by Rowan Jacobsen (Bloomsbury 2010) 272 pages with a few recipes
Rowan Jacobsen has been on a mission to seek out and spread the word about some of the best foods being grown in America. He is an accomplished author who writes about food, the environment, and the connections between the two. His previous books include A Geography of Oysters, winner of the 2007 James Beard Award, and Fruitless Fall, the story of the precarious future of the honey bee, and The Living Shore, a tale about the resurgence of the Olympia oyster and how it might lend insight into wider issues regarding our environment.
In American Terroir, Jacobsen considers more than a dozen products that represent, to paraphrase the author, “a very good day, food-wise.” The expression of place is the definition of terroir (tare-wahr) which can be translated from French as “the taste of place.” He investigates why sugar maples on a stony mountainside in Vermont yield the most flavorful maple syrup, why the gnarly, pocked cider apples make the best flavored brew or why dusty, stone-strewn vineyards produce the grapes that make legendary wines. Mr. Jacobsen is someone who is good company, possessing a clever, sometimes naughty, wit. He has a talent for explaining history and technical information in a cogent, yet entertaining, manner. He is not afraid to give his opinion: he prefers light roast coffee, gritty chocolate and he claims that red wine doesn’t “go” with food (!). You may not agree, but his thorough and compelling research offers real food for thought.
If you are interested in knowing more about how soil, water and micro-climate influence food production — and sometimes can create magic — you will enjoy reading this book.
I enjoyed learning that
- ‘Buddy syrup’ occurs when maple sap, collected in late spring (when the trees are budding), acquires an odd, fake chocolate “Tootsie-Roll” taste (not good) when it’s boiled down into syrup.
- Francois Brouillard, “Francois of the Woods,” a forager in Quebec, with his chef partner, Nancy Hinton, operates a restaurant, Les Jardins Sauvages, which offers year-round forest gastronomy . They prepare a single seating, prix-fixe meal every Friday and Saturday comprised solely of Francois’s foraged plants and fungi (they also raise their own venison).
- Mexican avocados, perfectly situated in the tropical highland forest’s volcanic soil of the Michoacan, west of Mexico City, bloom four times a year. There, avocados are always available and in season. Avocados ripen only after they are picked. The ready-to-pick fruit can wait on the tree for up to 6 months, its oil content increasing as it sits.
Francois Brouillard, “Francois of the Woods,” a forager in Quebec, who, with his chef partner, Nancy Hinton, operates a restaurant, Les Jardins Sauvages, which offers year-round forest gastronomy . They prepare a single seating, prix-fixe meal every Friday and Saturday comprised solely of Francois’s foraged plants and fungi (they also raise their own venison).
- Honey made from avocados is not very popular as its flavor is bitter and vegetal. However, at Heidrun Meadery, which specializes in Champagne-style mead in Point Reyes Station, California, their avocado-blossom honey varietal is one of their most popular. It’s described as being dry with a slight hop-like bitterness.
- You can stand in one spot on Prince Edward Island and see mussels being harvested, turn your head and see potatoes pulled from the earth — the fixings for PEI’s popular, terroir-driven dish, moules frite.
First published April 2014
Thai Steamed Mussels
“Steamed mussels are so easy, affordable, fast, and delicious that I don’t understand why more people don’t make them at home. (In fact, if you really want to keep things simple, replace everything but the mussels and coconut milk in the following recipe with a tablespoon or two of jarred red curry paste, and away you go.) Avoid buying wild mussels, which are invariably filled with grit. Of the many versions of steamed mussels, I find the one with Thai flavors to be the best, though I wouldn’t kick the Indian (curry and ginger), the Italian (white wine, garlic, tomato, and parsley), or the French (white wine, cream, and tarragon) varieties out of bed, either. If you’re not serving this with fries, a hot loaf of crusty bread is essential for mopping up the sauce.” — from American Terroir by Rowan Jacobsen
Ingredients
- •4 pounds mussels
- •4 cloves garlic, minced
- •14-ounce can coconut milk
- •½ teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional)
- •juice of ½ lime
- •1 tablespoon fish sauce*
- •1 cup chopped fresh basil
- •1 cup chopped fresh cilantro
*Bottles of fish sauce (often with a freaky-looking baby on the front) are available in most supermarkets these days. Three dollars gets you a lifetime supply. Used like soy sauce, it will improve the taste of half the things you cook.
Preparation
Rinse and scrub the mussels under cold running water. Discard any with broken or open shells; these are already dead. Remove any “beards” – the byssal thread, which sticks out of the middle of the mussel and which it uses for web-slinging itself around, Spider-Man-style. It’s an impressive piece of hardware, and unbelievably tough. To remove it, use a paring knife for leverage and yank it out with your thumb. You can also snip it off with scissors, but then you leave a little beard inside.
Combine everything but the fresh herbs in a large pot, cover, and cook over high heat, stirring occasionally, until the mussel shells have opened and the mussels have plumped up, about 12 to 15 minutes. Turn off the heat, dump the mussels into a large serving bowl, toss the herbs on top, and let everybody have at it. Or, if decorum is of the essence, serve them in individual bowls. Either way, you’ll need a bowl for the discarded shells.
