David Rosengarten

Transcription

David Rosengarten

Rosengarten
The
VOL. II, ISSUE 2 • RELEASE DATE: MARCH 15, 2015
NEXT RELEASE DATE: JUNE 15, 2015 • NEWSSTAND PRICE $15.95
Report
THE FOOD & WINES THAT MAKE ME SWOON
ETERNAL JAPANESE
KNIVES
The Mysteries Finally Unravelled in Staggering Three-Part Coverage
PART ONE • page 2
Comprehending Japanese Knives: A Complete
Buyer’s Guide
PART TWO • page 15
My Favorite Style of Japanese Knife…and a
Fabulous At-Home Source for the Sashimi it Slices
PART THREE • page 19
Bold New Idea for a Sushi Party in Your Kitchen…
that ANYONE Can Prepare!
ALSO IN
THIS ISSUE:
THE APOTHEOSIS OF
CARAMEL CORN
ENOUGH WITH
THE HERBS!
YOUR SUMMER
TRAVEL, 2015
A NEW WINE
CONCEPT FOR MANY
Orange and Cardamom
Do The Trick
Pg. 23
Rosengarten Rant
Goes Anti-Green
Pg. 24
The Wonders of
Eastern Sicily
Pg. 26
Highly Affordable
Bordeaux!
Pg. 36
and more...
DavidRosengarten.com
Comprehending
Japanese Knives:
ETERNAL JAPANESE KNIVES
part ONE
A Complete Buyer’s Guide
Now, I’m not playing the blame game here. First of all, like many things in
the wonderful Japanese culture, what seems simple on the surface is
infernally complicated when you delve into it. Japanese knives are a life’s
study…and who has a life for knives?
Secondly, there is not usually even an attempt to disseminate to American
chefs and cooks the kind of information that is essential to any would-be
user of Japanese knives. Oh yes, there’s reams of info out there…but take
it from one who has been trying to crack the code for years…little of it
takes you directly to the heart of the subject.
Part of the problem is “sloppy definition”…or that Twin Evil…“assumption
of reader knowledge.” When your guide to Japanese knives starts discussing
the intricacies of the “double bevel”—the guide, in most cases, doesn’t
spend the time to identify exactly what a double bevel is, or why it exists.
One of Japan’s most traditional knives
COMPREHENDING JAPANESE KNIVES:
INTRODUCTION
There is a Japanese cutlery uproar today, in kitchens across America…
both restaurant kitchens and home kitchens. Sushi bar explosion, Iron
Chef exposure, whatever the reason…it has been going on now for about
20 years.
Remember the days when American chefs and home cooks were happy
to get their cutting edges from well-known, European, traditional knife
manufacturers, like Sabatier, Henckels, Wüsthof, and so on? Any
burgeoning foodie of the 1970s, ‘80s, ‘90s automatically followed the Julia
Child plan, and stocked up on European knives like these. But a funny
thing happened on the way to the hamachi. Practically out of the blue,
we’ve been invaded by a new style of knife, Japanese…and the batterie of
many chefs has changed. Some of the chefs with good reason…some of
the chefs without. For the latter group, the “Gods of Food” attitude in
America now seems to be saying: “You ain’t complete anymore unless
you’re cutting at least some of your food with a Japanese knife.”
Aiyeee! I love food trends that make sense! But I hate food trends that are
nothing but trendy!
In my opinion, the proliferation of Japanese knives in America has dwarfed
the proliferation of Japanese knife info in America! There are many great
chefs out there, like David Bouley…who, in addition to his Western-style
restaurants in NYC, also owns a Japanese restaurant called Brushstroke…
who know and love Japanese cuisine, and are using Japanese knives for
all the right reasons.
But there are others who simply follow the pack without much thought. Oh,
maybe there’s one thought they’re thinking: “Japanese knives look cool!”
DavidRosengarten.com | March 15, 2015 | 2
And lastly, should these guide writers stray into “double bevel definition”
territory—descriptions are often vastly confusing. At the start of this
process for The Rosengarten Report team last summer, four different
people in the office had gotten a different impression of what a double
bevel is in a Japanese knife!
Oh yes…me…yours truly…I am definitely part of the ignorance problem.
I’ve been buying Japanese knives for almost 20 years—because they’re
“cool!”—with very little fundamental understanding of what they are.
So after last summer’s malevolent double bevel dilemma, I got fed up. I
realized that the only way to wrap my mind around this thing would be to
take real time with it. And, later, to be extremely clear in expression…no
Zen koans just to be cool!
To get my education, I started talking to numerous producers and importers
of Japanese and Japanese-style knives, taking sessions of several hours
with each of them (such companies as MTC Kitchen, Chubo, Kikuichi,
Shun, etc.). And for my extreme
enlightenment, one company
allowed me to take things even
further: Korin, based in Tribeca in
NYC.
I met Korin’s owner, Saori Kawano,
15 years ago, and had always
dreamed of seeking her aid in my
Japanese-knife education. Their
shop on Warren Street is like a
small, impeccable museum, the
glass display cases filled with
knives for sale. What they do is
very special:
1. They import super highquality knives from Japan
only, carrying the knives in
New York of seven different
carefully selected Japanese
The storefront of Korin, in Tribeca, New York City
knife making houses. Korin knives are exclusively made in Japan.
There are no knives for sale at Korin from Western knife manufacturers.
2. One of Korin’s houses makes Korin’s “brand,” with the name “Korin”
on the knife, as well as the name “Togiharu.” Korin supplies lots of
ideas to this house.
3. At three of Korin’s houses—Misono, Masamoto Sohonten, and
Suisin—Korin also consults with the knife makers, letting them know
what improvements Korin would like to see in their knives.
4. Half of the knives available at Korin are not only Japanese-made, but
are made in the traditional Japanese style. The other 50% of the
knives are also made in Japan, but they are made in a JapaneseWestern style. Which knives sell the most at the store? Korin estimates
that 30% of their sales in NY are traditional Japanese knives (a pretty
high percentage!), and 70% of their sales are Japanese-made
Japanese-Western-style knives.
When I heard Korin speak of its love for traditional Japanese knives made
in Japan, it helped me get to TRUTH #1:
The whole bubble surrounding Japanese knives should, in a perfect world,
be about traditional Japanese knives made in a traditional way in Japan. If
you really want to participate in the uniqueness that is a Japanese
knife…make sure it’s a traditional knife from Japan.
$250…and you can get Japanese-Western hybrid knives for as little
as $60. With your Japanese-Western hybrid knife you will definitely
get some of the “cool” of Japanese knives. If you pick the right one,
you may even get some of the features of a Japanese-style knife!
All clear? Good.
But…at this moment of great clarity…I should throw the first of
approximately 6,000 curveballs at you:
Your choice of traditional Japanese knife or Japanese-Western knife
should depend on what kind of food you intend to cut with the knife!!!
More on that later…for now, let’s take it from the top…
Here’s what my research yielded…and remember, please, this is not
written from the point of view of the forging-specialist, nor the metallurgist,
nor the historian of industrial practices. It is written from the point of view
of chefs and cooks who want to buy knives, and use them properly in their
kitchens. The buying and using aspects are the aspects upon which I
throw my spotlight…
THE ORIGINS
As you’ll read below, there was a huge change in Japan in the last century, as a new kind of Japanese knife developed…something you might
call a Japanese-Western hybrid knife. I’m not saying there’s something
wrong with these hybrids; I own a few myself and enjoy them. But it’s
important to realize that these moderns (like the semi-Western Santoku)
are different from traditional Japanese knives.
If you ask a Japanese knife expert the
ONE KEY QUESTION of Japanese
knifery—“WHY should I buy a Japanese
knife? WHY is it different from a Western
knife?”—the answers always come
down to:
ONE JOB,
ONE KNIFE!
1. Thinness of cutting blade
2. And, therefore, extreme sharpness of cutting blade
And why is a super sharp blade important? In the Japanese conception,
cutting with a less-than-razor-sharp blade squeezes the food. Think of
slicing a tomato. The blade that’s not super sharp will press down on the
tomato skin, not zip right through it. This “squeezing” causes cellular
damage inside, bruising. This small but important detail, in the Japanese
conception, not only changes the texture of the food…but it changes its
flavor as well!
Western knives, for various technical reasons, have thicker blades, and
therefore do not attain the same razor-like sharpness.
Ultimately, of course, the choice will be yours:
1. You can buy a traditional Japanese knife made in Japan, no matter
what the cost. And it is true that the most expensive Japanese knives
of this kind are CRAZY expensive; the priciest knife at Korin (traditional
style, made in Japan of course) is…$12,000! But that doesn’t affect
most of us. The average purchase at Korin of a traditional Japanese
knife made in Japan is about $350. And there are some knives of this
kind (smaller knives, always) that can cost as little as the high $100s.
2. Instead, watching the wallet, you can buy a Japanese-Western hybrid
knife, usually for less. At the top end, the highest-priced JapaneseWestern hybrid at Korin is “only” $1000. The average purchase is
Traditional Japanese knives—which grew out of the great samurai swordmaking tradition—developed with very specific kitchen needs in mind.
The watchwords in the Japanese kitchen were always:
“ONE JOB, ONE KNIFE!”
At the time that the knives developed, the Japanese diet consisted primarily
of fish and vegetables (with some tofu, of course). Three principal jobs
needed to be accomplished by knives:
1. Slice fish (as in sashimi)
2. Bone whole fish
3. Cut vegetables (and tofu)
And sure enough, each task gave rise to its own knife. The three resulting
knives were, and are, the holy trio of Japanese traditional knives:
told me…you will never find an expensive one! You might spend $10,000
for a great fish-slicing knife…but since this one is “only” for vegetables,
the Japanese find it natural to spend a lot less on a usuba!
YANAGI
(traditional fish-slicing knife)
This is the long, slender knife that sushi chefs use to cut their sashimi. I
would wager that the yanagi knife was instrumental in causing the
American rush to Japanese knives: who hasn’t sat there in wonder at the
sushi bar watching the beautiful slicing of fish with a long yanagi? Who
hasn’t said…“Gee! I wanna do that!”
Traditional Japanese chefs think of the yanagi as a “presentation” knife—
that is, it is not a knife used much to prepare foods for cooking. It is used,
instead, to prepare foods that go directly to the diner—as in slices of
sashimi cut by yanagi at the sushi bar and immediately handed over the
counter to you. The Japanese refer to this as a “finishing knife.”
Traditionally, the usuba looks like a rectangle, with a flat cutting edge all
along the bottom (if you place a usuba edge down on a board, all spots on
the edge touch the board). This makes the knife even more useful for
peeling and cutting vegetables in that ultra-artistic Japanese way: holding,
let’s say, a cucumber in one hand, and rotating it so that you get large, thin
ribbons of cucumber falling off the knife.
The usuba is usually about 6 ½ to 9-inches long (at most), and wider than
the yanagi—usually about 2 to 2 ½-inches wide.
THE DAWN OF MODERNITY
The yanagi is quite long and quite narrow: typically 10 to 12-inches long
for sushi bar chefs, usually a little shorter (8 to 9-inches) for home chefs
(easier to wield); the yanagi is typically 1 ½-inches wide.
Classically, the yanagi is used only for slicing fish—the ultimate “one job,
one knife.” And please note: the traditional Japanese chef never fillets or
breaks down whole fish with a yanagi.
DEBA
(traditional boning
knife for breaking down
whole fish)
The deba is a somewhat triangular knife, of different sizes…anywhere
from a few inches in length (ko-deba) to 12-inches in length and almost
always heavier than a usuba. It is designed to effortlessly behead and fillet
fish. The part of the blade nearest the handle is meant to cut through
bones, not the tip of the knife.
The rest of the blade is then used to ride against the fish bones, separating
the fillet. (NOTE: The deba is not intended for cutting large-diameter bones.)
Emperor Meiji in 1872!
Before the arrival of American warships in the port of Yokahama in 1853,
meat was not a part of the diet throughout most of Japan. In fact, the
eating of livestock was considered taboo by many! Therefore, of course, no
knives existed that were designed to easily cut meat.
But things changed quickly in the latter half of the 19th century. Japanese
government agencies began campaigns encouraging Japanese people to
increase their consumption of meat.
USUBA
(traditional vegetable knife)
Unlike the yanagi, this is more of a behind-the-scenes working knife…and
its traditional target is vegetables. It is the ultimate chopping-and-dicing
knife. Intriguingly, because it’s thought of as a “vegetable” knife, one rep
A watershed day occurred in 1872 when the Emperor of Japan, Emperor
Meiji…ate meat in public to set an example!
But they couldn’t cut steaks very well with their traditional Japanese
knives; just as with cabbage or onion, the thin Japanese knives started
“leaning” when cutting meat. Since the commercial barricades were
falling, Japanese entrepreneurs looked around at Western knives that were
more successful in cutting meat, and decided on Western chef’s knives—
which they started importing into Japan to deal with the cutting of meat.
Before long, however…Japanese knife manufacturers realized that they
too could make knives that would be suitable for meat-cutting. They
started making a Japanese version of the chef’s knife—albeit a little
smaller than the traditional Western chef’s knife.
Generally speaking, according to Vincent Kazuhito Lau, who is the chief
knife sharpener at Korin in New York City, santokus are “nimble, and very
accessible to home cooks.”
At the same time…perhaps it was the fact that another kitchen necessity
emerged in addition to the original three, which seemed like an overload
of specialization…or perhaps it had much to do with the recognition of the
many things a Western chef’s knife could do…around 1920 knife
manufacturers began making a Japanese-looking knife that had multiple
functions…including the cutting of meat!
The santoku was born.
CHEF’S KNIFE vs. SANTOKU
You can see that the chef’s knife on top is
narrower than the Santoku on the bottom
SANTOKU
(The classic santoku knife)
If you’re shopping for santokus, probably the first thing you’ll notice is that
they “look” Japanese. This is why Western chefs want them! In reality,
though there are some elements in the santoku that are based on Japanese
tradition, Japanese traditional knives are obviously much more Japanese.
(When I asked Isao Yamada, head chef of NYC’s Brushstroke, one of the
best sushi bars in the U.S., what he looks for in a santoku, he simply said,
“I don’t use a santoku. I’m a professional.”)
But you could think of the santoku knife as the Japanese version of a
chef’s knife, for home cooks. Here’s the line-up of “Japanese” elements in
the santoku, comparing them to similar elements in a Western chef’s knife:
•
Santokus are usually shorter than Western chef’s knives, often
measuring only 6-inches long.
•
Santokus are also wider than Western chef’s knives…this makes it
easier to lean your knuckles against a santoku when you’re chopping.
•
Santokus are thinner and lighter than Western chef’s knives. This is
the most Japanese element about them, perhaps…that quest for
thinness. Among other things, it means that the santoku will hold its
edge longer than a Western chef’s knife. But let’s not get carried
away: santokus will never
be as thin as traditional
Japanese knives.
Still in all, because of
whatever extra thinness
they have, santokus are
in greater danger of
chipping than Western
chef’s
knives
are.
Therefore, the steel for
santokus, if the knives are
well-made, is hardened to
prevent chipping. This
makes them a little
trickier to sharpen than,
say, German-made chef’s
knives.
Chef Isao Yamada, Brushstroke
But you must be careful in buying santokus, which today are manufactured
in many countries outside of Japan (since the name “santoku” has taken
off!). Some of the modern ones from places other than Japan kinda look
like santokus, but don’t always incorporate the features listed above.
So…if you get a good one…what is it good for?
“Santoku,” quite logically, means “three uses,” or “three virtues.” In the
original conception, it was something new in Japan because it was good
for “three” things: meat, of course (The New Age), fish, and vegetables.
And you can count on your good santoku to do a good all-purpose job with
all of those things.
Probably its best use, however, is as a vegetable knife. So if you’re buying
a santoku to focus on vegetables, you should go out of your way to find the
santoku variation that’s called a “nakiri.” The nakiri has a straighter edge
than most santokus, and is therefore better for julienne kind of jobs. (It
also has a flat end, no pointiness…but to many chefs that’s just an
aesthetic factor.)
It is important to add that Japanese knife makers—not in 1920, not now—
did not and have not abandoned the concept of the Western-style chef’s
knife. It was originally in Japan called the “gyuto” knife; do you recognize
the root “gyu?” This is the same root that’s in the word “wagyu.” Yes! This
was introduced to Japan as a “cow’s knife,” or a knife for beef. Historically,
it served as a kind of transitional knife before the santoku was invented—
but it did not go away! Today, you can buy Western-style chef’s knives from
Japan…AND ALSO Western-made chef’s knives that have a little Japanese
flair to them!
You can also buy another kind of Western knife made in Japan: the slicer,
which, as it sounds, is a long slicing knife, not unlike the Japanese yanagi.
In Japan it is called the sujihiki.
Then, there are two types of smaller knives made in Japan, both rather
Western. The smaller of the two has the same name it would in the West:
it’s called a paring knife. Even more popular is the slightly larger knife
known as a “petty” knife—usually about 5+ inches long. Both of these
smaller knives, though quite Western, usually have some Japanese
elements blended in. There are, for example, “pettys” available from
Japan that are astonishingly thin and light.
And so, after the introduction of the santoku around 1920, this very
interesting knife poised between Japan and the West…and the absorption
into the repertoire of Western-style slicers, and pettys…everything
changed!!!
Well, not EVERYTHING. Japanese knife makers continued making
traditional Japanese knives (yanagi, deba, usuba)…and still do, of course.
But with the 20th century came the recognition that there’s an international
market for knives (like the santoku) that have a Japanese “feel” to them,
though they’re not traditional Japanese knives. As the 20th century went
on, this small modern trickle of “Western-style” Japanese knives became
a flood…then an absolute torrent. I theorize that it was the spectacular rise
of sushi-bar popularity across the world in the 1970s and 1980s that did
it…but whatever the reason, practically overnight everyone in the food
world wanted a Japanese knife (whether it was traditional or not).
So, today, if you’re looking for a Japanese knife to add to your kitchen
repertory…the field is unbelievably variegated…and confusing!
THE 18 MOST
IMPORTANT QUESTIONS
All right…you’ve decided to buy a Japanese knife, or three. Do not forget
my chief admonition: if you truly want to revel in the very specific joy of this
thing, buy one of the three traditional styles made in a traditional way in
Japan.
However…maybe you’re not planning to cut raw yellowtail for your friends
on the kitchen counter (though I think you should!…see p. 17). Maybe
you can only afford one knife…and you’re looking for one that does the
most tasks well. Or maybe you just want some “cool” in your kitchen…but
it might as well be useful “cool.”
I imagine your next step is: going to a shop with a wide range of Japanese
knives (both traditional, and Japanese-Western).
Your eyes will glaze over. Seriously.
But I’m here to help.
I have identified the most important criteria in selecting a knife, whether
it’s a traditional Japanese knife, or a Japanese-Western knife. These are
the things you have to think about; these are the things you have to ask
about. Only you know how the answers will fit into your very personal
gastronomic life. But at least with the following list, you know the right
questions. Carry this list with you to the shop!
NOTE: Some of these questions have disappointing, non-consequential
answers! But you need to know them too…
I developed this list over many hours with Vincent Lau at Korin in New York
City. Because it is his job to sharpen hundreds of Japanese knives a day,
he must understand all the ins and outs of Japanese knives. He is
incredibly knowledgeable…and communicative! In the following section,
you will find many of his opinions…but if the opinions are mine, I will make
that clear.
Here are the 18 most important questions to ask in buying a Japanese knife.
This section will most come to life—if you are perusing it while standing
in a Japanese knife shop!!! Hie thee hither!
1
Where was the knife made?
I have a personal prejudice here: I like Japanese Japanese knives. In
these made-in-Japan knives, whether traditional style or JapaneseWestern style, I more regularly feel the elegance, the fineness, the balance
that is part of the Japanese tradition. But many great knife makers of the
world (as in Germany, France, the U.S.) are making very fine knives these
days as well. Take it knife-by-knife, of course, without prejudice that blinds
you…but I suggest you go in thinking “Japanese.”
2
What is the length of the knife?
You don’t need to know the exact measurement, but obviously this
criterion is something important that your eyes will tell you. The
advantage of long knives (say, 10 to 12-inches or so) is that you can work
with bigger pieces of food; a short knife will never help you cut a wide slice
of roast beef. This much is intuitive. But Vincent points out that longer
knives have more versatility; “You can work on something smaller with a
big knife,” he says,“but you can’t work on something larger with a small
knife.” Additionally, Vincent says that the longer knife will usually give you
a cleaner stroke. In favor of shorter knives—and the typical knife in the
Japanese home is less than 9-inches—they fit into small urban kitchens
much better (“You don’t have to worry about banging the tip into the wall,”
says Vincent). Keep in mind as well that shorter knives are more nimble,
easier to maneuver—as long as the size of the food is right.
3
Is the knife carbon steel or stainless steel…or
stain-resistant steel?
Japanese knives have the same metallurgical dialectic as good
Western knives: Do you want carbon steel (the traditional steel for knives
both East and West), or do you want stainless steel (a concept pioneered
by Western knifemakers)? The advantage of carbon steel is simple: It
sharpens better. You can get a sharper edge (which is the whole purpose
of having a traditional Japanese knife). But…carbon steel oxidizes, which
can lead to rust. It needs very, very careful treatment all the time to prevent
rusting. Stainless steel doesn’t take the same ultra-sharp edge…but it is
much easier to care for. The threat of rust is removed. Modern knife
makers have gone beyond the old dialectic, however; most of the noncarbon steel knives coming out of Japan today are known as “stainresistant” knives. That is to say…they get sharper than stainless steel
knives, but don’t oxidize as much as carbon steel knives. It is a beautiful
compromise. I still vote for carbon steel knives…but stain-resistant knives
are a good second choice.
NOTE: If you purchase carbon steel (which I recommend)…you must
care for it! Do not expose to acidic food; if you must cut tomato or lemon,
wipe frequently. After using the knife, at all times, wash it, wipe with a soft
cloth, and keep it dry. If not using every day, air-dry it completely after
using, then rub the knife with a little oil.
4
Which traditional method was used in making the
knife?
This article is not focusing on knife making—which would be a
whole book in itself! But I wanted you to know the two main processes of
traditional knife making in Japan, and their names…so you can easily
discuss with your knife merchant:
*Kasumi. Translates as “misty,” or “cloudy.”
Why? The misty-cloudy streak you see on these knives happens because
kasumi knives are made with two different metals—which are pushed
together, not blended. Soft iron (jigane) is used on the upper part of the
knife, starting with the spine, extending down to nearly the edge of the
knife. At the cutting edge, steel (traditionally carbon steel) is used, which
cuts better. Back on the top, or the spine side of the knife, the soft iron is
polished...but there’s no need to polish the iron in the center of the knife…
therefore, this is the part of the knife that has the misty look. Why do they
use the two metals? Economics. Because the most important edge is the
carbon steel cutting
edge…but you don’t
need expensive carbon
steel for the rest of the
knife. Using soft iron,
and not polishing all of
it, keeps the cost down
on a kasumi knife. One
disadvantage of the
kasumi knife: over
years of sharpening,
The misty-cloudy streak on a knife made by the kasumi
you may run out of the
process
more expensive carbon
steel at the edge…and then your knife is done. Once the sharpener gets to
the soft iron, you cannot sharpen any more.
NOTE: If a knife is referred to as hongasumi…it means it’s a kasumi type,
but the best artisans have labored on it at a higher level.
*Honyaki. This type of knife is made from only one steel…which means the
knife lasts much longer…if the steel is good! But honyakis vary. So you can
go from great honyaki made from carbon steel…to mediocre honyaki made
from low-grade white steel (high-grade white steel is better). Always check
the prestige of the brand, and what the merchant knows (if you trust him!)
Kasumi, hongasumi and honyaki are names that apply only to traditional
Japanese knives.
5
Is the
knife a
single
bevel?
OK, here we are
at the heart of
everything. One
of
the
most
crucial factors in
Japanese knives
is: the single
line of the shinogi can be seen in this photo between the shinier
bevel vs. double The
metal, and the more matte metal
bevel question.
Let’s explore the single bevel first, which is the bevel of a traditional
Japanese knife.
Imagine a knife, let’s say with a long blade. Then imagine a line which starts
at the heel, and runs all the way up the blade to the tip. This is the shinogi.
Once the knife maker establishes where the shinogi is, then he “bevels” the
side of the shinogi that runs down to the edge. The purpose is to make the
edge of the knife thinner and sharper. If the whole blade were thinned and
sharpened to the same extent…it would be too fragile! But the bevel allows
the knife to remain durable—it is thicker, sturdier on the direct opposite
side of the edge, what you might call the “top,” or the “spine”—while
offering to the cook one extremely thin and sharp side.
This type of bevel is done only on one side of the knife—that’s why it’s
called a single bevel. If it were done on both sides of the knife—the knife
would be too thin, too fragile, too prone to chipping.
There’s only one problem with the single bevel. Did you ever cut a vegetable,
like a raw onion, and found the knife uncontrollably leaning to one side of
the cut? With some foods, a single bevel knife has a tendency to do that. If
you are trying to cut cabbage in a fine julienne (what’s called sengiri in
Japan), you will have trouble with leaning.
6
Is the knife a double bevel?
When meat became more popular in Japan during the late 19thcentury—and Western knives came along with them—Japanese
knife makers discovered that Western knives had what’s called a “double
bevel,” with a bevel on each side of the blade. It is much better for cutting
meat: the bevel on both sides of the blade balances the knife.
But it’s easy to get a wrong image of the double bevel knife. When we hear
“double” we usually think “more” of something—in this case, wider bevels.
Confusingly, it ain’t so.
Isn’t that weird? As you can see in the photo above, the bevel just above the
edge is very, very narrow, maybe 1/16 of an inch. It is nothing like the wide
bevel of a single bevel knife. But this narrow bevel—which, of course, is on
both sides of the knife, that’s why it’s called “double bevel”—yields a knife
that is sturdier, more durable. And it’s better for some jobs—like cutting
meat (as mentioned above),
and in making sengiri (a
double bevel knife will not
“lean” as you julienne your
vegetables).
Of course, the double bevel
knife is not as crazy thin as a
single bevel knife.
Sum total: the double bevel
knife parts, say, the fish flesh
evenly as it cuts through, like
a wedge. A single bevel knife
exerts pressure on only one You can see the very narrow bevel of the double bevel knife
glittering under the lights. The other side has a bevel too.
side of the fish…creating a
smoother, glossier look on one side of the fish slice, and another look on the
other side of the fish slice!
When you’re buying your knife, if you want to be extra-extra Japanese
traditional, select a single bevel knife. But if you like the advantages
conferred by a thicker, more durable knife, select the Western-originated
double bevel knife.
A santoku, thicker than a single bevel Japanese knife, but thinner than a
Western chef’s knife, is always a Western-style double bevel.
STRUCK BY SENGIRI
I was struck by the randomness of the example of sengiri I was given —
cabbage in a fine julienne—until I realized how many times during Japanese
meals I’ve enjoyed cabbage cut sengiri-style!
It is a staple side dish to tonkatsu, panko-coated pork cutlets; so that’s why the Japanese focus so heavily on details like “you need a double bevel to cut sengiri!”
Furthermore, it’s tied into even more basic technique you’d never find in a Western kitchen: cutting the cabbage with your double bevel knife across the fibers makes softer strips, and cutting it along the fibers makes crisper strips!
It’s what you always expected about the obsessive detail at the heart of
Japanese cooking...and knives are a big part of it.
7
What are the angles of the double bevel knife?
During one of my sessions at Korin, an American chef came in and
started talking with a sales clerk about double bevel knives (it was
easy to overhear!). “I’m thinking about some 70-30s,” he said, “but I
might also buy a 90-10.” Uh-huh. I said to Vincent: “What’s THAT about?
It’s obviously important to chefs…” Vincent smiled. “Oh, yes it is,” he
said. “The angle of the bevel ON EACH SIDE of a double bevel knife has
a big impact on the knife!”
When double bevel Japanese-style knives are made in the West, the most
common angles are 50% on one side, 50% on the other. This means that
the shinogi starts in the same place on each side, and the width of the
bevel on each side is the same.
When a Japanese knife maker makes a Western-style double bevel knife,
the most typical ratio is 70-30: the bevel is wider on one side (the “70”
side) than on the other. But you will also see 60-40 knives, 80-20 knives,
even 90-10 knives.
What’s the diff? Remember the main difference between single bevel
knives and double bevel knives: singles (with their much wider bevels) are
thinner, sharper, while doubles (with their narrower bevels) are more
sturdy and durable.
The closer you get to a lopsided ratio, the more your knife acts like a single
bevel knife! A double bevel knife that’s 90-10 is almost like a single bevel
knife! But a double bevel knife that’s 50-50 is nicely balanced between
thinness and durability. The cool thing is that YOU can decide; you can
buy a knife anywhere along that continuum depending on whether the
thinness part or the durability part is most important to you.
8
Do you want a right-handed knife or a left-handed
knife?
Almost all single bevel knives made in Japan are right-handed—
which means that if you lay the knife on the counter bevel-side up, as in
the photo on right, the bevel part will extend to the right side of the handle.
It is a most important feature. Many of the cutting practices at the sushi
bar, for example, are based on right-handed chefs using right-handed
knives (see the follow-up story about sashimi on p. 15 for further
clarification).
In double bevel knives, if the ratio is symmetrical, 50-50, left-right doesn’t
matter. But as you move into asymmetrical double bevel knives, leftyrighty again comes into play. If you want to cut righty, and you’re buying a
90-10 double bevel knife—you sure as tootin’ want a right-handed double
bevel knife!
The big question: why are almost all Japanese knives in Japan made to be
right-handed?
Believe it or not, the answer seems to
be: because most knife makers are
right-handed! It therefore simply
became a tradition to use a righthanded knife in a Japanese kitchen—
even if you’re left-handed! Some experts
pointed out to me that order is very
much prized in a Japanese kitchen…
and that the head chef likes to have
everyone cutting in the same direction.
It’s safer, they say! Whatever the reason,
the world of Japanese knives in Japan
is fiercely right-handed—so much so
that left-handed Japanese knives
generally cost 50% more! Left-handed
Japanese chefs just get over it, and Two right-handed single bevel knives
learn to cut like a righty. Not so far from
a special practice in a sport we share:
some left-handed baseball hitters also learn to hit righty, so they can come
to the plate on either side (depending on the pitcher). Whether some
Japanese restaurant chefs are known as “switch hitters,” I cannot say.
IT’S A STEEL
I’m trying to stay away from the very technical in this story, trying to make it of use to CHEFS…who want to know what the various features of Japanese knives will
do for them. But you can’t hide from one very technical aspect: what kind of steel is used in the manufacture of the knife? I’ve broken it down as simply as possible:
CARBON STEEL
STAIN-RESISTANT STEEL
As you know, this is the most expensive and desirable of all steels, the one that
can get sharpest…but also the one that’s most susceptible to stains and rust. If
you want to talk carbon steel with your knife salesmen, focus on two types of
carbon steel:
8A steel - Softer steel, easy to sharpen, great beginner steel
White Steel. This type of carbon steel has the highest percentage of carbon.
Of course there’s further complication! You can buy three levels of white steel:
white steel 1 (the purest)
white steel 2 (a little less carbon steel)
white steel 3 (a little less carbon steel still)
Then, there’s another type of carbon steel:
Blue Steel. And “blue” is even costlier than “white.” Why? Well, it’s not that
it’s “purer”—because blue steel has some very high-end additives to it (like
Tungsten), that make the knife harder, and more edge-retentive.
Is blue better than white? The dollars say so. But Vincent points out that very
pure white can be sharper than blue.
I told you this isn’t easy! AND THEN...we have knives made from different
kinds of stain-resistant steel.
VG-10 steel - Harder, edge-retentive, can be harder to sharpen
SG2 steel - Similar to VG-10, polish can be higher lustre…used in
specialty-high-end knives (but the lustre is just visual)
Lastly, in the steel discussion you’re likely to hear, is “Damascus.” This refers to the
old practice of layering steels to make the knife (or sword) harder. So salesmen will
often tell you that a knife is made with Damascus steel. But, according to Vincent,
sometimes the knife IS harder, sometimes it’s just prettier (with the wavy lines). It
depends who’s making Damascus for what reasons.
In any case, you will find a baffling variety of knives purporting to be Damascus.
Such knives can be:
Japanese-made or Western-made
single bevel or double bevel
carbon or stain-resistant
We must take very seriously Vincent’s overarching view of the importance of steel.
Yes, he says, steel matters a lot—it’s the prime material. But if you give the best
steel to an inferior craftsman, the knife won’t be as good as one fashioned from
mediocre steel by a superior craftsman!
This finds its perfect analogue in chefs. Give a lousy chef a black Perigord truffle,
and pray for your dish. Give an “inferior” summer truffle to a three-star chef…and
watch the wonders he can perform!
9
Is the knife hand-forged?
Japanese knives were always traditionally made by hand in Japan—
but the modern world has seen the rise of knife industrialization, both
in Japan, and in other countries making Japanese-style knives. Still, the
best traditional knives are hand-forged: conceptualized and completed by
a master, who has brought all elements together in perfect balance. You
can usually expect in these knives a better ratio between sharpness and
durability. Ask your merchant about this. BUT…Vincent does point out that
the opposite method…usually called stamped…can produce terrific knives.
In fact, he says…Western-style knives made by a careful company like
Nenox can even be better when they’re stamped!
10
The explanation for the “concave”
feature is simple: the fish cut on that
side of the knife doesn’t touch the
surface as much, has less “friction,”
comes off the knife with a smoother,
cleaner cut, not bunched up.
Have you seen the movie about Jiro,
the superannuated sushi master in
Tokyo? He would NEVER cut his
sashimi without a concave knife!
11
12
Does your knife have a rounded edge?
The rounded edge knife is the most typical configuration in
Japan.
When your long blade has a little roundness to it—it curves gently, towards
the tip—you can “rock” it on the counter, which is a good way of quickly
cutting some vegetables. I, for example, rock my blade over parsley leaves
for a quick, effective chop.
More esoterically: sushi chefs say that when you cut out a slice of fish with
a round motion, using a rounded blade—the knife comes out of the fish
“cleaner,” creating a smoother,
more delicious slice of fish.
Is the knife concave?
First, let’s identify this
feature visually. It is
almost always a feature of single
bevel, traditional Japanese knives. If
you have a right-handed knife (which
is typical), the single bevel will be on
the right side as you hold the knife
with spine on top. But what does the
left side of the knife look like, all
along the blade? Two things. First of
all, no bevel. Secondly, from heel to
tip, along the length of the blade,
there will a slight concave, running
the whole length.
Only you can judge what amount of friction-reduction makes sense for the
food you’re cutting. In my experience: hollow ground on one side works
just fine!
13
Does your knife
have a flat edge?
This right-handed single bevel knife is being held with a T-square around it. You can easily see
that in the center of the concave blade some light shows through, over the concave, that doesn’t
show at the edges of the blade (because the blade’s only concave in the middle!)
A hollow-ground Japanese knife
But there’s no dearth
of flat-edge knives in Japan. It’s
easy to visualize the advantages of
this knife. Let’s say you have a leaf
of cabbage on the counter, and
you want to cut it into narrow, even
strips. By chopping down with a
flat-edge knife from right to left,
you can get into a rhythm and
yield perfect julienne as you go.
There’s some special needs like
this, that have led to specialty flatedge knives. Consider the menkiri,
or noodle cutter:
This flat-edge knife enables you
(as long as your pasta to be cut is
the same length as the knife) to
quickly move along cutting the
pasta into thin noodles.
Has your knife
been hollow
ground?
Of course, there is one more
classic usage in Japanese cooking
the
flat-edged
knife:
A fully-loaded hollow-ground knife from Glestain
A Japanese knife with a perfectly flat edge for
katsumaruki, the Japanese art of
The concave knife was developed in
unfurling a vegetable. Once your
Japan to reduce friction between the
vegetable is peeled…let’s say a
food being cut (like fish) and the knife
daikon…and if the length of your
itself…all in search of a non-ragged,
knife is about the height of your
non-bunchy, smooth and glossy cut
vegetable piece…you can artfully
A
Japanese
knife
with
a
perfectly
of fish (or other food). Western knife
rounded edge
work the knife around the exterior
makers, much later, had the same
of the vegetable, always rotating,
idea—but found a different solution.
to create a long, thin sheet of vegetable (which you later cut into
They put a series of little indentations along the edge of the knife—
desired pieces).
sometimes called “hollow ground,” sometimes called “scalloped.”
When I asked Yamada how many tries it took him to perfect this technique,
We in the West are used to this pattern on a long, thin smoked-salmon
he said “about a hundred.” And then he showed me the scars on his
slicer; it does a good job of cutting the smoked salmon thinly and releasing
hands from the first few!
it cleanly. But variations abound. Some knife makers like to put the
“scallops” on the other side of the blade as well! And some—only the
Glestain company, to my knowledge—like to fill up the first side with
“scallops,” both top and bottom!
14
Does the
knife have a
pointy tip or
flat end?
16
Does your knife have a slanted tip?
Notice once again that the “tip” is on the spine side of the
knife, away from the cutting side—a 45-degree angle from
spine to tip, looking kinda like the CitiCorp building. Pretty, but does it
have a function? Nope. Just another aesthetic moment.
Two different kinds of
pointy-tip knives
The pointy tip is
far more common,
as in Western
knives. Sashimislicing chefs claim
an advantage for
it, saying it comes
out of the fish more
cleanly than a knife
A flat-end
knife
with a flat end. Other
chefs say they like to
“score” their food with it (sushi bar items like mackerel or squid are often
scored before serving).
So why did the flat end develop? According to Vincent, the reasons are
purely historical/cultural. Pointy tips were common in the Tokyo region…
but in the Osaka region, a different mentality reigned; customers did not
like the idea of a chef wielding a knife that’s pointedly pointed at them! So
it was in Osaka that the flat end developed to keep the customers placid!
However, the slant tip knife does have some basis in historical development.
It was originally developed as a repair method…if your knife broke at the
tip! You just ground down the break to a slant!
And to take it one
aesthetic step further,
because aesthetics are
important to Japanese
chefs…
At the tip of a slanted
tip, there’s a slant
downwards that’s 1/4inch wide to 1/2-inch
wide: it’s called the
kanmuri (the crown).
Again…just aesthetics!
Of course, for Western buyers of “cool” Japanese knives…it is one of
those features that makes a knife look Japanese. So…there is the glam
factor!
NOTE: This pretty
“crown” feature can
“crown” any number of
Japanese knives—but
only single bevels!
Sometimes you’ll see it
on a yanagi (the long
sashimi slicer); if it’s
there, the yanagi is
called
a
kengata
yanagi.
If you are hell-bent on getting a cool-looking flat-end knife, one of the
coolest-looking ones is the takobiki, also known as the takohiki, a long and
narrow version of a flat-end knife.
Gasp. The detail in
Japanese knife making
is amazing!
Does the flat end have a practical use? I’ve heard some chefs say that it’s
nice for scraping ginger…but, according to Vincent, it is a purely aesthetic
touch, without an important utilitarian purpose.
The takobiki is a good knife for slicing sashimi—but very specialized for
that process (the yanagi, which it resembles, is a little more versatile).
The long, narrow, flat-end takobiki
15
Does your knife
have a curved
tip?
The next two criteria seem
complicated and fraught with
practical importance. But no.
Both of these tricky tips,
according to Vincent, are there
just for looks.
The kanmuri is located at the top left corner of this knife
17
Does the knife have wavy lines…and does it
matter?
One of the most salient features of Japanese knives that look
“cool”—are “wavy” lines across the blade. Vincent says that “wavy” knives
usually indicate Damascus steel, a throwback to the sword-making
practices of old, in which the steel was folded, or layered, to make the
sword stronger. He says that in the modern world, wavy lines can also be
etched on or lasered on. His big point is: no matter how the lines were
obtained, and though these wavy lines are powerful influencers because
they look so cool…today, they have nothing more than aesthetic value!
18
Does the knife have a tsuchime finish?
Definitions first: in a “tsuchime-finish” knife, the knife appears
to have been pounded on both sides (over 100 spots!) by the
head of a heavy nail. You see little round depressions everywhere, but not
in a symmetrical pattern. Once again, according to Victor…if you like the
way it looks, buy it! But it does nothing of a practical nature for the chef.
Notice in the photo just above
how the “curve” is on the spine
side of the knife, the non-cutting
side of the knife. That should tell
you everything right there! No
function! Sure is pretty, though…
A curved-tip knife
Two knives with slanted tips
All of the “Vincent” selections, laid out together
15 SPECIFIC KNIVES
RECOMMENDED BY KORIN
Now that you’re so conversant with Japanese knives…
it’s a good time to buy!
Before Vincent Kasuhito Lau and I finished our three-week project at the
Korin store, I asked him to pull out a dazzling array of knives that would:
1. Be great for anyone’s kitchen
2. Demonstrate a wide range of the criteria discussed just above
NOTE: As a digital subscriber, you may click below to see Vincent discussing
each knife with me.
https://vimeo.com/davidrosengarten/korinknives
If you’re in or near New York City, a visit to the Korin store would be rewarded
by your own personal walk-around with Vincent. Or, you could choose from
the following list and place an internet order with Korin, no matter where
you are. Please remember that ALL knives sold by Korin are made in Japan,
though NOT all are traditional Japanese knives. The knives appear below in
no particular order—except that the most traditional knives (yanagi, deba,
usuba) are at the top:
Knife #1
Stain Resistant
Yanagi, Korin ($149)
This is a traditional single bevel yanagi, the great traditional knife for slicing
sashimi. It is hand-forged, and stain-resistant. It’s a little shorter than some
yanagi knives (“only” 9.4-inches long!), so Vincent recommends this for a
home cook who is just learning the art of the yanagi. Also, since it’s made
from the soft 8A steel, it’s a good knife for those just learning to sharpen.
Great value!
Knife #2
Hongasumi
Yanagi, Masamoto Shiro-Ko ($352)
Another single bevel traditional yanagi for slicing sashimi…but this one
has advantages. It is longer (10.5-inches), and therefore better suited to
the experienced Japanese chef, or the restaurant professional. The
“hongasumi” part indicates a higher-level of craftsmanship. AND…this
one is a carbon steel knife, which means it will take a much sharper edge.
Beautiful knife.
Knife #3
Kasumi Deba,
Masamoto Shiro-Ko ($227)
Another good knife for home cooks. A classic deba for boning fish, but not
quite as long as some (it is 6.4-inches long). Good for small-to-medium
fish. Thick spine, with a fairly heavy, bone-crushing feel. The “kasumi”
designation is apparent in the “cloudy” row between the two steels (Vincent
adds that “you don’t need the fineness of ‘hongasumi’ for a deba, because
it is a rough-task knife.”) Best news of all: it’s made with carbon steel.
Knife #4
Ginsan-ko Deba,
Korin ($378)
This is a great deba…but for a chef who doesn’t want to worry about the
possible rusting of carbon steel. It is made from a very special stain-resistant
steel called ginsanko, or “silver-three-steel.” It’s the same length as the
deba above, but a little wider. Therefore, it is a little heavier, and a little more
efficient as a bone-crusher. Single bevel, of course.
Knife #5
Special
Dentoukougeishi
Hongasumi Kamagata Usuba,
Nenohi ($322)
A great vegetable knife, the classic usuba with
single bevel, made with carbon steel. This one is a
medium-sized usuba; it’s 7.6-inches long, and
about 2-inches wide. It’s a pretty knife, with the
curved tip called kamagata. More important, it
was made by a craftsman who has been
designated a “National Treasure” in Japan,
Dentokougeishi Kaichou; for the chef, this means
that the knife has the greatest potential for extreme
sharpness. The knife also features an 8-sided
handle that many chefs find very comfortable.
The knife maker Nenohi is famous in Japan for
single bevel knives.
operation, which brings an extra watchfulness to it. This is a medium-long
chef’s knife (8.2-inches), made in stain-resistant steel that keeps its edge
for a long time. The double bevel is 70-30 (the classic Japanese ratio for
double bevels), which makes it good for all kinds of cutting. Lighter and
more nimble than a Western-made chef’s knife.
Knife #8
UX10 Gyutou (chef’s knife), Misono ($379)
This is a VERY
large chef’s knife
(11.7-inches long),
which Vincent says makes it more versatile (since even large items can be
cut by it). The stain-resistant steel is quite hard, which holds the edge
longer…but…hard steel usually means more
difficulty in sharpening. Not so here! This
particular blend of steel is easier to sharpen than
you’d normally expect a knife of this hardness to
THE KNIVES I COVET
be. Not cheap, but a very impressive, imposing
chef’s knife.
After all the hours of my recent knife training…and
BLADE-RUNNERS:
all the reading you’ve been doing in this story!…
I thought it’d be nice to boil it all down to
the three knives
The sharpest knife in the store—Vincent was
reluctant to let me touch it!—and one of a few in
the four-digit price range. $1000+! Ouch! But
man, would I love to own this! This would be the
ultimate sashimi slicer! The great sharpness
comes from the craftsmanship, of course…but
also from the fact that it’s White Steel #1, the
purest of the carbon steels. Of note to the
collector…but not the chef…is the crazy exotic
handle; it is a composite of blonde magnolia
wood, white buffalo horn, and bands from bubinga
wood (the bubinga tree is considered the tree of
the gods in Africa). This knife is in a series of
prestigious knives from Masamoto called “Kizuna.”
Knife #2 Hongasumi Yanagi,
Masamoto Shiro-Ko ($352)
Knife #5 Special Dentoukougeishi Hongasumi Kamagata Usuba, Nenohi ($322)
Knife #15 Ao-Ko Hongasumi
Wa-Santoku Nakiri, Masamoto ($198)
I want them all for different reasons…
but the one common factor in the trio is the
steel: every one is a traditional carbon steel.
I want sharpness…and I don’t mind the
extra trouble in keeping these carbon babies
stain-free!
Knife #7
Pro Gyutou
(chef’s knife),
Togiharu ($175)
The brand is Togiharu, which is actually a collaboration of Korin and a
Japanese knife maker…Misono; both Misono and Korin oversee the
Inox Steel Petty, Togiharu ($78)
I’m planning to buy from Korin:
Knife #6
#1 Hongasumi Mirror Finish
Yanagi, Masamoto
Korin Shiro ($1100)
Knife #9
Vincent likes the Japanese petty knives very
much, which are larger than paring knives, but
smaller than chef’s knives. This Inox version
(which means stainless steel, or no carbon), runs
a typical petty 5.9-inches long. It has a 70-30
ratio in its double bevel, putting it in the allpurpose range, very versatile (except for long
items to be cut). “It makes sense in the kitchen,”
Vincent says, “as a secondary knife to the chef’s
knife.” Vincent the sharpener notes that its metal
blend makes it easy to sharpen. Great value.
Knife #10
Hammered Damascus Sujihiki,
Togiharu ($155)
An unusual knife to behold…very Japaneselooking! This is basically a yanagi on weight
training: it is a long sashimi-slicer, like a yanagi,
but much narrower all along the blade. A true
yanagi (a little wider) can have other kitchen
purposes, but a sujihiki is pretty much confined to slicing fish (even smoked
salmon!). Also, a yanagi has the famous single bevel, making it very sharp.
Not the sujihiki.The sujihiki is a Western-style double bevel knife (50-50),
stain resistant, making it a little less sharp than single bevel carbon steel—
but at the core of this knife’s Damascus process is VG-10 steel, one of the
tougher stainless-resistant steels that takes a better edge than the others!
And the Damascus process has created a beautiful knife with wavy lines;
lots of Korin customers buy this knife as a gift just for its visual delights.
and a paring knife (smaller). It is made from tough VG-10 stain resistant
steel, which takes an edge nicely. The double bevel is 70-30, which
makes it quite versatile. Most unusual is the handle—which is longer
than it normally would be for a knife of this size; for all those largehanded people who have had trouble with the small handles of small
knives…this one is your answer! You have found your shrimp-deveining
mate!
Knife #13
Blue Bone
Handle Gyutou
(chef’s knife), Nenox ($935)
A great, long chef’s knife (10.5-inches long!). Nenox is renowned for
Western-style knives that are made from a proprietary secret: a blend of
carbon steel and stain-resistant steel, which has undergone a sub-zero
manufacturing process, to yield an amazing knife with the advantages of
each style! Though their knives are not exactly hand-forged, Vincent says
that Nenox pays more individual attention to its knives than any other
manufacturer of stamped knives; he also says the the vaunted “handforging” certainly creates the best traditional Japanese knives, but some
Western-style knives (like these) can be better when they’re made in the
more industrial way. In any event, Vincent proudly notes that “this is the
highest-quality non-carbon steel we carry.”
Knife #11
Inox Honyaki
Wa-Petty, Suisin ($259)
This petty is unusual for two reasons:
1. It is longer than most pettys, running 8.2-inches long—which almost
makes it a slicer! You could also argue “chef’s knife”…though it is less
wide than that. Somewhere between all three.
2. It is absurdly, I mean absurdly!, light: the lightest knife I have ever
picked up. Vincent says it inspires lots of love-hate relationships.
People either say, “Amazing! it’s an extension of my arm!”…or…“I’m
paying HOW MUCH money for this thing that’s not there???”
It is a stain-resistant knife. The double bevel is 90-10, which means it
comes close to behaving like a single bevel knife—including the fact that
you can get it sharper than most double bevels. Another chef’s factor:
because it’s narrower than a chef’s knife, you’ll have less friction in cutting
fish, making it a better slicing knife.
The “honyaki wa” designation refers to two things:
1. We’ve already discussed the “honyaki” method of making knives,
using one type of steel only. A high-quality thing.
2. And “wa” means…Japanese!…as in “Wagyu”…Japanese cow! in this
case, the “wa” refers to the beautiful Japanese handle…juxtaposed
with the Western-looking blade.
Lots of talking points in this knife!
Knife #12
VG-10 Petty,
Masanobu ($185)
Knife #14
High Carbon
Steel Gyutou
(chef’s knife), Suisin ($87)
Another interesting blend of elements: this one features high-carbon
steel in a Western-style knife. That’s one of the reasons that Vincent likes
this knife for sharpener beginners: it is small, and easy to sharpen. The
“small” part also plays a cheffin’ role in Vincent’s recommendation: it’s a
knife that’s good to learn knife skills with, and will fit into a small urban
kitchen very easily (“It’s great for someone with smaller hands, or smaller
workspace,” says Vincent). An excellent value in carbon steel.
Knife #15
Ao-Ko
Hongasumi
Wa-Santoku
Nakiri, Masamoto ($198)
I’m really attracted to this knife; I wouldn’t want to buy a santoku unless
it were really special…and this one is! It is made with a very special
proprietary blend of the purest carbon steel, tempered with some soft
iron to keep the price down. But the level of craftsmanship is high. It’s a
rare double bevel carbon steel knife, with a 50-50 ratio (excellent allpurpose!) It’s a little shorter than 6.8-inches long (good medium, flexible
size), and Vincent the knife-sharpener says that he can get this edge
incredibly sharp. THE santoku to buy!…but because of the carbon steel
upkeep requirements, Vincent says this knife is more for the advanced
santoku user.
This petty knife is on the other side of the “petty knife spectrum,” the small
side; it is only 4.25-inches long, a mere inch more than most paring knives.
So it too falls between the stools—in this case, between a petty knife (larger)
OTHER KNIVES TO CONSIDER...
FROM OTHER JAPANESE KNIFE COMPANIES
Obviously, in researching this story I made my big knife connection with Korin.
But the fine Japanese knife companies below also dedicated their time and
expertise to helping our team understand the ins and outs of Japanese knives.
Here they are—along with a knife from each company that impressed us:
1. Kikuichi Takohiki 9.5-inch ($420)
2. Shun Classic Pro Japanese Style Usuba
6.5-inch Etched Blade ($225)
4. Takeda Aogami Super Kogatana 3.4-inch
($100 from Chubo)
3. Tsukiji Masamoto Sushikiri 24cm
($760 from Mutual Trading Company, Inc.)
5. M
BK-85 - Professional Series
8.5-inch Chef’s Knife
($195 from MAC Knife, Inc.)
1. Kikuichi Cutlery
With roots crafting samurai swords over
700 years ago, Kikuichi became a maker of
cutlery in 1868. Each knife is hand-foraged
by a master specializing in Wakashizuke, a
blade creation technique handed down for
generations that combines jigane (soft flexible carbon steel) and hagane (hard carbon
steel) lending to the quality of the blade.
Our team met with Kikuichi’s Sales Director
at the Brooklyn kitchen supply store Whisk
to sample these knives. With such pristine craftsmanship, and multi-generational
mastery, my top pick for a Kikuichi knife is
the Takohiki. This knife is perfect for sashimi
finishing work, and features a sexy square tip
for scooping up fish from the counter.
2. Shun
Inspired by the swordsmiths of Seki City,
Shun artisans handcraft knives that, they
say, require 100 steps to complete. This work
takes place in century-old Kai Corporation
factories and combines ancient traditional
techniques with modern materials. To sample
these knifes, we invited Shun expert Ghee Lip
Ong to our office for a hands-on demonstration which focused on sashimi and vegDavidRosengarten.com | March 15, 2015 | 14
etables. We loved the Shun Usuba—which
makes cutting matchstick daikon pieces a
breeze with its weighty feel and perfect
6.5-inch size.
3. Mutual Trading Company,
Inc. (MTC Kitchen)
MTC Kitchen began as a co-op organization,
supplying Japanese food, beverage, and restaurant materials; the company prides itself
on serving the chef market. One extremely
interesting knife they market to chefs is the
sushikiri knife—an extraordinary example of
a true Japanese knife (in the sense that it is
made specifically for one task). Sushikiri, or
“sushi cutter” is used by chefs to cut sushi
rolls (usually into six pieces) without damaging the rice and the seaweed; the unique
curved shape of the blade yields a perfect
stroke for this task.
4. Chubo
Chubo, roughly translated into “restaurant
kitchen,” is in an online Japanese knife
retailer founded just over two years ago by
Jeremy Watson—providing unique Japanese
knives not currently offered to the American
market. Our team met with Chubo’s execu-
tives as well as Executive Chef for Dream
Hotel Michael Armstrong for a demonstration. Chef Armstrong is adamant that he only
has room for Japanese knives in his kitchen
because they are “sharper, lighter, and more
precise.” After watching his skilled cuts, my
choice of recommended Chubo knife is the
Takeda easy-to-sharpen, razor-sharp paring
knife, with an unfinished-looking handle.
5. MAC Knife, Inc.
Founded to create a “new & improved” knife
that was better than anything available in
the United States, MAC manufactured its
first knife in Japan in 1960—where they are
still turning out wonderful knives today. MAC
knives are generally constructed out of one
piece of tempered steel, or “Honyaki,” usually
with a double bevel (unlike traditional Japanese knives). MAC Owner Harold Arimoto
claims that his knives are easier to control,
sharpen, and maintain than traditional Japanese knives. “Imagine a car that goes straight
even if you remove your hands from the
steering wheel” he says. Because of the MAC
knife’s versatility, efficiency, and sharpness,
the everyday chef’s knife, MKB-85, is my
choice for THE preferred knife from MAC.
part TWO
My Favorite Style
of Japanese Knife...
AND A Fabulous At-Home Source
for the Sashimi it Slices!
will undoubtedly be the most talked-about dinner
party in your neighborhood in 2015. Now, I do
know that pushing past sashimi, and actually
making sushi at home—which is to say, adding
the rice factor—is daunting to everyone (even
though my suggestions on p. 19 make the home
sushi party a surprising snap!) But sashimi at
home? Just raw fish? Sashimi should never be
daunting in the least!
The yanagi knives I recommend are on
pgs. 11-12.
My Favorite Style of Japanese Knife:
THE FISH
I
’m breathing hard just looking over all that
information in PART ONE of our Japanese
knife coverage. But if you want to go all Occam’s Razor on me…welcome to PART TWO!
My single favorite Japanese traditional knife is
the long slicer called the yanagi. I’ll let you poke
through PART ONE to find all the excruciating
detail about the yanagi…but suffice it to say it is
a long, slender knife that, when it’s super sharp,
turns slices of raw tuna into poetry. It is the non
plus ultra knife for raw fish at the sushi bar.
And that’s exactly where it caught my eye many
years ago, sparking my now nearly life-long
obsession with Japanese knives. I saw that man,
the sushi chef, with this gleaming hunk of steel in
his hands, and a blood-red, geometric block of
raw tuna on the counter below. With what I can
only describe as the effortless élan of Jean Béliveau (if you’re not a hockey fan, substitute
Nureyev, Franco Corelli, Robert Frost, Fred
Astaire, anyone you like), the chef swooshes his
way through the maguro in seconds, leading to
glistening, perfectly even, same-thickness slices
of pristine sashimi.
In a world where traditional practices are being
tossed out every day, replaced by modern
attenuations—often misunderstood as “improvements”—I can visualize no better symbol of all
that’s good in the world than a sushi master
quietly slicing raw fish (to order!) with a traditional yanagi.
Part of the yanagi appeal to me is that there are
amazingly set-in-stone rules for how to cut raw
fish with this knife. Another great enticement is
that the rules are not difficult to master, once you
know what you’re doing. And, lastly…my excitement goes through the roof when I realize that it
is now possible to receive sushi-bar quality raw
fish at home through internet order!
Put it all together…and this means that you can
now throw unforgettable sashimi parties at home
for friends and relatives! Buy a knife, order some
fish, learn a few tricks…and you can host what
I recently ordered raw fish on the internet from a
quartet of American seafood companies who
proclaim that they can send you spanking fresh,
sushi-bar-quality raw fish…and promise that
you’ll receive it at home within a day or two. I
ordered from each company at least twice, because this kind of product has all the earmarks of
potential variation.
The general result?
Surprisingly good! Each of the four companies
sent me at least something that was sushiquality excellent. Within each company, there
was quite a bit of quality variation: some
excellent items, some so-so. Nothing I received
was bad, or off. The biggest problem, when a
problem struck, was simply blandness (like
salmon with not much salmon flavor).
Here are the four companies, all good, listed
roughly in order of “who got my attention?” As I
said, I did each of these orders twice, and the
products I received were very consistent…so if I
tell you to get the Kampachi Back Loin from Fish
for Sushi…get the Kampachi Loin from Fish for
Sushi! (unless some seasonal factor changes
things).
Here are the shippers:
Fish for Sushi
1025 Alameda de las Pulgas
Belmont, CA 94002
(650) 515-3474
FishForSushi.com
[email protected]
Lobster Place
CHUTORO ($70-$112)
The first time I ordered the chutoro from Fish For
Sushi it was very good; the second time it was
even better. Both times there was the same
differentiation within the chunk: the paler flesh
near the skin had a creamier feel; the darker
pink flesh away from the skin less so. The other
problem is that this toro threatens to fall into
segment lines if you don’t slice wisely. But both
times the fish was delicious: a little salty, a little
sweet, gorgeous underlying minerality, just
oily enough.
KAMPACHI LOIN ($9-$33)
Some beautiful otoro home-delivered by FishForSushi.com
There is a theory in the world of fish that fish
frozen on the fishing boat, fast…comes to you in
better condition than “fresh” fish that’s been sitting in the hold for a few days as the boat returns
to port. That’s the prevailing theory at this California company, who “super-freeze” their fish on
the open water at -76°F! I’m inclined to believe in
their theory…since some of the best fish of the
tasting came from this company! (NOTE: VERY
detailed defrosting instructions come with the fish).
They’re also very sustainably oriented, using only
long lines to catch their fish (no nets), so as to
eliminate “collateral damage” to other fish.
I received five different fish from Fish for Sushi,
and four of them are highly recommended:
Kampachi is amberjack…but the Japanese give
amberjack different names depending on its
age and provenance. “Kampachi” is the name
for the most mature amberjack. This one comes
in fillet strips, each about 10-inches long,
2-inches wide. The flesh of kampachi should be
pearl-grey in color;
right on here, happily lacking the
“browning”
that
you sometimes see
in this fish. Not the
over-the-top buttery
thing you can get from kampachi and hamachi,
but the advantage is that this is not a mushy
kampachi, much more chewy and resilient than
some. Mild mineral flavor, which moves in a buttery direction (both flavor-wise and texture-wise)
as you chew. Impressive.
75 Ninth Avenue
New York, NY 10011
(212) 255-5672
LobsterPlace.com
[email protected]
I’m a New Yorker, and I’m always on the hunt for
high-quality retail fish. Though I live on the other
side of town, at a whole different longitude, the
Lobster Place (in Chelsea Market) sucks me in
quite often because of its extremely high reputation. And follow-through! I started going there for
lobsters and oysters…then discovered that this
might be your best one-stop source in NY for ALL
kinds of shellfish and fish. In 1974, Rod and
Jean MacGregor opened the first Lobster Place
on the Upper West Side (woulda been better for
me!) Their original goal was just to bring fresh
Maine lobster to New York City. In 1996, they
became the first tenant in the “new” Chelsea
Market. The company was taken over by their
son Ian in 2002. They are now New York’s largest
wholesale and retail
seafood purveyor, supplying at least 500 of
NYC’s restaurants. I’m
so happy their stuff
is now just a mailorder away: I get great
sashimi, and I don’t have to take two trains!
Gather guests
around and get this
party started!
I received three different fish from Lobster Place,
along with their sushi making kit, and two of them
are highly recommended.
AMBERJACK ($46/lb)
OTORO ($46-$93)
Probably the most exciting piece of the whole
tasting—but ya gotta like otoro! It is from the
belly, of course, normally just called “toro”—but
when the fish is a little fattier it’s called “chutoro.”
When it’s very fatty it’s called “otoro” (this comes
from adding the honorific “O” before the word
“toro.”) This 3x3x1-inches otoro block was a pale
pink throughout (except for the silver skin on one
side, with ¼-inch of fat below it)—and featured
wide bands of creamy white fat throughout.
It makes a beautiful slice that holds together
perfectly, even with the bands of fat segmenting
it. Have I had better otoro? Yes, in samples where
all the fat is better integrated. But I was delighted
to be eating something this good in my own
kitchen! Fresh as hell, sublimely buttery, worth
the price.
SCALLOPS ($24.99/lb)
Scallops are not a hot item at sushi bars in
America…but in scalloping areas of Japan, they
are a prized delicacy! These excellent Japaneseraised scallops will give you a good idea of what
the fuss is all about in Japan. Each scallop is
about 1 ¼-inches in diameter, and comes butterflied—the attachment of the two halves held at
the abductor muscle. So they really look like butterflies, or bowties! Sweet and fresh, to be sure.
Even more: does not have the blandness that raw
shellfish can have (like shrimp and lobster), but
rather tastes like a nutty, cooked scallop. Texture
is also special: tender but resilient! And…you
can put your yanagi away for these; though I
might prefer to cut them myself, the butterflying
is pre-done. The best raw scallops I’ve tasted in
a while.
Downside of Fish for Sushi: I was disappointed
by their yellowfin tuna.
This is the real thing: wild-caught amberjack,
hook and line, taken on the U.S. coast from
Virginia down. My pieces were perfect for
sashimi slicing: a rectangular block, 8-inches
long, 3-inches wide, 1 ½-inches thick. Gorgeous
color, which modulates from white pink to medium
pink…simply luminescent! Thinly spaced bands
of white fat, gorgeous to behold. Sweet and clean
taste, with no aftertaste whatsoever…but notes
of underlying butter and minerals along the way.
Texture-wise, it’s in that amberjack school I love:
not mushy (which can indicate bad freezing), but
marvelously resilient.
SALMON ($29/lb)
Atlantic salmon that’s farm-raised in Canada, in
open-ocean net pens. Perfect for sashimi-slicing:
blocks that are 6-inches long, 3-inches wide,
1 ¼-inches thick. Medium-rich color, with lovely
wavy bands of fat. Quite tender, with a little chew
to it—but dissolves quickly into a fatty goo, which
I love. Really exquisite subtle flavors of butter,
earth, and mineral.
Downside of the Lobster Place: I was disappointed by their wild, line-caught tuna.
Giovanni’s
Fish Market & Galley
1001 Front Street
Morro Bay, CA 93442
(888) 463-2056
GiovannisFishMarket.com
[email protected]
Giovanni’s is a fish market and small restaurant
located on the waterfront in Morro Bay, CA—on
California’s wine-mad Central Coast, west and a
little north of San Luis Obispo. Giovanni’s has been
family-owned and operated for over 25 years—
they are the oldest market/restaurant in Morro
Bay. They focus on local sustainable seafood from
their own fishing fleet, and ship their catches
fresh overnight to anywhere in the US. Most of
what we got was decent, but there was one crazy
stand-out:
HAMACHI ($24.99/lb)
This is the name that’s usually used for yellowtail
in the U.S. (a member of the jack family)…and
this was one of the best yellowtails I’ve tasted
anywhere in a long time, including sushi bars!
Perfect block for sashimi-slicing: 8-inches long,
3-inches wide, 2-inches deep. Yellowtail can
have problems at sushi bars; aficionados like the
“buttery” thang, but the fish is often mushy at
the same time. The platonic yellowtail, of course,
would be buttery and resilient simultaneously.
Breaking news: Plato has landed in Morro Bay!
The fatty look is what gets you first—not to
mention the fact that your hands are turning
shiny as you touch this fish! Then the chew: a
perfect, fresh piece of you-bite-it-bites-back fish,
but ready to melt. One of the deeper-tasting fish
in our tasting…earth and butter, of course. Don’t
miss this one!
Downside of Giovanni’s: I was disappointed by
their ahi yellowfin tuna, dry-pack jumbo diver
scallops, California red abalone, and live wild
spot prawns (though the fault may have been
ours in the prawns, by not getting to them
quickly enough).
Catalina
Offshore Products
5202 Lovelock Street
San Diego, CA 92110
(619) 297-9797
CatalinaOP.com
[email protected]
Catalina Offshore Products company started in
1977 when founder Dave Rudin began diving for
seaweed and live sea urchin from his boat off of
Catalina Island. He would sell his catches the
next day around San Diego. Almost four
successful decades later, they now source from
fishermen working off of the southern California
and Baja California coasts, who utilize hand line
and other sustainable fishing methods; obviously,
Catalina has greatly increased their roster of
available items. However, it is the dedication to
sustainability that causes some fluctuation in
what’s available (the roster is always dependent
SASHIMI PARTY
MUST-HAVES
on seasons, weather, fish migration…). Their
products are shipped internationally, including to
Japan, straight from their 30,000 square-foot
facility in San Diego. What was extraordinary to
us: the fin fish we received were all whole fish,
spanking fresh! This’ll really make you feel like a
sushi chef!
*Whole fish are available via wholesale; fillets are
also available.
WHOLE YELLOWTAIL,
OCEAN RUN ($2.45/lb)
These were large whole fish we received
8-9 lbs—and the filleting thing is not so scary on
these. Just cut off a fillet from one side of the
central bone, remove the skin…and you’re ready
to go with your “block.” Beautiful red gills in the
whole fish, a sure sign of freshness. Fairly dark
flesh, with some bloody areas, but nicely
resilient. Clean and fresh taste, with a little
minerality for depth. But mostly quiet in flavor.
WHOLE BAJA FARMED
SUSHI GRADE YELLOWTAIL
(HIRAMASA) (($6.50/lb)
Very pink flesh. And the flavor is a little quieter
still—definitely NOT the big buttery yellowtail
thing. A well-behaved but not thrilling piece
of sashimi.
Downside of Catalina Offshore Products: I was
disappointed by the whole Mt. Cook Alpine salmon,
and by the product that started it all for Catalina:
uni! I am an uni fanatic…but these were too
soupy to win my uni heart.
My Favorite Style of Japanese Knife:
THE EVENT
All-righty. The fish is in the fridge. What do you
do now?
My suggestion is to invite 5-6 friends, and build
an evening around the sashimi.
Or better still…have invited them a few days ago,
because that fish ain’t gonna wait!
1) Your slicing of the sashimi is kind of a show…
so you need a stage! If you have a large island in
your kitchen, that’d be great. YOU stand at
center stage, and everyone gathers around you
on both sides of the island. OR…you could just
put a large cutting board in front of you at the
dining table, and do the slicing right there…
with everyone else observing from their dining
table seats. Make sure they have plates
and chopsticks.
2) You need only three edible things to go
with the sashimi: soy sauce in little bowls, and
small plates of gari (Japanese pickled ginger)
and wasabi.
3) What to drink? So many great choices!
• Dry white wine (I’d suggest light whites, like
German Riesling…even a little off-dry Riesling
will do well!)
• Champagne
• Beer (I like light and crisp lager, but even
microbrew ales will be fine)
• Sake (the Japanese love sake with
sashimi…more than with sushi, because
they find the “rice on rice” redundant in
the latter match…so be on the hunt for
dry, crisp sake to serve with sashimi…it’s
a complicated field, but my favorite sake
category is “junmai daiginjo”)
quick, smooth swish through the fish—and the
bite of sashimi falls off on the left-hand side of
the counter, leaving behind most of the rectangular block to the right side of the knife. How you
position the knife before slicing is crucial! The
heel of the blade must be over the fish you’re
about to cut. Then, you pull that heel toward you
as you lop off one slice. It is one, continuous
motion: don’t stop, don’t saw. (The Japanese
verb for this slicing of sashimi is “to pull,” not “to
cut.”) Your reward? The “pull” will yield a glossy,
smooth slice that has a definite character to it—
much finer than any slice “sawed” off a piece of
fish—that is evident in both the texture and the
flavor. This will be emphasized if your “pull”
doesn’t have a lot of pressure behind it; this can
only be accomplished if the knife is razor-sharp!
There are many kinds of cutting techniques, for
many different kinds of fish…but the two most
important are:
For a video demonstration of this technique
on MTC Kitchen’s YouTube page:
http://youtu.be/5a3F0SKCIEg
• hirazukuri (the basic technique for thick slices
of sashimi)
I’m going to describe them both, assuming you’re
cutting right-handedly, with a right-handed knife
(as I mentioned in PART ONE, left-handed knives
are very hard to find). I’ll also assume
that your yanagi is a single bevel knife, in the
traditional Japanese style.
FOR SOGIZUKURI
(best for slightly fibrous fish,
like red snapper or fluke)
If a right-handed person is
slicing a rectangular block
of sashimi, as you see so
often at sushi bars—the
knife is held in the right
hand. The knife is held at
a 40-degree angle way
over on the left side of the
block—about one slice in
from the left hand
margin. This means that
you see the flat side of
the knife, but the bevel
is more or less facedown over the fish. A
bringing your knife to the RIGHT side of the fish,
about one slice to the left of the right-hand edge.
Once again, the heel of the blade is over the fish
you’re about to cut…but, this time, the knife is
dead perpendicular to the board (not a 40degree angle). Again applying minimal pressure,
and cutting downward, “pull” the knife through
the fish at whatever slice-thickness you like.
Some chefs, for some fish, prefer ¼-inch
slices…but ½-inch slices for
something like tender tuna are not
unheard of.
...a pull not a saw is
always going to make
a more exciting slice
4) And now the most important thing of
all: tips for cutting the sashimi with your new
yanagi knife! To start with, try to start with
“blocks” of raw fish that are rectangular, or
almost rectangular (many of the items sent
by the internet companies above conform to
this criterion).
• sogizukuri (the basic technique for thin slices
of sashimi)
the beveled side!) After you’ve placed your rectangular block on the counter, line up the cut by
FOR HIRAZUKURI (best for softer, less
fibrous fish, like tuna or yellowtail)
Leave it to the endlessly subtle Japanese. Not
only do they want to vary thin cuts and thick cuts
(like this one) at the sushi bar—but they do it in
a way that creates a different exterior texture for
the thick cut fish! That’s because for hirazukuri
the fish is cut from the RIGHT side of the rectangular block, which means that cutting is being
done by a different side of the knife (in this case,
To see a video demonstration of
this technique on L’OHIRA’S YouTube page, go to: http://youtu.be/
GIWxm_mRHQY
For all other kinds of fish and
seafood, outside of rectangular
blocks (like the delicious scallops described
above that you can order)…you’re on your own!
Thinness/thickness is always up to you, and…
remember…a “pull” not a “saw” is always going
to make a more exciting slice.
5) The rest of the meal? Well, that depends on
your gang. For some sashimi freaks, a meal
consisting entirely of 4-6 different kinds of
sashimi is heaven! For those kind of folks, you
can quit right here. Maybe some steamed rice
with a bowl of miso soup would be a good
follow-up and conclusion (for miso soup, make
some powdered dashi—the only kind of bouillon
powder I like in the whole world!—then whisk in
your favorite type of miso: white, yellow, brown,
red, up to you. A few chunks of tofu and some
chopped scallion finish it off).
But…maybe your guests are of the opinion that
sashimi should be an appetizer, not a main
course. No prob. At this point you could serve
anything you like as
a
main
course…
Japanese,
or
any
other -ese! From a Japanese noodle soup, to
a Greek beef stew!
Or...brave ones...you
can go on to sushi!
To see Isao Yamada of
Brushstroke demonstrate sogizukuri,
hirazukuri, and
katsumaruki, see
https://vimeo.com/
davidrosengarten/
brushstrokesushi
Start throwing
RICE To celebrate:
part Three
A Bold New Idea for a
Sushi Party in Your Kitchen...
That ANYONE Can Prepare!
For many years, I’ve been buying uncooked pizza dough from my fave local
pizzeria—then using it to make the crust of grilled pizzas at home. I even
buy that same dough to make quick tandoori-style bread.
But it was just a year ago that I realized: why not do the same for sushi rice?
So…I cultivated a relationship with a local sushi bar. I now go there somewhat regularly, asking to buy a few cups of cooked sushi rice! They take it
right out of the big tub that holds their sushi rice for the night, pack it in a
few take home-containers…and charge me a couple of bucks! That’s it!
I hurry home with it, because it’s gonna change texture over the next few
hours. But anytime “soon” will work just fine…
When you’re ready to roll, so to speak…
Gather guests around and get this party started! IMPORTANT NOTE: for
simplicity’s sake, I completely dispense with nigiri sushi, the “finger” of fish
draped over sushi rice that most people think of when they think of sushi.
It IS tricky to make. THAT I leave to the sushi bars. At your house, you’re
gonna focus on fish wrapped in nori (toasted seaweed)—this makes things
ever so much easier! Again a “temaki” is a “hand roll”—and that’s exactly
why the Japanese refer to this very special party as a Temaki Sushi Party!
Y
es, I well understand the fear that sushi-making strikes into the
heart of home cooks, even home cooks who are excellent! I once
took a sushi-making course…and…like so much in Japanese
culture (such as knives!)…what seems simple on the surface is
fiendishly complicated once you get into it. Bringing the rice to its sushirice ideal…molding nigiri sushi with your hands, so that it’s perfect, not
ratty…mastering the bamboo mat…it makes me shudder just to think
about it all!
With sushi, there is no place for a restaurant chef to hide. Either it’s perfect…or it’s inferior sushi.
Well, the first thing for the home cook to do is get over THAT attitude. Who
says your sushi at home has to be perfect? You’re not being judged by the
Sushi Academy!
Moreover, lots of untrained home cooks in Japan prepare sushi at home
all the time…for guests! The Temaki Sushi Party is very, very popular “Temaki” means “hand roll:” dinner party guests standing in the kitchen
(usually 8 guests or so, but at least 4-5), scooping rice out of a bowl, placing it on nori, along with some sliced fish…and wrapping up in any way
they can! Casual! Fun! Delicious!
And now…I have a suggestion that makes it even easier…
So here are the elements of the Temaki Sushi Party that you need to
watch over:
THE RICE
You’ve got that from your local sushi joint.
THE FISH FOR THE SUSHI
The day of the party, buy some likely sushi fish (such as salmon or tuna)
anywhere you like…even the supermarket is fine. Or, you can order more
exotic, top-quality fish from any of the suppliers discussed on pp. 16-17.
Raw fish is typical, but don’t forget the cooked-fish California Roll; it uses
the execrable faker called surimi, instead of cooked crab…but you could
put REAL cooked crab in there, if you like. And leap to any other cooked
fish you can imagine…
OTHER INGREDIENTS
INSIDE THE TEMAKI
Totally your call. I often like to use avocado, but there are lots of other possibilities: julienne of daikon (cut with a flat-edge usuba knife, natch!),
sprouts, crisped fish skin, scallions, whatever your little heart desires.
Buy the sushi rice!!!! Why not?
THE SUSHI-BAR CONDIMENTS
You’ll need bowls of good soy sauce for dipping…and…you’ll need to make
wasabi available to your guests should they want to smear some inside their
rolls (I always say: go light on the wasabi!)
THE NORI
To the left is Yamamotoyama (Original Teriyaki Nori), cut-down strips of
seasoned nori from Pomona, CA (just 3 ½ x 1 ½-inches). I love the crunch
of it (doesn’t need further toasting), and it makes kind of a sweet impression in the mouth. You can obtain it by clicking here:
http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/product/ymy-teriyaki-nori-80-pcs-0-8-oz
One of the key elements of this party is the seaweed wrap you’ll use for
wrapping: nori, Japan’s wonderful invention, which is seaweed that has
been turned into flat, black-green, rollable sheets. I did a tasting of many
available types for this story, and came up with two I prefer:
This is the wonderful Temaki Tatsujin, Urashima, made in Japan. It is cut
down to sheets that are 7 ½ x 4-inches, making it perfect for traditional
hand rolls. It has the deepest, most sea-like taste of all the noris I tried,
along with a perfect saltiness. The texture is very light, very crisp; it really
crackles in the mouth. As with every nori (except the small Yamamotoyama
above), I like to toast it briefly over an open flame before using. Fortunately,
the toasting method is very simple. You can obtain it by clicking:
http://www.japansuper.com/cgi-bin/ht los/002064.2.3957600078017310459
Holding the nori with tongs, toast it briefly (turning once) over a medium-low, open flame. It takes care; don’t let it burn or curl. The process should take about 5-6 seconds per side,
if you’re at the right distance from the flame.
THE ROLLING
You’re ready to go. You can have pre-cut the fish if you like, or you can cut it to order as you proceed. Make fish slices and other fillings available to the
guests, along with rice and wasabi.
Now, as I see it, there are three main types of rolls to consider:
The Traditional Temaki Cone
As you well know, when you ask for temaki at the sushi bar, most sushi chefs will roll you a cone that they pass to you by hand. To make one, lay out a
7 ½ x 4-inches piece of toasted nori (the Temaki Tatsujin, Urashima, is perfect!), long side near you. Place about 2 tablespoons of sushi rice along the
short edge on the left, spreading it out with your fingers so it covers about one-third of the nori sheet. You should leave a narrow border of exposed nori
on three sides of the rice. Add fish and other ingredients. Begin rolling the nori to the right. Manipulate it so that it forms a cone when it’s done.
The temaki is now ready to dip in soy and eat.
The Temaki Cigar
It’s a little less complicated to follow the same instructions…
but just roll it straight across, like a fat cigar (some of my
friends would call it a doobie).
The Temaki Packet
And there’s a third way, even simpler
still. This is a good time to use the
Yamamotoyama strips. Just place a little
sushi rice at one end of one…Top it with
a small piece of fish...And simply fold the
uncovered nori over the covered nori,
making a square little package, open on
the sides. And now...pop it in your mouth!
LASTLY… If you’re feeling really ambitious…don’t forget that a very typical order of events at a sushi bar is sashimi first, sushi after. Voila!
TASTING EXTRA
THE PRODUCTS
I’M LOVIN’
RIGHT NOW...
Each issue of The Rosengarten Report will bring you available products
that I’ve tasted recently, along with full information on how you can acquire
them. But there’s a difference in my approach. In most periodicals, in the
“new product” reports, the same-sized box, or page, is always dedicated
to new products. That means there’s a quota to fill. In The Rosengarten
Report, in some issues you may find no products recommended, some
issues you may find eight. Why? Because I have no quota. I have no space
I must fill. I WILL RECOMMEND TO YOU ONLY THOSE PRODUCTS
THAT ARE DRIVING ME WILD, ONLY THOSE PRODUCTS THAT I
BELIEVE YOU CAN’T (OR AT LEAST SHOULDN’T) LIVE WITHOUT.
Please don’t live without these:
1
SESAME & DILL SEED OIL, HANDCRAFTED,
PRESSMEISTER OILS ($15 for a 5-oz bottle)
I get nervous about oil! There can
be so many things about an oil that
might trouble me…is it an oil made
from something logical (like olives)?
Is it a fresh oil, not rancid? Is it an
oil that plays around with unwanted
flavors, infusions?
So when I heard about these oils
from Michigan, my defenses went up.
Completely unnecessarily, as it
turns out!
Christoph Milz was born in
Germany, where he became a
trained chef. In 2010, he discovered a flax seed oil at a market in Berlin
that flipped him out; he responded with wonder at “how vibrant, flavorful
and intense flax seed oil can taste when it comes straight from the press.”
He decided to make his own oils, from a variety of seeds and nuts. Then
he decided to bring quality like this to the U.S…moving to Traverse City,
Michigan in 2012, and founding Pressmeister Oils there in 2013. The
subtle, delicious oils he produces are cold-pressed, made in small batches
from various seeds and nuts. He now sells the oils at markets in MI…and
to you through the internet!
Of the four Milz oils I tasted, this medium-yellow oil was the knock-out. I
don’t even detect the sesame in it…but the dill! OMG! This tastes exactly
like dill pickle oil—which is both unusual and delicious! I’ve been loving it
as a surprising sprinkle on a green salad (I mean, sometime ya gotta get
a little tired of olive oil!). It’s also great on fillets of fish sautéed in butter…
and on a German-style potato salad!
I also loved the DuChilly Hazelnut Oil, made from a special hazelnut that’s
a little longer, and a little more concentrated in flavor, than the usual
filbert. You know how walnut oil and hazelnut oil sometimes blur in flavor?
Not here! This darkish-gold sucker is SO PRECISELY hazelnut! Intense,
fresh nuts fill your mouth, with a kind of sweetness in the finish.
I’m also very fond of the Blue Poppy Seed Oil (so precise!), and the Black
Walnut Oil (which, intriguingly, has an appealing apple-like flavor).
2
PORK CLOUDS, BACON’S HEIR
($36 for 10 large 2-oz bags or $36 for 24 small .7-oz bags)
These Atlanta producers of pork rinds have a knack for words; their
package urges supporters to “join the pork revolution!…begun with a
brash, baconic cry shaking the bland bastion of commodity chippery!”
More important…they also have an amazing knack for making pork rinds.
I love pork rinds, often labeled as “chicharrones” in Hispanic markets. I
buy ‘em in bags all the time. But there are sometimes two problems with
these rinds. They can be overly greasy. And they can be tooth-breakingly
hard to crunch.
That’s what Bacon’s Heir has addressed. They have created chicharrones
for yuppies! (“Re-inventing the pork rind,” they boast.) Cooked in olive oil,
these rinds are never greasy. And…
they are light as air, always willing to
have their fragility shattered by your
teeth. At which point, they just melt
away in your mouth in the next phase
of porcine ecstasy. I cannot stop
eating them.
But which “flavor” to eat? The most
basic is the Rosemary & Sea Salt,
which is fundamentally appealing. I
like the Habanero Pepper rinds
better, but be warned: they are
blazingly hot. Even better for me is
the Malabar Black Pepper, with its
sophisticated pepper taste, its strong fatty-taste finish, and, surprisingly,
its hints of hominy flavor (though there’s no corn in it).
My favorite of all, however, is the most bizarre…a flavor I never thought I’d
prefer: the Cinnamon Ceylon Pork Clouds. What? Cinnamon in a
pork rind? Happily, there’s not much of it in here…just a perfect,
haunting accent, along with a little sweetness that works beautifully.
ready-to-use products: salsas, moles, escabeches and adobos, handmade
in Brooklyn, using the freshest ingredients and the most conscientious
methods. The company is called Xilli (pronounced CHEE-la), and its
products just became available at the end of 2014.
And, while you’re ordering from Atlanta, give a try to the wacky Pork Dust,
which they call “the meaty alternative to bread crumbs.” Yup…looks a lot
like bread crumbs. But it tastes like…oh, yeah, you guessed it. In spades!
In addition to the pork blast, there is considerable salt and, though the
label denies it, an MSG-kind of umami taste. Works for me! The first usage
that occurred to me after I sprinkled a pile of this joy on my waiting
tongue…was a sprinkle over mashed potatoes already splashed with a tan
gravy. Oh man….
I have only tasted this one mole, the Mole Poblano…but I can sense the
quality oozing out of this operation. The Mole Poblano has a list of
ingredients as long as your arm (e.g. chile ancho, chile mulato, chile
pasilla, tomato, tomatillo, onions, almonds, pecans, peanuts, pumpkin
seeds, sesame seeds, raisins, plantains…and a lot more!) And chocolate?
“Mexican chocolate” is listed as #24 in a 26-ingredient list. That also fills
me with confidence…because “chocolate,” glam as it may be, is not an
ingredient with a huge flavor pay-off in an authentic Mole Poblano.
POWER TO THE PORK!…as Bacon’s Heir screams on its labels.
The product, in a sexy, squat, glass jar, is a thick paste, reddish-brownblack in color. A tiny puddle of flavorful red oil collects at the top; it is
medium-hot, as is this product in general. The numbers of flavors one
senses in a small bite is akin to the number of ingredients in the list!
Biggest flavor, for me, is something dried-chile like, sort of paprika-ish—
but even this one flavor dwells on several levels. Then there’s the driedfruit assault, with something quite raisin-y accounting for a perfectly
calibrated sweetness. All those nuts? I feel ‘em, I taste ‘em…not each one,
but there is an overall richness reminiscent of nut butter. I’m sold. I will be
mixing my Mole Poblano into stews, blending a dab into salsas, schmearing
it on meat towards the end of grill time. I even have this wacky idea of
thinning it with some cream, in a saucepan, and creating something
spicy-creamy for fish! I must get in the kitchen soon…after I’ve acquired
Xilli’s other products!
3
XILLI MOLE POBLANO
($13 for a 6.5-oz jar)
There are two widespread misunderstandings about mole among
Americans who know Mexican food a little.
The first concerns chocolate. “Ah, mole has chocolate in it,” they’ll usually
say. But many moles do not contain chocolate.
And #2? Most Americans don’t realize that mole actually comes from
Brooklyn!
OK…just joshing ya on that one!
Please don’t discard your belief
that mole comes from Mexico!
But here’s the rectification,
clearing up everything:
Mole is an old, old idea in
Mexican cooking: a mortar-andpestle combo of ingredients that
functions as a sauce. But the
catch is this: there are many
kinds
of
mole
scattered
throughout Mexico. Usually, they
are named for the region from
which they come. It just so
happens that the most wellknown mole comes from the town of Puebla, and environs. This is called,
naturally enough, Mole Poblano. But it also just so happens that one of
the classic ingredients of that Mole Poblano…is Mexican chocolate! Aha!
Since Mole Poblano is the best-known mole on our side of the border…
many Americanos who assume that all mole is the same also assume that
that all-purpose mole contains ground chocolate!
And that’s where the hipsters come in…
Nacxitl Gaxiola, a Mexican-born chef who worked for the famous Ricardo
Muñoz in Mexico City, and who cooked at a couple of NYC Mexican
restaurants, recently decided to market in the U.S. a line of ultra-Mexican,
4
PINKLETON’S CURIOUS CARAMEL CORN, ORANGE
CARDAMOM (FINISHED WITH A HINT OF SCOTCH)
($10.50 for a .5 lb. bag)
There’s nice caramel corn from
this upscale Portland, Oregon
company, in numerous flavors—
not earth-shaking, but at least as
good as the competition.
However, this one flavor of theirs
grabbed me in a much bigger
way. For starters, it has a lovely
chew, light and airy, with no tooth
mash-up factor from stale
popcorn (frankly, to their credit,
all the Pinkleton caramel corns
are kinda like that.) But then the
flavor kicks in! The combo of
corn, cardamom, orange—and
butter! organic Oregon butter!—
is magical, with a strong orange component in mid-palate leading to a
boffo cardamom finish. Lightly sweet, but not too sweet. Probably as
delicious for kids as it is for nostalgia-addicted adults!
Best strategies for acquisition:
1. P
ressmeister Oils can be
found at various markets in
Michigan and online at
Pressmeister-oils.com/oils-shop.
2. Pork Clouds can be found in
stores around the country and
online at Baconsheir.com/
buy.html.
3. We found Xilli Mole Poblano at
Blue Apron Foods in Brooklyn,
NY, and you can find it online
at Xillinyc.com/products/
mole-poblano.
4. Pinkleton’s can be found in
specialty shops around the
country and online at
Pinkletons.com/shop.
THE ROSENGARTEN RANT
Enough
with the
Every issue David Rosengarten will rant about something that
gets his goat, sticks in his craw, forms a lump in his throat,
gets up his butt, or simply sits like a painful pebble underneath his sock on the bottom of his blue jogging sneaker.
NOTE: In his rants, Rosengarten pledges to limit the clichés
wherever possible, and present his sober thoughts on a
contemporary food or wine issue of great importance.
Herbs!
“An apple should taste like an apple, lamb like
lamb. Original flavors should be authentic, not
smothered or overwhelmed by competing
flavors.’’
—Joël Robuchon, quoted in The New York
Times, 1983
I ask your indulgence. And your mercy. I am
about to record some things that will provoke
widespread disagreement, and occasional outrage…because the theme is pretty much the
diametric opposite of a cooking principle most
Americans have been taught to embrace. And
here it is:
originated in the early 20th century by Lizzie
Black Kander, a German Jew from Milwaukee.
Lizzie didn’t tell my Mom to sprinkle her chicken
with dried thyme leaves, or rosemary leaves.
Paprika, maybe…but not dried green herbs.
My Mom’s Mom didn’t tell her to sprinkle her
chicken with herbs.
The culture didn’t tell her to sprinkle her chicken
with herbs.
I’ve had it with the overuse of herbs.
I myself was herb-dependent for years; it was
the height of cookin’ cool in the 1980s to
have your chicken look like the back forty
of an herb farm!
Sneer, scoff, strew scorn…but hear me out, because I’m convinced there’s at least a grain of
truth in this screed.
Let me present the central part of the argument
first, then I’ll proceed to the corollaries…
When I was growing up, the Dad food in my
house was always ethnic and adventurous. But
the Mom food on which we subsisted from
Monday to Thursday was much more of its time
and place. There would be, from my Mom,
lovely versions of:
• roast chicken
• pot roast
• beef stew
• lamb chops
• baked fillets of fish
…and so on.
Now, my Mom was very 50s/60s. She didn’t take
cooking classes, or check out classic cook
books…other than The Settlement Cook Book,
Suddenly, however, a shift was in the air during
her housewife career. In the 1960s, Julia was
cooking on TV with…oar-ee-GAN-o! James
Beard was herb-besotted. Good cooks like those
two who’d spent time in Europe endeavored to
show us how Europeans use herbs, to make our
national cooking more sophisticated. Lesser
cooks took to the concept because it was so
much easier to make a flavorful anything if you
sprinkled it with dried herbs (never mind that it
often tasted like the herb, not like the thing
under the herb). McCormick’s and Ehlers’ were
booming. Older cooks like my Mom were
curious about all these herbs. Newer cooks
absorbed the Herb Theory as if there were no
other; I know people today who started cooking
in the 1960s and 1970s, who, when roasting a
chicken in 2015, won’t even think about anything other than shoving branches of rosemary
into the chicken’s crevices, including the big one
at the center.
Somewhere along the line, though—
perhaps it was the glorious step-up in the
frequency of my travel to France, and
Spain-—I took away the opposite lesson.
I learned that the food has to taste like the
main ingredient…that herbs, unless used in
the most appropriate ways, can seem intrusive.
So
guess
what? She
did not
sprinkle her chicken with herbs…or her pot roast,
or her beef stew, or her lamb chops, or her
baked fish.
It was at my Dad’s apron strings that I learned
so much about cooking Italian food, Chinese
food, etc. But it was at my Mom’s apron strings
that I learned about intrinsic flavor. Those
chickens really tasted like…chicken!
My chicken roasting, back at home, took a left
turn. No more sprig party. Now I was looking at
other things to make my chicken great: nonintrusive smears (like butter, goose fat); degrees
of salt-and-pepper seasoning; roasting temperatures and times; positions of the bird in the pan;
etc. My holy grail was a golden, uniformly
crisp-skinned chicken…that tasted like chicken,
not rosemary.
You see my point: herbs, for American home
cooks, became a kind of crutch…that prevented
them from truly walking a chicken home to greatness. The herb thing became a distraction, a
laziness; the home cook was saying “well, I DID
my best…I put herbs on it, for goodness’ sake!”
The practice goes way beyond chicken, of
course; you see this kind of thinking everywhere
today in American home kitchens. And in some
restaurants too: many’s the time a dish is “sold”
on the menu by its herb-inclusion (the “brined
red partridge with an infusion of Hallertauer
hops” kind of thing).
Now, I’m not sayin’ that all herbs are out of
bounds. Far from it. Fresh herbs at the height of
the season, usually when used in traditional
ways, can lead to brilliant food, of course. Could
I ever argue against pesto, made from small-leaf
bush basil? Never! Could I ever rant against
fronds of fresh dill falling lightly on my homemade chicken soup? Never!
Dried herbs, with their mustier, duller tastes, are
more of a problem. But that doesn’t mean I’d
banish them. No way! I love dried oregano on
pizza, even sprinkled on at the last minute; I love
dried tarragon in a French cream sauce.
In either case, and in every case, it’s a question
of quantity; hit just the right, subtle amount, and
you’ve achieved something special.
worked for chefs over the last 200 years! And we
start counting on things other than a small bottle
or can from the supermarket to win the day!
Just to show you my love for herbs done right…
here are some major traditional categories in
which I adore, nay, require herbs:
GREEK FOOD
OMG. Dill rules. Just made some spanakopita
the other night in which the dill ROCKED the
spinach filling…such sympathetic flavors! Glad
they discovered this about a million years ago!
Throughout Greek cuisine, there is a very logical
use of Mediterranean herbs…that makes the
food taste Greek. No surprise…here’s a culture
that has been herbing-up its wine for a few
thousand years, in the form of pine (leading to
the idiosyncratic wine Retsina, which I think is
perfect with many Greek foods!)
And where would this be without cilantro? Yes, of
course…I love cilantro in many of these dishes!
In fact, cilantro almost gets a pass from me in
this kind of cooking. My only caution would be: if
you’re making a multi-course meal, don’t cilantro-ize everything!
THAI/VIETNAMESE FOOD
Wow. The conflation of several herbs at the same
time in Thai salads, Vietnamese soups, and
more, is an outstanding herb achievement in my
mind. Phở…ain’t phở…without a small garden
of mint leaves, holy basil leaves, and cilantro
leaves going into it! THAT’s the taste of the dish!
ITALIAN FOOD
Duh! Neighboring Italy also loves its herbs, of
course. Again, though, one must look to
tradition. I do not want some herb-crazed chef
creating for me a lobster
risotto with
rosemary!
LASTLY, THE FOODS THAT
REQUIRE HERBAL CAUTION.
But I’m going to insist, once again, that you let
yourself be guided by tradition. I know, I know…
I would not go herb-happy,
some chef somewhere today (and I mean
TODAY) will put hoja santa on an Australian
however, around traditional
mudbug for the very first time, and the world
Spanish cooking; it is not traditional in
will change. Cool. New traditions should
the cuisine, and I think it’s not time to
be born all the time. But let’s face it: it
takes a thousand experiments before a
change that now. French food also requires
new tradition starts to form. The rest
some herb caution; yes, the South uses more
of those experiments…say, 999 of
them…are not going anywhere.
herbs, but please don’t herb up the brilliant cenAm I tamping down your freedom? Sorry! Don’t mean to! Herb
it up all you like! But I really think
home cooking improves as we all
learn more about what has
MEXICAN/
CARIBBEAN FOOD
tral and Northern cuisine. Do you want marjoram in
your onion soup? Oregano on your choucroute???
good old American classics…we
should resist the herby-inventy thing.
Boston baked beans? Southern fried
chicken? Steamed lobster? California patty
melt? Meat loaf? Try ‘em all herb-free,
giving your attention instead to COOKING
them just right…and see if your love for
the intrinsic flavors surpasseth not your
love for McCormick’s!
And, I would humbly argue, that when we cook our
FORK ON THE ROAD
THE DROP-DEAD MARVELS
OF EASTERN SICILY...
with Some Marvelous Prices, to Boot!
I was extremely fortunate in the last year…fortunate enough to have
taken two separate trips to eastern Sicily, fall and summer both, where I
was hot on the trail of the best Sicilian wine for import. Most Americans,
if they do Sicily at all, do a once-over of the capital, Palermo, in the
northwest, and maybe a drive to the Valley of the Temples, in Agrigento,
in the south center. These places are cool…but those who don’t go
beyond are missing so much! My favorite parts of Sicily, I decided this
year, are in the east…and, with the exception of the ultra-posh east-coast
town of Taormina (which I happen to like, despite its posh!), the value for
dollars is high in eastern Sicily. Particularly if you roam off the beaten
track.
A word to the wise…it is now March…time to start planning your 2015
summer travel!
HERE ARE SIX DESTINATIONS IN
EASTERN SICILY YOU CANNOT MISS
CATANIA:
A GREAT STARTING POINT
If you’re arriving on the island, and
you’re committed to eastern Sicily,
(as my daughter and I were this
summer) the airport to use is
Catania…Sicily’s second largest
airport (with many flights from
Rome), appropriate for Sicily’s
second largest city. Stay a night in
Catania (have I got a hotel for you!),
get yourself oriented…then hit the
road the next morning.
Is it a beautiful city? Not especially.
Italians often refer to it as “the
European Silicon Valley,” which
With my daughter in Sicily this summer
ain’t what I’m looking for. Therefore,
I stick to the old parts…which draw criticism nonetheless, because they
have a certain grittiness to them.
Hey…if it’s Sicilian grit…I’m all for it! I say: dive right into the grit…at the
Mercato della Pescheria, or fish market, held every morning except
Sunday, down by the docks. It’s over early, so this would be the perfect
thing to do on the morning you leave, after a good night’s sleep.
It is a large urban fish market, and not just a section of a more generalist
market devoted to other things. Do I have to mention that the emphasis
is wildly local? And that all around the market you can get great local food
made with great local fish?
And where have you slept, the night before? I’ve tried several Catania
hotels, and remain convinced that the Una Hotel Palace is the best one.
Good prices, too…as low as 115 Euros a night!
A new Italian chain of fine hotels was founded in 2000; among their 31
establishments today (only in Italy) are places for tourists and business
travelers (like the Una in Catania). There are also resorts and convenient
lodgings located along
main roads in Italy.
Standards are high; look
for this name throughout
the boot. They always
work with distinguished
Italian architects and
designers, and you can
clearly feel that in
Catania.
Una’s building dates
back to 1900. Set in the
artistic and commercial
center of Catania, lively
street scenes at night are
steps away…such as the
marvelous chiosco openair stands, or kiosks, that
offer fresh-squeezed fruit
juices late at night…
Swordfish is the star of the market
One of the things I loved in my beautiful room was the arrangement
regarding the small balcony. It lay just beyond the tall, billowing white
curtains…and you have to go down a few steps to get to it…an obvious
retention of a 1900 structural detail…that sends you back 100 years
every time you watch your step!
pistachios, but there’s an abundance of almonds and hazelnuts, too).
This board cannot be missed, before the other thing that cannot be
missed…pizza!
And where shall you dine, that night in Catania?
Now, I’m a pizza snob. Oh, I’ll eat most any pizza…but when you get
serious about ‘za, there is nothing in the world like authentic Naples
pizza. What distinguishes it? Three things, principally:
I have your answer, off-beat though it may be.
On the Via Santa Filomena, a crazy restaurant-mad alley not too far from
the hotel, is the wildly popular Fud. Popular with locals, from what I could
tell—I don’t think the tourists have found it yet!
Yes…believe it or not…real Naples pizza in Sicily. Not easy to find
anywhere in Italy outside of Naples!
1. A crackling perimeter of crust called the cornizione, which is like a
soft, airy pillow inside
2. A wet, wet center (the uneducated have criticized this molten center;
one of our least discriminating American food writers came back
from Naples hating the pizza, referring to the wet center as a
“swamp.” Me, I want to drown in this “swamp!” This Neapolitan
pizza “juice” is just about the most flavorful liquid in the world, with
its intense combo of olive oil, herbs and ripe tomatoes).
3. Above all, Naples pizza breathes, it lives. Anchored by a charred
bottom that the wood fire creates—and after only two minutes in a
crazy hot oven—the pie has give, lightness, lambency. It is a million
miles from the “thin” pizza Americans think they want—which is
technically thin, but loaded down with way too much cheese and too
many toppings.
Fud on a busy night
At this bubbling-over hipster spot, much of the language of the menu
seems like a playful imagining of English names with phonetic spellings
that sound like Italian-accented American. It is working. On a Sunday
night at 9:30, the wait in line was 30 minutes to get in…
Once in, you find a kind of grocery store, its walls lined with Sicilian
products.
It’s like a “museum” of all things Siciliano. In addition to the wonderful
condiments in jars, and olive oils, there is fabulous Sicilian cheese, not to
mention the best collection of Sicilian salumi that I’ve ever seen.
Three brilliant dried salsicce—all different textures and flavors—but my
fave, by far, is the local mortadella. NOT made in Bologna, yes! But even
more exciting—made from donkey, a Sicilian specialty!!! It has a much
tighter, closer-grained texture than any mortadella ever, with a wonderful
garlicky flavor, almost like old-fashioned Jewish bologna. I would have
asked for a lot more…but I didn’t want to make an ass of myself!
The salumi board also carries intense local jellies (the red chile jelly is
outstanding), and a scattering of Sicilian nuts (the island is famous for
True Neapolitan pizza in Catania
And what the heck is this thing doing in Catania? Obsession, that’s all.
Andrea, the wise, long-haired owner of Fud, is obsessed with Naples-style
pizza. He says that when he opened Fud, three years ago, he hired “the
best” pizzaiolo in Naples to teach his Catania chef how to make pizza in
Fud’s wood oven. And the chef keeps experimenting with the god-like
details of Naples pizza. “Currently,” Andrea said, “we are allowing the
dough to rise for 12 hours…but we’re experimenting with 24.”
My advice: when pizza’s this good, order the Margherita—the purest of all
Naples pizzas, adorned only with cheese, tomato and basil. Why eat
Naples pizza in Sicily? Because…unless you’re headed to Naples, this is
as close as you’re gonna get!
Etna as seen from a nearby winery, one day before an eruption
THE MOUNT ETNA AREA:
UNDER THE VOLCANO
I think it’d be madness to go to Sicily and not visit Mt. Etna! You start to hit its slopes only 30 minutes north of Catania…and then you’re in a wild up-country
fantasy with wonderful wine (the reds from Nero Mascalese are sensational), gorgeous groves of pistachio and olive trees, and the ever-present threat of
a volcanic eruption (the brave little towns that lie under the volcano are rarely in any real danger…but just having that note in the air creates thrills!).
As if all this were not enough…there are some lovely places to stay in the Etna area as you’re slurping Nero Mascalese! My favorite is in the sleepy, oddlynamed town of Linguaglossa. It is a spectacular small hotel called Shalai Resort, a former family mansion from the 19th century that was so revered by
locals it once housed important governmental functions.
The building was abandoned, finally, and fell into disrepair—until the current owners, the aristocratic Pennisi family, bought the building, renovated it, and
turned it into a luxury hotel with 13 rooms (opened in 2009). In Sicilian, “shalai” means joy, satisfaction…which is exactly what you’ll find in these airy,
ultra-comfortable rooms, each with a balcony; some rooms even have frescoed walls. The owners would like you to think of it as a base; when you stay
there, they can arrange your tours of Etna with jeeps, quads, mountain bikes, and, of course, donkeys.
Of course, you must be wondering how this town got its somewhat unusual name. No one is really sure, and theories abound. My favorite theories start
with the town’s original name, “Linguarossa,” which means “red tongue.” Some say that in old Sicilian dialect “rossa” meant “big.” Big tongue? Why? I
prefer to believe it meant “red tongue”…and referred to the streams of lava that came by every hundred years or so. And why did “Linguarossa” get
changed to “Linguaglossa?” Ya got me!
In Linguaglossa, you’re in shouting distance of one of my favorite Sicilian wineries, Benanti, well worth a visit for some tasting. I’ve become quite friendly
with young Salvino Benanti, the scion of the family, who runs the winery today. I asked him if he’d give a special “buongiorno” to Rosengarten Report
readers who stop by, and he eagerly agreed to do so. So if you’re heading to Mt. Etna anytime in 2015, please send us a note at: RosengartenReport@
DRosengarten.com.
Include your proposed time of visit to Benanti…and we will help make an appointment for you! Of course, you can always ask Salvino if there’s time for
you to take him to lunch; his favorite simple local restaurant is in Randazzo, not far from Linguaglossa. It’s called San Giorgio Il Drago, and it’s a rollicking
trattoria with a massive grill, a huge chimney, and succulent meats I can still taste today.
TAORMINA:
LOVE IT OR HATE IT
After your fiery adventures near the volcano, a 30-minute coast down
towards the sea (in a northeasterly direction) delivers you to the perfect
follow-up leg: glitzy, Liz-and-Dick Taormina. I love it. But…
When I was preparing for my first trip to Sicily, years ago, a travel writer
friend virtually spat on my idea of visiting Taormina. “You like other tourists?” she asked. “Why don’t you go to someplace Sicilian?” Well, I will
grant that Taormina, on the northern end of Sicily’s east coast, is a little
more international than most other Sicilian cities; Taormina is something
like the main town of Capri and parts of the fashionable French Riviera
rolled into one. But this is Sicily, dude—and the glossy overlay could
never completely cover up this authentic, history-laden, Greek-inspired,
medieval-feeling, gorgeously situated Sicilian gem.
Taormina sits high on a seaside cliff, looking down on postcard-perfect
views of the Ionian Sea and the Sicilian coast. But that’s just the “B” view.
Turn around, facing inland—and, from many vantage points in Taormina,
you will see the lofty peak of Mt. Etna looming just behind you, snowcovered until May, spouting a rising arc of white volcanic smoke even in
winter. My daughter and I sat in the main square of Taormina at sunset
this summer, drinking Aperol—and watching the crazy-red flames rising
off of the volcano, ever-more thrilling as the sun sank!
The setting is so perfect, a town had to be established here—as the
Greeks understood, when they started migrating to this region in the 8th
century B.C. By the 4th century B.C., what is Taormina today was already
taking shape.
The Greeks, in fact, have supplied one of the main reasons for anyone to
visit Taormina—having left behind the Teatro Greco, the most thrilling remains of an ancient Greek theatre I’ve ever seen (and I’ve seen many).
Yes, there are tourists...but when I went at opening time, 9 AM, I was
sitting in this breathtaking amphitheatre of antiquity completely by myself,
feeling pretty damned ageless. If you find the right seat, you can stare
straight through the orchestra at the monumental backdrop of Mount
Etna, which the Greeks conveniently arranged. The Romans, in the
2nd century A.D., tried to mess it up by building a scenae frons across
the stage, a rear wall with columns, effectively blocking out the natural
view. But time has had the final say, reducing the self-important
blockage to semi-ruins, restoring some of the natural harmony that the
Greeks desired.
It’s a perfect place to rest your bones after an early morning walk in
Taormina (on an espresso hunt of course). The morning is glorious; the
sun rises directly in front of you, out of the Ionian Sea, shining on Mt.
Etna, stirring the cries of birds, the hum of insects, and the aromas of
flowers into life. If you’re up really early—say, 7 AM—you get all of this, plus
a lovely tranquility that will vanish within an hour or two during tourist season.
Oh yeah. There is that downside.
Right through the heart of town runs the main street, the Corso Umberto,
as studded with Euro-trash glam shops as any street could be. And all day
in summer, after the tranquil dawn-and-yawn hours, the Corso is crammed
with tourists, who are hoping to pick up something or other that says
Louis Vuitton on it. Sigh. I do kinda like the bustle of it all, but at the height
of the crush you may have no idea that you’re in Sicily.
Etna as seen from a nearby winery, one day before an eruption. Photo Credit: Luca Volpi
Happily, for the overnighter, there are escapes at hand. Two very luxurious
hotels are just off of the Corso Umberto, each with an “enclave” kind of
environment that somehow makes you feel set apart from the Umberto
urgency. Unfortunately, particularly in high season…they are pricey as
hell (a thousand bucks a room, or so?) But if you’ve won the lottery, you
might want to consider these. I’ve experienced some nastiness at the Belmond Grand Hotel Timeo, gorgeous as it is, and right near the Greek
Theatre…so had I the means I would opt for the San Domenico Palace
Hotel (on a few occasions someone else has provided the means!). I recommend it fiercely—for its ecclesiastical-feeling grandeur (it began life as
a 14th-century Dominican monastery), its antique charm, its location in
Taormina’s oldest and most inviting neighborhood, and for the friendliness
of its staff, particularly at the concierge desk. Some travelers prefer the
rooms on the monastery side of the building, to the right of the glassed-in
cloister at the center of the hotel. But I would recommend choosing a
room on the more modern Grand Hotel side to the left; this wing doesn’t
really feel more modern, and its much larger rooms have sweeping
terraces on the sea.
OK…back to reality…
“MARVELOUS PRICE” ALERT…
At about a third of the price, the Villa Schuler is a smart choice in Taormina. It is right near the staircases to the Corso Umberto, like the big luxury
boys…but a double room with sea view here will cost you only 190 Euros!
The place was a private villa until 1905, when it was converted into a
hotel…and has been owned by the same family since. Exotic gardens,
sea-view terraces, the lush charms of Sicily everywhere. Rooms are not at
the grand luxury level, but carry the warmth of a Sicilian home.
Eating in Taormina? A bit of a dice toss…so many places along the Corso
Umberto, the kinds of places that have big placards outside with chefs in
hats making the OK sign with one hand. But I’ve been going to one place
for years…that recently changed hands, I was chagrined to learn. No
fears. My daughter and I checked out Osteria Rosso di Vino on our August
trip, just a short alley away from the Corso Umberto. The quality persists,
and the cooking is very Sicilian. The most memorable dish was spaghetti
with house-cured bottarga, made from the eggs of local red tuna. It
was intense, as tuna bottarga can be…but the salty smack of Sicily was
unmistakable.
The moon rises over the Duomo in Siracusa
THE JEWEL OF JEWELS:
SIRACUSA
If I had to pick one city to visit in all of Sicily, it would be this one...about 90 minutes south of Taormina. But keep in mind that the really special part of
Siracusa is a contiguous one-mile island called Ortigia, today connected to the main city by the Ponte Nuovo. Go there. Stay there. Eat there.
Ortigia goes way back—thousands of years back—having been the home (myth experts speculate) of Calypso, who prevented Ulysses from returning to
Ithaca for seven years. (I didn’t want to leave, either!). When you walk Ortigia’s streets today, especially at night, you feel as if you’re on a Hollywood
soundstage of a theatrical version of an ancient Mediterranean port—real but surreal at the same time. Unspeakably thrilling. But then there’s the rest of
history, beyond the ancient. The buildings of Ortigia are like an architectural museum of the last 500 years; do not miss the Baroque palaces along
the Via Maestranza, or the amazingly powerful Duomo, which includes some elements from the 5th century B.C., but was basically rebuilt in Baroque
splendor after the devastating earthquake of 1693. The floodlit, heart-stopping piazza in front of the Duomo is one of my favorite places in Italy to grab an
espresso, particularly at sunset.
As night descends, walk past the Duomo to other wonders. A few blocks away is the Piazza Archimede, with its heart-stopping fountain, numbering
dragons and horses in its cast of characters—supernally supernaturally lit at sunset!
Ortigia’s Duomo at sunset
The fountain at Piazza Archimede
And everywhere around you are rabbit warrens of small streets and alleys, lined with outdoor tables, laughing people, great-looking food,
and, of course, vino vino vino.
I’ve been captivated by Siracusa/Ortigia on every visit over the years…
but this visit in August 2014 was special…because I found the hotel in
which I always want to stay…and the restaurant at which I always want
to eat!
Not far from the Piazza Archimede in Ortigia is the restaurant Don
Camillo—see Rosengarten Report #1, which includes Don Camillo in
my recap of the ten greatest meals of 2014. It’s a very old-world kind of
place, multiple rooms under a high, 15th-century vaulted ceiling,
oozing charm but never turning stuffy. They do have a major international wine list, but the boys would be just as happy to serve you a glass
of local, dry sparkling Muscat. (“The boys” are dressed-up, highly
professional waiters—whose humanity breathes right through
the costumes).
Some of the things I loved here were: Arancini stuffed with black pork
and melted cheese, and spaghetti with sea urchin and shimp.
Spaghetti with sea urchin and shrimp...killer penetration of briny sauce into the pasta!
We finished up with cascades of sweet Sicilian delights, such as a
wonderful cooked fruit salad (marvelously perfumed, like roses) in a miniature jar; vibrant lemon gelato from local lemons, and excellent Bronte
pistachio gelato (from the Mount Etna pistachios)…dark brown gelato, not
green, deliciously roasted tasting.
Sleepy time? It’s a short walk back through the serpentine streets…
to the quay!
Hotel Des Ètrangers is an imposing five-story building just around the
corner from the great Duomo piazza. What a grand feel in here….
exactly like old Italian grandeur for 20th-century travelling Americans.
Arches, diamond-pattern black-and-white tiles on floors, lounges with
very large and soft white couches. Think The Amazing Mr. Ripley. Think
Daisy Miller. Very Italian but very tuned-into-Americans staff. Large
room on the water in high season for $250. Wow! Great value!
Didn’t eat, but 5th-floor roof terrace (also the dining room) is gorgeous,
views out over Ortigia to sea, selection of nibbles (almonds, sun-dried
tomatoes, cracked and marinated olives, pinzimonio, all truly outstanding, much better than they have to be!).
The roof terrace of Hotel Des Ètrangers
By the way…if you’re jonesin’ for a small meal anytime during your
stay…we ran into the best frittura mista of the trip just a two-minute
walk from the hotel. We tried a lot of other things too, at Luna Rossa…
but they were all kind of what you’d expect from a touristy outdoor café
along the quay. But the fried seafood! Shrimp with heads, tiny squid,
octopus, whole small fish…golden crackle of the gods!
Special Note: Italian Goodies
Last month, I had the pleasure of curating a box of Italian-made
products for a unique company called Try The World—who,
every two months, creates a new box featuring products of a
global gastronomic destination. I thought that their last box, on
which I worked, was really cool. To view their boxes, visit www.
trytheworld.com. Get 30% off first box in the subscription, or 30% off
their full order on the shop, with DROSENGARTEN at checkout.
Amazing frittura mista at Luna Rossa in Ortifia
The grandeur of small-town Noto
THE AMAZING NOTO
AND ENVIRONS
On to spectacular Noto, a short drive to the southwest of Siracusa.
It was gelato, pure gelato, that first led me to Noto, about 15 years ago. But
I’ve now been back numerous times…and not just for the ice cream! Noto
is special. In fact, with my discovery this summer of an extraordinary,
super-value, villa-type hotel just outside of the city…I hope to be going
back even more.
My friend Fred Plotkin, great Italophile food writer, had written 20 years
ago in his Italy for the Gourmet Traveler that a man in Noto named Corrado Costanzo makes the best gelato in Sicily (therefore Italy, therefore the
world). I took a two-hour detour on a busy trip, in about 1999, just to meet
Costanzo and taste his gelato.
After I negotiated the steep Noto hill, and got my car parked, I strode towards Costanzo’s gelateria with the excitement that an impending encounter with “the world’s best ANYTHING” engenders! I was walking on air
(about as much air as they pump into American ice cream!).
“Buongiorno,” I said to the man behind the counter. “I’d like to talk with
Costanzo, please.”
Stone face. “Eh?”
“Costanzo, piacere...” And I pulled out the folded-up xerox from Fred’s
book, with a picture of Costanzo, that I had in my shirt pocket. I handed it
over the counter.
The guy looked down. After a few seconds, he looked up at me. He said,
in a slightly scary way:
“He’s DEAD.”
Gulp. Dominus vobiscum…Dominus Costanzo…
But I had to get some gelato!
Without a whole lot of enthusiasm, Costanzo’s former employee pointed
me towards the Caffè Sicilia, just a few blocks away, on Noto’s main drag
of staggering architecture (edibles first, edifices later!).
And it was then that I made my first connection with Corrado Assenza,
best gelato-maker today, whose family started Caffè Sicilia generations
ago. Here’s a glimpse of him, shot by my dear friend Beatrice Ughi, owner
of Gustiamo, who imports some of Caffè Sicilia’s shelf-stable Sicilian
sweets (non-gelato, of course) into the U.S.:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIohmJOUxP0
I renewed my acquaintance with Corrado this summer, sat down at about
4 in the afternoon to a huge gelato sampler (fantastic), swooned over his
cannoli, and came away with the impression that maybe the very best
thing of all at Caffè Sicilia is Assenza’s mouth-puckering, deeply flavorful
lemon granita. Cosmically refreshing! In fact, give all the granite a try! Flavors for both gelati and granite vary with the seasons…because Corrado
likes to use local fruit! My favorite gelati on the day we visited this summer were the “Mexican” chocolate with cinnamon (Montezuma), the hazelnut,
the basil, the saffron, and the figs with marsala.
When you’re done, it is time to stroll up and down the same street, Corso Vittorio Emanuele, center of Noto architecture. The earthquake that wiped out
Siracusa in 1693 also wiped out Noto—but times must have been good, because builders in both cities got to rebuilding fairly quickly. The stand-out
thing about Noto is that it’s not a big city—but the replacement Baroque buildings were built on a grand scale! So you have the funny impression today,
while walking down the Corso Vittorio Emanuele…that the buildings are TOO big! It’s quite a sight:
Perhaps there’s a lovely hotel inside Noto,
but I haven’t found it yet. However, I am now
hooked on Villa Favorita, an absolutely
charming place just a few miles towards the
sea from the center of town. And the prices!
Adorable doubles are available for as little as
$150!
Villa Favorita is a conglomeration of three
buildings, linked over the years (since 1752)
by the production of olive oil (the factory was
a few steps from the owner’s villa).
Today, all three buildings are part of the hotel, and the descendants of the lovely family
that bought the property in 1932 are the extremely gracious innkeepers. Public spaces
are large and baronial.
Our room, with its gorgeous view of the sea,
was not outsized, but it was comfortable and
charmingly decorated in a traditional style.
Happily…this is not a place for modernism!
Best of all, in the summer…there is a very
large swimming pool, under the trees, a really perfect spot for sun, shade and swimming…
and you can gaze upon the Baroque buildings of Noto off in the distance.
On the grounds at Villa Favorita
At the end of the day…or at the beginning of
it!…Villa Favorita is just a feel-good place.
And if you don’t feel like high-tailing it into
Noto for your ninth bowl of gelato, the Villa
Favorita ristorante—with an open-air patio in
nice weather—serves very nice Sicilian food,
with mostly local sources.
Lastly, in the Noto area, if you’re up for a bit
of a road trip—we were, on a bodacious,
late-summer Saturday night—you should
drive about half an hour to the crazy, honkytonk, seaside town of Marzamemi. True,
there was some kind of festival on the night
we went…but I strongly suspect this colorful
place always feels like a slightly surreal carnival. Fellini, anyone? Unfortunately, we did
not find gastronomic satisfaction in Marzamemi…but if you stick with the cherry tomatoes grown a few miles away in Pachino, or
simple grilled fish just out of the ocean, you’ll
do fine.
A residential hallway lounge at Villa Favorita
RAGUSA IBLA:
HELL TO NAVIGATE, BUT HEAVEN TO VISIT
Should you ever feel like leaving this marvelous coast—and I suggest you
do, given the town that lies ahead—you’ll make your deepest penetration
into inland southeast Sicily when you visit the extraordinary hill town of
Ragusa Ibla.
There are actually two Ragusas, side by side: the main modern town
(known as Ragusa, and completely skippable), and the crazy monument
up on the hill, called Ragusa Ibla, that has been designated a Unesco
World Heritage site. I discovered it just a year ago, and I’ve already been
back to it. Noto is pedestrian by comparison—though your best shot at
Ragusa Ibla is as a pedestrian. This summer, my daughter and I, in rented
car, looking for our hotel, got wedged into one of the narrow, winding, ancient streets, and needed to get extricated! My advice: park at the bottom
of the hill and get ready to walk!
It is a breathtaking maze. The story begins in 1693, of course…why should
the Ragusans have escaped the earthquake? So there are a ton of re-built
18th-century Baroque buildings here as well. But the ancient is much more
in play here than it is in Siracusa or Noto; there’s mystery lurking in every
curve of the old up-and-down alleyways and passages.
A great way to immerse yourself in this is to stay at one of my favorite hotels
in Italy, Locanda Don Serafino, set in a cool stone wall that dates back to the
9th century.
The LaRosa family has done a staggering job in carving a hotel out of this
rock, in the center of Ragusa Ibla, finished in 2004…
There are beautiful, high, white arches inside, stone everywhere, a tremendously appealing dining room; on a warm night, we had dinner on a swooninducing terrace under the stars. The wait staff was wonderful, and the
sommelier played fabulous wine games with us (sticking to Sicilian wines,
but oh my does he have more).
The problem? Pretty food, not thrillingly Sicilian…in some cases, not even
Italian (except for the excellent pasta, of course!). If you were blindfolded
and taken to Don Serafino…you
might not know where you are…
other than at a high-end international restaurant. An expensive high-end international restaurant (easily $300 for two).
I say, by all means come to Ragusa Ibla…and by all means
stay at the splendid Don Serafino…but when it comes to mealtime…Ragusa Ibla overflows
with good casalinga ristoranti,
where red-sauce pasta and eggplant and sausages, sold for a
song, make for yummy local
eating.
Lastly, here’s another good way
to save your Euros in Ragusa
Ibla. Maybe an incredible way.
The opening array of crudo at Don Serafino...light,
At one end of the old town, near elegant, decently playful, but not particularly flavorone of the loveliest, quietest gar- ful (except for the razor clam with sea urchin!)
den/parks in the city, is a new renovation of a 16th-century Capucin monastery…that is now offering clean and lovely hotel rooms at the staggering
price of about 50 Euros a night!!! I’m not giving it more space here because
I haven’t stayed there yet (though I did take a tour)…but this could be the
greatest hotel deal in Italy.
In fact, it’s not just the hotel. The centerpiece of this project…funded by the
Catholic Church!…is a cooking school called Nosco, dedicated to preserving the local foods and local traditions of southeast Sicily. At the restaurant
Cenobio (subtitled cibo per l’anima, or “food for the soul”), the students
and teachers turn out an intriguing menu at, once again,
unheard-of prices. Here’s the Profumo di Terra menu…at 12 Euros for the
whole lot:
The “bath-cave” at Don Serafino
This summer, I was on a gastronomic mission in Ragusa Ibla: I wanted to
dine at Sicily’s highest-rated Michelin restaurant…owned by the same people who also own this marvelous hotel, and also called Locanda Don Serafino (though it’s not in the same part of Ragusa Ibla as the hotel). The restaurant is one of only 40 restaurants in all of Italy that has earned two
Michelin stars.
It is good. It is very good. But the meal I had with my daughter Andy would
not be reason alone to go to Ragusa Ibla.
“Two tastes of Sicilian cheeses and jam, a ‘tomasino,’ or a traditional savoury stuffed roll, macco of Cosaruciaru beans from Scicli, dried tomatoes
or other Sicilian preserves in oil, salami from Chiaramonte Gulfi, salad with
datterino tomatoes from Scicli, vegetables and Modicana breed beef,
homemade bread based on ancient Sicilian wheat flour (Russello, Timelia,
etc.), fruit and jelly from Ragusa, a glass of Sicilian wine.”
12 Euros! Bless the church!
I came upon this amazing place in August, just as Andy I were planning to
hit the road. I got to see the restaurant for a moment: medieval monasterial
halls, clean and quiet and dignified. I got to see a few rooms: small, spare,
monastic—but not using “monastic” as an excuse to underspend on decor.
They truly want you to be spiritual here. And I swear to God it doesn’t seem
as if it would be hard.
ONE EXTRA NOTE FROM THE AREA
There are those who believe that the nearby city of Modica is the greatest
city in Italy for chocolate. I haven’t been there, but at the two-star
restaurant in Ragusa Ibla, they offered me some samples from what they
consider to be the best chocolate shop in Modica (it is officially the oldest
shop, dating back to 1880): Antica Dolceria Bonajuto (Bonajuto.it). I will
go to Modica soon, I hope, and get a better perspective on Modican
chocolate. To me, just now, it’s merely “interesting”…more
like Mexican chocolate, with a little spice and crunch, than
like French or Belgian chocolate.
any Sicily!). She said she’d be happy to do so. You’d have to work out a deal
with her, but she’s a warm, generous person, who will likely give you a good
price! If you want to talk things over with her, please send me an email at:
[email protected].
Make sure to indicate when you’d like to go to Sicily, how long you’d like to
stay, and what your budget might be for a tour guide.
I will contact her for you and get the ball rolling…
ONE EXTRA OBSERVATION ON SICILY
IN GENERAL
Funny how that “Mexican” chocolate impression came up.
On my October 2013 trip, I was in Sicily with a perceptive
friend who had never been there before. She was so eager
to nail down, descriptively, “the Sicilian difference.” After a
few days, she said: “It’s almost like going to Mexico!” She
was, in her mind, comparing the rest of southern Italy to,
say, southern California…then recalling how it always felt to
step over the border at Tijuana, and arrive in a more
exotic, more dangerous, more heart-stopping place. The
comparison has its virtues…
WHAT EMILIA CAN DO!
My best friend in Italy is a wonderful woman, Emilia
Disclafani, who works in the travel and Sicily promotion
business. I have asked her if she might consider leading
Rosengarten Report readers on tours of eastern Sicily (or
See you soon, Sicily!
Una Palace Hotel
Via Etnea 218
95131 Catania
+39 095 2505111
UnaHotels.it
[email protected]
San Domenico Palace Hotel
Piazza San Domenico 5
98039 Taormina
+39 0942 613111
San-Domenica-Palace.com
[email protected]
Des Ètrangers Hotel & Spa
Passeggio Adorno 10-12
96100 Siracusa
+39 0931 319100
DesEtrangers.com
[email protected]
FUD Bottega Sicula Catania
Via Santa Filomena 35
95129 Catania
+39 095 7153518
Fud.it
[email protected]
Villa Schuler
Via Roma, Piazzetta Bastione
98039 Taormina
+39 0942 23481
HotelVillaSchuler.com
[email protected]
Caffè Sicilia
Corso Vittorio Emanuele 125
96017 Noto
+39 0931 835013
Shalai Resort
Via Guglielmo Marconi 25
95015 Linguaglossa
+39 095 643128
Shalai.it
[email protected]
Osteria Rosso di Vino
Via Spuches 8
98039 Taormina
+39 628 653 0942, +39 327
6917445, +39 328 644 2528
OsteriaRossoDivino.com
[email protected]
San Giorgio Il Drago
Piazza San Giorgio 28
95036 Randazzo
+39 095 923972
Don Camillo
Via delle Maestranze 96
96100 Siracusa
+39 0931 67133
RistoranteDonCamilloSiracusa.it
[email protected]
Profumo di Terra
(Hotel Antico Convento dei
Cappuccini)
Via Giardini 1
97100 Ragusa
Antica Dolceria Bonajuto
Corso Umberto I 159
97015 Modica
+39 0932 941225
Bonajuto.it
[email protected]
Villa Favorita
Strada Provinciale 34
Contrada Falconara
96017 Noto
+39 0931 820219
VillaFavoritaNoto.it
[email protected]
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WINE FOR FOOD
bordeaux finds
its footing:
under
20
$
(give or take!)
My, how the mighty have fallen!
When I was a young buck, determined to learn
everything there was to learn about wine, there
was one thing you HAD to learn right away:
Bordeaux.
It all started with Bordeaux. Your first wine text
went right to it, laying out the famous 1855
classification that established the four Premier
Crus, the Deuxième Crus, and so on. Probably
the first wine names you learned were Château
Lafite-Rothschild, Château Latour, Château
Margaux, and Château Haut-Brion.
The beauty part was…it wasn’t just a spectator
sport. You could actually afford these wines, no
matter who you were…and taste them!…and talk
about them…and learn from them!
I’ll never forget the French dinner party I cooked
in 1971, and the 1955 Château Cos d’Estournel
I purchased for the main course. Price tag?
Twelve bucks. Twelve years later, I was buying
futures of first-growth 1982 Bordeaux…at the
never-before-heard of price of $28 a bottle. We
thought that was high. Incroyable.
And then…the world really changed. First of all,
wine-drinkers discovered that there was Cabernet
Sauvignon from other places that was sometimes
more to their liking than Bordeaux. THEN…they
discovered that maybe Cabernet from anywhere
was not their favorite grape. Burgundy and Pinot
Noir was just the start! Soon, the specialties of
Italy, Spain, Germany, Australia, South Africa,
etc. swam into view.
At about the same time, the price of famous
Bordeaux became obscene. Maybe young bucks
in New York didn’t want it exclusively any longer,
but even younger bucks in Japan, then China,
went Bordeaux-mad. The châteaux noticed.
They noticed they could charge practically
anything for their famous wines…and did. A
hundred bucks a bottle for young wine…then
two hundred…then three hundred…then five
hundred…and more. For the average consumer,
or even the above-average consumer…Bordeaux
has priced itself out! 2013, the current vintage of
Château Pétrus—admittedly, one of the priciest
Bordeaux—is hovering at about $1200. A bottle!
And the Bordelaise are alarmed. Terrified is more
like it. They’re looking at a wine world in which
wine drinkers, far from thinking that Bordeaux is
a requirement…are now thinking (incorrectly)
that all Bordeaux is overpriced! And therefore
many drinkers ignore it!
Cognizant of this perception problem, the
thousands of Bordeaux producers who don’t
make grand wines are doing something different
today, Oh, they’re not changing the kind of wine
they make; they’ve long made excellent little
bottles at a great price. The difference is: they’re
YAKKING about it! They’re tired of hearing only
Margaux this and Rothschild that…they want to
get Bordeaux back in the everyday conversation!
I attended a luncheon in New York recently,
designed to do exactly that. And I followed it up
by purchasing 30 bottles or so of Bordeaux under
$30 for my own tasting. My reaction to both
activities was the same…
Wow! There are delicious Bordeaux out there for
as little as $15 a bottle!
My tastings explored two categories: dry white
Bordeaux, and dry red Bordeaux. Here are some
of my general feelings about those categories…
followed by my specific notes for the best wines
in the tastings…
Dry White
Bordeaux
Just by chance…I’d been looking for a way to tell
you that dry white
Bordeaux is one of
the most underrated
wines in the world!
I’ve had that
opinion for a long
time, concerning
some of the
GREAT dry white
Bordeaux, the
ones that are
pricey. What’s
new for me is
finding that less
pricey white
Bordeaux are
also underrated!
After tasting a few
dozen white Bordeaux
recently, I’d say that you
should be looking for these
wines in three quite distinct
categories:
1. Y
es, the big boys, like Haut-Brion
Blanc…but don’t expect to find
any for less than $200 a bottle!
Whenever I do get to one, I always
say to myself: “Wow! These are at
least as interesting as high-priced
white Burgundy!” In Bordeaux,
you get a kind of waxy, lanolin,
coconut quality that is uniquely
Bordeaux (with some
relationship to great traditional
white Rioja). The big
Bordeaux wines (like the
Spanish
DAVID’S WINE RATING SYSTEM
We have discovered that wines rated highly in
most wine rating systems are not consistently
compatible with food. We have also observed
that poorly rated wines, despite their deficiencies, can come alive when served with food. An
enormous, tannic red for example, might merit
95 out of 100, but it will be difficult to find a food
that goes well with this wine. A light, acidic white
might merit only 75 out of 100, but the wine will
go well with, and even be improved by, many different dishes. We believe that a combined wine
& food rating is the only sensible solution to this
rating dilemma.
Wines are rated on a 100-point scale:
95-100 extraordinary
90-94 exceptional
85-89 excellent
80-84 very good
75-79 good
70-74 fair
60-69 flawed or boring
50-59 seriously flawed
The best wines (those rated 90 or above) do not
necessarily go best with food. So, each wine also
receives a food rating, based on an A-B-C-D-F
scale, to show how flexible the wine is with food:
A: An exceptionally flexible wine, that will
go well with most dishes.
B: A flexible wine, that will go well with many
dishes.
C: An even bet for food; exercise some caution.
D: A difficult wine for food.
F: An exceptionally difficult wine for food.
We then combine the wine rating and the
food rating.
For example:
A rich red wine that receives 95D: A wine of
exceptional interest, but a difficult wine for food.
You can count on it to go poorly with many of
the dishes that you would expect to marry well
with rich reds (e.g. roasts, steaks, game in dark
sauces, spicy stews, etc.).
A light white wine that receives a 75A: An average wine, but an exceptionally flexible wine that
you can count on to go well with most dishes
that you would expect to marry well with light
white wines (e.g. raw shellfish, simple fish
preparations, salads, etc.).
Every wine has its ideal food mate somewhere.
A wine rated D or even F will go beautifully with
something—just don’t expect it to go beautifully
with many things.
The food rating is a measure of widespread
adaptability for foods that you might reasonably
expect to go with this kind of wine.
w
ines) also hold themselves together for
many years, getting more and more
interesting over at least a decade or two.
2. Then there’s an in-between category. Smart
buying really pays off here…because with
smart buying, you can find reasonably-priced
white Bordeaux that have some of the
complexity and richness of their more
expensive cousins.
3. The largest category: white Bordeaux that cost
under $20 —sometimes under $10! It’s hard to
generalize about them, because there are so
many different styles at this price level.
However, you may expect these value whites
to be simple, clean, non-intrusive with food.
Sometimes, there are flavor surprises. More
importantly, sometimes the varietal character
of Sauvignon Blanc (along with its regional
sidekick, Sémillon) is unmistakable in these
wines. Happily for some, that “green”
Sauvignon Blanc character (based on
pyrazine) is usually a little more subtle than it
is in, say, Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc, or
even in old-fashioned Sancerre.
The following whites are in descending order
of joy.
92B
2012 Château Smith Haut
Lafitte ‘Les Hauts de Smith’,
Pessac-Leognan ($30)
Wow! What a great find! This is one of
those Category 2 whites (see above),
at a good price, that suggests
Category 1. Straw, with a touch of
bronze. Almost on the edge of white
Rioja-like lanolin. Round, rich,
amazing mineral on palate. Great
acid. Medium-long finish. Elegant,
Much easier to match with food than
many white Burgundies of this price.
87C
For decades, I have looked
for this label on restaurants’ wine lists;
it has good distribution, and often
shows up. People are always surprised
by how delicious it is. Glints green in
the glass. Quietly, there’s a touch of
Rioja-like oxidation on the nose
(quite appealing to me!). Flavors
are impressive, but palate is slightly
off-dry; this vintage is a bit coarser
than other Clos Floridenes I’ve
known. Great acid comes to the
rescue with food.
86B
2013 Château GravilleLacoste, Graves Blanc ($17.99)
An even crazier value! Imported by the great
Berkeley, CA importer, Kermit Lynch. Very light
color. Super-juicy melon-lime blossom nose, with
some Rioja undertones. Very fleshed-out, but still
acid and zippy. Lovely combo of rich
and racy.
2013 Château Lamothe
de Haux, Blanc,
Bordeaux ($11.99)
Look how silly prices can get…silly good! Not a
Rioja ringer, nor a Pyrazine baby. Just well-made,
excellent, drinkable white. Lime-leaf nose. Dry,
crisp, elegant, no ruffles anywhere on palate. Not
quite an oyster wine, but excellent for most lightmedium white wine food. Try with charcuterie!
86B
2012 Château de Sours,
La Fleur d’Amelie Blanc,
Bordeaux ($15)
Very light-colored in the glass, with
green touches. Gorgeous little nose:
combo of Rioja suggestions, pain
grillé, stone. Mouth-watering acidity.
Not as filled-in as some of the others,
but a good straight-ahead dry white
for food.
86B
87B
2012 Denis Dubourdieu Clos
Floridene Blanc, Graves ($30)
2013 Famille Doublet,
Château Vignol Blanc,
Entre-Deux-Mers ($13)
Ah…here’s the one for Sauvignon Blanc lovers.
Very light color. Nice grassy nose with sprightly
grapefruit character. Great acid, very lively,
quite dry.
Note: Food ratings may change with time. A
tough, young Bordeaux may be a D today and a
B in five years. A simple white may lose its bright
fruit with time and go from a B to D. We’ll keep
you posted.
84B
2012 Château Argadens Blanc,
Bordeaux Superieur,
Bordeaux ($11)
90B
Love the price! Light straw in the glass. Lovely
combination of two white Bordeaux possibilities:
grapefruit and coconut! Crisp and light, but fills
out in the mouth, moving towards lingering
acidity, then…a sweaty Sauvignon Blanc
character in the finish. Quite a tour!
Quite dark but showing some
lightening at the rim. Nice
leafy nose, touches of
incense. Rich, but not Over
The
Top.
Harmonious
finish. Could serve as a decent
roast chicken wine tonight, or five
years cellaring will heighten quality.
Also about 65% Merlot.
84B 2013 Les Hauts de Lagarde,
Blanc, Bordeaux ($12.99)
Organic wine, made from 60% Sauvignon Blanc,
40% Semillon. Slight yellow-bronze. A little
bland, mainstream white Bordeaux. Lively,
though, with a lemon-candy character. Fairly
dry. Mouthfilling.
83C
2012 Château RespideMedeville, Blanc, Graves ($22)
Made from 50% Semillon, 48% Sauvignon
Blanc, 2% Muscadelle. Gorgeous zesty green
nose, lime rind, touch of earth. A little too fat on
palate, but pretty good acid picks it up. Flinty
flavor. Long finish.
Dry Red
Bordeaux
Well, we all know what heights red Bordeaux can
hit…and at what a price! I LOVE great red
Bordeaux that’s about 25-30 years old or more,
resolved and fleshy, elegant, suave, possessed of
a hundred fleeting notes that often remind one of
truffle, forest floor, secret body parts, etc. Well,
here’s the bad news: you won’t find aged
Bordeaux like that for under $30! But what you
can find in that range are these two types:
1. Pricey wine ringers, that purport to do with
age what First and Second growths do: grow
mellow and sumptuous with time in the
cellar. At these prices, they’ll never be as
sumptuous…but these are good values,
and good risks, for short-term aging (5-10
years).
2. More direct young Bordeaux that is delicious
right now—which is to say, not too loaded
down with extract and tannin. I always think of
the classic English Bordeaux for lamb chops,
what they might call a good “claret.” A little
angular, a little fruity, just perfect straightahead red wine for meat on a cold night!
2010 Vignobles Paul
Barre Château La
Grave, Fronsac ($40)
89A
The following reds are in descending order
of joy. (NOTE: I went above $30 in the top three
reds, because they were so good…and perhaps
you can find them for less!)
92B
2010 Clos Puy Arnaud,
Côtes de Bordeaux
Castillon ($40)
This is a major Bordeaux…the kind you
put away for at least 10 years. And it
costs less than many other red Bordeaux
of this quality. Very dark purple.
Exciting nose: green (including wild
leaves), earthy, toasty (showing some
expensive barrel treatment). Huge
fruity but complex wine. Great acid,
great balance. A lovely flood of purple
decadence next to a grilled lamb
chop right now…but so much more
awaits in the future. Made with 65%
Merlot.
91B
2010 Château Rollan de By,
Medoc ($40)
I want this one to go with dinner tonight! A bit
lighter in color than the others to which I gave
90+ scores. Amazing tar and chocolate notes on
the nose, with an almost exotic Burgundy-like
quality. A little astringent in finish, but some
lamb chops will fix that right up! Intriguingly, this
one is also a high-Merlot content, like all my
faves in this tasting; here, it’s 70% Merlot, 10%
Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Cabernet Franc, and
10% Petit Verdot.
2009 Château Tayac,
Cuvée Labory,
Margaux ($28.99)
Kind of an in-betweener, style-wise:
could be held for improvement, or
could be enjoyed today if you like rich
young reds. Darkening purple, with a vague hint
of brown. Love the nose: starting to show some
funky sour stomach, a little toasty barrel, roast
coffee. Some blueberries linger. Delicious acidity,
very bright in the mouth, which carries through
from beginning to end. In fact, ends more with
acidity than tannin…great food wine!
87C
2009 Château d’Angludet,
La Réserve d’Angludet,
Margaux ($30)
Here’s a wine principally from Cabernet
Sauvignon—and one that should be cellared. A
dark purple in the glass, but a little opaque, not
luminous. Pretty and restrained red-fruit nose.
Quite wound-up right now, but beautifully
balanced with good acid. Give it 5-10 years.
87C
2009 Château Beauséjour
Hostens, Haut-Medoc ($24)
Only medium-dark garnet-purple, a little light at
edge. Very lively fruit still—raspberryish, with notes of clove and spice. Tiny
touch of skunk and chocolate. Some
structure, but not a heavy wine. Nose
repeats on palate. Very savory and
gastro-nomic. A little rough in finish,
so serve now with tannin-fighters,
like charred meat.
86B
2010 Château La
Tour Cordouan,
Medoc ($15.75)
I really like this wine…and I
really like the price! Bright, light,
ruby-garnet. Mainstream red
fruit nose, berry-ish. Touch of
oak. Sweet, appealing entry...
but turns acid as you go in an
attractive way. Tannins are
appealing for food. Hint of green
in finish.
86B
2011 Château
Chantelys, Cru
Bourgeois, Medoc ($15.99)
Another great drinker at a good price! Light-ish,
pretty, healthy purple. Lovely healthy fruit nose.
Very sophisticated Bordeaux red fruit behind
this. Nice balance. Good acid, Just a touch of
astringency in finish. Definitely a “claret” for
enjoyment right now.
85B
2010 Château La Gravette
Lacombe, Medoc ($16.99)
More “claret” for right now!…with a range of
intriguing “complexing” elements. Dark-ish garnet.
Touches of oak, spice and chocolate. Skunk and
pistachio nut, too. Very lively palate, long nuttyskunky finish. Medium-weight. Some tannin, but
great acid lightens it. Lovely classic claret.
85B
2011 Vignobles Paul Barre,
Château La Grave,
Fronsac ($32)
Medium lightening purple. Basic red
fruit in nose, but hints of acetone, if
you can handle that. Kind of suave
on palate, with no acetone. Wellbalanced, zesty, nice throughout:
beginning, middle, end. Not an
exciting wine, but a well-made
one, comforting in its way. Does it
deserve this price tag? I’m not
rushing to pay it.
85C
2011 Château Fleur
La Mothe, Medoc
($17.49)
Do you like the funk of
brettanomyces? This is not for the
fruit juice people! I happen to love
it—so this is an ideal example for
me (I marked it lower in score
because not everyone shares my
love of brett.) Medium-dark
purple. Huge bretty nose: roasted
pistachio nut, horse sweat, dark
chocolate, Just lacks a touch of
acid, but the flavors carry it for
me. A touch bitter. Good for a
brett party TONIGHT.
84C
2010 Château Croix-Mouton,
Bordeaux Supérieur,
Bordeaux ($25.99)
A nice compromise for those who like rich body
in their red wine—but also appreciate a clean
zippiness. Very bright purple garnet, with a citric
nose (orange rind?), touch of spice, appealing.
Very refreshing palate, lovely fruit and acid. Some
body and strength near finish, but it doesn’t get
overbearing.
84D
2009 Château Caronne Ste.
Gemme, Haut-Medoc
($28.99)
Rough on food, due to astringency. Lightening
garnet, with a quite light edge. Very mainstream
claret nose, hints of Cabernet varietal. This is
old-fashioned-tasting Bordeaux, with an
unabashed greenness…which is exactly what I
like about it!
83C
2010 Château du Moulin
Rouge, Castillon Côtes de
Bordeaux, Haut-Medoc ($15)
Midlife garnet. Nice berry fruit with a little
attractive jam. A nice everyday red, zippy, a little
structure. Distant hints of horse sweat in the
finish. Lots of mild, unassertive everything in this
wine. Good middle-of-the-road choice.
83D
2010 Château Soleil Château
Croix du Rival, Le Rival,
Lussac Saint-Emilion ($37.99)
I decided to include this, because some like this
showy style of red wine; there were those in my
group who had it closer to 86 or 87 points! Big,
glossy, purple New World look. Fairly ripe
blackberry nose. Big-boned, rich texture,
lingering flavor of roasted spices…just not
enough, for my taste (no new-wood vanilla, for
example). And, of course, you pay for all this
purpleness with astringency.
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