I'm Just Here For The Food Part 21

Speaking of your nose, sneezing and blowing are two of the best ways to introduce unwanted germs into your food. Coughing is good, too. And I hope I don't have mention the bathroom, right?

Organically Challenged

It's become clear in recent years that microorganisms inside livestock can become resistant to the sub-diagnostic doses of antibiotics that are often (in fact, usually) given to livestock in this country. Now this doesn't mean they become super-bugs, capable of shooting webs or turning into rubber-they still die at proper cooking temperatures. The problem is cross-contamination in the kitchen. If you're not diligent, you could end up with a strain of bug that won't respond to the first few drugs that are tried. This is not good news. As a result, I'm starting to look seriously at switching to organic and naturally raised meats whenever I can, not for flavor as much as for safety.

Want to keep up with developments in food safety? check out www.fda.gov. They've got it all.

Sources U.S Food & Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety & Applied Nutrition: Foodborne Microorganisms and Natural Toxins (informally known as the "Bad Bug Book"). Available for downloading at (informally known as the "Bad Bug Book"). Available for downloading at http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~mow/badbug.zip The Educational Foundation of the National Restaurant a.s.sociation: Applied Foodservice Sanitation, 4th Ed. (1992) McGee, Harold: On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen. New York: Fireside, 1984.

The Top 5 Activities to Be Pursued by a Cook

Number 1 : Keep up with Family

Food is heritage. It's what makes "me" into "we." Besides, even if you don't like your family, everybody likes food. I keep a book of family recipes. They're not all good, but a few of them are cla.s.sics for my clan and I'd hate to lose them.

Number 2 : Travel

Whether you drive to the next county or the next hemisphere, nothing says where you are like the food you find along the way. When it comes to eating, beware the tourist guidebooks. Seek out the local favorites.

Number 3: Cook

Yes, this is fairly obvious, but the truth is, most of us cook as a means to an end: eating. What I'm suggesting is that you cook to cook. And keep a record of what you cook and what you thought of it before, during, and after the process.

Number 4 : Taste

Remember, flavor is a noun, taste is a verb, and it's one we often forget to bother with. We'll spend hours preparing food that we gulp down in minutes as if we're afraid a band of hyenas might pa.s.s through and wrestle it away from us. So chew your food and taste it. If you're with other people, stop talking for a minute and just taste. If you're by yourself, turn off the TV, put down the book, and enjoy your interface with planet Earth. And I'm not just talking about fancy fare here. I'm talking about that ballpark frank, that cup of coffee, that Milky Way bar. Heck, if you're going to have to work off the calories, doesn't it make sense to enjoy them to the fullest?

Number 5: Read

Cooking and food connect to everything: history, art, literature, physics, chemistry, math-you name it, food's got it. So, the more you read about food, the smarter you get about everything.

A Selected Reading List

Although I've never counted, I'd guess I have more than 500 books dealing with food. These are the t.i.tles that never seem to make it from my table back onto the shelf.

Outlaw Cook, John Thorne For my mind and money, John Thorne is the best American food writer alive and Outlaw Cook Outlaw Cook is the is the Physiology of Taste Physiology of Taste of our time. Part cookbook, part meditation, Thorne's book looks at everything from appet.i.te to meatb.a.l.l.s to the virtues of not being a very good cook. This is the book I reach for when the thrill is gone. of our time. Part cookbook, part meditation, Thorne's book looks at everything from appet.i.te to meatb.a.l.l.s to the virtues of not being a very good cook. This is the book I reach for when the thrill is gone.

Cookwise, Shirley O. Corriher Shirley is a hero and a friend and not only is her book full of delicious and reliable recipes, the text and ill.u.s.trations explain exactly why they are delicious and reliable. Applicable food science for the cook who really doesn't want to look at electrospectrographs (not that there's anything wrong with that).

On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen, Harold McGee Scholarly, scientific, badly dog-eared. This is the book cooks are talking about when they refer to the "bible." Until McGee got his nerdy self into the kitchen, cooks did things for no other reason than that they had been trained to do so. McGee changed that by explaining ingredients and methodologies via science. His sequel, The Curious Cook, The Curious Cook, is a companion piece that takes a close look at specific issues, from poaching to the perfect sorbet, which no one but McGee would ever have the patience to quantify. At nearly 700 recipe-free pages, this is not an easy read, but it is an indispensable one for any cook who wants to know "why." is a companion piece that takes a close look at specific issues, from poaching to the perfect sorbet, which no one but McGee would ever have the patience to quantify. At nearly 700 recipe-free pages, this is not an easy read, but it is an indispensable one for any cook who wants to know "why."

Gastronomic Me, M.F.K. Fisher The first time I saw Fisher's photo on the back of her wartime treasury How to Eat a Wolf How to Eat a Wolf, I fell into a heavy crush. She could cook and eat and write-and she looked like Grace Kelly. Boy, do I wish I could have shared just one meal with this woman and then sat around to talk about it. Not only was Fisher the first modern food writer, she was a woman, not a chef, which makes her writing even better. Her work reads as if it were written yesterday afternoon. n.o.body before or since has written as thoughtfully about eggs.

The Joy of Cooking (1962-1975 editions), Irma S. Rombauer (1962-1975 editions), Irma S. Rombauer The only book on earth that tells you how to make marshmallows and and skin a squirrel. skin a squirrel.

The New Food Lover's Companion, Sharon Tyler Herbst The subt.i.tle says it all: Comprehensive Definitions of Nearly 6,000 Food, Drink, and Culinary Terms Comprehensive Definitions of Nearly 6,000 Food, Drink, and Culinary Terms. I keep mine in a cool little zippered carrying case designed for Bibles and I take it everywhere. Although I like to act like I know everything, it actually does.

The Food Chronology, James Trager Name a year, and Trager has charted its food-relevant events, broken down into cla.s.sifications such as science, politics, economics, energy, medicine, religion, and so on. There are several great books on food history, but most of them spin their pages on a.n.a.lysis. Trager just says what happened, when, and to whom, and what. A food history Jack Webb would have loved.

The Visual Food Encyclopedia, edited by Serge D'Amico and Francois Fortin In addition to thorough histories and technical information, this weighty tome sports more than 1,200 entries with excellent color ill.u.s.trations. When you need to know what spirulina looks like, you'll have the answer right on your bookshelf.

The Frugal Gourmet, Jeff Smith This was my first cookbook. I don't care what he does or did in his personal life. Everything in here worked back then and still does.

The New Southern Cook, John Martin Taylor I don't usually buy cookbooks, especially regional ones, but this came to me as a gift. Once I tried a recipe, I cooked everything in it. Taylor has both knowledge and respect for Southern cooking, but he isn't afraid to take modern approaches. The recipes are dead-on and never fail.

The Time-Life Good Cook Series, Richard Olney, editor This multivolume series from the 1970s covers everything from cla.s.sic desserts to salads to sauces. Whenever I don't understand a procedure involving a cla.s.sic dish (a common occurrence), I go to these books. They feature extremely accurate and easy-to-follow photo-steps to teach basic procedures, which are followed up with zillions of recipes. This series has been out of print for a while now, but thanks to the Internet you can find them used.

The American Century Cookbook: The Most Popular Recipes of the 20th Century The Most Popular Recipes of the 20th Century, Jean Anderson Those who do not cook their history are doomed to repeat it, which isn't always a bad thing.

Fish and Sh.e.l.lfish, James Peterson For my money the best seafood book around. Peterson is a teacher rather than a chef, and I appreciate the difference.

Just before Dark, Jim Harrison The guy who wrote Legends of the Fall Legends of the Fall and and Wolf Wolf is also a h.e.l.luva food writer in a Hemingway kind of vein. His tastes run rich (foie gras, sweetbreads, half-rotted pheasants), but he writes about these foods with such gusto, such machismo that you want to go out and buy a couple of chest freezers and fill them with stuff you killed. Harrison used to write a column in is also a h.e.l.luva food writer in a Hemingway kind of vein. His tastes run rich (foie gras, sweetbreads, half-rotted pheasants), but he writes about these foods with such gusto, such machismo that you want to go out and buy a couple of chest freezers and fill them with stuff you killed. Harrison used to write a column in Esquire Esquire called "The Raw and the Cooked," and it was there I first read a review of Thorne's called "The Raw and the Cooked," and it was there I first read a review of Thorne's Outlaw Cook Outlaw Cook.

Here are some additional t.i.tles I recommend adding to your library.

How Baking Works, Paula Figoni

Foodbook and The Food Chronology, James Trager

Hungry Planet, Peter Menzel and Faith D'Alusio

Becoming a Chef and Culinary Artistry, Andrew Dornenburg and Karen Page

The Cook's Essential Kitchen Dictionary, Jacques L. Rolland