I’m an enthusiastic fan of eating seasonally, and support the incoming/outgoing nature of fresh produce as the year progresses. Even my cherished heirloom tomatoes: I desperately long for their arrival in July, but by November, fully caprese-salad-and-fresh-salsa sated, I wave a loving adieu to the bounty of summer, eager for the cranberries and chestnuts and butternut squash of late autumn.
But there’s one — no, two — crops whose late-spring/early-summer departure from the land makes me sad and a bit grumpy: strawberries and blueberries. Their seasons are unbearably short — unlike the tomato, who sets up camp for a good three to four months of the year, and then lives on through the winter in the form of delicious sauce — and it’s proven impossible to overuse or tire of either berry before their demise.
Blueberries are not quite incoming yet, but strawberry fields are in full swing here in the Queen City, and I’m already feeling a bit of a panic about their exit.
I dropped the ball last year. Big time. Lousy spring weather cut the already-short season even shorter, and I was left without any to freeze. No one to blame but myself, as there were plenty for the having during their brief time on this earth. I was too intent on using them up in strawberry cakes and tarts and smoothies to remember to reserve some for the freezer. My lack of forethought weighed on me every time I purchased the grocery store shadow-of-a-strawberry strawberries shipped from where-the-hell-ever for mid-summer shortcakes.
This year, I’m doing better, but I still have big plans: jams and gelatos and spiked strawberry lemonade. This weekend will find me shoving quarts (plural) into my bag at the farmers’ markets.
I’ve been mercifully spared from food allergies. They’re tough, folks, those food allergies and sensitivities (those of you that have them are probably nodding along with me right now).
When she was young, my niece had a terrible time with food allergies. For a good stretch, the only thing she would eat that she could eat was potato chips. (My idea of food heaven on earth, all health things being equal; her parents, however, were not happy.) Nevertheless, she grew to be a gorgeous, size 2 adult who now eats little else besides mac and cheese. She’s a girl after my own foodie heart, that one.)
In the final years of my dad’s life, his doctor suggested that he might have a gluten sensitivity and that going gluten-free might help relieve his frequent digestive upsets. As with everything, Dad jumped into the GF world with both feet.
This was 2006, 2007. There were GF sections in the grocery store at this point, but help and guidance was scarce, even on the interwebs. Avoiding (or substituting) the obvious wheat products — bread, pasta — was a no-brainer, but it was everything else that tripped us up. From sausages to salad dressings to pickles to Rice Krispies (my Dad’s favorite cereal), gluten has a way of working it’s way into everything.
Since then, the situation for food sensitivity sufferers has improved considerably, thanks in part to the enormous library of info on the interwebs and better product labeling. Just this morning, I noticed that my bottle of ibuprofen notes in red letters that the medication is gluten-free. Progress. (Although I suspect that for folks with anaphylaxis-inducing allergies, much more work is needed.)
So why am I prattling on about food allergies I don’t have? Because it’s National Food Allergy Awareness Week, and, in writing down the ingredients for today’s soup, I noticed that it’s nut-free, gluten-free, dairy-free, corn-free, soy-free and egg-free — the most common food allergans.
And also because one can develop food allergies at any point in their life. Awareness is a good thing.
Spring inspires spontaneity and an inventive spirit. The calendar shows we are now closer to summer than winter, and I’m feeling it — the desire to stop planning the clock and live more in the moment grows as the thermometer creeps upward.
One of the many things to love about having a home garden is walking out into the backyard, the sun strong on your shoulders, surveying nature’s bounty, and planning the mealtime menu. It taps the base instincts, foraging and hunting (and grilling, too — humankind has been cooking over an open flame for thousands of years). (For the record, I also get happy menu-planning feelings at the farmers’ market.)
One sunny Sunday morning, I fetched radishes, chives and over-wintered carrots from the garden and spread them out on the kitchen counter. Spying oranges and soba noodles from a recent trip to the market, lunch magically sorted itself out.
These are my favorite meals, the ones that happen effortlessly with ingredients on hand from garden and pantry.
I’ve never had rhubarb. Thaaat’s right. Not once.
The blushing stalk has escaped my spring produce greedy grabs for many years. Food that needs to be mixed with something else — in rhubarb’s case, sugar — in order to be palatable makes me suspicious. And did you know that rhubarb’s leaves are toxic? That’s why they’re sold stripped down to the stalk at the store.
All in all, rhubarb has been a can-spare.
And next to the strawberry … well, my friends, everything pales to the strawberry. If I were a poet, rhapsodic thoughts of spring would turn not to the matters of the heart, but to the bold, red berry. (But even though I’m not lyrically gifted, my thoughts still turn to the berry. They just don’t rhyme.)
There’s nothing not to love about the strawberry. I love how field-grown, freshly picked strawberries — like this first-of-the-season batch purchased at the farmers’ market on Saturday — are so tender and plump that merely sitting piled demurely on top of one another in their tiny pint crates causes them to leak sweet juice.
No, these berries are not for shipping cross-country. They’re for picking and eating — devouring — all on the same day. (Thanks, Bergefurds Farm — your berries are amazing.)
I have some bad habits I really need to break.
Note: being cured from soup addiction is not one of them.
I don’t check my tire pressure often enough. I don’t rinse out my mixing bowls right away, so things get crusty. (I know, ew.) I have paperwork clutter-blindness (I can step right over the catalog that fell to the floor a week ago without noticing).
But the one habit I feel compelled to tackle immediately is my reliance on the big box grocery stores, like Kroger, Whole Foods, Fresh Market.
As is absolutely their plan, I go in with a simple list of items for a dinner for two, and come out with a bag of stuff that costs $50. I’m a compulsive “stocker.” It goes something like this:
Parmesano-Reggiano is on the list, but right next to the parm wheel is a sampling display of cubed Bellavitano Merlot and, “OMG, I must have this even though I have no planned use for it.” ($7)
“Am I out of Kalamata olives?” I have no idea, I haven’t needed olives in months, so — just in case! — I grab a jar (only to get home and discover, of course, plenty more in the pantry). ($4)
“What about farro? Is the jar empty? I think it is!” (It wasn’t — $6)
“I should really make more fruit smoothies.” (Frozen peaches, frozen blueberries, $6. I hate my blender, and I prefer green smoothies. So I make neither because I hate my blender.)
Four little items, but it’s half the bill. Things I didn’t need.
They win, the big-boxers. It’s their raison d’être, after all, to separate me from my money, and to not only make it seem like a good idea — the overspending — but that it was my idea all along. (If accused of wily doings, the marketers and floor merchandisers would simply clutch their pearls in alarm and declare, Why, we didn’t force you to buy the merlot-infused cheese. You did that all on your own without a push from even the cheese monger.”)
And they’d be right. This problem is all me-me-me. I over-buy at these huge they-have-it-all-so-I-want-it-all stores; and I, alone, am to blame. Curses!
When I read through today’s recipe for the baking group, Tuesdays with Dorie, I immediately fell in love.
In. Love.
Although I don’t bake it very often, I do love shortbread. And the completely new-to-me technique of freezing and grating the dough was intriguing. I imagined a tender, fluffy cookie, yet somehow still sandy (the hallmark, of course, of really good shortbread).
Indeed, this recipe should be called “Hungarian Shortbread Cake,” or maybe “Hungarian Shortbread Cookie Bars” — more substantial than traditional shortbread, this party-worthy confection has double-stacked layers of soft and sandy-chewy shortbread sandwiched with tart jam.
Being a salty-over-sweet kind of girl, I’m a try-it-once-and-move-on baker. But this recipe is a keeper.
My garden is positively bursting out in radishes, the first officially picked vegetable of 2012 at Casa SoupAddict.
I know this makes some of you groan inwardly — radishes might not be your thing, but they are entirely my thing, and I can scarf them up raw, roasted or tossed in a salad. Their black-peppery bite is, for me, the perfect heat: it sits on the back of the tongue, instead of the sometimes-irritating (and cough-inducing, when you’re not expecting it) back of the throat, like cayenne pepper.
But my favorite way to prepare radishes is to grate them, along with a few carrots, and toss them with a spiced marinade, some seeds and maybe crumbles of a briny cheese. I’ve written about carrot salads before (including my favorite from last summer), and aside from fresh, heirloom tomatoes, I’m most looking forward to regular servings of these crunchy salads.
It’s been a weird week. And weird weeks find me contemplative in the kitchen, pondering life, purpose and path.
We handed over the keys to my parents’ house to the new owner on Tuesday, bringing to a somber close one of life’s unavoidable chapters. Once home, I wandered into the kitchen, as I do when I’m fidgety, whether in joy or sadness or a ponderous foggy funk.
I had purchased bananas last week with the intent of making weekend scones before The Cold from Hell knocked me flat, and they were still on the counter, yellow and perky as could be. Not a speck of brown, not a single soft spot.
How is it possible that 5-day-old bananas were still not over-ripe? [Shrug] I turned on the oven. I was feeling better already. The kitchen does that. So does bread-making.
Forgive me while I whine for a few minutes.
Some folks get sniffly colds that pink up their noses and cheeks and bring on squeaky little sneezes. It’s almost cute — you just want to hug them, wrap a fuzzy scarf around their neck, and hand-feed them chicken noodle soup. Five days later, they’re back to their regular jogging schedule, laughing with bright eyes and talking in a normal voice.
Not me, people.
Once a year, I get a knock-down-drag-out cold that knocks me flat for a good long stretch. After a day of an open-faucet drippy nose, it heads straight for my lungs, and for the next month (yes, month), I sound like an emphysematous 90-year-old man. My head is stuffed shut, my ears are a hollow cave. My d’s sound like n’s. When I sneeze, I crackle like crunchy potato chips. And if I don’t remember to cough heartily at regular intervals, I wheeze.
It ain’t pretty.
So, the 2012 version of The Cold started last Thursday. By Saturday, I was a sad sack, huddled on the couch with Kleenex and dextromethorphan, re-watching the entire 2nd season of The Walking Dead, feeling (and looking, I’m sure) like the title characters, envying their spunky determination to stay vertical and keep moving against overwhelming odds (i.e., being mostly dead). I completely lacked their energy.
Saturday, dinner was a no brainer: when I’m sick, I need Mulligatawny. Nothing else will do.
But Sunday, I was feverish and exhausted, craving starchy carbs and an eight-hour nap.
Spaghetti with Marcella Hazan’s famous tomato sauce (which I had in the freezer) sounded really good. But then I remembered cacio e pepe — spaghetti and black pepper — a super simple pasta dish with a peppery cheese sauce. Easy enough for even a groggy, stuffy-headed wheezer to pull together.
