Attention all minutemen! I’m sounding the alarm! Does your heart beat red, white and blue? Then it’s time to act! The most insidious grocery-based revolution since the Whisky Rebellion is afoot.

If you mess with this, you mess with America

Who is this culinary Benedict Arnold and what is his purpose? Why, it’s none other than Slate‘s Nathan Heller, who just last week wrote a polemic against that tasty, scrumptious and, yes, American food: Pie. Already, brave patriots who know more about the subject than I do have risen to the defense of our national pastry. But even as I sit in a foreign land surrounded by foreign food and foreign customs, I cannot help but, with a tear in my eye and a song in my heart, to rise to the defense of my mother country’s dessert.

No, friends, no. Put away the tar and the feathers. Heller attempts to make his case in taste and reason, and it is with taste and reason that we shall defeat him.

As I read it, Heller’s case stands on four points: pie is un-American, pie is messy, pie is difficult to make and pie is not that tasty. Yes, yes, I understand your reaction, but calm down. We’ll address each argument in turn.

First, Heller argues that pie is un-American. Evidently, we gullible Americans, misinformed by the insidious pie lobby, should be shocked that pie migrated here from Europe like the rest of us instead of somehow springing from the ground, fertilized by Benjamin Franklin himself and brought from sea to shining sea by Johnny Appleseed. Wow, I’m flabbergasted! Clearly we must refuse to call anything American that migrated here a couple centuries ago to evolve into a new identity. If pie’s un-American sin is that it has foreign ancestors, then this is a stain the majority of us bear. Like it or not, we are a land of immigrants. There’s a reason why our national beef patty is named after a city in northern Germany, and those hot dogs we consume at baseball games were once called Frankfurters. Unless you are a pure-blood Native American, you have foreign relatives who touched down around the same time pie did, perhaps much sooner. My paternal grandmother was an Estonian who came to America via Germany. I find it very American that our own President had a Kenyan father. Heck, the Statue of Liberty herself was a gift from the French. The fact that the puritans didn’t have fruit pie at the first Thanksgiving is irrelevant. If heller demands such national purity for his American food menu, then he is carrying a short list.

Heller spends a lot of words complaining that pie is messy. Oh dear, someone give this delicate person a napkin for his wittle mouth and wipe his wittle nose. By all means, don’t give him salsa for his chips or sauce for his ribs, lest he gets stains on his frock. Burritos are messy. A hot dog, properly decked in condiments, is messy. Lasagna is messy. What do they have in common? They’re delicious! Again, if Heller prefers food that doesn’t risk staining his fingers or spreading across his plate like the ocean tide, then there’s a lot more he’s missing out on than pie.

Heller also whines that pie is a lot of effort. Such blood, sweat and tears to make a messy foreign substance! Ok, my sarcasm tank is almost empty, so I’ll let the more mature Pie It Forward blog I linked to earlier speak to this point:

“The best pie, the pie that, in my book counts as pie, was made in a home, with love, with the best, freshest, regionally and seasonally-appropriate ingredients. The best pie takes a lot of time and not a little effort. It is made by those who have made hundreds of pies, some good, some bad. It goes from ingredients to oven to plate in the shortest possible amount of time. In the best pie, you can taste the sun that ripened the fruit, the spices and flavorings pop and the crust reminds you of the grandmother you wish you’d had; the one that knew how to make a really excellent pie.”

If he wants to, Heller can find all he wants to complain about in pie in the frozen food section of his local grocery store. With a little effort, excellent pie is possible.

This leads us to Heller’s argument that pie just doesn’t taste good. Well, ultimately, taste is in the tongue of the eater, and if he just plain doesn’t like pie, then that leaves more for the rest of us. And again, if we’re talking about mass-produced pie from the grocery store or some sort of short-cut halfway pie made with canned goods, then I’m with him. But the presence of McDonald’s doesn’t mean hamburgers are bad. The presence of Coors doesn’t mean beer is bad. The same goes with pie.

Here’s Heller’s closing point:

“Your own grandmother, grandfather, or other kitchen-able elder no doubt makes the best, most unequivocally delicious pie that I will ever taste. These people should be proud. The lengths we’ve gone to in order to make a pre-medieval baking technique as toothsome as possible today are proof of American ingenuity and care. But is this a cause worth the effort?”

I wonder if Heller needs to expand his circle to include such a pie-making elder, or younger, as it is in my case. You see, I am the beneficiary of my pie-loving sisters. When the family gets together, say Christmas or a summer holiday, the three of them, along with my mother, take the time, the efforts and the fresh ingredients to make some spectacular pies, among them apple, peach and (my favorite) chocolate pecan. None are too sweet, nor do they carry a fake sort of syrupy. I’d take a piece of any of them before even the most creative cupcake. And here’s the thing: they keep doing it. For them, part of the joy of baking, and baking well, is the baking part. There’s pleasure in working hard with loved ones to create something delicious for loved ones.

Worth the effort? An emphatic, freedom-ringing, home run-hitting, flag-waiving, red coat-fighting, eagle-screaming, anthem-singing, firework-cracking, Thanksgiving-celebrating, 50 State-memorizing yes.

(Photo by norwichnuts)

In Germany, if it’s spreadable, it’s edible!

Have you tried these German spreadables?

Ok, that’s not entirely true, and I’m sure you’re not thankful for the images of unappetizing oozes that just passed through your brain. But an American visitor who moves on from the biergartens (but why would we want to?) into other forms of German cuisine will note that there is much more to spread, and the spreadables (I will continue to use this word as a noun) are surprisingly good.

Yes, America does have its spreadables, but outside of creative dips in the Mediterranean section of your local Wholefood or Trader Joe’s, many of us don’t move beyond ketchup & mustard, mayo & butter, peanut butter& jelly. For simplicities sake, I am not counting sauces, such as BBQ sauce or gravy, or dips, as spreadables – only those food items that you actually take a knife and spread over something else. And come to think of it, there’s not a lot of dip over here in Deutschland, and most of it is pretty sub-standard compared to the salsas and bean-based offerings in the States. My hypothesis is that Germany has some of the best bread in the world, but no one really taught them how to make the chip. America, in contrast, has great chips – corn, potato, pita – and an excellent assortment of dipping sauces.

When we lived in the States, my German wife was surprised how few spreadables occupy the shelves of these massive American grocery stores. Even if she could find a cheese spread, it was usually cheap, fake plastic stuff smothered in artificial flavors. And forget about finding spreadable meat. (Note: I know that there’s pate, but I don’t think I’ve actually seen anyone in America eating that. Do you?) Yes, that’s right, spreadable meat. But before you gag and go back to your Facebook page, try to keep an open mind. I’m going to introduce you to a few spreadable essentials to the German diet, starting with something that’s so good it transcends any culture.

You’ve probably had Nutella. It’s showing up in more and more American stores, delicious if not pricey. It’s one of those European concoctions that those pompous snots who spend their first years after college in Europe (editors note: the contributor spent two years in Europe after college.) try to impose on the land of the free, sort of like soccer, espadrilles or environmentalism. But Nutella involves chocolate, and anything with chocolate can’t be that nutty – unless you mean delicious hazelnuts! Nutella, rivaled only by peanut butter, is the king of all spreadables. It goes good with any fruit, can mix wonderfully with Ricotta cheese, and is the best Crepe spread available. If you haven’t had it, stop whatever you are doing and go buy some (and bring your credit card. It’s pricey, but worth it).

Nutella is not a German product; it’s Italian. However, it seems to be a more important part of the German kitchen than it is in any other culture. I know someone over here who actually scoops it out with a spatula every morning. If all the world’s Nutella were raptured to heaven along with Harold Camping’s followers last weekend, there would be worldwide weeping and gnashing of teeth, but many Germans would act as if every tree in their republic were reduced to ash. There’s even a culture of Nutella snobs. I once was sternly rebuked after buying a cheap no-name brand Nutella substitute at a discount grocery store. I could hardly tell the difference, but most say accept no substitutes.

For our next look at spreadables, we’re going to visit the German company of Alnatura. As the name suggest, they make all organic biological products that are “sensible for the person and the earth.” Among those are some amazing spreadable products. Another sweet one is called, translated into English, Buckthorn with Honey. I had never heard of buckthorn before – evidently it is an orange berry that looks like roman tomatoes (at least on the Alnatura packaging). It’s very yummy, and quite healthy. The spread itself tastes a bit like blueberry yogurt.

Alnatura is known for their savory, vegetable based spreadables, and let me tell you, they are a delight. Today, my wife and I bought two from their impressive assortment. I had not tried the Arugula-Mustard Paste yet, and I worried that the mustard would dominate and make this spreadable not particularly creative. Nope – the flavor, while matching it’s name, had a delightful dill aftertaste. If you come to Germany, buy this product, along with a knife and a piece of bread. Although if I had to choose one, I would go for the Pepper & Chili, which is my running favorite. I learned about it when I discovered, in a hidden shelf in the fridge: my wife’s secret spreadable stash. It’s true. She was hiding spreadables from me. And maybe she was wise to do so. Because on tasting this wonderful, tangy, slightly spicy (though some more bite wouldn’t hurt) substance, I proceeded to eat the rest. With a spatula. Ok, a spatula would not have fit, and my wife did catch me and we proceeded to wrestle, which was fun for other reasons.

Meat: Spread on bread!

Ok, my friends. It’s time to talk about spreadable meat. When I first moved to Germany, I went to a large conference center with a bunch of other Americans. Every morning and evening, in cans, dishes or simply wrapped up in sausage form was spreadable meat, mostly liver-wurst, but it could just as easily been pork sausage, beef or turkey, except as spreadable as butter. We wrinkled our noses. We gagged. We cried. It was almost as disgusting looking as the sausage salad they had tried to serve us earlier (that’s for another post). It looked like a Halloween gimic – the brains in a bowl thing that those neighbors who over-do it every year put on their front porch. Then, much later, I summoned the courage to try it, to stick my knife into the pink goop, spread on what I knew would be an otherwise delicious piece of bread, and bite it.

Brothers and sisters, it was delicious. Believe me. I was converted on one taste. It’s hard to describe – a bit salty, a bit meaty, and quite healthy, actually. It’s one of those Andrew Zimmern moments where you let go of your cultural biases against a form of food and eat it. And I’m glad I did.

I’m tempted to say we need a creative spreadable revolution in America. More and more people are liking Greek spreadables, though we tend to take them in dip form (with pita chips!). But upon reflection, America still has the ultimate spreadable, and something I dearly miss now that I moved across the pond. That is, peanut butter. Most Germans can’t stand peanut butter, but that’s because the peanut butter they sell, including Alnatura’s version, is just not that good. They never had Trader Joe’s wonderful salty crunchy (my current favorite), or even Jiff (which I grew up with). Heck, maybe they would even settle for the sub-standard American brands like Skippy or Peter Pan – even those are spectacular spreadables. Yes, America (this is where you can start humming “America the Beautiful”), I know I talk about German cuisine all the time, but when it comes to spreadables, though we don’t have the wonderful meats or Alnatura products, we have George Washington Carver’s magnificent contribution to society. We can stand proud, plate in hand, spreading knife held high.

Ok, that was a lot of words, and if you are still reading, thank you. Please share your experiences with creative spreadables in the comment section. Oh, and a discussion question: If you had to choose one, would it be peanut butter or Nutella? Not an easy decision, but I’d go with peanut butter.