Chocolate Turkish Taffy

Yippee, novelty candy! Turkish Taffy is this airy, slightly porous, dense marshmallow-y light sugar candy that is advertised to be snappable. The idea is that you hit the bar against a hard surface, causing it to shatter. Then, you eat the pieces of the bar. I chewed the pieces because that's how I eat candy. The bar had a really clean break, which is interesting for a candy with the consistency of hard caramel and the flavor of cola.



Good candy bar for angry or violent people. And non-angry non-violent people.

It is definitely preferable to hit the candy while it is still wrapped, or else you get chunks all over the floor and table.

"Real People" Dinner

At a Discussion Dinner for my program, I was making a point and rambled that we first pilot test our food/solutions in our lab, and then, after approval, "give the test to real people." This phrase became the butt of a handful of jokes later in the discussion, and I am now ostensibly the lab assistant of a lab that has "non-real" people. On a related note, AK distinguishes "real people" food and lodging from college kid living conditions. "Real people", for example, have vapid paintings on their walls, and don't eat ramen-with-poached-egg. In a clutter of spontaneity and thoughtful planning, we managed to have a remarkably posh "real people" dinner on the porch of his house, complete with neither tablecloth nor napkin. Actually, apart from the food and sunset, everything else was rather "college kid"-style (including Christmas lights). However, the food is the only thing that matters and it's neat choosing not to pay for perfect plating and swanky music.

Unfortunately, as is frequently the case this summer, I didn't have my camera, so these phone pictures will have to suffice.

The Menu

Not-Crusty-Enough Baguette with Camembert

8 Oysters (4 Chesapeake, 4 other)

Ribeye Steak with Mushrooms and Steamed, Buttered Spinach

The Oysters

Oysters are really expensive to order at restaurants. At Simeon's, oysters are $37.50/dozen (I think). At Wegmans, however, they are only $1. Although this sounds perfectly ridiculous (because an entire box of mac and cheese is $1), consider ordering 6 cooked-from-frozen mozarella sticks for $7.99+tax+tip from a generic casual-style restaurant. And they revel in it.

The woman at the Wegmans seafood counter was very nice and explained to us that one of the oyster types was more briny than the other. However, I don't remember which was the more briny one, and I don't remember the name of the other oyster type either. Suffice it to say that 4 of the oysters looked more textured and wavy while the other 4 looked neat and tidy. '50s conservative, vs. '60s whoot-whoot, if you will. Although the two types of oysters came in different nets, I ended up mixing them due to a memory lapse. In another memory lapse, I put the oysters in the freezer, only to realize 20 minutes later that oysters should probably not be frozen because the oysters were still alive (maybe?) and that frozen scallops (and other seafood) have a terrible texture, so why not oysters? So, they were promptly moved to the fridge.

However, obtaining oysters is not the main problem. Opening them is. I didn't see the point of purchasing a $20 oyster opener, and I was confident that we could pry them open somehow. The woman at the counter suggested using a screwdriver. She also said that legally speaking, she could only tell us to eat them cooked. I found this humourous.

We tried using a butter knife and another sharp knife to pry open the oysters, before AK found that a 3/8-inch drill-bit (flat) works perfectly as an oyster opener! You gently poke the drill-bit between the bottom (corner?) of the oyster, and then gingerly wiggle the drill-bit around the perimeter of the oyster.

After a short amount of time (much less than the time taken to get to a restaurant, order food, and wait for food), we had our oysters! They sat in the fridge on ice, covered with a plate, for about an hour until we ate them.

The camembert was good because the rind was bland. That's probably not how it's supposed to be, but is agreeable towards my preferences. The steak was good. There were chunks of fat in it, and little blobs of mushroom and garlic. The spinach was made by steaming in this collapsible colander/steamer (like this), which I think is super nifty device!

This was so fun!

Carriage House Cafe

(No Pictures...but a milestone!)

Brunch: my least favourite meal of the day because it means that I didn't wake up early enough for both breakfast, second breakfast, AND lunch. However, brunch at the Carriage House Cafe this afternoon was quite a relaxing and novel experience.

Carriage House Cafe is a restaurant that offers local food. It is blatantly obvious when pointed out, on Stewart Ave, but is otherwise camoflauged because it has no blatant neon sign and it is painted an olive green that matches the nearby trees. It kind of looks like a barn, and the front door is difficult to open. The interior is both bubolic (with stone brick walls, lazy fans, and a winter scene painted on a giant saw) and old-school modern (with typewriters, a turtle lamp, old-style radio, and glass tables), if that's even a style.

It was really busy when we arrived at noon, so we either had to wait upstairs (really pretty, natural lighting, clean, quaint), or sit at the couch. We decided that we might as well eat at the wooden coffee table with the velvet, paisley-seated couch with plump beige cushions in which you could lose yourself (or your wallet, haha). It felt a little uncanny to be about 50 cm lower than everyone else seated at tables. Maybe it just seemed too casual. If the entire restaurant were couches and beanbags... well, then, that's a business plan.

The locally-killed animals included salmon, cow, pig, and rabbit (there may have been others but I don't recall...). As I have never been offered the opportunity to try rabbit, I was in quite a quandary. I like rabbits. They're cute. I frequently consider getting a pet rabbit after I graduate. Heck, a rabbit face is on my login screen! So...no rabbit, rabbit pate, or rabbit sausage? What a eerie feeling, which was soon overwhelmed by my animalistic desires to try new animals and not be a hypocrite (because I eat cows. Why not rabbits?).

I ordered the breakfast sandwich, which was an apple and rabbit sausage, egg (I asked for poached), and salad lettuce, served in house-made ciabatta (one side coated in butter, the other side with some mildly spicy mustard mayonnaise), with fried potato chunks on the side and homemade ketchup. The apple and rabbit sausage was really good. It was slightly peppery, and the apple cuboids were the size of rice grains. The rabbit part was very juicy, chewy, and sausage-like. It was kind of like eating a cow burger patty, but more fatty and chunky. I wonder which part of the rabbit they used. I would assume that the legs would be too muscular, thus rendering the patty too lean if they used it. But then, where do they use? The poached egg were great. The ciabatta was perfectly crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside, with lots of holes. The butter soaking into the ciabatta made me question why I never buy good butter to put onto my toast - or rather, why I never eat buttered toast in the first place. I also really enjoyed whatever mayonnaise sauce thing they threw on the other half of ciabatta.

The potatoes and ketchup were pretty good. Perfectly fried.

I also tried a slice of bacon which was pretty thick and not very fatty. It was pretty good but a bit too salty.

Overall, I currently do not regret adding rabbit to the list of animals I've consumed, though I think I prefer lamb more. The list is:

Cow

Pig

Chicken

Duck
Goose

Lamb

Various fish (eel, salmon, etc.), but not shark

Various other seafood and crustaceans (clams, mussels, oysters, squid, octopus, in various states of rawness)

Turkey

Quail

Snake

Turtle

Rabbit

Contrary to stereotypes, I have not tried kangaroo or dogs or cats. Possibly because of the stereotypes, I would prefer to keep it that way for now.

Sustainability in the Food Industry

One of the presentations at the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) Conference was about sustainability in the food industry. I care a lot about sustainability (specifically waste management and reduction), and it has occurred to me that there are careers in this area in food. I think that one of my college application essays said something about that, actually, back when I felt more optimisitc and full of potential.

Ah, here we go:

The chance to learn and research about crop production in relation to both the local biological impacts and domestic and foreign economical aspects would provide me with deep and broad insight. I would have the opportunity to change an agricultural or business practice, although I already frequently boycott or contact companies such as [company name redacted] to recommend that they use less processing in products. As a potential biotechnologist with a detailed understanding of the economy, I aim to promote fresh, varied food that is healthy, beneficial for the environment, and economically viable for efficient production and storage.

Well, that bombastic essay resulted in my rejection to the LSM program, which in retrospect, is a relief. In any case, at the Expo, I went around a bunch of booths asking about their sustainability initiatives, or what people in that area do (i.e. I need a job). Sure, product development is engaging and interesting too, but I would feel more useful to the world by researching or developing more sustainable packaging or food production methods. So let's swivel back to the sustainability presentation.

I got there a bit early and sat in the second row because the first row was occupied by a woman and her daughter. I watched them as they chatted. Soon, it occurred to me that the woman was the one who was giving the speech, and later, it hit me that she was actually extremely important. By this time, I had lost my chance to introduce myself to her, and after her presentation, she and her coworkers left. On the bright side, I had a neat conversation with her 11 or 12 year-old daughter.

So, rule number 1: If the person doesn't look busy, introduce yourself. You could be speaking with the Senior VP of Starbucks. And indeed I could've been.

Dr. Mary Wagner gave an interesting but broad presentation about coffee-growing sustainability efforts by Starbucks. I would've liked to have a chat with her afterwards because I had a lot of questions.

She started off by distinguishing between the Arabica and Robusta beans. Starbucks uses only Arabica beans. My notes say something about the coffee cherries being handpicked, and the only part of the cherry that is kept is the coffee bean. I wanted to ask whether there are efforts to develop applications of coffee pulp and skin (because in the dairy industry, they used to discard whey until they realized that protein powders were an enormous market). This would be the kind of research I'd like to do and would find fulfilling (perhaps). 

The coffee is grown on hilly land +/- 20 degrees from the equator. Coffee is susceptible to this fungus that causes "coffee rust", a disease that has something to do with lack of water. Of course, water (over)usage is a huge problem in the world. There are actually two kinds of processing, dry and wet, and a goal is to make dry-processed coffee taste like the wet-processed version and therefore minimize water usage.

I wonder, do they compost the coffee cherry skins and pulp? Do they use fertilizers? What happens when the nutrients in the soil are gone? Move to a higher patch of land? Doesn't this immensely increase transportation costs?

Apparently, a factor with which Starbucks is currently toying is the growth of coffee plants at higher altitudes. They're trying to figure out how this would affect taste, water usage, growth conditions, etc.

After this flurry of overview, there was time for three questions, so I asked whether the hills from which Starbucks obtains their coffee uses any sort of crop rotation. Apparently not. I also wanted to ask whether the topsoil is affected by coffee planting, and whether there is erosion occurring because of the lack of deep-rooted trees. I mean, I had plenty of questions...enough for a coffee chat. Looks like I'm finally learning about the importance of networking and grown-up/professional, extroverted things like that.

The second presentation was by Dr. Ruben Morawicki, and the idea that stuck with me was this: "A practice can't be "more" or "less" sustainable. It's either sustainable or not." Yet, I think he also meant that there are more "sustainable" processes than others (e.g. superflous water consumption does occur).

There was this spider graph (like this) which is used to compare products based on their energy usages/other metrics. I had never heard of spider graphs before, and I am instantly fond of, and will use, this method for decision making (yes, even for trivial things such as what to have for luncheon).

The third presentation, by Dr. Jason Hill, discussed biofuels. The take-away message was that people oversimplify everything. When someone asks what's "better" for the environment, we need to define "better". Better for the company (more profits, but also less innovation and a shadier public image)?  Better for the consumer (more convenient, but ridiculously expensive, OR, less convenient but cheaper)? Better for the earth (but more difficult to make this practice work on a large scale, therefore contributing no net "betterment")? 

It makes me wonder, and then feel rather helpless.

Citation: Wagner, M, Morawicki, R, Hill, J. Research Needs for a Sustainable Food System. Institute of Food Technologists Conference and Expo 2013. S503 McCormick Place. July 15 2013.

Rulloff's Restaurant

Yay, dinner at a restaurant-bar-type place: Rulloff's. Do I feel like an adult? Do I feel comfortable with a beer at the table (not on my side)?
What a peculiar lifestyle.
We sat at a table next to the only wall-window in the place. Happy Chowder-TV-show type music played in the background, which later switched into some sort of jazzy fling. There were ceiling fans, dim lighting, and a dusty cabinet.

I asked for clam chowder because I've had a fortnight-long craving for it (specifically, in a bread bowl, but they don't have bread bowls). However, I was later told that they had run out from lunch time. This was completely fine with me. I know this happens. At least they make it fresh?
AK (not to be confused with AK from high school) got French Onion Soup which tasted pretty good.

 He also got a pulled pork sandwich and sweet potato fries. The pulled pork sandwich came in a burger bun, which was unexpected but extremely tasty. I had no idea that pulled pork was so succulent and the BBQ
sauce wasn't overwhelmingly sweet. I also haven't had sweet potato fries in 2 years and these were excellent.

 Instead of clam chowder, I got the California burger with potato fries. The burger had a smidge of guacamole and baby sprouts which were pretty good since I've only ever had mung bean sprouts that look like this. The cow part was also really chewy and umami. It was a nice meal except I felt a bit hurried. Maybe I eat too slowly, or maybe the waitress was bored. We weren't left alone for more than 10 minutes at a time. I kinda wish the place was more crowded (though, as primarily(?) a bar, the place was near empty at 7 pm) so that I would've had an entire hour or two to nibble on food and people-watch.