1 bunch fresh washed squeaky asparagus, woody ends snapped off
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons lemon juice
grated zest of 1 lemon...
December is the final month. It begs contemplation of the year about to pass, it encompasses the darkest and longest night, and it embraces the commingling of mindless consumption and simple, lovely hope. I am far from a practicing Christian, yet I harbor a deep fondness for Christmas and...
It is late November, the sky is dark, the air is cold, it smells like snow, and I am in the kitchen thinking about holidays and the complicated comforts of simple food. When I was a small girl, my relatives from New Jersey would pile into their cars and...
The first foods of spring are indeed the coming back to life from the dead. After months of frozen ground, ice, and snow, the earth thaws, and somewhere down there, life opens up and starts to grow again and, if we are lucky, April brings rhubarb. Rhubarb is about the first serious edible a Vermont garden produces. It is one of the many rheum plants of the buckwheat family, and technically a vegetable, not a fruit. It is grown from...
Ah, the holidays. It used to be that all one had to do was roast a turkey, add cream and butter to everything else, sit back, and watch the carnage. What made us suddenly concerned about fat and carbohydrates and fiber and on Thanksgiving, for goodness sake? Turning 50. Then turning 60. Cholesterol. Blood pressure. Gall bladders. How gloomy. The holidays are a time to celebrate, not to ponder mortality. But part of our very American celebration of Thanksgiving has...
I have just finished steaming a handful of fingerlings, those miniature banana-shaped potatoes that are so golden, tender, and creamy as to need only a smidgeon of olive oil to complete their journey to my table. Spuds. I love 'em, and I'm not alone. We are a nation of potato eaters: baked, boiled, mashed, souffléd, scalloped, transformed into salad, browned and crispy and nestled around our roasted meats, made into chips, pan fried, home fried, and most especially French fried.
It is late November, the sky is dark, the air is cold, it smells like snow, and I am in the kitchen thinking about holidays and the complicated comforts of simple food. When I was a small girl, my relatives from New Jersey would pile into their cars and drive up the newly constructed interstate highways till they reached Vermont Route 14 and then finally our house and its accompanying little grocery store, Coutant's Country Center. My great-aunt Anne always...
I very clearly remember when I first discovered the true importance of food. My family had transplanted itself in the early 1950s from suburban New Jersey to a small grocery store/gas station in central Vermont - Coutant's Country Center, doomed, unfortunately, from the start by the poverty of the area and my father's willingness to extend credit. There were a few great years that I remember, though, when I had unlimited access to Creamsicles and Almond Joys, huge wheels of...