Manolo’s Food Blog

“Luv” back at you, Poochie, for your comprehensive and very informative letter on Disney restaurants.

At Epcot and at the resort hotels they do serve passable fare. Mr. Henry has eaten at the Swan and Dolphin, at the Beach and Yacht Clubs, and at most of the country pavilions, but he has yet to eat anything really delicious. The hamburger at Spoodles was probably the best meal he had in all of Disney World (with Sam Adams on tap, to boot).

At Animal Kingdom, soaked from hat to shoes after the Kali River raft ride, he froze solid in the Rainforest Cafe’s air conditioning even before being seated in their windy frigidarium.

The real problem at Disney World is not the absence of good food but the near impossibility of getting a table. You have to book months in advance. (“Is a 5:00 reservation alright?”) A vacation lacks a certain spontaneity when you know exactly where and when you’ll be eating lunch and dinner each day.

Pilgrim writes that the Moroccan restaurant at Epcot serves great food. Well, yes but not quite. Mr. Henry ate there once and remembers it as a pale approximation of the real thing. Paradoxically, Moroccan cooking is one of the great undiscovered cuisines of the world, but not for lack of restaurants.

After his first trip to Morocco Mr. Henry, high on the vapors of couscous and nectarines, decided to abandon his research into modern Moroccan cultural and political history so as to write a Moroccan cookbook instead, one that captured the genius of Esther’s recipes. Landing on the American shore, he straightaway went to the bookstore to discover a freshly published book by a first time writer, Couscous and Other Good Food from Morocco by Paula Wolfert (1973).

Although Mr. Henry may cavil with the inclusion of smin (rancid butter) in some recipes, a special bugaboo of his, the book is a monumental achievement. In addition to capturing the wild spirit of the place, Wolfert offers a spot-on description of the most celebrated and difficult Moroccan dish, basteela, (Paula calls it basteeya) a savory pie of braised squab, curdled eggs, and toasted almonds. You haven’t lived until you’ve tasted a great one.

On reading Wolfert’s Couscous, Mr. Henry abandoned his high ambition and returned to the drear of academe, defeated and directionless.

Wolfert noted then that no restaurant anywhere – not in Fez, Marrakech, or Paris – prepares food that even approximates the delicacy and refinement served at home. This remains true even today 35 years later.

Mr. Henry believes the clue to this riddle lies in the sexist and medieval division of labor that marks Moroccan society. Although women do all the cooking at home, and all the rest of the housework as well, they are not permitted to leave home to run service businesses like restaurants. Consequently, no Moroccan restaurant anywhere has a real Moroccan chef in the kitchen.

At Epcot last month, having been refused service by Europe and North America, Mr. Henry quickly dusted off his Arabic as he approached the hostess of the Moroccan pavilion. “Do you have a table for seven?” he asked flawlessly. She disappointed him both by refusing to find a table and by responding in French, the same way the deracinated Algerian youth in Paris respond, despite their militant identité arabe. Oh well. Mr. Henry’s high hopes were bound to be disappointed, and not for the first time, either.

Wolfert, by the way, now lives in San Francisco. Only in California, where the climate mimics Morocco’s, can you find the exceptionally flavorful tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and the like that are essential to Moroccan cuisine.

January is the time when Mr. Henry hides from creditors and curls up to read the books he received at Christmas.

From the marvelous Maria came Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well by Pellegrino Artusi, a book so full of wit and style, even cookbook haters will love it. First published in 1891 and never out of print, it is an essential food source book unavailable in English translation until 1997. Here are some sample quotes from the introduction:

Cooking is a troublesome sprite. Often it drives you to despair. Yet it is also very rewarding, for when you do succeed, or overcome a difficulty in doing so, you feel the satisfaction of a great triumph.

If you do not aspire to become a premier cook, you need not have been born with a pan on your head to become a good one. Passion, care, and precision will certainly suffice.

Life has two principal functions: nourishment and the propagation of the species. Those who turn their minds to these two needs of existence, who study them and suggest practices whereby they might best be satisfied, make life less gloomy and benefit humanity.

But let me tell you, and I say this reluctantly, that with our century tending toward materialism and life’s enjoyments, the day shall soon come when writings of this sort will be more widely sought and read than the works of great scientists, which are of much greater value to humanity.

Blind is the man who cannot see this! The days of seductive, flattering ideals, the days of the hermits, are coming to an end. With greater eagerness that it ought to, the world is rushing to the wellsprings of pleasure, and those who know how to temper this dangerous inclination with healthy morals shall take the palm.

Some of Artusi’s ingredients are rare in today’s markets – ox marrow, for example. Most recipes, however, seem quite contemporary. He chose representative dishes from every corner of Italy but did not fall victim to local hype. On typical regional specialties he lavished praise or criticism in equal measure. Some dishes will surprise the experienced gourmand. His Bolognese sauce, for example, has no tomato. Pensa!