Here’s how it went for me the other evening: I had wild shrimp, garlic, and organic butter from mama cows who get out to pasture–but I spaced out the wine. Wine in cooking really does make all the difference, given the umami that it brings to food. So I zipped into a shop down the street, Blackbird Wines, for some white.

Owner Andy Diaz suggested a blended bottle from France’s Gascony coast. “They do a lot of fish in Gascony,” Diaz observed. “Their wines are perfect with seafood.” He was right; the wine was a hit. I sizzled up the shrimp in olive oil, added some smashed garlic, a healthy splash of the vin de pays, and a lace of butter over the top for those first all important bites.

Beyond the succulent shrimp, it was biz as usual with seasonal vegs: flash cooked broccoli with spaghetti squash and roasted red peppers–plus slices off the room temperature yams I’d baked the day before.

So it was that in 10 minutes I sat down to a seasonal organic dinner complete with a glass of wine that was refreshing, not to mention priced right. Thanks Blackbird. Glad you’re in the hood. Glad I don’t have to go clear to Tuscany…

But my garden squash patch is almost entirely devoted to spaghetti because it’s such a work horse in flash-cooked warm salads. On the previous post, Getting Our Acts Together, I showed how prettily spaghy dressed up a New Year’s potluck dish (that I took to KCC). And how easily I got fed the following day by simply making some gremolata to go with.

Now here’s day three. Still spaghetti squash waiting in the fridge so I got a full blast burner going under my cast iron wok, poured in a puddle of water, grated a broccoli stem and gave the florets a brief chop. Into the steaming heat the good greens went along with some scooped out spaghetti squash. By the time I found some olives to toss in and a plate, the squash was warm and broc al dente.

Dressing was some olive oil poured over, pinch of coarse salt, grind of black pepper, lemon zest grated right on top, lotsa fresh squeeze lemon juice to follow, and a big fluffy grating of parmesan using my hand dandy microplane.

Yup, I could have stopped to mince some garlic but I didn’t and things were luscious with the olives especially saying, “hello.”

So, that’s getting on a roll with spaghetti squash, day 3. You can put it in a blender with eggs and cornmeal to bake up like pizza crust and top it with the usual too. Who knows, day 4 might just roll on out with that little number–or even some big puffy yellow muffins. How about you? Into to getting around and getting on a roll?

Let’s keep it simple to start. Simple not only for the sake of explanation but also because making food taste good really can be done very simply. The pantry items I used for my New Year’s potluck dish were nothing more than the sacred quartet: oil, vinegar, salt, pepper (as in red chile peper because who says the only pepper in town is black). The key was that they were handy and inviting in their fun bottles and pots. Oil and vinegar sitting out within arm’s reach in blue glass. A pot of coarse salt (the yellow dish from Itay) that I can dip into. Ditto with red chile pepper (in the footed dish of green Depression glass). You can see there’s also a black pepper mill and some garlic there along with kitchen tools ready and waiting.

As far as how it all worked, I had half a baked spaghetti squash waiting in the fridge and a packet of green beans thawing in the kitchen sink (both items, I’m pleased to say, where from my summer garden).

Then there was the end of a pot of homemade veg soup that got a whiz in the blender and then enough whole wheat flour to turn it into goop akin to mashed potatoes. This made veggie patties that I fried up on my cast iron griddle–an item that hangs conveniently on the wall above my stove. Yes, it’s true that if I’d had a couple eggs to stir in they would have been lighter. And also that some wheat sprouts or chopped walnuts would have added interest. But there you have it, my pantry was on the bare side, so I had make do.

If you can picture yourself putting this dish together…here you are at the counter with a nice platter for your arrangement. (In this case an oven proof quiche dish for reheating later on.)

You get the green beans out and give them a nice chop (if you didn’t already French cut them when you froze them last fall as I did). Then grab your olive oil and use your fingers. That way you can tell when your beans are nicely coated. Same routine for the spaghetti squash, your fingers being quite useful for pulling the strands apart as well. Once your lovely green and yellow circles are in place, you can nab the vinegar for a healthy sprinkling. Then some coarse salt and red chile flakes–the secret on the latter being not to over do.

All that’s left to finish this dish is a bowl of dip in the middle and the patties arranged around the edge. For me that day, no yogurt or humus in sight, so it was my home canned plum sauce from the summer that served as the dippity-do-dah. A few more red chile flakes over that for pretty-pretty and the deed was done. Ready for people at the buffet to shovel up some green beans and spaghetti squash, nab a patty and spoon on a little plum sauce.

It was quick to make, too. From start to finish I guess about a half hour including doing the veggie patties. Also yes, it depended on me working right along through the year and putting things like plum sauce up during harvest. Or at least buying things at the store with an eye toward mixing and matching. In addition to the sacred quartet, there’s keeping winter squash on hand. Not only spaghetti but other kinds, and when you bake them always do extra for on down the pike as they’ll keep a good week in the fridge. Same with the green beans or some other kind of green vegetable besides those boring old salad greens. Kale. Broc. Those are my choices this time of year if you don’t have a supply of others put up from your summer garden.

The other part of this equation is frugality. You can see I didn’t make many veggie patties. That’s because there wasn’t much soup left. The key, though, is that I did not throw it out. Why? Because I grew most of the vegetables in the pot and couldn’t bear to see them wasted. More, I thought, was the brew was blenderized, it was perfectly good goop to use for most anything. In this case the patties; another day it might have been the liquid in some homemade focaccia.

That’s the method to the madness around this measure free hippie kitchen. Hope it helps the cause in your kitchen too as the New Year kicks in. Here’s to healthy, wealthy, wise, and rocking & rolling….

If you’ve followed me much, you know that I like getting on a roll. Here’s what my lunch the next day looked like.

Spaghetti squash fluffed up on a plate, dressed with olive oil and fresh lemon juice (once you’ve captured it’s zest). Some gremolata spooned over and Parmesan grated around the edge. So delicious and easy. Healthy. Seasonal. The works. And if you don’t speak gremolata, let me introduce you to minced parsley flavored with garlic and lemon zest.

Cut the stems off your bunch of Italian parsley (nice with its flat leaves but use the curly stuff if that’s all you have) just above the tie thing. Then get your sharp chef’s knife and mince away until you have no visible stems or leaves left–until the parsley brew is fine indeed. Then mince equally fine, a clove or two of garlic. (If you have a deep mortar and pestle you can pound the garlic instead of mincing, but whatever–all roads lead to Rome.) Then take a microplane and zest a lemon or two.

Mix the works into a nice blend, and you just made gremolata–something that goes as easily on fish as it does on spaghetti squash.

On the stove at the moment is a clam chowder. Potatoes and frozen green beans from last summer’s harvest, fresh pulled leeks and carrots, and a can of clams. I even have a few leggy fronds of parsley from the kitchen window pot to add right before serving so it keeps it’s “somewhere-over-the-rainbow color” as I put it in one book or another.

All in all, not bad for the eve of winter solstice when it’s all we can to do keep the home fires burning.

Warm salads are another favorite of mine. Here I rely on garden spaghetti squash that’s keeps all winter in the basement or even in right in the kitchen–and is easy to bake. Then some freshly picked kale, flash cooked with garlic and red chile flakes. Dress with olive oil, fresh lemon juice, and coarse salt. Garnish with ruby pomegranates jewels and a polite chop of walnuts.

Pretty tasty no matter what carb and protein you pair it with. And it even works for the vegans in the crowd. Merry Howdy!

I think each of these readings is 3 minutes or so. Hope you have time for a listen. Merry Howdy, Jean

if you’re inspired–and I hope you are–you click over to the cookbooks page and take advantage of the December sale–all told with the free domestic shipping it’s a 20 percent savings

More, these books are kitchen companions that forge new ground in poetic prose designed to lure us back into our kitchens. Here’s a snippet from the introduction to Hippie Kitchen’s Winter Chow chapter. I hope it resonates as much with you as it did with the crowd gathered at the Blackbird Wine Shop reading I did last night.

Winter Chow

If there was ever a culture of people who need to hook up with winter, it’s mainstream Americans. Us non-siesta-takers. Us independent, highly mobile, multi-taskers who have bought the more-is-better, time-is-money line.

I know the rush-rush vibe has dogged me more than I ever dreamed it would. Like one time in 1982 when I lived up on Second Mesa in Hopiland. You could see forever from the pueblo that day. Out across Navajo where dusty roses and muted purples were a mere
suggestion of weavers in pleated velveteen shirts decorated with silver liberty head dimes and buffalo nickels. West and south where the winds came from the San Francisco Peaks, home of the masked gods, the katsinas. I, however, saw little of that on this particular day. I was in a hurry doing something, going somewhere.

That’s when one of the neighbors piped up and said, “Oh you’re such an efficient white lady.” He smiled and everyone tee-heed compassionately most likely remembering the times they had been ribbed in their turn. Indeed, joking and teasing is one way tribal people hold a mirror up, helping each other to at least try and keep the bubble in the middle. What a relief to live in that society. To not have to pretend you have it more together than you really do. It was like The Band’s “take a load off Fanny” line from Big Pink.

So that’s what the gentle but firm nudge did for me that day. Got my attention. Reminded me that kicking back now and then is cool. I can’t say I’ve been all that successful, but the winter kitchen does help bring one back. It’s warm in a winter kitchen. You can turn on the oven and bake focaccia. You can smell the fresh yeast bread. You can make soup. You can feel the hardy winter roots in your hands. Hear the rush of steaming water when the broccoli hits the heat. Taste how fun chile and sugar are together in buttery cookies. You can create a very Zennish moment in your winter kitchen—in your hippie kitchen in winter.

If you got this far, you might be about ready for a listen to this cool cat.
Come on into your kitchen!
We don’t have to go to Tuscany to have a sexy food life!
It’s right here. Right now. All we have to do is turn on the lights….

Here’s how ultrafast cooking works in my hippie kitchen. In the morning when I’m having breakfast, I steam up a pot of quinoa. This grain cooks in 10 minutes and has the highest protein of them all. I leave it sitting out at room temperature and then when dinner comes along all’s that needs doing is chopping the last of the garden tomatoes, walking outside and plucking the end of the basil, and dressing with a polite pour of olive oil, swig of red wine vinegar, coarse salt, and fresh crack of peppper from the grinder.

All that and I get some leftover quinoa to put in a soup the next day or even mix with an egg and minced celery and onion to fry up into crisp patties. Yep. Having a pot of leftover whole grain around–whether it be millet, amaranth, wheat berries, brown rice, or quinoa–can make your kitchen life easy, frugal, healthy, and wise.

So rock & roll. It’s easy to make simple everyday food in your own kitchen. Fun too since you get to be the boss.

I don’t have the recipe written up just yet, but I did dutifully put dried apricots in along with walnuts. Just the kind of muffin people would think is fun alongside the salad.

But, after behaving so well momentarily, I went back to my usual approach to cooking. I was on a muffins roll, but I certainly didn’t mess with the muffin tins again, pain in the neck that they are–both in fussing around with the knife to get each muffin out (and no I don’t want to use those paper cup thingies) and in washing the tins.

So it was back to cast iron as usual. My small pan since it was just me for breakfast. And yes, the center wasn’t quite done because of the size of the pan. And yes, I ate it anyway. And yes, it tasted as good as those chocolate lava cakes that came to be all the rage in precisely the same fashion: someone underbaked the cake and said, “This gooey part is the best!”

The vehicle shift was just the tip of the iceberg of course. The apricots and walnuts were gone. In their stead were two green apples, meat from half an acorn squash, and poppy seeds.

Which brings me to the real gist of this post: using your great big winter squashes. So many ways here besides freshly baked. Baked winter squashes whether acorns or spaghettis or butternut go into everything and anything: quick breads, warm salads with wintergreens and raisins, and pudding like custards or pies. Then again think sauces or gravies and get creative. Smash some of your winter squash into a roux of butter and flour, and whisk in milk. You’ll have a rather interesting brew for your broccoli.

I was reading in Rick Bayless’s work the other day and he noted how exceptionally creative Mexican cooks are. I snorted because in my mind he missed the point. It’s not Mexican cooks per se, it’s impoverished cooks. As in necessity breeds invention.

I know it’s been this way for me, divorced as I am from the land of crinkly packages in part because it’s too expensive. Without all those goodies around, I have to cook from scratch. Have to make use of things in the refrig like great big winter squashes. And in the process I discover over and again all kinds of delightful ways to spin food.

It’s like the difference between being a spectator at a sport and the actual players. The former sits and consumes and gets dull. The latter is up and active and engaged. She plays a vital roll in what comes down. She feels good. She’s empowered.

Laurel Robertson, who wrote Laurel’s Kitchen with Carol Flinders, is some kind of woman. This salad is adapted from their pages where they titled it “Astonishing.” I’ve made it many times over the years, and it’s my privilege to translate it into a measure free format.

What I especially like about this vegetarian and vegan approach to a spinach salad is that it springs from the more traditional approach which relies on hot bacon fat to wilt the greens. So smart of Laurel and Carol to figure out a different approach to a warm dressing—a dressing that not only succeeds in taming your fresh garden spinach but also one that is pretty darn sexy with its polite pour of dry white wine.

Cooking Beyond Measure, p. 72.
On Roasting Vegetables—

Vegetables roast marvelously well from low to high temperatures. On highs around 450 F, colors are preserved but you have to watch things like a hawk. Medium ovens of 350 work well too, and depending on what you’re roasting, munchies will be yours in a half hour. Then again if you’re going out for a walk you can turn the oven to 250. When you return, you’ll have the sweetest caramelized morsels a soul could ever ask for.

My preferred roasting vehicle is—or was—Jessie Branom’s extra large cast iron skillet. The iron and the sides of the pan cradle the vegetables in a cocoon of heat that caramelizes, and the veggies y turn out sweet and golden. Baking trays work too, but as you’ll discover if you use both vehicles like I usually do, the results cast iron produces are decidedly superior. Yet at this writing, a new over-sized cast iron skillet is on my shopping list. Here’s why.

Jessie Branom and my mother were close friends in Phoenix during the early 1960s where they raised their families. Jessie had two children; Mom had four. So the women reasoned that my mother should have the big frying pan Jessie owned, and Jessie should have my mother’s medium sized skillet. The swap was made, and much later after Mom passed away Jesse’s skillet came to me. I used it for years but as a historian who thinks in terms of centuries, I’m aware of how numbered our days are—and how things can get lost in the shuffle at the end of life.

So it was that Thanksgiving of 2007 when Jessie’s first granddaughter married, I posted the skillet swathed in wedding wrap. As I wrote to the young bride, Jenny Branom Patberg, “Great scratch cooks have used this skillet for a half century. May its journey go on.”

Postscript: I have by this time, 3 years after the above was written, purchased a new skillet which has definitely earned its keep and love as a new member of the kitchen family.