12,000 of 143 Million

As in 143 million pounds. Of Beef. Recalled.

Largest beef recall ever.

From the second largest supplier of beef to the nation’s public school system.

For example, Pittsburgh Public Schools, which has 12,000 pounds of the recalled beef.

Ms. Pugh said the beef is being kept at a food-service warehouse until federal officials tell the district what to do with it. If federal officials decide it's safe, she said, it still could be used in schools.

Ms. Pugh said the beef was part of larger shipments from the vendors. Some beef already had been eaten by students. There were no reports of illness.

I wonder how much of it made its way into the tummies of school children at other local school districts?

According to the USDA, the recalled 143 million pounds of beef, the Washington Post reported, "poses little or no hazard to consumers, and ... most of it was eaten long ago."

Of course, the most disturbing aspect of this whole sordid affair is that the only reason anybody even knows that these “downer” cows -- that is, sick animals that can no longer stand because they are so freakin’ ill – were literally being fork-lifted into the food production system is because somebody from the Human Society snuck in and took video of it happening! [Video is not for the squeamish!]

There’s no evidence that any of the recalled meat is tainted with any of those pesky bacteria that can kill people. Rather, the USDA explained, the recall was taking place “because the cattle did not receive complete and proper inspection” and therefore were deemed by the USDA to be “unfit for human food.”

The question that has to be asked is fairly simple: Is this – forcing cows that clearly are way sick to stay upright via forklift or cattle prod so that they can technically not be considered “downers” and therefore suitable to be turned into products for human consumption -- an isolated incident? Anybody would have to be a fool to believe so.

Tired of hearing about these beef recalls? A wee-bit scared that the steaks or burgers you’re getting for surprisingly cheap still at the grocery store perhaps is a little suspect? Try something local, most likely primarily grass-fed, and definitely not “processed” in massive meatpacking plants.

Below are a few local options for beef for which I can vouch. Others can be found via Local Harvest. Although, unlike at the grocery store, this is beef done on a truly small, local scale, so product only becomes available when there is enough raw material ready!

Sojourney Farms – Holbrook, PA

Rose Ridge Farm – Malvern, OH, 330-904-5365

Fergaed Farms – Valenica, PA (ground beef, quarter, half, or whole cows only), Caroline Hahn at 412-585-3903 or chahn@pulva.com

Bacon & Eggs

No, no, no. Not the classic American breakfast. The classic Italian pasta dish, “alla carbonara.”

The long-awaited first foray with a Zuni recipe finally took place last Sunday, spaghetti alla carbonnara. A wicked winter wind-induced power outage forced me to make it in somebody else’s kitchen, but it still turned out exceedingly well, and was remarkably easy to execute.

The recipe calls for mixing the egg/ricotta mixture with the pasta in the still-hot pan in which the bacon was cooked. But I kept the pan on a burner on low heat to cook the egg mixture just a bit more than might happen otherwise.

The sauce’s consistency was perfect: slightly thick, but still “loose” enough to thoroughly coat the pasta. I typically subscribe to the Mario Batali, less-is-more – or, as he puts it, “condimento,” – approach to saucing pasta. But with this carbonara, the condimento approach doesn’t work for me. Not that it should be swimming in the sauce, like so many Americans prefer (or think they prefer), but this sauce is the star, in my opinion, and deserves to be more than a supporting actor for the pasta.

Finally, timing is important here. The pasta will take only slightly longer to cook than the bacon, so once you get the pasta started, you want to get the bacon going just 2-3 minutes later.

The only thing I will do differently next time is load up more on the cracked pepper. Overall, though, this was highly enjoyable, and will undoubtedly become a staple. And my in-laws are owed a debt of gratitude for letting me borrow their kitchen, because I had been looking forward to this Sunday meal since the previous Monday!

Spaghetti alla Carbonara (adapted from the Zuni Café Cookbook)

• 1 pound of spaghetti [Zuni recommends penne or bucatini, as well, but, for me, the thick, round spaghetti noodle seemed the best option]
• 5-6 slices of a thick, quality bacon, chopped into small (1/2-inch) pieces [garden-variety bacon, I would think, will produce a disappointing result]
• 4 tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil [a few good turns around the pan]
• 4 eggs
• ½ cup ricotta cheese
• ¾ cup of peas [fresh, would be ideal of course, but organic frozen peas, quickly thawed in a bowl of warm water, worked very well]
• Good pinch of salt
• 1 cup of loosely packed, freshly grated pecorino romano
• Many turns of freshly cracked black pepper

Heavily salt a pot of water and get it to boiling. Put in your spaghetti.

Heat the olive oil over medium heat in a large sauce/sauté pan (enough to hold 1 lb of cooked pasta). Add the bacon and cook for about 7-8 minutes, until the edges are just getting crispy, but the middle is still tender. This should not be a “crunchy” dish!

While the bacon and pasta are doing their thing, crack the eggs in a bowl and lightly beat together with the ricotta and salt.

When the pasta is just short of al dente, drain it. If the bacon is done before the pasta, be sure to remove it from the burner (remember, tender, not crunchy). Add the well-drained pasta and the peas to the pan with the bacon.

Immediately pour the egg mixture over the spaghetti and add most of the pecorino and the black pepper.

Put back on the burner over low heat, and toss well (with the spaghetti, some long tongs works well here) for just a minute or so, until the pasta is well-coated and the egg mixture appears to be slightly cooked.

Serve immediately and pass around some freshly grated pecorino.

Blood Orange Love

The cocktail. The name elicits images of swanky Manhattan dinner parties or chortling, powerful businessmen in smoke-filled lounges. Even as I’ve become a martini fan (Saphire, up, dirty, with 3 olives!), I find the idea of the cocktail offputting.

Nevertheless, this sounded good: blood orange and Campari.

If I must be truthful, until several days ago, Campari had never tainted my liver. A twist of the cap and thoughtful whiff was all I needed to determine it was a form of bitters. I would not have guessed it had 60 ingredients, but when mixed with some pulpy blood-orange juice and a decent bit of confectioner's sugar, it’s highly addictive.

After a highly successful simple two-drink test run on Friday evening, we made a batch to have as a cocktail at a dinner party being thrown by some friends on Saturday (no pictures, alas, but the beef tenderloin topped with an herbalicious pesto was a thing of beauty). Most of a large pitcher was emptied, so I’d call it a success.

If you aren’t constitutionally opposed to bitter – and like your cocktails a little on the potent side -- you can get a little more aggressive with the Campari. If you’ve got a hankerin’ for something sweet, I’d recommend a scant teaspoon of sugar per glass.

Scrapin’ Up the Bits, Lusty Bit Update Style

Ssshhhhh. I gotta secret. I got some insider information about those stickers. What stickers? Those stickers, the ones on the fruits and vegetables you buy in the grocery store. What is it? Well, as long as you promise to keep it quiet (h/t Sustainable Table):

• A four-digit number means it's conventionally grown.
• A five-digit number beginning with 9 means it's organic.
• A five-digit number beginning with 8 means it's genetically modified.

Of course, most of the organic apples and celery and the like I’ve seen in Giant Eagle recently looks more like prunes they’re so freakin’ wrinkly. So, yeah, I've been sticking to the conventionally grown stuff.

This is from last week, but it got buried somewhat by coverage of the presidential horse races. If you don’t like to watch sick animals being shoved around by forklifts or smacked in the head with electric prods, then just read this (but don’t watch this).

The long and short of it:

Video footage being released today shows workers at a California slaughterhouse delivering repeated electric shocks to cows too sick or weak to stand on their own; drivers using forklifts to roll the "downer" cows on the ground in efforts to get them to stand up for inspection; and even a veterinary version of waterboarding in which high-intensity water sprays are shot up animals' noses -- all violations of state and federal laws designed to prevent animal cruelty and to keep unhealthy animals, such as those with mad cow disease, out of the food supply.

Moreover, the companies where these practices allegedly occurred are major suppliers of meat for the nation's school lunch programs, including in Maryland, according to a company official and federal documents.

Seriously, I really don’t know if I can eat a piece of meat anymore unless I have at least some indication that it didn’t come from a place like this!

It’s good to see that grocery stores are moving away from plastic, but I’m not even really sure what this particular journalist is trying to say about it.

While subbing tap water for bottled water is effortless, giving up plastic bags is an inconvenience.

Huh? She must usually write for the Style section.

Finally, some Lusty Bit updates. I’ve recently…

• made some additions to the Intertubes Stuff I like
• updated the recipes listing
• and I’m finally experimenting with a little more blog sophistication, adding “labels” to my posts. The labels – which are at the end of each post – are like key words, you can click on one of them and all of the posts with that same key word, that is, that are somehow related to the topic (e.g, milk labeling), will come up.

Scrapin’ Up the Bits, Hectic Style

A whole mess of things worthy of a mention.

First, starting with a local item. It looks like the Soup Nazi is coming to the ‘Burgh. Can’t wait to try the lobster bisque.

Next, and this is old news by now, but for anybody who missed it, particularly sushi fans, you might want to think twice about getting that spicy tuna roll the next time you’re looking to get some of those good fats. As the New York Times reported last week, mercury levels from sushi the newspaper purchased at 20 different places throughout Manhattan had scary-high mercury levels.

“No one should eat a meal of tuna with mercury levels like those found in the restaurant samples more than about once every three weeks," said Dr. Michael Gochfeld, professor of environmental and occupational medicine at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in Piscataway, N.J.

So, not only is bluefin tuna – often the tuna of choice at many sushi restaurants – way overfished and starting to become dangerously depleted, but it’s also warehousing the mercury from all of that wonderful industrial waste finding it’s way into to the ocean. What an unexpected two-fer!! Listen to this guy – for the time being, skip the tuna sashimi and try the mackerel.

Sticking with the good news (and New York Times) theme, Mark Bittman leaves behind his “Minimalist” persona for a day to become the food eco warrior. While I would never say this is scintillating narrative, it is a collection of some scary facts. Here are some of the highlights, but do be sure to check out the whole article, if for nothing else than the disturbing picture of a factory cattle farm.

Just this week, the president of Brazil announced emergency measures to halt the burning and cutting of the country’s rain forests for crop and grazing land. In the last five months alone, the government says, 1,250 square miles were lost.

And

The world’s total meat supply was 71 million tons in 1961. In 2007, it was estimated to be 284 million tons. Per capita consumption has more than doubled over that period.

And

an estimated 30 percent of the earth’s ice-free land is directly or indirectly involved in livestock production, according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization, which also estimates that livestock production generates nearly a fifth of the world’s greenhouse gases — more than transportation.

And

Though some 800 million people on the planet now suffer from hunger or malnutrition, the majority of corn and soy grown in the world feeds cattle, pigs and chickens.

Next up, some interesting stuff coming out about folic acid — some of the stuff added to cereals and pasta and other foods to “fortify” them. Well, there are some concerns that maybe all of this fortification isn’t a risk-free proposition.

As many as 1,000 newborns a year in the United States - and many more elsewhere - have been spared so-called neural tube defects because their mothers got a crucial infusion of folic acid before they even knew they were pregnant.

But now some scientists are asking whether there have been unforeseen trade-offs for the population as a whole - including thousands of additional colon cancer cases each year, a somewhat smaller bump-up in prostate cancer, and an increase in cognitive impairment among the elderly.

This is all very preliminary stuff, but it’s something that hopefully will be further investigated.

Finally, once the weather breaks and the birds are chirping and the flowers are blooming and the Pirates begin their glorious march toward their 16^th straight losing season, we’ll be transforming our garden into a Victory Garden.

Words to Eat By

While skimming through the February issue of Food & Wine, popping in and out of an article by Salma Abdelnour about a trip she took to Japan to pretty much do nothing but eat incredible food for five days (seriously, please, tell me, how does one get this job?!), I came across what Ms. Abdelnour described as the five “Buddhist-inspired principles” of eating:

1) Respect the labor of everyone whose work contributed to the meal

2) Commit good deeds worthy of sharing in the meal

3) Arrive at the table without any negative feelings toward others

4) Eat in order to achieve spiritual and physical well-being

5) Be dedicated to the pursuit of enlightment

Now I can’t say that I follow these five rules, although I’d like to think that, at any one moment, without really thinking about it, I’m generally following two or three. Unless we're making pizzas -- for which my wife is primarily responsible -- then I'm closer to five of five.

The Sentences and the Fury

ALERT! ALERT! This is a serious post that will discuss important social issues and reference scientific research. You’ve been warned.

Maybe I’m overreacting. But darn if this didn’t set me off when I read this last week:

A nation in which the poor are defined by an income level that in most countries would make them prosperous is a nation that has all but forgotten the true meaning of poverty. A nation in which obesity is largely a problem of the poor (and anorexia of the upper-middle class) does not understand the word "hunger."

The offending two sentences came early on in an op-ed by Bret Stephens, a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board, in the Journal’s online “Opinion Journal.” In the context of the larger commentary -- a backhanded slap at anybody who dare complain about “divisions” in America or about the progress, or lack thereof, in Iraq -- these two sentences were nothing more than punditry detritus.

But those two sentences say a heck of a lot to me about how a good portion of people in this country view the socioeconomics of food and, more specifically, nutrition.

It’s true, of course, that the obesity epidemic is concentrated in less-affluent populations (how’s that for medico-journalese!). And there’s a very good reason for that: cheap, calorie-laden food is what many low-income people can afford.

Just last month, researchers from the University of Washington reported something that might surprise Mr. Stephens, but not anybody who’s been paying attention:

They found that the foods which are less energy-dense -- generally fresh fruits and vegetables -- are much more expensive per calorie than energy-dense foods -- such as those high in refined grains, added sugars, and added fats.

[snip]

Lower-calorie foods jumped in price by about 19.5 percent in that two-year period, while the prices of very calorie-rich foods stayed stable or even dropped slightly, the researchers found.

And this isn’t some short-term phenomenon:

Since 1985, the actual price of fruits and vegetables has increased 40 percent, while the price of sugar and fats has declined by 14 percent.

The bottom line is that more fattening foods are far cheaper than healthful foods. This is due in very large part, of course, to the federal subsidies paid to support the growth of corn, soy, and several other “commodity crops” that are the backbone of those calorie-laden foods (e.g., the gazillion tons of corn used to feed all those cows needed to produce those flimsy little meat patties at McDonalds).

In the same McClatchy article, a beautiful chart shows that of the $70.2 billion in subsidies – that’s right, BILLION – given to agriculture interests between 1995 and 2004, only $1.55 billion went to support fruits and veggies.

So is it any wonder that, when a mom of two making, say, $16,000 a year, sees what it will cost her to buy four or five oranges, and then realizes she can get a case of generic orange soda for the same price, she chooses the case of soda?

This whole diatribe thus far brings me round to another recent study, published just this month and covered by the New York Times’ Tara Parker-Pope, which demonstrated that giving poor people vouchers to purchase fruits and veggies actually… wait for it… increased the amount of fruits and veggies they ate.

Who would have thunk it? Certainly not Mr. Stephens, who I have little doubt would decry such a program proposal as a government “handout” -- unlike those billions of dollars in federal subsidies for growing the corn so desperately needed to produce Cherry Pepsi.

In the study, women were given $10 vouchers weekly for use at a farm market or supermarket.

After six months, women who shopped at the farmers’ markets were eating about three additional servings of fruits and vegetables a day, compared to the control group. Supermarket shoppers consumed 1.5 extra servings.

The study results, Ms. Pope reported, coincide with a decision by the USDA -- after apparently a bit of pressure from public health groups -- to start giving participants in the federal W.I.C. program (Women, Infants, and Children) subsidies for purchasing fruits and vegetables.

“Wonderful!” you might think. “Fantastic, even!”

Think again:

The W.I.C. program will provide monthly vouchers worth $8 to each recipient and $6 to each child. Breastfeeding women will receive just $10 a month toward fruits and vegetables.

So here you have a study that demonstrates quite clearly that the eating habits of poor women with children can be significantly improved through nominal weekly vouchers for fruits and veggies. In contrast, you see an action by the USDA intended merely to provide a talking point, something along the lines of, “We are helping poor women and their children eat healthier with vouchers for fruits and vegetables…”

The well-documented socioeconomic disparities in deaths from diseases like cancer and heart disease are not due to happenstance. There are directly attributed to environmental and economic factors, such as whether somebody can afford to buy a bunch of grapes or a bag of carrots at the grocery store. And, meanwhile, you have the government subsidizing the production of the most fattening and cheap foods on the planet, while doing almost nothing to help those in most need of getting an apple a day.

And what are the costs of this?

A new study shows that the nation's unchecked diabetes epidemic exacts a heavy financial toll as well: $174 billion a year. That's about as much as the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and the global war on terrorism combined.

[snip]

The incidence of diabetes has ballooned — there are 1 million new cases a year — as more Americans become overweight or obese, according to the study, released Wednesday by the American Diabetes Association. The cost of diabetes — both in direct medical care and lost productivity — has swelled 32% since 2002, the report shows. (emphasis added)

So, contrary to Mr. Stephens’ assertion, I would argue that, as a country, we definitely understand what “hunger” means. There are many kids and adults who go to bed -- or heck, spend a good portion of their day – hungry, and there are many others who have enough money to eat, but only the cheapest foods, the stuff that leads to things like obesity and diabetes.

I don’t know how much any one individual can do about any of this. But aside from the superior taste and quality of everything I get from local providers, buying as much as I can from local farms is one way I see to help further develop a local food infrastructure that can, in its own way, be part of the solution to these problems.

I know that our CSA, Harvest Valley Farms, participates in WIC, and hopefully as people start to demand more sustainably raised produce and meat, more of it will become available, the price will begin to inch down, and something good can begin to take hold well beyond what’s in my CSA basket each Tuesday from May to November.

Scrapin’ Up the Bits, Lots of ‘Em

While I work on a longer, more “serious” post about nutrition and disease, there’s been a heck of a lot of interesting news and things happening.

Perhaps the most uninteresting of these was the arrival today of my Zuni Café Cookbook. After the wild success of the roasted whole branzino, it just seemed like fate was telling me to crack that thing open as soon as possible. My plan is to make at least one main course from it a week for the next month or so and report on the outcome.

From cookbooks we move to much more intriguing fare, such as the FDA’s approval of cloned animals as a source of beef and pork and milk. I swear on whatever holy text can be provided that I am not anti-technology, but this really is unnerving.

There are no long-term data on whether meat from cloned animals is safe, and the government has no plans to track the products from these animals once they enter the marketplace or to label them as coming from a cloned animal. In any case, for those interested, the Ethicurean’s cloned animals digest is very informative.

I’ve read about overfishing, but did you know that the price of cod – the fish of choice for fish ‘n chips – in the UK has quadrupled in the last few years because cod stocks have been so depleted? And that these huge Chinese-owned fisheries are doing their best to devastate the fish stocks in the waters off of Africa? The NY Times has the scoop… or should I say “catch”?

We use garden-variety fresh mozzarella on our pizzas. But true Neapolitan-style pizzas, particularly those made in Naples, only use mozzarella di bufala, and it’s apparently about to get more expensive because of problems with bacterial infections in Italian buffalo herds.

The Daily Table blog has an interesting post about water, both its scarcity and its health, and how local, family-owned farms are important to both.

Want to find food that’s in season and local? The National Resources Defense Council has a fantastic resource for you.

Milk Labeling: They Listened, They Really Listened!

Who are the four, well-dressed gentleman above, you ask? Why, the remaining members of the legendary Kool & the Gang, of course.

And, why, you ask, is there a picture of Kool & the Gang on a food blog? Because, it's time to celebrate, baby!

It’s now official: Government bureaucrats who engage in sneaky maneuvers to the potential detriment of the public sometimes get their rear ends handed to them.

Or, more plainly put, milk labels in Pennsylvania with terms such as “rBGH free” will continue to be allowed!

In a letter to Pennsylvania milk processors, William Chirdon from the Department’s Bureau of Food Safety and Laboratory Services (who I spoke to previously about this issue, and whose name I misspelled in that report!), explains that the PDA received “a great deal of input” on the (cough… BOGUS) labeling standards it issued last fall that would have banned any labels on milk that said the product was hormone- or antibiotic-free because they were cutting into Monsanto’s profits “misleading.”

Under new standards PDA released today, this information is allowed on a milk label, as long as it also contains language that explains the FDA has found “no significant difference” between milk from clean cows and those that have gotten Monsanto's special juice. From my experience, most labels already included this disclaimer.

This really is a stinging rebuke to what I still contend was some highly dubious and downright slimy actions by PDA Secretary Dennis Wolff—actions that were quickly met with a public outcry from food bloggers (pathetic self promotion, I know!) and, of course, dairy farmers who don’t use synthetic growth hormone in their dairy cattle and want to let people know about it.

To be honest, I’m shocked. I was almost certain that these guys would drag their feet for a few months, thinking the public would forget about it—get lost in a fog of American Idol and American Gladiator—and on some random Friday afternoon at 4:00, quietly announce the initial standards change would stand.

It’s nice to be pleasantly surprised once in a while.

Roasted Branzino, Mamma Mia!!

Since the day of the Strip Club, Penn Avenue Fish Company has become one of our favorite culinary stops in the Pittsburgh vicinity. We’ve had ultra-fresh cod and sole filets and buttery “#1 tuna” (seared to perfection by some friends for the rib-eyeriffic dinner party), not to mention the unorthodox yet highly satisfying seafood tacos and great sushi from the prepared foods menu. It’s all been quite good – probably as good, if not better, than any swimming creatures you can get in Pittsburgh.

So it was no surprise that when we purchased two whole branzino (those headless things on the chopping board over there), also known as European sea bass, on Saturday morning at said fish monger, the end-result later that evening was nothing short of spectacular: tender and moist, with a subtle flavor that seemed almost destined to be eaten with the “picada” – a mix of olive oil-soaked bread crumbs, orange zest and mint, among other things – sprinkled atop the fish.

Kudos must go to the wife, who, based on one whole fish that was filleted by the server at a restaurant table several years ago, did an expert job of filleting the mostly whole branzino that emerged from the oven. She also gets kudos for choosing what would accompany the fish: chard with raisins and pine nuts, from the indispensable Savoring Italy cookbook.

The branzino recipe was published almost a year ago in the New York Times, adapted from what has to be the most popular cookbook among food bloggers, the Zuni Café Cookbook.

There’s not much for me to add to the recipe. I followed it fairly closely, although, for the picada, I didn’t do a whole lot of measuring. I have included the chard recipe below, because it paired very well with the fish and was remarkably simple.

Swiss chard with raisins and pine nuts

• 1.5 lbs of chard, washed
• ½ cup of water
• 2 tablespoons of butter
• 2 tablespoons of raisins (we used goldens)
• 2 tablespoons of pine nuts
• Salt and pepper to taste

Cut the chard into long, thin strips. Turn up the heat to medium in a large saucepan, add the chard, water, and a good pinch of salt. Cover and cook, stirring here and there, until the chard is pretty tender. About 5-7 minutes.

Drain the chard in a colander and try to squeeze out as much liquid as possible. Wipe out the saucepan, put on low heat, and add the butter. When it’s melted, add back the chard along with the raisins and ground pepper, stirring to get everything well coated and buttery, about another 3-5 minutes. Sprinkle with the pine nuts and serve.

Scrapin’ Up the Bits, Local Style

Catching up on some local food news I’ve been meaning to get to for about a week or two.

First, on March 28 and 29, an organization called Pathways to Smart Care is hosting its second annual Farm to Table conference. The theme is "A Recipe for a Healthy Pittsburgh,” and it's being held at the Lawrence Convention Center. What’s in store at the conference?

The event will feature area farmers and businesses that support sustainable agriculture, with national and local speakers, including Sandor Katz, an expert on wild fermentation, along with Patricia DeMarco of the Rachel Carson Homestead and Will Clower of Mediterranean Wellness.

Registration is $10 before February 1 and you’re asked to submit a recipe as part your registration. My submission was grilled Kentucky Wonder Beans with prosciutto.

Second, McGinnis Sisters, a local “specialty” grocery store with locations on Rt. 51 and in Monroeville, is opening up a third location on Rt. 228, not far from Kitchen de Fillippelli.

What’s the big deal, you might ask? As one of the Sisters explains…

McGinnis Sisters Special Foods Stores has had a longtime dedication to not only buying direct from local farms, but also building strong relationships with individual farmers. "They promise to provide us with what we want, and we promise to buy it; we can guarantee we'll sell it," says Sharon Young, one of the three sisters that comprise those of the McGinnis Sisters name.

The kicker: from what I can tell, the store is going in right across from local grocery behemoth, Giant Eagle.

And, last but not least on the local food front, if you work downtown, you have some new temptations to resist:

The French Tart has opened a shop in 2 PPG Place, where it offers eclairs, cream puffs, brioches, macaroons, tarts, turnovers, its signature 4-inch cakes and other sweets, as well as an array of savories including quiches and pastries stuffed with succulent cheeses, veggies or meats (including a pastry-wrapped French hotdog with mustard).

According to my wife, who spoke with the owner one time at the Shady Side location (it also has a location in Mt. Lebanon), the French Tart uses almost strictly organic ingredients. We’ve had several pastries from the French Tart and they were all magnifique!

First Visit: Good Eats in Point Breeze

Not that it needs my approval, but, even after a single visit, I can highly recommend visiting Point Brugge Café in Point Breeze (real close to Shadyside).

Now, the two kids were in tow, which can skew the experience at any restaurant. Even though the restaurant bills itself as a “a neighborhood gathering spot,” it’s perhaps not the best choice if you’re bringing along children 5 and under (e.g., no kids menu, a chic, dimly lit interior).

This isn’t a criticism, as most so-called family-friendly joints, well, aren’t very good. Which is why we rarely take the kids out to dinner. In other words, why spend a lot of money at a fine restaurant on a meal you will have a hard time enjoying because you’re so busy begging one kid to sit down or fishing out Star Wars figures from under the table or entreating a child to drink his root beer more slowly? And, on the other hand, why spend money at all on barely edible food at a restaurant just because it has dinosaur-shaped chicken tenders and crayons on the table?

That said, this evening we just wanted to get out of the house and have somebody cook something for us for a change—something delicious. So we settled on the much ballyhooed Point Brugge.

To be quick about it, we had

• Delirium Tremens on tap;
• tender mussels in a creamy white wine broth;
  
• thick but perfectly crispy frites with a tarragon-laced mayo for dipping;
  
• a large salad with a mellow dressing, some creamy goat cheese, and surprisingly tender greens; and, to keep the kids at bay while we finished our entrees
• a truly perfect piece of a Belgian chocolate cake and some ice cream with a velvety chocolate sauce – neither of which got the respect they deserved from a 5- and 3-year-old (although the 5-year-old did an excellent job of sculpting the ice cream into a chocolate pond before devouring most of it).

All of it, including my son’s grilled cheese, minus the roasted red peppers, on a baguette, was truly enjoyable.

The lone disappointment was my entrée, a pan-roasted grouper resting atop a salad of artichokes and hearts of palm with a side of pilaf with sun-dried tomato. The fish was tender and flaky, but, with no sauce of any kind, was rather boring, and the salad underneath seemed to be an afterthought, as if whatever was supposed to be under the fish was a casualty of an inventory order gone wrong, and this was what the kitchen wrangled up in a pinch. The pilaf was very tasty, but seemed like a stranger on the plate, a side for the sake of a side.

This entrée was one of the specials for the evening, and specials are supposed to be, well, special, not something I could make at home, probably with better results.

Despite being the only couple with young kids, the service was excellent and we never felt rushed, and the restaurant truly is cozy – fairly intimate, warm colors, not too loud even when it’s packed – the type of place where you could sit at the bar, downing some Chimays and various small plates (does everybody have small plates now?), and not even realize 2 or 3 hours had passed.

Overall, it’s clear that Point Brugge knows how to do things well and, despite the occasional hiccup, keep customers returning. Next time, I’ll stick with some of the more traditional Belgian dishes – I'd be exhilarated with just some more mussels and frites – and hopefully be there long enough to get a second beer and a piece of chocolate cake all for myself!

Delicious and Befuddled

Several moons ago, there was a popular Pan-Asian restaurant in Bethesda, Md., called Oodles Noodles. As its name implied, noodles were the house specialty, and they were done well. [Sadly, the restaurant is no longer there, replaced some time ago by a New Orleans-themed restaurant that itself may have already closed – ah, the dangerous lives of restaurants.]

At one point, my wife and I probably ate there once a week, rotating our meal choices around a few favorites, among which included peanut noodles, which featured two different types of long noodles in a warm peanut sauce; mee goreng, a somewhat fiery, curry-infused dish with noodles reminiscent of traditional spaghetti in thickness, but not length or texture; and, one of my all-time favorite soups, Siam noodle soup.

The first slurp of Siam noodle soup was always an adventure, because no matter how I approached it, the broth’s spiciness would reach up through my nose and steal a breath. This soup truly was a circus in your mouth, full of tang and fire (and shrimp and squid and, of course, noodles!), begging you to not abandon a single slurp to the depths of the huge bowl in which it was served, and always leaving a dripping ring of perspiration underneath each of my eyes.

With a hankering for a spicy Asian soup, I recently went searching through a few of our cookbooks and found one in Barbara Kafka’s Soup: A Way of Life that sounded like just the ticket. The recipe, borrowed from Jean-Georges Vongerichten, called for ginger, lemongrass, curry paste, onion, garlic, lime juice, fish sauce, and an ingredient that has taken a hold on whatever part of my brain controls appetite and flavor desire, coconut milk.

It also called for kaffir lime leaves and probably my least favorite meat, boneless chicken breast. I didn’t have easy access to the former and Ms. Kafka, in the commentary accompanying the recipe, suggested the lime leaves weren’t an absolute necessity, a claim of which I was dubious, but in no position to challenge unless I wanted to spend my lunch hour trekking down to the Strip District to pick some up at one of the several Asian markets there, which was just not in the offing. I had some Bell & Evans chicken breasts in the freezer, and, honestly, I didn’t think much of their inclusion at the time I was making the soup.

I brought up Siam noodle soup earlier because this recipe, despite its inclusion of coconut milk, immediately made me think of it, meaning that it had to be made, kaffir lime leaves or not.

The end result, topped with chopped cilantro and green onion, was quite good and quenched my hankering. That said, one thing about it truly bothered me: the chicken. Its only purpose, from what I could tell, was to add some protein in the case that it would be served as the main meal. The chicken had no flavor and, consequently, was a taste distraction—a roadblock through which the other robust flavors had to bust through.

A Thai cookbook we have contained a similar soup recipe: No curry paste, a lot more lime leaves, and, to my disbelief, boneless chicken breast. Here it was again, this flavorless intrusion into a soup that, in all other respects, is a celebration of robust flavor.

Then I thought back to the book Heat, by Bill Buford, which I recently finished reading and highly recommend. In the book, Buford, who, through means that aren’t fully evident to me (or, at the least, aren’t explained enough to truly make sense of it) quits his life as a magazine editor to serve as Mario Batali’s “kitchen slave” at MM’s famous New York restaurant, Babbo.

At one point, Buford discusses the publication of the Babbo Cookbook and dishes some inside dirt on how restaurant offerings are transmogrified into a hopefully easy to follow recipe for the home cook. In short, what’s in the cookbook does not recapitulate what happens at the restaurant. It can’t be done.

And I have to wonder if the same general concept applies to these recipes. I doubt there's much boneless chicken breast used in traditional Thai cooking. In my experience, it’s more likely to be the dark stuff. But average Joe and Jane Cookbook Buyer, for reasons I can’t fathom, prefer the tasteless boneless chicken breast (usually breaded and fried on a Kaiser roll), so cookbook authors toss them a bone here and there, just to keep them happy.

In any case, I plan on making this soup again fairly soon. Next time, I’ll have the lime leaves, but the chicken will be replaced by shrimp. And, in honor of a long-lost friend, I suspect some noodles will find their way in, too.

A Meal Fit for the New Year

Although I’ve had a few fun experiences on New Year’s Eve, more often I’ve had bad – as in sucky, miserable, annoying – evenings. So, for the time being, my wife and I have abandoned any pretense of big plans for Dec. 31. This year we opted for getting the kids to bed at their usual time and enjoying some good food under dim lighting in our dining room.

The menu had an inherently Indian flair, born from what I though would make an ideal choice for the meal’s centerpiece, lamb chops from Pucker Brush Farm, which I picked up in November at SlowFood Pittsburgh’s last Laptop Butcher of 2007.

Once we decided to prepare those lamb chops tandoori style, we needed some appropriate accompanying dishes. They were, for the appetizer, some tumeric, ginger, and cayenne-infused shrimp and, to play sidecar to the chops, a curried lentil, sweet potato, and chard stew-style dish.

I have little to add to the recipes themselves, which I mostly followed. I halved both the shrimp and lentil recipes, both of which worked out extremely well. The lentils required almost four cups of vegetable broth to get tender and stay moist.

The chops were truly luscious, some of the most tender meat I’ve ever had. And the tandoori marinade, so chock full of vibrant flavors, did not overwhelm the lamb at all. My only recommendation would be to scrape off some of the excess marinade from the chops before putting them on the grill. Otherwise, you might have a hard time getting what I think is a necessary bit of char on the chops, which are only on the grill for 10 minutes for medium rare.

Initially I had planned on a desert of vanilla ice cream, topped with crushed hazelnuts, dark chocolate shavings, and a splash of Bailey’s. But we switched gears and just had a big glass of an Icelandic ice wine, which with its pear flavors was a welcome way to end an excellent meal.

Scrapin' Up the Bits, Bye-Bye '07 Style

OK, OK, I admit it… December doesn’t seem like the best time to be buying or eating avocados. That said, if Giant Eagle is going to sell avocados at this time of year, then maybe they should actually last a few days, eh? I bought one about a month ago as well and, when I cut it open and tasted it a little bit, it had the consistency and flavor of wax.

Last week, with the hope of putting some slices on a COBALT sandwich (Cheese, Onion, Bacon, Avocado, Lettuce, Tomato) – using some delicious bacon from Wil-Den Farms – I cut it open and you can see above what I found. Mind you, the avocado was by no means overly soft. Based on my experience over the past few years, it seemed to be plum for slicing. Shame the inside looked like a rotted out tree!

Even minus the avocado, the sandwich (pictured to the right) was still pretty good. And, admittedly, the “T” in the COBALT was a tomato from the same grocery chain (yes, meaning it came from pretty far away – I was weak and really in the mood for a BLT!) that was pretty good, even though it’s December.

Enough complaining… A little bit late, some of my favorite things about the holiday season:

• Holiday beers
• Panettone from The Enrico Biscotti Company - where, by the way, on Christmas Eve, we received a present in the form of two free black and white people cookies for our two kids: “Little ones never pay for little people cookies,” the very nice woman behind the counter said.
• My mother’s pizzelles
• Watching It’s a Wonderful Life
• My wife’s gingerbread men (and women)
• Listening to the soundtrack from Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown

‘Burgh food gems… A food critic from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, China Millman, offers her top 10 food moments of the year and, I gotta say, it was inspiring. It really demonstrated to me that Pittsburgh has a better food scene than I give it credit for.

Gotta get me some of that Boscano Tartufo from Penn Mac.

And, after our recent trip to NYC and the other-worldly gnocchi with short rib bits appetizer I had, the braised pork ragu with gnocchi from Mio Kitchen & Wine Bar in Aspinwall sounds ultra appealing.

More local food… Two other local food items of interest – that is, two new local food-related businesses. First, Radicchio’s International Marketplace to the south of the city in McMurray sounds intriguing. What caught my eye:

But the nicest surprise may be its 15,000-square-foot produce section in the center of the store. It features precise piles of fruits and vegetables (including exotics such as Sharon fruit persimmon) in easy-to-navigate rows managed by clerks in black bow ties.

And then there’s the mega-environmentally friendly, Florida-based pizza chain, Pizza Fusion, which is opening a location far north of the city not far from Casa de Fillippelli. The menu seems almost too extensive, almost never a good thing in my view. But it’s an interesting concept in a pizza chain, that’s for sure:

We proudly serve up delicious, gourmet pizza in its purest form - untainted by artificial additives, like preservatives, growth hormones, pesticides, nitrates and trans fats (to name a few). ... Additionally, we proudly offer health conscious alternatives for our friends with selective diets and food allergies, such as our delicious gluten-free pizza, brownies and beer and our tasty vegan selections.

Born from a desire to make a difference, every detail of our operations is continuously evaluated from an environmental perspective in an effort to further minimize our ecological footprint. From delivering our food in company owned hybrid vehicles and offsetting 100% of our power consumption with the purchase of renewable wind energy certificates to building LEED certified restaurants, we are committed to being a leader in not only the pizza industry, but in a better quality of life.

Two Days in Manhattan

Last week, my wife and I had the rare opportunity – rare for us, that is – to spend not quite two days in New York City.

The trip, ostensibly to see the (still) undefeated Pitt men’s basketball team take on (the no longer!) undefeated Duke men’s basketball team (you da’ man, Levance) at Madison Square Garden, almost didn’t happen because of various familial illnesses. In the end, however, it did happen, although not quite as I had planned – said plan almost strictly revolving around food.

Most of the details of the trip are, as Dr. Evil once opined, inconsequential. One worth noting is that my intention to eat a Neapolitan-style coal- or wood-fired pizza never materialized, primarily because of my own stupidity and indecisiveness.

The other is that, of the two exemplary meals we did have, the stars were the appetizers. Here some details are necessary.

Market Table

The first meal was at a restaurant called Market Table in Greenwich Village, a well-regarded eatery that has ties to an even more highly regarded restaurant called The Little Owl where I tried, but failed, to get a reservation.

We arrived, amazingly, at 10:00 p.m., the exact time of our reservation, despite the basketball game running long because of overly intrusive referees and one (incredible) overtime period.

We had hardly eaten all day and, truth be told, neither my wife nor I were in ideal gastrointestinal condition for a meal at a fairly high-end restaurant. But we were in the Big Apple, and had no intention of letting a little GI distress interfere with well-researched plans to enjoy culinary delights.

My wife ordered the bacon-wrapped scallops, hardly a unique appetizer, but one that came highly recommended (via Chowhound's Manhattan board) nonetheless. I went with the gnocchi with short ribs. This read like a heavy appetizer and probably not the ideal choice given the situation. In the end, however, it was the best decision I have made in some time.

There is no picture to be had because our digital camera was resting idly in our valet-parked car at the hotel, which means it was, for all intensive purposes, out of reach until our departure on Saturday morning. And it was too dark for my camera phone to provide anything more than what resembled a pasta apparition.

In any case, a picture would not do this little plate of wonder any justice: light, perfectly chewy petite gnocchi, with little shreds of succulent short ribs and tender escarole chunks in a savory “parmesan broth” that I would have poured down my throat if I were sitting at my own dining room table.

My wife agreed that, although her scallops were excellent, the gnocchi were beyond exceptional. Which led me to actually vocalize the question:

Will this be a case in which the entrée will, for no fault of its own, be a letdown?

I had just eaten what was, in my estimation, one of the most wonderful things I have tasted in a long time. By that measure, how could it not?

As it turns out, the entrée, a mammoth braised lamb shank (accompanied by a gruyere gratin and some braised escarole), was quite good. Excellent, in fact. But it did not exceed the gnocchi.

In the lamb shank’s defense, I was already feeling full by the time it arrived. Remnants of a nasty, cruel flu-like illness were still lurking in my chest cavity, and, as a result, I had eaten so little over the past two weeks that I had lost two pounds without a lick of exercise. Also, we had already downed two-thirds of a bottle of red by the time the lamb arrived.

The lamb shank was incredibly flavorful and tender, pieces effortlessly dropping from the bone with only a slight prodding from my fork. The flavor, in fact, was too intense. The dish was so rich that I had to take each lamb bit with a little gratin and escarole to tame it. Even with this workaround, I ate not even a quarter of the lamb shank, apologizing to our waitress for letting so much food go to waste and cursing the fact that our hotel room had no refrigerator.

August

The next night we had 8:45 reservations at another well-regarded restaurant, August, run by an alumni of Mario Batali’s uber-famous Babbo (yet another place where 3 weeks was insufficient lead time to obtain a reservation!), Tony Liu.

The star of August is the wood-burning oven, which is where a majority of the dishes on the sparse, but intriguing, European menu are cooked. This includes, not surprisingly, the tarte flambé.

The flambé begins with a light, crisp, flavorful (dare I say perfect!) crust accented by just a little char. It was the perfect delivery vehicle for seriously luscious caramelized onions and bacon and red cabbage, all sitting on a bed of crème fraiche. Again, here we were, faced with a welcome dilemma, that the entrée could potentially be a disappointment following such a wonderful starter.

Our entrees were both well prepared. My wife had the whole oven-roasted orata and I had a really interesting (“interesting” in the best sense of the word, not the backhanded insult kind of way) baked farro pizzichi pasta, which had bits of speck, red cabbage, and a healthy dose of sage. These were new flavor combinations for me and were truly enjoyable. But my dish, at least, was not as good as the flambé. The orata was quite remarkable, but if I were forced to choose, I’d probably have another flambé.

I’m still kicking myself about the pizza. And I’m still dreaming about that gnocchi.

* Statue of Liberty image from Ellis Island Foundation Statue of Liberty picture page.

Looming Breakdowns?

Michael Pollan had an excellent piece in Sunday’s New York Times Magazine, discussing just what the term “sustainable” really means in the context of agriculture and food production.

To call a practice or system unsustainable is not just to lodge an objection based on aesthetics, say, or fairness or some ideal of environmental rectitude. What it means is that the practice or process can’t go on indefinitely because it is destroying the very conditions on which it depends. It means that, as the Marxists used to say, there are internal contradictions that sooner or later will lead to a breakdown.

He cites two examples of looming breakdowns to illustrate a larger point about the unsustainable practices in agriculture today, including one about the extreme reliance on antibiotics on huge factory farms, where pigs and chickens and cattle are raised in such tight, and terribly filthy, quarters that infections, once unleashed, can race through inmate population like horses at the beginning of a Triple Crown race.

Public-health experts have been warning us for years that this situation is a public-health disaster waiting to happen. Sooner or later, the profligate use of these antibiotics — in many cases the very same ones we depend on when we’re sick — would lead to the evolution of bacteria that could shake them off like a spring shower. It appears that “sooner or later” may be now. Recent studies in Europe and Canada found that confinement pig operations have become reservoirs of MRSA. A European study found that 60 percent of pig farms that routinely used antibiotics had MRSA-positive pigs (compared with 5 percent of farms that did not feed pigs antibiotics). This month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published a study showing that a strain of “MRSA from an animal reservoir has recently entered the human population and is now responsible for [more than] 20 percent of all MRSA in the Netherlands.”

And, by the way, it’s not just the animals infected with these resistant bacteria. According to a new Johns Hopkins study, it’s the people who work with them.

Poultry workers in the United States are 32 times more likely to carry E. coli bacteria resistant to the commonly used antibiotic, gentamicin, than others outside the poultry industry, according to a recent study conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

[snip]

Currently 16 different antimicrobial drugs are approved for use in U.S. poultry production, with gentamicin reported to be the most widely used.

This is a huge part of why we try our best to buy our chicken, pork, and beef from local farms. The chicken and pork, in particular, not only tastes much better, but I know that I’m supporting farms that are doing things the “right” way – not damaging the environment, treating their animals well, and not promoting potential public health nightmares like rampant antibiotic resistance.

We’re fortunate to have access to these local farms and their products and, when necessary, to purchase meat sourced from somewhat more sustainably raised animals at places like Whole Foods. I know that’s not the case for a lot of people and I would never say that those with limited means should make sacrifices to purchase more sustainably produced products.

However, when scientists like Dr. Terry Etherton at Penn State – part of Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture Secretary Dennis Wolff’s infamous Food Labeling Advisory Committee -- claims that people like me, who are concerned about the use of antibiotics and synthetic growth hormones in the source animals for our food supply, are just snake oil salesmen who are “anti-ag, anti-biotech, and anti-science … who use campaigns of misinformation and junk science to scare consumers,” I’d like to take information like this Hopkins study and smack him over the head with it.

There are unintended effects, Dr. Etherton, of the way the majority of animals for food productions are now raised in this country. And while you may see unlimited use of antibiotics and growth hormones as an important part of the solution, there are mounting data that say using them in such an irresponsible manner on massive factory farms may be creating more problems than they are solving.

At the moment, their use may make a T-bone or a pork tenderloin more affordable for Joe and Jane American, but in the not-so-distant future, it may mean increasing rates of infections with antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria or maybe increased rates of cancer. So if we’re going to debate the facts – which is what Dr. Terry Etherton says is the purpose of his blog -- let’s talk about all of them, not just a carefully defined subset.

As one funny and wise blogger once wrote: Just. Friggin’. Sayin’.

* Image from University of California

Scrapin’ Up the Bits: Bah-Humbug Style

I can’t really do it any justice, because I’m just not as familiar with the ins and outs of the Farm Bill as I’d otherwise like to be. But, I believe I can sum up the recent activities surrounding the Farm Bill in one sentence:

The Democrats are a bunch of craven, corrupt pieces of rotten (overfished) tuna who turned their backs on family farms and sustainable agriculture practices.

The Democrats failed to:

• Place a meaningful cap on subsidies paid to already rich individuals who happen to operate a farm
• For that matter, enact any sort of meaningful subsidy reform whatsoever
  
• Prevent big meat packers from manipulating cattle prices
• For that matter, enact any sort of meaningful reform to reign in Big Meat
  

What was it Dianne Feinstein said on the floor at one point after Democrats took majorities in both chambers? "Elections have consequences." Yes, apparently they do. Meaningless ones.

Let’s see, what other good news is there to report. Well, gee, wild salmon are headed toward extinction, clearly a positive development. And bluefin tuna — the tuna sashimi and nigiri so many sushi-eaters, including myself, love — aren’t far behind.

Been meaning to get to this, but Unbossed has THE LIST, that is, the list of members of the heretofore mysterious Labeling Advisory Committee convened by Pennsylvania Dept. of Agriculture Secretary Dennis Wolff to support his already-decided decision to force certain dairies to remove helpful language from their milk labels.

At some point, I’d love to dig into this list a little more, but, with the holidays upon us, the time just isn’t there right now.

I did notice that one committee member, Dr. Terry Etherton, has a blog on agriculture and biotechnology (he's clearly an unabashed proponent of the latter). His most recent post discusses the milk labeling issue. I wanted to leave a comment, but, alas, the “comment” function is disabled. This could be a Penn State-wide policy, since the blog appears to be hosted on the university’s Web site. But it isn’t real conducive to providing a forum for a discussion of the issues Dr. Etherton raises, including his criticisms of “countless [advocacy] groups who don’t care about the facts” because “[t]heir first priority is their agenda and raising funds to continue their campaigns of propaganda and false attacks.” Nice ad hominem attack there, Dr. Etherton.

Well, after all of this pleasant talk, the very least that can be done is to imagine something delicious, like chocolate truffles!

Hammin' It Up with the Ibericos

Courtesy of the New York Times, I saw last week that those living in the United States can now -- for the first time -- get their mitts on one of Spain’s most exquisite delicacies, Iberico hams.

These prized hams, which take more than two years to cure, are lush, almost mahogany-colored and deeply flavorful, streaked with creamy fat from the famous black-footed (pata negra) pigs of western Spain. Such luxury comes at a price. The ham will retail for more than $50 a pound.

In addition to being sold at high-end food shops, whole hams (boneless, about nine pounds; bone in, about 15 pounds) can be ordered from latienda.com, with a deposit of $199.

The arrival of such a luscious-sounding style of cured pork product on American soil is true reason for celebration. But, as the Times article suggests, it may be a delicacy few will get to enjoy. In fact, the price for the whole 8.5-9 pound ham will be about $800. For those prices, it’s safe to presume that these hams will mostly end up in the kitchens of Spanish tapas restaurants, where a few paper-thin slices will probably run the price of an entrée. Why? Supply and demand, I suppose.

In the next few weeks, some restaurants and shops will serve and sell their allotments of the initial shipment of 300 hams from Embutidos Fermín, in La Alberca, Spain, the only producer that is authorized by the United States Department of Agriculture to export the hams here.

If the imports proceed without problems, more hams will arrive in coming months through Fermín USA, a partnership among Mr. Andrés, Embutidos Fermín and the Rogers Collection, a distributor.

Now, I happen to know one of the two fellows who run the Rogers Collection, and talked with him last year about these very hams. Getting all of the paperwork in order and coming into compliance with USDA regulations sounded like a formidable undertaking. I'm hoping to get some more details from him in the next few days about just how good these hams are and what restaurants or specialty stores will be offering it.

In a brief email exchange earlier this week, he didn’t comment on whether he thinks it's superior to Prosciutto de Parma. So, darn it, that’s something I guess I’ll have to investigate for myself next time I’m in D.C., probably in February. I can only hope that Jaleo, owned by famous D.C. chef José Andrés -- without whose help these delectable hams probably would not be available in the States -- will have some in stock so that I may gladly grossly overpay for some cured pork nirvana.

Or, even better, maybe the local -- and quite good -- Spanish restaurant Mallorca, or its adjoining tapas sister, Ibiza, will decide to hop on the Iberico wagon train. That's a call I suspect I'll be making very soon.

* Image from latienda.com.

Never Too Chilly for Chimichurri

Prior to this year, I had only had a true chimichurri — the famous Argentinean “sauce” for the country’s legendary grass-fed steaks and other meats -- once, at an Argentinean restaurant in Washington, D.C. It was good, but, to be honest, far from memorable.

Well, when we got some grass-fed beef earlier this summer, I wanted to try my hand at a chimichurri to accompany it. A quick Google brought me to a recipe by renowned Miami chef – and occasional guest on Top Chef – Michelle Bernstein. I made some modifications, which I included in brackets next to each ingredient. The results, given how simple the recipe is, were excellent. I made it again on Sunday to put on top of some small New York strip steaks from So’Journey Farms.

Nothing against the steaks, because they were very tender and quite delicious, but grass-fed is definitely a different taste than most Americans are used to. So some sort of sauce to tame the beef’s aggressive flavor is almost necessary, and this chimichurri is ideally suited to that purpose.

Traditional chimichurri

• 1/4 cup coarsely chopped flat-leaf parsley
• 3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 4 large garlic cloves, minced [2 large garlic cloves; 4 just seems like WAY too much]
• 2 tablespoons fresh oregano
• 2 teaspoons crushed red pepper [1 heaping teaspoon]
• Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1/2 cup of top-quality extra-virgin olive oil [Start with one-third cup and, if it seems to cover most of what you’ve got, you can stick with that]

Blend the parsley, vinegar, garlic, oregano, and crushed red pepper in a food processor until until smooth and then season with salt and pepper. Transfer the sauce to a bowl, pour in the olive oil, and let stand for at least 20 minutes.

Crostini for the Holidays

While laying in bed this afternoon, hoping that I just might be turning the corner on whatever this body-beating illness I have is, I caught the tail end of an old episode of “Molto Mario.” He was recreating a meal you would get at the Hotel Lancelloti in the Emilia-Romagna region, in northern Italy. Part of the meal included an array of crostini, or, as MM called them, crostini misti.

Occasionally we make what I guess would fall into the crostini category, a combination of a number of strongly flavored ingredients, but with roasted red peppers as the star. It has holiday-themed colors, and is really easy to make [Wish I had a picture. Made this just a few weeks ago and forgot to snap one. Doh!], so it's an ideal appetizer if you’ve got some friends coming over or as part of a small dinner party.

One important note: The measurements here are guesstimations of the highest order. The roasted red pepper, again, is the star, so should be the predominant component.

Roasted Red Pepper Crostini

• 1 cup of roasted red peppers, roughly chopped
• ½ cup of large, tender green olive, roughly chopped
• 2 tablespoons of red onion, finely diced
• 1 heaping tablespoon of capers, rinsed, drained, and roughly chopped
• Two big swirls of high-quality extra-virgin olive oil
• A little salt and pepper
• 1 fresh baguette, cut on the diagonal into half-inch slices

Preheat the oven to 325.

Combine the peppers through capers, swirl on the olive oil, add the salt and pepper, and lightly stir together with a spoon. Again, I typically wing this, so taste at this point and see what you think. Might need a little more of something or another. This is an easy preparation to remedy.

Put the bread slices on a baking pan, and toast in the oven for about 2-3 minutes, just enough to get lightly toasted, and then remove. Put a healthy spoonful of the red pepper mixture on each bread slice You don’t want to do this too early, or the bread will become soggy and fall apart while people try to eat.

Scrapin' Up the Bits, Bed-ridden style

Ahh, the holidays, time to decorate your house, buy some gifts, make merry, and, of course, come down with some dreaded sickness that leaves you flat on your back. So, a longer update on the milk label ordeal will be just a brief note, combined with some other odds and ends.

First, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette was kind enough to print an op-ed I submitted on this subject in its Sunday “Forum” section. Aw, shucks. Considering that I usually write slightly more technical stuff, I was just honored to be considered.

Over at Chewswise, a post written before Gov. Rendell stepped in to put these regulations on hold, has some interesting tidbits, including this one comparing organic producers, which undergo formal inspections, and those who aren’t organic but are synthetic hormone free:

Conventional milk producers can issue legal affidavits about their practices under penalty of fraud. But Pennsylvania closed off this avenue by saying that such affidavits were now unacceptable as a basis for label claims.

Next, it’s been a little while, but we have two very deserving candidates for Fast Food Abomination of the Month. The winners are Wendy’s Jalapeno Cheddar Double Melt, which the chain reintroduced this week for a “limited time only.” Ah, yes, two beef patties, lots of gooey cheese, bacon, and a heaping helping of (undoubtedly canned) jalapenos. What is it the kids say, these days? Oh, yeah. OMG! Not to be outdone, Pizza Hut has introduced the Double Deep pizza, which has double the toppings and 50% more cheese.” This is not pizza. It’s acid reflux in a cardboard box.

And, lastly, because I think it’s time to go get horizontal again, the other night I made a favorite of ours, pan-roasted pork chops. Although they are fantastic on their own, decided to make a quick sauce. So after I pulled the chops from the oven, I

• removed them from the pan and put the pan on a burner
• added half cup each of white wine and chicken stock (yes, it was store bought! Sue me!)
  
• cranked the heat up to high
• Scraped up the bits on the pan
• And let it reduce, about in half, which took about 5 minutes, stirring it here and there.

You want a sauce here, so be patient and let it reduce and thicken. It was excellent. Highly recommend this little bit of extra work. UPDATE: Ooops. Totally forgot. When the consistency was where I liked it, removed it from the heat and added about half-tablespoon of somewhat softened butter, lightly stirred it in, and then poured it over our wonderful pork chops from Wil-Den Farms.