Nasty

What’s nastier than finding a worm in your apple?

Finding half a worm.

Several friends recommended a breakfast restaurant in San Diego. Two had decidedly suspect tastes in food, but the third was a local home distiller who dabbles in charcuterie and who hadn't steered me wrong before. I dropped by the place this morning.

There’s no need to return.

My iced tea came to the table with a long metal spoon already in it. The spoon was encrusted with…something. Melted plastic? Caked excrement? A kelp encrustation? I don’t know. It was vile.

It got me thinking about other nasty food encounters I’ve had and how our food supply can be contaminated by the whim — or policies — of a single individual. There was the kid in my high school who bought fried chicken at lunch, only to find an intact brain from some small animal lurking under the crispy crust. That one seemed like employee sabotage at the fried chicken factory that supplied the school.

Sometimes, though, corruption comes from the top.

Take, for instance, two food wholesalers I knew, both with a moth problem. Each supplied gourmet and specialty foods to restaurants, hotels, caterers, and other food professionals. While visiting the warehouse of the first wholesaler, I noticed workers opening bags of rice, grains, and flour and either sifting the contents or picking through them by hand.

When I asked what they were doing, they explained that warm weather had led to a moth infestation, so — on the owner’s orders — they were removing as much as the visible evidence as possible before repacking and resealing the plastic bags. They were picking out maggots, moth larvae, and whatever waste products they could see. Once resealed, the packages were destined for unsuspecting customers. After all, those exotic grains, flours, rice, and beans were a substantial investment.

The second wholesaler had moths as well, but he carried few grains. Instead, the moths had gone after his dried fruit. His solution? Every single box with any evidence of moth activity went into the Dumpster. Turkish figs, 20 pounds at a time, into the trash. Candied pineapple, entire boxes, thrown out. Enough raisins to make a half-tonne of Waldorf salad. And all the boxes next to the boxes that were infected? They were thrown out, too.

It wasn’t quite Sherman’s march to the sea, but the devastation was impressive. The cost of the rubbishing was obviously painful, but here was a man who was so concerned with his reputation and the quality of his goods that he ordered his employees to rout out ruthlessly anything that could harm his customers and, therefore, him.

I continued to buy from the second wholesaler. The first one? There’s no need to return.

I've eaten — and almost eaten — a lot of nasty things over the years, but the image of those writing pale larvae getting sifted out of food destined for tony restaurants is maybe the one that made the most lasting impression.

So. Nasty food. What's the worst you've encountered?

Sweet New Orleans: Calas

If we don’t eat them, how are we going to save them?

~ Poppy Tooker

Sure, surviving New Orleans’ annual Tales of the Cocktail takes a defiant liver, iron kidneys, and a healthy dose of prudence. But the Crescent City’s liquid offerings aren’t all that require heroic constitutions — its pervasive sweets are anything but trifling.

Since Katrina, the obscure little fried cakes known as calas have undergone a revival. Definitely a fritter, arguably a donut, and with a lineage that reaches back to Africa, calas are little wads of rice held together in a custard-like batter, deep fried, and — more often than not — dusted in confectioners’ sugar.

A street food, calas were sold by women of African descent, but by World War II, they had become less common. Enter food preservationist Poppy Tooker who, as head of Slow Food New Orleans, championed the little fritters and who continues to make them in cooking classes and demonstrations. Savory versions do pop up on local menus and in Louisiana cookbooks now and again; the WPA-era Gumbo Ya-Ya listed calas made of cow-peas and modern chef Donald Link makes a version with corn. But hot, sweet calas are what you’ll most likely find.

This is a very flexible recipe. Once you bite into a cala, you realize that it’s not unlike deep-fried rice pudding. Then, suddenly, you understand that it practically begs to be tinkered with. Cook the rice in water? Yeah, you could do that. You could also cook it in milk. Or coconut milk. Lighten the batter with yeast, give it an overnight ferment, or use the more modern baking powder. Season with vanilla and nutmeg? Why not? But…what about cinnamon? Soak currants in Old New Orleans Rum, and fold them into the batter. Make the batter, chill it, cut it into cubes, and then fry? Sure. The end result won’t necessarily be 100% authentic, but it might be pretty damn tasty.

Here's Tooker talking about calas (recipe below the video)


Here’s a version I put together that combines recipes from Tooker and historian Jessica Harris. It yields about 18-20 calas.

Calas

3 cups/480g cooled cooked rice
9 Tbl/90g flour
4.5 Tbl/60 sugar
1 Tbl/10 baking powder
.5 tsp/5g salt
Nutmeg — a few scrapes
3 eggs, beaten
.5 tsp/2.5ml vanilla extract
Canola oil for frying (lard if you've got it)

Combine the rice through nutmeg in a large bowl. Add the beaten eggs and vanilla and gently mix into a homogeneous mass.

Heat oil to 360-375°F. Working with two large spoons, make loose balls of batter from heaped tablespoons (about the size of a ping-pong ball). Drop each one as it’s made into the hot oil, being careful not to splash. Fry until golden brown (or darker, for a more pronounced crackle). Drain on paper towels and dust them with confectioners’ sugar like you're trying to hide a crime. 

Eat them as soon as you can stand the heat.

Goes well with:

• Poppy Tooker's site
• The full text of the 1945 classic on Louisiana folkways, Gumbo Ya-Ya
• An earlier post bringing together Jessica Harris and my homemade watermelon pickles