Say Yes! To Michigan for 175 years

by emily on January 27, 2012

My home state sometimes gets a bad rap. And sometimes gives bad rap (Eminem and “Bawitdaba” era Kid Rock, for example.)

But despite some glitches in its recent past, like the music noted above and the creation of the SUV craze, Michigan is consistently a state that keeps its head down and its nose close to the grindstone. It doesn’t flaunt its jewels or beg to be the center of attention. Most Michiganders just work hard to do their best. So, in honor of the state that lets me use my hand as a map and its 175th anniversary yesterday, here are some Michigander related items that I’m enjoying at the moment**:

The Night Train: Recently published author Amy Elliott Bragg talks about Detroit’s historical oddities, wonderment and eccentric personalities in such an entertaining way that she sometimes makes you want to go back to when cholera was a real threat. At least to see a few swashbuckling, swaggering historical characters in action. Full disclosure, I went to college with Amy, but that doesn’t change the fact that her writing is so spot on and interesting that I hope you find The Night Train enjoyable too.

The Detroit Journal: This online video journal is the brainchild of Andy Miller and Ben Potter. It’s an ambitious project to produce a documentary once a month that delves into the stories of long-time Detroit residents. They want to shed light on life-long Detroiters and their stories, exposing the heart and soul of a city that’s trying to find its footing between an influx of hipsters and a bad economy. The first documentary “William Foster is a Good Man” is a well-executed 15 minute look at a well-earned break in life.

Hooray: Alli is a designer from downstate whose use of natural sunshine and brightness is impressive. It’s impressive because she makes it look like Michigan is bright and sunny all the time, instead of cloudy for most of the year. Her sense of aesthetic and camera wizardry makes her a design inspiration and plus, she just opened an online store. Let’s hear it for small entrepreneurs bringing it back to Michigan in style. (Literally! har)

Drink Michigan: In honor of raising a glass or two of something locally brewed, distilled or vinted for this festive occasion, Drink Michigan is the place to go. They cover a gamut of beverage related issues and make me excited to know that there’s another place outside of Belgium that has a passion for creating exciting craft beverages.

Sweet Juniper: There are a lot of things that I love about this quirky space on the Internet. But I first fell in love with the fact that their children love dressing up as villains and superheroes from the 80s. Robocop never looked so good.

The People of Detroit: The photography pulls you in and engages people with the fact that yes, there are people who live in Detroit. But it’s also the right amount of no-muss-no-fuss attitude, which is a refreshing break from many photo blogs who affect an air of self-given importance.  Plus, I whole-heartedly believe in this photo blog’s tagline – Not everyone in Detroit is an abandoned building.

The Detroit Opportunity Project: I met Bradford Frost one late Friday night this past summer at Lafayette Coney Island when he forced me into trying some of his coney dog to help him celebrate his new appointment as a Detroit Revitalization Fellow. It’s hard not to like someone who takes his coney dog very, very seriously. But other than that, Bradford’s Detroit Opportunity Project is smartly engaging and creates a space for extremely thoughtful and courteous discussion about what it means to be politically active, civically engaged, and invested in a place as a citizen and as a human. There needs to be more spaces like this – both virtually and face-to-face.

Happy Birthday, Michigan!

**Ok, yes, there is a heavy amount of stuff that is Detroit focused, but that’s because I am in love with the city. However, there are other really great things about Michigan. Like this, this, or this.

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The Low-Down on Belgian Waffles

by emily on January 24, 2012

I don’t often do the de rigueur write-ups about Brussels that are part and parcel if you’re a foreigner who lives here. I have yet to do a write up about frites (for the record, the best friterie in the city center is Tabora. The best sauce: samourai) or any of the chocolate shops (Wittamer wins my vote).  I have nothing against these write-ups, it’s more like I sort of forget that these things are exotic sometimes.

But I’m going to break my silence. I want to get serious about a serious subject: waffles.

Big, thick waffles reign supreme in Belgium and come in two styles – Brussels and Liège. The Brussels style is a light, yeasty and incredibly rectangular affair that’s always consumed inside an establishment on a plate with a knife and fork. The hoity-toity waffle of choice.

Then there’s the Liège waffle. This is the people’s waffle, the waffle that’s sold for less than two euros a pop on the street and warmly wrapped in a slip of waxy paper to eat on the go.

The gaufre de Liège is small and chunky with deep wide pockets that make it easy to tear off chunks of the pillowy dough to pop into your mouth. There is also this insanely addicting smell to them, thanks to the use of pearl sugar in the batter.  These little pearly balls of sugar diffuse throughout the dough when cooking in the iron, oozing out into the exterior, creating this carnival-like caramelization and accompanying smell.  A scent so crazy good that when it first hits you about 50 fifty feet before you see a waffle stand, you’re jonesing for a little carbohydrate pick-me-up by the time you finally pass the vendor.

You can find waffles in pre-packaged sets at grocery stores, but there are subway vendors and even waffle trucks who deal exclusively in the waffle trade.  However, the best place to go for a Liège waffle is Belgaufra, a Brussels chain specializing in nothing but this many pocketed treat.  The beauty in Belgaufra is the simplicity of having only two options, plain or chocolate covered, at their stands that can be found throughout the city and Belgium.

One quick word about etiquette: waffles are toujours sans suppléments. If you want to go native, grab your waffle on the go without anything adorning its nooks and crannies. Besides, it’s really in your best interest. There is nothing easy about eating a waffle smeared with Nutella and topped with strawberries when you have only a teensy, tiny fork to attempt civil eating. Plus, more toppings means it just takes longer to eat the waffle and where’s the fun in that?

Bon appétit!

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The 2011 Round-Up

by emily on January 17, 2012

Here’s the thing. It’s January, which means it’s the month of chronicling the ‘bests’ and the ‘worsts’ of 2011 and really nothing in between.  Here is my attempt to fix that gap.  Here are my reasons why 2011 was a solidly good year.

I ate a lot of these really good sandwiches from The Lasagneria all throughout the year.  That’s probably more mayonnaise than I want to calculate.

 

Before Girl Scout Cookies became a hot button cultural topic in the US, I made my own girl scout cookies.  And my brain somehow thinks that Chinese noodles and Tagalongs are connected.

I was the crazy fool who signed up to run a marathon in Madrid and then did it. But before we ran, we drank wine. Because that’s what they mean by carb loading, right?

I finally made it to see the Abbaye d’Orval in southern Wallonia.  And the beergrimage was born!

This pretty much sums up the night before my brother’s wedding:

If you find yourself in Northern Michigan at any time of the year, please eat at The Polish Kitchen.  If you’re in Michigan during the winter months, you can see two ladies make 7,000 pierogies a day.

Remember that time I went to Detroit and fell in love? I do. I’m really excited about this city.

The Fete de Wallonie was one of the more memorable Belgian experiences I’ve had in awhile.  It’s helped me respect Walloons in a whole new way.

 

Thanks 2011 – you were a solidly good year.  You weren’t the best. You weren’t the worst.  But I still liked you anyway.  And thanks to all of you who have read through it all with me.  Here’s to 2012!

 

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While I was home in Michigan for the holidays and furiously pounding out term papers (hence the absence), Belgium’s culinary delights were featured not once, but twice in prominent English news sources. One of them infinitely increased my insecurity.

I suffer from this syndrome that I didn’t know was a thing until I heard someone say it: FOMO – the Fear Of Missing Out.

My intense case of FOMO is about Westvletern, the best beer in the world (although this year it was bested and is currently number two. Big difference, I know).

Westvleteren is a small, sleepy village nestled among fields of Brussels sprouts, leeks and hops in West Flanders. Its closest neighbors are the calm towns of Poperinge and Ypres (pronounced ‘eee-per’). Poperinge, besides being known as ‘Pops’ by British soldiers, is the center of hops production in Belgium. As you drive alongside the town’s small roads during autumn, you pass by an innumerable amount of highly strung lines covered with thick, green vines. Eventually they’ll be trimmed from their heights, taking on the shape of cured tobacco and left to dry out in the number of hoop houses dotting the farmland.

Ypres is less bucolic but still charming. The city had the sad fate of being caught between a salient of trenches in World War I and was completely annihilated. At the end of the war, the tallest structure in the city only came up to a person’s knees. The city has slowly recovered and has been entirely refurbished to look like it did pre-World War I, thanks to reparations from Germany (who, by the way, just paid the city its last installment for the rebuilding a few years ago)**. Because of this, the town has been able to continue a medieval tradition of throwing cats from the top of the town’s main bell tower in a biannual festival.  Thanks to the rebuilding, the festival still has that medieval feel to it, except now they throw plush cat toys instead of real cats.

And so it goes that near these two towns sits a monastery, full of monks quietly caught in prayer. To support their spiritual pursuits, they only brew enough beer for commercial sale to cover their living expenses.

When the Westvleteren 12 was named the best beer in the world a few years ago by RateBeer.com, the monks were flooded with requests from the US to Japan to purchase their brew. The requests haven’t really stopped since then. Yet despite the continued clamoring for their beer, the monks have stayed true to their style of brewing and the physical constraints of the monastery’s facilities. Their production volume has stayed at a minimum and they only produce as much as they need to for supporting their lifestyle. The scarcity of the beer has turned acquiring it into a quest not unlike the search for the Holy Grail.

In a way, the monks make Westvleteren the most Belgian of beers. They embody the spirit of Belgium by quietly and modestly plugging away, doing work that sustains a lifestyle of small indulgence, and totally shocked and embarrassed when recognized for the high quality of the product produced.

I like that. I like when someone, or a group of people, pull together to make a simple, honest product and then, when it turns out to be good, aren’t bowled over by success. It’s endearing.

At the same time though, I don’t really like this famed beer, the Westvleteren 12. Hence my FOMO. I’ve tried several times to have that ‘A-ha!’ moment when drinking it, but it’s only been this year that I’ve come to accept that it’s a beer, and a good one, but not the beer. At least not for me – and that’s ok. I’m working through my case of FOMO. But when you tell people who are into beer facts that you don’t like Westvleteren, they look at you like you like you’ve kidnapped a baby. Their baby.

The Westvleteren 12 is a brown so murky that it’s impossible to see through and has a sweet smell that hits you immediately upon pouring. The sweet scent manifests itself in a flavor that nods its head in the direction of cough syrup or throat lozenges with a slight burn of alcohol at the finish. You definitely know that this is a strong beer. But strength doesn’t automatically mean a depth of flavor. I find its taste to be relatively one-dimensional compared to other Belgian beers. There’s a mellow undertone of smoked peat and an ever so slight grain-like quality to it as well, like an intensely heavy loaf of rye bread.  And when you blend that smokiness with the tang of the burning aftertaste, it feels like a long-lost distant cousin to whiskey. This is why I think so many people like it. The problem is that I strongly dislike whiskey.

Even though I’m not its number one fan, I do recognize the qualities that make the beer good and I would never claim it as a write-off. It’s no bottle of Wild Irish Rose or a handle of homemade gin. I can see its appeal to people and every time I’m in the area, I will continue to have a sit down at In De Vrede, the only cafe known to sell the beer.  It’s located across the street from the monastery and in the middle of a field, so it’s clearly there for one purpose – to serve the beer.  And in typical, quirky Belgian style, there’s a fantastic playground immediately outside the cafe’s entrance.

So would I qualify it as the best beer in the world? No, it’s not even close.  When it comes time for me to leave Belgium, I won’t spend my nights wistfully thinking of the times I had with Westvleteren. There are too many others in the arsenal of Belgian beers that will keep me up when I’m gone.

For those of you who are interested in visiting Westvleteren (and I highly suggest you do. The area is beautiful in that quiet, European pastoral sort of way), Joe Stange, a former American expat who used to live in Belgium, wrote up a nice ditty about car-free directions here. Also, give In De Vrede a call before you head over to make sure they’re open. I’ve definitely tried to go there a couple of times when they’ve been on holiday. (Despite their website, they do generally speak English)

** If you do find yourself in the Ypres area with a car and an interest in history, I strongly suggest checking out Hill 62.  It’s one of the few remaining fully intact World War I trenches and the site is run from an old farmer’s former house. The farmer and his family collected all of the shrapnel and other bits and bobs found around his land after the War. My American perspective always finds it intensely interesting and numbing. In general, Americans are never taught much about the Great War and this is a very in-your-face lesson about modern European history.  This sort of face-to-face interaction with history is something Belgium excels at when it wants to.

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Liquid Courage for the Holidays

by emily on December 20, 2011

I hear that the holidays are stressful. I hear that they are stressful because you might have a sick baby who throws up everywhere on the plane en route to visiting your in-laws.  In-laws who may or may not pressure you into having more babies. Or perhaps the season is stressful because your Martha Stewart gene has flared up and you’re feeling insecure because of the impossibly hip crowd on Pinterest. Or maybe it’s because you just broke up with someone a hot minute ago and all of your aunts and uncles are going to ask about your love life at the family’s holiday party like your Bridget Jones or something. Ok, that’s legit. That is stressful.

But can I tell you a secret? I think I discovered why we make the holidays like this. It gives well-meaning adults like ourselves a socially-acceptable excuse to day-drink. What better way to deal with the once-a-year-stress caused from arbitrarily made up deadlines and the pressure for perfection than mimosas in the shower, hot buttered rums, or mulled wine? Whatever it is that helps you get through this holiday season with sanity intact, all I have to say is: Respect. Own your holiday spirit, whether it’s a decanted bottled or a Cosby Sweater. Own it well.

To aid in this socially-sanctioned merriment, let me start by suggesting two variations on a theme: Homemade Adult Eggnog.

Before we start, the ‘adultness’ of the homemade eggnog is critical. Like Bluecross Blueshield critical.* Adding alcohol to raw eggs essentially ‘cooks’ the eggs – it kills all of the bacteria and salmonella friends that you don’t want crashing the party. So embrace your inner Blackbeard and your closest bottle of dark rum and let’s do this!

*It is perfectly acceptable if you are suddenly overcome with fear and hypochondria halfway through your first batch of eggnog. I congratulate you on your healthy dose of sensibility. However, I would not suggest checking WebMD for signs of salmonella poisoning. It might put you off eggs. Like, forever. But I can also tell you that so far, I am going strong and so are all of my roommates. Testify!

First up, we have the main event: eggnog. This was the first time I made eggnog and wanted to aim for something less thick and less infused with the spice of Christmas than the store bought stuff.  I was pleasantly surprised.  Substituting skim milk for the whole style was key.  However, I like the recipe because you can play with it, tweaking it to your tastes. Want it super creamy, just like it’s straight off the dairy shelf? Follow this recipe to the tee. Want to maybe scale back on the alcohol a wee bit? That’s cool too. Just make sure there’s a little somethin’ somethin’ there.

Homemade Eggnog
From Serious Eats

8 eggs, separated
1/2 to 3/4 cup sugar, to taste
3 cups whole milk
1 pint cream
8 ounces brandy
8 ounces dark rum
Fresh nutmeg

Beat egg yolks until smooth, and gradually add sugar, beating steadily until well mixed. Add milk, cream and spirits and mix well. In a separate bowl, beat egg whites to firm peaks; fold into yolk mixture. Serve in cups or goblets, and grate fresh nutmeg over the top of each serving.

Next up is the Tom and Jerry, a drink that is commonly thought to be the precursor to eggnog. This is for the person in your life who is bit more esoteric, or perhaps lactose-intolerant. It still hums with the holiday spirit of spice and everything nice and leaves you feeling a bit Dickensian.  Also, the relative ease of drinking this leads me to believe that this will be a great morning-after drink if you hit the ‘nog a bit too heavy the night before.  Just think of it like a Christmas Bloody Mary.

Side note, I would not be entirely opposed to purchasing a set of these typical, yet clearly-obnoxious-because-they-only-serve-one-purpose mugs for this drink:

 

The Tom and Jerry (serves 2)
From Slate

1 large egg
2 tablespoons superfine sugar
1 1/2 oz brandy
2 oz dark rum
12 oz milk or water, you decide!
Allspice, clove and nutmeg to taste

Put a kettle on to boil.  While waiting for the water to reach boiling, separate the egg.  With an electric mixer, beat the egg white until soft peaks form.

Once the water is boiling, fill the two mugs with the hot water to warm them up.  Meanwhile, blend the egg yolk and the sugar together.  Once blended, fold this batter into the egg white.  If you would like, you can add some allspice and clove here, depending on your tastes.

Once the mugs are warmed, pour the water out of the mugs leaving them empty.  Divide the eggy batter and the alcohol in between the two mugs and stir.  Depending on how thick you would like your drink or if you have dietary preferences, you can choose to top the mug up with either water or milk.  Then top with nutmeg.

However, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention this hot chocolate from the queen of decadence herself, Nigella Lawson. If you do nothing else this winter season, please make this easy-peasy hot chocolate at least five times. Preferably while listening to my man Otis sing about Christmas. I know how tempting it is to give in to pre-made hot chocolate à la Swiss Miss or Cécémeal, but this is so easy to make that opting for store-bought powders can seem a bit ludicrous once you taste the difference.  And the bonus of this hot chocolate is that it’s winter wonderland warming enough without the alcohol so it can be a treat for you and anyone who would like to abstain from the Captain.

Enjoy!

Super decadent adult hot chocolate (serves 2)
From Feast by Nigella Lawson

2 cups (or 500 ml) milk
100 grams dark chocolate
1 tablespoon cinnamon or 1 cinnamon stick
2 teaspoons honey
1 teaspoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons dark rum, or to taste

Put everything except the rum into a saucepan over medium heat.  Whisk continually until the chocolate melts completely.  Once melted, remove from heat and add rum until it suits your taste.  Remove the cinnamon stick and pour into mugs.

Wherever you are in the world, let me wish you a very merry holiday season! Salud!

 

(For extra fun, here are eight tips from Joanna Goddard – a fellow Michigander! – on wine etiquette for the holiday season.)

 

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The Little Black Dress of Carbs: Quadruple Chocolate Loaf Cake

December 13, 2011

I think the only time people truly enjoy the thought of going to parties is when it’s entirely on terms they are familiar with. There are three critical elements to attending parties and having an actual good time: you already know a critical mass of the other guests and that the degree of socially awkward [...]

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A restorative pint-sized weekend

December 9, 2011

First off, thank you all who took my survey a little bit ago. It’s been helpful and your responses were very, very much appreciated. This last week has been quiet, yet chaotic and weirdly restorative. My last few weekends have been so jam packed that it has felt like I’ve crammed a week’s worth of [...]

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How to be Interrogated by the Chinese Military

December 2, 2011

I’ve been talking to people about my criminal record on a much-too-regular basis recently. To be totally frank, I don’t have a criminal record. But to be totally frank, it’s sort of surprising. One of the reasons why this discussion is surfacing is because of a little incident that happened with a friend while I [...]

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TPF wants to know you better!

November 29, 2011

Hello all!  I hope all of my Americans had an excellent Thanksgiving and that everyone stayed warm and happy this weekend. There are many things in my life to be thankful for, including each and everyone of you who reads this blog.  Because of this, I would like to make The Petit Four a bigger, [...]

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My Brussels: Booze ‘n Blues

November 25, 2011

Sometimes I joke that I’m not an adult, but a faux-dult. Some of my markers for ‘true adulthood’ are entirely sane, others just bizarre.  For example, I’ll know I’ve ‘made it’ when I’ve finally settled enough to justify purchasing a record player and as many Sam Cooke, Otis Redding and Etta Jones records as I [...]

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