remedial eating

eating summer

Monday evening, I realized the fireflies had gone.

I'm not sure when.  Three weeks ago, they were still around, twinkling up the grass like so many unstrung Christmas lights.  And then, at some point, they weren't.  Days ago, anyway.  Maybe two weeks.  I can't pinpoint it.  This is the thing about change in the ordinary.  So many givens exit stage left, without warning.  They just fade away, without fanfare, without hoopla.  Just, out the back door, with finger-shushed lips.  Never-mind-me on cat-padded feet.  Errors of ommission in our everyday.

We dissected owl pellets, also on Monday.  Unwrapped foil bundles, the size of small potatoes.  Broke apart the contents, fur, feathers and bones.  Gently poked and prodded, nudged and wrangled, until jaws and wishbones and femurs came free. 

We expected three mice, found instead only one (me).  Plus two birds (Henry) and one rat (Zoë).  We talked about gizzards, and how it would be to be an owl. We marvelled over mouse and rat similarities and differences (skeleton, size). We discovered birds have two miniscule perfectly circular bones, the breadth of a lentil, the width of a hair.  We discovered rodents have two giant (yellow) front teeth, that become downright enormous when pulled free of their jaw.  Like fishhooks.  Like upholstery needles. Like nothing I ever really want to see again.  

If this all sounds a little detached, it is because the un-detached version would read instead something like this:

"What shall we look at first?  

(Oh good grief, oh, ew really?  Oh, EWWW [hold breath; repeat].  Aw jeepers EWWW seriously?  Okay. [Deep breath; repeat]  Eeoww oh wow, oh heck.  [Swallow hard; breathe; breeeeaaathe; BREATHE.])

Yes, amazing!  I completely agree."   

And it was, and I did, and I'd do it again.  (And that was my transcript only; they were a-okay.)  Because when a little American girl, surrounded by Barbies and glitter and pink (and make no mistake, loving them all), asks day after day, "can we do owl pellets today?", well.  The only viable answer is yes.  Yes, because it is ballast against all that.  Yes, because as Blair so aptly said, summer is for trying new things.  Yes, because that longing to dig through bones and fur may extinguish itself without so much as a goodbye.

(If you've been fielding similar requests, sympathies, whoops!, I mean, details: we used pellets from here and this fantastic site as our guide.) 

And if you come here for the food, apologies.  What came before may not be the best lead-in to what follows.  Thing is, food, family, family, food, it's all a piece.  It all goes down at our kitchen table.  (Our kitchen table that was duly wiped and scrubbed and bleached.)  Maybe we'd best clean up the images, also.

Pretty pictures!  

Pretty pictures!

(We also play with nice things, like flowers and fuzzy bears and bright colorful crayons.)

And if the link between fireflies and old owl dinners and new human ones seems tenuous, know that for me the connection is this: bugs, children, corn, they all tiptoe quietly by, moving right along with nary a headline.  The lawn lights up nightly, the clamor's constant (can we? now??), the tomatoes and corn are everywhere, everywhere.  We are in the thick.  

And then we are not.  

Last week, we brought dinner to a friend, who had just welcomed her fourth babe.  Included was a salad, because I always include salads, because of all the glorious bounty we received when we had newborns, it is the vegetables I remember most.  Vegetables are hard with a new babe in arms (I can only imagine they're harder still with four).  And yet, I craved vegetables more than sleep.  

It wasn't, isn't, an elegant salad.  To be honest, I'd never have shared it with another, if I didn't so vividly remember that vegetable hunger.  But it is, to my taste anyway, a very good one, one I make over and over, every year.  It is, at its heart, just tomatoes and corn, roughly equal quantities of both.  The tomatoes are chopped into bite-sized bits, the corn, cut raw, right off the cob. There is a simple vinaigrette, zipped up with minced shallot, which I don't like with lettuce but like very much with tomato.  There is also feta, creamy and sharp, not as garnish but full-on ingredient.  And fresh marjoram, or sweet oregano, or if you have neither, tiny leaves of fresh thyme.  

It is these last two twists that make me smile, the reason I return, time and again.  I tend, as I've mentioned, to turn Italian in summer, so good and vast are the tomato-basil-mozzarella variations.  It is a good turn.  I like it very much.  I also like leaving it entirely in the dust.  Because something wonderful happens when pitch-perfect tomatoes meet up with not-mozzarella and not-basil.  Feta's a real character compared to mozarella, sassy, flip, salty as an old sailor.  It was, in my opinion, made for corn, whose sweet crunch is littered all over the plate.  And the marjoram/oregano/thyme (all are different, all are good) bring little bursts of herbal bling that delight in a language entirely un-Italian, entirely more-ish.  It is like watching Miyazaki, after a steady diet of Disney.  Or like taking a sibling out, all by their lonesome.  A reminder of hidden talents, and rich possibilities, and loveliness, latent, there for the asking. 

I don't remember making it to the computer often in those early days, but somehow, said friend managed to tap out a sweet thanks.  Included were the words in the title of this post.  The genius wasn't mine, but I'm happy to pass it on.  Let's eat summer while we can.  

Tomato + Corn Salad with Feta + Marjoram
Serves as many as you'd like

This salad is eminently scalable, like this one, one of the things I love about it. As written, I consider it lunch for one.  Simply double, triple, etc. to serve a crowd.  

I like marjoram and sweet oregano equally here; if your oregano is the spicy sort, go with the marjoram.  None of either?  Try fresh thyme, ordinary or lemon.  Different, lovely.  Needless to say, this is no salad for December.  Pin this one under High Summer Happiness.

1 large-ish tomato
1 plump ear of corn
1/4 cup crumbled feta
1 tablespoon shallot, minced
1 tablespoon lime juice or 2 teaspoons sherry vinegar
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
1-2 packed teaspoons fresh marjoram or sweet oregano, roughly chopped if leaves are large

Mince shallot, and setle into the vinegar (or lime juice) to mellow, 10-15 minutes.

Stand an ear of corn in a medium shallow bowl, stem end down, and run knife from top to bottom, allowing kernels to spill into bowl, until ear is clean.  Chop tomato into small-ish (1/2") pieces, and add to corn.  Add olive oil, crumbled feta, oregano (or marjoram), and vinegared shallots, plus a few good pinches of salt and several grinds of pepper.  Gently, with two clean hands, toss ingredients.  You want to combine and keep intact.  Pile onto a plate, with a few more feta crumbles and herbs, if desired, and adjust seasoning, as necessary.  Eat summer immediately.  Second helpings, when possible.

funny business

Breakfast is funny business.  There were the days (years, really) when small babes couldn't make it the night.  Would wake up one, two, three times to re-fill tiny bellies.  Breakfast, then, wasn't so much meal as artifact, an alien concept from pre-newborn days.  Those years are behind us, now.

There were the days (years, really) when toddlers would wake up at four, five, six, for a top-off before their final few hours' sleep.  Or not.  Sometimes they were ready to rumble, before daybreak.  We are past those, now, also.  Those were rich, hard, tired, good years.

Then came the days (years, but by now you know that) when preschoolers could actually make it the whole night through.  For some, these days came by age two.  For others, hourly wake-ups were standard operating procedure until four. But finally, eventually, complete nights came.  Those days felt like miracles. They still do.

Small bodies such as these, who've slumbered without pause, always seem to wake up hungry.  The sort of hungry that is spelled f-a-m-i-s-h-e-d.  So we tend to start the day with breakfast, off the bat, nothing fancy, toast and peanut butter, scrambled eggs and toast, cinnamon toast.  Some yogurt, some fruit, so much better, already. For those who are hungry, anyway.

I qualify 'those' because appetite's a fickle thing, like upper arms and arches, subject to change.  I am rarely hungry when I first wake, which, because morning's not my thing, is almost always when they wake.  My singular goal is to grind beans and boil water, and to let the two mingle until my mug can be filled.  I always eat a little something, because coffee begs a little something, biscotti or a biscuit or a square of said peanut butter toast.  But this is all I need, all I want, until later.  

(Age changes appetites.  I see this, plainly.  My eldest little, who just yesterday woke up starving, today coasts to eleven on funnies and fumes.  For all the kerfuffle over breakfast being important—and I'm getting to breakfast, and I underscore the important—the timing and content is up for debate.  Not everyone needs flakes and o.j. before eight.)  

As for me, later does not equal lunch.  Later, for me, usually arrives around 9:47, or three hours after eyes open, whichever comes first.  Whether I've had a stack of flapjacks with a side of sausage and scrambled eggs at seven, or nothing at all, three hours in, I'll be ravenous.  I can't account for this.  I only know it to be true.  So when I can, I wait until the appetite goes off.  And when it does, I listen.

Mostly, it asks for produce and protein.  Sliced apples and almonds, lots of both.  Plain whole yogurt plus banana, crunched up with granola.  Last night's leftover veg, with this morning's scrambled egg.  Yesterday's salad, topped with a fried egg.  A bowl of the week's soup, with a poached egg afloat.  If you're sensing a theme, you found me out.  Put A Bird On It!: The Breakfast Edition.  

Sometimes, it's pretty fine.  Sometimes, worse for the wear.  A little deflated, but the right idea, and quick.  I'm no fan of quick eats for their own sake, but mid-morning's an awkward time to insert breakfast.  Everyone else has eaten, we're in the middle of some big thing (watercoloring, weeding, adding, Farkle-ing, encrypting bananas with top secret messages), and no one's interested in me setting aside 45 minutes to chop and cook a proper, glorious vegetable skillet for one.  Myself least of all.  For the mess alone.  

But the other morning, twenty mintues before swim lessons, I threw together a plate that hit all my high notes.  Yesterday morning, I did it again.  Today, I jumped at the gift of zucchini.  You can see where this is headed.  

It began with something called gilbir, a Turkish dish of yogurt and eggs I stumbled over in Silvena Rowe's latest.  But really, before that, it began with Jess' yogurt and eggs, a combination I'd never thought to make, much less eat. I mean, really.  Yogurt, eggs.  Soft, soft.  Creamy, creamy.  White on white.  I don't know.  It seemed so too too.  Like potato pizza, or spaghetti tacos.   (To read the comments in this piece, apparently I'm not alone.)  

But I've never known Jess to champion anything an inch less than excellent, and yogurt and eggs are no exception.  Read her words to understand why they work, and how.  (Actually, read her words because they're just pure joy to read.)  Maybe, like me, you'll walk away craving the contents of that blue-rimmed plate, a version I intend to try very soon.  As it is, I was waylaid by rusty butter. 

See, Rowe's eggs and yogurt, Turkey's gilbir, are drizzled in paprika-spiked butter.  That's it.  Butter, melted.  Sweet paprika, stirred in.  A spare, simple sauce.  A gorgeous, gutsy thing.  The paprika blooms in the hot butter, which takes up the deep sweet roasted toastiness of the pepper.  A teaspoon or two of this ruddy, intense stuff splits into vivid rivulets, everywhere.  It might overwhelm, were it not for the mint, a tablespoon of fresh leaves, slivered and scattered over all.  Together, the mint and paprika are brilliant, cool and hot, sweet and savory, yogurt and eggs.  (A fine match.)

Toast, I suppose, would be lovely alongside.  Cukes and tomatoes are calling my name.  But for now, I can't get past the zucchini.  I sauté two, sliced, in a splash of olive oil with garlic, quick enough to hold their shape, long enough to bronze (and lose their bite).  They are sweet, and toothsome, and fantastic sauce mops.  I imagine green beans might work the same magic.  

I imagine also it might seem funny business, calling this spiced-yogurt-vegetable-egg thing breakfast.  Not exactly blueberry pancakes, I guess.  Call it lunch, if you wish.  Or dinner.  Or brunch.  Just call it up, sometime, when the appetite strikes.   

Eggs, Paprika Butter, Mint, Yogurt, Zucchini
adapted from Silvena Rowe, Purple Citrus and Sweet Perfume

My first go, I poached my egg, per Rowe's version.  The second time, I fried my egg in olive oil, which I maybe loved even more.  I'd repeat either in a heartbeat; take your pick.  (I am no egg-poaching expert, but the bare bones are outlined below.  Deb's tutorial is clear, concise, and spot-on.)  

For crunch, I sometimes add a smattering of dukkah, the Egyptian blend of crushed nuts and spices.  Heidi has a wonderful, small-batch dukkah recipe.  A handful of toasted pine nuts would also be grand.  

Rowe's original calls for twice as much paprika butter, but the quantities below got me through two separate servings.  FYI.   

2 medium zucchini, cut into 1/4" slices
1 clove garlic, sliced
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
1-2 very nice eggs
distilled white vinegar, a splash
plain whole-milk yogurt
1 tablespoon butter
2 teaspoons sweet paprika
1 tablespoon fresh mint, slivered
toasted pine nuts or dukkah to top (optional) 

In a large skillet, over medium-high heat, bring the olive oil to a shimmer.  Tip in the sliced zucchini and garlic, season with 1/2 teaspoon salt, and let sit a few minutes to get a good bit of brown going on the underside.  Your zucchini will cook in 7-9 minutes or so, with the occasional flip and stir, adjusting heat if necessary, to prevent burning.  The end goal is slices with a bit of burnish on both sides, and interiors that still have their wits about them. They can mostly manage themselves, while you go about fixing eggs and melting butter.  

For Poached Eggs: Break your egg into a teacup or low, thin-lipped dish, and set aside.  Fill a small saucepan by half with water, season well with salt, and bring to a low boil.  Add a splash of vinegar.  Turn down heat to maintain a not-quite-simmer, then with a large spoon, create a whirlpool of the water.  Bring your dish to the surface, then slide your egg into the vortex.  All will look lost. Carry on.  Use said spoon to fold egg whites gently over the yolk, to help the whole thing hold together.  Turn off the heat, and let poach to desired doneness.  I like a solid white, and a yolk that is fudgy at the outside and saucy at the center, which is a 4.5-5 minute poach for my jumbo market eggs.

For Fried Eggs, Over Easy:  Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a small heavy skillet until it shimmers.  Crack in your egg, season to your liking, and let fry, covered, over a hottish flame, 2-3 minutes, or until white is completely set, and egg almost done.  Flip egg, if desired, and cook until yolk is done (or undone) to your liking, 1 minute for a runny bit at the center.   

Check your zukes.  Toss, taste and season, and/or turn off the heat, when done.

In a small saucepan, melt the butter.  When bubbling, add the sweet paprika. Let burble gently 30 seconds over medium heat to meld flavors.

Paint half a plate with a generous 1/2 cup of plain, whole milk yogurt.  Tip caramelized zucchini onto the other half.  Set poached (or fried) egg atop both, drizzle spiced butter over all, scatter with slivered mint, and sprinkle with dukkah or pine nuts, if desired.      

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.  

not to be denied

Right, I know.  I was just here. 

I'm just passing through.  Really.  

 

It's just that I was walking the garden last night, and the flowers pulled a puppy dog, went all wide-eyed and waggy-tailed.  Send a bouquet.  Make up a holiday. Or hey, wish everyone a Happy Fourth.  From us.  (Thump-thump)  We flowers have a bit of the firework about us, after all.
 

How could I say no?

(Thump.  Thumpity-thump)
 

So there you have it.  Happy Independence Day, my stateside friends.  And for those more far-flung: flowers.  For summer.  Or winter.  Or just because.  

Because flowers are a fleeting thing, not to be denied.

 

Okay, then.  Carry on.  

xo,
Molly

to look at it

I went walking, Thursday night.  It was 8:46 p.m.  

There were old discarded lawn chairs on the sidewalk, which I thought odd, given that trash day was days away, yet.  It took multiple chair sightings, plus several cordoned-off grass patches, before I realized folks were staking out spots for the parade.  The Fourth of July parade, this coming Wednesday.  Six days from last Thursday.  The Fourth is a fairly big deal, around here.  We'll probably go.  We probably won't stay.  94º.  You understand.

The trees overhead were deafening.  Right around the solstice, here, each year, the cicadas return, our high summer alarm.  A cicada sounds like a flourescent light on the fritz, during those final, whiny, vvvzzzzzzzzzzzz days. Like that, only louder.  Much, much louder.  Because while I'm never sure whether there are two or two thousand, invisible as they are in the branches and leaves, there are definitely multiples, all singing the same song.  I mention this, because I'd never heard cicadas, pre-Ohio, and maybe you've never heard them, either.

You non-cicada states should know you share a country with citizens whose entire summer has this soundtrack.  That for some of us, a walk in the great June outdoors sounds for all the world like a Wal-Mart whose every last overhead needs replacing.  (Weird.)

I know that it was 8:46 p.m., because I caught the time as I was checking the temperature.  The temperature was 98º.

Cooler than earlier.  Still, a bit toasty.

It's been hot here, this week.  It promises to be hot, next week.  I just checked the ten day forecast.  The first nine begin with "9".  The lows, for every last one of the next ten days, are expected to be higher than Seattle's highs.  

(Dear Seattle: I know you're beyond ready for summer.  Please know, I'm not bragging.  I'm whining.  I'll take rain on my parade over swelter, any day.  And anyway, sillies, Seattle's summer begins July 5.)

I mention this because I phoned my mom, while walking.  She asked after the heat, and I answered.  She was surprised, as I'd not thought to mention it myself.  I was surprised, because I realized I've become accustomed.  Am becoming accustomed.  Am at least not panic-stricken.  There was a time, last year, when I was in full-fledged summer panic.  It was just a passing phase, so I didn't mention it.  Only lasted from January through, oh gosh, maybe June? Literally, waking up in the middle of the night, frozen.  Paralyzed at the thought of the upcoming heat.  The suffocating humidity.  The claustrophobia of August.  The insufferable alter-ego I become.  

(Did I mention Thursday's humidity hit 92%?  After dark?  I am not anti-summer.  I am anti-awful.)  

Thing is, once last summer hit, it was alright.  More than alright.  Pretty okay, actually.  We'd learned enough, changed enough, to survive.  To cope.  To be competent.  To, often enough, thrive.  To be pleasant people, even in July.  To be able to go walking under ninety-eight degree skies.  In the event, it was just fine.     

Sufficiently fine that, last Thursday, I didn't think to volunteer the heat.  Had to be asked.  We've come a long way.    

I was looking over outtakes of our past week, realizing how very much they look like the week prior's.  More comic books, more flowers, more making stuff. More reading programs, more drawing sessions, more beetles and pests.  More popsicles, more baking, more beans and butterflies.  Encore, encore, to look at it.  

And yet, this week was entirely unto itself, in the living of it.  Looks are funny. Looks can fool.

Because this time, said comics were written with friends, which adds an entirely new element of funny.  And the reading program included words like Prize! and Finish!  The flowers were darker, fuller, further along.  The beans, big enough to climb inside.  The stuff made involved less flour and water (thank heavens), and more bulbs, wires, and circuitry (have mercy). This week's drawings were robots, portraits and puppies.  And ice cream doodles, on a long-wished-for, finally-found kitchen chalk board.    

I've yet to identify this week's blaze orange beetles.  I've identified and raged against this week's garden pests.  Bunnies.  Dear, sweet, tiny, twee, cotton-tailed bunnies.  Blasted, tomato-inhaling, zucchini-annihilating, sneaky stealthy bunnies.  Ate those first two tomatoes before dawn, the next day.  The first fourteen tiny summer squash, also.  One bite out of each.  Left the rest to rot. Make that thieving, inconsiderate, wasteful sneaky stealthy bunnies.  Memo to my furry friends: I hear you are lovely in mustard and cream.     

This week's baking took a detour toward cinnamon rolls.  This week, we made popsicles, but in triplicate, because, well, hello?  98º.  This week's butterfly looked just like last week's butterfly.  Black Tiger Swallowtail 1 and Black Tiger Swallowtail 2.  But redundant and metamorphosis are mutually exclusive. Wonder and awe never get old.  

And of course, that parade prep, beyond our backyard.  And those ubiquitous cicadas, which leave great moults, which make great collectibles to be shared over lunch.  And that old, existential, ultimately misplaced summer dread.  And these now, very real, sky-high outside temps.  Which cause fierce thunderstorms.  Which leave half our neighbors without power.  (We were so lucky.  Are so grateful.)  

Most of life unfolds outside the frame.  So much of what matters never earns verbs or nouns.  Where we point our lens, what we wrap words around, they are scraps and slivers, limited, selective.  Fragments, shards.  I was thinking about this, this past week.    

Next to that milk bottle of blooms, way up top, was a Lego robot.  Is a Lego robot.  As there is, on our table, almost always a Lego something-or-other. And a Pink Pearl.  And its accompanying crumbs.  And toast crumbs, from breakfast.  Yogurt smudges, also. And the counters behind, littered with the day's dishes.  Maybe bread rising.  A coffee pot, unrinsed.  Likely, half a lemon, careening toward mummy.  And we haven't even addressed the underneath, polka-dotted pink with dribbled smoothie.  See what I mean?  Sneaky, bunny rabbit words.  Splattered's more accurate, but I feel endlessly better stepping over spills Rorschach'd as polka dots.    

Much of it, most of it, sits beyond the borders.  Doesn't mean it's not in my kitchen.  

It is.  

Of course it is.  

Same as yours.

(Well, maybe you don't invite cicada casings to lunch.  But, you know, the sticky bits.)

To all appearances, that bowl might look a re-run.  To look at it, you might reasonably think, Lemon Curd.  To your point, it pretty much strikes the same pose.  To your tongue, it dances another jig altogether. 

Allow me to introduce Lime Curd. 

This particular curd was made a few months back, for a friend's birthday lunch. I had bought some strawberries to jolly up the table, despite the fact that it was February.  Certain exceptions apply when fêting a February 29th baby. After all, Leap Year doesn't come along every year.  And winter strawberries don't come with flavor, just because you will it.  

They needed help.  Lime curd was called in. 

I have spoken here before of my strawberry-lime love, of the way these two fruits complement one another.  If lime juice is all that, I reasoned, lime emboldened by egg and butter would flatter even winter's worst berries. Score one for reason.  Score ten for lime curd.  Or wherever your score card caps out.

We made our go-to lemon curd, the one I call foolproof because in fifty+ batches it's never failed, simply swapping out lemons for little green limes. Ace.  The color was only ever so slightly different, a bit more chartreuse, more off-yellow than green.  But the flavor, the flavor was unto itself.  Entirely different.  This week against last.  Lemon curd, for its part, tastes like it looks: soft, vivid, suave, (sorry) lemon-y.  Sharp, yes, but in a yellow way, which may make no sense to you but makes all kinds to me.  

Lime curd surprises.  Lime curd causes pause.  Lime curd raises eyebrows, and mouth corners, and berries.  Lime has that edge, that razor-rimmed sweet, a puckery, puckish, arch kind of tart.  Not unlike, come to think of it, a flourescent's final buzz.  Lime is lemon curd's mischievious twin.  Our plates, summers, selves, need mischievious twins.

It did the trick, dressing up those sad berries, but like any truly useful foodstuff, didn't stop there.  Turns out lime curd is swell on overnight waffles, settling into the squares like a birthright.  (Maple Syrup who?)  Whip it into buttercream, and sandwich between sugar cookies.  Slip it between a citrus-scented layer cake, littered, if you will, with blueberries.  Sneak it into summer trifle, alongside the custard, or better still, as a sly custard substitute. Spoon it onto pavlovas with raspberries and chantilly.  I eat it straight-up.  I've two kids who do, too.  Really, a spoon and a mouth and you're set.  

And yet, lime curd begs the berry.  There's something sublime, between the two.  All berries.  Any berries.  Blue, black, straw, marion, tay.  Maybe not goose.  Any berry but goose.  We made little berry tarts yesterday, the frilly French kind, with pâte sucre and fluted tins and a glossy jam topcoat.  We layered the berries on a pastry cream pouf, and it was nice enough, mild, softly sweet.  But I couldn't help wishing the cream was curd, an eye-squinching wink to wake up that ripe fruit.  

Our strawberries are gone, but I hear you Seattle folk still have some.  Score one for late-breaking summers.  For there is little lovelier (and little simpler) than a platter of rubies and a bowl of lime curd.  If that was strawberries under a cloud, this is them, dripping rhinestones, smart, dazzling, a nudge sassy. And if you, like me, see strawberries in the rearview mirror, rest assured: there's a berry parade yet to come.  And a sidekick, waiting in the wings.  

Foolproof Lime Curd
adapted from our favorite, foolproof lemon curd 
Yields: 2 cups

As I mentioned in the lemon original, the technique is what sets this curd apart: all ingredients are blitzed by stick blender before cooking, which shields the mixture against curdling, the ordinary bane of all curds.  I use organic limes for curd, owing to the heavy use of peel.  I've yet to have enough leftover lime curd to stockpile, but if it's anything like lemon curd, it will freeze admirably. Please note, you'll need a fine-mesh strainer (or regular strainer, plus cheesecloth).  Pull out your microplane and stick blender if you've got them.  Fine holes of a box grater and/or a standard blender make fine substitutes.

3 large eggs
3 large egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup fresh lime juice (from 4-6 plump limes)
1/4 cup freshly grated lime zest (from 4-5 limes), from organic limes, if possible
pinch of salt
4 Tablespoons salted butter, softened, cut into pieces

Wash and dry limes.  Zest limes on a microplane rasp, measure out 1/4 cup of the zest, and set aside.

Juice limes, and measure 1/2 cup.  If you have a stick blender, add lime juice, eggs, egg yolks, and sugar directly to a medium, heavy pot, and blitz 30 seconds or so, until mixture is smooth and no clumps of egg remain.  (If using a standing blender, blitz juice, sugar and eggs on high for 30 seconds, then pour into pan.)  After blending, add lime zest and salt to mixture, then place pan on medium heat.  Heat mixture for 8-12 minutes, whisking occasionally, until mixture thickens noticeably and coats the back of a spoon.  Remove from heat, then whisk in butter, one piece at a time.  Set a fine-mesh sieve (or cheesecloth-lined strainer) over a large, heat-proof bowl, and pour in hot curd.  Strain curd (to remove zest), nudging as needed with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon.  Use a rubber spatula to scrape free the nice slick of curd on the underside of the strainer.  Eat warm, immediately, or chilled, with all manner of summer berries.  Keeps beautifully, refrigerated, up to 5 days.