Summer 2009

This year, we have decreased our staff to suit the business better. Starting off the season, we would like to welcome

new comers Nicole Santarsiero & Rachel Smith. These two  Stonehill College students are a great addition to our

friendly and helpful counter help. They both are excited to be here and are happy to help with any of your orders.

Also, Chris’s mother Cindy Spagnoli has been a great help to both Chris and Sarah with all the re-modeling, and cleaning

to help make Sam Cook’s a comfortable place to relax.

Up and coming a few weeks from now is Matt Kostyk. A South Wellfleet seasonal local out of Connecticut. Matt will be helping

with all aspects of the business from counter help to kitchen help. We look forward to working with Matt after he gets out of school

in late June.

Returning this year, Karl Thompson. Karl has taken another full time job this summer with the National Park service, but

promises to make weekly appearances here at Sam’s as needed. We look forward to having Karl take time out of his

busy life of acting, playing music riding in the Pam Mass Challenge (and his full time job) to spend some time with

our frequent customers who are already asking about him.

And of course, a big thank you to Mr. Sam Baker himself. Sam has created this special place for the local Wellfleet crowd for a very

casual and inviting place for everybody. His wonderful pictures from around the world are hung around the restaurant reminding

us that the world is a unique place, try something new and appreciate it all!

Banquet for an Emperor

A few years ago, Sam spent three weeks touring many regions of China guided by a Chinese-American art historian. The main purpose of the tour was the exploration of Chinese art. Because the group took their meals all together, Sam expected the pre-arranged meals to be Americanized and bland. But the leader was as intent on providing the authentic taste of each Chinese region as she was on educating her group about art history. In each place, they were served a banquet of ten to fifteen dishes to sample. The guide admitted that the Chinese now prepare meals for visitors much as they might have prepared for royalty in past centuries. The recipes for the meals at Sam Cooks are borrowed from those amazing banquets in China. Manman chi! (Mandarin) or Sihk faahn! (Cantonese)

Italian food on both sides of the Atlantic

Sam’s trip to Italy was part of his 1969 Europe on Five Dollars a Day tour.  His concept before arriving in Italy was that Italian food meant pasta with sauce and pizza.  It was a surprise to find that the pasta was a course that preceded the entrée in most Italian restaurants.  But, because Sam was operating on a strict budget, he stuck to the pasta courses and, though he found them tasty, by the end of his stay, he was rather tired of pasta.  It was not until he moved to Boston and dined in the Italian neighborhood of the North End that he had the opportunity to taste the delicious Italian dishes that were not pasta.  He often went to the North End for the saints’ feast days and there he discovered great antipastos and delicious main courses—such as eggplant rollups and bife a marmegiana.  Sam has combined his travel experiences with his North End ventures to offer great and unique Italian foods at Sam Cooks. He is not neglecting the pastas he enjoyed in the old world Italy.  Red and green pepper vegetarian lasagna and lemon spaghetti with chicken will also be available at Sam Cooks.   Buon appetito!

Sam in Siam

For Sam, the most interesting cuisine in all his many travels is Thai, from  the modern country, formerly known as Siam.   From the lavish banquets in the opulent Oriental Hotel in Bangkok to the simple meals prepared by villagers in remote Cheng Mai, Sam enjoyed many flavorful dishes including Chicken with Lemongrass.  Although he certainly enjoyed the dining experience at the Oriental, a hotel renowned throughout the word for its luxury and fine food, Sam remembers most vividly the meals in the villages.
From the many options for a trek in the jungle near Cheng Mai, Sam chose a four day, three night trip that promised elephant riding, rafting, and visits to local villages.  What the trek did not promise, but delivered on the first two days, was seven hours of grueling jungle hiking in sweltering heat.  At night, they would arrive unannounced in a village, there being no way to communicate in advance, and the guide would negotiate with the villagers about a meal and a place to stay for the night.  Houses in the villages were elevated on stilts and the family brood of chickens and pigs lived beneath.  A couple of families would vacate their houses and the group would sleep there on bamboo mats on the floor, kept awake by the clucking and grunting animals below.  Meals were prepared by the villagers as well, simple but flavorful fare, vegetable stir fry with small bits chicken seasoned with lemongrass or kafir leaves.  In the final two days of the trek, Sam did get to ride an elephant up and down the hilly terrain and ride a raft down the river to the place where their transport awaited to return them to town.  Using a recipe created from the diverse dining experiences in Bangkok and Cheng Mai, Sam brings Thai Barbecue Pork with Lemongrass to Sam Cooks.

Cuban  Beans and Rice

Sam traveled to Cuba with Global Exchange, a group which leads cultural exchange tours in all parts of the world.  This purpose of this particular trip was to attend the Afro-Caribbean Music and Art Festival in Santiago.  In addition, the group attended lectures about life in Cuba and visited a number of political, historical, and cultural sites in Havana and Santiago.  Their days in Santiago were filled with concerts of music and dance from all over the Caribbean.  Most of the time, the group at together at hotels, but on one day, when there was the option for a free afternoon, Sam and his friends decided to go to the cigar factory and then to lunch on their own.  The bus driver had picked up a hitchhiker earlier in the day and when Sam asked him about a place to eat, the young man told him that he would take him to a good place.  He met them when they finished at the cigar factory and took them to a house for lunch. There were very few actual restaurants in Santiago, and the main way to get a meal was to look for a sign at someone’s house saying meals were available.  There they had a very traditional lunch of fried chicken and  beans and rice prepared by the woman of the house.  Besides the food, they enjoyed the opportunity to have a private and unrehearsed conversation with the young man about his life in Cuba.  Now you can enjoy Cuban Beans and Rice from Sam Cooks , a vegetarian version.  Buen Provecho!

Lincolnshire Relatives

Lincolnshire Relatives

Sam’s great-grandfather, Samuel Baker, for whom Sam is named was one of seven brothers from Lincolnshire England.  Samuel and six of the brothers emigrated to the United States and settled in the Mid-west.  Samuel started the family farm on which Sam grew up, and which still remains in his family. Sam’s grandmother, Emma Howard, emigrated with 2 siblings but left 3 more in England. As the generations passed, the Baker and the Howard families and their descendants in the U.S. and in England remained in touch across the pond.  Finally, in 1971, at the end of a trip to Europe, Sam went to London, where he met up with his parents and his sister Barbara in order to meet the members of the Howard clan who were still in England.  Sam’s father, Lester, met his four first cousins for the first time, and Sam and Barbara met their generation of the family in England.  Sam’s family drove to each of the cousins’ homes for individual family visits, and then met at one home in Lincolnshire for a family reunion. The English relatives had been planning a special “Christmas in July” ever since they had heard that Sam’s family would be visiting.  The fruitcake normally made in summer for the Christmas celebration had been made in December so that it would be ready for the reunion dinner.  The family all gathered at a big table to everyone’s great pleasure.   Sam especially remembers the delicious food prepared by his relatives–shattering myths of boring food in England. Now he brings some of those delicious foods to Sam Cooks in honor of his family heritage. Enjoy!

Greece

When Sam traveled to Greece in 1968, the island of Aegina, just an hour by boat from Athens, felt as far from the urban hubbub as any of the more remote islands.  People came to the island to lounge on the beach or to bury their legs in the warm sand as a balm for arthritis.  (Sam, young at the time, went for the former)
After a day at the beach, Sam perused the little cafes lining the harbor in search of a place to eat within his five-dollar-a-day budget.  He found one, sat at a table in the open air facing the Aegean, and enjoyed two dishes for which Greece is most famous: mousaka with its distinctive lamb and béchamel sauce layers, and Greek salad.  Unlike Greek salads now popular in the U.S., in their homeland, they are more simple, a plate of sliced ripe tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, perhaps a few olives and chunks of feta cheese drizzled with olive oil.  Sam’s budget even allowed a glass of the distinctive Greek wine, retsina, before boarding the boat for the return trip to Athens.  Now you can enjoy mousaka here in Wellfleet from Sam Cooks.  Kali orexi!

Sam’s just mad about Saffron

During Sam’s two year employment in Portugal, he made many visits across the border to Spain. The city of Sevilla appealed to Sam on that first trip because it combines European and North African influence.  There, Sam stayed in the old Moorish part of town in a very basic rooming house.  He wandered labyrinthine streets too narrow for cars, getting lost and finding his way again.   He enjoyed flamenco performances and bull fights.  He toured the largest Gothic cathedral in Europe built on the site of a Moorish mosque, parts of which are now part of the cathedral.
And he discovered paella, a dish he knew from the states, but found to be a special pleasure in Spain because it was always just a little different in each restaurant.  Paella is a saffron rice dish that is made with whatever seafood and meat are available in a particular time and location.  Like Sevilla, paella, a seafood stew with saffron and paprika flavors, combines the influences of Europe and  North Africa.  Sam tried paella in every restaurant he visited.  At lunch, he ordered it as a main course.  In the evening, he often had a small portion as one of his tapas servings in a wine bar.  In Spain, the dinner hour is late by U.S. standards—often 10 PM or later.  Sam and his friends, used to an earlier dinner hour, often made the tapas plates their evening meal.
Now he brings flavors of Spanish saffron and paprika from  Andalusia to Sam Cooks.  Buen Provecho!

The German side of Sam’s family

On Sam’s visit to Germany, the food was familiar from dinners at the homes of his great aunts and uncles on his mother’s side.  Sam’s maternal grandmother, Barbara Ulrich, had come to the U.S. with her family and settled in Southern Illinois.  When Sam’s family visited them, they always had a German food fest including all kinds of German sausages and potato and red cabbage salad.  So, when Sam visited Germany, he loved the food that tasted like home.  Unlike his traveling companions, he enjoyed every different kind of German sausage and the familiar salads that brought back memories of those family dinners.  Now from Germany through the Ulrichs of Southern Illinois, Sam brings to Sam Cooks two family favorites: Knockwurst, Bratwurst and Kraut and Black Forest Potato Salad.  Mahlzeit!