We have no cooking tips for you this week – just some encouragement to go out and eat! The 7th Annual Taste of the Town gets underway on Sunday, and it is the perfect opportunity for you to sample the wares of our many and talented chefs and restaurants. It is the ideal event to get out of your comfort zone and to taste something new for a change! Abandon your California Chardonnay rut (like me) and taste some new wines! See what is so special about ice cream sandwiches from Brooks Tavern. You haven’t had good bangers and mash for ages! Get thee to the fountain park in downtown Chestertown!
Here is the link to the press release: https://chestertownspy.org/2014/04/16/taste-of-the-town-celebrates-seven-years-of-delicious-food-fun/
It’s nice to get out of the kitchen and mingle with folks we probably haven’t seen for a while. And though you are a fascinating person, (because why else would you be reading Food Friday?) maybe you could use a new conversation gambit. Here are a few podcasts I like to listen to while I am zooming Luke, the wonder dog, out for his daily constitutionals. They make me feel adventurous and happy and they are highly entertaining. Our neighbors probably mutter under their breaths and their leaf blowers when we sail past, but I have ear buds firmly planted. By artfully multi-tasking, and getting some culture while walking the dog, I have also got a good idea of what to have for dinner – a never ending conundrum!
I think to truly experience all that the Taste of the Town offers one needs a scientific approach, much like a buffet eating plan. Dan Pashman, who hosts The Sporkful food podcast (https://www.sporkful.com) advocates serious scientific theories about the correct way to work a buffet line. Start with the meats, fish and other proteins, and leave the pastas, salads and bread for last. (I can’t remember how he weighs in for dessert, I’ll have to go back and listen again…) This is a great podcast, endlessly informative and amusing. Dan Pashman was a guest host on Sound Check this week and had a fascinating interview with Kelis: https://soundcheck.wnyc.org/story/kelis-in-studio/. Kelis is someone whose music doesn’t fall into my narrow range of folksie/show tune music, but now I think I will listen to some more of her music. She cooks, sings and writes – what a dynamic package of talent!
The Dinner Party Download is an hour-long podcast that is rich in jokes, discussion, celebrity interviews and music. Listening to it weekly will make you an enchanting dinner guest, whether you are balancing a plate on your knee, twirling pasta with fine sterling, or mingling under the big tent in Chestertown.
(https://www.dinnerpartydownload.org/). The podcast starts with a silly ice breaking joke that you can file away to use at your next dinner party. (This week’s guest Scarlett Johansson was hard pressed to remember the last dinner party she went to, so don’t feel left out.) But when you are standing in the queue for a sample of Crow Farm’s latest vintage, you can slyly interject this joke: “ ‘What do you call an alligator in a vest?’ ‘An investigator.’” They will either love you, or walk away, fast.
The Splendid Table (https://www.splendidtable.org/) is a little drier, but charming and highly informative. It has more cooking instructions than either the Dinner Party Download or The Sporkful. I enjoy the questions people ask the host, Lynne Rossetto Kasper, in the Stump the Cook segment. Sometime they are absurdly extreme. Here is a list of ingredients from a recent podcast, and Lynne is expected to recite an edible dish that can be made deliciously from them: Longjing tea, fruit (peaches and plums), preserved vegetables, fried dried fish maw and bittersweet chocolate.
What could you make from that? I am headed back to the Crow Farm queue…
I hope you get out of your cave and enjoy the spring weather. There is a lot going on this weekend. Plant a tree, visit the Farmers’ Market, buy a book, stroll through the Nearly New, enjoy your local talent and produce. And, as the inimitable Julia would say, “Bon Appétit!”
The sun was warm but the wind was chill
You know how it is with an April day.
-Robert Frost
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