My hometown friend Mark, who resides outside of Denver, is big on food and drink. He brews his own beer, a pasttime he appears to be forgoing with his new obsession for winemaking, and was a coffee connoisseur in the days when Starbucks hadn't ventured outside the Pacific Northwest. He makes fantastic goetta, sauerbraten, and spaghetti and meatballs from family recipes.
Mark recently recounted that his roommate Mike and neighbor Judy have become a culinary trio after being influenced by The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food. They're planning on buying into some locally raised grass fed cattle (i.e., putting dibs on a cow or part of a cow), which sounds both awesome and tasty, and Mark and Judy have also moved into classic cocktail making, perfecting the Sazerac.
Being a cantakerous contrarian, however, I was much more impressed by the trio's production of a classic Hawaiian snack of Portugese origin, the malasadas. Anyone's who lived in Hawaii knows about these little bits of heaven - fried yeasted dough dusted with granulated sugar (think of an ethereal version of zeppole, e.g., malasadas is to zeppole as Krispy Kreme is to Dunkin Donuts) - and, like Zippy's chili, the thought of a malasadas can produce a deep sense of nostalgia and longing for the islands and "local" culture, akin to a madeleine-inspired reverie. Leonard's used to be the place to get awesome malasadas, but on my last visit home I found their version both different and disappointing; folks have told me that they've changed their basic recipe and have also created malasadas with fillings, which just sounds bizarre. I don't know if some crazy marketing type filled their head with these weird lilikoi-flavored ideas, but I'm pretty unhappy that the "you can't go home again" adage had to play out this way.
Oops, back from my digression...so Mike found the Punahou (howzit, Uncle Barry!) carnival recipe and made the dough, Mark deep fried them, and Judy put them in a paper bag to coat them with sugar. I really wish someone had been around to film or photograph them doing this (because then you'd be seeing pictures of the process here). I wonder if they were drinking homemade Sazeracs, beer, and/or wine while they were on the factory line, or whether the thought of a hot vat of oil within spattering distance kept them sober. I like the family feel of this production - it reminds me of when my parents would make dumplings, a half-day long exercise that produced trays and trays of dumplings and their byproduct, scallion pancakes, and when the only things I could do to "help" were (1) make crazy looking, misshapen, and poorly crimped dumplings and (2) act as "quality control" by sampling as many of the finished goodies as possible.
In any case, I'm looking forward to hearing more from the trio and can probably be of help to them in the quality control/inspection process as well. Why Mark doesn't have his own food/drink blog is beyond me, since he pays attention to both in much greater detail than I do. Apparently Mike has suggested that he start one called "The absinthe-minded professor"; I say "ditto" to that.
Note: I'm still trying to figure out where I can get malasadas in Newark, which has a large Portugese population in the Ironbound neighborhood. The last time I looked for signs of them (admittedly in a very feeble, tapping into Google, way, versus walking around Newark), I couldn't figure out where to go. Any hints would be greatly appreciated.
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