Buttermilk Biscuits and Portobello Gravy

I first encountered biscuits and gravy at Humps, one of the greasy "family dining" restaurants my mom loves to stop at on road trips to the Oregon coast. Oregon greasy spoons are like retro Mystery Spots. They transport the diner back to a time when jello on a lettuce leaf constituted salad and everything came with canned green bean casserole. Our ultimate greasy spoon experience, the one that lives on at family dinners and college plays (cough) and any time we cook coq au vin, was in Dexter, Oregon, not at the coast at all but on the way home from Mt. St. Helens.

When we pulled into Dexter we were starving and tired from a long hike--and a terrifyingly close call on what my mom calls dot-dot-dot roads. The one cafe in town had a giant hand-painted sign declaring, "Deadheads Welcome!" and a lot of cheerful hallooing coming from the bar. Thrilled by the surprisingly leftist local culture, my parents shooed us all into the cafe side of the building, where we were met by a tiny middle-aged lady with a big black beehive and cat-eye glasses. That should have been the first clue.

The second was that nothing on the menu was actually on order except for burgers, fried chicken and the evening special coq au vin, which our hostess whispered to us conspiratorially, "has wine in it, you know, but don't worry, it evaporates." She sighed and looked reflective for a moment. "I sure wish the cook would make something I can pronounce!"

The third was when the two gentlemen who arrived shortly after us ordered "hamboogers."

The fourth was that, despite the welcome sign, there were no hippies in evidence; we were decidedly out of our element.

And the fifth was when our lady of the elevated locks cocked her head toward the kitchen window and hollered, "Velma, heat up the oil!"

All of this is true. And the chicken came with a jello mold on leaf of iceberg lettuce, canned wax beans, and some suspiciously hard biscuits.

But at Humps, although there was no adorable hostess in a fifties pants suit--or any deadheads, there was biscuits and gravy. Lumpy, fatty sausage gravy that congealed quickly on top of rich Crisco biscuits. I had the worst stomachache after that meal, and decided I was allergic to biscuits and gravy, which was probably a good call for my heart but a bad one for my mouth, because my word, biscuits and gravy can be good.

Take tonight's dinner, for example. With homemade buttermilk biscuits and a vegetarian portobello mushroom gravy, this country dish takes a slightly sophisticated turn while staying true to its comfort food roots. I'm not going to lie--this isn't health food (though the gravy recipe is from Eating Well magazine and would be healthy served over mashed potatoes or some lean meat), but it is delicious and perfect for cold nights when its pouring (Portland) or snowing (east coast) and you want something warm and simple to eat with a salad. Or a jello mold on lettuce, your choice.

The biscuit recipe is taken from the FoodDay section of the Oregonian, given to me by my father-in-law, and it's one of the best biscuit recipes I've tried (and perfect biscuits are a minor passion of mine). I think the trick is rolling the biscuits in melted butter, so that both top and bottom get a little crunchy while the inside turns into soft, flaky layers. Be sure not to overwork the dough, and to press down lightly on the flour mixture just after integrating the butter. This creates flaky layers during the baking process.

Note: get the gravy simmering before assembling the biscuits. Biscuits are best eaten fresh out of the oven, so you want to wait until 20 minutes or so before the gravy is done to get started on them. The gravy can be made in advance; unbaked biscuits can be chilled in the fridge for up to an hour before baking.

BUTTERMILK BISCUITS AND PORTOBELLO GRAVY

For the biscuits:

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F and melt 4 T butter in an 8-in square baking dish. (I just stick the dish in the oven as it heats up.) Set pan with melted butter aside.
2. In a large bowl, mix 2 C flour with 2 tsp baking powder, 1/4 tsp baking soda, and 1/2 tsp salt.
3. Cut 4 T of cold, unsalted butter into small chunks and toss into the flour. Using a pastry cutter, two butter knives, or your fingers, work the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Gently press your palm against the mixture once or twice.
4. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour in 3/4 C buttermilk. (I found I needed 1-2 more T of milk to make the dough cohere.) Using your hands, mix the dough just until it forms into a ball and leaves the sides of the bowl.
5. Dump the dough onto the counter and knead no more than 10-12 gentle times before rolling the dough out no less than 1-inch thick. Using a biscuit cutter or a drinking glass, cut the dough into 2-3 inch biscuits. Gently gather up the scraps to make more biscuits until all of the dough is used up. You should get between 6-9 biscuits per batch.
6. Roll each biscuit in the melted butter so that each side is buttered, and nestle all of the biscuits into the pan (you want them to touch). Bake for 12-15 minutes until risen and golden brown.

For the portobello gravy:

1. Finely chop one small onion, two cloves of garlic and 2 medium-sized portobello mushroom caps.
2. Heat 1 T of olive oil in a pan and gently cook the onion and garlic until soft and translucent, roughly 5 minutes.
3. Add the mushrooms and saute, stirring occasionally, until they release their juices, around 10 minutes.
4. Add 2 1/4 C vegetable or chicken stock to the pan, along with 3 T of tamari or low sodium soy sauce and a couple pinches of dried thyme and dried sage. Let simmer for 10 minutes.
5. In a separate bowl, make a slurry of 4 T water and 2 T cornstarch. Mix until well combined.
6. Add slurry to the gravy and simmer for another 10 minutes, stirring frequently.
7. Pepper and salt to taste.
8. Split open a hot biscuit and add a couple ladlefuls of mushroom gravy. We ate ours with a raw broccoli and apple salad, but any fresh green veggies will cut the richness of the dish and add some vitamins.

Banana Cranberry Cupcakes with Dark Chocolate Ganache

I love birthdays. I don't understand people who hate to celebrate their birthdays, or who hide the day from well-wishers, misanthropically defying community celebration. After all, unless one has a genuinely traumatic memory associated with his birth date (and I did know one such boy), isn't it nice to be alive for another year? And to have a day on which all of the people who love or even just know you celebrate the fact?

This debate came up during the most recent Leadership Meeting at work. In a discussion about how to boost morale around the warehouse, I suggested making a birthday calendar. (Which, incidentally, I thought to be an embarrassingly innocuous suggestion. I just figured that a pizza party and raises for everyone was a pipe dream.) Immediately, half of the lame indie posers I work for asserted that no one would want to participate in this, people hate sharing their birthday, it was a terrible idea, how would they fit into their skinny hipster jeans if they ate cake, etc. I like how no one wondered how this crushing criticism might affect my morale. I also thought the objections stupid.

"Why not make it volunteer?" I asked, "Besides, doesn't the fact that the leadership team won't assert the warehouse as a caring community suggest an origin for the low morale levels?"

One day, prior to speaking, I'll just remove my shoe and sock and insert my foot into my mouth. Unfortunately, at the meeting, I exacerbated my blunder by staring stubbornly at the management team, silently daring them to come up with a better idea.


I won, ironically by dint of the management's genuine lack of interest in employee happiness; the lanky wonders who boss me around all day were too antsy for a smoke to continue arguing. I'll be sure, however, to honor their original wishes by ignoring their birthdays. Which is a shame, because tomorrow someone else will get these cupcakes.

Banana Cranberry Cupcakes with Dark Chocolate Ganache
Adapted from How To Be A Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson

This cupcake batter is assembled in one pot, and bakes up with delicious results. The moist little cakes taste like banana bread, with bursts of cranberry and a wonderfully deep, adult dark chocolate lid.

For the cupcakes:

3 overripe bananas, mashed
1/2 C unsalted butter
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 C sour cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1 1/3 C all-purpose flour
3/4 C sugar
1/2 C dried cranberries

For the frosting:

1/2 C dark chocolate chips or pieces(I used Ghiardelli 60%)
100 ml heavy cream

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Put 12 cupcake wrappers into a muffin tin and light mist cups with cooking spray.
• Melt the butter in a large pot. When melted, pull off the heat and whisk in the sugar, vanilla and mashed bananas until blended. Next, whisk in the the eggs and sour cream until incorporated. Add the salt, baking soda and baking powder, and mix well. Finish by adding the flour and cranberries and mixing until just blended.
• Bake for around 20 minutes, or until the cupcake tops are golden and springy, and a toothpick inserted into the middle of one comes out relatively clean (a few moist crumbs are fine, you just don't want batter still clinging to it).
• Let cupcakes cool in wrappers on a rack.
• When the cupcakes are cool, add the chocolate pieces to the cream and heat to a boil in a saucepan. As soon as the cream boils, remove from the heat and whisk until smooth and thick. You can adjust the texture by adding more chocolate or cream.
• Using a spoon, frost the top of each cupcake, smoothing with the back of the spoon. It may run a bit, so place a sheet of wax paper underneath your baking rack.
• Let cool and enjoy! (Or, as I did below, take a gigantic bite while the chocolate's still warm and resign yourself to happiness.)
  

Grape and Gorgonzola Pizza

Last Friday night T and I had a date with my parents and sister at Zupan's yearly champagne gala. No one knows why we keep getting invited; we don't know anyone else present, and only my father buys champagne. But we go, because you can taste as many glasses of fancy champagne as you like and there's a phenomenal oyster bar, along with other delicacies like smoked scallops and manchego with quince paste. Besides, it's fun to dress to the nines and then watch all the trophy wives struggle to remain upright against the weight of their diamonds.

But the party begins late, and by 6:30pm our stomachs were growling. We wanted something satisfying, but fast and light enough to brook a 10pm oyster splurge. And that's how our grape and gorgonzola pizza was born.

I love the combination of of sweet and savory on pizza, and often bake pizzas with pears or figs and crumbles of sharp cheese, or slivers of prosciutto. I make these pizzas with an olive oil base, lightly rubbed with garlic, and then drizzle the toppings with more olive oil and large sea salt crystals. I love a good tomato-sauce and cheese pizza, too, but those tend to be heavier, and T and I are locked in a permanent pepperoni vs sausage debate that nearly always results in Canadian bacon. Last Friday all we wanted was a snack, something to add substance to a green salad. A quick trip to the store yielded red grapes on sale, a tiny wedge of raw gorgonzola, and premade pizza dough. (I know, LAZY.) I thought the high heat from the oven would wilt the grapes and make the strong cheese run a bit, permeating the crust with pungent salt and sweet juice.

It did. The grapes do release a little more juice than is desirable, but you can always pre-roast them to prevent the juices from running all over the top of the baked pizza. As with all pizzas, make sure not to overburden this one with toppings. A healthy smattering will do. Reducing the number of toppings to 2-3 helps you to taste each one individually as you eat, which also allows you to appreciate how they combine to create new, complex flavors. Go easy on the cheese, too; while not a delicate foodstuff, you don't want your pizza to be a gut-bomb.

Grape & Gorgonzola Pizza

1 batch homemade or store-bought pizza dough

1 clove garlic, peeled and halved

healthy handful of red or concord grapes, halved

healthy handful crumbled strong blue or gorgonzola cheese

smaller handful of good-quality Parmesan

extra-virgin olive oil

sea salt

Balsamic vinegar (I used white)

• Preheat oven to 500 degrees. If you have a baking stone, put it into the oven now so that it can thoroughly warm up.
• Roll your homemade or store-bought dough into a large circle. The thickness of the crust is up to you--I like them on the thin side, because I enjoy the toasty flavor of caramelized flour.
• Prick the dough all over with a fork to encourage it to remain flat.
• Rub the surface of the dough with raw garlic and then spread a thin layer of olive oil on top.
• Scatter the top with grape halves and gorgonzola crumbles.
• Sprinkle Parmesan cheese over the toppings, and add a few sprinkles of coarse salt.
• Drizzle a small amount of olive oil over the top, followed by an even smaller drizzle of balsamic vinegar.
• Bake pizza for 8-10 minutes, or until golden brown and bubbly. Cool slightly and enjoy.

Warm Bread

T passed his national and Oregon boards today! Which means, of course, that he's out celebrating with the other soon-to-be doctors, and the wives are at home doing...whatever it is we all do when left to our own devices. Or at least I'm at home. Drinking rum. Watching romantic independent films. Baking bread.

Now that the CSA box is coming to an end, and with it the weekly free loaf of Grand Central bread, there's flour in the kitchen crevices again, and the sleeve ends of my house sweaters are caked in dough. (Oh, don't grimace. I do launder them. Occasionally.) This is homely bread--you can see the giant crack in the loaf above--but it's soft and tender, and very convenient. I mix a big batch, store it in the fridge for days, tear off a piece and let a loaf rise in the evening for a late baking. It's not as precise or professional as the breads I make with the Merry Bakers, but it's good and the house smells divine. Plus, a warm slice of bread is perfect for sopping up the rum before bedtime. And the tears, if that movie's kind of sad.

The Humble Loaf
adapted from Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day

6 1/2 C flour: 3 1/2 C white and 3 C white whole wheat
2 C warm water
1 C warm milk
1 1/2 packets of yeast
1 1/2 T coarse salt
a handful of sesame seeds (optional)

1. In the bowl of your standing mixer, combine the yeast and warm liquids. You can let sit until frothy, or proceed--as I do--with no regard for that chemical process.
2. Add the 6 1/2 C flour, the 1 1/2 T salt, and the sesame seeds, if using. Stir with the paddle attachment (or by hand) until integrated.
3. Do not knead! Once the flour and liquids are well-mixed, top the bowl with some plastic wrap and set aside to rise for a few hours. You'll know it's done when the the dough has risen and fallen into a large, flat-topped mound.
4. At this point, stick your dough in the fridge for up to 2 weeks, or bake a loaf immediately. The chilled dough is easier to work with, and gains more flavor the longer it ferments in the fridge.
5. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees at least 20 minutes before baking. (If the dough is cold, pull off a loaf-sized chunk--1-2 lbs--and shape it and put it into a greased loaf pan to come to room temperature...around 1 hr and 40 minutes.)
6. Place the loaf pan in the hot oven and bake for 35-45 minutes, The loaf should be risen and golden, with a firm crust and corners. When tapped, the bottom should feel hollow. If it doesn't, or the corners seem soft, remove the loaf from the pan and stick back into the oven for 5-10 minutes.
7. Let cool completely before slicing for optimal crumb.

Beans and Freedom

Those two words, analyzed from a global socio-political perspective, can be seen as opposites. After all, and I don't mean to be glib here, impoverished people the world over eat legumes while their political leaders misdirect foreign and domestic capital to their pleasure yachts. But for me, beans are a symbol of a smaller freedom, the personal sort, because they're one of the first things I cooked when I moved into my own apartment; dried beans are the graduate student's Platonic ideal of dinner because they're cheap, you feel hip shopping the bulk bins, and a big pot of beans yields an incomprehensible number of meals.

Tonight, however, beans are synonymous with neither the third world (I'm beginning to suspect that analogy is tasteless, no pun intended) nor my college days. Tonight I happened to meet with my book group to discuss Jonathan Franzen's new novel Freedom and then came home, realized there's no lunch for tomorrow, and threw together a black bean, butternut squash and kale stem (yes, stem) stew in the crockpot. I hope it's good. If it is, I'll post the recipe.

You might want to read Freedom. It's very good, and that's coming from someone who'd thrown Jonathan Franzen into the detested Jonathan Safran-Foer Over-Rated Writers Club. A.k.a. Authors Who Write About Things They Know Not Club. A.k.a. You Tricky Little Man, I Read Yet Another Of Your Novels And It Took Me Until The End To Realize What A Senseless Dodo You Are AGAIN Club. You get the picture. I don't like Foer's gushy sentimentalism or Franzen's condescending "oh I'm so not the elitist white liberal I am (but if you're not like me, you must be a hillbilly)" subtext. But I liked this book a lot.

Maybe because Franzen owns and explores liberal pretensions (while obviously fantasizing about being a rock star). Though I think the book is much more about the true limits of the American freedom concept, applied to romantic and familial relationships. We had a really nice discussion, which included the female readers' fascination with the rock star and the male readers' attraction to Connie. It was fun. I spend so much time sticking labels on books and reading papers about "the Islams" and terrorism (no joke) that I sometimes feel my brain cells holding tiny hands over tiny ears, mouths wide and howling. I enjoy having an outlet for my under-stimulated brain.

So here's to beans and Freedom. May the stew be as tasty as the reading!

Meeskite Soup

There's a sweet song in the musical Cabaret called, "Meeskite," about two ugly parents who give birth to the most beautiful baby their shtetl has ever seen.

That's a lot like this soup.

Lumpy, frizzy-skinned celeriac meets knobby, chin-haired jerusalem artichoke to produce a smooth, voluptuous soup with a complex herbal flavor and wonderful, yogurty tang. You would never guess that such unappealing roots could soften into rich knobs of earthiness; these are simple vegetables that only need a bit of heat and fat to turn into treasures.



You could leave out the bacon and make this vegetarian, but why would you? The bacon flavor really comes through to provide a lovely smokiness that sits very well with the sour yogurt. All you need to finish this soup off is some chopped greens for garnish (any greens you like: I used spicy, raw salad greens, but kale or savoy cabbage, lightly wilted and seasoned, would do well).


Meeskite Soup, or Celeriac Soup with Jerusalem Artichoke and Bacon


Olive oil

2 celeriac roots, peeled and chopped into 1-in cubes

1/2 lb jerusalem artichokes, roasted and cooled (optional, but so worth it)

1/2 C chopped shallots

2 slices thick applewood bacon, chopped

5-6 C organic chicken broth

1/4-1/3 C whole fat plain yogurt

seasoning to taste

greens for garnish (optional)



1. Roast the jerusalem artichokes, first cutting big roots into small pieces. Toss the raw jerusalem artichokes in oilve oil, coarse salt, pepper, a pinch of dried lemongrass and some red chili flakes. Roast at 425 degrees F for about 20 minutes, until tender. Set aside to cool.

2. Heat olive oil in a medium-sized pot over medium heat and add bacon. Sautee until bacon softens and add shallots. Sautee gently until shallots are soft and translucent (5-10 minutes).

3. Add celeriac to pan. Cover vegetables with a wet piece of parchment paper, put the lid on, and lower heat. Gently steam vegetables for ten minutes.

5. Remove parchment paper. Add artichokes and broth to pot and bring to a simmer. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes, or until veggies are tender. Remove from heat and cool.

6. Blend soup in cuisinart or with an immersion blender until smooth and creamy.

7. Add yogurt and blend until integrated. It's important that the soup be cool-ish, or the yogurt may curdle.

8. Reheat gently, adjusting for salt and pepper. Add extra broth if the soup is too thick.

9. Top with optional garnish and enjoy!

Molly's friend Glenn's Banana Bread with Bittersweet Chocolate and Crystallized Ginger

Hungry yet? I'll admit the lighting for this photo isn't ideal, but trust me when I say that this bread turned out perfectly: moist but light, with each bite a flavor blast of humble banana, dark chocolate and crystallized ginger. It's not too rich or sweet to eat for breakfast, but it would also make a lovely dessert, plain or with whipped cream and an espresso.

I've been making banana bread for years, ever since I went to college and decided to try the old Wendy Gordon Bake a Banana Bread and Find a Mate for Life trick. (Banana bread is how my parents fell in love. In our family, banana bread baking is synonymous with serious monogamy.) I didn't find my mate in college (in fact, in an odd turn of events, my first serious boyfriend baked me a banana bread), but I do make my mom's banana bread relatively frequently for T, and like to think that each loaf is a little dose of love potion.

What I like best about my mom's recipe is its focus on the banana. She uses canola oil instead of butter, which yields a wonderfully moist and banana-y taste without the distracting richness of butter-based breads. She also uses brown sugar and plenty of cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. When we were little she would make one plain loaf and one with chocolate chips, and that second loaf would maybe last two days, with each of us savoring the slightly sticky top and the banana flecked crumbs.

The bread I made last night is a fusion between Molly Wizenberg's, which I read about in her book A Homemade Life, and my mom's tried and true recipe. I swapped the butter for oil and the sugar for brown, and added a bit of vanilla extract to the batter. Otherwise, it's exactly as written on Orangette and it is perfect.

Bake some for your lover. Or...bake it, open the window and see who strolls by.

Winter Squash with Bacon-Walnut Pangrattato

When I opened my CSA tote last week and lifted out the enormous green squash of indeterminate title (let's call it the Hulk), several thoughts ran through my head, all delicious:

Squash soup with lots of fried sage leaves
Squash and black bean stew

Squash risotto with parmesan pangrattato and amaretti cookie crumbs

Two loaves of squash bread with dark chocolate slivers

But life gets busy and the best laid plans--lazy, slowly-stirred risotto, for instance--get shoved aside for quicker meals that fill us up and get us on to the next activity. And even though 5 nights out of 7 you'll find me munching an impromptu salad and some melted cheese and veggies on toast, alone on the couch with a book or even worse, Netflix, musing moodily on my students, I really do prefer exciting tastes and lovingly prepared dinners with multiple dishes. Which is why I decided to make something simple yet special for dinner tonight:

Steamed, mashed squash with a crunchy pangratatto of bread crumbs, crisped bacon, fried sage, ground walnuts, and parmesan spread over the top and rendered extra crunchy over the broiler.

I got the idea from Jamie Oliver's Cook with Jamie, which boasts some incredible, easy vegetable recipes. His version involves boiling butternut squash, cubing and frying it, and then serving a parmesan pangrattato with fried squash seeds on the side, for people to spoon over their forkfuls. My squash, steamed all day in the slow-cooker, was too mushy for Jamie's approach, and I was longing for something more substantial, too, like a mash with the richer accents of bacon and walnuts.

Make sure to save the seeds from your squash to either fry and add to the topping, or toast with sea salt, paprika and the smallest bit of cocoa for a great snack and salad topping. You can also choose to keep the squash skin on--especially for tender varieties like butternut--as it is sweet and difficult to separate from the flesh once cooked. (You can easily peel a butternut squash prior to cooking, though.) One last note: the pangrattato can be used as a poultry stuffing or a flavor blast for a squash risotto. It's also really tasty on its own, when all the flavors meld and the parmesan starts to melt and crisp and clump the bread crumbs in the nicest way possible...I finally had to kick T out of the kitchen in order to have enough for the squash.

This recipe yielded a creamy, sweet, salty, crunchy dinner, perfect with our brown rice and apple-fennel-cabbage salad. It also made enough leftovers for lunch, which makes going to work tomorrow almost enjoyable.

Winter Squash with Bacon-Walnut Pangrattato

Steam, bake or boil a butternut or other sweet winter squash.

Scoop out the seeds (save for toasting) and either remove the flesh and mash or cut the flesh into bite-size chunks.

Season the squash liberally with salt and pepper and place in a 8x8 baking dish (or whatever meets your squash volume needs).

While the squash cooks, prepare the pangrattato:

Blend 1-2 C breadcrumbs (I used homemade bread and didn't measure) with a big handful of raw walnuts until fairly fine.

Chop 3-4 slices thick bacon and saute until crisp. Add a handful of chopped sage and cook for 1 minute.

Add the breadcrumb-walnut mixture to the pan and toss to coat. Add a nice glug of olive oil and a few dashes of balsamic vinegar to the pan and mix well. Let it become toasty and golden. At the end, toss in a handful of good quality parmesan, mix, and turn off the burner. The residual heat will allow the cheese to melt and crisp up without burning. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Preheat the broiler.

Spread pangrattato onto squash and broil for around 3 minutes, until crispy but not burnt.

Enjoy on its own or as a side, and happy fall!

Kaua'i, Hawaii and a Gluten-Free Chocolate Marmalade Cake

T and I got back last night from our honeymoon trip to Kaua'i, Hawaii. It was our first trip to Hawaii and our first vacation in seven years, so needless to say we were chomping at the bit for a week alone on a coast where the water is actually swimmable.

We weren't disappointed.

Everything you hear about Hawaii--that it's paradise, that the water is warm and aqua, that flurries of colorful fish swim just below the surface in shallow reefs (that they share with giant sea turtles!) and coral--it's all true. The picture above is from a hike we took on the Na Pali coastline on the north side of the island. The hike was muddy and rigorous, taking us over the sea cliffs and into a guava jungle to a 100 ft waterfall with a cold, deep pool. (Where no one was nude--it just looks that way.)

T taught me to snorkle, which was fun after I stopped hyperventilating. We swam and snorkeled in the calm waters of Ke'e Beach and Anini Beach on the north side, on the very slightly rougher (and my favorite) Po'ipu Beach on the southeast of the island--where on the same afternoon a monk seal crawled onto the beach to nap in the sun and a giant sea turtle hauled herself on shore to lay her eggs--and we waded in the body-slamming surf at Barking Sands Beach, on the western shore.

Other than fresh fish, the food on Kaua'i wasn't exciting. We found ourselves missing home-cooked meals and fresh vegetables, but the ahi tuna was deep red and buttery and the fruit was unbelievable. If you go, economize by eating ahi poke, avocados, and any fresh fruit you can find. I was particularly taken with dragon fruit, if only for its name and unique appearance.

And drink mai thais. The late afternoon we discovered the $3 mai thais at the poolside bar was a drunken, sweet and happy one.

T's favorite day was when we took a boat up the Na Pali coastline, stopping to snorkel and cheering on the spinner dolphins as they leaped alongside us. My favorite was our second visit to Po'ipu Beach, when we exhausted ourselves snorkeling and then lay in the shade of a palm tree, reading, sunning, and watching the chickens.

I suppose catching a wild chicken would be another bright way to economize. They're everywhere, and the roosters, while beautiful, lose some appeal during their customary 4am salute to the dawn.

If the snorkeling, wildlife, mountain valleys and bright blue ocean doesn't do it for you, then go to Kaua'i for the flowers. This is plumeria, my favorite, for its rich scent and waxy white petals.

But for those of you with a more wintry mind, or for whom the words "Hawaii" and "vacation" elicit feelings of bitterness, longing or despair, try this chocolate marmalade cake. Rich, with a light crumb, sticky, ridiculously easy and gluten-free.

Chocolate Marmalade Cake (adapted from Nigella Lawson's Feast)

• 10-14 ounces marmalade (pick your poison)
• 6 eggs
• 2 C almond meal
• 1/2 C cocoa powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 heaping tsp baking powder
• 1 C light brown sugar, not packed
• a pinch of salt
• a handful or two of bittersweet chocolate chips or shards

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter and line an 8-inch springform pan. In a bowl or food processor, combine all of the ingredients above until smooth. Pour into prepared pan and bake for around an hour (mine took about 70 minutes). You'll want to check after 45 minutes to make sure the top isn't burning--if it is, simply cover the top loosely with aluminum foil and continue baking until a cake tester comes out mostly clean. (A few fudgy crumbs clinging to the tester are fine--better to under cook slightly than to dry the cake out.)

Cool completely in the pan before slicing and serving. Enjoy alone, with barely sweetened whipped cream, with a liquored whipped cream (orange liquor or maybe brandy or rum), or ice cream.

The Meat of the Matter, and How to Make a Monte Cristo

(Or Two Dumb Bums with Beef on the Brain.)

This is me and Nathan:

About a month ago our spouses, T and M, decided to instigate a food feud between us; it was their thinly veiled objective to inspire countless evenings during which they would be fed, copiously, beautiful sandwiches inspired by mutual contempt and competition.

Unfortunately, being who we are, the competition's been mild. (Exhibit A: we keep voting for each other's sandwiches.) But the food...that's been anything but.


A couple of weeks ago we made vegetarian sandwiches with brie and goat cheese, oven roasted tomatoes and roasted garlic mayonnaise, fresh basil, bell peppers, and toasted pine nuts. They were mighty fine. I ended up being handicapped by the goat cheese--not a crowd pleaser--but even I had to concede that Nathan's fresh-tasting yet creamy sandwich was delicious.

Tonight was round two, the Meat Sandwich, and I was ready to dominate. Unfortunately, Nathan slaved away all day and made the most glorious French Dips we've ever had. He smoked and then roasted the beef, sliced it into thin strips and smattered the top with pan-fried onions. The meat and onions ended up on very lightly toasted baguettes with aged Gruyere, dipped by the eater into a rich, salty jus. Somehow intensely satisfying yet not rich.


Thank goodness, because we had to save room for the Monte Cristos.

A Monte Cristo, though recipes vary, is a battered sandwich stuffed with thinly sliced ham and melted cheese. I made mine by pressing two crustless pieces of high-quality white bread around black forest ham and Havarti, with thin smears of butter and homemade currant jelly. The sandwich is chilled, tightly wrapped, for a few hours, and then dipped into a simple batter (think thick pancake batter) and fried like grilled cheese in a hot buttered pan. The hot golden sandwiches get a final dusting of confectioners sugar and are eaten dipped into jam. Homemade blackberry jam.

In all honesty, as luscious as the monte cristo was--like savory French Toast, crisp and creamy, salty and sweet--I preferred the French Dip. I just wouldn't order anything like a Monte Cristo in a restaurant, because I don't enjoy very rich foods.

T agreed with me, but M and Nathan liked the monte cristos. So we tied.

Which, with all of the objectivity I can muster, was exactly the right decision.

To Make Your Own Monte Cristo: (1 sandwich)

• 2 slices high-quality white bread, with the crusts cut off and saved for another use (I ferret mine away in the freezer for future bread crumbs)
• 2 slices thinly cut ham or turkey
• 1 nice slice of havarti / any melty cheese you like
• butter
• jam
• confectioners sugar
• 1/3 C flour
• 1/3 C water
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 egg
  

Lay bread slices on your working surface. Butter both slices of white bread and spread jam onto one of the pieces.

Fold the ham or turkey so that it fits onto one of the slices of bread (nothing should hang off the side of the slice).

Top the meat with the cheese.

Cap the sandwich with the second slice of buttered bread and firmly press on the top and sides so that the sandwich is sealed.

Wrap tightly in plastic wrap and chill for 45 minutes to several hours. This helps to seal the bread and keeps the sandwich from falling apart during the frying process.

Next, Prepare a thick batter using the flour, water, salt, baking powder and egg. Whisk until uniform.

Unwrap the sandwich and dip into the batter, covering completely.

Fry the sandwich in butter over medium heat until golden on both sides.

Hint: My technique--and this makes flawless grilled cheese sandwiches, too--is to heat the butter until golden, set the sandwich into the butter, and then cover the pan and lower the heat to medium/medium low. Flip when golden on the bottom and repeat process. Covering the pan over a low heat encourages a golden crust to develop while trapping enough heat to melt the cheese before the sandwich burns.

Serve hot, sprinkled with confectioners sugar and dipped into jam.

Apple Dried Cherry Challah and Sweet Corn Chowder

One of the best parts of summer's end is using summer produce, like tomatoes and sweet corn, in fall dishes like soups and stews. On a rainy day earlier this week a bundle of delicate, baby carrots and sweet onion went into a beef bourguignon, and tonight we'll eat a light, creamy chowder of sweet corn and heirloom tomatoes. All week we've been biting into challah stuffed with new apples and dried cherries to welcome in the Jewish New Year, Rosh Ha'shanah.

I love this comforting food that's still fresh and green. We're in that tiny space of the Oregon year where we can enjoy the colors and diversity of summer veggies while baking the breads and stirring the thick soups essential to our damp, chilly nights. It's also the time of year that I associate with returning to our kitchen table, and replacing the hastily gobbled tomato sandwiches and pesto pasta bowls that get us through summer with longer, more complicated meals that involve sitting together with cloth napkins, silverware, a glass of wine. Summer is supposed to be languorous, but I find the fall and winter to be so; fall and winter in Oregon stretch from October to June, and the steady drip of rain sets a slow metronome rhythm to each day. The here-and-gone vitality of our summers is thrilling (look! the sun!), but it's easy to fall back into the seductive lull of rain and steamy tea pots.

That said I'm glad today is sunny. I've spent the afternoon outside sewing a quilt for Kate and listening to history podcasts on Catherine the Great and Catherine D'Medici (in case you've been wondering, the horse story is a myth, but the Black Queen earned her moniker) drinking thai iced tea with milk and sugar and missing my bike, which is at the shop, suffering from multiple mechanical woes. (The guy looked at me and said, "You ride your bike a lot, huh?" I wanted to be truthful and admit that I just commute on it, but I loved the unspoken assumption that I was a hardcore biker too much to say so. I don't know why I needed the charade, but I could almost feel my leg muscles strengthening and defining as I stood there.)

Tomorrow is phase two of the Nathan Whitney-Little Chef Sandwich Competition, in which neither chef is as competitive as his and her respective spouses, and everyone drinks too much hard cider. I think I'm going to do a riff on the Monte Cristo and stuff sturdy but soft bread with aged ham, Havarti cheese and some kind of chutney, press in the sides, dip the sandwich in egg, and fry it until golden and melty in butter or olive oil. It's not the kind of dish that I would normally eat, but it's luxurious and unusual.

And I feel compelled to say something political, given today's date, but all I feel is political exhaustion and frustration. I want the wars to be ended. I want there to be available healthcare and jobs and housing assistance for all Americans. I want the government to admit that we can't keep funneling money into a fight against an "-ism," which is only an idea and thus indefatigable in its ability to influence, to be acted upon, to be disseminated and undercut. 9/11 was a tragedy, but it is not a reason to continue dangerous and endless policies in countries whose histories and rivalries we do not understand.

To commemorate 9/11 I'm going to share a meal grown by local farmers with someone I love. I'm going to buy a Koran and put it next to my Hebrew bible. I'm going to approach my life as if I lived in the pluralistic, tolerant, humane world I would like my children to inherit. And maybe, inshallah, they will.

Slow Cooker Sweet Corn Chowder, However You Like It

This isn't so much a recipe as a suggestion. I used what I had on hand, and so should you: feel free to add in diced bell pepper, chunks of potato, leftover chicken, or sliced celery. You can also cook this on the stove--simmer until everything but the dairy is just tender and bright, and then add in the milk, heating through. It actually takes far less time on the stove--maybe 2o minutes of simmering and then 5-10 minutes after you add the cream. The advantage of the slow cooker is that it allows flavors to concentrate...and you can leave the house.

• approximately 3 C fresh or frozen sweet corn (remove the kernels from the cob)
• a few slices of bacon, diced
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 1-2 smashed garlic cloves
• 1 small hot pepper, minced, or a 1/4 tsp dried chili flakes
• an heirloom tomato, roughly chopped
• tiny fistful of fresh sage leaves
• 2-3 sprigs of fresh thyme
• a dash of smoked paprika
• stock
• 1-2 C milk or cream
• salt and pepper to taste

Heat a bit of olive oil in a pan and add the diced bacon. Cook until crisp and then add add the chopped onions, garlic and hot pepper (you may drain the bacon fat if you like, but it adds significant flavor). Saute until the onions are translucent but not browned. Add the onion mixture to the slow cooker, along with the corn, stock and spices. Stir and cook on low, covered, for 2-3 hours. If you are using potatoes, be sure to add them in at this stage.

About an hour before eating (less if you're making this on the stove), add the milk or cream to the soup and taste for seasoning. Salt and pepper as you desire. Cook the soup on high for about an hour. When finished, adjust seasoning as necessary and serve hot with grated cheddar and crusty bread. I bet a dash of hot sauce would be good, too.

And then sometimes good things happen

It's been a hard few days for us, and then the rain came this morning and it was difficult to get out of bed and drive to work. I fueled myself on long-steeped tea, reasoning in that not very coherent, early morning way that if Edith Wharton's characters can get a buzz from English Breakfast, so can I. (Not true. A cup of coffee and another cup of tea later, I felt somewhat conscious. Also, why is caffeine the only thing I remember from House of Mirth?) I pulled on my Oregon Girls Rock t-shirt that I save for cheerless days and my favorite ripped jeans. I packed an especially delicious and unusual sandwich. I slipped a Neko Case CD into my purse.

I was ready to be gloomy like the baddest most emo hipster poser you know.

And then I went upstairs to kiss T goodbye.

I think I married T because I had no other choice. And before you get huffy, let me explain. I met him and electrical currents zinged and I felt peace descend. My brain shut down completely except for one reverberant thought, thrumming through my limbs, that let me know, in these absolute almost godly tones, that this someone was for me. Of course, I didn't know that we would fall in love and get married and become the proud co-owners of an orange velvet couch (seriously Tom, I like the couch), but somehow I knew that future was possible.

I tried to delude myself for a little while, imagining T as a wild fling before I moved to New York for school, but it's hard to resist a 6' 3" dark-haired, blue-eyed prankster who dances to embarrassing love songs he makes up about me, and makes the best hash browns, and attracts the adoration of animals and babies everywhere, because he's really that kind. True, he also likes to pants me while I'm washing the dishes, and he's filled my Netflix queue with manga and monster movies, but I'd watch a month's worth of manga for one of T's hugs, because I feel like I'm disappearing into comfort. Six months into knowing Tom and I was hooked. More than seven years and life without him is like a Caesar salad without the anchovies in the dressing. (In other words, improbable. Inedible. Completely and utterly beyond the order of things.)

Tomorrow we will be married two years, and it's been awesome. Not easy, not all the time, but maybe better for that. I know I'm braver and kinder and just possibly, minimally less stressed because I get to kiss him goodbye each morning, and hello every night. And because he's a chiropractor and will give a back rub in exchange for a back scratch. I've never been in better alignment.

Take that how you will.

Happy anniversary, my sweet man. I love you.

Unlike Snow White

Yesterday one of Tom's childhood friends died of an oxycotin overdose. We think he took it recreationally, with his girlfriend, and just took one too many and so never woke up. Like Heath Ledger, and so many other people who take these drugs liberally, with no stigma, because doctors dispense them.

We have some experience with less acceptable drug use in my family. One of my siblings is a recovering methamphetamine addict. When she was high she was a raving lunatic with drug-induced paranoid schizophrenia and painful ulcers from head to toe, where she'd scratched the "bugs" away. People see what meth does to a person and they think they're looking at a trailer trash loser whose parents did something wrong. It's shaming to the parents, and the siblings, and eventually--if you're lucky enough that this person stops using--to the drug user, who knows that she's done something illicit and ugly. My mom thinks that the cultural stigma against crystal meth helped bring my sister back from the brink; she wanted to live in this world.

Meth is a bad drug. And while I support the legalization and de-criminalization of drugs, to reduce drug cartel violence and hopefully inspire a more transparent social conversation and response to drug use and treatment, it's really hard to say that people should be able to buy it. Heroin fits into that category, too, because it's so dangerous. Two Reedies (my Alma mater) have died of overdoses in the last year. But I'm not sure that making heroin illegal has stopped anyone who wasn't already disinclined to try drugs from using it. Instead, illegalizing drugs like pot, heroin, cocaine and meth has flooded our prison system with low level offenders and helped a devastatingly violent black market to flourish in South America and Mexico. Perhaps most importantly, making these items illegal has allowed Americans to push drug use off to the side as a marginal thing, a low-life activity; we do not face the fact that it is our country's demand for drugs that keeps the Mexican drug lords' pockets fat, and Mexico's northern states in the flux of brutality.

But we do allow Americans to take vicodin, and valium, and oxycotin, and any number of medical narcotics. The last time I was at the dentist I had a root canal, which if you haven't had one hurts, but really not that badly--not badly enough for the vicodin they offered me. I don't know why a doctor would offer someone an addictive substance when maximum strength Tylenol is sufficient; I don't understand how a drug like oxycotin, which has a physical impact and addiction risk to rival morphine and methadone, has been given to my cousin for the last ten years to help her mask the pain of a knee injury that should have been rehabbed. And yet it's okay for her to spend her days in a minor fog of substance abuse, to drive a car and mother her children. And it was okay for Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich and myriad celebrities who have crashed cars, passed out, and died in their sleep, because they weren't doing drugs. They were doing medicine, and medicine is safe.

Prescription drug abuse ranks second behind pot as the nation's largest drug problem (http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/drugfact/prescr_drg_abuse.html), and yet even after several high-profile accidents and overdoses, most of the people I know love to have a vicodin and a glass of wine before bed, if they can get it. Because it feels good. I know, because I tried it once with Tom many years ago and all I can think about tonight is how goddamn lucky we are that we woke up. How unbelievably overjoyed I am that I didn't wake up like Justin's girlfriend to find the person I love most in this world gone from this world. And for nothing. The waste makes me feel like raging.

Tonight I feel sad because my husband is so deep in grief, and angry because drug use and abuse is just one problem on a long list of things we could change about American policy--and so change about the world--but that we do not because these pills make a few people a lot of money. And so tacit approval for the use of these drugs, legitimately, recreationally, leaks out into our culture and into the bodies of people who someone loves, and for whom they mourn.

Tortilla de Patata

When I was fifteen, I accompanied my cousin Kate and her dad, "Uncle" Michael, on a 7-month stay in Salamanca, Spain. We lived in a furnished three-bedroom apartment with two bathrooms (amazing when you think about it), a living room, and a sizable kitchen with the world's smallest washing machine set into the wall. My bedroom wall had a reproduction of a famous Jesus on the Cross painting, in which a gangrenous Messiah wept down upon my sleeping, Jewish form. Other rooms had crosses, and the girls' bathroom had a beday. Which blew our minds, and which we used to clean our feet.

At the time Kate was a fairly picky eater and I was a vegetarian, neither of which are ideal conditions for eating in Spain where ham is king and there are all sorts of amazing, adventurous dishes to try like fresh sardine bruschetta, paella, baby squid in lemon, olive oil and garlic, giant salads with tomatoes, olives, tuna and hard boiled eggs, Basque panfried trout stuffed with bacon, and a cocktail called Tinto de Verano, which combines Fanta Limon with red wine and is actually pretty good. In addition to being difficult eaters, Kate and I were also teenage girls, which meant that we spent a lot of time mooning over creamy American peanut butter and 6pm dinner times and crinkling skeptical noses at late night tapas. What a waste of a culinary opportunity, though I know we each grew up a lot during that often difficult but wonderful stay. We also grew up into eager eaters, so perhaps exposure, if not ingestion, has its benefits.

Amidst the seafood that Kate wouldn't touch, and the meat that I wouldn't eat, we discovered the humble tortilla de patata, or potato omelet. Creamy on the inside, barely crispy on the outside, egg yolk-yellow and rich with the flavors of olive oil and caramelized onion, the tortilla is a simple dish with a deep soul. Spaniards eat it at room temperature, cut into wedges or, better yet, placed between two pieces of fresh bread just lightly rubbed with olive oil or mayo. Kate and I used to walk down to a tapas bar on the Plaza Mayor and share bocadillos de tortilla de patata and coca-cola in glass bottles for dinner. Sometimes for dessert we'd eat coconut ice cream that arrived in the coconut shell. I remember the waiter snickering at us just a little each time we arrived, maybe because we were eating a traditional snack for dinner, or maybe because of our accents, and maybe because the simple omelet brought us so much pleasure.

I started making tortillas of my own in graduate school, when my friend Erin lent me her fantastic tapas cookbook, Tapas by Penelope Casas. The secret to the dish is an obscene amount of olive oil, which you use to slowly simmer very thinly sliced potatoes and onions until tender. You don't want to fry or brown the potatoes! They sort of boil in the oil until partially translucent, and this draws out the sweetness of the potato and creates a velvety mouth-feel. The second important trick is learning to flip the omelet. I'm still learning this technique, but at least no longer break them. What you want to do is heat the omelet pan until very hot, which helps prevent the eggs from sticking. You'll probably need to help the omelet remain unstuck by periodically shaking the pan and running a metal spatula around the sides and under the omelet. When the omelet is cooked on the bottom, place a plate over the pan and invert the omelet onto the plate so that the uncooked side is resting on the plate. Then, carefully slide the omelet back into the pan to finish cooking. Ideally, the tortilla will be golden yellow on the outside and moist within. In all honesty, I've only ever managed golden brown; I don't know how Spanish chefs achieve a yolk-yellow finished product. Just be sure not to overcook the tortilla. You want it dense and moist inside, not dry.

It might take you a few tries to master the flip, but regardless of how your tortilla emerges from the pan it will be delicious. It's a tiny bit salty and rich, with layers of creamy potatoes and dissolving onions. Eat it with a salad and some crusty bread, grab a glass of light red wine, and you'll be a happy chica.

The following is based on what I remember Penelope Casas's recipe, but I tinker slightly with the type of potatoes I use (tonight they were baby goldens from the farm, with a sweet onion) and have occasionally added a green like kale.

Ingredients:
around 3-4 russet potatoes, very thinly sliced
1 onion, I prefer sweet, very thinly sliced
1 C olive oil
1-2 tsp coarse salt
4-5 eggs

Technique:

1. Pour the olive oil into a nonstick or other skillet (I use a cast iron). Bring to a medium-high heat--it's ready when a test piece of potato sizzles gently on contact. Lower the heat to medium-low, to sustain the simmer.
2. Place a layer of potato slices in the skillet and sprinkle lightly with salt. Now add a layer of onion slices and salt. Repeat until all of the vegetables are in the skillet.
3. Let the potatoes and onions simmer until tender but not brown, stirring occasionally. Don't worry if some of the slices break.
4. When the potatoes and onions are soft, remove the pan from the heat and drain the vegetables. I like to place the strainer over a bowl in order to save the olive oil, which should amount to 1/2-3/4 C. This olive oil should be stored in a jar in the fridge and used over the next few days to cook or dip bread. It's delicious.
5. In a separate, large bowl beat 4-5 eggs until frothy. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
6. Add the potato mixture to the bowl, mix, and let sit for 5-10 minutes.
7. Meanwhile, clean the skillet and add 1-2 T of olive oil. Heat until very hot but not smoking.
8. Add the egg-potato mess to the skillet and cook until the bottom is golden.
9. Flip the tortilla using the method described above and cook until golden.
10. Set the tortilla aside to cool slightly and eat plain, with a tomato sauce or salsa, or a garlicky aioli.

Sweet Pickles

Sunday afternoon, almost hot out; Stella and Tybalt are starting to assume that Mark Twain pose. And I'm pickling.

In between my mom's overflowing sweet pea beds and the CSA, T and I have been overrun with sweet and snow peas. Remember the ending of Weird Science when the popcorn bursts through the roof of the evil (dean's? president's?) house and threatens to overtake the neighborhood? That's analogous to our pea dilemma. Open our produce drawer and the little green pods jump out in a tumble of wilted lettuce (don't get me started on the lettuce problem) and the dessicated beet tops I genuinely meant to cook three weeks ago. It's getting dangerous down there.

Luckily, I discovered a recipe for pickled sugar snap peas, which I've now applied to snow peas and, today, baby carrots and radishes. For the peas I add tiny hot chilies (you can buy them super cheaply at Indian markets and store them in the freezer) and lots of garlic, while the carrot-radish pickles got some garlic and a few sprigs from the lavender plant. I borrowed the lavender idea from a recent article in the Oregonian's FoodDay section. I have no idea what flavor the lavender will impart to the brine, but the results are so pretty--my lame camera work does not capture how vibrant these jars are--that I'm not sure I care.

I made a jar of sweet pea pickles a few weeks ago, so I can attest to how freaking delicious they are. Tart (and tarter the longer they sit in the brine), sweet, garlicky and hot all at once, these little pickles taste amazing on cheese sandwiches and chopped into tuna salad. I brought the last of the jar to my in-laws last week and Fred ate a few alone, dripping over the sink. He's picky, so I'm taking that as a compliment.

I don't know what to do with the carrot-radish pickles yet. Veggie sandwiches? Bloody Marys? A garnish/side for a meal of sticky rice and teriyaki? What do you suggest?

Sweet Pea Pickles

• 1 LB sugar snap or snow peas
• 1 1/4 C white vinegar
• 1 1/4 C cold water
• 1 T kosher or pickling salt
• 1 T sugar
• 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
• a few whole, hot red chilies or red pepper flakes
• 1 quart jar (sterilize it first) with a lid

1. Put a dry glass jar and lid (separately) into the oven at 300 degrees F for 15 minutes to sterilize. Set aside.
2. Stem and remove the strings from the peas. (I don't remove the strings and have no issues with the pickles' texture, but you may be less lazy than I am.)
3. Heat the vinegar, salt and sugar into a non-reactive pot until the salt and sugar dissolve. Remove from heat and add cold water. Stir and set aside to cool.
4. Pack the sterilized jar with chilies, garlic and peas. Ladle cooled brine over the pickles and seal tightly. Let the jar sit in the fridge for up to two weeks to really pickle up nicely.*

*Note: We actually start eating these within the first few days. The pickling solution grows really intense after about 3 weeks--I like it, but be prepared to pucker--so at that point you might want to pour some out and dilute it with water. (I think that would be alright. I haven't actually verified that idea.)

Eat Beautiful Food

It's been summer for approximately three weeks now, off and on, with coldish cloudy mornings and warm afternoons. It's glorious. After all of my caterwauling about the endless rain, it feels luxurious to sit in the sun on our back stoop, wade through 2666 and watch the tomato plants grow. I'm watching our arms grow tan, our cheeks rosy and glowing.

And while we're still waiting for tomato season (hurry up! I want tomato corn pie and toasted tomato breakfast sandwiches smeared with a tiny bit of mayo), we have baby fingerling potatoes and sweet corn and fava beans to play with and distract our stomachs.

Oh, Favas.

Have you eaten them? Vivid green beans that require shelling, then blanching, then skinning, then cooking and which are so worth it for their buttery, almost cheesy taste. Our last foray into favaland was a pasta I made last week with garlicky lemon sauteed favas tossed with pasta and homemade mint-pistachio pesto. This week I might make a fava spread or a salad, something to eat with a cold lemon-garlic-olive oil dressing and the Puy lentils sitting in the fridge, and roasted baby squash. And some time this week we'll eat a fingerling potato and sweet onion tart and I'll smear avocado on sour rye bread and devour my breakfast.

I love eating in the summer. It takes no effort and everything tastes wonderful.

Today at lunch a (very lanky) co-worker of whom I'm fond admitted to being addicted to food. At first this sounds like a scary admission--something a contestant on the The Biggest Loser says to his shame and the viewers' consternation--but I think I know what he meant.

Food is a pleasure. And in the summer it is a fragrant, colorful pleasure of fruits that stain your lips and hands and sweet baby vegetables, and heavy red tomatoes that taste like a voluptuous promise of happiness and beauty. When food represents so much that is good in the world, when cooking it well makes your friends smile and you hum and dance in the kitchen, as long as you eat it with care and eat what is beautiful (because what good food isn't beautiful: the lacy grain of wheat, the jeweled red of beets, the bright green of new peas) an "addiction to food" is less a pathology than an effort to appreciate what grows in each season and how it gets into your belly.

Increasingly, I find myself looking forward to the day when I can teach our future babies to shell fresh peas and water the basil. And stuff fresh raspberries into their mouths and understand that to live life with this sweetness and gluttony and appreciation and attachment to what sustains us is the best way to live. I work on learning these feelings and living this way every day now. It is hard, but it is good.



P.S. This is Princess. T won him for me at Wunderland Nickel Arcades this afternoon and is immensely desirous that Princess appear in this blog post. Sometimes in marriage it is just best to agree.

The Gray Days of Summer

I know that whining accomplishes nothing but social alienation, but man, these cool gray days are wearing me out.

For a while--meaning, from October through to the present--I was able to content myself with cooking and baking projects, reading, theatre, working and daydreaming, but my body is screaming for some sustained sunshine. We've had random beautiful days, and I've ridden my bike gleefully, even to work, and eaten my lunch, back pressed against the warm concrete walls of the warehouse. I've trudged to the gym and run back out as soon as my workout was over, to drink a glass of wine on the back stoop and gaze lovingly (if fretfully) at my potted vegetables and herbs. I've eaten a small mountain of baby beets and tender lettuce and fresh sugar snaps, and even a couple of tiny, sun-warmed strawberries from my little plants. Summer is here, fitfully.

But on the 4th of July, it is cool enough to keep the back door closed and wear a sweater, and I don't feel like baking bread. The small pile of herbs sitting on my cutting board, snipped this morning from my parents' garden, induces more angst than creativity. And this month's literary project, Roberto Bolano's 2666, does not entice, perhaps because reading about depressed literary critics isn't uplifting. It raises spectres of my own abandoned graduate studies, making me glad and sad, both, to have left the ridiculous and insular world of academics.

I keep trying to imagine myself on the Irish coast, where it is often cold in the summer time, or at the very least, already on our September honeymoon to Kauai. I'm reading side novels about wars and magic--anything to distract me from the moon-colored sky and my uncharacteristic boredom. I even talked the management team into running a warehouse-themed haiku contest at work, and am now at a loss because all I can think of to contribute is

Books books books books books

books books books books books books books

Books books books books books.

When we were little, my sister and I used to sing this kids' song "Mr. Golden Sun," that went as follows:

Oh Mr. Sun, Sun, Mr. Golden Sun,

Please shine down on meee.

You hear that, Mr. Sun? Portland invites you to visit.

Three Pestos

With the herb bounty from our Creative Growers box increasing each week, I've been forced-- really quite aggressively, in that passive-aggressive way languishing fruits and vegetables have of fomenting guilt in the lazy cook letting them rot--to do something with them, something more lasting and copious than adding a teaspoon of fresh chopped herbs to the top of a tart or the last stir of a sauce. Hence the little plastic baggies of pesto dollops now filling our freezer, mint-pistachio pesto, parsley-sunflower pesto, and the standby basil pesto to be precise.

Truth be told, I'm not 100% pleased with any of the pestos--a crime considering the amount of kitchenware, herbs and olive oil that went into them. We did eat a lovely pasta with a combo of the basil and parsley pesto last night, and I have a feeling that the mint-pistachio pesto is going to find its cause smeared onto homemade flat breads and then baked with a smattering of ground lamb and aromatics. But by itself each pesto tastes too...green. A symptom of a lazy cook chucking them into the Cuisinart stem and all (so don't do that!), and a lack of lemon juice, perhaps. The pestos manage to taste both leafy and flat, a little too rich and not bright enough. Like Paris Hilton.

For this reason, I'm not going to give you precise recipes for these pestos. Besides, pesto is easy (just take off those stems and have plenty of lemons on hand). Grab your herbs, your olive oil, lemons, salt, garlic, nuts or seeds and cheese if you like, and grind them up. I like to toast the nuts/seeds before using to bring out their flavor and add depth to the pesto. Then, either put dollops of the pesto into a spare ice-cube tray, or do what I do, and place dollops (they will look unappetizing in this form, but go with it) onto a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Freeze the pesto lumps until solid and then scoop up with a spatula and pack loosely into plastic baggies. Voila! Instant flavor for pastas, soups, pizzas, roast fish and meats, and sandwiches. Or follow T's example and eat it with a spoon. Just don't, like T, expect a kiss afterwards.

At the Hop

Our retro-tastic 1950s cocktail party was a vibrant, if mellow affair.

There was the booze...

...and the jello.


In rich reds and greens, laced with tuna and dotted with olives, these jiggly gems reminded us of why our (grand)parents drank so many martinis.

The night's winner was probably Fred's mold, which looks like a night's worth of vomit topped by a jujube. Needless to say, only T tried that one. (Brave man, T! And handsome.)

Slightly more palatable, though no less era-appropriate, were the pigs in a blanket, francheezies, tuna noodle casserole, cream cheese and jelly sandwiches, Velveeta fudge, and Judith's chocolate Coca-Cola cake.

The sandwich loaves sounded promising, but it turns out that grape jelly, minced shrimp, cream cheese, bacon, and olives do not mix well.

My mom's was a bit ahead of her time; I call this The Ken Kesey Loaf:

While Dave presented the more streamlined Londoner:

And when we weren't hesitating over the food table, or drinking Fred's handmade Manhattans, martinis and whiskey sours, we were watching Joe and Dee's hilarious beer-can baby.

A good time was had by all. (If not by our stomachs.)

Waiting on the Cake

It's late, I'm waiting for the half-pound cake in the oven to rise to its golden domed climax (oh my) and rest into its cooling stage before tucking myself in. Tybalt is raging around the room , chasing one of those white bulk bag twist ties that I hoard in the small appliance drawer in the kitchen for reasons unknown even to myself.

Tom and I went to the wine country last Sunday.

Wildflowers, and small grape vines, Gewurtraminer and Pinot Grigio, and dry salami on rosemary crackers in the sunshine. And time alone with T. It was a good day.

It occurs to me, in my baby-addled mind, that these impromptu trips to the movies, the pub, our favorite wineries, will probably disappear when we start making little Waltons next year. Not that I don't intend to haul said tiny Waltons wherever I wish to go, but I need to start savoring these moments with T. Too often we get wrapped up in our lives and I forget to value him as much as I should.

It's been raining again, all week, cool and gray, making this a good weekend to prepare a Father's Day-Parents' 34th Wedding Anniversary feast for my family. I wish the date didn't coincide with Finals Grading Weekend and Theatre Audition Extravaganza (one audition today, call-backs tomorrow, followed by a first read of our summer beach show), but I have the Fennel Honey Pork Loin marinating, the pate fermentee for the baguettes fermenting, the pound cake baking, and a lovely roast beet and carrot salad, mashed potatoes with caramelized fennel and young Walla Walla onion, and a velvety butter lettuce salad waiting to be made tomorrow. My father asked for the homemade bread, roast pork and strawberry shortcake; I am surreptitiously adding beets to the menu to show my family that, when cooked properly and laced with my mom's Italian herb vinegar and olive oil, they can be quite nice.

One day, if I open the Ramona St Keep, I will serve this simple beet salad, maybe adorned with fresh thyme and a soft white cheese. The recipe comes from my CSA farmers, who adapted it from the Chez Panisse Vegetables cookbook. It made a convert out of me, especially the next day wrapped up in a whole wheat tortilla with creamy avocado slices and cheddar cheese. But I eat weird lunches.

The Beets that will Change your Mind

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Remove the beet tops (you can save these for another recipe--I chopped and sauteed them, and added them to a quiche), leaving about 1/2 inch stem. Wash the beets and cut in half. Put them into a baking pan with enough water to cover the bottom of the pan. Cover tightly with foil and bake for 45-60 minutes, until easily pierced with a knife. Uncover and allow to cool. Slip the skins off (this is quite fun) and cut off their tops and tails. Cut them into quarters or slices, sprinkle with at least 1 tsp vinegar (the recipe suggests sherry vinegar, but I used my mom's homemade herb vinegar to delicious results) and salt to taste. Let stand for a few minutes to allow the beets to absorb the flavors. Toss with a generous drizzle of olive oil and enjoy, warm or cold.

*If you want to add carrots, as I'm doing tomorrow, simply blanch the carrots in boiling water for around two minutes--until just tender--and cut into chunks or coins.