Pan & Ink

Ripple Effect

2012-01-28T12:02:00.005-05:00

How many lonely cookbooks do you have? You know, the ones in pristine condition, with spotless pages and stiff spines? The ones that look on with envy as their grease-kissed, dog-eared, and (my favorite) steam-rippled brethren get taken down from the shelf and spattered time after time. I feel for those neglected ones. They remind me of animals at the pound who keep getting overlooked as fuzzier or younger or better-named companions parade out the door to start a new life with loving owners.

But compassion has its limits. In our small space, cookbooks have to earn their keep. If they don't, they're out. (Steve jokes that one day I'll decide that he's no longer useful and toss him out during a clutter-clearing frenzy. This is not entirely unrealistic, given the increasing, at times blinding, zeal with which I battle the encroachment of stuff on our precious few square feet.)

With this in mind, I've found a good way to keep our menus fresh while getting better acquainted with the neglected tomes. Actually, two good ways. And they both involve collaborating with other cooks, a welcome bonus.

In late fall, a cookbook bonding opportunity arose when my mother-in-law, sister-and-law, and I formed a small soup-cooking society. Our muse is Betty Rosbottom, neighbor to Gramma and author of a cookbook called Sunday Soups. We prepare one soup each week from the book and email each other about how it went. This has been a great chance to learn from other cooks by swapping tips and substitution ideas, and it's forced me to engage with recipes I would otherwise have ignored due to my tendency to gravitate toward certain flavors and ingredients. Perhaps most important of all, it has opened a channel, albeit via email, for the kind of small talk about cooking and life that goes on when we're all together at holiday time.

The second arrangement was born when Steve and I realized that in our determination to accustom the boys to family dinner, we were losing out on time to connect and converse with one another, just the two of us. (Family dinner conversation with a two year-old and a three year-old consists largely of: (a) requests for more milk, (b) every request's accompanying reminder to say please, (c) threats to take plates away in the futile quest for basic zoo-animal-level awareness of manners to be displayed, (d) attempts to get Gabe to tell us what he did in school today, (e) Gabe's standard reply, "I can't tell that right now because I'm [insert currently accurate participle here].")

As life stands right now, the only opportunity for sustained adult conversation (to the extent that we are still capable of it) comes after the boys are asleep. Remembering the lavish feasts we used to cook together, sipping wine and listening to music amidst sizzling and warmth and good smells, I proposed that we attempt to recapture those halcyon days by instituting a weekend date-night-in. An added challenge: a rule stipulating that every course must come from the same cookbook.

It's been fun and educational to work within a particular chef's approach to recipe writing and food preparation. I enjoy paging through our cookbooks (it is not unheard-of for this to happen at the playground on Saturday morning), dwelling on whole sections I would otherwise ignore. We choose the courses, divide tasks, get as much done ahead as we can, and do a quick burst of cooking once the boys are asleep. If all goes smoothly, by 9 p.m. we sit down to a multi-course meal we've both had a hand in creating.*

On the menu for tonight: thinly sliced apples, buttered, spiced, sugared, layered, covered, and weighted in ramekins, baked in a low oven for four hours. Not your typical Saturday activity in our household, but one habit I'm hoping will take hold.

I dream of a cookbook collection swollen with steam-rippled pages. Neglected recipe stats at all time lows. Romance rekindled. Distances bridged. I can't promise world peace, but if these apples turn out as well as I hope, there might be a chance, at least in our little corner.

* One tip if you decide to try the one-cookbook date night: This approach works well with a comprehensive, hefty cookbook. So far, we've enjoyed using Around My French Table by Dorie Greenspan (twice), Essentials of Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan, and Simple Pleasures by Alfred Portale. It might be interesting to try a blog or other cooking web site some time (at risk of losing that cohesive experience of one chef's sensibility).

Easy Now

2012-01-10T21:42:00.004-05:00

Poor aging. Birthday parties aside, this is one process that's hurting for advocates. So I'm stepping up to make the case that it's not so bad. Now, I will admit that I have limited experience with getting older. But after exiting the 18-34 demographic advertisers so adore and finding myself on the other side of two pregnancies, relying on a slightly worn body to wrangle two hefty kiddos day into night, well, I began to feel my age. And sometimes relish it.

Sure, your skin sags with the decades. You amass more things than you can possibly use. You become more responsible, less spontaneous. Your mind works more slowly and you forget stuff. Your wardrobe evokes nostalgia for previous decades. (I speak only for myself, of course. Perhaps you have become less bogged down and more pert, spontaneous, stylish, intelligent, and so on. If so, I would like your secret.)

But there is one thing about getting older that I've come to appreciate. I call it passive practice. This is my term for the kind of practice you do when you're not really thinking about practicing.

It's not the kind of practice I did as a child, clicking open my flute case and screwing together the dank parts a few times a week so as to not get in trouble at my lesson. It's not lugging your tired bones out to the playing field every day regardless of rain, shine, heat or cold to hone plays, ball skills, field sense. No. For better or worse, I don't seem to have much time for that sort of practice these days.

The kind of practice I do now is the kind I don't even realize I'm doing until all of a sudden something that used to be hard is easy. Take biscotti. When I first began making it for holiday gifts several years ago, the process tired me out. There were late, flour-dusted nights, last-minute dashes to the grocery store, recipe failures, at worst, and uneven results, at best. Frequently, as I divvied up the goodies I would find that I didn't have quite enough.

I was remembering those early days last month as I surveyed a neat set of biscotti-filled gift bags ready to be delivered to neighbors and friends. It was afternoon, not midnight. The counters were clean, the cookies were colorful and crisp, and I had enough and then some. Making them hadn't been hard; it was fun. The process required a little forethought, some organization, familiarity with the recipe, a certain touch and quickness with the tools and ingredients. The fruits of experience, ripe at last. Huh, I thought to myself, I guess I've got this process down.

Whenever I find I'm getting to know a recipe well, I think about writer Daniel Duane's common-sense recommendations, which I wrote about last year. With my annual biscotti binge, I'm not exactly following his intensive plan to recipe independence. Making it once a day for two weeks would surely yield faster and perhaps more substantive results. But that would not be an example of passive practice, the results of which are pleasing precisely because of the lack of exertion involved.

If you think about it, I'll bet you can come up with all kinds of things for which this principle applies. For example, I once marveled at the sensitive way a friend helped her young son resolve a problem, and I remember telling her I'd never know what to say in her situation. Now? After spending most of my day talking with toddlers, I find that answers to tough questions often dribble out in pretty good form if I just open my mouth. It's just practice, the kind you have to do, the kind you don't realize you're doing because it's living your life.

The only catch? You have to be getting older to reap the benefits of passive, slow accumulation of skill and wisdom. In this way, it's very inclusive. So the next time you forget your phone number or yank a gray hair, just think about all the things you know how to do well, and be glad you're not twenty anymore.

*

You can find the recipe for cranberry-pistachio biscotti here. To include and please the aforementioned three year-old, I'm working on my own nut-free version and will post it once I get results that pass the family taste test.

Reconciliation

2011-11-02T16:30:00.009-04:00

What better way for Pan & Ink to surge forth from out of the dark creative silence of this summer than with a post on a food I've only recently learned to love? And I know the timing is right because I keep coming across my new flame in news stories of late. Seems like everybody wants to talk about how broccoli is healthy and cheap. What I'm here to add: Aside from being nutritious and economical, this crucifer is also darn good! It's zippy, easy to cook, and purty to boot.

I have not always felt this way. Broccoli and I are working on a new relationship. I have said mean things in the past. I have ignored and excluded. I have wrinkled my nose. Time was when I was a vegetarian, but it had more to do with rejecting meat than appreciating veggies. I preferred meals of the one-pot supper variety. Green food in that pot? Fine and dandy, but let there be a sauce or starch or long cooking time to flatten potent veggie flavors.

The past year has awakened me to all that I was missing. First, Christmas came, and I received a wonderful cookbook in Susie Middleton's Fast, Fresh, and Green. I read with interest, dog-eared some pages, and then put it on the shelf. As the weather warmed, my maternal guilt turned its lens on the lack of green on my children's dinner plates. Summer found me with an overabundance of guilt, farmer's markets galore, and a great cookbook unbaptized on my shelf.

I began to wonder about veggies, to be interested in them Just As They Are. Could I make them taste good? Would they let me back into their lives after so many years of scorn and neglect? There was only one way to find out. I took the book off the shelf, passed a few bucks to the perky college kids at the market, and introduced my kids to the cabbage family. (Yup, broccoli is a member.)

The greatest strength of Middleton's book lies in the methods she encourages you to master and the limitless options those methods offer once you learn them. Through practice with her "foundation recipes," I have assimilated the following bits of advice, which I now happily pass on to you:

- Butter, oil, salt, lemon, herbs: Pick three, or use all five--whatever you have on hand--and you will be on your way to veggie heaven.

- Don't crowd the pan, and don't overcook. Veggies taste best when still bright in color. High heat will give you some tasty caramelization without turning the veggies to mush.

- Learn a method and then experiment. Veggies are easy to prepare, cook quickly, and taste good without much embellishment. You can afford to play a bit. As long as you don't overcook them, they are hard to mess up.

Below, a very basic recipe based on Ms. Middleton's "hands-on" sauteing technique, which I find is not so hands-on that I can't be rushing around preparing several other dishes at the same time. And in the sub-basement (below the recipe), you'll find links to a few good articles, some exclusively focused on broccoli, others mentioning our star as one of many economical, delicious foods that will make your household happy. Enjoy!

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ZIPPY BROCCOLI SAUTE
Adapted from Susie Middleton's Fast, Fresh, and Green
You can do this preparation with half broccoli and half julienned carrots or asparagus. Throw in chopped garlic or crushed red pepper flakes if you like. Pine nuts, almonds, or walnuts would also be nice additions. I like to pair this with dishes where the broccoli's beautiful color will "pop," as Food TV stars like to say. It's great with Torta di Pasta and this, or perhaps as part of an antipasto platter, or alongside sausages, crusty bread, and a nice cheese. The only thing I don't like about this recipe: If you adhere to my advice and don't crowd the pan, there will, sadly, be no leftovers.

1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter, divided
2 heads broccoli
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. lemon juice (one good-sized wedge)
chopped herbs such as mint, basil, or parsley (optional)

Set a large saute pan over medium heat. Chop the broccoli florets and upper stalks so that you expose as much flat stem surface area as possible (slicing florets in half, for example, and stalk crosswise). This will encourage quicker cooking and yummy caramelization. Create evenly sized pieces according to your taste. Heat 1 tbsp. olive oil and 1/2 tbsp butter in your pan. Once butter has melted and oil is fragrant, add broccoli to pan with 1 scant tsp salt. Toss to coat and combine, increasing heat to medium-high. Cook, tossing with a spatula every two minutes or so, for 7-10 minutes, until broccoli is caramelizing in places but not losing its vibrant green. Add the second 1/2 tbsp butter and toss until butter is melted and coating the veggies. Add lemon juice, toss, and remove from heat. If you have chopped herbs, toss them in now. Add salt as desired (I usually don't).

*

Have you been looking for more to read about broccoli (or "brockee-brock," as I am strangely fond of calling it when serving it to my boys)? Of course you have. Who isn't? Well, let me get you started with a few pieces featuring our nubby-headed friend:

Mark Bittman in the New York Times, challenging the notion that it's cheaper to feed a family on fast food than it is to cook Link

Susan Gregory Thomas, also in the New York Times, on creating a garden in her Brooklyn backyard in order to feed her family on a super-tight budget Click

And from NPR's food blog, "The Salt," two articles here and here on broccoli's nutritional qualities

Oh, and here's one more from NPR, on the real person for whom the brand Chef Boyardee was named, featuring a tasty-sounding recipe for pasta with broccoli... Yum

When the Cat's Away

2011-07-14T15:35:00.001-04:00

Steve is not here. As a matter of fact, he is 7,000 miles away toiling in an office where blog-reading is expressly verboten (blocked, in fact). This means that he can't see our little cherubs on the family blog. And, more seriously for the family finances, he has no way of finding out what wickedness I've been up to here in his absence.

Yes, not only have I been sleeping in the middle of the bed and forgetting to check the mail, but...

(Note: If you have a heart condition and especially if you are extremely frugal, you may want to stop reading here and skip to the recipe.)

... I have also been forking over wads of cash to the perky college kids at the farmer's market. Once I spent, like, twelve dollars on one visit! And get this -- I had to borrow most of it from the friend I came with, because I had, like, NO cash in my wallet!!

My combined broke-ness and extravagance would most certainly provoke hyperventilatory sighs of exasperation from my careful husband, were he here. But he is not here. And we have a tacit agreement that while I endure the many hardships of his absence, I may spend money as needed to make myself feel better.

This makes me feel better.

There are many summertime pleasures that are free. Think sunshine, warm evening breezes, dandelions, fireflies' glow, cicadas' song, thunderstorms, and that sweaty sheen that reappears minutes after you shower. Farmer's market goodies, on the other hand, are not free. In fact, around here, I can get a better deal on produce at pricey Whole Foods than I can from the aforementioned perky, cutoff-clad youths.

But for me even the pleasantest grocery store cannot compete with the open-air market, where you shop from cardboard boxes, corn silk and smashed berries underfoot. The closest you get to climate control is the occasional dewy cooler full of goat cheese and fresh eggs. No airplanes or loading docks or automatic doors are involved in the process. It's just a farmer and a truck and a road that leads to a little corner near our home. Having listened to Terry Gross's interview with Barry Estabrook, author of the book Tomatoland, I am all the more eager to make sure my children and I know what pure food tastes like.

So I stand up for my right to indulge at the farmer's market. I proudly proclaim that I have a refrigerator full of berries. In fact, from this point onward, even after Steve returns and austerity regains its former place on the windshield of my conscious mind, I pledge to continue splurging on real, good food.

So what if the bank account's a little thirsty? I already know where the kids can work to pay the college bills... They're right perky, those two.

*

So who is the mysterious beauty featured above? Meet Ms. Cherry Cornmeal Upside-Down Cake, who came into my life from Epicurious via Smitten Kitchen. Now, let me say upfront that this is not a cake you whip up in five minutes and one bowl. The process includes some fussy steps like pitting cherries, briefly cooking the tangy-sweet topping, separating eggs, and whipping egg whites. Your kitchen may appear blood-spattered, and your sink will be full of dishes when you finish. But let me tell you...your work will be worth it! The combination of the tart balsamic-brown sugar-cherry topping with the sweet cornmeal cake is unusual and richly satisfying. I served it with a tiny scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side, but it really doesn't need anything.

You can find the recipe here. The only change I made to the procedure as written was to use a 10-inch cake pan in place of a 10-inch oven-proof skillet, only because I don't own one. I simply buttered the cake pan, lined the bottom with parchment paper, buttered the parchment, and then dumped the cherry mixture into the pan after cooking it. As Deb of Smitten Kitchen says, this is a cake you can't mess up. It's just that good. Enjoy!

This is, um, good.

2011-06-25T16:32:00.002-04:00

Do you ever have times when you have to put your inner diva on hold while you attend to something else? You know, those weeks (months? years?) when other responsibilities pile up and you find yourself telling your diva, "I'd love to play with you right now, honey, but I'm in the middle of something" or "Too busy to chat. Maybe later?" And then when you do make the effort to get back in touch, it's like calling a friend you haven't seen in ages and you've forgotten what you used to talk about?

Some of you may contend that you don't have an inner diva, to which I say: Not True. I believe that we all have a sparkly, inspired, muse-like entity lurking inside of us somewhere. Perhaps it is buried deep. Perhaps you have not made the effort to call in a while. But she (he) is in there: your diva (divo*).

* (Males--and I know there are at least two of you out there who read the blog--don't feel left out. The masculine form of diva is, conveniently, divo.)

But sometimes, when you've been neglecting her, she pouts, and sulks, and becomes indignant. You try to call her, after all those weeks of ignoring her, and she won't pick up. Or she picks up but she won't talk to you.

You cannot blame her. She deserves to be showered with attention. She is fabulous! Were it not for laundry and bills and hair washing and recycling, you would indulge her every day, wouldn't you? I would. I mean, I do want to be a clean-haired and eco-friendly person, but mostly I just want to bake buttery things and write this blog. But, alas, sometimes I cannot.

And so she retaliates by withholding the fine metaphor, the apt phrase, the catchy title, the pithy story. She blocks me, that is, until I show her I'm serious about making time for her once more.

So, while I endure my inner blogging diva's icy silence, would it be enough to simply say, er:

"This is really good, and it's healthy. You should try making it"?

Or how about:

"This sauce tastes even better than those jarred ones at Trader Joe's"?

Or maybe:

"Here is something I made, and I would like to share it with you. It comes from Real Simple. Enjoy!"?

No, the New Yorker will not come calling with phrases like that, but you get the idea. So, please, go make your home smell like a Thai restaurant. Meanwhile, I will keep dialing my diva's digits until she picks up.

*

Stir-Fried Veggies and Tofu with Coconut-Curry Sauce
Adapted slightly from Real Simple
I make this meal in stages. I might make the sauce (minus basil) the day before and store it in the fridge. Veggies can be chopped in advance as well and stored in the fridge for at least a day. Use any veggies you like or have on hand. The ones below are only suggestions. I like to serve this over rice.
>Serves 3-4

TOFU (optional)
1 package firm or extra-firm tofu
1 tbsp cornstarch
1-2 tbsp canola oil

VEGGIES (these are suggestions; use any you like)
3-4 carrots, cut into thin strips
1 red pepper, cut into thin strips
8-10 mushrooms, halved and sliced
2 heads baby bok choy, sliced, leaves and stems separated

SAUCE
1 can (13-14 oz) light coconut milk
2 tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
1/4 to 1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
zest of 1 lemon
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 heaping tbsp curry powder (or more, to taste)

MAKE the TOFU
Center tofu between two face-up dinner plates and carefully stack a couple of books on top. Let the tofu sit for at least 15 minutes. This will enable more water to drain out of it, making it easier to cook. Set a large skillet over medium heat and let it sit for several minutes, so that the skillet is nice and hot. Cut the tofu into bite-size cubes, sprinkle cornstarch over top, and gently toss. In your pan, heat 1 tbsp of canola oil and then add the tofu. Fry in one layer, without stirring, for several minutes. When the tofu begins to turn golden, gently turn it over and let it cook for another few minutes on the other side, adding more oil if the pan gets dry. If the tofu cubes stick together, simply separate them gently with a spoon or spatula. When tofu is fully golden, remove from pan and drain briefly on paper towels.

MAKE the VEGGIES
Heat a bit more oil in the same pan (you may need to wipe it out first with a paper towel), and add the veggies, beginning with the densest ones and later adding the softer ones so that they cook evenly. (For example, I would add the carrots first and cook them for a couple of minutes before adding the peppers, cooking them for a couple of minutes before adding the mushrooms, and so on. If using baby bok choy, add the stems earlier and the leaves last.) When your veggies are barely tender, remove to a plate.

MAKE the SAUCE
Stir together the coconut milk, soy sauce, sugar, and salt in a small bowl. Heat olive oil in your skillet and then add garlic, red pepper flakes, lemon zest, and curry powder. Cook for 15 seconds, until fragrant. Pour the coconut milk mixture into the pan, raise the heat a bit, and simmer for several minutes, until the mixture thickens and concentrates. If you have basil, stir it in now and follow with the veggies and tofu, making sure everything gets coated in sauce. Serve over rice.

Milestone

2011-05-21T16:01:00.007-04:00

Yesterday, Gabe pressed the elevator call button All By Himself for the first time. All the stretching and reaching and standing-on-tippy-toes he's been doing lately must have caused him to grow those millimeters hitherto standing between him and success. His joy was total: he leap-skipped up and down the hallway, proclaiming "Mommy, mommy, Gabe push the elevator all by his self!" When the door slid open, he hopped in and shouted, "Yippee!"
Sometimes, as adults, I think we forget the feeling of pleasure that comes from learning how to do something. I mean, we've mastered a lot at this point in our lives. Walking, for instance. Tying shoes. Brushing teeth. Reading. Attaching documents to emails. (I distinctly remember feeling baffled by that one for quite some time.) Maybe we just get accustomed after a while to that "I did it" feeling. Or perhaps in adulthood the milestones are spread so far apart that we might not even recognize them when they pass? And yet last night I found myself feeling like Gabe post-elevator button triumph.

When I began this blog, I wrote about my fondness for and reliance upon recipes. I followed them the way some people adhere to the teachings of scripture. Without them, I was lost. A few months ago, I came across an article by Daniel Duane that laid out a simple road map to culinary independence. Basically, he says, you can learn a lot by cooking the same dish several times, each time using less recipe and more memory. The article demystified recipes and helped me to see the interconnectedness among dishes. It empowered me to borrow techniques and flavor combinations, to experiment, and to trust myself.
I am happy to announce that I have, for the first time, made a very tasty dish both sans recipe and sans shopping list. The recipe below came together gradually as I sorted through the items we had on hand, consulted my nascent kitchen acumen, and got started. When it came out well, I was pleased but not surprised. A year ago, I would have been surprised.

Who says milestones are just for babes? Mind if I shout "Yippee!"?

*

Orecchiette with Mushrooms, Tomatoes, Sausage, and Thyme
Penne or another ridged pasta would work just as well here. If you don't wish to use meat, I would suggest using a bit more of the cheese and perhaps a pinch of crushed red pepper flakes. Cannellini beans would be a nice addition as well.
>Serves 4

1/2 lb. orecchiette pasta
1 link spicy Italian sausage (optional)
10 or so medium-sized mushrooms (I used button)
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
pinch of salt
1 1/2 tbsp fresh thyme leaves
1/2 cup white wine
1/2 cup chicken or vegetable broth
1 1/2 cups chopped fresh tomatoes
1/2 cup finely grated pecorino romano cheese
1 tbsp flat-leaf parsley, chopped

In a medium saucepan, bring pasta water to a boil. Salt the water generously and add the pasta. Cook until al dente (10-12 minutes). Drain, reserving a cup or so of pasta water.

Meanwhile, place a large saute pan over medium-high heat. If using sausage, remove it from its casing and place it in the hot pan, breaking it into bits with a wooden spoon. Saute the sausage, stirring frequently, until it is cooked through. Remove sausage to a pasta bowl. Return the pan to the heat and add the mushrooms. Reduce the heat slightly and let the mushrooms brown and soften for 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add butter, olive oil, salt, and thyme to the pan and cook, stirring often, for a couple of minutes. Add wine, broth, and a splash of pasta water to the pan, and increase the heat. Bring the liquid to a boil and cook for several minutes, until the liquid is reduced by half. Add tomatoes and cook for another minute or two, until they have softened just a bit and released some juices. Stir in the pasta, sausage (if using), and cheese, and add more pasta water as needed to moisten. Cook for another minute or so. Remove from the heat and stir in the parsley. Serve, topping with additional cheese, parsley, and a drizzle of olive oil if you like.

The Usual

2011-04-09T15:26:00.005-04:00

I don't often watch movies twice, and I rarely reread books. There's just always something new out there in storyland, and the comfort of the familiar can't compete with the allure of the unknown. Not so when it comes to cooking, however. In the kitchen, I am a repeat offender in a big way.

It's always been this way. I cringe now to think of the lunch I ate every day in high school: a sesame bagel with cream cheese, a Snickers, and a Mistic sparkling juice. Then, there was the family joke (deserved but, thankfully, now put to rest) about my ordering ravioli at every restaurant we went to. Even now, I get into years-long breakfast routines. In the late '00s, it was Cheerios mixed with Grape Nuts. 2011 brought in yogurt topped with fruit, nuts, and honey. It will take me several equinoxes to get tired of this. If we happen to run out of an element of the "it" breakfast and I can't get to the store before the next morning, I feel bereft.

Am I the only one who enjoys routine when it comes to food? I suspect not. Despite the seemingly limitless options available to us nowadays, I think there is something in our DNA that makes us crave repetition at the table. And it makes perfect Darwinian sense that the repeaters would prevail over the novelty-seekers when it comes to cooking. First, food takes time to prepare, so if you're going to go to the trouble of cooking, it's nice to know that you're going to like the fruit of your labor. Second, practice with a particular dish makes it quicker to fix and more likely to come out well. Trying something new every day, one could easily starve and/or become very grumpy, both of which are bad for species perpetuation.

Might I also suggest that there's a less tangible, but perhaps more essential, reason why we eat the same foods over and over again? Meals are rituals. There is security in coming to the table three times a day. Often, meals are a chance to connect with loved ones. Other times, they are a quiet refuge from the day's commotion. Commonplace? Yes. Mundane? No. There is a lot wrapped up in breakfast, lunch, and dinner, whether we speed through them to get to something else or linger at the table just a little while longer.

It makes sense, then, for us to share the recipes that we keep in our stables--for a trusted friend to say, "Look, it will be okay if you make this. Your sacred ritual will not be violated. In fact, it will be enhanced in a most flavorful way." Because even rituals benefit from a little shaking up from time to time. (As long as nobody takes the last of my yogurt.)

And so, from my stable to yours, I present: Torta di Pasta. Enjoy!

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Torta di Pasta
I came across this recipe in a Giada De Laurentiis article years ago in the Washington Post. The torta (literally, cake) is kind of like a frittata but with pasta instead of potatoes. I've adapted the recipe slightly. I like to put coarsely chopped prosciutto or ham in ours, but you can really use any filling you like. Roasted red peppers or roasted asparagus would be lovely in place of (or in addition to) the sun-dried tomatoes. Dabs of ricotta or goat cheese would be divine. I have yet to try using other types of pasta, but I don't seen why it wouldn't work. You can serve the torta warm or at room temperature, and it makes wonderful leftovers. It's delicious accompanied by slightly bitter greens like arugula or broccoli.
>Serves 4

8 oz dried spaghetti or linguine
1/2 cup drained, oil-packed sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
handful of coarsely chopped prosciutto or ham (0ptional)
4 eggs
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
3/4 cup grated Fontina, Asiago, or other mild cheese
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil

Cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling water (about 8 minutes). Drain, and place in a large bowl with the chopped sun-dried tomatoes and prosciutto, if using. In a medium bowl, use a fork to whisk the eggs, cheeses, salt, and pepper. Set a medium oven-proof skillet (preferably not straight-sided) over medium heat on the stove, and preheat the broiler. Once the pasta has cooled down a bit (so that the eggs don't cook), pour the egg mixture into the pasta mixture, and stir until everything is combined. (Tip: I know this is un-Italian, but I take a few swipes at the pasta with a chef's knife so that it's easier to blend it with the other ingredients.) Heat the butter and olive oil in the skillet. Transfer the pasta/egg mixture to the skillet and cook for about 3 minutes, until the eggs begin to set. While the mixture is cooking, preheat the broiler. Transfer the skillet to the oven and broil for 3 to 5 minutes longer, checking frequently, until the top is golden brown. Carefully remove the skillet from the oven and let the torta cool in the pan for at least 10 minutes (can be made well ahead of time, though). If you like, invert it onto a platter. We usually just cut wedges out of the pan and eat it right-side-up.

Nourishing and Pure

2011-03-25T16:20:00.008-04:00

Last weekend, I attended a beautiful wedding. The weather was beautiful. The bride and groom were beautiful. And the loving, merry, big-group-hug vibe that circulated and intensified over the course of the weekend (and lingers into this week)...well, it was beautiful.

In preparation for this wedding (specifically, hunting down a not-too-silly shower game), I happened to come across a compilation of wedding vows from various faiths. The vows were all lovely to peruse, but the seven promises spoken in a traditional Hindu marriage ceremony caught my attention. Whereas my wedding vows contained abstractions like "partner on your path," these statements enumerate, with a nice specificity, the key elements of a happy home and a strong relationship.

The first one covers something I consider critical to a long-lasting partnership: good food. In the versions I found, the promise reads something like this: "Let us take the first step to provide for our household a nourishing and pure diet, avoiding those foods injurious to healthy living." In other words, "Let's eat well, my darling dear!"

Now, I am going to allow you to make your own judgments about what constitutes healthy living. To my way of thinking, it would be hurtful to call an innocent cookie injurious, especially when it's made with love, as homemade ones always are. But even I need a reminder sometimes that there are many foods out there that are quite good despite lacking the beautiful, golden, crispy-chewy essence produced by the blessed union of sugar, butter, and flour. (Sigh...)

And this blog gets to feeling a little sluggish sometimes, what with all the sweets. (Groan...) So she and I are are de-toxing this week with my favorite health food: soup.

Okay, this is really more of a stew--an easy, satisfying one-dish supper. The first time I had it was years ago, in preparation for another wedding, at a farmhouse where a group of us had gathered to celebrate with the bride-t0-be. Prepared by the host's mother, the robust, subtly spicy concoction made for a memorable lunch.

It didn't cross my mind at the time that by eating a hearty and healthful meal together we were reminding the bride not only of the loving community standing behind her but also of the way in which good food nourishes relationships. Healthy living, indeed.

Enjoy!

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Farmhouse Lentil-Barley Stew
I don't know the source for this recipe. The photocopy I was given (now crinkled and spattered from long use) shows that it came from a newspaper, but that is all I know. This stew is best enjoyed with a crusty bread and a flavorful cheese such as parrano or manchego. Oh--and a glass of red wine doesn't hurt either.
>Serves 6

2 tbsp olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
4 medium carrots, diced (about 2 cups)
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
2 tsp cumin
1 cup brown lentils, rinsed
4 cups chicken or vegetable broth
1 28 oz. can diced tomatoes
1 tbsp brown sugar
1 cinnamon stick
1/2 cup barley, rinsed
1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
plain yogurt, for garnish (optional)

Heat the oil in a large pot over medium-low heat. Add the onions and carrots and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened (about 8 minutes). Add the garlic and cook, stirring, for another minute. Add cumin and cook, stirring, for a minute longer. Add the lentils, broth, tomatoes, brown sugar, and cinnamon stick, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat slightly, and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the barley and simmer, partially covered, for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in the parsley and add salt and pepper to taste. Top each serving with a dollop of yogurt and a sprinkle of parsley if you like.

Excuses

2011-02-15T16:45:00.025-05:00

I am late. Habitually late. Usually, I blame the children, but if I'm honest, I have to admit that it's in my genes. They should be blaming me.
I know you are upset that I did not adhere to food blogging protocol and offer a cute Valentine's Day recipe. I'm late on that, I know. I know. And it doesn't make it any easier that you were probably already disappointed because I let World Nutella Day pass by without even a word of acknowledgment. I know. I'm sorry. So very sorry. Grave sins, indeed.

Wait--you haven't heard of World Nutella Day? Otherwise known as February 5th? I-- ... Well, perhaps I shouldn't have said anything.

It is surprising, really, that such a day actually exists. And would you believe that I happen to know two people who, independent of one another, casually informed me, on February 5th, that it was World Nutella Day (hereafter known as WND)? This alone is startling enough, but even more remarkable was the fact that I had just recently begun stalking Nutella on various supermarket runs, tracking it down in the peanut butter aisle, pausing to eye it, rehearsing how to explain to Steve why I had spent $6.99 on it, turning away, and moving on, only to repeat the ritual in other stores, other days.

At last, a proper excuse arose, just days after WND, and I dropped a pleasantly weighty container of Nutella into my grocery cart. I took it home, peeled off the thick paper seal, and immediately dipped a finger into the shiny brown swirl. It was mine at last.

The excuse was a bridal shower for my sister--and the nutella brownies I had decided to make for my guests. The idea comes from a collection of cookie recipes put out by Fine Cooking in December 2010. I was attracted to them for their high beauty-to-time ratio, not to mention the opportunity to actually purchase Nutella and have leftovers into which to dip a finger every now and again (shhh...don't tell).

So here you go. Now, I don't want to hear a lot of complaining about this being late for Valentine's Day or WND or Groundhog Day or what have you. If you have a gripe, take it up with the boys. Honesty aside, were it not for them and their "needs," I'd surely be the food blog diva admonishing amateurs to avoid certain irrelevance by sharing dip recipes in advance of the Super Bowl, dozens of adulatory comments footnoting my every sparkling post.

Let's see...I think World Worcestershire Day is coming up some time this spring. I've got pound cake in mind. I'll keep you posted. Promise.

*

Nutella Fudge Brownies
Adapted from Cookies, Brownies, Bars & More by Fine Cooking
>Makes 12 mini-brownies

generous 1/2 cup Nutella
1 egg
5 tbsp flour
2 oz. dark or milk chocolate, finely chopped (optional)
1/4 cup chopped hazelnuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line mini-muffin tin with foil or paper cups, or generously butter. In a small mixing bowl, whisk together the Nutella and egg until well blended. Add flour, and whisk until smooth. Stir in chocolate, if using. Using two teaspoons, drop batter into muffin cups (about 3/4 full). Sprinkle hazelnuts on top. Bake for 11 to 12 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with gooey, wet crumbs. They won't seem ready, but they are. Cool on a rack, removing brownies from the tin as soon as they are cool enough to handle. (Or just eat them straight from the oven!)

That Cake

2011-01-11T14:52:00.036-05:00

Lately it seems that Gabe and I agree on few things. "Are you ready to put on your shoes?" "No!" "Want some soup for lunch?" "No!" Bath? No! Share a toy with your baby brother? No! He volleys no-bombs at me, and I launch my own right back at him. There is to be: no shouting, no throwing inside the house, no steamrolling one's baby brother, no eating stickers, no peeing in the bathtub. And so on.

Luckily for both of us, even on days when yes might as well be a foreign word, there is reading time. It's something we can always agree on. I love the way Gabe's curls nestle under my chin and his body gets all droopy and sleepy as we sit in the dim bedroom, picking books from a toppling stack. No matter what kinds of antics happen in the hours beforehand or afterward, reading time is dependably harmonious.

I feel a special kinship with the authors and illustrators who fill this much-needed hiatus with imagination, humor, and subtle wisdom. Some of the stories are just, well, about trucks (a brief sampling: "Good Morning, Digger," "Trucks Roll," "You Can Name 100 Trucks!," "Trucks," "Trucks Go," etc.). But others seem written with the sole purpose of lifting up tired, conflicted parents like me. They are a pleasure to get momentarily lost in. Marisabina Russo's "The Bunnies are Not in Their Beds," a recent library find, is among this special breed.

Now, as a rule, I avoid exposing my increasingly willful son to stories about children who refuse to go to bed. He doesn't need any more ideas, right? But there is something entrancing and even enlightening in this tale of three little bunnies and their patient parents, who, Zen-like, deal with repeated interruptions to their evening routine and never seem to lose their cool. To my amazement and awe, the bunny parents show only the slightest hint of exasperation when they trudge upstairs for the fourth time to find their three little ones dressed in chaps and bandanas, enacting a rodeo in their toy-strewn bedroom. They simply say--over and over again without cursing, clenching, or even breaking a sweat--"Good night, good night, sleep tight!", then retreat downstairs and resume an enchantingly quiet, cozy evening routine featuring armchair reading, letter writing, tea drinking, and cake eating.

You see where I am going with this, don't you? (I mean, this is a food blog, after all.) I want that cake, of course. The cake that is sliced sans brooding, plotting, sighing, anticipating, yawning, sniping--without any of the negative feelings evinced by my own child's occasional refusal to go to sleep. The cake with the tea and the book and the armchair and the calm husband and the inner peace required to write a letter to somebody. The cake that is eaten in a house where the parents have accepted that raising a little one is a process whose product can be elusive and distant. A process requiring tenacity, level-headedness, and, above all, patience. That cake, please.

The bunnies, naturally, are eating carrot cake (while reading Hare-Raising Stories!). For us, this cold January week, it's been a warming apple gingerbread upside-down cake. This recipe comes from a trusted source I've drawn on before. It's easy to make and beautiful to behold, and it fills the kitchen with an intoxicating spicy-sweet smell.

I am working on achieving a Zen-like posture towards my pre-schooler's growing assertiveness. It may be some time before I attain the enviable equanimity of Bunny Mama and Bunny Daddy, but I figure I have to start somewhere. So cake and tea after "bedtime" it will be.

"Good night, good night, sleep tight!"

*

You can find the recipe for Apple Gingerbread Upside-Down Cake here. Our 9-inch cake pan turned out a taller cake than the one you'll see in blogger Deb Perelman's photos. This meant that I used fewer apples (about two instead of the four she calls for) and that the cake-to-apple ratio was therefore a bit higher than it probably ought to be. It also meant that the baking time was a bit longer than called for in the recipe. Still delicious, but I can't help fantasizing about the possibility of even more apple-y, brown sugary goodness in each bite.

Keeping the Peace

2010-12-01T15:09:00.011-05:00

During childbirth with both of my sons, I perched upon a rocky outcropping, inhaled cool mountain air, and gazed out across dusky summits washing like waves against the horizon.

Okay, that sentence up there, though true, might be a tad misleading. Let me explain. My boys were born in a hospital, in a room replete with all kinds of beeping, plugged-in devices, my clothes stashed into a tote bag as I paced the linoleum in an industrially-washed gown. But in my mind, I sat still amid the White Mountains, gazing out at the aforementioned horizon (see flowery language, paragraph one). My yoga teacher told me to do it.

The idea was for us mothers-to-be to choose a place to which we could transport our minds when things got rough--a space of peace, comfort, calm. I've thought about why I chose a mountaintop when other moms channeled beaches, spas, and feather beds (all of which sound absolutely delicious right now). And what I've realized is this: It's not just the lovely view. It's not just the feeling of accomplishment associated with a rigorous climb, nor the cooling down of tired muscles easing into a welcome, rocky seat. It's not just about relaxation. It's also about, well, snacks.

Mountaintop food tastes good. It doesn't matter so much what the food is. It's the fact that you've packed it in your pack, and it's there ready to nourish you when you get hungry. Worn out with the physical and mental efforts of contraction after contraction, the summit image served as a reminder that at a fundamental level I have the resources to take care of myself. I can climb up that mountain, I can find a place to rest, I can provide myself with nourishment, and when I'm ready I can foot it back down. Why, then, should I smart at the idea of twenty plus hours spent steering an eight-pound baby from womb to swaddling blanket? The funny but perhaps unsurprising thing is...it worked.

In our chaotic household, the pantry meal functions in much the same way as the mountaintop image. There is something so satisfying about just opening up the cabinets and seeing what I can make with what I have. When you sit down to a meal that you've prepared from scratch, from ingredients you already have on hand, there is a tremendous feeling of security--of satiety--and what could be more calming than that?

Today, in the midst of the season of elaborate food preparation, I'd like to propose a toast to the humble lentil. The recipe below is a surprisingly delicious combination of a handful of basic ingredients. It is cheap, quick, and immensely comforting. For the true lentil-lovers out there, I am including links to two more recipes we have recently enjoyed both for flavor and ease of preparation.

If we have another baby some day, which Steve would say is highly unlikely, maybe I'll ask my yoga teacher if it's okay to picture myself eating a bowl of homemade lentils while I'm in my tranquil place. For the time being, I'll be in the kitchen channeling summits and napping boys. I'm feeling relaxed already. Namaste.

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Lentils with Rice and Caramelized Onions (Mujadarrah)
Adapted from Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone
Madison's recipe calls for brown or white rice, but we have not found a way to make brown rice work without overcooking the lentils, resulting in a mushy consistency. If you find a way to use brown rice without adding an additional pot to wash, please let me know!
> Makes 4 servings

6 tbsp olive oil, ghee, or a combination
1 large onion, thinly sliced
1 1/4 cups green or brown lentils, rinsed
Salt and pepper
3/4 cup white rice
a small cinnamon stick, cardamom pods, or bay leaf (optional)

Set a large skillet over medium-low heat, and pour in the oil. When the oil is hot, add the onions, and cook, stirring occasionally, until they have reduced and taken on a deep brown color and a sweet aroma. Meanwhile, in a saucepan, bring to a boil one quart of water, the lentils, and a teaspoon of salt. If you like, add the cinnamon stick, cardamom pods, bay leaf, or other seasoning of your choice at this point. Simmer for 15 minutes, and then add the rice and plenty of freshly ground pepper. You may need to add a bit more water to cover the mixture. Cook, covered, over low heat for about 15 minutes. Remove the pot from the heat, add about half of the onions, stir, and set aside, covered, for 5 minutes. Remove any sticks, pods, or leaves if you decided to use them, and serve, topping each person's portion with additional onions.

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If you are like me and can't eat enough lentils, check out these delicious dishes. The first is a delicious and easy lentil dal recipe from my new flame. The second is another easy pantry meal--a velvety, filling cross between a pasta, a soup, and a stew.
Slow-Roasted Bell Pepper with Red Lentils
Pasta e Lenticchie (Pasta and Lentils)
Enjoy!

New Flame

2010-10-24T16:11:00.020-04:00

My dating history is short. I could seat former boyfriends around the dinner table without having to add a leaf. And I've never had a big group of friends. I prefer to nurture a handful of close relationships rather than juggling a bunch of buddies. When I find a kindred spirit (props to Anne of Green Gables for that lovely phrase), I hold on. If relationships were blackjack, I would stay rather than take a hit every time.

I have been collecting wonderful people for several decades now. With cookbooks, on the other hand, I've only just begun in earnest to delineate the circle of trust. Currently, our home collection contains some prizes and some duds. A couple of them are almost as important to me as those close friends mentioned above. They are well loved, with worn spines and rumpled, stained pages. Others deserve more grateful owners, and one day I promise I will get around to setting them free. Which I really must do, as more and more seem to keep coming through the door and perching irresistibly on our dining room table.

I speak of the library-lent beauties that broadcast their special status with a showy crinkle every time one of us opens the cover. The public library (section 641.5 to be precise) incites in this homebody an unexpected voracity. Having met my husband in 1994, I missed out on the online dating phenomenon, but I imagine my cookbook search is not wholly dissimilar. First, I read a little bit about a book and perhaps see a picture of the cover. Then I put it on hold and await notification. Picking it up, I feel a rush of anticipation. A good first date--er, dish--leads to a second, and if it's meant to be, we make it official on Amazon.

I believe it was Jane Smiley who wrote, "There are some stories you just want to be with, the way you want to be with some people." Though they inhabit a separate section of the library or bookstore, good cookbooks are not so different from good novels, short stories, and memoirs. I like ones that offer a human story and share nuggets of wisdom--about cooking, of course, but also about living.

The recipe below comes from a cookbook I've recently fallen for: 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer. I appreciate Iyer's encouraging yet concise prose. And I love the stories and tips he includes with each recipe. Best of all, like a good friend, he accepts me for who I am and what I have in my pantry. Will I get more out of this cookbook once I journey to an Indian grocery store and stock up on curry leaves and asafoetida? Yes, and I plan to do just that one Sunday afternoon. But without any hard-to-find ingredients, we have made quite a few curries whose leftovers were snatched like pirate's booty from the fridge the next day by the first lucky comer.

I don't plan to invite former boyfriends to supper any time soon. It's not that I wouldn't know how to contact them. That problem could be surmounted through the wonders of the aforementioned internet. And it's not that Steve might feel a tad uncomfortable. He's a good sport and not the jealous type.

The heart of the matter is that these curries are so tasty that I want them all (yes, all 660!) to myself. No trips down memory lane with the old flames? No boisterous group of adoring friends? Fine by me. I'll be at the kitchen counter, fork in hand, scarfing down my leftovers.

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Chickpea and Tomato Curry (Chana Paneer)
Adapted from 660 Curries by Raghavan Iyer
This recipe is not difficult to make, but advanced preparation is required if you want to make the paneer. It's extremely simple to do, but you need a day when you can be in and out of the kitchen periodically to oversee the process. If you don't want to make your own, you can buy paneer in a specialty grocery store, or you could substitute tofu, meat, or a hearty vegetable like potato or cauliflower. The recipe below reflects some adaptations I made based on what we had in our pantry and what I could find at the market.

CURRY
2 tbsp canola oil
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 cup finely chopped red onion
1 jalapeno or other mild-to-medium-heat chile pepper, diced
1 large tomato, finely chopped
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 14-oz. can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
8 oz. paneer, cut into 1-inch cubes and pan-fried (see note; recipe below)
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp cilantro, chopped

Set a medium-sized saucepan over medium-high heat, and add the oil. When the oil is hot, add the cumin seeds and cook for 10-15 seconds, until they are sizzling and fragrant. Add the onion and chile, and stir-fry for several minutes, until the onion has just begun to brown. Add the tomato, salt, and spices. Lower the heat to medium and cook for another 3 minutes. Add the chickpeas and a cup of water. Bring to a boil, and then simmer, covered, for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Fold in the paneer and cream, and simmer uncovered until everything is warmed through and the sauce has thickened a bit, about 3 minutes. Sprinkle with cilantro and serve.

PANEER
Though you can make it the same day as the curry, I have had better results when I've made the paneer a day ahead and kept it in the fridge to continue firming up. It can be refrigerated for up to a week and frozen for a couple of months (see notes below). Once you've fried it, you can also keep it in the fridge for up to a week by submerging the cubes in a bowl of water and changing the water daily, or you can freeze the cooled cubes in a freezer-safe bag for up to two months.

1 gallon whole milk
1/4 cup white vinegar
cheesecloth or clean dishcloth for straining

In a large saucepan set over medium-high heat, bring the milk to a boil. Stir often to prevent scorching. When the milk comes to a boil, stir in the vinegar, and take the pot off the heat. Wait about a minute to let the cheese separate from the whey, which will have a greenish color to it. Line a colander with several layers of cheesecloth or with a clean dishcloth, making sure you have two to three inches hanging over the rim. Place the colander in the sink. Pour the milk mixture into the colander and let it drain. Once the cheese is well cooled down (after about 30 minutes or so), fold the edges of the cloth over the cheese to cover it. Fill a heavy pot with water and place it on top of the wrapped cheese in the colander. The weight will press out the water. Leave for 3 to 5 hours, until the cheese is firm. Wrap the cheese in plastic and refrigerate for a week or freeze in a freezer-safe bag for up to 2 months. To fry, pour several tablespoons of canola oil into a large saute pan. Cut the paneer into one-inch cubes. Fry for about 10 minutes, turning several times to brown evenly. Drain on a paper towel-lined plate.

Good Company

2010-10-11T23:23:00.007-04:00

Over a decade now stands between me and the year I spent living in Lima, Peru. I learned so much during that year. Spanish, for one. Also that no matter how slow it seems, time passes. And that a couple of lagers make a great remedy for mild gastrointestinal distress.

I also learned how to cook for myself. Having spent the previous two decades being fed by parents, line cooks, and cafeteria ladies (not to mention one boyfriend whose chef skills may have played a small part in the decision to make him my husband), my kitchen repertoire was quite limited. Left to my own devices, I often slurped up two bowls of cereal and called it dinner.

In Peru, I found myself with lots of free time on my hands. I've never felt so lonely as I did in my early days there. I still remember touching down in Lima on that first of many gray mornings. At six a.m., a shuddering school bus dropped me in front of a locked gate on Colonel Inclan. Somebody helped lug my trunk inside, then left. I had a whole day to myself and nothing to eat but a box of stale corn flakes kindly left in the cupboard by my new employer. After shedding copious homesick tears, I headed out on foot to explore, and to find a grocery store.

Over the course of the year, I became expert at shopping and cooking for myself with the ingredients available in my adopted city. Going on fifteen years later, I still remember a crunchy salad I would make with native choclo corn, tomato, red onion, olive oil, limones, and cumin. Breakfast was a dark and crunchy locally-made granola with cubes of papaya and fruit yogurt. And a favorite for dinner was a stew of lentils cooked with onion, fat carrots, and any other veggies I picked up at the corner produce cart. Preparing that big pot of protein delivered the same kind of satisfaction I felt hanging my laundry in the sun on our rooftop. With the bustling city outside my front gate demanding so much, I found in the elemental acts of cooking and cleaning a much-needed palliative.

There is contentment in a pot bubbling on the stove. Its sounds and smells entice, promise, reassure. A warm pot of soup grounds me, makes me happy to be at home. I needed that on a lot of lonely evenings during that daring, enriching, and sometimes unbearably solitary year.

A drawer in our kitchen houses a beloved, bespattered copy of Fine Cooking magazine, No. 96 (Dec. 2008/Jan. 2009). In the right-hand corner of the cover, I at some point scrawled "GOOD SOUPS" and underlined it twice. Inside live the recipes for this soup and another one I make often. They are one-pot meals that require just a bit of preparation before they're bubbling away on the stove and filling the apartment with warm, spicy aromas and the promise of nourishment.

Good friends and family surround me now, and the loneliness of that time is safely shelved in my memory alongside adventures whose like I'll probably never see again. Circumstances change, but I'll bet that the heavy, comforting presence of a pot on the stove will be a constant pleasure for many years to come. A flimsy box of cereal has no chance against it. Must add that to the list of things learned.

*

You can find the recipe for Black Bean Soup with Sweet Potatoes here. A couple of notes on this dish: For a hearty dinner, ladle the soup over white or brown rice. The sweetness and smooth texture of the soup make it kid-friendly; our picky toddler has on multiple occasions eaten his portion and begged for more. Also, we don't keep aniseed on hand, so I usually substitute fennel seed. Enjoy!

Rescue

2010-09-30T20:50:00.008-04:00

Dinner at our house is not what it used to be. The other night, six o'clock found me dashing breathlessly around our small kitchen while simultaneously attempting to appease a toddler whose new normal state teeters on the edge of complete meltdown. The aim was to have Dinner as a Family when Steve arrived home from work. When this happens, it enables us to a) eat before 9:30, b) teach Gabe about foods other than grilled cheese (while he eats grilled cheese), and c) pose as responsible adults when we really still feel like kids ourselves.

Despite our best intentions, there was nothing Cleaver-esque about this dinner. We were tired. Perched atop Steve's knee, the baby fussed and squirmed. Various glops heaved overboard by Gabe gradually obscured the pattern in the rug. In my mind, I pictured the ants mobilizing for a late-night banquet. What we were eating may have been good, very good even, but there was no mental energy available for savoring. We were both thinking it when Steve said out loud, "Remind me again why we had children."

It was a low moment. We needed help, cover, a life raft--something to get us through to bedtime. And then it came, from the unlikeliest of sources. In the midst of the noise, frustration, fatigue, and general wishing-we-were-someplace-else, Owen had gotten a hold of the tablecloth. Our eyes turned his way and suddenly all was quiet. There he sat, his little hands kneading the fabric, attempting to gather more and more of it into his mouth. It was soothing to him and funny to his brother, whose scowls melted into giggles.

The tantrum slunk off into the shadows. And I wished that Owie didn't have to go to bed so that we could enjoy watching him Hoover that tablecloth for the next hour. Like a little knight, he had hoisted all three of us back from the depths, banishing our stormy feelings towards each other and towards Family Dinner. Perhaps most importantly, he supplied an answer to Steve's grim question. Unexpectedly relaxed now, looking at my two rosy boys, I thought, This is why.

It was the same way with this tart--perhaps worse, since things actually started out well. I assembled the filling, set the oven, pulled out my chilled dough, and successfully rolled out a thin, round-ish disk that wasn't sticking to the countertop. I was just congratulating myself on a job well done when I stopped short. Looking down at a lovely ring of frangipane freshly spread on my disk of dough, I realized that I had forgotten to move the operation to the baking sheet. This was not good: frangipane is sticky and the dough was getting softer. All of a sudden it felt very hot in the kitchen as I attempted to fold, move, and unfold the dough. Things were ugly for a few minutes and would have stayed that way were it not for the impulse to just keep going and hope (props also to the inventor of the inherently forgiving galette). So I pushed and prodded and smoothed and took deep breaths, and a slightly imperfect but intact tart emerged from the muddle.

Later, when the boys were asleep, Steve and I sat down to finish our wine and taste our rescued dessert. I liked it then because it hadn't fallen apart on me. It wasn't until the next day that I admired it for its flavor and texture alone. Fresh figs are perfumey and velvety, and I love the tiny bite of their seeds. This crust is buttery and soft. No mere receptacle for fruit and filling, it is a pleasure in and of itself.

This is not the first time I have expounded here on the benefits of messing around with dough. If you're having a bad day, week, or month--or if you just need a reminder that things generally come right in the end--roll out a ball of dough and slap some fruit in there. Galettes are good confidence-boosters. If that doesn't do the trick, you could try eating the tablecloth, but, please, only in your own home.

*

Fig and Frangipane Tart
I was inspired to make this dessert when I saw the beautiful photos in this post by Megan Gordon. The recipe, however, was ultimately cobbled together from a couple of other sites. I used Martha Stewart's pate brisee (French for pie dough), and the frangipane and basic assembly instructions come from Chez Pim. I am re-writing it all out here so that you can have it in one place (and since Pim's measurements are metric). Busy people may want to make the dough and frangipane a day ahead and store wrapped in the fridge. In case you're not familiar with it, frangipane is a mixture of ground almonds, butter, egg, and sugar; it makes a nice base for any fruit dessert. This recipe makes more of it than you'll need. Just freeze the leftover portion and use it as an excuse to make another fruit tart.

CRUST (makes one single crust for 9- to 10-inch pie)
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 stick butter (4 tbsp), cut into pieces and chilled
up to 1/4 cup ice water

Place dry ingredients in a food processor and pulse until combined. Add the butter and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs, 8 to 10 seconds. With the machine running, add just enough water to make the dough come together. Test by squeezing a bit between your fingers. It should feel dry but not crumbly. If needed, add more water one tablespoon at a time, pulsing to incorporate. Form the dough into a ball, flatten into a disk, wrap tightly in plastic, and chill for at least an hour.

FILLING
1/2 cup almonds (slivered or whole)
1/3 cup sugar
5 tbsp butter, softened
1 egg
10 to 12 ripe fresh figs, cut into quarters

Make the frangipane: In a pan or oven, toast the almonds until fragrant. Cool. Place almonds and sugar in a food processor and pulse until finely ground. Add the butter and egg and pulse until smooth. Set aside.

ASSEMBLY
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough into a 9- or 10-inch circle (doesn't have to be perfectly round). To prevent sticking, it's helpful to turn the dough as you roll it out, re-flouring your surface as needed. Carefully, fold your dough into thirds, transfer it to the baking sheet, and open it back up. (Alternatively, some people have success rolling out the dough on an upside-down baking sheet and baking it like that.) With a spoon, spread a couple of tablespoons of frangipane onto the center of the tart, leaving a border of about two inches all the way around. Place the figs, skin side down, on top of the frangipane. Fold up the edges of the dough so that they cover the edges of the fruit. If you like, you can brush the crust with an egg or milk wash and sprinkle with sugar. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes, until the crust is golden.

Well Fed

2010-09-18T14:17:00.002-04:00

Another reason to rejoice over summer's departure: blueberry season is definitively over. It's not that I don't love blueberries. I do. The ones from my in-laws' garden are especially delicate and sweet, and I look forward to hosting a generous container of them in our kitchen every summer. If I lived alone, I would keep them nearby at all times, popping a handful here, a handful there as I pleased.

But I do not live alone. I live with my progeny, and that is how I found myself performing the maddening task of cutting blueberries in half all summer long. Why, you might logically ask, would anyone cut a blueberry in half? It is a ridiculous thing to do, I agree. And yet I have reduced myself to it after discovering that a simple cut mysteriously made Vaccinium corymbosum, heretofore repulsive, quite palatable to one particular toddler. (Who wouldn't commit an irrational act in order to get their child to eat a food that shares a Latin root with the word vaccine?)

And so "Cut," he commands, and then "More cut." And I comply. I also regularly change the diaper of a floppy gray bunny/rag called Vee. These are the humble motions of parenthood, the compromises that color our days and get us where we want to go.

Despite the fastidiousness suggested by such requests, there is nothing dainty about Gabe. He is commonly found charging around the apartment on chubby legs, making things go crash (pronounced frash), bump (boomp), and doink (followed by raucous giggles). Upon seeing him, strangers often predict that he will play football one day (not happening); others have proclaimed him "well fed" and "healthy-looking." You get the picture. Nothing comes into our apartment that can't take a lot of wear and tear. If an object shouldn't be bitten, stomped on, hurled, steamrolled, or made into a tunnel, it has no place here.

So it seems fitting, when I get a moment alone in the kitchen, to turn to oatmeal cookies. Digging my fingers into their chunky batter, I can channel the kind of zeal Gabe exudes when presented with mulch and a toy dump truck. Moreover, studies have shown that mothers who eat oatmeal cookies have more energy for playing horsey, making train sounds, and cutting zillions of tiny blueberries in half day after day. After day. (Okay, I made up the part about the studies, but it's a theory I have).

The cookies you see here are inspired by a recipe I found in Sara Foster's Fresh Every Day cookbook. Amidst other tinkering, I steered the recipe away from any trace of delicacy by using bittersweet chocolate, whole wheat flour, and dried cherries. There is nothing dainty about these cookies; instead, they are crumbly. The chocolate oozes. The cherries are tart, assertive, chewy. This is a food that will gird you for a stroll through the autumn leaves, the cool breeze reminding you to bring along a jacket next time.

This--this, my friends--is the kind of food one can be proud to split in half. Like a cheeseburger, this cookie is substantial enough that it fits better in your mouth if you cut it in two. It is the caloric equivalent of seven pints of blueberries. (Again, merely a theory; no nutritional information has been used to arrive at this wild guess.) And so it is with these ruddy beauties that I say farewell to blueberry slicing for this year. Farewell to daintiness! Break me open a cookie.

*

Dark Chocolate-Cherry Oatmeal Cookies
Adapted from Fresh Every Day by Sara Foster
This recipe makes about 18 large cookies but can easily be doubled. If I'm just baking cookies to have around the house, I often make enough to fit on one cookie sheet and then wrap the rest of the dough in plastic and store it in the fridge until I have a hankering for another small batch.

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cups rolled oats
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp ground sea salt
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg, at room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
6 oz. chopped bittersweet chocolate (or chocolate chips)
1 cup roughly chopped dried cherries

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Whisk the dry ingredients (flour through salt) together in a medium bowl. In a mixer or by hand, cream the butter and sugars until fluffy, about two minutes. Add the egg and mix until well blended, scraping the bowl as needed. Add the vanilla and mix well. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, and mix until everything is well combined. Stir in the chocolate and cherries, finishing the mixing with your hands if needed. Using a tablespoon and your fingers, form the dough into roughly two-inch balls and drop onto the cookie sheets, leaving three inches between cookies. Use your fingers to gently flatten each ball into a disk. Bake for 13 to 15 minutes, rotating the cookie sheets mid-way through the baking. These are done when the edges appear set and the cookies remove easily from the baking sheet. Do not overbake. Allow to cool for a minute or two on the baking sheet. Transfer to a rack to finish cooling.

Coda

2010-09-06T14:18:00.023-04:00

As I write these words, I am eating a bruised nectarine and listening to the quiet of Labor Day in the city. My neighbors are gone to weekend spots. Even Steve is away, attending a wedding in Colorado.

He left at six o'clock on Saturday morning. By nine, I had a lump in my throat, thinking about the three long days and nights ahead of me, alone with my two darling little overlords. A lifelong love of routine had me checking the clock often that day, counting down the hours until Steve's return, the return of normalcy.

There's another return on my mind these days: Fall is approaching. I am ready, and here's why.

It's the proper response to summer to be somewhat adrift. That's why people rhapsodize about summer more than any other season. We let go of some of the things that tie us down in the cooler months. We bare our toes. We go in and out of town. We linger and loaf more than usual. I like to do these things. In June and July, I am all over them.

But, deep down, adrift is not my most comfortable setting. The loosey-gooseyness of summer can be unsettling after a while. It's awfully hot. Stuff spoils. Mildew encroaches. My toenail polish chips and I reapply, coat over coat over coat. This cannot go on forever. I'd like my trusty sneakers back.

Fall represents a return to routines that, however mundane, give definition to our lives. Even as my own days rotate around the whims and spurts of early childhood, it's reassuring to know that there are people out there--including my neighbors, friends, and family--who are in town, going to their jobs every day. I like to see the traffic back up on our street during rush hour, to hear the school buses trundling by in the morning and afternoon, to know that the subway trains tunneling deep below the foundations of this building are full of people going places where they will do purposeful things.

Maybe it's just that I had to spend Labor Day weekend alone with babies (though it must be said that certain people performed valiant service relieving me of my lonely serfdom). Maybe it's the cool breezes wafting into our open windows in the early mornings of late. Or maybe it's sweet potatoes, molasses, soup, leeks. Ginger bread. Apple pie. Need I go on?

Whatever the reasons for wanting to hasten fall's arrival, there is no doubting that autumn foods provide a mellow, sweet, welcome coda to the bright, showy flavors of summer. I'm thinking of this salad as a nice bridge between the two seasons. It's a great way to summon fall while still savoring late summer's best produce. Whether you're enjoying the first whiffs of autumn, like me, or wishing summer could linger a month longer, I think you'll enjoy it.

Now, lace up those sneakers, quit loafing, and get into the kitchen!

*

Late Summer Salad with Zucchini, Corn, and Sweet Potato
I ate this salad on a bed of greens that came in a box labeled "baby arugula blend," but I think any moderately assertive greens would work well. Alternatively, you might try omitting the greens and tossing the sweet potato mixture with a grain like couscous or barley.

Serves 2 for a hearty meatless lunch or dinner, with leftovers

1 medium sweet potato, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice
drizzle of honey
handful of pumpkin seeds (minus the husk)
olive oil
1 small clove of garlic, peeled and diced
2 small or 1 medium zucchini, cut into 1/2-inch dice
kernels from 2 ears of corn
handful of dried cherries
salad greens (see note above)

DRESSING
4 tbsp olive oil
4 tsp lemon juice
handful of cilantro, chopped finely
1/4 tsp each of cumin, paprika, and coriander
salt to taste

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and line a baking pan with parchment paper. Wet the sweet potatoes with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and drizzle lightly with honey. Toss and roast in the center of the oven until tender, 20 to 30 minutes. In the same roasting pan, with a few minutes left, or in a toaster oven or skillet, toast the pumpkin seeds until fragrant.

Coat a medium skillet with olive oil and set over medium heat. Saute the garlic for 30 seconds and then add the zucchini and corn. Saute until tender, stirring often, 6 to 7 minutes.

Prepare the dressing by whisking all ingredients together in a small bowl. Toss the vegetables, dressing, pumpkin seeds, and cherries together in a bowl. When ready to serve, place a couple of handfuls of greens on each plate, and spoon the vegetable mixture over the greens. Alternatively, just toss it all together in a big salad bowl, and enjoy.

Want to print this recipe? Click here.

A Fine, Full Life

2010-08-29T20:36:00.008-04:00

There are many subjects on which author Laurie Colwin and I agree. Take beets, for example. She writes (inspirationally, I think), "Someone with a profound hatred...of beets should not be challenged. A life without beets or lima beans is a fine, full life." I do like lima beans, but I have a long-standing antipathy to beets, and I thank her for defending me on that score. I also find we are kindred spirits in our love of staying home rather than going out. And I appreciate that she reminds those of us who love to cook and write about food that there are too many people out there who have too little to eat.

But there is one subject on which we disagree, and that is chocolate. Colwin stands behind fudge as "chocolate in its most sublime form." I must part ways with her here. Fudge is nice, but its buttery richness overwhelms me. A small bite is the most I can manage. Now, some people might say that that's precisely what sublimity is: the experience of something so full of its qualities that even a little dose overpowers, even terrifies. But for those of us who do not spend our days pondering the writings of Edmund Burke, the word sublime simply denotes something that brings the greatest possible enjoyment. For me, fudge comes up short in a key category: texture. Sub-category: crust.

Being the shrewd reader that you are, you perceive by now that I am only dwelling on fudge's minor shortcomings in order to pique your interest in the recipe I have in mind. You see through my elementary rhetorical devices. You wish I would get on with it. Indeed, I will.

On the topic of chocolate, crust, and the sublime, I will mention two recipes today and give you one. (Don't be greedy.) (Besides, the other recipe can be found in a different section of this very blog, if you can find it. Hint: Molly Wizenberg.) The first is an almost-flourless chocolate cake that resembles fudge in many ways, with the added pleasure of a slight crust that is both appealing to the eye and delightful on the tongue.

The second is the cookie you see here. It comes from Alice Waters' Chez Panisse Cafe Cookbook, a book that I put away for many years because it contains recipes calling for ingredients such as wild nettles and cardoons. And so it is only now that I am finding out about these delectable morsels--and their crackled, sugared crust. May I be so bold as to assert that they are chocolate in its finest form? I think I may.

Were she alive today to try them, I think Laurie Colwin would agree. Sublime, in the non-Burkean sense? (Sorry, but a girl has to put her graduate degree to use somehow.) Check. No terror here. In fact, it's all too easy to eat several at a time, a behavior I justify by thinking of all the years these cookies spent as mere words on a stifled page, yearning to see the light of day, to leap from off the page and onto the cooling rack.

Think you have a fine, full life, with your beets and your lima beans and your fudge? It's okay. I did too.

*

Brandy-Kissed Chocolate-Almond Cookies
Adapted from Chez Panisse Cafe Cookbook
The recipe says it makes thirty cookies, but I usually come out with closer to forty. The brandy is the key ingredient, in my opinion. One time, I clumsily tipped in a splash more than what's called for, and I liked the result quite a lot. Like so many baked goods involving chocolate, these are better on the second day. I love Waters' advice that the cookies are done "when they lift easily from the sheet." I haven't put this to the test on other cookies yet, but I feel sure it will be a tip that will serve me well in the future. Oh, and if you want to make the dough or the cookies ahead, go for it. Both keep well for several days. Just wrap the dough tightly in plastic and refrigerate. Store the cookies in an airtight container, with parchment in between layers of cookies.

12 oz. bittersweet chocolate
1/2 stick unsalted butter
1/4 cup brandy (see above)
1 cup ground almonds
1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp flour (recipe calls for cake flour; I used all-purpose)
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3 eggs
1/2 cup sugar, plus extra for rolling
Confectioner's sugar for rolling

Melt the chocolate and butter together in a double boiler or in the microwave. Stir in the brandy. In a separate bowl, whisk together the dry almonds, flour, baking powder, and salt. In a third, large bowl, beat the eggs and 1/2 cup of sugar together until light yellow and foamy, two to three minutes. Stir in the chocolate mixture to blend. Then, fold in the flour mixture. Chill the dough until firm, at least an hour and up to two days.

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees, and line a cookie sheet (or two if you want to bake them all at once) with parchment paper. Set out a small dish of confectioner's sugar and one of granulated sugar. Form the dough into one-inch balls, and coat first with the granulated sugar and second with the confectioner's sugar. (Sometimes I give the powdered sugar a quick whisk first, to break up lumps.) Place on the baking sheets a couple of inches apart. Bake for about ten minutes, keeping in mind the good advice above about how to tell when they are done. They may still appear a little bit wet at the seams. Be careful not to overbake. Transfer to a rack to cool.

Don't Let the Exploding Donuts Get You Down

2010-08-20T16:41:00.021-04:00

For the record, I cannot draw a cow. Or a horse. Or a tractor. Okay, I really don't draw anything well at all, with the exception of some rather fine (if I do say so myself) doodle art completed during meetings in my previous life.

What I do know how to do is write. I don't mean that I do it brilliantly--only that I have confidence that I can do it. People sometimes pay me to help their children learn to write better. Just yesterday, I found myself sitting by the side of a ninth grader, encouraging her not to worry over each word, to just relax her inner editor and let the ideas pour out onto the paper (er, screen). She nodded politely like she'd heard that advice before. Easy to dispense, harder to follow.

When I'm writing, I don't have to think about the steps required to get me from blank screen to finished piece. I just start, and then I muddle around for a while, and then the pieces come together, and I finish. After years of practice, I'm okay with the muddle because I know I'm going to come out on the other side with a decent product.

But when I'm sitting at the table with my son and he asks me to draw a horse, I feel very much like my teenaged charge probably did the other day. Where to even start? And what is this mess I'm creating? And what if the result is a total flop?

Lately, I have been feeling this way in the kitchen, too. Over the last two weeks, our oven, through no fault of its own, has witnessed a string of failures, among them some dull banana-oat muffins, an eggplant and tomato tart that never firmed up, and a sugared yeast cake Steve referred to as the "giant exploding donut." There were more, but I won't pain you further by sharing them all. But I will whine just a little bit, if I may, because I devoted precious hours to these projects. I planted in them my hopes...for a few delicious mouthfuls, for rousing familial approbation, for the sound of my phone ringing off the hook with calls from cookbook editors eager to snap me up! (Okay, that's taking things way too far, but you get the point.) Instead, I was reminded once again of how much I still have to learn. Aargh.

I realized something this morning at the table with Gabe. When I attempted to draw horses and cows and tractors with even remote precision, I was trying to jump to the end of a process that I've never really begun. Looking over at Gabe, I noticed that he, also a novice artist, had a different approach. When I suggested he draw a train, he just scribbled madly and then smiled. I decided to join him, and it felt great.

This cake has gone through two iterations now. Given the kind of luck I've had lately, it'll come as no surprise that the first edition was just so-so. But instead of slamming down my whisk and driving to the Safeway for a SaraLee, I slept on it, tinkered with the recipe a bit more, scrawled a bunch of notes to myself, and dove back in. I'm pleased to say that this time the cake was a hit. It's not a Rembrandt (or should I say a Beard?), but it's darn tasty. And it reminds me of the importance of just plunging in to the messy, unpredictable thing that is baking and giving those beaters a whirl.

After Gabe and I covered an entire easel page with scribbles, I taped our masterpiece to the dining room wall, just beside the doorway to the kitchen. Perhaps with practice I will one day learn to draw farm animals and make reliably good muffins. In the meantime, our colorful montage reminds me, the best thing I can do is to keep scribbling.

*

Honey-Almond Bundt Cake with Peaches and Plums
Adapted from Jennie Schacht's Farmer's Market Desserts

This cake is very moist and flavorful on its own without any accompaniments, though I'm sure a dollop of lightly whipped cream (sweetened a bit and perhaps flavored with a few drops of vanilla and/or almond extract) would be a welcome addition. My inspiration came from an apple cake recipe, so I would encourage you to try other fruits as you see fit, altering the spices accordingly. Feel free also to eliminate the ground almonds and use a cup of flour in their place.

CAKE
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup ground almonds (see note above)
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 to 1 tsp ground nutmeg
3/4 tsp sea salt
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar
3 eggs, at room temperature
1/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
3 cups of peeled, chopped, and pitted peaches and plums (I used three white peaches and three red plums)

SYRUP
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
3 tbsp honey
2 tbsp water
splash of vanilla extract
splash of almond extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and position a rack in the center. Butter and flour a 10- to 12-cup Bundt pan. Whisk the dry ingredients (flour through salt above) together in a medium bowl. Cream the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Scrape down the bowl and add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. With the mixer running, add the buttermilk, honey, and vanilla and almond extracts, scraping down the bowl as needed. Stir in the flour mixture just until wet and dry come together, stopping when the batter is still streaky. Fold in the fruit until everything is evenly incorporated. Spread the batter into the pan. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes, until the top is firm and golden-brown and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Cool in the pan on a wire rack for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, prepare the syrup by combining all of the ingredients in a small bowl. Whisk until smooth. Invert the warm cake onto a serving plate. Using a wooden skewer or two toothpicks held together, poke lots of holes into the top and sides of the cake. Brush the syrup over the cake until all of it is absorbed. Serve warm or at room temperature, dusted with powdered sugar if you like.

My One Weakness

2010-08-10T21:11:00.033-04:00

In an earlier post, I confessed that I have become addicted to a Victorian serial drama called Lark Rise to Candleford. There are those in my family who would (do) make fun of me for this. But there are more (admittedly, all members of AARP) who will ask to borrow the DVD when I'm done. I like to think I'm an old soul. My brother and sister would probably use a different word.

At any rate, I have picked up a new expression from this adorable program: "My one weakness." The main character, Dorcas (yes, that is really her name), excuses all kinds of little indulgences with these words--things like a slice of rum cake or an afternoon nap. Hardly shocking behavior, you say? Well, yes, but these things were a big deal in Victorian times! People didn't just laze around in their flip-flops eating ice cream sandwiches back in those days.

Although I do sometimes wish I could put on one of those wonderful floor-length dresses and stroll the sidewalk twirling my parasol, I'm glad that I am living in twenty-first century America--in large part because I do wear flip-flops most of the time. And because we are more forgiving of our friends and neighbors now than they were back then.

But a little of that old-fashioned moral rectitude still gets in the way when I start poking into the cookie box around four o'clock in the afternoon. I know I should hold firm, wait until after dinner, or until Friday night, or my birthday. But I want a cookie now.

This is where "my one weakness" comes in handy. In those moments when you are feeling a little bit guilty, it instantly paves the way. It's a very useful phrase in that it both acknowledges and validates the indulgence. We are allowed a weakness, it tells us. We should own up to it and embrace it. I recommend saying it out loud, even if you are alone. And then you smile charmingly and dig in.

I like my cookies hearty. My favorites have strong flavors, chewy texture, and at least one healthy ingredient (molasses, oats, dried fruit) to help me justify eating more than I should (another good strategy for combating rectitude). I could take or leave a flimsy white cookie. I want to eat my sweets mindfully, to savor them. And that's what these babies demand.

So let me introduce you to one of my favorite weaknesses. I think you will find that the indulgence is well worth it. And if your conscience gives you any trouble at all, just straighten up, hold your head high, and intone, as Dorcas so winningly does, "My one weakness."

*

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies
from Good to the Grain by Kim Boyce
If you keep up with the popular food blogs, as I do, then you might have seen this recipe or heard of its author before. If not, then I am excited to be able to share it with you. It comes from a new cookbook by Kim Boyce, who began experimenting with whole grains when her kids were small and she wanted to feed them the healthiest food possible. What she discovered is that whole grain flours have interesting, delicious flavors and textures of their own, a fact we sometimes overlook because we are so focused on their status as health food. I have made the recipe quite a few times now, and I have tried different things each time. You'll notice that it calls for the cookies to be quite large. I think that they do indeed come out best (chewiest) this way, but for smaller, slightly cakier cookies, try scooping out rounded tablespoons of batter. You'll, of course, get more this way as well. The cookies are saltier than chocolate chip cookies usually tend to be, and I think they're quite good this way. That said, I always go a little shy of the recommended amount. Last, I added in chopped dried cherries one time and quite liked the way they complemented the flavors of the chocolate and whole wheat. You might try this or add in something else that strikes your fancy--coconut, almonds, cinnamon, orange zest...the possibilities are endless.

3 cups whole wheat flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
scant 1 1/2 tsp sea salt
2 sticks (8 oz.) cold butter, cut into small pieces
1 cup white sugar
1 cup dark brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
8 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and position your oven racks in the upper and lower half of the oven. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Sift the first four ingredients into a medium-sized bowl and then tip into your bowl any particles left behind in the sifter. In the bowl of a stand mixer, or with your hands, cream the butter and sugars until well combined, about two minutes. Scrape down the bowl. Add the eggs one at a time, stirring after each addition, and then add the vanilla. With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture and stir until well blended. Add the chocolate last, finishing the mixing with your hands if needed. Scoop out three tablespoons of dough and drop it onto the cookie sheet, spacing each mound several inches apart. Bake for 16 to 2o minutes. Remove to a rack to cool.

Zoning In

2010-08-01T14:12:00.003-04:00

Parenting can really do a number on your attention span. Evolutionarily speaking, this is probably a good thing. I suppose, from a species preservation standpoint, it's better for my brood if I have short, unsatisfactory phone conversations with my friends and instead focus on giving Gabe that cracker he has been hollering for. This is not always fun, however, and it can lead one to feel rather stupid when in the company of the toddler-free set.

So it's no surprise that I don't spend a lot of time these days pondering the writings of Hungarian psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (hereafter known as Dr. C., and please don't ask me to pronounce that.) But a post by fellow foodie and parent Cheryl (of 5 Second Rule) got me thinking about Dr. C.'s concept of flow, which I learned about at an educators' retreat several years ago.

The basic idea behind flow is that when we immerse ourselves fully in an activity, we gain energy and mental clarity. And we experience joy from focusing intently on one task, blocking out all distractions. It's the opposite of multi-tasking. When you give yourself completely to one thing--a trail, a book, a hunk of clay, a ball of dough--your mind shifts into auto-pilot. You don't think, you just do. It's kind of like letting your mind off the leash and closing your eyes as it runs, free.

You can imagine that flow is a bit difficult to achieve with two children under two running around the place. (Well, okay, only one of them can run, but the other is getting surprising air in the bouncy chair these days). I find, though, that if I open the door for flow-y moments, I sometimes get lucky. As in when, every now and again, the stars align and both boys nap soundly for the same hour. This happened the other day.

And you are looking at the results. At a certain point--mid-crimp, flour in my hair, eight little packets sealed up and ready for the oven, four more to go--it dawned on me that it was really quiet in the apartment. I hadn't noticed. I hadn't been worrying about good naps, bad naps, next week's trip, watering the neighbors' plants, the laundry pile, or anything else. I think it was the dough. Dough demands our full attention. I appreciate that.

Once I noticed the stillness, I began working a little faster, conscious that my time was running out. But even though the spell was broken, I sensed a new energy that hadn't been there when I began, a boost that must have bubbled up in that brief window when my mind was fully and passionately given to, well, empanadas.

I don't often select recipes with many steps. My default cooking mode tends to be quick and easy. But I realized the other day, as I slid the baking trays into the oven, that I should make time for those dishes that require a bit more attention. I liked the feeling so much that the next day I improvised a sweet batch of hand pies with peaches from a local orchard. (Stay tuned...I have to eat a few more pies before I can decide on their blog-worthiness.)

If you tend to think like me, and you want to get it done quickly and move on to the zillion other things that need doing, I recommend checking back in with dough. Sink your fingers in, channel Mihaly, and flow, baby, flow! Your brain--and your belly--will thank you.

You can find the recipe I used for empanada dough here, and the potato, pepper, and chorizo filling is over here. And of course you could experiment with other fillings. I'm thinking of something with sweet potatoes, peas, and maybe some curry powder. Or you could try spiced up ground lamb with raisins and hard-boiled eggs. For the sweet dough, I substituted lemon juice for the vinegar, cut back on the salt, and added a few tablespoons of sugar.

Summer's Blood

2010-07-26T14:44:00.004-04:00

It has been an exceptionally hot summer. In our apartment, this means that two of four window unit air conditioners are often running simultaneously, and still the kitchen is quite warm. Left too long on the counter or window sill, our fresh produce spoils quickly.

There is an urgency to summer food. I read that this year, due to the heat, the usual seasons for the various local fruits and vegetables will begin earlier and pass faster. Sometimes it feels like a race against the heat and the clock, both to buy produce in season, and then to figure out a tasty way to use it up before it turns.

Seamus Heaney's poem "Blackberry Picking" relates a young boy's disappointment every August when berries that look so promising on the bush so rapidly mold in the pail. The opening lines capture the visceral pleasure of a fruit or vegetable at its peak of ripeness: "You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet / Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it / Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for / Picking."

The let-down in the closing lines is heartbreaking: "Once off the bush / The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour. / I always felt like crying. It wasn't fair / That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot. / Each year I hoped they'd keep, knew they would not." Looking at this poem now at mid-summer, I feel an obligation to little Seamus to savor what morsels I can and not let a bit go to waste. I have already this year tossed out once-radiant strawberries and cherries because I failed to gobble them up fast enough and mold crept upon them when I was dilly-dallying, autumn-style, on a recipe.

Now I'm getting smart. At the farmer's market on Saturday, scrawly signs with arrows were taped to the table around a dwindling display of golden cherry tomatoes. "Like candy!" the signs exclaimed, and "Try one and see!". I picked one and tasted it. The skin was delicate, almost translucent. The juice was a tart-sweet nectar that lasted and changed on my tongue. I've heard wine described as complex; this was like that. I scooped up a pint, paid, and popped a few into my mouth right then and there. Another handful disappeared on the way home. It became clear that I was experiencing a flavor and texture that would not last. To neglect even one would be a sin.

I got home and began hunting for recipes. I would know the right one when I saw it. Watching this process, Steve wondered aloud why we can't just eat the lovelies as they are, without making anything fancy out of them. He's got a point. They are delicious in and of themselves. But then where would we be (you and I)? What would we (again, you and I) talk about? And, by the way, what would we (your family, my family) have for dinner?

Well, I'm glad to report that this salad preserves marital harmony by leaving a few tomatoes in the pint for the purists, who promise to polish them off before they expire. I feel sure that Heaney would approve.

*

Quinoa Salad with Crispy Chickpeas, Zucchini, and Cherry Tomatoes
The crispy chickpeas and zucchini are adapted from this month's issue of Fine Cooking. You probably won't use all of the chickpeas in the salad, so save any you don't snack on to put on a green salad later in the week. This would make a good side dish with grilled meats, and it's filling enough to stand alone as lunch or a light supper. I didn't have fresh herbs on hand (they had wilted in a glass of water on the countertop!), but I am including them in the recipe below.

SALAD
1 cup quinoa
2 cups chicken or vegetable broth, or water
sea salt
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp paprika
1/3 cup plus 2 tbsp olive oil
1 14 oz. can chickpeas, drained, rinsed, and patted dry
4 tbsp cornstarch
a couple of handfuls of cherry tomatoes, halved
1 medium or 2 small zucchini and/or yellow squash, sliced thin and quartered
a handful of chopped or slivered almonds, toasted
small handful of fresh oregano, mint, and/or basil, chopped

DRESSING
3 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp lemon juice
pinch of each of the following: sea salt, coriander, paprika, cumin

Combine the quinoa, water or broth, and 1/2 tsp salt in a pot and bring to a boil. Cover, lower the heat, and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes until the water is absorbed. Fluff with a fork and spread on a baking sheet to cool.

Place a large saute pan over medium heat and add the 1/3 cup olive oil. While the oil heats, stir together the spices in a small bowl and set aside. Place several thicknesses of paper towel on a dinner plate. Toss the chickpeas and cornstarch in a colander or fine-mesh sieve, tapping out the excess cornstarch. When the oil is shimmery hot, fry the chickpeas for 5-8 minutes, shaking the pan occasionally. When they are golden-brown, turn them out onto the paper towels, and sprinkle with all but one teaspoon of the spice mixture and a pinch or two of salt. Toss to coat.

Pour off the fat and wipe out the pan. Heat two tablespoons of oil over medium-high heat. Add the zucchini and a pinch of salt. Cook in one layer, without stirring, for a minute or two. When it starts to brown, sprinkle with the remaining teaspoon of the spice mixture. Stir gently with a spatula, turning over to brown on both sides. After another minute or so, remove from the heat.

Make the dressing by whisking all ingredients in a small bowl. In your serving bowl, combine the quinoa, zucchini, almonds, tomatoes, and two tablespoons of dressing. Toss in 1 cup of the chickpeas and herbs just before serving. Taste and add more dressing if needed.

Fizzled, But Not Forgotten

2010-07-21T15:41:00.005-04:00

On an airplane, headed down to Atlanta for a visit with family, I killed my camera. I unwittingly drowned the poor thing in a little pool of water that leaked out from my water bottle. I knew the water bottle leaked. I thought I had taken precautions. (Oh my...this is starting to sound very much like something else, which is not at all what this is. Get your mind out of the gutter.)

Ahem, back to the point: my camera is kaput.

It's not the camera I miss. It's the feeling of capturing something beautiful and holding onto it a bit longer. This little thrill has eluded me for seven days now. Here are some things I wanted to photograph but couldn't:

- Two round-eyed cousins, a boy and a girl, sitting side by side in their booster seats at the dining room table, eating pancakes and blueberries.

- At the Green Market in Piedmont Park: homemade cherry-lime popsicles, sturdy sunflowers, and colorful, stacked bags of homemade orzo pasta.

- The stove when I returned home. Steve had one pan filled with bright green spinach along with zucchini, onions, and black beans for enchiladas; another contained four symmetrically-placed, translucent rounds of zucchini devotedly softening for a toddler grilled cheese. Off to the side was a pound of red kidney beans brightly soaking in a glass baking dish.

Garrison Keillor includes a poem about photography in his collection Good Poems. The poet describes a man on vacation who takes so many photos that he misses out on the experience itself. I've misplaced the book, but I believe the last line reads something like, "He would never really see it." It refers to all of the beautiful scenery he captured on film. (I think there were canyons and whitewater involved--at least that's what I always pictured.) I used to read this poem to my students before they left for vacation. I wanted them to take to heart the importance of slowing down, coming out from behind screens, and noticing the world around them.

My parents gave me a camera when I was ten or so years old. It was a film camera, of course, a clunky, long point-and-shoot with a loud shutter click and a wrist band that I was fond of looping around my shoulder. I thought it was just about the coolest thing in the world. I still remember a some photos I took of fireworks on the Fourth of July, and how disappointed I was when they came back from the developer. On film, the fireworks were pale, imperceptible messes of color all but swallowed in blackness. The photos reflected nothing of the awe and excitement of that evening.

That night almost twenty-five years ago, I tried to capture on film something that was spectacular to see. Wedding and sports photographers do this well, but the rest of us are probably better off coming out from behind the lens and being fully present to the extraordinary. In this sense, the poet is right on.

But though I still appreciate the message of that poem, I find myself wishing I could have my camera back again. This blog has me noticing small details, the wonder of everyday things like fava beans and baby cheeks and cooling racks. No one can miss fireworks bursting in the sky above them, but we so often skip over the beauty in the mundane. Pictures may sometimes deflate the sublime, but they can also exalt the ordinary.

And, after all, the ordinary is what daily life is all about. Why not exalt?

*

The images above appear as a way to honor my fizzled-out camera. They are photos that, through no fault of their own, have not made it onto the blog because the recipes in which they starred were deemed good but not share-worthy. I'm glad to be able to share them, though I wish it could be under different circumstances (sniffle, sniffle).

Recess for Adults

2010-07-12T22:40:00.010-04:00

At a school where I once worked, you could walk down the hallways around ten in the morning and feel like a kid again. Parked outside the closed door of each busy classroom was a plastic crate stacked high with little half-pint cartons of milk. Next to the crate sat a small box of graham crackers in clear plastic wrappers. I always loved the sight of those mid-morning snacks quietly waiting for the growing bodies inside the rooms to emerge and gobble them up.

The snack was timed to coincide with a morning recess during which students went outside for some fresh air, some chatting (girls), some tussling (boys). It was a much-needed mental and physical break from sitting in class. In my time there, the snack offerings did not survive in their original form. Later years saw overly-sweet Nabisco "100-calorie snack packs" take the place of the simple milk and cookies. But the recess carried on. In spite of staff meetings in which we deliberated for hours over the schedule and how to wring out of it every last possible academic minute, the break stayed put. It endured because it was fundamentally a healthy practice for the adults and the kids. Everybody needs a break in the day.

Afternoon tea is my version of recess. On good days, I have the luxury of a quiet moment at the dining room table. On a really good day, it's cleared of the usual piles and there is only a plant or some flowers, a magazine, and a view out the window. Even on bad days, when nobody wants to nap and the apartment is a mess, I have my tea. It is perhaps on those days when I need it most. It was the same when I was teaching. I often paused mid-afternoon to fix myself a cup in the faculty room. The tea would sit on my desk and steam until it was cool enough to drink. The anticipation was almost as nice as the eventual first sip. As I gradually drained my cup, time slowed down, and the frenetic scramblings of the day settled into perspective.

The beauty of afternoon tea, 0r morning snack, is that you don't have to have it. It's not one of the three square meals that give structure to our days. It's a bonus meal, and it feels just a little decadent even when you're wrangling toddlers or grading papers while you take it. And I'm convinced it makes me better at whatever it is I happen to be doing beforehand and afterward.

I can think of many not-too-sweet things that go beautifully with tea, and these cookies will from now on reside at the top of the list. The oats and ginger give traditionally prim shortbread a pleasing edge. Plus, the recipe makes a bunch, and they keep well, so you'll have many days' worth of excuses for afternoon tea, not that you need it (an excuse, that is).

I highly recommend finding a moment in your morning or afternoon to savor one or two with a cup of something warm. Even better, find someone to share them with.

*

Ginger-Oat Shorties
From Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison

Even if you are an avowed carnivore, I think you'll find this a wonderful cookbook. Beyond the great recipes, Madison makes a convincing, inspiring case for thoughtful, creative cooking. One recipe note: I used almost a cup of the crystallized ginger and found the ginger flavor to be strong but not overpowering. If you want something milder, try using just 1/2 cup.

3/4 cup rolled oats
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, slightly softened
1 cup light brown sugar, packed
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 tsp ground ginger
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 to 1 cup chopped candied (crystallized) ginger

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Put the oats in a food processor and pulse just until some are minced and others are still whole. Set aside.

In a mixer or by hand, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the salt, ground ginger, and oats. Follow with the flour and, finally, the crystallized ginger. If needed, use your hands to bring the dough together into a ball. Press the dough evenly into a 9x13 baking dish. Then, score the surface with a knife, marking out whatever shape you want your cookies to take (thin bars, diamonds, triangles, squares, etc.). Bake for 30-35 minutes, until lightly browned. Remove from the oven and cut along the score lines. Then, let the shortbread cool completely before serving. The cookies will crisp up as they cool.

American as...

2010-07-07T16:51:00.013-04:00

If Senator Joseph McCarthy were still alive today, he might be wanting a word with me. The reason why? Okay, here goes...

I don't like corn on the cob.

I know that this is un-American of me. But please, be gentle. This is not something that is easy to admit. Only a trusted, tiny circle of intimates have been privy to my failing in this regard. You just can't go around saying you don't like corn on the cob. People love the stuff. Last weekend was the fourth of July, and corn on the cob was served to me at two separate gatherings. Did I refuse? No, of course not! People don't understand that kind of behavior. I have a husband and two small children to think of. Instead, my usual approach is to daintily break a cob in half and, nervously glancing about the table, nibble on it strategically so that it appears eaten.

It feels good to finally come clean! While I'm at it, you might as well know that I also eat my french fries with a fork, and I'm embarrassingly deep into a Victorian period drama called Lark Rise to Candleford on Netflix. I know, it's bad. I might as well turn in my passport right now.

I think so many people love corn on the cob because it represents everything we long for about summer. It's simple, it's bright, and it's fresh. Stretches of our countryside quiver with cornstalks all summer long. This plant's hold on our imagination--our identity--is firm. And, I concede, corn is tasty. I have no problem with corn.

For those of us who are not cob-inclined, there are many worthy alternatives. I came across this salad after our neighbors kindly dropped a bag of fresh farmer's market corn on our doorstep last week. It comes from a cookbook called Fresh Every Day by Sara Foster. On the stove as I write this is a pot of white corn soup from the same cookbook. (Just tasted the almost-finished product. Yum.)

If you can concede that summer isn't just about cobs, that it's also about fresh, bold flavors and colors on our plates, then I think you'll like this salad. It was a pleasure to sit down to on a hot summer evening. (We've been having a lot of those this year.)

And I'd like to point out that corn on the cob is just yellow and maybe a little bit white. Look back at the photo of this salad when it's all assembled. Between the red tomatoes, the white mozzarella, and the blue plate (okay, I cheated a little), I think you'll have to agree that this is a pretty patriotic salad. I feel redeemed. Passport, please.

*

Fresh Mozzarella Salad with Avocado, Roasted Corn, and Grape Tomatoes
Adapted slightly from Fresh Every Day by Sara Foster

The recipe calls for the salad to be topped with a summer herb vinaigrette (recipe follows below). I did take the time to make it, and we just finished it up last night on mixed greens. It's very good, and the flavors improve with time. If you don't have time for the extra step, then just use any light vinaigrette instead. Regarding the salad, I am tweaking the ingredients to include some changes I will implement the next time I make this dish, including the addition of bacon and/or smoked mozzarella instead of plain fresh mozzarella. If you prefer a milder flavor, try crumbled ricotta salata in place of the smoked mozzarella. (Oh--and if you're feeling extra domestic, you can save the corn cobs and make a corn broth. Foster suggests combining them in a soup pot with several quarts of water, some loosely chopped onion and celery, and a bay leaf. Simmer for 45 minutes and strain.)

4 ears of sweet corn, in the husk
2-3 strips of bacon (optional)
1/2 lb. fresh smoked mozzarella, cut into 1/4 inch cubes
2 ripe avocados, halved, peeled, and cut into 1/4 inch cubes
1/2 pint grape or cherry tomatoes, halved
8-10 fresh basil leaves, cut into thin strips
Sea salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup Summer Herb Vinaigrette (see below)
Several handfuls of baby arugula or other baby greens

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Soak the corn in a large bowl filled with cold water for 15 minutes. While the corn soaks, cook the bacon (if using) in a skillet over medium heat. Cool on paper towels.

When the corn has finished soaking, put it on a baking sheet and roast for 20 to 25 minutes, until the kernels are tender. Cool it to the point where you can handle it. Husk the corn, and cut the kernels, letting them drop into your salad bowl.

Add the cheese, avocados, tomatoes, basil, salt, and pepper to the bowl with the corn. Crumble the bacon over the veggies. Drizzle with 1/2 cup of the vinaigrette, and toss gently. Serve on a bed of the greens.

Serves 4 to 6

Summer Herb Vinaigrette
I rarely have fresh oregano on hand, so I left it out. Just use whatever you have, substituting as you see fit.

1/3 cup red wine vinegar
2 tsp Dijon mustard
Grated zest and juice of 1 lemon
2 or 3 fresh basil leaves, cut into thin strips
2 tbsp chopped fresh oregano leaves
2 tbsp chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves
3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Combine the first six ingredients in a small bowl, and stir to blend. Whisk in the olive oil in a slow, steady stream until everything is incorporated. Season with salt and pepper. Store the leftover portion covered in the refrigerator. It should keep for several days.

P.S. For more good recipes using fresh, local ingredients, check out Foodie Tots' Local Potluck Tuesdays!

Gift Times Two

2010-07-01T14:26:00.028-04:00

I love to wrap presents. There is something so satisfying about cutting the paper, folding it crisply, and securing it--and the contents underneath--with a criss-cross of ribbon. At Christmastime, I used to get a little out of control. The dining room table would be covered in my Supplies: magazines for collage, recycled ribbons and papers, tape, scissors, stamps, ink pads, hole puncher, colored pens, scraps everywhere--you get the picture. Now that two little ones share our space and time, I have scaled back the operation considerably. Still, in its simplest form, a well wrapped present is, to me, a thing of beauty. It's a gift times two.

I think I love to bake for the same reason. Baked goods are unfailingly handsome. They are golden. Sometimes they come punctuated with a splash of fruity color. Some are crimped, or scored, or fluted, or frosted. They come in pleasing shapes. Sometimes they crackle on top (like those molasses cookies I'm trying very hard to not make until fall). They are beautiful to behold and good to eat. Two pleasures in one.

So when Deb of Smitten Kitchen posted recently about her zucchini galette, I was, well, smitten. I had to be a part of something as gorgeous as the creation in her photos. I wanted to eat it, but more than that, I wanted to make it. And I wanted it to be waiting on the counter when Steve came home. I knew he would like it, and I wanted to give it to him--to us--for dinner.

I would not have undertaken this recipe if the process were complicated. It is simple, but it is not a quick supper. It is best made when you have time to enjoy the vivid rounds of zucchini, the smooth dough, and the process of building it, step by step. I have mentioned before that I am not handy with a rolling pin, but this dough made me feel like an Italian grandmother. (Please, call me Nonna from now on.) And for a present-wrapper like me, it was heaven folding up the edges and brushing them with the egg wash, which I knew would transform my pale dough into a golden beauty upon departure from the oven. A gift going in, and a gift coming out.

A recipe can be a gift, too. In a way, I think that's what food bloggers are really up to. It goes something like this: Take a dish, wrap it in pictures and writing, and pass it on. Here is something for you. I tried to make it as pretty as I could. Hope you like it.

*

Zucchini and Ricotta Galette
Adapted only very slightly from Smitten Kitchen

Instead of the sour cream called for in the original recipe, I used full-fat yogurt because that was what we had on hand. To approximate the texture of sour cream, I drained the yogurt over paper towels set atop a sieve. I only did this for about an hour, but ideally you would give it several hours. Other adaptations I made were to increase the amounts of cheese to make it a bit heartier, and to top the galette with mint instead of basil, again simply because of what we had in the fridge. Next time, I might intersperse strips of prosciutto with the zucchini, and I'm thinking sun-dried tomatoes would be a nice addition as well.

CRUST
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, chilled in the freezer for thirty minutes
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick of butter, cut into pieces and chilled again
1/4 cup sour cream or drained whole milk yogurt
2 tsp fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup ice water

FILLING
1 large or 2 small zucchini, sliced into 1/4 inch rounds
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
2/3 cup ricotta cheese
2/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
1 tbsp slivered mint and/or basil leaves

EGG WASH
1 egg yolk
1 tsp water

Whisk the flour and salt together in a large bowl. Sprinkle the butter cubes over the mixture and cut in with a fork, two knives, or a pastry blender until the largest chunks are pea-sized. Stir together the wet ingredients, and stir these into the butter/flour mixture until large clumps form. Gather the dough together into a ball, being careful not to overmix. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour (more is fine).

Lay out the zucchini rounds on several layers of paper towel, and sprinkle with the salt. Let sit for thirty minutes, and then pat dry. In a small bowl, whisk the olive oil and garlic. In a separate bowl, combine the cheeses, and mix in one teaspoon of the garlic/oil mixture. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees, and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Lightly flour a work surface, and roll out the dough to make a 12-inch disk. Transfer the rolled out dough to the baking sheet. (For a smooth transfer, you may want to try folding the dough into thirds, then moving and unwrapping it.) With a spoon, spread the cheese mixture on top of the dough, leaving a 2-inch border all the way around. Lay the zucchini on top, using a swirl pattern if you want to be fancy. Drizzle the remaining oil on top of the zucchini. Then, fold the edges of the dough over top of the zucchini, creating a border. Combine the egg yolk and water, and brush that on top of the crust.

Bake for 30 to 40 minutes. It's done when the crust is golden brown, the zucchini begins to wither, and the filling puffs up a bit. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with the mint and/or basil. After five minutes, slide the galette onto a cutting board or plate. It's good right away but also tasty at room temperature. The longer you let it sit, the more you can admire it!

INK: Force Fed

2010-06-28T16:43:00.019-04:00

Pan & Ink has loved reading since the beginning of time. (Cooking was a mere interest, not a love, until now.) This is the first of what I hope will be an intermittent series of book reviews on the site. Unfortunately, as you'll find out if you read on, the lead-off book happens to be one I struggled to finish. Look for more reviews to come. I promise to be choosier next time!

I think I am naive. When a book gets press on NPR and in a respected cooking magazine, when it is published by a major publisher, and when its author writes for the New York Times, is it wrong to expect good writing?

When I was reading Spoon Fed by Kim Severson, I had a flashback to my days of teaching middle school. From time to time, I would have my students write short stories. A boy who I'll call Ralph wrote one I still remember well. Ralph's story was a page-long thriller in which a little boy lies in bed at night and listens as a scary noise comes closer and closer to his bedroom. The action reaches a climax when the bedroom door opens and the terrified boy realizes that the sound is only the footsteps of his father, coming to wish him a good night. The story wraps up neatly with the father and son, to use Ralph's words, becoming best friends.

As I forged halfheartedly through this book, I sometimes felt like I was back reading that student's story all over again. Severson spends a lot of time convincing us how chummy she is with foodie celebs like Alice Waters, Ruth Reichl, and Rachael Ray, and an equal amount telling how dreadfully inadequate and nervous these women made her feel until she really knew them. She ends her chapters with life lessons learned from these three and other influential chefs. Too often, the lesson feels like a convenient narrative wrap-up device rather than the organic wisdom of a thoughtfully-told story.

Severson does have a scary story to tell, that of the alcoholism that she says nearly killed her. But she largely glosses over this, in the same way that she barely describes what must have been an interesting experience writing about food for the Anchorage Daily News. Instead, she focuses on her feelings about coming into contact with big names in the food world. And her feelings seem incongruous with her age and position. Despite her professed desire to "keep it as real as I can," she continually comes off as star-struck in a way that a mature, middle-aged, highly accomplished writer need not be.

The best parts of this book come when Severson writes about regular people and the places they inhabit. Her descriptions of New Orleans after Katrina (which is bizarrely recapped as if readers will have forgotten: "In case you don't remember...") are vivid and moving. Similarly, the portrait of her hometown of Cumberland, Minnesota is revealing and memorable. In these sections, she avoids over-explaining and lets the details speak for themselves.

Severson ends the book asserting that she has learned not to try to be someone she isn't. She admits to having sometimes used her connections with celebrities to impress friends and family, but she is resolved to be her "authentic self" from now on. But these professions don't ring true in her stories about the culinary celebrities she has befriended over the years, or in the self-congratulatory way she writes about moving from the San Francisco Chronicle to the Times: "I hadn't really imagined working at the NYT...I seriously never felt that I had what it took. It was kind of like playing first base for my women's recreational softball team. I was a star on that team, but that didn't mean I could play for the Yankees."

I know, I'm naive. Not every book needs to be a literary masterpiece. It's just that I was disappointed. (I mean, look at that great jacket design! I had high hopes!) Is it old-fashioned to think a book should contain something special? Anyone can write a blog. You just click and you're published. But a book has lots of hurdles to jump through before it can wind up in print, on the radio, in magazines, and on library and bookstore shelves.

I can't help but wonder whose stories got passed over when this book was given the green light at the publisher's. I imagine an office with a desk surrounded by manuscripts in teetering piles. I wish Severson had given me a book that left no uncertainty that hers was the best in the stack.

Cherries Go Savory

2010-06-16T22:06:00.021-04:00

As you might suspect from the last post, and the one before that, and several before that, we've been on dessert overload around here. Now, that is usually not an issue for me. I have a very high sugar tolerance. But with summer's heat pounding down on us with its full force lately, my body is craving salad more than butter these days.

As promised, I did pick up another quart of cherries at the farmer's market last Tuesday. This time, I allowed my family to do more eating straight from the cardboard tub. This was divine and could have more than satisfied our deprived, grocery-store-trained little taste buds. We had nearly made our way through the entire pile of them, however, when I began to get creative urges. From then on, they were off limits.

In addition to the cherries, I had purchased a few stalks of rhubarb. It was a few days after our trip to the market when I read in my Food Lover's Companion that rhubarb is highly perishable. I looked in the fridge. Yup. In place of my crisp stalks were six rubbery lengths that had more in common with a deflated bicycle tire than the celery they resembled earlier in the week. It was time to use those babies up, and preferably in something where they would be cooked to the point of mushiness so that no one could detect that they were slightly past their prime. That's how we wound up with a tangy but sweet buckwheat cherry-rhubarb crisp. Yummmm...

You see? Even when I intend to write about salad, the sweets have a way of barging in and hijacking the story. Okay, so it hasn't been a butter-free week in our household. But I did put the last of the cherries to work in an improvised salad that got good reviews around here. The salad was conceived in one of those a-ha moments, when, cleaning out a cabinet, I spied a container of greenish-black French lentils that hadn't seen daylight for years. When they hit the counter next to my bright red cherries, I began to imagine a salad that would at least be pretty if not also tasty. Following the color-composition method that had brought me to this revelation, I added some green, some brown, and some white, and this salad was born.

With the crisp fennel, tart cherries, and nutty lentils, it's a refreshing, comforting antidote to the sun's fury. And, if you've been hitting the desserts as enthusiastically as I have lately, it'll make you feel quite virtuous as well.

*

Lentil Salad with Cherries and Fennel

Serves two as a main course, four as a side dish

1/2 cup French lentils
1/2 cup orzo or other small pasta
Small head of fennel, very thinly sliced or shaved
12 to 15 pitted ripe cherries (dried would be good as well)
Scant 1/4 cup pine nuts, toasted
2 tbsp fresh mint, sliced
2 tbsp lemon juice
1-2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp crumbled ricotta salata or feta cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

In a medium saucepan, cover the lentils with water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes, or until lentils are tender but not falling apart, adding water as needed. Remove the lentils to a big bowl, add water to fill the pot halfway or so, and bring to a boil once again. When it's boiling, salt the water and add the pasta, cooking for 8-10 minutes, until al dente. Drain the pasta, and let it cool a little bit before adding to your bowl. Loosely chop the cherries, and set them on a paper towel to dry. If they are very juicy, give them a quick rinse so that they do not turn your pasta pink. Put all of the remaining ingredients into your bowl, and toss well.

*

P.S. Click over to Foodie Tots to find more inspiration for cooking from the farmer's market!

Cake Girl

2010-06-14T20:19:00.020-04:00

I used to be a cookie girl. Well, okay, I still am a cookie girl. Big time. Especially those molasses cookies I haven't yet written about. But they're so warming and pleasantly heavy that I don't generally make them in the summertime, so they'll have to wait.

Lately, on top of being a cookie girl, I find myself becoming a cake girl. Now, for afternoon tea, there is still nothing that beats a chewy cookie in my book. They're easy to grab in the morning, too, if I can't have my breakfast right away. But there is something so dignified about a cake. It feels more stately when I walk into the kitchen and see a cake on a ceramic plate. (This one is resting on a plate that Steve made ages ago.) It's beautiful in a way that a half-empty tupperware of snickerdoodles can never be.

Despite its lofty air, cake doesn't have to be snooty. It can be quite simple both to make and to eat. My daily forays into the food blogosphere have several times now turned up a recipe for French yogurt cake. I tried one over the weekend, and, despite my mother's protestations to the contrary, it was a dud. I kept coming back to it every few hours for a new forkful, each time hoping that the flavors would have magically melded into something edible. No such luck. I have never thrown a dessert into the trash before, but that cake had to take the plunge.

Pitching it wasn't so hard, though, because I had already found another recipe to try. This one comes from Orangette, who encouraged me to take her base recipe and make it my own. So I tweaked it a little bit and was pleased with the results. The cake has a light, delicate crumb. It has splashes of blueberry, hints of lemon and almond, and a slight tang from the yogurt. There is nothing fussy about it. It's not even that sinful.

And it doesn't mind if you're a cake girl, a cookie girl, a French chef, or a humble home cook (that's me). Enjoy!

*

French Yogurt Cake
Adapted only slightly from Orangette

The original recipe is charmingly written using yogurt jars for the measurements (i.e. "two jars of sugar"), since that's how the recipe has traditionally been prepared in France. I have translated jars into cups here, though I do love the image of dipping the same jar into sugar, flour, and oil to progressively build a cake. If you don't have almonds, you can replace them with 1/2 cup of flour. Other fruits would be tasty as well. I can imagine raspberries being quite nice, or even sauteed apples or pineapple. Be sure to check out the original recipe for additional suggestions on ways to flavor this cake. It's not very sweet, so it makes a great coffee cake or afternoon snack. With vanilla ice cream or a simple blueberry (or other berry) sauce, this would make a delicious dessert as well.

1/2 cup plain, full-fat yogurt
1 cup sugar
3 large eggs
Zest of one lemon
1/8 tsp almond extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup finely ground almonds
2 tsp. baking powder
Pinch of fine sea salt
Scant 1/2 cup canola oil (olive oil could work as well, for a slightly different flavor)
3/4 to 1 cup blueberries*
Confectioner's sugar, for dusting (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Generously butter a 9-inch cake pan. In a mixing bowl, combine the yogurt, sugar, eggs, zest, and almond extract. Stir until well blended, with no lumps remaining in the yogurt. Add the flour, ground almonds, baking powder, and sea salt to the bowl, and stir just to combine. It's okay if you can still see some streaks of flour. Add the oil and stir until the batter is smooth and the oil fully incorporated, about 20 to 30 seconds. Pour half of the batter into the cake pan. Sprinkle most of the blueberries on top, reserving fifteen or twenty to sprinkle on the top. Pour the rest of the batter into the pan and top with the remaining blueberries. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool on a rack for twenty minutes. Remove from the cake pan to finish cooling on a rack.

* If you use frozen blueberries, there is no need to thaw them. It sometimes helps to toss them in 1 to 2 teaspoons of flour before adding them to the batter; this can prevent sinking to the bottom.

Life is Just a Bowl of ...

2010-06-09T15:44:00.036-04:00

Yesterday was almost a bad day. An ordinary morning and early afternoon went downhill very fast when, upon waking from his nap, Gabe commenced a mammoth tantrum. I believe it was set off when I announced my intention to change his diaper. I have rarely seen the likes of such a fit.

One hallmark of our son's tantrums is what we call the "Lovey! NO!" phenomenon. This is where Gabe begs for something--his lovey, or a cup of water, let's say--and then when we give it to him, he cries "No, no, no!". This can go on for quite some time, with him convincingly demanding something that he very well may want, only to just as vehemently refuse when we offer it to him. Yesterday, we went through several iterations of "Lovey! NO!", with the object of simultaneous desire and disgust shifting every ten minutes or so: diaper change, water, Lovey, getting up on the couch, dinner (which he calls "lunch"), Lovey again, and so on.

I find that after some time attempting to manage this, it becomes clear that I must give in and ride the tantrum out along with Gabe. Typically, having abandoned my futile attempts to appease him, I feel my face take on a stony expression, as if I'm transported to some other place. I imagine that similar skills are required during meditation, say, or interrogation. This is one of those times when it's important to remember the Buddhist teaching of impermanence. The knowledge that "this too shall pass" has gotten me through many a rough spot in my short parenting career.

Maybe it's fitting, then, that the day was redeemed after all by a visit to the farmer's market. Pleasures are impermanent, too, be they parental, agricultural, or culinary. When the tantrum, storm-like, blew over, the three of us (baby, toddler, mom) trekked out to the market that convenes on Tuesday afternoons just a few blocks from our building. The goods spread before us on folding tables, the muted light of an early summer evening bringing out their full color. Strawberries, arugula, basil, cucumbers, chives, and lettuces lay in appealing little heaps and piles, but more irresistible than any of these delicacies were the cherries. I have always loved cherries. Like a good avocado, a ripe cherry demands immediate, passionate attention.

Our little caravan (Gabe in the stroller, baby on my chest, and I the sherpa) headed back home with a quart of precious, ephemeral sweet-tart gems. Gabe, who had refused most of his dinner earlier in the evening, took an interest in the cherries. I hoisted him back up into his high chair and watched him get all juicy, popping cherry bites until I finally had to hide them in the cabinet to keep him from eating the whole quart. He then proceeded to devour the pasta he had earlier rejected. Few things make me happier than seeing my little man enjoying healthy food. All that bluster from the tantrum had passed, a happy equilibrium taking its place. Things were looking up for this day.

One evening several weeks ago, Steve came home and asked me, as he always does, about our day. (Good day? bad day? somewhere in between?) I surprised us both when I answered, "Every day is a good day." Whoa. This was a revelation, even to me, and I said it. This is not the type of thing you would have heard me say five years ago, or even one year ago. But right now it is true. I think what I meant, and what continues to amaze me, is that I don't have a chance to dwell on the low moments. And not for lack of them. There are tantrums and other kinds of asocial behavior to deal with every day, many times a day. It's just that it's hard to hold a grudge with a toddler. Despite the tantrums, despite the frequent and messy refusal of food I've carefully prepared, despite the short naps and the sore back, at evening's final reckoning the accumulated joy far outweighs the moments of despair.

Not only did Gabe recover his spirits and eat his dinner last night, but he also learned a new word: "cheh-wee." And I found a new recipe. After a quick scouring of my cookbooks, I decided to entrust my loot to Patricia Wells, whose At Home in Provence has supplied me with two other favorite recipes (a lemon tart and a ricotta cheesecake, both delicious). Now I have a third to thank her for. The tart was fun to make and a sinful pleasure to consume. We ate it for dessert, nibbled on it at breakfast, and sneaked small slices here and there in the afternoon. (Well, okay, the latter deed was performed by me alone, since Steve was at work.)

Sadly, just like ripe cherries and tantrums, desserts, too, are impermanent.

And yet...there's still some cream left over in the fridge, and I stashed the remains of my ground almonds in the freezer, and Patricia Wells seems to like cherries as much as I do, because she has several other recipes she'd like for me to try.

Chance I'll be back at the farmers market next week, hoping to procure more cherries before their season ends: 100%.

*

Cherry-Almond Tart
from Patricia Wells' At Home in Provence

Tarts look impressive but are not difficult to make. You do need a tart pan, which has a removable bottom for easy cutting and serving. (Nine-inch is good for most recipes, including this one.) If you like to bake, this is a nice and inexpensive item to have in your kitchen. I especially like Wells' tart recipes because she uses a pat-in-the-pan crust. (My success rate with crusts that require rolling out is sadly low.) Pitting the cherries does take some time, but it is a fun and juicy affair. You can buy a special pitter at kitchen supply stores, but I just used the side of a chef's knife to smash each cherry (the way you would for an olive), and then I removed the pit with my fingers. This probably took me ten minutes. The recipe also calls for blanched, ground almonds. I saved a step by buying a little bag of pre-blanched, slivered almonds, which I then whirred in the coffee grinder for a few seconds. One more note: kirsch is a cherry liqueur that I've seen in numerous recipes over the years and thought about buying but always put off. I finally purchased a small bottle for $6.99, and I look forward to being able to make all of those other yummy-sounding desserts I passed up before now. Serving suggestions: This is delicious with vanilla ice cream. It's also quite nice the next day, served cold from the refrigerator.

PASTRY
1 stick (8 tbsp) unsalted butter, melted and cooled, plus more for buttering the tart pan
1/2 cup sugar
A pinch of fine sea salt
1/8 tsp almond extract
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp finely ground blanched almonds
1 1/4 cups plus 1 tbsp all-purpose flour

FILLING
5 tbsp heavy cream
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup sugar
1 tbsp all-purpose flour
2 tbsp finely ground blanched almonds
1 tbsp kirsch

4 tbsp finely ground blanched almonds
1 pound fresh cherries, pitted
Confectioners' sugar, for garnish (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350. Generously butter the bottom and sides of the tart pan.

In a medium bowl, combine the butter, sugar, salt, almond and vanilla extracts, and ground almonds. Stir to blend. Gradually incorporate enough flour to form a smooth dough. Gather the dough into a ball and place it into the center of the tart pan. Starting from the middle, press the dough out and up the sides of the pan. It's okay if the dough is very thin; just aim for a fairly even thickness all around. Put the pan in center of the oven, and bake until the dough is just lightly brown and slightly puffy, about ten minutes. Take it out of the oven and set it aside to cool, leaving the oven on.

While the dough is baking, make the filling. Combine the cream, egg, and almond and vanilla extracts in a small bowl, whisking to blend. Stir in the sugar, flour, ground almonds, and kirsch.

Sprinkle two tablespoons of ground almonds on top of the prebaked crust (to prevent it from becoming soggy). Arrange the cherries in a single layer on top of the almonds. Pour the filling over the cherries, and then sprinkle with the remaining two tablespoons of almonds. Bake in the center of the oven for about 45 minutes, until the filling is set and the crust is golden brown. Cool on a rack. For a pretty presentation, sprinkle with confectioners' sugar just before serving.

*

P.S. Check out FoodieTots' Local Potluck Tuesday to find more ways to enjoy early summer's bounty!

One Man's Trash...

2010-06-04T15:42:00.029-04:00

One of the things I love about our building is the trash room. I know, that sounds funny. But it is a great feature. Instead of having to schlep a sagging trash bag down four flights of stairs and across a parking lot, like we did in our old building, we simply walk out our door, turn right after six or so paces, and there it is. The trash closet. There are two large bins for garbage, a laundry basket for paper recycling, and a tub for glass, plastic, and cans. There is one on every floor. How civilized.

Despite my appreciation of this amenity, I am always wary as I bend in to drop my goods, fearing the creepy-crawlies I (probably wrongly) imagine lurking in the shadowy corners. Insect surveillance is just part of my wiring, especially in the summertime. But if one is willing to dwell a moment, there are occasionally small prizes to be found in the trash closet. Today, I scored three cooking magazines. They're several months old, but hey, there's nothing up-to-the-moment about my cooking, so I eagerly scooped them up and gave them a second life in our kitchen.

There are a couple of ideas I've been reflecting on lately. In my effort to try to improvise more in my cooking, I want to do better at a) using what's in the kitchen already, and b) having certain key ingredients on hand. (I've been stocking up on chocolate, for example, and lemons. You can create a lot of goodness between these two ingredients and the basic pantry staples.) So it was serendipitous when I discovered that one of my trash closet finds includes an article about resourceful cooking.

Jack Turner's piece in the May issue of Bon Appetit celebrates cucina povera, the cooking philosophy native to Puglia, Italy. The phrase translates as "cuisine of the poor," but Turner sees inventiveness rather than poverty. The region's scarcity of resources brings out wonderful qualities in its inhabitants: creative cooking and an antipathy to waste. There's nothing poor about the simple dishes he tastes on his tour of this region situated squarely in the heel of the boot.

Now, I am not trying to compare myself to the marvelously skilled Pugliese grandmothers who cook up things like dried fava and potato puree with dandelion greens (from the garden, naturally). But I like that there is a phrase, especially an Italian phrase, that encompasses what I want to do. Cucina povera sounds so much more romantic than "budget cooking" or "raiding the fridge."

One of the key precepts of cucina povera is, as Turner puts it, "Waste nothing and stretch everything." When Steve and I clean out the refrigerator every week or so, we inevitably discover items we meant but failed to use while fresh. Too much of our food ends up growing old in the cold, back corners of the fridge before its eventual banishment to the trash closet.

For these reasons, it felt good last week when I improvised myself a tasty little salad for lunch, all out of ingredients we just happened to have on hand. This salad was inspired by a very simple one I read about on the blog Orangette. That salad consists of chickpeas, lemon juice, salt, parmesan cheese, and olive oil. I've made it numerous times, and it's quite nice.

On this occasion, we happened to have a small hunk of ricotta salata and a pretty wedge of radicchio kicking around in the fridge. (The radicchio's first incarnation was as a topping for a delicious pizza Steve had made a few days earlier.) I combined these two remnants with some chickpeas, salt, oil, and parsley, and it made a simple, piquant centerpiece to a light lunch while the boys napped.

And, just in case I need another incentive for reducing our kitchen waste, I can always be glad that my scraps aren't fattening up any creepy-crawlies, real or imagined.

*

Quick Chickpea Salad with Radicchio and Ricotta Salata

Orangette writes that her husband strongly perfers Goya or Trader Joe's chickpeas to the other canned brands out there. I don't think I have a very sensitive palate, but I can tell that Goya chickpeas are much more flavorful and have a better texture than the 365 Whole Foods ones we've bought up till now. If you're curious, do your own taste test and see what you like best. For the cheese in this recipe, feel free to substitute feta, parmesan, or pecorino romano.

1 15 oz. can of chickpeas
1/2 cup finely chopped raddichio
3 tbsp. crumbled ricotta salata (or other cheese--see note)
2 tbsp. chopped parsley
2-3 tsp. lemon zest
pinch of sea salt
2-3 tbsp. olive oil

Toss everything together, adjust oil and salt as needed, and eat.

The Real Thing

2010-06-02T17:12:00.009-04:00

When I was a kid, there was a girl who had no television. Her name was Michelle Prauser, and she was in the grade above me at school. I think her family was French. In my young mind, this somehow explained why they had no TV in their home. The Prauser parents had clearly made a philosophical (not economic) decision to go without. This felt very exotic to me. I wondered what they did all the time. Play board games? Go for walks? Sit around and talk to each other? Read? I liked to do all of those things, but not when I could be watching a good TV program. No matter how much I tried to make sense of it, the Prauser family's TV-lessness was just plain weird.

And now I'm the oddball. In our home, we have a TV, but we don't get any reception. And we kind of like it.

It hasn't always been this way. When we first moved in to our current apartment, we miraculously got cable without paying a cent. It is probably wrong to admit that this went on for several years. And we loved it. I would come home from teaching school and click on the Food Network. On a good day, I'd get home by 4:30 to watch Giada De Laurentiis. Next up was Ina Garten. And after that, if I was really trying to avoid exercise or grading papers, I'd sit through Sandra Lee's Semi-Homemade.

This was before we had an Internet connection at home, and maybe even before Food Network had a website. I remember jumping up to get a pen and an index card when one of these women was making something I wanted to try at home. I'd scribble furiously as they talked, anxious not to leave out a single detail.

Inevitably, our television fortunes changed. It wasn't unusual for our covert cable to disappear during a storm, the screen reduced to "bees," as I used to call static in my younger, TV-lovin' years. When this happened, our connection would usually resume within a few hours and we'd be happily back to watching whatever was on. But one day, after a particularly bad storm, the bees settled in to stay. Not only did we not get any cable channels anymore, but we couldn't even get network TV. That was over two years ago. Rabbit ears or a converter box would surely deliver us from the media hinterland, but we haven't bothered to invest in either one.

Though I am happy with a Netflix subscription, the Internet, and my books for entertainment, I do miss some of my Food Network teachers. Despite her distracting cleavage and wedding-perfect hair, I like Giada De Laurentiis. She may not look like it, but she is the real thing. Several of her recipes are in our regular rotation, among them something delicious called Torta di Pasta. So when it was time to make Steve a birthday cake last weekend, I thought of her. She would have something easy but elegant for me, I felt sure.

I ended up making her Ricotta Orange Pound Cake with Strawberries. As I expected, it was simple to put together and a treat to eat. When we didn't have Amaretto or cake flour in the kitchen (and The Saver asked that I not run out and buy them) I conquered my fear of not following a recipe exactly. For Amaretto, I substituted almond extract, and for cake flour I filled a two-cup measure with three tablespoons of cornstarch and added all-purpose flour on top of that to make one and a half cups. Based on a cursory read through the comments section, I used a bundt pan instead of a loaf pan.

All was well--beyond well, if I do say so myself.

In a few hours, Giada will be coming on in millions of proud TV-watching American households. Sometimes I still wish I could join them. But then I probably wouldn't get around to sharing this recipe with you. I'm glad I did.

Happiness is a Ripe Avocado

2010-05-24T14:46:00.005-04:00

West coasters probably don't have to follow this dictum, but here in D.C., a ripe avocado in the produce section is not to be ignored. When I give a squeeze and feel that telling softness, I always snatch a few up in eager anticipation of their rich, savory goodness. Once they're in the cart, however, I never assume I'm home free. There's no worse feeling than standing at the kitchen counter, looking down at your treasure--mouth watering a little bit, imagining that first spoonful--and opening it up to find the fruit gray and mushy. So it is a truly special event when I cut in and see that inimitably bright but soft shade of green beaming all of its delicious promise back at me. I love cupping the nubby half in my hand, hacking into the pit with my knife, twisting it to remove, and slicing into the smooth contents with a teaspoon.

Last Sunday, we had some friends over for lunch. These are the kind of friends who host us far more often than we host them. And Claire's table always sports a lovely spread of nutritious and flavorful food. I come away from their home feeling pleasantly full, healthy, and well cared for.

I've been reading essays by M.F.K. Fisher recently, and one of her recurring themes is the pleasure of what I'll call conscious cooking. It's just this: as you prepare a meal, thinking about those who will consume it. Fisher writes that she would decide how she wanted her companions to feel during and after a meal, and she would plan her menu accordingly. My favorite example of this comes from a tender vignette about making a Valentine's Day supper for her two little girls. Imagine mother and daughters before the fire "drink[ing] soup slowly from solid little brown casseroles...sip[ping] cool milk from silver mugs." For dessert: "heart-shaped open sandwich[es] of dark, moist whole grain bread, sweet butter, and red currant jelly." It sounds magical to the little girl in me. To the mother in me, it sounds like love.

Following Fisher's lead, I had Claire in mind when I selected this salad for our lunch. It's healthy and hearty, and the flavors are unusual. I love the textures: the soft dried fruit, the crunchy almonds, the al dente quinoa, and the smooth avocado. Cumin, olive oil, lemon, paprika, and coriander mingle for a warm, slightly spicy dressing. I tossed the ingredients together in a pretty ceramic bowl (made by Steve--another, albeit non-culinary, embodiment of Fisher's philosophy, now that I think about it), hoping to cultivate for Claire the same comfortable feeling I have when she feeds me.

So here I was again, offering my cooking to others. But this time the result was totally different. No clotheslines, no grubbies, and no to-do list. Instead of the awkward pause, this time I got the highly-coveted recipe request. (Ding, ding, ding--we have a winner!)

More important, though, was that the conversation flowed while seconds were passed, and then everyone sat back feeling pleasantly full and glad to be together. It was a good comeback from the blueberry bread downer and some bland bran muffins I had made earlier in the weekend.

No doubt Fisher's conscious cooking approach figured into my success. And the ripe avocado? Well, that's always a good sign.

*

If you want to make the salad, here is the link: Quinoa and Avocado Salad from Fine Cooking.

Enjoy!

Next Time

2010-05-15T17:21:00.004-04:00

Not every recipe works out.

The other night, I needed to prepare something breakfasty for my neighbors to munch on at the start of our co-op work day. The stakes, I reasoned, were relatively low. My creation would be consumed distractedly in the laundry room amid shirts and jeans hanging off the clotheslines. My neighbors would be dressed in their grubbies, making small talk while scanning the to-do list for a chore to put their name beside. No one would be expecting a taste sensation; rather, my offering would represent good intentions and maybe bring people closer together for its being homemade.

Nevertheless, I wanted it to be good. I found a blueberry bread recipe that I had made once before, with decent results. Since I also wanted to see if I could bring off another tasty improvisation, I plotted how I might take this recipe from decent to delicious.

The opportunity to wing it arose when I noticed that we had only one egg when the recipe called for two. Too late to call up the neighbors, I conducted a quick internet search and remembered that eggs serve several purposes in recipes. They leaven, they bind, and they moisten. Hmmm....In the fridge, I had two dark and mushy bananas looking for work, so I mashed those and hoped they might fill in some of the missing moisture while adding a nice flavor dimension to the bread. I added some extra baking powder to compensate for the leavening that my absent egg might have supplied. And I upped the cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla, recalling that the bread had been a bit bland last time. Hopes were high as I mixed it all up and put the loaf pan in the oven.

The results, alas, were just so-so. The banana gave the bread a nice sweetness, and the spices complemented the fruit well. Texture-wise, however, this bread was more akin to a dried loofah: a bit chewy, even rubbery. The oatmeal called for by the recipe produced a bits-of-cardboard feel on the tongue.

But the show had to go on. It was bed time, and my creation was due in the laundry room bright and early Saturday morning. Maybe, I thought, I could get down there early, put out my pretty but mediocre offering, and escape before anyone knew it was mine. No such luck. A few women had already begun gathering when I came in. A lovely woman from the fifth floor commented on how delicious the bread looked. I said it was a new recipe (small lie) and allowed that it was okay, not great (also a small lie---it may not even measure up to being called okay). She said how much she loves the molasses cookies I've made for co-op gatherings. (Maybe that should be my next post; there, I follow the recipe to a T, with sumptuous results.) A few minutes later, I saw that she had taken a piece and tasted it. She looked down at it and said nothing. Awkward pause.

Did I learn something from this? Well, despite the disappointing outcome, I made some good choices. The banana was tasty, and the enhanced spices strengthened the flavor. I looked in the fridge, thought about what I had, and took some risks.That's good, even when mistakes follow. I learned not to skimp on eggs until I know better how to make up for them.

And I practiced not being perfect. I filled that awkward silence with a conversation starter: "We're off to Philadelphia tomorrow" (her daughter's hometown)... And then we chatted about Philadelphia, cruising babies, and Steve's new job.

And then it was time to prune the ivy and clean out the tool closet. People filed out of the laundry room, leaving behind my so-so bread and a big bowl of doughnut holes. (I had two, glazed. Perfect.)

Beauty and Brains

2010-05-10T09:38:00.006-04:00

Behold the Breton Buckwheat Cake I made for my mother and sister last Sunday. The recipe came to me through two trusted sources, both food blogs I admire (links below). In each case, the cake was singled out as the best recipe in David Lebowitz's The Sweet Life in Paris, which I plan to read one day soon. Ordinarily, I only need one rave review to get me composing the shopping list for a new dessert recipe, so when I came across this cake a second time, there was no question that I would be making it.

I have to admit that the words wheat and cake didn't initially co-habitate all that well in my brain's desserts file. And I don't think the buck- prefix made things any better. The only cakes I've made before have involved all-purpose flour, which quietly creates structure while the other ingredients proclaim their flavors. As it happens, I've been trying to boost the fiber in my diet lately, and so have been drawn to recipes featuring whole grains. Plus, the photographs Heidi Swanson took of the cake transported me straight to visions of afternoon tea. So I got over my initial hesitation, went to the natural foods store, and bought myself a bag of buckwheat flour.

The flour has what I now think of as a lovely, sandy color. (I had to check the label twice to be sure this was buckwheat and not ground pepper.) Added to the mixing bowl, it stayed put (no white flour clouds here) without weighing things down. The batter has a rich, toasty hue and nutty flavor, plus a grown-up sweetness thanks to the other key ingredient, rum.

Be sure to follow Heidi's instructions about not letting the cake get too dry. I left mine in for just 38 minutes (recipe calls for 45), and it came out a bit too dry but still delicious. I am definitely planning to make this again, special occasion or no.

*

Here's the link: David Lebovitz's Breton Buckwheat Cake via 101 Cookbooks

P.S. The other food blog that mentions Breton Buckwheat Cake is Jennifer Reese's funny, informative Tipsy Baker.

Mix, Wait, Bake, Eat

2010-05-08T15:17:00.004-04:00

The mess in our apartment is like the moon. It waxes and wanes. During the morning hours, it expands; during the afternoon and evening hours, on a good day, it slowly disappears, the toys and clothes returning to their rightful places. Peace, at last. The next day, the clutter rises and fills the place again.

As a stay-at-home mom, I witness the mess in all of its stages. The constant disarray unsettles me and on some days I feel like I'm either thinking about cleaning it up or actually doing it all day long. My mother-in-law says that she found putting away her sons' toys therapeutic. I see what she means. Some people meditate; I pick up. Once it's neat, I can think again.

In his introduction to My Bread, Jim Lahey writes that he started baking because it let him escape from the feelings of insecurity that clouded other areas of his life. Baking and cooking transplant us to a methodical, controlled, worry-free space. Before taking up bread baking, Lahey was a sculptor working towards a degree in fine arts. Baking, sculpting, cleaning. We all find our oases of order in the midst of life's chaos.

I have found myself wanting to cook and bake more in the last year than I ever did before. As I read the introduction to Lahey's book, I wondered whether I, too, was questing after a certainty that was missing in my life. During my first pregnancy, a friend told me to think of my labor as the first of many times when I would feel out of control. As a parent, she said, I would need to get used to that feeling. She was right.

I had never made yeast bread before I checked out this book from the library. It seemed too hard, too labor-intensive. It made me worry. But Lahey convinced me that I could and should do it. His basic method is easy. It only requires planning ahead (twenty-four hours ahead, actually). I know, that's a lot of planning ahead for a busy person, but trust me, it's worth it. You will want to take a picture of the results and send it to your relatives and friends. I wouldn't have believed it possible except that Lahey assured me that his method would turn out a beautiful, tasty loaf every time, and it did.

What a nice thing to be certain of.

*

Here is the link to Mark Bittman's 2006 New York Times article featuring Lahey's bread recipe: Jim Lahey's No-Knead Bread

Happy baking!

Inhale

2010-05-05T16:13:00.002-04:00

Do you remember when you were growing up and everybody's house had a different smell? I remember one in particular. The odor that greeted you upon arriving at this little girl's home made me think of old photos in a box in the attic. The smell infused our play there with a touch of mystery. Decades later, Steve lived with a Lebanese-American friend in Baltimore. Mornings, Ziad baked pita bread with dried herbs and olive oil. Their tiny row house harbored a scent of oregano and thyme.

In our apartment building, every floor has a distinctive smell at dinnertime. You can tell who the good cooks are by going up and down in the stairwell, opening the fire door a crack, and inhaling. We got lucky. Not only do we have neighbors from whom we can borrow a cup of sugar on a moment's notice, but we also share the floor with some talented home cooks. In the early evening, the scents sometimes make me want to drop by unannounced, hoping for a taste.

Some cooking odors seem to evaporate just as dinner is served; others linger for a long time. Once, Steve made a three-beef daube that involved marinating the beef in a pot of red wine and chopped onions--on the counter top, overnight. For weeks, the apartment smelled like rotting leaves. That recipe has not been welcome in our home since. More smell-favorable nights in our kitchen feature things like roasted chicken, lentil stew, any kind of cookies, and garlic sauteing in olive oil.

When we were contemplating selling our apartment and moving into a house (plans on hold for now), a relative shared a realtor's trick: Brew Dunkin Donuts coffee an hour before the open house. Apparently, people love the scent of it. That's too sneaky for me. Wouldn't it be more genuine to bake a real batch of cookies or granola? (I will take any excuse to have a batch of cookies around.)

Is now where I admit that this post was inspired by the occasional not-so-nice odors that result from having two sons in diapers? Whatever your reasons for wanting to fill your space with the smells of home-cooking, I think that you will enjoy the two recipes below. And I hope that you are inspired to cook and share your best-smelling recipes.

Coconut Almond Granola
(adapted from Ina Garten)

I love to eat this granola with soy milk and Grape Nuts in the morning for a wholesome, filling breakfast. The original recipe calls for twice the butter and no oil. To lighten things up a bit, I like to use grapeseed oil in place of some of that butter. It's a light-flavored oil that has anti-oxidant properties. Olive oil would also work, but it does have a slightly stronger flavor. You can use any kind of dried fruit you like. Sometimes, I just throw in a handful of raisins because that's what I have in the cupboard, but this is delicious with dried cherries and apricots as well.

3 cups rolled oats
1/2 cup sliced almonds
1/2 cup unsweetened, shredded coconut
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. butter
2 tbsp. grapeseed or olive oil
6 tbsp. honey
1/2 cup chopped dried fruit

Preheat the oven to 325F and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. In a large bowl, stir together the oats, almonds, coconut, pumpkin seeds, and salt. In a small saucepan set over low heat, melt the butter with the oil and honey, stirring to blend. Pour the honey mixture over the oat mixture and stir well. Spread in the pan and bake until golden brown. This takes 20 minutes in my oven, but yours may go faster. Stir it once or twice as it bakes. Cool on a rack and then mix in the dried fruit. Use the parchment paper to transfer the granola to a jar for storage. This makes about 5 cups and keeps well for over a week in a closed mason jar.

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Pasta with a Sauce of Black Olives, Orange, Pine Nuts, and Golden Raisins

This recipe comes from a wonderful cookbook by the Italian chef Lidia Bastianich called Lidia's Family Table. These particular pages of the book are wrinkled by steam, stained with sauce, and in need of a good tape job to ensure they don't fall out of the cookbook. Needless to say, this recipe is well loved, and you will see why. The recipe as written is quite long, so I am condensing it here, with a few slight adjustments. We like to eat this with penne, though Lidia recommends capellini or another thin pasta. Lidia always uses a lot of olive oil in her recipes, and I think you can get by with less. Same goes for the pine nuts. Also, she calls for golden raisins, but we never have those in the cabinet, so dark raisins it is, and it's still mouth-wateringly good. Don't forget to save two cups of the pasta water before you strain it. Lastly, I highly recommend that you pair a glass of red wine and some crusty bread on hand for maximum enjoyment of this dish.

1 lb. dry pasta
1/4 to 1/2 cup olive oil
5-6 garlic cloves, sliced
1 1/2 cup black olives, pitted and chopped
1/2 cup raisins
3 tbsp. orange zest
2/3 c. orange juice (fresh-squeezed is best)
1/2 to 1 cup pine nuts, toasted
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp chopped parsley

Bring a large pot of water to boil, add salt once it's boiling, and boil the pasta until al dente (taste after 7-8 minutes to check doneness--will vary depending on the kind of pasta you use). As the pasta finishes cooking, you will want to reserve two cups of the liquid for use in the sauce.

Set a large skillet over medium heat and add 3-4 tablespoons of olive oil. Once the oil is hot and fragrant, add the garlic and saute, stirring, for a minute or two. Then, one by one, add each of the following ingredients, stirring and sauteing for a minute before adding the next one: olives, raisins, zest, juice, pine nuts. Once the juice is in, the sauce will be bubbling. Let the sauce simmer until the juice has nearly evaporated. Then, add two cups of pasta water and simmer, stirring, for a few more minutes, letting the sauce reduce by about half. (This should look and smell heavenly!) Finally, stir in 1/4 teaspoon of salt, and add the pasta to the sauce. Taste and add more salt and olive oil as needed. Finish by tossing in most of the parsley, saving a little bit for garnish.

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Perfect

2010-05-04T16:35:00.003-04:00

Until recently, I have been a religious recipe follower. My obsession with doing it just right irritates certain members of my family, who wish I would loosen up and use my instincts. It's just that I want a dish to be perfect, and I trust that any recipe writer worth her stripes tested the heck out of whatever it is until it's just the way it should be. So why not follow the recipe to a t?

Well, I've learned something. Really, there is no one perfect way to make a recipe. Taste is utterly subjective. I, for example, love the earthy crunchiness of Grape Nuts. My husband thinks they taste like cardboard. He's right, actually, but I still eat them every morning, and he still avoids them. On the other hand, when it comes to molasses cookies, we are in agreement. The best ones have a sugary, cracked crust and a chewy, wet middle. But some people clearly prefer them cakey. Why else would they sell them that way at Starbucks?

The point I am coming to see about all of this is that cooking and even (my favorite) baking allow room for and even revel in in-exactitude. What's perfect to me is not perfect to you, unless we are drinking wine and sitting around a comfortable table, enjoying each other's company. And then it all tastes exactly as it should, because so much more goes into taste than the way the food molecules combine. It's the process: the feel of the food, the sounds and smells of the kitchen, the charge that comes with instinct and creativity. Perhaps most important of all, it's the people you're making food for, be it only you or a houseful of friends.

This blog is called Pan & Ink. I want it to be about making good food with simple ingredients and without spending a lot of money. It will be about eating healthfully most of the time and indulging in decadent desserts some of the time. What I'm reading might make an appearance, too, especially if it relates to food in some way. And I know that my family, the small space we share, our neighbors, our friends, and our city will become characters in the story as it unfolds.

In honor of not being perfect, I want to share the recipe for a dish I made recently, withOUT a recipe! Last Friday afternoon was green and sunny and warm, one of the first really nice spring days we've had this year. My husband called to suggest that we get out that evening before the boys' bedtime. I began to envision dinner at dusk on the deck of a local cafe. Margaritas and chips at Guapo's came to mind. And then I got a better idea, one I knew Steve would like because it would involve less spending: a picnic at the National Cathedral. I called to propose this to him: We would bring a blanket, meet him at Whole Foods, pick up a bunch of goodies, and, voila, a picnic we would have. But Steve had to take it one step further in the saving department (he always does). Why don't we just look in the fridge, he said, and see what we already have? Ho-hum, I thought, but then I took a look just to see (and to please him, which I secretly like to do sometimes), and...I surprised myself.

Here is what I assembled. It turned out quite well, and Steve was impressed, too. (He's one of the ones who wishes I would stop trying to make it perfect all the time.) It's not rocket science, but to me it means something because I made it myself, in a pinch, for my family...and it came out just right.

Last-Minute Pesto Pasta

You can use any veggies and/or meat you like in this dish. Pine nuts, chopped walnuts, or sliced almonds would be good, too. I used fusilli pasta, but you could use any type. Something with ridges or crannies is best, so that the pesto has a place to cling. We enjoyed it at room temperature, but it would be good hot off the stove, too.

1 lb. dried pasta
a handful of cherry or grape tomatoes, cut in half if you like
a handful of olives, coarsely chopped (any kind you like)
4-5 slices of prosciutto, coarsely cut into strips
1/2 to 1 cup of coarsely grated parmesan cheese
1/3 cup frozen peas
3-4 tablespoons pesto

Boil water in a large pot for the pasta. Add salt when the water is boiling, and drop the pasta into the water. While the pasta is cooking, chop the olives, tomatoes, and prosciutto, and grate the cheese. You can do all of this on one large cutting board. When the pasta has about two minutes to go, drop the peas in to cook with the pasta. Reserve a cup of the cooking liquid. Drain the pasta and peas, and put it back into the pot. Toss in the olives, tomatoes, cheese, and pesto, adding a third of the cooking liquid as well. Add more cooking liquid if it seems dry.

Enjoy!