Ramble down the length of Sant Antoni, and you'll spot a beguiling little bakery with a name that conjures a cool mountain wind whipping across the Mediterranean.

The windows are lined with temptations, and yet, you may hesitate. After all, you've been burned before, haven't you? Croissants made with vegetable shortening. Cloying pastries. Loaves that seem artisanal at first, only to later reveal loveless manufacture.



Fear not, hungry one! Mistral's squat peasant loaf has a stone-oven crispy exterior and a chewy, slightly tangy bite that fills the mouth with the flavors of warm grain. Have 'em slice it, pair with a friendly neighborhood cheese and you've got a picnic on the fly.



But wait... have they burnt the brioche? No, dear — that dark, buttery pastry is twice-baked to cultivate a crispy demeanor that dances blithely across the edge of bitterness. (Think: Stephen Colbert on a good day.) It's not one for the kids, but you, lover of biting greens, tannic wines and bold stouts, will revel in its depth. It wants... a cortado, a latte, a cup of chocolate to complement its sophisticated flavor and inviting crunch.

Alas... if only the Mistral blew its delights a bit closer to Brooklyn.



Forn de Pa Mistral
Ronda Sant Antoni 96
(or Torres i Amat 7)
Barcelona
93.301.80.37
Tel./Fax: 93.302.41.39

Labels: bakeries, recommended, reviews, Spain

I take a lot of photos, and as anyone who eats with me can attest, 80 percent of those photos are food shots done with my stealthy little Canon PowerShot SD400 Digital Elph.

I love it because it's about as small and heavy as a deck of cards, which makes it fantastic for quick little things like this:


Lunch at Iposa in Barcelona.

(BTW: The salmon was fair, the pork was very nice and the lunch menu price was simply super: 6 EU for an entrée, beverage and coffee. Plus, it's around the corner from the Boqueria. I score it at two spoons out of five.)

While packing for Spain I glanced at my trusty (but dusty) old Pentax camera. It's a lovely SLR film version (the PZ-20, to be precise), and I wondered if my digital mania came at the cost of some image beauty. Should I even keep the old gray mare? I hadn't touched the poor thing in years... So to perform a test, I made the trek to B&H (which really is worth it just to see all the wonder that is B&H) for a new battery and some fresh rolls of Fuji film (my fave).

I took both along to Spain and used the digi for stealthy restaurant shots and the SLR for obviously touristy stuff. I just got back my 1-hour film developing, and you can see the head-to-head results here:



These are both images taken at Gaudi's fabulous (and as-of-yet unfinished) Sagrada Familia church in Barcelona. The one on the left is film, the one on the right is digital. Click into each of them to get the larger versions.

Now, aside from a size difference and a difference in overall hue, look at the detail in the film version. The digital blows out in the lightest areas and doesn't pick up the delicate shapes of the shadows. Comparatively, the film version has such crisp lines and such touchable depth, it makes the digital version look flat and dull. The film version makes my stomach jump with its color and beautiful light handling. The digital one is merely... okay.

Of course I knew film was superior, but still: wow. I'm a bit shocked at the difference. I know all the digital benefits, of course... less fuss, less expense, fewer nasty chemicals in the processing, less looking like an idiot tourist or even worse, a theft target.



And yet, I also wonder how less tasty my food photos look. How much more lush tomato goodness would we see in this photo? How many moments are now captured as pale, digital index cards rather than vivid, tantalizingly rendered images?

Labels: blogging, Spain, technology, travel

Fresh strawberries and yogurt for breakfast


Wow! Mangosteens! Those aren't allowed in the U.S.!


Bumpy, savory little garden tomatoes at the Boqueria

I believe that in my native tongue (Hedonistese? Hedonistish?), I will make "Barcelona" synonymous with succulent fresh fruit. I've just finished my week there, and have been consistently agog with the flavor power in the ubiquitous glasses of fresh-squeezed orange juice, the sweet perfume floating up off the flats of strawberries in the Market de Boqueria and the luscious tropical gush in the local peaches.

The oranges, of course, are well-known here. Valencia, just down the road, lends its name and reputation to them. In Barcelona, it seems every little cafe contains the same mesmorizing juice press: the Zummo.

Looking like a Rube Goldberg device for citrus, the push of a button drops oranges down a wire gutter to the waiting slicer, turns the halves to face the reamer, and presses out tangy-sweet rivulets of nectar into a pitcher or glass below. Ahhh... bliss. I want one, but it costs thousands of dollars and my kitchen is too tiny... even for the far-more diminutive Zummito. I'd have to choose between my beloved Kitchenaid mixer and the Zummito. It's too painful even to contemplate.

Barcelona's streets are filled with shops displaying tasty little pastries, but they're generally a bit too cloying for me. When we had the menu for lunch last week at the terribly tasty and satisfyingly sustainable cafe Origen 99.9%, J chose the seasonal fruit for dessert, and received one perfect golden apple presented on a napkin-covered plate.

We were a little shocked at first. Dessert is generally so dainty and fussy that the presentation of one single fruit seems like underachievement. But after our richly braised entrées, a large, crisp and honeyed local apple was actually quite welcome.

I forget, sometimes, how treasured fruit once was. The apple in particular has had a rich history full of status and prestige.

When mated slices of his perfect apple with my adorable glass pot of creamy yogurt, the flavors loved each other very much. It turned out to be so much more satisfying than the usual parade of saccharine-sweet pastries and brownies done up with sparklers for additional dining drama. I could picture thousands of years of happy diners enjoying the simple, fresh flavors of fresh fruit and tangy sheep's milk yogurt, and that, too, added satisfaction to the experience.

Fruit is the plant's demonstration of affection for us. (Well, that and the natural inclination to propagate more plants.) I'll need to wait a few weeks for the local berries to arrive and another month or so before the stone fruits. It's gustatory affection on pause.

Meanwhile, Barcelona, rich in fruit, echoes across the ocean with its sonorous song of sweetness. I can hear it now... Barcelona! Barcelona! Barcelona!

Labels: brekkie, fruit, Spain, travel

"What I say is that, if a man really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow."

-A. A. Milne

Find more bite-sized food quotes.

Labels: food quotes, Friday, writers

Some help? Anyone?

Anybody know this vegetable? It's crisp, watery, slightly salty and covered in a bumpy, translucent skin that looks like perma-dew.

We discovered it first in our fresh mesclun mix from the big Barcelona Boqueria. Later, we found a vendor who sold them alongside sea beans and arugula. She said it was a local Spanish plant with a very long name.

It's tasty and fascinating, but we haven't used it in anything other than fresh salads. If anyone knows this green and has tips on use, I'd be happy to hear all about it!

Labels: Spain, veggies

Parents and kids often have very different ideas about what constitutes a "good" toy. I remember the year I so desperately wanted the Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine. I'm not sure why I skipped the E-Z Bake Oven (also popular at the time) and went straight for Sno-Cones, but my five-year old brain was obsessed with visions of making and sharing syrupy day-glo Sno-Cones in the livingroom.

Sticky syrup, brightly colored food dyes, garish commercialism... After all these years, I finally begin to understand why my father was horrified by the request. Needless to say, he didn't buy me the Sno-Cone machine. Instead, dad settled on the far more practical art set.

I imagine there are gobs of households filled with children who beg for art sets and receive, instead, items that more closely represent that household's parental hopes and dreams. Tiny doctors' bags, for example. Itty-bitty briefcases.

No, dad didn't try to force me into medicine or law. And yes, I used the art set. A lot. But I never forgot my Sno-Cone machine dreams.

My food production fantasies turned to other outlets... I shaped the back-yard mud into loaves to be baked on stones in the sun. I made salads of yard grasses and tried to feed them to the cats. I coveted the adorable set of tiny plastic packaged foods and the toy cash register that belonged to another little girl whose name I remember only as "Kelly." As I recall, Kelly and I played grocery store over and over again until she gave me lice and then we broke up. She, much to my disappointment, kept the grocery store.

Later in life, I heard from other kids that the Sno-Cone machine kind of sucked. The ice was always too hard for the flimsy grating device, and it mostly just dripped. Small vindication.

Several years ago, I finally enacted my revenge on a world that had seemingly plotted against my involvement with food commerce. I enrolled in cooking school. I took jobs in kitchens until I could no longer afford to pay both rent and school loans and had to quit.

Sudden career diversion, $30,000 in culinary school debt, bad marks on my credit... could all this have been avoided with a Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine? I can't say. Such mania may be inevitable.

Then again, today's toy food is ten times more compelling than the cartoon tie-ins of yesteryear. View, for example, the work of award-winning toy company Melissa & Doug.

I recently tripped across these items while paging through a copy of "New York Family" in the dentist's office. One peek at the orderly bento boxes sent me to the web, where I found the charming "Look, mom! I'm a sushi chef" play set, and the "nutritionist-in-training" wooden food groups assortment.



What food geek — whether five or fifty — wouldn't be dying to play?

Some favorites:

Sushi Pretend Food

More Wooden Sushi Toys

Sushi Slicing Kit

The Food Groups (in toy form)

Is rhubarb-eating some kind of shibboleth? I'm just wondering. I merrily bought a pound at the farmer's market this weekend and brought a strawberry-rhubarb pie into work yesterday. I was a bit shocked to discover that some of my coworkers (all of whom were folks with city childhoods) had never tried the stuff. I felt invisibly branded a country mouse, apt to dine on field greens and ditch weeds.

Of course, I'm from a place where the rhubarb runs wild. It sprouts up in the countryside every spring, always in the same places. It's tough to kill. I knew haters who repeatedly mowed right over it without the slightest success in subduing it.

I figure, (apologies to Annie Proulx), if you can't kill it, you got to eat it.

As for me, I've always looked forward to rhubarb season with glee. In childhood, it was my favorite pie (though I might be swayed to the charms of fresh peach pie these days), and the households of my memory all contained rhubarb preserves of some kind.

Find yourself wandering bewildered with an armful of blushing fresh rhubarb stalks? Lucky you! In just five simple steps, I'll make you a master stalker. Wash 'em well, and let's proceed to make:

1. Pie!
I used the strawberry-rhubarb recipe out of the Cook's Illustrated: The New Best Recipe." Seemed like a quality pie, but if you're looking for something a little different:

Rhubarb Custard Pie
2 cups fresh rhubarb, cut into 1-inch chunks
1 cup sugar (all white or use half brown... your choice)
2 egg yolks (save the whites for a meringue top)
1 Tbsp AP flour
1/2 cup cream
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 Tbsp cold butter (cut into four pieces)
unbaked pie shell

Toss cut rhubarb with half the sugar. Macerate (allow to sit in the sugar) 10 minutes. Mix the remaining sugar with the flour, egg yolks, cream and cinnamon. Pour rhubarb into an unbaked pie shell Pour cream mix over rhubarb.

Distribute butter on top and bake at 350°F for 1 hour. Whip reserved egg whites at high speed to make a meringue. Spread meringue over baked pie, and briefly return to the oven to brown. Cool on a wire rack.

2. Crisp!
I kind of prefer crisps to pies anyway... less fuss with the pastry. More crunchiness on top. I'm still seeing the "Rome beauties" at the farmers' market, and they're great baking apples. This is a nice transitional recipe, since it uses the last of last fall's apples with the first of this spring's rhubarb.

Gingered Apple-Rhubarb Crisp
1/3 c sugar
1 Tbsp AP flour
1 tsp grated fresh ginger root
2 cups apples, cut into 1-inch pieces
3 1/2 cups fresh rhubarb, cut into 1-inch chunks
1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup rolled oats
1/3 cup brown sugar
2 Tbsp butter, melted

Combine the sugar, 1 Tbsp flour and ginger root. Toss with the rhubarb and apple pieces. Place in a greased baking dish or casserole. Combine brown sugar, oats, flour and melted butter. Sprinkle over the rhubarb-apple mixture. Bake at 400°F 30 to 40 minutes. Serve warm with vanilla ice cream.

3. Chutney!
Chutneys are a great way to use rhubarb in savory dishes. Fantastic with pork, chicken, duck, venison and, of course, curries.

Rhubarb-Currant Chutney
4 cups fresh rhubarb, cut into 1-inch pieces
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white wine vinegar
2 Tbsp minced fresh ginger
2 Tbsp minced fresh garlic
1/4 cup chopped fresh shallots
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp coriander seeds
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1/4 tsp dry mustard
1/3 cup dried currants or raisins

Combine vinegar, brown sugar, salt, pepper, shallots, fresh ginger, garlic, coriander seeds, ground ginger and mustard in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook 5 minutes. Stir in rhubarb and currants. Simmer until rhubarb is just tender (10-15 minutes). Remove from heat and cool 10 minutes. Taste for seasoning and adjust with a little sugar or vinegar as needed. Refrigerate (or freeze) until ready to use.

4. Sauce!
This is so easy I'm not even providing a recipe, really. Put about a cup of rhubarb (chopped in 1-inch pieces) into a saucepan with enough water to cover the 3/4 of the fruit (a cup or so) and about 2 Tbsp sugar. Stir and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and -- stirring occasionally -- simmer about 25 minutes or until rhubarb is broken down and the mixture looks thickened. Add a pinch of salt and taste the mixture. Does it need to be brighter, more tangy? You might add a little lemon juice. Is it too sour? Mix in a little sugar. Voila! Sauce!

5. Ice Cream!
You could pour that sauce over ice cream, of course... or you could put it in the ice cream. That's what I did this weekend. It's yummy. Like rhubarb pie a'la mode without the crust.

I used the simple Sweet Cream Base recipe from the Ben & Jerry's ice cream book and my Kitchenaid ice cream attachment to do this. I'm not big on a lot of weird doohickeys (New York City kitchens are not known for spaciousness), but if you already have a Kitchenaid mixer and like experimenting with ice cream, I truly recommend this particular doohickey. It's a lot of fun.

Add about a cup of sauce to this recipe of Sweet Cream Base and make the ice cream as directed for the machine you're using. Make sure the sauce is not just cool but COLD when you add it. Otherwise you'll put your machine through a lot of extra stress and you might ruin the ice cream. (Oh, no!)

Sweet Cream Base (from "Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream & Dessert Book")

2 large eggs
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups heavy or whipping cream
1 cup milk

Whisk the eggs in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Whisk in the sugar, a little at a time, then continue whisking until completely blended, about 1 minute more. Pour in the cream and milk and whisk to blend.

Makes 1 quart

J left on Sunday for sunny Spain, and it's been cold and gray here in New York ever since. (Check the weather reports and you'll see this statement is not simply the skewed view of a pining girlfriend.)

While I labor in the industrial zone in Queens, he sends me notes that go like this:

I made a picture of today's picnic lunch for you, but my internet connection isn't good enough to upload it. The place where I bought the food was like the prepared food area of a Whole Foods, only better appointed and staffed by grown-ups. They had several counters, each with some sort of focus (breads, savories, pastries, chocolates). The items on sale were priced by the kilo, save some things that are typically sold in slices, such as tartas and quiches.

When I selected my veggie quiche, the quiche-lady wrapped it in butchers' paper, tied the parcel with a string, then handed me my food and a small placard on which she wrote the price in grease pencil over a space labeled with her counter's name (there was one slot for each section). When I was done, I took my parcels and the placard to the door where I was charged for everything at once, after which the clerk erased (i.e. wiped clean) the placard and placed it in a stack to be returned to the counters. The quiche, which I ate in the big park by the Prado, was excellent.

Yours,
J.

Ah, for a leisurely life of sunny picnics and charmingly wrapped quiches!

Meanwhile, back in Gotham, my crisper drawer is mad with spring fever. I brought home fresh spinach, strawberries and local grouper for a solo Friday night fish feast and discovered that every shallot bulb, garlic clove, onion, shallot and scallion in the bunch sprouted green tops and depleted the white bits I'd normally use in my sauté.

Sitting in the cool darkness of the refrigerator floor, how do they know it's springtime? They didn't do this to me two months ago. Suddenly, it's May, and all the aromatics in the household are suddenly inspired to burst into fresh sprays of chartreuse sprouts. I've been wishing for some space to garden, but this wasn't quite what I'd had in mind.

I was disoriented and dismayed until I remembered that green tops are just as yummy and useful as white bulbs. So then, marching on to dinner:


Montauk Grouper
with a quick brown butter sauce, sliced green shallots and fresh cilantro chiffonade


Spinach-Strawberry Salad
with toasted walnuts, Israeli feta and a balsamic vinaigrette


Three small chocolate-chip cookies*

Easy, quick, delicious, seasonally appropriate (except for the cookies, but when are cookies ever in season?), and a good use of my newly discovered refrigerator garden.

I won't join J. in the sunshine for another week, and every day until then is scheduled for darkness and rain. That said, as long as the market is full of fresh produce and my refrigerator remains rich in garlic and shallot sprouts, I can't help but feel the daily pulse of spring on my dinner plate.



*Cookie Tip for Single People: Next time you bake chocolate-chip cookies, make extra dough, chill it down, form the cold dough into fat discs the size of slightly squashed golf balls and keep 'em securely wrapped in your freezer. That way you can just take out two or three at a time. Bake frozen cookies in an oven preheated at 350°F for about 12 minutes. Presto! Fresh, hot cookies with no need to commit to a whole dozen.

A note from my operative on the Lower, Lower East Side:

"The new cheese shop at the Essex Street Market opens tomorrow.
They have an interesting mission: stock only artisanal American
cheeses. I recommend a visit for a bit of wine and, of course, cheese."

This new enterprise joins the freshly formed Essex Street Cheese Company — a charming Comté-only outpost run by Jason Hinds of Neal's Yard Dairy in England and Daphne Zepos (formerly a cheese heavy at the Artisanal Premium Cheese Center).

Sensing some market competition? Cheese wars afoot? Nay. It's all friendly on Essex street. Apparently, those who love curd, love community.

Another of my food scenesters reports that Ms. Zepos is acting as consigliere to the new spot's young proprietress. Perhaps cheese maturation mellows the fromager as much as the fromage.

I believe that if ever I had to practice cannibalism, I might manage if there were enough tarragon around.

-James Beard (1903-1985)

May 5th is the birthday of James Beard, who began his career in theater, but switched paths and became known as the "Dean of American Cooking."

Beard wrote twenty-three cookbooks (including the first major cookbook devoted exclusively to cocktail food, Hors d'Oeuvre & Canapés" in 1940) and appeared on NBC's "I Love to Eat," the first cooking show ever televised.

Through an age of convenience food, Beard espoused the value of whole, fresh foods, American ingredients and hands-on cookery.

A simple sample recipe: James Beard's Favorite Hamburger (with cream, of course).