Polenta, artichokes, chard

Eastside Road, February 7, 2011—

DINNER IN TOWN with friends tonight — their house, not out somewhere. And it's amazing how you can live three quarters of a century, eating dinner almost every day, and still find something new. Tonight it was a simple dish combining chard, artichokes, and polenta, with a little grated Parmesan cheese on top. The vegetables complement one another perfectly; and since we had barely-cooked broccoli on the side the taste and texture of vegetables was accentuated that much the more, with just enough cheese to highlight the meal. Absolutely delicious, and no green salad required, thank you.

And dessert! sliced oranges, dressed with orange and lemon juice, and a little lemon zest, and a tiny bit of sugar, and left to stand. And, with them, wonderful shortbread cookies that Becky said were a recipe of Carol Field's; Google "carol field shortbread cookie" and you'll get a number of possibilities.

Dinner with friends, sharing thoughts of other friends, appreciating flavors from so many yet others — there's no higher human activity.

Cheap Pinot grigio; Cheap Nero d'Avola; delicious Zinfandel, Alvey-Sinclair, Dry Creek Valley 2008

Sole meuniere; goose liver

Eastside Road, February 6, 2011—

WE USUALLY TRY TO REMEMBER to buy fish when we're down in Berkeley; Monterey Fish is so dependable. Today we had sole meuniere, the simplest possible thing: you dredge the fillets in a little flour, salt and pepper them, then fry them in butter with a little lemon juice squoze in. In fact it should be a proper
beurre noir, but no one's looking over our shoulders here.

With them, some nice chard from the garden — a curious paesano variety of chard whose name I disremember. In fact I disremembered the chard itself; it's been thriving away, a fine thickly-leaved plant feeding any number of leaf miners and quail; but it's generous enough to give us a few leaves when we think of them.

Before dinner, L. eyed me and said I think you should cook that goose liver now. Right now, I asked. Right now, she said. So I put a piece of butter in my favorite little enameled skillet, darkened it up, and threw in the liver, salting and peppering it; turned it once, turned it again, splashed in some brandy, and soaked up the remains of the butter on a slice of bread. Delicious! Green salad, of course.

Cheap Pinot grigio

Summer cassoulet…

Mill Valley, February 5, 2011—

…AND SOME ARE NOT, as the old play on words goes. Cassoulet's much on our minds these days; I parted out a goose the other day and rendered its fat, but we're still weeks off from the event.

But today we went to a lunch birthday party for a friend, and what should be on the menu but "summer cassoulet."


The weather certainly cooperated; never has February been so balmy under Marian's trees. We sat outside in the shade in shirtsleeves drinking white wine, lingering, before finally, almost grudgingly, moving inside to a delicious dish.

Was it really cassoulet? Well, if you're a purist, no, but I liked it enough to have a second helping. Flageolets, chicken, sausage, lemon zest, thyme, scallions I think a very pleasant combination. Green salad after; and then the birthday cake, a chocolate cheesecake, a pot of crème caramel alongside. Thanks, Marian; a delicious afternoon!

Sauvignon blanc, Guenoc, 2009; Malbec, Viu Manent (Chile), 2009 (a delicious, serious, fruity wine)

Chili (reprise)

Eastside Road, February 4, 2011—

TONIGHT THERE'S A LITTLE more time, so I take the trouble to consult the Wikipedia entry. Absolutely fascinating, of course. In the first place, as I should have remembered, the name of the dish is Chile con carne; "Chili with beans" is a poor approximation. (As to the distinction between chili-with-an-"i" and chile-with-an-"e", well, there'll never be enough time for that.)

Chili, or chile, is clearly a complex dish with as controversial a definition and history as, for example, cassoulet, which I've also been thinking a lot about recently. Perhaps if one made a chili as carefully and thoughtfully as we, for example, make cassoulet, when we do, then the chili would turn out to be as deep and rewarding as a cassoulet. Apparently the ur-chili consisted of beef and chile peppers. As Wikipedia says,

Chili was first invented by the Spanish Canary Islanders, in the city of San Antonio, Texas, which they founded. The recipe used for American expeditions consisted of dried beef, suet, dried chili peppers (usually chilipiquenes), and salt, which were pounded together and left to dry into bricks, which could then be boiled in pots on the trail.

Clearly much would depend on the nature of the beef, the suet, and the peppers. Lyndon Johnson's favoring venison over today's beef makes a good deal of sense: corn-based feedlots have little to do with chile con carne. (Again, the reference is owed to Wikipedia.)

I think it's partly the pervasive appearance of much debased versions of chili [con carne] [with beans], and partly the (perhaps therefore) less settled agreement, even among factions, as to what the dish authentically really is, that I'm reluctant to award it Hundred Plates status. Clearly Meat And Beans is one of the Hundred, but that's far too general a statement to be admitted as either Principle or Policy. So I'll just dodge it for the moment.

Whatever, we finished it tonight, and it was a little better than last night, which is to be expected. Before it, the last of yesterday's guacamole (which L. decided is, in fact, one of the Hundred Plates). After it, green salad.

Syrah, Lagranja 360, Cariñena, 2009

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By the way, I've posted photos of night-before-last's dinner at Alice's online here.

Chili and beans

Eastside Road, February 3, 2011—

I' M NOT GOING TO look it up; someone else can do that; there's a limit to my intellectual curiosity after binge-eating as I just did. Thing is, we had friends over to eat chile and beans; I made a batch of guacamole to warm up with, then a couple of bowls of that delicious chili; green salad of course (I should make a keyboard shortcut for that phrase), and Lindsey's old-favorite bananas-cinnamon-sugar-and-whipped-cream for dessert. So I'm pretty well slowed down at the moment.

But I do wonder: why was the phrase always "chili and beans" in my childhood? Does the dish chili not automatically include beans? Can there be a standalone chili innocent of beans? If so, what sort of carbohydrate is involved?

In her mania to continue emptying our stores L. found some corn meal in a corner of the icebox, just enough to make some cornbread to have with tonight's chili. Now that's inspired, that combination; Chili and beans is already one of the Hundred Plates, and the cornbread is frosting, to mix up a bad metaphor, on the cake.

Monasterell, Albero, Jumilla (Spain), 2009; Malbec, Doña Paula "Los Cardos, Mendoza (Argentina), 2009

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OH: AND BREAKFAST today at Alice's, truffled scrambled eggs and a little green salad, and with it a surprise. You think you've run into about every possible wonderful combination, and then something new comes along. This was simplicity itself: toasted bread, drizzled with good olive oil, then spread with — Seville-orange marmalade! It sounded improbable when first mooted, but oh boy is this a delicious combination.

Dinner at Alice's

Berkeley, February 2, 2011—

HERE WE ARE back down in Berkeley for the night, having dinner with an old friend. Fortunately, she's both a good cook and a good marketer. We started with a celery-root soup laced with truffled olive oil, went on to potato ravioli with artichokes à la grècque, then moved to rockfish grilled in the fireplace, served with carrots and little turnips,


a bit of cress lending further interest.

The final dish was perfect: a balance of flesh and vegetables, each flavor distinct yet contributing to an integrated final effect.


Simple, honest, authentic, and done while you watched (though the mise en place was instrumental, no doubt about it).

The requisite green salad was served under the fish, not afterward. Stroke of genius.

Other photos from this dinner can be seen here.

white wine, "Madame Preston", Preston of Dry Creek, 2009; Vaucluse, Le Pigeolet, 2008

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Eastside Road, February 1, 2011—

WELL, NOT EVERY day. Here it is, Tuesday again: a couple of cappuccinos, a handful of nuts. But I realize I forgot something yesterday: dessert.

Lindsey found a little bit of puffpaste dough in the freezer, and a couple of our Sierra Beauties were left from the fall harvest, so she whipped up a small tart. It was delicious late last night, and I'm going to bed hungry tonight thinking of it.