HUNGRY GERALD

The yiddish word haimish means warm, unpretentious, down home comfort. It applies to the comfort level of a home, the personality of a person and the taste of certain foods. Brisket, potato latkes, chicken soup, matzo balls, blintzes, chopped liver, pastrami are among the long list of “haimish” foods. Despite being decidedly unkosher, pork chops taste “haimish” to HG. Sushi and sashimi are delicious. But, not haimish. Gyoza, curiously, are “haimish.” So is Menudo, the Mexican tripe stew.There are times when HG chooses among three foods for a comforting “haimish” dinner. These are dishes HG’s Mom fed her growing boy, so they are imbued with a strong element of nostalgia. First choice is kasha (buckwheat groats) with caramelized onions, sautéed mushrooms and a big dollop of sour cream. HG accompanies this with chilled vodka and beer chasers. Number two is starkly simple (but lush): Little boiled potatoes in their skins. Butter. Sour cream. Lots of black pepper and Malden Sea Salt Flakes. Vodka and beer plus a platter of sliced Kumatoes and Vidalia onions. (No, HG’s Mom didn’t serve the little fellow vodka). Third choice is another simple dish: Egg noodles with cottage cheese, salt and pepper. Coffee if serving at breakfast. Trader Joe’s Vegetable Patch drink if serving at lunch. BSK, despite her Anglo-Saxon-Welsh ancestry and Canadian-Midwestern youth, makes superb matzo balls. HG longs for these winners floating in a big bowl of free range chicken broth. Unrfortunately, BSK has not made them for years. However,BSK makes a world class bowl of Straciatella, the Italian version of egg drop soup. Italian “haimishkeit”. The best cure for the common cold and a splendid nourishment when flu has caused (a very rare happening) the disappearance of HG’s hearty appetite.

Good news. A health magazine recently reported that pork rinds are a (relatively) healthy food. Yes, plenty of fat in these bits of fried pork skins but its a good kind of fat and the skins contain plenty of beneficial oelic acid. Since HG likes to scatter some pork rinds over a bowl of green chili stew the happy report caused HG to muse over other (not so healthy) fried favorites. When HG used to visit the streets of the Washington Heights section of Manhattan (lots of Puerto Ricans, Dominicans and Cubans lived there) HG would often drop into one of the plain spoken restaurants for a favorite meal: Moros y Cristianos ( Moors and Christians–black beans and rice topped with chopped raw onions) and a bowl of Chicharrones (fried pork fat, a by product of lard production). When in a hurry, HG would buy a snack at a Cuchifrito. A Cuchifrito is a colorfully decorated rolling cart that sells freshly made fried foods. (“Cuchifrito” also refers to a whole range of fried pork dishes served in Puerto Rican restaurants). HG remembers with fondness the baccalitos (salt cod pancakes) and rellenos de papas (fried mashed potato balls stuffed with meat or cheese) dispensed by a little cart near St. Nicholas Avenue. However, when HG explores the fried food HG memory bank, the taste standout is old fashioned fried chicken skin (fried in chicken fat, of course) that HG’s Mom cooked while she was rendering schmaltz (chicken fat). A favorite HG childhood sandwich was two slices of Pechter’s Pumpernickel Bread enhanced with an abundance of chicken fat, fried onions and a load of fried chicken skin (gribenes.) Serve a youngster that dish today and it’s off to jail you’ll go for impairing the health of a minor. HG has learned that the Second Avenue Delicatessen in New York (the new one in the East 30’s–the revered old one on Second Avenue closed following a rent dispute) serves a free “amuse bouche” of gribenes. Must indulge on next New York visit.

As HG luxuriates in front of a crackling fire at his New Mexico home watching news reports of three foot snow drifts battering the East Coast, HG notices a funny sensation. A nostalgic hunger for the soups HG’s Mom fed the family. They warmed HG and family in the winter and cooled them in the summer. Winter-time soups were either kapustah or potato soup. Kapustah, as HG recollects it, was a cabbage, onion, tomato, garlic melange in a beef broth enlivened with chunks of boiled beef. This was topped with a big ladle full of sour cream plus some fiery, freshly grated horseradish. With a few slices of Stuhmer’s (or Pechter’s) pumpernickel (with the savory spread of chicken fat and coarse salt) this was a solid, filling, cold weather dinner. The potato soup was simple. Just boiled potatoes and onions in a rich beef stock. A lunch dish. Warm weather soups were beet borscht and schav, both served cold. Mom’s borscht was incomparable. She used something she called “sour salt” to balance the sugary earthiness of the beets, giving the soup a distinctive sweet-tart taste. It received the usual topping of sour cream plus a healthy shower of chopped scallions and radishes. It was accompanied by a hot, buttered boiled potato. Schav was a sorrel soup, mouth puckeringly sour. Unlike the English Sorrel soup, the sorrel in Schav is not pureed but left in its leafy state. This soup was served icy cold (sometimes ice cubes were added to the bowl). Sour cream, naturally, and the obligatory boiled potato. During those non-air conditioned years of yesteryear, schav was a lifesaver on a blazing New York summer day.

HG has noticed that some serious chefs are playing around with marshmallows, trying to create what could be called, laughingly, “gourmet” marshmallows. A waste of time. HG has always despised these little fluff balls of cloying sweetness. As a lad, HG allowed others to roast marshmallows over night time fires on Rockaway Beach. HG nibbled a Mr. Goodbar.

In a bow to mid-America, HG’s Mom sometimes abandoned East European cuisine and baked mashed sweet potatoes mixed with canned crushed pineapple and topped with marshmallows. Horrible.

The only pleasure HG ever derived from marshmallows occurred, in of all places, a 42nd Street porn shop. HG and his pal, the comedy writer, Peter M.. finished their naughty browse and Peter M. approached the manager. Peter M. looked furtive. In a quavering whisper, laden with perverse guilt, he inquired: “Do you have anything with marshmallows?” The sleazy manager thought for a moment and said: “No.”

HG’s Mom often prepared HG’s favorite after-school snack: A slice of Pechter’s Pumpernickel liberally covered with chicken fat and topped with sliced onion and kosher salt. As HG matured, he pondered his Mom’s heritage which encouraged such obviously unhealthy food. Well, the small town — well, shtetl really — Belorussian lady knew something. Chicken fat (aka Schmaltz) is rich in lineolic acid, an omega 6 fatty acid with many health benefits. So, comrades, schmaltz it up with impunity. It is essential with chopped liver. Very good with garlicky chopped eggplant. Enhances fried onions. HG likes to stir it into a bowl of Goya garbanzos topped with microplaned garlic and sea salt. (HG intends to pair it with Duvel Belgian Ale while watching key NCAA basketball games).

Chicken fat can be ordered online from: mykoshermarket.com. Or, make it yourself (many easy recipes — such as this ONE — to be found online ). DYI chicken fat provides crispy and delicious bits of chicken skin known as “gribenes” — Jewish cuchifritos. For a carnivorous meal drenched in chicken fat go to the Shrine of Schmaltz: Sammy’s Roumanian Restaurant on New York’s Lower East Side. Wash the golden grease down with plenty of frozen vodka. L’chaim!!

Popeye not only loved it, he depended upon it! Remember the way his muscles would pop after sucking up a can of spinach allowing him to save Olive Oyl from the clutches of big, bad Bluto? Like the great, mumbling sailor man himself, HG is fond of the leafy vegetable. Loves it mixed into a risotto or rice pilaf. Spinach is one of the rare vegetables that freeze well, so HG always has some in the freezer. Frozen spinach (moisture wrung out) should be warmed gently and mixed with some warm olive oil and lightly browned garlic. Nice with a pan broiled steak. HG did not trust spinach as a child and actively rebelled against it. His imaginative Mom found a cure by concealing the tender vegetable in balls of mashed potatoes and calling the dish “buried treasure.” HG liked the name and the digging for treasure adventure and became a life long spinach fan.

So, watch out Bluto and keep your mitts off of BSK!!!