Thursday, August 02, 2007

Some like it hot

On the one hand, I'm increasingly convinced that American cities and towns must adapt new models of food production and delivery in order to save energy. I don't think our current model of shipping in broccoli from China and melons and bananas from Central America and bacon from Canada and then transporting the shit across country in big rigs and on trains is sustainable for more than another decade or so.

On the other hand, I'm excited by the prospect of trying a ghost chili, which of course must be shipped half way across the world. Maybe we can return to sailing ships to feed my appetite for exotic chilis and spices?

BTW--Saigon Remembered, which is of course primarily a Vietnamese restaurant, has great pad thai, but they simply can't make pad thai "Thai hot." Their idea of Thai hot is perhaps the equivalent of one star at Thai Landing, where the "Thai hot" standard approaches the limits of my chili endurance. Thai One On and Thai Restaurant are also exquisitely painful--order the whole rockfish at Thai Restaurant (in Greenmount) and you'll swoon under the crushing weight of Scoville Units. The hottest Indian food I've had locally? Mughal Garden.

2 comments:

Nick said...

Thanks for the interesting article--I'd like to try the bhut jolokia as well. And I'm sure the missus would handle it even better than I.

I swear, it's getting harder and harder to get peppers that are actually hot around here. Maybe 1 in 20 jalapenos, habaneros, poblanos, etc. will be acceptable. The rest are like bell peppers--faugh! Must be the soil and climate--we've brought back some of mother's peppers from Salt Lake but when planted they yield the most timid suckers here. I did get a couple of good jalapenos from Joan at One Straw though, so maybe there's hope.

Saigon Remembered, more like Saigon Best Forgotten.

Geoff said...

If I score some bhut jolokia we'll get together and cook up a special stir fry.

I agree about Saigon Rem. There's no good Viet around here--unless it's hiding somewhere. Rockville?