THE GURGLING COD

Add Gael

Bruni lists and discusses GG's choices for restaurants that mattered most. The Quilted Giraffe, yes, Ducasse/Boulud/hell even Chang like he says, no? Should we be surprised that Delmonico's is not on the list?

Looks like a good day for a new world to begin

Breaking bailout news from Artisanal!

The $700 B for Billion may or may not be in the offing for the Man,* but the folks at Artisanal have an answer:

Skyrocketing gas prices, a tumultuous economy, and daily market turmoil should not stop you from enjoying delicious Artisanal Cheese. We mean it . . . and we’re doing something about it!

We've decided to do our part to help in anxious times by drastically reducing our shipping prices.

Starting today, our new shipping prices go into effect, which means immediate savings - in some cases well over 50%.

I know they mean well, but I am not confident that being able to have almost 300 dollars worth of cheese shipped to me for only $21.99 is not quite the same thing as feeling like you are out of the woods.
*Enough to pay Tim Wakefield's 2008 salary for 175,000 years.

This ain't no Freaknik

 I was looking for something different on the KFC site -- deets tk -- but did find this.
KFC* as a sponsor of an event for HBCU**s? WTF?***

*Kentucky Fried Chicken.
**Historically Black Colleges and Universities.
 ***Whiskey Tango Foxtrot: There is a long, and not intended to be flattering, association between black people and fried chicken. You may remember Fuzzy Zoeller putting his foot in it on this subject not so long ago. So to have The Artist Formerly Known as Kentucky Fried Chicken sponsoring an event for HBCUs is a surprise. Has that stigma eased? Or has KFC's brand moved past what the F and the C stand for? The Cod wants to know.

Using blurs and slurs and words that don't fit

Gael Greene goes on beyond the OED in recalling her best meal evs:*

 Choose the best meal I’ve eaten as a restaurant critic? My brain reels in a barrage of taste memories; it’s all but impossible to single out just one. But for an all-time cuisinary high, that first astonishing dinner at the preposterous Palace stands out from the 18,814 meals I’ve eaten as a restaurant critic.

Cuisinary? Nice to meet you. Nothing wrong with inventing words when there is not one that will do. Justsk Uncle Grambo, or Shakespeare. But when a perfectly cromulent word like "culinary" exists, is it worth effing with "cusinary"? Don't print publications have editors to keep an eye on this kind of thing?

*If you were hoping that the answer would be "Sonic drive-in+ romp w/ Burt Reynolds in the back of his Impala, ca. 1978," you are far from alone.

If you have to explain...

A new game here at The Gurgling Cod. It's called "Things Julia Child Never Said."  Click to read the Giadia pufferview below, and see if you can spot* the Thing Julia Child Never Said:

 

An autographed Mario Batali empathy belly to the first correct answer!

Bruni: Don't call it a Comeback

The maestro lulls us with weeks of relatively flatfooted reviews, and then, when you least expect it, delivers like he's wearing brown shorts and carrying a Teamsters card:
As she washed down a Reuben fritter (Swiss cheese, sauerkraut and corned beef inside a densely battered shell) with a bloody mary, I asked her to play the Margaret Mead of downtown meatloaf, which Delicatessen and Cafeteria both serve.
Your eyes do not deceive: "the Margaret Mead of Downtown meatloaf." It works on so many levels. Coming of age in Samoa Soho (and eating meatloaf). Setting aside the anthropologist, is there another writer working today who possesses the audacity to write the word "downtown" and then write "meatloaf"? Is it possible not to imagine that Bruni is coyly referring to some chapter in Klaus Nomi's career known only to him? Finally, does the phrase suggests just a hint of somone fellating the auteur of Bat out of Hell?

Martha and franks and gherkins, oh, my!

This photograph is the best way I can think of to mention that Rick of Rick's Picks recently crafted some gherkins under the supervision of this same Ms. Stuart.

Ruude Vegan Pasta

I know. Old dog, new tricks. But this bastardization of a favorite Zuni receipt is tasty, and an excllent source of olive oil.

Preheat oven to 450.

Boil water.

Grind up some stale bread to make bread crumbs.*

Split and core a cauliflower. Slice, discarding thicker portions of fibrous limbs, and indifferently crumble the florets.

Toss cauliflower with generous slug of olive oil.

Mince some garlic. How much depends on you. Grind some fennel seed.  Toss garlic, fennel seed and dried red pepper flakes with cauliflower, spread in 1 layer on olive oiled cookie sheet, and put in oven.

While this happens, gather  about 1/3 cup capers, and pit about 1/2 cup oil cured olives.

After about 15 min, when cauliflower is looking brown, remove from oven, mound up and redistribute in single layer. Return to oven.

Slice up some peperoncini or bananna peppers. Put 1 lb pasta (rotini or something) in the boiling water.

Drain the pasta when it is ready.  Toss pasta with cauliflower, olive caper mix.

Toast breadcrumbs with some olive oil on the stovetop.

Just before serving, toss pasta with peppers, and garnish with crumbs. Serve at once. The orig Zuni calls for anchovies, but I forgot, and then realized as I was eating, there was no dairy, meat, or egg involved, which is rare for meals I cook. As the AG observed of his take on this receipt, it probably ain't good for ya,  but it tastes good. The peperoncini are a kind of FHMish touch, but they really make this debased version of the Judy Rogers original work.

*I discovered that the grater works much better than the chopping blade for this. Do I win the trip to Cozumel with Chris Kimball?

Moby Dick: The Movie

Usually the cinetrix handles the movie stuff all up in here, but the following from Variety touches a nerve, day job wise:

Universal Pictures has made a splashy preemptive buy of "Moby Dick," a reimagining of the Herman Melville whale tale that Timur Bekmambetov ("Wanted") will direct.

Studio paid high six figures to Adam Cooper and Bill Collage to pen the screenplay.

The writers revere Melville's original text, but their graphic novel-style version will change the structure. Gone is the first-person narration by the young seaman Ishmael, who observes how Ahab's obsession with killing the great white whale overwhelms his good judgment as captain.

 This change will allow them to depict the whale's decimation of other ships prior to its encounter with Ahab's Pequod, and Ahab will be depicted more as a charismatic leader than a brooding obsessive.

A charismatic leader, you say? I have your leader right here, who is so jacked about hunting whales with you, you would not even believe it:

   

TOTF to PP, which stands for Penny Pascal, and Peerless Photoshopping.