Spying on a Farm

When spying on a farm, one must first consider the best vantage point. Because farms generally consist of land (I'm not talking about farms of the mind here), and because a farm must have a not insubstantial amount of land to be a farm in the first place, it helps to spy from a height. One can see more this way. Luckily, the farm I aim to surveil is bordered by a levee. Both the farm and the levee are located about a quarter of a mile from my home, which is noteworthy because I live in the middle of a town. In fact, that's precisely why I'm spying on this particular farm -- because it seems to have recently, magically embedded itself in the middle of a residential neighborhood. Pretty clever, if you ask me.

Back to the levee. It's a long one, and has some bends and gullies. I've seen some of our town's local drifter population emerging from the gullies with paper sacks of beer in their hands. The levee, obviously, has something to offer for everyone. (In fact, it was on this very levee that I recently began a viewing of 'Go to the Chateau,' a play by Madeline ffitch involving an audience of two, a car ride around town, and much absurdist behavior.) Witness, the levee:

So, prowling along the levee, one eventually notices some buildings through the trees on the right, and some fields. I've been past these fields many times. In fact, some friends used to live a half block away, and I recall strolling past the fields at night during the summer. Thousands upon thousands of fireflies flickered and spun in the air. But now, the field and farm look like so:

At this point, a spy might have some questions. Such as: What's the purpose of building in the foreground? Or the big one in the back? Or the small one on the left? And what are all these fields about, anyhow? I paced back and forth along the levee, trying to divine the answers to these questions, and pretty much got nowhere. That's because spying on a farm is an inherently distancing activity. If a farm spied on me, it wouldn't learn the most important things about me, either. So, I decided to meet the farmer: 

That's Ben Jabirdy, of Town Farm. Turns out, Ben just ended a stint teaching English at a small liberal arts college in the area, which is exactly what I just finished doing. Now, he's farming. His goal is to set up a 100-member C.S.A.  The building in the foreground of the photo above the one above will serve as the distribution spot for the farm shares, the big barn is being made into living quarters for Ben and the rest of the farmers, and the other building, if I remember correctly, is for goats. Goats!

Though The Elephant and Butter is already committed to another C.S.A. for the summer, this neighborhood farm is nothing but a fantastic development. As for spying, despite its inherent flaws I remain a fan of the method. In the future I shall spy not on farms, though, but perhaps on a cappuccino.

On Two Chicken Carcasses Falling into My Lap

Sometimes, life presents us with crippling ambiguities. You know what I'm talking about. Other times, we are presented with two chicken carcasses, as well as a refrigerator containing carrots, onions, garlic, and celery. The clouds clear, existential doubts subside, and a straight line appears. It is in these moments when a man knows he must bring a pot of chicken soup into the world. Those are my carcasses, and I am that man.

On Beans & Rice & Hats

"As for red beans and rice, well, I don't have to say anything about that. It is my birthmark."

--Louis Armstrong, American Trumpeter

"The way of the wise is to prepare rice by steaming rice grains; the way of the ignorant is to prepare rice by steaming sand."

--Wonhyo, Korean Monk

Beans and rice. If one is not careful, merely thinking about this dish can destroy the causes for future rebirth and shoot one straight into enlightenment. It's that serious.

Rarely have I made the same beans and rice dish twice. Which is probably appropriate, because I suspect that I have never been the same person twice while making it. The latest incarnation, though, involves cutting open a hot Italian sausage (bought from George, my local butcher -- he used to work at the bagel shop, but apparently he's a meat man now), frying it with shallots and garlic, adding some cumin and chili powder, adding some beans (you choose the kind), and then stirring in some rice.

This last part is worth discussing further, though. While using basmati gives the dish a sense of firm separation, lately I have been using a short grain brown rice from Lundberg Family Farms, which was recommended to me in a potent vision. The shorter, plumper grains have a nice snap to them, and are therefore more sensual. Their girth also means more starch, which means more creaminess. Moreover, I appreciate rice growers who wear crisp hats.

On Close Reading the Sound of Seltzer

The second installment of auditory food programming concerns seltzer. I'll leave the cultural history to someone else. I'm more interested in the poetics of detail. Below you will find an admittedly middling-quality photograph of seltzer. Ignore my background attempts to understand phyllotaxy. Keep your eyes on the seltzer:

Now, keep your ears on the seltzer:

The very discerning listener will notice, somewhere after the initial seltzer eruption, an edit in the sound file. This is because the seltzer, which had been handled with tremendous care, nevertheless exploded all over my laptop when I opened it, necessitating a break in the recording process. Putting my computer in jeopardy has emerged as a main component of cosmic auditory blog programming. Perhaps someday I'll get around to purchasing a portable digital recorder.

Okay, listen to the seltzer again. Pretty fucking nice seltzer, huh? Just like crickets, seltzer offers a soothing staccato lightness that, I think, encourages contemplation. Why? Because it replaces unpredictability with singular consistency. One might also call it "an object of concentration," or a "summary-object," terms used when discussing meditation. But the sound of seltzer isn't exactly singular, because of the countless individual expressions of carbon dioxide rushing to the surface. I'd argue, though, that the polyphony of bubbles gives the mind even more room for contemplation because it establishes a narrow yet dynamic field of focus. Distractions are reduced, yet the mind is invited to get involved. Come, mind.

The narrative of seltzer is also worth consideration. There is the promise and danger of the opening. Have you ever held your hand firm on a seltzer cap against a rush of oncoming fizz? This is a nice feeling. And since seltzer is free of sticky sugars, crossing a line and getting wet isn't much of a problem. In fact, it could even be the point.

Closely following the expansive reverie of newly-broached seltzer is that long, steady stretch of time when the seltzer is manifestly seltzer. Just like when summer is manifestly summer. Some readers may be familiar with how I visualize summer -- and the rest of the year -- in my head. Imagine a slice of pie. The pointy tip of the pie represents December. The long line out to the crust is winter and spring. The long line back to the tip on the other side is the fall. But the crust, the crust is summer. It is also the steadiness of seltzer. It is a slow, settled arc. During it, one can often forget the possibility of it ending.

Which brings us to the decline of seltzer. Such is the effervescence of seltzer, one is likely to have consumed it all before it loses any of its verve, which is not a bad way to do things. If, however, it is left unconsumed, seltzer will eventually no longer be seltzer. Or, more positively: seltzer is seltzer until it isn't. Probably no one is qualified to say exactly when seltzer becomes not-seltzer. Probably I am over-using the word "seltzer." Probably we should simply drink it.

Look at the seltzer above. Listen to the seltzer. Arrange the tips of your fingers as if around a glass. There is a tendency to hold seltzer precisely. Seltzer somehow requests this of us. It is the ballet of the beverage. Dip your head back and send in the seltzer. The seltzer will find the spots it needs to find. Allow yourself to be overcome. Feel it, dear reader. Feel it.

On the Concept of the Desk Pantry

After a day spent recording the sounds of frying eggs, playing ukulele, walking along my local railroad tracks, writing in a cafe, consorting with a very nice juggler, and attending the neighbors' supper club, I find myself back at work, a slightly less charmed and vaudevillian environment. I do have a desk, though, and in that desk I have a pantry. Let's take a look:

DESK PANTRY ITEMS:

1. Fork and Spoon - The fork is named Otis. The spoon is a mystery.

2. Banana Guard - This brilliant device protects bananas from bruising while in transport. It's also a fun thing to carry around in public because strangers invariably mistake it for something else entirely.

3. Dried Mangos - This is about love.

4. Magazine - Good ol' Saveur. This issue features a come-hither photo-spread of brown rice.

5. Gummy Bears - The sub-prime mortgage collapse has contributed to the devaluation of the dollar, which I'm thinking will eventually cause a run on gummy bear commodities. My coworker and I have stockpiled against this possibility.

6. Oatmeal - For emergencies. I once read an article in which chefs were asked what they eat when they don't have much time. A surprising majority of them said instant oatmeal. I don't generally like instant shit, but I make an exception for oatmeal.

7. Lemon - This is not food, but rather a form a percussion - a shaker. The lemon shaker is particularly helpful when trying to convince coworkers that a rattlesnake has taken up residence in a file cabinet.

On Frying an Egg in Your Ear

The Elephant and Butter is very pleased to announce the addition of cosmic auditory food exhibits to the blog. I now present you with the particular sonic character of me frying two extra large, brown eggs in a cast-iron skillet accompanied by a tablespoon of butter:

Now, compare that to the sonic character of Louis Armstrong's "Butter & Eggman," most probably recorded in 1959, with Satchmo accompanied by his All Stars:

As for my eggs, I scrambled them with a shallot and sprinkled romano cheese on top.

On Succumbing to the Dull Imperatives of Kitchen Cabinets

Around midnight last night, it occurred to me that all my life I have accepted the premise of kitchen cabinets without questioning it. Allow me to state the partially obvious.

There is one room in most homes -- the kitchen -- in which a special type of furniture is installed. This furniture seems almost to grow from the walls, and in most cases completely obscures the walls. In other rooms, furniture can be moved around. In the kitchen, furniture is almost completely fixed. The length and uniformity of the furniture creates long stretches of what people call "counter space." People covet this counter space. Entire homes are bought and sold based on its presence or lack thereof. The blocky area underneath the counter is used for storage, and is equally coveted. To me, these structures look like enormous, corpulent robot stomachs that are ever-encroaching upon human space. They are made from not-wood. They are not sincere. They mean to strangle us.

It wasn't always like this. Originally, kitchens had tables and individualized pieces of actual furniture. Then, around the turn of the 20th century, people began to invent and market things like the hoosier cabinet:

Had humanity stopped at the hoosier cabinet, things might have been different. Instead, industrialization revved up, organizational psychologists started yammering about efficiency, and the next thing we know, our kitchens are bloated with dull, standardized surfaces.

This is bad for our souls. Which is why, the first chance we get, we should rip out the corpulent robot stomachs and take back our kitchens. John Thorne, writer of the Simple Cooking newsletter, did it (scroll down to 1997). After you've done it, go find a piece of furniture you actually care about--try the flea market--and let it provide a more personalized home to your boxes of cereal.

Oh yeah: also around midnight last night, I briefly thought I had invented the brilliant concept of sea water ice cream. Turns out, the Japanese beat me to it. Selah.

On Tangentially Food-Related Antics

The next thing you know, this is hardly just a food blog. This is how a life should be lived:

On Multivalent Risotto

Not long ago I had something like seven people coming over, and decided to make risotto. It seemed inhospitable to give them only one grain, so I quickly came up with the idea of two grains. But that had no balance whatsoever--I could see the piles of rice split into two on the plate, staring at each other with untempered boredom. Obviously this would make the guests do the same with each other. What a dumb, binary thing to bring into the world, two risotti! So before I knew it, I had arrived upon the idea of a triumvirate, as so:

Instance #1: asparagus, portobello, romano & pine nut

Instance #2: saffron, banana pepper, romano & lemon

Instance #3: marscapone, romano & apple

So of course you are thinking this was a very bad idea for the health of my arms, because everyone knows that risotto involves moving that shit around in a pot for an hour with a brutal spoon. You know who doesn't know that? Mark Bittman and Mario Batali. And now--after four years of obsessive and asocial spoon waggling--I know it. In fact, cooking three risotti is perhaps the best way to ween oneself off the useless stirring habit because it's virtually impossible to get them all going round at once. This frees up appendages for wine drinking and high-fiving.

Of the instances, there was no consensus on which one was best. Many people loved #1, most appreciated #3, and I remain dedicated to the idea of #2, a ditty picked up from here.

On Speck And Its Ilk

Having missed Dada at MoMA by one day, I certainly did not miss the meat at their Cafe 2. The dining hall looks like a workstation for the affluent. Very seriously functional, and possessing stools with trim saddles. Cultured people like to sit on stools, I think, because it makes them feel like their tasks are essential. Since I am generally enthralled with this sort of specious essentialism, and with its concomitant clean lines and love of dark wood surfaces, I thoroughly enjoyed the space. Cured meats suspended from the upper regions, elegant sugar packets arrayed, arugula salads, Fordism employed in the queue.

Anyway, the meat. It looked a little bit like the photo above. Hot sopressata, herbed sopressata, sweet sopressata, prosciutto di parma, mortadella, and speck. This last one was aggressively salty, see-through thin, and had the smokiness of a giant conflagration. Fucking perfect. This was bolstered by the presence of a plug of parmesan that had been twisted out of a mammoth wheel, a slickened range of olives in crockery, and some nicely powdery flatbread they called 'carta di musica.'

The art was also tremendous, particularly the screenprinting.