An Egg Cracker? Really?!

Sorry, But I've Got To “Counter” This Recommendation

It's been a slow afternoon, and as I was scrolling through some useless stuff on the Net I came across a piece on the best way to scramble eggs. Since I've only been doing it for over a half-century, I thought I'd take a look and see what modern innovations may have revolutionized the process. And, lo and behold, the first “need” the young author presented in her list of essentials (all available for purchase on Amazon and various other outlets, by the way) was an egg cracker.

No. Really, An egg cracker.

For only nine bucks, it's something I never knew I needed. Imagine, I've been struggling to cook scrambled eggs, both at home and in the professional kitchen, for decades and now I realize that I've only been making things harder on myself by not possessing an egg cracker. I feel so utterly inadequate now. I hereby apologize to all the people to whom I have presented obviously sub-par scrambles owing to my egregious lack of proper equipment.

Seriously, this little gadget looks like a spoon rest with a raised ridge in the middle of it. In fact, the author notes that you can use it as a spoon rest when you're not using it for egg prep. So it's a multi-tasker! Yay! “It can help you cleanly break shells into a straight line," she enthuses. "All you do is crack your egg against the center ridge, then pour the whites and yolk into a bowl.”

I already have a similar device in my kitchen: it's called a countertop.

Now, I don't have one of these things in my hand, but looking at the picture it seems to me that the little ridge in the center would have the same effect as the edge of a bowl in that it would not necessarily “cleanly break” the shell. The preferred better and safer method of egg cracking is to give the egg a firm tap on a flat surface – like a countertop. The egg-sperts – see what I did there? – say this method is far less likely to drive little shards of shell and any possibly contaminating bacteria into the interior of the egg.

Every culinary school graduate I know uses a flat surface for breaking eggs rather than striking them against a sharp corner or the edge of a bowl. Even though you see the occasional TV chef employing that practice, I promise you it's not what they were taught in school. I've even run across a few people – very few – who break their eggs by smacking them together. Okay, fine. But what if you're only cracking one egg?

My mother and my grandmother and probably their grandmothers, too, cracked eggs on the edge of a bowl. It's intuitive and it's how most home cooks roll. I don't know when the “better,” “safer” method was discovered/developed/decided upon among professional cooks, but it's the one they teach now and it's the only one I use/teach as well.

Once you crack the shell, techniques for the messy part - breaking the egg open the rest of the way – vary according to the preference and skill level of the cook.

I can open an egg one-handed. It's not really hard. It just takes a little practice. You hold the egg in your hand with your thumb placed along one long side of the egg and your fore and middle fingers on the other. Bring your pinky and ring finger to the bottom side and press the bottom of the egg into your palm. Crack the egg against a flat surface, then, in a slight twisting motion, use your thumb and forefinger to lift the top half while using your ring finger and pinky to pull down on the bottom half. If you've cracked the egg cleanly, it should separate cleanly and everything will come out without any shell fragments. 

I seldom do it this way, unless I'm trying to be showy or something. Most of the time, I do it the way everybody else does: after cracking the shell on a flat surface, you lightly press the tips of your thumbs into the crack until the egg's keratinous outer and inner membranes break. Then you just gently pull the shell apart and the white and yolk parts will slide out into your waiting bowl, hopefully intact. And, by the way, while not absolutely necessary, it's always a good idea to crack eggs into a separate bowl before mixing them together for your scramble or omelet or cake batter or whatever. Reason being, if you get a bad egg – which can sometimes happen – you can isolate it before it mixes in with other eggs and ruins the whole works. And it's easier to fish a stray bit of shell out of one egg than it is to fish it out of two or three or more.

So, there you have Egg Cracking 101. And it didn't cost you a penny.

The advocate of the nine-dollar egg cracker, who identifies herself as a “Senior Editor, Home & Garden” goes on to recommend a wide variety of bowls, whisks, spatulas, pans, holders, cookers, containers, add-in ingredients, and more, all of which are only a click away throughout her article. Fine. Everybody has got to make a buck. But if you've got a bowl, a balloon whisk, a silicone spatula or a wooden spoon, and a non-stick pan, you've pretty much got everything you need. The most essential thing you'll require to make outstanding scrambled eggs is practice and you can't buy that online.

You can buy an egg cracker, though. But, really, don't. 

McDonald's Friendly Service: The Ultimate Oxymoron

The Night of the Blank Stare

My wife is one of those rabid fans of McDonald's McRib, so when she got a craving for one the other night, love took the place of common sense and I ventured out to the local Mickey D's to fulfill her wish.

Upon arriving at our neighborhood fast food palace, I couldn't help but notice that none of the exterior lights were illuminated at seven o' clock on a dark winter night. Not even the iconic golden arch towering high above the roofline. If I hadn't known the place was there, I wouldn't have known it was there. So, when I entered, I brought this to the attention of an employee, a young female who was rather desultorily mopping the floor. And in response, I got my first Blank Stare.

Now, for the sake of being a general nuisance, I have been known to speak Italian to employees of Olive Garden and other pseudo-Italian places. But, here, caro lettore, I assure you I was speaking perfect, unaccented English. For all the response I got, however, I might as well have been speaking Italian. Just a Blank Stare. For all I know, I could have informed her that her shoes were on fire and I probably still would have gotten the same Blank Stare.

Moving on, I stepped carefully over the staring girl's handiwork and made my way to the counter in order to order my wife's McRib. You know, McDonald's actually discourages such behavior nowadays. They would much prefer that you order through their app or use that oh-so-personal ordering kiosk positioned right where you can hardly avoid it. But if you really must be old-fashioned and insist on actually speaking to a flesh and blood person, there are still a few of them around to serve you. All you have to do is find one and then get their attention. Easier said than done.

In retrospect, I think this is McDonald's way of admitting defeat. They know that the personality level of their employees is roughly equivalent to that of an automaton so they just put an actual automaton out front to begin with.

Anyway, there were at least four uniformed people “back there” that I could see and I know that at least two of them saw me step up to the counter because they made eye contact with me. They knew I was there. But they apparently couldn't have cared less. I guess it wasn't their job to man the counter, ergo, it similarly wasn't their job to find the person or persons whose job it was. So they just gave me the Blank Stare as I stupidly stood there waiting for service.

Eventually, from somewhere “back there,” someone in a management shirt appeared. “Ah,” I thought, “she is going to wait on me.” Alas, no. She was obviously focused on something having to do with the ice cream cone in her hand. She stood with her back toward me, intent on addressing the aforementioned Blank Starers. Whatever they were all discussing was evidently more important than taking my order as they all discussed it for quite some time. Finally, when I heard someone else “back there” shout out, “There's somebody at the back window,” I took the opportunity to chime in with, “There's also somebody at the front counter!” Well, that startled them all into noticing me. And giving me a Blank Stare. No greeting, no apology; simply a look that said, “who the hell are you and what are you doing standing there?”

Management person moved slowly to the register and stood there waiting for me to explain myself. Apparently, in lieu of anything along the lines of “hello,” or “may I help you,” her mere acknowledgment of my presence was all I was going to get. So I opened the one-sided conversation with the same observation about the lack of exterior lights causing me to almost miss the entrance. Surely, I thought, the manager would be interested in knowing this. Nah. I just got another Blank Stare. Not even a grunt.

Okay. I soldiered on and placed my order. A mumbled, “Is that all?” demonstrated that she could, indeed, verbally communicate, but when I said “yes” and proffered a gift card as payment, she merely pointed in the general direction of the POS terminal and said, “right there.” Ah, how foolish of me not to have noticed.

She came around a few minutes later to inform me that my order would be another couple of minutes because they were cooking the fries. Gamely attempting to be personable, I said, “Oh, good. I prefer them that way.” Blank Stare. Not even a smiling Blank Stare. Just the kind that said I was really being annoying by wanting something remotely resembling friendly, competent service.

Ultimately, my bagged order was placed on the counter in front of me and a guttural noise was made that could perhaps have been interpreted as “thank you” had I been in a more generous frame of mind. By now, though, I was more of a mind to interpret it as, “get the hell out of here and stop bothering me.” Especially since the utterance was delivered with the now-to-be-expected Blank Stare.

Sadly, this was far from an isolated incident. Somehow, the default setting on the faces of most fast food employees these days is flat affect, a clinical term defined as “a lack of emotional expression or response, often symptomatic of a mental health condition or of medication side effects.” I don't think that's the case in most cases. Rather, I think it's just a symptom of infinitesimally small and woefully inadequate social skills, caused, no doubt, by too much interaction with an electronic device and not enough with an actual person. After all, screens don't particularly care if you smile at them. But people do.

Now I'm not expecting the red carpet treatment or Michelin star service at a fast food joint. These are entry level jobs being filled by older teens and young adults with very limited social interaction beyond their own peer groups, groups where the things the rest of polite society consider to be rudeness are merely the accepted norm. But surely these young folks can muster something better than a sullen stare for the people who are financing their livelihoods.

Some fast food places can pull it off. Chick-fil-A, for example. I don't know how they skim the cream of young job seekers there, but I can unequivocally say that I have never had a bad service experience at a Chick-fil-A, a franchise where smiling faces and eager attitudes abound. And I'm not alone in that regard. Survey after survey has found that Chick-fil-A rates at the top of the service scale among fast food outlets. And the home of the Big Mac, the shiny Golden Arches, and the surly Blank Stare consistently ranks at the bottom of such surveys. So it's not just me. Seems that when McD's kicked their happy, smiling clown mascot to the curb, happy, smiling employees followed.

I don't know the answer. Chick-fil-A tends to pay its starting employees a little more than average, so maybe there's something there. But, in general, I think it's a matter of attitude. Young people just entering the job market seem sorely disappointed when they don't start at the top and it shows in their attitude. They seem to feel that they are doing their employer an immense favor by simply showing up for work and then they proceed to make their customers feel like impositions upon their paid social time, which, apparently, is what they consider their jobs to be. And I don't know how to solve that problem.

This is where I could come off as the curmudgeonly grandfather and say, “Back in my day, we worked for a dollar an hour and we were glad to get it!” Which is true, of course, but not really germane to the current issue. Which is either how do we get McDonald's employees to behave more like Chik-fil-A employees do or how do we get Chick-fil-A to start selling McRib sandwiches?

In the meantime, would you like fries and a grumpy Blank Stare with that?

Review: Mannino's Italian Bistro – Oceanfront, Virginia Beach, Virginia

Making A Great New Memory

Forty-five years after leaving Virginia Beach, Virginia behind, I recently found myself walking its sands and streets – well, its boardwalk, anyway – in search of some of my old haunts, most of which are now merely ghosts of days gone by. But while I was looking up old memories I found a new one in the form of a delightful Italian place called Mannino's.

To be clear, because there are a couple of area locations, I discovered the oceanfront iteration of the eatery, sandwiched in between the Pocahontas Pancake House and North End Pizza. But don't let the somewhat unprepossessing storefront put you off: it's what's inside that counts, and what's inside on Atlantic Avenue near the intersection with 35^th Street really counts!

Arriving for our 6:00 reservation, my wife and I were promptly seated at a nice, quiet booth by a very personable hostess. Normally, I prefer a table to a booth, but since I didn't specify, I wasn't going to quibble. No fancy tablecloths here, just a utilitarian wood tabletop set with tableware wrapped in black linen. The padded banquettes were surprisingly comfortable. (That's one reason why I usually prefer a table with chairs.)

Billed as “an upscale casual restaurant offering Olde World Italian cuisine infused with updated New York stylings,” the place was pretty old school as far as décor goes. Lots of dark wood, dark colored flooring, white drop ceiling that has seen better days. Kind of a tarnished elegance vibe. I liked it. It reminded me of me.

Our server appeared almost instantly and, like the hostess, she exuded pleasant personality. I harp on that point because I detest a waitstaff that makes me feel like I've intruded on their evening. Outgoing, friendly, knowledgeable, and helpful, Kaitlyn (I think that's spelled correctly) was the epitome of a professional server in the “Olde World Italian” style. European servers take their jobs seriously and are proud of their profession, unlike many of their American counterparts who are obviously just there for the tips and the paycheck while wishing they were somewhere else.

Anyway, off that soapbox and on to the menu.

Mannino's has an impressive wine, beer and cocktail menu. We arrived during the 5 to 6:30 pm “happy hour,” a concept rapidly disappearing from the dining scene, so my wife's Mango Tango cocktail was not only delicious, it was also half price! Me? Give me a cold bottle of San Pellegrino and I'm a happy man, so I was a happy man.

Mannino's features an impressive variety of antipasti ranging from clams Posillipo, through calamari fritti and fried local oysters, to bruschetta con Gorgonzola and a roasted garlic antipasti plate. Anticipating the entree portions to come and the possibility of dessert, we refrained from indulging. My wife, however, is a sucker for she-crab soup, now know simply as “crab soup,” so she had a cup and verified that “Mannino's Award Winning Crab Soup” definitely qualified for whatever award it won.

A nice selection of insalate followed the antipasti and zuppe categories, but, again, we passed them by for the main event.

Oh, dio mio, what choices!

Pastas of every kind, from simple penne alla marinara or spaghetti pomodoro to gnocchi Margherita and tortellini rustica and several more delectable offerings.

Then there were the piatti di pesce: linguine con vongole, scampi fra diavolo, scampi francese, and linguine frutti di mare.

The al forno offerings included lasagna Bolognese, portabella parmesan, eggplant parmesan and manicotti formaggio.

Then came the chicken dishes and the veal dishes and a few chef specialties like jumbo shrimp rosé and a vitello and portabella stack.

What if you – like me – have a lighter appetite and want smaller portions of lighter fare? Nessun problema! Order up penne semplice or scampi della casa or the linguine aglio olio.

I chose that last option and it was perfection. Just perfectly cooked linguine pasta tossed with garlic, olive oil, fresh parsley, and a hint of red pepper, it couldn't have been better. I've had aglio e olio overloaded with garlic, I've had it too oily, too dry, not garlicky enough, too much heat from the red pepper....here it was perfectly balanced and seasoned. BUT.....I asked Kaitlyn to go outside and find four or five starving Italians to help me finish it. Don't believe the “smaller portion” disclaimer. If that was a small portion, I'm glad I didn't order a large one! More than worth every cent of the $18.99 price.

My wife went with the $20.99 linguine pesto Genovese, consisting of fresh house made basil pesto, toasted pine nuts, and pecorino cheese tossed with perfectly al dente linguine. She declared the pesto to be the best she'd ever had – and she's had a lot of pesto over the years.

Dolce? Ma certo! How do you turn down house-made chocolate chip cannoli (me) or the sampler of three house-made gelati (her...with a little help from me)? Bring the hand truck now and just roll us out.

Mannino's was conceived in 2008 by a father and son chef team whose goal, according to their website, “was – and is – to give patrons great Italian food at a reasonable price point with wine choices to match. The Mannino’s Italian Bistro Family works with great passion and attention to detail to try and ensure that our guests develop a sense of home and comfort while enjoying their dining experience.” All I can say is, “mission accomplished!”

The Mannino's Italian Bistro location I visited is at 3420 Atlantic Avenue in Virginia Beach. They're open daily from 5 until 10 pm. It's an oceanfront place, just a block off the beach, so the dress code is somewhat flexible. I'm sure they would prefer classy casual, but there were shorts and t-shirts in evidence when I was there. Reservations are not required but are suggested. Call them at (757) 390-2580 or go online to https://www.manninositalianbistro.com. Parking is an issue as it is everyplace in an oceanfront tourist area. If the parking gods are smiling, you might luck out and find some limited on-street spaces, but there are also parking decks nearby. Just factor twenty bucks or so into you dining budget.

I only wish Mannino's had been around back in my Virginia Beach days. It would have taken wild horses to drag me out of the place. Sadly, I can't say I'll become a regular but it definitely won't be forty-five years before I return for another remarkable dining experience at Mannino's.

Jumping Off The Ozempic Bandwagon

No No No Ozempic!

A cautionary tale.

I'm old and I make no bones about it.

One of the many downsides of aging is the concomitant decrease in metabolism. Whereas ten or fifteen years ago I could drop thirty pounds by simply drinking one less Pepsi per day, I now find myself in a constant grudge match with my waistline, a match wherein the waistline usually prevails. I've always said. “A waist is a terrible thing to mind,” a pun that is sadly all too true these days.

Tall, dark, and handsome? Well, two out of three ain't bad. My older sister, who also fights the battle of the bulge, is fond of likening our genetic forebears to “bricks with legs.” Dark-haired and olive complected, most of our maternal family has always been what used to be called “stocky.”

So, as I recently watched the readout on the scale inch inexorably upward despite my best efforts, I decided to try a shortcut. I decided to try Ozempic.

Unless you've been living in a retreat with some Tibetan monks or something, you've heard of the latest celebrity weight loss fad. Everybody and their third cousins twice removed have been losing massive amounts of weight by injecting themselves weekly with the Type 2 diabetes drug semaglutide, aka Ozempic.

Ozempic is a glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonist medication that aids in lowering blood sugar by helping the pancreas make more insulin. It mimics a naturally occurring hormone, and as those hormone levels rise, they go to your brain, tricking it into thinking you're full. Ozempic also slows digestion by increasing the time it takes for food to leave the body. It's kind of the chemical equivalent of bariatric surgery.

The light and fluffy commercial that co-opts Pilot's 1970s hit “Magic” has firmly planted the refrain “Oh oh oh Ozempic” in consumer's minds like an annoying earworm. It shows happy, smiling people going about their happy daily activities, all while the happily upbeat narrator warns of pancreatitis, vision problems, severe stomach pain, low blood sugar risks, or myriad allergic reactions such as swelling of your face, lips, tongue, or throat, or problems breathing or swallowing. Severe rash or itching, fainting or feeling dizzy, or having a very rapid heartbeat are also mentioned, although obviously not manifested by any of the chipper actors cavorting around the screen. In a supreme example of “duh”-ness, the announcer advises you not to take the crap if you're allergic to it. And as a happy little girl bikes down a suburban street on her newspaper route, a brief disclaimer flashes: “Common side effects are nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, stomach pain, and constipation. Drinking plenty of fluids may reduce your chances of dehydration.” “Which,” the announcer intones, “may worsen kidney problems.”

Hey! Sounds like a no-brainer to me. Where can I get some?

Well, Ozempic is not actually approved for weight loss, so your doctor has to prescribe it “off label,” meaning you'll have to mortgage your house in order to obtain a couple of months' worth. Unless, of course, you are “lucky” enough to actually have Type 2 diabetes, in which case most insurances cover it to the tune of $25 to $50 per month.

While I am not a raging, insulin-dependent diabetic, I have in recent years – as my gross tonnage has increased – become prediabetic.

A normal A1C level is below 5.7. Levels of 5.7 to 6.4 indicate prediabetes, and anything over 6.4 is full-blown diabetes. I consistently bounce around between 5.6 and 6.2, maybe spiking a 7.0 if I've been particularly neglectful. When that happens, I drop that extra Pepsi I referred to earlier and, while I no longer lose thirty pounds, I do usually manage to drop a couple of A1C points.

That said, my primary doc agreed to put me on Ozempic, not so much for diabetic control but to see if I could lose a few pounds. Which, in and of itself, would likely keep my blood sugar levels level. Win-win, right?

Now, one of my nieces got herself on the stuff and had remarkable success. Dropped something like forty pounds in just a couple of months. Even got herself a case of “Ozempic butt,” a frequent complaint caused by the sagging that results from losing too much too fast. But she had gotten some sort of promotional deal from Novo Nordisk. When it ran out and she was faced with $1,300 a month to continue, well......

Another niece, however, had an entirely different experience. She lasted three weeks before the bloating, gassy, nauseous, stomach-lurching effects she was living with three-and-a-half days out of seven finally got to her and she said, “basta!” Well, since she doesn't actually speak Italian, she just said, “enough.” She quit and never looked back.

I figured I'd chance it because I'm one of those odd ducks that never seems to really get side effects from medications and such. Just lucky, I guess. But, boy, did my luck run out.

I got my little blue pen and was ready for the long haul. I even went out and bought a sharps disposal container for the used needles. It's a tiny little needle for a subcutaneous injection. Since the five thumbs I have on each hand sometimes limit my manual dexterity, I got my wife to handle the first injection into my upper outer thigh.

The starting dose is 0.25 mg, which you maintain for four weeks before doubling to 0.5 mg. The starting dose doesn't really affect your blood sugar; it's just supposed to help your body adjust to the oncoming digestive-related issues.

Well, I got shot in the leg on a Sunday afternoon. I knew the stuff was low-dose and slow acting, so I wasn't really expecting anything to happen immediately or even for the next day or two. And I was right. Nothing happened for a couple of days. Then, along about bedtime on Tuesday, I started feeling “off,” for lack of a better term. Not sick, per se, but feeling like it wouldn't take much to tip the balance. I woke up Wednesday morning full-on nauseated. An actual breakfast was out of the question, but I risked a couple of slices of toast. Bad move. Within an hour, the trips to the bathroom began. And they didn't stop for the next eight hours. This morning's toast, last night's dinner, yesterday's lunch – it all came out one end or the other. There might even have been some toenails in there towards the last.

Then came the diaphoresis. Also known in medical parlance as secondary hyperhidrosis, in everyday language it means the cold sweats. Followed by the dizziness and light-headedness, dry mouth, and a degree of disorientation. Having had medical training in a previous existence, I knew I was dehydrated. And I also knew there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it, because ginger ale, Gatorade, water – whatever I tried to use to hydrate – came barreling right back out. So when the wife got home from work, I said, “Honey, we're going for a ride.” And off to the ER I went.

Phenergan is wonderful stuff and once I got some – and a couple of bags of I.V. fluids – I was right as rain within a couple of hours. Well....sort of. I managed to move out of the bathroom Wednesday night but I remained in residence in the bedroom for most of Thursday. I was absolutely wiped out.

Friday was better and Saturday was okay and thus ended Ozempic week one.

Week two started again on Sunday. And it was Wednesday afternoon before the gassy, bloated, slightly nauseous feeling started to gain traction. This time I headed it of with Pepto-Bismol. I was still sick for two days, living on mashed potatoes, pudding, and crackers, but at least I stayed out of the hospital.

I thought week three was going to be the beginning of my success story. I was still sick by midweek, but not as bad as the previous week and nowhere near the way I had been the week before that. Of course, my toothbrush had to vie for space on the bathroom vanity with the Pepto and the GasX and all the other OTC concoctions I was using to stave off the symptoms.

Oh, and I had lost ten pounds. Being nauseated by the thought of food will do that to you.

Another Sunday rolled around and, with high hopes for the coming week, my wife gave me another jab. This time, it didn't wait until Wednesday. I was back in the ER by late Tuesday night. More fluids, more phenergan......and no more Ozempic. I went from “oh oh oh Ozempic” to “no no no Ozempic” in four weeks. I informed my doctor and told him we were going to go back to the old way of doing things. No more shortcuts.

When I mentioned this to my pharmacist – while filling a prescription to help me deal with the after effects of this crap – she said, “Oh, yeah. There are lawsuits being filed as we speak.”

Seems that in addition to the delightful gastro side effects I experienced, there's one more little disclaimer they need to add to their toxically upbeat and positive ad campaign: gastroparesis. Basically, it's a matter of Ozempic doing its job a little too well. Food moves so slowly through the stomach to the small intestine that it may stop moving altogether, resulting in a paralyzed stomach. Resulting in more nausea, vomiting, abdominal bloating, abdominal pain, severe dehydration, acid reflux, and malnutrition. Undigested food may remain in the stomach and harden. Doesn't that sound like fun? They ought to make a commercial about that. On the upside, you'll lose lots of weight.

Look, your mileage may vary. The niece who had a modicum of success with Ozempic admitted to having “some discomfort at first.” One of my numerous attendants in the ER said she had had no trouble with it at all. (Even in my weakened and semi-delirious state, I managed to give her a raspberry.) I'm just saying, don't jump in with both feet. Stock up on clear liquids, OTC medications, and toilet paper and hope for the best. Everything may be just peachy for you.

I wish it had been for me.

Don't Waste Money On Precooked Bacon!

 

Money Can't Buy Happiness. But It Can Buy Bacon, And That's Close Enough

I've decided to stop turning around in the grocery store because it seems like every time I turn around, the prices have doubled. This is especially true for my favorite porky ambrosia and yours...say it with me now... “mmmm...bacon!”

I'm old enough to remember when bacon sold for sixty-five cents a pound. The good stuff is going for upwards of $7 a pound now. You can still get cheap store brands for less, but you usually get what you pay for, you know? I can buy restaurant quality bacon through a restaurant supplier and it costs me a lot less; in fact, I just brought home the bacon – five pounds of it – for about $16. You can, too. There are a lot of restaurant supply outlets across the country that are open to the public. They may not be as convenient as your neighborhood grocery store, but......

And, speaking of convenience, let's talk about precooked bacon. I love the stuff. It's like instant bacon when you want to throw a couple of slices on a sandwich or a burger or crumble it over a baked potato or in a salad. But who wants to spend the time and clean up the mess involved in cooking up two slices of bacon for something like that? Enter the modern marketing marvel that is precooked bacon.

As the package says, it's real bacon, fully cooked and ready to use. Just pop it in the microwave for a few seconds and it's good to go. Because the high salt content and cooking method preserve the meat from bacteria, precooked bacon is shelf-stable in the store and you just toss it in the fridge after you open it. It'll be good for at least a couple of weeks.

That said, if I balk at paying seven bucks for a pound of uncooked bacon, there's no way I'm going to fork over five or six dollars for a measly two or three ounce package of the precooked stuff. There are usually sixteen to eighteen slices of uncooked bacon in a one-pound package. The precooked stuff averages about ten slices per package. No way.

So here's what I do: when I bring home my five-pound pack of bacon, I prep it for freezing via the method I discuss elsewhere on this site. (See “Bacon Is A Terrible Thing To Waste”) But I separate out about a pound that doesn't go right into the freezer.

First, I start my oven preheating to 400° F. Then I grab a rimmed baking sheet (½ sheet pan) and a cooling rack to fit inside. I line the bottom of the tray with foil before setting in the rack just to make for easier cleanup later. Next, I lay out as much bacon as I can fit on the rack, usually about ten or eleven slices. It's okay if it overlaps a little because it will shrink up some as it cooks. Into the preheated oven it goes for fifteen to twenty minutes. The time depends on how you like your bacon. I know people who want it to “oink” when they pick it up and I know people who want it so crisp it shatters into bacon bits when they pick it up. I'm pretty much in the middle of the two extremes, so I start peeking into the oven after about fifteen minutes. No flipping necessary, I just put it in there and keep an eye on it. When it's done to my preference, I drain it on paper towels.

Now, what you have here is – are you ready for this? – precooked bacon! The same stuff they're going to charge you an arm and a leg for in the grocery store. All you need to do now is wait until it cools completely, then lay it out on the same sheet pan (assuming you've cooled and cleaned it) and stick it in the freezer for an hour or two to flash freeze it. Portion it out in single slices or in twos or threes or whatever and wrap the portions in wax paper or parchment paper. Stick the wrapped bacon in a zip lock bag and put it back in the freezer. It'll stay nice and tasty for two or three months.

When you want a quick bacon fix, take a portion out of the bag and microwave it for a few seconds. Or, if you're really super-prepared and all, you can put it in the fridge a couple of hours ahead of time to thaw. Now it's ready for your sandwich, your burger, your salad, your baked potato, your pizza, or you can scarf it down next to a couple of eggs or all by itself. Heat it up or not, depending on what you're going to do with it.

And all the while you're devouring your precooked portion of porcine pleasure, you can smile because you didn't fall prey to the latest time-saving-but-money-wasting marketing gimmick. Win-win!

You know, money can't buy happiness. But it can buy bacon, and that's close enough.

Praise For Plain Pasta

 

Don't Overlook the Simple Pleasures

Mmmm, pasta. You ought to see my pantry. You'd swear I had stock in DeCecco and Barilla. I love pasta. And that love affair goes way back.

The very first pasta I remember eating was “wagon wheel” pasta made by La Rosa. I was four or five years old and my mother cooked it up and sauced it with nothing but butter and I was the happiest kid in the world. Fast forward several – ahem – decades, and if you still want to make me the happiest kid in the world, put a plate of plain buttered pasta in front of me. Works every time.

That's because plain pasta with butter and maybe a little Parmesan cheese is the most basic Italian comfort food. In Italy, it's called pasta al burro or sometimes pasta bianca. One of the most popular forms of the dish, pastina, has been in the news a lot lately because Ronzoni, one of the biggest manufacturers of pastina pasta in the US, stopped making the classic little star-shaped noodles back in February, causing widespread panic buying and hoarding. Sure, other companies produce it; Barilla markets it as both Pastina and Stelline. But Ronzoni had by far the biggest grocery store shelf presence for its pastina product and long-time customers were understandably miffed by its sudden absence. I mean, pastina is like the next step up from mother's milk for most Italian children. A little plain pasta, some butter, some cheese, and usually an egg. Okay, so my mom was weird starting me off on buttered rotelle. Must come from the French part of the family, I don't know.

I do know that when my own youngest son reached that pasta devouring age, it had to be plain pasta with butter. Never mind that most kiddie menus served up some form of spaghetti in tomato sauce. No, no! None of that for il mio bambino. If the pasta had even a trace of anything but plain butter on it, all bets were off. I recall a certain Old Spaghetti Factory in Atlanta that once dared to put brown butter on my kid's pasta. Wow! The way the acoustics in that place echoed, it was not a pleasant experience for anybody. Later on, six years of living in Italy expanded his palate quite a bit. But, like me, he still appreciates a good dish of plain pasta with butter and cheese.

Did you know that pasta al burro is the basis for fettuccine Alfredo? When you go to Italy, unless you're going to one of the tourist traps in Rome, don't bother ordering fettuccine Alfredo. They'll look at you like you've got a third eye. Instead, ask for pasta al burro or pasta bianca. They may still give you funny looks because that's a dish commonly served to children and folks with tummy troubles, but at least they'll know what you're talking about.

See, about a hundred years ago, a Roman restaurateur named Alfredo di Lelio had a very pregnant, very sick wife who could keep very little on her stomach. About all she could tolerate was Alfredo's pasta al burro, which he made with egregious amounts of butter and cheese for extra flavor. A couple of Hollywood luminaries, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr and Mary Pickford, were honeymooning in Rome and wandered into Alfredo's eatery. They inquired about the dish his wife was enjoying. Alfredo probably thought, “Boh. Americani pazzi.” But he dutifully served them some plain pasta with butter and cheese. And they LOVED it! They loved it so much that they went back to Hollywood and told everybody they knew – and they knew a lot of people – about the wonderful Italian dish they had in Rome. Fettuccine Alfredo, they called it, and thus was a culinary legend born.

Of course, American chefs didn't have access to the same quality ingredients Alfredo used in his restaurant, so they wound up bastardizing his simple creation, adulterating it with milk and cream and all kinds of extraneous additives to achieve what they thought was a close approximation. Sorry. No. Not even close. Nothing beats the silky, buttery unctuousness of the sauce that naturally forms when you briskly stir together plain hot pasta, high-fat butter, real Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, and just a tiny bit of the water in which the pasta was cooked. Buonissimo! And far superior to anything you'll find in a jar.

There are another couple of variations on plain pasta. Pasta cacio e pepe is one. Plain pasta, some butter, some Parmigiano and pecorino cheeses, and a good dose of some freshly-ground black pepper. That's all you need in life, you know?

Unless you want to use olive oil instead of butter and throw in some garlic. Then you've got pasta aglio e olio. Another mouth watering dish that's just super simple.

If you want a different flavor profile, you might try pasta al limone. Same basic ingredients – pasta and butter with some lemon juice and lemon zest.

I suppose carbonara could be a “plain” pasta dish. I mean, it's pasta, butter and cheese with bacon and eggs mixed in, but with all the egg tempering and such, it's just too fussy when you're craving something quick and simple.

When I'm just too tired or too uninspired to prepare something complicated, I boil some water, SALT IT, add some pasta, cook until al dente, then ladle it into a pasta bowl, mix in some good quality butter – something like Kerrygold – and season it to taste. Then I kick back and enjoy it while watching TV or reading a book.

As to what kind of pasta? It doesn't really matter. Smaller shapes work best. Something rigate with a little texture to it is even better. Plain old spaghetti or linguine are fine, too. Tube-shaped pastas don't hold light sauces real well. Except ditalini. That one's small and it works okay in this application. Broad noodles like tagliatelle or pappardelle aren't really agreeable with buttery sauces, either. Doesn't mean you can't use them. Just keep extra napkins on hand if you do. I like farfalle or farfalline (aka “bowtie” pasta.) And, of course. I never turn down a bowlful of good ol' buttered wheels.

Rich, exotic, fragrant sauces are beautiful. I swoon over a good marinara or a flavorful amatriciana. A spicy arrabiata is a wonderful thing. And, of course, Bolognese is the gold standard of pasta sauces. But in the rush toward those long-cooking, preparation-heavy concoctions, don't overlook the simple pleasures to be found in a little plain pasta, some butter and some cheese.

At Last! It May Soon Be Illegal To Massacre Italian Words!

There's No “American Way.” Wrong Is Wrong.

As regular readers know, I have long been on a quixotic quest to stamp out the egregious mispronunciation of Italian words. Italian is such a beautiful, flowing, melodious, language that it makes my ears bleed to hear some flat-accented English-speaker ask for “broo-SHET-uh” in an Italian restaurant. Brits and some Canadians with their bowls of “PAST-uh” (rhymes with LAST-uh) and Americans who put “mare-uh-NARE-uh” sauce on it make me want to run screaming into the night.

“Oh, well, that's just the American way of saying it.” Yeah. And it's also the WRONG way of saying it. I am fond of quoting French author and critic Anatole France who once said, “If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing.” There's no “American way” or “British way” or whatever. There's simply a right way and a wrong way.

And maybe soon the Italian government will back me up. Under new legislation being introduced by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, the Italian Culture Ministry would set up a committee to monitor the “correct use of the Italian language and its pronunciation” in schools, media, commerce, and advertising. This means that “mare-uh-NARE-uh” miscreants could be fined somewhere between $5,000 and $100,000 for mutilating the most lyrical language on Earth.

Unfortunately, the penalties would only apply in Italy.

The fantasy that such a law could be enforced in the US is drool-inducing. For one thing, it would enrich the coffers of Italy beyond the dreams of avarice. And it would end the endless aural assault on my nerves. Just think! I could finally enter an Italian eatery without cringing every time somebody ordered a plate of “spug-ETTY mare-uh-NARE-uh” with a side of “broo-SHET-uh.” It would be wonderful! Meraviglioso!

But, alas......it's only a dream.

I get little support among my native Italian friends in America because Italians are inherently too polite to correct anybody. Fortunately, my Italian heritage is tempered by a strong dose of French and everybody knows that the French will slap you silly over the slightest mispronunciation of a syllable.

And fuhgeddabout any sympathy from Italian-Americans. They are among the worst offenders what with their “gabagool” and “moozarell” and “rigott.” Interesting fact: most Italian-Americans don't actually speak a word of standard Italian, relying instead on the garbled dialect words and phrases passed down by their parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. I saw this in action myself recently when a New Yorker opened a little Italian-American cafe nearby. He tossed one of those dialect words at me in describing a dish on offer. When I responded by asking, “è fatta in casa?” (is it homemade?), he looked at me like I'd grown a third eye. My “non parli italiano?” was met with, “I don't speak Italian. We just always call it 'gabaladina'.” No wonder I didn't know what the hell he was talking about. Everybody else calls it “caponata.”

See why Italy would make a mint if it was able to enforce proper pronunciation worldwide?

And I really don't understand why the Italian language gets the old “it's the American pronunciation” treatment when other languages are strictly adhered to in the US. For instance, even the most linguistically limited American can go into Taco Bell and perfectly pronounce “quesadilla.” I have yet to hear the guy who says “mare-uh-NARE-uh” down at the Italian joint say “kwes-uh-DILL-uh” over at the Mexican place. (Okay. My wife's grandfather used to say “TACK-oh,” but he was the exception,) Nobody orders “FILL-it MIG-non” anywhere, do they? Most people take the time to learn that when ordering soup in a Vietnamese restaurant, it's pronounced “fuh” and not “foe”. Spanish, French, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese, German.......all get their due respect in terms of proper pronunciation. But Italian? Nah. Say it any old way you want and just fall back on “that's the American pronunciation.” I don't get it.

So, back to that proposed legislation in Italy, the bill would also try to combat the use of English and other foreign words in official communications. Apparently “Anglomania” is becoming a problem, with random English words, phrases, acronyms, and names creeping into the official Italian lexicon, something that the bill's sponsors say “demeans and mortifies” the Italian language. Wow! If they want to be mortified, let them come to the States and sit in an Italian restaurant for an hour or so. They'll go back to il bel paese and wash out their ears.

“I'd like a KAL-zone with some ex-PRESS-oh, please. And maybe a bowl of min-uh-STRONE, too. GRAT-zee.” Uffa! It just made my fingers hurt to type that.

Buona fortuna, Italia. You're going to hear a lot of gobbledygook about how languages are “living things” that “evolve” and that pronunciations change through “common usage.” Yeah. Well stick evolution in your ear, Darwin, and stop leaning on “common usage” as an excuse for intellectual laziness. Mispronunciations of “marinara,” “bruschetta,” “calzone,” et.al are not high-flown “evolution through common usage.” They are just plain wrong. Foolish, even. And you know what Anatole France and I have to say about foolish things, right?