Introducing: My new sexy food column at BrokeAss Gourmet!

Image “in the kitchen” by h.andras_xms.

I’m extremely excited to announce today’s launch of my new sex column over at BrokeAss Gourmet! When the team behind this new food blog approached me, I instantly warmed to the idea of a gourmet DIY food blog without pretension; they did name it “BrokeAss” after all. But what I really love is that the goal is to actually provide instructions for making meals that comes across as fancy or gourmet, but can be made for $20 or less. And since everyone I know has been laid off or still can’t find a job, a site that has us all eating well but living cheap couldn’t have better timing.

So, my challenge every two weeks is to cook a sexy meal, make it something a chef would admire, and give you the recipe — all for under $20 (hopefully with booze included). The fun is putting my cooking skills, sex and food knowledge, and snark to the test: in the column I do indeed openly recommend theft of overpriced but delicious food items (while providing the price if you can go over $20), while making fun of the tech company that just kicked you to the curb. Aphrodisiacs, yes. And if you’re wondering if I can cook, well — I’m not afraid to brag that I’m a true badass in the kitchen. Set me loose in your kitchen and I can always make something yummy out of whatever you have. Working in kitchens got me by when I was a homeless teen, and that skill later got me off the streets and into a lot of professional kitchens until my writing took off. You better bet I can make a meal to seduce and satisfy for less than twenty bucks; plus, I’m doing my recon for prices here in San Francisco (think: Bi-Rite). So wherever *you* are, dear reader, you know it’s cheaper.

There are a lot of fun features planned for BrokeAss Gourmet, like a guide to inexpensive but top-rate tasting alcohols, and some very snarky commentary features about the dining scene I can’t give you all the details on… yet. But now, enjoy my Love Spell Pizza, snip:

Sharing a meal that you eat with your hands is sexy enough; even better when the ingredients drive your senses into overdrive. Pizza has always been associated with love and romance, but the open secret about sexing up the DIY pizza is capitalizing on the aphrodisiac herbs on the cheap while making a pie that would impress top chefs — and a date. Even if that date is you. Basil is reputed to stimulate the sex drive from Sicily to India (and sacred to voodoo love goddess Erzulie); rosemary is an herb of romantic memory and a sprig can be easily stolen from anyone’s front yard in broad daylight. In Italy, sweet basil is called “kiss me Nicholas” (bacia-nicola); rosemary was reputedly named for Aphrodite / Venus and in many early depictions the goddess of love was portrayed clutching or wearing a sprig of the fragrant herb. And it is a weed, my friends, it grows everywhere. Paying for rosemary is foolish. And if you want to go the distance, slipping some overpriced and trendy — yet delicious — Mozzarella di Bufala up your sleeve or in the spacious pocket of your former employer’s keepsake company hoodie is a pretty romantic risk to take for a date. Trust me, it works. (…read more, brokeassgourmet.com)

If you’re curious about how foodservice saved my life and got me off the streets, read about it after the jump. Ironically, I’m blogging this in bed (still down with the flu) with a worn copy of Kitchen Confidential next to me.

So here’s the deal: according to California law, you have to be 16 in order to get a job. If you’re a kid who runs away from a hellhole of a life and thinks that death and/or life on the streets is a better bet, and you’re 13 (like I was, eve of my 14th birthday), you have to scrap to live. That means that simple things like eating is a problem. For food, you choose from soup kitchens full of crackheads, having to ask strangers for money, stealing, selling drugs (and risk getting caught), doing sex work (risking even more), or convincing people to help you out. Drugs and sex were not my method; I saw other kids my age going those routes and I saw what it did to them. Ever make friends with a 15-year-old tweaker or a 14-year-old sex worker? I made friends with them, but I also decided to make my own choices.

So I panhandled a lot and made friends with counter workers who were unhappy foodservice slaves and got free stuff. I only stole food that no one was using, I swear. And thanks to the law, getting a job and going legit to get off the streets was going to be a tough challenge (especially with no address for an ID) and a waiting game. Sure there were food kitchens in the Haight, but once you’ve had to do it, there are few things more humiliating than having to pray before they will serve you food. At least to me, asking people directly for money or food had more dignity and self-respect. On the streets that is one of the few things you have, however you define it.

One night I was asking for spare change outside a bar at 2am; that was the best time because drunks being kicked out would always give you (me, young punk girl with a mowhawk and a smile) more money. One guy came out and I asked him if he had any extra change, and he kind of sized me up for a minute before responding. He was an Asian dude and had a sweet, if inebriated vibe to him. He said sure, and gave me a couple dollars (a serious score), but said that I looked like I could use some rest and food more than money. I said, well the money’s for food. He said, hey, I’m not a weirdo; if you want a place to crash right now I live four blocks away, and I work at (a daytime restaurant, 5 blocks away). He was a chef who’d stopped for drinks on the way home. I’d never gone home with a guy I didn’t know when I was on the streets (I went back to girls’ places all the time). But he seemed okay and I was really, really tired. And he was right, I was hungry.

His apartment was a wreck; he put me on the couch while he talked about some shit that had gone down in the kitchen where he worked. He didn’t feed me, he just went to his bedroom and shut the door. As soon as the lights were out, I passed out with my clothes and boots on, as usual. I managed to sleep so hard that he had to wake me up in the morning — odd, because sleeping on the streets and in a strange guy’s apartment should have had me awake at the slightest noise. He said, “Hey I have to go to work. You can have all the change on my dresser and you can shower if you want. The door will lock behind you. Here’s where I work (he wrote down the address and phone number). If you’re ever hungry, call me at 9am and come to the kitchen. Expect to work for a few hours.”

He left me there and I thought, this dude’s crazy to leave me in his place all trusting and shit. I knew people who would have emptied the place out within hours.

So I didn’t take anything but the change and a little soap and water. And I called him the next day, around 9am. They made me wear white, and I picked up a kitchen knife and was taught how to wash and chop mountains of vegetables… Lots of veggies I’d never even heard of, but the guys in the kitchen told me all about them. I never crashed at his house again, and I can’t remember his name. But I was an underage prep cook for over a year and had a meal I worked for, and could count on, at least twice a week.