Published April 23, 2012

As family, friends, some readers of my blog and anyone within earshot for Baton Rouge’s Ryan Airport are aware, I was supposed to travel to Mexico this week. My destination was Oaxaca, considered by many to be the birthplace of much of what is considered distinctively Mexican cuisine. But, after three successive days of flight cancelations I had nothing to show for my South-of-the-Border aspirations except for a much more intimate acquaintance with the inside of our metro airport.

So, what is a disappointed and frustrated food writer to do under such circumstances? Close the weekend down by attacking a bottle of fine tequila for one, but also visiting one of the more interesting retail spots to open in Baton Rouge in a long time, La Morenita.

We have had a smattering of small grocery/deli places that catered to the Latin American demographic, but La Morenita is our first, real super-mercado. I do love the dusty shelves, the tinny mariachi music playing through a busted stereo and the general broken down charm of some of the smaller Latin markets, but La Morenita is in a whole other league. They even have their logo printed on their plastic grocery bags, so you know they mean business.

Buried within La Morenita is an extensive meat counter that sells a variety of cuts that were previously hard or impossible to find in Baton Rouge. They also run a bakery and a deli counter that serves a fine taco al pastor. But, the real draw of La Morenita is the variety. The place is brimming with fresh and diverse Latin American products and, as is often the case with “ethnic” groceries, the prices are shockingly reasonable. You will see the familiar mirliton (known in most Spanish speaking countries as a chayote) next to mounds of leathery-husked tomatillos. Hard, starchy plantains share the shelves with cactus, fresh epazote, a symphony of chilies and more unusual dairy products than you can stuff a quesadilla with.

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Published March 27, 2012

Eggs are the sort of thing that everyone knows how to cook and generally has strong opinions on. There are tricks for making your scrambled eggs fluffy, incantations to say over your frittata and secrets for getting them to hard boil without the yolks turning green. But, a really good omelet is all about patience and restraint. You have to be patient and let the eggs firm up before you flip it, and you have to exercise restraint when filling it or you will end up with a mass of un-cooked ingredients at the heart of your delicate egg dish.

Recently, I was fortunate enough to be given almost a dozen fresh farm eggs from the fine publishers of this magazine. As much as techniques may differ for egg preparation, there really is no disputing that eggs laid by chickens that wander freely around, scratching and pecking out a living in the backyard, are superior to (and come in more interesting colors than) the store-bought variety. The yolk is a rich, buttery yellow and the whites are clear as glass. And, of course, there is the flavor. Firstly, they have a lot of it. Secondly, the flavor puts the packaged-up-and-shipped variety to shame.

So, if you find yourself with a clutch of farm fresh eggs that have never known the refrigerator, then you would be wise to do something special with them. I chose to make an omelet with thin, early spring asparagus and rich, easy melting Oaxaca cheese (available at some groceries, but easily found at Latin specialty markets). By the way, omelets are not just for breakfast or brunch. I enjoyed mine for dinner with a flinty Fumé Blanc and it rounded out a Monday night rather nicely.

ASPARAGUS AND OAXACA CHEESE OMELET RECIPE...

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Published February 28, 2012

Let me be the first to say that I realize that this is not an award-winning photograph. But, I have been thinking a lot lately about the brevity of human existence, the actions that define our character and, in this case, the things we (to abuse a well known phrase) carry with us.

The first thing you should know is that I don’t lose things. Not, physical objects anyway. I might lose my dignity after too much bourbon or a hand of poker or something altogether more personal, but I don’t lose objects. My key ring came with my first car, one I was given in high school. I have never lost my wallet (well there was this once is an abandoned wood mill, but I recovered it). It would be impossible for me to say if I keep some sort of unconscious inventory of my belongings, because I don’t have a regular place that I always put them down. I tried that and didn’t use it. My things may be scattered around my house, but I never have trouble putting my hands to them.

At this point, any reasonable reader will be asking what this has to do with a food blog. Just to be clear, it is a subtle but legitimate subject. This thing pictured here is a water bottle, made by a company called Nalgene. They started off making vessels for science labs but found a niche in the camping, greenie, holier-than-thou nitpickers (of which I myself am a member, on occasion). The crux of this matter is that this water bottle, bought in an mildly-obnoxiously chipper (and also holier-than-thou) food coop in Carrboro, North Carolina in 2005, has probably saved more carbon emissions, waste, natural resources and long-swimming polar bears than all the shopping at Whole Foods or biking to work or buying at the Farmer’s Market could ever accomplish.

This is not just because I drink a lot of water (which I do), but also because the most neglected (and, to my way of thinking, most important) arm of the Green Triangle is reuse. It’s easy to throw your soda can in a barrel marked for recycling, but then someone just has to make another can. It is easy, if maybe far too expensive, to buy organic tangelos flown in from Maracaibo, Ecuador, but they must be flown into the US and then pass through the industrial food system to reach your table. What is hard is limiting out consumption and just using what we have. It also happens to not be very much fun, but contrary to what advertisers and people who write books with words like “Steps” or “Easy” in them might have us believe, feeding almost 7 billion people on this planet is not going to be fun. And, they certainly aren’t going to be eating any Ecuadorian tangelos.

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Published January 23
A recipe of winter flavors fit for the crawfish season from the kitchen of Frank McMains.

Ingredients:

Directions:

Add the butter to a medium sauce pan over low heat to melt it. Raise the heat and add the diced onions and sauté them until they just begin to color. Add the minced garlic andcontinue to sauté and turn the mixture. Once the garlic is fragrant (about 2 minutes) add the mushrooms and continue to sauté moving things around in the pan so nothing burns on the bottom. Once the mushrooms have become slightly soft (about 4 minutes), add the white wine and sherry and allow the mixture to reduce in liquid volume by about half. Add half the salt, the pepper, dried thyme and fresh tarragon.

Fill another large pot with water and add the other tbsp. of salt and begin to bring it to boiling. In a third pan heat the oil over a low-medium heat that stir in the ¼ cup of flour. You may need to at the extra tbsp. to achieve the correct consistency for a blonde roux. Stirring constantly over medium-high heat allow the flour to cook in the oil, creating a blonde roux (this should take less than 10 minutes). Pour the roux into an oven safe piece of Pryex and set aside. By now the mushrooms should have reduced satisfactorily. Add the crawfish tails and the fat they are packed in to the onion and mushroom mixture and stir to combine. Lower the heat to a very low simmer and add in the cream.

Allow the combination of mushrooms, onions, herbs, crawfish tail and cream to cook at low heat and reduce somewhat (about 12 minutes) then add the grated cheese, withhold some if you wish to use it for garnish. Add about three tsps. of your withheld blonde roux and raise the temperature somewhat. The roux should quickly thicken the dish. Place on the lowest heat possible while you bring your pot containing the water and salt to a boil. Cook your linguine according to the instructions being mindful not to over cook the stuff. Once the linguine is done, drain it and rinse wit hot water to remove some of the excess starch from the outside of the noodles and toss them in the colander where you drained them. Return the linguine to the large pot then add the mushroom and crawfish mixture. Toss all the ingredients together until the linguine is thoroughly coated (a toothed, pasta spoon is very helpful for doing this and handling noodles in general). Serve in pasta bowls being careful to distribute some of the larger ingredients like the mushrooms and crawfish evenly as they will tend to end up at the sides of the pot when you toss the pasta. Garnish with any remaining whole sprigs of tarragon or just serve with a nice, sturdy and delicious white wine.

More than an American collector's fetish.
Published January 20

Pyrex has a place in almost every kitchen. They manufacture the hardened, high-temperature resistant glass that comprises a lot of measuring cups. But Pyrex might not have a place in everyone’s heart. For decades Pyrex also made a wide line of kitchenwares.  Many folks might remember them as the clear or white and flowered casserole dishes used to serve things like spinach madeline at many a southern holiday (or funeral, for that matter).

There is something of a brisk market in vintage Pyrex, as a quick search on Ebay will reveal. But, the stuff is more than an Americana collector’s fetish. It is also has a very practical place in the modern kitchen. I use their “refrigerator dishes,” compete with a clear, beveled lid to store leftovers all of the time. Their small baking dishes are ideal for individual sides ranging from crème brulee to a generous mound of asparagus with hollandaise sauce.

The advantages to owning and using vintage Pyrex are many. First, they can often be bought for a song at garage sales (and your grandmother probably has a pyramid of them that she would part with, if you ask nicely). They are also eminently meritorious in this age of conservation. Not only are you reusing them on a daily or weekly basis but you are also reusing them in the broader, manufacturing sense. Sure, you can go out and buy sturdy, new, plastic leftover containers but they are just another item that has to be made. Vintage Pryex already exists and it doesn’t get that grimy feathering that bedevils plastic containers after too many washings. They work equally well in the microwave or oven, which makes them more versatile than plastic. Lastly, they just look cool.

I realize that not everyone will be drawn to the mouse-brown Pryex with the white chickens on them but they come in many solid colors that look right at home in today’s stainless steel and black marble kitchens. I have been amassing a collection of vintage Pyrex for years, ever since I was first alerted to their decorative qualities by the architect duo of Mike and Ursula Emory-McClure.

It seems that every time my mother finds herself at a swap meet or flea market she comes back with a piece of Pyrex for my collection. I have so much of the stuff now, that I may have officially switched from curious user of the product to impractical hoarder. My own peculiar interest in them aside, they deserve consideration from the environmentally or aesthetically conscious home chef. Cheap, cool and old are rarely found in the same object, but they mingle in vintage Pyrex. These little kitchen items warrant a second look from all of us who have ignored them as we filled our plates with green bean casserole at the Thanksgiving feed line. 

Very good (very portable) holiday food, from Chef Don Bergeron
Published December 13

The holidays are a busy time. With all the socializing, family get-togethers and end-of-year business fuss it is a wonder we have time to feed ourselves. That is where Chef Don Bergeron’s Mid-City Market comes in. They offer daily lunch specials that are uniformly delicious. But Bergeron really saves the day with his expansive line of to-go meals.

We all have enough cooking to do with twenty-three hungry family members showing up for a Christmas feed. But you can take away a little stress by popping a few tasty items in the oven for those pre-festivity meals. Hot, home-style meals are available Monday through Saturday and they vary according to the day (call ahead or check out their website to see your options). Many of the dishes will be familiar, like the baked chicken or fish filets. For those inclined to more hearty fare, they also serve delicious Shepherd’s Pie (much redeemed from the lunchroom variety you may remember from high school) and a delicious and flaky chicken potpie.

Now, I would not encourage anyone to eschew the rewarding ritual of preparing a large holiday meal but the Mid-City Market has even prepared a holiday menu that you can order in advance. The burden it will take off of your already stressed holiday schedule may allay your guilt at not having actually cooked anything and your guests certainly won’t mind when they are served piping hot trays of Spinach Madeleine, rice dressing or shrimp and mirliton casserole. They also prepare whole turkeys and beef tenderloin in portions suitable for serving the masses.

Don Bergeron’s is located in an unassuming slot along Jefferson Highway, near the much-missed Compact Disc Store. Their variety and quality should put them in the running for any busy (or perhaps a tad bit lazy) holiday chef and really … what are the chances you are going to whip up a Smoked Salmon Terrine with Toast Points for the Christmas meal? Whether for the holidays or just a quick lunch, Chef Don is making great (and portable) food right in the center of town.

Details
Chef Don Bergeron’s Mid-City Market
714 Jefferson Highway, Baton Rouge
(225) 218-4264
www.chefdonb.com
Email orders to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it