Category Archives: beans

Millet, red lentil, and sweet potato dal and pumpkin ricotta flatbreads

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Millet dal and pumpkin flatbread

Millet dal and pumpkin flatbread

Yesterday around mid-morning, I spent ten minutes sitting on the couch in my pajamas, with Clio half-on/half-off my lap. I petted her velvety ears and watched people rush by in the rain. They seemed so busy and productive, and I could just imagine how the world smelled like rain to them, and how they felt icy drops trickling into their collars, and how their cars had that feverish chilled-but-warming feeling. And here I was, so toasty and still and unproductive. I felt like I was in a Basho poem. I thought of the quote from the Hagekure (and Ghost Dog!)

There is something to be learned from a rainstorm. When meeting with a sudden shower, you try not to get wet and run quickly along the road. By doing such things as passing under the eaves of houses, you still get wet. When you are resolved from the beginning, you will not be perplexed, though you will still get the same soaking. This understanding extends to all things.

I found that I didn’t feel quite so unproductive, because my mind was busy, and then I felt foolish for thinking that. Then I thought about writing about thinking about writing about sitting there. And then Clio said, “Man, you’re cramping my style. I’ve got some napping to be getting on with.” The mail came, but I didn’t bring it in because it’s only bills and advertisements. Then I went up to clean the bathroom, and thought about writing about that, but luckily for you I won’t do that. When I was little, I used to narrate my actions in my head in the third person. Not all the time, because that would be crazy! But often. “And then Claire sat on a bench in the middle of the room. She always got through with looking at paintings before everyone else. She did everything quickly. And now she sat and watched the people looking at the paintings…” And on an on it goes! I feel like I’ve been doing that again lately, because of The Ordinary. Not in third person now, so it’s slightly less eccentric. But when I cook, I’ll think about writing about it, and aboutexplaining how it’s done. And sometimes I’ll wake up in the middle of the night, and try to occupy my brain with whatever I might say on here the next day (explains a lot about the quality of the work, doesn’t it?) and I’ll find myself writing in my head. And, yes, this might seem crazy, but I think this is a good thing!!! I firmly believe that the more you write, the more you write. The more you think about writing, the more you’ll write, and hopefully it will become a habit. (This doesn’t guarantee good writing, mind you! It just makes it easier to get started.) I think this understanding extends to all things. The more you draw, the more you’ll draw. If you want to make movies, you should watch movies, talk about movies, take photographs, write movies, make shorts. The more you cook, the more you’ll think about cooking, and the more you’ll want to try new things and experiment with new ingredients, until you’ll get sick of it all and go out to dinner. If you want to make music, the more you listen to songs, and practice making music, and think about music, the more life will present itself to you as a song. Because even if writing and making movies and drawing aren’t important, which, arguably they’re not at all, I’d still like to go through life looking for things to write about (or sing about or draw pictures of.) Just as the actors that work with Jaques Tati started to see little comic pieces in everyday exchanges in the world around them, you’ll start to find that even small things are worth noticing and remembering and examining, which in some way makes life worth living.

And now I feel foolish for writing about writing, so let’s talk about this dal instead. It’s made with red lentils, millet and sweet potatoes, and it’s cooked for some time, which makes it dense and soft and porridgey. Red lentils are nice because they cook quickly, but if you cook them longer, as (I believe) Indian dals are cooked, they take on a whole different life. I added spinach and peas to pep things up and provide a little texture. And I used beautiful black cardamom pods, which are so smoky and sweet (but watch out for them when you eat the dal, you wouldn’t want to bite down on one!) I decided that cumin was too obvious in this dish, so I left it out in favor of other sweet and smoky spices, like cardamom, nigella seeds and smoked paprika. The flat breads were quick and easy to make – they have a little pumpkin puree and a little ricotta, which gives them a nice flavor and texture, and they were just crunchy enough to provide a pleasant contrast to the soft dal.

Here’s Station Showdown from the Yojimbo soundtrack, cause it’s all about the millet. Golly, this soundtrack is brilliant!

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Kale and black beans in curried pumpkin sauce with pumpkinseed-arugula pesto

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Kale, black bean and pumpkin stew

Kale, black bean and pumpkin stew

This meal reminds me of something I used to make back in my bachelorette days. Can of pumpkin purée, can of chickpeas, loads of broccoli. It was quick, easy, cheap and not very fattening at all. I

n those days, I used to walk around the city I lived in. I’d walk for hours, every day, no matter the weather, lost in thought. And as I walked I repeated the mantra, “mad as a hatter, thin as a dime, mad as a hatter, thin as a dime.”

This time of year, we always read a lot about diet tips and trends. I always want to yell out about my story, calling out like the over-eager kid in class. It’s not much of a story, really. At one point in my life I was really skinny, and I wasted a lot of time and energy thinking about getting skinnier. I wasted a lot of energy depriving myself of energy, really. I was obsessed with numbers on a scale, I felt good at losing weight – it was a skill I’d conquered, and one it was difficult to stop once I’d started. I felt as though I’d conquered hunger, as well. The longer you ignore it, the less frequently you feel it. For me it wasn’t about looking like Kate Moss, who hadn’t been invented yet, it was about a million other things. About being the most thin; about becoming less human, more ethereal, less heavy on the earth; about getting away with something; about worrying people; about scaring myself.

And the reason any of this is worth mentioning is that I’m not like that any more. I know that millions of women are, and some men, too, and I’d like to say that it’s possible to regain balance and perspective, to feel good about yourself. And, actually, to stop thinking about yourself so much, so that you’re free to think about other things. It helps to have help, of course, from parents and boyfriends and friends. But mostly you find the balance yourself, gradually, over days and weeks and years. You learn that the better you feel about yourself, the better you feel about yourself, and that being healthy feels better than being thin and having ulcers and stomach aches, and having your hands and feet turn blue when it’s cold, and getting dizzy if you walk too far. You learn that it feels good to be strong. You’ll allow yourself to take up some space on the earth. You learn that you can loosen the vice-like grip of your control on everything you eat and how often you exercise without really changing yourself all that much. You’ll learn that all of the control in the world can’t save you from things over which you will never have control – your body will change over time, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

But you’ll realize that we’re all in it together, all heading in the same direction, and pulled by the same gravity. (And then, maybe, you’ll have a couple of kids and your whole world will turn upside down forever!) You’ll learn about the pleasure of eating with other people, and eating like other people do. You’ll find a place that you’re comfortable with yourself, and you’ll see that everything goes in cycles – you’ll gain weight, you’ll lose weight, everything will even out. You’ll throw out your scales. You’ll develop some rules to live by, probably unconsciously, that will help you to maintain your balance through thick and thin. You’ll mostly stop comparing yourself to other people, because you’ll realize that everybody is built differently. You’ll stop comparing yourself to yourself years ago, because everybody changes. You’ll know that you”re ok, and most of the time you will feel ok. You won’t worry constantly about your food and your body: you’ll take pleasure in them. That’s what I want to say when I see all of these advice columns, on websites, and on the covers of magazines at the grocery store, and on the news – all trying to sell themselves by making you feel bad about yourself so that they can tell you how to feel good about yourself.

And, of course, you’ll keep making meals like this, because they’re cheap and tasty, and full of vitamins, and yes, just a bit because they’re not very fattening at all. Kale and beans and pumpkin!! Can you think of all the vitamins and protein in this one meal! I was hoping my boys would like it, and they did like the sauce and the beans, but the kale was a little bitter for them. I bought a bag of baby kale, and because it was so young, I didn’t boil it first, but it was a bit bitter, so next time I’d parboil it just for a few minutes. I’ve been thinking for a while about combining pumpkin flesh and pumpkinseeds in a meal! It just makes sense that they’d go together, and they do! The flesh is sweet and warm, and the seeds are smoky and cool, and they’re just perfect together.

Here’s Tom Waits Diamonds and Gold.

There’s a hole in the ladder
A fence we can climb
Mad as a hatter
You’re thin as a dime
Go out to the meadow
The hills are agreen
Sing me a rainbow
Steal me a dream

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White bean, turnip, and thyme stew and cheddar cornmeal biscuits

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white-bean-turnip-stewAs you may recall, I’m reading The Brothers Karamzov, and I have been for some time. (It’s not that I don’t have time to read, but I feel a little guilty taking the time to read, which is sort of funny, because I was an English major, so once-upon-a-time, reading was my job.) Anyway, be that as it may, I’m slowly working my way through Bros. Karmazov, and I’d like to talk about Alyosha. I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately. He’s one of the most appealing characters in literature (to me), and I’ve been pondering this fact, and thinking about other characters of his type that I’ve also been drawn to over the years. Alyosha was named after Dostoyevsky’s own son, who died as a child, and I can’t help but think that the character is a sort of embodiment of the man Dostoyevsky might have hoped his son would become. He’s handsome, kind, good but not preachy, thoughtful, sympathetic. But I don’t find him cloyingly good, because, strangely, despite all of his ridiculously good qualities, he’s a very real and human character. He’s full of wonder, he’s often confused, his mood shifts from one sentence to the next, as we’ve all felt our own do. He’s part of the drama, obviously, he’s one of the brothers Karamzov, so he’s a major character, but he’s aside from the drama. Most of his struggles are internal – they’re philosophical or spiritual. He has faith, but he’s constantly questing and questioning, swayed by his cynical brothers, but very strong within himself. He reminds me of Gareth, from Once and Future King, who was one of my favorite characters when I was little. Like Alyosha, Gareth grows up in what we would today call a dysfunctional family. His father is at war, his mother rivals Alyosha’s father for evilness, and his brothers are caught up in the brutality around them. But Gareth is different. He has a sort of natural gentleness, “Gareth was a generous boy. He hated the idea of strength against weakness. It made his heart swell, as if he were going to suffocate.” In one scene, the four brothers attempt to catch a unicorn, but they kill it, and then, faced with the reality of butchering it, they’re sick, covered in sweat and blood and punctured intestines, and by the time they get the head home to their mother, there’s nothing left but a grisly, unrecognizable lump of flesh. This scene was so powerful to me when I first read it! And it made me love Gareth, who begged his brother not to kill the unicorn, and who lies crying in the heather once it’s killed, staring into the sky and imagining himself plummeting off the earth, and catching onto the clouds to stop his fall. And like Alyosha, as the story goes on, Gareth does not become as embroiled in the violent family turmoil. I love these characters, and I’m sure there are others (Kostya Levin from Anna Karenina comes to mind, but I’ve already talked about him!) Their stories become the most interesting, because they question not just the morality of the people around them, but the morality that drives the plot itself. In real life, I’m always impressed by people who can transcend their upbringing to question the world around them, and form their own values and ideals. It kills me that an author can create a character who stands in for himself (in these instances) in questioning the values of the world that he’s created. It’s brilliant, really, because it doesn’t feel like a moral judgement, coming from these characters, it feels like a difficult but natural peeling away of layers of accepted corruption and violence. In both cases, you can feel the force of the author’s affection for the character, and the depth of his sympathy for their confusion. Can you think of other characters like this? Atticus Finch, maybe? Or Herbert Pocket? Hamlet, even?

Sorry to go on and on as though this is some sort of addled, half-baked essay for a second-rate online literature course! I’ve just been thinking about it a lot lately. But I’ve been cooking, too, so let me tell you about this stew! It’s loosely based on an old recipe I found for French lamb stew, called Navarin, I believe. The original stew similarly contains turnips, potatoes, carrots and peas simmered in white wine and thyme. And I substituted white beans for lamb. I think it turned out very nice! Warm and sustaining, but not too heavy. And I made these cornmeal cheddar drop biscuits to go with it. They’re extremely quick and easy to make, and crispy outside, soft inside, and comforting.

Cornmeal cheddar biscuits

Cornmeal cheddar biscuits

Here’s Family Tree, by Belle and Sebastian
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Ring-shaped pie with french lentils, chard, walnuts, and butternut squash

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chard-french-lentil,-butterWe had a lovely snow on Christmas eve, light and soft, the kind that makes the whole world seem clean and quiet. Snow makes Clio crazy, it brings out one of the “four formes of canine madnesse, the frantic or crazed madnesse.” She leaps about the yard, and then races in with icy snow in her pink paw pads, and leaps off of the furniture with mad abandon. I watched her on Christmas eve, and thought of Steenbeck, our old dog, buried in the yard under Clio’s frenetic paws, sleeping beneath a blanket of silent snow. I felt a sudden sadness, but it was a comforting sadness, in some inexplicable way. And on New Year’s Day we went to a party at a friend’s house, up on the hill above our small city. We walked up, it being a clear, cold day, and it felt good to shake some of the holiday-induced torpor from my mind. The party was lovely, with many children instantly interacting, as they so delightfully do, making things, and sharing things, and giggling. And we drank some good red wine, and talked to friends from town and just out of town – some we see nearly every day, some we see once or twice a year. It felt social, and cheerful, and just right for a New Year’s day. We left at dusk, which still comes early though the days are getting longer, and we walked home through the big old cemetery that over-looks our town. The stones were centuries old, but the names were familiar – the names of families that still live in our community. We read the name of the man who built our house in the 1850s, the name of the man we bought our house from ten years ago, the names of the people that own businesses in town, of families that our children go to school with. My boys raced along the paths, pelting each other with snowballs and laughing. And we walked down into town back to our old house, sleepy from the wine but sober from my thoughts, and made a warm meal, and watched a Buster Keaton movie, cuddled on the couch. It sounds idiotic, but I’d been thinking the night before about all the people that have ever lived. All of the humans that have walked on this earth, and lived, and loved, and wanted, and worked. Some in good fortune and freedom and wealth; most, probably, in poverty and servitude. But all wanting the same things, surely: affection, friendship, some degree of comfort, a kind hand, a warm meal. And I thought about it again, up on the hill, covered in a blanket of melting snow…”falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.” I felt, again, that sort of comforting sadness, looking out on our beautiful town, on all of the houses lit up and ringing with laughter, with people crying, “happy new year!” Which brings us to my resolution, if I have one, and, I think I do, but in true Clairish style, it’s vague and muddled, so I hope you’ll forgive this ramble. I don’t make resolutions to lose weight, or be healthy, or give up bad habits. I’ve said before that I believe in finding a balance in everyday life, and that those things are built into the fabric of that balance, cycling continually day-to-day, working against each other. Everybody gains a bit of winter weight, but we’ll eat soup meagre for a week, run up and down the towpath with Clio a few times, and be fighting-fit come spring! To me, “resolve” doesn’t mean to give something up, but to come into focus, to become harmonious, to be solved, or healed. So I hope to bring things into focus and harmony in this new year, moment-to-moment and day-to-day. To notice everything, to recognize how vivid and poignant every moment is, how completely alive each person that I meet – how like me and how completely unique. I hope not to let fatigue, crankiness, or laziness cloud my senses or lessen my appreciation of time spent with my children and David; of strong flavors, good sounds, beautiful sights. Not to be crippled by the sense that time is passing, but to let that awareness help me to feel more keenly. Not to be distracted by our fast, cold, cluttered, cynical world from clarity, light and warmth.

Well, this is my grand ambition for the new year, and this was the pie I made for New Year’s eve and New Year’s day. To eat leftovers on New Year’s day feels like striking out in the direction of frugality and good sense! I made the pie in a ring, because I’d read that ring-shaped foods are considered lucky. I made the crust rosy-golden with cornmeal and smoked paprika, because it seems like a fortuitous color. I filled it with lentils and greens, for luck, walnuts for crunch, and roasted butternut squash for flavor and sweetness, and capers for their flavor-dynamite explosion, so that our life will be sweet, flavorful, tangy, and substantial. Or, you know, whatever…who believes these old superstitions anyway?Ring-shaped pie Ring-shaped pie[/caption]

Here’s a whole album for you. It’s Jordi Savall playing Francois Couperin’s Pièces de Violes, we bought it for ourselves for Christmas, and it’s meltingly beautiful. Full of light and warmth and generosity, like a good life should be!
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Beer-battered, cheese-filled risotto croquettes

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beer-risottoWe’re experiencing a bit of a lull, here at The Ordinary, characterized by a dearth of energy, a lack of purpose, and a general, fuzzy feeling of a vast network of spiderwebs taking over our brains. Oh yes, the post-holiday doldrums. Not a bad thing, in many ways, the mind needs to lie fallow, sometimes. But it’s a feeling that’s hard to shake!! I feel like I’ve got nothing to say but I can’t stop talking! I feel like I’m treading water. Pleasant, warm, sleepifying water, granted, but I’m not getting very far in it! Well! Last night, after dinner, I was feeling very drowsy, warm in our toy-strewn living room, when Malcolm said, “Mom, do you want to take Clio for a walk with me?” DO I?!?!? Of course I do. He even got me my coat and hat! It had been a day of creeping damp cold, and we’d gone on a walk earlier, but it just wasn’t pleasant. Now, in the dark, it was even colder…but it felt good! We decided to head for the bridge across the river, to see if Clio was scared of it the way Steenbeck used to be. Of course it was even colder there, but the sky was so dark and clear, the moon was almost full, everything was black and silvery, and the wind blowing icily across the bridge was helping to clear out the cobwebs. Then Malcolm showed me how to do his happy walk, which is a broad side to side skip. It is a walk that you do when you’re happy, but I’m here to tell you people, it’s a walk that makes you happy, as well. Flying across the bridge, dark icy water flowing fast far below, coats flapping behind, Clio pulling us ahead quicker than a human can walk, I felt nearly ecstatic, and we tumbled home cold, and breathlessly laughing.

I made risotto the other night, with roasted red peppers, black olives, white beans, and artichoke hearts. It was almost exactly like this one, except that I added artichoke hearts with the red peppers and olives, and I used can tomatoes, (hunts’ fire raosted diced) this being winter, and I used tons of rosemary, plus a pinch of cumin and a pinch of smoked paprika. I had a lot over the next day, and I decided to try something new with it, so I made a small ball, stuffed some mozzarella inside, and then I dipped the whole ball into a light beer batter flavored with smoked paprika and cayenne. I fried them in olive oil till crispy, and I made a dipping sauce of red wine and balsamic. Delicious! And very fun to make and eat. Secret melty cheese! Layers of crispiness and layers of comforting softness! The boys even liked them, and they don’t really like risotto! You could probably use any flavor of risotto that you have leftover, as long as it doesn’t have large chunks of anything in it. And you could adjust the seasonings of the batter to suit. In my experience, even a very brothy risotto is sufficiently dried the next day to form into croquettes. If your risotto is still too brothy you could a) drain it in a sieve b) cook it in a saucepan till it dries out, or c) add a couple slices of bread, ground into crumbs.

Beer-battered risotto croquettes

Beer-battered risotto croquettes

Here’s Tread Water by De La Soul. Infectious!!

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Crispy cornmeal cakes and chard with chickpeas, olives and roasted red peppers

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Corn cakes and chard

Corn cakes and chard

My favorite version of A Christmas Carol is from 1951, starring Alistair Sim. It captures the humor and the heart like no other version, and it captures the darkness as well. Visually, the play of light and shadow is beautiful, and it reminds us that the story of A Christmas Carol has a lot of darkness at its core. It’s despairing and macabrely funny, though it ends with an impression of warmth and hope. I’ve always found this scene powerful; it doesn’t shy away from the poverty and need that’s all around Scrooge, that he helps to cause with his business:

The children are ignorance and want, and they are the children of all mankind. This struck quite a chord with me this week. In these days following the horrible massacre of schoolchildren in Connecticut, which it’s impossible not to think about this season, it seemed as though all of us became parents. Everybody in the country, whether we have children of our own, whether our children are young or grown, we all became parents, we all became moved, responsible, hurt. And maybe that’s the way it should always be: we should always care for one another like we’re all children, which, of course, we are. And we should all take responsibility for ignorance and want. I was joking, yesterday, about finding the definitive meaning of Christmas. Of course, there is no one meaning, it has a different meaning for each person that observes the day, and even for those that leave it alone with indifference or with a bah humbug. I’ve been thinking a lot this season about children, and time passing, and I hope that I can fully understand this as my meaning of Christmas. I was so cranky and impatient this morning with my over-excited boys. I had so much catching up to do after a weekend of working, and the puppy-child cacophony left me feeling stressed and bewildered. But I don’t want to be like that, any more. Christmas is about the returning of the light. Days getting longer and brighter. I want to use that light to capture time as it’s passing, and imprint it somewhere inside of me, so that I recognize the beauty of my boys’ excitement, and their understanding of Christmas. So that I can keep it all year long, like Scrooge kept Christmas. That’s my Christmas wish.

Welladay!! I guess I’m feeling more serious than I thought! Let’s talk about food instead!! These little corn cakes were so tasty! I made a light, flavorful, eggy batter using only cornmeal, which gave it lots of depth and texture. And I fried them in a little olive oil. The mix of chard, chickpeas, roasted red peppers and olives is savory and delicious, warm and juicy and meaty. And very festive, all green, red and gold!

Here’s another track from my new favorite Christmas album…Jimmy Smith’s Silent Night.
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Black bean mince, parsnip, apple and pecan pies

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Black bean mince pies

Black bean mince pies

This week, Malcolm brought home a piece of light blue cardstock, folded in half. It contained little messages, scrawled in pencil every which way, some in boxes, some in circles, one in a heart – all little descriptions of Malcolm. “Cool & funny.” “You have a good sense of humor.” “A great treasure finder.” “You are a outside person.” “You are good at sports.” “Kind.” One even says “I love you,” but we’re not going to ask him about that! And one says, “Your [sic] weird and collect everything.” Honestly, I liked this one as much as any of the others. I’m proud that he’s weird. I’ve spoken in the past about the fact that I like strange people, and I’m glad to be strange myself. And about the fact that having children has made me see this, as all things, a little differently. I want life to be easy for them, I want them to get along with everybody, I don’t want them to be teased. I want them to be proud of the ways that they’re unique, but anybody who has been to high school knows how hard this can be. Sometimes, David and I are bewildered by the boys’ behavior, and we have that nagging fear that they’re too strange – that they’re disturbingly strange. Why are they rolling around on the floor wrapped up in blankets? Why does Malcolm say “pineapple” or “banana” so often, and why do both boys dissolve into laughter when he does? Of course the best cure for these doubts is to spend time with other children their age. They’re all crazy! And in pretty much the exact same ways! We’re all in it together. After all, next to little phrases on Malcolm’s card like, “Your are nice, smart, neat, teachest, and uses everything.” Some kid wrote “egg sandwitch,” and nothing else! Egg sandwitch!! It is fun to say. And Malcolm’s teachers have found many occasions to question his neatness and his handwriting, but, let me tell you, they all have the same handwriting, and the same sloppy spelling, and the same inability to keep everything on a straight line! I asked Malcolm who had written the comment that he was weird, and he named a girl (it is written in a heart!). I think it’s a compliment, and he seems so cheerful about it, about everything that was written. He has a small class of clever oddballs, and they’ve all known each other since they toddled around the town. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about community and conformity, the one I love the idea of, and the other I don’t like at all. I find it very moving to see people working together towards some common cause, it makes me weepy, at the most unexpected times! But I like to think about the people working together as each their own little bundle of eccentricities and strengths and weaknesses. This is why we need each other, and why we work well together as a community. At the very bottom of Malcolm’s blue paper, something is scrawled very lightly, and, to me, it’s completely illegible. I asked him what it says, and he said, “I think it says, ‘You are happy.'”

Speaking of weird! I’ve been musing about mince pies for some time now, this being the time of year that they’re mentioned very often. They befuddle me!! They’re sweet – they’re desserts (to the best of my knowledge), but they have beef drippings in them. Or something like that, I’m not completely sure. I’m fascinated by the intersection of sweet and savory. I like salty-sweet things, and I like an unexpected touch of sweetness in a savory dish, like raisins with greens, or guava paste in an empanada. Lately I’ve found myself drawn to the savory side. So I had the idea of making little mince pies, but making them savory, with black bean mince, which is something I invented all by myself!!! And then adding a few sweet touches, like parsnips, apples, raisins and clementine zest. I think they turned out quite good! The black beans, sage, shallots, and rosemary add depth, the smoked gouda and smoked paprika add…well, smokiness! The pecans add crunch, and the roasted parsnips and apples add a pleasant, not-overpowering sweetness. These were very good with mashed potatoes!! If you didn’t feel like making the crust, I think this would make a nice dressing or stuffing.

Here’s Strange Meadow Lark, by Dave Brubeck.

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Kale and chickpea curry with ricotta naan

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Kale and chickpea curry

Kale and chickpea curry

I love to walk to school with Isaac: it’s one of my favorite rituals of the day. He holds my hand and lags behind slightly, and Clio lunges ahead after squirrels, cats, or even any spiraling dry leaf. Clio runs in circles around us, and Isaac sings or tells jokes. His jokes are perfect, sweet and nonsensical. He told an existential one the other day that was very clever, and it went a little something like this…Q: What did the birthday say to today? A: How do you like the present? B’dum tish! Today he told a joke, and I just didn’t “get it,” because I’m quite slow sometimes. I said, “I don’t quite understand your joke.” He said, “that’s okay, it wasn’t much of a joke.” As we approach the school, we start falling in line with his friends, and they form little shifting huddles, and then they all rush, joyously, to their doorway. Clio and I stand watching them, out in doggy exile, and when Malcolm sees us he walks over, cool and slow, and Clio falls all over herself trying to give him hugs and kisses. Miss Sandra, the crossing guard, greets everybody with good cheer, and leaves us all with a “have a good day,” and you believe that she means it, that somehow the fact that she said it might actually help you to have a good day. All around the courtyard, happy excited children fly about, glowing like fireflies. They greet their friends and hug their parents goodbye. I’ve always thought that the amount of energy and love, spoken and unspoken, that radiates from a typical drop-off at our school shines so brightly it could be seen from outer space. It must be like that for every school in the country. Drop-off was emotional this morning. The children flew happily about like they always do, but the parents and teachers – and there were more of them around than usual- were quiet and thoughtful, full of concerns, and hopes, and good wishes, forming a strong web of good will and sympathy that must spread from school to school across the country and beyond.

This was a strange weekend to be at work – so grey and dreary, the restaurant was not at all busy, and I just wanted to be home, where it was warm and bright and my family scampered through the day. I thought all day, too, about making this curry. I wanted something bright and warm and comforting and flavorful. So that’s what I made. It’s got a sauce made with cashews, golden raisins and coconut (I used just plain old sweetened flaked coconut, as it happens.) And it’s got kale, potatoes and chickpeas. It had a nice texture, soft, but not mushy, and the flavor was a little sweet, a little spicy, and balanced with lemon. And these naan!! I had some ricotta left over from a tart I made the other day, and I decided to make the naan with that instead of yogurt, as is traditional. And I added an egg and some melted butter. Maybe I should stop calling them naan, as I drift farther and farther from the original recipe! They turned out so delicious, though. Tender, flavorful, simple. I couldn’t stop eating them!! None of this was hard to make, either, it was an after-work meal, after all.

ricotta naan

ricotta naan

Here’s Ombra Mai Fu, from Handel’s Xerxes. My friend Diane suggested it yesterday, and it’s so beautiful!

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White bean, spinach and roasted mushroom pie with pecan sage crust

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white bean, mushroom, and spinach pie

white bean, mushroom, and spinach pie

This is a very Dickensian time of year. I want to read Dickens, watch adaptations of his novels (good or bad), eat Dickensian food (like this pie!) drink hot gin punches. In short, I love Charles Dickens – I always have. I don’t care what anybody says about him. I don’t care if people think he’s nothing but an overly sentimental Victorian fuddyduddy. I’m not blind to his faults, I will admit that he can be a little ham-fisted with the sentiment at times. But he’s also darkly, bitingly funny, political, warmly human, and even light-heartedly absurd. His books contain everything a novel should – a broad, carefully calculated over-arching plot that feels complicated yet effortless; an expansive cast of characters so diverse, eccentric and detailed that they feel alive; and a powerful mix of humor and pathos, sweetness and brutality. What’s my favorite Dickens novel? I hear you ask. And without a second’s hesitation I will tell you, Our Mutual Friend. It’s a dark, dirty novel, swirling with life and death, like the river it describes. It’s about the river, and the bodies found there, and the people that make their living there, and those that try to escape its inky pull. Amongst the eccentric, extensive cast of characters are some of the most appealing Dickens (or anyone else) has ever created. There’s Eugene Wrayburn, witty, idle, disappointed, disappointing – the culmination of Dickens’ career-long treatment of the theme of a cruelly seductive wealthy man who ruins a poor young woman. There’s Wrayburn’s friendship with Mortimer Lightwood, a real friendship, generously observed. And Wrayburn’s love for Lizzie Hexam, who is far more than a poor but pretty face. And Lizzie’s friendship with Jenny Wren, one of the oddest characters in literature. She’s the twisted and crippled embodiment of the Victorian ideal of a child-woman – an ideal that Dickens helped to perpetrate. He’s created this bizarre monstrous little creature that stands as a criticism of his own work. She’s a perpetual child, physically, frail and beautiful, but her words are as sharp as needles, and she becomes a kind of chorus or surrogate for Lizzie, able to say the things Lizzie’s politeness will not allow her to express. She’s remarkable, I tell you! And of course this is only a small handful of an enormous cast of characters, but I can’t go on and on about it here.

Do you like Dickens? What’s your favorite Dickens novel?

Instead, I’ll go on and on about this pie. I love a double-crusted pie in the wintertime, one with a tall crispy crust that holds in any mashed potatoes you might pile on top. In some ways this is my ur-winter pie. I love the combination of roasted mushrooms and nuts, and smoky cheese, and savory spinach. The beans add substance and flavor. I love the combination of sage and rosemary with a bit of nutmeg. This pie has all those things! In this case the nuts are in the crust, which is light and crispy, and the filling is dense and satisfying.

Here’s the Dickensian Decemberists with The Chimbley Sweep.

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Roasted butternut, kale, black bean and goat cheese enchiladas with a roasted red pepper/pecan sauce

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Kale and butternut enchiladas

Kale and butternut enchiladas

Here at The Ordinary we have an institute entirely devoted to the study of time passing. We had thought, up until a few months ago, that we were mere moments away from complete understanding. Lately, however, our grasp is slipping, we are perplexed. We are, in point of fact, reeling. Surely it was August, only yesterday, the boys were home all the long day, and our greatest concern was finding a place for them to swim? Surely these mornings that we wake up and it’s dark and cold, and before you know it, it’s dark and cold and dusky, with just the winking suggestion of a pale wintery day in between, surely these days are just a dream, or a memory. Surely it’s not the middle of December. Did we have autumn? Did we have glorious fall colors and crisp, clear days? If so, we didn’t notice, which breaks our heart, because, here at The Ordinary Institute for the Study of the Passing of Time, noticing is our business! It’s what we do. We study each passing, perfect, irreplaceable moment, and then we capture it, and we put it in a glass jar with a filmy lid of wax. We study it and label it. We used to store all the jars on shelves in a darkened room, so that you could see how they glow, but this year we’re giving them away for christmas, because everybody is gifting with ball jars this year! Just everybody. We’ve known for some time, of course, that time travels at different rates for different people depending on the time of day. It goes quickest in the morning, when you’re lying in a warm bed, with the sun struggling weakly to light up the cold day, and all of your chores and worries swirling around your head. This time of year it travels faster for an adult, who has so much to take care of before Christmas, than for a seven-year-old, because no matter how many times he asks, each and every day, how many days are left until Christmas, it’s always the same answer, each day, all day long. Sigh. Time is running and passing, and I can’t keep up, so here I am by the side of the tracks, holding my baggage by my feet, watching it rattle and whoosh as it crashes by.

You know the seasons are changing because I just composted the last of my CSA produce. They’ve been in the vegetable drawer for a few weeks now. They seemed very precious, because they were pretty golden and peppermint striped beets. I had something very special planned for them. But never quite special enough, so I kept waiting and waiting. Until they were unusable. I have fun keeping up with the CSA veg, but there’s something liberating about buying whatever sort of vegetables you please in the grocery store. I try to stay mostly seasonable, but, let’s face it…nothing is growing in NJ in winter. I try to keep with a wintery mix of butternut squash, cauliflower, greens, mushrooms, fennel, things like this. And then I combine them all in a big beautiful enchilada!! These enchiladas have a lot of flavors, but they all go very nicely together. It’s not as complicated to make as it might sound, because you can roast squash, boil kale, and make a sauce all at the same time. I used goat cheese inside the enchiladas, because I love the flavor with butternut squash, and because I thought it might make for a lighter texture than wads of melted cheddar or jack. There’s melted cheddar on top, though! Wouldn’t feel like enchiladas without some type of melty cheese! I apologize for the picture, I know it’s not one of the best, but it’s really hard to take an attractive picture of an enchilada!!

Here’s Tom Waits with Time. I think I’ve probably posted it before, but it’s just that good!

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