[Sca-cooks] Ethnic was American Diet was Anchovette

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On Jul 11, 2005, at 1:03 PM, lilinah at earthlink.net wrote:

> Adamantius wrote:
>
>> OK, I'm an oddity, and I'd
>> rather eat an anchovy at any time of the day or night than have a
>> spoonful of molasses (let's not even discuss high-fructose corn
>> syrup)
>>
>
> Well, i'm right there next to you about the horror that is high- 
> fructose corn sweetener... but i like molasses and anchovies...  
> well, not necessarily together, other than in Worcestershire Sauce  
> - which tastes more strongly of tamarind than either molasses or  
> anchovies.

Oh, good. There's one other person on the planet, at least, who can  
find the tamarind flavor. And that person has spent some time in SE  
Asia. I feel a lot better about it now ;-).

> Heck, for a brief while i was drinking my very dark coffee with  
> whole milk and a heaping spoonful of dark molasses. I liked it. But  
> i'm not really that fond of sweetened coffee in general, so after a  
> while i went back to just coffee and cream (or half-and-half or  
> whole milk)

I think I could detect some sulfurous undertones when I was a kid  
(also wasn't a fan of mayonnaise or hardboiled eggs), and reading  
Alan King's comments about blackstrap molasses (in which he asserted  
that sugar is processed to remove dirt and other impurities, and then  
what you have left after you remove the sugar from the stuff is  
blackstrap molasses, which suggests that blackstrap molasses is, in  
fact, dirt... okay, it makes perfect sense when you're eight or nine)  
didn't help.

>
> I just don't understand why people think anchovies are so awful.
>
> One of my favorite pizza toppings included anchovies, shrimp, and  
> garlic. And i often bring anchovy-stuffed olives to events - along  
> with the garlic-&-jalapeno-stuffed olives which I know aren't not  
> period, but they're a good pick-me-up on a warm Saturday afternoon  
> or during break-down on Sunday afternoon.
>
> It was great living in southern France, because it was so easy to  
> get all sorts of delicious foods that included anchovies.

I'm a confirmed pissaladiere junkie, myself. For you non-Provencale- 
types out there, this is basically a pizza topped with olive oil,  
caramelized onion, garlic, anchovies, black olives and herbs instead  
of the more recognizable cheese-and-tomato stuff. I never lived in  
the South of France, but my first restaurant job, the one where I May  
Conceivably Have Killed Craig Claiborne ;-) , was at a Provencale  
restaurant in New York...

> Then, again, when i was in junior high (1960-62) i used to take  
> bags of wheat germ in my lunch and people teased me, but i knew  
> they were idiots, so while they were annoying, they didn't hurt me.  
> So i've always been secure in my taste for odd food.

I wish I could remember who it was, but I remember reading an  
interview (probably in the NY Times) with some well-known female  
chef, who said her parents had both been cooks on some level, and  
they used to send her to school somewhere in the American Heartland  
with Westphalian Ham and Brie sandwiches, and the other kids used to  
make fun of her, sitting over their PB&J. In the interview she  
expressed astonishment that anyone could find that strange in a  
planet that also contains balut -- which she then described in fine  
detail. Since then that's been pretty much the only food that truly  
scares me.

Adamantius



"S'ils n'ont pas de pain, vous fait-on dire, qu'ils  mangent de la  
brioche!" / "If there's no bread to be had, one has to say, let them  
eat cake!"
     -- attributed to an unnamed noblewoman by Jean-Jacques Rousseau,  
"Confessions", 1782

"Why don't they get new jobs if they're unhappy -- or go on Prozac?"
     -- Susan Sheybani, assistant to Bush campaign spokesman Terry  
Holt, 07/29/04