Does This Taste Funny? A Half-Baked Look at Food and Foodies

by Dane, Michael

  When I try to name a dish (in case I want to recreate it) I’m usually too literal. That’s because I figure, if the name of the dish contains enough details, I’ll remember how I made it.

  Unfortunately, The Girlfriend has yet to ask for my ‘Tortilla Crusted Spinach Topped Curried Chicken Thighs,’ so I’m thinking I need punchier names.

  Sometimes I try to be too clever. We had small burgers on English muffins a while back, which I now insist on calling ‘Royal Sliders.’ And the cheap cut of pork I braised in beer – I call that dish “My Drunk Butt.”

  There are times when I come up with a great name for a dish first, and then I figure out what might go in it. I have yet to make creation called ‘Peaches and Herb Chicken,’ but if I ever go to a seventies party, that’s what I’m bringing.

  I never come up with good names for my ground turkey entrées, because no matter what I might want to make out of pound of Jennie-O, it always ends up as meatloaf.

  It reminds me of when my mom crocheted. Despite telling me every year that she was making me a sweater, it always turned into an afghan on the back of our couch.

  Once, I got ambitious and made a turkey roll, and it looked perfect. I put it in the oven, and when I took it out, it had settled and flattened and . . . become yet another meatloaf.

  I decided if I were going to keep making variations on meatloaf, I would need to be more creative with the presentation. Hopefully that would inspire a more creative name.

  So the next time I made a meatloaf, I made it in a square casserole pan, the kind in which you would bake a cake. Right there, it would be different than its boring loaf cousins, because, hey, it’s now a meat cake.

  When it was done, I sliced it in half sideways, and spread a thin layer of mashed potatoes on the bottom layer. I know – I was out of control!

  But that wasn’t the end of my innovation. I replaced the top half, and topped the whole thing with two kinds of crumbled up crackers!

  I call my creation “Double Crumb Comfort Cake.” It’s catchy, it’s fun to say, plus it’s got a built-in slogan for marketing –

  “Sounds like dessert, but tastes like dinner!”

  I Need A Catchphrase

  There’s always a little down time when you’re cooking, whether you’re waiting for your eggs to poach, your onions to get translucent, or your roux to . . . get rouxey enough.

  I think cooking is like baseball, or jazz, in that, to enjoy them, you have to get past the fact that, in all three, there seem to be times when nothing’s really, you know, happening.

  The biggest difference between baseball, jazz, and cooking, of course, is that Ken Burns hasn’t done a twelve part documentary about cooking. Yet.

  I use my idle time in the kitchen thinking about philosophy and coming up with crackpot theories (or crockpot theories—see what I did there? Get it? Never mind).

  I don’t bother with meaning-of-life stuff, since that ground has been covered pretty well. I like to fold my philosophy into my cooking, like I’m making a pie-crust out of ideas. And pie crusts should be flaky, right?

  I wrestle with the questions that have troubled cooks for centuries, like “Can you cook chicken in beef stock?” Which, by the way I will not do. It just seems wrong and disturbing.

  Or, “Is it wrong to have rice AND potatoes in the same meal?” This is known amongst philosopher-cooks as the Starch Conundrum.

  As much time as I’ve spent thinking about cooking, I have yet to figure out the answer to the fundamental question all aspiring chefs should ask themselves—”What is your catchphrase?”

  A cook without a catchphrase is just . . . someone cooking! How dull is that? From “Kick it up a notch” to “Yummo,” the chefs making the big TV bucks all have a phrase or a word that brands them. It’s the thing they say when they add the lemon zest, or make peaks in their meringue.

  Initially, I wanted my hook to be just one syllable—one big flavorful syllable, like Emeril’s “Bam!” (on a side note, why does Emeril get “Bam!” and “”Kick it up a notch”? I think he should have to pick one and give the other one to an up-and-coming chef).

  At one point I thought I found my catchphrase when I spent a week or two saying “Boom!” while I was cooking.

  Now, I’m new at this, so I may have overused it. I guess it’s overkill to shout “Boom!” when you’re just, say, adding a sprig of parsley. As it turned out, it didn’t matter, because some sandwich guy on the Food Network beat me to it.

  I considered going really retro with some vintage slang. I could shout “Applesauce!” but that really only makes sense if I’ve just made applesauce.

  I really like ‘pish-posh,’ and it sorta sounds like a food item (“I’ll have the curried pish-posh”), but it’s a bit too snooty for the food I like to cook.

  I desperately wanted the perfect phrase for my trademark exclamation, and I wanted it to have a little worldly cachet.

  I went online and found a phrase I really liked: “Ahnaal Natrakh,” which was supposedly part of a Merlin’s Charm of Making. That could work—it tells people, this guy is making some magic!

  Unfortunately, after I’d rehearsed how I would use my new catchphrase, I learned that ‘Ahnaal Natrakh’ is also the name of a death-metal band in the UK, known for songs such as Castigation and Betrayal and Screaming of the Unborn off their album Hell Is Empty and All The Devils Are Here. Not really the vibe I’m going for.

  I could turn to pop culture, but all I could think of were sci-fi catchphrases like “Resistance is futile!,” which would be dramatic but might be overly pushy (“And now, you garnish the soup, and admit that RESISTANCE IS FUTILE!”).

  What about something more old school? Every time I add an ingredient I could say, “By the power of Greystoke!”

  Superheroes always have catchphrases, so I could go that direction, but then I’d have to wear a cape and a tights when I cook (there‘s a mental image for you).

  The Torch’s “Flame On!” would work unless you’re dealing with an electric range, in which case you would have to shout “Warm Up Gradually!,” which doesn’t really have the same impact.

  Eventually I hit a wall and just started trying random phrases. How about “Take the next train to Tastyville?” I could go edgy with “Put that in your Dutch oven!” Or, taking the understated approach, my trademark could be “Now THAT’S edible!”

  In the end, I found my catchphrase by turning back to music and my ‘cooking playlist.’ In Nat ‘King’ Cole’s Frim-Fram Sauce, the singer lists the foods he doesn‘t want, and ends each verse with the same gibberish words:

  I want the frim-fram sauce with the ausen fay

  With chafafah on the side.

  Well, there’s three potential catchphrases nobody’s using. ‘Ausen fay’ isn’t terribly catchy, but ‘frim-fram is perfect, because it could refer to anything you throw into a dish. “Now let’s add a little frim-fram!”

  But even better is chafafah. Not only does it sound like an exotic food (something you might have with a side of tabouli), it’s just plain fun to say!

  “Next you’ll put in your basil and, chafafah!”

  “Dredge the pork in the flour and, chafafah!”

  The best thing about it is, since it’s a made-up word, you can even use it to swear:

  “I put in too much salt—chafafah!”

  Go ahead and laugh, but by next year you’ll be flipping through your Williams-Sonoma catalog and see a full line of CHAFAFAH™ kitchenware. Aprons, cutting boards, meat mallets, you name it – I’ll put my catchphrase on it.

  Until Williams-Sonoma decides to carry these,

  you can get them at MisterComedy.net.

  Cooking is Believing

  Every so often you hear about someone who claims to see a supernatural being in their food. Jesus in a piece of toast. The Virgin Mary in a stack of pancakes. For some reason, deities seem to gravitate toward breakfast foods.

  Although I’ve had some meals come out looking a little od
d, I’ve never seen any signs of God in my scrambled eggs. Bear in mind, my idea of God isn’t very mainstream.

  I can say, unequivocally, that I believe there is some sort of vague, nebulous energy source that’s involved somehow in the way the universe works. An old bearded man smiting people? Probably not.

  But sometimes, when every part of a meal comes together, and the presentation is just right, I know that I believe in . . . something. When I’m in the kitchen, I become significantly more connected to The Great Whatever.

  That’s because I’m constantly either praying something won’t be overcooked, or begging for divine intervention to thicken a sauce, or imploring the heavens to make my side dishes come out at the same time as the main course. I figure, there may not be a ‘god,’ but on the off chance that there is, why not ask for a little help?

  Sometimes, I envy the Hindus. Not so much for the finger cymbals, but for the polytheism. The way I see it, if you’re gonna believe in what may well be a mythological being, why not believe in a whole gang of them?

  On those rare occasions when I hit it out of the park when I’m cooking, I would like to be Hindu, just so I could have a few more gods to thank.

  The Chinese have a dedicated Kitchen God, a fellow named Zau Jun. It literally means ‘Stove God,’ but I’m guessing he handles the entire kitchen.

  According to tradition, he returns to Heaven just before Chinese New Year to report on the activities of every household during the past year. Then the Jade Emperor either rewards or punishes the family based on Zao Jun’s annual report. See, that’s the problem I always have with gods. They’re so…judgy.

  .

  BY MY COMMAND, YOU SHALL HENCEFORTH

  COOK POULTRY to an internal temperature

  of at least 170 degrees

  Roman Catholics don’t have a god specifically assigned to kitchen duty, but they do have TWO patron saints looking out for cooks.

  First, consider Saint Marta. The sister of Mary Magdalena, she is said to have cooked meals for Jesus. Talk about your high-pressure catering gig! You really didn’t want to mess up His appetizer order.

  Then there’s St. Lorenzo. Not only a patron saint of cooks, Lawrence is sometimes thought of as a patron of comedians.

  That’s because, when he was being martyred on a bed of burning coals, the legend says that he quipped, “Turn me over. This side is done.” Which I suppose would also make him the patron saint of grilling.

  My personal spirituality is pretty eclectic. To put it in a food context, I tell people I’m a Smorgasbordian. I sample a little bit from all the major faiths, but I try not to fill up on any particular one.

  Some days I’m not hungry at all, but other times I might have a craving for Eastern mysticism, or I’ll go back for a second helping of Jewish angst.

  If any culture really gets how important food is, it’s Jewish culture. Forget all the ephemeral, heavenly symbolism and the learned scholarly debate about arcane theological points—most Jewish gatherings are all about the here and now. And the food.

  When I converted to Judaism as an adult, one of the first things I learned was a saying that explains every Jewish holiday:

  “They tried to kill us. We survived. Let’s eat.”

  It always bothered me a bit that I could never think of a way to connect my Judaism to my cooking. I wasn’t raised Jewish, so I don’t have nostalgic memories of making latkes standing next to my Bubbe.

  Then I figured out a way to bring together my Jewish faith with my cooking style, by way of the Yiddish language.

  First of all, I had been using Yiddish words and phrases since well before I became ‘officially’ Jewish.

  More importantly, it occurred to me that Yiddish is the perfect language for cooking. Maybe not everyone’s cooking, but definitely mine.

  My cooking is imprecise, and hard to define – just like Yiddish! Ask any two Jews what a Yiddish word means, and you’re likely to get at least three different answers.

  I got to thinking about how various Yiddish words and phrases might apply to certain kitchen situations, and then I realized I needed to call my rabbi.

  By ‘my rabbi,’ I mean the rabbi who taught my conversion class and then officiated while I recited Hebrew, floating naked in a ritual bath (I was the one floating and naked, not the rabbi).

  Rabbi Alan Shavit-Lonstein at Temple of Aaron in St. Paul is a great teacher, and since we hadn’t chatted in a while, I thought it would be fun to get a more learned take on using Yiddish in the kitchen.

  As he explained it, the strong connection I feel between Yiddish and my approach to cooking is something known in Hebrew as tam v’reach.

  Literally meaning ‘taste and smell,’ tam v’reach refers to something that

  “captures the Yiddish spirit without having any Yiddish ingredients from history or culture. It's got the taste and smell of it, without . . . It's like kosher-style, like kosher dill pickles make it a Jewish event somehow. ”

  I wanted to have the good rabbi define some of the Yiddish I already knew in a cooking context. For instance, could someone be verklempt over a meal?

  "Absolutely, and it can be both a positive and a negative. You can be so moved, and awestruck, and blown away by a meal—you can be so thrilled by it . . .

  Or so disappointed by it, or so overworked from having to prepare it and then nobody appreciates it. I think after every meal, a good Jewish response could be “I’m verklempt.”

  I asked him if there were a cooking scenario in which you might, conceivably, plotz. The rabbi’s answer encapsulates, in concise form, thousands of years of Jewish logic and higher thought:

  ”If you're a plotzer, I guess, then yes.”

  Despite what sitcoms would have you believe, ‘schlemiel’ and ‘schlamazel’ were around before Laverne and Shirley. The rabbi shared a definition:

  “A schlemiel is someone who comes up with the stupidest idea ever, and the schlamazel is the one who thinks it's brilliant. (For instance, if I were to suggest to The Girlfriend that we have lutefisk for dinner, and if she were to say that sounded great.)

  My favorite Yiddishism, and one I learned from my rabbi, is the conjunctive adverb ‘davka.’ As befitting a Yiddish word, I found several definitions. Here’s a couple from Rabbi Alan:

  “Two definitions are useful. You can define it using that scene in ‘Casablanca’ where Bogart says “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.” So you put in davka there—‘davka she walked into mine . . .’

  It’s that sense of 'Woe is me,' and 'Of course,' and that Jewish 'Here we go again,' and ‘I had to suffer this way.’

  And then there's the piece of davka when someone will do something ‘davka’ it means they're doing it even though they know it's annoying, and probably because they know it's annoying they’ll keep doing it.”

  “If you have an ingredient that you davka throw in because, you know, that's just the way you are. It doesn’t make any sense, there's no reason for it, it doesn’t fit the flavor profile. There can be ‘davka’ ingredients . . .

  There are people that get on kicks—they read somewhere that, say, ginger . . . cleanses their bodies. So davka, they have to put ginger in everything.”

  It’s a deep word, ‘davka.’ I should probably only bring out that word if I’m cooking for a holiday seder or something like that. Davka, I intend to use it all the time.

  We didn’t get to all of the Yiddish words on my mental list, but trust me; they all apply to cooking and food somehow.

  Unfortunately, we had to wrap things up because I was dealing with a lot of tsouris, and on top of that I had to schlep to the facacta store with a little mazuma because we had bupkis in the house to eat, and I get a little meshuggah if I don’t have a nosh . . .

  Oatmeal for Supper

  While putting this book together, I had a chance to talk with an inventive chef with forty years of kitchen experience—a web-savvy culinary veteran known for an adve
nturous palate and resourcefulness under pressure.

  She’s as comfortable preparing crème brûlée as they are wild game. I’m referring, of course, to my friend Carl’s mom.

  Carl is extremely Scandinavian. One of four children of a mixed-marriage (father is Norwegian, Mom is, if you can believe it, Danish), he looks so Nordic I always expect him to be skiing while carrying a rifle.

  Turns out, he’s more Frisbee golf than biathlon, but he definitely looks like his heritage. He’s from Willmar, Minnesota, doncha know . . .

  Willmar is a town of about twenty thousand people almost exactly halfway between the equator and the North Pole. Machine Gun Kelly pulled off a notorious bank heist here in 1930. Big railroad town.

  According to the town’s website, it’s “the fastest-growing non-metropolitan area in Minnesota” (just a tip, city planners–when choosing a slogan, shorter is usually better. Think in terms of ‘City of . . . something’).

  Carl and I were talking about the book and he said I should talk to his mom. I thought, why not interview her? I figured I’d get a couple of cute homespun stories and a little local flavor. I ended up getting a cooking education.

  It’s weird interviewing someone’s mom. I figured I would dial down the snark a bit; after all, this is someone’s mom.

  Also, what do I call her? Her name is Mary, but that feels way too familiar. I tend to treat moms the same way I would an ex-president. Whatever I might think of the person, I always respect the office. So I think I’ll go with ‘Mrs. Olson.’

  For people raised by the tube, I don’t mean the ‘Mrs. Olson’ from Folger’s. Our Mrs. Olson made it a point to tell me that Folger’s is their “everyday coffee—not for company.”

  Mrs. Olson took time out from a vacation to give me a look into the world of an unheralded chef who has spent decades in the cooking trenches.

  You want authentic? During our half-hour interview, she gave me two “there ya go”s, one “oh my word” and a “you betcha.” So have a seat, get your elbows off the table, and pay attention to Mrs. Olson.