Socrates.

Van Gogh.

Tesla.

All were geniuses ahead of their time.  And all, in one manner or another, were unappreciated by their contemporaries.

For dinner tonight, Petey and I dined on two foods that are also frequently unloved and misjudged: asparagus and duck.The Matthews family has been eating duck for many years.  A correctly cooked breast is very much like a bacon-wrapped, medium-rare fillet mignon, but with more flavor.

My mom, survivor of one too many overly cooked, overly sweet 1970’s duck ala orange hates, hates, hates it.

She cooks her steak to solid gray.  She was also raised to cook meats to dry chalk; so the idea of duck breast with a red center terrifies her. Tonight’s dinner was confit.

Duck confit is duck cooked very slowly in its own fat.  The meat is then pulled off the bone, and used countless ways.

Our confit was cooked, but pale and flaccid.  I removed the skin and cut it into strips.  Then I slowly rendered it.  Once brown and crispy, I placed the quacklings on a paper-towel lined plate, and salted it.  I left the fat in the pan.  I had two big plans for those couple of tablespoons which I had harvested. The first was in rice.

I left in about half the fat, and reheated the skillet.  When it was nice and hot, I placed in a chopped yellow onion, and one cup of uncooked brown rice.  Stirring constantly, I sautéed until rice and onion were starting to brown.I moved the rice and onions to a sauce pan.  Then I poured in 1 ½ cups of chicken stock, and added the cut-up duck.  I covered the pot, set it on medium-low, and let it cook about 50 minutes, or until the liquid was gone and the rice was tender.  Then I let it sit, covered for 10 minutes.

When rice was off heat, I turned my attention to the asparagus.

Years ago, an asparagus farmer had given me a tutorial.

You might as well munch crab grass…

When pencil-thin, the plant is either too young or old and played out.  A fully mature plant in its prime will give you fat stalks the size of your thumb which every knowledgeable asparagus aficionado craves.  When I see restaurants trying to pawn off limp emaciated veg, it really makes me angry.

The two main reasons why many people don’t like the vegetable are the serving of unsuitably immature stalks and overcooking it to mush.

“Don’t-bee” asparagus.

Cooked asparagus should still have a crunch to it, otherwise it is slimy and unpleasant.

Tonight I blanched it in heavily salted water.  Once it turned bright green, I removed it to salted ice water to stop the cooking.  When it was time to eat, I poured the last bit of duck fat into the skillet and turned it on medium-high.  I seasoned the asparagus, then cooked the vegetable until the skin began to blister and char marks appeared.I plated our dinner in shallow bowls.  First in was the chewy brown rice and duck meat.  Over it I laid the charred asparagus spears.  And to make the dish even more decadent, I topped the whole thing with a handful of the rendered skins.

My friend, Chef Chrissie once told me that one couldn’t truly say they didn’t like a specific food unless they eaten it prepared by someone who knows what they’re doing.

Now, if I could only get my mom to show Daffy or Donald, some love.  Heck I’d even settle for Huey, Dewy, or Louie.Thanks for your time.

Every year The Kid and I get some type of expensive or hard-to-find food item for Christmas.

Some years it’s heritage grits from Anson Mills in South Carolina.  Some years it’s vanilla beans.  But every year Santa brings me some kind of indulgent eatable.One day, while visiting the North Pole Costco with Mrs. Claus, the jolly, pink-cheeked couple spied split ducks, pre-cooked and vacuum-wrapped.  Knowing how much The Kid and I enjoy duck, on Christmas day, we each found a duck under the tree.  Each half came with a plastic pouch of orange sauce which was pretty much just sugar and orange food coloring.

The pouches were discarded as quickly and carefully as if they were glowing packets of strontium 90.

For New Year ’s Day I made what has become kind of a tradition for dinner.  Creamy, buttery Anson Mills grits, black-eyed peas cooked with bacon, and a mound of sautéed spinach.  It’s warm, comforting, and hey, if the universe wants to give me good luck and piles of money in the New Year, who am I to argue?As always, I made too many grits.  I decided to pour them into a square vessel and spread them out as smoothly as possible—I had a kind of an idea.  I also had some spinach left which was saved as well.

A few days ago I took one of the packs of duck out of the freezer.  More of the idea had coalesced.The plan was to cut the grits into two pieces, and grill them in a frying pan with a butter.  The center would be creamy, with a browned, crusty outside.  I would then warm the duck in some sort of sauce, lay it on the grits, and top the whole shebang with the reheated spinach.

Later that night I was still thinking about what kind of sauce for the duck.  Duck is really rich, and the grits are rich and creamy, too, so I didn’t want anything heavy and fatty.  I decided to shred the duck, and put it into a saucepan with some Sweet Baby Rae’s barbecue sauce.  There’s lots of flavor, but not fat.  Also, I thought the vinegar in the sauce would, along with the lemony spinach, help cut the richness.The duck came on the bone, with the skin on, which was pretty flabby and anemic. This was actually good news because that meant that the fat had not rendered out.  I pulled the meat off the one, and sliced the skin into strips. I laid it in a cold skillet and cooked it on medium-low until all the fat had rendered out and the skin was golden and crispy.  If this had been pork skin, it would have been called cracklings.

I called it “quacklings”.I salted the crispy bits and gave them to Petey.  That man ate every single piece.

I ended up with a couple tablespoons of duck fat.  Chef-type folk love this stuff and even call it ‘liquid gold’.  It makes the best fried or roasted potatoes you’ve ever eaten.  I was going to put it in the fridge and with the fat from the second half of the duck, do something potato-ey with it.

Then I glanced at the grit cakes I was preparing to toast in butter, and had a better idea.  Let me tell you, grits are good.  Anson Mills grits slow-cooked with loads of butter are darn good.  Pan frying them into cakes with butter would have been great.But cooking those puppies in duck fat were astonishing.  I cooked the first side covered, to make sure they were warmed through.  I uncovered the skillet and flipped them.  When that side was golden brown I plated.

The duck which had crispy, mahogany-colored caramelized bits went on next.  Then the whole thing was topped with sautéed spinach.

It was darn good.  Petey and I both cleaned our plates.

I’ve gotta say; if I were a duck, I wouldn’t feel that my life was in vain to have ended up in a dish like that. Aside from all the being killed and eaten thing, of course.

Thanks for your time.

Remember when pistachios were red?

When I was a little kid, pistachios came in bright red shells.  You could always tell when somebody had been into the pistachios.  There was no hiding it.  Fingers, mouths, and faces were stained an unnatural cherry.

The reason why they were red was because Iran was our major source for pistachios.  The producers dyed the shells to hide stains and imperfections.  After the Iran hostage crisis in 1979, the American government imposed sanctions on the nation.

No red pistachios for you!

And when the disco-era ban on anything Iranian was in effect, pistachio trees in California, which had been planted in the 1800’s, flourished, and replaced the nuts from overseas.  Due to time-sensitive handling, the shells remain pristine, and consequently, retain their natural hue.

Now it’s a lot harder to tell whose hands have been in the nut jar.

Poor Petey is one of those kids whose birthday falls right after the holidays, so we always try to make a fuss.  I cook his favorites for dinner, and we make or buy him something very special for his gift.

The Kid and I had planned on making a coconut cake, but both of us are pretty coconut-phobic, so we decided to make him another sweet treat which had a certain level of difficulty.  I could whip him up a batch of brownies in ten minutes—we wanted something which had expensive ingredients, and a high possibility of failure, so he could taste our loving efforts in every bite.I may have mentioned it before, but the man has a prodigious sweet tooth.  He had to be the kind of toddler you’d find digging a spoon into a 5-pound bag of Domino.

We decided, because cooking sugar can be tricky, to make him nut brittle.  And because a large bag of the shelled version runs around twenty dollars, we’d use pistachios.  Folks, we were cooking without a net.

We based it on a recipe from Food and Wine magazine.  But all brittle recipes are basically the same, with just a few variations of flavoring and finishing.

Petey’s Pistachio Birthday Brittle2 cups sugar

½ cup water

1 stick unsalted butter

1/3 cup light corn syrup

2 teaspoons vanilla

½ teaspoon baking soda

2 cups pistachios

Large, flaked sea salt

Prepare baking sheet.  Grease a large rimmed sheet.  Cover with parchment paper and grease paper, as well.

In a large saucepan, combine sugar, water, butter and corn syrup and bring to boil. Cook over moderately high heat, stirring occasionally, until the caramel is light brown and registers 300 on candy thermometer.  Remove from heat and carefully stir in baking soda and vanilla. The mixture will bubble. Stir in nuts, then immediately scrape the brittle onto baking sheet. Using a greased silicone spatula or a greased offset spatula (The Kid and I worked together, so used both), spread brittle into thin, even layer.  Sprinkle with salt. Let cool completely, about 30 minutes. Break brittle into large shards.The Kid has a genius trick from culinary school to clean pot and tools.  Fill the pot with water, place in all the tools used (including candy thermometer) and put on burner set to medium high.  By the time the water comes to a simmer, the sugar will be re-melted and wash right off.

It turned out beautiful and delicious.  I guess growth in middle age is possible.  It’s been five days since his birthday, and Petey still has some left.  Not much, but some. Thanks for your time.

“Some days you get the bear and some days the bear gets you.”, Commander William T. Riker, USS Enterprise NCC-1701D.In the last week, I got a refund at CVS for a faulty tube of mascara, and the manufacturer sent me a gift certificate for more than I had originally spent, as well as free shipping to order directly from their website.

My MP3 player, which I’d purchased 5 months ago, stopped working.  The Amazon seller sent me a brand new replacement, which was fully charged right out of the box.  He also told me to keep the old one.

And, due to a computer glitch and a misquoted fee, I was able to negotiate my co-pay from a trip to the Emergency Room from $250 to $35.

This week I got the bear.On average, I would say that I get the bear about 75-80% of the time.  Very rarely am I completely rebuffed and rejected when I have an issue with a company or product.

I’m not unusually special or charming.  I’m not an attorney, nor do I have one on retainer.  And, I’m not scary or violent.  So, how do I end up with refunds, apologies, and satisfaction while other people wind up on the receiving end of negativity and frustration?

I was in the library one day, and the guy working checkout informed a patron that a lost card replacement would cost $5.

The woman next in line lost her ever-loving mind.  She did a good five minutes on how the entire system was rigged against the little guy.  How every time she came in, she saw some other poor, benighted soul jacked by the man.What this irate woman failed to realize was that the employee in whom she was taking such joy in pummeling, was not ‘the man’.  This guy had no more say in library policy than the books we were borrowing.  He had no authority to waive that fee.

That episode illustrates two important things to remember when you decide it’s time to take a stand.

First, and most importantly, the person that is on the front lines, the first to hear your issue, will almost never be the one who makes the rules, and can make things right for you.  But, this is the gatekeeper.  This person is the one who will either plead your case or see to it that your case is ended before it ever gets started.  You are wise to be genuinely kind and respectful.  Frequently this attitude will persuade them to act as your advocate.

Mr. B, Gentleman Rapper (Left) vs the original, witty, talented genius that is Professor Elemental

Secondly, if you’re spoiling for a fight, take up boxing, or throw down with a rap battle (The east coast-west coast thing is still pretty volatile, I hear. Or maybe hip-hop versus chap-hop).  If you approach this encounter with anger, threats, and abuse, rarely will things go your way.

Rather, express your bewilderment and disappointment.  How could such a thing happen with a company or product you’ve used for years and believe in?  Explain how this completely uncharacteristic, unfortunate event has impacted your life.  You want an empathetic ear to help you overcome an injustice, not a punching bag to abuse.

And, these are not tactics to get free stuff.  This advice is to redress legitimate grievances.  If you possess a larcenous heart, you deserve nothing—in abundance.

For shame.  Nothing for you.

People don’t get up in the morning looking forward to messing with you.  If you are friendly and reasonable, they will find ten reasons to help you out.  If you have the same complaint but are rude and abusive, they can find 10,000 reasons to shut you down.

Thanks for your time.