24 posts tagged “food”

"You should see it," said the Asian-American guy with scruffy beard and windbreaker, on his cell phone to the missing three-quarters of his party. "It's a sea of hipsters in a dive Chinese restaurant." That serves well enough as a set description of Mission Street Food, currently in residence Thursday nights at Lung Shan (2234 Mission, near 18th). It's also a decent precis of the customers: hipsters protesting that they aren't. ("I'm not being ironic!" one of the women at my table kept insisting. Post-irony...that's so 2001. I mean it.)

 

Well, the good news is that the food isn't worried about being ironic or un-; it's well made but fun and fuss-free. Mission Street Food began life in October in a taco truck on Mission Street, where Bar Tartine line cook Anthony Myint served up PB&Js (pork belly and jicama sandwiches). After three Thursdays outdoors, he and his crew decided to move it inside. There have been just four nights at Lung Shan so far, but the concept seems to be on a roll.

 

I went to night #3 with guest chef Tia Harrison, executive chef of Sociale. The theme of the evening was "The Dirty South Cleans Up Pretty Good," and the menu was exactly that, southern food with an Asian twist. The PB&Js transformed to PBQs (a play on BBQ, I guess), Kurobuta Berkshire pork belly with potato salad, picked red cabbage, and a quince-onion sauce on flatbread ($6.50). One of the diners at the communal table where I was seated said that the PBQs were served fast, and indeed they did come out PDQ, hot, savory, slightly sweet, and of course full of fatty pork goodness. Perhaps it was the setting, but the thin, flaky flatbread reminded me of nothing so much as a green onion pancake, though overall the dish brought to mind David Chang's steamed pork belly buns with hoisin and cucumber at Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York. Which makes sense: Chang's a Korean-American who grew up in Virginia, and his menus mash up Asian and southern flavors. Chang's pork-belly buns are better--the PBQs were tasty but had one too many things going on; they'd be better with the potato salad on the side. (Apologies for the crappy photos, btw; I didn't want to blow my fellow diners' eye sockets with the flash. You can see better photos at Beer and Nosh.)

 

Next came the smoked duck beignet with sheep's milk cheese and cherry-shallot compote ($10), the dish whose listing on the Web site made me drag my carcass to the Mission. I mean, a donut stuffed with duck? You gotta try that. Actually, it was more like a fried wonton, and just as well, because the wrapper was thicker and didn't get soggy in the sauce as a true beignet would have. This, too, combined savory and sweet, with more of the latter than the PBQ, the cherries adding a lovely tart note to the smoked duck. It was rich enough that one was plenty. Probably.

 

I finished with the butter-fried cornbread with buttermilk panna cotta and a leaf of candied sage. Simple, down-home, no fuss, not too sweet, the kind of dessert you might expect from a non-pastry chef. My panna cotta wasn't properly gelled up, but I didn't mind--it tasted fine and, with the honey drizzled over the cornbread, rather reminded me of Greek yogurt. Besides, at $5 it was cheaper and yummier than many of the desserts I've had at established SF restaurants.

 

Other menu items included gulf prawns with grits, BBQ lamb shank (which my tablemates moaned over), creole catfish stew, dirty rice, and mustard greens. Though the menu was short, that's not a bad array considering, as the Web site tells guest chefs, that the restaurant has just four burners, two deep fryers, two woks, and an oven the size of a hotel pan. The ideal way to experience Mission Street Food, I think, would be to collect a few friends and order the whole menu, then get seconds on your favorites.

 

In keeping with the "dirty south" theme, the servers wore wifebeaters and trucker caps or do rags (conveniently, also a hipster uniform circa five years ago), and the beverages included 40s of Miller or Olde English for $5 (also available by the glass for a buck), as well as sweet tea spiked with soju (Korean grain liquor) for $2, surely the best cocktail bargain in the city. I had the sweet tea, but most tables seemed delighted by the 40 option. (Tablemate: "I'm contemplating another 40. [pause] That's what got me in trouble in Kansas City." Do tell.) Aside from the 40s, entertainment was provided by hiphop from someone's iPod.

 

Mission Street Food runs on Thursday nights from 6 p.m. to midnight, cash only. It doesn't take reservations, but the tables moved pretty quickly when I was there--I arrived around 7, had a seat within 15 minutes, and was out by 8. Check out the latest news, guest chefs, and menus at MSF's blog.

My June trip was off to a crackin' start with LaBute and Perilla, and on day two I added art to the itinerary with a visit to the Met, then showing Frank Stella sculptures on the roof and a Paul Poiret retrospective. Fashion-challenged me, I'd never heard of Poiret, so the exhibit was a fascinating introduction to the man who created the hobble skirt. That item was an aberration: we can thank Poiret for condemning the corset and inventing more draped, movement-friendly women's wear, including the chemise dress and harem pants. (Coincidentally, I recently read in Juliet Nicolson's The Perfect Summer, about the English summer of 1911, that the season's debutantes were forbidden to wear trendy hobble skirts, as these prevented women from curtsying to the Queen.) Fickle fashion turned against Poiret as more modernist designers like Chanel rose. Poiret once met her on the street in the '20s, and seeing Chanel dressed all in black, he quipped, "For whom, madame, do you mourn?" "For you, monsieur," she retorted.

It's an old story: the important but self-important elder, the irreverent upstart. And in fact that was the story at my next stop for lunch, Ed's Lobster Bar in SoHo: weeks after my visit, chef Rebecca Charles of Pearl Oyster Bar sued Edward McFarland, the eponymous Ed and her former sous chef, for copyright infringement, claiming that he'd copied her restaurant, down to the Caesar salad recipe. "Total plagiarism," she called it. It was a strange and surprising accusation, the first instance I'd heard of a restaurant claiming that its entirety--concept, interior design, recipes--are intellectual property protected by the same laws that apply to art and published works. While I certainly favor protecting creative output, it does seem a step too far to claim copyright on a Caesar salad. After all, if there were such rights, shouldn't royalties go to the descendants of Caesar Cardini, who invented the salad and trademarked the recipe? (Oddly enough, the recipe was born in Tijuana in the '20s--around when Poiret met Chanel?--so that city has at least one item in the "pro" column to offset drunk Americans and donkey shows.)

In any event, the suit (now settled) was a couple weeks in the future when I visited Ed's. Indeed, I was present at a happier time--one waiter was telling the counter-barflies that the Post had just that day dubbed Ed's the best lobster roll in the city. That's a tall statement: lobster roll aficionados are, like pizza fans, martini wonks, and royal matchmakers, highly fussy when it comes to questions of provenance, pedigree, and authenticity. I am not an expert, but I can vouch that Pearl Oyster Bar and Mary's Fish Camp, both in the Village, make excellent models (and in the latter, you might also get served by Amy Sedaris, though I haven't).

 

So, let us consider the lobster, as David Foster Wallace says in a fine essay from Gourmet on the ethics of boiling live creatures for consumption. Lobster's a luxury ingredient these days, but not so long ago the Atlantic was so rich in crustaceans that they were considered a trash fish, lobstermen's children presumably peering into their shellfish-stuffed lunchboxes and tearily longing for Oscar Meyer or PB&J. As Wallace notes, some of the American colonies "had laws against serving lobster to inmates more than once a week, because it was thought to be cruel and unusual, like making people eat rats." The lobster roll seems to be a 20th century, working-class invention, a toasted hot dog bun filled with lobster meat dressed lightly with mayo or drawn butter and minimal additions. As with crabcakes, an excess of other stuff in the mix usually indicates an incompetent cook and/or a cheap bastard who doesn't want to fork over market price. And the market price is a pincer nip in the wallet: you'll pay north of $20 for a lobster roll, probably the higher end of the 20s in New York. Of course, as the price of lobster has gone upscale, so has its cooking, though with rolls you'll see the expense in thoughtful ingredient sourcing rather than Alinea-like plating.

Mr. McFarland attended the French Culinary Institute and worked at Le Cirque and Picholine, so he knows starry cuisine and has obviously chosen to focus on flavor without fuss, careful preparation and homey presentation. The lobster is in big chunks, giving you the texture of the meat and a mouthful of its flavor, and it's minimally dressed with a slaw-like thin mayo, served as per tradition on a light, toasted bun. On the side are crunchy, sea-salted fries, house-made tart pickles, and a delicious slaw that got my vote by including shallots and cornichons, a little vinegary bite to complement seafood and salt (a trio that any fish-and-chip fan can vouch is The Way Things Ought to Be). None of those sides tasted like an afterthought, as is so often the case at fish shacks. For those people who don't like lobster rolls (do they exist?), there's a full menu, including lobster pot pie ($22), a raw bar, and a daily blackboard list of fresh fishy goodness, which when I went included an oyster roll, steamed mussels, and a fluke sandwich.

I arrived at the beginning of lunch service and was one of the first to pull up a stool at the bar, but the place was full within 30 minutes, and I'd bet on it being a mob scene in the evening. Still, if you're up for some treyf trencher, you'd do well to elbow your way in. I'd be happy to have a lobster roll in my lunchbox and was stuffing in every bite on my generous plate, giving thanks to Monsieur Poiret for excommunicating the corset.

Venite ad me omnes qui stomacho laboretis, et ego restaurabo vos. That, says the Larousse Gastronomique, was the dog-Latin sign of one Boulanger, Parisian bouillon seller: "Come unto me, all you whose stomachs are aching, and I will restore you." With that sign, Boulanger set up the first restaurant around 1765, the word derived from restaurer, to restore. Again according to Larousse, "gastronome Brillat-Savarin referred to chocolate, red meat, and consomme as restaurants." Soup, meat, and chocolate? Sound restorative to me, though I would've added wine and cheese to that list, especially the decadent triple-cream named in honor of that gastronome.

If restaurants are the place for restoration, there are few cities equal to the R&R (riot & restoration) offered by New York. So, after my ex-employer requested my absence, I was quite happy to fly to Manhattan for a week of food, plays, and art. And yes, I am 13 months behind in my blogging--so much for taking advantage of the medium's immediacy.

For a theater-chow double-header, it's hard to beat Greenwich Village--midtown may have Broadway shows, but have you tried to get a good, non-extortionately-priced meal there? And don't get me started on the crowds; I'd rather get lost in the Village diagonallies than salmon up Seventh Avenue any day. Thus my first stop was Neil LaBute's In a Dark Dark House at the Lucille Lortel, followed by a late late dinner at Perilla on Jones Street.

Perilla had just opened the month before, the first restaurant from the first winner of Top Chef, Harold Dieterle, and accordingly it had a certain amount of buzz. That buzz, though, seems to be what Perilla is not about: it's not a velvet-rope, see-and-be-seen scene, nor is it an exotic-ingredient, specialized-servingware, extravagant-tasting-menu temple of cutting-edge cookery. Nope, Dieterle has dared to be humble, opening a cozy neighborhood restaurant with an unpretentious menu. And that's quite all right: fireworks aren't for every day.

I arrived early, but the staff behaved as if they were the ones causing inconvenience. They asked that I wait 10-15 minutes at the bar, where they graciously and unnecessarily comped my wine and the host kept checking on me. I was glad to have a few minutes to scan the place: a long bar with about 10 stools on the right, 18 tables and banquettes along the left and back, and an old-fashioned pressed-tin ceiling.

Once at my table, I started with peekytoe crab salad with mango, avocado, and ginger vinaigrette. That's not a groundbreaking combination (and sounds like something you'd find at a nontraditional sushi joint), but it was delicious, creamy rich in texture, appropriately light for a hot night. Perilla is a serrated-leaf plant from the mint family, more commonly known in the U.S. as shiso, but I didn't see any shiso that day, and this crab is the only Asian-esque dish that I can recall there. Besides his CIA training, Dieterle took a cooking sabbatical in Thailand, so those eastern influences do pop up on the menu.

Wagyu skirt steak was my entree, not a slab of meat but rillettes on a bed of spinach creamed with sunchokes, with shallots and chanterelles and a fruity steak sauce the consistency of apple butter. I thought the sauce was made from cherries or plums, but the waiter said it's just reduced beef jus and red wine. It beat the hell out of A1--I was looking around to see if I could sneak a plate-clearing swipe with my finger. I love creamed spinach, too, though had my doubts about substituing sunchoke for dairy, but it was smooth and tasty. (And sounded familiar: sure enough, that combination was one of Dieterle's Top Chef recipes.) The wagyu was tender, pink, and flavorful, as you'd expect from well-marbled beef. Wagyu refers to several types of Japanese cattle bred for a judicious amount of fat in their flesh; Kobe is a subset of Wagyu. My understanding is that much of what appears on American menus as "Wagyu" or "Kobe-style" beef actually comes from cattle that are domestic Wagyu-Angus hybrids. In short, I wonder if Wagyu and Kobe are becoming menu marketing words more than a guarantee of superior quality.

Though I love sweets, I couldn't resist getting the cheese course instead, with selections from down the street at Murray's. Accompanied by grilled bread and quince paste, the trio included moussey, three-milk La Tur, mild here but it can get mushroomy and slightly pungent as it ages; gouda-esque Prima Donna (there are three types; I'm guessing this was the fino); and Bayley-Hazen blue (from Jasper Hill Farm, producers of Constant Bliss, which is), tasting a bit murky compared to the bitchen Colston-Bassett stilton I'd had the night before (still my favorite blue). Then it turned out that I didn't have to sacrifice dessert, because Perilla brought two quarter-sized oatmeal-raisin cookies for petit fours.

Six months later I was back with my father and step-mother, who couldn't come up with a Christmas wish list and so got dinner instead. I didn't notice a ton of menu changes or many changes period, which was fine--the food and service were as good as the first time. (Sorry, by the way, that I didn't take photos.) I started with a special, celery root soup with wild mushroom garnish, which was exactly what a winter soup should be, hearty but refined. Next I had pancetta-wrapped pork tenderloin slices (pig squared, hurrah!) on rutabaga puree (a mite sweet), with brussels sprout leaves, walnuts, and a black mushroom custard. That sounds like a lot on the plate, but it was a reasonable amount. This was one of the first times I noticed brussels sprouts peeled like a head of lettuce, which I've seen several times since, even a salad made of sprout leaves (which poor prep cook drew short straw on that task?). Finally, I had a rockin' dessert: four square, compact, "vanilla-scented" donuts with sides of lemon curd and dark chocolate to dunk them into. Ooee, those were good, hot and fluffy and not too sugary, with the curd and the chocolate offering two completely different shades of astringence to give a flavor punch to the dough. I believe Perilla has had donut variations on the menu since opening, and I'd definitely go for them again.

You have a mind-boggling number of restaurant options in the Village (and I'll be writing up some of those soon...or someday), and Perilla wouldn't necessarily be my first recommendation. It would be on the shortlist, though--I enjoyed everything I had there. It's on the money if you're not out for a "destination" restaurant but for a comfortable, reliable, fairly priced neighborhood spot with quality ingredients and well-prepared dishes. And don't forget the donuts.

Guidebooks are full of restaurant recommendations, but perhaps you've noticed that the fine dining is rarely in tourist-friendly locations, while the well-worn paths are lined with eateries of the tacky and overpriced variety. And then there are the odd hours, which was the problem on my last night in Florence: most restaurants don't open until 7 and close around 11, a problem for those of us with concert tickets and early flights the next morning. So, I wandered down toward the Ognissanti district and entered Il Profuto almost at random--and kismet, it was perhaps the best meal I had in Florence.

As I settled in with a quartino of Chianti, the waiter--a friendly young man with near-perfect English, thanks to a stay in Michigan--took my order for ribollita and recommended the boar. The ribollita ("reboiled") soup is a Florentine specialty, stick-to-your-ribs stuff thick with beans, kale, and bread, in this case big croutons of bread instead of the boiled-down dough I had in Trattoria ZaZa's version.

It was delicious, but the money course was definitely the papardelle with wild boar ragu, thick, inch-wide ribbons of handmade pasta, sauced with hunks of lean, flavorful boar slow-cooked until it fell apart at the touch of a fork, plus black olives adding briny contrast. The waiter had said the dish was something special, and unlike when our American servers say that ad nauseum, it was quite true.

I think that will be one of my winter missions: trying to replicate that sauce. If you'd care to attempt the recipe, too, you can find boar at the Golden Gate Meat Company at the Ferry Plaza Market. While you're there, invest in some of their excellent chicken, duck, or veal stock, which will make your favorite soup recipes taste so much better.

Fact: Food tastes better on majolica. OK, that's an opinion, not a fact, but look at that photo and tell me you don't want to eat the pasta, lick the plate, and take it home.

After a long day's touring, ending on the Oltrarno side of the river, I returned to the Piazza Santo Spirito for dinner at trattoria Borgo Antico. It's a cozy, casual place with a young clientele, a good-sized menu, and quite reasonable prices.

That plate on the left was my appetizer, spinach and ricotta ravioli in a beautiful, creamy, saffron-colored sage sauce. I couldn't tell for sure if the brilliant yellow was coming from saffron or egg yolk, but I suspect the latter. I am sure, however, that it was delicious--I could have eaten that every night in Florence and been a happy camper.

My entree was salmon stuffed with artichokes--an irresistible choice, those being two of my favorite foods. The artichokes could've stood a little more cooking, as they were on the tough side, but the salmon was perfectly medium rare. Others who have dined at the trattoria tell me that it has great pizza, too.

Borgo Antico is open every day for lunch and dinner (the latter from 8 p.m.), so it's a great option on Sundays, when many other restaurants are closed.

As I type this, the Fillmore Street Fair is shutting down, and hallelujah for that. The ostensible reason for this fair is to celebrate the Fillmore district's jazz heritage, and you can indeed hear some decent music at California Street and further south. But up near Jackson, where I live, we're afflicted with smooth jazz, which as we know is neither. Some years ago, the featured act was a Kenny G wannabe with a soprano sax and no reason to live. Then we had a School of Rock-style student band that knew just three songs and played them repeatedly all day long--what they did to "Rhapsody in Blue" could've turned Gershwin into a gherkin. This year I knew there was trouble when I saw the band looked like a Jimmy Buffett impersonator (Hawaiian shirt, baseball cap) had joined forces with a Carlos Santana impersonator. While one should always be wary of judging books by covers, I think I won't be defeated by the dust jacket if I offer this Quick Jazzbo Self-Check: If you look more like the figure on the right (Miles Davis), there's a chance you can blow; if you look more like the figure on the left (Maynard G. Krebs), there's a chance you should stick with your fellow latter-day beatniks and trustafarians in the Golden Gate Park drumming circle.

And that's just the music nuisance of the street fair--there are also the daft hordes, aimlessly milling around the 10 blocks of this open-air asphalt bar, the rerouted and delayed buses, and of course the setup itself, which starts Friday at midnight, with workers shouting back and forth all night. I can see why it takes time to tow cars and build the stages, but the stalls? How long does it take to put up four tent poles, two card tables, and a Rubbermaid receptacle's worth of your pottery ocarinas, fer chrissakes?

Well, if San Francisco's seasonal fairs are a pest, the good news is that the regular markets--particularly the farmers' markets--are fabulous. My first taste was at the Green Street market, which later migrated to the Ferry Plaza, and I'll write more about that market in a later post. There are also Fillmore and Noe markets on Saturdays, the Crocker Galleria on Thursdays, and the UN Plaza on Mondays, Thursdays, and Fridays--you can see a full list of Bay Area markets at SF Gate. But the grandaddy of SF farmers' markets is the Alemany, which opened during World War II and moved to its current location near the intersection of highways 101 and 280 in 1947. Ferry Plaza has the reputation of being the expensive, yuppie market, to which I can only say, who cares? That would matter if it were the only market in town, but when choice abounds, I have no beef with farmers and other producers making a little extra dosh for their labor, especially when the results are so top-rate and delicious across the board.

But if cost is a consideration, the Alemany is a more working-class market. I bought a bunch of beets ($1), fennel, Walla Walla onions (currently being put to good use in Mario Batali's yummy recipe for onion flans with fonduta, now in my oven), barhi dates (which I'd never tried; the type originated in Basra), kettle corn, a massive white cauliflower, pistachios, and a red pork tamale for lunch, and I walked out with cash left from my $20.

You'll find all sorts of fruit, veg, nuts, flowers, and honey; more unusual items like elk jerky and shiso; and some things you won't find at the Ferry Plaza, such as fresh fish and live rabbits and chickens. It's fun and gratifying to see the bounty we lucky northern Californians produce. Just as importantly, by going to markets, you're supporting your local farmers, whittling down those food miles, and getting better, more flavorful, in-season produce than you'll find at Safeway. The Alemany market is open Saturdays, year-round, and there's parking, or you can get there on the 23 bus.

There are so many fine restaurants to try in the Bay Area that I don't often make return trips. But I had such a great meal at Gary Danko in February that I was happy to go back in May, and even more delighted to find that my second meal was as good as the first.

That beautiful appetizer at top left was a winner that I hope stays on the menu: white and green asparagus with greens, poached quail eggs, greens, capers, vinaigrette, and yes by god, duck prosciutto. It's more ingredients than you typically see in a Danko dish, but they're well balanced, the fatty egg yolk cut by the vinegar and capers, the spiced duck prosciutto adding a kick to the asparagus.

For my fish course, I had the striped bass with yellow lentil puree, Swiss chard, and champagne-apricot compote. The bass was perfectly cooked, of course, and the apricot compote was an intense blast of fruit, I think intended to kick up what might otherwise be a bland dish. I liked the compote, which didn't overwhelm the fish, but apricots are so sweet, I think they should have had a savory element (like a chutney) to balance the sugar.

Then for the meat course, I tried the roasted loin of bison with king trumpet mushrooms and onion and herb spaetzle. I've never had bison before and was curious whether the lean meat would taste tough and grassy. As you can see, though, it was a gorgeous plate, the loin tender and flavorful--slightly less rich than the beef I had last time, but then it's hard to outdo a truffled wine reduction.

Now I can't wait for round three!

 

(Vacation day five, continued.) A sit-down meal is a beautiful thing for the active tourist, but sometimes you want fast, fresh, inexpensive snacking so that you can get right back to sightseeing. Florence doesn't have much street food, aside from gelato, but it does have the I Fratellini sandwich shop, the kind of hole-in-the-wall noshery that apparently used to be all over the city but is now a rarity.

The sandwich board offers at least two dozen types of panino, each a hand-friendly size--one makes a good light lunch, two would be very filling. My friend Ericka recommends the spicy wild boar (cinghiale piccante), which unfortunately wasn't offered when I was in town, and you can find other exotica such as the lardo di colonnata, lard aged in slabs of Carrera marble. I sampled the pancetta arosto (roast ham) with truffle cream, which was divine, and another day I had the fennel sausage with goat cheese, also delicious. I don't know about you, but even the better sandwich shops near my office don't offer high-end meats, let alone truffle cream, and they charge more for their sodden tuna-on-wheat and "ham" in shapes not found on the pig.

Another perk: I Fratellini offers several wines in three glass sizes, from what looks like a shotglass to a full wineglass. You just belly up to the counter, order sandwich and beverage, rest your glass on the wooden racks outside, and loiter in the street (it's not crowded), eating and watching people go by.

I Fratellini is centrally located on the Via dei Cimatori, near Orsanmichele and the Central Market. It's open daily from 8 to 8.

 

Turophile (n.): A connoisseur of cheese; a cheese lover.

Don't you love learning new words? It's as much fun as learning about new foods, and thanks to instructor Judy Creighton for providing both last Wednesday night at the Cheese School of San Francisco's course on Spanish cheeses. 

My favorite was the Nevat, which I've never even seen before, with the Manchego and Monte Enebro also at the top of the list. Here's the full tasting lineup, pictured at left, going clockwise from 12 o'clock:

Murcia al Vino. I usually see the name translated as Drunken Goat, because this pliant, mozzarella-like goat cheese, once formed, is immersed in pasa doble wine for one or two days. The tannins give the rind a pretty red color and add some flavor to this otherwise mild cheese, which I think would make a fine snacking option. Murcia al Vino is actually a recent invention--Spain realized there wasn't much industry going on in the marshy Murcia region, southeast of Barcelona, so in the '80s and '90s moved goats in and started cheesemaking.

Mahon. Mahon is one of Spain's signature cheeses and also one of its few cow's milk cheeses--Judy said there are about three cow cheeses, six goat, and the rest are sheep. That's because around 4000 B.C., when the Sahara dried up, north Africans migrated to the Mediterranean, bringing their sheep, and a second wave of migration came around 800 A.D. with Muslims who also had sheep. But in the 18th century, cheesemakers came to the Balearic islands, with cows in tow and new skills in aging cheese. Mahon is a bit like a cheddar, earthy, a little tangy, but not as aged. It would be a good choice, I think, for guests who are kind of skeptical about unfamiliar cheeses.

Nevat (at 2 o'clock in the photo). My favorite cheese of the evening, its name means "snowy," and this bloomy-rind goat's cheese indeed is white as a snowdrift. It's made with Brie penicillin, and unlike Brie it doesn't ripen all the way to a gooey texture, remaining pastier like cream cheese in the center. It has more of a kick (subtle but interesting) than you tend to expect from a soft-ripened goat's cheese, and it's flavorful enough to stand up to a fruity red wine. Sara, the Cheese School director, says it's touchy and to be sure to taste before buying. It ripens in a hurry, so you may need to eat it within 48 hours of cutting it.

Garroxta. I found Garroxta something like an Italian semi-hard cheese, firm, slightly oily, with small eyes, good with a sturdy red wine. Unlike the Italians, though, this is a goat cheese, and it's not salty. Garroxta was a traditional cheese that nearly disappeared after the 20th century's wars wiped out a lot of cheesemakers, but Spanish artisanal cheesemaking made a comeback--and inroads into the export market--in the 1990s, much (Judy said) as French cheese had done in the '70s and Italian cheese in the '80s.

Manchego (at 6 o'clock in the photo). One of Spain's signature foods, Manchego is a sheep's milk cheese from La Mancha, whose other famous export is Don Quixote. Sheep's milk has more fat than cow's or goat's milk, which tends to give sheep cheeses a rich, buttery mouthfeel. Manchego has a tasty, layered flavor, balancing buttery, salty, and sweet. Judy said you can now find Manchegos from all sorts of milks, with variable aging times, but the real deal should come from Manchega sheep (from the Arabic word for "dry" or "arid," which La Mancha is) and should be aged about a year.

Ombra. Made from raw (unpasteurized) sheep's milk and aged four to five months, Ombra ("shadow") is a bit buttery and has a mild tanginess and some crystallization. It's a nice cheese, one that would suit most tastebuds, though I thought it less flavorful than Manchego.

Pau. A washed-rind goat's cheese, Pau has a nicer flavor--tangy and creamy--than smell, which is barny and somewhat ammoniated. It was OK, but I find I'm not enamored of many washed-rind cheeses, whose aromas tend to remind me of locker rooms (or, as a classmate once put it, "This tastes like bongwater.").

Monte Enebro (at 10 o'clock in the photo). Relatively new, made for only about 10 years, Monte Enebro is a bloomy-rind goat's cheese made from a Brie mold, with a smooth, creamy texture and a surprisingly zingy flavor, very like a blue's. I had a fairly ripe one in class and a somewhat younger one from Cowgirl Creamery this weekend, and both were delicious, with the riper one tasting more blue-y and the younger one having more of a pasty, chevre-like texture in the center. I really like this cheese and can see why it was Spain's top goat cheese for 2003.

La Peral. Spanish blues are muy macho. The notorious one is Cabrales, wrapped in sycamore leaves and soaked in brandy, reportedly so ferocious that it can make eyes water, tongues numb, and throats burn. Sounds more like a dare than a dining pleasure to me. La Peral, a cow's cheese, is one or two notches milder than that, potent but palatable in small doses (something sweet helps, such as dried fruit or honey), with a strong, earthy aroma, a creamy texture, and a yellow color. The taste, for me, was a three-stage experience: an almost overwhelming pungency, followed by a milder, pleasanter flavor with creamy mouthfeel, and then a socky aftertaste. For my money and tastebuds, I'd stick with Valdeon, which is bold but sweeter and not so pungent. Judy pointed out something I didn't know about blues: many of the sharp, salty ones are created from the get-go as blues, whereas many of the better blues start life as a cheese that's edible in its own right, then is injected with the Roquefort penicillin and aged. See, lots to learn in every class!

 

Green garlic is adolescent garlic, still on the stalk, that does not yet have a papery exterior or crackly peels around the cloves. Like a spring onion, it's the kinder, gentler, and, well, greener-tasting version of its adult self. I've only seen green garlic at the Ferry Plaza farmers' market (in fact, the market was serving some very tasty roast artichokes with green garlic marinade on Saturday), on a few Bay Area restaurant menus, and occasionally at one of the more produce-friendly grocery stores. 

I encourage you to find some, and when you do, try this simple soup, which you can make Italian-style or more like a variation on French onion soup.

Green garlic soup
olive oil
1-2 bunches green garlic (5-10 stalks)
1 c. dry white wine (think of what'll go with garlic--nothing sweet or oaky)
1 quart good chicken stock (for those in SF, try the housemade stock at Bryan's or Whole Foods)
1/2 baguette
Parmesan or Gruyere
(optional) 3-4 eggs

Splash a few tablespoons of olive oil in a stock pot and add the thinly sliced green garlic (white and light green parts only). Saute until the garlic is soft and golden brown.

For an Italianesque soup: Remove the garlic to a bowl. Add a couple more tablespoons of oil and the baguette, cut into 1/2- to 1-inch cubes. Saute on medium-high heat until the bread is golden brown and a bit crispy. Add the wine and let it reduce a little. Add the stock and salt and pepper to taste. When the stock is simmering, you can, if you wish, add eggs. Crack one at a time in a separate bowl (to make sure you don't get any shell in the pot), then pour the egg gently into the simmering broth. Poach the eggs for a few minutes, long enough to set the whites but briefly enough to leave the yolks semi-runny, which will add a lovely richness to the soup. Ladle the soup into bowls and top with shaved or grated Parmesan.

For a French-ish soup: Leave the garlic in the pot and add the wine. Let it reduce a little, then add the chicken stock and season to taste. Meanwhile, slice and toast the baguette. Ladle the soup into oven-friendly bowls or a casserole, add baguette toasts, and top with slices of Gruyere. Broil until the cheese is bubbly and browning.

More green garlic recipes:

Chez Pim's shrimp stir-fry with green garlic

White asparagus and green garlic soup

Mariquita Farms

Knoll Farms