If meals could speak, mine would tell tales of the sea

A breakfast of leftover organic whole-wheat linguine with bottled marinara and added sardines, anchovies, red wine and seasoning, served with two small wedges of pesto-and-cheese frittata. Most of the ingredients come from Costco Wholesale in Hackensack.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Life, cooking and food shopping are so much easier when you don't eat meat and poultry.

You never have to worry about whether the food you are eating was raised with antibiotics and hormones that are harmful to humans or what the animal was fed before it was slaughtered.

You never have to imagine the horrors of the slaughterhouse or wonder if that steak came from a sick animal that collapsed, only to be dragged to its death.

None of those issues arise with wild-caught seafood.

Fresh fish is cheap, and you can avoid ingesting a lot of mercury by sticking to the smaller species, including anchovies, sardines, whiting and so forth.

Canned-fish salad includes yellow-fin tuna, pink salmon and Moroccan sardines with chopped celery and sweet peppers. The dressing is Dijon mustard, fresh lime juice and ground cumin, all to taste. Costco carries the mustard, limes and all three canned fish.

Cholesterol drops

I stopped eating meat and poultry more than four years ago, and my cholesterol has dropped to where I plan to ask my doctor if I can discontinue the statin I have been taking for decades.

The other members of my family still eat meat and poultry, meaning we often have to prepare two dinners.

I try to steer them to organic or grass-fed beef and antibiotic-free chicken and lamb at Whole Foods Market, Costco Wholesale and ShopRite.

Kimchi from Costco

I do eat organic chicken stock from Costco Wholesale, using it instead of water when I prepare brown rice and lentils in an electric cooker.

This morning, my wife called from Costco to ask if I wanted a large jar of kimchi for $7.99, but when she read the ingredients I noticed it included beef-bone extract.

I told her not to buy it.

Our favorite kimchi comes from the Oh family, which closed their Englewood business, but haven't re-opened yet in Ridgefield.

We always had a jar of their Arirang Kimchi in the refrigerator, but now, we only eat the spicy, fermented cabbage and other types of kimchi when we go out to a Korean restaurant.

Escoveitch of fish.

Ackee and salt fish, the Jamaican national dish, accented with Valentina Mexican Hot Sauce and served with garlic mashed sweet potatoes. My wife used salted Alaskan pollock from Costco instead of the Canadian dried cod the Hackensack warehouse store no longer carries.

H Mart helps me make a quick dinner

Prepared Korean food with homemade, stir-fried collard greens.

Dinner on Monday night was stewed, wild-caught Alaskan pollock; thin, pan fried slices of whiting, stewed tofu and collard greens -- all from H Mart in Englewood.

The Korean supermarket has a terrific selection of prepared food, fresh fish and an array of fresh greens for stir-frying.

The stewed pollock and tofu are made with red pepper, but the whiting is so bland it needs gochujang, a red-pepper paste in a squeze bottle, and it has a few small but annoying bones.

Pan-fried whiting with gochujang, tofu and store-bought guacamole.

Pan-fried whiting, left, and a variety of Korean pancakes.

H Mart's kimchi selection, but I prefer to buy Arirang Kimchi where it is hand-made a couple of blocks away at 191 W. Englewood Ave. in Engflewood.

On Sunday, my wife picked fresh, wild-caught whole sea bass for $5.99 a pound at the Englewood H Mart at 25 Lafayette Ave. in Englewood.

I seasoned mine, rubbed the skin with olive oil and fresh lime juice and roasted it in the oven for about 20 minutes.

Reduced-fat cheese, lettuce and smoked wild salmon.

On Monday, I picked up bulgogi marinade and two heads of red-leaf lettuce for a Korean barbecue dinner the meat eaters in the family were planning to have.

My wife thinly sliced free-range Nature's Reserve whole beef tenderloin for filet mignon, which she is marinating before cooking it on a stove-top grill. 

The cooked beef slices are dipped in gochujang and wrapped in lettuce, along with rice and kimchi, before they go down the hatch. 

I sometimes grill shrimp as a substitute for the beef. 

You can use lettuce wraps for other dishes, such as canned fish salad with diced celery and apples, Dijon mustard, lime juice and ground cumin.

Or just use lettuce to wrap slices of reduced-fat cheese and smoked wild salmon with whole-grain Dijon mustard. 

H Mart's stewed tofu and pan-friend whiting are $6.99 each, collard greens were 99 cents a pound and stewed tofu usually is $4.99.

Lettuce wraps with canned fish salad.

 

Free bread at Jerry's in Englewood

Customers hoping to shop at Jerry's Gourmet in Englewood found it closed today.

But there was bread for the taking in three large bags outside the exit.

Editor's note: On Wednesdays, I spend several hours in Englewood, where I volunteer at the hospital and then enjoy visiting some of the small city's great food stores.

A rare sight in Englewood today was an empty parking lot at Jerry's Gourmet & More on South Dean Street.

When I stopped by around 4:30 this afternoon, only one car was parked there, and two or three other people drove up, saw the store was closed, shrugged  and took off.

A woman seated in the parked car said she had stopped to send e-mails from her smart phone, not shop at Jerry's, which is known for its restaurant-quality takeout, cheese, wine, hundreds of Italian food products and lots of free samples.

I had just driven the few blocks from Balthazar Bakery, where I purchased a crusty baguette -- still $2 -- and a dozen assorted dinner rolls.

At Jerry's, I had hoped to pick up a container of Italian olives with whole garlic cloves for only $3.99 a pound. 

At the entrance door, I saw a small printed sign saying the store would be closed today and would reopen on Thursday (Jan.3)

I haven't stopped at Balthazar Bakery since I went on a no-bread, no-pizza diet.

Balthazar's incredibly crusty baguette still is only $2.

I made a rare visit to Balthazar Bakery to pick up bread for my growing teenage son, who mentioned how much he missed its baguette and dinner rolls.

The retail and wholesale bakery opened in November 2002, but getting out of its parking lot was a nightmare for many years, because vehicles parked at the curb blocked drivers' view of cars racing down two lanes of twisty, one-way South Dean Street.

Today, I was able to use a mirror the bakery finally put up on a telephone pole near its exit to see approaching traffic.

My dinner salad from the Garden Cafe at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center includes sun-dried tomato, beets, tofu, soybeans, mozzarella cheese, peas and beans.

The salad bar in the Garden Cafe at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center is a terrific source of sun-dried tomatoes, which have become a favorite ingredient in omelets and frittatas.

I bought sun-dried tomatoes in oil from Costco Wholesale for years, but began using the oil-free ones from the hospital after I became a volunteer. 

The salad bar was $5.93 a pound, and a 12-ounce cup of vegetarian lentil soup was $1.92.

Sun-dried tomatoes in open-face egg-white omelets, above and below.

  

I also use sun-dried tomatoes with whole organic eggs from Costco.

After I leave the hospital on Wednedays, I get to make the rounds of the great food stores in Englewood, including Jerry's, Arirang Kimchi, H Mart and others.

The Korean supermarket on Lafayette Avenue has finally repaired the exit that had been torn up and left unpaved for many weeks.

The new exit at H Mart in Englewood on Dec. 23. For years, the drainage grate was sunken and the pavement broken, which was a real problem on rainy days.

H Mart coupons prove to be no big deal

Image via Wikipedia

Beef, pork and chicken look good, but how were they raised?

I've been getting H Mart coupons in the mail for months now, but don't think I've saved a great deal of money at the Korean supermarket chain.


I signed up for an H Mart "Smart Savings Card" in February, which gives customers a $10 gift certificate on every $1,000 spent -- a rebate of 1%. I'm still not there yet.


I drove to the H Mart in Englewood today to return black plums that were spoiled, got a $1.37 store credit and then took out my coupon book. 


Flipping through it, I couldn't find anything I needed. There were coupons for Korean radish, green squash, red peppers, Korean grapes and red delicious apples, as well as small appliances.


The discount on red seedless grapes was 10% with a coupon. The red delicious apples were $1.49 a pound, and the coupon would give me 15% off. 


Three coupons for meat were of no use to me, and $1 off on Chilean sea bass exploits an endangered species that is high in mercury. Sea urchin roe or uni is $5.99 with a coupon.


Some coupons are good through Oct. 14, others until Oct. 30. You might be able to get a coupon book in the store. The regular price of discounted items isn't given.


Two things I wanted today were fish sauce and California-grown rice, which I have been buying at H Mart in 20-pound bags. I couldn't find the fish sauce, and no rice was on sale.


The four H Marts in Bergen County seem to run sales at different times, and discounts vary at stores in Ridgefield, Fort Lee, Little Ferry and Englewood.


I did buy a prepared seaweed-and-rice roll, called kimbap, and pan-friend crab pancakes or pajun for dinner ($4.99 each); yellow nectarines, 79 cents a pound; white peaches, $1.79 a pound; and empress plums, $1.49 a pound.


On my last visit to the Englewood store, I replaced the Korean-made, 12-inch, three-tiered, stainless-steel steamer that I had returned for credit after it rusted. The steamer was on sale for $22.99 (regularly $29.99), and no coupon was needed.


Today, the renovated store's new food court was closed. In September, I saw two women having lunch there, but a cashier said it hadn't been inspected by the city.


Before H Mart, I stopped nearby at Gaboh Inc., 191 W. Englewood Ave., Englewood, to pick up a 64-ounce jar of Arirang-brand cabbage or mahk kimchi ($9.99). This kimchi is made by hand and contains no MSG or preservatives (201-503-1314).


After H Mart, I picked up two large dinners with escoveitch of whiting, rice and peas, and cabbage ($10 each) from Ashanti International, a reliable source of  Jamaican takeout at 227 W. Englewood Ave., Englewood (201-227-0061).


Web site: H Mart


Costco membership


The annual fee for shopping at Costco Wholesale is going up 10% on Nov. 1 -- to $55 or $110 a year. 


Regular customers get the membership fee and more back in cash rebates when they use a credit card from Costco and American Express. 


The rebate checks must be used at Costco, but you don't have to spend the full amount there. You get the difference back in cash.


And you get low prices year-round, such as two dozen Eggland's Best large white eggs (vegetarian feed) for $3.99; three half-gallons of Kirkland Signature organic, low-fat milk for $9.49; and three pounds of bananas for $1.39.


There are hundred of items in sizes suitable for couples or small families, contrary to the impression of recent media reports that you have to buy large quantities to take advantage of Costco's low prices.


High-quality meat


Long after I stopped eating meat, I continue to receive catalogs from Brooklyn-based Heritage Foods USA.


The company was founded 10 years ago "as a response to the dwindling options in the marketplace for high-quality, humanely raised meat products grown by small and medium-sized independent farmers."


There are too many kinds of poultry and meat cuts to mention here, but everything is raised without antibiotics, hormones and animal by-products. In many cases, the animals spend a lot of time outdoors.


Piedmontese beef is described as "one of the tenderest beef varieties ever bred by man -- great marbling [fat]."


Four 14-ounce ribeye steaks are $75, four 18-ounce ribeyes are $93. Piedmontese briskets are 5 pounds for $60 and 10 pounds for $110.


This is a great catalog if you live far from the butcher counter of a Whole Foods Market, such as the one in Paramus.


Here's the Web site: Heritage Foods USA



Blog comments


At least one reader of  Do You Really Know What You're Eating? and Eye on The Record is reporting problems with posting comments.


Comments come to me in the form of e-mails, and I have the option of publishing or deleting them. I've noticed a decline in comments recently, but have published the few I've seen.


The technical problems readers encounter are beyond my control. All of us are at the mercy of Google's blogging platform.




Related articles

• Diner's Journal Blog: Heritage Meat Comes to the Essex Street Market, With Brooklyn Taco (dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com)

I saw a Big Wheel in Englewood

Image via Wikipedia

Emmentaler cheese from Switzerland is ready for its close-up.

I stopped for a free lunch of cheese samples on Wednesday at Jerry's Gourmet & More in Englewood, and as I munched my way around the store, I dialed a friend who lives nearby.


We're talking, and I'm eating and looking at cheese wedges and samples when I realized they were displayed on top of the biggest wheel of cheese I have ever seen.


The label said the wheel of Emmentaler cheese from Switzerland weighs 206.5 pounds. Today, I found this at epicurious.com:

"Switzerland's oldest and most important cheese, Emmentaler has a distinctively nutty-sweet, mellow flavor that makes it perfect for almost any use — from snacks to an après-dinner fruit-and-cheese plate. This cow's-milk cheese is light gold in color, with marble-size holes and a natural light brown rind. It was named for Switzerland's Emmental Valley and is exported in giant wheels weighing from 150 to 220 pounds each."

Blue crabs


After my visit to Jerry's, I stopped at the H Mart in Englewood to pick up six or seven live blue crabs ($2.99 a pound) for my wife and son, who have the patience to pick out the meat.


After she boiled the crabs with Korean red-pepper powder, my wife gave me a bit of the meat, and it was sweet.


I also bought two small, oblong Korean melons, on sale for 89 cents a pound. They are similar to honeydew, but the one I cut open at home wasn't ripe yet.


Kimchi factory


My third stop in Englewood was to pick up a large jar of handmade Arirang mak kimchi at the factory.


I bartered two Neapolitan pizzas from Jerry's for the cabbage kimchi, which I have been buying from the owner, Mrs. Oh, for years.


She has been kind to me, often giving me the kimchi for free, and now I've found food I can give her in return. She told me she loves fresh mozzarella cheese.


View a delightful video on the making of kimchi at the following link:


Two generations of kimchi makers


Three-stop food run in Englewood:


Jerry's Gourmet &  More, 410 S. Dean St.; 201-871-7108.
H Mart, 25 Lafayette Ave.; 201-871-8822.
Arirang Kimchi, 191 W. Englewood Ave.; 201-503-1314.

So much food, so little time

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

 

I only had a hour after I dropped off my son for his piano lesson in Englewood yesterday to pick up some of the terrific food the city has to offer.

My first stop was the kimchi factory on West Englewood Avenue, where I bought a half-gallon jar of Arirang-brand mahk kimchi ($9.99) from the always helpful Mrs. Oh. She combines crunchy nappa cabbage with red pepper, salted shrimp, anchovy sauce, garlic, scallion and other ingredients. It's a healthy and delicious side dish with a sandwich or a complete meal. (Photo shows woman in South Korea offering kimchi.)

Not far away is Balthazar Bakery on South Dean Street, where for the first time I found a dozen ficelles or miniature baguettes ($6). I also picked up a quarter of the bakery's signature rye, sliced ($3.75), and successfully avoided buying another scrumptious pear-hazelnut galette we tried for Christmas.

I drove down South Dean to Jerry's Gourmet & More, not so much to shop as to graze among the cheese, bread and salami samples. I did pick up two aseptic packages of Pomi marinara sauce and chopped tomatoes from Italy, each about 26.5 ounces for $1.69.

I headed back toward the kimchi factory and made my final stop at H Mart, the Korean supermarket near the Palisade Avenue monument. There, I concentrated on prepared food -- a pound of stewed tofu with red pepper sauce ($2.50), cucumber kimchi ($2.50) and honey rice cakes studded with beans ($3.49).

Arirang Kimchi (Gaboh Inc.), 191 W. Englewood Ave;
Englewood, 201-503-1314. 

H Mart, 25 Lafayette Ave., Englewood; 
201-871-8822.


Balthazar Bakery, 214 S. Dean St., Englewood;
(201) 503-9717.
 ‎
Jerry's Gourmet & More, 410 S. Dean St., Englewood; 
201-871-7108.



 

Homemade kimchi is a little harder to find

I stopped by my favorite Korean catering store this afternoon to buy a jar of kimchi and found myself staring at unfamiliar labels of commercial kimchi in place of the homemade stuff I have enjoyed for years.

The cashier couldn't tell me why Poong Yeon Korea on Broad Avenue in Palisades Park stopped making its own kimchi, which is spicy, fermented cabbage, cucumber, radish and other vegetables, the centerpiece of every Korean meal. The store had been one of my two main sources for homemade kimchi, the other being Gaboh Inc., a small factory in Englewood that makes and sells the Arirang brand.

The one-half gallon jar of Goshen kimchi I bought today at Poong Yeon costs $12 v. $10 at Gaboh. Fortunately, the Goshen kimchi isn't made with MSG and Poong Yeon still turns out hundreds of packages of homemade food daily, including japchae or translucent Korean sweet-potato noodles. For my dinner Monday, I'm planning to steam Korean mandoo (beef, shrimp or kimchi dumplings) from my freezer, heat up the japchae and fill a small bowl with kimchi.