April 26, 2004
Back from Redding
The weekend was fun, but not exactly relaxing (well, it was in the way that nutcases like me find cooking from 3pm to midnight a relaxing way to spend the day). The dinner for our nephew was a blast. I will post recipes as requested or will simply foist them on you at irregular intervals. The menu:
1. Asparagus and green garlic soup with garlic Pugliese croutons and orange creme fraiche
2. Warm salad with Niman ranch uncured bacon, avocado, seared sea scallops, and beurre blanc
3. Meyer lemon and campari granita
4. Roast tenderloin of pork, stuffed with dried apricots, prunes, garlic, thyme, and bay, served with rosemary roasted potatoes and short braised cavolo nero.
5. Tiramisu
6. Espresso served with dark chocolate orange cookies
7. Post dance midnight chocolate souffle
Today we went out for hamburgers at a Redding institution. Not the Redding institution we normally go to, but one that makes me appreciate fast food. One of these days I am going to post my tribute to McDonald's that discusses WHY fast food caught on so well and continues to do so well. Some of my foodie and slow food movement readers may be offended, but, so be it. There is a valid place for fast food, and a reason that the standardized chains were able to create a niche for themselves so quickly. If it weren't 2 am, I would write on it now, since I have been thinking about it, but I need some sleep if I am going to make it to os toiros tomorrow night!
Posted by erik at April 26, 2004 2:07 AM | TrackBackPeony,
MicDonald's makes the best fast food French fries, hands down. They even approach the level of proper pommes frites (I bet that I could serve them piping hot with a New York steak in a beurre rouge and no one would complain).
Posted by: Erik Keilholtz at April 29, 2004 11:18 AMOh, I like their fries when they're straight out of the vat, so hot they're whistling.
Posted by: Peony Moss at April 29, 2004 4:58 AMI'll be curious to hear your take on Mickey D's. I worked there for a couple of summers and actually felt a bit better about the food after I'd seen how it was made. (This was when they had those heated chutes for the sandwiches.)
Back then they made the breakfast biscuits in the store, so I was often the biscuit girl. I worked opening shift -- sometimes I worked in the kitchen, but I mostly worked the back drive-through (taking the orders and the money.)
Posted by: Peony Moss at April 29, 2004 4:55 AMErik,
Being one who is in total agreement with you on the fast food issue, I would like to see you get this down in writing, so that the other foodies on this board can give their input. I for one delight in good fast food, but as Stephen writes above the idea of corporate food repulses me. We must all understand that corporate food is not limited to the McDonalds of the world, corporate farming is just as if not more dangerous to our slow food and foodie way of being.
RAM
Maybe it's writing at 2AM that has you wanting to extol the virtues of McDonalds. Perhaps a good night's sleep will have you restored to better form.
FWIW, the section of Fast Food Nation that dealt with the rise of McDonalds was fascinating. That doesn't mean it was a good thing, even if it might have been in the days when girls brought you your food on skates. There's nothing wrong with a good burger, but there's plenty wrong with corporate food.
Posted by: stephen at April 26, 2004 5:34 AM