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January 24, 2021

The Chestertown Spy

An Educational News Source for Chestertown Maryland

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Food and Garden Food Friday Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Winter Salads

January 22, 2021 by Jean Sanders 1 Comment

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How are all your New Year’s resolutions holding up? Are you still walking 10,000 steps a day? Are you still eschewing alcohol (this has been a tough Dry January, but you can do it!)? Are you reading more? Are you still keeping a notebook handy for thoughtful jottings and ruminations? And what about your vegetable intake? I wish someone would sneak more vegetables into my diet, but being the chief-cook-and-bottle-washer around here, I can’t very well surprise myself with well-disguised broccoli or imperceptible beets. Therefore, I must suspend my disbelief and will finally surrender to adulting, and winter salads might be the best way to go.

I love a nice leafy, crunchy salad. I was raised on iceberg lettuce salads, so the discovery of romaine lettuce in college shifted the tectonic plates of my tetchy palate. I used to eat sun-warmed tomatoes out in the garden every summer, but grew up eating tasteless, refrigerated, hothouse tomatoes in my salads all winter long. Luckily time does march on, and we can avail ourselves of healthier greens all year long. Our local farmers have also come into the twenty-first century and are ready to nourish us with their winter bounties. Look for parsnips, garlic, turnips, rutabagas, leeks, lettuce, spinach, kale, chard, potatoes (sweet and regular), and cabbage.

The Ware family was going nuts on the Table Manners podcast this week, waxing poetical about “massaged kale”. Honestly. This was news to me, so off to Google I trotted. https://minimalistbaker.com/easy-massaged-kale-salad-15-minutes/ And as we all have delicate constitutions in this house, even omnivore Luke the wonder dog, I guess we will be massaging kale from now on. Put that hint in your handy notebook.

The dark of winter is a good time to introduce hints of color and sparkle to your salad. Cranberries! Apples! Cheddar cheese! Pomegranate seeds! https://www.foodiecrush.com/kale-salad-with-cranberries-apple-and-cheddar/

You can throw everything in a main course winter salad, by cleaning out the produce drawer in the fridge and adding shredded cabbage, carrots, Brussels sprouts, roasted squash, or chunks of apples. You will be cutting down on clutter while eating in a healthier fashion – surely that will be two more New Year’s resolutions you are attending to, because you are marvelously efficient and thorough. https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a104726/ultimate-winter-salad/

We still haven’t touched upon quinoa, grilled cabbage, or sweet potatoes. You can go meatless for weeks, and feel very smug about your resolutions. And since we can’t socialize anyway, none of your friends will know how smug you have become. Finally, a silver lining for our pandemic times: you can be insufferable in private. And when the good times roll around again, you will show off your toned legs, flat abs, and your newly bookish nature to great effect. https://www.saveur.com/best-winter-salad-recipes/

Here is a great chatty, weekly newsletter: Emily Nunn and The Department of Salad can guide you through the rest of the winter: https://eatsomesalad.substack.com/p/welcome-to-the-department-of-salads

We have almost gotten through January. The first daffodil has bloomed in my front yard – I think it is regretting its rash and hasty decision already. Nonetheless, time is inching forward. Put down your phone, walk the dog, wear your mask and eat all your winter veggies. You’ll feel better. It’s almost time to plant seeds, and then the rest of the daffodils will start blooming, right on schedule.

If you are going to plant your own garden this year, now if a good time to go through some of the seed catalogues that have been arriving weekly. It’s almost time to start sowing seeds to nurture inside, while waiting for spring to arrive. https://www.almanac.com/gardening/planting-calendar/MD/Easton#

“On Saturday afternoons when all the things are done in the house and there’s no real work to be done, I play Bach and Chopin and turn it up real loudly and get a good bottle of chardonnay and sit out on my deck and look out at the garden.”
–Maya Angelou

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Imaginary Friends and Coq au Vin

January 15, 2021 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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The COVID lockdown has been isolating and sometimes lonely. My days are mostly spent with my enthusiastic, yet strangely tongue-tied wonder dog; the ever-patient Luke, who herds me from room to room until he finally positions me in front of the box of dog treats, or into the car for the short drive to his favorite twice-daily walk destination. He is strictly apolitical, although I think he will like the Bidens, who will understand the concept of frequent dog treats. He hasn’t had much to say about books or movies or even Bridgerton. He is napping right now, just a few feet away from me. He is a comfort and is an abiding presence, but he doesn’t contribute much to the conversation.

When we are going through our daily paces, and adding up the 10,000 steps, I rely on various podcasts to keep me company. Some days I only listen to Slate Magazine podcasts. There is nothing like a brisk half hour spent with Mike Pesca and The Gist to get me going in the morning. His lively take on politics and world events is always clear-sighted and trenchant, and yet, hilarious. Considering how complicated, and pared-down, our lives are right now, it is good to turn to an intelligent interpretation of complicated and intimidating world scenarios. https://slate.com/podcasts/the-gist And the man who would hire the Pizza Rat performance artist to help him propose marriage surely has a lively range of interests.

For pop culture I adore the cheerful folks at NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour. I would love to have Linda Holmes and her dog stop by for cocktails when this is all over. She is gentle in her criticisms, and is jolly and positive about almost everything. If she likes a television show or a YA book or another movie that has gone straight to Netflix, I add it to my list. And recently the show has gone from weekly to a five-day-a-week format. Good news! https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510282/pop-culture-happy-hour

I have never been good at keeping up with popular music, even back in the day when I was buying physical albums or cassettes. So imagine my surprise when I stumbled onto Jessie Ware’s podcast Table Manners. She is a pop singer who has gained world-wide popularity for the weekly food podcast that she does with her mother, the ever-charming Lennie. https://www.jessieware.com/podcasts/ They chat up foodies, pop stars, film directors, actors, and activists all while drinking cocktails, cooking food, eating Friday supper, or Christmas nibbles, while talking about school lunches, life and food during lockdown, favorite restaurants they can’t wait to revisit, desert island meals, and favorite childhood meals. You will learn lots, all while being disarmed by the hilarious Wares.

The Slate Culture Gabfest podcast is among my faves, I must admit. I’ve been listening to them for about 10 years, so theirs are the voices of old and trusted friends that I have in my head every week. https://slate.com/podcasts/culture-gabfest Julia Turner, Dana Stevens and Stephen Metcalf are the three erudite personalities who discuss books, art and culture, signage, silent movies, Kant, Need A House? Call Ms. Mouse!, music, nutmeg, Phoebe Bridgers and recently, coq au vin. And I have lifted the coq au vin for this week’s Food Friday, oh patient Gentle Reader.

Dana Stevens mentioned that it was her family’s tradition to prepare coq au vin for Thanksgiving instead of the predictable roasted turkey. She waxed poetical about the cooking aromas that wafted through their house all day, and what a lovely meal it was to share, with friends, by candlelight. (And very kindly she shared their recipe with me on Twitter – the internet is just amazing, don’t you think? https://www.cookstr.com/recipes/coq-au-vin-5 )

We couldn’t have any friends for Christmas dinner, but we did have lots of candles, and coq au vin is what we prepared. As this is going to be a long, cold winter, I suggest you cook it one weekend. It fills the day with cooking activities, and warm companionable time in the kitchen. I was the observer while Mr. Sanders cooked the bacon, cut the bird apart, dredged and browned the chicken pieces, sliced and diced the carrots and onions, trimmed the parchment paper, and braised the bird.

I did make the mashed potatoes for our starchy side dish, and I baked a flourless chocolate cake for dessert, so don’t think I was a total lazy git. But it is always nice to settle back and watch someone else do the cooking, don’t you think? Thank you, Dana Stevens. It was a delicious meal, and maybe we will have a new coq au vin tradition.

“If you think about a Thanksgiving dinner, it’s really like making a large chicken.”
Ina Garten

Filed Under: Spy Highlights

Food Friday: Comfort Zone

January 8, 2021 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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I don’t know about you, but I am ready to curl up into a little ball, and burrow into a nest of protective blankets on the sofa for the next couple of weeks. The new year is not going according to plan. I feel like retreating, and keeping warm and safe in my cozy lair. It’s hard to stir myself enough to cook dinner. That is a self-indulgent fantasy that won’t come true anytime soon. There are deadlines to meet, a dog to walk, and a couple of growling tummies every night that cannot be ignored by magical thinking. Instead, I will compromise with some easy loaded and stuffed-to-the-gills, hot, baked potatoes. And by turning off the talking heads and going to bed early with my stack of Christmas gift books. (A New Year’s Resolution I made was to read more. I hope it was one of yours, too!)

One of my culinary pursuits is perfecting potato delivery systems. I aspire to making the perfect French fry, which has been a decade-long quest. I have decided that I am terrible at making fries from scratch. However I slice or dice the potatoes, I never seem to fry the frites of my dreams. I compromise by frying up frozen, store-bought shoestring potatoes. And in these stress-y days, that is OK. Store-bought are reliably crisp, tender-on-the-inside and importantly, hot.

Baking potatoes at home is much easier. Baked potatoes do not need searing hot peanut oil (or canola, grapeseed, corn, vegetable, olive or peanut oils) with an expensive immersive deep fat fryer, with a sensitive (and accurate) thermometer. Nope. Baked potatoes just need an oven. I can do that.

For a plain Jane baked potato I use a russet potato that weighs about 10 or 11 ounces. (I only know that because I weighed the two I have in the kitchen just now.) I think you know your potato preferences, so find one of a pleasing heft, and proceed.

I pierce the potato skin with a cooking fork a few times, wrap the potato in a paper towel, and pop it into the microwave for 3 minutes on high. (You can skip this step if you are opposed to microwaves. Some people have higher standards.) Then I place the steaming potato on the rack in the oven, which has been preheated to 400°F. After about 45 minutes, I poke the potato with the cooking fork and see if it tender. When it is done, we proceed.

Now comes the fun. Just adding butter, salt and pepper is for purists. For the more adventurous, you can dabble with twice-baking the potato, which has been our latest go-to variation. Since we aren’t venturing out into the COVID world much these days, we have been trying to re-create our favorite (or aspirational) restaurant meals at home. Lately, when we are playing Let’s Go to Smith & Wollensky, we add twice baked potatoes to our homemade à la carte menu. “Jumbo Twice Baked Potato: aged cheddar, apple smoked bacon, scallions, sour cream – $12.” (https://www.smithandwollensky.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Dinner_Fall_Miami2020.pdf) (One upside to the pandemic is that we are saving a lot of money. Imagine if we flew to Miami to eat at Smith & Wollensky! Airfare, plus hotel, plus Uber, plus $12 for one potato. Money saved! I love being frugal.)

This recipe is for a large party of potato eaters, which we are not. But you can do the math yourself and use what you need: https://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/overstuffed-twice-baked-potatoes

Here is a sightly more simplified version: https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/cheesy-stuffed-baked-potatoes/

And for those nights when you do not feel like pretending to go to a pricy steakhouse, when you are curled up on the sofa, wrapped in your toasty blankets and ennui, you can add a variety of goodies to a potato as a special home-styled comforting treat for yourself. Luke the wonder dog wishes you will drop some bacon chunks in his direction, but he is always hopeful of little, everyday miracles, isn’t he?

Toppings
• Rummage through the fridge and look for leftover bacon, taco meat, chili, Sloppy Joe meat, barbecue, diced ham or chicken, shredded beef, smoked salmon, shrimp, pepperoni, crumbled sausage
• Cheeses: Cheddar, gorgonzola, Colby, feta, mozzarella, gruyere, Monterey Jack, Swiss
• Greek yogurt, sour cream, hummus, guacamole
• Broccoli, chives, green onion, green pepper, mushrooms, corn, tomatoes, olives, capers, jalapeño slices, caramelized onions, leeks
• Fried egg and Sriracha
• Old Bay, steak sauce, barbecue sauce, pesto, honey mustard

Let’s enjoy our daily comforts, as we venture out into the cold new year. Stay warm. Curl up with a good book. Spring is in its way.

“Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.”
― James Baldwin

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Keep it Simple in 2021

January 1, 2021 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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2020 was complicated. Let’s ratchet down a notch and revel in simplicity while we try to adjust to our new year’s resolutions. Let’s roast a chicken. We can pretend to multi-task by reading a book, and enjoying a warm cup of tea. Winter is going to kick in soon. It’s time to burrow in.

Winter brings out the primal cook in me. It seems basic wisdom to turn on the oven, and bake, and roast, and generate a little more heat. (Remind me of this urge when I am whinging on about how tired I am of the long, torpid summertime heat…)

I would love to have a large, cozy kitchen, with a faded chintz slipcovered armchair and a lazy lap-sitting cat who would inspire me to write humorous tales about our happy little suburban lives. Instead, I am sure my kitchen looks much like yours, with ephemeral postcards, photos and receipts held up by magnets on the fridge, a Sunday book section still begging to be read, a drift of bills and papers I mean to get to soon, coffee cups in the sink and the dog toys scattered where we least expect to find them, particularly when we are barefoot and it is dark. Dog toys have replaced the bane that was Legos.

I may not have the trappings of an orderly dream kitchen, but I can close my eyes and dreamily drift along, buoyed by the aroma of roasted chicken wafting through the house. I can enjoy the illusion of a well-ordered life when I follow this easy peasy recipe for roasted chicken from our friends at Food52. Not only does it warm the house, and the cockles of my jaded heart, but it also provides two meals for us, and a couple of little snackums for the dog and that wretched complaining cat.

The Best Roasted Chicken

http://food52.com/recipes/24217-the-best-roast-chicken-with-garlic-and-herb-pan-sauce

I also appreciated that except for having to procure the chicken, everything else was in the cabinet (or fridge) at home. I hate finding out suddenly, halfway through a recipe, that shallots are a key ingredient – because I never buy shallots. Or saffron.

Honestly. I wouldn’t pull an odious trick like that on you, Gentle Reader. Because you, like me, can find the basics in your kitchen: garlic, salt and pepper, and wine. (Truth: I did have to use dried thyme, because the thyme and rosemary plants have been long-neglected in the outdoor container garden. I think they have freeze dried. Even the basil plants are looking a little long-in-the-tooth. But we always have wine…)

It was a little unnerving setting the temperature so high (480°F!), I must say. But that heat incinerated the two slices of pepperoni that slipped off the pizza a couple of weeks ago; ones that I hadn’t gotten around to cleaning off the floor of the oven yet. Thanks, Food52 for the deelish recipe!
Here is a roasted chicken recipe from Bon Appétit magazine. It sounds divine, but I worry I would forget to change the cooking temperature midway through. I tend to drift away and read, and unless I set the scary, heart-attack-inducing timer, I might forget…

http://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/roast-chicken-with-rosemary-lemon-and-honey

And finally, here is a Herb-and-Lemon Roasted Chicken recipe, originally from Food & Wine magazine, dissected by the guys at The Bitten Word. They are generally hilarious, and yet are so sensible! This recipe called for herb butter to be placed under the chicken skin, and then for one to flip the bird halfway through the cooking process. They were outraged! And there I was being peevish about remembering to change a temperature! Maybe that’s where the cat gets her howling and complaining ways?

http://www.thebittenword.com/thebittenword/2008/04/herb-and-lemon.html#more

“On the nights I stuffed myself full of myths, I dreamed of college, of being pumped full of all the old knowledge until I knew everything there was to know, all the past cultures picked clean like delicious roasted chicken.”
― Lauren Groff

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Cozy Up!

December 18, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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Winter is almost upon us, and though we are well-entrenched in our little bunker because of COVID19 preventative measures, we are yearning to cocoon even more. It’s the holidays, and the cold weather, and the early dark nights that turn us toward candles, twinkly lights and the warm kitchen. We will be doing some holiday baking this weekend, but first we need some nourishing and reassuring hot food.

The Scandinavians have a healthy approach to winter – they embrace the cold weather and make things bright and colorful – defying the gloom of early nightfall. I like to think about bright red wooden Swedish horses, and filling-destroying Swedish fish candy. Swedish comfort food – husmanskost – is hot and hearty. Pour yourself a cup of glogg and warm yourself by your virtual fire. https://www.thespruceeats.com/traditional-glogg-recipe-3510987

Yes, mournful, soul-searching Inspector Kurt Wallander was depressed, and had to solve multiple murders in the beautiful, but austere, Swedish countryside. He might have been less gloomy had he tasted our variation on Svenska Kottbullar, Swedish Meatballs instead of pizza at Bröderna M. I like to think that our meatballs are tastier than IKEA’s, but I haven’t been to an IKEA for a long time. Until the pandemic subsides, and we are free to roam around again, homemade will have to do. https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/216564/swedish-meatballs-svenska-kottbullar/

A friend of mine used to make several crockpots-ful for her annual Christmas soirée. I hope she knows how to scale back production this year, otherwise she will be eating them all winter long – which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Swedish meatballs are slightly more elegant than meatloaf. The American humorist Jean Shepherd waxed poetical about his mother’s meatloaf, she of “rump-sprung chenille bathrobe” ignominy. I used to listen to Shepherd on the radio as he spun his tales growing up in Depression-era Indiana. Shepherd achieved fame with his A Christmas Story, this is the appropriate season to serve up some childhood meatloaf. I have found that you can never improve on your own mother’s recipe. No one else ever makes it taste like home, and memories, however slightly the actual ingredients deviate from house to house. Perhaps you would like to try Ralphie’s Mother’s Braised Red Cabbage, useful as a pungent palate cleanser for my cloying nostalgia:

1 medium-size red cabbage, thinly sliced
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
4 bacon slices, diced
1 large onion, thinly sliced
2 apples, peeled and diced
3/4 cup red wine
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon minced garlic

* Toss together cabbage, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper in a large bowl.

* Cook bacon in a large Dutch oven over medium high flame for 10 minutes or until just crisp.

* Add onion to bacon and sauté another 5 minutes or until tender.
* Stir in cabbage mixture, apples, red wine, sugar and garlic to onion and bacon mixture in the pot. Cover and reduce heat to medium and simmer 30 to 35 minutes, adding a splash of water, if necessary.
* Makes 6 servings.
– – Recipe courtesy of Warner Bros. Studios

Meatloaf scene from The Christmas Story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0dUmykdtJA

https://www.nwitimes.com/lifestyles/columnists/philip-potempa/anyone-have-goldblatts-cheesecake-recipe/article_2e9c5c85-ba6f-5992-96e4-439becea1972.html

Which is a natural segue to Shepherd’s Pie! It’s warm, steamy, and topped with irresistible mashed potatoes. It uses up leftovers! It makes you eat vegetables! It is loaded with calories that you will effortlessly burn off while shoveling your neighbor’s walk, because it’s the right thing to do. (Not being huge lamb fans we make this with ground beef. Heresy, I know.) https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/member/views/gordon-ramsay-s-shepherd-pie-50161080
Warm yourselves. Merry Christmas from the Spy Test Kitchen!

The Holiday Yule Log: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGNXVhMLw8o&index=8&list=PLtHXFR1uXA7rG4k3RoZP0c96AfSX4avxJ

“If I could work my will every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!”
Ebenezer Scrooge

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Home for the Duration

December 11, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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I’ll be home for Christmas. And Hanukkah. And New Year’s Eve. And probably Valentine’s Day, my birthday and Easter. And it is looking increasingly like the Fourth of July will again be spent in the back yard. Maybe I will splash out for a wading pool next summer.

Those of us who are lucky enough to have a good internet connection can keep in touch with loved ones this holiday season. I am attending a Zoom cocktail party next week, which is thrilling. I need to find an appropriate party hat and devise a distinctive holiday cocktail – though I will probably just fall back on my favorite French 75. Bubbly is always festive, and it is such a treat.

Zoom meetings have become de rigueur and possibly passé; we are a jaded lot nowadays, nothing impresses us anymore. I think of Zoom as a thrilling novelty that the Jetsons promised us our future lives would enjoy. No, I do not have a robot housemaid, or a flying car, but it does my heart good to see a college chum on screen. Once we learn to take turns, and stop talking over each other it is practically like old times. The quality of our drinks has improved – we aren’t drinking Paul Masson wine or Old Milwaukee any more. For which our livers thank us. It’s nice to think that out there in the darkness we still have our tribe.

One element of real life that Zoom calls lack is a sense of smell. Not that college years smelled wonderful – I can remember distinctly the acrid, greasy, onion-y smell of cheesesteak subs wafting in the dorm – a sure sign of a hangover cure being implemented. And those group bathrooms were rather odoriferous. And the Brussels sprouts in the dining hall! Perhaps college is not the best metaphor for comforting vestiges of the past. Though, not all Zoom calls are made to college chums. Some are to children, and siblings, and parents. And I associate the holidays with the smells of cooking and baking, and fresh, fragrant Christmas greens, and spices we keep in a pot boiling away all day long.

I baked some gingersnaps the other night. The act of baking was a vehicle to Christmases past. The essences of ginger, cinnamon and nutmeg floated around the kitchen and made me feel connected to earlier times. It was good to work with my hands and make a bit of a mess. It has been such a crazy year, as we all continue to mutter every single day.

It has been a weird year. I’d like to go home. I’d like to be someplace cosy and reassuring. Where I can have a nice warm gingersnap, or some latkes by candlelight. And here we all still are. Take good care of each other. Bake some cookies. Grate some potatoes. Call someone just to say hello.

Let’s dive into the foods that celebrate Hanukkah, and the miracle of the Festival of Lights. Light your candles and remember how the lamp oil for one night became enough oil for eight nights. And then get ready for latkes.

https://toriavey.com/toris-kitchen/crispy-panko-potato-latkes/

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Potato-Latkes-104406

I always thought this was my mother’s recipe for Gingersnaps, but I recently unearthed a ruled recipe card, scrawled in her handwriting, that clearly identifies it as my aunt’s recipe. Who knew? Here for your holiday enjoyment is Regina Foley Noto’s GINGERSNAP Recipe:

Makes approximately 3 dozen cookies
Pre-heat the oven to 350°F

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon ground ginger
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt

Sift together the dry ingredients above. This is crucial – follow the steps here.

Add the dry ingredients to:
3/4 cup softened butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup molasses

Mix thoroughly. Roll mixture into small balls and then roll the balls in a bowl of granulated sugar. Flatten the balls onto parchment paper-lined cookie sheets with a small glass. Bake for 12-15 minutes. Cool on racks. They are quite delicious with a nice cold glass of milk.

Our friends at Food52 have more imagination – and I trust a larger budget than I do. I get by with a small saucepan, filled with water, cloves, cinnamon and nutmeg. It is aromatic and seasonal. They are fancier: https://food52.com/blog/14741-what-to-simmer-for-a-fresh-seasonal-smelling-home

“To each other, we were as normal and nice as the smell of bread. We were just a family. In a family even exaggerations make perfect sense. “
-John Irving

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: The Stuff of Dreams

December 4, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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I was led astray by some bright shiny ideas. ’Tis the season, I know, but my focus wavered, and I was beguiled and bewitched by a fantastic notion that I could bake something fancy and pretty. I should have learned my lesson with flourless chocolate cake – it rises like a soufflé and then collapses on itself like a black hole, and yet it is delicious. I should have learned from years of baking brownies that dark brown confections are perfectly fine dug out of a pan, accompanied by a glass of milk, and one should not ask for the moon.

But it is coming on Christmas, and one day as I flipped idly through a King Arthur’s flour catalogue, the envy genie tempted me with a glamorous, silvered and multi-rooflined vision of a gingerbread Bundt cake loaf pan. Oh, the peaks, the gables, and the mullioned windows! The cunning little trees and the shingled roof! The chimney down which our favorite fat man could climb! I was smitten.

You have to understand that every year a friend shares photos of her traditional Yule log cake. It is perfect in every way. She creates frosting that mimics tree bark, you can see age rings on the cut tree, with its chopped branches, drifts of fallen snow, and magnificent marzipan holly leaves and berries. It is wholly beautiful. I yearn for her sugar skills.

I tried going by the traditional gingerbread house route for years when my children were growing up. I probably scarred them for life. First we baked sheets of sturdy gingerbread, and using paper patterns, would trim out the various construction elements. Then we would pipe bowls of royal icing to cement walls to roofs, and doors onto walls, and carefully mount wobbly chimneys. Then the royal icing would start to slip. (Have I mentioned this is when we lived in Florida? Florida is not a kind place. Especially when it is hot and humid. Which is practically all year long. Things tend to ooze and slide, or not gel.) Once the royal icing gave way we tried toothpicks for supports. And then popsicle sticks. And then hot glue. I kid you not. Eventually we got one inedible gingerbread house to stand upright and look decent.

Martha makes all this look easy, I wretchedly complain to anyone who will listen. Martha has staff. Luckily children aren’t too judgmental. They had fun messing around in the kitchen, sampling all the decorations. There are few disasters that gumdrops, pretzels, peppermint sticks. Necco wafers and licking bowls clean of batter and icing can’t cure. Still, it might be nice now to pause and reflect on the countless years we rolled out lovely, photo-worthy gingerbread houses that could stand proudly beside someone else’s annually beauteous Yule log cake. Sigh. These are the things of dreams.

I was proud that we never succumbed to gingerbread house kits – those pre-fab, pre-baked gingerbread walls and roofs that you can find sold in boxes in the grocery store. One year we tried substituting graham crackers for gingerbread, and all we got were tiny little school-milk-carton-sized houses that looked pathetic. Which was why the gleaming silver gingerbread house Bundt cake pan looked so appealing. How hard could it be to mix up some batter, pour it into a Bundt pan, bake it and then triumphantly pull the pan off of a perfect gingerbread house? It was devilishly hard.

It might have helped if I hadn’t followed the fanciest damn recipe for gingerbread. Food52, we might be parting ways after all these years together. This recipe, which called for all manner of fancy ingredients, was delicious. I tasted some as I dumped it into the trash can. It was moist and spicy and redolent of a household where the baking is done to perfection, and even though their seasonal speciality might be Yule Log cakes, they can whip up a perfect gingerbread house without breaking a sweat, anytime they want.

The Gingeriest Gingerbread:https://food52.com/recipes/78431-the-gingeriest-gingerbread . The first item on the list of ingredients should have given me an inkling of the imminent disaster: 1 cup strong ginger beer. I was lucky that my grocery store (the fancy grocery store, not my everyday shopping haunt) had 2 kinds of ginger beer: 1 with 4 tiny bottles cost $4.99. The other, also with 4 tiny bottles, cost $10.99. I guess the recipe failed because I opted for the less expensive brand.

Farther down the ingredient list were 2 tablespoons Microplaned peeled fresh ginger. This is a hideously huge amount of ginger to grate. The microplane also did a number on my fingerprints. Oh, and then I had to go back to the store for a lime, because I needed to zest it. More Microplaning, more finger erosion.

After boiling the ginger beer and molasses, stirring in the fizzing agent of baking soda, I buttered and floured my adorable Bundt cake pan, and then followed all the instructions with rigor and due diligence. I tempered the eggs. I whisked until smooth. Then I baked for an hour and 10 minutes. The long skewer I inserted into the gingerbread came out sticky and raw. And so I baked, and baked, and baked.

Finally, it seemed as if the gingerbread was done. I cooled it for a while, and finally turned it over onto a baking rack. And nothing came out. I cooled it longer. I tried shaking. I tried running a sharp knife around the edges. Google suggested that reluctant Bundt cakes might be coaxed from their shells after a period in the freezer. Might I suggest that this time, this once, that Google was wrong?

I scraped the goo out of the Bundt cake pan, and scuppered my dreams of a perfect Christmas gingerbread house. The next time we went to the grocery store, not the fancy one, Mr. Friday pulled a box of Betty Crocker gingerbread mix off the shelf, and discretely tucked it in with the week’s shopping. That night I used our perfectly serviceable dull aluminum, 9-inch brownie pan, lined it with a sheet of parchment paper, and mixed up a bowl of gingerbread. We won’t have a gingerbread house this year, yet again, but we did have a nice dessert, topped with a heavenly cloud of whipped cream. Ho-ho-ho.

Simple is better.

“We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep.”

― William Shakespeare

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Re-eating History

November 27, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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This is a repeat of an earlier Food Friday Thanksgiving column. NPR has Susan Stamberg’s cranberry Relish recipe. Somewhere online yesterday you heard Arlo Guthrie singing Alice’s Restaurant for the 53rd year. The Spy gets to enjoy the annual rite of leftovers as engineered when my son was in college. In in these fraught COVID times it feels reassuring to remind ourselves of the simpler times. Here’s a wish for a happier, healthier world next Thanksgiving!

And here we are, the day after Thanksgiving. Post-parade, post-football, post-feast. Also post-washing up. Heavens to Betsy, what a lot of cleaning up there was. And the fridge is packed with mysterious little bundles of leftovers. We continue to give thanks that our visiting college student is an incessant omnivore. He will plow systematically through Baggies of baked goods, tin-foiled-turkey bits, Saran-wrapped-celery, Tupperware-ed-tomatoes and wax-paper-bagged-walnuts.

It was not until the Tall One was in high school that these abilities were honed and refined with ambitious ardor. His healthy personal philosophy is “Waste not, want not.” A sentiment I hope comes from generations of hardy New Englanders as they plowed their rocky fields, dreaming of candlelit feasts and the iPhones of the future.

I have watched towering constructions of food rise from the plate as he constructs interesting arrangements of sweet, sour, crunchy and umami items with the same deliberation and concentration once directed toward Lego projects. And I am thankful that few of these will fall to the floor and get walked over in the dark. Of course, now there is the wonder dog, Luke, so nothing much makes it to the floor.

I have read that there may have been swan at the first Thanksgiving. How very sad. I have no emotional commitment to turkeys, and I firmly belief that as beautiful as they are, swans are mean and would probably peck my eyes out if I didn’t feed them every scrap of bread in the house. Which means The Tall One would go hungry. It is a veritable conundrum.

The Pilgrim Sandwich is the Tall One’s magnum opus. It is his turducken without the histrionics. It is a smorgеsborg without the Swedish chef. It is truly why we celebrate Thanksgiving. He slathers a dark ooze not my rich, homemade gravy, made after many hours of precise turkey basting. It is barbecue sauce, from a bottle, without which, no decent, self-respecting Pilgrim Sandwich (in our house) is devoured. And he adds unique sides : corn bread and a spare pig-in-blanket. Round One of Leftovers vs. The Tall One.

This is way too fancy and cloying with fussy elements – olive oil for a turkey sandwich? Hardly. You have to use what is on hand from the most recent Thanksgiving meal – to go out to buy extra rolls is to break the unwritten rules of the universe. There are plenty of Parker House rolls in your bread box right this minute – go use them up!
http://www.rachaelray.com/recipe.php?recipe_id=4202

This is a recipe for simpletons. Honestly. And was there Muenster cheese on the dining room table yesterday? I think not.
http://www.favfamilyrecipes.com/2012/11/pilgrim-sandwiches.html

And if you are grown up and sophisticated, here is the answer for you. Fancy Thanksgiving leftovers for a grown up brunch:http://www.saveur.com/article/Menu/A-Brunch-For-The-Day-After-Thanksgiving

Here are The Tall One’s ingredients for his signature Pilgrim Sandwich:
Toast (2 slices)
Turkey (2 slices)
Cranberry Sauce (2 teaspoons)
Gravy (2 tablespoons)
Mashed Potatoes (2 tablespoons)
Stuffing (2 tablespoons)
Barbecue Sauce (you can never have too much)
Bacon (if there is some hanging around)
Mayonnaise (if you must)
Lettuce (iceberg, for the crunch)
Celery stalk (more crunch)
Salt, pepper

And now I am taking the dog for a walk before I consider making my own sandwich.

“Leftovers in their less visible form are called memories. Stored in the refrigerator of the mind and the cupboard of the heart.”
– Robert Fulghum

Filed Under: Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Happy Thanksgiving!

November 20, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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Thanksgiving plans across the country are being suspended and cancelled this year – our year of COVID-19, panic, existential dread, and group anxiety. Everyone’s expectations for relief and some reassuring holiday cheer have been dashed. And political divide within some families is driving the wedge further. How can we have a hopeful Thanksgiving?

Let’s try to cheer up and count those blessings we overlook every day. Luke the wonder dog and I went for our morning walk today. We go for the same walk five mornings a week. Today wasn’t much different from yesterday or the day before. But it was wintery cold for the first time today. There was frost on the grass. And I wore a hat and gloves and a nice warm coat. It was so unlike the walk we would have taken if we still lived in Florida. It is a joy to be wearing turtlenecks and sweaters again. For this I am grateful.

Our daily walks might seem to be a monotonous routine, but recently we trained a fellow quotidian walker to keep some dog biscuits in her pocket, to share with Luke, and he is overjoyed to see the old lady every day. His ears perk up and he strains eagerly to meet her on the path, where she kindly gives him a tiny dog treat – the size of a Flintstone vitamin. And then she pats his head, and tells him what a good boy he is. We all socialize for a moment and then go our own ways. We have made a tenuous connection, and the three of us are a little bit happier. Thank you.

Every couple of days I leave Luke penned up in the kitchen, with Alexa playing NPR, and a red rubber Kong toy stuffed with peanut butter, while I make a quick trip to the grocery store. After I finish writing this piece I will be buzzing out, mask in hand, with some reusable, locally-sourced bags, to pick up some wine for dinner, and a copy of the New York Times. While shopping I will make eye contact with a few of the other shoppers as we bob and weave and struggle to remember to keep our social distance. You have to smile with extra crinkling efforts these days, so people can tell you are smiling. Everyone seems to be trying harder. This is good.

Depending on the size of your pandemic pod, you might not be having much of a Thanksgiving feast. But you are always going to have a sinkful of dishes. No matter how much cleaning you do as you go along, there will be greasy pots, fragile glasses, gritty mixing bowls, slippery silverware and sticky beaters. For that we should be truly grateful.

I read somewhere today that Nigella Lawson, who is English, thought we should just have vanilla ice cream with a cranberry syrup on Thanksgiving. Sure. That’s just what we need to be doing – scrimping on dessert. I don’t think so, Nigella. (I mean, she butters her toast twice, for heaven’s sake!) Luke and I don’t walk five miles a day to have a measly bowl of ice cream for Thanksgiving dessert. On Thanksgiving we will be indulging in our favorite flourless chocolate cake. With whipped cream, thank you very much. Well, Mr. Friday and I will be. We’ll give Luke the treat of a peanut butter-stuffed Kong, but we’ll stay in the kitchen with him as we listen to NPR together. I can’t wait to hear Susan Stamberg’s annual recitation her mother-in-law’s recipe for orange cranberry relish. It is our Thanksgiving ritual. And then we will sidle over to the Group W bench for 18 minutes of song with Arlo Guthrie. And then maybe we’ll take a walk. Happy Thanksgiving!

Nigella’s recipe: https://www.nigella.com/recipes/ice-cream-with-cranberry-syrup

Susan Stamberg: https://www.npr.org/2006/11/23/4176014/mama-stambergs-cranberry-relish-recipe

The Spy’s Flourless Chocolate Cake: https://chestertownspy.org/2012/02/09/food-friday-for-love-and-chocolate/

Arlo Guthrie’s Alice’s Restaurant Massacree: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/brief-history-alices-restaurant-180967276/

“Those who are not grateful soon begin to complain of everything.”
― Thomas Merton

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

Food Friday: Take Sides!

November 13, 2020 by Jean Sanders Leave a Comment

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At Thanksgiving we have to open ourselves up to new traditions and tastes, while being grateful. As we gather together, whether it is via Zoom or FaceTime, or if we are lucky enough to have a little family unit pod to call our own, or if we are stalwart singletons gamely firing up the oven for a modest roast chicken, we will all be considering the all-important side dishes.

My favorite dinner is a roasted chicken breast, with salt and pepper and some chopped onions nestled on top of the skin. And I like a side dish of rice and butter. It is the most comforting meal to me because it is what my mother prepared for my family birthday celebrations. With a little green salad, with a splash of a simple oil and vinegar homemade dressing. Modest and simple, and easy to put together.

Turkey isn’t all that different from chicken, except there is more of it, and it requires more ritual, ceremony, and expense. And people have so many opinions about how to cook it: brine it, roast it, deep fry it, inject it, wedge compound butter under the skin, coat with strips of bacon, smoke it, and spatchcock it. Mr. Friday spoke with some yearning about a new brining combo he’d love to try this year. The Tall One has enjoyed success smoking a few birds. I guess we will have to be open to the adventuresome cooks who are taking an interest in the assembly of Thanksgiving this year. They are also chatting, albeit casually, about stepping up our side dish repertoire. I find this more alarming. I like some traditions to be consistent and unvaried.

I read a listicle in Thrillist this week about the side dishes most preferred by each state. It was an eye-opener. I had never considered macaroni and cheese as a viable Thanksgiving side dish before. https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/most-popular-thanksgiving-sides-list-2020-zippia

Maryland, according to Thrillist, is a mac and cheese state. So is my adopted home, North Carolina. But Connecticut, where I grew up, is a mashed potato state. Bland and starchy Connecticut? It could well be, but add some good quality butter and a pinch of Maldon salt, I think you will find mashed potatoes the perfect accompaniment to roast turkey. And as divine as mac and cheese may well be, can you hollow it out to create a little gravy reservoir? Doubtful.

I suppose it could be worse, Indiana likes deviled eggs. At Thanksgiving? That strikes me as both odd and wrong. But I also believe that the only sort of hors d’oeuvres you should consume at Thanksgiving are the cashews you pick very carefully out of a silver bowl of mixed nuts, and a very 1950s-feeling relish platter, with celery, carrot sticks, radishes and gherkin pickles. You should get to the table with an empty belly. That is the best way to appreciate and consume your fair share of Parker House rolls.

We have a family debate every year whether we should have Parker House rolls or Pillsbury crescent rolls, not being very talented yeast roll bakers. We rely on Pepperidge Farm and Pillsbury every holiday season, but we forget from year to year which we prefer. Annual group amnesia is our most unfailing family characteristic. And if we ever move to West Virginia, Oklahoma, Missouri, or Utah we will fit right in, as they prefer rolls, which I assume means generic dinner rolls. South Dakota will clinch the argument for crescent rolls.

We lived in Florida for more than 20 years, and I can safely say that never once did we have sweet potato casserole. Lucky me. I’ve never lived in Kentucky, where broccoli casserole is a favorite side dish. It must be grim living in Kentucky.

Green bean casserole is the favorite in Texas, Arizona and New Mexico. I like green beans as much as the next, but I draw the line at anything that uses a can of mushroom soup. Over the years I have politely moved green bean casserole around on my plate, or hidden it under a crescent roll. I find that cranberry relish is a wonderful agent for disguising discards.

I think stuffing and dressing are a personal decision – like religion or political party. I will not question you openly about your choice. That said, Vermont, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and New Jersey like stuffing, whereas Louisiana and Alabama prefer dressing.

We always mash potatoes. Some years we peel a bag o’russets (usually when we are testing out a new boyfriend or girlfriend), or we go wild and boil up some new, pink-skinned potatoes. We might need to try Alaska’s preferred side: hash brown casserole. That seems worth edging warily out of our stodgy comfort zone.

We are prepared to be a little adventurous with our side selections this year. I don’t think we will try the white gravy that is the fave in Arkansas, but maybe we will go out on a limb and have some Iowa corn with our dressing, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, cranberry relish, and turkey. We will leave the mac and cheese, broccoli casserole, and white gravy for the devotees of regional cuisine.

Be careful out there. Here is a link to CDC guidelines for our COVID Thanksgiving: https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/cdc-recommendations-for-thanksgiving-2020-guidelines

“What I say is that, if a man really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow.”
― A.A. Milne

Filed Under: Food Friday, Spy Top Story

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