New Food Trends

Here it is, Steve's declaration of the food trend for 2006. All media has been waiting for me to make this anncouncement, and that moment has arrived.

I'm going to hit you with a dumb phrase: Old is New Again. It's as incomprehensible as "Orange is the New Avocado", "40 is the New 30", or "Brown is the New Black". For those of you scratching your head, these are Gen-X's apparent theft of Baby Boomer ideas.

Women understand these phrases, they are splattered all over the covers of Vogue, Cosmo or In Style. Men's magazines don't have an equivalent, because old stereo equipment is never considered "retro" or "back in style."

"Nice reel-to-reel Teac, Steve"

"Yeah, I picked it up at a garage sale. Reel to Reel is the new HD-DVD."

"No, it sounds like shit. And what's with the simulated wood paneling? They build stereos out of wood?"

"Hey, back when Woody Allen made Sleeper, this was the vision of the future."

"Pretty bleak future."

"Yeah, kinda sucks doesn't it. I wasted my money."

What does this have to do with New Food Trends? Old is the New New, that's what. Comfort food. Fondue. Crock Pots. Sloppy Joe's. Meatloaf. Avocado colored stoves.

Last week I was listening to Mary Sue Miliken and Susan Feniger (hereafter refered to as the Two Hot Tamales). Even though they didn't say on-air, I had a suspicion the show was sponsored by Rival. The topic of the show was slow cooking, and how it is making a comeback..but the only product they talked about was the Rival Smart Pot...

Ok, I was skeptical, but I happen to own a Rival Smart Pot and it does do an excellent job at evenly heating the food and keeping it warm until serving time. Slow cooking is an easy way to cook a meal that is ready when you get home from work. By restraining the escape of moisture, whatever liquid you use to cook the meat will infuse itself throughout. You get a twofold benefit, first by keeping the meat moist, and second by imparting an enormous amount of flavor.

Some of my favorite liquids to slow cook are soy sauce, ketsup, barbeque sauce, orange juice, wine, beer, liquor (used sparingly), jams, jellies...there are really very few restrictions on what you can use. Its no wonder that this method of cooking is popular again. With the scarcity of time, its the perfect way to have something ready the minute you get home.

Don't worry about burning down the house, though. Any of the recent models have safeguards to prevent catastrophe.

Fondue is crazy simple, but you do need one specialized piece of equipment, which is why you probably haven't made it yourself: The fondue pot. There are a few varieties, some electric, some woefully inadequate, some outragously expensive. I picked up mine from Urban Outfitters for $15. It uses denatured alcohol as a fuel source instead of sterno. Denatured alcohol burns very clean, but I noticed it runs a little hot, so sterno might be a good alternative. There are more elaborate pots that have an ajustable knob which controls the flame like a stove burner instead of the random, dancing blue flame of sterno.

My favorite fondue is gruyere mixed with emmenthal. Traditionally, you prepare fondue by rubbing a garlic clove around the pot and discarding it. Lightly melt the cheese so as not to burn and cause oil separation. Add a dash of Kirshwasser, which is an obnoxious cherry brandy that I wouldn't drink, but it is imperative in fondue. Melt, transfer to the fondue pot, cut up your favorite food and dunk! Traditionally, bread is the vehicle of choice, but you can use shrimp, thinly sliced meat (cooked or uncooked, you can slice it thin so it cooks in the cheese), vegetables, even little smokies.

Ahh, meatloaf, the bricks upon which America was built. Meatloaf can go horribly awry if not tended properly, and chances are you were at one point in your life subjected to a brick of dense, tasteless meat. Here's an initial clue, and you can use this advice for any ground beef product.

Don't buy lean ground beef! Once you get below 10%-15% fat, hamburger meat gets tough and dry. You need that fat for moisture, texture and for God's sake taste. We've become paralyzed with fear about fat. Most fat drips off anyway, or you extract it after cooking, so it's not like the loaf will be swimming in its own oil. It will be when you pull it out of the oven, but you'll move it to a rack and let it drain a bit, or as you cut it, the fat will run off.

Use 85% ground chuck instead of the sirloin they've been pushing for the last several years. Chuck has more flavor and it more condusive to dishes using ground beef than sirloin, which is really best served as a steak or in stew.

There are so many variations of meatloaf, I will give you some general guidelines and you can mix and match as you see fit. All good meatloaf starts with ground chuck, we already covered that. To that, you will add eggs and breadcrumbs to bind. Now you add the flavor, and the choice is up to you. I like a few liberal dashes of worchestershire sauce, ketsup, sugar, salt to taste (or soy),diced onions, chopped arlic, barbeque sauce...pretty much anything that has a good base that can add to the flavor. Good earthy herbs like thyme, sage or oregano really add a punch of flavor.

The allure of comfort food, or traditional American dishes, is obvious. They are straightforward and hearty, harkening back to the days where people put in long hours of serious manual labor.