Tomato Kumato

March 8, 2010

Homesick

Filed under: Fish, Pasta — Tags: , — emiglia @ 11:23 am

“You know that point in your life when you realize the house you grew up in isn’t really your home anymore? All of a sudden even though you have some place where you put your shit, that idea of home is gone.”

The reason that a film like Garden State (from which I have stolen this quote) does so well is because of the truth behind it–genuine feelings, no matter how contrived the situation chosen to put them across, will always prevail over high-tech special effects and sickly-sweet romance, in the end. When this is no longer true, cinema will be dead.

But enough of my personal views on movies, and back to the quote, which is ringing especially true for me now that “that idea of home is gone.” For those of you who have not been following me for the nearly-four years (wow) that I have been amassing this collection of random thoughts and recipes, this is the first time in seven years that I have lived in the same state as my parents, much less in their house–from Andover, MA to Toronto to Cannes to Paris to San Sebastian, I’ve finally made my way back to my childhood home in New York City… only to find myself thrust into a weird in-between stage.

It’s a place where it’s perfectly normal for my peers to be getting married and having babies, but no one throws a second glance my way when I say I’ve moved home. Of my graduating class, it’s hard to say what the majority of people are doing, what the status quo is. My “normal” was so far removed from everyone else’s for so long that coming back home, eating dinner at my kitchen table and seeing my parents every day is, for lack of a better word, weird.

For a long time, I used to get a feeling of intense, random panic that felt like homesickness, although it wasn’t really attached to a place, but more a time–a time on Long Island when summer days lasted forever and we were all thrown together into our huge house by the sea.

It’s been weeks since I was out there–these pictures are from a random trek to the beach when the sun still started setting at 4, and the last thing I was thinking of was plunging head-first into the waves–and yet when I think of home, that’s where my mind goes: not to the couch I’m sleeping on, or to the fact that now that I’m back “home.” Instead, I can’t get over the feeling that I’m in everyone else’s way. All this time of revolting against the idea, the open invitation, “why don’t you just move home?” and now is when I learn that the open invitation wasn’t quite so open… that the ideal of me living at home is something that, like my dreams of home on Long Island, is caught in a time that has long-since passed.

The dream’s been shattered for all of us, as they realize that me moving home means that I’ll actually be around all the time, and I realize that moving back to a place where my room has long-since been converted into a room for my little sister involves a new sort of nomadic life, a series of days filled with carting my “stuff” around the apartment, trying to find a new home for the few things I allowed to follow me “home” from my old life: a pile of papers constituting my manuscript and my bank statements, a couple of pairs of shoes that don’t fit into the closet that I finally won the fight to own, the blanket that I sleep under on the couch in the den.

I guess what’s strange is the fact that, for so long, I found myself trying to nest and build a home around me in the life that I had chosen. Even if my apartment in Paris or the room I rented in San Sebastian never felt quite like home, it was mine. I would move into whatever new space I had chosen to inhabit, stack my books on the shelves just so, move the furniture until it made sense to the way I lived my life: a chair by the window, coffee mugs lined up on the counter, wine glasses low where I could reach them. And even as I did this, created these spaces that were “homey,” it was always home, that place you can apparently never go back to, that was on my mind.

I know it’s not a new feeling, if only because of the sheer number of quotes published by someone much wiser than I that discuss it. But I’ve finally realized upon moving “home” after all these years, that this is it: everything I own is here, shoved into this closet or under my brother’s bed… there’s no where else to go, no plane ticket to hold in the back of my mind as an end date, no empty apartment waiting for me or boxes holding my things until I get back. There’s no back to go to.

So why do I still feel homesick?

Spaghetti with Crab
6 oz. spaghetti
1 bay leaf
1 can lump crab
1 tsp. peri-peri sauce (or other hot sauce)
1/4 tsp. freshly crushed black pepper
salt to taste

Prepare salted boiling water for the spaghetti, and add a bay leaf. Cook the spaghetti until al dente and drain, reserving a half-cup of pasta water.

Toss the pasta with the crab and the peri-peri sauce. Add pasta water as needed to add moisture. Toss with black pepper and salt, and pretend that things are always as they were, and you’re eating fresh seafood barefoot by the bay.


February 24, 2010

Almost-Spring

Filed under: Appetizers, Side Dishes — Tags: , , , — emiglia @ 12:47 pm

Almost-Spring is in the air.

If you’ve lived in cold-weather climates (I’m looking at you Canadians… and you, too, New-Englanders), then you know what I’m talking about: it’s not warm–far from it. In fact, everyone is still bundled up as they hurry down the street, bemoaning the rain and slush… and then you realize: the ice and snow has been replaced by its wetter, warmer cousin! Almost-Spring is in the air! It’s almost enough to make you take off your second pair of long underwear.

Almost.

I don’t remember this season in New York–I first glimpsed it at Andover, when, after months and months of trekking through snow (and black ice, and snow that sort of melts from salting and then refreezes, and more snow, and sand…), the ground was visible again. You could smell mud and grass, and even if there was no floral evidence quite yet, it was coming. I could feel it as I inhaled the smell of mulch, looking forward to days when we would be able to sit on the lawn in the sun and pretend that we weren’t shivering beneath our thin sweatshirts…

This winter has been especially harsh, as far as New York winters go. Personally, I don’t mind snow every week and negative temperatures, but then again, I voluntarily spent three winters in Massachusetts and two in Ontario, so who am I to talk? It’s better than the wind off the Seine in Paris winters, which don’t have the added bonus of snowman-making material in the park or the snow days that permit middle-of-the-afternoon weekday treks to said park, where you can construct avant-garde representations of gangster snowmen in Liliput that would rival similar sculptures by a certain six-year-old and his stuffed tiger.

Still… Almost-Spring in Paris is beautiful. Without the snow and ice, the flowers bloom earlier. The sidewalks aren’t quite as damp; there’s no need to pick your way precariously over three-foot trenches of ice and ditchwater. And maybe the mud in the parks grasps your shoes a bit too harshly, it’s this time of year (OK… all times of year) that really get me thinking about Paris.

So, in honor of Almost-Spring, I offer you an Almost-Spring recipe. Pencil-thin asparagus will soon be plentiful–in Paris, they favor the fat white ones, but I was always partial to these. Last year, I found some at my local market and, on a whim, wrapped them in prosciutto. Since then, this has become a standby vegetable side dish when I want a weekday to feel a little special.

Prosciutto-Wrapped Asparagus

1 lb. asparagus, washed and dried, ends trimmed
about 8 slices prosciutto
1 tsp. extra virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Coat a baking dish with the olive oil.

Split the slices of prosciutto in half lengthwise, so you get two long, thin strips. Carefully wrap each asparagus spear in prosciutto, and lay them in the baking dish with the seam-side down.

Roast 15-20 minutes, until the prosciutto is crisp and the ends of the asparagus have withered and colored a bit. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with freshly ground black pepper. Serve immediately.


February 16, 2010

Lent

Filed under: Pasta, Vegetarian Main Dishes — Tags: , , , , — emiglia @ 11:55 pm

Today is Mardi Gras, also known as Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Day to some–the last day before the period of Lent.

I know that most of you are probably at least vaguely familiar with Lent–it’s that day that we Catholics make ourselves suffer and give up something like chocolate or cigarettes or drinking or television… right?

Well… sort of. Lent is a period of introspection, of preparing ourselves for Easter, which is really the most important holiday of the Catholic calendar, regardless of what the Hallmark industry and Santa Claus may want us to believe. For forty days before Easter, which represents the rebirth of Jesus–and essentially everything that makes Christians Christian–we get ourselves ready, and yes, this often does involve giving up something that we may find difficult to relinquish.

I’m not trying to get all preachy on you–God knows that I of all people am not the person to be preaching Catholic doctrine to anyone. I’m just trying to set the record straight: we don’t fast because we want to suffer; we fast because it makes us think. The whole idea behind giving up something that you want is that each time you reach for it–a bar of chocolate, a cigarette or a beer–you stop yourself, and then you remember why you’re stopping.

It’s because of this that my favorite priest–and yes, I have I favorite priest: the one who led my student youth group at boarding school–changed the rules somewhat. Father Francisco was a Franciscan monk, the most Catholic of all the Catholic people I’ve ever met. He walked the campus in billowing black robes and prayed when he joined us for breakfast like it was the most natural thing. His suggestion for Lent was not to give something up, but to take on a new challenge: he said that it was important not only to be introspective during Lent, but to use the period to give back to others as well.

I may pick and choose the parts of Catholic doctrine that I subscribe to, but I think that most Catholics–even lapsed Catholics–make some sort of gesture during Lent. It’s like an internal clock that gets us every year, even if we haven’t been to mass since Christmas, even if we haven’t really even taken a second to think about whether or not we believe, most of the C and E Catholics I know will go to church at some point tomorrow and come out with a black smudge on their forehead and something in mind that they’ve decided to live without.

I’ve decided to do a myriad of things, most of which I will not share here, for the sole reason that I’ve always liked the story in the Bible that tells you to pray in quiet, to hide the fact that you’re fasting when you do, because it’s a personal thing that you should do for your own fulfillment. I will share, mostly because it has some sort of effect on all of you, the fact that I will be giving up all meat in this Lenten season (as with most Catholics, I do not take this to include fish), and so on the eve of Ash Wednesday, I offer you this recipe, which I’ve been making for years, ever since I found it on Ree’s website.

Asian Noodle Salad (adapted from The Pioneer Woman)
1 package whole wheat spaghetti, cooked, rinsed and cooled
1/2 head sliced Napa cabbage
1/2 head sliced Purple cabbage
1 bag bean sprouts
2 carrots, sliced into rounds
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
3 scallions, sliced
1 lime, juiced
8 Tbsp. olive oil
8 Tbsp. soy sauce
2 Tbsp. sesame oil
1/3 cup brown sugar
3 Tbsp. fresh ginger, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 jalapenos, chopped

Mix pasta and vegetables together. Whisk dressing together and pour over salad. Toss to combine.

February 3, 2010

I’m a Writer

Filed under: Cake Day, Cakes — Tags: , — emiglia @ 3:38 pm

The conversation is inevitable: after a few minutes of talking to a new group of people, of asking “What can I get you to drink?” and “So, where are you from?” comes the question I so loved a year ago, but that now I dread.

“What do you do?”

I take a sip from my glass. I pause. I try to decide if I should just make a joke and say I’m “funemployed” and let that be the end of it. But I suck it up. “I’m a writer,” I answer.

“Oh! Wow!” They say appreciatively, nodding. I hold my breath. The worst is still to come.

“What do you write?”

And that’s where I stop being able to answer. What do I write? Well… it all depends…

Every day, I blog. I write about things that people should be buying and places that people should visit. Never mind that I don’t buy most of the stuff I tell people to buy and I haven’t been to a great majority of the places that I research… that’s what I do, every day. And I do it in French.

I write about the places I’ve lived, like Paris, the one that stole my heart, and San Francisco the one that got away, for they are my inspiration, my muse. I write about my home of New York-Toronto-Cannes-San Sebastian-Paziols-Westhampton. Paris. sigh.

I write restaurant reviews. Somehow I got famous for this one in San Sebastian, where people, I think, had lofty visions of me being a female Calvin Trillin. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that I generally get paid less per review than it costs me to go to a place, which means that 99% of the time, I only review places I was planning on going anyway: dive bars and cafés.

I do translations. I write other people’s resumes, cover letters and letters to the French bank (quelle horreur). I write letters to people I like and Facebook messages when I don’t have time, energy, stamps or stationery. I write recipes, as you all know by now. I write telephone messages. I write movie reviews. I write query letters… lots and lots and lots of query letters. I write some good stuff, but I also write a lot of bullshit. I’m OK with that, I think.

But when my fingers are aching for a pen and I answer distractedly to people’s direct questions. (”Em, you want pizza or Chinese for dinner?” “Uh… um… just a sec. One sec. One sec. Wait. What was the question?”) When I get an idea in my head that won’t shake free, when I remember why I chose this as a job: sitting at my desk with an endless cup of coffee that I microwave every few hours when I forget about it, trying to ignore Twitter so that I can actually get down to work… That’s when I write novels. Above all else, I’m a novelist; my heart lies in other people’s stories, in characters so real that I find myself falling in love with the good ones and promising them happiness and crying when I finally break their hearts on page 256.

“What do you write?” they ask. I want to answer… but I usually just shrug.

“You know. Stuff.”

Gingerbread (Culinary Concoctions by Peabody)

Peabody serves this with cream cheese frosting, which I’m sure is a dream. I chose to top mine with a Speculoos spread that isn’t available in the States, but if you ever find yourself in France, pick up a jar… it’s divine.

1 1/4 cups flour
1 tablespoon ground Ginger
1 teaspoon ground Cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup  (1 1/2 sticks)  butter, softened
3/4 cups sugar, divided
1 egg
1/3 cup molasses

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a brownie pan and set aside.

In a small bow, mix flour, ginger, cinnamon, baking soda and salt.

In a separate bowl, beat butter and sugar in large bowl with a whisk until light and fluffy. Beat in egg until well blended.  Gradually beat in flour mixture until well mixed. Stir in molasses. Spread evenly in prepared pan.

Bake 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan 15 minutes, then remove from pan and finish cooling on a wire rack. Spread speculoos spread over the bars. Cut into bars.

January 28, 2010

Apple-Cream Cheese Bread

Filed under: Cake Day, Cakes, Quickbreads — Tags: , , , — emiglia @ 6:54 pm

“Is there anything you can’t make?” The Artist asks me as she sits in a chair in my kitchen watching me put the finishing touches on an Indian feast one of my first nights back in Paris.

The Artist and I met for the first time at my Thanksgiving celebration last year, where she waxed on and on about this Pumpkin Tarte Tatin that has become a staple at my Thanksgiving table, going so far as to make it for her boyfriend, even though she only cooks tortillas and Kaiserschmarrn.

I thought about it for a moment. “Really simple things…” I answered, reaching for a dish towel to move one pot to another burner and stirring with the other hand.

“For awhile I didn’t like my tomato sauce… and I still can’t make latkes.” I kept thinking for another moment as I made a spice blend for the dal. Suddenly, it hit me.

“Bread,” I answered. “Anything with a yeast dough.”

I know it’s not an uncommon difficulty, but for me, it’s a very frustrating one. I bake all sorts of quickbreads, muffins and cakes with ease, and then the second I try to mix yeast, flour, water and salt, four simple ingredients, all Hell breaks loose and I end up with a rock-hard-on-the-outside, kind-of-raw-on-the-inside ball of tasteless yuck.

Oh well… someday I’ll figure it out, maybe. Until then, I can content myself with being good at this: I do love a nice quickbread, and this one is no different. It’s very light in texture–my father compares it to the inside of a cupcake. It’s all gone now, so I assume that’s a compliment.

Apple-Cream Cheese Bread

1-1/4 cup flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1 pinch freshly ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp. cloves
1/4 tsp. cardamom
1/4 tsp. black pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
2/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar
1/3 cup white sugar
2 large eggs
2/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 apple, chopped
1 8 oz. block of Neufchatel cheese (or regular cream cheese)
1/3 cup (packed) light brown sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prepare a baking pan (I used a tart pan and an 8×8 brownie pan) by greasing the interior and lightly dusting with flour. Set aside.

Combine the dry ingredients in a medium bowl. In a large bowl, combine the melted butter and sugars with a wooden spoon until well combined. Add the eggs, one at a time, and mix until completely encorporated and slightly lighter in color. Add the applesauce and vanilla to the wet ingredients and mix to combine.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet, mixing until just combined. Add the apple and fold into the batter. Pour the batter into the prepared vessel of your choosing.

Combine the cheese with the remaining brown sugar, and dollop in small amounts over the top of the batter. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until the cake is set in the middle. Cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then remove to a rack to finish cooling.

January 21, 2010

Au Revoir

Filed under: Salad, cheese — Tags: , , , — emiglia @ 4:08 pm

“When you went home this time, I had a feeling you weren’t coming back,” he says when I tell him, finally. I’ve only just admitted it to myself: the next step is saying it out loud, and who else to say it to than my best friend, this extension of me who, by now, knows everything about me, just because I needed someone for this exact purpose: to hear the truth said out of my very own mouth so that I can finally start to believe it myself.

“I didn’t,” I reply. “But I ran out of options.”

“I know.”

***

When I lived in Paris, I very rarely did things that most people consider to be “Parisian.”

My visits to the Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay were relegated to the handful of weekends I had out-of-town visitors who clambered to see the famous paintings I took for granted. My strolls through the Jardin de Luxembourg were the exception, not the rule, of my daily excursions to God-knows-where. And while my friends and I were known for uniting on most evenings over a bottle (or five) of wine, these were enjoyed barefoot on the floors of our apartments, scattered across the city, and not at the Café de Flore as we waxed on about existentialist theories clad in black and berets.

Why, then, am I overcome with the overwhelming urge, now, to watch any and every movie about Paris and reminisce. I watch La Maman et la Putain and imagine myself at les Deux Magots smoking endless Gauloise cigarettes with Jean-Pierre Léaud, though I never sat for even one minute at the famous brasserie, forgoing it for cheaper dive bars further down the Seine. I am glued to my screen as Chansons d’amour plays before me, and I imagine myself having Sunday lunch in la Bastille even though I know my true Sunday lunches were, more often than not, either taken in Breuillet at Alex’s parents’ hotel, or else not at all, as we slept off Saturday night’s events well into Sunday afternoon.

When I left Paris, I forbade myself from doing any of these things in my last few days there. I didn’t want to have “one last” walk around my favorite neighborhood of Montmartre, “one last” meal at the brasserie that Emese and I had visited countless times. My last trips to spicy soup, to the cinémathèque du Quartier Latin, to the vintage shops in the Marais… I wanted all of it to be genuine, for the memories I associated with these places to be real, and not that forced reminiscence that comes when you leave a place, trying to accumulate memories, like so many souvenirs. That is, after all, the word in French for memory: un souvenir.


“Comment peut-on s’acheter un souvenir ?” I often asked myself as I watched people purchase handfuls of cheap trinkets with “Paris” emblazoned on them to stuff in their suitcases and bring home. How can they be attempting to buy memories? I had judged it pathetic and sad and therefore forbade myself from what I judged as similar strolls down memory lane. Trying to glean all that was esoterically Paris in a last-minute dash attempt was lame and sad and wrong, especially when I was so convinced that I would return. Paris, after all, was my home. I had a plan, a way that I would force my dreams to come true… I just hadn’t laid all the groundwork yet.

“When you went home this time, I had a feeling you weren’t coming back,” he said, and as I heard it, my heart broke.

For whatever reason, now isn’t the time. I have to accept it, because there’s honestly nothing else I can do about it. For whatever reason, the universe has come together to decide that right now, in this moment, I will not be in Paris. My parents have made it easy for me to stay in New York, I’ve cut all major ties with the people who used to pin me to that city that I so fell in love with. Funny, how quick I was to try to leave when it was within my control, and now that it’s been taken from me, I feel as though I’ve been broken up with.

I can plan and pray as much as I want, but even I’ve come to terms with the fact that September in Paris is not in the cards for me.

I’m not sorry about those last few days in Paris: sure, it would have been nice to take one last walk along the Champs-Elysées, to pop the cork of one last bottle of cheap Champagne in front of the Eiffel Tower. But on the other hand, it’s nice to only have those genuine memories, the ones I created when my days in Paris seemed limitless. It’s nice to have left Paris, not by saying adieu, but au revoir, until we meet again.

I can’t say for sure when that will be. I like to think it will be sooner rather than later, that now that I’ve committed myself to staying in the States, the perfect opportunity will arise, as it often does when you’re least expecting it, and I’ll be back at Charles de Gaulle airport once again, walking out into that cloud of billowing cigarette smoke to find a taxi who will take me to my familiar péripherique, to where I can finally see all those twelve-story buildings that make up the blocks of the city that stole my heart away from New York.

But I can’t say for sure when that will be, or if Paris will ever be my home again. I don’t think my mother thought, when she left Paris more than twenty years ago, that her last flight out would be the last time she would call it home, but now she’s a New Yorker, through and through, and she won’t live there again.

I guess my only regret is the fact that I had it: for one brief moment, I lived in Europe, everyone’s dream. My backyard was the Boulevard St-Germain, my playground the Jardin de Luxembourg. I snacked on baguette and quenched my thirst with Bordeaux. I lived in France, and it’s gone… at least for now.

I’m embracing everything that is, now. I don’t want to feel this sort of regret when, someday, I leave New York or Argentina or anyplace else for that matter–this irksome itch that says that maybe, just maybe, I didn’t take full advantage of the fairytale life I was leading. I am living every day for today, because I never know when the “last day” will creep up on me again, and I’ll be left, once more, with mere memories of a place and a time that used to be normal, of a place that was, for a moment, my chez moi, my everything, my home.

As for the food, I offer you today something that I no longer have access to: one of those perfectly French things that can be picked up at your local Monoprix along with the milk and eggs, but that once you’re back in the States is a remarkable delicacy : Cabrichaud au Lardon.

If you, like me, now, don’t have access to this perfect specimen of cheese, get some bacon and wrap it around flattened rounds of goat’s cheese. It’s not exactly the same, but it will still be delicious.

Salade de Cabrichaud au Lardon

1 package of Cabrichaud au Lardon OR 4 rounds goat’s cheese and 4 slices of bacon. (To prepare: flatten the goat’s cheese gently with the palm of your hand. Wrap each slice in raw bacon.)
1/2 head green leaf lettuce
1 peach
2 tsp. olive oil
1 tsp. cider vinegar
1/2 tsp. Dijon mustard
salt and pepper

Heat a nonstick frying pan over medium heat. Add the cheese to the pan and cook without moving, two minutes per side.

Meanwhile, combine the oil, vinegar, mustard, salt and pepper in a jar with a lid. Shake to combine.

Toss the lettuce with the vinaigrette in a large bowl, and then distribute between two plates. Section the peach, and arrange the slices amongst the greens. Remove the hot cheese from the pan and place on top of the bed of greens. Serve immediately with a cool glass of white Bordeaux.

January 12, 2010

Lime-Raspberry Quickbread (Lactose free!)

Filed under: Cake Day, Cakes, Quickbreads — Tags: , , , — emiglia @ 10:53 pm

I think I should set up an office in a train.

I can have a seemingly perfect setup at home: a desk, a bottomless cup of hot coffee, headphones, a blanket… and I’ll still sit in front of the screen, the cursor blinking at me, taunting me. So I distract myself with something else–one of my myriad of freelance jobs or a webcomic or messing around in the kitchen for awhile–and my characters stay in suspended animation in their unsaved wod document, waiting, waiting, waiting for me to get back to them.

But be it a half-empty subway car, the New Jersey transit train that takes me from Penn Station to Princeton, the LIRR that I ride home from the Hamptons, the RER C that I used to take out to Breuillet on the weekends, or the five-hour train ride that I so love—the one that takes me from north to south, from my beloved Paris to my beloved Cannes–the second I set foot on a train—any train—I’m scrambling for a pen and a notebook or the inside cover of a paperback or a crumpled receipt (or even my arm, as some of you may remember all too well) to jot down sentences and half-baked thoughts that I’ll come back to later, when I have time to think. When my hand has time to catch up to my racing brain.

I notice when I reread what I’ve written that the ideas I was sure about–the ones I had already been chewing in the back of my mind–are clear and sure. The things I don’t know about yet, the word vomit that spills so fast that I can hardly get my hand to write fast enough before the words are gone, that writing is riddled with errors, barely legible. I hope I can read it, when I finally sit down at sunrise and decode purple scribbles on the lined pages, crawling from within, their prison like vines on an iron gate. This is what I write when I’m on the train.

A billboard in Belleville : one must be wary of words.

A billboard in Belleville : one must be wary of words.

It’s not just stories–it actually hardly ever is. Most of the thoughts I write on the train are detached from any other reality. Sometimes they’re phrases, descriptions of things I never realized I’d thought of before. Sometimes they’re characters–someone who doesn’t yet have a place in any of the worlds I’ve created, but who, someday, may integrate themselves somewhere. Whatever it is, it’s not until I bring it home that I realize what I intended.

Trains are also where I do some of my best thinking: this cake, for example, was envisioned on board a train, when I was trying to decide what to make for a lactose intolerant friend. I scribbled a bunch of things in the margins of the recipe I’d printed, and by the time I’d arrived home, it was easy as pie. Or cake, as the case may be.

Lime-Raspberry Quickbread (adapted from Culinary Concoctions by Peabody)

1 ½  cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
1 1/4 cup plain soy yogurt
1 1/3 cups sugar, divided
3 extra-large eggs
2 tsp grated key lime zest
½ tsp pure vanilla extract
¼  cup vegetable oil
1/3 cup lime juice
1/3 cup raspberry jam, heated with a bit of water until pourable

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a loaf pan.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium sized bowl. In another bowl, whisk together the yogurt, 1 cup sugar, the eggs, lime zest, and vanilla. Slowly whisk the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Fold the vegetable oil into the batter.

Pour half the batter into the prepared pan. Spread raspberry jam evenly over the batter. Add the remaining batter on top of the raspberry jam.

Bake for about 50 minutes, or until a cake tester placed in the center of the loaf comes out clean.

Meanwhile, cook the 1/3 cup lime juice and remaining 1/3 cup sugar in a small pan until the sugar dissolves and the mixture is clear. Set aside.

When the cake is done, allow it to cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Carefully place on a baking rack over a sheet pan. While the cake is still warm, pour the lemon-sugar mixture over the cake and allow it to soak in.

January 11, 2010

Carrottes Râpées

Filed under: Salad — Tags: , — emiglia @ 11:08 pm

I get this odd sort of satisfaction from performing relatively mundane everyday tasks. I used to think that it was linked to language, that it was the satisfaction of employing phrases I had practiced over and over again in class in the real world.

“Combien coûtent les tomates?” I would casually ask the market vendor at Place Maubert Mutualité, even though I have mountains of tomatoes sitting on my counter at home.

“Donde se puede alquilar un bici?” I would finally ask the lady who works at the front desk at my language school in San Sebastian after practicing in my head over and over, even though I probably wouldn’t end up renting a bike: I like walking too much, even in the rain, and if I ride a bike, I won’t be able to wear my dresses, which are better in the rain… the hems of my jeans get too wet.

“Deux baguettes, ’sil vous plait,” with a smile and an obligatory five-second conversation about the weather to the woman who runs the tiny épicerie in Paziols.

I had taken this explanation for my otherwise strange elation at asking these simple questions in stride; I had become aware of the fact that when I walked away from a social situation with a tiny smile on my face, the smile was a result of the use of my languages, pretty much the only thing I can do on a daily basis that makes it all seem worth it: the years and years I spent studying grammar (or pretending to) and asking everyone I knew to please, please, please correct me so that I could finally end up here–a place where I feel confident asking anyone pretty much anything in French or Spanish… though I may have to call blinds “the things that cover the window” in Spanish, and I’ll always ask for seven or nine of something in French so that they don’t have to hear me say “weet” instead of “uit,” pronouncing the number like a bread ingredient because I can’t for the life of me get my lips to make that sound (a high front rounded vowel, for those of you who care), at the beginning of a word. I have no problem saying “tu,” but I won’t say “huit.” I won’t.

But being back in New York, I realize that i’ts not a linguistic thing… not at all. There’s no reason I should be proud of my ability to speak English, and yet I live for asking the train conductor, “Does this train stop at Princeton Junction?” I love when people ask me for directions and to send them on their way, “Just make a right on 8th avenue, and head uptown four blocks.” What is it about these tiny, simple things that I love so much? I don’t know. My theory has been debunked, and all I can do now is enjoy it.

I shouldn’t enjoy making carrottes rapées this much either. This traditional French salad is nothing more than shredded carrots and vinaigrette… it’s simple and not terribly exciting, but I love making it anyway. I love making it because of the way we called it “raped carrots” (a little off-color… sorry) when we first moved to France. I love it because I’ve eaten it in every city in every region of France I’ve lived: it’s eaten in the north, in the south, in Paris… everywhere. Mostly I love it because it’s simple, and I think that’s as good a reason as any to love something.

Carrottes Rapées

3 large carrots, grated
1 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
the juice of 1/2 lemon
salt and black pepper
1 tsp. dried basil (this is not traditional, but I like it)

Combine all of the ingredients in a large bowl and toss to combine. Allow the salad to sit for at least fifteen minutes, covered, before serving. Can be kept, covered, in the fridge for up to three days.

January 4, 2010

Mini Speculoos Cheesecakes

Filed under: Cake Day, Daring Bakers, cheese — Tags: , , — emiglia @ 1:58 am

I swear I saw a stranger from a former life on my crosstown bus tonight.

It was appropriate, I suppose, considering the rest of my evening. It’s always been important to me to have intense people to call upon at all hours of the evening, friends who will force me to think and discuss. It’s always been important, but even moreso now that my daily bread is won by writing. Now, when I can spend hours and hours in front of a computer screen without ever looking up and participating in the world around me.

A writer is only as good as the stories he tells, and a writer’s stories are only as interesting as the life he leads. As a surgeon makes a point of memorizing the major arteries, as a chef makes a point of familiarizing himself with the food choices and trends around him, I must make a point of living my life.

I forget, until I get back here and see him again, see New York through the tinted glasses he eased onto the bridge of my nose nearly five years ago, how much of what I love about New York came from him: the Prep. One night spent the way we used to, the television on as little more than background noise to our long, persistent conversations about nothing at all brings everything back, and as I wander these streets, it’s as though the lights have changed. The director has called “action,” and I see New York the way I used to when we were still in love.

It’s in this New York that I can find the perfection in tiny moments like this, in discovering the poignancy of seeing a face that used to be familiar to me, a name that I’d forgotten I ever knew until I saw him and remembered. He doesn’t remember me… there’s no reason for him to. He was the Golden Boy, a boy I never would have spoken to had it not been for one night at prep school orientation, eight years ago now. I don’t feel old enough to reminisce about eight years ago, but there it is. We got off at the same stop: he walked east, I walked west. I didn’t look back… there was no reason to. But I laughed out loud to myself as I walked up Madison Avenue at night, shivering in the coat I borrowed from my younger self before leaving this evening, as I did so many times it came to be routine so many years ago.

Abbey’s Cheesecake

An oldie but a goodie, this cheesecake recipe comes from a Daring Baker’s challenge from last year, but it’s still my favorite. I sub speculoos for graham crackers and use crème fraîche in place of heavy cream. For mini-cheesecakes, make them in a muffin pan, and bake 20 minutes before resting for an hour.

Crust:
2 cups / 180 g graham cracker crumbs
1 stick / 4 oz butter, melted
2 tbsp. / 24 g sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Cheesecake Filling:
3 sticks of cream cheese, 8 oz each (total of 24 oz) room temperature
1 cup / 210 g sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup / 8 oz heavy cream
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (Gas Mark 4 = 180C = Moderate heat). Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.

Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your preferred pan. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker’s choice. Set crust aside.

Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, vanilla, lemon juice, and alcohol and blend until smooth and creamy.

Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan. If cheesecake pan is not airtight, cover bottom securely with foil before adding water.

Bake 45 to 55 minutes, until it is almost done - this can be hard to judge, but you’re looking for the cake to hold together, but still have a lot of jiggle to it in the center. You don’t want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won’t crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve.

January 2, 2010

Lentil and Rosemary Soup with Lemon

Filed under: Beans and Legumes, Soup — Tags: , — emiglia @ 1:35 am

After knowing me for a few months, most people replace the typical greeting of, “How have you been?” with the more useful, “Where have you been?” Those who I haven’t seen in awhile tend to get an answer that sounds like a list, and those who I haven’t seen in a very long while abandon the question entirely.

Suffice to say, I move a lot, and it’s been a very, very long time since I’ve been back in my native New York for more than a few weeks at Christmas. This year, all that has changed. I’m back in the land of bagels, lox and incredible pizza from John’s on Bleecker.

Returning home is strange for everyone, I think. I’m watching as my brother, a freshman in college, realizes this for the first time at eighteen: when you leave home, coming back is more like picking up where you left off. Your family may be aware on some level of the fact that when you leave the house, you actually continue living your life, meeting people, making decisions and mistakes, learning things and forgetting others, but when you actually appear at the doorway, your hair in dire need of a haircut and your laundry in dire need of washing, it’s all too easy for everyone around you to send you to the barber, toss you a box of detergent and treat you as though you had never left.

I’ve gotten used to toning down some of the developments in my life when I come home. I know now that some things are better left unsaid, and I’ve stopped vying for my time to speak at the dinner table, instead letting the normalcy wash over me, getting used to what has become the status quo in a place where I used to live. I’m used to having my own space, my own time and, especially, my own kitchen, things that are not the case when I’m living in my parents’ house.

This is one of the last things I made before leaving Paris for New York. It’s bright and delicious and perfectly light for starting those New Years’ diets for all of three seconds. I have several pictures from those last few days, and that’s probably all you’ll get while I’m here in New York, where the kitchen is most definitely not my domain, where I squat on a couch and live out of a suitcase. It’s not bad–just different, although I have to admit that when my cousin came back from Paris for the holidays and asked if I was sorry not to be standing in front of the stove instead of sitting in front of the television, I took pause.

And then I decided that the answer was no. I love cooking, don’t get me wrong, but this isn’t my kitchen, and in New York, my mother does the cooking. I may miss it now and again–that sense of possibility that comes from standing in front of a cutting board, reaching for ingredients without actually being sure what you’ll do. I miss serving what I’ve made to other people and watching as they enjoy it.

I’ll be leaving New York again soon… I always do. But while I’m here, I’ll be letting other people do the cooking: Barney Greengrass, John’s on Bleecker, Vico Ristorante, Artisanal… and, of course, my mother.

Lentil and Rosemary Soup with Lemon (adapted from Running with Tweezers)

1 tsp. olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 cup lentils
6 cups water
1 large rosemary sprig
1 lemon, cut in half, juiced, fruit and juice separated
salt and pepper

In a large stockpot, heat the oil and add the onion and celery. Cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until soft and translucent, 10 minutes.

Add the garlic and season with salt and black pepper. Add the lentils, water, rosemary and lemon, reserving the juice for later. Cover and cook until lentils are cooked through, stirring occasionally, about 30 minutes.

Remove from heat and remove and discard lemon and rosemary sprig. Using an immersion blender, purée to desired texture. Stir in remaining lemon juice and season with salt and pepper.

Optionally, you can garnish the soup with olive oil, parsley or parmesan cheese.

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