remedial eating

hem and haw

March, March. 

What do we think of March?

I'm lukewarm on the month, myself.  February, I realize, is for many the dregs, rock bottom of the winter blech barrel.  I get that.  I feel the same way about July. 

But by March, it gets a little funny.

For one thing, March is when winter divides us, North from South, inland from edgeland.  By March, in Seattle, there are daffodils to speak of, and yolk yellow forsythia, already come and gone, and the possibility, if not the reality, of peas.  Rain boots and bumbershoots replace cold weather gear, and the (often unrequited) hope for the white stuff.

We landed four inches, yesterday.  School was cancelled.  We won't be planting peas, anytime soon. 

You know I'm all over inches and igloos, and you probably hear my happy dance from there.  But by now, such splendor's the exception, not the rule, and more than a little melancholy for it.  Winter has entered its epilogue, the thrill of those early chapters behind us.  

Any snow that falls now inevitably brings thoughts not of firsts, but of lasts. Lasts are wistful.  

Mostly, March snow's a half-hearted thing.  Yesterday's was damp, heavy, and by today, halfway to gone.  It snowed all last week.  Accumulation: Zero.  It vanishes, on the way down.  It's a different snow species going forward, flyaway stuff, with no plans to stick around.  

The season itself seems spent.  But the finish line's a long way off, yet.   

By March, in Ohio, Winter starts to wane.  It does not follow that Spring kicks in.  Sun happens, March through May, in small, non-contiguous, biggering bursts.  But it will be two months, anyway, before Spring is here to stay.  

April is, after all, no stranger to snow. 

And so, dressers bulge with three seasons of clothing.  Shoes multiply, snow boots, rain boots, flip flops.  The coat closet teeters between clutter and chaos. Our first week in school, our first year here, it was 7° Monday morning, 70° Friday afternoon. 

A spread of sixty-one degrees.  Five days.  Same week.  First week of March. 

It's as if March, and its doppelgänger, April, can't decide which way to go. Winter, Spring?  Spring, Winter?  Eenie meenie miney mo...  

(We discussed how best to address this, the other day, and decided these next months deserve their own season.  A fifth, transitional, in-between season. Wing?  Wring?  Maybe Sprinter...  To, you know, get us through quicker.)

And I think that's the thing that gets me about March.  I'll mourn Winter when it goes, welcome Spring when it lands, but where we are now is a no-man's land. March waffles, equivocates, hems and haws.  It's ambiguous at best.  I am not. At my best, around ambiguous, that is.

So it's hard to explain why it is that I've dodged this minestrone for months.  

Partly, I point to the fact that it's one of those fluid recipes, wide open to interpretation and the contents of your crisper.  But we've covered that, now. Improvise.  Innovate.  Check.

Also, it's a dog.  Relentlessly unattractive.  Even in person.  I still ate thirty quarts.  (I know.  I couldn't believe it, either.  I just double-checked my pots. I've made more like forty.  But I did relent, and share a few bowls, so let's go with thirty-plus, and call it conservative.) 

Mostly, though, I'm still blinking in disbelief that minestrone could be considered edible, much less greed-inducing.  Prior to this fall, my minestrone encounters all came from crowd-friendly faux-talian restaurants.  The sort where you order not entrées but "dinners".  The sort where you get free bread/salad/soup/coffee/ice cream/refills.  Laugh if you will, but I've a soft spot for this sort.  For everything, that is, save the strident red sludge with tinned potatoes, khaki green beans, and that rarified terroir that comes only from three days on a steam table.  

Apparently, that was not minestrone.   

Apparently, if the fine women of River Cafe are to believed, minestrone is actually an exaltation of vegetables.  It's a careful building up of flavors, layer upon well-considered layer.  It requires a bit of work, and a bit of time, as ten pounds of vegetables don't chop themselves.  But it is good, deeply pleasing work, as the chopping and stirring and layering dovetail like an anonymous 19th century oak desk.  Perfectly.  Which translates pretty much directly to the spoon.  

But I'm getting ahead of myself...  

This soup is Judy Rogers' and Rose Gray's Winter Minestrone, and it is a first-class keeper.  Maybe that's redundant, since pretty much anything Rogers-Gray is, in my experience, a first-class keeper.  Still, there are several small, brilliant steps in this recipe that do a real number on ordinary old veg.  It is based on soffritto, that dense, intense, slow-cooked slurry of aromatics that go just shy of caramelized, anything but shy in flavor.  This slow dance is key, and totally unhip, when tinned broth, beans, and greens equal soup in ten.  I do that soup.  I like that soup.  This isn't that soup.  And it shows.  Save this one for a weekend morning, because thirty minutes is almost a cheater's soffritto, and forty-five minutes, not a moment too long.  

To this heady sludge, you add things in quantities that may raise eyebrows, and will demand seconds.  A full bunch of parsley, stems and leaves, both.  Heads of garlic.  Heads.  Plural.  Swiss chard ribs, tinned tomatoes.  And then, again, chop, stir, chop, stir, let the magic unfold in slo-mo.  Because caramelized tomatoes?  So, so not strident.   

Almost there.  In go your six pounds of slivered greens (you read that right), your mountain of diced roots, a few quarts of water.  I add parmesan rinds, as I love their umami, and a small throw of kielbasa, for my small sausage fiends. Both add something.  Both are unecessary.  That soffritto brings flavor to spare.  

Then, simmer.  Half an hour, give or take.  Add tender veg at the end, if you wish.  Beans—I like chickpeas—no matter what.  Season well, with the same slow attention you've given all along.  Because an undersalted soup is a television on mute, but add just enough, and in that moment, each vegetable becomes eloquent, articulate, witty.      

One last note about those vegetables: they're all my addition, and I adore them. Gray and Rogers call this one Winter Minestrone, and theirs is a soup of beans and greens.  But I made my first batch late last fall, as we were readying for two days in the hills, and my fridge and garden were both bursting.  These pictures all date to that time; this minestrone's carried me through every month, since.  From fall's last zucchini to late winter's storage veg, it has flattered every thing I've thrown at it.  Indeed, while peeling roots for last week's pot, I went a little panicky over their impending loss.  Hold up, I scolded the turnips and parsnips, I'm not done with your soft pepper, with your sweet cream.  

Whereupon I resolved to quit hemming and hawing, and get you a bowl of this soup.  Because what could possibly possess a person to pine for turnips in March?  See below.   

Three Season Minestrone
adapted from Italian Country Cook Book, by Ruth Rogers and Rose Gray 

Vary the veg to suit your taste and crisper drawer.  Bok choy can stand in for swiss chard.  Double the spuds.  Skip the green beans.  Follow the general guidelines for timing—stems in step two, roots in step three, and tender veg just before the end—and you can substitute at will.  

Rogers and Gray add half the cavolo nero at the beginning and half at the end, for a splash of bright, resilient green.  I prefer mine added entirely at the beginning, where it goes army beige but turns silky and rich.  Your choice. Either way, six pounds disappear.  Seriously.  Theirs is also a thick, standing-room-only soup, which contains only enough water to cover, and has half the beans mashed before adding.  I leave my beans whole, and often increase the water, as I love the warming effects of hot broth.  Also your call.  Half-inch dice.  I know.  But it makes for the most pleasing spoonfuls, each a small party of sweet, tender veg.  Truly.    

This makes vats, gallons and gallons.  I freeze a tall stack of portions, for later lunches, and get nervous when the pile runs low.  Halves easily, if you want less.   

4 tablespoons olive oil
6 medium carrots, chopped
3 medium onions, chopped
6 celery stalks, chopped
2 teaspoons' salt
2 heads of garlic, cloves peeled and minced
2 pounds swiss chard, leaves and stems separated, leaves slivered, stems chopped
1 28-ounce can plum tomatoes, roughly chopped
1 bunch parsley, leaves and stems, chopped
4 1/2 pounds cavolo nero (Tuscan kale) or other hearty green, stripped of tough stems, leaves slivered
3-5 quarts water, vegetable stock, or chicken stock
8-16 ounces parmesan rinds
6-8 cups root vegetables (parsnips, potatoes, turnips, sweet potatoes, more carrots), peeled and cut into 1/2" dice
6 cups tender vegetables (green beans, zucchini, corn), prepped and cut into 1/2" dice
8-16 ounces kielbasa, cut into 1/2" dice (optional)
2 cups chickpeas, cooked
salt and freshly ground pepper
freshly grated parmesan, to top 

Peel and roughly chop your carrots, onions and celery.  In your biggest, heaviest pot, preferably a dutch oven, warm the olive oil until shimmery.  Set flame to low, tip in your carrots, celery and onions, add two teaspoons' salt, and stir well to coat.  Cook slowly, stirring occasionally, until soft and amber, 30-45 minutes.  While this is happening, go about the rest of your prepping and chopping, working your way through the roots, leaves and such.

When your soffritto is one third its' former volume, slumped, and smelling wonderful, add the two heads' minced garlic, half the chopped parsley (stems and leaves), and the chopped chard stems.  Stir well, let settle, then add tomatoes.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until reduced, 15-30 minutes.

Add half (or all, see note above) of swiss chard and cavolo nero leaves, the diced root vegetables, enough water or stock to cover, parmesan rinds, and diced kielbasa, if using.  (At this point, I usually divide the soup over two large pots, so as not to crowd, and to allow for the vegetables still to come.)  Bring to a boil, and let simmer, 30-45 minutes, or until the biggest root yields easily to knife point.  Taste for salt—it will need plenty more, anywhere from 1-2 tablespoons.  Add and taste, add and taste, until you are happy.  

Now, finish off the soup with the final line-up:  add the remaining greens, if you reserved any; cooked beans; plus any tender vegetables (green beans, zucchini, corn), and let simmer another 5-10 minutes, until tender.  Taste for seasoning again—all the vegetables should be flavorful, each tasting distinctly of itself, and the broth bright and deeply savory.  Adjust salt and pepper until this tastes true.

Serve immediately, topped with freshly grated parmesan and/or olive oil.  And stash some away in the freezer for later.  There are few things better to find in the deep freeze.  

i took to throwing pumpkins

A week for soft things, this one.

Some beg it.  You know the ones.  Heavy on the gentle, double dose of cosset.

 

 

Colds kept everyone home, mid-week.  Sniffling noses, stuffy heads.  Nothing big.  Still, no school for anyone.  PJ days.

(Nothing big, save the penguin, who broke his wing.  Something about being rescued from the jaws of a seal.  And, the stuffed puppy, who was treated for a broken paw.  Ditto Mr. Monkey.  Big play theme right now, broken bones.  Go figure.  Fortunately, scotch tape and tissues heal all.)     

 

 

PJ days which happened to coincide with stellar weather, sixty-four and sunny and, well, weird.  We continue to whipsaw our way through winter.  Last Friday, we had four fresh white inches.  Wednesday, we flung open windows and doors. Today, balaclavas and a fresh dusting.  

As I type?  Fourteen below, with wind chill.  

 

 

What's a person to do, but take advantage?  On the warm days, play outside for hours in shirtsleeves and Crocs, no socks.  Crack nuts.  Pound rocks.  Make messes and ruckuses.  Set elaborate fairy tables.  Turn bean teepees into people teepees.  (The wind still whips.  Any excuse to use a sheet.)  Filthify fingers and toes.  

(Filthify: my 2013 Word of the Year nomination.  See precedents: vilify, quantify, Spotify.  See, also, the widespread utility: The children filthified the white carpet, running through on muddy paws.  See, finally, the tired redundancy of recent years: tweet ('09), app ('10), hashtag ('12).  Come on. Life isn't only online.  Dirt happens.  Filthify.  Are you with me?)

 

And on the cold days?  Make sn'ice cream!  Talk about soft, and taking advantage.  Two minutes between you and ethereal fluff, vanilla-scented, melt-on-impact, food-of-angels fluff.  Ice cream maker not even required.  Does take fresh fallen snow, though, several inches.  Reason alone to love winter. 

On every third day, when it decides to show.

 

 

Quiet afternoons balanced out the big ones.  I don't think of games as after-school fare often enough.  I'm coming to think they may trump snacks.  Doesn't work every day, but when it does, a game's a good way to to settle the tempo, set the tone.  To ease that awkward hour of re-entry.  

I must remember to schedule absolutely nothing more often.  

 

 

There was fiber.  A lot of fiber.  Fiber fixes much.  It's hard to beat the cosseting wallop of wool, linen, cotton, polyfill.  

Okay, polyfill's a little squeaky.  And odd.  But when it's stuffing the limbs of one pink polka-dotted giraffe, it's a soothing sort of squeaky.

 

 

We finally set out to conquer finger-knitting.  Seems such a smart way to launch a small child.  The video was very good.  I was not.  (The end result was to look like a ladder.  My end result resembled a cockroach.  A blue bulky-weight 100% wool cockroach.  Locked onto my hand.  Probably devouring it.)  

Needles for me from now on, thanks.

 

 

One sweater was finished and cast off, blocked, buttons auditioned.  Icy blue yarn was wound for another (TBD).  Yarn-winding is perpetually popular.  Also, perpetually disastrous.  The winder and I, we don't get along.  Or don't see eye to eye.  Or have bad karma.  Something.  

I blame the fact that I lost the instructions.  I suspect the truth looks more like that blue roach.  

 

 

I unearthed a second sweater I began two years back, and finished last fall, and buried last winter.  The Malabrigo yarn, so lovely on the screen, looked like old dishwater in the hand.  The sleeves didn't work up right the first time.  Or the second.  Or the third.  The buttons instructions began with "Crochet...".  I don't crochet.  (I don't, apparently, read instructions through, either.)  

I wrote it off as a giant flop learning experience.

 

 

But someone walked in just as I began to re-bury it, tried it on, declared it a fit.  And I saw just then that gray goes with winter.  And that the Swing Thing's full of twirly, flyaway fun.  And that buttons are really just after-thoughts.  

And really, what's two inches, between sleeves?     

 

 

And there was some saying 'yes', when what I meant was 'no', which always feels like a softening of sorts.  Paper.  Oh, paper.  I do so love paper.  I don't so love the mountains of scrap.  I ask for such conundrums, of course, with my well-stocked cupboards and well-loved childhood books.  Still, somedays, I'm not up for it.  I try to distract.  Drag feet.  Grumble.  On good days, I eventually give in.  Invariably, I'm glad I do.  

Because we figured out how to make curled paper snails!  And super cool cut circle twirlies!  And paperdoll chains!  Here's the key: Make sure the shape—doll, heart, snowman, whatever—goes all the way to both edges.  All the way. Both edges.  Really.  (Unlike Fulghum, I left Kindergarten lacking.)  

 

 

And for winter, and sore jaws, and scratchy throats, soft eats aplenty.  Cakes baked for no better reason than because.  Thick tiles of warm bread, spackled with butter, sliced well before the recommended hour's wait.  Clouds of rice pudding, our Rx for colds.  Cups of hot cocoa, extra whip.  Burbling vats of chicken broth, for them.  And, for me, bowl upon bowl of silky, sparkling, thrilling orange soup.

This is Heidi Swanson's Pumpkin and Rice Soup, which I mentioned last November in passing.  I mention it again, this February, as I've tweaked it to suit my pantry and palate, and want one place to put it all down.  I mention it again, also, as I've made at least a dozen pots since.  It's become a staple, a stalwart in my kitchen.  And staples and stalwarts deserve their own spotlight.    

 

 

I come back to this soup, time and again, for its quiet riot of flavors.  There's the soup itself, a straightforward affair of softened onion, sweet heat, squash and water.  I use fresh ginger in place of Heidi's jalapeno, and coconut oil, for its nutty whiff; either are true to the soup's simple bones.  Once tender, the whole business is blitzed into something of a surprise.  

So much squash soup, like so much pea soup, is thick thick thick, less soup than stew.  (I know.  I do it, too.)  This is not.  This is lofty.  Lilting, if such can be said of a soup.  Thin, airy, delicate.  I didn't know winter squash did delicate.  It does, and swimmingly.    

 

 

You wind up with a gorgeous orange pond, deeply creamy, despite its lack of cream, warm and rich, soul of squash stuff.  It makes a nice sip, all by its lonesome.  Not that I ever eat it that way.    

Because this soup's second stroke of genius (the first being the courage to add all that water) is in the thoughtful extra bits.  Classic Heidi, these.  I've long held puréed soups need bits, to break up the monotony.  I've never thought to combine rosemary, ginger and lemon in browned butter.  Nor to add rice.  Nor nuts.  It delights.

 

 

The nubbins of brown rice—I tried white; brown's better—bring a fragrant, pleasing chew.  The nuts slip in a necessary crunch.  The yogurt's tang offsets the squash's sweet.  Then there's the browned butter.  Can we just pause on browned butter?  Apply exclamation points as needed?  (Browned butter!!!!!!!!) Better.  I've professed my love before.  Ply it, wherever I can.  Pour it over whatever sits still.  I guess I must make antsy soup, since it somehow escaped my browned-butter-flinging ways.  Browned butter on soup's a showstopper. 

Particularly loaded browned butter.  Once the butter looks and smells of toasted hazelnuts, I pile in the minced rosemary, fresh ginger, and lemon, and cook it just a few slow minutes more.  They sizzle, and lend their flavor to the fat, and go a little crisp at the edges.  (Butter-fried lemon zest?  Yes.)  As with an Indian tarka, the aromatics and fat exchange phone numbers, each benefitting mightily from the trade.  And as with a tarka trickled over dal, the browned butter drizzle transforms this soup, a small spoonful of intensity that illuminates the whole bowl.  Good stuff.    

 

 

None of which explains twelve pots in three months, were this a half-day affair. Don't let all those extras deceive.  I clocked my last batch at eighteen minutes. Some slim forethought helps greatly.  I cook up a batch of brown rice most weeks, and keep it on hand, in the fridge, for whatever.  This removes the rice cooking time.  The browned butter cooks while the soup simmers.  And the squash, as always, is ready, cooked, waiting.  

See, I took to throwing pumpkins in the oven, last fall, when we were swimming in CSA squash.  Whole.  Unpeeled.  As is.  As in: sheet pan, foil, pumpkins, go.  I did it mostly as a dare, expecting them to explode/not work/never soften.  They did nothing of the sort.  What they did was cooperate, and cook to spoon-tender, and open up a whole new world in which squash was as hard to prepare as boxed cereal.  And as easy to eat.  It was a revelation.  I've long done this with beets, and loved having the roasted roots on hand.  Tamar Adler calls it striding ahead.  I quote the greeks, call it know thyself.  I cannot be depended upon to want to peel squash, simply because I want to eat soup.  

I want to eat this soup, a lot.  I don't see my pumpkin pitching arm atrophying, any time soon. 

 

Silky Pumpkin Soup with Browned Butter, Rosemary, Lemon + Ginger
adapted from Heidi Swanson, www.101cookbooks.com

Through Christmas, I made and loved this with pie pumpkins.  After the holidays, when pumpkins became scarce, I turned to butternet squash, also wonderful.  I keep the small pan of browned butter on the stove all week, re-warming and snitching spoonfuls, as needed.   

2 tablespoons coconut oil, or butter
1 very large onion (or 2 medium), chopped
1 heaping tablespoon ginger, peeled, chopped
2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more to taste
2 1/2 pound pumpkin or butternut squash, cooked*, flesh only
6-8 cups water

To Top:  browned butter rosemary lemon ginger drizzle**, cooked brown rice, plain whole yogurt, slivered almonds, coconut flakes (any or all)

In a large saucepan, over medium heat, melt coconut oil (or butter).  Add onions and ginger, and cook until translucent, stirring occasionally, 5-8 minutes.  Add water, salt, and squash flesh, stir to combine, and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat to a low-medium, and cook at a good simmer, 10 minutes, to let flavors marry.  Remove from heat, blitz with an immersion blender until very smooth (1-2 minutes), and taste for consistency and seasonings, adjusting water and salt to taste.  Bring back up to temperature, if you added water. Serve with spoonfuls of rice, yogurt, and/or almonds, and a generous spoonful of the loaded browned butter, drizzled over all.   

*Whole Baked Squash
Line a heavy rimmed half-sheet pan with foil, place whole pumpkins or butternut squash on top, and bake, on a middle rack, until knife pierces thickest part easily.  I've baked squash alongside cookies at 325°, bread at 350°, and chicken pot pie at 400°, for anywhere from 45-75 minutes.   Cooking times will vary based on squash and temperature.  Once tender, set squash aside to cool, then refrigerate, up to one week.  When ready to use, halve, remove seeds, and scoop out the soft meat.     

**Browned Butter Rosemary Lemon Ginger Drizzle
1/2 cup salted butter (1 cube)
2-3 tablespoons ginger, peeled, minced
2 tablespoons fresh rosemary, minced
zest of 2 lemons

Melt butter in a small saucepan over medium-high heat, and continue to cook until butter bubbles, foams, clarifies, then begins to brown.  When the liquid looks slightly amber in color, the milk solids, brown, and the scent turns nutty and rich, it is done, 5-7 minutes.  Immediately, add rosemary, ginger and lemon zest, and continue to cook over medium heat, another 2-3 minutes, until aromatics crisp a bit and give off their scent.  Take care not to burn.  Keep warm, and set aside.   

 

 

 

what's missing

As best I can tell, Larry Page and Sergey Brin think I'm playing Chinese tic-tac-toe with ABBA.  Or trying, unsuccessfully, to make fleece-lined pants for a hungry juvenile squid.  Or taking a slug with a toothache out for excellent tonkatsu chicken.  Or removing Flarp from the handlebar moustache of a Go master/Atomic Physicist/Ice Cream Pie Afficionado.  

So close, so close.  And yet...

Last week, I began The Numerati, which details the digital breadcrumbs, the Annapurna of data, that you and I and everyone leave behind, daily.  From frequent shopper cards to internet searches to high-tech HR department analyses, Stephen Baker pulls back the curtain on all the ways in which we're being tracked, monitored, scrutinized, quantified, analyzed.  It's a bit apocolyptic.  I should probably be terrified.  Maybe I will be.  Just as soon as I get past the giggle fits.

(I realize a book about number-crunchers and data-miners is not standard New Year's reading fare.  Whence the jaunty self-improvement, the inspirational memoir, the transportative fiction that airlifts us out of dark January?  What can I say?  Once a data-wonk, always a data-wonk.)

What makes it all okay, what has me in hysterics, is the niggling, yawning divide between our data and ourselves.  Computers excel at the numbers, of course, at gathering, tagging, organizing, cross-tabbing.  Not so much at making connections.  Assembling subtle stories, sniffing out the subjective, understanding the squishy human bits that reside between the bytes?  Mighty tough, for those mighty machines.  Yes, our every move is being tracked.  But what's missing, I think, is more telling than what's there. 

They're like three-year-olds, faced with a dot-to-dot, and no sense of number sequence.  The dots are all there, and beg to be connected, but dots and lines alone won't a proper picture make.   

Because I am amused by such things, I minded my own Google searches this week, curious to learn who I electronically am.  Here, then, is my week in review: "moustache party", "graham cracker crust", "weather.com", "how to remove noise putty from hair", "akai hana", "weather.com", "what to expect after a root canal", " how to play Go", "how to make lined children's pants", "weather.com", "squid digestion", "gutta percha", "why is my sewing machine making loopy stitches", "weather.com", "slugs 4 noses 3000 teeth", "Voulez Vous Abba", "how to play Pong hau k'i", "are all atoms the same size", "weather.com".  And there you have it: mustachioed Go Master, with a pet slug, and an Arctic address, and a love of seventies Swedish disco.  Or maybe not.

Maybe, alternatively, we celebrated an eighth birthday, with blinky bugs and new legos and a 'Stache Bash.  (Best 'Stache Pinboard Award goes to Janet Planet.)  And lunch out at an excellent, new-to-us Japanese restaurant, where our exceptionally gracious hostess made starter chopsticks for the kidlets.  And for the family fête, ice cream pie.  Because what better to eat in January than frozen cake?   

Post-party, we learned that Noise Putty also goes by Flarp, and can cement itself to long red hair, and can be removed, much to everyone's relief, with great fistfuls of conditioner.  (Thank you, Messieurs Brin and Page.)  Also, the ridiculous joys of bizarre facts, packed up in large fonts and bright colors.  Did you know sloths take a month to travel a mile?  Or that a squid's food travels through its brain?  Or that slugs have four noses and three thousand teeth?

I had to confirm that last fact for myself.  Turns out two of the four noses are more like eyes, and the teeth are more like rasps, but still.  Those ubiquitous blobs are vicious.

We played Pong Hau K'i, though only amongst ourselves.  Agnetha and Co. couldn't make it.  (Though I did finally identify the band Zoë's been hearing, and loving, and trying to describe to me, with little luck.  I thought it was maybe Elizabeth Mitchell, or Frances England, or possibly, They Might Be Giants.  Turns out it was ABBA.  I see a mirror ball in our future...)  I also spent time brushing up on my Go, which I haven't played in, oh, thirty years, and which I'm determined to get in a game of, this winter. 

(Be forewarned: If you search on both 'pong hau k'i' and 'how to play go', algorithms will assume you actually want to learn beer pong.  AI's got a long way to go, I'm telling you.) 

We checked the weather.  A lot.  It's been cold.  The thermometer reads like my kids' ages.  Right down to my littlest.  Brrr....  Hence the lined pants query, which I now have answered, but haven't yet done.  This would be because I started with curtains, something bright to live next to that laundry room shelf. And then, cranked out another two curtains, to cover the exposed sewing nook shelves.  And then, three pairs of pajamas for the smallest, who's existing PJ's are two sizes too small.  And then, two bigger pair, for two bigger brothers.  

Because everyone could use a little cozy right now.

This would also be when I googled loopy stitches.  Right after shouting at my machine for the sixteenth time.  Out loud.  Alone.  In a not-polite tone.  I was just trying to stitch curtains, for goodness sake.  Simple seams.  Straight ones. Four!  Not hard!!  All I got was pain and heartache and one constant battle for two inches without knots and loops and disaster.  No dice.

Until I sought electronic advice, removed the new needle, and replaced it.  This time, facing forward.  And, um, turned the bobbin the right direction.  I guess I'd be a little loopy, also, if my shoes were on backwards and my pants, upside down.  (I apologized.) 

Veni, vidi, vici, the root canal.  Yesterday.  So far, so good.  And so totally bemused to know I'm now officially part tree sap.  Pretty awesome, that.  

I'm not sure I'll ever vici chemistry.  Max just began a unit.  He's adored it since age two.  I've been playing catch up, ever since.  I suspected, when I typed in 'atom size', that I should probably know the answer.  Turns out I didn't even know the question.  Atoms, it seems, don't have size so much as mass, which varies greatly between elements.  Which makes perfect sense, if you're the atomic sort.  Which I'm not.  Yet. 

I am, however, the fish soup sort, and have one child who feels the same way. Just after Christmas, Henry settled on a birthday dinner, the cornerstone of which was Norwegian Fish Soup.  He'd never had Norwegian Fish Soup, mind you, but spied Fiskesuppe paging through this (the old, analog, ink-and-paper version), and decided on the spot it would fit the bill.  In the end, he didn't love it (too many celery and onion-y bits; next time, before adding the roots and fish, I'll immersion-blender the broth), but I love that he imagined up such a meal.  It's so him.  Also, I love that he led me to this soup.

I've made many fish soups, over the years, none memorable enough to make again.  There were bouillabases, which took too long to make, and required too much slippery, sloshy shell-picking to eat.  Laksas, which I loved, but which began with a mortar and pestle and eighteen-item spice paste.  (Began.)  And chowders, much simpler, much blander, bandaged together with cups of cream.  This fiskesuppe tilts toward the latter, but is simpler, lighter, deeper, more complex.  Right.  I don't understand it, either.  Luckily, understanding's no pre-req to inhaling.

There's a standard base of aromatics, here, onto which you slosh water, milk and cream.  The original called for stock, but with no fish heads on hand, I used water, which worked like a charm, sponging up ample flavor from every good thing that followed.  It also called for two cups' milk, cut with one cup heavy cream, a blend that was deeply wonderful, without being belly-aching rich.  Cream can be a cheap trick, wool pulled over our taste buds.  Not here.  It is necessary, and excellent, generously but judiciously applied.  Dairy and brine both bring their own sweet, which simmers into something like fate.  If this is surf and turf, I get it.

There are potatoes, cut to fit a spoon's hollow, cooked in the broth to fuzzy-edged tender.  Carrots and parsnips, also, which—who knew?—get along famously with fish, and seriously lively up a bowl of blond soup.  And Worcestershire sauce, which I grew up calling Lea and Perrins, and which I always understood to be beef's alter-ego.  Certainly, I never imagined it in fish soup.  My bad.  It works.  Brilliantly.  (All those anchovies.  Should've known.)  And then, the seafood, the soup's heart and soul, the details of which, you decide.  The original calls for two pounds of cod, which I would endorse in a heartbeat.  By request of the birthday boy, we used a mix of cod, salmon, shrimp and langoustines.  I'd endorse that in half a heartbeat.  

It tastes to me of summer, somehow, of saltwater and saline air and the sunshine that beats down on both.  It tastes, also, exactly of winter, of soft whites and pale pinks and calming comfort, velvet roots and sweet meat and ivory broth.  I've mixed feelings about mid-century modern, but at its best, that's exactly this soup.  It is all clean lines and spare aesthetic, pure and essential and all the better for it.  Like what one might eat, in an egg chair, chez Arne.  No fuss, no frill, just fish, roots, cream.  What's missing—the sass of tomato, ziz of spice, the smoke and bluster of bacon—is as important as what's here.  Just fish, roots, cream are gloriously enough.  Enough, anyway, to know with an ache that the only thing missing is another bowl. 

P.S.  Good luck, Google.  I connected the dots for you, this week.  Next week, you're on your own.

Fiskesuppe (Norwegian Fish Soup)
adapted from Saveur, January/February 2013

I omitted the green pepper and celeriac originally called for, as I had neither, and didn't like the idea of either well enough to aquire them.  I doubled up the carrots and parsnips, instead, and adored the extra hit of both.  It is hard for me to wrap my head around fish in the Midwest, being Northwest born and bread.  We don't eat it often, but when we do, Costco is my go-to: it is flown in daily, and impeccable.  As with anything seafood, what's good and fresh trumps ingredient lists, every time.  Good fish, well-frozen, is an excellent alternative. 

6 tablespoons salted butter
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 large stalks celery, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 leek, well-rinsed, sliced thin
4-5 medium carrots, peeled and sliced 1/4"
3-4 medium parsnips, peeled and sliced 1/4" (if large, halve or quarter first, then slice)
4 medium waxy potatoes, peeled and cubed 1/2"
3 cups water or fish stock
2 cups milk (I used 2%)
1 cup heavy cream
1 1/2 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
2 pounds cod, salmon, shrimp, langoustines (any or all)
salt and pepper, to taste
1/4 cup parsley, to garnish
juice of 1 lemon

In a large, heavy stock pot, heat butter over medium-high heat.  Add chopped celery, garlic, onion and leek, season with salt and pepper, and cook, stirring often, until soft and translucent, 8-10 minutes.  Add carrots, parsnips, potatoes, water (or stock), milk, cream, 2 teaspoons salt, and Worcestershire sauce, and bring to a near-boil, stirring occasionally, until bubbles appear around edges and steam rises from surface.  Turn heat down to maintain a gentle simmer, and cook 20-25 minutes, until roots are tender.  (Test a few.) While vegetables are cooking, cut fish (cod, salmon) into bite-sized bits. When roots are tender, add the fish and/or shellfish to the soup, stir gently to combine, and continue to cook until fish is just cooked through, another 6-8 minutes.  Adjust salt and pepper to taste, stir in lemon juice, and garnish with parsley, if desired.  Eat by the bowl to chase away winter's chill.

Soup keeps beautifully, refrigerated, 3-4 days.  

if we're to talk soup

I hesitate to talk soup, here.  This is misleading.  And odd.  

After all, I make soup often, once a week, sometimes twice.  I eat it more often, once a day, sometimes twice.  Three bowls are not unheard of, nor are four, but since frice is apparently not considered proper English, we'll leave it at thrice.  And that I eat a lot of soup.

 

 

Thing is, there are two types of soups in this world.  There are discrete soups, the sort you set out to make, with fixed ingredients and brief instructions and some semblance of structure.  Potato leek, say, or Tom Kha Gai, or in summer, cucumber or gingered beet.  Even our beloved go-to chili, which takes a short morning, but nothing more, and always the same eleven items.  Neat, tidy, turn-key soups. 

I make these.  I love these.  I rely on these, often.

 

 

Then there are the other ones, the rambling unwieldy ones.  Soups with no obvious beginnings, no perky, trim, tied-up-in-a-bow endings.  That take other meals as starting points.  That can only exist in ellipses (...soups...).   Soups peppered with hyphens and ranges and words like "leftover", "optional", "to taste".  Soups which may seem ambiguous at best (two carrots or four?), utterly presumptuous at worst (what 4 cups leftover roast?!).  Slippery, shifty, imprecise soups.  

These are the soups that evolve in the making, pinch of this, smidge of that.  So many good soups, so much good cooking—maybe so much good, period—plays out this way, from the hip.  Improvising.  In the moment.  In spite of Dora.  (Best thing I've read all week.  Arguably best post title, ever.  Shipoopi!)

 

 

They're the sorts of soups wherein when you hear "leeks", you know onions, shallots, scallions will do.  All in the allium family.  Wherein carrots can be doubled, or sweet potatoes omitted, or both replaced by butternut.  Parsnips welcome.  Turnips might be nice.  Bag the spuds.  Add rutabagas.  Pantry as guide, über alles.    

They're the sorts of soups more easily explained in person than in type.  That instantly makes sense when you're in the same room, rubbing shoulders, side by side.  Screens seem to be our new side by side.  They're amazing at that, in many ways.  I don't know yet if they're amazing at this.    

 

 

The trouble has always seemed to me that these soups don't belong to words. Trying to stuff them into ingredients and instructions, man, it's awkward. Elephant into tutu territory.  Print, in all its emphatic black and white, does a disservice to such soups, implying sharp edges and crisp corners where in fact there are only curves, soft and yielding.  They don't conform well to cups, quarts, and teaspoons, because they are, by nature, open-ended.  Democratic, flexible, generous.  

Which, if you ask me, makes them worthy of discussion, right there.   

 

 

For ill-suited though they may be to recipes, they fit exquisitely days, bellies, crisper drawers.  Because these soups are the seams between meals, the stitches that fasten yesterday's supper to tomorrow's lunch.  They bind Sunday's roast to Tuesday's Beef Barley, connect the dots between disparate dinners. They call on the orphans and odd-lots in our fridge, the half-head of parsley, the lonely celery, the forgotten carrots, left for limp. They honor our drippings, and trimmings, and bones, which turn water into stock, better even than wine.

And what's more?  Along the way, they take this hodgepodge, and make sense of it all.

 

 

(Not unlike the hodgepodge of a week, making sense of itself in retrospect.  I had little notion what I'd find, when I looked at the week's outtakes.  A week that has felt rather scattershot, as we leave behind winter break, breaks and colds, and creakily, gratefully, find our groove.  Turns out it's the same old January delights.  Scrubbing [preferably with pink-kerchiefed pirates].  Sorting [old art, older spices, new gifts].  Feasting [rice, tofu, shiitakes and bok].  Rushing headlong into resolutions.  I didn't always love resolutions, but boy oh boy, I adore them now.  Maybe because mine include "bake more cakes".  [Week One: Two down.  Not bad, 2013.]

And making.  And snow.  Always making and snow.)     

 

 

Delectable sense, and dinner, besides.  Just not prim and proper copy.

Oh well.

It is January, and cold, and time for deep comfort, and we can't let silly old language get between us and some very good soup.  We'll muddle through.   

 

 

All of which is to say: can we talk split pea soup?   Light, thin, rich, meaty, savory split pea, which was good, very good, and one such soup.  I ad hoc'd it from the Christmas ham bone, building and tweaking as I went, only to find, as I ate the first bowl, it's the split pea I've hankered after for years.  I ate bowl after bowl after bowl after bowl, alternately amazed and overjoyed to have finally found it.  I'm putting it here, in all its ellipses, so as to be able to find it again.  

Here is why I want to remember:

 

 

I have always loved the idea of split pea soup; rarely, the reality.  And I've cooked my way through many realities.  None were truly bad, mind you; just all pretty good, none genuinely great.  They all, to me, tasted too stodgy, too stiff, a little too Pease porridge hot.  A little, for lack of a better word, beige. Add to that their monotony—beyond a few carrots, and the odd bit of ham, most pea soups are all pea, all the time—and I knew just exactly how it wound up nine days old and cold.  

I felt like throwing up my hands in defeat.  I felt a little like Frosty, down there.    

 

 

Still.  I believed in split pea, knew it could do it, kept whispering Little Engine encouragements into pots.  I kept at it, trying out different takes, taking away what I liked from each.  From Moosewood, way back in my college kitchen, I learned the beauty of caramelizing carrots, celery and onions, low and slow. Also, the spunking-up effect of a good slosh of vinegar at the end.  From my friend Martine, I learned to love the Dutch angle, with plenty of pork and soft tender potatoes.  From Emily Franklin, I learned to finish a bowl with "fresh" (frozen) peas, plus parmesan.  And from there, I improvised, madly.

I pumped up the veg, extra carrots, sweet potatoes, because I wanted more interesting bits.  I discarded advice to add veg near the end, twenty minutes before done, for al dente tender.  Instead, I added them all early, not just a mirepoix but a mountain, because I've realized I like the results.  That roots and stock both benefit twice, first from that extra early caramelization, finally from all that time spent rubbing elbows.  Roots cooked an hour or more in broth go velvet-edged, a little bit plush, and entirely drunk on the stock they swim in.

 

 

About that stock.  It's nothing more than water, amplified by a few flavor bombs.  I used our ham bone, as I always do, but earlier and meatier than is my custom.  From my reading up on Ertesoupe, I realized I'd been a Scrooge, that I needed not only the bone but a good heap of ham, besides.  To pump things up further, the meat went in with the veg, to render its fat and crisp up its edges and generally perfume the whole pot.  Knowing how well parmesan played with the finished soup, and how beautifully rinds flavor a bland broth, I figured it couldn't hurt to toss in a few crusts.  So I did.  Have mercy.  Anything but beige.  Here—well, a simmery hour or two from here—was that savory, deep, lip-smacking umami every other split pea I'd met was missing.  

The bratwurst probably helped.  A pound was added near end.  The two porks worked in tandem, one smoky, one spiced, to fill the pot with pomp, circumstance, substance.  Vegetarian this split pea is not (though I think with a doubling of parmesan rinds, it well could be).  But it is meat the way I most like it, honored to the end, made the most of.  Diced small, it's everywhere, abundant, and yet wildly outnumbered by broth and veg, two pounds of pork to eight-plus quarts of soup.  Yum.

 

 

And soup it is, strange as that sounds.  One last note about that water.  There's a lot of water.  Six quarts of water.  Which translates to twenty four cups of water.  More, to taste.  (I used thirty two.  I know; I measured twice.  Also, two pots, to accomodate overflow.)  I realized, finally, this time around, that what I wanted was soup.  Split peas, like all legumes, expand tremendously in the cooking.  The ratio of peas:water in most recipes yields something far closer to stew, thick, stiff, nursery rhyme stuff.  So, I just kept adding water.  

And adding.  And adding.  And, lo!  I had soup!  And something wonderful, besides.  It turns out that when you add enough water to dried peas, they relax into themselves, dissolve, melt.  The end result is not only soup-ish and slurpable, but downright creamy.  Double yum. 

 

 

It looks dull.  Possibly dreadful.  It isn't either, not even close.  But I left it ungarnished, unvarnished, humble, both in the interest of honesty, and because that's how I often eat it.  The peas and parmesan at the end are fantastic, the one delivering bright pops of sweet, the other an unexpected, excellent bling.  They're also unnecessary.  This split pea stands alone.  And if we're to talk soup, we must talk straight.  And sometimes, I want a piping hot bowl yester-minute, no time to grate cheese and no thanks to peas andpleasepassanapkin,thanks!  Slurp.   

 

A Deeply Savory Split Pea Soup
inspired by Martine's exquisite split pea soup, with guidance from The Moosewood Cookbook, The Meat Cookbook, and Too Many Cooks

Good soup depends on good ham.  I'm fond of Niman Ranch hams, for their tremendous flavor, texture, and farming practices.  They also have a lovely "little ham", around two pounds, that would work well here.  Just leave out the bone (or beg one off your butcher, who often has oodles, for pocket change).  I add peas straight from the freezer; the heat of the soup perfectly warms the peas, and the cold of the peas cools the burn off the soup.

3 tablespoons olive oil
3 chubby leeks, well rinsed, quartered, white and pale green parts thinly sliced
1 very meaty ham bone, meat removed, diced 1/2" OR 4 cups good ham, diced 1/2"
5 large carrots, quartered lengthwise, diced 1/2"
3 stalks celery, minced
6 small yukon gold potatoes, scrubbed, diced 1/2"
2 large sweet potatoes, peeled, diced 1/2"
6-8 quarts water
2 cups (around 1 pound) dried split peas
4-8 ounces parmesan rinds (optional)
3 bay leaves
1 teaspoon plus 1 Tablespoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
1 pound bratwurst or kielbasa, diced 1/2"
1 teaspoon dried marjoram
1 teaspoon dried thyme
freshly ground pepper
2-3 tablespoons cider vinegar, + more to taste
petite frozen peas (optional)
freshly grated parmesan (optional)

Pull out your largest, heaviest soup pot, set it on your biggest burner, and slick the bottom in olive oil.  Set over medium heat, slice your leeks, and add them to the shimmery oil with a teaspoon of kosher salt.  Give them a lazy stir, now and again, as you go about the business of ham.  If using a ham bone, carve the meat from the bone, then chop the meat into a rough 1/2" dice, removing any great veins of gristle, but leaving on the sweet fat cap along the top.  (This fat will render in the heat, adding flavor, and helping to caramelize the upcoming mountain of vegetables.  If using boneless ham, simply dice, knowing extra olive oil may be needed if the ham has no fat to speak of.)  

After ten minutes, when leeks are limp and translucent, add your chopped ham, and give all a good stir.  Go about preparing the next 4 veg (carrots, celery, potatoes, sweet potatoes), in turn, peeling, chopping and adding, as you go.  Stir with each addition and keep heat at a low-ish medium; this allows each new vegetable to give off its moisture and caramelize gently, building flavor and sweetness along the way.  After adding and stirring sweet potatoes, give them a final ten minutes to caramelize, then add your water, 6 quarts (24 cups) for a thicker, porridge-style soup, 8 (32 cups) quarts for a thinner, cream-style soup consistency.  This is a lot of water.  If need be, pull out a second, small pot at this point, to accomodate overflow.  I do this all the time.  Bear in mind, also, you can always this the soup further, later.

Add dried split peas and bay leaves, as well as the ham bone and/or parmesan rinds, if using.  Turn heat to high, bring soup to a gentle boil, then reduce heat to maintain a gentle burble.  Simmer soup, 1-2 hours, stirring occasionally, until split peas are tender to the point of dissolve.  At the 1 hour mark, irrespective of the integrity of the peas, add the pound of minced kielbasa, and Tablespoon of salt.  Stir, and continue to cook if needed, or simmer another 15 minutes, if peas are ready.  (Total cooking time will depend on the age of your peas.  My most recent peas dissolved within the hour; I've had other batches take upwards of three.)  

Once split peas have collapsed completely into the broth, and sausage has simmered for at least 15 minutes, add the dried marjoram and thyme, crushing them between your fingers as you do, and 2 Tablespoons of vinegar, stirring well to combine.  Let meld a few minutes, then taste your soup.  Are the flavors forward, and bold, and bright?  Probably not quite yet.  Gauge consistency first, adding more water if you wish it thinner.  Then, taste and adjust seasoning.  You will almost surely need more salt (ham and sausage vary greatly in salt content), upwards of 1 Tablespoon.  Add in half-teaspoons, giving a stir and a minute between additions, and tasting as you go.  You may wish for another Tablespoon of vinegar, which doesn't add sour so much as brightness and depth.  I've been known to add sherry, to good effect.  More herbs may be wanted.  Taste, taste, taste.  Continue along these lines, until everything sings.

Eat piping hot, topped by curls of parmesan, a spoonful of frozen peas, or nothing at all.  This soup keeps very well for 5 days, freezes like a dream, and reheats beautifully.  

sweet relief

What?

What's that?

Where are the flowers?  

Creeks?  Bugs?  Walks?  Sprinklers?  Summer? 

Yeah, no.  Not going to happen today, actually.

The out of doors are sort of off our radar, at the moment.  Just for now.  

Just until the heat passes.  

Any week now.  

I'm not complaining.  I'm bursting at the seams with slap-happy gratitude, actually.  We talked to our pediatrician, Wednesday.  He was out of power a week, following the storms.  A week.  Without power.  In high-ninety degree heat.  Sometimes hundred-plus.  Not accounting for humidity.  

We have power.  Have had power.  Have no reason to complain.  Truly.  We were without power for ten days, once, in Seattle.  In December.  With two small children, one still a toddler.  I would take those ten days over two, here, now. 

Not complaining.  Giddy grateful.  Just not going outside. 

Much, anyway.  We do make it to the pool, which continues to be a revelation.  

My main experience of swimming in summer is of non-stop shivering.  Growing up, I would often swim with friends in Lake Washington.  It was lovely because it was calm and close and not salty.  Also, notably, it was warmer, if you timed it right.  Between mid-July and late-August, the first few shallow feet of water were sun-warmed.  And if it was not warm exactly, it was not-freezing, which was something.  Something special enough to make up for the way we'd always wind up hog-tied in milfoil.  

The counterpoint to which Lake Washington was warmer was, of course, the Pacific.  Every summer, we'd camp on the Peninsula, and every summer, we'd splash away much of the day.  I loved swimming in the Pacific, hopping waves higher than my head, eating agates as I face-planted bodysurfed back to shore, beneath the breakers. Granted, I turned faintly blue fairly quickly, and would invariably be covered in orange spots, within the hour.  They were extraordinary spots, vivid and large, dime-size, quarter-size, head to toe.

I still don't know what those spots meant.  Probably nothing good.  I never asked.  I just got out, found my sandy towel, and huddled in a tight ball until they faded. Then ran right back into the ice-cold thrill.

We don't get orange, here.  We don't even get blue.  We huddle under umbrellas, for shade.  We eat popsicles during rest breaks, to cool down.  Our bathtub is edged in a steady parade of suits.  I've learned to stock trunks in triplicate. 

The pool, a mystery to me our first years here, is now as obvious as salt and chocolate.  And as necessary.  

But beyond that?  We've been indoor dogs, these past weeks, waiting out this long, prolonged stretch of heat.  

I don't mind this, either.  I like inside.  We hang out, hole up, see which whims strike.  

We've watched feisty, independent redheads in air-conditioned theaters.  (Highly recommended.  Might be slightly biased.)

Watched episode after episode of Spiderman.  (Hobgoblin is not Green Goblin is not Green Goblin Two.  Who knew?)

Followed by Ice Age.  (Wishful thinking.  Can't hurt.)

Henry discovered, last week, that one length of yarn + one Playmobil dude + one laundry chute = one truly excellent superhero escape hatch.  Three years, I've waited for him to figure this out.  Took three hot weeks.  

Boredom is good. 

We flop on that couch, up top, a lot.  Sometimes to read.  Mostly because it's cool.  We make noodles and oobleck and technicolor milk.  Channel our inner Charlie Harper.  Walk the foil dog.  Compose sentences like, "The Ninjas were hired by royalty and other powerful cheeses to discover an enemy's delicious weaknesses.  They would sneak into opposing camps to steal passwords, battle plans or otters."  (Thank you, Mad Libs).  We turned Team Vowel into a song.  We're beginning to turn our socks into puppets.  It is possible (A!) we are becoming (E!) a little batty (I! O! U!). 

But we made it to the park two entire hours, yesterday.  I see upper eighties in our forecast.  All will be well. 

This is not a post about making pasta, or oobleck, or for that matter, inedible milk.  This is about the things that we do to adapt to our current environment. About flexing with the weather.  About figuring out the pool.  About learning to like love exist on cold soup.  Cold beet soup.  Cold gingered beet soup. Otherwise known as my 2012 Summer Soup.   

(If heat or circumstance is keeping you in:  Oobleck here, cool Non-Newtonian liquids info here.  [I totally want to fill a pool, walk on water.]  Pasta: 4 cups flour + 6 eggs + 1 sizeable threshold for mess; mix, knead, rest, roll, cut, boil, butter, smile.  Sudsy technicolor milk.)

I've mentioned before that I'm a Molly-come-lately to the sizeable field of cold soups.  For a very long time, I couldn't see the point.  Cold soup, for the majority of my years, fit right into a list with jumbo shrimp and military intelligence.  Turns out, I just couldn't channel the climate.  Shauna's cucumber yogurt soup made me a convert.  Amanda's gingered beet soup made me evangelical.  

The Amanda in question is Ms. Hesser herself, Food52 mastermind and The Essential New York Times Cookbook editor.  The latter is the sort of epic doorstop I usually avoid.  I don't avoid this one.  I dog-ear and splatter it. I've made a dozen-plus dishes from its pages, and every last one has been a keeper.  This soup is the latest in that unbroken string.   

What first caught my eye was the beets, a vegetable I've praised here before.  What held my eye was the ginger, a match I've never thought to make with beets. (Spoiler alert: they get along swimmingly.)  But what led me to actually fire up the flame was the abandon with which Amanda used both.  One and one-half pounds of beets.  Three (or five) tablespoons of fresh ginger.  This, my friends, is some serious soup.

Serious to eat, though not to make, which is just my speed, come summer. The beets are first roasted, which I love, both because I can (and do) do it days in advance, and for the way it intensifies their sweet beet-ness.  They are added to a mess of olive oil-softened-leeks, to which the fresh ginger is added and mellowed.  The original recipe calls for half water, half chicken stock, instructions I followed the first time around, because I had homemade stock on hand.  It added a palpable richness to the soup, and if you've got it and the inclination, go ahead.  But since that first batch, I've used all water, a fine, and vegetarian, substitute.  The beets and ginger have plenty of personality.  And then, there's the matter of buttermilk...

Amanda's soup is a deep garnet red, the color of crushed velvet and smoking jackets, ca. Sherlock.  Beautiful.  But to my taste, a touch thin.  With memories of that cucumber soup's yogurt swagger, I swapped a cup of buttermilk for the water.  This had exactly the effect I was after, adding plush creaminess, without cream, plus a thread of tang I adore with beets.  

It also turns the whole pot lurid pink.  I, for one, consider this a win-win.  (My kidlets, for the record, think the shade is magnificent.  The soup itself has yet to pass their lips.  Hard to argue, when fresh fettucine's on the table.)

So.  Beets by the pound, jacked up on ginger, edged with buttermilk, blitzed smooth as smooth.  The fresh ginger sort of sparkles around the edges, adding not heat, exactly, but a pleasant prickle.  It works like vinegar on the beets, a tingly sharp to counter the roots' treacle.  On top—because all puréed soups are incomplete without "on top"—is a trio of toppings as essential as the soup itself.  A good dollop (or three) of whole plain yogurt, which marbles rich white throughout the magenta.  A small mountain of minced cold cucumber, for crunch.  And one finely chopped barely-hard-boiled egg, for nubbly interest and just plain lovely.  The toppings are technically optional, though in my bowl, there are always equal parts soup and confetti.  It is salad as soup, and soup as salad, vivid and bright and rich and light.  

I'm on my third batch, and it's only July.  I've called it lunch, for four days running.  A pitcher on hand feels like a security blanket for summer, restoration guaranteed, sweet relief from the heat.  My childhood blanket I wouldn't have sold for blood or money.  This one's for sharing.  If you've need, be my guest.

Gingered Beet Soup, Cold or Hot, with Confetti
adapted from The Essential New York Times Cookbook, by Amanda Hesser

A few notes.  Season this soup when you make it, and season well again, after. The cold dulls the flavors dramatically, and the toppings, of course, are unseasoned.  I often double the salt and lemon juice, the next day, and sprinkle a pinch of extra salt over the confetti.    

As to ingredients, I like at least 4 tablespoons of ginger, which hums a little more loudly than 3, warm.  Cold, I always wish I'd added 5.  For your first go, you may want to try the lesser quantity.  If you keep roasted beets on hand, this is a quick, 15-minute soup.  Finally, Amanda suggests serving this hot or cold, and having tried both, I echo that.  But in summer, I vote cold all the way. Allow a few hours to chill, if you go this route. 

1 1/2 pounds red beets, roasted (see instructions below), peeled, cut into large chunks
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 leek (or 1/2 onion), chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
3-5 tablespoons fresh ginger, peeled and minced
5 cups water (or 3 cups chicken stock + 2 cups water)
1 cup good buttermilk (Bulgarian or whole; not non-fat)
juice of 1 large lemon, or more, to taste
2 teaspoons salt, plus more to taste

To Top:
1/2 English or Armenian cucumber, peeled, halved, cut into matchsticks, then chopped into 1/8" cubes
plain whole milk yogurt
hard boiled eggs, minced, optional

To roast your beets:  Trim leaves, leaving an inch of stalk, and set aside for soups or sautées.  Wash, and place in a baking dish (a Pyrex casserole washes up easily) with a half-inch of water, and cover tightly with foil.  Bake beets at 325º, until a knife glides through the biggest beet with ease.  This may take 45 minutes - 1 1/4 hours, depending on the size of your beets.  Test after 45 minutes, and if you meet any resistance, return to the oven again, adding more water if needed, re-sealing foil tightly.  When done, cool slightly, top and tail, then roll each beet gently in a clean paper towel: the skin will slide right off.  Use immediately, or store in the refrigerator for later use.  Roasted beets keep beautifully for 5-7 days. 

In a large soup pan or small Dutch oven, heat the 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Add chopped leek, and sauté, stirring occasionally, until softened and transluscent but not brown, 5 minutes.  Add ginger and garlic, and cook 2 more minutes. Add 2 teaspoons salt, then add chunked beets, broth (if using), and water. Bring to a simmer, and cook 10 minutes, to meld flavors.  

Allow to cool a bit, 15-30 minutes, to prevent curdling, then add the 1 cup of buttermilk.  Blitz with a stick blender, until smooth as cream, 2-3 minutes. Alternatively, blend in several batches in a stand blender, until completely smooth.  Add juice of half a lemon, taste, and adjust seasoning (salt, lemon, pepper), until happy.  Eat warm, topped with whole milk yogurt or sour cream, or chill in the refrigerator, overnight.  The next day, stir, taste, and season again (see notes, top), then ladle into bowls.  Top with generous portions of chopped cucumber, whole milk yogurt, hard boiled eggs, and/or herbs.  Soup keeps beautifully for 7 days, refrigerated.