Garbage chefs

A friend once said that to be a good chef you had to be a garbage chef, able to throw a good meal together with whatever is in the kitchen. She said this at 0300, as she was making Filet Mignon for about six of us, while we sipped Viuex Telegraphe ’79 in her kitchen. I doubt very much that Susan had ever had what most people would call “garbage” in her kitchen, she had one of the most developed palates and noses of anyone I ever knew.

I consider myself a good garbage chef, unlike other people who shop for meals, I shop for ingredients and put together meals on the fly. We’re slowly ridding the freezer of meat since Jack is going away, but I put together a few interesting meals for him, including a cheese steak pizza. mostly I cook with grins and veggies now, but there have been some interesting tufu creations.

I’m partial to one dish meals lately, Sunday I used a soy chorizo, cous cous, Mediterranean olives, red pepper, broccoli, cilantro, Belgian endive, mushroom, and green onions in a dish, basically whatever I had in the fridge. I’ll be doing something with Eggplant and tomatoes, probably garlic and ginger and whatever else is fresh later this week. So yes, garbage chef.

Last week we actually followed a recipe Lieve had found on the internet for a veggie lasagne, spinach, ricotta, caramelized vidalia onions, portabella mushrooms, walnuts, and Gorgonzola cheese. Much better than a veggie lasagne my sister in law once made, in which she just substituted broccoli for meat.

Being a vegetarian of convenience does cause some mistrust of my cooking. I made some wonderful stuffed sweet peppers for the crew at the shore, but one friend wouldn’t try them because I had eaten a meatball at lunch the previous day, and she didn’t trust my vegetarian integrity. There was no meat in them, just felafel, olives, ginger, cilantro, feta, and whatever else looked good at the moment. The carnivores loved them, which might have been another reason she was uneasy about trying them. My cooking often carries the textures and flavors of meat dishes, I did spend almost forty years cooking with meat, and there are profiles I aim for.

Making the most of what you have is a lifestyle. It applies to everything I do, a skill learned in the Boy Scouts, and honed in the Air Force. It has helped in every job I’ve ever had, and in a sense, every relationship. I have made the best out of twenty years of Multiple Sclerosis, unappreciative partners, and other “bad breaks” in life.

The most important part of doing the best you can is recognizing that sometimes your best is to do nothing.

More international dishes

My friend Tariq had a small restaurant, he is Lebanese and his food was as authentic as could be. Emma worked there and was quite literally one of the family, the similarities in Lebanese and Sicilian personalities are remarkable.

I learned a great deal from Tariq’s father, “Baba”, about Middle Eastern cuisine, as well as from his mother, “Mimi”. Over the years I picked up quite a bit about life in the Middle East, and attitudes about that life. The emigrant point of view is always interesting, a mixture of love of country and self preservation.

I found the restaurant because I love gyros (that is pronounced “yee ro”, not “ji ro”), and when Tariq opened at the end of the block I was in heaven. The variety of other dishes, plus knowing the chefs, caused me to try new things (along with Mimi’s pushing). One dish I found intriguing was tabouleh, a mixture of bulgar wheat (or cous cous), parsley, mint, tomato, lemon juice, and spices. I’ve never been a huge fan of mint, but Mimi’s recipe was very nice.

I was inspired to make my own version. I used cilantro instead of parsley and mint, lime juice instead of lemon juice, sundried tomato and kalamata olives, red onion instead of spring onion, some diced red bell pepper, and my spices were more cumin and chili powder instead of allspice and cinnamon. Emma loved it, as did Tariq and Baba, but Mimi hated it. “That’s not tabouleh!” she exclaimed, and she was of course correct, but it was still very good. It was more a “Southwest” version, I tend to blend cultures, I always have.

I use Mediterranean spices in tuna salad, Oriental spices in meatloaf, and what I have found to be curry spices in chili. I’m perfectly adept at making dishes in their original style, but there is an “a la Blake” version that is interesting and well received of just about everything. It’s not really “international” until there is more than one nation represented. As I’ve converted to vegetarian cooking, the ability to adapt has become crucial.

Food nourishes the soul as well as the body, so I pick up ideas everywhere and combine them in ways people haven’t considered. One of the things I love about the program “Top Chef” is learning new techniques and working them into old favorites. Some people do it very well, Marcus Samuelsson was great at bringing an Ethiopian feel to traditional dishes, Richard Blais worked his interest in molecular gastronomy into nearly everything, and Carla Hall showed that the most important ingredient is always love. Some chefs fail. I recall one woman making a bad dish and saying “I don’t like that dish, I never eat it”. She had failed to include love, as well as an understanding that you cook for your audience’s benefit, not your own.

We feed each other in many ways, each with their own talent. Some are chefs, some musicians, some poets, some illustrators, and some architects. All of these arts, and most others, have a base in mathematics, the universal language.

Enjoy your weekend, feed the hungry.