On Food and Writing - Perpetual Musings

Unbenownst to me, it is mid 2009, and I am in the midst of applying for a pile of money I probably won't win. Not to be defeatist, but I don't usually win cash. I win things like parking tickets and someone else's cold. It's not pessimism, it's reality. So this is more of an academic exercise on how to apply for things. This actually is a good thing. If irritating.

So I have to fill out a section on the writing I have done and realizing that the includsion is a bit sparse, I thought, cleverly to myself, 'oh I shall use my blog'. And then I realized that the last post was in 2008.

Having only 160 characters is what makes twitter so popular. For 160 characters everyone is a writer. Even I can put thought to a 160 characters of script a day. Those of you who use more than that on twitter are only contributing to the problem.

So we have caught me in the most vile twists of procrastination I have experienced since College. Which means that no matter how much older I get I am still ill-behaved. and lazy. I just want to take a nap.

So for a writer, I really haven't written much. But I HAVE! I keep writing reports and plodding away at the book and sending letters to my friend who has stomach flu. And parts are funny.

Behold:
I'm reading this book called the Julie/Julia projects about this crazy woman (who I think I know she looks so familiar) (Julie Powell do we know her?) and she lives in long island city and she mentioned this place on Steinway street called Western Beef. Maybe this is not a topic that holds fascination for you now but when the crackers have stabilised and you have paid your restitution to the the gods of mobile gut fuckery you might lift your head from the porcelain alter and have a think? Because it sounds AWESOME. like i want to visit and bring the blood of a vegetarian and lay it out for sacrifice.

This is funny stuff? Right? I am hilarious - very occasionally- to my best friend and usually when she is so under the weather that any attempt at humour is faced with grim determination and a mental tally of how she'll sooner or later get even. I may have just hoisted my own petard.

But The Point, Ladies and Gentlemen of my Imagination, is that putting your writing on a blog is a form masochism anyway. Some stuff rises, most of it stinks - I mean sinks- and I'll still have to go write my grant application having lost 14 minutes to waffling over my own navel.

That being said, I have gone all up in the woods about my cooking lately.
Curing my own bacon (seriously.) , baking my own bread, whipping my own mayonnaise, and stock! Gallons of it. I could sail away. I don't know if this is in response to a kitchen the size of which i have only seen professionally and it is all mine or if I have just had it with the supermarket.

Both?

Chasing Jalapenos.

Every February the Foodtown in downtown Auckland suddenly becomes overrun by American Exchange Students. The event is akin to the arrival of migrating birds at sudden watering holes in the middle of the Sahara. All of sudden, statements that sound like questions are echoing down the aisles: 'omigod look there's toiletpaper?' 'i totally miss fig newtons?'

Most of these kids are from the west coast of America where Mexican food, or more specifically, Mexican produce, is a constant staple. Coming to the South Pacific, even after that twelve hours plane ride, does not shake the inexorable faith these kids have in the constant supply of jalapeno peppers or Monterey Jack Cheese. And boyoboy, I get a sick, superior feeling thrill as I watch them go ballistic when all they can find, if they are lucky, is an old can of El Paso preserved japapenos. Girls who won't eat chicken skin and carry gallons of purex handiwipes, will pull hair out over a can probably teeming with botulism.

Forget that Mexico is almost 3000 miles away, travellin' Americans want nachos.

People in Auckland will tell you that we have nachos. Technically this is true. It became untrue the first time I pulled a carrot out of the cheddar cheese topped, dorito flavoured pile. It's just not the same thing. Maybe it's like the differences between Marmite and Vegemite. They look the same - if you squint and stand a good three, maybe four, meters away - but as we all know, they're not.

Anyhoodle, the desire for nachos abates after a few years. You move on. You find solace in Burger King. But that craving never goes away. Please don't ask me to say nice things about the Mexican restaurants in Auckland. I just...can't.

So imagine our surprise when we stumbled into the Hawke's Bay Farmer's Market in Hastings (a good 5 hours from Auckland) and found a CHILE PEPPER BONANZA!

Jalapenos! Poblanos! Funny long green ones! Short, smoky brown ones! Habaneros! Thai Fire Chiles. Mild! Hot! Super Hot! Eye Watering! THRILLED.

Like twitchy addicts we fell upon those peppers. We bought handfuls of peppers but we kept returning for more. Just another few poblanos, we said. Maybe three more jalapenos? They reminded us, we ship to Auckland. No no! We assured them, we're fine, we've kicked the habit, but maybe we'll take just a few more.

And so, when we returned home, we had a pile of peppers and if it was possible to roll around in that shit lke Ebenezer Scrooge and not burn our eyes out or ruin the peppers, we would have. Instead we just gazed upon on our collection and decided, oh yes it was good.

and if you don't think that was something special. Look, tomatillos. I heart Hawkes Bay.

Corned Beef and Cabbage Tree

photo by Alan Titchall

When we sent the postcard containing the seeds for the New Zealand Native Cabbage Tree back to Ireland, we congratulated ourselves for so cleverly writing, ‘we heard that upon blooming flowers give off a scent of corned beef with mashed carrots’. We gleefully imagined the garden blooming with corned beef dinners and permeating an aroma of the faint tinge of boiled meat.

So imagine my surprise when I was invited to André’s to a dinner of cabbage tree. ‘Shall I bring the corned beef?’ I joked. ‘That would be lovely!’, said André.

Righto.

The inevitable problem with corned beef is that it is salty, rubbery, and synthetic tasting. This is of course if you buy your corned beef from the supermarket as I do. For the CRAZIES out there who corn their own brisket for days and weeks and months, I can only say you are a more patient and better cook than I. However, for those of you who purchase silverside out of a vacuum packed container in the middle of your meat aisle, there are other solutions.

The way to solve this is to place the meat into a ‘reverse brine’ that will leach much of the artificial salt out of the corned beef while infusing it with moisture and flavour. After which you set out to simmer it in a broth of yummy. The result is a moist, delicious, tender corned beef. Not the same as a brisket you corned yourself but you also don’t suffer from that meat smell that invades your house when you just plunk it into boiling water either.

Brined Supermarket Corned Beef with Parsley Sauce

Reverse Brine
3 T honey
Small handful of peppercorns
3 Bay Leaves
1 small bunch of fresh Parsley
Several sprigs of fresh Thyme
1 T of Red Chile Flakes
Juice and zest of 1 lemon
NO SALT
1.5 kg (ish) of silverside corned beef
Water to cover meat.

Set aside in a coolish place and let it rest at least overnight.
Ours brined for about 18 hours. But it could easily have gone longer.

Corned Beef with Parsley Sauce
2 carrots peeled and chopped
2 onions chopped
Small bunch of parsley
Few springs of thyme
1 T of peppercorns
1 T of Red Chile Flakes
1 Bay leaf
1 T salt

Drain corned beef and place in pot. Place all other ingredients. Cover with water. Bring to a boil, skim, and then cover and simmer for 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Drain and slice. Serve with Parsley Sauce

Parsley Sauce (modified from Saveur Magazine)
2 T butter
2 t finely chopped yellow onion
2 T flour
1 1/4 c of the broth from the corned beef
1/4 c milk
1 tsp. chopped fresh parsley
1 T english mustard
Large pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and freshly ground black pepper (be heavy handed with your seasoning because of the corned beef is less salty now).

Serve with hearts of cabbage tree boiled and in a salad with vinaigrette.

Where did 2007 go?

Did I not eat? My jeans say nay.
Rather I think I learned the lesson that when one embarks on a Master's Thesis, the idea of writing anything else -- be it email, birthday cards, shopping lists, affadavits, whathaveyou-- they all go by the way side because to actually form words and make phrases is physically incapacitating. I could not sit in front of the computer/grasp pen /use language for a second longer than was absolutely necessary. It may sound like baloney (mmm baloney- shut up you know you love it fried) but it turns out to be the truth. Not like anyone's reading this, which I don't want anyway because then I would have to go read yours.

Anyway, 2007 went away, just a like that, a year of no posts. Which is shame because I ate at some fantastic restaurants. Like the pork belly at Bowman's. And I miss you people. Those of you who don't read this.

And finally. I went to the beer festival this past weekend. Me and most of the unattached males of Auckland. It was like New Zealand's largest frat party. And for some reason, I don't find that to be a bad thing.

What Goes Well With Chips?

I’m sorry, if you don’t know the movie I’m quoting then I need you to move to the back of the line. Rent A Fish Called Wanda on your way back there. Fish-n-chips are the most famous culinary duo since salt and pepper, more cutting edge than bangers and mash, and more sought after than red beans and rice. Fish-n-Chips don’t even need to use the ‘and’ to bind them; they’re so together they are almost one word. Fish-, deep fried with a coating or a batter, n-chips, flavorful, gloriously golden brown, crispy, dipped in salt, vinegar or ketchup. The condiments may change but the standard stays the same, fish-n-chips, originally a working man’s supper, it became a treat after the beach or a hit of grease to ward off the working week.

Fried fish came to England with the Sephardic Jews in the 17th century as Pescado Frito. It adopted the name fried fish, usually plaice, and became popular street food in London in the 1850s. Luckily, ice cream debuted on the street the same year so you could have a piece of plaice and a scoop of plain ice cream as the newly happening lunchtime treat. However, Fish and Ice Cream couldn’t draw the crowds and never became a solid duet. Ice cream definitely found its own career as a solo act and soon fried fish began looking for a new dance partner. Up north in Scotland, deep fried ‘chipped’ potatoes were becoming popular. Though no one has yet discerned when ‘fish’ met ‘chips’, Joseph Marin celebrated their commercial debut with the first fish and chip shop serving the pair together in newsprint in London in 1860.

Fish-n-chips toured New Zealand soon after and was a regular on the hotel lunch counters and in dining rooms by 1870. Kiwis never called it the ‘chipper’ like they did at Home, but always the ‘fish-n-chip shop’ or, incongruously, a restaurant, thus ensuring that a variety of seafood would be available in such places. Fried clams, oysters, prawns, if it stood still long enough it ended up in the deep fat fryer. But not like the Scottish, with their deep fried haggis or their deep fried mars bars. Oceanic produce only, please, perhaps bending slightly to include a fritter of pineapple or banana. But, always, always, always served with a serving of chips.

I have never loved the potato. Those who do are awfully sensitive about chips. The times, moods and accoutrements that can accompany wedges, shoestrings, skinny, curly, krinkle (note the ‘k’), chunky — as many types as the Eskimos recognize for snow — the potato fried has many hats. But when I say ‘Fish-n-chips’, this conjures its own particular type of fry: the fresh cut chip.

Oh New Zealand! We love your fish. Exotic names like Tarakihi, Guernard, Hoki, Snapper. New Zealand your fish delights but your chips! Your chips cause no end of grief. Frozen. Frozen! Nothing good comes out of frozen. Ask the mammoth; or Walt Disney should he ever thaw.

Local fish-n-chip shops have some excuses. Fresh potatoes are expensive, labour intensive and require a double fry. The frozen chips are cheap, fast and easy. And they do not care if I complain about the chips. If I don’t like it, I can get a fritter or a burger or piss off home to make my own. They’re busy. And I roll in their dismissal like any cheap food whore and I get my chips and I go home and I eat them, feel bloated, and wake up the next morning feeling used and vowing never to do it again…till the next time that I really don’t feel like cooking. Or I am at the seaside. Frozen chips don’t seem so bad near the sea side.

But we are now in the age of the gourmet fish-n-chip shop. A global trend, New Zealand has its own posh stores shiny with slick industrial settings, lush stools with napkin cups embedded in the benches. Cool halogen lights, a shabby chic blackboard on the wall with designer chalk handwriting telling you what is fresh off the boat for you to sacrifice in the deep fat fryer. Next to your tarakihi or your snapper you can get tuna kebabs or salmon croquettes. You can get your fish grilled and your chips potato gratineed. Menus expand to include chowder, Asian stir fried noodles, steamed mussels. Still in the midst of this cacophony and frippery and mockery of blue collar feeds is the sad, lurking truth: their chips are frozen. Beautiful, fresh succulent pieces of fish beer battered, tempura covered, set on a platter of pearls and some sad, indolent, frozen chips. Mutton dressed as lamb chips in their faux newspaper print or their brown bag containers never disguising that they’ve gypped the second player and sank on the chips.

It’s a mystery. Salt, an up-market slick haven of trendiness in the newly ritzy West Lynn neighborhood has all the makings of fancy faux fish-n-chip shop. Ewan McDonald described it as ‘big, clean, shiny black wood paneling and white tiles and long white tables and spongy stools. Little screens that play Finding Nemo’ (an unfortunate addiction to Pixar, the Incredibles were playing when we frequented — I would have loved to have seen Splash or Moby Dick just for some irony). McDonald hated the fish, poor thing didn’t get his favorite snapper but had to suffer the tarakihi, ‘tasteless, and the beer batter soggy rather than crisp’. However, he loved the chips, ‘superb: golden straight and long and thick as the ones in childhood’.

So I went to Salt. And I got some fish-n-chips. I got McDonald’s snapper. And I ordered the chips because he said they were ‘superb’. I was expecting fresh-cut. I also ordered chowder because it was there and I love chowder. The fish was great. Crispy, thick slab of golden fried fish garnished with a sprinkle of rough sea salt safely housed in its own kicky little white box. The chips were delivered in a brown paper bag exactly as Martha would have wanted it. And they were long and straight and golden and thick and once were frozen. As such, they don’t have flavour, they taste like cardboard and they are all identical. Don’t get me started on having to pay for the Watties sauce to dip them into give them some taste, noxious as it was. This is what McDonald equivocates to his childhood? Some things you should give up to a childish lack of appreciation. My brother ate everything with mayonnaise as a child — from Chinese food to fried chicken — he doesn’t miss the habit.

I loved the chowder.

Fish-n-chips are as traditional a meal as it can get, no matter what we try to do to it, no matter how much we gussy it up, fish-n-chips is a slice of white fish deep fried with deep fried ‘chipped’ potatoes. Fresh, never frozen, chipped potatoes. It is fish-n-chips, not fish-then-chips. These two are a pair and demand equal respect. Just because chips lost the coin toss and, thus, first billing, doesn’t mean that it is the support group to the fish, Paul to his John, Sonny to his Cher. Treat your chips as you would your fish. That’s being honestly gourmet. That’s what turns the meal into something special and makes it worth the treat. Just like grandpa used to eat.

Hey Time Out, we need to talk

Reviewing reviewers is getting big. Check this out. Or, you know, Time out, you know where to find me.