Category: Food

Tidy Tidbits: Watching, Reading, Eating

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VIEWING

The English Game (Netflix)

This is an excellent series and great “feel good” viewing for these strange times.  A whole series (6 parts) about football, (soccer, that is), you say; but I’m not a sports fan.  Well, there’s so much more to this historical drama by Julian Fellowes, creator of Downton Abbey. 

(Kinnaird & Sutor (metro.co.uk)

Opening in 1879, it focuses on two men, Arthur Kinnaird, captain and star player on the Old Etonians, a team of toffs, and Fergus Sutor, a mill worker from the north of England and the best man on team Darwen, and their competition to win the championship cup.  The rich men feel they own the game; the mill workers are passionate about it and capture the hearts of their town.  Add in the plight of poor women, often single and pregnant, and you get a picture of contrasting lifestyles.  For me, the last episode echoed the exhilaration of the finale of Chariots of Fire.  Highly recommended!

The Geniuses of Palaces (BritBox)

For armchair travelers (and aren’t we all today), this 3-part series written and hosted by historian Dan Cruickshank takes the viewer on a tour of historic palaces built by the English kings and queens down through the ages.  From the familiar Tower of London to Buckingham Palace along with the lesser known St. James’s Palace and Hampton Court, it’s visually striking, especially the interiors.  Note that captioning isn’t available, and Mr. Cruickshank’s accent sometimes hindered my understanding.

READING

Sea Wife by Amity Gaige

(flickr.com)

This new novel is rich and chewy with a lot of satisfying substance.  His wife, Juliet, reluctantly agrees, when Michael buys a sailboat and proposes that they with their two young children leave home for Panama and spend a year sailing.  Juliet is a stalled and depressed poet with an unfinished dissertation, worries about her success as a mother, questions about their marriage, and unresolved issues from her childhood.  Michael is restless and not loving his job in the corporate world, has fond memories of sailing on a lake with his dad, and feels he can never measure up or meet what Juliet demands of him.  Their children, Sybil, age 7, and George, 2, are resilient survivors.  

The book takes the form of Juliet’s musing and recollections about the voyage back at home in the present time interspersed with Michael’s very detailed and personal log of the trip on the Juliet, named for his wife.  We know from the beginning that Michael is not present, but we don’t know where or why or how the journey ends. There is that suspense plus the delights of the trip, the initial revival of their marriage, and then an unraveling.  It’s marvelously well written with the dominant and distinctive voices of Juliet and Michael punctuated by a conversation with Sybil.  

EATING 

With more time at home, I’ve been motivated to experiment with some new recipes.  Last week, I made a straightforward cauliflower casserole with cheddar cheese from Food & Wine.  I didn’t have sour cream on hand and so substituted Greek yogurt and was pleased with the results.  The Chief Penguin thought it was okay but would have preferred the richness of sour cream.  I also cooked a spicy chicken, celery and peanut stir fry which was a bit different. The celery was a main ingredient and we both found it delicious.  Lastly, I found an older Bon Appetit recipe for spicy-sweet sambal pork noodles which just tickled my palate.  It combined fresh ginger, fresh basil, soy sauce and chili paste in a sauce that I put over spaghetti.  It’s a keeper!

Spicy Pork Noodles (bonappetit.com)

We continue to do curbside takeout with an occasional variation in which restaurant.  We finally tried Harry’s Kitchen on Longboat Key and found both their meatloaf and the beef stroganoff very tasty.  The food is prepared ahead of time, so you have to re-heat it when you get home.  The portions are generous ones. 

Savannah Dining: From Grits to Chocolates

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EATING SOUTHERN

You will not go hungry in Savannah.  Portions are generous to very large and shrimp and grits appear on almost every menu.  Other local favorites are fried green tomatoes, pimento cheese, ham and biscuits, and crab meat.  Here’s where we dined.

Husk

We had lunch in their upstairs dining room which was largely empty and pleasingly quiet.  Service was excellent and while we ate more than we had intended, we found the food delicious.  Their homemade pimento cheese with benne crackers and the ham and biscuit starters were both great.  We also sampled the roast cobia with sour grits and collard chow chow (slightly different) and the pastrami tongue sandwich (man-sized).  This is upscale sophisticated dining and the menu changes frequently.

Gryphon

This charming café, located in a former apothecary and set up like a library, is owned and run by SCAD (Savannah College of Art and Design).  It is cozy and welcoming and a relaxing spot for lunch.  We enjoyed the very shrimpy shrimp salad, the crusted medallions of goat cheese on a mound of greens, and the salmon club sandwich.  Our delightful waitress was a current SCAD student.  

Six Pence Pub

For a change from just Southern cooking and because it was a cold day, we opted for comfort food at this English style pub.  The shredded beef pot roast with mashed potatoes, gravy and baby carrots hit the spot for two of us.  Our friends ordered the shrimp bisque and a salad and one of their hearty sandwiches; both were pleased with their choices.  And the Chief Penguin succumbed to the bread pudding with whipped cream.  Beer and wine, of course, were available. 

The Olde Pink House

First off, the pink house is a large mansion with a beautiful deep pink exterior.  Our hotel concierge felt it had become more touristy in recent years, so we lowered our expectations and were pleasantly surprised by how good everything was.  There are many dining spaces and ours was large and tastefully decorated, but noisy.  The maître d’ stopped by to ask how we were and would have re-located us had we insisted, but we had already ordered drinks and so declined.  

They specialize in Low Country cuisine and the menu is extensive with many choices of platters, appetizers, soups and salads, entrees, and sides.  Having had lunch out, we ordered mostly appetizers and salads.  The shrimp, crab and sausage spring rolls with honey mustard drizzle were delectable as was the sautéed shrimp in ham gravy with a cheddar cheese grits cake.  

Equally pleasing was the BLT salad:  fried green tomatoes, bacon, and lettuce with a buttermilk thyme dressing.  Their rendition of a chicken potpie was not as satisfying as the one at the 1540 Room, this from a lover of potpies. 

Vic’s on the River

This is a very popular restaurant and given its location was crowded and busy the night we dined here.  Pluses:  excellent jumbo lump crab cakes with Parmesan risotto and baby arugula, tasty meat loaf, reasonable sized portions (except for the humongous wedge of meat loaf), and nicely presented romaine wedges with cherry tomatoes and cucumber slices on the side.  Minuses: Very noisy and we felt a bit processed, read hurried, by the wait staff.

Edgar’s Proof & Provision

Wall of bottles in the bar

Bar cum dining venue in the De Soto Hotel.  Noisy, but the drinks and the food were very good, especially the seafood chowder, fish tacos and chicken wings.  Also, the wicked garlic chips with chipotle dip.

1540 Room

Breakfast and dinner venue in the De Soto Hotel.  We had breakfasts here and one dinner on a rainy night.  The skillet chicken potpie was excellent.  One of our group also had their version of shrimp and grits.

SWEETS

Other than the bread pudding the Chief Penguin enjoyed one lunch, we skipped desserts.  That said, we are chocolate lovers and so could not resist stopping in and then purchasing a few truffles at Chocolat by Adam Turoni.  In 2011, this millennial brought a box of his own homemade chocolates to his dinner hosts and, from there, was born this firm.  

Turoni’s flavor combinations are innovative, his creations beautiful to look at, and even better to taste.  The shop we visited, one of two in the city, is modeled as a library with shelves of books interlaced with shelves of chocolate.  You pick up a tray, a bit like an old-fashioned card catalog drawer except narrower, and walk around filling it with the chocolates you wish to purchase.  The truffle flavors range from Mint Julep Truffle to Coconut Meltaway with white chocolate to a Café American to Blood Orange and more.  Double yum!

Note: Photos ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved).

Notes from Manhattan: Film & Food

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FILM

Marriage Story (Netflix and theaters)

This is a painful, and at times excruciating, excavation of a marriage unraveling.  As the film opens, it’s clear that there will be no grand reconciliation.  Instead Charlie and Nicole initially intend to handle their divorce themselves amicably, but, perhaps inevitably, the tensions and the disagreements lead them each to consult and hire high powered divorce lawyers. Their first lawyers are well played by a consoling Alan Alda and a falsely cozy Laura Dern.   After all, this is a successful bi-coastal couple, he a theater director and she an actress.  

Angry words and hate-filled invectives are tossed out, but, what makes it a convincing and compelling film is the moments of unexpected tenderness and even humor.  When Nicole cuts Charlie’s hair, you are touched.  Although they can no longer live together, these two still care about each other and are concerned about buffering their young son, Henry, from hurt as much as possible.  The final scene is a real punch to the gut.

Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson are superb as Charlie and Nicole, and while each party is partially to blame for the impasse, you might find it difficult to take sides, although I did not.  Reviews indicate that this film is semi-autobiographical as director Noah Baumbach was divorced from his first wife, an actress, in 2010.  Highly recommended!

FOOD

“Early Bird Special”

When you say “early bird special,” some folks will think of tired food served to past-their-prime senior citizens at 4:30 in the afternoon.  As a senior citizen myself, I will admit that when we are on our home turf, the Chief Penguin and I eat earlier than we ever did before.  In the city, not so much so.  Unless we want to dine at our all-time favorite West Village restaurant, Via Carota.  To snag a dinner table at this very popular eatery, you must arrive around 5:00 or submit to waiting in line or adding your name to a list and returning an hour or so later.  Ever since Via Carota received mention in a New Yorker column and their green salad was featured in the Sunday New York Times Magazine, their popularity has only skyrocketed.  They don’t take reservations.  Why would they when they are always guaranteed to fill their tables!

The other day, we arrived at 11:00 am, just when they opened, to have an early lunch.  We were not the only diners and well before 12:00, the aforementioned line had already formed.  The grilled artichokes with slices of lemon and onion are a standard order for us; with them we alternate between the mouth-watering Meyer lemon risotto or a pasta entree. 

 This time, it was the tagliatelle with Parmesan and prosciutto.  A mound of homemade pasta noodles arrived, covered with a thin blanket of prosciutto and showered with Parmesan threads.  Simply sublime, this dish is a tangle of a soft, but springy pasta strands coated in butter and cheese with a hint of nutmeg.  Add in the saltiness of the prosciutto and you have perfection.  The Chief Penguin dubbed this our “early bird special” and that phrase now has new meaning.    

Note: Text and photos ©JWFarrington. Header photo taken at Rockefeller Center.

Tidy Tidbits: Cheese & More

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PROVISIONING—Cheese and More

I grew up eating good cheese, not expensive cheese, but good New York State sharp cheddar.  In our household, there was no such thing as American cheese, a misnomer if there ever was one.  In that era in upstate New York, Black Diamond cheddar from Canada was the height of sophistication and an occasional rectangular log of it was a treat. Others in our extended family loved cheese also.  Our Midwest cousins always arrived bearing Hickory Farms’ Lebanon bologna and a hunk of nutty Ohio Swiss.  Yum! As an adult as my horizons broadened beyond the Finger Lakes, I was introduced to other cheeses; everywhere the Chief Penguin and I traveled we sampled cheese, from Gorgonzola in Italy, to Emmental in Zurich, Manchego in Spain and, of course, Roquefort in France.

Today the Chief Penguin and I delight in all the cheeses and comestibles on offer at Artisan Cheese Company in Sarasota.  Owner Louise Converse (aka Cheese Louise) has a carefully cultivated and curated cheese case with a wide variety of cow, goat and sheep cheeses from small producers across the U.S. and abroad.  My favorites in their case include a clothbound cheddar from England, a just ripe Camembert, caramelly aged Beemster Gouda, Bayley Hazen Blue from Vermont, and the store’s own pimento cheese.  

Recently, Louise managed, through good connections, to snag some Rogue River Blue.  This cheese made in Oregon beat out more than 3,000 other cheeses and was named the best cheese on the planet in the World Cheese Awards!  We bought a piece and it is delectable and simply seductive.  Creamy, not overly salty, it begs you to keep eating more.  

But Artisan Cheese offers more than just cheese.  There are distinctive crackers, very good scones, wines that are both thoughtfully chosen and moderately priced, along with prepared foods.  Not up for cooking dinner?  Try their mac and cheese, tomato pie, or one of their several soups.  The store supports an apprentice program for young women in partnership with Girls Inc.; many of these food delights are their products.  Along with all the cheeses and other treats, Louise has added tea towels as well as a selection of china and bamboo plates and mugs.  These are distinctive wares that are not run of the mill.  I have to admit I surrendered to temptation and bought several of these items—of course, for gifts!

RECENT READING:  A Sensitive Novel

Upstate by James Wood

An Englishman by birth, Wood is the fiction critic for The New Yorker and also a Harvard professor and novelist.  I’d not read any of his earlier novels, but was attracted to this one by both the title and the setting in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., a town I frequented regularly some years ago.  It’s a short novel with short chapters and is both delicate and exquisite.  

Alan Querry is English and a widower who lives there with his partner, Candace.  He has two grown daughters.  Helen, who is married with children, often travels to Manhattan for her work in the music industry.   Daughter Vanessa is a philosophy professor at Skidmore with a younger boyfriend named Josh.  She has suffered from mental issues in the past and Alan and Helen have been summoned by Josh to Saratoga to check up on her.  

I love Woods’ prose; each word in a sentence is carefully chosen whether it’s in a phrase describing the weather: “it was coming down fast, in the passive-aggressive way of snow, stealthy but relentless, insisting on its own white agenda, the soft monotony canceling all time, all resistance, all activity.” And, “white lengths of snow, like fluorescent stripes, were caught in the folds of their nylon coats.” 

Or an evocation of someone’s thoughts, Alan’s here, as in: 

 “He watched his two highly intelligent, grown-up daughters, as they approached and drew back from each other, like switched magnets. Helen, apparently more confident, acute, with her slightly sharp teeth, elegantly handsome, but also being disagreeable somehow, as if she were necessary medicine Vanessa just had to take; Vanessa, quieter, softer, with her long dark hair and slightly squinting eyes, but exact, precise in her every word and thought, and so, to him at least, quite as formidable as her more obviously intimidating sister.  How had he and Cathy produced them?”

This is a novel of a family ruptured by divorce, of sisters living at a distance who care while simultaneously annoying and needling each another, and of a father with a failing business who isn’t sure how best to help his older daughter nor initially certain if he desires to engage completely.  Each of the principal characters reflects on his or her individual life:  what does it take to be happy; how important is success versus family; what does an entire life amount to in the end?  It’s a beautiful novel, wise and moving!  (~JWFarrington)

Notes: Book cover courtesy of Goodreads.com; header photo from medical news.com. All other contents ©JWFarrington.