Shrub a Dub Dub
I’m not quite ready to give up on summer. It’s a fool’s errand to try and hold onto a fleeting memory of a season on the way out. Thanks to the CSA, I cannot say that I didn’t eat enough corn, or glorious tomatoes, or fragrant, juicy peaches.
It’s hard to complain. I had my fill. The truth is that some of these things are still around. They are just a shadow of their former selves.
When produce is at its peak, you don’t have to do anything to it at all. Famously, the cafe at Chez Panisse offered a single peach on a pedestal for dessert. Given the proximity of Frog Hollow and the general excellence of peaches I could buy from the farmers market, I never took Alice Waters up on this temptation. But it’s a great way to hammer home the point.
Caprese salads exist to demonstrate the same concept. The season to enjoy this beloved menu item might be one or two weeks long somewhere towards the middle or end of August. But it’s gone now.
Now is the time when you have to do things to produce to make it amazing. And I only recently discovered this ancient idea for what to do with fruit.
The 6th Annual Tour de Donut
The next Tour de Cider Donut is just days away. Before we get to the when and where, let’s talk about the what and why.
Upstate New York may not have a lot of Michelin-starred restaurants, but we have a ton of apples. We live in the heart of apple country, and in the fall it’s an amazing place to be. There are orchards and country stores everywhere throughout the region, and most of them sell apple cider donuts.
These are a quintessential treat of fall. The only problem is that people are rarely exposed to a wide variety of these seasonal delights. And that’s fine. Family traditions are important and meaningful things, so I’m not going to try and change your rituals of the season.
However, there are some regional food lovers out there who are really curious to know which orchard, or bakery, or farm stand makes the best apple cider donut. And to answer that question, these Fussy Little Tours were born back in 2010. Since then, I (and a small handful of select others) have led intrepid groups of eaters around the region in search of tasty treasures.
But now fall is upon us yet again, so it’s time to circle the wagons and head west. Because I understand there are some mighty tasty specimens to be sampled in the netherlands on the other side of Schenectady. And what’s unusual this year is that our actual route looks very different from what was proposed back in the nomination phase. Read more…
Funday: Gone Farmin’
Tomorrow is another big Yelp Event. Farmer Gordon of 9 Miles East is hosting a Yelp Elite Event. In the past, the Official Yelp Events have been open to everyone. Now that the community is growing, there will be more of these private events for those who have gone the extra mile and earned their Elite status.
Part of my not-so-new job is to try and help those who want the rank, earn the badge.
I’m only mentioning this because this week with the Yelp stuff and the Jewish High Holy Days, I’ve been crazy busy. And for some reason, the press release machine feels like it’s working overtime. So not only do I have plenty of things to share, I’ve got more reason than ever to do it.
Next week is another crazy week too, and that ends on Saturday with the Sixth Annual Tour de Cider Donut. Hopefully you were already saving the date, because it’s September 26. Final details will be announced Monday.
You’ve gotta be at least a little curious about what the public relations community thought you would be interested in learning about this week. Even if you’re not, here it is.
A Taste For Learning (part two)
There are some posts that are destined to go unread. And that’s okay. It doesn’t stop me from writing them. For a while I wrote a weekly wine post. Nobody read those. But they were fun to write, and somewhere they persist in the FLB archives.
Eventually, I decided to give it up. And that’s okay too. Maybe one day I’ll go back to writing about drinks in a more focused way.
Today, I’m going to write the gripping continuation of my weekend in tasting. The first post was a decided flop, but Burnt My Fingers asked for part two. Part of me really wanted to tell you about the Hudson Valley Food, Wine and Craft Beer Festival anyway. So his request really was just the nudge that I needed.
Because the thing about food and wine festivals is that it’s all about what you make out of them.
Apologies
For most of the world, this week isn’t anything all that special. Sure, there’s a lot of stuff going on locally. My pal The Fuj is driving all over the place trying to drink all the great beer. It seems like he’s making a valiant effort too.
But if you happen to be Jewish, we’re in the Days of Awe. Maybe one of the rabbis who read the blog will want to weigh in today, but most likely they’re in the weeds this week. This is the busy season.
In between Rosh Hashanah (this past Monday) and the close of Yom Kippur (next Wednesday at sundown) I have to try and set right all the wrongdoings I’ve committed over the past year. And it’s not just the things I’ve done, but also the things that I could have done that went undone. Most of the time, this comes in the form of an apology.
Real apologies are hard. And I have a bad track record for failing to apologize. When friends have been in pain, I’ve failed to reach out to them in support. When important relationships have fallen off track, I’ve failed to take steps to repair them. These are big things. These are heavy things. And maybe this year will be the year that I set them right. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
Speaking of going off track, let’s bring this back to food.
Funday: Small Problems
There are lots of hard days to be a food writer. It’s not that food writing isn’t important. It can be. But it’s a luxury when so many go without, and it’s a privilege to obsess about trifles when people at home and abroad are oppressed. And then of course there are days like today.
A couple years ago I wrote a post about how reflecting on today made me feel lucky. My friend Michelle, aka Mama in Pajamas wrote a brief post about her experience with the day, and a request for remembrance. I thought it was really touching.
My small problem du jour is that there is just too much awesome stuff to do. It feels like a really small problem today. So I’m not going to complain, even in jest. I’m going to feel grateful that I get to be here and be overwhelmed by it all. Fortunately, there were some press releases about a few of these events. And there’s news from the future too. For what it’s worth, the future looks fab. It has noodles.
What We Take For Granted
The Capital Region is famous for a few things, but almost none of them involve food. And that’s okay. We do have a small handful of specialties from the area that haven’t quite taken off beyond our borders. It’s really understandable since these unique offerings are mostly different forms of other foods.
Fried fish is cut long and thin for Albany’s Fish Fry. Mozzarella sticks lose their herb coating and are paired with raspberry sauce for our local version. The Coneys of Michigan are shrunk down to three inches for our take on hot dogs.
But it’s often the case that a city’s most famous food isn’t its best.
Philly’s cheesesteaks aren’t as good as its Italian pork sandwiches. San Francisco’s sourdough isn’t a special as the city’s dim sum parlors. Miami’s Cuban sandwiches are bested by the croqueta preparada.
So what are we overlooking here?
The One Good Thing at Sonic
We have a new rule. There is no eating in the car. Ever. No cheese sticks. No apples. No lollipops. No trail mix. No nothing.
Well, water. The kids can have water. And gum. The adults can drink coffee. But that’s it.
This is the new cruelty that we imposed after paying a $250+ detailing bill just to clean out the inside of the minivan. There was six years of cereal and granola bar accumulation in pretty much every nook and cranny of the back seat.
Needless to say, the appeal of a Sonic Drive-In, where you eat in your car, is lost on me. Fortunately, because we live in a place where it’s really only nice outside about four months of the year, our local Sonic has eat-in seating. Capital Region denizens continue to mob the place.
A couple months ago, JoeN pontificated, “Why anyone would choose bland, precooked, mass produced food-like substances over a place like Pirates Lakeside Grill is beyond me.” Well, I happened to stumble upon one thing that you can get at this national chain that’s apparently hard to find elsewhere.
Heading West For Donut Picking
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know it doesn’t feel like fall yet. But the kids are back in school, and in a couple of weeks I have to believe fall will be here in earnest. That means the time to start planning our annual Tour de Cider Donuts is now.
For those who haven’t been around since the beginning, all the way back in 2010 Stanford Steph suggested that I get a bunch of people and go around to the local orchards to find out which ones were the best. Well, that first event was so much fun we made it into an annual affair.
Of course, it has also spawned other tours like the Tour de Mini Hot Dog, the Tour de Fish Fry, the Tour de Tavern Pie, and most recently the Tour de Italian Deli. But no matter how much fun those tours are, they all pale in comparison to the Tour de Donut.
Honestly, I can’t even believe there are still places we haven’t visited. Part of me hoped that this year would be the Tournament of Champions. However, we still have new ground to cover. So get your calendars out, and let’s discuss plans for the Sixth Annual Tour de Donut.
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