The Anatomy of a Pasta

08 Nov 2011 6 Comments

by scolgin in Recipes, Video Tags: , , , , , , , ,

One of the most interesting parts of cooking, to me, is discovering the roots of particular types of cuisine and dishes. The etymology of food, if you will. For example, you may claim to love tacos. But in Mexico, regional variations range from the familiar fish and shrimp tacos of Baja to the grilled sandwiched mulitas of Oaxaca to the fried tacos de cazo of Mexico City — often filled with pig’s esophagus. The people of central Mexico eat wriggling live larvae in their tacos. Do you love that?

The coat of arms of Amatrice

A favorite pasta of mine is called bucatini all’ Amatriciana. It has long been part of my Italian repertoire. But making it one evening, and videotaping it for this blog, I realized I didn’t know much about it’s origins. So I decided to investigate. More

A Kitchen Story

29 Jul 2011 4 Comments

by scolgin in Observations, Starlets, Yoga Students & Quinoa (stories) Tags: , , , , , , , ,

I always enjoy hearing stories of what brought people to their passions for food. My grandfather cooked on a train during the Depression. That’s all I know of that story. Although it provides a good prelude to my own.

The author at 13

My journey into food began, I suppose, as so many do: at my mother’s apron. The house always smelled good, and the kitchen was warm and inviting. More

“Better Cooks, Not Just Recipe Followers…”

18 Nov 2010 2 Comments

by scolgin in Cooking Tips, Observations Tags: , , , , ,

I was preparing a cooking workshop for a group of women later this week, and got thinking about exactly what it was I was trying to teach them, beyond the type of food they had requested…

A friend of mine recently gave me a cookbook, “Serious Barbecue” by Adam Perry Lang. After perusing various recipes, I turned to the introduction. Lang talked about learning to cook in culinary school and famous French kitchens, and then re-learning from Texas-born ranch hands on a ranch in New Mexico. “My new friends,” he said, “were as passionate as any of the professionals I’d met in French kitchens.” In reflecting on his journey and his reason for writing the cookbook, it was, as he said, to teach people “to be better cooks, not just recipe followers.”

Not trash.

This phrase stood out brilliantly to me. For it is exactly what I’m trying to do with this blog. And with my teaching of other people. I’m trying to do this myself with every meal I prepare — be a better, more mindful cook. When a friend invites us over for a roasted chicken she’s purchased from Costco, and I ask if I can keep the carcass when we’re done, it’s not because I’m weird (despite the startled look on her face); it’s because (as I will explain to her) this roasted chicken is filled with flavor and will make an insanely good stock. And then I leave the bones to her and explain to her how to do it. That is not a recipe, that is cooking.

Next time you’ve get a roasted chicken from Costco or Zankou or wherever — or roast one yourself — when you and your kids are done picking it over, throw the carcass in a big pot with enough water to cover, an onion, a bay leaf and a couple tablespoons of salt, an cook for about an hour. Then strain. You’ll see what I mean — this ain’t Campbells, and you made it with something you were going to throw out. (And you can freeze the stock in plastic baggies in the fridge to make soup whenever the spirit moves you.) This is respecting the animal that gave its life for your meal. This is cooking.

When I was in my 20s teaching English, I decided I didn’t like teaching very much. But now I find I love it. Maybe I just wasn’t teaching the right subject.

A Cook’s Tale

26 Oct 2010 1 Comment

by scolgin in Observations Tags: , , , , ,

My grandfather used to cook on trains during the Great Depression. I guess you could say it’s in my blood (a love of cooking… and a love of trains). I never met my grandfather. A train ran over his foot when my father was a boy, and he got cancer from the prosthetic. I’ll never know if he was a good cook…

This is not a photo of my grandfather cooking on a train during the Great Depression. My father didn't like his father much, so there are very few pictures. This is just some guy cooking on a train during the Great Depression.

When I cooked in restaurants, I used to wonder who was eating my food. It was a most intimate connection — the person preparing the food, and the person eating it — yet it was utterly anonymous. Save the occasional “compliments to the chef” delivered by a waiter, they ate and left back into the night to rejoin their lives, and you never knew. I wonder if my grandfather thought about who was eating his food when he cooked on trains. I also think about the person back in the kitchen cooking when I go to a restaurant, and hope it is someone who loves food. At home, when I am cooking for family or friends, I hope they can experience my love of food and my love of them when they eat.

I find myself thinking about food a lot, even when I’m not cooking. I wonder what flavors will taste good together, which textures and colors will complement each other. I think about it the same way I think about what colors and composition will work when I’m contemplating making a painting, or what chords should follow others when I’m writing a song. Cooking is every bit an art, but a fleeting one. If you create a masterpiece, all you are left with are memories. Which is more than enough.

There’s no reason to eat bad food. Because good food is so, so easy. Buy good quality raw ingredients. Treat them with reverence. Keep it simple. (The best meal on earth is composed of spaghetti, a couple really ripe tomatoes, some good olive oil and some well-aged parmesan reggiano.) Let each individual flavor and texture shine. Challenge, surprise and delight yourself. When you’re cooking for people, those you know or those you don’t, put love into the food. They’ll taste it. Don’t cook out of a box. Cook outside of the box.

Once I cooked on an ocean liner. Maybe one day I’ll cook on a train, too.

Teach Your Children Well

25 Sep 2010 9 Comments

by scolgin in Observations, Starlets, Yoga Students & Quinoa (stories), Video Tags: , ,

This is a post for parents. And for those who are childlike at heart. Because it is in approaching food with a childlike joy and wonder that your cooking will be transformed. And your eating.

Of course, any parent will tell you that children don’t always approach food with a childlike joy. When my son, Flynn, was young. I used to make him baby risottos. They were so good and he loved them so much that we thought of starting a baby food company. But then something happened. He switched. He was suspicious of everything I made. “Dad, there’s a dot in my food!” he would squeal in terror, and the simplest dishes would be derailed by a speck of pepper or a stray trace of parsley.

I was crestfallen.

A chef. And my first-born son would eat nothing but chicken nuggets.

The question, of course, was how to ever get him eating interesting food again. The answer was simple, if not exactly quick. Introduce him to the joy of growing, shopping, cooking and eating. And get him involved. Are your kids involved? Are YOU involved??

I expanded the garden, and gave Flynn his own tomato and corn plants. I got chickens, and put him in charge of egg collection (he now has an egg business selling them in the neighborhood — need any really GOOD eggs? Call Flynn…) My sister got him his own cookbook for his birthday — what a gift! Sometimes I find him sitting on the couch on a Saturday afternoon reading his cookbook. Sometimes he and I watch the cooking shows on PBS on Saturday afternoon. Sometimes we make what we’ve seen.

And I began to request his help in the kitchen. I would let him chop things — supervised, of course — with my really cool, sharp chef’s knife. (Chef’s knives are enticingly exciting to kids, especially boys.) I let him stir sauces. I let him toss the pizza dough in the air. And anytime he wanted a bite of something, I gave it to him.

While he’s still not eating EVERYTHING, there are few things he won’t try. And he’s had the experience enough times of enjoying something wonderful he didn’t want to try, that he believes me when I say, “No, seriously… you’re gonna LOVE this!” Plus, he learned to love the experience of sourcing our food. We go on food adventures. To Little Tokyo to get imagawayaki hot off the grill. To the cheese shop in Beverly Hills. To East L.A. to get handmade tortillas.

Flynn wants to go to France to try the stinky cheeses there. I heard him telling a friend in his taekwondo class the other day about the shabu shabu we were having for dinner that evening. “No,” he explained, his hands gesticulating animatedly, “you cook it right on the table!”

Have you made food an adventure for your children? First, of course, you must make it an adventure for yourself. I guess that’s really what this blog is all about. We’re all kids at heart. Life should always be approached with bright-eyed wonder, as an adventure. And in life, food is one of the greatest adventures of all.

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