Boning a Porkloin

Along the line of bone I shook
And shivered, dug inside, unseen,
Unseamed this lump of flesh, this lean
Loin lying open like a book.
I read red rooted out, alone.
I eased my narrow edge between
Meat and its matrix, slicing clean
Through thrip and thread to cold bare bone.
I drew the cunning edge to free
The slatted ribs, the gristled clot,
The essence of this flesh, unknot
The puzzle in its heart and see
An end to secrets. Here I laid
All secrets open with my blade.

Larding

Fingers of fatback, nosed through needleneck,
Sewn into sinew, fastened to flesh,
Put in a pattern through this meat, to mesh
And mingle, larding the larger cut. Fleck
Of fat adding sizzle and salt, to loose
Dry density. Look! When you carve, the slice
Slides off to show a face dotted with dice,
A textured checkerboard of joint and juice.
And if my own dry days are lacking flavor,
I must inject bits of wit to marry
Mind and meat. These little lardons carry
Tangled tastes the intellect can savor.
Then may I lick my lips and live a life
As succulent as slices off a knife.

Deglazing

When the meat's removed and juices bubble,
Then it's time for wine to scrape the brown bits
In, to make it smooth and slick and subtle,
Whisked and whipped to succulence. O let's
Scrape all the brown bits in, deglaze the pan
After the meat is gone, reduce, and so
Settle with seasons, fill with flours, blend.
Serve this dish up, no longer just au jus,
But filled and full with starch and seed and leaf.
Mask flesh with essence, action with belief.

Bread

The grains of yeast are gray and green. They slide
Into the teacup. In the water's warm
They cloud and smear, they bubble, crowd, and swarm
Out on the wooden worktop, then inside
All that that's in the bowl. This flour and salt
And sullen oil and shallow pool of milk
Now show their kinship. Closed, engrossed with silk
For skin, this lump will be a whole, gestalt,
A sponge, a bag of bulges, all in all,
A coil, a clump. Torn and dispersed to pans
It swells and swanks beneath a cloth. It plans
Pomp for its portion, wells above its wall.
Such growth can be grotesque. What's kneaded must
Be sometimes curbed. All softness seeks a crust.

Fermentation

Fermentation is slow fire. Watch it grow
Untended in the wort. It works in wet
And dank and dark, a vegetable sweat
That burns out sweet, that flowers to a slow
Explosion of what was. Fermentation shows
How time and temperature are tied to let
Warmth wax, beget more warmth and more, upset
An equilibrium, converting gross
To gloss, grain to glaze. Fermentation starts
The sponge, the whole, it makes the most from least,
The sum of all that rises in the yeast.
It feasts on particles and forms from parts.
Doubled bubbles that change cloud to clear,
Milk and malt and bran to bread and beer.

Planning

“Over time your heart will find joy just as each kind of food reveals its beauty.” 
– Kangxi Emperor, 1684.

When I make meals, fix food, I like to list
Ingredients. I sort and separate,
Plan portions and their proper place on plate,
Mind over menu so that nothing’s missed:
Food from the freezer on the day before,
Species of spices, a dessert that’s cooked
And cooled and covered. I make sure I’ve looked
Long in the larder, stopped by stand and store
That stock what I don’t. Time to trim the meat,
To prep the vegetable, arrange my rice,
My pasta, bulgur, on the stove top. Dice,
Julienne, mince and chop. Whip, purée and beat
Food to a form fashioned by fate and me.
Wine to decanter, glass... coffee to cups...
Steepings to satisfy who sips and sups
About my board. Success is when you see
That sweet fits soup, entree repeats hors d’oeuvre,
As couplet fits in sonnet, when each dish
Can celebrate its sequence as I wish
My rhyme to fit inside your ear. I serve
Fine food that fills the eye as well as gut,
That comes in time to table as we come
In time to our own tabling. I know some
Who claim lists lay a claim on spirit, but
Food and words both need system to unfold
The separate ways they hunger to be told.

Knowing Your Place

When I lay tables I set up
The settings so that they will serve
The food as well as you, a curve
Of plate and platter, glass and cup.
The tablecloth is canvas for
The cook. Linen, china, flatware,
The background for the bill of fare,
Setting as setting. Food is more
Than sustenance when it’s arranged
On table, served and sauced, displayed
As pattern, color, texture, laid
Out on the cloth, augmented, changed.
Art must deal with empty spaces,
Fill them with form. Just so my
Meals must please palate and the eye
When I put down plates and places.
So that you cannot tell which part
Of dinner’s food and which is art.

Out of the Frying Pan

Old black banjo, heavy in my hand,
Spreading constant temper into varied
Food, officiating over married
Fat and fiber. Solid, steady, you stand
On my stovetop. Anyone can see how
Crusty and coarse you are on the outside.
Inside you are so sleek and smooth. I slide
Butter on your belly, anoint your brow
With margarine, float olive essence in
Your cast-iron cup. Then you know what to do.
I need only feed my foodstuffs to you.
You convert them to cuisine. Your thick skin,
Even temper, seasoning! I admire
The easy way you fraternize with fire.

Chef’s Knife

Hammered to hardness, honed until the edge
Is thinned to nothing much, this heavy wedge
Will weight its way through any turn or twist,
True to the torque and tension of my wrist.
I strop this steel on stone, I lay its keen
On grit and scour and scrub until a clean
Bright glitter threads its length. I set this line
With steel, like on like, all sharp and shine.
The tang is riveted to wood that fits
My palm. It rests below my thumb. It sits
Within my hand so well, as if the blade
Was made to meet the hand where it is laid,
As if the metal and the flesh were one,
Here on this board where kitchen cuts are done.

Garlic

Unwrap the paper heart, the stinking rose,
Pry apart the wedges, silver, white,
The silken cloves uncleft, all that was tight
Untightened, separated into toes.
I run my fingernail where it goes.
I loosen all the crevices that  might
Need loosening. I try to let the light
Shine on.  I see unseen. I open close.
Ah, scent and savor! I’m the one who knows
Your secret ways, the one who knows your bite
As you know mine, the one who knows how right
It is to separate that into those.
In autumn plant the dragon tooth.  It shows
Its spear in winter, green and sharp and bright,
Above the darkened soil. It sends the sight
Of spring to January as it grows.
In June it shrivels and it dries and fades
To kitchen clusters hanging by their braids.

Popcorn

Clasped in a husk to dry, reduced to gold
And gush, these small kernels do their very
Best to hide abrupt surprise, snugly hold
Close the secret joy of ordinary.
From the plastic sack, they rattle into
Frypan, an iron plain awash with oil,
Scattering to form a flock, a pinto
Pattern flung in the midst of seethe and boil.
Frying fat will free them.  The humble corn
Sits, sizzles.  Then it creaks and cracks aloud.
It blooms.  It bounds and bounces to be born
And bursts into a bunch, a crunchy crowd.
See how they fly and trampoline and vault,
All asterisk and cumulus, a cup
Of crisp and crackle.  Sprinkle them with salt,
Baste with a bubbling butter, eat them up.

The Kitchen Murders

“You cook to make ghosts.”
– The Hundred Foot Journey, film

The carrot, beet, are ripped from the close embrace
Of earth and topped and peeled and julienned.
Roughneck potato dragged from dirt to face
The boiling kettle so it can pretend
To suavity and smooth docility.  
See satin onion as it sheds its skin.
All plants meet death with equanimity.
No prosecution here or thought of sin.

And flesh dies too as we all meet the worms,
Many with proxy meals along the way.
All living things will serve their sentenced terms.

So you must relish what you eat today,
And finally with one last tired bite,
Murder the master chef called appetite.

Flour and Rice

After Robert Frost's poem Fire and Ice

Some say the world depends on flour,
Some say on rice.
From what the West wants to devour, 
I hold with those that favor flour.
But since we have the pair, it’s nice
To think I’d know enough again
To say that for nutrition rice
Is also grain
And would suffice.

Clean As You Go

I know enough of pot and pan and sauce
To see the sense in those four words. I drape
A towel on my shoulder and I keep
The sponge and tap in use. There's nothing worse
Than carving , plating, saucing, serving
Something worth the work, done and delicious,
Only to find the kitchen crammed with dishes,
Sink and counter littered with the leavings.
So as the sauté pan is used, it's swabbed
And dried and oiled, the emptied saucepan
Rinsed and filled again and yet again,
No drip or dribble dries before it's mopped.
Let my life lie so I can say it's been
Uncluttered as my kitchen and as clean.