Thousands of people swirled through the Union Lake store on November 8, for face painting and tattoos, clowns and balloon animals, free hot dogs and Sanders sundaes. Product samplings throughout the store included Hiller’s own Polly’s Pastries and Chef Rick’s gourmet mac-and-cheese plus much, much more. Hiller’s: The Place To Feed Your Family.
When I was little, as a treat when I’d visit my dad every other weekend, he used to take me to Hiller’s (at 14 Mile and Haggerty Road) to get twice-baked potatoes and chicken and rice. We started going to Hiller’s when I was 9 or 10. I was a huge Beanie Baby fan (one Christmas, my dad decorated his tree with Beanie Babies instead of ornaments – I was delighted!) and we’d go to the little toy store near Hiller’s, then to get some weekend foods – an artichoke, twice-baked potatoes, chicken and rice from the deli counter.
We’d eat dinner Friday night, most likely the artichoke and a steak, bean soup, chili, pepper stake – all homemade. My dad loves to cook and eat. On Saturday and Sunday, we’d eat the chicken and rice and twice-baked potatoes.
When I started high school, I learned Japanese. Then I loved going to Hiller’s even more, to look at the Japanese foods – especially the unique snack foods! I’d sometimes buy Japanese pop, Ramune, with a marble in the neck of the bottle – you’d have to drink it a certain way or the marble would stop the flow of the drink.
But the potatoes and chicken dishes were my favorites. The chicken and rice wasn’t like anything else I’d ever eaten – and I have not yet succeeded in finding something like it since I left Michigan. I remember the wild rice and almonds and a very light sauce. Everything tasted really good.
The store was always clean and organized. Sometimes, we stopped at the bakery to get chocolate treats. My dad would kinda spoil me on the weekends he had me.
My dad told me he liked shopping at Hiller’s because the food was fresh and always tasted good. And, there was a good supply of fresh produce – artichokes especially; I have a hard time finding good ones like I’d find at Hiller’s.
Hiller’s carried everything we liked, especially items we couldn’t find in other stores. I first tried stuffed grape leaves from Hiller’s. It became our tradition to go there when we were together.
Now, I’m 21 and live in Fort Collins, Colorado. We stopped going to Hiller’s together when I was 18 or 19 – when I stopped going to my dad’s house every other weekend and started college.
I’ve looked everywhere for a recipe to make that chicken and rice but can’t find it. I would love to have a Hiller’s nearby. So many good memories.
Being involved with food for so long, I receive many solicitations from organizations requesting my participation in fundraisers. Due to time constraints, I can only do a few.
One of my favorites is the Slow Food Movement. In 1998, a friend in the wine business brought me the “Slow Food Manifesto,” a proclamation of passion from Italy.
In 1986, on the eve of the opening of a McDonald’s at the foot of the Spanish Steps in Rome, a member of the Italian Gastronomic Association, Arcigola, was offended by the introduction of low-quality American fast food in one of the world’s gastronomic capitals.
In response, the International Movement for the Defense of, and the Right to, Pleasure, was formed. We know it now as Slow Food International.
Other countries were quick to follow.
In 1989, at the Opera Comique in Paris, food lovers from many countries endorsed the Slow Food Manifesto:
Our century…invented the machine, and then took it as its life model.
We are enslaved by speed, and have succumbed to the corrupting virus [of the] Fast Life, which … forces us to eat Fast Foods…A firm defense of quiet, material pleasure is the only way to oppose the universal folly of Fast Life. May suitable doses of guaranteed sensual pleasure and slow enjoyment preserve us from the … mistake of frenzy for efficiency.
The manifesto recommends starting at the table, rediscovering the sensual quality of slow bites of flavor and savory regional cooking. It proclaims that real culture is defined by developing taste rather than demeaning it.
We have a Slow Food group close to home, in Ann Arbor. We are all guilty of forgetting the pleasure of time, how it feels to slow down.
Take time when you shop. Prowl the produce section at Hiller’s, and plan your evening meal from the bounty of our local harvest. Look for Made in Michigan shelf tags and create meals from locally produced delights.
Share your family’s heritage as it relates to food traditions. Learn your ancestry through the flavors that have endured. Search for favorite family recipes and recreate them for your family.
We will all benefit from living life instead of rushing through it.
– Rick Halberg, Hiller’s Director of Culinary Services
Autumn is a time when wine distributors host holiday trade shows for retail wine buyers. At these extravagant, overblown affairs, hundreds of wines are displayed and thousands of small portions poured – all for a milling, sniffing, sipping, spitting and pontificating crowd of restaurant sommeliers, party store owners, supermarket buyers, writers and uncategorized others.
People say they wish they had my job all the time, but the truth is that attending trade shows can be daunting.
After all, wines reveal themselves best and most enjoyably through contemplation and careful consideration. The ritualistic three- to five-second look, swirl, smell, slosh, spit, score process can’t be rushed. Nevertheless, there are so many wines to be evaluated, so we endure the trade show circuit, trying an awful lot of bad wine along the way so you won’t have to.
Of course, there is a lot of good wine out there, too, and this is the time of year when I look at the big picture: What’s hot? Who are the rising stars? What is trending down? And, where are the best values?
Right now, you’ll get the best value out of wines from Chile and Argentina. Their well-made wines at all price points are clean, fresh, varietally correct and well-balanced, with bright fruit and zippy acidity.
For a white, try Argentine Torrontes - lovely floral and stone fruit aromas and a refreshing, palate-cleansing finish. For a red, Argentina’s Malbec and Chile’s Carmenere are the signature varieties but excellent Cabernet, Merlot, and Pinot Noir are easy to find. Some brands I like: Cono Sur, Maipe, Ventisquero, Terra Andina, and Morande.
On the domestic side you cannot beat wines from Washington for value and distinctiveness. We recently devoted an edition of Jim Hiller’s Wine Club to Pacific Northwest wines.
(Click here to download the newsletter!)
Columbia Crest, Red Diamond, Hogue, Covey Run, Chateau Ste Michelle and Snoqualmie offer outstanding depth of flavor and solid, honest value.
- Eric Novak, Hiller’s Wine Buyer
October 1988, I was in Italy, researching stops for a guided tour of Detroit foodies. I stopped at Cibreo for a meal. Back then, Cibreo was a small neighborhood trattoria known for incredible old world Tuscan cuisine - like Ribollita soup made with cavalo nero, Tuscan black kale (which we sell at Hiller’s); Ciangale, wild boar slowly braised with sweet and sour fall apples; or Bistecca Fiorentina, a triple-thick Porterhouse steak done in a wood-fired oven.
Today, Cibreo is known internationally – and it’s a veritable food empire consisting of the original trattoria, an elegant restaurant, a coffee bar, a take-out store and a new Theatre Salon. All of these are located in the old Santa Croce neighborhood of Florence, where you can find the oldest Franciscan church and a beautiful example of Italy’s many piazzas as well as one of my favorite fruit and vegetable markets.
Some vivid memories from that meal:
But the best dish was the brains! After seven courses of incredible food, with dessert on the way, I remembered reading in an old Gourmet magazine that Cibreo’s chefs do wonders with lamb brains.
I called to my waiter: “Cervello?”
He looked at me with amazement in his eyes, then reminded me of all I had already consumed.
I convinced him I was serious. No more than five minutes later, a small plate arrived with a tiny foil packet. No wonderful odor, no glorious droplets of sauce. Despite the heat of the packet, my fingers navigated the foil open - and the soul-soothing scent hit me straight-on.
It was like nothing I had ever experienced: butter, lemon, garlic, olive oil, fresh bay leaf, laurel and something else….
Fabio Picchi, Cibreo’s chef-owner, had placed a tiny sliver of “Tartufo Bianco,” the prized Italian fungus with an aroma of things exotic and forbidden, inside the packet with the tiny lobe of lamb brain. Mmmm…eyes closed, I opened my mouth.
Two tiny bites, and I was done in! Delicate couldn’t describe that dish. It was the epitome of rustic perfection, supremely fresh ingredients treated with the utmost respect.
Just how I like it.
– Chef Rick Halberg
A bottle of wine begs to be shared; I have never met a miserly wine lover.
-Clifton Fadiman
Of all ways that wine enriches our lives, the joy found in sharing it may be the greatest. A friend drops by and you share a bottle while swapping stories of the kids, the house, the dogs. You prepare a recipe from the latest issue of Gourmet or Real Simple, anguish over the perfect wine to pair with it, and delight afterwards in the fact that it really didn’t matter to any of your guests which wine you chose. It was perfect because wine loves company, and company is always better with wine.
So why not organize a wine-tasting party for your next gathering of friends? A wine event can be elaborate or simple; only a few essentials are required and the rest relies on your crowd and creativity.
Unless you are conducting a formal, blind tasting and don’t want other tastes to influence the wines, arrange bread, cheese, crudités, olives, and fruit. And don’t forget to have lots of water for drinking between sips.
Have plenty of clean stemware with bowls large enough for a good swirl, but certainly don’t need to be Reidel.
Some folks offer paper and pens to encourage note-taking; jotting down thoughts on appearance, aroma, flavor, and overall impression of each wine is an excellent way to focus. (Of course, omitting the schoolwork keeps your party informal and less intimidating.)
Make sure you accurately assess your group’s true interest; don’t make things too technical, or too much work, if most guests aren’t seriously into wine.
Consider these ways of structuring a tasting, based on the crowd’s collective level of experience:
Cross-varietal tasting. This can be fun for beginners or a group with widely different experience levels. Taste a number of wines in approximately the same price range made from the same grape, and focus on identifying distinguishing characteristics. For reds, pick a Cabernet Sauvignon, a Pinot Noir, a Merlot, and a Syrah. For whites: a Chardonnay, a Sauvignon Blanc, a Riesling, and a Gewurztraminer. At the end, pour from a covered bottle something tasted earlier and see who can figure out which one it is.
Cross-regional tasting. Try the same type of wine but from different regions or countries. For example, compare Sauvignon Blanc from Bordeaux, the Loire, New Zealand and California. Or Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa, Australia, Chile and Bordeaux. Syrah from the Rhone and Washington State, Shiraz from Australia and South Africa, Pinot Grigio from Italy and California, Pinot Gris from Alsace and Oregon.
Price-level tasting. This is appropriate for an intermediate level of wine knowledge. Compare the same type of wine at different levels of quality: a Bordeaux, a Pauillac and a Premier Cru Pauillac; or, a Kendall-Jackson Grand Reserve versus the K-J Vintner’s Reserve versus Camelot (a K-J second label).
Vertical tasting. One needs a pretty extensive cellar or some good connections for this. Compare the same wine over several vintages. A vertical tasting can clearly show the effects of weather variation on wine.
Blind tasting. Wine bottles are covered so there’s no way to identify the wine. The point is either to compare similar wines without prejudice or to have tasters identify the grape, region and vintage. Definitely not for the faint of heart.
For a wine tasting party with minimum pretension and maximum conviviality, you can’t beat an idea from Dorothy Gaiter and John Brecher, who write the wine column for The Wall Street Journal. Ask each of your guests to bring a bottle of the same kind of wine within a certain price range-say, for instance, Chardonnay under $20. Tell them to put the wine in a bag with their names on it. Do the same. When people arrive, give each a glass of your wine (no more than two ounces; remember, this is a tasting) and put theirs on the table. After everyone finishes the first wine, pour tastes of the second and leave it on the table. And so on. Keep opening until all the wines have been tried. Then, take the bottles out of the bags. Don’t worry about assigning best and worst. It’s exciting enough to see who brought what, find out how much everything cost and compare who liked what.
Some members of Jim Hiller’s Wine Club say that after each quarterly arrival of Club selections, they convene a party of friends to taste our picks. They discuss the wines, decide which ones they like and as a final laugh for the evening, read my newsletter aloud and rate the level of bombast in my tasting notes. It’s okay - I’m tough, I can take it.
No matter what type of tasting you organize, if your friends are driving, be careful. Have designated drivers or call for cabs. You want your friends to be around for your next party.
- Eric Novak, Hiller’s Wine Guru
Today I was frying up our first batch of arancini…“little oranges” you can find on streets in certain parts of Italy. But they’re not produce. Arancini are deep-fried balls of creamy risotto filled with meat, peas, sausage, Mozzarella di Bufalo, or saffron…mmmm…
They are sometimes called Supli di Telefono in Italian, which translates to “the wires of the telephone,” because of all the stringy cheese that dangle when you take a bite.
As I worked over the pot of bubbling oil, in walked Fabrizio Casini, our Florence-born produce buyer – or as I like to think of him, a worker of produce wonders. I love cooking for Fabrizio, especially Italian dishes that remind him of home.
But he said he’d never eaten arancini before. That revelation spurred me to make one of the finest batch I’d ever fried up. One bite and I could see on his face how joyous the flavors were as they oozed onto his tongue.
At that moment, he started talking about his family in Italy, growing up in Florence, palming the produce in his father’s market when he was just a boy. His whole life has been sensory-rich and food-centered.
Having been to Italy many times, I closed my eyes and pictured exactly what he was talking about. The places, the people, the senses…
I’m American-born and bred, but Fabrizio’s memories called up images of home, food, love, the concept of soul-filling and soul-touching. This is why I cook, why I stand in the kitchen and work ingredients into tasty pieces of art. Anyone who spends a life around food is devoted to the idea of conjuring feelings when people sink their teeth into something prepared lovingly and with thought.
When I closed my last restaurant, Emily’s, we hosted farewell dinners. On the last night, when all of the emotions of serving a last supper of sorts swirled around and inside me, I didn’t think I could handle speaking to the group about what they’d meant to me.
I didn’t have to. People rose from their seats, one by one, and told stories of favorite times in my restaurant. They shed tears, giving permission for my own, and recounted stories of first dates, engagements, weddings, anniversaries, births, even deaths. Moments celebrated and marked with food, friends and family.
The love of food can do that to you….share with me…..
– Hiller’s Head Chef Rick Halberg
Countless cultures have a phrase for clinking glasses and toasting to one’s good health. In Hebrew, it’s L’chaim. In French, it’s a votre sante. In Czech, it’s Na zdravi.
It’s not all colloquialism, either. Medical research shows a link between regular, moderate consumption of red wine and a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease and certain cancers as well as the slowing of neurological degenerative disorders like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases.
The idea that drinking wine in moderation is good for your health became popularized after the 1991 “French Paradox” broadcast on 60 Minutes. Ever since, wine consumption – red wine in particular - has risen dramatically.
How, exactly, does red wine promote good health? And do different farming or fermentation techniques provide different levels of protection?
Dr. Roger Corder, a cardiovascular expert at the William Harvey Research Institute in London, wrote in “The Red Wine Diet” about oligomeric procyanidins (OPCs) as the source of red wine’s health benefits.
Corder dismisses the idea that resveratrol is the reason for wine’s health-promoting qualities. It does exists in grapes and has been known to discourage cancer - but there isn’t enough reservatrol in wine to make a difference.
All red grapes, particularly those with thick skins and high skin-to-pulp ratios, contain OPCs.
After measuring OPC concentration of several common red wine grapes, Corder identifies Tannat as the grape with the greatest concentration. Tannat’s benefits can be seen in the surprisingly long lifespans of residents of the département of Gers in southwest France, whose local wine appellation is Madiran. Gers contains more than double the national average of men in their nineties.
Madiran’s principal grape is Tannat, a thick-skinned grape native to southwest France that makes wonderful dark, dense, smoky wines renowned for their ageworthiness.
“One small glass of this wine can provide more benefit than two bottles of most Australian wines,” Corder writes.
It’s a good thing Hiller’s sells Madiran!
Alain Brumont Torus, a blend of 50% Tannat, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 20% Cabernet Franc, with loads of black fruit flavors and soft, ripe tannins, is on sale now for $11.99.
* http://www.whri.qmul.ac.uk/staff/corder.html
** http://www.whri.qmul.ac.uk/
- Eric Novak, Hiller’s Wine Guru
There are four common taste sensations: sweet, sour, salty and bitter. But another deserves attention. In Japanese, it’s called umami, and there is no good English translation. I like to interpret it as meaning, “Yummy.”
Scientists validated the concept of umami in Japan a century ago. The Chinese have talked about it for far longer. Brillat Savarin, a well-known 19th century French gourmand, referred to it as the “savoury taste.” It’s an all-around-the-mouth sensation of flavor, earthy and whole, salty and rich.
I think of it when eating mushrooms, a rich consommé or Tartufo Bianco, the prized Italian white truffle. But it’s also strong in concentrated meat or poultry sauces, certain shrimp dishes and good quality sun-dried tomatoes. Slow-cooked dishes are especially high in umami because of the richness that comes from concentrating flavors and spices over time.
Cooks and food lovers should be aware of the many factors that affect the way a dish works, individual components as well as the way they come together, especially when paired with an appropriate wine.
Simple grilled salmon blends well with Zinfandel, but when sautéed mushrooms are added, the combination doesn’t go with that wine. That’s because the oil of the grilled salmon softens the tannins of the wine; the mushroomy flavor reacts with tannins and exaggerates them. For the second dish, you’d want to sip a crisp chardonnay.
Try this: lightly marinate a boneless chicken breast in balsamic vinegar and good quality olive oil. Then, grill it over hot coals. Serve with slices of ripe tomatoes, fresh basil and roasted asparagus, and pour a glass of young California cabernet.
After sampling that perfect combination of flavors and textures, try using a whole chicken, cut into pieces, and braise it with dried tomatoes, mushrooms, cured ham and concentrated chicken broth. The same Cabernet will be a poor accompaniment.
That’s because the acid from the tomatoes and balsamic softened the tannins in the first dish. When you slow-cook the chicken with such rich ingredients, the wine takes on a bitter and metallic taste. But a silky pinot noir would be perfect!
We must eat to nourish and sustain ourselves – but that doesn’t mean it has to be a necessary chore. Elevating a meal to a joyful experience takes time, patience, knowledge and love. Of course, a few good ingredients, a sense of humor and a hunger for pleasure go a long way!
This is the perfect time of year to play with the rich flavors and textures of local produce. Michigan farmers are harvesting the season’s bounty, fruits and vegetables, what nature provides, kissed by the sun and nurtured by the elements.
At Hiller’s, we feature many local products, in the produce department and also in our prepared foods. Hats off to these earnest caretakers of the earth; without them, where would we be?
- Chef Rick Halberg
It’s a remarkable thing, finding your life’s passion. There’s nothing better than knowing exactly what you were meant to do.
It was 1970, I was a 21-year-old hippy living in Tucson, Arizona, and I got a job as a dishwasher in a communal vegetarian restaurant for 90 cents an hour. One day, the cook didn’t show so my hippy friends nominated me to take over the kitchen. Chaos led to Nirvana. I felt like I had come home - but it was no home I’d ever known before.
My passion for food grew until I enrolled at the Culinary Institute of America in 1975. I was already skilled as a vegetarian cook - at CIA, I learned to cook with “real” food: foie gras, sweetbreads, veal cheeks, fresh skate wing and Alaskan halibut.
There, I learned from the best chefs: Richard Czak, a master of the classics. Bruno Elmer, who cooked for Egyptian royalty. Fritz Sonnenschmidt, an expert sausage-maker.
And John Novi, my mentor, my friend, and the guy who set me free in the kitchen. I learned from John that a dedicated chef works and works until he gets it right.
In my career, I’ve cooked with the Culinary Olympic Team, prepared dinner for former Vice President Al Gore, and worked alongside great chefs like Pete Peterson, Emeril Lagasse, and Takashi Yagahashi. I’ve made dinner at top wineries in America, France, and Italy. I prepared a meal at the James Beard House in New York, the culinary great’s former residence-turned-showplace for America’s best food.
I’ve dined in great restaurants and owned some, too. And yet my hunger grows.
We’ve always been a traveling family and my kids share my love of food. We learn the places we go by sampling local cuisine. Yellowtail snapper in Florida. Crispy first-of-the-season artichokes, fried and pressed to look like sunflowers, in Rome. Bouillabaisse in Nice. If it’s fresh and what the locals eat, I want a taste.
My friends notice that before I take a bite, I breathe in the scent of whatever is on my plate. That’s how I make a permanent memory of taste.
I can still remember my first Tartufo Bianco - its heady scent musty like a mushroom. My first seared foie gras was like melting velvet. My first fresh oyster, a drop of the sea: briny, cool, and salty.
Memory, knowledge, taste, and supreme pleasure allow me to create a cuisine based on good ingredients, supported by a tender all-encompassing love for the wholesome products of the earth.
Share your love of food with me here…Chef Rick Halberg
