Buttermilk Graffiti by Edward Lee

Author:Edward Lee
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Artisan
Published: 2018-03-15T18:33:12+00:00

Chapter 9

A Lesson in Smen

I dream of white clam pizza. Tiny pebbles of garlic, dried oregano, freshly chopped littleneck clams, and a child-size fistful of grated pecorino on a warm crust of charred, puffed dough. The briny steam is the first thing that hits your nose; a light drizzle of olive oil makes the entire pie shimmer. Whenever I’m in Connecticut, I eat my weight in clam pizza.

It’s snowing today, a dense, silent snowfall that makes the world seem hushed. I’m driving to Westport, a tony suburban town known more for its quiet family life than its cuisine. But there is a Frank Pepe pizzeria in nearby Fairfield, and while everyone says it’s not as good as the original, in New Haven, I’m sure it’ll do just fine. People always say the sequel is never as good as the original. The snow is wet and thick, and has slowed traffic to a dismal forty miles per hour on the highway. My windshield is frosted around the edges. I’m dreaming of pizza, but I’m thinking of Morocco. I’m here for the smen.

Smen, a long-fermented butter, technically illegal to sell commercially in the United States, is not something you can buy at your local gourmet shop. I’ve searched in vain for a black market in smen dealers. I’ve winked at waitresses at Moroccan restaurants, hinting that I would be willing to pay a hefty sum for a taste of it. I’ve tried to make it at home, but there is scant literature on the subject. Recently, a blogger friend of mine connected me to someone who had attended a dinner party in Westport thrown by a young Moroccan woman who had recently moved to America. A few e-mails later, I was introduced to Amal. She’s from Marrakesh. She’s been here for six months and is living with her brother. She is said to possess great cooking talent. A few more e-mails, and I secure an invitation to her home. She promises to show me how to make smen. It is an ancient tradition in every Moroccan home, she tells me. I knew that. I worked with a Moroccan chef once, and I’ve been obsessed with the idea of smen ever since.

One of my first jobs in a professional kitchen was at a trendy French Moroccan restaurant in New York City’s East Village. Frank Crispo was my boss. He’s a no-nonsense blue-collar chef from Philadelphia. His mind is an encyclopedia of Western cooking: French, Italian, Spanish, and even some German classics. He would cook with the angry intensity of a bull and the delicacy of a ballerina. Frank taught me how to compete for my place on the line. He taught me how to win with nothing more than the willingness to work harder than the guy next to me. “Come an hour before anyone else does, and stay an hour late.” Frank would say things like that to me all the time.

Before the grand opening, the owners hired a husband-and-wife team from Morocco to teach us their cuisine.

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