trillium

You know, they're about a 20 minute walk from where I live and I keep meaning to go check 'em out. Maybe this weekend. I'll be sure to report back. regards, trillium

My bookshelves are full of books, all 5 of them. And they're overflowing because we just keep buying more books. You can't wheel your bookshelves closer to the kitchen during a mad cooking spree, can you? You can with Metro shelves (also can be had on the cheap at restaurant supply places, or huge size knock-offs at Costco). Someone came over to our house for the first time and said (picture a charming tennessee accent) "My goodness I've never seen anyone use kitchen things for decoration in the living room before". Whadda mean about decoration??? regards, trillium

Yes, I've bought them. Imagine my horror when I saw the identical ones for much less at our local restaurant supply place and no shipping fees. I hate that! I have many big Rubbermaid ones too (in spite of the fact that the rubbermaid heiress broke my brother's heart in highschool) but I like the King Arthur/food service ones better. They're airtight but easier to open and close because of the little tab on the side of the lid. Plus you can buy dissolvable labels while you're there (sometimes time is money, you know?). I'm also fond of the French glass jars that have a rubber seal, but not for things I grab with greasy, dirty hands. Shall we talk about where to store all these wonderful containers once the cupboard space is used up? My vote is for Metro shelving. regards, trillium

I was pretty sorry to miss Palermo, I really wanted to check it out (and go to the Nino Parrucca studio). Plus I adore street food and really wanted to have pan con milza, but hey, there's always next time. Would you go back to Palermo on your own next time? What was your favorite meal? As for temples, I enjoyed our visit to Segesta the best. We had the temple and ampitheater to ourselves for hours on a beautiful sunny day. The story behind Selinunte was depressing with war looming, those giant piles of rubble and all the people who died during the invasion. Agrigento seemed like the Disneyland version of greek temples in Sicilia. The order we saw them in had something to do with it, I'm sure. regards, trillium

Wouldn't that be sweet vermouth then (French = dry, Italian = sweet)? regards, trillium

Ok, here is the trip report at last. I tried to keep it short, I swear. I even cut out a bunch of stuff that isn't food related. I’m sorry to say that my dad wussed out on Palermo and we flew back to Roma a day early and just hung out, so no Palermo for me. Sigh. Sicilia was amazing, so different than the mainland in many ways. It seems like an island stuck in another time in many ways, but only when you’re out in the country. The bigger cities bustle with the best of them. I loved seeing the groves and groves of oranges and lemons and almonds and olives. What wasn’t trees seemed to be grapevines, green hills and seashore. We saw many shepherds and their dogs out herding sheep. I didn’t know they still did that. And the sea seemed unreal in some parts, like the Platonic ideal of the sea that only exists in the collective imagination. I speak Spanish, not Italian and that’s always got me by just fine before, but in Sicilia it didn’t work so well. I had trouble with the Sicilian accent, but adjusted to it over time. My father speaks tourist Italian and the strange part was that by the end of the day he would have trouble understanding what people were saying and ask me to translate for him. Since I have no formal training in the language (apart from my indispensable Berlitz phrase book) I’m not sure how I managed but I did. I would tell him what I thought they were saying in English, he would respond in tourist Italian and they would talk to me again in Italian. Yikes. Everyone got a big kick out of my father’s last name, Siciliano, which I think they found as amusing as I would if I ran into someone named Joe California. I had nothing to do with the arrangements of this trip, my father asked me to come along to celebrate his birthday and I opted to go ahead and go at the last minute (about a week and half before we left). He choose 3 star hotels and restaurants from various guidebooks. If I had planned the trip, I would have done it a little differently, but hey, I’m not complaining at all. Roma Old Bridge:gelati right off of P. del Risorgimento, perp to the Vatican walls, huge, homemade and cheap. San Crispano: gelati right of Trevi Fountain, if Alice Waters devoted her life to gelati it would taste like this. Osteria del Dino: in the neighborhood NE of the tourist epicenter near the Vatican. I think he found it in his Cheap Eats book. It was already filling up at noon, we were the only tourists, the rest were lunching Romani. I think he only does lunch. It’s very tiny and has some of the foodstuffs hanging from the walls and ceilings. The dishes of the day are written on a pad of paper and brought to you by Dino. My sister and I had rigatoni all’ amatriciana (when in Rome and all that), then she had some boring but fine chicken and I had the best polpette (meatballs basically) dressed in tomato sauce I’d ever had. They really just melted in your mouth while you’re tongue went wild for the flavors. I basically picked what I saw flying by me on its way to other tables. My father had skipped the primi and was happily scarfing down the best saltimboca he’d ever had. We’re both cooks and food snobs (my sister got tired of one or the other of us saying “mine is better” about dishes we ate on the trip) so this is saying a lot. I also had the best insalata mista of the trip here, it was a mixture of young, peppery greens. When my father asked for the bill, Dino wrote the total on the paper covering the table. Il Fornaio off Campo de Fiori: great pizze, mortadella grande and cherry tarts Ristorante del Pallardo near Campo Fiori: My sisters favorite from a former visit. It’s a fixed meal place (including wine) and there is a sign on the wall that says something along the lines of “here you will eat what we feed you”. It was packed with tourists and the owners (well, the husband Giovanni, not Paola Fazi) do a whole schtick that I found annoying...telling you how to eat, giving you a hard time. It was a nice meal, very filling, lots of antipasti (lentils, tomato salad, fresh mozzarella, huge plate of proscuitto crudo and olives), fried croquettes (potato and a veal one), rigatoni all’ amatriciana, and roast veal with potato crisps. Dessert was a tart and some tangerine drink (juice, water and sugar steeped with the peels, I’m guessing). My father wondered if any Romani actually ate there and I said yeah, but they won’t be bossed around like this. Sure enough, a couple of old geezers came in and started sending stuff back to the kitchen. It was pretty funny…there was some shouting about “what’s the problem with the veal”, “there is no problem, we just don’t want to eat it like you cooked it” which sounded better in Italian. Giovanni found out we were from the US and brought us a copy of Saveur no. 8, which has his restaurant in it. Monreale We ate at a place the guy at the Carrubella Park Hotel recommended. I didn’t write it down because I thought my father was. He didn’t either. It was past the duomo on the right and was a Taverna if it’s any help. I had the most amazing grilled raddichio there, and a really good pasta with artichokes. This was the first time we drank Donnafugata’s Vigna di Gabri and god was it good. I don’t usually like white wines, but wow. I’ve never had wine that buttery and aromatic and flinty at the same time. I wish I could find it here in the US. Every dog in Palermo was howling that night and I woke up to watch the sun rise over the city. The mosaics in the duomo were incredible, a “don’t miss”. Erice Erice was cool and weird. My father was very much looking forward to dinner at our hotel, the Hotel Moderno, which was supposed to be great. I really enjoyed my bucatini con le sarde, it was the most complex version I had (capers, wild fennel, anchovies etc). I found out the hard way that ordering something alla Palermitana means its breaded and fried when I ordered my spada (swordfish). Not my favorite, too greasy. My father had involtini di pesce spada that he thought was overcooked, too bready and too greasy. I agreed. He also had cuscus di pesce. I liked it, he didn’t. It came with one of those plato di buon ricordo. I don’t think he likes the heavy fishy sauces as much as I do. My sister ordered pasta with red sauce (she hates fish) and the same fish I did. Since she was being so brave about eating fish, we set out to find some dolce. It was 8:45 and the piazza and all of the streets were totally deserted. La Bottega dei Sapori, Via Vitt. Emanuele, 21 “Enoteca Prodotti tipici di Sicilia e Calabria”: My sister and I wanted to do some food shopping and the next day we found a really nice (thought touristy) place that I found almost every thing on my list. The woman minding the shop was very sweet and kept feeding us samples of Marsala and Zibibbo and lots of other stuff. My sister, who is 16 and doesn’t have the liver I do, got mildy tipsy from all that before lunch drinking. I bought capers from Pantelleria , a good size chunk of bottarga di tonno, some cactus flower honey, and a little bottle of some herbal booze from Erice. I also bought a small bottle of rosolio (the pink color was great) and some hazelnuts submerged in a jar of honey for my mum. My sister bought jarred sauces (with names that translate into the passion of sicily) and little bottles of booze for her school chums. Once I got home I was pretty sorry I didn’t buy any of the nuts, they taste so much better over there. I was also sorry I didn’t buy the huge jar of anchovies packed in oil, but I couldn’t imagine what would have happened if it had leaked in my very small bag. Everything was significantly cheaper then what you would pay for items of the same quality in the US, at least half price. She also gave us really cool posters from Florio advertising their Marsala (which killed me because it was 7 euros a bottle at the gas station in Marsala and I can’t even find it in Portland!). Pasticceria Grammatico Maria (Via V. Emanuele 14): We stopped at a salumeria for lunch and then went and bought dolce here, it’s famous for its almond paste confections. My sister also bought some of their beautiful marzipan fruits for gifts (you can buy sturdy gift boxes there) but I opted for two bars of the siciliano torrone (almonds and pistachios) which both my partner and I have a serious weakness for. When I got home I discovered that morbido means soft. I had been sure I was buying torrone for the dead. It was expensive (10.5 euro each) but oh so good. I’m eying the second bar that I’m trying to save to give to my mum. Agrigento Not my favorite food area, way too touristy, but I ate my favorite meal nearby. La Scogliera: I had the best meal in Sicily at La Scogliera, in Siculiana, which is a short drive from Agrigento. It’s on the marina and the sea is right out the front door. I had great pasta with pistachio pesto, shrimp and zucchini and then the best mixed seafood plate ever. The grilled swordfish and shrimp were amazingly good. This was the first time I could understand why people suck shrimp heads. Sweet and shrimpy goodness. Their digestive tracks were bright red, like their shells. Not something I’d ever ate before. The only disappointment was the calamari, which was too tough and huge. I think it had been frozen. Foresteria della Luna di Balla: near Agrigento. My sister’s favorite meal of the trip. It was really good, but I have a problem with Italian restaurants that try to be French. I like Italian food because it isn’t French and it makes me sad when they do that. It was a fancy place and we got there around 9 pm. Totally empty, like almost every other hotel and restaurant we went to. There were no tourists and the people we talked to were freaking out about how badly it was affecting their economy. No matter what time of night we ate (7:30 to 9:30) we were frequently the only people in the restaurants we ate at in Sicily. This was the week before we declared war on Iraq and everyone was staying away, I guess. The waiter suggested letting the chef decide what we would eat and we agreed. We had spaghetti with bottarga and fresh tuna cubes, white seabass with potato scales and broccoli that tasted like it had been boiled for a while in butter. Semifreddo for dessert. Kákalos: fine pizze if you’re desperate to eat something in Agrigento (I suggest you plan your meals for elsewhere). I had one with smoked pancetta, caperi, anchovy and chilli. Sciacca After we walked around Agrigento, we drove back to Sciacca, for what was my favorite part of the trip. Sciacca is a fishing town an hours drive back towards Trapani, totally off the tourist trail. My father’s Baedekers said there was a lot of ceramic painting going on down at the wharf. So to the wharf we went, parked and got out. I quickly noticed that my sister and I were the only females in the place and people were staring. Everyone was involved with something to do with fishing. It was really cool. We went in to Bar Charlie where I had the best alpine strawberry gelati ever and almost got killed when I walked into a fisherman because I was so into the musky, fruity taste. Ooops. We headed up towards the piazza and found all the ceramic shops. I was in ceramica heaven…the people were in the back painting and you could buy what they’d made in the front of the stores. I went crazy and had to be dragged away. My favorite shop was Bottarga della Maiolica di Accursio Toto. Mr. Toto was a really nice man and very happy I loved his stuff. If it was my trip, I’d stay at the Grand Hotel delle Terme in Sciacca (hmmm…hot springs) and visit the temples in Agrigento from there. Cefalù Osteria la Botte (V. Veterani, 6): By the time we hit Cefalù we were pretty maxed out on small medieval towns with duomos and mosaics (the one in Monreale is nicer). If I had Jim’s recommendations before we went I think we would have stayed longer, but as it was, we went, looked at the church and ate lunch and drove back to the airport. I had ok pasta vongole, and a really great filetto con pepe verde (with Marsala). I wish I could buy the same veal Italians do. It’s basically just really young beef, none of this chained up baby cow stuff, and damn tasty. email for any questions regards, trillium

Even more simply, the pony is the smaller side on a two-sided jigger. regards, trillium

There's a recipe in Marcella Hazan's book for pork cooked like game or something like that. It involves rosemary and juniper berries. I made it once or twice for a polenta topping. I liked it for a change of pace, but I like gin better. I don't think I've met a gin I hated. I also throw them in the mix when I'm corning beef brisket. I've spent some time drinking with sailors, but they drank aquavit not gin, probably had something to do with being in Malmö. regards, trillium

Doesn't the alcohol make it safe to store at room or cellar temp? That's my assumption. Alcohol is a great bacteria killer. To tell you the truth, right now the citrus stuff is sitting in around 90% alcohol and that's it. Once it comes summertime, it'll get diluted with water and some simple syrup. Then it gets put in the freezer to drink chilled! For aging liqueurs we have lots of options because we have a corker and capper. This means we can use beer or wine bottles, but to tell you the truth, most of the time I'm just too lazy and let it sit in the glass jar I've incubated the stuff in. I use those Italian jars with the wire closures and the rubber gaskets. If you're interested in cappers or corkers you can find them in your local homebrew shop. regards, trillium

From the gossip I've heard (it's second hand) Armandino has some health problems and his family is trying to get him to cut back on working because it's stressing him out too much. He was supposed to be retired! Maybe you just caught him on a bad day a couple of times. I'm not a regular, but when I went I was badgering him about a bunch of stuff and we were comparing notes on olive curing, and why American won't eat raw pancetta etc. He was very gregarious, but still had that vibe that reminds me of my grumpy Italian grandpa (my partner is still terrified of grandpa, without reason...). I wouldn't take it personally. My mum goes to pick up stuff for me regularly, and it's just him. regards, trillium

You know, I was sitting in a seminar thinking "wait a minute...I just wrote neonatal instead of prenatal" but it would have been rude to run out and correct myself.... I don't think the speaker would have appreciated it. So thanks Dave. I can see it now, next there will be talk about at what embryonic stage prenatal lamb tastes best. regards, trillium

I believe the word you're looking for is neonatal (before birth). regards, trillium ps thanks for the edit...but I hope all this newfound power doesn't go to your head...

I don't have help for you on your rice cakes, but I'd love to hear how you make your wine. We have the yeast balls and the rice, but the conversation I had with the grannie describing how to do it didn't get written down right away, and I'm foggy on the details. I'll ask my friend to ask her mum about them...do you have the Cantonese name for them? regards, trillium

Um...that should read "any one in pdx *want* some" and I can't figure out how to edit it..bad typing...that's what happens when you're guiltily procrastinating. trillium

Ok, so if you have issues about eating dead animals don't read this. Ever since I bought some suckling lamb in Chicago from my favorite Italian grocery store around Easter, my mum has been reminding me of how good it was and how we really should do it again. It really is good, tender and lighter in color then older lamb, I cooked it the classical roman easter way and had carciofi romani along with it. Cosmic. It's not economical, you get a high bone to meat ratio, but the flavor is delicate and sweet and the texture is velvet. Since she's close by now, and I know some sheep farmers, I thought it would be a good idea to give them a call and talk about suckling lamb. I talked to Dan of SuDan farms last weekend. He says he has lambs he can slaughter all year round right after they're weaned. I want one that's been eating new spring grasses, it really does make a difference in how they taste (the first eggs of spring from chickens have a similiar deal going). They're expensive, around 4.50 a lb and dressed weight for a whole one is around 40 lbs. I don't need a whole one, just a half. He'll sell me a half but then he has to take it to the packing plant and package up the other half. If I buy a whole one he can process it at the farm and take around .20 or .30 off / lb. The money doesn't make that much difference when you're talking about such a luxury item like this, but I thought other pdxers might be interested. I need to let him know which route I want to go by this weekend. He makes regular deliveries to Portland. regards, trillium

Maker's Mark? Maybe Old Forester? I... ah... know this guy.... ah... who would be willing... ah... free of charge to you, mind you... to... ah... take some of this stuff... ah... off your hands... ah... as it were. I was thinking more along the lines of an orange bitter for the Seville peels, but now, thanks to the kindness of strangers, I think I've found a replacement for my beloved Amer Picon. So hmmm...orange peel in bourbon... As for taking some of this stuff off of our hands, well, which exactly were you feeling the most helpful about? regards, trillium

I think you do. Maraschino has a really strong taste, the closest thing I can think of is kirsch but that's not quite it. The Aviation isn't for everyone, some people don't like it because they find it too astringent. For them, I make Delilah's. regards, trillium

I just got an email from Coit Liquor that they have it in stock at 10.25/bottle. That's less then the price at the other two websites I listed, for them that cares. And I like the folks at Coit. I've never mail-ordered from them, though. regards, trillium

here's a better link. You have to go to spirits, then look for the thread labeled Amer Picon. There are two sites listed in that thread that sell Torani Amer (it isn't listed on the website), which contains alcohol. www.bevmo.com/ or www.wineglobe.com/liqueurs.html Wine globe can ship to WA and OR without restrictions, it looks like bevmo can only ship wine. If you find it in Seattle, please let us know! regards, trillium

Thanks for the line, that's great news! I'm going to email both Sam's and Coit, to let them know there is a substitute. I know the guy at Sam's was willing to order anything if I could find it distributed in the US. It's funny about Amer Picon, like I mentioned before, it was everywhere in San Francisco, in the grungiest dive bar you could usually order a Picon Punch and they even knew to ask about the brandy floater. I was really surprised when the distribution got cut off, but the guy at Coit told me he thought that most all of it in the US was consumed in the bay area alone and it wasn't a big enough market for the big distributors. I wish I could remember who the last importer was. I seem to remember it was a NJ importer, but I'm not sure. I gave my friend a half of a bottle when I moved last year, thinking it could be replaced very easily. I'll email him and find out if he still has it, but knowing him, I doubt it. I don't know if it was distributed on the East Coast, but I know you could get it as far east as Chicago up to last year. regards, trillium

We've made a limoncello like drink from Buddha hand citron which has an unbelievable fragrance. I'm looking forward to drinking it this summer. There are lots of really neat liqueurs to make, the ones I've made so far are limoncello with meyer lemons, a liqueur made from an infusion of lemon verbana and thyme, cherry bounce (there are varients, we let sour cherries ferment naturally with lots of sugar and then mix it with maker's mark and let it age for a year), nocino (green walnuts, walnut leaves and a few spices) and 88 (coffee beans stuffed into an orange and submersed in vodka, then sweetened with raw sugar). My mum makes this incredible sparkling raspberry booze, which she does by sheer luck, and always turns out without exploding bottles. It's interesting to figure out which ones need lots of aging and which don't. The lemon verbana one was made after talking to a friend from Lucca and at first I thought it was disgusting. 2 years later it tastes great. I'd like to make a rosolio this year, something with black currents and a peach pit/leaves thing. Like I mentioned in a previous discussion, I'm also thinking about trying to make an amari or two, but I haven't got around to it yet. I'm also hoarding a bunch of seville orange peel with the hopes of trying my hands at something with them. The only problem is that at this point we've run out of space for all the bottles, and we're just not drinking what we've made fast enough. regards, trillium

I just received an email from Tony Giovanzana, the head dude at Coit. He says there still is no US distributor for Amer Picon. regards, trillium

Hi Vanessa, I'm not tissue, but I am the one who posted the recipe above. I'm guessing your truffle like items are chuan xiong. You can check out a pic of it here. The latin name is Conioselinum unvittatum which doesn't seem to match anything on your list, but the english ingredients lists aren't very trustworthy. Or the soups could just really vary. I had time to hunt down more translations for you for the recipe I posted. gan cao = licorice = Glycyrrhiza glabra luo han gao (guo) = arhat fruit = Momordicae Grosvenori, Fructus dang(deng) xin = bullrush pith = Medualla Junci dang kway (Tung kwai) = angelica = Angelica senensis sheng di (sheng di huang) = fresh rehmannia =Rehmannia Glutinosa There are many combinations of herbs that can be made into cooling soups, and it might just really vary from recipe to recipe. I find it facinating that a lot of herbs used in Chinese cooling soups are the same ones used in Italian bitters. How did you like the one you made? regards, trillium

Have you seen Amer Picon in the Bay Area recently? Last year I found out that it had stopped being distributed in the US. Before that I had been buying it at Sam's in Chicago. At the time Paul wrote the book it was available, I was getting it regularly, and you could drink it as Picon punch even in grungy bars in SF. When I moved to Portland I couldn't find it (along with almost anything else...sigh) so I did a big order through Sam's, but they told me it had just recently been dropped (this was late 2002). I even called Coit Liquour in North Beach because I didn't believe the guy at Sam's who told me it wasn't being distributed any more. They told me the same thing. Cinzano makes an orange bitters that is available in Canada, but I haven't been able to get my hands on any yet, so I don't know how it compares. I'll console myself with all the amari I brought back from Sicily. regards, trillium

We've done more then once and it's great. I like buying meat from the people that grow the critters, so I bypass the whole premium supplier deal, but the best one we ever did was one where we used an old layer to make the stock and a roasting hen for the meat. These were bought from one of our favorite farmers in Illinois. You can read about what I did here. I don't get into making good clear stock because the people I was talking to already knew how. I expect you may as well. regards, trillium