Turkey Talk 2011

It’s funny about food. One advantage to getting multiple food magazines from semi-serious (Food & Wine, Bon Appétit) to serious (Art of Eating, Cook’s Illustrated) kind of allows one to get an overview of food trends, or at least believe you do. I have pretty much given up watching the Food Network, just makes me nauseous these days with all the celebrity crap. Competition? Gimme a break.

Food

So anyway, a couple of years ago, fanciness was all the rage.  There was brining, de-constructing, rubbing, heat up, heat down, flip, tent, and so forth. Now it seems to be we’re getting back to basics, just roast the damn thing. Although Saveur is an “international” publication, I was surprised that the lead article was about “The Perfect Bird”, written by Molly Stevens. Thank god it wasn’t Molly Wisenberg. I was pleased to see her lead off with “I used to be expected to come up with newfangled takes on the Thanksgiving Turkey each year. I’ve brined it, smoked it, fried it, dry rubbed it; but eventually I (and everybody around the table) tired of elaborate seasonings and complicated preparations. What we really craved was a fantastic roast turkey….”. I might beg to differ with her on the last point, I kind of think “fantastic” and “turkey” are an oxymoron.

And maybe the editors of the magazines are beginning to reach the same conclusion. Although Martha Stewart Living devotes the cover to “Make it your BEST thanksgiving ever” the magazine devotes a whopping 6 pages (of 212) to the subject with only one turkey recipe. The rest is “Martha” stuff about making placemats with woven weeds from her yard and so forth. And the recipe is simple: Put turkey in oven at 425, roast 30 minutes, reduce temp to 325 until temp of bird (thigh) reaches 165. She does use a cheese cloth. And speaking of celebs, Food & Wine also has only one Thanksgiving turkey, this by Michael Symons. I never knew he existed but come to find out he owns seven restaurants and does four TV programs. What a food dedicated soul he must be. Lots of pictures of him and beautiful people enjoying themselves. Almost like Thanksgiving is a second theme.. His turkey is also put in at 350 and left to cook.

And that pretty much sums up the dozen or so recipes I looked at. Some call for starting at high heat for X minutes, then lower, some just stick it in about 365/75, baste and wait for the temp in the leg to reach 165 or 170. Only one source, Bon Appétit has four bird recipes, and all of them (!) called for the somersault technique of breast down then flip someplace in the process. So, “simple” pretty much carries the day. Preparations vary some, Tandoori, Cider brined with star anise, plenty of glazes, but mostly just plain roast the thing. I pretty much agree with that. Good old iconoclastic Cook’s Illustrated suggests braising a Turkey Breast. Not a whole lot (yes, there is some) of difference between braising and boiling!! The difference in finished product between jumping through hoops and just roast the thing is probably miniscule at best.  Okay, I will pass along one food tip.  It's a good idea to rotate the pan in the oven every hour or so...

Now “sides” are pretty much a different animal (ha ha). Here’s where you can flex your culinary muscles if you wish, or just do Grandma’s green beans.. Speaking of which, a quick aside here: I was in the supermarket the other day, and there were a pair of couples of my generation in the aisle and the conversation ran to: “Okay, you go get the green beans, I have the mushroom soup, and we need to find the dried onions”. Any bets on what is on their Thanksgiving table? Anyway there was plenty of magazine ink devoted to the vegetables and starches to go along side your pretty good turkey. Brussels Sprouts are in: “Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Capers and Walnuts”; as are almost any root vegetable: “Celery Root, Kohlrabi, and Apple Puree”; “Creamed Onion Gratin”; don’t forget those green beans; “Green beans with Miso and Almonds” and greens: “Creamed collard greens”; Squashes: “roasted Squash with Mint and Toasted Pumpkin Seeds”. And don’t forget the spuds: “The Fluffiest Mashed Potatoes”; “Potato and Celery Root Gratin with Leeks”; and yes, “Sweet Potato Casserole with Pecan Crumble”. Seems like all the sides take a basic ingredient, and then “fancy it up”. They are, after all “Gourmet” magazines.

Drink

Surprisingly, pretty much absent in all the magazines was any extensive treatment of wines. Most didn’t even suggest a wine. Ray Isle, the wine guy for Food & Wine, did a piece called “Wine Lover’s Guide to Party Planning” wherein he listed what he thought was value priced wines at Target, Trader Joe’s, Costco, and Whole Foods. Bon Appétit’s David Lynch listed what three Sommelier’s were drinking alongside his picks. The three Sommeliers he selected were characterized as Pragmatic, Iconoclastic, and Hedonistic. For instance the Iconoclast chose an “orange” wine from Long Island, the Hedonist took a 1er Cru Burgundy, and Mr. Pragmatic chose a Cru Beaujolais (NOT Nouveau!). Incidentally, “orange” wine is made from white wine grapes that are left on the skins (not normal practice) and so take on an orangish hue. All the rage these days.

Pairing wasn’t mentioned much, although I did like an article in the Washington Post Food Section called “What do you pair with baloney?”. The slant the article takes is to make some sense of Thanksgiving wines and the attendant aura.. He takes on the myth that “No wine can stand up to the Thanksgiving meal”. While kind of true, he suggests that wine should go with courses, such as a minerally Chablis with the poached oysters, a grand cru Burgundy with the roast pheasant, the myth arises when “the oysters are roasted inside the turkey, served with mushroom gravy, cranberry sauce, and marshmallowed sweet potatoes, and that’s when the Sommelier runs screaming from the room”. His defense is to serve several wines of varying variety.....Which upon reflection is pretty damn close to my Drink Whatever the Hell You Like” advice.  Still is!!

Dessert

So, there’s the Thanksgiving report for this year. While not in depth, I don’t think it has to be. The myth that Thanksgiving should produce wonderful, gourmet inflected, meticulously prepared food is bunk. The very first Thanksgiving was only about giving thanks for what they had, and that they were still alive and thankful for nature’s bounty. Maybe we should think about that rather than brining the poor bird in a 25 ingredient brine, prying under its skin, twisting and turning it during cooking, poking it with a thermometer, resting and carving.

No, the real joy of Thanksgiving is that it provides a reason to convene family and friends, a time to remember Thanksgivings past and people that were at the table then, and now only in memory and spirit, enjoy a meal and each other. Raise a glass to those memories, the ones in the making, and the many people that are in faraway places away from their families on this day.  Bless them.

Okay, enjoy whatever you cook and those you share it with. And of course on this occasion you MUST

DFD

PS: And if that glass you raise contains a Grand Cru Burgundy, so be it!!

Turkey Talk, Part One and a Half..

Although I know everyone is hanging on the edge of their seat (is that a mixed metaphor?) waiting for the annual “turkey report”, I have to admit that it will not be published until tomorrow morning. I fear that those of you who receive this via email at maybe perhaps, your work address will miss it if you take tomorrow off. Don’t forget you can just go to the blog yourself with your browser (or “Google machine” as Tony Kornheiser says) just by clicking

Link

The reason for the little delay is twofold. Number one, there is a lot of material to cover (although in a preview, it’s kind of disappointing) and number two, (and maybe most importantly), there are “chores” to be performed, and the Lady of the Manor is not interested in labor being wasted in idly doing silly stuff like posting blogs. Silver to be polished, chairs to be cleaned, rugs to be vacuumed, glassware to be identified, attention to small details like what the hell is the final menu, that kind of thing.

As a little teaser, I’m trying something completely different this year.. details to follow.

Quick Rant

And if you will spare me (“just a minute dear, I’m almost done!”) a little rant about local drivers I have to get this off my chest. Happened again just this morning...Say you are stopped at a red light on a major thoroughfare (like, maybe Rte. 235) and just down the road a quarter of a mile or so is the next light, which is perfectly visible from your current position. Okay, your (“yes, yes, I know!”) light goes green, but before you clear the intersection the next light is observed to be going yellow. Previous experience has taught you that the duration of that red light is such that you will most definitely have to stop again while waiting for cross traffic, left turners and so on. So instead of a jack rabbit start, you gradually increase speed, hoping that (unlikely) you will be able to arrive at the next light coincident with it going green, saving gas and brake linings. So there really is no hurry to get there. Reasonable? (“I’m hurrying!”). Apparently not. By doing this you are impeding the pickup behind you, as all you can see is a small portion of the grill in your mirror. And by God, if a space exists a screaming pass maneuver is called for. Out around, and cut back in.. I may have to yam on my brakes because the light is red, but by (“almost done!”) golly I passed that idiot ahead of me. One car better!!! Civility, where art thou? (“Okay, Okay, I’ll quit!”)

Just let me type

D

Turkey Talk, Part One

It gets harder every year. As alert readers will most likely remember, I do a “Thanksgiving” post most every year.


Well, here it is Monday (late afternoon!) of T-giving week, and I have nothing yet. Part of the reason is that I remain firm in my conviction that you can take as much or as little time and effort preparing a turkey as you want to, and in the end you get pretty much the same product. So why waste both of our times on the usual crop of recipes? I think this year we’re doing beef. Of course there’s the tradition end of things as in “we always do turkey” and that’s fine, enjoy the memories if not the bird.

So, before me sits the usual pile of some of my November food magazines:

surprisngly, out of the bunch I have, only three of them have the traditional cover shot of the beautifully browned fowl. It would be interesting to be on the shoot for that sometime....  Anyway, Bon Appétit proclaims: “Amazing Turkey” and “The Secret to make Perfect Gravy Every time”; Food & Wine headlines: “Thanksgiving – 65 delicious recipes including the perfect turkey”; Martha’s two publications “Living” and “Everyday Food” let me “Make it your best Thanksgiving Ever” and the Everyday version has “Thanksgiving 1-2-3”. Cuisine at Home boasts “our tastiest recipes – holiday classics, and best ever holiday side dishes”. Saveur, in its usual quirky way features “28 Great Holiday Sides, and in a sub blurb “Meat-Free Thanksgiving”, avoiding the pesky Turkey.

I suspect the reason for all this hype every year is that the poor home cook (whom they assume is eternally looking for short cuts and time savers) tried one of their suggestions last year and it turned out that it resulted in a just okay turkey. So, this year by God, I’ll find that Holy Grail recipe or insider “secret” and turn out a miracle. Not gonna happen.

Anyway, I’ll do my homework and pay attention to any nuances that catch my eye and in particular see what this year’s wine suggestions are, and report tomorrow. Hopefully by now you have decided what your center of the plate item is, and have a pretty good idea about sides and other courses. I suspect that my usual conclusion on wine will be “DWTHYL” as usual..

But, we’ll see..
Another One:

A reader (alert as usual) reminded me of another phrase that’s working its way around lately. I’m sure you’ve heard it. Normally used at the start of an interview, the obnoxious interviewer pokes a microphone into somebody’s face and says; “Talk about…. what you heard, how you felt, etc.”. An adjunct to that sometimes heard is “Tell me about…”. Or another favorite: “What was going through your mind when…..”.
Ugh.

And since we’re sort of on the subject of interviews, another thing that gets me yelling at my inanimate television is at the half of a college football game, some “reporter” (somehow usually a female) waylays a coach who is trying to get to the locker room sticking her microphone at him. If his team is leading, says something stupid like: “How were you able to score so many points on that team?” I suppose answers such as “We’re better than they are” are not PC so there’s usually the trite “well, we found we could run on them” (translation: we’re better than they are); or if it is the coach on the short end of the score, out comes something like “Tell me what you have to do in the second half to get back in the game?”. First of all he doesn’t have to tell her a damn thing, and again he can’t say “we have to cheat”, and so we get something like: “Well, we’ll have to block better and make some plays” (translation: They’re better than us). Just once (and I suppose I never will) I’d love to hear them say: “Lady, that’s a stupid question – good bye” and head for the locker room. I expect there is some contract that makes the coaches have to suffer the Holly Rowes and Erin Andersons and other notes sports authorities of their ilk. However, I do enjoy watching them in inclement weather trying to manage their coif.

Did I just slip into a rant??

Don't forget to include in your Thanksgiving planning how you will

DFD

THE Guy....

Before we get to “the guy at table” story, just a short note on language. As somebody who uses it a lot, I keep my ear(s) open and, to paraphrase Yogi, “you can hear a lot just by listening”. I try to pay attention to current culture (does that make me a “Folklorist”?) and current trends in speaking. I have noticed that there are phrases that come into vogue, mercifully run their course, and eventually disappear. For instance on the Today show, they routinely used to tease an upcoming interview with (say) the mother in law of some axe murderer with the phrase: “So and So SPEAKS OUT”. What the heck does that mean? Or how often lately have you seen a “thank you” dressed up as “give a SHOUT OUT to…..”, or worse “let’s give a great big SHOUT OUT….”. Should I run out into the front yard and start yelling? Now lately another one has caught my attention. Usually it starts out with some situation and an individual reacting somehow, like “You know when somebody….” And then will end with “Don’t be that guy!” Ignoring the gender issue, it just gets tiresome. Who knows what’s next? Keep your ears open.. Just say what you mean…

This Guy:

We were sitting at our table at Bistro 315 in Santa Fe enjoying our cocktails when the table next to us was seated with a couple and another gentleman (“the guy”). All were DFD’d appropriately and were younger than us (as are most people) but not by a lot. Mature might be a good descriptor. Not that you (always) listen on purpose, but of course it’s hard not to overhear a few words here and there. When I heard the word “wine” I perked up and nonchalantly paid more attention. The lady was going on about how pleased they were that they could get together, and then began to talk to the guy about their upcoming wedding. They were so pleased he would be involved and they had heard so much about his knowledge of food and wine and were sure that he would provide a wonderful meal for them, yadda, yadda. He sort of basked in his reputation and said he would do his best, yadda, yadda. They finally got down to perusing the menu (and blackboard), and “the guy” took the proffered wine list from the server, and studied it for a while. I thought it was a very good wine list (where I found that 1er Cru Chablis that was heavenly) with nice choices in all price ranges.

They discussed the food for a while, and finally when the server approached the table, he said (and I am not making this up): “we’re thinking of a red wine, what would you recommend?”. Now this is not to say that servers are ignorant on wines, some are very knowledgeable and are glad to discuss wine if asked. But, if I were with potential clients (my supposition) the last thing I would do is ask the server what wine I should have. It wasn’t “we’re thinking of ordering (whatever), do you have some suggestions for us to consider”, it was “what would you recommend?” with no discussion on food, and they accepted her recommendation. As I recall it was fairly high end cab (surprise surprise) . I was quite amazed. Servers have their likes and dislikes, but I certainly would not suppose what they might like or recommend would apply to me.

After some dithering, he asked if he could have the Foie Gras appetizer as a main course. So if he was sophisticated enough to want that (wonderful) dish as a main course he was either showing off, or knew something about food. Either way, asking the server blind for wine recommendations was astounding to me. That’s “the guy” story

Students and Deer:

As a footnote to my “Folklorist” adventure the other night, I forgot to mention the drive home. Thanks to EST it was pitch black when the welcome relief of the end of the talk came and I headed out. People who ply our roads at night around here live in mortal fear of encountering deer at inopportune times with their auto; usually much to the mutual detriment of car and deer, sometimes including the driver. So driving at night on the back roads is always cautionary, or should be. And, on top of that, I find that as I grow into my golden years my eyesight at night is somewhat diminished. Is it really that dark out??? So I left the parking lot at St. Mary’s City and started down the dark road from Calvert hall toward Route Five. All of a sudden, (apparently) from nowhere a dark shape lept into view. It was a student, all dressed in black (fashionable or de rigueur I suppose) just walking along, assuming: 1) I could see him/her; and 2) regardless of that, he/she had the inalienable right of way. Wrong, and not smart. Fortunately, it wasn’t even close, no evasive action required in either case, just a little pause to let the heartbeat return to normal. In the short distance roughly between the State House and the Boat House (~.5 miles) this occurred at least four more times. Blissful youth I suppose. So now there is another hazard to worry about driving at night besides deer: College Students!! And their eyes don’t reflect nearly as well as their four footed companions..

Maybe at night the undergrads should consider

DFV(visibility)

A musical hit.... and a folklore miss....

Too many things to do in the land of nothing to do…

Monday afternoon I attended another faculty seminar at St. Mary’s College, entitled “Setting Words to Music”. It was given by David Froom, a nationally recognized composer, and a member of the faculty at the college. I always stand in awe of creative people and love to hear about the process (everybody has to have a process) that results in (in this case) a musical piece. Apparently Joe Urgo, the new president of the college (and cruise ship operator) decided the college needed “a song”, and asked Mr. Froom to whip one up. So, David explained how he set the lyrics to music (the lyrics were created by another faculty member). Before he took over, the lady who wrote the lyrics talked about how she went about it. She said that because the college was so dominated by water she wanted to bring that out, and so used a lot of soft and flowing words. Lots of “S’s” and “H’s” and so on. Who would’a thunk? She also used the term “word painting”. And, to be truthful, I never did hear the complete song, but don’t think it was of the “cheer, cheer, for old…”, or “let’s go seahawks, beat those..” variety, but more of a level commensurate a liberal arts College.

David’s description of how he went about setting it to music was very interesting. He first talked about how a school song should be something ordinary people could sing (unlike the Star Spangled Banner), so needed it to be “simple” with a limited range (unlike…). So in talking about composing, he used terms like “step” and “jump”, first and fourth chords (which, thanks to Brian Ganz’s talks, I actually knew what he meant), and how he has learned that the important words need to be on the highest notes of the music. He had the score projected on the wall and used a laser pointer to illustrate various points he was making.

The remainder of his talk was how he generated another composition based on a poem that caught his eye. It was a translation of a poem originally written in Hebrew. At this point, the little automatic pencil I use for creating notes in the famous little brown journal (which contains restaurant notes and other such treasures) ran out of lead, so I can’t name the poet. But he explained how he read, reread, and listened to the words, got the rhythms, emphasis, and then would begin to construct the music. He knew what the instrumentation would be, and went from there. Fascinating stuff. He did play some of the piece, and it was “contemporary” which I hope is the correct term in that it didn’t have a melody, phrasing was interesting, and it was sung by a baritone. For his second example on another poem, he used the technique that I relate to the Messiah, where a simple phrase like “and then the light came out” is turned in to multiple phrases, as in “and then the light, and then the light came, and then the light came out, light came out, light, light, came out”.

Anyway it is always interesting to hear talented people talk.

So, I was enthused for the second lecture, held yesterday, which was given by Millie Rahn in St. Mary's Hall, entitled “The land of pleasant living; looking at the folklore and folklife of Maryland”. The more elaborate description of her talk included some words about foodways, which also caught my eye. Ms. Rahn is an anthropologist and describes herself as a “Folklorist, Ethnographer, and Oral Historian”. That “folklorist” description was a new one on me, but by the end of the evening I heard it about fifty times. Although describing herself as a “Marylander” she had never been to St. Mary’s County. She had, however, spent some time in Newfoundland, and was aware of the Calvert’s involvement there. Her talk was scheduled for 90 minutes. Well, the first 80 of those was spent in a rambling discourse on the importance of “place”, oral traditions, how important it is to document things, how neat it is to be a folklorist, and other sort of non-related generalities. Anything in the first 60 minutes or so relating to Maryland was pretty much skipped. Toward the end, she did present a couple of interesting videos of “local” things like a clip from a film about Dorchester, Maryland called “Muskrat Lovely” and some oral recordings of people who worked on the Bay Bridge.

Oh, I did get one good food takeaway. She talked about the famous (Maryland State Dessert) Smith Island Cake. Alert readers will know that it is a cake made of several small layers and lots of frostings. She said (one source, not checked out further by me) that the reason it has so many layers was that it was made before electricity reached the island, and using “Kerosene” heat, they could only bake small layers at a time. Sounds good to me..

With about ten minutes left, there was a “oh, I guess I should answer questions” but time had pretty much ran out. I was quite disappointed in the whole thing.  There were some interesting points, but I had hoped for so much more...

And being a foodie/engineer guy, I am always afraid that my background prevents me from “getting it” in these academic presentations. Sounded dumb to me, but maybe I’m too stupid to understand. Well, I checked with a couple of friends in the academic community (an anthropologist for one) and they shared my opinion that it was a poor presentation. Maybe I’m not too stupid. Just a little stupid.

So while I usually laud the college for great opportunities to hear a variety of subjects, this one was a whiff. But, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go, I guess reality is that they are not guaranteed..

And, I know I still owe you the “guy at the next table” story from Santa Fe. Was going to append it here, but that would most likely extend this post past your reading fatigue limit.. besides, I have a meeting in about an hour. So I have to go get

DFP(ublic)