DOG BITES MAN

DOG BITES MAN

DOG BITES MAN

It had started out as a simple healthful Sunday morning walk. Up through the Bamboo Family’s property, up and across the creek and up, up, up. Well frankly, I hadn’t known there was going to be so much up involved, but there was, so I went. I was with Linda and Jackie and they’re both pretty good walkers, and I figured I’d better hold my own so I did. We were doing some pretty good sweating because every turn seemed to turn into another turn and they all were going up.

When we finally got to the Camino de Suenos sign I was ready for a breather and Jackie informed us that the worst was over and we were almost there. We headed down that road, which was nice and shady and crossed into Lillian’s property. Since that was where we were going, we eased up our pace a bit and wandered past a house that we’re interested in and up the drive past a couple of others. The view was spectacular and the ocean was blue and there were horse pastures and corrals and stalls; all the trappings of a real ranch. Jackie said, “Let’s stop in and see Lillian and tell her we’re here.”

We climbed up a bit farther, since it is all about getting to the “view” when you live in the coastal mountains here, and got to the front of Lillian’s house. There was a big wrought iron gate, a big dog on a chain, and there was Lillian, waving and calling out to us from upstairs in her house. She trotted downstairs, unchained the big dog and wandered away, talking over her shoulder like she does. Her parting words were, "Get acquainted with the dog." The dog wandered over and we set about getting acquainted.

He sure was a big guy, coming up nearly to my hip with a head bigger across than my splayed hand. Jackie informed us that he had just returned from a week long visit to the vet after a tangle with some of the local wildlife. I commiserated and stroked the top of his huge head. He was good, I was good, so I stroked his head some more and told him what a good guy he was. I rubbed his giant floppy ears and he seemed to like that too, so I chucked him under the chin a bit. Lillian called something to us, from up in the house again, the dog and I both turned and then he whirled around and slashed at my right hand and ambled off.

It happened like lightning and in disbelief I looked at Linda and said, “I think he bit me.”I looked at my hand and there seemed to be a long white crease running from the base of my right thumb to near my wrist. It was oh, so white, and then it was very, very red. The blood seeped up and out of it with my pulse and was thick and bright. I think Linda said, ‘Oh My God” and then Jackie said, “Did he bite you?”

I told myself to breath while everyone seemed to run around me. Jackie ran to I don’t know where and returned with gauze. She slapped it on my hand and we watched it soak through. Lillian appeared in a panic and ran in several circles trying to do too many things at once. Linda stood at my side and held my hand, saying, “Are you all right?” Lillian reappeared with a tube of something golden brown and much, much more gauze.We all agreed that the clinic must be called and trooped upstairs to Lillian’s deck.

She scrabbled for phone numbers and scrabbled for Tylenol, returning with three that I already knew weren’t going to do much good. She and Jackie couldn’t decide where the number for the clinic would be so I reminded them that it might be in one of the local magazines, published for locals and tourists alike. Everyone kept asking me if I was okay, but all things considered, I was fine. It was a dogbite, not that dissimilar to a nasty restaurant cut and nothing would be gained by freaking out. “Breathe”, I told myself again.

The calls were made to Dr. Mauricio, who runs our local clinic; pulling him away from his family on this Sunday and within minutes we were tumbling down the hill in Lillian’s 4X4. And we talked about all kinds of odd and unrelated things as we bumped and clunked down the hill. Linda and Jackie were in the back where there were no seats so they bounced around more than we did in the front seat. We got to the clinic and Dr. Mauricio was not to be seen.

I didn’t want to sit in the car anymore so I got out and Lillian hightailed it for a payphone since none of us had had the foresight to bring a cell. I suppose we hadn’t felt I was going to get bitten by a dog that day. Anyway, just as soon as Lillian took off across the highway, the doctor arrived and we were treated to some unintentional humor as he talked to her on his cell while she was 200 yards away on the payphone, yelling and asking him where he was. He and I walked into the back part of the office and the fun began.

Dr. Mauricio is a great guy, young and very calm and patient. He has treated me for a Papalamollo infection, wasp stings and now this, the dog bite. He put my hand over a tray, glopped on more gauze and went about gathering his things. We both kept wiping the blood away, which was, if I haven’t mentioned before, plentiful. Then he got the anesthetic needle out and filled it up. I could hear the three women in the waiting room telling stories of their own cuts and wounds. I always think its funny that things like this bring out the history of others. Cooks do this with knife cut stories.

A Costa Rican doctors office is pretty Spartan. There’s a table for the patient, a couple of medicine cabinets and not much more. And oh yeah, no nurses, which is how I ended up holding two suture clamps keeping my wound closed while Dr. Mauricio did a crude stitching in my palm using something that looked way too much like a fishhook without the barb. If this had been the US, I would never have seen my hand, would never have watched with a detached curiosity as the doctor probed me over and over again with the anesthetic needle until I was nearly numb and would never, ever have participated in my own procedure. And as I said, if I had been in the US, I would never have seen my hand; it would have been slung out to my right, over a tray with two or three people attending to it. But this is Costa Rica.

Dr. Mauricio and I both breathed heavy sighs of relief as he finished tying off the final knot. Him, I suppose because it wasn’t really how he had planned to spend his Sunday morning and me, because in all the exploratory applying of the anesthetic, a lot of areas had gone un-numbed and the entire process had been a bit more painful than I was initially prepared for. There was still a lot of blood lying around and he cleaned and wiped while I stood up and admired the six somewhat widely spaced crude stitches. Again, in the US, this would probably have been between 12 and 15 nicely arranged stitches, but here it was six and that’s just the way it was. The doctor wrapped me up awkwardly (how does one tape around a thumb?) and off I went into the waiting room where the three women were.

Lillian dropped Linda and me off at home while she drove up the hill to plunder her cabinets for medical supplies. I gulped a handful of Tylenol and Linda and I got ready to drive up to La Cusinga to tell them I wouldn’t be working that night, or, it seemed, for the next several. Another Costa Rican adventure and a rare Sunday at home, but a tough way to get it.

TOMATOES; ALL YEAR. WHO KNEW?

This piece was written for the March edition of Dominical Days.

TOMATOES; ALL YEAR. WHO KNEW?

Tomatoes! Ripe tomatoes everyday!

Yes, good quality ripe tomatoes are available year round here right near us and they’re cheap, cheap, cheap. You don’t have to settle for those rock hard, chalky, pale imitations being sold at our local mercados. If you are like me and unwilling to accept (or just not include in your menu) mediocre tomatoes until the “season” arrives, this is heaven.

Any regular visitor to the Feria in San Isidro can find “Tomato Nirvana”, seemingly year round. There are a number of vendors taking advantage of the amazing growing climate here to keep rotating crops in order to keep luscious flavorful ripe tomatoes on their stands weekly.

There are numerous stalls around the Feria that sell tomatoes at wonderful prices, but the one I frequent has mountains of tomatoes separated by size and price. It is run by one family and while Madre takes the cash, Papa and the sons keep piling more and more tomatoes onto their red mountain.

The cheapest tomatoes are the smallest and least cosmetically perfect. For these I pay the princely sum of 350 colones/kilo*, and roast for sauces and soups. The middle size is a perfectly decent tomato, great for sandwiches, salads and dozens more uses. The price for these skies up to 450 colones/kilo*. And finally, the largest of the three, great for featuring sliced as a salad command an outrageous (!) 500 colones/kilo*.

Yes, it’s true you will have to pick through the tomatoes to find the ones you like, but this allows you to vary ripenesses and plan your week of tomatoes. At La Cusinga I ripen them on shelves and have them arranged so that I always serve the ripest first. I NEVER REFRIGERATE TOMATOES. EVER. I look forward each Thursday to shouldering into the crowd, grabbing my three or four bags and pawing through the perfect and imperfect beauties so I can have ripe tomatoes every day of the week.

*For those of you reading this in the US, these prices translate at from $.32 to about$.48 per pound

Roasting and Roasted Tomatoes

A perfectly ripe tomato is one of nature’s treasures and shouldn’t be altered (except perhaps with a little sea salt, some fresh cracked pepper and a droplet of olive oil), an even better way to intensify tomato flavor is by oven roasting them. I first started oven roasting tomatoes in the US in an effort to coax flavor out of cottony, out of season imposters.

It seemed to me that if I was able to wring flavor out of nasty juiceless specimens, just think what would happen if I roasted ripe tomatoes. I did, they were great and they have become a fixture in my kitchen. No more long cooking tomatoes for sauce, and better yet, no more canned tomatoes. I make rich-flavored tomato sauces and soups with inexpensive fresh roasted tomatoes. And you can freeze these in ziplocs and thaw with no loss of flavor. Dollop them on fish, add them to pan-roasted chicken; add capers, basil or citrus zest. You’ve got the basics, now have fun.

Here’s how:

Heat oven to 450;

Pour enough olive oil on a cookie sheet to coat it, thickly;

Core 20 small ripe tomatoes and cut in half;

Lay the tomatoes cut side down on the oiled sheet;

Slice 2 large yellow onions into ½” (1.27 cms); break into rings;

Arrange the rings around and over the tomato halves;

Sprinkle 12-15 whole peeled garlic cloves over all, and;

Pour another good drizzle of olive oil over the top.

Salt and pepper liberally.

Roast the tomatoes about 35-40 minutes until the tops start to turn brown.

Remove from oven and let cool.

For an amazing tomato soup, hot or cold, puree the tomatoes and all the juice in a blender.

For a great no stovetop tomato sauce hand chop the room-temp tomatoes, mix in a little basil and hand toss with pasta. So good.

KATIA KILLS THE CLEARWRAP BOX

KATIA KILLS THE CLEARWRAP BOX

I’ve worked in the restaurant world--the food service industry, my entire adult life, and in my industry we call it clear wrap, plastic wrap, food wrap, film or in the case of those folks just in from the outside world, Saran Wrap. You may, in fact, call it Saran Wrap at your house. What it is, is the plastic film cover that keeps food from drying out, odors from getting in and (with good wrapping practices) liquids from spilling in refrigerators and on counters. Clear wrap seals up fish, sauces and open containers. Pressed against warm purees soups and buttercreams it prevents that nasty skin from forming on top, and when double wrapped tightly, it makes a particularly efficient prophylactic against freezer burn. In the restaurant industry clear wrap is such a workplace essential as to almost be taken for granted.

And that’s where the problem starts; being taken for granted. When I was a lad coming up in the food service industry, clear wrap came in a very heavy box and wore at the box’s top a heavy-duty saw-toothed cutting blade. The box was not light (probably between 8-10 pounds), bulky and two feet long. The blade was most formidable and I saw some of the worst and bloodiest cuts of my kitchen career made by that sturdy blade. My good friend and early line-mate Steve Hall made the serious and unforgivable mistake of attempting to catch the clear wrap box as it fell from a shelf, and was rewarded with deep and painful gashes in the exact same place on the inside of either forearm. Yes, I was taught to respect the clear wrap and even more so, the amazing cutter box in which it resided.

More important than just respecting the clearwrap and its box was learning, practicing and thoroughly following the instructions and protocol for opening and readying a new box. The box was well designed, and when the instructions were properly followed (and the box was kept dry; a critical practice), the clearwrap box would last the life of the roll of clearwrap, a lovely arrangement. A poorly dispatched box, fresh out of the shrink wrap, would cause several weeks worth of misery in a kitchen that relied on clearwrap on an almost minute to minute basis. More painful than the ongoing struggle with the disintegrating box, however, was enduring the wrath of the Executive Chef each and every time he used the box himself, which in my day, was often.

It was ever so as I journeyed through the first several years of my restaurant career. Quite rarely but occasionally, one would encounter a roll of wrap that had not been cut correctly in the factory and it would begin to catch at one end of the roll or the other. This would cause the wrap to tear off for use in narrower and narrower pieces as well as creating a lump of unwound plastic on one side of the roll. When this freak of construction occurred, much consternation and unrest went on in the kitchen until the dry-goods salesman arrived to exchange it for a fresh and functional roll. As I said, rare was the roll of clearwrap that failed to do its noble and pre-determined job.

Thus trained and thus reliant on clearwrap I entered the Berkeley restaurant scene of the late 70’s. Richard Olney, James Beard and Diana Kennedy were now the icons and gurus of UC Berkeley grads with advance degrees in Art History, Romance Languages and Classical Literature. These instant cooks studied and embraced cuisine as avidly (or perhaps more so) as they had pursued their graduate degrees. Foraged mushrooms, balsamic vinegars, mesquite grilled fish and dry aged meats were now the buzzwords that informed their newfound consciousness. New to their world, I saw and used fresh herbs for the first time and was educated as to the many different types of olive oils and the specialization of their applications.

But the Berkeley-ites were as new to my world as I was to theirs, and almost immediately I realized that the things I had come to take for granted in professional kitchens were unknown quantities to the well-read neophytes. When I first started at the 4^th Street Grill, it took two people to man the grill (most certainly a one cook operation in any standard restaurant) on a busy night. Organizational skills I had thought were de rigeur for any trained cook, for example, reading and organizing the orders from the waiters were looked upon as arcane and mysterious gifts. So I may not have known my cold pressed olive oils from my pomaces, but I could run the grill by myself on a busy night, and that was regarded as a worthy skill.

Oddly enough, among the arcane and mysterious skills unknown to my new workmates was mastery or even basic understanding of clearwrap. The clearwrap box at the 4^th St, Grill was in a perpetual state of disintegration, the blade was used almost as a last resort (why can’t you just pull it off?) and the issue of the film rolling over on itself and bunching up at one end was seemingly a way of life. It amazed and alarmed me that these would-be wannabe cooks with one and sometimes two advanced degrees were at sea with the clear wrap box. It may not have been imported Sherry vinegar or a roll of peppery pancetta, but in its own way it was even more vital to the function of the kitchen. The day that a new roll arrived, I took two of the lead cooks and a waiter aside and revealed the secret of how to set up the clearwrap box for continuous and uninterrupted service. I taught them that clearwrap was not just your friend, but a tool, a part of happy and productive kitchen life.

In the ensuing years, I traveled to the East Coast, to Los Angeles, the Napa Valley and ultimately returned to the San Francisco area to ply my trade and kitchen skills. I watched as clearwrap manufacturers from coast to coast tried in vain to improve on the mysterious and baffling box. The cutter blades were changed from steel to plastic and then (this was short lived) to sandpaper. Adherent sheets of plastic were affixed to the front of the boxes so as to protect errant flesh from the sawtoothed blades. Warnings were printed boldly on each box as if the cooks might actually read them. Precautions were taken, but it seemed that the art of clear wrap was fading away as rapidly as the art of correctly boning a chicken.

Which brings us to where I am now: Chef at an Eco-Lodge deep on the south Pacific coast of Costa Rica, working in a kitchen that teeters between the old and the new. I am the only gringo on a kitchen staff of four. We have food processors and a Kitchen-Aide, but grind corn by hand for tortillas and make our own tamales. We work with fresh and local ingredients, and here, where it is perpetually hot and the life expectancy of foods not properly cared for is limited at best: knowledge and mastery of the clear wrap takes me back to those Berkeley days among the sophisticated and perhaps over-educated (did I say that?) students of cooking.

Here in our kitchen overlooking the blue Pacific, the clearwrap box seems to perpetually sit in a pool of water and the disintegration process is rapid. More often than not I am faced with a large naked tube of plastic film. It needs to be lugged to the table, where it rolls back and forth as one tries to steady it long enough to stretch out the needed amount and then grope for a knife with which to cut the film from the roll. With any luck, one can then peel the film off the table and wrap one’s chicken or cover one’s soup. This is so prevalent a practice, here in Costa Rica that the clear wrap is even sold in the grocery stores sans the box; just the roll and nothing more.

Imagine then, my anticipation as our roll of clearwrap neared its end in our jungle kitchen, and a new roll had been ordered and even delivered. I could scarcely wait to peel the shrinkwrap off that new box, undo the top, slide out and reverse the cutter, peel that first length of film off the roll and cut it neatly with the saw-toothed blade. The feeling of being able to stretch the film taut over my newly made salad dressing without having to fight it’s tendency to wrinkle and tear and without having to peel it off the table would be one I’d treasure over and over again.

At long last I peeled the last grudging sheet of film from the old roll and happily tossed the tube into the recycling barrel. I asked my new helper, Katia, an somewhat excitable and slightly headstrong woman to bring me the new roll of clearwrap from the bodega (storeroom) so we could unwrap it and put in immediately to good use. I stepped to the phone to place my produce order and chatted a bit about lettuces and their availability with my grower. I turned back to the kitchen and there on my prep table was a giant roll of film, brand new, removed from the box and gleaming naked as the day it rolled off the machine. Katia stood back proudly and beamed at me, “Aqui esta, Chef”, or, here it is. She had neatly removed it from the box, very professionally broken down and crushed the offending cardboard and smashed it all into the paper recycling bin. I yelped as if I’d been bitten by fire ants. I reeled around the kitchen in horror, the crushed cardboard box dangling from my helpless hands. And yes, I nearly cried.

I now have at least another four months of battling the clearwap roll each and every time I need to wrap my fish filets, cover my mango salsa or press a protective layer over my camote-platano puree. I will lug the large and unwieldy plastic roll out to the table, try to still and center it long enough to peel some film away and I will promise myself that this next time, I and only I will touch the box.