Verdict: Cilantro Guilty

I hate cilantro is not a performative statement. Saying it doesn't make it true. Wittgenstein would disagree with me here, but I hated it before I had words for it--the hate is stronger than even the words to describe it.

But there are other phrases that are performative: I do and I bet you come to mind, but so does another--Guilty.

My stint, which started today and will end I don't know when, as a duteous Brooklyn potential juror has got me thinking about all kinds of words: objectivity, (don't believe in it) judgment, (don't like it) guilty, (gross--do you know anything about the prison system? did you watch the OJ trial?) innocent (we're all guilty, did you read the Brother's K?)--words I have problems with, but it's not the words, it's what they represent. These are judicial words. Words meant to mean something concrete, serious and true. Words that weigh. Words that enable judgment. But, you know, that's just not how I feel about things.

When I say I love you, I know I'm saying the truth, not because it applies to certain feelings but precisely for the opposite reason, it just feels true. Maybe expressing that I would need to feel someone was guilty would get me out of jury duty. They like to tell you to pay attention to the facts of the case, to the evidence and then ask asinine questions like:

"Are you capable, Miss [I scream not married] Hollingsworth, of paying attention to the facts?"
"Sure," I respond.

"Have you prejudged this case Miss Hollingsworth?"
"No, but, I have, you know, opinions..."
"Oh, yes of course and I'd urge you to hold out on sharing those... but of course you have opinions as you say.."
"Yup"
"But you haven't judged"
"No, I don't know how I'd rule at this point" (laughs)

and I'm wondering if I have a shot in hell of getting on this jury (I find out tomorrow). What's weird is that I'm kinda into it. It's such a specific experience. They didn't say we couldn't talk about it. They probably should have? Anyway, it's a small case and the defendant is that city of New York. God damn it all to hell. I love New York--the city of taxes, taxes that pay me to do jury duty, taxes that pay the plaintiff for whatever the fuck happened to her and is New York's fault (or is it?!) Taxes! Love them. Suck it Sara Palin. I made $40 today serving my country! (though I guess you have to be tortured as a POW to get the full, authentic serving your country experience).

Well, anyway, whatever happens, probably won't end with me Law & Ordering someone into a guilty verdict (I'd hang that jury so fast if prison were involved). I don't make a lot of performative statements. Guess I prefer to take it in, observe stuff, then write stuff. I hate cilantro: it's easy to say, to write because it's specific, it's true (if we agree hate is a strongly negative feeling toward a thing) and I don't have those kinds of dogmatic, strong, true feelings about things like, oh, whether someone is guilty or not, but believe me it's very hard to explain to an ambulance-chasing attorney and his apathetic defense counterpart that all these feelings of ambivalence somehow tie into my hate of cilantro. It just doesn't roll off the tongue.

Anchovies, Beef Heart and Cilantro

You'll please pardon my linguistic atrophy--it's been awhile.

They say memory isn't (please, someone, explain to me why "isn't" isn't in my firefox dictionary--y'all download 3.0?--readers, so much has happened) so reliable, so it's going to require a leap of faith for you to believe my account of a dinner a fortnight past, but, suffice it to say, I have a preternatural memory, especially for all-things involving cilantro.

One of my good friends is leaving New York to work for the Obama campaign. This is a trend a lot of my friends are partaking in--not the work for Obama thing, the leave New York (me) thing. First there was good friend who moved to Cairo, then there was other good friend moving to Argentina in two months (I won't mention her name in the event her employers are reading--surprise!!) and then this guy, my best guy friend that isn't my boyfriend in the whole state of New York--moving.

Well, that's neither here nor there except that we had a sort-of goodbye dinner together. As I said, it's been a couple of weeks (I have, a few weeks ago, taken a real grownup job that has been a bit needy time-wise). We went to Marlow & Sons. This is a restaurant I can't help but love despite the fact that hipsters love it too--this is true of a lot of things in Williamsburg. Great oysters. The same menu of 10 things everyday, except the way each is prepared changes with what's in season and presumably the chef's whim. I've never had anything I didn't really like there.

That was, at least, until a couple weeks ago (God, I should write murder mysteries--you didn't know where this was going, did you?) when we ordered the beef heart. I'm basically of one mind when it comes to offal: I'll try it. I don't always like it, but I often do, and, you know, I'm out to eat, so, let's, like, try something new. Especially when I'm with a group of experimenters, as I often am--I like to just order weird shit, especially when I'm in good hands like at M & S.

I asked the waiter how the heart on anchovy crostini was and he responded with something like: "Oh my hold fucking christ it is so good you won't believe it." While bordering on the too-much enthusiasm in a response category, it seemed clear his answer was an endorsement, and so we ordered it. I said something snarky like "Wow, your chef really went for it with the anchovy AND the heart, huh?" He knew what I was saying. Bold. Real bold.

My review of the heart is this: it was fine. I wouldn't eat it every day. I wouldn't spit it out. It was just fine. I'd never had heart before and have no source of comparison. It seemed like it was probably cooked properly, it was just sort of OK. The anchovies were a bit much (I find they almost always are unless they're used where they belong--in caesar salad dressing or as a flavoring in some sauce or dip or other kind of condiment situation) and didn't help things out--they took things from fine, to less-than-fine. What changed things dramatically was the accoutrement. I've never seen such an egregious affront to my cilantro hate, maybe ever.

With the thinly sliced heart and anchovy crostini was a green salad of what looked to be parsley tossed in a very light vinaigrette. Of course, as any good cilantro hater would, I asked (aloud) if it could be, was it possible, could it be cilantro? I didn't really think it was--who would do such a thing? But wouldn't you know it? An absolutely mammoth pile of cilantro was just lying there nearly naked, adorned by nothing more than some fresh lemon, a little olive oil, some salt, some pepper and my rage, contempt and nonplus.

This was no normal cilantro. No, this was local, organic, seasonal, probably god-damn heirloom cilantro. In other words, it tasted like the Platonic ideal of cilantro, which is to say the Platonic ideal of gross. I promptly told my waiter, relating the same lesson I will take with me from the experience: When a chef is bold enough to pair beef heart with anchovy, he's not going to think twice about serving it with a heaping pile of cilantro--and you're a fool to think otherwise.

Independence (from Cilantro) Day

As a precocious, egomaniacal kid, the fireworks meant a lot to me growing up. See, they would happen on the 4th of July, while my birthday is on the 12th of July, (and I always used that syntax to describe my birthday, being in addition to precocious and egomaniacal, patriotic in the precise way of a nuance-free 5-year-old) and my recollection is that my father would tell me every year the grand fireworks were part of my birthday celebration, not so much that they were for me but that they were somehow part of the Erin Hollingsworth birthday gestalt, if you will.

So it's in this context that I came to know fireworks, Independence Day, the whole thing; America's birthday and mine are, in my mind, intrinsically linked. Of course, as I've grown older I've realized this isn't strictly true, but one doesn't easily shake-off childhood associations. This association has also become more disturbing as each year of age brings another year of Bush--another year of mitigated freedom. The fireworks, invented by the Chinese, are less magical and more ironic--China kicking our economic asses and everything. But as we grow older, we find new ways to enjoy things we used to, or we probably should try.

And so it is that I greatly look forward to this weekend's festivities, which awesomely will be full of friends old and new, and I'm thinking cilantro-free! You don't get more Americana than 4th of July food: potato salad, BBQ, hot dogs, baked beans, watermelon, (with salt if you have any reverence to either the fruit or your Midwestern roots) and domestic macrobrews. And when and if Americana is overtaken by cilantro, well, the war against gross is lost. Not on my watch America!

Channeling My Inner-Punk

Sometimes things like our jobs, personal relationships, and constant inner-monologues get in the way of what really matters: blogging. Dear readers, I apologize and will not soon let you down again.

The other night I had dinner, a subtle euphemism for blog fodder, with a good friend, her visiting-New York Latin lover (who loves being called that) and my, what I think it is now officially safe to call him, boyfriend. We went to a place called Graffiti, a joy of a dining experience if you're in the area and are open to not-so-much weird food, as much as weird food combinations, most of which work. From the moment the sweet watermelon balanced perfectly with the salty feta, and cool mint hit my impatient mouth...just kidding--I hate that kind of food writing: the watermelon with feta and mint sorbet tasted awesome. So did a lot of other things.

The chef, Jehangir Mehta, earned accolades as a pastry chef at Jean Georges and some other places that also matter, as it were. We met him quickly (the restaurant is very small) and not sure of what to choose, asked him if he would just send out some stuff. "Allergies, restrictions?," he appropriately and kindly inquired. "I hate cilantro," I said, but added: "But I know you're rocking the Asian thing and I wouldn't want to destroy the integrity of your cuisine; let's keep dishes that feature cilantro to a minimum, but do what you must do." And so he sent lots of stuff out (Graffiti is a small plates concept) and I was impressed that foie gras made the cut; there are people who wouldn't have been pleased with the assumption involved. I was very pleased.

A pleasant chickpea flour-crusted skate arrived somewhere in the middle of our degustation. What it was served with I don't really remember except that it tasted good. And also Mehta, bless his heart, brought the cilantro-cumin yogurt on the side. "Mostly it's cumin," he suggested, and rightly so. Some waiters will tell you that you won't really notice the cilantro. This really pisses me off. I will notice the cilantro, while you will not. See, we're different people with different tongues and everything. (It's like telling a die-hard right-to-lifer not to sweat the 'morning after pill': it's just a hypothetical, mini abortion, you see) But Mehta was right. Notice the cilantro? Yeah, cuz there was cilantro in it. But, and I'm getting more and more freaked out by this, I didn't hate it.



I attribute this largely to context. Mehta was explaining the restaurant concept to my ever-inquisitive, ever-gregarious boyfriend using words like "our living room," "inviting," "eclectic," and phrases like "graffiti is an international art and our cuisine is international" to explain the restaurant's name. But when you name a thing a thing, (a restaurant, a movie, a book, what have you) while your intention and inspiration is valid and, perhaps, interesting or amusing, the audience--diners in this case--gets to interpret the name how they want. I think graffiti and I think punk, as in the punk "Fuck you" or rather "Fuck the man" or rather "Fuck everyone" attitude. Mehta certainly doesn't have that attitude but his cuisine's irreverence toward the status quo, toward tired flavors, toward the stuffiness often associated with food as good (if not as inventive) is very punk indeed (by the way, Mehta has a fun quirk of saying "Thank you very much indeed," whenever you complement his food, or restaurant, which comes across as super genuine and hence super charming).

Anyway, I think because we had all signed up, so-to-speak, for this punk experience (I'm not sure pork-abstaining Latin Lover was ever informed he was eating pork), my palate was more willing to be assaulted than normal. I was so happy Mehta had taken the trouble to put it on the side, I figured I'd give it a taste. Cumin's a flavor I've come to really like, although I associate it with Rachel Ray, so I was cool with that, and because it's such a warm, if you will, flavor, the very little bit of (soapy) cilantro did cool it down. Now, I wouldn't say I liked it, because I didn't, but I appreciated it and said, for a moment "Fuck you" to my cilantro hate. But mostly I appreciated Mehta's relentless sweetness and attention to detail.

The skate with cumin-cilantro yogurt certainly didn't come anywhere close to converting me, but it was a nice reminder that cilantro lovers, while morons, can be very nice folks indeed.

Things That Suck More than Cilantro

1. 103 degree days in June (or any month)
2. culantro (more on this later)
3. Nazis

Colorado Doesn't Suck

Sometimes, I don't know why but I don't think it makes me weird (other things make me weird--sure--but not this one), I look around for what's wrong or incongruous in a situation before pinching myself to confirm that I'm not dreaming and in fact there is nothing "wrong," and that everything is as great as it seems.

No, I have not just found Jesus but props to the many who have. Instead I've come back from a "nothing wrong" weekend with 8 of my closest friends from college and hence, because I enjoyed college and was lucky enough to go with a whole bunch of awesome people, favorite people in the world. I hope some of them will read this so I don't have to actually tell them how I feel about them in person--God that would be embarrassing.

Anyway, we got a cabin and spent our Memorial Day Weekend in the mountains of Colorado on a Lake named Dillon that I can only describe as big, blue and wet. I was told we were 10,000 feet up, and I'll take it on faith that my graduating from Harvard law school friend who, while she doesn't know everything, probably didn't makeup the elevation of a location in a state she grew up in. We had a cabin, a hot tub and lots of provisions which thankfully included gin but did not include cilantro. Actually that isn't entirely true.

With the $300-something grocery tab (9 people, 3 1/2 days, pretty good if you ask me--no this did not include beer) we purchased lots of things that generally fell under these categories: meat, carbs, (both refined (hot dog buns) and unrefined (7-grain hot dog buns)) cheese (including my new once-a-year favorite--Salsa con Queso), condiments, (I correctly insisted on full-fat mayonnaise) bagged and pre-washed salad mix, and Oreos, which were consumed with such abandon as to require a group of their own. A category we did not entertain the use of was herbs, which if that means no cilantro is just fine with me.

Of course, when it came time to make extemporaneous use of the (somewhat) well-stocked pantry of the cabin we stayed in, anise seed made no appearance--a slight disappointment to my doctored-up leftover hamburger baked ziti. What they did have was two containers of dried cilantro. You know who else has two jars of dried cilantro? My folks. You know who else? I'm guessing a lot of people. But here's the thing: neither container had been used much, especially when compared to the others, especially when considering there was only one jar of most of those.

What I'm thinking is, as cilantro is now everywhere, people buy it, forget they bought it because they never use it, then buy it again because they think this would either make them fancier human beings or be something they might like to use. In either case they are wrong because those who like cilantro know it tastes better fresh and those who hate cilantro know that it always tastes terrible.

In any case, I'm very proud to report that we put a dent in neither dried cilantro jar--the gin's another story.

Epicurean Existentialism

It's just like me to make a flowchart on how to eat out, how to survive really, and go out of my way to ignore it.

Like the Christian Existentialists who explain life's troubling, irreconcilable paradoxes through the existence (and source) of the greatest irreconcilable paradox--Jesus (God/man? mortal/immortal?--anyone else confused? No? Congratulations--you're smarter than me.)--sometimes we do things not because they make or don't make sense, but because we just do them. Some things just are. Their absurdity is in line with the inherent absurdity of the universe and hence, given a certain liberal mindset, we are comforted.

And so was my absurdly comforting dinner at Chavella's last night.

I ordered the chicken enchiladas. Here's the thing about chicken: I was a vegetarian for 11 years, vegan for two of them and I certainly didn't start eating meat again to eat factory farmed chicken. But, and I'm not making excuses here as I think factory farm chicken is morally and ecologically reprehensible, in the moral/flavor cost-benefit analysis often at work in my food choices, there's something about that ambiguously but inarguably delicious American Mexican chicken that I'm a total sucker for. So, as I said, I ordered the chicken enchiladas.

At Chavella's, a pretty good little Mexican joint a few blocks from my Brooklyn digs, one orders his/her enchiladas with a choice of salsa verde or mole. You don't need a PhD in Cilantro Hate to know salsa verde is quintessentially dangerous to the cilantro averse. For those of you living in the far reaches of xenophobic denial, speaking so little Spanish that you don't know verde means green--verde means green. It gets its green moniker from a variety of ingredients, most notably tomatillo, lime, green chili and, yes, cilantro.

But the thing is the gentleman next to me had ordered the chicken enchiladas with salsa verde and he was enjoying them with gusto in a not-subtly audible fashion. I asked, "Sir, excuse me, I can't help but notice that you're enjoying those enchiladas."

"Oh, God yes. They're so delicious," he replied.

"Sir, do you have a palate for cilantro? What I mean to say is, would you notice if there was cilantro in your salsa verde there?," I continued.

A good sport, he confirmed what I already knew: "Well, yes, it's noticeable but certainly not overwhelming and did I mention how truly delicious they are?"

So then the waitress did what I didn't even consider asking her to do, which was to bring me the mole and verde to try. The cilantro-hating friend who was with me tried them both too. Strangest thing: I could kind of tell there was cilantro in the verde, but I liked it anyway, not because of the cilantro mind you, but despite it. Now, it's common knowledge that the cilantro taste is mitigated in the cooking process and in this case it was cooked. There was no extra fresh cilantro chiffonade or fresh cilantro finishing touch of any kind. As such it just sort of became one with the sauce. I don't know what I'm saying here. This doesn't make sense! This is so, so, absurd.

So I ordered the enchiladas with the very bright, pleasant, garlicky, limy, spicy sauce. It was perfect with the queso fresco and crema and yummy chicken and delicious house-made tortillas. The mole would have overwhelmed everything as (if you want my opinion) it does most everything it touches. In short, the chicken enchiladas verdes were good.

Now, this is not the post you've all been waiting for where I change my ways, start liking cilantro and ruin my blog. No. This is the post where I admit there was once a time in my life when I ate something that had cilantro in it and enjoyed it and much to the chagrin of you polarizing cilantro lovers out there--I'm OK with that. Existence precedes essence, if you know what I'm saying.