Category — Whatsitcalled?

I’m guessing this staple of Brazilian street food will be hard to find. You can substitute oil infused with annatto seeds instead….will try to find a cool recipe for all of you….

Check out those big red globes piled in your supermarket bins. They’re pomegranates and their season is now. Bursting with hundreds of ruby-colored seeds, they’ve worked great for centuries as a fertility symbol, but they’re a royal pain to eat. Pomegranate Molasses to the rescue.

The thick, garnet colored syrup made from those juicy kernels packs all the fruit’s tangy complexity into tablespoon format. Pomegranate molasses was always called dips roman in my house and it’s traditionally been a staple of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cooking. Today, it’s sometimes called Pomegranate Concentrate and you can find it in Whole Foods and many ethnic markets, as well as online. Use it to glaze poultry, make a salad dressing (see my recipe for Tangy Middle Eastern Salad,) or punch up a pot roast. I guarantee your guests will say “What IS that?”

When it gets cold and rainy (like it is today), I think about….poutines.

A single helping of Montreal’s signature dish – a liberal mess of fries, brown gravy and cheese curds – may take years off your life but I’m here to tell you it’s worth it.

First, it’s got all your favorite food groups (carbs/fat/salt – seriously, look it up.) Second, one of Montreal’s best poutines places is a funky hangout decked in Christmas lights whose name means “la-tee-dah, la-tee-dah,” and who wouldn’t want to eat in a place like that? At Patati Patata the potatoes go limp under their silky, saline gravy and the cheese curds spring back just enough to keep you chewing. And the only thing better than poutines is….poutines with beer. Try a local brew, like the crisp and bitter St. Amboise on tap, and you may apply for citizenship.

 4177 St. Laurent (at Rachel), Montreal, Quebec. Tel.: (514) 844-0216. No website (though there appears to be a Brazilian clown troupe by the same name). Cash only.