Posts from — April 2009

The view from the parking lot. Circus? Airport?

“Come on, there will be lots of wine and food. You like that sort of thing,” I said easily persuading a friend to accompany me to the Texas Hill Country Wine and Food Festival. This was my first time to attend. For years, I’d looked at the schedule and thought that I should be there. I mustered up the energy (I had a cold in full effect) this year and attended with wine glass in hand. (It also helped that I received two free passes.) In doing this I broke my rule of not drinking while ill–a rule whose reasoning I was soon reminded of. But it was all worth it: the endless bottles of wine and delicious food all set against the Hill Country foothills of Driftwood, Texas.

It having stormed for the first half of the weekend, you would have expected it to be muddier, but the organizers had laid down an effective layer of hay and woodchips. There went one of my worries. The other was five hours in the sun drinking wine. Giant tents that evoked Cirque Du Soliel’s big top or the Denver airport sheltered most participants from the rays.

Wine is great, but food is where my true interests rest. I walked into the first food tent I saw and started munching away. Mandola’s was dishing out a delicately soft and loving ravioli alongside a hearty Italian sausage sandwich. The Salt Lick offered their trustworthy brisket and sausage, and I couldn’t help going back for seconds and thirds at the Pure Luck’s goat cheese stand.

I had heard that the food usually ran out around 2 p.m., so I continued in on the food, also sampling dishes from Spec’s, Sullivan’s, Café Josie, Maudie’s, and right about there, it all becomes a blur. It may have been due to my realization and that my mouth was dry and my subsequent solution. I was surrounded by wine as far as the eye could see.

There was a good mixture of large and small names in wine, distant and local, with an emphasis on local. I started out taking pitcures of wines that I liked, but soon realized the futility of it all. Not having any expectations, I wandered between tents, making sure to at least inspect each booth. (I passed up the Ste. Genevieve booth.)

The hoardes!

I was hoping to see familiar faces but didn’t run into as many people as I thought I would. It’s not surprising because the place was packed. At $45 a head, they must have pulled in a lot of money. Was it worth $45? If it weren’t a fundraiser, I would say no, but the Texas Wine and Food Foundation does good things like give scholarships to young culinary hopefuls. They’re looking out for the future of your taste buds, which are worth more than $45.

At some point I checked out the cooking demonstrations but have never found them that interesting, and I had missed the interview by Pat Sharpe. And they wouldn’t be giving food samples to you unless you had a coveted seat, which I did not. It was time to find something else.

At that point I realized that I had done everything once. It was time for seconds, which might not have been the best decision of the day. (Remembre that I was sick.)

Around 3 p.m. I started to get tired and already had a headache. Unfortunately this wasn’t the result of me stumbling around in a jovial haze. I just drank wine, felt nice, then was hit with a massive headache. Right about then I saw a man passed out near the live music tent. He summed up my state at that moment. It was time to start the two hour sobering up process and drink as much water and coconut water as comfortable. I departed at 4p.m. because the wine had stopped and I wanted to beat the rush.

This guy had the right idea.

The drive back was pleasant and somehow took less time than I remembered. I must have been daydreaming about the day that had just happened. I’ll most likely return next year, even if I have to pay. Sampling wine and food in the Texas spring sun isn’t a bad way to spend a day.

Each season, I seems to select a food theme. Living in Austin means only two distinct seasons exist and that I have to make the most of each theme. Themes pop up in many area of my life. For instance, I’ve decided to spend the summer drinking copious amounts of pastis and playing pétanque. Whether or not I chose the themes or they chose me is up for debate.

For instance, in my CSA box today, I found a bunch of turnip greens. In my search for a great pairing, I zeroed in on some lima beans: a meal that I used to eat as a child. All that was missing was some cornbread.

My family grew up in Northern Louisiana and we had rice and beans four nights out of seven. Some sort of greens usually accompanied each dish and bacon was usually started the cooking process. The food was simple and hearty. Focusing on my childhood cuisine seems pertinent. I’m trying to eat simpler, healthier foods that don’t break the bank. Rice, beans, and greens fit that description pretty well.

Simpler and healthier has been my focus lately. I don’t know if it’s maturity or the fact that I’m getting older, wiser, and chili dogs with 13 beers hurts like hell these days. Something tells me it’s the latter. I’ve also become aware of my physical state and want to look and feel my best. This has resulted in me eating less processed foods to the point where they are now unpalatable. I look for foods with the least number of ingredients and now go through the trouble to make beef stroganoff from scratch instead of from a packet because it tastes better and I know exactly what goes into it. As revolution happens inside of me, I notice similar changes happening all around me. Natural grocers are becoming more and more prevalent. There are more cyclists on the road each year. I hope this trend continues and reaches beyond cities like Austin into small towns and stores like Safeway and Kroger.

Regardless of what happens in the world, I’m returning to my roots of Lousiana cuisine and am excited. Cornbread, beans, rice, gumbo, étouffée, and more gumbo. I can’t go wrong.

P.S. I have not yet moved to my new URL simply because it has involved more than I thought and I’m trying to get it right the first time.

Don’t you hate when perfectly good food rots in your fridge? In my kitchen, this happens all of the time. No matter how hard I try to eat everything, veggies get slimy, fruits get fuzzy, and cottage cheese morphs into another type of cheese, which is why I’m elated each time I figure out a way to simultaneously rid myself of more than one item.

Having a CSA box arrive every two weeks creates a lot of these situations. In addition to the foods that satisfy my capricious cravings, there’s always a box of delicate perishables speeding towards death. In order to save my veggies from the compost, I am forced to get creative, and sometimes it takes a lot of creativity to reach the obvious solution: BBQ and greens.

You might be asking yourself if there’s anything with which BBQ doesn’t go. There isn’t. And I proclaim myself a genius every time I add it to a dish, but I’m simply following that natural order of things: BBQ is awesome. Add it to something and you get awesome. I now realize that I’m not a culinary genius, but rather, a simpleton who took too long to reach the obvious conclusion.