Community Magazine August 2017

32 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE What Goes On Behind the Scenes Executive Chef of The Prime Cut Caterers, Raymond Tawil, shares similar anecdotes, revealing some behind-the-scenes information gleaned from his four years at Johnson and Wales Culinary University. He saw “crazy things, that were really regular every day ways people prepare their food in the real world.” Examples include using bacon fat, duck fat, or beef fat instead of olive oil to make eggs, biscuits, and collard greens. “The pastas we made in classical European class all started with beef broth, chicken broth, or a seafood broth. Rice is made in a broth; no one uses water in the kitchen,” noted the chef, who holds a B.S. in Culinary Nutrition and Food Science. Other surprises included fish sauces as a “big ingredient” used in stir-fry recipes or vegetable dishes; sauces with a wine base; and gelatins (formerly animal bones) used in salad dressings and mousses. But it’s not just the food itself that’s the issue. “Places that use cast iron to cook food are a big problem for us. Cast iron is themost absorbent material you can find in the kitchen,” Chef Tawil explained. “Besides the fact that you never really wash a cast iron pan with soap and water, chefs don't clean them at all. They call them seasoned pans… wait about two minutes and you’ll see the oils and juices of the last dish coming out of the pan. They use this to cook the next dish and give it added flavor.” Therefore, any item cooked in a cast iron pan is questionable, for it could have been in previous contact with an untold number of foods over the course of hours. TRULY HIDDEN INGREDIENTS During the manufacturing stage, there are ingredients added to foods that even chefs might not know about, let alone consumers! Here are some examples: Lac Lac or ‘shellac’ is a red colored secretion left behind by lac insects. They colonize on branches, where a farmer harvests their secretions. Lac is commonly used as a colorant in juices, carbonated beverages, jams, wines, sauces, yogurts, ice creams, gum, and candies. Castoreum Castoreum is the yellowish secretion attained from a beaver. Castoreum is used, most often, as a vanilla, raspberry, and strawberry flavoring. Candies, ice creams, gum, and alcoholic beverages rank among the food products that most often get ‘natural flavoring’ from castoreum. Gelatin Gelatin is a protein made from boiling the cartilage, skin, and bones of an animal in order to achieve a thickening agent. The animal can be either cattle or pork, at least among the major American brands. Gelatin is most popularly used in desserts, marshmallows, candy corn, gummy bears, fruit snacks, jellybeans, yogurt, creamcheese, margarine, and juices. Interestingly, gelatin is also used in low/no fat foods to simulate the ‘thickness’ of full-fat foods. There are so many foods that use gelatin that it would be impossible to name every one. Some of the brands you can be sure contain gelatin, though, are Jell-O, Skittles, Pop-tarts, Frosted Mini Wheats, Hostess, Coffee Mate, and Trident. Rennet Rennet is an enzyme that is naturally produced in the lining of the stomach of some mammals. In food processing, it is used for cheese making, helping milk separate into curds and whey. Rennet is taken from cows, sheep, goats, deer, and yaks among other animals. SUSHI FISH – AS WELL AS OTHER FISH ORDERED AT RESTAURANTS – MAY VERY WELL BE “SWAPPED” UP TO 87 PERCENT OF THE TIME, ACCORDING TO A NATIONWIDE STUDY DONE BY OCEANA.