Taste of Freedom: Ramadan - #112

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

RAMADAN

BURT WOLF: Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar and it is during this month that Muslims observe the fast of Ramadan. They fast during the day and at night; they eat small meals and visit with friends and family. It is a month of worship and contemplation. A time to strengthen family and community ties.

The first Muslim to arrive in the Americas that we know about was a Spanish explorer who showed up in 1527. He was part of a commission sent by the King of Spain with instructions to colonize Florida. He traveled throughout the southern part of the United States and was probably the first European to see the territory that is now the state of New Mexico.

Today Islam is the fastest growing religion in the United States. There are over twelve hundred mosques in the U.S. and more than half of them were built in the last twenty years. Over five million Americans worship in these mosques.

FAWAZ GERGES ON CAMERA: Islam and Muslims believe in the people of the book in Judaism, as the first, you might say, word of God, and then, Christianity as a follow-up. But to them, Islam is the, although it's really, you might say, an extension, that it's the most correct, the final word of all prophecies.

According to Muslims, Islam is the religion accepted by Allah, God.  And it has five pillars. First, to witness that Allah is one, that is, Islam is a unitary religion, and Muhammad is messenger.  To pray five times a day.  To fast in Ramadan.  To give and to go on el hajj, the pilgrimage.  These are the five pillars of Islam.

THE MOSQUE

BURT WOLF: During Ramadan, the entire Koran is read, one-thirtieth each night. Mosques are designed to produce an environment that is conducive to reading, prayer, introspection and learning. Very often, you will find people sitting in quiet spots and just reading.

JOSEPH LUMBARD ON CAMERA: There are a lot of challenges right now but America is a crucible for Islam. That is to say all Muslims come from around the world and they bring their cultural traditions but here they all come together and they start to realize that their cultural traditions are not Islam. And so they come, when they see an Arab, when an Indonesian sees an Arab or a Chinese sees an Arab or vice versa they start to realize that many of the things that at home they had associated with Islam are actually not part of the faith and so in a sense we burn all of those cultural creations away in the process of getting down to the roots of the religion and also creating a new mode of living Islam which is culturally relevant for people who are born in this country.

SHAMSI ALI ON CAMERA: Islam is a universal religion. Though Islam appreciates the cultural disparities.  Whenever Islam comes to certain places Islam tends not to demolish the culture, but Islam is universal teachings. But Islam at the same time wants the Muslims to understand the realities where they live in.  So that's why when the Muslims, for instance, coming from different parts of the world and they are here in the United States, it is very important that the Muslims understand the realities where they live in. For instance, the Asian people, they have their own dress. The Arab people, they have their own, and even Islamically speaking, it is not really desired when you dress strangely and you consider it to be Islamically.  You know, coming to the, to New York City, for instance, you dress Arabic dresses and then you say that these are Islamic dresses.  That's really undesirable in Islam, because Islam doesn't want you to be distinctive and make the people strange. We are not living in the camel era anymore.  We are in the global world.  We are in the modern world, and I think we need to modernize our minds as Muslims in understanding our religion.

BURT WOLF: At the Islamic Center in Washington D.C., over sixty-five different nationalities come to pray. Dr. Abdullah Khouj is the executive director of the center and its mosque was dedicated in 1957.

DR. ABDULLAH KHOUJ ON CAMERA: It took ten years to complete all this architecture you see, now, you see this around you, are the Turkish tiles, which were handmade in Turkey, and the gentleman who made them, came himself here and installed them.  And then we have this chandelier over here; it weighs a ton and half.  It came from Egypt, and it's actually from the Fatima design.  It's made out of copper. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Was she the daughter of Muhammad?

DR. ABDULLAH KHOUJ ON CAMERA: Fatima is the daughter of Muhammad. And all these calligraphy you see, they are Arabic calligraphy, and they are verses from the Koran. Starting from here, it goes this side, “God is the light of heaven and earth, the example of His light is like a candle in a chandelier, to light over the world”.

A mosque should be plain and that is to concentrate on prayers and your relationship with God. This is why it's prohibited, totally, to have any kind of pictures or animals or human beings, statues, at all, in the mosque.  Even this one, too much decoration should be plain. This is the Mihrab. It is a destination to Mecca. And the verse here it says, we see your face turning to the sky and we’ll forward you to the destination that you accept.

THE FAST OF RAMADAN

BURT WOLF: The fast of Ramadan is a time of worship and contemplation when Muslims say “no” to the desires of the flesh and “yes” to the word of God. It is a time to learn about self control, not unlike the opportunities offered during the Christian period of lent or the Jewish holiday of Passover.

SHAMSI ALI ON CAMERA: According to Islam, human desires are natural, and they are not supposed to be killed, but they are supposed to be controlled, so we are the masters of our own desires.  We are supposed to have control over them.  So we use our desire in a way that God pleases with.  We have desire to eat, to drink and to have relationship with our opposite sex, with our wives or husbands.  But Islam teaches that you have to have control over these desires, so that's why for one full month, Muslims are training themselves not to eat, not to drink, not to have that relationship during the day time, in order to train themselves.  And also fasting teaches the Muslim to be more kind to others, because by abstaining from food you can feel what the unfortunate people feel, so that's why Prophet Muhammad even called this month as the month of charity.

BURT WOLF: The daily fast is usually broken by eating three dates and taking a sip of water, which is how Muhammad broke his fast during the time he retreated to meditate.

The date may be the world's oldest cultivated fruit.  There are seven-thousand-year-old sculptures that clearly show the date palm.  The date's been a basic part of Middle Eastern agriculture for centuries.  The Arabs brought the date to Spain and the Spanish missionaries brought them to California. As a matter of fact, the first date planted in California, was planted in a town called Mecca.  Dates are often called nature's candy because of their sweet taste and caramel flavor.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: During Ramadan breakfast must be eaten before the day begins. The ancient test for that is your ability to distinguish between a white thread and a black thread using only natural light. If you can tell the difference the day has begun and so has your fast.

BURT WOLF: Dedicated Muslims come to prayer five times each day.

SHAMSI ALI: Why Muslim pray five times a day?  Why is not only three times, or two times or let's say once in a week?  We start our day by praying to God, by having connection with God.  Noon prayer is considered to be the busiest kettle of any human beings.  But still you have to find some time to pray to God. Afternoon prayer. You need to end your daily activities with a prayer, by having connection with God.  And sunset prayer, it is considered to be the end of your day, so you need to have a spiritual connection with God, so you pray to him.  And the last one is before bedtime prayer, it is also, as we started our day with a prayer, we end our daily life with a prayer before we go to the bed. There is no space in our life except that we have connection with God, and this what Islam wants us to be. 

SHAMSI ALI ON CAMERA: In other words, I would like to say that Islam wants us to have our feet in the earth, but have our head in the heaven.

THE ANCIENT ART OF HENNA

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The 27th day of Ramadan has a special evening known as “The Night of the Decree”. It marks the night when Muhammad received the first revelation of the Koran. Tradition says that on that night any prayer or good deed will be rewarded many times over. It’s also used to mark the passage of young girls into adulthood.

BURT WOLF: The passage is also often marked with henna.

STEPHANIE RUDLOE ON CAMERA: Henna is a natural dye, and it comes from the henna plant, which grows in very hot dry climates.  It is believed to originate in India, in Persia and Egypt. It has been used for centuries as a dye for the skin, hair and also for cloth.

STEPHANIE RUDLOE: People paint themselves with henna for adornment and for celebration, and in particular in Morocco it is done because they believe that henna contains this quality called botika, which is having magical healing properties and positive energy.  And this presence of botika is believed to infuse the henna plant and the women in Morocco who are nagotha henna artists, they also bring that energy of the botika, that positive energy and the blessing on to the person that they're painting.  So one of the reasons why they will do henna or is around celebrations or life passages that they believe someone could be susceptible or vulnerable to the evil eye. 

When I paint someone with henna, I begin by cleansing their skin with orange blossom water, which is a traditional thing that is done in Morocco to greet and bless your guests.  And then after that I always look at someone's hand to just kind of get a feeling as to where the henna would be the most beautiful.  I approach the henna as jewelry.  Traditionally in Morocco, henna is always done up to the wrist bone, covering the entire surface of the whole hand.  When I paint people here, I work in a much more minimalistic motif, maybe doing something in the center of the palm or the top of the hand or rings on the finger, or some kind of a diagonal.

And what is interesting about this is in fact, for the Ramadan henna designs, this is very similar to how they paint the young girls in Morocco.  They don't usually do a whole thing on their entire hand, like a bride.  They may simulate the bridal ceremony, but usually it will just be something that is like a diagonal starting from the wrist bone across the fingers, and then maybe a diagonal on the palm or a central design on the palm of the hand, to ward off the evil eye.

STEPHANIE RUDLOE ON CAMERA: There are several very common motifs that you see in Moroccan henna patterns. Most of the marks are repeat geometrical patterns that are all based on pretty much about protection from the evil eye. A very typical Moroccan design is to see a diamond motif with a literal eye in the center of it. Another very typical Moroccan design is to see the diamond motif with a floral design in the center of it. And the floral designs are a traditional design for bringing fertility and abundance to the wearer. And these are all designs that are meant to deflect the evil eye and to protect your love and to protect the wearer from covetedness or jealousy or any kinds of negative energy.

FOODS OF RAMADAN

BURT WOLF: What you eat each night to break the fast of Ramadan depends on where you come from. Muslims from the Middle East serve spicy pastries filled with vegetables or meat or a loaf of flat bread sprinkled with black cumin seeds. North African Muslims tend to eat a protein-enriched soup in order to energize their bodies after the long fast.

Hamid Idrissi was born in Morocco. Today he is the co-owner and chef of Tagine, a Moroccan restaurant in New York City. As a middle child, he was assigned the task of helping the family cook. He spent hours watching and learning the delicate and complex techniques of the Moroccan kitchen. Quite often his family would host meals for more than a hundred relatives, friends and neighbors.

HAMID IDRISSI ON CAMERA: My father was sort of Imam, so he has lot of people come to, kind of he was the leader of the town and my mother always constantly cooking and a lot of people come and help her cook and also in the kitchen.  And I found a lot of fun to see how much like activities in the kitchen and how many things they are doing. And when I came to United States, it's too hard for me to adjust to American taste.  So I would just get the ingredients and make Moroccan cuisine for myself.

BURT WOLF: The dish that is most commonly served at Ramadan in Moroccan homes is harrira. Hamid serves his version at Tagine. It’s a soup made from chickpeas, caramelized onions, lentils, and an assortment of vegetables, tomatoes and spices.

HAMID IDRISSI ON CAMERA: There's a lot of different ways to make harrira.  Harrira is every family does it its own special way.  But there is one common way of they all do it the same, is the way when they boil tomato into broth before they mush it up with flour and they mix it with flour, to kind of add the mixture of tomatoes and flour to the broth back and stir it before they serve it. 

BURT WOLF: Along with the soup, Moroccans break the fast with dried fruits, coffee, tea, salads of roasted peppers, spinach, spicy carrots and eggplant, Morocco’s national dish, couscous, and a variety of sweets including a specialty of Hamid’s.

HAMID IDRISSI: Shebekia is made from semolina flour, sesame seeds, and it's rolled and cut into special shape to look like a little nest. 

BURT WOLF: The meal also includes tagine.  The word tagine refers to both a dish and a pot for making it, like the word casserole. The dish is a savory stew native to North Africa. For Ramadan, Hamid makes a lamb tagine with prunes.

HAMID IDRISSI: The way I make the lamb tagine, I get the best part of lamb, baby lamb.  And you put onion in the bottom and you place it like a pyramid way, leaving if you can little air in between.  Then you top it with some prunes and you mix all the spices in little water.  You pour it in about cup of water.  And you start on low heat.  And you keep raising it to less than the medium. 

BURT WOLF: At the pre-dawn meal, Moroccans typically eat soup and a crepe that’s served with butter and honey.

HAMID IDRISSI: In the morning, before the fast began, we eat melwi.  Melwi is a semolina bread, which is pan-fried and it's kneaded for a long time, so it will be served with honey, with butter. And some people like to have like protein.  They eat some leftover from tagines, or so whatever you can eat.  But usually they don't eat fruits, like raw fruit at that time.  They eat something they can go back to sleep.  So most likely is melwi. It will fill up your stomach and give you energy for long time.

BURT WOLF: At Hamid’s restaurant, you can get a taste of true Moroccan food and experience Moroccan culture.

ISLAM AND AFRICAN-AMERICANS

BURT WOLF: One of the fastest growing segments of the Islamic community in the United States is made up of African-Americans. Yusuf Saleem is the Imam at mosque Muhammad in Washington D.C. He believes that African-Americans are attracted to Islam because within Islamic tradition the black community is fully accepted.

YUSUF SALEEM ON CAMERA: I think what happens is, I'm not going to say racism is prevalent, but that we cannot doubt the subtlety and existence of racism.  And I think in coming into Islam, your identity is equal. Equal. In other words, the Koran says that God has honored all the children of Adam.  So that means you're on equal par with everybody.  And the exterior has no meaning, importance, except to identify.  So you look a certain way because if you looked just like me, I wouldn't know you.  So you look a certain way, so I am aware of you.  And I say I look a certain way.  But this is just a shell.  Just a vessel to carry the real spirit and nature of me.  I think that's a tune that is attractive to many African Americans.  We feel a certain sense of equality and we feel a certain amount of being legitimatised. That we're a human being of self worth.  And we can achieve just like any other ethnic group.

BURT WOLF: Every evening at sunset during Ramadan mosques throughout the world serve meals to the hungry. They are following a commandment from god to give to the needy.

WOMAN SERVING FOOD ON CAMERA: I comes early so I can make them a good meal, you know, cause when you comes off a fast. That’s my blessing. I get blessings for coming feeding all the hungry people that have fasted so that’s why I push myself and I’m here everyday, see that they get a good meal. We’re having turkey, string beans, potato fluff, fish and tossed salad and cabbage. And my sisters they all come in and we help. And we fasting too. But we have to cook the food without tasting so we just pray and hope that the food tastes good because we can’t taste it.

ENDING THE FAST

BURT WOLF: The Night of the Decree celebrates the moment when Muhammad received the first revelation of the Koran. Joyous festivities begin that night and build for three days until the last night of the month. The next day, which is the first day of the new month, is known as Eid. It is a time to wear new clothes, eat big meals with lots of sweets, and pass the day with your family and friends. It’s also a day when you’re asked to donate a portion of your wealth to the needy.

SHAMSI ALI ON CAMERA: Our nature is to know our God, to be more close to God, to be a more righteous person.  This is natural, this is the human nature, you know, to be kind to God, to be kind to other people, to be kind to our fellow human beings.  So, the Eid Al Fitr actually is the day of victory for the Muslims, because they consider this to be a victorious day over their human desires.

BURT WOLF: Because the Koran has not changed since the time of the prophet, much of Ramadan’s celebration has remained the same. But it is almost impossible to come to the United States and not be influenced by America’s popular culture. The giant fairs that are held to celebrate the end of Ramadan often illustrate that point.

FAWAZ GERGES: Like other people all over the world, I think Muslims immigrate to America to improve, to seek a better life for themselves and their children.  America in the eyes of many Muslims and many people in the world including myself, provides an economic opportunity, you might say, an access to climb the social ladder.  But also, I would argue that unlike other people in the world, Muslims come to America to seek freedom.

FAWAZ GERGES ON CAMERA: There is considerable political oppression in most Muslim countries and contrary to the conventional wisdom, the majority of Muslims are attracted to and fascinated with the American idea.  The American dream.  The notion of freedom.  Of an open society. 

BURT WOLF: Ramadan begins with the sighting of the new moon. In the United States, most Muslim communities follow the dictates of the Islamic Society of North America in Plainfield, Indiana. Four officials confirm the sighting and its scientific base and they must do this within four hours after sunset on the East Coast. One result of this approach is that you are not sure when Ramadan will begin or end until one or two days before the event. If nothing else, the process reminds you that life is controlled by nature, and flexibility and faith are essential. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Independence Day - #111

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

INDEPENDENCE DAY

BURT WOLF: Every year on the Fourth of July the United States of America celebrates Independence Day. Communities from coast to coast commemorate the day in 1776 when the Continental Congress proclaimed America’s freedom from British rule.

Virtually every community in the country has some kind of celebration, but there is no city in the United States that has a closer association with the birth of our nation’s freedom than Boston, Massachusetts. It was the colonists of Boston and the surrounding towns who began America’s War of Independence. Independence Day in Boston starts with the raising our nation’s flag and saluting our troops—both past and present.

The British even sent a contingent from her Majesty’s ship The Scott to join the march and show there are no hard feelings.

The troops march down to the Old Granary Burial Grounds and place wreaths on the gravesites of three men who signed the Declaration of Independence —   

John Hancock, Samuel Adams and Robert Paine. Then the company proceeds to the Old State House where the Commanding Captain reads the Declaration of Independence to the citizens assembled below.

CAPTAIN GEORGE M. MORRISON ON CAMERA: We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

BURT WOLF: After the colonists won the Revolutionary War and felt somewhat secure that there actually might be a United States of America, they made the Fourth of July an official holiday. But amazing as it may seem, Congress did not declare it a federal holiday until 1941.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: It’s not that the Federal Government was so busy they didn’t have time to declare the Fourth of July a federal holiday. It’s the fact that when they declare any day a federal holiday, millions of people who work for the government get the full day off at full pay. The Federal Government wanted to wave the flag—they just didn’t want to pay for it.

LEN TRAVERS ON CAMERA: The earliest celebrations were almost like pick up games.  In Boston for instance there was a mock battle that was held on Boston Common.  There were fireworks that evening that were put on by the local militia company.  So there was a kind of parade.  There was some impromptu feasting.  And these elements of course, have remained with us right to the present day.

I WANT YOU

BURT WOLF (AS UNCLE SAM) ON CAMERA: Every year on Independence Day somebody feels the need to get dressed up as Uncle Sam. It all goes back to the 1700s when a guy by the name of Samuel Wilson started supplying meat to our newly formed U.S. Army. He used to stamp his crates “U.S.” and somebody who worked for him or worked for the Federal Government decided that “U.S.” stood for “Uncle Sam”.  And since then it has become a symbol of our federal government. 

LEN TRAVERS ON CAMERA: The origins of Uncle Sam probably go back to the image of a character known as Brother Jonathan.  You find him personalized as early as the American Revolution, but certainly by the War of 1812.  Brother Jonathan is the concoction of mostly British cartoonists who are looking for a way to symbolize America. And as time went on, and the United States began to mature, you notice that Brother Jonathan starts to mature as well, at least in his age.  He's still held up as this rather kind of ruffian looking fellow.  It's not until the 1830s, 1840s I think that the image of Uncle Sam turns that image into a somewhat more favorable for Americans.

BURT WOLF: The image of Uncle Sam that we are familiar with was created by a political cartoonist who lived in New York City during the mid-1800s. His name was Thomas Nast and not only did he give us our red, white and blue-suited icon of America, he was also responsible for our bearded Santa Claus, Santa’s home in the North Pole, the elephant as the symbol of the Republican Party and the donkey as the symbol of the Democrats. He gained most of his fame during the years that he worked for Harper’s Weekly Magazine and he’s often thought of as America’s first great cartoonist.

LEN TRAVERS: The political image of Uncle Sam has changed pretty often with the times.  In wartime for instance American recruitment posters and political cartoons will often depict him as a viral 50 year old rolling up his sleeves preparing for battle.  Venerable but still very tough.  However if people want to take sport with the American Nation United States Government in an embarrassing situation, it's very easy to make a rather goofy looking Uncle Sam as well.  He has been made a rather corpulent fellow in the 1890s and the early 1900s to signify for instance what was happening to America at the time becoming wealthier and more complacent.

BURT WOLF: The most recognizable image of Uncle Sam however is in the character of America’s parental authority on a World War I recruiting poster by James Montgomery Flagg with the caption “I WANT YOU FOR THE U.S. ARMY!”

NIGHT AND DAY

BURT WOLF: Traditionally our Fourth of July celebration is divided into two parts. Part one takes place during the day. It’s made up of rather orderly activities—parades, picnics, patriotic speeches and trooping of the colors. The second half takes place at night and is usually marked by fireworks, bonfires, loud music and the over consumption of fermented and distilled beverages. 

The daytime festivities usually start with a parade that shows off whatever people want to show off. After all what’s the point of being free and independent if you can’t show off your stuff. This parade is taking place in Gloucester, Massachusetts and what they want to show off is their Horribles. In Gloucester, a Horrible is a costume or skit made by anyone for the purpose of having fun.

Actually, the original idea behind a parade was to show off your military stuff. The word ‘parade” comes from an old Spanish word that means “the stopping point” and it describes the time when a foreign army occupied a town. The soldiers would march through the streets with their weapons on display in order to show their strength to the locals. The military aspects of our Fourth of July parades remind Americans that it was the Revolutionary War that won our nation’s independence.  

LEN TRAVERS: Probably the most recognizable symbol of Independence Day is the American Flag.  The red represented the blood shed in the Revolution to bring this new nation into being.  The red from the white indicated separation from the mother country.  The blue field was the color of the celestial of the heavens.  And each of the stars of course was to represent one of the States of the Union.  The original plan was to keep the flag that way with its thirteen stars, no matter how big the Union got.  But by the time of the War of 1812, they realized that the idea of adding Stars to the flag helped to confirm the idea of an ever-expandable Federal Republic. 

TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME

BURT WOLF: Another daytime element in our Fourth of July celebration involves playing or watching a baseball game—which usually starts with the playing of our national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner.

During World War I, President Wilson declared “The Star Spangled Banner” our unofficial national anthem. It was a time of intense public patriotism and the song was played on many public occasions. Harry Frazee, the owner of the Boston Red Sox, brought in a band and started playing the song at the start of each game, and during the 1930s it became our official national anthem. Every baseball club in the country started playing our song.

It’s not quite the same as singing the national anthem but eating a hot dog at a baseball game represents a certain level of patriotic behavior, and in fact it was at a baseball game that the simple frankfurter became the hot dog.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: In 1901, The San Francisco Giants were the New York Giants and they played in Manhattan. It was a particularly cold April and the ice cream vendors were not doing particularly well with their ice cream, so they began to sell a hot German sausage. The shape of the sausage reminded people of the dachshund dog and so they were called “dachshund sausages”. One day a cartoonist for a New York newspaper saw them, liked them, and drew a cartoon which showed a dachshund dog in a roll in his newspaper. He wasn’t quite sure how to spell “dachshund” and so he labeled it “hot dog”. And that is how the hot dog got its name. Eventually, the hot dog escaped from the ballpark and became a basic part of the American barbeque, especially on the Fourth of July.  Who wants a hotdog? 

BURT WOLF: For many people, however, a hot dog without mustard is considered “nude”. And even on the Fourth of July with all its emphasis on freedom, public nudity is unacceptable. People have been making mustard for over 5,000 years and its history in North America goes back at least to the early 1700s, when Spanish priests began settling along the coast of California. As they traveled north they would indicate their path by planting mustard seeds—the bright yellow flowers that came up marked the trail for other missionaries that followed.

The mustard seed itself is tasteless and odorless, but when its mixed with a liquid the intense flavors that we associate with mustard are released. And when mustard is slathered onto a hot dog your taste buds end up playing the Star Spangled Banner for your mouth. 

Like most of our gatherings and celebrations, barbeques illustrate our desire to bring together the opposites in our lives. We like the idea of leaving the structured environment of our homes and cooking outdoors.  The barbeque allows us to feel free and adventurous while at the same time maintaining a nice, safe structure in which we feel secure.

IT’S NO PICNIC

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Barbeques are traditional for the Fourth of July but because the Fourth of July celebration is all about independence and freedom so are picnics. Because picnics are about independence and freedom from the traditional dining room.

BURT WOLF: But it’s not total freedom. Though you may not see it during the picnic a great deal of work and organization goes in to its preparation. Ed Gannon is the Executive Chef at The Four Seasons Hotel in Boston and for years he has been preparing picnics for his guests.

The main course for today’s picnic is Cobb salad made with New England lobster, roasted corn and herb dressing.  He starts with a reduction of shallots, tarragon, champagne vinegar and white wine which he blends with a little buttermilk.  Mayonnaise and sour cream are whisked in. Fresh chervil and tarragon are chopped and added.  A little pepper and salt.  And that’s the dressing. 

ED GANNON ON CAMERA: Right on.  It’s good.  It’s important in the Cobb Salad is that everything is chopped somewhat small so it can all be mixed together and that’s going to enable you to get what we call “The Perfect Bite.”

BURT WOLF: The salad consists of lettuce, chopped egg yolks, chopped egg whites, sliced onion, corn, chopped tomato, pieces of lobster, bacon bits, chopped avocado, scallions and sprigs of dill.  Finally, the whole lobster claws. 

Along with the salad, Ed made marinated asparagus with roasted shallots and truffle oil and marinated olives.

Directly in front of The Four Seasons Hotel is Boston’s public garden. It opened in 1837 and was the first public garden in our country—24 acres of green in the middle of downtown - a perfect spot for a picnic.

We think we are escaping to a more natural state, but in fact we are very careful when we select a site for a picnic. We like the sense of being in the wild but we want control of what’s going on. Nobody goes into a jungle for a picnic. We do not enjoy a meal if there are real dangers nearby.

What we’re really doing is exchanging the discomfort of a more structured indoor dining area for the discomfort of spiky grass, pointed stones, flying insects and unpredictable weather.

And even if we get out into a natural setting, the first thing we do is mark off our territory with a cloth and add insult to injury by holding down the edges with boundary stones. We draw an imaginary line in the grass and announce, “nature stops here”.  Sometimes we keep nature at an even greater distance by setting up a table and chairs. We like being close to the earth, but not too close.

THE COOL TASTE OF FREEDOM

BURT WOLF: Ice Cream is also an essential part of Independence Day and we have been making it in America since the early 1700’s. Our first ice cream parlor opened in 1776, which just happens to be the year the colonies declared independence.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Mere coincidence - I don’t think so. Whenever I eat ice cream I have a great sense of freedom, independence, power. I think our early Colonial ice cream parlors were a hot bed of political descent. But most important they were safe.  The British troops never never thought to look in ice cream parlors for revolutionaries.  

BURT WOLF: And the place to celebrate the coolness of independence in Boston is Emack & Bolio’s.

BOB ROOK ON CAMERA: Well back in 1975 I was a music attorney representing a bunch of rock groups.  And Boston closed down really early, closed down at twelve o’clock. And after a gig we had no place to go to mellow out.  So I opened a little ice cream shop where we made our own ice cream.  And we’d come down after the gigs and we’d hang out and make ice cream, eat ice cream, play a little guitar and have a good time.  After a couple months of laying out money for rent and electric and all of that.  It dawned on me – as brilliant as I am – that maybe I should sell this ice cream.

We try to make new flavors all the time and come up with really outrageous combinations.  And most of the time it’s ok.  Sometimes you hit big, and sometimes you fail miserably.  And I’ve failed miserably on a few occasions.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: A great story: weird, exciting and different. That was my dating pattern for years. And I would fail miserably.

BOB ROOK ON CAMERA: So the first thing I want you to try is this Twisted DEE-light.  Cause it’s really great.  It’s chocolate ice cream, fudge chunks, and chocolate chips.  Devised by my friend Dee Snider from Twisted Sister – check it out.

BOB ROOK ON CAMERA: Here’s Deep Purple.  Named after my buddy Glenn Hughes from Deep Purple.

BURT WOLF: Now how come it comes in a cup?

BOB ROOK ON CAMERA: Well, that’s cause we’re trying to get the name Emack & Bolio’s on TV.

BURT WOLF: Oh okay.

BOB ROOK: So that’s an all-fruit sorbet.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The man was a record promoter; of course he’d want the label out front.

BOB ROOK: Rock and Roll Baby.  Everybody got ice cream?

THE SOUND OF FREEDOM

BURT WOLF: These days, Boston’s Fourth of July celebration is probably the top Independence Day extravaganza in the nation. And the man primarily responsible for it is David Mugar. 

DAVID MUGAR ON CAMERA: The Fourth of July in Boston started by Arthur Fiedler in 1929.  They were the first free outdoor symphony concerts in the history of the world, and they were of moderate popularity, and sort of declining in popularity, to where Fiedler was conducting only the July Fourth concert every year, and maybe three or four thousand people would show up. I said "Look, if you'll play the 1812 Overture at the next July Fourth concert when you're conducting, I'll try to find some howitzers, some live church bells and fireworks, but I don't know how to conduct music, so you're going to have to help me," and he said "Don't worry about it, just let all hell break loose at the end of the piece."  And so that's what we did the first year, not knowing what would happen.  Fifty thousand people showed up.

I funded the event personally for the first 27 years, and the number got to be an astronomical number, into the millions of dollars, because of all the logistics required to care for the public safety of the people, so I sought out corporate funding, which has become so popular in society now also in recent years, and we approached Fidelity Investments, and God love them, they stepped right up to the plate.

The event's free.  I've never allowed a V.I.P. section down front.  The poorest little family from anywhere in this country can travel to Boston, and if they're first in line, in the front row down front.

BURT WOLF: When citizens of the newly formed United States of America celebrated the first anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, fireworks were used to mark the event and ever since fireworks have been part of the Fourth of July.

Fireworks rely on gunpowder. Gunpowder was invented in Asia about a thousand years ago and in the beginning it was used only for fireworks. The sound of the exploding powder was so loud that people were convinced it would drive off evil spirits. Fireworks became part of any event that needed a celebration—births, weddings, coronations, the beginning of a New Year, my cousin Dudley picking up a check —all fitting occasions for fireworks. We even had fireworks at George Washington’s inauguration. 

Boston’s fireworks are launched from three barges anchored in the Charles River. The barges are twice the length of a football field. Eric Tucker is the brains behind the pyrotechnics.

ERIC TUCKER ON CAMERA: This shell is a brocade waterfall.  It'll generally be everybody's favorite shell.  It comes out and it breaks and it pours like a pitcher in gold and just sort of falls like a cascade. It’s absolutely gorgeous.  In a standard shell you have a lift charge, which is a black-powder lift charge, and you've got an electronic igniter, which is a very small pyrotechnic charge on the end of a nichrome wire.  We apply power to it, in our case 24 volts, and it'll go "snap" and make some heat.  That heat sets off the black powder, which does two things: it pushes it out of the mortar, throws it up in the air, and the heat from that is then transferred through it to a pyrotechnic timer, which is a small tube filled with pressed black powder and a few other things, which burns at a very precise level.  As the shells flying through the air, this burns up and hits another break charge, which then cracks the shell open and the heat from that break charge then ignites stars, which are round pellets or comets are pressed, which are inside this.  Those fly out from there on fire and that's the effect you see. 

Once the music is set, that's what drives 100 percent of the choreography.  Nothing on this barge happens without a musical reason.  If you watch it without the music, it would certainly be an interesting show.  It's certainly big enough.  But with the music it has soul.

BURT WOLF: In 1776, Thomas Paine, writing about the crisis in America at the time of the Declaration of Independence said that “these are the times that try men’s souls and the price of freedom is high.” And that’s as true today as it was over 200 years ago.

The price of freedom is still high but worth paying.

Happy Birthday America. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Easter - #110

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

BURT WOLF: Easter is thought of primarily as a religious occasion but originally it was a festival that celebrated events that were taking place in nature. It marked the arrival of the light and warmth of spring after the cold darkness of winter.

EASTER

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Easter, like most festivals is a rite of passage. It marks the end of winter and the beginning of spring. And all spring festivals have a similar message—death is merely a passage into new life. And because food is so important to life, all spring festivals that deal with rebirth or the return of the growing season use food as a powerful symbol.

BURT WOLF: The Easter festival runs for four days. Thursday marks the evening of the Last Supper. Good Friday is the day of the Crucifixion. Holy Saturday was the day Christ lay in his tomb and Easter Sunday recalls his resurrection. On Thursday, there is a Mass, a procession to remove the bread and wine of the Eucharist to a separate place, stripping of the altar and private prayer either until midnight or through the night into the dawn.

In many Christian churches there is a pre-Mass Seder feast, often held with Jewish groups in remembrance of the fact that Christ’s Last Supper was actually a Seder.

Traditionally, the Easter Vigil which can begin at any time after sundown on Saturday was considered the high point of the four days of Easter, but in the United States many churches now consider Easter Sunday as the most significant element in the celebration.

In many churches, the primary visual element of the Easter Vigil is the Paschal candle. It’s a symbol of Christ himself, rising from the dead and shining the True Light. Customarily, the candle is made of beeswax, which is a symbol of purity. And over the centuries, the bee itself has become a symbol of the Resurrection. The light given off by the Paschal candle is a reference to Jesus calling himself “the light of the world” and saying, “he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Light symbolizes the resurrection of Christ and the hope that God brought to the world through that resurrection. It also celebrates the idea that new beginnings can come from old endings.

BURT WOLF: The church is suddenly ablaze with light, and the bells begin to ring. In some places the bells ring from every church in the city. The altar is draped with white, which is the color of Easter. Flowers have been brought in and the priest appears in his finest white vestments. The Mass will include the baptism of adult converts, who have been receiving instructions during Lent. Christian baptism involves the idea of drowning in the waters, and rising out of them again into a new life: each baptism is a mini Easter.

REV. CHARLES NOTABARTOLO ON CAMERA: In the Scriptures, Jesus said that fasting adds power to our prayer.  And the fasting that we're talking about, it could be a variety of things.  It could be people refraining from food all day or missing just one meal as a way of worshipping God.  It could be candy, alcohol, their favorite food.  They could be fasting from watching TV or something like that.  The reason for it is to bring discipline to our lives.  We really do need to discipline ourselves and, at least in Lent, at least that one time of year where we really try to get back to disciplining ourselves to remove sin from our life and to get closer to God.

We all come here as sinners and we are all in need of renewal and this is our opportunity for renewal.

REV. CHARLES NOTABARTOLO: Turn away from sin and be faithful to the gospel. Turn away from sin and be faithful to the gospel.

BURT WOLF: Lent runs for forty days, from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday. The forty days is a reference to the forty days that Christ, Elijah, and Moses fasted in the desert. The foods of Lent should be lean and practicing Christians often give up meat, sweets, alcohol, butter, milk, coffee or tea. One of my friends gives up lunch and donates her lunch money to charity.

THE FOODS OF EASTER

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: One of the ways to understand the message of this celebration is to take a look at the simple acts of eating and drinking.  We must eat and drink in order to stay alive.  The food exists outside us.  We must find it and bring it inside.  It’s a very simple way of learning that there are things outside ourselves that we must discover and bring inside in order to survive.  And that is one of the central messages of the Eucharist, the communion. God becomes food.  We eat the food and become one with God.  Because bread and wine are used in the communion, they are the most important foods at the meal.  But there are other foods on the Easter table that also have the sense of the holiday. 

BURT WOLF: One of the best places to take a look at the foods of Easter is Italy. This is the kitchen of the Villa di Capezzana, a wine and olive estate just outside of Florence.  It’s the home of Count Ugo Contini Bonacossi and his family.  Countess Lisa and her chef are preparing their traditional Easter dinner.

The Easter lamb is a very important element in the meal. It recalls the Passover lamb, which was originally the animal sacrificed in the Temple of Jerusalem.  The lamb is also a reference to Christ, who was the “Lamb of God” and Himself became the sacrifice, in order to take away the sins of the world.  Lamb will often come to the Easter table in the form of a roast. It is the main course of the meal and it can be very elaborate -- or very simple -- in its presentation.

In the Bonacossi kitchen, a leg of lamb, which has been cut into chunks, is dredged in flour.  It goes into a roasting pan with a little oil, slices of leek and garlic, and sprigs of fresh rosemary. A little seasoning. The lamb gets browned on all sides. And a cup of white wine is added.  Then into a 450-degree oven for an hour.  Along with the lamb comes a dish that is made by sautéing some pancetta, which is a form of Italian bacon, with fresh garlic and peas.   After about five minutes of cooking, a cup of chicken broth is added.  The cover goes on for ten more minutes of cooking.  The peas are a local sign that spring has arrived.

The main course of the meal is served to Count Ugo and his family from a single dish, as opposed to having individual plates brought to each place.  It symbolizes the unity of the family, from which each individual person is derived and—especially during Easter—the unity of each person with God.

The dessert at Villa Capezzana is La Colomba, a sweetened bread presented in the shape of a dove.  For tens of thousands of years the dove has been a symbol of the return of spring and for almost two thousand years, a sign of the Holy Spirit of Christianity.  In Italy, La Colomba has became an almost essential part of the foods of Easter. 

Pan de Ramerino is also part of the Easter table.  It’s Italy’s Hot Cross Bun.  Originally a Florentine specialty, it was made on Holy Thursday and eaten on Good Friday. It’s baked with raisins and rosemary, and has a shiny top, which is sometimes marked with a cross. Rosemary is a sign of spring and sacred to the Virgin Mary.  Rosemary is also a symbol of remembrance.  The bun says, “Remember the meaning of Easter”.

A favorite Easter cake in Mediterranean countries is in the shape of a lamb with intricate curly “wool”, and bearing a flag. The cake represents Christ with the flag of victory over death—the Old Testament’s Suffering Servant, the Messiah who went “as a sheep to the slaughter and dumb as a lamb before his sheerer”.

One of the gastronomic responsibilities of a festival is to produce a series of foods that are associated with that specific celebration and underline the symbols of that particular festival. Ideally, they should be unlike anything you are going to eat or even see during the rest of the year. At Easter time there are a series of breads enclosing whole colored eggs. The breads may be shaped into a basket with eggs inside, or a heart with eggs underneath, or a cross.

Festival foods help us remember the festivals of previous years and make us feel that we belong, body as well as soul, to our culture.

THE RABBIT IN THE MOON

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: What's interesting about that Easter bunny is he's ubiquitous.  He is Hindu.  He is Maya.  He is Korean and he is also very American, that bunny.  Where does that bunny come from?  Well, the there's an interesting Hindu tale about the rabbit and how he got to be in the moon.  It is said that the rabbit was traveling together with a duck, a monkey and a fox.  And they were all hermits, going along the highway, when a god, a Hindu god materialized from heaven, to test their faith.  And he asked them, pretending to be a beggar; won't you make a sacrifice to me?  The fox immediately went off and brought back a pail of milk.  The monkey went up the tree and grabbed some mangoes.  The duck, being an inhabitant of a lake, brought the gift of a fish.  And when the rabbit was confronted by the deity, he said, “All I eat is grass.  I don't know what I can give you, but my flesh.”  He offers his flesh.  The Hindu deity says, "Well, I'm going to put this fire with a cauldron on it.  And you can jump off your rock into that fire and I'll eat your flesh."  And sure enough, the rabbit went to the top of the rock and jumped.  And at that moment, the Hindu deity had such admiration and compassion for him that he cradled, caught the rabbit, cradled him in his arms and threw him up to the moon, where his countenance still exists, as a sign that we should all maybe behave more like the rabbit, and give something that comes from the heart.  And if you look at the moon, you will see that rabbit. 

BURT WOLF: Rabbits reproduce at extraordinary rates and accordingly have often been one of the fertility symbols of spring. They express the ability of life to keep returning, like the moon.  At Easter we see chocolate rabbits carrying eggs. The egg is a symbol of birth and because it contains a bright yellow yolk, it is also a sign of the sun.  Like most holidays, Easter tries to combine opposites—life and death, darkness and light, moon and sun.

EGGED ON

BURT WOLF: Christians saw life breaking out of an egg as the perfect symbol for Christ breaking out of his tomb and eggs became a central element in the celebration of Easter. The decorating of Easter Eggs is part of the culture of Northern and Eastern Europe and dates back for thousands of years.

LUBOW WOLYNETZ ON CAMERA: Egg decorating traditions in Ukraine began a long, long time ago in the pre-Christian days, in the Pagan days.  When Ukrainian society, being an agrarian society, was always mindful of the cyclical movements of the sun and the different seasons.  For them, the power of the sun was very important and they wanted to harness this power somehow.  But the sun was far away and they tried to look around it to see if somehow, they might find an element that would be like the sun and would have some of the life giving power like the sun.  And they found it in the form of a chicken egg.  If you break the egg open, the shape and color of the egg yolk is like the sun.  And sometimes life springs up from the egg when a hen sits on it, you have a little chick, or sometimes you might have a rooster.  And for ancient society, not only in Ukraine, but all over the world, they believed that the rooster was the sunbird.  And that the sun came out because the rooster was crowing in the morning. The most important pattern or symbol that is applied upon the decorated egg is the sun motif.  It can be in the shape of a star, in the shape of a square cross, in the shape of a four-pedaled flower.  It is a hidden symbolic secret language. 

THE CZAR AND THE GOLDEN EGG

BURT WOLF: The ultimate Easter eggs are probably those that were created by Peter Carl Faberge, a master jeweler who lived in Russia during the second half of the 1800s. In 1965, Malcolm Forbes, who at the time was the owner and editor of Forbes Magazine,  purchased one of the eggs and soon after became a serious collector of the works of Faberge. His collection is on display to the public in the Forbes Building in New York City. Malcolm’s son Kip took me on a tour.

KIP FORBES ON CAMERA: Eggs as you know are part of the traditional symbolism of Easter and my father was a great believer if you're going to have eggs, you might as well have the ultimate eggs.  So, so he decided to go to Mr. Peter Karl Faberge, who every Easter made incredible eggs for the last two Czars of Russia.  And this is a particular favorite.  As you know, Russia has particularly severe winters and so this wonderful one with the lilies of the valley motif was given by Nicholas II to his wife, Alexandra, celebrating the birth of their second daughter.  If you turn that tiny little knob on the side there, those miniatures are paintings of the Czar and his two daughters, actually rise out of the egg and open up.  They blossom almost like a flower.  You turn it again, and they sink back into the egg so you just have a little crown sitting on the top.  This egg, and the egg in the next case, were two that my father negotiated almost over twenty years to purchase.  In fact, the negotiations with the Russians over missile treaties looked easy compared to negotiating for these two eggs.  The ultimate prize was this egg here, the so-called coronation Egg which was a gift from Nicholas to Alexandra on the Easter after their coronation.  You open the egg, which is decorated with the traditional motifs of the Romanoff Eagle and the same gold sort of almost fabric that the coronation robes are made of.  You open it up and inside is a perfectly detailed replica of the coronation coach, the coach that Alexandra rode to the cathedral for her coronation in.   In fact the detail is so good on this that when the actual coach was restored with the help from Ford Motor Company by the Hermitage Museum, they used this as points of reference because some of the detailing is on this was missing on the actual coach.  So the little doorknob actually works.  You open the door, the little step folds out.  I mean everything was absolutely perfect.  This fits inside the egg and it was a perfect surprise for the Czarina, her first Easter as Czarina.  The egg, which is perhaps the epitome of Faberge's and also the link with the Romanoff’s, is the so-called Fifteenth Anniversary Egg, which was given by Nicholas to Alexandra on their fifteenth anniversary.  This is my late father's favorite piece and it's a favorite of mine.  It has incredible miniatures of the Czar, Czarina and all of the children as well as tiny little paintings of all the major events of the reign.  So you see this incredibly attractive family and knowing what we know in hindsight, what's their brutal fate, it's probably the most poignant of all the eggs.  And again, the craftsmanship is stunning.

BURT WOLF: Today Americans celebrate the Easter season with Easter egg hunts and egg rolls. The hunt theory is based on the idea that the Easter bunny hid a bunch of eggs while the kids were asleep. On Easter morning, the children search out the eggs and win prizes in accordance with their hunting skills. Sometimes the event is held for the public. In New York, the city government organizes an Eggstravaganza in Central Park. Perhaps the most famous egg roll not including the ones in my local Chinese restaurant takes place on the White House lawn.

The original site of the Easter Monday egg roll was on the grounds of the United States Capitol and by the mid-1870s it was a major event. However, congress was already over budget for landscaping and cancelled it. In 1878, President Hayes was questioned by a group of children as to why Congress had put an end to the egg roll; the president invited the future voters to roll their eggs on his lawn. Yet again, an example of a president trying to thwart the intentions of Congress. And to this day, the White House egg roll continues.

THE WINES OF EASTER

BURT WOLF: Of all the celebrations in the Christian calendar, none is more clearly associated with wine than Easter. At the Last Supper, Jesus told his disciples that the wine they were drinking was his blood, and the bread they were eating his body. And in so doing, he made wine an essential element in the future rituals of the church.

Early Romans developed vineyards throughout Western Europe, so it was not difficult for early Christians to find wine for their services. But with the fall of Rome in the 400s, the cultivation of many of the vineyards became the responsibility of the Church. The monasteries of the Dark Ages acquired large properties, kept winemaking skills alive and in many areas developed new technology for the craft.

During the Middle Ages, the church played an important role in the feudal system and used its extensive land holdings to consolidate its power. Like other feudal landlords, the Church collected rent from people who lived on its land, and often the rent was paid in the form of wine. Unlike most agricultural products, wine lasts a long time and, in some cases, even improves with age which made wine a favorite form of rent.

The monks loved to stockpile this drinkable form of currency and taught the people who lived on monastery lands how to grow grapes and make wine. The monks would take a portion for themselves from each vintage.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: They also had one of the all-time great real estate acquisition programs. If you were an aristocrat and somewhat concerned about your morals and how you would be, or not be received in heaven, you could take a really nice hunk of one of your vineyards and donate it to the monks in exchange for which they would put in a good word for you upstairs.

THE AMERICANIZATION OF EASTER

BURT WOLF: Easter was not a holiday of particular importance in America until the large-scale immigration of Episcopalians and Roman Catholics that began during the middle of the 1800s. During the twentieth century, giving flowers, buying new clothing, especially women’s hats, and displaying your new attire by parading along your city’s major thoroughfare became important activities.  We also invented the Easter Card.  I never underestimate our ability to translate our emotional needs into “stuff”.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: Our holidays are fixed and our holidays float.  And the two floaters in our American calendar are Thanksgiving, and the worst one of all, Easter, which floats all around the place.  And though we've tried to pin it down, and there have been attempts to make it, fix it at the third Sunday in April, it still remains a floating holiday.  Now this raises havoc with the consumer, with the shopkeeper, with the marketer, because after all, we want to have our Easter finery laid out.  And sometimes in the cold northern climes, March the 22nd is pretty early.  On the other hand, April the 25th can be pretty late, if we want to start selling Easter bonnets, because it begins to get too warm as you start to move into May. Why haven't we changed and fixed Easter? We've managed to fix George and Abe's birthday as a single date in February.  Why can't we do it with Easter? Well, intriguingly enough, in a poll that was taken by Business World magazine in 1972, fifty-two percent of Americans favored pinning Easter down to a specific Sunday, the third Sunday in April, fifty-two percent.  This never went to Congress.  It was never it never came; it's rather like metric.  I think we had a lot of wonderful ideas in the 70s that we were gonna, put into play, but never got into play.  And so Easter has remained that bugaboo of all holidays, which floats around.  And every year, we have to say, let's see now when's Easter? One commentator said that, we may be able to fix Lincoln and Washington's Birthday, but we're never going to fix the Resurrection of Christ.

BURT WOLF: Of all the holidays and celebrations in the Christian calendar, none is more directly involved with the taste of freedom than Easter. The theme of Easter is liberation —liberation from time, liberation from sin and liberation from death. Easter celebrates the arrival of spring, which deals with liberation in the past and the present, but it also promises liberation in the future.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The message that comes with the arrival of spring is very precise: life, in one form or another, will always have the capacity to renew itself. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Passover - #109

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

PASSOVER

BURT WOLF: During the forty years from 1880 to 1920, three and a half million Jews passed through Ellis Island in New York Harbor.  Almost half came from Eastern Europe where Jews were being suppressed.  They found asylum in America and for most of them it was their first taste of freedom—the first time that they could openly celebrate their religious holidays without fear of oppression. And the holiday that was and still is observed by more American Jews than any other is Passover—the celebration commemorates the liberation of the Jews from slavery in Egypt. It’s an opportunity for families to pass on the story of the Exodus from Egypt and to embrace their freedom.

RABBI WOLK ON CAMERA: Passover is the story of a journey. It is a journey from slavery into freedom, a journey from Egypt to Canaan, to what became the Promised Land. The story begins approximately 3,000 years ago when the Hebrews were slaves in Egypt, and a man by the name of Moses, out walking in the desert one day heard the voice of God, or assumed he heard the voice of God, and God said, “Moses, I want you to go to Egypt, go see the Pharaoh and tell Pharaoh, let my people go”. Rather presumptuous, Moses hesitated but then he did it, and went to Egypt, went and saw Pharaoh and Pharaoh’s reaction was what you would expect. “Sorry, Moses, not a chance. Those people are my slaves. I need them. They’re my workers”. As a result, Moses brought a series of plagues, ten plagues against the Egyptians. The plagues can be considered as miracles. The plagues can also be explained scientifically. For instance, the first plague, the Nile turns to blood. What was this? Perhaps a bacteria, the red tide, but that then caused another plague in which the frogs that obviously were no longer happy living in the Nile, because who wants to swim in polluted waters, went on to the land and began to die and then were attacked by the gnats and by the flies and this created disease.

And so there was a causal aspect to all of these plagues. Well, Pharaoh still wouldn’t let the children of Israel go until the tenth and final plague, the plague in which the first born Egyptian sons died. And this began with the Hebrews placing some of the blood from a lamb on their door posts. And God then went over, or passed over the Hebrews’ homes, which is where the name Passover comes from, and smote the Egyptians. When Pharaoh’s son died in the process, Pharaoh then said to Moses, “you can go”.

BURT WOLF: And they did ---as fast as they could.

THE PASSOVER SEDER

BURT WOLF: On the first night of Passover, Jews hold a Seder. Seder is a Hebrew word meaning “structured or ordered”. Families gather at the Seder meal and retell the story of Passover.

Hanna Levy is an Israeli-born composer who began her career when she served as a performer in the Israeli army. Her parents were from Holland and moved to Israel in 1940. Her husband, Benjamin is an artist from Yemen. They raised their four children in this apartment on the upper west side of Manhattan.

The story of Passover is read from a book called a Haggadah, which means “book of legends”. Haggadahs can be a work of art. Each country has its own approach to the Haggadah.

HANNA LEVY ON CAMERA: Our particular Seder, we do a lot of music.  Since I'm a musician, I sit at the piano. We have our traditional songs that we all grew up on in Israel.  And, of course, we taught to our children and we do some of it, of course, in English, too, because we always have non-speaking Hebrew guests at the table. What really is important about Passover, aside from the fact that it brings the family always together and it's a strong tradition, and strong traditions is what keeps families together, is to remember that whatever happened then, is something that is always relevant and they say in every generation a person is supposed to see himself as he personally left Egypt.

RABBI WOLK ON CAMERA: The Seder really is told through visual effects, and we have a Seder plate that is in front of everybody that has certain symbols.  Each symbol represents one aspect of the Passover story. For instance, there are three matzos.  The matzos is the unleavened bread that did not have time to rise because the Hebrews left in haste.  Then there's a shank bone, which was the sacrifice, the Pascal sacrifice of thanksgiving for freedom.  There is moror, which is a bitter herb, it's usually horseradish, and that represents the bitterness of slavery. There's a little bit of parsley, which represents springtime, but the parsley is dipped into salt water, and those are the tears of oppression.  There's an egg, which is the symbol of mourning. It's a roasted egg and that's placed on the plate as well.  And then there's haroset. It symbolizes the mud brick that the Hebrews used when they had to build buildings and were slaves to Pharaoh. 

BURT WOLF: During the evening four cups of wine are poured for each person. They represent four divine promises: freedom, deliverance, redemption and release. Christ’s Last Supper was a Passover Seder and the central messages of Easter are the same as the promises of Passover.

In the center of the table is a special cloth that holds three pieces of dry flat bread called matzos. At one point in the ceremony a piece of the matzos is removed from the cloth and broken in half—one half remains on the table, the other, known as the Afikomen, is hidden somewhere in the house while the seder continues.

RABBI WOLK ON CAMERA: Afikomen is a Greek word.  It means dessert.  It might also mean I've had enough food. That is a possible interpretation, since it comes at the end of the meal and you've been eating for hours.  Or it might mean, I want to go to sleep, which after you've eaten a lot of food is a normal response.  It could be any of those roots, but it is a Greek word.  The Afikomen is half of a matzos that's been hidden; children go to find the Afikomen.  Whoever finds it has a little prize.  One of the pragmatics of the hiding of the matzos is that the children stay awake, because no one wants to sleep through the meal and through the service if they have an opportunity to have a prize, and so this is a little bit of baiting is that the children stay awake. But there is another aspect to the Afikomen.  We break the Afikomen, and that perhaps says to us that our world is still broken. Our world is not whole, and it’s little children that will put it together again.

BURT WOLF: The Seder table has a large cup of wine set aside for the prophet Elijah, who is expected to appear on Passover night and announce the arrival of the Messiah, who will bring peace to the world. At the end of the service, the door to the house is opened, allowing the spirit of the Prophet to enter and take a sip of wine.

THE JOURNEY

RABBI WOLK ON CAMERA: The major dietary rules concern themselves with avoiding any food items that might ferment; in other words, food items that have yeast in it.  You would stay away from bread, you would stay away from cake, you would stay away from many grains.  You can't drink beer at Passover, because that's a fermented liquor.

BURT WOLF: The food that replaces the bread is the matzos, which symbolizes the “bread of affliction”—the unleavened dough that the Jews brought into the desert as they left Egypt.  The people who have the most traditional approach to the making of matzos are in the Hasidic community of Crown Heights in Brooklyn, New York. Beryl Epstein is a rabbi who takes visitors on a tour of the area.

RABBI BERYL EPSTEIN ON CAMERA: I like to say that I've become the visitor's representative to really see what's going on inside the community.  There's been so many movies about Hasidim, Yentl, Chosen, a Stranger Among Us, Fiddler on the Roof, that depict Hasidic life from the outside.  But they don't really give, let's say, the real story, what's going on inside the Hasidic community.

You have to understand that the main place in Jewish life is not the synagogue.  It is the home.  The home is where the education takes place.  Home is where the couple, husband and wife, strive for peace, in their home. And the woman is called the Akeres Habayis, the foundation of the home.  So really the women are the foundation of Jewish life. The synagogue, the man needs to go there to elevate himself.  But a woman is Godly to begin with.  So that is why it seemingly looks that the woman is de-emphasized in the synagogue, because actually her emphasis is the foundation of Jewish life, which is the home.

A Torah is a Hebrew Bible Scroll.  That's the first five books of Moses.  There are 304,805 letters in a Torah. When the scribe writes a Torah, he has to look into a Torah scroll, or book.  He has to say the letters, look at the letters, say the letters, and then write the letters.  So that, every letter and every word will be permeated with his intention, because it has every action that a person has can be either a meaningless act, or a very meaningful act.

Rabbi Clapman, he’s a very interesting guy. He lectures all over the world. And also he makes all his own ingredients.  He cuts his feather.  He takes the raw hides, from the skins and prepares them himself in his basement.  And he also makes his own ink so that and that's very rare for a scribe to do it.  But he wants absolute control, because any process that is out of synch or not done properly would invalidate the Torah.

It's fascinating looking at the Torah.  You cannot see that there's any lines on the Torah.  But actually there are engraved lines.  According to Jewish law, there has to be those lines just made with a piece of metal in order that every line starts at the same point, and also Hebrew letters are written not like on English, on a line at the bottom.  But they are always written from top down, just like the flow of Godliness into the world is from above below. 

BURT WOLF: Passover matzos making in Crown Heights takes place in the Shmurah bakery.

RABBI BERYL EPSTEIN ON CAMERA: Shmurah means, "guarded."  And it's guarded from the time the wheat is harvested from moisture.  See, that which a Jewish person is forbidden to eat on Passover is flour and water mixed together with no other ingredients will become bread in after 18 minutes. 

The process of making matzos at the matzos bakery is that first flour is poured into the mixing bowl, then the well water is poured into the mixing bowl.  And they are mixed as fast as possible.  Once he's finished mixing it thoroughly, it is now taken to a table where it's handed out to woman all around a table who are eagerly awaiting that matzos to roll it out as thin as they can similar to a pancake. It will come out to about 12 or 14 inches round.  It's then hung on a long rod about eight feet long.  And then taken into the matzos oven, where it is laid flat and cooked on both sides at one time, at about 30 seconds, and then taken out of the oven.

They're very strict about every aspect of the matzos bakery. Every tablecloth, which is brown paper, the mixing bowl also is changed.  So, every 18 minutes, it’s a new matzos bakery because anything from the previous 18-minute matzos would contaminate the next 18-minute matzos.  So it really is an amazing process of dedication that in no way, shape, or form should there be any speck of chometz, or bread leavening, associated with the matzos itself.  And therefore, actually the more burnt the matzos is the better, because that means even more well done.

Shmurah matzos is worked, so to speak, dedicated by people who love the mitzvah, and who want other people to love the mitzvah. "Mitzvah", actually means, "Commandment."  But it also means, "connection," so that when a person eats the matzos, the goal is to actually overcome and get out of our own personal Egypt, which is freedom from our own desires so that we can serve God with a full heart.

BURT WOLF: At the moment the Hebrews got word that it was time to begin their escape from Egypt they were in the process of baking bread but they didn’t have time to let the dough rise so they took their unleavened bread and raced into the desert.

RABBI DANIEL WOLK: And that's the beginning of the journey.  The journey would then be a journey for 40 years, with some difficult moments along the way.  Not long after the Hebrews were freed, they encountered the Red Sea in front of them and the pursuing Egyptian armies behind them, and then in that wonderful picture we see the waters of the Red Sea splitting, the Hebrews go through, the Egyptians with their chariots and heavy armor are swept under.

RABBI DANIEL WOLK ON CAMERA: And we again call this a miracle.  It's also possible that it was low tide and that's how the Hebrews were able to cross, and it's also possible that this is symbolic.  That the Hebrews realized that if they just sit by the shore and don't move on in their lives, they're going to be extinguished.  And when you move forward, obstacles, water, your life parts and you can go ahead.  And maybe this is as true today as it was then, only those who move forward can find their life to be productive.  And so that becomes the journey of Passover.

THE MACAROONS OF PASSOVER

BURT WOLF: In 1980, Sarabeth Levine started selling marmalade that she made from an old family recipe. Today, Sarabeths’ preserves are sold in over 500 stores throughout the world. She has three restaurants, including one in The Whitney Museum of American Art, a fully automated jam factory and her own bakery where she makes macaroons, which are traditionally served at Passover. The name macaroon comes from an Italian word that means “paste”.  And it was Italian Jews that introduced the flourless cookie to the Passover menu.

The zest of an orange goes into a pot of syrup made from sugar and water.  The seeds of a vanilla bean are mixed in.  Unsweetened chopped-up coconut goes into a standing mixer.  The sugar syrup goes in.  Then the whites of four eggs are added.

SARABETH LEVINE ON CAMERA: And it’s done.

BURT WOLF: Half the batter is scooped onto a parchment covered tray.  The remaining batter gets mixed with some frozen chopped raspberries – more flavor, more color.  Then the raspberry macaroon batter gets scooped onto a parchment covered tray.  Both trays go into a preheated oven for about 25 minutes.

When they come out, they cool and are ready to eat.  Chewy and moist - these are definitely not to be passed over. 

PASSOVER AT SAMMY’S FAMOUS

RABBI DANIEL WOLK: When the Jews came to this country, I feel that one very major aspect occurred, and that was the desire to have freedom for all peoples.  As the Jew began to assimilate, more and more, and become very much a part of the fabric of America, and become very well accepted in America, we then became all inclusive.  The seders became interfaith seders, interracial seders, in recent times of course there's been much more emphasis placed on the feminist movement, freedom seders. Once we became free, we felt it was our duty to extend those freedoms to others, and to make the generic aspects of America our own, and these are represented by the diversity of Seder experiences.

BURT WOLF: A Passover Seder is usually a family affair held in someone’s house, but it can also be a more public event in a restaurant. The Passover feast offered by Famous Sammy’s Roumanian Steakhouse in New York is a unique example. In truth, there is no famous Sammy. There isn’t even a Sammy and the place is really not on any recognized list of New York steakhouses.

STAN ZIMMERMAN ON CAMERA: I opened the restaurant in 1975.  And it's been a true experience since then.  I know one thing that I might be the owner, but my customers are the boss. 

BURT WOLF: The dining room looks like the set for a low budget bar mitzvah movie.

DAVID ZIMMERMAN: I call it Jewish wallpaper. It tells a lot of history about the place.  People put up their business cards, their pictures.  There's no frames.  People bring it in and we just tape it to the wall. If you need a good doctor, you can pull it off the wall.  It's very funny.  And people put up their pictures; could be them when they were a baby.  And then we write something.  Call me when I'm 21 or something like that. Available in 2009.

STAN ZIMMERMAN: Passover is an event.  It's something special.  It's like being at grandma's house or great grandma's house.  I remember when Passover was in the Bronx where I was born. My mother used to say to the neighbors, "What are you doing for Passover?"  And the neighbor would pick her face up a little and she say, "I'm going to my sister's house."  And my mother would say "Great.  Could I borrow your table and chairs?" 

BURT WOLF: At Sammy’s, each table is set with a bowl of pickles and roasted peppers and a syrup dispenser filled with liquid chicken fat. The traditional dietary laws that govern Jewish cooking forbid the mixing of meat and milk or milk-based products, which means that butter and meat can’t end up on the same dish. The substitute for butter is the chicken fat known as schmaltz. We started off with chopped liver mixed with schmaltz, fried onions, radishes and a little salt and pepper.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Would you consider this a weapon of mass destruction?

CANTOR ON CAMERA: I’m going to ask those of you who can, out of respect for the holiday, to rise.

BURT WOLF: Everyone at the Seder table, who can read, reads from the Haggadah, but children are given a special role. The youngest child, capable of taking on the task asks the four questions and in so doing the story of Passover is retold. 

YOUNG GIRL ON CAMERA: Leavened or unleavened bread, but on this night only unleavened bread.

BURT WOLF: After the Seder, more food—matzah ball soup, steak, potato pancakes, mashed potatoes mixed with schmaltz and for dessert macaroons. And to wash it all down--you’re choice of vodka, Manischewitz wine or seltzer. Now I understand why Alan King once said that when he makes a reservation at Sammy’s, he also makes one at the cardiac care center at St. Vincent’s hospital. 

Saliou Diouf is the chef at Sammy’s. He came to the United States from Senegal and has a great appreciation of the Taste of Freedom.

The Pilgrims who came to America to escape oppression in England compared their flight to the Exodus. In the American South, slaves sang of the Exodus as they dreamed of winning their own freedom. And whenever the story of the Exodus is told at a Passover Seder, the objective is always to highlight the parallels between the story of Passover, the people present at the Seder, and our modern struggle for justice, and freedom from oppression. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Carnival - #108

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

CARNIVAL

BURT WOLF: Carnival has its roots in an ancient Roman holiday called the Feast of Saturn.  It was used as an escape valve to help reduce the tensions between the “rich and famous” and the “never to be rich and famous”.  It created an outlet for the frustrations of a major part of the society.  There were many more Roman slaves than there were Roman rulers.  The Feast of Saturn distracted the slaves from doing the math and trying to take control.  When Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire, the Feast of Saturn was converted into Carnival.  The last day of Carnival became known as Fat Tuesday, or in French... Mardi Gras.  It’s the last opportunity for the Catholic community to live it up before the forty days of Lent that are marked with fasting and abstinence.  Carnival was imported to the new world by the original French and Spanish settlers.  And even today, many of the rituals of the New Orleans Mardi Gras are the same ones that are followed in France and Spain. The ethnic origins of New Orleans are still here, still respected, and still presented as dramatically as ever.

Mardi Gras in New Orleans is packed with the ancient elements of Carnival.  And one of the most important ingredients is the theme of importing something from some other time or place. One way to take in something from someplace else is to bring up “the past”.  The past usually feels like it’s in some other place, and during Carnival it is constantly dragged out and put on view.  Most of the groups have names from the past, taken from Greek, Roman and Egyptian mythology.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The earliest forms of Carnival go all the way back to ancient Rome.  They were designed to keep the masses happy and in line and amused.  And one of the ways they did that was to throw things to them.

BURT WOLF: Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.  In New Orleans hundreds of thousands of plastic necklaces and coins called doubloons are flung from the floats to the crowds below.  The town is filled with people wearing the necklaces, and fingering the coins that they have managed to catch during the ritual.  The hope is that everyone will feel that they are getting, or at least have an opportunity of getting, a piece of the good life.  The guys on the floats have everything they want.  They’re “up there,” moving through life.  The watchers, on the other hand, are more or less locked in place, watching life go by.  The idea is that distributing the trinkets will help keep the watchers amused and in place.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: It’s a perfect Carnival joke.  It celebrates the American myth of equal opportunity and success through the accumulation of material wealth -- and yet at the very same time it makes fun of it.  And that’s what Carnival is all about -- making fun of those things which are normally respected.

BURT WOLF: The first documented Carnival procession in New Orleans, with masks in the street, took place in 1837.  This film is from the 1920s. From the beginning it was a mixture of French, Spanish and Portuguese traditions, African rituals and the masked balls that were held by the aristocratic families of the Confederacy.  In many cases, the pageants of the past made fun of life in New Orleans.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Over the years, there’s been a change in the content of the festival.  These days a New Orleans Mardi Gras float is most likely to make fun of something that is safe, something that is already in the process of being joked about.  It’s a distinct feature of North American culture to institute change without revolution, and these days the New Orleans Mardi Gras functions within that format.  It’s a lot like the cooking -- hot and spicy, but not so hot or so spicy as to offend the millions of tourists who come here each year.

BURT WOLF: The carnival season officially begins on January 6th, which is known as Twelfth Night, Epiphany or King’s Day. It marks the end of the Christmas season and the beginning of a new season called Shrovetide. The word “shrove” means to hear confession and be given absolution. On Shrove Tuesday, Catholics confess their sins and cleanse their souls in preparation for Lent. Church bells ring and remind people to get “shriven”.

Shrovetide lasts from January 6th to Mardi Gras. It’s a time of feasting in preparation for the fasting of Lent. In New Orleans, Shrovetide kicks off with the Reveler’s Ball. The season ends with Mardi Gras which is French for “Fat Tuesday”. During Mardi Gras you stuff yourself with the foods that you will be giving up during Lent.

ARTHUR HARDY ON CAMERA: New Orleans is a French city and Mardi Gras is a French celebration.  I mean our version of it came directly from Paris.  New Orleans was founded in 1718, but in 1619 French explorer Iberville was coming up the Mississippi River.  And it was March 3, 1699 and the spot that he camped out on at night, he named Point Du Mardi Gras because he knew back in Paris, Mardi Gras was being celebrated.  So that's how it came to North America.  And after New Orleans was settled, it didn't take long for the, the new citizens to remember those celebrations of Paris and start informally celebrating and then eventually formalizing it into an annual ritual.

It was a big deal immediately.  It had been celebrated in homes and on the streets randomly for years.  And it actually became quite violent.  So in the 1850s the press called for an end to Mardi Gras.  They said "this is an uncivilized celebration for these enlightened times."  Fortunately some gentlemen got together and formed a parade and a Krewe called The Mistick Of Comus and it was an instant success.  Press around the world hailed it as something that's worthy of attention.  So visitors started coming before the Civil War to see Mardi Gras.  It started with one parade, it has grown to a celebration now of 60 parades held over a 12 day period.  We did some calculations and found out that it is 1,063 floats, 588 bands, 304 miles, if you added up all the playgrounds on the street for 205 hours.  So it's probably the world's largest celebration.

KINGS & QUEENS

BURT WOLF: Anthropologists love to discuss Carnival because it is a feast that sets out to turn everything inside out and upside down. All festivals do this to a certain extent, but Carnival is more dedicated to changing roles than almost any other celebration. It’s always gross, indecent, and openly obsessed with sex. It demands excess of all kinds: over eating, over drinking, noise, expense, and size.

It makes fun of the famous and powerful. It also takes people who usually have little chance to be creative in their everyday lives and gives them a chance to show their inventiveness. It also gives them a chance to complain about the things that bother them. If you take a good look at what’s going on at Carnival you will quickly learn what is really annoying the population.

There is no royalty in North America, no real kings or queens, so having a king and queen of Carnival is part of the burlesque. In New Orleans many of the floats have their own kings and queens in addition to Rex the official King of the season. During Carnival, America has an oversupply of royalty.

WOMAN PARTICIPANT ON CAMERA: Hi. Happy Mardi Gras.

MAN PARTICIPANT ON CAMERA: Happy Mardi Gras everyone.

BURT WOLF: The entire organization of Carnival in New Orleans revolves around exclusive groups, private dances, and private balls.

WOMAN PARTICIPANT ON CAMERA: Greetings from New Orleans.

BURT WOLF: The groups are called Krewes and they have their own secret rules. The oldest krewe is ruled by Comus, whose real identity is known to only a few insiders. He remains masked, even at his own ball. That kind of secrecy enhances the power of being an insider. An ancient aspect of Carnival is making fun of hypocrisy.

WOMAN PARTICIPANT ON CAMERA: Hi.

WOMAN PARTICIPANT ON CAMERA: Having Fun!

BURT WOLF: In New Orleans the element of secrecy is used to make fun of America’s image as an open society, one where everyone has an equal chance.

YOUNG MAN PARTICIPANT ON CAMERA: Last time I got thrown into jail but I made it this time. I made it the whole way.

BURT WOLF: Most of the time only the people who are already on the inside ever get to have real power.

JESSICA HARRIS ON CAMERA: Royalty and Carnival is fascinating because at its origins, at its roots, at its inception, Carnival is very much about turnaround.  Turnaround being fair play.  Master becomes slave, slave becomes master.  In that sense the aristocrats become the commoners, the commoners become the aristocrats. Some of the famous Carnival monarchs, 1949, Louis Armstrong, King of Zulu, you find, at one point, and I don't remember the dates exactly, but the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, the deposed king goes to Carnival in New Orleans and he and his wife, the Duchess, actually salute King Rex and King Comus, so that you have the king saluting the king in that sense, the aristocrat saluting those who were perhaps not actual aristocrats.

BURT WOLF: Men had always ruled over the public parades, but in New Orleans women, with the title of Queen began to rule over the private balls. During the early 1940s the Krewe of Venus was formed and women began to march openly in the parades. But men and women didn’t march together until the 1960s. 

Part of the ritual is to have king Rex die at the end of the festival. In Europe, he was buried in effigy. In America, where we like happy endings, the King waves his wand and Carnival is over. The ritual is also a reminder that we don’t take royalty seriously.

THE FOODS OF CARNIVAL

BURT WOLF: To say that the King Cake tradition was still alive would be an extraordinary understatement.  Each year well over one million of these cakes are sold, and they have become so popular that bakers produce them all year long and actually ship them all over the world.  This is Haydel’s Bakery in New Orleans, and it’s quite special.  In addition to the plastic baby doll in the cake, there is a porcelain collector’s doll.  And in one cake each week, there is a certificate that can be exchanged for a solid gold King Cake Baby.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: If you ever end up at a carnival party and your piece of cake doesn’t contain the token that makes you king or queen, don’t feel too bad.  Along with the right to become king or queen, you also get the responsibility to organize and pay for next week’s party.

BURT WOLF: A King Cake is a traditional symbol of the sweet life that is part of Carnival in New Orleans, but so is the Pecan Praline candy. 

Pastry Chef Kurt Ebert at The Grill Room in the Windsor Court Hotel demonstrates the traditional recipe.

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: We are starting with about five ounces of butter.  The butter will have to be melted first before I put, add the cream and the sugar in.  This is a half a quart of cream, or two cups.  At this stage I can add my sugar to it, and I’ll be adding brown sugar first; it doesn’t matter, and this is one pound.  One pound of brown sugar, and we also add one pound of white sugar.

BURT WOLF: Okay.

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: I will be adding a little bit of vanilla beans to it.  If you don’t have any vanilla beans, a lot of people have this Mexican vanilla essence --

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Vanilla extract

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: The extract and stuff like that.  Some people put vanilla beans in their ventilation system.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: In the ventilation system?

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: It makes the house smell really wonderful.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: I’ll put ‘em in my socks and see what it does there.

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: Oh, God.  And that is it; now all I have to do is wait for the cooking, because you do have to get the temperature right before you add your nuts to it.  I can actually try to test it. I’ll do this test. A nice plate, a white, straight plate, and you drop some on here.  So this cools down immediately, and you can look how it’s running.

BURT WOLF: Aha.

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: So you don’t have to use your finger, you don’t have a thermometer, so do the old-fashioned plate test.  And this is not done yet, it’s too...

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: It’s too much moisture in there --

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: It’s getting there, it’s getting there, you see?  See what it does?

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Ahh.  It’s beginning.

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: Like it’s not supposed to be runny.  But I think I’m getting close.  See the bubbles, how different they are from a minute ago?  They’re more -- it’s almost like a volcano kind of thing.  It’s correct, it’s time to proceed.  It is approximately two pounds, and I’m just adding them in until I think it’s the right amount.  So it’s really important that you pre-toast them first.  Every nut is basically fat, oil.  So you’re toasting it to reduce the oil of the nut, and you enhance and bring out the flavor of every nut.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Interesting -- so when I toast a nut, I reduce the amount of oil, it vaporizes, and I get a concentrated flavor.

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: That’s right, ‘cause the pecans will not really cook in this batter; they’ll just be coated in it.  So you pre-cook them.  Transferring it onto the cookie sheet, you can either use two spoons or one spoon.  They’re very shiny and almost translucent at this point.  Now, this is one method.  Some people are more comfortable using two spoons.  So you go in with one spoon, and you take the other one and you sort of turn it out like that.  Because you cannot touch it with your hands, it’s way too hot.

BURT WOLF: And how long do they sit?

KURT EBERT ON CAMERA: It’ll take about, I would think, half an hour, forty-five minutes, and they’ll be ready for feasting.

WIDE RECEIVERS

BURT WOLF: Americans love belonging to a group and a parade is an excellent way for a group to show itself off.  Accordingly, the number of parades that are staged each year in the United States is extraordinary. The parade that is part of Carnival in New Orleans has become a way for the city to show itself to the rest of the world. Television has given the event a vast audience which allowed the city to turn what had been a local event into a spectacle for others.

These days, there are “national” floats with distinctly commercial overtones. They are large and slick and no longer make the hard-hitting or mocking statements about life in New Orleans that were central to Carnival for over a hundred years. To a certain extent anytime we have a spectacle with a large audience we feel the need to sell them something. In 1969, the Krewe of Bacchus was founded by companies that were involved in tourism. Each year, Bacchus is led by a nationally known celebrity rather than a citizen of New Orleans. Its two-story-high float includes a dinosaur called “Bacchusaurus”. It looks like it escaped from Disneyland. It is charming and friendly and will not offend anyone with the possible exception of scholars searching for authentic examples of ancient Carnival activity.

Part of Carnival tradition is to shower the watchers with gifts. In ancient Rome there were fountains of wine, barrels of nuts and baskets of sweets. In New Orleans plastic necklaces and tin coins are flung from the floats. The begging crowd, with arms open, waits below. Some authorities believe that people at the top throwing money to people at the bottom is a reenactment of the dream of America—streets paved with gold, a capitalist society offering an infinite supply of whatever you need at the moment you need it. People walk through the streets proudly displaying the necklaces and coins they have caught. The American myth of success through accumulation of material things is celebrated and at the same time mocked.  It’s a perfect example of people making fun of their society. 

ARTHUR HARDY ON CAMERA: There really are no spectators at Mardi Gras.  We all participate in it at some level.  We don't sell tickets.  It by law and by tradition it is not corporately sponsored.  The shareholders are the citizens of New Orleans who, who present this gift to the world each year.  And that's one of the unique things about Mardi Gras is, I tell people it's almost as if you went to New York and to a Broadway play and you're standing in line to buy your ticket and the actors come off the stage and say "wait, let me buy your ticket.  It's on us.  And by the way, we're going to give you a free gift to take home afterward."  And we do that.  Our parades are crowd participation events because we throw favors to the crowd.  There's no other entertainment venue in the world where the people who put on the show pay for it and the audience gets a free ride.  If you can't enjoy that, there's something wrong. 

GATHERING OF THE TRIBES

BURT WOLF: Like most traditions in the United States, Carnival in New Orleans is a mixture of things that have been brought here from different places. The primary elements came from French and Spanish culture. But as soon as they arrived African tradition was blended in.

ARTHUR HARDY ON CAMERA: The word gumbo is such a cliche.  But that's really what Mardi Gras is.  There's so many ethnic influences and they've melded together to the point that we don't even know what came from where.  But it is probably the most diversified event in the world.  And, and one of the things that I like the most about Mardi Gras is, is that spirit of togetherness.  You know when you're on the street celebrating, you don't know if the person next to you is a banker or a beggar.  It doesn't matter.  You know we are all equal at Mardi Gras.

BURT WOLF: An important aspect of Carnival in New Orleans is the role of the African-American community—they have their own krewes and their own king.  Known as the Zulus, during the early 1900s, they made a conscious effort to portray the grotesque aspects of white racist clichés.

JESSICA HARRIS ON CAMERA: If you think of Carnival as being Saturnalia, masters become slaves, slaves become masters, already we've got black folks emulating their masters, and white folks emulating their selves, if you will. But then you add to it something like Zulu.  King Zulu, well, King Rex arrives by water, King Zulu arrives by water, but on a barge, okay.  Banana stalk for a scepter, a lard can as a crown originally.  So it's a complete burlesque, and in black face. A complete burlesque of the traditional Carnival king who is in turn a burlesque, in a way, of aristocracy.  So it's the sort of multi-layered, it's that onion again.  It's peeling that onion.  You get all of those layers.

And so Zulu is an African American marching organization, Carnival organization that parades and that has become one of the most popular parades of all.  They parade on Mardi Gras, which is prime time.  Their throws are the most collectable of all throws.  Others throw beads and the doubloons and everything else.  Zulus throw coconuts.  And, you know, you don't want to get one of those lobbed at your head, but you do want to get one of those lobbed at your head because they're the most prized Carnival throw you can have.

BURT WOLF: Mardi Gras has always been a place where ordinary people could show off their creativity. The Mardi Gras Indians are a perfect example of people using Carnival to demonstrate their amazing talents. The Mardi Gras Indians are groups from the black community who call themselves “tribes,” and wear costumes inspired by the dress of the Native American. 

JESSICA HARRIS ON CAMERA: What we have in the United States is rather than dealing with the tribes of Africa, we have Indians.  We have our own range of Indian tribes, the New Orleans Indians, who parade ... they don't really parade, they have their sort of little neighborhood parades, they're sort of scatter-shot parades, throughout the city during Carnival.

I think that people chose Indians because one of the things that we're only beginning to discover nowadays is the communication that actually went on between enslaved Africans and native Americans.  They shared many values, in traditional systems, although they didn't same have the same religion, they understood some things about how you don't own the earth, and how you know, how the world works in other ways.  They shared a respect for medicinal herbs; they shared a kind of respect for ancestors; they shared or paralleled each other in many ways.

BURT WOLF: Larry Bannock is the Chief of the Golden Star Hunters.

LARRY BANNOCK ON CAMERA:    Basically I taught myself.  Over twenty-four years you just get better and better, you know.  Every year you learn something different.  There never was the Indian suit that was completed.  I mean, Mardi Gras morning, time is short, money is funny and everybody’s looking at you -- “Let’s go, let’s go!”  So you put it on.  But one of these suits, they’ve never been finished.  There’s always something else you could do to add on, you could add on.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: You think there’s one message that the Indian sends to everybody when they see him?

LARRY BANNOCK ON CAMERA: Well all I can speak for is what the message I send.  When I do a patch, I do a patch because I want it to have a meaning and a purpose.  It’s like a spiritual thing.  It’s like this patch here.  When I do a patch I pay respect to the red man for what they did for us.  But then again, you look at the red man culture, the black man culture. When we were slaves, the red men were the first to accept us as men.  So this is just a way of paying respect to them. A lot of times people think Indians are just a bunch of guys putting on a costume, but this is a ritual or a culture that starts in September and goes all the way to Mardi Gras day.  A lot of people don’t know the heartaches and the pain and headaches that you go through to do this. I mean, it’s no fun, believe me.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Then why do you do it?

LARRY BANNOCK ON CAMERA: Because you love it.  Once you do it, and you really love it, you never want to stop.

BURT WOLF: Cities are man-made, they’re structured; they start with a planning grid. Cities need to be orderly or they fall apart. But a city’s structure and control can also be exhausting for the people who live in it — from time to time, they need an infusion of new life—a sense of freedom, and that infusion and sense of freedom must come from outside the community. For cities, throughout the United States, that’s what Carnival is all about. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: St. Valentine's Day - #107

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

ST. VALENTINE’S DAY

BURT WOLF: February 14th is designated as St. Valentines Day and on that day Americans turn to thoughts of love—thoughts that are expressed by giving heart shaped boxes of chocolate, red roses, and greeting cards with messages of love.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: But who was this St. Valentine and why is he cleaning out my wallet? Well, in fact, we’re not quite sure who St. Valentine was. We don’t even know how many St. Valentine’s there were.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: St. Valentine was a real person.  I think we have maybe a problem figuring out which one he was. But it's fairly well-documented that the idea of St. Valentine's Day goes back to the 3rd century, early 4th century Roman Empire, when a rather militant ruler of Rome by the name of Claudius the Cruel outlawed marriage as a way of evading the draft.  St. Valentine, before he was a saint, was a priest who in defense of the gentleman's right to betroth, secretly performed marriages.  Well, he was caught and thrown in the clink, where his followers, some of them say women, passed notes to him, praising his martyrdom. 

BURT WOLF: By the end of the 1300s, St. Valentine, a heroic and romantic figure, had become one of the most popular saints in England and France. There are even a series of references to the custom of sending love letters and small gifts. Lovers were getting into the habit of selecting each other on February 14th. And part of the selection process was calling one another “My Valentine”.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: But even before St. Valentine’s, there was an ancient Roman festival honoring the goddess Juno. On the night before her feast young Roman men would gather in the grotto of the wolf-god. No relation that I know of. There was a box there filled with the names of young Roman women and each guy would pick out her name and that would form a couple and they would go off to the party together often becoming lovers at or after the party and the date of that festival—February 14th.

BURT WOLF: The early Christian Church wanted to do away with this pagan love-in and substituted the names of saints for maidens. A new but not necessarily improved celebration. What you ended up with was the name of your lucky saint for the year. Nice but not necessarily as interesting as a hot date.

LOVE AND MARRIAGE

DIANE ACKERMAN ON CAMERA: In the oldest love poems that survive, which were written in Egypt over 3,000 years ago, lovers yearn and obsess exactly the same way that lovers do today and about the same things.  They worry about keeping love a secret from their parents.  They talk about how love transforms them into their best self.  They say that they become sick with love.  They feel that they have to idealize the beloved.  Love has not changed.  Only the fashions have changed.  So, I think that if you took a woman from ancient Egypt and you put her in a city today, she'd be understandably surprised by what she saw.  But if she happened to glance at two people stealing a kiss in a corner, she'd know exactly what they were up to.  Love has not changed at all.

BURT WOLF: But sex has. Originally sex was about having children and that was it. Our societies poured endless energy into getting couples together in marriage with the objective of producing children. The family decided who would marry whom, and the success of the marriage was judged by the number of male children. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Getting married was fine because it was under the total control of society; falling in love however was a real problem because it was beyond anyone’s control especially the people who were falling in love. And if two people could place their own personal desires ahead of the needs of their society, well the whole place could fall apart.

BURT WOLF: During the past hundred years, we have seen an extraordinary decrease in infant mortality. It is now safer to have children than ever before. One result is that couples no longer feel the need to have children in order to prolong the life of the society. Romance, to a great extent, is now free from society’s need to reproduce.

MEETING YOUR MATE

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: In the old days, most marriages took place because your parents had chosen your mate in what was basically a preemptive strike on your emotions and every once in awhile somebody would luck out and actually meet and marry someone they loved. And most of those meetings took place in one of three spots.

BURT WOLF: The first was church, an excellent place to check out a future partner. Much of the community was present so the selection would be fairly large. Everyone dressed for the occasion so you could see someone in his or her Sunday best.  You got to see the family too and with a little luck you might get a private moment to express yourself. 

The local fountain was also a good spot. Before indoor plumbing made wells obsolete, young men and women were constantly going off to the fountain to bring home a bucket’s worth. Fountains are also reminders of the places in nature where vastly different species of animals come together to drink—not unlike many singles bars. In fact, neighborhood taverns are often called “watering holes.”

Another way to meet that “special someone” was to go to a festival. Festivals were the perfect place to start a romance. Lots of men and women of different ages gathered in the same place and at the same time. They were eating and drinking and dressed in their best clothes.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: For thousands of years, we’ve been designing places for romantic meetings. To be a good spot, you need a couple of things. You need to be able to sit down. You should be able to order a drink and some light food but most importantly you need a level of anonymity. You’ve got to look like you are surrounded by people and not give a signal that you are just waiting for one person or trying to meet one person. For centuries, the best spot was a café.

BURT WOLF: Restaurants are also excellent places for romance. Before you really know each other, the public aspect of the restaurant is very reassuring. In a restaurant, you are under the surveillance of the restaurant’s staff and other patrons and simple gestures can take on added meaning in public places.

BORN OF THE SEA

BURT WOLF: Another constant element in love stories is the sea. Classical mythology associated the sea with creation, sexuality, beauty, fertility and passion. And the deity that symbolized all these elements was Venus, also known as Aphrodite, the goddess of love and the protector of sailors. Her very name means, “born of the foam of the sea”.

So it’s only natural that lovers gravitate to the water. You know, they didn’t call it “the love boat” for nothing. A perfect example of what I mean is a ship called the Millennium—it stands, or should I say floats, in the tradition of the great ocean-going ships, which for over a hundred years have offered lovers an ideal environment. 

It’s almost a thousand feet long, and over a hundred feet wide.  It’s also the first ship with exterior glass elevators that offer a panoramic view of the ocean.  It’s powered by two gas turbines and one steam turbine, which substantially reduces emissions and made the Millennium one of the most environmentally sensitive ships in the industry.  There’s one staff member on board, for every two guests.

The first great ocean liners went to sea in the 1890s and their objective was to make the passengers feel that they were guests in the home of an extraordinarily wealthy nobleman.  By the early 20s, exercise had become an important part of on board services.  There was a Promenade Deck for walks.  A swimming pool.  A fully equipped gym.  Some had squash courts, steam baths and saunas.  One vessel actually had a tennis court, and the game of miniature golf was invented for ocean liners.  The great ocean liners are the largest moving objects on our planet.

But of all the comforts associated with the great ships, the most important were those that dealt with eating and drinking. The first liners had dining rooms with long tables and swivel chairs that were bolted to the floor. By the early 20's there were sumptuous dining salons with freestanding chairs and an extraordinary staircase that gave guests the opportunity to make a grand entrance.

Food has always had the ability to be more than just nourishment for the body. Food can be a source of emotional comfort and a symbol of love.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Good evening.

MAITRE D’ ON CAMERA: Good evening.

BURT WOLF: The Millennium, which belongs to Celebrity Cruises, had its maiden voyage in July of 2000 and it continues the tradition of great ocean liners. One of its restaurants has adopted the culinary customs of the RMS Olympic, which was the sister ship to the Titanic and went to sea in 1914.  The Olympic pioneered the ultimate shipboard service by introducing a first class a la carte restaurant.

The original French walnut paneling from the Olympic has been incorporated into the Millennium’s Olympic restaurant. The dining room features an open galley, which allows guests to watch the preparation of their meals.  There’s also an intimate dine-in wine cellar with a capacity for up to eight guests.  The menu was planned by Michael Roux who for decades has been considered one of the great French chefs.

APHRODISIACS

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: For thousands of years, there have been rituals associated with foods that were thought to increase sexual activity. They were called aphrodisiacs after Aphrodite, the goddess of love. And many of those foods were chosen because they came from animals that were thought to have prodigious sexual activity. The theory was that if the animal could get away with it and you ate some of that animal; you might get away with it too. I’m gonna have a little bit of this salmon and I’ll get back to you about this later.

BURT WOLF: Guys would look at a salmon swimming for hundreds of miles from the open sea to the river they called home—fighting rapids, fighting hydroelectric dams, fighting famous chefs, and all in the name of love. Clearly, the salmon had a great sexual drive that might be transferred to the eater.

Other foods were considered aphrodisiacs because they had a texture that seemed sexual—oysters, mushrooms, figs and passion fruit fall into this category. Others get on the list because of their shape. Bananas, eggplants, carrots, asparagus, cucumbers have all, from time to time, been classified as aphrodisiacs. The ancient Romans included arugula in their collection of love inducing foods and planted it near statues of the Greek god of male sexual power.

Tortellini is the noodle of love. There is legend that tells of a handsome young man who fell in love with a beautiful maiden who lived in the forest. But a niece of a powerful Duke wanted that young man for herself and proceeded to force the maiden back into the forest. Just before she returned to the forest as a symbol of her love, she gave the young man a handkerchief tied in a love knot. Tortellini is made in the same shape as her knot. Which is not as important as her dough.

Chef Agostino Clama starts his recipe by heating a little oil in a sauté pan.  As soon as the oil is hot, in goes some sliced mushrooms and a little salt.  While the mushrooms are cooking, the stems are removed from two tomatoes, after which they are blanched for ten seconds in boiling water.  The boiling water loosens the skin, and then they are peeled.  For me, peeling tomatoes is always an optional process; I kinda like the skins.  The tomatoes are sliced, seeded, chopped and added to the mushrooms.  A touch of dried hot pepper flakes are added.  A sprinkling of salt goes in.  A little more olive oil.  Then a teaspoon of minced parsley.  Four quarts of water are brought to a boil and a pound of freshly made cheese tortellini goes in and cooks for about 45 seconds.  Then the tortellini are drained from the water and added to the sauce.  Everything heats for a minute, and the pasta of love is ready to serve.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Believe it or not, there is a magazine called The Aphrodisiac Growers Quarterly and the editors of that magazine analyzed 500 seduction scenes in literature and concluded that 98% of them were preceded by a sumptuous meal. And very often the place where that meal takes place becomes saturated with memory and romance and becomes “our place”.

CHOCOLATE

BURT WOLF: In the western world, the food with the most elaborate history as an aphrodisiac is chocolate. Chocolate was being drunk in Central America and Mexico for hundreds of years before the Europeans showed up. Columbus was the first European to see the cacao bean, which is used to make chocolate, but the conquistador Cortez may have been the first European to taste it when he was offered a cup by Montezuma, ruler of the Aztecs. Montezuma considered chocolate to be the ideal beverage for an amorous evening.

Chocolate is especially important on St. Valentines Day because it contains a chemical that has been called “the love molecule”. The physical changes in a body’s chemistry that are associated with being in love are caused by the release of this chemical into the brain.

DIANE ACKERMAN ON CAMERA: Throughout the ages, people have believed in aphrodisiacs of all sorts.  But of course, the truth is that whatever you think is going to be an aphrodisiac will be one.  Most of the time, people have chosen foods that have certain kinds of chemicals and nutrition that were missing from their everyday life, and so, the healthier they felt, well the sexier they felt too.  A key exception to this, of course, is chocolate.  Chocolate is a serious mind-altering drug. It contains over 300 different chemical compounds, all sorts of nervous system stimulants, caffeine, phenyl ethylamine, which is a chemical that we feel when we fall in love and it's been used as a prelude to lovemaking and also something to soothe us if we've been jilted.  Also a kind of bribe that a suitor arrives with.  Throughout the ages, chocolate has been part of the love exchange. The best chocolate is dark chocolate, and it's best to get it with a very high cacao content, around 70 percent or so, because then it contains all sorts of anti-oxidants in it and stimulants, all the good stuff in chocolate without the fat and bad stuff.

BURT WOLF: Bright colors, especially red, are considered to be important for lovers. Red is alive and vibrant—it is the color of passion. We color our hearts red. We give red roses. Women wear red lipstick and powder on rouge. Red looks warm—it attracts the viewer. But it is also a signal of danger. Stop signs are in red. As a result, red can send a mixed signal—not unlike May West’s invitation to “come up and see me some time”—enticing but dangerous. Nevertheless we always include red foods in romantic menus: a double threat is a red strawberry dipped in chocolate.

THE CHEMISTRY OF LOVE

BURT WOLF: It’s been said that the meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemicals and if there is any reaction, both are transformed. There have, however, been a number of scientific studies that do shed light on the chemistry of love.

DIANE ACKERMAN ON CAMERA: The body rewards us when we fall in love with beautiful chemicals.  First of all, in infatuation, we rush with an amphetamine-like chemical called phenyl ethylamine, and that is like being on a roller coaster.  It gives us all the energy we need to stay up late talking with someone or making love. If we want to get cuddly, then oxytocin takes over, and that rushes through the system, and all we want to do is just nuzzle and snuggle.  There's more of it in women than in men, which may be why women like to lie around after lovemaking and just spend some time cuddling.  And then, after that takes place, if we really want to stay with someone, the attachment system takes over, and that's like being on a kind of opiate.  It's a mental comfort food. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Recently, scientists have concluded that the most reliable aphrodisiac is just being in good shape and feeling good about your body, which is easily addressed on the Millennium. They have the world’s largest floating spa. 

BURT WOLF: In the fitness area, they have the most sophisticated equipment available. Their programs have been designed to suit all levels of fitness, with mine as the possible exception.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Lot of people don’t realize it but it’s the rowing machines that make the boat go. Wow. What year is it?

VOICE OFF CAMERA: It’s the Millennium, Burt.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Great.

BURT WOLF: They also have a hydro pool with waters that contain salts and minerals. The ancient Romans added salts to their baths because it helped them float and made them feel lighter. The aqua spa offers forty different therapies to relax the mind and body. They last from ninety minutes to five hours.  Heading up the romantic category is the Well-Being Friendship Massage in a Sensory Cabana.  Partners lie side-by-side in their own private retreat, while two therapists massage them with warm oils.

ROSES

BURT WOLF: On Valentine’s Day, Americans exchange almost 90 million roses.  And for good reason.  Plants use flowers as part of their mating ritual and their perfume is a form of liquid memory, reminding us of the excitement we associate with romance. The rose is a symbol of the Virgin Mary, and originally a rosary was 165 dried rose petals wound up tight and made into a chain.  In medieval times, roses were used to make medicine and perfume, and love potions.  They were dried and used to stuff pillows and make carpets and hats, and even umbrellas.  Roses were a basic part of cooking, especially in Middle Eastern cuisine.  In Europe and the United States, rose-flavored waters were utilized in recipes until the middle of the 20th century. 

VALENTINE’S DAY IN THE U.S.A.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: The actual marketing of Valentine's in America is credited to a bright young woman by the name of Esther Holland who was a student at Mount Holyoke College.  She had a very wonderful capacity for designing little works of art.  And she made lace valentine cards with beautiful, romantic verses.

In the 1880s and 90s, that rather staunch Victorian period, insult valentines were rather common.  And ... and some of them were pretty rude.  Of course now we have the electronic valentine's card of which the primary consumer is the male in his 30s, interestingly enough.  Maybe the working man who doesn't have time to go, and get a card at the drugstore.  So we get more and more electronic valentines.  I think one out of six American males purchased one in the last year.  The Japanese, interestingly enough, have their own version of Valentine's Day, March the 14th, one month later.  At which time, women are instructed to give gifts to men.

BURT WOLF: Throughout the second half of the 1800s, the Valentine’s card became more and more popular, eventually ending up as a mass-market item. Near the end of the century, chocolate manufacturers entered the business with heart shaped boxes and heart shaped

candies.  Hearts are associated with romance because when we feel love, our hearts beat faster.  People started putting wedding rings on the finger that they believed had a nerve leading directly to the heart. 

Americans of all ages take part in Valentine’s Day even though it is not an official government holiday. Elementary age school children often make Valentine cards as part of a class project and put them into a decorated mailbox. On Valentine’s Day the box is opened and the cards distributed to each student. 

These days, Valentine’s Day produces more spending than any other holiday, with the exception of Christmas. Most of the money is spent by men between the ages of 30 and 50 and they spend it primarily on cosmetics, perfumes and jewelry.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: And sometimes they even buy something for their girlfriends.  For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Chinese New Year - #106

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

CHINESE NEW YEAR

BURT WOLF: Almost every major celebration has its origin in something that is happening in nature either on earth or in the heavens. In China, the most important celebration of the year is the one that takes place on the first day of the first lunar month—it’s Chinese New Year, and it usually starts at about the same time as the western month of February.

Central to the Chinese New Year celebration is the Dragon Dance. The dragon is the mythic symbol of water. It controls the rain from the sky and the flow of water on Earth. The sun runs in front of the dragon. Sun and water together, the two elements that are essential for the rebirth of agriculture in the spring, which is what Chinese New Year celebrates.

The Chinese were among the earliest immigrant groups to arrive in America. Between 1850 and 1900 over half a million Chinese came to the United States looking for work.

During the first half of the 1800s, China was in total chaos. There was no central government capable of keeping order. Local warlords rampaged through the country making any kind of normal life impossible. As a result, hundreds of thousands of Chinese men left China in search of a better life. The great majority came from the southern part of China, in and around the city of Canton.

For many, the promised land was California. Gold had been discovered and the rush of 1849 was on. The Chinese arrived, staked their claims and dug side by side with men who had come to California from all over the world.

As the gold rush came to an end, America rushed to build a cross-country railroad. And the Chinese rushed in to work on the construction gangs. The most difficult part of the track, between the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the Rocky Mountains was put in place by Chinese laborers. In fact, 80 percent of the labor for the most difficult stretch of the Transcontinental Railroad was Chinese.

But the Chinese rarely got credit for their work. This is a painting commemorating the moment when the rails coming from the east were joined to the rails coming from the west. It took place in 1869 in Utah. The painting, however, has very little to do with reality. Most of the guys in the painting were not there the day the rails were joined. And the Chinese laborers who were there and did most of the work were not put in the painting.

This is a photograph of the actual event and you can see that many of the workers were Chinese. When the railroad work was completed, thousands of Chinese who were near the west coast went into farming, particularly California grape farming. Many of our finest vineyards were originally planted and cultivated by Chinese immigrants. But Chinese immigrants were faced with even greater hostility than most other immigrant groups.

PETER KWONG ON CAMERA: Americans have always been wary about new immigrants.  Worrying about they ..taking their jobs away. But the racial hostility against Chinese was so intense that a law was passed in 1882 to actually exclude Chinese from immigration. And also, not allowing them to become naturalized.  And this act passed in 1882 was the first and the only act to single out the people national to be excluded and was not repealed until almost 60 years later in 1943. 

The reason Americans object to the Chinese had to do with the fact that Chinese were the first color group, other than blacks and Native Americans, came to America in large number.  And so, for the blacks, we put them in the plantation.  For the Native Americans, we put them on the reservations.  But then you have all these Chinese coming in as free labor.  So the only way to get rid of them was in fact passing a law to exclude them from coming in. And at the same time too, making sure they are not allowed to bring their wives here. 

Eventually, they would either leave because the hostile environment or they'd just die out as bachelors. In the earlier parts of Chinese presence in the United States, because of exclusion and segregation Chinese pretty much live, work and socialize among themselves.  And so, they were able to maintain a lot of their cultural traditions. 

BURT WOLF: And the traditions surrounding New Year’s are some of the oldest and most important in Chinese culture.

CHINESE NEW YEAR RITUALS

BURT WOLF: Traditionally, preparations for the Chinese New Year involve the Chinese equivalent of spring cleaning. Everything in the house gets scrubbed, sponged, polished or swept. All that cleaning not only gets rid of the grease and grime of daily life but because of an ancient, powerful and secret ingredient it also removes any evil spirits that have taken up residence in the house during the past year.

Lucky messages are attached to the front of the outside door of the home. They welcome the spirits of good fortune and invite them in for a drink.

A table is covered with offerings for the gods. The three main meats of Chinese cuisine—pork, chicken and fish are present. Oranges, which are a symbol of good luck, are always included, along with rice cakes and spirit money. Candles are placed in a shrine. Incense is burned and family prayers are offered.

When the incense has burned down about halfway, the gods are considered to have had their meal. Nice thing about these gods, they don’t actually eat or drink what is being offered to them. They just take a good whiff and inhale the essence of the food. At which point, the food once again belongs to the family. The gods expect the food to be taken home, cooked, and eaten by the family that offered it. It’s a win-win situation.

Next comes the burning of the spirit money. The Chinese, like many ancient cultures, believe that what you need and enjoy in this world you will need and enjoy in the next. And the way to send things from one world to the other is to reproduce them on special paper, and then burn the paper. The physical aspect of the thing disappears in the heat of the fire. The essence of the object goes into the smoke and the smoke goes up into the other world, where it is received by the spirit to whom it was sent. To send something to the other world that was made of stone or metal would be difficult, wasteful and expensive. Paper, however, is the perfect medium. In Chinese communities around the world, there are furnaces devoted to transferring stuff in symbolic form from here to there.

An essential ritual of the Chinese New Year is giving gifts of money.  The currency, which in this case is real, goes into a red envelope. The envelope has the magic power to take your bills and turn them into lucky money. The lucky money has the power to increase the recipient’s ability to acquire additional money. In Chinese culture, red is always the color of happiness and good fortune. It’s also a good idea to use some of the lucky money to pay off as many of your debts as possible before the New Year begins.

In China, lucky money is often given to children in order to send them off on the road to prosperity as soon as possible. 

New Year’s is also the time to stock up on paper gods. Paper gods are available in many shops, but you don’t actually buy one. It’s considered impolite to try and “buy” a god. After all, these are not Olympic judges or major accounting firms. What you do is invite the deity to come over to your place for a visit. And you pay the shopkeeper for assisting you with the invitation. You are also allowed to buy candles and incense from the shopkeeper who helped you with the invitation.

The tradition of decorating your home with lucky prints goes back to the 10th century. The most traditional and beautiful examples are printed from wooden blocks that have been carved with intricate designs. The prints vary in size, depending on where they will be in the house, and how much detail is needed to express the essence of the god’s personality. The materials and production are usually inexpensive. When it comes to sacrificial offerings, it’s really the thought that counts.

In almost every Chinese home or restaurant there is a little space that belongs to the kitchen god. It’s usually occupied by a small shrine or a paper print of the kitchen god’s image. The kitchen god comes in two forms: family size and industrial-strength. Family size is used in the home and comes either as a god or a goddess. Industrial strength is used in the work place and only comes as a god.

One of the primary tasks of the kitchen god is to keep an eye on the family and to make note of how they behaved during the year. Just before New Year’s the kitchen god goes back to the other world and reports to the Jade Emperor on what’s been going on in the house. As a general precaution, the kitchen god’s mouth is rubbed with honey in the hope that he will say only sweet things. The Jade Emperor likes to know when you are sleeping and when you are awake, and if you have been bad or good. So be good for heaven’s sake.

The Chinese like to keep the images of their gods close at hand. Some images are carved out of wood and stone; some are molded of clay; some are cast in metal. But the most common images of Chinese deities are those that are made of paper. They are an essential part of Chinese culture and the most popular paper images are the ones that are printed for New Year’s.

Unlike a western New Year’s celebration, which tends to be limited to New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, Chinese New Year festivities go on for over two weeks and on the second day of the New Year everyone honors the god of wealth.

The gods always take a vacation over New Year’s and they always return to earth on the fourth day of the year. They are welcomed back with firecrackers and offerings of spirit money. The welcoming ceremonies often take place at the end of the day, because no one wants to offend a god who might be getting back to town a little late.

FOODS OF CHINESE NEW YEAR

BURT WOLF: One place where Chinese traditions in America are still very strong is the kitchen. Michael Tong was born in Mainland China in 1944, went to high school in Hong Kong and then on to the United States where he graduated with a degree in civil engineering. Today he’s the owner of three of the most important Chinese restaurants in New York City, Shun Lee West, Shun Lee Café and Shun Lee Palace.

MICHAEL TONG ON CAMERA: The chef is making boiled dumpling has a filling of chive and meat and roll over a dough, make the shape like a treasury shape of the ancient Chinese dollar. Now the chef is making a different shape of dumpling. This is the we usually call a pan-fried dumpling so the boiled dumpling and the pan-fried dumpling come into different shape. But in Chinese New Year the meaning is the same is for prosperity. In Chinese New Year we serve whole duck, a whole chicken referred as Phoenix. Phoenix in Chinese means wealth and I mean prosperity and this is why we serve duck in the Chinese New Year as a celebration. We are celebrating Chinese New Year, we got to have a duck. Chinese do have greens for New Year’s Eve dinner or New Year’s dinner. Greens means health. Greens means forever young so bok choy is one of our very light vegetables. Here we have the chef cook for you sauté the bok choy with ginger. Fish is one of the most important ingredients for Chinese New Year dinner. Fish means abundance, plentiful so for surplus business I mean saving, fish is the most important that we wish for the coming year. Here we have a steamed fish with ginger, scallion, and Chinese pickle.

BURT WOLF: Like the foods of western New Year, many of the foods of the Chinese New Year have been selected because of their symbolic value. Lotus seeds, peanuts and pomegranates represent a hope for the birth of children during the coming year. The use of fruits with seeds is a common expression of the desire for many offspring. Grapefruits, oranges and tangerines show up because of their association with good luck. And there are lots of candies and sweet foods in the hope that they will produce a year filled with sweetness.

The Chinese word for fish rhymes with the Chinese word for surplus. Accordingly, if you eat part of a fish dish on New Year’s Eve and the rest on New Year’s Day, you may be able to transfer a surplus of good luck from one year to the next.

Chef Tsai at the Taiwanese restaurant in the Grand Formosa Regent in Taipei works on his good luck with a dish of braised fish with soy sauce. Oil is heated to 365 degrees. A whole fish goes in and cooks for five minutes. When the fish is ready, it’s drained away from the oil and set aside.  The wok is rinsed out and two tablespoons of oil go in. A quarter of a cup of fresh ginger that has been cut into strips, plus a quarter of a cup of scallions that have also been cut into strips. A few strips of hot red pepper.  The fish returns to the wok. A quarter of a cup of soy sauce is added.  Then a quarter of a cup of chicken stock. Two minutes of cooking and flipping and as soon as it’s warm and the sauce has thickened, the fish goes onto a serving plate and the sauce goes on top.

There is always an egg dish at New Years because eggs are a symbol for rebirth, which is also why they’re so important at Easter. And round foods are essential because they illustrate completeness. A round omelet is perfect for Chinese New Year.

Three eggs are beaten together in a bowl, along with a half-cup of chopped water chestnuts and a half-cup of sliced scallions.  A little salt is added.  A half-cup of oil is heated in a wok.  The egg mixture goes in and gets cooked on top of the oil. The edges of the eggs are folded in to make a round fluffy omelet. The oil is drained away, the omelet is flipped and it’s ready to serve.

Poultry dishes are also common at New Years because chickens are associated with good luck. Chef Tsai prepares a dish of chicken with chili. 

A wok is heated. A cup of oil goes in.  Then two cups of chicken are stir-fried for one minute.  The chicken’s been cut into bite-sized pieces and marinated for fifteen minutes in egg white, a tablespoon of sugar, a tablespoon of soy sauce, a little salt and pepper, and half a teaspoon of cornstarch.  Then the chicken is drained away from the oil, except for two tablespoons worth, which are added back into the wok. Two dried red peppers are tossed in and stir-fried for a minute.  A little soy sauce goes in, followed by a little Chinese vinegar.  A teaspoon of cornstarch mixed into a little water is added, just to thicken things up.  The chicken returns to the wok.  And finally a half-cup of peanuts are stirred in.

The dumpling is another New Year’s food with important symbolic meaning. On New Year’s Eve, the women of the family gather in the kitchen to make special dumplings. They undertake the task according to a set of ancient rules. Young children are not allowed in the kitchen during the dumpling making because they might say something that could interfere with the development of the good luck which is building up inside the dumpling. Custom demands that if there has been any disharmony between the women in the family, now is the time to work things out. It’s widely believed that New Year’s dumplings will not cook properly if there is any ill will among the members of the family. If anyone says anything unpleasant, the dumplings will be stolen from the pot by an evil spirit. And never count your dumplings while you are still making them. The more you count, the poorer you will be in the coming year. If a dumpling breaks up in the boiling water, the whole year could be filled with unpleasant experiences that will break up your happiness.

Chef Chou demonstrates his technique for improving your New Year’s luck. Dumpling dough, which is similar to the water and flour dough used for pasta is formed into one-inch pieces.  Each piece is floured, pressed into a disc, and rolled out into a flat three-inch round.  The rounds are filled with a mixture of vegetables and pre-cooked pork sausage meat and sealed.  Then they are set into a steamer basket that has been lined with aluminum foil to keep the dumplings from sticking to the basket.  The basket is placed on top of a wok that is filled with boiling water.  The cover goes on and the dumplings are steamed for ten minutes or until the filling is fully cooked.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: For centuries, it has been the custom to place a gold or copper coin inside some of the dumplings. If you got a dumpling with a coin inside, it was a signal that you were going to have a prosperous year. Recently however in order to avoid having people choking on hunks of metal in their food, the coins have been replaced with little pieces of candy. Some of the dumplings also contain sugar-coated lotus seeds. If a married woman of childbearing age receives a dumpling with a lotus seed inside, it is a signal to her that during the next year she is going to have a son. Now I have always suspected that lotus seeds were chauvinistic but this really proves it.

BURT WOLF: These are the traditional dishes you would get at a Chinese family meal at New Years. They should deliver the good fortune with which they are associated especially if they were prepared within view of the kitchen god.

THE LUNAR CALENDAR

BURT WOLF: The calendar that we use in the western world is based on the earth orbiting the sun. And every time the earth makes a full orbit we call it a year. But for some cultures a year is measured by the time it takes the moon to make twelve orbits around the earth.

The moon-based calendar was developed to meet the needs of farming societies and was used for thousands of years to tell people what had to be done at a particular time in order to have a successful harvest.

Harvest instructions were considered to have come directly from the gods and sent in relation to the position of the moon. To this day, much of Asia’s religious and cultural life is based on what is happening with the moon.

The Chinese lunar calendar is based on a twelve-year cycle with each year being devoted to a specific animal—The Dragon, the Snake, the Pig, the Mouse. Many people believe that the animal of the year in which you were born will influence your life. I happen to be a tiger. 

THE LANTERN FESTIVAL

BURT WOLF: The days of the New Year’s celebration come to an end with the ritual of the Lantern Festival, which has been part of the Chinese New Year for over 2,200 years. The people of ancient China believed that the first full moon of the year sent out a magic light that made it possible for people to see the heavenly spirits as they moved around on earth. Torches were added to the ceremony to make the job easier and eventually the torches became lanterns.

At some point, the Lantern Festival turned into a special event for children. Probably because the date of the first full moon of the year is often the date on which children go back to school after the New Year’s holiday. Parents began to construct elaborate lanterns that their children would take to school. Their teachers would light candles inside the lanterns to symbolize everyone’s hope that the children would turn out to be bright students. As the traditions that are part of a Lantern Festival developed, people began coming together to march through the streets with the lanterns. Fireworks were set off, and riddle guessing contests were introduced.

The traditional food of the Lantern Festival is a round sticky rice cake. It symbolizes both the new moon and the unity and completeness of the family. Some people believe that these cakes contain the power that controls aging, and that you will not gain the year of age that comes with the New Year until you eat this cake.

Of all the festivals involved in the cycle of the lunar year, none is as dramatic or as ancient as the celebration of the Chinese New Year. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: New Years - #105

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

NEW YEAR’S

BURT WOLF: Our first holiday celebrations were used to mark a New Year and were based on the sun and the moon. Today, however, we measure time according to the movement of the electrons of the cesium atom. When 9 billion, 92million, 31thousand, 7hundred and 70 beats have been recorded; it’s time to wish everybody Happy New Year. In New York the announcement is made by a glittering ball that slides down a pole, reaching the base at midnight. The dropping ball is actually an old navy custom that was used in ports all over the world. The ball would drop each day at noon as a signal to ships in the harbor that it was time to reset their clocks.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The moment in time between the old year and the new year, when the past meets the future is a dangerous moment. And we try to prepare for it by taking stock of our strengths and weaknesses and making a plan for the future. And we announce that plan because we believe wishes made at that moment have the best chance of coming true. Hope reborn with the new year. 

BURT WOLF: A second later when the old year becomes the new year is also a significant instant—filled with superstition and elaborate rituals. It’s important to be fully awake and clear headed when the midnight arrives. It’s the moment when you can consciously direct your fate. And you should be in a good mood during the transition.  The whole idea of a New Year’s Eve party is to establish a happy setting as the New Year begins.

SETTING THE DATE

FILM CLIP: Ann Miller singing “Auld Lang Syne.”

BURT WOLF: Some historians believe that our very first ritual was the one we designed to celebrate the start of a new year.  It usually makes sense to start at the beginning.  But how do you decide when the beginning begins?  Interesting problem and societies have answered the question differently from century to century and from place to place. Many people believe that there is a brief moment between the end of the old year and the beginning of the new year when good fortune can be brought in. It makes it an excellent time to test your luck. You can even gamble on love.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: New Year’s is about beginnings.  And every beginning has to start somewhere.  I know that every time I go on a diet, I always have to wonder when I'm going to begin it.  Am I going to begin it, the next Monday, after the weekend?  Am I going to begin it in two weeks when I know I'm not going on some cruise or a lecture tour.  When do we start?  When do we open up the cycle?  Our opening of the cycle stems from the Roman Empire, which used to be the first day of spring.  Rather an appropriate time to start a beginning because in Ancient Rome, that's about the start of the planting season.  And, so our original new year, in which the year was only 120 days long, by the way, only the four months during which we planted, was March the 21st, the equinox.  It was a Roman emperor around the third century A.D. who actually back shifted the first day of the year from March the 21st back to January 1st.  Now this is a Christian transformation, because we want to start our year when Christ brings new light into the world.  And that happens right after the 12 days of Christmas.  So January the 1st is indeed a late addition to the year. And the calendar that we developed is fairly unique because people all over the world have different starting dates. 

BURT WOLF: January 1st is an appropriate time to start the New Year because the 1st was dedicated to the God Janus. He’s usually shown as a figure with two heads, one facing forward and the other looking back. Janus represents the turning point—the moment when the old year gives way to the new—the instant when you look back to the past and forward to the future.

The French linked the start of the New Year to the arrival of Easter Sunday. They celebrated the rebirth of the year along with the rebirth of Christ—they combined two important events that celebrated regeneration.  Until the middle of the 1900s, the French did not give Christmas presents—gifts were exchanged only at New Year’s.

Visits were made to the homes of people who were higher up in your business or political circles and you always left your card behind. But since almost everyone was out visiting someone else, slightly higher on the social ladder, nobody was at home. So people began mailing their business cards. Eventually the business card evolved into the New Year’s greeting card.

SUPERSTITIONS AND RITUALS

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The use of a baby as a symbol for the New Year goes back well over 2,500 years to the ancient Greeks. They had a holiday where they celebrated the return of the growing season and during the feast, the new season was represented by a constantly returning baby.

BURT WOLF: The image of the new year as a diapered baby being welcomed in as the old year is ushered out illustrates an old German idea that was imported into North America during the 1800s. Often the old year is shown as Father Time with a scythe that he uses to cut off the past.

In order to bring in the New Year you must get rid of the old one. It’s a time to turn over a new leaf—to make your New Year’s plans and resolutions. Your house should be clean and all the garbage put out.

The moment when the old year becomes the new is a moment when evil spirits can slip past your guard. Loud noises, however, can scare them off, which is one reason New Year’s is marked with the blowing of horns and the banging of drums. Making noise is also symbolic of initiations, and new beginnings; it’s like banging on a door to make it open.

Being together with friends and family as the old year gives way to the new goes back for thousands of years.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: One of the most important act we indulge in at New Year's time is making those resolutions, the ones we know we're going to break by January 5th, I think in most cases.  The period of the end of the year, the last few days of the year, the 12 days of Christmas, are very, very important days because as we close out the cycle we know that the behavior of things on those days will determine what lies ahead. 

How we behave at the turn of the year, how we behave at the right at the midpoint of that cycle, that overturning of the cycle will, we hope, predict how we'll behave in the future.  So it's all about getting off to a good start, turning over a new leaf. And you do that at the time when the door is open, because that's the time when I think the spirits and the gods would be most sensitive to helping us to achieve our goals.  Unfortunately, I suppose, statistics would show not many of those resolutions ultimately work out.

BURT WOLF: These days, an effort is made to make the New Year’s celebration distinctly different from Christmas. Christmas is for families and particularly for children. New Year’s on the other hand is for adults. The parties are public and held late at night after the children are in bed. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: You should bring good things into your home and accept any gifts that come your way—especially if they involve money or sweet foods, but make sure everything comes into your home before you give anything out. There’s an old saying: “give out then bring in, bad luck will begin --- bring in then give out, good luck comes about.”  Simple.

BURT WOLF: In Scotland, your happiness in the coming year is thought to depend on the first person that comes to pay a visit. That person is known as the First Footer. He should be male, tall, not flat-footed, and carry an evergreen branch. If he fits the description he is known as “the lucky bird”. Almost everything associated with the First Footer is dark. Dark things are thought of as dangerous and powerful, so you want to get them on your side as soon as possible. Also, everything the First Footer brings into the house must be used up inside the house: nothing brought in by him should be taken out or your good luck might escape.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: If you like your work and you want it to continue doing it throughout the New Year, carry something that’s a symbol of your work on New Year’s Day. If you wear new things it will help you get new things. And on New Year’s Day don’t lend anything to anybody and don’t cry and don’t whine…I hate whining.

THE FOODS OF NEW YEAR’S

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Many people believe that what you eat and drink on New Year’s Eve will affect your luck in the future year. On New Year’s Eve the ancient Romans would set out a huge table and put all of the foods that they wanted to eat during the next year on that table.  It was important to pay attention to the individual foods as well as the quantities. You wanted a lot of stuff. Anything you didn’t put on the table you ran the risk of not getting next year.

CATHY KAUFMAN ON CAMERA: New Year’s celebrations in Colonial America were very much derived from Dutch and to some extent English customs of holding open houses on New Year’s.  The housewife would open up the doors on midnight on New Year’s Eve to let out the bad spirits, welcome in the good spirits.  And then the following day, friends, family, any one in the town would come and make a brief social call, visit, have a little something to drink.  Perhaps some cake or cookies, whatever was on the buffet.  But it was very important that you visited everyone. I don't think we have changed the holiday so much from what you would see in Dutch communities, in English communities who also adapted the Dutch tradition.  Even if they're not necessarily open houses.  This is the one time of year that you can show up at a party with 150 people in a Manhattan apartment and nobody thinks twice about that.  The idea of just getting the more the merrier.  The fact that we pack into Times Square as the communal open house for New Yorkers I think tells us something about that sense of wanting to re-establish bonds with our community at large.

BURT WOLF: New Year’s is a time to take a look at the shape of things to come. Foods eaten during the New Year’s celebration often have a symbolic shape. Breads and cakes that are usually long will be rounded for New Year’s. The circle expresses your hope for a “well-rounded” year. It also keeps the luck from escaping out of the end. Round pasta dishes will be served instead of those that have ends like spaghetti or linguini.

The foods we traditionally serve at New Year’s often show two aspects of life.

One group is expensive and extravagant. They indicate our desire to have lots of good stuff in the new year. But along side the foods of extravagance are foods that are simple, inexpensive or easy to make.

CATHY KAUFMAN ON CAMERA: New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day are two sides of the same coin.  They are indulgence the night before and repentance the morning after.  New Year’s we tend to go all out.  It's a time; it's the last night of the year.  You know whatever is in the larder that's yummy and fabulous our last you know, pennies can be put to some fabulous indulgence.  And then it really is the morning after.  You wake up perhaps you haven't had too much to drink, but it is a sobering thought of I now have to face the New Year, let me be a little more frugal.  A little more measured.  I've had my Bacchanalian blow- out and now on New Year’s Day that's when you have Hoppin’ John.  That's not a New Year’s Eve food.  That is a New Year’s Day food, something much more humble. 

New Year’s Eve is a difficult holiday to categorize from a food perspective.  New Year’s Eve depends so much on your budget, what you feel like doing.  I think if there are any two foods that tend to show up, it's champagne and caviar if you can afford it.  People like doing that.  But I have gone through scads and scads of magazine articles, cookbooks looking for common threads in the New Year’s Eve menus.  They're really not there other than to say, this is an important meal.  It's an expensive meal.  But there's no one food I think other than the caviar and champagne that is fairly consistent.

I think they are there because of the expense and people think they seem very, very sophisticated.  So it's a time to be sophisticated.  Men it’s often the black tie, tuxedo, long dress and you know what could be more glamorous than biased cut satin and champagne and caviar. 

BURT WOLF: Champagne is one of the ancient regions of France but it’s also the place where champagne was invented.

One of the classic champagne houses is Laurent-Perrier. It’s run by the family

de Nonancourt. There’s Bernard and his two daughters, Alexandra and Stephanie.

Their champagne is made in a small town in the middle of the French district of Champagne and they are made by the most traditional method.  They select their grapes from over a thousand different growers in the region, and their job is to find the ones that are just right for the balance.

When the grapes arrive from the growers, they are crushed and their juices allowed to ferment, which takes about two to three weeks. The sugar in the juice changes to alcohol and carbon dioxide gas.  The gas is allowed to escape.  The wine from each area is held separately in stainless steel tanks.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Each champagne house tries to develop a “house style” for its non-vintage champagne, and to reproduce that style each year. The job of developing the house style and reproducing it year after year is the work of the champagne blender.  The blender will use wines from over two hundred small villages, and a number of different years, in order to develop and maintain the house style.

BURT WOLF: After the blending, the wine goes into its bottle along with a small amount of yeast and a little cane sugar.  Then the bottles go into the cellar for the next three to five years.  Shortly after they arrive, the yeast in the bottle starts a second fermentation.  Gas is formed again, but this time it’s trapped in the wine -- and that’s how champagne gets its effervescent bubbles.

The next step in the process is called riddling. The bottles are held more or less on their sides and each day a riddler comes in and by hand turns the bottle a little to one side and slightly up.  The solids that have formed in the bottle as a result of the second fermentation slowly slide down to the neck. A riddler goes through 60,000 bottles a day.

When all the sediment is in the neck, the bottle is placed into a very cold solution of brine.  The liquid in the neck freezes. The cap is taken off and the block of sediment shoots out.  A little cane sugar is added to balance any acidity, plus some more wine to top off the bottle.  Then the cork goes on, followed by the wire covering that keeps it in place. The wire is important... there’s a considerable amount of pressure in the bottle.  Three more months of resting in the cellar and it’s ready to party.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: What makes one great champagne house different from another is the style that they use in making their non-vintage champagne, and it’s a style that they use year after year.  But every once in a while the grapes of a specific year are so extraordinary that they decide to make a champagne just using the grapes of that year.  And when they do, they call it a vintage champagne.  But a vintage champagne tells you more about the year than it does about the style of the house.

BURT WOLF: You hear the sound of a champagne bottle opening and you think... somebody’s celebrating something! 

Sweetness is also important. It’s a metaphor for the good fortune people hope to have in the New Year. And chocolate plays an important role, symbolizing the rich and sweet hopes that the giver has for the recipient.

An individual chocolate cake can stand as a gift for the trials of the past and a hope for a sweet and rich future. Here’s how they are prepared in the kitchens of The Trianon Palace Hotel in the French town of Versailles. Eggs go into a mixing bowl and get whisked together until they are quite fluffy and filled with air.  That’s a ten-minute job by hand or about two minutes by machine.

In a second bowl, sugar is mixed together with flour and some melted semi-sweet chocolate.  The chocolate mixture is then blended into the whipped eggs... a little of the egg mixture at first, and then the rest.  You don’t want to mix it so much that the air in the egg is forced out.  The air gives the final cake its lightness.  Half-cup molds are filled about three-quarters of the way with the batter. And then it’s into the oven for a few minutes. The chef mixes a little heavy cream together with a little Bailey’s liqueur and covers the base of the serving plate with that blend.  A design is drawn on the plate with some melted chocolate and finally the baked chocolate is placed onto the plate.  It looks like a little cake, but when you cut into the center it will be soft and runny like a soufflé.  Definitely a great way start to a new year.

The balance to a dish of something that’s sweet and rich is something that is inexpensive and simple--which is what is often served on New Year’s Day. The idea is to say, “please give me the rich stuff because I love it, but don’t forget I’m just a simple person at heart.”

Gerald Hirigoyen is a Basque chef who came to America and opened up two fine restaurants in San Francisco.  His simple New Year’s Day dish is a potato and white bean soup.  Originally, this was eaten for lunch as a mash of beans and potatoes.  Now it's served as a thick, smooth soup.  The preparation begins with olive oil being heated in a saucepan; chopped onions and crushed garlic go in and are sautéed for five minutes.  Then dried white beans that have been soaked in water overnight, and potatoes, along with a sprig of rosemary.  Gerald pours in a vegetable stock and the soup simmers for an hour.  

GERALD HIRIGOYEN ON CAMERA: And also what I like about this soup too ... its mostly vegetable and it still has a great flavor to it.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: And very low in calories…

GERALD HIRIGOYEN ON CAMERA: Exactly. 

BURT WOLF: While the soup is cooking, olives are pureed in a blender.  When the soup is cooked, the rosemary is removed and the soup goes into a blender to be pureed.  The soup is poured into bowls and the olive puree and some chives go on top.  New Year’s is also the time to eat something new or unusual, under the theory that people are hoping for new experiences in the coming year.  The day was often used to visit the more unusual members of your family and celebrate with them.  And it was always a mark of honor to do the visiting which is why I would like to thank you for visiting with us while we took a look at the rituals of New Year’s.  Happy New Year! For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Kwanzaa - #104

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

KWANZAA

BURT WOLF: This is the island of Manhattan. The first European settlers to arrive here were Dutch and they showed up in 1625. They called their community Harlem which was the name of the town they had come from in the Netherlands. Today, Harlem is the epicenter of African-American culture in the United States.

During the 1830s, the New York and Harlem Railroad built a rail line connecting Harlem to downtown New York and the area became a hot property. Many of New York’s most important families decided to build their estates on these streets. When a second railroad line was built from downtown to Harlem, the area was overrun with real estate developers. They thought they could build hundreds of elegant and expensive homes and wealthy New Yorkers would buy in, but they ended up with more expensive homes than New York had wealthy families. The developers didn’t do the math and they were in deep trouble.

A group of black and white real estate brokers, approached the white developers in their empty buildings, explained that they were aware of the developer’s reluctance to sell to blacks but also pointed out that money was green and the only way the developers were going to get any was from them.

Between 1900 and 1920, Harlem became a predominantly black community, but it also became the geographic center for black literature, theater, painting, photography and music.

JOYCE GOLD ON CAMERA: There were a number of reasons why Harlem became the center of Black culture.  One of the reasons, I think, had to do with some literary output that came about before many literary figures and artists started moving into Harlem, particularly in the 1920s.  Gene Tumor, W.E.B. Du Bois, wrote works of literature that appealed and sort of helped define African-Americans to themselves, and there was something of a literary awakening that spread beyond the confines of Harlem, and it helped attract African-Americans from many parts of the country to that hotbed of cultural ferment.  There were a couple of other reasons as well.  In the early 1920s, Noble Sissle wrote a play called "Shuffle Along".  It was the first African-American play that appeared on Broadway in ten years.  It was very well received; it was very lively, and people wanted to hear more.  A'Lelia Walker, the daughter of Madame C. J. Walker, the wealthiest, self-made woman in America, her mother had left her a third of her fortune, and A'Lelia Walker opens up something of a salon in Harlem, something called The Black Tower.  What happened at the salon was some of the white downtown money appeared, heard what the Black cultural center was achieving, and helped fund some of it.  So, that attracted more black artists to Harlem, because there was a way of getting some recompense for what they were turning out.

BURT WOLF: The African-American community had art, culture, music but it did not have its own holiday until Kwanzaa.

THE SYMBOLS OF KWANZAA

BURT WOLF: Kwanzaa runs from December 26th to January 1st. It’s not a religious holiday, but a holiday of reflection--an opportunity for African-Americans to celebrate their African roots. Kwanzaa is a Swahili word and it means “first fruits of the harvest”. It was created in 1966 by Dr. Maulana Karenga, — a leader of the Black Cultural Movement and chairman of the black studies department at California State University in Long Beach.

The festival revolves around the number seven. It lasts seven days and there are seven principles and seven symbols, that must be observed. You can celebrate the holiday along the lines Dr. Karenga laid out in his book or you can create your own traditions.

JESSICA HARRIS ON CAMERA: I contend that African-Americans, we don't we don't follow rules well. I mean, so we improvise. It's like jazz.  There is a basic Kwanzaa, if you will, and for that, certainly, the reference is anything by Karenga.  He invented it. He gets to say what it is.  Okay.  And basically it's those seven principles and those seven days. We've talked about the seven principles and the seven days but there are also seven symbols of Kwanzaa, and anyone who is going to celebrate Kwanzaa will have these seven symbols organized either on a Kwanzaa table, as a centerpiece to the house, to the room you're celebrating in but in some way, and they're built on the mkeka or the mat.  The mat, representing the building block, if you will, of the holiday, the foundation of the holiday.

BURT WOLF: The mat also symbolizes the foundation of Africa and the foundation on which African American values are based. A basket of fruit and vegetables goes on to the Kwanzaa table symbolizing the harvest that takes place when people work together; ears of corn represent children; a communal cup is laid out to show the unity of all the people of African descent. A seven-branched candleholder stands for Africa and the candles stand for the seven principles that Karenga made part of Kwanzaa. 

JESSICA HARRIS ON CAMERA: A kinara has seven candle holders, and we organize it in such a way that the middle candle holder is the black candle. The black candle because the colors of the candles on the kinara are red, black and green, which are the colors of African unity.  The black one, again, self-evident, for the people.  The red one, to represent struggle, and the green one to represent attainment. So, on the first night of Kwanzaa, we light the candle of umoja, the Candle of Unity, which is the black candle in the middle.  And on all subsequent nights, we first light on the second day of Kwanzaa the red candle, on the third day of Kwanzaa the green candle, and so on and so forth until we end with the final green candle of Imani. Why do we alternate between red and green?  To represent the fact that without struggle, there is no attainment.

And finally, zawadi or gifts because it is still a holiday. But the gifts of Kwanzaa, the zawadi of Kwanzaa are different in that they are gifts that speak to who we are as individuals or as people.  They are books about African history about the history of Africans in the Diaspora.  They may be records.  They are things that are self-made or hand-made or things that in some way will instruct and propel and urge onward the youngsters.  And the zawadi of Kwanzaa, the gifts of Kwanzaa are for the most part for the young. I think Kwanzaa is an incredible holiday for just that because it tells the young something about who they are, and it gives them a focus as to where they go.

KWANZAA AT THE BOOKER HOME

BURT WOLF: Every year Marie Booker and her daughter Kathleen invite their family and friends to celebrate Kwanzaa — an evening of drumming, eating and ceremony.

KATHLEEN BOOKER ON CAMERA: It's a bonding time for my mother and I, first and foremost, cause this is a tradition that she and I have started and even though we work very hard, it really is a time that it just shows our love for one another, and especially I hope it shows my love for my mother.  And we're both very giving, nurturing people and community minded, and it's s way to share not only it's a way to share what we have with each other with others, and to invite the community at large to open up their hearts, their souls, their minds, and go out and touch someone else. I come, I touch you.  You go, you touch someone else.  It's a ripple effect.

MARIE BOOKER ON CAMERA: What we do to celebrate.  We have friends over, and we have the drumming.  I find the drumming is the thing that sort of gets you prepared for the following year.  There's something very spiritual about drumming.  And we have our Indian friend to come over, and do a ceremony.  So for me, it's a renewal and a preparation for the coming year.  But Kwanzaa, we started Kwanzaa I think because the children were all grown, out of the house, and you get sort of tired of the mundane shopping and spending money.  And this was about community efforts and coming together, and all of the principles of Kwanzaa that go into when you're older, make you a better human being.

So it's sort of a spiritual celebration, renewal of your moralities, a coming together, a oneness with the universe and a oneness with your friendships, all of these things.

FOODS OF KWANZAA

BURT WOLF: Food is a major part of the Kwanzaa celebration. Often the foods cooked for Kwanzaa are drawn from different parts of the world where Africans were brought during their enslavement or in which they have a long heritage: Africa, the American South, the Caribbean, South America. 

KATHLEEN BOOKER ON CAMERA: We always have a fish because it represents in African American lore, culture, it represents silver, coins. It’s also luck. We always have some type of African dish because it introduces our community to our culture.

BURT WOLF: Kathleen starts by cleaning the fish and making sure all of the scales are off. Then she makes slits in the skin on both sides. Paprika, dried thyme, garlic powder and fresh black pepper get mixed together and rubbed into the slits in the fish. The spice mixture is spread all over the fish inside and out. The sauce is made by sautéing onions, garlic and chopped green pepper. Fresh pureed tomato is added along with dried thyme, scotch bonnet chili and homemade fish stock. The mixture cooks until its soft and then gets pureed in a blender. The fish goes into a pan, the sauce is poured over the top. It’s covered with aluminum foil and baked in the oven. Kathleen and her mom also prepare a dish of marinated collard greens. The greens are rolled up and thinly sliced. Olive oil and sesame oil are added and a little garlic powder.

KATHLEEN BOOKER ON CAMERA: Some cayenne pepper that my mother and I brought back from Benin, West Africa, just a splish splosh to give it a little kick.

BURT WOLF: Sliced shallots go in. Some fresh garlic and everything gets mixed together.

THE SEVEN PRINCIPLES

BURT WOLF: On each day of Kwanzaa, a candle is lit and one of the seven principles discussed.

ADA MARIE MURRAY ON CAMERA: Each one of the zaba or seven principles that black Americans should live by on a daily basis and which are reinforced during Kwanzaa. Umoja which is unity; Kujichagulia which is self-determination;Ujima, collective work and responsibility; Ujamaa, cooperative economics; Nia, purpose; Kuumba, creativity; and Imani, faith.

BURT WOLF: A perfect example of the fourth night, cooperative economics, is Londel’s restaurant. In 1995, Londel Davis, a retired police officer, opened Londel’s Supper Club on the same spot where he used to pack groceries as a child.

LONDEL DAVIS ON CAMERA: Londel's was put here intentionally because I think this part of Harlem needed something to lift it up. I felt that black people had to take hold of their condition, they had to do certain things to better their plight. Londel's Restaurant has been put in a place right in the middle of the so-called hood, the inner bowels of the Harlem community, which is Northern Harlem. I’ve been able to hire people from the community and often when someone comes to me that has had problems, they've just come out of jail or they had some drug addiction, I let it be known to them that this is a new beginning, so this is a  way that you can sort of get back on track, better your condition.

Londel's cuisine encompasses three different styles of cooking.  Southern traditional, Cajun, Continental.  When me and Kenny, Kenny being the chef, sat down and talked about the type of menu, we both agreed that Harlem needed something for the future, realizing that the complexion is changing, there's new people coming to the community, and ideally as people live here, they will spend their money here.  So the menu being encompasses these three types of cooking, we refer to it as New York style, and that mix or that blend of cooking, you can sort of accommodate any taste.

This restaurant I think has become quite popular for its catfish.  The blackened catfish, sauteed spinach, seasoned rice pilaf. 

BURT WOLF: The restaurant is also known for its barbecued ribs and smothered pork chops and you could make a whole meal out of the sides of macaroni and cheese, collard greens, and candied yams.

LONDEL DAVIS ON CAMERA: Londel's is a supper club, it dictates that we have music. 

LAURA MANN SINGING ON CAMERA: Tonight is going to be a good night because we’re just going to mix everything up, okay?

LONDEL DAVIS ON CAMERA: I have a wonderful woman tonight, Laura Mann, and me and Laura go back to the early days of the restaurant.  She's a wonderful, wonderful woman.  This is back in the day when the restaurant was doing very poorly, and we couldn't pay much money.  The scale might have been a hundred dollars at a meal.  And she would come and she'd say, well, you know, God's going to bless you, don't worry about it. I just like the spirit of the restaurant. 

I often say that, my mother and the spirit are the reason I'm here and I'm doing what I'm doing.  She's a wonderful woman, I think that most of all she instilled in me the love of God and just the love of people.  That's the kind of person she was.  Her picture's on the wall because I feel that she's watching over me.

BURT WOLF: When it comes to the principle of creativity you’ve got to take a look at the Apollo Theater. The Apollo opened in 1914 as a burlesque house. Though blacks performed, it was a white-only audience. By 1934 under pressure from Mayor La Guardia, the theater went from burlesque entertainment to variety revues and opened its doors to African Americans.

BILLY MITCHELL ON CAMERA: First of all, I just want to welcome you all to the world famous Apollo Theater.  My name is Billy Mitchell. I used to be an errand boy for the stars.  I would stand in the back of the Apollo backstage door, and as these stars would come in, I would offer to run errands for them. In the latter part of 1934, there was a Jewish brother.  His name was Frank Schiffman. He ran this place from 1934 until 1977 starting the careers of all of these people whose pictures are up on the wall, including the careers of people like Billie Holiday and Lena Horne, Dionne Warwick, Aretha Franklin, Gladys Knight, James Brown and they all appeared right inside on the stage in a show called Amateur Night at the Apollo, which is our longest running show to this date. 

Now, when you talk about jazz and jazz trumpet players, one of the greatest ever player of trumpet, up there in the corner, Mr. Miles Davis. The lady next to him in that beautiful gown with the stripes, she was a blues singer, her name was Ruth Brown. Mama, you treat your daughter mean.  Otis Redding.  Sitting in the morning sun. Brooke Benton.  Rainy night in Georgia. And Ben E. King.  So darlin', darlin', stand by me.

And Ella Fitzgerald. Ella Fitzgerald. In 1937, she was a contestant on our Amateur Night show, and when Ella was scheduled to perform she originally came on to be a dancer. Ella you know was studying dance for awhile and she was intimidated by the dancers that preceded her on the show that night.  So she turned to the host Ralph Cooper, and said, Mr. Cooper, sir, I don't think I can go out there, those people are so good and I don't want to embarrass myself.  He says, honey, you got to go out there, your name's on the program, you're scheduled, you got to go out there.  She says, please don't make me.  He says, honey, you got to go.  She says, please.  He says, well, what else do you do?  She says, well, I do sing a little bit  and he sent her out there, and she won the Amateur Night performance.

All right. All right, family, now we're inside. This is the Apollo Theater auditorium. When we do our Amateur Night, usually the host stands over there, the amateur stands right here. If they like what you're doing up here, they'll applaud you.    However, if they think that your act is, as they say, is wack, they will do something that to most civilized people sounds rude, but it's tradition here, they will boo you. Now, folks, I want to do something right now.  And I need your cooperation.  I would like for us, just us, right, to put on our very own Amateur Night right now, right here on this stage of the Apollo.  So I need a few volunteers.  Come on, this is just for fun. 

Ladies and gentlemen, let's give a big Apollo welcome to Harlem Love. Come on make them feel good.

HARLEM LOVE ON CAMERA: Wave your hands in the air. Wave ‘em like you just don’t care.

BILLY MITCHELL ON CAMERA: Give it up for Freight Train. Whoa!

It took a lot of courage for them to come up here and do this.  And that's evident by so many of you that are sitting down there. I see you. I see you. So please join me once again and give them all a big round of applause.  Take a bow.

BURT WOLF: Imani is the sixth candle and stands for faith. One of the great examples of faith in action is the Glide Memorial United Methodist Church in San Francisco. It’s been called a model religious institution that can help save America from the social stresses of our time, a church for the twenty-first century.

REVEREND CECIL WILLIAMS ON CAMERA: Most people during that period of time when I was a child, 12 or 13 years old, would play Indians and Cowboys, I didn’t, I played church.

BURT WOLF: Under the direction of the Reverend Cecil Williams it has become the city’s largest private provider of social services, offering recovery programs for substance abusers, domestic-violence workshops, teaching job-skills, and feeding 3,500 people three times a day.

REVEREND CECIL WILLIAMS ON CAMERA: And I used my imagination to integrate people into the church on the basis of them not being segregated.  We are the church first and foremost and it’s concerned about justice.  And with justice is always unconditional love. I’ve got a 144 boys gospel choir, a band that will get down, and I’ve got over 3,000 people who come here every Sunday all colors, all kinds, people from all over the world. And what we do is we create spontaneous action with each other there’s no telling what  might occur.  This is a place where we celebrate.

BURT WOLF: Hallelujah. Just what I was thinking. For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Christmas - #103

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

CHRISTMAS

BURT WOLF: Christmas is about remembering the past. It could be your actual past or some other past that you just feel like remembering. The sound of sleigh bells, the smell of pine needles, the taste of gingerbread. The toy trains and doll houses that remind us of a time when we thought we could control the world around us—when it looked like all our dreams might come true. In the northern hemisphere, we celebrate Christmas at the coldest and darkest time of the year when the fields are barren. And for that reason, the central message of Christmas is “no matter how dark and how cold it looks now, light, warmth and growth will return”.

CHRISTMAS TREES

BURT WOLF: During the 1500s, German Protestants introduced Christmas trees because they felt that the human images of St. Nicholas, the Three Kings and the Christ Child being used in Catholic communities were inappropriate.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: Christmas was never a big deal in America, largely because the Protestant immigrants who came here, many from Germany, mostly from Germany in the early eighteenth century, and late seventeenth century, were not terribly fond of idol worshippers.  And so therefore they tended to downplay the holidays that came, in the course of the Roman Catholic year.  Tree worship goes back a long way.  When I say knock on wood, what do I really mean?  Well, wood is a tree.  And a tree is important to us, for well, let's think, it gives us shade in the in the hot summer.  It gives us fuel in its wood in the winter.  It gives us fruit so that we can eat.  No wonder worshipping trees, was very, very important throughout all culture.  The German form of the tree would be the evergreen.  It was brought here by German immigrants.  And it was decorated with baubles and I think that that decorating of the tree is no different from the reason why we decorate our houses with lights.  We want to be ostentatious.

BURT WOLF: The Christmas tree tradition became popular in the United States in December of 1850, when Godey’s Magazine published a picture of Queen Victoria of England and her family standing around a small Christmas tree.  The image was reproduced around the world.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The Queen's husband, Prince Albert, was German, and Christmas trees had been part of the German holiday tradition for centuries.  Prince Albert was merely introducing his kids to what had happened in his own childhood, but anything that happened in the British royal household was immediately covered by the British press, and anything that was in the British press was immediately covered in the United States. 

BURT WOLF: One year later, in 1851, a farmer from the Catskill Mountains paid a licensing fee of $1 to the City of New York and set up the first official sidewalk concession for the sale of Christmas trees. The greenery of the forest slipped into town and everybody loved it.

The first set of electric Christmas lights went on to the tree of Edward Johnson, who was the Vice President of Thomas Edison’s electric company in New York. Electric lights were more economical than candles because they could be reused for years and even more important they were much safer than a candle’s open flame.

When I think of F.W. Woolworth, which isn’t that often, I think of him as the man who made a fortune as the father of the five and dime store. But a big hunk of his fortune came as a Christmas present. In 1880, Woolworth was wandering around the warehouse of an importer in Philadelphia, looking for some cheap toys to put into his store. The importer thought that F. W. might also be interested in a series of glass Christmas ornaments that he had just brought in from Germany.

Woolworth thought the importer was out of his mind. The breakage during shipment would be enormous and if any of them got through in one piece, no one would know what to do with them. The importer, however, felt so strongly about the market for these ornaments that he guaranteed their sale. If Woolworth didn’t sell at least twenty-five dollars worth, he could have the whole shipment for free.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The ornaments came into Woolworth's store just before Christmas and he put them out thinking, boy, am I wasting good retail space.  Two days later, they were sold out.  The next year, he stocked up even more and sold them out and more and more and more until he made twenty five million dollars on those little glass ornaments.  And when the Second World War came along and put an end to trading with Germany, he taught the Corning Glass Works of Corning New York how to make the little Christmas tree ornaments and they didn't do badly, either. 

CHRISTMAS AT BILTMORE ESTATE

BURT WOLF: Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, is the largest private home in North America.  It was put together by George W. Vanderbilt in the late 1800s.  George was the grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt.  At one time Cornelius was the wealthiest man in the world and the family’s sense of grandeur is clearly visible throughout the estate.  The original property covered one hundred and twenty five thousand acres.  George planted those acres with a working forest and a wooded park.  He also directed the planting of five gardens and the construction of 30 miles of roadway. Cathy Barnhardt is the floral supervisor at Biltmore Estate.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Of course we have the winter garden decorated for Christmas right now.   We have very typical Christmas plants in here and some maybe that aren't so typical.  Poinsettia I think most people can identify as Christmas.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Mm-hm.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: But why?  You know, we have bright red bracts these are actually bracts rather than the flower.  The flower are the small yellow pieces here in the center and those represent the Crown of Thorns for Christ and the bracts are the blood of Christ.  So that that's where the Christian symbolism comes into using poinsettias in your home and church.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: They're not native to America, are they?

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: No, they were collected in 1829 by Joel Poinsette who was the U.S. ambassador to Mexico.  And of course in Mexico poinsettias are just roadside weeds they're growing everywhere.  But quite exotic at that time.  This is an Olmstead basket what we call an Olmstead basket a miniature garden in a basket.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: And it's named after the garden architect

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Right.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: its landscaper who built the place ...

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Frederick Law Olmstead who also was the landscape designer for Biltmore Estate. And it has all those little garden elements in it.  As well as traditional plants but I especially like to use the twigs. And again there's a little symbolic reason to use that you see the buds about to

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Yeah.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Burst, you know?  So spring is coming there's renewal there.  Another plant typical of turn of the century decorating is ivy and I like to use that one at Christmas time because of its symbolism as well. It was used in ancient times to protect from evil spirits.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Ivy?

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Yes planted around the house and growing up over the cottage the vine-covered cottage to protect the inhabitants from evil spirits.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Oh, I never heard that that's fascinating.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Yes. And then the Christian belief takes it a step further and talks about the strength of ivy because once it does cling to something it doesn't let go.  So that strength that fidelity that belief is reflected in the ivy.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: I am going to plant ivy this spring and ...

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Protect yourself and be strong.  Another plant typically found in winter gardens otherwise known as palm courts are palms and we have several varieties here in the winter garden.  This is a fan palm we have eureka, fish tails, lots of different textures of greenery.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: And they're also associated with Christ.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: They certainly were that's another nice tradition that we can tie in with Christmas we all think about the palm tree being or palm fronds being laid at Christ's feet.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Yeah.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: on Palm Sunday and that represented humility and also honor for Christ.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: So all of the plants in this room besides being beautiful plants have additional meaning that relate to Christmas.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: Yes. Many, many of the plants that we use do relate right back to Christmas.  And I think it's important that we here at Biltmore try to hold onto those traditions.  We may not convey to every guest what those traditions are. But I think that it's important that we keep,  putting it out there so people think about it.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: You need to know what you're looking at.

CATHY BARNHARDT ON CAMERA: That's right.

SANTA CLAUS

BURT WOLF: For over a hundred years the dominant image of Christmas in the United States has been Santa Claus. But as it is with so many superstars, the general public usually doesn’t realize how long the guy had been in the business before he was “discovered”. Santa is a perfect example.

His early work was as a bishop during the fourth century in Turkey.  He was a real person and his name was Nicholas. His thing was to give gifts to kids and dowries to young ladies who wanted to get married. Later he became a minor folk hero in northern Europe, and eventually arrived in New York City with the early Dutch settlers. The name Santa Claus comes from the Dutch for St. Nicholas.

His first significant media exposure came in the 1860s, when Thomas Nast, an important artist of the time, showed him in a series of illustrations for Harper’s Weekly.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: At the time, people were interested in the explorers who were heading to the North Pole and it was Nast who decided that Santa Claus lived at the North Pole.  Nast's drawings showed him in a sleigh pulled by reindeer, big sacks of gifts behind him and stockings hung by the chimney with care.  Nast got those ideas from a poem by Clement Moore called "A Visit From Santa Claus."  And Moore got those ideas from Washington Irving, all of which is to say that our picture of Christmas started with the work of Washington Irving.

BURT WOLF: Santa, in his present form, is an all-American invention. The size of his stomach, his ruddy complexion, his fur-trimmed suit and his desire to share his stuff all speak to the image of America as a nation of abundance.

We also present Santa as an entrepreneur. He’s got a factory filled with workers. He developed an airborne delivery system a century before anyone heard of Federal Express. And he is one of the leading authorities on the advantages of the “not for profit business”.

GIFT GIVING

BURT WOLF: Originally, Christmas presents were simple gifts for little children. The tree was the holder and they hung from the branches—the gifts, not the children. As the trees got bigger, the presents got bigger. And when the presents began to get too big to hang on the tree, they started getting placed under and around the tree. In the old days, the present was clearly visible—no wrapping—what you saw was what you got.  And most often they were hand-made.

Things began to change however and one of the great forces for change in the history of American business was the Civil War. Suddenly, the Union army was placing huge orders with manufacturers. Industry had to learn to mass-produce what was needed. Instead of getting a suit cut to the precise size of your body, you got a 52 regular and hoped it did the job.

The war created a need for foods that were easy to carry. The canning process for food had been developed in 1825 but its growth was slow until 1858. That was the year when the can opener was invented. Having both the can and the opener made all the difference and the industry took off in response to orders from the Union Army.

Demand from the troops was also responsible for the success of condensed milk, and canned pork and beans. The troops were introduced to commercially made soap and candles. We even learned to mass-produce our Christmas presents.

During the 1860s the first wrapped gifts showed up. The paper was always plain and held in place with ceiling wax or pins and later with string and tinsel cord. By the middle of the 1870s, everybody was wrapping. But fancy wrapping paper only arrived during the First World War when Joyce Halls' little shop in Kansas City, Missouri, ran out of the solid color tissue and filled in with some French envelope lining paper that he used in his greeting card business. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: He sold out.  Next year he bought some more and sold out again.  So, he decided to start printing his own wrapping papers.  Wanted a brand name.  So he called it Hallmark.  Some historians believe that the idea of wrapping a present is part of the Victorian passion for enclosing things, for disguising all intimacy, for holding off the anticipated.  But to tell you the truth, that's kind of a stretch for me.  I tend to think a cigar is just a cigar.  Nevertheless, 96 percent of all Christmas presents given in the United States are wrapped.

CHRISTMAS THROUGH A WINDOW

BURT WOLF: The unofficial beginning of Christmas is the unveiling of the holiday displays in     the department store windows. Every year they try to outdo the windows of the past year. The tradition got started at Lord & Taylor in 1938. They were the first department store to devote prime retail space to the celebration of the Christmas season rather than their merchandise. Manoel Renha is Lord & Taylor’s creative director.

MANOEL RENHA ON CAMERA: I'm an architect. That's my background.  So, I have the technical background to develop the sketches.  And I usually do a lot of set designing.  So, when you see our windows, you can tell, they are nothing less than a Broadway production.  Maybe in a smaller version, but, where the, the actors or the characters are, are little figurines. 

BURT WOLF: These Lord & Taylor windows interpret the story of the Nutcracker.

MANOEL RENHA ON CAMERA: The first one is, is, is kind of creating the atmosphere of what should expect, is the Christmas Eve, where you have the guests arriving, to the mansion, the celebrating the Christmas Eve party, and then, one of the things we did, that we thought would be very interesting, was to, to give a twist to the story, and treat it more, almost like a story board, so we are zooming in from the first scene to the next scene, where you see the inside of the mansion, in right there, we create this split level, with this giant Christmas tree, with the, the main characters, where Drosselmeier is presenting Clara with her Christmas gift, then the Nutcracker, and right underneath, we have a second level, the mice world, and the mouse king is taking a bath while the other little mouse are spying and seeing what's happening in the upper level. In, in each window, we are very particular with the detailing.  So make sure you, you analyze, and you really take the time to see every single window.

Well, the mouse king is taking a bath, in his copper pan, having a drink, holding with his tail and moving around, he's relaxing.  You can see his stomach going up and down.  And, before he decides to take his bath, he made sure he took his fake teeth, and put it off the side.

Well now, we're literally underneath the sidewalk.  In Fifth Avenue.  So, this is how a hydraulic lift system, that was installed here in this store, in 1914.  And still works.  Let's bring it down.  The great thing about this system is that, enables us to create a, to play with the levels in the windows.  So you will see in order to hide all the mechanics, for the figures, the mechanical figures, we create this three, three to four foot platform.  In all the, the mechanism underneath, in case you have to go back and fix something.  You don't have to literally destroy the window you just crawl underneath, and fix everything, there.

People always asking me, what do you like the most about your job?  I always say, when everything is done, when the windows are complete, and I finally have the chance to go upstairs and just kind of mingle with the crowd, and, and hear the comments, and then listen to the oohs, and aaahs, that's a great feeling, and that pays off all the long hours and the hard work.

THE FOODS OF CHRISTMAS

BURT WOLF: One of the most important rules in any festival is that the festival itself and most of the objects within it must be temporary. A festival, by definition, is something out of the ordinary, different from everyday life. If it stays around too long it loses its impact. For that reason, food and anything made of edible material is always a mainstay of any festival. 

The Christmas meal varies from place to place, even within the United States. The core of the meal is usually a big bird either a goose or a turkey. But if you go down south you will also find ham.

Perhaps the greatest single influence on Christmas dinners in the United States came from the meal that was described by Charles Dickens in “A Christmas Carol”. He took the grand family feast of the Old English Christmas and shrunk it down so it worked for a single household. His book was first published in 1843 and became a Christmas instruction manual for the American homemakers.

CATHY KAUFMAN ON CAMERA: The most detailed meal is the meal of the dream with the ghost of Christmas present.  In it, Bob Cratchett is at home .There is a roast goose with gravy.  There is potato and onion and sage stuffing for it.  There's certainly gravy for the goose, applesauce and some mashed potatoes, interestingly enough.  The interesting thing, we tend to think today of goose as being a fairly elegant bird.  A fairly expensive bird.  And turkey being relatively inexpensive.  And some how as slightly less elaborate than a goose.  That was not the case in the nineteenth century, both in England and in this country.  Goose was the much more plebeian bird.  Turkey was the luxury bird.  When Scrooge wakes up the following morning and realizes he has a chance to repent, he flags down a little street urchin says "is there that big turkey still in the poulter's window?"  The little boy says "the one as big as me?"  And Scrooge, who was a changed man says "Ah!, very bright fellow, yes, that's the one."  And sends him off to buy that turkey to send to the Cratchett family.  The fact that he chose a turkey rather than a goose, was a real step up to the Cratchett family in terms of the fair on their table.

BURT WOLF: Each year, Andreas Hauk at the Hotel Nassauer Hof in Wiesbaden, Germany prepares a traditional Christmas goose. He starts by chopping onions, apples, and oranges and putting them into a bowl and seasoning them with salt and pepper and dried thyme. The mixture goes into the goose which is sewn up. The legs are tied together and the outside of the bird is seasoned with salt and pepper. Oil goes into a pan and the bird is browned on all sides. The giblets go into the pan, some water and into the oven. It cooks in a 350-degree Fahrenheit oven for one and a half hours and then another ten minutes at 500 degrees to crisp up the skin. The goose is then ready to be carved and served.

Red and green are always the colors of Christmas and Christmas foods. Red is for warmth and brightness; green is the promise that the leaves of the trees will return in the spring. Red cabbage is often on the menu.

Andreas starts his recipe for red cabbage by cutting the core of the cabbage out and then slicing it. He adds cloves, juniper berries, bay leaves, a cinnamon stick, and salt and pepper. Red wine is poured on top. The cabbage is covered and refrigerated for 24 hours to marinate.

Goose fat goes into a pan or you can use oil. Sliced onions are added. The red wine is squeezed out of the cabbage and the cabbage is added to the onions. Red wine from the pan goes in, followed by some sugar. The cabbage cooks on low heat for an hour. Apples are grated and put into the pot and it’s ready to serve.

Christmas is also a time for bread and cake baking and cookie making. Special Christmas breads are introduced like the German Christstollen. Andreas starts by soaking raisins in rum. Then warm milk is poured into a bowl, and yeast is whisked in. Flour is slowly blended in by hand. Almonds, butter, candied citron, and candied orange peel are added. The dough is worked together. In goes the sugar, salt, baking powder, and raisins. A cloth goes on top and the dough is put in a warm place to rise for an hour and a half. A form is floured, the dough is pressed in and it’s off to the oven for 45 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit. When it’s baked, it’s sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar.

Gingerbread is also part of the Christmas tradition. Ginger is an ancient spice that originated in Asia. During the Middle Ages it was the second most popular spice—right after black pepper. And during the 1500s, bakers started adding it to breads and cookies. German bakers were particularly attracted to the taste of ginger and the city of Nuremberg, which was one of the spice trading centers of Europe, became the gingerbread capital of the world. The town’s sculptors, wood carvers and goldsmiths began forming gingerbread into hearts, angels, men, animals and houses.

In the United States, the traditional beverage for Christmas is eggnog. Eggnog is related to a series of drinks made from milk and wine that go back for hundreds of years. When the wine and milk drinks arrived in colonial America, we dropped the wine and replaced it with rum. Rum drinks were called grog and one particular recipe was known as egg and grog, which eventually became eggnog. 

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: In 1897 eight year old Virginia O’Hanlon the daughter of a New York City doctor wrote to a local newspaper and asked was there really a Santa Claus.  Francis Church, a correspondent for the paper, answered with his famous column “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus.”  The column recommended that Americas be generous of spirit, love their fellow man, and even in the darkest days of winter trust that the Sun – which was also the name of the newspaper – would return.  It recommended that we all have a positive vision of the future.  And Merry Christmas to all.

For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Hanukkah - #102

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

HANUKKAH

BURT WOLF: During the Jewish month of Kislev, Jews throughout the world light Hanukkah candles in memory of a battle that took place in 165 B.C.  A Jewish clan known as the Maccabees won a battle against the King of Syria, which allowed them to return to Jerusalem and rededicate a sacred temple that had been sacked and burned. The encounter was part of a rebellion by the Maccabees.

RABBI JEFFREY WOHLBERG ON CAMERA: It was a rebellion doomed to failure because it was a small group of guerrillas against the greatest armed might of the world. And ultimately, they could not win.  But they won some battles and some significant victories.  They were able to recapture the Temple. And in 165 before the Common Era, they cleansed the Temple, they removed the statue, they rededicated the Temple to God, their God, the God, our God, and they celebrated a festival.  According to the tradition that grew up, there was only enough sacred oil found to last one day and the sacred oil miraculously lasted eight days and we celebrate that miracle and the rededication of the Temple. The word Hanukkah itself means dedication or re-dedication. 

BURT WOLF: But it was not just a battle against the religious oppression of the Syrian King. It was also a battle against assimilation—the acceptance of Greek Hellenist culture by Jews.

RABBI WOHLBERG ON CAMERA: The Maccabees didn't rebel because they wanted political independence.  They lost. Jews had lost political independence centuries before and they were not about to get it back.  They were rebelling because Judaism was outlawed.  They were rebelling not only because Judaism was outlawed but because they were seeing assimilation all around them.  Hellenism was a dominant culture, very significant, and it was very attractive.  It was new and it was upbeat and it was worldly.  And so, Jews were attracted to it.  And Jews who should've known better were participating in the Greek games, they were speaking Greek, they were adopting Greek culture and Greek attitudes. And in doing that, they were abandoning Judaism.  So the Maccabees were fighting on two fronts, as it were:  the external front against this domination and the internal front against assimilation.

BURT WOLF: As Rabbi Wohlberg pointed out, when the Maccabees were cleansing the Temple, they came upon a container of sanctified oil which they needed for their rituals. It appeared to be only enough oil to last a day, but it lasted for eight days which was considered a miracle. Hanukkah is therefore an eight-day festival with one light being lit each night in a special lamp.

The largest and most comprehensive collection of these lamps is in New York’s Jewish Museum. The lamps on view come from all over the world and illustrate many aspects of Jewish history. Susan Braunstein is the Curator of Archaeology and Judaica.

SUSAN BRAUNSTEIN ON CAMERA: I think that all the lamps that we have on display here show a special relationship, of the Jews to the lands they were living in.  The form of the Hanukkah lamp, other than the fact that it needs eight lights, is the only requirement for a Hanukkah lamp, and so the decorations, however, vary according to where the Jews lived.  And so many times you see the national symbol of the country where the Jews are living incorporated in the lamps. 

Originally there were only to be eight lights, one for each night of the holiday, but during the course of time it was realized that the eight lights provided room light, that you would be reading by this or using it to do work by, and the rabbis decreed that you can not use the Hanukkah lamp for anything but religious. It was a religious light, it was a holy light and you couldn't use it for secular purposes.  So over time a ninth light was added, which kind of took the function of the secular lighting of the room.  You can imagine, in days before electricity, that people didn't have brightly lit rooms, and candles and oil were expensive, and so the Hanukkah light just had to provide some illumination in the room, and so in order not to use it for secular purposes, they added a ninth light.  Today, we use the ninth light also to light the other eight.

One of my favorite lamps is this lamp over here.  It originally started out as a souvenir from Australia, and you can see that it has an emu on the top, and a kangaroo down here.  And it had this wonderful frame, and originally an emu egg would have hung in the frame.  And I surmise that eventually the emu egg broke and the person didn't know what to do with this, so they put a row of oil containers there, and they used it as a Hanukkah lamp.  So it started out its life in Australia, probably was bought as a souvenir and brought to Europe or the United States and was used as a Hanukkah lamp.

This is a magnificent lamp, done in the eighteenth century in Poland and it's made out of silver and gilt and it’s open work and repousse and quite elaborate decoration.  And what it does is represents the Torah arks that Jews in Poland and the Ukraine would have had in their synagogues, these magnificent two and three story Torah arks that were made out of carved open wood work, and in the scrolls you can see animals and birds all inhabiting it.  So I think it's a combination of baroque style and also of the local folk art style, because of all the use of the animals and the birds, which were very popular in folk art of the time.  And if you look down here, you see a double-headed eagle, and that is the symbol of the ruling emperor, of the Hapsburg Empire of Austria.  And so Jews, again, incorporated the symbols of the countries under which they lived, the art styles of the countries where they lived, but we have them doing that on a Hanukkah lamp.

This lamp was created in 1974, I think it's a combination of pop art and folk art, and it was created by Mae Rockland Tupa in anticipation of the Bicentennial of the United States.  It has wonderful patriotic imagery, the American flag on the base, and these Statues of Liberty, which are actually holding birthday candleholders in order to light the lights.  The artist is obviously celebrating the joys of being an American citizen, the joys of being free in the United States as a Jew, but she's also expressing a poignant issue as well, that some of the statues she has placed facing forward, and some she has placed facing backward to the viewer.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Why are they facing backwards?

SUSAN BRAUNSTEIN ON CAMERA: These are facing backward because the artist feels that at times in the history of the Jews in this country, the United States turned its back on Jews and she's thinking particularly of the time during World War Two, when Jews were fleeing Europe and were not allowed to enter this country.  So I think she’s expressing both the wonders and joys of being in the United States, but also some of the bad points as well. 

THE FOODS OF HANUKKAH

BURT WOLF: From biblical times on, olive oil has played an important role in Jewish life. It was used for cooking, as a sunscreen and moisturizer, as medicine, as fuel and as an anointing agent in religious services. Olive trees can live for hundreds of years. The roots are so strong and deep that even if you cut the trunk of the tree the roots will send up new life. Olive trees are a symbol of immortality, dependability and peace. Of all foods, the olive most symbolizes the continuity of the Jewish people.

At Hanukkah, Jews eat foods that are fried in oil to symbolize the miracle of the oil that lit the lamps in the Temple. One of the most traditional foods is the potato pancake.

The recipe for potato pancakes is pretty simple. Grated potatoes are mixed with chopped onion, egg, salt and pepper, and a little parsley to add color. The mixture is shaped, flattened and fried.

JOAN NATHAN ON CAMERA: In America you would never go to a home without potato pancakes.  Either boxed or bought frozen or made from scratch. I'll make about three dozen for tonight.

Jews from Sephardic countries, the Mediterranean, they don't have to have pancakes fried in oil because they had a lot more food.  So they might have oil desserts.  They might have donuts, for example, for desserts.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: But always a fried disk of some kind?

JOAN NATHAN ON CAMERA: Always fried disk.  Always some sort of fried pancake. 

BURT WOLF: The last night of this particular Hanukkah festival fell on a Friday, which in Judaism is the beginning of the Sabbath--the day of rest.

JOAN NATHAN ON CAMERA: Challah is a Sabbath bread.  And the one that is used every Friday night, at least in my house, to separate the Sabbath from the everyday week.  Whenever I'm making challah I think about Eastern Europe where people could not get white bread.  It was very expensive.

You know, we have a tradition on the Sabbath, you say a blessing, over bread before you eat it.  And before we say the blessings, we take these breads, put them over our heads and hold onto somebody who's holding onto the bread, or hold onto the bread.  So that we show a connection between people.

ALLAN GERSON ON CAMERA: We are here to celebrate together a very very special holiday, but like all holidays in the Jewish tradition we are asked to always interpret it differently. It’s very simple. It’s the story of freedom but everybody has to interpret freedom in their own way because every generation has a different challenge. Happy Hanukkah.

FAMILY AROUND TABLE ON CAMERA: Happy Hanukkah.

BURT WOLF: Hanukkah at the Nathan household is all about connecting to loved ones and paying respect to their Jewish ancestry. 

JOAN NATHAN ON CAMERA: I think that we all, no matter what our background is, owe something to our traditions.  And it doesn't really matter how you carry it on, but that you do carry it on, that you remember who I am as opposed to who he is.  And say it with pride.

It's ironic that in this period of history where Jews in America have the freest life they've ever had that some people just don't care about their traditions.  Here, this is a time in America when we have the freedom to carry on the traditions that each of us, I don't care what background you're from, brought to America.  And I think it's our sort of an obligation to carry it on, to continue it.  

Sufganiyot anybody? For dessert at Hanukkah I always make sufganiyot, which are Israeli jelly donuts.  And the jelly donut is the one food that all Israelis eat at Hanukkah. 

BURT WOLF: To make jelly donuts, you need a dough that is similar to a brioche dough--eggs, flour, yeast, sugar, and lemon rind are combined and left to rise in the refrigerator overnight. When they’re ready to serve, they’re rolled into balls and deep fried.

JOAN NATHAN ON CAMERA: You have to have very hot oil cause you want them to puff up and then you fill them with jelly afterwards. I use a Chinese wok when I’m deep-frying because you don’t have to use as much oil. It heats up evenly. I think it works really well. You can’t put too many in a time so it’s not too saturated with oil. When I make these this connects us back and this connects my family back with what there was in ancient Israel. Even if they don’t get what I’m doing in the kitchen, they do get it because these kids are connected to other kids so they have a good time and they associate coming to my house I hope with having fun with being with other children and after all, what are holidays for if not connections with your family with your friends with your family friends.

RUGELACH

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: At Hanukkah there is a particular interest in foods based on cheese. And that’s because of the story of Judith. It seems there was a Syrian general attacking the Jews and at the same time trying to date Judith. One night he was over at her house and she served him a lot of cheese that had a lot of salt in it. The salt made him thirsty. He drank a lot of wine. Eventually he passed out and as soon as he did Judith took a sword and cut off his head, which made him more or less useless as the head of the army. And to commemorate that event, cheese-based foods are served at Hanukkah.

BURT WOLF: A favorite example of a Hanukkah food is rugelach. Rugelach means little rolls and they originated in Austria. They are small crescent-shaped cookies and their dough is made with cream cheese, which brings us back to the story of Judith and the salty cheese.

Sarabeth Levine, who is the Sarabeth in Sarabeth’s, is doing the baking. She graduated from college with a degree in sociology which is the systematic study of how groups of human beings behave. Considering her success, this seems to have been the ideal background for a professional baker. A professional who is devoted to baking the special foods of our holidays.

She starts her rugelach by mixing butter and cream cheese together in a standing mixer. Sugar and salt go in. A little vanilla. A little lemon zest. The flour is slowly added and all the ingredients for the dough combined. The counter gets a light dusting of flour so the dough won’t stick. The dough comes out onto the flat surface and is cut in half. Each half is rolled into a ball and goes into the refrigerator for a couple of hours to chill out.

When they come out, each ball is rolled into a disk that is about fourteen inches in diameter and about a quarter-inch thick. Sarabeth then covers the dough with her own plum cherry preserves and is careful to leave a one-inch preserve-free border. Next she sprinkles on a filling made from chopped walnuts, granulated sugar, brown sugar, cocoa powder and cinnamon.

Each disk is then cut into sixteen slices. Starting with the wider back edge she rolls the dough into a tubular shape. The tube is then turned in at the ends to form a crescent and placed on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Then into a preheated oven for about thirty minutes. Dust with confectioner’s sugar and you are ready to honor the heroism of Judith. The crescent shape of the pastry is reminiscent of the shape of her dagger; the cream cheese is a reminder of the cheese she fed to the enemy.

SPINNING DREIDELS

CANTOR ON CAMERA: Okay here we are. Everybody see the letters over here.

YOUNG BOY ON CAMERA: I can read them.

CANTOR ON CAMERA: They’re Hebrew letters right and you can read them.

BURT WOLF: Hanukkah has an official game—dreidel spinning. A dreidel is a four-sided top with a letter on each side. Each letter stands for an instruction to the players.

CANTOR ON CAMERA: Well, that’s a shin, right?

BURT WOLF: The game starts with each player placing a coin, or something that stands for a coin, into the pot. Then one of the players spins the dreidel. If it lands with the nun up, then the player takes nothing from the pot. If the gimel is up, you take everything in the pot. Hay will give you half and if it’s shin, you add a coin.

CANTOR ON CAMERA: Okay, shin.

YOUNG BOY ON CAMERA: I win.

BURT WOLF: If you come to a point where you no longer have any coins, you’re out of the game.

RABBI JEFFREY WOHLBERG ON CAMERA: According to the tradition, the Maccabees, in order to indicate that they had achieved independence, which they really didn't, but to try to emphasize that they had, minted coins.  That was a symbol of their independence.  So the minting of the coins by the Maccabees in ancient times became the symbol for Hanukkah gelt in modern times.   

BURT WOLF: You’d think playing with a dreidel was easy but in certain environments it’s quite difficult.

CONTROLLER AT NASA ON CAMERA: Endeavour it’s Houston for Jeff. All of America would like to know what you’ve got and what you’re doing with it.

ASTRONAUT JEFF HOFFMAN ON CAMERA: This is the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah and there’s various ways that we celebrate it. And one of the games that we play is a little game with a dreidel. And its something that you spin and then you see which side comes up and according to that you either win or lose. And I was just trying to see how you might reinterpret the rules for space flights since there’s no up or down. Hanukkah is the festival of lights. It lasts eight days and to celebrate it, we light a little menorah which has eight candles and you light one more everyday until finally on the eighth day you have eight candles and so I brought a little traveling menorah of course  up here in the shuttle we’re not going to actually light the candles. To help the celebration of the season I brought it along. It’s a little silver traveling menorah.

BURT WOLF: Challenged by the Mission Specialist Jeff Hoffman’s skill, I returned to

Temple Adas Israel in Washington D.C., for a remedial class in dreidel spinning.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Okay. Who’s going to teach me how to spin the dreidel. Okay. Go ahead. Show me how.

BURT WOLF: There’s a legend that explains why the game is associated with Hanukkah. It says that when the King of Syria decided that any Jew found studying religious texts

would be put to death, members of the Maccabees gathering together to discuss religion would put a dreidel on the table and spin it. If the authorities passed by they would think that they were just a bunch of guys gambling.  The characters on the dreidel also stand for the first Hebrew letters of the phrase, “A great miracle happened here”.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Ah, that’s it. Now watch closely. Pay close attention there. Okay you watching that. Okay. You’re getting very very sleepy. Your eyelids are getting heavier and heavier. You want to take a nap.

RABBI JEFFREY WOHLBERG ON CAMERA: Oh, Hanukkah's a fun holiday.  We love Hanukkah.  The kids love Hanukkah.  Families love Hanukkah because there's a lot to do. We have a wonderful pre-school. That pre-school brings in many children from families in the neighborhood who know that it’s a quality school. The school is a Jewish school, emphasizing Jewish values, Jewish celebrations and rituals. We light the Hanukkia together as a whole school and we sing the blessings together. And many other things.  Emphasizing our Jewish connectedness and Jewish traditions. And what's interesting always is, the parents who come here and bring their kids here because it's a valuable resource in the community who had never really thought of giving Jewish traditions to children of that age, find themselves engaged as well. We think it's through our children that we can re-invigorate Jewish life in America. 

Well, America's a wonderful country.  It has offered Jews tremendous opportunities, as it offers all of us opportunities.  We've been able to find acceptance here that we were not able to find in any other part of the world throughout history, as it were. And so, that's very special for us.  But with freedom comes assimilation because if there are no ghetto walls holding us in, which there aren't in America, and there are no laws forcing us to be different, which there aren't in America, we then begin to expand and lose some of the essences of what held us together over the centuries.  And some of the ties become weaker.  The pull in America is centrifugal, whereas the pull in Europe in the smaller communities was centripetal, it pulled to the inside and we're pulled to the outside.  That influences everything we do.  It means, for example, that on Hanukkah we do things that were never part of Hanukkah. 

We've taken this gift giving from Christmas and we've blended it into Hanukkah, which traditionally not its right place, its rightful place. We decorate. And so, my wife puts some decorations on the table for our Shabbat dinner because it was Hanukkah as well.  Little Hanukkiot out of paper, little dredles, we have a "Happy Hanukkah" sign hanging in ... in our home, as do many children.  And that's not traditionally Jewish.  Certainly, nothing any nothing wrong with it.  It's perfectly fine.  It doesn't diminish Judaism at all.  But it's quite unique and it happens in the free society of America.  People want to be like everybody else and do what they do in a way which is more American, not just Jewish.

BURT WOLF: The power of American culture is extraordinary.  It appears to have the ability to influence and alter virtually every holiday and celebration that arrives on our shores.

For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Taste of Freedom: Thanksgiving - #101

BURT WOLF: Most of our holidays and celebrations were developed to mark the cycles of nature and they have taken place in traditional forms for centuries.

They bind the past to the present and predict the future. They are a basic part of every society that has ever existed.

But when these ceremonies arrived in America, they started to change. No longer controlled by convention these ancient celebrations began to evolve. They had gotten their first Taste of Freedom and they would never be the same.

THANKSGIVING

BURT WOLF: The word parade comes from an old Spanish word that means “the stop”. It was used to describe the days when a foreign army stopped in a town and occupied it. During the occupation, soldiers would march through the streets to show their strength and impress the local population.

In the United States parades are still used to occupy and demonstrate strength and power, especially on Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving celebrates a number of things including the start of the holiday shopping season. Cities throughout the United States have parades that occupy the attention of thousands of people, while demonstrating the strength of the U.S. dollar and its power to purchase.

The first Thanksgiving Day parade was held in Philadelphia during the 1920s and it was sponsored by Gimbel Brothers Department store. The parade ended with Santa Claus climbing a fire-truck ladder and entering a department store window.

Thanksgiving in America is a time when we give thanks for the things that we have and make plans to buy more things. We are a nation that works hard and shops hard.

But the primary objective of most of our holiday shopping is not to buy things for ourselves but to buy things for other people that we love. We shop and we share. The Saturday following Thanksgiving is always the biggest shopping day of the year.

SETTING THE DATE

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The idea of a Thanksgiving day goes back to Europe. The King would declare a holiday and ask everybody to give thanks. Might be for success in a battle, or the end of a plague, but it was always a one-time event. You might go to church to offer a prayer of thanks, but it wasn’t a religious holiday. It was always political or secular.

BURT WOLF: The first nationwide Thanksgiving in the United States took place at the end of the Revolutionary War. George Washington called for a Thanksgiving Day on Thursday, November 26th, 1789. But it was a one time only event.

Sarah Hale was the editor of Godey’s Ladies Book, a popular magazine of the 1800’s. She used her editorial page to urge the country to set aside a day each year during which the nation would give thanks for our blessings.

In the middle of the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln responded to Sarah’s appeals and proclaimed the last Thursday of November as a day of Thanksgiving for the prosperity and freedom that had been achieved in America. He also wanted to express his wish that the Civil War would soon end—every year since then, Americans have celebrated a Thanksgiving Day.

At one point, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was lobbied by business interests to move Thanksgiving to an earlier date, so the Christmas shopping season would be longer. The public hated the idea and put so much pressure on Roosevelt that he had the old date formalized by Proclamation.  In 1941, Thanksgiving was finally sanctioned by Congress as a legal holiday—the fourth Thursday in November.

LET’S TALK TURKEY

BURT WOLF: Presidents still make an official proclamation of Thanksgiving about six weeks in advance. One way or another, Presidents are very much involved in Thanksgiving.  Even West Wing’s President Barlett calls the Turkey Talk-Line.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Hello.

WOMAN ON PHONE: How can I help you sir?

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Well first let me say, I think this is a wonderful service you provide.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Well thank you. May I have your name please?

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: I’m a citizen.

WOMAN ON PHONE: I’m sure you are sir, but if I have your name I can put your comments in our customer feedback form.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: I’m Joe Bethersenston. That’s one T and with an h in there.

WOMAN ON PHONE: And your address?

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Fargo.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Your street address, please.

RICHARD SCHIFF ON CAMERA: Zip code Fargo, North Dakota, right now.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: My street address is 11454 Pruder Street. And it’s very important that you put street down there because sometimes it gets confused with Pruder Way and Pruder Lane. It’s apartment 23R. Fargo, North Dakota. Zip code 50504

WOMAN ON PHONE: Thank you. Your voice sounds very familiar to me.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: I do radio commercials for products.

WOMAN ON PHONE: And how can I help you?

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Stuffing should be stuffed inside the turkey, am I correct?

WOMAN ON PHONE: It can also be baked in a casserole dish.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Well then we’d have to call it something else, wouldn’t we?

WOMAN ON PHONE: I suppose.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: If I cook it inside the turkey is there a chance I could kill my guests? I’m not saying that’s necessarily a deal breaker.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Well there are some concerns. Two main bacterial problems are salmonella and Campylobacter jejuni.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: All right. Well, first of all I think you made the second bacteria up and second of all, how do I avoid it.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Make sure all the ingredients are cooked first. Saute any vegetables, fried sausage, oysters, et cetera.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Excellent. Let’s talk temperature.

WOMAN ON PHONE: One-hundred and sixty five degrees.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: No see I was testing you. The USDA calls for turkeys to be cooked to an internal temperature of a hundred eighty to one hundred eighty five degrees.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Yes sir. I was talking about the stuffing which you want to cook to a hundred and sixty five to avoid the health risks.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA:Okay. Good testing.

WOMAN ON PHONE: You have an accurate thermometer?

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: Oh yeah. It was presented to me as a gift from the personal sous chef to the king of auto sales in Fargo. Phil Baharnd. The man can sell a car like well like anything.

WOMAN ON PHONE: Very good sir. You have a good Thanksgiving.

MARTIN SHEEN ON CAMERA: And you do too. Thanks a lot. That was excellent. We should do that once a week.

BURT WOLF: In reality, the other end of the phone would be staffed by one of 48 professionally trained home economists and nutritionists who handle nearly 170,000 callers each year during the months of November and December. The Turkey Talk-Line was set up in 1981 and is prepared to help with any turkey-related questions.

WOMAN ANSWERING QUESTION ON CAMERA: Turkey talk line, how can I help you? Oh certainly. How many people are you expecting for dinner?

BURT WOLF: And why do these volunteers answer questions year after year?

WOMAN ON CAMERA: Being able to help people. They really sometimes just get such anxiety over fixing a turkey and they don’t have to.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: There is probably no animal associated with any holiday more strongly than turkey is with Thanksgiving.  It is the traditional American bird.  It existed nowhere else. It was part of that Thanksgiving Day table set outdoors in Massachusetts by Bradford.  It has grown ever since.  The White House menu, printed during Lincoln's administration had it right at the top with cranberry sauce and everything else.  And it's always been there for us.  But I think one thing that, some North Americans may not know, is that the turkey is ubiquitous throughout the Americas.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Benjamin Franklin was deeply disappointed when the eagle was chosen as our national bird. He wanted the turkey. He felt that the eagle was a bird of bad moral character and lived by swindling. He felt that the turkey was a much more respectable animal and a true native of our nation.

BURT WOLF: But turkeys seem to have a real image problem. Not a single sports team is named after them. You have cardinals and beavers and bears and colts and dolphins and rams. You even have razorback hogs. But no turkeys take the field, at least no turkeys, who put that name on their uniforms.

THE FOUNDING MYTH

BURT WOLF: Our present Thanksgiving Day celebration is clearly a day for giving thanks—but it is also a harvest festival. During their first winter in Massachusetts, half the colonists that reached North America on the Mayflower died. When spring arrived the survivors planted corn, peas and barley and in the fall of 1621, there was a harvest and a crop to live on. The fifty two people who survived from the original hundred and sixteen decided to have a harvest feast.

ANTHONY AVENI ON CAMERA: Thanksgiving is among those many festivals during the year that deals with the last of the harvest, the bringing in of the tail end of the harvest and it became a very big holiday in America, as we all know, because of the Pilgrims.  And it was good old Mr. Bradford who brought that about with his proclamation in 1621 after a long, hard winter.  We can say after the Pilgrims turned the corner.  They knew they had it made.  And what do you do when you've got it made; you go down to the local pub and have yourself a beer.  Well, in this case, they had themselves eels, clams, deer, wild geese, probably wild turkey, although it wasn't certainly wasn't the featured bird of the day. And then, of course, the products of the harvest, the last of the harvest, the beans, wheat, squash, corn.  And a celebration, we're told, if we're to believe Bradford, and he was a pretty straight arrow, lasted three days.  You can imagine, it was quite a feast.

BURT WOLF: But the event was not of historical importance until the middle of the 1800s when millions of immigrants arrived in America.

ANDY SMITH ON CAMERA: And part of the problem was how do you explain America to groups of people that would have had no American history and would have little understanding of what America was all about. So it was an origin myth that America began with the pilgrims in Plimouth, Massachusetts.  Now of course the first English Colony that was successful was Jamestown.  And it was founded in 1607, almost 14 years before Plimouth.  But the problem with Jamestown as a place of origin was slavery.  And, slavery began in Jamestown in 1619 and after the Civil War, you couldn't trace the origin of a country back to where slavery began so the Massachusetts and other New Englanders decided that what we really need to do was have Plimouth as the first real founding fathers of America and Thanksgiving holiday was part of that.  That's why the first Thanksgiving is supposedly in Plimouth.  There were many days of Thanksgiving in Jamestown prior to that.  But they're not looked on as the first Thanksgiving because we have our origin of our nation, and our origin of our nation goes back to the pilgrims, who are an interesting lot.  Good group of people.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Thanksgiving day in the United States is a combination of two traditions. First of all, it is a fall harvest festival but it is also a Thanksgiving Day proclamation and both of those traditions have been going on for thousands of years. 

THE FOODS OF THANKSGIVING

BURT WOLF: Philadelphia was our most important commercial city and the nation’s capital when George Washington proclaimed our first national Thanksgiving Day.

Philadelphia was a great trading port. Three times each week ships sailed into Philadelphia with spices and fresh produce from the Caribbean—coconuts, bananas, pineapples, and limes were readily available. It was also our country’s gastronomic center—famous for its bakers and pastry makers, beer brewers, and serious eaters.

The Mennonites came to Philadelphia from Germany and the Amish from Switzerland because the city promised religious freedom. Both groups knew a great deal about the use of spices and were excellent bakers. They were the masters of the cinnamon bun and perfected American fruit pies.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: The American Revolution brought a new government to Philadelphia. And the new government brought hundreds of politicians with expense accounts. Philadelphia became a heaven for good eaters. And just as the American Revolution came to an end, the French Revolution got started. Chaos. And at the same time, an uprising in French speaking Haiti. More chaos. By the middle of the 1790s, Philadelphia was filled with Frenchmen looking for a stable place to live. And being French, many of them were cooks, bakers, candy makers and wine experts.

BURT WOLF: The place where people like Washington or Jefferson and Adams came to eat and drink in those days was the City Tavern. It was opened in 1773 by a group of wealthy Philadelphia businessmen who wanted a tavern of the quality they had known in London. It became a hotbed of revolutionary activity and it was where the First Continental Congress met to discuss drafting our constitution. It is presently owned by the federal government and overseen by the National Park Service.

Under the direction of Walter Staib, proprietor, chef and cookbook author, City Tavern has been turned into an excellent restaurant with an authentic eighteenth century feel. The tankards and goblets resemble those which would have been used by Washington and Jefferson to celebrate our first Thanksgiving. The plates are like the ones used by the Continental Congress. Even the stemware is similar to that used during Colonial days. And from the very beginning, Thanksgiving was an important meal at City Tavern. Walter starts his Thanksgiving dinner with his stuffing.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: This is an eighteenth century stuffing with chestnuts and currants. Everything else is pretty much normal.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Currants.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Currants. Uh. Huh. And just chopping a little bit of onion. And not too fine actually. Really coarse because remember this stuffing later goes into the bird and cooks in the bird for almost another three and a half hours slowly. And chestnuts I already roasted them. Got them out of the shell and basically I cooked them al dente so later you can still feel them once you have it in the stuffing.

BURT WOLF: Onion is added to a sauté pan in which butter has been melted. Then some chopped celery. Some chopped garlic, mushrooms, dry white wine. Then on to the stove for a few minutes.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Now you want to cook it until the white wine is reduced until dry but you don’t want to overcook it remember again because it’s in the cavity of the bird for such a long time.

BURT WOLF: As soon as the wine is reduced everything goes into a giant bowl.                                     

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Chestnuts which we’ve just quartered. Parsley. The currant. Full thyme. Next comes the bread the croutons. And the chicken stock is really what binds it.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Ah you roll up your sleeves and mix.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Just want to get it nice, just the flavor. And what makes this very unique is the dried currants and obviously drying your food was definitely an eighteenth century way of preserving things because you know they had no freezers, no canned goods so they were pretty innovative and the flavor, that flavor, it gives the bird is just spectacular.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Concentrates it.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Oh yeah. Want to give me a hand?

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Yeah.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Give me about five six good strokes of pepper in there. Now remember with the salt and pepper you have to be very careful because you already have the salt in the bread as well you know so from a flavor point. Now we’re going to get the turkey ready prepped so we can stuff the turkey. Shallots. Rosemary. Thyme. And parsley. Olive oil. Just enough to kind of drench it. When you do this you have to be gentle because otherwise you’ll rip the skin. The herbs and the shallots you know penetrates the normally dull breasts. So the flavor you get out of this is mind boggling because put it on the outside, don’t if you put it on the outside it doesn’t go inside the meat so between it almost creates like a vacuum and sucks the flavor right into it. That’s basically what it is. Now what I’ve done earlier this morning, I washed the cavity really good and that I recommend for anybody to do. Wash the cavity good. I just like to put a little bit of salt in it, a little bit of the herb mixture, nothing else before I put the stuffing in. People have different ideas you know but me a little bit of the herb mixture into the cavity.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Just more flavor.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: Yeah a little bit of kosher salt. The easiest way to fill it I find you just make like a big ball easy to get in. Little olive oil. And then I recommend slow cooking those birds. Start off at high heat and reduce down by three and a quarter. Now let’s stick it in the oven.

BURT WOLF: As the turkey is cooking it is periodically basted with Madeira which is a fortified wine similar to port or sherry.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: You can never baste enough actually to tell you the truth. The moisture comes and the skin just gets very beautiful.

BURT WOLF: The colors of Thanksgiving foods are those of fall: gold and red. The particular foods associated with Thanksgiving are foods that became widely popular during the early 1800s—turkey, pumpkin, Indian pudding, sweet potatoes, maple syrup and cranberries.

WALTER STAIB ON CAMERA: What I want to do, first thing I want to open and get a drumstick out. What I want to do is just wiggle the drumstick a little bit when you move it a few little times you can feel it now obviously I’ve done it a million times so I don’t have to feel it but and here you go. Drumstick comes off. Voila. Then I can do two things. One, to make it easy for the novice person. Go down the center. There’s a bone. The breast bone. You want to go down the breast bone right here and loosen it up a little bit. All you got to do is push the knife. Put pressure on the knife and the knife will do the rest because there’s a bone that brings you all the way down. Here you go and then you can do two things. Loosen the entire breast or you can just leave it on the bone. I personally like it on the bone. Then just go like this. Now basically the bone has loosened it. Can you see here? Now all I got to do is go this way. And I make beautiful slices. Look how beautiful this turkey is. Unbelievable. And I slice it this way. And see the herb rubbing the herb stuffing that before we put underneath. It’s between the skin and the bone the skin and the meat. Right here. That’s where the flavor comes and penetrates it. And the reason is such a nice and shiny is because the Madeira glaze. The Madeira obviously has sugar in it and sugar caramelizes the skin and gives the skin an unbelievable flavor.

BURT WOLF: Over eating at a harvest feast has always been standard-op. On the last day of the harvest, when all the work was done, the landowners would reward their tenant farmers with a big meal—good food, good drinks and lots of both. Everyone would celebrate and thank the forces of nature. Workers were often presented with the gift of a goose, which is where Americans got the idea of giving devoted workers a turkey just before Thanksgiving.

Stuffing is a food that has always been an important part of festival recipes. It’s a way of making a dish more impressive without necessarily making it more expensive. It shows more work, adds more food, and extends the number of flavors.

Cranberries also play a significant role at Thanksgiving. It was one of the first foods that the Native Americans introduced to the English colonists and cranberry sauce was an important product. It could be made during the cranberry season and held throughout the winter.

Candied sweet potatoes are also a traditional dish at a Thanksgiving meal. The recipe became popular during the Civil War as a symbol of unification—sweet potatoes are thought of as mostly a Southern vegetable, the maple syrup used to sweeten them is associated with New England.

Drinks in City Tavern include shrubs, which were an early American cocktail made from sweetened fruit preserved in vinegar and blended with rum from the Caribbean. City Tavern also makes one with ginger ale instead of rum.

There was also beer. Today the tavern has a period beer made for it from recipes that were originally developed by George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

One of the things being celebrated at Thanksgiving is the wholeness of the family. The idea is reflected in the “wholeness” of the pies and cakes and molds.

When families immigrate to the United States, they often keep eating the foods of their native country. They also tend to continue celebrating their traditional holidays. The one American event that gets incorporated into the holiday cycle of almost every new arrival is Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is a way for immigrants to celebrate being in America and to share that celebration with everyone in the nation—from the descendants of the people who arrived here on the Mayflower to a family that arrived here last year.

Thanksgiving is a celebration of America’s prosperity and yet we don’t give gifts. That’s because in part Thanksgiving is a harvest feast—the earth does the giving and we do the receiving.

BURT WOLF ON CAMERA: Thanksgiving celebrates two things: Abundance and patriotism and the turkey’s pretty good too.  For Taste of Freedom, I’m Burt Wolf.

Burt Wolf's Table: Hamilton, Bermuda - #226

BURT WOLF:   Hamilton is the capital city of Bermuda and the cultural center of a group of islands just off the Atlantic coast of North America;  islands with a special climate made possible by the warm waters of the Gulfstream.  It's the place to scoot around and visit some of the most beautiful beaches in the world and to taste some top-class cooking.  So join me in Hamilton, Bermuda at Burt Wolf's Table. 

Hamilton has the island's major shopping streets, the world-famous Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, and about 2,000 residents, among whom is an old friend of mine, Charles Webb.  Charles being a typically hospitable Bermudian, has agreed to take us on a tour of Hamilton and some of his favorite spots on the island.  (SOUND OF MOTOR)

WOLF:    Historically, Bermuda has been opposed to the automobile and only allowed them onto the island after the Second World War.  As a result, the vehicle of choice for most locals and tourists is the motor scooter.  The maximum speed limit for everything on Bermuda is 20 miles per hour.  Bermuda's drivers are extremely polite, and everyone gets an introductory lesson and a helmet that must be worn.

CHARLES WEBB:    This is the Sessions House, which houses the Parliament and the Supreme Court.  It was built in around 1814.  The Gothic towers and the terra cotta colonnades were added later on.  But in this building you'll see robed judges with wigs, and lawyers with wigs.  So all the miscreants of the country end up in the lower floor of this house.

Upstairs, you have 40 members of Parliament, a leader of the government and the loyal opposition, all sort of umpired by the -- the Speaker Of The House, who wears what we call a full-bottomed wig.  Magisterial at its best.

This is the government tennis stadium, one of about 400 tennis courts throughout the island.  You may be interested to note that Bermuda actually introduced tennis to the United States.  What happened, we had a judge here who led a very dignified lifestyle.  And he had a tennis court on his property, which is just across the harbor.  And he decided that tennis was just a little too undignified for his lady, so we decided then, or at least he did, that he would just transport this very reckless game off to the United States.  And we sent it off to the Staten Island Tennis Club, where it still exists today.  Bermuda is well-known for tennis.  We have tennis courts that are lit at night, and we play tennis during the day.  You can play tennis at private clubs or public tennis courts.  It's all over the island.  Everywhere you go, you'll see a tennis court.

WEBB:    Burt, within these acres of landscaped gardens, the Botanical Gardens, it's officially called, houses an aviary, a fern collection, an arrowroot factory.  It even has a garden for the blind so the blind can actually walk through and smell the various species of flowers.

Now behind us is that beautiful Victorian residence, which the premier uses only for official entertaining.  He doesn't live there.  There are no bedrooms at all.  It's strictly for, only when he has local and out-of-town guests.  So, since it's close to tea time, I think we should stop in and have a cup of tea with him.

BURT WOLF:     That's fine with me.

WEBB:  Okay.

BURT WOLF:     When I was a kid, I saw a Marlon Brando movie called "The Wild One."  And it sent me into my biker period.  When I almost did myself in by skidding off an icy road in the Swiss Alps, I ended my biker period and entered my mall-walking period.  Ahh, but it feels good to be back, especially in a safe environment.

WEBB:   Burt, this Fort Hamilton is  probably the finest example of mid-Victorian polygonal fort.  And its job was to protect the Royal Navy Dockyard over that side, and still be able to cover the southern perimeters of the island.   It affords panoramic views of the island and, indeed, the City of Hamilton and every Thursday during what we call our November to March season, the skirling ceremony takes place here.  And these are the guys with the Scottish bagpipes and the kilts.  And they stand back, because if they stay too far over there, the wind comes and lifts up the skirts and you know what happens then. 

WOLF:    You find out what a Scotsman really -- (OVERLAPPING CONVERSATION)

WEBB:    -- really wears under his kilt, right.

WOLF:    Bermuda's South Shore has over 20 of the world's most beautiful beaches.  Now, you'd think that Mother Nature would have spread them around a bit more evenly.  But it appears that the unspoiled charm of the area just held her attention.

As you come to the eastern edge of the area, you are confronted with Elbow Beach, which is the longest stretch of beach on the island, and clearly one of the most dramatic.  Elbow Beach is also the setting for one of Bermuda's most famous hotels.  It's called Wyndham's Elbow Beach Resort, which is a great help to me because it gives me two pieces of information at the same time:  the name and the location.   Now with all the detail that I'm trying to store in my aging brain, a small efficiency  like that is actually  appreciated.  The Elbow Beach Resort first opened in 1908 and has maintained an outstanding reputation ever since.  Its owners recently spent a considerable amount of money restoring the property. 

The entrance has the kind of stately elegance that reminds me of Tara, Scarlett O'Hara's magnificent estate in  "Gone With the Wind."  I half-expected Vivian Leigh to come popping out and welcome me home.  Well, she didn't, but so many other hospitable people did, that it still feels pretty good. 

And as I recall, Tara never looked like this.  It was clearly unable to offer a Olympic-size, climate-controlled swimming pool, or five tennis courts by the ocean, two of which are lit for night play;  a couple of excellent restaurants, a considerable assortment of water sports, or the Fritholme Mansion.

The Fritholme Mansion is one of Bermuda's historical estates.  And a while back, it was reconditioned to become a guest house for special guests.  It has a living room, four bedrooms,  a formal dining room, a breakfast room, a steam room and exercise room, a sun room, a room in which they keep a list of the other rooms, and a room that is particularly dear to my heart, the television room, which down-links my reports every day.  It's quite a place.  And it's right smack in the middle of the 50 acres that make up Wyndham's Elbow Beach Resort.

On the other hand, Tara did have Clark Gable.  But Elbow Beach has chef Norbert Stange.  And I think he could compete with Clark Gable for Scarlett's affection.  I base that opinion on the old adage, “kissing doesn't last, but cooking does.”  Today, Chef Norbert is preparing a classic Bermuda onion soup. 

First thing, two tablespoons of oil go into a hot saute pan, along with two tablespoons of butter.  As soon as the butter is melted, in go three cups of sliced Bermuda onion.  They cook for about a minute.  Then in goes a teaspoon of chopped garlic.  Three minutes of cooking and the onions and the garlic are transferred to a big saucepan.  Some thyme and a bay leaf go in.  Six cups of beef stock and an ounce of Outerbridge's sherry pepper sauce. 

Years ago, local sailors would make an all-purpose seasoning sauce by taking some chopped hot peppers and mixing them together with sherry, and letting them sit in a cask for a couple of days.  Then they'd pour that on all of their foods.  The Outerbridge's Original Sherry Pepper Sauce is the local favorite here in  Bermuda, and made from the Outerbridge family's secret recipe.  If you can't get it in your supermarket, a reasonable substitute would be some chopped hot peppers sitting together with either vinegar or sherry in a jar for about 48 hours.  You can use that.

All that comes to a boil and simmers for 30 minutes.  The finished soup is ladled into a heat-proof bowl, a slice of toast that has been rubbed with garlic goes on top.  Plus two thin slices of mozzarella cheese.  The cheese is melted under a broiler and the soup is ready to serve. 

There's an ancient legend about the first two steps that Satan took when he was cast out of heaven.  It says that the spot where he first placed his left foot produced garlic, and the spot where he first placed his right foot produced onions.  Gee, I wouldn't give credit to Satan for onions.  They have a wonderful way of adding flavor to a dish, and they have a long history of being healthy, especially for your heart.

Now I think anything that is heart-healthy is heavenly, and that's much more in keeping with what the ancient Egyptians felt about onions.  They thought the onion was an ideal offering to the gods, and very often you will see drawings and paintings of onions on the walls of ancient Egyptian tombs, which is a good reminder on storing onions.  Always keep them in a dark and dry place.

The first onion seeds to arrive in  Bermuda came from England in 1616.  They may have been the forefathers and mothers of the famous Bermuda onion, or that honor may belong to an onion variety that came to Bermuda with the Portuguese, who started to arrive here during the 1840s.  No one knows for sure, but what we do know is that somewhere along the way, a particular variety of onion seed began to grow extremely well in Bermuda soil.  The seeds, the soil, and the climate combined to produce a very special onion, with a wonderfully sweet taste. 

Shortly thereafter, Bermuda began to devote more and more of its farmland to the cultivation of onions.  It grew to a rather large size for an onion, and their mildness made them very popular throughout Europe, South America, and the United States.  The exporting of onions became such a big business, that Bermuda sailors became known as “onions” and Bermuda itself as “the onion patch.”

Bermuda onions became extremely popular along the east coast of the United States.  Old advertisements that announced what was for sale from various cargo ships showed that thousands of tons of Bermuda onions came into  American markets each year. 

This story may not be true, but I have heard it so many times that I thought I would pass it on, but only the heading of “unsubstantiated folklore.”  People around here say that at one point in time, the Bermuda onion became so popular, that a bunch of Texas farmers came here to make a deal so they could grow the Bermuda onion in Texas and sell it under the Bermuda Onion name.  Well, these were the days before Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein and Mickey Mouse, and the people of Bermuda didn't understand the concept of a licensing deal.  They actually thought that if an onion was called a Bermuda onion, it should be grown in Bermuda  by Bermudians.  Can you imagine that?  So they turned down the Texas farmers.  Ahh, but that didn't stop Texans.  They went back home, changed the name of their town to Bermuda, Texas, got a copyright on the Bermuda onion name from Washington, and helped pass a law that made it hard to import Bermuda onions to the United States.  Well, if that story is true, then on behalf of U.S. onion lovers, I'd like to apologize.

About 70 million years ago, a three-mile high volcanic cone of rock came shooting up out of the floor of the Atlantic Ocean.  The water was warm and attracted millions of tiny sea animals, whose skeletons eventually compressed together to form what is now the Island of Bermuda.  Being an island, well out in the Atlantic Ocean, it's a great place to cook up some fish, which is precisely what Chef Norbert is going to prepare for his next recipe.

A little vegetable oil and a little butter are heated together in a saute pan.  The butter is used because of its rich flavor, but butter can easily burn at low temperatures.  The oil has a much higher burning point, so by mixing the two together, you get a rich flavor plus the ability to cook at a higher temperature.  As soon as the butter melts, in goes a sliced onion, some sliced ginger, a touch of white wine.  All that cooks together for a minute.  A filet of red snapper gets a light dusting of paprika, cayenne pepper, and salt.  A little oil is heated in a pan and the fish is cooked for two minutes on each side.  At that point it goes onto the onions.  Slices of green, yellow, and red bell peppers are sauteed and placed on top of the fish.  The pan goes into a 350 degree oven for two minutes.  The finished fish goes onto a serving plate, and it's ready to go.

The early colonists to arrive in Bermuda were English, and they left their mark culturally, militarily, and of course linguistically.  As Great Britain moved through its various fashions and fancies, so did Bermuda. 

WOLF:    One of the strongest social influences to pass through the British Empire during the last few centuries was Victorianism.  Queen Victoria ruled from 1837 to 1901, setting the standards for behavior in all things, including gastronomy.  Victorian ladies made a public display of being very delicate.  And that was particularly true in things that had to do with cooking.  They even developed these little covers to put on the legs of roasted meat and poultry, because they thought it was offensive for a lady to see legs in any situation.   Well, excuuuuse me.

They even began to use arrowroot instead of flour, as a thickening agent in sauces.  Arrowroot will give you a sauce that's clearer, cleaner, more delicate and therefore thought to be more lady-like. During the 1800s, Bermuda became the source for the world's best arrowroot. Arrowroot is a fine white powder that is made from a South American plant.  The plant is ground into a dust and refined through a process that mixes the dust with water and then strains and dries it.  Arrowroot is 80 per cent starch.

Because the individual grains of starch are so small, it's easily digested and often used for puddings that are going to be given to adults or children on a restricted diet.    It does its job at low temperatures, lower than flour or cornstarch, and therefore, it's ideal for egg dishes or custards or any recipe where you don't want to bring the food to a boil.   It has no taste and it does its job with twice the effectiveness of standard wheat flour. 

The general rule of thumb is to use one tablespoon of arrowroot where you would usually use two tablespoons of flour.  One tablespoon of arrowroot will thicken slightly more than a cup of liquid.  To use arrowroot to make a sauce, just add it to a little water.  Make sure it's fully dissolved and stir it into the pan drippings.  Then add broth to develop the sauce.  The result will be a sauce with a very delicate texture. 

One of the most impressive and enjoyable aspects of Bermuda is that everyone is dedicated to preserving their history.  Through a number of organizations, including the Bermuda National  Trust, citizens of Bermuda have been able to hold onto an enormous number of objects and properties that bring their history to life.   One of the most fascinating is Verdmont, a private home that was built in 1710, and has remained virtually unchanged for almost 300 years.  The south side was the original front.  The placement was made in order to give the building this splendid outlook over the south shore of the island.  The sash windows, 12 over 12, follow a style that was extremely fashionable in England during the early 1700s.  The two large reception rooms downstairs were used as a formal drawing room and a parlor. 

The double doors between the two rooms were left open for large parties.  Hey, even in the 1700s, they were party animals.  The white planking on the walls is made of Georgia pine and was thought to have been installed as a backing for wallpaper.  This portrait is of the Honorable Thomas Smith, who was a ship owner and the collector of customs.  The other paintings are of his four daughters and their families:  Elizabeth, Honore, Catherine, and Mary. 

These portraits were painted by Mary's husband, John Green.  He had been a judge and a portrait painter in Philadelphia, but his political loyalties lay with the King of England.  When the War of Independence got started, he moved to Bermuda and married Mary Smith. 

The house also has some great furniture.  Many of the pieces are made of Bermuda cedar and show the skills of the local craftsmen.  The sides of this desk are made of a single plank of wood.  This tallboy has all its legs put on facing into the room.  Bermuda cabinet makers originated the form and called them “marching legs.”  The design allows the tallboy to fit flushly against the wall. 

The nursery has a collection of children's objects that give you a look at what it was like to be a kid in the old days.  The dining room has a collection of Chinese export porcelain that ranges from 1680 to 1820.  The bathrooms were just that, bath rooms.  The toilet facilities were outside.  But with Bermuda's wonderful climate, that was less of a burden than it was in, say, Boston. 

The kitchen was also in a second building, and there were two reasons for that.  First of all, there was an enormous fear of fire.  True, there were fireplaces in the main building, but the idea of a working fireplace, the kind you'd find in a kitchen, was just too scary.  Second of all, they wanted to keep the heat of the kitchen out of the main building.

Because the island of Bermuda is warmed by an ocean current, it has a mild climate, and that's great for growing fruits and vegetables which are usually associated with the tropics.  A perfect example of that are the many fields filled with banana plants.  The banana, by the way, is neither a fruit or a vegetable.  The banana is, in fact, an herb; actually it's the world's largest herb.

Chef Norbert is using bananas to make a banana bread.  He starts by taking a large electric mixer, which is a good idea because he's making a large amount of batter.  Four cups of sugar are creamed together with 16 ounces of butter.  Twelve ripe bananas are added in.  Eight eggs are beaten in one at a time.  Two teaspoons of baking powder, plus a teaspoon of sugar and a little cinnamon are mixed together and added.  Add eight cups of flour, and two cups of chopped walnuts.   The batter gets divided into rectangular baking pans and popped into a 300 degree oven for two hours, at which time you have Bermuda banana breads.

Cecille Snaithe-Simmons was born in Bermuda and by profession is a registered nurse.   Her husband, Lionel Simmons, was  for many years a member of Parliament.  She's the author of "The Bermuda Cook Book," which contains recipes passed down from both her family and that of her husband.  She's been kind enough to stop by the kitchen of the Bermuda Hotel School and demonstrate her recipe for Spanish rice.

A Spanish recipe makes perfectly good sense in Bermuda.  The Spanish knew about Bermuda before the English.  As a matter of fact, the name Bermuda comes from the Spanish explorer, Juan des Bermudez, who stopped in here in 1511, a hundred years before the English.

Cecille's recipe starts with two strips of bacon that are cooked until they are crisp.  Then they are removed from the pan and crumbled.  Chopped onion goes in.  A chopped green pepper.  A minute of cooking, then two cups of chopped tomato are added, a quarter cup of tomato paste.  The bacon returns, plus a cup of water, two cups of medium-grain rice.  Everything comes to a boil and then into a 300 degree oven for 30 minutes.  That's it.  A rice dish like this is easy and convenient, and tastes so good because rice has a natural ability to carry the flavors of the the other ingredients. 

Long-grain rice is best for this dish, because it's extra fluffy and each individual grain tends to stay separate and hold its shape.

Princess Louise was the daughter of England's Queen Victoria.  But because she was married to the Governor General of Canada, she lived in North America. 

“North” is the operative word here.  Canadian winters can be quite cold and quickly turn your mind to thoughts of warm winter vacation.  The problem was that those were the days before air travel, and the amount of time you could spend on a vacation was severely limited by the amount of time that you were willing to spend on a boat. 

Florida and the Caribbean were warm, but they were pretty far away.   Bermuda was warm and only 600 miles off the Carolina coast.    Bermuda is a three-hour flight from Toronto, less than two hours from New York, and only two and a half hours from Atlanta. 

Princess Louise must have had a similar view of the geography, because she was the original discoverer of Bermuda as a vacation destination.  Her first trip here had an enormous amount of coverage in the press, and lots of public attention.  It transformed Bermuda into the ideal spot for a holiday.

Part of most vacations is the vacation postcard, which has really become an art form. While I was doing my research for this report, I discovered a wonderful collection of old Bermuda postcards at the Bermuda archives.  Karla Heywood is the curator of the photographic collection, and she's brought out some of the best examples.

KARLA HEYWOOD:     Nicholas Lusher was really the first photographer in Bermuda to develop or have his stock shots turned into postcard format.  When postcards were first developed, Lusher really got on the bandwagon quite quickly.

This is a postcard that's dated, I believe, 1905.  But you can see that this is exactly the same view that was taken of the lily field at Bellevue in the 1880s or '90s.  So obviously Lusher is sending his prints over to Germany or Austria and having them published and tinted, because you can see the color in this.  

Here's another example of a very early postcard. This is, again, October 29th, 1905.  The early postcards are actually -- you can't -- you can't write on the address side, so there's only one little area that you can write on, and that's at the bottom here, and they've sent a little message home. 

WOLF:     Interesting. So the whole back side is your address.

HEYWOOD:    That's right. 

WOLF:    It says, this side for address only, and you get this tiny little area for your message.

HEYWOOD:    Yup.  And here's the same view, a postcard from after World War I, although I can't--

WOLF:    Then they start dividing it.

HEYWOOD:    Absolutely.  So there's-- there's a view of Gibbs Hole Lighthouse.  What's missing are the shots of the-- of the beaches and the water at the south shore, which is, of course, why our visitors come here today.  But 19th Century and early 20th Century visitors came in the winter and they weren't interested in-- in bathing and sunbathing so much as we are today.  They were more interested in seeing sort of phenomena like rock formations, aquarium, public gardens.

WOLF:    And just being out of the cold. 

HEYWOOD:    That's right. 

WOLF:    Interesting.  We certainly do change.

That's it from Hamilton, Bermuda.  Please join us next time as we travel around the world looking for good things to eat and the reasons why people eat them.  I'm Burt Wolf. 

Burt Wolf's Table: Cultural Southland of Taiwan - #225

BURT WOLF: The cultural southlands of Taiwan.  home to the people of Lukang, whose town looks much as it did some 200 years ago.  We'll visit the Temple of the Goddess of the Sea.  We'll find out how Taoist teachings continue to control the work of Chinese cooks.  We'll visit one of the favorite honeymoon spots in the Far East, and learn some interesting recipes.  So join me in the cultural southland of Taiwan at Burt Wolf's Table.

BURT WOLF: The Ming Dynasty of China began in the middle of the 1300s and ran for almost 300 years.  It was one of the great periods in Chinese history.  Artists, writers, poets and scientists were supported by the Ming rulers.  Their works produced one of the golden ages of Chinese culture.  But by the early 1600s the administration had become totally self-serving and corrupt, while at the same time, their Manchu neighbors to the Northeast developed a well- trained and efficient army.  When the Manchu forces attacked, the Ming defenses disintegrated and their troops retreated to the South.  The last great Ming defender was a warlord named Cheng Cheng-Kung.  With an army of over 100,000 men he tried to hold back the Manchu advance.  But by 1661 he was forced to abandon the mainland and move his troops to the island of Taiwan.  Taiwan, however, was a major trading post for the Dutch who controlled the area from Fort Zeelandia.  Under the theory that “this town ain't big enough for both of us,” Cheng Cheng-Kung laid siege to the fort.  The battle lasted for two years.  At which point the Dutch were compelled to surrender and Cheng Cheng-Kung took control of Taiwan.  This is the Cheng Cheng-Kung Shrine in the city of Tainan, just down the road from what remains of Fort Zeelandia.  It's a quiet and peaceful place, a testimony to Cheng’s cultural interest; his statue rests in the main hall.  There's an ancient plum tree in the garden which is said to have been planted by Cheng himself.  When Cheng Cheng-Kung arrived in Taiwan he brought with him his army, but he also brought thousands of painters, writers, scholars and master chefs.  He did everything he possibly could to preserve classical Chinese culture... and the lifestyle that had existed under the Ming Dynasty.  It's amazing to think about it, but some 300 years later, just about the same thing happened, when Chiang Kai-Shek arrived in Taiwan in 1948 with millions of people from the mainland who wanted to avoid Communism.  Once again these days, Taiwan is the major repository for classical Chinese culture and cooking.

Chinese noodle making seems to have gotten its official start during the Han Dynasty, which ran from roughly 200 B.C. to 200 A.D.   It was during this time that people mastered the technique for grinding wheat into flour, which made noodle production obvious and easy, since a noodle dough in its simplest form is just wheat mixed with water.  This dish is called noodles Ming Jiang style. Ming Jiang is the name of a river in the province of Fukien.  The recipe uses the common Chinese cooking technique of cooking the noodles with two different methods:  first boiling, then stir-frying.  A cup of pre-cooked noodles are heated in hot water, then drained.  The water is removed from the wok and then vegetable oil goes in.  That's followed by a quarter cup of sliced cabbage, a few mushrooms, some sliced carrots, a few green beans and some minced pre-cooked ham or pre-cooked bacon.  All that gets stir-fried for two minutes, then the noodles return, plus a quarter cup of chicken stock.  Tablespoon of soy sauce, a little white pepper, another few moments of stir-frying, and it's ready for the serving plate.

Chinese cooks are great lovers of mushrooms and they've been cultivating them on a commercial scale for about 1500 years...which gives them a thousand year lead on everyone in the West.  These days there are about 300 different types of edible mushrooms available to the Chinese chef.  But in the United States when we reproduce a Chinese recipe, we tend to focus on three:  The cloud ear, the straw mushroom and the black mushroom.  Straw mushrooms are sold in cans and should be washed under running water before they are used.  And then leftover straw mushrooms should be stored in water in an airtight jar in the refrigerator.  They'll keep there for about a week.  But it's a good idea to use these small delicate mushrooms as quickly as you can after you open the can.

The town of Lukang is one of the earliest ports in Taiwan.  The first Chinese to arrive in the area came over from the mainland in the early 1600s and by the middle of the 1700s it was a major trading center.  These days there are parts of Lukang that look very much the way they did almost 200 years ago when it was at the peak of it's commercial history.  Yaolin Street is a good example of the old architecture of the town, a narrow roadway lined with homes that open out into the street.  Some front rooms are used as family rooms, others are shops or offices.  All of them however have similar altar tables that are given over to the artifacts of worship.

(WORSHIP SINGING)

Lukang's main street is Chungshan Road.  It used to be called See No Sky Street, because the roofs of the houses had been extended into the road until they met in the center.  The covered street that resulted allowed people to conduct their business from shop to shop without being inconvenienced by bad weather.  Amazing -- 200 years ago the Chinese were building covered malls.  About 50 years ago, however, they took down the road cover but it's still a great place to shop.  Lukang is also home to the Matsu Temple which was built in 1647.  It is a Taoist temple and named after the Goddess of the Sea.  She is protected by two of the most powerful guardians.  On one side is Thousand Mile Ears, who has mastered the art of listening through the wind.  On the other side is Thousand Mile Eyes, who can see for a thousand miles.  Having just increased the strength of my prescription in my reading glasses, I must say I am particularly impressed.

(GONG, DRUM)

In front of the Temple is an area devoted to street food vendors.  After all, once you've fed the soul it is time to feed the body.  The stalls are famous for their oyster soups and oyster omelettes, and they also have moon cookies.

They also have a food specialty that I had heard a bit about before I came here.  Although I knew I would have to taste it for professional reasons, I was really not looking forward to the experience.  They had been described to me as ox tongue cookies.  Fortunately the name is based on the shape, not the ingredients.  They're kind of crispy and like a pancake, with jelly inside.  Very good!

As you can see, the Matsu Temple is very much a part of the neighborhood and it's people.  And that's very common for Taoist temples.  Taoism had its beginning in the ancient Chinese Shamanistic culture that goes back in history for well over 4000 years.  But its formation into a philosophy appears to have taken place during the 6th century B.C. and is attributed to a man called Lao Tzu, which literally translates as “the old master.”  He was the keeper of the royal archives in the Court of the Chou Dynasty Emperors.  Eventually he got fed up with the Government and decided to leave the country.  When he came to the Western border, the guards recognized him as one of the wise men of the court and would not let him pass until he wrote down the sum of his wisdom.  So the old master sat down, penned a 5000 word manuscript, handed it to the border patrol and headed off, never to be heard of again.

There's a certain similarity here with what's been going on in the United States Government.  When you're finished with your government service and you want to leave Washington, you also get to write a book with the sum of your knowledge, but unlike Lao Tzu, before you get to head west you have to stop and cash a check from your publishers for a few million bucks.

The English title of the great Taoist work is The Way of Nature.  It's not really a religious text in the Western sense but much more a short poetic statement of moral philosophy.  It talks about the way the force that is in each individual thing, and yet greater than all things.  It's very much concerned with balance, which it describes as yin and yang.  And it has had an enormous effect on the way the Chinese cook.  Yin is the feminine force.  It is the earth.  It is cool.  It is shade.  It is fruit.  Green vegetables, clear soups and, quite amazingly, in the light of modern medical information on diet, it is low-fat, low-calorie and complex carbohydrates.  Yang is the masculine force.  It is the sky.  It is hot.  It is bright white.  It is red meat, saturated fats, peanuts and beer -- and keep in mind this information was compiled over 2,500 years ago.  Today's Chinese cooks are very much concerned with finding the right balance between Yin and Yang.  This balance represents the Taoist way of nature.  And a recipe or meal that fails to find that balance is believed to cause illness.  On any single day, thousands of Chinese who are not feeling well will stop into their herbalist to try and find out what's going on.  The herbalist will check the balance of the Yin and Yang forces in their body by taking their pulse and then prescribing a diet that will bring those forces back into line with the Taoist way.  That's kind of interesting.  In the Western media we're very busy promoting the relationship of good food to good health like it was a new discovery.  Here in China, they've known about the relationship of good food to good health for over 4,000 years and worked with it very effectively.

In Chinese cooking the chicken is a symbol of good luck and has become a regular part of the offerings to the Gods.  To great and powerful Gods who can easily do their own cooking, the chicken is offered raw.  To Gods of less strength and influence, and for honored ancestors, the chicken is offered already cooked.  This dish is a casserole of chicken with Chinese sesame oil.  It has a very rich and nutty flavor and it's very simple to prepare.  First thing, a cup of vegetable oil gets heated in a wok and in go two cups of chicken that have been cut into bite-sized pieces.  A minute of cooking and the chicken is drained from the oil.  All the oil is removed from the wok except for two tablespoons.  Those are re-heated and as soon as the oil is hot, in goes a quarter cup of sliced bamboo shoots... a few cloves of garlic and a few slices of red bell pepper.  A minute of stir-frying and the chicken returns to the wok.  Two tablespoons of Chinese sesame oil are added.  Two basil leaves, a little more stir-frying and into a hot casserole dish for serving.

Chinese sesame oil is made from toasted sesame seeds.  It has a light brown color and a really rich flavor.  The thicker it is, the better the flavor.  Don't try to substitute standard cold- pressed American sesame oil in any Chinese recipe, it's just not gonna have the flavor that you want.  On the other hand, Chinese sesame oil burns at a very low temperature so we don't want to cook in it.  Chinese sesame oil is really just a flavoring agent.

Ginger is one of the most common ingredients in Chinese cooking, but remember, what Chinese recipes you're talking about is the fresh ginger root and you can't substitute powdered or dry ginger.  Fortunately, these days you can get fresh ginger in many standard North American supermarkets.  When you're picking out ginger, make sure that it is smooth, full of soft spots and generally firm to the touch. 

At the very center of Taiwan is Sun Moon Lake.  It sits 2,500 feet above sea level in the hills of the mountain range that form the backbone of the island.  It's called Sun Moon Lake because from some viewpoints it looks like a round, shining sun.  And from other vantages it takes on the shape of a crescent moon.  It is surrounded by dramatic mountain peaks that are covered with dense tropical forests.  Mists float across the landscape.  Paths along the shore offer walkers a private moment in a drifting, moody, jade-colored world.  It's become one of the favorite honeymoon spots for the people of Taiwan.  Kind of like a Niagara Falls of the Far East.  It's also home to one of the great Taoist shrines.  It is called the Temple of Wen Wu.  The largest stone lions in the world guard the entrance.  The overall scale and workmanship are quite extraordinary.

On the first floor is a temple building that  contains the statues of two great warriors.  On the floor above them is the statue of the moral philosopher, Confucius.  The message is clear.  The pen is mightier than the sword.

(GONG)

Sun Moon Lake is also the home of the Hsuan-Tsang Temple. Hsuan-Tsang was a monk who lived during the 600s, travelled to India and spent 17 years studying Buddhist traditions.  When he returned to China, he translated the most important Buddhist teachings from Sanskrit to Chinese and was, therefore, a key figure in bringing Buddhism to China.  This is his temple and it contains some of the most valuable relics in Buddhist culture.  These little round balls are called Shou-lee-zu.  Buddhist tradition holds that when an important monk is cremated, these small stone balls will be found among the ashes.  The monks here will tell you that Shou-lee-zu cannot be destroyed and they get bigger or smaller depending on the number of people who come to worship at the shrine.  Western scientists will tell you that they're probably kidney stones.  But the Western scientists cannot tell you why an honored Buddhist monk, who died as recently as 1950, left over 10,000 of these kernels with a volume of half the size of his body.  The other day I saw a report from a group of American scientists that clearly indicated that, what you are thinking about when you are in front of your computer, even though you are not touching your computer, affects the way the computers work... so... I'm open to anything.

And one of the things that I am always open to is the cooking at the Grand Formosa Regent.

(GONG/MUSIC)

It was the European explorers of the 1600s who brought cattle to the island of Taiwan.  But it was the traditional Chinese chefs who developed the beef recipes.  Cattle raising has always required large amounts of grazing land, something that China has never had.  And beef cookery usually demands a lot of cooking fuel.  Something else that China has not had.  So when the Chinese cooks had their first contact with beef as a food, they approached it with their traditional cooking methods.  No big steaks, no heat-intensive roasts, they just cut it up into small pieces and stir-fried it.  And that's exactly what we're about to do with beef and scallions.

A quarter cup of oil is heated in a wok until it's just shimmering and in go two cups of beef that have been sliced into bite sized pieces.  Tenderloin would be the best cut of beef for this recipe.  The beef cooks for a minute, at which point it is drained of the oil and all the oil is removed from the wok except for two tablespoons’ worth.  That oil is heated up and in goes a half cup of sliced green onion and  a half of a red bell pepper that's been cut into small chunks.  That gets stir-fried for a few minutes.  Next a tablespoon of soy sauce is added, and a mixture of half a tablespoon of cornstarch that has been dissolved in two ounces of warm water.  Another minute of stir-frying and the dish is ready to go along to the serving plate.

One of the common condiments in Chinese cooking is oyster sauce.  It's made by grinding oysters together with an assortment of flavorings.  It's used to give a dish a darker color with a kind of a meaty flavoring.  In spite of the fact that it is made from a shellfish, it should never have a fishy smell. If it does, that's the first sign that it's a poor quality product.

The Republic of China, situated on the island of Taiwan, has thousands of miles of coastline and hundreds of rivers and lakes.  They have been a valuable source of an extraordinary variety of fish an shellfish.  Seafood has always been an important part of Chinese cooking.  But of all the seafood available, none is more popular than shrimp.  The recipe coming up is a simple combination of shrimp and vegetables that stands in the perfect balance of yin and yang that is recommended in the ancient gastronomic instructions of the Taoists.

The green leafy spinach is one of the cool foods in the female yin group.  The high protein shrimp is one of the male foods, the yang group.  There is also a balancing of cooking techniques.  The shrimp is first deep-fried and removed from the oil and finally stir-fried.

Chef Lee starts by heating a cup of oil in his wok.  In goes a cup of shrimp.  A minute of cooking and they're out.  Then the oil is removed from the wok, except for two tablespoons’ worth.  Some spinach arrives for a minute of stir-frying, after which it goes off to a serving plate.  Then the oil comes back into the wok.  Followed by a sliced clove of garlic.  A few pieces of red bell pepper, green onion and the return of the shrimp.  A teaspoon of cornstarch dissolved in some warm water.  Another moment of stir-frying and the dish is finished.

The idea of cooking a food with two or three different types of heating is a specialty of Chinese chefs.  In the West we usually decide to heat the food with one system, and that's it.  We roast it or fry it or saute it.  But normally only one cooking method is used.  The Chinese will use two or three different techniques in order to vary the taste in textures.  It's a little more work, but not much, and the results are quite interesting.  And even though many of the recipes start out with deep- frying you can contain your general fear of frying to some extent, because these dishes don't cover the foods with batters or coatings.  And that is normally where all the extra fat calories are held in deep frying.

Another example of a recipe that uses two heating techniques is sesame walnuts.  A few cups of water are brought to a boil and in go two cups of shelled walnuts.  A minute of cooking and they're drained from the water.  The wok is cleaned out and reheated.  Half cup of water is brought to a boil and the nuts go back in.  Cup of sugar gets mixed in.  Then the nuts are cooked and stirred until all the water has evaporated.  The nuts are taken from the wok, a tablespoon of water goes in and the nuts return.  Plus a second cup of sugar.  Stir-fry for a minute and, once again, take out the nuts.  Keep two cups of oil in the wok and deep fry the nuts for two minutes.  Drain them from the oil and mix in the sesame seeds.  It's kind of a nutty recipe with the walnuts constantly going in and out of the wok, but they end up tasting fantastic.

Anthropologists tell us that when a society starts to develop a written language, the first form is usually based on a picture of the thing being described.  As a written language develops, the lines are modified so that the words are easier to write.  There are some 50,000 images in the Chinese language, but only about 5,000 are in common use.  When they first developed, they were written on thin strips of bamboo, which is why the Chinese got into the habit of writing from top to bottom.  People who have mastered the technique of writing these words are considered major artists in Chinese society.  One of the leading practitioners of this art form is Milo Chang.  He works in the only major writing system in the world that has continued its pictographic development without interruption.  Which means that the average Chinese student can read manuscript that was written over 4,000 years ago.  And that includes cook books.  Milo is demonstrating the style "cursive script".  Chinese cursive script is thought of as a part of the mainstream of Chinese art.  But it is also a practical tool of everday life.  You will find examples of cursive script in major art collections.  But you will also find it on the menus of restaurants.

Each time I visit the Republic of China in Taiwan, I spend a little time with a friend of mine named Richard Vuylsteke.  For the past 30 years he has been studying and writing about Chinese culture.  This time I went to see him about my total failure to understand how traffic works in this country.

For me, and most Western visitors to Taiwan, the local traffic is utterly chaotic.  But it is really just another example of how Chinese thought patterns, and their physical manifestations, differ from those of the West.  Local traffic is totally understandable once you view it in the light of Taoist doctrine.  Central to Taoist teaching is the idea of flow.  Free, yet disciplined movement.  A good metaphor would be a young and quickly flowing river, a rapid mountain stream.  The water fills the space between the banks racing over rocks, under fallen trees and around any obstacle in its path.  Similar to the traffic in Taiwan.  Just a stream fills its banks, so do the vehicles fill the space between the curbs, and between other objects on the road.  Instead of the Western idea of parallel streams of traffic clearly marked by lines that can only be crossed under rigidly defined rules, the Chinese draw upon... different... less legalistic traditions.  Anywhere there is room there is a vehicle.  This means faster flow, and more effective utilization of space.  And a better chance of ultimately reaching your destination within a reasonable time.  The Taiwanese driver also has a different idea of what constitutes a near-miss.  The Western measures in feet, the Chinese mind in inches.  What would send the average North American motorist into a fit is totally ignored here, or at the very worst gets a honk of a horn.  Ancient Chinese concepts of flow and space have been adopted to modern traffic.  But it is also an illustration of the Taoist idea of balance.  The ability of two totally opposite forces to co-exist in one object at the identical moment.  Clearly, the drivers of Taiwan are at the same time the best, and the worst, drivers in the world. 

I've been reporting about food since 1965 and there really isn't a day that goes by where I don't learn something new about the relationship of food to history.  I was quite surprised to find out that the Dutch East India company centered its spice trade here in Taiwan and the enormous profits from that trade went back to Amsterdam to support Dutch artists like Rembrandt.  It's very much as the great thinkers have said, if you've got the information from the teachings of Buddha or the formulas of Einstein, it's the same.  We are all connected and everything is relative.  It's a great pleasure to follow these stories and I hope you'll join us next time as we travelled around the world looking for good things to eat and the reason why people eat them.  From the Republic of China, I'm Burt Wolf.

Burt Wolf's Table: The Island of Formosa - #224

BURT WOLF:   The island of Formosa...  where some of the most interesting temples of China show us how the teachings of Buddha and instructions of Confucius have changed the way the Chinese cook.  We'll see how seventeenth- century Europeans came here to control the spice trade, and accidentally influenced the course of Western art.  We'll take a look at the story of tea, and learn some great-tasting and easy recipes.  So join me on the Island of Formosa for Burt Wolf's Table.

The time period between the fall of Rome and the beginning of the Renaissance is often described as the Dark Ages.  From the point of view of food, much of that time period could also be described as the Dull Ages.  The ancient Romans had a big spice trade going with Asia ... and they used an enormous amount of spice in their cooking.  But with the fall of Rome you also see the fall of those commercial systems that brought the rare spices from Asia to Europe. 

With the Renaissance you find the real awakening of the interest in spices.  And those spices became so rare and so important that many of them were worth their weight in gold.  Every spice trader in Europe was looking for a direct deal with the suppliers in Asia.  But getting one wasn't so easy.

Between Europe and the spices of India and China lay the vast Muslim world.  The Islamic nations controlled the spice trade, and the European nations felt a constant frustration over the issue.  Every European monarch was interested in eliminating the Arab middleman ... and that is precisely why the Portuguese government sent out Vasco DeGama and the Spanish sent out Fernando Magellan, and of course, Christopher Columbus.

The first great European explorers were the Portuguese ... their navigators were charting distant oceans long before everyone else.   And they were the first Europeans to really start doing business in Asia.  They sailed along the coast of China and made a series of early charts showing the mainland, and the island of Taiwan. 

They gave the land the name Formosa which is Portuguese for “beautiful island” ... but they never actually set foot on the territory or considered building a colony.  The Portuguese ran their business out of Macao in the same way the Spanish ran theirs out of Manila.  The real action was in the Chinese coastal cities.

But then in 1602 the Dutch set up the Dutch East India Company with the express purpose of getting a piece of the spice action from the Portuguese and the Spanish.

One of the locations that the Dutch used to develop this trade was Fort Zeelandia ... it was constructed in the 1620's on a protected sand bank along the southwest coast.  The area was called Taiwan which means “terraced bay” ... and the Dutch began to use that word to describe the entire island. 

The site of the fort is at the edge of the present Taiwanese city of Tainan.  One of the original walls is still standing.  The bricks were held together with a mixture of sugar syrup, rice and oysters.  Makes a nice recipe, and a great wall.  It's thirty feet thick and high in complex carbohydrates. 

There's a small museum on the top of the hill that will show you what the fort looked like in its good old days.

Having come from an agricultural nation, the Dutch were quick to spot the high quality soil locally ... and set up a system of farms.  They were able to grow and successfully export wheat, ginger, and tobacco.  They also had a thriving trade with the mainland in sugar and porcelain. 

During the 1600's, the Dutch East Indian company exported fifty million pieces of porcelain to their customers back in Europe.  The center of the Dutch trade in Asia was right here on Fort Zeelandia ... and they used this fort to make an enormous fortune for their shareholders back in Amsterdam.

When you look at the amazing canal houses that stand in Amsterdam today ... the great furniture inside them ... or the fabulous art of the 1600's from people like Rembrandt or the VanLoons ... you're looking at things that came from the wealth created in Asia.  And to a particular extent, with the aid of Fort Zeelandia.

The bay that fronted on Fort Zeelandia has silted up ... and the fort now sits on the edge of the city of Tainan. 

Tainan is the cultural center of Taiwan and for over two hundred years it was the island's capital.  The local government has followed a policy of preservation that presents the visitor the a unique look at Chinese tradition and lifestyle.

Tainan has also had a long history as a gastronomic center.  One of Tainan's most famous dishes is called dan-dan noodles.  The recipe was described to me as combing the best qualities of pasta bolognase and noodle soup in one dish.   And that turned out to be pretty accurate.   Here's how it's prepared by the chefs in the kitchens on the Grand Formosa Regent.

First, the sauce is made by heating some oil in a wok ... adding a little chopped fresh ginger ... a few mushrooms ... and a cup of ground pork.  A little soy sauce ... a pinch of cinnamon ... a half cup of chicken stock.  That simmers for thirty minutes.  Then into the restaurant for the final presentation.

Pre-cooked noodles are heated and turned out into a serving bowl ... the shrimp on top ... a touch of soy sauce ... the pork sauce ... a little cilantro ... and the chicken stock.

Once upon a time in the not-too-distant past I actually made my chicken stock from scratch ... but as time’s winged chariot has drawn on I have reorganized my priorities.  And quite frankly, homemade chicken stock just doesn't have the thrill that it used to.  These days I use canned chicken stock ... it's pretty good ... and it's a lot faster ... one tip, however, that I'd like to pass on.  I do not store my canned chicken stock in a cabinet at room temperature.  I keep it in the refrigerator.   I take them out and open them up just before I'm gonna use the stock.  The cold air has turned the fat in the stock to a solid ... and you'll find it floating on top ... spoon it off ... and you'll have saved yourself at least a hundred calories.  And those were fat calories too.  Easy thing to do ... and quite healthful.

Of all the philosophies and teachings that have been developed in China ... none has been more powerful than the work of Confucius.  He was born in 551 B.C. during a period of political and moral chaos.  The ruling dynasty was crumbling, and petty factions were at war throughout the country.   Confucius wanted to reestablish the ethical principals that had guided much of China during an earlier time. 

He spent his life trying to teach people that true happiness could only be found in acts of generosity and the promotion of peace and friendship.  By the time he died at the age of seventy-two, over three thousand students had been trained in his teachings.

He wrote a series of books that recommended the proper behavior for just about every situation that might come up in life.  He told his students to be tough with themselves but easy- going and benevolent with other people.

He believed that the government was designed for the benefit of the people ... not the benefit of other government officials.  What an amazing concept.  Too bad no one has heard of Confucius in Washington. 

From the second century B.C. until 1905, the teachings of Confucius were literally the official body of moral and intellectual information for China.  He established what is known as the Five Cardinal Relationships ... and explained how each should be handled.  They cover the relationships between the individual and the government ... between husband and wife ... parent and child ... older and younger siblings ... and friends.

(GONG SOUND)

Today, some two thousand five hundred years after Confucious lived ... the people of Taiwan still follow his teachings ... and hold a giant birthday party for him each year on September 28th.

I'm particularly interested in that celebration because my birthday is also on September 28th ... and my Chinese name ... Wu Bor Da ... is associated with travelling scholars.  Two fortuitous facts that get me a lot of extra mileage when I'm working in China.  Though I must admit that the first time I heard of Confucius was in one of the old Charlie Chan movies when he was theoretically quoted by the great philosopher/detective Mr. Chan.

Chan would wait for a key moment in the film ... and then say something like ... “old Chinese philosopher Confucius say ‘to hide stone, place stone with other stones.  To hide man, place man with other men.’  We must look for killer in crowd.”

(GONG)

Confucius was clearly one of the world's great thinkers when it came to morals.  But it was also a big deal when it came to meals.  Many of the texts associated with him have large sections that are devoted to the proper preparation and consumption of various foods.

He was also an expert on the gastronomic hygiene of the time ... and particularly interested in the relationship of good food to good health.  Many historians actually give Confucius credit for the devotion of Chinese cooks to fresh ingredients.

And nowhere is that Confucian devotion to freshness more pronounced than in the area of seafood.  If it is at all possible, the Chinese chef will select his seafood while it is still alive.  And that way he can determine its true level of good health.

Most of the original Chinese immigrants to the island of Taiwan came over from the main land province of Fukien.  They started arriving over 400 years ago and they have come to represent a major portion of the present population.  Their ancestral province is famous for its seafood cookery.   And this dish of squid with sesame oil is an example of the Fukienese influence in Taiwanese cooking.

Chef Lee starts this recipe by heating a cup of vegetable oil in a wok.  In go two cups of squid that have been cut into bite-size pieces.  Two minutes of cooking ... and they're drained of the oil.  And all of the oil is removed from the wok except for two tablespoons’ worth.  Those are reheated.  Then in go a few garlic cloves, some fresh minced ginger, coarsely-chopped red bell pepper, and some sliced bamboo shoots.

A few moments of stir-frying and the squid comes back into the wok.  A tablespoon of sesame oil is added.   A little more stir-frying.  And then the final ingredient.  A cup of basil leaves.  One more minute of stir-fry and the dish is ready to be served.  It's turned out onto a warm serving dish ... and heads for the table.

It's usually pretty hard to find fresh bamboo shoots in the average North American market.  But if you have a market with an Asian section you ought to be able to find canned bamboo shots.  They come whole and chunked and sliced and pre-minced.  When you get them home, separate the bamboo shoots from the liquid that they come in in the can.  Give them a wash under fresh running water.  Any bamboo shoots that you don't use in the recipe should be stored in a glass jar tightly closed in the refrigerator.

You change the water every couple of days; the bamboo shoots will last for about two weeks.  Traditionally, bamboo shoots are used to lighten a recipe and that's what they're doing in this dish.

There are a number of Chinese folk legends that tell the story of the origin of tea.  They all describe it as an accident in which a tea leaf drops into someone's boiling water ... and they seem to date the drinking of tea back some four thousand years.  After the Chinese scholar Lu Yu published his book on tea in the year 780 A.D. ... tea became the most important beverage in Asia. 

Yu told his readers that tea would temper the spirit ... calm and harmonize the mind ... arouse thought ... prevent drowsiness ... and enlighten and refresh the body.

They also believed that tea would break down the protein and fat in a meal in a way that made that meal more digestible.  Obviously, in those days there was nothing like our federal Food And Drug Administration requiring scientific proof for all medical claims on food.  If there had been, it might have been a very small book with maybe one lovely page that contained the Chinese tea equivalent of “good to the last drop.”

Tea also appears to have the ability to remove stains and grease from various surfaces.  That is why in an old traditional Chinese restaurant ... you may see a waiter pour the remaining tea out of a teapot onto the surface of the table and the wipe it up to remove the grease.

Sunpoling is the tea producing area of Taiwan ... and though Sunpoling translates into English as “pine bluff” ... there are no pine trees in the district.  Just rolling hills covered with bamboo groves and giant palm trees that were planted to shade acre after acre of tea plants.

Sunpoling produces some of the finest tea in the world.  Part of its success comes from the unique climate in the region ... and part from the unusual soil.  But there's also an ancient tradition of exceptional craftsmanship that follows the techniques that have always resulted in the highest grades of tea.

The pickers move through the fields, selecting only those leaves that are at the perfect point of growth.  In the center of the district is the village of Sunpoling.  The main street of the town is literally lined with shops selling tea that was grown in the nearby fields.  Shop after shop ... street after street.  And each one offering a service called “old folks’ tea” that takes a full hour to perform.  It's called “old folks’ tea” because these days it seems that only old folks and television food reporters have the time to enjoy it. 

Actually I could qualify for the service based on my chronological age but I'm gonna use my press pass instead.

Their finest teas come from little leaves that are grown on the top of mountains.  If you want to taste it you can probably get some in a good shop in a Chinatown.  The manufacturers of tea in Taiwan do an enormous export business with their fellow tea lovers in Chinatowns all over the world.  But if you get to Sunpoling you can get it wholesale.

There are over four thousand species of crab ... all appear to be edible.  And Chinese cooks have known this for over four thousand years.  The succulent taste of the crab's meat has attracted the Chinese cook ... but he's also been drawn to the crab because of its visual beauty.  Many of the most popular crab recipes of China present the crab whole in order to show off its dramatic appearance.

This recipe steams the crab over fried rice ... the flavors blend together and the dish is sent to the table in the steamer basket.  It tastes as good as it looks.  First, the rice is prepared by heating two tablespoons of vegetable oil in a wok.  Half cup of shrimp go in ... a few sliced mushrooms ... quarter cup of ground pork ... a little soy sauce ... a few shakes of white pepper ... a half cup of chicken stock ... two cups of pre-cooked glutinous rice ... and a few minutes of stir-frying.

A leaf is used to line a Chinese steamer basket and the rice goes in.  The crab goes on top.  The basket is covered and the ingredients are steamed over hot water for six minutes, at which point it's ready to serve.

Glutinous rice is a round-grain rice which gets very soft when its cooked.  But also develops a glutinous surface that makes the individual grains stick together.  In Chinese cooking it's traditionally used for stuffings and desserts.  In this recipe it's used very much the way we would use stovetop stuffing in Western cooking.  The rice is cooked and instead of being placed into something ... it's served as a bed by itself. 

What's particularly interesting about this recipe is that the rice stuffing is used as a base on top of which the crab is steamed.  So the flavor of the cooking crab is added to the rice.

I tested this recipe substituting shrimp for the crab and it worked quite well.  I also tested it with regular long-grain rice instead of the glutinous rice, and though obviously I lost the glutinous quality it still tasted wonderful.

When you're buying whole crabs in the market make sure they're alive and moving about.  That's the only way to be sure that they're fresh.

The people of Taiwan have managed to blend together three philosophies and an assortment of folk religions in order to produce a body of beliefs and customs that appear to satisfy the spiritual needs of the community.

Two of these systems ... Taoism and Confucianism were developed in China during the sixth century B.C.  The third, Buddhism, also began in the sixth century B.C. but was imported to China from India.

Buddhism is based on the life and teachings of Siddhartha Gautama. Siddhartha is though to have been born about five hundred and fifty B.C. in a small town in Nepal.  He was a local prince and lived in great luxury.  But in his twenties he left his family and their palace in search of spiritual enlightenment.  For years he wandered the countryside, avoiding all material comforts.  At one point he began a long meditation under a fig tree ... and eventually found the enlightenment that he had been searching for.

From then on he was known as the Buddha ... the Enlightened One.  And he traveled about teaching his philosophy.  His teachings revolve around the Four Noble Truths.  The first is that all life contains suffering.  The second is that the suffering comes from desire.  The third is that if you can get rid of the desire you can get rid of the suffering ... and if you do that you end up enlightened.  And fourth, enlightenment is available to everybody.

Buddha rejected the difficult life of the ascetic, but he also opposed the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake.  He recommended what he called the Middle Way.  The same trade routes that brought Chinese spices, silks and potteries to the west brought Buddhist monks to China. 

For centuries Buddhist monks had been vegetarians.  And they introduced vegetarianism as a formal food style to China.  But the idea of a mostly vegetable diet had been around in China for a long time... not as a basis of a religious principal but out of simple necessity.  China's always been short on land for cattle ... and poultry and fish were not the easiest things to come by.  So vegetables were always on the top of the shopping list.

These days there's a constant stream of scientific information that clearly shows that a diet high in fresh vegetables is better for our health.  As a general rule you should get fifty percent of your daily calories in form of complex carbohydrates from fresh fruits and vegetables.  And Buddha knew it all along.

The vegetarian diet of Buddhist monks may have gotten started out of necessity, or it may have originated in the Buddhist philosophy of “responsibility to all living things.”  Most likely it was a little bit of both.  The result, however, is that the kitchens of Buddhist temples have some of the world's best vegetarian cooking. 

An example of this style is this dish of sauteed eggplant with basil.  Chef Lee starts by heating a cup of vegetable oil in his wok ... then in go two cups of eggplant that have been cut into bite-sized pieces.  Chinese eggplant is thinner than our traditional North American variety.  If you can't find it in your local market, you can substitute our standard eggplant and the recipe will still work fine.

A minute of cooking and the eggplant is drained from the oil.  All the oil is then removed from the wok except for two tablespoons.  In goes a quarter cup of green onion.  A sliced clove of garlic.  A few pieces of red pepper ... a little soy sauce ... a touch of sugar ... and an ounce of chicken stock. 

The eggplant returns, followed by a quarter cup of basil leaves ... another movement of stir- frying and it's ready to serve.

The eggplant is a native of Southeastern Asia where it has been cultivated for over four thousand years.  It probably got its start somewhere near or actually in India and moved east from there to China.  It shows up in Chinese paintings and recipes somewhere around 600 B.C., and was a common ingredient in cooked dishes.  But it was also eaten raw as a fruit.

In the the thirteenth century it became one of the foods that was specifically recommended as an offering at the shrines of royal Chinese ancestors.

It was also used as a cosmetic.  At that time it was fashionable for Chinese women of social standing to stain their teeth black ... and they used the skin of the eggplant to do the job.  About fifteen hundred years ago, Arab traders brought the eggplant from Asia to the mediterranean area ... and it looks like the Spanish were the first people in Europe to take a real interest in eggplant cookery.

Most of the eggplant dishes that we see in North America today come from countries that border on the Mediterranean Sea.  The French like to slice it and grill it.  Or make it into ratatouille.  Whatever the eggplant recipe, it usually tastes better if you start with young, thin plants.  As they get bigger and older they lose their best texture and taste.

Of all the Chinese seasonings, the single most important is soy sauce ... it's made from fermented soy beans ... wheat ... yeast ... and salt.  There are two types.  One is called dark soy sauce ... the other's called light.

The light sauce is thinner and is used for delicate dishes and as a dipping sauce.  The dark sauce is a bit darker in color ... thicker, and has a slightly sweeter smell.  It's used to give a dish a rich color and for marinating.  Both forms of soy sauce have the ability to tenderize meat and poultry and no matter which form you use, if you're gonna store for any length of time, store it in a glass container with a tight closing lid.

And as the great chefs of Taiwan point out to me over and over again ... never substitute Japanese soy sauce for Chinese soy sauce ... it won't give you the same flavor and it's politically incorrect.

The Sung emperors ruled China from the mid-900's to the middle of the 1200's.  It was a time of peace and prosperity, which gave the royal families an opportunity to devote a considerable amount of their time and money to eating and drinking.  Thousands of people worked in the imperial kitchens and produced meals that offered hundreds of different dishes.  This was going on every day. 

Not only did the cooks do the cooking for the royal family, their guests and the supporting staff ... but they also prepared the dishes that were offered at the temples to appease the gods and honored ancestors. 

If it's true that a nation must decide between guns and butter, then a period without war could easily raise the national cholesterol level.  And that seems to be what happened with the Sung dynasty.  Their imperial court was right smack in the middle of a fabulous agricultural area near the port of Shanghai.  If you could catch it, raise it, grow it or import it ... a Sung chef would make a deal with you.

It was also the time when the first Chinese cookbook was published with very specific amounts to the ingredients.  It was written by a a Madame Wu, and because the Chinese had already invented printing, it had a pretty good distribution.  In the West we had to wait until the 1800's before we got a cookbook with really specific amounts.

It was during the last years of the Sung dynasty that Marco Polo showed up in China and took note of what was going on in the Asian kitchen.  His accounts give us a second and confirming opinion as to the opulence of Chinese food at the time. 

After the Sung rulers came the Ming dynasty.  And they just made everything bigger and better.  They even established a ministerial position to oversee court banquets.  This was also the time that European trade began to pick up.  Spanish and Portuguese ships sailed into the neighborhood and introduced an entirely new collection of foods, including potatoes, corn and chili.  I was quite surprised to find out that the hot dishes of China, including those from Seczhuan and Hunan, got their heat from chili peppers that had come from South and Central America with European traders.

(GONG)

Before I shove off for my next report I wanted to say a few words about my Chinese pronunciation.  Actually, I want to apologize.  I thought it would be more interesting for me to use my limited Chinese vocabulary rather than the words that have been invented to make life easier for English speaking tourists.  But if you speak Chinese and from time to time my pronunciation has made your ears hurt ... bow chen.  Which means, “sorry about that.” 

I hope you'll still join us next time ... as we travel around the world ... looking for good things to eat and drink.  From Taiwan, the Republic of China ... I'm Burt Wolf.

Burt Wolf's Table: Island of Bermuda - #223

BURT WOLF:  Bermuda, only 600 miles off the coast of Carolina; it's an ideal spot for an easy vacation.  The British have been here since the early 1600's and have packed the place with interesting architecture and traditional English culture.  Bermudians are also interesting cooks with a 400 year old history of local specialties.  So join me on the Island of Bermuda at Burt Wolf's Table.

The islands of Bermuda were well-known to the Spanish explorers who followed Columbus to the New World.  Their ships, filled with valuable cargo, started home by sailing north along the coast of Florida.  The islands of Bermuda were a navigational marker.  They told them it was time to make a right and head home.

The first written description of Bermuda appears to be the work of a Spanish sea captain who's ship ran aground here in the early 1500's.  Hey, hey, cut that out, come on, back up here.  In Bermuda, Bermuda shorts are the preferred form of dress for men.  As a matter of fact, they are actually considered conservative.  And I could go to the most serious business meeting in my Bermuda shorts and be told that I was properly dressed.

As I was saying, the first written account of Bermuda was made by a Spanish sea captain in the 1500's.  And the document really interests me because it’s the country's first shopping list with recipes.  I quote: "The birds came to us and perched on our heads, we brought more than five hundred to the ship.  We cooked them with hot water and they were so fat and good, that every night the men went hunting for them.  We dried and salted more than one thousand for the voyage home.  We also caught great numbers of fish.  Groupers, parrot fish and especially red snappers which were so plentiful, we were able to catch them with our hands.” So from the very beginning Bermuda was a great spot for a good meal.

The story of England's involvement with Bermuda begins with Sir George Summers.  He was the Admiral of a small fleet that had set sail from England with colonists who intended to settle in Virginia.  On July 28, 1609, a huge storm drove the Admiral's ship onto the rocks that surrounded Bermuda.  On board the ship was Sir Thomas Gates, who was going to Virginia to become the Governor of the colony.  Summers, the professional seaman and Gates, the professional politician, had different views on building a ship to continue the voyage to Virginia.  And so each built to their own design.  A full sized replica of Gates' ship, named Deliverance, now stands on a small island in front of the town of St. George. 

Summers' ship was named Patience, and both Patience and Deliverance showed up in the Virginia colony of Jamestown in 1610.  Jamestown was in terrible shape and Summers had no real interest in hanging around, but he had to have an excuse to leave, so he told everybody he was going back to Bermuda to get them more food.  Whether he really intended to do that, or just push on to England, we'll never know because when Summers got to Bermuda he died.  His heart was removed and buried here and the rest of him shipped back to England.  Which I guess makes Summers the first tourist to leave his heart in Bermuda. 

The description of Bermuda given by Sir George's nephew, Matthew, was so positive that it convinced the king to grant a new charter for the development of Bermuda.  In 1612, the first intentional settlers arrived on these islands. 

The islands that make up Bermuda are some six hundred miles out in the Atlantic Ocean, in an area long famous for exceptional fishing.  The result is a four hundred year old history of outstanding fish cookery.

A private home that is over a century old has been restored and transformed into one of Bermuda's finest restaurants.  It's called Once Upon A Table and its run by Lou Harvey.  The interior has been decorated in the Victorian style of the 1800's and the food is basically French with a Bermudian influence.  If you're in Bermuda and you give Lou thirty-six hours notice, he will  produce a traditional Bermudian meal. 

LOU HARVEY:  Today, Burt, we're going to start with traditional Bermuda fish cakes.  A fish cake of course you can present it with ... as I present it here today with a honey mustard sauce and topped with banana.  Also, you can make fish pies out of the codfish, you can do a whole host of different things.

BURT WOLF:  Codfish is really an old standby here isn't it?

LOU HARVEY:  Codfish is a basic yes, a very traditional Sunday morning breakfast that we have here in Bermuda.  And after that we're going to follow along with a ... with a Bermuda fish chowder which is very traditional.  And it's made from fish stock and other herbs and spices.  And that ... has been laced with black rum and sherry peppers.

BURT WOLF:  Everybody puts in a little bit Gosling's rum and Outerbridges’ Sherry Pepper Sauce.

LOU HARVEY:  Most certainly, the fish chowder without Outerbridges’ Sherry Pepper and black rum, isn’t really fish chowder.  And after that we can go into a pan-fried yellowtail and the yellowtail is really from our local waters.  And what we're presenting it on today is crushed pink peppercorns and also a black rum butter sauce.  After the snapper we're going to have a little pork noisette.  And again with the pork which was ...  eaten quite a bit in Bermuda, due to the fact that we had a lot of hogs running wild here.

BURT WOLF:  I saw the original map of Bermuda drawn by Admiral Summers, and in the lower right hand corner, there were a group of hogs that they feel were left here by a Spanish galleon.  They were, I guess, the original inhabitants of the island.

LOU HARVEY:  Yeah, exactly, well ... Bermuda as you know is named after Juan DesBermudez, and ... this is where we had the rock named Spanish rock where he came in, down there by Smith’s Parish, and of course that hearing these wild hogs, he probably thought that it was devils.  That's why Bermuda is also named Devil's Island.  Yeah.  Mhmm.

BURT WOLF:  The fish cakes and the fish chowder are traditional Bermudian dishes, but because the ingredients are generally available and the technique is so simple, it's just the kind of recipes I like to learn.

Let's start with the fish cakes.  They're being prepared by the chef at Once Upon A Table, Gerhard Lipp. 

This recipe starts with a pound of dried codfish, which looks like this.  You soak it in water for about eight hours, changing the water twice during that time period.  If you don't like codfish or you can't get it, you can use any white firm-fleshed fish; you don't have to soak it, but you do have to cook it.  And then you'll need three or four potatoes that you've boiled and cut into pieces so you can mash that together. 

The fish and the potatoes go into a mixing bowl, followed by two tablespoons of chopped onion, two tablespoons of chopped parsley, a tablespoon of basil, a hit of Outerbridges’ Sherry Pepper sauce and some ground black pepper.  All that is mashed together.  The final ingredient is a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce.  The mixture is formed into little cakes about three inches in diameter and given a light coating of flour.  Two tablespoons of vegetable oil and two tablespoons of butter are heated together in a frying pan and the fish cakes are sauteed until they develop a golden brown color.

CHEF:  You fry them very crispy on the outside so when you bite in it they're nice and crunchy.

BURT WOLF:  When they come out of the pan, they go onto some paper toweling to drain, and then onto a serving plate with a sauce made from mayonnaise, mustard and honey.

Wherever the sea meets the shore, cooks use seafood to make a soup. 

As soup gets thicker, it becomes a stew.  But when does a fish soup become a chowder?  Not an easy distinction to make.  The word chowder appears to point to a thick soup made along the east coast of Canada.  First time you see the word in print is in the mid 1700's and Herman Melville uses it in his novel, Moby Dick.  He talks about towns along the east coast where you've got seafood chowder for breakfast, seafood chowder for lunch and seafood chowder for dinner, until you got to a point when you start looking at your clothing to see if fishbones are sticking out.

In Boston itself, and going north, chowders almost always have a milk base.  Starting in Rhode Island and going south, chowders are usually based on tomatoes and their juices.

It was a highly charged emotional issue.  There were actually governments in New England that passed laws saying that it was illegal to make a chowder without using milk.  Here in Bermuda they make a chowder without milk.  Is that simply because cows were never really important in Bermuda?  Or is it a political statement, a reference to the fact that not everybody in Bermuda was loyal to the King of England during the  War of Independence.  I'll have to get back to you on that.

Two quarts of fish stock or chicken stock go into a large saucepan, followed by a cup of chopped onion, cup of chopped celery.  A cup of chopped carrots.  Then in goes a chopped tomato and its juices.  A half cup of parsley, three bay leaves.  Two tablespoons of basil, two tablespoons of oregano, a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce and finally a tablespoon of rosemary.   All that is brought to a boil and simmered for thirty minutes, at which point in go two pounds of boneless, skinless fish filets that have been cut up into bite- size pieces.  The best fish for a Bermuda fish chowder is porgy, rockfish or grouper, but any mild-flavored, firm-fleshed fish will do the trick.  Ten minutes more of cooking and the chowder is ready to go into serving bowls.  Just before it goes to the table, the chef adds a touch of Bermuda Black Seal Rum and a little of Outerbridges’ Sherry pepper sauce.

The success of the revolutionary forces during the American War of Independence against England, deprived the British Navy of its ports on the east coast of North America and placed the British fleet in a somewhat insecure position.  The young American Navy was quite aggressive, and England feared that their position as ruler of the seas might soon be challenged.  So in the late 1700's England devised a plan to construct a naval fortress on Bermuda.  And by 1807, the work was well underway.  The most interesting structure is the Clocktower building.  It was meant to be a very dull simple Navy warehouse.  Ah, but the wrong plans were sent from London.  Bermuda totally by mistake got the architectural renderings that were supposed to be the British Embassy in Khartoum.  And they used those in error to produce this magnificent building.  It does really make you wonder what the British Embassy looks like in Khartoum.

The Clocktower has four faces and everybody around here calls it the “four faced liar,” simply because no one face can keep time with the others.  It has some value though; if you're late for work you can select which face you want to refer to, and the same is true if you want to leave early.  The towers are a hundred and one feet high and they have become one of Bermuda's most recognizable landmarks. 

The U.S. Navy never really gave any trouble to the Royal Naval Dockyards, but the yards were an incredible source of aggravation to the U.S.  It was from these docks that a British invasion force crossed over and attacked Washington during the War of 1812.  They actually burned down part of the White House.  It was the only time that the United States was invaded, assuming of course you exclude British rock bands and Japanese investment bankers.

When the First World War started in 1914, the Bermuda dockyards became a key element in Great Britain's defense.  And that role was repeated for both the English and the U.S. forces during the Second World War.  This yard was a major port for ship repairs and anti-submarine patrols. 

But in 1950, the British Navy closed the dockyard and it fell into a state of neglect.  Fortunately, a group of local citizens realized that the dockyard was a valuable historic property and began bringing it back to life.

The keep-yard has become the setting for the Maritime Museum, where Bermuda's maritime history is on display.  The old Cooperage where storage barrels were once made, is now the Frog And Onion Pub.  The name was a somewhat rude reference to the fact that the establishment is owned by a Frenchman, the Frog, and a Bermudian, the onion.  That seems rather unfair: onions are on the menu, but no frogs. 

Next door is the Bermuda Art Center, with regular exhibitions by local artists.  When the Clocktower was first constructed, it was regularly visited by the captain in charge and his cashier,  and housed the Naval Store Offices.  Today it is a residence for all sorts of local stores, each with its own cashier and ready to accept your charge cards.  Proving once again that the more things change, the more they are the same.

The dockyard hosts the Island Pottery, where potters pot jugs, bowls, teapots and vases to your order.  The husband’s waiting chair is a somewhat sexist element, but clearly quite functional.  There's also a craft market which sells works made by Bermudian craftsmen and women.  As well as a complete selection of locally-produced foods and beverages for tourists to take home. 

The Fourways Inn is one of Bermuda's best restaurants, and enjoys a worldwide reputation for excellent food and service.  The building was originally constructed as a private home in 1727.  In 1975, the property was purchased by Walter Sommer.  Walter was trained at the famous hotel school in Lausanne, Switzerland and spent many years developing some of the most important hotels and restaurants in the Carribean and on Bermuda.

After he got the restaurant in top shape, he began to develop a series of Bermudian food products, including an instant souffle.

WALTER SOMMER:  We discovered we'd be the first company to develop such a product.  Now the product is in a powder form.  You can have four different souffles.  That will mean that a lady or gentleman that can do the souffle without having a dirty kitchen, and a guaranteed product in twelve minutes.

WOLF:  The Bermuda Hotel and Catering College opened in 1965; today it’s part of the Bermuda College.  The school actually built its own hotel so the students could have a real working environment.  It's called the Stonington Beach Hotel, and the food and the restaurant's services are top-notch. 

Fred Ming is one of the leading instructors at the school and today he's giving me a private class.  The subject of which is his recipe for roast loin of pork with papaya stuffing.  The stuffing is made from chopped onion, garlic, sausage, bread crumbs and papaya.  A rack of pork is sliced almost in half, stuffed with a stuffing and roasted in a 375 degree oven until a meat thermometer indicates an internal temperature of 160 degrees.

FRED MING:  So that when you do sink your teeth into it, it's not going to sort of pull out any of your teeth to any extent.  It's going to be still be nice and ... nice and soft, nice and soft.

BURT WOLF:  The sauce is made from vinegar, sugar and crushed pineapple.  A little cinnamon and some brown sugar go onto two rounds of pineapple, which are then seared in a grill pan.  The pork comes out, some red cabbage goes onto a serving plate and the sauce, a slice of the stuffed pork, the pineapple rings, some carrots, a little broccoli and its ready to serve.

In 1964, Argosy Magazine ran an article that described the unexplained disappearance of an extraordinary number of ships and planes in a triangular area between Bermuda, the coast of Florida and the island of Puerto Rico.  The article told the story of a British ship named the Ellen Austin.  In 1881, the Austin came upon an abandoned vessel in the triangle; the craft was in perfect working order.  There was no crew on board.  The captain of the Austin put some of his own men onto the empty ship and instructed them to head for Nova Scotia on the coast of Canada.  A few days later, the two ships met up, and once again, the crew on the mystery ship had vanished.

The legend of the Bermuda Triangle also includes the story of the flight of five U.S. Air Force fighter planes that took off on a routine patrol from Fort Lauderdale, Florida in 1945.  At one point the flight leader of the group radioed ground control that he was lost.  The rescue plane was sent out to help.  All six planes disappeared without a trace.

Since the original publication of the story about the Bermuda Triangle, there have been dozens of additional newspaper and magazine articles, a couple of television specials and even a movie.  Eventually somebody decided to take a real close look at this material.  It happened to be a man who was the head of the library at the University of Arizona.  And he used his research skills to scientifically evaluate all of the material.  He got hold of this stuff from the 1800's.  He was able to put his hands on a copy of the military transcript of the conversation between the five fighter pilots and the ground controllers.  And he tracked down all of the stories about the triangle.  When this material is subjected to scientific analysis, the conclusion is obvious:  none of it is true.  There is nothing going on in the Bermuda Triangle that doesn't go on every place else. 

There is however, one mysterious element that remains.

Bermuda Chef Norbert Stange at the Wyndham’s Elbow Beach Resort, baked something called The Bermuda Triangle Cookie.  And there are continuing reports of their disappearance in extremely large numbers.  I felt I should investigate the situation in some detail. 

The recipe starts with four cups of heavy cream being heated in a sauce pan.  And in go four ounces of butter, four cups of sugar, and a cup of honey.  All that cooks for about five minutes.  And add in four cups of sliced almonds.  Another five minutes of cooking and the mixture is ready to be poured onto a sheet of pre-baked pastry dough that has been used to line a jelly roll pan.  Twenty minutes in a 350 degree oven, and the sheet is cut into triangles. 

And it is at this very point that the disappearances occur.

The people who came to vacation in Bermuda during the past two centuries represented hundreds of different occupations.  Businessmen and women, doctors, lawyers, factory workers, even television reporters have come here for their holidays.  And they have all shared at least one objective, and that was to leave their work at home.

Nobody paid any real attention to the occupations of the tourists, except for a small group of people who were inspired by the vision of Tom Butterfield.  Mr. Butterfield realized that not all of the tourists left their work at home.  Some of them continued their craft when they were here and actually did some of their best work on Bermuda.  Those people were artists...  as a matter of fact, some of the world's most famous artists.  Only problem was when they finished their vacation, they brought those paintings and drawings back home.  To solve that problem, the Masterworks Foundation Gallery was formed, with the objective of bringing those works back to Bermuda.

It's organized as a charitable trust and run completely by unpaid volunteers.  Some of the works in the collection have been purchased, others are here on loan.  Each of them gives you a unique look at Bermuda through the eyes of an outstanding artist. 

TOM BUTTERFIELD:  This is a work by E. Ambrose Webster; it's a large oil of a family, painted in 1922, and this is the first portrait that we've ever been able to find of any Bermudian, black or white, painted on a non-commissioned purpose.  And we were very excited to find it.  This is a work by Jack Bush.  What's exciting about it is that Jack Bush to many Canadians is known as an abstract painter, and it is, it's a work that is just so charged with energy and light and life and vitality, that we love having it.  And just one ... a little anecdote, I had to run the London Marathon to raise the money to get it, but it was worth every mile.  This is a work by Ogden Pleisner; when we originally found it, it was titled The Mango Tree; however it is more correctly the PauPau tree, and just in interest, we use paupau here on this island to thicken our fish chowders.  Pleisner has no other peers in the watercolor medium, except for obviously the likes of Winslow Homer, so having six in our collection means a lot to us.  And he is nothing less than genius.

BURT WOLF:  The great American master Winslow Homer visited Bermuda and produced some twenty works.  This picture, called Bermuda Settlers, illustrated Homer's vision of the wild hogs that were found on Bermuda by the early English settlers.  The hogs we think had been left here by the Spanish explorers who had to stop back later and use their increased numbers to resupply their ships.  Good food has always inspired good art.

Bermuda's first settlers built cedar-framed all- timbered houses that were thatched with palmetto leaves.  During the early 1700's, the desire to conserve cedar for the profitable construction of ships led to the increased use of limestone.  Whatever material was used, the design had to meet the very unique environmental demands of these islands.

First of all, as the original settlers knew only too well, having arrived here as a result of a horrendous ocean storm, this island can from time to time be in the path of some difficult weather.  Second of all, there is no source of fresh water, save that which descends from the heaven in the form of rain.  And finally there are fabulous ocean breezes that come off the sea and you wouldn't want to miss them during the warm summer months.

The result of these elemental forces is an architectural style that is truly unique to Bermuda, that is valid today as it was almost three hundred years ago when it was originally developed.  Logs were used to build a basic frame, slices of limestone called slates were layered down like dominoes.  The bottom slate went on first, the bottom limestone layers went on in a way that formed a set of steps.  The final form was sealed with a wash of lime.  Downpipes pulled the raindrops together and directed them to a holding tank dug into the rock next to the building.  That was the basic plan for the original structures and even today, Bermuda's buildings are topped with a roof that acts as a giant rain pipe.  Even the chimneys are topped with forms that are designed to save rainwater.  The only major difference appears to be that these days the storage tanks are under the buildings rather than next to them.  The walls of the buildings are thick and sturdy and well suited to withstand the occasional passing storm.  They're also ideal for capturing the cool and gentle breezes that come off the ocean.  Around each window are a set of shutters that help contain the cool air.  Many buildings have open porches that give the building more roof area for the water works and a shaded area for outdoor living.  Bermuda's limestone met the most important needs of the island's early home builders, but it’s not a material that lends itself to architectural detail.  There are few decorative elements in the buildings of Bermuda.  On the other hand, they have a certain sculptural quality with clean crisp lines that reflect the ever-changing light patterns.

In many ways, the architecture of Bermuda is extremely natural and therefore very pleasing.  It’s done a good job of withstanding both the physical and critical tests of time.  Well, that's our report from Bermuda.  Please join us next time as we travel around the world looking for good things to eat and the reasons why people eat them.  I'm Burt Wolf.

Burt Wolf's Table: Halifax - #222

BURT WOLF:   Halifax ... on the east coast of Canada.  Surrounded by clear clean waters that produce some of the world's finest seafood.  It's the place to look at the magnificent, natural charm of North America.  To learn how to take the meat out of a lobster...  Cook up some great tasting and easy recipes...  And find out what politicians and crabs have in common.  So join me in Halifax at Burt Wolf's Table.

The first Europeans to see the coast of Nova Scotia were probably the Vikings who stopped by during the eleventh century.  But they were just visiting.  The first fellow to drop in with the idea of claiming the land for a European king or queen was the explorer John Cabot, who arrived here from England in 1497. 

They used Cabot's voyages as the basis of their claim of discovery.  They believed that the area was destined to become New Scotland, in the same way that they believed the shores to the south were destined to become New England. 

And so in 1749 Colonel Edward Cornwallis showed up here with 2,500 British Colonists, and they proceeded to build a classic replica of an English town.  They called in Halifax.

He built it on the world's second largest natural harbor ... the British being ever-intent on ruling the waves.  And he reproduced everything he could to remind him of jolly old England ... including the food.  Roasts, puddings, biscuits, double-crusted fruit pies, and an elegant tea service that is still in fashion.

Every day the mayor of Halifax has an open tea.  All of the citizens are invited in the hope that they will come and speak their mind.

The town itself and the surrounding countryside with its coastal villages presents some of the most beautiful parts of North America's east coast.  Bill Goddard is a native of Halifax and a pilot with Cougar Copters. 

BILL GODDARD:   When the first explorers came to Halifax from the sea, this is what they saw ... it's a fabulous coast ... that strip of land down there is called McNab's Island.  It looks beautiful now ... but in the old days ... if they caught a deserter from the British Navy they'd hang him from the gallows right there on the shore.  As the other British ships would come in they'd see the deserter hanging there ... it was like a stop sign that said “don't desert here.”

BURT WOLF:   Um ... that's a pretty effective sign I bet.  (LAUGHS)

BILL GODDARD:   The sea is central to the story of Halifax ... that's the world's largest natural harbor ... and it's ice-free all year ... the only one that's bigger is in Australia.  That's Peggy's Cove ... it's a fishing village that sits right on the granite rocks ... it looks just the way it always has.  They say it's the most photographed fishing village in the world.

You know, Captain Kidd buried his treasure around here ...

BURT WOLF:   Um.

BILL GODDARD:   There are a number of groups trying to figure out how to find it.  This was a big area for pirates.

BURT WOLF:   Sure, they must have loved it.  After a tough season of sinking ships and stealing treasures and looting and killing ... you know, there's a lot of pressure to being a pirate ... it must have been really nice to come up here and mellow out ... and relax in a seaside village.

But it looks like most of your visitors are families just relaxing or couples taking time off.

BILL GODDARD:   True.  Or lovers of good food -- like you.

BURT WOLF:   I'm definitely a food lover in terms of eating.  But I'm even more interested in food folklore and history.  And as I look at Nova Scotia's past ... I see a very strong New England influence.

The original French settlers to arrive in Nova Scotia called themselves Acadians ... after an ancient Greek word that meant “dwellers in the land of innocence.”  They had been the first European colonists in the area ... but by 1755 they were living on territory controlled by the British.  And there were ten thousand Acadians.

Now, that made the British nervous.  They were afraid that the Acadians were going to side with the French in the constant Anglo-French wars of the period.  And so the British troops gathered up all of the the Acadian families and forced them out of Nova Scotia. 

They scattered them all over North America ... some as far south as New Orleans.  As a matter of fact, the people in the New Orleans area who are known as cajuns are actually the descendents of the Acadians who were forced out of this area.  And the British took the farms that belonged to the Acadians, which just happened to be on the best farm land in the area, and sold them to loyal British subjects in New England.

That influx of New Englanders became even greater during the American Revolution, when thirty thousand people loyal to the king of England moved up here. 

At one point in time there were so many people from New England in Nova Scotia that they represented two-thirds of the local population.  And they gave the cooking of the area a distinctly American colonial flavor.

There are recipes all over Nova Scotia that clearly come from kitchens of eighteenth century Virginia and the Carolinas.

The local hearts are definitely Canadian.  But part of the local stomachs came up from down South.

The town of Halifax has a number of restaurants along the waterfront that have become well-known for their seafood cookery.  Perhaps the most famous is called The Upper Deck.  The chef is Chris Profit.  And one of his signature dishes is called Upper Deck Lobster.

Chris starts the dish by removing the meat from a lobster that was cooked by boiling.

CHRIS PROFIT:   Son of a gun ... put him up on his head with his legs ... like hold it back.

WOLF:   Um-hmm.

CHRIS PROFIT:   Off come his legs.  Take his tail ... just twist it from the body ... set that guy aside ... this is gonna push down cause you're gonna ... (CRACKING SOUNDS) ... crack on one side ... cracked on the center on the other side.  That's the tail.  Now, on the claws ... just push down and snap ... and off come the joints.  One, two.  This is like a pump.  Pull 'er out ... off she goes ... same action ... pumpin' up the jam ... out comes the click ... turn her over so the claws down ... line up her ... crack it open and out comes your claw.  And that's the lobster out of the shell.

BURT WOLF:   Then he crushes two tablespoons of black pepper into small pieces ... using the bottom of one of his sauce pans.  A little tarragon ... the black pepper ... the lobster meat ... and a splash of white wine cooked together in a sauce pan for a few minutes.  Cooked pasta is added.  A third of a cup of cream.  Three minutes of high heat to thicken the sauce, and it's ready to serve.

Until recently lobsters were so plentiful that all you had to do was walk along the beach and pick them up.  A British visitor to Nova Scotia in the mid-1800s wrote a letter back home to London describing the fact that there were so many lobsters all over the beaches of this area that farmers were picking them up by the thousands and using them as fertilizer.  Hm-um.  Boy, how times have changed.

It as the introduction of high-speed transportation that gave fresh lobster a much bigger audience ... and increased both its popularity ... and unfortunately its price.

It's important, however, that lobsters be alive when they're cooked.  As soon as a lobster dies ... its uncooked flesh begins to attract the bacteria that can be very dangerous.  Lobsters should be moving about when you start the cooking process.  The restaurant lobster tank is a really great idea.

Nutritionally, lobsters are a good source of low-fat protein ... they contain some calcium ... and much less cholesterol then we used to think.  Good stuff!

An American statesman named John Hay once pointed out that he believed politicians were very similar to crabs.  They both seem to be coming when they're actually going ... and seem to be going when they're actually coming.

There are over four thousand different species of crab ... and the one thing they all have in common is that they are all edible.  North America's fortunate in having more different types of crab than anywhere else in the world ... and we respond to that bit of good luck by making crab our second most popular shellfish.  The only shellfish that we eat more of is shrimp.

Most of the crab that we get at home is pre-cooked and pre-cleaned.  But it always isn't as pre-cleaned as we'd like it to be.  It's a good idea to sift through your pre-cooked crab meat ... and make sure that all of the bits of shell are out of it before you start using it in a recipe.

If you're going to buy live crab in your supermarket ... always pick out the ones that are more active.  And the heavier the crab the better.  Make sure the claws are bound and can't grab at you.  And remember, crabs are cannibals and will eat each other ... so don't leave two of them alone in the same place. 

And like lobster, crab must be cooked while it is still alive in order to be safe to eat.

The waters of Nova Scotia produce an enormous amount of seafood.  The vast majority comes from the clear, clean seas ... just the way Mother Nature set things up.  There's also a farm- raised source.  British farms have been around for thousands of years ... and the people of Nova Scotia put them to good use. And so do the local cooks.

Alan Johnson is the executive chef at the Upper Deck Restaurant in Halifax.  Today he's using the local seafood to make a chowder.  A little butter goes into a saucepan ... followed by chopped celery, chopped onions, and chopped pre-cooked bacon.  That's cooked together for a few minutes.

Meanwhile, in another saucepan, stock is heated and used to cook some haddock, baby shrimp and baby clams.  A little flour goes into the vegetable mixture to absorb the butter.  That's cooked for a moment ... then the fish-cooking liquid is added to the vegetables and whisked in.  Three cooked potatoes go in ... the fish goes in ... some parsley ... white pepper ... paprika ... and cayenne.  That's it!

(DRUMMING)

By the middle of the 1700s, it was apparent that France and England were about to go into a final contest for the posession of North America.  In preparation for this military conflict, the British founded the city of Halifax, and the Halifax Citadel was constructed on a hill overlooking the town.

It was built in four stages.  The first one was constructed as a defense against the French and the local native tribes.  The second one was set up to defend against the troops and the American Revolution.  The third one was actually installed in the fear that the troops of Napoleon Bonaparte might show up in the New World.  And the fourth one was once again to defend against American troops who might come up here during the war of 1812.

My favorite piece of equipment at the Halifax Citadel is this stove which would sit out on the ramparts next to the cannons.  A convenient little hot plate for preparing a quick cup of tea?  Not quite.  That stove was used to heat a cannonball until it was red hot.  And the hot ball would be fired at a wooden target.  The heat of the ball would set the target on fire.  It was perfect for a ship.  The wooden decks ... the sails ... the masts... they'd burst into flame.

The heated cannonball was called a Hotshot.  And that's where we got the word “hotshot” from.

In 1794 England's Prince Edward was installed as Commander of the Halifax Citadel in Nova Scotia.  By far, his most important military project was the improvement of the Citadel's defenses. 

In order to get the job done, they imported a group of workers from the British colony of Jamaican in the Caribbean.  They were known as the Maroons.  When Canadian historians think about the Maroons, they think about a group of people with such extraordinary strength that they could move these huge stones and construct the Citadel. 

When I think about the Maroons I think about an even more important achievement.  An achievement which is still affecting tens of thousands of people in the United States of America.

When the British arrived in Jamaica, they were greeted by the guns of the Maroons.  Slaves that had escaped from the Spanish.  The Maroons were fabulous fighters ... and no one has ever been able to fully subdue them.

Between battles with the British the Maroons would hunt for wild pig.  When they caught one they would cook some of it right away ... but preserve the remainder in a mixture of very hot peppers wrapped in a banana leaf.  Next time there was a break in the battle ... they'd take some out and cook it over some hot coals. 

The result of this technique is something called jerk pork... rapidly becoming one of the most popular foods in North America.  And we owe it all to the Maroons.

The Maroons were not the only non-British group that the British put to work in order to develop their North American colonies.  The British liked to do the concept ... and have someone else do the work.

Accordingly, it was an English nobleman named George Dunk who drew up the plans for the British settlement of Nova Scotia in the mid-1700s.  Thankfully, his name was not used for the city.  Instead, they chose his title:  Lord Halifax.

But the British subjects who colonized the area were not very good at farming and so they sent word back to the King of England and asked him to ship over some German farmers who had a reputation for doing things right agriculturally.  As a result ... during the 1750's a couple of hundred German farmers moved to Nova Scotia and settled down in an area ... just south of Halifax known as Lunenberg.

The Germans proved to be excellent farmers and equally good ship builders.  During the days of sail, Lunenberg was famous as the village of wooden ships and iron men.  Today, Lunenberg is one of the most picturesque seaside towns in North America.  Still carrying on its nautical traditions ... looking much as it has for the past two hundred years ... and cooking with a distinctly German accent.

Potato salads, herring dishes, sauerkraut ... and rye breads.  The rye breads come with a local superstition.  A Lunenberg baker would never turn a rye bread over.  They feel that it would temp fate to capsize a ship at sea.  And ... uh . that's not so good for the bread either.

Nova Scotia is Latin for New Scotland.  It's the ancestral home of the Native American Micmac tribe ... the original French colony in North America ... a major colonial outpost for the English ... and a welcome residence for tens of thousands of immigrants from the United States.  And  a joyous haven for Germans who escaped world poverty to come here in the mid-1700s.

The only group that had a consistently terrible time coming to New Scotland were the Scots.  They were forced to come here in the middle of the 1800s when the clan system in Scotland just collapsed.  They were poor ... they were uneducated... and they had a really difficult time adjusting to the New World.

But with traditional Scottish determination and frugality ... they managed to hang on, and eventually they brought their traditional foods to the area.

Their beloved oats took hold in the soil ... mills were built ... and before long, oatmeal ... oat cakes ... oat breads ... and any other oat-based recipe that you could think of became part of the cooking of Nova Scotia. 

The Scottish are well known for their open hospitality ... and that affects the kinds of recipes they like to use.  Particularly true when it comes to baking.   They like to use quick cakes and quick breads that are made with baking soda.

I once spent some time with a famous Scottish cook who said that she would only do cakes and recipes that could be prepared in the time that it took someone to come up her driveway and sit down in the living room.  And she didn't even have a very long driveway.

I came through the door ... the cake went into the oven ... and fifteen minutes later we sat down to tea.  Scottish hospitality.

The Silver Spoon Restaurant in Halifax is famous for its warm and hospitable atmosphere.  It's owned by Deanna Silver ... who was forced into the restaurant business because her friends loved her baking.  A good example is her blueberry oatmeal muffins.

A cup of oatmeal goes into a bowl, plus a cup of hot water.  Zest of an orange and a cup of orange juice.  A little vegetable oil is sprayed into a muffin tin ... then paper cups go in.  Five ounces of butter or margarine go into an electric mixer and are creamed together with one cup of brown sugar.  Four eggs are added.  And the oatmeal / juice mixture. 

The dry ingredients are mixed together.  Two and a half cups of flour ... two teaspoons of baking soda ... two teaspoons of baking powder ... and tablespoon of salt . .two tablespoons of vanilla extract.  The dry ingredients go in ... two cups of blueberries ... everything is gently mixed together ... and spooned out into the muffin tin.  That bakes at 350 degree for twenty-five minutes and the muffins are ready.

Oats are the berries of a cultivated grass that is native to Central Europe.  They've been grown by European farmers since about 1500 B.C.  Oats grow best in cool wet climates like England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.  In Scotland, oats are the staff of life.  Scottish cooks will take oats and put them into cookies and cakes and breads and stuffings and just about anything else they can think of.

I knew a Scottish cook who would toast oats and put it on her children's ice cream.  The madness for oats in North America got started a number of years ago when a study at Northwestern University outside of Chicago indicated that two ounces of oats or oat bran each day would reduce your cholesterol.  It's actually the soluble fiber in the oats that does the job.  It turns into a gel as it passes through your body and reduces your cholesterol.

Two cups of breakfast style oatmeal ... or two medium-sized oat muffins contain the two ounces of oat fiber that you need.

But remember, if you're getting your oat bran in the form of oat muffins ... you want oat muffins that are made with a low level of saturated fat.  Saturated fat can increase the cholesterol in your body and cancel out the effect of the oat bran.  Oat bran only works as part of a low saturated fat diet.

Halifax was founded by the English in 1749. Shortly thereafter, a law was passed which forbade the immigration of Irish to the colony.  Nevertheless, within ten years, one out of every three people living in Halifax was of Irish ancestry.

By the end of the 1700's, virtually all of the anti-Irish legislation had disappeared.  As a matter of fact, British royalty was attending the local St. Patrick's Day celebrations.  On August 31st, 1843 the Church of Our Lady of Sorrows was erected in one day.  Two thousand parishioners showed up and built the entire structure by dinner time. 

Today, ten percent of Nova Scotia's citizens are of Irish ancestry and their foods are eaten throughout the community.  Besides the potatoes, corn beef and cabbage, soda bread ... and green colored St. Patrick's Day specialties ... the Irish were responsible for many of the really good beef and pork recipes.  And the idea of having porridge for breakfast, which is a really good idea.  Because breakfast is still our most important meal.

At the Compass Rose Inn in the town of Lunenberg, Nova Scotia ... Roger Pike and his wife Susanne have taken an old recipe from Susanne's Irish heritage ... and used it to give new meaning to the St. Patrick's Day idea of “the wearing of the green.”

It's an ice cream cake and it's quite frankly irresistible.  Start with a cup of oreo cookie crumbs ... add two tablespoons of melted margarine and mix the two together with a fork.  That mixture gets pressed into the bottom of springform pan to make a crust.  And in goes a quart of chocolate chip mint ice cream ... green of course.  That gets patted down to form a layer.  A little creme de menthe -- optional.  A second layer made from one quart of ice cream ... into the freezer for three hours.  When it comes out, run a knife along the inside edge ... remove the pan ... put your slices onto a plate ... and decorate the serving with chocolate sauce and whipped cream.  Fabulous!  And that's no blarney!

The word “mint” comes from an ancient Greek legend about a nymph named Mintha.  She was kissing the god Pluto when Pluto's wife came in and discovered them.  Pluto's wife, by the way, was a goddess of considerable power in her own right ... and she was furious.  And so she crushed Mintha into the earth.

Pluto took pity on Mintha and saw that she survived in the sweet smell of the plant.  Elizabethans in England love this story ... and they planted mint along their garden paths.  As they walked along, their feet would crush the mint and perfume the area in which they walked.  That perfume, by the way, comes from a chemical called menthol which is found in the stems and leaves of the plant.

If I remember my menthol commercials properly, that meant that the Elizabethans had feet that were kissing sweet.

In 1970 ... the City of Halifax had a plan to demolish the old waterfront buildings here ... and construct an expressway.  What their plan didn't plan for were the walls of the building behind me.  That's the old Privateers’ Warehouse.  And the walls are over two feet thick.  The wrecker's ball ... it just bounced off them like they were a backboard at an NBA game. 

Instead, the citizens of Halifax constructed what is known as the Historic Properties.  It preserves the look and feel of the place as it was in the 1800's ... and seven of the oldest structures on the waterfront.  This was the city's commercial center during the 1800's.  Today, it's home to a maritime museum that tells  the story of this area's four hundred year old relationship to the sea.

There's a shopping area ... some excellent restaurants ... the dock for Bluenose II...  a replica of the most famous Grand Banks fishing vessel, and so powerful a symbol of Canada's relationship to the sea ... that you find a picture of it on the Canadian dime. 

They've also held on to the last remaining Korvette...  The H.M.C.S. Sackville.  It was this class of ship that escorted the supply convoys across the Atlantic during the Second World War.  And it tried to protect them from the German U-boats.

(RINGING)

As part of preserving its past, the Historic Properties have included a town crier.

TOWN CRIER:   Oyez... oyez...

BURT WOLF:   The idea of a town crier has been around for well over a thousand years.  They were the original anchormen ... Brokaw, Rather, Jennings, Shaw ... the town criers were there first.  They gave people the news ... but most importantly, they warned everyone about impending dangers ... and with each new danger they altered their warning.

Peter Cox is the town crier for the city of Halifax ... and he is sending out the word on what Nova Scotia can tell us about the relationship of good food to good health.

TOWN CRIER:   Take heed up ... and listen.  Many small meals during the day ... especially for you ... than just two or three big ones.  Try and get more than half your daily calories from fresh fruits and vegetables ... grains ... and cereals.  Lobsters ... hm ... excellent low-fat protein with much less cholesterol than we once thought.  Soluble fibers from oat bran or any other source can help control cholesterol levels.  But remember ... there are no magic foods ... oats only do their job effectively when they are part of a proper balanced low-fat diet.

(APPLAUSE)

BURT WOLF:   That's all from Halifax, Nova Scotia.  Please join us next time as we travel around the world looking for good things to eat and drink at Burt Wolf's Table.

Burt Wolf's Table: St. Croix - #221

BURT WOLF:   St. Croix, in the U.S. Virgin Islands.  Relaxed and easy-going with one of the most beautiful old towns in the Caribbean.  We'll tour a fascinating botanical garden ... find out what the galley cooks on sailboats can teach us about making life easier in our kitchens... and learn some recipes that are simple to prepare and taste great.  So join me on the island of St. Croix at Burt Wolf's Table.

During his second voyage in 1493, Columbus came upon this group of islands and named them the Virgin Islands after the legend of St. Ursula.  The story tells of a pagan prince who demanded the hand of Ursula in marriage.  Ursula was the beautiful daughter of the King of Britain ... but she was not too happy about marrying a pagan prince because he had pledged herself to a life of saintliness. 

Anyway, to save her old man and his kingdom ... she agreed to marry the prince.  However, there was a catch.  Eleven thousand of the most beautiful virgins from the two kingdoms had to come and live with her for three years.  And during those three years she trained them into an army of amazons.

Well, when the pagan prince heard about this. he was furious!  And he took his own army and went into battle against the amazons.  The battle is said to have taken place during the year 238 outside the German city of Cologne.  And, unfortunately, all of the virgins were martyred.

When Columbus saw the beauty of these islands they reminded him of the legend of St. Ursula ... and he called them the Virgin Islands.  What a story!  And what a group of islands.  There are actually dozens of islands in the group, but the three most famous are St. Croix, St. John and St. Thomas.

This is St. Croix.  It's the largest of the U.S. Virgin Islands.  Twenty-six miles long and six miles wide ... with a surface of about eighty square miles.  And most of those square miles are flat enough for farming, which is not true for St. Thomas and St. John.  As a result, St. Croix developed as an agricultural base.

At first it was home to the Arowak, Taino and Caribe tribes that had come up here from South America.  Then the Spanish came in ... but when they had trouble controlling their widespread interests in the Caribbean it gave a chance to the French.  The Knights of Malta opened up a branch office ... the Dutch were here ... and for over two hundred years, the Danish were in charge.

The area was known as the Danish West Indies until 1917 when the United Sates government plunked down twenty-five million dollars in gold and purchased the property from Denmark.  Acre for acre it's the most money that the federal government has ever paid for land ... but it was well worth it.

The main town on the island of St. Croix is Christiansted.  And it is one of the most beautiful and unspoiled towns in the Caribbean.  During the 1700's it was a major port in the sugar trade.  And many of the buildings that were constructed during that period are still standing.  It's the kind of town that lends itself to a walking tour which usually starts from the old Scale House.

Today, it's the home of the Visitor's Bureau.  But in the old days it was the spot where commodities for commercial shipment came in to get a true weight on the official scale.  True weight ... a subject dear to my heart ... and to my heart doctor.  And though I am technically not a commodity for sale ... I am very much interested in my true weight.

What someone should or should not weigh these days is certainly open to debate.  When I was a kid, the Metropolitan Life Insurance scales were the last word and whatever they said, we believed.  But these days there are number of other organizations with very dependable information ... and I leave the determination of your proper weight to you.

I will use the Scale House to give you some tips on how to check your proper weight.  First of all, if you're really serious about knowing what you're weighing you should use a balanced scale ... you know, the one with a bar and a couple of little weights that slide up and back.  That's much more accurate than a spring scale.

Second, you should try to weigh yourself on the same day of the week each week and at the same time of that day.  Your weight can really bounce around within the day and within the days of the week.  I always weigh more on Sunday night.

There's a general rule of thumb as to how many calories you should take in each day to maintain, gain or lose weight.  Every pound of body weight requires ten calories per day to stay in place.  So if your proper weight is a hundred and fifty pounds ... fifteen hundred calories per day will keep you there.  If you take in more calories, your weight will gradually go up.  If you take in fewer calories, your weight will gradually go down.

But please remember, ten calories per pound per day is just a general rule.  Your exercise level can have a great effect.  It's just a way of keeping the picture in scale.

Directly across the street from the old Scale House is the old Customs House ... where they keep track of old customs, like saying “please” and “thank you,” eating together like a family ... but most important ... being a member of Congress and not being interested in ripping everybody off for your own benefit or the benefit of your friends.  You know, those old customs that are so hard to come by.

These days the building is the home of the National Park Service, who are doing a great job watching out after the old fort and the area around it.

The fort was built by the Danish in the 1740's as part of a defense plan for the port.  Never actually saw any military action because the Danish knew that it wouldn't hold up very well.  Every time there was a powerful wind, it fell apart.  It's an interesting place to visit and it has some great views of the area.

Just down the street is the Christian Hendricks Market Square.  It was set up in 1735, and every Saturday it is packed with farmers and vendors ... .all whom are offering their produce and goods at real bargain prices.  Unfortunately, this is not Saturday ... it's actually Thursday ... I'm here ... my camera crew is here ...that's pretty much it.  There was a chicken here earlier but she left.  On Saturdays, however, this place is awesome.

(CHICKEN CLUCK)

Christiansted also has some excellent places to eat and drink.   There's the Top Hat, which has been run by Bent Rasmussen and his wife Hannah, who came here from Denmark in the 1960's.  This restaurant is probably the strongest Danish influence still on the island. 

The town is filled with small eateries that occupy picturesque courtyards.  St. Croix, like all of the U.S. Virgin Islands, is a duty-free port with great places to shop. 

One of the most interesting is the store belonging to clothing designer Wayne James. 

His real love is anything that reflects the history of the Virgin Islands.  He's even developed a line of seasonings. 

There are a number of elements that give each regional cuisine its distinct flavors.  And the most important are the seasonings.  When we think about the flavor of Louisiana, what comes through most often is cayenne.  In Italy it's oregano ... and sesame is regularly associated with the taste of China.

Mike Smith is the executive chef at the Brass Parrot Restaurant at the Buccaneer Resort here on St. Croix.  And he's been studying the use of seasoning by world latitude.  He sees a pattern of spices based on the area's relationship to the equator ... and he is testing his theory in his kitchen.

MIKE SMITH:   Hello!  Welcome.

BURT WOLF:   Now, normally Mike cooks in a regular restaurant kitchen ... but as an accommodation to the shortness of my visit and the really great weather ... today we're gonna do our cooking on the beach.  Now ... what we're gonna cook is a fillet of fish that's being flavored by the seasonings that are traditional to this area's world latitude.

The seasoning mixture is made from a half cup of chopped peanuts ... a half cup of ground coffee beans ... and a quarter cup of curry powder.  Yeah ... I said ground coffee beans ... I think you'll just have to trust me on this one.  The fish filets get coated with that mixture on both sides.

MIKE SMITH:   To the oven, Burt.  Ten minutes three hundred and fifty degrees.

BURT WOLF:   Right. 

A white bean stew goes onto the plate.  The fish returns from the oven and goes onto the beans . the dish is finished off with two sauces.  One made from a puree of cooked red peppers ... mixed with a little sherry ... and the other from yellow peppers.

When Mike Smith first started cooking at the Buccaneer Resort he noticed that dried beans and lentils were a regular part of the diet ... and they had been a part of the diet of the people on St. Croix for hundreds of years. 

The reason is very simple ... the people who came here came by way of a long ocean voyage. And when they got to this island community they had to be sure that their food supply would store for long periods of time without spoiling.  They also had to get the most nutrition for the least costs.  Dried peas and lentils will store indefinitely.  And when it comes to good nutrition for low cost, dried peas and lentils are unbeatable.

Today, Mike's making an orange and lentil stew.  A little oil goes into a saute pan ... some small pieces of carrots, celery and onion are added.  Cook together for about five minutes.  Two cups of lentils and a cup of chicken stock.  Everything simmers for an hour and a half.  Meanwhile, an orange is sectioned and some basil leaves are sliced.  Both are added to the lentils when they come of the heat.  And, finally, the juice of lemon.  Nice dish.

The lentil is one of the first foods brought under cultivation.  The ancient Greeks had them as part of their diet ... and so did the Romans.  Lentils are very valuable from the point of view of good nutrition.  But they are also very inexpensive.  In ancient times if you became rich but still ate lentils it was a sign that you had not lost touch with reality and become a snob.

Today almost all of the lentils available in the United States come from the northwest ... from an area that spans between the border between Washington State and Idaho.  It's called the Palouse, which is a French word meaning “green lawn.”  Not a bad name for an area that's very busy growing peas and lentils. 

Lentils are packed with potassium and protein and a substance called foliate or folic acid.  A lot of research has come in during the last few years that indicate the importance of folic acid in the diet of pregnant women.  And there are group of organizations that are interested in the health of the United States ... like the March of Dimes ... who very busy spreading the information on how important folic acid is. 

The Bible says that Esau sold his birthright for a bowl of lentil stew.  Now, from a financial point of view, that may not have been the best deal.  But when it comes to nutrition, Esau was moving in the right direction.

The Danish purchased St. Croix from the French in 1733.  They were looking for good agritcultural land for the development of sugar plantations ... and boy, were they right on target. 

St. Croix's rich soil and tropical weather are ideal for plants.  These days there is virtually no sugar grown on the island ... but the environment is put to great use at the St. George Village Botanical Garden.  The gardens were an Arowak tribal village in one hundred A.D. ... then a Danish sugar plantation ... a cattle ranch ... and since 1972, the Botanical Garden.

The garden's sixteen acres of lush tropical vegetation are looked after by Ken Jones ... the horticulturalist of the facility. 

KEN JONES:   This is an interesting tree also.  This strange looking thing that I'm holding in my hand looks like a sausage ... actually it's the seed pod off of this tree. 

BURT WOLF:   A sausage tree.  What a wonderful idea.  Now, what you need over here is a pizza tree right next to the sausage tree and I bet you Domino would put up the money for the research.

KEN JONES:   I thought it was being funded by a cheese company.

(LAUGHTER)

BURT WOLF:   What else is growing along here?

KEN JONES:   Right now we're in the cactus garden ... and we have over a hudnred different species of cacti and succulents in here.  This particular plant is an Agave ... and it's the source of sisle hemp.

BURT WOLF:   Cause they make a sisle rug from ... 

KEN JONES:   Uh-huh.

BURT WOLF:   Interesting.

KEN JONES:   And also it's the source of tequila as well.

(WHISTLING “TEQUILA” ... LAUGHTER)

KEN JONES:   Next, we're gonna take a look at a tree over on the other side that has a really interesting history behind it.  It's called a Fish Poison tree ... and the Indians used to mash up the leaves of this tree and then throw it in a pond containing fish.  aN alkaloid in the leaves would stun the fish ... they'd raise up to the surface, float ... and the Indians would be able to take them home for dinner.

BURT WOLF:   It's like nature's fish net.

KEN JONES:   Exactly.

(LAUGHTER)

BURT WOLF:   What an extraordinary thing.

KEN JONES:   Exactly.

BURT WOLF:   The slogan on the license plates of the U.S. Virgin Islands reads "The American Paradise."  And one thing that makes you feel that you've arrived in a bliss-filled environment are the flowers.  There are yellow trumpet flowers, hibiscus, bougainvillea; it's like living in the center of a bouquet ... with each flower contributing its sweet perfume.

Flowers have always been a great source of beauty in man's environment, as well as the origin of many of our perfumes.  But flowers have also been an important part of gastronomy.  The different aroma of each flower has a culinary significance. 

It's the aroma-filled nectar of a flower that gives honey its flavor and color.  There are over three hundred honeys available ... and each one comes from a different flower.  The blossoms that the bees visit affect the color range.  It goes from nearly colorless to dark brown.  And the flavors vary from light and mild to quite intense.  As a general rule, the lighter the color of the honey, the milder the flavor.

The most common floral source for honey in the United States is clover.  But you'll also find orange blossom ... wild lower ... tupelo ... alfalfa ... and buckwheat.  Alfalfa and buckwheat ... interesting ... never really occurred to me that honey was named after the Little Rascals. 

Honey has an enormous color range and each of those colors are associated with a different flavor.  The Bible says that paradise is the land of milk and honey.  And that's because milk and honey are the only two foods produced by other animal life forms that are ready to eat for human beings.  And I guess “no cooking necessary” was always a little bit of paradise.

The cone-shaped towers that dot the landscape of St. Croix are monumental reminders of the island's agricultural past.  They are the remains of windmills that were used to power grinders that crushed sugar cane.  

When the Danish brought St. Croix from the French, they turned it into one of the most important sugar-producing colonies in the Caribbean.  Europe had developed an almost insatiable sweet tooth.  And the sugar plantations of the West Indies became the source of their satisfaction.  It also became the source of extraordinary wealth for the planters.

Today, on the west end of St. Croix there is an excellent restoration of a plantation from the 1700's known as Estate Whim.  It has a team of well-informed guides to take you through the property and explain its history.

THELMA CLARK:   Now, in those days ... they didn't have machinery to cut the sugar cane ... people actually had to do it themselves.  And I can remember as a child ... I did a lot of tying the bundles of sugar cane where my mother had leased some land from the Shabirs.  And, I tell you, that was a lot of work.

Now all you do when that sugar cane is ripe ... you get a knife ... of course, in my days I didn't need a  knife ... because I was young and my teeth was good ...

BURT WOLF:   (LAUGHS)

THELMA CLARK:   Today I need a knife.  But in those days you just peel it ... and you throw away the top ... and you suck the juice from it.

BURT WOLF:   Oh, yeah.

THELMA CLARK:   And you got your sugar juice.

BURT WOLF:   Beautiful.

THELMA CLARK:   Right.

(CHICKEN CROWS)

THELMA CLARK:   Now, they would feed the sugar cane through these rollers which crushes the sugar cane ... and it extract the juice.

BURT WOLF:   The rollers were powered by the windmill.

THELMA CLARK:   That's right.

BURT WOLF:   The juices would come out.

THELMA CLARK:   Um-hmm.

BURT WOLF:   And drain away.

THELMA CLARK:   That's right ... to a different division.  And then it will go again to another boiling house ... but there it remains there to be crystalized ...

BURT WOLF:   First it was put into big vats and boiled?

THELMA CLARK:   That's right ... uh-huh.  And you will see that when you go to the Great House.

BURT WOLF:   Alright.  Let's go to the Great House.  (PAUSE)  On days when there was no wind there would be ... uh ... horses ...

THELMA CLARK:   Oh, yes.  Animals such as ox and donkey mules and so on ... helped to do that when the wind was slow.  Now, going up this stairway here to the gallery ... planters and traders would come up the stairway and they would do their business in here. 

Now, we're entering into the dining room.  Now, this Great House was not built typical West Indian.  It is built European style.  Now, as we step into the other room which is the front room ... I'd like to point out ... these rocker chairs.  They are one of our local West Indian furniture.  They were made from the mahogany here and caned here.

Now, this is a child's rocker.

BURT WOLF:   Oh, that's so cute!

THELMA CLARK:   It is.  And both of these are the lady's rocker.  And the huge one is the gentleman's rocker.

BURT WOLF:   Uh-huh.  It's like the three little bears. 

THELMA CLARK:   That's right.

BURT WOLF:   There's different sized seat for each people.

THELMA CLARK:   That's true.

BURT WOLF:   I never saw that.

THELMA CLARK:   Good.  I'd also like you to notice the upside-down tray ceiling.  You see, back in those days they had no air condition ... and the height, which is sixteen and a half to seventeen feet ... the outer walls were three feet thick.  So all that made it easy for the air to flow.  And even in the summer months, this house is fairly nice and cool.

BURT WOLF:   So if you design a house properly and build it properly you save all that energy of the electric ...

THELMA CLARK:   Exactly.

BURT WOLF:   ... air conditioning.

THELMA CLARK:   Um-hmm.

BURT WOLF:   And the Whim Estate is not the only property on St. Croix with a fascinating history ... the Buccaneer Resort is a classic Caribbean property in the great tradition of the tropical resort. 

In 1653 this area was the site of the castle of Martel.  Martel was a Knight of Malta who decided to set up his west coast office on St. Croix.  It was set up on the back of the hill facing the area that's now the pool.  Of course, there was no pool at the time.  Guys like Martel wouldn't even take a bath, much less go swimming.  And the reason he set it up on the back was because he wanted to hide it from the pirates who were sailing along in the front.  Those days were tough for knights.

When the Danes bought the island in the 1700's, the Danish Governor built his home here.  He also put in a sugar mill.  Later on it was used to grow cotton ... and still later as a cattle ranch.  In 1948, the Armstrong family turned it into a guest house with eleven rooms. 

These days the ninth generation of the family operates the property which has a championship eighteen hole golf course ... tennis courts ... three separate beach coves ... three hundred acres of tropical vegetation and some great food.

(MUSIC)

The great agricultural estates of the Caribbean had only one objective.  To grow and process as much sugar cane as possible.  And the first commercially available product of the procedure was molasses, a valuable ingredient on its own. 

Michael uses molasses to make a basting and barbeque sauce that adds a rich flavor to just about anything.  The sauce starts with the juice of six limes ... a quarter cup of molasses gets whisked in ... a half cup of ketchup ... a quarter cup of vegetable oil ... and a little allspice ... a little chili powder and some salt and pepper.

At this point Mike usually adds a few drops of tabasco ... but someone has taken the tabasco bottle off the dock ... and quite frankly, we're just too lazy to go up the hill to the kitchen to get it.  Hey, nobody's perfect!

We now have the basting sauce.  Half gets held aside, and a little more oil added to what's left.  The chicken goes in for half an hour ... then heads for the barbeque.  The original basting sauce is then used on the chicken.  A few slices of sauteed sweet potato go onto a serving plate ... and when the chicken is fully cooked it goes on top.

(MUSIC)

The first Europeans to set foot on what is now the island of St. Croix were a couple of sailors who came ashore from Christopher Columbus's ship during his second voyage in 1493.  Since then there has been considerable Spanish influence on the island's history.  Not the least of which can be found in the kitchens.

Today Mike is preparing a gazpacho, which is a classic soup in Latin countries.  But Mike makes his with pineapple, which produces a refreshing and interesting soup.

A ripe sweet pineapple is peeled, cored, sliced into chunks and placed into a blender.  A little vegetable oil goes in and a splash of tabasco.  And a pinch of salt.  The top goes on ... and everything is blended into a smooth puree.  A quarter cup of fresh mint leaves are added and blended.  Everything goes into a bowl.  A minced red onion is added ... a minced red pepper ... and a minced green pepper.

And now ... for a stirring experience.  And into a serving bowl with a garnish of a mint and yogurt puree.  That's it!

When I was in my late twenties I took all of my life savings and a considerable bank loan and put the money into a purchase of a sailboat.  I learned quite a bit from the experience.  The first thing I learned is the truth of the old saying that “a boat is a large hole in the water into which you throw money.”

I also learned how wonderful it is to get away from everything and feel the real rhythm of nature ... the sky and the sea.  To wake up because of the sun and not because of your alarm clock.  And to go to sleep because of the moon and not the Tonight Show. 

I also learned a lot about making good food under bad conditions ... and a lot of what I learned in the galleys at sea can be applied to the  kitchen.  Here are a couple examples of what I mean.

Breakfast is our most important meal.  But not everyone is ready to do much cooking first thing in the morning.  So do a little the night before.  Good old-style oatmeal is one of my favorite breakfasts and one of the healthiest too.  Oats appear to have the ability to lower cholesterol levels. 

Instead of facing twenty minutes over a simmering saucepan in the morning ... I put the oats and boiling water into a wide-mouthed insulated bottle ... close it up and let it cook over night.  In the morning, my oatmeal is ready.  A good thing for the office or the ocean.

When you're pouring something into a glass or a cup, do the job over the sink.  If anything spills you save the cleanup work and the surface of your counter. 

Cookie dough freezes well, so mix up a batch of your favorite cookie dough ... roll it out into portion sized balls ... and freeze them.  And keep the balls frozen until you're ready to bake them off. 

And something that works well for picnics as well as boating is to freeze water and juices before you start out on your trip.  You'll save ice and energy.

Finally, a tip that sounds totally off the wall but really works.  One of the best sources of rood for a yachtsman is the fish you catch while you're cruising.  But it can be a real messy job to kill a fish that's flopping around on your deck.  A great way to render the denizens of the deep into a state of total unconsciousness and to do it really easily is to pour vodka on their gills ... they'll just pass out.  Strange ... but true.

(MUSIC)

Just off the island of St. Croix is Buck Island Reef.  It's a national park that covers over eight hundred and fifty acres, which include some outstanding beaches.  It's also home to the only national park that is underwater.  The reef has two major underwater trails with signs that tell you what you're looking at. 

You can go along with a snorkel, which is just a pipe to breathe through while your face is in the water... or if you're qualified, you can go down with scuba gear.  And if you're not a qualified scuba diver ... St. Croix has a bunch of scuba instructors who will teach you how it's done.

Please join us next time as we travel around the world looking for good things to eat.

I'm Burt Wolf.

Burt Wolf's Table: Washington State - #220

BURT WOLF:  The Pacific coast of Washington State:  one of the most beautiful parts of North America; the source for some of our best foods, and home to one of the country's most interesting public markets.  The area has become a major center for the production of films and television shows, which gives us the opportunity to visit the set of "Northern Exposure."  We'll also do some cooking with some of the town's best chefs.  So join me in Washington State at Burt Wolf's Table.

Native Americans have been living in the Pacific Northwest for at least 13,000 years.  And for most of those years, it was a perfect spot.  The area has an unusually mild climate, considering how far north it is; and when it came to food, the place was literally Mother Nature's supermarket.  The local rivers were home to hundreds of thousands of salmon, who each year returned from the ocean and swam upstream to spawn.  It was just sex for the salmon, but it was a dependable supper for the tribes.  The sea also offered up dozens of other types of fish and shellfish:  the famous Olympia oyster, the Dungeness crab, and a variety of clams.  The forests were packed with elk and deer and bear.  Wild ducks and geese regularly passed through the area.  And the wild berries and nuts were fabulous.

The first Europeans to really settle into the region were agents of the Hudson Bay Company who were here for the fur trade.  They planted gardens which, surprisingly, contained potatoes --- potatoes that had come here not with the Irish immigrants, the way they came to the East Coast, but from the Spanish missionaries who had learned about potatoes in South America and taught their cultivation to the Native Americans here, who in turn showed it to the fur traders.  Today, Washington potatoes are a major crop for the state, and a big deal to potato lovers all over the country.

Seattle, Washington has also developed a corps of really excellent chefs.  The Dahlia Lounge is one of the most respected restaurants in town, and Tom Douglas is the chef-owner.  The type of cooking that is his specialty is called cross-cultural.

TOM DOUGLAS:  I'm a world traveler, it's my favorite thing to do in the world, is to travel around and to take things that I've had, that I love, dissect them, think about them, try and recreate them, and do them either a little bit better or a little bit different, or ... have fun with it.  So it doesn't matter whether it's Mexican or Japanese or Italian or my mother's cooking, I'll steal it and do my best with it.

Crab cakes made me famous in Seattle.  You know, on the East Coast you go to a diner, you go to a hotel, you go to the finest restaurants, every restaurant offers a crab cake, especially the Eastern Shore area near the Chesapeake, where I'm from.  And when I come to Seattle, there's these huge Dungeness crabs in the market, there's king crab from Alaska, there's Tanner crab, snow crab, crabs everywhere, and not one restaurant had crab cakes.  And so I got this quote-unquote gourmet reputation over my fresh Dungeness crab cakes.

There's a couple of things I want to show you before you get out of here.  My favorite, fish lamps, which have been the most popular thing since we opened our restaurant.  The person who made these lamps has sold close to 500 of them, because they're the coolest things ever... they were even in the movie Sleepless in Seattle ... so those are great things.  My red walls, that my wife and I fought over ... we finally mixed our two favorite paints together and came up with this color.  And don't forget my knees.  Most chefs don't cook in shorts, but I do, because ... most chefs wear whites, but I don't ... I'm kind of the irreverent chef in Seattle, I'm the only who doesn't necessarily follow all of the rules.  There's just something about people that take food too seriously, and I don't ... I don't ever want to do that.

DOUGLAS (in kitchen):  Hey, J.P.

COOK:  I messed up your tomatoes.  (LAUGHS)

WOLF:  "Northern Exposure" is a television series set in the fictitious town of Cicely, Alaska, but actually filmed just outside of Seattle, Washington.  Dr. Joel Fleischmann, a classic New York kid, played by Rob Morrow, makes a deal with the state of Alaska to pay for his medical education in exchange for four years of practice after his graduation.  The series traces his adjustment to his new and rather quirky environment.  The show has great ratings, the critics love it, and it gets special attention from me because there's always something in the script that deals with food.

DAVE THE COOK:  I wonder how they get that sweetbread so crisp.

RUTH-ANN:  It's the batter.  Oh --  I'd like some more of those delicious little olive rolls.

ADAM:  Souffle de clam.

MAURICE:  You made this?

ADAM:  No, Maurice.  I got a mix from the convenience store, just plopped in an egg and a cup of water.  Of course I made it, you imbecile!

DAVE:  Is that Red’s order?

SHELLY:  Uh-huh.  Pancakes and ... shrimp salad.

DAVE:  Supposed to be link sausages.

SHELLY:  Huh.

HOLLING:  Oh, and there was this mile-long table bearing sweets of every kind.  Italian plum tartlets and marzipan cakes, and my favorite ... coq am bouche.  You just pick off the little cream puffs and pop them into your mouth one by one.  Oh ...

SHELLY:  Oh, yeah.

ADAM:  Why do I bother?  Why do I even cook?

COOK:  Because you're hungry?

WOLF:  Sicily's best restaurant — actually, Sicily's only restaurant — is called the Brick.  It's owned and operated by Holling Vincoeur and his wife Shelly, played by John Cullum and Cynthia Geary.

SHELLY:  Mondo weirdo.

“HOLLING” (John Cullum):  Well, moose is our main meat.  We do have some ... sort of ... not many of our clientele like salads and things of that nature.

“SHELLY” (Cynthia Geary):  Exactly.  You know, they're really into mooseburgers and reindeer patty and stuff like that.  But ... I think that's kind of a hype.  I mean, seriously, people really want beef.  I mean, they want hamburgers, they want bacon, they want stuff like that.  So ... yeah.

WOLF:  I think it's interesting that Holling is resisting the idea of franchising.

SHELLY:  I don't know what it is, but Holling kind of likes just having the one place and everything.  But I've been telling him, we should expand.  I think the Brick could go international.

HOLLING:  I might do some franchising ... but just in this area, because I don't really think that mooseburgers would go over too well in Tallahassee, Florida.

WOLF:  I've noticed that in the Lower 48, there's an increased interest in the relationship of good food to good health.

HOLLING:  Yes.

WOLF:  I wonder, is anything happening here in Cicely along those lines?

HOLLING:  Not really.

SHELLY:  I've got the greatest recipe for Hershey bars!  You take Hershey bars and you melt them in with peanut butter, and then you take real nuts, you take almonds and cashews, and melt that all in together, and put it over ice cream.  It is so good!  Holling loves it.

WOLF:  Oh, that's wonderful.  Why don't you put it on the menu?

SHELLY:  I will.  See, Holling won't let me tell anybody, cause that's his special thing I make for him, but I think I'm gonna do that.

HOLLING:  We have some pretty horrendous desserts here at the Brick, mainly since Shelly's arrived.  It's not that we serve very fancy things, but there's ... since Shelly, we serve a lot of different colors.  (WOLF LAUGHS)

SHELLY:  Well, yeah.  I guess that's one of my fortes.  I'm pretty artistic, and so ... you know, I like to put these little colored umbrellas in a whole lot of different colors, because ... you know, I guess I kinda got a flair for fashion, and color and things, and ...

HOLLING:  It's amazing, what color ... apple pie can turn into.  I mean, peppermint-colored ... even she has a way of making separate colors, striped apple pie and things like that, it's really nice.

WOLF:  To further confirm my judgement that the people who produce this show are really serious about food, they've gone and written the “Northern Exposure Cookbook”:  clever recipes and really nice text written in the style and voice of the characters.  A recipe I want to test is Ruth-Ann's meatloaf.

RUTH-ANN:  Meatloaf?

RUTH-ANN’S SON:  Mm-hm.  With bacon and catsup on top.

WOLF:  Ruth-Ann Miller, played by Peg Phillips, is the 75-year-old owner of Cicely's general store, which also serves as the town library, video shop, and local post office.  She's the kind of person you can trust with a meatloaf.  So I borrowed a little spot in the kitchen of Seattle's Four Seasons Olympic Hotel, and chef Brooke Vosika, to test out the recipes.

Ruth-Ann's meatloaf recipe starts with a big bowl, into which goes one egg, a pinch of salt, a little black pepper, some thyme, two tablespoons of prepared mustard, a cup of milk, a half-cup of chopped celery, a half-cup of chopped onion, and a quarter-cup of catsup.  All that gets mixed together.  Then in goes a pound and a half of ground chuck, and one and a half cups of soft bread crumbs.  The beef mixture goes into a loaf pan.  Two tablespoons of catsup are spread on top, and finally three strips of uncooked bacon.  Into a 350-degree-Fahrenheit oven for an hour, and Ruth-Ann's meatloaf is ready.  The loaf comes out of the pan and gets sliced.  Two slices go onto a plate, some scalloped potatoes, and a few vegetables.  The stage direction reads:  "Enter Hungry."

The choice of a meatloaf recipe for Ruth-Ann's character is really ideal.  Beef contains iron, and iron is the nutrient that is most often missing in the diet of adult women.  Beef also contains the kind of iron that is most easily absorbed by your body.  Beef also has zinc, and zinc is essential to your cells when they are trying to repair themselves from a cut or a wound.  But the thing that fascinates me most about zinc is it helps you taste and smell, so beef is kind of fascinating:  it gives you the zinc that helps you taste it.

(TUGBOAT ANNIE MUSIC)

During the 1930s, the Saturday Evening Post magazine carried a series called "Tugboat Annie."  The storyline was so popular that it became the basis for two movies.  There actually was a Tugboat Annie, but her real name was Thea Foss.  She and her husband Andrew were immigrants from Norway who arrived in Seattle, Washington in 1889.

Her husband was a boat-builder, and one day while he was away working in a shipyard, she purchased a beat-up old rowboat from a neighbor who was about to move away.  She paid $5 for it, fixed it up, and sold it for ten, and she liked that experience.  Who wouldn't?  She doubled her money.  And that meant, for a while, Thea continued to buy old boats, fix them up, and sell them.  And then one day she realized that she could actually make more money taking these rowboats and renting them to people who just wanted to spend a relaxing day on the water.  And that eventually led to the development of a sizable Foss fleet.

After a while, some of the boats began to be used to take people and supplies to the larger ships anchored in the harbor.  Little by little, Thea went out of the rowboat-rental business and into commercial maritime services.  Her husband stopped making boats for other people, and concentrated on the design and construction of boats for Thea.  He developed the teardrop design that eventually became the world's standard for tugboats.  These days, the Foss Tug Company is one of the most important organizations in the business, operating on a worldwide basis.  To honor their contribution to maritime history, Thea and Andrew have been inducted into the Maritime Hall of Fame.

Now, quite frankly, I came on board to track down a story.  For years I had been hearing that the men and women who work on tugboats are real serious about good food, and that there is some fabulous cooking going on right here on the tugs.  Well, the first indication that I had that this story might actually be true was quite obvious:  Foss has their own cookbook.

Then when I came on board, I could easily see that the largest space on the boat after the engine room was the cooking area ... a good sign.  Finally, I tasted cook Joe Goodman's seafood stew.

Joe starts by putting a little melted butter into a frying pan, adding a chopped onion, two chopped stalks of celery, and cooking that for two minutes.  While that's cooking, two Washington State russet potatoes get peeled and cut into small cubes.  The potatoes go into a stock pot along with a cup of clam juice and a 14 and a half ounce can of chicken stock.  The pot goes onto the heat until the stock comes to a boil, and it's kept boiling until the potatoes are cooked.

While that's happening, Joe takes a piece of halibut, slices off the skin, and cuts it into bite-size pieces.  He also cleans a pound of shrimp and slices them in half lengthwise.  The cooked celery and the onions go into the stock pot for five minutes of heat.  Two 12-ounce cans of evaporated milk go in, plus two cups of chopped clams, the shrimp, the halibut, and three cups of fresh oysters.  A little thyme, a little pepper, a little stirring.  Five minutes of cooking, into a bowl, some parsley, and it's ready to serve.

(BOAT WHISTLE)

Fish stew's ready on the fan-tail.

Seattle's Olympic Hotel opened in 1924.  Its construction had been financed by 4,500 individuals as a community effort; they felt that it was important for the city to have a great hotel.  And ever since then, the Olympic Hotel has been special to the residents of Seattle, especially these days.  $16 million were recently spent on its restoration.  The general manager is Peter Martin, and now the hotel is known as the Four Seasons Olympic.

The hotel has three interesting restaurants:  the Garden Court, which is a pleasant, airy space where they serve lunch and English tea; Shucker's, a popular oyster bar with an extensive selection of beers from Northwest micro-breweries; and the Georgian, which has been described by a national food magazine as, and I quote, "an impressive showcase of culinary talent."  Well, I'm not exactly sure what all of those words mean, but if they're trying to say that the chef is a very good cook, you're absolutely right.

The hotel's executive chef is Kerry Sear, and he's well-known as one of the most talented chefs in the country.  His artistry starts with his own drawings of the dish he is about to create.  And though his menus are packed with a fine selection of meats, his own diet is vegetarian, and today he's going to prepare a series of vegetable recipes.  The first is a lasagna made with spaghetti and asparagus.

A little vegetable oil goes into a saucepan, and a tablespoon of chopped garlic; a quarter-cup of chopped onion; a quarter-cup of chopped fresh basil; two cups of chopped tomato; a half-cup of water; and a little fresh pepper.  That simmers together for 15 minutes.  Two pounds of pre-cooked Washington State asparagus go into a heatproof pan.  A layer of tomato slices goes on top, then a layer of pre-cooked spaghetti, some grated mozzarella cheese, a few spoonfuls of ricotta cheese, a layer of the tomato sauce, another layer of each of the ingredients.  Then into a 375-degree oven for 45 minutes.  When it's finished, the serving goes into a bowl and it's ready to eat.

Cool nights, warm days; clean, clear water; mineral-rich volcanic soil:  conditions that make Washington State the ideal place to grow asparagus.  Washington State has about four hundred farmers who are dedicated to growing asparagus, and they produce about 100 million pounds of asparagus each year.  Most Washington asparagus have tips that are purple, which indicates a high sugar content, and explains their sweet flavor.

The ancient Greeks and Romans considered asparagus to be a gastronomic delight, but they also valued asparagus in terms of its medical properties.  And, boy, were they right on.  These days scientists are telling us that asparagus contains a compound which is one of our most powerful cancer blockers.  Asparagus also contains folic acid, which is very important to proper cell growth, especially during pregnancy.

Look for spears with closed and compact tips and a firm stalk; those are the signs of freshness.  And pick out spears of the same size, so they will cook evenly.  Plump spears are the most tender.  The best way to store asparagus is in a moist paper towel inside an open plastic bag -- but not for long; it's best to eat asparagus the same day you buy it.  And keep the cooking time short:  five minutes of steaming should do the trick.

The Native American tribes called it Fire Mountain, and on May 18th, 1980, it lived up to its name.  After two hundred years of snoozing, Mount St. Helens woke up in a terrible mood and blew its stack.  The eruption caused over one billion dollars worth of damage and sent out clouds of ash that circulated around the globe.  Those clouds of ash had a silver lining for the potato farmers of Washington State.  For millions of years this part of the world has had active volcanoes.  As they erupted they deposited layer upon layer of volcanic ash... ash that is packed with valuable nutrients.  As a result, the potatoes grown in Washington State have an extraordinary high level of nutrients. 

For years I have used baked potatoes as a snack food.  I wash it off.  Rub a little oil on it.  Put it into a four hundred degree oven for an hour.  When it comes out I wrap it up and put it into the refrigerator where it will hold properly for a couple of days.  When I want one I take it out put it into the microwave for two minutes and it's ready.  I have a diet and exercise program that was specifically designed to control my high blood pressure, so a low-fat, high-potassium snack like this is absolutely perfect.  I don't want to blow my stack like Mount St. Helens.

Washington potatoes are put to excellent use in Kerry Sear’s vegetarian burger.  He starts by putting a little vegetable oil into a hot frying pan and following that with a sliced onion, glove of minced garlic, a cup of chopped pre-cooked beets - canned beets are fine - some grated yellow zucchini, carrots, dill, parsley, green zucchini and turnips.  All that cooks down for about five minutes.  And in goes some rolled oats and some fresh pepper.  A few more moments of cooking your mixture is turned out into a bowl.  At which point, two cups of mashed Washington State potatoes are blended in.  It's formed into patties and pan-fried in a little vegetable oil for three minutes on each side.  Everything has actually been cooked... the pan-frying is just done to develop a nice crust.  Ketchup goes onto a bun.  A little mustard and the veggie burger.

One of the most common shell beans in the United States is the baby lima bean.  It is named after the capital city of Peru, where they have been growing baby limas for over six thousand years.  And even now the name of that city is spelt L-i-m-a just like the bean it is pronounced “Lema,” not “Lima.”  So if you are ever in Peru and you need some baby lima beans it's important to remember to ask for Lemas.  Lima lovers need to know that. 

These days, however, baby limas no longer come from Lima.  Most of them come from California.  The dried variety is high in complex carbohydrates, protein and dietary fiber.  They're low in saturated fat and sodium and they're easy to prepare.  First thing you want to do is look through the beans and make sure that no small stones have come in with them from the field.  Wash off the limas and put them into a large pot.  Remember that dried lima beans will increase by at least twice their volume when they finish absorbing water.  Then pour in ten cups of hot water for every pound of beans.  Bring the water to a boil and let it boil for three minutes.  Then turn off the heat and let the beans soak for one to four hours.  At that point, you drain off the water that the beans soaked in and they're ready for a soup or a casserole or a salad.

Seattle's Pike Place Market opened up in 1907.  The basic idea behind the operation was very simple.  Local farmers wanted to have a place where they could sell their produce directly to the public without price increases from middlemen.  The farmers would get more money for their crops and the consumers would get lower food prices.  The idea worked so well that within a few months there were over two hundred farmers renting space.  The market continued to expand as a public source of good food, but it also began to develop as a social center.  It did particularly well during the Great Depression of the 1930s, when people were looking for both low food prices and a place to just hang out. 

Everything worked fine until the end of the Second World War.  That's when people began to move to the suburbs and shop in supermarkets.  At one point, it even looked like they were going to sell this area to a group of commercial real estate developers who had a vision of a modern commercial shopping area.  Well, the people of Seattle just would not stand for that and so they formed a grass roots committee and began a "save the market" campaign.  And that is exactly what they did. 

In 1971, the citizens of Seattle voted overwhelmingly to place the market under public ownership with the clear object of preserving and restoring it to its former glory.  I like that.  Hopefully when I get on in years someone will be interested in preserving and restoring me, too. 

Roy Fearing is with the preservation and development authority that oversees the markets operation.  He's the perfect person to give us a tour.

ROY FEIRING: Our farm tables are low stalls.  Our high stalls are high stalls.  And, and the way that we tell the difference around here is if you're eye to eye with an artichoke you're at a high stall. 

WOLF: Look how beautiful they're laid out.

FEIRING: Yeah.  And don't even think of distributing those.  Those are for display only.  You tell 'em what you want and you get the same product from behind.  You want an avocado, be sure and tell 'em when you're gonna eat it, because they'll pick one exactly ripe for you.  If you want it tonight, want it tomorrow, this weekend for a salad. 

Local berries, here's our pride.  Here's what really gets the city excited every year is when the berries are on.  They're the raspberries.  We usually have, say, two crops.  We have a fall crop of raspberries too, a little different.  These would be the real sweet summer berries, the early berries.  We have one grower does seven acres of blueberries and does nothing but make jam, chutney and blueberry vinegar out of 'em. 

Everyone has a speciality.  Cut flowers, dried flowers.  Here's “Piroschki Piroschki.”  This is all Russian pastry baked in the window.  Cooked in the oven and sold over the counter.

WOLF: Oh, I got to have one of those.

FEIRING: These people are immigrants from Russia.

WOLF: Yeah, I heard.

FEIRING: And they recently got a small business award.  And that's what the market's all about.  No businesses from outside can come into the market.  You have to start here and grow out.  You can't start outside and grow in. 

WOLF: What a wonderful idea that is.

FEIRING: It's a, it's an incubator.  Start-up, start-up place. 

Here's another food service.  This is a day- old bread store.  And we have... here on this, this... commercial corner which would probably support a very expensive jewelry store, we sell day-old bread.  Because serving the low-income people who live downtown is a mission.  It's a very important one.

WOLF: That was part of what the market was about from the very beginning.

FEIRING: That's right.  That's right.  So, being a non-profit agency managing the market, we have the luxury to be able to not be in it for the money, so we're in, we're in it for... the cultural opportunities, the nutrient opportunities.  We're here to fill people's needs and so it works out very well.

Cheese.  I think...we have something in the market something like a hundred kinds of cheese just from Great Britain.  I mean, it's... amazing. 

And on our right is the... Oriental Market where you'll find every kind of sauce, seasoning, noodles that you can imagine for Asian cooking.  Pakistani, Mid-Eastern spice store.  Speciality... and then over here we have the Bavarian meat store.  You remember the days when your local supermarket had one kind of mustard?

WOLF: Yes.

FEIRING: Here's a place where you can find dozens and dozens of different kinds of mustard.  This is...the...Italian grocery.  DeLorenti Speciality Food Market. This is a favorite with everyone in Seattle.  I think you’d best know what you're doing when you come into a store like this, right?  You can spend a hundred dollars and go home and not know what you have.  (LAUGHTER)

WOLF: But you know it's good.  (LAUGHTER)

FEIRING: Right.

WOLF: That’s something valuable. 

WOLF (new scene):  People who live in Seattle are always telling reporters like me to inform our audience that Seattle is cold and grey and overcast.  They just don't want anybody else to move here.  Well, I've been here for awhile.  I didn't see any more cold or grey or overcast than you'd see anyplace else.

(THUNDERSTORM SOUNDS)

WOLF: Please join us next time as we travel around the world looking for good things to eat.  I'm Burt Wolf.

Burt Wolf's Table: Down Under, Australia - #219

BURT WOLF:  Australia ... it's called the land “down under” because it sits in the southern half of the globe.  But when it comes to eating and drinking, it's totally on top.  Local chefs are producing some great food, the country has some of the world's leading wineries, and it looks like everybody is rediscovering their 30,000-year-old past and what it can teach us about good food.  So join me down under in Australia, at Burt Wolf's Table.

As you head north from the bottom of the world, one of the first continents that you come to is Australia, which is why it's often referred to as "down under."  Well, it may be down under geographically, but when it comes to food, it's right on top.  Because Australia is so far away from every place else on the planet, it had to become self-sufficient in terms of food production.  And because Australia is so far away from every place else on the planet, the food that it produces comes from a relatively unpolluted environment.

They have fish farms in Tasmania, which is a devil of a place to get to.  It's actually an island between the continent of Australia and Antarctica.  The deep, cold waters around it produce some of the finest fish in the world.  But Australians also come up with great prawns, which North Americans call shrimp.  There is wonderful salmon, lobster, orange roughy, and just about every other type of seafood you could possibly want -- over 3,000 different varieties.  They produce excellent lamb, which is delivered fresh to North America within four days of processing.  They developed the Granny Smith apple.  They even have an olive-oil industry.  And during the 1980s, their wine producers won many of the world's most important competitions, and began to develop a major overseas market for their vintages.

Because Australia has a land mass about as large as the United States, with as varied a climate, you'll find production areas that range from subtropical banana plantations to wheat and rye producers in regions that are similar to Canada.

But food in Australia wasn't always what it is today.  The first 150 years were pretty tough going for the settlers.  They often gave the recipe for galah soup as typical of the Australian kitchen.  Galah is a local bird, and the recipe goes like this:  take a galah and a stone and put them in a large pot; cover them with water; bring the water to a boil, and continue boiling until the stone is tender; then throw out the galah and eat the stone.

Because the English colonization of Australia began only a little over 200 years ago, and the history of photography is 150 years old, much of the story of Australia has been documented in photographs.  The best place to see the photographic chronicle is the picture collection at the State Library of New South Wales, right in the heart of Sydney.  Alan Davies is the curator of photographs, and he's put together a selection that does a great job of showing us what life was like in the early days of colonial eating and drinking.

ALAN DAVIES:  And this is my favorite photograph of a late 1890s family having dinner together.  You can see the head of the family here, typical Victorian male, carving the roast.  The handmade bread.

WOLF:  Judging from the shape of the base of the bread, it looks like it was cooked in a frying pan.

DAVIES:  Could have been.  It's an extraordinary photograph, full of wonderful detail.  I find it rather amusing, of course, because after this photograph was taken, with a great magnesium flash, the whole family would have been covered with white magnesium powder, so they would have been choking and coughing after this photograph was made.  But it's an extraordinary image.

This photograph shows us what it was like in the kitchen.  Here we have Mrs. Donohue, a family cook, and here you can see her kitchen has a bare floor.

WOLF:  The walls are actually made out of some kind of cloth, so the air can go in and out.

DAVIES:  That's right, it's Haitian, a very loose-weave cloth.  See how she's gone to great trouble to sort of cut out a newspaper valence for the shelves here.  There's just so many English things in this photograph.

Here we have a great photograph of the Dick brothers in Kempsey.  They had found a glut of lobsters, wonderful-size lobsters, in Port McQuarrie.  They took them up to inland, 50 kilometers into Kempsey, to sell these and make a profit.  Of course, no one knew what they were.  (WOLF LAUGHS)  So they had to sort of trudge home empty-handed; they had to bury the lobsters on the way back, cause they'd gone off in the summer sun.  Extraordinary, isn't it?  Wouldn't we just love to have those lobsters today?

WOLF:  It was only a wooden shed and a single biplane that carried farmers and grazers around the Australian outback.  They called it the Queensland And Northern Territory Aerial Services.  And if you take the first letter of each of those words, you will end up with the name Qantas.  Today it's the national airline of Australia, and the oldest airline in the English-speaking world.

Now, when most international airlines got started, the distance between nations was not a significant factor in their operations; the plane crossed a border, and suddenly you were an international flight.  France to Germany, Italy to Switzerland, USA to Canada ... no big deal.  But that is not the case for Australia.  From the very beginning of their airline industry, Australians needed to be able to fly for hundreds of miles over the Pacific Ocean before they constituted an international flight.  As a result, Qantas pilots are the ultimate long-distance pilots in the business.

(AIRPLANE RADIO VOICES)  [Editor’s note:  I can’t make a lot of this out, but it isn’t important -- if you’re dubbing, you can make something up.]

PILOT:  Qantas 2, we’re established on final runway one-six.

CONTROLLER:  Right, Qantas, descend to one thousand.

PILOT:  Okay, getting ready for the approach.

CONTROLLER:  That's Qantas four-niner, lift seven thousand.

PILOT:  Engage landing flaps.

CONTROLLER:  Tango F-zilla, turn left heading three-six-zero vectoring route...

WOLF:  If you saw the film Rain Man, you may remember that Dustin Hoffman's character refused to fly on any airline but Qantas.  Well, that was because of Qantas's extraordinary safety record.  And Tom Cruise was totally unable to convince him otherwise, which really surprised me, because the women I know tell me that Tom can be quite persuasive.

The original settlers to Australia arrived on what came to be known as the First Fleet.  Most folks coming to Australia today still arrive on the Fleet, but these days it's the Qantas fleet.

All of that actually took place in the Qantas flight simulator.  And in the same way that computers can be used to simulate flight, different herbs and spices can be use to simulate the taste of salt. 

Cheong Tse is the executive chef at Qantas.  His extensive knowledge of herbs and spices has given him the ability to produce intensive flavors without using salt.  A perfect example is this dish of vegetable soup, accompanied by sauteed Australian prawns.

A little vegetable oil goes into a saucepan.  As soon as it's hot, in go some sliced carrots, peas, tomato, and zucchini.  That cooks for about five minutes; then in goes some chicken broth.  The ratio is two cups of chicken broth for every cup of vegetables that are in the pot.  That simmers for five minutes.  While it's cooking, a frying pan is heated.  A touch of vegetable oil goes in; a little sliced garlic, shelled prawns, a little chopped basil, and some lemon juice.

Cheong does an interesting thing:  he takes a wide toothpick and sends it down the center of the prawn, and in that way the prawn will not curl up when it hits the heat of the pan.  It also gives you something to hold onto if you're using it as finger food.

Then, two minutes of cooking and stirring; a few thin strips of asparagus and some slices of red pepper are added.  A few grinds of fresh black pepper; a few flips; a tablespoon of chicken stock; and everything is ready to serve.  The soup goes onto a plate, followed by the Australian prawns and the vegetables.  A low-sodium light meal, all on one plate.

The interaction of the basil, coriander, garlic, lemon juice, and pepper, stimulate many of the same taste buds that are normally stimulated by salt, so you end up with a dish where you don't miss the salt.

Chef Tse has been interested in art since he was a child, and he uses his drawing skills to plan the look of his finished dishes.  Today, the design is for a dish of sauteed chicken breast with a tomato and onion sauce.  He starts by putting a little vegetable oil into a hot saucepan, followed by sliced red onion.  A little stirring and flipping.  A teaspoon of chopped garlic.  Some chopped sun-dried tomatoes.  A few cherry tomatoes.  A twist of pepper.  A little chicken stock, and fifteen minutes of simmering.

While that's cooking, the chicken gets underway.  Chef Tse takes a skinless piece that is the breast and wing, with the bones removed except for one of the wing bones.  That bone is there for looks only, and you can do this dish with a boneless, skinless chicken breast and it'll work fine.  The chicken is cut almost in half and opened up butterfly-style.  A little oil goes onto some plastic wrap and the chicken gets wrapped in it.  Then it's pounded until it's flat, and about the same size as the inside rim of the serving plate.  The plastic wrap comes off, and some seasonings go on:  white pepper, basil, coriander, and black pepper, first on one side, then on the other.

A little vegetable oil is heated in a frying pan.  The chicken goes in and cooks for a minute or so.  Chef Tse checks to make sure that it has developed a good color from the cooking.  Then over it goes, and the second side cooks for about two minutes more, until the chicken is fully cooked.  Then onto a serving plate.

A second frying pan is used to pan-fry some chopped garlic, some pre-cooked green beans, and a few strips of spring onion.  A third pan browns some pre-cooked potatoes.  A few whole cherry tomatoes go into the onion sauce that started this recipe.  The reason for the late arrival is that Chef Tse wants the tomatoes to cook for only a few moments, so they will hold their shape.  The tomato and onion sauce goes onto the chicken; the green beans and spring onions go on next to the onion and tomato sauce; and finally, the potatoes.  Art you can eat -- good thing.

(MUSIC)

When the First Fleet arrived in Sydney Cove in 1788, the settlers brought with them the first vines to be planted in Australia.  They'd actually weathered the voyage without difficulty, and were planted soon after the fleet came in.  The vines grew rather well in the fertile areas near the coast.

The long hours of warm Australian sun produce excellent grapes, which in turn produce excellent wine.  As a matter of fact, a while back the Australians entered their wines in a European wine-judging competition.  The judges wouldn't judge it.  They tasted the wine and felt it was so good that the Australians must have taken French wine and put it into Australian bottles.  If those judges were still around, they'd probably feel the same way.  Australian wine is top-notch, and one of the reasons for that high quality is the extraordinary dedication of the early Australian wine-makers.

One of the first was Dr. Henry John Lindeman.  Dr. Lindeman had been a medical officer with the British Navy, and emigrated to Australia in the mid-1800s.  He had decided that wine was a great source of happiness to all mankind, and began to produce his own.  My kind of doctor!  These days, Lindeman wines are some of the finest, and they are produced right here in the Hunter Valley just north of Sydney.

The wine-maker at Lindeman's is Patrick Auld.  He's actually the fifth generation of his family to make great wine right here in Australia.

PATRICK AULD:  We make outstanding wine.

WOLF:  And you're very focused on the idea of good fruit.  You don't make yourself crazy about a particular piece of land, the way the French do; you get the best grapes that you can from wherever you can get them.

AULD:  Well, very much so.  What we try and attempt to do is to first get the right country to grow grapes in, and that's done by careful selection; and secondly, the best fruit we can produce makes the best wine we would like to produce, obviously.

WOLF:  You also mark the label with the alcohol content, which affects the flavor of the wine.

AULD:  Yes.  In certain styles of wine, the higher the alcohol content, the better the wine we make.  Now, I don't mean to say you just keep on hoping to add more and more alcohol to get better wine; but alcohol and flavor go together.  And if I can just explain, it all comes from the amount of sugar level that are in the grapes on the vine when we pick them, and what happens is that that flavor of the grape is slowly fermented, along with the sugar, into the wine itself.  And we believe that the more flavor, and the more alcohol, the better.

WOLF:  In 1844, Dr. Christopher Rawson Penfold came out to Australia from London in order to develop a medical practice.  He brought along a few vine cuttings and planted them around his new home.  His medical practice flourished, and so did the vines.  Within a few years, the wines that were produced from those vines became so popular that Dr. Penfold became more interested in healthy grapes than healthy patients.  Today, Penfold's is probably the most famous winery in Australia, and many of its vintages have won the most important international awards.

And unlike many wine-makers, they produce product at a wide range of price points.  Penfold's has bottles that sell for $9 and $90, and that's very much part of the Australian love of democracy:  everyone should get a fair shot at the good stuff.  But one of the most appealing things about Australian wine-makers is that they are not particularly interested in making wine that ends up being stored in cellars and talked about for 20 years before it gets into a glass.  They're much more interested in drinking their wine.  But having said that, and not wishing to offend the late Dr. Penfold, I should point out that his company does produce some great wines that improve with age.

A good wine deserves a good glass.  But if you'd like to buy an all-purpose wine glass that'll do a pretty good job for just about any wine, here's what to look for.  First of all, you want a glass that comes in at the top, a tulip shape; that will concentrate the aroma inside the glass at the tip of your nose -- and what we call flavor is actually 75% smell.  Second, you should only fill a glass halfway, because you need the air inside to build up the aroma.  Since most of our portions are four ounces, you need a glass that will hold eight ounces or more.  Third, you should get a glass that's clear; you want to be able to look inside and appreciate the color of the wine.  And lastly, just before you use the glass, you should rinse it with clean water and dry it out; you don't want any musty smell inside, and you certainly don't want the taste of soap.  And then you are ready to taste something quite extraordinary.

Just to the west of Sydney is the Blue Mountain National Park, and it actually looks quite blue.  The reason for the color are the eucalyptus trees.  Eucalyptus give off a fine haze of oil that lingers in the air; when the sun hits the haze, the reflected light looks blue.  The district got its start about 300 million years ago, when the weight of accumulated sediment began to sink the Sydney area.  The rocks of the Blue Mountains are what remain.  As the lowlands continued to sink, successive layers of rock were exposed.  Some of the rock was softer and weathered more easily.  Wind, rain, and the action of the mountain streams, created the grandeur of the great ridges.

And it was this ridge face that saved the area from development and kept it in its pristine state; there isn't much you can do in a place like this except enjoy the awesome beauty of nature.  There are over a thousand different species of plant life, from heathland shrub to subtropical rainforest, and almost everything in between.  And to have this enormous area for recreation, right on the doorstep of Australia's largest city, is truly a gift from Mother Nature.

The Blue Mountains were an obstacle that prevented access to the west, until the construction of the railroad in the 1860s.  Suddenly they wealthy people of Sydney arrived and began to build country homes.  Perhaps the most beautiful was Lillianfels.  It was constructed as the summer residence of Sydney Chief Justice Sir Frederick Darley, and named after his daughter Lillian.  Today it's a graceful and elegant guest house.

(MUSIC)

The original residence area has been restored as the setting for Darley's Restaurant.  Chef Ralph Potter presides over the kitchen, and today he's preparing a plum pudding.

Into a mixing bowl go two cups of currants, two cups of raisins, one cup of dried apricots that have been chopped, and one cup of blanched almonds.  All that gets mixed together and chopped up.  Ralph adds rum to soften the dried fruit and add flavor; if you don't like the flavor of rum, you can soften the fruit with fruit juice.  Next, into a mixer:  sixteen ounces of butter, one cup of brown sugar, a half-cup of dark karo syrup, mix all that together, and add in eight eggs.  The batter goes into a mixing bowl; in goes the rum and fruit mixture.  Then a tablespoon each of cinnamon and allspice, zest of two lemons, and a cup or so of dried grapes.

RALPH POTTER:  There you go.

WOLF:  Finally, a little salt, and three cups of self-rising flour.  All that gets mixed together.  The insides of individual cup molds are given a light coating of butter.  If you don't have molds like this, you can use any heatproof form, from coffee cups to clean tuna cans.  The batter goes into the molds.  Make sure to hit the bottom of the mold against your work surface; that settles the batter to the bottom and gets out the air holes.  A piece of parchment paper that has been buttered on its bottom side goes onto each mold, and the molds go into a steamer for an hour.  This recipe will make about 16 puddings of about three-quarters of a cup each.  When they're fully steamed, they're unmolded, garnished, and served.

A sister property to Lillianfels is the Observatory Hotel in Sydney, where the sous chef is Anthony Musarra.  Anthony's father came to Australia in 1939, which was one of the early years of a major migration of Europeans to Australia -- a migration that changed the way the Australians eat.  Quite frankly, they went from a really boring, bland, English food, to the best of the European tradition.  And it was the Italians that were at the forefront of this move.  Today, Anthony is carrying on that tradition, but not just with European foods; he's interested in the foods of all nations, and he tends to take the common ingredients of Australia and use them in recipes that come from other places.

Today, he's preparing a lamb tortilla.  Lamb is a traditional meat in Australia; tortillas are clearly Latin American.  He starts by making a marinade:  a little soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, freshly ground chopped chili peppers, mustard, and vinegar.  That gets mixed together and poured into a pan.  Then in goes a loin of lamb.  It marinates there for a minimum of one hour, though overnight will give it a richer flavor.  When the lamb's ready, a little oil gets heated in a frying pan, and in goes in the lamb.  It's seared for one minute on one side, then flipped over and seared for another minute on the other.  The final cooking time is 15 minutes in a 375-degree oven.

While the lamb is cooking, Anthony makes a very easy fresh tomato salsa:  chopped tomato, salt, pepper, chopped mint, and a little vinaigrette dressing.  He also makes a small Greek salad from feta cheese, black olives, cucumber slices, chives, and a little of the same vinaigrette.

The lamb comes out of the oven, and is sliced thinly against the grain.  A tortilla is placed on the work surface.  A little plum chutney goes on; a thin layer of iceberg lettuce; the sliced lamb; and some of the tomato salsa.  The tortilla is rolled up tightly, sliced into two-inch pieces, and put onto the serving plate next to the Greek salad.  Waste not, want not.  An interesting blend of Latin American, Australian, English, and Greek.

At the edge of the Sydney business district are the Botanical Gardens.  Its winding paths take you on a tour of the unique flora of Australia.  Most people who stop for lunch in this splendid setting must bring their own food, but that was not the case for me.  I walked through the Gardens with Vic Cherikoff, who is a specialist in the wild foods of this continent.  He runs a company called Bush Tucker Supply, which is beginning to supply indigenous Australian foods to markets all over the world.

VIC CHERIKOFF:  It looks a little bit like bubble gum, but crush it and just smell it.  It's got what we call subcutaneous oils; the oils are deep down ...

WOLF:  Mmmmm.

CHERIKOFF:  ... deep down within the leaf.  It's called lemon myrtle or sweet verbena tree.  I'm very keen to get Ben and Jerry's homemade ice cream to use this as a food flavoring, because in ice cream it is just stunning.

WOLF:  It's a wonderful lemony smell.

CHERIKOFF:  Yeah.  How about a smell ... how about using it perhaps in an aftershave or some such?

WOLF:  Aftershave?

CHERIKOFF:  Yeah ...

WOLF:  You and I are going to talk about aftershave?

CHERIKOFF:  (LAUGHS)  Oh, there's a thought.  So here we've got a bush supermarket.  It's a fairly uninspiring little tree, but the amazing thing is, this ... first off, the papery bark:  as the bark comes off in big shoots, you can use it for food wrap; it's the aboriginal tissue paper, toilet paper, oven bag, Glad Wrap.

WOLF:  It's quite amazing.  It really is a supermarket in a tree.

CHERIKOFF:  Exactly.  This tree is also like a pharmaceutical ... a pharmacy, a chemist's shop.  The new leaves are picked, very small leaves, the ones that you want, and these are crushed, either just ... rubbed in the hands, and ... well, you can smell the menthol in it; it'll clear the head.  Have a ... just rub it in your hands and give it a good whiff.

WOLF:  Mmm!  Why, that's quite wonderful.  My stuffed nose is all gone!

CHERIKOFF:  Well, these things are ... the nuts from a large tree, they grow in a big banana-shaped pod like that.  They're actually a food, but they're not something you can eat straightaway.  The aborigines baked them in a ground oven, removed that brown covering, grated them ... they actually cut them, often with the shoulderblade of a kangaroo, so that's your chopping knife ... cut them up finely, and then you put them in a dilly bag, which is a string bag, put them in your local creek, and leave them there for ten days.  Then drag them out, pound it to a flour, and make bread out of it.

WOLF:  They're like a chestnut.

CHERIKOFF:  They're like a chestnut.  They taste ... well, in fact, I've heard folks who say they're tasteless.  But they are interesting these days, not so much as a food, but because some of the chemicals that the aborigines were washing out are in fact effective against certain types of cancer.  And we've ... well, Australia has exported tons of these to companies in America to actually evaluate the alkaloids that are responsible for the anti-cancer effect.

WOLF:  Amazing.

CHERIKOFF:  A lot of work still to be done, but that's really the secrets that many of our rainforest trees still hold.

WOLF:  What's over there?

CHERIKOFF:  This tree here is probably one of the most well-known of Australian species, the macadamia.  And everybody thinks the macadamia comes from Hawaii — the "Hawaiian nut" is actually a marketing tool — but it comes from Australia.  It was found ... once, it was only found in Australia.

WOLF:  Never knew that.

CHERIKOFF:  Never, yeah.  And now these nuts are all ... I mean, they're regarded as the best eating quality nuts in the world.  There's another plant just over here as well; there's one of the fruits.  It's called a Davidson plum, it's after a fellow by the name of Davidson who named the first plum.

WOLF:  Can I just eat it?

CHERIKOFF:  Well, yeah.  Another name, I warn you, is the sour plum.

WOLF:  (EATING)  Now you tell me.

CHERIKOFF:  (LAUGHS)  It's very, very sour.

WOLF:  Augh!

CHERIKOFF:  It's amazing to be out with aboriginal kids and they just pick these up by the bucketful and just scoff them whole.

WOLF:  I'll never forget the name of this.

CHERIKOFF:  (LAUGHS)

WOLF:  It's so amazing to have this kind of a garden right in the center of the city.

CHERIKOFF:  And very convenient.

WOLF:  Well, that's all from down under, Australia.  Please join us next time as we travel around the world looking for good things to eat and drink at Burt Wolf's Table.