Tag: everyday cooking

Not a likely love

Well, would you look at that! Yesterday was Saint Patrick’s Day, and how fitting, I’m writing about scones! Which are Irish, of course – and, well, also Scottish, and English, and generally British, but anyway, they’re Thatapproximatepartoftheworldish, at least. I should quit while I’m ahead. When I was growing up, my elementary school was near a health food store called the Earth. It was not a large place, nor was it fancy. It was not Whole Foods. It was small and low-ceilinged, lit with fluorescent tubes and lined with vitamins in brown bottles and beeswax chapstick and sesame bars in plastic wrappers, and it smelled like lentil soup. There was a cafe at one end where they served sandwiches and…

Read more

The very definition

I am bad at weekend mornings. I hear that some people, maybe even a lot of people, have weekend mornings that involve a hot breakfast, hot coffee, the Sunday Times, and hours that pass slowly, quietly, as though on tiptoe, but I am not familiar with that kind of weekend morning. I like mornings a lot, but I am not good at planned relaxation, and I married someone who is similarly impaired. We went to visit his grandparents in Florida over New Year’s, and we were very tired and verging on sick, but instead of reading books, lying on the beach, or whatever one does on vacation in Florida, we wound up kayaking in the Everglades. With alligators. (To be…

Read more

I am not kidding around

Well. It’s hard to know where to start. I’m tempted to jump right in, to say that you should hurry up and put a pot on the stove and make the pasta recipe below and let’s get back to business, shall we?, but that doesn’t seem right. First, I need to thank you. I had no idea that Delancey would swallow me up like that, and I need to thank you for being so patient, so supportive, so good to me. This restaurant is up and running today because of you. I am not kidding around about that. I am also not kidding around when I say this: I’m ready to get back to writing. I can’t imagine not having…

Read more

It really does help

A few evenings ago, I felt very uninspired about making dinner. This has been happening a lot lately, far more than I should probably admit, as someone who is supposedly crazy about cooking. I could attribute it to lots of causes, but I think these things go in cycles for all of us, these urges to cook or not cook, and no matter our individual circumstances, it’s only sane to acknowledge that. Sometimes I want to make two types of sauce gribiche, and other times, I want to claw my eyes out and then call for a pizza delivery. I know I should try to find some sort of happy medium in this, and maybe I will someday. But in…

Read more

Something called sauce gribiche

About five years ago, I think it was, I went out to dinner with my friend Keaton and ate something called sauce gribiche. I had never heard of it before, but it was a kind of coarse vinaigrette, with chopped cornichons and capers and hard-boiled eggs, and it was served over asparagus. I don’t know why I remember it so clearly, aside from the fact that I dripped some of it onto my pants, but ever since, I’ve thought about it sometimes, usually when I’m supposed to be thinking about more important things, and I’ve wanted to try making it. It took me a while, as you can see, but yesterday, I finally did. Twice. The thing is, as I…

Read more

About cake

Today, I thought it would be nice to talk about cake. Actually, that’s a lie. Today, I thought it would be nice to eat cake. That’s all. Anything else is completely optional. I’m easy to please, as long as there is cake around. Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about cake. This is not an unusual condition for me, but it happens particularly often when I’m feeling frazzled or tired or harried, right around the same time that I start listening to the easy listening station on the car radio and feeling genuinely soothed by it. It’s pretty clear that you need a good night’s sleep when “Peaceful Easy Feeling” comes on the stereo and you almost choke up, sitting…

Read more

Its name is farro

As I type this, it is cloudy again, and cold. The weather today leaves much to be desired. Such as some sunlight, for starters, and warmth, and caramelized onions. Right now, I really, really desire caramelized onions. I know that this picture doesn’t seem to have much to do with onions, nor does it even seem appetizing, I imagine, but bear with me for a second. What you see there is my new ideal lunch: warm farro with French lentils, caramelized onions, and feta. It’s ugly as sin, and it’s also completely delicious. It’s a little like a lentil salad and a lot like mujadara, and if I could somehow ensure – maybe through magic, or fervent prayer – that…

Read more

I mean it

I would like to sit down here today and write as though everything were normal, as though I were actually capable of forming complete sentences. But the truth is, I am an absolute maniac. Tomorrow is the official release date for my book, a day that I never really trusted would come, and I feel alternately so ecstatic and so freaked out that I can’t decide whether I need to run around the block a few dozen times or lie down for a nap. In the meantime, I will eat some sweet potato pound cake. As you can see, that’s been my fallback position for a few days now. Many of you have written already(!) to say that you have…

Read more

Now you know

I have a confession to make. It probably seems like I live and breathe to cook, right? It probably seems like I never get tired of stirring and whisking and chopping, like I go to sleep at night spooning the refrigerator and wake up each morning to find a skillet under my pillow and a rainbow arcing gently, benevolently, over the stove. But the truth is, there are many days when I would rather do anything than cook. ANYTHING. Like, hit-myself-over-the-head-with-the-aforementioned-skillet anything. Anything. Lately, I’ve been having a lot of those days. At first, I thought it was because of my recent run of bad recipes. It’s hard to feel terribly excited about spending time in the kitchen after you’ve…

Read more

On cue

I don’t make many demands around here, but today, I have to. So listen up. (Please.) Get a pen and a piece of paper. Then write the following: 4 large tomatoes 1 yellow onion Arborio rice Fresh basil Breadcrumbs Potatoes Now, go to the grocery store or market or wherever, and buy everything you wrote down. Go on! And don’t forget to preheat the oven. Tonight, for dinner, you are having Luisa Weiss’s tomatoes filled with rice. (With a couple of potatoes on the side.) This photograph hardly does them justice, but trust me: you are going to love these tomatoes. I say that as someone who doesn’t, under ordinary circumstances, even like tomatoes filled with rice. Prior to last…

Read more