Stomachs on legs are proud to present

I just did a search on wiki to find out more about uni/ sea urchins

Culinary
Humans consume sea urchin ("roe") either raw or briefly cooked. Sea urchin "roe" is not actually roe, but rather the organs that produce the roe (the gonads). Five strips of roe reside within the structure of the urchin, a yellowish or orange substance resembling a rather firm custard. Sea urchin roe is a popular food in Korean cuisine, and it is called "uni" in Japanese sushi cuisine. It is a traditional food in Chile, where it is known as an "erizo". Sea urchins are highly appreciated in Spain, Greece where they are known as "achinos"-(αχινός), and also in Italy where they are known as "ricci di mare". Apart from domestic consumption, Chile and a number of other countries export the sea urchin to Japan in order to meet its demand throughout the country. Traditionally considered an aphrodisiac, sea urchin "roe" has been found to contain the cannabinoid anandamide

This year Hock surpirsed me for my birthday with my very own box of Hokkaido uni.

I first tried uni in Japan on my wedding and honeymoon. We were staying at a strange little ryokan in between yokohama and tokyo. It was the height of summer and we had just arrived and we wandered down some quaint neighbourhood streets and found a local sushi joint. Inside was an old sushi chef, making sushi with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, the place was full of men drinking enormous draft beers.

Anyway, uni was a revelation to me and I have been obsessed with it ever since.

My throw away comment a few days before my birthday that I wanted to eat uni did not go unnoticed

At 12 am on my birthday I was presented with a bottle of moet and a big box of beautiful golden uni



The next day he made me uni sushi





I love Hock

So much to my horror I turned 30 the other day...so I decided I better celebrate it with lashings of alchohol and low fat food

A while ago a friend had recommended a new Japanese restaurant in Bangkok on Sukhimvit Soi 16 called Tensui.

So I tried to find some other food blogs reviewing the place. First I found this one but google wouldn't translate it so I threw the first words into mac translator.

汗っかきがタタリ足がすごいかぶれてしまったサーヤです。
超足が痒い…痒い痒い痒い痒い痒い痒い
我慢の日々です。。。。｡

Which translated to.....

"The sweat っ scratching the タタリ foot is enormous, it is
サーヤ which breaks out. The super foot is itchy.. It is everyday
life of itchy itchy itchy itchy itchy itchy patience"

Further translation of other sections proved fruitless

This blog was slightly more intelligible through mac translation widget, so we figured we'd give it a go.

"Again also 2 times going to the heaven 翠 in Bangkok, the stripe
stripe it is to do. It is tasty because and the liquor and type of
low-class distilled spirits are many, by any means to go being to stop"

Green Dean from NZ was in town as was Siem Reap's only gay in the village, so we all got together and went

The restaurant itself is beautiful, surrounded by a stunning Japanese traditional garden replete with mist machines....this being Bangkok however we decided to sit inside due to mosquitos remembering the comment "scratching enormous foot itchy itchy itchy"

Upstairs there are private tatami rooms that were completely booked. We sat downstairs adjacent to a euro trash family obviously out to celebrate.....the mother was one of those super thin 45+ european women that had baked her skin so much she looked a haggled 60. She wore a bright red dress reminicent of that 80's classic Lady in Red, yet nowhere near as classy. She had peroxide hair and red talons. The daughter was a fat little dumpling whom the mother was obviously trying to model after herself despite the fact that the daughter was a good 20 kilos heavier than herself. The poor girl was unappealingly sqaushed into a silk beige dress that looked more like a nightie. Unfortunate for them the bright downstairs lighting in the restaurant (my only one complaint along with the dead flower arrangement) did not do the family any favours....but it certainly helped with the food photography.

We had around 11 courses and 6 bottles of sake from their extensive sake menu.

First was sea cucumber liver with raw egg (sounds strange but it was great). Sorry we forgot to take a photo

Then came clams in sake


We ordered the generic mixed sashimi selection and out came very generous portions of top grade bluefin tuna including they served top grade toro (so much for eating low in the food chain)





sushi




salmon skin salad with lashings of kewpie mayonnaise


eel (no photo)

tempura (no photo)

scallops



agedashi dofu (no photo)

beef tongue




pickles, miso and rice (no photo)

The service was excellent, helpful and prompt, and never overbearing.

For the lashings of food and alcohol it wasn't cheap, the total bill came to around 11,000 baht or around $75.00 USD per person. However, given the quality of the food I was expecting the bill to be far more. So while it was pricy it was reasonable in terms of what we ate.

Tensui
Skuhumvit Soi 16
Klongtoey Wattana
Bangkok


****

More on donuts. Browsing Mari Kanazawa's
blog, I found a link to these delicious-looking baked donuts
. I'm not sure what the texture would be like - without the frying, would it taste like a donut? - but they do look beguiling. And they come in both Kinako and Coco flavour.

Anyway, looking at Mari's links to the new Krispy Kreme franchise in Japan, I remembered the tofu donut I had at Mister Donut somewhere on the highway between Osaka and Wakayama back in '99 (see photos above and below). That was the best goddamn donut ever.

Plus, cold oolong tea is excellent with a chewy, dense, not-too-sweet tofu donut. But I'll admit that I sometimes have strange taste when it comes to such things.





According to Wikipedia, Mister Donut was founded in '56 in the States but eventually was swallowed by its competitor Dunkin Donuts. Now there are few stores left in North America, but since '83 Mister Donut's Japanese franchise
has grown to close to 10,000 stores. The donuts are less sweet than regular Krisy Kreme or Dunkin Donuts, and one has the option of choosing donuts in mochi-style (inspired by the glutinous rice cakes). (Chewy and/or sticky are my favourite textures, along with crumbly..not so keen on krispy or krunchie or 'old fashioned'). Mr. Donut also has franchises in the Phillipines, Taiwan and El Salvador - wonder if they have the set menu of dim sum & steamed bun on offer there too? At the moment the Mister Donut site has a promotion for a line of 'crispy sticks', tropical choco-coconut with mango sauce or spicy churo with cheese and basil. Beautiful. Just try to blank out the memory of the recent chemical-in-buns scandal.

Mien Dtuk Mien Dtrey - Have Water, Have Fish

July 1st was National Fish Day in Cambodia.

Fish comes in as a close second to rice as Cambodia’s most important food stuff, and is usually fermented into fish paste known as prahoc. Gut Feelings team member and foremost Cambodian food blogger has the low down on this fishy treat.

The majority of fish, that is such a crucial protein element in the Cambodian diet, comes from the Tonle Sap, but like fisheries elsewhere in the world, fish stocks in the Tonle Sap are coming under increasing pressure.

The Mekong River Commission's bi-annual newsletter reported recently that:

"Prime Minister Hun Sen has warned that population pressures, severe poverty and unequal access to the benefits of economic growth are exerting an “enormous risk” on the ecological system of the Tonle Sap Lake. “The lake is facing a serious threat of overexploitation and its ecosystem has turned quite fragile. Honestly, if this problem is not addressed decisively and soon enough, Cambodia could face a serious environmental disaster,” he told a national forum on the Tonle Sap sponsored by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in March."

A little more close to home, y'all may appreciate these 3 tips on eating fish sustainably from Worldwatch

Eating Sustainable Seafood - Three Tips to Steer Clear of Fisheries Collapse


1. Eat less of the big fish such as salmon, tuna, swordfish and sharks. These are among the most vulnerable populations, and also the fish that live the longest, have the most fat, and accumulate the most toxins over their lifespan.

2. Eat lower on the marine food chain, including smaller species such as clams, oysters, mollusks, anchovies, and sardines. Smaller species are less endangered because they are more abundant, reproduce faster, and feed lower on the food chain (so they don’t consume other fish themselves.) They also have less fat and don’t accumulate as many toxins as the larger, longer-lived fish species.

3. Keep in mind how fish are caught. Some trawling nets are so large they could pull a 747 jet off the ocean floor. Instead, choose fish caught by line, pot, or net (or other artisanal methods) and avoid trawl-caught fish.

I was reading Coco's post and waxing nostalgic about those little mini doughnuts they made at kiwi school fairs and pretty much any public gathering.

In Germany, you can get cold donuts from bakeries (glazed or cinnamon donuts), but top consumption goes to the Berliner
(known as jelly donut in the States, though I'm having a serious memory block over what we call them in NZ. I think they are known as another animal to the ring-shaped and dusted variety, right?)
In Germany when it comes to bakeries the Berliner rules the roost. Witness the huge glass walled stacks of them at Merzenich chain bakeries for ambling shoppers and children of shoppers. Rather gothically, their jelly filling is injected with a large syringe post cooking.



But when cruising Christmas markets and malls or supermarkets, for your hot fried and/or doughy treat, you will have much more luck finding either waffles or (mostly at Christmas time) the delicious 'reibekuchen'.

A typical scene at the entrance of Kaiser's supermarkets:



The waffles are of course very good, especially when accompanied with a thick cherry compote like the ones at local theme park Fantasialand. (The waffles are pretty much the highlight of Fantasialand by the way, though supposedly Michael Jackson is a big fan of their roller coasters. But the Chinese acrobats in the Chinatown section performing to high speed euro pop in faded neon leotards? How hokey)

Getting back to the important stuff (i.e. fried treats), Reibekuchen - grated potato pancakes served scalding hot with apple mousse - are damn good.

Basically,
this:



leads to this:




and it all ends in this:




Super on a freezing night with a cup of Glühwein.

Here is a recipe for banana-lemon waffles from a woman living in Berlin

Yes and at the risk of stating the obvious, how awesome does this 'Ratatouille' movie seem? I can't wait to see it. It will be the best thing since 'Ants'.

[from trailer]
Remy: What is that?
Remy's Brother Emile: [Looks at the odd thing he is eating]
Remy's Brother: I don't really know.
Remy: You don't know, and you're eating it.
Emile: You know, if you can sort of muscle your way past the gag reflex, all kinds of food possibilities open up.
Remy: [to the screen] This is what I'm talking about.

From the subheading it seems Mr. Bird may have read the Time magazine article about restaurants being the new sweatshops.




Not only does the main character's voice remind me of David Schwimmer (whose brilliance cannot be denied), one of my favourite actresses Janeane Garafalo is in the movie and she says it is her favourite movie she's ever done. Quelle horreur!
Here is a description of her character:
"After many years in a male-dominated profession, Colette is a tough cookie. A talented and ambitious chef, she doesn't appreciate having to look after Linguini but is there a soft center under that hard exterior?"

Can't get enough of those cheesy puns! Cheesy! Get it??

Peter O'Toole is also in the film as the voice of 'Antono Ego': the ultimate food critic and feared by everyone in the world of cuisine. He is known as 'The Grim Eater'.

Then there is Auguste Gusteau, a world-famous chef who mysteriously died after his highly-regarded restaurant was downgraded from five stars to four by Anton Ego.

You can watch this:



You could also watch
this video review by A.O.Scott.
He calls it the best work of populist culture he's seen in a long time or something like that.

By the way, the movie is set in Paris. I have some Paris food blogging on the way for y'all.

All this talk of bacon and chocolate and liver cheese made me remember the Ween album, chocolate and cheese...I don't know if they are the most prolific band when it comes to songs about food but they have a fair number including

- Candi
- Don't Shit Where You Eat
- Who Moved the Cheese

and this...Pork Roll Egg and Cheese

Crisp, buttery, compulsively irresistible bacon and milk chocolate combination has long been a favorite of mine. I started playing with this combination at the tender age of six while eating chocolate chip pancakes drenched in maple syrup. Beside my chocolate-laden cakes laid three strips of fried bacon, just barely touching a sweet pool of maple syrup. Just a bite of the bacon was too salty and yearned for the sweet kiss of chocolate syrup. In retrospect, perhaps this was a turning point, for on that plate something magical happened: the beginnings of a combination so ethereal and delicious that it would haunt my thoughts until I found the medium to express it--chocolate.
--Katrina

Just when I thought that I was the only person thinking about covering crispy bacon in couverture chocolate, pretentious candy purveyors Vosges have apparently been thinking about it since their copywriter's childhood.

What's more is that they're pimping it on their website for US$7 a bar.

I just made a banh mi from the left over chicken I had in the fridge from noodles the other night...was super yummy

But I forgot to take a photo for y'all to see....so I stole this one off google images



I had my first ever banh mi when I lived in Melbourne, we would hop on a tram down to Victoria St to go here Pho Dzung Tan (aka Chicken and Cow on account of the chicken and cow pictures they have on the front window), afterwards we would wander down Victoria and pick up asian ingredients at the different stores down there are buy a banh mi at one of the Vietnamese bakeries to take home as a snack for later.

The banh mi we had were always pork....and included an array of pork products, first the bagguette was smothered in butter then pork pate, then roast pork and sliced pork sausage. Then they add crunchy pickled veges, scatter through bullet chilis and sprigs of fresh corriander. Lastly it is seasoned with maggi soy sauce (must be maggi), fish sauce and white pepper.
The bullet chilis in the bun add an element of excitement...it's like russian roulette with a baguette....also on account of the fact that some people have been known to have gotten food poisoning from them....so double the roulette factor.

My version is much more simple

sliced cold chicken, preferably chicken that has been cooked asian style or with asian flavours (poached in water flavoured with ginger, fish sauce, garlic cloves, white whole pepper corns, corriander roots, light soy)
fresh baguette,
crunchy carrots and cucumber marinated in rice vinegar, fish sauce, chili, lime and garlic
sliced bullet chilis
sprigs of corriander
mayo (kewpie will do just fine)
maggi soy sauce
fish sauce
ground white pepper

Take baguette smother with mayonnaise, put in chicken and veges, add sliced bullet chilis and whole sprigs of corriander and then season with maggie soy sauce, fish sauce and white pepper

Feel self satisfied

We almost decided to quit Thailand and move back to Australia last month, but then Hock found out what a Head Chef can expect to get paid in Australia. It hasn't changed much since we left and with the cost of living high and housing affordability at an all time low, we decided to stay in Asia and keep on saving our pennies.

Although to some degree salary levels for chefs in Australia are low because profits are spread more equally in the kitchen between all workers, unlike in Thailand where bigger pay disparities exist, that doesn't mean that Australian workers are necessarily any better off than their Thai counterparts, relatively speaking. The cost of living in Thailand is comparatively low compared with Australia. However on a relative standard all workers in hospitality generally get paid shit. This is because people don't want to spend a lot of money on food.

So far the issue of ethical consumerism has so far only arisen in the retail supermarket arena where big supermarkets operate on economies of scale, selling large volumes at an average of 1% profit margin and thereby squeezing all those further down the supply chain to deliver you everyday savings....the magnanimous concerns of ethical consumerism are only now turning thier attention to those poor bastards (like secret here) who spend night after night serving rude diners and "dying a little inside".


So this month Time asks Are Restaurants the New Sweatshops?"

"Eating out has become as American as apple pie, but for those manning the kitchen, restaurant work is anything but an American dream. Dishwashers, waiters and delivery people are increasingly served up unfair pay, discrimination and dangerous working conditions."

Backing up Maytel's recent post on the topic that we are (as societies) what we eat, so an article by Nicholas Wade in today's NY Times presents findings by scientists that we have also genetically evolved, partly according to what our ancestors have eaten.

"A category of genes under selective pressure covers those involved in metabolism, suggesting that people were responding to changes in diet, perhaps associated with the switch from hunting and gathering to agriculture."

"People have continued to evolve since leaving the ancestral homeland in northeastern Africa some 50,000 years ago, both through the random process known as genetic drift and through natural selection. The genome bears many fingerprints in places where natural selection has recently remolded the human clay, researchers have found, as people in the various continents adapted to new diseases, climates, diets and, perhaps, behavioral demands."

It seems that a historical bovine influence has given an unfair advantage to Northern Europeans and East Africans in the field of lime milkshakes.

"A notable instance of recent natural selection is the emergence of lactose tolerance — the ability to digest lactose in adulthood — among the cattle-herding people of northern Europe some 5,000 years ago. Lactase, the enzyme that digests the principal sugar of milk, is usually switched off after weaning. But because of the great nutritional benefit for cattle herders of being able to digest lactose in adulthood, a genetic change that keeps the lactase gene switched on spread through the population.

Lactose tolerance is not confined to Europeans. Last year, Sarah Tishkoff of the University of Maryland and colleagues tested 43 ethnic groups in East Africa and found three separate mutations, all different from the European one, that keep the lactase gene switched on in adulthood. One of the mutations, found in peoples of Kenya and Tanzania, may have arisen as recently as 3,000 years ago.

That lactose tolerance has evolved independently four times is an instance of convergent evolution. Natural selection has used the different mutations available in European and East African populations to make each develop lactose tolerance. In Africa, those who carried the mutation were able to leave 10 times more progeny, creating a strong selective advantage."

So there you have it. Crusts may not make your hair curly but milk & cookies might have a startling effect on your procreative powers. Well, at least after 7000 years or so.

C.R.E.A.M. get the Money:



However, a Harvard School of Public Health study reported in May that eating low fat yoghurt may actually decrease one's likelihood of conception.

"Recent research has shown that women who eat low-fat dairy products when trying to conceive may be dramatically cutting their chances of pregnancy. Drinking a pint of semi-skimmed or skimmed milk or eating two pots of yoghurt a day almost doubles the risk of anovulatory infertility, in which women stop ovulating."

Horror! And what's more, skim milk can give you zits, also decreasing your ability to procreate I'd say.

"Processing milk to make low-fat versions may raise levels of the hormones, making the situation worse.
The US researchers looked at the teenage diet of more than 47,000 women and then compared dairy product intake with cases of acne. Worst off were those who regularly drank skimmed milk, with two half-pint glasses a day raising the risk of the condition by 44 per cent. Those who drank a pint of whole milk a day were 12 per cent more likely to develop acne, while semi-skimmed milk increased the risk by 16 per cent. Cream and cottage cheeses also raised the risk of the condition, however, chips, chocolate and pizza did not."

Studies are still inconclusive on donuts, frikandel speziaal, pineapple fritters, Kyupi mayo and rhubarb cheesecake.

Man I always bum out that I'm the one who brings the teenage mutant ninja turtle element into this food-radical community and lower the tone. But daaamn. Today I lost all control and ate THREE donuts from my 'scum-bag on the corner open til 3am cos its thats how we roll' fish n chip shop. I felt so ghetto but have you ever appraised these guys? Or any fish n chip provided 'dessert' menu? My donuts were fried almost dark brown, slathered in cinnamon sugar and had me hooked for two reasons. Crunchy as a mf on the outside. Soft on the inside. Bonus ghetto points if you can see half the fluffy inside is secretly infiltrated by the grease. I hate Dunkin Donuts cos it has too many Homer Simpson theatrics - I love these guys. This is dedicated to my 'pineapple fritter' skulling homies everywhere.

Next week: why I love 2 for Tuesday Taco's. $5 dude!

"Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you who you are"

Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, The Physiology of Taste, 1825
French gourmet & lawyer (1755 - 1826)

A while ago, when I was writing my thesis proposal (so a very long time ago) I read a great book called "The Rice Economies" by a woman called Francesca Bray. It explained that many people have failed to understand Asian agriculture and therefore culture because they try to understand it and continue to compare it with western agriculture. The book explains the fundamental properties of the rice plant, how as a plant the highest yields are traditionally achieved by labour intensification as opposed to capital extensification like wheat. Think of the traditional image of small bunded rice paddies with peasants hunched over in the sun versus enourmous wheat fields with combine harvesters rolling off into the horizon. This is what she means. Rice also produces more tonnes per hectare of food than wheat thereby supporting larger populations, which in turn can add to labour intensification. Rice also typically, not always, requires complex large-scale water management systems if one is to get the most out of the crop. While disputed, Karl Wittfogel claimed in his book Oriental Depotism, that this requirement led many Asian societies to develop what he termed hydraulic civilisations based on the control of water through authoritarian managerial regimes.

Anyway, the point is when you study food systems you usually arrive not too long into at culture systems.....so I thought the geeks among you may enjoy reading this small thesis entitled "Human societies are defined by their food". The final sections present, what I consider to be some pretty humdrum, standard lefty comments at the end, but the initial sections are useful.

"All evolution is ultimately geared towards genetic reproduction, but to achieve that end, evolution works on two broad goals: the reproduction of life, and the maintenance of life (at least until reproduction has been achieved). These can be reduced with little violence to the truth to the essential drives for food, and sex. Most of the necessities humans require could be served by any social group. Any mixing of males and females will invariably lead to sexual relationships and the successful rearing of children. Protection from the elements is gained easily through any number of methods. That leaves food as the factor which society must spend most of its effort procuring. Not only is food a requirement which is needed on a much more regular basis than sex or protection from the elements, it is also a much riskier prospect than the others. Minimally, only a single sexual liason may result in offspring, and a single shelter can protect several individuals from the elements for an extended period of time--but most people must eat several times a day. In any social group with both males and females, sexual relationships will form, and protection from the elements can be easily attained in any environment--but famines often afflict whole bioregions for lengthy periods of time, and hunger and starvation can even become endemic to an entire population. Any form of society would suffice for our other basic needs. Culture develops primarily as a means of procuring food, and everything in a given culture serves that end."

After a months research, I have come to the opinion that if the US and the UN want to really tighten the screws on Iran they should look at sugar sanctions. In a country where alcohol and promiscuity is outlawed people overindulge in what they can - sugar. Iranians love sweet stuff, given that it is hot here and there is a lot of desert they particularly like cold sweet stuff. Rose water is the key ingredient to much of the desserts here, you can drink it, soak cake/biscuits in it and pretty much add it to anything with sugar.

Iranians also like to eat carrots and cucumbers as fruits. Two curious combinations of this is the very popular carrot juice with rose water (or vanilla) ice cream, or thin flat bread (lavash) with carrot jam and cream. In one small take away joint, one man was so intent on imbibing his carrot and ice cream juice as quickly as possible that he managed to spill much of it on his pants and had to leave immediately.

A more classic example of Iranian sweets is plain cake soaked in sugar and rose water syrup so that the cake is moist, syrupy and delicious. Another is the nice take on neopolitan icecream with a 3 flavoured ice cream (made from rice flour) slice with chocolate, vanilla and banana, a hint of rose water throughout and pistachios.

Click here to read about imitation beer in Iran