feminist blogs

The first and last time I was in Rome, I was escorted about by a colleague who lived there in the early 1960's while studying to be a priest. Dude knew everything about Rome's art, architecture and history. And I mean everything.

While we were there only two days, I felt like we packed in a week's worth of touring. In fact, we scurried about so intently at various points, I had to beg him to slow down so that I could see what I was seeing. Yet he made that trip exceedingly memorable in so many ways, it seems a little petty to complain about the pace.

Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the fellow's gastronomic preferences and restaurant hunting instincts.

My colleague's canonical approach to seeking sustenance in the Eternal City consisted of plopping us down at any available table in one of the major tourist piazzas, where the archetypal overwrought attendants served a banal selection that rivaled what I imagine one would find at a downtown Des Moines Olive Garden. (BTW: Does anyone else have trouble believing that Olive Garden chefs are trained in Tuscany?) When we were hungry and stuck senza piazza, he found a tout who dragged us into an empty cafe --and I think we all know what that means-- where the single best feature was the blessed vino bianco.

When my husband and I travel, we employ a few simple rules for finding a good meal:

• Walk four or five blocks into a non-touristy neighborhood
• Find a smallish place that's half-busy with non-tourists
• Make sure the personnel are outfitted with genial-enough dispositions
• Avoid street vendors

We also frequently rely on the suggestions of friends. If you've been to Rome and have a restaurant to recommend (as Randy did here), throw it into the comments.

The chokingly fragrant menudo leaves no doubt as to the part of the animal from which the meat was excavated — menudo may be L.A.’s favorite hangover remedy, but it is hard to imagine confronting this menudo on a stomach trembly with drink.  --Jonathan Gold, winner of the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, on El Atacor #11

Other than its curative properties after a big night of enjoying entirely-too-much alcohol, you know what I like about Mexican menudo? It's certainly not the cooking of it. A "from-scratch" authentic batch of menudo requires an interminable amount of prep time at a time when it's healing magic is required immediamente! Also, I'm not particularly enamored with a few of the ingredients. I choose to leave the pigs feet out of my bowl, for example.

No, I appreciate menudo for the celebration of culinary and class ingenuity that it is:

Menudo is yet another sacred ethnic dish that has its roots firmly planted in peasant food heritage. Menudo is also a byproduct of conflict. Long ago in northern Mexico, the select cuts of a town's cattle would go to battle-weary and hungry Mexican soldiers while the leftovers went to the peasant folk. These leftovers consisted largely of Fear Factor staples like innards, tails, hooves, et al. Inventive and/or desperate peasant cooks created a soup that made good use of a couple of these ingredients - the stomach (tripe) and calf's foot (hoof). Classic menudo is basically a slowly cooked stew of honeycomb tripe and calf's foot later infused with several varieties of chiles and spices and balanced in flavor and texture with white hominy. It's presented as a soup and served with corn tortillas.

Unlike most pseudo-Mexican fare popular in El Norte, menudo has yet to be extricated of its mojo by the likes of Sandra Lee, Rachel Ray, Chevy's and Taco Bell ...which is another reason why I long for it:

Maybe no other dish reveals the divide between America and Mexico, steeper than any border wall could ever rise. America's taste for violence ends at the table. We like our meat in the form of muscle, free of the slaughterhouse whiff that clings to organs. Mexico has less-conflicted animal appetites. A well-made menudo, like the one here, both wallows in and triumphs over the carnal. Call it the crowning achievement of a meat cuisine steeped in Catholic theology, the transcendence of the fleshy ...

Menudo also conjures home and childhood for me. While my mother was an accomplished cook who could make as mean a mole as Diana Kennedy, my aunt Rosie and, by turns, her aunt Rosa, were my family's designated makers of all Mexican cuisine during the holidays. Perfectly wood-chip-grilled carne asada was the star of the show on all non-Winter holiday gatherings. Our Christmases included entirely-too-generous servings of turkey/mole tamales, sweet white masa raisin/pineapple tamales, birria, cochinita pibil, Rosca de Reyes ("Don't bite into the baby Jesus!"), and the like.

Unsurprisingly, after an evening of drinking salted keg-beer on-the-rocks, no adults in our family had the vim and vigor to turn out a good pot in the morning, even though menudo consumption was practically a requirement on New Year's Day. No, we enjoyed our "Breakfast of Champions" in one of many of Los Angeles' mom-and-pop tacquerias.

While living in San Diego during my college and just-post-college years, I made an annual trip to Puerto Nuevo with a carload of not-so-sober friends for an adventure and a New Year's Day menudo fix. Which, I think, surprised the locals who were much more used to SDSU gringettes showing up for langostino y fifty-cent coronas. Since then, with the exception of a four-year adulthood stint in LA year's later, my menudo jonesin' has been left unsatisfied.

Has anyone else noticed how Bon Appetite has been desperately trying to young/hip-it-up (Neal Pollack blogging epi?) just as Food Net goes all lowest common denominator?

Here's the supporting evidence offered by the Daily Mail's Sam Holden:

Most men are extremely greedy, and as a result they are in love with food. They want to have food at least four times a day in every way they can.  

They don't want to stick with just one sort of food, but they want multiple culinary experiences.  

Most women, however, see food as fuel, as a means to an end. Why cook something interesting when you can cook something dull and be ready to watch Friends at 8pm? If any more proof were needed, then I'd suggest you consider just how many Michelin-starred female chefs there are. If you can name three, then I'll cook you dinner. You lucky girls.

Not very women are elected heads of state. Nor do many of them run board rooms. And where are all the women who blog about politics?

I think I see a pattern here.

Lately, I've been toying with the idea of going to culinary school with the idea that I would eventually put my entrepreneurial skills to use in my own business. As I have yet to begin deep research on the matter, tips and opinions are greatly appreciated. 

Shot with my iPhone; Malkinville, MD

I spent the better part of the morning dealing with these bad boys and a couple hundred of their sisters. While they dry out in preparation for ristasmania, we're off to the Big Apple for a few days. And no, I'm not going to meet you for brunch, bleachers or sashimi. It's our anniversary. But if you must have your Rox fix, there's a good chance you'll find me at Astroland sometime in the next 72 hours.