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A Burrito for the Next Hundred Years

According to Mexican tradition, the burrito was invented by Juan Mendez, a street vendor who sold tacos wrapped in large flour tortillas during the Mexican Revolution, 100 years ago. Mendez transported himself and his food on a donkey or burro. Hence the name burrito.

In the ensuing 100 years, the burrito has, in my opinion (and with apologies to Sr. Mendez), gone off the rails. The traditional Mexican burrito composed of one or two ingredients has given way to the oversized, overstuffed, overly caloric American variety: tortilla, beans, cheese, sour cream, guac, lettuce, tomato, meat, etc., etc. Too many of these mega-burritos are unhealthy, soggy, hard to eat, and just plain unappetizing.

What we need, then, is a burrito for the next hundred years, one that retains the yumminess, convenience, and nutritional value of the Mendez variant but also takes advantage of the diversity of foods available today and appeals to the correspondingly broad tastes of the American eater. A burrito that brings the excitement back to wrapped foods, the same alegria de comer that drew Mexicans from hundreds of miles to Mendez and his famous steed.

In this blog post, I intend to propose such a burrito. But first, to motivate my formula, let me outline the chief problems with today’s product, the kind you might get at Chipotle or even local joints like Northampton’s own La Veracruzana.

First, they are too thick. Why is this a problem? Each bite of a burrito should provide a cross-section: an equal sampling of all the ingredients. Most burritos today preclude such a bite: you just can’t fit them in your mouth. You’re reduced to alternating components — first a little rice and beans, then a little veg and guac, etc. — or, worse yet, eating with a knife and fork. If you’re going to do that, what’s the point? Get a taco salad.

Second, and relatedly, the tortilla-to-filling ratio is completely out of whack. Due to the ever-increasing diameter of today’s burrito and the constant thickness of the tortilla, this critical ratio is under constant downward pressure. The result is a tortilla subordinated to filling, acting as a mere shell, and a burrito with no yin to its yang.

Finally, there is the problem of texture, which manifests itself in two areas. First, even though contemporary burritos have more ingredients than the Mendez variety, all of the ingredients have the same mushy consistency. You might as well be eating a samosa. Don’t believe me? Slip into a Chipotle, and you will see an entire meal prepared with a spoon: no fingers needed, and no prongs. Second: many, many burritos come soggy. Liquid from tomato or unspun lettuce has seeped down, soaking the tortilla and creating a mess. La Veracruz, I’m looking at you.

So what to do? Shall we perform a gastronomic John Roberts, forsaking the burrito and casting aside 100 years of precedent? No, we shall not. That would be rash and downright arrogant. Instead, a more measured approach is called for — an eater’s stare decisis. We must understand where we’ve gone wrong, take stock, and amend our formula in pursuit of a more perfect foodthing.

Number one, we must make smaller burritos. We must restore the tortilla-to-filling ratio. We must! Smaller tortillas are not necessary, in case you have a 20-pack in your freezer. Simply use less filling. Number two, to fully restore the tortilla-filling parity, we must seek higher quality tortillas. In Brooklyn, where I live, you simply can’t find a well-crafted, additive-free burrito in most delis or supermarkets. You have to seek out the goods at Perelandra or the co-op. But it’s worth it: Not only do these tortillas yield flavor worthy of Sr. Mendez; they also withstand liquid, addressing the problem of sogginess. Number three, we must vary the texture of the filling, liberally employing kernel corn, radish slices, fresh romaine (dried, of course), and other crunchy items. The resulting bite (comprehensive due to smaller size) should feel like biting through a cold ice-cream sandwich: some crunch, some mush. And finally, as is the case with so many things in America today, we must prepare our burritos with moderation, choosing a few complementary ingredients and using a bit of each, rather than pumping the tortilla full like a sausage.

I’ve already made a few burritos following my new philosophy, and I’ve been pleased with the results. I just may have it: the burrito for the next hundred years. Check back often for updates on my quest.

2010 07 20 jonah none Comments (0) Permalink

The Employees at The Strand Are Obnoxious

Whenever I go to The Strand, that huge bookstore whose canvas bag is carried by every other New York City girl, I run into a snooty employee.

Last year, I went there looking for a copy of Demian by Hermann Hesse. I found an attendant and asked, “Do you have any Hermann Hesse?” pronouncing Hesse in two syllables: Hess-uh. “You mean, Hesse?” she replied monosyllabically, eliding the “uh.” “Well, yeah. I guess,” I said. And she guided me to the Hesse.

I was pretty sure Hesse was German and pretty sure you say the “uh”: heffe, waffe, Deutsche. Back home I consulted Wikipedia, and indeed, the correct pronunciation in German is ˈhɛɐ̯man ˈhɛsə, complete with terminating schwa. It might be that in English, you drop the last syllable (I’ve heard luft-waff instead of luft-vaff-uh), but even if that’s true, was it necessary to correct my attempt at an original-language pronunciation, especially when there is no notable author named Hessuh?

I gave myself a year to cool off and returned to The Strand last week in search of a not-so-literary but still important book: the classic guide to software project management called Peopleware. At the info desk, I asked the attendant, “Do you have Peopleware?” “Peopleware,” he said. “What’s that?” I said, “It’s a classic book on software project management. He said, “The computer section is downstairs. It might be there. As for project management, I couldn’t tell you because I don’t know what that is.”

Really? You don’t know what project management is? Could you perhaps guess from the words project and management? What annoyed me, though, wasn’t the guy’s ignorance but the smugness with which he proclaimed it: his superfluous explanation that my area of interest had never registered in his brain and he didn’t care to parse it.

I expect some snootiness at a cool bookstore, like Spoonbill in Williamsburg or the Broadside in Northampton, but not at the big, boring Strand. They had better watch out or they might end up the victim of another Burke boycott.

2010 07 07 jonah none Comments (0) Permalink

I Disagree with Most of What Hank Paulson Said on Charlie Rose

Hank Paulson was on Charlie Rose this week. I disagree with so much of what he said, I don’t know where to start. So I’ll just take a few of the most objectionable statements:

Well, Charlie, the risk was a huge one, because if the system had collapsed, it would have been catastrophic for the economy.

This is a common refrain among the trifecta of self-styled saviors: Bernanke, Geithner, and Paulson. Not unlike their approach to regulating prior to the collapse, it is a very short-term view. We “saved” the system, and now we have a disaffected populace, ten-percent unemployment, and the same old rickety financial house inhabited by greedy superbanks. Not to mention that we endured a series of injustices that can only be called un-American. Has Paulson considered that maybe the system needed to be remade, and a “collapse” was the surest way to do it?

And so most of what is cited as mistakes were really things we had no control over. For instance, I would like to have seen the AIG problem coming earlier. But there was no regulator that had responsibility for the whole institution, and we just didn’t have a clear line of sight, and we didn’t — we didn’t have the information.

Paulson talks as if he were installed in mid-2008. The man became Treasury Secretary on July 10, 2006. If he didn’t have the information to detect a financial collapse or the authority to avert one, it’s because he didn’t ask for it. The Treasury’s own web site describes the Secretary’s job as “the principal economic advisor to the President” who “plays a critical role in policy-making by bringing an economic and government financial policy perspective.” Would that not include ensuring that the government can avert an economic disaster? This is just one instance of many where Paulson passes the buck. I can’t help but think that the average American worker would be fired if he did the same.

On the “Volcker rule,” which, in the spirit of Glass-Steagall, would prevent depositories (“commercial banks”) from trading for their own gain:

I’m not at one on that. . . . the idea of having sound bites and going up to Congress and legislating it, I would let the systemic regulator and the prudential regulator worry about that, and I would let them deal with it.

Given the laxity of the SEC and other regulators leading up to the crisis, this statement — which, let’s recognize, is being uttered by a former Chairman and CEO of Goldman, Sachs — can only be read as naive, self-serving, or just plain stupid.

We need compensation plans to be structured so they don’t promote excessive risk-taking.

This contradicts Paulson’s earlier statement that “we need to have a system again going forward where no bank or financial institution is too big to fail so we don’t to put taxpayer money in.” Which one is it, Hank? Do we limit the size of banks and let them fail, or limit the level of risk and let them grow? This is such a fundamental question that you’d think Paulson would have a coherent idea or at least a consistent theory buttressing his answers. But he doesn’t. And that’s just more evidence of the intellectual laziness that dragged Hank Paulson into the muck — and took us all with him.

2010 02 06 jonah none Comments (0) Permalink

Five Good Reasons Not to Vote for Scott Brown

Five good reasons not to vote for Scott Brown, based on the “issues” page of his web site:

1. Scott Brown plagiarizes his son’s social studies papers: “America is a great country but we also have some challenges that we need to solve if we’re going to remain the world’s superpower.”

2. Scott Brown does not know what a colon is for: “I want to ensure that we leave them an America that is financially stronger and independent: minus a national debt that we can never repay.”

3. Scott Brown needlessly capitalizes important words as if he were writing the Declaration of Independence: “Our Government should have the ability to impose the death penalty in cases where it is justified.”

4. Scott Brown either does not know what “elders” means or is in bed with the shaman lobby: “[Health care legislation] will raise taxes, increase government spending and lower the quality of care, especially for elders on Medicare.”

5. Scott Brown is wrong on basic comma usage: “I have been a vigorous supporter of legislation providing benefits to returning service members, as well as, benefits for the families of those killed in action.”

2010 01 17 jonah none Comments (0) Permalink

Free Ham Sandwich

My brother Matt posted this to craigslist:

Free ham sandwich available for the taking. Sitting on the lawn at corner of Freemont Ave and 41st. Good sandwich, just never really got around to finishing it. Took a bite and then got really busy with graduate school. If you come by for it, PLEASE do not just take a bite – I need this thing out of here ASAP (lease is up!) and there is NO room for it in the studio I’m moving into, so just can’t take it with. I CANNOT help with moving, so please no more requests. You must haul away yourself. It’s on rye with some tomato and mayonnaise. Would probably work fine with mustard too, but that’s up to you.

Please direct all interest in the sandwich to Matt.

2009 09 02 jonah none Comments (4) Permalink

Palimpsest

A couple weeks ago, I tried to read Louis Menand’s review of Thomas Pynchon’s new novel. I got as far as this passage:

Getting broken is in the nature of being an egg. The novel gives the concept some low-key metaphysical play—original sin is an obvious analogy—but, apart from this and a death-and-resurrection motif involving a saxophonist in a surf-rock band, “Inherent Vice” does not appear to be a Pynchonian palimpsest of semi-obscure allusions.

At this point, I concluded what I usually do when I read Menand: I am not as smart as Menand. Not only do I fail to understand the beautiful, complex molecules that are his thoughts; I don’t even get the atoms. What, cried my feeble brain, is a palimpsest?

Luckily, my dad, who also has not won the Pulitzer Prize, was standing close by. He told me that, although he had seen the word here and there, he didn’t know what it meant either. We looked it up, mused about it for a minute, and continued on our way, content with our new grain of knowledge and confident that palimpsest would not soon again cross our paths.

How wrong we were. Today, on the train, immersed in Andre Gide’s The Immoralist and feeling pretty good about reading something French, I once again collided with that hyper-aspirated interloper. In the midst of a scene in which the protagonist is discovering, within his dry, erudite self, a sensitive and passionate person–there it lurked:

And I would compare myself to a palimpsest; I shared the thrill of the scholar who beneath more recent script discovers, on the same paper, an infinitely more precious ancient text.

Before, reading Menand, I hadn’t recognized the word at all. And now, face to face again with that frustrating jumble of obstruents, I had only a vague memory of the definition. I could glean something from the context, but, having been bested by palimpsest twice in two weeks, I wanted a full measure of understanding. I resolved that, once I navigated the soppy floor of Canal St. station and arrived at my office, I would postpone work and consult the Internet.

My favorite source, the simple and reliable Merriam-Webster web site, reminded me of my prior trip to the dictionary. A palimpsest, according to m-w.com, is a “writing material used one or more times after earlier writing has been erased.” It also quotes Margaret Atwood using the word as metaphor, meaning something with “diverse layers or aspects apparent beneath the surface.”

Gide, of course, uses the word in its literal sense, and–doh!–practically defines it for the reader. Menand, on the other hand, employs it like Atwood, asserting that “Inherent Vice” does not, like some of Pynchon’s other work, require the reader to peel back an apparently simple surface to get at the book’s real point.

What’s so interesting about palimpsest, though, is not its meaning but its sound. What an exemplar of pulmonic egress! It sounds more like the French rejoinder to the Zeppelin or something that Voltaire would sit on than a humble scrap of papyrus. How did this word come about?

The always helpful Online Etymology Dictionary presents an unusually simple lineage. In fact, the word comes not from the French (shows my lack of word instinct) but the Greek palimpsestos, meaning “scraped again.” Palim, points out the OED, derives from the root palin, meaning “again,” as in palindrome.

I always wonder why I remember certain things and forget others. Esoteric words like obstruent stick in my brain while palimpsest, epigone, and untold others slip away. Or are they still there, under the surface?

2009 08 25 jonah words Comments (2) Permalink

I Found Something With Bing That I Could Not Find With Google

I was searching for my friend Alison Branch’s wedding web site. Into Google, I typed “branch wedding,” “alison branch wedding,” “branch meade wedding,” “branch wedding site:wedding.com,” etc., etc. To no avail: Google insisted on showing me wedding planners in Branch, SC; the Facebook page of an unrelated Ms. Branch; a story about the engineers from Allison Turbine Co. who contributed oxidizers to the Apollo command module; a bizarre and seemingly unrelated page entitled “Profile of God. Zilla.”; and other Web drivel.

At this point in a search, I usually conclude that the information I want can not be found on the Internet. Rarely have I typed something into Yahoo, Ask, Live Search, etc. and found anything approaching, much less beating, Google results. Google is God or, shall I say, God. Zilla.

This time, having heard the buzz about Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine, I decided to give something else a chance. I typed “bing.com” and pressed enter: already I had saved two keystrokes! And not only that: my screen was filled with a picture of illuminated cubes floating on a lake, with a slightly anachronistic search box superimposed. No matter, into the Bing box I entered my original and oh-so-obvious query: “alison branch wedding”.

To my delight, the first result read:

ALISON BRANCH and THOMAS MEADE IV – WeddingChannel Profile

That was it! Bing had bested Google — and informed me of the groom’s lineage in the process. With that seemingly mundane but apparently complex task behind me, I clicked on “Macy’s” and confronted the real question: cake plate or ceramic tuna? When will Bing decide that?

2009 08 06 jonah none Comments (7) Permalink

Insights from Daniel Ellsberg’s Secrets

I’m reading Secrets by Daniel Ellsberg, the economist, former State Department staffer, and self-described “cold-warrior” who leaked the Pentagon Papers. The book is a memoir of the Vietnam War era. It chronicles how the Johnson administration deceived the electorate, escalated the war despite public opposition, and cultivated in the Executive a culture of secrecy and subordination that ensured the conflict would drag on. Given our current entanglements in Iraq and Afghanistan and the seemingly ever-present voices calling for even more war, I have found the book very relevant to our time. I wish I had read it sooner.

In particular, Ellsburg quotes from a Defense Department memo to which he contributed in 1964 that argued against the so-called “Rostow approach,” a strategy advocated by hard-liners who wanted to open the wider war with an intense and unprovoked campaign of bombing–the 60′s equivalent of “shock and awe.” Ellsberg writes:

Application of the Rostow approach risks domestic and international opposition ranging from anxiety and protest to condemnamtion, efforts to disassociate from U.S. policies or alliances, or even strong countermeasures. . . . Currently, then, it is the Rostow approach, rather than the measures it counters, that would be seen generally as an “unstabilizing” change in the rules of the game, an escalation of conflict, an increasing of shared international risks, and quite possibly, as an open aggression demanding condemnation . . .

This seems to be a cogent rejoinder to the Bush Doctrine. And in 1964, at least initially, it was heeded: the Johnson Administration pursued a less aggressive policy than Rostow, gradually escalating the bombing in the hopes that, if necessary, it could be terminated. In Iraq, of course, we did no such thing. I wonder, did Rumsfeld, or Bush himself, consider Ellsberg’s logic in 2003, the year after his book was published?

While Ellsberg’s old memos are fascinating, the most interesting aspect of the book, in my mind, is not the discussion of policy but the exposition of Washington’s inner workings: how officials manipulate the bureaucracy, and especially the press, to further their own agendas. Of his boss at the Defense Department, Assistant Secretary John McNaughton, Ellsberg writes:

As he got into areas where he had to be especially untruthful or elusive, his Pekin, Illinois, accent got broader till he sounded like someone discussing corn at a country fair or standing at the rail of a riverboat. You looked for hayseed in his cuffs. He simply didn’t mind looking and sounding like a hick in the interests of dissimulation. My future boss in Vietnam, Edward Lansdale, had the same willingness to appear simpleminded when he wanted to be opaque . . .

Most people thought Bush was an idiot, but I always thought he was a lot smarter than he looked. He was no puppet. He had a strong hand in lots of decisions, now attributed to Cheney and Rumsfeld, that led us into the war. His apparent slowness, I would guess, was effected for the same reasons as McNaughton’s: to ingratiate, to head off deeper inquiry.

Now that we have a less hickish President who seems less evil, many of Ellsburg’s lessons seem, for the time being, less relevant. But the following passage, which discusses how decisions were made in the frantic days between the 1964 election and the initiation of major combat, reminded me of the predicament Obama finds himself in today:

The image that often came to mind as I watched John [McNaughton] . . . move from one caller to another on the phone, one crisis to another, was that of the juggler in a circus who keeps a dozen plates spinning in the air . . . I asked myself more than once: Can they really get away with decision making like this? . . . Can men even as brilliant and adroit as these . . . manage safely and wisely so many challenges at once, with so little time to acquire more than a shallow understanding of any one? Can you really run the world this way?

I hope, for everyone’s sake, that Obama develops a better way to make policy than did Johnson, McNamara, McNaughton, and the rest of the crew that got us into Vietnam. What Ellsberg makes plain is that if he doesn’t, we may find ourselves fighting yet another needless war.

2009 06 26 jonah none Comments (0) Permalink

My Brother And I Waged Our Second Successful Boycott

Last weekend, my dad and I stopped at Northampton Coffee. I was waiting for my customary decaf americano, perusing the muffins, when it hit me: “Hey, I’m supposed to be boycotting this place!” You see, about a year ago, my brother Matt had gone into the same cafe and asked whether the beans were fair trade. “Fair trade?!” the owner scoffed. “That’s not my problem!” Knowing my feelings about non-fair coffee, Matt told me the story, and we knew what we had to do. The boycott was on.

We may not have been so quick to retaliate had we not already waged one successful campaign. In 2005, not long after Matt moved to Seattle (when I was still living there), he got a job at a restaurant called Local. He was happy because it seemed like a cool spot, and finding a job in a new city is always hard. But the joy would not last. Upon reporting for his first day of work, Matt was informed that he had already been fired. No justification. They had just hired too many people. Oops!

We called an impromptu brothers’ meeting in the front seat of his Honda. Clearly we couldn’t patronize the restaurant, but was there anything else we could do? Yes, there was. We resolved not only to tell people the story of Local’s bad behavior but also, and more importantly, to open the car window every time we drove past the offender and scream what became our rallying cry: “LOCAL SUCKS!”

In the waning days of 2005 and throughout 2006, a pedestrian near the intersection of Olive and Denny in Seattle would no doubt hear that exhortation–”Local sucks!”–as a gray Civic SI with a robot dashboard ornament or a blue VW Golf with a vestigial Howard Dean bumper sticker zoomed by. We hurled the insult while driving south, while driving north, with music playing, with stereo silent, out of front window, rear window, and sunroof. When we got on the highway, when we needed a $4 juice from Whole Foods, when we set course for the Space Needle or Pike Place Market or the Puerco Lloron or that weird vegan hot dog place next to the convention center–any place that might take us past our nemesis–we threw the bomb: “LOCAL SUCKS!”

In early 2007, I was ascending Olive Way in my hatchback cum bomber, preparing for a raid. I dutifully opened the ordinance hatch (rolled down the driver’s window), turning my head to the left. My mouth was open and my vocal cords abuzz when I saw it: the steaming rubble of a thwarted enemy base. Local was dark. We had won.

Two years later, as I stared at a bran muffin, I knew I had made a grave mistake. Never in our campaign against Local had we even stepped foot inside. Now, by purchasing an americano at Northampton Coffee, I had committed the cardinal sin. All I could do was hope for a stroke of luck, a divine reprieve. I asked the barista, “Where do you get the beans?” Cheerily, she replied, “We get them from Barrington Coffee. It’s a more-than-fair-trade kind of thing.”

“Say what?” I thought. Had Matt been wrong? Had he led us into this fight based on false intelligence, leaving us the shameful choice between an admission of our incompetence and the prosecution of a war under false pretenses? “It can’t be!” I told myself. “Matt would never be so cavalier. He would never waste our powers on an illusory threat. Not my brother.” But back in the car, with my dad, my mind was not on the rich, dark asset I now possessed but on how we got into this mess and how we would get out.

My dad, who has won many a battle himself (in the 90′s, he got smoking banned at the offices of Monarch, a large insurer where we worked), and whom I credit with giving me and my brother whatever genes control indignation and perseverance, had not heard the Local story and, indeed, was not aware of the pending cafe boycott. I told him everything.

“Jonah,” he said, “Don’t you see?”

“See what, Dad?”

“Matt was never wrong. They did serve normal coffee before. They changed because of you.”

His words were like a revelation: I never expected to hear it, but when I did, I knew it to be true. My brother and I had won, again.

2009 06 22 jonah none Comments (3) Permalink

I Ate My Last Tiger’s Milk Bar

When I was a kid, I used to go to my friend Dan Stern’s house every Wednesday after school. We’d play Castlevania, make vinegar and baking soda rockets, attack each other with rakes, concoct oozes from the stuff in his parents’ pantry and watch them burn in the oven, and do all kinds of stupid things. Like Bill Bryson wrote in his memoir Thunderbolt Kid, childhood now seems short, but those were long pre-adolescent afternoons, and we would do anything to fill them.

One oddly clear memory I have of those times is sneaking into Dan’s kitchen to get my hands on a Tiger’s Milk bar. These were little sugary bricks of peanut butter coated in carob and wrapped in foil. So many snacks were hard to get at–Handi-Snacks, Fruit Roll-Ups–but a Tiger’s Milk wrapper would yield satisfyingly. And the texture! That’s what I really remember. Somewhere between a Three Musketeers and a Watchamacallit, a Tiger’s Milk would resist your bite just enough.

When I moved to New York last January, I noticed that amidst the array of energy bars now on display in all delis was my childhood friend. At first I bought them infrequently, as a treat, a little nostalgia pill. But recently, I’ve been buying one almost every day, finishing lunch with it. That is, until yesterday. That’s when I ate my last Tiger’s Milk ever.

Yesterday I turned the wrapper over, lifted the flap, and read the ingredients list. Now, I had read the nutrition facts before, and they stack up all right: it’s not a head of lettuce, but for what is essentially a candy bar, it’s not bad. Moreover, I always assumed Tiger’s Milk was healthy because Dan’s parents used to give us good food from Cornucopia, the little natural foods market in our home town.

Boy, was I wrong. The ingredients read like a Michael Pollan hit list. Top ingredient: high-fructose corn syrup. And farther down were all the hallmarks of processed non-food: partially hydrogenated oil, soy protein isolate, a bunch of chemicals you can barely pronounce. I have a firm policy of not eating not-food, and so, grudgingly, I decided never again to eat a Tiger’s Milk.

I’m sure that my body will thank me, but in all honesty, I’m sad. I feel like I’ve discarded something that made me happy and severed a connection to my childhood. When we’re choosing what to eat, is the food itself all that matters?

2009 06 19 jonah none Comments (0) Permalink