The Artist Eats An intersection of art, food, and culture.

Giant in the Kitchen: Sausagefest!

There's something really invigorating about trying something new in the kitchen. It's so  easy to get stuck in the same old same old - and I really think that boring eating makes for a boring life. It's not that standard fare is bad, but if you make it the same way week in and week out, things are going to get a bit monotonous.

One way I've found to really mix up a standard dinner is to make from scratch what you would normally purchase premade. This can really apply to anything, and it doesn't have to be overly complicated, but if you make something from scratch, it'll taste better and you'll have a little more personal investment in the meal. I'm thinking of food along the lines of homemade pasta, bread, ice cream and cake, but especially sausage.

I know, I know, sausage doesn't really fit into that category, but what's more simple than grinding meat?

My buddy Jason and I have been talking about making sausage for a few weeks now, and finally got around to it on Friday. I've never made sausage before, but Jason is an old pro, so it went smoothly and ended up being a real learning experience for me. He has this awesome old French sausage recipe which we used as a starting point, but we ended up coming up with some great mixes of our own.

I'm really lucky to work at Fair Shares, because it gives me access to awesome local meats. We used one of Karlios Hinkebein's pork shoulders for the sausage. This is sustainably raised, happy meat - you'd be hard pressed to find a better quality product. The pork shoulder was 14.25 pounds and we got a little over 10 pounds of sausage out of it. We decided to make loose sausage, because most casing is too thick and plastic-like for our tastes, and it's really just easier not to mess with the casing.

I haven't done much research on meat grinders, but Jason has a KitchenAid stand mixer with a meat grinding attachment and it seemed to work quite well.

There are basically five steps to making good loose sausage:

1. Cut the meat from the bone

2. Slice the meat into strips which will fit into your grinder.

3. Grind the meat.

4. Mix in your spices.

5. Grind the mixture again for thorough distribution of the seasonings and a smoother final sausage.

The whole process is very simple. The double grinding makes for a very smooth and silky sausage (i.e. no big chunks of gristle to get stuck in your teeth).

We split the ground meat into 3rds and made different seasoning mixes for each. It turned out that we made a French style, a Spanish style, and an Italian style, but that wasn't premeditated. The following recipes are rough guidelines. We didn't measure the ingredients and neither should you.

One little tip to really get your seasoning just right: In step 5 of the grinding process, grind a little bit and fry it up on the stove. This allows you to taste the sausage and see what, if any, corrections are needed to really get the most flavor into your final product.

The French Recipe is a pistachio-garlic sausage which tastes fantastic. We upped the amounts here by 50% because we had around 3 pounds but the proportions stayed close to the same. We didn't have truffles, but I gave it a few glugs of truffle oil instead, and I think we use around 6 cloves of garlic rather than 1.5 teaspoons.

2 pounds ground pork shoulder, 20 to 25 percent fat
1/4 cup dry, fruity white wine
1 teaspoon finely chopped garlic
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon Salt
1/3 cup shelled, unsalted pistachios
1/4 cup coarsely chopped black truffle, optional

For the Spanish Recipe, I ground all of the seasonings together in the mortar and pestle. We went heavy on all of the spices here, especially the Paprika. The pork can handle it, why not have a spicy sausage?

The Italian Recipe is straight forward rosemary-fennel sausage.

I’m Up To My Ears In Fennel!

Ok, I'm swamped right now. I'm working full time for two weeks at Fair Shares, picking up my aunt Lindy's hours while she's out at Telluride. I'm also still doing my Google quality rater gig, so I'm pushing it in terms of hours in the day.

I'm really busy, so I need you to do me a favor. Take a minute. Go to a coffee shop. Enjoy a latte. Play a quick game of scrabble for me. I'm sure you won't get as many vowels as I did last time. Do it for me?

The Artist Drinks: Raw Milk

Do you ever feel like a Superhero? I do...when I drink raw milk. It makes me feel like a great beast of a man; like the world is spinning by my grace alone. Raw milk (I probably should explain this) is milk which has not been pasteurized or homogenized. It is unprocessed and is basically going from the cow's udder to your mouth. Thankfully for the cow, there is a farmer and some refrigeration involved, but you get the idea. I have come to believe in the the deliciously restorative powers of raw milk. It may be just a placebo effect, but when I drink raw milk I feel like Wolverine - rippling muscles and a devil-may-care attitude.

When milk is pasteurized, the active enzymes and bacteria are killed, effectively "sanitizing" the milk. This is all well and good for standardization, but it fails to account for the fact that our bodies have a symbiotic relationship with the naturally occurring organisms living in the milk. For example, the enzyme lactase, which is killed during pasteurization, is instrumental in digesting the sugar lactose (Milk being chalk full of lactose). Lactase is naturally occuring in children, but as we grow up and are weaned from our mothers, we stop producing the enzyme. It is at this point which people develop lactose intolerance. I thought that I was lactose intolerant for years until I started drinking raw milk. Now I eat lactose like a bear eats honey.

Raw milk is amazingly delicious. You can almost taste the grass that the cow is pastured on, and the flavor definitely fluctuates as the seasons change. It is certainly not the static taste of store bought milk. Unfortunately all of the unique flavor is destroyed when the milk is pasteurized.

I guess that I should mention that raw milk is illegal in a bunch of states (check out the debate as to why here), but if you can find it, I really recommend that you give it a shot. I don't believe that the health concerns are warranted if you take the time to know the farmer who is milking the cows. Oh, yeah - if it gives you dysentery, I'm going to pretend like I don't know you.

Giant in the Kitchen: The Briny Word

Have you brined? Brining is fun. Brining is easy. Everybody's doing it...Seriously though, brined food is moister, juicier, cooks easier and tastes better. So, why not try it? To start, what is brining? Good question! Rather than respond with simple prose, I have chosen to use the form of a sonnet:

Brine

How lovely are the messengers who tell

Of all the scrumptious attributes of brine

And keep their friends and family fed well

Spreading the briny word to human kind

Brining, gustatorially speaking

Guarantees you tasty pork and poultry

Also good to prevent people choking

Whilst feasting on your prized Christmas turkey

Every briner has their own concoction

With a secret blend of potent spices

Mine has pepper, bay and rind of lemon

Make yours with a flavor that entices

So spread the word of brine to heart's content

And salivate to meaty merriment

Brining is a simple marinade of salt water, and just about anything else you want. My brine is never quite the same because I use whatever is around: peppercorns, whole sprigs of rosemary, bay leaves, sage, maple syrup or brown sugar, cayenne, lemons, orange juice concentrate. I've got some pictures below of a brined Pilgrim's Acres free range chicken that I put together at Fair Shares. I'll use the chicken as an example, but apply the technique to whatever you're cooking. It is more about the approach than the specific recipe.

For the chicken brine, I used two sprigs of rosemary, three fresh bay leaves, the zest and juice of one lemon, a bit of sugar and a bunch of sea salt and peppercorns. With the salt, don't worry about measuring it. Take a container which is large enough to submerge the chicken in water, fill a third or half full with cold water (allowing for the water displacement of the bird) and stir in sea salt until it tastes like the Mediterranean (In a salty, not polluted sense). Be aggressive as you add flavors. Your brine should taste intense. This isn't the time for delicate seasonings - be bold! As you stir together the ingredients taste your concoction periodically to ensure you have some robust flavors happening. (This may be obvious to some, but make sure you don't taste the brine after you've put the Chicken into it. No one wants a case of salmonella!)

At this point, toss in your bird, top off with cold water so that it is completely submerged, and you're good to go. I stuck mine in the fridge for around 24 hours, but if you don't have that much time, don't worry about it. The timing for brining isn't an exact math. I would suggest soaking your bird in the brine for at least two hours. That's a minimum though - you want to allow the chicken the time to get fully saturated with flavors. I soaked the Thanksgiving turkey for two days last year, and it tasted brilliant. (Side Note: Pork can get so dry that brining is almost a necessity. With pork chops or steaks, two days is an excessive amount of time to brine. Two hours is a good time to shoot for, but a forty-five minute soak will do the trick.)

When the chicken is properly brined, remove the bird and rinse thoroughly with cold water. This is a key step. If you don't give the chicken a good rinse, it will be overly salted. Pat the chicken dry with a paper towel. At this point you have some more options. You can stuff the cavity with a sprig or two of fresh herbs. I used rosemary and oregano, but sage is also a good choice. Another option is sticking garlic or a halved lemon into the cavity. You can also stuff butter and herbs under the skin of the breast, but I think this is overkill with limited results. This stage of the process is another chance to be adventurous. Do something exciting. I stuck with bright, fresh, herbs in the hole and some garlic powder sprinkled over the top.

Now it's time to cook your chicken. Put it in a roasting pan breast side up and toss in a 400 degree oven. (Chickens can be confusing. Picture this - breast side up is when the chicken is running out of the pan, not into it.) After an hour, take the chicken out and flip it on to it's chest, pour some beer or stock over the bird and ring it with washed roasting potatoes and as many garlic cloves as you are willing to peel. I used a variety of Yellow Wood Farm's potatoes (a mix of red, black and golden roasters) that were fresh at Fair Shares. Top the spuds with olive oil, salt and pepper to taste. For the fluid, I used a pint and a half (about 24oz) of Schlafly Oktoberfest. Any good lager will do the trick, but make sure to use something you would drink. If you would never drink Miller light, why would you cook with it?

Stick the bird back in oven and cook, basting occasionally until a thermometer stuck into the thigh (not touching bone) reads 170 degrees. Ok, you're done! One last note. The drippings from the chicken are amazingly delicious. Try and serve it in the pan you cooked the chicken in so that you can really sop up the juice with the extra bits of meat. Cheers!

EDIT: The beer quantity is all relative. Go for about a quarter inch of liquid in the bottom of your pan. In other words, if you have a smaller bird and less potatoes, bonus!, you get to drink most of that beer you opened!

The Artist Volunteers: Fair Shares

My travels continue - another week on the road, another week avoiding jobs and bills. I'm in St. Louis visiting family, and for the next week I'll be volunteering at Fair Shares - a combined CSA. Fair Shares is a food nonprofit owned and operated by my mother, Jamie, and my Aunt Sara. It's really an amazing concept, something completely unique. The basic idea is to create a community of people with a common interest in local food, sustainability, and social justice. The community is made up of both growers/producers (i.e. Farmers) and members of the CCSA. Each week members receive $50 worth of goods. They get a ton of locally grown produce and sustainably raised protein (grass fed/free range beef, pork, lamb, bison, chicken, and trout. Actually, I doubt that the trout is grass fed). They also get a weekly allotment of locally made commodities such as tortillas, honey, bread, maple syrup and freshly roasted coffee beans. The Fair Shares members get a great deal on locally grown consumables and the producers have a consistent buyer to supplement their sales at farmer's markets.

The social justice aspect comes in after the members have received their share of food. All the excess food, of which there is always some, goes to local food pantries. If you think of what usually goes to food pantries, pickled beets, creamed corn and the like, a box a fresh peaches is veritable a godsend.

Below, for your viewing pleasure, I have some pictures from the work site. I filled 90 bags with 44 pounds of locally grown Ozark Forest shitake mushrooms. It took a couple of hours because I had to weigh out 7.7oz of mushrooms into each bag. Tedious but fun.

Also, a perfect peach.

I get it. Relax

Okay. OK! I've gotten your emails. I've gotten your calls. I have received your post cards. The carrier pigeons are still coming in.  I know. I get it.  I haven't been posting with the weekday regularity that you've come to expect. I've been touring the New York metropolitan area and have found little success in finding suitable topics to put my artistic stink on. I've had a good latte or two, but that is hardly postworthy. We all know New York City has baristas. Believe me, they'll tell you - if they get past the condescension. (To be fair, the folks at Jack's on 10th st are really friendly and don't reek of hipster.)

Anyway, I'll leave you with this warning - Always check for Godzilla in your watermelon before picnicking.

Giant in the Kitchen: Saving Padron Pepper Seeds

I don't think it will work. As I mentioned earlier, I want to save some seeds from the fresh Pimientos de Padron thatI received in the mail. After further thought, I don't think the seeds will do well because the peppers are prematurely picked. My knowledge is rough, but from what I've read seeds need to be harvested from peppers when they have grown to full maturity. The peppers I have are prematurely picked because that's when you want to eat them. Fortunately I found seeds for sale online. I'll have to order a pack and try them in the spring.

The Artist Arts: Museum Ho!

I was in Cleveland last week, visiting family, and took advantage of some cultural experiences which aren't afforded me in North Carolina. I hit up a few museums and ate as much ethnic food as I could get my hands on. When I was a kid growing up outside of Chicago, I would get really antsy whenever we would visit The Art Institute. I could hardly last 30 minutes before I was dreadfully bored and, most likely, obnoxiously vocal about the fact. I really enjoy experiencing cities more and more as I grow older and I regret not taking advantage of everything Chicago had to offer. That being said, I had a great time in Cleveland and was really impressed by how affordable it was to do stuff there. Both of the art museums I went to were free to the public and had very enjoyable collections.

The Cleveland Museum of Art has been under renovation for years, but the few galleries that were open were well arranged and thoroughly engaging. I spent about an hour there, and learned a good deal about colonial American art. One of the galleries was dominated by a set of huge paintings depicting Apollo and some of the Muses. They're by Charles Meynier and are really stunning. I'm posting some pictures, but they don't really do the works justice.

The other museum I went to was the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College. It's kind of in the middle of farm country, but definitely worth the trip. Added Bonus: You're only going to pay for gas 'cause this museum is free too. It has to be one of the best college museums in the country (not that there are really very many). They have works from almost every period, but their modern collection is a real gem. A set which really drew my attention was of modern Chinese propaganda posters. They're from the 70's, but they are obviously drawing on the American WWII look. I have to wonder why this style of patriotic advertising is so popular. It must be effective. Here's one American propaganda poster alongside the two Chinese ones. They're crappy pictures because I didn't have very good light, but you get the point.

I know Cleveland has a bad reputation, you know, rivers burning and the like, but it really is a place to check out. Lots of art. Lots of cultural experiences (Little Italy is always fun). And Big Fun, an amazing toy store.

Thought for the Day

I'm back. Posts should resume as usual.

I was at Sweet Melissa's in Rocky River, Ohio yesterday. It's a decent trendy/organic kind of place with tasty and affordable food. It was a good lunch, but not necessarily noteworthy. What I took away from the place was the interesting comment painted on the hallway wall leading to the exit:

"Save the Earth, it's the only planet with chocolate."

poignant, verdad?