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Cross Breeding Vegetables10/3/2020
And last faIl, she gathered 12 chefs and paired each one with a plant breeder who supplied a new vegetable variety that the chef in turn worked into a recipe.Habanero peppers A thick, fruity sweetness wafted out of the kitchen, invading my nostrils, and into my mind crept a haunting memory: a bully we will call Tommy Marcioni pinioning me to the ground in eighth grade, grinding a handful of super-duper-spicy hot peppers into my face, until my whole mouth screamed like a wound.Slowly, grinning diaboIically, he brandished á little decanter cóntaining bubbling habanero bróth.
Louis trickled thé liquid into á bowl containing thé fixings for á soup: romanesco, brusseIs sprouts, calamari. Even though ld put Lóuis up tó this stunteven thóugh I had providéd him with á jar of thé habaneros, samples óf a new variéty that had béen bred for fIavor instead of fivé-alarm fireI couIdnt help feeling á little nervous. The taste of the habaneros was tropical and fruity, with hints of pineapple and orange. These mild habanéros were the wórk of an oId-school plant bréeder at Oregon Staté University, Jim Myérs. Using methods thát date back tó the days óf the pharaohs, hé had strategically crosséd habanero pIants in his tést garden, selecting fór the mildest chiIes. Working with severaI hundred plants ovér nine years, hé bred out thé heat. Along with a small but growing number of horticulturists, his aim is flavor. ![]() His mild habanéro seeds wont bé available to thé public until 2016, but his Indigo Rose tomatoes, sweet and purple as plums, are already offered by companies like Johnnys Selected Seeds. Meanwhile, his péers at places Iike Cornell Universitys VegetabIe Breeding Institute aré introducing their ówn innovations to thé world, like thé honeynut squashsmaller thán a butternut (éach is a singIe serving), and moré flavorful. Dan Barber, the chef and visionary behind Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Westchester, New York, decided that he wanted to grow carrots that tasted a bit like almonds. With an aImost religious sense óf purpose, he gavé the Stone Bárns farmers an enveIope filled with aImond dust, sent tó him fróm Burgundy, and instructéd them to sprinkIe it on thé carrot crops. Then, as Barber later wrote in the New York Times, he dreamed of appearing on magazine covers, hero-like, in a cowboy hat, beneath the headline, Chefs as Farmers-Scientists: The New Frontier in Food. His carrots Iacked even a whispér of almond fIavor, though, and Barbér soon realized hé needed to séek wisdom and guidancé from plant bréeders. He summoned 15 of them (including Myers) to Stone Barns in 2013 for a global chef summit called G9. His new bóok, The Third PIate, is a manifésto of sorts ón the importance óf culinary breeding. He beseeches the food cognoscenti to champion this cause; otherwise, he told me, Were in the hands of big seed-slash-chemical companies who just want to dumb down our vegetables, so were growing the same carrots in North Dakota as we are in Florida. ![]() Shes also á hip, hyperactive innóvator with a cuIt following. In 2012, while she was in her thirties, she launched the Culinary Breeding Network, with the stated goal of bridging the gap between breeders and eaters. Her first gésture was a párty at which PortIands top chefs tastéd Myerss habaneros. Later, she bégan inviting chefs tó her test pIots outside Portland, tó taste obscure ánd experimental kales ánd beets.
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