TRAVELING CHEF, Part 2

Onward to Oregon!

In the week I've been here the climate has gone from lovely and bright "end of summer" skies, with temps in the low 70's, to cold, windy and downright blustery. It would seem that they take the changing of season both literally and seriously here.

I flew into Portland on a Thursday and had an amazing reunion with Kathy, who I had been Skyping with, but hadn't seen in 42 years. She drove me south of of Portland and down into the N. Central farm country and guided us expertly to our first country farm stand. I was craving corn, corn and more corn, but the late season bounty in this part of the world had me filling bag after bag with produce long out of season in the rest of the country. I couldn't believe my good fortune at finding luscious ripe peaches and my favorites, nectarines. We also loaded up on all three of the berry brothers; black, rasp and blue.

My first night here in Oregon I was presented with a local organic chicken and my choice of vegetables from the garden; my kind of challenge. I stuffed the chicken with stems of lemon-oregano from the garden along with a couple of lemon halves, surrounded it with small garden fresh onions, carrots, whole garlic cloves and potatoes and fired that baby in the oven. I basted it with a mix of lemon juice, olive oil and butter and it emerged from the hot oven a lovely and crisp burnished gold. We added some local green beans (from our earlier stop) sauteed with mushrooms and topped with toasted pine nuts, and of course a couple of ears of sweet local corn. I made a quickie sauce out of the pan drippings and it was country eating at its finest.

Sunday we made the drive out to the coast along the Alsea River and it was a gorgeous pre-Fall day. The maples were turning color, the river was flowing and the road from Corvallis to the coast winds through some dense and verdant forest. We had hoped for fresh Dungeness crab, whole and kicking, but settled for a bag of fresh, local crab meat instead.

I smashed up oyster crackers and along with an herbed mayonnaise that I'd concocted at Kathy's house, lightly bound the crabmeat into six fat crab cakes. I pan fried them and we topped them with more of the herbed mayo and served them with roasted potatoes and a salad of baby spinaches, romaine and peppery radishes, also from the garden. The crabcakes came out perfectly; crisp, light and tasting "oh so crabby".

The following morning we hit the Yachats beach and strolled along, peering into the tide pools while watching two maniacs head out into the freezing surf in their bathing suits. It always amazes me to remember that this is the same ocean I see every day in Costa Rica. It seems so different in color, smell and even in its temperament. The ocean in Oregon is percussive, slamming and sailing into the coast with a power and fury we rarely see way down the coast.

We were all about seafood after the walk so went to a funky chic local spot called appropriately enough, The Drift Inn. Kathy went for more crab in a very nice salad with avocado, crisp romaine and artichoke hearts and I had local halibut done up in crisp breading served with herbed handcut french fries in a great regional take on fish and chips.

That night we went out to see my sister Nancy and her husband Mark's lovely house along the Yachats River and luckily ran into a lovely large hunk of local salmon; a big filet weighing in at at least three pounds. Mark had fired up the grill and I made a glaze for the salmon out of seeded dijon mustard, honey and tamari. My sister had snipped green beans from her garden the way our mom used to when we were small and she sauteed them the same way we had eaten them years ago, with chunks of bacon (although I think this bacon may have had a bit more of a pedigree than Mom's). Mark had made focaccia that he topped with thin slices of homegrown onion and yellow crookneck squash and put back in the oven until the veggies were just cooked.

The fish came off the grill, full of that rich salmon smell that I have missed in the tropics. I love salmon and my mouth was drooling from the aromatics coming off the little Weber. We plated salmon chunks cut from the roast, the bacon-y green beans and wedges of focaccia and we nearly ran to the table. Not much was said for the first five minutes or so, which is always a good sign. The meal was perfect and I got a serious salmon fix.

Sadly, the following day was the journey back to reality, but we made a stop in Eugene at the 5th St. Market and a great bistro called Marche, for the type of food I crave down in Central America. I stared off with half a dozen Totten Bay oysters on the half shell, briny and crisp tasting; almost like falling face down in the chilly ocean. We shared a salad of Little Gem lettuces tossed with an "anchoide" dressing (read, Caesar), thin shards of good Parmesan and garlicky thin crostini along with a BLT with applesmoked bacon, braised pork belly and heirloom tomatoes. We finished the meal with a classic vanilla bean creme brulee. It was a perfect "American Bistro" meal.

We came back to steaks from beef raised by Kathy's neighbors one night and a pot of lentils cooked with smoked ham hocks the next. Tonight will be braised organic chicken thighs in a sauce of roasted garden tomatoes and tomorrow I am, more than grudgingly, in the skies back to Austin and then Costa Rica. I do, however, have the ever-growing Austin Farmer's Market to look forward to; lots of fall vegetables and seriously tasty goodies from my friend Jesse Griffith and his Dai Due butcher shop. There will be at least one more epic feast at my sister Barbara's house in Austin. And it is starting to get just a bit chilly here for my wardrobe, it's time to admit. I've got to get back to where flip-flops, shorts and a loose shirt are the norm, if not slightly overdressed.

Traveling Chef

Greetings from the Great Pacific Northwest where they look at you funny if you wear shorts and flipflops in the 60 degree weather; go figure...

I hit Austin on a Monday and walked out of an air conditioned airport into 92 degree heat. Ah, welcome to Texas. My sister, Barbara, picked me up and I was greeted at her house by her husband Pete and a 32 ounce Porterhouse steak. Ah yes, welcome to Texas, yet again. We grilled the steak and paired it with corn on the cob (oh, how I miss corn on the cob!!) and a big green salad; such a nice way to get into town.

Tuesday was all about running all the errands doing things I cannot possibly do in Costa Rica. First and foremost was the visit to the Genius Bar at the Apple store to get this baby worked on. Sitting outside in the humidity and heat in Costa Rica, coupled with being attacked by the greasy fingers of the chef were not doing the keyboard any good at all. From there it was on the camera store (so long, faithful Canon), Best Buy for more computer stuff, the Good Will for Costa Rican dress shirts (4 short sleeved dress shirts for $20) and every book store and drug store in between.

That evening we were planning on going to Flipnoticks, a tiny club down near Barton Springs, to see and hear the incomparable Erik Hokkanen and his quartet, so dinner was to be convenient, but naturally, delicious. Barbara pointed me in the direction of a new cheese store, Antonelli's that had popped up in her (and my old) neighborhood, so I strolled over to check it out, and what a find!

I slipped in through the door and looked down the long narrow room at a cheese counter that nearly took up the entire length. I was the only one in the store and Eric, behind the counter and I struck up an immediate rapport. I was asking all the right questions and he had some good answers. John Antonelli, the owner, came over and soon I was regaling them with stories of cooking in Costa Rica while they plied me with taste after taste of cheese.

I ended up with a lovely and herbaceous semi-hard cheese from Vermont that reminded me of a St. Nectaire, two half wheels of great double cremes from Cowgirl Creamery in Pt. Reyes, a tangy blue from Oregons Rogue River and a chunk of delicious grainy, minerally English Farmhouse Cheddar from Quicke. And around the corner from the cheeses was the charcuterie and olives. I picked up a nice spicy hard sausage made by an Italian family who have settled in Utah to raise pigs and make pork products and a wonderfully thyme-scented cured pork loin sliced thinly like speck. A tub each of Lucques and Castelveltrano olives completed my trip and I went out the after leaving website and blog addresses. It is probably a good thing that Antonelli's wasn't there when I lived there or I'd be fatter and poorer than I already am.

Our "light" repast was set off by a tangy arugula and organic tomato salad and a couple of loaves of Brea Bakery baguette. Thus fortified we headed out into the warm night to jam ourselves into the tiny room at Flipnotics to hear Mr. Hokkanen work his magic. He is a genius of a fiddle player and incorporates the Stephane Grapelli gypsy style into his repertoire along with a lot of Western Swing. But it isn't until he puts down the fiddle and straps on his candy apple red Fender and starts to play his own take on surf and rockabilly that the place gets rockin'. He has the deranged grin of a true savant as his fingers fly over the strings and his background on the violin makes his approach to his guitar playing totally unique. The man is or should be a national treasure.

The next day was more errand running, but ended up at Austin's newest "see and be seen", tough reservation restaurant, Uchiko. Uchiko is owned by the same folks who own the nationally acclaimed Uchi and shares the same culinary destinations; truly fresh fish in Asian directed presentations. One side of the menu is all sushi and sashimi (and thank God there are no stupid show off rolls) and the other side has three headings, Cold, Hot and Grill.

The room is long, large and loud and it seemed as if everyone there was celebrating something and that they all knew each other some way or another. Despite the truly annoying offering of the waiter's name by both the host and the waiter himself (oh how I hate that, "And Tim will be your waiter tonight"; ugh), the service was exemplary and quite helpful. We started off with grilled (!) edamame and the best (ever) fried eggplant, cut in ultra-thin discs, I've ever had. The eggplant was sauced with a homemade "Sri racha" type sauce that was excellent.

This is one of those "order a bunch of plates for the table" places where the waiter recommends how many you'll need if you want enough to eat. We opted for six, two from the sushi/sashimi side and the others from the the more complete plates in the the Hot/etc, columns. The first plate was probably the most disappointing of the evening, a hamachi roll with a bland lemon mayonnaise on one side of the plate and some sweet goopy, plum-like sauce on the other. Fortunately, the next plate, a sashimi of fresh white anchovies with the tiniest cherry tomatoes you've ever seen, shavings of bottargo (dried tuna roe) and micro basil leaves was amazing and the pedestrian roll was soon forgotten.

From the other side we ordered and got (in succession): Roasted squid with Reisling pressed celery, baby chard and marinated apples; Norwegian mackerel with pickled bluefoot mushrooms and huckleberries (don't laugh, this was a great dish and the mackerel was outstanding); Rabbit confit with celery chips, poached egg and a madras curry sauce; and a "hot pot" style dish of two kinds of Asian mushrooms, bonito flakes, roasted onions and another poached egg. The "hot pot" was great and the rabbit was not. This is the only area our waiter fell down in; the two dishes should not have been served, one after the other, or he might have steered us in a different direction. The "hot pot" was umami at its finest.

We actually were nearly full after all this, despite the plates not being huge, and were waffling on dessert when "Tim" told us that since our first courses had been delayed that the house would buy us dessert. We opted for a celebration of sweet corn that included a sweet corn sorbet, a gelatinous sweetened polenta-like bar, toasted and caramelized corn meal and a tall architectural cookie made of pressed sweetened corn flakes; dots of tart lemon gel surrounded the corn creations. It was an odd dessert, but if one was agile enough with the fork to catch a bit of every component in one bite, the logic of the preparations came through.

It was an interesting and creative meal; thought provoking, which to me is good. We had enough time between courses to discuss them at great length and I like that when I eat.

The next day was a morning flight to Portland and pretty radical shift in climates. More about the trip out to the coast and the Pacific Northwest bounty soon...