Susan McCrory

Hey there, PRK readers. Hopefully you’ve noticed our trend over the past several months of featuring guest contributors on a monthly basis. This past November Meryl LaTronica introduced both herself and her work as Farm Manager/CSA Director of Powisset Farm in Dover; Meryl’s been giving us a monthly window onto her amazing world ever since. In January PRK inaugurated the posts of Anastacia Marx de Salcedo of Slow Food Boston, learning from her the background of the Slow Food movement and, most recently, getting great tips on seed catalogs and planting strategies for home gardens. PRK is very excited today to introduce our newest monthly contributor, Ilene Bezahler, publisher and editor of Edible Boston. From hereon in, Ilene will hand-pick an article for feature from the current issue of the magazine and give us a taste of the ‘what’ and ‘why’ behind it. Today she’s talking fish. Enter, and welcome, Ilene…   

Ilene Bezahler
Edible Boston

Over the past four to five years, the world of food has made radical changes. No longer can we just pick up something to eat. We now stop to think, ask questions and, to be honest, end up confused and struggling about what to do.

It all started with produce, then shifted to the protein we eat. Just when we thought we were free and clear, seafood moved into the spotlight. The problem, which we at Edible Boston have named the “Pescavore’s Dilemma,” is much more complicated than that of produce or proteins. There are so many variables: the livelihood of the local fisherman, the actual health of the fish (mercury levels, etc.), the health of the fish stocks and the health of the world’s aquaculture.

Last year, Cape Ann was home to one of the country’s first fish CSA models, Cape Ann Fresh Catch (CAFC). In the following article from the Spring 2010 issue of Edible Boston, Roz Cummins reflects on both the positives and negatives of being a member of the CAFC, while trying to understand the issues behind sustainable seafood. As Roz quickly learned, there is no easy solution.

Tom Urell, PRK Guest Contributor

Maybe this has never happened to you. But, if you cook, and especially if you cook for yourself, following a recipe or not, I suspect you’ve had this feeling: I made it, so I’M GOING TO EAT IT. Sometimes, though, it’s just not worth it. Your meal is not exactly a disaster, but if you’re alone, there’s no one around to joke about it with! So, you eat. Some of it, anyway.

Act I. The Setup. You don’t have to be cooking for one, but that’s often the scenario. It usually begins with an apathetic approach to the meal: I don’t really want to cook, but I’m even less inclined to go out. Besides, I have ingredients that need to be used in the fridge…

Act II. The Procrastination. I’m really not that hungry yet, and there are those dishes in the sink that I’ll need to do before I really begin. I’ll get to cooking in a little while. Sit back down in a different room, find another rerun of The Office, or try to get some more work done, but you think back to that half-onion, wrapped in lackluster saran wrap on the top shelf…

Act III. The Sloppy Prep. A rough chop is fine for the onion, right? It’s all going into the blender anyway. The corners of the rough piece burn, of course. Turn down the heat, and it stops cooking. Turn it back up, it burns again. But you don’t want to throw it out, it’s just you, and it’s not really so bad.

Act IV.  The Mess. It all happens so quickly–the sloppy seasoning, messy blender transfer or splattering spaghetti sauce–and you knew it all along but seem helpless to right the wrongs. It’s the reality of cooking for one on a weeknight. How come it seems to be that shade of brown that only happens when I cook for myself…?

Act V. The Tragic Ending. Tough collard greens, salty soup or pasta with burned bits of garlic. Disappointing at best, inedible in the worst cases.

This is the reality, I think, for those of us who don’t buy prepared food, succumb to frozen TV dinners or even own a microwave. It doesn’t always happen, and I can go months without truly wrecking a meal. But happen it does. And I feel the same way every time: the best remedy is doing all the dishes and letting the worst of it run down the drain.

Adam Ragusea, PRK Guest Contributor

One of the benefits of toiling in public radio is that sometimes you get invited to do crazy stuff, like judge a lamb cooking competition. It was a terrific, well-organized event held at the Middle East in Cambridge, around the corner from my place. More than a dozen amateur chefs were each given 15 pounds of lamb furnished by the American Lamb Board, and let loose. Dishes ranged from the elegant winner (five-spice braised lamb with pickled vegetables), to an impeccable Barbara Lynch inspired lamb bolognese, to something I might uncharitably describe as “lamb shank Shake n’ Bake.”

Congrats to all the competitors; enjoy my little commemorative iMovie!

Pears, by Franklin Einspruch

Emma Jacobs

Franklin Einspruch began painting comics a couple of years ago. Fruits and vegetables pop up in his work pretty regularly, especially a lot of seasonal delicacies like pumpkins, cranberries and plums. We thought we’d ask him a couple of questions about painting his food, and eating it afterwards.
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PRK: How did you get started painting comics?

My first interest in art was cartooning, but it switched over to painting. After a decade of painting and several years of writing art criticism,  I became interested in comics again. Initially, I thought it would be a good way to combine my disparate and somewhat alternating impulses to paint and write. This turned out not to be the case at all – comics are not just illustrated writings or annotated drawings, but have to be conceived as a whole, just like paintings and essays. It took a couple of years to figure out what I wanted to do with the medium.

PRK: What strikes your fancy? When do you decide an idea’s worth sitting down to illustrate?

I determine it by feel. I take it on faith that everything merits attention, and if I’m paying attention in the right way, the profound will spring up out of normal, everyday living. I don’t have the exact quote, but Fairfield Porter once said that the perfect still-life arrangement would come from your family eating dinner and getting up from the table without clearing the dishes.

There’s a Zen proverb you’ll likely appreciate: “Unformed people delight in the gaudy and in novelty. Cooked people delight in the ordinary.” Cooked people are baked in the heat of meditation. I have plenty of cooking to do myself, but I aspire to that sensitivity.

PRK: Food seems to show up in a lot of your work. Why is that? What is food like as a subject?

A notable portion of the English language derives in one way or another from farming, so it’s pretty much guaranteed as you work with language that you’re going to run into food eventually. Too, food is a unique combination of choice and inevitability. You must eat –  and yet you make myriad idiosyncratic choices as you select, acquire, prepare, and consume your food, giving you specific references to work with. Successful art appeals both to universals and a desire for individuality and freshness, so it has a lot of experiential overlap with food.

Image from the I-70 Suite: OH, by Franklin Einspruch

The story behind Ohio–That comic was one episode of the I-70 Suite, in which I documented a road trip from Boston to Orange County, California, through Arizona and Nevada. The trip was necessary so I could take an ill-fated teaching job in California, but I was curious about this string of states that I had never seen. In eastern Ohio we drove through a foggy landscape that evoked the mist-covered hills of Song Dynasty painting, shot through with a strange, variable light as the sun went down.

PRK: Is it tough to eat your subjects after you paint them?

Maybe not tough, exactly, but after that pear had served me so well as a painting subject, it only seemed right to honor it before eating it. It was a sort of grace.
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Go to Franklin Einspruch’s website to look for (or purchase) edible items in more of his comics.