Old-school Em-i-lis

The past couple days have found me yearning for leisurely hours in the kitchen. It's been a long while, too long, since I've felt I had any significant amount of time to relax in there and play around. I miss it, and have noticed that when rushed, dinners become more chore than pleasure, and I cut culinary corners in ways I don't like. 

Our spring has, so far, been an awfully wet and chilly one. There have been glorious days of warmth -heat even!- and sunshine, promises of lemonade stands and relaxed evenings on the deck with a cold glass of wine. But by and large, those times have been elusive, and most days are still "pants and long-sleeve T's, boys" rather than shorts and sunblock ones.

That said, it's spring somewhere, and the produce of the glorious season is starting to roll our way. It's the right time for rhubarb, and those beautiful pink and green stalks are showing themselves at our local farmers markets as are greenhouse tomatoes and herbs and the earliest strawberries. Asparagus is in its prime.

At the grocery, fava bean pods glow green and swollen, and plums, peaches and apricots are finally being trucked in from places north of Chile!

Perhaps I should thank the mostly-gloomy days of the recent past, for they have offered me quick moments in which to steal to the markets and have then shooed me back inside when the rains return. During the latter periods, the beautiful beans and fruits and tomatoes and greens beckon to me, and I have gone to them.

Shelling beans is an always-pleasant task, meditative, productive and grounding. Favas and borlottis are my favorites to hull, because my reward is a bowl of vibrant green or cranberry-speckled beans that only nature could conjure. Favas beg to be smashed with mint and pecorino and olive oil and a squeeze of lemon, slathered atop grilled bread slicked with more oil. Nothing this beautiful can be anything but healthful or a pleasure to eat.

The smell of tomatoes alone is thrilling, but then the juicy pop of each orb's taut skin is the happiest salvo. The crisp crack of each asparagus spear's end breaking off at just the point that woody and fibrous gives way to silky and tender. 

All of these ingredients make such delicious dishes but without much effort; that is the gift of real, fresh, seasonal food.

Today, I made my black velvet apricot and Cognac jam. It is as delectable as it is pretty; looks rather like a jewel, really. I love recipes that freeze an ephemeral ingredient in time for later enjoyment. It's why I make mango butter even though straight-up mango, peeled and sliced, is our favorite way to enjoy them, especially the Ataulfo, or champagne, variety that comes out in late April each year.

I also made some old favorites this week including my farro with golden beets, candied pecans, feta and a sage-chive oil and oven-roasted rosemary salmon, and, perhaps most thrillingly, treated myself to this Meyer lemon tree on Mother's Day. I'm positively over the moon about it, and will feel equal parts Cher (from Clueless; remember when she reaches out of her father's office window to pick a fresh lemon for his tea?) and Martha Stewart when I pluck a fresh lemon from its boughs.

Now, if only the sun will come out a little bit more and help us all dry and grow and ready ourselves for the next marathon of cooking and growing and rooting, it'd be swell!

A mother's day

I am in my reading chair, a languid fan spinning above me. My door is closed. I just showered after working for a couple hours in the garden. My hostas have gone wild and were crowding out other loved plants, so I relocated and weeded and visited with some worms and gave thanks that today the sun came out and started drying things up. The yard was getting so soggy I thought it might metamorphose into a writhing mess of slugs at any moment. Truly, it seemed dire.

The boys and a friend are in Jack's room playing with Legos and singing Don Gato. Listening to them makes me smile. The big kids are always kind to Oliver, they always include him, and I appreciate that. Ol is charming and fun, but I'm still grateful that the little brother gets to hang out instead of being kicked to the curb. T is making the dinner the kids will soon eat.

After a delicious breakfast T brought to me in bed and a latte drunk from the Pollock-inspired mug Ol made me in his art class, I took the kids to the farmers market. We saw friends, loaded up on several varieties of cherry tomatoes and the kids devoured a pizza and a mango lassi. They wanted so much more, but I bought myself a young Meyer lemon tree instead and boogied us home.

Isn't this a fabulous gift?

We had lunch with my in-laws, and after, while the kids played and the men talked, she and I cleaned and caught up. The women so often end up in the kitchen, don't they. 

I am in my reading chair with my door shut because while it's been an absolutely lovely mother's day, it is now Emily time. Quiet alone time in which I shut my duty light off and forward all requests to Dad. In which I remove the hat I wear every other day and let my shoulders sink and my breaths deepen.

For me, this is the essence of Mother's Day. Yes, it is about being with the boys, talking to my mother, mother-in-law, aunt and sister, celebrating and being celebrated. But it is also about being given a brief reprieve from the minutiae of daily mothering; from being on at every moment; from being the go-to for everything. It is about being appreciated for all that by getting a break from it.

It is, isn't it, a mother's day.

I think that's an important message, to send and to receive. By asserting that some solitude is one thing I really want each and every Mother's Day, I am showing the boys that mothers are people who have children but are also individuals with interests and passions and needs wholly distinct from the beings that provided the Mom label in the first place. 

In some sense too, I think shaping this day in the ways I want versus the rosy, Lifetime-channel gloss it's often shellacked with by society is a way of pushing back just a bit on the pressure too many women shoulder to love and feel wildly fulfilled by motherhood at all times. That's just not realistic for most mothers. Sometimes, all we want is some space away from our children, some time to not mediate or manage, look or acknowledge.

We want, simply, to tend to ourselves in undistracted fashion. I think that is a marvelous thing to honor.

I love my children with a joyful ferocity, but I think it is always worth understanding and acknowledging that, like most things, motherhood is complex. It is really hard and it is constant, and the gloss of perfect that is too often painted atop the enterprise can cause Moms who find its depths infinitely more variegated to feel isolated or lacking. They end up like icebergs frozen in place in an unmoving sea.

If, however, we acknowledge the murky depths as well as the glossy surface, the ice cracks, allowing us to move toward each other once more and repair the connections that will strengthen us, and by extension our kids, all. When I am in a pit and text a friend, I feel better. When she texts me back with words of understanding, commiseration and/or support, I lighten even more. We all need each other, but to really know one another, you have to dive deep.

I chose to have children, and I am lucky to have such a good relationship with them as well as with my own mother and mother-in-law. Not all women can or choose to have children, not every women has happy memories of her mother. Some women who made the same choice I did are having an awfully hard time of it.

On this day, keep in mind the total validity and worth of those who choose not to have children and also those who do and are struggling. Keep in mind those for whom today is hard, for reasons in the past or the present. If your mother is amazing, please celebrate her. Also remember that you've likely been mothered by a number of others- aunts, mentors, friends, siblings- and if they are great, celebrate them too. 

Here's hoping that your hearts feel full today, and that you got to spend it in just the ways you wanted. I did, and that is the best kind of mother's day I could wish for.

More Persian food, Penzeys, and Yekta, a new-to-me, great market

I recently ran out of Aleppo pepper and have felt a vague sense of unease since. Whole Foods doesn't carry it, so for years Williams-Sonoma has been my source. Now they've gone and stopped stocking this marvelous, brick-red spice. Penzeys to the rescue!

Do y'all know Penzeys Spices? They have a good website and also a number of brick-and-mortar stores, they support environmental and civil liberties causes, and they carry a wide variety of dried herbs, spices, extracts and proprietary spice blends. For orders north of $30, shipping is free and prompt. 

For one or two bags of Aleppo pepper though, a trip to the store closest me is required, and while I sort of hate driving up Wisconsin Ave to Rockville, it is a chain-store shopper's paradise. Last Sunday after swimming, because my Aleppo-unease was growing mightier, I took the kids to Penzeys with me. The only thing I struck out on was dried rose petals which I wanted for several of the Persian recipes in Food of Life I've been salivating over.

"You know, you should try Yekta's. It's a Persian market just down the Pike," said a Penzeys employee. 

I hightailed it out of there so fast, I nearly left the kids behind. 

Yekta Market and Kabobi are adjoining structures in the same lot as Oliver's favorite place, Party City. The restaurant faces Rockville Pike while the market looks at the side parking area. I was in heaven immediately upon stepping inside as vats of nuts, bins of dried berries and racks laden with all kinds of tahini, rice, couscous, tea, herbs and spices, breads and sweets greeted me warmly. There are also refrigerated, freezer and deli sections.

Suffice it to say that we left with much more than a bag of dried rose petals.

Yesterday, after enjoying a Cinco de Mayo lunch of tacos and then making more for the boys' dinner, I pulled out the beef short ribs I'd purchased earlier this week (I adore short ribs), and started browning them while considering a Persian-inspired braise.

veggie tacos, beans and brown rice

I decided to use onions and carrots, red wine and beef broth, a hefty amount of advieh (a Persian spice blend that includes cumin, coriander, nutmeg, cardamom, and dried rose petals; mace and turmeric are sometimes added too.), pomegranate molasses, pomegranate arils, salt and pepper. After sauteeing the onions and carrots and then letting them stew in the red wine as it reduced, I added everything else, covered the pot and let things cook for about three hours.

Short ribs cannot be rushed if you want tender meat. The rib should slip out on its own, and three hours is usually the sweet spot for that. It is worth the wait because during a long, low braise, the gravy gets awfully flavorful!

Just before serving dinner, I used some of the braising liquid to cook the couscous, a gorgeous, fine-grain, whole wheat version I bought at Yekta. I also quickly broiled some asparagus that I'd drizzled with lemon and olive oil and made a caprese with sumac to give it a middle-eastern twist.

If I say so myself, dinner was sublime. I only wish I'd made something for dessert!