The low down on food terms

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

The waiter appears at your table and you drop the menu to pay

close attention as the daily specials are announced. Will you follow

his or her lead and live dangerously, or will you play it safe with

something from the menu you’ve had before?

Chances are, you’ll return to the menu if you’re dining with an

important client or trying to impress a date and don’t want to expose

your lack of culinary savoir faire.

Help for the gastronomically challenged appears in this Cliffs

Notes for diners, “Everything You Pretend to Know About Food, and Are

Afraid Someone Will Ask” by Nancy Rommelmann.

Following are some of the terms and information found in the book.

Pay attention, and perhaps you’ll be the one to translate those

enticing daily specials for your fellow diners next time you gather

at a restaurant.

Nothing makes a carnivore happier than a perfectly cooked steak.

The most tender cuts of beef are from the tenderloin, which is

butchered into three sections: chateaubriand comes from the center,

filet mignon (steaks) from wide end, and tournedos (smaller pieces)

from the small end. While these steaks will practically melt in your

mouth, they’re a bit short on flavor because of their low fat

content.

These cuts are often dressed with a demi-glace (French for

“half-glaze”). The sauce is made with meat stock or poaching liquid

reduced to a syrupy consistency with added sherry or wine and butter.

Whole glace is reduced stock or poaching liquid that has been reduced

further, resulting in a much thicker sauce with a very strong taste.

Every Italian restaurant has pancetta and prosciutto somewhere on

the menu.

Pancetta is salt-cured unsmoked bacon, crafted into a salami-like

roll and sliced. Not usually fried, it is eaten by itself or added to

sauces and pasta dishes. Prosciutto is unsmoked Italian ham that is

seasoned, salted and hung to dry. It is sliced very thin and usually

served atop a slab of ripe melon (honeydew is best) or eaten with

bread, olive oil and parmigiano-reggiano cheese.

Rather get your protein from poultry? Free-range chicken is

considered superior to standard supermarket fare because the birds

get to roam around in the fresh air and develop more muscle than

their coop-bound cousins. They are killed at a younger age and are

more tender.

Fish and seafood are consumed more often at restaurants than at

home because most of us aren’t completely comfortable cooking it.

While those portion-sized pieces of filets and steaks certainly are

delicious when cooked properly, you’ll enjoy much more flavor from a

whole fish served with or without its head and tail intact. If you’ve

ever ordered the catfish at Five Feet, you’ll know this is true.

Ever wondered how Seviche got “cooked?” This classic

Latin-American dish is the result of soaking small pieces of

white-meat fish in an acidic bath of lime, lemon, grapefruit juice or

vinegar. The acid tenderizes the fish by penetrating the flesh and

breaking down the fiber, just like heat from a stove.

Seafood and many vegetable dishes often get dressed up with the

addition of coulis or aioli. At one time, coulis was concentrated

meat stock, but now appears most commonly as a fruit or tomato-based

sauce that has been pureed and strained, often decorating the plate

in swirls from a squeeze bottle. Aioli is garlicky mayonnaise made

with egg yolks, lemon juice, garlic and a little mustard. Fantastic

on fish and cold vegetables, it’s also easy to make at home.

Ordinary lettuce is a bit boring, but mesclun has become a fixture

for salad offerings. Not a specific kind of lettuce, It’s a rather

flexible combination of young greens like arugula, oak-leaf lettuce,

chervil, dandelion and baby cress. It’s best served with a mild nutty

vinaigrette.

When it comes to dessert, order a torte when you want a cake-like

layered confection made with ground nuts or bread crumbs (instead of

flour). It’s usually filled with cream, whipped cream or jam. Order a

tart (or tarte) when you want a small pie with no top crust.

How is gelato different from ice cream? Gelato is actually an

Italian ice cream that uses the same basic ingredients minus

stabilizers like gelatin. It’s not subjected to the amount of

churning used to produce American ice cream. The first thing you’ll

notice is the richness and velvety quality.

The main difference between sherbet and sorbet is the addition of

milk. Sorbet is made with only fruit, water and sugar and delivers a

much bigger flavor.

This very handy little book goes into great detail describing

appetizers and entrees featured in ethnic eateries -- mostly Asian,

Middle Eastern and Indian. I learned more than a thing or two in this

section and will pass them along soon.

* LILLIAN REITER is a Laguna Beach resident. A self-described

“shameless foodie,” she is co-authoring a cookbook. Reach her at

[email protected] or P.O. Box 248, Laguna Beach, CA 92652, or

by fax at 494-8979.