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Taste Greg Atkinson

Beyond Meat 'n' Potatoes

International flavor comes to the center of America's table

We hear a lot about what's wrong with American food. And yet, it seems to me that quite a few of us are managing to eat pretty well. In fact, I would venture to say that more and more of us are finding healthier and better-tasting food easier to reach than it's ever been.

An explosion of farmers markets has put us in more direct touch with small farmers than folks have been in generations. Home delivery of local produce through Community Supported Agriculture programs has home cooks all over the country sampling chioggia beets, heirloom apples and Swiss chard in place of the usual russet potatoes, red delicious and frozen peas. And our newly heightened concerns about sustainability run deeper than the fads that periodically sweep across our diet-crazed populace because they are part of a larger, global movement. It's not just about us; it's about our children, our world.

This generation is turning on to organic produce, tuning in to sustainably raised meats and dairy, and dropping out trans fats with a passion once reserved for sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll. But perhaps best of all, we've embraced a wave of highly charged international flavors that rivals in scope and diversity any change that's hit the American table in a generation.

Not long ago, I attended a conference at the Culinary Institute of America in Napa Valley: "Flavor, Quality, and American Menus; Envisioning the Future and Stimulating Dialogue Among Chefs, American Foodservice and U.S. Agriculture." Despite its cumbersome title, the summit afforded a sharp look at how American food is changing in response to our broadening tastes. It seems that Americans may be ready at long last to venture beyond the meat-and-potatoes mentality that has ruled for so long.

Punctuated with reports from groups like Foster Farms, the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute and Sunkist, chefs' cooking demonstrations offered tastes that they imagine will shape the future of American food.

Joyce Goldstein, a frequent visitor to Seattle who once designed the menu for Spazzo on the Eastside, traced the influence of Mediterranean foods on American menus. Italian food, she noted, has become so thoroughly rooted in the American canon that it can no longer be thought of as ethnic. Spanish influences are becoming almost equally rooted here, and on the horizon, she said, we can expect flavors from Morocco and Turkey with eggplant, chickpeas, almonds and raisins appearing in new guises more flavorful than any we've seen before.

Mai Pham, a Vietnamese chef with several restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area, also has Seattle connections. She designed a line of soups and sauces for Seattle-based Stockpot Soup Co. Pham demonstrated a recipe for spring rolls that made everyone in the room realize these savory fried pastries have become as much a part of 21st-century American cooking as hamburgers were a part of the last century's food scene. And she helped us see that as our taste for Southeast Asian food becomes more sophisticated, we're developing an appetite for Cambodian, Laotian and Thai herbs and vegetables, which are increasingly becoming staples at our local farmers markets.

Maricel Presilla, a culinary historian specializing in the cuisines of Spain and Latin America, owns two restaurants in Hoboken, N.J., where she serves as executive chef. As she demonstrated recipes for contemporary Latin American dishes like Pork Belly with Bitter Orange and Guava Adobo, she explained that flavor combinations from Peru and Brazil are becoming more acceptable to Americans because we're already fluent in other Latin cuisines.

Suvir Saran, as the first "international concept and brand development partner" for food-service giant Sodexho, is in a unique position to bring exotic flavors and innovative culinary techniques to American workplaces. Saran's latest book, "American Masala," features some of the dishes he has developed for Sodexho. Having lived in the U.S. almost as long as he lived in India, Saran applies — with delectable results — his Indian taste for spices and fresh produce to his growing passion for American classics.

Together, these and other presenters painted a portrait of an evolving American table simultaneously familiar and new. I know the conference will influence my own cooking, and I'm going to start by serving Saran's Sweet Tart Cranberry Chutney at my Thanksgiving dinner.

Greg Atkinson is author of "West Coast Cooking." He can be reached at greg@northwestessentials.com. Barry Wong is a Seattle-based freelance photographer. He can be reached at studio@barrywongphoto.com.

Recipe: Sweet Tart Cranberry Chutney

Makes 9 cups

Suvir Saran's homage to Mother Burd's Cranberry Salad is his lighter take on a cranberry salad that his American partner's grandmother serves every Thanksgiving. The original was made with canned pineapple and set with raspberry-flavored Jell-O.

1 (12-ounce) bag fresh or frozen cranberries

3 granny smith apples, peeled, cored and quartered

3 blood oranges or navel oranges, scrubbed, quartered and any seeds removed

1 pineapple, peeled, cored and cut into chunks

1 cup sugar

1 cup chopped pecans

½ cup dried strawberries

¼ cup dried cherries

¼ cup dried cranberries

1. Place half of all the ingredients into a food processor and pulse to combine until everything is uniformly chopped. Transfer the contents of the food processor to a large bowl and repeat the process with the other half of the ingredients. Combine the two mixtures.

2. Refrigerate the Cranberry Chutney for at least 24 hours, or for as long as two days before serving.

— Recipe adapted from "American Masala" by Suvir Saran

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