the most marvelous legume...er, allium!

here's an oldie but a goodie (read it out loud. you need to hear it in order to get it):

q: how do you make potato leek soup?
a: first you take a leek...

(courtesy of kahtah)

right then. this is a food post. as most of my friends know, i love to cook, and i'm really good at it. i made a huge pot of broth a few weeks ago, and froze most of it, which has given me the opportunity to make lots of different soups. these soups last for days, and they are cheap. and of course, they taste a-MAZ-iiiing.

today i decided to make a potato leek soup, which is not only the subject of my favorite crappy joke, but also a delicious soup. i used the joy of cooking recipe. the potatoes make the texture, and the broth adds the depth, but the leeks! oh the leeks - if you cook them right, they get a little caramelized and give the soup that complex, smokey, and citrusy illusion that no other allium can provide.

as i learned today while blindfolded, the leek is an illusion in another profound way. i have interacted with them before, and always thought that, viewed from the top, they look sort of like the cross-section of an onion. well, i put on my blindfold and took those suckers out of the refrigerator to try and gain a new, tactile understanding of the allium. (looking through the fridge was hilarious in itself: i live with two other people, and all of our food is in there. how do you tell a fake-blind person to find the leeks in a crowded refrigerator?)

i took the first leek out of the bag and laid it on the counter: it is long and has tiny little bumps all over it. not smooth. i find the tiny slit where the ends meet, and i gently pull it apart. it yields with the tiniest bit of papery resistance. there is a bit of slime left behind that layer, and i believe this must be part of the layer itself that i have failed to remove entirely. i move my hand back to the top of the stalk, and expect to find another slit in the same place. quelle choque! it is not there! i feel around the top, and notice there is something on the other side - a tiny opening. could it be? mais non ... mais oui! it is there! so i peel away that layer as well. it is a little more tender than the previous one, and i do not leave behind any trace of it on the next layer. i expect the slit incident must have been some sort of anomaly, so i go back to the other side of this layer, and sure enough, the slit is there (but in my head, i think, this could also indicate a pattern). looking for the counter-intuitive, i reach for the other side of the next layer, and the slit is there! there you have it, folks, the genius of the leek. each layer protects its opening by being positioned opposite the opening of the layer around it.

as a seer, i am simply a user of the leek. i purchase it, i bring it home, i cut the ends, i wash it, i cut it, i cook it. in that order. i do not engage with the leek. there is no ethics of the leek because i have not really understood it. sure, the final product tastes good, and the leek is certainly there, but perhaps it is not fully present....

digression: when i go to the market, the leek is laid in an eloquently conceived pile (particularly if i am buying the leek from josh's produce department). under strategically positioned lights it lies. i look. i see. it will taste great. but i have already imagined the taste based on my vision. i have been encouraged to do so by the grocery store, and by whoever produced the leek (this is particularly true in a corporate supermarket). thus, cooking becomes a visual process in ways that we may not even consider. if this sounds weird, think about the ravenous fans of the food network, or shows like top chef: we cannot smell the food, we cannot taste the food, we can not digest the food and will not be nourished by it, but we watch with watering mouths. "IT LOOKS DELICIOUS! CAT CORA IS A GENIUS!"

....back to the presence and ethics of the leek. what i found today is that i interacted with the leek on a totally different level. i did not grow it myself, which would be the most tactile way of engaging the food, but i did appreciate its qualities in a new way. i was actually stunned by the intricacy of the leek, and next time i buy one, i might look at it while i fondle it. but i respect the leeks i put in the soup, and i feel we developed an understanding. without concentrating on vision, i was able to rethink what the leek is to me and to the world and perhaps most importantly, what the leek is to itself. without this dynamic between two entities, how is understanding possible?

btw, the soup was fantastic. thank you leeks.

also, big thanks to irigaray on this post.