AskTP – Spring is Nigh
Yeah. I’m done with winter. As I was harping on this fact, it struck me that perhaps the arrival of Valentines Day in the middle of February is no accident. We need something like chocolate to make us happy and get us through the doldrums of winter. A little bit of additional body heat wouldn’t hurt either.
As inconceivable as it seems, I just saw the first harbinger of spring: the Passover display has gone up at my local area Walmart. Who would have thought that Walmart would have a solid selection of Kosher for Passover matzoh? But while it’s still early, maybe this spring holiday is the thing I need to be the light at the end of this tunnel.
With spring on the distant horizon, this is the time to start thinking about CSAs. Roxbury just released their 2013 Enrollment Form. If you are interested in signing on this year, think about doing so early, because their Capital Region locations fill up.
But now it’s time to answer the questions from the last two weeks. That’s my commitment to you. As long as questions are asked in the comments with a question mark, they will eventually get answered. Usually in these semi-regular roundups. But late is better than never, right?
Okay, without any further ado, onto the questions.
Eggs and Other Acts of Blasphemy
Backyard chickens aren’t an option for me. I wish they were, because I have been spoiled by the eggs laid by my friends’ chickens. So what does a great egg look like?
Well, it has a deep orange yolk. And when you gently poach it in slightly acidulated water, the white coalesces around the yolk, producing a simply gorgeous culinary masterpiece and ensuring a luscious runny yolk.
Backyard chickens can deliver on the lustrous yolks because they eat a great rich diet of table scraps and ground bugs. And since you can poach them the same day they are laid, the whites are at their most resilient. Each day the egg sits around, the more it declines. Not that it goes bad, it just rapidly falls from greatness.
I’ve gone to farmers markets looking for my ideal eggs and have gotten plenty of expensive specimens with pale yolks and loose whites. True, I haven’t tried the much ballyhooed eggs from Elihu Farm, which are still on my list. These days, when I need good eggs, I go to Stewart’s. Theirs are three days from hen to store and even though they come from a large regional producer, the yolks are pretty darn golden.
Honestly, I can’t believe it myself, and am more than a little disappointed in the smaller local farms. So as long as I’m going to be pissing off the farmers and their fans today, let’s talk a bit about that Super Bowl commercial.
Fried
Last night at the end of the game I felt like disemboweling myself. Not because of the Forty-Niners’ tragic last-minute defeat. But out of sheer discomfort from all the food I ate.
By some measures I suppose you could call my repast the most healthful game day feast ever.
Organic-cornmeal dusted Cajun-spiced trout (sustainably sourced from Fin), maque choux made from organic corn and peppers, red beans and brown rice, organic cajun-spiced popcorn, and Buffalo-style Three Smiles Kitchen seitan. It’s like a hippies delight.
All in all, a lot of dishes were dirtied, and I ended up with a sprinkling of crumbs across my belly. But I learned something important, although perhaps you already have heard this before. Although even if you have, it bears repeating.
SOS: Super Bowl Edition
When I think about San Francisco sports teams I always need to take a minute. Because I hear football, I think Giants. But that’s the SF baseball team that came from New York that shares the same name with a current New York football team. But it’s really the Forty-Niners.
Go Niners! Although in all honesty I have always wanted to be a Raiders fan. The problem is that I’ve never been good at following sports.
Anyway, I periodically use Sundays to publish the press releases I’ve been sent over the course of the following week. And this week I have two that are of profound relevance to today, even if you don’t celebrate the Super Bowl as a national holiday. Perhaps I should say especially if you don’t celebrate the Super Bowl as a national holiday.
Curious? Do you live within a ten mile radius of the Troy Atrium?
A Super Bowl Full of Beans
Somewhere in this big improbable world, I have to imagine there is a savory cupcake that would lend itself well to your Super Bowl festivities on Sunday. But they aren’t going to be found at CoccaDotts.
Yesterday, my diet was befouled yet again. This time by AOA Greg who called me up and wanted to know if I were interested in tasting this year’s batch of phantasmagorical creations that felled the brave Anderson Cooper. I mean, this guy who flies into war zones was terrified of eating a Buffalo chicken wing cupcake.
You can see the full report, including pictures here. To be fair, there were a couple that just needed a little bit of tweaking to be good. Neither the chili and sour cream, the chocolate covered pretzel, nor the beer with lime were actually awful. But the iconic Buffalo chicken was tweaked this year for the worse, the pepperoni pizza was ill conceived, and the chips and salsa was simply foul.
So now we’ve covered what not to eat. There’s another discovery that I just made. The Super Bowl is in New Orleans this year? Looks like my festivities just got a couple of menu additions.
Catch Up
Here’s the joke. The big game is on Sunday. I think San Francisco is in it this year. Presumably they are playing against some other team. I don’t know. Doesn’t really matter. Big men. Pig skin. Grunting. Commercials.
Pig skin. Sigh. Crispy, cracklin’ pig skin. Warm from the fryer and sprinkled with salt.
Damn you arteries and your plaque collecting walls. Damn you pork fat for being so freaking delicious. Damn you doctors for putting all kinds of crazy thoughts in my head about cholesterol numbers and mortality.
Oh pork fat, I could never stay angry with you. But I have been avoiding fried things for the last month and I miss them terribly. I did, however, cheat yesterday and got my first ever order of tater tots from Comfort Kitchen in Saratoga Springs with Awesome Sauce. Yeah. Those are crazy good and worth every delicious gram of saturated fat.
I’m going to try and make some kind of Buffalo seitan out of some misguided attempt to eat healthier while I drink far too much beer on Sunday night and yell at the television. You may be eating tots or some other kind of fried food that goes well with ketchup. Even if ketchup isn’t a part of your plans for the Super Bowl, it’s America’s one great sauce, and there is something you need to know.
Dinner with the Fussies
We’re not normal. I was just trying to explain this to the kids recently. Mommy works, Daddy stays at home and takes a lot of pictures of food. Granted I think this scenario is becoming more and more common (minus the food photography). But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
I don’t know how families with young children go out to dinner on weeknights.
By the time Mrs. Fussy comes home there is at most two hours to eat dinner and get the children to bed. As it is the kids all too frequently skip baths. Driving to and fro, and all of the collective waiting that is part of the restaurant experience, is just not all that appealing with the overtired underfed bundles of joy in tow. So the vast majority of nights I find myself making a homemade dinner. Nothing fancy, but from 5 pm to 6 pm you can find me in the kitchen.
Anyhow, as part of my prize package from Bellini’s for coming in second place in their cooking contest, I got four free “Dinner Table Tuesday” meals. These are take-out only specials intended to feed a family of four some pasta, salad and bread. I had had one of these a while back when the promotion was still relatively new. Now that we have completed our four week cycle with the Bellini’s take-out trays as part of our regular routine, I have some thoughts that I want to share.
Fishy
There’s a tempest in a teapot happening in Albany, but I’m only going to touch on that briefly as a segue into the more important news at hand.
One of the best things to come to Troy (besides the new spoons at Dante’s Frozen Yogurt) is the Charles F. Lucas Confectionery. One of these days I’ll get a Yelp review up. But I was thrilled to chat with Vic as he was putting the finishing touches on the space, and learn about his vision. Then I was thoroughly impressed with how that vision translated into execution. If you haven’t been, you should go.
The food critic for the Times Union was recently there, and she gave it a glowing three and a half stars (out of a possible four). While I mostly agree with her assessment (the part about the espresso is a notable exception), and am thrilled for Heather and Vic about the publicity, I do have to acknowledge being surprised that the TU wrote a starred review for a wine bar that doesn’t pretend to be a restaurant.
And there has been a little bit of blowback.
The complaint is that a place which largely slices and plates meats and cheeses has no business in the upper echelon of restaurants that actually cook food well. But I have another idea. Perhaps, given some of the past 3.5* reviews the Times Union has awarded, this current review is less about irrational exuberance for the glorious artisanal cheeses and charcuterie that are being presented, and more of an indictment of past recipients of the 3.5* rating.
Exhibit A is the most current 3.5* review of record for Reel Seafood, granted it’s a bit outdated. You know where I would rather eat than Reel Seafood? McDonalds.
Did you hear the news?
Bitter Potatoes and Vanishing Greens
A few weeks ago I was at the Schenectady Greenmarket, buying some locally raised winter vegetables and a dozen green eggs. The kids like to bring the hard boiled green shelled eggs to school and freak out their friends and teachers.
Generally, I’m a creature of habit. I know which farms I like at the different markets for specific products. Often, I don’t even remember the farm names, but simply remember the table’s location at the market.
That part is bad, I know.
But on this fateful trip, I happened to see a sign written in chalk on a small blackboard that was propped up against a crate of sweet potatoes. The sign proposed that these were the best sweet potatoes ever. It was an audacious claim, so I felt compelled to stop and ask, “So what exactly makes these the best sweet potatoes?”
Diet Dilemma
It’s confession time. Yesterday, I spent thirty minutes exercising. There was some cardiovascular bits, some stretching, some strength building. I sweated. I’m not proud.
My plan had been to skip the whole exercise thing and try to make my blood lipid goals through a change in diet alone. But then we got a Kinect for the Xbox. And now I’ve got the world’s most annoying personal trainer, but the TV totally can tell when I’m not extending far enough, or my back isn’t straight, or any of the other countless ways I’m doing it wrong.
Truth be told, it’s more fun that I expected. But I don’t like the way exercise makes me feel.
The diet is going well, but there seems to be one problem that keeps on raising its ugly head. In fact it seems to be inescapable. Everywhere I look, there is fried chicken. And seriously, I can’t even begin to describe to you the powerful craving I’ve got right now.
FUSSYlittleBLOG 