Acetaria Caesaris apud Juliam

Among culinary innovations of the last century, there are few as widespread, or as variable, as the Caesar salad. Rather like the sandwich or the cocktail, it is the sort of thing that seems so obviously correct that it is difficult to imagine a time before it existed. (And yet for millennia we did without it!) The popularity of the Caesar salad has been, perhaps, its undoing: any food so ubiquitous is bound to suffer a thousand iniquities by way of stale or cheapened ingredients and incompetent preparation. A local establishment here in Iowa City, billing itself as a "salad company", is content to call anything a Caesar if it has enough of the nominal dressing (pre-made, mind you) on it. I have been asked whether I want a Caesar salad with spinach. I do not. (An aside: how does one register as a "salad company"? It is anything like a "salad factory", where assembly-line workers clad in gray overalls each add one ingredient to a salad? Are there "salad mines" where, when the whistle blows, the miners emerge from the earth after a twelve-hour shift, smeared with ranch dressing instead of coal-dust?) Perhaps even worse — or at least more expensive, and less forgivable — are the culinary horrors of fusion cuisine. Does anybody really want a Caesar salad with curry, or wasabi? I submit to you that they do not.

The fundamental uncertainty of Caesar salad can be traced to its inception. Or rather, it can't be traced anywhere, since we can't even agree on where or when the salad was invented. The leading theory is that it was first made in the twenties at Caesar Cardini's restaurant in Tijuana. (Tijuana, Mexico: "the happiest place on earth", according to Krusty the Clown.) Julia Child, la grande dame herself, recounted visiting the restaurant with her parents and watching raptly as Caesar prepared the salad in front of them. She later would get the recipe from Caesar's daughter, and presented it in From Julia Child's Kitchen, an invaluable resource that I consult from time to time. In one of those acts of impassioned pedantry that make the Internet truly worthwhile, somebody has copied this account in its entirety on a website titled simply There are no anchovies in Caesar Salad. The recipe as Julia gives it contains all the wonted ingredients, without the accretions (anchovies, shrimp, chicken, bacon) that would later muck it up. It is worth noting that the original version was served on whole romaine stems, eaten with the hands. (This is a bit odd, but not unpleasant.) But the most jarring quality of the Ur-Salat is that the olive oil, lemon juice, coddled eggs, and Worcestershire sauce are not mixed beforehand! I found this to be most unsatisfactory, as without an emulsified dressing, each bite tastes of whatever liquid happened to fall upon it. In my first bite of an "authentic" Caesar salad, I must've had all the Worcestershire sauce in one go, for that was all I tasted. Subsequent mouthfuls tasted of oil, or lemon, or eggs, but nary a bite tasted like a harmonious union of the whole.

So much, then, for authenticity. I find a much better result is possible when one mixes the dressing together beforehand, and then applies it to the romaine. The only downside is that this method lacks the panache of mixing all ingredients at once in the salad bowl. But then, ours is an unglamorous and unimaginative age.

Further Adventures in Good Drinkery

My most recent favorite drink, if you must know, is of course gin-based. (Gin remains at the top of my hierarchy of liquors. Second is rum, though much of the time it is overtaken by whisky. Down at the bottom are vodka and tequila, which I find pointless and loathsome, respectively.) It is rather more complicated than my standard gin-and-tonic, but it is correspondingly more satisfying when prepared properly. The drink is known as a "Red Cloud". I offer here my recipe for it:

• 1.5 measures Gin (New Amsterdam's almost-citrus flavor works nicely)
  
• 3/4 measure Apricot Brandy
  
• 1/2 measure Lemon Juice
  
• 1/4 measure Grenadine
  
• two dashes Angostura Bitters

My experience suggests one ought not to err on the side of sweetness. The charm of this particular drink is in its subtle tonality (if one may misappropriate musical jargon), the interplay of the juniper (and, depending on the brand, citrus) of the gin with the herbal notes of the angostura bitters. The apricot and lemon flavors, though necessary, are by no means dominant, and the grenadine is more for color than overwhelming sweetness.

Cursory research has not revealed whether the drink has any connection to the Oglala Sioux chief of the same name. Another possible connection is to that bit of weather lore from the Gospel of Matthew (16:1-3):

The Pharisees also with the Sadducees came, and tempting desired him that he would shew them a sign from heaven. He answered and said unto them, "When it is evening, ye say, It will be fair weather: for the sky is red. And in the morning, It will be foul weather to day: for the sky is red and lowring. O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times?"

A Tolerable Punch Recipe

For a family gathering yesterday we attempted a punch recipe (found in what appears to be a local hippie magazine), with some success. Here is the recipe:

2 cups boiling water
3/4 cup honey
4 cups cranberry juice
2 cups orange juice
1 cup lemon juice
4 cups ginger ale
Ice, preferably in cubes
(Optional:) sliced lemons, limes, oranges, or strawberries

Mix boiling water & honey, stirring to dissolve; chill. Mix juices, then add honey-water. Just before serving, add ginger ale, ice, and those optional fruits. (A quantity of vodka may also be added.)

A Pronouncement, ex Cathedra

It is difficult, what with today's postmodern world and such, to make definite announcements regarding just about anything. But I aver, with every ounce of conviction that I have, that the best drink that there is to be gotten anywhere is the simple Gin & Tonic. Why, whenever I drink it, I feel like I've donned my pith helmet and am relaxing in a cavernous lodge somewhere in Kenya (which I am inclined to pronounce "keen-ya", when I drink Gin & Tonics) or the Punjab or some other barbarous place where I've been sent by Her Majesty the Queen to establish some outpost of civilization (which is to say, British civilization, which is to say, British colonization). The best gins, I have found, are probably Bombay Sapphire or Hendrick's, though I will settle for Tanqueray in a pinch.

On Drink, and Drunks

I have decided that I am willing to give Riesling another try. (Heretofore my opinion of it was much the same as my opinion of diesel, the taste of which I had not considered dissimilar.) My next step, I suppose, is to obtain some unobjectionable examples of said wine. I therefore ask your advice, dear reader: if you happen to have particular Riesling preferences, I would like to know them.

* * *
As a college student I have learned far more about drunks than I ever intended. It had never occurred to me, however, to create a taxonomy of drunks. It did occur to Thomas Nashe, who includes one in Pierce Penilesse his Supplication to the Divell. I present it here, without commentary and with only the slightest editing; one hopes you can manage the Elizabethan spelling.

Nor haue we one or two kinde of drunkards onely, but eight kindes:

(1) The first is ape drunke; and he leapes, and singes, and hollowes, and daunceth for the heauens.
(2) The second is lion drunke; and he flinges the pots about the house, calls his hostesse whore, breakes the glasse windowes with his dagger, and is apt to quarell with anie man that speaks to him.
(3) The third is swine drunke; heauie, lumpish, and sleepie, and cries for a little more drinke, and a few more cloathes.
(4) The fourth is sheepe drunke; wise in his own conceipt, when he cannot bring foorth a right word.
(5) The fifth is mawdlen drunke; when a fellowe will weepe for kindnes in the midst of his ale, and kisse you, saying, "By God, captaine, I loue thee. Goe thy wayes; thou dost not thinke so often of me as I doo of thee; I would (if it pleased God) I could not loue thee so well as I doo;" and then he puts his finger in his eye, and cryes.
(6) The sixt is Martin drunke; when a man is drunke, and drinkes himselfe sober ere he stirre.
(7) The seuenth is goate drunke; when, in his drunkennes, he hath no minde but on lecherie.
(8) The eighth is fox drunke — when he is craftie drunke, as manie of the Dutchmen bee, that will neuer bargaine but when they are drunke.

All these species, and more, haue I seen practiced in one companie at one sitting, when I haue been permitted to remayne sober amongst them, onely to note their seuerall humours.

(Yes, of course, Nashe, you were only there to observe...)

Why I'm glad I bought a radio

This morning I was listenin' to the ol' radio, when what should I hear but the dulcet tones of Mr Wendell Berry! On the Diane Rehm show, of all places. P'raps you might find it edifying to listen to the interview.

Saturdays; Ecumenism

If there is one regard in which South Bend is better than home, it is the farmers' market. (I suspect that this is the only regard in which South Bend is better than home.) I will here vociferously recommend their café (which, logically, serves local fare), as well as the pastries made by some nice Polish ladies. (The pączki are good, but the poduszki are better, I think.)

Saturdays are fast becoming my favorite day of the week. My routine is as follows: I awake, listen to Car Talk, and attempt to conquer swathes of France. Around noon I wend my merry way over to the farmers' market, a pleasant two-mile walk across the river, and soak in the ambience there. After a lazy afternoon, I listen (that is, I am currently listening) to Mr Keillor on that radio show of his. I shall be early to bed to rise early for Mass tomorrow.

Speaking of Masses, or, at least, of religioussy things, perhaps you've heard of that whole Roman Catholic maneuver to assume disaffected Anglicans into the Church? It's an interesting strategy. (I do wonder what's uniting R.C.s and conservative Anglicans, though: it is a commitment to shared values or merely shared distastes?) Of course, it's causing some friction, as the Vatican was rather uncommunicative about this to the Archbishop of Canterbury. He and da Pope met today. Quoth the BBC, "The meeting between Pope Benedict and the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams had been billed as something of a showdown." This leads me to wonder who would win in a fight. Dr Williams is younger, yes, and probably more limber, but Benedict looks meaner. Over at America Magazine, the Jesuits are speculating that we're entering a new era in reconciliation between different Christian churches. I remain cautiously pessimistic.