Tastes of the Tropics - Norman Van Aken

Taste of the Tropics: Weird Fruits Deep in South Florida’s agricultural district in Homestead and the Redland, on the way to the southern entrance of Everglades National Park, you can’t miss the big fruit stand called Robert Is Here. Pull in and treat yourself to a key lime milkshake, local honey, maybe some guanabana, and a chat with Robert Moehling, who is behind the counter nearly every day, talking about tropical fruits. Robert Is Here started more than 50 years ago when he was a little boy selling his family’s cucumbers. Today, this family business is an institution, its cases heaped with stacks of tropical fruits and produce. They ship out exotic tropical fruits to those who can’t visit in person. Moehling knows pretty much everything about all tropical fruits, so we decided to talk with him about a few unusual – and delicious – tropical fruits you can find in South Florida. Weird fruits Jackfruit (Artocarpus heterophyllus) Dragonfruit, also known as pitaya White-fleshed (Hylocereus undatus) Red-fleshed (Hylocereus costaricensis or H. polyrhizus) Black sapote, also known as chocolate pudding fruit or chocolate persimmon (Diospyros nigra) Canistel, also known as eggfruit (Pouteria campechiana) Miracle fruit (Synsepalum dulcificum) Sugar apple, also known as sweetsop or custard apple (Annona squamosa)

Know Your Mango Known as the King of Fruits the world over, the mango (Mangifera indica) has been cultivated for thousands of years. Among the hundreds of varieties are fruits that are green, yellow, red, orange and deep purple; flesh that is pale yellow, deep orange, fibrous or silky smooth; and flavors that are sweet, tart, spicy or sour, sometimes tasting of coconut, lemon, orange or, well, mango. Tropical fruit expert Dr. Richard Campbell invites us into his kitchen to taste three mangos deeply rooted in history: Cambodiana, Chao Savoy and Cogshall and share tantalizing tales along the way. These three varieties are among the renowned mangos that Campbell and his three sons – Mango Men of Homestead https://www.facebook.com/mangomenhomestead/ – grow, sell and ship throughout the summer.

How’s Your Neighborhood Grocery Store? Does your cashier greet you by name? Do you find local artisans represented? Or do you skip your grocery store visit altogether, use a delivery service and shop at the farmers market? Michael Ruhlman, author of Grocery: The Buying and Selling of Food in America, talks with us about the modern grocery store – why we love it, what it does well and what it needs to do better, and how we the consumer can make a difference in the future of this uniquely American institution. 

What’s on Your Plate?   Thank a Plant Explorer Kale, hops, mangos, avocados, peaches and plums – and thousands upon thousands of other food and useful plants – made their way to this country over a century ago because of David Fairchild. He even brought the famed cherry blossom trees...   https://cherryblossomwatch.com/ ....to Washington, D.C. from Japan, despite an initial disastrous effort. It’s all in Daniel Stone’s new book, The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats. We talk with Stone and Fairchild’s granddaughter, Helene Pancoast, who shares recollections of growing up with a legend who

All About Peppers with Maricel Presilla  Do you like ’em spicy? Mild? Blazing hot? Sweet? Maricel Presilla – James Beard award-winning chef, culinary historian, author and restaurateur – talks with us about the world of peppers. From using peppers in her native Cuba, cooking with pepper leaves, the true origin of the datil pepper, plus recipe tips and tricks in her encyclopedic guide, Peppers of the Americas, Maricel demystifies this essential ingredient for chefs and home cooks alike.   www.ediblecommunities.com

Lidia Bastianich on How to Celebrate Like an Italian Just in time for the holidays! Find out how to throw a fabulous dinner party and put together a great antipasti spread with tips from award-winning television host, restaurateur, entrepreneur and cookbook author Lidia Bastianich. We spoke with her at the Miami Book Fair about her new book Lidia’s Celebrate Like an Italian – which is as much about love and friends and family and joy as it is about polenta torta with gorgonzola and savoy cabbage. http://ediblesouthflorida.ediblecommunities.com/ www.ediblecommunities.com

Fighting Food Waste One Produce Box at a Time Tons of fresh, nutritious, delicious fruits and vegetables are wasted every day because they never even make it to the grocery store. Maybe they’re too big, too small, blemished or otherwise imperfect, at least in the eyes of the grocer. Or perhaps the farmer grew too much to sell. Whatever the reason, Now, this “rescued” produce is available to consumers through Hungry Harvest, a service that gathers freshly harvested food and sells it online via subscription. The Baltimore-based business, which delivers in Maryland, Washington, DC, northern Virginia, Philly and South Florida, has expanded to South Florida. We spoke with Evan Lutz, whose belief that no food should go to waste led him to co-found Hungry Harvest. And we unbox one of their organic mini-harvest boxes to find out what’s inside, and why it’s there. (Spoiler alert: It’s all fresh and delicious).

Tree-to-Bar Chocolate in South Florida In his small suburban Miami shop, artisan Ricardo “Cao” Trillos handcrafts chocolate bars using cacao beans from fair-trade certified plantations in the Dominican Republic, Tanzania and Costa Rica, countries within 10 degrees south and 10 degrees north of the equator. Within this band are the countries that provide the best growing conditions for the cacao trees – hot temperatures, abundant rainfall, high humidity – in the Caribbean, Central and South America, Africa, Indonesia and Hawai’i.   Now, Trillos is making chocolate from cacao beans he harvests from a lush, tropical grove 15 miles southwest of his shop in the part of South Florida called the Redland. The latitude is 25 degrees, but in recent years, the hot, steamy conditions have been ideal for growing cacao and turning it into chocolate bars – a first in the continental United States.  Find out more: Visit Cao Chocolates’ monthly chocolate tours and tastings at Patch of Heaven Gardens (http://www.patchofheavengardens.com/about/). Find out more: http://www.caochocolates.com/index.php/cao-chocolates-miami-chocolate-tasting

Tastes of the Tropics: Norman Van Aken To many, Norman Van Aken – chef, author, pioneer of New World Cuisine, storyteller, James Beard award winner – is not just the face of Florida cooking, but the heart and soul. From working in kitchens in Key West in the 1970s, he was the driving force behind a diverse collection of memorable restaurants in the state, including A Mano in South Beach, Norman’s in Coral Gables and Norman’s at The Ritz-Carlton Orlando, still going strong. His body of work includes cookbooks – including Norman’s New World Cuisine, My Key West Kitchen, Feast of Sunlight, to name a few – that pay loving homage to the history, geography, culture, spirit and cuisine of food and drink. And he’s far from finished. Van Aken has more on his plate: a charming new restaurant called 1921 in Mount Dora, the quaint Victorian town north of Orlando; a soon-to-open restaurant, lounge and cooking school called Three in Wynwood, Miami’s urban arts district; and My Florida Kitchen, coming out this fall from University Press of Florida. He joined us for a chat with Erica Guzman at her cookware boutique, Aragon 101 in Coral Gables: