Don’t Play With Your Food

Maybe once in a great while mother doesn’t always know best. For Valentine’s Day,  we went to an entertainment that was, literally, “playing with food.”  Food Acts is  a series of short stories, quotations, and observations by famous people all involving food on NYC’s Little Theater Row.

We were greeted by two women wearing toques and aprons who presented us each with a Menu, aka, the program. 

Inside, food-related music filled the air, mostly oldies of the Animal Crackers in My Soup, If I Knew You Were Coming I’d Have Baked a Cake and Rum and Coca Cola variety. Eight actors got up as chefs spoke or enacted bits ranging from Dorothy Parker to Homer to Anthony Bourdain, some funny, some slightly icky (one about hog slaughter and another about rat cookery in restaurants in China.) Overall, the entertainment could have been a little shorter and had more musical numbers but we enjoyed it.

Then to Vermont where we were joined by some kids and grandkids. Over the weekend went a Fireman’s Breakfast (brunch for us) in West Pawlet to eat pancakes plain and/or with cranberries, blueberries or chocolate chips, waffles, bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs and home fries with juice and coffee. (Oh yes, someone offered us a piece of birthday cake and there were chocolate-covered cookies on the way out.)

At $7 an adult pop, the price was right and the atmosphere straight out of Norman Rockwell. In the afternoon, some of went skating and others to a Clawhammer banjo and fiddle concert featuring John Specker in a artesan’s gallery in Londonderry.

John Specker playing Clawhammer Banjo

(follow link to hear him on banjo– if it works) http://youtu.be/-V-9rE005a4http

In keeping with the high cholesterol theme of the day, for dinner that night we had fried chicken. Years ago, my family was looked after by Margaret Pruden who was our housekeeper-cum-babysitter. She also made the best fried chicken in the world. This isn’t exactly Margaret’s recipe but as close as I can come as she never revealed her secret.

Fried Chicken (slightly tweaked from Martha Stewart)

2 cups buttermilk (which you can make by adding 2 Tbls. white vinegar to just under two cups milk and letting it sit for five minutes.)

Kosher salt

3 teaspoons cayenne pepper

2 whole chickens (2 1/2 to 3 pounds each), each cut into 10 serving pieces (wings, thighs, drumsticks, and 4 breast pieces)

3 cups all-purpose flour

4 cups vegetable oil

In each of two 1-gallon resealable plastic bags, combine 1 cup buttermilk, 1/2 tablespoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon cayenne, and half the chicken pieces. Shake to coat, refrigerate up to 2 days. (Or an hour or so.)

In a large shallow bowl, whisk flour with 2 tablespoons salt and remaining 2 teaspoons cayenne. Dredge chicken pieces one at a time in mixture, shaking off excess.

In a 12-inch cast-iron skillet heat oil to until a pinch of flour sizzles when dropped into it. This means oil is roughly 350 degrees.

Carefully add 1/2 of the chicken. Cook 10 minutes: turn chicken with tongs. Cook until golden brown and juices run clear, about 10 minutes more. Transfer to a paper towel draped rack to drain.

Return oil temperature to 350 degrees. Repeat with remaining chicken. Season with more salt if you wish. Serve, whistling Dixie.