In a piece I read in the New York Times, the criticizing author noted that the best way to mastering a salad (a sadly neglected dish of a meal) is to focus on what the French do: a solid vinaigrette. I would have to agree that we definitely have ruined the beauty of salad-making in America. Iceberg lettuce seems to serve as an appropriate base despite its lack of substance and nutrition (yes, I do have some weird hatred for it). A house salad is usually a toss of roughly chopped iceberg lettuce, dry sticks of carrot, and wimpy red cabbage doused in thick, fatty ranch dressing. Sound familiar? All too much.

So a quick run-through the article leads to some tips for mastering a salad by mastering vinaigrette. How interesting that it is easy enough to whip up. Give yourself some high quality ingredients of olive oil, wine vinegar, salt, and pepper to start. You can get a little creative after that but the basics lie in these main ingredients in the proper proportions. Make the salad leaves glisten, not drown. Give the article a read and let me know what you think about salads.

Reader questions: What do you dress your salads with? What do you think of American salads? Do you like vinaigrettes? Do you make your own salad dressings? Do you like to eat salads?

Original article: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/02/dining/mastering-a-vinaigrette-dressing.html

I read an interesting article yesterday that made me really think about my relationship with food versus my parents' relationships with food. The article focused on the tension that the author felt between the kids of the family and the parents when it came to food. The children had grown up and moved to more artisan food-centric areas such as New York and San Francisco from their hometown of San Antonio. Thus, reunions with the parents lead to frustrations and disagreements on what constitutes good food - I believe she even stated that there are often shouting matches!

Well, I'm not that bad with my parents. In fact, for the general part, they are quite open to the foods I cook because they know that I have put some work into it. I think they try the food more out of courtesy to my effort and love for me than out of curiosity about the new types of food I try to introduce into the household. When it comes to eating out, they steer towards either Asian restaurants or make the argument that it doesn't make sense to eat out because it's cheaper at home (the latter option being more common). As the article's author points out, much of the older generation (particularly immigrants) grew up looking at food as just sustenance. What filled your stomach was what got you through the day. Who needed all the pomp and fluff that accompanies much of the food we consume today? Food was a means of survival.

Are we so spoiled now that we must have our plates given to us with artistic flourishes and unused droplets of reductions/pestos/etc on the borders? I included a picture above of when my parents went to North Carolina for my graduation at Duke. I took them to a cafe I really enjoyed but the menu contained much outside of their knowledge. They had me order for them and generally liked what I got since I based my choices off of their tastes but they did question almost everything and definitely scrunched their noses at the bill. No heated arguments ensued (unlike in the author's case) but the differences were still visible. Questions like, "Why do they give so little?" "Why does it cost so much?" "Why is everything complicated?" arose during lunch, and I didn't have satisfactory answers.

Are they wrong? Am I wrong? The generational gap that comes with every family touches on many things but because food is so ingrained in our culture and society, regardless of whether it's considered high or low-brow, it can become a point of contention. My mom is always asking me why I eat out so often and points to it as the reason for weight gain. I ask her why she doesn't want to try new things and tell her that her diet needs to change for better health reasons. Small things but constant reminders of differences. I have just been re-inspired to keep to my roots as I move forward in my food exploration; after all, my mom was the one who got me interested in food in the first place! On the plus side, my older brother moved to New York earlier this year so we definitely have grown closer over newfound foods and palate changes. During this holiday season, I encourage you to read the article and think about it & the following quote from it:

Dr. [William J. Doherty, a social science professor at the University of Minnesota,] suspects that parents in suburban and rural areas harbor unspoken pride in their children’s culinary snobbery. Yes, we can be insufferable to dine with, but we can also afford to eat out and learn about foods that were not available where we grew up. But like working-class parents who sacrificed to send their children to college, only to find that they have little in common, different tastes can also highlight familial growing pains.

“Food is a symptom and a symbol of change and how people grow apart,” said Heather Paxson, an anthropology professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “People want their kids to do better, but there’s also the fear that they’ll be left behind or judged as lacking in some way.”

Reader questions: Do you have disagreements with your parents when it comes to food? How bad are they? What are your and your parents' perspectives on food? Where are each of you coming from?

Orignal article: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/19/dining/bridging-the-generation-gap-one-meal-at-a-time.html

I wanted to attach a super happy picture (though it's a year old) of myself because that's how I felt when Gary Schwind retweeted to me an interesting link. Though he is a music writer by trade, on occasion he covers food and drink. Lucky for me, his research for CBS Los Angeles led to an article posting the best Orange County foodies to follow on Twitter. Of the eight listed on that article, @MuchAdoBlog was one of them! I had such a huge smile on my face when I read that, especially since the majority of the others on the list were food trucks. Thanks Gary, and I hope I will see new faces on my Twitter, FB, and blog soon =].

Reader questions: Do you have any suggestions/requests to improve my blog and its content? Do you already follow me on Twitter? If not, DO! There are things that get tweeted and not loaded to the blog itself.

Original article: http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/top-lists/best-orange-county-foodies-to-follow-on-twitter/

So Duc's told me that as the wine market grows in China and other countries, the rate of counterfeits has gone up (trust us Asians to fake even wine...). That's understandable - I mean, widely distributed goods eventually ends up in the wrong hands or for the wrong purpose. With something as expensive and indicative of high class as wine, it was inevitable. However, what about faux wines handled domestically? Using different grapes than advertised or re-corking isn't improbable.

"The most publicized claim of fake wine (so far) involves billionaire American wine collector Bill Koch, who has filed four lawsuits alleging that he was sold fraudulent wine, including a 1784 Château Lafite reputedly owned by Thomas Jefferson. (Koch’s story, and his outrage, have inspired a book, The Billionaire’s Vinegar, that is soon to be turned into a movie.)"

I read an article about a Food & Wine writer who decided to take it upon herself and try to imitate a wine, checking if she could scam her dinner guests. She paid a hefty price (in general,  not for the wine itself) for a 100-point ’82 Château Mouton Rothschild which came in at $1,200. That's a top notch price for a little dirty trick. Her scamming of the wine involved replacing the actual Mouton with another wine that was similar enough to hopefully fool her wine aficionado friends. Did it? Well the suspense is held in the writing so check out the article below!

Reader questions: Would you know the difference? If a person didn't know the difference, is it so bad that they paid their premium for the wine? How often do you think this will happen?

Original article: http://www.foodandwine.com/articles/wine-scams-a-counterfeiter-confesses