When we memorialized my Uncle Joe under the canopy of a public gazebo overlooking the Pacific Ocean in La Jolla, California, on a July afternoon in 1982, we laughed about his last meal, taken in a hospital bed the night before the heart surgery that would be his undoing.
The irony of this gourmet dining on a Big Mac and fries was inescapable.
The physician-son of Sicilian immigrants, Uncle Joe was, to use the vernacular, a “foodie.” Though he’d never heard that word, I suspect he’d have hated it as much as I do.
Uncle Joe’s food mantra was simple, direct and challenging: the weirder something is to put in one’s mouth, the more exciting the experience might be.
Thus was his motivation for sticking a piece of what I assume was raw octopus into my nine-year-old mouth (we’re talking 1960 here) and instructing me to chew. His son, John, thinks that the octopus was probably grilled. Raw or grilled, it delivered to my young palate a ten on the scale of weirdness, a zero in excitement. After many minutes of labored exertion, I asked if this gelatinous, tasteless glob that seemed to actually increase in size as I chewed it, should be swallowed or be stuck under my chair like a piece of contraband gum at school.
In anticipation of her meeting him for the very first time, I warned Geri about Uncle Joe on the drive to Huntington Beach, California. She’d heard countless stories about him over the years, but I thought she might have needed more extensive briefings.
“He’ll probably stick some weird food in your mouth. It’s what he does.”
Geri is pretty no-nonsense about a lot of things, food being one of them. Her likes and dislikes are well-established to those who know her. So is her sense of decorum.
“Please,” I begged her once as she was leaving for a girl’s retreat to Key West, “just lie and tell them you’re allergic to fish. If you say you don’t like fish, they’ll take it as a challenge.”
Uncle Joe, divorced from Aunt Grace after who-knows-how-many-years and seven children, had settled with his new bride, Rosemary, in this Orange County suburb.
Having given up his medical practice for any number of stated reasons, Uncle Joe continued his quest as a restaurateur. It had long been his interest, having opened a Mexican drive-in in Westchester, Illinois, in 1962 (the same year Taco Bell opened in Southern California) and, later, an Italian joint called Tony’s Ats-a-Nice. He also dabbled in some pizza joints, marketing a stuffed pizza that he thought would fill every frozen-food aisle in America.
It didn’t.
Despite his scientific mind and successful medical practice, Uncle Joe was a dreamer. He was a showman, with a great sense of theater, but no time for drama. I learned from him that the quality of a restaurant diner’s experience was more important than profit.
In retrospect, it is a lesson I wish I hadn’t learned. Oh, well…
Uncle Joe’s newest venture at the very end of the seventies was Lombardo’s, a large Italian place whose focus seemed to be fine-dining pizza.
Joe answered the door that Saturday afternoon, welcoming Geri with open arms and Italian-style kisses (both cheeks). He was wearing grass-stained checkered chef’s pants and a T-shirt that had seen much better days.
“Jesus Christ!” came a scream from the kitchen. “Can’t you even dress up for company?”
“Meet the Bickersons,” I whispered to Geri.
Joe dutifully departed down a hallway and Rosemary greeted us warmly, leading us to a large kitchen table. We sat. Rosemary returned to the stove and Joe reappeared, resplendent in his grass-stained checkered chef’s pants, an un-tucked, ruffled white shirt and black-satin bow-tie.
Joe delivered four plastic tumblers and a jug of Chianti to the table with all the aplomb of a diner waitress. I filled the glasses and within a moment, her no-nonsense sensibilities taken seriously aback, Geri had a pork neck bone protruding from the corner of her mouth.
“Told ya.”
I’M CONVINCED THAT “foodies” are a bit too fussy. Unlike great masses of people in various parts of our world, they are greatly concerned about what they’re going to eat; others wonder if they’re going to eat at all.
They concern themselves with all matters of food, which, in and of itself, isn’t terrible. But so many of their concerns seem silly: an exhibited penchant for trend-spotting, the openings, closings, and menu changes of restaurants in towns and cities far from their homes. They yammer on about sustainability, locavores, farm-to-table, wood-burning ovens, organic, grass-fed whatever, classes, cookbooks, ethnic cuisines, tourism, health and nutrition.
Let’s face it: those are concerns by people who can afford to have such concerns. They are luxury concerns that, for the most part, exclude the dedicated parent wanting to place a nice plate of nutritious food on the table.
Each of those are topics worthy of some kind of discussion and perhaps I’ll add my two-cents-worth on each topic at some point. But at this moment I feel compelled to comment on the sustainable, locavore farm-to-table thing.
Alice Waters, bless her entrepreneurial soul, built something of a food empire based on the way most of us born before 1957 grew up eating. I grew up in Chicago and the only produce I can recall eating that didn’t have a season was bananas. I vaguely remember oranges and grapefruits as well—exotic imports from Florida. I never ate a tomato or an ear of corn in February. Those were foods available in July, August and September. From early summer to late fall, we ate lots of fresh vegetables. The rest of the year we ate dried beans, onions, potatoes and cabbage, and the green beans, applesauce, and sauerkraut my grandmother canned.
What Ms. Waters has accomplished, in my estimation, is to remind people of a certain age that the way we once ate had been lost and she wanted to refocus our attentions to that sort of attitude toward food.
From her very pricey Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, California, Ms. Waters contradicts much of her philosophy with her wine list of mostly French wines, and produce that is grown exclusively for her establishment.
Nobody is without faults, and I applaud Ms. Waters for her culinary efforts.
For the record, I also prefer French wines.
Food styling and photography by Courtney A. Liska
Fettuccine ala Toscana
A delightful pasta dish. Add any vegetables you might like and bacon, a cheaper alternative to prosciutto, works just fine.
1 lb. fettuccine
2 oz. prosciutto, thinly sliced and diced
15 oz. ricotta, whole milk, drained
¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 cup heavy cream
3 Tbs. olive oil
¼ cup onion, finely chopped
fresh nutmeg
1 lb. fresh asparagus – trimmed, thinly sliced diagonally
fresh basil, torn
salt and black pepper
Cook pasta according to package instructions and drain. Do not rinse. Reserve a cup of cooking liquid.
In a large bowl, whisk together the ricotta, cream, 2 tbsp. Parmesan, salt, pepper, and a few scrapings of fresh nutmeg. Set aside.
In a large skillet, over medium heat, heat oil. Add the asparagus, onions, and prosciutto.
Cook while stirring often for about 5 minutes or until the asparagus are tender-crisp.
Add the hot pasta and the Parmesan cheese to the pot. Toss well and top with ricotta sauce and sprinkle with torn basil.