatoes that I had cut up for two salads. The chicken, or at least the bits and pieces I pulled from its carcass after I'd carved it, was delicious. I've got two breasts, two thighs, two wings in a container ready to be divvied up as lunch. I've got a carcass devoid of any slivers of meat awaiting its stock bath.

The peach jam was a success. Its production was prompted by my addiction to Fage Peach Yogurt. I pretty much eat a $2 150g container every morning and I know that it's excessive to spend so much money on yogurt. So, I purchased a large 500g tub of plain Fage for $5 and 2 lbs of peaches for $2. I used about $1.50 worth of peaches and have enough jam for about two containers of yogurt. I've learned a little bit about pectin and I feel like a country bumpkin making my peach "preserves.

poultry with a pause - part I

When I set out to roast a chicken a few days ago, it was not as simple as it sounds.

On Sunday, I bought a lovely bird from soon-to-be momma bird Karen at McCall's Meat & Fish Co. It's one of those olive oil ingesting, happy feathered fowl from Kendor Farms. I was excited to take on my first solo roasting.

That night, I threw some overdue unpasteurized apple juice into a large bowl with an imprecise amount of salt and let the chicken soak. I went to sleep with the bird belly up and before I went to work, turned the bird belly flopped so that both sides would get an equal sugary salty slathering.

Then President Obama came to town. And while I don't have political leanings being that I'm actively uninformed and Canadian, I was happy that he was here. I was happy that he was schmoozing at John Wells' Hancock Park home with John Wells' friends paying $30,000 per couple to drop by, say hello and take a Twitpic with POTUS.

I was NOT happy that the uncoordinated, seemingly erratic and clandestine street closures prevented me from going up both major streets that lead to where I live. I couldn't get home in time to roast my brining chicken. Feeling trapped, I pulled over after being re-routed for the 3rd time and just happened to be near the apartment of two friends. My guardian gays, as they are now known, welcomed me, poured me wine, fed me chicken teriyaki and cookies 'n' cream ice cream. They saved me from a 3 hour commute and a midnight snack filled with the bitterness of a disgruntled resident alien.

Tonight, I placed the chicken on a rack above a pan and let the oven rip. But apparently, as I made peach jam while I waited for it to roast, the oven wasn't hot enough. As the planning was interrupted for the roasting of this chicken, so was its actual roasting. I took the bird out after an hour and let it rest for 15 minutes and when I cut into it, the meat was dark pink. The oven was fired up a 2nd time and now it's in there...sizzling and hopefully getting hot enough. At this point, the jam is done and I'm going to start eating my tomato and basil salad. Tomatoes from the Nozawas and basil from my "garden". It's not a big plant but apparently, many of my culinary endeavors are stunted. Stay tuned for part II when I actually can report on how the chicken tasted. And this time, I can't blame "the Man."

Codependency

Carbon dioxide is a gas which plants "enjoy". Photosynthesis is a complex biological process that I could have sketched for you years ago. But nowadays, the cycle is a generalized concept of which I rarely think. Simply put however, the chlorophyll in plants which makes them green churns carbon dioxide into carbohydrates and oxygen. As you know, oxygen is what humans use to power our body engines, expelling carbon dioxide from our mouths when we exhale and speak. They say it's good to talk to plants for this very reason.

Mo is still not well. Tonight, I had to remove another yellowing branch that serves as a visual symptom of illness. From the biology classes that are now foggy in my memory, I recall the structure of xylem and phloem, funneling nutrients from plant roots to their stems, branches and leaves. Mo is lopsided and I suspect that half of his roots on one side are suffering below the dark soil.

This morning, as I said goodbye before work, I noticed that Mo was salty. That is to say, he was dusted with what I think are bug eggs that looked grains of sodium chloride. Aphids. A few of his leaves looked to be the venues for aphid outings; tiny flat green bugs were gathered and still. Mo looked itchy and I wanted to scratch him.

Miranda reminded me of the brilliant insect food chain and the hierarchy of predators. On my way home from dinner, I stopped at Home Depot to play pimp and find Mo some ladies: ladybugs. Unfortunately, I didn't get any action as they were out so I decided to rid him of the encroachers myself. I could buy him another day's worth of time until I find a harem of spotted red coquettes for my dear tomato plant. He needed cheering up.

So, in a silky black blouse with cream colored lace trim, I stood next to the kitchen sink. I ran Mo's branches gently under a steady stream of water from the faucet. I tilted the pot with my left hand while the aphids were swept into the current of water circling the drain by my right thumb. I brushed the leaves with my finger tips, his spiky hairs rough to the touch. I didn't speak but I breathed deeply and gave him much needed attention.

After the bath, I cut open the new bag of fertilizer. I detected a faint note of delicious cocoa, spooned out the prescribed dosage and mixed it with the soil. Then, an ample shower followed by a patient draining of the excess water. Quick trim of the weakened branch and a few leaflets and he was done.

He's back outside in the cool night air. Tomorrow, I'll try another nursery for Mo's ladies. I'll move him into the sunlight on my way out and hope that he'll be warm and comfortable for the day before I blow him a kiss goodbye. He enjoys the carbon dioxide.

no you don't, Mo

When I read books about ingredients or "food encyclopedias" as they are called now, I particularly enjoy the entries for various fruits and vegetables. Bereft of recipes, whether it's the Food Lover's Companion or a 1961 Larousse Gastronomique, the produce listings always have detailed illustrations or color plates to demonstrate the painterly allure of everything from artichokes to a strawberry. The description will include the biological origin of the species, the proper names of a few varietals, general directions on how to consume it and maybe a dish name or two. Often, the phrase "out of hand" is applied to how a fruit or vegetable can be eaten. This I know how to do.

What these book don't tell you is that humans are not the only organisms that enjoy fruits and vegetables. I suppose it's not a botany book or a biology book. When the bugs come to nibble at the same succulent kernels of corn, you pretty much have to accept it and salvage what you can for leftovers. Bug leftovers.

I stood before the rainbow of produce at Chino Farm on Sunday, bewildered by the array of perfect specimens. Swiss chard in various hues. French carrots in milk, saffron, carrot, salmon and beet colors. Kale, at least 5 kinds. I can't do justice to these things yet. I cannot wrangle the boldest iteration of a butternut squash using heat and forged, sharpened metal. All I can do is photograph the cornucopia of California's bounty. For Mother Nature's efforts, my respects are paid by holding her gifts gingerly as I taste them, preserving her work and enjoying each masterpiece out of hand.

When I returned to the city and its soot stained palms, I felt a stronger desire to tend to my own plants. I'd been moving Mo, the tomato, to the sunniest part of my walkway but he was still looking spotty and unsure. I'd been told that Mo was ill and that I needed to protect him from the bugs which were slowly eating him alive. The other night, I went to Home Depot and Whole Foods to find an organic pesticide. I couldn't bring myself to purchase anything I saw. The bottles were either horribly marketed to be safe (Home Depot > Ortho "ecosense" all lowercase, pretty pastel colors hiding chemical names pesticide) or expired (Whole Foods > some random probiotic spray that was safe yet 2 years old and probably dead inside). I decided that Mo needed to see a doctor.

So, before work this morning, I took Mo and my basil plant to the Hashimoto Nursery on Sawtelle. The basil plant has been suffering as well with huge holes in its leaves. Someone clearly has been enjoying its sweet flavor, leaving me with nary a whole leaf for what I would call the world's tiniest caprese salad.

Admidst the narrow dirt paths between flowers and vines and pots and bagged soil, I teetered in my fancy shoes; Louis Vuitton purse on one arm, Mo and the basil plant in the other. I showed them to the man at the nursery. Deadpan, he told me that Mo wasn't going to make it and to throw it away. I told him that I didn't want to give up. He didn't seem moved. He suggested a bigger pot, no water for a week because I'd been overwatering and then some fertilizer. I asked him about pesticide and he said not to use any as I'd want to eat the tomato. Tomato. Singular. I'm hopeful that Mo can squeeze out just one, red orb. As for the basil plant, it needed more water and also a bigger pot. Later in the day I would remove two green worms from the underside of its leaves. Hopefully that would make a big difference.

I purchased two new pots, a bag of potting soil and a small bag of fertilizer for about $16. Tonight, after whipping up a batch of cookie dough, I set about putting Mo and the basil plant in their new containers. In lieu of insecticide, the nursery man told me to just use water to wash the bugs away. A shower in both senses of the word. Down the drain the bugs went as I ran the kitchen faucet over the green branches and leaves of Mo and the basil. I even removed a tiny millipede and a worm by hand. Not wanting to leave out the thyme, I put it in a new pot as well even though the thyme is flourishing like a weed. A weed. Not weed.

These plants are under my care and I will not give up their health and wellness without a fight. I know that Mother Nature is responsible for bugs and soil and all the rest, but I'm not letting them get Mo. I cannot cull culinary brilliance out of a bushel of perfect produce but I know how to care for things, especially those that cannot care for themselves. When I shucked an ear of corn from Chino, I tore into the home of a thick green worm, somnolent from carbohydrate overload. I touched it with my fingertip and it twitched at the sudden pressure but didn't feel the need to shrink into the cornsilk and husks. I stared at it for a moment before cutting off that bit and tossing the end and the worm into the trash. This time, I was about to eat it out of hand and house and home.

Smells Candies

On La Cienega Boulevard, just south of Jefferson, a large white building houses the See's Candies factory/plant/calorie cloud from heaven. I assume this building also serves as a distribution center, watering the West Coast malls and airport stands with their milk and dark chocolate bits.

They're making minty chocolates today, the scent of menthol puffing out of a vent somewhere. I can usually smell the day's work when I drive by every morning and you can imagine, for me, how amazing this opportunity is. I probably eat See's Candies twice a year but the yummy smells on La Cienega make dodging LAX-bound taxis every day infinitely less annoying.

Epilogue

Today, I write from a gardening workshop in Little Tokyo. Not knowing that the workshop would be conducted almost entirely in Japanese, I'm quietly typing away as the room of Japanese speakers takes notes on handouts. I've heard a few words I know; "soil", "loam", "mulching", "tomato"; but without the context of their usage, they are just gardening basics that will be Wikipedia'ed later.

Yesterday afternoon, behind a bowl of leftover ramen with its slices of fatty pork, I sat down to watch "Food, Inc.", lent to me by a co-worker. We both love food and gardens and we both work for a grocery store. At the end of the film, this last similarity would affect a sentiment in me that would not have existed 6 months ago.

I own "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and I haven't read it. Most of my "big food" information is gleaned from Chef Dong Choi's nighttime rants about corn or diabetes or from the fan postings on the grocery store's Facebook fan page wall. It's interesting that supposed fans wander by their own free will onto the pages of companies of which they clearly are not fans. It's so un-American (read broadly: socialist).

The film's chapters take you through the costs, secrets, consequences and coersions of the food industry. Nevermind the visuals of chickens who can't walk, their swiftly fattened bodies outpacing the maturity of their bones. Forget the image of a cow with a rubber stent into one of its stomachs and the scientist happily digging around to test the E. Coli it the ruminant (the verb of and after which this blog is named). Forget the shock value. The most disconcerting statistic I learned is that 4-5 companies in the United States produce about 80% of its beef. And the largest customer of beef (and potatoes) here is the McDonald's corporation.

It's nothing we haven't heard piecemeal or assumed. The scope of this continuity of supply and demand makes me lose my appetite. I don't eat a lot of meat and now, I can't look at the steaks and chops and thighs at the grocery store, at my place of employment, in the same, salivating way. I was lucky that I had already finished my ramen.

In an act of precognition, the producers of the film evaded the sense of helplessness pervading the bulk of the film and included a literal epilogue. In it, reminders and suggestions were typed onto the screen. Shop at farmer's markets...plant a garden...change the world with every bite. Stop working for a grocery store that sells questionably raised meat was not among them.

While I didn't understand the lecture, like any good student, I'm still taking my homework seriously. I'm about to pay for thyme, basil and tomato seedlings that will hopefully flourish in the indirect sunlight that finds the top of my air conditioning unit. In size and distance, it's far from a field but it holds my dreams of being a honorable and informed food enthusiast. Delicious.

A Birthday

When you're 13, you don't know to be modest. You might be shy or bashful but you won't deflect flattery whether justified or convenient with a gracious smile. When you're 13, your birthday means your wishes come true with your pimpled friends, a cake and pizza.

The day I turned 33, I was modest. I hadn't planned a party or a fancy dinner or a masquerade ball in the French Quarter with doormen and coat check girls like I've always dreamed. My plan was to hang out afterhours at McCall's Meat & Fish Co. and maybe eat a hamburger. No cake.

Instead, at the last minute, one of my closest (in proximity) friends got tickets to see David Sedaris speak at UCLA and he invited me to go. David Sedaris is one of my favorite writers; his calm, resigned observations bring giggles up from my belly like bubbles in ginger ale. This friend and I once sat at my kitchen table, me with David and he with a script for a pilot TV show. I sporadically laughed so hard that I had no choice but to read passages aloud. One passage was about Halloween candy in a chapter from "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim". My friend knew how much I loved Mr. Sedaris and I was grateful that he remembered.

On the evening of May 5, since my friend had already had a snack, my birthday dinner was eaten from its plastic wrapper in the car on the way to UCLA. I had a leftover fresh&easy Italian Sub Sandwich with spicy, salty sliced meats, provolone cheese hugging slowly drying ciabatta bread. Pepperoncinis were pretty much for decoration as they packed a tepid but helpful punch. I was so hungry that the sandwich was delicious.

What might have followed as a cake monstrosity in previous years was replaced by kind and witty company and a writer who was funny, inspiring and shared with an auditorium full of people. For he's a jolly, good fellow and I was satisfied by just being there. The gift of presence was more than enough.

links

My friend Karen and I have shared a lot of great memories. I've known her since we were just freshly graduated from college and since those youthful days, we've lived together in New York, gone to Hawaii for her wedding and among other silly girl miscellany I can now tell our children one day that their mother and I stuffed ground pork with fennel and orange zest into pig intestines called hanks. We made sausages by hand.

Karen and her husband Nathan have opened a butcher shop on Hillhurst Ave. in Los Feliz. If you are a discerning carnivore, you must stop by to marvel at all kinds of meaty madness, carved and curated by two professional chefs who love food. When Nathan cuts a steak, he thinks of the final dish as he guides his knife. How many butchers do you know that can say they've worked in three Michelin star restaurants? It's like your school nurse telling you she was a neurosurgeon at the Mayo Clinic before she came to hand out band-aids and condoms.

Every morning, before I even begin to have weird dreams about orange blue cheese (true story), Nathan is headed downtown to the fish market. By 6:30am, he's given a humble nod to Mr. Nozawa, yes, of Sushi Nozawa, an unofficial mentor and a McCall's customer. Traffic isn't even an issue this early as he heads back with incredibly fresh seafood that's in season. Salmon, tuna, oysters, scallops, mussels...they're all sitting in the case early everyday, shiny and briny and begging to be devoured. The array changes every day so if you're on Twitter, you can follow them to know what's wriggling. I follow them. And Lady Gaga.

I bought a tiny bit of Alaskan black cod the other night and poached it. I concocted a simple sauce of soy, mirin, rice vinegar and sesame oil in which the black cod was dipped. After the first white flake of fish met my taste buds, I immediately wished that I had bought a pound of it. All for me. The texture was silky with a slight bounce. It possessed a hint of fishiness, mainly from the skin, that was beautiful with the acidity of the rice vinegar.

On dry land, they're sourcing cuts from purveyors that only sell to restaurants. So when you wonder why you're such a bad cook because you can't seem to get things to taste like what they serve at your favorite restaurant, know that not all ingredients are created nor available equally. A flimsy Vons pork chop isn't a Berkshire pork chop. One night before they opened, we were all chatting when they told me that they could find super-foodie ingredients like white truffles and foie gras...things that you can't normally get at the market. My mind started to wander into the land of things I can shave white truffles onto. It was an endless landscape dotted with pretty much anything edible.

If farms were strip clubs, Nathan and Karen would be bouncers who can get you into the champagne room while discreetly slipping you your $100 bill back in ones. I've now discovered my new food love: the very hard-to-find natural certified angus beef prime dry aged short loin (where you get a T-bone from). Nathan had fried up a tiny bit to test and the flavor was complex with notes of Parmesan. As I chewed and let the juice seep out from the sinews, I knew that some people won't ever get to experience a steak like that. You know, an extra lap dance from the hottest stripper at the strip club type of steak.

And not to go on and on even though I am, I just have to tell you about the eggs. I haven't had them personally but the chickens and the eggs are apparently the most incredible tasting chickens and eggs that both of them have ever tasted. Kendor Farms is in Van Nuys so the which came firsts are local. But the best tidbit is that they mix a little olive oil into the chicken feed. Uh, I'd be pretty delicious if I ate olive oil every day. I'd be fat-astic.

And of course...the sausage. As a bonus for randomly being there the night sausages needed to be stuffed and helping Karen while Nathan butchered some fish, they gave me a sausage I had "made." Nathan's mixture of pork butt, orange and fennel was amazing. A little salt, a little love and into the pig intestine it went. I fried it up at home one night along with a little bit of extra, unformed stuffing and I had to stop myself from eating the entire pound of seasoned juicyness in one sitting. The fennel is potent and the orange comes in towards the end and the fattiness of the pork just made me want to hug someone.

At any rate, I'm always excited to pop-in to their tiny, maroon shop on Hillhurst. Where my best friend Karen wraps up protein jewels in brown paper and sends me home with little projects. I gave them an old book I found at a used book store simply titled Meat. I hadn't paid much attention to the author but upon presenting them with it, we took it as a sign that it had in fact been written by the Lobels of the eponymous butcher shop in Manhattan; the shop that sold them the steak that inspired them to do what they did. I'm fortunate to have them be my culinary guides but we're all lucky that they've put the entirety of their time and energy from the past year into an endeavor that I hope will change the way people shop for meat and fish...and eggs...oh my.

The Worst Aversion

On Sunday night, around 9:15pm, I ate a slurp of stir fried chow fun noodles sliding under an egg drop sauce with slices of cod and green onion. My father's leftovers. For dessert, I finished what was left of a small square of chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and washed a bowl of Mexican blueberries I had purchased the day before at the farmer's market. I went to sleep happy and full until around 3:30am when I woke up feeling slightly strange. After playing a mental game of Battleship with my stomach, I had to surrender when my devilish dinner wanted OUT.

I know you're not supposed to blame the most recent thing you've eaten when food poisoning strikes, but after 9 hours of sweaty fits, troubled sleep and undignified bathroom behavior, I'm pretty sure I can't stand the sight of blueberries anymore. I caught a glimpse of some in a photograph today and I had to blink away my disgust. I suspect it was the blueberries since everything else I ate on Sunday had been shared with people who weren't sick at all. But worse than this reasonable deduction...am I really to believe that I won't love chocolate cake anymore? This cannot be.

Taste aversion is a well-studied topic amongst psychologists and behavioral scientists. I once read a report about wolves that happened to feed on strategically placed rabbits injected with a solution designed to induce vomiting. The result? Farmers had more bountiful hare crops that year.

But to take away one of my true loves? The food fairies have done me wrong. I'm hopeful that the passion for my favorite dessert will return because at the moment nothing sounds tempting to me, not chocolate cake, not the wonderful leftover bouillabaisse in my fridge, not pizza from Lamonica's. I can't hate ALL of these things forever, can I? Oh, this is a very sad day. Despite the fact that I lost 5 pounds overnight, if I can get my appetite back, I won't mind the return of the pudge. Seems like those two might go hand in chubby hand.

adam and eve

The last time I had BBQ ribs, it was at Baby Blues BBQ on Santa Monica, just a few blocks from my apartment. It was a disappointing though lively place and the ribs were tough and less than acceptable. I ate there with a friend from Atlanta and he said "You don't know BBQ until you've eaten BBQ in the South." Well, now I have.

I have often written about life changing foods. Delicious, paradigm-shifting dishes that have set my culinary trajectory one enormous degree closer to a lifetime of enjoyment. Over time, that one degree will have sent me to a place of flavors that I may have missed otherwise. Missed by a long shot.

At Fat Matt's, I ate my first bite of ribs. Surpassing all other bones protecting the hearts of pigs that I have tried, this first bite of soft, fatty, sweet, tangy pork and I will never be the same. I also had "Brunswick" Stew which is like pot roast with a little bit of tang blended into a chili-like consistency...with corn. It was delicious. I also had a bit of a pulled pork sandwich, a few forkful of coleslaw and some mac and cheese. You can see the menu exactly like I did here.

A white-haired man with a guitar sang silly country songs on the small stage. Men from Alabama in their Crimson Tide jackets jawed on cellphones. Black ladies on their lunch break waited for a table to open up and I, with my messy fingers and white sweater ("You wore the wrong color," said my friend Matthew) sat there, smiling next to a case of BBQ sauce for the trip home. A case.

If the bible-lovers here are right, I, my sisters, all women, nay, all people have descended from a man and his rib. And that's a great lineage I'd say.

neck bones for Jesus

I don't usually go to church but yesterday I went to the United House of Prayer to have lunch at their Kitchen Café. We stood in line with our trays under the portraits of black reverends and a black Jesus. In the skylit dining room, black and white guests chatted about work as they enjoyed their lunch break.

Plates of lemon cake sat wrapped in plastic. Banana pudding in To Go clamshells. Greg ordered neck bones and rice. Karen had BBQ chicken. We shared sides of turnip greens, mac and cheese, black eyed peas and yams. I ordered crappy spaghetti bake because I LOVE crappy spaghetti bake particularly when it's covered with melted cheddar cheese. Meat sauce that has been stewed for a day combined with pasta that has been boiled for almost as long makes a squishy, lovely lunch.

The neck bones were served with brown gravy and the BBQ chicken was slathered in a dark burgundy sauce. I enjoyed the braised neck bones, the beef softened by lingering, low heat. It reminded me of oxtail which I guess is the opposite end extension to a neck. I nibbled at the sides, discovering the wilted turnip greens, slightly acidic from the vinegar used to break down the tough fibers. The mac and cheese was great and so were the yams although they were almost too incredibly sweet. We joked that this was the only way one could spread the word of obesity. Or Type II diabetes.

For dinner, Karen and I went to Wild Wing where I satisfied a craving for hot wings. We happened upon "Two-fer Tuesday" where buying 8 wings got us 8 more. I'm a wimp when it comes to wings so we had medium spicy hot wings and Jamaican jerk wings. Not to be remiss with the terrible appetizers, we also ordered loaded potato skins with cheese, bacon and jalapeños. With a dessert of peanut butter, chocolate and caramel flavors piled into a stack of wafers, cake, cream and gooey layers, our bill came to $21 between the two of us and we were stuffed. It's amazing to me how much food doesn't cost here.

As we looked around the restaurant, Karen pointed out the many tables of black and white friends dining together. You actually see less of that in LA, a more melting pot city by most accounts. How does that happen in a place that everyone claims is so racist? I suppose that calories might be the answer to a common love that transcends external appearances.

"are y'all doin' ok?"

That's what the waitress asked my friends and me about 6 times during the course of our dinner. Not once annoying, not once perfunctory...it was sincere and southern and so very different from LA!

I'm in Augusta, Georgia this week for a mini-vacation and tonight, I ate dinner at a place that had a wooden bear in the entry way and my name "Katie" tagged with a knife into one of the plexiglass windows. I was destined to eat here.

Rhinehart's has picnic tables each with a roll of paper towels on it. As he tried to explain the cuisine to me, my friend Greg said simply "It's a lot of fried seafood." So, fried seafood I had; served on paper placed on paper plates. Oysters, shrimp and instead of fries or grits, a side salad with honey mustard dressing. We all shared a paper plate of boiled, peel-and-eat shrimp dunked into cocktail sauce. The paper towels marched off their roll one at a time as our fingers became slick with shrimp juice.

Greg told me he was interested in what I thought of the "chain restaurant hell" that is Augusta's food scene. I told him that after many fine dining experiences, you start to become a little jaded. Then, something natural happens. You rebel against the foams and veloutés and search for the perfect cheese enchilada or the ultimate corn dog. In Augusta, Georgia, you don't have to look too hard though because here, the corn dog (and funnel cake) booth from the county fair pops up in the Wal-Mart parking lot now and again. I took a photo of it today.

Speaking of chains, at the airport, I fell in love with a Hawaiian pizza from Domino's. It was an unfortunate but delicious misstep. After 5 hours and two planes, I waited for my friends to pick me up and devoured this cheesy, doughy disc and bought the Sunday New York Times. As I read, an airport worker sat down at my table with her own Domino's pizza. Then her friend joined with her soda. Then a third friend sat with his baked potato, the green scent of it rising to my nose. I listened to them talk about how tired they were. I took in their "mmmmmm HM"s and wondered about their fatigue. Of course they were hard workers, two of them wearing navy blue dickies and fluorescent vests. Maybe they weren't eating properly. Surely they weren't. The newspaper cost more than my meal. If that isn't an indicator of the state of this state, then butter my butt and call me a biscuit.

cake pops

There is a thin layer of brown dust on my kitchen. The stove, the counter, the handles of the fridge. This is what happens when I play with cocoa powder.

Last week I baked a cake for my sister's birthday, a Devil's Food cake with a dark chocolate whipped cream frosting. It seems excessive but I had to use a $300 sashimi knife from Osaka to cut cake layers because I don't own a bread knife or a similarly serrated knife of the appropriate length for the task. In producing even layers for the cake, the crumbs I sliced off were kept in a take-out container for tonight's experiment: cake pops.

Cake Pops have somehow become a cottage industry for bloggers who like sweets. There's a company in Irvine that makes them in an actual bakery and packages them for you as gifts. A friend brought some to a party I went to and I was hooked. Basically, you have cake bits mixed with adhesive (frosting works) dipped in chocolate and stuck on a lollipop stick.

I had cake crumbs but no lollipop sticks so I just decided to make them into little cake truffles. I mixed the crumbs with a mixture of cream cheese, unsalted butter, confectioner's sugar and cocoa powder. I cooled the mixture, formed them into balls and then dipped them into chocolate melted in a glass bowl on top of a pot of boiling water. In the future, I'll freeze the balls before dipping them in COOLED melted chocolate. The temperatures were too high all around and my first attempt became a soggy mound of shiny, runny chocolate on top of a slowly oozing cake falling through the grate of a cake rack.

When I gave everything a chance to cool, I resumed and produced some lovely looking truffles dusted, like the kitchen, in cocoa powder. I ate a tester and between the few that I ate to ensure the right flavor, I feel sick and jittery. This coupled with the brown smears across my chef's coat make me look like someone you'd stay away from. But I bet you can't...because I've got all the cake pops.

the average bear

Call me a food Samaritan.

I was standing outside my apartment the other day with my upstairs neighbor, a stylish gay who drives an X5 and listens to loud pop music in the morning to prepare for work. I know this because he dances on my ceiling and I awake to his routine almost every day.

Mid-conversation, an apartment door opened and out came John, our new neighbor.

"Hey, how you guys doin'?" John asked, "Did I meet you already? I'm John, I just moved in."

We exchanged names and he then asked, "I have a strange question. Do either of you have a rolling pin?"

An odd request. "What are you rolling out?" I inquired.

"Pizza dough."

Now, unbeknownst to John, I know a little bit about food and about pizza dough having worked for a pizzeria as its marketer. I know how to explain the basics of pizza dough to press so I thought maybe I could help John the new neighbor cum pizzaiolo.

"You can just knead it with your knuckles." He said he'd tried but the dough was just too hard and his hands were tired and sore. Sounded a little odd to me. So I asked him about the temperature of the dough. Turns out that he had just taken it out of the fridge and it was still cold. I told him to let it come to room temperature and try again, perhaps using the side of a bowl or mug to help him since he didn't have a baseball bat.

John closed the door to his apartment after he'd gone back inside, probably to get back to pounding the dough with a hammer. I wished his pizza well.

bartlett

Some people have memories of their childhood that involve summer swims and lakeside cabins or first kisses behind the couch. Some remember a topsy-turvy night out with their compadres. Others remember a sentence that changed their perception like one of those quarter-driven stationary binoculars. I remember fruits.

I remember a peach I ate in 1996. I remember the moist buzz of the skin as I pulled it away from the flesh. I remember the flavor and the juice, the pit's easy release. This peach had a slightly tannic taste but it was wonderful.

I remember a nectarine I ate sometime between 2002-2004. I had rinsed it with tap water from the kitchen faucet, taken a quick bite out of idle hunger and stopped to marvel at its bright, bold perfection. I remember sitting down on the sofa, in the sunlight, telling myself to eat the nectarine slowly so that I would enjoy every bite of the firm, juicy flesh. Its gold color sparkled and the red bleed from the stone reached towards the skin ever so shyly.

Moments ago, I stood in my kitchen and cut bruises from a Barlett pear that I had a suspicion would be delicious. I cut slices away from the core and placed them in a bowl. From the core, I took a few bites of flesh and instantly, I felt its memory forming in the most sturdy parts of my brain. This pear will go down in my tastebud history as one of the greatest to ever exist and then cease to exist by the greedy slurping of my tongue and teeth. Its friends are green with envy, ripening to their pale yellow best on my kitchen counter. This pear was curvy and lumpy like a hardworking mother of 5, grandmother of 15. The flesh near the skin was slightly bitter, its core was a bit acidic. But both qualities brought to life its slippery, soft meat, replete with pear magic.

Go find pears (and pomegranates!) at the farmers markets soon, my food loving friends. May they have been harvested for a worthy reason, not to succumb to spots of mold which according to Chef Dong Choi are "Mother Nature's fingertips coming to take back what's hers."

pillowside library

When I turned 27, I bought a big girl bed. After years of sleeping on a European single which is like an extra-long twin from your old collegiate days, I bought myself a $150 frame from Ikea and a $700 full-sized mattress. Oh, how the extra inches felt like yards and yards of drowsy terrain.

On the bed, during the precious few moments before slumber rolls over me like a fog approaching the shore, I read a few pages from whatever books I'm into. Being too tired to return them to their respective shelves, I've allowed a pillowside library to erect itself on the corner of my mattress. The library usually contains anywhere from 2 to 4 selections. When the number of volumes becomes too high and I can't sleep for fear of a stack of books falling on my head in the middle of the night, the lesser titles find their way to the floor.

It's an interesting barometer of my mental or intellectual state. Sometimes of my emotional state. Consistently over the past few years, dictionaries have appeared and disappeared from the library. In the periodicals, there's usually a section or two of the New York Times. Over the summer, I read On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee. Then it was the September issue of Vogue and the Food Lover's Companion (3rd Edition). A UK paperback of "The Prophet" by Gibran travels back and forth between the mattress and the floor.

If you didn't know me, you could easily take the books and conjure what would probably be fairly accurate assumptions about my interests. I'm probably a "foodie". I'm probably a woman. I probably went to college. Maybe I'm an artist or perhaps a wannabe hippie. Maybe, based on the frequent appearance of dictionaries, I'm an English professor. I'm probably an old English professor as many of the dictionaries were published before 1960. Maybe one of my liberal and fairy-headed students gave me a copy of "The Prophet" as a gift. These are all reasonable paint strokes giving context to a stack of books.

Right now, the assortment of books is fascinating. I'm currently sleeping with three, independently published poetry books one of which was copied at Kinko's and stapled by hand and a book on self-defense. I recently saw the poets Ellyn Maybe and my idol and friend Rachel McKibbens and quickly snatched their chapbooks from them, shoved money into their hands and ran off to immediately crack them open. The "Complete Guide to Unarmed Combat Techniques" was written by man whose nickname is "Lofty". Presumably a reflection of his goals. This one I found sitting in a friend's box of discards.

To save myself, I'm armed with the writhing, tentative words of two poets. I've got the curt directions of a British Survival Instructor whose orders are accompanied by agitated black and white illustrations of people fighting off attacks. You can tell the women by their skirts and black high heels.

Defend your body with your body. Defend your heart with your heart. Here's a better glimpse into the pages that punch and jab and wriggle me free. Reprinted without permission.

"I found a year that likes my body
1921
girl sitting on a rock
Picasso painted a woman with my thighs."

"I lean into the paintings.
I veer to the outside to find out what Picasso
called each work.

I like titles.
Their vocabulary of oil."

-Ellyn Maybe, from the poem "Picasso" found in walking barefoot in the glassblowers museum


"The head on a hinge, the man notices a small light coming
from somewhere inside the cat, possibly between the fourth
and fifth cervical vertebrae. He takes his pen and digs around,
parting flesh and fur chips as best he can.
Inside, he finds Theresa, the first girl to tell him "no."
He can tell it is Theresa, even though she is considerably smaller, because she is sitting on a stool polishing spoons by candlelight and of all the women he has ever known,
only Theresa would do such a considerate thing
at at time like this. Theresa! I knew it was you! How are you?

Theresa looks up and smiles.
I'm doing just fine, Charles. Thank you.
She sets down a polished spoon inside of the other.
There are tall stacks of spoons spooning that surround her
feet and stool. She pulls a new spoon from a crate
and huh huhs her breath into its shallow bowl,
rubbing it with a handkerchief. She is mesmerizing.
A three-inch tall Elizabeth Taylor.

She continues to polish spoons as if he is not there.
The man realizes he has interrupted a meaningful pattern
of pure and absolute beauty. A natural machine, designed for no
one other than the machine itself. Clumsy, he interrupts one last
time. Are you thirst Theresa, would you like me
to bring you a cup of tea?

Theresa continues her stack, then reminds him:
There isn't a teacup small enough. The words
form a dinner table of malice inside his chest,"

-Rachel McKibbens, from the poem "Thirsty Theresa" found in Tomatoes and Daffodils


"The teeth can be very useful in self-defense. If you're a woman, bite on whatever you can get hold of, ideally the ear. And once you bite don't let go - you'll just arouse the attacker. Bite into his neck, his throat, his ear; just bite, chew, rip and spit."

-John "Lofty" Wiseman, "The SAS Self-Defense Handbook: A Complete Guide to Unarmed Combat Techniques - Chapter 2: Your Body's Weapons"

chickenhead

I roasted my first chicken last week. When I purchased the bird from a Korean market, I stared wanly at the chicken head encased with the body under the cellophane skin. It looked sleepy and featherless.

I prepared a brine with Kosher salt, garlic and a little bit of sugar. "It should taste like the ocean in terms of saltiness" said Nate, my professor. I took teaspoons of brine from my stock pot until the mixture reminded me of my first surf lesson.

Upon tearing the plastic wrap off the bird, I realized that the chicken still had its head on. I had picked it up out of the tray with my bare hands so I leaned over the sink to have a think. Do I put the bird down, wash my hands and take out a knife to decapitate it or do I brine with the head on and return later with the guillotine? I decided on the latter so the whole bird went into the pot and I washed and returned to my other prep.

When it came time to cut it off, I wasn't as squeamish as I thought I'd be. After a pointer from Nate, I took my gyotou and cut the head off at the base of the neck and threw the head into the trash. The stuffing, salting and tying took a while but eventually the bird was placed on a bed of spinach and yams to roast for about an hour. Meanwhile, I made creamed corn with what I thought was fresh corn from the market and a basil plum cobbler.

The chicken was saltier than we thought it'd be but most of the salt fell into the spinach and yams. Those were eaten sparingly. The creamed corn suffered due to old, tough kernels and the basil plum cobbler was surprisingly minty due to Thai instead of Italian basil. All in all, we had a good meal and a lesson that sometimes you have to deal with life head on.