Running Afoul of the Nutrional Nazis

Our supermarket had frozen WILD coho salmon on sale.  If you read this blog you know I'm crazy about wild salmon and dubious about farmed. 

I browsed through my recipes to see what I had, because grilling season is over here in Massachusetts.  We don't have the right set up for outdoor cooking in winter.

"Salmon with the taste of the fjiord" popped into view with a recipe for Russian potato salad.  Looked good, and I had everything except beets, dill and well, salmon. 

The recipe was yellow with age, maybe from the New York Times. by Marion Burros, whose name I recognized. 

So:  first the potato salad.  I had some nice fingerling potatoes and we bought some gorgeous organic beets.  The recipe also called for chopped apple (yum) and the dressing was sour cream, vinegar, horseradish, and seasonings.  After everything was cooked and together I took a taste.  Sour as lemon.  Then, I noticed there was no mayo.  No salt either, so I added those things and re-tasted.  A winner!

On to the salmon cakes.  I grilled the salmon indoors and one of the cats came to investigate.  Go away, kitty.  Since it wasn't shrimp, she did.  Everything was fine with the cakes, which had dill, capers (rinsed) red onion, rye bread crumbs and more horseradish.  Everything was fine until I tried to make cakes out of the salmon.  It continued to fall apart and this was not good.  The recipe called one one egg white.  I added a second and that didn't work either so I added the yolk as well.  Moderate success.  Fried them up and we sat down to eat.  Very tasty.

Then I realized that the lack of egg york, salt, and the recommendation for low fat sour cream which I ignored sounded like a recipe you maybe wouldn't want to try.  Even the New York Times fell for this back in the 80's when Molly O'Neil waved the flag for low-fat food for a while.  Then she went for ethnic food with 24 ingredients per recipe and I stopped reading the Sunday food column.  Alas, Craig Claiborne, where were you then?

 I tried to recall if Burros had been on a low-fat, low-salt, low-anything-that-tastes-good regime.  Maybe.

So the salmon cakes were good, if tricky to produce in one piece, and with the addition of whole egg.  

I'll probably make the potato salad again with salt and mayo.  On the whole, a good meal. With some doctoring. 

Seasonal Recipes: cheap and tasty

We are probably one of the last households to receive and read three daily newspapers.  One of the best things about the NY Times and the Boston Globe are the Wednesday food sections.  Sometimes the recipes call for difficult (read drive 80 miles to get ingredients) or sound like a lot of work and with 30 ingredients (mostly vegetarian), but last week had a couple of seasonal recipes that sounded like something I might try, and try I did.

From the Times, I made the Cucumber and Buttermilk Soup with Sourdough Croutons. Quick, Flavorful No-Cook Soup  It's a lovely green color and had a pleasant taste before chilling.  From the Globe I got Orzo salad with green beans, tomatoes and olives. Truth be told, we are eating the croutons on hand, whatever their flavor. Yummy orzo salad recipe

Our tiny garden has produced a bounty of cukes, and naturally a recipe where I needed two pounds (!) was welcome.  Buttermilk and avocados were on sale, and the herbs were in the garden, too.  This was a no-brainer.

The salad uses green beans and tomatoes, always a good combo, and I had a package of orzo.  Olives from the olive bar for flavor and that elegant little touch of black.  Sweet onion  also on sale.  Basil and mint in the garden.  This looks like a winning vegetarian meal.  Easy, great for a hot evening, an no list of 27 ingredients or time-consuming cooking.

The Times and the Globe today had tributes to Julia Child on the occasion of her 100th birthday.  I have her epic cookbooks, and always had a favorite veal stew that I made with fresh tomatoes every summer.  Caflouti is a favorite dessert in our house, easy to make, tasty and not a diet-buster.  The Times has a yummy roast pork recipe from Julia that I'll make tomorrow for family company.

The great thing about the recipes in the newspaper is that they come to you.  No wracking of brain, no browsing through cookbooks (a pleasant activity, nonetheless).  Ingredients are usually seasonal.  By and large prep is not too difficult.  Just screen out those too time-consuming, weird or that don't really sound all that good.   You'll recognize them immediately.  They call for lime leaves and oddball stuff.  Or weird combos like kale and squash.  Butternut squash is fine for soup or a vegetable but I get fatigued seeing it in the most outre combinations. Now I never tire of green bean recipes!  Yay. 

I'll do photos tomorrow, so  you can judge for yourself.  We had more chicken pesto pasta salad with tomatoes this week.  My own recipe, intuited many years ago from Rebecca's Cafe in Kendal Square, Cambridge.  That was one dynamite dish.

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The Man Burns

The New York Times has a incredibly cool photo of Burning Man today. Yup, the Man burns on Saturday. I haven't been there since 2004, not to the Festival that is. Pining to return to the Playa. In the photo I can see my characters Emma and Jean Claude, looking at the art in the desert.

Festival Madness hasn't sold, and I've not been able to drum up any interest. Would that some of the agents who have yet to respond see the stuff in the times and say, "hey, didn't I just have a query about Burning Man?"

I am going to break a rule this week, and send a photo from the paper along with my query. That's a no-no, but WTF? Nothing I've done so far has sparked a burning interest in the novel.

Whatever drummer I am marching to these days appears to be out in the desert (the playa?) banging out a rhythm that nobody but me can follow. You'd think this would be good for a writer, but it's not.

My suspense novel is approaching 70,000 words. Writing some fun stuff now, and in a few pages the computer is stolen. This book will end up in Gerlach, last town before the Man. With a shootout. And the world's most unlikely hero will surface. And there will be redemption.

In the meantime, this is the week to push Festival Madness.

http://www.burningman.com/

http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/subjects/b/burning_man_festival/index.html

The Boston Globe

If the Boston Globe disappears, I'll have to change my life. Every morning, S.O. brings the Globe up to the bedroom with my coffee, and I drink and read until I am awake. This is a 26 year old ritual, and the Globe, like the coffee, is a daily fix. I can't even imagine life without it, and my favorite columnists, the curmudgeonly Alex Beam, the sports write-ups, the recipes and restaurant reviews. All the stuff I read about. Even the Craig's List Killer.

I mean, what could possibly replace the daily paper? I began reading The Denver Post when I was a young teenager, and at college I read the Houston Chronicle, then continued life with the St. Louis Post Dispatch, and the the Chicago Tribune. The daily paper is a part of my life, and I mean the LOCAL daily paper. We also get (hopeless readers that we are) the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.

But we LIVE IN BOSTON.

Duh!

It would be awful if all those people lost their jobs. People I know. This just can't happen. I blog, I tweet, I friend, but I also read newsprint.

This just can't happen.

Grrrr.

John Updike

Such a shock to hear of Updike's death. American Literature lost a great writer.

I loved his New Yorker fiction and the "Rabbit" books. Updike always had his finger on our pulse, and of course we were mostly a little sick. Sometimes I look back upon the prior decades with a mixture of awe and horror. Updike was always there, recording everything.

The New York Times had a huge obit and the Globe weighed in with a large article, too. Loved those metaphors. When I took modern American literature in college, Updike wasn't taught, yet, so I had to find him for myself.

Small town life teaches us so much, if we will just attend. The suburbs, too, once you get before the boosterism and the superficial surfaces. Updike mined these locales for gold. What can one say? It's not often that a "Literary" writer produced a book a year, and ventures into so many odd places. And excels.

We will miss his twinkling eyes and his extraordinary pen.

Black Friday

Greed is ugly whether manifested by greedy bankers and businessmen or greedy shoppers, whipped to a frenzy by advertising and the lure of Black Friday"bargains."

I am appalled. The fact that a horde of "Christmas" shoppers would trample store employees like pilgrims in Mecca is shocking. Well, Christ left Christmas years ago and not only that but the true spirit of giving is gone, along with fellowship and charity. Now I guess all those shoppers were "holiday" or "seasonal" shoppers. They were rampaging clods and to an extent you have to blame retailers for creating this kind of a climate. This whole season and economy reminds one of why the moneychangers were driven from the temple.

Retail was my unwilling corporate home for years. I always hated it. Loved manufacturing--"fulfillment" was somewhat short of fulfilling, but oh god, retail was detail, and the people in the back offices were often not my type.

Retailers bitch and moan about everything. Too hot. Too cold, Too this. Too that. Of course this year they have the economy to bitch and moan about. You could not pay me enough to stand in line at 4:00 a.m. to get into a retail store. Are these people crazy? The so-called bargains will be just as good in two-three weeks. Maybe better. We don't need them anyway.

This frenzy for consumer goods is really getting to me. My friend, when we were discussing the wardrobe malfunction of Caribou Barbie, said, "Well, any blouse costs $400! "
Excuse me? Last winter I found a very nice shirt at Brooks Brothers outlet and it cost nowhere near that.
Of course my friend lives on Fifth Avenue and shops on Madison Avenue, and I know she shops the sales, but nonetheless.

If I bought a $400 blouse you can just about bet that it would have a grease stain on it before you can say "spot remover!"

I am thinking of a Christmas boycott this year. Books, yes, magazine subscriptions, yes. Maybe warm socks or pajamas. Flannel shirts, the soft warm kind. Mittens. Cat toys.

But all this consumption is disgusting. Really.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/29/business/29walmart.html?em

Bah humbug.

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Why I Am For Obama

Once upon a time I was a Republican. My mom was a committeewoman for the party in Denver and my dad was only slightly to the left of John Birch. I shook hands with the Nixons. We went to Republican picnics. I voted for Nixon. When I began wavering in the more liberal direction, I registered as an Independent and voted for John Anderson. Does anyone remember John Anderson?

After that I voted mostly for Democrats, while still registered as an Independent. Of course, I voted for Governor Weld in Massachusetts, but the so-called Wellesley Republicans are a dying breed, usurped by the Southern right wing bloc of the party. . The older I get, the more liberal I become. It’s supposed to work the other way. I like to think with age comes wisdom.

On the cover of the New York Times (elitist Eastern rag) this morning, two photos ran side by side. One was of two old farts in Florida, McCain supporters, and they were fat and well, they didn't look like intellectual giants. Next to them were two young Obama supporters. They are the future, and we are looking at the future now, and I'm a not very young white woman and I like the look of the future. Obama is the future.

Obama is a good person. You can see his goodness shining through. He doesn’t have McCain’s naked ambition, win at any cost, damn the torpedoes, damn the ethics, full speed ahead. Power will not corrupt Obama. Obama is tough, but in a good way.

He’s smart. He’s thoughtful. He’s steady. He believes in getting good advice. He’ll even put some honest Republicans in responsible positions. He won’t be afraid to say ‘no,’ and he won’t be the kind of person to whom people are afraid to deliver bad news.

He’s respected globally. Think what that means to this country. This campaign has tested him, and he has not been found wanting. He grows before our eyes, commanding respect and even love.

It’s time. Time for a change, time for Obama. People who think, those who can reason, understand this. It’s the most important election in our lifetime. Obama won’t be perfect, but he’ll do all right. Experience isn’t everything. Look at the mess those with “experience” got us into. That kind of “experience” we can eschew.

Obama is the future. Look into the future. Cast your vote. Change is always scary, but change is good.

Vote for Obama! Vote for the future.

My Kitchen Disasters

This is the speech (or a variation) that I will give to my Toastmaster's group at the next meeting. The speech is supposed to be entertaining, starting and ending with stories. Let me know what you think.

Disasters in the Kitchen - - A Learning Experience

The first time she made mashed potatoes and gravy, my friend Dorothy said her husband had to pour the potatoes over the gravy. Dorothy became an excellent cook. You can, too, if you laugh at yourself and learn from your mistakes.

Between the spring I graduated from college and the fall when I was married, I lived in Denver with my parents. My fiancé would visit on weekends and we would pick out dishes and glassware and look for furniture. Back then, I didn’t realize my good fortune in that I had actually found a husband who loved to shop.

Sometimes we had lunch at the Denver Hilton, and because it was summer, the restaurant served a cold cream of potato soup called Vichysoisse. The waiter brought it to the table on crushed ice in elegant little soup cups sprinkled with a scattering of bright green chives.

As a soon to be married woman, I had begun to take more interest in cooking, eager to advance my repertoire beyond meat loaf, pork chops and toast. One of the obstacles to my learning to cook was my mother, who had no objection to my cooking, but always found fault with my cleaning the kitchen afterward. She invariably discovered an overlooked blob on the counter, a spatter of grease on the stove, a piece of onion on the floor.

Nonetheless, when I announced I was going to make Vichysoisse, my mother showed no objection, and I drove to the University of Denver to find a cookbook with the recipe. An old cookbook.

Armed with a list of bizarre ingredients, I encountered the first obstacles in our local Safeway. The produce man had to show me the leeks. Who knew? They looked like onions, only different. In the dairy department, the person I asked had no clue what 10 percent cream was, so I bought plain old cream.

I read the recipe again for instructions, and wondered about the advice to “force the cooked mixture through a layer of fine muslin.” My mom provided a worn but sturdy muslin pillowcase, and my adventures in cooking began.

Never, ever, try a recipe where muslin is mentioned in any way, shape or form. I had potato glop up to my armpits. It was smeared all over the counter, the stove and the floor. In my hair. I had created the mess to end all messes. Worse, I had a measly amount of the strained potatoes. Maybe, just maybe, enough for two minute cups of soup. That was with the cream added.

My mom was strangely sympathetic and made no comment about my kitchen cleanup, which was long and arduous.

When my fiancé arrived Friday evening, we each had a small cup of Vichysoisse with chives from my mother’s garden. It tasted good, almost like the Hilton’s. My first failure was also my first success.

Fast forward twenty plus years. I am now a working woman, as well as an experienced cook. My husband has a new job and the corporate brass is coming into town from Rochester. We will invite them to dinner. What might be worthy of the occasion? What could I make in advance and heat up quickly after getting home from work?

Sunday’s New York Times recipe provides the answer. A venison ragout. It sounds delicious, with a long marinade and 28 different ingredients. I’ve never cooked venison, but a friend, a bow hunter, has given us a leg of venison which has been in the freezer ready for such an event. Before leaving for work on Monday, I put the package on the counter to thaw. I have actually never looked at the venison, which was wrapped and frozen when we received it.

Monday evening after a dinner, a most unpleasant experience ensues. I have to cut the meat off the leg, and there is lots of blood and the leg looks like, well, a leg. There is much bone and little meat, barely a pound. Enough to feed two but not six. Still game, no pun intended, I make the marinade with its 19 ingredients. Then I race to the store and buy a pound of round steak and add it to the marinade with the venison.

I have to admit that even half-soled with round steak; there will not be enough meat. The next day at work I tell my colleagues of my dilemma and one of them asks, “Haven’t you ever been to John Dewar’s meat market in Newton? They have all kinds of stuff like venison and buffalo and game birds.”

John Dewar has flown under my radar, but moments later, I am on the phone to the market. Do they have venison? Yes, but it’s frozen. I order a pound and a half, and tell them to put it out to defrost.

After work, I arrive at John Dewar’s astounding market. The man behind the counter hands over the thawed meat. I fork over $27.00. Who knew that venison was gold-plated? I could have served filet mignon for less.

Back home, I cut the meat into cubes and into the marinade it goes. A day before company arrives, I cook the ragout according to the recipe. It smells divine. The next night, we serve it up to many accolades. The guests don’t realize that part of the venison ragout is round steak, and I don’t tell them.

Our friend stops hunting, much to my relief. I never cook venison again.

What wisdom did I acquire from my misadventures in cooking?
· Buy mom a blender.
· Avoid muslin.
· The folks running the supermarket and the meat market are your best friends.
· Be humble.
· Unwrap and inspect frozen foods before making menu decisions.
· Learn from your mistakes.
· Leave your comfort zone and be adventurous.

We were having a big party, and I was baking my mom’s old standby, Bisquick and cheese bits. I forgot they were in the oven and burnt them. Not wanting the smell of burning food all over the house and it being winter, I threw the charred cheese bits off the deck into the snow. My son’s dog discovered them. Ate every one. Then the dog kept looking up at the sky as if these delicious cheesy morsels had descended from heaven.
No matter what you cook, someone will love it. ©

Maureen Dowd is right on!

Maureen Dowd's column in the New York Times today has humor, irony and sticks it to Sarah Palin on any number of issues.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/10/opinion/10dowd.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Wish I would have said that. Now if only she had mentioned polar bear helper. . . .

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Barbequed Brisket

This recipe is from the New York Times, and is a good reason not to be a vegetarian. Make sure the brisket has some fat thereon. You'll chill it and take it all off later.
Here's a link to the web site:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/21/dining/213mrex.html?pagewanted=print

I browned and cooked the meat in a broiler pan that was about 2.5 inches high. It's hard to turn the meat (used turkey lifters), so be careful. I covered it with 2 layers of heavy duty foil. You want to cook it leaving enough time to cool it so you can remove the solid fat (beaucoup) from the sauce). This normally means cooking it one day early.

The recipe text (not included on the web site) mentions not buying two 2.5 pounds instead of one 5 pound. One other thing. This time of year (high summer) many supermarket don't have big briskets, or if so, they are frozen, so you need to allow for defrost time.

Obviously, not something to make spur of the moment. :)

The stuffed mushrooms as appetizer were from the 1976 Gourmet magazine and were something special, although I greatly cut down the amount of butter. They were something of a pain in the ass to make, because in those days Gourmet gave no quarter. But zowie, were they tasty.

I now have 57 pages, count 'em, in my new manuscript, tentatively title, In Flight. Currently I am researching money laundering and banking in the Cayman Islands, and hoping no one is monitoring my Internet searches, as they might get the wrong idea. Once I researched gambling and got SPAM from the gambling sites for years. I researched moonshine stills in the hills of Georgia for a short story, and pimps for another story.

The moral here is that a writer's searches may encompass lots of weird and even illegal stuff. Oh yes, and the transgender research for Festival Madness. The devil is in the details and so it the believability and yea, the writer's authority.

I roamed far from the brisket, another writerly trait that needs reining in. Sometimes.


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Cat Blog Day and Other Pensees

Friday Is Cat Blog Day

Last Sunday not only did I give Thisbe a good brushing, but I combed her, especially down close to her tail where lumps appear in the summer. Thisbe is fat and can’t reach this in her daily bathing. She took exception and nailed me on the arm. No big deal, except that she hasn’t slept at the foot on the bed since, and I am bereft without my kitty. No amount of coaxing has helped. Cats can be so cruel. Sigh.

Tonight we’re having Cayman Island Pork Chops with Pineapple Salsa. Doesn’t that sound enticing? The yellow, red, green and purple salsa will be so tasty and colorful. The recipe is from Steven Weber’s grilling email, which comes often enough but not too often. Now if it would only stop raining.

Wednesday’s New York Times food section had a telling-tales-out-of-school feature by Kim Severson. Recipe Deal Breakers. What makes you tear off your apron and throw down your whisk?

Of course for non-cooks, that would be the recipe itself, which would require greater effort than moving a package from freezer to microwave. And the plain cooks, who fry meat and boil potatoes. Give me good old salt and pepper for seasonings. Chop parsley? Go away.

Most real cooks are more adventurous, but only up to a point. Ingredients, according to the article, can be off-putting, for example, “fresh pick vine leaves,” or “two quarts of pig blood,” or my favorite, “wild board from the hills around Santa Fe.” My own turn-off is a host of ethnic ingredients that our supermarket doesn’t carry that would require a day and a tank of gas to round up. Remember I couldn’t even get poblano pepper this week, and S.O. had to go to two stores for jalapenos. This is Boston.

Unfamiliar techniques stop some cooks cold—sieving or pounding—“butterfly 12 4-inch fresh anchovies.” Sure thing. Stuffing small foodstuffs, e.g., cherry tomatoes, olives or squash blossoms makes some cooks quail, including moi.

And then there are each cook’s visceral reactions to certain recipe phrases. “Work quickly before it hardens.” “Have a helper.” “Remove all jewelry before proceeding.”
Perhaps do not proceed.

The most intimidating recipe I ever saw was for fresh strudel dough, which required a kitchen table to stretch it out on. Get serious. That’s why God gave us the frozen food section. Really.

What is your recipe deal breaker?

Last item of the day, again from the New York Times, was a front page article about a young German woman who has written a frank, racy novel, about, I am not making this up, feminine hygiene. A kind of tell-all, a combo orfporno and feminism. The title is “Wetlands.” Throat clearing heard. The author, Charlotte, Roche is cute and calls her profession, “circus pony.” The readings are for over-18 audiences only.

Do I see men smirking? Yup.

Last, last, item of the day. I have considered quitting this blog. There are approximately 30 readers per day on average, but no one ever comments, which means the blog remains mired in the deep bottom of blogdom. By now I’ve written enough words to populate a novel, and so I’m counting on some comments or the blog may die.

Onward to “real” writing.

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A Recipe Obsession

First it was Gourmet. Then finally, a cheap subscription opportunity to Bon Appetit. A relative recommended Cooks Illustrated. I got a free companion air ticket if I subscribed to Food and Wine. Of course the Globe and the NY Times and even the Wall Street Journal have recipes.

At the dentist the week I read Saveur, and tempted, told myself, no way. For a person who is always dieting, why do I put temptation front and center. It's not like I'm subscribing to Cooking Light.

And of course there's the web recipes: Epicurious that has a reprise from Bon Appetit and Gourmet. There's the Weber Kettle recipes, the smoker recipes, the this, the that.

I have 5 of my own "cookbooks" and 10 or so folders labeled "chicken" "salad" and well, you know, these folders are growing and I need to separate the stuff I've made from the stuff I want to try.

If we live into the next century I'll never make all the cakes I've clipped. Yesterday, in anticipation of company, I made a coffee cake like affair, with a thick yummy crumb topping. It was from Food and Wine and a photo follows. The day before we had enchiladas verdes, and were they ever good, both the chicken and the cheese.

It's hard to find tomatillos in New England. Tried to grown them once and it was a miserable failure: huge plants, no fruit.

See the next post for a photo of the cake.

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Strawberry Sour Cream Streusel Cake

In case you haven' t planned an Easter dessert, this will serve 10-12, is easy to make and doesn't dirty every dish in the kitchen. If memory serves (and sometimes memory does not), this is a Nigella Lawson recipe and we should all thank her very much. I believe it was in the New York Times. Haven't seen her recipes there for a while. They should bring her back for an encore.

Strawberry Sour Cream Streusel Cake

For the Strawberry Puree:
8 ounces strawberries
3 T. strawberry jam
2 t. cornstarch
2 t, vanilla

For the Cake:
Vegetable oil for pan
3.4 c. sugar
2 c. plus 2 T. flour
1 t. baking powder
½ t. baking soda
12 T. (1 ½ sticks) cold butter, cut into ½ inch cubes
1 cup sour cream
1 large egg
1 T. vanilla

For the crumble topping:
2 t. Demerara or turbinado sugar

Prepare strawberry puree: In a blender, combine berries and jam. Make a paste of cornstarch and vanilla, and add to blender. Puree until smooth. Set aside.
Prepare cake: Heat oven to 375 degrees. Oil a 9 inch springform pan and set aside. In a large bowl, combine sugar, flour baking powder and baking soda. Sprinkle in butter cubs and rub them in by hand until mixture resembles large coarse crumbs. Remove ½ cup and set aside. To large bowl, add sour cream , egg and vanilla. Mix well.
3 Using a little over half the cake batter., drop dollops of batter into the pan. Pat batter across bottom of pan and about 1 inch up sides; mixture will be very stick and somewhat uneven. Add strawberry puree, making an even layer across bottom of pan and leaving a rim of dough above it. Cover with remaining cake mixture.
4 Prepare crumble topping: In a medium bowl, combine reserved ½ cup dough and Demerara sugar. Stir with a fork to mix. Sprinkle evenly over cake.
5 Bake cake until lightly golden, about 45 minutes. Cool complete before serving.,
6 Yield One 9-inch cake.

I served the cake with a side of slice strawberries, but whipped cream is also good. Of course, whipped cream is good generally. Of course you could do both. Yum!

Fried Rice, Roast Pork and other possibilities

A major plot point in World of Mirrors centers around a party at which the main dish is roast pork fried rice. Obviously, this is not your father's thriller. That being said, the evening ends with skinning dipping with the KGB and smoking some serious weed, along with an attempted murder. My characters like to have a good time, and they aren't constrained by legalities, especially the World of Mirrors gang.

We're actually having roast pork fried rice for dinner tonight, and I am sharing the recipe and some commentary.

Fried Rice –
8 servings, but we have had four people devour it.

This recipe is either from the Chicago Tribune or the New York Times. My best guess is the Trib. It’s about a million years old, and never disappoints. I usually use about 2 cups of meat, but less is fine. Keep the bacon.

Tonight ours will be filled with leftover pork tenderloin, bacon, broccoli, celery, grilled eggplant, onions, scallions, garlic, a handful of unsalted cashews, egg, soy sauce, sesame oil, hot oil, sugar and a smidgen of salt. Rice, of course. Good Basmati rice. Bacon adds a lot of salt, by the way, as does the soy sauce.

The nice thing about the recipe is that if you have the basics: rice, cooked meat, egg, onion, bacon and seasonings, you can improvise the rest. Mushrooms are very very good. Pea pods, spinach-- the list is endless.

Original Recipe:
1 ½ cups raw rice
3 T. oil
2 eggs beaten
¼ cook cooked ham or bacon slivers
½ cup cooked pork, chicken or beef slivers (shrimp will work, too)
½ cup chopped green onions and tops
2 T. soy sauce
½ t. each: sugar, salt
¼ t. MSG (I skip this ingredient)

Prepare rice early in the day so it is cool when you prepare the dish. Heat half the oil in a large heavy skillet. Scramble eggs until just done. Remove from pan and set aside. Add remaining oil, bacon, meat and onions. Cook and stir a few minutes, then add rice. Stir constantly so that the rice grains separate and become coated with oil. Add remaining ingredients and scramble eggs, cut into thin slivers. Serve hot.

Add additional ingredients when rice is added.

Congratulations, Doris Lessing

What a great surprise that the Nobel Committee has selected Doris Lessing as this year's recipient! I read The Golden Notebook and much of her work many years ago, before a career put an end to much leisure reading. I checked one book after another out of the library, in awe of her great gift to bring Africa and later on England and her characters to life. The Science Fiction I never read, not being a sci-fi buff. That seems to be something either you are or are not, although I do love William Gibson's work. There's always an exception.

Lessing was writing about women, not the liberation of women, but the struggle of a woman to become a whole person. Apparently that is still controversial. The sniping pisses me off. Sunday, (I think) The New York times printed an earlier essay of hers that was brilliant.

And while we're handing out accolades, three cheers for Al Gore, another soul who has the courage of his convictions. There's a phrase one doesn't often hear anymore. We should all have the courage of our convictions.

Thanks, Doris and Al, for showing us how.

Mrs. Astor

Back in the day, when one actually dressed nicely for air travel, I arrived in at the Denver airport for a Christmas visit in a black wool coat newly purchased on Fifth Avenue in New York. I wore long black gloves, black heels, sported a black handbag, and a red (I think) hat. I was a new bride of a few months and my mother, seeing me, exclaimed, "You look just like Mrs. Astor!" It was my mother's high compliment regarding dress. For years whenever I would dress up (and back then dressing up was done a lot more than nowadays), Significant Other would remark, "You look just like Mrs. Astor."

She was buried yesterday, wearing we don't know what, but I'm sure it was elegant. Elegant funeral. Elegant lady, a class act. The telling detail about the affair, which the New York Times did not fail to report, was that although the church was open to the public, it was only half full, the reason being that New York society is no longer made up of people who would sacrifice a Friday afternoon in August to pay their respects or to quote the Times, "Asking people to spend a late summer Friday afternoon in town would be demanding a true quality-of-life sacrifice--or at least some heavy rescheduling. . . " Goes on to say Mrs. Astor was the kind of woman who sacrificed time and money readily. We won't see her like again.

I wondered idly, while I was ironing, if anyone from the antique boat cruise had interrupted the cruise for the funeral. Couldn't decide. Swells sailing through swells. Were you astounded to read that I was ironing? Lots of people (all women of course) say, "I don't iron." Does that mean that a) they're comfortable with wrinkles, or b) they have a polyester wardrobe or c) everything goes to the cleaners? Dunno.

Women, again, also announce, "I don't cook." Well, duh, you eat don't you? Have you noticed men never make themselves look like idiots by making I-dont-iron-I-dont-cook remarks. I never know what "I don't cook" means. Does it mean only instant oatmeal and mashed potatoes, or does it mean fast food and takeout and the salad bar at the supermarket? Does it mean not from scratch? Inquiring minds want to know. "I don't cook." What b.s.

Grapeshot, on the other hand, worries about dying before she can try all the outstanding recipes she has filed away. Today we are doing something new from the Times this week, an eggplant salad. Sounded so yummy, with grilled chicken breasts. The rest of the breasts will go into an Mexican (Yucatan) soup of orzo, chicken broth, jalapenos and lime juice. The problem with recipes is that there are old favorites, new favorites and the yet-to-be-tried. I cook.

Last night I didn't cook, actually. We had insalata Caprese, salami, rye bread, cheddar cheese, olives, pickles and potato chips. So filling we saved the dessert for tonight.

Insalata Caprese: Only make this when high qualitiy tomatoes are available. Slice a tomato or two thin and cut slices in half. Slice fresh (the balls that come in water) mozzarella thinly and put on top of the tomato slices. Hie yourself to the garden and pick some fresh basil. Chop up the basil leaves and sprinkle on the tomato-mozzarella mixture. Drizzle EVOO over the top. Season with salt and pepper. Notice no cooking was involved. Slicing and chopping and drizzling require minimal skills.

So good, esp. with the tomato from the garden not an hour before eating, and likewise the basil. We have regular and lemon basil this year. The old-favorite chicken pesto will be showing up on the table some night.

I cook. I even make my own garam marsala for Pete's sake.

Off to the kitchen,

Grapeshot