Chus On Chow

My dad lives in Mexico (and that’s not Mexico, NY!). He retired years ago to a fabulous little town that is a favorite destination for readers of Conde Nast publications: San Miguel de Allende. Dad has always been a gardener, but of flowers, never of foodstuffs. Given his interest, and the fact that it’s been years since he’s seen the flora of Syracuse, I’m putting some pictures of our urban yard – currently in some turmoil – in this post.

Maybe you’ll be inspired to try putting some raised beds in your own yard. Our goal is to have as much food to eat and as little mowing to do as possible.

To view larger images, click on each picture. Use your browser’s “back” button to return to this site. Enjoy!

From Tom Colicchio in Think Like a Chef:

When I was growing up, we went to Dicosmo’s for fresh ricotta and Parmesan, Centanni’s pork store for meat (it sold everything but we called the pork store), Saracino’s for bread. These things were too important to trust to the A&P.

I found this at the website of the Syracuse Real Food Co-op and, having no time to write an actual post, just set it here for your enjoyment. Show it to your kids, too.

Okay, this is going to be fast because dinner is waiting. But I just learned something new. That’s been happening a lot since I started eating a lot more organic and local food.

So I was at the Regional Market and bought a chicken and a hen. Just because they were there, they were reasonably priced, and I didn’t know the difference, not really. I knew the hen was older. That’s all.

So tonight I tried making a sort of Indian curry-like Old Hen stew. In the pressure cooker.  First I cut up the hen and seared the parts in some coconut oil (so healthful!), then I removed them and sauted a bunch of mirepoix in the same oil. I added some kind of Indian readi-spice mix, some ground cumin and turmeric and stirred. Deglazed with white wine, added the chicken back in, some golden raisins, some chopped up apples (using up calories I find lounging in the refrigerator) and a ton of hot water. Let ‘er cook in the pressure cooker for 10 minutes.

Well. Everything came out yummy, soft, voluptuous (from all the schmaltz). Except that bird. Expecting the meat to fall off the bone after this treatment, I had to take her out of the pot, tear off that rubbery skin and actually saw off pieces of meat… what meat I could find. As I cut this bird apart, I thought of the life she must have had. With muscles like that, she must have done a good deal of walking around, maybe doing some of that powerlifting Dave thinks I should do some day. I could even imagine her flying, with wings that just wouldn’t part with even a bite of meat. Wow! She was a tough old bird.

But the fact is, I got many chewy bits that taste like chicken! Into the pot they’ve gone. And we’re really hungry by now. The tastings were promising. There’s a small pot of cous-cous to pour the stew over. I think we’ll love it. Even if it’s only because la mejor salsa es el hambre (the best sauce is hunger).

Do you have a story about a surprise ingredient?

Philly is such an amazing place for food.  People there feel that it’s comparable or superior to New York!  Though that’s a sure way to start a big argument, I will say that someone could pretty easily have a great restaurant meal every day in Philly for a year and still have a whole lot of great places left to try.  Here are a few little victual vignettes.

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