Meats – Orangette

June 30

Sat, 01 Jul 2017 04:08:18 +0000

A couple of weeks ago, while researching rhubarb crumble recipes for the Crisps and Crumbles episode of Spilled Milk (still going strong, 52 weeks a year! and still featuring impromptu hair-metal duets!), I pulled down an old copy of Canal House Cooking, and it fell open to page 57, “Cutlets Smothered in Peas.” That’s when it dawned on me that I had somehow made it to age almost-39 without ever cooking a chicken cutlet, and that my child had somehow made it to age almost-five without ever eating a chicken cutlet. I understand this makes one subject to ridicule and rebuke not only in America, but also in many other parts of the world, including Japan, where panko-breaded, pan-fried chicken…

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That January thing

Fri, 29 Jan 2016 20:52:29 +0000

Split pea, the ugliest soup! The food whose appearance most closely approximates toxic waste water! The miraculous substance capable of making a home kitchen feel like a military chow hall! Capable of making a person who has never used the words “chow hall” in her entire life suddenly feel like Chow Hall is what she will call her vast, sweeping estate in the English countryside, when she somehow inherits a vast, sweeping estate in the English countryside! Split pea, a voyage for the mind! I have written before about split pea soup. It is apparently a January thing for me: I last wrote about it four years ago this month. Until yesterday, in fact, I wasn’t going to write about this particular version,…

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Doop dee doo

Fri, 04 Dec 2015 18:53:00 +0000

A couple of years ago, late one winter morning, we were out running errands in the neighborhood, and we stopped into La Carta de Oaxaca, on Ballard Avenue, for an early lunch. June was still in a high chair and not yet fully proficient at chewing anything with crunch, so we ordered their sopa de pollo for her, a rich, brothy chicken soup served in a bowl big enough for mixing cake batter, with the meat still on the bone and big hunks of zucchini, carrot, and chayote. I shredded the meat onto a plate and chopped up the vegetables with the side of my spoon. She ate with her hands, the juices running fast down her forearms, which were then still…

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One Tuesday, late-morning

Sun, 14 Jun 2015 00:30:00 +0000

I come to you today, June 13th, a fine summer’s day on which you probably have no desire to turn on the oven, to talk about roasted chicken. More specifically, I want to talk about Thomas Keller’s Favorite Simple Roast Chicken, which I prefer to call TK’s Hot Buttered Chicken. I have long been a devotee of the Zuni Cafe recipe for roasted chicken. I imagine many of you feel the same way. Zuni’s recipe, which Judy Rodgers wrote with a rare and reverential thoroughness – may she rest in peace, and may more cookbooks be written like hers – relies on three things: using a small-ish bird, salting it a day ahead, and cooking in a crackling hot oven,…

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Right now

Mon, 09 Jun 2014 02:10:00 +0000

Hello from a train en route to Portland, Oregon! I’ll be at Jim Dixon’s Real Good Food olive oil warehouse tomorrow, Monday, from 3 to 4, if you’d like to stop by for some olive oil and a book, and then I’ll be reading at Powell’s on Burnside tomorrow night at 7:30. And then, on the way home, because I am an unstoppable book-signing machine, I’ll be swinging by the Bayview School of Cooking, in Olympia, for an event at 6:00 pm. If you’re in the area(s), come on out. Now, in the meantime, I promised you the recipe for June’s new favorite thing, which, now that I think about it, may also be my new favorite thing. The thing in question…

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A short leap

Mon, 10 Mar 2014 20:44:00 +0000

Our friend Ben is in town for a visit, and this past Friday, while we waited in line for lunch at Il Corvo – always worth the wait, in case you ever walked by and wondered – I told him about some lamb meatballs that I wanted to write up, but that I had a problem: the only photo I have is of the raw meat and seasonings in a bowl. Ooh, Ben said sharply, sucking air between his teeth, which I took to mean, That’s going to hurt. And yet. AND YET. Maybe it will ease the blow to know that the reason why I have no meatball photo is that, by the time they’re done cooking, they smell so…

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Please consider

Fri, 22 Nov 2013 17:46:00 +0000

So, how bored will you be if we talk about soup again? Ham Bone, Greens, and Bean Soup? I didn’t set out to write about this one – I made it mostly as a vehicle for a ham bone that I put in our freezer last April, forgot, and then triumphantly unearthed the week before last – but June liked it so much that she did her special high chair “dance,” swaying from side to side and grunting, so I changed my mind. Swaying and grunting: strong praise from young June E. A. Pettit! (Also, Swaying and Grunting: what I will call my debut album when I launch my third career as a down-and-out country singer.) I know that it’s almost…

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Let’s wing it

Mon, 18 Jun 2012 22:39:00 +0000

Before I say anything else, I want to thank you for your kindness about my aunt. I was very nervous when I put up that post, but I felt much better for having written it, and I hoped that meant something. Thank you for reading, and for saying what you did, and mostly, for understanding. There is no smooth transition to be made from talking about death to discussing Thai food. Let’s wing it. I don’t know why that fried egg looks like it has no yolk. It definitely had one, because before I took this picture, I punctured it with that spoon. I think this is my punishment for not taking a proper photograph: my iPhone ate the yolk. Anyway,…

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Your efforts will be rewarded

Mon, 30 May 2011 03:34:00 +0000

Listen, I know it’s a holiday weekend. Most of you are probably outside, grilling or picnicking or generally engaged in some form of early-summer eating. In fact, as I type this, I can hear my neighbors on their deck, shaking a bag of charcoal briquettes, talking about Neil Diamond. But what I would like to tell them (aside from, HAVE MERCY! NO NEIL DIAMOND TONIGHT!), and you, too, is this: do your future self a favor and go inside and cook a pot of rice. Also, do whatever you have to do to get some Napa cabbage kimchi. Come midweek, your efforts will be rewarded. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to get around to writing about kimchi…

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I am celebrating

Sun, 09 Jan 2011 02:39:00 +0000

2010 didn’t exit quietly, and the last month of it was a royal mess. But my aunt is okay now – even heading back to work! The rewards of health! – and for that, we’re relieved. I’m home again and excited for a new year, for the return of plain, normal, everyday life. I love plain, normal, everyday life. The laundry, the occasional clean sheets, the morning coffee that I never brew right, the dog asleep on the couch, the arrival of the mail, the mail carrier who hates the dog, the restaurant, the work, the split pea soup. Few things are uglier than split pea soup, but that is alright with me. I’ve been on something of a split…

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