Waste Not! Want? Not!

Posted on July 20, 2015 by vagabondallen

I just watched a special report on food waste in this country. This topic is very important to me, as I love food and I hate to see it go to waste. When so many people go hungry every day, and I have at one time or another in my life experienced this to a small degree, it’s depressing to think about some of the reasons preventing us from tackling this problem.

So here’s a few quick points I gleaned from this report that I wanted to share. (And yes, gleaning used to be a thing that helped hungry people find food. We should embrace this practice more.)

1. I learned this statistic that helps put things in perspective. We waste enough food each year to fill 730 average sized NFL football stadiums. I think it amounted to $16 billion annually. That’s insane, even if not surprising.

2. “Sell by”, “Use by”, and “Best by” dates are not regulated or mandated and are completely at the discretion of the manufacturer. Don’t let them scare you into wasting that milk that still smells and tastes perfectly good.

3. There is actually a law that protects food donations, so you cannot be sued if someone gets sick from donated food.

4. Much of the food we waste is wasted at the beginning, because we are food snobs who won’t buy odd shaped peaches.

5. Many stores overstock shelves for fear that the last bunch of kale or chard won’t be bought because everyone assumes there is something wrong with it.

6. Permanent tax breaks exist for big businesses who donate. Small businesses get tax breaks, but these are temporary and must be renewed every year, leaving many small businesses fearful to spend the resources. The House of Reps passed a bill to make these permanent, but the Senate hijacked it and changed it into something else. These tax breaks are critical to offset the costs of donation, which are greater than the costs of disposal.

That’s all I can remember from the report. I work very hard at home and when I’m out to avoid food waste. I’m not perfect, but I think I’ll be even better now. Please join with me to spread the word and please do your part to reduce food waste so we can all have more to eat. Enjoy!

Quesadillas!

Posted on May 24, 2015 by vagabondallen

My dad is half hispanic. That makes me a quarter hispanic. Totally not obvious to people around me, and that’s cool. However, when my dad was a little kid, my grandma remarried Desi Arnaz. (Okay, not really, but he reminded me a lot of Desi growing up.) I spent many Sundays with my grandparents, enjoying chorizo and eggs and refried beans for breakfast. Many a holiday included chicken molé next to the turkey or ham. I learned about rompope, gazpacho, fidello soup, and picadillo, a ground beef and potato dish.

Because of this, I’ve become a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to mexican food. Not completely, of course, since I still like cheese on my otherwise mexican-style tacos (usually just meat, cilantro, and onion, often with a squeeze of lime.) Yet the one thing I love the most, I usually love most traditionally… Quesadillas!

In my mind, the best quesadilla is a corn tortilla, filled with chihuahua cheese and flat grilled till it’s the right balance of crisp and chew and the cheese is nearly as stringy as mozzarella on a pizza. Forget flour tortillas, forget cheddar-jack blends, and no thank you to the endless parade of add-ons. Calling that a quesadilla is like calling instant pudding “mousse” or Spaghetti-O’s “pasta.”

To be fair, there are the occasional surprises. A few of the tex-mex inspired creations out that can be amazing. However, it’s still hard not to bristle at the notion of these fantastic creations being given the “quesadilla” label. I’d much rather see them called something like, “latin-style grilled flatwraps” or something like that. Case in point, the delicious grilled flatwaps I made two days ago, with flour tortillas and slices of smoked sweet swiss. They were amazing, but very non-traditional.

So, if anyone is paying attention, feel free to use “flatwraps” for a more accurate description of your creativity, and please leave the traditional quesadilla to the professionals at Los Burritos (insert appropriate name here). Enjoy!

A Not So Secret Menu Item

Posted on May 7, 2015 by vagabondallen

It’s no secret I currently work as a server at Cooper’s Hawk Winery & Restaurant. I’ve been with the company for nearly four years now. In that time, I’ve eaten my way through the entire menu, and experimented with my own concoctions during many of my meal breaks.

One of the most popular side dishes on the menu is Betty’s Potatoes, a cheesy, shredded hash brown casserole inspired by the founder’s mother-in-law. People order it all the time, and often substitute it for other side dishes. I don’t blame them. If you’ve tried them, you don’t either.

They are also prepared in small batches and finished in individual rarebit dishes. Often at the end of the night, there are anywhere from one to four leftover orders that cannot be reused. As is often my motto about perfectly good items due to be discarded, “If it’s me or the garbage…” I will grab a couple servings to bring home. I usually reheat them for breakfast, playing with various mix-ins, like diced pepperoni, bacon bits, scrambled eggs, and canned chili, just to name a few.

The challenge has always been reheating them, I tend to scrape off the excess bread crumbs before I pack them, because those can turn out weird in the microwave. Lately, though, I’ve taken to a very specific set of steps to prepare them for breakfast. Before, I would pack them in bulk in a large to-go container and cut or scoop chunks out for a meal. Now, I pack each serving into a soup bowl, which serves as a mold, to shape each order into a nice, round cake. I then drop them into a greased, preheated frying pan on medium heat, and cook them for about 2-3 minutes per side. They get a nice, crispy toast on each side, and each serving makes a great base to lay a fried egg on top. It’s my current morning obsession.

Obviously, if you don’t work there, you can’t get them as easily as I do. However, they are very reasonably priced. Just order a side to go the next time you’re in the store. Press them flat into your carryout container, or take them home and transfer them to something that will give them a nice round shape, and reheat them the next morning. Then experiment with your own toppings, and see if you don’t get obsessed with them as well. Enjoy!

An Apron by Any Color…

Posted on April 26, 2015 by vagabondallen

This week, we received a free shipment from Blue Apron, courtesy of one of my wife’s coworkers. For those not familiar, they essentially pack and ship two complete meals, with nearly all the ingredients you need (including meats, packed in ice for shipping), neatly bagged and labeled, along with a recipe for each. All I needed to do was a little slicing and dicing, and provide my own olive oil.

Tonight, I tackled the first recipe; Salisbury Steak with roasted potato wedges and asparagus. I pulled all the ingredients together and skimmed through the instructions. I needed to dice an onion, mince some garlic, slice some cremini mushrooms, wedge-cut the russet potatoes, and cut the “woody” ends off the asparagus stalks. Overall start to finish time was estimated at 35-45 minutes, but it took me a little over an hour from oven preheating to serving up the finished product. So, my first bit of advice is, unless you’re a wiz with a kitchen knife, add about a quarter longer to the overall time estimate.

The instructions were clear and left little to chance. The attached pictures were a bit helpful, but almost unnecessary. It was easy to work with most of the items, and the quality and freshness of the ingredients was noticeable. I did have to move to a bigger pan at one point, but that’s probably because I ignored my initial instinct. The only step I felt less than confident that I completed well was when I had to gently blend the sautéed “aromatics” with the ground beef and bread crumbs. The finished “steak” patties were more fragile than I had hoped.

When I was all done, the dish presented very well. The sauce for the steaks had a chunkiness I’d never seen before for this dish, but I think that’s because I’d only ever had Salisbury Steaks in cafeterias, or as a tv dinner. The dish wasn’t gluten free, but as long as the all-purpose flour substitute can successfully thicken the sauce, it should be easy enough to alter. The flavors of the steaks, potato wedges, and roasted asparagus paired very well. The asparagus may have been our favorite part of the meal.

Overall, from a culinary perspective, I think the Blue Apron is great. The food was quite good, and I felt confident preparing this meal. I’m not sure if I learned anything significant, but I think looking at the portioning would help me be more aware when I wing it in the kitchen in the future. As far as the value of the program, I think it would depend on one’s lifestyle. If you’re home cooking dinner several nights a week, this could potentially be a great fit. They do all the thinking for you, while letting you focus on the joy of cooking a home-cooked meal. Compared to eating out, it’s a good deal, but only if you eat out frequently. I also think this would appeal most to people who don’t mind making some time to enjoy the process from start to finish. If you’re on a time crunch, this may not be a good fit. So, if you’re passionate about learning to cook, you enjoy the process, and you haven’t mastered ingredient selection/shopping and meal planning, this could be a great way to make your own great food for a change. Enjoy!

A Great First Impression

Posted on April 21, 2015 by vagabondallen

I finally got a chance to try Seasons 52 in Oak Brook. Their gimmick is a new menu every week of the year, with locally-sourced, healthy, lower calorie dishes. Cathy and I came in for a late lunch, early dinner.

We started out by splitting a tasty watercress salad with pine nuts and aged balsamic drizzle. Great taste, but the watercress could have been a bit more chopped. She had red mole braised beef lettuce wraps, a nice gluten free option that packed tons of flavor. I had their signature burger. They blend beef with druxelle mushrooms. It had a nice char and was served with housemade sweet pickles. The standout surprise for me was the side of tamale tots, served with two different dips. Basically they were deep fried balls of cornmeal. So good! I enjoyed a handmade ginger agave soda that was perfectly refreshing. Dessert was a small bite tasty lemon custard with blueberries.

I asked the server to what degree the menu changes. From what he told me, they have about two-thirds changing four times a year and one third changing weekly. I imagine that keeps regulars coming back, while catering to the adventurous. I plan to come back as soon as I can and explore some more. If anyone has tried this place already, let me know what you thought. In the meantime, watch for my second impression, coming soon. Enjoy!

Try it. You’ll like it.

Posted on March 29, 2015 by vagabondallen

Recently, a coworker said to me, “You always have the best break food.” She was noting my recent experiment with various items from the kitchen at work. My latest endeavor to change things up is to try different sauces and toppings on mashed potatoes. My current favorites are tomato basil relish on the regular mashed and the potsticker sauce on wasabi-buttered mashed.

Whenever guests ask me what I like, I always say the same thing. “I have tried everything on the menu, and I have favorites in every category.” When someone tells me to chose between two items I always ask if they’ve tried either and usually tell them to try the other one. If they want me to choose an all-time favorite, I rarely have one, and usually respond, “It depends on my mood.”

Why? Because I’ve got an explorer’s spirit when it comes to eating. I love to try new things. Sure, I have my go-to favorite flavors, like cilantro, chocolate, anything cheese. Yet, more often of late, I’m getting away from my old pattern of getting stuck on a dish and trying it wherever I go. Gone are my caesar salad phase, my obsession with reuben sandwiches, or my penchant for all things alfredo sauce. I’ve learned to appreciate brussel sprouts again, to cook without cheese, to put a fried egg on peanut buttered toast, just because a pinterest pin suggested it. I’m an open-minded eater always on the hunt for my next dining experience.

There are limits of course. I still won’t eat liver, I’ve never eaten bugs (as far as I know), and I prefer my seafood tailless and shell-less. Still, the pairing of cayenne pepper and dark chocolate, or peanut butter and jalapeños, are just some of the many unexpected treats I now seek out. I hope my adventurous spirit is something my son embraces as he learns about foot. I also hope I can continue to inspire others to embrace new food for the rest of my life. After all, there’s so much out there to be explored. You never know where your next great favorite meal is waiting to be consumed until you keep looking to find it. Enjoy!

Artificial Sweetener Saccharin Shows Promise In Cancer Treatment

Posted on March 23, 2015 by vagabondallen

Artificial Sweetener Saccharin Shows Promise In Cancer Treatment.

An interesting read. I’m not much for artificial sweeteners myself, but I’m guessing this might mean an uptick in usage of the pink packets again. This still won’t quiet the debate about all things artificial and diet, but it’s nice to see researchers are being more thorough about food safety concerns than they used to be.

Gluten… Free, but Not Yet Easy

Posted on March 15, 2015 by vagabondallen

When I met my wife, she’d been diagnosed with a gluten sensitivity for at least a couple years. Back in 2010, she ate a lot of popcorn, because options were few and far between. Some Asian and Latin cuisine was safe (she just had to watch out for soy sauce), but she hadn’t had a good pizza or burger for a while, at least not without cheating and paying for it later.

Fast forward to the present day and there has been an explosion of support for this affliction. Store shelves already starting to fill up with lots of health food company options are starting to get crowded with name brand support, such as Chex, Bisquick and King Arthur. Even Aldi’s offers some of the most reasonably priced products on the market. Most are even quite good. I emphasize reasonably priced because prices are still generally higher for replicators; products that fake the common uses for wheat.

There is still some room for improvement. Udi’s makes the best sandwich breads we’ve had so far, but the loaf size for their version of a white bread is smaller than a standard loaf. The whole grain loaves can be found in a more traditional size at Costco, so that’s what we usually have on hand, even though the cost is nearly 2.5x the comparable wheat price. Many pizza chains now offer gluten free crusts, but these are stocked frozen and made to order, and almost always only available as a thin crust. I even heard the Labriola Bakery moved their baking kitchen out of their cafe to a separate location so they could clean up and cater to the sensitive with new options and offerings.

However, there are still a few things missing from the alternatives. As long as it remains difficult to replicate the binding behavior of wheat gluten, certain classics remain elusive. Since I share so many of my meals with Cathy, I end up missing out as well. For both of us, I crave a good deep dish pizza, a good burrito, or a hearty italian beef. There are plenty of options out there. I just continue to hope for more, and for better.

Or a cure. That would work, too.

Until then, I’ll keep posting great gluten free finds when I discover them. Enjoy!

My 16 Truths: Expanded – No. 8 through 16

Posted on February 14, 2015 by vagabondallen

I left this series of expanded posts about half done back in June. It was around the time my wife went back to work after the birth of our first child (who is currently begging for attention in the background behind me as I try to write this.) A lot has happened in the last eight months, and I have decided I would rather focus on other things. So here is a summarized expansion for any remaining points I still feel like expanding.

8. I am your server. I feel I covered this one pretty well. Gratuity is for what i do and how I do it. The check is for everything else. Please don’t let what happens with one impact the other. Just as I would hope to get a good tip for great service even if the meal was bad, I’d expect a bad tip for bad service no matter how good the food was.

9. If you ever visit an establishment where servers rely on gratuity, and you knowingly don’t intend to tip for any reason, you are a thief. I recently learned a little bit about the history of tipping. It became popular in the U.S. during Prohibition, when restaurants took a major hit on profits from the loss of sales of alcohol and decided to make their servers look for income elsewhere because they could no longer afford to pay them. The system is outdated and I’m in full support of it going away. Until it does, there is an unwritten social agreement between establishments who rely on this system to pay their waitstaff and patrons who make use of these businesses. Breaking the agreement is theft. Failing to clarify if the agreement applies is cowardice. Neither is punishable by law, but those with a conscience should keep this in mind. Those without, well, everyone’s gotta eat.

10. I love food. I don’t love all food. People continue to appreciate my candor about food. At the place I work now, we have a dish that I find to be a poorer example of what the kitchen can offer. I always describe it as hit or miss. One recent guest called it fabulous. I explained this to the next guest while giving my usual warning. I came back and she said it was just okay, but that I did warn her. She tipped me just fine, in spite of her disappointment. The point is, tastes are so subjective, but dishonest descriptions would impact my income over the long haul, so I avoid them.

11. Every day I work is a “quality versus quantity” contest. The best example of this is people who don’t crack open the menu for their first 20 minutes at the table, or more. I want to say, “If all you wanted to do was talk, you could have stayed home. You came here to talk with your mouth full. Get to it, already.” I don’t say that. You’re welcome.

12. A great guest experience is extremely important to me. I was raised of a nobler ilk than some. I’m wired to care about others to the point of guilt. I genuinely want others to be happy, because that genuinely makes me happy. I’m reminded of an episode of Friends where Joey challenged Phoebe’s notion that there was ever such a thing as a truly selfless act. In the end, while your joy is great thanks, it is not ALL the thanks I need.

13. Poor tipping or non tipping will have zero impact on improving your experience. I work really hard at giving good service. So when I screw up, I know it I promise it’s not intentional. Yet if all you do is leave a bad tip, you accomplish nothing. No matter what you hoped to communicate with a bad tip, a bad tip does not speak.

14. I have no problem splitting the check for my guests. Splitting checks is a much easier task with the modern computer systems employed by most restaurants. So don’t be afraid to ask them to split it by seat or group of seats or evenly among specific payers.Allow more time for these multiple checks to be processed and don’t try to get too carried away. “Can you split the bottle of wine with her, but I’m paying for part of his appetizer over there.” So annoying. Also, if you’re paying part with cash and part with card, hang on to the cash, have the card(s) run, and then put the cash in the final. It will take away some of the fear that someone is going to forget how much the whole bill is.

15. Bad tipping won’t ruin my day, because I don’t have bad days. The one nice thing about being a good server is that I can usually attribute a bad week to things like the weather or sporting events like the Super Bowl (which is very much not a busy day for my employer.) However, according to a Stanford University study, when factoring what part service plays in the average tip, the difference between good and bad service is only 1%. It doesn’t mean I’ll give worse service, but it does mean I’m less prone to think my service had anything to do with how much I got paid.

16. In the end, my little monologue (unless it goes viral) will have little impact on the world around me. So far, it hasn’t gone viral, as far as I know. So I’m letting go and moving on. Enjoy!

Italio! Like Piada, only closer.

Posted on January 14, 2015 by vagabondallen

A couple years ago, I visited Easton Town Center in Columbus, Ohio on a business trip to help open a new Cooper’s Hawk. While there, one of the restaurants I visited was a place called, “Piada“. At the time, I commented in my Facebook check-in that it reminded me of what it would be like to walk into a Chipotle and think to myself, “Actually, what I really wanted was italian.” While their italian “burritos”, aka street wraps, were pretty good, the pasta bowl was the real winner.

So today, I got the chance to try a new local eatery called, “Italio“, In Orland Park, IL. It has nearly everything in common with Piada. There’s the option for a wrap, a pasta bowl, or a salad bowl. There are lots of choices for meats and fresh toppings, several tasty sauces and multiple cheese toppers. My dad and I shared a meatball sampler with the spicy diavolo sauce, and then we each selected our own pasta bowls. I ordered the diced steak for my protein choice, and blended their alfredo and marina sauces. Overall, it was a delightful experience.

In the end, Italio is so similar to Piada that I’m not entirely sure why they aren’t the same company. I’m thrilled to have a place like this within a reasonable distance, and I look forward to visiting Italio again soon. The only thing it didn’t have was Piada’s italian soda tap that offered multiple tasty flavors. Italio does carry little bottles of San Pellegrino’s sparkling blood orange soda, so it’s not a complete loss, but those don’t come with free refills. If you’re ever near a location for either company, stop in for a real treat. If you can make it twice, try the wrap at least once. Otherwise, take my advice and go for the pasta bowl. Vi piace!

Me, My Food, And I

My blog about food and other philosophies

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