John Whiting

I must admit that I'm pleasantly surprised at how much wisdom has accumulated in this series of random postings. My wife has written four books on the subject of healthy eating for young children, and little if any of what she says contradicts what has been written here. There's hope...

Toby writes: Don't belittle your observation! You echo what I've endorsed in other contexts; i.e. a fondness for small auberges/bistrots in out-of-the-way corners of France where someone simply cooks because he/she doesn't want to do anything else, and where the locals come early and often. Such places still exist in sufficient quantity to make the search worthwhile.This isn't meant to refute SteveP or Cabrales or Bux in their search for the monumental. It's just that I've come to prefer chamber music to the symphony or grand opera.

Re food and opera: Opera is a particularly equivocal art to consider within the present context of Fine Dining vs Cheap Eats. Don't forget that Italian opera, which is the dominant school (not necessarily the same as the best) was quintessentially a popular (and populist) art form -- at its height and in its own country no more intellectual or elitist than the World Cup. As for the comparative virtues of the performers, *everybody* was an expert! It was the transplanting to Anglo-Saxon countries, with the libretti left untranslated, together with the enormous expense of mounting productions for relatively small audiences, that made it toffee-nosed. (Germany, for instance, has freely translated Italian opera into German.) All this isn't totally off-topic. A lot of what has been roughly and inaccurately called "haute cuisine" in England and America has been ordinary solid bourgeois cooking, dressed up and prettified for the rising middle classes.

Bux et al, my words were only intended as a summary of how I happen to enjoy both food and companionship, not as a model to be followed by others. In other words, a description, not a prescription. Haute cuisine might be regarded as a rough equivalent of classical art -- a genre whose imitation teaches certain techniques. Just how far we may depart from this, for better or for worse, can be deduced by observing modern conceptual art which owes nothing to skill and everything to salesmanship.

More and more, I take pleasure (or otherwise) in a meal in much the same way I take pleasure in a person's company. I'm prepared to meet a meal on its own terms and relish whatever is good, passing over what isn't. I'm not eager to evaluate it at the time in comparison with other meals. If it's a place where I haven't eaten before, I'll later come to some conclusion as to whether I want to return. If it's an old friend, and it's having an off night, I'll put up with it and maybe say a gentle word on the way out. A meal in a restaurant is to be enjoyed, if at all possible. To that end, I stay away from places that I don't think will be sympathetic, no matter what their reputation for brilliant individual dishes. By the same token, I don't choose my friends for their bon mots, but rather for their general compatibility. The end result of all this is that (a) I enjoy the company of my friends because, if they have faults, I have decided to ignore them; and (b) I find myself in very few restaurants that don't at the time give me a certain amount of pleasure, even if I decide not to return.

Why does page 2 of this thread run off the screen, so that it can't be read without shifting the image back and forth?

I keep my rules soft and slow.

In London (maybe NY as well, I can't say) multiculturalism has hit the very form of the sandwich as well as the filling. More and more, including those available from supermarkets, start with pita bread, ciapatta, flat unleavened "wraps" of various sorts, bagels, lengths of bagette -- in fact, any form of bread that doesn't fall apart and will take a filling.

SteveP wrote That's a sweeping generalization whose broom gathers up a lot of suggestive associations. I've remarked before that the sandwiches now widely available in both the US and UK are much better and more imaginative than those sold on the Continent. In Paris, there were queues at Marks and Spencer waiting to buy sandwiches imported ready-made from England, which had arrived at 7 a.m. in huge lorries carrying nothing else. They illustrate Europe's moving towards the first part of your paragraph; namely, the growing prevelance of the short lunch break.I wonder what will be the long term effect on fine restaurants? For those travelling abroad, it's generally easier to get luncheon than dinner reservations, and there's often a luncheon menu which is substantially cheaper. In toffee-nosed tourist meccas I sometimes go for lunch in order to avoid the clientelle who come in the evening and make their presence so ostentatiously evident.

They're SOP for cassoulet, put in to slowly stew along with the stock, the beans, or one of the meat stews, depending on which method you follow. Apart from enriching the flavor, they give a cassoulet its gelatinous cohesiveness. In some recipes you pull the meat off the bones and add it in the final assembly, in others you discard the foot after the "glue" has cooked out of it. Me, I never throw anything away.

Steve, you're on to something interesting with your comment about Americans eating while they're doing something else. It's only in relatively recent years that I've noticed large numbers of Europeans walking along the street and eating at the same time. Of course the French two-hour lunch is legendary.

Bux, what you say makes perfect sense to me. I've never tried to stuff a pig's trotter, but I've handled them a lot for cassoulets, both before and after cooking. I really think I prefer them as a texture and flavor conditioner for other dishes rather than as the primary ingredient -- except for the little pickled chunks I remember from childhood, but that's another story.

I once asked a friend who is a retired Indian ambassador what Indians drink with their food. he answered, "Wine, if they can afford it." Was he joking? I didn't question him further.

French wine producers are feeling the chill winds from the New World. Some will say "Alas!", others "Good riddance!" Over to you. http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...30%2Fwine30.xml

These are truly wonderful. There are similar beers in Britain, especially Worthington White Label. A good bartender opens and pours it very carefully and stops just before the yeast sediment starts to cloud the drink. In Belgium, however, you put your thumb over the opened bottle and shake it vigorously so that the yeast is distributed and the beer is very cloudy with a heady foam on top. De gustibus ...

Several members of the Guild of Food Writers (UK) spent some time last year attempting to work out what wines went well with a variety of Oriental foods. There was a general consensus, in which I concurred, that the wine that worked best with the widest variety of gently and even strongly spiced foods was Gewürztraminer. It is very pungent, aromatic, full-bodied, exotic, and stands up to very strong flavors without negating them.

Steve P wrote: You would appear to have something in common with the viola player who sat in his music room all day playing the same note. Finally his wife ventured to say, "Dear - I notice that other viola players go up and down the scale, playing different pitches of different durations. Sometimes the pattern is very pretty." The viola player continued to draw steadily on his bow and replied with a superior air, "They're looking for the right note. I've found it."Actually, my note about valuing scarce information was not an attempt to argue a case, but rather to convey a mood, a nuance. I still have very vivid memories of a sort of sensory deprivation, of being unable to hear as much as I wanted of particular pieces of music. It was not unlike living in a small town in the middle of nowhere with no restaurants, no decent food stores, and not even the ability to order foods by mail. Only an occasional travelling chef who would serve a splendid banquet and then move on.

I couldn't tell; he was playing with himself. I learned about sex the same way.

I might have said that, but what was principally on my mind was the fact that we value information most when it's in short supply. We're now the victims of sensory overload; and, as Marshall MacLuhan observed, overstimulation leads to narcosis.

For me, the remarkable thing about GT is that they have become and remained a huge success by behaving in an old-fashioned manner which smart operators tell us is a recipe for failure. Honesty? Sincerity? Moderation? Naturalness? Forget it! You've got to be loud, forceful, ruthless, cutting edge -- just like Enron, Anderson and WorldCom!

SteveP's point about "jaded eaters" is a good one; I think it relates to mine. There is just too much space to be filled on the subject of food -- filled with something or other, and not too challenging. I think back -- and this isn't really off the subject -- I think back to the mid 1940's in Providence RI when I used to go four times a year to the splendid little auditorium at the RI School of Design to hear the Budapest String Quartet play one work each by Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven. I didn't know most of the works they played, but there was a record collection in the Providence Public Library that had a large collection of 78s. Some of them were string quartets, and some of these were the works that the Budapest played in concert. I had a list of these and whenever one was about to be performed I'd treck from Pawtucket to Providence and spend an afternoon listening to it again and again. All that work just to hear a piece of music! Now I have all those quartets, some in multiple performances, and can listen any time I like; but it's been years since I settled down with a single composition and worried it to death like a dog with a bone. Steve, does that make sense to you?

This is a corruption of an old English custom, mutton and mint sauce. The (raw) sauce was strong and vinegary, with lots of fresh mint, and it cut through and complemented the fattiness and strong flavor of the mutton.

Suvir writes: There's a wonderful book on the spice trade by Edward Dalby, titled _Dangerous Tastes: the Story of Spices_, British Museum Press, 2000. It was a Guild of Food Writers prizewinner for that year.

For cracking crab claws without smashing them, particularly spider/snow crabs with small diameter, very hard legs, I use a lock/Mole wrench -- the sort with an extra intermediate fulcrum that gives very high leverage. They can be set to different diameters, so put the jaws in place on the claw, adjust the screw to barely fit, remove and tighten screw another turn. Then crack the claw. The jaws will go just far enough to break the claw but will not close all the way and smash the meat inside.

I found joy I'm as happy as a baby boy With a brand new kind of choo-choo toy Since I ate my quiche lorraine...