The Cleaner Plate Club

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Participated in my first cookie exchange, making shortbread cookies for the occasion (see above) Chose shortbread, because it requires, rather miraculously, only four ingredients. Sometimes even just three ingredients. After my other baking disaster, it was a welcome change.

Cooked a local turkey, a whoppin’ 26 lbs of meaty love. Delish. And faster than expected — those free-range birds really do cook quickly.

Purchased a yule log. Much easier this way.

Eleven adults. Six children. Three dogs. Five Santa-believers. Much chaos.

My most-foodie-gifts: an Aero indoor herb garden, so I can grow herbs even while my Earthboxes are tucked away in the garage for the winter. That, and a really beautiful Made-in-Vermont slate lazy susan, which looks something like this, that my 18-month old drew all over with a Sharpie within 10 minutes after I opened it (helpful hint: rubbing alcohol removes some, though not all, Sharpie marks).

Biggest challenge: the final and very sad decline of my old Mac Powerbook (her name was Trixie, and she served me well), the only computer in the house that still connects to dial-up (oh? you forget that I’m on dial up? Oh, yes, I am). This, combined with Comcast’s heartless unwillingness to extend cable up our road, means either (1) many more hours spent in wireless coffee shops for me, or (2) my final acquiescence to the expensive-to-set-up-and-highly-imperfect satellite internet. Crapola. Will do my best to keep up with the blogging in the meantime.

Most troubling email: was probably from Miranda, who pointed to a news bulletin on Mothering.com, that pointed out that the levels of bisphenol A in canned infant formula poses higher risk than the stuff that’s leaching out of the baby bottles themselves. That bulletin steered me to an investigation by the Environmental Working Group, about how infant formula cans are lined with nasty bisphenol A, or BPA. From the EWG report:

Dozens of laboratory studies show that BPA affects the developing brain and reproductive systems of animals exposed to low doses during pregnancy and early life. BPA has recently raised concerns from 2 separate expert panels of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), with 1 group of scientists warning that human exposures to BPA are already at or above the levels that harm animals and another expressing concern about impacts of BPA on infants’ brains and behavior.

It’s yet another reason to breastfeed. If you can’t, EWG recommends Nestlé, Enfamil & Similac powdered formulas, clear silicone nipples, NO bottle liners, and glass bottles. And to all you makers of infant feeding products: it’s time to clean up your act, pronto. Thanks for the tip, Miranda. It’s depressing, but mighty important.

And with that, we look toward a new year. Which brings me to a quick mention. The Ethicurean pointed to an article by Terri Coles, of Reuters, who made predictions about top health issues in ‘08. Her predictions? Food related. All of ‘em.

More later. Pray that I figure out a solution to this internet issue. Merry to you and yours.

Pssst…Pssst…Hey, you. Yeah, you! I’m talking to you. I’ve got a secret for ya’. Wanna’ make a child cry? Because I know how to make a child cry, guaranteed. You interested? Okay, here goes.

The first thing you gotta’ do is commit to making a Buche de Noel, a Yule log, for your kid to bring in to school. It’s French, you know, the Yule Log. Started under Napoleon. And your kid’s French teacher (French, you say? Like as a second language? A third or fourth language, sure. But aren’t there more practical languages, like Spanish, or Chinese, or even Swahili? I answer: You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But you can’t make a Buche de Noel for Chinese class) asked a parent to volunteer for making this traditional French festive cake.

Your kid? She’s excited. She tells everyone about how she’s bringing it in. Her excitement is a key part of it. Really work her up about it. Make her think that you are ‘DA BOMB for doing this.

So you skip a gingerbread house-trimming party to make this thing. Tell her that it will all be worth it in the end…she will be so proud.

Ignore your other child while you’re making the Buche de Noel. (Quality time with the kids? Who manages that? At best, you get quality time with one, while you utterly neglect the other. In this case, your other child should be prepared for hours of neglect).

Painstakingly go through all the steps. You separate the eggs for the sponge cake:

You butter the pan…

…then flour it:

You melt the chocolate for the sponge cake:

Then you mix the ingredients for the yolky portion of the cake…

…and mix…

Then add in your chocolate:

Then fold them into egg whites, which you have meticulously whipped into peaks:

Then, while the cake is baking, you get started on the chocolate whipped cream for the center…

Oh, yeah…and you’ll want to start on meringue mushrooms:

Oh, and you’ll make chocolate frosting, too…

Then, when everything’s ready, you will place your chocolate whipped cream in the cake pan and spread it around…

And then, of course, you’ll roll the cake up.

And THAT, my friends, is where the fun begins. Because by this point, you have been in the kitchen for hours and hours and hours. And it is late. And the kitchen is a mess. And everyone is exhausted. And, the ingredients have been mixed to the point of no return. No more baking, not now that the cake is smeared with whipped cream.

So, you start to roll the cake. And you see…

…wait for it…

THIS:

What is it you ask? What that is, my friends, is an uncooked sponge cake, just oozing with raw eggs. That is a cake that is absolutely guaranteed to poison an entire kindergarten class, just days before the holidays. It is not a yule log. It is not a Buche de Noel.

It’s pretty. Really, really pretty.

Oh, you say you want a different view? Here’s a close up:

Say the words: “We have to throw it out.” Then throw it in the garbage and send the child to bed.

You will be amazed by the results. Utterly amazed. Because this is a guaranteed show-stopper in the house. A guaranteed broken heart. A guaranteed crying-oneself-to-sleep.

Just a little tip from me to you! Oh, no, it’s nothing, really. I’m filled with handy tips like this one! You bet I am!

Merry!

Looking for a gift for a foodie? A cook? Or simply someone who eats? I’ve got a few suggestions — ranging from the mundane to fabulous to the downright absurd (and no, I’m not getting paid one red cent for them, so you can click away knowing that no matter how many times you click, the Cleaner Plate Club will remain the Po’est Blog in Town).

If someone on your holiday gift list enjoys thinking about food, a solid bet is always a subscription to Cooks Illustrated ($24.95) or Eating Well ($15). But aren’t there more creative options?

Williams Sonoma abounds with gift opportunities, of course. Anyone looking for a gift for me, for example, might want to consider the charming powder-blue CornuFe convection oven by La Cornue (their most accessible model, at a mere $9,300, including white-glove delivery). They’ve got smaller-ticket items, of course. I recommend steering clear of specialty items, like their Hot Chocolate pot ($29.95), or bagel slicer ($25). In my house, at least, these would wind up in the back of a cabinet, never used, adding only to our general clutter, like the sandwich press I bought three sumers ago at a local tag sale ($3, North Hoosac Road, but they sold out with me). Fortunately, Williams Sonoma offers some good basics, like a decent set of glass mixing bowls ($34 for a set of ten), or a good cast-iron/enamel frying pan ($100).

What’s that you say? You prefer something a little less corporate? Local Harvest offers lots of good options for gifts, including such delicacies as the mysterious-sounding Kumquat Puree from La Vigne ($12.50), a yearly subscription of organic Kona Coffee ($204 for 8 oz), and gourmet raw honey with vanilla bean ($14.50). Whether or not mail-ordering these supplies actually is more environmentally friendly is questionable, but it does channel your money to smaller farmers, and it helps support rural economies.

The frilly cook and her equally frilly child can get the cutest little matching retro aprons from Bella Pamella in ruby polka dots ($40 for adult, $28 for the child). If you’re feeling really retro, you might even want to consider adding a matching Lucy hair shrug to keep hair out of one’s face ($10, and you really will look like Lucille Ball).

For the kids in your life, there’s always the Kids Cooking Club, which delivers a cooking project to their door each month ($56 for three months). It’s a nice idea, but it seems like most of their cooking projects are made from mixes. Instead, I might just get a bunch of inexpensive creative copper cookie cutters from H.O. Foose Tinsmithing (looking for a dragon and castle? A pirate? A monster truck? An Amish man? A pistol? A coffin? They’re all there, oh yes they are, $1.50 for most), then make up some sugar cookies from scratch.

Should those cookies burn, you will suddenly be reminded of every recommendation you ever heard from every firefighter you’ve ever met: that you should keep a fire extinguisher under the counter. You ignored those recommendations, of course; most of us do. Let this be the year you change that, with a sodium bicarbonate extinguisher, in stylish white ($16.95). Or, you could hope to be saved by a different kind of force altogether; the talking Jesus doll might not squelch your fire, but it will remind you that every Kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, which at least will provide some food for thought as the flames dance.

If you’ve got lots of both cash and time to spare, you can plunk down a $199 deposit on a Boneless Jamon Iberico Belotta Ham, available in America for the first time (final price: approximately $1,400, with delivery in July). You also might consider a course at the Culinary Institute of America, like their upcoming Healthy Cooking Boot Camp ($1,625 for an intensive four day program).

Can’t afford that cooking school? Then try Alice Waters’ latest cookbook, The Art of Simple Food, which Barbara at Tigers and Strawberries says is an “altogether lovely cookbook, worthy of a place in every budding locavore’s and newbie cook’s kitchen shelf where it can easily be referred to again and again.” ($20.99 on Amazon, unless you, like Barbara, are lucky enough to sent a copy from the publisher. For the record, I was not).

By far, though, my favorite gifts — I mean my OH-SO-FAVORITE ones — are those found on Etsy.com. For example, a sushi lover can pick up a handmade glazed ceramic sushi dinner set for two ($46), a sushi-themed wallet made completely from duct tape ($20), or a hand-sewn felt sushi play set for the wee one in her life ($12.97).

More into pasta? Consider a notebook crafted from a San Giorgio box ($2.20), a hand-thrown blue mod pasta bowl ($100), a set of quattro colori fleece tortellini magnets ($15), a surprisingly realistic macaroni and cheese necklace ($14.50), or this rather strange tile that tells a story involving a psychic reader and wet purple pasta ($70).

For the meat lover in your life — or simply an herbivore who loves the look of meat — Etsy’s got a fabric hambone from Sweet Meats ($33). Why? I have no idea, but it’s fantastic. The woman behind this project also makes other things, like nifty meat-themed jewelry, and a custom felt model of your intestines. Know someone who’s really bringing in the bacon? Consider adding to their bounty with hand-dipped bacon-scented incense, ($2.60 for a 15-pack). For a masculine meat-fancier, you might want to consider this necktie, silkscreened with an image of a pork meatgrinder ($30, available in fashion-forward white or pink). If your loved one is more a fan of “meat,” how about a nice Spam electric outlet cover ($8)?

And you’ll get excited about grocery errands with an earth-friendly canvas market tote from Modern Charm, complete with Amy Butler fabric trim ($12). Whatever you do, you’ll want to carry your grocery money in this felt coin purse that looks like a casette tape, from Lindsey Porter ($17).

More important than that money, though, or any of these gifts that you could purchase, is the only thing sure to make your loved one happy: a little more time to spend with you (priceless).

But that’s their New Year’s Resolution to make, isn’t it? In the meantime, you might just want to pick up Herbivore’s “Eat Like You Give a Damn” T-shirt — a great gift for anyone (herbivore or otherwise) who is trying to eat with a little more conscience ($21, and you’ll need to scroll down the page to see it). Not a bad stocking stuffer….and, in my opinion, a great theme for a new year.

Back to my own shopping, folks. Hope yours is going well.

I have been writing and writing and writing recently. You wouldn’t know it here at the Cleaner Plate Club, of course, since food is the one thing I have not written about. Anyhow, I thought I’d share some of the things I AM writing these days, just to give you a sense of what I do when I’m not, you know…here. Some quotes from recent projects, in no particular order:

“Middle-aged and older women who provided care for an ill or disabled spouse were almost six times as likely to suffer depressive or anxious symptoms as were those who had no caregiving responsibilities.”

“The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development estimated that in 2005 the global market value of the arts and related industries was $1.3 trillion — up more than 50% from just 5 years prior.”

“.604 winning percentage, 16 post-season appearances, five MASCAC Championships, an NCAA Final Four, six players who went on to play professionally.”

“Frisky feline? Have no fear…minor changes to diet and environment, combined with some creative bonding, can create happier, more harmonious human-cat relationships!”

“Later that year, Tony was her date to the sophomore prom, where Carol was named Queen of the Hop.”

A motley assortment of statements, no? (shows you that I’m a bit of a writing ‘ho. Pay me enough, and I’ll write it).

Still, I will take a tiny break to show you the results of my attempt to make Greg’s Mediterranean Kale Salad, which I mentioned in a previous post. Greg makes the prepared foods for our local co-op, and he does it well, and at a lower-price-per-pound than I would probably pay at Whole Foods, if there were a Whole Foods anywhere within an hour and a half. Greg cooks for our family often. His Mediterranean Kale Salad is probably one of my favorites — it’s tasty, and both my kids enjoy it.

And, if you close your eyes and hum silently to yourself, so as to block out the sounds of your children and barking dogs, and if you sit really, really close to your floorboards when the heat is on, you can almost — almost — imagine that you’re sitting on some Grecian beach while you eat it.

Look, ain’t it pretty:

Here’s how Greg told me to make it:

First strip the leafy greens off the tough stalk of the Kale leaf. Run a knife through them a few times to roughly chop the leaves. Toss the stalks in the compost. In a large saute pan or wide bottomed pot, heat some extra virgin olive oil (enough to liberally coat the bottom - 16th to 8th of an inch) over medium-high heat until it just barely begins to smoke. Quickly add the Kale and gently toss it around in the hot oil using tongs or a heat proof kitchen spoon. (If the Kale begins to fry and becomes crumbly, you are using too much oil and/or it is too hot. Remove the Kale and adjust your heat.)

After a minute or two, the kale will be slightly limp but a deep dark green. Spread it out on a cookie sheet or a large plate to cool. (If you leave it in a heap, it will turn color to battleship-gray.) In a mixing bowl, toss together a couple ounces of crumbled feta cheese, pitted kalamata olives, thinly sliced red onion, a little red wine vinegar and salt and pepper. When the kale has cooled toss the cooked greens with the mix in the bowl. Adjust the ingredient amounts to your own taste. Tasty, healthy, easy and cheap.

Why that does sound easy, doesn’t it? So I took a stab at it, to see if it’s as easy for the Kitchen Dunce as it is for the Culinary Institute-trained chef.

I discovered at the last moment that I only had shallots, so I sauteed them slightly before adding the kale. But for everything else, I did exactly what he said I should:

I stripped. (the stems, people. I stripped the stems. This is not that kind of blog.)

I heated.

I tossed.

I spread, so as to avoid the battleship grey.

I tossed some more.

I adjusted.

Here’s what mine looked like:

Looks-wise, it was a reasonable facsimile. But how did it taste? It tasted…good. Not as good as Greg’s, however. They key difference, I think, was this: Greg’s kale is more tender, with more of a smokey flavor (not bad smokey; tasty smokey, if you know what I mean).

Which makes me think that (1) my fear of overcooking the kale led me to undercook it, and (2) I didn’t actually let the olive oil smoke enough before adding the kale. Plus, looking at the pictures made me realize that I used way too many shallots - Greg’s onion are barely noticeable.

Either that, or Greg does some crazy voodoo stuff to bring out flavors that the rest of us can’t.

At any rate, I highly recommend that you give this one a whirl. It’s great for a potluck, or for a main-ish salad dish (serve with crusty bread dipped in olive oil). Unless you are as time-pressed as I’ve been recently, and you live locally, in which I recommend you start with Greg’s version (it’s there today, folks; I just picked up a third of a pound for $2.85).

It’s not exactly lying on the beach at Santorini, but these days — amidst deadlines and the looming article about China that I have yet to finish — it’s as close as I’m getting.

How ’bout you guys? What are you working on these days?

I’m always slightly late on the uptake — once again, I’m referring you to an article that’s been bandied about on the blogosphere for close to a week already. If you missed it, you’ll definitely want to read Eric Schlosser’s Op-Ed, Penny Foolish, from last week’s New York Times.As if being the dirtiest of the fast food chains, and also one of the worst in terms of trans fats, weren’t enough, Burger King also appears to be the meanest. Schlosser talks about the migrant workers who pick tomatoes for fast food restaurants, the backbreaking labor that is involved, and Burger King’s steady efforts to cancel a mere penny-per-pound raise that other fast food chains had agree to pay these workers:

In 2005, Florida tomato pickers gained their first significant pay raise since the late 1970s when Taco Bell ended a consumer boycott by agreeing to pay an extra penny per pound for its tomatoes, with the extra cent going directly to the farm workers. Last April, McDonald’s agreed to a similar arrangement, increasing the wages of its tomato pickers to about 77 cents per bucket. But Burger King, whose headquarters are in Florida, has adamantly refused to pay the extra penny — and its refusal has encouraged tomato growers to cancel the deals already struck with Taco Bell and McDonald’s. This month the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange, representing 90 percent of the state’s growers, announced that it will not allow any of its members to collect the extra penny for farm workers…Now the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange has threatened a fine of $100,000 for any grower who accepts an extra penny per pound for migrant wages.

Most damning is his indictment of the corporate executives at the top of the Burger King Chain:

Three private equity firms — Bain Capital, the Texas Pacific Group and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners — control most of Burger King’s stock. Last year, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd C. Blankfein, earned the largest annual bonus in Wall Street history, and this year he stands to receive an even larger one. Goldman Sachs has served its investors well lately, avoiding the subprime mortgage meltdown and, according to Business Week, doubling the value of its Burger King investment within three years. Telling Burger King to pay an extra penny for tomatoes and provide a decent wage to migrant workers would hardly bankrupt the company. Indeed, it would cost Burger King only $250,000 a year. At Goldman Sachs, that sort of money shouldn’t be too hard to find. In 2006, the bonuses of the top 12 Goldman Sachs executives exceeded $200 million — more than twice as much money as all of the roughly 10,000 tomato pickers in southern Florida earned that year.

Blair read the op-ed to me out loud last week, as I puttered around the house, doing a poor imitation of cleaning. At the time, the only thing I could really articulate was, “Wow. Anybody who reads this article and still accuses me of being elitist by avoiding fast food needs their head examined. Rejecting fast food can be about choosing a more equal, more just world.”I’ve been thinking about it lots since then, too. It reminds me of something I heard Robert Reich discuss on the radio once — the conflict that our selves-as-consumers can be in with our selves-as-workers-and-citizens. Here’s the crux of that conflict: We like things inexpensive. We don’t want to pay a penny more (literally) than we have to. We shop for the best bargains. We’re very, very good consumers. But the very thing that makes us good consumers also creates a world in which it is much, much harder to get by.I couldn’t find an MP3 of Reich’s comments, but I found an old article that basically says the same thing:

…many of us pressure companies to give us even better bargains. I look on the Internet to find the lowest price I can and buy airline tickets, books, merchandise from just about anywhere with a click of a mouse. Don’t you? The fact is, today’s economy offers us a Faustian bargain: it can give consumers deals largely because it hammers workers and communities. We can blame big corporations, but we’re mostly making this bargain with ourselves. The easier it is for us to get great deals, the stronger the downward pressure on wages and benefits.

It’s happening at Burger King, but it’s happening in almost every area of our economy. That a good part of why millions of full-time employed people visit food pantries, and why nearly half of middle income workers are now going without health insurance part of the year. Reich supports regulation in order to protect us against ourselves:

The only way for the workers or citizens in us to trump the consumers in us is through laws and regulations that make our purchases a social choice as well as a personal one. A requirement that companies with more than 50 employees offer their workers affordable health insurance, for example, might increase slightly the price of their goods and services. My inner consumer won’t like that very much, but the worker in me thinks it a fair price to pay.

Now, I know that regulation is a dirty word in some circles, and I’ll admit that there are huge implications of adding any regulation. I won’t even pretend to understand them all. But I will say this: regardless of what the solution is, the Burger King issue does make it clear that purchases — including food purchases — are, indeed, a social choice, as well as a personal one.For me, it’s just another reason to drive past Burger King. I hate giving my money to Scrooges.

If you haven’t seen it already, you should check out Free Rice, a nifty little site where vocabulary, altruism, activism, and marketing all merge. The site is basically one big vocabulary test. For every answer you get right, you donate 20 grains of rice to the World Food Programme. Sounds scanty, but it adds up quickly — in just a few short minutes, you’ll have donated a bowl. The site’s been up less than 2 months, and already, they’ve given away 4,550,033,230 grains — about 2 million servings, as far as I can estimate (about 2000 grains add up to a quarter cup uncooked rice).The site is non-profit — you just need to bear with a small screen at the bottom that flashes some ads. The advertisers pay the site for each view, and that money is used to purchase rice. Want to see even more rice going to the world’s hungry? There are links on the site where you can send a message encouraging political leaders to up their foreign aid contributions.The kicker is that you really will build your vocabulary. According to the site:

After you have done FreeRice for a couple of days, you may notice an odd phenomenon. Words that you have never consciously used before will begin to pop into your head while you are speaking or writing. You will feel yourself using and knowing more words.

Well, I don’t know if that’s true or not that claim is veracious or wholly spurious. The only claim I can make assertation I can aver is that the game diversion can relieve your boredom pococurantism and lassitude, and perhaps even make you a little smarter more sapient….hot diggity dog! Hark! The danged site works is efficacious after all!