’Tis time for nicely seasoned
greetings and foodstuffs of all sorts. So being the practical, world-conscious
Canadian gal that I am, can I gently remind you of the best gifts of all
— ones that disappear, preferably those that are B.C.-born or
–bred.
How about a year’s supply of Whistler
Chocolate? Gift certificates, or the real thing, from Howe Sound Brewing? Or a
sack of Across the Creek Russian blue potatoes paired with a couple of
Pemberton Meadows steaks for the pal who has everything. You can offer to cook.
On the other hand, I can’t think of a
soul who wouldn’t welcome rare and exotic already-homemade comestibles, or even
down-to-earth retro ones like a batch of spicy nuts ’n’ bolts mixed up by your
very own hands and baked golden-brown in your very own oven.
Or consider beautiful B.C. wines, a
box of smoked salmon that’s easy to ship to friends in other time zones, fine
hand-made soap from an emu farm in the Okanagan — gifts like these give
double or triple overtime when you count the giftee, who’s delighted to receive
it, the giver, who’s delighted to source it so easily and conscientiously, and
the delighted gift producer, who’s grown, raised or made it and has friends and
family of his or her own to support this Christmas season.
Another usually welcome gift that
produces volumes of pleasure beyond the physical resources it consumes or
tangible space it occupies is a mighty good book. Chances are that once it has
been consumed by the intended recipient it, too, will disappear — into
the hands of another eager reader or, at least, into a second-hand book sale
where its capability to give will keep on giving.
Thankfully, ideas centred around food
and eating, in case you haven’t noticed in this column, segue into just about
every human activity and foible, from politics to pottery-making. Lord knows
you don’t have to be a “foodie” — how I hate the term, sticky as it is
with classism and the swagger of competitive eating — to appreciate a
good book about food. So here are a few offerings, in time for holiday or
any-day giving:
In Bad Taste? The Adventures
and Science Behind Food Delicacies
.
Dr. Massimo Francesco Marcone. Okay, so you’ve caught me
red-handed, but wasn’t that a good set-up for a book bent on demystifying food
brinksmanship? Like, is it worth paying 30 bucks for 50 grams of coffee (
kopi
luwak
<) made from coffee beans a civet in
Indonesia eats and then poops out?
Dr. Marcone, being the balanced professorial
sort that he is from the University of Guelph, can’t really advise you on that
one. But, among other adventures, he does one heck of a job describing his trip
to Indonesia to see how the myth holds up of gathering the
scatologically-sourced beans from the rainforest floor (it does), and the
subsequent testing in his lab back at the university to see if the coffee’s
flavour really is enhanced by the process (it is). Your giftee will then have
to figure out if it — or the maggot cheese from Italy — are worth
ordering on eBay.
Endless Feasts: Sixty Years of
Writing from Gourmet
.
Edited by Ruth Reichl. She’s been a
tour de force
of a restaurant critic for the likes of the
New York
Times
and a best-selling author. Now she
reigns as editor-in-chief of
Gourmet
magazine. But Reichl (also spelled Reichel) is no food snob. This is largely
due to her roots in Berkeley’s ’70s counter-culture, where she had a taste of
political protest (the Vietnam War) that made a difference, hung out with Alice
Waters, who wrote the metaphoric cookbook on sourcing local/cooking local at
her restaurant, Chez Panisse, and dumpster-dove for ingredients for
Thanksgiving dinner, not because she had to, but because she could and should
(all that wasted food).
One of Reichl’s best quotes is, “You
can be a decent critic if you know about food, but to be a really good one you
need to know about life.” And so this collection of essays from
Gourmet
is all about life. It stands as one engaging, humanistic
collection of writing, about food or otherwise — part travelogue, part
time-traveller, especially if you drum up one of the recipes, which are written
in their original form, in other words, not modernized for contemporary
kitchens or ingredients.
One of the quirkiest pieces is James
Villas’s essay on the regional cooking of the U.S. “low country” coast, which
lies between Wilmington, North Carolina and Savannah, Georgia — a place
barely on anyone’s map these days, even with GPS. The article drips with a
strangeness as affecting as the Spanish moss that hangs from the region’s
swamp-addled trees. The Brunswick stew recipe, with its three meats and zing of
hot pepper, will transport you there.
The Escoffier Cookbook and
Guide to the Fine Art of Cookery
.
Auguste Escoffier. Sure, this has been a bastion of French
cooking, gourmet-dom and all things chef-like for 100 years. But that doesn’t
make it any less fun to poke through or even cook from. When it was first
published in 1903, Escoffier’s book was a
Reader’s Digest Condensed
version of French cooking of the day, simplifying some
5,000 recipes. I know… your friend doesn’t have a hair sieve for straining
sauce anywhere in sight, and why would she? But, honestly, this book still
sports a lot of simple, useful recipes that anyone who can make a taco can pull
off. The hot wine with orange looks like a perfect holiday topper.
On Food and Cooking: The
Science and Lore of the Kitchen
.
Harold McGee. Yes, I cite it endlessly, and I’ve told you
about it before. But I can’t pass up an opportunity to plug this amazing book,
stuffed as it is with weird facts and good stories. Even people who hate to
cook will gobble it up.
The book is organized in snippets,
like an encyclopedia, perfect for browsing and grazing. Open it anywhere, like
I’m doing now, and interesting tidbits invariably pop out: Water is the major
component of
all
foods. Aztecs
flavoured their chocolate with aromatic flowers, vanilla, chili, wild honey and
achiote. The English walnut is Persian. Pistachio trees are related to cashew
and mango trees. Bonus: If you’re into it, this is the kind of book that will
also help anyone invent their own recipes. Have fun!
Glenda Bartosh is an award-winning
freelance writer who wishes you the best of the spirit of giving.