A Literary Feast

Posts from the “Uncategorized” Category

Sour Puss: Lost Pies Vol. 2

Posted on March 3rd, 2011

The origins of the word “pie” are as murky as the midnight waters of the Dagoba System, but, the general consensus seems to be that our modern definition stems from the word ‘magpie’–the implication being that the contents of the pastry are as varied and disparate as the scraps found in a magpie’s nest.  I’ve yet to find the ribbon of a cassette tape hanging out in a pastry envelope alongside a huckleberry, but, here at the Farmer General, we’re discovering that there are plenty of other equally confounding pie ingredients that have been lost to the ravages of time and far sexier seasonal components. Let’s start with vinegar. Vinegar pie.  It’s not a name that sings off of the page, promising tender crust…

If It Was Good For Sir Roger North It Can Be Good For You Too

Posted on March 2nd, 2011

Hard of hearing? Say what now? Fear not, noble subject.  Queen Elizabeth I has the following advice to offer: “Bake a little loaf of bean flour, and being hot rive it in halves, and into each half pour three or four spoonfuls of bitter almonds; then clap both halves to your ears at going to bed… and keep your head warm.”* Pfft, doctors.  Forsooth! Should you care to experiment with the internal application of almonds, as opposed to clapping them over your ears upon retiring, we suggest having a go at making Maids of Honour, as the kitchen of Sir Roger North did at a luncheon for Her Majesty in the summer of 1578.  (They also made ‘Neat’s Tongue Roasted with Rhenish Wine’, but,…

One Dalmatian

Posted on March 2nd, 2011

At some point in the career of the truly ambitious culinary professional, there arrives a luminous moment of epiphany in which it becomes abundantly clear that both personal development and advancement in the field will require some travel. This is especially true if you’re an ambitious culinary professional in the relatively isolated and oddly underexposed culture of the United States, a vast land with one foreign country as a neighbor (Canada does not count).

Eating Bread: A Venerable Tradition Getting Its Ass Handed To Itself By Psychopaths

Posted on February 28th, 2011

Bread — quite possibly the quintessential food the world over, one of the most fundamental parts of the diet of people on every part of the globe. It is believed the ancient Egyptians were the first bakers, the first loaf possibly discovered when some porridge got left out too long. Wild yeast in the air or on the grain itself caused it to ferment, and when Akbar accidentally dropped the sludge onto a stone in the fire, voila — primitive bread. Granted, the story is a bit far-fetched, but incredible shit happens every day.

From Fritchie To Eternity: Lost Pies Vol. 1

Posted on February 28th, 2011

Pies that are named for people run the unfortunate risk of sounding as though that person has been tucked tidily away behind the crust itself—a posterity turducken of sorts, a homemade mausoleum that shows up, calling card at the ready, on your sideboard.

Behold the Power of Cheese Affinage

Posted on February 28th, 2011

If you were to look up cheese affinage in a dictionary or even in Google, you wouldn’t find much. Perhaps it’s because the word is French. Or perhaps it’s because we, in the States, don’t have a very long history of cheesemaking. Either way, affinage – or cheese refining – is not on the tip of most people’s tongues. And yet, if you’ve ever tasted a European cheese or any aged American artisan cheese, you’re hopefully eating the result of some damn good affinage. So here it goes:

101 Ways to Ruin Your Supper or Fast Bites for the Ill-Informed

Posted on February 28th, 2011

1. PEPPERS A LA PLACARD: First, find a pepper. Then, put it in the crisper drawer. Forget about it. Offer your guests your palpable sense of regret and resignation.
2. MARK BITTMAN’S INSTANT LASAGNA: Place three carrot sticks in a pan, each an inch apart. Using a citrus reamer, juice one ripe tomato over the sticks (freeze the tomato rind for stock). Let infuse for twenty-five seconds, then serve immediately with hummus and cranberries.
3. THE PERSISTENCE OF MEMORY: Here’s a doozy. Take a scant handful of sesame seeds, and press them into softened black-eyed peas. Voila! Crab cakes nobody has to walk out on.

I Am Trying To Clam Your Heart

Posted on January 4th, 2011

I will get to the point where the clouds parted, and I uttered perhaps the only prophetic words of my entire existence, and there will be a sentence with a rainbow in it presently. There will be low tide and salt, and the wind and the rain, and a mollusk fetched up in a spiny shell that was not, in fact, what I was looking for. But not yet. First, there’s a death, an idea, and a slim book with a deceptively simple cover by Curtis J. Badger.