A Working Lunch

So here I am, in self-imposed exile, trying to write my story.  I’m alone in a warm house, it’s very, very quiet. The snow outside the windows looks like it’s beginning to melt. I don’t go out much, and I don’t have to- there’s plenty to eat in the fridge. I enjoy scrounging through the vegetable drawers to see what I can come up with. I don’t want to spend a lot of time cooking for myself, but I do think about my meals plenty. Even so, I should probably write more than I’m actually writing. Stalling? Right now I’m toasting a piece of somewhat stale baguette with a thick layer of fresh goat cheese (the kind that comes in a log), and some thyme leaves on top. First I used that trick of sprinkling the bread with water and toasting it lightly to bring it back, before I spread it with cheese and popped it in the toaster oven again. The goat cheese will melt a little. The thyme will give it that incredible, savory perfume that reminds me of summer and feeds into a long held fantasy about eating meals outside, somewhere in Provence. It usually happens when goat cheese and fresh thyme are united: I can feel the hot sun on the top of my head, and on my shoulders, where it blazes through the sand-colored fabric of my shirt. There’s a bee buzzing lazily around, and we linger at the long table, our feet in the grass. I gaze out at the lavender fields and…

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The toaster oven beeps. I drizzle a healthy amount of the most delectable olive oil (the one I reserve for special moments) on top of my toast, and impatiently take a bite before I put it on a plate with some cucumber slices. I sit, looking at my lunch and thinking about it for a few moments. Do I even like goat cheese warm and melty? I always think I will, but then when I eat it I think the texture is off-putting, a tiny bit slimy, in a state of pseudo-melt. And I usually don’t like chevre added to an omelette or other egg dishes, because I think it’s overpowering. But here, today, it’s perfectly fine, a creamy match for the extra crunch of the now-resuscitated baguette, and that whiff of thyme…

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Then I’ll eat. And read a page of a magazine. At some point (pretty soon) I’ll feel guilty about spending too much time sitting here eating and reading, and not enough time writing- so I’ll stand up and put my plate in the sink. Time to start thinking about dinner.

 

If I Could Save Thyme in a Bottle/ Blanquette de Veau

IMG_8542I approached the butcher’s counter today with no thought other than: spring vegetables. The market at piazza san Cosimato looked so much more verdant than it did one week ago, before we left town. I saw a small piece of rosy veal behind the glass – it was just the right size for the three of us, and looked perfect; compact and muscular with tender fat in between. After a few clumsy words (including brasato, which I think impressed the butchers that I knew my stuff) and a little bit of pantomime, including me slapping my left thigh, dinner was in my bag. I returned to the produce stalls, and walked home with bright, fresh peas, young carrots, leeks and a lemon. I knew the veal was good for slow cooking, and I had decided to try my hand at blanquette de veau.  I know, it’s a little bit weird to make that when in Italy. But I’ve been thinking about making a spring trip to the kitchen of Buvette Paris, and blanquette is one dish that is pure comfort food to many French people. My little boy has eaten brasato di vitello here in Rome, served totally plain in its brodo and liked it- so I decided I should make us all a good dinner for our first night home.

While he was still at school I simmered the veal in salted water with leek trimmings and thyme (the only herb I have here, and my true favorite). When it was tender I turned off the stove, leaving the veal in its aromatic poaching liquid. I crossed the Tiber and met the school bus…then it was time for the daily gelato.  On our way home from the gelateria, my son proposed visiting the Orto Botanico, a botanical garden in Trastevere.  At 4:30 the sun was strong, and the bright, spring grass and tall palm trees looked inviting. As we wandered amongst them, though, a sadness swelled inside me.  I recalled mornings spent at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden with him when he was a toddler while his brother Lucian was at school, and many other memorable days spent there as a family. One of my favorite photos of my son Lucian is of him with his friend Walter, both less than three years old, carrying walking sticks and wearing winter hats in the BBG. A couple of years ago, when Walter turned eight, I made a photo book of some moments they had shared over the years; dressing up as astronauts with white paper jet packs, and covered in mud, laughing in our little garden. I knew then that their friendship was shifting but they remained connected, picking up where they left off each time they saw each other. Now, walking in the Orto Botanico I wondered what Walter thinks when he looks at the pictures in the book I gave him. How did his parents break it to him that Lucian had been killed, and how had he reacted?  I hope he holds that book forever.

IMG_8504Back at home I focused on my blanquette...preparing more leeks and carrots to simmer in the broth, and I started a bechamel sauce in another pot; traditionally cream is used, and the sauce is thickened with a roux and egg yolk, but I only had milk today. I was winging it, feeling good. All the meandering thoughts from the garden had left me, replaced by the urgency of making dinner. I briskly stirred milk to make the creamy sauce. I added a wide strip of lemon peel to the veal pot, and fetched more thyme from the patio. As I stood at the counter, rapidly plucking the leaves I remembered a chef I once knew telling me how much he hated it when cooks threw thyme in to a dish, coarse stems and all, in a misguided attempt at being casually rustic. My thyme today had tender stems, but I stripped them anyway I wanted my stew to be soft and pure, with only a few flecks of delicate leaves. Next thing I knew I was deep in a meditative state, stirring, skimming, tasting, boiling rice, blanching peas… all the while only half-conscious of my actions because the thought of thyme led me on a long trip down memory lane, to Cambridge, Mass, 1992.  Hard work in the kitchen, a romance gone wrong, staff parties and afterhours fun. A famous chef who honored me with his respect, and hired me years later to work on special events what had he seen in me? And then, 2004: an off-season walk down a Massachusetts beach, with my first baby strapped to my body. I’d seen the chef passing by, we’d waved, not sure whether to stop and chat. What a lifetime away that day seemed now! I recall my self-consciousness at my new role as mother; the physical changes and lack of freedom. My sweet baby, Lucian, waving his hands up and down and closing his eyelids against the wind, his first exposure to the coastal breezes. His life begun and ended between then and now; celebrated and mourned. All these thoughts passed through a few thyme leaves. There is no escaping the persistent sadness; memory infuses every moment.   And so we go up and down, round and round… another spring is here, and still my days go on; feeding a little boy and hoping he will enjoy his meals and grow (turns out he didn’t like this one)…

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