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. 

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.

Just Ignore The Latest Lunatic “Hack” For Cooking Pasta

“Every Time This Technique Is Replicated, An Italian Dies”

I thought I'd seen it all. I thought I'd experienced every crackpot “time-saving” and/or “labor-saving” technique and device out there for the simple task of cooking pasta. I've gaped in amazement at all the so-called “hacks” (I really hate that term) that espouse cooking pasta in cold water or that proclaim pasta can be successfully prepared using cups of water rather than quarts. I've shaken my head in bemusement at the rubbery, silicone gizmos that claim to produce “perfect” pasta in the microwave. I've heaved sighs of frustration at American “old wives” who dump oil in pasta cooking water or who don't liberally salt said water. As I said, I thought I'd seen it all: then I saw this.

Some benighted woman in the pasta cooking capital that is northeastern England has gone on record – via TikTok, of course – with the ignominious idea of cooking pasta in its sauce. Sort of.

Now wait! Before you remind me that that is, indeed, the proper Italian way to finish cooking pasta, let me explain this culinary genius's complete method. The woman, named Jasmine, claims that she got the idea from an Italian-American restaurant chain called Frankie & Benny's. Founded in London in 1995 by one Kevin Bacon, (probably not that one), the fact that it is a British Italian-American outfit means it's already at least two degrees separated from anything remotely authentic.

Anyway, according to Jasmine, the best way to prepare your pasta in one pot with a minimum of muss and fuss is as follows: you boil some water in a teakettle. Then you pour a jar of spaghetti sauce directly into a pot and add some of the boiling water from the kettle. Toss your dried spaghetti into the sauce and water mixture and boil it up. Once you reach the desired degree of doneness (and I shudder to think what that might be) you throw in a few meatballs and declare the insipid result to be a delicious Italian dish.

According to the website wantedinmilan.com, one person commenting on this travesty summed up the reaction of Italians everywhere with the statement, “Every time this technique is replicated, an Italian dies.” Let me expand on that. Not only does an Italian die, they die screaming and are joined in their death throes by the spinning of generations of nonne in their graves.

With admittedly facetious apologies to Jasmine and other “experts,” there is one and only one proper way to prepare pasta. Uno. Un. Um. En. Een. Ett. Ein. Éνας. Moja. You get the idea? ONE! And it most assuredly does not involve tossing uncooked pasta into a pot of diluted tomato sauce. Uffa!!! And that's the mildest word I can conjure at the moment.

You gotta have water. Lotsa, lotsa water. The water's gotta be boiling. Lotsa, lotsa bubbles. And it's gotta be salted. Lotsa, lotsa salt. Did you notice that Jasmine didn't include any salt anywhere in her “recipe?” Those are the only ways you can coax desiccated bits of durum wheat flour to give up their starches, achieve perfect al dente tenderness, and absorb flavor. Otherwise, what's the point? Any other method or technique or “hack” (the word reminds me of what a cat does to a hairball) is going to produce an unsatisfying mush.

Now, as I said, finishing the cooked pasta in a pot of sauce is not only a good idea, it's an essential and quintessential Italian technique. Only in Italian-American restaurants, greasy spoon diners, or church “spaghetti dinners” do they actually serve piles of naked spaghetti on a plate doused in cups if not quarts of red sauce. You will not find an Italian anywhere in Italy or elsewhere on the planet who cooks pasta that way. Unless they own one of the aforesaid Italian-American joints, in which case they do so under protest because that's what their palate-less customers expect and demand.

I took over running the kitchen in one of those diners once. The place offered “spaghetti specials” on the weekends and the very first thing I did was to change the method of preparing the spaghetti.

My cook had already prepared a big pot of pasta when I got in one day. I tasted it. Horrible. Bland. Devoid of any semblance of flavor. I asked him how he had cooked it. He looked at me as though I had grown a third eye and and told me that he had boiled the water, added some salt, and cooked the spaghetti. I asked, “how much salt and for how long?” “I don't know. A couple of teaspoons, I guess, and for about fifteen minutes.” Dio mio! He had produced the equivalent of canned spaghetti alla Chef Boyardee.

“Throw it out,” I said, “We're starting over.” We boiled some more water and his eyes bugged out as he watched me pour in the salt. We're talking a restaurant stock pot here, okay? Forty quarts. Ten gallons. Probably eight gallons of water. Allowing two or three tablespoons of salt per gallon, that's about a cup and a half of salt. I thought he was gonna choke. “Taste the water,” I told him. “What does it taste like?” “Kinda salty,” he replied. “Like seawater,” I asked? “Yeah,” he said. I exclaimed, “Perfect!”

I added the pasta and cooked it at a rolling boil for a generous eight or nine minutes. I pulled out a strand and told my cook to try it. “Oh, wow! That's good! I'm gonna make that way at home from now on.” Flavor! What a concept!

Okay, so now the par-cooked pasta goes in the fridge. We kept a big pot of sauce simmering on a back burner of the stove. When an order came in for the special, instead of throwing a portion of the pasta back in some hot water to heat it up (called “double-cooking”) and then plopping it on a plate and pouring a big glug of sauce over it, I insisted that the cooks ladle some sauce into a smaller pot and add the pasta to that pot of sauce to finish cooking for maybe two minutes. Then you plate it up on a warm serving plate and present it to your happy customer. Not only were the patrons amazed at the difference – especially the regulars – but the cooks were, too, and so I achieved what I set out to achieve.

You can do the same thing at home. Cook your pasta in plenty of generously salted water until it's just shy of done, then finish it in your sauce before serving. It's that simple, it's that easy. It's the way generations of Italians have done it. No “hacks” required. And no dead Italians or spinning grandmothers, either. Win-win, right?

Good work is seldom fast and fast work is seldom good. Remember that rule next time you see a “hack” that promises to make things quick and easy. (Remember, too, that one of the definitions of “hack” is “someone who produces banal and mediocre work in the hope of gaining commercial success.”) 'Nuff said.

Buon appetito!

Why Must Restaurants Be So Damn LOUD?

It Used To Be Merely Annoying. Now It's Nearly Intolerable

As I frequently remind readers – and family and friends and just about anybody else who will listen – sono vecchio: I'm old. And sometimes cranky and ill-tempered as well, especially when something gets me started on a path toward a rant. And one such thing is the current trend toward ludicrously loud restaurants.

Now, in fairness to myself, it's not just a matter of temperament. Within the last year or so I have developed something the audiologists refer to as “hyperacusis,” defined as “a highly debilitating hearing disorder characterized by an increased sensitivity to certain frequencies and volume ranges of sound (a collapsed tolerance to usual environmental sound).” Thankfully, mine is a very mild case and its only manifested itself in one ear. But believe me, it's enough to make me wince, cringe, and occasionally cry out when, say, the screams of an infant echo off the hard, bare walls, floors, and ceilings of a modern eatery and reverberate through my skull. Before hyperacusis, I found this merely annoying. Now it's nearly intolerable.

Once upon a time, restaurants – finer dining establishments in particular – were lush, plush places. There were rich draperies adorning the windows, carpeting covering the floors, paneling on the walls, acoustic tiles on low ceilings, thick padding on the chairs and booth seats, heavy fabric table linens, and wall hangings of various sorts. If there was music playing, it was of a soft background nature. All of this cushiness resulted in a gentle, refined, muted atmosphere. One in which you could sit down in quiet enjoyment of the food on offer and engage in conversation with your companion or companions.

Nowadays? You're lucky if you can hear yourself think.

Used to be, two of Guy Fieri's three “D”s – diners and dives – were the only spots where this was a problem. Usually a little farther down the upscale spectrum, such places were pretty low-fringe. Lots of tile and chrome and plastic and very few plush accoutrements. You generally expected a noisy atmosphere and you were seldom disappointed. But today it seems like even the finest of five-star establishments are out to strip down to the bare walls and to be as “industrial” as they can be.

Case in point: Meril on Girod Street in New Orleans. Billed as a “casual Emeril Lagasse spot” serving “New American” fare, the service at Meril is unreproachable and the food indescribable. I had an Iberico ham dish I'm still praising weeks later and my wife still salivates over her perfect rib eye. But if you've ever been in a packed sports bar in Tuscaloosa, Alabama on an Iron Bowl game day at the moment the Crimson Tide definitively rolls over the Auburn Tigers to clinch the win, you'll get an idea of what the atmosphere at Meril is like on an average Friday dinner service.

My wife and I sat at a beautiful hardwood table in beautiful hardwood chairs amidst a plethora of hard, unyielding surfaces at a roughly ninety-degree right angle to one another, hands touching above the table and knees touching beneath, scarcely an arm's length apart and completely unable to hear one another without leaning in and shouting in each other's ears or faces. Romantic it was not. When the waiter came over and shouted at me regarding my order, I shouted back at him, attempting to explain my hearing difficulty and directing him to attempt to communicate with my wife, who could at least nominally understand what he was saying/shouting. She would, in turn, point, sign, and shout to me and thus convey whatever information the server was striving to disseminate. There were at least two large tables nearby filled with people celebrating birthdays or something and being served dishes that featured literal fireworks. And even at the surrounding “quieter” four and six-top tables, diners were all reduced to shouting at one another, adding to the general din of unrelenting sound bouncing off unpadded, unadorned walls, floors, windows, and ceilings and hard furnishings. We were expecting my son to arrive in town at any moment and when he called me, I felt rather than heard his call and had to step out into the relative peace and quiet of a busy New Orleans street to answer it, the crowd gathered outside being much quieter than the one inside. Four of my five senses will always remember fondly the experience they had at Meril. The fifth one? Hearing? Not so much.

And it's not just the high-dollar, big city places. There's a new eatery downtown in the tiny rural hamlet where we live. My wife and I decided to check it out the other night. Shades of Meril! Brick walls, stone floors, high metal ceilings, wood furnishings. Only this was a “family” bar and grill, so in addition to the boisterous bedlam created by the adult diners, there was the added element of screeching children and bawling babies factored in to the general cacophony. The food was good, but as we were leaving we noticed an adjacent outdoor patio. Guess where we'll sit next time. Even if it's raining.

On the other side of the coin, we were dining at one of our favorite family-owned Italian places recently. And it was packed; easily a hundred-twenty people or more occupying nearly every available seat. And yet, as we sat in the midst of this sea of noisy humanity, we were able to talk to one another and to interact with our server in normal, conversational tones. Why? Because it's “old school:” low, acoustic-tiled ceiling, padded seats, draped windows – lots of sound-absorbing elements in the construction and décor.

It's not just me being annoyed by this raucous new trend. Others are noticing and commenting on the same thing. A quick Google search of “loud restaurants” yields numerous results: How Restaurants Got So Loud - The Atlantic; Why restaurants became so loud — and how to fight back – Vox; Why Are Restaurants So Loud? - Eater; Are Restaurants Getting Too Loud? | Here & Now – WBUR; Why Restaurants Are So Loud These Days | HowStuffWorks; It's not just you: Restaurants really are louder than they used to be; and a host of other similar offerings on the subject. Respondants to restaurant surveys by both Zagat and Consumer Reports list excessive noise as their number one complaint.

Several sources cite the same motive behind the noise: profit. They claim that restaurateurs are deliberately cranking up the volume in order to turn tables more quickly, the theory being that you'll find the loud atmosphere so unpleasant you'll simply wolf down your food and leave. Could be: I didn't linger at either of the aforementioned loud restaurants one second longer than I had to.

Another reason for the unreasonable noise has to do with the personal tastes of upscale chefs like Mario Batali, David Chang and others. Back in the '90s, Batali was among the first to inflict his personal musical taste on his customers. Restaurant kitchens have always cranked up the tunes for kitchen employees even though more subdued music usually played in the dining area. Batali felt that his head-banger faves “energized” the overall atmosphere and created what he considered a “New York vibe.” And it wasn't long before other chef/restaurateurs followed in the aural assault.

But the main factor behind the noise seems simply to be the newest architectural “trend.” Whereas in the middle of the last century, “upscale” and “elegant” were equated with plush opulence, today's “high-end” establishments follow a “minimalist” or “industrial” trend started in the 1970s. Lots of glass and steel and exposed brick. Soaring high ceilings featuring open ductwork. These are the “elegant” spots of the new dining era. And they're killing us. Or, at least they're not doing us any good.

The author of one of the Googled articles took a calibrated decibel meter into several places and found that the noise level in a brewpub situated in a rehabbed fire station reached ninety decibels. That's approximately as loud as an approaching 737 or a DC-9 one mile out. It's as loud as a motorcycle that's twenty-five feet away or as loud as a running newspaper press. And more important than the aggravation factor is the health concern for people who have to put up with it for extended periods of time. Exposure to ninety decibels can damage your hearing after several hours. Okay, so diners don't sit at tables for six or eight-hour stretches, but employees are another matter.

Even short-term exposure is not altogether healthy. Acoustic engineers studying what one MIT engineer terms “aural architecture” have discovered that the atmosphere, the noise level, the “voice,” if you will, of a space can adversely affect the physical and mental health of people occupying the space. Scientific research suggests that noisy settings have been proven to annoy people, and noise annoyance itself has been linked to depression and anxiety. I know extremely noisy places have always tended to set my teeth on edge. And now, with the additional complication of my hearing problem, well......I've been known to pull out an earplug and stick it in my ear just to get through dinner.

One more factor contributes to the overall noise problem in American restaurants and that factor is Americans. By and large and with few exceptions, Americans are the loudest, most boisterous people on the planet. I've been around groups of Chinese who might come in a close second, but most folks who study and evaluate such things agree that Americans are a bunch of loudmouths. Theories on why this is so vary from Americans being accustomed to having a lot of space, hence the tendency to shout, to Americans loudly expressing their individualism to cultural and social influences. But for whatever reason, put two or more Americans in a quiet room and it won't be quiet for long, especially if you lubricate their vocal cords with a little booze. Even stone cold sober, though, Americans tend to exhibit an “I'm having a good time, dammit, and to hell with anybody who doesn't like it” attitude, and if you're unfortunate enough to be seated near a group of these individualists, well......

The solutions to the problem aren't abundant nor are they very promising. You can always complain to management, which will usually get you a polite if insincere apology and very little else. You can “shush” or stare angrily at offending noisemakers – as long as you have A) good health insurance and/or B) bail money. You can go at “off peak” times: personally, I love having dinner at three in the afternoon. Or you can avoid noisy places altogether: in other words, eat at home.

Seriously, people who like a more tranquil dining experience, one with perhaps a bit less “energy,” are pretty much stuck bucking the still-growing trend toward minimalist industrial chic. And it's a trend which I doubt a few complaints to management is going to reverse. Restaurant owners have jumped on the bandwagon big time and they're not getting off until the next big thing comes along. For one thing, it's cheaper to go “industrial.” Sound dampening elements cost money, although there are a few customer conscious innovators out there who manage to be “trendy” while still keeping the atmosphere in their establishments from deafening their patrons and employees. Kudos to them, but good luck finding them. No, we're basically screwed. The noise is going to continue unabated until enough diners lose their appetites – or their hearing – to make it stop.

In the meantime, stop by a Walmart or a sporting goods store on your way to dinner at that fancy “upscale” place you've been wanting to try. Earplugs are cheap.

All About Macaroni & Cheese

Stuck A Feather In His Cap And Called It Macaroni

Easily one of America's favorite comfort foods, macaroni and cheese is certainly one of mine. I learned how to make it at the age of seven or eight and I've been turning it out on a regular basis ever since. Of course, in those callow days of youth I did what almost everybody else did in the 1960s: I opened up the blue box from Kraft, poured the pasta into boiling water, cooked it for the prescribed amount of time, drained it and then mixed in a little butter, a little milk and that packet of unnatural orange “cheese” powder.

My infatuation with the dish ramped up when I discovered Stouffer's frozen macaroni and cheese sometime in the late '60s. Wow! Goodbye blue box, hello red one! Talk about macaroni and cheese at the next level! Believe me, I've since learned much better ways of making macaroni and cheese. But even so, there still lurk in my pantry and freezer microwavable cups of Easy Mac and a box or two of Stouffer's. So sue me. Three-and-a-half to six minutes and I'm transported back more than a half-century to Mom's kitchen and the familiar tastes I grew up with. Or, at least, reasonable facsimiles thereof.

But how did we all come to be so enamored of macaroni and cheese in the first place? Hold on as I guide you through a culinary journey with more twists than cavatappi.

Macaroni and cheese has its roots in Italy. In fact, there's an Italian idiom for things that go together naturally: “come il cacio su'maccheroni” (like cheese on macaroni). But the creamy, cheddary version we serve in the United States is practically unknown in Italy. When Italian cooks put “cheese on macaroni,” it's generally Parmigiano-Reggiano or asiago or pecorino or some other Italian cheese. Cheddar and American cheeses are not particularly popular.

The earliest known reference to the dish in Italy dates back to a late thirteenth century cookbook, anonymously authored in Latin, Liber de coquina. In it we find a recipe for de lasanis, which many consider to be the first “macaroni and cheese” recipe. The recipe employed lasagne sheets made from fermented dough, cut into two-inch squares, cooked in water and tossed with grated cheese, probably the aforementioned Parmigiano-Reggiano. The recipe's author suggested using powdered spices and layering the sheets with the cheese if desired, just as we would today when making lasagne.

According to the famous fourteenth century English cookbook, the Forme of Cury, a cheese and pasta casserole known as makerouns was made with hand-cut pasta layers sandwiched between a mixture of melted butter and cheese.

The first recipe that we would recognize as macaroni and cheese was included in Elizabeth Raffald's 1770 book, The Experienced English Housekeeper. That recipe calls for a Béchamel sauce with cheddar cheese – technically a Mornay sauce if you want to be all French about it – which is mixed with the macaroni, sprinkled with Parmesan, and baked until bubbly and golden.

They even had macaroni and cheese in France in the late eighteenth century. And why not? The Italian chefs of Caterina de Medici did teach the French to cook, after all. (I know, I know! That's a myth. But it's a fun myth because it annoys the French.) Anyway, the most popular story of how macaroni and cheese crossed the ocean to American shores involves Paris, Naples, and the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson.

The story goes that Jefferson visited France and Italy in 1787. Basing in Paris, he traveled extensively through the south of France and Italy, writing to his friend and ambassador to Paris William Short, “architecture, painting, sculpture, antiquities, agriculture, the condition of the labouring poor fill all my moments.” Well, maybe not all of them. He also closely observed the local culture, including, of course, food and wine. Jefferson became enamored of the pasta dishes he encountered in his journeys. In 1789, he commissioned Short to purchase a pasta making machine for him. Short acquired one in Naples and had it shipped to Paris. Jefferson likely returned home before the machine reached him, but it was inventoried among his possessions at Monticello in 1793. There the soon-to-be president drew sketches of his favorite pastas and the device that made them and wrote detailed notes on the extrusion process as he observed it in his travels. Evidently, the machine he ordered did not meet his requirements as he later was known to import both macaroni and Parmesan cheese from Italy for his use at Monticello. In 1802, now-President Jefferson served “a pie called macaroni” at a state dinner. At least one of the guests, Rev. Mannaseh Cutler, was not impressed. “Dined at the President's... Dinner not as elegant as when we dined before. [Among other dishes] a pie called macaroni, which appeared to be a rich crust filled with the strillions of onions, or shallots, which I took it to be, tasted very strong, and not agreeable. Mr. [Merriwether] Lewis told me there were none in it; it was an Italian dish, and what appeared like onions was made of flour and butter, with a particularly strong liquor mixed with them.”

Some like to say that Jefferson “introduced” macaroni and cheese to America, and that's not quite accurate. As noted, there were recipes for variations circulating as early as 1770. But his affection for the dish certainly helped popularize it among his countrymen. He even wrote out a favorite macaroni recipe in his own hand:

6 eggs. yolks & whites.
2 wine glasses of milk
2 lb of flour
a little salt
work them together without water, and very well.
roll it then with a roller to a paper thickness
cut it into small peices which roll again with the hand into long slips, & then cut them to a proper length.
put them into warm water a quarter of an hour.
drain them.
dress them as maccaroni.
but if they are intended for soups they are to be put in the soup & not into warm water

Note the instruction “dress them as maccaroni.” Before we move on, let's take a second to look at “macaroni.”

When we think of “macaroni” today we usually think of the familiar “elbows,” right? But up until fairly recent times, the word “macaroni,” the plural form of the Italian “maccherone,” used to apply to pretty much any form of pasta, especially the short tubular varieties. While each individual shape may have had its own individual name, collectively it was all “macaroni.” And the word didn't always apply only to pasta. In eighteenth century Britain, anybody seen to be dandified or overdressed in foppish Italian fashions and wigs was derisively referred to as a “macaroni.” You didn't really think the old “Yankee Doodle” line “stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni” was talking about pasta, did you? (If you did you wouldn't be alone.)

Although American macaroni and cheese started out as a novelty dish for the well-to-do seated at the Presidential table, it didn't take long for its popularity to spread to the masses. A recipe for a preparation actually called “macaroni and cheese” showed up in Mary Randolph's highly influential 1824 cookbook, The Virginia Housewife. Randolph's recipe called for three ingredients: macaroni, cheese, and butter, layered together and baked in a hot oven. Other recipes began to appear in popular publications such as Godey's Lady's Book. By the turn of the century, macaroni and cheese casseroles were being turned out in kitchens across America, aided by readily available and affordable ingredients made possible by factory production. And as macaroni and cheese became “common,” it lost its cachet among the elite.

Even though macaroni and cheese was now accessible, it still wasn't necessarily popular. It had not yet achieved the “comfort food” status it currently holds. That came along thanks to Kraft.

In the midst of the Great Depression, when Americans were seeking food options that were filling but affordable, Kraft Foods stepped up to the plate – no pun intended. James Lewis “J.L.” Kraft had pioneered the method for “processing” and powdering cheese around 1916. According to Sasha Chapman, writing in The Walrus in 2012, “The idea for boxed macaroni and cheese came during the Depression, from a salesman in St. Louis who wrapped rubber bands around packets of grated Kraft cheese and boxes of pasta and persuaded retailers to sell them as a unit.” Kraft started producing boxes of macaroni and cheese under the name “Kraft Dinner” in 1937. The contents of the box – a measured amount of pasta and a paper packet of powdered cheese – could feed a family of four for about nineteen cents. Kraft sold eight million boxes right out of the box. Again, no pun intended. This convenience and economy became increasingly popular a few years later when WWII rationing began to pinch family budgets and food options. Fifty million yellow boxes of Kraft's product were sold during the war years. The now ubiquitous blue boxes came into being in 1954, by which time “Kraft” and “macaroni and cheese” were practically synonymous.

Frozen foods began to make inroads into the dominance of canned and packaged goods about that same time, and macaroni and cheese proved to be an instant hit in the freezer case. My favorite, the previously mentioned Stouffer's, began appearing in select grocery outlets in the early 1960s and expanded to a more general market as the decade progressed. Originally developed by an Ohio-based restaurant, Stouffer's was initially considered a “high end” product, but by the end of the decade it was showing up in stores and on dinner tables across the board. Swanson's also marketed frozen macaroni and cheese as did numerous other manufacturers, including Boston Market and Amy's, but Stouffer's was always somehow a cut above. Sadly, Stouffer's has been bought and sold a couple of times over the years and the quality of the product has suffered significantly. It just doesn't taste the same anymore. It lacks that fresh, sharp cheddar flavor it had before the company started cheaping up on ingredients. But take heart! Believe it or not, the macaroni and cheese served at IKEA tastes almost like Stouffer's used to.

Today, macaroni and cheese – often abhorrently abbreviated to “mac & cheese” – is everywhere in many forms. The old blue box is still on store shelves along with its microwavable counterpart. Chef Boyardee puts macaroni and cheese in cans. Frozen product, from individual serving cups up through ginormous “family size” packages, competes for freezer space everywhere from the supermarket to the big box discount place to the corner convenience store. And more and more cooks are eschewing the frozen, canned, and packaged options in favor of returning to the dish's traditional roots: cook the pasta, make the cheese sauce, serve the dish hot and fresh to grateful eaters.

There are even food trucks and restaurants serving nothing but variations on macaroni and cheese. Take for example S'Mac (short for Sarita's Macaroni & Cheese) in Manhattan's East Village. It bills itself as “an exciting eatery specializing in macaroni & cheese.” I ate at another such place, Mr. Mac's in Portsmouth, NH. Mr. Mac's – with several locations in New Hampshire and Massachusetts – lays claim to “the best comfort food on the planet, with fresh ingredients all made hot and delicious to order. Perfect family dining, or to-go!” Indeed, we picked up one of their “take and bake” family-size portions for our holiday dinner table and it was quite good. On the other coast, Elbow's Mac N' Cheese serves “the best mac n' cheese” along with another of my favorites, grilled cheese sandwiches. But, darn, they use that unfortunate abbreviation.

Along with the eateries dedicated only to macaroni and cheese, there are tons of places that are famous for featuring the dish as part of their menu. Some are even infamous, a word used to describe the macaroni and cheese at Humpback Sally's in Bismarck, ND. Boston's Yankee Lobster Company serves a rich, creamy macaroni and cheese, studded with lobster plucked from ocean-fed aquariums on site. And Beecher's Handmade Cheese in Seattle proclaims it has the “World's Best Mac and Cheese.” Maybe, but there's that abbreviation again and besides, IKEA might give them a run for the title.

And if none of those float your boat, go out and get the following ingredients at your local supermarket: macaroni, cheese, milk, and butter. Macaroni and cheese is one of the most stupid simple, entry-level cooking dishes in the culinary world. As with everything else, if you want it to taste like one of those fancy high-end dishes, use the best quality ingredients. If you don't care that it tastes like something out of a box or a can, use cheap ingredients. It's up to you. There's no reason you can't make your own and then customize it to make it your own. My wife likes Velveeta as the primary cheese; I use sharp cheddar in mine. She uses milk, I use milk and cream or half-and-half. We both agree – as do experienced cooks everywhere – that butter is the only way to go. The only use margarine should have in your kitchen is perhaps to grease the hinges on your cabinet doors. And, of course, use the best pasta you can find. De Cecco or Barilla are the best supermarket choices if you don't happen to live next door to an Italian market. As for the method of preparation, that's up to you, too. My wife's not big on baked macaroni and cheese. She prefers to make it on the stovetop. Okay by me. As long as there's macaroni and cheese in it, I like it either way.

Oh, and remember, macaroni is pasta and the only way to properly cook pasta is in lots of water with lots of salt. Doesn't matter if you use imported European butter and organic milk and artisan cheese that costs twenty dollars a pound in the sauce, if your pasta lacks flavor – flavor it can only get from being cooked in aggressively salted water – you might as well be eating the stuff out of the can or the box.

You'll have to excuse me now: I'm really hungry all of a sudden.

Bypass Advertising Chickens**t When Buying Eggs

The Incredible, Marketable Egg

As I frequently remind you (and myself), I'm old. Old enough to remember going to the grocery store to buy eggs that just said “EGGS” on the plain, old-fashioned cardboard carton. No “cage free” or “hormone free” or “free range” or any of the other clever qualifiers stamped all over the fancy containers eggs come in nowadays.

Back in those days of blissful ignorance we didn't think much about how eggs got into the cartons. Most of us knew enough about farm life to draw mental pictures of jovial farmers in overalls going out to the henhouse and raiding the nests of contented cluckers. We didn't know – or want to know – about factory farms wherein thousands of hens existed in battery cages; wire mesh contraptions, stacked and wired together usually containing more than one chicken squashed side by side with another in an arrangement that keeps them from being able to spread their wings or stretch their legs or do much of anything other than sit there and lay eggs. Each bird “lives” – if you can call it that – in about seventy square inches of space. I'm looking at my 9”x8” mousepad. That's seventy-two square inches. My wireless mouse has more room to roam than a factory farm hen. Kinda makes you look at your omelet in a different light, doesn't it?

Fortunately, awareness of these inhumane conditions is slowly forcing changes to be made in the way eggs are produced. I don't know if we'll ever get to that bucolic scene I described in the previous paragraph, but several big egg sellers and big egg users have gotten behind efforts to moderate or eliminate the cruelty. A number of states have limited or banned the use of battery cages and legislation is in the works in other jurisdictions to make things better for the birds that provide us with such an essential element of our diets.

And, of course, even as substantive efforts at improvement are being undertaken at the legal level, here come the hucksters, hawkers, peddlers, and sloganeers from the ad agencies trotting out to help thoroughly obfuscate the issue. Ever ones to leap to the forefront of a cause to see if a dollar might be made there, they have cluttered supermarket eggs cartons with all kinds of meaningless words and phrases designed to confuse consumers into feeling better about themselves and their choices. With that thought in mind, allow me to blaze a path through the chickenshit in an attempt to offer some clarity.

Let's start with “farm fresh.” If you've ever seen – or smelled – a commercial chicken farm, “fresh” is the last thing that comes to mind. It's just a term they use to sell eggs. If you want real “farm fresh” eggs, you have to go a real farm. As far as commercial egg freshness goes, check all those arcane codes on the end of the carton. There's a “pack date,” an “expiration date,” and a plant code. The plant code simply tells you in what facility the eggs were actually packaged. It's a four-digit code that's usually preceded by a “P” and if you're really curious, the USDA has a plant location tool you can use.

The “expiration date” is more a guideline for the store than for the consumer. Also expressed as a “sell by,” “use by,” or “best by” date, it just tells the grocer when to pull the eggs from the shelf. You can still safely eat the eggs for at least a couple of weeks after they “expire.” Same thing with a “sell by/use by/best by” date; it's an indicator of maximum freshness, not safety. Both expiration and sell by dates are based on the pack date; expiration dates have to be thirty days or less from the pack date and sell by dates have to be within forty-five days. The pack date is the actual date on which the eggs were put in the carton. It's a three-digit number that may be a bit confusing because it's based on Julian dating. Julian dates run from 1 through 365 (366 in a leap year), so eggs packed on April 1 of a regular year, for instance, will be Julian coded as 091.

“Natural” and “All Natural” are among the ad game's most popular buzzwords. And also among the most meaningless. They tend to slap the word “natural” on just about anything. According to the dictionary, “natural” means “existing in or formed by nature.” If that's not a broad category I don't know what is. When it comes to eggs, the USDA says egg products are “natural” if they contain no artificial ingredients, added color, and are only minimally processed. I've never encountered an artificially enhanced, color-added, processed egg, so I'm assuming just about all eggs are “natural.” And if you're scrambling unnatural eggs, I'm not sure I want to know about it.

“Organic” is the next big word of the day. It's a term that actually does have meaning when it's enforced and not just used as a selling tool. Organic eggs can be a bit healthier for you because the chickens that lay them are healthier. Organic eggs come from free-range chickens that have not been doped up with hormones, antibiotics or other drugs and which have been fed with entirely organic feed. That means the feed given to the chickens can't come from crops that are genetically modified, treated with pesticides or herbicides, or fertilized with chemical or synthetic products. And no poultry-slaughter byproducts. Which leads to another often misunderstood label: “vegetarian-fed.”

People like to think of happy chickens eating grass and grain and green, leafy vegetables. That's a nice picture but far from the truth. Chickens are omnivores: they'll eat anything including other chickens or parts thereof left over from the slaughtering process. They also eat bugs and crickets and any fly larvae – aka maggots – they happen to find hanging around in cow manure. Sorry. Probably better not to dwell on a chicken's natural diet for too long, but do keep in mind that a “vegetarian-fed” chicken's favorite between meal snack is frequently.....chicken.

I mentioned hormones. That's another specious selling point: “No Added Hormones.” By law, laying hens are not allowed to be given hormones anyway, so this phrase is a selling gimmick. Even the cheap eggs in the cheap cardboard cartons that just say “EGGS” contain no added hormones.

Same thing applies to “Antibiotic-Free.” According to the US Poultry and Egg Association, there are only three antibiotics approved by the FDA for use in laying flocks and “only a small percentage of laying flocks producing conventional eggs ever receive antibiotics due to use of effective vaccines and other management practices which minimize the need for antibiotics to treat illness.” And FDA regulations for antibiotic use ensure that antibiotic residue does not migrate to the eggs. So, it's just another advertising gimmick.

“Non GMO” is a controversial term. In and of themselves, eggs are, of course, not genetically modified. Nobody's out there trying to engineer a better chicken or a better egg through genetic manipulation. The “non-GMO” label is meant to apply to the feed the hens consume, but unfortunately most gullible consumers just see “Non-GMO” and think, “Oh, how wonderful! Non-GMO eggs!” And that's what the ad people want them to think. It sells more eggs.

“Omega-3” sounds healthy, doesn't it? And most nutritionists will agree it is. Chickens on a natural diet get an omega-3 boost from sources such as the aforementioned grasses and weeds. Such hens, therefore, lay eggs that are higher in omega-3 fatty acids than chickens that are only grain-fed. Grain-fed birds get their omega-3 charge from fortified feed. “Omega-3” eggs can be fortified with different types of omega-3 fatty acids: DHA (docosahexaenoic acid), commonly found in fish oil, and ALA (alpha linolenic acid), a component in flaxseed, walnuts, and chia seeds. EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid), also found in fish oil, is another player in the omega-3 game. The problem is there's no official recommendation for human intake of any of these substances, and even if you allow for the 1,000 mg daily intake of a combination of DHA and EPA that some experts promote, the amount of omega-3 acids added to eggs through a diet of flaxseed and fish oil are minimal. One omega-3 egg typically contains 340 milligrams of ALA and seventy-five to one hundred milligrams of DHA. So you'd have to chow down at least two-and-a-half eggs every day to get anywhere close to a beneficial level. But it sounds really healthy and it sells eggs.

“Humanely Raised” and “Animal Welfare Approved” are terms that help sell eggs to people who truly are concerned about animal welfare. You'll see little seals that say either “Certified Humane” or “Animal Welfare Approved” on the cartons. The former means that the egg producer subscribes to a set of rules and regulations that guarantee chickens have decent, healthy living conditions that include proper ventilation and appropriate nesting material in their nest boxes. They are also given the opportunity to “bathe,” something chickens do to rid themselves of lice and other parasites by flopping around in a box of dirt. The other label certifies that the birds have all these things plus being raised almost entirely outdoors and that they escape wholesale slaughter and are painlessly euthanized when their usefulness as layers expires.

Let's wrap up this walk through the chicken droppings by examining the real stars of the egg marketing firmament, “cage-free,” “free-range,” and “pastured” or “pasture raised.”

According to the US Poultry and Egg Association, “eggs labeled as cage free must be produced by hens housed in a building, room, or enclosed area that allows for unlimited access to food and water, and provides the freedom to roam within the area during the laying cycle.” However, “cage-free” only means that chickens aren’t kept in actual cages. They might still live jammed in on top of one another, up to their knees in their own and their neighbor's waste, and never see daylight within that “building, room, or enclosed area.” And remember what I said about chickens being omnivorous? It has been shown in some cases that without the barriers of cages, “cage-free” chickens living in close proximity to other chickens have a higher mortality rate due not only to the easier spread of disease but also because they tend to peck one another to death.

“Free-range” is a little better option because, the association says, “free-range” eggs must be produced by hens housed in a building, room, or area that allows for unlimited access to food, water, and continuous access to the outdoors during their laying cycle. The outdoor area may be fenced and/or covered with netting-like material. The operative word here is “access.” Just because a chicken has “access” to the outdoors doesn't necessarily mean it goes outdoors. Often chickens are still jammed into cavernous buildings with a small door on one end that opens to a few feet of outside dirt space. Even if the chickens on the far end of the building know the door is there, there's no way they'll ever get to it. And “outdoors” doesn't automatically mean some picturesque pasture where the chickens can romp and play in the sunshine. “The outdoor area may be fenced and/or covered with netting-like material;” in other words, a screened-in porch of some sort may qualify as “outdoors.”

“Pasture-Raised” or “Pastured” eggs are kind of the humane gold standard. They are exactly what they imply; eggs that are gathered from chickens who run around outdoors eating the things that chickens who run around outdoors eat. The “girls” at Vital Farms, for example, live on rotated pastures with an allowance of approximately 108 square feet per bird. Contrast that the with the seventy or so square inches allotted to commercially raised chickens in battery cages. Of course, regular old commercial eggs can sell for less than a dollar a dozen while pastured eggs go for upwards of six or seven dollars a dozen, but, as with most things in life, you get what you pay for.

Oh, and one more thing you'll find printed on egg cartons: grades. Grades are the USDA's “beauty contest” for eggs. The grades “A,” “AA,” and “B” have nothing to do with the nutritional content of the egg. While they do help weed out defective eggs with unpleasant things like blood spots, meat spots, bloody whites, mixed rot, blood rings, stuck yolks, embryo chicks, and other nastiness that you wouldn't want to serve sunny-side up, grades are primarily cosmetic standards. The highest grade is Grade AA. These eggs have thick, firm whites and high, round yolks with clean, unbroken shells. Grade A eggs, the ones usually sold in stores, have most of the same characteristics of Grade AA, except their whites are "reasonably" firm. Grade B eggs have whites that may be thinner and yolks that may be wider and flatter than higher graded eggs and while their shells must still be unbroken, slight stains are permissible. And, of course, that USDA grade shield is yet another marketing tool used to sell more eggs.

No eggs were harmed in the writing of this article – at least not yet. I feel a frittata coming on and you know what they say about not having an omelet without breaking a few organic, pasture-raised, Grade AA eggs.

Stop Wasting Money On Copper-Colored Crap Cookware

Baa, Baa Copper Sheep. Have You Any SENSE?

Gordon Ramsay has adopted a new catchphrase lately; “Let's get that right!” And it applies when I tell you that copper cooking vessels are the crème de la crème of cookware. Let's get that right!

Professional cooks the world over have used copper for generations. It's an excellent conductor of heat, it warms up quickly and stays warm longer, and it allows for gentle, even heat distribution. Much more so than any other material, even cast iron. Hot spots are all but unheard of with copper. This results in more uniform, more controlled cooking with practically no burnt spots or scalding. Copper cookware is generally a perfect weight. It's heavy enough to sit securely on your stove but not so heavy you can't lift it with one hand. Copper is reactive but when lined with a non-reactive material such as tin or stainless steel, it is one hundred percent safe and two hundred percent effective. Bowls made of pure copper are the industry standard for whipping up fluffy egg whites. In short, copper is great stuff. Let's get that right!

Something else to get right, copper is also expensive and somewhat temperamental to maintain. You can't crank the heat up to OMG hot under a copper pot and then just toss it in the dishwasher before stuffing it into your overfilled pots and pans drawer. Well......I guess you can if you don't give a rip about what it's gonna like like or how long it's gonna last. Copper tarnishes easily and requires frequent if not constant polishing and it's a fairly soft metal prone to scratches and dents. Some cosmetic denting and pitting is okay – gives it that “cooked in” look, I suppose – but if it gets too warped and battered, it's useless.

Bring your banker and an appraiser to the store when you go to buy the stuff. I can get you a nice deal on a twelve-piece set of Mauviel copper at Williams-Sonoma; a steal at just $1,900.

Or you can go out and buy the latest fad in “As Seen on TV” cookware. Yep. Copper. “$19.95 and if you act now, we'll double your order. Just pay extra for shipping and handling.” Uffa! As P.T. Barnum famously never said, “There's a sucker born every minute.” I can assure you there's more copper in a Lincoln penny – which is 97.5% zinc these days – than there is in any and all of those cheap, overly-hyped “copper” pots, pans, cookie sheets, fry baskets, grill mats, knives, and I don't know what all else. I saw a plastic slotted spoon with a “copper” handle in a store the other day. WTF is a so-called “copper” handle supposed to do to improve the performance of a spoon? 

It's a scam, folks, pure and simple. A gimmick designed to separate you from your money. It's a con worthy of “The Sting.” A flimflam. A fraud. A racket. A rip-off. A double-dealing shell game. A fast one. A hosing of epic proportions. Get the idea yet? It all started out with one product and now it's spread to the point where every blessed thing you see is “copper.” And you know what? It's all paint, people; copper-colored paint. Like the kind you buy for household and craft use only on an industrial scale.

These hucksters take cheap aluminum pans, pots, spoon handles and what have you and spray them with a tissue paper thin ceramic coating that has been infused with copper-colored paint. They could just as easily have made the stuff green – oh, wait. They already do that, don't they? Anyway, copper-colored crap cookware has exactly the same non-stick abilities as any other cheap aluminum junk but with absolutely none of the desirable properties of real copper – because there ain't any real copper in any of it! It's paint. Pigment. Useless coloration. The equivalent of covering rabbit droppings in red food coloring and calling them berries. Let me drag out my Van McCoy and the Soul City Symphony album here and play you a chorus of “The Hustle” while I reiterate; it's a gyp designed to hoodwink gullible rubes. Of which, apparently, there is an endless supply.

Whenever you put a “non-stick” surface, be it Teflon or a ceramic coating or whatever, on any pan, you usually do it by spraying or dipping the pan in a gel solution which is then hardened by a high heat firing process known as curing. Decent quality stuff usually gets at least three or more layers of this coating. Colors are absolutely immaterial; they can make the finished color anything they want it to be. Most are silver or gray, some are black, some are white. And when they're trying to bamboozle somebody into following the latest “As Seen on TV” trend, they make it copper.

Most people know – don't you? – that the most durable materials for making cookware are cast iron or stainless steel. Aluminum is a close second, but only if it's hard anodized aluminum. Anodization subjects the surface of aluminum pots and pans to an electrochemical process that builds up the metal’s natural coating of oxide, yielding a hard, nonreactive substance that forms a tougher coating. Hard anodized aluminum gets, like, a double dose of the process, making it useable in even tough professional kitchens, the place for which it was originally designed when Calphalon came up with it back in 1968. The most utilitarian hard anodized aluminum cooking vessels are usually coated with a non-stick surface of some sort. Even so, aluminum – even anodized aluminum – is pretty soft and can be warped and beaten out of shape through hard use. I've been in a few restaurant kitchens and know whereof I speak.

Now, you take ordinary cheap aluminum. It's light weight, a good heat conductor, and relatively corrosion resistant. It's great for a lot of things, especially bakeware. But if you bang it with a foam rubber mallet or drop it on a firm mattress, it's gonna dent or bend out of shape. And if you spray paint it with a thin coating of copper-colored paint, within a fairly short span of time that paint is going to scratch up and flake off like nobody's business. 

Real copper is ridiculously expensive. A single Mauviel twelve-inch 1.5 mm copper fry pan with a stainless-steel interior is going to set you back to the tune of about $295. For one pan. A good quality twelve-inch stainless-steel pan – say, something by Calphalon – goes for about $110. An enameled cast iron twelve-inch pan from Tramontina will cost you around $70. And even a plain old Lodge cast iron workhorse sells for twenty to thirty bucks, depending on where you get it. So do you really – I mean really – think you're getting anything resembling real copper or real quality for $19.95 – two if you order now? Really?

Baa, baa, copper sheep. Have you any sense?

It all evolved from a single snake oil salesman – er, I mean “marketer” – who conceived the original concept a few years ago. The stuff they were pushing then may or may not have actually been worth what you paid for it, I don't know. What I do know is that it's not just cheap gimmicky pots and pans anymore. It took about a week for all the copper-colored crap that's out there now to start flooding the market. Like the frickin' “copper” handled spoon! Really? A “copper” knife that “never needs sharpening”? C'mon! At best, it's an inexpensive ceramic knife with a coat of paint. “Copper” fry baskets? Why? “Copper” crispers to “turn your oven into an air fryer.” Riiiight! “Copper” grill mats, “copper” roasters, “copper” baking pans and muffin tins? What's next? “Copper” oven mitts? (If I see one of those in the store next week, I swear I'm gonna scream.) There must be enough soft-headed suckers with no sales resistance out there who keep buying this garbage or they wouldn't be able to keep selling it.

I don't know why but that great old 1968 comedy routine that Johnny Carson and Jack Webb did on “The Tonight Show” just jumped into my head.

Webb (As Sgt. Joe Friday): This is the city. Los Angeles California. Some people rob for pleasure. Some rob because its there. You never know. My name's Friday, I’m a cop. I was working the day watch out of robbery when I got a call from the Acme School Bell Company. There’d been a robbery.

Carson: There’s been a robbery.

Webb: Yes Sir, what was it?

Carson: My clappers.

Webb: Your clappers?

Carson: Yeah, you know those things inside a bell that makes them clang.

Webb: The clangers.

Carson: That’s right, but we call them clappers in the business.

Webb: A clapper caper.

Carson: What’s that?

Webb: Nothing Sir. Now can I have the facts? What kind of clappers were stolen on this caper?

Carson: They were copper clappers.

Webb: And where were they kept?

Carson: In the closet.

Webb: Uh huh. You have any ideas who might have taken the copper clappers from the closet?

Carson: Well, just one. I fired a man. He swore he’d get even.

Webb: What was his name?

Carson: Claude Cooper.

Webb: You think he…….

Carson: That’s right ! That’s right! I think Claude Cooper copped my copper clappers, kept in a closet.

Webb: Do you know where this Claude Cooper is from?

Carson: Yeah, Cleveland.

Webb: That figures, that figures.

Carson: What make it worse, they were clean.

Webb: Clean copper clappers?

Carson: That’s right.

Webb: Why do you think Cleveland’s Claude Cooper would cop your clean copper clappers kept in your closet?

Carson: Only one reason.

Webb: What’s that?

Carson: He’s a kleptomaniac.

Webb: Who first discovered that the copper clappers were copped?

Carson: My cleaning woman, Clara Clifford.

Webb: That figures. Now let me see if I got the facts straight here. Cleaning woman Clara Clifford discovered your clean copper clappers, kept in a closet, were copped by Claude Cooper the kleptomaniac from Cleveland. Now is that about it?

Carson: One other thing.

Webb: What’s that?

Carson: If ever I catch kleptomaniac Claude Cooper from Cleveland who copped my clean copper clappers that were kept in a closet....

Webb: Yes?

Carson: I’ll clobber him.

Hey, at least that's funny. Countless cadres of consumers committing copious quantities of cash to acquire colossal collections of crappy counterfeit copper cookware with which to clutter their kitchens is not.

Remember, folks, all that glitters is not copper. Especially not at $19.95 plus shipping and handling. If you really want copper cookware, save your money and buy some of the real thing. And don't forget to pick up a gallon jug or two of Wright's Copper Cleaner or Brasso while you're at it.

Buying Celebrity Cookbooks

Is It What You Know Or Just Who You Are?

We live in a world of instant celebrity. Whereas stage, screen, music, television, radio and sports have always given us celebrities, the process has traditionally been somewhat slow to develop. Most celebrities spent years in the trenches “paying their dues” in order to achieve their elevated status. Now, thanks to shows like “American Idol,” we can create celebrities in the blink of an eye. And thanks to “Top Chef” and “Iron Chef” and “MasterChef” and “Next Food Network Star,” and numerous other shows of that ilk, we can now add instant culinary celebrities to our pantheon. Would anybody have ever heard of Carla Hall if not for her popularity on “Top Chef?” Now she's a co-host on a daily network food/talk show, along with fellow celebrity chefs Mario Batali and Michael Symon, who, while exceptional cooks, would also be unknown to the vast majority were it not for TV. Used to be when the pencils came out, culinary stars wrote cookbooks and entertainment and sports celebs wrote tell-alls and biographies. Not anymore. Now they also write cookbooks, defined by Webster as “a book of cooking directions and recipes.”

In our culture of celebrity, celebrity itself is the biggest selling point. In most textbooks and instructional manuals – which, after all, is what a cookbook is – it’s not so much who you are as it is what you know. But not if you’re marketing a cookbook these days. Then it's the exact opposite. As I’m writing this, country singer Trisha Yearwood has a cookbook and a cooking show. International singing and dancing superstars Gloria and Emilio Estefan have a cookbook. Gwyneth Paltrow has a cookbook. Freddie Prinze, Jr has a cookbook and, not to be outdone, so does his wife, Sarah Michelle Gellar. Chrissy Teigen has a cookbook. Sheryl Crow has a cookbook. Kris Jenner, Patti LaBelle, and Eva Longoria have cookbooks. You can go “Cooking With Kenny Rogers” or partake of “Dolly's Dixie Fixin's.” There’s a cookbook by noted professional Italian chef Tony Danza … well, at least he’s a professional Italian. Speaking of which, you know that famous team of kitchen experts from the TV show “The Sopranos”? Yes, even they have a cookbook. Buy it, if you know what’s good for you. In addition to being Italian and an actor, Stanley Tucci likes to cook so naturally he has a cookbook. And then there are the people who have actually done a little cooking here and there and who, thanks to TV, have achieved “celebrity” status: Mario Batali, Emeril Lagasse, Rocco DiSpirito, Bobby Flay, Wolfgang Puck, Giada De Laurentiis, Julia Child.

I myself have compiled a great cookbook. I’ve been working on it for years and it’s chock full of recipes and tips. Some are my own creation and some are contributions from family and friends. The vast majority are personal favorites adapted from other people’s cookbooks. So what sets celebrity cookbooks apart from mine? I’m at a loss to explain it. Oh…..yeah, that whole “celebrity” part. I forgot.

What should you look for in a celebrity cookbook? A lot of celebrity cookbooks are actually “ghostwritten” or, at least, co-written by other people. (Not so in my case, I assure you.) But unless you are buying the book based solely on your affection for and appreciation of the person on the cover, you should be looking for the same things in a celebrity cookbook that you would expect to find in a book written by somebody you’ve never heard of. Like me. Things like:

Recipes. Recipes should be clear and concise. They should follow a standard format that includes measured quantities of all ingredients, as well as detailed preparation and cooking instructions. A little backstory on the recipe is a nice touch as are serving suggestions.

Pictures. Everybody likes pictures. It is widely believed that you eat first with your eyes. Pretty presentational pictures of how a completed dish is supposed to look are an essential element of a good cookbook. And, if there are some tricky techniques to be employed in the preparation of a particular dish, step-by-step instructional pictures are important, too.

Tips and techniques. In cooking, some things are very basic. This is a frying pan, this a chafing dish. Both useful items, but rarely interchangeable. What’s the difference between baking powder and baking soda? Ignorance of this can produce some really interesting results. The most difficult part of writing a cookbook is gauging your reader’s level of expertise. Some people have been preparing elaborate meals for their families for fifty years and are just looking for something fresh and new, while others have difficulty boiling water and are just looking for help. A good cookbook provides tips and techniques beneficial to both extremes. Sometimes these tips and techniques accompany individual recipes, sometimes they occupy a section of their own, and sometimes they appear as sidebars interspersed throughout the book. However they are presented, there should be lots of them and they should be as clear and concise as the recipes.

Layout and construction. Nobody wants to read a book that reads like the author is just throwing out random thoughts in no particular order. The same is true of a cookbook. The book should be laid out in a logical and progressive manner. At the very least, appetizers, main courses, side dishes, desserts and beverages should all have their own dedicated sections. These sections can then be subdivided into appropriate groups and types according to the dishes involved. A table of contents up front and a comprehensive index at the back are a must. Otherwise, you’ll just get frustrated looking for that rutabaga salad next to the rhubarb pie.

Style. Okay, you bought the book because there’s a picture of somebody you like on the cover. This person should mark the style of the book. There should be lots of elements by and/or about the celebrity author throughout the book. Again, there should be pictures. Pictures of the author cooking. Pictures of his or her family enjoying the author’s cooking. Pictures of the author in compromising situations…no, wait. Those belong in the tell-alls and biographies. But, there should be stories. Stories about how so-and-so’s grandmother’s cooking influenced their lives, and such. And, of course, there should be a dedication to all the loyal and devoted fans who have so enriched the author’s life, along with their agents and their accountants, and now it’s time to give back something personal and intimate, etc, etc. In short, if the person whose picture is on the cover is not reflected throughout the book, you might as well have purchased something crushingly generic by some wretched unknown. Like me.

Finally, consider cost. Do you really want to take out a loan to buy your favorite singer’s cookbook? Is it worth skipping a car payment to pick up the latest from your favorite TV chef? You could probably purchase the same good, comprehensive cookbook your grandma had in her kitchen for the same money or less. Then you could use the savings to buy a nice celebrity magazine and put it on the shelf next to the generic cookbook.

I'm not saying celebrity cookbooks aren't good: many of them are. A lot of famous people – especially the TV chefs – can cook. But just remember when you're emptying your wallet, you're actually buying celebrity more than recipes, tips, and techniques – things found in abundance in your grandma's Better Homes and Gardens cookbook.

To celebratize or not to celebratize! Along whichever path through the kitchen you choose, I wish you happy cooking!