08 Mar 2013
by scolgin
in Food, Humor, Recipes
Tags: Baja California, cochinita pibil, machaca, margarita, Mexican cooking, Mexico, Milton Brook, Nayarit, Sonora, tacos
Unless you’re a drug runner, things in Mexico generally move pretty slowly. I remember watching an entire construction crew working on a resort collapse in the heat and humidity of the late morning in Nayarit, and nap on site until the mid afternoon.
Machaca, mid-mash
A lot of the foods of Mexico are slow, too. In the Yucatan, for example, they wrap pigs in banana leaves and bury them in the ground to cook for a day. Nobody’s setting timers or watching the clock. And in the cowboy cattle country of the desert north, they hang strips of beef in the sun to dry out in the blazing sun. Up there, they call it machaca. More
01 Mar 2013
by scolgin
in Food, Humor, Pork, Recipes
Tags: beef short rib, Chinese cooking, Don Schnieder, five spice, guanciale, Japanese cooking, jowl, Matthew Tekulsky, monkfish liver, Pork
The other night I was drinking wine and eating monkfish liver with my culinary soulmate, Donnie, and lamenting about when odds-and-ends meat cuts become trendy and then are suddenly expensive.
Pork pops
Take the case of the aforementioned monkfish liver. It used to be the rare non-Japanese person who would try this odd delicacy at the sushi bar, and I could buy a whole softball-sized liver at the Japanese market for a few bucks. More
08 Feb 2013
by scolgin
in Food, Pork, Recipes, Video
Tags: Austria, Austrian cooking, Café Pruckel, Danube, Mozart, spaetzle, Vienna, Wien, Wienerschnitzel
I spent a long, cold portion of a winter in Vienna once.
What I was doing there is a long story all it’s own, but like many such stories, it had to do with a girl. That didn’t work out as planned, and I spent much of my time there on my own, exploring the city — stumbling on former residences of Beethoven around every corner, searching out the Grove of the Immortals — Brahams, Schubert, Strauss, Beethoven — in the Central Cemetery, visiting the homes of Mozart and Dr. Freud, staring at the sparkling canvases of Klimt at the Kunsthistorisches Museum, taking in Richard Strauss’ “Rosenkavalier” at the famed State Opera House and a performance of the Vienna Boys Choir at the Imperial Chapel. More
13 Jan 2013
by scolgin
in Food, Humor, Recipes, Starlets, Yoga Students & Quinoa (stories), Video
Tags: citrus, fish, hamachi, Hass avocado, Japanese cuisine, Ponzu, sashimi, sushi, yuzu
About seven or eight years ago, I was making Japanese food at our previous home in West Los Angeles. I had a rare delicacy — a yuzu fruit, a small Japanese citrus that, on the odd occasion you can find it, sells for about $3-$4 a fruit. Yellow and wrinkly, about the size of a lime, it is filled with seeds, and you’re lucky if you get a few drops of the pungent, floral juice from within. More useful is the aromatic zest, which the Japanese will shave over tempura, use to brighten sauces and fold into dishes both savory and sweet.
Koi pond, bamboo, afternoon sun & yuzu tree
I have no recollection what I did with the yuzu that evening. But what I do remember is planting several of the seeds in a pot outside in the garden the next morning. A couple weeks later, I had a few bright green seedlings which somehow over time became reduced to one gawky, spindly little yuzu tree. More
18 Dec 2012
by scolgin
in Food, Humor, Recipes
Tags: Barack Obama, bread pudding, dessert, Hawaii, King's Hawaiian Bread, macadamia nuts, recipes, Shepard Fairey, Topanga, West Hollywood
Sometimes readers of my blog have great ideas that lead to new things and new posts! A few weeks ago — Election Eve, in fact — I wrote a post called “Barack, Brits & Bananas” about a spontaneous dessert I’d come up with for a last-minute party (or more appropriately, a long-planned party I’d forgotten about until the last minute): banana rum walnut bread pudding with Nutella dulce de leche. The post prompted a comment from my friend Greg:
“And in honor of President Obama you could make it banana macadamia nut rum bread pudding. Sounds delicious either way.”
I replied that I thought that was a fine idea, and left it at that. Until, that is, I had a couple slices of stale King’s Hawaiian Bread and was cooking Hawaiian-style pork ribs for dinner one night. And Uncle Greggie’s comment came flooding back into my head. More
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