Shark Fins and Sichuan Peppercorns

I just finished Fuchsia Dunlop's Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper:  A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China.  Fascinating book, which doesn't really say much about it.  Let me try again.

Ms. Dunlop writes eloquently about her experiences taking in Chinese culture(s) as food.  It's a book both humorous and elegiac as she describes her experiences in the shifting landscape of Chinese culture in over the last fifteen or so years.  She arrives as a student who was determined to eat everything served to her.  She ends up making a career out of writing about Chinese food.  She begins with the thing that Westerners "know" about Chinese food -- namely that the Chinese will eat anything, much of it disgusting.  Dog, chicken feet, sea cucumber, bird's nests, shark fins, insects, and bear paws all show up in the typical Western list of the horrors of Chinese cuisine, and they all show up in the book.  Ms. Dunlop does, in fact, succeed in eating everything, and thinking critically about it.

She holds up these exempla of the cultural divide between East and West, and succeeds in explaining some of their cultural significance.  That was what I hoped for, and expected since my friend JVW had handed me the book.*  I did not expect that I would spend most of the book ravenously hungry.  Discussion of deep fried rabbit heads do not usually do this too me, but Ms. Dunlop's descriptions of her enjoyment and her growing understanding of a culture that sees them as a delicacy left me staring into my fridge in the middle of the night.  I settled for a quesadilla, but found it vaguely unsatisfying as a solution.

Owing to a soy allergy, Chinese food is largely a closed book for me, so the author's achievement was even more notable.  Food that would make me very sick if I were to eat it filled me with longing.  It was this glimpse of something so alien that gave Shark Fins and Sichuan Pepper its power over my imagination.  Something so alien made comprehensible.


*JVW's understanding of my taste in books is exemplary.

Foodie? Some Words About Nomenclature

Danse Macabre: The Foodie copyright 2010, 2011 Dylan Meconis

I love food.  I pretty much love all food barring some finicks about texture, and the odd histamine reaction.  I unapologeticly love pot pies from the freezer section, and I love the fads of trendy cuisine. One of the best moments when I was home in Alaska came while having lunch with some friends at a favorite restaurant.*  Kinley's is one of those trendy places where your side salad comes with goat cheese, and your fried chicken sandwich comes slathered in the house sour cherry preserves.**  JVW had ordered the bacon wrapped date appetizer. This is the apotheosis of dates -- dates should always be paired up with something savory, lest their sweetness take over whatever one is eating.  It is a favorite.  I bit into one.  The meld of smokey, sweet, and salt with a lemon and garlic in the background to cut through all the richness was perfection. 

For all that, my tastes are not all that abstruse, or so I like to think.  Until, I find myself saying things like, "You know, that would be really good with some goat cheese," when a classmate is talking about making macaroni and cheese. Such a totally trendoid thing to suggest.  My classmate asked me, "Are you one of those foodies?"  Yes, but hopefully without the sour faced snobbery that shows up in the illustration above (which I find hilarious, but that might be the art history classes talking), and in some contemporary food writing.

However in the playful spirit of the best contemporary food, I offer one of my favorite fusion dessert recipes. 

Garam Masala Pumpkin Brownies

Intensely rich, serve in bite size pieces.  These brownies would be absolutely divine with dulce de leche, and bananas on top.  And creme fraiche or chevre.  And pecans.  Maybe bacon too.  You know, trendy things.

3/4 cup butter
2 c brown sugar
1 1/4 c Dutched cocoa
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
1 T vanilla extract 

3 eggs
1 15 oz can pumpkin
1 1/2 c flour
1 c chocolate chips
1 1/2 coconut

1 tsp cinnamon (I used the Vietnamese)

1/2 tsp garam masala (but check the ingredients, garam masala sometimes includes mustard, which I have yet to like when paired with chocolate.  One could alternatively experiment with pinches of cumin, coriander, clove, cinnamon, fenugreek, and nutmeg or mace -- when the blend tastes right, use 1/2 tsp of the blend.  But for this application, I use the Spice Islands Garam Masala blend.  It's pretty wimpy otherwise, so I only use it for desserts.)

1/2 tsp cayenne, or to taste, or use something milder, or a splash of Tabasco sauce
1/4 tsp ginger

Preheat 350 grease a 13"x9" pan.

Melt butter over low heat (or nuke it, but I never do) and stir in sugar. Return to heat, stirring until the mixture appears smooth and shiny. Transfer to mixing bowl.

Stir in cocoa, salt, baking powder, and spices
.
Blend together eggs, pumpkin, and vanilla. Add to cocoa mixture, beating 'til smooth.

Add flour, chips, and coconut, stirring 'til well combined.

Spoon batter into prepped pan and smooth over. Bake 35 minutes or so, or until a toothpick or fork inserted in the center comes out with only a couple of crumbs clinging to it.

Absolutely delish.

*Anchorage is, slightly inexplicably, one of the better places to eat that I've ever been to.  It's not Rome, but what is?  I theorize that the long cold winters and the constant caloric drain to keep warm have supplied the drive to perfect the nouvelle pizza, and haute diner food.  And beer? I could weep missing the breweries of Anchorage. 
**It is fantastic.  I have wondered ever since why all fried chicken sandwiches don't come with sour cherry preserves.

Against Yogurt

I like yogurt.  I grew up eating yogurt. I wanted to buy some today.

Today found me in QFC staring with rising dismay into the dairy case as I attempted to buy a reasonable and affordable amount of vanilla yogurt, preferrably with some fat* in it and not too many extraneous weird things.

That ought to be simple, yes?  There were squillions of choices, surely one would make me happy. 

Americans seem to view yogurt as a "health" food.   Or should I say "health" "food"?  Apparently if I just bought the right brand of yogurt, I would lose weight and have well regulated bowels.  My skin would clear up.   My sex appeal would abound.  My dishes would do themselves.  Claims are made about the active lives of the yogurt's cultures which would enable this miracle.

Unfortunately, I wanted yogurt because I think it tastes good, and I wanted to experiment with packing yogurt and granola as part of my lunch.   I wanted yogurt because it will help fill me up and give me energy to do things.  In short, I wanted yogurt as food, not as a tonic or patent medicine.

Most of the yogurt in my market segment* is fat free or lite (which is like fat free only without the sugar as well).  Not infrequently it comes in unholy flavors meant to mimic dessert: one can get apple pie yogurt, strawberry cheesecake yogurt, chocolate mousse yogurt, creme caramel yogurt, or even key lime pie yogurt.    Most all of the flavors, whether or not they are intended to mimic desserts, are packed with sugar, high fructose corn syrup, or artificial sweeteners to make up for the decrement in flavor that occurs when fat is removed.  Trading fat for sugar does not please me. Trading real sugar for something that breaks down to formaldehyde in my brain? The depths of my displeasure are as a canyon which no explorer may plumb nor any traveler cross. 

Low fat is alright, not my favorite**, but it has some flavor, less sugar, and less algae byproduct*** to create the creaminess that the fat skimmed out would otherwise impart.  Yogurt made from not-skim milk, and flavored with a moderate amount of sugar is increasingly hard to find, squeezed out of the market by the health claims of yogurt-like substances tarted up as desserts and packed with chemicals.  If Americans regarded yogurt as food rather than medication, I suspect that this would not be the case.

I had to read every single label in the case.  The Dannon All Natural line of yogurt appears promising... except that they did not have vanilla yogurt in the large container, or the small.  They had coffee yogurt, which was flavored with real coffee though.  I eventually settled for a quart of the Mountain High Vanilla, which is a known quantity****, even if it was slightly more than I wanted to pay.

I am not noticeably sexier. 

*There is fantastic yogurt on the market.  Yogurt that fills my heart with loving gluttony.  Unfortunately I cannot afford it as a regular thing.  If you want to know, my favorite brand is Greek Gods, with especial affection for the fig yogurt.

** There have probably been times in my life when my response to the world of food has not been "needs more fat"-- I'm not sure when they were.

***Carrageenan is seaweed extract, e.g. algae.  It's a common thickener, and commonly used to smooth textures that would otherwise be damaged by fat removal.  There's nothing exactly wrong with it, except when it goes bad.  Oh dear, I'm about to tell you why I don't buy fat free half-and-half.  Those of you who have already heard this story may want to roll your eyes and go back to the main essay right now.  Those of you with delicate sensibilities may wish to do likewise.

My excellent friend JVW was attempting to limit her fat intake.  To that end she had started buying fat free half-and-half.  It tasted fine.  The mouthfeel wasn't weird.  However, it was ultra-pasteurized (which I think involves gigantic lasers or something) so it had an unusually long shelf life.  JVW does not go through half-and-half particularly quickly.  One day six weeks or so later, she was pouring half-and-half into her tea, while I was nattering inconsequentially (probably, the ensuing event totally drove my thoughts from my mind).  The flow stopped, but the container still felt like it was about a third full.  This being the sort of condition that would raise questions in anyone's mind, we investigated.

Inside was a viscous, pink jelly.  Horror ensued.  Neither of us drank any more tea that night.
The carrageenan had fallen out of suspension, and begun acting like a bacterial culture.  A bright pink bacteria culture. 

****I'm ambivalent about crystalline fructose as a sweetener, but I know from experience that they don't use much. 

Facts and Figures

Mom figures that she and I have used more than ten pounds of flour in the time I've been home.  

Looking Forward, Looking Back

The new year supposedly takes its tone from the activity it finds you engaged in when it arrives.  Regrettably, I wasn't kissing anyone.  Fortunately, I was up to my elbows in bread dough and thinking about my Grandmother Ervine.  Kissing anyone might have distracted me from my dread purpose... persuading recalcitrant honey/olive oil bread that it wanted to roll out nicely so that I could turn it into peasant loaves.  Which was approximately what I was doing the year before.*

It's been a strange year. Stranger than I could ask, or even imagine. Some of the strangeness is so huge that I can't even look at it.  Like mountains, many of the changes in my life are too big to take in when I'm in the midst of them.**  I'm a person who roots.  I was rooted in Alaska, and then I decided for various reasons that I needed to leave, even though I spent my four years of college horrendously homesick.

I do not think of myself as a brave person.  I have been known to say in tones of outraged frustration, that I am not only not a brave person, but that I further do not appreciate being placed in situations where I have to pretend to be one.  I'm beginning to think that practiced pretense after thirty years is becoming fact. 

This year my Grandmother Ervine died.  I cannot tell you what a fine woman she was -- for now, the memory is too tender.  The readers that I visualize when I'm writing this -- close friends and my family -- either knew her or have heard the stories.***  She was a brave woman, and a kind one.  I try to be both, but I'm not as good at it as she was.  In my defense, she had a substantial head start.

Mom and I had a plan.  We would take a week and drive from Anchorage to Seattle, with some of my furniture and all of the stuff that makes civilized life so comfortable.****  It would be fun.  It would be bonding.  Forgetting the fact that neither of us is good at sitting still, and I hate driving, with a particular emphasis on hating driving in unfamiliar places --I was looking forward to it.  We were going to leave on the sixteenth of August.  Grandmother died on the sixth.  Instead of the leisurely trip I'd been looking forward to, we threw the bare basics in Rubbermaid tubs, and got on a plane three days later. 

Four days after that, I was kneeling on the grass in the Anacortes' cemetery on a blindingly sunny day, placing her ashes in a hole in the ground.  The box of ashes weighed almost nothing.  The only thing that made it at all bearable was that I was in shock.  I realize that ninety-seven is a reasonable age at which to die, and that Grandmother had been looking forward to getting clear of this mortal coil for years.  I knew it then too.  It had just never actually seemed probable that she would die.  (The sun will go out one day too, but I don't really believe in that either.)  Shock in me manifests in a sort of desperate matter of factness: She's dead.  I put her in the ground.  The grass is green.  The dirt is brown.  It's a sunny day.  She's dead. Most of us are wearing shorts.  I'm saying the Lord's Prayer now.  I am not going to start crying.  She's dead.  If I start crying, I'll never stop.  And the power and the glory forever. Amen. She's dead.   Like that over and over again, until I could believe this impossible thing.  I didn't cry, and I suspect I might have been insufferable.
 
I cried later.  For a lot of the fall I went around being very careful because almost anything would set me off.  Songs in church.  Songs not in church.  Books.  Museums.  Particularly pretty days in Volunteer park.  Conversations with aunts about nothing to do with my grandmother.  Only two things made it bearable.  One, I live by myself, so that if I'm going to fall apart every six minutes, I can do it in private.  Two, I could go to either relatives or friends so close that they may as well be relatives for the weekend.  I didn't do this as much as I expected, but I could and having the option made an enormous difference.

Life finds you out.  One day I looked up and realized that the quarter was nearly over, and that I had friends I was looking forward to seeing that night.   It was a good feeling the first bit of normal since that August evening when Uncle Jim called to tell us Grandmother was gone.

Good year.  Hard year.  And I'll probably spend next New Year's Eve up to my elbows in bread dough.  It seems to be a harbinger of interesting things.




*This makes me wonder if the superstition holds true, and the omen of baking bread means a year of upheaval, blessing, and terror in equal measure.  Not unlike what bread dough goes through when I'm thumping it around while kneading. 
**However, overwrought metaphors are not one of the things that has changed in my life.
***Judging from the stats that google gives me, they are aren't the only ones, but they are the ones I know about.  Maybe sometime I will tell stories about my grandmother for those people who never got to meet her. 

**** Books.  Lots and lots of books.

Literature Ministry

This has nothing to do with food.  If you were expecting food writing, and a recipe, I am afraid you will be disappointed and ought to stop reading right now.

The following conversation, while not actually made up (mostly), was edited.  The dialogue at the time was stilted and improbable, possibly even more so that what I write here.  If my life were a movie, the script would be sent back for serious revisions to the self-indulgent dialogue.  Most of my friends are just as bad.  Some of them are worse. 

The Tall Guy and I are walking down one of the residential streets in South Anchorage near the Bluff.  I'm in my gigantic black parka.  The Tall Guy is pacing along crane-like beside me looking meditative*. 

"We look like cultists."

The Tall Guy's look of meditative inquiry became more inquiring.   

"We could knock on doors.  'Excuse me, ma'am, have you heard the good news about George MacDonald?'"**

"Have you let the Lord Peter Wimsey into your life?***"

"Good one, if I had one of my omnibus editions with me it would look like a Bible.  'Can I interest you in twentieth century literary modernism?  If you have any questions, we'd be glad to come back and talk with you about W.H. Auden.'"

We've been friends for a long time. 

*The Tall Guy's default expression seems to be meditative inquiry.  My default expression looks a lot like a scowl.  Some people might suspect that this was indicative of our characters.

**A nineteenth century Scottish fantasist.  I'm outrageously fond of some of his stories, and in the same breath driven to argue myself blue in the face with them.  MacDonald being dead, I tend to direct my arguments at The Tall Guy, who bears patiently with my flights of literary criticism.  If The Tall Guy and I were going to go around handing out literature that we found important, we would get in fights on people's doorsteps about which MacDonald we ought to be handing people. 

***  If you read fiction, and suffer from a touch of Anglophilia, you ought to do so.  I would suggest starting with Strong Poison or Murder Must Advertise.

Adventures in Ornamental Shrubbery

I have dried lilac blossoms down the back of my shirt.  This is one of those things that happens.  Could happen to anyone.  They itch. 

It's Christmas day here, and Christmas brunch at the Ervine house consists of too much coffee, and Grandma Ervine's coffee cake.  Suddenly, I realized that I was restless (probably a result of the four or five cups of coffee).  I needed to be moving, doing, I could not sit still one more minute.  I announced that I was going for a walk.  No one wanted to come, even though it's warmed up to six degrees above zero -- and the sun hadn't set yet.  (Anchorage in winter is a land of austerities and you take your luxuries where you find them.)

Before I left, Dad asked me to go out into the back yard, and shake the lilac tree* which was bowed under the weight of the week's snow fall.  I went and did exactly that.  Unfortunately, the best way to shake the lilac tree is to stand right under it and shake the main trunks.  Truthfully, I knew exactly what I was in for, but I shook the tree anyway.  It took five minutes or so to get all the snow out.  Much of the snow ended up down the collar of my silly looking "Help, it's the dead of winter in Alaska" down sleeping bag... er, parka.  As long as I was outside that wasn't so bad.  The snow was cold, but it was frozen.    It was when I came inside to change from my pack boots to a pair of heavily insulated hiking boots (more comfortable for walking) that I realized the extent of the problem.  The snow melted and ran down the back of my shirt in my own personal Niagara.  Apparently carrying with it a multitude of dried lilac blossoms.  Which itch. 

I then went for the long walk, and watched the sun set.  If I were a good blogger, I would have taken pictures.   You'll just have to take my word for it that even though winter sunsets in Anchorage occur at 3:30, they are still some of the finest sunsets in the known world.  I alternated thinking "it's freezing, why does anyone live here?" and "It's so beautiful, why do I live in Seattle?"  Good questions both of them.  Occasionally punctuated with "why does my back itch?"


*Yes, tree.  It's almost as tall as the house.  The house is two stories tall.

You Know You're in Alaska When...

Women in jeans and opera-worthy fur coats at the grocery store are one of those quintessentially Alaskan sights. Then there is the backlog of seafood given to us by friends in my parent's freezer. I've been having fun with salmon this week. I'm afraid that the recipes I'm about to relay are not cheap as written, unless you have friends with salmon fishing "problems". (One can explore canned salmon for example.) On the other hand, both of them do use leftovers.

I served the salmon cakes, along some bean soup and salad, to friends who came over for a Scrabble game.

Salmon Cakes with Feta

vegetable oil
1 cup finely chopped onion (or one medium onion)
1 1/2-ish pounds salmon "burger meat" -- that is the skinned trimmings from filets and steaks. One could use a filet, but that seems like overkill. If you don't happen to have a pound or two of salmon odds and ends, I would definitely explore the canned option. Or one could use cheaper fish (and a different cheese).
3 slices of bread, crusts cut off
1/2 a cup of milk
OR a cup and a half of leftover mashed potatoes (Which is what I used -- making these cakes friendly for people with wheat issues)
2 tsp dried dill or 2 Tbsp fresh
a dash of garlic powder
A squeeze of lemon juice, salt, ground black pepper, cayenne to taste
Chunks of feta

Heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. Sauté untill golden, stir them every few minutes to prevent burning. This will take somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen minutes.

If one does not have leftover mashed potatoes, tear up the bread into small chunks and place it in a small bowl with the milk, and let it soak for five minutes while you're doing other things.

While the bread is soaking and the onions turning golden, you will be breaking up the fish witha fork. When it's the consistency of tuna salad, wring out the bread, and add it along with the onions, the egg, the lemon juice, and other seasonings. (If you aren't using bread and milk, obviously you just skip the whole rigamorale and dump in the mashed potatoes.)

Form the salmon mixture into patties roughly four inches across. Layer on a large plate using waxed paper to separate the layers, and refrigerate for an hour to give them time to set up. (I think I ended up with eleven cakes last time.) In an emergency one can skip the chilling, but the cakes are more annoying than necessary to work with.

Preheat the oven to 350. (Or not, these are nice fried.)

If one is going to bake the cakes one ought to bake them for twenty five minutes, turning them at the mid-point and sprinkling them with a layer of feta.

Or one can fry them in oil at four minutes a side. Or one can bake them half way and finish them by frying.

Either way, they are tasty either by themselves, or as part of a sandwich.

Two apiece for adults seems to be the right number, if one is not serving them as sandwiches. If I were serving them as sandwiches, I would serve them in pita bread with tomatoes, lettuce, and tzatziki, or tahini and humus, or mayo if I didn't feel like making the former, and didn't have tahini and humus in the house.

After the night of Scrabble and salmon cakes, I had a cake left over. This evening I was rummaging through the kitchen in search of dinner for my parents and I. I found the salmon cake and some whole wheat pasta and the feta again. The result was uncommonly tasty.

Baked Penne with Salmon and Tomatoes

1 cup-ish whole wheat penne pasta or other suitable pasta, which is to say that members of the fettucini and spaghetti families are out.
2/3 cup milk or cream (I used 1%, but it would have been better with whole milk, and decadent with cream)
1 or 2 eggs (I used 1, but in retrospect I wished I'd used 2, especially with 1% milk)
1 1/2 - 2 tsp dried dill -- it so happens that I really like dill, if you don't-- a mixture of tarragon, oregano, and parsley, or any of them singly would be delish too. Mint also has its possibilities if one is feeling adventurous.
a couple of drops of hot sauce -- optional
a dash of nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste
2 tsp tomato paste (tomato paste in tubes is one of the better inventions of the twentieth century)
1/2 c minced onion
3/4 c finely diced tomatoes
1 leftover salmon cake (or other deck of cards sized piece of flavorful fish -- one could use rather less smoked salmon if one had that on hand)
1 c grated extra sharp cheddar -- may I recommend the Tillamook?
1 c feta

Preheat the oven to 350

Prepare the pasta according to the directions, especially if it's whole wheat pasta. I like normal pasta al dente. Whole wheat pasta al dente is like unto sawdust. This dish is not liquid enough to cover any pasta deficiencies, so go ahead and cook the whole wheat pasta for 13 minutes.

While the pasta is cooking, butter a medium size gratin dish.

Mix together everything on the ingredients list from the milk to the tomato paste. It will take some concerted beating to get the tomato paste to incorporate. Oh well.

Chop up the tomato and onion. You might mix them together, or even mix them together with the crumbled fish. Yes, you want to crumble the fish. There is not a lot of fish in the dish and you want the flavor to get around.

When the pasta is drained, spread half of it in a thin layer across the bottom of the baking dish.
Cover that layer with the tomatoes, onions, salmon, and half of the cheeses. Cover this layer with the other half of the pasta. Spread on the rest of the cheese. Pour the milk and egg mixture over the mound of goodness.

Bake for forty minutes, or until everything is bubbly and not too liquid.

Dignify Our Feast

To the left we see yet more Pieter Bruegel, Peasant Wedding. Which is lovely and cheerful and the people look like they were having nearly as much fun as my family was last night. The title is drawn from one of my favorite poems by Ben Johnson, "Inviting a Friend to Supper." I love feeding people. I love entertaining. Its heartfelt invitation hits me where I live, every single time. Which is funny as it was probably tossed off as a courtly trifle.

I'm home, which is to say that when I was doing dishes at eleven this morning the sun had just barely topped the southern mountains. (At this latitude in the winter, the sun rises in the south and sets in the south, and any other directional formulation is wishful thinking.) Last night we celebrated my brother's birthday. A delayed feast, he waited until I could be home to share it (or possibly cook it).

The menu featured a bone-in beef rib roast (if I could remember the proper name for it, I would tell you), mashed sweet potatoes (which have been discussed here ere now), Yorkshire pudding, gravy, and a big green salad to balance the enormity of our indulgences.

I have some philosophical opinions on salad-- namely a good salad should include a balance of sweet and savory, with some protein in it to give heft. I am inexplicably anti-creamy salad dressings. Last night's salad was butter crunch lettuce, apple, pecans, onions, and extra sharp cheddar with a port-pear vinaigrette. (One nice thing about cooking in my parents kitchen instead of my own: a better class of provender. A second nice thing: my parents have a dishwasher.)

I went for simplicity in the beef. I allowed it to sit out for a couple of hours, warming up to something resembling room temperature. I rubbed the seven pound monster with a bit of butter, and sprinkled it with an herb mixture -- the Tongass Blend from Summit Spice and Tea. I preheated to oven as high as it would go -- in this case 500 degrees. I placed the carcass on a rack in the smallest practicable roast pan (in order to minimize burning the drippings beyond use), and popped it in to the oven. I immediately turned the temp down to 350 and allowed it to cook unmolested until it achieved an internal temp of 150. (Some members of the family, including the birthday boy, inexplicably prefer their beef cooked past medium rare.) This took somewhere in the 2 and a half hour neighborhood.

On retrieving the gigantic hunk of beef from the oven, I made Yorkshire pudding, which I had never made before. I strongly suspect that I shall make it again. AND I shall share my recipe with you. While the pudding was baking I made a small vat of beef gravy.

Yorkshire Pudding

1 heaping cup flour. (All purpose is probably the canonical choice, but I used a finely milled whole grain product that they sell at Costco, which if I recall correctly somewhere contains the words "super grain". It functions more or less or exactly like all purpose white flour, but has a richer nuttier taste and is theoretically better for us. I am clutching at any straws of nutritional respectability in the meal I am describing.)

1/4 tsp. salt

1 cup milk

3 eggs

1/4 cup rendered beef fat (or other liquid fat, preferably with a high smoke point)

Combine the flour, salt, milk, and eggs in a blender or food processor, or a large bowl. Beat until smooth. Stick in the fridge for an hour to chill.

Preheat the oven to 350. (Assuming that you aren't cooking a roast of unusual size in it)

Pour your liquid fat of choice into a 9 in pie plate, or some other suitable receptacle. Place in the oven for 10-15 minutes. It needs to be really hot. Some recipes say smoking. I did not let it go that long on this outing. Next time...

Carefully pour the batter into the hot grease. It may spatter. Bake for 15-25 minutes,until puffed majestically and golden brown. Use it to sop up gravy. There should be lashings of gravy.

I suspect that in days ahead, I may just make up the pudding and some gravy (using stock) and skip the roast entirely.

Important Safety Considerations

A few years ago one of my friends and I came up with our three cardinal rules of kitchen safety:

1. Do not fry bacon with your shirt off, even if you have a job interview and you only have one clean shirt left. Eat a peanut butter sandwich instead.

2. When straining chicken broth, do not pour boiling broth on the hand that is holding the sieve.

3. Even if you're in Alaska, and fresh fruit costs the earth, even at Costco -- do not eat the apricots that are beginning to turn black. Projectile vomiting will ensue.

I'm thinking that it might be time for another safety rule.

Do Not Deep Fry Gnocchi.