Carpaccio: Vol. 2, No. 2: Ellie, Whitey and Why I Love Black People

Forget swimming pools and movie stars. Try Kool-Aid and Black People...

           

         IN GENERAL, I DO NOT eat soul food. Ribs, chicken, cornbread, mac and cheese, yes…but, deep cuts, nah. I do not like pig’s feet. Or chitterlings. Or black-eyed peas. Or collards. When black people learn this about me they do not care that my people are from Barbados and not Alabama. They not only demand my union card, they want me to volunteer it. With shame. I tell them I earn it back every time I buy a house and months after receive a letter from the state’s attorney general telling me the mortgage companies racially profiled me, overcharged me on points and interest rate and thus my name has been added to a class-action discrimination suit (You laugh, but it’s happened two of the three times I’ve purchased a home. Mortgage Master, Bank of America and Wells Fargo, all guilty).

            I love the improvisational genius of black people. The making something out of nothing valuable _ so valuable that white people will want what they gave us back _ is the genius of hip hop. The conditions, the environment, the danger, the utter lack of resources – are the ghetto, and yet black people found a way to turn those conditions, designed by the state and private industry to ensure the failure of an entire people, into a billion-dollar sound. Nobody like us.

Taking nothing (for example the unwanted remains of a slaughtered pig) and making an international cuisine of it, was rooted in survival but is also an example of that improvisational genius. And let there be no mistake: black people were never intended to make it here. We were brought here to work. For free. We ate what was left, and now soul food restaurants are so cool they exist in Scottsdale, Arizona, a place that as late as the early 1960s did not allow black people within city limits after dark. Nevertheless, I remain undeterred. You can call me inauthentic. You can demand by black card,. You can disinvite me to the cookout (I’m coming, anyway), but chitterlings are, and forever will be, pig intestines. 

And they are nasty.

My mother used to stink up our house cooking chitlins. I would turn green and she would sneer, “You’re not my son.” It was in this spirit of emotional scarring that I arrived at Lo Lo’s Chicken and Waffles in Scottsdale.

            Lo Lo’s has been in Scottsdale for years. It is where black baseball people meet. Chicken and Waffles sound alternately delicious and repulsive (two sides of the American coin when it comes to food). In the spring of 2017, after a morning at Giants camp, former all-star Ellis Burks and I did Lo Lo’s for lunch. Ellis played 17 years in the big leagues _ Red Sox, White Sox, Rockies (Shoulda been MVP in 1996), Giants, Indians, and lastly won a ring with the 2004 Red Sox _ and now works as a special assistant with the Giants. Shawon Dunston, a Giants coach and another former all-star, was supposed to join us, but he did not.

              

Ellis Burks: 18 years, 2,107 hits, 352 HRs, two-time All-Star, one Hall of Fame story.

            We sat at a high top, a long table for multiple diners, but it was just the two of us. The food is enormous, colossally unhealthy but decadently good (I had the Phat Azz Samich: catfish, cheese, bacon on a brioche bun). Fitting for America, virtually everyone both working and dining at the restaurant would be medically classified as morbidly obese. The food smelled good. It tasted damned good, and I was getting _ as they say in Oakland _ hella mad.

Some people let their politics get in the way of their sports. Others let politics get in the way of their sex. My politics get in the way of my food. Pig’s feet smell awful. It’s been so long I cannot remember having ever tasted them, but despite my admiration for our entrepreneurial genius, my politics are insulted that I am asked to eat what other cultures throw away. I am told to like it. I am inauthentic if I don't. I am told to disregard the obvious health hazards to eating our cultural cuisine. I am told, even more disgustingly than the smell of chitterlings, that rejecting eating the dregs, all that they would let us have, is not only anti-black but a plea to be white. That is some bullshit.

“Yeah to all that,” my cousin Chuck once said. “But chitlins with some hot sauce taste goooooood.”  

            Lo Lo’s sells Kool-Aid. Not fruit punch. Kool-Aid. For reals. Ellis and I laughed at the stereotype in commercial action, especially as the brothers in there were drinking it was Fiji water, the natural spring of the homeland. I look over Ellis’ shoulder and there is San Francisco Chronicle beat writer Henry Schulman, getting down on a lunch special while tapping on the laptop. When they served it in 32-OUNCE MASON JARS, I started going dark again. Death by Kool-Aid and waffles. The Diabetes Special. Killing ourselves isn’t funny.

"What's your favorite flavor?"
"Blue."

            I love being around the black heritage of baseball. I first interviewed Ellis Burks in 1997 at the Oakland Coliseum. Rockies-A’s interleague. He was taking batting practice listening to Cameo’s “Candy” on the loudspeaker and singing along. Jim Rice taught him how to tip, how to be a big leaguer. We’ve known each other 20 years. We laugh at the time back in Boston when his manager Joe Morgan (the other one) brought him into his office, circa 1989 or 1990. He was hitting over .300. The team was playing well. Morgan was rambling. Burks was wondering why he was in the manager's office. Then Morgan dropped it on him: Somebody saw Burks with a white girl and it got back to Morgan. 

      "Just be careful," Morgan told his young centerfielder. "I hear you been chasing that cat a little bit too hard lately."

      "That cat?"

     "Yeah. That white cat. I hear you been getting after it lately." 

            We order. There’s blue Kool-Aid on my table. An old white man walks by who reminds me of Whitey Bulger. I dive into the Phat Azz samich. Ellis says matter-of-factly, “Did I ever tell you the time I hung out with Whitey Bulger?”

Uhhhhhhhhhhhh….Whaaa?

     

Black Jeopardy answer: "Did I ever tell you the time I hung out with Whitey Bulger?"
What is, "Something you never expected Ellis Burks to say?"                                       

        "Had to be my rookie year,” he says. “I was out one night after a game at some bar and these guys were talking and they come over to me and a couple of friends. These were big guys surrounding one guy. This guy was the somebody, because no one did anything unless he said to. Everybody was afraid of him. A half-dozen people waited on him hand and foot. The whole time I was there he was asking me about the team, so I figured he was another Red Sox superfan. He’s asking about Boggs and Clemens, injuries. They wanted inside stuff on guys – who was healthy, who was having marital problems. What was going on with this guy’s slump, whatever.

“Then a couple of his guys asked me if I wanted to come hang out at their place. I didn’t know the difference between the South End and Southie, so I said, ‘Yeah.’ And I end up in Southie. Seriously. Like I said, I had just gotten to Boston. I was brand new. So we go to this place _ this unbelievable penthouse _ and it is wild: girls, bodyguards, people hanging out. It’s crazy. The guy tells me to take whatever I want. And he’s pointing at the girls, too. I said I had a girlfriend. He said ‘Everybody does.’ Then they start wheeling out serving carts with cereal bowls full of cocaine. Anything you want. It’s yours.

            “Now, I see that shit, and I’m getting scared. I can’t be around no kind of drugs. I gotta get outta there. I tell them, ‘I gotta go. We’ve got a game tomorrow.’ I get ready to leave and he says to me, ‘I know this town. I know how this town is. If anyone – ANYONE – gives you any shit, for any reason, you come see me, all right?’ All night, I had no idea who he was. End of the story. Never saw him again. Never spoke to him again. That was it. All these years later, he gets caught. I see it on TV and I was like, ‘OH SHIT THAT’S THE GUY!!’” - HB

Carpaccio: Vol. 2, No. 1: (In your best Rakim voice) 🎶It’s been a long time...🎶

So, HB, where you been? 

How does a person lose themselves so completely? Writing this, I feel like Don Corleone, sitting at the table with the Five Families, asking the question, "How did things get so far?" I am, of course, talking about Carpaccio, and the last entry being nearly four years ago, Aug. 3, 2014. How could four whole years pass without a single entry to this frivolity I enjoy so much? 

The first answer is unsatisfactory but kinda true: There are only so many words. On book project, I tend to marshal the words I do have in me into the manuscript I'm working on. It is not an infinite reservoir of words and one must be judicious, focusing on the project instead of some bullshit appraisal of the octopus at Landmarc (above average, by the way). 

This justification for not writing isn't just unsatisfactory, but I'm mistaken: it's patently untrue. Plenty of words have been spilled that never made it between two covers. A quick look at my Twitter profile says I tweeted 77.1k times since 2009, cutting that roughly in half would mean maybe 40,000 tweets at 160 characters is a lot of words that could have been allocated to Carpaccio but instead were spent sparring back and forth online. This is inexcusable. 

The second answer is more pure: I lost interest in this little hobby. The last entry was Aug. 3, 2014, a few days before police killed Michael Brown in Ferguson. Ferguson is a true demarcating line in America, and an intensely personal one for me, where black folk especially, regardless of our historical layers of protected covering were reminded in ways maybe we wanted to forget not to feel as though equality had been achieved, that the state is now colorblind, or your ability to be served at Morton's means Morton's wants to serve you, or its customers want you in the dining room or both don't still believe it's their dining room and they're graciously allowing you to enjoy sitting in it. It has always been better to assume nobody cares if you're in there or not, but that would be foolish. 

Ferguson was followed by "Hands Up, Don't Shoot!" and Jordan Davis and Sandra Bland and Tamir Rice and Philando Castile and Alton Sterling and suddenly my feelings about the Sunrise Roll at Roy's not only felt unimportant but offensive. Who the fuck cares about your fancy dinner? 

Four years later, the second answer still applies, what with Stephon Clark being shot in the back by Sacramento police and Houston Texans owner Bob McNair essentially saying "Sorry not sorry" for apologizing to players for calling them "inmates" a few months ago. The issues haven't gone anywhere. 

Still, writers write and you use the times around you to write differently, feel differently. The desire to resume Carpaccio has returned, to chronicle the often bizarre and humorous life of covering sports, the food encounters that come with it – and the people at my tables. Humor is important and so is an outlet, so let's not take any of this too seriously. 

As I told a friend earlier this evening, if this blog ever amounts to nothing more than the uninteresting exercise of me snapping pictures of my dinner and assessing the consistency of my parsnips, feel free to slap the shit out of me. It's a standing offer. - HB

Art, Billy and The Capital Grille

"Are you what you seem to be?"

ONE DAY DURING  his last season as general manager of the Chicago Cubs, I trekked over to Mesa, Arizona and interviewed Jim Hendry. The setting was perfect, old-time baseball: walking around the spring training facility under the morning Arizona sun, hearing the pop of dozens of baseballs into catcher's mitts echoing across the facility, never quite far from the back of one's mind that back home everyone was digging themselves out of their parking spaces, staking their territory by digging out their parking spaces and placing a folding chair in the cleared spot, a modern sign of medieval intentions, or just clicking their electric car starters, counting the days, while we, the gilded, sat at a picnic table discussing on the record how if things just went right the Cubs could win, and then off the record how this fucking team didn't have a chance. It was the good life.

Jim was a particular pleasure to talk to, not because he was a baseball genius but precisely because he wasn't. Like managers who actually had authority, Hendry's people, the baseball men who did not have MBAs from Ivy League schools and did not resemble young Wall Street sharks, were out of time. The image of Theo Epstein, Blackberry (now iPhone) glued to the side of his face, suggesting his rise was the product non-stop work (as well as a self-important shield against being approached) would soon replace Hendry knocking back a gin and tonic as the front-office archetype.

Jim Hendry: A good man out of time...

While walking across the back fields with my old friend Marty Lurie, Marty's phone rings. Marty talks for a few minutes and hands me the phone.
"He wants to talk to you."
I take the phone.
"Howard," the voice said. "HE MADE ME LOOK LIKE A FUCKING ASSHOLE!"
It was Art Howe, former manager of the Oakland A's.
"He" was Billy Beane, still GM of the Oakland A's.
"He" was also the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, who portrayed Howe in Moneyball.

Art never sported a prodigious gut like that underneath his windbreaker.

Art Howe was the first manager I covered in the big leagues. It was April 1998 and I was the beat man for the San Jose Mercury News. The A's were not a good team and nor were they expected to be. They were, however, expected to have a bright future. Two players, Ben Grieve and A.J. Hinch, were to contribute immediately. Grieve even won Rookie of the Year, and after every big game, Billy would say, "He's got a swing like Tiger Woods." Two other kids, Miguel Tejada and Eric Chavez, would be called up that year. Two more, Mark Mulder and Tim Hudson would arrive the next year. In 2000, the year Hudson won 20 games, Barry Zito would be next and beat Roger Clemens at Yankee Stadium in the playoffs that fall.

Art was a solid baseball man. In his office was a newspaper clipping of his finest moment as a pro, when the Houston Astros won their first division title. One-game, playoff, October 6, 1980, at Dodger Stadium. Howe went 3 for 5 with a home run and four RBI in a 7-1 win. Howe kept the banner headline of the Houston Chronicle the next day above his desk. It read:

"HOWE THE WEST WAS WON."

"I may look like Kandy Korn, but I can play."

Perhaps most importantly, it would be in 1998 that GM Sandy Alderson would step aside and his heir apparent, Billy Beane, would take over, become a famous baseball innovator, innovations made famous first by Michael Lewis' runaway best seller Moneyball and then by Brad Pitt playing Beane in the film. Beane was also innovative in tormenting Art Howe every chance he got, making him the first real casualty of the coming analytics war. The coup de grace came on the big screen. While Pitt's Beane was sharp and quick and three dimensional and human, Hoffman's Howe was sullen and unlettered, selfishly obsessed with his contract as the team won, representative for all America to see of a man whose sport Beane in real life believed had passed him by. The only greater indignity would've been if Hoffman, while portraying Howe channeled his inner Scotty from Boogie Nights and asked, "Billy, can I kiss you on the mouth?"

"I'm such a fucking idiot!"

Before meeting Art Howe, I did not know the word “Monkeyfucked” existed in the English language, nevermind know it was a verb. We were in Detroit, in old Tiger Stadium. Grieve misplayed a fly ball in right by hesitating, stepping back, then charging a ball that would clang off of both his shin and glove before ricocheting past him. A four-run inning ensued, and the A’s would lose again.

Afterward, when the cameras left and it was just the writers, the tape recorders turned off, Art summed up the evening.

“We had a chance until Ben monkeyfucked that ball.”

Art Howe was not only responsible for adding to my vocabulary, but he also took me to my first big-time steakhouse. Once a season, Art took the beat writers out to dinner. In 1999, he treated us to Ruth’s Chris in Toronto and it marked an appreciation of the American steakhouse that exists to this day. 

Flying 56,000 miles on American produced its own share of monotony, but it was there, up in the air, where I noticed the ad for the great independent steakhouses across the country and began the journey of sampling many, from Bob's in Fort Worth to Plaza III in Kansas City to Berns in Tampa to Manny's in Minneapolis and Gibson's in Chicago. The enjoyment of the steakhouse even forced the repeated violation of HB Food Rule No. 2: (No chain restaurants unless completely necessary).

Having visited the Boston (the old Newbury Street location), New York, Philadelphia and Hartford locations, The Capital Grille represented one of those repeated violations and also one of the great conflicts. 

There is not a bad choice on the Capital Grille menu. The beef carpaccio is superb. The Potatoes Oscar (potatoes with asparagus, lump crab and Bernaise sauce) is stunning and the steaks, even though I am not adventurous, preferring my bone-out filet, medium rare, are first-class. The only thing better than the food at Capital Grille is the service. Yes, they actually keep a database of their customers and the locations they've visited to provide them premium VIP service. That, or they send it directly to the NSA as part of its nationwide spying program in the name of patriotism...   

A Capital Grille burger with Parmesan truffle fries - and a sidecar.

Rules, however, were NOT meant to be violated and the price of Capital Grille deliciousness is the face-to-face collision with morality and worldview. The Capital Grille is a high-end continuation of the homogenizing of America - a Capital Grille is not a bonus for being in a city, as is Manny's or St. Elmo's in Indianapolis, but part of the ubiquity of Anywhere, USA, the corporatocracy at full octane. 

As the Lexus is really nothing more than a Toyota, the Infiniti is a Nissan and the Audi a Volkswagen, the Capital Grille is the top of a chain, but still a chain. Its family of restaurants includes Red Lobster and Olive Garden and the defunct Bugaboo Creek Steakhouse, and that is the problem with chains, they have too many links. 

All the pieces matter.

The links are perilous: supporting the Capital Grille is essential to the pursuit of a high-quality gastronomy. Its existence also stands in complete opposition to how I view the world. It's like shopping at Home Depot (which I have been known to do) or eating at Subway (which I do not).

Maybe there is no stopping the dismal tide, but understanding America is understanding who signs the checks, of knowing that money may be power but knowing where the money is going and controlling that flow is even more power.It has always surprised me how surprised people are to discover ESPN is owned by Disney. Darden Restaurants Inc., owns the Capital Grille, so supporting them means supporting Olive Garden and its cookie-cutter nothingness, LongHorn Steakhouse, Bahama Breeze, Seasons 52, Eddie V's and the sports pub Yard House. To know is to be forewarned.  

Art Howe was right about many things. While ridiculed on the silver screen, he was ultimately right about Grieve. During Grieve's sensational Rookie of the Year campaign, Art would privately say, "He can't hit a breaking ball. I mean, not even a bad one. I have no idea why anyone throws him a fastball." 

At first it sounded like typical baseball-speak. The game of failure also produces a language of failure and managers, coaches and scouts all tend to concentrate on what a player cannot do instead of what he can. 

Art was right, though. Opponents caught on and the amount of fastballs he saw slowed slowed to a trickle. Grieve would never be as good as he was that rookie year, but still lasted nine seasons in the big leagues. 

He was also right in his choice of restaurants. Ruth's Chris, too, is a chain with 136 franchised locations, the largest luxury steakhouse chain in the country, but it is still of high quality despite its expansion. Oddly, I've never gone back to a Ruth's Chris since Toronto.

The Capital Grille, meanwhile, is a spectacular dining experience coupled with the gnawing dilemma of resisting my politics and patronizing the chain. Perhaps it is incumbent upon me to forgive the chain for top service in return. Peace is made in such ways, but so are slaves. Mel Gibson said so in Braveheart. Thanks a lot, Art.

Gorgonzola-topped filet mignon in red wine sauce with potatoes Oscar

Emerging from the spiral...

  Once, I used to write in my journal daily. I had many things to say, usually from about 38,000 feet traveling from one city to the next as life on the baseball beat dictates. One day, the journal writing stopped, not because I was more mature or more together; indeed life has only grown more complicated even as it has gotten better.

 The reason was because I had run out of words. Book writing killed journal writing because I have a certain number of words in me over a given time. How David Foster Wallace wrote "Infinite Jest" is beyond me.

Book writing, long-form ESPN writing and column writing seemed also to kill blog writing. Jeff Pearlman is a machine, writing books and blogs prolifically and with style. I, alas, am but a man.
A man, whoever is coming out of the abyss. There are words again, and this emergence promises to be sustained. Having written exactly one blog post in the last 18 months is embarrassing, yes, but another factor for the disappearance of the Carpaccio Files must be confronted: taking pictures of food has only been eclipsed by the selfie for sheer obnoxiousness. In bad economies, with friends losing jobs, with Gaza being destroyed and cops (still) killing black people, a photo of a Gorgonzola rib-eye from Roast seemed pretentious at best and at worst, colossally insensitive. If you're going to look like an asshole, at least let it be inadvertent...of course, being an asshole usually consists of some premeditation.

Still I do love art and food is often art, and here is a place to discuss an appreciate that art. Facebook is gone for me. If I cannot stand selfies of toes in sand no one should be subject to photos of my next sidecar...

Whoever comes here, however, is doing so because they love the art of food and the discussions of food and the magic of food (despite the deep disappointments that spurred HB rule no. 1: Never experiment when you're hungry).

A weekend in Boston for Sox-Royals landed me downtown, at Legal Crossing on the corner of Washington and Avenue de Lafayette. Legal may have, because of its popularity and expansion seemed like the McDonalds of Boston seafood, but the quality of the fried oysters far surpassed a Filet o' Fish...

Fried oysters with aioli...

After oysters, Fenway...A very Boston afternoon...

The weekend progressed with stops at an old standby, the sturdy Fleming's in Park Square. Yes, Fleming's is a direct violation of HB Rule No. 2: No chain restaurants, but like Roy's each rule has its exceptions. Capital Grille, while clearly overpriced, is another one.

Zocalo, on Stanhope, nestled on a side street between the South End and Back Bay, was a the Sunday spot and it didn't move me as it should have. A new tequila bar with chuletas de puerco on the menu should have been consistent with my "never experiment when you're hungry" edict, but because it was a new place, I could not vouch. 

The chuletas, like Zocalo, wasn't a complete failure, because the food was generally good despite the deafening noise of the lunch crowd. At the very least, it, like most things in life, deserves a second chance.

That, obviously, is an overcooked pork chop with spinach and mashed potato underneath...

The drought finally ends...

After an embarrassing year of dormancy, and numerous broken promises, the Carpaccio Files live again, brought fully to life by the Leaf Peeper: Apple brandy, riesling, cointreau and local maple syrup. - Peter Havens, Brattleboro, VT

Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone.

A Return to Detroit, with a new find....

DETROIT – A year ago, I made a pledge: No more complaining about Detroit. The dark days of Dearborn are long gone. The town itself and its people _ tough and unpretentious _ deserve respect, not ridicule. The old ballpark, Tiger Stadium, was iconic and the new, Comerica Field, is modern and excellent. The old, dreary combination of The Athaneum and Fishbones, dreary because of its lack of variety, has been replaced by more hotel choices and better restaurants.


The potential problem with this year’s postseason is not Detroit, but the lethal combination of Detroit and St. Louis, the equivalent of mixing bleach and ammonia. So many better combinations were once in play, such as a Giants-A’s World Series, a holy grail of gastronomy. Or New York-San Francisco. Or Oakland-Washington. A Detroit-San Francisco World Series would be welcome (and as fate would have it…)

By dint of taking out the Oakland A’s and nailing the Yankees to the floorboards to the tune of a four-game sweep in the League Championship Series, Detroit and its rolled-up sleeves earned the spot, which meant not only a second chance to win the World Series after losing to the Cardinals in 2006, but the recognition on my part to embrace Detroit.
And what wasn't to like? Every restaurant and bar in Detroit pumps Motown through the speakers and Jeff Daniels, from Dumb and Dumber (NOT the Newsroom) showed up for Game 3.

"Actually, it's a cardigan, but thanks for asking."

During last year’s Tigers-Rangers ALCS, my main objective was Roast (www.roastdetroit.com), an opportunity lost to a long rain delay that turned an afternoon game into an all-night affair. This year, it was an opportunity that would not pass by.

Roast, located at 1128 Washington Blvd, on the first floor of the Westin Book Cadillac hotel, is the brainchild of the well-known chef Michael Symon, who made various appearances on the Food Network. The theme of the restaurant, like its name suggests, is a celebration of meat. Lamb, pork, beef are all on an eclectic menu.

Nobody likes to be ridiculed, and when I saw the steak tartare on the menu I immediately thought back to Paris, to the French Open when I dined at the disappointing Le Castiglione, located in the First District, where in broken English a French customer commented that steak tartare was a French culinary joke to the world, that the French only make tartare to watch foreigners eat raw meat they wouldn’t feed a pet. It would have been the equivalent of Americans foisting off a hot dog as one of the country’s great culinary achievements, y’know, just for fun.

For clarification, I went to Chez Albert, the outstanding French restaurant in Amherst, Massachusetts, and partner Emmanuel Proust disavowed me of any notion that steak tartar is a French inside joke.

“No, no,” he said. “Steak tartare is a phenomenal dish. You start with the best cut of meat. In France, it is something we take very seriously. The problem, though, is in America. About three or four times a year, we put it on the menu and each time it is one of our worst sellers. Americans just won’t eat raw beef.”

And yet, at Roast, steak tartare was on the menu, with something of a twist – a fried egg on top.

The Roast ribeye...

Roast was a winner. A 16-ounce ribeye was a fine call, even though 16 ounces of beef is a bit, ahem, much. The creme brulee was a coconut-pumpkin, which was bold enough to be considered foolish. Still, it was good. As were the Brussels sprouts, believe it or not.

Box lunches and the Tigers routing the Yankees in a sweep, kept me from Opus One and Forty-Two Degrees North, two other highly rated Detroit spots. Since the Tigers are now in the World Series, there will be other chances next week.

The European Tour: Le Castiglione, Paris

Le Castiglione, Paris...A swing and a miss...

RESEARCH IS THE LIFEBLOOD of any journalist and on Day 2 the recommendations started coming in. Steve Tignor, who writes the Concrete Elbow column for Tennis.com and does terrific features for Tennis Magazine, suggested Au Moulin a Vent for a “good, bloody Chateaubriand.” At the TV compound at Roland Garros, there was talk of this joint that only served French fries and steak. No menus. You walk in, tell them how you want your steak cooked, and that, along with a homemade green spicy pesto sauce, is that.

The New York Times, obviously aware I was in town, offered a piece on the latest, greatest gastronomic craze in Paris: food trucks (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/04/world/europe/food-trucks-add-american-flavor-to-paris.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all). Yes, food trucks, like the ones from Temple University - but Temple didn't sell 10-euro cheeseburgers.

I settled for my own internet research and a highly rated choice was Le Castiglione, in the first district next to the hotel, in fact right across the street on Rue Castiglione. Castiglione, yes, yes, that name rings a bell.

Castiglione. Even in Paris, the Red Sox haunt me.

Le Castiglione (235 rue St. Honore, Paris, France) was a nice place with, like most European spots, a stylish outdoor terrace. Being directly across the street from the French-free Westin, it held promise as a late-night choice. http://www.tripadvisor.com/ rated it four of five stars (47 reviews).. Le Castiglione also had carpaccio on the menu, which is of course, a must. Was it to be, that the research would pay off, and that on consecutive nights, positive experiences would be had? Was it to be, simply, that the food in Paris was so good that you could, literally, fall out of bed and eat well?

NO...!
NO...!
NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!


Let's first say this about Le Castiglione: the bartender made one terrific mojito. He muddled the mint with so much force it shook the restaurant, and I was the better for it. The carpaccio was solid, though not as thinly sliced as it should have been - but solid.

In Paris, the restaurants have monogrammed plates. Classy or tacky? You be the judge...

The main event, however, was for the second night in a row, beef tartare. And yes, this one realized my fears. It was terrible. It was mushy and wet. The consistency was similar to that of oatmeal. Even the French fries were soft. Days later, when my oldtime pal Michelle came to visit and I told her of my experience she said, "The chefs were laughing in French that another American dummy ordered the dog's dinner."

One awful meal...

For comparison's sake, let's use the eye test....

Tartare from Bar Tuileries....Note the care and craftsmanship. There is no argument.

BUT... The mojito was really good...

Story of my life

The Paris adventure is over, but the gastronomic tale is about to begin...stay tuned....HB

CARPACCIO: THE EUROPEAN TOURS, VOL. I



Note the portion size, but the tartare was quite dense.

 THE MOOD was set early, a Sunday morning walk on a 77-degree day through the Jardin Tuileries, then along the right bank of the Seine. The iPod provided the mood music: John Coltrane, Live in Antibes, 1965 – a phenomenal performance, nearly 50 minutes of “A Love Supreme” capped by a sly finale on soprano sax by Coltrane and special Pharoah Sanders.

The housekeeping came first: the Boy wanted a photo of L’Tour Eiffel, and mission accomplished. The harder part, the underestimated part, was navigating the gastronomic brick and cobblestone streets of Paris.

If “No” is an international word, when it comes to food, the most fitting international phrase is “Can You Vouch?” I hadn’t been to Paris since November 1999, and had not cultivated a list of restaurant stalwarts. I scoured the Internet for recommendations, but was reduced to recommendation, the always dangerous, always tricky, always uncomfortable space where Friends Go on Trial.

The first day was easy. Tennis at Roland Garros rolled into the night, making it difficult for true adventure. I chose conservatively, Bar Tuileries, otherwise known as the hotel bar at the Westin Paris. The Westin represented something of a haven for English speakers. It was a French-free zone best illustrated by a late-night scene in the elevator during the trip, where reserved Parisians (and reserved foreigners) heading up were awoken by a big, booming American voice and his giggling female companion. “EVERYBODY HAVIN’ A GOOD TIME? WHO’S GOT SNACKS?”

(A point of information here: I was suffering from the severe, self-inflicted handicap of not speaking French. A general exchange for me went something like this:

“Bonjour, monsieur.”

“Bonjour. (whispering lower) Um, do you speak English?” (weak, helpless smile).

“Oui, monsieur. How may I help you?”

Only begging for a piece of bread would have been more embarrassing than my attempts at French).



I settled in on the beef tartare, salad and French fries. To add to the odd mix was a mojito, or perhaps it should be called an “18-euro mojito.” It wasn’t overly adventurous, but in the States, I never order beef tartare because few places do French food well. Paris was the place to make the leap.

It was a welcome score. The mixture of capers and mustard was interesting and the beef was robust instead of looking like it was headed for the dumpster until it was rescued by some idiot ordering the tartar. Things were off to a good start.

And dessert...

One scoop of bourbon vanilla ice cream with a soft lemon cookie on top, garnished with pink sugars.

The first drink...

A mojito in Paris....Bar Tuileries...

Bar Tuileries

I wound up here at the hotel bar, out of necessity. It went down like this: Air France flight 0337 left Boston Friday evening at 5:30 pm. We landed in Paris at 6 am. Arriving at the hotel at 7:13, I find, naturally, that my room wasn't ready, which forced some morning sightseeing (the Boy demanded a photo of the Eiffel Tower and by golly he go it) and walk/Metro to Roland Garros.
I arrived on the grounds at roughly 10 am and proceeded to get acclimated, an endeavor which included having Martina Navratilova, the finest, fiercest competitor of them all, sprint by, and watching Francesca Schiavone lose to newly minted American citizen Varvara Lepchenko in three sets. When Schiavone won the French Open in 2010, she was frequently compared to Navratilova (perhaps as much for her wearing her competitive emotions without the pretense of being ladylike as for her aggressive serve and volley).

Schiavone has never been as good as she was when she won, but she is still a compelling figure to watch.

By 3:30 pm (my apologies, 15:30 hrs. I am in Europe), I still hadn't checked into my room and hadn't slept since waking up Friday morning. Upon walking back to the hotel, a quick walk from the Corcorde Metro stop along Rue de Rivoli to Rue de Castiglione, it was obvious I needed a plan: I'm in the greatest food city in the world and don't have the slightest idea of where to go.

The smart move was to regroup at Bar Tuileries, enjoy a €17 mojito (damn!) To go with a delicious beef tartare. Eating the first meal in Paris at the hotel bar may not have been the most inspired choice, but it had to be done for strategic purposes - and it wasn't like I ordered a cheeseburger.

An Unacceptable Lull...

Carpaccio from Abe and Louie's, Boston (and yes, that's a fried egg on top)

MORE THAN THREE MONTHS HAVE PASSED since the last entry, a dereliction of duty that without care could have become fatal, leaving The Carpaccio Files chipped, run down, ignored. It would have been not unlike driving by a dilapidated tennis court or ballfield, overgrown and neglected, its vibrancy but a memory. There is a lesson in this: Blogs in motion stay in motion…

Forgotten tennis courts with inch-wide cracks and grass growing diagonally across the service box is due to neglect – no one is actually playing tennis on those courts anymore. The same is true for those sad and sagging baseball diamonds where the fences are broken, the grass tall and wild and nobody cares – people have moved on to other things.

Here, the offense is actually worse, because discovery and discussion is alive, the adventure in gastronomy is ongoing, wonderfully and dynamically - I have simply been too lazy to water the plant. As I load up the Ipad and Ipod for the Next Big Trip _ the French Open _ my dereliction has been boundless.



There have been trips to Scottsdale, Arizona (Sweet Baby Ray's Barbecue, http://www.sbrbbq.com/),  Boston (Sonsie http://sonsieboston.com/flash/, Abe and Louie's Steakhouse http://www.abeandlouies.com/), and, yes, Laramie, Wyoming (Altitude chophouse, http://www.altitudechophouse.com/), which will all be discussed.

 I even failed to mention the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells, California back in March, which featured not only another lack of conviction from one of my favorites, Jo-Wilfried Tosnga, Roger Federer dusting a distracted Rafael Nadal in a weather-marred semifinal and John Isner stunning the great Djokovic in the other, but the abundance of carving stations during the hospitality reception that made me think of only one thing: death by box lunch during the World Series.  



Tsonga couldn't put it together against Nalbandian...





....but no dead rat sandwich, with an apple and chips for me at Indian Wells. We got first-class sushi... 


WHEN RULES COLLIDE

HB Rule no. 1: Never experiment when you're hungry.
HB Rule no. 2: Avoid chain restaurants whenever possible.*

* (I didn't know Sweet Baby Ray's was a chain until I got there, so back off...)

Indian Wells forced a collision of two important pillars of The Carpaccio Files. Palm Desert was lovely, and there was just something fun and breezy about navigating Doris Day Drive from Frank Sinatra Drive and I think Bob Hope Drive runs into Kirk Douglass Way in Palm Springs. Nevertheless, I wasn't overjoyed by The Nest and wound up at Roy's, the high-end Hawaiian fusion chain that receives a waiver from the rule. I have dined at Roy's in Kauai, Philadelphia, San Francisco, New York, Baltimore, Newport Beach and Tampa, and it was sad to walk along 15th Street and find the Philadelphia edition to be wiped out, closed. Over.

Roy's Palm Desert didn't disappoint, and while rule no. 1 was reinforced at the expense of rule no. 2, I nevertheless believe I came out ahead and morally intact. Roy's is consistent. It can be counted on (unless you're in Philly looking for it).

The pineapple upside-down cake at Roy's is as reliable as Ripken...

Meanwhile, local discussions are taking place at high and serious levels. New Year’s resolution no. 2 _ only eat sushi in Approved Sushi Zones _ is facing a serious challenge, a recall perhaps, if you will.

Challenge and competition is good for democracy, and Northampton, MA is petitioning ASZ status. Before the resolution, I had dined at Zen Sushi on Main Street. Zen was erratic, sometimes more valuable for its Chinese food than its sushi, which brings us to a Red Flag:

1. You can either be a Chinese Restaurant or a Japanese Restaurant, but you cannot be both. This is a stone-tablet fact.

The sushi at Zen was reliable for reduced expectations, solid and passable if you happen to be 90 minutes from Boston and yet are craving a dragon roll. Still, like Arigato, my old local sushi in Fairfax, Virginia (DEFINITELY NOT AN APPROVED SUSHI ZONE), the eel would be overcooked or mushy, and the mackerel might be wet, slimy and/or fishy or surprisingly good. Arigato simply couldn’t be counted on. The same became true for Zen over the past couple of years, prompting a New Year’s sushi resolution.

Danielle Mann, a friend who once called Northampton home, suggested Moshi Moshi, located diagonally from Zen as a local joint worthy of ASZ inclusion while another told me the only acceptable sushi in Northampton was Osaka Japanese Steakhouse and Sushi. Danielle (who, as an aside, should be a hand model in her spare time. Like Charlie Brown and the Little Red Haired Girl, I do notice hands, but that is another story for a different blog) not only vouched for Moshi Moshi, but also worked there. Vouching, as we know, is serious business, for not only is it a referendum on credibility, but also on taste. By vouching we find out a lot of things, sometimes _ when a highly recommended restaurant turns out to be dreadful _ information we wish we hadn't. There is an inherent danger in this...

Nevertheless, I determined a runoff between Osaka and Moshi Moshi: Five separate visits to each ordering the same meal. The reason for the five visits ordering the same thing was to determine consistency, always important. Last week it was a dragon roll, crunchy dynamite roll and an order of saba (mackerel) nigiri.

Round 1 went to Osaka. Danielle vouched well, and I happily don't have to question her taste and she can avoid for the moment calling me a sushi snob. Moshi Moshi was more energetic and friendly. Immediately upon entering, Sam, the gregarious sushi chef, bellowed comically and melodically, “Welcome to Moshi Moshi! Thank you coming!” Style points are not insignificant, especially when choosing a local joint, and as a rule, anyone who is a regular should be treated with respect. It was clear that frequenting Moshi Moshi would only enhance the neighborhood experience. Places like Moshi Moshi make a town feel like home.



 On this day, however, even though the nice people at Osaka barely said hello, the food was better on each item.  The price was negligible, and I will be watching Osaka to determine if it is the kind of restaurant that treats regulars like strangers, but eel, mackerel and dynamite rolls won the day. The local sushi runoff is  officially underway....

Osaka 1, Moshi Moshi 0

Going big at Katana...

Bacon wrapped shrimp and filet mignon with asparagus, Katana...

One of the great treasures of Katana is its versatility. There are sushi restaurants and then there is Katana, which reminds us is also a robata grill. The appetizers were strong. Note the bacon-wrapped shrimp at the top of the photo followed by the filet mignon wrapping around asparagus.

Little was going to affect me this night, anyway, since I was eating outside in January. My needs are small...

The Katana Experience

Two pieces of Spanish Mackerel nigiri...
Class is a concept difficult to avoid. It permeates the entire culture. In gastronomic terms, it is easy, then to dismiss a restaurant strictly by its decor. A poorly or shabbily designed restaurant might house some of the best food in town. Back in San Francisco, circa 1992 or '93, my uncle Steve resisted our insistence on the House of Nanking. It was crowded. It didn't look particularly clean. Nothing, from the creaky wooden tables to the spartan counter tops to the dingy, laminated menus invited customers to enter.
Yet, each night, a line formed around the block while neighboring Chinese restaurants were empty.
Uncle Steve relented, and twenty years later, still talks about the Great House of Nanking...
Katana has no such problem. It is majestic. It is grand. It is in West Hollywood. The outdoor seating with its couches and heat lamps are movie-star stylish. Inside is dark and sultry. Katana belongs to The Beautiful People.

Katana, West Hollywood

LOS ANGELES -- To protect the innocent, I will not name names. I will not offer clues. On the souls of my unborn grandchildren, I will not be the one who breaks the peace we have formed today.

I needed to be redeemed. It has been nearly 11 years since I left California for good, eleven years of weeping and nostalgia, for the Flatiron in San Rafael with the Marin County boys, eleven years of plotting, planning and ultimately failing to get back to the Bay (see: prices, housing for details), eleven years of no Mexican and inferior sushi.

Rules were introduced to temper the disappointment. Take, for example the New Year's Resolution list of 2011:

1) To say "no" early, often and with conviction.

2) To only eat sushi in Approved Sushi Zones

3) I forgot the third.

The "Approved Sushi Zone" consists of the entire West Coast (Vancouver to San Diego), plus proven East Coast favorites:
Boston (Oishii Boston http://www.oishiiboston.com), Fugakyu (www.fugakyu.net) and, in a pinch, Samurai (www.samurai-boston.com)

New York Nobu and Nobu 57, plus, in a pinch, Koi (www.koirestaurant.com)

I held to that resolution, both in fact ("No!" See? And that was with feeling!) which made it important to replace a disappointing sushi experience with an excellent one.

The excellent one was Katana (katanarobata.com, 8439 W. Sunset Blvd @ La Cienega). Katana is part of the IDG group, owners of such solid favorites as Sushi Roku and the steakhouse BOA (where on my last visit, Smokey Robinson dined behind me). Katana was recommended and it delivered. Big time.

The first cheesecake of 2012

Thai Basil - Manchester Center, VT

Wasting pitches and top creations

"Caesar IS home."

Decompressing from the postseason and a terrific baseball season, I recall vivid snatches of conversations; the handful of times during the postseason that Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington lamented that his pitchers have not yet learned how to waste a pitch, a shortcoming that eventually cost them a world championship as big hits by Miguel Cabrera, Victor Martinez, John Jay and most importantly, David Freese would all come on two-strike pitches; standing near the visitor's dugout with Jim Leyland, listening to him talk baseball, the uncomfortable eye on Mark McGwire during the World Series as he stood by the batting cage, one Paul Bunyan and now, forever disgraced, the smallest man on Earth; listening to CC Sabathia try to tell me down at Tropicana Field that The Rise of the Planet of the Apes was a "great movie."




Boulevard: A candidate for contraction?

 The ground rules suggest, also, for the true growth of the gastronomic pusuits, caution must fall secondary to daring. The great restaurants _ Bob's (Ft. Worth, Texas), Nobu 57 (New York City), Oishii Boston (Boston), and the great Boulevard (San Francisco)  _ cannot become the reliable anchors they are. Relying on the old standbys will lend itself to laziness and complacency, the two great foes of creativity, the great foes of progress. We may have to say goodbye.




Nieman Rib chop with mushroom risotto cake, Boulevard, SF

 

Therefore, certain restaurants will have to be voluntarily retired in favor of new pursuits, new adventures, new risk, and hopefully, new rewards. It will be a difficult list, one for another day. Today, however, is for celebration of some of the best creations of 2011:

Strawberry shortcake with caramel kettle corn, Ten01, Portland, OR



Crab and Tuna Tower, Met Bar, Dallas




Lobster with fried clams and light wasabi sauce, The Spiced Pear, Newport, RI




Dohyo (Tuna Tartare with avocado, scallion and caviar), Ozumo



There will be difficult choices to make, especially in San Francisco where Ozumo (161 Steuart Street. http://www.ozumo.com/) will be hard to say goodbye to. It is consistently excellent, artfully executed both on the plate and aesthetically, a haven also, for the beautiful people (if you happen to like beautiful people). However, we know what Ozumo can do. We know it's there. That will have to be enough.

Civilizations may rise and fall, but Fang will never be contracted...

However, Fang (660 Howard Street. http://www.fangrestaurant.com/) will never be on any Carpaccio contraction list. Not only is it an original staple of my time in San Francisco, dating back to the first House of Nanking visit in October 1991, not only is it the meeting place for the SF HB+Brian Murphy lunch, but it is simply too good to be willfully ignored.