AlmanacSquare July 1, 2017 Days Until. . . Fourth Of July 1 Eating Around The World Today is Canada Day, that country’s equivalent of the Fourth of July. Is there Canadian food? Yes. A good deal of the beef we eat is Canadian. Most of the lobsters that turn up in our stores and restaurants come from Canadian waters, which produce the greatest number of homards in the world. Also setting a standard of excellence are the mussels from Prince Edward Island (often noted as P.E.I. mussels on menus.) Their scallops are good, too. On the West Coast, Canadian salmon and halibut are classy enough that they’re widely distributed. One culinary horror story has been expanding from Canada lately: poutine. That’s French fries topped with brown gravy and cheese curd (something like rubbery ricotta). Yuck! Today’s Flavor Today is the beginning of the following: Lasagna Awareness Month, National Baked Bean Month, National Culinary Arts Month, National Ice Cream Month, July Belongs to Blueberries Month, National Picnic Month, and National Pickle Month. HotDogMost worth celebrating, however, is National Hot Dog Month. Although the hot dog is pretty close to the bottom of the gourmet scale, only the ultimate food snob would say he doesn’t get a twinge of pleasure once in awhile from indulging in a frank. It seems an essential gustatory act when one is in any kind of ballpark. There’s something magical about hot dogs: we learn to love them when we’re little kids, but we never become immune to their charms. A hot dog is made with pork or beef or both. I prefer pork, although all-beef hot dogs are often more expensively made. The meat is ground finely with curing ingredients. The smoke flavor some hot dogs have usually comes from another additive. A small percentage of hot dogs are covered with a natural casing; those are among the most expensive, and usually among the best. Hot dogs are pre-cooked, but enough incidences of listeria food poisoning have come from eating them right out of the package that it’s probably a good idea to cook them again. The hot dog as we know it was popularized at the World Fair in St. Louis in 1904. But the antecedents of the hot dog are numerous and go back in history a very long way. Here’s a web page devoted to the genealogy of the hot dog. It’s full of stories you’ve probably never heard before. New Orleans has not been a good place to find hot dogs until recently, with the advent of Dat Dog and imitators creating a new hot dog world here. Before them, however, thinking about hot dogs here was a thought about the Lucky Dog cart–and then you try to forget it as quickly as possible. A few stalwart restaurateurs have attempted over the years to incite interest with a first-class Chicago or New York-style dog with interesting garnishes, but most failed dismally. But we have a few local hot dog traditions. Many people like hot dogs with red beans and rice. The pepper wiener poor boy–a specialty at Juneau’s and (in the old days) Domilese’s–is another local version that need expansion. The only long-running hot dog sandwiches of excellence are the split, charcoal-grilled Numbers Seven through Nine at Bud’s Broiler. Deft Dining Rule #561 A hot dog that doesn’t make you want another one right away is not a very good hot dog. Food In Manufacturing Today in 1910, Black and Decker opened for business. The company started out making food-related machinery: a gizmo for capping milk bottles, and another for dipping candy. But their name became famous for construction tools. My first power drill (which I still have, after thirty-eight years of regular use) is a Black and Decker. So it seemed funny when they started their line of kitchen appliances in the early 1980s. My first food processor was a Black and Decker. That lasted from 1982 to 2009. Pretty good stuff these guys make. Annals Of Junk Food On this date in 1917, Coca-Cola changed its formula. Nobody complained. That formula is the one still in use for Coke Classic, although almost all other forms of Coca-Cola use the New Coke flavor. . . Wally Amos Jr., who created the “Famous Amos” chocolate chip cookie, was born today in 1936. . . Forrest Mars, who created M&M’s and the Mars Bar, died today in 1999. He was a driven, no-frills businessman who permitted almost nothing to be known about himself. His history is presented in a great book called The Emperors of Chocolate. Cheese Of The Day Cheez Whiz appeared on shelves in grocery stores for the first time today in 1953. It’s cheese and milk emulsified with oil to be spreadable. The name alone is enough to keep the tasteful person away. But Cheez Whiz does have one tenuous claim to culinary interest: it’s the traditional cheese used on the Philadelphia-style cheese steak sandwich. At least that’s what some purists claim. I use provolone on mine. Original recipes are often far less good than the improvements that follow them. Gourmet Gazetteer Butternut is in north central Wisconsin, 120 miles east-southeast of Duluth, Minnesota. It’s a town of about 400 people founded in 1878 as a station on the Wisconsin Central Railroad. The trains arae gone now, but the town remains as a center for commerce in that dairy farming area. Butternut’s website leaves no stone unturned for those who want a detailed history of the little town. The place to have lunch is Jumbo’s, right in the middle of town. Edible Dictionary escolar, n.–A widely-distributed fish in the tuna family, escolar is a controversial fish. Several varied species have been called by that name. The one that appears in restaurants with fish grills and sushi bars is a pale tan in color, with a firm flesh and a very good flavor that comes from a high fat content. It is also known by two other names, both of which are inaccurate: white tuna and oilfish. The latter causes confusion with a related species which also tastes good but causes an inconvenient reaction in the lower digestive tract of some people. Escolar causes this too, but much less often than a true oilfish. The problem is not harmful and rarely painful–just, as I say, inconvenient. I get the symptoms, but I eat the fish anyway–if not often. Food And The Law Today in 2007, restaurants in New York City were prohibited from using trans-fats in their cooking. This affected Hispanic restaurant more than most, but many recipes had to be changed. Trans-fats are everywhere Crisco or margarine were present, and that’s a lot of dishes. The health benefits are hard to ignore. And better-tasting substitutes for trans-fats are easy to find. Music To Eat Beans By Dan Ackroyd, Canadian-born comedian and actor, was born today in 1952. He was one of the Blues Brothers, first on Saturday Night Live, then in the movie. From the latter the House of Blues chain of music clubs and restaurants was born. The HOB on Decatur Street here in New Orleans is always packed, but the food has only rarely been memorable. A statue of Ackroyd in his Blues Brother attire stands in the Louis Armstrong International Airport. Food Namesakes Evelyn “Champagne” King, who sings dance music, is forty-five today. . . Claude Berri, an actor and director known best for the movie Le Sex Shop, is seventy-one. Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, Comte de Rochambeau, was born today in 1725. He is the man for whom one of the best dishes at Antoine’s is named. Poulet Rochambeau is a roasted, deboned, cut-up chicken atop a thick slice of ham, topped with a slightly sweet brown sauce and bearnaise. It’s the first entree I ever ate at Antoine’s, and still one of my favorite dishes there. Chicken Rochambeau is also served at Galatoire’s and Arnaud’s, though not as well as at Antoine’s. A modernized and very good version is at the new Rebirth Restaurant. Rochambeau the man was a French aristocrat who participated enthusiastically enough in the American Revolution that he deserves the honor, and then some. Words To Eat By “I once served a steak to Janis Joplin at Max’s Kansas City. She was quiet and very polite. She didn’t eat her steak but left a five-dollar tip.”–Deborah Harry, singer in the group Blondie, born today in 1945. Words To Drink By “Eat well is drink well’s brother.”–Scottish proverb. FoodFunniesSquare What Is Olive Loaf, Really? Where does it come from? What kind of animal, I mean. Well, here is the answer. Click here for the cartoon. Train Trip aboard Sunset Limited, June 19, 2917 During the past two weeks I have been on vacation in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and in numerous venues throughout the American Southwest, a place I love. During the sojourn, I have kept my Dining Diary pretty rigorously. And here it is. The first part is largely about railroads, a longtime hobby of mine. As it goes on, it will shift to food I encountered along the way. June 19, 9:00 a.m.–Amtrak Train #1 leaves New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal 9 a.m.–Train passes next to Jesuit High School baseball stadium 9:21 a.m.–Train crosses Central Avenue, then begins to climb the apporoach to the Huey P. Long Bridge, the world’s longest railroad bridge 9:30 a.m–Train tracks crest the Huey P. Long Bridge peak abd crisses the Mississippi River. 9 a.m.–Train back on terra firma. 9:47 a.m–Train passes through two large railroad yards, then enters an assortment of very dense woods alternating with sugar cane fields. The latter are all the same size, and line up uniformly 1:34–Bridges cross the bayous in the Des Allemands. This is where the best wild-caught catfish are fished locally, and where the name of the place is a mark of quality. 9 a.m–We run along the edges of the most extensive sugar cane fields we will see, extending to about half of the horizon. June 19, 9 a.m.–The sugar cane tapers out in favor of trees–mostly oak, often covered with Spanish moss–bushes, and an improbably large number of bayous, many of them connected with Bayou Lafourche, a former distributary of the Mississippi River. The train races along at speed; track is quite good, and sometimes very smooth. 10:35 a.m.–Train arrives in Schriever, the first stop on the westbound Sunset Limited, whose name is the oldest in the gazetteer of train names. When the train leaves Schriever, it is five minutes late. 10:53 a.m.–The train enters a swamp rooted in many 50-foot and taller trees, with standing water about eight inches deep and covered with bright greenish-yellows and magentas. Beautiful in its way. 11 a.m.–Train crosses the Atchafalaya River at Berwick, where the Sunset Limited once went into the river with some fatalities. New bridge now. 12 p.m.–I talk at length with a young woman who is learning the ropes of being a sleeper car attendant. We discuss trains and model trains. She says that model trains are the way grown-up men act like children. I resemble that remark. 12:15 p.m.—The train travels alongside of US 90, which follows almost all of the Sunset’s route. Here it especially obvious, what with the many businesses selling the needs of the petroleum industry. It can all get more than a little unpretty. 2:15 p.m.–We pass a freight train heading in the same direction as ours. It’s the third freight train we’ve encountered. The first was on the Huey P. Long bridge at the same time we were crossing the river. This train carries ninety-four cars behind four diesel units. We will see many more freight trains with many more cars. Many, many automobiles are among these shipments. I’m guessing, but it looked like around over a thousand automobiles are going one way or another. 3:18 p.m.—We cross the New Iberia city limits. Here is the most flagrant example of what is called “street running.” The main riIt has the main line of a major railroad sharing the tracks with everyday street traffic. I saw a particularly bad such combination, our train heading west while five passenger automobiles moved slowly eastward. I watched it from the window of the Sunset Limited. 12:34 p.m.–The dining car requires reservations, to keep everyone from trying to dine at the same time. I chose half-past noon. When I showed up, I was seated with a man and his six-year son. The boy has a sharp wit and an articulate speaking style. The third person is a young woman working on her PhD in Psychology. She’s quiet, but I think this owed entirely to big-mouthed males sitting with her. I order a quesadilla, which would have been better described as two flour tortillas with bacon and cheddar in front of it. I should have ordered the Korean pork sliders, and I will have the opportunity to do that tomorrow. The father of the sharp six-year old, after a few minutes, figures out who I am. He used to work as a sous chef at Carrollton Market. He also cooked at Cuvee and a few other first-class restaurants. The conductor on this train and an attendant in my sleeper car are others who ask me about I had no idea so many Amtrak people are into food. As the conversation went on, the dad with the chef credentials figured out who I am. That has almost never happened to me on a train. Meanwhile, the waiter neglected to bring the salad I asked for. I got even with him by not having dessert. (It didn’t appeal to me.) I go back to the roomette and mostly just stared at the window. Which is, of course, one of the more pleasant activities on a train. Sooner or later I knew I would require a nap, since I was up before five this morning. I fold down the bottom seats and let it go at that. I slept about an hour and fifteen minutes, only until the dining room steward came by to ask when I’d like to have dinner. Six-thirty, I tell him, hoping as I do that the Amtrak steak is still there. It was delicious two years ago. The train remained at the Lake Charles depot for a long time on account that a passenger needing to debark can’t be found on the train. Never found out what happened to her. We slow down to let a 114-car freight train pass in front of us. We than go on to Beaumont. This is the point at which the BNSF (Burlington Northern Santa Fe) gives way to the Union Pacific. All the miles we’ve traveled so far as well as ahead of us were originally part of the Southern Pacific, the first transcontinental line under one management. The train follows US 90 between Beaumont and Houston, where the 1927-vintage US highway number disappears in the center of the big city. It emerges from Houston on the west side of town. At about five, we learned that there was some sort of accident on our route somewhere along our route. The train sat waiting for this to be cleared up, but the engineer has not had much to say lately. This is the big problem with passenger rail service. If a train or even a streetcar stops, action on other rails nearby stops dead. They can’t back out, they can’t shift to an adjacent track, they can’t do anything but wait. 6:18 p.m.–We start moving just then, and am I glad. I am starting to think in a very pessimistic way. Almost as soon as we did, my name was called by the dining car for dinner, which cheers me up. I am seated with a young couple from Los Angeles, heading home after spending a good bit of time in New Orleans. They’re They seemed to want to carry on their own conversation in hushed tones, I try to insert my thoughts into the conversation. As part of my appeal to my dining companions, I offer to share my bottle of Cabernet with them. They remain engaged with one another. Meanwhile, the sights I see outside the train register as surely the the least attractive of Houston. It’s in the northwestern part of the well-spread city and is highly industrial, with immense piles of what can only be called “material.” The railroad yard seems to be at least thirty, rusty, parallel lines of classification yards. It’s all ugly in a host of different ways. Only the handsomeness of the big buildings in central Houston lift one’s heart above all this junk. I shift my attention to dinner. It begins with a salad composed of iceberg ribs and those lathe-carved baby carrots. Neither of which is easy to chew. Thing warm up in the entree section, from which I ordered the most expensive ($25) meal I’ve ever had aboard an Amtrak train. It’s a nicely-encrusted, juicy strip sirloin, served with a prefabricated but tolerable bearnaise saice. I never though I’d ever see the king of the French sauces in service on Amtrak, but here it is. This is served with little green beans and corn with tiny tomatoes, but this is good enough, I didn’t yet know that this same combination will turn up four more times during this trip. 7:44 p.m–We roll along at a less-than brisk pace when, after the little passenger traffic that Houston’s railroad operation supports, we pull away. After another twenty minutes, we stop again. This time I ask around as to what’s going on. Answer: a fire on a highway about half a mile away from the train is close enough to one of its train tracks for the UP to send some of its conductors out to manually set the points that direct the train. Our train rolled over the joint gingerly, first in one place and a little later in a similar spot. And then we were off at last, with only brief stops until we reach US 90 ALT, which we follow until San Antonio. 8:50p.m.P–It is almost a dozen hours since we left New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal. Somehow, It feels more like three days. This is Tom’s Good-Time Stretching Theorem, which says that when you’re having a good time, the time will seem to pass longer than if you’re having a bad time. Which seems to be the opposite of the way it should be, but it always works for me. 8:57 p.m.–I begin getting ready for bed, since I had only a short, sleepless nap a few hours ago. I fall asleep easily, even though I am being serenaded by “To Your Good Health, From Squibb.” This is a 1941 radio music show featuring vocalists whose musical tastes were popular as they are relaxing. It would probably be considered as opera or classical music. The thirty recordings I have of these fifteen-minute shows puts me right to sleep. I do awaken at half past eleven for the racket of putting two trains together. One of them is our Sunset Limited with the Golden Eagle. The latter came from Chicago, and will become part of the Sunset as it heads toward to Los Angeles as the longest train route in the Amtrak system.
