The Greek Makeover: Diane Kochilas Freshens Up Greek Cooking

Genevieve Taylor is coming to Milk Street Radio

to answer your grilling questions.

“If you need new recipes or a bit of inspiration,”

we're here to help. Or you can try to stump me in Genevieve with your toughest grilling mysteries or food fights. Email us at [email protected]. One more time, that's [email protected].

And we'll be in touch. Hey, it's Christopher Kimble. This year, we're celebrating 10 years in Milk Street Radio by re-releasing a few of our favorite archival episodes. This one from 2019 features Greek cooking legend,

Diane Cochillus, our conversation actually inspired our kitchen in Milk Street to make a bunch of Diane's recipes from Rhode Island, E. Korea, including tomato rice with oregano and feta and E. Korean braised pork with honey, orange and rosemary.

Both recipes are linked in our episode notes. Now, please enjoy the show and come back Friday, March 27th for this week's brand new episode.

“This is most of your radio from Pierre Axe.”

I'm your host, Christopher Kimble. Today, Diane Cochillus, author of my Greek table, explains how to make great dishes with stale bread, the definition of Greek yogurt, and what Americans get wrong about cooking at home.

Americans tend to be very exacting and a little bit uptight for my experience when they cook, and it has to be convenient. And if it requires, you know, opening a package and actually emptying it into a pot, that's way too much work.

Okay, get it, get it, get it all out. Okay, let's go. I'm getting it all out. I'm getting it all out. I'm getting it all out.

Also coming up, we find out what happened when Colorado changed the legal definition of a sandwich. We present fresh new take on spaghetti puttinesca.

But first up today, it's my interview with Emily Wallace and Kate Medley.

They helped curate omolding night, one night only exhibit. In Durham, North Carolina, they invited community members to submit their best jello sculptures. Kate and Emily, welcome to Moxtree. We're glad to be here.

Yeah, thanks so much. So both of you have worked now on this whole issue of jello, on a history of jellots and maybe we could go back to the beginning. So jellotin was made from cabs feet among other things. And it wasn't until about the mid-19th century

that a real jellotin product was invented. But they were still using the boiling the cabs feet method well into the 1800s, right? That's our understanding, press. That it was sort of born out of this tradition of decadents

and royalty because it did demand such time and expense. And then it wasn't until the late 1800s and early 1900s that it was somewhat democratized by way of a cough syrup maker named Pearl B. Wait, who made a mixture of jellots and sugar and named that jello. So then what happens?

So now we have jello, it comes in a box. What did Americans do with that?

“I mean, I think a little bit of everything.”

In the cell, I think our experience was that congealed salads saw a huge rise as that, as a salad, as a vegetable dish. Could you explain that? Because I've seen the same thing at church suppers and Vermont for years. How did jello with celery and it or whatever it's got?

How did that become a salad? You'd have to ask my mother or many, many mothers and grandmothers in the cell. But growing up in Mississippi, I can count the times on one hand and the 80s it. We had a green salad to proceed, a fancy meal.

It was almost always a congealed salad.

And the one that my mother would always make was orange and had canned Mandarin or jellots and marshmallows in it. Yeah, that my mom still makes a Mandarin orange salad, is what she calls it. So tell us about omolding night, the jello exhibition,

how it got started and talk about some of the sample molds. Yeah, just about a year ago with another friend and colleague, Kate Alaya, we put together an exhibit that was a pop-up art show of about 40 entries of molded foods. Some of them were very appealing, as you really want to eat them. Some of them were a little bit less appealing.

Just talk about the visuals here, where were the ones you guys really liked a lot. Visually. When I loved a name and sort of visually was called Bojello, which it took its cue from a southern fried chicken chain, Bojangles, and featured as the base sweet tea,

and then fried chicken tenders inside, and then had piping of Bojangles mashed potatoes around the edge. This is pretty inspired. Do some of these really taste great, too?

Some of them tasted terrible, but a lot of them tasted great.

“Like what was your favorite couple of your favorites?”

I mean, the yellow gin fizz was awesome. The Lady Edison pork jelly, which visually somewhat resembled a brain, was definitely a crowd favorite taste wise. Yes, same, there was one that was shaped like a boot that was, it was all made out of the crushed pineapple, and sort of other fruits that

it really sort of hardened back to what I grew up with. So what were one or two of the ones that looked better than they tasted? I have to go on the record and say this.

I'm just kidding. Bojello was beautiful.

I mean, it was one of my favorite molds, but it required a lot of gelatin to make the chicken tenders stay upright in the-- So I had that sort of nasty bitter flavor. Yeah, then also a chicken tender and a congealed salad is not that great. As it turns out, yeah, who was the father?

Right, right. So where are we headed with jello these days? Are jellets and sails falling?

“Or is the south still making lots of jello salads and and Vermont churches?”

It's a great question. When we put together this art show, we didn't know if it doesn't people would show up or 25. We were surprised to have about 500 people show up, which, you know, I'm going to go out on a limb and say jelleth come back. So anything else you love or interesting entries in the exhibit?

There was one particularly interesting entry from a woman named gingerwag, who is a performance artist based in Carber and North Carolina. And so she was the mold and she draped her body in sheets of fruit leather, apple flavor, if memory serves. And she stood on that pedestal all night encouraging people to pull the sheets of fruit leather off her body and taste them.

I will say from an official capacity, we were lucky our very newly elected Mayor of Durham Steve Scholl agreed to be one of the judges for the event. And it was so funny the night before Kate received a couple of emails from him where he had stayed up late writing lyrics about jello. Did you have any of the lyrics? I brought one. Okay.

So this is from Mayor Steve Scholl who was one of three judges for what we called the shimmies. Their once was a large orange aspect who's sagging was really quite drastic. The diners all giggled as it juggled and jiggled, but that aspect proved rather elastic.

“Well, at least that's a good use of the time of an elected official though, right?”

I mean it could be worse. Right? And it was like one of the first things he did in office.

So these were the shimmie awards in what were the different categories and what one? The best in show was called the crown molding. We had the best jiggle. The judges went around and kind of poked each mold. It was called the back that aspect award. And that went to Debbie Moose who created what she called the wobbly white house. So it was a very unstable white house made of jellington.

We had the my jello americans choice award and that went to a musician, a folklorist, Sarah Bell, who recreated a philia drowning out of aspect. Wow. It was crazy ahead of all these delicate herbs and flowers around it. Really stunning. I mean, I saw a woman cry by it, not kidding. No, no, no, no, no, no. One of the people who came to the awards was actually crying next to us. She teared up. So it happened. So so this is like the world's nightmare buffet, right?

Because once you start cutting into these things, things got messy pretty quickly. I mean, it probably was kind of a mess by the time the night was over, right? They had to have the carpets professionally. Yes, and next time is going to say we haven't been invited back yet, but we're holding out. Well, are the shimmies now going to be an annual event? I think it's fabulous. There's been a lot of requests for that. There seems to be a lot of

interest in seeing the shimmies go down again. But I will say part of the magic of this whole event crest was conjuring it up and not really knowing what to expect from. And all these people really taking a chance on this pretty wacky concept and really over-delivering it every turn. That's pretty magical. Okay, Namely, thank you. Oh, moldy night, the Jello exhibition was a huge success and one person actually cried. Thank you so much. Thank you for having us.

That was Emily Wallace and Kate Medley. You can check out photos from the Oh, moldy night exhibit on our website, milkstreetradio.com. Right now, my co-host Sarah Moulton, I will

and the star of Sarah's weeknight meals on public television. Sarah, how are you?

“I'm great, Chris, and I think it's time to get to the farms. Open up the lines. Let's go.”

Welcome to Milk Street, who's gone? Hi, this is Will from Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Will, how are you? I'm great, are you? Pretty good. So I have been having a trouble since I was in my

20s. I've tried it again in my 30s and in my 40s, I can never get dry beans to cook in time.

No matter what the recipe says, I double or triple it and then it takes another two hours. You're cooking them in the same place. You haven't moved to different places in the country. This is the same. You know, I've tried different places. You know, I've lived here in Chapel Hill for a long time. So I've done most of my cooking, but if I've tried internationally as well. And you're talking about any dried bean. Any dried beans? I've tried black beans. I've tried your

black bean soup recipe. I've tried the little red beans that are common in Central America. You said something about doubling or tripling the recipe? I double it's triple the cooking time. Oh. And it seems like the even then like when it's almost meal time, like there's a little bit

of firmness there that you buying the beans always from where?

From different places, local supermarket, but again, it's been multiple places. Do you soak the beans overnight? I've done that some of the time. It seems to help, but it still doesn't seem to do everything. Do you add acid of some kind like tomatoes or something when you're cooking the beans? Let's see. I'm not all the time. I tried just cooking the red beans plain and I've tried the black

bean soup recipe are the two ones I've tried most recently. The three things, the only three

“things we know, hard water, we could slow down cooking to adding acid. You should not add”

acid. I said we'll slow down the cooking because the water is a hard time getting through the outer layer. And then if the beans are really old, the age of the beans. But you've done this in different places so it can't be the hard water. I wouldn't think you're buying beans from different

places so that's probably not it. And you don't always add acid or tomato to the beans when

you cook them. You know what? I would say something I learned from Chris is soaking the beans overnight in salted water makes a huge difference. Silky water? Yes. Okay. Because it tenderizes the skins and also flavors the beans. It's like brining the beans. But they will cook better more evenly and also soaking them overnight means they will cook in less time. Chris, you know if there's an actual ratio of salt or just it should taste a little. Two tablespoons of diamond

crystal salt, not table salt. Two quarts of waters. That's right. I think in general that will certainly cut down your cooking time because they absorb a tremendous amount of water overnight that they're double the volume. Yeah. For years we said don't salt. No, it was just like acid. Those are the things you shouldn't do. So it turns out that if you don't salt the beans ahead of time you don't get much flavor in the beans. We found it didn't slow down the cooking time. That was

not true. No. They freeze beautifully. You know you can freeze them and cook them. Oh really? Yeah. That's good. That's good. It's a great thing to have in the freezer. And you can freeze rice, too. Yeah. I would try that. I would try that. Soak in when salted water that should really help a lot. Yeah. Yeah. I'll keep at it. Okay. Thanks. Well. Take care. Take care. Thank you guys. I love you more. Bye. Welcome to Milk Street. Who's calling? Hi. This is Joseph from Austin, Texas. Oh, I love Austin,

Texas. How can we help you today? Yeah. I was having trouble baking sweet potato fries. I've tried a lot of different methods. I've tried different oils. I've tried different cuts. I've even tried different sweet potatoes. And I could never seem to get them crisp. They're usually soggy. Well, that's understandable. They don't have the same starch as white potatoes. So, you know,

“you have to give them a little extra help. One thing that I think would help enormously is to”

toss them in some cornstarch. You know, just lightly coat them and cook them in a hot oven like 425 or 50 on an oil tray and don't crowd them. I assume you're not crowded them. No, no. That was one of the things that I felt that did work. I cut them into larger pieces and I've a sprays the tray with oil as well to kind of help keep it from sticking and burning. But those are the only things I've done that's really how about not try the cornstarch. But that might be a good idea. Is there

anything to do it's like the placement of the oven rack that could help? I would say to cook them in the middle of the oven to tell you the truth. Are you preheating the baking pan? Not the baking

and that would really help. The other problem is let's just be honest for a moment. I've tried to

make sweet potato fries many times. They never come out as well as a regular crispy fry. Because

there's this full of moisture and the starch is very different texture. I use a lot of heat and preheated pan with certainly help and also I've taught a lot of people restaurants about making fries and a lot of people use potato starch which you can also buy in the supermarket. So you might want to try potato starch instead of cornstarch. I would cut them thinner so that you have a higher ratio of outside to inside. I agree. And the other thing is just turn them once. So put them in, say,

a 4/20 oven and they'll get a little brown around the edges, particularly the ends, but don't worry about it, but just turn them once, turn them at 15 minutes and other than that, don't mess with them. Why only flip them once? So they get more of a crust because if you keep moving them, they won't.

“Good point. Yeah. Anyway, I think all of that will help.”

Okay. Okay. And so put them in there for 15 minutes, flip them once and then put them in for the rest of the time. Another 15. So I'd say about a half an hour total or until they're close now, we need to be a 4/25 or 4/50, it might be less than that. Yeah. Well watch them. It's like anything else. You know, the old famous thing that chefs used to say or until they're done, which essentially means pay attention. Don't just rely on a timer. And let us know how it goes.

Okay. I will. Thank you. You're shot. Hope it works. All right, Joseph. All right. Thanks. Bye bye. This is Milk Street Radio. If you have a cooking question or need to resolve a culinary debate, call us 855-426-984-31 more time, 855-426-984-3 or email us at [email protected]. Welcome to Milk Street, who's calling? This is Leah. I'm calling from Lexington, Massachusetts. How are you? I'm well. How are you? You sound familiar. Yes. So I called you a little while ago

about a problem I was having making a gluten-free and dairy-free key lime terts. And I was having trouble getting it to sex. With this recipe where you had to fold in egg whites. And then somehow when I took it out of the oven, it's just all of the filling sort of leaked through the bottom of the pie crust of sort of a disaster. But my kids actually called it the key lime disaster and they loved it because they ate the entire

thing they tried. It was so delicious. So I was really determined to make it work.

“And you suggested that I try adding sugar to the egg whites. I think Sarah suggested that.”

Right. Because I was using a sort of coconut-based, evaporated milk product. So I tried Sarah's trick and then I really misbehaved with the scientific method because I actually changed three things at once. And it worked. I did use Sarah's suggestion with the egg rice. And the thing that I did differently this time was I found a sweetened condensed coconut milk.

Whereas the first time I had used evaporated coconut milk and added sugar and boiled it down.

But I don't think I boiled it down enough. Oh, that's interesting. Because that's fair. I didn't know there was a sweetened condensed. It's just labeled sweetened condensed coconut milk. Where did you find it? Where did you buy it? I bought it at Whole Foods. Really? Okay. That's terrific. Because that means it's pretty, you know, available. That was the first thing I changed. And then the second thing I changed was adding some sugar to

“the egg whites, which definitely did stabilize them at that I think. And then the third thing I did.”

And maybe you can tell me why this happened. I had to bake it twice as long as the recipe suggested. And how long it went temperature? I think it was at 375. I baked it for over half an hour. Well, then the original recipe said 15 minutes. I think over half an hour sounds right to me. Yeah, I think the original recipe was wrong. Or there was something else in it that made it set up fast. But if you think about a custard pie like a pumpkin pie, yeah, you would bake it more than 15 minutes.

Absolutely. Well, that's a happy ending. You get cracked on it. It was so good. We ate the entire thing in two days. So the kids liked it as much as the disastrous version? They loved it much more. But that is a happy ending for you. Chris and I both now know about a new ingredient, which is

I've never heard of a sweet and condensed coconut milk, coconut milk. Good to know. Wonderful.

Yeah, congratulations. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Okay. Take care. Oh, geez. You want to take a victory lap now, sir? I do. I do. I do. You're listening to Military Radio. I'm Christopher Kimball. Up next, my interview with Diane Cochelis, author of My Greek Table. That's coming up after the break.

born and bred New Yorker, but she found happiness on the Greek island of Icaria, her father's home.

Cochelis is the author of 18 books on Greek and Mediterranean cuisine. Her latest is My Greek Table. Diane, how are you? Welcome to Mylch Street. Thank you. I'm a pleasure to have you right in the studio. I love your book, My Greek Table. You know, it's not just Spanish Copa, yet again. You've really taken a fresh look at a lot of these recipes and also I learned a lot about how to cook from the book. I mean, the idea of how to put things together. Coming from you, that's a tremendous

compliment. I'm always looking for better ways to cook. So let's go back. You were young when your father died. You were 10 years old. You eventually went back to his village. Just tell us about the village and what that experience was like. Well, that was 1972. Greece was a completely different place. It was very still very pure. And especially place like Icaria, which was completely off the

“beaten track. It took us, I think it was a 16-hour ferry boat ride. And then another two or three hours”

to get to our side of the island on these incredible dirt roads that I had never, you know, experienced

before it. The island at the time had just been recently wired free electricity. So people were still living a very, very traditional lifestyle. And I was a New York City kid. So it really, I remember my reaction was very visceral. And I remember thinking to myself, back then, I totally get this place and I totally love it. The feeling of inner freedom that I experienced at that age, and then in suing summers after that, that has definitely shaped my life in the best possible ways.

Does that freedom still exist today? Increase you. You mentioned that back in the 70s was a different place than today. How has it changed? It does exist. It certainly exists Sanicaria. I mean, you know, this idea that you can, if you're in the village, things are open until really, really late. Or I should say until really early in the morning. And it's not unusual to see kids out in the town, you know, sort of square, playing as their parents are having dinner,

late dinners, you know, or then moving on to have maybe a glass of wine somewhere. And then friends

“come by. It's this very, a very unstructured existence, which I think is the key to, you know,”

inner happiness. I mean, you know, they're, we're not ruled by the clock. And that's something that I think people, at least from that island, from the El Nviqadi, are carrying their DNA. Let's talk about food. Still bread. I just love every culture that uses simple ingredients, sour milk, still bread. So how do you use still bread in your cooking? There are some really interesting recipes. Old recipes probably not, not in use anymore, but, you know, a few of the

classic dips that we know, things that are almost, you know, in the sort of common lingonale, like scordalial, the garlic dip, taramostalata, the fish row, spread that you find in Greek restaurants. Those often utilize still bread. There are a few recipes. There's one recipe from the island of Tinos. It's, there's a, to local recipe for kind of like, um, it's almost like a bread pudding,

but, you know, that's not really a concept that Greeks are familiar with, but it's basically

still bread and artichokes and cheese and eggs baked together. Also, let's talk about clay pot, probably. You know, is there something special about cooking with that kind of pot that's very

“different for you than cooking with a metal pot? I think there is, um, I have a few clay pots.”

There are some clay pots that are specific to different regions in Greece and shaped accordingly. And one of the one of the sweetest experiences I've ever had there was on the island of Seefnose, and on Sunday mornings, this is still a tradition. The, actually on Saturday evenings, local family is bringing this, it's a, it's a tall clay pot that's somewhat tapered at the top, so it's a narrow, sort of a narrow mouth and then a wider base and there's a cover,

and oftentimes they'll seal, they'll seal it with a little bit of dough, but they make a traditional

which is not fired up, but it's still quite warm and it, you know, sits there all night.

If this still happens, yes, this still happens and on Sunday mornings after church, the family's go by the, the bakery and the baker knows, you know, which pot belongs to which family and that's, you know, that's still a tradition, but in terms of the flavor that, that clay in parts, I mean, I think that clay has memory, I think it has flavor memory and it, it becomes more complex, you know, the more you use a clay pot,

the richer that memory becomes. So there are places in the book where I'm going like, okay, Diane's like pushing the envelope now, like making file. Okay, so just talk to me about why, I only have so many years left, should I spend some substantial portion of that time trying to make my home free. I'll be really, oh, you need, just spend 15 minutes with me and I'll teach you how to do it. It's really easy. So how do you make it? It's, it's very easy. I mean,

we're not, there's, there's filo and there's filo. So I'm not talking about the really thin,

“you know, the gossamer sheets that you need to stretch over a pastry table, you know, that's,”

that's a different art. And it's not, that's, it's not that difficult to do that, but, you know, you do need a certain skill level, which I'm sure you have, but to make filo at home for a nice, you know, spinach pie or any other kind of savory pie is basically, it's almost a two-to-one ratio of flour to liquid. So say I've got a pound of four cups of flour. That's about, you know, this is not an exact art, but it's about one, it's a little bit more than one and three-quarter cups

of liquid. And again, that might need to, it might be a combination of water and olive oil or water,

olive oil and Greek yogurt, which gives the final texture of certain springiness. And I always put

something else acidic in there, so either vinegar or a little bit of wine or maybe some oozo for flavor. I knew the oozo was going to show up. Yeah, of course. Well, it just, it's this nice, underlying sort of freshness. And then, which is with a rolling pin, it's extremely easy to work with. It's very durable. From a ball, say about two inches in diameter, you'll probably get a piece easily get a piece. You'll easily get a piece that's 18 inches. Really? In diameter, yeah.

Finally rolled out. Yeah, it's easy to do. It's much easier than people think. And very gratifying, right? I mean, you know, for me, I don't know, the two, two cheapest shrinks are, you know, swimming and making dough. Let's talk about Greek yogurt. So this is an opportunity for you to vent about Greek yogurt in the supermarket. So go right ahead. Well, some of the Greek yogurt in American supermarkets is pretty authentic. And some of it is not authentic. It's, it's been thickened with

“various thickening agents. It hasn't really been strained. That's, you know, that's what you're looking for.”

I mean, for me, I think to my mind and to my palate, the greatest difference is that the American palette is not, it's, it's not in order to sour sour taste. So Greek yogurt has been is less sour in this country. If you go to, you know, small producers in Greece, the yogurt is incredibly sour. It's so delicious. And there are different, there are different types of yogurt in Greece. So what we know is Greek yogurt in the United States is actually just one of several

different types of yogurt. There's a wonderful, cheap smoke yogurt that comes usually in a little clay bowl with, you know, the skin on top and it's, it's just a dive for it. It's so delicious. You grew up in New York. I did. You spent a lot of time in Greece. You have a house there now. Could you just talk about how Americans cook versus, I know this is so general versus the

way Greeks cook? Greeks, you know, wherever they are on the planet, never think there's enough food.

There's always, you know, more than anyone can possibly eat and they never get thrown away, either gets given away to the guests, you know, where they are or, you know, eat the next day, repurposed, whatever. And there are lots of recipes for, you know, lots of repurposed lentil dishes,

“for example, and other things. But, so I mean, I think that's, those are two main differences.”

Americans tend to be very exacting and a little bit uptight for my experience when they cook. And I think a lot of that just comes from being so, you know, especially the, you know, the last couple of generations, the last 20 or 30 years. I mean, people have

you know, opening a package and actually emptying it into a pot and then actually heating it,

that's way too much work. You can't get done. Get it all out. Yeah. I'm getting it all out. I'm getting it all out. I'm getting it all out. But I mean, I cook every day for my kids.

“But I think for me, that's the main lesson when you're, when you're teaching somebody how to cook,”

is really, get, take a look at it, understand kind of the basic components, you know, learn to be flexible if you don't have parsley in the house and you have basil or, you know, vice versa, you can most likely switch things out without ruining a recipe or without changing its identity. So kind of just relax, pour yourself a glass of wine and have a good time. Diane, this has been an enormous pleasure. Thank you for joining us here at MilkStream.

It was, thank you for having me.

That was Chef and Cookbook author, Diane Cochillist. Her latest book is called Migrate Table, authentic flavors and modern home cooking for my kitchen for two years. So what happened to Greek cooking? Back in the 70s, it was a really hot cuisine. Greek yogurt with sacaca, tomato copata, pastizio, saganaki, suvlaki, tatsiki, feta fava, grilled octopus. Of course, Greek salad, Greek coffee and uzzo.

And the 70s also had David Bowie, Star Wars, Led Zeppelin and Starsky and Hutch. So it's time to rethink the 70s. Maybe the lava lamp wasn't such a bad idea after all. It's time to chat with Catherine's smart about this week's recipes, spaghetti, puttanesca. Catherine, how are you? I'm good, Chris. Our editor, Jamhurst, just came back from Naples. He spends a lot of time in Italy.

Because we discover the Italians cook some classics totally differently than the way we think we should cook them here. Naples is home to puttanesca that tends to be a saucy dish. We think

“simmer is a long time. It uses anchovies. It turns out it's none of those things. What is it?”

Well, Chris, it is a simple kind of pantry pasta, but actually you make the sauce in a skillet. It comes together really quickly. It's reduced down to a really, really thick sauce. It's not at all watery or soupy. And it has a lot of flavor but not from anchovies. There's a couple kinds of olives, there's capers, and it's a really flavorful sauce to be absorbed by the pasta. Nothing is sacred. No anchovies and puttanesca. Now the other thing is,

every time I've gone to Italy, I never get garlic breath. And I've asked this question for 40 years.

Now, why is it in Italy? You don't get overpowered by garlic. Well, in this recipe, they do something really interesting with the garlic. What do they do? That's right, Chris. So before you saute any of your aromatics, you're actually making a garlic oil. You cook the cloves of garlic in the oil and once they've released their flavor, you toss those cloves. So you cook this sauce, which is sort of on the dry side. You cook your

pasta. How do you finish? Well, you want to make sure you're cooking your pasta shyvelle dentakes that's going to finish in the sauce. You're going to add some reserved juice from those canned tomatoes you're going to use as well as some of the pasta water. And you're going to finish cooking the pasta in the sauce. What really absorbs most of the flavor? So a 20 minute puttanesca sauce, it's obviously a great pantry sauce. It's not garlicly, no anchovies. And

it's easy to make. Thank you. Thanks, Chris. You can find the recipe for spaghetti puttanesca at 177milk3.com. You're listening to Milk Street Radio, coming up Dan Pashman and I discussed the legal definition of a sandwich. We'll be right back. This is Most Jea Radio. I'm Christopher Kimball. Right now, Sarah Malton, I will be tackling

“a few more of your culinary questions. Welcome to Milk Street, who's calling?”

Negina Cole from Phoenix, Arizona. Hello, Negina. How can we help you today? I mystify by Vietnamese or Thai fish sauce. Tell us how. Well, I thought it was the new big thing to use and I'm a fairly creative and adventurous cook, but I did not like this. What was the recipe used it and how much did you use? I used it with shrimp. It was kind of a marinade and it was way too salty and it had lime juice in it and it was way too sour. Was it a sauce or just a marinod

for the shrimp? Well, it was supposed to be a marinod and it's supposed to be grilled, but I wasn't grilling so I thought I'd use it as kind of a diversion of a scampy that was not good. So now the words he used it is sauce? Right. Oh, well. That's from there. I mean, if you're going to use fish sauce as part of a marinod, that would be quite different than

the bottle, you'd be like, why would I ever add this to any of that? I mean, fish sauce, first of all,

if you're going to get a really good brand, they are first press, you know, it's the stuff that comes out of the barrel the first time. And secondly, use very small amounts of it. I mean, if you don't agree with you, a large amount, like in a sauce, you know, I might use half a teaspoon. I mean, you sound like you used a couple tablespoons for something. Yeah. Okay. Well, there you go. That'll do it. What anchovies do to seize their salad is sort of the genus they quah. It's like the umami,

it's like the salt. And I think that fish sauce does the same thing in the recipe. It used properly in recipes. The salt and the umami sort of at the base, you sometimes don't even taste the

“fish. You should not be able to taste anything fishing. Okay. So much is more is what you're”

telling. Just use a very small amount. It's one of those secret ingredients you could add to a

stew or soup. Just a tiny bit. And it gives you a little foundation, but no one will ever know it's there. If you want to add a salty element to something, just a tiny bit, reach for it and see what happens. And I think you'll be happy. Just use small amounts. Yeah. Red boat is a good supermarket fish sauce, but just don't use too much. That's very helpful. Don't put a lot of it in a sauce. Yeah. All right. Circle back and try to give. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Take care. Bye bye.

Welcome to Milks Street, who's calling? Hi, this is Terran. How are you? Where are you calling from? I'm good. Thank you. I'm calling from the Seattle area. So how can we help you? I have a question about mulchet barley. After somebody around with digestive issues three years,

I finally figured out that I'm allergic to barley. Not we are gluten. And with more research,

I realized that most flower-based products have mulchet barley in them. And nearly every all-purpose flower has mulchet barley in it too. So I've completely given up on eating bread from restaurants, a great grocery store because even if it's not listed in the ingredients, I often have a reaction to it. So my question is, what is the purpose of mulchet barley flower? Is it a taste factor, a texture component? What is it at? Sarah, she's the expert when I don't know the answer.

I think it's because yeast feeds off it, right? Yeah, it gives it sort of jump start. Jump start.

“Exactly. I think that's why. But you know, I believe that pastry and cake flour don't”

have added mulchet barley. So if you were going to start baking at home or are you baking at home? I do bake at home. I just look at the ingredients. So Bob's Red Mel, they have a few flowers that do not have any mulched barley in it. But just like you said, but don't add some cakes. I can buy those and eat those because they're fine. Yeah, but I'm just curious why they're so often an even cracker, which I would think are not yeast in. Well, that's an excellent point.

That isn't bad. Well, let's go back. So I would assume a big mistake that on the packaging, like King Arthur Flower, for example, if there was mulched flower barley in it, it would be on the package. That character not. Yes, it is. There'll be an ingredients list. So does something like King Arthur have mulched barley in it? Yes. Yes. You know, it's silly because you could also sugar, and there's also sugar and flour. You know, sugar and starch

would give the same jump start to yeast. So why do they have to add mulched barley? I don't know. But that's apparently the point is it gives it sort of a star. Because somebody somewhere has a warehouse

“full of mulched barley. You know, it's like corn syrup, right? Right. That's what we have ethanol.”

Right. So your answer now is you just use Bob's Red Mel flower or you just stay away from it entirely. No, I do eat flour. I make bread at home. You know, I just make sure that stuff that doesn't have the mulched barley in it. That's really interesting. Well, I don't think when they put mulched barley in flour, like a five pound bag or something, I don't think they're putting very much in it. It's not one pound of mulched barley in four pounds of flour. It's just a very

simple amount. I don't think it's there for flavor at all. Yeah. I think it's more for the chemical reaction. Maybe mulched barley reacts with baking soda, baking powder in some way. Of course, crackers probably don't use either of those. It's crazy. Why would you use it in crackers? Sarah, you're job. Yes. If you choose to accept it, it's to figure out why they put mulched barley in crack. Okay. Let's find out. Okay. I will find out. I'm making a note.

I've got a pen here. Good. Oh, you're so old fashioned. Yes. Tara, thank you very much. That was a great question. Yes. Yeah. That's perfect. Yeah. Thank you. I appreciate your help. Take care. Take care. Have a good day. Bye bye. You're listening to Mel Street Radio. If you have a cooking question, give us a call, 855-426-984-3, that's 855-426-984-3, or email us at [email protected].

Welcome to Mel Street, who's calling? Hi, this is Paige. Hi, Paige. We're calling from Colorado. Okay.

house, and we make a lot of that. We've been trying to cook our way through each issue. And my husband and I have a bit of a disagreement about whether we can just mix and match any recipes, or whether we should stick with a certain region in pairing our recipes together. I wonder if you had any guidance on that? Well, I'll give me an example. What are two of the things you want to pair together in your husband says? Wait, just a little bit of work. One that we had a dispute

about was hoisin glaze, baby back ribs, with the bag Nikata and steam broccoli.

And I said no way, Jose. I'm with you. First of all, I don't tend to make a lot of dishes.

I'd make one dish, and I serve it with something simple, like a salad or rice or something.

“I think if you had a profile from Thailand, and mixed that with something from North Africa,”

and then something from Wahaka, yeah, I just think that's weird. Sarah? Wonderful. You know, it's interesting because I think she just wants to get off the call next. We get for the answer, she wanted. We said you win, so she's like, okay, I'm good. I think, so I'm of two minds. One is, I like to keep it within the cuisine. For me, what's more important is if I'm eating a meal, and everything is sweet, or everything is acid, or everything is fatty, I don't like that.

That's a good point. So I'd rather have something, let's say something's fatty in the meal. I don't

care what nationality it is, than I want some sort of acidic dish to go with it. If you've got something spicy, you're going to want to have something either dairy or sweet. You know, that sort of thing. So that's where I would go. If you have a profile with white pepper, fish sauce, et cetera, from Cambodia, whatever, and then you have a dish that's cumin and coriander, et cetera, lentils from the Middle East. I can't get my head around shifting clashes. That's great. That

“question. I think there's one exception to the rule. There are recipes from different cultures,”

like simple salads and things. Like, you know, guacamole or hummus can go with a lot of different things. So there's some fairly neutral recipes that are not extreme examples of the spice flavor or the flavor profile of that region of the world that can go with almost anything. In most of you, for example, there's a gauze in guacamole, right? With sesame seeds and yogurt and with the avocado, that could be used in many different guises. But if you have something that's very particular to

a region, I think you can't mix. I agree with you page about the poison ribs in the bond you count. I don't think I'd like that either. Doesn't make sense. What would you pair with the saffron risotto? Well, saffron risotto, you could pair with almost anything. I mean, you could have a grilled meat or grilled fish or something. You could have a protein of some kind. You could be a first course, like they would do that in Italy, and then you just have a second course, which is meat or fish.

That's funny. That has obviously a saffron taste, but besides that, it's not very complicated. It's not challenging. It's creamy. It's cheesy. Anyway, page at your right. Your right. Your husband is actually a little right, too. I think sometimes it's okay to have different dishes from different

cuisines as long as their flavor profiles work well together. Sarah's always was people to be

“happily married. That's why he's trying to throw my past that along. I'll give him that challenge.”

For a whole page. Thanks for calling. Thanks for calling. Thank you. Bye, bye, bye, bye. Now it's time for the unpredictable and also un-sensored and damaged. Dan, how are you? I'm doing well, Chris. How are you? Pretty good. What do you got for me this week? So, you know, Chris, the what has not become a sort of classic food debate? Is a hot dog a sandwich? In recent years, it's taken on new dimensions. You thought

that that was a simple sort of a fun social media debate. You know, you argue, you move on, you know, ha ha, all right. Turns out that the way that we define our foods has legal implications. It has tax implications. So, for example, in the state of Colorado, certain bars are required to serve sandwiches and snacks in order to maintain their liquor licenses. So, the the bars went to the the law officials and said, what does that mean? What are sandwiches? So, a ruling was issued

that said sandwiches as used in articles 47 and 48 of title 12 CRS are defined as single-servant items such as hamburgers, hot dogs, frozen pizzas, burritos, chicken wings, etc. What? Right. I mean, this is a real problem. I mean, like, why do we even have words if a chicken wing is a sandwich? Ha, are you going to be on the Supreme Court soon? I hope so. So, chicken wings are now sandwiches. According to Colorado, as are by the way burritos, and this is more of a gray area,

what's your take on burritos, Chris? Our burritos sandwiches. No, they're burritos. So, are there

case law I thought I would share with you, Chris. This happened a few years back in your home

“state of Massachusetts in Worcester, Mass. There was a panera that had one of their, you know,”

bread sandwich places in a strip mall, and another company came in and wanted to open a burrito joint in the same strip mall. And panera's lease says no other sandwich shops in the strip mall. So, panera said you can't open a burrito shop here because burritos are sandwiches. And the case went to court and a judge in Massachusetts ruled that a burrito is not a sandwich. So, this is a, this is not a federal issue. This is a state by state issue. The USDA has its own definition of a

sandwich, which is essentially two pieces of bread or a split roll with meat or poultry inside, which seems terribly outdated. Like according to the USDA, there's no such thing as a vegetarian

sandwich. Like a grilled cheese is not a sandwich. Well, there's no such thing as a grilled cheese sandwich,

or a peanut butter sandwich. Right. I mean, does that not strike you as ludicrous? Essentially, since sandwiches in the title of the dish. Yeah. But, but originally, if you look at that newspaper article from Coney Island in the late 18 or early 1900s, they called it a hot dog sandwich. Do you think anything that is meaty is a sandwich, or do you think, are you a strict constitutionalist here? I agree with you that a burrito is not a sandwich. I do believe that a hot dog is a sandwich,

because I am a strict constructionist, Chris, and I do believe we should look at the framers original intent. The Earl of Sandwich wanted a food that he could pick up and eat with his hands. And not get his hands dirty. Some people say he was addicted to gambling and he knew his hands free to gamble. Some people said that it was because he was running the royal navy, and he was just very busy. Maybe he was very busy running the royal navy and gambling. But the point is he needed

to eat on the go. And so he put some meat between two pieces of bread in the sandwich was born. And

“I think that the criteria for sandwich are twofold. First of all, you need to be able to pick it up”

and eat it without your hands touching the fillings. That's an excellent definition. I like that. And then the other thing is that the fillings must be sandwiched between two discrete food items. It does not have to be bread, but you got to have two discrete food items. Now I know what you're saying, Chris, you're saying two discrete food items, but a hot dog is on a bun, a bun is one food item. It's one piece of bread. But I think that the hinged bun or sliced roll should count

because it's like a meatball sub. Like you're not going to tell me a meatball sub is not a sandwich. Of course it's a sandwich, right? You now sound exactly like a constitutional lawyer standing in front of the Supreme Court argument about the definition of sandwich. I'll think that is the compliment, Chris. I mean, look, you're going to get a kick out of this, but I actually, this is 100% true. Like that case in Worcester Mass with the Panera and the burrito place,

there was an almost identical case in Canada and I was called as an expert witness. And I had to write an affidavit. What did the affidavit say? What was the case? It's said that a burrito is not a sandwich. And so the burrito place should be able to be open next to the sandwich place. And for the reason I laid out my definition of a sandwich. I said that a burrito is a wrap. People don't like when I call it a wrap because they think of like American sandwich wraps, which are often not so good,

but the truth is like a wrap is just a name for a structure. And so a burrito is a wrap.

And that's where I stand. Well, I just want listeners to milk street to know that they've heard it here first. That's right. I just wish that our politicians would stop grandstanding and start talking about the real issues in our country. And we have different states. They can't agree. The USDA says it has to have meat and it to be a sandwich. I mean, what are these people doing with our tax payer dollars? I've not sorting out these pressing legal issues, Chris.

“David Pageman, thank you for the legal definition of a sandwich. I will remember that always. Thank you,”

Dan. Thanks, Chris. That was Dan Pashman of the Sportful. Pashman says that a burrito is not a sandwich. It's a wrap. So when acquiring culinary minds, it might also ask when is a super stew or when it's a cake a tort. Cooking and eating are full of uncertainties. And that's why cooking is called an art. So here's an idea. Let's just enjoy the hotdog instead of worrying about legally speaking, whether it's really

a sandwich. That's it for today. If you tune to the later, just want to listen again, you can download and subscribe to Milk Street Radio on your favorite podcast app. To learn more about Milk Street, visit 177milkstreet.com. There you can download each week's recipe, take an online cooking class, and order our latest cookbook, Milk Street, Tuesday nights. You can also find us on Facebook at Christopher Kimball's

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