Food for thought

Food for thought -

When you travel, even within your own region, state, county, town or neighborhood, or where ever, and you eat at a “local” restaurant (local meaning, owned and managed by someone “of” the area, not a chain restaurant – though these may have a telling clue) check out the condiments on the table or that are available per request, as it tells a deeper story of the proprietor, the customers, and the tastes of the area and location you are in, possibly even some history.  Of course the type of place you choose to eat also guides the condiment selection and choices available,  that goes almost without saying and the menu itself will most likely bear local influences as it should, as well as influences of the owner or head chef or cook – taste and technique, “beliefs” about food, flavor and preparations.

Granted, we are an ever growing and expanding nation and world, with many multi-cultural influences getting melded together all the time and many restaurants are looking to serve a diverse palette even if they are an Italian, Chinese, French, American, Mexican, Sushi, Steak, Taco, whatever place, they very-well may have some cross-over stuff to make “everyone” (mostly little kids and the less adventuress adults who end up there in-tow against their will) happy, or at least able to order something to eat and not stick out like a dweeb (and you all know the type, they’ll still bitch and moan about it the whole time and afterwards trying make you feel bad about forcing them to go and eat at “that” place.  -- OPINION here: screw 'em, enjoy the food – the flavor, the smell, the textures and tastes, the view of the presentation, if the sound of the food or presentation is important, like Fajitas sizzling, hopefully for that brief moment they’ll shut up and you can “hear” the food, then block out their ranting dribble. Then consider NOT eating with them ever again, or at least not there, but DO go back without them and enjoy it. – )

Got a bit off track there, sorry, so you know if you go to a high-end place aside from salt and pepper there will be no condiments on the table, and depending on how well you know the place or how you’d like your service to continue, asking for any condiment is a bad idea. In fact if you’re at one of these places, I’d say the food out of the kitchen had better be spot-on perfect needing no salt or pepper or anything else, or you’re paying too much for it. This is not the kinda place I’m talking about (or trying to get to talking about – hang in there, we’ll move it along).

Condiments – the staples like salt, pepper, and sweeteners aren’t what I am talking about, nor is Soy Sauce at Asian food places, or Steak sauces at a Steak house, or Ketchup at a burger and fry place, although some of those may actually be a superficial peek in the box by Brand that is available. For instance, Kikkoman soy sauce is the leading brand on the West Coast (maybe across the whole country) but East Coast you see a lot of Lee Kum Kee brand soy sauce. Better yet, Heinz Ketchup in PA and the regional vs Hunts “Ketchup “(east of the Mississippi) “Catsup” (west of the Mississippi) and believe it or not Hunts “Tomato Cornchops” (only in Iowa) gets me closer to what I want to say about the story condiments tell. By the way, as the story goes, Hunts finally dropped the name "Tomato Cornchops" from their ketchup line when their mascot and product promoter, “Cornchoppy”, overindulged on cider at the Iowa State Fair and goosed the governor's wife during an apple pie judging, bringing disastrous press. (I have no idea if that is remotely true, but if not it’s a hell of a story).

I’ve digressed pretty seriously I think, to get to my point more directly, all of this came to me this morning as I ate a small breakfast at one of my local restaurants. It sits on a state road, a “pike”, here in Lancaster County PA, in a town that per 2000 census boasts 2,978 inhabitants, but that is for the “township” not the town per se. I had my usual, which is their #2 breakfast special of two eggs (locally raised by PA farmers), homefries (real sliced potatoes, also local, fried in a skillet moist and soft with just a slight crust – not hashbrowns out of a plastic bag) and two pieces of whole wheat toast (I can’t state firmly that the bread is locally baked, but I would expect so, because there are a boatload of local providers) sliced diagonally. Note here; another nuance of certain restaurants, regions and proprietors/cooks is whether they slice the toast, and if they slice it, whether it is a top to bottom slice or diagonal corner to corner (maybe another blog sometime) and what kind of toast you can get; wheat, whole wheat, white, sourdough, rye, other (yet another blog to come because a lot of people here order Rye toast, and many order it “dry”).

OK, so here we go, on the table are Salt (iodized) and Pepper (fine grind) in shakers that “are not stingy” (as my mother-in-law would say), a white ceramic container with sugar, Sweet-n-low and Equal, and a four compartment Jelly Caddy. The waitress wil ask if you need “creamers”, if you need ketchup, or hot sauce, and a yes answer to any of these gets you – small individual half-n-half cream from a local dairy cooled, Heinz Ketchup and Tabasco. The jelly is our real focus here. First not everywhere has an actual Jelly Caddy, they’ll have a small basket, or dish or combination metal holder that also has the salt and pepper. Here, they have a stand-alone four compartment caddy. They are serious about their jelly. Now what kinds of jelly do you provide? I’ve been to some places where it’s a combination of various kinds and lots of times all mixed together (I hate that). Most of the time in most places you will find Grape, I guess it’s the #1 favorite, then it can be one of these three; mixed fruit, cherry or strawberry, and many times those are the four staples. Occasionally in a four compartment caddy you’ll have grape (like almost always), two of the others (cherry usually doesn’t make the cut in this group) and the forth is Orange Marmalade. I’m not quite certain this has more predominance out east where the British roots still have a certain grip, but I don’t think Orange Marmalade is in the Jelly Caddy (if they have one) in Gallup New Mexico (if someone there reads this and knows different, please enlighten me). In this little local place of mine they have Grape, Strawberry, Orange Marmalade and . . . . .

Apple Butter! Yep, Apple Butter, always, taking up one slot of its own in the Caddy, next to the Orange Marmalade in its own slot, stacked neatly all the same in its spot no intermixed jellies, then Strawberry and Grape. I know that there are other places in the world that have Apple Butter, but I do believe that Lancaster Counties “Pennsylvania Dutch” heritage has a knack for producing Apple Butter (and other butters for that matter; Pumpkin Butter is terrific) and that Orange Marmalade hangs on to those English, British, roots from the 1700s. Patriots and Loyalists, taking their stance in those revolutionary years, debating, plotting, planning, providing for their families and both eating biscuits and bread with Apple Butter or Orange Marmalade (with the Kings tax sealed jars), and Strawberry jelly. Their condiment history began and continues here to this day. --- Food for thought !