Kulinarik Stipendium

In diesem Sommer habe ich eine ganz besondere Chance und ein ganz einzigartiges Stipendium. Für drei Monate in die Uckermark nördlich von Berlin gehen und dort kochen, forschen, experimentieren, gärtnern, foragen, Erzeuger besuchen, und vieles mehr… Ich freue mich!

Und das habe ich vor:

“Leaf to Root”: Obst & Gemüse essen vom Blatt bis zur Wurzel

Hallo, Ich bin Sabine. Ich koche für mein Leben gerne mit und für viele Menschen und ich experimentiere am liebsten mit Obst und Gemüse. Ab Juli führt mich meine kulinarische Reise nach Libken, denn seit einiger Zeit köchelt es in mir und der Dampf der vom Topf aufsteigt, riecht nach Veränderung. Meine Reise bestand immer aus praktischen und theoretischen Gängen. Die Begeisterung fürs Kochen für viele Menschen habe ich bei dem Projekt Theater Total in Bochum entdeckt und die hat mich dann in Praktikas und Jobs durch verschiedene Küchen geführt. Weil ich aber auch den Weg von unserem Essen vom Acker bis auf den Teller spannend fand und warum wer eigentlich was isst habe ich in Osnabrück Ökotrophologie studiert. Genug vom Studium habe ich ein kleines Fahrrad Catering auf die Räder gestellt und auf Straßenfesten und Hochzeiten von meinem Hänger serviert. Zurück zur Theorie ging es nach Italien für einen Master of Food Culture and Communications mit 6 kulinarischen Studienreisen auf denen ich viele Produzenten kennengelernt habe und ich praktisch viel gegessen habe. Die letzten vier Jahre habe ich für die Betreiber der Markthalle Neun in Berlin Kreuzberg gearbeitet, wo ich heute den Wochenmarkt organisiere und Bildungsarbeit rund ums Essen mache. So weit so gut. Und jetzt ist nach vier Jahren überwiegend Büroarbeit wieder Praxis an der Reihe: Ich möchte, dass die KÜCHE, das KOCHEN wieder zentraler Bestandteil meines Lebens wird. Aber wie und wo? Das ist wohl mein persönliches Fragestellung für die Zeit in Libken.

“Aber woran will sie forschen?”, fragt ihr Euch vielleicht: Und na klar gibt es auch ein kulinarisches Thema das mir unter den Nägeln  brennt: “Leaf to Root”: Obst & Gemüse essen vom Blatt bis zur Wurzel

Inspiriert von dem (fast) gleichnamigen Buch möchte ich das Konzept erforschen, eben nicht nur die “Filetstücke” des Obst und Gemüses zu essen, jene die wir gewohnt sind, sondern auch die Stücke, die sonst auf dem Kompost landen. Das Möhrengrün, die Fenchelwurzel, der Kohlstrunk. Es geht also darum alles von der Pflanze zu verwenden und so das Bewusstsein für ihren Wert zu schärfen. Im Rahmen meiner Arbeit für den Obst& Gemüse Markt in der Markthalle Neun habe ich Esther Kern eine der Autor*innen des Buchs kennengelernt und ich würde gerne das von den Autor*innen begonnene Kompendium in dem Gemüsesorten und was man von ihnen wie essen kann, weiterführen und mehr Wissen sammeln. In kulinarischen Experimenten, beim Kochbücher wälzen, bei Feldversuchen und in Gesprächen mit Nachbarn anderen Köch*innen und Erzeuger*innen um mich herum. Und ich möchte nach dem selben Prinzip gehen und (Wild-) kräuter, Pilze und Hülsenfrüchte erforschen.

Hast du einen Garten? Kennst du das Phänomen: Zur Hochsaison einer bestimmten Kultur gibt es eine regelrechte Schwemme (Ob Zucchini, Tomaten, oder …). Und was macht man dann damit? Ich freue mich in diesen Gemüse und Obstwellen zu schwimmen ihre Sortenvielfalt zu entdecken und mich an Zubereitungsarten und -techniken zu probieren, die für mich Neuland sind. Zum Beispiel mit dem Feuer zu spielen: Räuchern, Veraschen auf dem Lagerfeuer mehr als nur Stockbrot backen. Mit Aggregatzuständen, Formen und Gängen spielen. Und dann das Haltbarmachen, das wohlige Gefühl der Sommerfülle einfangen, mit Salz, Essig, Zucker, Wasser, Öl… ob fermentiert, eingekocht, getrocknet alles entfaltet neue Geschmackswelten von  ein und demselben Ausgangsrohstoff, das fasziniert mich.

Das war nun ein bisschen von mir und ein Auszug aus meinen Ideen, die mir kommen, wenn ich mir vorstelle mich drei Monate in der Uckermark der Kochkunst zu widmen. Ich freue mich sie in die Tat umzusetzen und mit euch zu teilen und sie mit all denen zu paaren, die in dieser Zeit und diesem Raum mit Euch noch entstehen werden. Was ein Fest!! Kommt vorbei und feiert mit.

Danke für diese Chance!

Idee

Meine Geschichte beginnt in einer Auflaufform der Tagungshausküche im Energie- und Umweltzentrum am Deister.

In dieser bin ich als kleines Kind über die Ozeane meiner Phantasie geschippert. Hier wurde das Saatkorn meiner Leidenschaft für große Küchen gelegt. Die Begeisterung fürs Kochen kam mit der Zeit. Während meines Ökotrophologiestudiums in Osnabrück hat mich die Idee, ganz eigene gastronomische Erfahrungen mit einem eigenen „Laden“ zu sammeln, nicht mehr losgelassen und so habe ich dann Mitte 2011 das Velo Culinaria gestartet, ein kleines Fahrradcatering, das bis 2014 Osnabrück mit gutem Essen versorgt hat.

Ein Cateringunternehmen habe ich heute nicht mehr, doch das velo culinaria lebt weiter. Es ist das Vehikel meiner kulinarischen Reise geworden, meines beruflichen Schaffens, meiner Auseinandersetzung mit dem Thema Essen in all seinen Facetten. Diese Seite ist ein Album mit  Schnappschüssen dieser Reise.

Nächster Stop: Berlin

My time in Italy is almost over and my next stop in Germany is Berlin. I would like to take this occasion to share an article with you that I wrote for a journalism class the other day. It’s in memory to the time I worked on the Saturdays Farmers Market in Osnabrück.

Saturdays Market

Do you know Osnabrück somewhere in northwestern Germany? Right! This city that you pass on about half way from Amsterdam to Berlin. Well, what about stopping there next time and I take you on a trip to the Saturday farmer’s market. The only one from the markets I visited so far that I’m really missing since I moved away. In the last five years of living in Osnabrück a Saturday morning was not a Saturday morning without the weekly grocery shopping and a breakfast at the market.

Let me invite you to my favorite: “Linde’s Cafe” a mobile coffee shop, where I worked for three years. A box-like trailer with five smiling servers squeezed behind the bar that couldn’t be more then 70 by 250 centimeters and which is definitely not suitable for claustrophobic people. Well it’s not less crowded in front of the counter, when the clock just strikes eleven, opening the “coffee rush hour” and one open sandwich with a hot drink after another is passing over the counter. As much as I loved to be part of preparing these treats I’m glad to be on this side today and just enjoy. While waiting in the crush I will give you an idea of my former boss who inspired me in the way of looking on food and its aesthetics.

Linde, is a woman in her 60s with a colorful life who has experienced and supported the organic movement in Germany from its beginning. She started this cafe ten years ago as an autodidact with a strong idealism and the mission to spread her concept of good food with no compromise. Every one of her carefully selected ingredients has a story she loves to tell, sometimes even if you haven’t asked. There are the tomatoes that listen to classical music while growing which she exchanges with her farmer friends for buns plus coffee. Or what about the walnuts that she cracks by hand one by one for her “Engadiner Nut Tarte” with caramelized cream and the organic whole milk in brown glass bottles that clicks when you first open it, with a thick layer of cream settling on the surface of the milk (you can barely find this in any other cafe). Maybe she will tell you about the vegetables grown by her partner that she uses for the daily soup representing the mood and season she is in, paired with the passionate tale about the freshly baked buns from one of the last artisan bakeries in town, which were baked at three in the morning.

I learned a lot about life and business while working with her side by side in the last years. For example, how to give your products a personality through stories and that gossiping or little life-advice if well dosed can lead to regular customers as well as a simple talk about the weather at 6 in the morning is very stimulating for your relationship with your stand neighbors. This is all part of this Saturday experience as alike the slightly chaotic management that sometimes leads to waiting times that the guests just accept because they know what they miss when giving up.

Finally I made it. I’m standing in front of the showcase full of open faced sandwiches layered with cheeses, cold cuts or cured meats accurately decorated. Each one a little artwork and arranged in harmonic composition also taking care of not mixing cheese and meat in respect for vegetarians. Here you see buns with finely sliced bright orange cheddar crossed by two dark green chives and right next the creamy blue cheese ones, topped with musical tomato slices. On the meat side there is the filmy fennel salami curled up with a quarter artichoke heart nestled in, or imagine the juniper affined cooked ham with a drop of thick aioli and a caper fruit. And if you can’t find your favorite sandwich, Linde will not hesitate to freshly prepare it for you.

As I do. I order a whole grain bun with “Merlin” and a hot chocolate. “Merlin” is a fresh french goat cheese covered with Mediterranean herbs and a light layer of fine molds. A dash of homemade dressing with fig mustard and honey drizzled on the snow white cheese. Taking the first bite the crumbly dry consistency tends to stick to the palate. But soon it melts and mingles with the fruity, spicy flavor of the dressing which accompanies the light sour and “goaty” taste. You don’t like the “goaty” taste? “No worries…” Linde would tell you “..it’s really light and even people who were not used to like goats cheese, loved this one. Believe me, taste it, and if you don’t like it. Bring it back and choose something else.” The next bite there’s a scent of mushroom and slightly fermented herbs evaporating from the piece of rind captured in the mouth. The wholemeal bun in its rough, nourishing texture contrasts with this smooth sensation and gives you the satisfaction of filling your body. Not as those empty white sticky baps whose none taste represents the exhaustive travel they made from the thousands kilometers distant baking factory in cheap labor land.

Next I order the hot chocolate. Linde scoops slightly sweetened pure cocoa powder – that just melts properly with hot milk – in the cup. Slowly she intermixes a little milk with a tiny whisk until the pale brown de-oiled dust turns into a thick dark chocolate mud enhanced by 3,8% milk-fat. From this base she fills up the cup with foamed milk constantly stirring and bursing the bubbles. It’s just the right amount of milk to keep the fruity roasted flavor and the slightly bitter-sour taste of real cocoa. Every once in a while there are these poor people – who are used to instant over sweetened hot chocolate drinks – complaining about the milk that might gone sour. But there’s nothing wrong with the milk. They just don’t remember or never experienced how real cocoa without artificial vanilla flavor tastes like. However I don’t need to worry about it, I can be sure Linde will take care of them.

The steaming chocolate in front of her, Linde sweetly asks: “With cream?”. In the second it takes me to consider this optionshe already starts explaining to me why I shouldn’t refuse the cream. She doesn’t use artificial canned whipped cream that by the way you can’t even call cream. Hers is real, full fat, like in good old times, it comes from a biodynamic producer with the cows that still have their horns. Listening to her I smile into myself knowing that there’s nothing to consider than to take the whole thing. Not that I ever really wanted something else. Quickly I start spooning the cream. There’s nothing better than plain whipped cream, but nothing worse than when that cream melts entirely into the hot chocolate and dilutesits dark sensation. With every spoonful I’m grateful for all the guests Linde will convince to not give a damn abouta lite diet.

Studying at the University of Gastronomic Sciences

In my first days at the University of Gastronomic Sciences (UNISG) I learned that gastronomy is not just about cooking delicate, appealing food that fits with the expactations of the customers or . Rather they say „Gastronomes are a new type of food professional, those who apprehend the entire food-production web, from agricultural origins through industrial transformation and distribution. With particular attention to environmental and sustainability issues, these leaders understand how to connect food processes to both economic and communication systems, as well as the relationships within food-and-wine tourism, marketing of high-quality products, and promoting of the rich value of regional food traditions.“

And I say: „This is what I want to be!“  and instinctively I’ve been developing to be a gastronome of this definition on my journey for the last several years without defining myself as such. Doing the Master in „Food, Culture and Communications“ at the UNISG is my next step for getting deeper into „The World of Food“ which is connected with everything I can imagine.

What makes the difference for me studying here, refering to my first impressions?

It’s the passion of the people for what they are doing…

… starting from the staff who serves us in the canteen. They prepare every plate with such a dedication I’ve never seen in a University canteen before.

… the professors coming from all over the world and just stand for the subject they are teaching and are interested in the students and their backgrounds sitting infront of them.

… classmates with twenty different life-stories none of them are similar everyone is excited to learn and absorb as much as possible.

… the students organizing wonderful dinners, brunches, EAT-INS and are active in groups to change the system little by little

… the people of the Slow Food network surrounding us giving plenty of oppurtunities to get active and are open minded and hearted.

And in the end it’s the place – Pollenzo, Bra, Piemonte, northen Italy-  with a view on the alps from my balcony.

„Thanks to all the people who support me on this exciting culinary  journey!“

 

 

An italian dish!

The mouth captures a spoon of a creamy dish but there are also little grains to bite. A fresh smell of mint disperses and is paired with the characteristic but light taste of parmesan and the aromatic flavour of tomatoes. „Risotto menta e pomodori“.

Risotto is a pretty simple dish in my culinary experience one of the italian dishes which is definitely underestimated and underrepresented. In Germany Pizza & Pasta seem to be THE italian dishes.

But how did it come that I never experienced the brilliancy of this simple recipe? Or more practical what makes the difference between the risotto I cooked back home before I came to Bra and the five different varieties I’ve tasted in the last three weeks since my arrival?

Very important is definetly my curiousness about every single meal I had in these first exciting weeks of my extraordinary culinary expedition.

Though the key is the described consistency. Most Risottos I had before were either too dry or too soft. The right balance between liquid and solid compounds which is achieved through a dedicative preparation with continously stiring and adding the broth love scoop by scoop is essential.

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Trentino

A culinary trip in search of authenticity

What is authentic food? This is one of the key questions that I’ve been asking myself since I started studying “Food Culture and Communications – Human Ecology and Sustainability” at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo.After one month in class we went on our first “Study field trip” to make practical experiences. Destination: Trentino.

Meeting people from small-scale producers up to head managers of world-wide acting corporations. What a great opportunity to get closer to my own definition of authenticity and to learn about the ways how sustainability can be understood in the world of gastronomy. Of course all the way from the agricultural production to the plate.
Arriving in Trento we visit “The Palazzo Roccabruna – The Home of Trentino Products”. There we get an introduction to the autonomous province of Trentino by Adriano Zanotelli the head of “The observatory of products of Trentino”. The province in the north of Italy close to the Austrian border consists of 70% of mountains which create a pattern of many u-shaped valleys which developed  through the erosion of the glacial ice sheets. Generally the climate varies from mediterranean in the south up to alpine in the north. But it also changes between the different valleys and how they are opposed to wind and sun. Due to this the typical products of the region are as manifold as its territories. As some examples show on the map above .

 

Wine in Trentino

One beverage two approaches

We are driving through the Vall‘ Adige plenty of vineyards are clambering up the slopes until the edge of the forests that cover most of the Mountains. Trentino is a wine region with 10.000 hectares of vineyards from 70 meters  altitude up to 800 meters.

Ferrari Spumante 
The fresh pre-alpine climate with cold nights and warm days is perfect to grow Chardonnay and Pinot Grigrio with a high percentage of acidity which is the base for the so-called TRENTODOC Spumante (DOC- Controlled Designation of Origin) the Trentinos Champagne. At the beginning of the 20th century Giulio Ferrari brought the Chardonnay variety and the “Metodo Classico” (Métode Champegnoise) – as described on the picture above – from the Champagne region in France to his home region Trentino and started the Spumante production with its company Ferrari. The denomination of TRENTODOC furthermore includes strict rules based on the territory such as the typical cultivation in pergolas.
Today Ferrari is run by the Lunelli family that took over the in1952. With about 720 hectars (600 ha from partner wine-growers) they produce about 5 million bottles of high quality TRENTODOC with an aging range from two to ten years. Arriving at the Ferraris visitor-center we are entering a classy hall with pictures of “Very Important People” celebrating with Ferrari. Nothing reminds me on the actual growing of the wine. This comes after visiting the huge and impressive wine cellar, when we watch an image video with romanticised fieldwork in yellow reddish autumn light. Excluding any possible problems which appear during the complex procedure of growing wine. In his speech about his business Marcello Lunelli the vice president of the company explains us how the right marketing made Ferrari so successful. He presents us the marketing concept promoting Ferrari as “the Italian Art of Life” all over the world5. On the other hand he speaks about his recent struggle to strengthening the distribution in Trentino and the identification with the region. Which is not astonishing me when I see the advertisement with a sexy woman after a party in Venice which is for me disconnecting the product from it’s origin. Never the less the  straw yellow Perlage from 2006 we taste after the speech is an excellent sparkling wine with an intense bouquet and the fresh and fruity note of a ripe apple.

Castel Noarna
A way different experience awaits us at the end of the same day, with the wine producer Marco Zani at his vineyard “Castel Noarna”. His father bought this piece of land of about six hectares with an old castle on it and used to produce for Ferrari. At one point about seven years ago Marco Zani discovered bio-dynamic wine and that it can have really good quality. He learned all about this special wine-making from the right work in the vineyard until the process of spontaneous fermentation. And unfortunately the old man who helped him in the cellar still had some similar traditional knowledge which seemed to be lost while the modernization of the wine production in the last decades. Finally he converted the production into bio-dynamic.

For that reason he for example stopped using the conventional chemical pesticides mixture which has to be applied every two weeks preventively. Instead he uses copper and sulphur right after it has rained to protect the leaves from mildew. He’s digging a hole to let us understand the role of the soil, its structure and the important loosening effect of green manure that is planted in between the wine rows. We get a glimpse of what it means to be a winegrower. We are basically experiencing the things we have missed in the morning at Ferraris. And in the end we taste these honest wines in the ballroom of the castle with a feeling like shifted back into the 11th century.

A week of conviviality 

Favourite restaurants

Besides tasting wine we obviously had to eat and what is such a trip without the conviviality of the gastronomes of the region and tasting their interpretation of the traditional kitchen and their connection to their territory. In the following part I will portrait three restaurants which not just served excellent menus but represented concepts of authentic cuisine in three different individual ways.

Locanda delle tre chiavi in Isera 
Sergio Valentini – the communicator
The Locanda delle tre chiavi is located in the little village Isera in the middle of the vineyards of Vallagarina. For fifteen years, Sergio Valentini has been running this place with a beautiful ambience where people come together and which makes them feel comfortable. As the current president of “Slow Food Trentino – Alto Adige”, and its Presidi his philosophy is: “I want to give value to the local community, and tell my guests the story from the people, who make the food. And in this way support them in their work, especially the young ones.” Following this aim there’s a detailed list in the menu of all of his producers, suppliers and the “Presidio” products he serves. In which you can also find a description of the restaurant philosophy formulated in twelve acts of eating slow.
Furthermore he knows about his responsibility for the environment as a gastronome for that reason the “Locanda Tre Chiavi” is certified by the province to be an Eco-Restaurant (“Ecoristorazione Trentino”). This means besides the priorly organic and local food provisioning, that they have to reduce waste, save energy and water, put the priority on “green” non-food products and finally inform clients about the

implementation of environmental good practices and involve them in them.  Following all these obligations, day by day, is not the easiest way of running a restaurant. But in the end he certainly says “it is much more rewarding than the conventional way.”

Albergo e Ristorante Nerina 
From field to plate
In the middle of the Val di Non we are having lunch at the hotel and restaurant Nerina. We are sitting in a guest-room with the old fashion charm of a hotel from the 1960s in the alpine-regions of Europe. Sandro di Nuzzo welcomes us and tells us the story of this hotel that his parents Nerina and Francesco started in 196910.  As the “farmer” of the family he shows us the garden in the back of the house and the field 50 metres down the road, both supply most of their vegetable and staple needs. Nerina is a family business all working together and sizing the restaurant and hotel after the amount of work they can do. There’s no aim to grow and they are satisfied with the way it is. Always trying to make as much as they can by themselves. Such as the Mortandela from Val di Non one of the Starters we have. A Salami from a suckling pig that was usually made from the families in the valley. For this the meat is finely grind and after mixing it with spices brought into a roll like balls  and wallowed in buckwheat flour. After this it gets smoked on a wooden board and has to ripen at least 25 days. The salami is either eaten raw or cooked and has a mild but smoky flavour. Right after our lunch we pass by the local butcher where they buy the meat. A small artisan production and when Sandro plans to make his products he chooses which animal is going to be used and his butcher will freshly slaughter and prepare it for him.

Costa Salici
The wild taste of the season
Maurizio Tait is the chef in his alpine rustic restaurant at the ed

ge of the forest right above Cavalese in the  Valle di Fiemme. In his menu he serves a taste of the “wild” Trentino. The menu starts with “Insalata Salmerino” (smoked samlet salad) and a “raw deer tatar” with home made “cheese crackers”. The second is a traditional Polenta from corn and buckwheat with a ragout of self collected mushrooms such as porcini and a fondue cheese sauce.

Copyright Sabine Laaks

But if this hasn’t been enough it was the dessert that gave me this very deep gut feeling that this menu honestly represents the season. I immediately recognised this floral mild aroma in the sorbet that we got  and I fell in love straight away. A sweet but light experience with the simple sourness of fresh lemon. An elderflower sorbet that melts on the tongue smoothly and gives you this very special floral sensation of the beginning summer, when you smell the sweetness of wild elder trees blooming all along the fields. Topped with an arrangement of wild berries it was just delicious. But as you can see on the recipe to the right the ingredients are so simple. That leads me to the last point about what makes a kitchen and its gastronomes authentic to me: The willingness to share recipes, ideas and with the passion for food. As  an autodidactic chef Maurizio Tait gives cooking courses13 and he was more than happy to tell me the “open secret”  of his sorbet.

Arts in a medieval village

La Casa degli artisti

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copyright Frank Schneider

Canale is a little 13th century village, in the community of Tenno, that tightly fits on the mountain slope about 600mts above sea level just ten kilometres  up from the Garda lake. There are plenty of narrow tiny streets with arches, closely packed houses looking like that they are one. On this sunny day the air is cool in here and filled with the humidity of century old stonewalls.
In 1967 when a lot of people had left the village to the next bigger city the hobby artist “Giacomo Vittone” came with his bike to paint here. Further on he bought one of the abandoned houses for a reasonable price and founded “La casa degli artisti” “The artists house” together with friends. After the renovating it was an open place for artists to come and paint for a week in an inspiring environment with a beautiful view on the end of the Valle di Sarca. As exchange they left a painting there for the internal exhibition.
Today the house is run by the communities of Tenno, Arco and Riva del Garda. It is a meeting place for contemporary artists where seminaries, courses, exhibitions, study visits and cultural events take place. With the exhibition halls under the roof top, a kitchen and the simple guest-rooms on the second, course rooms on the first floor and an art garden surrounding it, this house has the enriching combination of hospitality and cultural creativity.

Alpine milk 

La Malga Sass

The last extraordinary experience of our trip goes up on almost 2000 metres of altitude visiting the “Malga Sass” (Chalet Sass) for one night. Here we meet the alpine herdsman just 17 years old who herds the 27 Grigio Alpina cows (Slow Food Presidio) for the summer season (june to october) when they are on the “Malga”. Still going to agricultural school he roughly explains us the daily routine like an old farmer who worked with heart and soul for all his life:

  • Gathering the herd and milking in the morning
  • Bringing the milk down to the artisanal cheese dairy of the Agritur Fior di Bosco in Valfloriana
  • Helping out in the cheese production
  • Cutting grass for the hay in the winter season
  • Helping out on the farm in Valforiana
  • Maintaining the shed on the Malga
  • Gathering and milking the cows in the evening

In the end we ask what he wants to do in the future and he says with total conviction: “I want to be a farmer. This is my life.” On a little hike to a plateau above the tree limit we have a stunning panorama on the alpine mountain range. Breathing this clear air with the smell of green fresh grass, herbs and flowers, I can immediately understand why the cows like it here.

Copyright Raffaela Infanti
Copyright Raffaela Infanti

And I experience the difference between the sensations of alpine milk and the one coming from cows standing in the shed all day long eating concentrated feed from the other side of the world. After a warming nourishing risotto in the cosy guest room of the hut we go to sleep with the jingle of the cows bells playing the good night song. And the world seems to slow down for a moment.