Chocolate Cake with Rhubarb-Strawberry Compote + Crème Fraîche Cream

Swan

Did you see it, drifting, all night on the black river?
Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air,
an armful of white blossoms,
a perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned
into the bondage of its wings: a snowbank, a bank of lilies,
biting the air with its black beak?
Did you hear it, fluting and whistling
a shrill dark music, like the rain pelting trees,
like a waterfall
knifing down the black ledges?
And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds–
a white cross streaming across the sky, its feet
like black leaves, its wings like the stretching light
of the river?
And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything?
And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for?
And have you changed your life?

–Mary Oliver

“You cannot be really first-rate at your work if your work is all you are.

So I suppose the best piece of advice I could give anyone is pretty simple: get a life. A real life, not a manic pursuit of the next promotion, the bigger paycheck, the larger house. Do you think you’d care so very much about those things if you developed an aneurysm one afternoon, or found a lump in your breast while in the shower?

Get a life in which you notice the smell of salt water pushing itself on a breeze over the dunes, a life in which you stop and watch how a red-tailed hawk circles over a pond and a stand of pines. Get a life in which you pay attention to the baby as she scowls with concentration when she tries to pick up a Cheerio with her thumb and first finger.

Turn off your cell phone. Turn off your regular phone, for that matter. Keep still. Be present.

Get a life in which you are not alone. Find people you love, and who love you. And remember that love is not leisure, it is work.

Get a life in which you are generous. Look around at the azaleas making fuchsia star bursts in spring; look at a full moon hanging silver in a black sky on a cold night. And realize that life is glorious, and that you have no business taking it for granted.

It is so easy to waste our lives: our days, our hours, our minutes. It is so easy to take for granted the pale new growth on an evergreen, the sheen of the limestone on Fifth Avenue, the color of our kids’ eyes, the way the melody in a symphony rises and falls and disappears and rises again. It is so easy to exist instead of live. Unless you know there is a clock ticking.

Inspiration

I am tired of the tundra of the mind,
where a few shabby thoughts hunker
around a shabby fire. All day from my window
I watch girls and boys hanging out
in the dark arcades of desire.

Tonight, everything is strict with cold,
the houses closed, the ice botched by skaters.
I am tired of saying things about the world,
and yet, sometimes, these streets are so
slick and bold they remind me of the wet

zinc bar at the Café Marseilles, and suddenly the sea
is green and lust is everywhere in a red cravat, Read more »

Baked Caramelized Apple + Pear French Toast

The expired weeks since Christmas have stretched long–a barrage of travel and too many nights that lasted until morning. I will unravel the contents of those weeks some time, but not yet. For now, I just want to remember the holiday we spent in France, with family that will soon officially be my family.

The details of so many fêted meals blur together now, but I can tell you that there was foie gras d’oie, served alongside heady-sweet, wine-poached figs. It was an especially good year for figs in the garden. Comme d’habitude, the whole roast goose traveled no farther than the farm down the road, its rearer a family friend. Read more »

Tipsy Apple-Parsnip Cake with Sultanas and Cider Glaze + A Food Rant

I oscillated hour to hour on whether or not to post this essay here–it is not the kind of writing I normally share in this space. Regular readers will know how much I care about whole foods, and that the farmers market is an essential facet of my cooking life, but I do not usually bring policy into the conversation.

Ultimately, I am posting this because I think the issues at hand are more important than my fears you won’t like what I have to say.

I recently spent a few days with a group of people who could not think more differently than me when it comes to food. After that experience, I needed a way to vent my frustrations, collect my thoughts, and clarify my views. If you already agree with what I write below, excellent. If you agree and are looking for a way to broach the subject with the people in your life who disagree or simply don’t know, I hope this essay aids that conversation. If you think I am totally full of cow manure, well, we are just going to have to agree to disagree. Either way, if you would rather simply read about a happy-go-lucky, apple-parsnip cake laced with rummy raisins and warming spices, click here to jump ahead. Read more »

Vanilla Caramel-Apple Cider Ice Cream Pie

I know it’s technically fall now. I see the apples at the market. I see the squash. I’m not impervious to the presence of root vegetables. I recognize the glorification of fall in every mention of a pumpkin-based coffee drink. But here’s the thing–I’m not quite ready to give up on summer just yet. I am still enjoying sun golds, even if their flavor has dulled these past few weeks, if I can find them at all. And so this ice cream pie is my compromise, my concession. It includes basically all of the prime fall flavors: apple cider, maple syrup, nutmeg, cinnamon, toasty nuts, and deep vanilla. But, it’s ice cream. It’s a total mess in all the best possible ways, and calls to be eaten right away. Read more »

Fig and Hazelnut Muffins

I recently purchased David Tanis’s book, A Platter of Figs. In the introduction, he talks about the idea of understanding the seasons, really understanding them, so that you always get the best out of whatever garden-grown thing you’re bringing into the kitchen.

“Do you really need a recipe for a platter of figs?” he asks. “No. Is that the point? Yes. Does it have to be more complicated than that? Not really. Yet to serve the figs you need to know about ripeness and seasonality — the seasons of the garden — and you need to know your figs. By this I mean, are they sun-ripened and bursting with jammy sweetness? Are they succulent enough to eat as is, or do they want a sprinkling of salt, a drizzle of good olive oil, perhaps a thin slice of prosciutto? A dab of fresh ricotta and honey to heighten the flavor? Or should you roast the figs with onions and thyme and serve them warm with rare-grilled duck breasts?

The platter of figs perfectly illustrates the idea of eating with the seasons. Read more »

Goat Milk Yogurt Panna Cotta with Vanilla-Plum Compote + Coconut Panna Cotta with Mango Puree

I’ve always loved, loved, loved panna cotta–really, any super creamy dessert has my vote–but I’d never considered making it at home before. (Erroneously, it transpires), I had visions of sloshing water baths, scary-complicated gelatin packs, and in-general technical difficulties floating around in my head.

Oh, how wonderful to be so, so wrong!

In actuality, panna cotta is dead simple to make. It’s perfect for your next dinner party/potluck/office party, because it needs to be made ahead of time and chilled anyway. It also looks and tastes like a million bucks, so your guests will leave your home/event/office with the impression that you are a dessert wizard/magical confection fairy. Not bad for ten minutes of active labor. Read more »

The Roaming Kitchen

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