I just bought a box of Teuscher's champagne truffles for christmas (much recommended for a special treat. My paralegals gave me a small box, and they are exceptional), and came back to do a little research on truffle brands. It turns out that the ubiquitous Godiva is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Campbell's Soup, manufactured somewhere in Pennsylvania. Campbell's Soup? As in the people of the Cream of Mushroom casserole? They're making extremely expensive chocolates?

David Post at Volokh says that he's now requiring students to read entire cases rather than the digested versions available in casebooks. Only one of my professors required the same, and I think it's a valuable practice. Indeed, as a law clerk, I never felt like I had any trouble understanding the law, which, in the end, isn't rocket science. But procedural posture I was almost entirely unfamiliar with. I roughly knew how the summary judgment and motion to dismiss standard differed (kind of). But the difference between a TRO and a preliminary injunction? The occasional need for a permanent injunction? A resulting trust? A constructive trust? Which types of motions could be made ex parte? When and why we could send something for interlocutory review to the Delaware Supreme Court? I hadn't the slightest idea about any of these. And the secret is that as a matter of adjudication, they're all really important. Especially in the sphinx like depth of Delaware jurisprudence, procedure, and the number of facts dug up by procedure, is what often makes the difference between a case with only faint clues about the future behavior of Chancery, and a case with real, deep, roots. All that is stuff I learned only on the job. A little headstart, provided by reading whole cases, would have been nice.

Of course, my current practice as a transactional lawyer has almost literally nothing to do with civil procedure. But it still would have been nice.

(picture of the complete meal here)

Food sometimes makes me wonder about hypocrisy. I tout good food while enjoying Mcdonald's frozen french fries. I've doused pasta in ketchup (yes, really). And although I think fish should always be bought whole and cleaned yourself, and although I think that we've ranged too far from a world in which people recognized what they ate, where they knew that cod was a big ugly fish, and not just white flakes ground into indistinguishable chum, mixed with haddock, and made into fish fingers (which remain, alas, delicious with store bought tartar sauce in a sandwich, with those American cheese singles), I still can't bring myself to follow those views to their logical end and kill my own fish or lobster. In all honesty, I find even find putting mussels in the pan to die in their delicious, mortal, juices, a bit of a problem.

All that is to explain why I don't blame anyone if they don't want to clean their own fish for just a dinner. But cleaning fish is rewarding, and not just in a "I created food out of animal" sort of way. You also get wonderful bones for fumet, or "fish juice" as my instructor in Paris called it, a little disturbingly. And, along the way, you learn about restaurant economics. All that fish you left on the bone? Unless you scrape it off a for a soup, it's all lost profit!

Having said that, to properly clean a fish, start with a good, fresh fish (the best clue is a glassy eye, and bright red gills), scissors, a paring knife, and a flexible fish knife. Cut off all the fins with the scissors, like this. Then, use the scissors to slice the fish open for cleaning - make sure to run cold water over the fish afterwards, as at least clumsy cleaners (like me) will leave blood all over the insides. Fillet the fish by using the tip of the fish knife to detach the meat from the back bone, like so. The result will be a nice fillet of fish, ready to be cooked however you like. I personally prefer sauteeing in brown butter (when you put butter in a hot pan, first it'll foam, then the foam will subside, and then a little while later it'll give off a rich, hazelnut, smell. When you smell that, the butter should turn brown a few seconds later, and it's only then ready for the most flavorful saute), so I scored the back of the fish to prevent curling, (I'll have pictures of this later - I've misplaced them), and then put into the hot pan, taking care to avoid getting splashed. I like deep, crispy, color, on my fish, so I waited until it was this done, before pulling it out of the pan with my trusty fish slice, giving it a few seconds on the non-skin side, and salting with my two favorite french salts. I served the meal with sauteed fennel - had I been making this correctly, I would have cooked the fennel in fumet for half an hour further, and then reduced the fumet to mix with cream for sauce, but I was hungry, and the football was coming on the tv. Obviously, this method can be used for any fish, whether already filleted or not. And it doesn't even involve any ketchup.

I once wrote several pages of amusingly rotten Tom-Stoppard pastiche in which the main character defended, at obnoxious length, his preference for grappa over cognac. Personally, I have barely ever been able to stand the stuff (with one overenthusiastic exception), but in case there are grappa-lovers who read this blog, I offer this (derivative) quote, courtesy of my father:

On the off chance that you have been overly influenced by American yuppies who perceive grappa as a status symbol, remember Italo Calvino's warning that this was the beverage that was "suitable only for defrocked priests, unemployed bookkeepers and husbands that have been cuckolded"