morsels & sauces

In this  Cook Your Books  series, I have chosen 15 books to read in 2017 based on somewhat arbitrarily chosen categories. My theory (bogus it might turn out to be) is that all 15 of these books will somehow connect to food. And I plan to write about that food.  And it turns out that these entries are a sort of long-form blog-post. So settle in. This fifth installment is a  National Book Award  winner . In a world going increasingly mad, reading seems to be an increasingly political act to me. And so it is with the inimitable Louise Erdrich, who has always been a political writer. Such is no more evident than in her National Book Award winning novel  Round House . The book opens with 13-year-old Joe Coutts digging out tiny trees whose roots have attacked his parents' house at the foundation--a laborious activity he engages in with his father. In perhaps a beleaguered metaphor, within pages we learn that Joe wants to root out the mystery of who has da...

Where has March gone?  Where is April going? I cannot keep track of this spring and it seems to be slipping away. For example, I made this duck confit (post on how to make duck confit itself, here ) and then I made this pasta and then two months passed and now we're here .  And here seems to be spring break, our move to Richmond (oh, Oakland how we already miss you), and a life lived out of boxes, which admittedly, we have been doing lately.  I have come to appreciate the well-labelled box, and to shake my fist at my past self who labelled far too many boxes "Miscellaneous."  Those are the most frightening boxes. Until we have a full kitchen, I am resurrecting old dinners that I haven't posted and am subsisting on pickles and popcorn. Both of which I love. Don't judge. I just love salt, okay?  Maybe I'll just get a salt lick for the new kitchen. It could happen. However, if you're feeling fancy (and we both know you and I li...

Oh, Happy New Year! What a delight.  Let's start 2016 off just right, okay? One of my very favorite poems of all time is "Persimmons" by Li-Young Lee.  Take a minute. Go read i t. I promise it's worth it. See.  Wasn't that breathtaking? From forced assimilation to a poignant connection to one's aging father with stops at different layers of startling sensuality along the way, this poem bowls me over every time I read it. Torn between cultures, the speaker explores what we can recover or inherit from our families and what we invent for ourselves. This hybridity creates a new language, one of love, loss, and revelation. And ain't all that just fruit glorious in all its symbolism? The persimmon used in this baked good--more cake than bread--is the hachiya persimmon Lee references in the poem. Hachiya persimmons need to be ripe , really ripe, to be eaten, or they are bitter and unpalatable. They are astringent unless their tannins are all...

This has not been the best of weeks.  A week ago on Saturday my aunt died.  My mother called early in the morning to tell me, and such an announcement was not a surprise; my mother's oldest sister had been diagnosed with cancer a while back, and this past summer, I said my goodbyes.  That July, my thin aunt declared that she hoped to make it to August, when her granddaughter got married, and once she made it to that late-summer wedding, we all dared to hope that she would make it through Thanksgiving.  Once early December came and she turned 81, we all pulled for her to make it through Christmas and New Year's.  My aunt had determination. About a year ago, my aunt discovered that I loved to cook--something that probably startled her, given my mother's own anti-cooking stance.  She asked my mom to give me her recipe box, which my mother mailed to me.   The box is full of cake and cookie recipes (peanut brittle, pumpkin cookies, coffee cake, powd...

These past two months have been busy.  I knew that something had to give in my booked life.  I knew that something could not be my running schedule or my yoga classes, so this blog became what I let go.  And such a reminder to let something go, that not everything had to be attended to, was sweet indeed.  However, I have missed writing about food here, even if my readership is small (but mighty! just like my stature), and I have missed sitting down to think about the role food plays in my life in specific but all of our lives in general. These past two months I have been focusing on my dad, who has been sick, and thinking a lot about my family, as strange as that fabulous little grouping of people may be.  I flew back to the heartland to spend a couple of days with Dad as he was recovering from surgery, and I am happy that next week he is flying out here for a much-needed vacation and chance to recuperate.  This sprin...

Adapted from Cookbook #53: Baking In America   (2002) Recipe:  Irish Whiskey Fruitcake with Spiced Walnuts and Pecans "It's always the same: a morning arrives in November, and my friend, as though officially inaugurating the Christmas time of year that exhilarates her imagination and fuels the blaze of her heart, announces: 'It's fruitcake weather! Fetch our buggy. Help me find my hat.'"--Truman Capote, A Christmas Memory While this is my last entry for 2010, I will hold off on the musings and reflections until the first week of 2011.  In the mean time, it's fruitcake weather, no matter where you are. Fruitcake is one of those recipes that gets a bad rap.  Yes, it's heavy.  Yes, it is chock-full of nuts and fruit.  Yes, it has a shelf life longer than some small electronics.  But people, it's made with whiskey. It is traditional to serve this loaf around the holidays, and I thought it a perfect way to end the year. Known for its longe...