The Omnivorous Fish

Today I received an invitation to trade blogrolls with a new site called devour.tv. I declined to do so, but I will give them a free plug, because it led to an email correspondence that made me write up some feelings I have about the New Food Culture that I have yet to express much in the blog, despite how strongly I feel about it. Here is an excerpt:

Since you’ve read my blog, you know it’s mostly about cooking and empowerment of cooking. I try to put 20 years of professional and amateur cooking experience into each cooking post, so they’re meta-recipes, rather than lists of ingredients. Below is the list of “definitive pieces” I point people to.

So, the porn aspect. I’ll give you the long answer, since I think you’ll appreciate it. When I was a kid, I watched Julia Child and Jacques Pepin on PBS. They were educational shows, produced to teach the viewers about cooking. These were documentary: demonstrating a process. Modern cooking shows (IE, everything on Food Network) are pornographic: they are a wanton display of food. If you watch Paula Dean’s show, for example (who, unlike many TV personalities, actually knows how to cook) if she’s making a cake, she’ll start with her pre-measured ingredients laid out, dump them into a bowl, and no matter how skillfully she proceeds to mix them, the process is edited out. Two cuts and four seconds later, the batter is ready: nothing about gluten development, nothing about air content, nothing about leavening, nothing about batter structure, nothing about cooking. If they cut a recipe or two out of the show, or the ‘let’s set the table’ featurettes, or damn near anything they wanted to, there would be plenty of time in the format to include information about cooking. But that’s not the goal. The goal is heavy product placement (all-clad, oxo, kitchenaid, etc) and speedy delivery to languorous footage of finished products, interspersed by more advertising. Some of the content then says “ok let’s cook” but what they mean is “let’s open a package.” So then they’re further encouraging people to eat things that are not food. Of course, Food Network is not a public service. They are a business, in business to make money, not to steward the planet. It is also true that I don’t need to support them simply because I am interested in food.

Now, to give you specific examples in the devour.tv content, I looked at three things: The Telepan segment, the Dueling Foodies congee segment and Pied Piper Chicken with 40 Cloves of Garlic segment.

The Telepan segment had nothing to do with cooking, and very little to do with the dish itself. It was largely a much longer than needed discussion about the details of a dish that the reviewer had yet to taste, followed by a pronouncement that a dish is great without any true detail of its preparation. “Simple ingredients, done just right,” is the reviewer’s summation. How? What? Who? Tell us: the brioche was perfect, the crumb was just right, the butter flavor came through. The mushroom had this texture, this flavor, the egg. No, we are left with the comment “this is the afro of mushrooms.”

The dueling foodies was cute, but again lacked in depth. This congee is too brown this one’s too green, this one tastes like snails, which the editing taunts us to think is overwhelmingly exotic, which of course it isn’t, especially in New York. I have to assume this is a function of editing since we know that David Rosengarten was geeking out the entire time.

Finally, the Pied Piper, probably the best of them, again edited too much. Let’s calm down the electronic music and let the cook finish showing us the deboning process. He started out being very informative, and then all of a sudden we were somewhere else. Likewise the browning; If I didn’t know how to cook, I’d have thought he turned the chicken pieces over, then immediately added white wine, which of course he did not.

I don’t mean to pick on what you are doing. It is what the pop-culture food world is doing. You guys are absolutely typical in terms of ethos. Even though I’m 29, and I’m supposed to be part of the sound-byte generation, I simply don’t like it. I strive for a little PBS in the noise of the internet. If there are camps, I am securely barricaded in with Jacques Pepin and Lidia Bastianich, with the ghosts of Julia Child and MFK Fisher hanging around. The camp with Giada de Laurentis and Rachel Ray is distant and, to me, destructive.

List of definitive pieces:

Guazzetti:
http://omnivorousfish.com/node/265

Poeles:
http://omnivorousfish.com/node/176

Gnocchi:
http://omnivorousfish.com/node/199

Pasta:
http://omnivorousfish.com/node/209

Empowerment:
http://omnivorousfish.com/node/211

Listening: NPR: National. Public. Radio.

In case I forgot to mention it, I’m in Knoxville. It’s thrilling, but I still have to eat. I heard about this soul food place online called Chandler’s Deli, and I have to admit, when someone said it was in a former Taco Bell, I had to see it. I also saw another review (sorry, I didn’t save the links) that said something about not being afraid of the neighborhood and “go there anyway.” I figured if the food was good enough to get shot at, it would be worth a ride.

It was about 10 miles from the hotel, and I have to admit, it’s still weird to have to drive on the interstate every time you need to go anywhere. I realize this is a normal experience for many people, but in New York, we just don’t do it. Eventually, we found Chandler’s along the side of a dirty, nondescript road (with a pretty name: Magnolia) in a dirty, nondescript part of Knoxville. It was unmistakably a former Taco Bell, complete with drive-up window, except very subtly painted pastel pink. Inside the place was pretty much dirty. The kitchen was dirty, the dining room was dirty, it was just dirty. A big poster hung on the wall telling us the many names of Jesus. I hoped this was going to be one of those experiences like going to a Mexican place in Southern California that’s in a trailer and it turns out to have absolutely transcendent food. I hoped the friendly, sweaty people behind the steam table were going to serve us up some truly authentic from-scratch food I would remember to my death.

I was disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, the food wasn’t bad. It was a good representation of the kind of food that some people in the south care about. NK (my partner in crime on the road) had pulled pork (we both did; I initially was going to have chicken and dumplings, until I saw the dumplings) with sweet potatoes, resplendent with marshmallow topping, and macaroni and cheese, which, like much we ate was good, but not great. My sides were fried okra- which I believe to be prefab- and mixed greens, which were ok, but desperately needed the nearby cruet of vinegar to perk them up. The pork was ok, but had a higher-than-acceptable percentage of gristly bits, and it was more shredded than pulled. Think frizzy perm. The iced tea, however, was excellent, the second-best of the trip thus far. (The winner, so far, was an unmemorable but perfectly fine sandwich place close to the theater that I would go back to just for the tea.)

So, if you’re in the shadier side of Knoxville, Chandler’s is worth stopping by, but I wouldn’t wade into gunfire to go there.

Chandler’s Deli
3101 E Magnolia Ave
Knoxville, TN 37914
(865) 595-0212

There are different schools of thought in the food world on the merit of innovation. Some people value it above most, if not all, other qualities, preferring to consider the genius of cocoa-infused anchovy paste barquettes than to savor the sacramental releves of Larousse Gastronomique. Some people spurn it and only begrudgingly accept canard a l’orange. Wherever you fall in the debate, it can be agreed that every so often, it is refreshing to have a meal that is simply excellent. This is a meal that is staid, even predictable, but is of such high quality and executed with such technical expertise that there is no debate to its merit: it is merely fantastic.

Some people might wonder if it’s even worth writing about (or visiting) a restaurant that has been around as long as Union Square Cafe. It has been given its accolades, it has made its mark, it has had its moment; enough. I disagree. Restaurants evolve; they undergo changes in staff, both back-of and front-of-house; they change suppliers and menus and chefs and prices. People also just get plain lazy. Not so with Union Square.

Truth be told, the decor is one thing that might stand a little change. It is simple and understated, mostly timeless, but kissed here and there with touches- like vibrant salmon-hued watercolors of ingredients- that are best described as When-Harry-Met-Sally Provincial. Like a rental apartment from the Reagan era, there is certainly nothing wrong, but its modern touches could use a little updating.

One aspect that needs no updating whatsoever is the service. It seems that a knowledgeable waitstaff has somehow come to mean the suggestion of “favorite dishes” to customers. Truly good service, however, remains a balance of enthusiasm and restraint; it is a mixture of knowledge and the desire to serve. Indeed, the reservationist was apologetic, if not empathetic to the difficulties of securing a table. The waiter was friendly, but cordial, professional. It took a long moment to secure his attention, but once we had it, he was practically ideal. Knowledgeable about the menu and wine list, he gave opinions when asked, but remained otherwise occupied with giving us what we wanted.

The food, uniformly excellent, if sometimes uninspired, remains true to its mission: an American menu with Italian flourishes, prepared to branch out, but never at the sake of flavor or consistency. The first appetizer, Yellowfin Tuna Tartare with Salsa Verde, Spicy Aioli, Asparagus-Radish Salad and Potato Crostini, was perhaps the busiest thing on the menu, but truly a triumph. Highest-quality yellowfin, anointed with flecks of brilliant emerald salsa verde- an earthy, herbaceous amalgam of parsley and salty goodies- and garlicky, piquant mayo, was served with a side of what could best be described as some really fantastic chips. The sparse but flavorful salad broke the texture barrier set up by the crisp chips and yielding fish.

Another appetizer- unfortunately the only pasta sampled- was beautifully made and prepared frascatelli. A tiny dumpling resembling a slice of an gnocchi, but with a lighter texture and pure semolina flavor, the frascatelli were supposedly alla carbonara but in reality were sauced with cream, guanciale (a richly flavored, marvelously baconesque product made from the jowls of the pig; certainly worth a google) and pecorino romano cheese. Delicious by any name, but nary an egg in sight.

The main courses, though not as exciting, demanded no less attention. Tiny, tender grilled lamb chops Scotta Dita- marinated in a basil-infused vinaigrette- were cooked exactly medium rare, served with a tart tangle of sauteed insalata tricolore (arugula, belgian endive and radicchio). A simple but delicious potato-gruyere gratin ensured I wouldn’t have to go a whole course without any type of cheese, thankfully. A Pan-Seared Halibut with Spring Vegetable Farrotto and Mushroom Jus was a crusty piece of fish on a bed of grains with perfectly cooked vegetables. Hardly exciting, it is a clear illustration of the menu’s desire to please without offending anyone. It is one of a few dishes on the menu remarkable only in their uncanny perfection.

Incidentally, these were both superb with a Whitcraft 2004 Pinot Noir from Santa Maria Valley.

Desserts cater mainly to the sweet-tooth crowd, but are very good for what they are. A Rocky Road Baked Alaska with Chocolate Cake & Fudge Sauce was comprised of dense, moist cake with a mound of voluptuous cream-and-egg-filled ice cream. Not to be confused with anything low-fat or compromising in one’s experience; this is the kind of ice cream that people care about. A toadstool of lightly sweetened meringue capped off the presentation, a fantastic nod to desserts of this tradition. For those less enamored of the sweets, the restaurant goes out of its way to have on hand an array of cheeses that would make Murray proud. From Maconnais chevres to Cato’s Corner Hooligan (available steps away at the Saturday Greenmarket), the selections show a desire to bring some lesser known but deserving products to the forefront.

Overall, the restaurant’s dedication to quality and commitment to local purveyors- and the unmistakable beauty of something grown close to where you are eating it- make it worth the trip. Innovation will always be around, but, thankfully, so will Union Square Cafe.

unionsquarecafe.com

212.243.4020