Anger Burger

I’ll make this short, because you’ve heard me grouse about this before:

• Christopher’s Big Cherry
• Twin Bing
• Chase’s Cherry Mash
• Cherry Blossom

So, a few weeks ago commenter David Farris Creations mentioned on Anger Burger’s Facebook profile that he saw this cherry-peanut confection and offered to buy me one.  I demurred and then regretted it but that is what it is like to be me.

So, near Cannon Beach is the psychotronic terror-zone of Seaside.  In Seaside are several massive candy stores that specialize in regional,  “vintage” and strange candies, where I looked for a Owyhee Cherry Cocktail and immediately found one.  I had my doubts since it’s made by the Idaho Candy Company, makers of the Idaho Spud a.k.a., what would it taste like if we chocolate-coated a latex camping pad?

The Cherry Cocktail falls into the category of “Obviously Formed with an Ice Cream Scoop” candy, which also doesn’t inspire confidence.

But guess what?  I think this is my dream candy.

The Cherry Cocktail is packed with peanuts and ONCE AGAIN I’m sure I taste coconut but it isn’t listed on the ingredients.  The center is actually maraschino-flavored instead of just being a glacé cherry, and the whole thing is in perfect proportion to itself.  My sister and mother both had a bite of the Cherry Cocktail and each agreed: not too sweet, decent chocolate and good fresh roasted peanut flavor.  There really was little to be improved about it, save making an actual homemade gourmet version with premium chocolate.

Now I can rest easy.  Minus the part where I can’t find them back in Los Angeles.

West siiiiide, bitches.

I’ve decided to give up thinking I could ever live on the East Coast.  Me and the West Coast are best friends for ever and ever.

This is my first visit to Cannon Beach, Oregon, and I’ll be back.  It’s a little busy for my taste, but the town is tooth-ache sweet and dangerously easy to exhaustedly stroll around while cramming fresh made you-name-it into your mouth.  So, so unlike my usual camping trips up the Washington coast line, where roasted hot dogs without ashes stuck to them are haut cuisine.

I risked some pizza covered in fresh tomato slices last night, and my colon was too distracted by the pound of saltwater taffy I put in it to notice.  It happens sometimes, and it’s hard to explain even to myself, but I went a year being hypersensitive to both tomatoes and sugar, and the day I gorge on both I felt great.  Sand between the toes imbues one with powers of supernatural strength, I guess.

This is about a restaurant, but it also isn’t.  In fact, it mostly isn’t.

Friends of mine are soon moving to Olympia from Texas, and I’ve been walking around town with fresh eyes these last few days.  I wonder if everyone views their own hometowns with the eye of retrospect.  Was it better 10, 15 years ago?  It would take me weeks to draft only the beginning of a rant about this town’s charms and flaws, but the older I get the more I find myself not caring as strongly as I used to.  It’s just a town.  Full of busybodies.  It is familiar to me and therefore comforting.

An entire microcosm of this was walking to Old School Pizza with my dad on a recent evening.  I’m sure my friend who owns OSP would be horrified to see me tell you that I’ve been eating at Old School since I was 15 years old, but there it is: for 17 years, this pizza has been my pizza of choice.

There’s a lot of legitimate dislike for OSP, and not even because of the pizza.  The restaurant is loud, visually cluttered and occasionally sticky to the touch. The young workers behind the counter are too cool for school and are likely to pop their gum in your face.  Woe is to any poor bastard who needs to use the restroom.

But none of that really matters, because there is pizza.

Not just any pizza.  The pizza that for whatever reason, floats my boat.  I know plenty of locals whose boat is decidedly not floated by this pizza, and I respect that in the distant way of people who fancy themselves fair and thoughful but are actually judgemental.  I’ve had a lot of really excellent pizza in my life, but none of it has filled the space where Oldschool goes.  Nothing else has the hot summer afternoons, the unfulfilled crushes, the woozy bar-breaks, the rainy day depressions, the sudden and total need to leave the shop before your heart breaks under the brittle but relentless weight of all time that has passed.

But, shake it off.  Because there is pizza.

See that cheese pizza up there?  It irritated me because the slice on the right was unusually small and slightly under-cheesed.  And I hesitated at the counter for a moment, holding it, wondering if I should say something before realizing, this is just the way it is.  Just because I revere this as an unmoving monument to my own adolesence doesn’t mean it’s without reproach.  In fact, the opposite may be true: that little runty slice is there to slap some sense into me.  Don’t be such a shmoopy old lady, it says.  Quit it with the rosy watercolor memories.

Because there is pizza!

I am not.

In botanical news, this was a “Black Krim” tomato.

The Viking loved them, and maybe in no small part because they are called “Black Krim”.  I admit to a thrill when discovering that they appear rotten when sliced open, though they have an peculiar salty green apple note to them.  As with all homegrown tomatoes, it was almost offensively tasty, and not just because it looked like a butt.

They are delicious.

That is all.

Because I’ve spent the last week eating nothing but frozen grapes and sparkling red wine, and also because I’ve blown all my body’s sodium out my eye-holes, it was time to eat something salty and full of coconut milk.

One of my favorite things ever is the Thai dish tom kha gai, or a chicken and coconut-broth soup heavily scented with the root herb galangal.  The soup simply cannot be made without galangal, so this is yet another of my food rants that will torture everyone not within a reasonable distance of a well-stocked Asian market.

Galangal looks almost exactly like ginger root, but tastes nothing like it.  Where ginger is sharp and spicy, galangal is floral, resinous and arcane.  There’s nothing like it in the world.  The good news is that like ginger, galangal freezes well — just slice it up first for easy use later — so if you find it, stock up.

But I’m not in the mood to draft an exegesis on tom kha gai for you.  If you’re really curious, Leela at She Simmers can tell you all about it.  My recipe is based heavily on hers, though I’m not sure she’d want my screwed up Caucasian-American version associated with hers.  What I’ll tell you is that my favorite version of tom kha gai was from a Thai restaurant in Olympia that they themselves no longer even make as good since they changed ownership in 2010.  It was so deeply layered, so complex and impossibly exotic, but it also had something that no other tom kha gai had: an orange oil floating on top.  Not a lot, just little orange spots where the oil floated.  I asked the restaurant and they said “spices.”  No further help.  And I gave up trying to recreate it.  Until I read She Simmers.

There on her post about tom kha gai was a photo – and not even the first photo, but halfway down the page – of the soup.  Orange-colored oil!  And offhandedly she mentions that adding nam prik pao, or Thai roasted chili paste, is the orange oil culprit.  She advises that it isn’t traditional, but I didn’t even shut my computer down or close the door behind me as I ran to the subway to ride down to Los Angeles’ Thai Town.

NAM PRIK PAO!  It helps if you yell it.

This stuff is a fucking miracle.  This is the condiment I’ve been missing all my life: unctuous, burny, sweet, salty, fishy, oniony, everything that is good about the world.  That’s it, that’s what it is.  Nam prik pao is an affirmation of life.  And don’t get scared off it if you’re not crazy about fishy and/or oniony things – the product transcends the sum of the parts.  It’s basically a jar full of FLAVOR.  In fact, I’d say the first thing you’d taste is salty-sweet.  This particular brand isn’t very spicy by my tastes, but the chili, anchovy, shrimp and shallot makes for this well-balanced and sort of unidentifiable savory foundation.

Added to my tom kha gai, it was the single secret ingredient that for years I had feared unfindable.

At She Simmers’ suggestion, the next day I had it spread on a grilled cheese sandwich (consumed with the leftover tom kha gai) and it was another epiphany.  I hadn’t realized that grilled cheese was missing something.  But it is.

Bear with me while I spend the next week Googling what else nam prik pao is used in.

Whitey Tom Kha Gai
there are no substitutions in this recipe.  lemon juice cannot be subbed for lime.  ginger cannot be subbed for galangal.  i’d maybe allow for white meat chicken instead of dark, but just don’t tell me about it.  anyway, though the ingredients may be elusive, the recipe itself is dead simple.

2 14oz. cans sodium-free chicken broth
1 knob of fresh galangal (about the size of a large lime) sliced thin
1 stalk fresh lemongrass, chopped into 1/4 inch slices
6 keffir lime leaves, each torn in half
handful of fresh mushrooms, preferably oyster or chanterelle, sliced
2 carrots, sliced thin
1/2lb. (about 3 or 4) boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into bite-size pieces
2 Tbsp. sugar
2 Tbsp. fish sauce
juice of 1 lime
2 Tbsp. nam prik pao
1 14oz can high-quality coconut milk (“Chaokoh” brand is best in my experience)

fresh hot chilis (Thai bird’s eye or whatever, who cares) (optional)
chopped fresh cilantro (optional)
cooked rice to serve with

• In a medium saucepan, reduce the chicken stock by almost half.  Do this by brining it to a simmer and then allowing it to evaporate down for about 10 – 20 minutes (how long it takes depends on the shape of your saucepan).  While this is reducing, add the galangal and lemongrass, both sliced thin (they won’t be eaten, so ignore how they look), and the lime leaves.

• Meanwhile, prepare the mushroom, carrot and chicken.  Slice them however you’d like.  You can use any mushroom you like, and while it’s traditional to use straw mushrooms, they’re only available canned in the U.S. and I find the texture and flavor to be appalling.  I found fresh mushrooms at my local Thai market called “King Oyster” and they were great, really meaty.

• When the chicken broth has visibly reduced in volume (don’t stress about it being exactly half), turn the heat down to medium-low and using a slotted spoon or small sieve, remove the galangal, lemongrass and lime leaves.  Discard them.  To the broth add the can of coconut milk – take care to get all the good thick stuff out of the can and into your soup! – and the carrot, mushroom, chicken, sugar, lime juice, nam prik pao and fish sauce.  Keep the temperature of the soup just barely and not quite at a simmer.  We’re basically poaching the chicken at a low temperature.  If it begins to bubble, nudge the heat down a little.  Depending on how large your pieces are, it could take anywhere from 7 to 15 minutes for the chicken, mushrooms and carrots to cook.  Just keep the heat at barely a simmer and check pieces regularly for doneness.  Because of the low heat, it’s pretty forgiving if they cook a few minutes too long.

• When everything is cooked, taste one last time for seasoning.  It should be a perfect balance of salty and sour with an ever-so-faint whisper of sweet.  If it seems maybe too rich, add more lime juice.  The level of spiciness is up to you: if you like it very spicy, add the optional fresh hot chilis at this stage.

• Serve with a garnish of fresh cilantro.  I really, really like to plop a big scoop of fresh hot rice into my bowl of tom kha gai just before eating, but you (like the Viking) may not like soggy rice.  You’re on your own.

When I was younger and saw people drinking wine in TV I thought it would taste like, well, grape juice.  But like a lot of kids, I have a distinct memory of my first drink of wine and the immediate feeling of hurt — why would someone have given this to me?  What did I do to deserve this awful crap?  Why does it burn?  Who actually likes this?  Can I have a rootbeer now?

I grabbed this bottle at total random the other day, mostly just because I’d been wanting to try a sparkling red wine for years.  And this bottle was $5 at Trader Joe’s, which doesn’t hurt.  Five dollars!  Some Google-fu suggests it might be at World Market as well, for those of you without a Trader Joe’s nearby.

So: La Grotte Reggiano Lambrusco?  Tastes like I imagined wine would taste.  And it’s fizzy!  Michael Jackson would have been pleased to serve this to his underage friends.  It’s refreshing and light, it’s very fruity and just a little floral (violets?), and borderline dangerous.  It’s chuggable.  It is a delightful summertime tipple for the unadventurous and lazy.  The bottle even recommends it paired with pizza – pizza – and they are absolutely right to do so.  We ate it with pasta salad, s’mores and True Blood, and it was perfection.  I’m going back to buy a half dozen bottles just as soon as possible, for I intend to be a wino this summer.

You will never be sad if you make friends with foreigners¹, and here’s why:  they may bring you things.  Take our friends Sol and Yuko for example – they go to Japan about once or twice a year, to show off the babies they made to Japan in general.  And it is not uncommon for our favorite brand of tea² to make it back to us or some toe-socks or some other delight.  And this time while I was barfing my bone marrow out my nose, Mike the Viking went as envoy and returned with this:

I don’t know what I thought it was going to be, but I fell upon it like a caveman handed an iPhone.

What the hell is going on with it?!  It’s like they can’t even package a bar of chocolate right.  And there’s a stick with indeterminate function.  It wasn’t until I reached the protective plastic shell (!) that I started to suspect something magical was going to happen to my face.

Oh shit, yes.  This isn’t a bar of chocolate.  This is a goddamn orgy where everyone is beautiful and generous and you are their fetish.  The pieces are solid little blocks of ganache, or the interior of a particularly fine chocolate truffle.  They are impossibly smooth textured and even more unbelievably smooth in flavor – there is zero bitterness (despite this being “bitter” flavor), none of the sharp sour notes that put me off so many dark chocolates. As someone who enjoys only the pussy versions of dark chocolate (Lindt, I love you, but lets be serious here), this dark chocolate nugget made me swoon.  Full on Anger Burger mode, like, the most amazing thing ever instantly followed by a feeling of pure rage BECAUSE WHY IS THIS NOT AVAILABLE FOR MY MOUTH ALL OF THE TIME?

I frantically set to the internet to find more info on this stuff, and while there is plenty to read, it’s not what I wanted to hear.  There appears to be no way to get this stuff in the US, or at least reliably.  I mean, sure, Japan.  Singapore.  Hong Kong.  Those bastards get to eat it whenever they want.  The rest of us have to make jet-setting friends and making friends is hard.

In all honesty, if you know anyone going to the Asian Pacific Rim and you can put in a request, please, please ask for Royce Nama Chocolates.  They come in a variety of flavors and I’m certain they are all the most amazing thing ever.  And then, you know, send me the empty package afterward so I can sleep with it inside my pillow case and dream about a better life.

¹ Or people who travel a lot, but if we’re being honest I just don’t know anyone that rich.
² Though no longer! THANKS FOR NOTHING, RADIATION.  Stupidest.  Meltdown.  Ever.

My computer is going into the shop for an exorcism¹, so to everyone who is holding your breath for the next Anger Burger delight: sign your will.  Everyone else: say a little prayer that my bootleg Photoshop makes it through.

Real quickly -

The Viking’s dad, Elder Viking, is an agricultural hobbyist, which I love about him.  Home brew cider?  Check.  Shiitake mushrooms?  Under the deck.  Fortified wine?  Ha-ha!  I realize two of those last three things weren’t agricultural, but whatever.  Anyway: the new thing is oysters.  They have waterfront property up the sound a ways, and he started buying seeds to keep a regular, rotating crop of 3 year-old oysters to harvest just a one-minute walk from his front door.

This is a Pacific Triploid, a crossbreed grown for hardiness and its resistance to getting “milky,” a naturally occurring, harmless but unpleasant change in the texture of the oysters that happens according to heat of the water, bacterial levels and the presence of witches in the area.

I wish I’d taken a photo to show the size of the oyster, but we semi-jokingly said they’d be graded as extra-extra-extra-extra smalls.  Still, perfect little bites of brine.

Because I basically forget that beef exist unless Mike the Viking suddenly starts losing consciousness, my mom obliged to cook him up some outrageous steaky monstrosity that kept him quiet for a good 10 minutes.

Another night, another giant baking pan full of sushi.

And the reason that most of my mom’s children come around:

Fresh local steamed mussels, fresh Nisqually Dungeness crab, some salad and garlic bread and then no one spoke for a solid half hour, and there was a fine spray of crab juice splattered all over the walls and ourselves.

¹ I’m the last Vista user in the world, and I’m not proud.

Guess what’s for dinner?

Beef (flavored) vegetarian meat substitute.  From a coffee can.  Pull up a chair and grab a fork!  Or possibly a straw! Later, when you’re stinking up the chemical toilet, light one of these candles: