Don Giacomo

Don Giacomo e signora

Most people in and around Nongkhai know him as Jimmy the Shmear, but in the New Jersey and New York area he is known as Don Giacomo, a title of great deference and respect. The Don's late wife was a Siciliana and as a result of marriage he was, somewhat involuntarily, associated with all things Sicilian. We are told that he was a house painter (hence the nickname "the shmear") but that was only part of the truth because, together with his in-lawed Sicilian family, he was widely reputed to shmear various other things as well.

As was the custom for men of his status, the Don wore a ring but his Protestant upbringing precluded any kind of imitation of the Catholic practice of kissing the ring. Instead, he would tell supplicants simply to kiss his ass. Few people actually did, but the ATTITUDE  he used to make the suggestion was quite intimidating and inspired great fear which pleased the Don very much.

Now recently, Don Giacomo acquired a new villa here in Nongkhai and I called on him to pay my respects and to wish him bona fortuna in his new digs. He seemed happy to see me. After diplomatically declining to kiss his ass, I was received in his usual gracious manner and we munched on olives and prosciutto (i.e.cheddar cheese) and sipped grappa (i.e. beer Chang) whilst having our usual on-going discussions about philosophy and the meaning of life.

It was right about then that the Don suddenly said, "Brashule!"

I said "What?"

"Brashule," he repeated, but this time with the ATTITUDE. "It's a wonderful dish that La Siciliana used to make and that you should do at Milford's Corner."

Of course, I had no idea what he was talking about but knowing his fearsome reputation and concerned about being shmeared, I moved quickly and did a Google search. Neither of us knew how to spell it, so I searched phonetically and came up with braciole. "That's it!" said the Don to my great relief.

It turns out that braciole is the italian version of rouladen, a German dish mentioned in one of my previous posts. It is basically a piece of beef stuffed, rolled into a cylinder, braised in a tomato sauce and served over pasta. Some people refer to it as the food of the Godfather and Don Giacomo has now made an offer I cannot refuse. Friday, 19 August (after 5pm); be there.

Chicken Parmasan

I don't remember where or when I first discovered Chicken Parmesan. It might have been in one of those little inexpensive restaurants that catered to students on Columbia Road in Washington DC. Or, maybe at a similar such place in Boston's Italian North End. But I do know two things for sure; I had never experienced anything like that coming out of my mother's kitchen and it was absolutely fantastic. It quickly became one of my favorites.

It took many years of experimenting in my own kitchen to get the recipe correct. But eventually I learned to cook a fairly decent one. My version uses both chicken breasts and, with a nod toward the vegetarian version, aubergine. This is a bit of a departure from convention, but I assure you the outcome is absolutely delicious.

This will be the first time that I offer Chicken Parmesan as a Friday special which happens to be appropriate since this Friday, 8 July will be a very special day indeed. Come on by and find out why!!

Irma's Pork Pot Roast

Irma used to be my mother-in-law. I liked her a lot, indeed as it turned out, a lot more than her daughter.

Like her daughter, Irma was born in Germany and an offspring of the Third Reich from which in some ways she never recovered. She spent the war years living in a commune deep in the Wald with other children who had been evacuated to protect against Allied bombing. It was in the commune that she learned to be frugal and also where she began her lifelong love for cooking.

 "Do you know how much egg is wasted,"  she would ask in heavily accented English as she ran her finger around inside a broken egg shell to extract every bit of albumen, "In the camp, we could save enough egg white to feed another person." Irma was like that.

With her ex-POW husband (Luftwaffe, shot down over Scotland) and first-born daughter (my ex), Irma emigrated to Canada as a young woman and began her career as homemaker and --eventually-- mother of three girls. But, as I was to find out, it was in the kitchen where she reigned as both queen and, for me, inspiration.

It was over braised pork pot roast that we first connected. She had fixed it for us on a holiday visit to Toronto and I was genuinely effusive in my praise. She seemed pleased by my appreciation, so much so that she started upon a year-long tutorial, including mandatory trips to the market with instructions on how to pick just the right piece of meat, what kind of equipment to use and strict cooking techniques.

"Now, you must WORK with it," she would say while I watched her brown the roast, "you MUST be patient." Her tone was commanding, made somehow more so by her accent.

On birthdays and Christmas she would always give me something to advance my German cooking skills. Soon, if I say so myself, I learned to do a pretty good pork pot roast, although it must be said I could never quite do it as well as her. In the end, it was always a matter of that 'right touch'.

Irma eventually extended the lessons to potato salad, sauerkraut, potato pancakes, cabbage rolls, and rolladen. But it was braised pork pot roast that was always the star in the repertoire and for which I will always remember her.

It saddened me to learn recently that Irma is suffering from Alzheimer's. I suppose she would not recognize me today but I'll bet anything she would recognize the wonderful smell of a good pork pot roast.

This Friday's special will be my feeble attempt to duplicate Irma's wonderful pot roast. I only wish she were here to join us.

Coming to Terms with Thai Beef (contd) - Beef Brisket

As part of the continuing challenge of cooking Thai beef, this week's Friday special will be beef brisket. As many of you know, brisket is one of the toughest cuts of beef; it is so tough the Thais say it even makes the tiger cry when he chews it. And yet, when cooked slowly over low heat it is also one of the most tender and flavorful cuts. Needless to say that is how we do it at MC.

Now, I have not done brisket for a while; in the past I have cooked it in a sort of British/New England style with onions and gravy. This Friday, however, I am going to try my hand at a more Texas style, which to say smoked over the barbeque.

So y'all mosey on over to MC on Friday to check the latest episode of coming to terms. Y'a hear?

Comfort Food - Pork Rashers

One of the things that amazed me when I first arrived in Southeast Asia some thirty years ago was the similarity between here and the sub-culture of my upbringing in America. There was, for example, the great respect accorded to elders here just like in my community at home. Or the games I saw children playing being almost identical to those games I played as a child back home.

The similarities on the economic front were also very obvious to me. In my day, parents frequently left their children behind in small villages and towns to seek employment opportunity in the big city. I, for example, spent the first four years of my life with my maternal grandmother on a farm in North Carolina while my parents worked in New York City; only joining them when I started school.

Like the great migration to Bangkok here, hundreds of thousands of poor people from rural areas in the US migrated to big cities looking for opportunities. And yet, unemployment remained high and those who were fortunate enough to have employment often lived from paycheck to paycheck, not unlike today.

The food I found in the markets of Southeast Asia also amazed me for much of it was identical or similar to the foods from home. From sweet tubers to green leaf vegetables to pig's feet and intestines, my trips to the markets here were often a nostalgic return to the kitchens of my boyhood. And, like here, rice and chilies were staple foods in our community.

Both here and there, these are fundamentally cultures of survival. With respect to food, one aspect of survival is that nothing is ever wasted. Whatever can be eaten will be eaten and that which cannot be eaten will somehow be recycled to produce more food.

As a tribute to these cultures of survival, this week's Friday Special will be pork rashers (bellies) with collard greens and rice. This is a variation of a dish made by both my mother and grandmother and resembles several dishes found in this region using almost the same ingredients. Ours is made using strips of pork bellies roasted in a tomato-based sauce flavored with molasses and honey.

While it is true that this just happens to be my personal comfort food, it is my hope that you will enjoy it as much as I do and perhaps even adopt it as your own comfort food.

Here's to eating low on the hog!

The Secrets of Le Chateau de Bouesse

My friend Harry, an Englishman, once owned a castle in France. I suppose by medieval standards it was modest, but to my modern day eye it was very impressive indeed. It stood on a parcel of land of about 5 acres in the middle of a little village called Bouesse, southwest of Paris in Joan of Arc country, you know the place of witches and magic and all that stuff. The stone walls of the castle were over a meter thick in some places and the original part of the castle dated back to the 12th century. It was an amazing place, and after 800 years of history you can imagine that the walls had lots of stories to tell. After spending a few nights there even I came away with a strange one.

Harry and his wife, Jacqueline, had decided to buy the castle, renovate it and turn it into a first-class hotel. Jacqueline was a French national originally from New Caledonia but wanted to live back in France metropole. One of the things they wanted to open at the hotel, of course, was a restaurant.

Jacqueline was a great cook especially of French country food. During one of my visits prior to the opening of the hotel she interrupted her renovation work to fix a very simple but elegant boneless beef shank in my honor. I was so delighted I asked for the recipe which she happily gave me. Later, I was to learn that when the restaurant opened they hired a real chef, so Jacqueline no longer cooked. But I still have the recipe and have treasured it all these years, using it many times, always with great success.

For this Friday's special, I have turned once again to Jacqueline's time-honored recipe, except this time it is with Thai beef. It is interesting, however, that traditional French beef is raised in a similar manner to Thai beef, that is, free range. But can one get the same results?

Come on by on Friday and find out...oh, and while you are at Milford's Corner, ask about the strange events that take place in Room 5 at the Chateau de Bouesse.

Crispy Roast Loin of Pork

At Milford's Corner, we try to offer our customers a unique Nongkhai dining experience. Many of our dishes will not be found elsewhere in town and we take pride in being a little bit different.

Hope it  will look like this!!

This week (Friday 20 May) however, we are going to offer a dish that is found frequently around Nongkhai: crispy roast loin of pork. There quite a few folks around town who can do this dish the way it should be done, which is to say skin puffy and crispy on the outside; meat moist and tender inside. I must confess that I have attempted this dish many times but have never quite measured up to the standard. While the meat was eminently edible, the roast lacked the flair and elan of a properly done pork roast. Never mind, I shall try again.

Drop on by on Friday and weigh in whether we have yet hit the target.