I was living in Emeryville, California in September, 2001. Emeryville is a small suburb nestled in between Oakland and Berkeley with easy access to San Francisco, where I worked with Nicole at Millennium Restaurant. September was a busy month for me already. Our restaurant had been invited to participate in a large flashy gala event in New York City and my boss, the chef, had flown out with the pastry chef and catering manager to attend, leaving me in charge. Nicole’s grandfather was, coincidentally, turning 100 years old in Boston that week as well, and she too, had flown off to attend that event which meant that I was in charge and alone both at work and at the house.
Nicole and I had been enjoying our urban lifestyle, to some degree; our salaries were good and our apartment was cozy. We weren’t, however, at home. My family and her family both lived thousands of miles away from us and neither was in much of a financial position to visit often. This meant that what little vacation time we could muster was often spent appeasing one family or the other. We loved the work, but not always the hours and we loved the people, but eventually, to get along with people, relationships have to evolve, which is difficult in a workplace with a glass ceiling. The series of events that had taken us each to the west coast and together had been adventures of a lifetime for both of us, but the road west dead ends at Highway 1 and we were both about ready to start looking for another route.
On the 10th of September, I spoke to Nicole briefly; she’d had a great time with her family, I was sad to have missed it, there was some mix-up with her flight, but she’d figured something else out. She was taking a cab and the train back to the house from the airport so I didn’t bother to write down her new flight number.
On the morning of September 11th a phone call woke me, Paul from work said, ‘go turn on the TV, I don’t think we’re opening the restaurant today.’
By now plenty has been written about that morning by lots of people who write better than I do. And for all the ink and column inches it has greedily drunk, it is, at the end, just one more simple example of a day where someone woke up to find the world had turned up different, darker and worse than the one they’d put to bed the night before. For me, for 45 minutes, I wished more than anything else in the world that I’d written down a fucking flight number. Every minute was a million horror movies played out in repeated images on every channel and in my head.
Her plane was grounded in Wichita. She called, she was fine. I was changed. It took a few days to get her back to San Francisco, to Emeryville, but I knew before my heart stopped racing that morning that I was ready to move home. The problem was I didn’t yet know what home meant.
I had another clear thought that morning. I was sad. I was sad because I knew that whoever had done this, however clever they felt for pulling it off, and no matter how loud the voices of logic and sanity shouted, the war hawks were going to fly. If the plan had been to make the world, or even some small corner of it, a better place for anybody, by whatever twisted logic, I knew that it was for nothing because the only possible result of that monumental act of stupidity was that the war hawks were going to fly.
I am fascinated by conspiracy theories, but skeptical. For any conspiracy of grand magnitude to work, the conspirators would have to be incredibly smart. I, personally, don’t think George W. Bush is very smart. He is smart enough, obviously; he has managed to land an excellent job, but I don’t think his ability to reason is fully developed. His thinking is short sighted and he makes snap judgments, he is inflexible and apparently, from his actions, incapable of empathy. I don’t think he orchestrated September 11. I don’t think anyone in Washington did. I think the official script is pretty close to the truth. Incompetence is probably the most accurate charge that can be leveled against him or his people, and one that certainly is consistent with every other action (outside of political maneuvering) that we’ve seen them take before or since. This is not an excuse.
What is not in question is that as of that morning, my and lots of other people’s safe, bland world stopped feeling so safe and so bland. Nicole and I quickly agreed that we needed to get our priorities in order and high on that list was moving closer to family. Getting away from a city. Finding a home.
We didn’t move right away. We were ready in our hearts, but life wasn’t ready for us. We loved and still love our restaurant in San Francisco. We had met there, married there and come of age in our profession there. We are still in touch with the owners and some of our co-workers and still follow their careers with fascination and pleasure. We also felt that our change of life needed to include doing things we had put off; like a honeymoon trip to Europe and a road-trip across this continent. And at the end of that trip we knew we had a devil’s choice. Would we live near her family or mine?
Our road-trip brought us, among other places, to Texas, to Austin and Bryan to visit my family. Nicole and I both loved Austin; I had lived there for a number of years and she had been there twice to visit a childhood friend who had moved there for work. We loved the town and still consider it a second home. The trip also brought us to Kemptville, to visit Nicole’s sister who has lived here for many years. We went for dinner at a groovy restaurant in town, Amanda’s Slip. It was the first time since I’d found Millennium in San Francisco where I read the menu and said “I understand exactly what this chef is trying to do. “ I also told Nicole that night, “This is the kind of place we should open.”
We came for dinner and I stayed for the summer helping in the kitchen while Nicole earned us some spending money for Europe at her old job in Ottawa. When we came back from Europe we were broke. The first stop had to be in Austin where we were both able to work. It was a move brought on by necessity, not a decision, and our belongings remained in storage for the year we were there.
After much soul searching we knew we couldn’t choose between the two families. We loved both options too much to decide. It wasn’t what you’d think either, we both loved our native homes, but Nicole wanted Austin’s sun and my niece and nephew’s hugs and smiles as much or more than me at times, and I was as likely as not to be daydreaming about the little restaurant in Kemptville and universal health care.
But we did know that we were tired and increasingly afraid of the darkening clouds over America. My clear thought on September 11th had turned into an ugly reality, the war hawks were flying. And my opinion? The Afghanistan war would have happened with anyone in the world in the oval office, but the Iraq war was and is to all practical observation a political action designed to promote America’s business interests, and manufactured in whole by an imperial minded executive. Sadly, the whole damned thing was bought and paid for by a blank check of political capital co-written by a handful of extremists in Washington D.C. and Afghanistan and handed over to the world in New York City six years ago.
A lot of Americans agree with every word I’m saying. And a lot that don’t agree out loud know in their hearts that I’m right. Everyone who was living in the U.S. on September 11th was emotionally affected, it upset the apple cart and we’ve all got to deal with the fact that we’re never going to go back to the safe world we thought that we had before.
But America is not governed by consensus. It is governed by a government made up of slick political operators chosen by a majority of voters. I knew I didn’t want to continue living a country entranced by a fear-based culture being cultivated in Washington, and frankly, thanks to our unique circumstance, and given the timing, we actually did have a choice. We knew we couldn’t decide ourselves, so we finally decided to let the American voting public decide. It was simple, four more years of Bush and we would move to Canada. Anyone else and we would stay. I can’t say I’m happy Bush was re-elected. I can’t say the outcome increased my faith in America’s political system or gave me much hope for an end to the series of mistakes and the tendency towards incompetence that became so apparent 6 years ago. But I can without a doubt say we made the right decision.
Sometimes, in life we need a jolt to remind us of what is important. September 11th was our generation’s jolt. The question is, and what determines our value as human beings is, what do we do with it? For some, that means taking all that anger and fear and spraying it back out on the world from the barrel of a gun. And to some, to folks like us, it means getting our priorities in order. It means moving home to be with family, finding the kind of work that is fulfilling. It means committing to doing little things to make the big world a better place. Being thankful and gracious for the life we have, for the luck of magic that our lives have given us, and trying to spread that love around in the faint hope and desperate belief that if we could all react this way, we wouldn’t have to live in the kind of world where our kids have to fight and die as our surrogates in a live ammo schoolyard pissing contest.
We were in Canada for a nearly a year when we found out the little restaurant in Kemptville was for sale, and with help from some family and some friends we pitched in and bought it, and it felt so right that we’ve never looked back. Our lives have changed a great deal from that September. We see family now, every few days instead of every few months. I am thankful every day for little graces; my music, my food, my family and friends. I try my hardest to live well, love well and give back some of that love to the world. And I wake up every day thankful that the girl beside me wasn’t on one of the other flights that left that September morning. So, why Kemptville? Because, Kemptville is home.
authentic texas specialties, amazing live music, incredible selection of local, microbrewed draft beers and locally sourced and organic foods...
Thursday, December 6, 2007
Friday, November 16, 2007
Where there's smoke...
One of the best things that ever happened to me was losing everything when I was 17. My family home was engulfed in flames in the middle of the night, a couple of weeks before Christmas. Firefighters never could figure out exactly what happened, except that it started in the furnace. Speculation pointed to a fan malfunction. It didn’t seem like one of the best things that ever happened to me at the time, of course; instead, it seemed incredible, beyond imagining, surreal. I didn’t lose everything either, not really, just some stuff. I was woken by my mother; I recall that it took more than one attempt to wake me and my brother as well...the deep sleep of innocence and youth being what it is. It took us a while to clue in that it was an actual emergency wake-up, as opposed to the usual “emergency” wake-ups that usually ended with us trudging off to school or church. Even after I got out of bed, the strangeness of the situation seemed to blend seamlessly with the dreams I was shaking off. My memories of that night are fragmented, spiked with moments of clarity and mixed with long vague patches of smoke.
I remember being instructed to wake the neighbours to call the fire department and then trying to do so by ringing the doorbell once and waiting, only to be pushed aside, a minute later by my mother who rushed over to ring their bell repeatedly and furiously while pounding on their door, officially signaling that the rules had changed: politeness, the law, was suspended temporarily with the martial law of justifiable rudeness in its place. I remember having to choose what I would take (a trench-coat and a briefcase full of my adolescent poetry). I remember being able to see my sister’s closet on the back of the second floor burning from the street out front. I remember my father salvaging our Apple IIe computer, a prize possession in those days. I remember the dog sleeping through much of the fire in her doghouse out back. I remember being sent to our neighbor’s house to sleep and instead staying up singing the Talking Head’s song ‘Burning Down the House’ and laughing at our precocious sense of ironic detachment, giddy and stupid from the adrenaline overdose. I remember my mother, without makeup, in her nightclothes, sad, scared and as strong as I’ve ever seen her. My father, all action and no talk, after seeing to our safety, defying the smoke for at least three trips back inside the house for things he suddenly realized we couldn’t leave to chance. I remember brave firemen throwing a family heirloom antique desk out of a second story window in a bizarre, unguided and prescient act of preservation. It’s one of my sister’s only possessions that wasn’t burned to cinders.
Silly what you get attached to—I think I was most upset about losing a candle bottle which had been the result of hours of wasted time moulding the wax into interesting patterns by choosing colors, turning candles, and directing the flow of wax as I fell asleep watching it for the several months prior. No, it didn't start the fire. It was worthless, but also uniquely irreplaceable. My family lost some pictures; my mother and father lost some of their childhood talismans, and a family bible. As I mentioned, my sister lost almost the entire contents of her room. My brother lost some things but was and is a stoic and refused to complain. We all lost our home. It was rebuilt, different, but similar, but the old building is and will always be gone. We lost furniture, of course, and clothing. Even some things that seemed to survive were damaged by the smoke and disintegrated in the ensuing months. We mourned, at first, and felt a gap, and moved on as people do. But we didn’t lose everything. We were insured. We had a supportive community. We replaced all the things, even the emotional attachments which broke free of their moorings, in time, docked on the fertile shores of new possessions.
Later, on the morning of the fire, I remember the church, our community, arriving, the pastor and his wife at first, then the church, as a group, arriving with hands to help and ratty clothes on, scrambling through the muck and salvaging what they could, our neighbors and friends, ankle deep in ashy mud. I remember the soggy crumpled Christmas tree and crushed presents and how strange it all looked with the sunlight streaming through where the ceiling used to be. I remember that the fish survived, and how important that was. Everyone survived. I remember a miracle; my mother’s wooden box of love letters from my father was less than ten feet from the origin of the blaze and opened to reveal not a single singed page. I remember coming home to my grandmother’s house within two days of the fire to find a room stacked from floor to ceiling with donated clothes, canned foods and household goods. I remember my school collecting hundreds of dollars for us.
I was confused and gracious. I had never been on the receiving end of charity, and did not (and still do not) fully comprehend the degree to which a community is capable of and even desires being good to one other. I have had my share of personal struggles with the dogma and philosophy of the Baptist church; but one thing is for certain, I was a Baptist that day. Specifically I was a full fledged member of the First Baptist Church of Bryan, Texas. Unless you are a member of a community that joins together in times of need (and I hope that you are) you’d have a hard time understanding. That day was not about dogma or philosophy, it was not even about ‘whether or not to help’ it was about ‘how to help.’
Speaking of the church: I always recall, when thinking of this time in my life, a bible verse that instructs the reader not to ‘lay up treasures on earth, where moths and rust doth corrupt’ (colorful language, that...). Whether or not you lend any credence to the source, it, for me, summarizes a very valid philosophical point. One shared, knowingly or not, by every society that has ever engaged in any actions that result in the banding together of people to help equalize the quality of life for others in their community. It is a philosophy of setting aside, at times, that very human compulsion to collect, store, accumulate and pack away material goods for oneself alone, and instead to share with, to give to and to help carry the burden of those in need.
The fire was, in its own way, one of the best things that ever happened to me. I can feel my mom cringe when I say that, but it’s true. I wouldn’t be who I am today if it had not happened. Standing on the lawn that night I saw everything we owned going away and I learned in an instant that things could be lost. Then, over time, I learned that things could be replaced. I learned that communities can and do come together.
It is not a lesson I wish on anyone, but one I am grateful to have learned: unfortunately, nothing else can teach you the importance of charity more than being the person who needs it.
We are very happy to have found, in Kemptville, a generous and charitable community. Our efforts on behalf of the Salvation Army Food Bank in particular have been met with an outpouring of generosity that astounds me. I have no doubts, seeing the caliber and depth of character of the people here, that I am again a member of the kind of group that does not hesitate to come together to help those in need.
And for that, I'd like to say thank you.
I remember being instructed to wake the neighbours to call the fire department and then trying to do so by ringing the doorbell once and waiting, only to be pushed aside, a minute later by my mother who rushed over to ring their bell repeatedly and furiously while pounding on their door, officially signaling that the rules had changed: politeness, the law, was suspended temporarily with the martial law of justifiable rudeness in its place. I remember having to choose what I would take (a trench-coat and a briefcase full of my adolescent poetry). I remember being able to see my sister’s closet on the back of the second floor burning from the street out front. I remember my father salvaging our Apple IIe computer, a prize possession in those days. I remember the dog sleeping through much of the fire in her doghouse out back. I remember being sent to our neighbor’s house to sleep and instead staying up singing the Talking Head’s song ‘Burning Down the House’ and laughing at our precocious sense of ironic detachment, giddy and stupid from the adrenaline overdose. I remember my mother, without makeup, in her nightclothes, sad, scared and as strong as I’ve ever seen her. My father, all action and no talk, after seeing to our safety, defying the smoke for at least three trips back inside the house for things he suddenly realized we couldn’t leave to chance. I remember brave firemen throwing a family heirloom antique desk out of a second story window in a bizarre, unguided and prescient act of preservation. It’s one of my sister’s only possessions that wasn’t burned to cinders.
Silly what you get attached to—I think I was most upset about losing a candle bottle which had been the result of hours of wasted time moulding the wax into interesting patterns by choosing colors, turning candles, and directing the flow of wax as I fell asleep watching it for the several months prior. No, it didn't start the fire. It was worthless, but also uniquely irreplaceable. My family lost some pictures; my mother and father lost some of their childhood talismans, and a family bible. As I mentioned, my sister lost almost the entire contents of her room. My brother lost some things but was and is a stoic and refused to complain. We all lost our home. It was rebuilt, different, but similar, but the old building is and will always be gone. We lost furniture, of course, and clothing. Even some things that seemed to survive were damaged by the smoke and disintegrated in the ensuing months. We mourned, at first, and felt a gap, and moved on as people do. But we didn’t lose everything. We were insured. We had a supportive community. We replaced all the things, even the emotional attachments which broke free of their moorings, in time, docked on the fertile shores of new possessions.
Later, on the morning of the fire, I remember the church, our community, arriving, the pastor and his wife at first, then the church, as a group, arriving with hands to help and ratty clothes on, scrambling through the muck and salvaging what they could, our neighbors and friends, ankle deep in ashy mud. I remember the soggy crumpled Christmas tree and crushed presents and how strange it all looked with the sunlight streaming through where the ceiling used to be. I remember that the fish survived, and how important that was. Everyone survived. I remember a miracle; my mother’s wooden box of love letters from my father was less than ten feet from the origin of the blaze and opened to reveal not a single singed page. I remember coming home to my grandmother’s house within two days of the fire to find a room stacked from floor to ceiling with donated clothes, canned foods and household goods. I remember my school collecting hundreds of dollars for us.
I was confused and gracious. I had never been on the receiving end of charity, and did not (and still do not) fully comprehend the degree to which a community is capable of and even desires being good to one other. I have had my share of personal struggles with the dogma and philosophy of the Baptist church; but one thing is for certain, I was a Baptist that day. Specifically I was a full fledged member of the First Baptist Church of Bryan, Texas. Unless you are a member of a community that joins together in times of need (and I hope that you are) you’d have a hard time understanding. That day was not about dogma or philosophy, it was not even about ‘whether or not to help’ it was about ‘how to help.’
Speaking of the church: I always recall, when thinking of this time in my life, a bible verse that instructs the reader not to ‘lay up treasures on earth, where moths and rust doth corrupt’ (colorful language, that...). Whether or not you lend any credence to the source, it, for me, summarizes a very valid philosophical point. One shared, knowingly or not, by every society that has ever engaged in any actions that result in the banding together of people to help equalize the quality of life for others in their community. It is a philosophy of setting aside, at times, that very human compulsion to collect, store, accumulate and pack away material goods for oneself alone, and instead to share with, to give to and to help carry the burden of those in need.
The fire was, in its own way, one of the best things that ever happened to me. I can feel my mom cringe when I say that, but it’s true. I wouldn’t be who I am today if it had not happened. Standing on the lawn that night I saw everything we owned going away and I learned in an instant that things could be lost. Then, over time, I learned that things could be replaced. I learned that communities can and do come together.
It is not a lesson I wish on anyone, but one I am grateful to have learned: unfortunately, nothing else can teach you the importance of charity more than being the person who needs it.
We are very happy to have found, in Kemptville, a generous and charitable community. Our efforts on behalf of the Salvation Army Food Bank in particular have been met with an outpouring of generosity that astounds me. I have no doubts, seeing the caliber and depth of character of the people here, that I am again a member of the kind of group that does not hesitate to come together to help those in need.
And for that, I'd like to say thank you.
Smoke, part 3, Why Organic?
Travelling and being a strict vegan are a great combination. If you want to starve to death. In case you don't know, a vegan is sort of an executive vegetarian, eschewing not only animal meat, but all animal products as well, including: eggs, cheese, milk and in some cases (like my own, at the time), fringe animal products like honey and even wearing leather.
In 1994, I was a couple of years into the vegan thing, and dead serious about it, but after about a week on the roads of America with a rucksack, a very light money belt, and little more than a sense of adventure, saying no to free food became, well, silly. I tried sticking to the salad bar in Vegas, eating lots of trail mix, finding Chinese restaurants in obscure places where the soy protein was supplemented by a healthy dollop of vitamin MSG. I even lived for days at a time on bread dipped in olive oil. After a while, though, the vegan thing definitely started to wear thin. Traveling alone is not easy when you are young and poor. Traveling alone when you love social contact as much as I do AND you happen to have weird food restrictions can be scary as hell. Which is, of course, why I was doing it.
‘The Journey’ is a time honored tradition, at least according to Joseph Campbell, in which a person can test oneself, and find out if the structure of his or her belief system can actually stand up to the rigors of reality, kind of like Luke Skywalker following Ben Kenobi, or Superman slipping off to the South pole... As a literary device, or even as a teaching tool, ‘The Journey’ is the story of a person who takes a risk, goes off on their own, and comes to terms with some piece of knowledge, which transforms them. For some, it is the move to college, joining the military, fishing in Alaska, or the ubiquitous backpacking trip to Europe. For me, it was a giant move to San Francisco, to work (somewhat ironically) in a vegan restaurant. It was a little strange, realizing that I was losing my religion while I was on the path to Mecca, but it was definitely what was happening.
I kept thinking, on that trip, about how some of my core values; things like friendship, family, community and sharing, were starting to conflict with some of my other values; things like not doing harm, or honoring life (by not killing it to eat, for instance...). I even started to feel a little selfish for the times I had turned up my nose at food that had been offered to me with good intentions and love. I knew, in my mind, that my snubs were not meant as insults, but I was also beginning to understand how easy it would have been to interpret them as such. It’s easy to think about these things when you’re hungry.
I did move to San Francisco, and I did go to work for the vegan restaurant. I even managed to maintain a vegetarian and mostly vegan diet for another few years. You see, and this is hard for me to admit, the last two years of my vegan life had become a sort of exercise in ‘more vegan than you’ posturing for me. My incessant thirst for knowledge had forced me to face the nasty truths about the presence of animal byproducts in so many places in my life, and each new bit of knowledge became on one hand another restriction for me, and on the other hand, a weapon in my arsenal of how much better I was than those around me. It was a manifestation of my own insecurity. Part of my transformation, on my (capital ‘J’) ‘Journey’ was that bit of realization. I have never lost my belief in eating healthy foods, or in my desire to feed healthy foods to others; what I lost was the religious fervor and the deep rock solid belief that I was right.
Many vegetarians and vegans are also motivated by the environmental impact eating meat has on the world we share. Therefore, most have at least a passing familiarity with the concept of organic agriculture; now much of the world seems to be waking up to it as well. During this time, I became more and more familiar with its nuance and meaning. The restaurant where I was training purchased much of its food directly from organic farmers. Over the years of working there, I got to know and like them and I began asking simple questions about how these small farmers managed without the chemical pesticides and fertilizers used by the factory farmers. The answers were surprising. Instead of pesticides, they relied on biodiversity, or the keeping of many different crops and different types of even the same crops (‘the bugs won’t get all of them’), which, you may note, is the same system used by Mother Nature. And instead of chemical fertilizers? They used compost, sure, but also manure, bone meal, blood meal, even fish meal. In two words, animal husbandry. Many of these small farmers kept animals for their own food, and knew volumes about both meat and livestock handling and especially, how much well-cared-for animals made for better health for the farm. As a practicing vegetarian, and a vegetarian chef, charged with the work of bringing strict vegan meals to a passionate clientele, I was horrified. I mean, how could a responsible vegan eat organic food? And where did it go from there? What was next, eating only wild harvested foods? Air-itarianism (read it again, you'll get it...)? I was thinking myself into a corner and I knew I had to reassess my ideals. It may sound silly, but I honestly felt like I had to choose between organic and vegan. I guess I was transforming.
There was one other important part of the transformation that lead me back to barbecue. Forgiveness. Much of my overwrought thinking and philosophizing were the products of my single minded ambition. Like many ambitious young men with good intentions, I was determined to be pure and perfect. To fix myself. Like some sort of religious zealot, I felt like I was driven to achieve some sort of higher state through constant and unflagging self discipline, but the fact was, all of my experiences were leading me to an inevitable conclusion: I was never going to get there. And neither is anyone else. It is the same mistake being made everyday by factory farmers and war hawks with their ideals of a perfect, pure, neat and ordered world. The same mistake. We are never going to conquer nature, least of all our own, and we will always fail if we try. Oh, we won’t stop trying, and we can easily be better people, and being good to other people around you has a tendency to draw people who like to be good and be surrounded by good people to you (get all that?) But we will never be perfect. And the only way to be happy is to realize that and forgive it. To say, ‘I tried, I’ll keep trying, and that’s worth something, but this time, I didn’t make it.’
I guess it all really started on my trip to San Francisco. You see, I ate a pancake in Vegas. I knew it had eggs and milk in it. It tasted pretty good, it was free, and I forgave myself (later) and began to accept that I will keep trying to do the right thing, will keep trying to do the best things, and that in the end I’ll fail sometimes, and things will still turn out pretty good either way. And after years of arguing with myself over the political, environmental, and spiritual implications of a meat based diet, I came to some honest conclusions. You see, I like meat, I like the way it tastes, I like the people who raise it responsibly, and I like the idea that when I purchase it, I can choose to purchase responsibly. I like that when I do, my impact is probably a more successful form of activism than my holier-than-thou vegan rhetoric. I like that when I purchase it, handle it and cook it I both have and take the oppurtunity to treat the whole animal with respect and with gratitude.
A couple of years after my move to San Francisco, I found out about an organic barbecue joint in the suburbs of Oakland. Nicole and I went there for my birthday and enjoyed some of the best brisket I have ever eaten; I asked the guy, ‘Why do you use organic beef?’ He said, ‘I work here and eat here every day, and so does my family.’ Sounds like a good enough reason to me.
In 1994, I was a couple of years into the vegan thing, and dead serious about it, but after about a week on the roads of America with a rucksack, a very light money belt, and little more than a sense of adventure, saying no to free food became, well, silly. I tried sticking to the salad bar in Vegas, eating lots of trail mix, finding Chinese restaurants in obscure places where the soy protein was supplemented by a healthy dollop of vitamin MSG. I even lived for days at a time on bread dipped in olive oil. After a while, though, the vegan thing definitely started to wear thin. Traveling alone is not easy when you are young and poor. Traveling alone when you love social contact as much as I do AND you happen to have weird food restrictions can be scary as hell. Which is, of course, why I was doing it.
‘The Journey’ is a time honored tradition, at least according to Joseph Campbell, in which a person can test oneself, and find out if the structure of his or her belief system can actually stand up to the rigors of reality, kind of like Luke Skywalker following Ben Kenobi, or Superman slipping off to the South pole... As a literary device, or even as a teaching tool, ‘The Journey’ is the story of a person who takes a risk, goes off on their own, and comes to terms with some piece of knowledge, which transforms them. For some, it is the move to college, joining the military, fishing in Alaska, or the ubiquitous backpacking trip to Europe. For me, it was a giant move to San Francisco, to work (somewhat ironically) in a vegan restaurant. It was a little strange, realizing that I was losing my religion while I was on the path to Mecca, but it was definitely what was happening.
I kept thinking, on that trip, about how some of my core values; things like friendship, family, community and sharing, were starting to conflict with some of my other values; things like not doing harm, or honoring life (by not killing it to eat, for instance...). I even started to feel a little selfish for the times I had turned up my nose at food that had been offered to me with good intentions and love. I knew, in my mind, that my snubs were not meant as insults, but I was also beginning to understand how easy it would have been to interpret them as such. It’s easy to think about these things when you’re hungry.
I did move to San Francisco, and I did go to work for the vegan restaurant. I even managed to maintain a vegetarian and mostly vegan diet for another few years. You see, and this is hard for me to admit, the last two years of my vegan life had become a sort of exercise in ‘more vegan than you’ posturing for me. My incessant thirst for knowledge had forced me to face the nasty truths about the presence of animal byproducts in so many places in my life, and each new bit of knowledge became on one hand another restriction for me, and on the other hand, a weapon in my arsenal of how much better I was than those around me. It was a manifestation of my own insecurity. Part of my transformation, on my (capital ‘J’) ‘Journey’ was that bit of realization. I have never lost my belief in eating healthy foods, or in my desire to feed healthy foods to others; what I lost was the religious fervor and the deep rock solid belief that I was right.
Many vegetarians and vegans are also motivated by the environmental impact eating meat has on the world we share. Therefore, most have at least a passing familiarity with the concept of organic agriculture; now much of the world seems to be waking up to it as well. During this time, I became more and more familiar with its nuance and meaning. The restaurant where I was training purchased much of its food directly from organic farmers. Over the years of working there, I got to know and like them and I began asking simple questions about how these small farmers managed without the chemical pesticides and fertilizers used by the factory farmers. The answers were surprising. Instead of pesticides, they relied on biodiversity, or the keeping of many different crops and different types of even the same crops (‘the bugs won’t get all of them’), which, you may note, is the same system used by Mother Nature. And instead of chemical fertilizers? They used compost, sure, but also manure, bone meal, blood meal, even fish meal. In two words, animal husbandry. Many of these small farmers kept animals for their own food, and knew volumes about both meat and livestock handling and especially, how much well-cared-for animals made for better health for the farm. As a practicing vegetarian, and a vegetarian chef, charged with the work of bringing strict vegan meals to a passionate clientele, I was horrified. I mean, how could a responsible vegan eat organic food? And where did it go from there? What was next, eating only wild harvested foods? Air-itarianism (read it again, you'll get it...)? I was thinking myself into a corner and I knew I had to reassess my ideals. It may sound silly, but I honestly felt like I had to choose between organic and vegan. I guess I was transforming.
There was one other important part of the transformation that lead me back to barbecue. Forgiveness. Much of my overwrought thinking and philosophizing were the products of my single minded ambition. Like many ambitious young men with good intentions, I was determined to be pure and perfect. To fix myself. Like some sort of religious zealot, I felt like I was driven to achieve some sort of higher state through constant and unflagging self discipline, but the fact was, all of my experiences were leading me to an inevitable conclusion: I was never going to get there. And neither is anyone else. It is the same mistake being made everyday by factory farmers and war hawks with their ideals of a perfect, pure, neat and ordered world. The same mistake. We are never going to conquer nature, least of all our own, and we will always fail if we try. Oh, we won’t stop trying, and we can easily be better people, and being good to other people around you has a tendency to draw people who like to be good and be surrounded by good people to you (get all that?) But we will never be perfect. And the only way to be happy is to realize that and forgive it. To say, ‘I tried, I’ll keep trying, and that’s worth something, but this time, I didn’t make it.’
I guess it all really started on my trip to San Francisco. You see, I ate a pancake in Vegas. I knew it had eggs and milk in it. It tasted pretty good, it was free, and I forgave myself (later) and began to accept that I will keep trying to do the right thing, will keep trying to do the best things, and that in the end I’ll fail sometimes, and things will still turn out pretty good either way. And after years of arguing with myself over the political, environmental, and spiritual implications of a meat based diet, I came to some honest conclusions. You see, I like meat, I like the way it tastes, I like the people who raise it responsibly, and I like the idea that when I purchase it, I can choose to purchase responsibly. I like that when I do, my impact is probably a more successful form of activism than my holier-than-thou vegan rhetoric. I like that when I purchase it, handle it and cook it I both have and take the oppurtunity to treat the whole animal with respect and with gratitude.
A couple of years after my move to San Francisco, I found out about an organic barbecue joint in the suburbs of Oakland. Nicole and I went there for my birthday and enjoyed some of the best brisket I have ever eaten; I asked the guy, ‘Why do you use organic beef?’ He said, ‘I work here and eat here every day, and so does my family.’ Sounds like a good enough reason to me.
Smoke; part two, the lean years…
SCENE: A household in Texas in the early 90’s, a son confronts his parents with a startling revelation:
SON: “Mom, Dad I’ve got something to tell you.”
FATHER: “You’re gay?”
SON: “No, worse…”
MOTHER: “Oh my god, Sam, he’s a vegetarian!”
There are a lot of things that can go through the mind of a cook or a butcher whose profession involves the handling of meats daily and often. I’m sure I don’t speak only for myself when I consider the speculation involved in the quartering of a chicken or a rabbit, when the mind wanders to a pet cat or dog, or the way a knife passes through a meaty joint of pork or lamb and considering one’s own cut-ability. Perhaps even more disturbing are the thoughts that creep in when handling the less blatantly obviously animal of the meats, for instance opening a case of four layers of six ounce boneless, skinless chicken breasts, twenty-four to a layer, each identical piece separated into its own little plastic tray. What kind of world produces such cases upon cases of these disturbing ‘protein delivery systems’, and what is to be said about the consumers who demand it? These can be weird and terrible thoughts, and they inevitably lead to a black sense of humour among cooks. I used to love the way the fat trimmed from the chicken breasts looked like giant loogies; the waitresses, however, were not nearly as impressed. No doubt, some Sigmund would describe this as some sort of coping mechanism, which is fine, and I would hope we could all laugh in the face of our own darkness, but not too much, and not to excuse it. All things considered, we are meat and our rationalizations for consuming it will always be tempered by that honest truth. In the early nineties, my response to this philosophical hypocrisy was simple: I quit eating it.
My first wife’s father was a rancher; it was his first and third career. In between, he was a civil engineer. His first career, because he was raised with it, and his third, because even after years of schooling and years of well-paid high level work in engineering firms in Dallas, he couldn’t get it out of his blood and returned. In the city, he heard (herded?) the cows in his sleep, mooing for him to come home. Or something like that. He was a good intentioned man, which is not to say he was a good man. Cattle were something he thought he understood, unlike the employees at the big firm or even his own family. He worked with the cattle like he would have approached an engineering question: with a desire to produce the most beef per acre at the lowest cost. Dogs and cats on the farm were treated with the same callous disregard for health or hardship and were only allowed their share of the food when their usefulness (as mousers or herders) warranted it; they certainly weren’t allowed inside and affection (or a trip to the vet) was out of the question.
Maybe my ex-wife’s inheritance of this attitude of disrespect for animals was what lead to our demise-- our last big fight was about the fact that I shelled out a pile of cash to save our dog’s life without consulting her (how many marriages have cell phones saved?), but probably not, as we were headed apart anyway. But it is no coincidence that my exit from that animal-hating family put me off the meat industry for a while. When people ask me about why I became a vegetarian, I usually crack wise about getting thin to pick up chicks after my first divorce or crack sincere about how I was always a lover of the environment and animals and life in general and couldn’t reconcile that with my experience of the meat production industry from within. Well there’s actually a partial explanation within both of those reasons and in the story of the rancher above, and in the meat cutting story in the previous paragraph. None of us do anything for just one reason, we do things for one just reason. To me it all goes back to one little lie. One day in the field with my father-in-law I pushed the punch into the calf’s ear for a tag and felt the large animal shudder with pain, and my father-in-law said the following:
“Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt them.”
They say that one of those stages of addiction (or is it grief?) is denial. And we are addicted to the consumption of meat, without question. There are millions of us who satisfy our itches with booze or drugs, but there are billions and billions of us who satisfy our itches with a Big Mac. The only way we can collectively justify that industry created by our addiction to cheap meat is to hide it on the fringes of our vision. We don’t see the killing floors on our televisions or in our grocery stores; our feedlots do not offer guided tours. Our meat comes to us on sale, pre-cut and pre-cleaned on a Styrofoam tray wrapped in cellophane, and we buy it with out ever looking at the guts, brains or the eyeballs of the animal from which it came. We collectively deny the animal’s pain. When I lost my ability to deny it, I had to confront it, and I had to quit.
But wait, isn’t this supposed to be about barbecue? Now you’ve got us addicted to eating food? That’s like saying we are addicted to air! We have to breathe don’t we? Well, to that point I must ask, how quickly would our lives change if we had to pay for air? Bet the cheap stuff would go quick and somebody would figure out a way to market second hand smoke to children (“Keeps you alive for a few years for under 99 cents and it comes with a free toy!”) In other words, there are right ways and wrong ways to do everything. There is always more to the story than meets (meats? Sorry, that was completely uncalled for…) the eye…
Stay tuned for part three…
SON: “Mom, Dad I’ve got something to tell you.”
FATHER: “You’re gay?”
SON: “No, worse…”
MOTHER: “Oh my god, Sam, he’s a vegetarian!”
There are a lot of things that can go through the mind of a cook or a butcher whose profession involves the handling of meats daily and often. I’m sure I don’t speak only for myself when I consider the speculation involved in the quartering of a chicken or a rabbit, when the mind wanders to a pet cat or dog, or the way a knife passes through a meaty joint of pork or lamb and considering one’s own cut-ability. Perhaps even more disturbing are the thoughts that creep in when handling the less blatantly obviously animal of the meats, for instance opening a case of four layers of six ounce boneless, skinless chicken breasts, twenty-four to a layer, each identical piece separated into its own little plastic tray. What kind of world produces such cases upon cases of these disturbing ‘protein delivery systems’, and what is to be said about the consumers who demand it? These can be weird and terrible thoughts, and they inevitably lead to a black sense of humour among cooks. I used to love the way the fat trimmed from the chicken breasts looked like giant loogies; the waitresses, however, were not nearly as impressed. No doubt, some Sigmund would describe this as some sort of coping mechanism, which is fine, and I would hope we could all laugh in the face of our own darkness, but not too much, and not to excuse it. All things considered, we are meat and our rationalizations for consuming it will always be tempered by that honest truth. In the early nineties, my response to this philosophical hypocrisy was simple: I quit eating it.
My first wife’s father was a rancher; it was his first and third career. In between, he was a civil engineer. His first career, because he was raised with it, and his third, because even after years of schooling and years of well-paid high level work in engineering firms in Dallas, he couldn’t get it out of his blood and returned. In the city, he heard (herded?) the cows in his sleep, mooing for him to come home. Or something like that. He was a good intentioned man, which is not to say he was a good man. Cattle were something he thought he understood, unlike the employees at the big firm or even his own family. He worked with the cattle like he would have approached an engineering question: with a desire to produce the most beef per acre at the lowest cost. Dogs and cats on the farm were treated with the same callous disregard for health or hardship and were only allowed their share of the food when their usefulness (as mousers or herders) warranted it; they certainly weren’t allowed inside and affection (or a trip to the vet) was out of the question.
Maybe my ex-wife’s inheritance of this attitude of disrespect for animals was what lead to our demise-- our last big fight was about the fact that I shelled out a pile of cash to save our dog’s life without consulting her (how many marriages have cell phones saved?), but probably not, as we were headed apart anyway. But it is no coincidence that my exit from that animal-hating family put me off the meat industry for a while. When people ask me about why I became a vegetarian, I usually crack wise about getting thin to pick up chicks after my first divorce or crack sincere about how I was always a lover of the environment and animals and life in general and couldn’t reconcile that with my experience of the meat production industry from within. Well there’s actually a partial explanation within both of those reasons and in the story of the rancher above, and in the meat cutting story in the previous paragraph. None of us do anything for just one reason, we do things for one just reason. To me it all goes back to one little lie. One day in the field with my father-in-law I pushed the punch into the calf’s ear for a tag and felt the large animal shudder with pain, and my father-in-law said the following:
“Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt them.”
They say that one of those stages of addiction (or is it grief?) is denial. And we are addicted to the consumption of meat, without question. There are millions of us who satisfy our itches with booze or drugs, but there are billions and billions of us who satisfy our itches with a Big Mac. The only way we can collectively justify that industry created by our addiction to cheap meat is to hide it on the fringes of our vision. We don’t see the killing floors on our televisions or in our grocery stores; our feedlots do not offer guided tours. Our meat comes to us on sale, pre-cut and pre-cleaned on a Styrofoam tray wrapped in cellophane, and we buy it with out ever looking at the guts, brains or the eyeballs of the animal from which it came. We collectively deny the animal’s pain. When I lost my ability to deny it, I had to confront it, and I had to quit.
But wait, isn’t this supposed to be about barbecue? Now you’ve got us addicted to eating food? That’s like saying we are addicted to air! We have to breathe don’t we? Well, to that point I must ask, how quickly would our lives change if we had to pay for air? Bet the cheap stuff would go quick and somebody would figure out a way to market second hand smoke to children (“Keeps you alive for a few years for under 99 cents and it comes with a free toy!”) In other words, there are right ways and wrong ways to do everything. There is always more to the story than meets (meats? Sorry, that was completely uncalled for…) the eye…
Stay tuned for part three…
Smoke, or how I learned to stop worrying and love the brisket. Part One:
Granddaddy made his own barbecue sauce. Or so I believed. More likely, Grandmother Ruby made it and he added a stick of butter and a couple more shots of Tabasco. A family event at our grandparents’ house usually meant one thing, barbecued brisket. By the time we got there, granddad would have already been tending the brisket for a number of hours, so I can’t relay his exact method, but after a number of conversations with my father, my cousins and some of Granddaddy’s friends, as well as years of my own experience, I can now make some assumptions. First, either early in the morning or late the night before, he would build a wood fire in the pit with post oak or mesquite, then let the coals die down, and then set his brisket on the far side of the pit. The pit was made from a 50 gallon oil drum, it had welded-on legs, handles, hinges and a stovepipe and it was split sideways, so it could open up like a giant clam, it may have been painted at some point, but it was black from years of smoke by the time I saw it. It was fitted with a rack across the bottom half, like any other barbecue and it included little sliding doors on the bottom and across the top of the stovepipe to control the airflow through the main chamber when the lid was closed. No Texan needed that description as these contraptions were (and in some places still are) as plentiful as heat and sun in our yards in the summertime, which is to say, well, plentiful. Robb Walsh (a Texas food writer) called them Texas Hibachis, a description I like now but wouldn’t have remotely understood if you’d used it at the time. A Hibachi is a tiny grill for charcoal grilling used in Japanese cooking. When I was a kid, I probably just assumed Japanese people ate Chinese food, as I didn’t encounter Japanese food more exotic than ‘teriyaki chicken’ (with the ubiquitous canned pineapple ring) until my early twenties. Since everything is bigger in Texas (just ask any Texan) a fifty gallon drum is a Hibachi the same way a guitar is a Texas mandolin. When my granddad cooked a brisket, it took total attention. He was the pit boss, and it was his show. By profession, he was a dentist, but in the summers I remember him two ways, in his coveralls in the garden or perched on an aluminum lawn chair next to that barbecue pit, chewing on a fat cigar and tending the brisket. His method was unique; it involved a regular basting with his barbecue sauce until the sugar formed a kind of crust on the meat. In retrospect, it wasn’t perfect, but it was perfect for us.
Barbecue can be source of great pleasure and great debate with Texans, some would claim that there are as many different barbecue styles as there are Texans, but there are some universal truths. Barbecue, in Texas, refers specifically to the slow and low cooking of a cut of meat. Cooking meat, or anything else for that matter, on a grill over direct heat is called grilling. You may grill foods in a barbecue pit, but that’s kind of a coincidence, like figuring out you can use a hammer to not only hammer a nail but also, say, to crack an egg or perhaps to open a window. Texas barbecue almost always refers to beef. And it almost always refers specifically to a cut from the front quarter of the animal found near the leg called the brisket. The brisket is whole and untrimmed and when cooked, is sliced against the grain. Brisket is also the cut of meat used to make Pastrami and Montreal style smoked meat. Barbecued brisket is served sliced warm in Texas with a sweet, spicy and vinegary tomato based sauce, known far and wide as barbecue sauce. This distinction is important because apparently some folks make a non tomato based sauce, and still try to call it barbecue sauce although most Texans aren't sure why. My granddad's barbecue sauce had a list of over twenty ingredients of which I'll share two, tomato paste and orange peel. Tomato paste to make the point about a tomato based sauce, and orange peel, because I thought it was weird and kind of cool. After I got the recipe, I liked to imagine him peeling an orange and throwing it in the big bubbling pot like a mad alchemist, but later, after he died, I found a McCormick’s spice jar in his cabinet, dry and ancient, that read 'orange peel' which dashed that fantasy to bits. If it had ever actually smelled like orange peel, I'm afraid it was many years before I opened it.
Along with barbecue the food, there is also barbecue, the culture. When you leave the Texas Hibachi in the yard and go out to get barbecue, you venture into the very pinnacle of Texas culture, the barbecue joint. A barbecue joint has a about a 90 per chance of being a guy's name. Luther's barbecue house had the best sauce, Tom’s had the best meat. Some other place had the best sides, it was probably called Jim's or Rufus's or something. And these were all joints. They were kept clean, sort of, but no money was wasted on decor. Cast off street signs, old beer cans, hunting trophies, all mixed up with red-checked plastic tablecloths and Sears picnic furniture. The smell of smoke and meat. No money was wasted on cutlery or dishes, either. Barbecue is best served on butcher paper on a tray with onions, sliced cheese, thick slices of fluffy white bread and pickles. Tables were carefully set with a stainless steel napkin dispenser and a plastic bottle of barbecue sauce. You pay by weight. Barbecue joints offer choices like sausage or chicken or a combination. Family meals, that kind of thing, maybe a grilled cheese sandwich for a kid. Sides were usually simple things like slaw or potato salad, but if you were lucky, maybe something hot like fried okra or a big buttery ear of corn. But the most important thing was the brisket.
Maybe that's why my biggest act of rebellion was becoming a vegetarian.
Stay tuned for part two....
Barbecue can be source of great pleasure and great debate with Texans, some would claim that there are as many different barbecue styles as there are Texans, but there are some universal truths. Barbecue, in Texas, refers specifically to the slow and low cooking of a cut of meat. Cooking meat, or anything else for that matter, on a grill over direct heat is called grilling. You may grill foods in a barbecue pit, but that’s kind of a coincidence, like figuring out you can use a hammer to not only hammer a nail but also, say, to crack an egg or perhaps to open a window. Texas barbecue almost always refers to beef. And it almost always refers specifically to a cut from the front quarter of the animal found near the leg called the brisket. The brisket is whole and untrimmed and when cooked, is sliced against the grain. Brisket is also the cut of meat used to make Pastrami and Montreal style smoked meat. Barbecued brisket is served sliced warm in Texas with a sweet, spicy and vinegary tomato based sauce, known far and wide as barbecue sauce. This distinction is important because apparently some folks make a non tomato based sauce, and still try to call it barbecue sauce although most Texans aren't sure why. My granddad's barbecue sauce had a list of over twenty ingredients of which I'll share two, tomato paste and orange peel. Tomato paste to make the point about a tomato based sauce, and orange peel, because I thought it was weird and kind of cool. After I got the recipe, I liked to imagine him peeling an orange and throwing it in the big bubbling pot like a mad alchemist, but later, after he died, I found a McCormick’s spice jar in his cabinet, dry and ancient, that read 'orange peel' which dashed that fantasy to bits. If it had ever actually smelled like orange peel, I'm afraid it was many years before I opened it.
Along with barbecue the food, there is also barbecue, the culture. When you leave the Texas Hibachi in the yard and go out to get barbecue, you venture into the very pinnacle of Texas culture, the barbecue joint. A barbecue joint has a about a 90 per chance of being a guy's name. Luther's barbecue house had the best sauce, Tom’s had the best meat. Some other place had the best sides, it was probably called Jim's or Rufus's or something. And these were all joints. They were kept clean, sort of, but no money was wasted on decor. Cast off street signs, old beer cans, hunting trophies, all mixed up with red-checked plastic tablecloths and Sears picnic furniture. The smell of smoke and meat. No money was wasted on cutlery or dishes, either. Barbecue is best served on butcher paper on a tray with onions, sliced cheese, thick slices of fluffy white bread and pickles. Tables were carefully set with a stainless steel napkin dispenser and a plastic bottle of barbecue sauce. You pay by weight. Barbecue joints offer choices like sausage or chicken or a combination. Family meals, that kind of thing, maybe a grilled cheese sandwich for a kid. Sides were usually simple things like slaw or potato salad, but if you were lucky, maybe something hot like fried okra or a big buttery ear of corn. But the most important thing was the brisket.
Maybe that's why my biggest act of rebellion was becoming a vegetarian.
Stay tuned for part two....
You can never go home again...or can you?
My birthday is coming up this week and for me at least, that sort of thing tends to set the old nostalgia engine to rumbling. It also means lots of people are doing nice things for me. It started a week ago last Monday with a trip to Prince Edward County; my sister-in-law Denise surprised her husband Steve, my wife Nicole, and me with an elaborate plan involving fine hotel rooms at Huff Estates winery, reservations at restaurants in Picton and Kingston and pages of printed internet pages recommending culinary and booze related stops at an organic farm, a cider maker, several wineries, a brewpub, a cheesemaker, an ice cream shop, a beach and even Reader’s Digest’s pick for the ‘Best Hot Dog in Canada.’ Our whirlwind tour brought back numerous fond memories of trips Nicole and I took in California and Austin to each of their neighboring wine regions (I’ll let you guess which one was better). Visiting a winery’s tasting room is the best way to discover a wine’s secrets. You will always find the wine displayed in its very best condition, temperature, aeration and proper glass; the staff do nothing but answer questions about the wine and are therefore always capable of offering at least some basic information to help a buyer make informed choices. They also tend to know the culinary and cultural landscape of the area, as locals, and can help to guide the experience outside the winery as well.
When we first moved to this area, Nicole and I took a day trip from Toronto to the Niagara region and were just a little disappointed. The wines were not terrible, we just found them unadventurous and safe. I’m sure a few more trips might yield a different opinion, but after California and Europe, Canadian wines just seemed, well, like they needed more time to come into their own. Prince Edward County, on the other hand, was a pleasure from the first stop to the last. Perhaps the insanity necessary to build a wine region in an area that requires burying the entire crop to save it from the harsh winter also attracts winemakers with a bit more of a maverick attitude. Oh, the safe names like Cabernet and Chardonnay were still evident, of course, but they were often dismissed by the wineries themselves, as well they should be, as most of them were produced from grapes sourced from Niagara. They instead seemed more interested in showing off the newer grape varietals and blends, or the older varietals that were more appropriate for our cooler climate. The wines were not perfect, which is why I liked them. I once heard the French biodynamic wine guru Nicolas Joly speak in San Francisco; he said that he loved to taste bad wine; then, after a beat, he said, it’s the only way you can tell it was made by a human and not a machine. In my experience, some of the best and worst wines I have tasted have been made by the same person. I like Prince Edward County wines and am thrilled to find such a gem so close to my new home.
My parents arrived on Friday of last week with a trunk full of my old vinyl records. It was the missing puzzle piece for me in many ways. I started collecting records when I was about 15 and have amassed a modest but personally important collection over the years. When I moved away from Texas in the 90s, I left the bulky collection in my parents’ care (it wouldn’t fit in my rucksack), but on arrival in California, realized that I had not lost the bug. Collecting records is a very satisfying hobby; it is an excuse to visit second hand shops, garage sales and flea markets, it involves the skills probably evolved in our DNA for hunting, it has the reward of music upon the find, the lost art of the record sleeve, and unless one is a different kind of collector than I, it is a cheap hobby. I never even go to the collector’s shops where discerning snobs have placed inflated values on some album I will definitely find next year after Grandma cleans out Junior’s old room and will sell me the whole box for, I don’t know, 50 cents? Over time I built what I called, The California Collection. And my parents held The Texas Collection. In my mind, I dreamed of a day where the two collections were joined together, and as of last Friday, that wish has come true. I have often said that when these two collections were together I would know that I was home.
I was raised in Bryan, Texas; my family on both sides were Bryanites for at least three generations; I know that wouldn’t seem like much to a European or an Asian whose family has held their patch of ground for hundreds or thousands of years, but to me, it was home, it’s what home felt like, it was the streetmap of my nostalgia, the precise location of my ennui, my longing; for me homesickness was bryansickness, and it still seems like a mystical place, shrouded in the very mists of blah, blah, blah. Ughhh. The fact is, Bryan was a smaller town, it had some neat stuff, but it wasn’t a place I felt very strong about at the time. In fact, as a pre-teenager, I remember fighting tooth and nail to convince my family to move to East Texas when an opportunity came to buy my great Aunt’s house and property. High School was a bitter pill for me and felt more like a survival game than a learning institution. When my chance came, I was gone. I love my parents dearly, but the life of a Bryanite was not for me. I have and will visit the old home for many a year to come, but it is not for me. Not to mention that businesses have closed and opened, old friends have left, new people have arrived, and it’s not the same place it once was.
Many people have written on the theme that we can never go home again, most famously Thomas Wolfe in the book by that (approximate) title, in which he proceeded to piss off so many people with his frank tell-all approach that he actually made the title true by writing it. I don’t claim to understand the mechanics of nostalgia, but I am not immune to it. I feel longing and sometimes its name is Bryan, sometimes Austin, sometimes San Francisco, sometimes it is for my great Aunt’s homestead and farm, a place I never even lived but sometimes wonder about. It was in a small town, a village smaller than Kemptville, and I would have had a very different life. I wanted to move there so badly because it was near my father’s family farm, a (now) collectively owned 150 year old house we call ‘The Old Place’. When I close my eyes I can feel the smooth wood of the porch rail and the magical wind we called the Enloe breeze. I can smell the pine forest and I can imagine milking cows and hauling hay in that blistering hot Texas sun. I can imagine the sound of the old fiddle from the closet, strung and shiny and new giving us a mournful tune in the hands of some great-great aunt or cousin of mine before cars drove down the old red dirt road. I am nostalgic for something I’ve never even lived through. And isn’t that what nostalgia is? A ghost?
I am writing this in a 130 year old building in a country and village which neither I, nor my ancestors had any part in building. I am looking at my complete record collection. And I am home.
When we first moved to this area, Nicole and I took a day trip from Toronto to the Niagara region and were just a little disappointed. The wines were not terrible, we just found them unadventurous and safe. I’m sure a few more trips might yield a different opinion, but after California and Europe, Canadian wines just seemed, well, like they needed more time to come into their own. Prince Edward County, on the other hand, was a pleasure from the first stop to the last. Perhaps the insanity necessary to build a wine region in an area that requires burying the entire crop to save it from the harsh winter also attracts winemakers with a bit more of a maverick attitude. Oh, the safe names like Cabernet and Chardonnay were still evident, of course, but they were often dismissed by the wineries themselves, as well they should be, as most of them were produced from grapes sourced from Niagara. They instead seemed more interested in showing off the newer grape varietals and blends, or the older varietals that were more appropriate for our cooler climate. The wines were not perfect, which is why I liked them. I once heard the French biodynamic wine guru Nicolas Joly speak in San Francisco; he said that he loved to taste bad wine; then, after a beat, he said, it’s the only way you can tell it was made by a human and not a machine. In my experience, some of the best and worst wines I have tasted have been made by the same person. I like Prince Edward County wines and am thrilled to find such a gem so close to my new home.
My parents arrived on Friday of last week with a trunk full of my old vinyl records. It was the missing puzzle piece for me in many ways. I started collecting records when I was about 15 and have amassed a modest but personally important collection over the years. When I moved away from Texas in the 90s, I left the bulky collection in my parents’ care (it wouldn’t fit in my rucksack), but on arrival in California, realized that I had not lost the bug. Collecting records is a very satisfying hobby; it is an excuse to visit second hand shops, garage sales and flea markets, it involves the skills probably evolved in our DNA for hunting, it has the reward of music upon the find, the lost art of the record sleeve, and unless one is a different kind of collector than I, it is a cheap hobby. I never even go to the collector’s shops where discerning snobs have placed inflated values on some album I will definitely find next year after Grandma cleans out Junior’s old room and will sell me the whole box for, I don’t know, 50 cents? Over time I built what I called, The California Collection. And my parents held The Texas Collection. In my mind, I dreamed of a day where the two collections were joined together, and as of last Friday, that wish has come true. I have often said that when these two collections were together I would know that I was home.
I was raised in Bryan, Texas; my family on both sides were Bryanites for at least three generations; I know that wouldn’t seem like much to a European or an Asian whose family has held their patch of ground for hundreds or thousands of years, but to me, it was home, it’s what home felt like, it was the streetmap of my nostalgia, the precise location of my ennui, my longing; for me homesickness was bryansickness, and it still seems like a mystical place, shrouded in the very mists of blah, blah, blah. Ughhh. The fact is, Bryan was a smaller town, it had some neat stuff, but it wasn’t a place I felt very strong about at the time. In fact, as a pre-teenager, I remember fighting tooth and nail to convince my family to move to East Texas when an opportunity came to buy my great Aunt’s house and property. High School was a bitter pill for me and felt more like a survival game than a learning institution. When my chance came, I was gone. I love my parents dearly, but the life of a Bryanite was not for me. I have and will visit the old home for many a year to come, but it is not for me. Not to mention that businesses have closed and opened, old friends have left, new people have arrived, and it’s not the same place it once was.
Many people have written on the theme that we can never go home again, most famously Thomas Wolfe in the book by that (approximate) title, in which he proceeded to piss off so many people with his frank tell-all approach that he actually made the title true by writing it. I don’t claim to understand the mechanics of nostalgia, but I am not immune to it. I feel longing and sometimes its name is Bryan, sometimes Austin, sometimes San Francisco, sometimes it is for my great Aunt’s homestead and farm, a place I never even lived but sometimes wonder about. It was in a small town, a village smaller than Kemptville, and I would have had a very different life. I wanted to move there so badly because it was near my father’s family farm, a (now) collectively owned 150 year old house we call ‘The Old Place’. When I close my eyes I can feel the smooth wood of the porch rail and the magical wind we called the Enloe breeze. I can smell the pine forest and I can imagine milking cows and hauling hay in that blistering hot Texas sun. I can imagine the sound of the old fiddle from the closet, strung and shiny and new giving us a mournful tune in the hands of some great-great aunt or cousin of mine before cars drove down the old red dirt road. I am nostalgic for something I’ve never even lived through. And isn’t that what nostalgia is? A ghost?
I am writing this in a 130 year old building in a country and village which neither I, nor my ancestors had any part in building. I am looking at my complete record collection. And I am home.
Smile
Someday, we’ll look back on all this and smile. Every once in a while, however, we realize exactly how great all this is right now. And smile. Sunday was one of those days. When 2 o’clock rolled around and the first farmer’s market customers started approaching the first farmers, we knew something special was happening. Everyone seemed to feel it. Smiles were miles wide in every direction. I’ve flirted with spirituality from a distance since my Baptist upbringing, but if ever a case could be made for divine intervention, it was the way the sky cleared and the rain dried up for the exact two hours of our first market day.
Recently, I’ve been wondering what has kept Kemptville from sustaining a farmer’s market long before now (yes, I know that this is not the first attempt). And, to some degree, I’ve been thinking how much fear plays a role in our lives. Be it fear of the unknown (or the unknown food, as it relates to cooking and eating), or fear of change, or the fear of failure, it seems we are constantly being controlled on some level by our fears. For me, I came to a point where I either had to face my fears, or I wasn’t going to be able to get on with my life.
I was in my early twenties and I was beginning to realize that my chances of finishing college were about as good as my chances of making a career out of the theatre degree I was pursuing, which is to say, next to none (apologies to Sarah, my sister with the theatre degree). I wasn’t going to be a rock star after all, and I was Single Again. For years, I had talked about travel, specifically going to San Francisco to pursue my career as a cook, but fear had kept me from it. Growing up in a smaller town, we spoke of “The City” as a scary place, with Crime and His Cousins lurking in every shadowy alley (smaller towns have fewer alleys but I’ve since discovered that that particular family doesn’t seem to mind…). Travel in general was met with equal suspicion, and admittedly can be quite harrowing, especially without the cushion of financial stability or a network of friends and family in place to buffer the dangers. But the biggest roadblock, far and away was not the fear of the danger…it was the fear of loneliness.
We humans are not an incredibly large animal, nor do we possess razor sharp teeth, claws or the ability to out-run, out-jump, or out-swim, well, (speaking for myself, of course) much of anything (hey! I’ve got flat feet!) As such, and being social creatures, we love more than anything to stay close to our pack. As for the fear of being alone, I really think that it’s just the way our brain decodes the blips and bleeps of our subconscious that are telling us, “wait, slow down, let’s just watch from a safe distance, if she eats the toadstool and doesn’t die, then the rest of us can try it,” or “let’s all just wait on the shore, we’ll watch this potentially insane ape walk out on the ice, if he doesn’t fall in and drown, and this does turn out to be an excellent shortcut, then we’ll follow” etc. It can be a rather useful instinct, when you think about it. Though we do celebrate, as a culture, those who are willing to step away from the crowd, we just don’t like to commit to joining them until they’ve proven themselves to not be insane. We like the winning team (Go Sens Go!) but are anxious, cautious and doubtful until the results are tallied (Senators in 6, I’m told). For me, when faced with my choice, I realized that I had to be the one to eat the toadstool, to walk out on the ice.
At the age of 24, I packed a bag and went west. Alone. I knew I needed to find something, and I did. I found that I survived. For me, that simple discovery was a big deal. As important and useful as our instinct to cling to the warm comfort of the pack may be, the fact is that someone has to be the loner, the innovator, the one to take chances; and without that wacko gene, we wouldn’t evolve as individuals or as a species. The best part is that once a person learns that lesson, how to put aside one’s fear, life starts to become easier. In the years since I took that first big risk, I have traveled both this continent and abroad, I have written a cookbook, I have made a good and important career out of something I used to think of as nothing more than a way to make the monthly payments on my microphone and P.A. Best of all, I met and married the most important person in my life, and wasn’t afraid to tell her so.
Last year, Nicole, Brent, Jenn and I each set aside our fear of failure and opened a business, offering creative & tasty organic food in Kemptville. There are those who think we are silly or weird, but it seems like more and more people think it is a good and timely idea and are willing to take a chance and try something new. A month or so ago we set in motion a plan to open a farmer’s market. And last Sunday, with smiles as bright as our own personal patch of sunlight, we saw that without question Kemptville was ready for a taste of the local foods movement. Time and again, we have seen that fear alone should never be a reason to not do something, and that life rewards the innovator. So don’t be afraid. Go west. Or east. Or even just go down the street to meet a new farmer, make a new friend, or maybe just to try something new...
Trust me, someday you’ll look up...and smile!
Recently, I’ve been wondering what has kept Kemptville from sustaining a farmer’s market long before now (yes, I know that this is not the first attempt). And, to some degree, I’ve been thinking how much fear plays a role in our lives. Be it fear of the unknown (or the unknown food, as it relates to cooking and eating), or fear of change, or the fear of failure, it seems we are constantly being controlled on some level by our fears. For me, I came to a point where I either had to face my fears, or I wasn’t going to be able to get on with my life.
I was in my early twenties and I was beginning to realize that my chances of finishing college were about as good as my chances of making a career out of the theatre degree I was pursuing, which is to say, next to none (apologies to Sarah, my sister with the theatre degree). I wasn’t going to be a rock star after all, and I was Single Again. For years, I had talked about travel, specifically going to San Francisco to pursue my career as a cook, but fear had kept me from it. Growing up in a smaller town, we spoke of “The City” as a scary place, with Crime and His Cousins lurking in every shadowy alley (smaller towns have fewer alleys but I’ve since discovered that that particular family doesn’t seem to mind…). Travel in general was met with equal suspicion, and admittedly can be quite harrowing, especially without the cushion of financial stability or a network of friends and family in place to buffer the dangers. But the biggest roadblock, far and away was not the fear of the danger…it was the fear of loneliness.
We humans are not an incredibly large animal, nor do we possess razor sharp teeth, claws or the ability to out-run, out-jump, or out-swim, well, (speaking for myself, of course) much of anything (hey! I’ve got flat feet!) As such, and being social creatures, we love more than anything to stay close to our pack. As for the fear of being alone, I really think that it’s just the way our brain decodes the blips and bleeps of our subconscious that are telling us, “wait, slow down, let’s just watch from a safe distance, if she eats the toadstool and doesn’t die, then the rest of us can try it,” or “let’s all just wait on the shore, we’ll watch this potentially insane ape walk out on the ice, if he doesn’t fall in and drown, and this does turn out to be an excellent shortcut, then we’ll follow” etc. It can be a rather useful instinct, when you think about it. Though we do celebrate, as a culture, those who are willing to step away from the crowd, we just don’t like to commit to joining them until they’ve proven themselves to not be insane. We like the winning team (Go Sens Go!) but are anxious, cautious and doubtful until the results are tallied (Senators in 6, I’m told). For me, when faced with my choice, I realized that I had to be the one to eat the toadstool, to walk out on the ice.
At the age of 24, I packed a bag and went west. Alone. I knew I needed to find something, and I did. I found that I survived. For me, that simple discovery was a big deal. As important and useful as our instinct to cling to the warm comfort of the pack may be, the fact is that someone has to be the loner, the innovator, the one to take chances; and without that wacko gene, we wouldn’t evolve as individuals or as a species. The best part is that once a person learns that lesson, how to put aside one’s fear, life starts to become easier. In the years since I took that first big risk, I have traveled both this continent and abroad, I have written a cookbook, I have made a good and important career out of something I used to think of as nothing more than a way to make the monthly payments on my microphone and P.A. Best of all, I met and married the most important person in my life, and wasn’t afraid to tell her so.
Last year, Nicole, Brent, Jenn and I each set aside our fear of failure and opened a business, offering creative & tasty organic food in Kemptville. There are those who think we are silly or weird, but it seems like more and more people think it is a good and timely idea and are willing to take a chance and try something new. A month or so ago we set in motion a plan to open a farmer’s market. And last Sunday, with smiles as bright as our own personal patch of sunlight, we saw that without question Kemptville was ready for a taste of the local foods movement. Time and again, we have seen that fear alone should never be a reason to not do something, and that life rewards the innovator. So don’t be afraid. Go west. Or east. Or even just go down the street to meet a new farmer, make a new friend, or maybe just to try something new...
Trust me, someday you’ll look up...and smile!
Spring Farmers Market Story
Spring has finally sprung! April showers are bringing May mushrooms (or flowers, if you prefer that sort of thing...). The monolithic parking-lot-snow-mountains have shrunk and finally slunk off in a watery retreat to the rain gutters of our fair village. The tips of sprouts are courageously poking out through the brown, frostbitten soil, buds are breaking the ice hardened skin of the bushes and trees, and all around us the bright green chlorophyll is tentatively singing the first few bars of her sweet song of promise. If you listen, you can almost hear it...it sounds like a collective sigh of relief as we all plunge together into the brief season apparently known in these parts as 'Not Winter'.
With Spring upon us, it seems that all we can talk about is gardening, farming, planting and growing food. There is no doubt that this instinct is as human as thousands of years of agriculturally based civilization can possibly make it. Let me clarify, at our core, we creatures of the earth have the simplest mechanism to keep us alive, that of survival. The desire to follow successful survivors is a manifestation of that base engine, and as humans, the successful survivors have been agriculturalists. So naturally, when spring reminds us of its bounty, we are culturally compelled to prepare the soil, to plant, and to plan for the harvest. Frankly, if we weren't so compelled our genetic traits would meander off aimlessly and probably fade from the gene pool altogether.
My grandfather was a dentist, but was raised on a farm in East Texas. At his home in Bryan throughout his life he kept a small vegetable patch, a few fruit trees and a few chickens. I think he was just cheap; when you are raised on a farm it is likely difficult to spend money on things that can be produced so easily at so little expense. (I'm joking, of course, I mean he was definitely cheap, but farming is not easy...) The beauty of his example, though, is another fact of farm life that we are all quietly aware of. Fresh food tastes better. He knew it and couldn't be satisfied by the grocery store's poor excuse for quality, and we know it, but suppress the knowledge because our busy lives have made the idea of farming and even gardening seem like hobbies or vanity projects. The industrial age has been a noble human pursuit, but it has come at the expense of the flavour, healthfulness and quality of our food (and our lives), and ultimately our connection to the earth itself. This is illustrated clearly by both health crises we are facing as humans and by the looming threat of global warming, a health crisis for our planet.
But Spring has sprung. Everywhere we look or listen today people are talking about these issues. Commercials for organic baby food have entered primetime, hybrid cars are not just for tree huggers and hippies, recycling and energy conservation are now the winning buzzwords for successful politicians, not just the claptrap of the fringe. Is the battle over? No, of course not, it's just beginning, but it is beginning in earnest and with vigor. I know in my heart that humans will turn this mess around, and I'll tell you why. Survival. We always end up rooting for the winning team. We are so hardwired to win this game that we will do whatever it takes to make it happen. And mark my words, those who don't will wander off aimlessly and their genetic information will fade from the gene pool altogether.
What can you do? Eat local, shop local, buy those funny looking light bulbs, quit driving so much and quit buying from people who drive so much. If you do buy from abroad, and we all do, choose organic. The branch will be starting a Sunday afternoon farmer's market on May 27th; let’s all pitch in and support our local farmers. It's our best good chance to win this race. This human race.
With Spring upon us, it seems that all we can talk about is gardening, farming, planting and growing food. There is no doubt that this instinct is as human as thousands of years of agriculturally based civilization can possibly make it. Let me clarify, at our core, we creatures of the earth have the simplest mechanism to keep us alive, that of survival. The desire to follow successful survivors is a manifestation of that base engine, and as humans, the successful survivors have been agriculturalists. So naturally, when spring reminds us of its bounty, we are culturally compelled to prepare the soil, to plant, and to plan for the harvest. Frankly, if we weren't so compelled our genetic traits would meander off aimlessly and probably fade from the gene pool altogether.
My grandfather was a dentist, but was raised on a farm in East Texas. At his home in Bryan throughout his life he kept a small vegetable patch, a few fruit trees and a few chickens. I think he was just cheap; when you are raised on a farm it is likely difficult to spend money on things that can be produced so easily at so little expense. (I'm joking, of course, I mean he was definitely cheap, but farming is not easy...) The beauty of his example, though, is another fact of farm life that we are all quietly aware of. Fresh food tastes better. He knew it and couldn't be satisfied by the grocery store's poor excuse for quality, and we know it, but suppress the knowledge because our busy lives have made the idea of farming and even gardening seem like hobbies or vanity projects. The industrial age has been a noble human pursuit, but it has come at the expense of the flavour, healthfulness and quality of our food (and our lives), and ultimately our connection to the earth itself. This is illustrated clearly by both health crises we are facing as humans and by the looming threat of global warming, a health crisis for our planet.
But Spring has sprung. Everywhere we look or listen today people are talking about these issues. Commercials for organic baby food have entered primetime, hybrid cars are not just for tree huggers and hippies, recycling and energy conservation are now the winning buzzwords for successful politicians, not just the claptrap of the fringe. Is the battle over? No, of course not, it's just beginning, but it is beginning in earnest and with vigor. I know in my heart that humans will turn this mess around, and I'll tell you why. Survival. We always end up rooting for the winning team. We are so hardwired to win this game that we will do whatever it takes to make it happen. And mark my words, those who don't will wander off aimlessly and their genetic information will fade from the gene pool altogether.
What can you do? Eat local, shop local, buy those funny looking light bulbs, quit driving so much and quit buying from people who drive so much. If you do buy from abroad, and we all do, choose organic. The branch will be starting a Sunday afternoon farmer's market on May 27th; let’s all pitch in and support our local farmers. It's our best good chance to win this race. This human race.
Mother's Cafe Story
I applied to Mother’s Café and Garden when I first moved to Austin, at the time, I was a vegetarian, and they were Austin’s most successful and longest running vegetarian restaurant. I was cooking to support my burgeoning and inevitable music career, had been for a while, and it seemed like a good fit. For whatever reason, they didn’t hire me, so I went back to cooking Italian; pasta sure could pay the rent (at least until the music thing took off). I took a job at a cheesy little strip mall Italian joint, it only lasted a few months, then I applied to Mother’s again. They didn’t call, again, so I took another Italian job. I was getting rather good at cooking noodles. This new place was a big clean new operation; the executive chef took me under his wing and I learned a lot. But the new chef de cuisine wanted to bring in veal (I was a bit more squeamish at the time)… and, well, I applied to Mother’s again.
Mother’s, to me, was a sort of Mecca. The people who worked there looked cooler, more urban and hip. The guys in the kitchen wore bandannas, shorts and t-shirts instead of chef coats, they had visible tattoos and wacky facial hair. Loud punk rock could always be heard when the kitchen door opened. They looked like a merry band of pirates. It was like a cross between music and cooking. Also, the place was always busy, so it looked like a challenge. The food was real, and I could eat anything on the menu, not to mention learn how to cook it… The third time I applied I actually got an interview. John Silverman explained his philosophies, I explained mine. I’ll never forget that at the end of the interview he said “basically, what we’ve found is we like to hire people who are positive, who have a positive attitude…” then he looked at me, “do you think you’re one of those people?” Dead serious. I’ve used that line in a few interviews I’ve conducted over the years and have found that it is a good way to initiate a commitment to positivism with a new employee right from the start . It also helps the way the restaurant operates from the top down. If the dishwashers smile, the cooks smile, the servers smile and so do the customers. Most people go to a restaurant to have a good time and a smile is big part of that system. Mother's Cafe was always a good time.
He hired me that time. I took a pay cut, shifts I didn’t want, the work was harder and dirtier, and I was never happier in a kitchen. Busy restaurants tend to form a kind of team spirit that pulls everyone together. Those of us in the know always joke that the camaraderie is like that of soldiers who have gone through a war (although, admittedly, there is a much smaller chance of an IED or a roadside bomb). I worked at Mother’s for two years, as a night cook, a brunch cook (now that was a war story!) and finally, the dream job, as a lunch cook. In Austin, Texas, the land of music and partially employed musicians, a lunch shift is pure gold. It means that you can pay the bills, eat, and still practice with your band in the evening and play shows on the weekends. It took nearly a year of waiting to get the spot, and every single lunch cook was a musician. Spontaneous jam sessions would regularly break out in the walk-in refrigerator with pickle buckets and wire racks serving as improvised percussion instruments.
John did the hiring, but Cameron Alexander was the kitchen’s guy. He did the ordering and such and would work shifts to fill in for cooks who needed time off (for, you know, tours). The menu was fixed (and an institution unto itself), but Cameron and I started a dialogue about daily specials early on which somehow turned into a going concern. By the time I left, I regularly wrote and prepared a number of specials for Mother’s and her sister restaurant (the West Lynn Café). It was a position of creative leadership in a kitchen that had no formal leadership structure. I took the responsibility seriously (when I wasn’t thinking about my music career) and discovered, to my surprise, that I genuinely enjoyed the opportunity to be creative in my work environment.
I was going through a tough time. Music, my first love, was dissolving in my hands. Everyone I knew was a musician, and no-one was making a dime at it. Almost all of them were better than me, and I felt like I was just taking up their place in line. For that and many other reasons, my life was getting generally complicated, and in an effort to become more centered I was seeking wisdom, as many have, in books about Eastern philosophy. It was in a book about Buddhism that I came across the idea of choosing a ‘path’ or a ‘way’. It just clicked. What had music ever done for me? Had it fed me, sheltered me, kept me warm, bought me a beer? (O.K., maybe it had bought me a beer…) Music was a creative outlet, sure, and creative people need outlets (trust me, danger ensues). But cooking had not only taken better care of me, physically, but recently (thanks to Mother’s), cooking had become a creative outlet as well. In a sort of improvised Buddhist riddle, I asked myself which of these two disciplines I would choose if I had to give one up to follow one 'way', and the answer seemed clear. I loved music and still do, but simply put, cooking has been a much better friend to me. I decided to simplify my life and become a cook first and musician second.
Within a year, thanks in no small part to a letter of recommendation from Cameron, I was a Sous chef at one of America’s top vegetarian restaurants in San Francisco, California. Seems cooking also moves a lot faster than music…
Last week I received an email that Mother’s Café and Garden had burned in the night, no one was hurt, but a lot of folks who are my spiritual kin are out of jobs and having a tough time. We’ve decided to donate a portion of this week’s proceeds to help them get through it… There will also be a jar on the counter. I think it will mean a lot if they know folks all the way up in Canada are thinking about them, so please stop by and show your support. And if you’re up for it, maybe this week would be a good time to try one of our vegetarian specials; we’ll be offering a fixed price menu based on foods I learned to cook at that restaurant.
Mother’s, to me, was a sort of Mecca. The people who worked there looked cooler, more urban and hip. The guys in the kitchen wore bandannas, shorts and t-shirts instead of chef coats, they had visible tattoos and wacky facial hair. Loud punk rock could always be heard when the kitchen door opened. They looked like a merry band of pirates. It was like a cross between music and cooking. Also, the place was always busy, so it looked like a challenge. The food was real, and I could eat anything on the menu, not to mention learn how to cook it… The third time I applied I actually got an interview. John Silverman explained his philosophies, I explained mine. I’ll never forget that at the end of the interview he said “basically, what we’ve found is we like to hire people who are positive, who have a positive attitude…” then he looked at me, “do you think you’re one of those people?” Dead serious. I’ve used that line in a few interviews I’ve conducted over the years and have found that it is a good way to initiate a commitment to positivism with a new employee right from the start . It also helps the way the restaurant operates from the top down. If the dishwashers smile, the cooks smile, the servers smile and so do the customers. Most people go to a restaurant to have a good time and a smile is big part of that system. Mother's Cafe was always a good time.
He hired me that time. I took a pay cut, shifts I didn’t want, the work was harder and dirtier, and I was never happier in a kitchen. Busy restaurants tend to form a kind of team spirit that pulls everyone together. Those of us in the know always joke that the camaraderie is like that of soldiers who have gone through a war (although, admittedly, there is a much smaller chance of an IED or a roadside bomb). I worked at Mother’s for two years, as a night cook, a brunch cook (now that was a war story!) and finally, the dream job, as a lunch cook. In Austin, Texas, the land of music and partially employed musicians, a lunch shift is pure gold. It means that you can pay the bills, eat, and still practice with your band in the evening and play shows on the weekends. It took nearly a year of waiting to get the spot, and every single lunch cook was a musician. Spontaneous jam sessions would regularly break out in the walk-in refrigerator with pickle buckets and wire racks serving as improvised percussion instruments.
John did the hiring, but Cameron Alexander was the kitchen’s guy. He did the ordering and such and would work shifts to fill in for cooks who needed time off (for, you know, tours). The menu was fixed (and an institution unto itself), but Cameron and I started a dialogue about daily specials early on which somehow turned into a going concern. By the time I left, I regularly wrote and prepared a number of specials for Mother’s and her sister restaurant (the West Lynn Café). It was a position of creative leadership in a kitchen that had no formal leadership structure. I took the responsibility seriously (when I wasn’t thinking about my music career) and discovered, to my surprise, that I genuinely enjoyed the opportunity to be creative in my work environment.
I was going through a tough time. Music, my first love, was dissolving in my hands. Everyone I knew was a musician, and no-one was making a dime at it. Almost all of them were better than me, and I felt like I was just taking up their place in line. For that and many other reasons, my life was getting generally complicated, and in an effort to become more centered I was seeking wisdom, as many have, in books about Eastern philosophy. It was in a book about Buddhism that I came across the idea of choosing a ‘path’ or a ‘way’. It just clicked. What had music ever done for me? Had it fed me, sheltered me, kept me warm, bought me a beer? (O.K., maybe it had bought me a beer…) Music was a creative outlet, sure, and creative people need outlets (trust me, danger ensues). But cooking had not only taken better care of me, physically, but recently (thanks to Mother’s), cooking had become a creative outlet as well. In a sort of improvised Buddhist riddle, I asked myself which of these two disciplines I would choose if I had to give one up to follow one 'way', and the answer seemed clear. I loved music and still do, but simply put, cooking has been a much better friend to me. I decided to simplify my life and become a cook first and musician second.
Within a year, thanks in no small part to a letter of recommendation from Cameron, I was a Sous chef at one of America’s top vegetarian restaurants in San Francisco, California. Seems cooking also moves a lot faster than music…
Last week I received an email that Mother’s Café and Garden had burned in the night, no one was hurt, but a lot of folks who are my spiritual kin are out of jobs and having a tough time. We’ve decided to donate a portion of this week’s proceeds to help them get through it… There will also be a jar on the counter. I think it will mean a lot if they know folks all the way up in Canada are thinking about them, so please stop by and show your support. And if you’re up for it, maybe this week would be a good time to try one of our vegetarian specials; we’ll be offering a fixed price menu based on foods I learned to cook at that restaurant.
My winter vacation
Nicole and I took a few days and went to visit my sister in Staunton, Virginia where she is enrolled in a Master’s program studying Shakespeare. Staunton is home to one of the only existing theatres modeled as an exact replica on the indoor theatres of Shakespeare’s time. She was able to give us a tour of this fascinating space, but unfortunately the timing of our visit did not allow for us to take in a show. We did, however, get to experience another kind of theatre and do something I’ve wanted to do for years, which was to visit one of the United States’ most critically lauded restaurants, ‘The Inn at Little Washington’ in Washington, Virginia.
The chef, Patrick O’Connell, through his writings and through stories, has been an inspiration to me for over ten years. Though often described as one of the top chefs in America, he is self taught, like myself, and has a great love for home cooking and what I call ‘real’ or ‘comfort’ food. He is often grouped with the great chefs of the world in magazines and books, but rather than challenging or inaccessible, I find his cooking style to be humble, smart, and invested with a sense of fun and adventure. In reading about him over the years, I was struck by his anti-snob attitude towards haute cuisine. He always remembers that flavor and service are more important than celebrity or presentation, but by focusing on the former it seems that he comes naturally by the latter. He also was the first chef about whom I read about who was associated closely with a cuisine based on local foods. This seed of thought germinated several ideas in my head and as a result I’ve often cited him as a reference point for my own style. All this before ever eating at his restaurant.
One of the most interesting things about ‘The Inn…’ is that it is, almost literally, in the middle of nowhere. It is a full hours’ drive from Washington D.C., the nearest city, and that drive is through mostly absurdly winding mountain roads populated by a host of vigorously suicidal deer who are actively seeking a hood to ornament. The town is cute and small, but is not home to any other particularly special industry of note (such as the wine country surrounding the world renowned small town restaurants of California). It is a challenge to get there and a challenge to leave which was part of the reason the restaurateurs expanded into an inn soon after opening in the late 70’s. And yet, for years, the inn has filled its dining room night after night even with, what the owners describe as, prices ‘raised out of self-defense’. Why would someone brave this treacherous journey for a meal? Well, after our visit it was obvious.
We were late, a bit, and at some restaurants in this stratum that would have earned us our first scowl. Instead, we were made to feel welcome, greeted by name and treated like old friends. Due to poor planning, we were dressed a touch less formally than we would have liked, at some restaurants, this would have earned us a second scowl, but here? No, again. It was so homey I felt like I should have brought a bottle of wine for the hosts. Nicole and I have eaten well in our time together, rarely at such posh places, but our adventures have, at times, taken us (sometimes as employees, other times as the lucky guest of those who can afford, and by an occasional almost heroic effort to ignore the right hand side of the menu until it is too late) to some dining rooms designed to comfort only the chosen (and by chosen, yes, I do mean wealthy) few. Our intimate familiarity with the kitchens and wait stations of such venues also makes us quite familiar with the attitude toward a couple of ratty young ‘middle class’ types like ourselves. We are obviously poor marks, financially incapable of ordering the finer wines or spirits that might push the waiter’s tip percentage into the stratosphere. In places such as these it is easy to discount such customers, to give them the table by the kitchen door, to subtly move them down the priority list for the table check or the water refill, etc. Small gestures, unintentional mostly, but observable to the experienced eye nonetheless.
I can honestly say, with just such an experienced eye, that I felt none of this subtle class distinction here; in fact, it was entirely the opposite. We were greeted by name, even our history was known. When my sister made the reservation on our behalf, she had mentioned that we were new restaurant owners. Given this grain of knowledge, the hosts had found a copy of our logo and printed it on special copies of that nights’ menu, welcoming us as equals. My reaction was emotional; no restaurant, no simple business had ever gone to such lengths on our behalf. The night improved from there, as we were immediately treated to complimentary champagne and a number of delicious treats including tempura green beans, parmesan crisps, and sashimi of tuna. We chose a few selections from the a la carte menu and were treated to more tiny tastes. Our wine selection was aided by a sommelier who recited our menu choices to us (he wasn’t the waiter who took the order) and not only didn’t flinch when I explained our price needs but through the course of the meal, brought us complimentary tastes of some choices we were unable to afford, just because he thought we might enjoy them. And from the menu? I ordered, yes, macaroni and cheese with white truffles and Virginia ham. Those who know me well know I could not resist such a treat. Other menu items included perfect and fluffy gnocchi with lobster and walnuts, lamb loin tartare, wild mushrooms and Artisan cheese (again with white truffles, who can resist?), a meltingly tender tenderloin of venison, an immaculate tuna steak with seared foie gras and desserts of a chocolate trio and a butterscotch ice cream and cookie tower. What we didn’t order? Well, in addition to the nibbles I mentioned earlier there was a Red sweet pepper soup, an intermezzo ‘dreamsicle’ lollipop of vanilla and passionfruit ice cream, and a picnic basket of assorted cookies during dessert, and a chocolate truffle after (don’t tell him I said it, but it was almost as good as Brent’s). The flow of new tastes and flavors never stopped. It was flowlicious. It was a foodgasm.
After the meal we were ushered into the kitchen to meet the chef. He was entirely approachable, friendly, funny, proud, but not cocky, and quick to share secrets and advice. I let it slip during the meal that I had a copy of the first but not the second cookbook, and in the kitchen he handed us a signed copy of the second. As we were leaving, we were also given copies of our menu and the picnic basket from the dessert course.
It’s kind of obvious why people drive this far isn’t it? These folks understand that good service is the art of making people, regular people, feel special.
I read once that food from a top tier restaurant should be held up to a ‘take-out box’ standard, that is to say, that the food should taste just as good out of a take-out box as it does in the restaurant. Few, if any finer restaurants would fare well in such a test. Devoid of the trappings of the high grade china, flatware, crystal, linen and the elaborate lighting and plate design that make up the dining room of a modern haute cuisine restaurant, the food often becomes lifeless. Interesting, perhaps, but not necessarily special. My favorite story to tell about Patrick O’Connell is about his answer to a question which was put to a number of top chefs, the question was something along the lines of ‘What food would you take with you to a desert island?’ Most chefs answered with predictably impractical foods such as truffles or foie gras or some exotic oil, but Patrick answered a bit more creatively. ‘Clean water,’ he said, ‘I don’t think I would enjoy dying of thirst’ and went on to explain that he would enjoy having to forage for the rest. On his menu, he is not afraid to use the tools of haute cuisine which are afforded him by his current station in the firmament of modern day chef stars, but that isn’t what makes him special. What makes him special is that it seems as if he’d be just as content, and competent, without them. And that’s why his food is good. Probably even out of a take-out box.
In a way fine dining is little more than theatre, it is often far removed from the rational reasons of why we eat food, for instance, no one can argue that it has much to do with nutrition or sustenance. But that is not to say it does not play an important role. Much like theatre, fine dining is often a place where new ideas are vetted and tried, exposed and expressed. Just as theatre brought edgy ideas like class war, suffrage and racism to the dialogue of everyday people in Shakespeare’s time, fine dining has helped to bring forth conversations about such topics as organic agriculture, local foods and changing foodways today. One example might be how chefs are no longer relying solely on overfished ocean populations to maintain the impossible ideal of a static menu, and are instead looking to new and more sustainable populations for the future. Not all chefs are thinking this far ahead, but it is undeniable that the potential is there, and as long as chefs like O’Connell and Alice Waters are successful and are willing to take the lead there will be those who follow. That’s when fine dining becomes important, when food becomes more than what is on the plate and when being kind to a customer is more than act put on for profit and becomes a genuine act of people caring for one another. Now that’s good service.
The chef, Patrick O’Connell, through his writings and through stories, has been an inspiration to me for over ten years. Though often described as one of the top chefs in America, he is self taught, like myself, and has a great love for home cooking and what I call ‘real’ or ‘comfort’ food. He is often grouped with the great chefs of the world in magazines and books, but rather than challenging or inaccessible, I find his cooking style to be humble, smart, and invested with a sense of fun and adventure. In reading about him over the years, I was struck by his anti-snob attitude towards haute cuisine. He always remembers that flavor and service are more important than celebrity or presentation, but by focusing on the former it seems that he comes naturally by the latter. He also was the first chef about whom I read about who was associated closely with a cuisine based on local foods. This seed of thought germinated several ideas in my head and as a result I’ve often cited him as a reference point for my own style. All this before ever eating at his restaurant.
One of the most interesting things about ‘The Inn…’ is that it is, almost literally, in the middle of nowhere. It is a full hours’ drive from Washington D.C., the nearest city, and that drive is through mostly absurdly winding mountain roads populated by a host of vigorously suicidal deer who are actively seeking a hood to ornament. The town is cute and small, but is not home to any other particularly special industry of note (such as the wine country surrounding the world renowned small town restaurants of California). It is a challenge to get there and a challenge to leave which was part of the reason the restaurateurs expanded into an inn soon after opening in the late 70’s. And yet, for years, the inn has filled its dining room night after night even with, what the owners describe as, prices ‘raised out of self-defense’. Why would someone brave this treacherous journey for a meal? Well, after our visit it was obvious.
We were late, a bit, and at some restaurants in this stratum that would have earned us our first scowl. Instead, we were made to feel welcome, greeted by name and treated like old friends. Due to poor planning, we were dressed a touch less formally than we would have liked, at some restaurants, this would have earned us a second scowl, but here? No, again. It was so homey I felt like I should have brought a bottle of wine for the hosts. Nicole and I have eaten well in our time together, rarely at such posh places, but our adventures have, at times, taken us (sometimes as employees, other times as the lucky guest of those who can afford, and by an occasional almost heroic effort to ignore the right hand side of the menu until it is too late) to some dining rooms designed to comfort only the chosen (and by chosen, yes, I do mean wealthy) few. Our intimate familiarity with the kitchens and wait stations of such venues also makes us quite familiar with the attitude toward a couple of ratty young ‘middle class’ types like ourselves. We are obviously poor marks, financially incapable of ordering the finer wines or spirits that might push the waiter’s tip percentage into the stratosphere. In places such as these it is easy to discount such customers, to give them the table by the kitchen door, to subtly move them down the priority list for the table check or the water refill, etc. Small gestures, unintentional mostly, but observable to the experienced eye nonetheless.
I can honestly say, with just such an experienced eye, that I felt none of this subtle class distinction here; in fact, it was entirely the opposite. We were greeted by name, even our history was known. When my sister made the reservation on our behalf, she had mentioned that we were new restaurant owners. Given this grain of knowledge, the hosts had found a copy of our logo and printed it on special copies of that nights’ menu, welcoming us as equals. My reaction was emotional; no restaurant, no simple business had ever gone to such lengths on our behalf. The night improved from there, as we were immediately treated to complimentary champagne and a number of delicious treats including tempura green beans, parmesan crisps, and sashimi of tuna. We chose a few selections from the a la carte menu and were treated to more tiny tastes. Our wine selection was aided by a sommelier who recited our menu choices to us (he wasn’t the waiter who took the order) and not only didn’t flinch when I explained our price needs but through the course of the meal, brought us complimentary tastes of some choices we were unable to afford, just because he thought we might enjoy them. And from the menu? I ordered, yes, macaroni and cheese with white truffles and Virginia ham. Those who know me well know I could not resist such a treat. Other menu items included perfect and fluffy gnocchi with lobster and walnuts, lamb loin tartare, wild mushrooms and Artisan cheese (again with white truffles, who can resist?), a meltingly tender tenderloin of venison, an immaculate tuna steak with seared foie gras and desserts of a chocolate trio and a butterscotch ice cream and cookie tower. What we didn’t order? Well, in addition to the nibbles I mentioned earlier there was a Red sweet pepper soup, an intermezzo ‘dreamsicle’ lollipop of vanilla and passionfruit ice cream, and a picnic basket of assorted cookies during dessert, and a chocolate truffle after (don’t tell him I said it, but it was almost as good as Brent’s). The flow of new tastes and flavors never stopped. It was flowlicious. It was a foodgasm.
After the meal we were ushered into the kitchen to meet the chef. He was entirely approachable, friendly, funny, proud, but not cocky, and quick to share secrets and advice. I let it slip during the meal that I had a copy of the first but not the second cookbook, and in the kitchen he handed us a signed copy of the second. As we were leaving, we were also given copies of our menu and the picnic basket from the dessert course.
It’s kind of obvious why people drive this far isn’t it? These folks understand that good service is the art of making people, regular people, feel special.
I read once that food from a top tier restaurant should be held up to a ‘take-out box’ standard, that is to say, that the food should taste just as good out of a take-out box as it does in the restaurant. Few, if any finer restaurants would fare well in such a test. Devoid of the trappings of the high grade china, flatware, crystal, linen and the elaborate lighting and plate design that make up the dining room of a modern haute cuisine restaurant, the food often becomes lifeless. Interesting, perhaps, but not necessarily special. My favorite story to tell about Patrick O’Connell is about his answer to a question which was put to a number of top chefs, the question was something along the lines of ‘What food would you take with you to a desert island?’ Most chefs answered with predictably impractical foods such as truffles or foie gras or some exotic oil, but Patrick answered a bit more creatively. ‘Clean water,’ he said, ‘I don’t think I would enjoy dying of thirst’ and went on to explain that he would enjoy having to forage for the rest. On his menu, he is not afraid to use the tools of haute cuisine which are afforded him by his current station in the firmament of modern day chef stars, but that isn’t what makes him special. What makes him special is that it seems as if he’d be just as content, and competent, without them. And that’s why his food is good. Probably even out of a take-out box.
In a way fine dining is little more than theatre, it is often far removed from the rational reasons of why we eat food, for instance, no one can argue that it has much to do with nutrition or sustenance. But that is not to say it does not play an important role. Much like theatre, fine dining is often a place where new ideas are vetted and tried, exposed and expressed. Just as theatre brought edgy ideas like class war, suffrage and racism to the dialogue of everyday people in Shakespeare’s time, fine dining has helped to bring forth conversations about such topics as organic agriculture, local foods and changing foodways today. One example might be how chefs are no longer relying solely on overfished ocean populations to maintain the impossible ideal of a static menu, and are instead looking to new and more sustainable populations for the future. Not all chefs are thinking this far ahead, but it is undeniable that the potential is there, and as long as chefs like O’Connell and Alice Waters are successful and are willing to take the lead there will be those who follow. That’s when fine dining becomes important, when food becomes more than what is on the plate and when being kind to a customer is more than act put on for profit and becomes a genuine act of people caring for one another. Now that’s good service.
What the heck is a "rubber boots buffet?"
From the time I was about 13, I was spending my summers mowing lawns in Texas, it’s a sweaty job, and dirty. We would wake up early, and put on our work boots. My father would accompany me, and perhaps my brother or a cousin on these jobs, and would use the opportunity to teach us the importance of hard work, as well as its rewards. Often, when looking at a finished yard he would sigh, contented, and smile, saying, “Nothing feels as good as a job well done.”
I also remember that for lunch we would often go to drive-through windows or walkup barbecue stands, as our attire (not to mention our odour) did not exactly merit table service. But there is one lunch that I’ll never forget. We were just finishing a one-off job in a part of town in which we didn’t usually work, it was about lunchtime, and my dad suddenly remembered that we were close to a soul kitchen. For those who only know that term from Jim Morrison, a soul kitchen is a sort of underground restaurant, usually in a black community, where food is served family style, plentiful and cheap. This was my first experience with such a place. As I recall, the food service area was the front porch and front room of a ramshackle house, the tables were Sears picnic, the beverage was iced tea, and the food was all you can eat, first come, first served. The other diners were construction workers, linemen, oilmen and farmers, and all of us were sweaty and dirty and wearing our boots. The food was fried chicken, biscuits, greens, mashed potatoes; it was buttery, rich and served right to the middle of the table, where we all sat together and passed the gravy just like Sunday lunch.
A few years on, I passed on the career in yard work to become a cook, eventually a chef in California. I also, on occasion, found myself working outdoors again, for one reason or another, often with the farmers who would supply the kitchen where I worked. I came to have a world of respect for these farmers; few if any occupations are more difficult or more important. And you know, I couldn’t help but notice that they were always wearing those familiar work boots.
When my wife and I traveled to Europe, we decided to try a program called WWOOF (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) as a means of seeing first hand how organic farming works and to experience the countryside. We spent about a week each on farms in Gascony, Tuscany and Piedmont, trading our labor for room and board. It was in the mountains in France where we heard a story about a local restaurant; it was apparently well regarded, served haute cuisine and held a place of regard in the Michelin guide. On Sundays, however, the chef would volunteer his time to cook family style comfort food for just the locals and the farm workers who supplied his restaurant during the week.
Last year, in Canada, I was loaned a book by Timothy Taylor, called Stanley Park, (set in Vancouver) in which he relates a similar story. His main character, a chef, speaks of his desire to bring this “rubber boots” food to his clientele. His choice of the words rubber boots instantly connected my memories of the soul kitchen in Texas, of the hard working farmers in California and of the rich soil clinging to our boots on the farms in Italy and France.
When we were planning for our restaurant, Sundays just seemed obvious, we would have family style comfort food; all you can eat, an open stage for musicians and others and we would accept no reservations. Our “Rubber Boots” Sunday is a way of saying thanks to all of the hard working friends, locals and especially the farmers who have made this restaurant possible.
I also remember that for lunch we would often go to drive-through windows or walkup barbecue stands, as our attire (not to mention our odour) did not exactly merit table service. But there is one lunch that I’ll never forget. We were just finishing a one-off job in a part of town in which we didn’t usually work, it was about lunchtime, and my dad suddenly remembered that we were close to a soul kitchen. For those who only know that term from Jim Morrison, a soul kitchen is a sort of underground restaurant, usually in a black community, where food is served family style, plentiful and cheap. This was my first experience with such a place. As I recall, the food service area was the front porch and front room of a ramshackle house, the tables were Sears picnic, the beverage was iced tea, and the food was all you can eat, first come, first served. The other diners were construction workers, linemen, oilmen and farmers, and all of us were sweaty and dirty and wearing our boots. The food was fried chicken, biscuits, greens, mashed potatoes; it was buttery, rich and served right to the middle of the table, where we all sat together and passed the gravy just like Sunday lunch.
A few years on, I passed on the career in yard work to become a cook, eventually a chef in California. I also, on occasion, found myself working outdoors again, for one reason or another, often with the farmers who would supply the kitchen where I worked. I came to have a world of respect for these farmers; few if any occupations are more difficult or more important. And you know, I couldn’t help but notice that they were always wearing those familiar work boots.
When my wife and I traveled to Europe, we decided to try a program called WWOOF (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) as a means of seeing first hand how organic farming works and to experience the countryside. We spent about a week each on farms in Gascony, Tuscany and Piedmont, trading our labor for room and board. It was in the mountains in France where we heard a story about a local restaurant; it was apparently well regarded, served haute cuisine and held a place of regard in the Michelin guide. On Sundays, however, the chef would volunteer his time to cook family style comfort food for just the locals and the farm workers who supplied his restaurant during the week.
Last year, in Canada, I was loaned a book by Timothy Taylor, called Stanley Park, (set in Vancouver) in which he relates a similar story. His main character, a chef, speaks of his desire to bring this “rubber boots” food to his clientele. His choice of the words rubber boots instantly connected my memories of the soul kitchen in Texas, of the hard working farmers in California and of the rich soil clinging to our boots on the farms in Italy and France.
When we were planning for our restaurant, Sundays just seemed obvious, we would have family style comfort food; all you can eat, an open stage for musicians and others and we would accept no reservations. Our “Rubber Boots” Sunday is a way of saying thanks to all of the hard working friends, locals and especially the farmers who have made this restaurant possible.
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