Too Relaxed

I made a painful but true observation recently: The quality of my cooking has declined recently. My friend Massimo, whose taste is beyond reproach, said it more politically: that my cooking “has become more relaxed in style.”

It’s not as if I wasn’t aware: I made a number of conscious decisions about my cooking that I knew would lead to its decline. Mostly, they were based on the availability of time. Stock made less frequent appearances. Some very detail-oriented things got less attention- like risotto. I also have had to work through some bad ingredient choices. For example, after much lobbying by friends of mine, I bought the Trader Joe’s arborio rice. I said “How can this be? Two pounds of arborio rice for five bucks? It’s too good to be true.” Well, it was too good to be true, because that rice blows.

Also, the menus were getting longer as time became dearer. Here’s an example. This menu is from June of 2003:

Toasted Almonds, Garlic Shrimp, Serrano Ham, Green Olive Tapenade
Hidalgo La Gitana Manzanilla Sherry NV
St-Hilaire Blanquette de Limoux Brut 2000

Asparagus Soup
Hermann Wiemer Dy Johannisberg Riesling 2002

Poeled Pork Shoulder with Turnips
Braised Brussels Sprouts
Domaine Esmonin Sylvie Gevrey-Chambertin 1999
Ramsay Vineyards Pinot Noir 2000

Salad of Belgian Endive with Roaring Forties Blue Cheese and Walnuts

Epoisse and Gala Apples

Pear Tart a la Bordaloue
Chambers Rosewood Reserve Muscat NV

Yes, this is a six course meal, but not really. The first course is hors-d’oeuvres, completed in advance. The second is soup, done and sitting in a bain-marie when people arrive. A roast is tricky to time, but doable. A salad, easy, a cheese course, easy and a tart, completed early that morning. In other words, it is safe. It also was expertly prepared, even if I do say so myself- and shows the former largesse of my spending on wine. Of course Burgundy is always worth the expense.

Here’s the last menu I wrote about, one whose execution had serious defects:

Mostarda of Celery with fresh ricotta on crostini with my special olives: oil-cured sicilian olives macerated with blood orange juice and zest

Cauliflower risotto alla cariinese. (a replacement for rice and nettle soup)

Panelle with a salad of favas, salame calabrese (spicy), ricotta salata and whole chopped meyer lemons

Pork Butt Roast with braised leeks and Sicilian potato salad

Strawberries with lemon mousse

This is only five courses, but much more complicated. The mostarda is [a piece of] cake, but I boned the crostini: I just couldn’t get the right bread, and it ruined it. I should have either made the bread or made the trip to get something better. Crackers would have been better.
The risotto was a big disappointment. As I was making the Plan-A nettle soup and realized that was going awry, I should have just trashed the course, but I didn’t. I made risotto, instead, without stock, or an acceptably flavorful replacement, and didn’t have enough cauliflower sauce to season the risotto properly, not to mention the suck-ass rice I used, and it was blah. With more salt it could have been in any check-tablecloth place in Little Italy.
The panelle were good, but I might not fry them in advance next time. The texture was fine, but they had that not-freshly-fried taste. Or maybe next time I’ll fry them in lard. That stale taste comes from vegetable oil.
The pork butt was good, as was the potato salad, but the leeks were a bomb. I cooked them at too high a temperature and they dried out. They also probably needed more butter. The real problem is that I didn’t flesh out the recipe enough, I threw them together, and it showed.
There was a certain amount of hubris involved, since I entertain so much, I figured I could just pull some things out of my ass, which I did, and did very well, but not great. It’s like the Ruth’s Chris syndrome: There is nothing wrong with a meal at Ruth’s Chris. In fact, I enjoy a steak there from time to time, usually when traveling, but you won’t have a really spectacular meal there, ever.

So what is a spectacular meal?

Well, a spectacular meal doesn’t leave any detail unnoticed. In addition to absolutely perfect execution, the dish has to have harmony. A rich, succulent meat needs something to lighten its heaviness, like vinegar with foie gras or a salad with salumi. This, however, is not just a point-counterpoint, the harmony has to apply to flavors, too, though sometimes the counterpoint is something unexpected. I ate at [Osteria Mozza]( http://www.mozza-la.com/osteria/about.cfm) last night, and the dish was grilled octopus, perfect in its execution, smokey and mysterious with a gentle bite to the seafood. And all of a sudden- in this smokey, chewy haze- there was a bite of raw celery: light, fresh, spry in the mouth, it was exactly what was needed. The problem with the risotto was attention to detail: since the rice was crappy, I lost control of the timing since cheap rice cooks very quickly, not to mention that in a dish made almost entirely out of one ingredient, the flavor of the dish will vary in direct proportion to the quality of that ingredient; mediocre rice makes mediocre risotto.

To be perfect, the risotto would have been more al dente, and creamier, from better rice; more flavorful, from better stock; and even if I had used leftover sauce, I would have a) had enough of it and b) I would have augmented some of the surprise goodies, like the pine nuts and raisins. I also would have paid a lot more attention to the acid balance than I did. On pasta, the sweet-and-sour element would be clear in this sauce, but some cooked vinegar, or maybe even a gastrique (vinegar caramel) would have refueled the agrodolce flavor that dispersed into the soupy rice. I was lazy.

So I’m simplifying. Since time is at a premium right now, rather than scatter my efforts afield, I am editing my standard menu from:

Hors D’oeuvres
Pasta or Fish
Meat
Salad and Cheese
Dessert
Coffee

to something more like this:

Very simple Hors D’oeuvres
Vegetable Appetizer
Main
Salad and Cheese OR Dessert
Coffee

I never used to make dessert, and when I baked it was either as a gift or to scratch a specific itch and usually became an afternoon treat or breakfast. Mostly I did it for the holidays. Somewhere along the line I started doing a lot of desserts, I’m not really sure when or why, but the fact is I don’t enjoy them much, and people- at my house, at least- are usually so full they look at dessert with trepidation (read: dread). A salad and a piece of cheese, maybe a slice of pear and a few walnuts, aid digestion, clear the palate and turn the page on richer tastes just gone. A very delicate plated dessert- a perfect, harmonious whole- can be another stage in the natural progression of a meal, or a simple fruit dessert can provide some contrast. A piece of chocolate cake, though, to my taste, is a discordant, vulgar pie in the face of an otherwise lovely experience.

With a shorter menu- not to mention summer approaching- intensely flavored cold and warm vegetable appetizers will lead into whatever is cooking, which will have my undivided attention.

So I’m simplifying, but not relaxing.

**I wrote this over the last couple of days, but before I posted it, I coincidentally but unsurprisingly read the following passage this afternoon. My latest food musings have been on things like garnished sauerkraut, cassoulet (strange considering the weather), poached chicken and souffles (probably more digestible at the moment). At any rate, this is from MFK Fisher’s *How to Cook a Wolf*, and is offered in the context of wartime rationing, but no less relevant to my latest thinking:**

>If you want Mortimer [your theoretical son] to drink a fruit juice you can almost certainly arrange to have it given to him in the middle of the morning or afternoon, when it will not war with the starches in his own middle, and will give him an unadulterated and uncluttered lift.

>For lunch make an enormous salad, in the summer, or a casserole of vegetables, or a heartening and ample soup. That is all you need, if there is enough of it.

>And for dinner, if you want to stick solemnly to your “balanced day,” have a cheese souffle and a light salad, or, if you are in funds, a broiled rare steak and a beautiful platter of sliced herb-besprinkled ripe tomatoes.

>That with some red wine or ale if you like it and a loaf of honest bread, with or without butter, and toasted or not and good coffee afterwards, is a meal that may startle your company at first with its simplicity but will satisy their hunger and their sense of fitness and balance, all at once. An unnecessary peptic goad, but a very nice one now and then, is a good soft stinky cheese, a **Camembert or Liederkranz, with what is left of the bread, the wine, the hunger.**

> And later, when they begin to think of the automatic extravagance of most of our menus, and above all of the ghastly stupid monotony of them, they too will cast off many of their habits, and begin like you to eat the way they *want* to, instead of the way their parents and grandparents taught them. They will be richer, and healthier, and perhaps, best of all, their palates will awaken to new pleasures, or remember old ones. All those things are devoutly to be wishesed for, now especially.

Emphasis mine. Listening: NPR Marketplace