Category: Detroit

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Roasted Spring Lamb And Veg With Several Calls To The Suicide Prevention Hotline.

Five hours roasting at 150 Celsius or about 300 Fahrenheit and Maillard Reactions abound as lamb bone, flesh and skin browns, fat melts and a wondrous dark, umami aroma fills the kitchen and house.  Carbohydrate molecules and amino acids change and change in dry heat as colors and taste merge.  Fat molecules with the aid … Continue reading Roasted Spring Lamb And Veg With Several Calls To The Suicide Prevention Hotline.

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A Bog In Saint Clair Shores Surrounds White Castle, While Danger Doom Stirs The Pot.

Time to cook for the family, which means sledging the bog, digging the swamp, pouring the fat. Off to Eastern Market to gather onions, carrots, parsnips, garlic, mushrooms, potatoes, herbs, and oxtails and short ribs. Yes, oxtails and short ribs. Produce from local Michigan farmers gleams aisle after aisle. All that grows in the dark … Continue reading A Bog In Saint Clair Shores Surrounds White Castle, While Danger Doom Stirs The Pot.

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“White Castles” As My Son And I Watch “Rick And Morty,” While Space And Time Bubbles And Wobbles Away

Always there waiting when I arrive, though not always visited, not always directly acknowledged and approached like an itinerant believer noticing the grail, but in the end deferring.  Talked of often, gestured toward, but sometimes the car continues, the night passes.  But not tonight.  No, as I raise a glass of Michigan whiskey raised with … Continue reading “White Castles” As My Son And I Watch “Rick And Morty,” While Space And Time Bubbles And Wobbles Away

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Frank’s On The Avenue And Travis Restaurant: East Side Dining Comforts For The Weary Traveler.

Right off the train, through the streets of Windsor, under the Detroit River, past customs and down Jefferson Avenue and up to Harper Avenue, Lou and Deb speed me to Frank’s on the Avenue for what I crave most when I visit Michigan–coneys and chili.  “Two Coneys and Fries.”  It’s afternoon.  I think.  Time has … Continue reading Frank’s On The Avenue And Travis Restaurant: East Side Dining Comforts For The Weary Traveler.

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A Goulash For Angela Merkel While Dreaming About Solyanka, My Grandmother Dicing Onions, And The Hot Club Of Detroit.

Fifty years ago in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, tall pine trees face a perennial bed of bluebells, geraniums, Black-Eyed Susans, goldenrod and more all bordered by clusters of basil, sage, rosemary, and sweet marjoram.  St. Augustine grass covers an acre while a wide, asphalt drive slides down to a dirt road.  In the kitchen off the … Continue reading A Goulash For Angela Merkel While Dreaming About Solyanka, My Grandmother Dicing Onions, And The Hot Club Of Detroit.

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“Yes Donald, Immigrants Do Change Cultures, So Do You Want To Send Back The Coney Island?”

It truly amazes me how some Americans view this country, a group of states built from immigrants over and over across the centuries, and yet these cultural critics never appreciate nor understand.  Now with Donald as their mouthpiece, some outrageous delusions appear on my newsfeed, leaving me speechless but definitely hungry.  Take the Coney Island … Continue reading “Yes Donald, Immigrants Do Change Cultures, So Do You Want To Send Back The Coney Island?”

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From Monstrous Omelettes To A Giant Horse To Little Fish And A Dark Night Of The Gut.

I can’t eat another omelette.  Seriously, my first morning in Michigan I digested a Polish Omelette at Lake Breeze Restaurant in Harrison Township, then yesterday morning I polished off a Gyro Omelette at Leo’s Coney Island off Gratiot–six eggs in two days plus mystery meats, cheese and a scattering of vegetables. Look at it!  Amazing … Continue reading From Monstrous Omelettes To A Giant Horse To Little Fish And A Dark Night Of The Gut.

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Traveling Through Food Wastelands, Blended Scotch, Uncle Tupelo, And Onto Good Soil.

I’m reading a Chili’s Too menu at Bush Intercontinental Airport as the Bosnia/Nigeria World Cup game buzzes overhead and travelers from the states and the rest of the known world whisk in for a few sips of sacred water and then dash back out for their gates.  I’m flying Spirit Airlines tonight which means I … Continue reading Traveling Through Food Wastelands, Blended Scotch, Uncle Tupelo, And Onto Good Soil.

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From Small Goat Farms To Megafarms: The Shared Reality of Urban and Rural America.

Born in Royal Oak, Michigan, raised in Troy, I really didn’t interact with the city of Detroit until I went to Wayne State University located in mid-town, south of Grand Boulevard and what used to be the General Motors Building, and north of Cass Corridor and dire poverty.  My whole stay in the Metro-Detroit area … Continue reading From Small Goat Farms To Megafarms: The Shared Reality of Urban and Rural America.