Artichokes

Eastside Road, May 2, 2013—

HOW EASILY WE forget: but then, when we're in one place, we're no longer in the other…

For two weeks in January, in Rome, I had artichokes nearly every day. I thought I'd never forget those wonderful artichokes, and could hardly wait to get home to our own.

Then came nearly a month in Spain and Portugal, and the new obsession was bacalhao. All thoughts of artichokes completely disappeared. When we got home, the artichoke plants looked like foreign objects, imposing but a little weird, and certainly demanding.

Today we had the first three of them, one violet, two globes. I simply cut them in half lengthwise after trimming them, rubbed them with lemon juice, and simmered them in salted water to cover, with the halved lemon keeping them company.

Lindsey added a bit of lemon juice to some mayonnaise — she buys it in tubes when we're in The Netherlands, Zaanse mayonnaise, very nice stuff. And that was that. Next time, in a couple of days, we'll have a few small ones, probably browned with garlic in olive oil. Close to alla giudia, perhaps.

Also on tonight's menu: delicious white bean and tuna and onion salad, and then the green salad, with lemon juice rather than the usual vinegar in the vinaigrette. And a bowl of applesauce, because we've got to start emptying the Mason jars, looks like a good fruit set again this year…

Cheap Pinot grigio