Camp Stories: A Weekend in Paradise

There are some traditions in my family that are not to be messed with: Christmas dinner means turkey and fixin's…no suggestions of ham, lamb or other funny business allowed. Same goes for Thanksgiving. And Friday evenings are invariably kicked off with Dave's martinis garnished with Spanish anchovy-stuffed olives.

Instant classic: the Sierra cup martini.

Now it looks like the fourth of July is becoming another don't-mess-with-the-best formula: a minimum of three nights of tent camping with a group of four couples sharing food and drink at what has been officially voted (by us) as a 10-out-of-10 campground, Paradise Creek in the Gifford-Pinchot National Forest just north of Carson, Washington.

Classy glassware? Who needs it?

A mere 90 minutes from Portland, it's pretty primitive, meaning no showers, flush toilets or hook-ups for big rigs. But that also means it's devoid of roaring generators, loud music and crowds of marauding children on dirt bikes. Instead the air is filled with the smell of campfire smoke and the sound of the small creek that flows by, and the night sky through the trees is studded with millions of stars.

New classic: Coney sauce.

This year we had dibs on making dinner the first night, so instead of trying to relive the success of last year's campfire posole I decided to try my hand at that hallowed American specialty known as the Coney Island hot dog. What I came up with is definitely a twist on the traditional, but what can you expect from someone who grew up on the left coast?

And the dogs were no Ball Park Franks or even Hebrew National, but a selection from local purveyors Olympic Provisions and Chop. Both types got raves, by the way, though I have to say I really liked the flavor and heft of the Chop dogs. And the sauce is one I'll pull out for a backyard BBQ soon, sided by some potato salad or coleslaw.

Coney Island Hot Dog Sauce

2 Tbsp. olive oil
2 lbs. lean ground beef
3 lg yellow onions, chopped fine
3 lg cloves garlic, minced
1/2 Tbsp. garlic powder
1 1/2 Tbsp. white vinegar
4 Tbsp. ancho chile powder
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes or hot chile powder
1 Tbsp. cumin
1 Tbsp. salt
1 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce
2 6-oz. cans tomato paste
4 c. water

Heat a large Dutch oven on medium heat and add oil. When it shimmers, add ground beef and brown. Add onions and garlic and sauté till tender. Add garlic powder, vinegar, chile powders, cinnamon, cumin, salt and allspice and stir until fragrant. Add remaining ingredients and bring to a simmer. Continue simmering for 3 to 4 hours, stirring occasionally to make sure it doesn't stick. Makes about 10 cups of sauce.

Read other Camp Stories in the series: Trout Creek Campground, Shadow Bay at Waldo Lake, LaPine State Park, Indian Crossing Campground, Frog Lake Campground, Patrick's Point State Park, Harris Beach State Park and Moss Creek Campground and last year's trip to Paradise Creek.

The L Word: Double Down

The two-fer is such an American idea, isn't it? Buy one, get one free. Whether it's toilet paper or, in this case, a recipe.

I was stuck for something to make for dinner the other night. I wanted something light and wasn't in the mood for meat, a tough task with two voracious carnivores drooling all over my kitchen counters. And no, I'm not referring to the dogs here…they're too short to drool on anything but my toes.

There were some leftovers (the L word) in the fridge: a bit of really good tomato sauce, a few marinated castelvetrano olives from a dinner party, a bunch of kale, a few Meyer lemons I hadn't got around to using yet. Hm. Then it hit me…kale…lemons…olives!

A quick check of the pantry revealed pasta and (yes!) a tin of anchovies. Victory!

At this point you have to picture me dancing around the kitchen, pumping my fists in the air, hearing the theme from Rocky bouncing off the kitchen cabinets. Now the more psychologically stable among you may be thinking that I need something more meaningful to do with my life when coming up with a plan for a weeknight dinner is considered a quest on a par with King Arthur's grail, Hannibal's elephant parade over the Alps or even Indiana Jones's women…um…I mean mythical antiquities. But there you have it…I come up with an idea for dinner and I'm Rocky Balboa. But back to the subject at hand.

What had suddenly turned me into a down-trodden, working-class boxer from Philly was the raw kale salad I'd perfected last fall, based on a raw Brussels sprout salad I'd had at Olympic Provisions. Would it taste as amazing if I used Meyer lemons and combined it with pasta? It sounded reasonable enough to me, so just over twenty minutes later we sat down to what I have to say was one knockout of a dinner.

Meyer Lemon and Kale Pasta

1 lb. dried pasta
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 2-oz. tin anchovies in olive oil
3 cloves garlic, chopped fine
1 small bunch kale (I love lacinato, though any will do), sliced into chiffonade
10 castelvetrano olives, pitted and roughly chopped
Zest of 1 Meyer lemon
Juice of 2 Meyer lemons
Salt and pepper to taste
Parmesan, finely grated

Bring large pot of water to boil. Add pasta and cook until al dente.

Heat oil over medium heat. Add anchovies and stir until they dissolve (stand back…they can splatter). Add garlic and heat but do not brown it. Add kale and sauté till wilted. Quickly stir in olives and remove from heat.

When pasta is done, drain off water and place in large serving bowl. Add kale mixture, lemon zest and juice (chopped preserved lemons would also be terrific). Toss, adding salt and pepper to taste. Sprinkle it lightly with parmesan. Serve with more parmesan in a bowl for sprinkling.

Livin' in the Blurbs: A Dram of This, A Slice of That

I don't know a soul who wasn't heartbroken when Kurt Spak decided to close his Piedmont-comes-to-PDX Alba Osteria in the Hillsdale neighborhood. Unfortunately, as of this week he's also closed his Caffé Autogrill next door where you could still pick up some of his justly-famous handmade and hand-filled pastas by the pound. Word just came out that a lease and liquor license have been filed for Alba's former space by local whiskey expert Stuart Ramsay. As reported by Andy Wheeler in the Hillsdale News, Scotland native Ramsay plans to open Ramsay's Dram, a gastropub with "a stellar local beer portfolio and world whiskey selection." Stay tuned!

Details: Ramsay's Dram (proposed), 6440 SW Capitol Hwy.

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A new effort by the USDA, called Chefs Move to Schools, is working in conjunction with Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign to get chefs involved with local students. The program now has a celebrity booster in Genoa's David Anderson (right). He spent last year working the students at Lewis Elementary School in Portland, giving hands-on lessons in taking produce picked in the garden and turning it into meals that any kid would love. Noting that some kids had never seen a pea pod on the vine, he said he loves to "watch those kids eyes light up." He and his brother, Chef Ray Anderson of Nuestra Cocina, are looking for other local chefs to sign up and adopt schools for the 2011-2012 school year.

Details: Chefs Move to Schools. Contact Sarah Medeiros by e-mail at Share Our Strength or call Tim Parsons, 503-866-1822 for information.

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In Portland, pigs are as popular as backyard chickens, and seemingly as ubiquitous. While, unlike chickens, they're not (yet) allowed in back yards unless contained on a grill or spitted on a rotisserie over a bed of hot coals, pigs and their requisite parts are popping up like early spring daffodils on class lists all over the city:

• Whole Hog Butchery Class: Josh Graves and Eli Cairo teach the basics of breaking down and cutting, tying and processing a whole animal. Includes bag full of fresh, local pork. Sun., Mar. 6, 2pm; $125, 18 students, reservations required. Olympic Provisions, 107 SE Washington St. 503-954-3663.
• Basic Pig Butchery for Home Charcuterie: Gabriel Claycamp teaches how to butcher a pig to utilize all the muscle groups to produce cured pork specialties. Includes a share of meat and recipes. Sat., Mar. 12, 1-5 pm; $225, 12 students, reservations required. E-mail Portland Meat Collective to register.
• French Seam Butchery: Dominique Chapolard and Camas Davis teach how to transform a pig into premium French cuts using seam butchery, a traditional European method of breaking down animals according to their muscle seams. Includes charcuterie tasting and butchered meats. Wed., Mar. 16, 1-5 pm; $225, 12 students, reservations required. E-mail Portland Meat Collective to register.

Quick Hits: Olympic Provisions & Lucca

I'm sure you know the feeling. We'd had a couple of beers at a pub, talked with a few folks we knew, then left with the sense that the evening wasn't quite over, particularly in the food department. I mean, beer is a meal in itself, but doesn't quite hit the same spot as a nice nosh.

The beers were consumed at the drastically revamped Produce Row Café, founded in 1974 and the very first pub owned by the McMenamin brothers. We were there for an event put on by Megan Flynn (left) to celebrate the summer issue of her magazine, BeerNW. It prominently features an article on the Row, but more importantly it also has an article that includes my recipe for paella with chorizo and mussels. Cool, huh?

So finding ourselves in the eastside industrial district, we opted for a bite at Olympic Provisions, Nate Tilden and Jason Barwikowski's emporium of cured meat products. I hadn't yet been there in the evening, and on this weeknight we found it about half-full, with tables available and plenty of room at the bar.

We ordered the meat board, which came tout de suite and contained a sampling of three of their salumi, a wedge of chicken liver mousse and a pistachio rillette with pickled onions and rhubarb, cornichons and mustard. They're definitely finding their way with the salumi, which is getting more flavorful and distinct each time I try it. The mousse and terrine were fantastic, though the three thin slices of toasted bread were only about half of what was needed.

Shining like crossed swords, the seared fresh sardines came with a salad of baby potatoes and asparagus dressed in a mustard vinaigrette and topped with half of a soft-centered boiled egg. Perfect for sharing, it was a great pairing I'm going to have to copy here at home when sardines are next in season. The best dish, though, was the pork belly with clams that had been cooked in a spicy tomato sauce with greens and carrots. Rich and brilliant, this blew us away.

I'd tell you about the drinks we had, but we'd abstained due to the beers consumed beforehand. And, amazingly, we didn't really miss them, an observation I wouldn't have expected. (Note to self: sometimes the food is enough!)

Details: Olympic Provisions, 107 SE Washington St. Phone 503-954-3663.

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My idea of the perfect neighborhood has, it goes without saying, friendly folks who like to hang out and chat with neighbors passing by with their dogs and kids. It should also be walkable, bikeable and close to public transportation. There has to be at least one good grocery store and a farmers' market nearby, and great cafés for coffee and a really good low-key restaurant for those nights when you don't feel like cooking, a place where the food and conviviality is more important than the decor or the toniness of the crowd.

We're lucky to live in exactly that kind of neighborhood, and to have a restaurant like Lucca only a ten-minute walk away. On the way home with friends Ivy and Gregor the other night, we stopped in for a bite and a glass of wine and had a spectacular meal that started with a wonderful antipasto platter, probably the best I've had recently and by far the most reasonably priced.

Several slices of excellent charcuterie were accompanied by stuffed dates, a pile of assorted olives, a pickled vegetable salad, a liver mousse with a small pile of salty crisp chips for dipping and a pile of crunchy deep-fried vegetables. More than enough for three, this plate would be well worth ordering on its own with a drink at the bar or, as we did, the starter for the terrific meal to follow.

Details: Lucca, 3449 NE 24th Ave. Phone 503-287-7372.

Olympic Ambitions

Sometimes you know you're going to like a place the instant you walk in the door. So it comes as no surprise that I felt a flood of warm feelings immediately on walking through the door of the recently opened Olympic Provisions when I saw the giant "MEAT" sign lit up like a Broadway marquee on the back wall. The brainchild of Clyde Common's Nate Tilden and co-owner (and executive chef) Jason Barwikowski, it serves as a playground for the meat-curing prowess of salumi maven Elias Cairo.

Cairo, known until recently as the sous and then head chef at Hawthorne's highly respected Castagna, came to Olympic Provisions to operate Oregon's first USDA-approved dry cure salumeria. Located in what was Portland's inner eastside produce district, it now looks to be its latest hot spot for eating and drinking. And Cairo is serious about his meat, with a window next to the kitchen that looks into the hanging meaty bits in the curing room.

On my first trip there for lunch a friend and I sampled some of those meats, mine a hot pastrami sandwich that didn't carry the label Reuben but was packed not only with warm meat but lots of fresh sauerkraut. The appetizer of fresh fried sardines and garlic aioli with chopped pickled onions on crostini were sublime, showing that these guys know how to take full advantage of what's in season.

The second trip was for a face-to-face with my fellow blogger Denise and biz exec/world traveler and fellow twitterer Nitin Khanna. (As I told Nitin, I'm old school when it comes to face time.) Deciding to dive meat first into the menu, we ordered the charcuterie plate (above right), a combination that showed off Cairo's prowess in the curing room with, clockwise from top, coppa (with white chunks), mortadella (with green bits), saucisson sec, terrine (under knife) and pork liver mousse. The plate was a collection of contrasting flavors and textures, from the meatiness of the terrine to the silken lushness of the moussse to the crunch of the peppers in the mortadella. The cured meats were surprisingly mild and a tad dry, the sec rather flavorless and the coppa almost leathery.
More surprising was the treatment of the vegetables, which you'd think would almost be an afterthought in a palace built to honor the many delicious ways to enjoy the flesh of animals. The shaved brussels sprout salad with its anchovy-rich vinaigrette (right) was something I'll be working to copy here at home and might require (many) further visits to confirm ingredients. And the complex curried roasted cauliflower with chickpeas and golden raisins (above left) was pure genius, and another dish I could devour on a regular basis.
Denise and I opted for the roasted eggplant sandwich on a bolo roll (left) that was combined with roasted red peppers and a honeyed ricotta, a nice textural combination, but I probably would have gone with a pungent goat or sheep's cheese to give it more character. Nitin's grilled cheese and mushroom on brioche was very good, the buttery brioche grilled to be crusty on the outside, and once bitten the bread almost dissolved in your mouth.

This place would be a great one to visit at several times of the day to see how its atmosphere changes as night falls, the brighter, noisier crowds at lunch giving way to the more intimate lighting in the evening. Especially if you can get the prime seats at end of the counter and toast your luck under that MEAT sign.

Details: Olympic Provisions, 107 SE Washington St. Phone 503-954-3663.