Sinking Your Teeth Into Change
Writing when you feel like you have nothing to say is much like eating when you haven’t got the appetite. Here’s me reaching back into my archive of past topics, and plucking out a lost appetite because I really do feel like I have nothing to say. Or perhaps more accurately, I don’t want to say anything, because of course I have thoughts, and although I believe in Joan Didion’s sentiment that we write to find out entirely what we’re thinking, mine are as vast and trafficked and sprawling as the LA landscape I’ve been traversing (mainly on foot, which most Angelenos will be very confused about).
Luckily my appetite has not gone missing. Los Angeles brought with it Californian crispy rice bowls in every restaurant I visited. Buttery tahdig at Kismet, which hid a creamy egg yolk in the middle, the top perfectly crispy like a creme brûlée, ordered last minute just for myself because I couldn’t go a meal without rice. Sqirl’s crispy rice salad and sorrell pesto topped with charred broccolini. A deep bowl of white rice topped with two fried eggs and a fillet of salmon at All Time. The exact same but scattered with bitter sprouts at Gjusta. Tahini and flaky bread so oily that we almost had to use the napkins that we most definitely stole from an establishment I won’t name. Rotisserie chicken and flatbread and chilli oil and pickled jalapenos so potent it gave me the hiccups for five minutes. Crispy fries on a rooftop with a crisp glass of cold rosé. Curly fries from the burger joint in front of a cinema eaten on the sidewalk.
I’ve been thinking a lot about identity signifiers. That the place we come from, or where we’ve made a home for ourselves, exposes our likes, dislikes, vulnerabilities, joys and insecurities. Particularly for people like me (those who think about food more than they probably should), the food culture of these places also had as an identity. Since being away from Londoner, I’ve never felt like more a Londoner. The somewhat rough-around-the-edges dining culture, the pints in the pub (or more likely the park, now the weather has turned) is completely different to the self-awareness of LA or the wellness obsession of Vancouver. I arrived in Vancouver and immediately felt I needed to be more healthy; I spent a week in LA thinking about what I looked like. It’s not something I’m conscious of in London. And perhaps it’s not just a London thing, but a where-you’re-comfortable thing.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how my best friend’s kitchen feels like a stranger to me. And I think it always will, no matter how much time I spend in it. I don’t like to think of myself as a possessive person, but when it comes to food and cooking and hosting and homes, I am. I have such specific rituals. Certain objects or utensils used for certain things. Of course spending time in LA, I was desperate to cook the Californian produce and use the Flamingo Estate olive oil I couldn’t afford; but I wanted all of these things in my own kitchen. As beautiful as my friends Hannah and Luke’s apartment was, I didn’t feel called to cook there because it wasn’t mine.
I left at the beginning of April wanting to escape London and everything it reminded me of (which was perhaps just myself). I then arrived in Vancouver and balked at the fact that I felt like a foreigner in my own body, despite that being what I wanted. LA was a sun-soaked tonic, and it pushed me away from that feeling of strangeness, the haze I was walking around in the week before – but I think what I replaced with that was just total wonder and awe at how self-conscious and sprawling this city could be. Now, as our plane towers over snow-capped mountains, full from a large bowl of skillet eggs and potatoes wolfed down at 9am at LAX, en route back to Vancouver, I wonder what I’ll find for me there during my last week. Tonight, at least, there will be Greek food. Apart from orzo, I’m curious to see how my appetite changes before I touch down in London next Monday morning.
Until then, there are workouts to do, wellness cultures to navigate, personal grievances to air out and more Vancouver streets to cry (and hopefully laugh) on. Cooking might have to wait.
Taking this recipe that I wrote for my good friend Anita’s newsletter, which feels pertinent as it’s a crispy rice and salmon recipe, which I’ve basically been living off in different guises over the past week.
All you need to do is gather your greens: you could roast kale with sesame and soy sauce so it goes crispy; slice raw fennels super finely and dress with lemon juice and olive oil; slice half an avocado and coat with chilli oil; or my personal favourite, smacked cucumbers. Literally bash a little cuke, cut in half then slice into thick half moons (you could remove the seeds) and dress with rice wine vinegar, chilli oil, sesame seeds and soy sauce.
Cook the rice (either steam or boil with a ratio of 1 to 1.1 – aka 1 cups of rice to 1.1 cups of water) and let it rest. Or you could use some leftover rice, too. Works best with white not brown, sorry not sorry!
Now the salmon: a few hours ahead of time, marinate the fillets (one per person) in a little glug of soy sauce, sesame oil, lime juice and honey. Preheat the grill to 190ºC, then pan fry in an oven-appropriate hot pan coated with oil, flesh (not skin) side down, saving some of the marinade. You could sear the sides as well.
Remove the salmon and place onto a plate, then turning the heat down add a big knob of butter. Once it starts foaming add the cooked and rest rice and flatten to the bottom of the pan. Let it crackle – about 4-5 minutes – on a medium-high heat (you don’t want it to burn). Add the salmon fillets (skin side up) to the top of the rice, spoon over the remaining marinade and place in the oven until the salmon is fully cooked. There should be a crispy layer of rice at the bottom.
Serve up in a bowl with your greens. Veggies, just take away the salmon step and add a fried egg or some crispy tofu if that’s your vibe.