Monthly Archives: October 2013

Biscuits & Gravy

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I had never tasted biscuits and gravy until I was in my teens.
Biscuits and GravyWhen I finally did, I believed I had discovered ambrosia, the food of the gods (there is a dish commonly served up as “ambrosia,” but it is a sickening, gloopy abomination). In fact, one of the reasons I originally chose to move to the South was that it was a place that I could get biscuits and gravy.
If done right, the biscuits are crisp and buttery on the outside, but soft and either flakey or cake-like on the inside, and the gravy is creamy and warm, but also spicy.
When my daughter became a vegetarian, the gravy had to be re-invented.
One of my proudest moments came one Easter a few years back. A friend of ours, Tyler, had given up meat for Lent, and piled up a big plate full of my biscuits and gravy and was digging into them talking about how glad he was to finally be able to eat meat again. We had to tell him he was still keeping his Lenten vows.
The key to biscuits is several things: Don’t over-work the dough, and have a good blend of baking soda or power, fat, and a little bit of something acidic.

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups TVP (texturized vegetable protein)
  • 2 tsp. Onion Powder
  • 2 tsp. Garlic Powder
  • 1Tbsp Sage
  • 1 tsp. Paprika
  • 1 tsp. Worcester Sauce
  • 2 tsp. Soy Sauce
  • 1/2 cup Red Wine
  • a bit of Vinegar
  • 1/4 cup Oil
  • 1 cup Yogurt (this began as buttermilk, but I like the viscosity of yogurt better; if you are vegan, use some substitute, but add a dash of an acidic, like vinegar or lemon juice; if it is a liquid, use less)
  • 1 tsp. Baking Soda
  • 2 cups Flour (pastry flour might actually be better, but suit yourself)
  • 1Tbsp Baking Powder
  • 1  tsp. Salt
  • 6 Tbsp cup cold Vegetable Shortening
  • a bit of cold butter
  • Extra Oil
  • Extra Flour (maybe half a cup?)
  • Extra Milk (maybe 2 cups, maybe more)

Step 1, gentleman, start your sausages: In a jar or bowl, combine the TVP, seasonings, wine, vinegar, oil, and whatever else suits your fancy. Leave it to soak a bit, you that the TVP absorbs the moisture.

Step 2, start leavening: In a bowl with some extra room (it could expand), combine the yogurt and the baking soda. Let this sit.

Step 4, turn on the heat: Pre-heat the oven to 475 degrees.

Step 5, sift & cut: Sift the flour, the baking powder, and the salt together. Cut in the shortening and the butter, allowing it to form a crumbly mixture.

Step 6, mix: Add the yogurt to the flour, just enough to get it to all stick together; mix it to get this, but as little as possible–only enough to get it all moist & sticking together.

Biscuits 1Step 7, roll & cut: Roll the dough out on a floured surface until it is a half an inch or so thick. fold it over, and roll it just a bit. Cut into biscuits with a biscuit cutter, or a juice glass, or a cookie cutter, or a cutlass, or whatever you prefer.

Step 8, bake: Place the biscuits on a greased cookie sheet and bake for 12 minutes, more if necessary.

Biscuits & Gravy 3Step 9, the gravy: In a big ol’ skillet with some oil (be generous!), fry the TVP mixture until it gets a bit of texture and brown. Add a few tablespoons of flour and let them absorb some of the oil. Slowly add milk, while stirring, and let simmer.

Step 10, monkey with the recipe: If it is too thin, dissolve some flour in some more milk and add it too it; if it is too thick, add some milk. If it is too bland, add more salt or sage, or pepper; if it is too spicey, add more milk. when it is fine, turn off the heat or put on low.

Final step, serve: The gravy is traditionally served over a split biscuit, Biscuits 2so that it absorbs the gravy, but adds some texture. You can add eggs on the side, or sausage, or whatever you like. You can have extra biscuits to sop up the gravy, or for apple butter. Go out and face the day.

Audio Post, October 10th, 2013: Recipes, Rules, & Realtivism

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As usual, for my friends who have trouble sleeping, or for those who just prefer their Bistro aurally, here is the link to the audio version of tonight’s post.
http://philosophybistro.tumblr.com/post/63675212054/as-usual-for-those-of-you-needing-a-sleeping-aid
Upsidedown Pineapple PieBlue Sky

Recipes, Rules, and Relativism

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It recently occurred to me how odd my recipe collection here in my posts is.
From reading here, one would get the impression that I cook mostly muffins; that is not the case. The recipes that I post are for things that I actually bother to follow a recipe Upsidedown Pineapple Piefor; most of the things I cook–the stews, pastas, potatoes & rice dishes that make up my day-to-day life aren’t necessarily planned, and certainly aren’t measured–and this is what most cooking, as well as most of my life, is like: I look at what’s available, and I make the best of it. I recently had a wonderful pineapple-coconut-upside-down-pie that long time reader and Bistro regular Rachel had made, but she couldn’t have told me the recipe–she just put in what she thought would be good (and it was).

There are people whom this drives crazy–they need to be able to measure everything, and they need to know exactly what to do and when to do it. They need hard, fast formulas that they can follow to the letter to be absolutely certain that it comes out right. Lots of recipes are a good thing when you are still just trying to find your way around a kitchen, but eventually, they just become “guidelines.” Apples, potatoes & carrots don’t come in uniform sizes, flour doesn’t come in uniform levels of moisture, even the difference in air pressure on different days can change food–you are working with food, not forcing it to do something.

Now, there are things that matter:
Proportion matters; in oatmeal or rice or other cooked grains, the amount of liquid will be twice that of the grain. The perfect biscuit has a perfect proportion of flour, leavening, shortening, and moisture. It is obviously possible to have too much salt.
For some dishes, recipes matter more; bread involves a great deal of time letting the dough rise and then bake, as do cakes, and there is really no way to alter the recipe in the middle of baking the way I constantly do with soups, stews, etc. Cooking for large groups, it is also necessary to have some recipe in mind, just because of the difficulties of scale.

But even with things that have no recipe, it is possible to say that you got it right Spatzle(Rachel’s pie, the Seitan Sauerbraten I made up), or that you got it wrong (the first attempt at the spun sugar nests). The balance, the flavors, how well, but not over-cooked things are–these are all there regardless of any recipe, regardless of even knowing what the experiment is supposed to taste like.

Some people need rules the way that other people need recipes.
They are not happy–well, generally, they just aren’t happy–but they just aren’t happy unless they have rigid rules and formulas to order their lives by. Anybody who doesn’t accept their rules is a danger, a challenge, a sinner, or–perish the thought–a relativist.

Rules are fine in certain circumstances.
Small children, like beginning cooks, need clear instructions and clear guidelines. There are also trickier situations, more complex situations where it is good to have worked out standards because the results could be so disastrous, and the long-term results are too difficult to see before it’s too late. In situations involving large groups of people, it is also good to have a clear understanding.

But virtue isn’t always dependent upon categorical imperatives or divine fiat. Sometimes we have to make decisions about how to react in an appropriate way, or how to be a good person, in the circumstances we find ourselves in. This isn’t relativism: a good cook doesn’t need a recipe to know that a dish is awful, and a good person does not need laws to understand that hurting another creature is wrong. A good cook knows that braising and slow roasting will give food more flavor, and a good person knows that patience and kindness make the world better.

1010signature rules

Improvised Oatmeal

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It recently occurred to me how odd my recipe collection here in my posts is. From reading here, one would get the impression that I cook mostly muffins; that is not the case. The recipes that I post are for things that I actually bother to follow a recipe for; most of the things I cook–the stews, pastas, potatoes & rice dishes that make up my day-to-day life aren’t necessarily planned, and certainly aren’t measured–and this is what most cooking, as well as most of my life, is like: I look at what’s available, and I make the best of it.
Oatmeal (4)Among the best is this breakfast oatmeal, which my daughter and I started making after having some incredible oatmeal at the Tiny Cup Café in Brooklyn. The inspiration was theirs, but the genius behind it is probably my daughter’s.

 

Ingredients:

  • Oatmeal
  • Milk or something like it (I use some unsweetened almond milk and a little sweetened)
  • Salt
  • Nuts
  • Dried Fruit
  • Fresh Fruit
  • Pumpkin Seeds
  • Sunflower Seeds
  • Coconut
  • Chocolate Chips
  • Peanut Butter
  • Whatever else you can think ofOatmeal (1)

Step 1, Heat the liquid: It doesn’t matter how much, but I would advise about a cup per serving, I like to get it boiling first, then add a dash of cinnamon and salt, but you can do what you have to.

Step 2, Add the dry ingredients and stir, let simmer: Half Oatmeal (2)the amount of oatmeal that you added of liquid. If you are adding dried fruit (or fresh), I like to add it next so it softens, but you might like it firmer. At this point, I am digging through my nut drawers and seeing what there is to add. I love dried cherries, almonds, sunflower and pumpkin seeds, but I make do with what is in the drawer.

Step 3, Simmer: Until it gets firm and lumpy, maybe 20Oatmeal (3) minutes; usually, I am ironing a shirt at this pint, so I don’t really know how long it takes.

Step 4, Serve: I like a pat of butter on it, and maybe some brown sugar, but some people like a little more milk or cream.

Of course, ya git!

Link

[Editorial comment: I have very little control over Wode Toad’s posts.]Wode Zombie

Even the Bleeding New Yor Times can be sensible once in a while.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/06/opinion/sunday/dogs-are-people-too.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
It does, however, raise the disturbing question: if personhood is limited to beings who show similar brain activity patterns to humans, are we limiting it to beings we can coax into a huge machine?
The question is also easy for dogs, whom we already consider junior family members, but what of pigs, who seem to have as high or higher intelligence than dogs, and seem to have as rich an emotional life?
What of elephants, who may excel either (even humans–I haven’t noticed that memory or empathy are really practiced all that commonly in humans)?

“Ave, Jeff Bezos, morituri te salutant!”

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Bezos.

bez0-008I’ve been thinking about Jeff Bezos this week, in part, because I was also trying to teach about Plato’s Philosopher Kings.

Bezos, for those of you who don’t know, is an evil Sith Lord ruling an all-powerful empire bent on destroying anything that is beautiful and of value to us.

No, of course not. He is, however, the founder and CEO of Amazon.
What he managed to do was found a company which could take advantage of the strength of the internet—ease of ordering, convenience—and couple that with the ability to manage a huge amount of inventory—including inventory he did not actually have to  possess or control—and the new possibilities of rapid shipping. By coordinating all of these parts better than anybody had managed before him, and by using the volume and the lack of actual inventory to keep costs incredibly low, and by coupling these with amazingly good customer service, he managed to build an unequaled on-line bookstore, and then a larger on-line market place, and become the first realistic leader in the electronic book business—a business which played to Amazon’s strengths, eliminating the problems of delivery and inventory, but adding the challenge of actually having to design, build, and maintain a physical product: the kindle.

This is a charitable interpretation, but, I think, an accurate one.

I’ve been a book customer since before I can remember.Shakespeare & Co stairs
I’ve worked in several book stores.
I want to disdain Mr. Bezos, because Amazon is driving bookstores out of business.

But I can’t; he is getting books to people—either electronically or in the mail—with great efficiency, and at a lower cost. How are we to fault that?
Besides, he can get me stuff nobody else can, and Wow! Does Amazon have great customer service!

As I said, I’ve been teaching a seminar class on Plato’s Republic, his utopian vision where decisions are made for us by wise, benevolent rulers.
So, perhaps, we should allow businesses to be dominated by those wise folks who can figure out how to make it work better, how to make it work best, and let them do what they do best. Bezos is sharp, he has read the market well, he offers a quality service, and he does something that is dear to my heart: he gets the written word to people.

However, in doing so, he has forever changed the business of books.

BooksThere are unintended consequences to any series of choices, but with a shift of this magnitude there will be even greater consequences.
We no longer browse shelves in the way we used to—there is no longer the serendipitous moment when we  pick up a random book because it strikes our fancy, and begin to leaf through it. Sure, we can find new books on-line, perhaps even sample some pages, but it is harder to get captured in the ruffling of pages that brings us to a sentence or story that captivates us.
There still can be folks to discuss and recommend books—chat rooms, recommendations, posts, etc.—but these are read in the same way the sample is read: not with the enthusiasm of a flesh & blood human being handing us a book and saying “You have to read Helene Wecker’s The Golem and the Jinni!” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msy1ctlRh4Q) I have a friend who actually remembers the names of booksellers at a local Indie and looks for recommendations from her favorites. This is the kind of interaction a local brick & mortar store can give. I have seen it happen on-line as well, but I still think it happens best face to face.

Furthermore, Amazon is primarily a distribution company, and because of its success has been able to dominate the companies which actually produce the product, companies which have greater risk in accumulating inventory, and greater expenses up front. Although Amazon has taken its toll on chain booksellers like Borders (rest in peace) and Barnes & Noble (bless their hearts)—as they, in turn, wiped out smaller bookstores, its greater long term impact—as well as the impact of the move to digital books in general—will be upon publishers, because this will affect the way books are actually produced, eliminating editors and other ways of cultivating talent.

The greatest danger, however, might be one inherent to success and centralization: pb 001markets dominated by a single or even just a few corporations are unwieldy and unstable.  Having the decisions about the future of an entire industry made in one or two board rooms—whether Amazon or Monsanto—is not very different from having decisions made by a centralized Politburo committee.
Freedom aside, a corporation as big as Amazon cannot turn on a dime. It would be nice if those leaders were self-less, all-wise philosopher kings who were capable of making good choices, but they are humans, like we are, and it is hard to judge the unintended consequences of the decisions they make. Unlike the humans who are actually interacting with local customers daily, and have small enough operations to make changes, corporations change slowly, and react slowly.

What can we do?
Well, support alternatives!
Buy local.
If you have to choose, buy regional, since they are more likely to be in touch with the local economy, and with local producers.
Buy Indie.

Independent booksellers and food producers are outside of the decision making process of the corporations, although they are still influenced by it. They are closer to you, and able to adjust their courses based upon what is happening “on the ground” rather than having to wait for decisions from a detached board room. They are also more likely to cultivate diversity, leaving room on their shelves (or in their fields) for genetic variation, so that we won’t just be stuck with pasty golden delicious apples and 50 Shades of Gray.

So buy local. Drop by CSAs like Trosley Farm or a road-side produce vendor.
Share a local microbrew at a local restaurant like The Acoustic Coffeehouse or the Philosophy Bistro.
If you can’t find what you need locally, find an independent dealer like Malaprop’s Bookstore not too far away, or find an independent business on-line like Glynne’s Soaps and use Amazon’s tools against him.live local live grand 10.3