Trial by Fire

Last weekend, Scott and Amoreena came to pay us a visit and to help out on our work day. Scott was eager to try out the new kitchen, which I had (foolishly perhaps,) described as 'Scott-Proof.'

Scott is a fantastic cook, having worked early in his career both at a Whole Foods Market and at a Pan-Pacific Restaurant, learning to wok over very high heat. He has taken this technique out of the professional kitchen into the amateur arena, leading to some exciting culinary experiences that have variously involved minor grease fires, blaring smoke detectors, and clouds of thick greasy smoke forcing the opening of every window and door in the house, even in the midst of a cold rainy Oregon winter.

With a new range that can kick out serious BTU's and a range hood with professional-style grease traps and 400+ CFM of airflow, I thought that finally we had a workspace that would stand up to the worst that Scott could dish out.

I was wrong.

Although the sirloin tip roast turned out fantastic and tasty, alas we were defeated in our effort to have a smoke-free dinner. Somehow the range hood just could not seem to keep up with the smoke from the hot oil, and we indeed had most of the windows and doors open in an effort to clear the air so that we could see each other over our delicious dinner.

But at least we haven't gotten around to installing the smoke alarms yet!

More Badger Fun!

When I was in North Carolina, my friend Bob told me about a local car sales company that had some very funny television advertisements. They had hired the same agency that does Geico's Gecko commercials. The result is pretty darned funny, with the message of "Johnson Auto Sales - No Badgers." Guess you will just have to watch for yourself!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlnojyrSx_g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DG8cdMutLwA&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18SeqcDtPEI&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pn0xM6m4STs&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9F1z21G2J8&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPigcNxXVog&feature=related

The Carlston Zoo

http://www.badgerbadgerbadger.com/

Amy thought that we should include this link in honor of the animalian activities that have been going on around these parts of late. Let me know what you think!

Work Party at our House

We have had a lot of our friends saying 'we want to come see your place' and 'hey, if you need any help give us a call...' The problem is that the pace of our remodel is less structured - it is hard to say, "come by on next Wednesday, and we will be changing doorknobs." Everything takes an unpredictable amount of time, and our energies & enthusiasm ebb and flow. We don't really know what we are working on until we start to work on it.

So we had the idea to have a work party, invite a bunch of our friends, and get them working on diverse projects throughout the house. It worked out fabulously! I am sure that we accomplished more last weekend than we would have been able to do in a month or more on our own! Here are some of the tasks that were accomplished:

Cut out baseboards, touch-up painting, painting cabinet doors, hanging pictures and artwork, painting baseboards, lining cabinets with cork sheeting, replacing doorknobs, setting a post with our house number and lights by the end of the driveway, putting up shelves in the office, hanging blinds and curtains, and unpacking & organizing lots of boxes of stuff.

The house is definitely looking much more home-like now. Thanks everyone for a lot of fun, and all your hard work!

"An Engineer's Guide to Cats"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHXBL6bzAR4

This is a very enlightening and entertaining look into the role that cats play in the American household.

Pancakes & Pinot Noir

Pancakes & Pinot Noir- (As served at our “Pinot & Pancackes” Work Day Party 4-20-08)

I adapted this from a recipe that I found online; I never seem to make it exactly the same, adding or subtracting spices to change the aroma a bit. It makes some of the best pancakes, fluffy, light and crispy, that I have had. It is not a batter to make ahead of time, as it depends on being mixed together immediately prior to going on the griddle. Use this as a general guide, and have fun! -NRC

Part #1: Separate 2 eggs carefully into 2 stainless steel bowls. Add a pinch of salt to the whites, and whisk them briskly until they form thick, firm peaks. (The firmer, the fluffier the pancakes!) Set aside.

Part #2: Grab the bowl with the two yolks. Add 1 cup of milk, and 3 tbsp of melted butter. Whisk together. (You could also add some spice like ground cardamom or vanilla if you like; orange zest is delicious as well.)

Part #3: In a third bowl, sift together 1 ½ cups of flour, 3 tsp baking powder, ¾ tsp salt, and 1 tbsp sugar (don’t make them too sweet, or they won’t pair well with Pinot Noir!) Sift it back slowly into the egg yolk / milk mixture, and mix. If the mixture is too thick, add a bit more milk to make it lighter – I usually have to use an additional 1/8 cup or so.

Assembly: Using a rubber spatula, move the yolk / batter mixture into the beaten egg whites (whisk them again if needed to make sure that they are really firm and fluffy.) Add 1 cup of fresh blueberries, and with the spatula LIGHTLY mix them together – almost like how you would toss a salad – you don’t want to break the blueberries, and the egg whites don’t need to be totally incorporated – they will make fluffier pancakes if there is still a lot of air trapped in the egg whites.

Preparing: Get a large griddle or cast-iron skillet hot enough that butter starts to smoke, and then back it off a little bit to maintain a constant, even heat. Brush lightly with butter to grease the surface. Make a few tiny test pancakes the size of a quarter to make sure that the temperature is right. They should get crispy on the outside, but not burnt, and should fluff up nicely, with the inside moist, but cooked. If all looks good, you can start your pancake production line, making 3-4 at a time – the best size seems to be a little bigger around than a beer can, with 4-5 blueberries in each cake, and nice and thick.

Serving: These are best right off the griddle, as if you hold them they cook all the way through, and the outside gets soggy instead of crisp. Maple syrup is okay, but the sweetness clashes with Pinot Noir. Amoreena made some butter with Pixie tangerine zest, which was amazing, and Scott made a Pinot Noir reduction with blueberry-soaked Amaretto, which he wasn’t too sure about, but I loved. Whatever you do, make sure to serve it with a big pile of thick-cut bacon!

Photos from the Grassy Knoll

Kristin woke me up yesterday early in the morning, and told me to come down to the window. In the meadow next door, there were two furry animals running around, chasing each other. At first, we thought that they were both foxes, but then after watching for a while, it was clear that the other was something else - a Badger!!

The badger seemed to be in a hole of some sort, and the fox would come in and bite at it, then the badger would rush out of the hole and attack the fox. The fox then danced away and the badger went back to his hole.

This went on for 45 minutes or so - at one point two deer came wandering by and one went right up and looked right in the hole, as if to see what these two were fighting about. Eventually, the fox lay down to watch the hole, and eventually wandered away as the day got started.

A young neighbor kid came by later and introduced himself, and told us that there were foxes living up in the field. Now I wonder if the fox had a den here, and the badger came and got her pups. That would be sad, but it makes the most sense - I can't imagine a fox being that persistent and risking that much danger without a good reason. The badger was huge, and obviously powerful, like a little bear or something!

Here is a short video as well (click on this link)

"Gorillas in our Midst"

http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=114593

Appropo of nothing; this is just some seriously good, seriously funny writing about bouncers at nightclubs, told from the experienced viewpoint of a longtime bartender in NYC. It appeared today on egullet.org, which is a great food / restaurant / chef writing site that acts as an online magazine, forum, and cooperative blog.

Update - Remodeling Expenditures by Vendor

Here is a look at how we have been spending on our remodel - this is as of 4/14/08. Still heavy on the local vendor & local labor. I am a bit surprised that internet hasn't been a more important part of our spending, but I guess with the nature of a remodel, when you need something, you need it NOW. I am starting to count stuff that I buy on Craigslist (just bought a couple drills yesterday,) as internet purchases as well. And no matter how hard you try, it is difficult to stay totally out of the big box stores, especially since our local hardware store closes at 6:00pm!

Convection Oven = GOOD!!

I am about as excited about our new convection oven as the first caveman undoubtedly was about discovering fire. This definitely goes into the 'splurge' catagory, but if you know how much I love to be in the kitchen, and if you think back to the past ranges / ovens that we have had, you will understand my state of culinary near-bliss.

To recap: our last house had a really cool-looking O'Keefe & Merritt, circa 1950 extra-wide range and oven - massive and splendid in all its enameled cast-iron glory. The only problem was that the burners had absolutely no fine control, the broiler half of the oven was broken, and the oven temperatures as marked on the knob had little to nothing to do with reality. Perhaps most vexing was the way that the entire house we were living in was slanted horrendously, making slow progress on its patient, decades-long slide down the hill. Every omelet that i have made over the past 3 years; every pancake has been heavy on the downslope side!

Our house in Oregon had an electric range, with those silly spiral elements. Maddening, especially since we actually had a natural gas fireplace plumbed in just 10 feet away, as well as a gas powered clothes dryer. Priorities, man! Apparently, people in that part of Oregon mostly have electric ranges and appliances, as electricity is cheap, subsidized by huge hydroelectric plants on the Colombia River. We could have gotten the gas line run and replaced the range, but we were only there for a year, and we really didn't have ANY extra money at the time.

Anyway, this range is a dream. I still haven't figured out all the buttons, but it has a great high-powered burner, as well as one that is designed to give absolute control for the most mild simmer imaginable. It is level! Yeah! And the oven itself is a technological marvel - it has both gas and electric elements at the top and bottom of the oven, so you can apply direct heat as needed. It can proof bread, has a thermal probe so you can get a roast exactly to med-rare, and the convection feature is amazing, allowing quick baking times, and ability to crust the exterior while leaving the inside perfectly done.

Kristin went on a trip to Napa, and it was the perfect opportunity to make some 'Lambsicles.' Simply let the rack warm to room temp over 30 minutes or so, trim any gristle, (but leave the thick layer of fat on the outside of the ribs, maybe score it with a knife to allow it to render off more completely.) I rubbed them with balsamic vinegar, sea salt, crushed corriander and fenugreek, then seared the fat side for a few minutes in a saute pan, before moving it to the oven, fat side up. I put a probe into the center of the rack, set the probe monitor to stop cooking when it hit 140F (probably could back that down to 135 next time,) and turned the convection oven to 400F. Once the interior temp hit 140, (~10-12 minutes later,) the oven beeped, the elements turned off, and I removed the rack to cool on a plate for ten minutes. I drained the juices from the lamb back into the saute pan, turned the heat to high, dropped in some chopped sage, and reduced about a cup of red wine into a sauce. I threw a handful of arugala on a plate, cut 3 lambsicles and arranged them, then strained my hot reduction sauce and drizzled it over the top, wilting the greens slightly. Delicious!

NPR Stories about El Salvador

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89431942

I have been hearing this series of 3 stories about immigration issues and El Salvador while on my way to work in the mornings. Quite interesting, and gives an interview with people going through these issues as we change our immigration policies here in the US, we don't think about how it affects people elsewhere whom have their families split up across the continents.

Playing with your Food?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7335351.stm

Wow - this story was on BBC today, a German inventor has designed a restaurant that completely eliminates the servers - all the food and drink is ordered via touch-screen, and delivered via a very cool gravity rail system to your seat. You swipe a card to pay for your order, and you can look up where the ingredients came from on the touch screen while you wait for your order!

Almost like the old-school 'Automat' restaurants, only the food is freshly prepared and delivered hot! Plus, the rail system is very nifty looking.

Back to the remodel

So not much has surfaced here lately regarding the remodel, as most of the space has been dominated by travel, El Salvador, and other issues.

This is just a quick update; we are closing in on having all of the interior lighting fixtures in place. We made some serious progress with the main pendant lights for the living room. Kristin found these beautiful blown-glass fixtures, and we placed an order right away.

I just got the last one hung up today, and they look really great! They make our lamps look a bit outclassed though!

The other main project has been the baseboard trim. I am slowly working my way around the downstairs of our house, making some progress, but it is slow. The pieces need to be cut to fit as well as possible, then they get 2 coats of paint before being nailed to the wall. Caulking and spackel is used to fill the gaps where the wall is crooked or my cuts are not quite right, then we have to touch up the paint again to make it look good. A lot of work!

Blowing the Surprise

My brother Benjamin was married in November 2006 to a great young woman whom he was (is!) really in love with. It wasn't easy for me to get away from work to attend the wedding, as harvest was ongoing, and there was still a LOT of work going on.

In fact, on the very day that he was married, November 4th, we had a couple vineyards scheduled for harvest - so I decided that I would make some wine for him from grapes that were picked precisely on the day of his wedding, and get enough bottles for him so that he can have a bottle every anniversary until the wine starts to go over the hill. (I am sure that their marriage will outlast the wine!)

We just bottled that wine a few weeks ago, just before I left for El Salvador, and I am setting aside several cases for them. But in addition to the small bottles of wine, I had a bottle etched by a local artist for them; a really BIG bottle in this case, 5 litres!! (A normal bottle of wine is 750ml, so this bottle definitely qualifies as 'Party Size!')

The back of the bottle has their names, and the date of their wedding, as well as a passage from the Song of Solomon, which Kristin read at their wedding, and had a passing mention of the vine and agriculture;

My beloved spoke and said to me, "Arise my darling, my beautiful one. Come with me. See! The winter is past; the rains are over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing is come. The cooing of doves is heard in our land. The fig tree forms its early fruit; the blossoming vines spread their fragrance. Arise, come my darling, My beautiful one, come with me!"

On the front is a copy of a painting that Ben painted when he was in art class in High School. I think that he gave it to me as a graduation gift, and I have hung it on the wall wherever I have lived since, from California to Oregon and back again.

I think that it turned out really well, and I had to show it off, even though it might spoil the surprise for them; but it will look so good when they get it, that I am sure they will forgive me!

Besides, if you see it displayed on the mantle, you should scold them; this bottle needs to be stored someplace dark and cool so that it won't spoil. I think we should all get together with them on their 5th anniversary and drink through this - I can always refill it with something else in the future, and the many other small bottles will allow them at least a small taste from that very special day in 2006 for many years to come.

Ben & Michelle, we love you guys!

'Mama Dip's Country Kitchen' Chapel Hill, NC

My flight was delayed so I had time to stop at 'Mama Dip's Country Kitchen' in Chapel Hill for breakfast. Grits, homemade biscuits, jam and two eggs with country ham. It was tasty.

Country ham is a kind of salty, rustic cousin of prosciutto, or Jamòn Serrano, made by packing the raw hindquarter of the pig in salt for a period of time before hanging it to cure over the winter, losing moisture and gaining complex flavors as enzymatic fermentations transform the flesh. The exterior of the ham can develop a lush growth of fungus, like some cheeses, or like Italian Soppressata. I saw some of these at a farmers co-op in Raleigh, but forgot to take a photo. Sometimes they are smoked, but I think that they are traditionally raw cured, and I suppose there is a lot of regional variation and individual secret recipes.

By the way, this is an entirely text messaged post, so now is a great time for you to be suitably impressed at my newfound texting prowess! Now off to Philly, Phoenix, then SBP!

'Smithfield's Chicken 'N Bar-B-Q' Raleigh, North Carolina

I suddenly had to go to Raleigh, North Carolina this week, to meet with the largest synthetic cork manufacturer in the world, at their headquarters, in Zebulon, NC - they were interested in a production-scale closure trial that I have been working on for the past 2 years, and I met with their R&D team, and their enologists, whom were in visiting from Belgium.

I resolved firmly in my heart that I would sample North Carolina Bar-B-Q (I don't know the significance of this spelling, vs BBQ or Barbeque, but I trust that there must be a difference!) The way I understand it, North Carolina Bar-B-Q differentiates itself regionally from other styles in the following ways; it is always Pork based, apparently a shredded shoulder, or roast of some sorts; the sauce is not tomato based, not sweet, but rather consists of vinegar, peppers, and spices.

It was brought to my attention by my friend, Bob Carruthers, who moved with his family from SLO to Chapel Hill (they used to be our next door neighbors,) that there are actually two distinct BBQ (abbreviating, apologies if I offend someone's sense of Bar-B-Q' propriety...) styles within North Carolina - the 'Eastern' which is very plainly prepared pork with just a little vinegar sauce, and the Western, or 'Lexington' style, which only uses pork shoulder, and has a sweeter, slightly more tomato-based sauce. Tons more about North Carolina BBQ in this paper titled "What is North Carolina-Style BBQ?" by H.Kent Craig.

In his paper, Craig says, "It's easier to be a Master Chef at the New York Academy Of Culinary Arts & Sciences, it's easier to be be a Professor Of Sanskrit at the Sorbone, it's easier to be a Master Steak Chef at Blackie's in DC, than it is to be a Master BBQ Chef Of Eastern-NC-BBQ. That's because Eastern-NC-Style BBQ is plain whole-hog pork meat, with just the tiniest bit of vinegar-based "sauce" which isn't a sauce at all, applied as a moistening agent. Eastern-Style BBQ is usually one of two grades; either excellent, or close to inedible."

I had expressed my interest in exploring NC BBQ to one of the research scientists, whom also happened to be a native of the area. One of the places that I had copied out of my 'Road Food' book, called 'Murray's Barbecue' was on my list of places to visit, but I still asked for a recommendation. I was told that Smithfield's, despite being a chain, did a very credible, authentic job.

The next day, when I went in search of Murray's, I was disappointed. (I later found out that it closed, back in 2005.) I could not locate it anywhere, and when I called the number listed, there was no answer. Fortunately, I remembered the Smithfield's recommendation, and found several listings within 10 miles of where I was. I chose the closest one on my GPS navigator, and was there in just a few minutes.

I ordered the Chicken 'N Bar-B-Que Platter, and a glass of Sweet Tea - when the food arrived, it was a mass (see photo above!) of shredded, tender pork shoulder (almost like carnitas, but not fried - moist and roasted and with authentic 'porky' flavor - YUMM!!!) Beside the pork was a mound of excellent, finely chopped coleslaw, and a pile of hushpuppies. Topping the plate were two pieces of crisply coated, peppery fried chicken.

The pork was great, I loved the spicy, tangy sauce, but you didn't need much to bring the flavor of the pork up. I can see why a sandwich, which usually would include the coleslaw heaped on top of the pork and bun, could be such a classic match up. The fried chicken was great, but I just couldn't finish all of the food, so I left most of the second piece of chicken, and some of the hushpuppies.

Sometimes I hear people say that we don't really have an American Cuisine. When faced with traditional food culture in the southern US, especially, I have to disagree. It is amazing, beautiful, and reassuring to see the intense regionalism, traditionalism, and pride with which BBQ in particular, and southern cooking in general is practiced.

Does anyone know what happened to Murray's? (4700 Old Poole Road, Raleigh) (I found out that it has closed.) Are there other suggestions of quality, traditional, or idiosyncratic BBQ, Bar-B-Que, or Barbeque that should be sought out in the future? (see this link for a great forum on current NC BBQ places.) How about Smithfield's? Do you think that I really got a fair taste of NC BBQ, or was that just commercialized, mediocre chain food? (It was still tasty!)

A link that I found, to a Carolina BBQ discussion board