I have a new addiction. No, it isn’t heroin or Jersey Shore. For the last couple days I’ve been watching quite a few Iron Chef Americas on Youtube. I’ve never seen the show before, but I’m completely hooked. My psychological and physiological motivation, of course, is the fact that I’m constantly starving due to my illness. I can’t eat much of anything. What I can eat I have to eat in tiny quantities.
However, I can watch Iron Chef America and all the amazing, creative things they do with food.
Parmigiano-reggiano, eggs, paiche, kale, sausage, tortillas, salmon. What wonderful episodes! It really is fascinating to see the chefs’ creativity in taste and design. While what they do is functional it is also, without a doubt, art.
The internet connection where I am is dreadful. Happily, though, this forces me to ping-pong between two addictions: Iron Chef and writing. I feverishly write a few paragraphs while the episode is loading (sardines is the current one), then I watch a few minutes of knife work and emulsions and frying and whatnot until it freezes up again, dash back to writing a few paragraphs while a few more minutes load, etc. I’m actually getting a lot of writing done.
This addiction is making me dream about food. I spent about an hour in bed last night, tossing and turning and fretting over different ways to construct savory tomato pies. Inspired by Iron Chef, no doubt. We grow tons of heirloom tomatoes on our farm and are forced to throw a lot away due to spoilage. I’ve been thinking savory pies would be a good way to limit some of the loss. Perhaps a tomato pie constructed of a flaky crust, a judicious mixture of cheddar and parmigiano-reggiano, fresh basil, heirlooms, and olive oil? Topped off with an egg-washed crust.
I must return to the sardines episode (Morimoto vs. Zakarian). My addition is calling.
Savory pies would be awesome for tomato usage. But what about just tomato sauce? I cringe at the thought of heirloom tomatoes having to be thrown out – that just seems wrong (I know you don’t do it lightly). Tomato sauce, tomato juice, tomato soup (made from the juice), salsa, BBQ sauce, sardines in tomatoes – oops, now you’ve infected me, too. I had some yellow heirloom toms last year; I never tried it, but I thought they’d make an interesting light-coloured sauce for something like chicken, where you don’t want that punchy brown-red of regular tomatoes but more of a creamy colour. Or a piebald soup: one pot of each colour, poured into the bowl at the same time so the two halves don’t mix – eh? Food art indeed.
Enjoy your sardines show.
We grow a lot of heirlooms. It’s a pity to toss so many, but they go bad fast. At any rate, they make good fertilizer.
Salsa… a fresh salsa made from tomatoes and cilantro and peppers straight out of the field is amazing. I wish I had some now, plus tortilla chips. That would kill me so fast. Aargh.
Agree that what they do with food is art!
Wonderful tasty art!