Wow, Fork readers—we're shocked and nonplussed and all those other feelings you get when people write you a bajillion emails expressing their feelings. We love it, even when some of you get mean. What are we talking about? Canned foods, of course—again (sorry)!
See, as it turns out, we hit the jackpot with this one, though in this case 'twas tin and not gold we struck, and it turns out that you, dear readers, had a lot of feelings about cans and food and food in cans. If you don't know what we're talking about because you missed last week, catch up here. It was a pretty fun one if we don't say so ourselves—it had everything: soup, sausages, the French and American armies, devotional art, intrigue, fish, salt, fun, murder, sex, betrayal, resurrection, chemicals and ketchup…just to name a few.
Anyway, as we are sometimes wont to do, we figured we'd keep the conversation going just a little longer with thoughts from you, the people who read The Fork. We read you, too. Religiously. And, as always, keep those letters coming!
"I obviously have lots more important things to do, BUT, I just can't pull my eyes away!"
So sayeth Fork reader Lynn A. We understand, Lynn, but in the interest of total transparency, did you know that we didn't even plan this out? You did because we said so in the previous installment of The Fork? Word. Well, our point is that it totally wound up being more interesting than we thought it would be, too, and we could barely stop.
"Apropos of Heinz- when I was a kid growing up in 1950s Pittsburgh, we often went on Heinz factory tours. It was really fun, especially the pickling room's vinegary smell which made my eyes water. They also would give us pickle pins at the end."
Another stellar missive from Anne, who taught us all where "pulling all the stops" came from last week. That tour sounds amazing, Anne, as do the pickle pins. Wait til you see this other thing we're planning on writing about Heinz soon. It's gonna blow everyone's freaking minds!
"Can it!"
YOU can it, Fork reader Casimiro T.! Naw, but furreal, that was a solid one.
"This was truly hilarious and really interesting start to finish! Bravo!!"
You're gonna make us cry, Iris M. Thank you so much! We particularly liked the part about the tin can art.
"…I am a dad who loves an occasional Vienna sausage…like my dad before me."
Totally, James R, totally. ICYMI, James is referring to our brilliant slogan idea from last week: "Vienna Sausages: Your dad likes them." Would you believe we cooked that up because of our own dad? Of course you would! Side food note, James, The Fork's dad would eat a big thing of salted cashews with a glass of 1/2 and 1/2 when The Fork was a kid—and he's inexplicably still alive! He also ate a living lobster one time and he was a Vienna Sausage fiend.
"Why do you think we'd care about this?"
Oh, we dunno, David W., but we got a whole bunch of friends up there who seemed to like it.
"Never knew the stuff about tin art. Very cool."
We agree, Marco. For those who missed it, he's talking about how the US Army came into the region in the 1840s and New Mexican artists used their discarded tin cans to birth a genre in tin-based devotional art.
So yeah. There you have it. Canned food. Who knew? We'll also point out that if you'd like some food-based history exhaustively researched and related to you in pithy Fork Form (TM), we're open to suggestions.
Yikes. Hashtag MeatKing.
Also
-This is not paid or coerced in any way, it's just our real-life feelings. Let's talk The Art of Coffee, a roasting operation located within Cacao Santa Fe, a choco shop in Midtown. In the quest for a Restaurant Guide piece of information (that special glossy issue comes out next month, btw), an SFR staffer brought some coffee from Cacao into our world, and it's some of the best we've ever had. They roast it there, it's $12 for 12 ounces—it's soooooo worth it and delicious. Maybe we're just at that point in our lives where we won't drink bad coffee. Fuck outta here with that Folgers, mom (and yes, we're addressing our actual mother here)…Art of Coffee is in our top 3 local coffees alongside Ohori's and Remix Audio Bar.
-Not Santa Fe, obvs, but now that Santa Fe Restaurant Week is done-zo and we're still looking for good deals at good restaurants, we'll point out that Albuquerque Restaurant Week still has a few more days to go. If you're adventerous, numerous ABQ eateries are offering up special deals through Sunday, March 15, including Farmhouse 21 Modern Italian, Seasons 52, and Zine Wine Bar & Bistro.
-The Santa Fe Farmers Market's CSA (that's community supported agriculture) is back and signups are open now! There are two subscription tiers ranging from $210 to $420 and each gives you either 7 or 14 weeks of fresh seasonal produce—plus you're supporting local farmers who grow great stuff.
-Starting Friday, March 27, the Santa Fe School of Cooking kicks off a series of classes dedicated to faraway places and faraway foods (to be clear, the foods will be close to you in this case) with a lesson dedicated to Oaxaca, Mexico. You'll learn how to make tamales de elote (that's corn tamales and corn salsa), chicken with green mole, queso fresco and pumpkin seeds, pork carnitas in red mole and more. It's $90, but sounds magical. Register here.
-Sazón's chef Fernando Olea is back in our news items again as it has been announced he's one of three chefs across the country to win the Faces of Diversity award from the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation (which sounded fake but is real). This means prestige, but also that the foundation is gonna donate $2,500 to a promising culinary student in Olea's name. They even made a video.
–La Casa Sena loves organic wines—and you can, too! Learn more about what that means and how they taste at a special tasting event on Saturday, March 21. It's only $25, which sounds like a steal and a great way to learn about wine. Then you can take that information out into the world and lord it over people. We would. RSVP at either 505-988-9232 or lcwineshop@lacasasena.com.
-Lastly in the local world this week (which in no way means there aren't other things happening, just that it's the last bit in this particular section), if you aren't too busy wine tasting on Saturday, March 21, Blue Corn Brewery is hosting Cask Fest for the fourth time, a raucous good time featuring offerings from sooooo many breweries like Blue Corn itself (their brewmaster Paul Mallory is a beer genius), Beer Creek, Chili Line, Santa Fe Brewing Co. and lots of others. The thing runs noon to 4 pm, costs $25 in advance, $30 the day-of and, if we're being honest, is a hop-head's dream.
More Tidbits
-Sorry, buds, but Costco has decided to suspend food samples in its stores until this whole coronavirus thing blows over. In the meantime, let's all keep washing our hands or, in one extreme but respectable local case, self-quarantining ourselves for many days if we were someplace abroad.
-Speaking of coronavirus, The Washington Post has a rather interesting read about the do's and do-not-do's of dining out while we're all wigged out and flipped up by the spread of the virus. We agree with John Oliver that there's probably a middle ground between not giving a shit and going absolutely fully-full-on freaked, but we calmly invite you to check it out.
-Step aside, regular-ass berries—Japan's Omakase berry is here! The way The Fork hears it (y'know, from NPR) is that some chefs in NYC are willing to spend $50 for a mere eight of the fruit. Think of it like an even sweeter strawberry which, apparently, melts in your mouth. Hmmm…sounds kinda mealy to us, but if one comes our way somehow, we'll let you know.
-Turns out The Replacements were right and you can totally drink beer for breakfast. Score one for you, America! In reality, though, the sound of a pint with some fried eggs is totally a good sound. And taste, probably. Yeah, we like to use all the senses we have to, like, sense and feel stuff.
We know it's a cover, we just like this band.
-Trader Joe's has a new seasoning salt that's totally vegan and, we hear, pretty great on everything. Word is, the seasoning hails from Australia and, since it's vegan, doesn't have any koala meat like so many other Australian products. So put it on that vegan stuff you're making. Or the not-vegan stuff. Put it on ice cream? In a s'more? Doubtful, but we're gonna try it for sure.
-Did you know that if your kids read enough books, they can get free Pizza Hut stuff? Yeah, it's a program that's been around since the 1980s, and Food & Wine's Kim Kelly apparently gamed the system pretty hard in their day. It still exists, but there's an honor system and kids who try to not do the work are fully not given pizzas. The Fork obviously was super good at word reading when we were young, but it's more than word-gooding you'll need if you want to pizza right, y'know? Anyway, trick your kids into reading more and might we recommend John Bellairs? He never talked down to kids, wrote some truly scary stories for youths and, bonus, Edward Gorey himself did the cover illustrations! Get out of here, Harry Potter and your Johnny-come-lately crap! Oh, and by the way, the recent Jack Black version of a Bellairs book (The House With a Clock in its Walls) does not count and we hate it and we're mad as hell and we're not gonna take this anymore!
Finally
In the print edition of SFR, hole-in-the-wall-finder Cole Rehbein went to town at a hidden Southside gem.
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A Totally Scientific Breakdown of The Fork’s Correspondence Number of Letters Received
43
*Whooooooo!Most Helpful Tip of the Week
“Jam is good, too.”
*Jam IS good, too!
Actually Helpful Tip
Anne clinches this prestigious honor again because we are down with those pickle pins she mentioned from the Heinz tour.
*If you want ’em, Anne (or anyone), you can get ’em here.
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Reading books for free pizzas,
The Fork
