Watching the Markets: Grand Central

sweet dolci spreads at Bella Cucina Last Tuesday, I was inspired. I don't mean that I had rushed home with a fresh purchase of groceries and a spontaneous, must-make-tonight, dish idea. Or that I was struck with an urge to expound upon any national cuisine, penny-pinching technique, or environmental cause. No: I had just roamed the gourmet, European-style food hall in Grand Central Terminal, and the beauty of it was still sinking in. I was in food shopper's bliss.

Ravioli Aioli

It used to be that when a potluck presented itself to me, I would default to one of a number of tried-and-true party favorites. Now that pool has run rather dry. But no fear -- a new pasta crank is here.

Rum Butternut Ice Cream

super squash-caramel sundae Not butter rum ice cream, not just butternut squash ice cream (although you can just omit the rum if you care for that), but buttery, yummy rum butternut squash ice cream. Say that five times fast. Now try it after some more of that rum.

More on that pasta

needs more peas, according to Bittman It seems (belatedly) that I am not the only one with pasta on the mind. Mark Bittman’s recent article in the Times offered hoards of recipes for pasta lore that I can’t wait to try out sometime soon. But he also touched on a point that I found interesting, and struck at a deeply embedded piece of cultural wisdom that I had never thought to question before: The ratio of grains to delicacies.

Fresh Fettuccine with Baby Portobellos, Green Beans and Sage in a Cream Sherry Sauce

I got a brand new toy. Alright, it's gently used and I bought it on eBay for $10, but check this out: A true Italian Marcato (aptly named) "Pasta Queen" pasta crank with 7 thickness settings, 2 pasta widths and a table clamp. Early Christmas in New York.

Seriously Corny

This land is corn land: Curt Ellis (left) and Ian Cheney in Queens It's not a joke. More than 80 million acres of corn were planted in the US last year. Yet only 253,500 of them were sweet corn, for eating on the cob. Where does the rest of it go? Leave it to Aaron Woolf, Ian Cheney, and Curt Ellis to illustrate this -- and many other crucial facts about our current agricultural system and diet -- in their documentary film, King Corn. These college buddies did what many a young urbanite might dream of and moved out to the heartland to learn what it takes to grow an acre of corn. If you don't mind a double-dose of my wit and wisdom, read more about the film at The Reeler. Also, check out Curt's ongoing blog on more food insights as he travels for the film, which is up and running at Culinate.

This Side of “Paradise”

I enjoy tea a lot. All kinds of tea. I haven't taken this passion to the next level of home DIY experimentation, drying out leaves and whatnot, but lately it's crossed my mind. Typically at around this time of the year, I return to the comfort of tea. Having a propensity toward being cold all the time, I like having hot drinks to sip on much as a fish likes to have things to fill its gills with. As temperatures began to inch toward the mild fall range yesterday, I found myself with a craving at work. So I opened my office kitchen cupboards and was delighted to find a nice assortment of individually-wrapped teabags. Lemon… no. Peppermint, not today. Mandarin Orange Spice? Naturally, I’ve seen this trademarked tea blend from Celestial Seasonings with its Mandarin princess on the box countless times throughout my life. But today I actually felt like drinking it. So I did. Yet as I sipped, instead of being soothed, I was more and more peeved by this: Her eyelids are lowered in a sultry glare. She offers a bounty of oranges, but you know there’s more. For me it’s a well-known, almost accepted fact that tea marketing clownishly fetishizes Asian cultures. Perhaps more so than any other not-necessarily-Asian product. From Tazo’s ugly packaging and fourteen-year-old-getting-high-for-the-first-time pseudo-spiritual “The Art of Tea” campaign to Snapple’s "lovably" clueless tourist reacting to grizzled sages in their commercials for white tea, it’s clear that American tea companies are not exactly vying for the Asian American market. Fine, then. But I draw the line at this image. And this copy, from Celestial Seasonings' website: “Deliciously spicy and teeming with flavor, Mandarin Orange Spice Herb Tea embraces the essence of an oriental paradise. At your fingertips, the flavor of luscious oranges mingles with piquant cloves to create an exotic and 100% natural feast for your palate. Mandarin Orange Spice Herb Tea is a medley of aromatic flavors with the allure of the mysterious Far East.” Hey, guess what? The mystery’s been cracked! We’ve already opened the vault to the secrets of the Far East. I think it was on Indiana Jones’ getaway raft in The Temple of Doom. Now, I might be the only person in the world offended by Madame Mandarin over here and if that's the case, then I'm prepared for and okay with it. The problem is, I really like this tea now. I like that the product is all-natural and I find this blend of herbs delightful. But I can’t stand the packaging. Can't I enjoy my drink without being reminded of the sexualization of women of my heritage? Also, let’s not forget that the tea is not exactly "Mandarin" in any non-imagined sense – the blend of warm cinnamon, cloves, herbs and orange peel riffs on Christmasy mulling spices more than anything else. Or those oranges stabbed with cloves that I once made from a craft book as a child. So what the hell is this “oriental paradise” all about? I am so not in it. Now, a good rant come off me, let's start talking homemade tea.

Baba Ghanoush: Eggplant Mush

I find it no coincidence that so many cultures like to tame eggplant by beating them to a pulp. My run-in with not-so-well-cooked eggplant earlier this summer has put me off the poisonous plants for a little while, but I'm not calling it quits just yet. Baba ghanoush, eggplant "caviar," so to speak, has been enjoyed throughout Middle Eastern, North African and Eastern European cuisines for many centuries before peasant food became chic. They must know what they're doing.

Mocha Frosting

No, it's not my blog's birthday part II. Last weekend was the birthday of a couple friends of mine -- a couple, who happen to share the same birthday. No, they're not twins. So, since everyone loves cupcakes and two birthdays is certainly that much more reason to, I baked up a batch of mini white cake delights topped off with my own mocha frosting. These friends are keen on coffee, as am I and most people I know. But, like myself and probably not so many others, they're not particularly cake lovers, nor frosting aficionados. I don't know what it is about it, but it takes a little something extra to get me excited about frosting. This mocha one, fortunately, rose to the challenge.

The Search for Closer Cloves

little garlic, where came thee? It's no surprise to me, as an average American consumer, that nearly everything I wear, step on, brush my hair with, carry my things in, or merely touch in my day-to-day routine was made in and exported from China. So perhaps I should likewise not be surprised that something as ubiquitous in my daily life as fresh garlic should come from the same place. After all, black pepper hails from Indonesia.

Lamb Vindaloo Curry

Vinda-who? Has it been this long since I've dined in an Indian restaurant? I suppose so. You see, I've been spoiled by always having plenty of Indian friends while growing up that the taste of authentic curry was never too hard to come by. Nowadays though, things have gotten a bit dicey. I've long forgotten what many of my favorite types of dishes were called, or what they consisted of. But perhaps the most tragic thing I managed to forget was how terrifically easy it is to cook up a simple curry. And in my book, it doesn't take very much for a curry dish to taste very good.