HUFF POST PICKS BEST CITIES FOR LOCAL FOOD

The Huffington Post picked the top ten U.S. cities for local food--a decidedly green look at great restaurants. Foodies won't be surprised that Portland, Oregon ranked number one.

According to the article, "It is no surprise that Portland, the first city to adopt legislation to combat climate change, is serving up some of the greenest and tastiest food in the United States." They singled out Three Square Grill and Higgens for their use of fresh and sustainable local produce. Good job, PDX!



I prefer small, imaginative restaurants far more than the standard warhorses with white tablecloths that frequently get mentioned in the "best of" lists. One of my favorite places in Portland is Pok Pok and Whiskey Soda Lounge (at 3226 se division, pdx). I've mentioned it before (and so has the New York Times, GQ, Food and Wine, and a slew of others) so it's not exactly undiscovered, but it may be new to you. Pok Pok offers a brilliant take on Southeast Asian street food. Order Ike's Vietnamese Fish Sauce Wings. Sticky and sweet, and tossed in caramelized Phu Quoc fish sauce and garlic, this is amazing. Or try the Kaeng Hung Leh--"Classic Northern Thai sweet pork belly and pork shoulder curry with ginger, palm sugar, tamarind, turmeric, Burmese curry powder and pickled garlic."



Jumping to city number two on the list, San Francisco, here's another favorite--an unassuming spot in a city of great places to eat, Cafe Claude is a perfect little bistro in an alley (off Union Square, at 7 Claude Lane) that serves the best french onion soup in town and features jazz at night. By day, sit under an outside umbrella.



My town, Seattle, is a great place to eat and scored a number 5 on the green list. They singled out Cafe Flora, "an eco-conscious vegan, vegetarian, and gluten-free restaurant that serves local produce and herbs from Washington farms." Blah. I'm sure it's quite good, but we skipped the vegan food for la Medusa, a big favorite of ours. This hip Sicilian restaurant is a lively creative spot with a knowledgeable and friendly staff, and a chef that is a tattooed wizard of the culinary arts. A ten minute drive from downtown, this out of the way place is worth the trip (it's in the Columbia City neighborhood at the south end, at 4857 Rainier Avenue South) to taste their "Sicilian inspired food for the soul."


My parents are excellent Italian cooks and they vouch for the place. Mom is Calabrese, and Dad is Sicilian from New York City (also quite a food town) and he said the Perciatelli con le Sarde (the signature dish of Sicily: perciatelli pasta and sardines in caramelized fennel & onions, saffron, pine nuts, olives, raisins) is better than the same dish he'd eaten in Sicily. A recommendation doesn't get any better than that! The apps are great, too, so try the homemade eggplant caponata and the bacala--fried cod fritters. By the way, you may know that Sicilian food is different than Italian food--Italy is highly regional and wasn't even a united country until the 19th century. Try la Medusa.

There is an old Sicilian saying: Cui va 'n Seattle e 'un vidi la Medusa, si nni parti sceccu e torna armali. (English translation: Whoever goes to Seattle and doesn't see la Medusa, goes there a jackass and returns a fool.)

The Huff Post Top Ten Cities for Local Food

1. Portland
2. San Francisco/Berkeley
3. New Orleans
4. Albuquerque
5. Seattle
6. Chapel Hil, NC
7. New York
8. Minneapolis
9. Denver
10. Washington, DC

Hungry? Check out these amazing out of the way places:

Pok Pok is located at 3226 se division, pdx. Check out their website here.
Cafe Claude is located at 7 Claude Lane, in SF. Website is here.
La Medusa is located at 4857 Rainer Avenue South in Columbia City. Their website is here.

FRONTIER PSYCHIATRIST

Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), physiologist, medical doctor, psychologist and father of psychoanalysis, pictured here with phallic symbol. Freud articulated the concepts of the unconscious, of infantile sexuality, of repression, and proposed a tri-partite model of the mind's structure, all as part of a radically new conceptual and therapeutic frame of reference for the understanding of human psychological development, based on a limited sample of unhappy Viennese housewives.



Eventually a frequent cocaine user, Freud started with the purchase of a gram for fatigue. After all, he reasoned, the German army used it to fight off exhaustion so maybe it would help some of his patients. First, he took a dose himself. And then another. Before long, he was tooting on a regular basis. He even sent some to friends, including his fiancee, Martha Bernays, accompanied with this note on June 2, 1884:

"I will kiss you quite red and feed you till you are plump. And if you are forward you shall see who is the stronger, a little girl who doesn't eat enough or a big strong man with cocaine in his body. In my last serious depression I took cocaine again and a small dose lifted me to the heights in a wonderful fashion. I am just now collecting the literature for a song of praise to this magical substance."

Clearly, Freud was coked out of his gourd.


John Styth Pemberton, plucky entreprenuer and dope pusher

Along came Pemberton. Back then, one could buy cocaine lozenges and pastilles, elixirs and pills. Cocaine wine, first sold in Europe under the name of Vin Mariani, was a raging success. There were many imitations. In the United States, John Styth Pemberton brought out his own version in 1881. He hit the jackpot when Atlanta banned the sale of alcohol in 1885, and he tweaked the recipe, removing the alcohol but keeping the cocaine, and sold his drink under the name Coca-Cola.

This was the true "Classic Coke." Of course, the coke was eventually removed from the Coke (in 1913) but the company has remained successful. It turned out it was even cheaper to sell colored sugar water without the cocaine!


In the spirit of psychiatry, we present a wonderful expressionistic portrait of madness by The Avalanches, entitled "Frontier Psychiatrist:"

SICILIAN SOUL FOOD

One of my favorite places to eat is La Medusa, a Sicilian restaurant in the Columbia City neighborhood of Seattle. This weekend, we ate there with my parents and had a wonderful meal. My father is Sicilian and my mother is Calabrese (from the toe of the boot) and they're both excellent cooks. Not your typical rubes, they won't have the wool pulled over their eyes by a merely trendy eatery, and they will happily let you know if the meal isn't up to par.



For starters, we had bacala--salt cod fritters--and "grandmas's greens" in warm garlic anchovy broth, pine nuts, olives, raisins. Then we ate perciatelli con le sarde, a signature dish of Sicily, pasta with caramelized fennel & onions, sardines, saffron, pine nuts, olives, and raisins. We also had orecchiette ("ears") pasta with brussels sprouts, taleggio fonduta, spicy Italian sausage, and truffle oil. Everything was cooked to perfection and made with fresh, seasonal foods from local markets--just as it would be in Sicily.


Sicilian Street Food

We drank Montepulciano d’ Abruzzo between bites and talked about our trip to Italy in the spring, and my folks gave us plenty of great recommendations of must-eat-at-spots scattered throughout the boot. Do you detect a theme here? In Italy, they take food very seriously. You can eat in ristorantes, osterias, trattorias, caffes, enotecas, paninotecas, pizzerie, bars, and Autogrills. If you don't get good food, you only have yourself to blame. Of course, it's not just food--there is a world of history and art and architecture to attend to--the underpinnings of western civilization--but food and drink is part of that, and more than just fuel.

At La Medusa, the food was excellent. Dad said the pasta con le sarde was better than he had in Sicily. That's high praise indeed. La Medusa is a lively neighborhood spot run by foodies, but if you're looking for a typical checkered tablecloth, spaghetti and meatballs Italian eatery look elsewhere--this is Sicilian soul food. Go there.

La Medusa, 4857 Rainier Avenue South, 206.723. 2192
Check the menu here.

THE BARBECUTIONER COMETH

The burger in question, courtesy of Reuters

I can grill a decent cheeseburger. It's a simple thing, really, not "fine dining" by any means. Even so, it has to be done right. I bet my burgers are nearly as good as those at the Wall Street Burger Shoppe in New York City. The difference is, they charge $175 for their cheeseburger. I kid you not. The price just went up from $150.

Chef Kevin O'Connel says the burgers are worth it because they include a Kobe beef patty, black truffles, seared foie gras, aged Gruyere cheese, wild mushrooms and flecks of gold leaf on a brioche bun. He says they sell 20 or 25 a month.

When the revolution comes, and the hungry masses storm the Bastille, somebody will probably have to answer for this hamburger. Until then, let them eat cake!

More of the story here.

EIGHT ARMS TO HOLD YOU

This grilled octopus with fennel, green sauce and chickpea puree may look strange to you, but it tastes fantastic. I ate it last night for my birthday, at a wonderful Northern Italian restaurant, Cafe Juanita. The grilled octopus began a perfect meal (actually, the Grey Goose martini kicked things off nicely) and joined the other antipasti from the sea, bacala -- salt cod fritti -- with a caper maionese. Delicate, lightly done. The prima piatta was goat cheese gnocchi with Lamb Sugo. Amazing. For the main course, my girlfriend Wendy ordered the Roasted Duck with Peccorino Romano and pomegranate seeds, which was perfect. I had the cinghiale - Wild Boar braised in organic local milk -- with a "Ligurian Silk Handkerchief" - a delicate sheet of homemade pasta. This was food elevated to the high level of art. Everything was perfect.


Yes, an extravagant meal -- a birthday feast -- and it might puzzle the meat-and-potaoes types, or offend those thoughtful vegetarians and vegans who sneer as I pass by. With all due respect, to hell with them. This is life!

To finish, we had a Pralus Chocolate Souflee with Crema Inglese, and a couple liqueur glasses of Limoncello. Ahhhhh.

Gourmet Magazine ranked Cafe Juanita among the fifty best restaurants in the country, and I can see why. It was definitely worth the drive to the Eastside.

THE LAST SUPPER

Anthony Bourdain explains in the introduction to a new coffee table book that chefs often play a game after hours, as they sit drinking their wine, of choosing their last meal. You may have read about it in the New Yorker. Fifty top-rank chefs rose to the challenge, and the results may surprise you. Sure, there are truffles, and caviar, and foie gras, but well-respected Jacques Pepin chose a simple hot dog for his last meal. Masa Takayama requested blowfish. Gordon Ramsay, a blowfish of sorts, called for a classic roast. Tyler Florence wants a southern meal, like the suppers he had as a child. "No frou frou French. No snout-to-tail. No fucking foie gras."

It's a cute game for foodies, but what about the last meals of actual condemned prisoners? What requests come from Death Row? I dug around and found a list.


That made it possible to pair some top-rank chefs with condemned prisoners. It would be an education for both parties. Jacques Pepin could eat his simple hot dog with convicted murderer Richard Williams, who actually requested hot dogs smothered with chili. Takayama could eat his fish with David Hicks, who requested fish, fries, and soda. Chef Laurent Tourondel wanted a BLT sandwich, and so did condemned man Jerry McFadden. Tyler Florence could have his southern meal with Alva Curry, who requested chicken-fried steak with country gravy.



Some matches are not perfect. Eric Ripert would have to share his black-bass tartare, poached white tuna, and spiny lobster curry with Clydell Coleman, who actually requested salmon croquettes. And Gordon Ramsey. His yelling probably wouldn't make him very popular in prison, but maybe his grilling skills would please Stanley Baker, Jr., who asked for two 16 oz. rib-eyes. That is, unless Ramsey gets a knuckle sandwich first.

http://web.archive.org/web/20031001190442/www.tdcj.state.tx.us/stat/finalmeals.htm

THE RISE OF DUTON LANG

This is a classic UPA cartoon from 1955, animated by Osmond Evans and Ken Hultgren. I love the look of this thing. Makes me want to eat more salad.

CELEBRITY CHEFS PREPARE TURKEY

Ever watch the Food Network? Where did all these celebrity chefs come from? You've got Anthony Bourdain, Mario Batalli, Giada De Laurentiis, Rachael Ray, Gordon Ramsay, Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson, Charlie Trotter, Jacques Pepin, Maryann Esposito, Bobby Flay, Biba Caggiano, Emeril Lagasse, Alton Brown, and a few dozen Iron Chefs. There are a million of them, and now that Thanksgiving is here they're grabbing that turkey like it's the last chopper out of Saigon.

They all can cook turkey. These TV chefs can roast it, bake it, deep fry it, smoke it, stack it sideways, and put little booties on it, but Thanksgiving dinner should be about tradition. That's why we're ignoring these studio-tanned, camera hogs and going with the old pros. Pay attention and learn something.

ASK THE SOPRANOS

Let's flirt with stereotypes and ask America's favorite EYE-talian family about their favorite food.

* * * * * *
A related scene from the Sopranos; Paulie Walnuts and Big Pussy at a Starbucks.

Paulie Walnuts: How did we miss out on this?
Big Pussy: What?
Paulie Walnuts: F****n' expresso, cappuccino. We invented this s**t and all these other c*********s are gettin' rich off it.
Big Pussy: Yeah, isn't it amazing?
Paulie Walnuts: And it's not just the money. It's a pride thing. All our food: pizza, calzone, buffalo moozarell', olive oil. These f***s had nothin'. They ate pootsie before we gave them the gift of our cuisine. But this, this is the worst. This espresso s**t.
Big Pussy: Take it easy.