Cooking and Music

Back in the days when I was cooking in the fast paced world of restaurant line cooking music could make a big difference in how any given night shift would go. Myself and the other line cooks needed fast rock and roll like Led Zepplin “Black Dog” Ten Years After doing “I Going Home”, or similar good stuff from the late 60’d and 70’s. Music like that would keep the pace needed for an intense 4-5 hour shift, and put us in a happy place too. I remember well a restaurant I worked at in Keystone, Colorado where we had a young manager who had just taken over from the previous owner after the place had sold. This young manager after about a week on the job told us we couldn’t play loud rock and roll music in the kitchen anymore even though it wasn’t heard out in the dinning room. Well I showed him by packing up my rock and roll tapes and quitting. I still crack me up thinking about that move. Fast forward to today and I still think music is a great aid in the kitchen for fostering a fast pace when needed, or even thoughtful music for experimenting in the kitchen while making up new recipes. Any given day might find me listening to Jimi Hendrix or Beethoven, or Warren Haynes “Fire in the Kitchen”, or Dvorak’s “New World Symphony”. Music, like cooking is a creative art form, and the two go together well. This mornings quick cooking project was to bake something sort of healthy baked good for the crew at Essex Middle River Vet Clinic. They take such good care of Miss Vixen on our almost weekly chemo visits, and she is doing well thus far. So there I was trying a new recipe for Whole Wheat Biscuits and had a very short timeframe to pull it off. From the music library I selected Jude Cole’s “Start the Car” to power me through the prep part of this job. It only took about 10 minutes to measure and mix the dough and another 5 to knead and cut the biscuits out. I cut them small so there will be enough for the crew at EMVC. In the oven they went and I went to work on the laptop writing this piece. Now they are out of the oven and smelling great! Time to get to the vet.

Whole Wheat Honey Biscuits

We are back from the vet and Miss Vixen got to skip the chemo today due to low white count on the blood test. She is still in complete remission according to the vet and looking good!

Back from the vet

The crew there liked the biscuits and apricot jam for a morning snack, and I told them I take requests for what I’ll cook for next weeks visit. Cooking treats for people is one of the best ways I know to show gratitude. If you like whole grain baking this King Arthur baking book is just about my all time favorite baking cookbook. Give it a try and bake some healthy goodness in your home. Be sure and show someone you care by cooking up something special for them soon.

Whole Grain Baking from King Arthur

Otavalo street market

My wife and I just got back from eight days in Ecuador. It was a lot of fun exploring the food scene and natural places in the country. We found many tasty foods in our wide travels. From the $2.50 lunch in Mindo that had fried chicken and rice with a bowl of soup, to the wonderful seafood of the coast and Galapagos Islands. I attempted last night, to recreate a rice dish in Ecuador that is similar to a Spanish Paella. The big difference is with this rice dish you don’t cook the vegies and meat with the rice, and you don’t use saffron. My attempt last night included onions, carrots, peas, and garlic then mixed with steamed brown rice for a nice vegetarian dish. In Ecuador they commonly prepare it with squid, octopus, clams and shrimp. It was fairly easy and quick to create and I’ll give it a few more tries before posting the recipe. I suspect just like paella you can add chicken, sausage, and artichoke hearts if you like.

Another nice dish was the fried Tilapia. We only had it once but it was quite good. Tilapia is raised in Ecuador and exported to the U.S. often. The big difference is in Ecuador is usually is sold whole but in the U.S. is usually skinned and fileted.

In Otavalo we were amazed at the Saturday market. I had been to the regular market three years previous to this trip, but had not seen the huge Saturday market. It goes for blocks and blocks in every direction from the main square with people selling from tables or just sitting on the ground. You can buy just about any local food there is from pigs, chickens, fruits, vegetables, rice and beans. If we had cooking facilities in our accommodations I would have gone wild cooking all these amazing fresh foods! The avocados in the area were some of the best I have ever tasted. The hotel we stayed at, ( La Posada del Quinde) had a nice restaurant that served a tuna salad stuffed avocado that I had twice during our two day stay because it was so good. They also served a quinoa soup that I re-created last night. I have eaten quinoa for about 6 years now but never thought to put it in a soup. Once I do further testing on my version I’ll post the recipe.

Trout with shrimp sauce

Trout was also on the menu at several places we ate at and we had it twice. At the Hacienda Cusin in Otavalo we joined our new friends Mel and Peggy from upstate New York and had the rolled trout filet topped with shrimp sauce that was excellent.

Everywhere we stayed were different fruit juices served with breakfast and sometimes lunch. They had mango, strawberry, watermelon, and a few local special juices I still don’t know the name of. All were good and safe to drink. We rarely ate fresh fruit or vegies to avoid traveler’s disease.

We finished off the trip in Quito with a native guide for a 6 hour tour of the historic old town area. In old town we found a trendy street with many little shops and restaurants including Republica Del Cacao. I have tried their chocolate in the U.S. before and didn’t think it was that good. I went in the store with low expectations, but didn’t know they had many more varieties then I had seen in the U.S. Here also were samples of each kind of chocolate, and sample we did. They had a wild pineapple covered chocolate that was the best fruit and chocolate I had ever tasted. We ended up buying four types of dark chocolate bars and the pineapple covered chocolate too. Later in our guided trip I had the guide take us the SuperMaxi a large grocery store chain in Ecuador and bought more chocolate at much lower prices to bring home. With each bar we open in the U.S. will be fond memories of a great trip. Republica del Chocolate also has a shop in the Quito airport that is worth a stop even though it is a bit more expensive than buying in SuperMaxi.

Chocolate shop Quito airport

All in all I would highly recommend Ecuador as a great vacation spot. There are many interesting places with very different climate zones to visit. Be sure and read up on it first as you need to know what precautions to take, like staying away from certain foods and neighborhoods. I would recommend tripadvisor.com and their So. America forum to get specific information on an area you want to see. We used it often and it helped immensely. Your public library will probably have several guide books to as Ecuador is rapidly becoming the place to visit.

Mexican food in the U.S. is one of the least known ethnic foods we eat. We don’t know much about it beyond tacos, burritos, and nachos. The blame goes to our eat first ask questions later harried lifestyle. We seldom ask, is that all there is to Mexican food”? My eyes were first opened back in the 1980’s when I bought a book of Mexican recipes that were nothing like the foods I had eaten for years at Mexican restaurants in Colorado, New Mexico, and Alaska. These were bold new dishes with fish, and turkey in them. Chiles with names I had never heard of frequented the pages. It was so intimidating to find some of the ingredients I never cooked a single recipe from the book and lost it amongst the many moves that followed over the years. That cookbook did however open my eyes to a different aspect of Mexican food.

Baltimore is really my first experience with a wider range of Mexican dishes. Two restaurants stand out in this food voyage of discovery. The first was Fiesta Mexicana that featured street foods of Mexico City. Beef tongue tacos, strange and delicious sandwiches called tortas, amazing guacamole, and the best enchiladas I have ever had. Then came R&R Taqueria that was featured on the Diners, Dives and Drive Ins show. This was the first place I ate Mexican lamb. They slow cook a whole lamb in onions, garlic and spices then use it in taco that only costs $2.19! They also put it in other dishes like huaraches, and tortas.  I was amazed at the taste and quality of their food. They have the best beef tongue tacos I have ever had. The tilapia and shrimp dishes were amazing too. This is stuff that you just didn’t see in most Mexican restaurants up until the 1990’s in most places. It seems that slowly but surely the true variety of Mexican Cuisine is showing up on American menus and it’s about time.

While browsing my library a couple days ago I spied Simple Food, Big Flavor by Aaron Sanchez. I decided right then and there I was going in search of a wider view of Mexican food and see if I could find a healthier version. Last night I dove into that book and Rosa’s New Mexican Table, by Roberto Santibanez to come up with the following dinner. I started by making Habenero Love from Simple Food, Big Flavor. It’s a fluffy salsa mostly made from bell peppers,(red and yellow), onion and yes, habenero. It’s a special salsa that is not too hot, but full of flavor. I doubled the amount of habeneros which made the heat just about right for me. The next dish I tackled was Mushroom Quesadillas that I turned into soft tacos, but other than that I followed the recipe. I rounded it off with a Mexican Red Rice recipe I found posted on a food blog. It made for a wonderful meal that many a vegetarian would love. So my challenge to you is to explore the internet and your library to open up the possibilities of cooking quick and healthy Mexican food in your home. I think you are going to love it.

Mushroom Tacos, Mexican Red Rice