Off the Shelf: Restaurant Reviewing with the Best

A decent amount of my reading material is food-related, and while I was in culinary school, I almost exclusively read food-related material.  I particularly loved the book "Becoming a Chef" by Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page, which provides a great overview of the various routes to development as a professional cook. 

It is almost textbook-like in its depth, but it reads like a novel.  It can be read as a how-to guide for culinary development, or it can simply provide insight into the lifestyle for those who are interested.

I recently came across the book "Dining Out" by the same authors, and I dove into it immediately. 

The book does for restaurant critics what "Becoming a Chef" does for chefs.  It provides an in-depth look into the world of restaurant reviewing, from the perspectives of both critics and the chefs and restauranteurs they review.  The book discusses the various career paths taken by critics, but it also analyzes the very practice of reviewing restaurants.  The authors raise a variety of issues that really got me thinking about how restaurants are judged, from the role of the critic (defender of the public's wallet versus aesthetic/artistic critic, similar to a music or theatre critic) to the merits of a quantitative (i.e., star) rating system to the importance (or lack thereof) of a critic's anonymity.

The book was published in 1998, so some of the information about specific restaurants may be out-of-date, but the critics interviewed for the book are still probably some of the best critics in the history of US restaurant criticism.  I learned a lot and really started thinking about the ways I judge restaurants, and I would recommend the book to anyone who is interested in learning more about this impactful (and rapidly-changing, especially thanks to social media) profession.

Off the Shelf: Hard Times and Southern Cooking

I finished reading Paula Deen's memoir, "It Ain't All About the Cookin,'" a while ago, but I somehow managed not to write about it until now.

The book is a memoir rather than a cookbook, though she does provide a recipe at the end of each chapter.  I adore Paula Deen - she really is my favorite celebrity chef (and I'm not embarrassed to admit it!), both because I love Southern food (it must be somewhere in my genes...) and because she comes across as such a genuine person.  After reading her book, I might like her even more.

Paula Deen certainly traveled a hard road to her current success, and she is incredibly forthright about her struggles.  From a tumultuous marriage to agoraphobia to near-destitution, she has faced some terrible straits - and often her troubles were compounded by her own bad decisions.  She was past forty when she started The Bag Lady, her lunch delivery business, and her restaurants, cookbooks, and TV shows came much later.  She speaks openly about the difficulty of starting a small business, and particularly of starting a restaurant, and she really does not glamorize that life.

I found it incredibly courageous that she wrote a book that highlights her own weaknesses and failings (she doesn't sugarcoat anything she thought or did), especially when her celebrity is so dependant on people's perceptions of her.  Her story is really a modern-day version of the American dream, however, and it provides a testament to the power of determination and the reality of pulling yourself up by your bookstraps.  Be forewarned, though - the story is written with an accent.  Literally.  I could really imagine Deen's voice telling the story - it just takes some adjustment to get used to reading that way!

Off the Shelf: Ingredient Love

I just finished reading The Artful Eater by Edward Behr, and I was really impressed.  Some of the material in the book my be outdated (it was published almost twenty years ago), but I am sure I will be using it as reference for a long time.

The book is a compilation of essays about individual ingredients, most of which appeared in a quarterly newsletter Behr had previously published.  So many of the books I read are about cooking or chefs, that it is refreshing to have a good read that focuses on the quality and variety of individual ingredients.

The selection of topics provides an interesting cross-section of ingredients.  Some are universal (salt), while some are very localized (aged country ham).  The essays do not follow a standardized model, but for each ingredient, Behr provides information about its history, its uses, and determinants of its quality.  He seems particularly interested in ingredients that represent a range of species or varieties (pepper, salmon, vanilla, coffee), and he does a great job of explaining the range of varieties and their respective strengths and uses.

Some ingredients clearly hold a special place in Behr's heart - his essay on cream is more of an ode to un-pasteurized, un-homogenized, high-fat dairy products.  For other ingredients, he leaves little room for sentimentality.  When discussing tomatoes, he allows that people's recollections of tomatoes past may be tinged with a bit of fantasy - and old-time favorites would not necessarily be preferred today.  (It is fascinating to learn that even twenty years ago, people were lamenting the state of the tomato.)  Furthermore, he claims that good farmed salmon tastes the same as wild.  This sense of realism really led me to enjoy the book - rather than waxing rhapsodic about obscure or impractical ingredients for their own sakes, Behr provides practical information that can truly be used for improving one's cooking (and eating!).

Given that the book was published in the early 90s (in the essay on coffee, Behr discusses an up-and-coming coffeeshop chain from Seattle that currently had 90(!) stores - and based on the discussion of roasting, I feel vindicated in my belief that their coffee tastes burnt.  But I digress), I would be interested to do some additional research into the current state of some products.  Particularly in the past few years and given the increasing interest in food, I suspect that some of the top-quality ingredients may be making a reappearance.

This book does include a few recipes, provided at the end of the book rather than along with each chapter, as well as sources for some of the ingredients discussed in the book (though I'm not sure whether they are still relevant, given the amount of time that has passed since the book was published).  Behr also provides a fantastic bibliography that provides sources for additional reading on individual topics as well as general food books and cookbooks.

On the Table: Murgh Masala

I adore Indian food, but somehow in my mind it is intimidating to attempt at home.  Every time I do it though, I am thrilled with the results!  Last night I decided to give it a try, and once again I was so happy I did.  I have a wonderful cookbook called The Food of India that I use as my go-to guide. 

Usually when I cook, I pretty much make things up as I go along.  However, for Indian food, the beauty is really in the combinations of flavors and spices, and since I am not intuitively familiar with how the different flavors combine, I really rely on recipes in this case.  The Food of India also provides lots of background information, and is really good about providing substitutions for equipment and ingredients that might not be available in an American kitchen. 

I made Murgh Masala, though I made some changes to the recipe as I went based on the ingredients I had available.  Apparently I was a little spacey last night - I completely forgot to take pictures as I went!  I must have been really engrossed in the recipe :) 

To prepare:

In a large mixing bowl, combine half a teaspoon of ground cumin; half a teaspoon of coriander seeds, crushed with a morter and pestle

(or you could use ground coriander); half a teaspoon of turmeric; and half a teaspoon of garam masala.  Cut two boneless, skinless chicken breasts into bite-sized pieces and add them into the bowl.  Stir well, until all the chicken is coated in the spices.

Finely chop one white onion, two cloves of garlic, and six cherry tomatoes.  In a small bowl, combine half a teaspoon of ground ginger, half the chopped onion, and the chopped garlic and tomatoes.  Stir well to combine.

Put a large skillet over medium heat and coat the bottom of the pan with canola oil.  When the oil gets hot, add in the other half of the chopped onion; half a teaspoon of clove powder, and half a teaspoon of ground cinnamon.  Cook until the onions start to brown.  Add in the onion/garlic/tomato mixture and stir well to combine.  Cook for a few more minutes.  Add in a healthy dash of salt and stir well to combine. 

Add the chicken mixture to the pan, along with six ounces of Greek yogurt and about 1/3 of a cup of chicken stock.  Stir well.  When the liquid comes up to a simmer, cover the pan and allow to cook for 45-50 minutes.  Remove the lid and allow to cook for about 10 more minutes, or until the sauce reaches the desired consistency.  Taste and adjust seasoning.

Serve over rice.  (I did remember to get a picture of the finished product!)

Enjoy!

Off the Shelf: Pressures and Glories in Fine Dining

The title sounds a little bit like a cheezy murder mystery, but I just finished reading The Perfectionist: Life and Death in Haute Cuisine by Rudolph Chelminski, and it provided a fascinating look into the often-hidden tumultuous world of French fine dining.

The main story arc is that of Bernard Loiseau's life and untimely death.  Loiseau resided in the pantheon of French culinarians in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, and the dichotomy between his external persona and his internal struggle provides a very human look into the making of a culinary icon.

Interspersed with Loiseau's story is a history lesson and a psychological study.  The world of haute cuisine is fairly small, and Loiseau seems to have interacted with everyone - and charmed most of them.  Chelminski explores Loiseau's relationships, and recounts memories of Loiseau from a huge range of friends and acquaintances.  He also provides a social and cultural perspective on fine dining, as well as the pressures that weigh on top-tier chefs. 

The external focus is complemented by a very internal focus.  Chelminski delves into Loiseau's (largely un-recognized) struggle with bipolar disorder, and illuminates the paradoxes that drove an incredibly talented individual.  On one hand, Loiseau sought constantly to please everyone.  He sought to develop not only flawless cuisine, but also opulent surroundings in which his guests could relax.  He strove for perfection in every aspect of his hotel and restaurant, with a constant focus on attaining, and then maintaining, three Michelin stars.  On the other hand, bumps in life sent Loiseau into nearly bottomless despair, and the realization that he could never please everyone - least of all himself - ultimately led to his suicide.  Chelminski assigns no blame in the course of the book, but does a fantastic job of identifying the numerous pressures that weighed on Loiseau  - both those that were shared by his compatriots and those that were self-imposed.

Loiseau experienced an apprenticeship similar to that of Pepin and Diat, though his stint as an underling was significantly shorter than normal; for that reason, Loiseau did not possess nearly the technical proficiency of many of his peers.  His cuisine focused exclusively on native ingredients, prepared so as to maintain their vital essences.  He firmly opposed fusion and globalized cuisine.  The foodie worlds' constant search for novelty led to a firm embracing of fusion cuisine in the early twenty-first century, and being left behind may have been part of Loiseau's undoing.  He focused his cuisine on those ingredients and techniques that he knew he, and his staff, could use flawlessly.  A huge part of his rise to fame can be attributed to his personality, however, and his incredible sociability, in addition to his culinary prowess; maintaining his establishment and ceaslessly promoting it (and himself) was an all-consuming focus for Loiseau.

Many biographies and autobiographies of famous chefs (and for that matter, other glorified vocations) gloss over the downside of their profession.  Constantly striving to please a fickle public, not to mention professional critics, can be a thankless job.  Chelminski does a fantastic job of describing the profession and its pressures, as well as the incredible drive that propels the most illustrious chefs to the top of their field.

Off the Shelf: French Cooking at Home

Before there was Julia Child, there was Louis Diat.  I just finished reading (and sometimes skimming...it is mainly a cookbook after all) Diat's French Cooking for Americans (published in 1946), which turned out to be one of the most succinct yet exhaustive overviews of (mainly homestyle) French cooking I have encountered to date. 

Diat was a classically trained French chef (his training probably resembled that of Jacques Pepin), but he never forgot the food his mother prepared for him as a child, and his book serves as an introduction to that type of cooking for American cooks.  The book is comprehensive, from soup to pastries (there aren't many references to nuts in the book), and provides an incredible variety of recipes within individual categories.  Twenty-six recipes for chicken may not strike a modern reader as very many, given our current affinity for that type of meat, but the collection of thirty-one recipes for veal is pretty impressive.  The treatment of vegetables is similarly comprehensive, with a breadth and depth of recipes provided. 

The book does a fantastic job of conveying the philosophy (if that is the appropriate term) of regional French cooking.  There is a focus on economy, and nothing (or very little) was wasted.  Interspersed with the recipes are passages describing the background of particular ingredients, the seasonality of eating, and the settings for particular meals.  Foods usually would be eaten in season, and those that could be preserved would be eaten throughout the year.  Recipes are included for organ means and suggestions are given for using less than ideal parts of produce.  There is an undercurrent of efficiency, both in terms of cost and time, running through the book, though there is no sacrifice in terms of the quality of the final product.  This approach could be adopted by many modern home cooks.  I was particularly impressed by the recipe for Hollandaise Sauce (there is an entire chapter in the book on sauces), which was based entirely on egg yolks, butter, and water (and none of the white wine and shallot reduction I learned to make in culinary school).  I tried the recipe one morning, and the results (seasoned with some lemon juice) were fantastic, and certainly made a delicious finishing touch for a breakfast at home.

Though the focus is on home cooking, Diat also includes recipes for things such as breads and cakes that the French would traditionally purchase, but that American cooks might be interested in making by hand.  The book provides an incredible reference, with great ideas for using familiar ingredients in new ways as well as for using unfamiliar ingredients.  I think some of the recipes would be difficult to follow just based on the text, and some of the techniques would be easier to learn with someone actually showing you how to do it.  (Incidentally, that is probably exactly how Diat learned how to cook - documenting and formalizing the recipes must have been a departure from how his mother actually cooked at home.)  Practice is exactly what is needed to master cooking, however, and doing so will give the home cook the freedom to experiment and adapt the recipes to his/her tastes.

Off the Shelf: A Culinary Icon

Over the weekend, I finished reading Jacques Pepin's The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen, and I cannot recommend it highly enough. 
 

Pepin's career has spanned an impressive scope of the culinary field, from working in some of the greatest restaurants in the world to developing recipes for Howard Johnson's to teaching.  After a childhood and young adulthood in France, he came to the United States; the elite culinary community in the US was fairly small at the time, and by the sound of it, he became friends with anybody who was anybody.  He began his career long before the days of celebrity chefs and clearly just wanted to spend his life doing what he loved.  The book was published in 2003, at which point Pepin had become incredibly famous, but nonetheless his tale comes across as very humble.  From his life in France during World War II, to his grueling kitchen education, to his arrival on America speaking barely a word of English, to his rise to the status of a culinary icon, Pepin has led an often difficult, though always optimistic, life, and his story is incredibly inspiring.  Furthermore, Pepin was involved with many of the biggest culinary changes in 20th century America, and the book gives a front seat view into the extent to which the culinary landscape has changed.

I particularly enjoyed The Apprentice because it ties together ideas (and in some cases, literal events) from a range of other food-focused books.  Pepin was great friends with Craig Claiborne, and a number of scenes from Claiborne's A Feast Made for Laughter are also recounted in The Apprentice; hearing about the relationships within their circle of friends gives another (interesting) perspective about the lives of some of the great American gourmands in the 1960s and onwards.  Pepin also makes some observations that actually mirrored a conversation on this blog, in relation to Amy B. Trubek's The Taste of Place.  Upon arriving and beginning to work in the United States, Pepin was struck by the culinary freedom that was evidenced.  Kitchen work arrangements and the range of food he could produce were vastly different from the world in which he had grown up.  There is a great quote from the book that emphasizes this point:

"Perhaps the most important thing I came to understand during my decade at HoJo's was that Americans had extremely open palates compared to French diners.  They were willing to try items that lay outside their normal range of tastes.  If they liked the food, that was all that mattered.  I wasn't constantly battling ingrained prejudices as I would have been in France....  In France, unless a dish was prepared exactly "right," people would know and complain.  In the States, if it tasted good, then fine, the customer was happy.  A whole new world of culinary possibilities had opened up before me." (p. 165)

Pepin's classical culinary training (started at the age of 13!) clearly impacted his culinary aesthetic throughout his career.  The book depicts a man, however, who was incredibly down to earth.  He was not a food "snob" by any means; he loved fishing, mushrooming, and otherwise gathering his own food; he was a pragmatist; and he frowned on nouvelle cuisine's transition towards creativity for creativity's sake.  He firmly believed that classical techniques (and common sense!) should be the basis for innovation.  The book includes a number of recipes, and they clearly convey his love of homestyle comfort food that can be shared with family and friends.

For anyone interested in the world of food, this book provides an enthralling firsthand perspective from someone who is not only a culinary hero but also a human inspiration.

Off the Shelf: Novel Meets Cookbook

Despite the chick-lit cover, this book is all about the food.  That would be my synopsis of Amanda Hesser's book Cooking for Mr. Latte. 

The book draws from columns Hesser wrote while at the New York Times, and recounts her relationship with her (now) husband, from their first date through their wedding.  The story is presented as a series of vignettes, each of which involves some sort of meal and concludes with recipes related to that meal.  The love story is interesting, particularly considering that "Mr. Latte" (so called because he had the audacity to order lattes after dinner) started out with considerably less interest in food than Hesser has.  However, the prose also provides a telling look into Hesser's culinary aesthetic.  She seems to truly embrace food without pretension, and she praises fresh, largely-unadulturated food in equal measure with the most technically complex dishes.

The recipes accompanying each vignette are the true highlight of the book.  Some chapters provide essentially an entire menu for a particular type of party, while others include just one or two featured recipes.  Many of the recipes are suitable for dinner parties, so they are not labor-intensive or can be made ahead of time, though there are some recipes that involve marathon cooking sessions.  Hesser's culinary expressions seems most pure when she presents recipes that involve careful seasoning to accentuate ripe fruits and vegetables; she seems to abide by the premise that less intervention often produces the best results.  I would recommend this book for the recipes, even if the reader has no interest in the accompanying prose.

Off the Shelf: Costumes and Criticism

Over the weekend, I finished reading Ruth Reichl's Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise, and the speed with which I finished it is really a testament to the fact that I couldn't put it down.  I picked up the book thinking it would be a quick, fun read after finishing The Taste of Place, which was fairly dense and academic.  Well, Garlic and Sapphires was both quick and fun to read, but it turned out to be much more than that. 

Ruth Reichl was the restaurant critic at the New York Times for much of the 1990s, and went on to become the Editor in Chief of the now-defunct Gourmet magazine.  She also has written a number of books; Garlic and Sapphires focuses mainly on her tenure at the New York Times.  Reichl writes about the lengths to which she went to disguise herself while dining out, and the alter-egos she devised are impressively complex.  In addition to donning wigs and costumes, she developed back-stories and full personalities for herself.  These disguises allowed her to experience restaurants as "everywoman" would, since she almost invariably received significantly better food and better treatment when she was recognized at a restaurant.  Her experiences in a restaurant both as herself and incognita would inform her ultimate review. 

Costuming became more than just a way to do her job better, however, and in some ways the book becomes a sociological and psychological study.  In developing and living as different personalities, Reichl experiences firsthand the differing treatment that different types of people (women, specifically) receive from society at large.  Furthermore, it is fascinating the extent to which donning a costume allows her to express previously hidden aspects of her personality.  It seemed that wearing a disguise changed her behavior, almost without her having to consciously think about it.

Finally, the book reveals Reichl's inner (and in some cases external) struggle with her own profession.  At some points, she considered herself a sell-out for getting paid to eat in and write about extremely expensive restaurants, in a world where so few people can actually afford to eat in those types of establishments.  She also consciously focused on smaller restaurants and ethnic restaurants, in addition to the restaurants that she was "expected" to review, and this approach won her some critics.  Her use of disguises allowed her to experience restaurants as (most of) her readers would, and it seems that Reichl in some ways viewed herself as the "protector" of the everyman; she wanted to endorse restaurants at which everyone would be treated well and receive good food. 

The narrative in the book is interspersed with some of Reichl's restaurant reviews from the Times, along with her own recipes.  It is a joy to read, and gives an entertaining and informative look into the life of one of America's foremost arbiters of food.

An Exploration of Food and Locality: Follow-Up

I am still new to this blogging thing and I am not sure whether the comments are easily visible to everybody.  There was a really good point raised in the comments that I am going to paste up here so y'all can see it, along with my response.  If you have now seen it twice, I apologize :)

The commenter said:

"Fascinating post. I wonder to what extent "terrior" can act as an inhibitor to creativity in the development of wines, foods and other products and services. Does it require that production methods, for example, must remain static."

Here is my response:

"That actually is an issue to which the book alludes. It seems to be more of a concern (though to its defendants it is probably not a concern) in places like France, where the "rules" can get fairly extensive. For example, to be eligible for an AOC designation, a winemaker must follow rules about the grape varietals that are grown, the density of growth, the geographic location of the vineyard, how the wine is produced, etc. There certainly are producers in France who use non-traditional approaches (and may produce very good results), but they do so outside the defined system. Stasis seems to be less of an issue within the U.S. because we don't have the same level of ingrained ideas about where and how certain things can be produced.

There is a very interesting second angle raised by this comment, however, which has to do with marketing. Producers have an incentive to clearly define their product and market it as unique in some way. In some cases, they are supported by governments or other organizations, but in others they may be largely self-designated. Creating the sense of distinctiveness necessarily excludes others who may be doing similar things in different places or using different methods; there is an incentive for producers to function such that they can use the marketing power of the defined "brand." Whether in France or the U.S., any producer operating outside a defined structure bears the burden of making his product known to consumers largely on his own.

I think that brings us to the key point that I took away from the book, which is that ultimately it is up to the consumer to be curious about the source of her food and look beyond the options that are most readily available. "

Off the Shelf: An Exploration of Food and Locality

I finally finished reading The Taste of Place: A Cultural Journey into Terroir by Amy B. Trubek.  I bought the book months ago but never got around to reading it, and I am really glad I finally did.  The book addresses the very amorphous concept of terroir.  The traditional American translation equates terroir with, essentially, soil.  The term is most often used when discussing wine, particularly the tastes typical of wines produced in certain areas.  Trubek provides a significantly more nuanced interpretation of the term, both in terms of its original French meaning and its applicability in contemporary society.

The term terrior holds different meanings for different people.  The broadest definition includes a recognition of the impact on the finished agricultural product of multiple factors, including environmental (geography, geology, and climate, for example) and human (production methods and cultural standards, for example) inputs.  Essentially, food (and wine) tastes different based on where and how it is produced.  The most strictly codified interpretation of terroir is evidenced in the French Appelation D'Origine Controlee (AOC) system.  The system is intended to recognize and promote the uniqueness of certain products (originally wines, but now also foods) produced in defined areas using defined techniques.  Attitudes towards and appreciation of terroir within France have been culturally ingrained; the country has hundreds of years of strong agricultural tradition that have established standards and practices for food and wine production, and there has also been a concerted effort on the part of the government to preserve the perceived uniqueness of French products. 

The United States does not have nearly the same historical perspective on agriculture as France.  Since the rise of commodity food production, the exploration of terroir in the US has largely been considered countercultural, and has been undertaken by fairly discrete groups of producers and consumers.  The limited historical and cultural traditions regarding agriculture in the U.S. allows these individuals to be experimental and implement new techniques and practices while striving to make great tasting food and wine.

Trubek examines the concept of terroir along multiple dimensions, and highlights people and groups within both France and the United States that are working to maintain and develop this idea.  The book includes extensive research and interviews, and the focus ranges from French winemakers to California winemakers to chefs in California, Wisconsin, and Vermont focused on using local ingredients (and the organization and logistics needed to make that happen) to Vermont maple syrup producers.  The stories are compelling, and the book provides an incredible perspective on the breadth and nuance of flavors, as well as the human connections, that are available to us through food.

Off the Shelf: Comprehensive Cookbook with a Home Cook Focus

One of my biggest weaknesses is cookbooks.  I am perfectly happy to read them like a book, and I love all kinds - new, old, whatever.  Last weekend I came across the Taste of Home Cookbook Revised Edition and it was on SUPER sale, so I picked it up (from what I can tell, there is a new edition out, so they must have been trying to get rid of the old ones).  I haven't made anything from it yet, but this book looks AWESOME.  Most of the recipes come from home cooks (some come from the Taste of Home Test Kitchen), so the recipes use common ingredients and basic techniques - nothing particularly strange or complicated.  The book (really it's a 3-ring binder) is broken into different sections - Appetizers & Beverages, Vegetables, Poultry, etc. - and each section includes its own index, introductory material, and a variety of recipes.  For some recipes, they provide variations on a theme and include "Time-Saver," "Light," and "Serves 2" options.  The book provides a wealth of information in addition to recipes.  There is a whole "Kitchen Basics" section that includes everything from knife skills to storage times for a variety of foods, and within each section there is information about that specific type of food and tips interspersed with the recipes.  Taste of Home has an entire separate Baking Book, but the Cookbook provides tons of baking and dessert information and recipes.  There are sections ranging from Quick Breads to Cakes to Candies.  Since my background in baking/desserts is very limited, I am looking forward to using this book as a guide (one day I WILL make cream puffs from scratch!).  Due to its scope, the book doesn't go into a huge amount of detail on any one topic, but for a wide-ranging, easy-to-follow kitchen text, it seems like a good option.