morsels & sauces

There are certainly so many poems by Emily Dickinson to celebrate, but there's one that just won't get out my head: So there you go. It's winter. It's excruciating. Sometimes the light slants just the right way in winter and, well, you start to contemplate just what it is that will make us stand with the landscape and the shadows and, simply, listen. Even if what we hear or see is just for a moment. Like a held breath. Like a slant of light. And then it goes.  2016 has been that kind of year, huh? Well, this post took a turn I was not expecting. That's pretty much what we get with Emily. An opening line that draws us in and an ending line that punches us in the gut. But I do think she was a little more lighthearted than this. Or at least she was from time to time.  And her black cake suggests that girlfriend knew her way around the kitchen. And there may have even been some real joy there. Let's take a ...

In addition to the Baba Ghanouj that I made for the book club meeting, I made this little quinoa dish.  Life has been insane (as I will detail in an upcoming post), but two months ago I not only made this dish, but it also comes from a cookbook that I have not used here before.  I received this lovely book as a Christmas present--and the great news is, this recipe isn't even on page 210, so you know you will be seeing this cookbook here again!--and I am delighted by it and its premise.  Maria Speck , the cookbook's author, is a food journalist and culinary school instructor in addition to writer of this fabulous book.  Greek and German by upbringing, she provides a Mediterranean flair to a Northern European focus on whole grains. And in our current climate of whole-grain-and-sometimes-gluten-free cooking, this cookbook is a nice addition to the culinary bookshelf. An ancient Andean crop, quinoa is actually a seed not a grain, but it cooks up like a...