Cake and Commerce

Gemelli Bakers: Going Slow in State College, PA

For years the goal of my drives from Chicago to Boston was to make the fastest time possible with the fewest stops, usually at a dingy gas station on the side of the highway, nose held, senses on high alert. Unless stopped by a zealous and bored Ohio highway patrol, I could make it in 14 hours, 3.5 tanks of gas, innumerable snacks, and a guilty fast food stop, which I then promptly struck from the official record of the trip. The Indiana and Ohio portions were particularly onerous - long, flat and dull with costly tolls;  corn fields cut with industrial parks. Pennsylvania was the home stretch, curves and straightaways, mountains and valleys for hundreds of miles.

When Sarah (a high school friend) and Ben (her academic husband) moved their family (Ava and Ruben) to State College this past summer, I finally had a sensible stopping place where I could break up my trip. The first couple visits were brief and vaguely alarming; I wasn't used to a college town and the welter of students following a Penn State victory, the nocturnal calls of drunken students making their way past the house to fraternity row, and the warm beacon of Hooter's welcoming me when I reached town center.

This week, as I made my way from Chicago to Boston for perhaps the last time, I stopped in State College for a four day sojourn - I needed to decompress from my move and spend some quality time with my friends. I was sleepy and unmotivated - I found myself sleeping late and napping at random intervals. I busied myself by washing dishes, watching videos I'd downloaded and walking the dog. Sarah and I met for lunch during the weekdays - she works from home and would take a break to hang out without the kids.

The first full day I was there Sarah took me to one of State College's treasures - a tiny artisan bakery called Gemelli Bakers.

It was, improbably, located up the street from an alley lined with state college flags. I felt a bit like Dorothy upon stepping out of her house and finding herself in Oz.

Once I stepped in to Gemelli Bakery, I was immediately at ease - the warmth of the oven coupled with the smell of fresh baked bread were familiar and comforting. It was the smallest bakery I'd ever set foot in - the oven was about 10 feet from the door and all of the fixtures were on wheels so that they could be moved during production. The space was both claustrophobic and open - big picture windows brought plenty of light into the space. I've heard many spaces described as jewel boxes. Gemelli truly is one.

The owner, Tony Sapia, is a State College legend. He owns several restaurants and bars and is as much a craftsman as he is a mini-mogul. He opened up the bakery late summer 2007 after running a successful wholesale business out of his restaurant next door. The shop, which used to be a bottle shop, was used for storage for several years before Tony turned it into Gemelli, named for his twin sons.

I visited twice, and each time he was there, waiting on customers, chatting up the regulars, and patiently answering questions from obtrusive bloggers (cough).

When we stopped in on Thursday night, just before close, Tony was tending the ovens as the last loaves of Challah were baking (he's the only certified Kosher baker in PA, and does a brisk sabbath and holiday business). Furniture was rolled to the side of the shop to allow for easier cleaning.

The next time we stopped in, on Friday morning, the shelves were stacked with fresh bread and as I took pictures a continuous stream of customers kept Tony busy, moving from shelf to shelf to cash register.

The old school cash register:

And the breads:

The bread is as good as it looks - rich tasting, great crumb, wonderful texture, terrific crust. We gobbled up both loaves we purchased in record time. And the challah was still toothsome and tender two days after we bought it.

For the curious, Tony makes his list of ingredients available. Predictably, he pulls no punches - the breads are natural and made with minimal ingredients.

Gemelli also sells a small selection of pastries, cupcakes and cookies - baked in the restaurant's ovens rather than in Gemelli's certified kosher deck ovens. We purchased a few cookies - delicious. The apple galette looked great.

And the cookies, oh the cookies:

Gemelli Bakers also sells their bread year-round at the farmers' market.

Gemelli Bakers
129 S Pugh St
State College, PA 16801
(814) 234-8946

They keep slightly odd hours, so call ahead.

Sofra - A bakery & cafe in Cambridge, MA from the Oleana crew

At 4:30 pm on a Thursday, just over two weeks since opening day, things were quiet at Sofra Bakery & Cafe in Cambridge, MA. The lunch rush had long passed and the staff in the kitchen, including pastry chef and co-owner Maura Kilpatrick, were busy baking, putting together mise-en-place and cleaning up, and filling the occasional order.

Sofra, owned by Kilpatrick and Chef Ana Sortun, the team behind the beloved Eastern Mediterranean-influenced Oleana, is one part commissary, one part bakery and cafe, one part retail store featuring produce from Sortun's Siena Farms. Sofra offers a large selection of mezze, including a hummus bar with a multitude of dips and spreads;  sandwiches (Turkish gozleme) and flatbreads grilled on the Lebanese saj griddle that occupies a central position in the kitchen (the two domes, above, are saj griddles); and creative baked goods that reflect the marriage of Mediterranean flavors - mostly from Turkey, Lebanon, and Greece with some Egypt thrown in for good measure - with traditional American melting pot pastry.

According to the Oleana website, "[the word] Sofra comes from an ancient Arabic word meaning dining table, picnic, or kilim; it is also a synonym for generosity and hospitality." The definition, on the menu, is a bit more specific: "a picnic on a rug; a low communal table; a small square kilim rug to eat on; a large coffee table; a special table preparation." To that end, the space and seating are comfortable, with Kilim rugs tossed over wooden benches. The tables, though lovely, are a bit low for the seating, a little awkward for a long, leisurely breakfast or lunch.

They were still figuring out how to ring up the retail products when I approached the register with Oleana's signature spice blends and some crackers.

There were a number of other packaged and farm treats at Sofra that looked great but didn't come home with me after this initial visit.

Zataar Stix

Grano - remember wheatberries?

Produce from Siena Farms and hummus and mezze ready to take home

They sell signed copies of Chef Ana Sortun's cookbook

I was, of course, completely entranced by the pastries.

Cookies of all types, each with a twist on tradition

Maureos - 'Oreo' style cookies filled with house-made milk jam created by Maura Kilpatrick

I took some of the baklava home - it was buttery, rich, chocolatey and incredibly decadent.

Brioche covered in Eastern Mediterranean spices

Brioche Donut with Rose Petal Sugar

Musician's tart, made with almonds, orange peels, pistachios and honey

I went back a few days later for breakfast. I ordered the Turkish breakfast - a soft boiled egg, figs, 'spoon fruits' - i.e. strawberry jam, warm breaded & fried feta, greek yogurt, tomatoes, cucumber, and olives. It was gorgeous. 

The egg was particularly lovely - it was rolled in shredded fillo dough (or a similar thin dough) and crisped to a crunchy contrast with the soft egg and softer yolk. 

My mother ordered the fried egg covered in breadcrumbs, sumac, and other spices. It had a touch of tomato on top. My mom loved it, and was very surprised. She usually doesn't like fried eggs.

Though I didn't sample any of the mezze, the cold ones were conveniently stationed by the register, near the pastry. They looked great.

Pickled vegetables

Before I head back to Chicago, I'll need to stop in for lunch. Tomorrow's breakfast is flatbread with zataar and brioche with spices.

Sofra Bakery & Cafe
1 Belmont St
Cambridge, MA 02138
(617) 661-3161

Provisions for the Restaurant - when farm-to-table goes too far; and a little satire from John Kessler of the AJC

Alice Waters' farm-to-table (F2T) model for the restaurant, crafted over the more than 30 years of Chez Panisse's existence,  has morphed into something rather snicker-worthy in this era of designer salts, house-made and house-cured everything, and the restaurant kitchen garden - and farm.

Does every item offered by a restaurant need to be lovingly plucked from the earth with ceremony and pomp and long menu and verbal description, or should the pedigree of a restaurant's ingredients be an assumption, stated unobtrusively at the bottom of a menu rather than emphasized and reemphasized with every dish? Does a diner need to know everything about the provenance of the meat, vegetables, oil, salt, sugar, flour, nuts and the rest of the mise-en-place to truly enjoy a meal? Restaurants no longer seem to trust that diners will appreciate the foods they are being served, so long-winded descriptions have become de rigeur in fine - and some, not-so-fine - restaurants.

Exclusivity and differentiation has always been the goal of competitors in a crowded marketplace. In a country where the French Laundry's Butter Poached Maine Lobster travels coast to coast with the speed of chefs dining at the much ballyhooed restaurant and photos of a great meal are posted to Flickr within minutes of being eaten, it seems that excellence and originality are no longer enough. Rare, coveted ingredients, perhaps ingredients with only a single producer are now de rigeur for many chefs. If that ingredient is grown exclusively for the chef, so much better.

In a recent article in the San Jose Mercury News of San Jose, CA,  Michelin-two starred Chef David Kinch of Manresa in Los Gatos, CA (and, full disclosure, my former employer - I worked for him over 10 years ago), explained the thinking behind his sourcing mission:

"I wanted to create a great American restaurant,'' he says. Manresa had to reflect "all the flaws, all the brilliance, all the quirks'' of his personality, and he also wanted it to mirror the character of its setting.

To assure that, he forged a partnership with Cynthia Sandberg's Love Apple Farm in Ben Lomond, the two-acre biodynamic garden that provides all of Manresa's fruits, vegetables and eggs.

"You go to the farmers markets, and you see every chef in town buying the same Swiss chard and peaches and carrots,'' he says. "It's great stuff, but how do we set ourselves apart? The answer's obvious. You have to grow it yourself.'' (emphasis mine)

Can a diner, once a vegetable has been prepared, really tell the difference between the Swiss chard she has at one Michelin two star and another? Or is differentiation about bragging rights, the ability to say that only your restaurant has that particular raw ingredient, which, to be fair, cannot be compared on a real-time basis by the diner with the same raw ingredient from another source? Given Kinch's statement above, it seems having your own garden or farm is about bragging rights, as it is near impossible for a diner without a 'photographic' memory for taste to accurately compare two products not prepared in an identical manner and served at different times in different contexts.

John Kessler, the Food Editor at the Atlanta-Journal Constitution, recently published a tongue-in-cheek piece called "How a Concept Might Backfire (hint, hint)" about how the execution of the farm-to-table restaurant can go horribly, terribly wrong. He imagines a scenario where a diner is trying out a new farm-to-table restaurant just before heading to the movies. He is in the midst of trying to order his meal when he stumbles at his entree choices:

"Now for my main course. I was looking at the menu, but it doesn’t appear that you serve any kind of meat other than pork.”

“Yes, the chef believes that pork is the only ‘cool’ meat. In fact, later in the evening he’ll come into the dining room wearing just a Speedo and a toque to show you his head-to-toe tattoos of primal-cut pork. Aren’t you curious to know where the Boston butt comes from?”

“Not really. I’m supposed to pick the breed?”

“Yes! Different breeds of heirloom pork have subtly different characters, and our sommelier would be more than happy to find a matching wine for the breed you choose. Trust me on this one: the Kurobuta rocks out a pinot noir.”

“Then let’s go for it.”

“Another excellent choice. I hope you realize that all of our pigs were humanely raised in an Inman Park Victorian and then personally slaughtered by the chef, who cried. Up until the end it was just like ‘The Real World: Atlanta’ for them.”

Though a satire, elements of this scenario are playing out in restaurant after restaurant all around the US. Don't get me wrong - I love F2T restaurants and patronize them as much as I can, if they are actually using their specially sourced and raised products unobtrusively and honestly in service of their cuisine rather than simply in service of a loosely defined farm-to-table concept that is more trendy than true.

Oleana, in Cambridge, MA, for example, has their own farm (and offers a CSA) in Sudbury, MA, but focuses on Chef/Owner Ana Sortun's vision of Arabic/Mediterranean cuisine. Rick Bayless' Mexican trendsetters Frontera Grill and Topolobampo have been using microgreens, tomatoes, peppers and herbs from Bayless' own garden for many years and have forged close relationships with local farms. And there are dozens and dozens more like them.

Seasonality is great. Local is great. Exclusivity is great. But what makes them come together is the greatness of the chef, her vision, and her execution. Without the fusion of all of these elements, however, you just have another trendy restaurant with mediocre food. And no ingredient, no matter how well it is grown or how much it tastes of local terroir, can rescue mediocrity.

Heavenly Mexican...in the exurbs of Portland, OR

Usually I don't talk too much about restaurants I've visited. What's the point? But on a recent visit to Portland, my old friend John took me out to some town that was en route to some fantastic waterfalls for an amazing lunch.

The place? Salvador's

John waits impatiently

The food? Amazing, fresh, bright, glowing - like the decor!

These photos have me dreaming all over again of that incredible meal...

Suckered into shilling for da man

I generally align myself with products that I care about...but every once in a while a friend calls in a favor, and I make myself useful, despite my lack of genuine interest in the product.

Back in May I played host - surprisingly - to a Dove Chocolate-sponsored event at a hotel in downtown Chicago that I didn't even know existed. The hotel room was completely decked out in chocolate - Dove's new 'origins' chocolate (chocolate that indicates country of origin) and their filled caramel chocolate. There were samples everywhere, and they paired everything with wine and cocktails.

Here are some pix of the guests, enjoying wine with their chocolate:

The best part of the evening happened after the Dove folks gave us our goodie bags and the party ended. We stumbled, quite by accident, into a grand re-opening party of the hotel's terrace. Models strutted around in some kind of fashion while we grubbed as much free food and liquor as we could find.

There was an ice sculpture:

And, of course, a group photo:

Although I'm in the picture, you can't see me.

That's it, I'm done shilling for other people! Unless I've got corporate sponsorship, I'm not going to smile for a corporate behemouth who isn't paying my way. Bah!

Overpackaged at Whole Foods

I used to be a die-hard Whole Foods fan. I worked there for nearly a year in 1998-1999 as the cheesebuyer in one of their stores. With my 20% employee discount in hand, products were affordable and better quality than most markets near my house. They also had an unbeatable cheese case. Since there were just over 100 Whole Foods stores at the time, it flew under the radar. No stores had been opened in NYC, Canada or announced for the UK. Wild Oats was still a competitor.

In 9 short years times have indeed changed. There are now 194 stores and most of the new stores and the stores in the works are super experiential food centers of 55,000 - 80,000 square feet, offering restaurants and cafes, wine tasting, gelato stands, coffee roasted on-site, and the usual selection of produce, groceries, cheese, wine, meat, bakery products in conventional all-natural and organic. New Whole Foods stores are places where you could spend a day, attending a class, dining at a restaurant, and grocery shopping.

Whole Foods Market polarizes the food-obsessed like nothing else. There are the haters and there are the loyal-'til-death fans. Not too many fall into the "Whole Foods is okay" camp. In general, Whole Foods is a conscientious corporate citizen and does make an effort to recycle, use green products and alternative energy, and, increasingly, offer local produce. They are trying.

Recently a Dutch friend, Pim van den Berg, came to visit for a tour of Chicago's interesting new shopping sites. I brought him to the brand new Cicero/Peterson Store, which, until the new Lincoln Park store opens, is the largest Whole Foods in Chicagoland. We strolled through the store casually, checking out the new features (unfortunately this store doesn't have a cheese cave like the SoHo store) such as the Brauhaus featuring house-smoked sausages and meat (and, of course, beer on tap and in the bottle). Everything looked gorgeous. And then I noticed something that for some reason I had never noticed before. The packaging. Everywhere I looked there were shelves, tables, cases piled high with goods that were packaged in wrap packaged in glossy printed cardboard. And I was buying this stuff, recycling what I could, and throwing out the rest. For the first time I felt like a very bad consumer.

In my current job I've come to have a basic understanding of the amount of fossil fuel and resources needed to package food products. Food grade plastic film, used to keep products from cookies to pasta and everything in between fresh, is, surprise, a petroleum product. Cardboard, even partially recycled cardboard, is produced from trees and plant pulp and then processed. At least craft board, the unbleached version, is less processed. Inks, if not made from soy or linseed, are made from a heavy petroleum distillate.

I checked the Whole Foods website's Green Action section looking for their policy on packaging for suppliers. The closest policy I found was for their in-house publications:

Printing Standards

For our printed material, we work with printers who are as dedicated as we are to caring for the planet. Whenever possible, we insist on recycled paper, soy inks and solvent-free printing processes. Plus, we carefully evaluate the "right to exist" of every piece we print.

A good start, but it doesn't go far enough.

Whole Foods has a lot of buyer power amongst certain niche suppliers. United Natural Foods, the largest natural and organic distributor in the US, does a lot of business with Whole Foods, and a lot of manufacturers of all-natural and organic goods are distributed through United. If United and Whole Foods decided to change their packaging policies, and require suppliers to reduce the amount of packaging in their products, they could make a deeper impact on the reduction of fossil fuels. Additionally, if they provided incentive to their suppliers to seeks out alternative, eco-friendly substitutes for traditional packaging and printing materials, perhaps demand could motivate packaging companies to innovate in materials and design.

I realize that one barrier to changing packaging materials is shipping -- products need to survive shipment from manufacturer to distributor to store to shelf. Is there a reusable outer packaging that could be use, a la the plastic pallets at Wal-Mart? There's got to be a solution, but in the absence of pressure from Whole Foods or similar supermarket chains, change will be slow, at best. Recycling is great, but it isn't enough.

I'm no eco-activist, I'm just a consumer who cares about sustainability. Until Whole Foods starts reducing the amount of packaging in their stores, both their own (the cheese case is particularly ugly, with pre-sliced plastic wrapped cheese) and their suppliers, I'll avoid shopping there.

Taking 'food' out of foodservice and other heartbreaks

Conferences are universally reviled for poor food. Served banquet-style, or in a buffet, breakfast, lunch and dinner are usually times of mourning (for real food) and complaint (endless, expected, and unchanging). In the past I’ve tried to be optimistic, and have welcomed every course with anticipation and surprise. Although my corporate handlers would request ‘delight’ in addition to surprise, I have yet to actually enjoy a conference meal let alone find it delightful.

My capacity for palate fatigue and intestinal torture was yet again pushed to the limit this past week at a conference for women in the foodservice industry. These women are food professionals - people who have made their careers building a better chain restaurant or chain restaurant experience.

As I made my way through each salad, snack break, and unappealing banquet platter, I made notes for the sole purpose of sharing the experience. In the past two years I have learned not to have expectations for food quality, especially at conferences for food professionals. Makes you think, doesn’t it?

Key to ratings:

* An experiment gone horribly, horribly wrong. I will not admit to actually eating this.

** Suspiciously deep-fried – even the salad.

*** Choked down with some guilt.

**** Went back for seconds, although I’ll be paying for it in the morning.

***** I’d consider paying for it out of pocket if it weren’t already covered.

Unless otherwise noted, all meals provided by the hotel in which the conference was held. All snacks provided by 'sponsors' who donated product

Sunday, April 15

Opening Night Reception ***

I arrived suspiciously early to size up the dinner that lay ahead. I had made a vow to refrain from flour, following the poorly heeded advice of my nutritionist, and decided this would be the night to start. After appraising the spread – a selection of fried entrees (“fried parmesan and artichoke globes”; “crawfish balls”; “crab –not krab, phew – cakes with mango goo”) “Asian-influenced” fare (“chicken skewers with some sweet goo”; “vegetarian potstickers”; “deep fried wontons”) and grilled vegetables, I opted for a glass of some generic corporate red wine. Subsequently, to get the flavor out of my mouth, I dashed to the buffet and started eating crab cakes and pot stickers, one by one with my hands, using my napkin as a plate. It was, admittedly, disgusting. But since I didn’t know anyone, I figured it didn’t matter. And then I remembered that I was wearing a name tag.

** Fried Stuff. Even the crawfish balls were crawfish-free.

****Grilled Vegetables. It seemed I was the only one who really cared about asparagus.

Monday, April 16th

Breakfast, Java Coast Café ***

I asked for an extra dry Cappuccino. I love my dry cappuccino. How difficult is a dry cappuccino? Not very. All it is is a couple shots of espresso topped with a lot of foam – deep, rich foam. This foam had big bubbles and the drink was too milky. And to think I actually paid $4.50 for it, plus tip. Oh well, it was still better than the generic breakfast they served in the banquet hall downstairs.

Snack Break, Morning ***

This sponsored snack break in hindsight proved to be the best one – if only I had stockpiled! Sponsored by Campbells and Kelloggs, the break featured those nasty soft nutrigrain bars, Pepperidge Farm Goldfish and Milano cookies. I took a pack of cookies and dunked them into the flavorless coffee that were sitting in sterno-powered urns (there is no worse way to serve coffee – the quality plummets dramatically when in contact with a hot sterno flame). I threw out the coffee after I finished dunking the cookie. Again I gave little mind to the disgusting factor of my actions. There was also plenty of Coke and Pepsi product – too bad Dasani and Aquafina are the only things I would drink, I am ashamed to say (I've got an internal prohibition against bottled water).

Lunch **

Big Old Banquet Hall for 3000 I was late for lunch. By the time I showed up, everyone had finished their salads and there were no free seats. I wandered around, going from table to table, trying to find a table to insinuate myself into. After a ten minute walk from one end to the next, I found a seat wedged between a portly “talent acquisition” (i.e. recruiting) VP and a woman who took no interest in me. After I ate my salad, I pulled out my food notes, which the portly VP noticed. “So,” he asked, looking at the ‘menu’ for the meal, “what was in the salad?” After rattling off the ingredients – nearly perfectly, I may add, except for the omission of ‘Boston’ when describing the Bibb lettuce – his colleague, a young woman of some girth – pointed out that I was very geeky for taking notes. Did I play Warcraft (super geeky online game – I’m bad but not that bad) she wanted to know. Of course I ended up offending her, because Warcraft was her game of choice. So much for making friends.

The entrée, a welter of reddish sauce, undercooked vegetables, and muy mysterioso pork, was as dissatisfying as it was unpalatable. After offering my pork to the rest of the table (no takers, surprise) I proceeded to gobble down my asparagus (with my fingers) and attempted to carve up the baby carrots, which could have been used as weapons. They were practically raw and a little pointy at the end – just the right size for taking out an eye. I ate my indifferent neighbor’s asparagus from her abandoned plate after boldy asking her permission. “Go right ahead,” she said. “And eat the carrots too.” Dessert was an anemic piece of lemon cake – lemon cake! A fakey-moist layer of ‘lemon’ flavored cake was filled with lemon-ish curd and iced with lemon-esque buttercream. Oh yeah, and there was some raspberry-like jam, too. I ate the icing. Can’t say no to icing. So much for my integrity.

Afternoon Snack *

Tell me, did I do something wrong in my previous life? Does God laugh as I push my way past the business-attired crowds, through the throngs of self-help book readers, to get to the table only to find the same out-of-the freezer brownies as were served the night before? Do my tears mean anything? How long did I have to search before I found a freezer of Blue Bunny ice cream novelties, limited to some peanut butter ice cream treat and a giant frozen ice cream hydrox/oreo cookie? And then how many bites did I actually take of the peanut butter novelty? One! I took one bite. And threw it in the trash.

Dinner ** Reception at some fish restaurant for a bunch of people from my company

I am grateful to my colleagues who made the time and effort to set up this event.

I am grateful for their foresight, their willingness to get involved, and their follow-through.

I am grateful that we had two hours of open bar, that the frozen thingy I drank had no alcohol (still recovering from a nights that were not so much debauch as they were irresponsible. There was this voice in my head saying, “dammit, drink the freakin’ water, what is wrong with you” which I of course ignored).

I am grateful that there was a stilt walker/balloon girl, made up to look very much like a trannie, who fulfilled my request to make a ‘balloon bra’, which I wore proudly, much to my colleague’s dismay (note: we were all women).

I am grateful to the servers, who were always there to offer me a drink when mine ran out. But dammit, couldn’t someone have gotten us better food? We had the same crab cakes as the night before, and the same chicken skewers. There was this interesting concoction called a ‘Shrimp Martini’ – mashed potatoes covered with warm scallops, shrimp, and crawfish, topped with some kind of creamy gravy and mango chutney and garnished with a giant cracker. It was, ahem, interesting. And then this cheese plate. There were odd shaped chunks of Port Cheddar, generic blue cheese, and something off-puttingly white. I was scared. I did gorge myself with chicken skewers, obviating the need for more food. The rest of my colleagues went to an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Breakfast, Java Coast Café * How can you screw up a dry cappuccino and a bagel with cream cheese? I’ll tell you – you don’t make a dry cappuccino, and you find the oldest, nastiest, fakiest bagel you can find and age it for a few days, toast it and then don’t bother to mask it with butter or cream cheese. It was like eating sawdust, but without the fiber.

Snack Break ***

After my nasty bagel, I wasn’t going to eat anything during snack break. Which was too bad, because they were serving Yoplait yogurt and some quickbreads. Not that I love either, but they were better than anything I had eaten in a while. And that's saying a lot.

Lunch ***

I skipped the official lunch. Last year it was so awful that I knew a few hours in the sun and a lunch paid for by the company would beat out anything they were serving in a dark conference room to the accompanying sounds of self-congratulation. I was joined by five of my colleagues, who had the same idea. I ate French fries and a chicken sandwich and got a rosy sunburn. The thing that fired me up about resort hotel chicken is that it wasn't fresh tasting – it had a nasty warmed-over flavor which I masked with ample quantities of ketchup. I then ate a slice of a colleague’s flatbread, which had a remarkably awful tasting crust.

Afternoon Snack ***

I couldn’t find the promised Baskin-Robbins ice cream cups anywhere. Women were running to tables and grabbing boxes of peanut-caramel Crunch N Munch. I managed to pull one of the last boxes out from another young woman's reach. After speaking with our VP of R&D with my mouth full of popcorn, I put the box down and walked away. I noticed that many of my sisters-in-arms continued to snack throughout the rest of the afternoon. That’s one hour less on the treadmill for me.

Dinner ***

Another big banquet-thingy, with lots of red meat. There were stale rolls (what is up with the stale bread thing? It seemed every piece of bread I ate had been aging for several days before it was served). I wolfed down a gross of stale rolls, slathered in butter and red pepper hummus. I dug into my salad with gusto- two rounds of processed goat cheese, topped with too much pink peppercorn and black pepper. And then I waited. And waited. And waited. You see, I had asked –foolishly, of course- for a plate without red meat. By the time I was served, my compatriots had finished their entrées. So in typical fashion, I ate off their plates, until mine arrived. My fish was cooked to leather, and had a certain bounce to it. Dessert was inedible. We were served a trio of desserts provided by one of the companies attending the conference. A cheesecake slice, a brownie tart, and a wedge of tiramisu were topped with a rosette of non-dairy topping. I ate the tiramisu, because it was the only thing that didn’t taste artificial and had a pleasant-enough texture. Then I grabbed my commemorative mug and made a dash for it before the presentations began.

Conference Overall Food Score: **1/2

Crushing. If there’s anything that shakes my faith in the future of the foodservice industry, it is poor dining options at foodservice conferences. If you can’t make things taste good for your industry colleagues, then what the hell are you serving to the consumer? Thank you very much, but in the future I’ll be bringing my own food to conferences, even if that means a week of maple-brown sugar oatmeal.

Gambling at The Time Out Chicago Eat Out Awards Ceremony

No one from Tipsycake was interested in going with Naomi to the Time Out Chicago First Annual Eat Out Awards last Monday. So she recruited me to be her date.

I tore out of the company parking garage at 5:30, a half an hour later than I was supposed to leave. I called Naomi to let her know I was running late. "You're not backing out on me, are you? Cause I'm counting on you." No, I assured her, I was going to go with her, but I would be late, cutting short the free drinking we would presumably be doing before the awards ceremony began.

I arrived at Tipsycake 10 minutes before our taxi was scheduled to arrive. We opted for the taxi because of the challenges of parking around the Harold Washington Library, where the ceremony was taking place. The evening was unusually warm so I showed up in an Australian sun dress by Gorman that I had purchased in Melbourne back in December, in part to honor Naomi, who is from Sydney.

At Harold Washington Library, we were directed to the top floor, the Winter Garden Room. It is an airy, bright sun room at the top of the library. There are trees and flowers and it has the feel of a function hall in the suburbs.  Famous names and faces from every segment of the Chicago dining scene was there, from Hot Doug Sohn of Hot Doug's (the foie gras avenger) to pretty boy tv star Rick Bayless to the bartenders of Chicago's finest dive bars. It was a diverse and unusual crowd - and given the industry presence, it made sense that the ceremony was taking place on a Monday, the nearly universal day off for restaurants.

Naomi and I stood by the door to intercept the servers as they brought out platters of food. There were pieces of chicken piled on a cucumber (I dropped a few), pieces of mozzarella with a dollop of tomato, and grilled cheese sandwiches on a stick made to resemble lollipops. Naomi made a beeline to the booze table and threw tips to the bartenders to ensure her glass would always be full. I found myself standing in the wrong place every time another tray came out and had to follow the servers around the room, trying to nab another free morsel.

We were assigned to unlucky table 13. After we took our seats, Naomi turned to me for reassurance. "Do you think Tipsycake will win?" she asked. "No," I answered, "BomBon is going to win." I figured Laura Cid Perea's third restaurant/cafe/bakery was a shoe-in for the "Best New Bakery" honor. I can be a jerk.

Soon we were joined at our table by Chef GEB of Avenues, his front of the house manager, his sous chef, and the PR rep for the Peninsula Hotel and Avenues. They were nominated for best hotel restaurant.

I knew about Chef GEB from his posts on LTHForum.com . I had never met him, and I was surprised that he was as young as he was. The first and only question I asked him that night (he spent the rest of the night glad handling admirers and texting someone on his phone) was about his food. "So," I asked. "What do you call your cuisine? Some people have lumped you in to the molecular gastronomy camp. Others prefer to call it 'new cookery.' What do you call your cooking?"

Without missing a beat, he answered, "Contemporary Cuisine, or Chef GEB's cuisine."

I asked him what contemporary cuisine meant. It just seemed like a meaningless term for the food he was turning out of his kitchen. The explanation was cut short by the arrival of a few more associates who showed up to shake his hand.

The servers began bringing out platters of food as we waited for the award ceremony to begin. They brought out crudites, a plate of desserts, rice paper filled with rice, shrimp, and a sweet and hot sauce, and roast beef on choux pastry. Realizing that we had a long, boring ceremony ahead, I suggested to the table that we bet on the outcome of the Eat Out awards.

There were plenty of 'ballots' on the table, so each of us took one and filled out our picks for winners. Five dollars was the price of entry. By the time the awards began, we had eight people submitting ballots for a total of $40 - low stakes but enough to make the proceedings more tolerable.

I kept tally during the awards, giving points and taking off marks for each category. My score keeping was momentarily interrupted when Tipsycake unexpectedly won the Best New Bakery Award.

Yep, she won! And pulled me up on stage with her. I tried to stay to the side so that she would get all the attention and that I would - hopefully - stay out of photographs. That hope was short lived when we were pulled aside and told to pose for the camera. Luckily Time Out opted to not post our photo to their website. While she still stood on stage, Naomi grabbed the microphone and yelled out, "Aussie Aussie Aussie."

There was no response from the audience. I yelled out "Oy Oy Oy!" from my perch at the side of the stage, but since I wasn't near the microphone, I doubt anyone heard.

Back at our table, I caught up with the categories I had missed scoring. I added up the numbers after the last award - for best fine dining - had been given to Alinea. While I scored an impressive 12 points, Susan, the PR person from the Peninsula, cleaned up with 14 points. "I eat out a lot," she explained. I don't, but I try and remember what I hear about places in Chicago. Unsurprisingly, my Achilles heel was bars and pubs. I'm really pretty clueless when it comes to the 'in' dive bars in Chicago. I'm more of a stay-in-and-drink person. You know, cheap.

Susan gloated over her win:

But our night wasn't over then. One of Naomi's TOC Eat Out "Best New Bakery" competitors, Natalie Zarzour of Pasticceria Natalina, a four-week old bakery in the Andersenville neighborhood on the northside, approached her to congratulate her on the win. Of course, because I had been on stage first, she turned to me to tell me how much she wanted to meet me. Gently I directed her to Naomi, who would be delighted to be congratulated. Natalie, who brought her husband and business partner Nick along, was a sincere and earnest 24 year old who had opened up her bakery using old family recipes from Sicily. She and her husband were the main staff, and had been experiencing issues around labor similar to those at Tipsycake (hard to find bakers, high labor costs, etc). Naomi and Natalie immediately hit it off.

We ended up downstairs in Nick and Natalie's car, talking, smoking and drinking wine with the owner of the L&L, a well-known old man dive bar in the middle of Boystown. He was grumpy and fun, with a shock of white hair, a dangly earring, and a natty jacket, worn just for the occasion. We were a motley crew, hanging out in a late model Jetta parked just under the el tracks. No one took any notice of us.

It seemed an usual ending to an otherwise uppity evening with the creme de la creme of the Chicago food scene.

I hope Naomi invites me next year. I'm going to study up on my Chicago restaurants so that I can clean up in the betting.

Petals on a wet, black bough

This photograph brings to mind a poem by Ezra Pound.

In a sea of dull umber cubicles, Michelle's birthday gift of knitted desserts glow. She made these in a couple hours from a pattern. I'm especially fond of the cupcake and the cherry pie. Remarkably, no one has asked me to take them down since I put them up just after my birthday.

The white ball on top of the pink mini donut is a scoop of ice cream, for my a la mode cherry pie.

Dining at Manresa in Los Gatos, CA

Recently I dined at Manresa restaurant, a recent recipient of two stars from Guide Michelin. Was it worth it?

You'll have to read my entry, at http://www.lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?t=10880 and see.

One of the most influential young people in Ghana eats cake

Congratulations Elikem Kuenyehia! Elikem was just honored as one of the most influential young people in Ghana. For his 30th birthday in 2003, I made him an elaborate cake out of the tiny kitchen in my grad school dorm/apartment. It was a remarkably tasty cake, just what the birthday boy requested. The blue and yellow strips and the red flowers and green leaves are all made from marzipan. The rest is tinted buttercream.

Dinner with the Consultants

We've had a group of four consultants from a high profile firm in our office since early March. This was not something that many of us looked forward to; the consultants from that company had a reputation for arrogance and a sense of superiority and secrecy.  In the past, the presence of a consultant in the office usually meant that something was desperately wrong and probably about to be dismantled and pink slips weren't far behind.

But they weren't engaged (their word -- these kinds of jobs are referred to as 'engagements' -- it sounds so quaint!) to pull us apart, job description by job description (see Office Space), but to help us organize our massive ideation (see below) and fix a few processes while they were at it. So they were friendlies. Very friendlies. Which I found disappointing at first because I really wanted to hate them and their templates, process improvements, and jargon. (Years earlier I had even made up a a character on Friendster called Blaine whose description was taken -verbatim- from the websites of Bain, McKinsey, and BCG - no, I wasn't a fan). But they were too damn lovable, all four of them, even if they preferred diet coke to Junmai Daiginjo.

For the first time at the company, I was actually enjoying the people I was working with (OK, Ed, that's not entirely true, but it sounds so, um, epiphany-like) and I found myself spending quite a bit of time in their office (appropriately they had set up camp the same deluxe office once occupied by my now departed former boss), telling them about whatever crossed my mind. As time went on this devolved from work-related topics to completely inappropriate discussions of homicidal roommates, the past sex life of one of the consultants, the evil in-laws of another, drunk people, stupid people, and most usually, the unbelievable and ridiculous situations that one of the consultants got himself into on a regular basis. For hardcore and highly paid type-A personalities, they were flawed and nerdy and pleasant and social and I soon found myself joining them for the occasional dinner out on the town, each time at a venue of my suggestion. They accorded me final decision perhaps in part because of my food background but more likely because they just didn't want to think about it.

We have been out together now more than a handful of times -- usually just me and a couple of them. We've dined at some newly opened fine dining joints including May Street Market and Sola (where we were the last people to leave because invariably we are the last people to sit down owing to the consultants' workaholic ways and late departure from the office), some good chowist destinations like Mitsuwa Market and Tank Noodle, a sushi joint downtown, and some chain restaurants. On one night we bought chicken bowls from both Baja Fresh and Chipotle, just to be able to say, definitively, which was was better (Chipotle by a long shot). And the beauty of all this? They have expensed every last dollar. And the delicious (not literally) irony? Ultimately my company picks up the tab.

Yup. Apparently they get 20% on top of the agreed-upon price as a cost overrun. So let's just say (hypothetically speaking) that they are getting $100,000 for the job. They would also get an additional $20K  for incidentals, like dining out and travel and rental cars and any other expense that might come up. We do talk about work at dinner, so I don't feel terribly guilty. And some of our meals have been so cheap that they don't even need to send in the receipt. But fine dining is part of their lifestyle, a trade-off for the hours they work and their very firm-focused social world. As one consultant told me, "Everyone in the company has done something really interesting and was probably a really interesting person in the past. But now they don't have time for anything except work, and so they aren't interesting anymore."

One thing I will say for my present work situation is that I do have work-life balance. When I was chained to my desk at Cheese Hell in NYC just before moving to Chicago, I had no time for anything, including seeing friends. I was gone from my house 16 hours a day, which left not quite enough time to sleep, let alone have a life. I worked for a chef and he expected us (especially those of us on salary) to work soul crushing kitchen-style hours so that he could maintain his home in lovely Greenwich. Have I mentioned that I don't enjoy working for chefs?

Work at the Company is relaxed compared to what I used to do and a vacation compared to the work of our consultants. What they do (crunch numbers, make really pretty power point decks that aren't much fun to read) and don't do  (sleep, mostly) reminds me of life in grad school, and I'm way too old to want that anymore.

But I'm around if you want to take me out to dinner - but no chain restaurants.

Adventures in Fast Food

I dislike fast food. Traditional fast food. I dislike McDonald's and Wendy's and Burger King (but I like those ads) and KFC and Krystal and White Castle and Arby's and Hardee's and Carl's Jr and Jack in the Box and Quizno's and Subway and Whataburger and Taco Bell and Del Taco and Popeyes and all the Vienna dog stands and greasy spoons. I should admit here an important detail: I don't eat red meat, so burgers and dogs don't hold much appeal. I will stop only at a fast food place if there is nothing else within miles and I'm driving from Chicago to Boston and am trying to set a personal best of 12 hours, which I have yet to accomplish. And since I do that maybe once every two years, I don't have much occassion to eat fast food (except for Chipotle, but they use Niman Ranch and Bell & Evans meats). I don't like the taste, I can't find anything I want to eat, and did I mention that I really don't like the taste? The warmish bread and the processed meat aren't satisfying...I always feel like I'm missing something after a fast food meal.

Except last night. My roommate and I were going downtown to see a taping of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me (the NPR news quiz) and left the house without eating dinner.

As we drove downtown my roommate began making noise about stopping for food. I wasn't ravenous, but I knew a quick bite would be a good idea as the taping wouldn't let out until close to my bedtime (I hit the mattress early, owing to a long commute and a restless dog who likes to wake me up before 6 am). We drove past greasy spoon after greasy spoon and I wouldn't let him stop. "Let's find parking," I told him, "And then we can find somewhere to eat."

Note to people going to tapings of Wait Wait. You should plan. Because the only thing open at 7 pm in the Loop that is speedy at all is Fast. Fast Food. And the only fast food near Wait Wait? Wendy's -- a horrible, awful, dirty Wendy's. With an untrained staff.

I found the item on the menu least likely to kill me from food poisoning -- a baked potato, which cost all of $1.42. My roommate went greasy and ordered some combo with lots of added fried stuff. We placed our orders and waited. And waited. My roommated turned to me and said, "they are really slow" and I said, "no, they are really untrained."

When we did get the food, it was fine. My potato was thankfully overcooked (killing any pathogens that may have been hitching a ride) and my roommate seemed to enjoy his greasy meal. I don't know if he is still alive this morning as I leave before he wakes up, but I suspect his constitution is stronger than mine and his antibodies are used to dealing with fast food germs. I know this because I have been in his car and have seen the wrappers on the floor.

So I spent $1.42 in a fast food restaurant. That's the most I've spent in one in years (I'm not counting Hot Doug's, which is an Encased Meat Superstore and palace, worth every penny and calorie and tasty as all get-out. How 'bout them duck fat fries? And that Duck sausage with foie gras?). I'll be going to another fast food joint soon. My colleague, who knows I hate fast food, gave me a coupon for a free coffee at McDonald's. I usually make my coffee at home, but if I can go drink some joe for free -- and pour it down the drain guilt-free -- look out, I'm already there!

There is Justice, Sometimes it Just Takes Awhile

I recently discovered this ancient email draft and thought it was a pretty amusing example of why life in the corporate world can be very painful if you work with nutters. This documents a meeting of little consequence at the company where I used to work (certain details and names have been changed to protect people I wish I had never known). There are many run-on sentences here (what was I thinking? Obfuscation by bad grammar?). Anyway, turn off your inner copy editor and take a peek:

Hey Boss

I wanted to give you a heads up that you may be hearing from the Jerk (A VP) regarding some meetings organized by the Marketing group. I was not invited to this week’s meeting yet received a frustrated phone call from the marketers at 2:07 asking me where I was. I obligingly rushed over to the conference room upon receiving their call.

These monthly meetings were apparently set up last year by The Raving Lunatic (a manager), as a way of sharing end of period info with sales and marketing. Oddly, she never seems to include us on the invite.

On Monday mornings at the end of the Period, Marketing gets their financial reports from their financial analyst. On Tuesday at 2 pm, The Raving Lunatic has a meeting with her team and the marketing business partners (so she claims). She asks for explanations of sales trends (declines/increases). She usually seeks very specific info. For example, which accounts declined and why. For Chain Stores, this isn’t too difficult. For our group, it is much more of a challenge, as you know.

Given that we do not have similar meetings with our group, there is no way for me to anticipate her questions and have answers before her meeting on Tuesday.

Today’s meeting was particularly disastrous. I was the only Business Partner who showed up (after the frantic phone call). The other two were in meetings. None of us had answers for them because we did not know which accounts they would be asking about (the questions are very specific to failures with sales). They simply expected us to come to their meeting anticipating what they needed from us. They had never supplied, at any point, a comprehensive list of questions or even an outline of what they wanted to discuss. Additionally, they do not seem to consider the structure of our group, and seem to think of it in terms similar to Chain Stores.

The Raving Lunatic was difficult and confrontational. As the only Business Partner at the meeting, I was put on the spot from the moment I stepped into the room. At one point, after I explained that getting her the information she wanted within 1-1/2 days of her receiving her numbers was close to impossible considering the fragmented nature of our team, she said, “Well, we might as well adjourn this meeting!” When I asked for her to look at her numbers and give me questions to ask the team, she responded that wasn’t possible either. She told me that there wasn’t enough communication between the groups, that’s why they had set up the meetings. She spoke as if she did not have any data. I argued that our data was available in many places that her team can access, from SAP to Oracle. I recommended she take a look at the Big Report (a weekly financial update) so that she could come up with questions before her deadline was only hours away and she turned into a werewolf.

At the end of our very brief meeting, in which out of the ten people in the room, I was the only one who was put on the spot and yelled at, The Raving Lunatic loudly said, to no one in particular, “Well, I’m going to have to leave another voice mail for the Jerk and tell him that this just isn’t working!” She then dismissed the group. All of us looked at one another, shocked at her behavior.

So what happened?  I didn't send the email -- I hoped the whole thing would go away and I wouldn't need to CYA. It didn't, unfortunately. The Raving Lunatic called my boss and told him that I needed "coaching" -- and offered to do it herself (guess she was off her meds that week)! I was dumbfounded but knew that a protest on my part would, in the mind of my boss, constitute an admission of guilt. Well, eventually The Raving Lunatic screamed at one too many at the company and was "let go". Unsurprisingly, it took a regime change to make it happen. Her boss, The Jerk, found it easier to let ne'er-do-wells stick around...so when he left, many of his old managers were swept out. My takeaway? Regime changes can be fun -- and are frequently the only way that the bad ones get their due...

Amino acids yum yum yum

So when I read reviews of May's National Restaurant Association show, only the big guys get mentioned: McCain's fried stuff booth, the party booth with the beer n Tabasco people, the austere Republic of Tea booth, and Coke. No one, but no one, ever name drops Aji-no-moto, the flavor ingredients company best known for MSG. But my visit to the Aji-no-moto booth was by far the most educational. I learned about various naturally-derived enzymes they are making that are used both in the meat industry to bind chopped meat and give it the appearance of whole muscle, and in fine dining establishments like WD-50 in New York City, where the same product is used to bind interesting proteins together and make sheets of "pasta" - imagine a pureed shrimp product bound with the Aji-no-moto compound and cut into strands resembling spaghetti. The website is pure food science joy but you will have to dig around quite a bit to find the really juicy stuff. There's an amino acid page that reads, "How versatile amino acids are" and explains how different tasty "umai" (delicious/savory - root of umami) flavors are the product of the interplay of different amino acids. And the USA pages have longer explanations of Transglutaminase (aka Activa TG), the fun enzyme that cross-links proteins. Just a shake or two and you'll be reanimating all kinds of protein!

Aji-no-moto will be at the Worldwide Food Expo in Chicago in late October.

Food Reference dot com

So what if it has pop ups for classmates.com, Foodreference.com rules! There are listings for festivals and trade shows throughout the world, crazy food quotes ("People who drink light "beer" don't like the taste of beer; they just like to pee a lot." Capital Brewery, Middleton, WI.), and listings of catalogs of all kinds. It is difficult to read and laid out like a street map of Boston, but provides hours of foodie fun.