Day 187: Dried or Candied?

When I saw dried cantaloupe in the store, I was skeptical. To me, it seems that cantaloupe is probably about 50% water (after a little research, I discovered it's about 90% water). So how can you dry it? Isn't that like drying watermelon? Of course, this is probably a problem with many dried fruits. Except I'm pretty sure what we buy as "dried" isn't so much dehydrated as candied. I mean, think about those apple chips. Those are truly dried. Most "dried" fruit is gelatinous.

Anyway, I tried this dried cantaloupe stuff, and it tasted very bland. It's the kind of thing where, if it was in trail mix, I could only identify it by reading the bag and using process of elimination. It's sort of cantaloupe colored. But cantaloupe flavored? Not so much.

Generally, I think we should probably leave most fruits alone. I suppose drying/candying preserves them longer and makes some of them taste pretty good, but maybe we should leave cantaloupe alone. It's just so much better fresh.

Day 186: Grape Expectations

When I was a kid, my dad liked to eat certain foods while watching TV: mostly peanuts, whose shells he would deposit in a plastic grocery bag, but also grapes. I mostly remember him eating green grapes, but I know there were red grapes, too. I was a bit of a snack mooch (I always liked to quote the old Disney TV show The Torkelsons: Whatcha got there, Boarder Hodges?) and I liked to hope or pretend that I would grow up to have Dad's amazing twig-thin metabolism (which, of course, I didn't) and be able to snack in front of the TV every day, which at the time seemed like the height of luxury.

On grape nights, though, it was not so luxurious. For one reason or another, I never took a shine to grapes. Maybe it's because they were fruit (in the kid thesaurus, synonymous with yuck). As I got older, I pinpointed it to a textural issue: I didn't like food that exploded in your mouth (which seemed to be the main reason most people liked grapes). I took to peeling them, for a time, which proved too laborious. Often, the red grapes tasted a little rotten (what most people would call too sweet, but I associated sweetness with processed sugar, not plant matter) and the green grapes were a little too tart. So grapes were marginal.

Of course, then I married a grape eater. A thrifty grape eater. A man who buys fruit seasonally, which generally means at its cheapest, which means that though I want Granny Smith apples year-round, he goes for things like grapes, most recently black grapes, which I had never (to my recollection) tasted before.

Here's how Ian described black grapes after eating a handful: not as sweet as red, not as tart as green. Part of me thought, Wow, they must not have any flavor. But than I tried them and realized that these are the ideal grapes. They're like grape juice grapes, the flavor the candies are modeled after. I've eaten cups of them, without any coercion, just for an afternoon snack. I bet you could make a savory sauce from them and serve it with meat (maybe black grapes and wine, with some spice in there). I bet they would be good in salad. Maybe a black grape granita. Or simply straight off the vine.

Day 185: Opaa!

I recently discovered that I like ouzo, Greek's licorice-flavored liqueur, favorite of one of my favorite Iron Chefs, Cat Cora (after every battle, she and her sous chefs take a shot of it from little glass prep bowls). So when I saw ouzo candy at World Market, I had to buy it. And I did.

The candies are (to me, a licorice lover) totally yummy (though my husband cringed and exclaimed how bitter they were--to me they are sweet and perfumey), but I have to say I expected something more complex than your basic flavored hard candy. I don't know why. The packaging doesn't claim anything more. They are ouzo candy. Period. They deliver what they promise.

I'm curious about how one goes about making candy with alcohol. I know these probably don't have any alcohol in them and never did, but after my Jack Daniels pecans (I also tried another brand's bourbon pecans and found I preferred the whiskey version), I'm thinking it might be fun to play with sugar and booze.

Day 184: When in Montana...

I find that every time I visit my in-laws in Montana, I end up eating buffalo. This is not a complaint. Often, it's in the form of a buffalo burger at Fuddruckers, which we visit at least once per Montanan trip (when we visit my folks in California, we always visit In-n-Out and Eriberto's). I believe at some point I might have sampled a buffalo steak. This time, I had a magical plate of buffalo osso buco. (I had the turkey burger while at Fudds.)

So what's new about that, you might ask? You've obviously had buffalo before. No, this post isn't about the formerly endangered, now carefully farmed cattle. Mostly, it's about osso buco, a dish that has intrigued me for quite a long time, and until now, I had never tried. Honestly, since osso buco is more often made with veal or beef than buffalo, you could say I still haven't tried it. The flavors of the buffalo were probably completely different.

But do you want to know the best part about this dish? They plated it with the marrow bone. I'm sure, since the cut of meat used for osso buco is so tightly held to the bone, since the two are cooked together until the meat falls off of said bone, and since the marrow is so important to the flavor of the sauce, this is common. But as I said, I've never had osso buco. I've also never had the pleasure of scooping marrow out of a bone with a tiny little fork, which (as you can see from the picture) was generously provided so that I might enjoy every last bit of my meal. I even brought the marrow bone all the way home for my cat (I don't have a dog), across two states. I realized her little mouth was too small to chew on it and I've never seen a cat chewing a bone and I did eat most of the marrow, but there were definitely more fatty deposits that she could have reached with her tongue. Sadly, she didn't seem interested. But hey, I tried.

Day 183: Sour Cream Potato Salad

As you might remember from the portion of this blog where I ate a food I didn't like every day (a portion I'm considering returning to, as I find myself getting flabby and weak-willed when it comes to certain foods), I have not long been a fan of potato salad. My main qualm: the mayonnaise. And while I have discovered that potato salad, even gooey, mayonnaisey versions, can be sublime when seasoned properly, I still find myself looking for alternatives. Let's say, for argument's sake, that this has something to do with health. It probably should, right? Concern for the old ticker, though more likely it would be concern for the waistline, especially since I don't buy that eggs are particularly bad for you, or that you're going to die or even get sick from eating raw yolks (which, in commercial mayo, have been denatured anyway) except one in a billion times (I should do some sort of count of raw cookie doughs, cake batters, etc. that have not sickened me over the years), nor do I think that the amount of mayo in even the goopiest potato salad is necessarily excessive if your portion size is reasonable. (Can you tell I've been reading a lot of Steingarten lately? I feel like quite the culinary curmudgeon.)

So: While at my in-laws' this weekend, celebrating our nation's independence, I sampled a lovely sour cream potato salad that blew me away in taste and simplicity. It was quite creamy and tangy, and though I forgot to get the recipe from my mother-in-law before leaving (I will have to email her), my palate detected these few ingredients:

Potatoes
Sour Cream
Chives
Green Onion
Salt
Pepper

That's all! Isn't it brilliant? Maybe some of you are thinking, How dull! Or perhaps you don't fancy the particular tang of sour cream the way I do, and wonder why one would choose to at least cut the sauce with mayo (it's possible there is a little mayo in the recipe, though the mixture was marvelously white and my tongue didn't taste or feel it). Perhaps you're thinking, That sounds awfully oniony. My only advice to you quibblers would be to try it yourselves.

Day 182: Whiskey Praline Pecans

One of my favorite ice creams of all time is pecan praline, so when I saw these whiskey praline pecans at World Market, I had to have them. I'm always surprised at the lovely depth of flavor whiskey can bring to food, though as a beverage, it's not my favorite (I do like a Jack & Ginger if it's a lot more Ginger than Jack--mostly because I like the name.) And pecans are my favorite nut, so I had to try this combination.

Can I say yum? I can? Yum!

I don't know how else to say it. I would like to learn to make something like this. I should learn to make something like this. I WILL learn to make something like this.

PS: Can you believe it? The year (and thus, this resolution) is half over. Yikes!

Day 181: Peanut Chews

Yet another candy-tasting inspired by Steve Almond's Candyfreak: Peanut Chews.

Note that the front says "Chocalatey" not "Chocolate." There's a reason for that.

The interesting thing is, in Almond's book, the friend who accompanies him to the Goldenberg factory (before they were bought out by Just Born--you know, the guys who make Mike & Ike and Peeps) was given a whole mess of peanut chews, but told Steve she didn't like them. The next time they spoke, all her peanut chews were gone and she wanted more. Let's just say I can relate.

At first, I was completely disappointed in my peanut chews. They didn't have much punch. But after the first little piece (there are 8 in the package) I figured I would give the second one a chance. And then, I actually kind of wanted the third one. The fourth was divine. The fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth I had to save for my husband (I promised to share and I just don't need 460 calories from one snack).

The moral of the story: these things are dangerous. They have a sort of nostalgic wrapper and it's always fun to come across new things, but I don't know if I will have them again, if only because I don't want to become a peanut chew addict.

PS: Check out this cool candy blog I found and their opinion of peanut chews!