The Rake Magazine

Category: Food and Drink

  • Fresh Pink Innocence

    End-of-term gifts from one’s pupils are a recurrent pleasure of professorial life. Like the boarding-school boy who thanked the aunt for the bottle of cherries pickled in brandy, one enjoys them not only for themselves but also for the spirit in which they are given. Only once have I been given an apple (and then in a spirit of irony). Port, of course, is always welcome.

    Some of the offerings that have thus come to ornament my office enjoy an oblique, even recondite significance. There is the plastic McNugget that for nearly twenty years has been ever ready to perform the function kindly envisaged by its thoughtful donor, namely to differentiate between two senses of the present participle neuter of the Greek verb “to be.” Unadorned, the McNugget is mere Being, pure Essence. But accoutered with his little ten-gallon hat and his red-and-yellow McGunbelt, he becomes a Specific Being, That Which Is.

    The token of appreciation that most often catches the visitor’s eye is my Plastic Action Figure of Pope Innocent III. His Holiness stands about six inches high in a maroon vestment, pallium, and triple tiara. He holds up a number of fingers in a gesture, perhaps of blessing, and has at hand a scroll reading, “Filii Hohenstaufenin, osculamini asinum meum.” I guess this is meant to allude to Innocent’s political manipulation of the Holy Roman Empire; rendered roughly into the vulgar tongue, the words might mean, “Sons of the Hohenstaufen, you are kissing my donkey.”

    Innocent must be one of the least aptly named of all Roman pontiffs. He gave ecclesiastical backing to the unspeakable Fourth Crusade of 1204, which one historian has called the last of the barbarian invasions. Its knights never went near the Holy Land; instead they appropriated Constantinople, the venerable capital of the Christian Emperors of Byzantium, who had formed an intelligent symbiosis with their Muslim neighbors.

    Look westward and Innocent’s effect is no brighter. The Cathars are not heroes of mine, a set of dismal dualists who denigrated the flesh and whose promotion as early avatars of modern hedonist (sorry—liberal) theology is (shall we say charitably) difficult to understand. But whatever the Cathars’ faults, there was no need for Pope Innocent to fire up knights from northern France to invade the Cathar region—what is now southwestern France but was then a distinct land with its own language, the langue d’oc (so called because its word for “yes” was oc rather than the French oui). One of the northern aggressors was so ferocious that he exhorted his subordinates, who could not tell Cathar enemy from innocent bystander: “Kill them all; God will recognize which ones are His.”

    The city walls of Carcassonne, one of the great Cathar strongholds, no longer echo with the clash of swords. They were extensively rebuilt in the nineteenth century by the Gothic fantasist Viollet-le-Duc, and breathe a heavily romanticized version of the last enchantments of the Middle Ages.

    A reassuring reality is to be found a few miles northwest of Carcassonne. The Château de Pennautier is the leading winemaker in the small, relatively new appellation of Cabardès and its 2004 rosé, available for about $12, is a proper summer tonic. It is made from Syrah and Grenache grapes, varieties one most associates with the Rhône valley, but it is much less heavy than most Rhônes.

    When I first poured this, I found it confusing. The color is a clear carroty pink, the nose subtly sweet. The initial flavor recalled soft fruit, then tannins kicked in, redolent of mild black pepper, and finally came a series of aftertastes, including the slightly numbing sensation that wine folk associate with pear-drops. But for all its lightness, this wine stood up well to a small steak. What I really liked, however, was the way the wine settled into the glass. A day later it was no longer confusing. The wine had achieved the boldness one associates with innocence. It had come together in a combination of sweetness, acidity, and salutary bitterness—as refreshing as a fine, fleshy, pink grapefruit. Now that’s something no student has ever given me.

    Oliver Nicholson is a classicist at the University of Minnesota and former secretary of the Wine Committee at Wolfson College, Oxford.

    Read more of Oliver Nicholson’s wine selects at www.rakemag.com/restaurants

  • Fast and Fabulous

    Our story begins with a hungry young lass on her way to lunch at a new restaurant. She’s dragged along her lunch date to see what all the fuss is about, but upon entering the establishment, she feels a certain unease. The place is packed, and she is assured by a less-than-sweet hostess that the wait is a solid forty-five minutes, even for a bar table. A generally unfriendly atmosphere causes our heroine to grab a takeout menu and leave, sputtering a fabricated story about returning for dinner another night with some large—very large—group.

    But she’s still hungry, and her date is getting cranky. While she straps him into his car seat, she is forced to make a decision: She’s losing time, losing a three-year-old’s patience, and losing ground in the battle for a good lunch. It may be time to settle. Heading to a nearby place we’ll call Smartguy Bagels, she orders a standard PB&J for her date and a chicken Caesar salad for herself. With her first bite, she discovers the chicken is still frozen. Alerting the good people at the counter to this tragedy, our plucky girl watches as the chicken is lifted off the salad, tossed into the microwave, then plopped back onto the greens. It is this display of fast-foodsmanship, coupled with one more bite of alternately searing-hot and semi-frozen chicken, that leads our defeated young woman to conclude: It is what it is.

    Yet, there is a happy ending of sorts to this tale. The plight of our stunningly beautiful heroine grows increasingly rare these days, because of the hottest trend in the restaurant industry: fast-casual dining. Coined in the mid-’90s, “fast-casual” or “quick-casual” describes restaurants that fill the niche between fast food and casual dining, between McDonald’s and TGI Friday’s. These restaurants offer expedited service, but with better food and a more comfortable ambience than fast-food outlets. Diners usually order at a counter, with the food either picked up at said counter or delivered to the table. Not a surly hostess in sight.

    Not that I think this tolls the death knell for full-service restaurants. People still enjoy being tended to and consulting with knowledgeable servers. But frequently, the quick café fits the bill: when you’re running late, when you have kids in tow, when you refuse to eat in the car, when you want something healthier than fast food—which means most of the time for most of us.

    Big players on the fast-casual scene include the familiar Panera, Noodles & Company, and Pei Wei Asian Diner, a chain mostly present in the Southwest but with a few outposts here.

    In addition, the fast-casual trend has caught the eye of local culinary types, so the local scene promises to get better and better. Tim Niver and Aaron Johnson, the boys behind Town Talk Diner, are shopping for a site for a fast-casual Italian restaurant; and Alex Roberts, of Restaurant Alma, is opening Brasa, a saucy, south-of-the-border-flavored rotisserie joint in Northeast Minneapolis, sometime this summer. I desperately want to name two other industry players who are looking and scheming, but they still need their day jobs, so all must remain hush-hush for now.

    Not that there isn’t already plenty of fast and fresh food available around town. Lucia’s Bakery & Take Home is one of the more recent and welcome additions to the market. Pop in for some sweet or savory crêpes, freshly made soups, and daily bread specials. Most of her sandwiches feature meats and ingredients from local farms and producers (as if you’d expect anything less from Lucia). Meanwhile, at Yum Kitchen and Bakery, the menu changes about every three weeks—a distinct departure from the big chains’ fixed menus. You’ll always find innovative sandwiches, like the hot turkey mole with manchego cheese, and they’re courting the dinner crowd with entrées like seafood stew and ribs. Take home a whole chicken dinner with two sides if you’d like.

    Pizza, of course, fits the fast-casual bill to a T. Punch Pizza, which started as a full-service restaurant in St. Paul, has expanded over the Cities with express locations. Simply order your Toto pizza (this model is beautifully smothered with prosciutto, arugula, crushed red pepper, and goat cheese), and, by virtue of that nine-hundred-degree wood-fired oven, it’s ready in a flash. Slower to arrive, but bigger, are the classic New York-style pies from Snap!, like the Snaparooskie, piled with sausage, pepperoni, onion, green pepper, and mushrooms.

    Step out of the rut and try Sea Salt for seriously high-quality fast fish. A po’boy or a grilled marlin taco with a side of clam fries in Minnehaha Falls park will heal any memories of bad lunch. Or step away from the burrito and check out Kabobi in Eden Prairie. Meats, seafood, and vegetables, fire roasted in the Persian tradition, tucked into flat bread with brilliantly spiced sauces and snappy sides should be a welcome change for any palate.

    One quick-casual joint I’d be happy to have in my neighborhood is The Bad Waitress. With a snarky twist on fast-casual, diners grab a table and fill out their own ticket (choosing a monster or superhero name as an identifier), which they bring to the counter. The food delivered is comfortably familiar and always tasty. If I lived nearby I’d be there for the pumpkin pancakes at breakfast, the grilled-cheese deluxe at lunch, and the mac & cheese at dinner (plus late-night hot dogs).

    According to the National Restaurant Association, Americans will spend some $150 billion this year at quick-service restaurants. As for our amazingly witty heroine, we can be assured that her portion of the bill will be spent thoughtfully. No longer satisfied to accept “what is,” she’s quite excited to see “what will be.”
    SHOP TALK

    Get ready, get set … summer festival season is kicking into gear. Whether you’re planning to brine cabbage for Henderson’s Sauerkraut Days (June 22-24), toss back a rhubatini at Lanesboro’s Rhubarb Festival (June 2), or train for the milk run during Willmar’s West Central Dairy Days (June 1-15), check in at ExploreMinnesota.com to get all the tasty details … Beginning June 7, the Mill City Farmers’ Market will be open Thursday evenings from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. Given their track record with the Saturday morning market, this could make Thursday the tastiest night of the week … When it comes to learning the basics of baking bread, you can’t get much more basic than the class at Historic Fort Snelling on June 9, which focuses on the brick-oven and iron-kettle baking techniques of yore. Plus, while your bread bakes, you can churn butter and make preserves for that freshly turned loaf (www.mnhs.org) … Classic cars go nicely with burgers and shakes, wouldn’t you say? With the coming of summer, these nostalgic treats can be enjoyed at such throwback joints as St. Paul’s Dari-ette Drive-In (1440 N. Minnehaha East, St Paul; 651-776-3470) and the Minnetonka Drive-In (4658 Shoreline Dr., Spring Park; 952-471-9383), both of which play host to hot-rod buffs and the onion-ring cognoscenti alike.
    CUISINE SUPREME

    Saffron
    A table here will soon be as prized as the spice for which it is named. Saffron’s brightly colored and inviting dining space has already attracted a small but loyal group of devotees, but the masses can’t be kept from this kitchen’s delectable dishes for long. Playing with traditional Middle Eastern and Mediterranean flavors, the cooks devised a menu with contemporary edge. A beautifully pale veal-tuna carpaccio is touched with brown butter vinaigrette and hazelnuts. The salmon-clam tagine celebrates fennel. The blue-crab salad with avocado balances the heat of curry with a kiss of citrus. Treat yourself to some hibiscus lemonade or the Saffron version of a bloody mary (the Harissa Mary, oh yeah) if you find yourself waiting at the bar for a table—a practice you’ll have to get used to here. 123 Third St. N., Minneapolis; 612-746-5533; www.saffronmpls.com
    Manana
    Nestled on the corner of Seventh and Arcade streets in St. Paul is Manana, a small pupuseria. If you’re muttering “pupusa-wha?” you’re not alone. Pupusas, though popular in El Salvador, are rarely seen this far north. Made with a thick and puffy handmade corn tortilla, they are stuffed with creamy melted cheese and your choice of chicharonnes (chicken) or loroco (a briny vine-flower bud from Central America). You’ll also find fresh Mexican tacos, burritos, and carne asada on the menu, as well as Salvadoran favorites like flaky empanadas, tasty pasteles (beef pie), and crispy fried plantains. Since everything is under three dollars, ordering up a mess of pupusas with chilled rice milk horchata will make you feel virtuously frugal, happily fed, and in the know. 828 Seventh St. E., St. Paul; 651-793-8482; www.mananarestaurant.net www.mananarestaurant.net

    Naviya’s Thai Kitchen
    Dwelling in the shadow of a Richfield water tower, this restaurant retreat endeavors to create dishes that heal the body and soul through the traditional five flavors (hot, sour, salty, sweet, bitter). Somehow “creamy” might be added to that list, as a taste of Naviya’s lightly herbed cream-cheese wontons is certainly palliative, and possibly addictive. The lunch buffet offers a nice sampling of the regular menu, including a pungent coconut lemongrass soup. The Bangkok hot plate features a lovely abundance of garlic. The crispy fish cakes come replete with a zingy, sweet-and-spicy cucumber sauce. Heck, the teas alone are reason enough to visit. Check out the oolong graced with an essence of orchid, or splurge on a pot of pu-erh vintage cave-aged tea. 6345 Penn Ave. S., Richfield; 612-861-2491

    Read Stephanie March’s blog at www.rakemag.com/today, find more restaurant reviews at www.rakemag.com/restaurants

  • and then some …

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    I liked Rick Nelson’s Taste 50 in the Strib the other day…but I want to add a few more.

    The breads from Rustica Bakery in Mpls are something I think about often. Craving a crusty baguette with a fluffy, airy center or a dense pugliese with purpose right now.

    The U of M Arboretum is responsible for the Honeycrisp apple, bringing in Michael Pollan as a speaker, and pioneering hardy wine grapes. Check out their summer programs for kids which teach them about growing food, and the new Summerhouse which provides a place to buy their tasty wares.

    Town Hall Brewery are the unsung meisters of beer. They consistently put out award winning beers that challenge the average drinker. Their growler program is genius and their seasonally available Retreating Darkness (made with local Peace Coffee) is the only way to suffer being a Northerner.

    The slab of Nueske’s smoked bacon as a side dish at Manny’s Steakhouse. Yeah, it’s not really good for you, but man is it gooooood.

    Sue Zelickson. More than just chatting on the radio and writing about restuarants, Sue Selickson is a force in the food world: she has worked hard to feed hungry kids, she has inspired and supported countless women in the culinary fields, and best yet, she shows no signs of stopping.

  • Who do that voodoo?

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    Voodoo Doughnut, that’s who.

    Not only is this possibly the coolest doughnut shop on the planet, it’s a lesson.

    It’s a lesson about quitting your job and finding your life … about putting out a great and attention grabbing product … about having fun.

    Do you have a voodoo dougnut in you?

  • Small Bites

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    Just some things to chew on …

    Yesterday I caught a slip of the Today show in which Matt and two lady doctors sat and chatted about which “healthy” foods might or might not be reeeealy evil in disguise. They singled out some fish (swordfish, tilefish, king mackerel, shark) to avoid because of high mercury. When asked if eating it in moderation was ok, the she-doc advised avoiding it all-together (that way people won’t eat it as often).

    The issue: Why must we be treated like idiots? Do we need to be preached an extreme point of view just so that we are scared into listening, some of the time? And she was so comfortable with that ethos that she didn’t even try to hide it. It’s a bit of an overstatement anyway, yeah? How many times per week do you eat swordfish? How many times a month have you eaten shark? When was the last time you cooked king mackerel on your own? If you’re speaking to the general audience of the Today show, it’s a good bet that telling them to eat in moderation will fit the bill. No one’s going to get mercury poisoning from their occaisional fish taco.

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    The restaurant industry is the second largest employer in the nation, behind only the government. That means that at one point or another in our lives, most of us have been members of the food/bev/hospitality world. How was it for you? Was it a spectacular spectacular job or did you get faux kicked in pre-shift like at Mr. Chow in NYC? Check out the Bruni blog on which the comments are deliciously whiny.

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    Hershey’s has sagely grabbed on to the gourmet chocolate trend. First they bought Scharffen Berger and now they’ve launched allchocolate. It’s a smart and sexy adult site with good information that’s free of simpy puns and cliches about women and chocolate. I hate those.

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    I rarely leave any wine in the bottle, but sometimes I do. While out of town, I wasn’t going to bring my bottle back to my hotel, but the server put it in a wine doggy bag which sealed it up quite nicely. Great idea.

  • wikifood

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    Food & Wine has launched a Chowhound meets MySpace kinda thingy called Food & Wine Across America.

    Does it feel like they’re using locals to ferret out story ideas?

    Well, check it out … there’s an interactive map and everything!

  • Mom

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    There’s nothing culinary about cold, smeared toast and rubbery scrambled eggs thrust towards my sleeping head. But that kind of meal isn’t for filling the stomach, it’s for filling the heart.

    On Mother’s Day, I think less about what I deserve to get and more about what I still hope to give. There’s so much more to show, so much more to taste and discuss and cry about and laugh with…

    Will my beautiful and ungraceful daughter be adventurous enough to find and appreciate an off-the-path cafe during her first trip to Spain? Will she ever embrace fish? Will she understand the power of a woman who grabs the list and confidently orders the wine? Coming home from work, smelling like pizza, she’s beginning to love the industry she ignored for so long …

    Will my logical and mathematical son ever learn to ignore the recipe and work from his gut? Will he move beyond the simple rolls in his sushi journey? Can he learn to stop fearing every bit of mold on a piece of cheese? Paradoxically, this one will always try something unfamiliar from the menu…

    Will the awkward athlete finally understand that I am not trying to poison him with whole grains? Will he ever grasp the idea that what you eat can either build you up or tear you down? In his future life, will he rebel against me and go kookoo for Cocoa Puffs or subconciously balance his meals with a zucchini here and there? My biggest mission is to open his eyes to see that all cheese is not alike….

    What will my fat and sassy young one remember? Will he remember the days we had to ourselves, the others trapped in school, and our lunch dates? Will he remember his four-year-old Fridays as fries-day, the day we always seek out the best spuds our towns can offer? Will he remember it like I remember Coney Island Thursdays at our local A&W with my own Mom? Sitting in the car, with our huge frosty mugs of root beer on the tray perched precariously on the window of her light blue VW Bug, I would scrape most of the onions off before I excitedly bit into my hot dog. I looked forward to that day all week, that special day when I got my Mom all to myself … a day when sharing a hot dog meant so much more than just lunch.

  • Top Chefs

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    hirny schmirny schmirny hirny schmirny bork bork bork

    Sooooooo. Mr. Top Chef #1 has finally made his claim on the NY eating scene. Yes, I was a Tiffani fan to the end, but I did heart Harold like the rest of you. I think it’s fantastic that he opened a small space with a friend instead of trying to bank on his TV-fabulocity and rack up investors for something glammy. I think he’s a real cook, and that’s a high compliment. Looking forward to the reviews….

    But here we go again, the next season starts in a little less than a month. And once again, I KNOW one of the contestants! (clearly I am such a special, special little sycophant)

    Chef Brian is the Exec Chef of the San Diego outpost of our own Oceanaire Seafood Room. He absolutely rocks. He disappeared in March, all hush-hush like, and soon enough the news leaked out.

    The cast seems stacked with serious pros this year, but I’m here to tell you, he’s got a shot. He’s totally charismatic, a reeeally good cook (I can still picture one of his angry lobster dishes that killed me: the bug looked like it was going to reach up and hug you), and he’s easy on the eyes. I just hope the edit guys don’t kill his fun and crazy personality. I guess we’ll stay tuned….

  • Shroomin'

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    Every year I get the fever to forage. The thought of walking around a park for a couple of hours and coming out with an armload of wild edibles is like winning the lottery to me. Pirate like, even.

    Today I am especially craving mushrooms, morels. Maybe it was the overdose of cheap and tawdry guacamole over the weekend that has me dwelling on dusky, earthy flavors. I want rich and buttery soft.

    I missed the mushroom class at Whitewater State Park this weekend, but it remains one of the best places to hunt morels. It may seem odd, but as mushroom hunting is a secretive sport (to the lone hunter go the spoils) there are few public gatherings and events. The Minnesota Mycological Society is a great resource, but you need to join up to go on their forays. Understandable.

    Personally, I’d rather go out on my own, on a soggy Monday when others are at work, and trust in fortune.

  • Wednesdayliscious

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    like a kitchen mixer …

    There’s just a bunch of stuff swirling around my brain today…

    Doug Flicker’s new menu at Mission started on Monday. I slinked in for lunch and had a nice egg sandwich, but our server had to read from his pack of notes to answer quetions, and a different egg dish was quite short on the cheese it promised. I’d give them a little more time to get things balanced.

    I saw that Shelley’s Woodroast in Golden Valley closed. I wonder what that place should become? Also out that way, the old Louie’s Habit (which I truly mourn for their amazingly-fall-apart pastrami, sigh) has a sign in the window proclaiming the coming of Wayzata Eatery & Wine Bar. Wonder who is behind that one (could have come up with a better name…)? Must dig.

    I guess I’m having people over for Cinco de Mayo this weekend, but I still plan to make it to St. Paul for part of the day. But now I have to formulate a guac plan and locate my best pitcher for margaritas.

    Thursday I’m hanging with some of The Girls at a garage sale. That means sucking down loads of coffee and snacking on baked goods. Obviously, I like to bring something a little out of the comfort zone: dark chocolate zucchini muffins, sweet olive oil bread, Grand Marnier brownies.

    Am I too excited about this Ratatouille movie? I think most foodies have the heart of a kid (check yourself: do you clap when receiving a hot bowl of truffled soup? do you ferociously rip open a parcel you know to contain your cheese-of-the-month? do you hum a little ditty as you watch your dough rise into the perfect boule?) … so I think those who breed and those who don’t will both find enjoyment in the new Disney flick about a Parisien rat who wants to be a chef.

    Watch 9 whole minutes of teaser and cheer like you’ve mastered the perfect roux.