Gourmandistan

This is not another Alinea menu post

May 20, 2010 by Steve

There are many, many sites where people post video and/or pictures and course-by-course accounts of their experiences at Chicago’s Alinea. This is not one of them. Before our last visit, Michelle read about chef Grant Achatz expressing his dismay and confusion over diners’ need to document every moment of their visits, to the detriment of the dishes he was trying to serve. (OK—we did sneak one iPhone photo of the final dessert course, but not of Achatz himself preparing it […]

Categories: Food, Restaurants

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So many strawberries, so little time.

May 16, 2010 by Steve

Trying to eat SOLE (sustainably, organically, locally, ethically) can be trying for Steve, who feels he hasn’t eaten right if he doesn’t get at least one piece of fruit per day. So when the local stuff is in season, we tend to buy in bulk. Now strawberries have appeared everywhere from the Foxhollow Farm store to the Bardstown Road market. (Rhubarb, the tart celery-like stalk that Steve usually grabs as the first “fruit” of the year never appeared at our markets.) […]

Categories: Cooking, Food, Fruit Desserts, Recipes, Strawberries, Vegetarian

Disaster in Gourmandistan!

May 15, 2010 by Michelle

We, who so cavalierly call for massively-involved kitchen preparation using who-knows-how-many utensils, have suffered a tragedy. It seems our not-so-frequently-used disposal chose to drop a chunk of itself down its drain—preventing its use while also causing any dishwasher drainage to spew out the disposal bottom instead of nicely draining away. We now face at least two days of hand-washing all pots, pans, dishes and utensils. Steve has called for an emergency dining-out protocol (he has a magazine assignment anyway), but […]

Categories: Cooking

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Because sometimes you get the carrot.

May 15, 2010 by Michelle

Friday night, Gourmandistan served chicken and dumplings for dinner, along with a little watercress salad. The salad we threw together in a trice—Michelle’s high leaf-selection standards were the biggest delay. The chicken and dumplings? Getting that dish together took a bit over a year. We started with several baby chicks, which grew into heritage French Houdan hens running around the yard with the rest of the flock. Actually, these Houdans spent much of their time running from the rest of […]

Categories: Chicken, Chicken keeping, Cooking, Food, Recipes, Soups & Stews • Tags: Chicken keeping

A Quick(ish) Duck Confit

May 12, 2010 by Michelle

Duck confit is one of the world’s wonder ingredients. The rich, salty and herb-tingly tasty meat can be used on pizzas, in salads or soups. Or, you can make a quick meal by crisping up a couple of legs in a pan to go with whatever else happens to be around. In France, we’ve bought packages of traditional confit, made by slow-cooking duck legs in their own fat, then preserved by covering them in more duck fat. But here in […]

Categories: Cooking, Duck, Food, Recipes

Squeezed: The Secrets of the Orange Juice Industry | Food & Think

April 28, 2010 by Michelle

Sigh. Another illusion shattered. Perhaps we should start drinking Tang®—it may be more honest. From the article: “[R]aw juice is often heated, stripped of its volatile compounds and flavor-rich oils, and stored for as long as a year before it reaches the consumer. Something called “the flavor pack” is used to return most of the “natural” aroma and taste to the product…” Squeezed: The Secrets of the Orange Juice Industry | Food & Think.

Categories: Food, News • Tags: Gross

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Birthday Soup

April 27, 2010 by Michelle

Recently, Michelle had a birthday. Since Steve’s is only a week after Michelle’s, the usual practice is to have a joint celebration of some sort. (This year we’re going back to Alinea in Chicago—and, in keeping with chef Grant Achatz’s direction, the only self-indulgent table shots will be a couple discretely taken with an iPhone.) But on her actual birthday, Michelle decided to cook a variation of Thomas Keller’s Chicken Soup With Dumplings. After a full day of work, she just […]

Categories: Chicken, Cooking, Food, Recipes, Soups & Stews

Sacrelicious

April 26, 2010 by Michelle

Judy Rodgers’ Zuni Cafe Cookbook is somewhat of a holy text here in Gourmandistan—but, like any bible, it contains mysteries that sometimes test the faithful. A good example is the recipe for “Three Onion Panades: Chard, Sorrel, & Tomato.” Over the years, we’ve used all three varieties of panade to turn an overabundance of farm share greens, tomatoes, stale bread and about-to-go-bad chicken stock into a gooey, cheesy, rich meal. But at the end of this four-page recipe lies an […]

Categories: Breads & Crackers, Cooking, Eggs, Food, Recipes, Sorrel, Vegetarian

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Don’t worry, Evo: Your hair and heterosexuality are safe with Gourmandistan chickens.

April 23, 2010 by Michelle

We are not fans of factory farming here in Gourmandistan, but we’d like to think our reasons (suffering of birds and workers, awful products, massive rivers of animal shit) are a little more reality-based than those of Bolivia’s president. His heart seems to be in the right place, but the dude definitely needs more science. Gay and bald? Evo Morales thinks you ate too much chicken | News | guardian.co.uk.

Categories: Chicken keeping, News

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