The fruitfulness of words well wrought

You know what I'm discovering in my life of drive-by blogging? People don't remember how to write. They don't know how to make coherent sentences or paragraphs. It seems as if the insights into the beauty of the written word have all but disappeared into the digital void of self focused thoughts that fly through the ether or over the Ethernet to the Internet. The desire to say something is more pressing than the need to say something of value.

Sometimes I feel like I'm quickly becoming a cranky, old man. The one who stands on his porch yelling at kids for picking apples off of his tree. Did you ever notice the guys who did that never actually ate the apples? The heavy, ripe fruit would always fall off the tree to the ground. Flies would swirl around the broken brown flesh. The sour hint of vinegar hanging in the air. Wasted apples. Wasted frustration. Remember the anxiety soaked fear you felt as you tasted the forbidden fruit stolen from that cranky neighbor's yard on a hot summer's day? Your heart pounded as you tried to catch your breath from running. You hid yourself in the woods and you took in the waxy, dull reflection of the sunlight off the apple's surface. The color and the fragrance taunting your senses. The green, taught skin snapping as you bit into it. Tangy sweet juice running down your chin. You were the victor in the battle against the tyranny of evil men who held something that they could not truly posses. In fact, they held only the illusion of control as they sat, small and withered on their porch. Feeling empower as they scared children too small and too fearful to question the frayed thread of authority that the old men felt they had.

So what's the point of this ramble? It's simple. Even if you don't have anything important to say, say it with style. Words are far too lovely to let them go to waste. Apples feed the body, but words enrich the mind. And, if used well, feed the soul.

Chocolate is a cruel mistress

I had a job during high school in my family’s business in a rural town in Western North Carolina. Every couple of months, our family would make a trip to Ashville, North Carolina. We’d shop at the mall there. The highlight of the trip would be visiting the Belk-Legget department store because they carried Godiva Chocolates at their candy counter. I would purchase a 1 pound box. After offering a piece of candy to the rest of my family, I would consume the rest of the box on the drive home. Each piece was savored- the flavors exploding in my mouth. Within 30 minutes all that was left was the smell of the chocolate in the gold foil wrapped box.

Today, I still enjoy chocolate, but now it’s in a way that most people find, well, weird. Before I crossed the line from consuming it to working with the devilish compound, I reveled in the stuff. Every detail. The complex volatile compounds that give it its flavor profile in your nose as well as on your taste buds. The thick, rich liquid it becomes as the enzymes in your mouth, coupled with your body’s own warmth turn the solid mass into a velvety coating that slides down your throat. All of these sensual elements made chocolate my drug of choice.

Today, I actually enjoy the smell of chocolate more than tasting it. The fragrance to me is the purest sensory receptacle of the essence of chocolate. Not the mouth. To eat it is overwhelming, like drowning in flavor.

No, for me chocolate has become a challenge because of its structural complexity and its love hate relationship with temperature. In fact I see it in much the same way a carpenter sees a plank of wood. Or more accurately, as a gem cutter sees a piece of quartz, because chocolate is at its heart a crystalline structure of sugar, cocoa and cocoa butter. But because the crystals are less than 30 microns in diameter, we perceive the structure as a smooth, not gritty. Fudge, nougat and fondant are all crystalline based structures.

There is a delicate balance in taking chocolate, and reshaping it into another state. It’s called tempering. Every time you bite into a chocolate, be it Voges, Godiva or from the map on the interior of the Whitman’s Chocolate box, you have experienced chocolate that has been tempered. Chocolate that is “in temper” will have a high, glossy sheen, a distinct snap and a velvety mouth feel. Despite what you’ve heard or read, wax isn’t added to the chocolate to make it shine. It’s time, temperature and skill.

Essentially, you tear down the crystalline structure of the cocoa fats with heat when you melt it. This redistributes the fat crystals, sugars, milk porteins and the cocoa solids. You then cool it to stabilize and distribute the components, then reheat before the structure reforms. While it is in a liquid state, you shape the chocolate and then let cool so that the structure can reform once the fats in the cocoa butter have evenly distributed within the structure. Believe it or not, that’s the simple explanation.

The basic premise of tempering is something like this:

1. Elevate the temperature of the chocolate above it’s melting point, but below it’s scorching point. That’s about a 9 degree temperature window. Also bear in mind that each type of chocolate [dark, milk, white] has a different melting point. In some cases, individual brands of chocolate will have their own unique melting point. Get it too hot, and the chocolate will seize. That’s where the cocoa solids will separate from the cocoa butter, creating a lumpy mess. A few degrees warmer and you’ll be smelling burnt chocolate.
   
   
2. Next, drop the temperature 30-40 degrees, depending on the type of chocolate, below the melting point to its cooling point. Regardless of the type of chocolate, the temperature window at the bottom end is only 2 degrees. For milk chocolate it’s between 80-82 degrees Fahrenheit. 2 frickin’ degrees! If it gets 1 degree cooler it will start to “set” and you’ll have to start all over again.
   
   As the temperature starts to bottom out, you start heating it again to a workable temperature where the sugars, cocoa solids and cocoa butter are evenly distributed, but the structure is still largely unstable, but the thickening of the chocolate will indicate that crystals are starting to form.
   
   
3. At this point, you must raise the temperature back up to 88-90 degrees. The mass will be liquid, but “seed” crystals will be present. At this point, in order to keep the chocolate both in temper and stable, you must keep the chocolate in the 2 degree range for as long as you need to keep working with the chocolate. A few degrees higher and your fat crystals will destabilize and you will have to start over. A few degrees lower and your fat crystals will start to form uneven crystalline structures and you will have to start over.
   
   

That’s just the chocolate part. Other factors can destroy chocolate’s delicate balance. The temperature of the room should be between 70-75 degrees. Humidity can also wreak havoc on your chocolate too.

That said, I have been working with chocolate now for about 6 or 7 years. I’ve never achieved “perfect temper”. I stand in chocolate stores in awe of the shiny jewels behind the glass. Each one a delicate balance of perfection of heat, fat crystals and skill.

So, now as the temperatures outside start to cool and the relative humidity starts to drop, I will once again head into the kitchen. This time I am armed with an infrared thermometer to carefully watch the ballet of the heating and cooling of the chocolate. The National Weather Service will help me monitor the humidity. The battle of will against the physics of microscopic particles that in a flash of patience and skilled mastery create a bit of magic that vanishes into a perceptual realm of ecstasy.

Sure, there are chocolate tempering machines that do all of the aforementioned steps with mathematical precision. At the end of the cycle, the chocolate can be held in a perfect state of temper as long as there is a power supply. It would be a $700 investment and a fast track to achieving predictable perfection. Maybe one day I will take that step. But until then, learning the ways of my cruel mistress will be far more valuable. And if I succeed, in many ways, it will be infinitely more rewarding.

Southern Cooking: Lost in the Translation

For years, when I lived down South, I would hear transplants from “the North” bemoan the South and its food. I admit a bit of my Southern pride would be wounded. I’d go to the same grocery stores they did, eat at the same establishments, and wonder what they meant. I didn’t fully understand their frustration, until I moved to upstate New York. I discovered the frustration cuts both ways.

The grocery store frustration makes sense now. When I first walked into a local chain here, I was literally overwhelmed at the choices I was presented. Fresh crème fraîche. Meats and cheeses I’d only read about. Varieties of vegetables that were both familiar and foreign were available to be explored. Funny thing is that I have friends who moved here from Los Angeles. They found the selection underwhelming. If that’s the case, then down south, they’d find themselves damn near suicidal.

I didn’t realize how quickly I had adapted, until recently. While my wife and I were on vacation on the coast of North Carolina, I made a trip to a grocery store chain there. When I asked if they had arugula, the clerk wanted to know what it was. I found myself becoming a bemoaning “Yankee”. Crap.

Another thing I have discovered are the specialty stores. In our town it’s the Italian Grocery and Deli, Roma’s, that makes me understand a little further the passion of Italian food. I’ve stood and looked at no less than 30 varieties of Balsamic vinegar. Don’t get me started about the olive oil selection. While this store is relatively small, I could spend an entire afternoon there reading the ingredient lists, and smelling dried spices and cheeses. The grocery itself is only half the story.

I never understood the concept of the deli. I mean, I’d been to Subway, right? It wasn’t until I stopped into the Italian grocers and I was starving. It was the perfect moment to be introduced to mortadella.

It was 3:00 in the afternoon and I hadn’t eaten. I walked up to the counter. I was bombarded with an overwhelming selection of meats and sandwiches, but the name of mortadella was summoning me. When I tried to order, the man behind the counter became frustrated. I didn’t really know how to do this I explained. “I’m from the South and don’t know how to order this.” The man’s whole demeanor changed. He happily walked me through the process making recommendations and suggestions. My result: “I’ll have a large mortadella on a hogie roll. Lettuce, tomato, oil and vinegar-olives on the side to go”. I’ve discovered that the “to go” part is crucial. The ingredients need time to fuse and meld together to make the flavor a cohesive whole. But that’s a sidebar to the main feature.

Mortadella, I speak the name in hushed tones, like a lover summoning the focus of his passion. There is some confusion with this sacred meat mixture and American Bologna. True, they are made by a similar process: chunks of pork and fat are puréed to the consistency of mayonnaise at about 60 degrees, put into a casing and cooked. Mortadella takes this a step further by incorporating extra chunks of fat. Sometime pistachios are added. In Spanish varieties olives or peppers are incorporated. But, if you order Mortadella, by law in the European Union, it must be manufactured in the Bologna region of Italy in order to be allowed to carry the name. But, I digress.

The point is, the chances would have been pretty slim of me ever finding this in the deep South. Bologna is a poor substitute. Yet, many are willing to accept it. But if you look closely, each region in Italy has a subtle variation (7 that I could find), yet here, Oscar-Meyer produces a “meat product” and calls it Bologna, in essence taking away its original meaning and value. The same thing happens in transplanted cuisines in the US. Specifically “Southern Cooking” when it crosses the Mason-Dixon line.

Here in Saratoga Springs, NY, there are two noted restaurants among locals. Not to disparage local eateries, I’ll keep them nameless. One serves barbeque, the other serves “Southern Food”. Neither succeeds. That may seem a harsh criticism, but from someone raised on both types of food-each is a poor substitute. What I have discovered is that unless you know the difference, then it might seem pretty good. Unfortunately, I do know the difference.

To understand this, first you have to understand that southern cooking is derived from a confluence of influences.

The traditional southern dishes reflect the history and past economics of the region. Although the South was once noted for its large cotton plantations, even at that time most rural Southerners were subsistence farmers, and were quite isolated from the rest of the world. These people were most numerous in the Southern Appalachian region, and their ancestral origins were mostly Scotch, Irish, English, Germanic, and to a lesser extent, French or Dutch. They made do with what they could grow, and what they could find in nature. For example, the extensive use of corn meal probably resulted from the fact that wheat was little grown in the South. Native Americans (Indians) were major contributors to the diet of the South. From them, poor southerners learned how to use many wild or cultivated plants and game. In addition, the early African-Americans introduced several of the plants, such as black-eyed peas, okra, sweet sorghum, and watermelons, from which many prized southern dishes are derived. In many affluent households, they were the family cook, and as such, they molded and modified the taste preferences of those they served. There is little doubt that the creative use of food by American Indians, subsistence farmers, and the African-Americans were the major influences on the nature of Southern cooking, and there is historical evidence to indicate that these groups learned from each other.

There are many sub-regions where the type of cooking was influenced by local factors. One important region, as we have pointed out, was the Appalachian region that was populated mostly by subsistence farmers. The cooking of some coastal areas were influenced by their early settlement by the Spanish or French. The well known cuisine of southern Louisiana was mostly influenced by the "Cajuns", who were immigrants from Canada and of French origin.

William J. Gray

On Southern Cooking

http://bama.ua.edu/~bgray/recipes.htm

Groovy. Now let’s take the anthropological implications a step further. Each of these distinct cultures began to merge and meld through food. Variations began to be handed down through subsequent generations. Techniques evolved and were passed along to the next crop of burgeoning cooks. Even cooking utensils were passed along. My wife proudly posses her late grandmother’s cast iron skillet. The years of carbon and curing on that mass of iron can sear a steak better than anything you can buy in the store today.

No, what I think sets most southern cooking apart is that it is generational. Subtle details that can’t be quantified. To this day, my grandmother can’t tell me how she makes her biscuits. She’ll show me how she makes them as her mother showed her. And her mother before and so on. She’ll tell me what to look for and how the dough should feel. A handful of this, some milk, some lard… it has become instinctive.

Now add to that the availability of local ingredients in the south. Martha White, White Lilly and Yelton’s Best are only three brands of many varieties of flour and cornmeal available to cooks in the south. Like the Italian Grocer and their varieties of balsamic vinegar and olive oil, there is a wealth of subtle choices that people are passionate about. Generations will stand loyal to “their brand” of flour, cornmeal or lard. These passions fueled kitchens to produce food that is far more distinctive and complex than the failed attempts I tasted. When I went to a local northern grocery chain to look for cornmeal, my only choices were from a Quaker better know for his oatmeal. My choices were white and yellow cornmeal.

Let’s establish 3 well known rules in the south: tea is sweet, cornbread isn’t, and catfish that is farm raised isn’t fit to eat. Most northern restaurants fail these test. The local choices here are no exception. Sweet cornbread, unsweetened tea and mealy, farm-raised catfish are the norm, rather than the exception.

Another test they fail is with cornmeal. In my South, it is used in in a plethora of cooking: hush puppies, cornmeal fritters, cornmeal dumplings, corn pone-the list could be longer, but you get my drift. The point is cornmeal is not for breading-with the exception of some fish, and even then it is mixed with flour. Why does this matter? To start with, flour is softer and more readily absorbs and cooks in oil. Secondly, it has a better mouth feel. Third, spices are more easily integrated. And lastly, it just taste better.

Every dish I was presented at the local “Southern” restaurant that was fried was breaded in cornmeal. Tragically the okra was no exception. Understand that for years, I ate my grandmother’s and my mother’s okra that was dusted with flour and deep fried in a 4 generation’s old cast iron skillet. A dash of salt, a bit of pepper and an eye toward brownness, yielded morsels of culinary goodness that these poor Yankee’s will most likely never understand.

So why the rant? Because, left in the hands of someone unfamiliar with a culinary culture, the food will quickly drift into the realm of bad cliché. For instance, the “Southern-Style” restaurant here in town was originally opened in 1938 by an African-American woman who was born and raised in Louisiana-that really was Southern cooking. Further, the establishment was in the former poorer section of town. The food was plain, simple and cheap. Again, reflecting a food that is born out of hardship rather than dining whims of gourmands.

In recent years, the restaurant was purchased by a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America. And while the restaurant has earned rave reviews by everyone from Travel and Leisure to Bon Appetit, not one Southern news organization can be found heaping accolades on the establishment. And, I doubt that there ever will be.

I don’t begrudge the restaurant their success, I’d rather that they call the food what it is: Southern Fusion. Until then, the true taste of the south has been lost in the translation.

Don’t get me started on the barbecue joint.

A Prayer for the Dying

There is a point that one reaches in life where the reality of mortality comes face to face with the reality of living. Where the inevitable fate that awaits all of us runs pace with the requirements of living. Work, mopping, paying taxes-they all compete with the desire to experience life rather than maintaining it.

Recently I saw a commercial for an anti-aging cream. The promise that the collagens encapsulated within the unguent would restore voids created by the loss of moisture in the sub dermal layers of the skin. Collagen is contained in the connective tissue found in cartilage and muscles. It’s the protein rich stuff that binds while giving flexibility to the structures it is entwined in. It’s also the stuff that cooks out of meat. The matrix formed of the proteins that gives meat sauces the rich velvety texture that we devour. We lose it and then reclaim it in our diets. And now, we want to rub it on our skin to re-plump ourselves to the bodies of our youth.

What I found more interesting was that while people are looking in the mirror day after day trying to slow the process of aging, they are asleep to the fact that their thoughts are focused on the wrong loss. While youth is slowly leaving them, the locus of their angst blinds them to the fact that they are missing the life that they have. A blind eye misses the gift in front of them. The here and now.

One of the most difficult challenges I have come to realize is, as actors refer to as, “being in the moment”. That’s spending time appreciating the experience that life is. Not looking backward or forward. Just being “in the now”.

Being middle aged kind of sucks. The waistline spreads. Muscles and joints ache. The body that I dwell in has started to fail. I realized it one afternoon when I dropped an object to the ground. Instead of quickly bending over and picking the dropped item up, I found myself maneuvering to hold against the wall and I struggled to pick it up. In my minds eye, I saw myself as an eighty year old man. Oddly, I wasn’t sad, just aggravated. The clash of the desire to move, based the sense memory of being a youth, collided with the body that could no longer accommodate the actions of my intentions.

The typical American reaction to this moment of age awareness is to take collagen rendered from the left over body parts of chickens, pigs and cows and slather on my skin in hopes that I can fend aging, and more to the point, death off. The reality is I can’t. So what am I to do?

Step 1: Understand that this day comes once.

No “do-overs”. You’ve got one shot at today. Lull yourself into a distraction, watch another rerun and you will have squandered what you will never have again. Wake up and inhale every sensation. Blink and it’s gone.

Step 2: Know that tomorrow is not guaranteed.

If you could have a conversation with the dead who passed today, chances are few of them expected it was their last day. But the slip on the ice, the fallen power line, the drunk driver who never intended to hurt a soul-all are out there where you are not looking for them.

Step 3: Don’t look back.

Okay, we learn from our experiences. The trick is not to dwell on them. Take them in and get on with it. You will never be 1 second younger. You are 1 second younger than you will be by the time you get to the end of this sentence. Why spend your energy trying to hang on to the image of who you were. Embrace who you are and what your life is right now.

One of my favorite ads was for a chocolate company. The headline read something like this: “No one ever lies on their death bed wishing they’d eaten another rice cake”. While the ad was more about yielding to the temptations of consuming a pleasurable foodstuff, the point is valid. When you are facing the final moments of your life, do you really want to look back and say “that’s it”? No, I want my life to reflect this quote that I could find no attribution for:

“Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, your body thoroughly used up, totally worn out. You last thought being “what a ride”.” -Unknown

For the past five or six years, my goal has been to make everyday count. Not to live for the weekend, or to look back and say “where did the week go”? No, I’m living with the idea that I know and can account for every second that was left in the stream of my life’s timeline. That said, I’ll leave the collagen in the gravy and off my face because wrinkles are the least of my concerns. It’s the living that makes the wrinkles that count.

Transitions

There is a myth that we parents are the protectors of our children. It is an illusionary belief that we can hold at arm’s length against the realities of the world. When our children are young, we ourselves are indoctrinated into this belief. Shielders in the battle. Guardians at the gate, holding the evils of the world within our power. But as time and the seasons change, we and our children come face to face with the reality that life is cruel, and more importantly beyond our control. The illusion of having the answers and the formulae for keeping the boogie man at bay is revealed as a falsehood.

Life chooses to come at you slowly. Or so it seems as the flow of years ticks by in a seemingly endless stream of seconds. A cold in the middle of the night. A virus that disrupts the calm of the day to day. Rocking away tears until the heave of deep sleep signals that the battle has been won. Each of those seconds seemed an eternity at the time, but the cosmic joke of perception turns in on itself to reveal that those endless days and decades have been wisps in the fabric of the continuum. We stand at the doorway to the past and see that the journey has been brief. I long for those moments to return.

I have had the good fortune to have been the father of two wonderful daughters. It’s hard to explain the place they have in my heart. They are entrenched in the very fibers of the muscles of that meaty pump, pulsing as it beats its cadence in my chest. Their names spelled in the minutia of the vesicles, hidden among the arteries.

On September 22^nd at 5:18 pm EDT, the autumnal equinox will occur as the earth shifts on its axis and the northern hemisphere moves toward the sun. The irony is that as the northern half of the planet reaches toward the sun, the planet as a whole shifts further away from the sun. Winter ensues and the balance of the seasons remains intact.

I can’t help but dwell on this-the balance of change. The shock of the new in the cycle of the familiar. To embrace change is to embrace chaos. Grasping at familiar straws thrown in a new pattern. You long for the old patterns, not realizing that the new patterns will yield new unexpected joys and unforeseen sorrows.

I look to my daughters, helpless as life envelopes them. The torrents they are navigating and I stand helpless on the shore. The battle is no longer mine. They have stepped full force into the life stream. Heartaches are at moments counterbalanced with joys they never knew existed. And, while these moments seem an eternity, it is my desire that they recognize each moment for the fleeting treasure that it is-good or bad. Because one day they will also see the sum of those seconds yields one lifetime. If they do, it will be a life well lived.