Cooking With Fire

Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!
- New Testament: James 3:5

We certainly live in amazing times full of technologies that allow us to have anything we want within minutes of desiring.  But, has anyone ever sat around a microwave?  Despite the many diverging paths our cultures have taken over the centuries, we share a common origin: the fire pit.  Sitting around a fire with the day's catch cooking on it, the fire kept us warm and predators at bay allowing us the piece of mind to socialize and share discoveries and new ideas.  It was a place of safety, comfort and nurture - of our bodies and our community.  It was here we developed speech, commerce, art and politics.  The building blocks of today's human societies all developed while huddling around a fire waiting for food to cook.

The primal aspect of cooking over an open fire, the conquering of something dangerous and presenting guests with an edible meal is, I think, the epitome of any cook's talent.  There are no knobs to turn on a bed of coals, if you need more or less heat you have to act quickly and with skill to get just the right heat for the job.  The basics would be boiling water - to make coffee, tea or soup - grilling steaks or small animals and roasting vegetables.  But, when the aim is to provide foods that have been combined with other ingredients to heighten or enhance the main ingredient, that require time to build and layer flavour, then the cooking, sometimes, requires more finesse.  For these jobs it would be best not to re-invent the wheel and instead look to classic dishes that have been cooked over fire for generations.  That is what we did this past Friday.

Our first dish was a chicken tajine with preserved lemons and olives.  There is a magical element to a tajine, as the ingredients are added without liquids to assist in the cooking.  The sauce that develops comes naturally from each ingredient's own liquid content.  The design of the cooking vessel helps ensure the moisture is trapped inside and is recycled back into the dish.  Whenever I use my tajine I wonder if this will be the time the meat comes out burnt as it goes into the cold pot without oil or liquid and remains in contact with the bottom for the duration of the cooking.  But, I am always rewarded with a tender, rich and flavourful meat with plenty of moisture.  I always wonder if there will be enough liquid to cook the carrots and potatoes, but each time they come out perfectly cooked, tender and al dente.  My tajine has become my favourite way to cook and one of my most used kitchen appliances.  This was the first time I experimented with it in the traditional way over an open fire and it performed with the same magic.

Our second dish was a seafood paella.  Like the tajine, I feel there is an element of magic in a traditional paella pan, as all the ingredients seemed to be just thrown into it with hope that it will come out alright.  And each time it does.  This was also my first time using my paella on an actual wood fire, the way it was intended, and this pan, too, worked its traditional magic.  The beauty of paella is that it does not have a strict recipe or style that must be followed; it is very adaptable to a wide variety of ingredients and is meant to be made that way.  One couple brought with them South African boerewors and we used them instead of the traditional meats of rabbit and chirizo.  While we did not have the flavours that come from chirizo, the dish did not suffer and was, in fact, remarkable.  I looked at this as an example of true Canadian cuisine, where two cultures meet to create a dish that neither would have on their own.  Saffron infused rice with meat, spice and seafood, how can you go wrong?

The meal was a success and the food was enjoyed a second evening last night as leftovers.  I can not express the pleasure that comes from watching the reactions of others when they taste the food and realize that it came off the fire they sat around watching.  I, also, cannot describe the enjoyment of having the guests gather around the fire as I am cooking and assist with the meal, this really was a communal effort with some guests prepping ingredients, others helping with the fire and others carrying food back and forth from the house to the fire pit. We also enjoyed homemade roti and frozen yogurt for dessert. To end the evening we all sat around a second fire on a patio enjoying one of those modern conveniences in the form of a hot tub - hey, I wonder if I could accomplish a primal version of that... maybe not.