Sweet Madeleines

I am not certain how it is pronounced, but the kouing aman from Les Madeleines patisserie and cafe in Salt Lake City is interesting. The French pastry is crispy and buttery, sticky and sugary.

Must-eats

We seldom heed guidebooks, winging it on the road instead. When it comes to food, however, we can not resist local recommendations. We like to see what other people eat, and do not mind the hunt.

In the Sunday paper

Though we know him for the chocolates, John Scharffenberger apparently has done and now does considerably more. The San Francisco Chronicle details his pre- and post-chocolate endeavors:

"His food businesses have been nothing short of diverse. Besides having produced Champagne-style bubbly, high-end dark chocolate bars and now gourmet soy, Scharffenberger is also juggling a small sauerkraut enterprise and has teamed up with his hog-farmer neighbors to market cured hams."

Alas... if only we liked tofu - he is CEO of Hodo Soy Beanery in Oakland - half as much as we liked chocolates.

Memphis in Manhattan Beach

Geography matters. Or not.

We go to see Phoenix at the Hollywood Bowl. Tonight, we travel to Memphis in Manhattan Beach, where we order catfish and crab cakes, a bison burger and fried chicken. When the food arrives, we pass the camera around the table. It is a habit we have developed. We eat and swoon.

Label us skeptics

A corn syrup by any other name is still artificially sweet.

From The New York Times:

"The Corn Refiners Association, which represents firms that make (high-fructose corn syrup), has been trying to improve the image of the much maligned sweetener with ad campaigns promoting it as a natural ingredient made from corn.

"Now, the group has petitioned the United States Food and Drug Administration to start calling the ingredient 'corn sugar,' arguing that a name change is the only way to clear up consumer confusion about the product."

Meat and vegetables

"A piece of bacon here, a chicken wing there, all eaten out of hand, fingers licked afterward. The sun is heading toward the horizon now; the small bit of beer in the bottom of my bottle is warm. Sunday is coming to a close and we've done nothing all day but grill and eat meat - which sounds absurd but feels sublime..."

Tara Austen Weaver, writing about barbecue in "The Butcher and the Vegetarian: One Woman's Romp Through a World of Men, Meat, and Moral Crisis."

Peach fuzz

"In trying to save my Sun Crest peaches, I discover that they are more than just food, they are part of a permanence, a continuity with the past. People who enjoy my peaches understand what juicy, sweet ones taste like. Biting into one may send them back to the orchards of their childhoods and that warm sense of constancy of family found in their memories. Individuals leave for the city, but the memories of farms stay behind to anchor personal family histories. My peaches find a home with these folks, a touchstone to their past."

David Mas Masumoto, in "Epitaph for a Peach: Four Seasons on My Family Farm."

Food art

Because sometimes the display is simply too beautiful to ignore.

Keeping it Real

When Real Madrid arrives for a friendly against the LA Galaxy, when 89,000-plus file into and out of the Rose Bowl in Pasadena on a sunny afternoon, we look for icy drinks to cool us down.

Horchata

2 cups boiling water
3/4 cup rice powder or rice flour
4 cups lowfat or whole milk
1/4 cup plus 2 Tbsp. sweetened condensed milk
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
a few drops vanilla extract

Whisk the boiling water into the rice powder or rice flour until incorporated. Add the remaining ingredients and stir until the milk dissolves. Chill for several hours, or until quite cold or at least cool. Stir and serve over ice. Makes 6 servings.

Lunchtime pie

"Nobody makes strawberry chocolate pie the way you do. Wednesday is my favorite day of the week because I get to have a slice of it. I think about it as I'm waking up. You could solve all the problems of the world with that pie...

"Just a pie? It's downright expert. A thing of beauty. How each flavor opens itself one by one, like a chapter in a book.

"First a burst of exotic spices. Just a hint of it. Then you're flooded with chocolate, dark and sweet, like an old love affair. And finally strawberry, the way strawberry was always supposed to taste but never knew how.

"In fact, I tell you what, forget all the other stuff I ordered. Just bring me the damn pie. That's all I want. I don't care if it's not a well-balanced meal. Just bring me the pie..."

Joe (Andy Griffith) talking about Jenna's (Keri Russell) special strawberry chocolate oasis pie in the film "Waitress."

Good Stuff

The July issue of Food & Wine includes a story on Spike Mendelsohn, whose Good Stuff Eatery in Washington, D.C. is a 15-minute drive from the White House, and whose menu features a heart-healthier Michelle Melt, "a turkey burger flavored with sauteed apple and celery."

What intrigue us most in the piece, however, are the recipes:

Michelle's Turkey Burgers with Lemon Mayonnaise

3 Tbsp. canola oil
1 onion, halved and thinly sliced
1/2 cup finely chopped celery
1/2 cup finely chopped Granny Smith apple
2 scallions, thinly sliced
1 small canned chipotle in adobo, minced
1 1/2 lbs. lean ground turkey breast
1 Tbsp. minced flat-leaf parsley
2 tsp. finely grated lemon zest
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise
1 1/2 tsp. fresh lemon juice
1/4 tsp. chopped thyme
4 whole-wheat hamburger buns, split and toasted
4 iceberg lettuce leaves
4 tomato slices

In a nonstick skillet, heat 1 Tbsp. of canola oil. Add the sliced onion and cook over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until golden and softened, about 25 minutes. Transfer the onion to a bowl. Wipe out the skillet.

Heat 1 Tbsp. of canola oil in the skillet. Add the celery, apple and scallions and cook over moderate heat until softened, about 8 minutes. Transfer to a bowl and add the chipotle; let cool.

Stir in the turkey, parsley, 1 tsp. of lemon zest, 2 tsp. of salt and 1/4 tsp. of pepper. Shape the mixture into four 1/2-inch-thick patties.

In the skillet, heat the remaining 1 Tbsp. canola oil. Add the burgers and cook over moderately high heat, turning once, until no longer pink inside, 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, mix the mayonnaise with the remaining 1 tsp. of lemon zest, the lemon juice and chopped thyme and season with salt and pepper.

Spread the lemon mayonnaise on the top halves of the buns; set the burgers on the bottom halves and top with the caramelized onions, lettuce and tomato. Makes 4 servings.

White House Honey-Oat Muffins

3/4 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
3/4 cup whole-wheat flour
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground coriander
3/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup plus 2 Tbsp. honey
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup canola oil
2 large eggs

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Coat a 12-cup muffin pan with cooking spray.

In a large bowl, mix the oats with the whole-wheat flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, coriander and salt.

In another bowl, whisk the honey with the buttermilk, canola oil and eggs. Pour the honey mixture into the dry ingredients. Mix until just combined.

Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin cups and bake for about 18 minutes, until they're golden and a toothpick inserted into the center of the muffins comes out clean.

Let the muffins cool in the pan for about 5 minutes, then transfer them to a rack. Makes 12 servings.

Comfort cooking

In the months before my grandmother's death, my mother cooked.

She bought pork and lamb at the store, glad to take advantage of grocery specials. She marinated beef to roast in a hot oven. She trimmed Chinese greens. She chopped and braised, steamed and stir-fried. She spent time in her kitchen with the television on but often ignored.

My mother cooked not for my grandmother, who by then hardly ate, cancer stealing the best of her appetite. She cooked not for my father. He would be fine with simple soups and porridges. She cooked not for my sisters, brothers or me. Though we dropped by on weekends, we could only eat so much. Imagine the leftovers. She cooked, I believe, for herself.

At the counter or the sink, my mother stayed busy. She prepped chicken perhaps or removed scales from a fish. She gave herself these things to do. Meanwhile, her mind wandered.

She thought about the food she did not have growing up in China and the access she enjoyed when she arrived in California. She recalled years of scrimping to send money back to family across the Pacific and the relief she finally felt when her mother arrived in the United States as well. She cooked and cried.


We talk of comfort food: a scoop of ice cream, for example, or a slice of cake, a barbecued pork bun or an egg custard tart.

Jonathan Reynolds wonders whether the term is redundant. "All food is comforting," he says in the memoir "Wrestling with Gravy: A Life, With Food," "or we'd be eating nothing but hot dogs at Shea and warm tar (indistinguishable in a Times blind-testing), with possibly a few vitamins thrown in.

"Unless you're... undergoing a fraternity initiation or briefly lapse into Joan Crawford territory with one of your sons, there is no such thing as 'punitive food'."

I suspect there is the idea of comfort cooking as well, the notion that kitchen work can help to reassure us, that time in front of a stove can keep us centered. My mother cooked, it seems, for the same reason others might ride a bike or read a book. She needed the diversion.


The moment my mother spied my grandmother in hospice care, the day after my uncle had admitted the woman, she ran to hold her. It was something I had seldom seen my mother do: openly embrace anybody. It felt like a clip from a Chinese-language soap opera.

Outward displays of affection had been rare in our house. Hugs and kisses were things other people traded. My mother demonstrated her love through food instead.

She treated scrapes my siblings and I got playing in the back yard with a little Bactine and a lot of candy. She marked our achievements with dumplings and broth. She greeted our returns from college with dishes we favored: braised eggplant, tofu and beef, vermicelli with egg and barbecued pork. She wasn't about big gestures but small everyday concerns. I realize this now.

"When am I going to get better?" my grandmother asked, her voice a soft but steady whisper. "I don't know when I am going to get better. Maybe this time I won't."

A friend told me once her heart grew three sizes the day her daughter was born; my heart broke into a hundred pieces that afternoon at the foot of my grandmother's bed.

My mother insisted that if my grandmother simply ate more, her health could improve. "If you don't have the nutrients," she reasoned, "how would you ever get well?"

I knew enough Cantonese to understand this exchange. From talks earlier with doctors and relatives, I also knew the truth: That no matter what or how much my grandmother did or did not eat, she wouldn't get better. The disease had taken a toll, wreaking havoc on her pancreas, stripping her body of the energy it required.

My mother punctuated her visits to the hospice with trips to Safeway or Trader Joe's nearby or to Chinatown, recognizing the severity of the situation, I'm sure, but needing still to collect ingredients for her own meals. In this way, she continued to live as my grandmother was about to die.

After all, my mother needed to pay attention to herself, too, did she not? She needed to look to the future and occasions she would inevitably get to spend with the rest of her family. Food - thinking about it, shopping for it, preparing it - provided a way for her to exert control over something when so much around her had been beyond her control. It was the happiness she allowed herself. In this backyard scrape, it was her candy.

The short market trips were also a way, I suppose, for her to fool death personally, to not let it follow her straight home from the hospice. She wanted to open and close car doors, enter and exit other buildings, walk up and down wide aisles, to ditch death randomly. She was superstitious like that.


In the months since my grandmother's death, my mother continues to cook. She shops for exceptional deals and brainstorms menu ideas. Her tears, however, no longer flavor the food.

She tells me about a visit with a friend to their neighborhood Lucky for 99-cent eggs. She wanted to limit herself to a couple of cartons. Her friend, however, dismissed the restraint.

"The people in the store know us," the woman said in Cantonese. "They see us all the time anyway. They know we're greedy. It doesn't matter how much we buy or don't buy." They shrugged, gathered four or five cartons each and headed to the register.

With joy I have not seen in a while, my mother tells me of the day she spent with a nephew from New Jersey. During a last-minute business trip to California, he made it a point to invite her out to eat.

In San Francisco, they came across a Chinese buffet. Though inexpensive, the food they spotted on people's plates seemed unappealing.

He placed his hand on my mother's back and guided her away from the entrance of the restaurant. "The two of us," her nephew said, gently and genuinely, "let's go eat something better. You and I, we deserve something better." She agreed.

My mother tells me these stories, peppered with humor, irony and insight, one night over dinner. I listen and laugh.

(A version of this essay appears on the website for The Atlantic.)

Why ask why?

Pie, pie, three-berry pie.

Though the crust is store-bought, the lattice is not. The filling, consisting of strawberries, blueberries and raspberries, is totally summer.

Stars and stripes

Because it is red, white and blue.

One each

In a box of 15 macarons from La Boulange in San Francisco, we are down to the final four. One for each of us. We check out a jazz festival on Fillmore Street and uncover a French bakery on Pine Street instead. The cookies have all been excellent. We pass them around the table and think of getting more.

Berry love

The Guardian does a combination history, how-to pick, eat and store piece on strawberries. It is a light but informative read.

It seems to me the British strawberry season coincides nicely with the U.S., another reason I love England.

Much too much

OK now this has got to stop.

I survey the groceries and realize there is simply too much food in the refrigerator. There are tons of fruits and vegetables. It's crazy.

After the Mexico-Argentina game Sunday afternoon, I went to the Berkeley Bowl, where I got raspberries, blackberries and blueberries on the cheap. I don't want to keep them too long, though, so I make a crisp.

I got a bag of eggplants for 99 cents and think of a tomato-less pasta sauce with a recipe I saw on Salon. Or perhaps I should roast them for baba ghanoush.

I got six ears of shucked yellow corn for 99 cents. I got a bag of squash - zucchini and two varieties whose names I do not know - for 99 cents. I have not figured out entirely what to do with them but have a couple of days still, I think.

I got rhubarb, which I happened to see and, of course, could not resist. I love it and will need to cook that down for schloop (a word I made up). I can have it with vanilla yogurt and granola for breakfast.

I got kale just because. In hindsight, perhaps I should have put back the kale. I still have carrots, onions and lettuce leaves, too. I even wound up freezing a mess of sliced red bell peppers the other week because I could not use those immediately.

It is ridiculous, right? You'd think I was cooking and shopping to feed a football team. And this is all after the full flat of strawberries the other weekend from the farmers' market.

Oh, and shoot, running errands in Chinatown with my mother this morning, I got pluots, too. I know, I know. But they are in season, and I saw them.

Milkshake

"My milkshake brings all the boys to the yard and they're like it's better than yours. Damn right it's better than yours. I could teach you but I'd have to charge."

The lyrics are taken from "Milkshake" by Kelis. The sign hangs at Trueburger on Grand Avenue in Oakland, where they serve hamburgers, french fries and, yes, milkshakes. It proves a nifty play on words.

Summer cake

Nigel Slater can not resist cake. I, apparently, can not resist Nigel Slater. The British author champions summer cakes in The Observer. I am smitten:

"Cake is my downfall. I can refuse a glass of wine, push away an opened box of handmade chocolates, spurn a toffee from the tin and turn my nose up at a HobNob, but I can never, ever resist a slice of cake.

"The feel of the soft, open texture of the sponge between my finger and thumb, the warm scent of vanilla, orange, lemon and almond. A slice of cake is both pleasure and vice and I sometimes look away as I walk past a particularly tempting shop window..."

(Photo credit goes to Jonathan Lovekin for The Observer.)

Food for my father

When we were growing up, my mother spent afternoons in the kitchen making traditional Chinese dumplings and pastries. Determined not to let us forget who we were, she poached chicken and steamed fish. She simmered pots of soup. She stuck with the familiar.

But my father liked to experiment. Having been in California long enough to taste other foods, he wanted to introduce us to all sorts of things. He asked my mother to serve asparagus the way many Americans did - with hollandaise sauce. He showed her how to bake russet potatoes in the oven. He fed us sour cream.

He allowed my sibling and me departures from Chinese food, rescuing us from what would become our mother's predictability. He injected new flavors into our weekly menus, bringing home burgers from a restaurant near his store in San Francisco, patties so thick they dripped with each bite, and deep-dish pizzas. He had these with glasses of beer, a practice I have long since adopted.

He took us to the grocery store. My mother shopped mostly in Chinatown. But my father preferred the American supermarkets. We went with him on Saturdays for staples such as milk and bread.

My sisters, brothers and I wandered the aisles and filled the cart with cookies while our father stayed in the meat department comparing packages of beef. We never asked permission for the items we chose. He never denied us the foods we liked.

So it is disheartening to learn now that my father, as he gets older, sometimes fails to eat, that he sleeps late and skips meals, that he's uninterested in the things my mother cooks. That his weight has begun to fall.


Nutritionists and psychologists talk often about the connections between age and health, mood and appetite. In articles and on Web sites, they write about the benefits of a balanced diet, offering suggestions for seniors to stay well.

Eat more whole grains, they say. Eat more fruits and vegetables, beans and nuts. Eat less fat, cholesterol and sodium. They tell me nothing new.

They look at the possible effects of treatment and medication on appetite. One influences the other, they say. But my father isn't on treatment. He isn't on heavy medication. He takes a pill a day and a couple of calcium supplements.

They look also at environment. Seniors who live alone sometimes find it discouraging to eat alone. They don't like to sit by themselves. But my father does not live alone. My mother is next to him, cooking morning, noon and night. How could he not be hungry?


Watching my father in the kitchen, I recall a time years ago when he ate heartily, when sumptuous Saturday evening meals, for example, were rewards for weeks of hard work, when holidays, both Chinese and American, were occasions for serious family feasts.

My mother would fill the table with my father's favorites: cellophane noodles, shrimp and vegetable stir-fry, sweet and sour pork, as well as crab or lobster when they were available. She'd top the menu with refreshing slices of oranges or sweet, ripened mangoes.

Eager to watch television, my siblings and I tried to tear through the food. But our father disapproved. Slow down, he'd say. Enjoy your meal.

He'd pick up a mouthful of noodles with his chopsticks, touch it to his lips and taste. The seasonings were perfect. He'd lick the sauce off a piece of pork or wok-fried crab, savoring its juices.

Half an hour later, my father would wipe his lips, push his chair from the edge of the table and gently pat his stomach. Good, he'd say, smiling discreetly. I'm full.

I wonder if that might happen again, if my father would find such peace and satisfaction in the things he ate.


One afternoon, aiming to give him a respite from Chinese food, the way he had done for my sisters, brothers and me when we were children, I set out to make a pot of chili for my father.

I select a recipe from my eclectic collection and cook ground turkey instead of ground beef. I want the dish to be heart healthy. I include tons of vegetables: diced bell peppers, portobello mushrooms, corn, zucchini and tomatoes. I want it to be nutritious. I throw in chili powder and red pepper flakes. I want it to have a significant kick.

At my parents' house that night, I serve the chili with steamed white rice, something my mother cannot refuse. I note the ingredients and encourage them to help themselves.

My mother thanks me for cooking, saving her time and energy. It is not a big deal, I reply, before turning to my father, who scoops a small portion.

I want him to like the food. I want him to have seconds. Thirds even. I do. He doesn't. In the end, I impress only myself.


Perhaps the nutritionists and psychologists were right. Maybe my father - like others his age - isn't thinking much about eating. At 80, he has different concerns. But does his decreasing appetite for food in particular mirror a decreasing appetite for life in general?

Does he believe, 15 years into retirement, that he has tasted all there is? It would be a shame. I want to convince my father there are tons of foods he has not tried.

So I will continue to encourage my father to eat today and tomorrow. He is the one who introduced us years ago to American favorites, who did not deny us the snacks we craved, who pushed his chair from the edge of the table after an especially satisfying meal.

I will help my mother keep their kitchen stocked with all sorts of good food - the chicken and fresh fish she likes, the cereals and bananas he likes - and provide them occasional departures from the usual.

And on mornings when my mother visits friends in the neighborhood, I will stop by the house to spend time with my father.

I will boil eggs for his breakfast. Twelve minutes, no more, no less, the way I learned to in college. They will come out perfect. He can have them with a bowl of oatmeal and a cup of coffee.

It might not be the biggest or most extravagant meal in the world. It might not be fancy or expensive. But it will be a decent start.


(A version of this essay appeared originally in The Oakland Tribune.)