Sour Vinegar Sweetens the Season

I like to think I have an open mind, but I must confess that there are A LOT of things I discovered late in life. Meat. Sushi. Eggplant. Mussels. Beets.

I'm sure I was carrying some childhood prejudices, but am ultimately glad didn’t swear off these items with an absolute refusal: “No way… I don’t like that”. I was willing to try again. I suppose I had some instinct that life is all about discovery and re-discovery. I must have guessed it would be worth it to keep myself open to things that weren’t quite my cup of tea, because sometimes the timing is right and the whole thing gets reinvented. Everything is contantly changing. Even our taste buds change over time (it’s a scientific fact!)…so what you hated at age 8 might be pure manna at age 38.

I recently discovered that what I once dismissed as the sour battery acid of the culinary world actually works miracles in good cooking. This summer’s new discovery has been vinegar.

Yes, vinegar…humble, astringent vinegar.

It started with a shish-kabob recipe back when I was on a kabob kick earlier in the season. I was trying all kinds of marinades. Many of these marinades had exotic juices, booze, imported oils, and all kinds of sexy ingredients. But I chanced to stumble upon one recipe that wasn’t much more than distilled vinegar, salt, and chopped onions. It didn’t sound exciting, but the recipe was credited to a Middle Eastern woman who swore that this is what her parents used in the old country. I was interested in trying an “authentic” shish-kabob, so I made the marinade.

Much to my surprise, it was so good. Many people who know much more about the chemistry of food swear up and down that a marinade does little to tenderize the meat. Maybe they are technically right, but this shish-kabob was not only tender, it also had such a perfectly-balanced flavor…!! You could taste every bit of the sweet, earthy protein, but it was accented with a high piquant note.

Oh, my!

And then I tried Chimichurri.

“Chimichurri” is said to be a bastardized, made-up word that may or may not be a play on somebody’s name. Evidently, it’s an Argentine sauce. It sounds very exotic, but it's certainly not challenging to enjoy. It’s really just a lovely vinegar-herb sauce. I do mine with a healthy dose of cilantro and an eyedropper-full of honey, and find it so refreshing and summery-tasting. It’s great on grilled meat, on pasta, or as a dip for bread. Tomorrow, I think I’ll try it as a pizza sauce…maybe with some brie and a tiny dice of papaya??? It’s so incredibly inspiring and yet it’s so humble. It's not much more than some green stuff floating around in vinegar.

Of sourse I cannot discuss my "discovery" of vinegar in the summertime without recalling hand-cut potato wedges, crispy on the outside, soft and fluffy on the inside, sprinkled liberally with big grains of salt and some malt vinegar.

Oh, my my my my my.

Is there a sunset over the water somewhere? Is there music in the air? Is there a carousel with painted horses? Because that, my friends, is the stuff of summer paradise.