Modeh Ani by Jackie Olenick. For more information about Jackie Olenick, see page 163
2 T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fall 2 010
THE
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In recent weeks
we’ve consumed a bounty of marvelous chicken and egg stories and examined these ubiquitous foodstuffs from myriad perspectives ranging from the delicious to the Divine. In the process, the age-old question of which came first—the chicken or the egg—was never far from our minds. You may think we resolve it in our first selection, a thoughtful piece from African-American food authority Jessica Harris that centers on a Yoruba myth placing the chicken at the center of the world’s beginnings. But by the time you reach our end page, you will discover, courtesy of the writings of Uruguayan Eduardo Galeano, an equally powerful New World creation myth involving a cosmic egg. Mythology remains divided. Science is no help, either. This summer a group of British scientists proclaimed the chicken first based on a study of protein in the eggshells. But another British panel convened a few years earlier, consisting of a genetic specialist, a philosopher of science and a poultry farmer, looked at a range of scientific evidence and decided just the opposite. Even breakfast is inconclusive. While eggs are overwhelmingly present on the American and European morning table, our story on the quirky but tasty tradition of fried chicken and waffles notes that chicken as the centerpiece of the first meal of a farm family’s day also has a long history. At some point it occurred to us that the real philosophical/spiritual question is not which came first, but why so many of us desire such an answer. To pinpoint a beginning implies an outcome. To define a cause allows us to predict the effect, and in so doing, gives us the illusion of some measure of control over the future. More than a few of the world’s religions, and much of science, have been based on just this desire. But there are other spiritual ways of thinking—including new ways of interpreting the scientific evidence of physics—that suggest the possibility of no discernable beginning, and hence no predictable end. And nothing for a wise chicken (or egg), then, to do but jump on the wheel of life and go for the glorious ride. PATRICIA WEST-BARKER, Publisher/Executive Editor
RONNI LUNDY, Editor-in Chief T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 3
Z E N C H I L A D A . COM BOX 628 551 WEST CORDOVA ROAD SANTA FE, NM 87505
THE
THE
ZENCHIL
ISSUE No.2 • CHICKEN & EGG • FALL 2010
Patricia West-Barker
Cover
Publisher/Executive Editor pwestbarker@thezenchilada.com
Photograph of Dave Harris, a cattle rancher in Crane, Montana, by PAUL MOBLEY, from American Farmer: The Heart of Our Country.
Ronni Lundy Editor-in-Chief ronnilundy@thezenchilada.com
REVIEW ON PAGE 154.
Kristie Jones Copy Editor
Fernando Delgado Creative Director fernando@smartassociatesinc.com
Barbara Walzer Advertising Sales, Marketing Director bwalzer@thezenchilada.com 505. 577. 2282 We welcome your comments. Until our interactive blog comes online, write or e-mail us at the addresses above. TheZenchilada.com is published quarterly. TheZenchilada.com currently publishes at no cost to readers. There is, at this time, no fee to subscribe, no secret stories hidden for only a select paying few. But if this second issue inspires you to become a financial supporter of our efforts, send an e-mail to pwestbarker@thezenchilada.com and we’ll tell you how to go about that; we’ll also send a spot of organic New Mexico red chile powder to everyone who contributes $25 or more. We are happy to share, but ask that no part of this publication be commercially reproduced without the written permission of the publisher. ©2010. THEZENCHILADA.COM ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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Inside Cover, Creator of Judaic illuminations, Jackie Olenick, gives us this lovely, lively rooster to sing the traditional Modeh Ani, or morning prayer. Editors’ Letter Table of Contents Making the World from Scratch:
A RECIPE FOR CREATION,
PAGE 6 Some Voudon, Santería and Candomble rituals make use of the egg,
others the chicken; Afro-American food scholar Jessica Harris shares a Yoruba creation myth that says who was on first.
Something to Crow About,
PAGE 9
The late Marvin Finn’s rambunctious roosters and other artful critters reflected his southern rural childhood, but may have roots that reach even further.
The Red Wheelbarrow,
PAGE 12 A classic from the modernist poet William Carlos Williams.
Chickens: A Love Story,
PAGE 14 A genuine chick-lit romance from New Mexico’s Patricia Greathouse—plus a meditation on the art of being Mother Zen.
Why I Love Egg in a Hole,
PAGE 22 There’s a lot of good in a fried egg, Ronni Lundy says—especially when it’s served in crisped bread with a story on the side.
Rhode Island Fed: A Chicken Memoir,
PAGE 26 Lucille Minuto discovers the past is still present in a poultry shop on Providence’s Federal Hill.
Uptown Struttin’ with City Chicken,
PAGE 30 Everything old is new again—and more expensive—but this classic version of meat-on-a-stick is just as delicious as ever, says Christopher Kolon.
Coop de Ville,
PAGE 32 How you gonna keep ‘em down on the farm? Poultry savant Ashley English says you don’t have to—and delivers the scoop on raising chickens in the city.
Proof of Life: DRINK UP—RAW EGGS AND ALL, PAGE 38
The raw egg cocktail is not just for frat boys anymore. Our resident mixologist Matthew Rowley tells you why this treat is now toney.
ADA. Boy and Egg,
Enchiladas Oaxaqueñas:
COM
MAKE MINE OVER MOLE, PAGE 76 Goose, gander, schmander. In Oaxaca, finds expatriate Pat Reed, what’s sauce for the chicken is sublime for the egg.
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner:
PAGE 42
Texas poet Naomi Shihab Nye captures a moment of the possible—like an egg in the hand.
Eggs on Board: HANDLE WITH CARE,
PAGE 44
Meet the hardest working ingredient in the food business as Sacramento author and radio commentator Elaine Corn reveals the many culinary qualities of the remarkable egg.
THE CHICKEN OR THE EGG? A Play in One Act, PAGE 80 Ronni Lundy delivers an eggs-cruciatingly pun-filled close encounter of the bird kind.
The Egg and I, PAGE 84 Chasing perfection in omelet and saucepan, journalistcook Pat Reed discovers there is more than one way to prepare the perfect egg.
Finding the Good Egg: A DATING GUIDE,
LC—The Last Chicken, PAGE 90
PAGE 48 As if organic, omega-3, free-range and
The amazing adventures of an indomitable Maine bird as recounted by her human Boswell, Kim Moss.
cage-free weren’t enough to contend with, what do those strange numbers on the egg carton mean? Sue Vorenburg unscrambles the egg label mystery.
The Devil Is In the Details, PAGE 54
Ten Things You Need to Know About Southern Fried Chicken, PAGE 94
The Queen of Devilment and Deviled Eggs, Debbie Moose, delivers new twists on a sinfully delicious treat.
From pulley-bones to chicken extenders to the schism between them who soak and them who don’t, Ronni Lundy gives you the word on this iconic dish.
Is That An Egg In Your Pocket, Or Are You Just Happy To See Me? PAGE 58
Recipes, PAGE 100
New Mexico artist and storyteller Beth Surdut trades eggs for inspiration and Raven wisdom.
Now it’s time to shake a tail feather and get cracking in the kitchen with a flock of fine recipes for chicken, eggs and more.
A Taste of Moorish Spain,
Coq au Vin,
Santa Fe pastry chef Diane Perkins tastes history in a frozen honey mousse and declares, “Let them eat cake!”
PAGE 122 Pat Greathouse has a tasty way to handle a rooster when love’s gone wrong.
Tasting New Mexico,
Pink Pickled Eggs, PAGE 138
PAGE 60
PAGE 65
Award-winning cookbook authors Cheryl and Bill Jamison are seeking contributions for Tasting New Mexico: 100 Years of New Mexico Cooking
Bar food goes straight—and lunch and snack time take on a rosy glow!
Cracking Open a Beloved Tradition,
EVERYTHING NICE, PAGE 150 April McGreger tells how to turn a bushel or a peck of green tomatoes into a winter of good eating.
PAGE 66 Native New Mexican Carla Aragón spins a
charming tale of a Santa Fe holiday ritual involving confetti-filled eggshells.
Time and Terroir: IRRESISTIBLE INCENSE, PAGE 70 Passion or addiction? Who cares when the
Yes, We Can Can: SOUR AND SPICE AND
Resources: BOOKS, PAGE 153, VIDEOS/SITES, PAGE 158
smell of roasting chile is in the air, exults New Mexico’s Rocky Durham.
CONTRIBUTORS, PAGE 160, NEXT ISSUE, PAGE 165
Jiron Family Chile Rellenos,
Vic Hogsett shares his chile-drying technique, and delivers a little-known rendition of a regional tradition.
Death is part of life on the farm, but some losses move us in mysterious ways, notes Appalachian filmmaker Lora Smith.
Pollo Real,
End Page: The Creation, PAGE 170
PAGE 73
PAGE 74 Pasture-raised organic chicken is the real deal at the Pollo Real farm in Socorro, New Mexico. Photographer Kitty Leaken captures the experience for us.
Goodbye Chicken Dog, PAGE 166
Uruguayan journalist and novelist Eduardo Galeano recounts a folk tale that delivers the last word on who came first. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Story by JESSICA B. HARRIS
IN THE BEGINNING there was only water. Olodumare commanded Obatala, the head of the pantheon of orisa, to descend to the watery regions and make land. Obatala thought of how to do this and went around in heaven asking for gold from all of the orisa who willingly donated their jewelry to the cause. When he had the gold, he created a golden chain and placed a hook on the end. He descended the chain carrying under his arm a chicken, a snail shell full of dirt and some iron. When Obatala arrived at the bottom of the chain he threw down the iron to form the base for his endeavor. Then, he poured out the dirt from the snail shell and set the chicken on it. The chicken did what all yard fowl do—kicked and pecked at the dirt, scattering it until it spread out and formed the land. When the land was formed, it was tested to see if it was firm and then many of the orisa descended the golden chain to live in the place that became known as Ile Ife, a town considered by many to be the center of Yoruba worship in present-day Nigeria. Big Blue Rooster, 1990 by Marvin Finn Photo from Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft
THIS PATAKI, or creation story, is a testimonial to the powers of observation of the Yoruba. The ability of a chicken to spread dirt, often witnessed in a barnyard or garden, becomes the method by which the world is created. As with many of the world’s creation stories, there are Old and New World variations, each with its own regional particularities. For the Yoruba, they all begin with Olorun, who is also called Olodumare, the creator principle and most important entity for the Yoruba. Religious traditions formed by the coming together of the varied teachings of the African continent in the New World are complex and compelling. Anyone who has ever watched as the Vodun loa possess the bodies of their followers and come to earth at a ceremony in Haiti, or who has sat down in a Brooklyn basement to honor the orisa by sharing in the ritual meal of a CubanAmerican bembé, is sure to be impressed by the importance of food and foodstuffs in the traditional New World African religions. Food is one of the most important ways of honoring and placating the deities. It is also a means of creating community among congregants. As cultural historian John Mason put it in his masterwork on the food of New World African religions, Idana Fun Orisa: Cooking for Selected Heads, “Food and music are two hallmarks of the African and African American religious statement … It is not considered proper to display God’s food in abundance without inviting those T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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present to break bread with us and share the bounty. New World Africans, no matter how poor or mistreated, never forgot this ancient rule of hospitality.” Within the highly codified world of Vodun, Santeria and Candomble Gege/Nago, food is strictly regulated with each orisa or loa having dishes that are preferred and that must be prepared according to ritual recipes passed down in oral form from time immemorial. From the ingredients—many of which are imported from Africa at great expense—to the methods, which may be as specific as which way the knife cuts must be made, to the injunction at some places of worship to cook only over wood and with nothing as modern as gas stoves, the exactitude with which the meals for the orisa and loa are prepared are one of the hallmarks of worship. At other times, it is the simple foodstuff itself that is of cardinal importance, as reported by Maya Deren in Divine Horsemen: The Voodoo Gods of Haiti, an account of her experiences in the world of Vodun in Haiti in the early 1950s. “Damballah Wedo is the ancient, the venerable father, so ancient, so venerable, as of a world before the troubles began; and his children would keep him so: image of the benevolent, paternal innocence, the great father of whom one asks nothing but his blessing. He comes as a snake, plunging at once into the basin of water which is built for him, and then writhes, dripping and inarticulate, upon the ground, or mounts a tree, where he lies in the high branches, the primordial source of all life wisdom… “He is shown as a snake, arched in the path that the sun travels across the sky, sometimes half of the arch is composed of his female counterpart, Ayida, the rainbow… Damballah and Ayida, who together represent the sexual totality, encompass the cosmos as a serpent coiled around the world. The egg, the world egg, is the special symbol for them; and the egg is the particular offering to Damballah. He drinks it, crushing the shell with his teeth.” The importance of the egg as a ritual offering for the cosmic couple of the serpent and the rainbow (Damballah and Ayida Wedo) is interesting, as eggs are not a food ordinarily eaten among the Yoruba or their neighbors, the Fon. These people do not raise chickens for their eggs, as they traditionally believe that eating 8
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them would encourage children to be thieves. They preferred guinea hen eggs. Many New World recipes, however, prepared for ritual banquets—including many of the puddings and desserts and sweets out of the Cuban culinary repertoire—do call for chicken eggs. Unfortunately, the Yoruba tale doesn’t answer the classic question of which comes first, the chicken or the egg, for we’ll never know on which heavenly barnyard the yard bird that accompanied Obatala might have originated. That question, like so many others in all religions, must remain unanswered.
A FEW DEFINITIONS: OLUDUMARE/OLORUN: the Supreme Being in Yoruba belief. ORISA/ORISHA/ORIXA: a spirit, either male or female, initially in West African belief systems, but transplanted now throughout the world. OBATALA:the creator orisa. VODUN: a traditional West-African coastal religion that forms the foundation of many New World spiritual traditions as well, including Haitian Vodou, Cuban Santeria and Candomble in Brazil. CANDOMBLE GEGE/NAGO: is the Brazilian Candomble tradition based on Yoruba and Fon traditions. LOA: the spirits of Vodun. SANTERÍA: a syncretic religion that merges Yoruba beliefs with Catholicism and indigenous American traditions. For more about Jessica B. Harris, see page 161.
Marvin Finn at home, photographed by Geoff Carr
SOMETHING TO CROW ABOUT THE WORK OF ARTIST Marvin Finn (19132007) has been well known in Louisville, Kentucky, for more than thirty years. Moveable, wind-up, bend-down and roll-on Rube Goldbergish vehicles and machines made from scrap wood amused Finn as a child, his children later, and collectors after that. But it was his gaily painted, whimsical creatures—roosters, and chickens, fanciful birds, ducks, bulls, pigs and the occasional two-headed entity—that won him national fame as a folk artist. In 2000, the city of Louisville commissioned 32 replicas of some of his most beloved birds to be cast in steel and painted in Finn’s style by a cadre of local artists. Called the Flock of Finns, some of them 9 feet tall, the collection was an outdoor art display that for many years moved from one part of the city to another with the seasons. Eventually the Flock was permanently installed with a view of the Ohio River at Louisville’s Waterfront Park. Biographers often noted the stark conditions of Finn’s childhood, one of 12 children of a sharecropper. Finn learned carving from his beloved father, standing underneath his dad as he whittled. He said he took up the skill to make the only toys he ever had. What few people realize is that Marvin Finn’s work is linked to
a larger tradition of folk art, one which reaches back to Africa. As Albertus Gorman wrote in an essay, “The Rooster in Marvin Finn’s Work,” for a retrospective at the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, “Finn once shared a remarkable story of his early days in rural Clio, Alabama, that may provide a reason the chicken form is so important to him. Once, Finn’s brother was bitten by a snake while the two young men were walking in the woods. Quickly returning to their home, they sought out and caught a black chicken. The bird was killed and then pressed to the snakebite wound. Soon, his brother was well again. “In her essay, ‘Black American Folk Art, Origins and Early Manifestations,’ (art historian and Virginia Commonwealth University professor emerita) Reginia A. Perry notes that chickens and snakes are important to the folk remedies and religions of West Africa. Through slavery, these customs and practices were roughly transplanted to the West Indies and then to the Gulf Coast of the United States. Interestingly, Finn has said that he has made only one snake sculpture. The night he made it, he dreamt the snake became alive. This startled him so much that he sold the piece to the T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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first person who wanted it. Perhaps the healing power the chicken holds over the snake is one of the reasons Finn uses the rooster image so frequently. “In her essay, Professor Perry also mentions that wood sculptures and the use of mixed media are characteristics of the Yoruba peoples of West Africa. A typical Finn rooster is made of scrap wood and then specially painted. Each feather of the bird’s body is rendered as a single dash mark of the paintbrush. The visual effect is much like beadwork, which is also an important West African link. Finn adds other materials to his work—it is not uncommon to find a crowing rooster with a small nail representing the bird’s tongue. The use of nails, tacks and shells are integral to West African sculpture traditions. “One last note concerning the rooster: Professor Perry has observed that when chicken forms are used by the Yoruba, they tend to be realistically sculpted. This seems true of Finn’s work, as well. Of all the animals in the Finn menagerie, the rooster form is the most naturalistic.”
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Rooster, 1981 by Marvin Finn. Photo from Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft
For more information about the Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, CLICK HERE. For more about the museum’s retrospective exhibition of the work of Marvin Finn (October 25, 2008 to January 31, 2009), CLICK HERE.
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THE RED WHEELBARROW BY WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS (1883-1963)
so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens.
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Reprinted from Collected Poems Volume I, William Carlos Williams, edited by Walton Litz and Christopher McGowan, Carcanet Press Poetry Publisher, 2000. To learn more about Carcanet Press, CLICK HERE. To hear Williams read “The Red Wheelbarrow,” CLICK HERE. Photo illustration by Richard Cady. For more about Richard Cady, see page 160. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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CHICKENS: Story by PATRICIA GREATHOUSE Photographs by FERNANDO DELGADO CHICKENS, THE BRUNT OF JOKES and the victims of unspeakable cruelty, have a bad reputation for cowardice — but I'm here to bear testimony to their charms.
chickens would be cold hardy, good layers, docile, lovely to look at and would be good mothers.
Known on small farms as an easily raised source of meat, eggs and insect control, chickens are not only the most versatile and utilitarian of the domestic animals—they are also beautiful, funny and courageous, especially when called upon to defend their loved ones.
Armed with this information, I went to the Town and Country feed store in Española, New Mexico. I was astounded at the selection. Like Noah, I got two of each variety: two white Silkies, two Naked Necks, two Australorps, two Buff Orpingtons and two Golden Wyandottes. I added six turkeys that were cheap because they were mixed varieties.
Last spring, after a friend called and asked if I wanted some guinea fowl poults to help with the grasshopper problem, I began to think about chickens. And turkeys. I was going to have to babysit guineas for three weeks, so adding chicks and turkey poults seemed like a smart thing to do.
We had an old adobe chicken house on our property. Surrounded by weeds and full of cobwebs, it was just begging to be refurbished. We had time to work on it because the fuzzy chicks and poults were going to have to live inside until they grew enough real feathers to keep them warm.
I had raised some chickens 30 years ago. I had a practical country attitude toward them then, inherited from my farming grandparents. One set had a small farm on the Continental Divide in New Mexico’s Rio Arriba County; the other set were teachers in Portales who raised chickens for market. I'd never heard of raising chickens for pets.
I set up the box of little peepers in the greenhouse and I handled them every day. I let the grandchildren handle them, too. The kids learned not to drop the chicks from three feet in the air when they pooped on their hands, and they all — chicks and children— survived.
At that time, I ordered meat chicks and white layers from a catalog. The hens were ugly and uninteresting, and a neighbor's dogs broke into our shed and killed most of the meat chicks. The rooster, supposedly one of the white layers, jumped on my 3-year-old’s back every time we went in the coop. I loved the eggs, but the rooster had a texture like rubber bands even after a 24-hour braise — he just couldn't live on with the attitude he had. I was not inspired to get more. As a friend who grew up on a farm said then, “How many animals that you feed every day run when you come into the cage?” Yes, the chickens seemed stupid and ungrateful. Somehow, in the intervening years, I heard about breeds of chickens that were docile and beautiful. Friends who raised such chickens talked of them sitting on their laps and eating out of their hands. I got online and found that I could find the chicken varieties of my dreams by listing the traits that I wanted: My perfect 14
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I was determined to make my chickens into pets. In addition to enjoying their delicious eggs, I would be able to hold them and enjoy them. I was enchanted.
R E A L I T Y ST R I K E S The chicks and poults outgrew their box, but they still hadn't feathered out enough to live outside, so we released them into the greenhouse. They shat all over the brick floor, and within a week they had reduced several gigantic tomato plants and all the fig trees to stalks and stems. I didn't care. I loved to sit on the steps and watch them in all their busy goofiness. One would find something interesting and the race would be on, all chasing the one with the twig that looked like a worm. A real bug sent them into frenzied competition that lasted until there was nothing left to fight over. Several of the bravest babies would approach and eat out of my hand. Mr. Friendly, a bug-eyed turkey,
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WHEN I’M UPSET
or the world
seems too hard, I sit in the coop or in the yard and watch the chickens. In no time, I feel better.
was the biggest and the funniest character of the bunch. He would come running when my husband, Chris, came into the room, and would sit on his knee while they eyeballed each other. Chris hand-fed him grasshoppers. Within a month, the young chickens were snuggled into a new home in the adobe chicken coop. They had a large yard, and we made roosting perches from which they could survey the countryside. The birds had become a community with all kinds of characters while they were growing up, and the guineas were the skinheads that terrorized the good citizens. The turkeys were the huge galumphing dinosaurs, but the guineas picked on them, too. It was a conundrum, because we really wanted those guineas to eat our grasshoppers, but we couldn't bear to watch the way they beaned the others with their anvil-like 16
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beaks. And they were just flat-out ugly, too, with their little bald, vulture-like heads. They fought like Ninjas when we tried to catch them, clawing and flapping as if we were going to cut their throats. I grew to despise them.
N O T- S O -F R E E R A N G E The dream of every back-to-the-earth chicken farmer is to have free-range chickens. The dream of every coyote in the world is to eat those chickens. After six weeks of habituation to their new home in the adobe coop, we let the chickens out to enjoy nature. They were like elementary students at recess. They frolicked and played, voraciously ate green grass, hopped into bushes and caught grasshoppers with single-minded relish. At the edge of our land is a
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deep, wild arroyo, a veritable predator superhighway. At the end of that first day of free-ranging, two birds were missing, including Mr. Friendly. Brokenhearted, Chris turned his back on the chickens forever. I had a neighbor who was raising all kinds of fowl, and his large ducks, geese, turkeys, and chickens regularly grazed in our alfalfa patch. They seemed safe enough, but he told me that he had seen two different bobcats feasting on his chickens. They had jumped a high fence for their meal. We had buried the base of our coop fence and covered the top of the yard to keep predators out, which made our flock relatively safe as long as they were locked in. The neighbor’s flock didn't seem to get decimated like ours, however, so I held out hope. I let the birds out to free-range twice more over the next two months, and each time we lost two more. We figured that it was a couple of coyotes, or perhaps the two bobcats, that hit and ran with the chickens and turkeys in broad daylight because we never saw a sign of them. I sadly gave up on the idea of the chickens getting to enjoy nature and eating alfalfa. Now I keep them locked up. I cut fresh grass and alfalfa for them in summer, and in winter they get baled dry alfalfa. They have forgotten what freedom was like and no longer try to squeeze out when I go in to feed them. By the time the chickens and the guineas were full grown, the guineas were such bullies that I decided they would have to live outside the coop. I hoped they would survive, and I fed and watered them regularly. They hung around for a few days trying to get back into the coop, but finally gave up and went to roost in the trees. Within a week, all were gone but one. The poor surviving guinea couldn't give up the flock and hung around until we found her a new home.
over thousands of years of living with humans. (Current belief is that they were domesticated in what is now Vietnam, more than 10,000 years ago.) They have a social hierarchy, and woe to the chicken that is on the bottom, for “lowest on the pecking order” is more than just an expression. The lowest status chicken is the one whose head gets pecked by every other chicken in the flock. They eat last and have no rights. When I'm upset or the world seems too hard, I sit in the coop or in the yard and I watch the chickens. In no time, I feel better. If I feel really bad, I catch one and hold it and preen it. The chickens seem to enjoy this, too, and relax and nest into my lap. Their pupils dilate and contract as they watch me. They make little throat sounds. They're incredibly soft and their feathers are clean and glisten with iridescence. They are beautiful, and my mixed flock is visually stimulating. The little rooster is a riot of colors and flouncing tail feathers. His neck ruff is as complex as a Dutch burgher’s in a Rembrandt painting. The little Silkies are so Shmoolike, their fluffy whiteness making them look like little stuffed animals, their feathered feet like little boots. The Australorps look black, but their feathers are iridescent green and they have big, dark eyes. The little Wynandotte hen has an amazingly complex, symmetrical overlay pattern in her feathers. And they do flock together, each pairing off by breed — something that makes me reflect on our own nature and helps me forgive humans just a little.
CH I CK F L I CK By now, dear reader, you are probably wondering just what the benefits of having chickens might be. First, watching them gives me great pleasure. It soothes me and slows me down; it's better than television. When they graze, they make contented sounds that make me feel warm and happy. When they're upset or want to make a point, they communicate. They scold, they fuss, they talk to each other. They have a language and behaviors that have evolved T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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THE CHICKENS HAVE TAUGHT ME
to respect the natural abilities
and attributes of my fellow creatures. I love the industry of the chickens. The rooster has his job. He protects the flock and leads the way. He is husband and bodyguard to the hens. The hens are the womenfolk who busy themselves laying eggs and gossiping. (This may sound sexist, but it's true.) They eat up table scraps, running to greet me in the morning to see what goodies I've brought. They especially love salad greens and tomatoes. They like butter, too, and they ate tons of fallen peaches, nectarines, pears and rotten apples with relish last summer. When they're not scratching for food, they take dust baths, mate and nap in the sun.
T H E L E S S O N S O F CH I CK E N S I've learned a few things that I'll never forget in the course of raising chickens. One is never to put a handful of eggs in my coat pocket and then chase a rooster. The gallus gallus domesticus rooster can be as good or as bad as any man, and they usually combine the traits. Our first rooster, a Naked Neck, was a wild-eyed, top dog, tobacco-spitting redneck who'd just as soon kick your butt as look at you. He probably had little Harley tattoos under his feathers. After he jumped my grandkids a couple of times and kept coming after several swift kicks, he became a great coq au vin.
After his reign ended, our second rooster took charge, but I did a little research on how to keep him docile before he got too full of himself. Now he knows I'm at the top of the pecking order because I never let him breed a hen in front of me. They're my hens and establishing that is what made me top. If he mounts one in front of me, I pull him off and chase him around the coop. Other times I hold him when I catch him and tell him how good he is and that he's my boy. He hates it, but he has to submit to me. I'm the top rooster, and if he challenges me and won't back down, he'll go into the pot, too. I just don't have room for a bad rooster in my little flock. The hens are lovely for the most part, with the added appeal that they make eggs regardless of whether or not there's a rooster in the henhouse. The first time I got an egg was like Christmas morning and Easter all wrapped into one. I had been waiting six months. I carried the tiny pullet egg back to the house and told Chris to shut his eyes and hold out his hand. (This is a little game we play; sometimes the gift is a raspberry, sometimes it's an insect, with mixed results.) We shared it, lightly cooked, straight up. The next day, there was a second egg. As I reached into the nest to take it out, I noticed a black hen looking at me intently, her head tilted slightly to the side, her eyes black and beady. I was a kidnapper, caught in the act. I actually felt bad about it. The chickens have taught me to respect the natural abilities and attributes of my fellow creatures. We humans give birth a few times in our lives and we think it's a big deal. A chicken can lay up to 300 eggs a year and it takes her very little time to pop one out. She doesn't have to have any help and she needs no recovery time. If she gets broody, she will go into a kind of Zen trance and sit in her nest 24/7, leaving just briefly to eat and drink and poop — and she will keep that up for more than 20 days. After her chicks hatch, and as a single parent, she will keep them warm and teach them everything they need to know. Chickens make great mothers. I have watched many of my friends' eyes glaze over as I talk about the chickens, and I have had a few
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friends that won't go in the coop or hold a chicken, but I didn't like them very much anyway. Everyone else has
submitted to my Love the Chickens Campaign. And no one has complained about getting a few fresh eggs.
M O L L E T E G G S : M Y FAVO RIT E WAY TO E AT A N E X T R AORDI NA RY EG G . Start with fresh eggs and let them age for three or four days. I let my freshly gathered eggs sit at room temperature during that time. Eggs that are a few days old are much easier to peel once they're cooked. You might be surprised to learn that some commercial eggs are actually quite old. Nature has designed the perfect storage receptacle. Put the eggs into a saucepan and cover with water. Bring the water to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer the egg. This takes 4 minutes at Santa Fe’s 7,000-foot altitude; 2 or 3 minutes could do it closer to sea level.) Remove the eggs from the water with a slotted spoon and immerse in cold water for 10 minutes. Peel immediately or refrigerate. For good eating after chilling, put the egg into very warm water for a few minutes, then peel it. (You can also eat it cold or at room temperature.) Eat the warm egg with salt and freshly ground pepper. If the egg came from a chicken
that ate a variety of grains and greens, the yolk will be bright and full of flavor. The white will be set but not hard and rubbery; the yolk will not be runny, but it will still be creamy. It will be the best.
Photograph by Patricia Greathouse T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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My female turkey got the same idea about a week later and stuffed herself in with them. It was sad and funny at the same time to see three birds crammed in a little box; we could pull the chickens out when it was just them, but once the fearsome lady turkey joined the group, we left them alone. Broody birds peck, defending their eggs diligently. Those eggs were another story. The Silkies had somehow managed to make up a nest of every kind of chicken egg that we had. Other hens, accustomed to laying their eggs in the broody box, snuggled in next to the Silkies and left their eggs. Little did they know that they were contributing to the Silkies’ little clutch. I saw one of the Silkies out of the nest one day, rolling an egg toward it with her beak — although how she ever got it over the lip of the box remains a mystery.
MOTHER ZEN
The eggs should have been fertile. Why they didn't hatch is another mystery. It was very cold then, and perhaps the hens couldn't keep them warm enough. After the 19 to 21 days it's supposed to take a chicken egg to hatch, the box had begun to stink. It wasn’t the eggs. They didn't stink until my husband Chris threw them into the arroyo and they cracked. It was the Silkies stinking from sitting in the nest for so long, pooping in there and sweating, or whatever chickens do. Moldering.
WE USE THE WORDS “MOTHER” and “hen” together in ways that are not flattering. Even those who have never actually seen a real chicken outside of a petting zoo understand the connotation, one of an overprotective busybody, fussily sticking a beak into everyone else's business. But my experience with some real mother hens has changed the way I think about that phrase.
We let the Silkies brood way longer than it should have taken fertile eggs to hatch, both because we wanted to give them a fair chance and because the turkey was menacing us. Her eggs needed much more time. One day I caught the turkey out of the nest, and what happened next is an event that I hesitate to report to sensitive readers. Suffice it to say that we threw away the nesting box and cleaned the coop. The Silkies went right back to brooding on an empty nest.
World War I poster by Mabel Lisle Ducasse (1895-1976), gouache on board, private collection
My two little Silkies got broody this spring — which means they got a hormonal message to nest. They stopped eating and drinking and pooping with any regularity. They developed a Zen-meditation stare and their metabolisms dropped. They pulled their breast feathers out. Doesn’t that sound just like the metaphorical martyr/mother hen? But it enables a real hen to keep the eggs and later, the chicks, closer to her body and warmer; it also allows moisture from the hen’s body to keep the eggs from drying out. Then the Silkies devoted themselves to sitting on the nest they shared full time. 20
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A friend whose mother is an old chicken hand told me that her mother sneaks baby chicks under broody chickens at night and the chickens are happy to begin mothering. I went to the feed store and bought four new chicks. In the dead of night, I sneaked into the chicken yard. I opened the lid to a small pen there to protect the chicks from the other hens. Inside was the broody box— and there were the Silkies. As I slipped two cheeping chicks under each mother, they cackled. Within 10 seconds, though, all the complaining stopped. I waited for mayhem, but soon soothing mother-chicken sounds began, and they all quieted down.
M O THER Z EN
MY TWO LITTLE SILKIES
got broody this spring—which means
they got a hormonal message to nest... They developed a Zen-meditation stare and their metabolisms dropped. The next day, the Silkies were leading their adopted chicks around the little pen, showing them how to scratch and eat from the feeder. The mothers co-parented— a term I generally hate —but they didn't seem to differentiate between whose chicks were whose. After the chicks got to be two months old, we put them all out into the pen with the other chickens. The little Silkies, half the size of the other chickens, flew at any hen who approached their chicks, fighting battles to make sure their babies were not killed. They submitted to the rooster, too. He mounted each one of them at least five times in the first fifteen minutes out. Chris said they were paying for his protection, and they were. The rooster began to discipline any hens that approached the chicks.
This would be a wonderful ending to the story of the Silkie mothers, but as soon as those four little chicks became independent, the girls went broody again. This time, I only brought home two chicks. Even though they grew to be bigger than their mothers in no time, I found one of the Silkies with both under her outstretched wings at night when I went into the hen house. They are now independent, and she is back in the broody box, a far off, stoned look in her eye — a fine example of Mother Zen.
For more about Patricia Greathouse, see page 161.
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WHY I LOVE
EGG HOLE IN A
Story by RONNI LUNDY
Photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
IT WAS A GIRL NAMED JUNE who moved into our neighborhood just as summer began who introduced me to them. She was little, dark-haired, wiry and full of spunk—so even though she was younger than I, she immediately became the pal of the older girls who were sometimes, yes, but sometimes not my friends. This didn’t make me like her less. In fact, she was impossible not to love. She was game for anything, Pan-like, mercurial; one moment bubbling with imagination and invention, the next filled to the brim with tears. And when her large brown eyes turned liquid she’d shrug and abruptly say, “I’m going home.” “Have you ever had Egg in a Hole?” June blurted one morning the minute she got to the playground. She threw her knees over the bar of the swing set and flipped over, her grin wild and wide, upside down. “Buddy makes ’em.” Buddy was a man who showed up at her house some days, left on others. When he came he was full of surprises—a new toy she’d bring across the street, a treat she’d save enough of to share. And when he left it was also a celebration, his stay having run its course to a time of quarrels, darkness and tears. Buddy had been there when she woke up that morning, his duffle bag in a corner of the kitchen, so she sat and waited patiently at the table until he appeared. Sure enough, he made them both coffee, mixed half with milk, sweet with brown sugar, and then said, “How about some Eggs in a Hole?” “Here’s how you do it,” June said, flipping upright, falling to sit on the ground and demonstrate with utter concentration. “First take you a piece of bread and bite a hole out of the middle…” When I repeated this verbatim to my mother later, I was offended when the words brought a gleeful
laugh. “Pap, come here,” she called out to my daddy. “Listen to these directions for making eggs”—and she grinned at me and winked like I got the joke, only I didn’t and so I thought the joke was on me. “That’s what she said,” I said defensively. “Oh, I’m sure she did,” my mother smiled. “Just tell it to your daddy like you told me.” She had me tell it twice more to my sister and to her best friend, and in the telling I began to realize that the joke was on June. And each time it felt like a betrayal, so then I just quit. Refused to say the words any more. But I continued to long for such. Egg in a Frame. One-Eyed Jack. My mother made it for me once. She was always eager to try something new, made me come home with recipes from my friends’ houses, fixed them once but then, like as not, found each in some way lacking, so went back to the things she liked cooking best. My story of Egg in a Hole might have piqued her curiosity, but it would have offended her urge for abundance. My mother liked to cook for a crowd, and even when she didn’t have one, she cooked as if she did. She would make me pancakes and French toast, piled high on a plate to the point of tumbling. When she fried eggs, she fried half a dozen, the skillet popping and smacking like a boogie-woogie band. A rasher of bacon was hardly rash enough for her. And when the family couldn’t consume the giant quantities she put before us, she would sigh and give off such an air of disappointment, as if we’d somehow failed her. To make one small serving of a single egg and grilled toast, this would seem to her a stingy, pointless act. But even so, one morning that summer she took her biscuit cutter and, in a piece of bread, she made a hole. To me, sitting at the table alone, cutting each glistening bite into triangles, portioning the bread and T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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white to end up equal to the liquid yolk, there was a contained perfection. Sunshine Toast. Hole in One. It would be years before I had it again. I was in my 20s, living in Boulder, Colorado, in a house rented by someone else, broke and at loose ends. I didn’t know if I was coming or going, only that I was hungry all the time and had no way to feed myself. A friend who lived there had a dozen eggs, a loaf of bread and some butter, and she told me to make myself welcome to half. Every morning for six days I got up and went to the kitchen alone. I laid the ingredients on the counter next to the stove in a pleasing order; then, while the butter melted, I took a sharp knife and carved out a hole. I learned that it was best to fry the bread first on one side to crisp it before turning it over and filling the hole with a freshly broken egg. I grilled the cut-out circle of bread and perched it jauntily aside the egg’s forehead on my plate. Egg in a Hat. I sat in the dark living room at a low table made of a door set over orange crates. I ate my egg seasoned with salt and memory. Runny yolks were my father’s favorite; made me think of him, strong and good to the core. I felt magically nourished by the meal. I felt surer and clearer with each passing day. On the second day, I met a man who fell in love with me and took me to supper at an organic cafeteria in Denver. On the fourth day he asked me to ride away in his brown panel van to Canada. On the sixth day, I knew who I was. I packed my bags, told the van man no, and hitchhiked home to Kentucky. Bird in a Basket. Bull’s Eye Toast. That first long-ago summer, June would come to our house for breakfast some days. Not exactly intending to, of course, but on the bad Buddy days, it was sometimes necessary for her to leave that house early. The door to my mother’s kitchen was always open. Sometimes I would wake and hear June already there, sitting at the white enamel-topped table, chattering brightly, oblivious to my mother’s early-morning warning sighs. My mother would be smoking, sipping that first cup of coffee, staring into nothing, leaning against the stove. As soon as I was up, or my father, as soon as the crowd in the kitchen constituted a quorum, my mother would begin to slap the skillets and the pans, to stir and cut and mix and fry. Soon June would be dwarfed by a stack of hot buttered toast, her big 24
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brown eyes dilated with delight at the sight of a mountain of bacon-flecked scrambled eggs. I thought she might some morning ask my mother to make Egg in a Hole, to make enough for both of us, but she never did. After awhile, June’s mother must have realized that while her daughter was welcome in our house, I was only allowed to go on the porch—in sight of my mother’s kitchen—of hers. I imagine she was a proud woman, after all, and this must have galled her. Pretty soon, June was not allowed to come into my house, either. And then they were gone. Just not there one morning. Charley, the tomboy who lived next door to my house, got Tina, the fast-budding vamp who lived on the other side, to boost her on cupped palms so she could peek through the kitchen window of June’s little shotgun. “There’s no pots and pans,” she hollered. “Just an empty White Castle sack.” Egg in a Window. Then I had a family of my own. My husband liked his eggs with cheese and salsa. Dill and onions. Mushrooms. More. My daughter preferred them scrambled with bacon flecks like Granny used to make. But breakfast wasn’t a meal we three had together often, our busy schedules taking us in different directions almost before the day had begun. These days I almost always find myself alone in the kitchen in the morning. Breakfast for one. I take out a perfectly oval brown egg, the golden slab of butter. And sometimes, since I am alone, I don’t use the sharp knife or the biscuit cutter. I take myself a piece of bread and, from the middle, bite out a hole. For more about Ronni Lundy, see page 162.
“THERE’S A LO T OF GO OD IN A FRIED EGG.” THIS LINE FROM JOE CASTRO, one of my favorite Louisville, Kentucky chefs, graced my refrigerator door for many years. It is still my mantra when making Egg in a Hole. It reassured me that if I had a half-dozen eggs, a skillet and some grease, I could make something out-of-the-ordinary on moment’s notice. Here’s another half-dozen such things you can do to find the good in a fried egg:
1. IN A BREAKFAST SALAD: The best version I’ve had is served at the Sunny Point Café in West Asheville, North Carolina. This rendition begins with snappy fresh field greens tossed in a Dijon vinaigrette, filled out with garden-ripe tomatoes, thick bites of crisp bacon and chunks of herbed, sautéed red potatoes with an over-easy egg on top. Cut into it and the liquid yolk adds a luxurious element to the dressing. I recollect that once the Sunny Point served this with grits croutons—chilled cooked stone-ground grits cut in cubes, dusted with flour and deep-fried. I also like it with fried okra as savory crunch.
2. SAUCING BEANS: The late Bill Neal—chef, writer, restaurateur and champion of Southern food—introduced me to the idea of serving green beans with a coddled egg as sauce. I like my beans Southern-style—braised long until very tender in white bacon pot likker. Bill’s trick works well with beans cooked for less time, with or without the bacon. It also works beautifully with baby limas. I like the idea of coddled eggs, but pulling them off without overcooking isn’t as easy as doing a quick over-easy.
3. ADDED TO A BOWL OF SOUP OR STEW: From Bee Bim Bo—a classic Korean mélange of sautéed vegetables and beef, chicken or tofu served over rice with a chile-paste broth—to the Atrisco plate —the New Mexican green chile pork and potato stew served for
breakfast at Tia Sophia’s in Santa Fe— a wide range of savory stews can be enhanced with the addition of a fried egg to each bowl.
4. AS AN ADDITIONAL ELEMENT: In a croque-monsieur—that yummy hot ham and gruyere sandwich grilled in an egg wash — like French toast with an attitude!—which will transform it into a croque-madame and make your tongue say, “Ooo-la-la!”
5. ON TOP OF A TRADER JOE’S VEGETABLE MASALA BURGER: OK, we know not everyone has a Trader Joe’s nearby, and believe me, we feel your pain. For those who do have access to it, this Indian riff on the veggie burger can be found with the frozen foods. (You can make your own version of the Masala Burger at home, using mashed potatoes as the base, adding diced, cooked green beans and carrots, bell pepper, corn, onions and masala spice.) Pan-fried, this make a tasty, unusual burger—made even better as a breakfast entrée with a fried egg on top.
6. IN THE CD PLAYER: Your judgment on whether there is truly good in these fried eggs will depend on how you feel about derivative progressive 1970s rock done to a crispy kitsch. If that sounds tasty (or even intriguing) check out the title cut from the Japanese trio Flied Egg’s 1972 album, Dr. Siegel’s Fried Egg Shooting Machine. VIDEO T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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A CHICKEN MEMOIR Story by LUCILLE MINUTO Photographs by DAVE WEYERMANN and LUCILLE MINUTO WHEN I WAS A CHILD, CHICKEN was the centerpiece of Sunday dinner—and there was always Sunday dinner. My mother, a first generation American who spoke only Italian until she entered school, started preparing Sunday dinner on Saturday, when she would make the gravy. (Most people serve their pasta with marinara, or tomato sauce—unless they’re from Rhode Island. Here it’s called gravy.) The meal included macaroni and meatballs and a meatloaf rolled up with luncheon meats, mozzarella cheese and hard-boiled eggs. My mother would fry the meatloaf, as she did the meatballs, until it was a crusty brown, and then carefully place it in the gravy to flavor the sauce. All this was followed by a roasted chicken, with potatoes, vegetables and salad. Beef and pork were served only on rare occasions and turkey was an annual treat. Sunday’s leftovers would be stretched and reconfigured again and again. Second-generation Italians know the joy of eating leftover roasted chicken, homemade pizza or peppers and eggs for breakfast.
T H E G U E ST O F H O N O R Like the gravy, the chicken’s story begins on Saturday. My mother and I would walk to the neighborhood poultry store to select Sunday’s dinner “guest.” The store had a simple counter with brown spring hens, fowls and capons lined up behind it in cages. My mother could pick out the exact chicken she needed for the meals she had planned for the week: For Sunday dinner, it was a young chicken with good breast meat. If there was going to be chicken soup, she would need a fatty fowl—but she would return later in the week for that purchase. In those days, we didn’t purchase food for weeks at a time. Fresh daily was best. In the 1950s, all the chickens we bought were raised on local farms. “Free range” was a fact, not a part of our vocabulary. Mama was able to select exactly what she wanted at the live poultry shop and negotiate the price based on the weight and age of the chicken. The chicken then was respectfully taken away to the
back room to be killed and plucked. It never occurred to me that this was anything but what it should be. Chickens were raised for food and the hen was an important contributor to the enjoyment of the Sunday meal. Her role was preordained and she was appreciated. She was the guest of honor. The “chicken man” returned our purchase wrapped in stiff white butcher paper torn off the gigantic roll attached to the end of the counter. The only thing missing was feathers. The rest belonged to my mother—and everything had to be used. “It is a sin to waste,” my mother would say. The chicken could be stretched with beans, macaroni (what Rhode Islanders call pasta), and vegetables. Polenta, lentils and shank cuts of meat were other meal stretchers. Chicken gizzards were sautéed with green bell peppers and onions. Today these dishes are high-end cuisine. They’re called pasta e fagioli and osso bucco, and sell for $15 to $30 a plate in tony restaurants. At the kitchen table, my mother carefully unwrapped the bird to examine it for any prickly pinfeathers that may have been left behind. It was Mama’s job to gut and clean the bird. I received my first anatomy lessons from my mother. “This is the heart and liver. The liver looks good and healthy. Here’s an egg in the womb. That’s good luck. Wombs are where babies are made.” The bird was scrubbed with salt, rinsed and refrigerated for the next day, when it would be placed with quartered potatoes, onion, carrots, celery and seasonings into a heavy roasting pan. The potatoes would turn brown and crisp with the drippings and the best-tasting ones would be stuck to the side of the pan.
. . .T H E M O R E T H I N G S STAY T H E S A M E When I want a really fresh chicken now, there are still places in Rhode Island to find one. Two of the poultry stores have been in the same location since my mother’s time—Antonelli’s Poultry on Federal Hill in Providence and Baffoni’s in Johnston. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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MARRIED TO AN ANTONELLI,
Chris Morris took over the business when the old man died.
Antonelli’s has been in the same spot on DePasquale Square since 1854. It’s in the heart of Federal Hill, the old Italian section of town where our mothers and grandmothers shopped for all their food. Today, the square is closed to traffic and has a fountain and restaurants with outdoor cafes. In my mother’s time, peddlers and pushcarts lined the street. While you waited for your chicken to be killed and plucked, you could go into the street and make other food purchases. Produce was trucked in from the local farms. What was available varied with the season. In spring, we bought zucchini flowers; in summer it was fresh plum tomatoes to make that gravy. (In those days, everyone put up tomatoes in summer so there would be a supply for gravy all year long.) Wine grapes in the fall brought the men to the Hill. A wine press in the cellar or the garage produced a dry red that tasted best sipped out of stubby 4-ounce glasses. When the men were banned from smoking their cigars in the house, they adjourned to the cellar for a glass a wine and a smoke. Chris Morris is the current owner of Antonelli’s. Although his name doesn’t suggest a relationship with the original family, like all things Rhode Island—the most densely populated and smallest state in the union —there is a connection. Chris was married to an Antonelli and took over the business when the old man died. Chris calls the store a melting pot. While second- and third-generation Italians still come in for fresh poultry, he says he can chronicle U.S. foreign policy by the shifting backgrounds of his clientele. In the’50s, the shop’s customers were joined by African refugees; after Vietnam, he started seeing Hmong and Cambodians. Now he serves Guatemalans, Colombians and Caribbean islanders. With Providence nearly 25 percent Hispanic, Latinas from Central and South America are among his most regular customers. When I visited Antonelli’s on a recent Tuesday, it was bustling with customers wanting fresh birds after the Sunday and Monday store closings. There were two Latinas with their preschoolers in the back room picking out their chickens, an Asian man squatting out in the front of the store having a cigarette while he waited for his bird. An African came in for her Helmeted Guinea fowl.
Chris provides birds to the immigrant population that still prefers its food fresh. He does this by offering a variety of birds to suit different tastes—a cross between a Rhode Island Red and a New Hampshire Red, Silkies, guinea hens, Muscovy and mallard ducks, partridge, quail, doves and pigeons. He now carries rabbits, goat meat and duck eggs to meet the needs of his customers. The small space set aside for dry goods also speaks to his current customer base— Goya and Barilla products dominate the shelves. But in many ways, nothing has changed at Antonelli’s. While Chris now has six men working for him, preparing 1,100 fresh chickens a day to sell to store customers and local restaurants, the setup for processing the birds hasn’t changed much since I was a child. A shopper can select her bird from a cage and the bird is quickly and humanely killed by a precisely placed and swiftly delivered slit to the throat. The birds are then placed head first into a round hole on a covered table to drain off the blood. After a few minutes, the birds are scalded to reduce the feathers and put into a machine that plucks them clean. Two men working at the preparation table finish the process for the customer. Chris told me that the custom of using all the parts of the chicken is still alive with the new immigrants. The Asians fry up the chicken intestines; the eggs still in the bird are a special delicacy; and the feet, gizzards and neck are used to add flavor to dishes. Using everything and not wasting is still of value to the newcomers. During my visit, I purchased a spring chicken killed within the hour to grill that night. I butterflied the bird, seasoned it with salt and pepper and fresh lemon and placed it on a hot grill. The meat was sweet and tender—just as I remembered it. My cousins, some old friends and I had lunch on Federal Hill recently. Seated at an outdoor cafe in full view of Antonelli’s, the women lamented the loss of the “good old days”—meaning the good will and generosity they felt was missing from present-day life. “No one was jealous of the other person, because people didn’t have anything. We had family,” they sighed. Food, though, is still important to our lives.
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R HODE I SL AND F ED
If we attend an event, we want to know what was served. Was the food good? How was the chicken? In the old days, we would celebrate birthdays and holidays, and play cards or a board game every Sunday night. The men would play poker or rummy, the women canasta, and the kids, checkers, Old Maid or Monopoly. We learned how to be with each other, how to solve problems, what was funny and what was cruel. The most important of the lessons we learned were how to share and how not to waste—not a piece of chicken, not a moment of our lives. All this and anatomy lessons, too. For more about Antonelli’s Poultry (and Providence’s Federal Hill neighborhood), CLICK HERE. For more about Lucille Minuto, see page 162.
slow down the conversations so I could take notes. The warm, wonderful memories of living and shopping on The Hill came flooding back to them. Food, its purchase, preparation and eating, is tied to family and memories that bring comfort in the awareness of being connected to something that still can be felt and appreciated. The first time Olivia met her husband’s family, she was still in junior high school. Louis introduced her to the Lembo household on chicken-soup night. The image of Louis’ grandmother and mother sucking on boiled chicken feet still brings laughter sparked by amazement and an appreciation of another’s joie de vivre. According to Esther, every part of the chicken was used—from the delicacy of the small brain, to the feet to boil in the soup. Esther’s mother preferred to kill her own chickens, so she could make the blood pudding. If the bird was killed at the poultry shop, she wanted the black feathers left on the feet and neck so she could be sure that she was getting the right bird for soup. The bird with black feathers was best for soup because it was more fatty and flavorful. (At Antonelli’s, they still mark the birds by cutting toes so customers know they are getting the same bird they picked out.) Patricia, who was raised Irish and married Italian, remembers her first Christmas Eve dinner. She had heard about the traditional fish dinner call la vigilia, but was expecting fish and chips. What she was served was baccala, periwinkles and stuffed squid in gravy with macaroni. “Is there anything normal here?” she asked her fiancé. Today, Patricia makes Sunday dinner with an open invitation to anyone in the family who wants to stop by. Sunday meals are a tradition worth preserving, and Christmas Eve is still the feast of the seven fishes.
MEET THE COUSINS IN MY QUEST FOR CHICKEN STORIES, I invited my “cousins” to meet me on Federal Hill in front of Antonelli’s for lunch and talk about the old days. Carol Mangiarelli brought her mother to lunch. Esther Nappi, who is 88, still drives and has clear memories of her life on Federal Hill from her childhood through the present day. She lived there most of her life, and retired to the suburbs only about 15 years ago. Olivia Lembo and I go back to junior high school. Bunnie, Olivia’s sister, and Olivia’s friend Patricia rounded out the group. Once the stories started, it was hard to stop or
The conversation drifted over to the other shops on the Hill. There were three other chicken stores and four bakeries within a 60-second walk from DePasquale Square. Olivia said her mother loved bakery shops so much that whenever she was giving directions it was by bakeries. She may have been vague about the street names, but she knew where the bakeries were. Street peddlers were an everyday occurrence in all the neighborhoods. The ice man who delivered to Olivia’s house would leave free ice in exchange for a glass of her father’s homemade wine. “He would stop in two and three times a day. We always had plenty of ice,” she laughed. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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UPTOWN STRUTTIN’ WITH
CHICKEN
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bread. A time in which chicken was so rare that the future president of the United States, during his campaign, pledged, if elected, he would assure the populace of a chicken in every pot. That would be like President Barack Obama promising us an Angus T-bone on every grill.
Story by CHRISTOPHER KOLON Photograph by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
So my immigrant ancestors—Poles, Germans, Czechs—devised a dish that utilized inexpensive cuts of meat such as pork and veal (yes, this was an era in which only poor immigrants recognized the value of delicious veal) to replicate the taste, texture and appearance of that exotic comestible: The Chicken. And not just any chicken, but City Chicken. Chicken with a monocle and spats, comfortable strutting down Fifth Avenue, or swathed in silk and clucking her approval of the newest Broadway play. No country bumpkin she, City Chicken was a sophisticated girl whose appearance at a Depression-era table heralded the American immigrant’s ingenuity and pointed in the direction of better things to come.
THINKING BACK ON MY CHILDHOOD in the Midwest and the myriad of unusual dishes my mother presented to her family, none stirs my imagination more than City Chicken.
In a twist of irony that would probably be lost on Colonel Sanders, City Chicken has become the au courant darling of many trendy chefs these days. And it is perfect in that role: Take expensive cuts of meat such as veal and free-range pork and disguise them in the shape of plebian chicken so that when the savvy diner takes a bite, he is rewarded with unexpected succulence.
As a boy I never knew exactly what those odd skewers were composed of and I wasn’t curious enough to ask. Cubes of meat, breaded and fried and vaguely formed in the shape of drumsticks, I just assumed they were chicken—although why the meat was wrapped around a stick instead of a bone, I had no idea.
But City Chicken, no matter the guise, is an immigrant dish with echoes of the Old Country. What is City Chicken but chicken-fried steak on a stick? And what is chicken-fried steak? Why, it is wiener schnitzel super-sized: a slab of beef steak, pounded thin, coated with a half-inch of batter, deep-fried and doused with cream gravy. Now that’s American.
With City Chicken, my mother served a dish of cooked cabbage and egg noodles. This was a meal we all enjoyed, particularly my father, though I suspect his pleasure was due more to the frugality of a meal consisting of cabbage, noodles and meat bits rather than any epicurean aspect of it.
My friend Stan, who hails from western Pennsylvania, calls my mother’s dish of cabbage and noodles haluski, though my mother never did. My wife, who hails from Austria, makes a very similar dish, which she calls Krautfleckern—cabbage and onions cooked until sweet and tossed with noodles and caraway seeds.
But that was just the point of City Chicken.
No matter the origin, City Chicken and haluski make a delicious meal.
There was a time, dear children, when chicken was special. This was a time before factory farms littered the countryside of the South and lower Midwest, creating a surfeit of poultry that keeps the price per pound of chicken less than that of a loaf of
For recipes for City Chicken and Haluski, see page 144. For more about Christopher Kolon, see page 162. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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IMAGINE SOUNDS punctuating an urban landscape and you’ll probably come up with honking horns, wailing sirens and the insistent car alarm. What might not immediately come to mind is the squawk of a chicken proudly announcing the arrival of her latest egg, or clucking heartily as she hurries after some juicy bug. You might need to adjust your thinking, however, because urban chicken keeping (or “chickentendering,” as I like to call it) is a trend showing nothing but an upward arc. From community gardens to rooftop honeybees, chicks in the city are just another example of the rapidly growing interest in urban homesteading. The delineation between animals kept expressly in rural domains and those allowed warm entry on city sidewalks (the Yorkshire pig versus the miniature Vietnamese pot-bellied, for example) hasn’t always been a clear one. For years, livestock and humans kept close urban quarters, and in many parts of the world, they still do. But as U.S. cities became more densely populated with humans —and space to house, employ and entertain them grew more limited — the animals to feed us were pushed increasingly out to rural areas. So, what accounts for the comeback? The answer is multifold. As the interest in eating whole foods and creating a shorter distance from farm-totable — or “nest-to-fork,” as it were — grows, keeping a small crew of feathered friends offers a readily accessible backyard source of protein. It doesn’t get more local than popping into your backyard in your PJs and gathering up fresh eggs for omelets. Many folks are flocking to urban chicken-tendering because raising your own can yield more nutritious offerings. Hens allowed to peck in the dirt, eat grass, forage for bugs and worms and fed a varied diet produce eggs higher in beta-carotene (which accounts for the vibrant hue of their yolks), folic acid and vitamins D, E, and B-12 than their caged counterparts. Also, given the number of food scares that have occurred (and seem to be happening with greater and greater frequency, the recent half-billion-egg salmonella recall among them), backyard eggs offer their eaters a means of quality control unavailable when purchasing factory-produced, store-bought eggs. 32
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them), backyard eggs offer their eaters a means of quality control unavailable when purchasing factoryproduced, store-bought eggs. Keeping a flock of urban birds also offers a number of benefits beyond those directly related to health. They can assist in insect control, provide droppings that greatly enhance the quality and nutrient profile of compost, help engender community connections —both when you meet and connect with other urban chickentenderers or when you ply your neighbors with fresh eggs — and assist in an increased degree of food selfsufficiency. They also make fantastic pets. All of the preening, pecking, busy-bodying, dust-bathing, chattering and strutting witnessed daily in the coop are of Shakespearean proportions, providing countless hours of free-for-the-viewing entertainment for their caretakers. In response to this revived interest, cities across the country have begun to relax restrictions on keeping a variety of urban livestock, chickens among them. It’s now considerably easier to obtain and successfully keep a flock of hens in Brooklyn or Chicago or in smaller cities like Asheville, North Carolina (where I’m based), than it’s been so for decades.
L AW A B ID ING CIT IZE NS Before you place an order for a few gorgeous Araucanas (they’re the ones responsible for those lovely blue-green eggs) or lay down cash for a galvanized waterer, however, determine what the codes and ordinances regarding keeping chickens are in your area. A quick call to the local animal-control agency will tell you what is and isn’t permitted. You can also consult this listing provided by the website The City Chicken, CLICK HERE. There you’ll find a lengthy, though certainly not exhaustive, city and state listing of laws. Be forewarned, though: People with visions of a regal Foghorn Leghorn-type prancing about, fretting over his “ladies,” will have to put such notions aside. For the most part, roosters are prohibited
Story by ASHLEY ENGLISH Photographs from www.backyardchickens.com For more about Ashley English, see page 161.
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ALTHOUGH THEY DON’T CROW, HENS DO LIKE TO CHATTER...
in urban settings, as their crowing —which, for the uninitiated, isn’t limited to early morning revelries — can literally wake the city block. Don’t worry, though; it’s entirely unnecessary for a rooster to be present in order for a hen to lay eggs. Once you’ve determined that chicken tendering is permissible in your city and you’re aware of the limit on the number of hens allowed (this varies widely), it’s time to set up shop. No matter if you’re keeping birds in the city or the country, when it comes to housing, the same considerations apply. It’s imperative that you fashion, or purchase, housing that is predator-proof and weather-resilient. What that translates to is an enclosed structure that will keep your flock safe from the potential ravages of neighborhood dogs, cats, possums, raccoons, rats, weasels and more — as well as keep them out of the direct path of rain, snow, harsh winds or excessive heat. Per bird, allow for around 2 square feet in the henhouse and 4 square feet in the run (assuming you have land available for a run). Otherwise, if your birds will be “intensely confined” (i.e., always in the same area, with little to no variation in location or size limitations), offer up at least 4 square feet per bird overall. Your flock will also need roosts for hens to sleep upon at night — a vestige of their origins as wild tree-dwelling, jungle fowl; a nesting box in which to lay eggs (plan on one box per every 4-5 birds); a bit of room for roaming and exercising; and a dust bath in which to flop and plop and ward off the potential ravages of pests and diseases. Additionally, they’ll need food appropriate to their ages. Just like a growing human, a chicken’s dietary needs alter as she transitions from chick to pullet (that’s a female chicken under one year of age) to hen. They’ll also need grit and water at all times. City chicken-keepers must remain ever vigilant about coop hygiene. Meg Paska, a Brooklyn, NY-based 34
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gardener, beekeeper CLICK HERE and chicken enthusiast, can attest that keeping the coop clean and dry is imperative when attempting to stay on the good side of neighbors. “Flies and odor can be a problem if the run is not kept reasonably dry. I spread straw and coffee chaff over the run and turn it in with a trowel once a week to keep things stink-free. The last thing I want is for my neighbors to be swatting flies away and holding their breath while trying to enjoy their backyard summer barbecue.” Paska says she has been fortunate in having neighbors who are “very tolerant.” She offers up eggs from her flock to keep the good will going, but cautions those considering the urban chicken path that not all neighbors will be so open, so “it's always worth opening a dialog before you get started.” In addition to keeping things tidy, Paska also encourages would-be city chickeners to position their coops as far away from their neighbors’ windows as possible. Although they don’t crow, hens do like to chatter and what might sound like happiness and contented birds to you may grate on the nerves of the folks next door. From experience, she’s learned it’s best to “try and build an enclosure for them that is as large as you can afford to dedicate to them and give them plenty of food.” She cautions: “Bored hens can get a little vocal.” She buries corncobs gathered from a nearby restaurant in the coop’s straw each morning, along with spent grain from a local brewery to keep her ladies scratching, pecking and, she hopes, fairly quiet.
YO U CAN F I G H T C I T Y H A L L What to do if your chosen stomping grounds aren’t amenable to the idea of feathered fun in the city? Well, to begin, don’t give up too easily. A number of cities previously hostile to the entire notion of urban chickening have gone on to relax restrictions or alter them entirely.
KEEPING HENS HELPS FEED FAMILIES, REDUCES CAR TRIPS TO THE SUPERMARKET...
Cathy Williams is co-founder of the North Carolina organization Asheville City Chickens, which tirelessly campaigned for 18 months until successfully convincing city leaders to change existing ordinances on urban chicken-keeping. Also the force behind Mother Hen urban chicken consulting, Cathy has a number of tried-and-true suggestions for those ready to fight city hall — and win. She and Asheville City Chickens co-founder Jenny Mercer found these techniques effective:
1. Find allies from within the local governmental agencies. Key players are officials who are responsible for rewriting ordinance amendments (in Asheville, that was the city attorney’s office); enforcing a new ordinance, i.e., the animal-control officers; voting “yes” on a new ordinance, i.e. city council members; and the mayor. 2 . Make an appointment to meet individually with each of these people in their offices. This is the time to make strong eye contact and smile a lot.
3.
If you find opposition, get specifics: Ask why they object. Then provide succinct answers to defend any number of arguments, including those concerning enforcement, sanitation, noise, etc. Cathy also suggests having professional packets of information pre-printed to give to the people with whom you’ll be meeting. Additionally, in the event that you’ll be giving a presentation, come prepared with visuals, including bar graphs, pie charts or any other sort of easily comprehensible form of information that these folks can consume, understand and process. Remember that they’re busy. Treat their time as the much-appreciated, precious thing it truly is. Los Angeles-based homesteaders Erik Knutzen and Kelly Coyne keep chickens in their urban home, chronicling their efforts at small-scale urban homesteading in their blog, CLICK HERE, as well as in their book The Urban Homestead — a must-read for those looking to take urban homesteading as far as they possibly can. (Keep an eye out next spring, as well, for their next publication,
Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post-Consumer World.) Knutzen points out the absurdity of restrictions on keeping a small flock of urban hens: “I live in the middle of Los Angeles in a very urban area. We have four hens and keeping hens is legal here. We also have a Doberman pinscher. I find it ironic that it's perfectly legal to keep a Doberman everywhere (while our dog wouldn't harm a fly, an adult Doberman weighs 90 pounds and can kill you) while keeping hens is tightly regulated or forbidden in many places. If you can keep a Doberman, why shouldn't you be able to have a few hens? “Keeping hens helps feed families, reduces car trips to the supermarket and cuts down on the number of factory-farmed birds kept in appalling conditions,” he adds. “The question is, how do we change our laws to encourage common sense?”
F I N E F E AT H E R E D F R I E N D S While all breeds of chicken will manage just fine in urban conditions —provided their basic needs are met — several rise head and shoulders (or should that be “comb” and “hackles”?) above the rest when it comes to adapting to city life. As you begin your quest for chickens, you may want to give some thought to the following four breeds: BUFF ORPHINGTON: This breed is especially docile and handles a range of weather conditions with ease. BARRED PLYMOUTH ROCK: Very friendly and inquisitive, this breed is also a reliable layer. BROWN LEGHORN: All Leghorns are known for their exceptional egg-laying abilities, as well as their high levels of activity. HAMBURGS: Great layers with modest appetites and beautiful plumage. The following websites offer good information on sourcing both chickens and their necessary equipment: www.BackyardChickens.com, www.TheCityChicken.com www.MyPetChicken.com. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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PASEO POTTERY S A F E R BY T H E D O Z E N Los Angeles urban chicken keepers Kelly Coyne and Erick Knutzen posted this wisdom, following the summer Salmonella scare, on August 24, 2010 on their blog, homegrownevolution.com: AP reporter just called to ask for my comment on the recent egg recall. He asked if I thought more people would start backyard chicken flocks. I said yes, adding that I believed that a “distributed� form of agriculture, i.e. many more people keeping small numbers of animals rather than small numbers of professionals in charge of tens of thousands of birds, would lead to greater food safety. Backyard flocks can get infected with salmonella. But if my birds get infected only two people get sick rather than 2,000. I can also keep a better eye on my flock's health and rodent issues than can a minimum wage employee in charge of 10,000 hens. A small farmer has the same advantages — literally fewer eggs in one basket. I went on to get up on my high horse and suggested that our current agricultural system goes against nature. As Heraclitus put it, "Though the logos is common, the many live as if they had a wisdom of their own." By the "logos" Heraclitus means the underlying, ordering principles of the universe. Applied to a chicken, those underlying principles are that a chicken is a bird and that birds in nature have access to dirt, bugs, sunlight and vegetation. To keep them in battery cages under artificial light is a kind of arrogance, an assumption that we humans know exactly what a chicken needs, that we have a "wisdom of our own." Admittedly, a chicken is a domesticated animal, but that doesn't give us the right to make the kinds of sudden, radical changes in animal husbandry that have been made in the past hundred years. To go against the logos is to court catastrophic failure.
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1 4 2 4 PA S E O D E P E R A LTA S A N TA F E , N E W M E X I C O 8 7 5 0 1 1.505.988.7687 M O N DAY- F R I DAY, 1 0 - 5
w w w. p a s e o p o t t e r y s f . c o m
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Proof
of LIFE
Bartenders have known the attributes of raw eggs for centuries... Eggs temper the harshness of alcohol and lend a soft, velvet texture to a drink..
TEN years ago, slipping eggs into cocktails was more like a college prank than an experience you’d actually pay for. Oh, there was eggnog around Christmas and, if you cruised in the right circles, you could score an occasional Pisco Sour or a heat-busting Ramos Gin Fizz. But it wasn’t until this decade that drinkers rediscovered that raw eggs— properly handled —can transform some merely decent cocktails into delicious ones.
By MATTHEW ROWLEY Photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
Bartenders have known the attributes of raw eggs for centuries, however. Eggs temper the harshness of alcohol and lend a soft, velvet texture to a drink. They increase its volume and impart a degree of finesse that a Jack ’n’ Coke just can’t touch. Some recipes, such as the 19thcentury punchbowl classic Tom and Jerry, call for a dozen eggs or more. Now, for some folks, a dozen might be about 11 too many. No worries. I want to tell you about three cocktails, each requiring no more than a single egg — a Brazilian batida made with a scant teaspoon of egg white; a fizzy number enriched with a lone yolk; and a smoky mezcal-spiked cocktail from New Orleans that blends a whole egg with sherry and red chiles. There are a few rules of thumb when using raw eggs in drinks. First, know that eggs ain’t for everyone. The very idea can turn some people off. I wouldn’t force them on anyone, but I’ve made converts out of unbelievers. (The usual caveats apply: The very old, the very young, pregnant women and folks with compromised immune systems should probably not consume raw eggs at all.) Second, make sure the eggs are fresh, clean, and their shells sound. Crack them as needed with a sharp rap on a flat surface. Eggs cracked on edges tend to break into more tiny shell fragments along the crack—these are a pain to get out of a drink. USDA large eggs contain about two tablespoons of white and about a tablespoon of yolk. If an occasion calls for an enormous number of cocktails in a short time, consider separating yolks and whites, straining each into separate squeeze bottles and measuring as needed. Third, shake. Eggs don’t mix readily in alcohol. They will mix; they just need extra effort to create a smooth emulsion. Various tricks to do that include: a “dry” shake with no ice in the shaker to mix ingredients, then adding ice and proceeding as usual; adding liquor in stages once the other ingredients are mixed; and shaking hard and long. Finally, regardless of technique, strain well into the serving glass. You want to keep any unmixed egg and missed shell fragments off the menu. 38
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ONE BATIDA PAULISTA 2 ounces
cachaça (Leblon preferred) 1 tablespoon egg white 1 teaspoon superfine sugar 1 ⁄2 ounce fresh lemon juice (or lime) Sugar for rimming
Drink Up — R AW E G G S A N D A L L
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Proof
of LIFE
THREE EGG DRINKS BATIDA PAULISTA During the Truman administration, Brazil’s ambassador to the United States was Mauricio Nabuco, widely regarded as a charming bachelor. Nabuco was known for throwing intimate, civil cocktail parties in Washington, D.C., where a few guests could mingle easily. Margarette de Andrade credits him with this São Paulo cocktail in her 1965 Brazilian Cookery: Traditional and Modern. It’s exactly the kind of drink, made one at a time, that suits small gatherings. The batida (or “beaten” drink) calls for cachaça, a sugarcane spirit from Brazil gaining popularity in the U.S. Rhum agricole from the French West Indies makes a passable substitute.
TWO GOLDEN FIZZ 3 ounces
gin (Citadelle Reserve) preferred) 1 ounce fresh lemon juice 1 tablespoon simple syrup 1 fresh egg yolk 4 ounces seltzer
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Wet the rim of an old-fashioned glass with fresh lemon juice and dip in sugar. Combine ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice cubes and shake hard until blended. Strain into the prepared glass.
GOLDEN FIZZ Gin & Tonic, the French 75, Ramos’ famous gin fizz — gin and bubbles were made for each other. This “golden” fizz (so-called for its whole yolk and a dose of seltzer) is grand with Citadelle’s oak-aged Reserve gin, but Beefeater and Plymouth are also nice. Swap out the yolk for egg white and you’ve got what old-time bartenders called a Silver Fizz. Leave out the egg entirely, and it’s practically a Tom Collins.
Combine lemon juice, syrup, and egg yolk in a shaker. Shake to create a homogenous mixture. Add half the gin and 4-5 ice cubes. Shake. Add the remaining gin. Shake until cold. Strain into highball glass and add seltzer at the same time to create a head that just pokes above the rim. Serve with a straw.
"THAT NIGHT A FOREST GREW…” At Cure, a stylish bar in a rehabbed firehouse in the city’s Uptown neighborhood, New Orleans bartender Danny Valdez struck gold with a hot little innovation he calls "That Night a Forest Grew…" The drink is bitter, warm, and sweet. It’s also as thick as Turkish coffee with a head like a miniature pint of Guinness. The mist of mezcal a t t h e end gives the drink a pungent, smoky nose. An atomizer or kitchen spritzer would do the trick. An anejo tequila won’t have the same taste or nose as Del Maguey’s smoky mezcal, but it’s a passable, if tamer, substitute. For sherry, Valdez uses Dios Bacos Oxford 1970 Pedro Ximénez. If you can’t find it, swap out another dark, sweet PX sherry. Combine liquid ingredients in a shaker with ice. Crack the egg into the shaker. Shake hard until emulsified. Strain into a cocktail glass. Mist additional Chichicapa (once) on top.
Proof
of LIFE
THREE “THAT NIGHT A FOREST GREW” 2 ounces Pedro Ximénez sherry 1 ounce unfiltered apple juice 1⁄ 2 ounce Del Maguey Chichicapa mezcal 6 drops Tabasco hot sauce 6 drops Sriracha hot sauce 1 whole egg
For more about Matthew Rowley, see page 163.
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BOY & EGG BY NAOMI SHIHAB NYE
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EVERY few minutes, he wants to march the trail of flattened r ye grass back to the house of muttering hens. He too could make a bed in hay. Yesterday the egg so fresh it felt hot in his hand and he pressed it to his ear while the other children laughed and ran with a ball, leaving him, so little yet, too forgetful in games, ready to cr y if the ball brushed him, riveted to the secret of birds caught up inside his fist, not ready to give it over to the refrigerator or the rest of the day.
Reprinted from “Fuel�, published by BOA Editions. Copyright 1998 by Naomi Shihab Nye. Copyright 1998 by Naomi Shihab Nye. For more about BOA Editions, a not-for-profit publisher of poetry and other literary works, CLICK HERE Glass egg by Elodie Holmes. For more about Elodie Holmes, see page 161.
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EGGS
ON BOARD: HANDLE WITH CARE
EGGS ARE CULINARY ACROBATS that perform a combo of feats no other food can claim. They bind, leaven, thicken, clarify and glaze. Yolks emulsify. Whites give poof, puff and fluff to an array of dishes, both savory and sweet. What cooks can too easily overlook is that the egg insists on being understood and treated gently. Under its fragile shell there comes a moment when it wants to say, “Enough!” That’s the moment when it has endured too much whipping, too much heat, too much time in motion. The vengeful egg lets you know in punishing ways. If heated too long, it curdles. This 4 4 T heZe nchilada.com Fa ll 2 010
is an irreversible state. No amount of straining, whipping or wishing will make the egg smooth again. Or, the egg might separate. It can toughen, too. Or weep, seep and fall. But as a miracle ingredient, the egg should be forgiven such treachery. Look at all it does for you. It’s really up to you, then, to know just how to handle the egg.
REVERENCE FOR VERSATILITY The three functional properties of egg cookery are on-purpose coagulation, emulsification and foaming.
Story by ELAINE CORN Photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN ASHLEY ENGLISH
To function well with an egg, you need to know about them all. Coagulation is the inevitable condition when an egg comes in contact with heat. It’s a phenomenon of the egg’s protein that changes a liquid to a curd. Depending upon your intentions, coagulation can be a benefit or a disaster. Coagulation is the moment when custard (whew, stopped the cooking just in time) turns to scrambled eggs (I meant to do that). Emulsification bridges the domains of oil and water through the molecular attractions of yolks. It’s what amazingly turns eggs, oil and a bit of acidic liquid, like lemon juice or vinegar, into mayonnaise. And finally, foaming adds volume to food, cooked or not, from whipped egg whites. The beating of egg whites is fraught with compromise. Adding sugar makes the whites very stable, but limits their potential for the greatest volume. An acid, such as cream of tartar, helps prevent a collapse—but the whipping time will be longer. Egg whites happen to enjoy torture. The older they get, the better they like a good whipping. There are so many things to look for when cooking with eggs that one of the most important elements in your kitchen should be good light. The egg gives many clues about its status through the stages of a recipe but you have to watch for the signs. Gloss or sheen? Stiff peaks or soft? Is the egg ribboning, thickening, coating a metal spoon? Has the beaten yolk lightened to the color of a lemon?
EGG SAFETY: HATCHING A NEW OUTLOOK THE EGG’S WORST REVENGE is its inclination to incubate bacteria if not handled right. Using Grade A eggs with clean, uncracked shells and keeping them refrigerated except when you are cooking them will prevent practically all health problems.
I have reverence for the egg. The bottom line of cooking eggs is that they’re delicious and one of the most versatile foods we eat. Sure, it’s great they’re nutritious. But I eat them because I love them and because every time I cook one, I know I have to be nice.
The total likelihood of finding an egg infected with salmonella is .005 percent. Despite the low possibility of Salmonella entering the human digestive tract, cautionary advice is in place for the very young, the very old, people with compromised immune systems and pregnant women. All in these groups should be wary of any recipes that contain raw eggs. (See Resources, page 159, for more on Salmonella.)
For recipes for Poached Eggs, Hard-Cooked Eggs, Enchilada Strata, Shirred Egg Florentine, Saffron Flan and Lemon Meringue Pie, see pages 112 to 120.
For more about Elaine Corn, see page 160. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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carbohydrates on the bottom of our USDA food pyramid. But where there is growth of life, there must, by definition, be protein. The word comes from a Greek verb that means “to take first place.” In fact, egg protein is so high that scientists use the egg as a worldwide standard in measuring the quality of protein in other foods. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations charts whole eggs as having a biological value of 93.7 percent, rating eggs higher than milk (84.5 percent), fish (76 percent), and beef (74.3 percent).
SLOW! EGGS AT WORK
zen
THERE ARE NINE ESSENTIAL AMINO ACIDS. Because all nine are in a single egg, the egg is a complete protein.
THE
Protein isn’t a good thing to be without. Yet, protein has been overlooked in favor of complex
TASTING
THE
ONE LARGE EGG CONTAINS: 75 calories 6 grams protein 5 grams fat 1.5 grams saturated fat 1.9 grams monounsaturated fat 0.6 grams polyunsaturated fat 213 milligrams cholesterol Vitamin A Vitamin D Vitamin E
Vitamin B12 Choline Folic acid Vitamin B3 Biotin Inositol Niacin Vitamin B6 Riboflavin Thiamine
Photograph by DEBBI SMIRNOFF
CHILADA
WORLD
ONLINE
.com
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FINDING THE GO OD EGG:
Story by SUE VORENBERG Photograph by VLADISLAV STAROZHILOV 48
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F INDING
YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE AN EXPERT—or an eggspert, for that matter—to figure out if the eggs in your refrigerator are fresh. The breakfast food of champions actually has a very long shelf life. Grocers recommend eating eggs within 45 days of harvest—but if properly refrigerated, they can last even longer, say many who know from experience. Sarah Gilbert is one, a woman who has been raising her own chickens for the past three and a half years in Portland, Oregon—a city that’s been described as having “the most vibrant urban chicken coop scene in the country.” Eggs “last a really, really long time,” Gilbert said. “I only ever had one bad batch, and that was when I had a really broody chicken that just wouldn’t give up her eggs, so they stayed warm in the nest for a few weeks before she would let me take them.”
THE
G O OD E GG : A D ATING G UIDE
Grocers can stamp any expiration date they want on the carton within 30 days of the pack date— and the expiration dates they choose vary greatly. But you can get a clearer idea of the age of the eggs in a carton with a quick Julian Date calculation. However, in the past some unsavory grocers—shall we call them bad eggs?—have been caught repackaging and re-dating eggs that didn’t sell on time. The practice has been banned by the USDA for many years, Maloberti said. And recently, some grocery chains or egg producers have started laser stamping each individual egg with a use-by date to assure customers of their legitimacy.
NO MORE BLIND DATES? If you raise your own chickens, you don’t have to worry about how to interpret the marketing classifications found on egg cartons because you control all the factors—food, environment, etc.—yourself, Gilbert said.
A DATING GUIDE No need to brood yourself, however, as there are ways of determining if an egg in your fridge has aged past its prime. There’s the dime-nickel-quarter method, where you examine the size of the air pocket inside a broken egg to determine freshness: Dime-size is relatively fresh, nickel is mid-life and quarter indicates it’s time for the trashcan. If you don’t have a pocketful of change, you can always try the floater method, which is Gilbert’s favorite: Put the egg in a cold glass of water; if it floats, it’s toast. Neither method is much help when you are standing in the dairy section of your grocery wondering which carton to buy, however. Elisa Maloberti, director of egg product marketing for the American Egg Board, knows how to crack the code there. Every egg carton from a commercial supplier has a Julian date on it —although in the egg world, the Julian date is a bit different than the multi-digit version used by scientists. The Julian date on a carton is generally a three-number code that indicates the day of the year when it was packaged. A carton packed on January 1, for instance, would be numbered 001; a carton packed on September would be 270.
Gilbert has seven chickens, and generally each produces one egg per day, except during the darkest parts of the winter. “The goal originally was to feed my family, but now I’ve got enough that I can give eggs to my sister and neighbors and try to trade them for things,” she noted. The eggs she gathers don’t taste much different from the store-bought ones, although the size range and color of the eggs vary more, she said. “Some of my eggs are enormous, and the yolks are always oranger. I feel like there are health benefits from raising chickens yourself, but as to whether that’s true or not I couldn’t tell you.” She added, “Grocery store eggs have to be washed (with a detergent solution) before they’re sold. (Detergent) in small doses is not terribly toxic, but it’s still not something I really want on my food.” Eggs have a kind of natural protection when they are first laid. An egg initially comes with bloom or cuticle, which is a coating that seals pores and protects it from bacteria and moisture loss. Eggs are washed in a detergent solution by packagers before they go to market for cleanliness reasons, because eggs and feces exit a hen’s body in the same location, Maloberti said. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Sarah Gilbert’s, Portland, Oregon, chickens produce eggs that need no labels.
But the process also removes the bloom and its protection. Often after washing, egg packers will replace the bloom with edible mineral oil, which performs a similar function. Salmonella bacteria, which can grow around chickens and egg-producing facilities, can be a threat. Washing eggs in a solution specifically engineered for a region’s water and keeping the eggs cool are two methods producers use to protect the public from that bacteria. But the threat of salmonella is also why egg producers discourage eating raw eggs and making sure that egg whites are fully cooked on both sunny-side up and poached eggs, Maloberti said. “Salmonella is destroyed by heat, so we do recommend that all eggs be thoroughly cooked. If you’re cooking an egg that you don’t want to flip over, we recommend you baste the top with cooking fat to get it hot.” For help breaking the Julian egg code, CLICK HERE where you can find a chart showing the code for each day of the year. For official government responses to food safety questions, you can visit AskKaren.gov or call the USDA meat and poultry hotline at 1-888-674-6854. For information about a wide range of U.S. and international food politics, recalls and safety issues, SIGN UP for Food Safety News, a free daily web-based newspaper, founded by Seattle attorneys Bill Marler and Bruce Clark. For more about Sue Vorenberg, see page 164.
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EVEN MORE CONFUSING than Julian dates are the many different branding labels you can find on supermarket eggs. This guide (put together with information from The Humane Society of the United States, United Egg Producers and other web-based resources) will lead you through the maze of cage-free, vegetarian, Omega-3 buzzwords so you’ll know what you are really buying:
TYPICAL GROCERY EGGS Most eggs you find in the grocery, with no special labeling on the package to indicate how the chickens they come from were raised, are the products of chickens raised in large facilities with wire cages. Feed and water are provided to each cage and there are often several hens per cage. The use of antibiotics is fairly common to keep the birds healthy in such crowded conditions. The environment is cooled by special tunnel ventilation to fluff the birds’ feathers and carry away body heat. The Humane Society of the United States considers this treatment inhumane because the hens get only 67 square inches (or 0.5 square feet) of cage space each, which is less area than a standard 8 1⁄2 x 11-inch sheet of paper.
USDA CERTIFIED ORGANIC One of the more easily verified claims you can find on an egg carton, these eggs must come from chickens fed certified organic, pesticide- and herbicidefree vegetarian feed. But the organic certification tells you little else about how the chickens were raised. While these chickens are required to have outdoor access, the duration and quality of that access is undefined by the USDA. They must have at least 1.3 square feet per bird of floor space in the henhouse. These chickens are not given antibiotics except in cases of infectious outbreaks.
FREE RANGE/CAGE FREE/FREE RUN/ FREE ROAMING These eggs come from hens that are not raised in cages—but that does not necessarily mean they have access to the outdoors. Hens whose eggs carry this designation are sometimes raised in large barns, although they are required to have at least 1.3 square feet per bird of floor space in the henhouse. Feed is not regulated by this label. Free-running chickens can be
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given antibiotics and fed with animal byproducts and GMO crops. To ensure you are getting eggs from organically or vegetarian-fed chickens, look for those labels along with the free-ranging designation.
CERTIFIED HUMANE RAISED & HANDLED Eggs that carry this logo have been certified by the national nonprofit organization Humane Farm Animal Care. These eggs come from uncaged birds raised inside barns or warehouses. The chickens must be able to perform all of their natural behaviors such as nesting, perching and dust bathing. Farms must meet the organization’s humane requirements for number of birds, perches and nesting boxes. For a list of egg and meat producers meeting Certified Humane standards, CLICK HERE.
ANTIBIOTIC-FREE EGGS These eggs have a USDA label given to producers who can document that their hens were raised without antibiotics.
HORMONE-FREE EGGS These eggs are no different than any other egg. Hormone-free designations actually only apply to beef products. It is illegal to give hormones to chickens, so all eggs, labeled so or not, should be hormone free.
ALL NATURAL/FARM FRESH EGGS These labels mean absolutely nothing. These eggs are generally produced the same way as eggs from 52
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caged hens. Don’t bother spending the extra money on this flashy and useless labeling.
OMEGA-3 EGGS There is some controversy regarding this label. All eggs contain omega-3 fatty acids—the question is how much more and what kind of omega-3s can be found in eggs produced by hens fed special diets (usually flax seed and/or seaweed) to boost this nutrient. According to a complaint filed with the FDA by the Center for Science in the Public Interest in 2007, even eggs with the highest levels of omega-3s contain no more than the amount found in 1 1⁄2 teaspoons of salmon, the richest source of omega-3s.
AMISH EGGS This label may not indicate much difference in production from factory-farmed eggs. These chickens, raised on Amish farms, don’t always eat vegetarian feed and they also may be raised in cages.
FARMERS MARKET/ LOCALLY PRODUCED EGGS These eggs are often unlabeled or may even be packed in recycled cartons with labels that have nothing to do with the local operation. Be sure to ask the grower how the chickens were raised, how and when the eggs were harvested, and how soon after collection they were refrigerated. If you can find locally produced, pastured eggs, go for them. Tests by Mother Earth News (and others) have shown these to be the most nutritious of all.
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THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAILS Story by DEBBIE MOOSE Photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
FROM THE SPRINGY WHITES to the richness of the filling, deviled eggs are just plain satisfying. To make great ones, it helps to first follow a few simple rules— and then think outside the shell to let your deviled egg flag fly. To make great deviled eggs, you have to start with the right kind of eggs. Fresh-from-the-hen eggs are delicious, but aren’t great for deviling. Extremely fresh eggs are nearly impossible to peel after they’re hard-cooked. The reason has to do with egg anatomy. The older an egg is, the larger the air pocket between the egg and the shell, and that pocket lets you get a finger-hold to pull off the shell. Very fresh eggs have no air pocket. The shells will stick like white paint on wood. So let fresh eggs sit for a couple of weeks in the refrigerator, or use older eggs from the supermarket. If you are a perfectionist and are obsessed with perfectly centered yolks, put a rubber band around the egg carton and turn it on its side. Let it sit like this overnight in the refrigerator, then get professional help for that obsession. The biggest mistake people make when preparing deviled eggs is overcooking, resulting in rubbery whites and the dreaded greenish yolk. For creamy yolks and just right whites, use this method: Place the eggs in a single layer in a saucepan and cover them with cold water by about an inch. Bring the water to a rolling boil, then remove the pan from the heat and cover it with a lid. Let the pan sit, covered and off the heat, for about 15 minutes — it may take a little longer at high altitude. When the time is up, drain and cool down the eggs as quickly as you can, either under cold running water or by putting them in a bowl of ice water.
Hard-cooked eggs will keep in the refrigerator for a week. Just seal them in plastic bags to prevent the porous shells from picking up other odors in the refrigerator. Then you’ll be ready to devil at a moment’s notice. If you were not lucky enough to receive a deviled-egg plate as a wedding gift or inherit one from your mama—you’re not a Southerner, are you?—you needn’t worry. Place curly parsley on a regular serving platter and nestle the little devils in it for a pretty presentation. Deviled eggs taste better if you prepare them ahead, even the night before you want to serve them, so that the flavors of the filling have a chance to come together. That makes them a fabulous do-ahead dish. Just devil, wrap and refrigerate. The final rule about deviled eggs is—there are no other rules. There is a world beyond the same old ho-hum pickle relish and mayo. Let the eggs be your canvas, and paint.
THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT, TOO This is probably my favorite deviled-egg recipe, and a version of it is in my cookbook, Deviled Eggs: 50 Recipes From Simple to Sassy. (In fact, all three of the recipes that follow come from that book.) This variation pumps up the fire with Creole mustard, which contains horseradish. Replace the Dijon with it, too, if you dare. And do not use a vinegar-based hot sauce; stick with a fruity Caribbean style. Where there’s fire, there’s smoke—and smoked paprika tops off these devils.
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T HE D EVIL
IS IN
T HE D ETAILS
THE DEVIL MADE ME DO IT, TOO MAKES 12 6 1
⁄4 1 1 1 1⁄2 1 1 ⁄4
hard-cooked eggs, peeled, cut in half, yolks mashed in a bowl cup mayonnaise teaspoon Dijon mustard teaspoon Creole mustard teaspoons Caribbean-style habanero hot sauce teaspoon curry powder teaspoon garlic powder Salt and black pepper to taste Smoked paprika for garnish
COMBINE THE THOROUGHLY MASHED YOLKS with the mayonnaise and mustards. Stir in the hot sauce, curry powder and garlic powder. Taste, then season with salt and pepper (you may not need any). FILL THE WHITES evenly with the mixture. Sprinkle lightly with smoked paprika.
LOX & EGGS MAKES 12 This recipe is inspired by a breakfast dish that my husband loved as a child. When we married, I was Southern sausage and bacon; he was Jewish lox and bagels. Well, I’ve finally gotten used to the smoked fish—as long as there aren’t any beady-eyed fish heads staring at me over my morning coffee. And here’s a tip: With the pink color and garnish, these devils look gorgeous even if you put them together in your sleep. 6
hard-cooked eggs, peeled, cut in half, and yolks mashed in a bowl 2 tablespoons sour cream 2 teaspoons whipped cream cheese 1 1⁄2 teaspoons Dijon mustard 2 tablespoons chopped smoked salmon 1 1⁄2 teaspoons grated onion Salt and pepper to taste Drained capers for garnish
COMBINE THE THOROUGHLY MASHED YOLKS with the sour cream, cream cheese and mustard. Stir in the smoked salmon and onion. Taste, then season with salt and pepper.
All recipes from Deviled Eggs: 50 Recipes from Simple to Sassy Debbie Moose, Harvard Common Press, 2004
FILL THE WHITES evenly with the mixture and garnish each egg half with 3 or 4 capers.
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T HE D EVIL
BLUE DEVILS
IS IN
T HE D ETAILS
MAKES 12
The Duke University Blue Devils are my alma mater’s archrival in basketball, but sometimes you have to give the devils their due. The unusual flavor makes this a good appetizer or cocktail-hour munchie. Fry up some bacon for the topping or use the real bacon bits available in a jar—avoid the fakin’ bacon. 6 2 1 2
hard-cooked eggs, peeled, cut in half, yolks mashed in a bowl tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons mayonnaise teaspoon Dijon mustard tablespoons crumbled blue cheese Salt and pepper to taste About 3 tablespoons real bacon bits
COMBINE THE THOROUGHLY MASHED YOLKS with the mayonnaise and mustard. Add the blue cheese and mash well into the mixture with a spoon. Taste, then season with salt and pepper. FILL THE WHITES evenly with the mixture and garnish each egg half with the bacon bits. For more about Debbie Moose, see page 162. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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IS THAT AN EGG IN YOUR POCKET, -1AFTER TWO YEARS IN THE HIGH DESERT of New Mexico, I've resorted to bribery. Raven, my very insistent suitor, called me here to create Listening To Raven: Drawings, Myths & Realities, a two-year-and-still-in-progress multimedia art project. But now, instead of banging on the skylight and dancing on the portal, Raven seems to be playing hard to get. Although I see the birds when I go out for a walk in these hills above Santa Fe, and we have conversations, this house—unlike the other homes I've perched in since coming here—hadn’t been visited by Raven. So, when I saw that other trickster, Coyote, in the arroyo recently, I asked him why. I swear he said, “Bribery.” That night I placed two uncooked whole chicken eggs on the lava rock watering hole. 58
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The next morning, I heard two visitors talking in the garden. Two huge ravens were sharing the raw chicken eggs I'd put out for them. Feathers glowing like abalone in the cool sunlight, they nibbled and chatted.
-2The Egg Thief swoops in at least once a day to check on the chicken egg situation. Today, even in winds so brisk the house was howling, he took one egg of the two I placed on the rock fountain and brought it over to his mate, who was hopping impatiently in the budding desert. These birds have yet to connect me with the eggs, but have figured out where I place the treats—and that sometimes I do it more than once a day. Patience.
-3-
Nesting season here, so the players have changed. No sign of the courting couple, or the male who delicately picked up an egg and brought it to her a couple of yards away where they dined, leaving a mosaic of white and brown shells on the desert. One sloppy eater is dining in place, leaving pieces of shell and a glutinous haze of egg white on the rocks. I wonder, courtship over, if it is the same male or some young bachelor.
Story and illustrations by BETH SURDUT
3 4
or are you just happy to see me? -4There's a new raven lurking in the lavender. He's bigger and more cautious than my regulars, who swoop in on fly-bys to see if I've put out more eggs. I know they love junk food and can spot a fast-food logo from on high, but I just can’t bring myself to feed them greasy fries. The newbie, watching to see if the egg is really available, is stalking amid the sweet-scented purple mint flowers, flying up to land on the portal roof where he hops four times, having a conversation with himself. Then he’s back to the bushes, peeking out like a child playing hide and seek. I’m doing the same thing in my studio, trying to hide and see without giving myself away. Now he's on the rock, head swinging back and forth to see if he's alone. He picks up the prize in his beak and takes off, his feathers gleaming blue and silver. I see a feather drift off his body—jet black, woven with emerald and amethyst lights. A few days ago, seeing five shining ravens swooping around my piece of New Mexico sky, I put out three eggs. I heard the whoosh of wings and some ravenish comments as I went inside and walked down
the hallway to my studio. There, through the glass door, I saw winged shadows lofting. The eggs were gone. Just for fun, I immediately placed two more eggs in the usual spot atop the rock fountain and, for the next hour, watched desire being overcome by confusion. These guys thought they had raided a nest so, much as they wanted those eggs, well, something wasn't right. Swooping in, slowing to look but not land and touch, they wove a loose tapestry of yearning. The eggs remained until the next morning—a new dawn, a new raid. We are on intimate terms, Raven and I—he feeds my spirit while I provide the eggs. Lest you think our association is based on food, which it had never been before, Raven has taken to calling loudly to me again, wherever I may be. For more about “Listening to Ravens” and Beth Surdut’s art for the mind and body, CLICK HERE. For more about Beth Surdut, see page 164.
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A wise man once said that one can recall an entire civilization in the taste of one dish. If that is so, this simple mousse captures the refinement of Moorish Spain—the aromas of its flowers, the delicacy and freshness of its eggs Story by DIANE PERKINS
and cream, and the lingering sweetness of its
Photographs by MATTHEW TAYLOR
wild meadows. HOW RECIPES FARE IN CULINARY HISTORY is much more interesting than whether they survived and found their way into common use, survived as features of a later cuisine, or formed the basis for a whole category of dishes that today look little like the ancient recipes on which they were based. I found that out during the first Spanish Market I worked as pastry chef at Coyote Café in Santa Fe. It was 2004 and the Coyote’s then-chef/owner Mark Miller’s habit was to present a completely fresh menu to diners throughout this week-long celebration of the Hispanic culture of Northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado. He expected the recipes to be well researched and representative of Spanish culture, but a bit less well known to diners—both recognizable from the cuisine and still a surprise. I had already learned that working at 7,000 feet made creams of all kinds more reliable options in the sweet kitchen than many of the items in the classic repertoire, but I was about to get a tutorial on the egg and its role as the most basic ingredient in the famous line of Spanish postres we know and love today—and with it, a taste of the culinary traditions that formed the infinitely complex food culture of Al Andalusia. We did put a Crema Catalana on the menu that year which, since it is not baked, retains an ethereal lightness unmatched by the more familiar cooked Crème Brulée. And we served a blood-orange ice cream that dissolved sweetly in the mouth with a lingering hint of acidity. There was also flan, flavored with the juice of fresh oranges replacing some of the milk, Valencia style. However, the dessert I remember best was a honey mousse sprinkled with pomegranate seeds. It was so well received it remained on the menu for the rest of the year—and sent me in search of a wide variety of off-season pomegranate sources as well as the fruit’s fascinating history. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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A TASTE
OF
M O ORISH S PAIN
SEEDS OF A CIVILIZATION
A TASTE OF HONEY
THE POMEGRANATE, long known to the Moors, came with them when they invaded Spain in the 8th century and became the namesake of their most fabled Andalusian city—Granada, or pomegranate in Spanish. The pomegranate was considered so emblematic of Al Andalusia that when Ferdinand and Isabella conquered Granada—the last city on the subcontinent occupied by the Moors—they added the fruit to the Spanish coat of arms, where it remains today.
THAT THIS DESSERT IS MADE WITH HONEY makes it more likely to have been developed in the Middle Ages before the use of sugar. Sugar, a tropical grass of India, was also imported to Spain by the Moors. Like chocolate, it was first thought to be a drug and was wildly expensive until relatively modern times. Honey and date sugar were the sweets of the Moors and the Spaniards.
To the Moors, the pomegranate, with its many seeds, represented fertility and its slightly acidic finish on the tongue was considered medicinal. Of course we know today that their intuitive grasp of the fruit’s healthful qualities is true: pomegranates are one of the best sources of antioxidants and vitamin C. In this dessert, that “astringent” quality is a surprising contrast to the sweet mousse and gives this decidedly antique sweet the edge that many modern pastry chefs value. The Moors also brought with them to Spain the preserved wisdom of Roman beekeepers. It was the Moors who translated ancient texts on beekeeping from Latin into Arabic, saving for future generations the techniques of domestication we still use today— revising the Roman texts with their own knowledge in the process. Both the Spanish and the Moors refined the practice of beekeeping throughout the Middle Ages. From the time of Christian King Alfonso X “el Sabio” (the wise) in the 13th century comes the preserved manuscript, Cantigas de Santa María—the largest collection of monophonic songs in a vernacular language to survive the period. Written in Castilian and illustrated by a Moor, the manuscript is treasured for its depictions of everyday life in the period. There in the margins is a whimsical illustration of a beekeeper who has found Santa María and the infant Jesus hiding in a beehive. In Spain, as in the Haute Provence, the hives are brought to the areas where plants producing the most distinctive flavors are plentiful each spring. The combs are harvested in the fall and spun in centrifuges to obtain the honey, which is then packaged in clay jars and sealed with (what else?) beeswax for sale to the public. 62
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For this dessert I selected the queen of honeys—the chestnut honey of Asturias. Connoisseurs of honey—and I urge the pastry chefs among you to become one—say that honey made from the chestnut flower is the most creamy and mysterious of all. In a recipe with only four ingredients, the flavor of the honey is the flavor of the dessert. The chestnut honey is not merely sweet; it also is smoky and mildly bitter. In a word, it’s unforgettable. We are told that when the Moors left Spain, they entrusted their well-guarded and very specific recipes for marzipan and other sweets to the Catholic Sisters. To these, the nuns added the rich cream and egg yolks of southern Spain. They had the freedom to experiment, since the yolks were free to them the gift of sherry makers who needed only the whites to clarify their fortified wines. This custom of adding extra yolks to egg creams survives today and is used by chefs working in every cuisine.
FROZEN SPANISH CUISINE IS CHARACTERIZED by freshness, simplicity and, often, technique. This honey mousse is an example of all three. To make it at home for six, take one large fresh egg and three large yolks and place them in the bowl of an electric mixer with the 1⁄2 cup or 4 ounces of honey. (See page 45 for ways to be sure your eggs are fresh.) Using the whisk attachment, set the mixer on high/medium and whisk the eggs and honey until they have quadrupled in volume. This will take 10 to 15 minutes. Do not stop the mixer once you have started. As you whisk the eggs they will turn from a bright
Wild Honey Mousse THE CHESNUT HONEY is not merely sweet; it also is smoky and midly bitter. In a word, UNFORGETTABLE. Photograph by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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A TASTE
OF
M O ORISH S PAIN
yellow to a pale yellow. You eggs can achieve the volume Without doubt this recipe hand, and we leave to your attention that took.
will be surprised that the they do with long mixing. was originally made by imagination the time and
In a separate bowl, using the whisk attachment, whip 10 ounces of heavy cream—triple cream, if you can find it—to stiff peaks. The peaks should stand tall when you remove the beater from the bowl, but the cream should not be whisked beyond this point or it will quickly become butter. Fold the cream into the yolk and honey mixture by hand using a wide spatula or spoonula. The mousse can now be poured into small soufflé dishes lined in plastic wrap and frozen. (Alternatively, you can also ladle it over toasted “quart a quart” cake for a level of decadence that is beyond compare, and smother the whole thing in berries. (Recipe follows.) This mousse never freezes through. It remains soft and creamy and can be brought to the table within minutes of emerging from the freezer. To serve it, turn the soufflé dish over and remove the mousse from the plastic wrap. Turn upside down and center on a plate. Sprinkle the pomegranate seeds and juice over the
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mousse and serve. It pairs wonderfully with a Pedro Ximénez Sherry. Al-Andalus and Mitica brands of wild Spanish honeys are available at The Spanish Table, with retail outlets in the San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle and Santa Fe. For more about Diane Perkins, see page 163.
FOUR BY FOUR BY FABULOUS What the French call a "quart a quart" cake is very similar to our American pound cake. I know this will seem counter-intuitive, but the following recipe works up to 7,500 feet without leavening, using the creaming method: 1 part butter 1 part sugar
1 part egg 1 part flour
That's it: Four ingredients of four equal parts— the quart a quart. It works and it's a dense and lovely cake. I use 8 ounces of everything for one loaf pan and add a little salt and lemon juice. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour in a buttered loaf pan, or until a knife comes out clean. Toasted in the morning with berries, it's heaven.
TASTING NEW MEXICO Photograph by KITTY LEAKEN
ALL
Zenchilada readers with connections to New Mexico, this is for you. Would you like to share with the world what’s really special about traditional New Mexican foods and dishes? In 2012, the Museum of New Mexico Press will publish Tasting New Mexico: 100 years of New Mexico Cooking by four-time James Beard award-winning cookbook authors and longtime New Mexico residents Cheryl and Bill Jamison. The recipe and history-infused publication is being produced by the MNM Press to coincide with the New Mexico Centennial in 2012, coordinated through the state’s Centennial Foundation with the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. Tasting New Mexico will feature recipes for 100 of the most beloved traditional dishes of the state, and will describe how these dishes developed and evolved, including local variations in their preparation. The book will also trace the agricultural and ranching heritage of New Mexico, and will relate stories about notable cooks, restaurants and food products that contribute to New Mexico’s distinct culinary flavors. The book will
include many photos illustrating New Mexico food history, too. Cheryl said recently, “Bill and I see this as a celebration of where New Mexicans have come from, who we are now, and where we’re going, told through food.” The Jamisons look at this project as bringing their food-writing careers full circle. Their first foray into foodwriting began 20 years ago with the Rancho de Chimayó Cookbook. It was followed by some dozen books, including The Border Cookbook: Authentic Home Cooking of the American Southwest and Northern Mexico; The Traditional Cooking of New Mexico; Smoke & Spice; The Big Book of Outdoor Cooking & Entertaining; American Home Cooking; A Real American Breakfast; and Around the World in 80 Dinners, all of which have allowed them to research foods throughout the world. The Jamisons are soliciting recipes and stories from former and current New Mexico residents for possible inclusion in the book. They are looking for photographs, too. Those with recipe ideas and information to contribute should send them via e-mail to tastingnm@gmail.com no later than November 1, 2010. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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CRACKING OPEN A BELOVED TRADITION SOME FOLKS EAT ONLY THE WHITES, others are yolk folk, but it’s the eggshell that really counts in my book. That’s because the eggshell plays a starring role in a Spanish tradition that cast a spell on me as a child— the annual Baile de los Cascarones, or Dance of the Eggshells. It’s difficult to document the exact origin of the confetti-filled eggshell called a cascarón in Spanish. It’s believed that Marco Polo may have first used eggshells to transport perfumed powder during his journeys to and from the Far East. The Old World’s love of the decorated eggshells came to Mexico with Carlota, the wife of Austrian-born Emperor Maximilian I, who wanted to bring some European culture to her new home. Eventually, the cascarones traveled up the Camino Real to New Mexico.
confetti in his or her hair at the end of the evening is the most popular dancer. The playfulness of the cascarones sets the mood, but the dancing—the second part of the tradition —is just as much fun. Men and women dress up in their favorite fiesta outfits and dance to folk music popular in Northern New Mexico during the mid-1800s. Most of the dances are designed to be ice-breakers to encourage people to mingle. There are waltzes, polkas and a few familiar dances like La Raspa (the Mexican Shuffle), and the Varsoviana (“Put Your Little Foot Dance”).
Members of Santa Fe’s La Sociedad Folklórica— a group of women who promote and preserve the language, culture and traditions of Spanish Colonial New Mexico—say pious Spanish Catholics of Northern New Mexico in the 1800s did not eat meat at all during Lent. Instead, they prepared dishes made with eggs and saved the eggshells for the annual Baile de Cascarones. Dancing was also forbidden during Lent, so after Easter rolled around, everyone was eager to have fun. Since most people lived so far from each other on isolated farms and ranches, the baile was an ideal way to get the community together. La Sociedad Folklórica revived the tradition in 1935 and has been holding the dance in Santa Fe on the weekend after Easter ever since.
Two of my favorites are El Baile de los Celosos (The Dance of the Jealous Ones) and El Baile de la Escoba (The Broom Dance). In El Baile de la Escoba, men and women partner up and form a “soul-train” type line—women on one side, men on the other. One person is left without a partner and gets the honor of dancing down the middle of the space with a broom. When the bastonero, or master of ceremonies, blows a whistle, that person drops the broom and tries to get a real partner. The men and women who are standing on opposite sides of the room also scramble to grab either their partners or the first person they can reach. It’s kind of like the mad dash during a game of musical chairs. After everyone partners up and dances a bit, the person who is shut out picks up the broom and the men and women separate and return to opposite lines once again so the broom dancer can waltz down the middle.
There are two parts to the baile tradition. The first involves the decorated cascarones, or confettifilled eggshells: People ask one another to dance by breaking a cascarón over a potential partner’s head. It’s a hoot to hear or feel the eggshells crack and then see the confetti sprinkle down. The person with the most
In El Baile de los Celosos (The Dance of the Jealous Ones), men and women face their partners and form a circle—women on the inside and men on the outside. When the music starts, women hold hands and move clockwise. In the outer circle, the men hold hands and move counter-clockwise. When the bastonero
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Story by CARLA ARAGÓN Photographs by CHRISTINA FRAIN
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As a child, I looked forward to the dance with almost as much enthusiasm and excitement as I looked forward to Christmas. blows his whistle, everyone stops and dances with the person they’re facing. When he blows the whistle again, everyone returns to their circles and moves in opposite directions until the whistle signals them to dance again. When the music ends, you’ve danced with several different people—enough to make your partner jealous. My mother, Socorro Aragón, the longest tenured member of La Sociedad Folklórica, introduced me to the baile. As a child, I looked forward to the dance with almost as much enthusiasm and excitement as I looked forward to Christmas. I was one of the many children who sold cascarones at the dance, so it allowed me a chance to squeeze one more week out of my Easter basket. And of course, it was a blast to surprise my cousins by smashing cascarones on their heads. (The proper way is to crack the eggshells over people’s heads, not on them, but most of us succumb to the temptation to bop someone on the head!) The Baile de Cascarones sponsored by La Sociedad Folklórica is open to the public. It’s easy to remember the date: The dance is always held on the weekend after Easter. But even if you can’t go to the dance, you can still enjoy the magic of the cascarones. You can make them yourself—and yes, you can also buy ready-made cascarones. Judging from how cascarones have made their way onto store shelves at Easter time, it looks like this tradition is here to stay. For more about Carla Aragón, including links to her children’s book and audio book about the Baile de los Cascarones tradition, see page 160.
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YOU CAN MAKE CASCARONES YOURSELF BY FOLLOWING THESE INSTRUCTIONS FROM GEORGEANNE BRENNAN, author of Holiday Eggs: TO MAKE YOUR OWN CASCARONES, you will need raw eggs, egg dyes or paints, an egg cutter or sharp knife, scissors, colored tissue paper, clear paper glue and confetti, rice, tiny trinkets or candies to fill the empty eggs. START BY CUTTING A SMALL HOLE in the narrow end of each egg with a clean knife or egg cutter. Pour the yolks and whites of the eggs into a small bowl. (If you cover and refrigerate the innards of the eggs as soon as you collect them, you can use them to make a special dish for your Easter brunch. Just don't store them for more than three days before cooking.) RINSE BOTH THE INSIDE AND OUTSIDE of the eggshells, let them dry, then dye or paint them. (Remember to handle the shells gently!) Let the dye or paint dry thoroughly, then fill the shells with the goodies of your choice. PUT A LITTLE GLUE around the opening in the shell, and cover the hole with a small piece of tissue paper. If you like, you can also glue narrow strips of tissue paper on the shell for additional decoration.
Excerpted from Holiday Eggs: A Collection of Inspired Gifts, Recipes and Decorations, Georgeanne Brennan, Ten Speed Press, 2002
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A R C H I T E C T U R E N AT U R E THE W W W. F E R N A N D O D E L G A D O P H O T O G R A P H Y. C O M
TimeandTerroir
By ROCKY DURHAM Photographs by KITTY LEAKEN
IRRESISTIBLE INCENSE IT
was early, a Saturday morning and I was pulling into my secret parking place for the Santa Fe Farmer’s Market when I thought I caught a whiff. Musky but fresh. A hint of green and growing overlaid with the dark incense of charring. A little sweet at first, but then in the back of the throat, teasing the eyes, the burn. Oh, that heavenly scent: green chile being roasted over open flame! I felt something stirring deep, something primitive and visceral. I grabbed my bags from the passenger seat and made a beeline for Matt Romero’s booth. My memories of the next few moments are somewhat hazy and if it was you I pushed aside on my mad-dash for green, I am truly sorry. Matt has a chile-roasting rig that looks like the Dialing for Dollars letter bin. His is made from heavy-gauge steel mesh, equipped with a propane jet that blasts thousands of BTUs into the chile-filled drum. There is a hand crank on one end that the person in charge of the roasting uses to keep the chiles tumbling around until they are evenly blistered and blackened. The smell is intoxicating and I fear I have developed an unnatural love for it. “My name is Rocky, and I’m a chile addict!” To make a comparative analogy, imagine that you are a bread lover. For eleven months of the year you eat two- and three-day-old bread baked miles away from your home. You pick it up at the store, cold, sliced, a mere shadow of its former majesty. It’s not bad, but it bears little resemblance to the bread you have smelled and tasted, fresh out of the oven. Then one day, as you turn into the supermarket parking lot, you’re stirred by a distinctive scent in the air. Oh my God! Is that FRESH BREAD?! The baker will be in town for only one month, so get it while it’s hot! 70
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This is how we New Mexicans react to the arrival of the first crop of green chile. Q: All right, Mister Chile Addict, why not move to a locale where fresh chiles are available 12 months out of the year? A: Terroir, my friend! We are living in the Bordeaux of chile-producing regions. All plants are little more than dirt, air, water and sunshine. The dirt, air, water and sunshine here in New Mexico are different than anywhere on the planet. Not better or worse mind you, simply different. Did I say, “not better or worse”? What I meant was much better (sorry, Anaheim!). Within the Great State of New Mexico, there exist several distinct chile-growing appellations, the most famous of which is Hatch. Hatch is the name of a village in southwestern New Mexico. Only chiles grown in and around Hatch are Hatch green chiles. Champagne only comes from Champagne, n’est-ce pas? But being from the north sways my allegiance towards the more local appellations of Española, Chimayó, Alcalde and El Guique, all of which are represented at the Santa Fe Farmer’s Market. Full disclosure: The Number One reason I prefer the chiles from Northern New Mexico is because I’m from Northern New Mexico. Not to say the Northern terroir isn’t distinct. I detect a specific heady, earthiness
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in many of the chiles from this soon-to-be-recognized local appellation. But before I upset too many southern New Mexicans, let me say that I love their chiles, too. By and large, I find the southern cousins to have thicker flesh and skin, making them easier to peel even if I put a heavy roast on them. I look forward to trying the new varietals hybridized by New Mexico State University. Apparently experts there have developed a chile with triple the flavor of some previous crops. Go, Aggies! I like to buy a modest bag of roasted green chile and a bushel or three of fresh. The bag of roasted doesn’t make it past the first tortilleria I see on the way home. I need little more than a pinch of salt and some fresh corn tortillas. The purist’s taco! I roast the fresh chiles at home over my gas grill. Most are meticulously prepared for freezing. All others get folded into every meal until the crop is gone. One of my favorite traditional New Mexican dishes is the Blue Corn Green Chile Chicken Enchilada—a celebration of the region and its ancient culinary heritage. Did you know that all chiles are exclusively indigenous to the New World? That’s right, there was not chile—not one—in Asia, or India, before the Spanish arrival on the American continents. The Spanish, and later, the Portuguese took chile (and tomatoes, as well) along trade routes to every corner of the globe—even though the globe has no corners. So if it’s got chile, like corn and potatoes, it’s an American food!
Because the red chiles are dried, they are easier to store without sacrificing quality. I place mine in Mason jars, seal them airtight, store in a cool, dry place. There are two ristras hanging off of my portal as well, but those are not for eating. I have it on good authority they are keeping away the evil spirits and, might I say, with amazing efficiency! Canned green chile can be found at virtually all supermarkets in New Mexico, but the preferred method of storing is freezing. Green chiles can be dried, a storage method employed for centuries in these parts that decreased as home freezers and the availability of frozen chile increased. In recent times, though, the “old way” has had a bit of a revival. As a coveted fresh ingredient that is available for only a brief window each year, however, the arrival of the “first crop” is eagerly awaited by the local citizenry, and the fresh, roasted chile is consumed voraciously until the roasting tumblers stop spinning and the morning air begins to smell like piñon burning in the woodstove instead. Buen Provecho! For recipes for Green Chile Chicken Enchiladas and homemade blue corn tortillas, see page 140. For a source for dried chiles of all varieties, CLICK HERE. For more about Rocky Durham, see page 161. For more about Kitty Leaken, see page 162.
Although I am generally a red chile man, when the first crop arrives in the capital and I get that scent that is truly of New Mexican terroir, I eagerly and proudly turn to the Green Side. When you come to my country, you will soon find yourself needing to swear allegiance, or at least answer the question at virtually every meal, “Red or green?” Red chile is made from the vine-ripened fruits grown here in New Mexico. They are harvested and then sun-dried, sold in pods or ground into pure chile powder (no cumin or other spices added as they are in those common commercial “chili” powder blends). Green chile is the fruit of the exact same plant, but harvested in the earlier green state. (Those long green peppers you find elsewhere, those California-bred Anaheims, are kin to our Big Jim variety—but they’re more like distant cousins whose family long ago moved away and started eating their victuals in white-bread sandwiches, not wrapped in a steaming tortilla.) T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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JIRON FAMILY
CHILES RELLENOS By VIC HOGSETT Photograph by KITTY LEAKEN
BEFORE
there were freezers, the harvest season was the only time of the year in which one could enjoy what is now common New Mexico fare: fresh green chile. This was also before hybridized Big Jims became popular. Then, the native strains of chile were all very hot by today's standards. If a family wanted to enjoy the taste of green chile year round, they would have to roast and peel it, let the chile dehydrate it in the sun, then store it for later use. One of the best ways to make chile seca was the following: Roast and peel hot—honestly, this works better with hot chile—meaty, fresh green chiles. Lay the strips across a clothesline to dehydrate in the sun for a couple of days. (Cover it with cheesecloth to avoid bird droppings and insects.) Once they are dehydrated, the dried green chile can be stored in a glass jar for a long time. Rehydrate the chile in a bowl of water. Squeeze as much water from it as possible before using. This is the dish Mary Ellen Hogsett and dried green chile. They not what other people those words.
my mother and grandmother, Emilia K. Jiron, made with the called it chile rellenos—but it’s may think of when they hear
FRY GROUND PORK OR BEEF and add the rehydrated, squeezed green chile (shredded by hand or very coarsely chopped). Just before the meat is cooked, add chopped garlic and salt to taste. Pour off much of the grease, but leave a little so that when the mixture has
cooled it can be shaped into small meatballs, with a little flour for binding. VERY LIGHTLY SEASON more flour with salt and pepper. Place enough flour in the palm of your hand to lightly coat just more than a tablespoon of the meat mixture to form a ball (experiment with ball size). Let the cooled, floured balls set for about a half hour—if they must sit longer, place waxed paper over them. HEAT UP A PAN OF OIL—lard tastes best, but cooking oil works too. Separate some eggs; beat stiff the whites and lightly season and stir the yolks before gently folding them back into the stiff whites to form a batter. Dip the balls in the batter, and while they drip with the batter, place them one at a time into the hot oil. Turn with a slotted spoon until they are golden on all sides and lift them from the oil to let as much oil drain off as possible before placing them on a clean cloth or news papers topped with paper towels. These are pretty dang good hot, but they make a good meal for hiking or working in the fields the next day too. Emilia's husband, Victor Jiron, would take some in his saddlebag to work cattle, hunt or just go for a ride on his horse. They are the best thing I know to eat while drinking cold beer. Makes me shed a tear just remembering. For more about Vic Hogsett, see page 161. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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PASTURED CHICKEN IS THE REAL THING
Pollo Real
For more about Kitty Leaken, see page 162.
THIS PAGE- Chicks are never kept in overcrowded pens but gently raised in converted sheds before being moved to pasture in the churts at the Pollo Real farm along the Rio Grande in Socorro, New Mexico. 1. French meat chicks, around three weeks old, are ready to go to the field. 2. Tom Delehanty checks on baby French meat chicks that are around three weeks old and ready to go to the field. The chicks are housed in converted trailer homes with plenty of light, fresh air and space—unlike industrial farms where chickens are housed in crowded and artificially lit buildings, sometimes 10,00 together on the floor. 3. Although a French Label Rouge chicken is superior tasting, it’s slow growth makes it unattractive to industrial chicken producers. Not so at Pollo Real! 4. Chickens are enclosed in pens specially made by Tom Delehanty. Moving the pens prevents prolonged exposure to fecal matter. The fields are pesticide free and the composted soil is rich with nutrients. 74
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5. Portable shelters, fresh air and sunshine along with fertile, organic soil production, provide the most humane and sustainable model for chicken farming. Forty to 50 chickens per “churt” (or chicken yurt) graze in the fields, feasting on everything from organically grown greens such as wheatgrass and chicory to millet and brassicas. Pollo Real chickens are fed no pesticides, antibiotics, growth enhancers or hormones. 6. Delehanty also raises guinea fowl; these are three to four weeks old. 7. In 1966 Pollo Real became the first certified organic poultry farm in the United States. Birds are transported by refrigerated truck to the farmers’ market in Santa Fe. POLLO REAL is at 108 Hope Farms Road, Socorro, NM 87801. For more information, CLICK HERE or send an EMAIL. FOR MORE INFORMATION about pastured poultry, or to find a pastured poultry farm near you, CLICK HERE.
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Story by PAT REED Photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
Enchiladas MAKE MINE OVER MOLE
NOBODY WOULD CALL the Comedor Familiar Colón an upscale restaurant. Located in Villa de Etla, a Zapotec town about 30 minutes from the zócalo in Oaxaca, Mexico, this comedor occupies an old colonial house along a wide, pockmarked street just a block from the town’s wonderful Wednesday mercado. The word “comedor” indicates the family’s women are serving meals in their home. Tables here fill two rooms as well as the covered area outside facing the courtyard. The place is clean and orderly, but “beautiful” is not a word that comes immediately to mind. It does, however, have two features I can’t help noticing: a pair of squawking green parrots caged in the courtyard and a clock hanging from the wall that looks like a wristwatch, complete with straps, so big that it might have been worn by a giant. That “wristwatch,” of course, no longer works. Not long ago, a neighbor and I showed up at the comedor for a late breakfast. What I was hankering for was the restaurant’s Enchiladas Oaxaqueñas. For inexplicable reasons, or at least inexplicable to me, the comedor serves the dish only in the morning.
Mexican folklore, a Mexican woman pats out between her thighs the tortillas she will serve her lover. Needless to say, no one was patting out my tortillas that way at this comedor. But a couple of waitresses seemed to be considering their romantic possibilities with my breakfast companion, a good-looking male musician from Boston, who charmed them with his beginner’s Spanish. The “red sauce,” though, is what sets this dish apart, I discovered after my first bite. That sauce is Mole Coloradito, called simply coloradito in Oaxaca, and every cook has her own version. Coloradito is usually translated as “reddish mole.” And reddish it definitely is—a dark, rusty red. Oaxaca is known for its seven moles–six besides Coloradito. But the notion of seven moles is misleading. Oaxacan cooks invent new moles almost every day. While some folks credit a Puebla nun with the first mole, Mesoamerica’s indigenous peoples likely concocted mole-like sauces centuries before that nun ever said a prayer in the New World.
For years, I had passed up trying Enchiladas Oaxaqueñas. This dish was, I thought, little more than a couple of tortillas, nicely folded, floating in a red sauce, sometimes topped with a fried egg. If you are from the American Southwest, as I am, you think an enchilada needs to be more than that, stuffed with beans or cheese or something.
The taste of Coloradito is difficult to describe. But this much I know: Ancho and guajillo chiles provide a little heat. Sesame seeds, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, peppercorns, thyme, Mexican oregano, marjoram and garlic make Coloradito a bit spicy. Tomatoes, ripe plantains, raisins and chocolate provide a slight sweetness. Put all these things together, and a tad more, and the mole is totally delicious.
But the Comedor Familiar Colón makes its own tortillas, patting them out by hand. And they just may be the best tortillas in the Oaxaca area. According to
Though you can order your Enchiladas Oaxaqueñas with tasajo, a dried, thin piece of beef, I prefer mine with a fried egg on top. And that’s where
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Oaxaque単as:
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OAXACA IS KNOWN FOR ITS SEVEN MOLES – SIX BESIDES COLORADITO. the Comedor Familiar Colón, unfortunately, falls short. In Mexico, a fried egg is often, well, just a fried egg. Crumbled queso fresco completes the dish. Comedor Familiar Colón sells its Coloradito in plastic bags tied in a knot at the top, the way Mexicans sell almost everything. So I bought a half-kilo of mole, a little more than a pound. A day or two later, I picked up fresh tortillas (machine-made, but still good) at my local tortillaria. And at home, I sat about making my own Enchiladas Oaxaqueñas. Heating mole and tortillas made by others is a whole lot easier than concocting them yourself. That meant the tasks left for me were frying the egg and crumbling the cheese. But let me digress a moment to discuss fried eggs. In the 1990s, I was in war-ravaged BosniaHerzegovina, not long after the war had ended, in the town of Mostar. I was staying at a Muslim-owned hotel that overlooked the exquisite Neretva, the turquoisecolored river that had, over the centuries, cut a deep gash in the limestone that cradled it. Croats lived on one side of the river, Muslims on the other. And they still weren’t too happy with one another. Each morning, I ordered fried eggs for breakfast at that hotel. Some days they came fried crisp, perhaps too crisp sometimes, and other days, they arrived cooked until their whites had just hardened. Some days the yolks were runny; some days they were cooked through. I have no idea whether the hotel had two cooks, each with his or her own idea about how to fry an egg, or one cook too distracted by other 7 8 T heZe nchilada.com Fa ll 2 010
breakfast preparations to give a damn about how the eggs turned out. I suspect the latter. I had never given a lot of thought to fried eggs before those early-morning Mostar meals. But I began contemplating fried eggs, and I concluded I liked my whites fried golden around the edges, just a little crisp, with a runny yolk lightly bathed in hot olive oil (or bacon grease), cooked just enough so it didn’t look like a bad artist’s painting of the sun at high noon. I know, however, not everybody likes eggs fried that way. Many prefer their egg whites cooked only until firm. For most of my life, I had fried eggs the way that cook did in Mostar—however they turned out. But recently Penelope Casas, in her cookbook La Cocina de Mamá: The Great Home Cooking of Spain, taught me how to fry an egg the way I like it, not a difficult task, I admit. (Other chefs, I have discovered, offer other ways to fry eggs. The Michelin-starred chef Michel Roux, for example, deep-fries eggs in a pan of peanut oil.) That day, at my home in Oaxaca, I fried my perfect egg. I spooned the warm mole onto a plate and folded the hot tortillas into the appropriate shape, two sides meeting. I placed the tortillas atop the mole and moved the egg to the center of the plate, mostly covering the tortillas and mole. Then I sprinkled a little queso fresco over it all. And I sat down to eat a really good meal. For a recipe for Mole Coloradito, CLICK HERE. To order a ready-made Mole Coloradito, CLICK HERE. For more about Pat Reed, see page 163.
Chicken on a wheel in Oaxaca, Mexico. Photograph by RICHARD BRAM For more about Richard Bram, see page 160. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Guess Who’s COMING TO DINNER?
THE CHICKEN OR THE EGG? A PL AY IN ONE ACT
By RONNI LUNDY Illustration by WILLIAM ROETSART Scene: A room. Sparsely furnished. Looks rather like a dentist’s waiting room… No, wait, more like The Restaurant of No Return. A single café table with two chairs sits center front and, as the lights slowly come up, leaving the stage fairly dim, we see a man seated there, stage right. Dressed in black sweater and slacks, he is small with an inordinately large, pale head bedecked with round tortoise-shell glasses and topped with a beret. He smokes a pipe. He is The Philosopher. He scribbles in a notebook, puffs and sighs. We hear a door open and a waiter enters downstage left, followed by a man dressed in a white suit and black ribbon tie, sporting a full head of white hair, moustache and Van Dyke beard. He is The Colonel. The waiter waits as The Colonel pauses to look around and then says, Colonel: So this is it? Waiter: This is it. Colonel: (Musingly) And this is the way it looks. (At this The Philosopher lets out a huge sigh.) Philosopher: Not you again? Colonel: (With a big grin and rubbing his hands together.) Eternally yours, I believe. (The Waiter holds out a small black musical instrument case, which the Colonel takes with relish. The Waiter 80
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exits stage left and the Colonel moves down center to take the other chair.) Philosopher: The argument is over, monsieur. I have written the definitive word. Didn’t you get your script? (He pulls a well-worn folio from a black leather briefcase on the floor and points.) It says it all right here in the title: “No! Egg’s It!” The Colonel grins even more and opens the case on his lap, pulls out a mandolin. Colonel: Musta got the wrong playbook, buddy. I thought we was doing “The Sound of Music.” (He begins to strum and sing.) “You take a chicken and you kill it/And you put him in a skillet. And you fry it 'til it's goldenbrown./That's Southern cooking and it tastes mighty nice." Philosopher: Yes, Merle Travis. All very lyrical, but it proves nothing. And the chicken is nothing! I have laid it all out here for you in my immortal essay (pulls crumpled papers from same briefcase and points) “Beaking and Nothingness.” (Slams pages onto the table, which shakes a little. But the Colonel remains unruffled, which only irritates The Philosopher more.) Philosopher: Must I spell it out for you, mon ami? Colonel: Spell? (He strums again and sings, beginning softly but building so that he delivers the last line resoundingly and with a smack to the table as if that ends the argument.)
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You can boil it, roast it, broil it... Cook it in a pan or a pot...Eat it with potatoes, rice or tomatoes... But chicken's still what you got, boy! C- that’s the way it begins H- is the next letter in I- you're in the middle of the word C- you've already heard K- now you're roundin' the bend E- you're nearin' the end C-H-I-C-K-E-N That is the way you spell CHICKEN! (The Philosopher shakes his head and covers his face with his hands.)
Philosopher: Look, old man, consider where we are. There is no question that here Deviled Eggs are the dish supreme. Colonel: (Quizzically.) But surely you don’t think we’re in …? Philosopher: But, please, I am the one who said it: Hell is other people. And if you don’t think it’s hell to have to listen to you sing! You know, you’re no angel choir.
(But the Colonel has only been warming up, and now he sings with swing.)
(As the words “angel choir” are uttered, a heavenly light emanates from back stage left and a fluttering chorus is heard. A claw-foot bathtub descends from the ceiling with a corpulent, bearded dark-haired man sitting amid bubbles. A sign hanging from the bath’s lip reads “Vox ex Machina.” The man begins to sing in a heavenly voice...)
Colonel: “Chicken, nice fried chicken, Barbecue chicken, won't you send it down the line?”
Fat Man in the Bathtub: “If you’ll be my Dixie Chicken, I’ll be your Tennessee Lamb…”
(The Philosopher raises his head, and cocks it as if the lyrics are somewhat familiar.)
(The Colonel smiles beatifically. But the Philosopher shrugs.)
Colonel: “Say, everyone's talking 'bout chicken Chicken's a popular word…” (he hums the next few bars and The Philosopher begins to snap his fingers in time. Then the Colonel sings authoritatively.)
Philosopher: And how do you make a perfect Angel Food Cake? (He snaps his fingers toward upper stage right and a dramatic crash of thunder, burst of lightning is followed by the appearance of a thin young man in shiny red jacket and black jeans, dancing backward as he enters. The young man spins around, pulls a glitter-encrusted egg beater out of the air and begins to spin the handle with one gloved hand as he sings…)
Philosopher: Your singing is beginning to give me Nausea.
You can boil it, roast it, broil it Cook it in a pan or a pot Eat it with potatoes, rice or tomatoes But chicken's still what you got, boy! (The Colonel delivers that last line with gusto, but The Philosopher is on his feet now, grinning like a cat and waiting for the next stanza. The Colonel begins persuasively…) Colonel: “It was a dish for old Caesar Also King Henry III ...”
The Gloved One: “Just beat it! Beat it!” Colonel: (Leaping to his feet, clutching his hair.) Stop! Stop! (All music stops and the two angelic singers stare as The Colonel desperately grabs The Philosopher by the shoulders.) Where are we? Is this…? (He points up toward the two singers.) Or…?
(But The Philosopher takes the mandolin right out of his hands, points it at him and delivers the coup de grace, crowing triumphantly.)
(He points down and shakes his head. The Philosopher is suddenly shaken as well. He throws his beret to the floor and claps his hand on his shining egghead.)
Philosopher: “But Columbus was hip, he said, "Take this tip, A chicken ain't nothin' but a bird!"
Philosopher: Mon dieu! Sacre bleu fromage! I do not know!
(The Philosopher does a little jive step and The Colonel looks crestfallen.)
Philosopher and Colonel as one: Where? Are? We? (A light like the rising sun begins to grow into brilliance at T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Hell is other people. And if you don’t think it’s hell to have to listen to you sing! You know, you’re no angel choir. the back of the stage and a huge swinging door is revealed. It opens and a magnificent, round, brownskinned woman with a glorious smile steps into the light that now suffuses the entire stage.) Pachamama: Oh, boys, boys, boys—You’re in Pachamama’s Kitchen. And dinner is served. (With this her arms, which have been held behind her back, come forward and begin to unfurl. They extend to the front of the stage. Her right arm is covered in every egg dish imaginable: in aspic, omelet, flan, egg salad, even scotch eggs in sizzling sausage crusts. Her left arm is stacked with chicken dishes: pot pie, fried thigh, cordon bleu, coq au vin and country captain. On her head, a huge chicken soufflé is rising above the edge of its ample ramekin.)
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Pachamama: And here’s the truth, boys: It don’t matter who gets there first as long as all of Pachamama’s children get fed! (With these words an angel band that sounds remarkably like Delaney Bramlett and Duane Allman with special guest Robert Johnson begins to sing…) Band: “Won’t you come on, into my kitchen…” (And everyone eats happily ever after as the curtain falls.) Want to hear more? CLICK HERE
For more about Ronni Lundy, see page 162.
Some people seek balance in unusual ways. Photograph by ANNE RICHMOND BOSTON For more about Anne Richmond Boston, see page 163. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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THE IDEA
of perfecting an omelet hooked me as it had many others.
While I had eaten omelets,
I HAD NEVER COOKED ONE.
I HATE TO ADMIT THIS, but I’m not a good cook. However, when I moved to Oaxaca, Mexico, I decided I needed to teach myself those skills. I knew I could find lessons online or in special cookbooks, but I wanted–probably a tad strangely–to make my learning experience uniquely mine. While I was trying to figure out how I wanted to start–and I admit I pondered this for weeks–I read an article in Best Food Writing 2008, titled “Chasing Perfection,” by Francis Lam. The book describes him as a chef-writer who has “a philosopher’s yearning to find the deeper meaning of every culinary endeavor.” Lam got his first taste of a great French omelet in a cooking class. “It was fantastically tender, almost slippery with creaminess,” he writes. “Not quite scrambled and not quite custard, it hit my mouth and dissolved in a cloud of butter and egg. … “It wasn’t just that it was delicious; … I realized … at that moment I was seeing for the first time something I thought I’d known my whole life. Like how, if you grew up with tomato-shaped rocks from supermarkets, your first explosive bite into a tomato off the vine in August shows you what a tomato really is.” A few years later, Lam returned to omelets. His cooking-class chef had left the area, so he arranged to talk with Daniel Boulud, “perhaps the finest French chef in America,” he says. Boulud brought out a book, a history of French cuisine, to find out what it said about omelets. “In that moment, this Chef, this magnate, looked like an eager young cook again. A cook aiming for the top, because even though we were talking about eggs, we knew what we were really talking about was perfection, about giving the idea of perfection a physical form.” The idea of perfecting an omelet hooked me as it had many others. While I had eaten omelets, I had never cooked one. Lam’s French omelet is simply three eggs, salt, pepper and a little butter, cooked in a black-steel omelet pan that he tends carefully. I, however, live in Oaxaca, and a black-steel omelet 84
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is almost impossible to find. Most frying pans here are made of lightweight aluminum. Some have nonstick coating. Fresh churned butter from the nearby Etla mercado–made by local Zapotec women–comes squeezed into clear plastic bags. I recently bought butter at that mercado that tasted, well, funny. Was it rancid? And it had a dead fly stuck in it. But Mexico’s eggs can be wonderful, tasty things, though they are rarely marked by size. Eggs of all types are tossed into cartons or plastic bags. My salt –rather good–is produced in the high desert of nearby Puebla state. My pepper? I brought Tellicherry peppercorns from the U.S. when I moved here. I made plenty of omelets over the days that followed. Good omelets, but not perfect ones and not always in the required large-cigar shape. Then I read the article in Best Food Writing 2008 that followed Lam’s. This one was about a writer who finagled a day working at the Restaurant le Meurice in Paris, a Michelin-starred eatery. Its chef, Yannick Alléno, reputed to be “the most talented cook” in that city, taught the writer how to make a French omelet. While he, too, used nothing but eggs, salt, pepper and butter, his technique differed greatly. Lam barely mixed his eggs together; Alléno beat air into his eggs, making them like mousse. Lam added a teaspoon of cold, diced butter to his eggs before pouring them into a tablespoon of clarified butter. Alléno tossed a half-tablespoon of butter into the pan, waiting for it to separate before he poured in his eggs. Lam used two forks to stir his eggs while shaking his pan over medium high heat. Alléno got his pan incredibly hot and moved his eggs around with his wrist, expertly shaking the pan, running the back end of a fork across the pan’s bottom. Confused, I decided to move on to scrambled eggs. After all, I thought, an omelet is little more than that. At the time, I was reading My Life in France, written by Julia Child with her late husband’s nephew Alex Prud’homme. And in it, the Cordon Blue’s Chef Max Bugnard calls for a volunteer to make oeufs brouillés,
Story by PAT REED This photograph by LYNNE HARTY Food photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
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to move on to scrambled eggs. After all, an omelet is little more than that.
OEUFS BROUILLÉS
literally “agitated eggs,” as the French call scrambled eggs, and Julia steps forth. “Bugnard watched intently as I whipped some eggs and cream into a froth, got the frying pan very hot, and slipped in a pat of butter, which hissed and browned in the pan,” Child writes. “ ‘Non!’ he said in horror, before I could put the egg mixture into the pan. ‘That is absolutely wrong!’ ” “With a smile, Chef Bugnard cracked two eggs and added a dash of salt and pepper,” Child continues. “ ‘Like this,’ he said gently, blending the yolk and whites together with a fork. ‘Not too much.’ “He smeared the bottom and sides of a frying pan with butter, then gently poured the eggs in. Keeping the heat low, he stared intently at the pan. Nothing happened. After a long three minutes, the eggs began to thicken into a custard. Stirring rapidly with the fork, sliding the pan on and off the burner, Bugnard gently pulled the egg curds together. ‘Keep them a little bit loose; this is very important,’ he instructed. ‘Now the cream or butter,’ he said, looking at me with raised eyebrows. ‘This will stop the cooking, you see?’ I nodded, and he turned the scrambled eggs out onto a plate, sprinkled a bit of parsley around, and said, “Voilà!’ ” I immediately went to the kitchen and scrambled eggs as Bugnard had instructed. They were delicious. Scrambled eggs became my temporary passion. Because I write about food, particularly the food of the world, I have a large cookbook collection, five or six tall bookcases full, and the vast majority of those books made the move to Mexico with me. One of the first books I opened was Rick Bayless’ Authentic Mexico: Regional Cooking from the Heart 86
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of Mexico. I learned a lot more about how to scramble eggs. “The more you beat (eggs for scrambling) the less texture they’ll have and the drier they’ll seem,” he writes. “I beat them only enough to combine the yolks and whites. Also, adding a little liquid (water, milk, cream, sour cream, yogurt, what have you) will make them lighter.” And, he adds, “medium heat is a detriment to eggs, making them lifeless and rubbery. Scrambling should be done over medium-low heat for small curds or in a hot pan over medium-high heat, gently and slowly stirring, for large tender-but-firm curds.” Mexicans, I learned, scramble their eggs the latter way. I tried scrambling my eggs Bayless’ Mexican method, no liquid, high heat. I watched, fascinated, as the eggs in the pan almost immediately began to form big curds. Then I found another way to scramble my eggs French style. In his Parisian Home Cooking: Conversations, Recipes, and Tips from the Cooks and Food Merchants of Paris, Michael Roberts gives a recipe for eggs scrambled in a saucepan. I had never imagined scrambling eggs in that cooking utensil, but I immediately cooked those eggs. If done right, they cook slowly, taking at least nine minutes as you pull the pan on and off the fire. I e-mailed a friend about Roberts’ eggs. “Are you scrambling eggs or making custard?” she responded. Definitely scrambled eggs, but “in an almost saucelike base,” the best I had ever eaten. I finally returned to researching the French omelet. I learned about the still-famous omelets made by Annette Poulard in the late 19th century on Mont-St-Michel,
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OMELETTE MOLIÈRE stirred them. Some didn’t stir at all; they lifted the cooked curds with a spatula to let the uncooked eggs flow onto the pan. And finally, folks differed on when to remove the eggs from the pan. Some liked them moist; others preferred them drier. Making an omelet was, I discovered, like baking a chocolate cake. You can find hundreds of recipes for chocolate cake. So, too, it seems, with omelets.
a rocky tidal island about a half-mile off Normandy’s coast. In a copper bowl, she vigorously beat the eggs for her Omelette de la Mère, continuously shaking them while they cooked in a long-handled pan in her fireplace. The mousse-like texture of those beaten eggs and the constant shaking of the pan made me wonder: Were they the inspiration for Yannick Alléno?
As I tried to perfect the French omelet, my undertakings were getting tastier with every effort. And they were now rolling out of the pan into the right shape. But I realized one day that I didn’t know what I was aiming for: I had never tasted a “perfect” French omelet. All I could do was guess. Near the end of his story, Francis Lam writes: “The more you learn about something, the more you find out there’s more to learn.” Yes indeed.
Next, I tried the Omelette Molière that Elizabeth David, the revered 20th-century food writer, describes in her book, An Omelette and a Glass of Wine. Served at a small restaurant in Provence’s Avignon, it calls for adding finely grated Parmesan cheese, diced Gruyère and some cream to the eggs. “Were there any justice in the world,” David writes, “(this omelet) would be as celebrated as that of Madame Poulard.”
For recipes for Omelette Molière, Francis Lam’s omelet, Michael Roberts’ Scrambled Eggs the French Way and Flat Omelette with Herbs, see page 124. For more about Pat Reed, see page 163.
As I read about omelets, I learned chefs differed in how they made them. Some recommend a black steel pan for cooking those eggs. Others prefer an old-fashioned cast-iron pan. Julia Child worked with a kitchenware store in Boston to develop a heavy aluminum omelet pan. Others use a non-stick pan. Some beat their omelet eggs just enough to barely swirl the yolks through the white; some beat their eggs gently, mixing the whites with the yolks; and some beat their eggs into a froth. Some add butter, water, milk, cream or chicken stock to their beaten eggs. A few add flour. Yes, flour. It is supposed to make the omelet fluffier; when I tried it, it made my omelet slightly pasty. Some cooked their omelets over a medium-high flame; most, however, preferred a really high heat. Some gently stirred their omelet eggs; some vigorously
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THE OMELET: ON A PATH FROM PERSIA grew up in Egypt, writes: “An eggah is firm and sound, rather like an egg cake. It is usually 2 cm (1 inch) or more thick, and generally bursting with a filling of vegetables, or meat, or chicken and noodles, suspended like currents in a cake. The egg is used as a binding for the filling, rather than the filling being an adornment for the egg.”
Story by PAT REED Photograph of Persian Easter Eggs by ELIAN EGGS–“the astonishing and unintentional gift from birds to human beings,” as Alan Davidson calls them in The Penguin Companion to Food–have been around for a long, long time. And somebody eventually figured out how to turn them into omelets, quite probably without an old, carefully seasoned black steel omelet pan in which to cook them. According to Wikipedia, the omelet likely originated in the Ancient Near East, the region considered the cradle of civilization. That is, more or less, the area we know today as the Middle East. “Beaten eggs were mixed with chopped herbs, fried until firm, then sliced into wedges,” Wikipedia says. Davidson, who was one of the pre-eminent authorities on the world’s food until his death in 2003, agreed. “Indeed,” he writes, “since so many dishes are now being found to have their origin in ancient Persia … or in early Arab cuisine, it is tempting to suppose that something like an omelette may have originally arrived from that region. If so, the Persian kookoo (or kuku) could be the best representation in the modern world of the original.” If omelets are known as kukus in Iran, in Egypt, they are called eggah and in the rest of the Middle East, they go by ajja. In her 1985 cookbook, A New Book of Middle Eastern Food, published in London, Claudia Roden, who 88
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I am no food historian, but I suspect the Persians might have been the first to make an omelet. After the Arabs adopted the Muslim faith, various sources say, they swept across the Middle East, converting most nonbelievers to their new religion. When the Arabs arrived in what was then Persia, they supposedly were quite taken with the often-opulent food of that region, and added Persian dishes to their own cuisine. The omelet probably made its way to Western Europe from the Middle East and North Africa. Each country it reached adapted the original recipe to produce its own version: the tortilla in Spain, a country whose cuisine was seriously influenced by its Moorish invaders; the Italian frittata in Italy, where the invaders reached Sicily and some southern areas on the mainland; and the French omelet. “The light fluffy French omelette, with it runny interior and its non-existent or relatively scant filling, would be a diversion from the mainstream,” Davidson writes, “a diversion which of course gained wide currency in countries where French cuisine has enjoyed a period of ascendancy.” A 17th-century cookbook, Le Pastissier François, translated that same century by Robert May, a chef who cooked for the British aristocracy, shows the omelet’s “evolution from a Middle Eastern past to French classical future,” Davidson reports. “It includes some omelettes to be fried well on both sides (the ancestral ones?) besides one which sounds perfectly suitable for a 20th century French cook.” Davidson says omelets likely existed “in recognizable form” in France, as well as in other places, from the early Middle Ages on, “since the concept of frying beaten eggs in butter in a pan is as simple as it is brilliant.”
PYSANKY
IS THE ANCIENT UKRAINIAN TRADITION of decorating eggs with special colors and symbols, a process similar to batiking. It took Santa Fe artist CHARLES E. VEILLEUX III about 20 hours to complete this goose egg honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe. For more about Charles Veilleux, see page 164. Photograph by JANE PHILLIPS, For more about Jane Phillips, see page 163. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Story by KIM MOSS Photographs by NANCY WILLARD
I GREW UP WITH CHICKENS. Childhood chores included cleaning the hen house roosts with a hoe in ammonia-laden air and collecting eggs from under setting hens. I did this by slowly sliding my hand under smooth warm feathers so not to disturb the bird’s trance— and also to not get pecked. We had a collection of old hand-blown glass eggs to replace the real ones, and hence not slow the wheels of progress. Most of these chickens were classic strains, such as Rhode Island Red and Barred Rock. Some years later, these plump and plodding hens were replaced with game chickens. Game chickens, as the name implies, are used for fighting. They are sleek, beautiful, aggressive, clever and can fly quite long distances. My mother liked those qualities, and liked to see them free and roaming the thickets and lawn for the bugs and worms that made the yolks a deep orange. Since they were a bit smaller than regular hens’ eggs, we'd eat three to make up the difference. Game chickens were good at avoiding hawks and other predators and roosted in trees at night. There was one tall pine they liked for awhile, just outside my window—so when anyone says, "The chickens have come home to roost,” I have a vibrant mental image of the metaphor. As dusk falls I can still see them, one by one, hopping to higher branches in the tree, clucking softly as they go. There were drawbacks to these independent creatures. They were clever when it came to nesting. Like all wild birds, they chose their camouflaged sites well and didn't go directly to them, sneaking instead through long grass and bushes in a roundabout way to throw you off. Collecting eggs, then, was always a treasure hunt. Chicks would appear when some of the nest remained unfound. Game chickens become very aggressive when they have a clutch of chicks. If a person or dog, say, happened to be close by and a chick made a distressed peeping sound for whatever reason, the mother would attack the perceived danger by flying at the subject and hitting with wings and beak, feet churning as if to spur with surprising force—just like a rooster does in a fight. It's a very effective defense. I tell you my history with chickens so you’ll know I’m not just some city slicker smitten with the novelty of the barnyard when I introduce you to Last Chicken, or LC. Two years ago I visited old friends in Maine, Al and Nancy Willard. They live in a particularly beautiful, rural farming area, in a long sloping valley that looks away to distant lakes. They call their acres "Imagination Farm" because, as Al likes to say, "It's all in your imagination.” In fact, theirs is an old working farm dating back to the early 19th century, set in the rolling hills with a long farmhouse, a cavernous barn 90
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LC—T HE L AST C HICKEN
and an automotive shop. Al hays neighboring farms and Nancy works in town. Their once-large menagerie of farm animals has shrunk now to a couple of horses, a rescue donkey named Edison, Otie the dog, a parrot —and LC, the Last Chicken. LC comes from a long line of Bantams, a small variety of chicken. She not only seems to have an uncanny aptitude for survival in a land teeming with hungry tooth and talon, she also has character. Her mother, father, the rest of her brood—in fact, all the other chickens that once strutted Imagination Farm—met untimely ends. When LC was quite young, Al came out of the house to find a red-tail hawk flapping, half under the porch, talons sunk in LC and struggling to pull her out from under the steps. Al figured she must have braced herself on something to survive the tug-of-war. When the hawk saw Al, it let go and flew off. Al didn’t say if LC said thanks. I had come to Maine to paint. One day I set up my easel inside the entrance to the barn where swallows dipped and sailed up to nests high in the rafters, their beaks full of flies caught on the wing, heading toward hungry young mouths. It was shaded there and I could work undisturbed. The shade and the solitude might have appealed to LC, too. One day she came nearby, pecking at specks on the old boards and talking gently to herself in the seemingly absentminded way chickens do—a soft drawn-out cackle. I thought it was just a coincidence she was nearby at first, but then it became apparent she was lonely and liked the company. She'd fly down from her roost on the hay bales as I set up for the day and wander about, sometimes even perching on my easel. We were good companions; painting is a solitary business, and lonely at times too. When I came back to New Mexico, Al wrote to share news of LC's most recent exploit. For hay delivery, Al hooks up his flatbed trailer, loaded high with bales, the night before and drives them to the destination, usually miles away, the next day. After one particular run, Al received a phone call. Was he missing a chicken? Apparently LC had roosted on the hay the night before, and then gone for the unexpected morning ride. I like to imagine she planned the whole thing. In my mind I can see her riding high on the bales, head to the wind and feathers flying, holding tight like some Norse Valkyrie riding into battle.
For more about Kim Moss, see page 162. 92
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NAVAJO CHICKENS NAVAJO FOLK ARTISTS started recreating the world around them with unfired mud sculptures of families in horse-drawn wagons, surrounded by sheep. When they began carving in cottonwood and pine, they kept the horses and sheep, and added cowboys, chickens and other barnyard animals. The artists realized that chickens are universal, and they are now the number one Navajo folk art carving says Cheryl Ingram, co-owner of Silver Sun gallery on Santa Fe’s Canyon Road. “We’ve been seeing them for the more than 30 years we’ve been in business.” The brightly painted carvings are whimsical and personal, reflecting the way the artists see the world, people, animals and spirits around them. These cottonwood chickens with pine dowel legs, by Navajo folk artists Guy and Edith John of Sweetwater, Arizona, are available at the Silver Sun. (www.SilverSun-sf.com)
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TEN THINGS
YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT SOUTHERN FRIED CHICKEN Story by RONNI LUNDY Photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN & AMY EVANS STREETER
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SOUTHERNERS DON’T OWN THE PATENT ON FRIED CHICKEN.
“I have discovered that wherever in the world there are chickens and fat, cooks are, and probably always have been, frying the bird in one form or another,” writes Damon Lee Fowler in the single finest book on chicken frying techniques and recipes you may ever own, Fried Chicken: The World’s Best Recipes from Memphis to Milan, from Buffalo to Bangkok. And in Fried Chicken: An American Story, the single finest book on the who, what, where, when and why of frying chicken in the U.S., John T. Edge says, “Eating my way across the girth of our nation, I found much evidence to support the notion that, though the South has a long and distinguished history of fried chicken cookery, we have no lock on excellence.” That said, it is likely no coincidence that both of these men dedicated to searching out and recording the
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ultimate words on the mystique of fried chicken are themselves certified Southerners. North Georgia born, South Carolina reared and now Savannah-based chef/writer Fowler titled the chapter devoted to this regional icon “The Developed Art,” and notes that in the South it is “almost a state religion.” Edge is a native of Clinton, Georgia, who, as director of the Southern Foodways Alliance, now lives in Oxford, Mississippi. “I own three cast-iron skillets. Each, by way of repeated use, is burnished black as Satan’s bung,” he writes. “I’ve yet to eat my fill of chicken fried in the Southern manner; I can hold forth with the best of my kinsmen as to proper preparation and consumption.” So while Southerners may not be the only folks who know how to wield a skillet, when it comes to fried chicken, we do know whereof we beak.
THE BIRD IS THE WORD.
Southern fried chicken is a simple dish with no sauces (or secret spices) to vamp it up. Even the classic cream gravy that accompanies it is used to douse mashed potatoes and biscuits, but not the main event. Therefore the texture and flavor of the chicken itself is paramount. A “fryer” was originally a young chicken weighing less than 2 pounds. Small birds produced small pieces and small pieces cook quickly and evenly, all the better for frying. (And all the better for saying, “Believe I’ll have another piece of that chicken,” without raising eyebrows.) The meat of young, smaller birds is tender as well, with older, more muscular birds needing a slow simmer or baking to tenderize. Today commercial birds
are bred with an emphasis on size and it’s difficult to find a supermarket chicken—even a young one—that weighs less than 3 pounds. Nevertheless, buy the smallest bird you can. And if you can buy your chicken at a farm market, or from a small, local poultry operation, you up the chances of finding a real fryer-sized chicken with better texture and distinctive flavor. While blind taste tests pitting supermarket birds labeled “organic,” “free range,” and “natural” vs. conventional factory-farmed chickens have had mixed results, consumers and chefs fortunate enough to be able to buy their chickens from local sources cite better flavor and texture as primary attractions. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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T EN T HINGS Y OU S HOULD K NOW A BOUT S OUTHERN F RIED C HICKEN
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CHICKENS DON’T HAVE FINGERS, BUT THEY DO HAVE PULLEY-BONES.
And a platter full of genuine Southern fried chicken should have at least one pulley-bone (also called a wishbone) per bird. Commercial chicken producers don’t recognize this delicate little flange at the top center of the breast, and so you won’t find a pulley bone in a cut-up, plasticwrapped package of chicken at the grocery. That’s no excuse. If you have to learn how to cut up your own chicken to make sure you get one, then you have to learn how to cut up your own chicken. (See “A Whole Is Better Than Just Some of Its Parts” page 98.) Pulley-bones are traditionally given to the youngest child at the table. After the meat is consumed, the bone is licked and wiped “clean” and the wish ritual performed. The child grasps one side of the pulley-bone’s legs and an adult the other. Both close their eyes and pull and whoever gets the longer piece when the bone breaks gets to make a silent wish, guaranteed to come true. If the adult makes sure to put her thumb up against the joint of the bone, then she can
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When you cut your own chicken you will also discover that you end up with “the back.” Sometimes you get the back in a package of already-cut chicken, sometimes you don’t. Some folks add the back to neck, gizzard, liver and heart in a pot of water to make broth. Most of those folks are not Southern. Southern cooks bread and fry the back and put it on the platter, where it is generally taken by the cook or the oldest woman in the house. “Believe this back will do me,” she says with just the hint of a sigh. This makes it sound as if she is making a sacrifice since there is very little meat on the back. But that meat is particularly sweet and it must be sought out in the crannies it occupies and consumed delicately, almost meditatively. And it comes with a bounty of seasoned crust, making the back a secret treat. Don’t tell your mother that I told you that.
“BY MY RECKONING, FRIED CHICKEN MUST HAVE A BONE.”
Edge again there. And true Southern fried chicken must also have skin, an elemental part of the multiple texture and taste sensation that is its very essence. That said, one of the best Southern fried chicken recipes ever came from
Grace Rainwater and called for skinless chicken. Grace was country singer Brenda Lee’s mother, and Brenda could not abide chicken skin. Grace soaked the chicken in buttermilk, which was its saving … well, grace.
THERE’S THEM WHO SOAK AND THEM WHO DON’T. Them who do let the chicken sit, refrigerated, in buttermilk, sweet milk or salt water for an hour or more before breading and frying. Them who don’t, don’t. The rationale
for soaking is that it makes the meat more tender. The rationale for not is that it doesn’t. Like the question of the chicken or the egg, no decision has ever been conclusively reached.
DEEP-FRIED BATTERED CHICKEN CAN BE GOOD.
It’s also not inherently greasier. The higher temperature of the fat caramelizes the outer surface of whatever is being fried and the process is quicker than skillet frying, so less grease is absorbed. But deep-fried chicken is most often found in restaurants while Southern home cooks have perfected the art of skillet frying. Skillet frying gives the distinctive 96
usually manipulate the break in the child’s favor. If that doesn’t work, the adult must quickly say, “No, wait, I‘m pretty sure it’s the short end that gets the wish this time. Yep, it’s the short end.”
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Southern crust, which is crisp on the surface with a delicate yummy underlayer and incredibly moist and tender chicken inside. That balance of textures is produced by first browning the chicken at a higher temp, then turning the heat down, covering and braising the chicken, followed by a quick crisp on higher heat at the end.
WHEREVER IN THE WORLD THERE ARE CHICKENS AND FAT, CO OKS ARE FRYING THE BIRD Photograph by LYNNE HARTY
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SO MUCH DEPENDS UPON A RED LARD BUCKET.
Or whatever color bucket or wrap, the freshest, purest lard you can find may come in. Lard can do that dance between the levels of heat better than any other fat and in the process imparts a distinct aroma and flavor. Fresh lard is essential, though, so know where and when your supply comes from. If you can’t find fresh lard, or if you don’t eat pork, you can make do with a vegetable oil. Canola is workable
and peanut oil can reach the highs and lows as well as lard, although it will impart a slight flavor of its own— not unpleasant. Olive oil is great for sautéing chicken, but its price makes it prohibitive to use in the quantity needed for Southern frying. Frugal cooks may consider straining and saving the grease to fry another day. Fat may be used more than once, but each time it’s used its smoking point is lowered, so don’t push it. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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CREAM GRAVY DOESN’T HAVE CREAM IN IT.
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FUNERAL CHICKEN DOESN’T TASTE THE SAME AS REUNION CHICKEN.
It tastes like it does, though, when it’s made right. Cream gravy is actually made with milk. It’s added slowly to a roux made of a small amount of flour added to a bit of pan drippings and all the little crumbs of crust that remain in the pan, plus salt and pepper. Cream gravy is passed separately at the table and poured over hot biscuits or mashed potatoes, even over “chicken extenders,” but not over the chicken.
Atlanta chef, teacher and food writer Tim Patridge has observed that while the ingredients stay the same, chicken for the family reunion is fried quickly and efficiently, probably at a higher overall temperature, the cook in a hurry to get to the park and party. That gives it a darker, crisper crust. When frying chicken for a funeral gathering, though, the cook is apt to take her time, to
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And what are “chicken extenders?” Some frugal cooks pinched small bits of biscuit dough from the bowl and tossed them in the hot grease just after the chicken was done. There they puffed and fried, taking on the patina and flavor of the chicken. These little doughboys were called “chicken extenders” and could also be made with cold cornmeal mush cut into slabs or cubes.
stand at the stove and turn the pieces, meditatively, over lower heat, extending the process of braising. That makes for tenderness in both crust and meat. And if, as so many of us do, you subscribe to the notion that thoughts also flavor the food as it’s cooking, then Reunion Chicken tastes of anticipation, Funeral of recollection.
COL. HARLAND SANDERS WAS BORN IN INDIANA, NOT KENTUCKY.
THE WHOLE IS NOT THE SAME AS SOME OF ITS PARTS MOST WHOLE CHICKENS in the U.S. are sold trimmed, with feet and head removed, neck severed and tucked inside in a packet that also contains the chicken’s liver, gizzard and heart. These innards can be used to make broth, although many cooks liked to bread and fry up the liver and gizzard quickly at the start of the process to be consumed as a treat while cooking. In Fried Chicken, Damon Lee Fowler writes: “Cutting up a chicken is very easy, joints in the muscle and fat leave natural guidelines that show you exactly where to cut. Once you get the hang of it, you’ll be able to cut up a whole bird in about two minutes.” To help you get the hang of it, here are Fowler’s instructions for disjointing and cutting up a trimmed bird for frying Southern style, and plenty of other uses. 98
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T HE W HOLE I S N O T T HE S AME A S T HE S UM O F I TS
“LAY THE CHICKEN FLAT ON ITS BACK on the work surface and bend back a leg. Under the skin, you will see a line where the thigh muscles join the hip. Cut through this line, bend back, cut through the hip joint, and remove the entire leg. Lay it flat, outer side down. You’ll see another line between the muscles of the thigh and drumstick, marking the joint. Cut through it with a cleaver or heavy chef’s knife. Set the thighs and drumsticks aside. The wings have a smaller ball joint at the shoulder. Cut through it and set the wings aside with the leg pieces. The rib cage of the bird has joints up both sides where the back and breast rib bones meet. Cut though these joints and bend back the breast until the joints at the shoulder are exposed. Separate them with a cleaver or chef’s knife.
zen
PARTS
“TURN THE BREAST SKIN SIDE UP on the work surface. At the collarbone is a little Y-shaped bone that we call the wishbone … Reach under the collarbone and feel for the joint of the bones. Cut straight down and then cut the meat away from the collarbone. Turn the breast over and, using a cleaver or heavy chef’s knife, chop through the center breast or keel bone and its long, pointed cartilage. Now take the cleaver or knife and cut each breast half in half crosswise. If you are using a very small bird, you may elect to leave the breast halves in one piece.” For recipes for Honest Fried Chicken, Cream Gravy, Grace Rainwater’s Buttermilk Chicken, Thai Fried Chicken, Bajan Fried Chicken and Cuban Fried Chicken, Creole Style, see pages 100 to 109.
THE
For more about Ronni Lundy, see page 162.
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Chicken cooked the way my mother taught me— and the way her mother had been taught by her mother before her—is slow-fried in shallow fat in a tightly covered heavy skillet so the juices stay in the meat. The crust is crisp to the bite, but in the mouth becomes meltingly tender. Achieving such a crust takes approximately 30 to 35 minutes of frying. The other secret to perfect chicken is the final “crisping.” This is accomplished by taking the lid off the skillet and letting the pieces cook in the open for a few minutes after the chicken is done.
WASH CHICKEN PIECES and trim visible clumps of fat. Put flour, salt and pepper in a clean plastic or paper bag and shake to mix. Put skillet on a high flame and add lard (or canola oil if you prefer) 1⁄2-inch deep. As the oil heats, shake each piece of chicken— one or two pieces at a time—in the bag of flour until coated. Place the chicken in the hot oil, with the skin side down. (If you are frying mixed pieces of chicken instead of all breasts or thighs, put the largest pieces in the pan first.) You can nest the pieces fairly close together. When the skillet is full, turn heat down to medium and let chicken fry until it's just golden and crispy, then turn and let the second side get just golden. Reduce heat to low, cover, and cook 25 minutes. (Check occasionally to make sure the heat is not too high and the chicken isn’t browning too fast or burning.) Remove lid and turn pieces over once more. Turn heat up a bit—but not too high— and cook a few minutes longer until crust is crisped all around. (If crust on the sides of the breasts is still soft and mushy, turn those pieces on their side in the fat for a minute or two.) Remove chicken from pan and drain on paper towels, then put on warm serving plate while you make Cream Gravy.
Cream Gravy
(MAKES ABOUT 1 CUP)
FRIED CHICKEN DRIPPINGS make a rich, golden-flavored cream gravy. But chicken drippings aren't the only base you can use to make delicious cream gravy for bread or biscuits. Green tomatoes fried in cornmeal leave dregs that make a tangy sauce, and sausage gravy is a breakfast delicacy prized in country kitchens. And my mother’s cream gravy made with bacon grease was delicious in its own right and the foundation of her extraordinarily good chipped beef and gravy. 100
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SERVES 4 2
POUNDS CUT-UP CHICKEN
1⁄2
CUP FLOUR
1⁄2
TEASPOON SALT
1⁄4
TEASPOON PEPPER, freshly ground MELTED LARD, 1⁄2 -INCH DEEP IN PAN
Recipes adapted from Shuck Beans, Stack Cakes and Honest Fried Chicken, Ronni Lundy, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1991 Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
YOU MAKE CREAM GRAVY right in the pan in which the meat or tomatoes were fried. Drain off all but about two tablespoons of fat, but leave all the little pieces of crust and crumbs in the pan to give the gravy flavoring. Use a metal spatula to gently scrape them from the bottom and sides of the pan so they don't burn. Sprinkle a tablespoon of flour over the drippings and cook over low heat until browned, stirring constantly to keep flour from lumping. It takes a minute or two.
RO N N I L U N DY
HONEST
Fried Chicken
SLOWLY STIR 1 CUP OF MILK INTO BROWNED FLOUR.
Although it's called "cream" gravy in the country, I never knew anyone to make this gravy from real cream. And I've found that 2-percent milk works just fine and is supremely tasty. Stir gravy constantly. Using a small wire whisk will minimize the chance the mixture will lump. (If it does despite your best efforts, remove pan from heat and whip it with the whisk briefly until smooth.) When the milk and flour are smooth, turn the heat to high and bring to a boil, still stirring constantly. It will take a minute or two for the gravy to come to the desired thickness. Taste and add salt or pepper, then serve.
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Most Southerners wouldn't be caught dead skinning a chicken before frying it. In fact, most will tell you that it's the skin that keeps the meat moist in the frying process. But Georgia-born-and-fed country singer Brenda Lee begs to differ. "I don't like skin on my fried chicken. Don't like it at all," she told me emphatically. And when I made a skilletful of chicken the way her mother, Grace Rainwater, does it— coating the chicken in thick buttermilk first—I understood. The result is exquisite: tender, juicy chicken in a crunchy, tangy crust.
SERVES 6 6
CHICKEN BREASTS, bone in
1⁄2
CUP BUTTERMILK
1 1⁄2 CUPS FLOUR 1 ⁄2
TEASPOON WHITE PEPPER
1
TEASPOON SALT MELTED LARD, 1 ⁄2 -INCH DEEP IN SKILLET
GRACE RAINWATER’S
Buttermilk Chicken THIS CHICKEN IS FRIED EXACTLY like Honest Fried Chicken, but its preparation is slightly different. Wash chicken breasts and remove skin and all visible fat, leaving the bone. Pat dry with paper towel. Pour buttermilk in a shallow bowl. In a second shallow bowl, mix flour, pepper and salt.
BEFORE COATING
chicken, put the skillet on high heat and add lard (or canola oil if you prefer) 1⁄2 inch deep.
DIP EACH BREAST in the buttermilk, making sure it is completely coated. Dip in the bowl of flour, turning to thoroughly coat both sides. Shake each piece ever so slightly to remove any loose flour, then place it in the hot fat, fleshy side down. You can nest the pieces fairly close together.
WHEN THE SKILLET IS FULL,
turn heat down to medium and let chicken fry, uncovered, until it's just golden and crispy, then turn and let the second side get just golden. Be very careful when turning not to break the buttermilk crust.
REDUCE HEAT TO LOW,
cover and cook 25 minutes. (Check occasionally to make sure the heat is not too high and the chicken isn’t browning too fast or burning.) Remove lid and turn pieces over once more. Turn heat up a bit—but not too high— and cook a few minutes longer until the crust is crisp. (If crust on the sides of the breasts is still soft and mushy, turn those pieces on their sides in the fat for a minute or two.) Recipe adapted from Shuck Beans, Stack Cakes and Honest Fried Chicken, Ronni Lundy, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1991 Photograph by Ryannan Bryer de HIckman 102
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Damon Lee Fowler
adds an utterly decadent twist to cream gravy in this recipe from old family friend and pastor Reverend William H. Ralston. Being from Kentucky myself, I agree with his suggestion that you not use the small batch or single barrel super premium bourbon here, but don’t get the cheapest stuff either. Someone has to finish off the rest of that bottle. WASH THE CHICKEN AND PAT DRY.
Spread on a platter or large plate and lightly dust with salt and flour. Wipe the fresh mushrooms with a dry cloth and cut into thick slices. If they are especially large, cut them into bite-sized pieces. Set aside.
Chicken Kentuckian (MAKES 2 2
1⁄2
-3 DOZEN PIECES)
SMALL FRYING CHICKENS, no more than 2 1⁄2 to 3 pounds each and cut up for frying SALT to taste
1⁄2
CUP ALL-PURPOSE FLOUR
8-10 LARGE WILD MUSHROOMS, sliced thick (or 1⁄2 pound crimini and 1
⁄2 ounce dried boletus reconstituted
by soaking in boiling water for 30 minutes) 4
In a large, heavy skillet or sauté pan, heat the butter and olive oil over medium-low heat. Add the chicken pieces and scallion and sauté, turning the chicken frequently, until golden and tender, about half an hour. While the chicken cooks, baste it with spoonfuls of bourbon every few minutes, being careful to add it in small amounts so there is never any liquid accumulated in the pan. When the chicken pieces are cooked through and golden and all the bourbon has been added, transfer the meat from the skillet to a warm platter. If you are using only fresh mushrooms, turn up the heat and add them to the skillet. Sauté, tossing and stirring them constantly, for about 3 minutes. If you are using reconstituted dried mushrooms, lift them out of their soaking water, dipping them to loosen any sand that is clinging to them, squeeze dry and put them in the pan. Filter the soaking water through a paper towel or coffee filter and pour it into the pan. Bring it to a boil, stirring frequently, until all the liquid evaporates. Add the cream and scrape loose any residue that may be stuck to the skillet. Simmer until it is just heated through and starting to thicken. Taste and correct the seasonings, then pour it over the chicken. Serve at once.
TABLESPOONS UNSALTED BUTTER
1 1⁄2 TABLESPOONS EXTRA-VIRGIN OLIVE OIL 2
TEASPOONS CHOPPED SCALLIONS, white and tender green parts only
1⁄2
CUP BOURBON
1
CUP HEAVY CREAM
Recipe from Fried Chicken by Damon Lee Fowler, Random House, 1999 Photograph by Ryannan Bryer de HIckman T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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FRYING CHICKENS
’ROUND WORLD THE
THAI Fried Chicken 104
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Once you’ve got the knack of skillet-fried chicken,
you can begin to play all sorts of variations on the theme with rubs and marinades. Cajun, Creole and soul-food cooks frequently soak the chicken in aromatic hot sauces, or add a plentitude of cayenne pepper to season the flour. My daughter, Meghan Lundy-Jones, likes to spike the family heirloom using a Thai marinade from Nancie McDermott’s Quick and Easy Thai: 70 Everyday Recipes, then serves it with her dipping sauce on the side. McDermott’s recipe, Grilled Garlic Chicken, Issahn Style (Gai Yahng), calls for grilling the chicken after soaking, but Meghan simply follows the directions for dredging and frying Honest Fried Chicken. This makes enough to enhance a 3-pound chicken, cut into pieces.
Cilantro Pesto
TO MAKE PESTO,
blend all the ingredients in a small food processor to make a paste. Rub the paste on the chicken pieces and refrigerate for an hour or so.
SERVES 4 3
TABLESPOONS CILANTRO,
coarsely chopped 3
TABLESPOONS GARLIC,
coarsely chopped 1
TEASPOON BLACK PEPPER,
freshly ground 2
TABLESPOONS SOY SAUCE
1
TABLESPOON FISH SAUCE
1
TEASPOON SALT
3
TABLESPOONS WATER, or more
as needed to grind the paste
TO MAKE DIPPING SAUCE, combine
sugar, water, vinegar, garlic and salt in a small, non-reactive saucepan. Bring to a rolling boil over medium heat. (Beware of the fumes! It will taste much, much better than it smells at this stage — vinegar fumes will make your nose itch and eyes water!) Stir to dissolve sugar and reduce heat to low. Simmer until slightly reduced and thickened to a light syrup consistency, about 20 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in chile-garlic sauce. Cool to room temperature; if not using right away, transfer to a jar and seal tightly (can be stored at room temp for 2-3 days).
DREDGE CHICKEN in flour and fry according to directions for Honest Fried Chicken. Serve with sauce on the side.
Sweet-Hot Garlic DIPPING SAUCE 1
CUP SUGAR
1⁄ 2 1⁄ 2
CUP WATER
2
TABLESPOONS GARLIC,
CUP DISTILLED WHITE VINEGAR
finely minced 1
TEASPOON SALT, if desired
1
TABLESPOON CHILI-GARLIC SAUCE (available in the Asian
section of your grocery) Recipe from Quick and Easy Thai: 70 Everyday Recipes by Nancie McDermott, Chronicle Books, 2004 Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de HIckman
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This recipe for chicken Barbados-style from Damon Lee Fowler’s book Fried Chicken, is distinguished by an aromatic herb mixture tucked under the skin and into the meat itself. This seasoning recipe makes enough for a 3-pound or smaller chicken cut in pieces. Damon also uses cornmeal for part of the dredge mixture, a nice touch.
Seasoning MAKES ABOUT 1 CUP 2
LARGE OR 3 SMALL GARLIC CLOVES, minced
2
TABLESPOONS YELLOW ONIONS,
minced 2
TABLESPOONS SCALLIONS OR OTHER GREEN ONION,
minced, both white and green parts 2
TABLESPOONS FRESH THYME,
minced 2
TABLESPOONS FRESH CHIVES,
MIX garlic, onion, scallion and herbs in a glass container and sprinkle a generous pinch of salt over the top. Cover and set aside for 30 minutes (refrigerate for longer storage if you make the seasoning a day or two ahead). WASH THE CHICKEN PIECES and pat dry. Partially loosen the skin, but don’t remove it. With a sharply pointed paring or fillet knife, cut several deep gashes in each piece of chicken. Pack the seasoning mix into the gashes and rub a little under the loosened skin. COMBINE FLOUR, cornmeal, a healthy pinch or so of salt and cayenne, and several liberal grindings of black pepper in a paper or large resealable plastic bag. Close the top and shake until the dredge is evenly distributed.
minced 2
TABLESPOONS PARSLEY, minced
(preferably flat-leaf parsley) SALT to taste
Dredge MAKES ABOUT 2 CUPS 1 1⁄2 CUPS ALL-PURPOSE FLOUR 1⁄2
CUP FINE STONE-GROUND CORNMEAL SALT, to taste GROUND CAYENNE PEPPER,
to taste FRESHLY MILLED BLACK PEPPER,
to taste
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Fry according to directions for Honest Fried Chicken. Recipe adapted from Fried Chicken by Damon Lee Fowler, Random House, 1999 Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de HIckman
FRYING CHICKENS
’ROUND WORLD THE
BAJAN Fried Chicken T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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FRYING CHICKENS
’ROUND WORLD THE
CUBAN Fried Chicken CREOLE STYLE 108
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One more delicious riff from Mr. Fowler:
This recipe not only uses the marinade for soaking, but doubles the impact by using it to steam after a brief, initial frying. Tender and tangy! (Seville oranges can sometimes be found, but you can mimic their tart, slightly bitter taste by combining the juice of regular oranges with that of limes.)
1
CHICKEN, weighing no more than
3 pounds, cut up for frying 2
TEASPOONS SALT
3
LARGE GARLIC CLOVES,
lightly crushed FRESHLY MILLED BLACK PEPPER 1
SEVILLE (BITTER) ORANGE (or 1
regular juice orange and 1-2 limes) 1
CUP ALL-PURPOSE FLOUR
COMBINE THE GARLIC PASTE, juice and grated zest in a large non-reactive glass or stainless steel bowl. Stir well and add the chicken. Toss until it is uniformly coated. Cover and marinate, refrigerated, for 4 to 6 hours, occasionally turning and basting the chicken. Let the chicken return to room temperature for 30 minutes before frying it. FIT A WIRE COOLING RACK
in a cookie sheet and set aside. Remove the chicken from the marinade and set the marinade aside. Spread the flour on a plate. Fill a cast-iron, lidded skillet with enough lard or oil to coat the bottom with about 1 ⁄2 -inch of fat. Turn the heat to medium high.
LARD OR PEANUT OIL for frying PARSLEY, for garnish 1
ORANGE, thinly sliced, for garnish
WASH THE CHICKEN and pat dry. Combine the salt and garlic in a mortar and work it with the pestle until it is a smooth paste. (The salt acts as an abrasive and will help grind the garlic to a smooth pulp. You can also do this with the flat side of a chef’s knife on a cutting board.) Grind a teaspoon of black pepper into the paste and mix it in.
When the oil is hot, lightly roll the chicken in the flour, beginning with the dark meat. Thoroughly shake off the excess flour and add the chicken to the pan. Fry, turning once, until it is lightly browned on all sides, about 8 minutes. Slowly pour the reserved marinade into the center of the pan, lower the heat to mediumlow, and loosely cover the pan. Cook, turning the chicken occasionally, until tender and cooked through, about 20 minutes.
UNCOVER THE PAN, and raise the heat to mediumhigh. Cook until the liquid is evaporated and the chicken crisp, gently turning the chicken so it browns evenly on all sides. Be careful: After the steaming stage, the crust will be very fragile and sticky until it is crisped again.
GRATE THE ZEST from the orange, then split the orange and squeeze the juice from it. You will need 1⁄2 cup of juice, so if there is more, set it aside for another use. If you cannot get bitter oranges, use the zest from a regular juicing orange and combine 3 tablespoons of the orange juice with 2 tablespoons of squeezed lime juice.
Recipe adapted from Fried Chicken by Damon Lee Fowler, Random House, 1999 Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de HIckman T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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CHICKEN ON THE WHEEL OF LIFE Story by RONNI LUNDY Photograph by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN
ALMOST AS PERPLEXING as the question of chicken or egg is this: Where did Chicken and Waffles come from? Admittedly, for some we need to first answer another series of questions: “Do you mean fried chicken?” “Do you mean with waffles?” and “Who eats that?” Those answers are respectively: “Yes.” “Yes.” And “The cool folks.” To illustrate this last point, we’ll begin with Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles, arguably the most famous restaurant dealing in this specialty. When owner Herb Holland landed in L.A. he courted Motown stars such as Natalie Cole and television and movie folk. Consequently Will Smith’s character on Fresh Prince of Bel Air liked to talk the place up and Arsenio Hall, Snoop Dog and Redd Foxx encouraged their audiences to go there. Characters in the cult classic Tapeheads make a video for Roscoe’s, Samuel Jackson’s character in Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown lures Chris Jackson’s to his death with a promise of dinner at Roscoe’s, and Heroes character Hiro Nakamura is delighted when he gets a chance to eat what he considers a classic American dish. Roscoe’s also makes cameos in Swingers, Rush Hour and in the Ludacris song, “Call Up the Homies.” For all its fame, though, Roscoe’s is neither the earliest nor onliest show biz and chicken-waffle spot. Gladys Knight and Ron Winan’s Chicken & Waffles has two locations in Atlanta. But Gladys credits Harlem’s Wells Supper Club for her introduction to the dish. 110
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Wells was a jazz club itself and its late hours made it a hot spot for a post-show repast for performers from nearby clubs, including Count Basie’s next door. Knight remembers hoisting wings with Sammy Davis, Jr. and Frank Sinatra there. And the legend goes that the unusual combo came about because in the wee, wee hours of the morning no one could make up their minds if they wanted breakfast or supper. It’s a good tale, but John T. Edge (the selfdescribed secret research wonk who directs the Southern Foodways Alliance) notes that while Wells was established in 1938, trumpet player Bunny Berrigan cut a disc for Decca in 1935 with the title “Chicken and Waffles.” Edge, who is the author of Fried Chicken: An American Story, notes that fried chicken was often a popular breakfast dish for southern rural families, and it’s not illogical to think that the combo emerged on morning tables in country kitchens. But truly, what does it matter where it all started when you’ve got a crisped, hot breast of chicken perched on the wheel of life? Although many chicken and waffle spots around the country serve the bird deep-fried, if it truly is a country classic, it would have been pan-fried instead. You can use the recipe for Honest Fried Chicken that follows for the chicken portion of the duo—and Grace Rainwater’s Buttermilk Chicken (page 100) would be divine; it specifies using breasts, which Edge says allows the proper technique of eating, a small slice of chicken with a piece of syrup spiked waffle in every bite.
HERE’S EDGE’S RECIPE for the perfect chicken waffle from Fried Chicken (G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2004): LATE-NIGHT (OR EARLY MORNING) WAFFLES SERVES 6 1 1 1 ⁄2 2 1 2 1 3⁄4 4
cup all-purpose flour cup stone-ground cornmeal (yellow or white) teaspoon baking soda teaspoons baking powder teaspoon salt eggs, separated into yolks and whites cups buttermilk tablespoons melted butter Rendered fat from 3 slices of bacon Cane or maple syrup and a bottle of Louisiana hot sauce, for serving
COMBINE FLOUR, cornmeal, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Sift, or, if you’re feeling lazy, stir well with a fork. In a separate bowl, beat egg yolks well. Add buttermilk, butter and bacon fat to yolks and stir. Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and combine with four or five strokes of a whisk. (Do not overwork the batter, for it will toughen.) Beat egg whites until stiff and fold gently into batter. Cook 4-6 minutes according to waffle iron directions, or until steam ceases leaking from the lid. Serve with cane or maple syrup and a bottle of Louisiana hot sauce (or any of the more viscous brands).
For more about Ronni Lundy, see page 162. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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It’s a common myth that poaching eggs is a difficult procedure. In truth, poaching eggs is easy, and the technique has the added bonus that the eggs are not cooked in butter or oil. To make poached eggs, raw eggs are cracked out of their shells into a skillet or saucepan full of water or other liquid such as stock or milk. A skillet is used instead of a pot. About 3 inches of cooking liquid is brought to a boil in the skillet. The eggs are slipped into the liquid from a cup or saucer, so they can glide into it at the liquid’s level rather than being dropped in. Once the eggs are in, the heat is turned off, a cover goes on, and in four minutes (perhaps a bit longer at high altitude) these eggs will be poached. Vinegar helps keep the whites intact. If you’ve ever tried to poach eggs and seen grainy white strands flop around in the water, lack of acid is why. I like a hint of vinegar on my finished eggs. Japanese rice vinegar is also an option. The ideal poached egg is cooked to the same stage of doneness all the way through. The 4-minute poach is a baseline with no gamble at sea level. If you live at a high altitude, you may need to experiment. Your eggs should be medium. Next go-around, add or subtract time for firmer or softer yolks. I never knew when it happened, but if you Google poached eggs, my method comes up. The procedure is not totally of my own doing. Like many cooks and authors, credit is due to a company of inspiration —Julia Child, Pierre Franey and the American Egg Board and its cadre of recipe testers.
FIND A DEEP, SMALL TO MEDIUM SKILLET with matching lid (depending on how many eggs you’d like to poach). Fill with 2 to 3 inches water or other liquid. Set on high heat, covered. Meanwhile, crack each egg into its own small cup or ramekin. Set on a plate or tray and set them near the stove. When water boils, uncover the skillet. And add vinegar and salt. Keep the heat high. Lower the cups half way into the water and let each egg slip out of its ramekin. Work fast. Immediately turn off the heat and cover the skillet. Set timer for 4 minutes (or whatever works in your locale).
2
EGGS, OR UP TO 6 EGGS
1
TABLESPOON WHITE VINEGAR
1
TEASPOON SALT
When time’s up, scoop each egg from water with a slotted spoon. You can set them on toast, on top of enchiladas, fried green tomatoes, a frisée salad or eat plain in a bowl with Tabasco.
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Shirred eggs
aren’t as popular as they once were but they’re easy and can be
beautiful with colorful vegetables around them. You put them in the oven and walk away.
WASH SPINACH, REMOVE TOUGH STEMS. Heat a wok or big pot over highest heat. Add rinsed spinach and a little water. Cook, stirring, until spinach is wilted, about 1 minute. It should still be jade green. Instantly remove from heat and rinse with cold water. Squeeze water out of spinach. Chop coarsely. (Alternatively, defrost frozen chopped spinach and squeeze out water.)
SERVES 6 1
POUND FRESH SPINACH (yes, you can use a 10-ounce box, frozen)
6
TEASPOONS BUTTER
6
EGGS
6
TABLESPOONS HEAVY CREAM
Set 1 teaspoon butter in bottom of six 1-cup ramekins and place in the microwave on high for 15 seconds to melt butter. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Set ramekins on a baking sheet. Divide spinach between cups. Make a well in spinach and crack an egg into each depression. Spoon 1 tablespoon cream over each egg. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and dust all with nutmeg.
SALT & GROUND BLACK PEPPER
Bake 25 minutes, or until eggs set around edges. Serve hot.
PINCH GRATED NUTMEG
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
Hard-Cooked Eggs Much has been made of the greenish ring around yolks and shells that won’t peel easily— stumbling blocks that may annoy the cook, but aren’t worthy of vexation. Hens aren’t factories (although they may live in something like a factory). Like most things in nature, differences do occur, and not every egg behaves like every other. To prevent the green ring, cool the eggs in cold water and peel them as soon as they are cooled. They can be stored, shells off, in a bowl of cold water in the refrigerator for up to three days. Place the eggs in a pot just large enough to hold them in a single layer. Add water to cover eggs by 1 inch.
Bring to a boil over high heat. Immediately cover and turn off heat. Let eggs steep in hot water with lid on, 17 minutes. (This may not work as well at high altitude. You may need to experiment.) Immediately pour off hot water, rinse with cold water and begin peeling eggs. Roll on countertop until surface is crackled. Peel off shells. To peel an egg easily, first roll the egg on the countertop to crackle it all over, then remove the shell. It should come off. A stubborn shell that sticks to the egg white might be a result of overcooking, or it can mean that the egg was exceptionally fresh. Shells are porous. Older eggs have aspirated some of their contents out of the shell, leaving air pockets that help peeling. Fresh eggs fill the shell completely and push against it, making peeling more difficult. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 115
There are so many ways to make strata;
with apologies to that violin maker, I like to think of the entire category as Strata Various. Looking at American books and pamphlets about eggs from 40 to 50 years ago, you’d be hard pressed to find a recipe for a strata. Be happy it came along. Think of it as the dump cake of egg cookery. By virtue of its sitting time overnight, it’s the ultimate make-ahead for the next day’s brunch.
MINCE GARLIC. MINCE ONION
and set aside. Grate
the cheese. Butter a 9-inch square baking dish.
4 CLOVES GARLIC 1 MEDIUM ONION
In a mixing bowl, combine enchilada sauce, minced garlic, cumin and oregano. Spoon about 1⁄2 cup sauce evenly onto the bottom of the buttered baking dish. Arrange 4 tortillas on the sauce, overlapping. Spoon half remaining sauce over tortillas and top with half the cheese and all the minced onion. Cover with remaining tortillas, remaining sauce and rest of the cheese. Whisk together eggs, milk, sour cream, milk, salt and pepper. Slowly pour over layers, making sure tortillas and cheese are submerged. Cover with foil and refrigerate overnight. Next morning, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake strata, uncovered, 45 minutes, or until puffed and richly browned.
3⁄ 4 POUND MONTEREY JACK CHEESE
14 OUNCES RED ENCHILADA SAUCE, homemade or canned 1⁄4 TEASPOON GROUND CUMIN 1⁄4 TEASPOON GROUND OREGANO
8 CORN TORTILLAS 6 EGGS 3⁄ 4 CUP MILK 1⁄2 CUP SOUR CREAM
SALT & GROUND BLACK PEPPER,
to taste
Savory Saffron Flan (SERVES 6) Set oven rack in center. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter six (6-ounce) custard cups and set cups in an oblong baking dish. 3 1⁄2
EGG YOLKS TEASPOON SAFFRON THREADS,
finely crushed 1⁄ 8
TEASPOON GROUND CUMIN
1 1⁄2 CUPS HEAVY CREAM 1⁄2
CUP PLAIN YOGURT
5
EGGS PINCH OF SALT PINCH OF WHITE PEPPER
Whisk the three egg yolks only, saffron and cumin until smooth. Add cream, yogurt, whole eggs, salt and pepper. Whisk just until blended. Pour into custard cups. Set baking pan on oven rack, then fill with hot water halfway up sides of cups. Bake 45 to 50 minutes or until set. (It will take longer at high altitude.) Remove cups to a wire rack to cool (I use long tongs to lift them out of the water). Serve in cups or invert. To invert, slip a thin knife around edge and invert onto a plate or into bowl. Serve warm or cold. Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
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ELAINE CORN
Lemon Meringue PIE
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This is a big, impressive pie
that cuts into tall wedges. Remember to zest the lemons before you juice them. Considered by some to be the most difficult of all the pies, lemon meringue shows the cook what an egg is capable of: thickening, how it’s possible to boil yolks without ruining them, a lesson in stiff, shiny, brown-tipped meringue. SET RACK IN LOWER THIRD OF OVEN. (MAKES ONE 9-INCH PIE) 1 1⁄4 CUPS FLOUR 1
TABLESPOON SUGAR
5
TABLESPOONS COLD BUTTER,
cut in pats 2
TABLESPOONS SOLID VEGETABLE SHORTENING
1
EGG
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. In food processor, pulse flour and sugar a few times to mix. Set cold butter and shortening on top of flour. Pulse a few times, add egg and pulse until sandy. With machine running, pour in ice water. Stop just as dough holds together. Roll out to 13-inch circle and fit in pie plate. Roll overhang under, then crimp. Prick pastry all over with a fork. Completely line pie shell with a round of foil and fill with about 2 cups of dry beans or rice. Bake 15 minutes. Remove foil and beans and bake 10 minutes more. Cool while you make the lemon filling.
2-3 TABLESPOONS ICE WATER
2.
FOIL, DRY BEANS OR RICE,
for blind baking
Lemon Filling
1. Crust
IN A HEAVY SAUCEPAN,
combine sugar, cornstarch and salt. Slowly stir in lemon juice and 1 2⁄3 cups cold water. Stir out lumps.
1 2⁄3 CUPS SUGAR
Beat egg yolks until smooth. Add to saucepan with butter. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and begins to boil. Set a timer and boil hard for 1 minute, stirring. Remove from heat and add zest. Pour lemon curd into baked crust. Turn down oven to 350 degrees while you make the meringue.
2⁄ 3
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
1⁄2
CUP CORNSTARCH PINCH OF SALT CUP LEMON JUICE,
freshly squeezed 1 2⁄3 CUPS COLD WATER 6
EGG YOLKS
3
TABLESPOONS BUTTER
4
TEASPOONS LEMON ZEST,
finely minced or grated T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 119
ELAINE CORN
3. Lofty Meringue 6
EGG WHITES
1⁄ 4
TEASPOON CREAM OF TARTAR
1⁄2
TEASPOON VANILLA EXTRACT
3⁄ 4
CUP SUGAR
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
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SET OVEN RACK ON LOWEST NOTCH. This is a tall pie! In a large bowl, beat the egg whites, cream of tartar and vanilla to stiff peaks on highest speed. When stiff, slowly add sugar while continuing to beat on highest speed. Beat until glossy and very stiff. Spread meringue over pie, making big swirls. Be sure the meringue touches the crust all around, like glue. With tips high, set in hot oven 5 to 10 minutes, until tips are golden brown. Keep checking; don’t even think about walking away when baked meringue is at stake. Cool to room temperature before serving.
A N YA S E B A ST I A N
London’s most exclusive store, Fortnum & Mason, claims to have invented Scotch eggs—a hard-boiled egg encased in sausage meat—back in 1738. Originally intended as a portable snack for coach travelers, they have descended through the social ranks over the years to become a popular mainstay of British life. Now available as pub fare and even pre-packaged, in supermarkets, Scotch eggs (which are eaten cold) are great for picnics and lunch boxes. HARD BOIL THE EGGS (about 9 minutes). Drain and cool under cold running water. Peel and set aside in fridge. Put sausage meat in a bowl. Mix with the thyme, parsley, sage, salt and pepper to taste. Divide the sausage mix into 4 sections and, on a clean surface, flatten them into ovals, about 3 inches wide and 5 inches long. Place the seasoned flour onto a plate and coat each egg in flour. Wrap the floured eggs in sausage meat, making sure to cover them completely. Dip each sausage-covered egg in the beaten egg, then roll in breadcrumbs until well coated.
Scotch Eggs 4
EGGS, preferably free range
1
POUND GOOD QUALITY PORK SAUSAGE MEAT FRESH THYME, SAGE AND PARSLEY LEAVES, minced
Heat the oil in a deep, heavy-bottomed pan, until a breadcrumb sizzles and turns brown when dropped into it. Reduce the heat to medium, carefully add the eggs and deep fry for 8 to 10 minutes, turning occasionally, until golden brown and crisp and the sausage meat is completely cooked. Remove with a slotted spoon and place on kitchen paper towels to drain. Serve cold, on their own, or accompanied by a salad or pickles.
SALT & FRESHLY GROUND PEPPER
to taste 1
CUP PLAIN FLOUR, SEASONED WITH SALT/PEPPER, to taste
1
BEATEN EGG BREADCRUMBS OLIVE OIL FOR FRYING
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
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Story by PATRICIA GREATHOUSE Food photographs by RYANNAN BRYER DE HICKMAN Rooster photograph by CH. BIERI
CUT THE ROOSTER INTO PIECES and salt and pepper him generously. This may be done as much as 24 hours ahead of time to give the seasonings time to penetrate.
WITH APOLOGIES TO VEGETARIANS, I must say that sometimes a rooster needs to die. A farmyard Hitler, one of mine had threatened and menaced and jumped and clawed. Some would say he was just doing his job, protecting his hens. But we had raised the flock by hand. From the first day, they knew we were no threat —yet they cowered before his majesty, the Transylvanian Naked-Neck rooster. He had the swagger of a small-town Don Juan, cigarette pack stashed in the arm of his tight, rolled up T-shirt, cigarette dangling from a surly lip, his eyes squinted against the smoke. But when it came down to it, I was the biggest rooster, and he was my bitch. He made a rich, earthy coq au vin, all that toughness breaking down during hours of slow simmering. I would like to encourage anyone out there who can find an old rooster to break with the tradition of running for the French cookbook to stew him up. Coq au vin is a country recipe made up of some simple parts, and it's hard to go wrong. While there are some common elements to each recipe, each cook has his or her own way of doing things. Thick bacon, tiny onions, white mushrooms, hearty red wine, a couple of carrots and an onion, a few herbs, a little chicken broth—and you can have a rich meal and a quiet conscience. (After all, that old rooster wasn't throw to the coyotes.) 122
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BEGIN WITH THE UNSMOKED BACON. Think of it as adding richness and flavor. Cut it in lardons and render out the fat in a large skillet. Drain and reserve the bacon but leave the fat in the pan. Add some nice little pearl onions to the pan and brown them on all sides. Reserve them, too, in the same bowl as the bacon. Add some butter to the pan and brown the mushrooms and add them to the bowl. Now add even more butter and brown the rooster, which you have patted dry first. Once the chicken is browned, pour off the fat but keep the browned bits. Pour the bottle of wine into the pan and deglaze. Add the rooster, a couple of halved carrots and onions cut almost in half but still held together by the root end. Top it off with enough chicken broth to cover the bird, throw in a bay leaf and a little thyme, put the lid on, and cook on the stove top on the lowest flame or in a slow oven until the rooster is quite tender. This may take several hours. ONCE THE ROOSTER IS TENDER, remove the pieces from the cooking liquid, tent it and set it aside. Discard the onion and the carrots. To thicken the sauce, add 2 teaspoons of softened butter and 2 teaspoons of flour that you have kneaded together and broken into bits to the pan. Whisk until incorporated, then simmer the sauce until any hint of a floury taste disappears. Add the mushrooms, onions and lardons to the pan and slowly reduce the cooking liquid until it is a rich sauce. Taste for seasoning, and add salt at this point (if you add it earlier, it may be too salty after reduction). Add the rooster pieces back into the sauce and warm through. Serve with potatoes, rice or noodles to enjoy with the sauce. For more about Patricia Greathouse, see page 161.
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OMELETTE
Molière Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman 124
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PAT R E E D
In
An Omelette and a Glass of Wine, Elizabeth David, one of England’s 20th-century food scribes, writes about an omelet served at a small restaurant in Avignon where she ate twice a week, on market days, when she lived “in a rickety old house in a crumbling Provençal hill-top village.” The restaurant, she writes, “was a totally unpretentious little place and the proprietors had always been angelically kind, welcoming and generous.” A powerful draw was the cheese omelet, the Molière’s specialty. The proprietress gave David this recipe:
BEAT 1 TABLESPOON of finely grated Parmesan with 3 eggs and a little pepper. Warm the pan a minute over the fire. Put in half an ounce of butter. Turn up the flame. When the butter bubbles and is about to change color, pour in the eggs. Add 1 tablespoon of very fresh Gruyère cut into little dice, and 1 tablespoon of thick fresh cream. Tip the
pan toward you, easing some of the mixture from the far edge into the middle. Then tip the pan away from you again, filling the empty space with some of the still liquid eggs. By the time you have done this twice, the Gruyère will have started to melt and your omelet is ready. Fold it over in three with a fork or palette knife, and slide in onto the warmed omelet dish. Serve immediately.
Francis Lam’s Omelet BREAK 3 LARGE, superfresh, room-temperature eggs into a bowl and beat them lovingly with a little salt and pepper until they are perfectly combined, but be careful not to froth them. Stir in a teaspoon of unsalted butter that you’ve cut into tiny dice, making sure it’s evenly distributed. If the butter can’t be from Brittany, make sure it’s at least chilled, OK? Now take your 8-inch black steel plan that has been well seasoned for 20 years and that you reserve exclusively for eggs. Heat 1 tablespoon of clarified butter over a medium-high flame. Get the pan hot enough so that the eggs will start cooking when you pour them in, but not so hot that they bubble violently and start frying. Use the back of two forks to stir the eggs in silverdollar-size circular motions at slow speed (120 revolutions per minute), revolving them around the pan. When the eggs have become a thickened liquid containing small curds, gently shake the pan and increase the speed to medium (140 rpm). When they’re all wet curds, shake more vigorously and speed up to fast (160 rpm).
When the eggs are all cooked but still tender and slippery curds, let the pan sit untouched on the heat and count to seven to form the skin. Lift the pan, and with your free hand, give the handle a couple of good whacks to shake the omelet loose and get it to slide up the top edge. Set the pan down and change your grip so that your palm faces up and the handle is perpendicular to your wrist. Roll the omelet onto a warmed plate by flipping the pan handle-first so that your palm faces down again. Don’t be afraid — you just have to commit to it and go. If it doesn’t come out, it wasn’t meant to be. Now examine your omelet: the tight cigar shape, the rich yellow color, the smoothness, the thinness of the skin. Curse yourself for all the ways it’s not perfect, insist that this is a personal failing, and start over. Omelette Molière recipe adapted from An Omelette and a Glass of Wine by Elizabeth David, Grub Street Cookery, 2009 Omelet recipe adapted from “ Chasing Perfection”by Francis Lam, Best Food Writing 2008, Holly Hughes (ed.) DaCapo Press T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Although French omelets are renowned for their creaminess and lightness, it’s rare that people make them at home, for they have to be prepared individually and must be eaten immediately. For a family dinner or lunch, most people make large flat omelets, enough to serve three people or more. Begin them as scrambled eggs, then as the eggs begin to set, cover the skillet and place it in the oven. The omelet should not brown; it should be rather wet in the center and fluffy. Comparing a flat omelet to scrambled eggs with a skin is the best way to describe what they are like. You’ll have the most success if you use a well-seasoned nonstick skillet. A 9- to 11-inch skillet is best; you want a nice mass of eggs to cook slowly.
PREHEAT THE OVEN TO 325 DEGREES. Combine the wine, tomato paste, and 1 teaspoon of the salt in a small saucepan, place over high heat, and boil for 2 minutes. Add the cream and simmer until the mixture reduces to a saucelike consistency, about 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and keep warm. Melt the butter in a 10-inch nonstick ovenproof skillet over medium heat. Add the leek and cook, stirring occasionally, until soft, about 5 minutes.
1⁄2
CUP DRY WHITE WINE, such as Sauvignon Blanc TABLESPOON TOMATO PASTE
Meanwhile, break the eggs into a mixing bowl, add the water, tarragon, parsley, chervil, chives, the remaining 1⁄2 teaspoon salt and the pepper and beat together.
1 1⁄2
CUP HEAVY CREAM
Pour the egg mixture into the skillet and cook, stirring vigorously with a wooden spoon, for 2 minutes. Once the eggs begin to set, shake the pan in a circular motion for 1 minute. Cover the pan, transfer it to the oven and bake until the center of the omelet is barely set, about 8 to 10 minutes.
2
TABLESPOONS BUTTER, unsalted
1
LARGE LEEK, white and tender green parts only, quartered lengthwise, cut crosswise in 1⁄4–inch pieces, well washed and dried
8
LARGE EGGS
3
TABLESPOONS WATER
1
TABLESPOON FRESH TARRAGON,
Remove the skillet from the oven and invert a large plate over it. Grab the skillet handle with the inside of your wrist facing up, place your other hand on the plate, and quickly turn upside down to remove the omelet from the skillet. Drizzle the tomato cream over the omelet and serve immediately.
1 1⁄2 TEASPOONS SALT
chopped 1
TABLESPOON PARSLEY, chopped
1
TABLESPOON FRESH CHERVIL,
chopped
Recipe adapted from Parisian Home Cooking: Conversations, Recipes, and Tips from the Cooks and Food Merchants of Paris, by Michael Roberts William Morrow & Company, 1999
1
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
1
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TABLESPOON FRESH CHIVES,
chopped TABLESPOON FRESHLY GROUND BLACK PEPPER
PAT R E E D
Flat Omelet with HERBS
T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 127
When properly executed, oeufs brouillés, literally, “agitated eggs,” bear slight resemblance to their American cousin, scrambled eggs. The scramble should result in small tender clumps of eggs suspended in an almost saucelike base. Most people prefer them creamy, with the consistency of oatmeal. Cooked until dry, they’re more like small-curd cottage cheese but still springy and light. USE A SMALL POT rather than a skillet for French-style TO SERVE 2 TO 3 PEOPLE 6
EGGS
6
TEASPOONS WATER
3⁄ 4
TEASPOON SALT
3
TEASPOONS UNSALTED BUTTER
OPTIONAL 6
TEASPOONS CREAM
6
ADDITIONAL TEASPOONS UNSALTED BUTTER
scrambled eggs. It’s pointless to cook less than six eggs; in fact, the larger the quantity, the better the scramble. For each egg, add 1 teaspoon of water, 1⁄8 teaspoon salt, and 1⁄2 teaspoon of butter to your bowl of eggs. Beat the mixture lightly, using a wooden spoon; use a whisk for scrambling. Scramble the eggs in the pot over low heat, whisking all the time. When the mixture begins to coagulate and form lumps, begin a little dance of removing your pot from the heat and replacing it, scraping the bottom and sides with your whisk to detach the particles that form there. If you loosely scramble six eggs in less than nine minutes, you’ve not done it properly. For richer scrambled eggs, stir in 1 teaspoon each cream and butter per egg at the end of cooking. Recipe adapted from Parisian Home Cooking: Conversations, Recipes, and Tips from the Cooks and Food Merchants of Paris by Michael Roberts William Morrow & Company, 1999
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PAT R E E D
SCRAMBLED EGGS
THE
French Way
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Basic, straightforward and deeply satisfying, the chicken is sparked by the chile sauce but is not too spicy. The technique of pre-salting the bird makes the meat firm, seasoned to the bone and juicy. Start a day ahead with free-range organic chickens for the best flavor; make the sauce the day before serving as well to give flavors time to meld. Since everything but the final roasting and the salad is done ahead of time, this recipe is perfect for either a relatively quick meal or entertaining. TO PRE-SEASON THE CHICKEN:
Rinse and dry the chicken. Sprinkle all over with salt, then place in a resealable plastic bag or a covered dish and put it in the refrigerator overnight.
TO MAKE THE SAUCE: Stem and seed the chiles. Warm a skillet and coat the bottom with the oil. When the oil begins to glisten, add half the chiles and fry briefly, a few seconds per side. The chiles will quickly turn color. Take care not to toast for too long, as they will turn bitter if they burn. Place the chiles in a bowl and cover with the hot water. Let soak for 20-30 minutes. When the chiles are soft, put them, along with the liquid, in a blender. Add the garlic, oregano, cumin, cloves, sugar, two tablespoons vinegar and a few grindings black pepper; process until smooth. Strain through a medium-mesh strainer, rubbing the bottom of the strainer with a rubber spatula to help ease the flow. Add water if the sauce seems too thick—it should be the consistency of tomato juice. Taste for seasoning, balancing the flavors with a little more vinegar, sugar or pepper. Remember that the chicken has been salted and will add salt to the sauce. Refrigerate the adobo sauce until ready to use.
SERVES 4; INCREASE QUANTITIES PROPORTIONALLY TO SERVE MORE 4
drumstick and thigh still attached 2
TEASPOONS KOSHER SALT
4
DRIED ANCHO CHILES or a
combination of two New Mexico dried red chiles and 4 guajillo chiles 2
TO ROAST THE CHICKEN: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Arrange the chicken in a 9 x 12-inch casserole, reserving the marinade. Rub the potatoes with oil and arrange them around the chicken. Sprinkle with kosher salt. Carefully pour 1⁄3 cup water into the casserole, then tightly cover the casserole with foil and place on the middle rack of the oven. Bake 1 hour and 15 minutes, turning the potatoes once in the middle of cooking. Remove the pan from the oven and coat the chicken and potatoes with the reserved marinade. Return the pan, uncovered, to the oven and bake another 10 minutes, or until chicken is cooked through and potatoes are tender. 130
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TABLESPOONS EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL, or vegetable oil
1 1⁄2 CUPS HOT WATER 2
GARLIC CLOVES, peeled
1⁄2
TEASPOON MEXICAN OREGANO PINCH CUMIN PINCH CLOVES
3⁄4
TEASPOON SUGAR
2
TABLESPOONS CIDER VINEGAR FRESHLY GROUND BLACK PEPPER
TO MARINATE THE CHICKEN: In
the morning, drain the seasoned chicken. Pour the adobo sauce over the chicken in the bag or dish and refrigerate. An hour before cooking, remove the chicken from the refrigerator.
LARGE CHICKEN QUARTERS,
VEGETABLE OIL 1⁄ 3
CUP WATER
4
MEDIUM RED POTATOES
Onion-Tomato Salad 1
SMALL WHITE ONION, thinly sliced
1
MEDIUM RIPE TOMATO, cubed
1
AVOCADO, cubed
2
TINY CUCUMBERS or a quarter of
an English cucumber, thinly sliced 1
TABLESPOON CIDER VINEGAR
PAT R ICIA GR EAT H O U S E
Pollo Adobado CH I CK E N M A R I N AT E D I N R E D CH I L E S AU C E
THE ONION-TOMATO SALAD
adds color and crunch and should be made at the last minute. You can prepare it while the chicken is roasting. Toss all the ingredients with the tablespoon of vinegar. Sprinkle with salt to taste and reserve. Serve the chicken with the potatoes and the onion-tomato salad on the side.
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Some would call this dish, which combines chicken and eggs in a spicy sauce, a mother and child reunion — but it’s also a popular Ethiopian stew. “It’s the first Ethiopian dish I ever had,” writes chef Marcus Samuelsson in The Soul of a New Cuisine. He notes that the combination of tender meat, spicy eggs and flavorful sauce are a good introduction to Ethiopian food because most of the ingredients and flavors are familiar. The sauce will not bind and thicken like most Western sauces, he says, adding that it should soak into the injera — a sour, spongy flatbread that is served with almost every meal in Ethiopia. Traditionally, injera is made from a sourdough starter and teff — a grain available at natural food stores and over the Internet in the United States — and allowed to ferment for three days before cooking. Samuelsson’s version is streamlined for American kitchens, eliminating the need for teff and sourdough starter by offering substitutions. (If you are pressed for time, a store-bought flatbread will do the job.)
SERVES 6 2
MEDIUM RED ONIONS, d iced SALT
4
TABLESPOONS ( 1⁄2 stick) UNSALTED BUTTER, d ivided
1⁄4
TEASPOON GROUND CARDAMOM,
preferably freshly ground 1⁄4
COMBINE THE ONIONS,
a pinch of salt and half of the butter in a Dutch oven or other large deep pot over low heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are golden, about 15 minutes. Add the remaining butter, the cardamom, black pepper, cloves, garlic, ginger and berberé or chile powder and cook until the onions soften and take on the color of the spices, about 10 minutes.
freshly ground 3
CLOVES
2
GARLIC CLOVES, finely chopped
1 1⁄2
INCH PIECE GINGER,
peeled and chopped 1
Add 2 cups of the chicken stock and the chicken legs and thighs, bring to a simmer, and simmer for 15 minutes. Add the remaining half-cup chicken stock and the wine, bring back to a simmer, and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the chicken breasts and simmer for 20 minutes. Gently stir in the lime juice and eggs and simmer for another 5 minutes. The sauce will be loose and soupy. Season with salt to taste. 132
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TEASPOON BLACK PEPPER,
TABLESPOON BERBERÉ (recipe follows) OR CHILE POWDER
2 1⁄ 2 CUPS CHICKEN STOCK, divided 1
4- TO 5-POUND CHICKEN, in pieces
1⁄4
CUP DRY RED WINE JUICE OF 1 LIME
2
HARD-BOILED EGGS, peeled
M A RC U S S A M U E L S S O N
DORO WETT
Chicken Stew
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Injera (MAKES 12 FLATBREADS) 2
CUPS TEFF FLOUR OR WHOLE-WHEAT FLOUR ( don’t use stone-ground flour)
1
CUP ALL-PURPOSE FLOUR
1 1⁄2 TEASPOONS BAKING SODA 1
TEASPOON SALT
5
CUPS PLAIN YOGURT
3
CUPS CLUB SODA
2
TABLESPOONS
WHISK TOGETHER THE TEFF FLOUR, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Whisk the yogurt into the club soda, then stir into the flour mixture to make a smooth, thin batter. Strain through a sieve to remove any lumps. Grease a large skillet with clarified butter and heat over medium-high heat. Pour a half-cup of batter into the pan in a spiral, starting at the center, and cook for 20 seconds. Put a lid on the pan and cook for an additional 30 seconds. Transfer to a plate and cover with a cloth to keep warm while you cook the remaining injera.
CLARIFIED BUTTER ( see note)
or purchased ghee
CLARIFIED BUTTER Because all the milk solids have been removed, clarified butter can be cooked over high temperatures without burning and can be stored for much longer without going rancid, an important point for cooks living in Ethiopia’s scorching climate. To make clarified butter, heat at least a half-pound of butter in a saucepan over mediumlow heat, without stirring, until the milk fats separate and fall to the bottom of the pan. Carefully skim the foam from the top, then pour the golden liquid butter into a container, leaving the milk solids in the pan. Tightly covered, clarified butter will keep for up to a month in the refrigerator. (Ghee, sold in stores that specialize in food from India, is clarified butter.) Teff flour is available from Bob’s Red Mill and other online sources.
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M A RC U S S A M U E L S S O N
“In Ethiopia” Samuelsson writes, “the preparation of berberé takes days— chilies are dried in the sun for three days, then ground in a mortar and pestle, mixed with ground spices, and set in the sun to dry again—and it is usually made in huge amounts, using as many as fifteen pounds of chilies and five pounds of garlic. I’ve streamlined the recipe and cut the yield drastically for a simplified preparation that maintains the integrity of flavors but takes only fifteen minutes to make. … Traditionally, berberé is used to flavor Ethiopian stews, but I also like to use it as a rub for beef and lamb.”
FINELY GRIND
Berberé
the fenugreek seeds with a mortar and pestle or in an electric spice or coffee grinder. Combine with the remaining ingredients in a small bowl, mixing well. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 months.
(MAKES ABOUT 1 CUP) 1
TEASPOON FENUGREEK SEEDS
1⁄2
CUP GROUND DRIED SERRANO CHILES OR OTHER GROUND DRIED CHILES
1⁄2
CUP PAPRIKA
2
TABLESPOONS SALT
2
TEASPOONS GROUND GINGER
2
TEASPOONS ONION POWDER
1
TEASPOON GROUND CARDAMOM,
preferably freshly ground 1
TEASPOON NUTMEG, freshly grated
1⁄2
TEASPOON GARLIC POWDER
1⁄4
TEASPOON GROUND CLOVES
1⁄4
TEASPOON GROUND CINNAMON
1⁄4
TEASPOON GROUND ALLSPICE
Recipes adapted from The Soul of a New Cuisine: A Discovery of the Foods and Flavors of Africa, by Marcus Samuelsson, John Wiley & Sons, 2006 Photographs by Gediyon Kiflé T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Chicken Yassa is the signature dish of Senegal. Smothered in aromatic lemon, onion and chiles, it’s both simple to prepare and deliciously memorable. It’s traditionally served with rice to soak up the juices, but pairs equally well with couscous.
SERVES 4 3
LARGE ONIONS JUICE OF 3 LEMONS, plus 1 teaspoon grated zest
1-2 FRESH SERRANO OR JALAPEÑO PEPPERS 1
TEASPOON SALT
1⁄2
TEASPOON BLACK PEPPER,
freshly ground 3 1⁄2 POUND BROILER OR FRYER,
cut into pieces 2-4 TABLESPOONS PEANUT OR OLIVE OIL 1⁄2
CUP WATER HOT COOKED RICE OR COUSCOUS, for serving
Recipe from from The Festive Table: Recipes and Stories for Creating Your Own Holiday Traditions, by Ronni Lundy, North Point Press, 1995
SEVERAL HOURS BEFORE
you are ready to serve, halve onions and slice about ⁄2-inch thick. Zest lemons and extract juice. Discard the seed and stems of the chile pepper(s) and chop very fine. (Use 2 peppers for a hotter dish.) Mix the juice, zest and chile together with the salt and black pepper. 1
Rinse the chicken well, pat dry with paper towel and place the pieces in a large non-reactive container. Cover with onions. Pour marinade over all. (If you have to layer the chicken pieces, be sure to scatter onions and pour marinade over each layer so it can soak up the flavor.) Cover well and refrigerate for at least 3 hours, up to overnight. When you are ready to cook, heat a Dutch oven or other wide, heavy pan with a lid over medium-high heat. Add oil to coat the bottom of the pan. Remove the chicken pieces from the marinade, shaking off any onions that cling. Brown the chicken lightly in the oil, turning once. (Don’t crowd the pan; brown in batches if necessary.) Set the browned chicken aside. Add a little more oil to the pan. Remove the onions from marinade and sauté in the hot oil until browned. Add the remaining marinade and 1⁄2 cup water to the onions in the pan and bring to a boil. Return the chicken to the pan, cover, turn the heat down and simmer until chicken is very tender, about 35 minutes. Serve hot with rice or couscous. spooning the pan juices and onions over each serving.
SERVES 4 TO 6 2 CUPS GRATED FRESH OR DRIED UNSWEETENED COCONUT 2 CUPS FRESH BREADCRUMBS 4 EGG YOLKS 1 CUP MILK 1 CUP COCONUT MILK 5 TABLESPOONS BUTTER 6 TBLESPOONS BROWN SUGAR 1 TABLESPOON VANILLA EXTRACT 2 TABLESPOONS MOUNT GAY OR OTHER BARBADIAN RUM 136
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RO N N I L U N DY, J E S S I C A H A R R I S
Chicken Yassa
Coconut Pudding
SERVES 4 TO 6
PREHEAT THE OVEN TO 350 DEGREES.
While the oven is heating, place all the ingredients together in a large bowl and stir them until they are well mixed. Pour the mixture into a large ovenproof casserole. Bake for 1 hour. Serve warm. Recipe from from Sky Juice and Flying Fish: Traditional Caribbean Cooking by Jessica B. Harris, Fireside, 1991. Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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I’D PASSED 19 SUMMERS by the time I could bring myself to eat a beet. To my young and disordered mind, those fat red roots smacked vaguely of veganism. Or possibly hippies. Either way, they were at odds with my Kansas City barbecue upbringing. But the truth is, I knew the sweet, earthy taste of red beets almost as well as that of smoked brisket. In fact, I couldn’t remember a time when I didn’t dote on both. It was blood-red beets, at least indirectly, that made my lunches stand out among those of my grade-school classmates. Unlike every other brown-bag lunch, mine sometimes came with pickled eggs, stained by the beet juice I supposedly hated. My father is to blame. He’s from Pennsylvania, where uncounted generations of Pennsylvania Dutch cooks have baptized hard-boiled eggs in a transformative bath of vinegar and beets. After a day or two in the liquid, the peeled eggs come out pickled, slightly firm—and purple. In Kansas City, in the 1970s, purple eggs were a freaky deal. Pickled eggs, whatever their color, aren’t everyday food. If you see them at all anymore, it’s less likely in a school lunch than in a bar. You know what I’m talking about — a dust-covered jar so big you could pack a head in it lurking in the back counter. Huddled in its murky liquid, a clutch of discolored eggs lies among spent spices; pallid mustard seeds, a drab and broken bay leaf, unidentifiable sludge —and a whiff of sulfur when they’ve been overcooked. Eggs so old and untouched that they’re more embalmed than pickled, eaten in times of desperation and daring. Old-timers swear they rise and sink with changes in the weather. You can keep those feral bar eggs. The small batches of pickled eggs my dad made at home were marinated for a few days in flavored vinegar and eaten within a week. The whites were firm, but still pliant. Not that they were really white anymore; after only a few hours in the jar, the eggs would turn to the color of old wine and, after a day or so, that purple would seep into everything but the yolk. I’ve learned by making more than I could eat in a week, though, that if you leave them in vinegar too long, they shrink into rubbery little disappointments. You’ve got a week to eat them, two at the most. After three weeks in the brine, they’re still edible, just mediocre. Despite their deep purple hue, my dad still calls these “pink” pickled eggs. When I asked him about them recently, I half expected a recipe traced through his family for a hundred years or more out to rural Lancaster County. Forget that we’re not actually from Lancaster County. I’d cobbled together a working recipe from several books, but I assumed his would be the real deal. Nope. He picked up the pink egg habit in Philadelphia. Turns out my older sister tracked down a recipe for him years ago. Unlike 13 8 T heZenchilada.com Fall 2 010
Pink Pickled Eggs 6
HARD-COOKED EGGS, peeled
3 ⁄4
CUP BEET JUICE,
from canned or cooked beets 1⁄4
CUP DRY RED WINE
3 ⁄4
CUP RICE, WINE OR CHAMPAGNE VINEGAR
1
BAY LEAF
1⁄4
TEASPOON WHOLE ALLSPICE
1⁄4
TEASPOON SALT DASH BLACK PEPPER
1
GARLIC CLOVE, crushed
the recipe I’d been using, my dad’s calls for red wine, allspice and garlic. The wine and heavier proportion of beet juice in his makes a richer, darker purple that sets faster but, overall, it’s a more subtly flavored pickle than the more aggressive spices I tend to use. Like me, he also sometimes slips a few shallots or boiling onions into the jar to pickle alongside the eggs. As for the eggs, I’ll slice them thinly for salads or to gild a grilled Cheddar sandwich. Photographs by Douglas Dalay
M AT T HE W ROW L EY
Pickled Eggs PLACE COOKED, PEELED EGGS IN A QUART JAR. Combine beet juice, wine, vinegar, bay leaf, allspice, salt, pepper and garlic in a saucepan and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Do not allow to boil. Pour hot liquid over eggs to fill jar. Cool, cover and refrigerate overnight or longer, if desired. Give the jar a gentle shake now and then or rearrange the eggs gently with a stainless spoon to ensure they color evenly. With a jar of these in the fridge, I know I’ve got quick snacks for after the gym, when I’m running late in the morning, or when I need to eat something less than a meal and dinner’s still a few hours off. When it’s picnic time, I may use these as a base for deviled eggs. You know. To go with the barbecue. CLICK HERE for another Rowley recipe for pickled eggs and some tips on prepping the eggs and serving them.
T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 139
RO CK Y D U R H A M
GREEN CHILE
Chicken Enchiladas with BLUE CORN TORTILLAS
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Nothing says fall in Northern New Mexico like the scent of roasted green chile —and there’s no better way to show off the iconic fruit than in green chile-chicken enchiladas. There are as many ways to prepare the dish as there are norteño cooks; this is one of chef Rocky Durham’s favorites.
Chicken Enchiladas (SERVES 6) 12-15 BLUE CORN TORTILLAS ( recipe follows) 4
CUPS GREEN CHILE SAUCE ( recipe follows) MEAT FROM 1 LARGE ROASTED CHICKEN
1 1⁄2
CUPS MONTEREY JACK CHEESE,
shredded SHREDDED LETTUCE, CHOPPED TOMATOES AND/OR SOUR CREAM, for serving
Blue Corn Tortillas (MAKES ABOUT 16 4-INCH TORTILLAS) 1 1⁄4
CUPS BLUE CORN MASA HARINA
3⁄ 4
CUP YELLOW CORN MASA HARINA
1⁄ 2
TEASPOON SALT
1 1⁄3
CUPS (approximately)
FOR THE TORTILLAS: Place the dry ingredients in a medium bowl and slowly add the water, stirring with a fork until the dough comes together into a ball. Knead the dough several times and roll into a log-shape (like icebox cookies) about 2 inches in diameter and 8 inches long. Wrap the log in plastic wrap and let it stand for about 30 minutes. Preheat a cast iron comal, skillet or griddle over medium-high heat. Cut the log into 1⁄2-inch rounds, keeping it covered so the dough doesn’t dry out. Place one of the rounds between 2 sheets of plastic in a tortilla press and flatten to about 1⁄16-inch thick. Peel off the plastic and place the tortilla in the preheated pan. Cook about 1 minute, until light brown speckles appear. Flip the tortilla and cook 30 seconds, pressing down on the tortilla with a small spatula. Repeat with the remaining rounds. As the tortillas are cooked, stack in a kitchen towel to keep warm while assembling enchiladas. Note: The tortillas may also be made in a food processor. Place the dry ingredients in the work bowl fitted with the steel blade. While the machine is running, slowly pour the warm water through the feed tube and process until the dough forms a ball. Proceed as directed above.
FOR THE GREEN CHILE SAUCE: Sauté onions and garlic in oil over a medium high heat for 4 to 5 minutes stirring frequently. Add green chile and chicken stock and bring to a simmer. Season to taste with salt and pepper and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes. Set aside.
WARM WATER
TO ASSEMBLE ENCHILADAS: In an oven-safe, 9 x 11-
Green Chile Sauce 1 1⁄2
CUPS YELLOW ONION, choppped
2
TEASPOONS GARLIC, minced
1
TABLESPOON VEGETABLE OIL
2
CUPS roasted, peeled, choppped
Repeat until all ingredients are used, finishing with a sprinkle of cheese. Place in a preheated 350-degree oven for 20 minutes or until the top is bubbly and slightly browned.
CUPS CHICKEN STOCK
Serve with shredded lettuce, chopped tomatoes and/or sour cream.
SALT & BLACK PEPPER to taste
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
NEW MEXICO GREEN CHILE 2
inch casserole dish, ladle in enough sauce to just cover the bottom. Cover with a layer of tortillas, then chicken, then cheese.
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What Makes an Enchilada a Zenchilada? For chef Kevin Archer —who left Santa Fe last winter to help set up the Compassionate Cuisine Program at the Catskill Animal Sanctuary in Saugerties, New York—a zenchilada has to be as kind as is it delicious. In part one of the video he made with chef Laura Ramos at The Treehouse Bakery and Café in Santa Fe, Laura makes corn tortillas while Kevin shows us how to use them to put together a vegan enchilada so delicious we won’t miss either the chicken or the egg.
TEMPEH
Chorizo Enchiladas WITH RED CHILE SAUCE TEMPEH CHORIZO 1
POUND TEMPEH, crumbled
2
TABLESPOONS CUMIN SEEDS
1
TEASPOON GARLIC POWDER
1
TEASPOON SMOKED PAPRIKA
1
TEASPOON GROUND CUMIN
1
TEASPOON ground RED NEW MEXICO CHILE ( preferably from Chimayó)
1
TEASPOON SEA SALT
2
TEASPOONS OLIVE OIL
1
TABLESPOON TAMARI
WATCH VIDEO
T E M P E H CH ORIZ O R E D CH I L E S AU C E L E M O N PA R S N I P C R E A M F R E S H CO R N T O RT I L L A S S U N F L OW E R S P RO U TS S W E E T P E P P E R S , S L I C E D C A R RO T & C A B B AG E S L AW TEMPEH CHORIZO
P R E PA R AT I ON
Mix all ingredients well. Spread on baking sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Prepare Tempeh Chorizo according to recipe and keep warm.
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K E V I N A RCH E R
RED CHILE SAUCE MAKES ABOUT 4 QUARTS
1
ONION
5
CLOVES GARLIC
1⁄4
CUP OLIVE OIL
3
QUARTS WATER
1 1⁄2 CUPS NEW MEXICO CHILE POWDER ( preferably from Chimayó) 2 1⁄2 TEASPOONS SEA SALT 1⁄2
TEASPOON FRESHLY GROUND BLACK PEPPER
1
CUP MASA HARINA
WATCH VIDEO
RED CHILE SAUCE
P R E PA R AT I ON
Dice onion and mince garlic. Slowly sauté onion and garlic in olive oil. When soft but not caramelized, add water, chile powder, salt and black pepper. Bring to boil. Simmer for 30 minutes. Whisk masa harina into 3 cups of cold water. When all lumps are gone, whisk this mixture into the simmering chile mixture. Continue to simmer until sauce thickens, about 20 minutes. Prepare Red Chile Sauce according to recipe and keep warm. (The sauce can be made ahead, divided in portions and frozen almost indefinitely.)
LEMON PARSNIP CREAM
P R E PA R ATION
Peel parsnip and cut into small pieces. Bring 2 cups water to boil. Place parsnip in water and reduce to simmer. Simmer till parsnip can be easily pierced with a fork. Put parsnip in blender with the lemon juice, salt, olive oil and 1 cup of the cooking water. Prepare Lemon Parsnip Cream according to recipe and chill until ready to assemble enchiladas.
ASSEMBLY : Heat tortillas in lightly oiled pan or griddle. Place corn tortilla on cutting board. Fill with Tempeh Chorizo. Roll tortilla around filling, and place on plate with folded ends down. Smother with Red Chile Sauce and dress with Lemon Parsnip Cream. Garnish plate with sprouts, sliced sweet peppers and a simple slaw of shredded carrots and cabbage.
LEMON PARSNIP CREAM MAKES ABOUT 1 CUP 3 ⁄4
POUND PARSNIP
1
CUP OF COOKING WATER, reserved JUICE OF 1 LEMON
1⁄4
TEASPOON SALT
1
TEASPOON OLIVE OIL
T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 143
It may be hard to believe, but once upon a time veal and pork were cheap — and chicken was special. Those were the days when politicians promised voters a chicken in every pot, and thrifty homemakers made mock chicken legs out of less desirable meats. Christopher Kolon’s mother served her City Chicken over Haluski, a combination of cabbage and noodles — then topped it all with the savory pan gravy.
CUT THE VEAL AND THE PORK STEAKS
into 1
x 1 1⁄2-inch pieces. Sprinkle them with salt and pepper.
SERVES 4 TO 6
Arrange the veal and pork cubes alternately on 6 skewers. Press the pieces close together into the shape of a drumstick.
1 POUND VEAL STEAK 1 POUND PORK STEAK
Roll the skewered meat in flour.
SALT AND PEPPER
Beat 1 egg with 2 tablespoons water. Dip the sticks into the diluted egg, then roll them in breadcrumbs.
FLOUR 1 EGG
Melt 1/4 cup shortening in a large skillet. Add 1 tablespoon minced onion (optional). Brown meat well in the shortening.
2
Cover the bottom of the skillet with boiling stock (or substitute water). Put a lid on the skillet and cook the skewers over high heat until the meat is tender.
1 ⁄4 CUP SHORTENING
TABLESPOONS WATER BREADCRUMBS
6 EGGS 1
TABLESPOON ONION,
Remove meat from pan and thicken the pan juices with a slurry (2 tablespoons flour to 1 cup of liquid) and cook stirring until it reaches gravy consistency.
minced (optional)
If preferred, the skillet may be covered and placed in a slow, 325degree oven until the meat is tender.
( for thickening gravy)
Haluski 1 (12-OUNCE) PACKAGE EGG NOODLES OR PASTA ( such as farfalle or rotini) 1 ⁄2 CUP BUTTER
1 MEDIUM HEAD GREEN CABBAGE, chopped 1 MEDIUM ONION, chopped 1 CLOVE GARLIC, minced 1 ⁄2 TEASPOON SALT 1 ⁄4 TEASPOON PEPPER
BOILING CHICKEN STOCK or water ADDITIONAL FLOUR
BRING A large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add noodles or pasta, and cook until al dente; drain. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Stir in the cabbage, onion and garlic, and season with salt and pepper. Cook 15 minutes, or until the cabbage and onion are tender. In a large bowl, toss together the cooked pasta and the cabbage mixture. Serve warm. Recipes adapted from The Joy of Cooking by Irma S. Rombauer, Bobbs-Merrill, 1946 edition. Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman
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CH R I STO P H E R KO L O N
City Chicken MOCK CHICKEN LEGS
T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 145
MILES’
Wild Mushroom Potato Hash AND
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MILES JAMES
Up around certain parts of the Ozarks,
the morel mushroom is known as “hickory chicken.” Elsewhere laetiporus, or sulphur shelf mushrooms, are called chicken of the woods, with other varieties bearing such labels as hen of the woods and the fried-chicken mushroom. Obviously, there is something in the delicious fungus that tastes akin to a hen. This recipe comes from James at the Mill, a favorite restaurant in western Arkansas, just on the verge of the mountains (www.jamesatthemill.com). Chef Miles James shared it in Ronni Lundy’s book, Butter Beans to Blackberries: Recipes from the Southern Garden. If you have access to edible wild mushrooms, they can be used or mixed with the more common mushrooms listed here. Sourdough bread makes a lovely sop for the sauce.
PEEL THE POTATOES
and dice them about 1⁄2-inch square. In a large, deep-sided skillet or sauté pan, heat the canola oil over medium high heat. When hot but not smoking, add the potatoes. Cook until they begin to turn golden on the bottom. Use a spatula to gently turn them and brown on the other side, scraping any crust up from the bottom of the pan as you do. While the potatoes are cooking, wipe the mushrooms clean of any grit and remove the stems. Place the stems, thyme and cream in a heavy saucepan, and heat slowly on low.
SERVES 4 AS AN ENTRÉE, 6 TO 8 AS A SIDE DISH 1 1⁄2
POUNDS RUSSET POTATOES
2
TABLESPOONS CANOLA OIL
1⁄2
POUND MIXED “WILD” MUSHROOMS (shiitake, portobello, oyster and crimini are good)
1⁄8
CUP FRESH CHOPPED THYME
1
CUP HEAVY CREAM
1
WHITE ONION, finely diced
1
RED BELL PEPPER, finely diced SALT & PEPPER to taste
Chop the mushroom caps coarsely. When the potatoes begin to brown on the second side, add the mushrooms, onion and bell pepper. Stir to mix, again scraping any potato crust from the bottom of the skillet to prevent burning. Cook until the potatoes, onion and pepper are tender, about 4 minutes. If you need to turn the heat lower to prevent sticking, do, and take a little longer to cook, if necessary. When the vegetables are tender, strain the cream, removing thyme and stems, and add to the hash. Add salt and pepper to taste. Bring to a boil, stirring just enough to keep the mixture from sticking. When the cream boils, remove from heat. Serve warm.
Recipe adapted from Butter Beans to Blackberries, by Ronni Lundy, North Point Press, 1999 Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
147
LUCIA’S
Chicken & Wine
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L U C I L L E M I N U TO
This is a great dish for a buffet or a quick special dinner.
My mother Lucia always thought of it as her signature dish. Since so many people say they don’t like anchovies, she wisely kept the secret ingredient from them. Once all the flavors have been blended together, you can’t taste the anchovies anyway. It’s difficult to give exact amounts of each ingredient. Lucia did this all by taste and trial. I watched her make the dish a number of times, and had to estimate the proportions to recreate it in my own kitchen. A recipe like this also leaves a lot up to the cook’s personal tastes —so experiment, but don’t leave anything out. I’ve sometimes added basil, peas and green or red bell peppers to Lucia’s basic recipe.
PREHEAT THE OVEN TO 350 DEGREES. SERVES 4 TO 6 3- 4
POUNDS OF CHICKEN THIGHS AND WINGS
1⁄2
CUP FLOUR, seasoned to taste with salt and pepper
1⁄4
CUP OLIVE OIL (add more if you need it)
1⁄2
CUP TO 1 CUP DRY WHITE VERMOUTH (or enough to cover the chicken)
1
TIN OF ANCHOVIES PACKED IN OLIVE OIL (or 2-3 teaspoons anchovy paste)
2-3
GARLIC CLOVES, minced
1
ONION, thinly sliced KOSHER SALT to taste
8
OUNCES MUSHROOMS, sliced
Dredge the thighs and wings in seasoned flour. If you use a pot that goes from stovetop to oven, this is a one-pan meal. Sauté the mushrooms in the olive oil until tender. Set aside on a plate. Sauté minced garlic in the olive oil, but don’t let it brown. Add the thinly sliced onion and sauté until tender, again without browning. Set all the veggies aside on a plate and add the dredged chicken to the olive oil (adding more if necessary). Sauté until golden brown, but not cooked all the way through. Place the chicken in a roasting pan or leave it in the oven-safe sauté pan. Add the mushrooms, onion and garlic. Whirl together the anchovies and vermouth in a blender and pour mixture over the chicken and mushrooms. Finish cooking the chicken in the oven — about 30 minutes. Add more salt and pepper to taste if needed.
(I like the small portobellos)
Photographs by Ryannan Bryer de Hickman 14 9
SOUR & SPICE AND EVERY THING NICE
Photograph by APRIL McGREGER 150
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YesWeCanCan IT’S NOT
just Grandma’s Ball jar anymore. A whole new generation is turning to canning and preserving both as a technique for making eating locally a year-round experience, and also simply as a means of creative expression. A couple of young North Carolina women have also made home canning an aspect of their livelihoods. Western North Carolina mountain resident Ashley English, who told us just about everything we needed to know about the urban chicken in Coop De Ville (page 32), is the architect of a new series from Lark Books called Homemade Living. In addition to her Keeping Chickens, Ashley has books on dairy and beekeeping coming up this spring. And she is the author of the delightfully accessible Canning and Preserving: All You Need to Know to Make Jams, Jellies, Pickles, Chutneys & More. It really is all that, but if you like to get your info from the Internet, Ashley recommends some sites, including the comprehensive www.canningusa.com. Over on the other side of the Tarheel state, in Carrboro, April McGreger has established Farmer’s Daughter Brand, selling freshly baked pastries, jams, preserves, chutney and artisan pickles at specialty stores and local farmers markets, from whence she gets most of her raw materials. For those of us who can’t get to the Carrboro Farmer’s Market some fall Saturday, April has graciously offered to share some of her best green tomato recipes here. CLICK HERE for more information on the McGreger operations. —EDITOR This is a favorite with a loyal following. It is a shining addition to country ham or any cured meat, roasted poultry and pork, and makes for a stellar grilled ham and cheese sandwich. It is also a lovely accompaniment to farmstead cheeses, particularly those with a bit of sharpness and an enticing barnyard-y aroma. My favorite is a washed rind, Belgian style Jersey cow's milk cheese called Hickory Grove made by Chapel Hill Creamery in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, WEBSITE. This chutney is a great way to use up those end-of-summer tomatoes hanging on the vine, refusing to ripen. The aroma of
By APRIL McGREGER
sweet spices and warm vinegar simmering on the stove is my harbinger of fall.
GREEN TOMATO CHUTNEY - Makes 2 1⁄2 Pints 2 cups apple cider vinegar 2 cups light brown sugar 3-inch piece of ginger, peeled and sliced thin 1 cinnamon stick 4 whole allspice berries 5 whole cloves 1 1⁄2 pounds green tomatoes, with no trace of pink, cored and cut into 1⁄2" pieces 1 large yellow onion, peeled and diced 1 tablespoon fine sea salt A pinch dried red chile flakes 1 1⁄2 cups black currants (or substitute raisins) 1 tablespoon yellow mustard seed 1 ⁄2 teaspoon celery seed Put the vinegar and sugar in a large, nonreactive saucepan. Bring to boil over high heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat to a steady simmer and cook for 10 minutes. In a piece of cheesecloth, wrap up the sliced ginger, cinnamon stick, allspice berries and cloves, and secure with kitchen twine. Throw in the simmering vinegar syrup. Add the green tomatoes, onion, salt, chile flakes, currants, mustard seed and celery seed to the vinegar mixture and simmer, stirring often, until the tomatoes are tender and the chutney is thick and glossy, about 45 minutes. Remove the spice sachet. Ladle into clean half-pint jars with two-piece lids and process in a boiling water bath for 5 minutes for long keeping, or simply put in sterilized jars and refrigerate for up to 1 month. Note: If you live at a higher altitude, you will need to add 1 minute to the processing time for each foot over 1,000 feet. For example, at Santa Fe’s 7,000foot altitude, we would need to keep the jars in the boiling water bath for 11 to 12 minutes. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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Y ES W E C AN C AN
Traditional cultures all over the world preserved much of the food needed for the winter through lacticacid fermentation. Sauerkraut, kimchi, grape leaves, cucumbers, turnips, green tomatoes, peppers, corn and many, many more vegetables were commonly preserved through this process. Of all methods of preserving, lactofermentation is the most magical. At its simplest, it is just vegetables and salt. This provides the right conditions for nature to take its course. The salt slows the decomposition of the vegetables briefly until the sugars in the vegetables are broken down by friendly lactobacilli and converted into lactic acid to preserve the vegetables for many months. The recipe below is a dill green-tomato pickle with an addition of pickling spices, which gives it an appealing old-fashioned flavor. The pickles are wonderful on their own as a snack, with burgers or sandwiches, or on a meat and cheese platter. You can even get a little crazy and have them battered and fried. You'll experience the perfect marriage of two Southern favorites: fried green tomatoes and fried dill pickles.
LACTO-FERMENTED SPICY GREEN TOMATO PICKLES - Makes 2 quarts 2 quarts quartered green tomatoes, with no trace of pink (those will be mushy) 5 cloves garlic, smashed A large handful dill (preferably dill heads or flowering dill, but fronds only will suffice. You may substitute 1 teaspoon of dried dill weed.) 1 heaping tablespoon pickling spice 5 dried chiles de arbol or more (or substitute any fresh hot pepper) 1 quart of filtered water 3 tablespoons fine sea salt For crunchier pickles, add a few grape or sour cherry leaves
NECESSARY EQUIPMENT - 1-gallon stoneware crock, OR a food grade plastic bucket, or other nonreactive container to hold your pickles, such as a large glass jar - Measuring cup and measuring spoons - Plate that will fit snugly inside the rim of your container, or two plastic Ziploc bags large enough to cover the surface of your pickling crock.
INSTRUCTIONS In a clean crock or other pickling vessel, layer well-washed vegetables and spices. Leave about 4 inches at the top of crock. Prepare brine with cold, filtered water. Whisk well to completely dissolve the salt and pour the brine over vegetables. The brine should just cover vegetables. Next, you need to weigh down vegetables to keep them fully submerged in the brine. You can do this by using a plate that just fits inside the crock, thus creating a seal, and weighting it with a well-scrubbed, large rock or several quart jars that have been filled with water and covered so that the water does not spill. Cover all of that with a clean dishtowel or cheesecloth. Alternately, you can use a plastic bag filled with brine to act as both a weight and a seal. I often use this method. Fit a heavy 1-gallon plastic freezer bag inside another (for larger than 2 gallon crocks, I use the 2-gallon bags). Fill the inner bag with a salt brine of 3 tablespoons salt to 1 quart of water and tightly close both bags to prevent leaks. Place on top of the pickles, making sure it fits tightly around the inner edge of the crock. It acts as an airtight weight on top of the vegetables, which will discourage the growth of yeast and scum. Store the crock in a cool place (60° to 75°F). Liquid may bubble and seep from the pickles as they ferment, so place the crock on a tray to contain any overflow. Check the pickles every day and skim off any scum, yeast, or mold that forms. At temperatures above 70°F, yeast and mold are more aggressive, so fermenting in a cooler environment requires less maintenance. The pickles will take about 4-10 days to complete fermentation, depending on the temperature— cooler temperatures slow fermentation. You will know that fermentation is complete when bubbles are no longer rising to the surface of the pickles and they have a fresh, tart smell. Taste the brine. If the saltiness is not balanced with sourness, you can let the pickles continue to ferment another day or two. Store the finished pickles in the refrigerator, where they will keep for up to a year as long as you keep them under brine. If you fermented in a large stoneware crock, you may transfer the pickles to sterilized pint jars for storage. You may also process the pickles in a water bath for shelf storage, but you will kill the beneficial bacteria and probiotics that make the pickles so healthful. For more about April McGreger, see page 162.
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READMOREABOUTIT B O O K S R E L AT E D T O T H E FA L L 2 010 E D I T I O N O F T H E Z E N CH I L A DA . C O M
HOLIDAY EGGS, Georgeanne Brennan BUY BOOK
THE SOUL OF A NEW CUISINE Marcus Samuelsson BUY BOOK
THE WELCOME TABLE, Jessica B. Harris BUY BOOK
MEMORY OF FIRE, Eduardo Galeano BUY BOOK
IRON POTS, WOODEN SPOONS Jessica B. Harris BUY BOOK
SKY JUICE AND FLYING FISH Jessica B. Harris BUY BOOK
DANCE OF THE EGGSHELLS Carla Aragón BUY BOOK QUICK AND EASY THAI, Nancie McDermott BUY BOOK
THE FESTIVE TABLE, Ronni Lundy BUY BOOK
DANCE OF THE EGGSHELLS (Baile de Cascarones) Bilingual CD by Carla Aragón (Spirited Voice and Talent, 2010)
SHUCK BEANS, STACK CAKES, AND HONEST FRIED CHICKEN Ronni Lundy BUY BOOK
BUTTER BEANS TO BLAKBERRIES, Ronni Lundy BUY BOOK
RANCHO DE CHIMAYÓ COOKBOOK, Cheryl and Bill Jamison BUY BOOK
THE BORDER COOKBOOK, Cheryl and Bill Jamison BUY BOOK T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010 153
AMERICAN FARMER: THE HEART OF OUR COUNTRY Photographs by Paul Mobley, Text by Katrina Fried Welcome Books, 2009 BUY BOOK Although he initially kept his summer’s work close to his chest, within a few months of returning home Mobley had negotiated a contract with Welcome Books — and the portraits of the 40 farmers he photographed in Leelanau County grew into a portfolio of more than 50,000 images of 300 farmers and ranchers in 37 states. Although the farmers were an unusual subject for Mobley, a successful advertising photographer based in New York City, the images are shot in the same in-yourface style of graphic portraiture for which he is known in commercial-art circles.
THEY
stand in front of barns, tractors, fences, horses, livestock, fields of grain, corn and sunflowers; holding roosters, pigs, cats, hats, pitchforks and other tools of their trade. At rest for the moment, they stand alone or in the company of family and dogs. They are the more than 200 farmers and ranchers featured in American Farmer: The Heart of Our Country — a celebration of the hard-working but largely unsung men and women who feed us. What began as a spur-of-the-moment inspiration — photographer Paul Mobley asking a pig farmer he met at a coffee shop in Glen Arbor, Michigan, if he could come by the farm to take his picture—turned into a three-year, 100,000-mile journey that not only produced a best-selling, award-winning coffee table book, but also changed the way Mobley experienced the world around him. “I remember taking his picture kind of brought me back to why I got into photography,” Mobley said in a recent phone interview, “because there was nobody telling me how to do it or what to do, or giving me a lot of direction like what you get when you shoot advertising work and there’s 20 cooks in the kitchen. I just put the camera to my eye and thought, ‘I’m going to do this the way I want to do it — and if nobody likes it, I don’t care. It’s just what I want to do.’ And I liked that session that I did with him so much that I just spent the rest of the summer photographing every farmer in the county.”
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The book’s cover, a portrait of Dave Harris, a cattle rancher in Crane, Montana, is an iconic image for him, Mobley said. “We were finishing the day and I saw this red wall on one of his barns, and I said, ‘Hey, Dave … Why don’t you pick up that rooster …’ and there was this calm-at-the-end-of-a-storm kind of moment, where the animal had calmed down and the lighting was perfect and you can see the peace in his eyes … red, white and blue … “American Farmer” … it’s the perfect picture.” The accolades he’s received for the book — which will go into a second printing in January 2011— are gratifying, Mobley said, but less important than the life lessons he learned while visiting farms and ranches. “I embarked on this project as a photographer in search of artistic evolution, and I found it,” he writes in the afterward to American Farmer. “But the exquisite and unexpected discovery was of a kinder and gentler world and way of life than any I had known before. … With every farmer and rancher I met, I was newly astonished, humbled and deeply inspired by the generosity and warmth shown to me … Entering into this rural culture, this family of farmers, had revived my own sense of spirit and optimism.” Looking deeply into the faces collected here, it’s easy to understand why. —PATRICIA WEST-BARKER To read Paul Mobley’s blog, CLICK HERE. To view more images from American Farmer and from Mobley’s advertising photography, CLICK HERE. To buy a signed copy of American Farmer, or learn more about the print editions available through Mobley’s Santa Fe representatives, the Monroe Gallery of Photography, CLICK HERE.
READMOREABOUTIT B O O K S R E L AT E D T O T H E FA L L 2 010 E D I T I O N O F T H E Z E N CH I L A DA . C O M
SMOKE AND SPICE, Cheryl and Bill Jamison BUY BOOK
BRAZILIAN COOKERY, Margarette de Andrade
BEST FOOD WRITING 2008 Holly Hughes BUY BOOK
THE JOY OF COOKING Irma S. Rombauer BUY BOOK
MY LIFE IN FRANCE, Julia Child, Alex Prud’homme BUY BOOK
DEVILED EGGS, Debbie Moose BUY BOOK
URBAN HOMESTEAD, Erik Knutzen, Kelly Coyne BUY BOOK
KEEPING CHICKENS, Ashley English BUY BOOK
CANNING AND PRESERVING, Ashley English BUY BOOK
FRIED CHICKEN, Damon Lee Fowler BUY BOOK
FRIED CHICKEN: AN AMERICAN STORY John T. Edge BUY BOOK
CHICKEN: 150 GREAT RECIPES, Elaine Corn, Sergio Baradat BUY BOOK
365 WAYS TO COOK AN EGG, Elaine Corn BUY BOOK
IDANA FUN ORISA, John Mason BUY BOOK
DIVINE HORSEMEN, Maya Deren BUY BOOK
AUTHENTIC MEXICAN, Rick Bayless BUY BOOK T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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RESOURCES:BO OKS
JUST A COUPLE OF CHICKENS Corinne Tippett Westchester Press, 2009 BUY BOOK
WHAT’S
chick-lit without the romance? A darn good read if we’re referring to Corinne Tippett’s insightful and downright funny memoir of contemporary homesteading in a collapsing economy. Corinne and her husband, Andrew, bought a twoacre parcel of stony New Mexico land about 45 minutes east of Santa Fe in the 1990s because, she writes, “we wanted to live somewhere outside of the city to grow our souls.” “We had few neighbors, but plenty of wilderness, beauty and fresh air,” she notes. “Our souls were growing like weeds. We’d gotten back to Mother Nature and found her to be an uncompromising bitch who rarely gave second chances. We spent a lot of time fending her off with a stick.” But the Tippetts were tenacious. Corinne left her career to become a stay-at-home mom when their first daughter, Blue, was still nursing. Andrew began to create a viable contracting business. Still strapped for cash, particularly after their second daughter, Juno, arrived, and looking for some sort of creative fulfillment as well, Corinne came up with a novel cottage industry: raising chickens and other fowl to sell blown eggs and feathers online to crafters.
PARISIAN HOME COOKING, Michael Roberts BUY BOOK
AN OMELETTE AND A GLASS OF WINE, Elizabeth David BUY BOOK
THE PENGUIN COMPANION TO FOOD, Alan Davidson BUY BOOK
A NEW BOOK OF MIDDLE EASTERN FOOD, Claudia Roden BUY BOOK
LE PATISSIER FRANÇOIS, Robert May
LA COCINA DE MAMÁ Penelope Casas BUY BOOK
It began innocently enough when Andrew suggested buying a couple of chicks for their daughters “to help them learn about the cycle of life.” “I was against the idea, already overwhelmed by the cycle of life,” was Corinne’s initial response, but soon she was ordering chicks of all sorts from a hatchery catalog and driving into town in pajamas in the wee hours to fetch her birds from the post office. Just a Couple of Chickens brings the impromptu barnyard that resulted to vibrant life. And lest you think that Corinne’s wry— okay, sometimes very dark— sense of humor makes her the Anti-Annie-Dillard, there are passages that describe the rare beauty of rising in a New Mexico dawn and others that also look deeper into the philosophies of country life. 156
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COOKING WITH CAFE PASQUAL’S, Katharine Kagel, Kitty Leaken BUY BOOK
COOKING WITH JOHNNY VEE, John Vollertsen, Kitty Leaken BUY BOOK
JUST A COUPLE OF CHICKENS BOOK REVIEW (continued) “I was a worm farmer now,” she muses about her practical foray into raising mealworms for her brood, “and I’d learned the patience of the worm. It was a segmented way of thinking, with a view of the changing state of life. The shape of my inner mind no longer chained me. I knew that I could metamorphose and change my entire being to accomplish a new purpose. I could wait and I could worm. Worm Queen, I set up my boxes and waited for my new subjects.” As for her quirky business idea, a couple of years of modestly growing sales vaulted into a new dimension when her website, TheFeatheredEgg.com, was featured prominently in the Easter 2009 issue of Martha Stewart Living. If this were fictional chick-lit, this is where the story would rosily end. But Corinne’s tale is real life, and real life, particularly for real people in recent years, has been anything but rosy. And while the Martha recognition was a balm to Corinne’s ego, it was a financial boon too small and too late to save the family farm. Working diligently to get beyond the typical debt of any young American family of the era, Corinne and Andrew had rented out their small, beautifully crafted country house, and bought, gutted and remodeled a single-wide trailer that the four could live in on their property. Andrew’s contracting business had steadily grown and was showing a good profit. Following the wisdom of the era that promised real estate was a sure investment, they’d bought a condo in Santa Fe and began living there part-time to make it simpler for the girls to go to good schools. As 2007 ended, it looked as if they would soon be out of debt and well on the way to a stable economic future. Then the economy crashed.
“I felt like we’d been caught in an awful game of freeze tag where everyone was forced to stand in place with only what they had in hand at the time…” Corinne writes. But it was worse than that. Andrew’s business dried up as clients whose money had vanished with the stock market canceled contracts. New work was nonexistent and fellow contractors began calling to see if he knew of any jobs. Virtually overnight, neither the condo nor the country property was marketable. It’s a story that will resonate with most readers, but there is a particular irony here. The contemporary back-to-the-land movement that began in the 1970s and returned with a new generation and new vigor in recent times has been fueled by the firm belief that a rural lifestyle offers real protection against just the sort of economic collapse 2008 brought. But sky-rocketing land prices and the resulting high mortgages during the latest property boom (and their subsequent plunge in the resulting bust), and the ever-rising price of gas and its impact on the price of everything else, have changed that dream drastically. The reality is that now rural life is, for all but a few, as expensive as living in the city. That said, Just a Couple of Chickens ends on a cautiously optimistic note followed by a truly succinct and helpful reference section that covers everything from “How to Tell If a Hen is Laying” to “The Truth About Mobile Homes.” Visitors to TheFeatheredEgg.com and Corinne’s blog there, however, will learn that while the blown egg and feather business continues on back stock, the family has moved to Portland, Oregon. There, Corinne is contemplating an urban chicken version of her business and a new book. Who knows where The Worm Queen’s next metamorphosis will lead? —RONNI LUNDY THE WAR OF THE SAINTS Jorge Amado Bantam Books, 1995 BUY BOOK The inclusion of the distinctive icon of Santa Barbara of the Thunder in an exhibit at the Museum of Sacred Art in the Brazilian city of Bahia is to be the crowning glory of director/curator Dom Maximiliano von Gruden, the German friar who starts the action rolling in Jorge Amado’s The War of the Saints. His congruently released book on the unusual statue, he believes, will seal his fame in the realms of culture, the church and even T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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RESOURCES:VIDEOS/SITES politics. But there are forces at work in Bahia that are not concerned with the official affairs and affirmations of this world. Or, perhaps more accurately, that are determined to upend the rules and self-righteousness of same in favor of that which is real — meaning that which celebrates love and life. So it is that when the sloop bearing the wooden image in its bow docks, Santa Barbara stands and shakes off her rigid Catholic designation, assumes her ancient African role as the orisa Oya or Yansan, and begins to stir the ritual pots of Carnivál with added chaos, magic and spice. Amado began his career as a political writer, but revealed his true lyrical voice in the rich mixture of magical realism, satire and sheer exuberance that characterizes both Doña Flor and Her Two Husbands and The War of the Saints. The latter novel deftly skewers everyone who thinks he or she has the world defined and under control — and does it to a samba beat spiked with the intoxicating scents of cinnamon, palm oil, coconut milk and a multitude of peppers. Candomble, capoeira and the Catholicism of Liberation theology weave together with enough eating, drinking and making merry to set forth a spiritual cosmology of nourishment for body and mind, spirit and soul. —RONNI LUNDY FIRST THE EGG Laura Vaccaro Seeger Roaring Book Press, 2007 BUY BOOK Yes, it’s an award-winning children’s book with captivating drawings, die-cut pages, simple words and a storyline that loops back on itself in that way that utterly delights the toddler set. But Seeger’s seemingly simple text may well serve the same purpose as a Zen koan for any older, “wiser” reader who shares the pleasure of leafing through it with a young friend. The confident surety of the title and cover is upended when the dust jacket is removed to reveal that the white underneath the cut-out egg is part of a fat hen illustrating the hard-jacket’s other title, First the Chicken. No resolution to the riddle is provided inside, only more illustrations (tadpole/frog, seed/flower, word/story) to limn the eternal looping that is life. Is the “message” here that we are to let go of our grown-up urge for definition, for a clear beginning and end, and instead approach the world with the elastic wonder of a child, able to hold paradox as gently as a hen — or an egg—in the hand? —RONNI LUNDY 158
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ZEN MIND, CHEF’S MIND “Nothing!” is chef Kevin Archer’s answer to our cosmic question, “What makes an enchilada a Zenchilada?” Still, in the spirit of “chop wood, carry water,” with the help of chef Laura Ramos, Kevin prepares Tempeh Chorizo Enchiladas with Red Chile WATCH VIDEO Sauce and Lemon Parsnip Cream—a vegan oasis in an animal protein-packed issue. See page 142 for the recipe. THE MUSIC that accompanies the cook—“Vals de CadenaChimayó”—is also a Northern New Mexico tradition—one of the historic Spanish American dance tunes collected by the WPA in 1936-1937, transcribed by Taos musician Jenny Vincent (now 97 years old ) and performed by the Jenny Vincent Trio. Limited copies of the CD are available from violinist Audrey Davis. For more information or to place an order, send an e-mail to wmdavis@newmex.com or a letter to P.O. Box 1642, Taos, NM 87571. SOME LIKE IT HOT: New Mexicans love their burgers almost as much as they love green chile. “The green chile cheeseburger has been a staple on menus here since the middle of the last century,” says the state’s Green Chile Burger Trail website. “Burgers gained in popularity during the glory years of American road travel, when the asphalt ribbon Route 66 bisected New Mexico from west to east.” For profiles of more than 40 burger joints across the state that do the pepper proud, as well as maps and videos and other burger lore, CLICK HERE. LUPE & LAUREL AND HARDY— OH, MY! Some eggs are not for eating or for hatching —unless it’s to give birth to a classic comedy routine captured first in 1934’s Hollywood Party — a plotless MGM musical comedy built around the studio’s stars. Egg on your face isn’t the half of it! WATCH
RESOURCES:VIDEOS/SITES WHICH CAME FIRST? Thirties comics aren’t the only ones to throw a few eggs around. Lost Moon Radio — an LA-based comedy-rock-theater group —tosses a few bawdy chickens and a risqué rap single from 1988 into the mix while it offers new ways of looking at that age-old question. Fowl, but fun! CLICK HERE.
Y’ALL COME, NOW… MSNBC.com may have voted the Alabama Chicken & Egg Festival one of the country’s wackiest festivals—but organizers say not. It’s an “interactive agricultural experience” that includes live music, arts, crafts, food booths and yes, wing and hard-boiled egg eating contests. Held in Moulton, Alabama, for the past six years, the 2011 festival is scheduled for April 9 and 10. For more information, CLICK HERE. BOILING POINT Egg Watchers, a video-based egg timer, asks a few good questions about the size, temperature and preferred doneness of your egg—then entertains you with randomly selected YouTube videos while you wait. Warning: The timer doesn’t ask about altitude, which can add minutes to cooking an egg. Also, during some test runs, we got only the timer. Random is as random does, we guess… CLICK HERE.
THE SALMONELLA
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questions about how we raise and market the food we eat. Because it is a universal question that ultimately must be answered with a keen awareness of the vast diversity of incomes, cultures, geographies, climates and individual capabilities, no sweeping generalizations or broad panaceas will do. Some of us have the luxury of choice. We can support small and sustainable farm practices via farm markets, CSAs, co-ops, and the restaurants and stores that patronize them. Some of us may even choose, as several of the writers and artists in this issue do, to raise our own chickens and/or eggs. (For a thoughtful discourse on why free-range hens appear to be less susceptible to Salmonella, visit award-winning journalist Barry Estabrook’s website CLICK HERE.) But such choices are not available to everyone. But we cannot afford to lose the awareness that such choices are not available to everyone. Our survival as a species may well depend on our ability to balance the yin yang of both local and global awareness and responsibility. As one small move in this complicated juggling act, we include this link to a Slow Food USA video addressing issues of government regulation and food safety CLICK HERE. And, if you are so moved, you can join the organization’s call to action CLICK HERE. STILL HAVEN’T HAD ENOUGH? Check out The Natural History of the Chicken, an award-winning 2001 documentary by filmmaker Mark Lewis. To learn more about it and watch the trailer, CLICK HERE. If you want to see why Roger Ebert said this is no ordinary chicken movie, it’s available for rental on Netflix.
AS WE ASSEMBLED a delightful collection of articles for this issue about two of the world's most fundamental foods, the chicken and the egg, a most undelightful event began unfolding: By August 30, 2010, more than 1,500 cases of Salmonella poisoning had been documented and more than half a billion eggs recalled by two related Iowa egg farms. Joe Fassler’s September 16th piece for the Atlantic outlines a frightening pattern of abuse by the owner of both farms going back decades, and makes it clear why the debate that has followed this latest food safety crisis has focused not only on U.S. government food oversight—it appears that the farms’ owner is getting only a warning letter from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration—but has also raised far deeper and broader
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CONTRIBUTORS I S S U E N o . 2 • CH I CK E N & E G G • FA L L 2 010
Ryannan Bryer de Hickman is a freelance Carla Aragón
is an Emmy Award-winning journalist with 38 years of broadcast experience. Carla left television news in 2007 to pursue other interests, including writing Dance of the Eggshells/Baile de los Cascarones, a bilingual children’s book, which is a finalist for two 2010 New Mexico Book Awards. She enjoys gardening, traveling, white-water rafting and spending time with her husband, Allen Lewis, and their two rescue dogs. For more information go to www.carla-aragon.com.
Chef Kevin Archer
follows a very simple concept, best expressed in the Upanishads: "First learn about food. Food is Brahman." Kevin studied with Joanne Saltzman of the School of Natural Cookery in Boulder, Colorado, and Cheri Soria of Living Light Culinary Institute in California. He is currently establishing a culinary training program in conjunction with the Catskill Animal Sanctuary, educating chefs, home cooks and everyone who wants to have a more peaceful and sustainable diet. Reach Kevin through his website, www.thegoodchefkev.com, or follow his blog at www.chefkevinarcher.com. For more about the program at the Catskill Animal Sanctuary, visit www.casanctuary.org.
Richard Bram
built his early career in public relations, public events, performance and portrait work. After moving to London in 1997, he concentrated on street photography and other personal photographic projects; in 2001 he joined In-Public.com, the international street photographers' collective. Now living in New York City, Richard’s work is in many institutional, corporate and private collections, including the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, the Museum of London and the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography. Find his work at www.richardbram.com and www.in-public.com/RichardBram. 160
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editorial and fine art photographer who spends all her free time cultivating a vineyard and making wine. Her work has appeared in many magazines and newspapers. She works with both traditional film and digital cameras in a variety of formats. Learn more about Sotto Il Monte Vine-yards and Ryannan Bryer de Hickman’s other passions at http://sottoilmontevineyards.blogspot.com/.
Richard Cady
has worked in advertising and promotion as a graphic designer for almost five decades. When he arrived in the Southwest 12 years ago, he was told (more than once) that his totem animal was a squirrel — which may account for his being an enthusiastic collector of American Arts and Crafts furniture and pottery, classical music and Golden Age movies. He lives in Santa Fe with his wife, two dogs and a cat that thinks he’s a dog.
Elaine Corn
is a former news editor turned food editor and author. She has headed up food sections for the Louisville CourierJournal and Sacramento Bee, and written six cookbooks, including Now You're Cooking: Everything a Beginner Needs to Know to Start Cooking Today, which won both Julia Child and James Beard culinary awards. Follow Elaine’s work at http://zesterdaily.com or listen to her public radio spots http://www.capradio.org/about/bios/elaine-corn To order an autographed copy of 365 Ways to Cook Eggs from her, send an e-mail to bigslabofbutter@gmail.com.
Douglas Dalay
is a San Diego -based digital artist.H is photographs have appeared in print and online for such publications as Rowley's Whiskey Forge and Salon.com. This is Douglas Dalay’s first assignment for The Zenchilada.com. Contact him at douglasdalay@cox.net
CONTRIBUTORS Rocky Durham, a native Santa Fean, began his culinary career at age 13, washing dishes in a French bistro. He later studied classical French technique at Western Culinary Institute in Portland, Oregon. After a four-year stint as chef de cuisine at SantaCafe, Rocky moved to England, where he opened eight restaurants — all bearing the name of his hometown— in eight cities. While in England, he wrote and presented Plates from the States, a television program examining the regional offerings of the 50 U.S. states. Rocky is now culinary director of the Santa Fe School of Cooking www.santafeschoolofcooking.com. He can be reached at rockydurham@usa.net.
Ashley English
and her husband live in Candler, North Carolina, with their menagerie of chickens, dogs, cats and soon-to-be son. She is the author of the Homemade Living book series published by Lark Books. Ashley writes a weekly column on Design Sponge www.designspongeonline.com/category/small-measures and about her adventures converting her land to a homestead on her own blog: http://small-measure.blogspot.com.
Patricia Greathouse
is a fourth generation New Mexican. She co-owned Santa Fe’s iconic Jefferson Street Soup Company in the 1970s, taught English and music and played in a mariachi band before becoming a food writer. She currently lives in the Pojoaque Valley with her husband, two dogs, a cat and 10 chickens. Her non-fiction book, Mariachi, published in June 2009, weaves tales of contemporary mariachi life, extensive historical research and dozens of recipes into a tapestry as colorful as the music it celebrates. Reach her at cwb@cybermesa.com.
Jessica B. Harris
is the author of seven critically acclaimed cookbooks documenting the foods and culinary history of the African Diaspora, including Iron Pots and Wooden Spoons: Africa’s Gifts to New
World Cooking, Sky Juice and Flying Fish: Traditional Caribbean Cooking and The Africa Cookbook: Tastes of a Continent. A culinary historian, she has lectured on African-American foodways at numerous institutions and colleges throughout the United States and abroad. Professor Harris has made numerous television appearances, including a stint as the resident food historian on Sara Moulton’s Cooking Live Primetime on the Television Food Network. She is currently working on Beyond Gumbo: Creole Fusion Food from the Atlantic Rim and a scholarly investigation entitled Nyam: A History of African American Foodways. Her website is http://Africooks.com.
Lynne Harty thought that when she was asked to join the team at Lark Crafts as the photographer for the Homemade Living series, the job sounded nice. But after an exquisite al fresco dinner at author Ashley English’s farmhouse with the Lark team, where they explained that these books would focus on “homesteading” endeavors, she knew she was part of something special. Read about Lynne’s photo shoots in the beautiful Appalachian countryside of Asheville, North Carolina, at http://lynnehartyphotography.blogspot.com/. Find her work at www.lynneharty.com.
Vic Hogsett
is a native New Mexican who learned to cook on wood stoves in the San Francisco River Valley. He has spent much of his life in the Santa Fe area, where he’s still trying to figure out how to reproduce the flavor of his abuela’s red chile.
Elodie Holmes studiedceramics at Montgomery College in Rockville, Maryland, and glass and ceramics at California College of the Arts in Oakland. When she relocated to Santa Fe in 1981, her initial passion for ceramics gave way to hot glass. With her work represented in galleries around the United States, Elodie continues to make glass art at Liquid Light Glass, her studio in Santa Fe. She also helped establish the Baca Street Studios, one of Santa Fe’s hottest new areas for artists. See more of Elodie’s work on her website, www.liquidlightglass.com. Her glass egg (page 42) is available through www.santafeps.net. T h e Zen c h i l a d a . c o m J u l y 2010
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CONTRIBUTORS Anna Keene
took to working with steel almost as though she were born to do it. In fact, it wasn't long after setting up Flying Hammer Forge that she discovered her greatgreat-grandfather had been a blacksmith in Tennessee. She divides her attention equally between sculptural pieces —like the bird's nest featured on page 170 — and utility pieces such as gates and fire screens. Anna makes her home in Bernalillo, New Mexico, with her husband and their 3-year-old son, Jasper. See more of Anna’s work at www.facebook.com/flyinghammerforge.
Christopher Kolon is a freelance writer specializing in food, lifestyle and personality profiles for such publications as New Mexico Magazine, Fiery Foods & BBQ Magazine and Veranda. In addition to journalism, Kolon has enjoyed careers as a chef, cooking teacher and business entrepreneur. Follow Chris’ adventures as an expatriate living in Graz, Austria, for the winter of 2010-2011 at http://forbetterorwurst.wordpress.com. Kitty Leaken lives in Santa Fe with her husband, editor Daniel Gibson, but spends as much time as possible in a straw-bale cabin in Northern New Mexico. Her books include Cooking with Cafe Pasqual's, Cooking with Johnny Vee and the upcoming Native American Artists: The Contemporary Masters. Her first book, Art of Exile, grew out of her work with Art Refuge, an ongoing art therapy program for Tibetan refugee children and orphaned girls in Sri Lanka. Kitty is currently researching a book about tea. See her portfolio and learn more about her books at www.kittyleaken.com. Ronni Lundy is the editor-inchief of TheZenchilada.com and the 2009 recipient of the Craig Claiborne Lifetime Achievement Award for food writing. Her books about food include Shuck Beans, Stack Cakes and Honest Fried Chicken, and Butter Beans to Blackberries. She is currently working on a tribute to bluegrass music pioneer Bill Monroe, and loves to 162
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write about music when it’s got a beat and she can dance to it. Lundy lives outside Santa Fe, between a rock and a beautiful place. Find her at ronnilundy@thezenchilada.com.
April McGreger
is the proprietress of Farmer's Daughter Brand Pickles and Preserves (www.farmersdaughterbrand.com) in Carrboro, North Carolina. She also writes a monthly column called Farmers Daughter for www.Grist.org that focuses on seasonal Southern food.
Lucille Minuto
learned everything she needed to know about food, love and life in her mother’s Providence, Rhode Island, kitchen. Her 40-year career as a human sexuality educator led to the natural pairing of her interests in Appetites, a book in process about food, sexuality and their sensual convergence. Lucille believes that living in ethnically diverse Rhode Island expands her opportunities for cultural adventures in food and relationships. She loves spending time in New York City and taking advantage of all things new. Reach her at Lucie111@verizon.net.
Debbie Moose
of Raleigh, North Carolina, is the author of four cookbooks. A former food editor for The News & Observer of Raleigh, she writes an award-winning column, “Sunday Dinner,” for the paper. She also co-authors “Tasteful Garden,” a column on growing your own food and cooking it. Debbie’s work has appeared in Our State, Midwest Living, Gastronomica and other publications, as well as on JanNorris.com. Read her blog at www.debbiemoose.com or follow her on Twitter @DebbieMoose.
Kim Moss,
a painter as well as a chef and baker, studied painting in Italy for two years, where learning about food became almost as important as drawing. Following his European studies, he worked for 25 years at New England inns and restaurants and established
CONTRIBUTORS a catering company in New York City. Kim now lives in Santa Fe, where painting, cooking and writing fill his time when he’s not distracted by dreams of taking his Airstream on the open road. Reach him at kim45moss@earthlink.net.
Jackie Olenick
creates Judaic illuminations based on her favorite Torah text, psalms and prayers in several media. She also designs multidimensional,personalized ketubot (traditional wedding contracts) for the bride and groom. Jackie’s intention is to bring blessing and holy reminders to every home through her art. Her work can be found in public and private collections in North and South America, Europe, Israel and Australia. Jackie also teaches handson workshops for temples, schools and other organizations. To see more of her work or contact her, visit www.jackieolenickart.com.
Diane Perkins
was an insurance company startup expert for 25 years when she chucked it all in for Le Cordon Bleu de Paris to become a pastry chef. After stages (apprenticeships) in France, England and Canada, with the superior pastry degree in hand, Diane was pastry chef at Santa Fe’s Coyote Café for three years. She now operates a wholesale pastry business and is a private chef in Santa Fe. Diane also is at work on a book linking Arab foodways to the unique cuisine of Northern New Mexico. Contact her at chefdianeperkins@gmail.com.
Jane Phillips
is an awardwinning photojournalist who has worked in the field for 20 years. A native New Yorker, she began her career working for New York Newsday, UPI, The New York Times and The New York Post. She has been a staff photographer at The Santa Fe New Mexican since 1995. In South Africa this past fall, she documented artists in their environments to promote the Mpumalanga 2009 Folk Art Market in that country. See more of Jane’s work at janephillipsphotography.com.
Laura Ramos’ food has delighted diners at such Santa Fe landmarks as SantaCafe, La Casa Sena, La Choza and La Posada de Santa Fe. Originally from Cancún, Laura draws from Mayan, Central American and Mexican cultures to create her own distinctive flavors. Prior to immigrating to the U.S. 12 years ago, Laura was a 20-year veteran circus performer. In her family’s troupe, she performed on the tightrope and trapeze and rode a motorcycle in the globo de muerte. Her most enduring role, however, was that of clown. Today chef Laura brings smiles to colleagues and diners at the Tree House Pastry Shop and Café. Reach her through the restaurant’s website, www.treehousepastry.com.
Pat Reed has worked, in times past, as a journalist for American newspapers and magazines and as a humanitarian consultant in the world’s war zones. Today, she writes about food from Oaxaca, Mexico, an exciting place to experience one branch of the world’s food. Contact her at preed5@hotmail.com.
Anne Richmond Boston, mother of one daughter, singer of many songs, designer of many printed things, lives in Colbert, Georgia, with her three dogs, three cats and two hens. See her work at annerichmondboston.blogspot.com.
Matthew Rowley, “Proof
of Life” columnist, is a freelance writer and editor who traveled more than 14,000 miles and interviewed more than 50 extra-legal distillers to debunk the notion that moonshining is a dead or dying craft. The result is his book Moonshine: Recipes, Tall Tales, Drinking Songs, Historical Stuff, KneeSlappers, How to Make It, How to Drink It, Pleasin’ the Law, Recoverin' the Next Day. He lives in southern California, where he maintains Rowley’s Whiskey Forge, a sporadic blog about food, drinks and the people who make them. Find him at http://matthew-rowley.blogspot.com.
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CONTRIBUTORS Lora Smith
wrote “Goodbye, Chicken Dog” while living and working at Celebrity Dairy in Siler City, North Carolina, where she spent an intensive internship caring for the farm’s herd of 60 goats and making artisanal cheese. She now lives in Carrboro, North Carolina, with her husband, Joe Schroeder, and works as the national outreach director for Deep Down, a documentary film exploring mountaintop removal coal mining in Kentucky that will air on the Independent Lens PBS series on November 23, 2010. Lora is always looking for ways to balance her love of food with issues of social justice in her home region. To learn more about the film, visit www.deepdownfilm.org.
Beth Surdut worked in a chicken house in Israel when she was 17 years old, collecting eggs from hundreds of cranky hens. She has never wanted to raise chickens, although she does consider ravens and alligators boon companions. Beth would love to hear your stories about ravens for inclusion in her project, Listening To Raven~ Drawings, Myths & Realities. When interacting with humans, Beth designs painted silk prayer shawls, healing head scarves and wedding canopies. For more information about the full range of her work, visit www.bethsurdut.com.
Charles E. Veilleux III
was born in New England but has been living west of the Mississippi since 1980, integrating the different textures of his surroundings and life into his high-relief color field paintings. Charles also teaches pysanky workshops—the traditional Ukrainian art of wax-relief egg decoration — in his Santa Fe studio and in private homes. For more information about Charles’ art, visit www.veilleuxfineart.com for information about his Christmas or Easter pysanky workshops, send an e-mail to ceviii@yahoo.com.
Sue Vorenberg
has written for several print publications including The Santa Fe New Mexican, The Albuquerque Tribune and New Mexico magazine. She recently moved to Portland, Oregon, where she works as a freelance writer. Her blog, which includes musings on food, television, music and a host of other random topics, is online at www.explodingegg.com.
Dave Weyermann has been a photo editor/designer for Rhode Island’s Providence Journal newspaper for the last twenty years. He has contributed photography, illustrations, graphics and occasional stories for the feature sections of the paper as well as for magazines and online. A graduate of Tennessee’s Memphis College of Art, he lives in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, with his wife Jo.
C R E AT I O N M Y T H FROM THE BAMBARA PEOPLE OF MALI “ONCE THE BABY CHICKEN AND THE EGG went out to pick some lemons. But when the chick instructed the egg to climb the tree to do the picking, the egg said it could not climb trees. So the chick climbed and shook the lemons down. The chick and the egg ate them. Then the egg said it would climb if the chick would spread some dirt under the tree to soften any fall. This the chick did but left a pebble in the dirt. So it was that the egg, while shaking the tree from above, fell, hit the pebble, and broke. The chick thought this very funny, but a branch decapitated him and the branch thought that was funny too. But then the fire destroyed the branch and thought that was very funny. So did the water when it put out the fire and the Earth when it soaked in the water. But then God and the Earth got into an argument and God dropped it into space, where it is now.” Excerpted from Creation Myths of the World: An Encyclopedia, Volume 1 by David Adams Leeming, ABC-CLIO, 2009
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SAME TIME NEXT YEAR WE AT THEZENCHILADA.COM lift our glasses now to wish all of you a glorious holiday season and a joyful New Year! We’ll be back with our quarterly publication in January, an issue devoted to all things festival, from the rowdy Galician Antroido to the poetic Persian New Year. Carnivale and Mardi Gras traditions and recipes from south of the border, as well as from New Orleans, Biloxi and Mobile, are planned to pull you out of winter’s doldrums and into the promise of a spring. In 2011, TheZenchilada.com will also appear in April, July and October, but you can get juicy and informative updates, stories and recipes delivered to your in-box between issues if you sign up for our mailing list. In November, for example, we’ll be serving some holiday recipes that look as beautiful as they taste, including succulent substitutions for traditional meat dishes sure to delight your newly-turned-vegetarian daughter home from college, or your brand new (and vegan) son-in law.
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Don’t miss one single morsel!
N O C O N T E ST
I T ’ S A N O T H E R G I V E - AWAY, P U R E A N D S I M P L E
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www.santafebasketcompany.com
OR ONE OF TWO ONE-POUND packages of freshly handcrafted white and dark molded solid chocolate and bark bejeweled with fruit, nuts and herbs grown by Santa Fe chocolatier (and Doctor of Oriental Medicine) Linda Durante, proprietor of Le Jardin de Chocolat (a $35 value).
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WINNERS will be announced by e-mail the week of NOVEMBER 15, 2010. T h e Z e n c h i l a d a . c o m Fal l 2010
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GO OD BYE CHICKEN DOG Story by LORA SMITH Photograph by LORA SMITH
ONE OF OUR BABY GOATS, Little Sammy, died during the night. Sammy had already had a close call with death. He was born small with peculiar traits. He never developed a sucking reflex, and when placed in the pen with other babies would separate from them and stand motionless, staring into the corner. Sammy never played. He could drink milk, but only in small amounts, which I had to pour down his throat. A little over a week ago, he was found at the bottom of a pile of kids, all snuggled up sleeping together. Flat and motionless, he looked like a goner, but on closer inspection his eyes twitched and faint breaths were detectable. We moved him to the farm office to warm up. There, amid charts about every goat born on the farm, invoice orders for our goat cheese and the employee time clock, we wrapped Sammy up in towels and began a series of tube feedings to get some milk back in his deflated body. Sammy slowly got better, but not much better. He could stand up on his own, but was lethargic and didn't like to eat. On the night before Valentine's Day my partner, Joe, and I decided he needed more attention and moved him into our house. I was convinced I could love him back to health. Sammy's favorite thing was to sit as close as possible to our gas heater. I was sure he was going to set himself on fire, so a constant negotiation of how close he could actually be ensued. We fed him throughout the day, tiny amounts of milk, but a steady stream. And we started giving him a calf supplement of sugar, vitamins and iron that the vet recommended. 166
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Sammy made sounds like a chicken. He never quite mastered walking on our hardwood floor. We'd come home to find Sammy spread out, legs in every direction, stuck and making distressed chicken clucks. He tripped us walking through the house and peed on our new bathmat. But despite all his awkwardness he was our sweet Sammy. We took to calling him our "chicken dog." Following us around the yard clucking, he seemed confused about what kind of animal he was. But mostly, Sammy just seemed confused. After a week of concentrated attention and ear scratching, we started seeing improvements. He was gaining weight. Once or twice he even really suckled and could drink a whole third of a bottle in one feeding. Most important to me, though, he was responding to us. He cried when we left. Wagged his tail when we came near. Followed us around the house and out into the yard. He seemed more engaged with the world than the newborn kid who stared off into the corner. Still, there were things that were never quite right—he couldn't consistently suckle, his jaw clicked when he moved it and his teeth were abnormally large and crooked. Sammy was definitely different, but we took him as a survivor. We eventually put him back in the barn with the other babies to see if he could integrate into the group. He lived outside for four days. He still needed to be bottle-fed and was smaller than even the newest newborns, but seemed happy. The weather was warm and he slept in the kid piles with his sister and even played with the other babies. Or at least tried to, in his own weird Sammy way.
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G O OD B YE C HICKEN D OG
THERE WAS A PASSAGE
Sammy and I made from the cultivated earth of the farm to the Hades-like wilderness of the forest.
This morning I found him dead in the pen. His body was limp and stretched out flat. I thought he might come back to life like he did the last time. But he didn't. The other babies nudged his nose and looked at him in confusion. I went ahead with the morning feeding and milking and the babies followed suit, happily eating and dancing on the milk bucket, forgetting all about Sammy. The truth is that Sammy was going to die. Almost all the baby bucks have been pre-sold off the farm for meat. An enterprising young man from Siler City’s large Latino community has bought them to raise and sell to local families. So I knew from the beginning that even by trying to save Sammy I would only be saving him to end up the main course at a Christmas goat roast. I thought about that when I bottle-fed him. And he wasn't a pet. I thought about that when I held him at our kitchen table and brushed his fur with my fingers. Sammy was a part of the farm's livestock. I repeat these words silently to myself during the workday, "Live. Stock." I try to make sense of them and what the balance between a farm's life and a farm's stock should be. You can't save every baby and you sure can't pour all your farm's resources into saving every sick animal while the others wait for your care and attention. Our goats have delivered more than 50 healthy and vivacious babies that clamor for my attention whenever I step foot into the barn. And we are now milking 30 strong mothers. Only a very small number don't make it. But those small numbers stay with you. I carried Sammy out to the burying place in the rain. The llamas in the pasture acknowledged my passing with their periscope heads as I made my way towards the forest. Sammy's eyes stayed open, his little legs swung back and forth in a walking pattern. Other animals have died, but this was my first time dealing with a body. I walked past some of those other
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dead bodies when I entered the forest. A hog who hadn't made it to slaughter lay sideways, his mouth open and grotesque, his eyes eaten by birds. An adult goat lay farther down, his body twisted, legs missing and neck torn by fox and coyote. I covered little Sammy's eyes and moved quickly. Maybe it was the rain, the mist, or my somber mood, but the forest felt otherworldly. Like something out of a Greek myth, there was a passage Sammy and I made from the cultivated earth of the farm to the Hades-like wilderness of the forest. On the farm, animals live; there is order. We have rows, pens, scheduled times for feedings and milkings, sheets with data. In the forest, fox and coyotes plot chicken raids, bleached bones lie on rock piles, plants grow without being watered, animals reproduce without husbandry and the order and rhythm of things isn't measurable by the punch of a time card in the farm office. I buried Sammy near a rock pile and tried to pin down exactly what I felt. Was it stupid to be torn up about a baby goat? Especially a baby goat that was so obviously not going to survive and clucked like a chicken? Had it been cruel to try and keep him alive in the first place? I placed some pinecones around his resting spot and searched for some kind of … something … a feeling, a realization, a lesson, the right words for the moment. All I could come up with was, "Sammy, you were a good goat and you really loved to sit by the heater." We'll miss you, Chicken Dog. Excerpted and adapted from the February 24, 2010 posting on Lora Smith’s blog, The Milk Maid: Life on a North Carolina Farm. For more about Lora Smith, see page 164.
T H E C R E AT I O N T H E W O M A N A N D T H E M A N D R E A M E D T H AT G O D WA S D R E A M I N G A B O U T T H E M . GO D WA S S I N G I N G A N D C L ACK I N G H I S M A R AC A S A S H E D R E A M E D H I S D R E A M I N A C L O U D OF
TOBACCO
SMOKE,
FEELING
HAPPY
BUT
SHAKEN
BY
DOUBT
AND
M YST E RY.
T H E M A K R I TA R E I N D I A N S K N OW T H AT I F G O D D R E A M S A B O U T E AT I N G H E G I V E S F E RT I L I T Y AND
FOOD.
IF
GOD
DREAMS
ABOUT
LIFE,
HE
IS
BORN
AND
GIVES
B I RT H .
I N T H E I R D R E A M A B O U T G O D ’ S D R E A M , T H E WO M A N A N D T H E M A N W E R E I N S I D E A G R E AT S HIN IN G E GG, SI NGI NG AND DA N C I N G A N D K I CK I N G U P A F U S S B E C AU S E T H E Y W E R E C R A Z Y T O B E B O R N . I N G O D ’ S D R E A M H A P P I N E S S WA S ST RO N G E R T H A N D O U B T A N D M YST E RY. S O D R E A M I N G , G O D C R E AT E D T H E M W I T H A S O N G : “ I B R E A K T H I S E G G A N D T H E WO MAN IS BOR N AND TH E MAN IS BOR N. AND TO G E T H E R TH E Y WIL L L IV E A ND DI E . BUT THE Y WILL BE BOR N AG AIN. TH EY W ILL BE BOR N A N D D IE AGAIN
AND
BE
BORN
AG A I N .
THEY
WILL
NEVER
ST O P
BEING
D E AT H I S A L I E .”
( F RO M M E M O RY O F F I R E : I . G E N E S I S BY E D UA R D O G A L E A N O ) S C U L P T U R E BY A N N A K E E N E
For more about Anna Keene, see page 162.
BORN,
B E C AU S E