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Media Meltdown, Volume 10
Books
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Spice Notes, by Ian Hemphill. Sydney: Macmillan, 2000. Hardcover, 497 pages, approximately $30 plus shipping. ISBN 0-7329-1052-8. Available from herbie@herbies.com.au
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This book is a masterpiece by Australia’s king of herbs and spices, Ian "Herbie" Hemphill, whose parents John and Rosemary pioneered the country’s love of spices in the 1950s. Written in encyclopedic form, Spice Notes is the accumulation of Ian’s information collected over a lifetime in the spice industry, and it is peppered (!) with history, legend, lore, culinary uses, and just about every detail anyone would want to know about a given spice or herb. I had the good fortune to meet Ian during our trip to Australia, and he was kind enough to guide me to the native, or mountain pepper that is found growing wild in various parts of the country. Ian and his wife Elizabeth own Herbie’s Spices, a shop in Rozelle, a part of greater Sydney, and every spice-loving visitor to Sydney should plan a visit. Spice Notes is highly recommended. –Dave DeWitt
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Best Food Writing 2000, edited by Holly Hughes. New York: Marlowe & Co. and Balliett & Fitzgerald, 2000. Trade paperback, 348 pages, $14.95. ISBN 1-56924-616-5.
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Sorry, but if this is the best food writing of the year, the editor needs to find new authors. This book should be retitled "Best Mainstream Food Writing 2000" because most of the essays here are, well, ordinary. Only a few of them held much interest for me, but then again I may be jaded. Another problem is that foodies will have already read much of this material, as it is culled from popular books, newspapers, and food magazines. There were some excellent pieces here by Anthony Bourdain, Jeffrey Steingarten, Anne Mendelson, and Eric Asimov, but if you really have a desire to read good food essays, try The Adventure of Food, edited by Richard Sterling (Travelers’ Tales, 1999). –James B. O’Malley
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Cowboy Cocktails, by Grady Spears and Brigit L. Binns. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 2000. Trade paperback, 135 pages, color photos, $14.95. ISBN 1-58008-077-4.
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This is a book for people who like to throw parties, combining about 60 recipes from the Reata Restaurant bar with about 20 appetizers and some basic recipes and garnishes. It starts with "Cowboy Coffee Drinks," but come on, Grady, would a real cowpoke put Bailey’s Irish Cream in his coffee? I think Fishin’ with a Worm is more like it, where there’s black coffee and a shot of mescal. But since the whole book is sort of tongue-in-cheek, we’ll allow for the Sonora Sangria and the Rusted Spur. Yes, you have to be a lover of exotic cocktails to truly enjoy this book, and I was more taken with the appetizers like Pan del Campos and Texas Strip Steak Nachos. Also fascinating is his recipe for Sundried Tomato Mash, which consists of sundried tomatoes, spinach, jalapenos, garlic, salt, and vegetable oil, which is spread over crackers or used as a rub for barbecued chicken. For chileheads, the drink I’d recommend is Texas Prairie Fire, which combines 3/4 ounce tequila, very cold, ˝ ounce lime juice, and few dashes of green Tabasco sauce. Recommended listening for this recipe (and there are suggested songs throughout the book) is George Strait’s "80-Proof Bottle of Tear-Stopper." –Dave DeWitt
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Kitchen Confidential, by Anthony Bourdain. New York: Bloomsbury, 2000. Hardcover, 307 pages, $24.95. ISBN1-58234-082-X.
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Subtitled "Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly," Bourdain’s book is a shocker. Part autobiography, part expose, it is an impassioned, vulgar, gut-wrencher of a book that probably tells us more about the restaurant business than we ever wanted to know. Bourdain also reveals too much about his own life, which includes thievery and drug addiction, and by the end of the book I found myself skimming over the pages rather than concentrating on the prose. If I had been editing this book, I probably would have tightened it up by about fifty pages. But some parts of the book are brilliant, particularly when Bourdain traitorously (in the view of other restaurateurs) gives away trade secrets and rightly discourages amateurs from opening their own restaurants. Some parts of the book are very humorous, especially early on, but his tales of what goes wrong in a kitchen would make me think twice about dining at his New York restaurant, Brasserie Les Halles. But now Bourdain is a celebrity chef (he despises them) on the basis of this book–or at least a notorious celebrity chef. –Dave DeWitt
Web Site
Mexican Grocer - www.mexgrocer.com
This site is an excellent idea for finding Mexican products and ingredients, but I found it somewhat difficult to navigate. For example, to click on the left navigation bar for "Spices" and you get a map of Mexico with the different culinary regions and their spice preferences, but no way to order, say, Mexican oregano. When you click on "Chiles," you get many selections of canned chiles, but the dried pods are not listed either here or under "Ingredients." Instead, you must search for "ancho" to take you to the dried pods. Not very logical. And try finding tortillas. A search lead to a message saying that my search criteria ("tortillas") could not be located. I looked everywhere but never did find a way to order tortillas. Despite these troubles, there is a very good selection of most Mexican ingredients and products here for very reasonable prices, and if you cannot locate these needed foods at your local supermarket or Latin market, this site is the next best thing. –James B. O’Malley
