I am reading a collection of Nora Ephron’s work this week. (The MOST of Nora Ephron) She was a remarkable talent: writer, film director and cook. Read her now, if you haven’t already! Her deft hand was apparent in her wry observations and in her flaky piecrusts. And I had her help with dinner last night – she said it is OK to buy something you can’t really cook well at home – and so we supped on store-bought fried chicken. This was excellent advice, which I am please to pass along to you, Gentle Reader.
I took it personally that when Nora Ephron died I hadn’t had a hint that death was imminent. Not that I had a passing acquaintance with her, not even a street sighting, but her words echo in my head sometimes. I have read her books and articles and seen lots of her films. I think of her when I see a nice scarf or a beautifully dressed salad. She is someone I would have liked to have known and then, somehow impressed. (This winter I finally understood how valid her philosophy of turtlenecks has become for me.)
She was smart and she was funny, two rare traits I use as a gauge when judging people. Sometimes I cook and have imaginary conversations with her. (Keep in mind that I work by myself all day and have lots of conversations with a great variety of people. When I was small I am told that Glinda was my imaginary friend, so you can see that my current companions have impressive slippers to fill.) Nora Ephron is the influence that guides the chocolate soufflé.
Julia Child drops by sometimes, too. Mostly because I keep lots of wine on hand for all emergencies, like bouncing the chicken on the floor and snatching it up again before the dog gets it, searing the stew beef into charred chunks, and forgetting to turn the oven on. She chortles and we plunge on, chopping onions with aplomb, trussing up those chickens and smearing butter on everything we can.
Ruth Reichl and Nigella Lawson stop in, and so do Merrill Stubbs and Amanda Hesser from Food52. Merrill and Amanda are far more hip than I am ever going to be, and have imagined and developed their own growing digital empire, while packing imaginative school lunches, mastering e-commerce and merchandising, and researching and writing The Essential New York Times Cookbook. They are practically dancing backwards in high heels on that website, while I am still in my jimjams in suburbia, grappling with laundry and the ridiculous middle class dictates for three square meals a day. I love their website, as you can see by how often I refer to it. They have grown a real food community that I adore. And maybe they’ll swing in for a little wine, too!
The charming Lee Child swans through whenever I bake a flourless chocolate cake. (Lee Bailey’s Country Desserts) I owe him many a birthday celebration success. I have honed my few baking skills with his delightful book. The recipe has never failed me, and it never ceases to impress. That might be because I come from the land of Jell-O lemon meringue pies and boxed tapioca pudding. A flourless chocolate cake, which is basically a chocolate soufflé, is still rather continental. Not much can go wrong with chocolate, eggs and sugar.
Calvin Trillin, though not a cookbook writer, has long written persuasively about food. I waddled through my pregnancies reading long passages from his travel-and-eating-with-Alice books to my poor husband and the captive audience sprog. Never in a million years am I going to eat boudin sausage from Louisiana, or scarf down fresh oysters from the cold water of Nova Scotia, though they all sounded intensely divine when I read about them. When we visited Kansas City we took a family field trip to Arthur Bryant’s, Mr. Trillin’s oft-touted barbeque emporium. Barbecue was a concept we could enjoy. Life is described in books, but the barbeque is in Kansas City.
As soon as I am finished with this column I am going out to the kitchen to bake some shortcake, because the strawberries need a little dressing up. It will make up for last night’s shortcut. I’ll see which of the literati follow me in there.
“I don’t think any day is worth living without thinking about what you’re going to eat next at all times.”
-Nora Ephron
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