slkinsey
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Posts posted by slkinsey
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I had the pleasure of having a full blown tasting menu at Babbo back in September. The two dishes that were head and shoulders above the rest were the two pasta dishes. I'm still kicking myself for not having the pasta tasting menu.
Interesting. I agree that the pasta dishes are outstanding -- especially the fresh pasta dishes and even more especially the pasta ripiena dishes (I speak of the goose liver ravioli, the beef cheek ravioli, the calf's brain "francobolli" and the mint "love letters"). That said, the most outstanding dish I have ever had there was the fennel dusted sweetbreads with quince vinegar and duck bacon. The tripa alla parmigiana blew me away too.
Grappa at Otto afterwards was most excellent, too.The grappa tasting at Babbo is pretty cool, too. We've always managed to make friends with the wine guy (I love Italian wines and grappa even more), who always gives us a very generous pour and sometimes an extra grappa to taste.
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I think it's a mystery. We still don't know how to cultivate most kinds of mushrooms (or truffles), or even necessarily know why they grow in one place and not another. If we knew more, porcini and chanterelles, etc. would be as cheap as portobellos.
I actually think that decent mushrooms pop up more frequently than people think. It's just too bad that most people don't know enough about mushrooms to take advantage of it. The average American, upon waking to see his lawns covered with brown-gray spongy fungus would immediately head for the lawn mower. The only reason we were lucky in that regard is that my parents are both scientists and, due to the incredible mushroom activity around our house in Western NC, they decided to learn everything they could about North American mushrooms so we could pick and eat wild mushrooms. (There are, BTW, mushrooms known as "false morels" that you don't want to eat.)
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Dried morels are ridiculously expensive, though.
Not if you're me! One year when I was in high school, my parents opened the front door of our house in Boston to discover the entire front yard awash in morels that had popped up overnight! They picked them all, took them to the lab and freeze dried them. This happened several years in a row and then just as mysteriously stopped. We still have a huge bag of freeze dried morels.
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I don't think I have ever encountered any starch but potatoes or biscuits. I wouldn't be surprised to find rice in Louisana or other parts of the south.
Interesting. I don't know why we always did it with rice. Perhaps because it's easier to make? My father's family comes from both East and West Texas, though, and I never got the impression eating it with rice was all that unusual.
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I agree on the Texas version (my grandmother's being the one with which I am most familiar). She used to soak the pounded meat in salted water for an hour or so.
Perhaps a more interesting question is what starch to serve with chicken fried steak. A lot of people have mashed potatoes, but we Kinseys often like white rice.
Leftover chicken fried steak biscuits are mighty nice the next morning, too.
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E un minuto di silenzio per Peppino Cantarelli. Due stelle per una cucina Emigliana proprio tradizionalissimo. Nemmeno Michelin a potuto ignorare.
And again...
"And a minute of silence for Peppino Cantarelli. Two stars for an very traditional Emilian kitchen. Not even Michelin could ignore it."
Okay, guys. Basta con la lingua Italiana! eGullet is an English-language board. If you want to make occasional rare comments in Italian, you must provide a full translation in English. And yes, I know that I was the one who opened Pandora's box on this thread.
But if we're not careful, Pan will start posting things about us in languages we don't have the slightest hope of understanding. 
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... one of the more common things you will hear said about Michelin-starred restaurants in Italy is: "it's not really Italian food."
...(he has [batali], by the way, said a number of times that he thinks the Michelin Guide is screwing up restaurants in Italy and causing them to offer food that isn't really very Italian).
Esatto!!!
Sono sicuro che ci sia qualquno qui nel filo che ha mangiato al famoso Enoteca Pinchiorri a Firenze (due stelle). A me, quello non e cibo italiano --- e cibo francese! Si puo dire la stessa cosa di tanti altri ristoranti "stellati" dalla Michelin, come La Tenda Rossa (due stelle) a Cerbaia (Toscana). Mi dispiace di usare l'italiano, ma mi ha sembrato giusto per questo soggetto particolare....
For the non-Italophiles:
"I am sure that there is someone here in this thread who has eaten at the famous Enoteca Pinchiorri in Florence (two stars). To me, that is not Italian food -- it's French food! One may say the same thing about other restaurants "starred" by Michelin, such as La Tenda Rossa (two stars) in Cerbaia (Tuscany). I'm sorry to use Italian, but it seemed just to me for this particular subject."
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2. Re: copper cookware, I was at Fante's here in Philadelphia last weekend, and they have some stuff on sale. And I have nothing to do with them professionally or anything--it just seems cheaper than what folks have posted so far. If I weren't in fast reply I'd remember how to put the URL in, but it's here http://fantes.com/copper_cookware.htm
They are cheaper than the prices we have been discussing for heavy copper because they're tin lined and not stainless lined. Stainless is considerably more expensive. Fantes is a great store, but I wouldn't say that their prices for tin-lined heavy copper are substantially lower than the competition.
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"The information that you are requesting, is considered by All-Clad to be proprietary."
Odd that they are not upfront about this, given that anyone, especially someone with an expense account, could buy a small saucepan from all of these lines and have the answer in a few days. On the other hand, they probably aren't interested in competing on mm of Al, but rather on how exclusive they can be.
Yea. I think that's pretty stupid on their part. If I were ever to write a book or publish an article comparing the various lines of cookware, I would tell the manufacturers up front what specifications I wanted. If they decided they didn't want to give me the specifications I wanted, I'd simply buy a cheap piece, saw it in half and measure the layers myself.
The fact is that they must be aware that it would be ridiculously easy for any competitor to reverse engineer their product to this extent. And, really, they are hardly giving anything away to a competitor by disclosing the thickness of the stainless and aluminum layers they use. Personally, I think they don't want to give out those measurements because they don't want potential customers making direct comparisons between the various clad aluminum lines on the market today. It is interesting to me that I was able to get their materials specifications with nothing more than an email several years ago when they were the only game in town.
One thing I was surprised by was the apparent thinness of the sides on the SS saucepans. To me, it looks like they have a 5 mm Al layer throughout. If that's true, that's not even really as good as, say, Sitram. Interesting.If you look at the data in my cookware class, you will see that I have the exact measurement for the aluminum layers in the fully clad lines (Stainless and Cop-R-Chef -- both around 2 mm) and the interior clad lines (MasterChef and LTD -- both artound 4 mm).
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Now where's your evidence that there are all these great Italian restaurants outnumbering the French ones? Where can we look for these lists? At least, can someone name a bunch?
D'oh! Sorry, Steven -- my fault. I was insufficiently clear. When I said "I would bet you that there are more excellent Italian-American restaurants in America than there are excellent French restaurants" I did not necessarily mean to equate "excellence" with fine dining of the multiple-starred variety. What I meant to convey is that of restaurants which are excellent in their own way, and primarily at a one-star or lower level, there are more Italian-American places of quality in the US than there are French. Because the fact is that, outside of a handfull of major cities, there are practically no French restaurants of quality at the one-star level and below whereas most cities have plenty of reasonably good Italian-American (although not Italian) places.
At the "fine dining" multiple-starred level, it is quite clear that French restaurants dominate. I would suggest, and indeed have been suggesting, that this "fine dining" multiple-star model is an inherrently French one and therefore it comes as no surprize that French restaurants dominate in this arena. I would further suggest, and have been suggesting, that the fine dining multiple-star model is so inherrently French that it is virtually impossible for an Italian restaurant to attain four stars from the New York Times (or the equivalent) without sacrificing some of its Italianità. And I would even further suggest that many of the high rated, multiple-starred fine dining establishments across America are only French in the sense of being a part of the international style of neo-French cooking exported and promulgated by the inventors of high restaurant culture, as opposed to being related to the actual cooking of France and French people.
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Hee hee! I think it's an interesting topic, for sure. It just seemed a fork in the road leading away from a discussion of why Italian restaurants in other countries are easy to bash when you get back from Italy.
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If the pans look either black or blue, they should be hard black or blue steel. If they appear silvery or gray, they are probably softer carbon steel.
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Nice points, Chad. Obviously there do exist certain issues that do lend themselves to disclosure. Fundamentally that is something that is left up to the reviewer, tv personality, reporter, or whatever. Why? Because ultimately it's their reputation and career they're playing around with. If it comes out that a reviewer who has been plugging a restaurant most people think is mediocre at best is married to the owner's sister... well, he'll pay for that with his reputation (which is, by the way, his most salable commodity) and ultimately his career. To go back to my earlier example of our own Mr. Shaw, discovering that his agent is the brother of one of Ducasse's chefs doesn't lead me to question the integrity of his comments regarding Ducasse's establishments in the slightest. Why? Because he has build up a certain store of trust in me that he is not unduly swayed by such relationships by not shying away from critical commentary in the past relating to businesses and people with whom he has such relationships.
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It strikes me that people in the real world have all kinds of biases. Some of them may have to do with relationships, and some not. The question becomes whether and to what extent one discloses these biases.
At the moment we are discussing a situation wherein the reviewer has a personal relationship with the chef or restauranteur. Some people are saying that this should be disclosed. Well, what if, for example, the reviewer admires the chef's television program? That could be equally biasing. Should the reviewer disclose that? What if he really liked the restaurant that previously occupied the space of the restaurant he is reviewing. Potentially biasing again. Does this demand a disclosure? What if he had a fight with his wife on the way out the door? What if he's a heavy smoker and has trouble with delicate and subtle flavors? What if it's really hot that day and he's not all that hungry when overheated? Maybe he doesn't think Italian food can possibly be as good as French food. The list of things that can potentially lend bias to a restaurant review is so enormous that full disclosure of all potentially biasing elements would entail a listing of such size that it borders on the absurd.
Everyone is biased. You call them "preferences" and I call them biases. Reviewers, being humans, are necessarily biased. Anyone who pays attention to reviews of any kind either does or should understand this. In my own business, for example, it is widely known that a certain critic at the New York Times will never give Renee Fleming anything other than a positive review. Whether or not he is being paid off by her recording company, is a diva-worshiping fan or a personal friend to Ms. Fleming really doesn't matter. What matters is that those of us who read the opera reviews rewcognize this bias and do not consider his reviews to be indicative of the real quality of her performance.
To make another example, it should be quite clear to most of us by now that Steven is an admirer of Alain Ducasse and his restaurants. This is not to say that he is dishonest when writing about his experiences of Ducasse's food or in his restaurants, and I am sure he would point out things he didn't like. But we already know that Ducasse's overall style of cooking, approach to food and ideas about how to run a restaurant are admired by Steven. This is a bias, and to a certain extent the knowledge of that bias colors the inferences I make from his reviews of Ducasse establishments. Why? Because I have no way of knowing whether my tastes are the same as Steven's in this regard. I won't know until Steven pays for me to go to AD/NY and Mix a dozen times -- an experiment I would be willing to try for the sake of the site.
However, if he wrote a regular review column in the New York Times, and I tried a bunch of the restaurants he reviewed and had markedly different reactions than his, I would know that he was a reviewer whose tastes and preferences (i.e., biases) did not accord with mine. As a result, I would not pay too much attention to his reviews in the future -- just like I don't pay attention to Fleming reviews by the abovementioned Times critic.A reviewer who allows his reviews to be unduly influenced by personal relationships in the restaurant business will quickly reveal himself as such to his readers. Therefore, I agree with Steven that it only clouds the issue to make such disclosure (among who knows how many others) on an individual review basis.
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Veal Parmignana. A breaded (heavily, in the worst versions), fried veal cutlet (chopped veal, or chopped beef passed off as veal, in the worst versions) with cheese (usually mozzarella, rather than the implied Parmesan) melted on top which is then smothered in tomato sauce. The industrial versions are often plopped on a sub roll and thus, turned into a hero sandwich (possibly the highest and best use of veal Parmignana--Jason Perlow would think so, and maybe me, too).
Is it found in Italy?
I have never seen it there. That said, it certainly does have some Italian antecedents, such as bistecca alla pizzaiola.
If we want to talk about veal parmigiana and other such dishes, however, I think we would be well advised to start a new thread so that the topic of this one is not too diluted.
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I think another factor playing into this duscussion is actually defining Italian cuisine -- A lot of the "Italian" food served in the US is actually a stereotype of itself...
This is true, but I think it goes to the question of "Italian-American" cooking versus Italian cooking. I-A cooking, in my opinion, has more or less crossed over into being a distinct cuisine all on its own.
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I almost never use the steamer insert; the folding steamer is so much handier. Many more sizes, depending on to what degree it is opened. Easier to clean -- that is, takes up less room in the dishwasher.
And there we have it from a steaming expert! Er... an expert in steaming, that is!
I thought this would be the case, but figured it was better to hear an explanation from someone who actually does this kind of thing. Thanks for the illustration.For example, I'm cooking whole flounder tonight for dinner. I might do it Chinese-style with soy sauce, scallions, ginger, and a little oil: on a plate on the fully-unfolded folding steamer in my covered "chef pan."Sounds tasty. We're all coming over, so make extra.
Mostly [the steamer insert] lives on the bottom of the lower cabinet, all the way in the back corner, under the double-boiler insert and the food mill.Sounds like the home pasta extruder we finally got rid of. That thing must have had an inch of dust on it by the time I finally decided it was ready for early retirement. I actually use my food mill all the time. It would be interesting to hear which various items of cookware are the least used in people's homes. I ended up getting rid of my double boiler once I started building up a collection of good cookware that can spread the heat around. Sounds like it's the same with you.
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I think you are badly mistaken if you suppose that there are "tons of excellent French restaurants" in the United States. I also take exception with your assertion that there are "no or very few good Italian restaurants" here. In fact, while there are likely more excellent French restaurants than Italian-Italian restaurants, I would bet you that there are more excellent Italian-American restaurants in America than there are excellent French restaurants.
How would you propose we measure all this? Certainly if we look at the various major metro area newspapers that rate restaurants, we're likely to find that the top echelon (four stars or whatever) in every major city in America is totally dominated by French restaurants.
I don't think this is a very good model to make this kind of judgment. I would suggest that your observed French domination of restaurant stars has to do with several things:
1. French restaurtant culture has a several hundreds year head start on Italian restaurant culture. Indeed, France more or less invented restaurant culture as it is currently known in the Western World.
2. As a result, the measure by which restaurants are judged in these star systems is according to how well they hold up to the highest French restaurant traditions. Clearly there are two ways to look at your data that the top star-winning category in every major city in America is totally dominated by French restaurants. Your way of looking at it is to say that the best restaurants in this city all happen to be French. Another way of looking at it would be to understand that the restaurants are rated acccording to a French standard -- that the restaurants were able to win their top ratings precisely because they are French, and that it would be extremely difficult if not impossible for a restaurant which did not include major features of the French model to win a top rating.
3. As explained above, the "four star" restaurant model is basically a French thing, and it is not one that is particulatly practiced in Italy. In fact, one of the more common things you will hear said about Michelin-starred restaurants in Italy is: "it's not really Italian food."
For example, in New York City there are five restaurants that carry a four-star rating from the New York Times:Alain Ducasse
Bouley
Daniel
Jean Georges
Le Bernardin
I don't think there is any Italian restaurant in New York City that competes at that level.
I think it depends on a number of things.
First of all, I am not sure I would call all these restaurants "French." Here are some items from one of Jean-George's menus:
- "Langouste" Salad With Grapefruit And Mint (sounds Italian)
- Porcini Tart With Wild Herb Salad (sounds Italian)
- Chestnut Broth With Mushroom Ravioli And Fall Vegetables (sounds Italian)
- Sea Scallops, Caper-Raisin Emulsion, Cauliflower (not really French)
- Tuna And Hamachi Marinated In Olive Oil, Lemon Juice, Radish And Chive (Asian?)
- Young Garlic Soup With Thyme, Sauteed Frog Legs With Parsley (French)
- Green Asparagus With Morels, Asparagus Juice (could be anything)
- Farinette Of Escargots With Scallion And Parsley Oil (French)
- Toasted Brioche Of Foie Gras (French)
- Black Sea Bass With Sicilian Pistachio Crust, Wilted Spinach And Pistachio Oil (could be anything)
- Slow Baked Maine Char, Sauteed Chanterelles And Artichokes (sounds Italian)
- Baked Dorade With Bay Leaf, Lemon And Fennel Seed (could be anything)
- Turbot In A Chateau Chalon Sauce, Tomato Confit, Zucchini (French)
- Lobster Tartine, Pumpkin Seed, Fenugreek Broth, Pea Shoots (French?)
- Muscovy Duck Steak With Spices, Sweet And Sour Jus (could be anything)
- Broiled Squab, Onion Compote, Corn Pancake With Foie Gras (French?)
- Loin Of Lamb Dusted With Black Trumpet Mushrooms, Leek Puree (could be anything)
- Sweetbread En "Cocotte" With Baby Carrot, Ginger And Liquorice (French?)
- Millbrook Venison Wrapped In Cabbage, Kumquat-Pineapple Chutney (not French)
Doesn't seem all that French to me.
Here is a menu from Bouley. I don't see how anyone could demonstrate to me that 80% of that menu is distinctively "French." For that matter, other than the fact that the menu names are in French, I don't see what is so distinctively French about this menu from Daniel either. Surely this is not the standard by which we are calling a restaurant "French?" Do these menus strike you as particularly French? Other than the language and the format, do these menus strike you as all that different from, say, this one?
Now... clearly there is more to earning a top rating in the NY Times than the quality and style of the food. There is also the setting, the service, etc. I would suggest that these standards are also based on the French model. So, the question is... if Babbo relocated to a more upscale space and if it seriously upgraded (i.e., "Frenchified") the service and decor, might it be able to earn another star from the NYT? Or, what would it have to do in order to earn another star? Would it have to start serving more sauces, making things like "lobster aspic" and making the preparations more complicated to earn that fourth star?
Now I'm sure there are more Italian restaurants at the three-star level -- and that would still probably count as what you mean by "excellent" -- but without doing the hard work of going through several lists of restaurants I know nothing about, I'd be pretty confident betting you that the French and French-influenced-American places outnumber the Italians in that category as well. Probably at the two-star level too. But I'd be willing to be corrected if someone wants to comb through the lists and tabulate them.Again, the question that has to be asked is how many restaurants of the various types actually aspire to high rankings in these star systems. My strong suspicion is that the number of French restaurants seeking a four star rating vastly outnumbers the number of restaurants of other nationalities seeking such rating.
Furthermore, as I am sure you would agree, a three or four star rating is generally more an indication that a restaurant meets a certain predetermined set of criteria, not necessarily that it is a better restaurant or serves better food -- it's just higher up on a certain arbitrarily-defined ladder. To my mind, there aren't very many Italian restauranteurs in America who are all that interested in playing the four star game. I have no doubt that Mario Batali could open a four star restaurant in NYC if he really put his mind to it. I just don't think he's particularly interested in making the changes in his cooking and service he would have to make in oirder to earn such a star (he has, by the way, said a number of times that he thinks the Michelin Guide is screwing up restaurants in Italy and causing them to offer food that isn't really very Italian).
What do you think an Italian restaurant could do to earn a four star rating and still remain fundamentally an Italian restaurant? Could a Chinese restaurant earn a four star rating and still remain fundamentally Chinese? If the answer is no (and I think it is) then we are left with two ways we may look at this: We may suppose that this is an indication of the supremacy of French cuisine over all other styles, or we may look at the star system as a fundamentally French measure and understand that it may not be entirely appropriate to judge a Chinese restaurant on a French scale.
- "Langouste" Salad With Grapefruit And Mint (sounds Italian)
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oh, it's cast iron all right. and most copco is of a very fine quality, and beautiful, too. i've just been wondering about the thing you mentioned in your lecture: that when the frying pan is heated, the enamel will not expand at the same rate as the iron - which will cause it to loosen. meaning, as i understood it, that i won't be able to use it like i would use a "raw" cast iron skillet. i believe most enameled cast iron like, for instance, a french oven, is used for low/slow.
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Hard to say... I wouldn't use it for super high-heat cooking like you might a raw cast iron skillet. But I wouldn't worry about the regular medium and medium-high heat you would use to fry up some onions or chicken thighs, etc.
It is true that enameled cast iron is best for low/slow, but Le Creuset, et al. all make frypans that are intended for more speedy cookery.
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i just bought this vintage copco enameled fry pan. couldn't resist its beauty, and it was only 6$. but what the devil can i use it for? decorative purposes only?
Is it enamel over heavy cast iron or enamel over thin carbon steel? If the latter, then it is only good for decorative purposes. If the former, then you should be able to use it. Just imagine it is a cast iron skillet (i.e., not very responsive but holds the heat) that is nonreactive.
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One thing I think is a common mistaken ragù expectation among Americans is that it will be tomatoey.
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- To go way back to the original question, I wonder if there might be a bit of travelers' double-standard being used in restaurant-selection. I wonder, would the same people who travel to Italy and rave about the food pay the same amount of money, devote the same amount of time, and accept the same limited choices they accept in Italy if they were presented to them back home? Does part of the pleasure of eating in Italy, for most Americans at least, require that it be part of a vacation?
Certainly that is part of it. A friend of my family once came back from a 2 week trip to Italy and his one complaint was that "the Italian food was unrelenting." Not that it was bad, mind you, but that he found it monotonous to eat Italian food every day for two weeks. how many of us (besides Craig, Bill and myself) could happily eat Italian food 6 days a week for 6 months? There are plenty of people who eat "American food" all the time and who don't find that monotonous. Italians, it should be said, do not think of their cooking as "Italian food." To them, it's just the way food is.
- It's interesting that there is a massive Italian population in the US, but no or very few good Italian restaurants, whereas there is almost no French population in the US yet there are tons of excellent French restaurants. Perhaps this says something about the relative abilities of France and Italy -- as cultures -- to transmit their culinary traditions outside of certain narrowly defined geographic areas.I think I touched on this a little in one of my posts above. Two things here:
1. I think you are badly mistaken if you suppose that there are "tons of excellent French restaurants" in the United States. I also take exception with your assertion that there are "no or very few good Italian restaurants" here. In fact, while there are likely more excellent French restaurants than Italian-Italian restaurants, I would bet you that there are more excellent Italian-American restaurants in America than there are excellent French restaurants. For example, where I went to college in Appleton, Wisconsin there is an Italian-American restaurant and a French restaurant, among many others. The Italian-American restaurant (run by Mexicans trained in Chicago) is reasonably good, and the French restaurant is terrible.
2. I don't necessarily think that it is the case that France, for example, it really exporting its culinary culture wholesale. I think it is the case that France is exporting part of its culinary culture, and the world has come to identify that food as "French." But, I am not sure that the "French" food one eats in most American French restaurants would be identified as being all that French were it put on the table in France -- and, if so, whether it would be identified as being a particularly good example in that respect. France, as you point out, has the advantage of having more or less invented international restaurant culture, so many things about the standard restaurant format work very well for neo-French cooking. Italy has exported part of its culinary culture too, and quite successfully, in the form of Italian-American cooking. But, in terms of the real Italian experience, it is fighting against the already established French-derrived restaurant culture: antipasto, primo and secondo instead of appetizer and entre; starch separate from protein instead of all together; less sauce and more emphasis on the primary ingredients; etc... these are all obstacles to having a truly Italian-style dining experience outside of Italy.
- I think we are underemphasizing the difference between food and restaurants. Again, this causes me to wonder about the difference between the French and Italian approaches to restauration. The French basically invented the modern restaurant. In Italy, however, there were barely any restaurants pre-war. My understanding is that many Italians had to travel abroad to learn the restaurant business in the early days (aka the 1950s) of the Italian restaurant business. This would mean, for example, that Italian-American restaurants on the whole may very well predate Italian-Italian restaurants. That could explain something, though I'm not sure what.Yes. I've gone into this in another thread. Here is a relevant excerpt:
1. America had a huge impact on Italian culture. This is evident in the social and agricultural changes that came about due to the fact that the peasants could (and did) leave for the New World, and also in the things that were brought back from America when many of the immigrants eventually returned to Italy with their heads full of new ideas. This was not necessarily an impact of American culture on Italian culture, but rather a huge impact on Italian culture that happened due to the existence of America and the possibility of affordable immigration.2. Prior to the mid-20th century there basically was no Italian restaurant culture in Italy. Unlike, say, France or America, there really weren't many professional restaurant cooks preparing Italian food in Italy in the early 20th century. There was the "high cooking" that happened in the homes of the wealthy and the "low cooking" that happened in the homes of the peasants. There wasn't much of a middle class. What trattorie and osterie there were existed mostly as places where people would eat when they were traveling and didn't have anywhere else to go (i.e., were not guests at someone else's home). Unlike most well-developed restaurant cultures of the time, there was no expectation that one would be eating especially good food at one of these establishments -- quite to the contrary, they were not considered to be very good. Families did not "go out to the restaurant" for fun in those days. No one could afford it, and those that could were getting better food at home.
3. When restaurant culture began in Italy, it began primarily as a way to cater to foreigners and did not serve particularly Italian food. The first country that had a significant number of Italian restaurants serving Italian-style food was America. Italian-American restaurant culture was well-established in America when there was no Italian-Italian restaurant culture to speak of in Italy. The Italian immigrants who opened restaurants in America were not copying trattorie from their home country, because there weren't any -- certainly none with which these people would have been familiar. They were copying the other restaurants they saw around them in America and serving adaptations of their traditional home cooking. Italian restaurant culture as we know it is basically a thing of the second half of the twentieth century.
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Tradition dictates that the First Footer can claim a kiss from every female in the house
Excellent! And with that, I'm off to be the First Footer at Hugh Heffner's mansion.
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Perhaps a more interesting question might be: What national cuisines do travel well to other countries. And, of those national cuisines, what is it about them that travels well? Or, more to the point, what part of them travels well and what is it about certain cuisines that allows us to identify a partial transplantation of one country's cuisine as "good X food" and not others?
Chinese cuisine travelled spectacularly to Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore, and very nicely to Indonesia. To a large extent, what happened is that local ingredients and various local techniques were embraced, creating a kind of regional Chinese cuisine that functions as a fusion in the best possible sense. For example, in Thailand, Chinese cooks have adopted things like mixing meat and fruit, and in Malaysia and Singapore, they've adopted local vegetables and, in many instances, strong use of hot pepper, plus use of curry flavor, belacan, etc.
Okay. But I would argue that this same sort of thing happened in the creation of the "fusion cuisine" known as Italian-American.
What I wonder is: if someone came back from China where they really loved the food and went to one of these Chinese places in Thailand, would they consider it "good Chinese," or might they complain and say "this isn't very good Chinese food -- it has fruit in it."
Chicken-Fried Steak: Chicken or Steak?
in Food Traditions & Culture
Posted
Might be an interesting idea. Certainly it is the case that the average Southerner will be using a softer, lower protein flour to make CFS. Using Wondra would probably give it a nice effect, but one that isn't entirely traditional, I'd guess. You should try it!