The Kettle

a bad drawing of one of my little Chinese teapots

Just a few days ago although it seems ages now, I called Fran to ask her if she had one of those lovely French water heaters, you know, the kind you put the water into and press the button and in a few seconds you have boiling water for drinks. This is very European, and I think it uses a great deal of electricity. Everywhere in this country they have these wonderful boiling water things and everyone's always pressing the button and sipping some kind of infusion.

I was packing my bag for a morning of brainstorming and collaborative work chez elle and had this really great tea that I had received as a gift. I was going to come all equipped with tea and little pots from Tati to soak it in, planning to leave her the pots as a gift.

"What, you mean a kettle?" asked Fran.

"Yes, a ket-tle." I pronounced it in a way that cradled the 't' just behind the palate like she does it, and she laughed.

There was something resembling a kettle at my house growing up. It was this old bulbous thing morphed by heat into nearly a bubble. Who knows where it came from. Envious images of the kettles at my friends' houses growing up came to mind, the flat bottomed shining cruisers with all of the bells and whistles. When the hot water boiled, like a siren, a beautiful harmonious steady choir of readiness and steadiness of steam injected organized chaos into the crystalline gleam of my friends' polished kitchens.

This was in direct contrast to what went on at my house. When the kettle decided to finally boil, it just kind of huffed into our existing dimly lit rabbit hole mayhem with a halfhearted cloud of steam. It would roll lazily on its base a little bit when the water was not quite ready. I often preferred actually heating water in a pan so at least I could see when it was boiling.

"Put on the ket-tle, I'm-a coming up!", I hollered. I hit the road across the cobblestones and marched up the hill to St. Juste. I was hoping she didn't have a fancy one. It would have dashed my image of her.

Fran's kettle.

Postcard Marché St. Antoine Lyon France

Early summer stew in the making

Cold Cucumber Velouté for Concentration

In these past few weeks I have been trying extra hard to keep my eye on the ball. I have had to struggle to keep focused. I work so much better when I can take the work into the center of my mind's eye and live it straight. There are times for self scrutiny and there are times to just dive right in and go. This is one of those times I need to dispense with the agonizing.

When I am in need of clarity of mind, there are things I can do. The first thing is to do something physical in the morning, climbing steps or riding my bike to shed all the chatter and tune in to work station in my mind. Exercise has always been a good way of working through the excess energy that might interfere with my concentration. It makes me feel good too.

Something also that makes a big difference in my ability to concentrate is what goes in my mouth. Forget the evening cocktail when I am working on a project - save the party for when it's done! Coffee intake must go down. Forget the Diet Coke, it just sends me into a hyperactive tailspin. Forget busying myself in the kitchen with fatty heavy things that are going to weigh me down physically. I am nourished, with light things that won't interfere with my brain's activity. It's nice to be a little bit hungry when you're working to a distant goal and you know that only with diligence and discipline will you arrive.

This soup is perfect for times like this, and also a very nice summer palate cleanser.

Cold Cucumber Velouté

2 large cucumbers
1.5 cups cold mixed poultry stock which has been made with a sage bouquet, all fat removed
1 stalk of celery, minced fine
1 spring onion
a small handful of fresh fennel
chervil to taste
a few sorrel leaves
2T. white vinegar of your choice
salt to taste (cold things need more salt)
white pepper
olive oil (optional)

Peel the cucumbers, mince the onion, fennel, sorrel and chervil, leaving some aside for the garnish. Mix everything but the finely minced onions and dill to a smooth puree in the blender or with the stick blender in a bowl and then stir in the minced onions. Chill thoroughly before serving. If you want to, you can a add a drizzle of good olive oil or garnish with razor thin slices of cucumber when serving. A shortcut to getting a nice cold soup immediately is to use frozen stock. But if it rests for awhile it tastes better. This is one of those better on the second day soups.

Vin de Noix, thème Caramel et Chocolat 2007

Last year's vin de noix ended up exceeding my expectations. I found that by not making a liqueur and making more of an aperitif drink, and using a local white wine in the mix along with the alcohol, the result was actually much better than a thick and highly alcoholic liqueur. It is just fantastic on ice as an early summer drink this time of year. Light enough to be pleasant and airy, the taste of the nuts having come through nicely, and still packs a nice punch.

Thank you Lolo, for taking this picture

We had a nice big stock of good grade B maple syrup (gift from afar) to flavor the vin de noix last year, but this year we didn't have any. I began to think about alternatives. We went to pick up the vodka and saw that maple syrup of dodgy origins in an imitation Aunt Jemima bottle was nearly 6 euros for a little bottle. Seeing this detail, and doing a quick calculation about what that would cost us, my decision was made instantly to make a caramel syrup instead for this years batch. Loic was there in the store still clutching to the bottle of maple syrup, he loves that it is my secret ingredient in vin de noix, and I said - "Just forget the maple syrup! Forget the whole idea this time!"

But he wouldn't let go of the idea and he pestered me about it for a while. "Are you sure? Are you sure?" he kept asking me, and I said - "Loic, when was the last time you had something with both nuts and caramel, and you didn't like it?" He thought about it for a few minutes and decided that he did finally agree. So we went ahead with the caramel syrup, which I made just before we began cutting the nuts. The caramel syrup for putting up fortified wines and liqueurs is easy and is outlined in my recipe for Punch Mirabelle façon Ile de la Réunion.

We went to get the nuts this morning, and the lady went back to her car, came back with a sack full of freshly picked green nuts which she presented to me as a gift, one which I accepted gladly. She said that she and her husband already drank the whole bottle of the vin de noix I gave her last week and although I know she was probably greatly exaggerating, I thought it was a nice gesture when she told me that they think mine was better than hers. I seriously doubt it! I shared my recipe with her and she raised her eyes with a cryptic little smile when I got to the part about the Burgundy white wine being added, and she raised her finger as if to say 'aha!' when I told her it contained no cane sugar, but was sweetened with maple syrup.

Since I was moving in another direction with the caramel this year, I also decided to do away with the Szechuan pepper corns. I can always go back to them next year. Nuts, caramel, what's missing? Chocolate! I had a little stash of simply roasted raw cocoa beans which I picked up at Michel Chaudun last time I was through Paris for a quick visit, so I brought them out and divied them up among the jars.

This years addition to go with the caramel theme, roasted coca beans

So this year the proportions were as follows:

I put up six 1.5 liter jars, and put in each jar:

10 quartered green nuts per jar (up from 8 since they're good karma and all)
9 roasted cocoa beans
1/2 of a vanilla bean
2 cloves
a piece of dried orange peel
1/2 cup or 125 ml caramel syrup as prepared here
50cl vodka
After all of the above are in the jars top them off with this years choice of a local dry Macon instead of a full bodied white Burgundy.

In some of the jars, I crushed the cocoa beans, and in some of the jars I left them whole. I'll let you know which turns out better. The jars are in the safe and in three months I'll be posting about it again when the wine is ready to strain and bottle.

On va voir ce que cela donne.

Tasting Terroir - A Tutorial.

1. The main thing that you must remember is that the land, the soil, the earth, contains different mixtures of minerals and materials depending on where you are. Do you remember the first time you realized it?

5. It was when you first noticed it was spring, the Central New York snow melted and the mud and the earth gave off a certain smell. The mud was black. The Ostrom Avenue snowbanks were covered in black dirt.

7. It was when you were in the back seat of the van with your mother behind the wheel by the shores of the Gulf of Mexico in Alabama. The Spanish moss swung like cobwebs from the trees. You had watched through the car window for an eternity. You saw the earth turned orange along the way. Bright orange, deep rusty orange. They had cut tunnels through miles and miles to make the highway.

8. It was the first summer you noticed that the water tasted different in Chaumont.

14. It was when you went apple picking on a class trip in Cortland and once things settled down after the terrible accident, you found yourself alone and leaned against a rail and took a big bite of a Cortland apple from Cortland picked that day and realized through your tears that you had never tasted an apple that tasted so much like itself before.

15. It was when Willy planted daffodils on Sarah's grave.

18. It was when you first left home and bought your groceries in Boston and found that they didn't have any real cheddar cheese.

22. It was when you were doing push-ups in the red dirt and remembered your childhood with fondness.

23. It was when you were forced to sleep by the side of the Pacific Highway in order to meet your orders to report to the Presidio. In the Canyons behind Carmel, the lady with the red jaguar who didn't want to take her car. She hitchhiked for a ride to the monestary, going for the summer solstice. She wanted you express yourself in a scream out over the canyon. Do you remember?

23. The earth was a warm yellow fawny brown. In the fog, the air smelled warm and free. Camping, and a fox barked and scared you. You felt relieved that the bark of a fox scared you more than your own scream. It shocked and balanced you.

23. It was when the plane touched down in Germany.

24. It was when you ate that salad on the Turkish coast, and you were so surprised that the cucumbers tasted so cucumbery, the tomatoes so tomatoey, the onions so onioney, and he replied that it was nothing. Secret notes taken in the spirit. Nothing.

25. It was when Ayi in Beijing brought home the first batch of vegetables she had bought "from a friend" with the weekly allowance you gave her. She chopped them under your watchful curious eye, and served forth a meal so explosively delicious you could only thank God for her existence.

27. It was when you went home after years abroad.

27.5 Parched beach-side grilling. Succulent smoked meats.

28. It was when you took a traveling man around a grocery store as a late night diversion to look at him some more. His beige pants searched for bread and yogurt, and the things he was accustomed to. It was when he solemnly declared that the "baguette" was not really baguette.

29. Study in Paris.

30. Cured sausage. The cheese he had chosen to have on hand. The bottle of wine. The wallpaper. The light. The first fondue, in a restaurant, wearing his beige pants because they had lost your luggage. How convenient that you wore the same size. He was no longer traveling.

31. It was the first time you tasted a cheese from the Auvergne that had the smoky taste of a long ago erupted volcano. (St. Nectaire). Learning a culture that made everything out of "nothing".

34. It was when you raised the glass to your lips and they said "the terroir". It was when you thought not of the limestone steppes of Burgundy, but of the limestone quarry of Chaumont, New York, the water there. Dunking your head into the water there.

This is the taste of terroir.

Cancoillotte

Dubious beginnings that end in glorious harmony

This cheese has a vague and mysterious background. Historians argue about how long this cheese has been in existence, with some claiming to have found references to it dating back to records of the Gallo Roman conquest of what is now the Franche Comte region some 4,000 years ago. Whoa. Some pretty old cheese.

Old local legends are told like fairy tales over the table about how this cheese began. Some food historians defiantly trace Cancoillotte to a mistake made in cheese fabrication sometime in the 16th century. Whatever its story, Cancoillotte is something to try, especially if you are making a day trip from Lyon into the Haute Savoie, the Jura, or the Doubs to hike or ski.

Cancoillotte is made with buttermilk left to coagulate on its own at ambient temperature. The separated solids are removed and pressed to obtain a nasty smelling hard bunch of curds from the turned milk. They are pressed down tight and preserved in cakes called metton, and not even close to edible at this stage in the production of Cancoillotte. They are ripened even further until they are ready to use.

When it is time to mix the Cancoillotte, the curds are steadily melted with water or bouillon and butter to obtain a fondue-like homogeneous product, which is then fortified by a local white wine and any number of additions, herbs, garlic, shallots, kirsch, nuts, ham or just plain served forth, hot, warm, or cold. It maintains its homogeneous consistency when cooled, although it becomes slightly gelatinous and makes a great spread on toast. The flavors of the fermentation are more pronounced when it is eaten warm.

Cancoillotte mixing falls within the domain of the local fromager, who might have his or her own house mix, making it a specialty, so depending on where you go, the qualities and flavors of this cheese will vary.

An industrial production of this cheese was introduced in the early 20th century by using sterilization and canning methods. It was first used as soldier rations during the first world war, and you can find industrial versions of it outside the region today. Although canned production was stopped in 2002, you can find the factory versions of it in grocery stores in plastic pots alongside the cheese-like products. The real Cancoillotte remains artisanal and stays within the local region, and has nothing to do with the chemically preserved, starched thickened, homogenizing agent laden gluey product we find at the grocery store.

I can definitively say that this cheese is worth a cheese pilgrammage.

Don't be afraid by the metton cakes so full frontally mentioned above. Cancoillotte, once the preparation is complete, has a light and creamy flavor, and can seem quite mild and ethereal. The flavor is dreamy and creamy and it seems like it must be very fattening. But because of its buttermilk origins, this cheese is lower in fat than many other cheeses. It is great eaten plain tartined on bread, and some cooks use it in preparations like stuffings or as the base of a sauce over meats, with regional sausage, or eat it with potatoes.

When taking a day trip from Lyon into the Alps or Jura mountain ranges, keep you eye out for Cancoillotte, also known as : cancoillote, canquoillote, canquoillotte, or camoillotte.

Griottes - Early in the Season Yet

These are griottes, a sour cherry used a lot in preserves, sauces, and chutneys for sucré-salé dishes, dishes that incorporate staid savory flavors and textures with sweet accompaniments. When combined together with just the proper level of restraint, the complimentary qualities can really heighten the enjoyment of a dish.

There are many classic combinations to choose from should you decide to try a sucré-salé dish at home.

Postcard From Lyon

A Gift for the Green Walnut Lady

Before we went to the market this morning

Every weekend for months now I have been meaning to drop off a bottle of vin de noix with the lady who supplied me with the nuts last year. Throughout the year she sells a variety of things from her farm in Grenoble, but her principle specialty is walnuts, they must have a large orchard of walnut trees. Mushrooms in the fall, dried nuts offered throughout the winter, various veggies coming from her garden, always asparagus in the spring.

I inquired once in the past with a man who sometimes used to work her stand about getting some green ones, and he gruffly turned me away, but it was because he didn't get it. Last year in passing I noticed that this woman had a bunch of green walnuts back behind the table in a bucket, and she was a bit taken aback when I asked oh please could I buy some. She was a bit surprised that I make vin de noix, maybe because of my accent.

I was very glad to have found them without any effort whatsoever. In years past I have gone to great effort to get the green nuts and people always made a big deal about making me meet them at some particular place or come and pick up the order under constraining circumstances. Last year's vin de noix was made with this lady's walnuts, the ones that serendipitously fell into my lap.

Next Sunday is the festival of St. Jean, which is also the day that traditionally people pick the green walnuts in Grenoble. I have been told this by several producers over the years, and I am not exactly sure why they always choose this particular weekend, except that it's always around the beginning of summer. The Festival of St. Jean always falls on the third Sunday of June. The vin de noix is an extra that comes from these green nuts.

The festival itself has its roots in the pagan celebrations surrounding the summer solstice, but in the time of Clovis, our dear Burgundian newly converted king, the pagan festivals became the festival of St. Jean the Baptist. Many a festivity takes place on this day, especially in this region, where Clovis followed his bride the Burgundian princess Clothilde into Roman Catholicism. From a more local perspective, there is also the neighborhood in the 5th arrondissement of Lyon called St. Jean, named after the cathedral there, and they always have big parties involving lots of merrymaking the third weekend of June.

This morning I put my name, address and phone number on a card and tied it to the bottle with some red string that Callan gave me before she moved to New York. I thought it would be better than just giving the lady the unmarked bottle. That's fine for friends and family, but since I am merely a a familiar face to her, I thought it might be better to idenitfy myself with the gift and let her rest assured I wasn't some kind of crazy. Loic of course thought I was being silly even for giving her a bottle to begin with, since she is not someone we socialize with. But I had been meaning to do this since winter and every time I always forgot to take a bottle with me on the way out the door to market.

Today at the market, we went to her stand where she had some cherries out, and I presented her with the wine. I told her that last year the batch had turned out particularly well, and I wanted her to have a taste of the product of her own nuts. It was such a nice moment between us, and she promised to bring me more nuts next Sunday. Loic was amazed and mused aloud on our way home, wondering why she seemed so incredibly happy to have received the bottle of vin de noix from me, in fact more incredibly happy than anyone he had ever seen at receiving a bottle of one of our home made fortified wines, ever.

I explained to him that when you show to a producer that they mean something in your life, that their product is a part of your family tradition, and show to them that you appreciate their product and come to know them through connections like this, it warms their heart. A lot.

So you know what we'll be doing next Sunday. If you want to make Vin de Noix this year, here are two recipes from my kitchen notebook, one for a liqueur, and one for a lighter aperitif drink.

Postcard from Lunch with Fran

Fran came down for lunch. She wore white and I wore black.
Lunch was omelettes containing the chopped up leftover stuffed mushrooms.
Celery root salad.
Cheese.
Dessert.

Burgundy, Part I

One idea ....

Burgundy. The Bourgogone. I used to think of heavy overly wine-laden rich floured sauces that put people to sleep. I used to think of this region as a good place to have a large bulbous glass of either wan and sugary stuff, or heavy earthy wine closed up secret and tight like a monk would encase the bones of a saint. The good ones teased me with a promise of heavenly bliss years down the line. I always had a feeling of a bit of remorse and dread that I could not ever afford to buy it once its flavors had opened up and its character had reached full majestic maturity (this was before we had the cave of course, now at least we can hope...). I believed that Burgundy was a place to have a gargantuan ladle of meaty stew, to drink young robust wine before its time and to lie down and take a nice long nap, but I was wrong.


If you do make Lyon home base for a gastronomic discovery tour, a day trip to the Burgundy is completely do-able and actually a wonderful idea. There are things to find there that depart completely from anything you'll find in in this city. One hour's drive north can take you to the heart of it. Burgundy of course would never claim to be a part of Lyon, although you might find some restaurants in the more touristy areas that feature their interpretations of Lyonnais specialties. There are other things to look for in the Bourgogne.

When I think of the English word Burgundian, history professors' lectures still linger. Of course my imagination ran wild as tales were recounted. Images marched rote through my mind in mnemonic detail on timelines. Now they are like flashbacks: Medieval armor clad knights jousting. Battles with Huns, Roman conquests, and landscapes ravaged by war and betrayal. Joan of Arc was kidnapped by the Burgundians and sold to the English to be burned at the stake. Did you know that? Thick short towers constructed in the dark ages, viciously defended by Cisterian monks and the intrigue behind little spy holes in six foot thick stone walls. Moats and draw bridges. Big breasted wet nurses lined up along their beds of hay while the mothers lined up with their own swelling bosoms along banquet tables creaking with gluttonous feasts hosted by the hordes of megalomen ready to swear their oath and take power, or die. And well of course, the cheese. But that came later. Lord, Please forgive me for my indulgences in Burgundian cheeses. Well, At least I won't get osteoporosis.

The land of Bourgogne has in fact been divided, conquored, traded, given up, fought for, granted as gifts by kid Charlemagne, sectioned off, sold, raped, tunneled through by force of the sword, and been host to long periods of mayhem and slaughter. It is a land that has been defended by its men, women, and children to the very tooth. It still is.

Aside from its land having been a geographically strategic buffer between warring factions and capitals in times of shifting boundaries and conquests, the Bourgogne in essence is the epicenter of the creation of French identity. In Burgundy the land has always been of infinite importance. The terroir. You can see this pride in Burgundian eyes today.

In the 21st century, when you go and breathe the air there and take a look around, the shadows and time lines and not so mysterious gratuitous violence in the history of this region is swept away on an early summer breeze. The historical matrix is filled out with a whole new spectrum of lightness, color, lyme and mineral rich steppes. Telling you what makes Burgundy different from the rest and how I think it does interact with Lyon may inspire you to give some real Burgundian cooking a try once you get back. It might make you think a little bit more about the wine, especially the whites, which can be surprising and beautiful.

You have to ask why so much precious stereotype has been dismissively penned over and over about the gastronomy of Burgundy region and why they can't seem to get much further than you know, those dishes. Is it that the people who wrote about didn't actually go there to write about it, or did they only speak from the voice of distant memory? Were they working on a huge work that was tiring them and in a hurry to get on down past through and to the next Michelin starred restaurant where they might be coddled and felt more appreciated and less - defended against? I haven't figured it out yet. But it won't stop me from giving Burgundy a try this summer.

In terms of research material, In French, there are a few interesting tomes that record old original cooking from the region in the ancient collections reading room at the municipal library here. I will get some inspiration from them, but the real discovery this summer will come from actual kitchens there. Hopefully I will have a chance to absorb the stories that normally hover like halos around people cooking in them.

My approach will begin with the wine and as I discover dishes that use that kind of wine, I'll ask the women who prepare them in their kitchens to show me how its done in their homes. This is the only way, really.

Next article, The White Burgundy Wines (don't worry, the food and recipes will come!)

Auvergne's Magic, Strawberries & Champagne

Photo by Lisa Annenberg, Mother of the Bride

Yesterday Loic opened the jam called Strawberry and Champagne. This prompts me to tell about who gave us the jam, and why the jar Loic opened is fitting.

Alison, my second of 8 nieces, came to France after graduating from the university with her diploma in Classical Dance and also Arts Management. She came here for dancing at the National Conservatory and teaching and learning the language. Her teaching position was placed in the Auvergne, it was to be her home base.

After the audition which basically consists of a master class,
and before she met Tom.

Anyway, Alison's job and dancing in Auvergne gave me a pretty good excuse to go out and do some research into the traditional regional cooking of a region that had me in a constant state of fascination. One typical dish, for example is the stuffed cabbage soup that originates there. I have had discussions also with chefs here in Lyon who come from the Auvergne. One striking fact is they all independently tell me without pause that the Auvergnat culinary heritage is rich precisely because it has its roots in poverty.

Being broke, as we all know, is one of the most difficult things to have to endure, and it's funny that some of the best tasting and most powerfully touching country dishes in the Auvergne were developed and transmitted through the region in times when poverty was the moving factor in creating them. Things are of course very different now, and the Auvergne of today is much more affluent. Now there are remnants: symbols, some traditions which have been embellished for touristic reasons, and icons of a certain style that existed at another time, now markers of places where one must dig deeper and send out feelers for the stories and peoples traditions that once created the food there.

Clermont Ferrand.

Imagine you go to a place and it strikes you because there is a very old emotion circulating around and through everything. For me, being in the Auvergne is like being in the back yard among a whole lot of towering trees in autumn with a rake. You get lots of leaves some pretty and colorful and some faded and grey. You rake up a big pile of them and then you lie down in the pile if only to rest, and take one in your fingers by the stem and hold it up to the sun. The veins in each leaf are like treasure maps to images and stories of that region to me. The richness of the culinary tradition is central to all of it because it is what has always brought communities and families together. There seems to be a collective memory of something tragic but also shared and joyous and a feeling that resides in your throat threatening to sweep you up that settles in when you enter certain places, something I cannot explain, and this region is one of them. It can come out in words with some coaxing and early morning channeling, I am sure of it.

The dirt there sparkles because of the volcanic soil so when you are dirty and tired you glow and sparkle. (do you remember, Alison?) There are a number of very special cheeses that are local to the region and many recipes I have collected and researched have been put in my kitchen notebook. They find their way to our table time and again. I hope that one day in America these cheeses will be available to everyone and not just the rich and glamorously connected. I still have much to discover there.

Tom is a person I admire a whole lot. I can see that his mind turns carefully and thoroughly as he takes in the significance of activities and subjects of conversation, and like my father, who was a remarkable man, Tom reflects about what he wants to say before he speaks. Tom knows how to verbally encapsulate an idea extremely well. This is a good quality in a man, and he may not realize it now, but a central quality to a leader. His symbolic gestures are profound as well, for example, we had a discussion one afternoon when he was but a mere acquaintance to Alison, and a week later, in the mailbox, Alison's aunt Lucy received an interesting book to read on the same subject that enriched not only my knowledge of the topic we had touched upon but took my esteem for him up a notch.

Tom is good for Alison and I felt that fact in my bones even before she told me that she had fallen in love with him (I was not the first to know, her mother knew already). Tom is also a man who knows how to compliment a woman's cooking, even a first attempt at Sticky Toffee Pudding which for me was a stab in the dark in which I incorporated Molasses and he didn't bat an eye. He appreciates soft yolks coddled in egg coddlers and passes the whites to his friends, which tells me he will well fit in to the clan, especially that side where my father comes from. My feelings stayed strong and I felt unequivocal joy much later when the news came that he proclaimed she was the love of his life and had proposed marriage to her. I told her at one point, I think in general about men that she had to have not a single doubt in her heart, not one doubt. And she didn't with Tom.

I wanted to do something special for them to celebrate. I wanted to make a dinner party sized croquembouche, which is a traditional French wedding pastry served like a wedding cake and more a pagan fertility rite more than elegantly French - of pastry creme filled profiteroles and held together with caramel with its own history and symbol all mixed in. But then as usual events went this way and that and I began flipping through one of David Lebovitz's now classic dessert cookbooks, you know the one Ripe for Dessert, a very good one, actually one of my favorites. I looked at the sky, was it was clear blue and had been all day, felt my thumb for any sign of stiffness, and feeling none, I decided that David's idea of meringue nests with chantilly and strawberries in a very special sauce (listed in his easy desserts section in that book) would be just the thing. We went out for an apero at a sidewalk cafe while the nests crispened in the oven.

I always do a few extras to ensure I have at least enough in tact to serve.

Not being a person particularly adept with pastry, I appreciate David's encouraging note that I don't have to pipe the meringue from a pastry cone like a professional although this is an option. I can plump up little nests like the ones the birds make, created with a spoon and with love.

I chose the recipe too because it was an opportunity to use our instant chantilly pumper, which is amusing to newlyweds and I just love the thing. The kind you insert a cannister of gas into and pump out the foamed sweetened cream as a kind of way of making instant bliss, just the kinds newlyweds appreciate. (David doesn't say to use this contraption in the recipe, it's just something I use when I can). And the strawberries, which needed no searching for. We served the dessert with champagne, of course.

When we were at the table and having fun each feathering our nests with chantilly and strawberries in sauce in our own style I mentioned that this was like a Pavlova, and Alison being a dancer, it was a nice light touch to the end of their weekend of gluttony in Lyon.

Tom delicately noted said that his mother does a sublime Pavlova. What he didn't say was that his mother's Pavlova (with which these nest have no comparison to) is that one day Alison must go and spend some time in Sue's kitchen with her own kitchen notebook (which I gave her as a wedding present) in hand and get that Pavlova recipe, because it is something very special to Tom and to his family.

They will be having a big party at home in America to celebrate next summer. That is going to be one big serious party. Congratulations, Alison and Tom Gardiner. I am glad you finally made the formal announcement to everyone. And you are a pair of complementary personalities that I just know will help each other to flourish as you tend to each others' spirits together throughout each others long and fruitful lives.


Come and see us soon again. And bring jam.

The Secret Stash

Between 5 and 7 in the morning, I write. This is something that many find to be a terrible gaspillage of sleep, but in fact I find the aube glow just before the street cleaners begin making their rounds and the birds waking to be perfect for me to think. In the center of the city a quiet and comforting feeling has descended on everything. Things seem actually countrysidelike and my mind is clearest even before coffee, which I have after I have spent my 2 productive personal hours.

Sissy, who is my entirely spoiled kitty born in Beijing, eats rabbit Whiskas senior in sauce from a secondhand limoge teacup and then settles on the arm of the couch to raise her nose to sniff the breeze coming in over the window boxes through the open window, and watch me, or perhaps try to telepathically tell me to give her more rabbit.

Loic came out seeking breakfast sometime between 6 and 7 and while I had his toast heating, I realized there was nothing sweet to spread. I had given him the last dollop of last summer's Mirabelle Jam last night on yogurt for dessert, and the cherry butter was finished. I began rooting around on the shelves turning out various half used jars of savory apero spreads in our embarrassingly cluttered refrigerator, nothing for Loic's sweet tooth. I mentioned that I might have to make him some cinnamon toast and he said - Lucy, don't worry.

He went knowingly over to the old cabinet where we keep special things like delicacies we are saving and liqueurs and things like special teas we have received as gifts, and he reached directly his full arm all the way into the back like he knew exactly where a treasure was hidden. He brought out the oblong box that kind of looked like a box you might receive jewels in. He paused for a moment, as if he was contemplating something.

I didn't realize at first what it was, because it had been ferreted away within minutes after we received it as a gift from Alison and her new husband visiting from London, and then he raised the top off of the box, a bit like he raises the top off the box containing a set of silver knives we have. He was kneeling before the cabinet and opened the box and fitted the rich thick creamy forest green colored cotton rag paper coated lid carefully underneath it.

That was when I saw the two blank spots, the missing jars. Two of the four small gourmet jars of special English jam had already been eaten. Without my knowledge. I had never even seen them opened or even had a taste of them or seen them empty. He had discreetly devoured them and gotten rid of the evidence.

He held the box without even looking in my direction, kind of cute kneeling before the cabinet like a kid in his pyjamas anyway. He had a little smile on his face because he knew I was going to forgive him. He made his choice carefully after scratching his chin and then his cheek, something he does when deciding, and removed yet another jar of jam from its custom moulded slot. He closed the box back and smoothed his fingers over the top of the box as if caressing it. He replaced it back into the very back of the cabinet again. I wasn't suprised at what had just occurred. Amused because it is not like him to keep secrets. Touched that he confessed in this silent way, just showing me.

La Fête des Mères

Today is Mother's day in France, and if there's one thing my French family knows how to do is to take advantage of the chance to faire la fête. All the mothers came from near and far and had a weekend at you know where. Four generations were together today.

The fathers pitched in while the mothers, grandmothers, and great-grandmothers
relaxed and basked in mid-day sun out near the elms.

Aude and Seb decided a few weeks ago to have another baby so now there's one on the way. Isn't that nice? The noontime meal preparations hummed in the little kitchen where Brigitte set her champagne aside and quickly prepared her cod and shrimp curry.

Awen's making a place in her garden for another little brother or sister.
Even favorite tanties got their kisses in.

All of the mothers got flowers and presents. It was a lovely party with lots of smiles and laughter.

La Tropézienne was my favorite dessert. I took all of the vanilla beans that were topping all of the dessserts and tied them in a knot to go into the sugar jar.

The Optomistic Salad

Recently friend Mimi spoke of her everything but the kitchen sink salads and somehow she managed to create a conduit in my mind. You know, just a thought, about something that everybody does or has or is, a snapshot, but still something that hits. Mimi's salad last month somehow slithered in like a probe and found the route to where the essential thoughts wait. Now there is a path that I walk down these days, kind of like the path to the swimming hole. A place to take a dip, to think about and develop perhaps a character that does their thinking there.

Last year, Mimi sent me some American Spoon Cherry Butter made by nice folks out in Michigan. I am not from Michigan and have no memory or experience with Montmonrency cherries, or this traditional Michigan favorite. But retrieving the package through the post and coming back to the house and seeing her handwriting and taking this foreign vessel of sweet breakfast spread into my palm recalled annother time. Even the jar seemed strange in its classic American simplicity. While I stood near the fireplace in the midst of ancient boiserie surrounded by a French tune on the radio sung swiftly and tersely along precise hexagonal metre, I felt extremely and at once very far far away.

The jar was glowing with something so simple and so strongly home it amazed me. I did what I normally do in these circumstances. When we were in L A California, real unpastrurized properly aged very simple cheese like camembert could only be had in the city from a boutique on Beverly Drive. At the time it was plain that Camembert was not really a common thing there, but an icon, which was a sad thing for Loic, because to him it was the simple homely thing he had fixed in his mind.

We were completely out of place on Beverly Drive, but we went there because this shop's specialty was cheese. We closed our eyes and bought the common Camembert which at the time would have cost pocket change within its proper context, but which featured a markup of approximately 17 times its normal retail price. We paid, because it was important. And Loic held it in his palm. Precisely the way I was holding the curious jar containing America that came from Mimi last summer.

A razor thin shaving of camembert goes a long way. And a couteau à tartiner has scraped ever so gently across the top surface of Michigan cherry butter so many times I cannot count now, and then it is spread completely, turning the knife first one way and then the next until the knife is clean. How I relish the process.

My choice to eat fast food the other day

Two weeks ago, after a routine mammogram which progressed quite quickly to other frightening imaging techniques which came as a bad surprise and then to a biopsy between results in which I cried myself to sleep, made love to my husband as if it was our last chance to continue humankind, rethought my entire life plan, and gave some serious thought into career decisions, I had a bad craving.

It was a nasty, awful, take out, craving for a fast food chicken sandwich. Why? I hadn’t touched those fast food things forever. The day after my biopsy last week I entered a McDo for the first time in a good seven years, ordered specifically this sandwich, this particular sandwich, ate it on a park bench, and in between bites let memories flood into my mind.

James Street. Mama. Exit 45 on route 81 on the way to the yacht club, only with Mama, because my father would never agree. Burger King (does not exist in France) Chicken sandwiches would only do. How we looked smiled into each others eyes as we devoured them.

Willie came home. I knew, and I didn’t know because between us it was too difficult to take and impossible for him to tell. He had AIDS, at the time when people didn’t have a chance to live very long, he was going to die, which he did within a rather short time, something he never told me he was going to do but which I was aware was going to happen, and when I wrapped a silk scarf around my hair to keep it calm, I pushed the button to cause the 1968 Chevrolet Impala roof to ceremoniously raise itself and back and fold like self satisfied arms behind us. The convertible cruised round coners through the east side, and he popped the tape into the system he’d made for me in NYC. I guided that loose steering wheel along the streets of our home town - through it and along and we wound the black and silver two toned Impala round corners through the projects here now and there.
We ordered drive-through on Erie to go and took our prepared bag full of rebellion with fries complete and so very bad for him, although he wanted it, and parked at the Thornden water tower where lovers go and unwrapped them and looked into each others eyes like me and my mom and we never let any kind of remorse rule us. We laughed although he wasn’t normally allowed to eat these things at this time, we laughed about how it was perfect, loved it and loved our friendship like never before. I wanted him to talk some and mention it but he could not so I didn’t push but I took pictures it being afternoon and directed him to lean against the wall like the first ones I took for his fashion portfolio. We didn’t talk about Marthas Vinyard but we kissed, like first love because we knew that maybe it would never happen again and our friendship as children had been long and rich.

Willie never said goodbye. His health deterioriated soon afterward and he never had a chance to contact me during the time when people come by the bedside. I only knew from his father through my sister who was a nurse who talked to him.

The results came back from my test and it was benign. The sandwich comforted me although I suspect the strange food craving was related to memories of Willie and also the confort that came with my mother indulging me so.