The South Florida Traveler

SAKE IT TO ME: WHAT I LEARNED ABOUT SAKE, BEER, BREAD, COFFEE, CHOCOLATE AND INDIAN SPICES IN FAIRFIELD COUNTY

What's the strongest beer made? Should sake be hot or cold? How do you make a perfect cup of coffee?

I learned the answers to these and many other food questions I never had at a two-day culinary tour of Fairfield County, Connecticut, north of Westchester County in New York, which has become home to so many fine restaurants, food shops and culinary experts.

For example, Gregg Glaser, a nice (half) Jewish boy who somehow became an expert in Japanese sake and other drinks, taught me the following about sake at the beautiful Wasabi Chi Restaurant in South Norwalk, which offers 16 different types of sake (and you thought there was only one).

Cold sake is better than hot. Restaurants may heat it to mask that it's not such good quality. Ahh so.
If you drink sake in Japan, you're probably older. Younger people in Japan prefer another drink that's 25% alcohol (sake is usually 15-7%.
Don't eat sushi with sake - it's like eating rice and rice.
If you want to look like you know what you're doing it, treat sake like wine: smell it, look at it, taste it, move it around in your mouth--but don't spit it out.

Gregg also gave a fascinating lecture on beer - which would have made his Mom proud -- at the Ginger Man, a unique tavern style restaurant in South Norwalk, Greenwich, and Manhattan.

Remember that dumb song we used to sing in camp? "99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall." Well, this amazing restaurant has 52 taps of beer on the wall, plus 120 bottled specialties. I learned that:

1) Alcohol is the s--t of yeast (honest, it's what's excreted from it.)
2) The strongest beer is 27% alcohol and made by the Boston Beer Company (Samuel Adams). But you probably can't buy it: they only make 12,000 bottles every 2 years, and people like Gregg are waiting in line ahead of you.
3) Beer was developed in the Tigris-Euphrates Valley. So Iraqis have a long history of getting bombed-and it's not just by America in the current war.

Prasad Chirnomula (on right), the charming chef/owner of the Thali restaurants in Fairfield County, has been called "the most exciting Indian chef in the US," and the one dish I tasted there confirmed it.

Prasad runs four of these popular restaurants, and also conducts culinary tours of India. If you're interested, the next one is in February. The cost: well, if you have to ask.... No, seriously, it's about $13,000 per person.

1) There is no curry powder in India. Curry is a made by mixing various spices, Chirnomula said.
2) Indian food is the most aromatic in the world and very complicated to create. "You can't just make food hot by putting cayenne pepper in it."
3) Indian spices have medicinal properties. (He should know; his father is a doctor.) For example, you can put turmeric on a cut and a Band-Aid over that.

A celebrity taught me about bread: John Barricelli, the owner of Sono Baking Company & Café in South Norwalk. John used to work with Martha Stewart on her TV show, but he was so talented and handsome (and maybe he buttered her up so he could get a baking show) that he now has his own popular program on PBS called Everyday Baking".

At this unique bakery and café, they offer traditional breads as well as those you've never heard of like Swiss Egg, Flaxseed and Miche, and you can watch it all being made through the glass while you taste pastry too good to wait until you're home to eat it. His tips:

1) If dough sticks to your rolling pin, put it in the freezer for a few minute

2) When making cookies, use unsalted butter, not margarine.

3) Add a pinch of baking soda to your frosting to keep it moist.

4) To stop fruits and nuts from sinking to the bottom of a cake, mix them with a little flour and bake for a few minutes, then add to the cake.

The name Knipschildt doesn't exactly roll on your tongue - but his chocolates sure do. And if his name is not familiar - and it is to chocoholics - you may know it if you've had a box of Dean and DeLuca chocolates since he makes some of them under their name. (If you look at the back of the boxes, you may find Knipschildt's name there as well.)

The affable Fritz Knipschildt now owns a tasty chocolate shop and café called Chocopologie, at 12 South Main Street in Norwalk. From him I learned that:

1) If you've been reading about how the cocoa harvesters are poor exploited children in Africa, working on beans when they're not mining diamonds, make sure your chocolate uses cocoa beans harvested in South America, not Africa.
2) Chocolate should be kept in your wine cellar. And if you don't have one, keep it in a ziplog bag in the refrigerator.

Finally, one of the most interesting places in Fairfield County to visit is "The Coffee Guy," technically Zumbach's Gourmet Coffee shop in New Canaan. There, you can buy over 50 different types of coffee, like Ethiopian Yrgachette. You can smell this café and coffee shop from a mile away since the obsessed but fascinating owner, "coffee guy" Doug Zumbach, is often roasting his 200 pounds of coffee in his 6 foot tall gas-fired roaster. I learned from him that:

1) The coffee you buy in most places was roasted months ago and has lost most of its flavor. (What do you expect him to say: that it's good?)

2) If you want to impress somebody when you're ordering coffee, ask for Doug's personal favorite: Tanzanian peaberry.

3) Use freshly-drawn cold water to brew a good cup of coffee and clean your brewer regularly with white vinegar and baking soda.

4) Use at least a full tablespoon of ground coffee per cup.