Final Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market - 10/29/05

It’s over. Or just begun. As I have paraded before you, with high degree of righteousness and sanctimony, I will be eating from a farmer’s market shopping cart even as Oak Park’s splendid market packs up for the year—does it not seem like the old time circus, it’s here, it’s all consuming, and then just gone. For the next six months or so, that parking lot at the Pilgrim Church*, on Lake near Ridgeland will be like any other parking lot. It will be hard to imagine the many stands with their fruit, their vegetables, their flowers, their cheese, their meat, their eggs, their vinegars, and their bake sales for various good causes will not be there. No one will hear the several guitars, banjos, mandolins, fiddles, a stand-up bass or two, and whatever else shows up, that combine into one complexly pure line of music. No one will take in the whiffs of donuts being made and Oak Park’s own Hayes, since 1789 (?!), coffee. No one will not run into their neighbors, kid’s coaches, co-volunteers, and Village residents who look vaguely familiar (most likely because you see them once a week at the Market). No dogs will be parked at the edges of the lot, tails wagging, waiting for someone to return. It will just be a parking lot.

It seems so sudden because the market stayed so full this fall. In years past, the last few weeks were mostly a bazaar of snake gourds, bales of hay and corn stalks. All the things I hate for its uselessness (but have to appreciate for the way the farmer’s can make a few extra bucks pawning off their garbage). Usually by this time of year even the pumpkins look a bit haggard as all the good ones have been sold. The last market was about saying good bye and celebrating the run with a Styrofoam cup of stone soup. Inevitably, the soup kept you warm on a day that was a brutal as a Welsh summer. The metaphor for this year’s market was the fact that the stone soup was gone by the time we made it to the market (having a soccer game first), but we did not need the soup.

I will say that finally, the market thinned a bit. Nicholls’s Farm did not have any tomatoes, yet tomatoes, at the end of October! fresh tomatoes could still be found. There were also still raspberries but not enough for them to be there at 11 AM. We bought a ½ bushel of apples from Hardin Farms, under this year’s standing philosophy of sticking with the place I know. This should keep us in local fruit for a while, although we picked up a new blender the other day at Costco, and we should start mixing up smoothies with some of our frozen stuff this week. Because we gave Farmer Vicki a check for her fall CSA, we did not feel the need to over-buy vegetables. We still did buy. Skinny, leafy celery and skinny white eggplants from Nicholls; cabbage, cow’s head sized cauliflower and the remains of this years broccoli crop from The Farm (oh, and tomatoes too), lettuce and onions and potatoes and jalepenos to carry us over from Vicki’s Genesis Growers. Things cool that I passed on included sunchokes, parsley root and celery root from Nicholls’s (who uses parsley root?); fresh lavender from Vicki (smelled good though), and interesting radishes at Sandhill Organics, hand grenade-ish looking black radishes and another radish that when sliced was almost like those old-fashioned watermelon candies, green, then white then bright red. They looked like Middle-Eastern pickled turnips already pickled. As always, I admired the wild mushrooms at Nicholls more than I ever will purchase them. My favorite farmer’s, the Wettstein’s, made one their intermittent visits. We bought their brats, pork sausage and ground beef and promised to buy some eggs when they will be at Oak Park’s Buzz Café on November 19 (as like the soup and raspberries, the eggs were gone by 11). It just was like pretty much any week, plenty to buy, plenty we could have bought.

Like I say, our eating local will not stop when this week’s produce runs out. We have the CSA, which I will duly report. We have our freezer stock, our apples and squash and potatoes and onions waiting for us in the cold room. We will make a run to two to the Green City Fall market just to see what is there. Like I have also said, I believe what we eat daily in our house is as good as all but the best restaurants in Chicago. There are really great reasons to go local. Think of the effect on the environment when your produce is trucked in all the way from California, or worse, flown in from Holland, South Africa, and New Zealand. Or think of the difference between the one round stiff tomato found at Jewel and the many sizes, shapes and colors of tomatoes found at the markets when someone throws out the word biodiversity. Support the nearby farmer, not just for what they are doing but because how well they can help you eat.

See ya next year.

*The other notable shingle style, triangled roof building in Oak Park.

Why I Hate Johnny Apple

Link

What's Interesting This Week at Caputo's

Carrots, potatoes, grapes, apples. And what's interesting about them? All local (Michigan). It is possible to buy local produce at a convenient store (and at low prices!). You too can be local.

Why Chowhound.com Sucks

The greatest thing about the Internet food site, Chowhound.com, was it was there. In 2001, I found it (via a diary of site "Alpha Dog" Jim Leff in Slate.com). When I got there, some really smart foodies like Zim, ReneG, Seth Zurer, ErikM, and LeeK had already found the site. Over time, more great foodies like Hat Hammond, the Brilliant One, Aaron Deacon, MikeG, Cathy2, JiminLoganSquare, OurPalWill, GWiv (and hundreds more) all found the site. Except for Wiv who was kinda lured on to Chowhound from the decrepit Chi.eats, everyone else pretty much found Chowhound on their own. And we were VERY happy we found the place. We all learned so much about Chicago, about food, about people. Today, you will find none of us on Chowhound.com. And because we are all vanished from Chowhound, the site hardly offers much about Chicago, about food and about people.

Read this post to know why. The exact reasoning for Chowhound's laser-focus is what makes the site a failure as a database. If you cannot cultivate a local food community, you cannot expect to populate a board with useful tips and tidbits. Read Chicago's Chowhound board today. See what is there and what you can learn. Compare this to what was there a few years ago. Compare to LTHForum.com (or any split-off board like OA or Mouthfuls). If you cannot attract and interest great foodies, the Seth Zurers, the RSTs, the SteveZs, the Sazeracs (and all the other LTHForum posters I barely know now) of the world, how can you expect to attract great postings?

Detroit Breakdown*
A Regional Specialty That Failed Me

Poster MJM writes lovingly (with pic) of Lafayette Coney Island of Detroit here. The grand poohbahs of Roadfood, the Sterns, also write lovingly of Lafayette in their latest book (although there is no mention on their Roadfood.com web site). I've been anxious to try...

About 15 years ago, I tried Cincinnati chili for the first time. Before that moment, I had been reading about 5 way and all sortsa other regional specialties in the Stern books. Those books, of course, made me interested in the chili. Going into Cincy I thought I'd enjoy the experience of "trying", but I did not expect that much. I was surprised then in how much I really liked Cincinnati chili. It was good, really good. It set the standard for regional oddities over the years. And what I have found, with things like LA french dips, Central Texas BBQ, NY pastrami, Boston Indian pudding, [ed. italian beef?]etc., is that these things are not just interesting but exceptionally tasty. There is a reason they have become famous.

Which meant that when lunch came around in downtown Detroit, I knew exactly where I needed to go. For once, however, the hype did not match the product. I cannot fully say "so what" because, as well described on LTHForum (link above), Lafayette Coney is a classic, the kinda of barely changed, Hopperesque place I live for. Still, the product just did not move me. At all. And when I tried for the sake of chow-science, All-American's coneys next door, I did not leave any more blissed.

The Detroit coney dog gets griddled and then condimented with chili sauce, mustard and onions (I skipped the latter). The dog itself is pretty good, well crusted from the griddle and a nice smokey flavor. The toppings, however, added nothing. Bland is not quite a word for chili, but I am not quite sure the word (Antonius, MikeG, Hammond, Desmond?) for something with flavors that still have little taste.

I passed through Detroit's Greektown a few times for reasons I cannot detail and rued missing the lamb with squash daily special. I did buy a some nice pastries at Astoria.

To end, I'll add that for someone like me, who fetishizes over old buildings (and old stuff generally), downtown Detroit is a fine place to hang for a day. I think I counted 3 skyscrapers built after 1985.

Lafayette Coney Island
(313) 964-8198
118 W Lafayette Blvd
Detroit, MI 48226

Astoria Pastry Shop
541 Monroe St
Detroit, MI 48226-2932
(313) 963-9603

*Who else misses J and the gang?

Local Challenge Challenge
Various Un-Reported Farmer's Markets

It’s what, one, two, three, four, five markets I missed blogging? I shopped at Oak Park pretty much weekly. I have allso visited Green City, Daley Plaza, Wicker Park, and 311 S. Wacker. Want to read no more: Loved 'em all.

More? I think last time we talked there was still a peach or two to buy. Incredibly, through all these markets, tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, cucumbers stayed. It seemed like there were as many eggplants today at Nicholls’s as there was six weeks ago, even if most of today’s were gray-white to match the cloud cover. Yet also, in a mimic of turning leaves, Nicholls’s sold tiny eggplants the hue of a good fall drive. Several weeks ago you would not have seen the wild mushrooms including elephant ear sized hen of the woods and expensive chanterelles as you would have today in Oak Park. Just because I have not been faithfully reporting does not mean I have not been shopping.

Shopping like a fool. As I noted when I tossed my hat into the Eat Local Challenge, eating local in the summer is pretty effortless. I said come back in a few months and see how things stand. And it is still rather effortless. For long periods I could rely on a very full market. I purchased varieties of plums, summer ending with the concentrated flavor of the Stanley plum, liquid prunes. Grapes and apples and raspberries, broccoli purple or green or white which we call cauliflower (almost) and all sizes and shapes of squashes have been here forever it seems and I filled up each week. On the other hand, most of the pear varieties made the briefest of appearances and I regret not buying more. Paying attention to the market (even if not putting it to bit and byte), I noticed how short the pear season was. Not as short as the Black Walnut. One week, my favorite fruit vendor, Hardin Farms, had quarts of these for $3. I jumped at it, as much for the uniqueness as its nuttiness. Good thing because these hard to crackers never appeared again.* I have been buying a lot.

Because soon it will not be so effortless to eat local. The challenge will challenge. We are gonna try our hardest to stay local all the way to the opening of the 2006 Farmer’s Market. I am sure I have admitted my exceptions, bananas and citrus fruits. Of course, I only mean fruit and vegetables. Price wise, we cannot afford to commit too fully to local meat and fish; while, other local stuff like Wilmot grains are just too esoteric to matter. On the other hand, we pretty much stick with local dairy products. This is the true local challenge, local off-season. Eating local when the Oak Park Farmer's Market tucks in for the year.

Accepting the challenge takes work. And a fair amount of freezer space. And learning. We are learning the hard way how to keep local. We are lucky we are not Little Home on the Prairie. Whatever mistakes and such we make, we will hardly starve come January. Our biggest mistake was not really thinking about the big picture until about September. It dawned on us, after recollecting once again on the especially delicious apricots this year that we should have dried some. Drying was well within our knowledgebase. As canning is not. Next year I am gonna try to convince Cathy2 from LTHForum to hold some canning classes. Until then, the Condiment Queen and I are still afraid we will kill the family if we can. The thing is though, for the first few months of the market we neither dried or canned or froze, the idiot’s method of preserving. None of those cherries we enjoyed, the ten versions of strawberries at the market, the limited offering of blackberries, the sugar-snaps and shell peas, the edamame, we just plain did not think to save any of those. We started in earnest in September.

We realized in time to pack away a bit of blueberries, plums and peaches. Mostly, we have been packing away grapes (the frozen grapes go about 1:1 between eating now and saving), raspberries, bell peppers and green beans. We have made a ton of tomato sauce and oven dried other tomatoes. We still have a gross or so of tomatoes to process. We have one more week of market to buy, and we will stock up on all of the above plus apples—the folks at Hardin say some of the kinds of apples will stay fine in the fridge for several months. I am not worried about stocking up on everything.

As I reported before, Farmer Vicki will offer a CSA all the way through December. I expect to get plenty of greens, potatoes, cabbage and onions and more, her stand, Genesis Growers has been quite full even now, each week from the CSA. Green City Market will also be in function for the rest of the year. It’s a pain to shop in the lion house, but once or twice I am sure I will make it. I am going into unchartered territory. I think the challenge has barely begun. See what I have to say in a few months.

See ya next week at the market. It’s the last one in Oak Park.

*When we bought the black walnuts, they warned us they would break a nut cracker. And how. The thing is, not only does it take several wakes of a hammer to crack these nuts, it takes some strong work to get the nuts out of the shells. I know this is gross, but they remind me of my daughter’s Cesarean birth, the nut is like the baby held tightly in place. It is worth the work. Unlike any other nut. I would say they taste almost like grapes, with a winey, musty flavor as well as being much sweeter than you expect nuts. I am glad I was there the week the nuts were (don’t insert any jokes…)

Not Like Chicago
Tallahassee, Florida

Yea, Tallahasse aint like Chicago, but specifically, when I finished up the bit of business I had in Tallahase yesterday, I said to one of the people I was with, well, the standard Chowhound question: "got any good suggestions for dinner?" We went thru the usual process of trying to match needs and wants. They asked me, what was I looking for, and I said "not like Chicago."

I had already had lunch not like Chicago. Sonny's is a franchised BBQ chain, but it arose in Florida, so I felt reasonably authentic stopping there. More important, Sonny's symbolizes the difference between Q down there and up here. You just cannot seem to combine a place that smells real with a restaurant that is real up here--and real I mean with menus, tables, pop in glasses, etc. Yea, Sonny's is a bit cute the way most Southern BBQ restaurants these days are cute, but like I say, they are actually smoking stuff.

Smoking stuff well? As a tourist, I had to sample, and forsake the lunch specials for a Pig 3 Way special with pulled pork, sliced pork, and spareribs. Of these, only Sonny's original, the sliced pork, truly stood out. The pulled pork was mushy and watery (is mushy by its nature, watery?); the ribs had a nice hickory flavor but were way to mono-dimensional in flavor. The slice pork was exactly what you cannot get around here, meaty, porky, moist, with real flavor that did not hide when your squeezed some sauce over it. In the pantheon of great BBQ, you will not find Shorty's, but for a boychick in town, it was not like Chicago in the best of ways.

And I wanted more. The original dinner suggestion was Bonefish Grill. I am sure that was the safe, we do not wanna scare the boychick suggestion. I feigned interest. I was thinking these are just not foodies, and no form of pressing would get me anywhere. I figgered I'd thank them for the Bonefish Grill, pretend like that was a good choice and just skedadle. I have other sources you know...Luickily for me, they read through the falsity in my, "mm Bonefish Grill, sounds fine..." The said, what about Seineyard, in Woodville? I was not convinced 'til they said, "at Bonefish you get real plates, Seineyard gives you paper plates."

Well what kinda guy like us does not race out with a hook like that? Yet, I never did eat at Seineyard (and it turns out it probably would have been a good meal.) I rode past Seineyard a bit too early for dinner. I decided to drive around and find a hotel for the night nearby (which turned out to be useless both because there are no hotels in Woodville and I ended up flying back last night). A bit past Seineyard I passed Register's Country BBQ. This was in some ways, less a Not Chicago BBQ place, as our classic local Q places are shacks without tables, etc. Still, no one in Chicago is cooking their BBQ outdoors.

I had a bit of conversation with the folks at Register. They told me that Florida did not allow true pits anymore, that you had to have some kinda walls around the smoker. So, his barrall smoker was in a porch surrounded by a four foot fence. Fans blew the smoke AWAY from the store, which I guess is a sign of confidence. He let me try a bit of rib tip while he fixed up my chopped pork sammy. What a rib tip, crusty, fully of flavor, yet not the least bit greasy. The sandwich was marred by the fact that he nuked it. He regaled me with a lot of local lore. It only takes about 5 miles south to not only be Not Chicago, but Not Tallahasse either. Not too far from Woodville is a civil war battle site, where I was told the Rebs whipped the Yanks, one of the few victories for that side in that part of the world. In honor of this event, the locals do a re-enactment every year. They like the winning part. I hope this gives you a sense of his sentiments, sentiments discussed in other BBQ threads. Of course, of course, of course, go for the food.

Pretty much filled up on Q, I continued to explore. I did not realize until my discussion, how close Tallahassee is to the water. I decided to visit the coast (so to speak), which is quite bayou like. I wandered the town of St. Marks Florida where boats outnumber cars and where there are quite a few seafood markets. I asked around and was told to go to Nicholl's. The menu at Nicholls looked good, but it was early and I was stuffed. But by then, I was also on a 7 PM flight back to Chicago, and I knew I had to eat soon. Early dinner for me.

Fried shrimps, fried mullet, hush puppies, cheese grits, I was blissfully not in Chicago. I'm not much of a mullet expert. Mine last night was a fishy-fish, almost like mackeral. It grew on me as I ate it. The shrimps, well, shrimps just do not taste like that around here, so fresh. Best of all to me, the carb guy, however, was the sweet hushpuppies.

I do not have the addresses for any of the places but they are all along Woodville Highway (Florida 363) heading South from Tallahasse, first Seineyard, then Register (both on the West side of the road) and finally Nicholl's when you get near the end of the road.

What's Interesting This Week at Caputo's

Olives. Yea, yea, Caputo's always has olives. This week they have fresh, awful-tasting, fresh olives. Cure your own!

Farmer Vicki Contact Info

I should have included this in the post below. Those interested in Farmer Vicki's Fall and Spring CSA's should contact her at genesis_growers@hotmail.com

Greetings from Farmer Vicki

Not only is there a plug in here for my daughter's school, but as we've been talking about, here's a way to keep local past the market season. I hope to post more resources like this soon.

What a wonderful season! The cooler weather is refreshing and the new crops are loving it. This morning I was out early looking things over and had to rejoice in the beauty of the land. It was very foggy and the dew was heavy. The land was covered with cob webs that were moist with dew. In the early light it was like a myriad of diamonds across the land. How often does nature present us with such beauty and we fail to notice because we are so busily on our way here or there? It pays to stop and enjoy the wonder of creation. What I felt was a combination of awe, inspiration, joy and peace. It caused me to stop to look and listen. The corn stalks were rustling, the leaves in the cottonwoods were murmuring and the roosters were crowing. Then I saw a toad hop off on his way to find a yummy breakfast treat. A few grasshoppers pinged their way across the field and a wooly caterpillar wiggled his way to who knows where. A lady bug sat quietly on a leaf drinking in the dew and waiting for a tasty treat to come its way. There is so much life around us. A whole world exists under us and around us. When the school kids were here a couple weeks ago they were more interested in the insects than they were anything else. Perhaps we should take a lesson form the kids at Hatch and take the time to enjoy the little things.

The fall crops are coming along very nicely - both inside and out. We have new little peppers and tomatoes in the greenhouse. I am amazed at how fast they are growing. We are prepared now to plant greens and such in the ground in one of the greenhouses, but the outside crops are doing so great in this weather that I am just thrilled. The guys hoed and cultivated everything this week and it looks beautiful. We should have a nice variety available for the fall/ winter CSA. The location and day for pick up have been arranged and are as follows: The Oak Park Children's School, located at 124 N. Kenilworth. It is located in a large, green house called Gale House, just south of Unity Temple. There is a large, covered porch where the boxes can be stacked. I will deliver on Wednesdays by approx 9:30 AM. The school asks that people not pick up during the time that parents would be picking up their children to reduce traffic stress. To sign up, just let me know and make payment either at market or by mail. A couple of folks have indicated that they would need to pick up after work and I will find out if that is workable. Ask me at market and I will let you know. The cost is $140.00 for the season. Then I will take January and February off and will hopefully begin again in March or April with a Spring share.

The picture is of the guys out picking greens. Don't those greens look great? Hope your lives are filled with as much joy and wonder as is mine. Famer Vicki

Suggest-A-Meal
More La Quebrada

I've been twice of late to La Quebrada, so I guess that's what's inspired two posts. Still, the meal I had last night is about fits the model for the Suggest-A-Meal, a concept originated by ChiNola on the LTHForum.com

For the table - Nachos - Nachos ARE Mexican in the sense that they were first conceived and served in Mexico, but for food historians, I think they are kinda Mexican in the same way Caesar salad is Mexican. In other words, more of a dish associated with Mexican restaurants in the USA. Well, La Quebrada's in the USA and they make great nachos. These are not the loaded 10,000 calorie, seven layer, nachos that can be sit in the dark and listen to Brittney Spears, guilty pleasure good. Instead, they are near minimal nachos. Some of the chips barely have a coating. Yet, it's great, like all melted Mexican cheese, great cheese, very fine guacamole, some crema, some beans, some pickled jalepenos, it stems any hunger pangs while the rest of the meal comes.

For Daddy and daughter to split - Several tacos de cesina (see previous post) and a carne asada campestre. In anticipation of this post, I asked the staff yesterday what was in the oily, spicy campestre sauce. They laughed at me. The dish is Quebrada's benchmark arranchera under a coating of queso fresca, charro beans, and nopales and soaked in this mystery sauce. I go through several tortillas just mopping the sauce.

For someone - Chiliquilles en salsa verde con cecina. It does not take a genius to realize that the best chiliquilles will come from the best tortillas. With the contrasting cecina, it is a great dish of textures and strong flavors melded against a soft background.

For the other person - A dish. Here's your chance to explore the 50 or so dishes on the Quebrada menu. Chances are, anything but the soups will be good. A lot of people have liked the chicken legs, although I have never tried. The enchilladas are boring but good, tostadas de ceviche and seafood cocktails can hit the spot when the moods is right.

There's some flan in a case but I never get around to it. If it is early enough in the day, zip over to Cermak and try some candy at Old Fashioned Candy.

Foodfirst!

I'm about six months too late in pointing out this new blog, but my new blogging motto will (soon) be, better late than ever. Since, a little brilliant one has been whispering in my ear all week, I figger now's as a good as time as ever to make things right and mention this blog.

The writer of this blog has a special place in the annals of Chicago Chowhounds. Once upon a time, our palates were shaded, shaded by our menu limitations. We knew a place as simple as Yum Thai in Forest Park seemed to offer treats beyond its stated choices. In fact, there was a secret menu, but a menu no one could actually read. Awfully hungry, we posted the menu on the Internet, seeking the kindness of a stranger who would tell us what to eat. e.e. cumming's like foodfirst came to our rescue. From the across the sea, she translated our Yum Thai menu and then later Spoon Thai's. It's been fun eatin' every since. Of course ErikM has had the advantage of visiting the restaurants and ironing out certain terms, but foodfirst did it first.

Needless to say, her blog justifies the revelation we hold her in, in Chicago.

Save the Ramova Theater

This came in the mail box, but it's pretty cool/worthwhile:

The following is some info on TheRamova Theater in bridgeport, the 'sister' theater to the north side Music Box Theater. There is a current push to save the interior of this historic old theater - currently developers want to gut the interior, which is very similar to the music box. Also threatened with emolition is the Ramova Grill, to which I have never been, but some of you may have.

If any of you have an interest in signing the petition to save this theater or want to get more information, please check out the website listed at the bottom of this newsletter...

The Chicago Sun-Times ran a great two- page article by Misha Davenport (thanks Misha!) in the Wednesday October 5th paper, page 53. You can see the online version of this article by clicking here. The photos are the first pictures published of the theatre's interior in 20 years...and while they're not pretty scenes, they definitely don't show the total devastation we were repeatedly warned to expect.

It looks to us as if that damage had to have been in place at the time in 2002 when the City published their Request For Proposals that spelled out their preference for a theatrical use for the building. So no matter what happened to the building while it was in care of the city, the city agrees: it can rehabilitated to be used as a theatre, even in its damaged state. To see that original DPD RFP, visit our new blog by clicking here.

Doing My Part for Chowhound.com

Last week Chowhound.com let everyone know that it's broke. Now, you won't find me sending them any money as I am infrequent user of their site. But I will help. I was putting together post today and I realized that I had never blogged on Hugo's Frog Bar, one of my favorite places to eat in Chicago. So, I decided to re-post my Chowhound Hugo's posts. This way, you can read the stuff on the blog and save Jim Leff the bandwidth costs by engaging his servers. I hope to re-post more stuff soon and save Chowhound even more money.

Hugo's Post #1

It has been a good few weeks, providing vial information to manage risks, so feeling a bit flush we made a beeline to the place we love to drop our wad. Of course, we could have spent less money and had been in the wonderful company of the Chilean chowers, but sometimes, a mayor and his consort have to do their own thing.

We got to Hugo's pretty much on time for our reservation, the place was just filling up, but we got plunked in one of the gosh darn worst seats in the house. A comfy, circular banquette that was too close to the kitchen door. Every time it opened, we got serenaded by the crash of dishes and other assorted work-in-progress noises. They moved us easily, but it still rankles me a bit, why did WE get that booth? The new booth was just as comfy and circular and built for canoodling and before long all thoughts of noise were gone.

The Condiment Queen expressed pleasure she had been served pretty much her ideal repast: shrimp de jonge, the crab cakes with hot pink mayo and a veggie combination platter that included asparagus, broccoli, sauted mushrooms, creamed spinach and sauted onions.

The shrimp de jonge was true revelation on this Chicago classic. Very large shrimps not in the least mushy or possessing that certain cooked shrimp taste I do not like--imagine that poor rendition of shrimp creole you once ate. The twelve or so shrimps were covered in the de jonge, a mix of butter, garlic and breadcrumbs. It was a dryer mix, almost a paste, but I liked it better that way. The crab cake was still terrific although perhaps because I have spent some extra time with Evil Ronnie, I was a bit more discerning on it. I did not seem pure jumbo lump, rather a mix, with only nuggets of lump interspersed. I cannot say whether this is a trend or if it has always been that way, it is only recently that I have taken this keener approach to crab cakes.

Hugo's does a very fine job with the smaller things. Not too many people whip up a better blue cheese dressing, and that effusive hot pink mayo works awfully well. The three kinds of bread on the table were even better. We resisted mightedly before meal, just nibbling on the raisin, but faced with a plate of spare de jonge, we went carb crazy. We liked all the vegetables. The simple ones, broccoli and asparagus, prospered without treatment. The more fancy spinach was just as good, tasting of spinach and cream but not too much else.

Hugo's Post #2

On Saturday night we decided to spend a fair amount of money for dinner. Deciding to put my money where my mouth is, we picked Hugo's Well, first of all, we succeeded in spending a lot of money. With tax and tip and one drink, we hit a cool three figures. What did we get for that amount of money? Did we validate my constant call?

They push the seafood. Soon after sitting down, in an alternative to the morton/gibson's meat display, they bring a fish display. This is not necessarily good marketing. I mean it would work if they brought by sparklingly fresh, whole species with bloody red gills and ultra-clear eyes, but dragging an oxidized slab of fish meat to each table, what does that prove. I mean no one wants the fish they show. Still, the menu descriptions sounded good.

I was spoiling Ms. VI and I went along with two fish dishes, forsaking the lake perch deal I really wanted. For newcomers to Hugo's, I would highly advise on the perch. Instead, we got the giant slab o'tuna and a black grouper with wild mushrooms. On the side we ordered a big helping of greenbeans and to start, the crabcake appetizer with the hot pink mayo. Everything worked with its minimal garnish. When you offer high quality stuff, why muck it up anyway with sauces. The primo dish, as always was the crab cake. I know of no better version outside of Baltimore. Ms. VI's on an anti-carb thing, and she initially shied away from the cakes. No worry, barely any bread-related product in these crab cakes. The tuna came purely rare with just the right skin of crust. With the wasabi and soy sauce offered, it was like slicing your own sushi. The other fish had a very grandma like coating of paprika type spices, but underneath was perfectly done grilled fish. The greenbeans straddled expertly the line between trendy under-done and old fashioned mushiness.

We skipped any mondo desserts, but they are fun if you have a few more people.

1024 North Rush Street, (between Oak Street and Bellevue)
Chicago, IL 60611
(312) 640-0999
http://www.hugosfrogbar.com/restaurant/homepage/

Eating at Home or Shopping in Chicago

As a unit, the VI family loves eating out. We do it often for convenience, for instance when Mickey's and its tasty Big Mickey's are right there between soccer games. We like the spectacle of a Todai or Fogo de Chao. We like the chance to dress up and feel like a high roller (like here or here). A lot of eating out I think comes from wanting to sample so many types of food. Indian today, Afghan tomorrow, Shanghainese during the week, Czech on weekends. Finally, I know some of it comes from the fact that no one in our clan much likes to clean up. So, we eat out a lot. But eating in, I am coming to realize, may be as good if not better.

For one thing, the ingredients available to the home cook are far superior to all but what the best restaurants are using. Granted, I am not buying Waygu beef briskets too often, but I do have great local sources. I will write soon (really) about what's in the Farmer's Markets about now. Today, I want to mention a few stores we have recently visited.

Caputo's Cheese Factory

When we started visiting this store in Melrose Park, owned by one of the Caputo brothers, it was truly a factory. Then, it sold mostly cheese and served up cheap lunches including chicken sandwich that managed to be both grilled and fried. Over time, the factory has moved out and the space taken over by more and more stuff. For a while, they tried to sell fresh produce but that did not take. Today, Caputo's is mostly about cheese with a smattering of great deals on other products. They make excellent fresh mozzarella, and we nearly always buy some. They are also especially strong in grating cheeses and provolone. It is near impossible to walk out without some of the ricotta decorated with ridges from its molding.

Argo Georgian Bakery

Or the place with the oven in the middle of the floor. It's hard to believe that for a while, I did not like this place, victim of a stale bread that I was too dumb to realize was a fluke. Now, we visit every time we hit Da'Bomb. The breads, either round or long and skinny are about as primal a loaf as possible. You really taste the flour and yeast. For the kidz, we buy up all the hatchapuri's on offer. These are a flaky pastry encasing a blend of cheeses--a blend made to simulate fresh Georgian cheese. The hatchapuris are one of the few things we know daughter number 2 will always eat for breakfast. See here for some great Argo pictures.

Elliott's Dairy

What's with the dairy thing? The milk department is nothing special. Elliott's is a supermarket that competed with Jewel and Dominick's in like 1957. As they grew, Elliott's stayed the same. If I lived in the neighborhood, I might shop for a few things. Overall, it is not that special of a store. Yet, what is worth stopping in for, are a few items. Mainly, the corned beef. Chicago, since the demise of Winklestein's, is not a town of great corned beef. It IS a town of very good corned beef, and oddly enough, one of the best sources is this store just outside of Chicago on Nagle. Maybe because they know what they do well, Elliott's is set up for the full corned beef spread. They sell very good Chicago style (i.e., not so sour) pickles from a quasi-barrel and Rosen's premier rye, one with an actual crust. They always seem to find some kinda condiments not seen at Costco. Yesterday they had Da' Coach's mustards.

Avenue's Supermarket

If Elliott's long ago stopped competing with other supermarkets around town, it has come of late that the biggies have been eclipsed as well. Chicago is, in my opinion, receiving a supermarket renaissance. Of course there is Whole Foods for Amish milk and good bread, but the real action is in the hoods, massive A&G with its extensive selection of offal along with canned goods from every corner of the map, sparkling Mexican outlets like Carneceria Guanajunto, the various "Fresh Markets" and a host of Polish markets well below most people's radars.

Avenues is a true supermarket, with aisles stuffed with stuff, several varieties of jellies and jams, a whole section of wild Polish mushrooms in cans, the requisite quasi barrels with pickles, and three kinds of sauerkraut. The deli counter is huge. I was not sure if I could manage it when the numbers were being called strictly in Polish. But the turkey looked especially good, so I managed. Once I managed to "hear" my number by watching the ticker, the staff spoke enough English for me. Most of the stuff in the cases is clearly marked, although there are all sortsa smoked sausages and smoked ribs without labels. At another counter we got herring in both vinegar and oil for only $2.99 /lb for each kind. Like all Polish stores, it is a great source for dairy--here the dairy bar name would fit, and we got a log of Amish butter as well as farmer's cheese and kefir.

New York Kosher

When I wrote the section on Da'Bomb for the Slow Food Chicago book, I lamented the state of the kosher markets remaining on Devon. New York Kosher is not what I would call a stellar store. It nearly makes Elliott's look like Zabar's, but they have a couple of neat things buried in the dreck. They make a "Persian whitefish". I am not sure what Persian Whitefish is, Google left me bare. What New York Kosher sells is a white fish, like cod or haddock, breaded with a coarse crumb, then fried. It holds up very well though as cold dish, and there is something in there, perhaps the Persian part, that gives it a neat taste. At times, there are other fresh things in the case worth buying including grape leaves, a potato salad with something red in the dressing and a good beet salad. My wife likes the ample supply of Mantiowoc Farms breads.

Caputo Cheese Market
1931 N. 15th Avenue
Melrose Park, IL 60160
708-450-0074
wisconcorp.com

Argo, Inc. Georgian Bakery
2812 w. Devon ave.chicago, IL 60659-1502
773-764-6322

Elliotts Dairy & Deli
4800 N Nagle Ave
Harwood Heights
(708) 867-9044

Avenues Supermarket
Somewhere west on Belmont, past Oak Park Avenue

Moshe's New York Kosher
2900 W. Devon
Chicago, IL 60659
773 338-3354

La Quebrada - New(ish) Menu

La Quebrada changes its menu nearly as often as Alinea. Perhaps like ChefG, the maestros at Quebrada stay up late seeing how they can stretch the envelope of salted dried beef (a/k/a cecina). Actually, the new menu seems all about trying to get the Quebrada customer to eat more. There are several combinations ranging from $8.99 to $35 mostly combing grilled meats, but there is also a combination Teloloapan, which is like a restaurant version of the famed Maroon vans, fried tacos and enchilladas in Guerenese sweet dark brown Teloloapan mole. I'd like to comment on these items more, but I have never tried them.

La Quebrada makes some exceptional sauces, the curry scented salsa India (no joke), the house warm molcajete, with roasted tomatoes and chiles (I believe guaijillo) and the extra spicy, one dimensional, but one brutally great dimension arbol. Still, I've mostly settled in, of late with the antojitos (tacos, sopes, gorditas, picaditas).

All the antojitos at Quebrada start with a mass of nixtamal or corn masa dough (but NOT instant!). One woman in the kitchen forms to order the masa into different shapes depending on what you want. Gorditas have a thick base and the thinnest of tops for their stuffings, I especially like to have them with the steamed goat (barbacoa de chivo). If you are feeling vegetarian, get the picaditas, think a gordita without its top. While a lot of places make gorditas and such from scratch, few places also serve their tacos on fresh made tortillas.

I have not found a better tortilla in Chicago than the ones La Quebrada makes, large and thick. Stack about five and eat them with maple syrup for breakfast. The taco de cecina is, with the tacos de barbacoa at La Ley, my favorite taco outside of Maxwell Street. The ingredients do not look like much, typical friojoles refrito, bits of drab cecina (a truly ugly product), a sprinkling of pico de gallo and a dab of guacamole. Because all of the materials, from the tortilla upward, are so well done, the taco is so well done. That's what sums up La Quebrada.

From the outside it looks like nothing special, certainly one of any of thousands of Mexican places around Chicago. Inside, they make the effort to make things better. Guacamole, salsas, pico de gallo are not difficult things to make, even tortillas are not THAT difficult, assuming ideal nixtamal, yet Quebrada coaxes the most out of these things. Over time, La Quebrada has spread. You have no excuse from finding your own location. Check the new menu because it may change soon.

4859 W. Roosevelt - Cicero
3818 W. 63rd - Chicago
5100 S. California - Chicago
2906 W. Cermak - Chicago
723 S. Broadway - Aurora

Lack of Posts

Sorry for the paucity in postings. Holidays and work combining against me. I have been to the Oak Park Farmer's Market the last two weeks, so I will post something on that soon. More importantly, the VI family is now scrambling to put away, so we can be local come November onwards. I do have one lead right now on a source for local vegetables for the winter which I will post on soon, any other leads in this area are appreciated.

The one great meal (although nothing compares with the Rosh Hashanah dinner made by the Condiment Queen) I've had of late was at Gene and Georgetti's. I'd like to say I am a long time regular there, but everyone has to start some time right. Good stuff about G&G, with some pictures and notes by moi, can be found here.

Cooking Skills, Present or Not

I'm sure everyone has certain odd memories that stick with them no matter what. One thing that has stcuk with me, is a drawing my friend Bobby Di did in 5th grade. He was one of the two or so "good artists" in our class, and I was always jealous with his ability to draw things that looked like they really were. So, I tried to pay attention to how he did it. One day, we were drawing hot dogs, that part I forget why, but I always remember how his hot dog looked so realistic, so life-like. He had added a few small lines at the end of the hot dog, showing the point where the sausage links come together. It gave the impression of bulk, of a hot dog. I realized that it was not so much a steady hand that made him the good artist, it was his ability to pick up on the bitsiest detail that made something look right. I could never draw like Bobby but I can cook.

Perhaps because I've eaten great food for so many years (thanks Mom, thanks CQ), I seem to instictively know how to make good food. I do not have a wide repotoire, and I avoid dishes that require precision. What I can make, most of the time, I can make very well. Like Bobby Di, I seem to know the right amount of seasoning or the right amount to cook something. I'm not bragging because I know a lot of people who can cook even better than me. I'm posting because, skilled as I may be, I have a real big problem in the kitchen. I cannot toss a salad.

I've written before on my love of big salads or chopped salads, usually a mess of cubed fresh vegetables with something leftover, like today, rotisserie chicken. I've become adapt at the chopping, make a great mustard vinegriette, season very aggressively especially with cracked black pepper. It all tastes great EVEN if all of the good stuff gathers on the bottom. I have tried several copied or observed methods to toss my salads. I've used tongs, spoons, fork and spoon, the flip (OK, I've not quite mastered that one). At the end of the day, I have lettuce on top, stuff underneath. I wanted total mixture so that each bite is like the last and each taste is such powerful combination of ingredients it tastes like nothing I have ever tasted before. Can anyone help

Annals of the Discovered

Chicago Magazine's weekly e-newsletter, Penny's Morsel's [ed. I think they call it Dish now] mentions Honey1 Ribs. Some where in this big city, there's a skinny Asian man with a gift for languages crying into his Dalmation wine.

Need a Hand?

I know a trained chef from New Orleans who is currently taking shelter, with his family at the Madden Facility in Maywood, Illinois. If anyone has any job openings, contact me and I will give you his number.

GAF Hits NYC

GAF, a member of the Chicago LTH community, recently took shelter for a year in librul New York City. He writes with stunning detail on his gastronomic welcome here.

What's Interesting This Week at Joseph's Market

Well, everything at this somewhat off the beaten path on the FAR west end of Chicago, but something you won't find at most other Italian markets:

• Sea Urchin (called, oddly, "sea eggs")

Actually, as long as I'm on talking about Joseph's, I should mention a few other things of note. The pizza, what pizza, it's what I might call blob pizza. The base is free form in area like a very difficult calculus problem and awfully thick, almost two inches. Yet, unlike Chicago sheet pizza it has a crisp crust and a bit of weight in the dough. You need strong toppings to stand up to this dough and the ricotta-vegetable I tried really does.

Ok, there's more. Some of the best giardinara I've seen/tried, a mess of mostly pickled jalepenos, reminding me a lot of one of my favorite Korean panchan. There is another giardinara with vegetables. Breaded octopus to be eaten hot or cold, several kinds of salami and hams all in excellent state and cut attractively on the bias and a cheese I'm not sure the type but marinated in oil and covered heavily with spices and chopped chives. The mystery cheese is very salty. A few wedges of that, several slices of salami, both giardinaras, some marinated green olives, a bit of marinated eggplant, crusty whole wheat D'Amato bread, and my lunch went down a lot better than da Bears.

Joseph's

8235 W. Irving Park

Chicago, IL

Two Housekeeping Notes:

1. I was not able to make it to the Farmer's Market this week due to soccer committments. If anyone has any info, I'd be happy (really happy) to publish.
2. Neither I or the many deserving geniuses at LTHForum.com recieved a Genius Grant this year. Maybe next. Which reminds me, I'm late in posting on a very special achievement on of our community members got--hint he know's jack about Vesuivio. It's quite the honor and I want to give it full justice. Stay tuned.

From DishNews, Tips, and Inside Information from the Dining Editors of Chicago

Avec (615 W. Randolph St.; 312-377-2002), which pretty much single-handedly made charcuterie popular in Chicago, is not curing its own charcuterie at the moment.

Really? All those places up and down Milwaukee, Joe the Sausage King on Western, numerous chorizo hecho en casa, Saravele's Romanian, Thai sausage from Sticky Rice cited last week in Time Out Chicago, a whole festival built around brats made by hand at a place in Morton Grove, Freddy's hams, soppresettas and salamis, pigs, chickens, ducks baked in Chinatown, more than a few Greektown places with their own sauasage, a couple of Middle-Eastern places around Albany Park too; a very well stocked department at Fox and Obel, hell even Trotter's to Go. What else? But, of course, none of those places are popular.

15th Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market 9/10/05
In Which We Buy a Lot of Plums

Hardin Farms. All season long I have been talking about the great fruit the VI family has been purchasing at this certain stand at the Oak Park Farmer's Market. The problem was, I had no idea the name of the stand. There was no big banner, no truck, no signs, no nothing that could point you the reader to this outstanding fruit beyond my vague description, SE corner, on the inside, etc. Finally, though, last Saturday, I spotted a farm name written in small letters on an apron. Hardin Farms. Hardin Farms has been the source for the best peaches, apricots and now plums I think I have ever had.

On Saturday, now knowing their names, we became fast friends. And we mentioned the best apricots ever, which segued into something the wife and I have been talking about for a while. Why did we not buy more at the time. Partially because, obviously, one does not always realize that one has had the best apricots ever at the time. It can take of summer of fruit buying to realize what you had earlier was so special. Moreover, we have just not been the kinda family that thinks too far ahead in its produce buying. We fall into that category of people that are scared of canning--if you cannot keep your house tidy, can you can? Yet, with our attention to eating local, and my pledge to stay local even come winter, we were amiss that we did not take more advantage of the short apricot season. If nothing else, we realized that we could dry the apricots. Even idiots can dry fruit right? We conveyed all of this to Hardin on Saturday. They responded by offering us a bunch, read bushel, of plums for $25. It will be a winter of local plums. We figure on drying some, making freezer/fridge jelly with others, just plain freezing some, and perhaps a bit of infused vodka with some laggards.

If we do not eat them first. Like everything else from Hardin this year, these plums are incredible, almost too sweet. The last of the season's peaches from Hardin were incredible (as usual) as well, with an intense taste of vanilla in the peaches. We got lostsa grapes from Hardin, Nicholl's and Skibbes, and heard about Chad Nicholl's attempts to make wine from his grapes. It was a turning point market. Still very well stocked with tomatoes, bell peppers and sweet corn, the items of summer, but everything else was thinning out. We are now on the downside of the peak. That does not mean things are bad. There are all sortsa apples to try, and posting so late, I have forgotten the varietals we purchased. Fall is appearing. Farmer Vicki already had some pumpkins. Nicholls has all sortsa sexy looking root vegetables including shotput sized rutabagas. I know things will look even more different next week.

See ya there.

On a roll

If you do not read Atrios regularly, today is a great day to start.

Drink Local Cont.

High end restaurant Tru serves still water from Genesee Wisconsin called Century Springs.

Open your hearts—and stomachs—as Farm Aid battles dual disasters

Katrina and eating local, what can be more interesting to me. Read how you can participate here.

Drink Local

Recent tastings conducted during a statewide tour of the major winemaking regions showed a number of drinkable wines out there, from decent to extraordinary, from as dry as any posh Napa bottling to as sweet and homey as Grandma's berry pie.

The Chicago Tribune does a nice run down on the local (meaning Illinois) wine business. Especially nice, they focus on vitners using grapes GROWN in Illinois.

But one of these days he and the Rovians really ought to take a stab at trying to solve other people's problems.

Billmon (and others) report:

Firefighters say they want to brave the heat, the debris-littered roads, the poisonous cottonmouth snakes and fire ants and travel into pockets of Louisiana where many people have yet to receive emergency aid.

But as specific orders began arriving to the firefighters in Atlanta, a team of 50 Monday morning quickly was ushered onto a flight headed for Louisiana. The crew's first assignment: to stand beside President Bush as he tours devastated areas." (emphasis added)

Salt Lake City TribuneFrustrated: Fire crews to hand out fliers for FEMASeptember 7, 2005
(Via Talkingpointsmemo.com
and Daily
Kos)

For All You State and Local Blame Folks

AP (via MSNBC)

WASHINGTON - The government’s disaster chief waited until hours after Hurricane Katrina had already struck the Gulf Coast before asking his boss to dispatch 1,000 Homeland Security workers to support rescuers in the region — and gave them two days to arrive, according to internal documents.

Read the whole thing. You too Mickey Kaus.

After 21 Years, Overnight Sensation
Flamingo Ice Cream

Scooped. I was scooped. One day not that long ago I drove past Flamingo #2 on Cermak near Oak Park Avenue. It had enough neon in the signs, that impressed me that there would be capital for a decent product. I made a mental note to try soon. Then, the Chicago Tribune scooped me. Reporting on this place. Discovering too a place that actually has another branch in Chicago for over 20 years. 20+ years of offering 101 flavors of Mexi-Italian style ice cream made with natural fruits and flavors. Flavors include agave, avocado, cheese, rice pudding, mamey and elote (corn). That's the ice cream. There are also a range of ices including several with boosts of salt and chile. Do not expect a lot of butterfat in the ice cream. Do not expect gelato like smoothness. The thin ice cream, however, is an excellent carrier for the flavors. Go to taste.

We got around to trying the ice cream last night. As told in the Tribune, the owner, Guadalope is part of the appeal. She spends a lot of time explaining her ice creams and offering tastes. In fact, I tasted so many, with the flavors so intense, that I got palate fatigue. She told me that the Trib tasters had water lined up between tastes. I needed some bits of bread or something.

The bad thing to say about the place is that, as I imagined, 101 flavors is too much to handle. Even an apparently fresh looking vanilla suffered a bit from freezer burn. Ice cream really benefits from freshness, and I wish they slash their daily inventory greatly.

OK, that out of the way, everything is interesting in its own way. All of the flavors come from natural sources, meaning sometimes the flavor itself may be muted, but it will always taste like something. One of my scoops was cajeta. As noted by a poster on LTHForum.com, this is not a creamy caramel. Yet the flavor of the cajeta, sugar, burnt sugar, carried the scoop. Guava was especially good as the flavor is strong. Then again, some of the ices, especially the ones with salt and spice were, as I noted, too intense.

In the annals of undiscovered, it should be noted that this place has existed on the South Side for 21 years. I'm glad it is being discovered.

Flamingos #2
6733 W Cermak Rd
Berwyn, IL
708-749-4287

14th Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market 9/3/05
Win Some Lose Some

I love my farmer's market. I love nearly all farmer's markets. I do, however, recognize a few flaws with markets. For one thing, they aint cheap. I spend around $50 or so each week, and I've been a bit more careful this year, less vegetables, less flowers, not as much meat as I'd like to buy. The other thing, though, is that money-schmoney, there's a crap shoot angle to the market. Now, I am looking for puffball mushroom segments, or Piedmontese beef, I do not have many choices. Either it's good or not. For most things, I have multiple vendors to choose. Sometimes I make the right choice...

...And sometimes, not so good. You go by several things. You pick up, smell, poke, inspect, taste. That works sometimes. Other times, with apples that reveal very little or peaches that are not quite ripe, reputation plays a big part. Sometimes, you rely too much on reputation. Skibbes Farms is the biggest "pure" fruit vendor at the Oak Park market. They combine better than necessary prices with outstanding fruit. They also do a great job with variety, and most weeks I visit them last to supplement whatever seasonal fruit I still need. For instance, they will have blackberries when no one else does. This week, perhaps because the donut line was too long, I started with Skibbes. They had a great price for local grapes. Without doing much, I snagged a bunch (or bunches so to speak). Turns out these grapes taste as sour as currents.

I wished I waited for Nicholl's Farm. They had green Niagara grapes that, six more hours, would have been on the vine too long, but the result was incredible sweetness against the musk of Northern grapes. I did get a basket of Champagne grapes for the freezer again. Also, a bunch of apples including the pink Dayton and the classic Cox Pippen. I skipped the cannonball sized Wolf River, but my daughter zeroed in on one variety, I did not catch the varietal name, that she wanted for her teacher. It was the teacher's apple. So exactly appley apple-red, so apple-curved apple shaped. It even had a distinct, woody, thick, Pisa leading, visible stem. It will grace a desk very well.

Besides grapes and apples, I picked up green Bartlett pears, yellow flesh peaches and raspberries. I admired the selection of heirloom tomatoes at Nicholl's, especially the dark Cherokee Blacks, but I have a ton of tomatoes still. I admired those puffballls mentioned above at Nicholl's, but I had no desire to buy. More things I admire around the market including palm sized mini-cabbages, multiple brands of melon, cheddar cheese colored cauliflower. Everything else is great and worth the money. Nothing beats local fruit in season.

See ya next week.

America's Grandma

Barbara Bush speaks her mind:

What I'm hearing which is sort of scary is that they all want to stay in Texas. Everybody is so overhwlemed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway so this (chuckle)--this is working very well for them.

All the details, including audio here.

State and Local

As predicted, the Bushies are now splitting the blame between an especially mean Mother Nature ("we did not know") and state and local officials in Louisiana. Par for the course, they lie. What is also especially interesting, is that those closest to the scene ARE NOT blaming state and local officials. Broussard did not. Read what the Times-Picayune sez:

OUR OPINIONS: An open letter to the President

Dear Mr. President:We heard you loud and clear Friday when you visited our
devastated city and the Gulf Coast and said, "What is not working, we’re going
to make it right."Please forgive us if we wait to see proof of your promise
before believing you. But we have good reason for our skepticism.

After three months, Russert Watch is officially speechless...

Did you see Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussaard's gut wretching performance yesterday on Meet the Press (just the antidote from hearing that is was really the fault of state and local officials). Well, if you saw it, you wondered too, how the hell could Tim Russert live with his performance. Arianna Huffington explains.

Corrections

The Washington Post makes a few key corrections. See here.

First, they note that the first levy breaches were reported on MONDAY MORNING. So, quit all this, we did not know stuff.

Second, they note that LA. Governor Blanco had declared a state of emergency on August 26, despite efforts to report the contray.

Remember, I predicted the sliming of Blanco and Nagin several days ago!

Billmon on the real Bush (link):

Likewise, for the conservative ultras to accept Bush's failures now would be to admit the patriotic demi-God constructed after 9/11 by the White House propaganda machine (and, ironically, by the mainstream media ) doesn't exist. All that would be left would be the real Bush: the incompetent, arrogant rich kid who's failed at every significant job he's ever held -- from CEO of Arbusto Energy to commander in chief of the planet's most powerful military machine. For many Bushistas, this is equally unbearable.

Ever wonder why New Yorkers detest George Bush?

Steve Gillard explains (and I thought I was angry). 'nother must read.

Just Amazin'

Charles Smith, of the foodie forum, Opinionated About, pointed me to this CNN story showing the TOTAL disconnect between the Federal government and the happenings in New Orleans. Must read. It's a start, but maybe I'll take back all the bad stuff I've said about CNN...

And the Band Played On

I do not get many comments in my comment boxes, so I should not take the one or two people who comment to task. Yet, this Bill chided me for questioning where were the Democrats. This entry by Steve Soto makes the same point (and then some):

Watching the disaster that started with Katrina unfold over the past few days, I have been filled with a rage. A rage that makes it difficult for me to think. Leaves me inarticulate and unable to express it in more than a simple sentence or two. A rage that encompasses every aspect of our government, every elected official and a large swatch of my fellow citizens.

Hundreds of thousands of people have lost everything. And what Katrina didn’t destroy, the sheer incompetence, neglect and indifference of this country will. Either in body or spirit. People are dying while Condi Rice shops for a new wardrobe. Congress remains on holiday. GWB talks about destroying Social Security and attends a birthday party for McCain. The communication systems among first responders failed just as they did on 9/11 – four years and billions of dollars later and we can’t even get this one right for one of only three identified locations that were at the highest risk for a disaster. See Krugman. Thirteen years after Andrew struck and FEMA is no more, and maybe less, effective than it was back then.

Please read the whole thing. Also read the Krugman piece embedded.

A slightly different perspective (Via Salon--click on the ad)

Dewey, 23, of Washington, is one of countless tourists trapped in the city amid the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina. Dewey said she has no idea when or how she'll be able to leave, her best chance lost Wednesday night when she learned the buses would never come. "No one really knows what to do," Dewey said. "The people who are left are just going and breaking into stores. ... ( Read the whole article link)

Hey, I hate the way it is being covered, a bunch of "them" stranded, people more interested (and disgusted) with the looting and security. I think if the media covered a bit more of those "real" 'mericans too, perhaps there would be more understanding.

Someone on the inside:

Link

I Predict

At least some of these things will happen

• Drudge, the Washington Times, or other useful tools will start the character assasination of Governor Blanco or Mayor Nagin -- After they start blaming the Feds.
• New Orleans will turn into some kinda Mad Max land. Left to those looters and shooters. The city will essentially be given to them.
• Bush will use the coming disorder and collapse to seize power.

What else?

• That it will be as long for a major Democrat in Washington to step up and show some leadership. I saw Clinton on TV namby-pamby. This is not the time to rally around der leader. This is the time to seize leadership.

Plans and Plans

I had a bit of a chat with me Mum this afternoon. She questioned where was the plan in New Orleans for the hurricane. There was a plan. Get out. For those that could not get out, they said get to the Superdome. Now, some question the latter, but what else could they have done. How could they have gotten people with no other means outta of the city? That plan was ok.

Here's what really (really) bothers me. I turned on the TV on Tuesday morning to see what was happening. I saw the bridges from New Orleans to the east completely destroyed and I heard the levees were being breached. I knew then and there that things were fucked. Like 7:30 Tuesday morning. They say that they could not have known the magnitude of the after-effect, but it takes no degree in civil engineering to know once you got the facts. When the levees break (any levee), New Orleans will flood. Not maybe. Surely. It will flood. That's why there are levees. So, I can accept the plan up until 8 or so Tuesday morning, but what was the plan from then on. That is where leadership really failed.

“On the other hand, you got to do what’s right.’’

I have been hypnotized by Katrina and spend gobs of time searching for news. This may be one of the few pieces of good news I found.

From the Time-Picayune (a/k/a NOLA.com):

Robert Eckels, who as judge of Harris County presides over the Astrodome, said he knew about the “renegade’’ bus and that the indoor stadium wasn’t ready for evacuees – particularly the unexpected arrivals.“

That bus that arrived earlier was a young man who had loaded up a bunch of kids and just gotten into the bus and driven here,’’ Eckels said. “It was not one of those (official) buses. At this point, our plan, our agreement, is to take the Superdome buses.’’

But shortly after Eckels left, the judge was overruled.

Margaret O’Brien-Molina, a spokeswoman for the American Red Cross, discovered the school bus sitting outside the entrance and gave the orders: Let them in.

Really the best source for news outta New Orleans is the venerable Times-Picayune. (I take back every bad thing I ever said about you!).

Does Bush genuinely not know this? Or is he just so comfortable lying about stuff like this that he doesn't give it a second thought? And which is worse?

Kevin Drum provides more evidence.

Choices have consequences. And bad consequences require accountability.
-- Josh Marshall

Farmer's Market Reports

Maybe I can draw some mental attention to write more, but I so caught up in the destruction and failed leadership.

Anyways, because we missed Saturday's Oak Park Farmer's Market, we got the chance to try out two other markets, Sunday's Wicker Park and Tuesday's downtown Federal Plaza. I got to say that I was especially impressed with the downtown market. Both Nicholl's and Green Acres are there and the amount of things between these two vendors was incredible. Six kinds of eggplants, Asian greens, all sizes and colors of tomatoes, watercress sprouts, fresh soybeans and fresh sunflower seeds (in flower!). I just wish some local restaurants, ethnic restaurants, would shop at these stands.

Some interesting things in the markets now. Nicholl's had strawberries (!), a second planting strawberry I never knew about. Really weird, but last night I ate a bunch of delicious sweet, real strawberries...on the last day of August. On the other hand, local grapes seem a bit early. Nicholl's had a variety called champagne--no not the grapes used for Champagne which is mostly Chardonay and Pinot Noir grapes. My daughter Hannah had the idea to freeze these grapes, and this is an awesome treat. The iced grape balls taste nearly like ice cream. We also got regular ol' Concord grapes, seeds and all. These grapes may make awful wine, but outta hand, they one of the all time great things. It is the grape flavor, not just sweetness or juiciness that makes this fruit. I know back in Wisconsin I was leaning towards sour cherries, but the difference is sour cherries need to be cooked/sugared. Concord grapes are best raw. In fact, they loose a lot of their specialness when cooked. See grape jelly. Tons of great tomatoes still as well as plenty of summer veg like sweet corn, peppers, and eggplants.

Todd Gitlin notices:

Well, everything begins as tragedy and ends as politics. All the
greater is the burden on the press to blow every whistle in sight and keep
blowing. Others at tpmcafe.com have been sounding this horn and rightly
so. This is a time for journalism to shine--or go dark.

"I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees." (Via Atrios)

Anyone remember this from Sunday (top story on Drudge that day):

URGENT - WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE NEW ORLEANS LA
1011 AM CDT SUN AUG 28 2005
..DEVASTATING DAMAGE EXPECTED

HURRICANE KATRINA
A MOST POWERFUL HURRICANE WITH UNPRECEDENTED STRENGTH...RIVALING THE INTENSITY OF HURRICANE CAMILLE OF 1969.

MOST OF THE AREA WILL BE UNINHABITABLE FOR WEEKS...PERHAPS LONGER. AT LEAST ONE HALF OF WELL CONSTRUCTED HOMES WILL HAVE ROOF AND WALL FAILURE. ALL GABLED ROOFS WILL FAIL...LEAVING THOSE HOMES SEVERELY DAMAGED OR DESTROYED.

THE MAJORITY OF INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS WILL BECOME NON FUNCTIONAL. PARTIAL TO COMPLETE WALL AND ROOF FAILURE IS EXPECTED. ALL WOOD FRAMED LOW RISING APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL BE DESTROYED. CONCRETE BLOCK LOW RISE APARTMENTS WILL SUSTAIN MAJOR DAMAGE...INCLUDING SOME WALL AND ROOF FAILURE.

HIGH RISE OFFICE AND APARTMENT BUILDINGS WILL SWAY DANGEROUSLY...A FEW TO THE POINT OF TOTAL COLLAPSE. ALL WINDOWS WILL BLOW OUT. AIRBORNE DEBRIS WILL BE WIDESPREAD...AND MAY INCLUDE HEAVY ITEMS SUCH AS HOUSEHOLD APPLIANCES AND EVEN LIGHT VEHICLES. SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES AND LIGHT TRUCKS WILL BE MOVED. THE BLOWN DEBRIS WILL CREATE ADDITIONAL DESTRUCTION.

PERSONS...PETS...AND LIVESTOCK EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL FACE CERTAIN DEATH IF STRUCK. POWER OUTAGES WILL LAST FOR WEEKS...AS MOST POWER POLES WILL BE DOWN AND TRANSFORMERS DESTROYED. WATER SHORTAGES WILL MAKE HUMAN SUFFERING INCREDIBLE BY MODERN STANDARDS. THE VAST MAJORITY OF NATIVE TREES WILL BE SNAPPED OR UPROOTED. ONLY THE HEARTIEST WILL REMAIN STANDING...BUT BE TOTALLY DEFOLIATED. FEW CROPS WILL REMAIN. LIVESTOCK LEFT EXPOSED TO THE WINDS WILL BE KILLED.

AN INLAND HURRICANE WIND WARNING IS ISSUED WHEN SUSTAINED WINDS NEAR HURRICANE FORCE...OR FREQUENT GUSTS AT OR ABOVE HURRICANE FORCE...ARE CERTAIN WITHIN THE NEXT 12 TO 24 HOURS. ONCE TROPICAL STORM AND HURRICANE FORCE WINDS ONSET...DO NOT VENTURE OUTSIDE!

"I would think that yesterday they could have flown in," said Myers. "Everyone was flying in. Put it this way, FOX and CNN are there. If they can get there ..."

The "MainstreamMedia" is noticing (via Kevin Drum). As is the "librul" New York Times*.

*Although I got to say this "news" story from the Grey Lady: News Analysis: Hard New Test for President is pretty pathetic. It starts out fairly strong, with some veiled digs at W, but then denigrates into a series of quotes from "longtime aids and friends". For balance, should not they asked a few longtime opponents and enemies?

I'm sorry. I know we're supposed to be observing an accountability free moment for the president.

More from Josh.

More People Noticing

No Coordination.
-- Josh Marshall (link)

UPDATE: Him too.

I Guess I am Not the Only One Who Noticed

See here.

I know one of the five stages of grieving is anger, and right now, that's where my anger is directed.

Someone Named Chris Rose Checks In

I know I should not copy the whole column, but I have the feeling he won't mind. (link)

Chris Rose column

Tuesday, 6:30 p.m.

By Chris Rose

I got out.I’m mystified by the notion that so many people didn’t even try,
but that’s another story for another time.We left Saturday, my wife, kids and
me. We went first to Picayune, Miss., thinking that a Category 3 storm would
flood New Orleans and knock out power, but that we’d be dry and relatively
comfortable in the piney woods while the city dried out.Sunday morning, of
course, Katrina was massive red blob on our TV screens – now a Cat 5 – so we
packed up and left again.

We left my in-laws behind in Picayune. They wouldn’t come with us.
Self-sufficient country folk; sometimes you can’t tell ‘em nothing.We don’t know
what happened to them. My wife’s dad and her brother and their families: No
word. Only hope.Like so many people around the country wondering what happened
to those still unaccounted for; we just don’t know. That’s the hardest
part.

If you take the images you’ve seen on TV and picked up off the radio and
internet, and you try to apply what you know to the people and places you don’t
know about, well, the mind starts racing, assumptions are made and well … it
consumes you.The kids ask you questions. You don’t have answers. Sometimes they
look at me and though they don’t say it, I can see they’re wondering: Daddy,
where are you?

My 6-year-old daughter, she’s onto this thing. What is she thinking?We
spent Sunday night in a no-tell motel in a forgotten part of downtown Vicksburg;
a neighborhood teetering between a familiar antiquated charm and hopeless decay.
Truth is, it called to mind my beloved New Orleans.Most of the folks in the
hotel seem to live there permanently and it had a hard-luck feel to it. It was
the kind of place where your legs start itching in the bed and you think the
worst and you don’t want your kids to touch the carpet or the tub and we huddled
together and I read them to sleep.Monday morning, my wife’s aunt told us they
had a generator in Baton Rouge. As Katrina marched north and east, we bailed on
our sullen little hotel and drove down along he western ridge of the storm,
mostly alone on the road.

Gas was no problem. We had catfish and pulled pork in a barbeque joint in
Natchez and the folks there - everyone we have met along our three-day journey –
has said the same thing: Good luck, folks. We love your city. Take care of it
for us.Oh, my city. We have spent hours and hours listening to the radio. Image
upon image piling up in your head.What about school? What about everyone’s jobs?
Did all our friends get out? Are there still trees on the streetcar line? What
will our economy be like with no visitors? How many are dead? Do I have a roof?
Have the looters found me yet? When can we go home?Like I said, it consumes you
as you sit helplessly miles from home, unable to help anyone, unable to do
anything. If I could, what I’d do first is hurt the looters. I’d hurt them
bad.But you have to forget all that. You have to focus on what is at hand, what
you can reach and when you have three little kids lost at sea, they are what’s
at hand and what you can reach. I brought them to a playground in Baton Rouge
Tuesday afternoon. They’d been bottled up for days.Finally unleashed, they ran,
they climbed, they fell down, they fought, they cried, they made me laugh, they
drove me crazy; they did the things that makes them kids. It grounds you. You
take a breath. You count to ten. Maybe - under the circumstances - you go to
twenty or thirty this time.

And tonight, we’ll just read them to sleep again.We have several books with
us because – and this is rich – we brought on our evacuation all the clothes and
things we planned to bring on a long-weekend trip that we were going to take
over Labor Day weekend.To the beach. To Fort Morgan, right at the mouth of
Mobile Bay. Man.

Instead of that, I put on my sun tan lotion and went out in the yard of the
house where we’re staying in Baton Rouge and I raked a massive pile of leaves
and limbs from the yard and swept the driveway.Doing yard work and hitting the
jungle gym on the Day After. Pretending life goes on. Just trying to stay busy.
Just trying not to think. Just trying not to fail, really. Gotta keep
moving.

Send the Queen Mary

I know this sounds flippant, but I am serious (also, I lived in New Orleans for a few years, so I really take to heart what is happening to the city). So, my suggestion to anyone who is looking for a suggestion is send some cruise ships up the Mississippi to New Orleans. Why not? Food, water, shelter, hospitals. It's all there. Ships are like the only things that can really access New Orleans. New Orleans has wharves big enough for cruise ships. Get some there. Now.

Leadership

CORONADO, California (AP) -- President Bush will cut short his vacation to return to Washington on Wednesday, two days earlier than planned, to help monitor federal efforts to assist victims of Hurricane Katrina, the White House said Tuesday.

Wednesday? Cut short? Certain Republicans could not understand the popularity of Bill Clinton, but I can almost tell you (fer sure) that he'd be down there right now doing whatever it took.

13th Market
Oak Oak Park Farmer's Markert 8/27/05
From Ann

When I recruited Ann Fisher to write the market report this week--I attended a bat mitzvah--I did not realize she would REALLY put me to shame with the quality of her report. A little put to shame I could stand, but this. Perhaps I will count on Ann all weeks.

From Ann:

Corn from The Farm* continues to be terrific. Makes you proud to be from Illinois. The ears weren’t quite as big as last week, but still plenty large. In my experience, good corn continues until almost the middle of September, so we should have a few good weeks left. I was intrigued to find that the Angelic Organics CSA corn wasn’t nearly as good. I suspect The Farm is growing sweeter varieties and Angelic is growing more pest-resistant ones.

Tomatoes everywhere, in every color. I bought some beautiful little “garden peach” tomatoes from Scotch Hill Farms. In the bowl on my windowsill they’re almost indistinguishable from the shiro plums from Skibee. Nichols says they have 80 varieties. I wouldn’t doubt it. Sandhill Organics continues to offer tastings of its heirloom varieties, and this week was also selling bags of tomato puree, suggesting it be used a soup base. They also seduced me with Swiss chard that looked like it belonged in a Rembrandt painting. Nichols also had the most beautiful “exotic eggplant” display–red, purple, green–and made me really regret I didn’t have my camera with me. They and the place at the northeast outside corner of the market were selling lemon cucumbers, pictured here. Since they were the size of lemons, and cost 75 and 50 cents respectively, and I heard the woman at Nichols say they really just tasted like cucumbers, I passed them by.

I’m loyal to Skibee for my apples. I love to be able to mix and match from all their crates. In addition to the Paula Reds that they had last week, the first real Macintosh were in. A sign, of course, that fall is on its way.

Barry’s Berries blueberries continue to be excellent and they were selling a lot of raspberries as well. We’re seem to be past the Red Haven peaches, to my regret, but they and everyone else still had a lot of choices of peaches, plums, and nectarines.

I spent some time talking to the man from Scotch Hill Farms. The scent of their pet soaps, while not unpleasant, makes it harder to appreciate their produce. But when I moved a little way off to taste the yellow tomatoes, I was glad I’d stopped. They’re still offering CSA shares, this week down to seven weeks. It’s $27.50 a week, pesticide- free but not organic. They always have a couple of sample bags available for $25. If I hadn’t felt compelled to check out a variety of vendors to fulfill my guest blogging responsibilities I might have been tempted. Maybe next week.

*Surely I can’t be the only person who thinks of Spriritual Midwifery every time they see the name of that vendor.

Mom's Tip of the Week

I mentioned below my frustration of getting a bunch of corn mid-week, then my salvation thru Mark Bittman. What I did not know was THE trick for corn on the cob, but thanks to Bubbie, here it is:

An angel food pan. Brilliant. I started to de-kernel some corn roasted on the grill the other night. My mom sez to me, "do you have an angel food cake pan." Knowing our abundance of kitchen supplies that was a dumb question. But you know, I do not even like angel food that much. I love the pan (now). It achieves two things. First, you stick the cob in the hole in the pan, keeping it firmly in place for cutting. Second, you have the reservoir for cake to catch the kernels.

12th Market
Oak Park Farmer's Market 8/20/05
Loaded Up

I saw chowhound, Ann Fisher as I was leaving the market on Saturday, hands full. She said, "good day at the market." But you know what I was thinking. I was thinking, with Sophie with her friend Quinn, the Condiment Queen and Hannah volunteering at the Animal Care League, I had only two hands to carry stuff. And when I could not carry anymore, well, that was it for the day. Or put another way, I got hassled this morning because the only berries I purchased were blue berries.

White peaches, peach peaches, nectarines, blue berries, golden raspberries, jalepenos (nicely hot), small red potatoes, basil, green beans, wild Illinois plums (from Nicholl's) and stunning, dull red pears; oh and a carton of fresh eggs from the Wettstein's. What I could have done with another set of arms.

For the records: there was an absolute profusion of hot peppers in the market. I do not know if it's a "thing" for peppers this year, the hot weather or what, but both Nicholl's and Farmer Vicki had several kinds of peppers (as did a few other vendors). Apricots seemed to have finished but what a short great season they were.

How I Eat Local

The family and I had a delicious lunch today of assorted bruschettas (how do you say it?), and I think the lunch illustrates some of my do's and don'ts on eating local.

Here's what he ate that could be called local: kale, swiss chard, tomatoes, garlic, onions, bread baked at Bittersweet bakery.

Here's what we ate that was not local: olive oil, Portuguese tinned sardines, Pecarino Romano cheese, Turkish olive oil (and I am sure, the ingredients in the Bittersweet bread).

I feel I made no compromises. Cheated not one bit. Why? In my theory of eating local, anything that can be effectively shipped with no degradation of quality is as good as local. Another way I might put it, if people could reasonably eat it in Chicago 100 years ago, it's legitimate to eat today. It means that I am not restricted to cooking with butter or lard. It means Stilton as well as Maytag. It also means citrus in season because I think there is little degradation in quality. It surely allows for bananas, and because these products were part of the Chicago culinary scene for a long, long time, shrimps and oysters. On the other hand, I make no exception for modern transport. Sure, a fish caught in Hawaii can be in my kitchen with a day of it being hauled in, but I won't count that. I do not count that mostly because it is highly unrealistic that I can truly get such fresh food. I am not Thomas Keller.

As long as we are the subject, and I have alluded to this already, but I am too cheap to fully commit to eating just local meat. I like to think that I treat meat a bit in the Mediterranean fashion, as an infrequent luxury, but I am too American. So, there are times where I will give in and buy supermarket meat.

That's the basic of how I eat local. Come back in December and see how I am faring. That's when the challenge kicks in.

No Good Chinese Food in Chicago (?!?)

Not! 'til my dying days I will fight against two fallacies, that the New York Times aint so librul (Krugman, and thank god for Krugman excepted) and that there is no good Chinese food in Chicago. I think a lot of the no good Chinese food is propagated by the same New Yawkers who pine for a good triangle style slice. That is, it is not good Chinese food they want, but Chinese food like the take away they once got. But there is also a home grown school of Chinese restaurant detractors. This school mostly bemoans the lack of sophistication and airs of our Chinese restaurants and tends to be tone deaf to the greatness of "real" Chinese food (oil and all). For instance, this later school, push comes to shove, might point to places like Ben Pao or Opera as the few good Chinese restaurants. Me, I have a hard time hitting all the places I like, and then I run across a place like Lee Wing Wah, and I am even more pissed.

Lee Wing Wah is one of a several Chinese restaurants in the mall North of Archer, on the Northern part of Chinatown. The mall has had these restaurants for years but only now, about ten years later, does the mall feel alive. And all these years, I never bothered to try Lee Wing Wah. I am mostly a creature of habit, and while I go to a lot of places in Chinatown, I tend to have set places for things: Happy Chef for Cantonese, Mandarin Kitchen for Shanghainese (which sounds weird but makes sense if you know the back story); The Sevens, Treasure for soup noodles, Wives for breakfast; Spring World for spicy/oily stuff; Triple Crown for late night; Ken Kee if I wanted to be weird. I know there are places I need to try like Sky, and I know that others off the short list, like Lao Sze Chuan or Moon Palace can be pretty special, but like I say, I am a creature of habit. Now, a few weeks ago we finally tried the pho place in the Chinatown mall, so I guess I was inspired to seek out new things.

I gazed long into the Lee Wing Wah space because it was so packed on this weeknight. And it all looked good, especially the salt 'n pepper shrimps on a lot of tables. Mostly for Cantonese food, I've stuck (well) with Happy Chef. Happy Chef has three things I like in a Chinese restaurant: a broad and easy to navigate menu; good value and great cooking. Well, not that long ago I was noticing some great looking food on customer's tables at Lee Wing Wah, and I thought, finally, to give that place a try. Lee Wing Wah also has a broad and easy to navigate menu; good value and great cooking.

I have been to Lee Wing Wah twice. Sorry, I have not sampled too many dishes between the visits. On the first visit it was salt n' pepper shrimps, fried (crispy skin) chicken, stir fried tong choi with spicy bean sauce (not really spicy at all); "egg style tofu", and steamed oysters with black bean. On the second visit, we got the dinner for 4--crab with ginger, fish fillet with vegetable, snp shrimps and fried chicken*; we added the egg style tofu (for the kidz) and Chinese broc with oyster sauce. Not a single dish has been less than excellent on both visits. The shrimps are a little different than say Happy Chef's shrimps. The salt n' pepper make a very thick coating at Lee Wing Wah, like battered fried shrimp. Egg style tofu is called egg style because the tofu was cut to look like hard cooked eggs. It looked solid but it was just barely, and it contrasted well with typical brown sauce. Let me also get out of the way, that we picked the dish (one of my daughters picked it) from a menu with color pictures, making the place easy to navigate. The other thing about that menu is that they gave away the game on "crispy skin" chicken. That is, the picture menu translated it as fried chicken. Fried chicken, it definitely tasted more fried, more greasy than others around Chinatown, but not in a bad way at all.

I do have one bone to pick though. As I noted, there are several color pictures to help form a menu. But, but, there is also a page of lunch specials, much cheaper, written soley in Chinese characters. My first visit was for lunch, and I could have read Chinese, I would have spent even less. If anyone tells you there is no good Chinese food in Chicago, take them to a meal at Lee Wing Wah.

*The dinner for 4 is a very good deal at $39. You are allowed to substitute out from the choices; there about six alternative dishes. We asked if we could substitute out the chicken instead. They were fine with that for an extra $1.75. All in all, still a very good deal.

Eating Local

I'm sorry but I have not been following all of the other Eat Local Challenge attempts, but I wonder has anyone mentioned the obvious? August is not exactly a strenuous time to eat local (at least in the Northern parts of the USA, in Florida it could be a challenge challenge). For the second week, we picked up a friends box from Angelic Organic's CSA, giving us local vegetables for a while.

I DO appreciate the capital providing aspect of a CSA, but as a practical matter, I much prefer getting my stuff at the Farmer's Market. Yes, there is a neat, Iron Chef aspect of getting a weekly box of cooking materials. "What shall we do with two zucchini, hon?" But that is precisely the problem. If last week it was two small zukes, this week it was one medium sized eggplant. What would Morimoto do with one eggplant? Worse, we got like a half a bunch of swiss chard. With last weeks bit of kale, there might be a portion there soon. What we are getting is, is a lot of sweet corn. And if I'd like more eggplants, I'd take less corn. Corn is weekend food, fire up the grill food. Still, these six ears of corn in the box demand pretty immediate attention. Luckily, Mark Bittman has some ideas of what to do with corn that sits for a few days. Last week was like one green bell pepper and one purple bell pepper that were sliced into rings and munched as a side. This week we got a fair amount of red peppers, and I am anxious to roast them (the question then becomes, store then in oil or vinegar). And I aint complaining with the amount of tomatoes received last week or this week. About a dozen "determinate" tomatoes (I always thought they were called hybrid) and a few heirlooms--more heirlooms this week. I do not have so many tomatoes that I am to the make sauce stage yet. I am enjoying all the versions of tomato salad I can contrive--today the kidz had the luxury of sel de gris purchased at the Maxwell Street Market (yes!) with their tomato chunks. It will be an easy week for me to eat local.

Eat local yes, eat well? The other thing I do not like about a CSA is you feel guilty about not liking anything. You own the stuff. It's like saying bad things about the kidz. When you buy at the Farmer's Market (or God Forbid the store*), it is an arm's length transaction. If you do not like it, you visit a new vendor next week. With great regret, I mention that we got some very weird carrots last week. Maybe they are good and we just do not know. Carrots ARE related to parsley. These carrots tasted a lot closer to parsley than carrots, or shall I say, the greens and the oranges did not taste that different. Maybe carrot aficionados, however, appreciate this uber carrotness to these carrots.

*I would like to report for all the millions who read this blog on an hourly basis that at the peak of local tomato season, Whole Foods in River Forest, Illinois was selling, well not just asparagus from Peru, but "vine ripened" tomatoes from Holland. Yea, there were organic heirrloom potato-tomatoes from California. Hardly matters. Senator Whole Foods, "do you have no shame?"