eats goes on the road

Warsaw Krakow L’viv Kyiv

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For reasons that will become clear, I have the opportunity to hit the road – or rather rails – in Eastern Europe. Never been. Never dreamed of it, but here it comes.

We – that would be Carol, son Brian and I – need to be in Kyiv, Ukraine on October 10th. That’s 10.10.10 for you numerology folks. Brian and I were thinking about the trip a few weeks back, standing by my big National Geographic Atlas in our front hall. Brian has been. He traced a route from Kiev to L’viv, the first capitol of Ukraine, on to Krakow, Poland and described the cities as being beautiful and steeping with history. Good enough for me… I know nothing.

As the time neared and dates were considered, we reversed the trip:

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Fly to Warsaw, which is remarkably easy from San Francisco (remarkably long, as well). Take the train to Krakow, stay a few days; train to L’viv for a couple days and on to Kyiv. Sounds like a plan.

Needless to say, I’ll be eating and drinking and writing and taking pictures, so sometime in late October something good – or at least interesting – will appear on eats. In the meantime, I’m limited to rather pedestrian electronic and communication equipment and will be out of touch, as they say. Although son Brian tells me I can email from Carol’s iPad where we find wifi.

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Looed Chicken

… and a swell macaroni salad
… and a vibrant rice salad for good measure.

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Back in the day, Looing Sauce was a staple in our household. It is a soy sauce based liquid used for poaching meat, primarily chicken, never fish. We glommed onto it back when Jeff Smith’s The Frugal Gourmet Cooks Three Ancient Cuisines: China – Greece – Rome was brand new, 1990. I was a big fan of his TVw_the-Frug show and bought the book when I was home on R and R from Jerusalem. I kept jars of Looing Sauce in the refrigerator and used it – at least – once a week. I transcribed it and included it as an early entry in my developing eats4one cookbook.

Years passed and it kind of got lost in the shuffle when we moved to San Francisco in 1992.

Recently, I bought a small half chicken – just 1.8 pounds – at the Mountain Ranch stand at the Saturday Market.

What to do with it? Hey, we haven’t had Looed Chicken for a while. I couldn’t find it in my computer recipe files. I still have the book, of course, but its gotta be somewhere on the computer. I went into the archives and found it in the original eats4one and made a copy for my active files.

I had to go out and find star anise. I still had some broken pieces in my spice cupboard, but its gotta be 20 years old. How else does one use star anise? So I whipped up a batch, and poached my little chicken.

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OK, it ain’t pretty, but it sure tastes good and looks way better on the plate.

I served it over rice with a side of Romano beans and tomatoes. Oh my… it was nice and moist and flavorful.; better than I remembered. Way to go Frug.

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Even with that little bitty chicken, we had enough bits and pieces of meat left over to make a swell macaroni salad. When I did this year’s Super Bowl Party I fashioned a macaroni salad with ham, based on a Cooks Country recipe for BBQ Macaroni Salad. They add BBQ sauce to the mayonnaise and it was pretty good. In my version using Looed Chicken, I substituted Looing Sauce for the BBQ sauce. Continue reading

Scallops

Scallops with Pimento Relish and Red Bell Pepper Oil

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This was a quick dinner, but oh so good. It came down to about 90% inspiration and 10% perspiration. I like that ratio.

The Inspiration (90%)
1 – Shopping at the Saturday Market, I couldn’t resist the lovely scallops at the Shogun Fish Company stand. You can’t beat fresh sea scallops… as for supermarket scallops, just fuggedaboutit.

2 – Tom Colicchio’s Think Like a Chef, Clarkson Potter, 2000 (before he was all over TV) and Jacques Pepin’s Fast Food My Way, Houghton Mifflin, 2004. Both of these books are about technique and simplicity in cooking; ones to which I refer often.

We didn’t do any cooking on the weekend as we paid a visit to the Carneros wine country. We had a late lunch at the Boon Fly Café on Sunday, so we ate ad hoc from the fridge that evening.

Boon Fly Cafe, Carneros

Boon Fly Cafe, Carneros

Monday, we were ready for those scallops.

The Perspiration (10%)
Sear the scallops and place on a warm plate in a pool of Red Bell Pepper Oil, served with two slices Acme green onion slab fried in butter and olive oil, one topped with Pimiento Relish. Damn fine meal.

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To do: Continue reading

The magic of caul fat

Lamb Crepinettes, potato salad, haricot vert
K-Paul Meatloaf, melted potatoes, broccoli

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I volunteer at the CUESA Kitchen two Thursday evenings a month (more or less) to help with cooking classes. We prep food for the students, wash dishes and set up and break down equipment and furnishings. The most recent class was “Sausage Making” taught by Dave “the Butcher” Budworth.

On my way to the class I had visions of meat grinders and sausage casings arrayed around the rolling stainless steel pods used as counters. There was none of that. There were mounds of herbs ready to be chopped and spices ready to be portioned, boxes of ground pork, ground lamb and caul fat. The class would not be making sausages in casings as I had envisioned, but crepinettes.

I’m familiar with the word because Fatted Calf sells crepinettes at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, but I had never seen nor eaten a crepinette. That evening I learned how to make a crepinette and Saturday, dined on my own homemade crepinettes.

sage to pick and chop

sage to pick and chop

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Sage was only one of many ingredients that went into the sausage. We also picked and minced fresh thyme leaves and parsley, and minced long green Anaheim chilies and garlic.

mise en place

mise en place

Each pod was set up with a tray of sausage making supplies. Ten students worked at each station.
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Dave holds a piece of caul fat

Dave holds a piece of caul fat

Caul fat is the spider web of fatty membrane that encases the internal organs of pigs, cows, and sheep, and it can be used in a variety of meat-friendly ways. Chef Vuong Loc of Portage Restaurant in Seattle calls it “kind-of like the original combi oven, because it allows the meat to roast and steam at once. It can get to a super hot temp because it’s fat, but it also keeps the moisture locked inside. It gives the meat a unique texture and adds flavor.” Continue reading