PANEM ET CASEUM

Homemade three-cheese pizza with mozzarella, taleggio, Parmesan, and a shitload of black pepper.

Never mind bread and circuses... give me bread and cheese and I’ll be a happy camper. And what is a better exemplar of the glories of bread and cheese than the pizza?

[OK, there is the Grilled Cheese Sandwich. Made with good bread and a flavorsome cheddar or Gruyère, it’s a perfectly fine alternative... but that’s a story for another post.]

Having grown up in the New York area, pizza was a part of our lives from Day One. After all, I lived in Massapequa, a village on the south shore of Long Island that was called Matzoh-Pizza by many of the locals, owing to the relatively large proportion of Jewish and Italian residents. The local product consisted of two types of pies: the round Neapolitan, with a thin, floppy crust laden with cheese and tomato; and the Sicilian, a rectangular version with a substantially thicker and breadier crust. I was a Neapolitan fan from Day One... or at least as far back as I can remember.

When I left the northeast and moved to Texas, I was horrified to find that I had moved to a pizza desert. Oh, there was pizza a-plenty, but the Real Thing - that glorious Neapolitan pie of my youth - was thin on the ground, available in only a few places. Mostly there was the crap available from places like Pizza Hut and Pizza Inn... and, later, Domino’s. Year later, though, Houston was where I first discovered the Tuscan-style pie, with a shatteringly crisp crust that - as Laurence Simon was wont to say - you could slit your wrists with. Wow.

Pizza options abound these days. In our neighborhood - assuming you have no interest in the fast food offerings of Domino’s, Papa John’s, and the like - you have places like Capozzi’s, Aurelio’s and Uncle Maddio’s. Of these, Capozzi’s offers the closest thing to the Pies of My Youth. Oh, and there’s a California Pizza Kitchen, an outfit that I liked a lot more when they had duck sausage pizza with spinach on the menu. Oh, well.

It wasn’t until last week that I tried my hand at making my own pizza from scratch. That was a mistake. It’s way better than the commercial stuff, so now I have a new Food-Temptation to resist.

The key is to let the dough - made with a blend of finely ground 00 flour and all-purpose flour - rise in the fridge overnight or longer. The long fermentation allows all sorts of nice flavors to develop.

And what to enjoy with this cheesy delight? How about a Nantucket Red?

2 ounces white tequila
1 ounce Aperol
Juice of half a lemon
Grapefruit soda

Combine the tequila, Aperol, and lemon juice in a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake vigorously and strain into a highball glass with ice. Top with grapefruit soda; stir. Garnish with a lemon peel.

One of the trendy Atlanta restaurants was advertising this drink, so I made my own version. It’s named, strangely enough, for a style and color of pants - presumably one that is popular in certain New England vacation spots. Nantucket Red: That sounds so much more appetizing than “Charleston Chino,” doesn’t it?

THE STING: A 100-WORD STORY

Don Giacomo Finocchio sat behind his enormous oaken desk. An incongruously tiny cup of espresso sat before him from which he sipped, pinkie finger upraised delicately.

His consiglieri had been pressing him to strike against the Nunzios for weeks now. Yet Finocchio had not acted rashly. There were negotiations to conduct, arrangements to finalize, before he could make his move.

Everything was ready now. “Fluttuare come una farfalla, pungere come un’ape,” he thought to himself as he raised his wand, unleashing his sting. Miles away, every Nunzio caporegime fell stone dead.

Being a fairy Godfather, Finocchio thought, had its advantages.

IVY LEAGUE DRINKAGE

The Princeton Cocktail: sophisticated, elegant, a bit arcane, and fully capable of Getting the Job Done.

I had never given much thought to the fact that there exist mixed drinks named after various educational institutions... but apparently, Ivy League cocktails have been around for quite some time, according to an article that had been graciously forwarded to me by Leslie, the Omnibus Driver.

Some of these cocktails sound like they’re worth a try, while others inspire a certain degree of fear and loathing... and that’s based solely on their ingredients, not on their names. Nevertheless, given my educational provenance (and given the contents of my little Lacquer Liquor Locker), I had to give the Princeton Cocktail a try. Here’s what to do:

2 ounces Old Tom gin (I used Hayman’s)
Couple dashes orange bitters (I used Fee Brothers)
¾ ounce ruby or tawny Port, preferably chilled (I used Warres Tawny)

Combine the gin and bitters with ice in a cocktail shaker. Stir well and strain into a cocktail glass. Carefully pour the Port into the glass along the side so that it forms a (mostly) separate layer at the bottom. Squeeze a bit of orange peel over the drink and discard (the peel, not the drink, Harvard Boy.)

If you don’t have Old Tom gin in your collection of spirits, you can concoct a rough approximation by using two ounces of Plymouth gin with a half-teaspoon of simple syrup.

Savor this cocktail slowly. Owing to the layer of Port at the bottom, its character changes with every sip. Have a few of ’em, and they’ll transport you to the verdant fields and Gothic spires of Old Nassau.



Update: I’ve now had a chance to try making one of these with Ransom Old Tom gin, and it’s also excellent, with a more complex malty character. Either way, a fine cocktail.

MAKE MINE A DOPPEL

Me and Stanley Tucci... separated at birth?

They say everyone has a doppelgänger, someone who bears an eerie resemblance to another individual. I’m not sure there is anyone who has the unfortunate lot in life to be my doppel, but at various times in my life, there have been a few that - some have said - at least looked vaguely like me.

In my high school days, it was Dustin Hoffman. After The Graduate came out, all too many people would greet me by saying, “Plastics,” a bizarre foreshadowing of my career with the Great Corporate Salt Mine. And later, during the long years when I sported a moustache, other comparisons were inevitable. 

Now that I’m a bit older and my hair has become, ahhh, significantly less in evidence, new comparisons have begun to pop up... like the one pictured above. Not quite a “Separated at Birth” moment - Mr. Tucci is eight years my junior - but still...

MOLE REMOVAL

The other day I went to see the doctor, and he removed a mole.

No, it’s not what you think. The doctor was not my dermatologist, and I did not go to his office to have something snipped off my skin. This was Dr. T., a personal friend, and he and I were taking an afternoon dip in his swimming pool. The good doctor removed said mole - the mammalian variety - from said pool, where it had drowned.

The mole is a creature of the earth: A swimming pool, being mostly filled with water, is not its natural habitat. The poor little feller was out of its element, and a mole in water will fare little better than a fish out of water.

[Those inclined to squeamishness should probably stay on this side of the jump.]

SUNBEAM

Astride a sunbeam, Stella seems to cast her own light.

Stella, the fluffy kitty
Has a very tiny nose
From looking at this picture
You might even think she glows

FISH ON A DISH

Roasted salmon with Montreal Steak seasoning, lemon zest, and piment d’espelette. Yowza.

Sometimes, to paraphrase the Incredible String Band, a fish on a dish is just what I wish. And when the good folks at Costco are selling slabs of wild-caught sockeye for a very reasonable price, how can I resist? I ask you.

I love salmon filets prepared any manner of ways, and simple tends to be best. I like to grill ’em on a well-soaked cedar plank, which gives them a nice light smoky flavor. The Missus will wrap them in heavy-duty foil and park them on the grill, a method that allows the fish to baste in its own natural juices. Delicious. And if that’s too complicated, twenty minutes in the oven at 350°F gets the job done nicely.

When it comes to seasoning the fish, there are all sorts of choices. Williams-Sonoma, purveyor of (mostly) overpriced foods and gadgets, sells an excellent rub under the name “Potlatch Seasoning.” Plain old salt and pepper work well, too, and you can go the Asian route with any number of variations on the teriyaki or ginger-soy theme. Lately, though, I’ve been happy with Montreal steak seasoning, a McCormick standard that works even better added to hamburger meat or sprinkled on fish. According to Wikipedia,

“...the Montreal deli Schwartz’s is credited with the creation of Montreal steak seasoning. The story of its creation is that, during the 1940’s and 1950’s, a Schwartz’s broilerman by the name of Morris ‘The Shadow’ Sherman began adding the deli’s smoked meat pickling spices to his own rib and liver steaks. Soon the customers began asking for the same. Due to its popularity, it eventually became a norm in Montreal delis and steakhouses such as the nearby Moishes Steakhouse and the Main Deli Steak House to spice their steaks similarly.”

This time I added another twist by adding a liberal amount of lemon zest and piment d’espelette, the fiery Basque red pepper.  Just what the doctor wishes he had ordered.

Oh, that green stuff on the plate? Arugula dressed with lemon juice and gremolata-infused olive oil. Sounds too frou-frou for you? Tough titty.

CAREER CHANGE: A 100-WORD STORY

Ron was sick to death of the shop.

He used to love the place, no question. It was only natural that he ended up there, helping brother George run things after Fred was killed in the War. But the stress of dealing with customers was nothing compared with the gut-grinding agita of working alongside George.

So he left, opening a golf shop that was equally popular with muggles and wizards... for Ron’s practice balls could work wonders, magically bouncing off water, avoiding sand, and veering away from trees.

People would queue up for blocks to buy buckets of Strange Balls.

I PITY THE POOR FOOL...

... who doesn’t like a tasty fool for dessert.


Lemon-Blueberry Fool.

When most of us think “British desserts,” we think of heavy suet puddings with picturesque names like Spotted Dick, Drowned Baby, and Treacle Sponge. And of course there’s the ubiquitous flaming Christmas pudding. All fine and dandy, but not what one would call summery.

There is a completely different sort of British pudding, though (pudding, that is, in the British sense - a generic name for dessert). That would be your fool, in its simplest form a concoction of berries and whipped cream.

The Lemon-Blueberry Fool shown above is a little bit more complicated. It combines two flavors that go together beautifully - lemon and blueberry, a match made in Food Heaven. The assertive sharpness of the lemon is tamed by converting it into a tart, silky lemon curd, while the blueberries’ flavor is intensified by gently cooking them into a compote.

The basic recipe is here at seriouseats.com. I made a few minor tweaks, to wit: (1) When making the lemon curd, I add the butter (cut into small chunks) after the sugar-egg yolk-lemon juice mixture is fully cooked, and (2) I strain the hot lemon curd before chilling it.

This stuff is light, yet satisfying. (Well, not too light. Butter, egg yolks, whipped cream, sugar. Oof.) It’s a perfect dessert for a warm summer evening... and it tastes every bit as good as it looks.

A FEW THOUGHTS ON A LOST ART

Today, July 7, is an anniversary of sorts.

I started keeping an Online Journal ten years ago today, with a post that, not surprisingly to those who know me, made mention of certain unmentionable digestive issues. (Online Journal sounds so more professional and important than “blog,” that distasteful-sounding nonce word that comes from hacking off the first two letters of “weblog.”) That was at a site I chose to call “Blog d’Elisson” out of a combined failure of creativity and a desire to honor my father. I was, after all, Eli’s son, and so that became my nom d’électron.

What was the point of all this? You may well ask. I had already accumulated a small pile of miscellaneous scribblings, and I suppose I was curious as to whether anyone else would find them amusing and/or worthwhile. All it took was a precipitating event to get me started. And, as I discovered later, there was the element of catharsis, as well: It felt good to write about certain things... even if they were painful. Writing as anodyne.  

The catchphrase I used on that site was “Another Monumental Exercise in Self-Aggrandizement and Time-Wastage,” the first such exercise having been the static website I started sometime around the turn of the century. I hesitate to try to calculate how many hours I have pissed away writing at both Blog d’Elisson and here, but when you consider that there is a combined total of over 5,000 posts at the two sites, you can assume that, at least, the Time-Wastage part of my mission has been successful.

As far as Self-Aggrandizement is concerned, blogging is not necessarily the most efficient way of tooting one’s own horn. (If that were my main concern, I would have been better served by simply renting a billboard on Atlanta’s Downtown Connector and slapping my grinning face on it.) My use of that term, originally, had been facetious... and yet I cannot deny the modest ego boost I got back in the early days of my bloggitry when I would get a new blogroll link - hell, any link - or a comment. Those, along with my pageview stats, meant that somebody out there in the Internet-Ether had read something I had written, sometimes liking it enough to lob a comment back over the net or plug a link into his or her own site. That somebody was most likely a total stranger, and yet those invisible linky connections, over time, sometimes morphed into real-life friendships. One element that made those friendships remarkable was their sheer unlikeliness: These were people I would probably never have encountered in everyday life - yet we became bound together solely by the strength of our ideas and our ability to express them.

That, to me, was what made Old-School Blogging special. It built communities... without necessarily intending to. And it did not rely on a self-selected network of “ffriends” to keep it going.

Alas, Facebook (which I refer to as “Farcebook” in my blacker moods) has eaten the guts out of blogging. That is, any guts that remained after the commercial interests jumped in. Most of the people who used to write personal blogs have given up and migrated to Facebook, where their connectivity is measured in their number of ffriends, their likes, their status updates, their shares. Blogroll links and comments just aren’t sexy any more.

That’s too bad, because - to me, anyway - blogs were where I discovered people whose politics were different from mine... or the same. People who looked at the same things I did and came away with completely different takes. People whose senses of humor were all over the map. People who saw the beauty in the mundane. People who were just plain nuts... but entertainingly so. People who could write... and make me want to read more. And people who interacted with you, people with whom you could have a dialogue.

Rob Smith, who styled himself Acidman on his famous - some would say infamous - blog Gut Rumbles, used to call his blogging “a ceaseless quest for adoration from people who don’t know me.” Sounds an awful lot like Self-Aggrandizement, doesn’t it? And that is hardly a surprise, for it is normal for males to seek the Three A’s: admiration, appreciation, and acknowledgement. Adoration and aggrandizement might be a bit more extreme, but they certainly fall somewhere in the spectrum with those other A’s.

Since mid-2010, I’ve been writing here at Lost in the Cheese Aisle, where the elements of self-aggrandizement and time-wastage, while still present, are no longer worth memorializing in the form of a catchphrase. The title of the blog comes from one of the Missus’s more endearing characterizations of me: when I’m acting especially distracted or confused, she calls it “being lost in the cheese aisle.” (I am actually capable of getting lost in the cheese aisle. Oooh, cheese!) That ADHD-ish facet of my personality can be exasperating, but I like to believe that it adds to my charm... at least, such charm as I may possess.

And I suppose I will keep writing here, albeit with diminished frequency. I started all of this Online Journalism for my own amusement - despite any and all appearances to the contrary - and as long as it continues to amuse me, I’ll keep flogging the beast.

BLOWN AWAY

That was my reaction to this video of fireworks in West Palm Beach, Florida... filmed from the midst of the explosions, using a GoPro Hero 3 silver camera attached to a DJI Phantom 2 drone.

Remarkably, the drone was not damaged despite its proximity to the bursting shells.



Now I wanna get me my own drone. At the very least, I can use it to terrify the local conspiracy theorists.

PATRIOTIC TOES

Our friend Arlene sports a snazzy July 4 toenail job.

On Independence Day, anything goes -
So get yourself some Patriotic Toes.
When red, and white, and blue adorn thy Nails,
Your Love of Country cannot ever fail.
Not all the Bombast of a Fireworks Show
Can match the Colors painted on your Toe.

INCONSOLABLE

When I am in a nasty mood,
Not all the spangled pulchritude
Of Vegas beauty pageant winners -
No porterhouses (grilled) for dinner,
Accompanied by dry Martinis,
And caviar-bespeckled blinis -
No cakes from the Cacao-Bean
Can serve to ease my vile mien.

TODAY’S PERFORATED HEADGEAR PINUP

If there’s a colander, I’ll wear it.
(If I’m feeling generous, I’ll share it.)

On this final day of June,
Check out my snazzy Colander-Spoon!

[Strainer positioning assistance provided by Elder Daughter.]

TOODLE-OO, TUCO

Eli Wallach (1915-2014) in his iconic role of Tuco in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

Tuco has gone on to the Great Shoot-’Em-Up in the Sky: Eli Wallach, the actor who portrayed him in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, has died at the age of 98.

Wallach, strangely enough, was one of the first celebrities I actually saw in the flesh. And he had the distinction of sharing my own daddy’s first name, Eli. How could I not like the guy?

Requiescat in pace, Mr. Wallach. Regardless of what Tuco may have said, I hope you never feel the Devil bite your ass.

[Tip o’ th’ Elisson fedora to Velociman for the image.]

R. I. P., MISTER WATER-PIK

My Waterpik gave up the ghost the other day, announcing its demise in a schpritz of high-pressure water all over my midriff as I was waterflossing my teeth.

This was different from the faux pas of pulling the jet tip out out of one’s mouth while the machine is still running... a good way to get squirted in unexpected places: the eye, the right nostril, the armpit. (Don’t ask me how I know this.) No, I had the jet tip firmly ensconced in my mouth, and yet I was getting an impromptu shower. Fuck! thought I.

Sure enough, a hairline crack had developed in the hose that leads from the pump unit to the handle. It was, typically enough, right below the handle. This wasn’t the first time one of our Waterpiks had cacked in exactly the same way, so it wasn’t so much a surprise as a disappointment.

There was a silver lining in this damp cloud, however. She Who Must Be Obeyed had just been to Costco, where she had spotted Waterpiks on sale. Even better, it was a package deal: a full-size Waterpik along with a companion travel-size version, complete with its own carrying case. Perfect for those out-of-town trips. I had heard about this with only a mild amount of interest, but now, with a dead Pik on our hands, the Costco option was looking mighty attractive.

You don’t own a Waterpik? You should. These handy oral irrigator devices have been around for about fifty years, but not everyone owns one. That’s too bad, because waterflossing is really good for the gums and, in my case, has made a huge difference in the amount of calculus buildup my oral hygienist has to scrape off of my teeth every six months. Alas, being mechanical, they do not last forever... but the occasional need to replace our Pik is, to me, a cost of doing business. Nevertheless, I’d love it if there were some way to replace a cracked hose without having to buy a whole new appliance.

Update: According to commenter Jackie, replacement hoses are available from both Amazon and from the Waterpik website. Sure enough, they are. I’ll keep that in mind next time we blow out a Waterpik hose. 

FLOWERS FOR DANIEL

...P.P.S. please if you get a chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard...

- from Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes

Daniel Keyes, author of the tragically brilliant short story Flowers for Algernon, died last week at the age of eighty-six.

The story concerns Charly, an intellectually challenged man - in older, less politically correct days, he would have been called “retarded” - who is given an experimental treatment that raises his IQ to genius level. The story’s first tragedy is that his increased intelligence allows him to see that many of the people he regarded as his friends had, instead, been cruel and abusive. The second tragedy is far worse, however: The treatment is a failure because it is not permanent. With enhanced brainpower, Charly sees his future decline, his return to the world of slow-wittedness. It’s heartwrenching.

Keyes expanded his 1959 short story into a novel - not entirely successfully, in my opinion. But Flowers for Algernon has also seen several screen adaptations, notably the 1968 movie Charly, which featured Cliff Robertson in an Academy Award-winning role as the titular character. (I am a bit horrified that there has also been a musical based on the story as well.)

Who is Algernon? you may ask. He’s the mouse upon which the treatment is first tested, with positive results that are encouraging but ultimately all too fleeting: Algernon’s decline allows Charly to see what awaits him as well.

So now, if you get a chanse, please put some flowrs on Daniels grave. Ave atque vale, Mr. Keyes!

JUNE GUILD EVENT

This evening the Sommelier Guild returns once again to the Chops Lobster Bar. It’s time for the annual banquet, typically a monument to wretched winey excess.

My attendance at the Guild’s banquets has been hit-or-miss, given that June is usually our Traveling Season. But we’re back from our big summer trip now, and I suppose one more tying-on of the Feed-Bag won’t make too much of a difference in the grand scheme of things.

There will be a host of excellent wines, along with a few of my favorite proteins to accompany them on their voyage down my gullet. Here for your delectation is the evening’s List of Provender:

Reception
NV Collon Champagne Brut**

First Flight
2012 Domaine des Valanges Mâcon-Prissé “Le Clos” - Mâcon, Burgundy, France**
2009 Pegasus Bay Chardonnay - Waipara Valley, Canterbury, New Zealand
Lump crab cakes, mustard butter sauce

Second Flight
2000 Beaucastel Châteauneuf-du-Pape - Vallée du Rhône, France*
2007 Xavier Vins Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Anonyme - Vallée du Rhône, France**
Lamb rib chop, Brussels sprout leaves and mushrooms

Third Flight
2009 Anderson’s Conn Valley Right Bank - Napa County, California***
2007 Chalk Hill Estate Red - Sonoma County, California**
2007 Joseph Phelps Insignia - Napa Valley, California**
Filet mignon with two sauces, creamed spinach, organic mushrooms
(First half of filet served with sauce Béarnaise)

Fourth Flight
1998 D’Arenberg Dead Arm Shiraz - McLaren Vale, Australia**
2005 Bernard Faurie Hermitage - Rhône, Hermitage, France***
(Second half of filet served with sauce au poivre)

Dessert
2003 Bretz Bechtolsheimer Petersberg Eiswein - Bereich Nierstein, Rheinhessen, Germany**
2005 Heyden Oppenheimer Sackträger Beerenauslese - Bereich Nierstein, Rheinhessen, Germany*** (Half of the tables will receive the eiswein and the other half the beerenauslese)
Chef’s Surprise Dessert (Bread Pudding or Orange Crême Brulée)

Lagniappe
1995 Turley Aida Vineyard Zinfandel*****
2004 Andrew Will Sheridan Vineyard Red Wine**
2011 Redoma Douro*
2011 Gevrey-Chambertin Vieilles Vignes - Morceaux***
2010 Rhys Anderson Valley Bearwallow Vineyard Pinot Noir****
2007 El Olivar Malbec Viu Manent Single Vineyard
1993 Langtry Meritage**
2007 Weingut Bründlmayer Grüner Veltliner Alte Reben**

Update:
So far I have never been disappointed with the food at Chops Lobster Bar, and this dinner was no exception. Only later did it strike me that the one thing missing from the menu was any form of starch... and that was fine with me. No drab, dreary potatoes or pasta to get in the way of the perfectly seared lamb chop, the à point beef filet. The sides, consisting of tiny Brussels sprouts and sautéed mushrooms, were just the right counterpoint to the rich proteins. And the wines? With one exception - the unfortunate 2009 Pegasus Bay Chardonnay, which had a strange, dense flavor - the wines were anywhere from good to excellent. And if twelve wines on the menu were not enough, there were plenty of other bottles being passed around.

Gotta try to make these banquets more often... this one rocked!

A FATHER’S HANDS

[Originally published on Father’s Day, June 20, 2010.]

 

These are the hands that raised me. They are my father’s hands.

As a child, I would watch those fingers fly over the valves of his trumpet as his foot would tap out the metronomic beat. He would then sit down at the grand piano and those same fingers would coax beautiful music from hidden strings.

The hands are older now, spotted with age.  But they still make that same beautiful music, and it makes my heart sing with sweet memories.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad!

Postscript: I wrote the above post on Father’s Day of 2010. It is especially noteworthy because it was the first - and only - time my (notoriously technology averse) father ever left a comment on one of my blog posts. Here’s it is:

Eli (hiz own self) said...

It is absolutely amazing but I recognized my own hands immediately! Thank you for the sweet thoughts. It’s good to be a Dad who is appreciated and loved. D.O.D.

For the curious, D.O.D. stands for Dear Old Dad, which is how Eli styled himself in the cards and letters he would send me. He’s gone now, but that beautiful music will always be in my memories.

GOING BACK... AGAIN

Detail from a vintage 1930 Wedgewood plate featuring Princeton University’s Blair Hall... my home for junior and senior years.

Beginning tomorrow, the Missus and I will be making our once-every-five-years pilgrimage to my Alma Mater in order to attend Reunions. It’s a big event, with attendees ranging from doddering old gentlemen from classes in the mid-1930’s to the newly minted graduates of the Class of 2014. Our class falls roughly halfway between those extremes: we’ll be celebrating our fortieth year.

Forty years. Hard to believe, innit? We are now those semi-elderly alumni in their venerable class blazers, the ones we never could imagine ourselves as when we were the new kids on the collegiate block. We’re now the ones with (in some cases, at least) grandchildren almost old enough to start thinking about college themselves. Great Googly Moogly.

There will be plenty of catching up with friends of long standing... getting to know some of the classmates we missed out on knowing when we were undergrads...shooting the breeze... drinking and partying until the wee hours. (We old goats still have our stamina.) It’s why I always look forward to going back to the Best Damned Place of All.

There’s a certain synchronicity that attaches to the weekend, as well. This coming Saturday, our dear friend Houston Steve will celebrate the fiftieth (!) anniversary of his Bar Mitzvah by chanting the haftarah - the prophetical selection that follows the traditional reading from the Torah. Although we won’t be in Atlanta to hear him, the week’s Torah portion is Nasso (“take a census”): what could be more appropriate for the weekend when we will be going back to Old Nassau?

MAY GUILD EVENT

This evening will bring yet another Sommelier Guild event, this one a celebration of the wines of Italy. Italian Stallions, the invitation calls ’em, and I am hoping that appellation refers to the heartiness of the selections we’ll be drinking and not any possible resemblance to Horse-Piss. We will be dining and drinking at La Grotta in Buckhead, a place with pleasant associations for both me and She Who Must Be Obeyed.

Based on the evening’s menu (thirteen different wines! six dishes!), I will be eating and drinking way, way too much. Is that bad? You decide:

Reception
2012 Abbazia di Novacella Stiftkellerei Neustift Kerner***
Prosciutto di Parma, fresh melon, mint, aged balsamic glàce, salmon tartare in pastry cups

First Flight
2011 Vestini Campagnano Pallagrello Bianco
2010 I Pentri Castelvenere Falanghina Flora
Seared calamari, basil pesto, EVOO

Second Flight
1999 Dalla Valle Pietre Rosse Sangiovese
2009 Monsanto Chianti Classico Riserva**
Beef short rib-stuffed tortellacci, red wine brodo

Third Flight
2010 Passopisciaro Rosso Nerello Mascalese**
2008 Col d’Orcia Brunello di Montalcino**
Tortelloni stuffed with braised onions, cooked prosciutto, fresh thyme and mascarpone cheese with fresh oregano tomato sauce

Fourth Flight
2010 Paitin Serra Barbaresco***
2010 Paitin Sori Paitin Barbaresco***
2009 Produttori del Barbaresco***
Risotto, wild mushrooms, Parmesan,white truffle oil

Fifth Flight
2007 Castello del Terriccio Tassinaia
2009 Tolaini Valdisanti***
2010 Giacomo Grimaldi Barolo**
4-ounce filet mignon with Gorgonzola cheese in a Barolo and Pommery mustard sauce, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, seasonal vegetables

Lagniappe
1997 Castello di Brolio Chianti Classico**
2009 Rosso di Montalcino Le Ragnaie
2010 Beaulieu Vineyard Georges de Latour Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon**
2007 Punset Barbaresco
2004 Lamborghini Campoleone

Update:
Leave the gun. Take the cannoli. And don’t forget the vino rosso.

A fine collection of foodstuffs set off by a very agreeable palette of wines... enjoyed al fresco thanks to the weather having been cooperative. I’d call this Guild Event a success. 

A CANAJAN COCKTAIL

The Robertson Davies Elderflower Rye.

Appropriately enough, as we prepare to head for the Great North Woods for (part of) our summer travels, here comes a cocktail of Canadian origin: the Robertson Davies Elderflower Rye.

Being from south of the border, I had no feckin’ clue who Robertson Davies was until I did a bit of Online Research. Turns out he was one of Canada’s most celebrated authors, The Deptford Trilogy being among his notable works. Hmmm... a few more books for me to read after I clear away the existing pile on my nightstand.

I have no idea whether drinking this cocktail will help inspire the writerly impulse, but it can’t help to try and find out. Here’s how you make one:

2 ounces rye whiskey (The Fairmont Royal York uses Knob Creek rye)
1 ounce Aperol
1 ounce St. Germain elderflower liqueur

Combine in a cocktail shaker with ice; stir and strain into an old-fashioned glass with a honking big ice cube. Drink several and then write about the experience.

Postscriptum:
Well, I’m enjoying one of these bad boys as I grill a dry-aged New York strip steak and prepare a vat of asparagus-spinach soup. And it’s Just Fine.

[Tip of the Elisson fedora to Ben René for the recipe.]

A BAKER’S BROMIDE

A lively, foaming bucket of home-grown sourdough starter, resurrected after having been kept in the freezer since before Passover. After thawing it out, a few daily feedings were sufficient to wake it up and keep it happy.

This is my starter. There are many like it, but this one is mine.

My starter is my bread’s best friend. It is my loaf’s life. I must master it if I want lively loaves. My starter, without me, is useless. Without my starter, I am useless. I must feed my starter well. I must ferment my dough better than my competitors who are trying to outbake me. I must bake or be baked. I will...

My starter and I know that what counts in baking is not the number of loaves we bake, the clatter of our pans, nor the aroma we make. We know that it is the taste of our loaves that counts. We will bake tasty loaves...

My starter is made of cells, even as I, because it is a living being. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strengths, its components, its behavior, its leavening power. I will keep my starter well fed and ready, even as I am well fed and ready. We will become part of each other. We will...

Before Gawd, I swear this creed. My starter and I are the defenders of our dough. We are the lords of our leavening. We are the saviors of our sandwich bread.

So be it, until we can boast of our baguettes and drink a toast to our toast!

IT’S CRACKERS

“It’s crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide.” - Magersfontein Lugg


The Seed 75 cocktail, a perfect way to use that bottle of Old Tom gin you have in the back of your Booze-Box. (What, you don’t have a bottle of Old Tom gin in the back of your Booze-Box?)

One of the nicer local eateries hereabouts - Seed Kitchen and Bar - offers a cocktail called Capture the Flag, a concoction that includes Maestro Dobel tequila, lemon juice, a house-made port-pineapple syrup, and Ramazzotti, the last being an Italian amaro. It’s probably the Missus’s favorite cocktail, and I can’t say I blame her for liking it as much as she does. It is sweet, but not overly so, and it has layer upon layer of flavors. Oh, and it also packs a wallop, something to watch out for, as that alcoholic fist is well disguised in a highly drinkable glove.

The only problem I see with this Adult Beverage is that I cannot, as yet, make it at home - that is, until I manage to convince one of the bartenders at Seed to fork over the recipe for the port-pineapple syrup. But in the meantime, there is another tipple on offer there that I can make at home: the Seed 75. And it is a fine drink. It’s simply Hayman’s Old Tom gin, lemon juice, and pomegranate grenadine. The last one I made, I used 2 ounces gin, the juice of half a Meyer lemon, and a scant ounce of my homemade grenadine, and it was superb. (You really need to use an Old Tom gin for this; the more familiar London dry gin style doesn’t really work.)

What to eat while you’re sipping on your Seed 75? How about some Cheesy Smoked Paprika Crackers, courtesy of those fine folks over at Serious Eats? I ran up a batch of these bad boys a few days ago and now I’m regretting it, for they are powerfully addictive.


Cheesy Smoked Paprika Crackers. These decadent little bastards are sprinkled with smoked sea salt and fleur de sel.

Postscriptum: The quotation above will be familiar to anyone who read Mad magazine in the 1950’s or early ’60’s. It was a recurring catchphrase - at least, in Mad - that had been lifted from The Fashion in Shrouds (1938), one of Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion crime novels. It means, “It’s crazy to pay off a cop in phony money,” in case you’re curious.

Postscriptum the Second: See that tray of crackers? There were a handful of ’em left over from Friday evening, nicely wrapped for future use. But not any more. (Urp.)

A DAY FOR CELEBRATION

Elder Daughter, in a photograph taken six years ago during our legendary Japan trip.

Today, May 11, is a celebratory twofer: It is Elder Daughter’s thirty-fifth birthday (!) and it is, appropriately enough, Mother’s Day as well.

Yes, it was thirty-five years ago today that She Who Must Be Obeyed delivered unto us our firstborn daughter. Dr. Phil’s tiresome catchphrase - “This is going to be a changing day in your life” - was never more apropos, for that day indeed changed our lives forever.

Until the moment she arrived, I looked forward to the Blessèd Event with a mixture of eagerness and stark, staring fear. Being a Daddy, after all, was a huge new responsibility, and I did not want to be found lacking in the necessary skills to do the job right. All uncertainty and doubt evaporated the moment we saw our beautiful new daughter: It was love at first sight in the deepest and most abiding sense.

She’s a wonderful woman now, thirty-five years down the road, with a keen insight for people, an ebullient personality, and a unique creative intelligence. I could not be prouder to have her as a daughter.

Of course, none of this would have been possible without the motherly part of the equation - She Who Must Be Obeyed - and it is a happy coincidence that Elder Daughter’s birthday so frequently coincides with Mother’s Day, as it does this year. SWMBO has contributed far more than half of Elder Daughter’s DNA. She has been a gentle guiding hand; a source of wisdom, love, and support; and an unflinching advocate for both our daughters. I could not ask for a finer mother for my children, and I love her with all my heart.

To Elder Daughter, happy birthday! May you have long years in health and happiness, without limit to any good thing.

To She Who Must Be Obeyed, happy Mother’s Day! Our daughters are the most wonderful gift you ever could have given me, and so much of their thoughtfulness and insight are the result of their having your example from which to learn.

To the other mothers in my life - Mimi, Mamacita Chelo (¡mi querida!), Toni, and all the rest - happy Mother’s Day! For where would we be without mothers? Nonexistent, that’s what. And without their love, we might exist... but it would be a miserable existence.

AHHH, FRIDAY

I look forward to Fridays.

Even though I’ve been retired from the Great Corporate Salt Mine for over five years, I still have a keen awareness of what day of the week it happens to be at any given time... and Fridays are one of the good ones.

We generally get together with a group of friends for Shabbat dinner, a dinner that we sanctify with the lighting of candles and the appropriate blessings over wine and bread. Much of the time, that bread consists of home-baked challah, a couple of loaves of which are just about ready for braiding and shaping even as I write this. The wine may or may not be kosher, but that’s OK with our group.

Tonight the main event will be thick beefsteaks, carved by Yours Truly from a massive primal cut and grilled to what I hope will be perfection. She Who Must Be Obeyed will prepare a fish dish for those who do not partake of the beefness. Others have been tasked with the preparation of side dishes - vegetables and starches, et al. - appetizers, salad, and dessert. It’s a sort of Foodly Crowdsourcing, a potluck supper with some structure. And it’s always a delight.

May your weekend be pleasurable and (for those of my Esteemed Readers who are Red Sea Pedestrians) may your Shabbat be filled with love and peace.

THE ELISSON BOOKSHELF

It’s been a little over six months since my last Bookshelf Post, so I suppose it’s as good a time as any to bring you, my Esteemed Readers, up to date on the books I’ve been reading.

As I pointed out in my last bookly summary, the above photo is somewhat misleading, filled as it is with Dead Trees. More and more I find myself gravitating toward books in electronic form: This past six months, exactly half of my reading has moved to my iPad and iPhone. Electronic books are eminently portable, and new ones can be delivered unto my devices in seconds at the touch of a button (or, more likely, the click of a mouse, accompanied by the instant drainage of bank account.) When I use my iPad, I can read in the dead of night without the need for a reading lamp... and I can adjust the size of the font all the way from microscopic to Old Blind Guy. Hardcopy books, on the other hand, still deliver a more satisfactory tactile experience... and when the electrical supply fails, I can still read by natural light.So there’s that.

Enough prefatory drivel! Here are the last few months’ worth of reads, with electronic versions marked with an asterisk:

October

• Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety - Eric Schlosser

This book will scare the ever-loving crap out of you. The Damascus accident is not something that took place in Syria - it was a fire in a Titan II missile silo that came very close to wiping Arkansas off the map. And it is by far not the only close call involving our arsenal of Doomsday Weaponry. When you learn how vulnerable nuclear weapons are to simple accidents, you realize that it is a thoroughgoing wonder that in the time since these devices were invented almost seventy years ago, there has not been an accidental nuclear detonation. Yet.

November

• Relish: My Life in the Kitchen - Lucy Knisley
  
  Lucy Kinsley tells the story of growing up and being exposed to Good Food in an unusual combination of memoir, graphic novel, and cookbook.


• Insane City* - Dave Barry
  
  Nobody captures the complete nuttiness of south Florida quite like Dave Barry. This novel includes Haitian refugees, a giant snake, a horny orangutan, a billionaire, and a good-intentioned, somewhat nebbishy young man who is trying to juggle all of the above without blowing his Big Wedding.
  

December

• Doctor Sleep* - Stephen King
  
  The long-awaited follow-up to The Shining, one of King’s great novels from the 1970’s, catches up with Danny Torrance many years after the horrific events in The Overlook. Informed by the author’s own struggles with alcoholism, it’s vintage King: horror, but with a warm heart beating at its core. 
  
  
• Fate is the Hunter - Ernest K. Gann
  
  Ernest K. Gann, author of The High and the Mighty, recounts his adventures as a pilot in the early days of commercial aviation... a considerably more hazardous business then than now, and as always one that requires grace under pressure, the ability to make quick decisions, and a cool head. 
   
• The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets* - Simon Singh
  
  Given that the writing staff for “The Simpsons” has an exceptionally large percentage of talented mathematicians, it is hardly surprising that they would cram all kinds of subtle (and not-so-subtle) mathematical jokes into the show. This book has the lowdown on the ones you saw... and the ones you may not have noticed.
   
• Tartine Bread* - Chad Robertson
  
  Chad Robertson, the mad genius behind the Tartine Bakery in (where else?) coastal California, shares his knowledge on making amazing sourdough breads. It has become my sourdough bible, and it’s where I learned to make great sourdough boules, baguettes, and English muffins.
  

January

• Frozen in Time: An Epic Story of Survival and a Modern Quest for Lost Heroes of World War II* - Mitchell Zuckoff
  
  The adventures of a band of American soldiers stranded on the Greenland ice cap during World War II... and of the salvors who, half a century later, searched for and located their wrecked plane.
  

February

• As a Driven Leaf - Milton Steinberg
  
  A novel set during the early Rabbinic period, this is the story of the moral and intellectual struggles of a scholar who, disillusioned with the faith of his people, seeks enlightenment among the pagan Romans who occupy their land.
  

March

• Russka*- Edward Rutherfurd
  
  A novel of sweeping historical scope and turgid phrase, this book nevertheless provides the reader with some insight into the history of both Russia and the Ukraine and the fraught relationship between the two.
  
  
• The Telling Room: A Tale of Love, Betrayal, Revenge, and the World's Greatest Piece of Cheese* - Michael Paterniti
  
  The title says it all. After having read this book, I want to live in Spain where I can drink wine and eat cheese.
  
  
• A World Lit Only by Fire: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance - Portrait of an Age* - William Manchester
  
  Manchester puts forth the thesis that Ferdinand Magellan’s historic voyage - his expedition succeeded in circumnavigating the globe, even if Magellan himself did not survive it - spelled the end of the Dark and Middle Ages, a lengthy period that is in itself an instructive cautionary tale concerning the effects of an insufficient separation of Church and State. An excellent book that has an enormous amount of information about just how nasty things were Back in the Day.


• Calculating God*- Robert J. Sawyer
  
  Aliens arrive in Toronto (yes, Toronto), looking not to meet our leader but to study prehistoric extinction events in an effort to better understand the nature of God.
  
  
• The Stars My Destination* - Alfred Bester
  
  A science fiction classic from the 1950’s that introduced the idea of teleportation by mental power alone (the “Jaunte”), it’s one that I had managed never to read... until now.
  
  
• The Golem and the Jinni - Helene Wecker
  
  A love story involving characters of very different backgrounds. This is Helene Wecker’s debut novel; I believe it is the beginning of a fine career as a novelist.

April

• The Man Who Ate Everything - Jeffrey Steingarten
  
  Jeffrey Steingarten manages to overcome his loathing of Greek food after he is appointed food editor of Vogue magazine. A collection of food-related essays - many amusing and most of them informative. (Thanks, Cappy!)
  
  
• Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know - and Doesn't - Stephen Prothero
  
  The premise of Stephen Prothero’s book is that Americans are the world’s most vocal proponents of religiosity, but at the same time they are by and large completely ignorant of what’s actually in those Bibles that they love to thump... not to mention the basic tenets of other major world religions. Faith is a powerful force in today’s world, as anyone who remembers the 9/11 attacks can attest, and this ignorance does not serve us well.


• Dark Summit: The True Story of Everest’s Most Controversial Season - Nick Heil
  
  The 2006 climbing season was the deadliest since 1996, that latter captured in Jon Krakauer’s riveting account Into Thin Air. Everest has since become ever more commercialized, but the dangers still persist - as evidenced by the massive death toll in 2014 after an avalanche on the Khumbu Icefall struck a group of climbers and their Sherpa guides, wiping out twelve. I am happy to leave the mountain climbing to others, thankyouverymuch.
  

So what have you been reading lately?

APRIL GUILD EVENT

Our April Guild event will be this evening at The Shed at Glenwood and will feature wines from the Rhône region of France, home to great reds like Châteauneuf-du-Pape and Hermitage.

I’m a sucker for a good red wine, and I’ll even put up with a good white wine... so I’m in. So, happily, is Houston Steve. The wine will flow, and so, too, will the conversation, laced with bad puns recounted in an East London accent. Here’s what we’ll be consuming:

Reception Wine
Domaine Achard-Vincent Clairette de Die**
(90% Muscat Blancà Petits Grains, 10% Clairette)

First Flight
2011 Domaine Lafond Lirac Blanc**
(50% Grenache Blanc, 30% Roussanne, 20% Viognier)
2010 Fortia Châteauneuf-du-Pape Blanc
(60% Clairette, 30% Roussanne, 10% Grenache Blanc)
MV Avril “Petit Avril” Blanc*
(98% Marsanne, 2% Chardonnay)
Antipastos and baguettes (olives, cured meats, mozzarella)
Watermelon salad, fromage blanc, candied peanuts, basil

Second Flight
2010 Charbonnière Vacqueyras*
(60% Grenache,40% Syrah)
2011 Boissan Gigondas****
(80% Grenache, 20% Syrah)
2011 Cros de Romet (Alain Boisson) Cairanne**
Duck confit and terrine of local mushrooms, fava bean salad, chèvre

Third Flight
2011 Charbonnière Châteauneuf-du-Pape Vieilles Vignes***
(Grenache from 80 yr old vines and Mourvèdre from 100 yr old vines)
2011 Charbonnière Châteauneuf-du-Pape Mourre des Pedrix**
(Grenache, Syrah, Mourvèdre, Cinsault)
2011 Charbonnière Châteauneuf-du-Pape Brusquières*
(70% Grenache, 30% Syrah)
Smoked pork loin, jalapeño grits, huckleberry sauce, daikon
Brussels sprouts, cider vinegar, bacon, apple
Asparagus, chanterelle and saffron risotto, Parmesan

Fourth Flight
2011 Saint-Cosme Côte-Rôtie**
2009 Matthieu Barret (Coulet) Cornas “Les Terrasses du Serre”****
2010 Domaine du Colombier Crozes-Hermitage “Cuvée Gabby”**

Lagniappe
1999 J. Vidal-Fleurie Côte-Rôtie***

Update:
A few really excellent wines, including the 2009 Coulet Cornas Terrasses du Serre, which displayed a remarkably Bordeaux-like character (Houston Steve compared the bouquet to the aroma of the leather seats of his father’s classic Jaguar, and that’s a good thing.) It was also the most expensive of the evening’s wines, at $79.99 the bottle. But for only $29.99, the 2011 Boissan Gigondas was remarkably intense and aromatic, one that I would be happy to drink again and again.

The food? Well, they had me at duck confit, but the asparagus risotto was quite lovely, as was the loin of treif. All, in all, a very successful evening.

THE NOT-SCOTCH SCOTCH

Suntory Hibiki, 17 years old.

Most of us, when we think of whisky - that’s whisky without the “e” - we think of Scotland. That’s as it should be: If you want your whiskey with an “e,” you have to go to Ireland... or across the pond to America, where bourbon and rye reign supreme. Fine creatures all, but not at all the same as the wonderful Water of Life the Scots brew with their smoke and peat.

And then you have Japan, a country with a serious culinary tradition that is not well understood by most Westerners, who pretty much stop at the California roll. Japan, a country in which a single melon, offered at the peak of ripeness and aesthetic perfection, can command well over US$100. Japan, a country that is adept at taking Western ideas and technologies and putting their own unique spin on them. (The fabled Japanese Game Show is but one example.)

You can find no-e whisky in Japan, and I am here to tell you, it can be Mighty Fine.

You’re looking at the remnants of a bottle I purchased at Narita Airport six years ago when I made a pilgrimage to the Land of the Rising Sony with Elder Daughter. After having consumed most of it, I had tucked it into a hidden recess in my Lacquer Liquor Locker, where it remained until just a couple of days ago.

This particular whisky is a blended malt - a combination of several single malts but without neutral spirits. It is extraordinary, smooth with notes of toffee, vanilla, and caramel. Very much like a good single malt Scotch, but subtly, inscrutably different.

A little research has established that to replace this bottle, I would have to spend something on the order of $180 today... well above what I paid for it in Tokyo six years ago. A good investment, sez I.

GOLLY GHEE

Ghee. Tasty, golden, buttery, nutty ghee.

Sometime last summer, I was taken with the inexplicable urge to cook up a mess of Doro Wat, a fiery Ethiopian chicken stew. (Anything that has onions, chicken, and plenty of red-hot pepper is likely to appeal to me, so perhaps that urge was not quite as inexplicable as it seemed at first blush.)

The recipe came from a site called Nom Nom Paleo, which I had found as a link on my Farcebook feed. While I do not necessarily subscribe to the Paleo eating philosophy, I do know tasty when I see it. The Doro Wat was just that.

To make Doro Wat, the first thing you do is caramelize a bunch of hacked up red onions... and the preferred fat for this job is ghee, which has a high smoking point and which contributes a unique nutty flavor.

With its slightly scary-sounding Indian name, ghee may seem exotic... but it really isn’t. It’s nothing more or less than clarified butter, the same stuff one uses for dipping chunks of lobster. It’s easy enough to make... and waaaay less costly than the prepackaged version you’ll find at the local Whole Paycheck Foods. All you do is melt a pile of unsalted sweet cream butter (the highest quality you can get) in a saucepan over medium-low heat, let it come to a bubbly simmer, and skim off the foamy goop that rises to the surface. After about 10-15 minutes or so, the bubbles get smaller and subside as the moisture in the butter cooks off while the remaining milk solids drop to the bottom of the pan and begin to turn brown. Don’t wait until they burn - that’s the time to take the melted butter off the heat and strain out those browned solids. You should have a nice, clear, golden liquid. Pour it into a Mason jar and screw on the lid.

You can store ghee at room temperature, but if that makes you nervous, stick it in the fridge. (That’s where I keep it, mainly so I don’t clutter the kitchen counters unnecessarily.)

I made a quart-size batch last August - eight months ago to the day! - and only now has my supply run low. So this afternoon I made enough to replenish my inventory.

Damn, this stuff is delicious. I still like to use a squirt of olive oil for cooking my eggs, but a little bit of ghee gives them a wonderful buttery, nutty flavor. It’s a perfect “something extra” added to sautéed or steamed vegetables. I’ll bet you could use it to doctor up a passel of saltines, too. Golly ghee, whatever did we do without it?

GIVE ME THAT OLDE TYME ARTISANAL CRAFT BEER

Nacho Punch serves up this video of hipsters ordering beer. Elder Daughter can probably attest to its veracity. Snarfed from the HuffPo, of all places.

SMIT-WIT-FISS

Some people use clocks and calendars to measure the passage of time. I use my SMTWTFS.

Oh, you don’t know what a SMTWTFS is? It’s one of those little plastic thingumabobs that holds your pills. It has a separate box for each day of the week, each box labeled with the initial of the day: thus, SMTWTFS. I pronounce it “Smit-Wit-Fiss.”

Every evening, I pop open my SMTWTFS and remove that day’s supply of Old Man Medicine: baby aspirin, statin pill, fish oil capsules, vitamin D... plus an anti-allergy pill in the springtime, when pollen lies thick on the land. I swallow the small handful of pills and capsules in one gulp, chased by a shot of water straight from the bathroom tap. (She Who Must Be Obeyed is appalled by the fact that I drink bathroom water, believing that it somehow becomes contaminated by Poop-Cooties by virtue of its passage through pipes located within fifty feet of a Water-Closet. Go figure.)

Once all the boxes are empty, it is of course time to reload. I fill each of the seven compartments with my various medicaments, taking that evening’s dose directly out of the bottles. Thus I only have to recharge the SMTWTFS once every eight days. That’s efficiency for you!

And thus I gauge the passage of my days, eight at a time. O, how they fly in their octal progression, alas!

A COPROLOGICAL QUERY

Betimes a Food-Baby may be born
A-studded with golden grains of corn.
So, too, when the Elephant drops his load
Alongside of the jungle road,
Would it be crazy? Would it just be nuts?
To imagine it decorated with peanuts?
And doth it make the Grizzly merry
To see his scat festooned with berries?

SLIV ’N’ LIV

“If you are Jewish, this is the spirit that speaks to you. Drink enough and it speaks for you.” - Edward Serotta, regarding slivovitz

The eight-day festival of Passover presents a few challenges to those of us Red Sea Pedestrians who happen to enjoy the occasional (or frequent) Whisky-Drink... mainly because products made from grain, with the exception of matzoh, are verboten. That means that whisky - Scotch, bourbon, rye, and their happy cousins - is not on the drink card. It also eliminates most white spirits as well as beer. (Potato vodka is OK, as is rum... at least in theory.)

That unhappy gap is filled perfectly by slivovitz, an eau-de-vie distilled from Damson plums. It’s a popular item in eastern Europe as well as the Balkans, and many brands are officially certified to be kosher for Passover use. Perfect!

Well, maybe not perfect. There’s plenty of inferior slivovitz out there, and the bad stuff bears a remarkable resemblance, taste-wise, to Ronsonol lighter fluid. Also, it’s powerful. Most of the brands I’ve seen are bottled at or around 100 proof, not for the faint of heart. Nevertheless, there are excellent versions available if you’re willing to look around. Right now we’re working our way through a bottle of R. Jelinek’s Silver Slivovitz, a higher-end Czech product that is competitive with any of the finer eaux-de vie. Kirschwasser, meet slivovitz. Sliv, kirsch.

Gee, I'll bet it’s dandy with a bit of my homemade grenadine and a squirt of lemon. Hmmm.

Now: What to eat while you’re swilling sliv? Why, chopped liver, of course! Gehackte leber, as we might call it in Yiddish. The high-test character of slivovitz is perfect for cutting through the unctuousness of fine chopped liver.

You say you’re not a chopped liver fan? Well, it’s not for everyone... and neither are oysters, Champagne, and caviar. (OK, chopped liver is somewhat, ahhh, earthier than these other examples, but you can call it pâté de foie de volaille if you want it to sound classy.) If you don’t like liver, or if you have a loathing for organ meats in general, then chopped liver may not be for you.And that’s OK: More for me.

Although you can find perfectly decent chopped liver in your supermarket’s kosher section, this year I made my own. It’s easy enough.

Start with about a pound of chicken livers. (If you prefer, use beef liver. Weirdo.) Remove any connective tissue and cut into medium chunks. Melt about a tablespoon of chicken schmaltz in a large skillet and sauté the livers until cooked through. Set aside.

Now, hack up a couple of yellow onions: You should have about four cups of chopped onion. Melt four tablespoons of chicken schmaltz in that skillet and cook the onions over medium-low heat until very soft and just slightly brown. This may take half an hour, thereabouts - you want to do it low and slow to get the onions nice and soft and caramelized. 


Onions cooking gently in schmaltz. Goose schmaltz. Yummy, yummy goose schmaltz.

Now, after the onions and livers have cooled down a bit, run them through the coarse plate of a meat grinder. Then run the mixture through again, this time through the fine plate. (Alternatively, chop them up well in a bowl with a hockmesser - the half-moon shaped chopper known to Italian cooks as the mezzaluna.) Season with plenty of salt and freshly ground black pepper, and add some more schmaltz if it’s too dry. Presto! You have gehackte leber.

Some people like to add chopped egg to their livers. If you are this type of person, feel free to chop up one or two hard-boiled eggs and combine with the liver mixture. I elected to do without the egg, and I was extremely satisfied with the results.

Of course, I had a secret weapon. In lieu of chicken schmaltz, I used goose schmaltz, which is far richer and more flavorful. Having a goodly amount of goose schmaltz sitting in my freezer is a fringe benefit of my custom of roasting a goose once a year. (If you have no goose schmaltz near to hand, duck fat works beautifully.)

Yes, this batch of chopped liver was, dare I say, epic. (SWMBO might disagree, but then again, she does not partake of any sort of liver.) And, enjoyed with a shot of slivovitz - sliv ’n’ liv! - it was even better than epic: It was epicurean.

SHARP AS A MATZOH

“By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.” - Shakespeare

“Merely touch it with your thumbs: Matzoh makes a lot of crumbs.” - Elisson

When my Daddy, the late Eli (hizzownself), wished to compliment someone, he would, like as not, state that that person looked “sharp as a matzoh and twice as crumby.”

Nonsense, sure, but as with all good nonsense, there is more than a grain of truth in it... or in this case, a crumb of truth. For there is nothing as crumby as matzoh.

We don’t call it the Bread of Affliction for nothing, yo.


Handmade shmura matzoh.

Not only is it famously constipation-inducing, but matzoh - the unleavened bread consumed by us Red Sea Pedestrians during the eight-day Passover festival that begins at sundown this evening - is incredibly crumby stuff. Simply look at it sideways, and little shards will break off, working their way into the tablecloth, your clothing, and any nearby floor. This time of year, our house is filled with Matzoh Detritus. Crumbs.

You cannot avoid them. They are everywhere. Matzoh-crumbs get onto every horizontal surface. They stick to many vertical ones, too, owing to their light weight and grabby little edges. Try to pick one up: Hydra-like, it multiplies, breaking into smaller, harder-to-pick-up chunks.

Funny thing about matzoh. It’s really not bad, this Unleavened Bread. Every year, I enjoy a Matzoh Honeymoon for the first few days of Pesach. We eat it happily, with charoset (the traditional relish of apples, nuts, and wine that is reminiscent of the mortar with which the ancient Israelites built Pharaoh’s cities), with horseradish, with cheese, or slathered with butter. But after five or six days, the honeymoon is over, and crumbs - those fucking crumbs! - are everywhere.

It’s traditional to clean the house thoroughly before Passover, in order to ensure the complete absence of leaven. But it’s at least as necessary to have another thorough cleaning after the holiday is over, in order to remove the quadrillion or so little matzoh-smithereens that manage to adhere to every surface.

“Bread of affliction,” indeed. Oy.

[Adapted from a post originally published on April 11, 2009.]

THE COOKIE KID: A 100-WORD ORIGIN STORY

Fidgeting, forehead glazed with sweat, Joe sat across from Max Schwartz, the vaudeville impresario, his toddler son cradled in his lap.

Nervous? Why wouldn’t he be? Max held Joe Junior’s future in his hands. Junior didn’t seem to be concerned, though. He sat quietly until his father asked him to demonstrate some of his dancing skills.

Max gnawed on a macaroon as he watched. The kid was good. Way better than good.

“We’ll need to give him a stage name,” announced Max. Absently regarding the half-eaten coconut cookie in his hand, he suddenly brightened. “That’s it!” he cried. “Mickey Rooney!”

[Mickey Rooney, who began his decades-long acting career at the tender age of seventeen months, passed away yesterday at the age of 93. Requiescat in pace, Andy Hardy!]

ELI

Eli, 1925-2014. Barukh dayan emet.

He’s gone now.

There is no person who has been a bigger part of my life. In addition to supplying half of my DNA - including at least 75% of my sense of humor - he has shared this planet with me for over sixty-one years. Longer than anyone else.

Alas, he is with us no more... but I shall always be Eli’s son.

TINY BUBBLES

Tiny bubbles
In the bread
Make me feel happy
Ah, they go to my head

Those tiny bubbles
Make me feel so nice
You know that I’m gonna
Love that butter conveyance device

So here’s to the golden crust
And here’s to the butter knife
And here’s some tasty toast
For me and my wife

When the tiny bubbles (tiny bubbles)
In the bread (in the bread)
They make me feel happy (make me feel happy)
They go to my head (go to my head)

Those tiny bubbles (tiny bubbles)
Make me warm all over (make me warm all over)
With a feeling that I’m gonna (with a feeling that I’m gonna)
Love that butter conveyance device (it’s so nice)

Tiny bubbles (oooh-a-licki)
In the bread (ik-a-may-li)
Make me feel happy (a-ka-oli)
Ah, they go to my head (ik-a-ba-al-he)


Naturally leavened bread dough completes its bulk fermentation. Lookit all them little tiny bubbles!


The final result. Mmmm, crusty!

Even Don Ho would approve.

MARCH GUILD EVENT

This evening’s Sommelier Guild event will be held at Murphy’s in Virginia Highland. It features Burgundies... specifically, Burgundies produced by Maison Louis Jadot in 2007 and 2009.

I’m more of a Bordeaux than a Burgundy guy, but that’s probably more due to laziness on my part than anything else: I tend to stick with what I like when buying or ordering wine. But some of the finest wines in the world come from Burgundy, so who am I to turn down a learning opportunity? Besides, what sort of Georgian would turn up his nose at wines made from the legendary “Peanut Noir” grape?

As far as the Foodly Accompaniments go, I do love a good coq au vin, especially when I don’t have to mess up my own kitchen making it. And salmon - a full-flavored fish - is one of my go-to dishes, one that I am happy to enjoy along with red wine. It will be interesting to see how it pairs up with three serious Burgundies.


The evening’s array of Winey Goodies. [Click to embiggen.]

Now, let’s take a look at tonight’s menu, shall we?

Openers:
NV Collon Brut Grower Champagne**
Mini crab cakes

First Flight:
2004 Kistler Chardonnay
Mystery Wine (served blind)
2011 Beringer Private Reserve Chardonnay***
Crispy flatbread with arugula and prosciutto

Second Flight: Beaune Premier Crus
2007 Jadot Theurons
2009 Jadot Theurons*
2007 Jadot Bressandes
Chef Ian’s Surprise Course - Lentil Soup with Black Truffles and Truffle Oil

Third Flight: Beaune Premier Crus
2009 Jadot Boucherottes**
2009 Jadot Clos des Coucheraux*
2009 Jadot Clos des Ursules***
Coq au vin with potatoes and pearl onions

Fourth Flight: Côte de Nuits Premier Crus and Côte de Beaune Grand Cru
2009 Jadot Les Boudots Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru
2009 Jadot Gevrey-Chambertin Estournelles-Saint-Jacques Premier Cru*
2007 Jadot Corton Pougets Côte de Beaune Grand Cru*
Grilled salmon with cheese grits and local cabbage slaw

Lagniappe:
2000 Henri Gouges Clos des Porrets Monopole, Nuits-Saint-Georges Premier Cru**
2009 Cénit - Viñas del Cénit, Zamora, Spain*

Some three decades ago, we were friendly with the executive chef at one of Atlanta’s fancy-pants dining establishments. Every so often, when he would clear out some of his wine inventory, I would be able to grab a few bottles of Jadot Burgundy at wholesale cost. Man, would I love to be able to do that today.

As usual, I’ll report back after the event with a summary of my preferences.

Update: I had had such high expectations coming into this event, but Burgundy will not be replacing Bordeaux as my favorite French appellation anytime soon - at least, not on the strength of this evening’s showing.  Except for the third flight, which combined a reasonable rendition of coq au vin (chicken stewed in wine) with several pleasant enough wines, most of the evening was, alas, not up to the usual standards. The wines were, for the most part, thin and uninspiring. The salmon was bland, and the Chef’s Surprise - a bowl of lentil soup with the captivating aroma of black truffle - was salty to the point of inedibility. Ouch. (On the other hand, the crab cake was a little gem, perfectly prepared and with no detectable filler.)

Oh, well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Not every dinner can be a winner. [Insert your favorite cliché here.]

Bonus Question:



Let’s see how much of a Wine Geek you are. Take a look at the bottle above. What’s wrong with it?

[El Capitan knew the answer. If you think you do, leave a comment!]

Attendees at this month’s Guild event - 24 of ’em - were asked this question upon arriving at the restaurant. Only three got it right... including Yours Truly. No, we did not win any valuable prizes.

ON PENS... AND QUILLS

The Pen-guin sits up-on the shore
And loves the lit-tle fish to bore;
He has one en-er-vat-ing joke
That would a very Saint provoke:
“The Pen-guin's might-i-er than the sword-fish”;
He tells this dai-ly to the bored fish,
Un-til they are so weak, they float
With-out re-sis-tance down his throat.

- Oliver Herford

Well, I don’t know much about penguins - aside from the fact that the insidious little bastards are plotting to take over the world, that is - but I do know something about pens.

I’ve used all manner of pens over the years. Aside from the ubiquitous ballpoint, my list of Writing Implements includes fountain pens ranging from the humble Sheaffer to the more rarefied Parker and Montblanc. In my engineering student years, I used Staedtler-Mars and Rapidograph engineering pens, pens capable of drawing lines of an exact thickness, useful for engineering diagrams but also for cartooning. Lookee:



Princeton Tiger Magazine, September 1972. Cover drawing done entirely with Staedtler-Mars engineering pens.

Among my vast collection of pens you can find all manner of calligraphy pens (I used to take class notes with a chisel-tip Osmiroid. A stupid affectation? You bet), Speedball lettering pens, and even a few Hunt Crow Quills. Nothing like a Hunt Crow Quill for detail work.

No, a Crow Quill is a metal pen nib. It’s not something yanked from a bird’s ass, although I have used that type of quill to write with as well.

Speaking of quills, there’s a completely different type of quill I have been enjoying lately: the Quill Cocktail.

The Quill is a variation on the Negroni theme. Simply put, it’s a Negroni with a little bit of absinthe thrown in to give it a bit of an anise flavor note.


Quill Cocktail. For sure, mightier than a swordfish.

You want your own Quill? Here’s how:

Quill Cocktail

1 ounce gin (I used Hendrick’s)
1 ounce sweet vermouth (I used Punt e Mes. Carpano Antica works well, too)
1 ounce Campari
¼ ounce absinthe

Combine in a cocktail shaker with ice. Stir and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange twist. Enjoy!

THE SCHMEARIN’ O’ TH’ GREEN

What better way to observe Saint Padraig’s Day than by baking up an eight-pack of shamrock green bagels?


“Kiss me, I’m Irish.” “Eat me, I’m Jewish.”

One of the Missus’s colleagues has a permanent standing order for my green Saint Padraig’s bagels.  There was still enough high-gluten flour in the pantry left over from an earlier bagel-baking session, so I was happy to oblige. After mixing and kneading the dough yesterday afternoon, I was up at 5:30 this morning to finish them off with a quick boil and bake.

These babies are coated with the traditional blend of Irish toppings: white sesame seeds, black sesame seeds, wasabi sesame seeds, poppy seeds, and Montreal steak seasoning. And the wasabi sesame seeds are green - an added bonus.

The best way to eat these? Perhaps a gentle schmear of Kerrygold Irish butter... perhaps a slice of smoked salmon... or decorated with a chunk of Dubliner cheddar. Decisions, decisions!

I’LL HAVE WHAT HE’S HAVING: A 100-WORD STORY

Harry’s Delicatessen was the hot spot in Boulder, Colorado for Jewish cooking.

Harry piled his pastrami sandwiches high with silken, garlic-spiked meat. His matzoh balls were clouds floating in a chickeny firmament. Nova Scotia salmon, sable, belly lox were all of the highest quality.

No matter how stuffed his customers were, they would always save room for dessert. The rugelach and chocolate babka could make strong men weep with pleasure.

It was after recreational marijuana was legalized when Harry’s business really took off. Other delis sold hamantaschen, but Harry’s ganja-filled rastamantaschen had customers lined up out the door for blocks.

[Tip o’ th’ Elisson fedora to Josh - the redoubtable son of Houston Steve - for the inspiration and artwork for this story.]

TIMEQUACK: A 100-WORD BOOK SYNOPSIS

Kurt Vonneduck’s Timequack is the story of Ludwig von Drake, an inventor who builds a time machine that transports him to a Duckburg of the Far Future (802,701 anno mallardi), an almost unrecognizable world in which ducks have divided into two separate species.

As Von Drake explores this strange Future Duckburg, he sees that the Muscoveloi live pleasant lives on the surface of the duckpond, their needs provided by the underwater-dwelling Mallardlocks. It is only after days of observation and speculation (interspersed with several harrowing adventures) that he realizes that, to the Mallardlocks, the Muscoveloi are naught but farm animals!

[Inspired by a typo. The book, of course, is Timequake.]

APLOMB: A WORKING DEFINITION

His Lordship the Earl of Grantham was in the study at Downton Abbey when Carson, the butler, approached and coughed discreetly. “May I ask a question, my lord?”

“Go ahead, Carson,” said His Lordship.

“I am doing the crossword in ‘The Times’ and I have found a word about which I am not too clear.”

“What word is that?” asked His Lordship.

“The word is ‘aplomb,’ my lord.”

“That is a difficult word to explain. I would say it means ‘self-assurance’ or ‘complete composure.’”

“Thank you, my lord, but I’m still a little confused.”

“Then, let me give you an example to make it clearer. Do you remember a few months ago the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrived to spend a weekend with us?”

“Of course, my lord, I remember the occasion very well. It gave the staff and me much pleasure to look after them.”

“Also,” continued Grantham, “do you remember that William plucked a rose for Kate from the garden?”

“I was indeed present on that occasion, my lord.”

“And while plucking the rose, a thorn embedded itself very deeply in his thumb?”

“Yes,” replied Carson. “I witnessed the incident, my lord, and saw the Duchess herself remove the thorn and bandage his thumb with her own dainty handkerchief.”

“And that evening, the prick on his thumb was so sore that Kate had to cut up his venison for him, even though - being from our own estate - it was extremely tender.”

“Yes, my lord, I saw and heard what transpired.”

“Then the next morning, while you were pouring coffee for Her Ladyship, Kate enquired of William in a loud voice, ‘Darling is your prick still throbbing this morning?’”

“And you, Carson, did not spill one drop of coffee. That was aplomb!”

[Tip o’ th’ Elisson fedora to Houston Steve for passing this little gem - what the Downton folks might call a Richard-Jest - along.]

THE CHEESE AISLE DICTIONARY, Vol. 20

Yet more stuff that should be in the dictionary but isn’t.

Long-time readers of my previous site may recall the Blog d’Elisson Dictionary, installments of which may be found in that site’s Archives. For other entries in the Cheese Aisle Dictionary, simply click on the sidebar link for Cheese-Dic.

And now, the Word of the Day:

spittoongria [spi-toon-gree-a] (n) - The contents of the dump bucket after a wine tasting.

“Just got back from the North Coast Wine Industry Expo in Sonoma... Honest to Gawd, I think they had enough spittoongria in those buckets to fill three fifty-five gallon drums by the time everyone cleared out!”

UNLEASHING THE YEAST BEAST

Though for my diet it is deadly,
I am obsessed with Matters Breadly.


The latest production from the Cheese Aisle Kitchen: French style baguettes.

(Just think of it as a couple of huge-ass breadsticks.)

FEBRUARY GUILD EVENT

This evening’s Sommelier Guild event at Petite Auberge zeroes in on red Bordeaux, specifically the vintages of 2009-10. For me, that is a win-win: my favorite wines, and in vintages that are considered by many to be not merely good, but splendid.

Throw in some of my most beloved proteins - duck! beef! lamb! - and I am already drooling. It should be an evening of Wretched Excess... and for extra fun, the three flights will be tasted blind. We won’t know which is which until we’ve had a chance to decide which one(s) we like best.

Now, what’s for dinner? Glad you asked:

Openers:
2009 Niven Valley Wine Estates Baileyana Chardonnay Grand Firepeak Cuvée**
Hors d’oeuvres

First Flight: Right Bank (served blind)
2009 Jean de Trimoulet Grand Cru - Saint-Émilion*
2010 Duo de Conseillante - Pomerol***
2010 Château Reynon - Côtes de Bordeaux**
Duck Breast à l’Orange - pan-seared Maple Leaf Farms duck breast topped with a duck jus flavored with a hint of orange, served with a cauliflower gratin

Second Flight: Southern Haut-Medoc and Graves (served blind)
2010 La Parde de Haut-Bailly - Pessac-Léognan***
2009 Moulin de La Lagune - Haut-Médoc*
2010 La Sirène de Giscours - Margaux**
Beef Wellington - Beef tenderloin, ham, and mushroom duxelles baked in a puff pastry crust, served with sauce bordelaise

Third Flight: Pauillac (served blind)
2010 Château Lacoste-Borie - Pauillac**
2009 Fleur de Pédesclaux - Pauillac***
2010 Hauts de Pontet-Canet - Pauillac*
Grilled New Zealand Lamb Chops - herb-encrusted rack of lamb served atop a root vegetable purée with a mint reduction

Lagniappe:
2008 Philippe Leclerc Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Les Cazetiers****
1996 Pride Mountain Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley
1990 Château Lafleur du Roy Pomerol****
2009 Louis Latour Marsannay*

Several of the wines in this tasting are “second wines” - a more economical version of the first wine produced by a given château. (For example, Château Giscours produces La Sirène de Giscours as their second wine; Château Grand-Puy-Lacoste calls their second wine Château Lacoste-Borie.) In great years like 2009 and 2010, the second wines ought to be pretty damned good, and I suspect they’d be even better with another ten years or so of bottle age on them.

We’ll just have to see...

Update: My favorites denoted with the usual asterisks... and several excellent bottles for “afters.”