Culinary Historians Potluck

Last Sunday, the Culinary Historians of Washington (CHoW) were having their annual potluck, and I tagged along with Liz to check it out. You may be wondering how many people could possibly be making their living as a culinary historian, but the group simply consists of history buffs and enthusiasts who are passionate about food.

The potluck was themed “Presidential Favorites,” so the night before, we searched online intensely for favorite recipes of our Commanders-in-Chief. This proved to be more difficult than I’d anticipated because cooking has evolved drastically in the last 200 years and historical recipes are often intractable. Pre-20th century recipes tend to use esoteric ingredients, require lots of labor, and have few measures for volumes, temperatures or cooking times. (“Now, set the wood-burning fire at 350°…”) After ruling out Nancy Reagan’s Monkey Bread (too long rising time) and James Garfield’s Squirrel Soup (squirrel hunting on the National Mall, anyone?), we decided to make Harry and Bess Truman’s Coconut Balls. This recipe was ideal because 1) it was a presidential favorite (not just First Lady), 2) came from the Truman Library website and seemed historically credible and 3) required only five ingredients and 15 minutes of baking.

Now, my first rule for potlucks is to never bring a dish that hasn’t been tested before. But we were running short on time, so an hour before the potluck was due to start, we hastily mixed a batch of coconut ball batter (basically coconut flakes and condensed milk) and threw them in the oven. The kitchen smelled great, deliciously coconut-y! Much to our dismay, upon removing the cookie sheets, we discovered that the coconut “balls” had spread to 3” in diameter, and were now an oddly shaped sort of macaroon-cookie, with crisp browned edges to boot. Egads. On the other hand, they still tasted great, and who knows, maybe that’s what they were supposed to look like in the 1940s. We tossed the coconut balls into a storage container and dashed for the train.

At the potluck, a vast array of dishes were spread out over two tables. These ranged from the familiar macaroni and cheese (served at Jefferson’s inauguration, and considered quite fashionable at the time), to more exotic items like pickled watermelon, tomato bread pudding and Harrison-era sliced tongue. There was a violet soup, garnished with freshly picked violets, and a Johnson-era canapé “cake” constructed of hors d’oeuvres on toothpicks. President Obama’s affinity for Mexican foods was celebrated with pork loin and homemade molé sauce (this takes a full day of roasting peppers and pressing them through sieves). Amy Carter’s favorite peanut butter cookies were available, and a veal & bacon pie modeled after Martha Washington’s recipe was on display. Amusingly, there was a definite bias towards dishes from Democratic administrations, and even scattered apologies from people who had brought Republican administration foods.

Alas, someone else had brought Harry and Bess Truman’s Coconut Cookies, and they looked much prettier than our offering. After eyeing the competition though, we decided that the coconut cookies were distinct from coconut balls, since the former had flour in the recipe and were clearly different. At any rate, by the end of the afternoon, all of our coconut balls were gone, while half of the coconut cookies were left over. Victory was ours! As an additional aside, while waiting in line for food, there were definitely some comments made about “Harry’s Balls.” It’s good to know that you’re never too old to joke about balls.

I sat down next to a gentleman who works for the Department of Energy, whose wife is currently writing a book on sugar. (Books on single products seem to be very trendy these days.) Unprompted, he began spouting facts on early scientific instruments like the polarimeter, and how taxation on goods often drives scientific innovation. Apparently, the British developed methods of determining the alcohol content of beverages in order to properly tax them.

The rest of the group was full of interesting, intelligent people as well. As we circled around the room, explaining our dishes, quirky debates would sporadically break out over say, the origins of “Philadelphia” cream cheese or the foundation of industrial celery cultivation in Kalamazoo. I heard the tale of Andrew Jackson’s cheddar cheese; apparently a farmer from upstate NY gifted him a 2-ton wheel of cheddar, which he aged for two years and then set in the foyer of the White House. Anyone who could travel there was invited to partake, and the cheese was demolished in about two hours. And it was a good thing we put some effort into historically accuracy because some people had brought in copies of original, handwritten recipes on index cards. The woman who brought in cheese stick crackers said that she gave careful consideration to the type of cheese that she should use (cheddar, or rat cheese, as it was known in the ‘50s?) and how to replicate low-gluten Southern flour (3 parts cake flour to 1 part all purpose). Meanwhile, someone else apologized for “cheating” and using Knox gelatin, instead of boiling beef bones and using egg whites to capture the impurities. When it came to our turn, Liz took the reins in explaining our coconut balls, and someone quipped, “No wonder the Puerto Ricans were shooting at Truman, he was taking all their coconut!”

Needless to say, the first thing I did when I got home was look up the Culinary Historians of Chicago chapter.

Harry and Bess Truman's Coconut "Balls"

Dolly Madison's "Apple Pie" with Wine Sauce

Michelle Obama-inspired Violet Soup

Johnson-era Canapé Birthday Cake

Pillow Fight Day

Unbeknownst to many, last Saturday was International Pillow Fight Day, and the list of participating cities was quite impressive in scope. (Sao Paulo? Székesfehérvár?) Since I couldn't go to the Chicago gathering, I suggested to Liz that we try to join the pillow fight in D.C. There were, in fact, two taking place that day, one on the National Mall and the other at Dupont Circle, and the timing worked out perfectly such that we were at Dupont Circle at the appointed hour.

Since we didn't have pillows with us, the next task was to procure the necessary equipment so that we could participate rather than simply watch (which would have been quite lame). In the immediate vicinity was a CVS and a Books-a-Million, and we decided the CVS would be the more likely candidate to sell pillows. After asking if they carried pillows, the woman behind the counter gave us a long look and pointed us to the travel section, where neck pillows (for use on planes) were available. This seemed unsuitable, sort of like bringing a piddling water gun to a fight against a firehose. Just as we were about to give up, Liz turned around to discover...a dog bed. It was the type without raised sides, essentially a very large, dog-sized pillow, and it was on sale for the low price of $9.95. Bingo!

Back at Dupont Circle, we staked out a spot on the grass and tried to figure out which people were here for the pillow fight, and which people were muggles. The instructions had said we should conceal our pillows for maximum surprise, flash-mob style, so several people were carrying suspiciously puffy shopping bags. In a rather ingenious move, one fellow was holding a large stack of pizza boxes, which turned out to be hollowed in the center to hide his pillow. At about 3:05 pm, an "argument" was started between two of the fight organizers, who jokingly shouted for a bit, then started swinging pillows at each other. At least 50 or 75 people rushed to join the melée, myself included. I started whacking anyone within reach, lightly bopping people young and old, suited and mohawked, white, black and green. People were shouting, smiling, singing "Olé Olé," and jumping into the fountain with abandon. It was the most exuberant experience I've ever had with a crowd of strangers.

After about a half-hour or so, the fight tapered off as we all exhausted ourselves. Who knew that swinging pillows was such an excellent upper-body workout? Then, with shouts of "To the bar!" the crowd began to disperse. Subsequently, Liz and I were left with the unappealing prospect of carrying around a dog bed for the rest of the day. Thinking that it should go to someone who could use it, we approached a couple people walking dogs, and politely asked if they would be interested in a clean, lightly pummeled dog bed. Alas, our offers were rebuffed both times since the pet owners also did not want to carry around a dog bed. At that point, we decided to leave the dog bed on a sidewalk with a note attached, indicating that the dog bed was free. I do hope this didn't later result in phone calls to the police department for "suspicious packages."

Oh yes, before we left Dupont Circle, we were accosted by a guy with a camcorder, who asked us to say a few words on the pillow fight. So, somewhere out there, we are on camera explaining how we came to be holding a large dog bed. I wasn't able to find this online, however here is some footage of the pillow fight, though I didn't spot either of us on camera.

April Fool's Day

Aintaerjection has a good synopsis of how my April Fool's Day afternoon went. In a nutshell, I was dared to wear a condom as a hair tie for the afternoon, in exchange for dinner at Joe's Shanghai. This was easily done by tying the ends together and fashioning a sort of rubber band. Contrary to his claims of "shame," I will argue that, working in a large office building, this was a prudent move less I get hauled down to HR for creating an "uncomfortable work environment." You can see the super stalker-ish pictures here.

Though the hair tie was recognized for what it was at lunch, it did not seem to attract much notice from my economist. At least, I had two lengthy conversations with him that afternoon, and he failed to bring it up. This was probably for the best, as I imagine it would have only resulted in additional awkwardness, and I had already spent the morning explaining to him why wearing my rearview mirror was necessary.

How to Make Rainbow Cake

Over the weekend, I did something completely out of character: I baked a rainbow cake. This is striking because I am pretty health conscious and strive to cook things from scratch, eschew the use of processed or packaged ingredients, and usually don't find a dish interesting unless it has some sort of esoteric ingredient, like sumac or harissa. Also, I hate baking and generally avoid it because it's very precise, error-prone and does not allow for creativity. (At least, I am not knowledgeable enough about baking to be creative about it.) For this cake, I used boxed cake mix and leaned on my buddies Red 40, Yellow 5 and Blue 1 for help. O.o

Some recommended uses for cake:

• Centerpiece for your 3-year-old's Care Bears party
  
• Relive the '90s with a Lisa Frank sticker and stationery swapping bash
• Celebrate the discovery of the end of the rainbow
  
• Coming out party for your angsty teen
• Mark the release of the latest Radiohead album
• Offer your dieting guests a slice of the infrared spectrum cake; it's calorie-free

Armed with some tips from this post, I set out to make a cake more colorful than Candy Mountain. I followed the directions to make batter for one box of white cake mix, then split the batter into six parts. For coloring, I used Betty Crocker gel food colors (located next to the icing), which are cheaper than regular food coloring, give more vivid colors and result in less dilution of your recipes. Straining to recall the color wheel from elementary school art, I concocted an array of batters:


Next, scoop the batter into a greased, 9" round pan. Pour each color directly into the center of the pan, on top of the previous color. Don't worry about spreading or mixing it; as each layer gets added, it will push the previous layers out to the sides quite nicely.


With 40 minutes of baking at 350 degrees, this gave me a nice single-layer cake round. After allowing the cake to cool, I threw on some innocuous white icing to hide the surprise underneath. In an effort to recover my cooking cred, I did make orange cream cheese icing from scratch. This was done by creaming 3 T of softened butter with an 8 oz package of cream cheese, then adding 1 cup of powdered sugar, 1/2 t of vanilla extract and zest of 1 orange. The final product is below:


I divided out a small portion of the batter to make two cupcakes, which turned out like so:


The final product turned out quite well, with each color clearly visible in every slice. And as someone who hates frosting, this frosting was a perfect complement to the cake, not cloyingly sweet, with some citrusy notes for depth. Our waitress at dinner was so taken by the cake that she asked if she could try a slice. Needless to say, it was demolished by the end of the night. Nom nom nom!

More Firsts, Temperance Edition

My shot glass was tipsy before I even got started.

There are few things I would change about my undergrad experience, but I realize that it was pretty atypical. So, for better or worse, I've been making up for lost time in Chicago with hedonistic antics that most people (except for the people I hung out with) cover in college. I must say, the stories have gotten a bit more entertaining. (People making out with two guys at once vs Friday night Duffield study party, which would you rather hear about?) At any rate, in the last couple weeks, I have acknowledged the end of my political aspirations with the following activities:

Chocolate Cake Shot

• 1 part Frangelico (hazelnut liqueur), 1 part vodka, shoot the mixture, bite a slice of sugared lemon


• I was quite skeptical that this was going to taste anything like chocolate or cake, since its components contain none of those ingredients. But shockingly enough, it tasted like chocolate cake, even evoking the floury texture of cake somehow! My mind was boggled.


• Ideal for people who prefer chocolate Yoohoo to alcohol

Lemon Drop

• Vodka shot, splash of triple sec, bite a slice of sugared lemon
  


• This was lemony...and vodka-y, as you might expect. After the chocolate cake shot, I was a little disappointed that I wasn't tasting the crystallized crunch of a lemon drop.
  


• Best suited for girls' night parties and scurvy pirates
  

Irish Car Bomb

• 2/3 glass of Guinness, drop in a shot of Bailey's, chug before the mixture curdles on you. The chunky film left on the bottom of the glass is a tad disturbing, then I thought about what was going on inside my stomach.
  


• Guinness is not as carbonated as many other beers I've tried, so it was actually pretty easy to chug. Having said that, I don't know how everyone else manages to finish their drink in half the time that it takes me; I was told I need more practice. Be careful not to splash the contents of the glass as you drop in the shot. The drink itself tastes similar to chocolate milk.


• Perfect for your 7-year-old's birthday party. Just kidding, we would want to give them Benadryl instead. Irish car bombs have a certain fratty cachet to them, since they are most commonly consumed for St. Patrick's Day, so perhaps this should be reserved for Man Night. On the other hand, I thought the Irish car bomb was a lot smoother than your average sake bomb, which tastes like turpentine. Maybe someone should inform all the freshman chicks at Miyake to try car bombs instead.
  

Hookah

• There were dozens of flavor combinations at Samah Lounge, and we were at a total loss as to what to choose. Originally, Katherine wanted to spring for Fruit Loops (rose, orange) since that's what she had last time, but then I was persuaded by our server's recommendation of Autumn Night (vanilla, rose, lavender, something else I'm forgetting).
  


• With thoughts of Bill Clinton running through my mind ("I didn't inhale!"), I grabbed the hose and took a deep breath. A pleasant floral scent filled the air, warm and mysterious. I exhaled a few smoke tendrils and leaned against the wall. No wonder they never get anything done in the Middle East! Towards the end though, the hookah became quite harsh and started to burn the back of my throat. This had better not do any permanent damage to my voice. Also, for the rest of the night, I kept smelling vague whiffs of Autumn Night. I swear the Oak Street bend of the Lakeshore Path smells exactly like Autumn Night.
  


• I've heard differing reports on the amount of nicotine in hookah, from "It's like .001 mg!" to "You split hookah between 3 people? That is a lot of hookah.", but overall the impact is slight. I felt a little more mellow than before, but part of me thinks that laying on the floor with cushions would be relaxing anyway, so why bother with the hookah? However, there is a particular brand of bonding that comes from communally sharing and passing the hookah while sprawled on pillows. Next time I have an Alice in Wonderland party, there will be hookah.
  

Marriage-you-wanna?

• After numerous people skeptically told me that "you never get high the first time," I must say that if that's the case, you're probably doing it wrong. And there is no shame in that because lighting the bowl takes some practice. Not surprisingly, I was pretty terrible at figuring out when to cover the hole, when to inhale, when to move in the lighter, how to even work a lighter...all this mostly resulted in a massive attack of coughing, as if I'd swallowed hot sand. I would like to note that the Californians were by far the most adept at this process.
  


• Never mind hookah, this puts the M in Mellow. I can see why the stereotypical group of stoners is sprawled semi-comatose on couches while listening to Jimi Hendrix. (Although, me being me, I was up at 7 am like clockwork the next morning.) Have you ever wanted the superpower to freeze time? It was as though the clock had stopped ticking, and I could move around normally, push children out of the way of trains, or loot a bank...but I was too comfortable to actually go anywhere. Even the most ardent Type-A personalities will turn into a contented bag of mostly water. On my way home, I was curiously unaffected by the (miserable, extremely windy and rainy) weather. Though sans hat, I felt no cold and despite a ten-minute wait for the train, I felt no impatience.
  


• Generally, one of the more pressing questions for neophytes is how to know if you're high. It sounds cliche, but you will definitely know when you're there. For me at least, the effects hit unexpectedly. All of the sudden, it felt like the blood vessels in my head had expanded, my heartbeat was drumming in my ears, and it was impossible to focus. I'd start a sentence and then lose my train of thought before finishing it. Reading was hopeless. Terrible jokes were greeted with uproarious laughter. Even if you had the presence of mind to realize how unfunny the remark was, you still couldn't stop laughing at everyone else who thought it was amusing. (For good measure, I watched some Aqua Teen Hunger Force and didn't find it significantly funnier than when sober.) Most interesting is the way your senses heighten and exaggerate random inputs. As Rolling Stones wafted from the speakers, I could feel heavy vibrations of bass, amplified like Libe on Slope Day. Then, the sensation faded and I started pondering the vivid colors of my shirt. Man, they were bright! Up till that point, I wasn't experiencing anything differentiable from an alcohol buzz, but this last step catapults the experience over booze. Though my short-term memory was impaired, the effects were less severe than with alcohol and cognition was mostly intact, just fragmented and distracted. If only I could have recorded my internal monologue, I might have generated a great new contribution to literature.
  


• Despite my state of complete chillaxation, my heart was pounding violently as if I'd run a 10k. Other physical effects include dry mouth, bloodshot eyes and dry eyes, though the latter may have simply been due to the smoke in the room. I kept thinking how great some water would be; too bad there was no running water in this apartment's kitchen. I was also semi-seriously joking about protecting my valuable vocal chords; for that reason alone, I would not make this a regular practice.
  


• Recommended for when you want to really explore your Led Zeppelin collection or need to write that philosophy paper
  

Opium

• Just joshing, I would never do that! Besides, as we all know, bad things happen when Chinese people smoke opium.
  

Money, Porn and Other Sordid Tales

As befits its audience, Wrigleyville tends to be filled with generic, fratty faux-Irish pubs and sports bars, where the name of the game is cheap booze and raucous behavior. This certainly has its place, but I have discovered a far more interesting option in the seemingly mislocated Risque Cafe. I first heard about this bar through Rob, who described it as antithetical to the goal of meeting women, since it is filled with posters of pin-up girls and specializes in beer, neither of which are strong attractors for females. Sure enough, upon walking inside, I was greeted with the flashing lights of a Playboy pinball machine and large portraits of scantily clad women.

Onto the beer list. Risque features a gargantuan list of over 200 American craft beers, sorted by state of origin. Skimming through, I saw some familiar regional names, like 3 Floyds (IN) and Great Lakes (OH) breweries, along with more far-flung names like Southern Tier (NY) and Rogue Ales (OR). Though some of these beers can set you back $20, each night features a $3 beer on tap. They also have an impressive offering of whiskeys, with three types of whiskey even on tap. I ordered Jack Daniels from tap simply because I'd never seen that before. In case you're curious, it doesn't taste markedly different from a regular pour.

It took us a while to notice the TV screens behind the bar, but we soon caught on to the titillating material being presented. In order of weirdness, on the right-most screen, Mondo Topless was playing, which involved a lot of bouncing cleavage. Oddly enough, the Chinese subtitles were showing underneath, though I was too far away/couldn't read quickly enough to catch them. (One line said something like "I love running through the woods au naturel!") The center screen was showing Teeth, whose plot centers on the vagina dentata myth, and thus, resulted in many disturbing scenes of dismembered members. I should mention that Ryan's friend was playing at Risque that night, so in the middle of his acoustic guitar set, he glanced up to see a dog chomping down and screamed "Oh my god!" in horrified distraction. Shockingly, this movie won a lot of acclaim at the Sundance Festival and has a fairly impressive 82% from Rotten Tomatoes. (Forgive me for my skepticism; since we were watching with the volume turned down, I was joking but didn't actually think the movie was about women's empowerment.) Finally, on the left-most screen, there was fat chick morbidly obese chick porn. Also, some shots of naked children. I didn't catch the credits on this one, but trust me, it was quite bizarre.

Afterwards, Katherine had mentioned that James was housesitting for the guy that runs his law firm for the week, and ergo, he was throwing a party. I was told to bring "as many people as possible." I started to question whether this was a good idea, but upon second thought, remembered that the time Jie and I housesat for her boss, we drove the car and left the headlights on, resulting in a dead battery. Twice. Thus, I dutifully hauled the entire gang with me to my friend's roommate's classmate's boss' mansion on the Gold Coast.

Chicago's "Gold Coast" neighborhood is so named because it is the highest concentration of luxury retail stores and wealthy homes in the city. The house in question was located on Astor, which is renowned for its magnificent mansions, originally designed and owned by all the major luminaries from the 19th century. Hugh Hefner's first Playboy mansion is also located on this stretch.

Needless to say, the home was stunning, straight out of a magazine photoshoot. There was an original Miró hanging on the wall. A jersey signed by Michael Jordan. Flat screen TVs in every room. Two decks offered views of the downtown skyline. A pool table. Fireplaces. The master bathroom toilet was in a room that was completely mirrored on all sides. (Call me crazy, but why on earth would you want to watch yourself?) Two ornate, handpainted and limited edition (by default, because the artist has died) chess sets. Leather-bound books with gilt edges lined the study. And finally, Yale paraphernalia subtly popped up wherever you looked, from the coffee table reading selections to the pennants in the background of photos. Factoring for location, this was definitely the most expensive house I've ever partied in. What a shame that much of the alcohol was locked up, not because the owners were worried about us drinking, but to "keep it away from the son."

As we toured the house, I thought of the tour buses going past the ostentatious homes of AIG executives. Does this empty-nest family need all this space? Does anyone need all this space? The answer is undoubtedly no. I could feel some tremors of populist rage welling up inside me. At the same time, it would be wicked cool to be able to afford all that. Think of the ball pit room I could design! I grew up in a comfortably middle-class family, but for the first time, I felt like a grubby street urchin illicitly peeking into the lifestyles of the Rich and Powerful. This is where cognac is sipped in the cigar smoke-filled room, where admissions decisions are smoothed with the donation of buildings, where legislation is sealed with a handshake. And the Evil part of me wants to be in that upper echelon.

Anyway, we snapped pictures of the Miró (and had Adrian stand in the picture to prove that this wasn't from a museum):

Persepolis

March marks Women's History Month, and while I wasn't previously aware that such a month existed, the Fed has done a great job scheduling activities and events to recognize and celebrate women's history. For the month, the Fed is bringing in speakers, presenting film screenings and hosting an art show. Mad accolades are due to the people responsible for programming.

I don't strongly identify with the feminist movement, and am generally more cognizant of issues involving Asian rights and racial discrimination because that is more central to my identity. Moreover, the feminist movement itself is diverse and fractured, while having the unfortunate characterization of being full of "white, upper middle-class bitches" who whine about Hillary Clinton's failed presidential bid. But the last couple weeks have provided me some food for thought. In a semi-provoked outburst at lunch, Katherine gave a stern lecture to our cohort of mostly male AEs after someone made a remark that lightly trivialized women's rights. "In many ways, women are still second-class citizens in this country and the situation is worse around the world," she said. "If you removed the word 'woman' from your comments and replaced it with 'black,' that would have been extremely out of line. Considering many of you will spend the rest of your lives with a woman, it would behoove you to give some thought to the state of women's rights and be a little more sensitive about the issue." The rest of the lunch table sat back looking rather shocked and wounded. Katherine went on to mention other instances of misogyny in the news, like the school shooting in Germany that targeted women. Ironically, someone who shall remain unnamed then said, "But that's because women can't run." I shot him an arresting glare before he could continue.

I like making insensitive comments as much as the next person, and there is certainly a culture of inappropriate remarks at the lunch table, with the understanding that we are not going to report each other to HR. However, there is always a line that should not be crossed, where edgy becomes offensive and kills Fun. Personally, it is irksome and offensive for me to hear people using epithets like "pussy" and "grow a vagina." I would argue that calling someone "ho" is less offensive because it is obviously not true, where as the former phrases attack and cheapen women's bodies and their social status. In the same way, it makes me uncomfortable to hear people calling things "gay" or "faggoty". [end soapbox]

Anyway, the Fed sponsored a screening of Oscar-nominated and Cannes prize-winning film Persepolis yesterday, and Katherine and I decided to swing by. The movie is based on a graphic novel series by Marjane Satrapi and is heavily autobiographical. In a bildungsroman set against the Iranian Revolution, Satrapi chronicles her childhood in a time of war and ever-increasing societal repression, where simply wearing Westernized sneakers can result in harassment and jail time. To protect their outspoken child, Satrapi's parents send her to Vienna in her early teens while they stay behind. Navigating the cultural divide is not easy for Satrapi, as she struggles to come to terms with her Iranian roots while far from her family. Nor is returning to Iran the solution, as Satrapi finds out when she goes home to find a changed country.

The choice of medium for the subject matter was intriguing, given that comics, erm, graphic novels are generally used for lighthearted, fantastical topics, and this movie discussed issues that are very much real and serious contemporary problems. The cartoon violence helped soften the edges; rather than seeing the vivid, bloody carnage in the aftermath of a missile strike, we see a cartoon arm sticking out of a pile of rubble. For a narrative with so much potential to be painful, the film is surprisingly whimsical, never straying far from the its original perspective of a child's eyes.

Overall, this is an eye-opening, quirky and very French movie. I would say it is less about women's rights, and more about cultural differences and historical events. I highly recommend it, particularly if you are curious about the development of modern Iran or enjoyed Amelie. A trailer follows below: