The extraordinary amount of blogs served by the internet is a sign of how food has become a fetish, something folks can play with now that they have enough not to worry where their next meal is coming from. Like just everything else in our world, it's been turned into entertainment, complete with pornographically luscious pictures, hyped competitions, seductive background scenery and breakout stars. The hype, spin and theatricality are more and more ginned up because it's now a player in what I call the Excitement Bowl.
Food was late to be recruited for this great American sport because prior efforts had been to make it very unexciting: cheap, fast and for granted. But it became hard to overlook once the potential of so much else had been exhausted, because why not? It is every entertainment profiteer"s wet dream: our lowest common denominator.
No food no life. And to quote bumper stickers: No farms no food. (At least not yet, if cloners and chemical corporations get their way.) As I said in my much liked opinion piece online in The Daily Dot: "Food is our connection to the earth, sky and sea. Like feng shui, it harmonizes us with our surround. Food is our link to each other, to everybody out there past and present, for food is the one same need everyone--regardless of their financial percentile, political state, geographical region, age, gender, dress, whatever—shares in common. And because even with supersonic jets and super fast electronics, we would not be alive if that need isn’t met, we share food, share the labor and love of it, share recipes. Eating makes us all one big community... ."
The world is awash with people for whom just having food provides excitement just as it is becoming more and more washed away by desecration in serving up all the exciting exotica the elite can eat. Many blogs serve concern for the mess we're making--in the rain forests that have become cattle grazing grounds to feed demand for burgers, in the Bolivian highlands where the people who lived on quinoa for centuries can no longer afford to eat it now that Westerners have discovered how nutritious it can be, in Africa which the Chinese are devouring for farmland. But few have linked the dots. Destitution...depredation...titillation...
To change the way food is presented, we need to change the way we ourselves perceive it. This blog is a quiet plea for awareness of hard reality: if we want to sustain life, the Earth and all who we hold dear, we need to focus exclusively on genuine seasonal eating and real appreciation for the local farmer who's gotten down and dirty to keep us alive.
We can do this eating not so much simply as graciously, nutritiously, deliciously, always guided by a strong sense of when enough is enough. This blog is trying to work within and on those parameters. It wants to be a hand out to people afraid of food or afraid to cook, to people who are also just afraid they don't have the time. What better use of time than to serve up love to those you care about, including yourself? Serving food is preserving life, something you may find you and they need more than a pedicure or Porsche.
This is a difficult time of the year for farm fresh ingredients but that doesn't mean we are without shining options. Here is a recipe I adapted from one I found in my French "sister's" file. It's refreshing, as a new start should be. It's ridiculously simple and fast, cheap, as seasonal as we can be right now, and something to serve as a side dish or full lunch with perhaps a side of bread and cheese.
Orzo and Fennel Salad
Serves 6.
2 fennel bulbs, cleaned and chopped, greens too
1 2/3 cups orzo (about ½ lb)
3 seedless mandarins, or clementines, peeled and pulled apart*
1 lemon
½ lime
12-15 pitted prunes, coarsely chopped
2-3 tbsp olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
salt to your taste
Put a few of the fennel fronts aside to chop for garnish.
* if you want to cut the sections in half, feel free.
Cook the orzo according to package instructions, until just al dente
Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a small skillet and sauté the chopped fennel 4-5 minutes. Midway, add the garlic and blend.
Pour the contents of the skillet into a salad bowl.
Add the mandarins and prunes and blend.
Remove the zest from half the lemon and grate it. Add to the salad.
Juice the lemon and lime, mix and add to the salad.
Drain the orzo. Salt them to your taste. Add to the salad
Stir to blend everything.
Chop the reserved fennel fronds and top the salad.
Refrigerate an hour before serving.
No comments:
Post a Comment