Just how tumultuous a year was 2008 when it comes to food news? In November, a man in India died at a company-sponsored pastry eating contest. That same month a couple sued McDonald's. For what? Philip Sherman left his cell phone at a McDonald's in Fayette, Arkansas, and he claims that employees found naked pictures of his wife Tina and posted them online.
Alright, what's so new about McDonald's being sued? Fair enough. Perhaps, one of the craziest news in food for 2008 is the world's largest fruit mosaic created by over 1,000 students from Pingyuan Middle School in China. The mosaic consists of 349,200 navel oranges, 18,172 apples and 5,153 pomelos. And, it made the Guinness World Record being 60 m (196 ft 10 in) long and 37 m (121 ft 4 in) wide, with a total area of 2,220 m² (23895 ft²).
This past summer, CNN posted a story online of the world's priciest foods. And, apparently gold is an edible mineral. Companies, such as Fancy Flours, are selling edible gold leaves for approximately $15,000 per pound. Now, one of my favorite food stories from 2008 comes from Wacky Archives: creative food sculptures. These adorable and insane food creatures are hilarious, especially the one of the egg shell transformed into a baby carriage carrying its yolk. And, there's the anthropomorphized roll of bread, seen above, biting onto its knife.
What are some of your favorite crazy food moments from 2008?
Confession time: what's the wine you buy on autopilot, the wine you know inside and out like a wife of many years, the one that's reliable, trustworthy, and has stood by you through thick and thin?
A recent Nielsen survey commissioned by Constellation Brands divides wine consumers into six broad categories. Fourteen percent are Satisfied Sippers, who tend to always buy the same brand, and twenty-three percent (the largest category) are Overwhelmed, staring down the endless wine aisles and not knowing what to get. It's easy to draw the next conclusion--these buyers end up getting the tried and true as well.
I don't advocate tossing the wife, but this month what about banning the house wine? (If you drink beer or cocktails or even soda, read on--you can do this, too.)
At restaurants, house wine tastes somewhere between boring and wretched. At home, house wine is good for many things--you already know you like it and can serve a bottle to unexpected guests, or just when you yourself are tired and don't have the energy to try anything new.
But January is the time for new beginnings. Instead of buying the same-old wine, fill a case with 12 wines you've never seen in your life (you'll get a 10-20 percent discount on a case, so there's even more incentive). There may be some duds in the dozen, but life is short, and wine is fun, when you're willing to branch out a bit.
I'll certainly admit to having one heck of a lot of 'cue country exploration left to do in my lifetime, but thus far I've yet to encounter any venue outside of North Carolina slinging BBQ slaw alongside their meat. It's an essential side for Lexington style, vinegar-kissed chopped pork, and gets its characteristic pink tint from a dollop of ketchup or barbecue sauce. Also -- it's pretty darned delicious, and provides a pleasantly crunchy textural contrast with the rich, soft strands of slow-cooked shoulder.
"In the central North Carolina Piedmont you will often find what locals there call "red coleslaw" on the plate next to your chopped pork barbecue. This tangy variation replaces the usual mayonnaise-based slaw dressing with a catsup-and-vinegar-based dressing. In fact, it is not unusual for Upcountry slaw all over Dixie to be spiked with a big splash of barbecue finishing sauce. Whether a sweet/sour tomato-based, spicy mix, either right from the store-bought jar or from some dusty bottle of secret brew, this spicy addition turns the coleslaw sauce either red or a rich brown color and creates what most Southerners called "barbecued coleslaw."
Surely food experts and gourmets all over the planet will ... most certainly suggest that this "barbecue on barbecue" presentation robs the meal of balance. ... Southerners will scoff at this suggestion. Everyone down here knows that if a little barbecue sauce it good, then a whole lot is even better."
If you happen by High Point, NC, do stop into Carter Brothers BBQ (from whence the above pictured platter of BBQ came on this most recent Christmas Eve) for some of the finest chopped (regular or coarse -- they're both good) pork BBQ you'll ever have the pleasure of eating.
BBQ Slaw is recipe after the jump. Got one of your own? Might you please be so kind as to kick back with a Cheerwine and share it in the comments?
It's been more than two weeks since we've had a new episode of Top Chef (any of you going through the stages of withdrawal yet?). Thankfully, the wait will be over next Wednesday, when the show will return after the holiday break. If you remember, in the last episode, the chef'testants cooked for a faux holiday party, hosted by the lovely Natasha Richardson. However, the judges rated their appetizers as subpar across the board, and so, in an act of holiday charity, they determined that they weren't going to eliminate anyone that week.
That act of compassion won't be repeated this week though, and one of the chefs is going to be out faster that Padma can say, "Pack your knives." As you can see in the clip above, the Quick Fire is a dessert challenge in which they have to make a sweet treat minus the sugar. After that, they'll be judged blind, so the food will have to speak for itself. Who do you think waving good-bye this time around?
Down South, New Year's Day means greens, black-eyed peas, cornbread, and pork. Eating the greens and peas augurs well for the New Year, according to Southern superstition, as Marisa explained last year. The cornbread and pork? Those just happen to taste divine with the lucky dishes.
This year, my family opted for a pork loin roast. Instead of roasting it, though, we fired up the grill. Using a recipe from Weber's Real Grilling by Jamie Purviance as a model, I first rubbed a simple dry rub all over the roast and let it cure in the fridge for a few hours.
Then came the glaze. I was eager to use a bottle of small-batch cane syrup produced by and named for a man named Robert E. Long who used to work with my grandfather. He makes and sells it in a tiny northern Florida town called--no joke--Two Egg. The liquor of the syrup is the clearest amber, and I had a feeling it would caramelize beautifully on the pork. I was right. The recipe, and a picture of the syrup bottle, follow the jump.
What could be more Southern than eating black-eyed peas on New Year's Day? How about sweet tea, deviled eggs, pimiento cheese, ambrosia, three-bean salad, shrimp boats, red beans and rice, corn pudding, fried okra, red eye gravy, cream doughnuts, cup custard, lemon icebox pie and divinity? If your mouth is watering from that recitation of down-home specialties, you'll like Screen Doors and Sweet Tea, a Southern cookbook which escalates the competition in a crowded field.
According to her bio, author Martha Hall Foose is a Mississippi Delta cook who studied in France, and the cuisine bears this out. True Southern fare -- heavy on the influences delta and soul -- is approached with reverence and then presented with signature spin: Foose is not the first cookbook author to prepare banana pudding (page 198) in individual servings, but she may be the first to suggest you do it in canning jars. As far as I know, she is definitely the first to make sweet tea pie (page 203) -- a recipe so crazy and that it would have made my grandmother applaud and so good that, according to the head note, it got Foose into the state fair pie baking contest. She didn't win, but then again, the winner probably didn't go on to write a cookbook as good as this.
The only sandwich in the world that I accept without veggies and cheese is the Montreal Smoked Meat sandwich. It's the perfect meat to have on its own, with fresh and delicious rye bread and a nice helping of gourmet mustard. It's also the type of meat that you don't want to prepare half-assed. When you bring it home, you don't want to throw it in your frying pan to heat up, or (egads!) microwave it -- especially when it comes straight from Montreal.
When my friend brought me a few pounds of the delicious meat on New Years Eve, I knew it would make the perfect dinner to start off 2009. But how to prepare it in a way that makes the most of the flavor?
Simple. Grab your soup pot, slip a steamer insert inside, and fill with the appropriate amount of water. Rip off a sheet of plastic wrap, place a generous amount of meat in the center, and then place the pile and wrap in the pot so that the bottom is protected by the wrap, but the top is open to get some moisture from the steam. Put your top on the pot, bring it up to a nice steam, and when the meat is nice and warm, pile it onto your sandwich with some gourmet mustard, preferably with grains.
Side it with poutine, and you'll want to move to Montreal!
The good folks at Chattanooga Bakery have seen fit to re-release their previously discontinued peanut butter permutation of the traditional choco-coated cookie, and not a darned second too soon. I'm here to tell ya, this li'l fella is some seriously good -- if nigh on violently sugary -- eating. With a crunchy, fudgy cookie as the foundation, a hearty slathering of extra-sweet peanut butter in lieu of the standard marshmallow and a silky chocolate coating, the confection bears an astonishing texture and flavor resemblance to the perennial Girl Scout vended fave, Tagalongs®, a.k.a. Peanut Butter Patties®. Served frozen, per a suggestion on the box, it's simply a revelation.
The upside is that unlike the GSA confection, Moon Pies can be acquired year-round. The downer for those trapped north of the Mason-Dixon is that they're not especially easy to come across in stores. $17.99, plus $8.95 (give or take) shipping will net you 48 pies, but I'd daresay it's worth the investment at least once. Tell ya what -- if you don't like 'em, next time I see you, I'll spring for your R.C.
Just a few days ago, I noted my love for highly specific food traditions, tied to holidays and celebrations -- hoppin' john on New Year's Day, king cake on Mardi Gras, mint juleps on Derby Day. So, it seemed foolhardy not to avail myself of a Moravian Love Feast bun when I had the chance, seeing as how I was in North Carolina, and my in-laws have been attending the Christmas Eve Wesley Memorial United Methodist Church's Love Feast since back when Rudolph was a fawn. I'm not, by habit, a churchgoing gal, but was assured that all (even long-lapsed Catholic school girls like me) are welcome to share in the ritual.
What the heck is a Love Feast, you ask? Well, according to North Carolina and Old Salem Cookery (1955):
No church service is more distinctive than a Moravian love feast. Love feasts are held in connection with holidays such as Christmas, New Year's, Easter and on days of special significance to the church such as church anniversaries and a day set aside to honor missionaries.
During the love feast, each person in the church receives a large, flat yeast bun and a mug of coffee containing cream and sugar.
The love feast is symbolic of the fellowship of the church. The idea behind the simple meal is that those who break bread together are united in the fellowship the way a family is.
While there are regional variations in the components of the feast -- some congregations subbing in warm cider or hot Russian tea for the coffee, or embossing an "M" on the bun tops, rather than the Moravian star seen in the image above -- the recipe invariably calls for the inclusion of mashed potatoes. As a choir or orchestra performs, the buns are passed in baskets throughout the congregation, followed by cups of the hot beverage. After these have been collected, beeswax candles -- decorated with red paper frills to catch dripping -- are distributed to the assembled, lit from wick to wick, and carried in procession out of the church.
Food writers have been extolling the virtues of a simple pot of beans since the beginning of food writing. I'm a relatively recent convert to the world of dried beans, but these days, I can't get enough. Cooked up with bacon (pork or turkey both work) and a little sauteed onion (sometimes I throw a bit of red or green pepper in if I'm feeling adventurous) they make a wonderful, easy, abundant meal.
I like to cook them up a little juicy, so that when the beans are fully cooked, the result is something between a traditional pot of beans and bean soup. I serve them over brown rice and top them with a rotating assortment of grated cheese, cubed avocado, chopped cilantro, salsa and minced raw onion.
The other nice thing about this meal is that while it tastes wonderful, it's fairly simple, which is just the ticket after the indulgences of the holiday season.
I hope you can stomach one more sweet treat after the sugar orgy that is late December. This lovely chocolate cake (and don't you love the way the background pattern mimics the look of the sprinkles) comes from Jeannette of Everybody Likes Sandwiches. She baked this cake as a Christmas dessert and if you're up for it, you can get the recipe here.
I had a really mellow New Year's Eve this year. A couple of friends came over for cheese fondue (with roasted potatoes, sausage, brussels sprouts and broccolini, in addition to the tradition bread cubes, for dipping) before the early They Might Be Giants show at Philly's TLA. Afterwards, we came back and ate vanilla ice cream drizzled with Kahlua. Of course, there was some bubbly to toast 2009.
How did the rest of you celebrate? Did you eat our or make a special meal at home? Do you have New Year's Eve traditions?
Happy New Year, all! Hope everyone had a warm, festive Eve and is relatively headache-free and rested post-revelry. Now, there are as many ways to prepare the cowpea and rice concoction of Hoppin' John as there are squares on a calendar, but in many parts of the American South, the definitive date to simmer up a big ol' pot of it is New Year's Day. While the name's origin is still the subject of some debate -- some scholars asserting that it's a corruption of "pois a pigeon," a Carribean dish enjoyed by Southern slaves while still in their native land, and others claiming it's derived from a 13th century Iraqi dish called "bhat kachang" -- the dish's fans maintain that eating it ensures good luck for the coming year. This may well be superstition, but I'm inclined toward any angle that's gonna get a bowlful of it in front of me on a chilly January 1st.
My grand revelation of the day (though likely hardly news to many of you) is that cowpeas are the genus for the group that contains blackeye peas (most commonly used in Hoppin' John), catjang, and yardlong beans. They're also called crowder peas.
Some recipes for Hoppin' John contain tomatoes or okra, and the swap in of okra for the beans makes it a Limpin' Susie.
Got a favorite variation? Share it below, and peruse my favorite recipe after the jump.
A few weeks ago I listed my 2009 wine predictions, including one under "wishful thinking" about box wine, PET bottles, and lighter, alternative forms of packaging becoming mainstream. Now it seems we're one step closer: a California wine company is bottling (or would that be "bagging") a Cabernet Sauvignon in a cardboard tube.
According to the company, Four Wine reduces carbon footprint by 50 percent and reduces landfill waste by 85 percent compared with traditional glass packaging. The packaging is 100 percent recyclable.
As far as I can tell, this wine is boxed wine of a different shape, an attempt at marketing to people who want to be green but don't want the stigma of serving from a box. It has a bag and spigot, but the packaging is a bit more upscale than your generic box brand. And hey, if wine snobs latch on, who cares if the cardboard packaging is a rolled tube or a rectangular box?
I haven't tried the wine, but it's supposed to be a premium brand with lower prices since you're not paying as much for shipping. A 3-liter tube (the equivalent of four bottles) retails at $39. Tried it? What do you think?
Wondering why your refrigerator and freezer or using so much energy? Follow some quick and easy instructions to keep these machines running more efficiently, even during a power outage.
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A few weeks ago I listed my 
New Year's Day Hoppin' John
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It's all in the planning - First time Thanksgiving
