Woody Guthrie, Steinbeck … and Shetterly

Posted on March 18, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

“America stretched out beyond our windshield, undiscovered by us – huge, exciting and full of possibility.”

In her newly minted book, Made For You And Me, my friend and Portland neighbor Caitlin Shetterly chronicles her small family’s inspiring cross-country odyssey in search of the American Dream. I won’t blow the arc of this very compelling story, but it has a lot to do with the Great Recession and our prevailing economic free-fall.  Made For You And Me sits among the iconic westward-ho greats by Steinbeck, Woody Guthrie and Wisconsin’s own Laura Ingalls Wilder. Yes, I am talking about Little House on the Prairie – one of Caitlin’s favorites, too.

Try is tasty bite: “When we left the Holiday Inn parking lot that morning, the huge bag of things to take to the Salvation Army on my lap, I felt immensely lighter. After making our donation, we grabbed a couple of falafel sandwiches from a stand on Thayer Street that makes the best falafel wraps I’ve ever had in my life (hummus, hot peppers, pickles, baba ganoush, vegetables and tahini sauce all in huge fluffy, homemade pita) and sat outside on the grass of one of Brown [University]’s capacious lawns, the sun dappling our backs and Hopper panting contentedly. In one last effort to begin with order, I pulled a few bits of trash out of the car, ran a napkin over the dashboard, found every stray coin and put them all in the middle console for tolls and arranged an old piece of sheepskin on my seat to make our modern wagon more cozy. I made sure the animals were as comfortable as they could be and we hit the road.  Our iconic American trip was beginning, once again, with lots of leg room and a new attitude.”

Caitlin’s memoir is powered by her astonishing, openhearted eloquence. When she described “feeling small in a big world,” I felt it, too. I felt the weight of her questions and her “what-ifs.” Best of all, this powerful chronicle of resilience and hope zips along without getting mired in gloopy cliché and sentiment. Made For You And Me is a dynamite travel story and an absolute gas to read. (And how apropos: I drafted this on a train from New Haven to Boston just before midnight.)  •

NOTE: I expect she’s pretty busy these days but I have asked her for one of her recipes, so stay tuned!

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Gator Gastronomy

Posted on March 15, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

Here at last are tasting notes from Lake Charles, where the food soars from down home to upscale without skipping a Zydeco beat. Our top picks from this cozy little corner of Calcasieu Parish include:

1. Down Home Breakfast:

Boudin (rice and pork) sausage from the Market Basket grocery and warm beignets from Delicious Donuts and Bakery – sweet, pillowy and addictive.

2. High-End Breakfast:

Otis & Henry’s lovely upscale brunch features Creole Eggs Benedict, French toast, Eggs Sardou, omelettes, Belgian waffles, crabcakes and seafood, plus a signature donut bread pudding. Arrive hungry!

3. Down Home Lunch:

Steamboat Bill’s offers gumbo, etouffé, red beans & rice, “lovingly boiled” crawfish, plus catfish, shrimp, oysters, Po’ Boys, and soft shell crab. Extra napkins recommended.

4. Best Coffeehouse:

Stellar Beans is a friendly gathering place for artists, locals and the hipster crowd with Monday night poetry slams, free WiFi, robust coffee, chai drinks and frothy cappucino.

5. Down Home Meets High-End:

121 Artisan Bistro serves Italian classics and Bayou favorites like a crisp Tuscan salad with a silky shrimp bisque. Indulge in a cocktail by 121’s Jacob Trevino – I recommend the “Hemingway” with Pernod, fresh blackberries and Champagne.

6. High-End Evening:

Ember Grill and Wine Bar’s signature seafood appetizer of crab legs, claws, lobster, mussels, clams, prawns and oysters is a fresh, icy tower of wow. Don’t miss their tiny succulent lamb chops, truffle mac & cheese, organic salads, and legendary “Tomahawk” steaks. Linger awhile over Ramos Pinto Tawny Port and decadent Ember chocolate truffles.

* NOTE: We didn’t try alligator but were assured it’s available … and that it tastes just like chicken.

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Listening for Tony Kushner

Posted on March 12, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

No place is any one thing. Lake Charles, Louisiana, had to be more than fried catfish, King Cake and spicy gumbo.

Playwright Tony Kushner grew up in Lake Charles and may be its most famous literary resident. He describes a “happyish” boyhood exploring the shady, melancholy woods, waiting for his life to happen.

Our time in Lake Charles was rigorously boistrous, joyous and noisy. Mardi Gras is a party – we get that.  But at times, it takes on the air of a Fellini movie with a touch of Sunset Boulevard – vivid moments when beauty and grandeur entwine with mortality to stunning effect.

In Lake Charles I tasted my first Boudin, first beignet, and first crawfish – all sublime. I saw my first Confederate flag on a dilapidated house and a second done up in spangles – equal parts repellent and disturbing. I saw my first alligator plus graceful herons and egrets under a blue Louisiana sky at the Creole nature preserve.

The trip was an indelible experience, one I would not have missed for the world. It was compelling, intriguing, and at times, deeply moving – and, to borrow a phrase from Tony Kushner, “strange, a little scary, and in some sense, ineluctable and sad.”

No place is any one thing. •


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Laissez Les Bon Temps Rouller

Posted on March 10, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

Fat Tuesday at Last

Harold – musician, dance teacher and mad crush

Cajun music is thumping and grinding as morning revelers dance a freestyle Zydeco mash-up of mambo, tango, two-step and whatever. Accordion, drums, guitar, fiddle and “frottoir” (washboard) are so boisterous you can’t hear yourself think. Then again, thinking is totally beside the point.

Breakfast includes Elmer’s Heavenly Hash – a local pillowy confection of marshmallow, almonds and chocolate. Add a piece of Praline King Cake and you’ve got a heavenly sugar headache just in time for the Mardi Gras parade.

Though the weather is iffy, the downtown streets are full of revelers.  Kids of all ages, parents, grannies and Gumbeaux Gator himself – everybody’s dancing up a storm. By mid-afternoon the VIP tent is expanding and contracting like a big Cajun bellows.

Harold is scraping away on the “frottoir” like nobody’s business with Lil’ Wayne and the Same Ol’ Two Step. Gumbeaux Gator is shaking and shimmying his green bulk in the wet parking lot as well, and like the rest of us he’s added several dozen more necklaces and a few more pounds.

Bling, bling and more bling.

We indulge in a little Boudin (sausage), crawfish, and cracklins to keep our strength up. I am vegetable-challenged but I’ll eat healthy later, gator.

The parade begins. We clap and shout wildly, waving at the bead-throwers as they pass. Beads are flying. Some twirl up and drip from power lines like shiny souvenirs. In my enthusiasm, I lose both a diamond from my wedding ring and my voice.

This is how “we pass a good time, cher,” in Lake Charles – rockin’ the afternoon away in the warm Louisiana rain.  •

Next up: The Flip Side

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Throw Me Something Mister

Posted on March 8, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

Day 1 at Mardi Gras in Lake Charles, Louisiana, home of the shiny, beaded and fried (pronounced “fraahd”). It’s Mardi Gras and we’re throwing green, gold and purple beads from Gumbeaux Gator’s parade float. We roll past hundreds of  kids and families with arms raised, chanting,”Throw me something Mister!” Little old ladies hold their canes high to catch the beads – this is serious business.

Decked out in feathered masks and sequins, we throw beads, beads, and more beads. Plus shiny dubloons and oddly popular orange plastic “Mardi Gras” cups. I learn that if you don’t meet your throw-ee’s eye, your beads – however neatly thrown and carefully aimed – will land the gutter. Eye contact is king.

I also learn that my left arm beats my right for aim, twirly fling, and distance.  I’ve developed a wave between Nancy Reagan and the Royals, a discreet back and forth, fingers cupped. A uniformed cop in gold beads winks at me. Heck, I wink back. It’s Mardi Gras. •

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Tuscan Trifecta

Posted on March 3, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

Pistoia, Montecatini and Lucca

Massive snowbanks line our street and yard-long icicles hang outside my window. The temperature hovers around ten degrees. From the Maine deep freeze, I recall a warm and sunny afternoon in the Tuscan Hills.

Ready for a relaxed roadtrip?  Head for Pistoia whose medieval courtyards and turrets recall life perpetually under siege. On Sunday, family day in Italy, locals find a grassy park. Impeccably dressed toddlers ride the carousel as proud parents and grandparents look on, waving that funny Italian backwards wave. Sweet, yeasty aromas will draw you into Pasticceria “GG” to watch the baker rolling triangles for Sunday brioche.

In beautiful Montecatini visit the “termi,” or ancient thermal baths. Check out the healing mineral waters, said to cure everything from kidney stones to gout. In the off-season, the legendary spas are used for over-the-top nuptials, with bride and groom swanning around columned façades, opulent flower arrangements and fancy cars.

Then on to lovely Lucca, an ancient walled city. Once inside the gates of its mostly pedestrian center, admire the delicate swirling columns on the Duomo de San Martino. Try to find two columns alike – it’s a challenge. Savor a long lunch in the Corte Portici. Don’t miss the signature pork tortelli, densely meaty and flavored with nutmeg. Order a carafe of “vino da casa,” house wine, red or white – in Tuscany, it’s always a treat.  •

Sunday in the Park

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Sting in Florence

Posted on March 3, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

We were all set to buy tickets to a “Sting-a” concert here in Firenze until we learned that hearing “Roxanne” under the Tuscan Sun would cost more than our airfare home. Sting has been producing extra virgin olive oil, honey, wine and salumi at his 900 acre estate’s organic farm, Tenuta il Palagio. He sells to high-end retailers and directly from the Tenuta in the small town of Figline Valdarno, south of Florence. One of these days we’ll drop round for a tasting tour and maybe catch a few bars of “Roxanne” over a glass of their own vin santo.

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Mo’s Dark Bacon Bar

Posted on February 27, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

Okay.  Last night we shared a bacon chocolate bar celebrating our 30th anniversary with Anne, Joe and Chris. Bacon, chocolate and good friends – what can I say?

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St. Emilion Afternoon

Posted on February 26, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

by Guest Writer Chris Akerlind

We left Bordeaux, heading roughly 40 kilometers east, for an afternoon tour of St. Emilion, a hill town in wine country named for an 8th century miracle-working monk and confessor who found home in a cave there. Evidently he was quite the draw as other monks followed and began the production of grapes that still exists today.

After a quick tour of the eroding Romanesque church, we proceeded to L’Envers du Décor, “Behind the Scenes” – a fitting name for hungry theater people. The restaurant is operated by the Chateau Figeac which we were to tour later that day. The menu was simple and confident with few dishes to choose from. As our server uncorked what turned out to be an excellent and creamy red, a 2002 Chateau Pomerol, we made our decisions. I began with foie gras served simply as a  pate spread on toast, with fig jelly and a sprinkling of fine red pepper. It melted in my mouth, the slightly metallic earthy taste of the liver set off nicely by pepper and jelly combination.

After several minutes, many more than some of my colleagues could stand (the French take their sweet time), our entrees arrived. My plate was gorgeous – a steak of rich sea bass perfectly prepared, on top of a simple saute of herbed carrots aside a small pile of grainy polenta with two flash fried slices of local chorizo, all swimming in olive oil and herbs. I ate slowly, further agonizing my over-caffeinated comrades. After a course of three local cheeses – a strong goat, a buttery Le Moulis, and a knockout Camembert – we tossed back strong espresso, and set out about the rest of our day: tours of Chateaus Figeac and Soutard.

Chris Akerlind

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Mario Batali Loves The Frankies Spuntino…

Posted on February 24, 2011 by Epicurious Travelers

“Grandma never broke a sweat. Neither should you.”

My sister-in-law Aimee Good gave me The Frankies Spuntino Kitchen Companion and Cooking Manual. I love this book. Mario Batali loves this cookbook, too.*

Frankies Spuntino is a tin-ceilinged exposed-brick restaurant in Brooklyn, NY, where chefs Frank Falcinelli and Frank Castronovo serve up nonna’s Italian comfort food with a farmer’s market twist. From classic Sunday tomato sauce to salads of watercress with fresh figs and gorgonzola to simple homemade pastas, it’s all here – a great resource for beginners, home cooks and hipsters.

Aimee and her dad, Tom Good

Try Aimee’s Good Dirt Garlic in the Spuntino version of Spaghetti with Clams on page 191. It’s the best garlic ever, I swear.

* “This time-capsule-worthy cookbook is destined to become a lifestyle mantra for the cooking community and the rest of the country.” – Mario Batali

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