The Dish

“Bread and water are standards of graciousness. You don’t withhold it like it’s some treat.” — Martha Keller, Culinary Institute of America

Good news
Miyabi “Mike” Yamamoto opened Miyabi 9 in East Village, redefining Japanese cuisine in Des Moines with fresh sushi and 46 years of Osaka-originated experience… Splash opened a stand-alone Raw Oyster Bar with fresh oysters, comfort food and a caviar menu to keep people sober with prices hitting $400 an ounce… Lisa Vacco opened Pavato’s at 70th Street and Douglas Avenue with pizza, pasta and salads for dine-in or delivery… Chocolaterie Stam franchised new stores in Ames, Wauwatosa and Chapel Hill... Hubbell Realty closed Johnny’s Hall of Fame for remodeling. It should re-open in time for March Madness with state-of-the-art electronics… The Coppola family sold Java Joe’s Coffeehouse to Amy Brehm, who owns Kaleidoscoops Ice Cream of Ankeny. Brehm shocked no one by announcing that she would add ice cream to the menu in time for farmers market… Cedar Ridge Winery and Distillery of Iowa released an impressive aged single barrel apple brandy... Java Lava Coffee Shack opened in Dogtown after a long delay dealing with Des Moines’ new plumbing codes… Maria Cosmo and Oz Kapic opened Black Cat Café in the crowded Ingersoll coffeehouse scene with a worldly combo of coffee drinks, beer, music, poetry, pastry and pizza… Sheree Clark organized Des Moines’ first raw food group (call 279-2922)… Dos Rios opened “Tequila University” with two-hour, 12-tequila seminars in agave culture (call 282-2995)... The long-anticipated opening of Alba in East Village became imminent. At press time, the fine dining café had been hiring personnel and putting the finishing touches on their trappings… Django, a French bistro with full charcuterie station, pushed its anticipated opening back to April.

Accolades
The Iowa Restaurant Association named Scott Carlson, owner of Court Avenue Restaurant and Brewing Co., Restaurateur of the Year… Cityview’s Food Dude column named Dos Rios the best new restaurant of 2007 and its 22-year-old chef Scott Stroud the rising star of the year. George Formaro of South Union, Centro, Gateway Market Café and Django was named chef of the year… Des Moines Register restaurant critics Wini Moranville and Deb Wagner named Azalea and Gateway Market Café the best new restaurants of 2007 respectively.

Sad news
After 35 years in Dogtown and downtown, Beggars Banquet closed their last store… Dolce Vita in Clive closed… Acapulco shut down on Ingersoll… East Village Market closed. It’s food and wine events moved to La Mie… River Bend Trading Co. shut down after six months. It’s basement bar, Shorty’s, and wine shop remain open… Grand China Buffet closed on Hickman… Dungeness crab and halibut both experienced record shortages and price increases.

Transitions
Rob Beasley left Mojo’s on 86th. One of the metro’s best, and best known, chefs, Beasley said, “The other two partners are taking the restaurant in a new direction and I will not be involved.”… Breakroom Cyber Café will close its doors on Urbandale Jan. 26. Owners Holleen Lawrence and Becka Hodges recently won a long legal struggle for a variance to establish a café that allows dogs. However, Lawrence said they lost their fight to compete with a new drive-through Starbucks and now plan to open a “Bark and Brew” in a year or so in a new location… The defunct 5 & Diner in Johnston was transformed into the Bosnian restaurant Old Castle Bar & Grill. It’s now a family dining place with a large smoking section… Jasper Winery began moving from Newton to Des Moines. They will continue to grow and buy grapes from Jasper County vineyards... Hong Willer’s excellent Cafe Shi moved from Campustown in Ames to a bigger place in the Northern Lights area… Legacy Restaurant Supply moved from Normandy Plaza to Urbandale, doubling their size and adding bilingual help to keep up with the burgeoning local food scene… Blue Moon Dueling Piano Bar announced it would open a restaurant in West Glen... Uncle Wendell’s expanded into a sit down shop on Ingersoll where Wendell Garretson introduced Des Moines to Kool Aid pickles and some Cajun-smokehouse fusion dishes… Hezekhia Jackson purchased When Pigs Fly and added smoked chicken to the menu… Mark Rogers of Legends bought Jimmy’s American Café… AK O’Connor’s opened its third area store, on Court Avenue… Taste! To Go moved into the old Bass & Ringneck space on University… Frank’s Pizza added free classic movies on Monday nights… La Mie began its second expansion in the Shops at Roosevelt absorbing the former Pink space… Tasty Tacos moved into a new building next to its previous shop on Euclid.

Election news
The caucus season ended with three clear winners in the niche food run-off. Dennis Kucinich took the vegan and vegetarian vote uncontested. Chris Dodd dominated the Iowa food icon vote after repeatedly pandering to pork tenderloins. Bill Clinton won the café-fly award. On multiple occasions, the former president so enjoyed and enthralled café customers that reporters wrote his mingling had upstaged his wife.

Corporate news
Chipotle Grill, majority-owned by McDonald’s, announced a Spring opening for their first Des Moines area store, in Valley West Mall. Chipotle upgraded to humanely raised Niman Pork a few years ago and saw dramatically increased sales despite higher prices. They have cultivated good stewardship standards ever since, adding organic and natural products… Happy Joe’s re-opened its E.P. True and 86th St. stores after remodeling. Their S.E. 14th St. store is not re-opening… McDonald’s announced a nationwide rollout for espresso bars within their restaurants, beginning with 800 stores this quarter... KFC leveled their East Euclid store and began building a bigger one expected to open by winter’s end… After both McDonald’s and Yum Brands Inc. (Taco Bell, etc.) agreed to pay tomato pickers a higher wage, Burger King refused to go along. That encouraged the largest tomato growers’ organization to threaten heavy fines against farmers who co-operate with McDonald’s and Yum… Starbucks’ legendary founder Howard Schultz returned as CEO to lead “a major restructuring initiative.” That’s usually code for slowing down expansion. Starbucks stock fell over 50 percent last year as its same store sales plummeted.

Health news
The European Food Safety Agency declared that genetically modified foods do not pose a risk to health or environments, alienating environmental groups across the continent… The U.S. Food and Drug Administration declared meat and milk from cloned animals and their offspring safe to eat, sparking a new round of Frankenfood debates… Grapefruit snared headlines in the pharmaceutical press. Scientists confirmed that grapefruit juice contains enzymes that dangerously interact with some drugs. Grapefruit juice can change the effect of some cholesterol-lowering drugs (Lipitor) to deadly levels by blocking active agents and reducing their effectiveness. In certain mood-elevating drugs (Valium), it can increase the pharmaceutical effects drastically… Researchers announced that mothers can influence the diets of their children by eating certain foods while pregnant… Absinthe became safe after all. Banned for a century in the U.S.A. because of faulty scientific data, the mysterious liquor was approved for sale by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau. St. George Absinthe Verte became the first legal American-made absinthe in almost 100 years. RELISH

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The Good Steward

“He was a bold man that first eat an oyster.” — Jonathan Swift

We are what we dare to eat

By Jim Duncan

As Fed Ex shrinks the world, medical experts advise us that expanded, diversified diets are healthier for almost everyone. Yet, the odds of anyone trying new foods are determined by one’s youth. After years of studying human inclinations for trying new things, biologist Robert Sapolski has determined that most people open and close their minds at similar ages. He found that musical tastes awakened between ages 14 and 21 and shut down around age 35. He also discovered that almost all first time body piercing is performed on 16 to 23-year-olds, and almost none on people over 35. At Midwest sushi bars, the scientist found that people under age 26 were quite likely to try raw fish for the first time in their lives but very few people over age 39 would.

After studying people in these older groups who had become unlikely to try new things, Sapolski found they usually had two things in common: They remained in the same occupation; and they had become successful. He concluded that the more eminent one becomes, the less adventurous. That’s troubling.

Familiarity might make us feel comfortable, but daring to try new things makes us grow. Plus, trying new foods has been essential to the growth of all species and tribes. Because eating is tantamount to surviving, civilizations rose in synch with increased diversity of diets. People conquered other people in order to steal their goodies — until the middle of the last century. Then the diets of people in the most developed parts of the world began declining in diversity for the first time since of fall of the Roman Empire. That period wasn’t called the Dark Ages for nothing.

Among more than a million classified species, more than four percent are edible. Yet during the last 60 years, American diets became increasingly restricted to fewer species and fewer specific parts of those. I flipped through 10 best-selling cookbooks and couldn’t find any that included more than 120 different species. Most included far fewer. That means we are eating less than half of a percent of known foods, even as health experts advise us to consume more variety.

After World War II, the most affluent middle class in world history began eating fewer different foods than their parents. Does that mean that success reduces the sense of adventure in eating among societies as well as individuals? As Relish has been reporting the last five years, there is now a reactionary movement of people rediscovering the lost foods of our ancestors. Seed savers, homeopathic physicians and gourmets now call these foods “heirlooms” in hopes that people re-evaluate their worth.

Culinary trends are cyclical. The next new thing is often just something long forgotten. Do you think Starbuck’s ushered in the ultimate coffee craze? During the 1760s, more than three thousand coffeehouses were established in London, when that city’s population was only 750,000. America’s current coffee craze shared a similar motivation with its predecessor. In London’s heyday, the Protestant work ethic brewed a strong case for coffee as a substitute for gin. Workers were much more productive wide awake than they were dead drunk. Today’s coffee boom spun out of Seattle and the Silicon Valley, where it grew cup-in-hand with the dotcom work ethic.

If current forecasts are correct, today’s coffee fad will also emulate the 18th century’s by being supplemented by a new chocolate craze. In both cases, health concerns drove interest in chocolate. The 18th century great food writer Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin convinced France that “chocolate is as healthful a food as it is pleasant; that it is nourishing and easily digested; that it does not cause the shameful effects to feminine beauty as coffee, but is on the contrary, a remedy for them.”

Chocolate was so important to morale in Paris during the Napoleonic Wars, that Lord Nelson’s blockade of France was expressly instituted to deprive England’s enemy of chocolate and sugar. Napoleon responded by offering huge financial incentives to anyone who could find substitutes. Those led to the invention of the sugar beet, but chemically complex chocolate remained inimitable to this day. It is back in food vogue because researchers found dark chocolate to be high in anti-oxidants. Dark chocolate makers now advertise that their product helps prevent cancer, heart disease and diabetes while lowering blood pressure.

Of course, chocolate hardly demands adventurous eaters. As Sapolski discovered, sushi does. Five new sushi places opened in Des Moines last year bringing toro and kama into our vocabulary. Those are the most cherished parts of the blue fin, the most cherished of all tuna. While many Iowans may taste raw tuna for the first time, it’s hardly new. Pliny the Elder wrote this about blue fin 2000 years ago: “The choicest parts are the neck and the white flesh of the belly (toro) and the throat, provided they are fresh. The most sought after parts are by the jaws (kama).”

Yet, 40 years ago, eminent food writer James Beard wrote that tuna was the only food better canned than fresh. Even the Japanese considered it poor people’s food until World War II, when shortages taught them to appreciate it. Since then Japanese buyers have paid as much as $83,000 for a single blue fin.

This issue of Relish celebrates the newest old things on the culinary cycle — because civilization depends on us trying something different. RELISH

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“All is flux, nothing stays still. Nothing endures but change.” — Heraclitus

‘Umami-mia’ and other fashion bombs

An explosion of new flavors

By Jim Duncan

The average human has 4,600 taste buds on the tongue and another 2,500 elsewhere in the mouth and throat. Different buds detect and analyze five taste signals— sweet, sour, bitter, salty and umami. All are essential to our well being because most poisons are excessively sour or bitter, and saltiness, sweetness and umami help us find three things that our bodies require to live and grow — salt, carbohydrates and amino acids respectively. Since taste buds diminish with aging, it’s important to keep trying new foods in order to keep them active.

That makes food trends more vital than other cultural fads. Ever since the historical Buddha recommended “all things in moderation,” human beings have thrived on diets of diversity. Thanks to overnight delivery and the ephemeral nature of nutritional science, food trends come and go faster than the sting of chile pepper. None have possessed the staying power of the current umami buzz. Known to the Japanese for 100 years, umami was only recently recognized in the West. The word translates as “savory” and applies to the detection of glutamates, which are concentrated in protein-rich foods like meat (particularly salt-aged meats like salami and prosciutto), aged cheeses, fish, seaweed, bone marrow, tomato paste, soy extractions (like soy sauce or miso) and dried mushrooms.

Monosodium glutamate was invented to deliver umami without fat, but the current culinary trend is based on bone stocks and other natural foods. Super star chefs Jean Georges Vongerichten and Gary Danko have popularized menus of “umami bombs” in their worldly restaurants. In Des Moines Cyd Koehn-Mull (Cyd’s Catering) has been working with some of Danko’s recipes. George Formaro (Centro, Gateway Market Café, South Union and the soon-to-open Django) is an umami devotee.

“I have been working with the element of umami for a lifetime without even really knowing it,” Formaro said, adding that he makes all his stocks, soups and sauces from bones and uses anchovies, cured meats, aged cheeses and dried mushrooms liberally. His “lamb chops Scottaditto” is so rich in umami, with lamb, anchovy sauce and intense veal stock, that the chef calls it “Umami-mia.”

“At Gateway my favorite things on the menu are umami-licious — like the ramen with its rich stock of bones and soy sauce and miso. We have an ‘umami shooter’ on the way soon,” Formaro said.

Charcuterie and chef stations
One new feature at Django will combine umami with two other hot trends — chef stations and charcuterie.

“We’re planning to have a station where customers can watch the chef prepare their platter — pâtés, rillettes and saucissons, many of which we will make on site, as well as the artisan products from (Norwalk’s) La Quercia and (California’s) Fra’ Mani,” Formaro said.

Chef stations help people take control of their diets even when eating out. Wine Spectator editor Owen Dugan wrote recently that the ideal contemporary wine tasting should include three chef stations: blue cheeses (with Ports); ham/charcuterie (Pinot Noir and Sherry) and foie gras (Sauternes). Top local caterers agreed that chef stations are hot. Andrea Williams (Taste! To Go) explained their popularity.

“Guests love the interaction with the chef and the environment it creates. You are really able to use all of your senses before you eat the food. A hot trend that goes along with stations are ‘chef bars.’ Actually ordering off of a menu, maybe three selections, and watching the ‘chef tender’ cook in front of you,” she said.

Koehn-Mull thinks chef stations tap a need for interactive dining.

“Guests love the personal service — a direct dialogue with their chef, the chance to see their food prepared in front of their eyes and to choose ingredients themselves, whether it is a loaded smashed potini bar with toppings or carving station. Who does not like to watch the fire of the rum for a banana foster?” she said.

What’s hot
Food trends mostly flow to town from three tributaries: nutritional hypotheses that label certain foods healthy; downtown restaurants, where hotel visitors request things that haven’t yet found their way here and caterers, whose worldly clients want to turn their friends on to something new. As the century enters its second duodenary cycle, by which astrologers reckon significant change, Relish tracked the food and nutrition press, local caterers and chefs to predict what’s going to be hot and what’s not this coming year.

Campbell’s Research Kitchen touts 14 hot new flavors: figs, pomegranate, beets, cauliflower, acai, short ribs, blood orange, mango, artichoke, caramelized, coulis, pickled and organic. It also predicts emerging food flavors and techniques for haute cuisine: fruit flavors - watermelon, grapefruit and goji; vegetables - rhubarb, parsnips and celery; ingredients - pork belly, sun chokes, coconut, farro (an old grain) and “wild“ fish; plus cooking methods-confit, ceviche and candied.

A poll of food industry pros listed North American caviar, burrata (upgraded mozzarella) and black licorice as the top hot items for 2008. Cookbook author Dorie Greenspan observed “We’re in a licorice moment” and super star chef Grant Achatz (Chicago’s Alinea) wrote that he has been adding licorice to everything from cakes to squab, and even melting it into a sauce for braised short ribs.

A poll of U.S. National Restaurant Association (USNRA) chefs predicts more interest in organic and fresh and local foods. Bon Appetit declared that beurre noisette (butter melted till brown but not burnt) will be the flavor of 2008. Food & Wine said that old-fashioned candy, wild American shrimp and muesli (a whole grain cereal) would shine this year. The Orlando Sentinel predicted boom times for ancient grains (amaranth, quinoa), plus “more interest in organic with the same lack of understanding.” That newspaper also called goji (a Tibetan berry) “the new pomegranate” and predicted “chocolate snobbery.”

The USNRA poll named wasabi, chai, polenta and deep-fried meats as having outlived their cycles, but singled out raw meat (tartare and carpaccio) as the number passé trend. If you like raw things other than meat, there’s good news. Sheree Clark organized Des Moines’ first raw food group, Living Raw, with sold out demonstrations for three months. Robin Moyer has launched RAWphoriaLive, a raw food preparation school in Ankeny. Splash Raw Oyster Bar joined seven new sushi outlets that opened in the metro during 2007.

Chocolate, particularly as a beverage, has been cited as trendy by at least half a dozen publications. “Hot Chocolate: 50 Heavenly Cups of Comfort,” by Fred Thompson, was a surprise hot selling book. Many of its recipes returned the drink to its pre-Columbian roots, mixing it with vanilla and chile. At Dos Rios, Karl Alterman says hot chocolate has been returned to its Aztec roots. “We developed a new intense version of the drink that tastes more like cacao and chile and less like sugar and chocolate milk.”

Koehn-Mull says that chocolate martinis are now popular. Williams says that drinking chocolate is hot because so many different varieties of chocolates are available.

“We have a hot chocolate shot on our menu that is very rich and a nice way to end a meal. I think we will start seeing chocolate drinks on a lot of menus. It is still comforting, like Swiss Miss from our childhood, but add some cinnamon or a liquor and it becomes a hip adult beverage,” she said.

Whole animal
Influential restaurant consultants Baum & Whiteman predict hot times for offal (animal innards). Local chefs say whole animal cookery is gaining acceptance here. Andrew Meek at Sage has produced popular dinners built around parts of the pig that are rarely eaten. Enosh Kelley at Bistro Montage said he’s been encouraged by the response to menu items such as sweetbreads. He now adds pork belly to his ground beef recipe. Wendell Garretson of Uncle Wendell’s BBQ smokes whole cow’s heads and makes jambalaya with their cheeks. Formaro believes the trend will grow for ecological reasons.
“The philosophy is simple — eat the whole animal nose to tail and fewer animals have to die and fewer animals have to be raised,” he explained, adding that tongue tacos are a favorite staff meal.

“We should have a more honest relationship with our food. Let’s stop killing animals for just a few steaks. You will start to see things like haggis, black pudding and other things made with the offal in the years to come,” Formaro said.

Hot tools
Media prognosticators and local chefs all think that plastic-bag steaming, previously associated with frozen foods, is moving into fresh food kitchens. It appeals to chefs interested in reducing oils and fats for health reasons. At least two major plastic-bag manufacturers emerged recently with microwave-safe steaming sacks designed for fresh food. That’s catching on with home chefs and tailgaters because there are no messy pots to clean. Underground chef Hal Jasa likes sous vide for convenience, particularly when cooking in impromptu kitchens.

Orchestrate Management’s Paul Rottenberg says that text orders and text reservations are a future trend. “I’ve already had plenty of people trying to sell me the software that makes it possible, and I have no doubt that it will get used. But it’s not necessary in Des Moines now. It will come after more people get used to it in Chicago and other larger cities.”

The New York Times reported new interest in cleavers because they are more practical than Western knives. Industry writer Leslie Brenner touted a new, easier to use Swiss-made potato ricer made of molded plastic.

Something old is something new
Nothing combines so many trends as heirlooms. They are comfortingly nostalgic, fresh and local and bountifully diverse while allowing people more personal control over diets. Anyone who shops regularly at farmers markets has been exposed to wondrous rainbows of heirloom tomatoes, lettuces, potatoes, squash and apples. Experts say the next wave of recovered diversity will include garlic, more root vegetables and beans. Seed Savers Exchange (SSE) founder and director Diane Ott Whealy says their mail order catalogue (www.seedsavers.org) completely sold out of every available garlic last year.

“I think the next area of rediscovery will be root vegetables — carrots, turnips, beets, even parsnips. People are starting to look more toward root cellar foods in order to take more control over their food supplies,” she said, affirming the Campbell‘s research.

Bill Best has collected more than 200 traditional bean varieties through his sustainable farm, research center and mail order catalogue (www.heirlooms.org). He says that “greasy beans” are being rediscovered with fervor.

“Once people eat them, it seems that nothing else quite satisfies,” Best said of beans named for their hairless, shiny green pods. He also thinks that heirlooms are here to stay.

“I think heirloom values in general are making a comeback for similar reasons. Our old traditional values — honesty, trust and neighborly compassion — might be good antidotes for cynical, impersonal times,” Best said. RELISH

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“The newest is but the oldest made visible.” — Henry David Thoreau

Des Moines in the raw

New movement forsakes cooked, processed food

By Jason Hancock

Sheree Clark knows a lot of people think her eating habits are strange. “Every time someone finds out, they have a million questions,” she said. “I don’t mind, though. I like talking about it. I’ve turned into an evangelist.”

Clark is a raw foodist, meaning she consumes only uncooked, unprocessed and often organic food. She is also a vegan, something that is common among raw foodists, which means she consumes nothing that is a product of animals.

“I started about 16 years ago as a vegetarian,” she said. “But then I had a series of health challenges. I learned a lot about the role of nutrition in health and well being. I thought I could go further.”

She started by adding more raw food to her diet, but didn’t go 100 percent right away. The more she learned, the more she wanted to know how to prepare it, so she went to the Living Light Culinary Arts Institute in California to learn how to be a raw chef.

“It’s not nearly as in-depth as a typical culinary school,” she said.

Raw foodists believe raw foods contain enzymes which aid digestion, meaning that the body’s own enzymes may work unimpeded in regulating the body’s metabolic processes. They hold with the theory that heating food degrades or destroys these enzymes in food. They also believe raw foods have higher nutrient values than foods which have been cooked.

“I don’t heat anything past 105 degrees,” she said. “Other people think 110, but I say 105 is the point where enzymes start to die.”

Earlier, this month, Clark started a raw food “Meetup” group, with its first meeting on Jan. 7.

“Almost 50 people attended,” she said. “We didn’t anticipate that turn out, so 10 people had to stand the whole two hours.”

When people learn more about the raw food diet, Clark said, they begin to realize that it doesn’t have to just be salad.

“It’s not boring, which is what most people think,” she said. “We don’t eat carrot sticks all day. At my last cooking demonstration, I did pasta marinara.”

The sauce was “just like mom used to make,” she said, only it was not heated. The spaghetti was spiralized zucchini.

“If you don’t have a spiralizer, you can use a vegetable peeler and make linguini,” she said.

The food is prepared and served at room temperature, she said.

“We’re seeing more and more people look at this as an option,” she said. “The main reason, I think, is people are becoming more aware of the crap we put in our bodies.”

She also cited weight concerns and general health as reasons why people have turned to raw food diets.

“I have never felt better,” she said. “I have more energy, I think more clearly, I rarely get sick, and I need less sleep, all since I started eating raw.”

Amy Heinz is a recent convert of Clark’s. She has “dabbled” for about a year, but she has not yet gone 100 percent raw.

“I’m not there yet, and I’m not sure if I ever will be,” she said. “I try to eat at least one raw meal a day.”

Clark said this is not unusual.

“It doesn’t have to be all or nothing,” she said. “Just adding more raw foods into your diet will do a lot.”

Heinz said she decided to try the diet after seeing the effects it had on Clark.

“I saw her energy level increase, and I saw her health improve, and I couldn’t deny that there were positive changes,” she said.

One of the first things she noticed when she started eating raw, Heinz said, was that she was satisfied more quickly.

“Your body knows what to do with that food,” she said. “So I’m full and satisfied with less food.”

That can be of great value to people struggling with their weight, Clark said.

“I can eat whatever I want, whenever I want, as long as it’s vegan and raw, and I don’t have to worry about weight,” she said.

Heinz said once people try the food, and find out how good it tastes, the misconceptions disappear.

“The food is so good,” she said. “It really is good.”

When Clark goes out to a restaurant, if it isn’t busy and she knows there is a good chef on hand, she will ask the chef to prepare something for her.

“I had the best experience at Trostel’s Dish,” she said. “I just told the waiter that I wanted the chef to make me something vegan and uncooked, and he made me a wonderful assortment of things.”

Clark said she knows there probably won’t be a raw restaurant in Des Moines any time soon, but she hopes there can be more raw options on menus, especially as more and more people turn on to the idea of raw food.

“We have another ‘Meetup’ group meeting coming up, and it’s already booked,” she said. “Our next one is in March, and it’s two-thirds booked. And it’s not all repeat people. There are lots of new faces. So it is definitely a growing trend.”

She’s living proof, Clark said, as she feels better at 51 than she has ever before. RELISH

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“Alcohol is both the cause of and the cure for all the world’s problems.” — Homer Simpson

Tapping into drink trends

Old school beverages get a new school twist

By Jared Curtis

Every year there are numerous new spirits introduced to consumers. It seems like every month there is new vodka to try, and distilleries are popping up all over America. So we decided to take a look at three new trends — some that have already reached Iowa, and some that could be taking space on your local liquor store shelf in the near future.

Barrel aged beers
A long time ago, brewers served their beers in wooden barrels, unleashing a new flavor. Now the barrel beer is back and has already taken up a tap at El Bait Shop.

“We had a beer from Old Capital Brew Works called Farmer Brown Ale, and it was aged in Templeton Rye Whisky barrels,” said Jeff Bruning, a member of Full Court Press, owners of El Bait Shop, High Life Lounge, Red Monk and others. “I hope they continue to make it. It sold out really quick, and it was the most popular beer we offered at last year’s Brewfest.”

The tradition of aging beers in wooden barrels originated in Belgium. Rodenbach makes one of the more expansive brands available in America. It’s a tradition that not a lot of breweries have dabbled in, but the taste is unforgettable. When stored in the barrels, it offers an entirely new taste with the wood being home to dozens of wild yeasts that enhance the fermentation of residual sugars.

“The barrel aged beers are in limited supply,” said Bruning. “You’re not able to flood the market, which keeps the beer popular. People are excited about the process and are buying
up barrels.”

While barreled, the ale grows in acidity, aroma and depth of flavor. Bigger flavored beers such as stouts, bocks and barley wines are the best to draw flavor from the barrels. The beer needs a lot of malt to stand up to the overpowering flavors of oak.

“Spirits are very trendy. It seems like a new drink will come out and six months later it is gone because something new has replaced it,” said Bruning. “When I go somewhere, I’m always looking for beers I have never heard of. Beer never goes out of style.”

With some hard work and a little time, the barreled aged beer develops just like a wine would. It gives it a complex, varied flavor that will stimulate any beer drinker’s palate.

Iowa distilled spirits
Since 2005, Cedar Ridge Winery and Distillery has been creating quality wine and spirits made in Iowa. With 12 wines and seven sprits, they offer something for everybody.

“We want to offer our customers the chance to enjoy locally-produced spirits instead of the mass-produced products,” said owner Jeff Quint. “The trend of micro breweries and micro winery is in the past, and we think that micro distilleries will be the next big thing.”

Along with the wine, Cedar Ridge produces Clearheart Rum; Clearheart Vodka, which is 90 percent corn and 10 percent apple; Cedar Ridge Grappa, an Italian drink made from a hearty distilled wine; an Apple Brandy, which is Iowa’s only pure apple brandy that is fermented and aged on site and barreled in a single American oak barrel; Lemoncella Liquer, a super sweet “dessert in a bottle” and Clear Heart Gin, which is infused with juniper berries, coriander, fresh orange zest, fresh cucumber and orris root. A grape brandy, made from local vineyards will be available around Christmas time.

“We put a lot of care and pride in the product that we make,” said Quint. “We make our products in small batches, using a pot still. We have three factions — the head, the heart and the tail. We only bottle the heart. A big distillery can’t do that because they are constantly producing.”

VeeV
Making a huge splash on the west coast is a new drink called VeeV. People are calling Veev a HI-C for grownups that packs a punch. It’s a 60 proof distilled South American alternative to vodka. Veev is made with the acai berry, which offers antioxidants, vitamins C and E, fiber and protein, which allows you to party all night and feel terrific in the morning.

Being a very versatile drink, you can drink it on the rocks, mix it with champagne or add it to normal fruit juice to give it a kick. The acai berry is the exotic tasting fruit that was made popular by surfers and sports enthusiasts, and is thought to be the healthiest fruit on the planet. The target consumers are trendsetting, health-conscious 25-to-35-year-old professionals. Veev tastes slightly sweet with accents of berries, cherries and chocolate.

As a company, VeeV is all about “green living,” and all its promotional material is printed on recycled paper with soy ink. For every bottle served, $1 goes to the green initiatives that protect and sustain the Amazon Rainforest, which is the home of the acai berry. Although not yet available in Des Moines, just like every other trend, it will be here sooner or later. RELISH

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“The animals most prized come from the hills where there are still stands of ancient oaks. Their acorns build up the flesh.” — Waverley Root

Critics agree, La Quercia’s prosciutto is buonissimo

By Michael Swanger

Every now and then we Iowans need a gentle reminder from outsiders of just how good we have it when it comes to producing, buying and enjoying quality foods. Chock it up to the overactive sense of humbleness we were born and bred with, not to mention our agriculture roots that have instilled in us high expectations each time we visit the grocery store, farmers market and restaurant.

Chances are if you relish the taste of premium quality American prosciutto — Italian cured ham — you already know what foodies around the country are saying about La Quercia (pronounced La Kwair-cha) in Norwalk. If not, then you might want to consider that critics, restaurants and distributors from across the country are saying that some of the best — if not the best — American prosciutto is being processed 10 minutes south of Des Moines.

In February 2005, after having spent a few years making prosciutto in their basement, Herb and Kathy Eckhouse completed the construction of their processing plant in Norwalk and opened La Quercia. Seven months later, they sold their first prosciutto — the savory results of pork, salt and patience — and have since enjoyed heaping helpings of praise from food connoisseurs from the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, and Vogue and New Yorker magazine. Renowned wine critic Robert M. Parker Jr. called La Quercia’s Rossa “stunning,” and praised its Prosciutto Americano as “top, top quality.” The Rossa is one of only three hams in the world selected by Chef Daniel Boulud and his charcutier, Sylvain Gaston, to be included on their Bar Boulud menu. And last month, Hugh Garvey, the features editor for Bon Appetit, said the Eckhouse’s Prosciutto Americano is the best sausage in America you can’t buy because “there are only 50 or so of these pigs in the country, and they’ve already been spoken for by chefs like Mario Batali, Laurent Tourondel and David Burke.”

“On a personal level, it’s been really gratifying to get the kind of press we’ve received. We feel honored and humbled, because when you’ve worked hard to make something, you don’t know if it’s a success until people like it,” Kathy Eckhouse said. “On the business side, it has given us a degree of respectability in the food world. When you say you make gourmet food in Iowa, people laugh because they don’t associate Iowa with good food. They associate it with the caucuses, corn and the state fair. So it’s helped us get recognition so people don’t dismiss us.”

Acorn-fed Berkshire pigs bred by Becker Lane Organic Farm in Iowa, the Eckhouses said, are key to the success of their heritage breed pork sausage. The pigs gain 50 percent of their weight from an organic acorn diet. It’s an expensive method considering organic acorns cost about $60 a pound, which is why pigs sell for about $3,000. But critics and discerning fans agree it’s worth the price when you taste non-confinement pork.

“People are interested in food with a story,” She said. “They’re beginning to assess the kind of food they eat and the food systems being used. I think the standards we have are comforting to people who care where their food comes from.”

That kind of attention to detail is what makes La Quercia’s homemade Prosciutto Americano, its Green and Black label cousins, and a host of other products like its Rossa-Heirloom Breed Calaccia, Speck Americano and Prosciutto Piccante so special. The Eckhouses learned to make prosciutto the traditional Italian way of killing their hogs in November and salting and curing the hams for seven months while living for more than three years in Parma. Along the way, they have added a few American twists and turns of their own, including changes in trim, handling, salting and curing to appease American customers, processing thousands of pounds of fresh pork each year and converting it into hams that weigh between 6 and 8 pounds. The company name La Quercia even unites Iowa and Parma: it means “the Oak” in Italian, which is also the symbol of the province of Parma and the state tree in Iowa.

“When we lived in Parma, we used to joke that Parma was the Des Moines of Italy and Des Moines was the Parma of the Midwest — minus the 14th Century Baptistery in the middle of town,” Kathy Eckhouse said. “We wondered, ‘Why can’t we make value-added products in Iowa?’ Like Des Moines, Parma is surrounded by farmlands with corn and wheat. They take these things and make fabulous products out of them, though there’s nothing inheritantly wonderful about their products — it’s what they do with them. Here in Iowa, we have those wonderful products.”

Though restaurants from Las Vegas to Chicago to Boston use hams from La Quercia, Des Moines foodies can find them at Centro, Gateway Market, Wine Experience at Jordan Creek, The Embassy Club and the Des Moines Club. Kathy Eckhouse said products like hers are part of a growing trend in Des Moines where consumers are realizing the value of quality foods.

“One of the things that started happening in this country is we started making good wine, cheese, bread, coffee and Niman Ranch meat products, and you can see that happening in Des Moines,” she said. “When we moved to Des Moines in 1981, there were no espresso bars or artisan bread makers. But over the years, people have had the courage to try something new. Just look at the places that have opened in the past few years and the success of the farmer’s market in Des Moines. People respond to fresh local food, and they pay a premium price to have quality items. It’s a real development in Iowa and across the country.” RELISH

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