Egan: The language of modern cuisine is getting harder to digestto digest

When you were a kid, bread was just bread. Now, it's Parisian, slow-milled whole wheat, cheddar, chive and jalapeño, kalamata olive, rosemary garlic sourdough, and something called ciabatta.

I’m not much of a cook, as food grows ever more terrifying.

Tried a recipe for chilli the other day; was stumped after five words: “In a large Dutch oven …”

This is probably just a big pot — not Dutch, not even an oven — best to never mind and just open another pint.

An Ottawa chef won the Canadian Culinary Championship last weekend. Wonderful news for Briana Kim. The gold-medal recipe, though, began to lose me at “onion tuile,” left me blank at “maitake mushrooms” and “lacto-fermented green tomato” is just something, on private browsing, you toss to The Google.

You know who really has the most explaining to do? Yes, the French.

Do you remember the craze for “sous vide”? Apparently you put meat in a sealed plastic bag, then boil the thing in a pot of water. Sure you do. This is different from using a “Bain Marie,” which is apparently (and I’ll be wearing out the word today) cooking food in a hot-water bath.

Now try to imagine the hapless novice accidentally co-mingling his “sous vide” and “Bain Marie,” putting the whole thing “in a large Dutch oven,” and probably blowing a hole in the stove, or risking actual drowning.

About ovens, though.

It is baffling, in finer establishments, to be offered “oven-roasted” potatoes, say, because at home — like many of you — we like to roast things in a rusty garbage can. I mean, is there a “non-oven” way to roast anything? Open fire in the driveway?

Au gratin, Coq au Vin, Table d’Hôte, À la Carte — no end to the French invasion of the simple man’s choice of chow.

(Me and pal Biff like to eat “At La Cart,” the kind with four wheels and a yappy guy with tongs. He tells, by the way, an epic story about accidentally — tricky translation again! — ordering “brains” in a Parisian restaurant. “Tasted just like chicken” was not part of the still-haunting review.)

So, it isn’t just me. Don’t servers in high-end “bistros” spend several minutes translating, or at least explaining, the daily special of fusion-infused-braised something-something, while the panicked eye races to find “poulet” on the chalkboard?

The chilli recipe called for “dicing” a cup of onions, which I guess means cutting into little pieces, but not perfect little squares because, apparently, that is called “cubing,” while long, thin pieces are, apparently, called “juliennes,” no technique to be confused with “mincing.”

And, on a side note, they keep inventing both food — until 15 minutes ago, no one had heard of kale — and devices to make it with.

We have an Instant Pot. At the moment, it is bravely propping up several books in the basement.

Leaving this beast on the counter — with the coffee maker, four-slot toaster, Soda Stream, food processor, the smoothie blender, the big KitchenAid mixer, the rice cooker, the cappuccino presser, the boxy bread-maker and the “large Dutch oven” — is the reason modern kitchens have “islands” like Greenland or Aisle 6 at Canadian Tire.

Food was once so simple.

Do you remember, as a kid, your mother sending you to the corner store with a buck for a loaf of bread?

Bread was just bread. Even at age 10, you didn’t need a note or a manual.

Now there’s “artisanal” baguettes (French again!) of every description — Parisian, slow-milled whole wheat, cheddar, chive and jalapeño, kalamata olive, and things like rosemary garlic sourdough, heirloom-grain, ancient-baked, flax-seed what-have-you.

Last week, my wife dispatched me to find a “ciabatta.” Her quiet prayer went unanswered. Came home with the wrong thing. (I mean, how in God’s name is Metro carrying, let alone “out “of, ciabattas?)

Some of these loaves are great-tasting, mind, and easy to slice, due to containing about 90 per cent air.

And things will likely get even scarier. The butcher had a sidewalk board the other day advertising “U15 Scallops” and, honestly, you’re afraid to ask, lest it involve a submarine.

(Don’t, either, turn on the TV as a means of escape. Wall-to-wall cooking shows, all ending with some shattered soul in apron and tears.)

Meanwhile, our kids are ordering food on their phones, made in strategically placed Wendy’s trailers, delivered to the door in perfect cardboard containers.

Tout de suite, patates frites — see, there is even a French phrase for that.

Kelly Egan is a former Ottawa Citizen city columnist. He can be reached at kellyegan197@gmail.com.

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