My Mom and I were having a conversation that we had already had many times before. “No, no, no you and Remi are real cooks,” I insisted. “You both are unafraid to try anything, no matter how complex and you make it look soooo easy. Me, I am a lazy cook.” “No, you’re not. You cook all the time!” she responded without losing a beat.
I thought about that for a second. And to the corn-pepper quesadillas that I had whipped up to go with the last dregs of my chili for lunch. Dinner was already forming in my mind. I knew that I had to use the zucchini and so would probably shred it in a sauté with shallots, cumin and curry. That would go on top of teriyaki salmon (I am big on layering stuff in bowls) and topped with some sort of tahini sauce (it ended up being tahini, soy, lemon, olive oil). So maybe Mom was right (and isn’t she always?). But then again, all of this is super simple to do. There are no “techniques” involved, no themes, no recipes.
And while I do own some fine cookbooks, I usually read them like novels in hopes that something will filter down to my Swiss-cheese memory (one aside about my memory problems and food–my Mom will back me up in that I may not be able to remember the name of the movie that I watched last night but I will be able to recall exactly what I ate the first time I was at say, Uglesich’s, more than twenty years ago–Muddy Water Trout with anchovies and jalapenos, easy).
Instead, I usually just look at what I have and make something up. That is why I tend to call myself a lazy cook and not really a foodie, which implies not only encyclopedic knowledge but derring do. But I do love to eat, I do love my wine.
So perhaps instead I am a Food E as in Food (that’s) Easy.
Somehow things that come over the internet seem to strike me in a more immediate “Oh, I need to have that now,” type of way and so, looking over what I brought back from the market today (plus a bag of oysters and another of mussels that were immediately put into the fridge), I can see that I would like to make:
Sharon Santoni of My French Country Home’s mind-bogglingly simple roasted tomato soup
David Lebovitz’s Moules Frites (happening tonight)
Saveur’s Roasted Cauliflower with Tahini Sauce, link found via their newsletter
Gallivanta of silkannthreades’ Crostata (I am so not a baker–luckily as I already eat my weight in cheese–but this looks tempting)
Other food goings on that caught my attention around Ye Olde Webbe?
— The hilarious NK of Bread is Pain has launched (after many of us begged) a new blog, Bread is Pain Food. This recipe for leeks and pancetta pasta was delish.
–By chance, charming Jeanne at I dream of just posted today about her recent experience at the outdoor markets in the ancient Kingdom of Bhutan. Take a look-see, it is fascinating.
— Now, this doesn’t quite count but my friend Jennifer of the Gustia blog has mentioned that she hopes to do a post on the recent olive harvest and pressing that happened recently at her house in Menton. I am still tapping my wristwatch on this one. Maybe if we ask her nicely? “Oh, Jenniferrrr….”
*UPDATE: Yay! A new post from her hot off the press: From Ventimiglia to Pigna*
— Do you remember when I made a link to a lovely blog that I had stumbled upon while researching Hotel Crillon Le Brave? That is Map and Menu and it is a delight. Meredith is an extremely talented lifestyle photographer and her honey, Michael is a charming web developer so they make a great team. They love to travel and their enthusiasm is infectious. Plus, they take their huge black Lab, Orvis, with them whenever they can, so seriously, what is not to like? I can’t wait to hear about their trip to New Orleans (and Edgar, if you see this, they just came back from Sonoma).
–Speaking of puppers, well, I can be a little slow on the uptake and so just noticed that the beautiful (inside and out) Kristin Espinasse has a few videos on her epic blog, French Word-A-Day (I also just noticed that she has 42,085 readers. Yes, you read correctly). Now, if you pop over there right now, you can see photos of a young Smokey (one of her two insanely lovable Golden Retrievers–shh, don’t tell Ben and Kipling) but you can also watch a video of Kristin making cake with Smokey’s Mom, Braise here:
–To toot my own horn (woot! woot!), you can read my post for the Tuesday Dinner series on Ann Mah’s blog here. In it, I probably whine about being lazy some more but give a good recipe for a Provençal tart. Now, I realize that it was published some time ago so why bring it up? Because this week’s participant of the series is none other than Patricia Wells. Me. Patricia Wells. Same series. I nearly fainted. (And yes, Ann’s book is absolutely as great as I said it was. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll become seriously hungry).
–An apple a day? Laoch at Counterintuitivity recently provided this link to a TED talk with William Li about foods that starve blood vessels feeding the growth of cancer cells and one of his readers gave a link to a list of foods that do so. It can be found here.
And I hope that this epic post (my longest posts are always about food, what does that say?) stirred some happy hunger out there as well. I will just finish by thanking my Mom for cooking for us from scratch every night of my childhood when I was growing up. Yes, it was considered outright wacky that she made such ‘exotic’ foods as “lasagna” and “chicken curry” in the 1970’s Midwest of the U. S. of A but she did it anyway and gave me the lifelong gift of a love of food because of it. Merci, Maman!
So do tell, what kind of cook are you?
