Today’s blog
Lynn Murphy Mark
Esculent
It’s been a while since a vocabulary word has appeared in my app that I never heard of in almost 75 years. This word means “fit to eat, edible”. For some reason it made me think of a food that my son-in-law from Nigeria prepares on a regular basis. Maybe because I’m listening to an African choir sing the rich tones and harmonies that characterize music from that continent.
Anyway, Africa + “esculent” carries me to New Jersey, where I first experienced Jollof Rice. According to Momoh, the Nigerian version is the best, even though a number of West African countries claim to have the most delicious jollof rice. There is even a term between Ghana and Nigeria – the “Jollof Wars”. According to a short history of this dish, it is supposed to have originated in Senegal.
While he is able to whip some up in no time, there are quite a few steps that go into the production of this delicious tomato-based rice. He starts with long-grain rice, but on the kitchen counter he has already assembled tomato paste, chilis, onions, spices that I can’t name, and, if no one is looking, a touch of fish paste. Most of the time he gets caught before the fish paste can make it into the pot. A blender is required to properly mix all the ingredients. Jackie has been studying the making of jollof rice and can now produce her own pot, sadly minus the chilis.
One Christmas shortly after they married and settled in New Jersey I was introduced to “Chin Chin”, a Christmas staple in Nigeria. Out of the kitchen came a bowl of golden fried cubes of deliciousness. This dish involves flour, sugar, butter, nutmeg, vanilla, eggs, and milk. Crunchy chin chin is a delicacy in my mind, although it is ubiquitous in Nigeria. It can be eaten year round, but at Christmas it becomes a welcoming dish in the home as well as a gift to take to others.
Having grown up overseas, my palate has been trained to appreciate different spicy dishes. Whenever I get the chance I order my Indian, Mexican, or Thai foods highly spiced. Only a few times in my life have I been caught off guard by the extreme hotness of a dish. Once in London at an Indian restaurant I asked for my curry to be quite hot. The waiter asked if I was sure, and I in my grandiosity, assured him I could handle it. What came out of that kitchen made my eyes water and my nose run, but it was a matter of pride and I ate the whole dish. Another time, at Horseman’s Haven in Santa Fe I ordered the dish with the hottest green chili level available. The waitress and my companions tried to warn me, but I was in my I-can-handle-this mode. I learned a lesson that day and humbly ate my lunch in silence with tears flowing. I finally learned that this level of spicy makes it impossible for me to enjoy the other flavors.
I have voted for Hillary Clinton for several reasons, but my favorite one is this: the woman travels everywhere with a bottle of hot sauce in her purse and makes it a habit to eat a jalapeno every day for its immunity-boosting property. I got this nugget of information from a Time Magazine article. “Clinton is right. Chilies are absolutely crammed with nutrients…folic acid, and vitamins A, E, and about six times as much vitamin C as an orange…A 2015 study of the health outcomes for about half a million Chinese adults found that people who ate spicy food every day or almost every day had a 14% decrease in mortality over the course of the study.” (Time Magazine, April 18, 2016). I rest my case.
Rose and I occasionally go to Zen, a Thai/Japanese restaurant. I always get the yellow curry with fresh vegetables and tofu. They have spice levels, which is measured by the number of red chili pepper flakes in the curry. Recently a work colleague introduced me to Flavors, an Indian restaurant. I love their food because not only is it as spicy as I ask, the combination of spices helps the restaurant live up to its name. The next time we go there, we are taking our Summer law intern. She is a sweet young thing from the heartland of Wyoming. She’s about to get an education in what our immigrant clients eat daily. We’ll start her out on a 0 scale of hotness, otherwise we might scare her. Get ready for an Epicurean Episode, Chandra!