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Apps and Sides

Cinnamon Message Meringues

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This past weekend, Caitlin graduated from law school.  But she didn’t just graduate; she graduated with style, earning a number of academic honors and awards.

But a few days before the graduation, I found myself sitting around with a lot of extra egg whites (you’ll see why in a few days).  Rather than toss perfectly good egg whites, I decided to make meringues.  And rather than make the simple spiral meringues, I decided to spice them up a bit — literally and figuratively!

After a healthy dash of cinnamon, and a few twirls from my piping bag, …

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Southern Cornmeal Pancakes

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When I first started my blog, my goals were modest to say the least.  I hoped a few dozen people would visit my blog each day.  I hoped my blog could be featured within the first few pages of a Google search.  And above all, I hoped that someone I didn’t already know might leave an encouraging comment.

I’ve met each of my first two goals.  According to the blog administrator, my blog receives over a hundred page views each day.  The administrator also lists the search terms and hyperlinks that direct these individuals to the pages within my blog.  When I keyed some of these terms into Google, sure enough, there was my blog – and on the first page no less!

I’ve also met my third goal – and in exciting fashion.  For many months now, …

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Madeleines

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French recipes are, understandably, often steeped in history.  The nation is as proud of its culinary traditions as it is of its epistolary and philosophical ones.  It’s why the incursion of soft drinks and hamburgers are as noxious as the incursion of English words like “le leader,” “le power” and “le hot-dog.”  It’s why Jose Bove can become a national icon for burning down a McDonalds, and why Maria Antoinette’s remarks about brioche could topple a monarch.  The evolution of French culture and identity can be easily traced along the x-axis of language, and y-axis of cooking.

The center of this graph, the 0,0 point, might well be Marcel Proust’s A la Recherche du Temps Perdu, or The Remembrance of Things Past.  In one section…

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Blue Corn Posole

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When Caitlin and I were in Santa Fe, several of the restaurants offered a bowl of posole as we waited.

Posole is a thick soup or stew, made from nixtamalized corn (corn that has been treated or soaked with lime and water, or calcium hydroxide).   The nixtamalizing process improves the flavor and aroma of the corn, increases its nutritional value, and makes the corn easier to grind.  Nixtamalized corn is also referred to as hominy.  You may be able to find it in a local grocery store, though I went to a special Latin American grocery store to find mine. (where it was called pozole).  It’s also available online.

Because corn was a sacred plant …

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Yogurt and Blue Corn Cornbread

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A few weeks back, Caitlin and I went to Santa Fe for her Spring Break.

Driving into Santa Fe, we were greeted by breathtaking scenery, snow-capped mountains rising in the distance, with parched tracts of desert-land and spotted cacti dotting the roadside.  The city itself encapsulated this sense of beauty and wonder.  The entire city burst with color.  Every building in Santa Fe was built in the adobe style, and the pink hues created a stark contrast with the cloudless blue sky.  Dragon-red chili peppers hung from nearly every veranda, tempting both your visual and olfactory senses.  The city teemed with art – from the Georgia O’Keefe Museum to the record number of galleries to the Native American artists selling their craft in the open-air downtown square.

The cuisine was yet another form of art available in Santa Fe.  New Mexico is justifiably famous…

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Beef Brisket

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In 1969, Georges Perec published La Disparition, a mystery novel of sorts.  The book centers around the disappearance of Anton Vowl, and traces his winding path through the various chapters of his life – though chapter five is omitted.  La Disparition, or “The Disappearance,” is a story and not a story.  The novel tells a tale, but also functions as an exercise.  Which captures the essence of Georges Perec.

Georges Perec belonged to OULIPO, a workshop of famous French authors.  The workshop for potential literature (Ouvroir de Litterature Potentielle) was both a place and a style.  One of its co-founders, Raymond Queneau, published Exercises de Style, in which he wrote the same story ninety-nine different ways.  This was hardly unusual.  Perec, Queneau, and the other members delighted in wordplay.  They wrote …

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Butternut Squash Layer Cake

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It’s easy to get side-tracked in this modern world.  Text messages, phone calls, and e-mails demand our constant attention.  Or, as it may be, distract our attention from the tasks at hand.  Answering e-mails, flowing with the speed and strength of an angry river, evokes a triage center, with each incoming e-mail mentally sorted by its degree of urgency.  Phone calls and text messages are no better, and the dangers associated with driving and phoning are well-documented.

Video games and the Internet are different species of the same beast.  Punching controller buttons will always be more entertaining than punching the clock.  And when the project at hand is growing tiresome, the browser icon is always a quick click away.  There is always a headline to read or a score to check.  There is always something out there, in need of your attention.

I’m not sure how it happened, but somehow this post got neglected.  I should, of course, distinguish between…

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Hand-Dyed Eggs

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One of the things I most admire about man, is his ability to create art – his penchant for creativity.  Art is, of course, a loose term, as anyone who has visited a modern gallery knows.  One man’s junk will always be another man’s treasure.  A piece of art will always be undervalued to one and overpriced to another.  But that’s not really the point, at least as I see it.

For me, the point is to discover what I consider to be art, to stumble upon a work and to declare it, by my fiat alone, some thing of genius.  In the world of architecture, I throw that label on Santiago Calatrava, whose sweeping shapes and arcs on the Milwaukee Art Museum take the viewer from one work of art into another.

In the world of literature, I favor From Paris to the Moon, a work of non-fiction that captures …

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Quinoa Meal

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Relationships are like cooking.  Just as recipes often require staple ingredients, so too are relationships built on certain foundational elements.  But, beyond the basics, the thrill of cooking resides for me in the unexpected combination of ingredients.  The way a sprinkling of cayenne pepper intensifies chocolate with its smoky spice.

Charles and I share many ingredients between us: a love of writing and cooking (and a sometimes bossy attitude in the kitchen!), a creative eye, an interest in obscure documentaries, the desire to wander new cities by foot, and the legal profession.  And while I cherish our similarities, my life has been enriched by our unique ingredients.  Charles was raised Jewish in New Orleans and with several siblings, whereas I grew up in Washington, D.C. as an only child from an Irish Catholic family.  Together, we’ve incorporated these traditions, yielding a flavor that is complex, new, and wonderful.

Last March, we tried our hand at hamantaschen in honor of Purim.  In December, amidst law school final exams, I enjoyed…

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Brown Rice Pudding

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In my legal world, I’m accustomed to starting things fresh.  Every case requires its own study; every case presents its own facts and presentation of the law.  It’s why the Circuit Courts can direct their District Courts in opposite directions.  It’s why a simple car accident can take its litigants to the Supreme Court, and it’s why the Justices there can split their vote.  Even the same case presents itself differently to different viewers.

Last week, I should have brought this understanding to my cooking world.

After making rice pudding with white rice, I copied the recipe …

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