Author: mashastre

Melody of Certain Damaged Lemons

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My Dear C –

I think you would be better served having our former classmate Darrell as your epistolary blog mate. He keeps posting fascinating foodstuffs he is making that I have to look up. Just this week I think – soubise, tangzhong, and tepache.

Soubise is apparently a French sauce made of onions, butter, and cream – Darrell noted Caramelized onion soy “butter”! From Calvin Eng’s “Salt, Sugar, MSG” cookbook. Really more of a sobuise sauce…so good! He made a rye tangzhong. I had to look it up on Wikipedia and to be honest I still don’t quite get what it is. It’s a roux/gel that makes bread more tender? Tepache is a traditional Mexican fermented beverage, often pineapple-based. That I get.

On that note – my mother made beet-based kvass when I was visiting her. At a farmer’s market foray, she’d bought this quite pricy and delicious tonic and had the inspiration to make her own. She skipped the spices, for better or worse, but it’s still tasty although less concentrated for sure. She basically applied the pickling concept to create it. But I found this recipe that looked good to me, partly because it uses whey – which is great if you make your own farmer’s/cottage cheese, because you’ve got a built in use for that nutritious stuff. I will try my hand at it.

I discovered that all the pickles I’d made last year didn’t get eaten – they just got hoarded and languished in their own brine at the back of the fridge. Super sad. I bought some pickling cucumbers (dubiously fresh) at a Russian store over the weekend and shoved them into the old brine to try to redeem this. We shall see.

Did I tell you I found a Magic Bullet on the street? With 6 containers. I used it to make a pesto yesterday. It’s – excessively smooth. But I used the analogous thing – that my mother found on the street by her house – to make a nicoise dressing and it was quite lovely. I put in a ton of basil and parsley and garlic and spring onion and olive oil and it was delicious.

Trader Joe’s canned tuna in olive oil in full effect. And the first good tomatoes of the season. Plus green beans that I had already made into a salad with a fancy white wine vinegar and shallot dressing.

Back at home the tomatoes aren’t yet ready. But I did get some Japanese eggplant and sweet peppers and zucchini – and picked some makrut lime leaves off a tree nearby – and made a lovely curry. I marinated very firm tofu in red thai curry with a little aminos and soy and rice vinegar.

Sautéed onions in avocado oil – threw in the 4 lime leaves, added the sliced eggplant when the onions were translucent, then a few sliced cloves of garlic and the marinated tofu, followed by the sliced peppers and then the sliced zucchini when everything seemed near cooked. Finally a bit of coconut milk (I had half a can moldering in the fridge – once I took off the bad bits it was probably 1/3 cup or less). Truly one of my better efforts. Despite the overcooked basmati rice on the side. I still haven’t learned to cook rice.

I am feeling like a damaged lemon, hence the title (courtesy of Blonde Redhead).

Much love –

M.

The Asparagus Song

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6/22/25

My Dear C –

I am back in the place we met. I used to not like coming down here because life is organized entirely around eating and now I like coming down here because life is organized entirely around eating.

I drove down yesterday with my mum – well, she drove us down, going 90 on the 5 in her Prius. Good to see so many yuccas pointing their waxy fairy asparagus candelabra blooms up out of the hills of chaparral south of the Grapevine.

On the way we listened to Long Island Compromise – a novel I thoroughly enjoyed but my mother found lacking so far in humanity (the Beemer character maybe doesn’t speak to her). Todd Solondz’s Happiness is showing at the Aero this evening and we are not going to see it. Too much humanity?

As time came to consider dinner, my old post-road-trip standby of a steak and bottle of red wine came to mind. After getting dropped off home I’d make my way to the Safeway open late on Mission and get a steak and cook it — in my cast iron pan on that gorgeous gargantuan O’Keefe & Merritt stove with its built-in porcelain salt and pepper shakers that spelled PS — and enjoy it alone. A return deserves a reward.

Yesterday we pulled off into Whole Foods and I got a rib eye and some young potatoes. I don’t cook steak much and less on this electric cooktop, so it’s a challenge to get the sear right and also cook it through just enough but not too much. I damaged my mother’s Le Creuset cast iron pan in the past overheating it to get the sear. Turns out you don’t have to go so high heat to get a good sear. It’s more about patience, perhaps.

Added whole young garlic cloves- sautéing gently in the fat at the side of the pan. And the young potatoes I first boiled and then poured off the water to steam them and seal in the flavor – I don’t understand this but it makes potatoes taste like butter. I suppose they’re less watery. Made myself martinis and should have kept it singular.

Oh got some French asparagus and instead of snapping off the bottoms, shaved them and when the steak was done, sautéed some shallot in the fat and added the asparagus and later a bit of red wine for the spears to simmer in. Finished with lemon and salt. Turned out well. Deglazed the pan with more red wine for a bit of sauce. One of my favorite ways to cook asparagus. (Usually I do just snap off the very bottom stem and use it in a stock.)

Tried my hand at compound butter. A bit of marjoram in the fridge that needed using – I tried to massage it into some butter from the freezer. Eventually somewhat successful and excellent on the steak.

Today – the farmer’s market. Green beans, the first tomatoes, the last of the pickling cucumbers, green garlic (still, amazingly, available), strawberries, delphiniums & lilies, mint, basil, Italian olives. A loaf of Jyan Isaac seeded sourdough and a conversation about “crumb” at the dinner table.

I’d driven down some very neglected (moldy on the outside) artichokes and wilty spinach and got those into decent shape here. Steamed the artichokes with the stems (which I love but are too fibrous for my mother) and served with garlic butter.

The spinach I put into a polenta. I’m finally getting a handle on those Italian starches, now that I’ve got a good relationship with risotto and made this polenta, which was…. extraordinarily satisfying. I think I used this as a concept and used a random stock my mother sitting in the freezer as the base, which was maybe made from asparagus? It had a very deep, complex flavor that I couldn’t quite place. After it stopped needing constant attention, I started throwing things in – first, some of tomatoes (not quite sweet enough raw but excellent cooked), the remains of the compound butter, and at the end – spinach, basil. It was like summer and comfort food got married and I got to officiate.

Steak sliced next day, with asparagus, olives, the artichokes and garlic butter, the potatoes and the polenta and a green bean salad – more on that last next time.

Much Love –

M.

PS I couldn’t figure out how to link it in the title, so here’s a link to Yo La Tengo’s The Asparagus Song

They Say It’s Spring

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My Dear C –

I’m sitting in a tank top and looking at some lovely redi-ish tulips I bought at Trader Joe’s. Yesterday I heard the ethereal song of my first Swainson’s Thrush of the year – so it’s past spring here now. One of the cats is passed out next to the flowers, her paw hung over the edge of the table, lethargic from what we call heat around here.

Just a couple weeks ago, I happened to be passing through the Ferry Plaza in San Francisco – spilling over with pea blossoms and berries and asparagus and lilacs. The market here by me has been – underwhelmingly un-springy.

I wonder what your CSA has this time of year? Never mind – I can just look on their site! Mmm – fennel. That’s a vegetable I changed my mind about as an adult. I used to find it unbearably anise-y in flavor and – also – overused, I suppose. I think there was a period when it was in everything fancy. Not that I was eating fancy, was I? But now perhaps my taste buds have dulled and also it’s no longer the annoyingly ubiquitous darling it was in the early 90s (?). I want to say 80s, though.

Probably 80s. Not that my mother cooked with it, so where would I have been eating it? I wasn’t soire-ing at Star’s, though I can still picture their ad from the NYT of my childhood – I remember it featuring a sketch of an impossibly lanky woman with big hair swirling all around her, and the restaurant’s name in a sophisticated serif script above her head…. I wonder if that’s an accurate recollection. I was fascinated by it.

Once as a kid I was staying over with my mother’s friends in Noe Valley for a couple days, in their Victorian in what was a very different neighborhood than it is now– and they told me they were taking me to Star’s and I got so excited. It turned out they were referring to the bakery down the street famous for its Irish Soda Bread. Star Bakery opened in 1899 and closed in 1998. Jeremiah Towers’ Star’s closed in 1999.

In my short stint as a professional cook, I did learn to make and sort of enjoy fennel braised in orange juice. It was quite a popular appetizer. But then – bread pudding was a popular dessert. So that says a lot about the patrons’ tastes.

The thought of a fancy dinner out used to thrill me. I racked up a lot of debt satisfying that particular yen – eating at the counters of some of the best restaurants in town. A lot of sushi, which is good for loneliness. It’s the omegas I guess.

The yen for a fancy dinner out still kicks in when someone else is paying, or when I know I’m going to eat with someone who will really appreciate the whole to-do of it. The last meal I had like that checked both boxes: at Boulevard. They still got it, man. And they’re bringing the 80s back – or they never left the premises. I wish I could remember what I ate – but I remember my companion and the joy of it.

These days I eat at home, most of the time. And I’ve jumped on two bandwagons – fancy tinned fish and the Rancho Gordo Bean Club. These two things can go together well. Last week I was making variations on what I call “dirty rice” which is probably not what other people call dirty rice – mine is rice cooked with things thrown in – maybe canned tomatoes, spices, asparagus, sesame oil, greens at the end. What is to hand. Topped with whatever is to hand. Some beans (I made an entire pound bag of Christmas Lima beans and I’m still eating them 2 weeks later) and greens and / or exquisite tinned fish, and some chili crisp or the like.

There’s no turning back from the fancy tinned fish. I had smoked trout from Fishwife and mackerel from a Spanish brand. Maybe Matiz? But I feel like there was a tilde in there somewhere. I must’ve happened on a sale because normally these little cans’ prices are too rich for my blood. Today I opened a can of TJ’s ahi in olive oil and beyond being dry, it was actually gristly. Sheesh. This is what happens, Larry…

The Rancho Gordo Bean Club shipment is quarterly and hard to keep up with, especially for a hoarder. The pile of pound bags grows precarious. So far I think my favorite new bean is the buckeye. I just made a pot of flageolet beans – going to have them with some salmon and greens/asparagus and green garlic. And sometimes I just get a hankering for a gigante bean, because I want to make this, which satisfies at home and for parties.

But back to fennel and your CSA. I wonder if you’re a fan of The Vegetarian Epicure. Maybe we’ve talked about it. It – the original edition, also featuring a woman with big hair on the cover, though quite a different aesthetic than the ad for Star’s, was lying around when I was knocking about alone in a big house a friend let me stay in and cooking wasn’t yet a habit. I made the greens and garlic soup (with feta) and was blown away.

And more recently, with a more practiced cooking hand, I made the chard and fennel – and feta – pie, with a dough from my sourdough starter. (The starter is languishing, long-unfed, in the fridge.) These days I’m a lazier cook than that pie, or even the soup, allows for – got one eye on the clock and the other on the stove, testing to see how quickly I can throw together something satisfying.

Tonight it was a soup of leftover roast chicken I’d frozen, thawed in a pot with soy and coconut aminos, a leek thrown in and a big green garlic shoot, some ginger grated in (I don’t even bother to peel it anymore) and a couple pints of frozen scrap stock. Once that melted – tossed in cauliflower, bok choy, and some lovely Tokyo turnip greens about to be languishing, and the cauliflower leaves, some shirataki noodles and finally finished with a little rice vinegar. Plated and garnished with chopped spring onion and the green garlic top and a drizzle of sesame oil. I think it took me 15 minutes. Maybe 20.

Sending you love and vegetal inspiration –
M.

P.S. I’m googling “How to revive sourdough starter” so I can make that pie again. I bet it can come to life again. I shall report back.

P.P.S. I’m in love with cooking pasta in just enough water so I don’t have to drain it – I don’t care what anyone says.

Pork and beans

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My dear C –

Grocery shopping while hormonal is similar to grocery shopping while drunk. I bought a pork shoulder this morning. Nearly 5 pounds. Or is it a pork butt? It is a bone-in pork shoulder that was sub-labeled as a pork butt. And indeed the internet tells me that pork butt comes from the pig’s shoulder. How confusing. Cuts of meat often are.

The other day I was at a butcher shop and a customer was asking if NY steak is tender and the guy behind the counter thought she was asking if it was tenderloin. I wanted to say it all depends on what you do with it…. but I refrained from ahem butting in.

I don’t know if/when I’ve cooked a pork shoulder before. I used to cook pork tenderloins with fennel braised in orange juice as a line cook but this is a different story and it’s been a couple decades. I did buy a fennel bulb at the market. Along with a $10 bag of mystery produce at my favorite (organic) stand that has yielded: A lovely bunch of Tokyo turnips with excellent tops, chard, several small & lovely lettuces, a tiny red cabbage, nice arugula, cilantro (which – not knowing, I bought another cilantro in my hurry), a sad bag of end of season (thank you, California) tomatoes, a celery, a a delightful broccolini, plus an excellent assortment of peppers. Nothing to sneeze at.

I don’t nearly ever cook pork anymore, living as I do with a no-pork-person. But I thought I might make myself a nice dinner and for some reason decided – a 5 lb cut of pork is the way to go for a simple solo meal. I’ve just frantically salted it and put it back in the fridge.

It’s 4 pm on a Sunday in the December of my late middle age and I have no idea what I’m doing with my groceries or my life. At least I’m contemplating that in peace. It’s so comparatively quiet after the stormy days. And I’m speaking literally here. San Francisco had a tornado warning. The first in its history? We also got a tsunami warning last week-ish.

I’ll let you know how it all goes.

Missing you

M.

PS here’s most of my haul from today

PPS I’m using this recipe because I love its tone and I’ve thrown in the sad tomatoes. And my beans are some delightful brown speckled variety that have been sitting in the pantry for a bit…

This is a 2 minute pre-soak…

Under construction…. The beans are in there…

And then I threw in some onions and peppers and there’s garlic in there, too. We shall see. Oh adding some bay leaves (collected from people’s ornamental bushes) and coriander seeds because I have too much.

Now we wait.

Hit or Miss

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Dear C –

It is not the best time for me. Unlike the tofu in this poem I am complaining. Maybe it’s pre-birthday blues, maybe it’s general dissatisfaction with the whole direction of life. Who knows? D. has gone to surf and I have stayed home this Friday night. I just can’t face a drive. It’s a lovely evening but I’ll be staying inside eating my feelings (Ethiopian take out likely) and listening to Paul McCartney. Who would no doubt applaud your tofu enthusiasm.

I didn’t grow up eating tofu and I was recently asking my friends about their childhood tofu experiences. I guess I didn’t ask you! My Ukrainian immigrant mother embraced a lot of California things of the early 80s, but carob and tofu weren’t in her mix that I recall. I can’t pinpoint my first tofu exposure nor my aha tofu moments.

I’m much more into tofu, tempeh, and beans as my carnivorous cravings decrease. Although not seitan. Never seitan. Change my mind.

I love tofu from this spot – since they stopped coming to my farmer’s market I’m not getting it much. That kind of high end tofu is delicious just seasoned / briefly marinated, sliced and served over a bed of greens. And then there’s all these fun tofu options – also local to me and also not cheap. I particularly love the yuba sheets which are basically tofu pasta one can cut to preference.

The real game changer for me with tofu – beyond learning to press and marinate – has been freezing. The resulting spongy version soaks up any sauce or marinade with alacrity and makes it a crowd pleaser – great grilled, great in stir fries. Even good in salads. I imagine you’ve tried it? I have some marinating in my fridge right now (for soooome time) but in this depressed state I can’t bring myself to do anything about it. I think this one is sitting in tamari, coconut aminos, garlic, maybe some rice vinegar….

In low times, it’s always long-form noodles that speak to me. I blitzed a very quick cheese-free pesto (1 bunch basil, half a handful of walnuts halves, 5 or so cloves garlic, salt, olive oil, lemon juice) yesterday in the Cuisinart and have been eating in on fancy fresh spinach fettucine for the past 2 days.

When I am this down my appetite is insatiable – in both senses. I can’t get enough to eat and nothing satisfies. I play my favorite game “If you could eat anything right now, what would you eat?” and I haven’t got an answer. I played a couple weeks ago with a friend on a hike and she wanted a hand pie from a spot in Richmond, Virginia, and I was just stymied. Normally I’ve got a complex combination of yearnings, kind of like in this book.… And usually just asking the question turns on a light for me – but not lately. Just a gnawing vacuous maw.

I can’t imagine making your commute day to day. I wish I had something useful to say beyond that. Sending you much love.

Much love —

M.

P.S. I love my Instant Pot and use it most to make scrap stock and it’s also great for chicken soup. More about all that next time. Miss you.

Risotto

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Dear C – I went to Palermo in May to visit S., my long-time friend. This isn’t how we met, but some of my initial recollections of S. are swimming in a pool with her. An open air pool ringed with caryatids.

Over many years, we go out – for a walk or a run or a hike or a swim – and we come back for a meal. I suppose it’s not exactly right to say we’ve cooked together for 20 years. We’ve cooked for each other or perhaps, more true, S. has cooked for me. Or I have eaten food she cooked for others.

I remember scones that she made for her boyfriend at the time and left with a sweet note in an arcane language before we went running up a long hill. And then I got to enjoy them after – the scones. I’m not sure how well I remember them, really, but I remember a clean crumble and a warmth and something like currants.

S’s talent – oh just one of many – is creating marvelous dishes out of no effort. Or apparently. A kind of hosting I can only dream to emulate. She favors canned beans, tinned fish, pancetta, good bread, olives, herbs, greens. Salt.

A hosting that is an antidote to the effortful and imposing version I was raised with. That’s another story.

I recently hosted a dinner party – the invitation to return the favor after being hosted so many times was so pointed. I can’t blame them. I’m still recovering, though.

I made whipped feta, and hummus inspired by this recipe. I do follow their tip to whip the tahini and lemon first but the skinning of the chickpeas – that’s a no. Although let’s be honest I did sit there and skin some of the chickpeas after I soaked and boiled them from scratch. A kind of procrastination. I made this – now that I think I may have found a responsible source of shrimp from Imperfect Foods. It is a fantastic recipe – simple and savory and crowd pleasing. And I made a mangled version of a Sicilian street skewer, mangia bevi. Bacon isn’t the same as pancetta – which is what the Sicilians use. But pancetta is wildly expensive here and isn’t easily found in these lovely long strips. I went for pancetta but wonder how bacon might do….

Anyway – after this dinner party many thing languished, cramped in the fridge. I felt like I was gagging from eating grilled vegetables. And then I left to house sit. And I’m keeping it simple.

I have a troubled relationship with risotto – I love it but as anxiously as I follow instructions on how to make it it never turns out toothsome and velvety as I expect. The texture of the rice is inevitably either under or over done. My best results have been from Instant Pot risotto. A comfort food game changer. But it does take the meditative process out of the equation.

One of Palermo’s street foods is a stuffed risotto ball – a kind of risotto dumpling. And also they are loud and proud there that “L’arancina e fimmina”. Since the word is from “arancia” so it makes sense, but the feminine “arancina” is unique to western Sicily. Notwithstanding my love of the femina, I wasn’t impressed by the arancina as foodstuff until I needed emergency hiking food, and then my respect for the arancina’s staying power was um – cemented.

Here in the treehouse I’m sitting in, I made two lovely risottos in a row. The first – I used leftover pancetta as the base fat and then I made a huge batch of pesto from very wilted whole plant spinach and big green garlic stalks that had been lying around for a while that I mixed in. I did have plenty of olive oil and grated parm so the risotto result was rich and restaurant style.

this is some trout my friend left in her fridge being poached in that pesto and I don’t know how to make this a caption

And I followed up with a caution to the wind “cucina povera” version where I washed out the pesto from the Cuisinart and some schmaltz from the bottom of a tupperware of penne in chicken broth, blitzed a big bunch of herbs about to end up in the compost (basil, mint, parsley) and a bean soup that I defrosted. I threw all these in – using the bean soup and the rinsed out schmaltz and pesto as broth. Oh yes – I started with a leek base, I had a bunch of chopped languishing leeks (overdo from the shrimp recipe). And I didn’t have parm / pecorino to grate into it but I did have a fat parmesan rind to cook it with. The rice came out the most perfect texture. And I’m snarfing the softened rind.

L’arancina e femina!

xoxo

With love – M.

PS Here’s a playlist you might enjoy. I wanted to share a different one but Spotify doesn’t have the iconic Pansy Division song Male Model so it was ruined RUINED. XOXO

Brick House

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Dear C –

My mother is visiting and she mused, in the context of a cooking conversation, “I think I’ve been chopping things too finely.” For me, who ever toiled away under her constant exhortations to mince finer! finer! this was like the pope declaring that he might be too Catholic.

We have been eating out some – sharing the pleasures of a pot of tea or a cappuccino at the café nearby, its courtyard filled with Anna’s hummingbirds drinking from the many salvia and abutilon planted along its edges. It also features the pictured avocado tree, with the solitary pictured avocado, as yet unravaged by the many resident squirrels. And I introduced her to xiao long bao and momo. One can never have too many friends in the dumpling family.

If she gets around to it, she’ll make sambusa baraki with pumpkin/squash and pomegranate filling. We found the puff pastry dough she likes. I need to ask her why she likes this particular one, and to remind myself of the difference between puff pastry and phyllo dough.

Speaking of baking, I ask your advice: I like making a breakfast pastry that’s a hippie version of this cake. I skip the maple syrup and keep it unsweetened except for the fruit and maybe a tablespoon of jam if I have some lying around; and I replace a cup of the almond flour with a mix of hemp and chia seeds and some flax meal. I might throw in some yogurt of something of the sort to replace the syrup. Although it comes out fairly moist it is soooo dense. Any tips towards lightening it up?

I made a shakshuka this morning and with the rainy weather I’m thinking about a batch of this lentil soup that I love. What’s on your mind and your stove these days?

Much love and happy almost 2024.

Yours –

M.

P.S. I remembered what caused my mother to acknowledge that her motto of the finer the mince the closer to god might be flawed. We were invited to dinner at a friend’s home. My friend is an excellent and inventive cook (case in point: her secret ingredient in a delightfully velvety lentil soup? Pickle juice!). She’d made a salad of roasted beets with homemade ricotta and the beets were particularly lovely – they impressed even my mother, who, despite her E. European origins, or maybe because of them, has a wary relationship with that ruby-colored root. Our hostesses roasted beets were not too finely cut – maybe 2″x1″ and – here’s what I think was the kicker: she’d peeled and chopped them while raw, marinated them in some olive oil left over from a jar of oil-packed chevre, and then roasted them at, if I remember correctly, 400. They were divinely on the edge between earthy and caramelly.

Whip it. Whip it good.

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My Dear C –

Ach, I am sorry to read about your woes. Food IS SO EXPENSIVE these days. Here is a “let them eat cake” example – I was recently visiting a friend staying on the UWS of Manhattan, like right by Central Park, and I asked to be taken to the farmer’s market. I like a farmer’s market and enjoy seeing how they stack up, place to place. Amongst the fray, there was an urban composting hub, late summer eggplants, and romano beans (yum), tasty made goods and punny signs

and one sign I wish I had taken a picture of but was too shocked: “haricots verts $4” and then – in the upper right hand corner, a discreet “¼ lb.” Of course on the UWS, one might expect this kind of cool chicanery and not bat an eyelash. It’s kind of par for the course.

This weekend, I’m visiting my mother in our town of yore. And going to the Brentwood Farmer’s Market with her as a birthday treat (she does NOT shop there as a rule on her budget, for sure) with she who has the march of prices memorized from 1982 onward – is a litany of “guess how much these lettuces etc. cost?” (eyebrows very raised). It does seem like many vendors don’t even bother to put prices up because: if you have to ask, you can’t afford it! It is even more expensive than my local market, which is saying something.

Your letter reminded me of a question that arose back when I was working with refugees from the Former Soviet Union and volunteers who were helping them “acculturate” and learn English. I got a call from one volunteer, Burt, about something he considered a bit of an ethical quandary: The family he was meeting with had done fine for themselves and the adults had middle class jobs of some kind, if I remember correctly. They were long past the refugee stage but, had developed a friendship with Burt and so, they continued to meet fairly regularly. Burt would come over, and the family would offer him food they had picked up at their local food pantry – boxes of cereal, I remember, maybe a loaf of bread. Burt was appalled. He felt that this was taking advantage of the system – that there’s some tipping point at which you self-identify as no longer being eligible for a food pantry and stop using its services. He wanted my advice about talking to them about this. For better or worse, I can’t remember what advice I gave, if any. Perhaps it illustrates something about capitalism, and people who weren’t born under it and people who were. And maybe also about this overused word – trauma, and what experiences of food shortages at some point in your life might cause you to feel compelled to do. Anyway – as the kids say these days, a lot to unpack there. 

One thing I bought at the UWS farmer’s market was a little half pint of herbed, whipped feta. It was the most elfin green color. And it was tasty. I decided to try making a version myself and it turned out quite nicely. I mention it in this missive not just because I recently discovered it, but also because – for a cheese-involved thing, it is a fairly inexpensive and very decadent treat. It’s delicious as a dip, as a salad dressing (thinned out a bit – just tried it, yum!), as a sauce for beans, etc.  I think you can do the whole thing for $10 and get enough for you and S. plus a party….

I had to bring something to a party this week and I brought the leftovers of the batch I’d made and it met with great success. I mention the party because – I was asked for a recipe. I did glance at both the ingredient list of the version I bought in NY and a recipe or two online. Then I went forth and did what I could with what I had.

Here are the 2 absolute necessities in my mind – a block of feta and a hefty amount of fresh herbs (ideally 2 or more for depth of taste) that offer some grassiness (in that I mean something like parsley rather than oregano), and a little lemon/acid of some sort. IMO – some allium is always a good addition.

Everything else is variable, optional, to your taste – eg.  Do you like raw allium? Do you have some sesame seeds handy? How salty is your feta? What herbs float your boat? How juicy is your lemon? Does cumin make your heart sing? Do you want to spice it up?

Here’s the recipe I made today with what was on hand – which looks to have resulted in about a quart of the stuff!

Recipe

.79 lbs of Bulgarian sheep’s feta ($4.73) – I like Bulgarian feta as it’s cheap and strong

1 large bunch of dill ($3 at Gretna Green farmer’s market) pictured below – only very rough stems removed (there’s no scale in the image so – think 5x the little plastic cages of herbs you get at the supermarket)

2 scallions in their entirety 

1 Tbsp or so of sesame seeds (a bit stale, so I toasted lightly)

Small handful of parsley leaves 

Very small handful of dried celery leaves that were hanging out

Smattering of marjoram leaves (I prefer thyme)

Glug or more of olive oil  – for texture and to cut salt (my “more” was a dash of a peppered   olive oil that was on hand)

Several tablespoons of yogurt 

Juice of about ⅓ or less of a lemon 

I started with throwing  about ¾ of the block of feta and the whole bunch of dill, plus celery and marjoram in the Cuisinart (colloquially called “The Foot Professor”)  and improvised to taste from there. 

Much love and more soon – M

Some people they like to go out dancing

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Dear C –

All respect to having a new job and being slow to respond. I’m at the one year anniversary at my first new place after being at the same org for 20 years (!!!) and I feel like I just got my bearings.

There’s a meme about how being new at your job is like being the new character in season 5 of a show. Feels true. I miss you.

Listening to Velvet Underground’s Sweet Jane and it’s bringing back our days of yore.

Some people — they like to go out dancing and other peoples they have to work…. And there’s even some even some evil mothers – they’re gonna tell you that everything is just dirt. You know that – women never really faint and that villains always blink their eyes. And that – you know – children are the only ones who blush. And that life is just to die.

The thing about pescetarianism is that fish is SO EXPENSIVE if you want to buy anything sustainable. “I know a guy” who fishes halibut and crab seasonally and sells off his boat near me. I’ve got to meet up with him on a pier and on his schedule (a bit like a drug deal). When I do – it’s a joy (minus maneuvering traffic) and it’s a connection with the reality of eating an animal. It ain’t no Styrofoam package.

Working from home means that I can warm fish up in the microwave. So for this weekend’s meal prep I made a big batch of this stew with variations – I used leeks (greens included) instead of the onion plus harissa as part of the base. For veg — favas (only shelled, not peeled) from a friend’s garden, and fennel and squash. Skipped the clam juice. Added the favas shortly after the leeks and used my own scrap stock as the base.

The fish – went down to our sustainable fish market, and there wasn’t anything under $18 a pound. All the signs detail where the fish is caught and how and the fishmongers can talk about it. My mother taught me to ask at the counter for fish pieces — they had yellowfin and swordfish and those were half the price but not what I was looking for.

Ended up getting the cod at Sprouts because it was $12.99 / lb. They’ve got this sign saying everything is sustainable. Asked the very kind guy at the counter how the cod was caught and he said – “From a boat.” Fair enough…

Much love my friend. I miss you.

M.

I fixed a toilet and made a soup

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Dear C –

I have been writing to you for some time – sometimes in my mind, sometimes on paper. Somewhere there is a notebook with a few pages of a letter to you, where I mention depression and me not calling you and you not calling me, as well.

Today, though, I had a triumph borne out of desperation: I fixed the toilet.

“Hello?”
“Is your toilet running?“
“What?”
“You’d better go catch it.”

Our toilet was running, and because the landlord is just the last person we want to interact with, and because now the plumber won’t come without the landlord’s consent, I peered into the depths of the tank and googled “Fluidmaster 400” and “Fluidmaster 400 hissing sound” and watched some videos, which involved grabbing the Fluidmaster firmly by the shaft and pushing up, and 1/8 turns, and clever use of a Solo cup, and lo! I fixed the toilet. I don’t know if you’ve ever fixed a toilet – and you probably have because you are practical like that – but for me this felt like possibly the apex of my life’s achievements. I rarely feel a sense of satisfaction or completion, or good-enoughedness, but today, C, I really did.

Then I sat in the sun for a little, with the cat, listening to the spring sounds of woodpeckers and Lesser Goldfinches, and the song of a Ruby-Crowned Kinglet (which I just learned to recognize – it goes teeter teeter teeter teeter TI) and thought about the rotisserie chicken about to go bad in the fridge.

And I made a soup, which turned out quite well and it made me think of you, again.
I had a can of chipotles in the pantry that expired at the end of 2020. This morning I used a bit of them in a shakshuka, and this evening I made a soup with the chipotles, scrap stock, the borderline chicken, onion, garlic, carrots, and a can of chickpeas and most of a can of corn (I saved some of the can to eat later with mayo and cayenne/chili powder – my bastardized elote treat).

Chicken Chipotle Soup

1 onion (I used red as that’s what needed using)
Oil (I used a couple Tbsps of olive)
A few cloves of garlic- roughly sliced
Couple carrots – chopped to your taste
Chipotle peppers – 3ish/to taste (Canned? That’s what I used; and they came in adobo sauce – added benefit.)
Cumin – couple dashes
Some roasted chicken, taken off the bone and in bite-ish sized pieces (I had a leg & a thigh and a breast & a wing)
Diced tomatoes – 14.5 oz can
Stock – 3 cups or so
Can of corn – 14.5 oz or however much you like
Can of chickpeas

Optional for garnish
Sour cream
Carrot tops and green garlic tops, chopped (but really any green to your taste would do)

I might have bought this can just for the looks of it

Dice the onion and saute in the warmed oil, when translucent —
Add the chopped carrot
Saute saute saute til the carrots start to soften, then —
Add the garlic & saute just until fragrant
Add cumin & chipotle —
I took the chipotle peppers and squeezed them through my garlic press
Saute for a minute
Add the chicken
Add the diced tomatoes
Rinse out the can and add the rinse water
Add the stock
Probably some salt – to taste
Put it on high so you bring it to a simmer
While it’s getting there –
Add the amount of corn that you want and
Add the can of chickpeas,
And, if you’re into it, add some of the aquafaba, maybe all of it!
I kept some to play with later

Once the soup has come to a simmer, make sure the carrots are cooked to your taste and turn it off.

Serve garnished with sour cream and chopped greens – eg. carrot & green garlic tops – that’s what I had in my fridge.

In my next missive – spring salads.

Much love,

M.