Poll: The next City Council food ban?

Have fun.

And be very, very worried.

Cheers,
Wade

It makes me so proud that I live outside Chicago's city limits.

I just hope everyone on this forum is a registered voter. I think we need to make sure these folks are aware that some of the people inconvenienced by these idiotic bans (or worried by the erosion of freedom) have a voice.

Food Porn - It makes you want to eat something, leading to obesity

nr706 wrote:It makes me so proud that I live outside Chicago's city limits.

Don't be too complacent. How long will it be before Nuclear-Free Evanston follows Chicago into this municipal silliness?

Alas, I fear it might not be safe to invest in the Evanston Foie Gras and Fatty Foods Hut.

My husband, who grew up in Wisconsin, remembers childhood smuggling runs down to Illinois for illicit margarine, sold at the border with large signs promoting it. (Margarine wasn't banned in Wisconsin but could only be sold uncolored, with little capsules of yellow coloring to mix in yourself.)

I can see it now: "Last stop for foie gras, Crisco and Blue Bonnet!"

[url=http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/wmh/pdf/wmh_autumn01_strey.pdf[/url]The Oleo Wars[/url] (pdf)

I voted other, for I think barbecue (the real kind like Honey 1) will be banned for the meat spending too much time in the bacteria "danger zone" of 40* to 150* (I think thats the range) as well as places like the Weber Grill for the fat hitting the coals and causing carcinigens (sp) to adhere to the meat.

But maybe they'll give these places an exception, if they have a garden on the roof for the "Green Chicago" plan.

jeez.

I will say that one of the things that irked me most about the foie gras ban was that it was, in my opinion, unconstitutional. That is, the Illinois 1970 Constitution grants home rule units (such as the City of Chicago) police authority to protect the health and welfare of their citizens. As well they should! But banning foie gras did no such thing. No matter how much of a foie gras fiend you may be, a couple of ounces here and there is all anybody is going to eat; compare that to the typical intake of Big Macs and White Castles with cheese in an everyday diet, and you see that the ban had nothing to do with protecting the health of the citizens of Chicago. Now, however, the proposal is to eliminate the use of trans-fat cooking oils. From all I have read, trans fats are the cigarettes among lipids -- no amount of them is really desirable, and even small amounts can be terribly harmful to your health. So, regulating their use -- even prohibiting it -- may actually fall within the Constitutionally granted authority of the City of Chicago's Council. At least they have a colorable argument, unlike the foie gras ban, which was purely political and, I think, vulnerable to a constitutional challenge. (Anybody among our professional contributors here want to get a ticket for serving foie gras and take it to court? Maybe the ACLU would step in!)

I voted other -- Cured Meats are next.

JimInLoganSquare wrote:Anybody among our professional contributors here want to get a ticket for serving foie gras and take it to court? Maybe the ACLU would step in!

I have heard of one restaurant that plans to get around the ban by giving away the foie gras for free -- with purchase of its accouterments.

LAZ wrote:

nr706 wrote:It makes me so proud that I live outside Chicago's city limits.

Don't be too complacent. How long will it be before Nuclear-Free Evanston follows Chicago into this municipal silliness?

Last time I checked, every atom within the city of Evanston was still allowed to have a nucleus. Might be a bit of a deterrent to the materials research at Northwestern if it were otherwise.

LAZ wrote:Alas, I fear it might not be safe to invest in the Evanston Foie Gras and Fatty Foods Hut.

Damn! What a great idea for a restaurant! The Foie Gras Hut! If we can just get a few investors together ...

Maybe it can be rolled in with Guts 'n' Such.

. . . in your honor, my fiancee, Sigita, and I fixed chicken-fried steak and cream gravy today.







Ban that.

Cheers,
Wade

Oh, my, that looks delicious! My gall bladder hurts just gazing at it.

After consuming many chicken- and country-fried steaks across TX, the South, and the Mid-West, and after much experimentation and trying many recipes, here are my humble suggestions:

Get a cheap cut like round steak. Tenderize it yourself (I use both a tenderizing mallet to get the meat into cutlets, and a Jaccard multi-blade tenderizer for extra penetration.

None of the preparations I've encountered mentioned this, but here's my discovery. Marinade the tenderized meat overnight in buttermilk and beaten eggs (I had maybe 3 lbs. of meat and used a quart of buttermilk and six eggs).

Heat oil to 375 degrees. When ready, dredge marinated meat in seasoned flour (salt and pepper), back in the marinade, and then back in the flour. Fry, turning, until golden brown on each side. Let the oil cool a little, then pour most off (straining and presevering the crunchies). Heat again, adding milk (I tried this with buttermilk, but it was a little TOO tangy, and the seasoned flour until you have a nice brown roux-like gravy, then add salt and pepper to taste.

I've never had CFS this good anywhere: thick and crunchy crust. The bacteria in the buttermilk-marinated meat seems to react when it meets the flourcausing it to rise just as it hits the oil.

Cheers,
Wade

What kind of fat do you use for frying?

waderoberts wrote:. . . in your honor, my fiancee, Sigita, and I fixed chicken-fried steak and cream gravy today.

Sweet Mama O'Brian that looks grand!!

LAZ wrote:

What kind of fat do you use for frying?

In this case, canola oil; I had a gallon on hand.

I generally like lard for flavor or peanut oil for frying at high temps. I use lard exclusively when I'm frying chicken (even when fixing up a neghborhood-size batch by frying 10+ pounds in my turkey fryer (and THAT requires a LOT of lard [not to mention clean-up]).

The canola oil worked fine for the CFS, because it didn't really need any more flavor, and, since it was well-tenderized by hand and by marinating, it fried pretty quickly and woundn't have picked up much from the lard.

Cheers,
Wade

Oooh, just wait: High Fructose Corn Syrup might be next... but probably not in Illinois, a corn state. HFCS prices will probably be going up, though, since they're the principle ingredient in making ethanol.

On the trans-fat ban: what it's going to hurt is the small mom-n-pop shops with a fryolator.

At the haute end, Charlie Trotter's probably doesn't use any; if Moto uses any, I'd bet it's ironically. At the fast food end, McD's has already pledged to get rid of it... but they've got the R&D bucks to develop a tasty fry medium. It's going to put some hot dog stands, fish friers, chicken huts, milanesa purveyors and so on out of business, because they can't afford to either buy a high-flavored oil, or do the more-frequent replacement that polyunsaturated oil will require.

Maybe it's time to go back to frying spuds in tallow?

I avoid that stuff, unless making pecan pies with Karo syrup.

JoelF wrote:

Maybe it's time to go back to frying spuds in tallow?

Yes. Please. Why should all of that good tallow go to waste?

Cheers,
Wade

JoelF wrote:It's going to put some hot dog stands, fish friers, chicken huts, milanesa purveyors and so on out of business

Not to mention a lot of bakeries. Pastry crust, frosting and many other bakery products rely on vegetable shortening* and margarine. It's unrealistic to expect them to return to leaf lard and butter. And what are the kosher bakeries to use?

I wish this foretold a return to animal fats (not to mention palm and coconut oil) but I fear not. Tonight some of us were speculating on the on the possible results of french fries cooked in chicken shmaltz.

I have a terrible foreboding that it will be something akin to Olestra.

*Has anyone tried the transfat-free Crisco?