HUNGRY GERALD

New York Times had a story on the duck lunch at David Chang’s Ssam Bar and the “duckavore” dinner at Wong in the West Village. Duckalicious. The descriptions of the ducky delicacies were so riveting and appetizing that HG was tempted to leave for The Big Apple post haste. However, HG stayed put and ransacked his memory for tasty webbed foot treats.

Best duck dish ever was the braised duck with olives at the late Le Pavillon. Crisp and juicy, the abundant richness of duck fat cut by the sting of the olives. A runner up was the crackling Peking duck at the Peking Duck House in New York’s Chinatown. When in Paris, HG often indulges in the ubiquitous duck confit; however, the best HG has ever tasted came not from Paris, but was found behind the counter of Oyama, the great French-oriented charcuterie and cheese shop located in Vancouver’s Public Market on Granville Island. In Chinatown (both in New York and Vancouver), HG often does a simple (and cheap) lunch of barbecued duck and pork plus a bowl of rice and pot of tea.

During their ten years of residence on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, HG and BSK had a tradition of late Sunday dinner a deux (little ones safely snoozing). The duo devoured a rotisserie barbecued duck from the Bretton Woods Butcher on W. 86th Street accompanied by a salad of sliced orange, sweet onion and avocado. Then, a crusty baguette, runny brie. Two bottles of red wine. A nice way to close the weekend.

Yes, Sunday was a day of indulgence in HG and BSK’s rent controlled paradise. The day began with a breakfast of Zabar’s smoked salmon, sable, scallion cream cheese, bagels and bialys. The fat Sunday Times on the table. It was all worked off with long bike rides in Central Park. SJ strapped to HG’s back. Little Miss LR in a kiddie seat. Peaches, The Wonder Dog, racing along on a leash. Happy memories of food, fun and family — a ducky time, indeed.

As noted in a previous post, HG had planned to make inroads in holiday leftovers as he cheered his homies — the Giants (HG has loved them since, at the age of eight, he followed the heroics of Tuffy Leemans and Ward Cuff on the radio) and the Broncos (the object of a love-hate relationship during HG’s 25 years in Colorado). HG devoured BSK’s incomparable chicken soup and the Giants and Broncos beat their foes (the Broncos game was an extraordinary overtime thriller).

Going into this weekend, HG is gloomy about the fate of the Giants and Broncs vs. the Packers and Patriots. Yes, a deep thinker like HG knows that this devotion is quite infantile. Nevertheless………

An HG fan remarked: “Wow, HG, you really write brilliantly on dim sum and Japanese food.” HG must clarify (with pride): These posts were written by SJ, who is quite modest in identifying himself. Identity check: SJ is Jeremy Kent Freeman, son of HG and BSK. He is a reggae entrepreneur, barbecue expert, writer, husband of Exquisite Maiko and father of Adorable Haru. BSK, for the benefit of inquirers, is Beautiful Sharon Kent, HG’s wife of 48 years (49 in July). A versatile woman, BSK is a painter, potter, photographer and retired political/public relations strategist. And, a mighty fine cook. With infinite patience and compassion, SJ and BSK tolerate HG.

Blood, Bones and Butter is a memoir by Gabrielle Hamilton, the chef/owner of Prune, a much acclaimed, tiny restaurant in New York’s East Village neighborhood. Very good writing with on target descriptions of a chef’s life, appetite provoking accounts of food and meals and pungent attacks on all manner of food pretensions. Not exactly a tell all memoir. Hamilton caught HG’s interest but failed to satisfy HG’s natural, probing curiosity. There are big gaps concerning Hamilton’s mother, father, siblings and emotional life. Thus, the memoir is a bit of a cheat. But, if like HG, you relish food and restaurants, “B,B and B” is quite a good read.

The Year of the Dragon started with the wonderful holiday leftovers from the Year of the Rabbit. HG and BSK raided the refrigerator for Turkey soup, of course, enriched with kale and noodles. Green chili pork stew. Papardelle ragu. Japanese crabmeat pancakes. Batter for blini. Small amount of red caviar. Sour cream. Spicy hummus. Mozzarella. Feta. Kalamata olives. Bubbie’s pickles. Panettone. Canadian Butter tarts. HG will grab some food from the frig and back to the TV rooting for the HG home teams: Giants and Broncos. Go, Manning and Tebow !!!

HG and BSK received dreadful news today. A dear friend with whom we shared many happy years on Fire Island told us today that she has an awful, threatening disease. Our friend is a beautiful woman who used to turn even blase Fire Island heads as she scampered the sands in a knit bikini. In addition, the lady was a superb athlete — equally graceful on skis or brandishing a tennis racquet. Supremely elegant, this lady could tuck into — and cook — some hearty food. HG remembers with fondness big platters of winy sauerkraut bedecked with Kassler Ripchen and knockwurst. HG knows the lady is a reader of Hungry Gerald so HG can only say, for himself and BSK: Our hearts and wishes are with you, dear one.

During the immediate post-World War Two period, The Eating Man was often hired by publicity seeking New York restaurants and department stores. Permit HG to clarify: There was not a single Eating Man, but many. The Eating Man was a precursor to the “professional” eaters we have now who enter contests such as the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Competition

What did The Eating Man do? Well, The Eating Man would be seated at a table in the front window of the restaurant. He ate. A lot. A big crowd gathered. There was lots of news coverage. It seems the public was fascinated by feats of outrageous gluttony. Legends arose. It was said The Eating Man ate 250 hot dogs, or five hams or six turkeys. Of course, this was all hyperbole from the press agents who hired these big eaters. One true fact: The Eating Man was never a big, fat guy. Robust, yes (and with a good appetite). The champion amateur big eater during HG’s days as a Broadway flack was Kenneth MacSarin, a stage manager. Typical MacSarin anecdote: Kenneth was finishing breakfast at Lindy’s. One dozen eggs with two dozen strips of bacon. Lots of Danish pastry. A quart of orange juice. Endless coffee. Turns down a last cup from an astonished waiter : “Sorry, I’m in a hurry,” says Kenneth, “I’ve got an early lunch date.”

There was an important schism in the immigrant Eastern European Jewish cooking that HG relished in his youth. Litvak vs. Galitzianer. Litvaks hailed from Belorussia and East Poland. Galitzianers were from historic Galicia (now part of the Ukraine) that bordered German-speaking regions. (HG was always vague about precise Galitzianer geography because geography was not a discipline in which HG’s parents specialized).

The HG Family was totally Litvak and this was expressed in its cuisine. It was based on chicken fat, garlic, onions and plentiful salt and pepper. Here’s an example — lukshen kugel (noodle pudding), an HG favorite. As HG’s Mom prepared it, the kugel had something in common with Italian baked ziti. Mom’s kugel was simple. Wide noodles prepared al dente and piled into a casserole with abundant chicken fat and grated garlic. When removed from the oven it had a crisp, golden top and a soft, lush, fatty interior. The perfect accompaniment to braised beef. HG once had a lukshen kugel at the home of a Galitzianer friend. It was suffused with sugar, honey and cinnamon. This was a travesty of a kugel, more like an inferior dessert than a decent companion to robust meat. HG looked at his friend with understanding compassion.

SJ here, back in NYC after a lovely winter holiday in New Mexico. Greeted by bone chillingly cold weather and to add insult to injury, a dead battery and a flat tire. If you have ever changed a tire while the eagle claws of a NYC winter wind clamp down on the tiniest patch of exposed flesh, then you can well imagine my sorry state when I arrived home for dinner.

Well, I have made one very, very smart choice and that was joining forces for life with the great Exquisite Maiko. For she, among her many many talents, knows how rejuvenate with a meal. And if anything can rejuvenate in the winter, it is what she welcomed me with, Onabe or Hot Pot. This is a simple dish really. You take stock — take the time to make homemade stock please as it makes an enormous difference — and kombu and boil it in a clay pot over an open flame (we use a portable gas grill). And then you just add stuff. Napa Cabbage, bean sprouts, marinated chicken, fish balls, shitake mushrooms, tofu, watercress, noodles and really any vegetable (except cucumbers and a few others!). Spoon out the steaming hot broth, add some ponzu sauce, some chili paste and pick out your favorite vegetables and proteins and dig in. The various vegetables and meat flavor the soup and the pure heat of the boiling broth could warm up one of those frozen Siberian mammoths in a matter of moments.

Onabe is the essence of Japanese home cooking – simple, delicious, healthy; a virtual translation of the concept of hearth and familial warmth into something edible. It is a bed rock favorite of the Sumo cuisine known as Chanko. And the best part is all that delicious broth does not go to waste. Tomorrow night the soup gets added to rice to make Ojiya, a sort of Japanese congee that is as heartwarming as it sounds. Normally Ojiya is made at the end of an Onabe meal — just add rice, a beaten egg and scallion and cover!

So, while the frost may fall in layers about my ears and the winds may whistle, I have the pleasures of Japanese Winter foods to look forward to — and that may just be worth whatever cold I have to face.

HG will pause in HG’s musings about food and yesteryear dining. The crazed zealotry of the Tea Party, the religious right and all the Republican collaborators has made HG fear. Let us heed the words of Thomas Jefferson in his first inaugural address: “Let us reflect that having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions.”