What If Nobody is Listening?
It turns out I like blogging. I do. And every day I feel grateful that you, yes you, are reading my posts and that some of you are submitting comments.
On a side note, if you haven’t commented, today is a great day to start. Just type in “I am here” or “I can’t believe I read the whole thing” or even simply “Hi.”
I am especially grateful because I read plenty of interesting and well-written blogs on very similar subject matters where the vast majority of posts have not received any comments. I try to comment on other blogs as much as possible. But there is only so much one person can do. Yet thankfully those bloggers persist, and continue to post.
And I think that it must feel like talking into a vacuum.
While I like the independence of writing what I feel like talking about, and doing so on my own terms, on another level I do harbor petty jealousies towards the established media. Not just those on TV, the radio or in newspaper but also the long-established bloggers who have accumulated a significant audience.
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Food Versus Restaurant Food
I don’t really care to go into the history of restaurants, although it is interesting. We could spend some time discussing the different grades of restaurants from “greasy spoon hole in the wall” to “palace of fine dining.” Maybe we’ll do that later.
But I have been reviewing a few of my recent posts, and some that I have on deck for the future. What I need to come clean about is an expectation I have for higher-end restaurants.
Now I do recognize that “higher-end restaurants” may be a vague term. But it is one that I believe reflects a variety of decisions a restaurant makes: from the look and feel of its menus, to its menu offerings, to the price of the dishes, to the table setting, to the dishware, to the formality and dress of its waiters, to the interior and exterior of the building, etc.
On occasion one of these elements will not be in line with all of the others, and it is as wrong as pants on a trout. For example, the beautiful restaurant with inventive seasonal menus and elegant utensils that uses paper napkins emblazoned with the name of the establishment.
In Albany there is one thing that sticks out across the board: the absence of restaurant-quality ingredients.
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Cherry Lie
Here is another thing that needs a new name. Maybe it can be called the “hot fudge sundae cherry” or the “Shirley Temple cherry.” But Maraschino cherry has got to go.
I know it has its supporters.
That impossibly red, artificially flavored, syrup-soaked monstrosity that only resembles an actual cherry in that it has a stem, which implies that at one point this was something derived from nature, not a lab in New Jersey.
Ok. That’s not entirely true. The two major players in the bright red edible orb market are in Oregon and California. So maybe they are not made in a New Jersey lab, but you wouldn’t be surprised, would you?
Honestly, I cannot figure out exactly which bothers me more: that people see fit to include this abomination in cocktails in the first place or that it corrupts the good name of the once famous, if now forgotten, Italian liqueur.
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One Wine Four Cups
If you think Coke is better than Pepsi or if you prefer tea to coffee you can also learn to appreciate wine. You clearly have taste preferences. Now you need to figure out how those taste preferences relate to wine.
If you are like most people, when you have a sip of wine it tastes, well, it tastes like wine. Maybe you’ll pick up the bottle and look at the back label for the winemaker’s description. There you might find some words to help describe what you taste. But likely they will just be a curiosity. Tobacco?
And there are many people who will say, “Good wine is lost on me.” Or perhaps, “It all tastes the same to me.” My in-laws were just like that until they agreed to let me convince them they could indeed have a greater appreciation for wine.
All it takes is four glasses.
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School of Fish
I want to try and stay positive. It is all fine and good for me to tell you to avoid farmed salmon. But if I’m going to suggest you not do something, it’s only fair for me to provide a better alternative.
In the case of salmon, wild Alaskan salmon, the best alternative has its drawbacks. It’s not available all year long and it’s pretty darn expensive.
So, if you are trying to be an ethical eater and you want fish, where can you turn? The answer is terribly complicated. But I will try and simplify it a bit using two great resources available to you, Seafood Watch and the EDF Seafood Selector.
Still, determining the best fish to eat is a daunting task because there are so many factors to take into consideration.
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Hearty Grains
I am the first to admit that brown rice just sounds nasty. And that makes sense given most people’s experience with it. Earlier this month when I talked about Cuban black beans I mentioned that they were full-flavored enough to be served with brown rice.
Tonia called it “yucky.”
But I am going to tell my story and make my case. You should try the technique once. If you don’t like it, fine. And if you do, well, I told you so.
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How Cheese Came Into My Life: The Early Years
“How did you get to be so fussy?” It’s a fair question. The truth is there were many converging paths that have carried my epicurean journey to where it is today. One of these paths involves my love of cheese.
It’s a long meandering path. And since Saturdays are historically low traffic days for the FLB, I decided to be a bit indulgent and tell more of my story (in far too many parts).
Hopefully, if I do this well, people besides my devoted family will find this to be interesting. And it may even inspire you to try new things from your local neighborhood cheesemonger.
Ready? Go.
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Sour Nix
Perhaps you are looking at a cocktail menu. And it lists a variety of tasty and unusual drinks along with their ingredients. Should you see the words “sour mix” anywhere on the page, I would urge you to reconsider that cocktail and order a gin on the rocks.
Sour mix is usually nasty stuff.
Don’t take my word for it. I present to you the ingredients from Mr. & Mrs. T:
Water, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Citric Acid, Sodium Citrate, Sodium Benzoate (Preservative), Gum Acacia, Polysorbate 60, Natural Flavors, Sodium Metabisulfite (Preservative), Glycerol of Wood Rosin, Yellow 5, Yellow 6.
Yuck-a-doo.
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One Mighty Pan
I am not a very manly man. I’m not.
Really, Mom. It’s true.
And I’m ok with that.
I never really got into watching sports. Certainly I have never been good at team sports. Cars never interested me. I like women, but I never chased them around. Beer is fine, but so is wine. And with grilled sausages on a hot summers day, nothing is better than a dry Bandol rosé.
That’s not to say I don’t enjoy certain manly things. In the kitchen, my favorite piece of cookware is my cast iron skillet. And there is nothing feminine about cast iron.
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Sorry Salmon
I never would have imagined that I would need to write about farmed salmon.
Mostly because it has been written about extensively. By actual journalists. In big newspapers and in national magazines. I know people in upstate New York still read the New York Times.
So it would seem that either the message never made it through, or that people just don’t care. Now here I am. Putting the message out there. Again. And hopefully, this time, getting people to care.
Here is the news flash:
If you see the word salmon on a piece of fish in the store or on the menu at a restaurant, and it doesn’t explicitly say “wild” you are most likely eating farmed salmon (sometimes called Atlantic salmon – even at sushi bars their sake is usually farmed).
Here is the executive summary of farmed salmon:
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