A Taste of MoneyThe Blog

The beautiful lush green olives you see above are of the Nocellara del Belice variety grown in Castelvetrano, Sicily. I first encountered these at Peasant restaurant where they serve them on the bar in lieu of boring clichéd bar snacks like nuts or pretzels. The stunning bright green color just catches your eye and makes your mouth water. Then you taste it and it’s like a moment of awakening. Unlike any other olive, the Castelvetrano has a fresh green buttery flavor and a meaty, juicy texture. While other olives taste like they are of indeterminate age, the vegetal vibrance of these just exudes freshness. The olives are harvested young and cured in a very light brine. If you are turned off by olives that are too salty or overly assertive in flavor, then you must give Castelvetranos a try. But of course there’s a catch- depending on where you live, they might be pretty hard to find. If you’re in NYC, you can get them from Di Palo’s in Little Italy, currently selling for $7.99/lb. Coincidentally, I ran into David Rosengarten shopping there this past Sunday. I hadn’t seen him since since my birthday dinner at Daisy May’s a few years ago, but it wasn’t surprising to see him at Di Palo’s; foodies all know the best places to shop! Alternatively, you can always stop into Peasant and grab a seat at the bar. They don’t always have Castelvetranos on the bar, but frequently they do. Peasant has great food anyway, so even if they don’t have these glorious olives on the day of your visit, it is still worth the trip. If you’re lucky enough to be there when Vicky High Life is bartending, she can steer you to some of my favorite menu items. But be sure to save room for dessert- their panna cotta and their bread pudding are the best renditions of those classics I’ve ever tasted. Then after dessert if you linger at the bar enjoying your wine, let’s see if you can resist having a few more Castelvetrano olives. My guess is no.

Last month my cousin Nancy was in town and we went to meet up with my brother and his wife for dinner at Ichiumi, a buffet place in Edison, NJ. There was a huge selection of food including lots of seafood items of varying degrees of quality. I spotted one of my favorite things to eat- monkfish liver (also known as ankimo in Japanese), so I of course had to sample it. Sadly, it was awful. Probably the worst I’ve ever tasted. It had a very strong fishy funkiness to it and strands of sinewy veins which ruined the texture. Monkfish liver is supposed to be a little bit funky in a liver-ish sort of way, but mildly so and with a totally smooth texture. It has been called the foie gras of the sea and for good reason. When prepared correctly it has a mouth-filling richness and a mellow creaminess that exemplifies decadence.

The preparation of monkfish liver isn’t particularly difficult, so let me show you how I do it at home. First, get some raw monkfish liver from a reputable fishmonger or Japanese market. Usually monkfish liver is best during the cold weather months, so if this is your first time trying it out, now is a good time for it. It should be a nice pale cream color with as few red spots as possible. The good stuff, partially pre-cleaned for you, should run about $10 a pound. If it’s significantly cheaper than that, I’d probably steer clear of it. When you get it home, the first thing to do is to sprinkle some salt all over it, then place it in a bowl and pour in just enough sake to cover it. It can be any cheap sake, just avoid the sweet or cloudy unfiltered varieties. Here’s what good quality monkfish liver looks like at this stage of the preparation:

Place the bowl in the refrigerator to let it soak for an hour. This is the first step that Ichiumi must have botched because the salt and sake is what draws out the overwhelming funkiness.

After an hour, dump out the sake and place your liver on a cutting board. This is the only mildly challenging/messy part of the process. With a very sharp knife, start trying to remove any veins or sinewy strands that you see. Anything that does not look like soft liver tissue should be removed, so that includes the very thin outer membrane which peels away very easily once you get it started. The veins are often impossible to remove in complete strands, so don’t don’t get frustrated if you have to remove little pieces at a time. Try to pull the veins off the liver and then use your knife to gently scrape the liver away from them. It will look something like this:

As you proceed, you will be exposing more and more of the interior of the liver. That allows you to run your fingers thru it looking for any other tough strands. Also cut away any red blood spots that you see. Don’t worry if it looks like you’re completely mangling the poor piece of liver and it ends up looking like little mounds of jello on your cutting board. In fact, you actually want it broken down into smaller blobs like that because that will make the subsequent rolling step much easier.

Once you have the liver completely deveined, transfer it onto a sheet of heavy duty aluminum foil. Place it all in a horizontal row at the edge of the foil closest to you. Then grab that edge of the foil and gently lift it up and roll it forward, trying to encase the liver into a little tube shape. Do your best to get the liver into as tight a roll as possible without it squeezing out of the two ends. Once you have completed your little aluminum liver tube package, place it into a pan with a steamer rack and let it steam for 30 minutes:

After 30 minutes, take it out, let it cool down and then refrigerate until you want to serve it. To serve, just unroll the package and slice off coins about 1/4″ thick. I like to place them in a bowl with a little bit of scallion and drizzle them with ponzu soy (a sauce made of soy sauce and ponzu juice, it’s not as salty as soy sauce and has a citrus flavor that helps cut the richness of the liver). And a quick tip regarding the scallions- for any recipe that calls for raw scallion, I like to use a technique I first learned by watching the guys at Typhoon in the East Village. Finely slice the scallions, wash them in really cold water, and then drain and dry them in paper towels to get out the extra moisture. This cuts the aggressiveness of the oniony flavor and just makes them more palatable overall. If you want to get really fancy with your monkfish liver preparation, a little dab of momiji oroshi would go fantastically with it. That’s the spicy grated daikon that you’ll see with some dishes at Japanese restaurants. Alas, I didn’t make any of that this time around, so here’s my simply plated finished dish:

As of January 1st, I no longer get the Food Network or HGTV because Cablevision declined the rate increase being requested by Scripps Networks, the parent company of the two channels. Cablevision claims Scripps was attempting to raise the fee for those channels by 200% and that they could not accept those terms without passing the increases on to their cable subscribers like me. If you ask me, both sides have a greedy wrongheadedness about the value of their offerings. Cablevision charges too much for their services as it is, so they could certainly eat the price increase if they had to. Though I’m not saying they should, because I think Scripps is pretty delusional about the worth of their channels too. But in this day and age, there’s a way disputes like this get resolved- using the arbitration model just like in sports contract disputes. Get an independent arbitrator to listen to both sides and determine what is actually a fair carriage fee for the channels in question. It should be that simple, and at that point, whichever side refuses to go to arbitration is clearly the one in the wrong. Enough said.

As for me personally, I had lost almost all interest in the Food Network long ago. The good shows are either long gone (Taste with David Rosengarten, Molto Mario, the original Iron Chef), or relegated to very obscure hours (Jamie at Home). People that can actually cook, like Mario Batali, have been replaced by cartoonish personalities who annoy us with forced ebullience. So many of the current roster of Food Network celebrities remind me of used car salesmen. But these charlatans aren’t peddling vehicles, they’re selling themselves. They’re trying to convince you that they are fun, cool, and boy wouldn’t you just love to hang out with them. It’s not about food, it’s about them! Nauseating.

Slightly more regrettable is losing HGTV, but only slightly. The only show I watched there was Holmes On Homes, but I won’t miss it too much because it seemed they only had about 15 episodes in rotation and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen them all. That’s another thing to gripe about with Scripps- if they are going to charge more for these channels, they should damn well bring the other episodes of Holmes on Homes to the U.S. audience (there are tons of episodes that have only aired on HGTV Canada).

But while the fallout from this battle between Scripps and Cablevision is no big deal to me right now, I do have serious trepidation about the future. You see, Scripps also bought a majority stake in The Travel Channel back in November. Now that is a channel with programming that I do still like a lot. I love No Reservations, Dhani Tackles the Globe, Meet The Natives and sometimes I even find Samantha Brown, Andrew Zimmern and Man v. Food worthwhile. It scares me to think that Scripps and Cablevision could someday upturn this apple cart the same way they took the Food Network and HGTV away from 3.1 million viewers this past weekend. The way I see it, losing the Food Network is just mildly irritating. I’m annoyed only because it has become a part of popular culture and being a typical American with an inflated sense of entitlement, I feel I should have access to it even if I never actually use it. But losing the Travel Channel? Man, I hope it doesn’t ever come to that.

My good friend Jan who lives in Norway knows how much of a foodie I am, and for a while now, he had been raving to me about one of his favorite traditional Norwegian dishes called Pinnekjøtt. Well, look what he sent me this week!

Literally translated, Pinnekjøtt means “stick meat”, probably referring to the way the lamb ribs look. In Norway it is served seasonally only at Christmas time, so it is quite a holiday treat. It is traditionally prepared by drying, curing and smoking lamb ribs, and then rehydrating them just prior to cooking. Kind of like bacalao, but using meat instead of fish. Jan says his mom makes the best Pinnekjøtt, but the packaged one he sent me is pretty damn good too. Here’s what was in the box:

The main bag of meat contains lamb ribs and sausage. The sides are peeled boiled potatoes and a mashed Norwegian turnip called kålrot. Cooking them up couldn’t be easier- you just drop the bags into boiling water for 10 minutes and it’s done. Then just cut open the bags, plate the goodies and it’s time to eat!

There’s something very comforting about this kind of food. The lamb was so falling-apart tender, kind of like meat that you’d find in a bowl of a soup. It was very well seasoned and had that gaminess we associate with lamb but in a mellow, fragrant sort of way. Absolutely delicious. The sausage was reminiscent of kielbasa, with a deep smokiness and a nice firm texture. The potatoes were just potatoes, rather unremarkable on their own. But on Jan’s advice, I saved the cooking liquid from the bag of meat and used that as a sauce. The liquid was rather salty and had that aroma of lamb which really brought the potatoes to life. And to contrast the saltiness of the meat and potatoes, the mashed kålrot was fantastically buttery and sweet, sort of like really good squash. What a meal!

So I’d like to say thanks to my amigo Jan for a fantastic treat. Now I understand why so many Norwegians choose to have Pinnekjøtt as their Christmas dinner. But with something so delicious, what I don’t understand is why they don’t have it all year round!

I’ve always loved products that are over-engineered. You know, products that are designed to meet lofty standards and survive extreme conditions the likes of which I am not likely to ever encounter. Recently I’ve discovered two products for my feet which fit into this category- Icebreaker socks and Unequal Insoles.

First the socks-

Icebreaker makes a wide array of products from merino wool; everything from underwear to coats. The idea behind all of their products is that merino is an ideal material for clothing that performs well in all weather conditions. In warm environs, the wool wicks moisture away from your body to keep you cool. When it’s cold, the merino keeps you warm, as their website says, “through a molecular process called heat of sorption“. That basically means that when the wool fibers draw moisture from the atmosphere, the process produces heat. It’s just a tiny bit of heat to be sure, but it’s enough that your body feels warmer in wool than in other materials. The merino wool in Icebreaker products is finer, softer and does not itch. And if that’s not enough to sway you, also consider that the material naturally does not retain odors. Their marketing materials say that the record for wearing an Icebreaker product non-stop in severe conditions was 196 days! I don’t know if I believe you can wear anything that long and not have it stink, but that’s the whole point of over-engineered products- you’ll never subject them to what they’re capable of (assuming you shower more than twice a year!), and as long as they perform even close to what they advertise, you’ve got a winner on your hands. These socks are definitely winners. Details such as the fit around the heel and the strength in the toe area are top notch. And best of all, these are the only pair of socks I own which stay snug to the calf so you don’t have to keep pulling them up every hour. Nobody likes socks with poor elastics which continually fall and gather around the ankles like 80’s leg warmers. Get a pair of Icebreakers and put your Flashdance days behind you. Retail price is $16.99 a pair for the Ultralite Crew socks pictured above, but they have a wide range of styles and colors at different prices.

But keeping your feet happy takes more than great socks. The other new product I’ve become a fan of are these Kevlar insoles from Unequal Technologies:

Yes, they’re made with Kevlar, the same material used in bulletproof vests. The revolutionary idea here is that insoles should not just provide cushioning, but actually absorb shock. By using Kevlar to absorb the shock of every step, you’re reducing the amount of impact stress transmitted upward thru your feet, legs and back. These insoles (as well as other Kevlar products) are already being used to great benefit by professional sports teams. So do they work? In a word, yes. Could they be better? Also yes. There are two different pairs of insoles in my picture- the Comfort Insoles on the left and the Sports Insoles on the right. The Comfort ones are thinner and narrower, probably intended for dress shoes. The problem I have with them is the width. I found them a little too narrow so that when inserted into any of my dress shoes, they did not fit snugly up against the sides of the shoe. You could still walk in them and everything felt fine from a comfort standpoint, but it is somewhat annoying when you can feel there’s a gap between the side of the insole and the side of the shoe. The Sports Insoles are wider and fit perfectly in every shoe I tried them in. I would be inclined to wear the Sports Insoles in even my dress shoes, but the slight extra thickness of them would make the fit a bit too tight from top to bottom.

From a performance standpoint though, Unequal Insoles really work. While the insoles feel firmer, not as soft as cheapo drug store insoles like Dr. Scholls, they actually leave your feet feeling better over a longer period of time. I’ve done plenty of walking over the last few days and both the Comfort and the Sports insoles both worked their magic. At first blush, you wouldn’t notice that much of a difference from regular insoles, and in fact each step would probably feel firmer under your feet. But if you were to walk a long distance or perhaps jump and stomp around for a bit, that’s when you would notice and appreciate what the insoles are doing. I guess the best way to describe it is that they dampen any harshness from the impact of each step and it turns out that’s more important than cushioning when it comes to keeping your feet happy. Surprisingly, these insoles also come with a lifetime replacement warranty. The catch is that you can only get one replacement pair per year and you have to pay like $10 for shipping and handling, but still, that’s pretty darn good. Retail for the insoles are $24.99 per pair. Small price to pay for happy feet!

My friend and ex-coworker Mike is a really talented photographer. He doesn’t take pictures for a living, but he probably could. Recently he took a picture of Grand Central Terminal that really grabbed me. As someone who has been thru GCT a zillion times, there’s a very familiar feel that the image instantly evokes. It’s the sense of majestic space, and of activity and purpose that always seems to be in the air at Grand Central. But usually our real world experience of the place is frenetic and impersonal. What Mike captures here is the terminal during a relatively quiet time of day. Still with people milling about, each with their own places to go and things to do, but emptier than usual which makes the place feel more like my own. I don’t know if that makes any sense, but it’s kind of like how Boston used to feel to me in the summertime. Since Beantown is such a college city, it had such a different vibe during summertime when school was out. To me, it was like getting the city back to myself during those months, like I was more connected to it. That’s what Mike’s photo captured for me about Grand Central Terminal. And of course there’s the American Flag as a focal point in the image, seemingly watching over the room, lending an air of security, unity and pride.

But enough gushing over the photo. Let’s gush over what’s now hanging on my living room wall!

Since I loved the photo so much, I really wanted to have it printed to canvas, but the only question was how to go about getting that done. A Google search turned up so many different companies that do this sort of thing that it was hard to settle on one. Thankfully Mike himself had a great recommendation- Pixel2Canvas. While he hadn’t used the service himself, he had heard lots of good things about them from his photography buddies. Now that I have my canvas, I can definitely say, believe the hype, Pixel2Canvas absolutely rocks!

The term for this type of art production is giclée printing. Really it just means it’s a fine art print basically made using an inkjet printer, but giclée sounds so much cooler, doesn’t it? Of course there are all kinds of inkjet printers, inks, canvases, coatings and finishing techniques, so the quality differences from one printing company to another can be quite dramatic. With little experience in this sort of thing, I can’t comment on the technical merits of the printer or ink choices made by Pixel2Canvas, but there are a few things I can point out.

The mounting option I selected was a 1.5 inch gallery wrap. In a gallery wrap, the image is extended around to the sides to create an attractive presentation suitable for hanging without a frame. In order to create the gallery wrap without sacrificing any of the image from the front of the canvas, a digital technique called cloning is employed. Basically that involves copying the parts of the image around the edges in order to add an additional 1.5″ border around the original which looks like the it’s part of the image. One of the cool things about Pixel2Canvas is that they can do this cloning for you, free of charge. Here’s the result:

Pretty nifty, eh? That’s the sort of thing where a fine attention to detail really matters because the mounting has to be done in such a way that when the canvas is stretched, the edges fall precisely on the transition between the original image and the cloned border. As you can see, Pixel2Canvas absolutely nailed it. I love the way it looks from any angle.

Now for the even finer details. Have a look at this closeup of one of the corners of my canvas:

Just look at how tightly and cleanly the corner wrapping has been executed. While researching different printing companies, I saw several examples of gallery wraps from other printers that were loose, uneven and just kind of sloppy looking. The way Pixel2Canvas has done things, you can tell how much care they took in the process. The other thing I’m thrilled about is the canvas itself. Notice the texture of the canvas is a much tighter, finer weave than standard art canvases. This is Pixel2Canvas’ Luxe line, and for my taste, it provides a better look for photographic prints. And best of all, it’s actually less expensive than their traditional canvas. This fine 24″x36″ piece of artwork on my wall cost only $160! The only mild gripe I have is that it took a while to have my order fulfilled. From the day I placed the order until I received it was 20 days. I’m sure you can find other printers that will be faster, but you don’t want to sacrifice quality for speed, especially for a gallery wrap where shoddy workmanship will be readily visible.

So thanks to Michael Wan for his amazing photo, and to Pixel2Canvas for their outstanding craftsmanship in bringing his work to life in my living room. I absolutely love it!

It was over a year ago that I ate at Ad Hoc in Yountville, CA. It’s one of Thomas Keller’s restaurants, but this one is unique in that there’s no menu and the food is served family-style. Unshackled from having to adhere to a static menu, the chefs are free to feature the best of whatever products are available to them each day. I had such a wonderful meal there so I was incredibly excited when I heard Michael Ruhlman was going to be working with Keller on a cookbook featuring Ad Hoc’s family-style recipes. Well, I’m thrilled to announce that Ad Hoc at Home has just been released and I received my copy this week:

The book is absolutely stunning in every way. The first thing you notice is the heft, weighing in at probably over 3lbs. Visually, it’s the most impressive cookbook I’ve seen since Ruhlman and Keller’s other collaboration, The French Laundry Cookbook. As you can see from the picture above, the photography is so beautiful and vivid that this would make a fine coffee table book. But don’t be fooled by its good looks, this book is meant to be used in the kitchen. Unlike The French Laundry Cookbook which has gorgeous photos but dishes that are too fussy and elaborate for the average home cook, Ad Hoc at Home contains a wealth of practical information, tips and easy, sensible recipes.

As I did an initial skim through the book, I was struck by how many little gems of insight it contained. Not just raw facts and recipes, but also a peek into Keller’s mind and how he thinks about things in the kitchen. Why we should ditch our tongs in favor of palette knives. Why cooking asparagus in water washes out the flavor and what to do about it. Using vinegar as a seasoning tool. Basic categories of techniques home cooks should master. Versatile items to stock your pantry and refrigerator with. Dishes for the home cook’s repertoire which offer possibility for variation and creativity. Even the difference between the two major brands of Kosher salt. There were just so many excellent little a-ha! tidbits and insights.

When you think about it, what do you really want in a cookbook? Some are great as reference books for specific recipes. Others provide great illustrations of technique. Some include valuable little tips. But for me, especially when it comes to books written by great chefs, what I’m looking for are any nuggets of information to help unlock the mysteries of why their cooking better is so much better than mine. Why is it that when I taste a carrot at Charlie Trotters it is practically life-changing, but when I cook one at home it is just a lifeless veg? That’s the sort of thing I’m always in search of, whether it’s from cooking shows, magazines or cookbooks. And you know what? Ad Hoc at Home delivers on all of that and more. Great recipes, clear instructions, gorgeous pictures, helpful tips and even philosophical insights. A cookbook that is every bit as practical and usable as it is gorgeous to look at. Is it the best cookbook ever? As Kanye West might say, “Imma let you finish, but Ad Hoc at Home is one of the greatest cookbooks of all-time!”