Inter-Culinary Competency

It is funny when you travel that there arises two types of eaters that fall along a continuum.  On the one end there are the safe eaters, only eating at the national chains or things they have eaten at before.  I am not sure if these people have just had a bad experience or if they just enjoy the predictable.  The kind of souls that eat a McDonalds in Thailand.  We move up the scale to the "that looks safe" group.  These are the people who eat at a place because it looks similar to a place they know or has high reviews on the internet.  Next, we move into the "let us try something new" group.  These people are willing to try some new food but will likely order the safest item on the menu.  Finally, there is the food adventurer.  This person will not only try everything but seek out these experience.

So, what is my point in bring up this food continuum?

Well, it really sucks when all (or a few) different types of eaters try to go out to dinner together.  Case in point.  This week I traveled to Harrisonburg, VA with a small group of people.  We wanted to go out to eat and try something new.  We decided to use Yelp to look up highly reviewed restaurants in the area.  There were three that were highly reviewed. 

One of these restaurants was Blue Nile Ethiopian Cuisine which sounded good by the reviews.  All in the group agreed that they had never had Ethiopian food before and it would be fun to try.  Then to interesting events happened

1.  The dining experience was described as," Be prepared to eat family style with your fingers".

2.  A Yelp member had posted this picture:

As a result of these too events members of the group quickly changed their minds about going.  I asked one party member why they did not want to go anymore they stated, "I do not want to sit in a circle on the floor, taking turns feed each other baby crap with our fingers!"

I guess family style to them meant that you feed each other food and not yourself, and I admit the picture was not the best. This moment demonstrates what happens when individuals lack Inter-Culinary Competency which is the ability of successful eating with food of other cultures.

Andrew Zimmern has a phrase, "If it looks good eat it" but I have decided to add to that "if it looks good in person eat it"

1.  Can we just admit that picture are not the best gage of the quality of a food.  In cookbooks food and photos are doctored up like high end fashion models.

2.  Can we not be scared of difference, eat with your finger!

I was robbed of a new experience by people playing it safe, and such is the sad story of all food explores who eat in non-exploring groups.  I will add that the steakhouse we went to was probably one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had at a restaurant.  So, I am not bitter, if fact it taught me an important lesson, sometimes in my quest for the completely different meal I miss the subtle differences that local restaurants can have.

P.S. If you are ever in Harrisonburg, VA eat at the Local Chop & Grill House and get the ice cream sampler for me

Hot Potatoes...Save Money

As food prices continue to increase I often ponder how I might be able to feed my family well and save money.  I have many cost saving methods, the first is that I conceptualize all of my meals in terms of starch, vegetable, and protein.  I plan to explain this further in later post. 

For now let's talk about a money saving starch: Potato

They are usually pretty cheap at the store, I have paid as little as 97 cents for 10 lbs, and easy to make and not mess up.  I usually include them once a week in my meal planning, twice if I am eating a sweet potato or yam.

I also try an mix up the type of potato I eat each week: I generally see about three kinds that are cheaply priced: Russet, Yukon Gold (yellow potatoes), and Red Potatoes.  

How many ways do you know to cook potatoes?  

So Russet I use in two ways, the most obvious is bake potatoes but I also do oven wedges with them.  I have found that Bake Potato night is a great cure for lazy Thursdays (which I find to be the hardest night of the week to cook).  Here is my baked potato check list (it changes each time and is never all of them):

Broccoli
Bacon or chili
Cheese
Butter
Sour Cream/ Ranch Dressing
Salsa
Olives

 Most of these items I have on hand at all times and all of them, except Bacon or chili, require little prep work or cook time.

So yellow potatoes I love to mash, I will leave it at that

Red potatoes are my favorite.  One dish I like to make with them is Parsley Potatoes

Cut red potatoes in 1/4" slices

Boil potatoes till done, drain water

Throw some butter in that pot, enough to be delicious to you

Throw in fresh/or dried parsley (as little or as much as you like) toss it around.

I will talk about sweet potatoes another time

One last point I not sure what your feelings are about dried potato flakes but I love them for their cheapness and quickness for making mash potatoes in a pinch when you are too tired to cook.  Remember fatigue is the enemy of a family budget and increases your chances of eating out.   

Introduction

So, the question for today is why a food blog?  

I will come right out and say that there little chance that I will blow your mind with new recipes.  I am not a professional chef, I am however a foodie who search for the best recipes and methods like monks search the bible.  I apply my weird love of food to help me live well.  I have been poor for much of my adult life and have always eaten well.

There is a method to my madness.  Many people can only work from recipes and have very little flexibility in planning their weekly meals.  With food prices increasing, flexibility will become the name of the game.  I am here to explore that game as one topic of this blog.

Food is life, it is the sensory rhetoric of our childhood, our greatest moments, and failures.  Most people can name "that meal" they want on special occasion, that cookie that reminds them of love, or that meal that reminds them of the dark moments when the world could not get any worst.  The relationship between food and life is another topic of this blog.

Finally, food is taste, it is experience.  Poor people, like myself, travel with our taste buds.  I have never physically traveled to far away exotic lands but my tongue has tried.  The experience of flavor, the amazing phenomena of imagination that goes into combining raw ingredients.  The experience of food is another topic of this blog.

It is my hope that sharing together will make you hungry... to play the game, live life, and experience food. 

I am a Turkey

I take food very seriously.  One area that is of important concern is Turkeys.  A Turkey done wrong is the bane of the table. A dry barren dust bowl lacking all flavor.  That bird needs love.  The question becomes what is the message of a juicy turkey?

The turkey speaks... epic meal... even better left overs!
So... what do we do to get this mouth watering turkey, two ideas.


1.  Give that bird a bath... er in a brine
  

For the brine: Adapted from Good Eats

• 1 cup kosher or sea salt
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 gallon worth (Knorr cube) vegetable stock (I use Knorr blocks because they add more salt to the brine, the salter the better)
• 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns (optional)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons whole allspice berries (optional)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons chopped candied ginger (optional)
• 1 gallon heavily iced water

Combine the vegetable stock, salt, brown sugar, peppercorns, allspice berries, and candied ginger in a large stockpot over medium-high heat. Stir occasionally to dissolve solids and bring to a boil. Then remove the brine from the heat, cool to room temperature, and refrigerate.

Early on the day or the night before you'd like to eat:

Combine the brine, water and ice in the 5-gallon bucket. Place the thawed turkey (with innards removed) breast side down in brine. If necessary, weigh down the bird to ensure it is fully immersed, cover, and refrigerate or set in cool area for 8 to 16 hours, turning the bird once half way through brining.

2.  Learn to use a probe thermometer!

the old math equations about weight and time are wrong and will always result in a dry crappy turkey

Roast the turkey on lowest level of the oven at 500 degrees F for 30 minutes. Insert a probe thermometer into thickest part of the breast and reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees F. Set the thermometer alarm (if available) to 161 degrees F.

If this seems like a lot of work, well I warned you that I take food seriously, do everyone a favor and don't cook turkey