Whoops! I Think I Just Sharted

I would like to know this: when did skid marks become appetizing? Because if I receive one more fancy dessert (like the deconstructed s'mores at Zare, above) with a big brown poo-stain sliding across my plate, I am going to soil my trousers for real.

Here is the thing about the smear...it serves no real purpose. Oh sure, I could pick up one of those hand-made marshmallows and wipe it up with it, but is that very elegant? Or does it feel more like, I don't know, cleaning the toilet?

That brings me to another pet peeve: the deconstructed dessert. Conceptually, it's kind of interesting, but it is really hard to get the execution right and it can go quickly to annoying. Last night at dinner we ordered 2 desserts, both of which were deconstructed - in other words, each component was separated, plated in some kind of artistic manner, and had some kind of little twist to it. For example, the carrot cake plate had baby carrots, a mini carrot cake, and cream cheese ice cream. The only only way for this concept to work is if every component is delicious on its own, and can also work with the others. Sadly, most that I have tried failed on one or both counts. In the carrot cake example, the cream cheese ice cream was the best thing on the plate, and the other stuff was decidedly meh. What also happens in this configuration is that you end up chasing everything around the plate, which seems like a whole lot of work after you have already agreed to pay an exorbitant amount for the pleasure of eating it. I get cranky when my dessert is an irritation and not a pleasure.

So please, restaurants, I am begging you - give me whole, constructed desserts, and keep the pastry brush away from the chocolate sauce. And I in turn promise to keep my personal habits where they belong, well-hidden from view and under the table.

Nibble Nibble Like a Mouse

Here is my tribute to Robert Steinberg and the wonderful chocolate that he brought to the world. The recipe, and others, was right inside my trusty can of cacao nibs.


From the Scharffen Berger website:
Cacao Nibs are perfectly roasted cocoa beans separated from their husks and broken into small bits. They are the essence of chocolate. Nibs add crunchiness and subtle chocolate flavor to baked goods and savory dishes. They make a great substitute for roasted nuts or chocolate chips, without added sweetness. Packaged with suggestions for use in a 6-ounce nitrogen flushed mylar bag, they are a unique gift for the home baker.


Scharffen Berger Nibby Cookies

• 1 c. dark brown sugar
• 3/4 c. sugar
• 1/2 lb. (1 c., or 2 sticks) butter - NOT softened
• 1 t. vanilla
• 3 c. flour
• 1/4 t. salt
• 3/4 t. baking soda
• 1/2 c. Scharffen Berger Cacao Nibs

- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Measure sugars into food processor and blend
- Cut up butter into chunks and drop into the feeding tube until blended.
- Stop processor, add 2 egss, followed by vanilla. Process for 15 sec, scrape down sides, process for an additional 10 sec.
- Remove cover, pour in flour. Add salt & soda and mix it into flour. Cover and process for 30 sec. Scrape down sides and process for an additional 10 sec.
- Remove cover, add nibs, and process for 15 sec.
- Drop onto cookie sheets, adding a sprinkle of nibs on top of each cookie, and pressing down.
- Bake for 8-12 min (until edges are brown, may take longer).
- Cool on cookie sheet 5 min before removing.

Strawberry Oatmeal Muffins

After making Fresh Strawberry Cupcakes for Jen's birthday party on Sunday, I found myself with a lot of leftover strawberries. I decided to make these Strawberry Oatmeal muffins from a recipe that I found online, with a few modifications. They turned out very well - moist, not too sweet, and full of berries. This was great way to use extra stawberries, and buttermilk, too. I like my oatmeal very thick and rough, so I used Bob's Red Mill Thick Rolled Oats, which added nice texture and flavor. I doubled the recipe and it made close to 36 muffins.

Strawberry Oat Muffins

• 1 cup rolled oats
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 t. baking powder
• 1/2 t. baking soda
• 1 t. salt
• dash of cinnamon, dash of nutmeg
• 1 egg
• 1/4 c. vegetable oil
• 3/4 c. brown sugar
• 1 t. vanilla
• 1 cup chopped fresh strawberries
• zest and juice from 1/2 lemon

- Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners.
- In a small bowl, combine oats and buttermilk. Let stand for 5 min.
- In another small bowl, combine the chopped strawberries with the lemon zest and juice.
- In a medium bowl, combine dry ingredients (flour through nutmeg). Set aside.
- In a large bowl, beat together the egg, oil, brown sugar, and vanilla.
- Blend in the oat mixture
- Stir in to flour mixture, just until moistened.
- Fold in the strawberries/lemon mixture.
- Fill muffin cups 2/3 to 3/4 full.
- Bake for 15-20 min, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

A Walk Down Chocolate Memory Lane

Yesterday Robert Steinberg passed away from lymphoma. Steinberg was one of the original founders of Scharffen Berger Chocolate, along with his friend John Scharffenberger. They took a different approach than most American chocolate makers, with the intention of making chocolate in the European tradition. They bought a machine from Germany and crafted their first batch in Steinberg's kitchen - working and reworking it until they got it right. They insisted on using more cocoa in their product than the minimum required by law, creating an exceptional quality chocolate that raised the bar for the chocolate industry in our country.

I took the tour of the factory in Berkeley last year. It's one of the few chocolate factories that let people in - most keep their secrets highly guarded. It was so interesting to see the process, and to learn about the nuances of different types of chocolate.


The tasting was the best! I remember our guide saying, "Even if you don't love milk chocolate, you will love this chocolate." I thought, "Yeah, right" and then I tasted it. Rather than the flat, overly sweet, chalky taste that I expected was a rich, smooth, complex bite of chocolate. I learned that the milk chocolate in the SB bar has as much cocoa as most manufacturers use in their dark chocolate. Now when I stop by my local Peet's Coffee, I usually buy a square or two of the milk chocolate as a treat. My absolute favorites were this limited edition chocolate pictured below that had a rich, almost grassy flavor (no longer available), and the Nibby Bar which have the added crunch and nuttiness of chocolate nibs.


Tonight I was supposed to go to an event hosted by restaurant expert and gal-about-town Marcia Gagliardi, aka the tablehopper, called a "Chocolate Adventure Contest". It was sponsored by Scharffen Berger and Tutti Foodie, so out of respect to the Steinberg family, the event was called off. The event was going to be a contest between two local pastry chefs, Boris Portnoy of Candybar, and William Werner of polite/persuasion, to whip up something chocolicious using a selected ingredient. And John Scarffenberger was going to conduct a blind chocolate tasting...yum. All of this and a discount at Sur la Table - what a dream. Instead, I will pick up some Scharffen Berger chocolate tonight and embark on a chocolate adventure of my own, as a way to honor the innovation and high standards that Steinberg was instrumental in bringing to the American market.

I wish I had had the chance to meet Robert Steinberg in person. David Leiboviz, an American living in Paris and chocolate connoisseur, wrote a very nice tribute today which you can read here.

I leave you with a delectable slice of cake that Sean and I enjoyed at the Scharffen Berger cafe, the day of our visit. It's rich, silky, smooth flavor still lingers.


Note: they have just added a tribute to Robert Steinberg on the Scharffen Berger home page, so do check it out. There is a lovely statement from his partner John Scharffenberger.

Tripping the Fruit Fantastic

Not the usual party spread, right? Well, it is if you are attending a Miracle Fruit, or Fruit Tripping, party.

We first read about this magical fruit in the New York Times. It was touted as being able to make bitter and sour foods taste sweet, and there was a guy in New York who had started throwing "Fruit Tripping" parties, where he would offer a variety of foods (vinegar, citrus, Tobasco sauce) and invite people to try it out. The way it works is through something called glycoprotein which messes with your taste receptors for a limited time, around 1-2 hours. Kind of like the toothpaste-followed-by-orange-juice effect, only pleasant.

It is legal, just not FDA-approved. Mike told me that it was originally meant to be marketed to diabetics, which I thought was a great idea.

It seems that everyone in the universe read that article, because the berries are now next to impossible to get. Our friends Mike & Olga were able to get ahold of some of the tablets and hosted an evening of Magic Berry fun at their home.


And the result? It was pretty cool. Some of the taste changes didn't live up to the hype for me (Guinness tasted like Guinness, not a chocolate milkshake), but some of the foods were amazing. The lemons and limes were so sweet, it felt like you were eating the sweetest orange or even a fruit jelly. I probably ate and entire lemon and lime by myself, and I found myself drinking pure lime juice concentrate like it was lime-aid. The cheeses were interesting, too - goat cheese tasted like cream cheese and the Roquefort was like a very mild cheese with just a hint of blue flavor. I had brought the most bitter plain yogurt that I could find, Nancy's, and it tasted like sweet vanilla yogurt. Dave and Jen brought a Scharffen Berger 99% cocoa chocolate bar that tasted strongly of cocoa butter, mildly of chocolate, and not a hint of bitterness.

Definitely worth a try, and best to do in a group as everyone has a slightly different experience. I'd love to try the pure berries, but the tablets definitely work well. All in all, a fun evening tripping with friends!

Not Yo Mama's Corned Beef Hash

From my brunch at Pomelo this morning:

"Cork" corned beef, purple & sweet potato hash, 2 eggs sunny-side up, with gorgonzola thyme vinagrette

It was everything I could do not to lick the plate. OK, maybe I licked it a weeeee bit.

Marin Madam

Mellow Marin...my ass! I spent the day in Marin yesterday, and it was filled with debauchery, starting at 9am when I went to a copy meeting for a client. First category up for review? Women's foundations. That's right, bras, underwear, and whatever the equivalent of adult onesies are called. I will be studying these to write copy that will sell them, no double entendres and snickering allowed. I practically skulked out with my huge clear plastic bag full of D-cups and lace and ruffles.


That night I went to my sweet little Book Group in Mill Valley - formed of various members of the San Rafael Mother's Club - for a nice sit-down dinner and good adult conversation. Sounds very civilized, right? Sure, we sipped wine and enjoyed some fine food - and then out "came" dessert.


In case you can't read it (or have turned away in horror), it says "Your Day Has Cum". It is Pepto Pink, cream-filled, with special icing touches such as the white in the front and black around the...bottom. Now, even with this attention to detail, this has to be the least threatening rendition of the male organ that I have seen - it looks more like a toy gun of some kind. The flourishes around the base confuse me, but even better, I LOVE to think about the person decorating this cake, humming a little tune as they carefully place the swipes of black hair just so. And poor thing, it only seems to have achieved a dribble, although the volume looks sizeable - but hardly the money shot heard 'round the world. Wah, wah.

What do they use as a model, I wonder? A photo? I think not. This one seems to be from memory...or something.

To be fair, the book selection for this month was sex-themed : "Bonk" by Mary Roach. And we agreed to have a sort of GNI (Girls' Night In) in lieu of a serious discussion, so this cake didn't appear totally out of the blue - or the flesh-pink, as it were.

Still.

I think we have a Cake Wreck candidate on our hands, people!

Ceci N'Est Pas Une Tasse en Papier

I have a lot of mugs and cups that I like for different reasons. This is my new favorite - called "I am not a paper cup" by DCi products, which I purchased at MOMA the other day. It is made out of insulated porcelain and has a silicone lid, which I like for the obvious portability feature, but also because when I use it at home, I can keep my tea warm by keeping the lid on, and avoid the constant trips to the microwave to reheat it.

It travels well, and drinking out of it while driving is actually much more pleasant than out of the usual plastic lid, which always dribbles. The soft mouth-feel is kind of comforting, like drinking out of a baby bottle (not that I know what that feels like!)

I also bought the silicone sleeve, which looks cool, but is entirely unnecessary as the cup's insulation keeps the heat away from your hands. I'm just going to stick it in my bag to use when I am getting a paper cup from somewhere else and want to save using a paper sleeve.

At $22, I think it would make a great gift.

When Life Gives You Blueberries...

...make Cobbler

In the Slow Lane

Some highlights from the Slow Food Nation festival, Aug 29 - Sept 1, 2008. Over 60,000 people were in attendance.

I Declare

Over Labor Day weekend, I volunteered at the Slow Food Nation festival, which took place at various locations around the city. The festival was the brainchild of Alice Waters, and was created to promote the use of fair, healthy and sustainable practices in all areas of food creation and production. It is the first of its kind in our country, and is part of the international Slow Food Movement that is starting to gain momentum throughout the world. There were 3 main areas of interest at the festival: the Civic Center, where there was a Victory Garden and Marketplace, the Herbst Theater, where there were panel discussions with renowned food professionals, and Fort Mason, where there was a grand food hall with wine and tasting stations.


The organization that I worked for was Roots of Change, who drafted a document called The Declaration of Healthy Food and Agriculture. It was presented to City Hall on the Thursday before the festival weekend, and our job was to collect 1 million endorsements so that the declaration can be brought to Washington and used to change the current farm bill. Marion Nestle and Michael Pollan are big supporters, which of course adds some interest and celebrity cred to the project. But I was impressed with how much people knew about it already and if they didn't, really took the time to find out more.


It was very exciting to be a part of this event, and to give my time to try and affect change. People were very receptive and interested, and it was a positive experience all around.

Below is the draft of the declaration - if you like what it says, go to website and make your endorsement online:

We, the undersigned, believe that a healthy food system is necessary to meet the urgent challenges of our time. Behind us stands a half-century of industrial food production, underwritten by cheap fossil fuels, abundant land and water resources, and a drive to maximize the global harvest of cheap calories. Ahead lie rising energy and food costs, a changing climate, declining water supplies, a growing population, and the paradox of widespread hunger and obesity.

These realities call for a radically different approach to food and agriculture. We believe that the food system must be reorganized on a foundation of health: for our communities, for people, for animals, and for the natural world. The quality of food, and not just its quantity, ought to guide our agriculture. The ways we grow, distribute, and prepare food should celebrate our various cultures and our shared humanity, providing not only sustenance, but justice, beauty and pleasure.

Governments have a duty to protect people from malnutrition, unsafe food, and exploitation, and to protect the land and water on which we depend from degradation. Individuals, producers, and organizations have a duty to create regional systems that can provide healthy food for their communities. We all have a duty to respect and honor the laborers of the land without whom we could not survive. The changes we call for here have begun, but the time has come to accelerate the transformation of our food and agriculture and make its benefits available to all.

We believe that the following twelve principles should frame food and agriculture policy, to ensure that it will contribute to the health and wealth of the nation and the world. A healthy food and agriculture policy:

1. Forms the foundation of secure and prosperous societies, healthy communities, and healthy people.

2. Provides access to affordable, nutritious food to everyone.

3. Prevents the exploitation of farmers, workers, and natural resources; the domination of genomes and markets; and the cruel treatment of animals, by any nation, corporation or individual.

4. Upholds the dignity, safety, and quality of life for all who work to feed us.

5. Commits resources to teach children the skills and knowledge essential to food production, preparation, nutrition, and enjoyment.

6. Protects the finite resources of productive soils, fresh water, and biological diversity.

7. Strives to remove fossil fuel from every link in the food chain and replace it with renewable resources and energy.

8. Originates from a biological rather than an industrial framework.

9. Fosters diversity in all its relevant forms: diversity of domestic and wild species; diversity of foods, flavors and traditions; diversity of ownership.

10. Requires a national dialog concerning technologies used in production, and allows regions to adopt their own respective guidelines on such matters.

11. Enforces transparency so that citizens know how their food is produced, where it comes from, and what it contains.

12. Promotes economic structures and supports programs to nurture the development of just and sustainable regional farm and food networks.

Our pursuit of healthy food and agriculture unites us as people and as communities, across geographic boundaries, and social and economic lines. We pledge our votes, our purchases, our creativity, and our energies to this urgent cause.

Waiter, There's a ___in my Soup

Cobb Salad - what's in that, anyway? Let's see, Lettuce, Tomato, Cheese, Eggs, Avocado and Beef T...eeeewwww! What, do you get a Cow Pie for dessert after that?

After swallowing the vomit that rose up in our throats, we ordered the "Argula" salad instead. Then the vomit returned for real.

File this restaurant under Never Again.

Labor Day Highjinks: Ice Cream and Tropical Birds

I don't like to post too many pics of myself on my blog (and they are EVERYWHERE else, so believe me, the universe is well aware of what I look like), but I had to make an exception in this case. On Labor Day, my friend Michael and I had one of those rare, funny afternoons that can only come from a random series of events that cascaded together to leave us laughing hysterically.

It started out innocently enough - we made plans to go to Joe's for an ice cream cone, and a walk around the neighborhood to catch up. Joe's is one of those great places that has a wonderful, simple product and has not changed one bit since it opened in 1959. Unfortunately, Joe's is closed on Mondays. Wah, wah.

Leave it to Michael to find a solution. We started walking up the block and ended up at...Rite Aid. No, no, we weren't going there to huff correction fluid (we weren't quite that depressed) - they actually serve ice cream there. The ice cream is not that bad, despite the less than appealing brand name ("Thrifty" - WTF), but we found ourselves in fits of giggles at the counter - it felt so weird to be ordering ice cream amongst the toothbrushes and personal massagers. Not only that, they had run out of medium containers so we had to make do with the rediculously large family sized ones.


So there we were, laughing and walking around the block with our Big Gulps of ice cream, when we heard something that sounded like a cat. Then, maybe a monkey. Then, a person's voice. "Hello? Hello?"

We looked around and right in front of this house on the railing were 2 parrots - a green one and an African Grey. (why is my world suddenly filled with birds, why?) They were just out in the open, talking and making sounds as casually as you please. We stopped and "talked" to them for a while, and realized that the owner was right behind us washing his car. He showed us how when he blew a whistle, the African Grey imitated it exactly.



The Grey kept its distance, but the green kept trying to inch closer and closer. If you look close enough at the picture, you can see the murderous glint in his eye - and the owner warned us not to get too close, or he would bite.

Anyway, it was a great afternoon full of laughs and "only in San Francisco" moments. I can't think of a better way to spend a leisurely afternoon - you can't buy entertainment as good as this!