from chicago: a mess on your plate

Is it a chain if there are nine locations of a given eatery? If so, then I am about to scribble some notes on yet another chain – one that we often choose for a meal when in Evanston: the Flat Top Grill.

Don’t stop there, Madisonians, read on, for there is this small sign tucked away at the Flat Top:



I’ve eaten at places similar to it before: you pile onto a plate a selection of stuff, you hand over your mess to the cook and you sit down. In minutes, your very own assortment is stir fried and set before you.

But the Flat Top really pushes it over the top, so that the entire restaurant spins around this stir-fry operation. At any one time, one or two dozen individual mounds are being swished and tossed on the huge flat cooking top. And no, they don’t (99% of the time) mix any of it up: you don’t get any of your neighbor’s spillings.

My eating companions have preferences. One of them especially likes a few select veggies, of the green and thin type, and so she carefully mounds her bowl with her favorites. There are also wonderful sauces and spiced waters that you can ladle onto your mound and she looks for her one or two precious blends each time.

Me, I have my cluttered mindset scribbled all over the plate. None of this meticulous selection and scrutiny. There are literally two dozen raw veggies (and a handful of fruits, plus raw meats and fish for those who like to throw in such stuff) out there to pick from and another dozen sauces and mostly I find them all irresistible, so that in the end, my plate looks like this:



It’s all very economical. Your mound of food is around $12 and for another couple of bucks you can get another round of it. If you take their wine suggestion, you’re out only $12 for the bottle.

I feel after dinner completely satisfied that I have covered all my veggie needs for a week. Guilt-free eating. As fresh and honest as it gets.

So one more little plug for a chain-ish place. Asian again. About to pop up in Madison. I’ll be there when it opens.

windy (city), warm thoughts

Just about two dozen years ago, my daughter and I took a stroll down Michigan Avenue in Chicago.


downtown Chicago, 1983

Today we again made our way downtown. And now I am spent. It is a shame that when I finally take to the road again and leave Madison for a quick trip to Chicago, I have so little energy at the end of the day that I can say nothing beyond that I am here.


downtown Chicago, March 10, 2006



March weather: eating outside

chained

I am tickled by the response to the new restaurant that opened less than two months ago on the far west side of Madison: PF Chang’s. Overheard: it’s okaaaaay. Too salty. Not as good as Muramoto.

Interesting perspectives.

Chang’s is a chain. In Madison, it is not cool to like chains. Okay, Whole Foods. You can admit to shopping at Whole Foods and people will forgive you. These days. And after shrugging apologetically, even serious types will tell you that they hang out at Borders.

But mention restaurant chains and the Inner Circle turns up the Inner Nose.

So why is it that yesterday, midweek, rainy and cold, Chang’s was packed, so packed in its huge space, that even those with reservations (us) had to wait? (Wee hoo, free apps as a result!)

Oh, I was initially put off by the huge stone horses at the entrance. Welcome, big crowds! You are now in Vegas! And my man Jason, who clips and colors with a mark of genius, just a parking lot away, shriveled his nose at the tofu when I asked for a lowdown . Too soggy, he tells me.

But others who have eaten at one of the many Chang’s outside the Midwest, brought in different reports and so three of us hiked west to give Chang’s a chance.

Oh there were imperfections: the wait, the forgetful waiter, the rain. Yes, the rain. I did not like being drenched on my way in or out. So there.

But the food was fine! Lettuce wraps, oolong marinated sea bass, black bean chicken. Main dishes hovering around twelve dollars.



Oh we are such great critics, you and I! We all love to knock down everything in sight: places, spaces, people’s cv’s, food. Too salty, too imperfect. It has been done better elsewhere on the planet.

Yes, of course. I agree. And somewhere on this planet there is real spring and flowers are blooming and people are looking out their office spaces and witnessing something far brighter than this:



today on Bascom Hill


I’ll pick small, earnest cooks and growers and producers over big guys most times. I’ll shove artisanal down your throat, I’ll preach the organic mantra. But I wont turn my back on a place that is packed with hungry people who, at the end of the evening, leave intending to come back. I’m one of them. Call me insane, but I am one who even loves a number of items on the Macaroni Grill menu (another maligned chain). I forgive the name there, just as I forgive the Vegas horses outside PF Chang’s. (I do not forgive the weather. Madison, get it together.)

taxes and tables

I met with a CPA today.

For more than thirty years I have been filling out tax forms – for myself, family members, pretty much anyone who walked down the road and asked me for help. I had 1040 confidence.

Then I started making mistakes. Not huge, but come July I’d hear from the IRS. They always included the worlds “you owe.” Nice little note that often came minutes before the fireworks of the fourth of July. Yay Uncle Sam. [Mind you, I like taxes, I do. I just don’t like to be told I made a mistake. Even if I did.]

And here we are, tax season at hand. Since 2005 was a year of Great Changes for me, I became concerned that I would be royally tax-screwed.

Go get help, said one friend.
Do turbo tax, said another.
Sharpen your pencil and do it yourself, another shrugged.

I sharpened the pencil, called a CPA and wrote down the time of the appointment.

Then I went for a walk.


a picnic table outside Monona Terrace: waiting for better weather

this morning

Misty scenes, misty dreams. Wake up, look outside.



morning, part 1

Eventually, a fog lifts, light comes through, something beautiful is revealed.



morning, part 2

midnight

It used to be that it had no meaning for me: midnight. Big deal. Hands of a clock, moving, always moving. I’m on the computer, there’s music. No compulsion to work at that hour, no pressure to perform. Post midnight time was my time.

Then midnight became synonymous with an Ocean deadline. Self-imposed. Post something by then or else. A journalist’s deadline, except I am no journalist. Just a blogger. Still, midnight is suddenly threatening.

And now it is a goal, not a given, that I should stay awake that long. On Saturday, I ended a night out early by saying at 11:45 I am ready to go home.

I am, therefore, pleased that my evening tonight with Tubbs is an early one. You know Tubbs – the Eldorado guy? And his new restaurant on Atwood Avenue? Tex Tubb’s Taco Palace? I get the name wrong a lot. I forget the Tex or the Palace, but Tubb’s sticks with me. Sometimes I think I would do well with a last name like that. Less subject to mispronunciation.




Tubbs does tacos right. My three, achiote rubbed tilapia, shrimp and grilled portabella, sitting on soft corn tortillas, flavored with chipotle dressing, made my eyes burn with joy. Though perhaps the burn was the result of zestiness, as I doused each taco with one of three salsas available in limitless quantities.





My eating companion wanted a taste and a small greedy part of me wanted to say no. The enchiladas on her plate were plenty delicious. I relented when I realized that each taco was only $2.50. If her bite was too substantial, I could easily order another.

I do wish the backroom where we ate was a little, well, warmer. I am used to eating dinner in my coat in Madison restaurants (winter or summer, the latter raising severe AC issues – it’s as if Wisconsinites can’t get enough of that cold air), but the nip here came from both the cool temps and the cool-ish space. I’m trying to recall why I thought it to be less than embracing and as I spin back, I am seeing gray tones and dim lighting. It’s okay, I can live with it. The food is worth it. But, oh, for a burst of warm air, warm tones, warm something! Maybe I am over dramatizing the fact that we are in March and it feels like the dead of winter still.

P.S. Why an early dinner? Because I am a groupie. Doesn’t it make me a groupie to hear Lucinda Williams in the summer in Milwaukee and then to enthusiastically show up at her feet when she comes to Madison?

day is done

Is a blog the place to exhale? I am exhaling, wearily, spent.

Thirty years ago, I had an Oscars party. I invited friends. I met someone who would, within minutes (yes…) become my husband for the next three decades.

Today, the snow fell, gently, then rapidly. I spent the day talking to people who were reviewing their own past.

It continued, the snow did. Eventually, I spun the wheels of my leased car and drove down to Lake Mendota with my daughter. She told me that one of her best memories is of a snowstorm many years back where I had shooed the family out for a walk by lake Mendota. Today she and I walked there, retracing the steps of ten, twenty years back.

Back home, I did what I needed to do: I cooked for you (even though so many of you could not be here). Roasted pepper soup, figs with cheese, beef with horseradish, citrus rubbed shrimp, chocolate pots de crème.

To you, for this day that was a whiteout weatherwise and clear as anything otherwise.



two birds, different, eyeing each other (Lake Mendota)



roasting figs



citrus rubbed shrimp



pots de creme

March madness, of the good kind

You wake up, you look out and you see blue. You wait an hour, another, and still it is blue. Deep blue.

You drive out ten minutes, abandon the car and start walking. Suddenly, you have silence. Between trees you see Lake Waubesa. Fishermen, still there, in abundance actually.

Overhead, a hawk. Snow is melting. Not rapidly, but melting.

An hour later you head home. Oh, just a few more minutes! You follow the bike trail, the one that passes by your loft. On the offshoot of Lake Monona, the fishermen here too are reaching into that lake, pulling out the last of the little squiggly things. In the distance, a man looks affectionately at his dog, right there, in the middle of the lake.

Such is a March Saturday in Madison.


fishing, lake Waubesa



a pat, lake Monona

let’s do something

...Most frequently uttered words by grown daughter(s) who come to visit (they live on the east coast) and hang out in this town, in times when few of their old friends still remain.

The problem is that doing something in March means keeping indoors. I suggested snowboarding, but it didn’t go over well. Madison is tough for a host humoring someone from out of town.

Okay so let’s do lunch and then a brief spell at Borders, a cup of tea maybe, followed by a drive, then a trip to Whole Foods, then munch delicacies at home, then Wasabi sushi, then let’s top it off with… No, stop right there. Wasabi will fill me up and out.

[Understand: I will need twelve hours to recover from the full day.]

We sit at the bar at Wasabi and watch the skilled guys do their thing. A waitress takes our picture, I take another of the food. For me, true Madisonian (of the “it’s been a long day” type) that I am, this is a mouthful, an eveningful, a postful. Tomorrow night I’ll push the clock. Today, I eat the rolls and roll back home.

westward ho hum

I left westside Madison this Fall. And I was happy to do it. I have lived in the deep countryside of Poland, I have lived in cities on both sides of the ocean, but I never came to understand the suburbs and so it was inevitable that I should leave.

I rarely go back. My distaste for malls is significant and there is little else that will draw me to these parts. Suburban friends, I am certain, will travel downtown to see me. It hasn’t happened much yet, but I am sure they will one day leave their orbit of four blocks and connect down here, where the view of the Capitol, from my writing desk, is stupendous.

But I do go back to the far far west side once a month, just to see my man Jason.

Jason cuts and colors at the Aniu Salon. Jason is so good at what he does that I feel I should not ever share the secret of his existence. As it is, I have to make appointments six months in advance to get a time and day I want and I tip the man to high heaven. I do not want you, reader, discovering the Jason touch.

Today I was once again under his sheers and, as usual, we talked food. I wanted to eat well after the cut and I wanted to eat close by.

Eno Vino? – he asked.

Eno Vino. The location of this place is worse than hell, especially if you hate strip malls and live downtown. Oh, but the food!

I sat at the bar, that part that faces the kitchen. I love watching the weathered arms of chefs moving food between stove and plate.





When asked what I’d like, I say – two dishes (Eno V does food in the style of Crave and Cocoliquot and Nina Camic dinner parties: many small courses, so that you can sample stuff. In the case of Nina Camic dinner parties it is a strategy that permits failure. You make eight courses, one fails, it is outnumbered; people do not remember the burned or underdone something or other, because by then they are so full of good stuff and, well, wine, that it hardly matters). I clarify my request: two dishes that are visually pleasing.

And a Black Cherry Effen Vodka with a splash of white cranberry and lemonade. Because Jason said so.



(Just fyi, I so love the Cosmos at Eno V that I threw one in as well. But don’t tell Jason. I mean, they dribble pureed cranberries down your martini glass. How fresh and honest is that.)



I had what I always have here – the crab and cabbage spring rolls with sweet chili sauce (with a chive-garlic-lime dipping soy sauce).



After that I succumbed to the chef’s recommendation: a seared sea bass with jumbo dive scallops. But there’s more there on my plate – basil verjus butter sauce and a tomato jam. Bet you don’t know what a verjus is. In spite of my previous restaurant employment, I didn’t either until I looked it up tonight: juice of unripe fruit. Verjus, the real thing, verily presented to you without mask or cover, in its bare essence.



Anyway, the staff got into my picture taking obsession. They brought dishes for me to photograph and I did just that, but truthfully I am an egotistical blogger/photographer. I enjoy writing about and shooting down dishes that I myself ingest. Ah, the benefits of having your very own blog.

hi from high noon

I am at a party. The Wisconsin Film Festival Preview Party 2006 at the High Noon Saloon. What you need to gain entry to this party is a friend in the right place at the right time. It’s always like that, isn’t it?

This is as close as I’ll come to a post-Oscar party with famous people present. Actually, I don’t think there are local famous people present. Probably most are here for the free pizza. Not me, I hit the pink stuff.



This party welcomes shy folk like me (so funny) who like to hide behind a computer. I am behind mine. I am high on WiFi at the High Noon Saloon.

It’s my first taste of the High Noon. I am a complete ignoramus as to Madison’s east side bar scene. Okay, to any bar scene. People ask me – what bar do you recommend for a night out here in town and I always list one or two that I visited easily five years ago. Next time I will mention the High Noon Saloon because of this party and the free (not tried by me) pizza.

Because my friend is on top of things, we are sitting at the front table. Hundreds crowded around us. We have laptops (free WiFi, remember?). We Look Important.

But really, I know that I am not important. Not more than the person next to me or the person further down. I am no better than the geese who are confused about their time, their place, their surroundings. They stomp along Lake Monona, wondering if there is ice or water beneath them.


confused

blueberry matters

It is said that blueberries have great health value. I vaguely hear the words “antioxidant” bla bla bla and I imagine I am prolonging my life by ten years by sprinkling them on my granola. There are foods that cause such reactions in me: carrots, grape juice, salmon – I am convinced that if I only remember to ingest some I will have done my duty, thereby keeping screaming ambulances away for a few more years, lessening the anxiety of family members and loved ones.

Of course, the few times I have ridden an ambulance, food could not have stopped the episode leading to it, even had I devoured that day a pound of salmon liberally covered with shaved carrots and dried blueberries. Still, one likes to pretend.

About ten years ago, I had recovered from whatever emergency lead to the ambulance run and I packed up my family and left for a week on Martha’s Vineyard. We stayed at the Inn at Blueberry Hill. We dished out more money per night for two rooms than I ever remember dishing out before or after. It was not a complicated or posh place, but it was Martha’s Vineyard and Martha has got herself one pricey Vineyard.

Still, one evening, before dinner, I poured an aperitif for the adults among us – Dubonnet on the rocks, with a twist – and all four of us sat out on the deck adjacent to one of the rooms and we watched the sun sink lower and lower, until it gave that golden glow to everything and everyone.

The women among us painted toe nails and we all watched bunnies scamper in the way that bunnies scamper.

I thought then that it was a perfect moment: not even the day my high school boyfriend in Poland first put his arm around me felt as perfect.

A less perfect but significant moment was some 40 years ago, when I sat with my grandmother on a bench in front of her house, deep in the village environment of rural Poland and we picked through a bucket of blueberries together. I wonder if she would have answered questions had I asked them. She was not a big talker. A doer who loved through her hands.

In a few days family members are descending on the loft (spring break for them) and the blueberries will multiply. It’s not the season here, but it is in Chile and I always thought that airplanes are meant to transport food as well as people and the whole concept of eating “regional seasonal” foods was obviously invented by Californians.

blog me tender

I had a phone call from someone who wanted to do stuff tonight.

Wanna play pool at the Union?
I’m not good at it, I am tired from the demands of the day, I don’t think so.
You don’t have to be good… you probably are good (the suck-up statement of a desperate person who wants company playing pool).

I dunno… so cold outside… A DVD at home, me on the couch, sipping wine.. mmmm.
Have you done your blogpost for today? Do you know of the photo opportunities at a pool hall?

I’m thinking: you’re right. Let’s go.

Except tonight, more than any other night, I really do not want to play pool. It has as much draw as the lake out there with the half-frozen fishermen, sitting, waiting, hoping not to crash down under. There’s a pool for you, a pool of dirty post-winter water, just what I want. That or a pool hall.

No one on this planet really cares deeply if I post daily or not. No one. I do it for myself. And I will continue to do it in this way. Only the deal is such: I will not structure my actions to conform to blogworthiness. If my day does not produce a photo or an event, then I will reach within myself and blog about the clutter inside.

Comments have been disabled for this post. Tonight, it is a statement, not a conversation.

after dinner clean-up notes: palate cleansers

It’s an excuse: I often make granitas and call them palate cleansers but really I just like the way they taste. Like the shaved ice that they are, subtly touched by fruit.

But not today. Today my palate cleanser, served between portabella soup, the stuffed tomato with salmon and capers, the chicken rolled with apricots and mushrooms and the desserts, there it will be, a celery salad with nothing more than flat leaf parsley, bits of cheese and lemon vinaigrette added to it.

I am tired of the sweet upon sweet. I want fresh and crisp and pungent.

Yesterday morning I was asked if all my sadnesses, the ones that show up here and there, if they have one source these days. I said yes. There aren’t many times that I can answer with a yes because days can shake out any number of thorns and waspy moments.

Is the idea that if I deal with this one source, then I will coast? My own plate will be clean of sadnesses and I will bask?

In the meantime, I stuff myself with good and interesting foods. They possess me and I them and truthfully, they temper that which comes to the surface now and then.

But in addition, I can keep trying out palate cleansers until I strike gold and I will not then taste anything but the dessert that follows. In this case, the celery salad wipes out traces of everything that came before it, making room for lemon soufflés along with the pine nut tart.



fresh and crisp



delicate and dreamy

ms. dilly-dally-the-time-away goes out to buy flowers

All these people to feed tonight and what do I do? I spend the morning in conversation, then I search for candles and then I take the time to fiddle with flowers.

Thank God for last night’s Olympics. I became so agitated with those skiers and skaters that I had to bake. So at least I have one of the desserts, an almond tart with pine nuts, ready. Between it and the hot nuts for the r&r rounds (ricotta and radicchio), I am well on my way, no?

I would be even more on my way if I did not pause to blog. Cursed blog of mine, sitting there, tempting me in the worst possible way, like an indulgence, a puffed-out pastry. Oh! I have to get to those as well. Theme of today’s dinner: Sicily with elements of France, in celebration of my forthcoming travels.



almonds and pine nuts and lemons and of course, the flowers

cooking

A friend asked me this today:
Why do you like to cook?

It’s not a difficult question, but I was stumped.
So he persisted: is it the smells as you prepare foods? (no) the prettiness of the presentation? (no)

So I said: it’s because there is great joy in having people sit around a table in my home, laughing together, over dishes prepared in my kitchen.

But it sounded lame. I mean, if there is such “great joy,” then how come I haven’t done much of it in the past year? I have cooked for a bunch of people exactly once since I moved to the loft, October 2nd. Sure, there was my family during winter holidays, but I would cook for them whether I liked it or not. They’re worth it.

And the thing is, people have been food-nice to me. They have cooked for me, taken me out, all those things that would typically cause me to bring out my Polish apron and rolling pin in a flash. In the past.

I think, like all things in life, my love of cooking for others has had to take a pause..

Not any more. For the next two months, while I am still on this side of the ocean, I want to cook. For you, you and you. For people who have fed me, food wise (and otherwise). I know, we are not even yet, but just you wait.

I begin tomorrow. About time, say those who have worked hard to make me food-happy this year.

Look: my beginnings, for you. Tomorrow, you get to find out what it is that I am playing with. All new foods, of course. I hardly ever repeat.


hot nuts

notes from tuesday's flight home

I have no moral fiber.

But come on, consider this: you are a lowly person who can never break into the inner circle of men who inhabit first class (on flights). But by some fluke and rather unusual circumstance (whereby you go so far as to travel to Japan via Paris, just to get the miles, and have several other overseas flights which you deliberately bunch in one calendar year), you get yourself for one year and one year only platinum plus status on Air France. The elite of the elite (and there are 5 gradations of elite status on Air France).

Then Air France merges with Northwest. Voila! This past week, I am flying with Ed to Canada on Northwest. On international flights, platinum plus bumps everyone and anyone. If the pilot wanted my seat, s/he could not have it. I am boss!

And so on each leg of the journey, I have been given first class seats. And each time I have said: no, if my companion cannot be with me up there in super stardom, then I will join the sardines in the rear of the plane.

Until this last, the fourth flight.

I mean damn, what would you do? Your super elite status is about to expire at the end of the month. You will never ever again be sitting among men who all wear conflicting scents of aftershave.

Would you not say YES! to that final upgrade, leaving your 6'4" traveling companion back there for the 56 minute flight to shift and squirm in the middle seat between two good-sized people whose extensions are more the side to side rather than up and down kind?

Still, I have such guilt. I am a weak person. I know that. As I sit in the first row, with what seems like ten drinks lined up for me to get through, I feel like an utter pig.

P.S. I have, this year alone (besides this Canada fancy), given up three business class upgrades on across-the-ocean flights just to be back there with friends. Does that gain me points?

I tell myself: if we crash, I swear I will give up my life to save those in the back. Fact is though, with all that alcohol, I wont be much use. Damn it. I am such a loser.

notes from yesterday's drive to montreal: camera in hand

If I drive, you can look at the world out there. I’ll stop if you want to take photos.

Generous words. Ed drives, I look. We take the side road. Rarely do we choose a highway over a back road. Snow flurries along the St. Lawrence. Much of the river is not frozen here.



ice fishing hut on sled runners; no ice here.



old but not without color



out for a morning run


Please, while I’m handling the camera here, can you put one hand on the wheel? I mean, life is short enough.
It’s a habit…
I see that.

Do you know where the airport is?
I saw a sign. Montreal airport. Take the exit at 15.
Okay… even though I thought we were departing from Trudeau…
Damn. Turn around then, we’re going the wrong way. Only not here: no u-turns permitted.
Signs are there to keep sign-makers employed.

My own bad habit: getting to the gate seconds before check-in closes. This time we have four minutes to spare.

Such are the issues that accompany travel. So many people have said that travel these days is a pain. Waiting, always waiting, managing bad weather, faulty reservations, security issues. Who needs this?

I do. Just to look at a place that is different from home. Wherever home may be.

from quebec city: comfort in food

I wake up, look out the window of the once-warehouse hotel. I seem to only inhabit century-old warehouses these days.




Looks cold outside. Back to sleep. Wake up again. Ah. They are serving breakfast here now.



in addition to the granola, I pick up one or two of these. I'll stay silent on how many my traveling companion can eat at a sitting.


A few steps outside and I feel I have earned the next round.



asparagus and cheese melted over a baguette

An aperitif in front of the fireplace at the hotel. It stirs the appetite. Dinner? About time.



warm goat cheese on a toasted baguette, mixed greens



snails over puff pastry



halibut with crab, over shaved fennel, in a lobster - tomato sauce



fried ice cream in maple sauce


A walk along the river at night is de rigeur. I mean, there is great comfort in fresh and honest food, but watching the bricks of ice on the river, shifting directions with the ocean tide, is even more calming. Truly, in the end, I did not even notice how cold it is out there in the Quebec air.

Returning to Madison today.

from quebec city: do as the romans

Walk the city streets briskly, pick up foods at the epicerie, follow the side streets home.





Near the old town, take out your blades (or rent some), turn your face away from the direction of the wind and skate. Then, because it is the ubiquitous treat around here, take a bag of maple syrup cones home.



who is this person? wonder if she keeps a blog...



a shack with skates and maple sugar cones



instead of ice cream


If it gets too cold, warm up at the local café, where they are serving hot mushroom soup. Or, just sip your espresso and catch up on the paper.





Going home, be careful. Snow removal is in full swing. Nearly every block has a guy on the roof pushing the stuff down. Step out of the way.





And for God’s sake, enjoy the food. Post on food will follow. Tomorrow. I am off now to enjoy the food.