Or so reads the bumper sticker from "Better Place" the exhibition center for Shai Agassi's grand scheme to bring all-electric cars onto the world market, starting, over the next few years with Israel and Denmark (plus taxi fleets in Tokyo and San Francisco). But what's striking about Agassi's business model is not the purchase of the car itself (think mid-sized sedan run on a battery instead of gasoline) but your ongoing relationship with the company. Better Place plugs you into a network that provides you with services to recharge or change your battery, maintain or repair your vehicle and all the digital entertainment, information and communication you'd expect in the car of tomorrow.
How? Through the smart card that starts your car's systems and let's you plug in to the recharging or battery changing stations. The car's computer and GPS keep you in constant contact with the Better Place network and can, for example, guide you to the nearest charging or battery changing station with the shortest line. Unlike existing car companies who sell you a car and then leave you on your own to get gasoline or digital communication services, Better Place sells you a car with an all-inclusive monthly service plan. Your bank account gets debited monthly. In other words, your relationship with your vehicle will be pretty much the same as with your cell phone.
Agassi figures, and I think he's right, that Israelis will love this. The market consists of several million tech savvy, upwardly mobile people who are perpetually plugged into their digital devices, pay over $6 a gallon for gasoline and would love to breath cleaner air while simultaneously f*****g the Arabs. Agassi's pitch is clear and to the point: Want to live better and stop funding terrorists? Get yourself an electric car. And, just in case you slept through the slick multi-media presentation, the symbolism of building the exhibition hall and test track on the ruins of the Pi Glilot complex, just north of Tel Aviv, is not lost on any of the locals. Pi Glilot? Oh yeah, that's where all the oil and chemical tanks used to be.
The New York World's Fair of 1964-65 featured such futuristic wonders as fiber optic cable from DuPont and video phones from AT&T. It took a few decades but that future really has arrived. What neither the World's Fair nor Better Place mentioned is what happens if the system crashes. I got a personal lesson in how the digital age can also taketh away when we first arrived for this winter's sojourn in Israel. On the day we arrived in Israel, our cell phones would not work. Cellcom, the largest cellular communications company in Israel, suffered a total network crash for reasons that have yet to be made public (probably to spare them the embarrassment of admitting to having been hacked by a couple of 16-year-olds who got tired of playing beer pong).
But, on the giveth side, Liz and I have installed webcams on our laptops and use both Skype and Gmail video chat to see and speak with the children. Shades of the World's Fair. It being Chanukah, I moved my computer to put the candles between the webcam and the parents, enabling us to light candles and sing songs with children in Chicago and in Hoboken, NJ. We could see the smiles on everyone's faces. Just like the families in the GE House of Tomorrow.
Read more!
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Saturday, December 18, 2010
In Memory of Captain Beefheart
Don Van Vliet, known as Captain Beefheart, has passed away. Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band played music that ran the gamut from brilliantly innovative to almost unlistenable, usually on the same side of the same album. In a day when jazz musicians like Ornette Coleman and John Coltrance were breaking free of old conventions like keys, chord changes and time signatures, Captain Beefheart was succeeding in such efforts but with a rock band.
Beefheart's group was, as I recall, the first band to be produced by Frank Zappa on his Pumpkin Records label. Zappa was pushing the envelope of music and liberating himself and other musicians with "no commercial potential" from the tyranny of the music companies. Back in the days before digital recording and the internet this was a lot easier said than done.
I am privileged to have seen Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band play at the Warehouse in Ithaca, New York, in the winter of 1971. To borrow from a later day, they rocked and we were not worthy. The opening act was a guy named Ry Cooder, playing electric slide blues and swing jazz, awesome musicians in awesome times.
Don Van Vliet, may his memory be for a blessing and may his art live on forever. Read more!
Beefheart's group was, as I recall, the first band to be produced by Frank Zappa on his Pumpkin Records label. Zappa was pushing the envelope of music and liberating himself and other musicians with "no commercial potential" from the tyranny of the music companies. Back in the days before digital recording and the internet this was a lot easier said than done.
I am privileged to have seen Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band play at the Warehouse in Ithaca, New York, in the winter of 1971. To borrow from a later day, they rocked and we were not worthy. The opening act was a guy named Ry Cooder, playing electric slide blues and swing jazz, awesome musicians in awesome times.
Don Van Vliet, may his memory be for a blessing and may his art live on forever. Read more!
Monday, July 19, 2010
Forever Stamps or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Postal Rate Increases
Millburn, New Jersey
19 July 2010
Everyone laughed at me two years ago when I spent $820 to buy 2,000 Forever Stamps. But I'm the one laughing now.
I'd known about Forever Stamps for perhaps three years but was wary of buying them. You buy a stamp today at today's first class rate and it's good forever, no matter how high the first class rate goes. At first glance, a great hedge against one of life's certainties - postal rate increases. It's like death and taxes. Right? Since 1958, the frequency of rate increases has gone from 5 years down to less than two years (1958 was the first increase in 26 years, the current 42 cent rate will be in effect for a mere 20 months). The typical increase used to be a penny, now its at least two cents - that's a 100% increase in the amount of each increase. Given the increases in both the frequency and the amounts of postal rate hikes, Forever Stamps could be one of the greatest inflation hedges since common stocks and home ownership. And even us disabled, retired guys have better things to do than counting stamps, buying small stamps and sticking two or more stamps on every letter to use up our pre-increase stamp supply. Nevertheless, my brilliant analysis seemed to put Forever Stamps into the category of "if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is." After all, for the inflation hedge to work you'd need to buy enough stamps to last through some number of rate increases. What if the spread of electronic communications really does force the Post Office to close it's snail mail services? Let's be real, who would go out and buy a supply of more than one year's worth of stamps? Would you? Would anyone you know, even your friend who owns the business that advertises and ships by mail? Heck no. Only some wacko would go out and do something like that just to beat some hypothetical future rate increase imposed by an agency that some people, many of whom are decidedly not wackos, think is going to disappear.
And so, on May 1, 2008, 12 days before first class rates increased from 41 to 42 cents for the first ounce, I walked into the town Post Office and officially became the town's resident wacko.I asked the clerk if he had Forever Stamps. He said he did and also, on further inquiry, said he did not sell many and could not understand why more people did not use them. Figuring there must be a catch to what seemed, to me, like a great deal, I asked if there was a limit on the number I could buy. He said the limit was whatever amount he had in stock. As it turned out he had a pack of 2,000 stamps (that's 100, 20-stamp strips). And so, I impulsively invested $820 in 2,000 Forever Stamps, knowing that in a mere 12 days my stash would increase in value all the way up to $840. The clerk gave me a look like he wasn't quite sure whether to take my credit card or push the button that brings the Postal Police in to subdue customers who go off the deep end. People waiting on line behind me gave me lots of room when I turned to leave.
Returning home in triumph, I told my Beautiful Wife what I had wrought and, without looking up from her laptop, she said, as lovingly as she could manage between the chortles, "That's nice dear, you now have something to leave the children since you will die before using up the stamps." Now I will admit to making the purchase on impulse without actually calculating my stamp usage. So, for your amusement, here's how the math worked out. Most of my monthly bills are paid electronically and most of my correspondence is by e-mail. As a result, my actual need for stamps has fallen dramatically (which, multiplied by millions of Americans, is probably why the Postal Service needs more rate increases). Being generous, let's say the Beautiful Wife and me use ten stamps a month. Since we regularly spend 4 months a year in Israel, our "US Stamp Usage Year" is only 8 months long. That's 80 stamps a year. Divide 2,000 by 80 and you have enough stamps for 25 years. Given my multiple heart conditions, to say that in 2008 I had a life expectancy of 25 years would be generous.
The next week, the Beautiful Wife was standing on line in the Post Office. The clerk who made the sale was regaling a few people with the story of how some wacko had come in the week before and bought 2,000 Forever Stamps. The Beautiful Wife, always quick to defend her loved ones, shouted out, "That wacko is my husband!" The clerk started to apologize but she cut him off saying I had lost it years before and this purchase was no surprise. She then rushed home to tell me that I had become a town celebrity.
Now, whenever I get the chance, I remind the postal clerk, and everyone else who scoffed at me, that I'm the wacko who loaded up on the Forever Stamps. Only I do it with a note of triumph in my voice. When I first bought these stamps the second person I told about my brilliant idea was my good friend, Allan Sloan, a nationally prominent financial journalist. Allan, who does this for a living, had a jolly time mocking me and pointing out that he had written almost two years earlier that Forever Stamps might be a convenience but were certainly not a better inflation hedge than money market funds, Treasury paper or CDs. Of course, what Allan and everyone else who wrote me off as a wacko overlooked is that past performance really does not predict future results. Today he, like all those people who gave me lots of room at the Post Office, my children and even my Beautiful Wife, are not scoffing quite so loudly (or, more accurately, have found other good reasons to mock me). Why? Throughout the worst financial collapse since the 1930s and a recovery that may take most of the coming decade to return us to where we were before the housing bubble burst and the banks started doing the dead cat bounce, my Forever Stamps have done nothing but increase in value. Come next January 2, when first class rates go up to 46 cents for the first ounce, the value of my remaining stamps will have increased three times, gaining more than 12% (that's an annualized return of roughly 4.4% for the 32 months from May, 2008 through December, 2010). Not exactly pre-bubble bursting day trading profits but slow, steady, reliable and not too shabby under the circumstances. How's your portfolio been doing? Read more!
19 July 2010
Everyone laughed at me two years ago when I spent $820 to buy 2,000 Forever Stamps. But I'm the one laughing now.
I'd known about Forever Stamps for perhaps three years but was wary of buying them. You buy a stamp today at today's first class rate and it's good forever, no matter how high the first class rate goes. At first glance, a great hedge against one of life's certainties - postal rate increases. It's like death and taxes. Right? Since 1958, the frequency of rate increases has gone from 5 years down to less than two years (1958 was the first increase in 26 years, the current 42 cent rate will be in effect for a mere 20 months). The typical increase used to be a penny, now its at least two cents - that's a 100% increase in the amount of each increase. Given the increases in both the frequency and the amounts of postal rate hikes, Forever Stamps could be one of the greatest inflation hedges since common stocks and home ownership. And even us disabled, retired guys have better things to do than counting stamps, buying small stamps and sticking two or more stamps on every letter to use up our pre-increase stamp supply. Nevertheless, my brilliant analysis seemed to put Forever Stamps into the category of "if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is." After all, for the inflation hedge to work you'd need to buy enough stamps to last through some number of rate increases. What if the spread of electronic communications really does force the Post Office to close it's snail mail services? Let's be real, who would go out and buy a supply of more than one year's worth of stamps? Would you? Would anyone you know, even your friend who owns the business that advertises and ships by mail? Heck no. Only some wacko would go out and do something like that just to beat some hypothetical future rate increase imposed by an agency that some people, many of whom are decidedly not wackos, think is going to disappear.
And so, on May 1, 2008, 12 days before first class rates increased from 41 to 42 cents for the first ounce, I walked into the town Post Office and officially became the town's resident wacko.I asked the clerk if he had Forever Stamps. He said he did and also, on further inquiry, said he did not sell many and could not understand why more people did not use them. Figuring there must be a catch to what seemed, to me, like a great deal, I asked if there was a limit on the number I could buy. He said the limit was whatever amount he had in stock. As it turned out he had a pack of 2,000 stamps (that's 100, 20-stamp strips). And so, I impulsively invested $820 in 2,000 Forever Stamps, knowing that in a mere 12 days my stash would increase in value all the way up to $840. The clerk gave me a look like he wasn't quite sure whether to take my credit card or push the button that brings the Postal Police in to subdue customers who go off the deep end. People waiting on line behind me gave me lots of room when I turned to leave.
Returning home in triumph, I told my Beautiful Wife what I had wrought and, without looking up from her laptop, she said, as lovingly as she could manage between the chortles, "That's nice dear, you now have something to leave the children since you will die before using up the stamps." Now I will admit to making the purchase on impulse without actually calculating my stamp usage. So, for your amusement, here's how the math worked out. Most of my monthly bills are paid electronically and most of my correspondence is by e-mail. As a result, my actual need for stamps has fallen dramatically (which, multiplied by millions of Americans, is probably why the Postal Service needs more rate increases). Being generous, let's say the Beautiful Wife and me use ten stamps a month. Since we regularly spend 4 months a year in Israel, our "US Stamp Usage Year" is only 8 months long. That's 80 stamps a year. Divide 2,000 by 80 and you have enough stamps for 25 years. Given my multiple heart conditions, to say that in 2008 I had a life expectancy of 25 years would be generous.
The next week, the Beautiful Wife was standing on line in the Post Office. The clerk who made the sale was regaling a few people with the story of how some wacko had come in the week before and bought 2,000 Forever Stamps. The Beautiful Wife, always quick to defend her loved ones, shouted out, "That wacko is my husband!" The clerk started to apologize but she cut him off saying I had lost it years before and this purchase was no surprise. She then rushed home to tell me that I had become a town celebrity.
Now, whenever I get the chance, I remind the postal clerk, and everyone else who scoffed at me, that I'm the wacko who loaded up on the Forever Stamps. Only I do it with a note of triumph in my voice. When I first bought these stamps the second person I told about my brilliant idea was my good friend, Allan Sloan, a nationally prominent financial journalist. Allan, who does this for a living, had a jolly time mocking me and pointing out that he had written almost two years earlier that Forever Stamps might be a convenience but were certainly not a better inflation hedge than money market funds, Treasury paper or CDs. Of course, what Allan and everyone else who wrote me off as a wacko overlooked is that past performance really does not predict future results. Today he, like all those people who gave me lots of room at the Post Office, my children and even my Beautiful Wife, are not scoffing quite so loudly (or, more accurately, have found other good reasons to mock me). Why? Throughout the worst financial collapse since the 1930s and a recovery that may take most of the coming decade to return us to where we were before the housing bubble burst and the banks started doing the dead cat bounce, my Forever Stamps have done nothing but increase in value. Come next January 2, when first class rates go up to 46 cents for the first ounce, the value of my remaining stamps will have increased three times, gaining more than 12% (that's an annualized return of roughly 4.4% for the 32 months from May, 2008 through December, 2010). Not exactly pre-bubble bursting day trading profits but slow, steady, reliable and not too shabby under the circumstances. How's your portfolio been doing? Read more!
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Everyone's Egyptian Grandmother
Tel Aviv
11 March 2010
Julie Ozon cooks Egyptian food just like your grandmother would if your grandmother was from Cairo. This is a line I often use to describe some wonderful hole-in-the-wall ethnic restaurant. This time it so happens that Julie, the owner and chef, is an Egyptian grandmother. Her cooking is truly sublime. Located in the Yemenite Quarter just down a narrow street from Shuk Hacarmel (corner of Yom Tov and Malan), Julie's is perfect for anyone who missesmiss eating lunch in their grandmother's kitchen.
Julie's family was driven out of Egypt (with most of the rest of the Egyptian Jewish community) in 1949. Their property (which included houses in Cairo and Alexandria) was confiscated. They spent time in a refuge camp in France and finally made their way to Israel, then a country with not much of anything, that had to absorb hundreds of thousands of refuges from Arab countries who came with the clothes on their backs. After the peace treaty, Julie made about seven trips back to Egypt to find the few remaining family and friends and take a look at where she had lived. But her trips, she says, are over. Israel is her home and here she will stay. You stroll in and become one of the family.
Julie's cooking is strictly home style, as is the service. Don't bother asking for a menu. Just ask what's for lunch. Julie or one of her assistants will stand behind a counter and describe (in any of several languages) what's in each pot. She will gladly make you a plate of what she thinks is good for your lunch (between Liz and I we got to sample something of everything and went back for seconds).
The central ingredient is ground meat with a variety of spices. Some of the meat is stuffed into vegetables (today we had eggplant, zucchini and artichoke heart), made into kubeh, meatballs or fried in a burger shape. These were topped off with a mix of sauces that included just enough harif so you know you're in the Middle East but not so much as to cloak the tastes of the spices. The problem with this style of cooking is that it can easily become too greasy. Not at Julie's.
She had two kinds of rice (saffron and white, the white with fresh vermicelli, the saffron with some chick peas and whichever sauce Julie decides to put on it). Added to this were green pea pods in a light sauce cooked so soft they almost needed a spoon instead of a fork.
It being a hot day we passed on the soup but had the Arabic coffee with cardamon and the tea with cloves, washed down with basbousa,a sweet cake made with semolina, honey and lemon syrup.
Once again we are reminded why we come to Israel and why we will miss this place so much when we are back in New Jersey. As we walked off to the shuk to shop for Shabbat dinner (company is coming) I called our agent to see if we can have the apartment for next winter. Read more!
11 March 2010
Julie Ozon cooks Egyptian food just like your grandmother would if your grandmother was from Cairo. This is a line I often use to describe some wonderful hole-in-the-wall ethnic restaurant. This time it so happens that Julie, the owner and chef, is an Egyptian grandmother. Her cooking is truly sublime. Located in the Yemenite Quarter just down a narrow street from Shuk Hacarmel (corner of Yom Tov and Malan), Julie's is perfect for anyone who missesmiss eating lunch in their grandmother's kitchen.
Julie's family was driven out of Egypt (with most of the rest of the Egyptian Jewish community) in 1949. Their property (which included houses in Cairo and Alexandria) was confiscated. They spent time in a refuge camp in France and finally made their way to Israel, then a country with not much of anything, that had to absorb hundreds of thousands of refuges from Arab countries who came with the clothes on their backs. After the peace treaty, Julie made about seven trips back to Egypt to find the few remaining family and friends and take a look at where she had lived. But her trips, she says, are over. Israel is her home and here she will stay. You stroll in and become one of the family.
Julie's cooking is strictly home style, as is the service. Don't bother asking for a menu. Just ask what's for lunch. Julie or one of her assistants will stand behind a counter and describe (in any of several languages) what's in each pot. She will gladly make you a plate of what she thinks is good for your lunch (between Liz and I we got to sample something of everything and went back for seconds).
The central ingredient is ground meat with a variety of spices. Some of the meat is stuffed into vegetables (today we had eggplant, zucchini and artichoke heart), made into kubeh, meatballs or fried in a burger shape. These were topped off with a mix of sauces that included just enough harif so you know you're in the Middle East but not so much as to cloak the tastes of the spices. The problem with this style of cooking is that it can easily become too greasy. Not at Julie's.
She had two kinds of rice (saffron and white, the white with fresh vermicelli, the saffron with some chick peas and whichever sauce Julie decides to put on it). Added to this were green pea pods in a light sauce cooked so soft they almost needed a spoon instead of a fork.
It being a hot day we passed on the soup but had the Arabic coffee with cardamon and the tea with cloves, washed down with basbousa,a sweet cake made with semolina, honey and lemon syrup.
Once again we are reminded why we come to Israel and why we will miss this place so much when we are back in New Jersey. As we walked off to the shuk to shop for Shabbat dinner (company is coming) I called our agent to see if we can have the apartment for next winter. Read more!
Friday, February 19, 2010
How To Brew Espresso
Jerusalem
3 December 2009
Maurizio and I arrived at JoAnne's apartment on a mission of mercy. JoAnne, needing a consult, was thrilled when Maurizio agreed to make a house call. If you want Maurizio to talk about coffee, you don't have to ask twice. Just the day before, he had sat on our balcony (the one that overlooks the beach, I think I've mentioned the beach) and, drinking a cup of tea, of all things, explained the four elements needed to brew good espresso. These are written on each bag of Cafe Maurizio:
Miscela -- Macchina -- Macinino -- Mano
Standing in JoAnne's kitchen, Maurizio put words into action, teaching her how to get the most from her new espresso machine. Following is my reconstruction of Maurizio's explanations and demonstration of how to make espresso and, in turn, cappuchino. This may be a bit rough as it's my translation (with the occasional embellishment for which I make no apology - as usual) from the Hebrew, Italian and English, accompanied by ample hand and body language.
Miscela are the dark roasted coffee beans themselves. The varieties of beans that may be used for espresso are too numerous to list here. Suffice it to say that the roasted beans may be a blend or a single variety. This is a matter of taste and, as with wine (or anything else), you should drink what you like. Also, in an ideal world, you buy whole beans and grind them only as you need them. If you just don't have room in your kitchen or your heart for another appliance and really hate the thought of cleaning up specks of coffee, it's OK to buy ground coffee. Just don't buy too much.
You need enough coffee to assure that you won't run out at a critical moment. Say you're really stuffed with a great meal and more than a little drunk on an outstanding wine and you've got to wash down dessert with espresso. There's no way you are going to make it to a store and back before you lose the mood(to say nothing of what such a delay may do to your chances of getting lucky with the person you just shared all that food and wine with). On the other hand, even the best roasted beans have a shelf life and you don't want to buy so much that the coffee loses flavor. Just like bananas, you never, ever put coffee in the refrigerator (or freezer). The preservation of coffee with cold temperatures is an urban legend against which Barista heroes such as Maurizio wage a never-ending struggle for truth, justice and coffee stored at room temperature.
As for the coffee itself, I'm a fan of Cafe Maurizio, a blend whose recipe is known only to Maurizio and Rotshield, his roaster. When in the USA, and lacking Cafe Maurizio (when we run out I start planning for next winter's trip), I've been drinking Phonecea from La Columbe (a Philadelphia outfit that supplies the Museum of Modern Art with it's coffee) which is 100% Arabica. We buy the beans and grind as needed. Thanks to Liz, we now own two coffee grinders - one grinds smooth for our macchiato (an Italian forced water pot) and drip machine (to Maurizio's horror Liz brews his coffee in a Mr. Coffee) - the other produces a rough grind for our coffee press (yeah, it's French but Maurizio is willing to be ecumenical, up to a point).
JoAnne was using Illy - a good dark roast that I like and of which Maurizio approves - and a local store's blend (both of which now live outside the refrigerator). The Illy came in cloth packs to brew one cup at a time. Her problem was that the coffee she was brewing just was not as good as she knew each blend could be. This brings us to The Machine.
Macchina is the machine. It has to allow manual control of water flow, water temperature and steam. Then you need, with proper body English (or, perhaps more appropriately, body Italian), to use the machine to it's full potential. JoAnne had recently purchased a DeLonghi, a good, Italian-made machine, which should have done (and now does) the job. She had even made the sales people open the box to assure her that the set up instructions were written in English but was, nevertheless, missing something.
First, when dealing with a machine set up to make one cup at a time, you need to make all the cups of espresso you want to serve before you steam the milk for the cappuchino drinkers. Why? If you keep going back and forth between espresso brewing and milk steaming you will clog the steam spout and have to stop everything to dismantle the mechanism and clean it. Leave the milk for last.
Next, before you bolt the armature with the coffee onto the machine you need to move water from its reserve (or from the wall if you're hooked directly to a water line) to the heating chamber. Then heat the water, testing it by releasing a bit of water and steam (this also assures that you have no clogs in the line). Serious tea drinkers know this maneuver as priming the pot. As with tea, you never, ever allow cold water (defined here as water at less than boiling point) to touch your coffee.
Now you can bolt the armature onto the machine and start the brewing cycle. You repeat this until you have the number of cups you need. Then move on to prime the steam pipe by releasing some steam and then steaming the milk. Afterwards, you release some more steam to make certain that the pipe is clear. Now you are ready to drink your espresso, provided you've got it in the right cup.
Maccinino is a small, ceramic cup with a narrowed or rounded bottom. Glass or, G-d forbid, paper, do not preserve and will even ruin the taste of espresso (and Turkish or Arabic coffee for that matter). The shape counts as much as the material, as you want to pursuade the foam to concentrate as it rises. It's like the difference between drinking champaigne from a flute as opposed to the classic, but taste killing, flat, wide glass. JoAnne's variety of cups allowed Maurizio to prove this thesis beyond all doubt. To say nothing of the fact the JoAnne's machine was suddenly turning out really good espresso.
Mano is the barista, the person who pulls it all together. You can have the right ingredients but without someone who knows what to do with them you may as well go out for Dunkin' Donuts' coffee. Has JoAnne joined the ranks of baristas worthy of the title? Well, her housekeeper and handyman have stopped buying coffee on their way in to work for her and instead gladly let her make their morning brews. Time to go, our work here is done.
Read more!
3 December 2009
Maurizio and I arrived at JoAnne's apartment on a mission of mercy. JoAnne, needing a consult, was thrilled when Maurizio agreed to make a house call. If you want Maurizio to talk about coffee, you don't have to ask twice. Just the day before, he had sat on our balcony (the one that overlooks the beach, I think I've mentioned the beach) and, drinking a cup of tea, of all things, explained the four elements needed to brew good espresso. These are written on each bag of Cafe Maurizio:
Miscela -- Macchina -- Macinino -- Mano
Standing in JoAnne's kitchen, Maurizio put words into action, teaching her how to get the most from her new espresso machine. Following is my reconstruction of Maurizio's explanations and demonstration of how to make espresso and, in turn, cappuchino. This may be a bit rough as it's my translation (with the occasional embellishment for which I make no apology - as usual) from the Hebrew, Italian and English, accompanied by ample hand and body language.
Miscela are the dark roasted coffee beans themselves. The varieties of beans that may be used for espresso are too numerous to list here. Suffice it to say that the roasted beans may be a blend or a single variety. This is a matter of taste and, as with wine (or anything else), you should drink what you like. Also, in an ideal world, you buy whole beans and grind them only as you need them. If you just don't have room in your kitchen or your heart for another appliance and really hate the thought of cleaning up specks of coffee, it's OK to buy ground coffee. Just don't buy too much.
You need enough coffee to assure that you won't run out at a critical moment. Say you're really stuffed with a great meal and more than a little drunk on an outstanding wine and you've got to wash down dessert with espresso. There's no way you are going to make it to a store and back before you lose the mood(to say nothing of what such a delay may do to your chances of getting lucky with the person you just shared all that food and wine with). On the other hand, even the best roasted beans have a shelf life and you don't want to buy so much that the coffee loses flavor. Just like bananas, you never, ever put coffee in the refrigerator (or freezer). The preservation of coffee with cold temperatures is an urban legend against which Barista heroes such as Maurizio wage a never-ending struggle for truth, justice and coffee stored at room temperature.
As for the coffee itself, I'm a fan of Cafe Maurizio, a blend whose recipe is known only to Maurizio and Rotshield, his roaster. When in the USA, and lacking Cafe Maurizio (when we run out I start planning for next winter's trip), I've been drinking Phonecea from La Columbe (a Philadelphia outfit that supplies the Museum of Modern Art with it's coffee) which is 100% Arabica. We buy the beans and grind as needed. Thanks to Liz, we now own two coffee grinders - one grinds smooth for our macchiato (an Italian forced water pot) and drip machine (to Maurizio's horror Liz brews his coffee in a Mr. Coffee) - the other produces a rough grind for our coffee press (yeah, it's French but Maurizio is willing to be ecumenical, up to a point).
JoAnne was using Illy - a good dark roast that I like and of which Maurizio approves - and a local store's blend (both of which now live outside the refrigerator). The Illy came in cloth packs to brew one cup at a time. Her problem was that the coffee she was brewing just was not as good as she knew each blend could be. This brings us to The Machine.
Macchina is the machine. It has to allow manual control of water flow, water temperature and steam. Then you need, with proper body English (or, perhaps more appropriately, body Italian), to use the machine to it's full potential. JoAnne had recently purchased a DeLonghi, a good, Italian-made machine, which should have done (and now does) the job. She had even made the sales people open the box to assure her that the set up instructions were written in English but was, nevertheless, missing something.
First, when dealing with a machine set up to make one cup at a time, you need to make all the cups of espresso you want to serve before you steam the milk for the cappuchino drinkers. Why? If you keep going back and forth between espresso brewing and milk steaming you will clog the steam spout and have to stop everything to dismantle the mechanism and clean it. Leave the milk for last.
Next, before you bolt the armature with the coffee onto the machine you need to move water from its reserve (or from the wall if you're hooked directly to a water line) to the heating chamber. Then heat the water, testing it by releasing a bit of water and steam (this also assures that you have no clogs in the line). Serious tea drinkers know this maneuver as priming the pot. As with tea, you never, ever allow cold water (defined here as water at less than boiling point) to touch your coffee.
Now you can bolt the armature onto the machine and start the brewing cycle. You repeat this until you have the number of cups you need. Then move on to prime the steam pipe by releasing some steam and then steaming the milk. Afterwards, you release some more steam to make certain that the pipe is clear. Now you are ready to drink your espresso, provided you've got it in the right cup.
Maccinino is a small, ceramic cup with a narrowed or rounded bottom. Glass or, G-d forbid, paper, do not preserve and will even ruin the taste of espresso (and Turkish or Arabic coffee for that matter). The shape counts as much as the material, as you want to pursuade the foam to concentrate as it rises. It's like the difference between drinking champaigne from a flute as opposed to the classic, but taste killing, flat, wide glass. JoAnne's variety of cups allowed Maurizio to prove this thesis beyond all doubt. To say nothing of the fact the JoAnne's machine was suddenly turning out really good espresso.
Mano is the barista, the person who pulls it all together. You can have the right ingredients but without someone who knows what to do with them you may as well go out for Dunkin' Donuts' coffee. Has JoAnne joined the ranks of baristas worthy of the title? Well, her housekeeper and handyman have stopped buying coffee on their way in to work for her and instead gladly let her make their morning brews. Time to go, our work here is done.
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Sunday, January 24, 2010
Sender My Regards
24 January 2010
Tel Aviv
I would have called this blog "Return to Sender" but a Jerusalem Post reviewer beat me to it. In describing our favorite ethnic restaurants, I have often used the line that the food is like your Grandmother's cooking, if your Grandmother came from the food's country of origin. Sender is the only restaurant we've found where the cooking is like my Grandmother's.
Chopped liver is the haute cuisine of peasant/workers' food. The not-so-secret secret to perfect chopped liver is that it has to be - wait for it - chopped. A food processor, blender or other evil mechanical device has never touched Sender's chopped liver, just as such vile 20th century automatons never touched my Litvak Grandmother's chopped liver. Sender's current chef/owner, Zami Schreiber, chops with a knife. My Grandmother (also my Mother and my Aunts) used a curved chopping blade and a wooden bowl.
The ingredients are simple enough - sauteed liver and onions, hard boiled eggs, raw onion, and enough fat and salt to put you on intimate terms with a good cardiologist. Zami chops his mixture to just the right consistency and flavor. The dish is both smooth comfort food and has identifiable chunks of liver, egg and onion. It's best eaten cold though the truly impatient have been known to eat it warm. (I couldn't be the only kid who used his fingers to scrape the remnants of the mixture off the chopping blade and, while sucking warm chopped liver off his fingers, listened yet again to his Mother explain about how hard it is to reattach a severed digit.)
Sender's chopped liver is made as well as chopped liver can be made. You might, with years of practice, be able to replicate this dish but you can't get it better than perfect. I should know. I was raised on this stuff. I don't have 4 stents, an angioplasty and a pacemaker for nothing.
Sender has been in business since 1948. Zami, the son of the original owner's partner, grew up in the kitchen where he learned how to cook like my Grandmothers. Zami's wife (and childhood sweetheart), Yael, runs the dining room and can easily translate the Hebrew menu into what some of you may think is English but are actually the Yiddish names for the various delicacies -- kreplach (fried with onions or boiled in the soup), schnitzel, kishke (intestine stuffed with mystery breading), kneadlach (OK, it's matzoh balls but that somehow doesn't have the same artery clogging ring - and, for the Gentiles out there, it's pronounced with the "k" as a separate syllable from the "nead" - as in knish)), gefilte (stuffed) fish and compote (which may be a French word but sounds Yiddish to me).
We gorged ourselves on appetizers of chopped liver (have i mentioned the chopped liver?), kreplach with onions fried to be crispy but not overly hard or greasy (my Litvak Grandmother's were great eaten cold the next day, Zami's are wonderful time machines back to Brooklyn), kishke (not the U.S. caterers' kishke that turns your skin orange but a kishke whose stuffing reminded us of helzel (stuffed chicken necks - not on Sender's menu but a real treat at my English/Russian Grandmother's apartment)) and chicken soup with kneadlach, kreplach and thin noodles. The chicken soup was tasty but, unlike the rest of the meal, did not live up to that of our Grandmothers. This may, however, be because the chopped liver (I think I've mentioned the chopped liver) raised the bar so high.
And then there was the gefilte fish. Sender's fish is stuffed back into the skin and then sliced. It tasted like Liz' gefilte fish back in the day when she would, once a year for Pesach, expend the enormous amount of time and energy it took to replicate her Grandmother's recipe. Liz' gefilte fish is the best I ever had. Zami's is right up there with her's. (Liz made a point of telling Yael and then telling the chef to his face.) Yael says he makes it fresh a couple of times a week so you don't have to wait until Pesach.
While moaning in pleasure over the appetizers (I mentioned the chopped liver, didn't I?), we noticed another diner having a dish of thin sliced meat in gravy with a side of kasha (buckwheat groats - the Ashkenzi equivalent of couscous or grits). Liz figured out that the meat was tongue. We had intended to fill what little room we had left in our stomachs with goulash but the sight of the tongue made us change course. I've been told that eating tongue, (or other organ meats like liver or kidney), is a matter of dealing with the texture. For anyone reading this who doesn't like organ meat - good, that means more for me. Sender's tongue can be cut with your fork and melts in your mouth.
We washed our feast down with seltzer (in Israel it's soda - with the accent on the a). Liz' was flavored with a classic red syrup called petal which is raspberry; mine was straight up. We could not cram in the fruit compote this trip. We'll go back for the goulash and compote another time.
I think I've mentioned the beach. Add Sender's chopped liver to the list of reasons why I spend winters here.
Read more!
Tel Aviv
I would have called this blog "Return to Sender" but a Jerusalem Post reviewer beat me to it. In describing our favorite ethnic restaurants, I have often used the line that the food is like your Grandmother's cooking, if your Grandmother came from the food's country of origin. Sender is the only restaurant we've found where the cooking is like my Grandmother's.
Chopped liver is the haute cuisine of peasant/workers' food. The not-so-secret secret to perfect chopped liver is that it has to be - wait for it - chopped. A food processor, blender or other evil mechanical device has never touched Sender's chopped liver, just as such vile 20th century automatons never touched my Litvak Grandmother's chopped liver. Sender's current chef/owner, Zami Schreiber, chops with a knife. My Grandmother (also my Mother and my Aunts) used a curved chopping blade and a wooden bowl.
The ingredients are simple enough - sauteed liver and onions, hard boiled eggs, raw onion, and enough fat and salt to put you on intimate terms with a good cardiologist. Zami chops his mixture to just the right consistency and flavor. The dish is both smooth comfort food and has identifiable chunks of liver, egg and onion. It's best eaten cold though the truly impatient have been known to eat it warm. (I couldn't be the only kid who used his fingers to scrape the remnants of the mixture off the chopping blade and, while sucking warm chopped liver off his fingers, listened yet again to his Mother explain about how hard it is to reattach a severed digit.)
Sender's chopped liver is made as well as chopped liver can be made. You might, with years of practice, be able to replicate this dish but you can't get it better than perfect. I should know. I was raised on this stuff. I don't have 4 stents, an angioplasty and a pacemaker for nothing.
Sender has been in business since 1948. Zami, the son of the original owner's partner, grew up in the kitchen where he learned how to cook like my Grandmothers. Zami's wife (and childhood sweetheart), Yael, runs the dining room and can easily translate the Hebrew menu into what some of you may think is English but are actually the Yiddish names for the various delicacies -- kreplach (fried with onions or boiled in the soup), schnitzel, kishke (intestine stuffed with mystery breading), kneadlach (OK, it's matzoh balls but that somehow doesn't have the same artery clogging ring - and, for the Gentiles out there, it's pronounced with the "k" as a separate syllable from the "nead" - as in knish)), gefilte (stuffed) fish and compote (which may be a French word but sounds Yiddish to me).
We gorged ourselves on appetizers of chopped liver (have i mentioned the chopped liver?), kreplach with onions fried to be crispy but not overly hard or greasy (my Litvak Grandmother's were great eaten cold the next day, Zami's are wonderful time machines back to Brooklyn), kishke (not the U.S. caterers' kishke that turns your skin orange but a kishke whose stuffing reminded us of helzel (stuffed chicken necks - not on Sender's menu but a real treat at my English/Russian Grandmother's apartment)) and chicken soup with kneadlach, kreplach and thin noodles. The chicken soup was tasty but, unlike the rest of the meal, did not live up to that of our Grandmothers. This may, however, be because the chopped liver (I think I've mentioned the chopped liver) raised the bar so high.
And then there was the gefilte fish. Sender's fish is stuffed back into the skin and then sliced. It tasted like Liz' gefilte fish back in the day when she would, once a year for Pesach, expend the enormous amount of time and energy it took to replicate her Grandmother's recipe. Liz' gefilte fish is the best I ever had. Zami's is right up there with her's. (Liz made a point of telling Yael and then telling the chef to his face.) Yael says he makes it fresh a couple of times a week so you don't have to wait until Pesach.
While moaning in pleasure over the appetizers (I mentioned the chopped liver, didn't I?), we noticed another diner having a dish of thin sliced meat in gravy with a side of kasha (buckwheat groats - the Ashkenzi equivalent of couscous or grits). Liz figured out that the meat was tongue. We had intended to fill what little room we had left in our stomachs with goulash but the sight of the tongue made us change course. I've been told that eating tongue, (or other organ meats like liver or kidney), is a matter of dealing with the texture. For anyone reading this who doesn't like organ meat - good, that means more for me. Sender's tongue can be cut with your fork and melts in your mouth.
We washed our feast down with seltzer (in Israel it's soda - with the accent on the a). Liz' was flavored with a classic red syrup called petal which is raspberry; mine was straight up. We could not cram in the fruit compote this trip. We'll go back for the goulash and compote another time.
I think I've mentioned the beach. Add Sender's chopped liver to the list of reasons why I spend winters here.
Read more!
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