Monday, December 26, 2011

Redemption.

(L) Layer one. (R) Fresh out of the oven. © Ryan Schierling
It's been eight years since I made a lasagna.

There's a reason for that. In 2003, I spent the better part of a day making a vegetarian lasagna for my then-girlfriend. This wasn't just a thrown-together, slap-dash hot dish. Each layer was a work of art, and I had poured my heart into it. I put it into the oven, tipped myself a drink and smiled a little, nodding my head proudly. This was going to be the best lasagna I'd ever crafted.

When the kitchen timer on the oven buzzed zero, I had pot-holders at the ready. I opened the oven door and paused for a moment with my eyes closed, breathing in deeply to savor the comforting, rich, straight-up-nonna's-kitchen aroma that had filled the room. I pulled the oven rack toward me with my left hand, only to watch in horrific slow motion as the rack tipped and the 9x14" glass pan full of all that was good in the world suddenly lurched forward. The leading pan handle hit the end of the oven door right at the window and – as if carefully scripted in a near-physics-defying move – the entire pan flipped over and shattered, upside down on the tile floor.

I let out a blood-curdling "NOOOOOOO!!!!!!!"* and slammed the oven door so hard it came off the hinges. Birds took flight from nearby telephone wires. Neighbors with open windows feared the worst. My face turned blood red, I dropped to my knees and with clenched fists thrust skyward, I cursed the heavens furiously in Italian.

I don't know Italian.

Eight years is long enough to forget a lot of things, apparently.

Monday, December 19, 2011

"Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me, unless he does not know the Secret Menu."*

Now I give you everything. © Ryan Schierling
*Adapted from the Revelation 3:20 bible verse (KJV) referenced on the bottom of my In-N-Out burger wrapper.

Southern Californians wax poetic about In-N-Out Burger. Residents love it, expats long for it. Non-believers lambaste it, converts celebrate it, food tourists do the requisite research and try to give it a straight-up fair shot.

We are food tourists.

In-N-Out set up camp in Texas this year, initially blessing three stores in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex. Like loaves and fishes, they multiplied to nine stores with another currently on the way. It can't be long before they're here in Austin, San Antonio and Houston.

Texas is the fifth state to grow the SoCal chain in an easterly direction, and the 63-year-old, privately-owned company (no franchises), was received with open arms and people camping out for days prior to the first opening. Building a distribution center in Dallas, In-N-Out secures a 500-mile radius for new stores which could include a nice bible-belt swath of the midwest - including Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and wee bits of Tennessee and Alabama.

The thing is, at least in Texas, there are no shortage of local burger chains with a similar "all-fresh, never-frozen, no-microwaves" policy. I will admit that In-N-Out's "burger on top" model pleases me greatly, and our visit to the Arlington location this week impressed me. The store was bright, immaculate, and well-staffed with well-trained disciples who were eager to serve. We'd read up on AHT's research and had suggestions from Wm. A, so we were ready to make an inaugural order.

I went with a double-double, animal-style, extra-toast. Julie had a grilled cheese with grilled onion and chopped chilies. French fries were ordered regular, no alterations, to see what the benchmark was. Drinks were fast-food Texas proper, which is to say, Dr. Pepper.

Service was quick. We pulled into the lot at 1:40 p.m. Despite having 15 cars in the drive-thru when we walked through the front door, a line of ten ahead of us and every seat in the joint occupied, we had our food and were seated in a booth in little more than ten minutes. The way this In-N-Out turned a busy lobby was pure professionalism. The burgers were solid and tasty. I knew mine was going to be a messy handful (which is why I went with an extra-toasted bun), and Julie was pleasantly surprised with her veg option. The fries were certainly fresh... I mean, they were a whole potato less than an hour ago. But that's about all the praise I can heap upon them - they were bland, blonde, flaccid and under-seasoned. Internet reviews tend to echo these sentiments across the board, and most seem to prefer to order their In-N-Out fries "well-done," "animal-style" with melty cheese, grilled onions and a hearty dollop of spread (Thousand-Island-ish dressing), or they just skip the fries altogether and order a second burger.

When they inevitably break ground here, Austin competition will certainly be P. Terry's Burger Stand, which is as close to In-N-Out as you'll get in Texas (except they have a delicious Andrew Brooks/Spirited Food fresh veggie Austin-hippie burger that both Julie and I really dig).

And, you know, it only took eight little chapters in the bible to go from full-on vegetarian to meat-eating*. Texas is a red-meat-eating-sonofagun-state, so when In-N-Out comes to town, get yourself in line before someone calls you a Godless-pinko-communist-veggie-burger-eating hippie (even if you're only going to order the grilled cheese, which is quite delicious.)

*Genesis 1:29-30 - "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be food for you. And to the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground--everything that has the breath of life in it--I give every green plant for food. And it was so."

Genesis 9:1-3 - "Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. The fear and dread of you will fall upon all of the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air, upon every creature that moves along the ground, and upon all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hands. Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, now I give you everything."

Monday, December 12, 2011

My inner child begged me to share.

Magic Marshmallow Crescent Puffs (with wholesome nutritious filberts). © Ryan Schierling
Did you ever have a day that went so sideways that by the end of it all you wanted was to be five years old again, in the kitchen with your mom, baking up something ridiculously sinful and a fantastically magical "just because?"

I had one of those days today. Nothing horrible happened, it just seemed that at every single turn there was a road block or hang-up that prevented me from accomplishing anything I had set out to do. My last stop before making it home was the grocery store. It was fitting that they were out of those little shopping carts I prefer and there were no hand baskets in sight, but I soldiered on, selecting a family-size trolley for my five-item list. Not ten paces into the store I was greeted by a friendly employee behind a counter offering me samples of... guacamole. Perfect! I detest guacamole; the very smell of avocados I find utterly revolting. I had to laugh... what a way to seal the deal on my suspicions that the day was (still) conspiring against me.

My retort? I added to my list some Poppin' Fresh® crescent rolls and a bag of large marshmallows. It was time to fix things with sugar sponges rolled in butter, rolled in cinnamon sugar, rolled in buttery pastry, rolled in more butter and drizzled with sugar.

I came home and made Magic Marshmallow Crescent Puffs.

Sugar, butter, sugar, butter. © Ryan Schierling
Do you remember these? This gooey delight – the genius of Edna Walker, Pillsbury's 1969 Bake-off winner – is a treat that, though rarely sighted, still roams the primitive wilds of my psyche. What a trick to pull out of the oven these hollow puffs of refrigerator pastry filled only with drippy marshmallow-cinnamon syrup. And just when you didn't think it was possible to be even MORE insanely over the top, there's icing too!

Now I just need to borrow a five-year-old with the bravado to help eat all of them...

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Crawfish pot pie.

Crawdads, no. Crayfish, no. Crawfish, yes. Pot pie. © Ryan Schierling
Ten years ago, a friend in Washington who was a Houston-expat would occasionally travel back to Texas for business. Before he went to the airport to return to Seattle, he'd fill up a cooler with dry ice and Hebert's frozen crawfish pies, duct tape everything securely shut, and check it with his luggage. They were like Cajun gold, and he'd rather the airline accidentally send his suitcases to Montreal than misplace his cooler full of crawfish pies.

I didn't really understand the attraction. I mean, I liked pot pies, but I'd never had a seafood pie, let alone tasted one with crawfish in it. When he finally gave me a few to heat up, I figured it out after the first few bites. It was a foreign flavor, but still rich and comforting the way pot pies should be. The golden, flaky puff pastry crust was buttery and almost melted on the tongue. The crawfish itself I could only describe as salty, and a little fishy (sea-gamey?), like shrimp's bad cousin who did some time upstate. But the creamy, cheesiness of the filling countered nicely and balanced things out. I really liked it, but it was a taste that was very specific to a region, and I didn't grow up in that region.

I only had a few of those Hebert's crawfish pies, and as delicious and different as they were, over the years I forgot about them entirely.

Now, we're a day trip away from Louisiana. During crawfish season, from March to June, you can't miss the squirming bins of live mudbugs at the fishmonger and local grocers – waiting to be boiled, pinched, pulled and sucked. We went to our first crawfish boil this summer, and I found out that there are two types of crawfish eaters – those who suck the head and those who do not. I may be a northern transplant, but consider me a head suckerWhen it's not crawfish season, you can still find two or three different brands of tail meat in the frozen sections of most decent grocery stores. 

For some reason, this week I decided I wanted crawfish pie. So, I looked up Hebert's Specialty Meats and tried to go back to the beginning. The 8 oz. pies looked like little raviolis and were $5 each (plus shipping). That seemed a bit excessive for nostalgia's sake. I thought about driving to Houston, but then found out that Hebert's is actually in Tulsa, Oklahoma, so I really wasn't sure what to do. Then I remembered the frozen crawfish tails at the grocer.

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