Matters of Taste

Chocololate-Covered WHAT?

Latest entry in the "You Have GOT to be Kidding" category:

Red Fire Chocolate Tortilla Chips from Vosges of Chicago. To be exact, "Crunchy organic corn tortilla chips covered with deep milk chocolate and sprinkled with ancho and chipotle chillies."

I've written about Vosges chocolates in the past; I like their signature Naga truffle which is made of    
milk chocolate, sweet Indian curry and coconut.

But the new tortilla chips are an idea that never should have been thought. They're gross.

I know that's not a terribly sophisticated or professional or descriptive term. But, trust me, it's apt.

The chips are thick and dry. The chocolate, which is actually very good if you pick it off, is unevenly layered on, making the creation taste coarse and stale.  And the aroma when you first open the bag is musty and unpleasant.

They're packaged in a sexy cardboard cylinder, all purple and red and artsy. But inside is a homely plastic bag and a messy jumble of chips.

I paid $20.99 for a six-ounce package at Whole Foods. TWENTY BUCKS for something that you couldn't pay me to ever eat again.

A Rhone To Moan Over

When it comes to red wines, I’ve never been a particular fan of the “Rhone Rangers,” the American winemakers (and drinkers) fixated on the Grenache-Syrah-Mourvedre blends that France’s Rhone Valley made famous.                                                                        

But after last night…I’m a convert.

The current object of my affections is Rolf Binder “Heinrich,” a 45% Shiraz, 35% Grenache, 20% Mataro blend from the Barossa Valley in Australia. It’s insanely fragrant, with a rich, in-your-nose jamminess that jumps out of the bottle the instant it’s opened. The color is jewel-like purple/red, the flavor is unabashed fruit, fresh-from-a-sunny-vineyard fruit, satisfying fruit.

Sure, there’s some oak. Some spice.  Some tannins. And the presence of a certain herbal quality thanks to the Mataro (also known as Mourvedre). So I guess you can call it balanced if you’re inclined to throw such words around.

Personally, I’d call it delicious and let it go at that.

The Heinrich is one of about 10 wines that the company makes. Heinrich is the name of the father of the current winemakers. The winery’s other offerings have names like Hubris, Heysen, Hovah and Hanische (a Shiraz that Robert Parker rated "Extraordinary"). All start with the letter “h.” The Rolf Binder Web site is interesting -- slightly funky, very family-oriented, quite informative.

I found the 2004 Heinrich at Costco a week ago. It costs somewhere in the $20 neighborhood. I found a couple other Rolf Binder wines on-line at Berkeley Wine and Wine Chateau. But neither site currently stocks the Heinrich.

I drank this lovely surprise with homemade salmon burgers, patted together using fresh wild Alaskan salmon, chopped scallions (the green part as well as the white), a bit of minced jalapeno (both red and green varieties), tons of chopped cilantro, some chopped Oso Sweet onion, salt and pepper.                                                       

Now, chopping up a piece of gorgeous wild Alaskan salmon may seem like a crazy extravagance, but, #1, my family got hooked on super-fresh fish burgers at Twisted Fish in Juneau, Alaska and figures all fish burgers have to be that good; and #2, the salmon tastes just as great when it’s in loosely-patted-together burger form and cooked on a hot indoor-grill.    

I'm quite sure that Rolf Binder isn't the only jammilicious Rhone-style wine out there. If you have one you’re partial to, I’d like to hear about it.

Mad About Asparagus

It’s pretty amazing what pops out of Mother Earth when she starts to wake up in springtime each year. We’re talking peas, baby garlic, artichokes, fiddlehead ferns, ramps, and rhubarb. But mostly, we’re talking asparagus.   

Every restaurant in the country that fancies itself “market cuisine” or “contemporary cuisine” has a special asparagus dish on the menu right now.

In San Diego, savvy diners at Jayne’s Gastropub will make a meal of her sautéed spears topped with a sunny-side-up egg and shaved parmesan.  At George’s California Modern in La Jolla, chef Trey Foshee gilds the lily by crowning a “raft” of asparagus (held together with strips of prosciutto) with a “crispy” poached egg.    Loosely translated (and quickly gobbled) that means a poached egg that is lightly dredged in flour, dipped in egg wash and thinly cloaked with panko crumbs, then fried. As sous chef Elizabeth Murray describes it, it’s “crispy outside with a nice goosh inside.”

Personally, I’d eat that egg if it were perched on a slab of linoleum.

But back to asparagus.

At 1500 Ocean in the Hotel Del Coronado, chef Brian Sinnott does a farro salad that combines that nutty flavored grain with asparagus, spring peas, roasted red pepper  and a citrus vinaigrette.

In Boston, Gordon Hamersley of Hamersley’s Bistro likes to toss the spears with chopped pancetta, shallots and lemon juice; roast them in the oven; then cover them with paper-thin slices of Asiago cheese and run them under the broiler. The recipe is in his "Bistro Cooking at Home" cookbook.

Mario Batali, of the New York-Las Vegas-Los Angeles restaurant empire, has been known to tuck blanched jumbo asparagus under a drizzle of sherry vinaigrette, then top the  picture-perfect spears with a poufy cloud of chilled zabaglione enriched with pecorino romano and freshly ground black pepper. In case you haven’t yet wallowed in a good zabaglione, it’s a cloud of whisked egg yolks, Marsala wine and heavy cream whipped to stiff peaks. The recipe is in "The Babbo Cookbook."

In Chicago, where springtime is greeted each year with sheer euphoria, asparagus of all sizes and colors show up on restaurant tables.  At MK, fettuccine pasta is interwoven with green “pencil” asparagus that are first blanched, then sautéed with butter, lemon zest, parmesan cheese and fines herbes.

Simple vinagrettes work wonders. The spears on the left are shiny with a mustard and soy sauce dressing. The recipe is from a Mark Bittman article in The New York Times.

What’s your favorite way to celebrate the spring asparagus season? Recipes or restaurant fare...I’d like to hear.

Sugar High

Coffee and coffee-flavored foods continue to be the rage this spring...and I'm a sucker for both.

This week, I tried the new Coffee Caramel Milkshake from Chick-Fil-A. The chain brags that its shakes are Hand-Spun, which to me conjures up an image of a soda jerk scooping ice cream, pouring milk and letting an old-fashioned Hamilton do the rest.    

In fact, the Chick-Fil-A employee does put a couple of liquid mixes into a shaker and holds it under a whirling wand for a few seconds. But it seems to me that most of the "spinning" going on is by the PR agencies hyping this shake. ("Only 97 Days Left" warns the Web site about the "Limited Time" offer.)

So how does it taste? Well, like a generic milkshake, I guess. Sweet and milky but with minimal coffee flavor and even less caramel flavor. The overriding taste is sweet....sweet enough to make your teeth hurt.

And no wonder. There are ONE HUNDRED TWENTY SEVEN grams of sugar in the 17-ounce shake.  At 5 grams of sugar per teaspoon, that's 25 shocking teaspoons of sugar. The calorie and fat stats are pretty shocking too: 810 calories  and 27 grams of fat per shake. To put that into context, 27 grams of fat represents 80 percent of the daily fat intake recommended for an average adult.

The Web site also gives a list of ingredients which starts with "Icedream," a trademarked concoction of milk, sugar, cream, corn syrup...and goes on to include artificial flavorings, dried eggs, high fructose corn syrup, gums, sodium benzoate, blah and blah. I stopped counting at 28 ingredients.

My mother and I shared one shake. We also shared a real bad case of the "shakes" a couple hours later, when our fantastically elevated blood sugar levels finally tanked.   

The Missing Matzo

"Where's the matzo?" is the traditional question at every Seder table. But this year, the unleavened flat cracker bread has done quite the disappearing act, according to today's New York Times story about a shortage caused by everything from glitchy new ovens at Manischewitz to Trader Joe's decision not to carry the Passover product this year.

But a far more important question for me is "Where's the almond macaroon?" 

Every year I stock up on packages of this simple but hard-to-find treat during Passover, when most supermarkets amp up their selections of kosher products. Sure, you can buy the flourless cookies-- typically made with almond paste, egg whites and sugar -- the rest of the year, fresh, from local bakeries. But the packaged brands are a lot cheaper. Moreover, since I don't use the cookies 'til they start to dry out and get stale, the packaged variety more than fits the bill.

This year I haven't found a single box of the golden cookies, though I've made forays into a half-dozen supermarkets. I'll keep looking though. And you would too, if you knew how insanely good this Pear Gratin dessert is.

PEAR GRATIN

4 ripe pears (any variety...whatever smells best at the market)
1/2 cup apricot preserves, pushed through a small plastic strainer
1/4 cup dry white wine
3/4 cup coarsely chopped almond macaroons (if moist, let them dry out for a day or two before using)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, plus a bit to grease baking dish

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
In a small bowl, whisk together the sieved apricot preserves with the white wine.
Peel, core and slice pears into thin slices.
In a food processor, chop the macaroons with a pulsing motion so they don't turn into dust.
Lightly butter a glass baking dish just large enough to hold the pears. Arrange pears in dish in overlapping rows or circles.
Pour apricot-wine mixture over pears. Scatter chopped macaroon bits. Dot with pea-sized pieces of butter.
Bake for about 25 minutes or until top is bubbly and starting to brown.

Serves 4. This is a casual recipe (meaning exact measurements are not important). Feel free to add or subtract according to taste. If you cannot find the packaged kosher macaroons in the next few days, you can always use the little Italian biscuits called  amaretti (though I find that they don't produce as desirable a crumble in the food processor).

I'll be sharing this recipe when I teach a cooking class at Great News! Cooking School in Pacific Beach  in August. The class menu includes my favorite recipes from 25-plus years as Food Editor and Restaurant Critic at The San Diego Union-Tribune.

Green Ivy

It’s called the “23-pound mug.” But every day, thousands of Harvard University students dash around the campus sipping coffee, tea and soy lattes from it.             

So, what’s the gimmick?

This re-usable plastic mug is the latest gear-shift in Harvard’s drive to become a greener, more sustainable campus. The 23 pounds represents the pounds of paper waste that is saved in one year by one person using the mug instead of paper coffee cups, one cup each day, Monday through Friday.

Twenty-three pounds of garbage saved just by switching to a re-usable mug!

I was doubly horrified when I considered that I could be saving 46 pounds of landfill trash because I ask for a double-cup at Starbucks, etc. (I can’t always count on my surgically-repaired thumb to hold on to flimsy paper cups. However,  I do re-use the clean cups at home.)

The attention-getting 23-pound mug is just one of the strategies developed by Harvard this past year to promote an environment-friendly lifestyle on campus and throughout the community. (Universities across the country are now making an eco-friendly environment their top priority.)

Last week I attended the annual meeting of an Advisory Council that reports directly to Harvard University Dining Services. The Council – a group of chefs, restaurateurs, cookbook authors, journalists, parents and dining service directors from other U.S. universities – toured the school’s dining facilities and retail outlets, sampled all the food offered in various sites, interviewed students, faculty and staff members and prepared a report that combined praise for a job well done with recommendations for future improvements.

I came away with plenty of food for thought.

#1. Plastic water bottles remain one of the biggest pollutants of the earth. At Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, student organizers (of seminars, parties, etc.) are not allowed to spend school funds on plastic bottles of water.  At Sebastian’s Café in the Harvard School of Public Health, plans are underway to phase out bottled water completely, providing taps of filtered water for students to fill cups and re-usable bottles. Paul Riccardi, Dean for Administration and Operations for the school admits that bottled water is a “big money maker” for the café.  “But we can’t talk out of both sides of our mouth,” he adds. “We say we’re all about public health…then we’ve got to deal with plastic bottles of water which are one of the biggest pollutants.”  The café is also testing a machine that dispenses sparkling water, both plain and flavored, which will take bottled sparkling water out of the deli cases as well.
(With these initiatives, the school is following the lead of such cities as San Francisco, Santa Barbara and L.A.  which have cut off the flow of city money to buy bottled water.  Others, including Chicago and Salt Lake City are considering a similar course of action.)

  Now, we all know that re-usable bottles such as Nalgene have their detractors. Recent studies have warned that some polycarbonate plastics may leach Bispherol A (BPA), a hormone-disrupting chemical. The National Geographic’s “Green Guide” recommends using safer alternatives such as bottles made with high-density polyethylene (HDPE) or, better yet, stainless steel bottles that are lightweight, durable and chemical free. (The Nalgene company’s Web site  says it is phasing out production of polycarbonate containers that include BPA.)

No one said it was an easy issue. But, clearly, it’s time for all of us to come up with some personally acceptable alternative to one-use plastic bottles.

2. Substituting compostable plates, utensils and to-go “shells” for regular paper and plastic is NOT a long-term solution. (Harvard joins several other universities in the area in composting food and other waste and delivering it to farms outside the city for use in the fields.)  For starters, the flimsy compostable forks and knives are ineffective against even a tender piece of chicken. Moreover, most compostable items cost 10-12 percent more than regular paper/plastic products (a cost that is passed along to the student/diner); and few homes/restaurants are equipped to maintain a compost heap.  Most importantly, at the end of the day you’re still faced with Mount Trashmore…just one that decomposes somewhat faster than the traditional one.

3. Throw-away latex gloves are said to take 200 years or more to degrade in a landfill. I’ve seen a sandwich maker go through two or three pair just to turn out one crummy little chicken club six-incher. There’s got to be a better way.

4. Other steps being taken by Harvard to “green” up their act include:
    * Using digital displays at cafeteria entrances to communicate information rather than using paper “flyers” and table signage.
    * Buying meats, produce and dairy products from local producers. (The university is in its third year of sponsoring a weekly Farmers Market, for students and Cambridge residents alike, next to the famed Harvard Yard.)
    * Using student volunteers and videos at trash stations to encourage efficient re-cycling.

You don't need a college degree to get the message: Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. Rethink.

Fighting Hunger....In More Ways Than One

Caviar tacos with horseradish and crème fraiche? Spring garlic soup with crunchy fresh peas and poached prawns?

It doesn’t get much yummier than San Diego’s Taste of the Nation event held this week at JBar atop the Hotel Solamar in the Gaslamp Quarter. Organized by Share Our Strength (SOS), Taste of the Nation is the largest coordinated culinary benefit in the county. Every spring, thousands of the nation's top chefs donate their time, talent and cuisine at some 60 events, with the goal of raising money for the fight against childhood hunger in America.

In San Diego, guests paid $95 to sample the fare at more than a dozen mini kitchens where restaurants such as Anthology, Stingaree and Mistral Loews Coronado Bay Resort strutted their stuff.

Damon Gordon, chef at Quarter Kitchen in the Ivy Hotel wowed guests with the Caviar Tacos that have garnered him attention from the national press.  The whimsical take on a traditional taco involves a crisp potato “shell,” Tsar Nicoulai domestic sturgeon caviar, a sauce of fresh horseradish, heavy cream and crème fraiche, grated hard boiled egg, red onion and chives.

And chef William Bradley of Addison in The Grand Del Mar, prepared an ethereal Spring Garlic Soup that blew me away.  Spring garlic, also called baby garlic, young garlic or green garlic, has a delicate, clean, sweet flavor and can be used raw in many dishes. It has a very short growing season.

For his super soup, Bradley used both spring garlic and regular garlic, along with plenty of shallots and not a little heavy cream. He tucked a piece of olive oil-poached prawn in the bottom of each cup and floated a few quickly blanched English peas in the picture-perfect puree.

SPRING GARLIC SOUP
Chef William Bradley, Addison Restaurant

(Serves 4)

Ingredients:
6 cups spring garlic, peeled and chopped
2 cups shallots, peeled and chopped
1 bouquet of thyme
1 cup garlic, peeled and chopped
4 tablespoons salted French butter
Fleur de sel to taste
6 cups chicken stock
3 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar

Method for Soup:
Combine spring garlic, shallots, thyme, garlic and butter to a heavy-duty saucepot. Sauté over low heat for 5 minutes, stirring frequently.  Season with a fair amount of sea salt. Add chicken stock and let simmer for 5 minutes. Add heavy cream. Bring mixture to a simmer and cook an additional 3 minutes. Remove from stove and remove thyme from saucepot. Cover the saucepot and let the mixture steep for an additional 5 minutes. Place mixture in a blender and purée until smooth soup consistency. Then add 2 tablespoons sherry vinegar.

Ladle soup into four individual soup bowls and serve.

Upcoming Taste of the Nation events include a “strolling buffet” in Los Angeles on June 1st ($115 per person) and a cocktail party at the Las Vegas Hard Rock Hotel on June 4th ($75 per person). For information and tickets, see the SOS Web site.

Parmesan in the Pantry

Recently the blog Epicuriocity.com took me to task for leaving two critical ingredients off the list of foods I bought to stock the kitchen in my son's new condo. (See Pantry Stocking post.)

It was a forehead-slapping moment for me.

How the heck could we have forgotten Parmesan cheese, that culinary wonder that's essential to risotto and pasta dishes and can dress up frozen pizza, canned soup,  simple salads, steamed veggies and take-out rice bowls. Heck, it's even the go-to item for getting a finicky dog to eat his dinner.

Epicuriocity also tsk-tsk-ed the lack of Plugra butter in the condo's fridge. Again, I plead nolo contendere. I keep a block of Plugra in my own refrigerator (and another in the freezer for emergencies) and though I try to use it sparingly, I would never saute vegetables or scramble an egg without it.

The difference between Plugra and regular butter is summed up on the Plugra Web site: Regular butter contains 80% butterfat. The remaining 20% consists of water and milk solids. Plugrá European Style Butter contains 2% more butterfat and is slow-churned in a way that creates a lower-moisture, creamier texture than other butters.

I also agree with Epicuriocity  that a fancy-schmancy finishing salt is a critical staple.  Kosher salt is important for adding while foods are cooking. A finishing salt, used sparingly just before serving, adds depth of flavor and a desirable texture to the final product.   

However, whereas light and lacy Maldon sea salt is the choice of Epicuriocity, I prefer Anglesey sea salt from an island off the coast of  Wales. Its delicate flakes have a clean, bright flavor with no bitterness.It has a beautiful sheen and satisfying crunch. A bottle by Victoria Taylor Seasonings costs about $10 at Igourmet.com.

These and other finishing salts are described in my article "Seasoning from the sea" in the San Diego Union-Tribune

 

.

Reigning in Spain

I'd be hard pressed to tell you the last Spanish red wine I ordered in a restaurant or bought in a market. But that's about to change.

Last week I made the aquaintance of Los 800, a delicious red wine from the Priorat region of Spain. Supposedly Robert Parker and the Wine Spectator have proclaimed this area in northeastern Spain to be one of the world's up-and-coming wine growing regions, but I never got the memo.   

What I did get was a noseful of some of the loveliest fruit ever to find its way into a glass. Ripe fruit, especially blackberries, with a hint of violets and dried herbs thrown in for good measure. The wine is a blend of 50 percent grenache (called garnacha in Spain), carignan, cabernet sauvignon and syrah, which puts it in the same ballpark as France's Chateauneuf du Pape. 

My first sip was another "Oh, wow" moment.  Rich, elegant, lively fruit flavors balanced with what some folks call "rocks" (meaning, I presume, a certain balancing minerality). I was eating pork-and-veal meatballs with sauteed greens at Rendezvous at Central Square in Cambridge, Mass. (more on that in a future post) and the wine was a magic-making partner.

Priorat is an area of steeply terraced vineyards and picturesque medieval hamlets. Los 800 gets its name from the altitude of this family-owned vineyard, 800 meters or about 2600 feet. Up until fairly recently the region was known for rough and overly alcoholic wines. In other words, plonk. But new winemakers, new techniques and renewed commitment have resulted in top-notch wines that frequently reach cult status.  A 2005 article by Eric Asimov in The New York Times detailed the region's comeback.

A survey of Priorat wines available on-line turns up plenty in the $60 to $80 range. Which means that Los 800, at about $16 a bottle, is but a delicious introduction to the glories of Priorat.

Compliments for Fish Tacos

Recently, I was a guest on SignOnRadio.com’s Gourmet Club with hosts Ron James and Robert Whitley. During the broadcast they asked me what I thought was the best fish taco in San Diego. I had a ready answer: Beaumont’s in La Jolla’s Bird Rock neighborhood.

Fish tacos have become the signature food of San Diego -- much as deep-dish pizza and Nathan’s franks are icons of Chicago and New York – thanks to a guy named Ralph Rubio who discovered the taste treat in San Felipe, Baja California while on college spring break in the early ‘80s.

In 1983, Rubio opened his first fish taco shop in San Diego, peddling the tacos of San Felipe on Mission Bay Drive. The traditional creation begins with a small, warm corn tortilla. The fish is white-fleshed and rather neutral tasting (such as cod or pollock). It’s beer-battered, deep-fried and topped with a scattering of shredded cabbage, salsa fresca and a creamy, mayo-based dressing. A wedge of lime is on the side.      

Over the years, the lowly fish taco has gone upscale in San Diego and has slowly spread across the country. The fish is now as likely to be grilled as deep-fried. The salsa may feature fresh mango, peaches, avocado or tomatillos. And the low-brow mayo sauce of San Felipe has given way to sophisticated crème fraiche toppings gussied up with jalapeno, cilantro, Thai red chile paste or the ubiquitous chipotle chile.  (This photo is from food-and-travel site LosCabosRecipes.com.)

Last week I had dinner at Beaumont’s and marveled once again at the cleverness, freshness, tickly textures and downright delicious flavor of these tacos. There may be a place for “authentic” taquerias that revel in grease and funky beachside eateries that tout tacos made with deep-fried frozen fish. But I, for one, am awfully glad that institutions like Beaumont's have decided to take a good thing and make it better.

Beaumont’s takes fresh, local ingredients seriously. The “catch” changes daily; it might be mahi mahi, yellowtail, ono or seabass. It's simply grilled and served on wispy, paper-thin tortillas hot from the presses.  (They’re so thin that the folded package may start to fall apart when you pick it up. Solution: Eat faster.)

The accompanying salsa fresca is spunky and plentiful. The two-color shredded cabbage is crunchy. The black beans are slow-cooked and tender. The jasmine rice is seasoned with cilantro and fresh lime. And the plop of cilantro crème fraiche in the middle of the plate?  Sheer genius. (There's also some heavenly chile aioli on the side.)

It’s not often that San Diegans get to feel superior and smug about their local food specialties. Long live the fish taco.