God Bless America and Our Lumpy Vegetables

America, at least the one I grew up in, takes great pride in its misshapen fruits and vegetables. You only have to attend one county fair in any small town to know this is true. The large and misshapen vegetable display at the Benton County Fair my family went to every summer was one of my favorite exhibits (less favorite than the pig barn, more favorite than the quilting displays).

I remember walking through the rows of vegetables that people had entered and actually aspiring to enter it myself one day. I really believed that if I worked hard enough, I too could grow a potato that looked like a hippopotamus or a pumpkin that weighed more than my Dad or a zucchini that had naturally taken the shape of a VW bug.

But where one person sees a work of art, another sees a piece of produce that society needs to be protected from. For the last twenty years most of Europe has regulated the shape and size of 36 fruits and vegetables that are sold in supermarkets. Cucumbers, for example, must not be bent by a curve of more than 10mm per 10cm. It is illegal to sell cauliflower that is less than 11cm in diameter. In order for a banana to be a proper banana, "the thickness of a transverse section of the fruit, between the lateral faces and the middle, perpendicular to the longitudinal axis, must be at a minimum of 27 millimeters."

What?

I am happy to report that I heard on NPR yesterday the EU has rescinded the ban on 26 of the 36 fruits and vegetables that have been regulated. Ugly, misshapen fruits and vegetables are now free to co-mingle with the pretty ones! Hopefully, the last ten will soon be free as well. Although I have to admit, I kind of like the regulation on pears that states, "Pears must not be gritty." In some cases, those Europeans have their priorities straight.

Happy 4th of July everyone.

Ode to a Mini Kiwi

Even in our over-sized culture, I still believe that smaller versions of anything are always irresistible. This is true for inedible objects (baby shoes, VW bugs) and edible ones (cupcakes, kumquats). It is for this reason that I believe the mini Kiwi will be the next "in" fruit, charming everyone from innovative chefs to mothers desperate for something new and healthy to put in their kid's lunch. The mini Kiwi is showing up in more and more produce departments, forcing consumers to ask themselves some tough questions, such as: "why am I still buying big, hairy Kiwi fruit that are hard to peel when I can buy cute little bite-sized kiwis that can just be popped right into my mouth?" and " why am I taking the time to slice a big Kiwi fruit into a fruit salad when I can just throw mini Kiwis right into the salad?"

What is there not to love about the mini Kiwi? They taste exactly like regular Kiwis, except maybe a little sweeter. The outside peel is edible and you can easily tear or slice off the tiny stem. They are about the size of a large cherry. The only down side is that miny kiwis don't keep very long, so I don't advise buying and then forgetting about the little guys in the back of your fridge for a week like I did. But if you do, just throw 'em into a smoothie, which adds a healthy dose of Vitamin C.

So cute. So not-furry. Mini Kiwi, you are the fruit of the future.

Celery root

There are more than a few frightening-looking fruits and vegetables that look more like creatures you’d find under your bed than something you’d want in your kitchen.
When I bought celery root recently, I was sure I’d come out for a glass of water during the night and find that the root had sprouted legs and beady eyes or some sort of sticky gremlin-like cocoon. But beneath its scary exterior, is a mild and harmless vegetable.

Celery root, also known as celeriac [sel-LER-ee-ack], is the ugly cousin of celery. It can be eaten raw or cooked and tastes a
little bit like a cross between celery and a potato. To serve the root raw, peel it, shred it on a cheese grater and added a little mayonnaise and shrimp for a light salad. Cooked, you can treat celery root like any other root vegetable: bake or boil; puree or mash.

It supposedly keeps better in the fridge after buying, but I left mine on the counter for week. When left out long enough, the root gives off a savory aroma that smells exactly like Lipton Noodle Soup.

Strange and Hairy Fruits

This week I was not exactly in the countryside, but while house-sitting for a friend with a backyard I found I could trick myself into believing I was. Butterflies and hummingbirds pollinated bougainvillea, squirrels stole figs from a tree, a raccoon dared to cross the patio in the middle of the day, and lemons and mint were begging to be picked and made into lemonade. After living for so long surrounded by the concrete and noise and rush of city living I’d forgotten how amazing mother nature really is. I discovered yesterday, however, that you don’t necessarily have to be in nature to appreciate her. A stroll through the produce section at a grocery store can be awe inspiring as well when you happen across a strange fruit called a Rambutan.
The Rambutan I bought was from Guatemala, but Rambutans are native to Malaysia and commonly imported from southeast Asia. Loosely translated from Malay, Rambutan means “hairy” and this is an apt description of the fruit. Its hairy tentacles are apparently edible, but its more palatable to cut the outer skin away and go straight for the fruit inside. Slightly more palatable anyway. I’ve posted some of the more G-rated photos of the opened Rambutan, but, how can I put this delicately . . . there’s something oddly erotic looking about this fruit when you cut into it, but not in an appetizing way. It is, however, a completely fascinating specimen, from its hairy exterior to the soft lychee-flavored fruit that is wrapped around a surprisingly large pit. While I won’t be snacking on them regularly, I may buy Rambutans from time to time. When the world starts seeming dull and dreary its good to have a fruit like a Rambutan around to remind us how truly amazing this planet we live on really is.

Plop Plop, Fizz Fizz

I’ve always thought that when I have a kitchen to remodel the first thing I’ll install is an extra faucet on my sink to dispense seltzer water. I love bubbles in beverages. If boring flat water disappeared completely and the lakes and natural springs and every faucet in the country started running with only seltzer, that would be fine with me. You can understand, then, why a jar I saw today in an Italian market caught my eye. The shape of whatever was in the jar was too intriguing to pass up and one of the ingredients was sodium bicarbonate, which meant bubbles. The next ingredient was Zucchero, which meant sugar. I realized I was pretty much buying a cross between a sugar cube and an Alka-Seltzer. But for $3.75, I was willing to gamble that maybe the jar held something more exciting, something that would turn any beverage into a delicious, fizzy concoction. To get right to the point, my first instinct was right. When I threw a dozen white twiggy things into a glass of water it tasted exactly like sugary Alka-Seltzer. Then, although it clearly said on the package to add water, I couldn’t resist putting one directly on my tongue. Before I spit it out into the sink, it fizzed and foamed in my mouth and I realized that I had basically discovered the Italian version of Pop Rocks Candy. I can’t say that I would recommend buying “Effervescente Tortoroglio” to put in a glass or on your tongue, and probably the jar I bought will sit in my cupboard until December when I will use the white twiggy things as fake snow on a ginger bread house. The thought of an Italian grandmother dropping “Effervescente Tortoroglio” into everyone’s glass at the end of dinner to help digest the gigantic meal she just served is kinda heartwarming though. You can even buy the stuff in a keepsake glass, although why you’d want to preserve the memory of indigestion, I don’t know. The sugar was probably added to this product in an attempt to make it taste better, but when it comes to curing indigestion, bitter is really the way you want to go. A bitter flavor, whether it comes from herbs, or hops in beer, or an arugula salad, gets the salivary glands going and your stomach juices flowing. Bitterness sends a signal to the brain to get the digestive tract in gear. When I was waiting tables for awhile, a fellow server frequently came to work hung over. She always sipped on a glass of seltzer water with a heavy dash of angostura bitters from the bar and swore it was the best cure for an upset stomach. This girl was not the sharpest tool in the shed and when she started coming to work drunk instead of hung over, she got fired. But it turns out she was right about those angostura bitters. Also, the bitter, herbal flavor of a traditional cocktail, Italian Campari subdued somewhat by a squirt of seltzer, is also good for the belly, which means all those Italian grandmothers are on to something too.

Sea Beans

The sea is indeed a mysterious place. Who knows how many plants and creatures and creatures that look like plants are lurking down there. In a much less mysterious place this week (Whole Foods Market) I discovered a vegetable pulled from the sea called a Sea Bean. Now, I can't guarantee these little sprigs were actually pulled from the sea, but "Farmed in a Salty Marsh on Land Bean" doesn't have the same charm. So lets just believe these were actually plucked from their natural habitat, shall we?

Boil Sea Beans for only 1-3 minutes and whatever you do, don't salt the water - these little guys carry the salt of the sea with them. The flavor is slightly more asparagus than bean-like to me, but there are definite traces of green bean in both the flavor and looks. I think they'd be great served with rice or fish, or tossed with shrimp and tomatoes for a chilled salad. Sea Beans maintain a beautiful bright green color after cooking and would be visually stunning on a dinner table. Hmmm..now that I think about it, a chilled glass of sake would perfectly balance the saltiness of the Sea Beans. Why didn't I think of that before I ate them?

Breadfruit

For this week’s edition of “What the Hell is This?” I reached into a garbage can filled with water and floating green objects that were about the size of a large grapefruit. Due to a language barrier between the store clerk and myself, I had no idea if what I was buying was a fruit or a vegetable, but for less than two dollars I figured the risk was worth it. It took twenty minutes of typing various combinations of the words “dominican republic green fruit vegetable” into Google before I realized two things:
1.) What I had bought was a Breadfruit
2.) I need to buy “Uncommon Fruits & Vegetables” by
E. Schneider

The Breadfruit I bought was mature, but not ripe. Raw, it had an aroma somewhere between a pumpkin and a melon. The inside texture was squash-like. Its starchy nature is often compared to the potato but the texture is different – the Breadfruit floats. I cut it in half and peeled it (this required a knife; a potato peeler couldn’t get through the thick skin). I put half in the oven to bake and half on the stove to boil. Twenty minutes later, inexplicably, I started craving cinnamon rolls. I sniffed the air. It smelled like a bakery in my apartment. Egad! A baking breadfruit smells like bread! This moment of discovery made me remember why I love working with food. As an adult, how often do we really get to experience completely new things? But if you step in a kitchen or sit down at a table, it can happen all the time. In this case it was touching, smelling and tasting something I had never experienced before. Other times it's about tasting something normal, like a pork chop, in a whole new way. You can eat a hundred pork chops, then one day someone cooks it in way you’ve never thought of and it’s like your tasting pork chops again for the first time. But I digress…The flavor of the breadfruit, unfortunately, was less memorable than the aroma, slightly sweet and very bland. Recipes indicate its best mixed with a rich and flavorful ingredient, like sausage, butter and even coconut milk. You can learn more about how to cook it from The Breadfruit Cookbook and you can learn other uses for Breadfruit, like spackling canoes with its sap, from The Breadfruit Institute.

Swiss Chard

For the first installment in my on-going series called “What the Hell is this?” I’m starting out with something simple. You will find it nestled among the various heads of lettuce and other, darker leafy greens in almost any grocery store: Swiss Chard. The one thing I always remember about Swiss Chard is that my dad doesn’t like it. You may think that this is a strike against Swiss Chard, but keep in mind that my dad loves bologna and margarine sandwiches. Swiss Chard is one of those enormously healthy leafy greens. When I was a kid we always had it in the summer straight out of the garden, sautéed with butter. Now, because you can find it in grocery stores year round, I think of it as more of a winter green to be eaten on cold days when salad just doesn’t sound good. I roughly chop the greens (sometimes omitting the stems, which tend to be tough)and rinse them, leaving some water on the greens when I put it in a pan over medium heat. This way, when you put a lid on the pan the Chard will steam itself. When it’s soft and wilted I sometimes add a little olive oil or salt. I especially like it as a side to pasta dishes with a red sauce. In the summer, look for rainbow chard – before I cook this chard I stick in a flower vase and use as décor on my counter for a day or two.