The Vegetarian Guy

“I learned from my two year’s experience that it would cost incredibly little trouble to obtain one’s necessary food even in this latitude; that a man may use as simple a diet as the animals, and yet retain health and strength.  I have made a satisfactory dinner, satisfactory on several accounts, simply off a dish of purslane ( Portulaca oleracea) which I gathered in my cornfield, boiled and salted.  I give the Latin on account of the savouriness of the trivial name.

And pray what more can a reasonable man desire, in peaceful times, in ordinary noons, than a sufficient number of ears of green sweet-corn boiled, with the addition of salt?  Even the little variety which I used was a yielding to the demands of appetite, and not of health.

Yet men have come to such a pass that they frequently starve, not for want of necessaries, but for want of luxuries; and I know a good woman who thinks that her son lost his life because he took drinking water only. The reader will perceive that I am treating the subject rather from an economic than a dietetic point of view, and he will not venture to put my abstemiousness to the test unless he has a well stocked-larder.”

~Henry David Thoreau

Many years of exploring traditional cooking techniques and preparing countless meals have influenced the choices I make when purchasing ingredients.  As a service,  I have created a marketplace to make it easy for our readers to find and purchase unique products which are fundamental to preparing fantastic healthy food.

Everything one needs to set up a kitchen and produce my recipes, with the exception of fresh produce, are available through the store. Here you will find items chosen from experience such as: Kitchen appliances; Pots and pans; knives and utensils; organic grains and flours; organic spices and herbs.

In addition, there are cookbooks, videos, yoga materials , gardening tools and supplies selected to enhance a harmonic lifestyle.

Shopping Links:

ENTER THE VEGETARIAN GUY STORE

ORDER ANYTHING ON AMAZON GREEN!

Chefs witness this on a daily basis, but most of us disconnect from the notion that food influences us far beyond the digestive tract.  Eating is a multi-sensual experience and what we hear plays a significant role.  With food,  sound supports the other senses, placing us in a three dimensional experience. Even though it seems to play a background role, the influence of sound on our heart and mind is perhaps the most powerful sense. In Feng Shui and Vedic Vastu, sound is recognized as having the ability to create motion through vibration. What we hear inspires us to react and that is why the aural environment is important in all stages of the food experience.

According to Pythagorus, and confirmed by Plato, sound is the primordial element. This is also embraced by the Vedas from India, which are considered by many to be the oldest books in the world. According to these beliefs, sound is the original element that creates vibration, thus causing movement in the universe. If we could hear across the entire aural spectrum, everything would have a sound, including the silence we currently perceive. According to the Vedas, physical environments can change through sound and it is also an important tool for spiritual connections. Sound is a key part of our environment affecting our mind, body and spirit. Often, ancient Greeks spoke in song. This is still evident through Cretan spontaneous poetry known as Mantinades. Sanskrit is a poetic language, verbalized with meter and rhythm, often with melodious incantations. Sanskrit is called Deva Nagiri, because it is believed to be a heavenly language and is structured in a way that creates change and movement when enunciated. Vedic Brahmins maintain chanting specific Sanskrit mantras can change physical environments, mundane elements and alter the cycles of action and reaction they call Karma.

More accessible to everyday thoughts, music can change moods, evoke passions and greatly effect perception.  White noise and harsh noises can also make a difference. Cutting words, arguing, criticism and expressions of anger are vocal distractions which can  affect us in both subtle and gross ways. Abrasive soundscapes often create stress, adding clutter and distraction to thoughts and actions.  Sound affects our mindset, bodily movement and clarity of spirit. It is natural to see how an aural environment influences cooking. For me, cooking is an expression of what lies within, most often I see culinary actions as a conveyance, of knowledge, tradition and creative expression. As some people are eloquent speakers, the eloquence I rely on the most is in the language of food and all that goes with it.

Choosing sounds

Often, traveling to Crete with my father and son, we found simple tavernas where waves lapped in symphonic meter by our feet while feasting on a crisp cucumber salad glistening with the liquid gold of fresh pressed extra virgin olive oil. Local dialects epitomized the Greek word onomatopoeia, with mellifluous chatter beautifully decorating the aural landscape. Mixed with the scents of the sea and the olive oil basted grills we entered a meditative state, much like Odysseus and the Sirens, where a concentrated effort to extract ourselves from the hypnosis was necessary to accomplish tasks of the day.

A visual landscape is dramatically enhanced by sound. The transition from silent film to ‘talkies’ is one example of the difference. Sound gives depth and definition to sight. To create a fulfilling dining experience, chefs and restaurateurs sculpt the aural experience to compliment and enhance the sensual experience. In dining, sound is a compliment to the meal, a background enhancement that soothes and excites indirectly. Anticipation and salivation are encouraged with the sight of food cooking uttering companion sounds like crackling, spurting, bubbling, puffing and sputtering Sound also plays a direct part as an accompaniment to taste, touch and aroma as food is consumed and we sense such things as crunching, slurping, chewing and swallowing. In some old cultures, a good belch at the end of a meal signifies a cook’s success. Listening, and becoming sensitive, to the sounds of cooking and eating is a very important part of the world of cooking. Just as a spice can change the nature of a preparation, so what we hear when cooking and eating alters the food and how we digest it.

Cold preparations in particular seem to produce more sounds due to brittleness enhanced by the temperature.  While eating, these dishes produce a mellifluous combination of crunches, snaps and juicy sound bites that are intriguing, fun and fresh.

The snack food industry is testimony to the human addiction to crunch. Thinking about it, if we take the sound away from crunching, the feel alone is not enough to satisfy. It is the sound, inside and outside the jaw, which pleases our senses and creates the moment of satisfaction until the next bite. Crackers, chips, nuts, apples, corn, celery, carrots and many other foods are crunch worthy. In a dinner, a light, delicate crunch from a garnish or integrated crispy pastry provides a surprising and very pleasant addition to the sensual experience. A salad is an ideal course for exploring crunching with fresh, crispy greens, delicately cut vegetables, toasted nuts and the snap of fresh cherry tomatoes.

Dessert can turn into an extravaganza for all the senses by adding the crunch factor with a sweet pastry or candied nut.

“The incomparable beauty of Greece stimulates all the senses and enriches the spirit.  From the stunning azure of the Ionian and Aegean seas to the herb- and beehive dotted mountains, honey-sweet fruit aromas fill the air , while the twisted trunks of olive trees and the curling vines of the ubiquitous grapes delight the eye.  Colors vibrate.  Air seems fresher, the atmosphere lighter, than in other lands. You can imagine you see Hermes flying gracefully across the cloudless sky on his winged sandals, or the misty-eyed Nereids and Naiads dancing on the blue-green water.  It is impossible to resist the attractiveness of the warm, volatile Greek people or keep from falling in love with their country.”

“In Greece there is an intimate interaction of people with nature, and hence with food. This interplay is never more obvious than in the Greek markets, where fresh fruits and vegetables are piled high in baskets—a refreshing contrast to the packaged fruits, dehydrated herbs, and frozen, unrecognizable fish seen in markets in the United States.  Invariably, instances of Greek philoxenia (hospitality) surprise tourists.”

From:  The Food of Greece

By:  Vilma Liacouras Chantiles

Here is a link to this month’s issue which features our kitchen in the Rivenoak house in Birmingham, Michigan and some recipes from the upcoming Inn Season Cafe Cookbook.

http://picasaweb.google.com/GVutetakis/DetroitHomeMagazine

This week, our editing team has been immersed in Inn Season Cafe recipes, cutting this, adding that.  An exacting task, this is the final stretch of getting the recipes almost perfect.  Needless to say, appetites are worked up looking at, talking about and documenting the foods that made Inn Season Cafe so popular for decades.  There are no complaints when we break for meals and I am able to cook dishes with local market ingredients.  We have convinced ourselves (without great effort) the satisfaction arising from partaking in beautiful fresh food, adds an edge to the often tedious editing process.  Here is a sampling of the market finds and dishes created.

Quick chopped gazpacho

Fresh caprese style tomatoes

Tomato season is here!

Spinach salad with tofu and walnuts

Corn and leek cakes with chopped guacamole

Michigan blueberries are extra sweet right now.

Swiss chard tart

Almond and orange torta 

For lunch on the Akrotiri peninsula in Crete, a smattering of flavorful foods would be shared among family at home, or in tavernas and kafenions during frequent “volitas” or jaunts to town.  It would be a welcome culmination to the busy mornings that had to be productive before the sun blazed oppressive noon-time heat, fueled by sirocco winds from the desert in North Africa.  During these “kalokeri” (summer), months lunch always had a fresh tomato and cucumber salad with sweet red onions and sliced fresh feta cheese from sheep or goats residing down the road.  Of course, this was dressed with olive oil from local trees and red wine vinegar from nearby vineyards.  Cretan olives were cured a number of different ways, but my favorite was the method my grand uncle Kyriako would use.  In the storage room behind his house, he would pile olives on a tarp with sea salt harvested from the sun-drenched sea rocks nearby in Stavros.  The tide would wash in every ten days to fill the volcanic pockets with a fresh dose of Mediterranean sea water, conveniently evaporating to provide salt before the next swell.  Kyriako’s olives were tiny, similar in size to Nicoise olives, but salt cured with a wrinkled skin. The size was deceptive because they tasted extraordinary and were very addictive.  Meals were always accompanied by bread, not the white pasty Greek bread often seen at restaurants, but darker crusty loaves worthy of a good soak in the salsa of the salad. The noon-time meal often would have Kaletsounia (page 127), potatoes fried in, and dressed with, extra virgin olive oil (superb!), kolakithia keftedes (zucchini balls), various kinds of horta (boiled greens with lemon and olive oil), melitzana salata (eggplant dip), “fasolia gigandes” (butter beans), hard cheeses and local retsina wine of home made wine from grapes in the Vothono valley nearby.  All of this would be followed by sun sweetened figs, fresh almonds in local thyme honey and “karpusi,” perfectly sweet watermelon from the field down the road. This was the mezzes lunch we would share with family and friends during visits to Crete.  Often lasting for two hours, it was a time to share stories, histories and toasts to friendship.  Although, quantities of food were not always large, we would fill up on exquisite tastes and good company.  Lunch would be followed by a refreshing siesta to prepare for festivities in the evening.  This was mezzes the way it was meant to be: enjoyable, stress-free and vibrant with nourishing foods.  

Every week something new pops up at the market.  The first few heirloom tomatoes, sweet white Siberian kale from Cinzori Farms and local peaches are notable this week. Also, as each week progresses, the corn is sweeter and is more tender by the day.  We do not get corn like this in San Diego, where the best is comparable to end of season Michigan corn—-Something to be said for winter dormancy, manifested in the intensely flavorful splendors of summer. 

The season progresses and culinary excitement builds as we explore various local fresh flavors.  Farmers market produce is bolstered by herbs and tender greens plucked from the garden, while bread made from Hampshire Farms fresh ground flours makes the house smell irresistible.

Below is a photo tour as we work on editing The Inn Season Cafe cookbook, documenting my years as chef and chef/owner—1981 to 2002.

The book is entirely vegan as well as all the food presented here.

Maple Creek Farms–beautiful organic foods

Michigan Peaches are in!

 

Burda’s cherries and berries

Sauteed endive with pine nuts

Cinzori kale salad with plum vinaigrette

Donny Hobson zucchinis

Zucchini Parmagiana

Roasted coriander bread with Corscan thyme honey

Chocolate almond cream cake

Knowledge is a powerful “utensil” in the kitchen for creating recipes and this cognizance, combined with a historical perspective, has been one of my guiding passions. It was a path that unlocked the secrets behind recipes and helped me to discover the connections between longevity and good food. 

The basic conflict of interest between food as a commodity and as a health enhancing product correlates with the modern disconnection between the land and the plate.  Research has also taught me that most cultures have vegetarian traditions in some aspect of their history. Sometimes born out of economic necessity, but often these traditions were addressing the spiritual conflict between life and death, man and animal. 

Aromas waft into the nostrils as the dish arrives.  Flavors explode with imagery of fabulous lands and forgotten civilizations, highlighted by local notes of earth, sun and moon.  Pressing the fork into each morsel is a visual delight that alternates in texture from silky smooth to a delicate crispness. Peaceful rhythms scintillating in a background of melodic humming and chatter of others who dine.  Plates are exchanged for the next course and with each move, anticipation builds. Finally, after a thorough sensual workout of the palate, desert arrives.  Visually enticing and not too sweet, it is the smooth finish to a great meal.  Satisfied and vitalized, the body is nourished, the mind is pleased and the soul tingles.  Until the next time, life is perfect.