International Foods

If there's one thing people love, it's food.

An article on BBC mentions that no diet consists entirely of native foods, that is, foods whose origins were from that area. When people encounter new food crops, they have, historically, been quick to pick up the new flavors and absorb them into their diet as possible.

Ramen is delicious. Especially the kind you don't
find in a bag or a cup.

It's not something I see addressed very often in fantasy stories, this exchange of food staples. Sometimes the spice trade is referred to, but that exotic tomato, the strange new thing called a chili,  that lovable potato, none of which were ever seen in European diets until after the Columbian Exchange?

One of the joys of travel is trying new foods and discovering different flavors. Sometimes I rather wish stories made a bigger deal of that, on the hero's journey, some kind of recipe they could take home with them, like pizza.

On the other hand it's not usually a critical element to the story, so perhaps it's better to leave it out and cut out the unnecessary tangent. Won't stop me from wanting to try new foods when I travel, though!

What foods would you miss the most if you could only eat things native to your area? And what foreign-originating foods could you just not live without?

What to do with strawberries...

It's strawberry season here in NC.

U-pick farms offer all-you-can-carry treasure-hunting magic. Sure, it's weighed per pound, but it's cheaper than store berries. The main danger is trying to resist picking just one more ripe, sweet, perfect ruby.

Remade this recipe.

Which is how I wound up making pie this weekend.

And some of my friends wound up making jam.



'Tis the season!

(YUM!)

Your favorite food places

Publishing news will be a bit late this week due to chores and another chapter of King's Quest coming out.

Case in point, my tea shelf.

In the meantime, let's share some stories of good food. There's a great place in Durham, for example, called CocoaCinnamon. People say their coffee is incredible. Their teas look amazing--but I've never tried them, because the hot chocolate is so delicious.

That's right, the teas look wonderful, but I HAVEN'T TRIED them.

This from a woman with an entire page devoted to tea.

That is how good the hot chocolate is.

What's one food (or beverage) place you love? 

Strawberry Banana Crisp (Dairy-free)

Coconut oil substituted for butter verdict: The strawberry-banana crisp was a wild success.

The recipe for this treat:

Exactly Delicious, Approximately Measured Strawberry-Banana Crisp (Dairy-free)

Ingredients:
NOTE: all ingredients are approximately measured, as my measuring cup's lowest line is at 1/2 cup, I couldn't find the measuring spoons, the pecans were poured until about 1/2 of 1/2 of 2-cup bag had been used, and the coconut oil was guestimated at about 1/7 the 14-oz jar. It worked out fine, so trust me, don't worry if you're not exact.

Filling:
1 1/2–2 pints strawberries, depending on depth of pan, sliced
3–4 large bananas, depending on depth of pan, sliced
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
1/2 of 1/2 a lemon's juice (about 1–1.5 tbsp)
1/2 pinch sea salt (about 1/4 tsp or so)

Topping:
1/4 cup quick-cook oats
1/3 cup flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup chopped pecans
a dash of mace (or 3/4 dash nutmeg--is "3/4 dash" a thing?)
1/4 cup coconut oil, room temperature, solid state

+olive oil & flour for greasing & dusting pan

Utensils:
1 8×8 or 9×9 baking pan (or 2 pie dishes, skip "bottom crust" portion of recipe) (I used glass, so if using metal, adjust baking temp & time appropriately: +25°F if using shiny metal, for example)
1 large mixing bowl for fruit
1 medium mixing bowl for topping
1 cookie sheet in case of overflow
cutting board, knife for fruit slicing, forks & spoons for mixing, measuring cup

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°F (or 177°C, or something close to that).

Topping first: Mix oats, brown sugar, flour, and a dash of mace in a mixing bowl. Mush in something close to 1/4 cup coconut oil (~2 oz) until it's nice and crumbly. The coconut oil will have the texture fairly similar to that of softened butter, but requires a little more effort to get the crumbly texture; this takes me about 3–5 minutes with a fork. Stir in pecans.

Pans: Grease your pans with a little olive oil and dust lightly with flour. Pour about 1/2–2/3 (depending on how much you want to have left over for the top of your pie) of your crumb mixture into the bottom to make a bottom "crust." Don't worry about the sides, just the bottom. Press with floured fingertips until the bottom looks more or less evenly coated (the coconut oil will melt during baking and redistribute the layer, so it'll still wind up being even in the end if you don't get it perfect). Bake at 350°F for 15 minutes, until it starts to resolidify and maybe brown just a tiny bit. Remove from oven and set aside.

Filling: If you haven't sliced your fruit yet, while the crumb mixture is baking is a great time to do so. Make sure all your strawberries and bananas are sliced and stir them together into your big mixing bowl. I estimated volume of my 8×8 baking dish and, since last time it bubbled over, would up using about 1 3/4 pints instead of the full two pints, and only 3 large bananas. Pie pans have lower sides and will probably need to go with a little less than that, while 9×9s may need more.

In any case, put all the sliced fruit into the bowl, add the lemon juice, flour, sugar, and salt, and stir gently until everything is evenly coated. (Also, keep your remaining topping mixture in view, so the cat doesn't jump up on the table she knows she's not supposed to be on and stick her face in it, and make you remake half the mixture. Bad kitty.)

Pour your filling into your baking pan (or 2 pie dishes). Cover with the remaining topping (or use 1/2 topping for each pie dish). Place on cooking sheet (in case it bubbles over, because cookie sheets are easier to clean than the oven) and bake for 40–50 minutes (pies about 35–40 minutes). Filling should be bubbling before you take it out.

Let cool for an hour or so, and then enjoy.

What's your weird food substitution story?

I'm playing around with cooking ingredients after the crunch-time craziness at work (and some resulting stress gut irritation). Which means I'm trawling around the internet looking for and finding substitutes for butter, dairy, and fruits that aren't in the FODMAP list, which has in turn lead to my discovery that coconut oil can be substituted for butter in many cooking situations.

Yup, looks like a strawberry-banana crisp to me.

Yes, I didn't know that. I do now, and have begun my first experiment in using it as part of a strawberry-banana crisp topping. It was a pretty simple recipe, and seems to have the same texture of butter, so I'm hopeful it'll turn out well. Will report the findings after a tasting.

I'm sure everyone's had to substitute things in recipes before, whether due to food allergies, special diets, or just running out. What's the best and/or weirdest substitution you've used that worked?

And more entertainingly, ever tried anything that didn't?

When Characters Cook

Does your main character's dinner look like this?

When characters cook in a story, what happens?

Food's a pretty important part of our lives, and so it's not surprising to see characters preparing it in the scenes of a story. Watching how they do so tells us about them. Do they microwave? Is the idea of putting a pan in the oven more terrifying than fighting six demons before breakfast? Or do they sweep through the kitchen with joy, dancing through elaborate feasts and feeding all their friends?

In some stories, especially those with restaurants, food is an obvious plot-motivator. But usually it's an accessory, just another way to help develop characters.

Or like this?
(From Wikimedia Commons,
uploaded by PanShiBo)

Sometimes it's a weakness, a point of vulnerability. Often characters will be bad cooks as a way to show something they haven't mastered. Kick-butt super heroine who destroys bad guys with one hand and speaks 14 languages? Chances are she can't boil water.

On the other hand, sometimes kitchen ability is a way of connecting characters. Have a party of four or five disparate characters who don't get along? Cooking together gives them a way of connecting. Have a hypermasculine character who needs a touch of softness? Give him a frying pan and an apron. What about a character who wants to take care of everyone? An author can emphasize nurturing tendencies by letting a character cook for everyone.

There's a lot of characters in stories I read who have unhealthy relationships with food, and often it's almost even celebrated. This trend seems to coincide with the writer's attitude towards skinniness. It's important to remember the character who survives off vitamins for half his meals is probably constantly lethargic and doing horrible things to his body--something often overlooked by writers. The truth is, starving distracts the mind, gives headaches, causes dizziness, and makes a character confused and weak in critical moments. Doing so too long can lead to nutrient deficiencies, including hair loss and weak nails, extreme illness, strange bruising due to the body's consumption of internal organs, and worse. Neglecting those consequences can romanticize unhealthy eating habits (something that bothers me, personally).

On the other hand, occasional missed meals may not be dangerous, and a character in situation where food is hard to come by might deal with starvation on a regular basis. Those who go adventuring (as many stories have them do) will probably burn off a lot of calories on a daily basis, meaning they can eat as they wish. And honestly, a story is just a story, and sometimes it's nice to pretend that the lifestyle habits are sustainable--wish fulfillment does play a role in many novels, after all.

In any case, how the characters deal with cooking tells the reader about them, and sometimes the foods themselves become popular on their own. Ever heard of the cookbooks assembled by sci-fi writers, including Anne McCaffrey (and her bubbly pies)? Some of those recipes are pretty tasty!

Does your favorite character know how to cook? What does his or her kitchen habits tell you about the character? And does the story offer realistic consequences for his or her general eating habits?