Anyone Can Cook, Even A Rat...

A great food movie is being released on DVD today (November 6th.) If you haven't already seen it, go rent or netflix (yes, "netflix" has become a verb, just like "google" did) Ratatouille, Pixar's latest animated feature. Normally, I'm not blown away by animated movies but I really enjoyed this one. Like Jim Henson's Muppets, Ratatouille is equally entertaining for kids and adults, especially for adults who like to cook.

Ratatouille is the story of Remy, a French country rat who dreams of becoming a great chef after he gets inspired by the work of Auguste Gusteau, a Parisian chef whose motto is "anyone can cook." Remy has a highly sensitive nose--he's the designated rat poison sniffer-outer for the colony--but he longs to use his skills to create delicious food. Fate and his love of cooking conspire to tear Remy away from his family and dump him into a fast-flowing sewer drain. After a hellish ride throughy some gnarly tubes, Remy finally climbs up a drainpipe and finds himself in Paris, dripping wet and utterly alone, but miraculously staring up at the sign on Gusteau's restaurant... I won't spoil the rest for you.

I loved the accuracy and detail of the cooking/kitchen scenes. The techniques and ingredients are impeccable; the restaurant scenes are accurate - the chefs, sous-chefs, pastry chefs, bus-boys, and waiters are all zipping around and bumping into each other in the controlled chaos and barely restrained animosity of the kitchen; the lone female chef, Collette, has a big chip on her shoulder about being a minority in a male-dominated field; and little details like the horizontal burn marks across the wrists of the cooks showed an impressive knowledge about cooking and an admirable devotion to realism.

I also loved its message about the power of good cooking. Remy's love of food is so great that he is willing to leave his family and follow his chef's nose to Paris where he risks his life just to save a pot of soup that Linguini is ruining. And Anton Ego, the fearsome restaurant critic whose brutal reviews result in Gusteau's death after his five-star restaurant is downgraded to four stars, becomes human only after his frozen heart is melted by a dish of Remy's ratatouille.

"Anyone can cook", the catch-phrase of the deceased Chef Gusteau, is echoed throughout the film. Although the film does contradict itself a bit because Linguini, one of the main characters, really can't cook, at least not without the help of the culinarily-gifted Remy, I still appreciated the democratic message.

Here's a clip from the movie to whet your appetite (so to speak.)

Restaurant Review: Dopo

My friend, Naushon, and I had been wanting to try Dopo for months and finally got around to it on Tuesday night. My first visit was a good one. I will definitely go back.

Located at 4293 Piedmont Avenue in Oakland, the expanded space features mustard-colored stucko walls with red accents. Four flower and leaf arrangements were hung in green glass vases atop a pillar, lending a nice autumnal feeling. And a legendary chrome FAMEA E61 1961 espresso maker held court at one end of the tall granite bar.

Our server, Megan, was a delightful mix of knowledgeable, funny, down-to-earth, and attentive, without so much as a hint of pushy. In honor of Halloween, she was wearing a black "Catholic Girl Gone Bad" t-shirt, black skirt, and black and white striped tights. The "crowning" touch - a pair of small red horns sprouting from her head.

We ordered the:

• Fennel, wild arugala, and parmesan salad;
• Dopo pizza; and
• Riccota gnocchi with ragu of house-made sausage and hoffman farm hen

The salad was excellent. The thinly sliced fennel was refreshingly crisp, the grated (not shaved, as is often the case) parmesan was sweet and nutty, and the wild arugala was tender and fresh with a little kick to it. The olive oil and lemon juice vinaigrette was nicely balanced and there was lots of it (I like my salads well-dressed.)


The dopo is their cheapest pizza and is topped with a light tomato sauce, grated pecorino and mozarella, chopped parsley, pepper flakes and anchovies (which are optional and I skipped). Because my stomach rebels at spicy foods, Megan had offered to ask the kitchen to hold the hot pepper flakes. As a result, the pizza toppings were slightly out of balance and tended to be primarily salty (and this was without the anchovies!) It was good, but unremarkable and not a topping combo I'd order again. The crust, however, was perfection! The pizza had the best thin crust I've eaten. It was remarkably thin, tender, and flavorful, but not at all burnt or charred.

The gnocchi was rich (thanks to the ricotta) and tender. The ragu was really excellent. The flavors had been well-married through long cooking and it had a subtle "creeper" spiciness that asserted itself more as you ate. They make their own salumi on the premises and the house-made sausage in the sauce was very tasty. Although the dish was good, we both felt that the sauce would have been even better with a plainer pasta - maybe a tagliatelle.

Dopo also has an amateur-friendly wine menu that features a picture of the boot with the wines listed by region. Naushon ordered a glass of montepulciano d'abruzzo ($5) which she enjoyed.

The Acme bread they served us was not quite warm enough but still very tasty.

Their portion sizes are fairly small. We both cleaned our plates. I felt perfectly full at the end of the meal, however, had I been a bigger woman or a man, I feel sure I'd have needed another dish or two to fill me up.

Total bill, with tax and a 20% tip, was $48.

Dopo is Italian for "after"or "later."

Click here for hours and more details from Yelp

Finding Free-Range Gobblers for T-Day

This year will be the first time I've ever spent Thanksgiving apart from my family on the east coast. Since many of us "kids" have ended up here on the west coast, we'll be having our own younger generation T-day celebration here in Berkeley. And that brings me to another first - I'll be roasting my first turkey!

Naturally, I am feeling a little nervous -- after all, it's a very large bird and a crucial part of the Thanksgiving dinner. So I am planning to do two things to help ensure a delicious roasted turkey:

1. I am going to brine the turkey before I roast it. According to many sources (including Martha Stewart), brining a.k.a. soaking the bird in salt water for many hours, helps to ensure a moist, flavorful turkey. I'll write more about this soon.

2. I am going to buy the best-tasting, "happiest" bird I can find. Around here, that appears to be a Willie Bird, a free-range, organic turkey from Willie Bird Farms near Santa Rosa. I have to say that I am still recovering from the sticker shock - the smallest turkey they sell costs nearly $100! I am hoping that part of that price is the cost of them FedExing it to you and that it will be slightly cheaper to pick it up from a local grocery store.

For those of you who don't live in northern California, you can consult the Eat Well Guide (http://www.eatwellguide.org) to find a good source for free-range (possibly organic) turkeys near you.

Slow Foods USA also has a listing of heritage turkey farmers by geographical region on their web site (http://www.slowfoodusa.org/ark/turkeys.html.)

If you happen to live in Vermont, I'll save you the trouble. Below are links to the two places my Aunt Katy (the owner of Healthy Living Natural Foods market in Burlington, VT) recommended. I'd take her word for it, she's definitely done her homework.

• Adams Turkey Farm in Westford, VT
• Misty Knoll Farms in New Haven, VT