1,000 Foods To Eat Before You Die: A Food Lover's Life List (229 page)

New Zealand is the biggest exporter of the mussel.

Known to many as the world’s premium mussel, the large, thin-shelled, “green-lipped” or “green-shell” variety is as likely to be found in upscale fish markets and restaurants in the States as it is around its native waters. Farmed near the shores of Korea, Japan, China, Southeast Asia, and New Zealand, the last being the world’s largest exporter,
Perna canaliculu
boasts an alluring, deep sea–emerald color that yellows when exposed to sunlight.

Bivalves from the North Atlantic might be the mollusks of choice for those who prefer them salty, small, and very firm. But because the green-lipped mussel is plumper and can grow to eight inches in length, it can be grilled or baked without shriveling or drying. Of course, its greatest appeal lies in its flavor, which carries the sophisticated overtones of salt and copper and the soupçon of sweet sea air that make the green-lipped mussel so prized in Mediterranean and Asian dishes. (The flavor of the ivory-colored male mussel meat tends to be sharper and saltier than the lusher, milder orange meat of the female, and Mr. Mussel is more appealing simply steamed and served cold; his lady friend is better suited to more complex soups and stews.)

True mollusk lovers may cringe at the use of extracts from green-lipped mussels as antiinflammatories, prescribed to treat various types of arthritis and damaged joints (as Gertrude Stein would say, “very interesting if true”). But anyone suffering from such pains will undoubtedly find eating the mussels to be the most felicitous prescription of all.

Where:
In New York
, The Musket Room, tel 212-219-0764,
musketroom.com
; Citarella, tel 212-874-0383,
citarella.com
;
in Brooklyn
, Kiwiana, tel 718-230-3682,
kiwiana-nyc.com
;
in Cayucos, CA
, Hoppe’s Garden Bistro, tel 805-995-1006,
hoppesbistro.com
.
Further information and recipes:
A Multitude of Fishes
by Ann Creber (1987);
The New Zealand Seafood Cookbook
by Auckland Seafood School (2010);
The Great Mussel and Clam Cookbook
by Whitecap Books (2004);
foodnetwork.com
(search green-lip mussels);
kiwiwise.co.nz
(garlic and white wine mussels);
seafood.co.nz
(click Types of Fish, then Greenshell Mussel).
See also:
Thai mussels
.

Full of honeycomb’s crackle.

Take some of the coolest, creamiest vanilla ice cream on earth, add the smoky-sweet crackle of honeycomb toffee known as hokey pokey, and you have the seductive textural and flavor contrast that makes this New Zealand dessert magical.

The name, also used at one time in England and in the United States for ice cream mixed with other ingredients, is thought to have been derived from the Italian ice-cream street vendors who would call out
Eccu un poco
, meaning “Here’s a little,” or
O’che poco
, meaning “Oh, how little!” Fortunately for us, there’s no need to keep the portions small.

Anxious to get started on a little hokey pokey of your own? It’s easy enough to make at home. All that’s required for honeycomb toffee is golden syrup, superfine sugar, and baking soda (see recipe references below). Simply allow ready-made vanilla ice cream to soften so that the toffee (or nut brittle, if you like) can be folded in, then refreeze the ice cream. That’s all the hocus-pocus required to produce a delicious batch of hokey pokey.

Where:
In Brooklyn
, Kiwiana, tel 718-230-3682,
kiwiana-nyc.com
;
in Corning, NY
, Hokey Pokey’s Ice Creamery and Yogurt Haus, tel 607-962-4720.
Further information and recipes:
nigella.com
(search hokey pokey);
australianfood.about.com
(search hokey pokey ice cream);
sbs.com.au/food
(search anzac biscuit hokey pokey sandwich);
goodtoknow.co.uk
(search honeycomb toffee).

With the kiwi bird as their national symbol and the fuzzy, bronze-green kiwi fruit as one of their most epicurean exports, it’s no wonder New Zealanders fondly refer to themselves as Kiwis. (Whether they prefer to align themselves with the flightless, tailless bird or with the plump, juicy fruit—
Actinidia deliciosa
, also known as a Chinese gooseberry—may be a matter of personal preference.)

As valued for its stunning, glassy-green interior as it is for its unique flavor, the kiwi fruit suggests a combination of banana, citrus, and pineapple. Peeled and sliced horizontally, it reveals a sort of stained-glass star pinpointed with tiny black seeds.

That appearance is part of the reason the kiwi has had such success on the international stage. First exported to the United States in the 1950s, and then made fashionable by French chefs with a nouvelle cuisine bent, the fruit is now widely grown in California.

Unfortunately, as with so much mass-produced produce, the domestic kiwi is often bred for shelf life. Picked unripe, it is rarely noteworthy for more than its unusual appearance and a vague sourness. Far better varieties arrive from New Zealand or even Italy, currently the world’s largest producer, or from any boutique orchard or family tree where they are allowed to ripen in the sunshine and turn a deep bronze. The best kind of kiwi remains green on the inside; the gold kiwi, or Hinabelle, developed for its cheerful orangey hue and lower acidity, is a blander and less interesting fruit.

Mail order:
Melissa’s Produce, tel 800-588-0151,
melissas.com
; Pittman & Davis, tel 800-289-7829,
pittmandavis.com
.
Further information and recipes:
Uncommon Fruits and Vegetables
by Elizabeth Schneider (2010);
The Purple Kiwi Cookbook
by Karen Caplan (2000);
Cooking the Australian Way
by Elizabeth Germaine (2013);
epicurious.com
(search kiwi sorbet, kiwi pomegranate angel pies);
kiwifruit.org/recipes
.
Tip:
Kiwis are not only delicious, they’re also good for you—they are high in vitamin C, potassium, and actinidin, a protein-tenderizing enzyme similar to the papain in papaya (see
listing
).

Prepared for
motu
—the traditional beachside meal.

Cool and piquant, the colorful raw fish salad
poisson cru
is an enticing appetizer or lunch from the French Polynesian island of Tahiti. “Raw” is not the real story with this sparkling salad, for the fish marinates in acidic citrus juices that lend a
firmness and opacity to its flesh—“cooking” it, in a sense, much as similar marinades do for ceviche or Hawaiian poke. Favorite
poissons
tend to be white-fleshed saltwater swimmers such as snapper, halibut, flounder, and fluke, but sliced sea scallops are also de rigueur, along with tuna and salmon.

With fresh catch in hand, few dishes could be simpler to prepare. The Tahitian method calls for about 1½ pounds of fillets of fish, sliced into small, thin ribbons or squares, about ¼ inch thick and 2 inches long or square. Placed in a glass or ceramic bowl and covered with about ¾ cup strained fresh lime juice and ½ cup chopped mild young onions, the fish marinates in the refrigerator for about 6 hours. After marinating, the flesh will be firm, looking as though it had been cooked.

To tie it all together, the salad is well drained and the fish is tossed with diced tomatoes, scallions, and green pepper. A dressing of creamy coconut milk (known as lolo sauce in Fiji) is the finishing touch, and the dish is most traditionally and prettily served in a large scallop or clam shell.

Further information and recipes:
Foods of the World
by Rafael Steinberg (1970);
epicurious.com
(search poisson cru);
foodnetwork.com
(search poisson cru coconut lime; halibut poisson cru);
gohawaii.about.com
(search tahitian poisson cru).
See also:
Poke
.

The extract is used in aromatherapy and desserts.

So pervasive is vanilla as a flavoring in our ice creams, puddings, cookies, and cakes that we may forget what it actually is. With a delicate, flowery flavor, Tahitian vanilla reminds us that the vanilla bean comes from a member of the orchid family, in this case
Vanilla tahitensis.
It is one of the most prized iterations of this innocently sweet seasoning (with the Mexico and Madagascar beans as runners-up), but the high-quality bean is very expensive no matter which sunny, orchid-friendly region it comes from. The flowers need to be hand-pollinated when they are grown in nonnative regions that lack the insects to do the job, and the pods themselves must be painstakingly dried and cured by hand. All of this amounts to a labor-intensive process, hence the prevalence of synthetic vanilla flavorings, generally a poor substitute for the real thing. Using vanilla beans for flavoring requires splitting the slender dried pod and scraping out the pasty seed mass within. Although more complicated than resorting to pure vanilla extract, there are extra rewards in flavor. Additionally, empty pods can be stored in sugar to impart their flavor and aroma—useful for making desserts and confections.

Prized by cooks and bakers all over the
world, on home ground Tahitian vanilla is worked into beverages, puddings, fruit salads, and desserts, as well as the base flavor for a rich coconut cream sauce that graces shellfish and chicken dishes. Vanilla is also used as a scent, as well as a flavoring, and is believed to calm nerves and impart a sense of ease. In Victorian times it was a common and non-scandalous perfume for women to wear, with a bit dabbed on wrists and necks, the sweeter to smell.

Where:
In New York
, for Tahitian vanilla ice cream, Le Bernardin, tel 212-554-1515,
lebernardin.com
.
Mail order:
For beans, Marky’s, tel 800-522-8427,
markys.com
(search tahitian vanilla); for extract, iGourmet, tel 877-446-8763,
igourmet.com
; Sur la Table, tel 800-243-0852,
surlatable.com
.
Further information and recipes:
Vanilla 101 Cookbook
by Amy Bugbee (2012);
foodnetwork.com
(search tahitian vanilla creme brulee);
cookstr.com
(search pears poached tahitian vanilla);
jamesbeard.org
(search tahitian vanilla roasted pineapple);
nielsenmassey.com
(click Consumer, then Recipes).