The French are geniuses.

So, I never really thought much of French cooking, really. I dont know why, exactly, perhaps it was simply youthful rebellion against the overwhelming French influence on formalized Western cuisine, or my greater affinity for Asian styles of cooking, but I just never was terribly sold on the importance of it.

Oh, certainly, I recognized that some of the techniques were downright invaluable. I couldn't live without the roux, if nothing else. But I never really thought much of it, because it seemed like such a basic thing.

And despite being the Bourdain fan that I am, even when he'd go on at length about the wonders of French cooking, it still didn't really register.

Until I watched him make cassoulet.

It was for the Cleveland episode of No Reservations, that he prepared a cassoulet for Michael Ruhlman and his family.

Here was a dish, which basically involved cooking a bunch of different kinds of pork, inside of pork skin, with a pot-pie-like pastry crust to top the whole thing off.

Pork pot pie.

Any dismissal of the French instantly vaporized. I don't know how I can even entirely express in text with enough emphasis. I literally feel that the medium of text is inadequate to describe how utterly and completely astounded and infatuated I was at the very idea of this dish. I've taken longer to fall in love with women.

Of course, the moment I saw it, I knew I would have to make it. Someday, somehow, I would make a cassoulet, because it was simply too damn genius not to experience first hand, and there aren't exactly a lot of French bistros in the middle of the Oregon desert.

Well, today, I finally got my chance. I was perusing the days selection of meats at Ray's, and saw the package of pig skin, and immediately the light bulb moment went on in my head. I would make cassoulet. A chat with the butcher revealed that he was perfectly happy to cut me a bit of skin to suit even.

My mind was made up. A frenzy of activity ensued to acquire all the desired and needed ingredients for my own interpretation of the concept. First things first, I needed a pan, as my house is dreadfully short on them, and completely lacking one that was ovenable.

I wound up going with a cheap disposable foil 5lb. loaf pan.

Next was ingredients. At this point, I realized I was going to need a basket, so I went back to the door, and grabbed one, and basically worked my way around the store from there. A sweet potato, cheap surplus from Thanksgiving, a red bell pepper, shallot, Braeburn apple, fresh savory for some herbage, an onion which I didn't wind up actually using because of the strength of the shallot, some brown sugar and paprika for some further flavorants, a bottle of cheap pinot grigio (more cheap sale-priced Crane Lake), and two cans of white beans. From the butcher counter, 4 strips of peppered bacon, 1 large andouille sausage, a custom cut measure of pork skin, and a smoked pork hock chunk, cut in half. Finally, to top it off, premade pie crusts, to provide the topping.

Once I got it home, I discovered that the pork skin wasn't quite the big solid piece I'd hoped for, as he'd mostly just picked out bits from the already cut package from the shelf. Fortunately, there was a big enough sheet of it to cover the base of the pan, which I figured was good enough, so I laid it across the bottom of the pan.

Then, into the pan went the yam, shallot, apple, and red bell pepper, all diced, followed by three cloves of minced garlic. On top of this went the two halves of pork hock, followed by sliced andouille, and chopped bacon. On top of all this went the cans of white beans, draining the liguid into a seperate vessel first. Then seasoning: black pepper, paprika, cumin, New Mexico chili powder, garlic powder, salt, a sprig or two worth of the fresh savory, and a generous helping of brown sugar. For liquid, the liquid from the beans, a good amount of the pinot grigio (maybe a cup and a half or so), a bit of soya sauce and seasoned rice vinegar, and then topping it off with water until everything was roughly to the level of the top layer of beans.

All of this was topped by covering the top with the pie crust. One 9-inch pie crust wasn't quite big enough to cover the whole length of the pan, so I wound up using one whole one, and part of the other, crimping it over the top and trimming the excess from the side of the pan, then slitting across the top five times.

This went into the oven for about a half an hour at 350 degrees, followed by another 10 minutes or so at 450. This proved not enough, so it wound up going back into the oven for another hour at 350, and to be honest, I think it could've used another half an hour or so, and this will probably be what I do to heat up the leftovers for dinner tomorrow.

However, difficulties with nailing down the cooking time aside, the dish was overall absolutely fucking delicious. Like a rich, slightly sweet bean soup, and absolutely tasty. The red pepper and some of the sweet potato seemed a bit undercooked, hence the consideration of another half an hour's cooking time.

Still, while probably not remotely faithful to the traditional French recipe except in the overarching concept, I think I managed to pull of a very, very tasty dish, and I intend to make it again. Possibly even next weekend.

A brief Thanksgiving public service message.

Just Say No to White Meat.

When it comes time to divvy up that colossal bird, choose flavor, choose dark meat. Your mouth will love you for it.

White turkey meat is only slightly lower on the scale of tasteless culinary conformity than the dreaded chicken breast, in that every once in a while, you find someone who manages to cook the turkey properly enough that there's at least some moisture left in the white meat of a turkey.

So rather than winding up in the same category as people who order California rolls and teriyaki chicken at Japanese restaurants, or the Dread Chicken Caesar, go for where the real flavor is at, and open up your tastebuds to the world of turkey bliss.

Save the white meat for tomorrow, and throw it in a Thai yellow curry. That's what that shit's for man.

I am to wine . . .

. . . as most people are to beer.

I'm not much of a wine guy. For a wannabe gourmet, that's probably some kind of horrible crime or sacrilege, but really, I've just never been a fan of the stuff. I have never had a white wine that I liked at all, and only the occasional red that I've tolerated or liked at all. Most times it's more the effect of most alcohols where after the first glass or two, you just don't care anymore.

So I suppose it should come as no surprise to me that the Crane Lake cabernet sauvignon that I have managed to polish off this fine evening is in fact nothing more than another brand name from the same man who is responsible for Franzia in a box.

I feel vaguely dirty, but damnit, it wasn't a half bad wine to me, and the review I found online at Winecast has be wanting to try their petite Syrah tomorrow. At $3.33 a bottle, it's damn hard to resist.

Dinner itself was a bit of an odd sandwich. Roast beef and red-pepper marinated canned squid on marbled pumpernickel/dark rye, with a Tillamook smoked cheddar spread, fresh spinach, and Cardini's original Caesar dressing. Pretty good, though I'm not sure the squid really added anything to the party, and was in fact far milder than I expected.

For lunch a few days back, I got a Black Angus ball tip steak, cooked to a char medium-rare, and sliced sashimi style, and served with a dipping sauce of shoyu, crushed red pepper, Korean red pepper paste, sugar, and brown rice vinegar, quickly boiled and then filtered. Very, very tasty, and something I'd be proud to serve as an entree in the restaurant.

I am not the next Iron Chef.

So for dinner Monday night, I was a bit tighter on cash, and decided to finally break down and experiment with beef heart.

My love of Tony Bourdain has sort of left me inheriting a deep curiosity about offal, but I personally have done nothing whatsoever with them in my life. This appeals though, in a way, because it presents a fun challenge. I love getting some strange new ingredient, and then trying to figure out what in god's name to do with it, and what better challenge for the cook's instinct than the sort of thing most people simply throw away?

Heart also seemed like a relatively easy place to start. It is after all, nothing more than one big muscle, and thus, can be treated in some ways like a tough, gamey cut of regular old beef.

Google however, was almost no help whatsoever. Seriously, I've just about given up on finding food information on Google, because invariably I seem to just wind up with shit tons of links to those "post your own recipes" sorts of sites, which are generally littered with misinformation and shoddy recipes that often result in terrible or even inedible food.

While I did eventually find a reference to a Peruvian dish called anticuchos, which is marinated chunks of beef heart, skewered, and then grilled. But I was feeling remarkably lazy, and not really feeling up to trying to find an adequate container for marinade. I will probably try this again however.

So instead, I decided to get creative, and devise my own method. For some reason, perhaps simple alliteration, the phrase "braised beef heart" kept popping into mind, and so I decided that was what I would do. I had some left over sangiovese, and figured I'd do a red wine braise, using that crummy folding omelet pan I'd seen on the stove.

So, I melted about a tablespoon of butter in the pan, added two chopped garlic cloves, and a half teaspoon of chili garlic paste. I salted and peppered the strips of beef heart on each side, and then seared them in the butter, before adding some of the wine, a little more black pepper, cumin, and New Mexico chile powder. Brought that up to a simmer, folded the top closed, turned down the heat to low, and cooked it for about a half an hour.

It was upon checking it, that I discovered that the brand new dial thermometer I'd bought for temping meat with, was apparently already broken. I'd had some trouble with it the night before with the porketta chop, but now it was just giving me temperatures that made no sense at all, and taking far, far longer than it should to take a reading. I finally wound up giving up and just cutting into the thing. Satisfied it had reached doneness, I removed the meat from the pan, set it on a plate, and to the now carmelized wine and spice mixture, added a bit of seasoned rice vinegar in an attempt to deglaze the pan a bit, and create a pan sauce, which I then drizzled liberally over the heart.

My initial reaction upon finally tasting it was a bit mixed. By itself, the meat still had a bit of an odd liver-y taste to it, and it was still a bit tough. The sauce, while a bit greasy and lumpy, still tasted quite good however, and managed to cut through that organ meat taste a bit, and the meat itself seemed to mellow over time. From time to time, I would also get bites of very uneven texture, where part of it would be OK, but then one side would be very tough. I think perhaps next time I need to endeavor to more carefully butcher the meat, so as to perhaps remove some of the extra-tough layers of the meat.

However, at it's core, the recipe shows promise. I think it needed more cooking liquid, indeed, probably the remainder of the bottle I had left, but I was wanting to conserve enough for a glass to drink with the meal. It also probably needed a longer cooking time, to ensure more break down of the meat, and a more careful eye towards removing outer membranes and such that result in tough sections. I will have to try it again, and hopefully do it right next time.


For entertainment as I consumed my meal, I watch the concluding two episodes of the Next Iron Chef. I was pleased. While John Besh is definitely an excellent chef, in my heart of hearts, I'd been wanting Symon to win from day one. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's just his style, his attitude, his personality. I'd seen him before on Iron Chef, as well as Bourdain's visit to Cleveland, and was impressed with the guy. I was disappointed that Morou got sent home when he did, although I am sort of forced to agree that his presentations were a bit formulaic, it seemed to me like a small thing, especially considering that otherwise the actual food seemed to be consistently impressive.

I was also please to see that the two Food Network ringers, the ones who looked like they were accidental transplants from Next Food Network Star, both got sent home. Both really just seemed amateurish, the woman's personality, especially in her final appearance, was painfully grating in it's vapid bubbliness, and the other guy, while he did surprise on occasion, just clearly didn't even belong in the same room with any of the other giants there. As Ruhlman and Bourdain had both intimated on their blog, Food Network really surprised by not going with the vapid "TV personality" over the people with real talent and experience.

So overall, I'm very happy with the results. The show was fantastic, and I think the ultimate winner really deserved it, and I look forward to seeing him in action in the coming season of Iron Chef America.

Ray's Food Place is the best supermarket ever.

So, I've been working a lot, and largely exhausted, and had sort of neglected the blog and the writing. It started with just the move distracting me, and then all the hours in the kitchen, but lately, it's been a bit intimidating coming back, because for once, I actually have things to write about.

Too many things, in fact. I've had some time to experiment since my last entry, with a whole bunch of things, and produced some really excellent food, and learned a few things. So look for more blog entries to come as I try and catch up and all the back log of new recipes.

However, for the moment, there's just one thing I want to talk about: Ray's Food Place. This is, hands down, the best goddamn supermarket I've ever been to, and I love it with all my heart.

Why is it so wonderful? Well, here's my menu for today. For lunch, a fresh comice pear, smoked gouda, jalapeno cheese bread, and Mexican grapefruit soda. For dinner, I've got a lovely pork sirloin chop, rubbed liberally with the house porketta spice, and a Nappa Valley sangiovese.

And how much did I pay for all this bounty? $10.70. No, I'm not joking. And all of it, except possibly the wine as I've not tasted it yet, and WineSpectator.com is no help at all, is positively lovely.

Largely, this is all a result, oddly enough actually, not of a relentless focus on quantity and cheapness, but seemingly paradoxically, on quality and freshness. Ray's policy, as best I can figure out, is that everything must be absolutely, gloriously, fresh, and great quality.

So that pear? On sale, got it for about 50 cents, because while it is still perfectly delicious, and in fact, just the right ripeness, it's just barely too ripe, and they'd rather just sell it off.

The pork chop was only a buck and 50 cents, for exactly the same reason. It only just got cut two days ago tops, and is probably fresh enough still that if it were beef, you could make a carpaccio with it.

I've yet to buy anything from their meat department that wasn't absolutely awesome, in fact. I never get that feeling I get walking into most grocery stores and being genuinely nervous about the meat, or realizing the butcher doesn't actually know what the fuck he's doing, or that half this meat's probably already been frozen once, and looks about like it.

Generally speaking, when I walk in through those doors, I know I'm going to be able to get something really good, for not a whole lot of money. I have lived like a king since moving here, because of that store.