'California Dish' With The Dirt
The name Jeremiah Tower may mean nothing to you, but in the culinary world he is recognized as the godfather of modern American cooking.
He's mentored many a celebrity chef over the last 30-years. Now after two James Beard Award-winning cookbooks and a popular PBS cooking series, this chef and former co-owner of the now famous Chez Panisse and the then infamous Stars restaurant in San Francisco has penned his memoir: "California Dish: What I Saw (and Cooked) at the American Culinary Revolution."
Tower visits The Early Show Tuesday to discuss his passion for food. He also shares his mouth-watering recipe for Tropical Fruit Compote.
Tower is the self-taught culinary master who in the early 1970s had the revolutionary idea of creating meals from fresh ingredients prepared and presented simply. Today, some may credit Tower for re-writing the book on dining in America.
Tower pioneered what we now call American regional cuisine. From his start at Chez Panisse in 1971, he went on to open several other restaurants. From 1984 to 1998 he ran in San Francisco (Stars, Stars Cafe, Speedo 690), Hong Kong (The Peak Cafe), Singapore (Stars) and Seattle (Stars).
In total he's written four books. Two of his cookbooks, "Jeremiah Tower Cooks" and "Jeremiah Tower's New American Classics" both won James Beard best regional cookbook awards. A third book, "America's Best Chefs Cook with Jeremiah Tower," is the companion to his 26-part PBS series "America's Best Chefs" where Tower cooks in the homes of 13 James Beard Award winning chefs. The book is to be released in November of 2003. In between shooting the PBS series, Tower managed to find time to pen a memoir chronicling his comeuppance in the world of food.
A recent LA Times review noted Tower's book "settles scores and tells intimate tales on some of the food world's most-revered figures ... and many in it are seething."
Recipes
Tropical Fruit Compote
Serves 4 to 6
Serve the warm compote with either custard, vanilla or coconut ice cream, marscarpone, English clotted or heavy cream, and cookies or your choice, like shortbread or warm gingersnaps 5 minutes out of the oven.
2 ripe mangos, peeled, cut in 1/4-inch slices
1 ripe papaya, peeled, seeded, cut in 1/4-inch slices
2 ripe passion fruit, cut in half, pulp and juice saved
1/2 cup medium sugar syrup
1 basket raspberries
1 teaspoon fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
salt
Put the mango and papaya slices in a medium-size non-reactive frying pan. Whisk the passion fruit pulp with the sugar syrup for 1 minute to break up the pulp, and add to the fruit.
Warm the fruit over medium heat until just heated through — about 3 minutes. Add the raspberries, lime juice, butter, and pinch of salt. Turn up the heat, and swirl the pan around until the butter is just melted.
Serve immediately in soup plates with the cream or ice cream in the center.