The Tea That Launched a Thousand Manuscripts

Just a short post about cool beverages (hey, we’re getting warmer weather now!), and my former boss at the university press. I was reminded of her delicious iced tea last weekend when we visited her during Boonville’s annual Big Muddy Folk Festival.

She served us some of her tea while we were there. So delicious and refreshing! I had to make some today for myself.

Jane was the managing editor and, I’ll bet, played a part in creating darned near a thousand published books. (Maybe a lot more. Or maybe I overestimate slightly.) Those of us who worked at the University of Missouri Press during her long tenure were used to seeing her large, insulated cup of iced tea on her desk. It was a fixture, just like her computer, her dictionaries, her copy of the Chicago Manual of Style, her thesaurus. The stack of manuscript pages for the current work. And a stack of page proofs to be sent to the author, proofreader, and indexer.

Ahhhh, the university press. Where I once edited a manuscript, translated from German, to be published in an English edition, that had sentences that were so long I had to scroll down in order to finish them. Yes! It was double-spaced, DOS, WordPerfect 5.0, and it wasn’t a gigantic monitor, but the whole sentence wouldn’t fit on my screen at one time. I kid you not.

Now, please realize that what follows only applies to a few cases. And it’s my opinion only. I don’t want to make it sound like drowsiness was a big problem for any of us: it really wasn’t. For the most part, we had good, interesting, important manuscripts and incredibly nice authors. But a few manuscripts were indeed snoozers. I’m sure you can imagine. I mean, sometimes I’ve told people about editing, say, index manuscripts, and how I rather enjoyed it. “It’s especially nice to have some Bach or other baroque music playing. All those straight lines and right angles: perfect for making sure all the entries and page numbers are in the right order!” Just telling people about that kind of makes their eyes roll up in their heads.

Once (“only once,” ha ha), while nodding and plodding through one of the snoozers, I truly nodded off while editing. My finger was on the “down” arrow on my keyboard, and I started awake to find the manuscript flying upwards on my monitor, lickety-split. “Heck!” I thought. “This is terrible! What’s the last thing I remember reading?” I had to scroll back for my last change, or my last query.

I figured out lots of ways to keep awake while copyediting some of these projects. My morning coffee kept me chugging for a while, then it was lunchtime, but then there was the dreaded midafternoon lull. It was quiet, and I was digesting. I figured out that Polar Ice–flavored chewing gum could rouse me. I also learned to take a fifteen-minute break behind the building to practice my trumpet. That woke me up! (Well, the smokers in the office took smoke breaks, why couldn’t I?) When the drowsiness was really bad, I would put a small bowl of fresh, raw cranberries on my desk, and chew up one of those when the florescent lights’ humming lulled me to sleep.

What I’m describing is the “goofus” method of being an editor of scholarly manuscripts. Now, I’m about to share with you the “gallant” method: Be like Jane!

Jane’s m.o. was to get up super early, work out, then basically be the first person at the press. She doesn’t drink coffee. Instead, she drinks this tea she makes. There’s caffeine in it, but not much. She’s an efficient worker, so she kept to her schedule and was able to depart for home right at 5 p.m.

So this is her recipe for her special iced tea. It’s how she told me she makes it a few years ago, though according to what she said last week, she changes it a little depending on what she has on hand, or what she’s in the mood for. The bag of black tea can vary, though I indeed like to use Earl Gray.

Here’s the formula:

• 2 teabags green tea
• 2 teabags jasmine tea (which is also green tea)
• 1 teabag Earl Gray (which is a black tea)

That’s it! Make a pitcher using this formula, and you’ll have the deliciousness of the Earl Gray and jasmine, and the health benefits of green tea. Enough caffeine to keep you chugging along, but not enough to make you jingle-jangle. Also, the punchiness of the Earl Gray is softened with the other flavors. I think you’ll like it!

. . . But I’m pretty sure I’m not ready to give up my morning coffee.

My Lemonade Atroci-tea

I admit it: I should not be proud of this . . . but guess what? I kind of am. But this does fit into the category of “childhood culinary atrocity.” Reading it, you’re gonna go “. . . ewwww.”

But not so fast! I recently resurrected this beverage a few weeks ago, when I saw they actually still make Lipton Instant Tea. So I bought a jar! I mixed up my old formula to the best of my memory, and I found it genuinely tasty. In fact, it’s better than I remembered it, which is saying a lot.

This recipe (if you can call it that) dates back to high school, when I used to sometimes bring a lunch, including a big cup for my tea. Here’s how I would make it.

In the morning, or the night before, I prepared a lemon-tea-sugar concentrate ahead of time. I used a small (2 oz.) Tupperware “midget” condiment container for my mix, which was about 1 heaping teaspoon of Lipton Instant Tea (unsweetened), about 1 heaping teaspoon of sugar, and about 1.5 ounces of ReaLemon lemon juice. I’d shake the juice with the tea and sugar, and it would form a sludgy, muddy slurry.

The horror.

It was ugly, but it blended easily with water I’d get from a drinking fountain at school. I guess I’d bring a plastic spoon with me, one that would fit into the cup along with the little Tupperware full of my sludgy stuff. (I don’t remember getting ice at school . . . though maybe I’d get a cup of ice from Taco Bell, across the street, which is where we band kids went for lunch nearly every day.) Or maybe I did without the ice.

(BY THE WAY, I'm using some pictures of old plastic souvenir/giveaway promotional cups from 1980s Columbia in this post. . . . Like, remember when Shakespeare's cups were opaque tan?)

And yeah, it’s gotta be Lipton instant tea, not Nestea. The two taste completely different. Instant tea is, almost by definition, terrible, but of the two brands, Lipton is the only one that’s tolerable. Nestea is the devil. It just is.

No, we didn’t have Nalgene bottles or Yeti sealable cups back then. So I just used one of the ubiquitous big plastic, indestructible cups that restaurants gave out back then. Faddenhappi’s, Harpo’s, Shakespeare’s, etc. You know the type.

I usually used a Harpo's cup, for the Mizzou logo and for the fact that it was from a bar. And what's cooler than the local college bars when you're in high school?

(And gosh, remember Faddenhappi's? I loved that place. They were at 700 E. Broadway and served pizzas and loaded baked potatoes; the same toppings could work for both. They probably also served salads.)

Here’s the fun part about my humble beverage: it’s basically an instant “Arnold Palmer.” An Arnold Palmer is half lemonade and half iced tea. My version simply has less sugar and more lemon, making it extra sour. Even in high school, I liked sour drinks.

No, I would not make this for company. Never. But just for little old me?

Well, let’s say, what if it’s a busy workday, and you don’t really want to spend any time brewing up a pitcher of tea. Or maybe your air-conditioning has gone out, and you want iced tea without turning on the stove, or heating anything. Instant tea is so fast.

In graduate school, I shifted away from instant tea, forever. I made sun tea all the time when I lived in Arizona. I’d get tea in bulk from the local health-food coop. In Montana, I’d set out my jar of sun tea on the back steps. Like any good lesbian, I have kept a cabinet full of boxes of various teas, black and herbal. Until a few weeks ago, I don’t think I have ever purchased instant tea. Once I moved out of my parents’ house, I never bought instant tea.

So, now that I have a jar of powdery brown Lipton Instant Tea, I’ve had fun returning to my old concoction. I’ve been experimenting with adjusting the ratios of the various ingredients. I’ve been discovering that if you put a lot of ice in it, the ice melts and mellows whatever flavor was maybe too dominant. Taking the initial few sips certainly wakes you up. But I can sip on it all afternoon.

So that’s all. Just a little salute to my former self, before I became all “foody” and snooty.

And when you consider I've happily enjoyed dirty martinis (about which a friend of mine once said, "Don't you love them? They taste just like poison!"), this rather sour lemonade-and-iced-tea blend ain't too bad.

Now I’m trying to decide if I should “confess” to more childhood culinary atrocities. What do you think? Did you “cook” things as a juvenile that today, you’d shudder to think of?

Switchel, Stichel, Switzel, Swizzle: Ginger Water for Hot Days

Six years ago, in a post I’d almost forgotten about, I talked about our sweltery summertime heat. And that’s where we’re at again: heat and humidity. Well? It makes the corn and the tomatoes grow!

But it makes me wilt. And it, with all the rain we’ve had, makes the watergrass, crabgrass, or whatever-it-is grow like crazy. So I’ve gotta mow the lawn it again. I’m going to wait until the sun starts to set tonight. Ugh! I’m dreading it. (Compared to this heat, my hot flashes seem cool!)

Revisiting that older post I did about “Heat,” I recalled John Madson’s description of an old-timey lemonade-like beverage that farmers used to gulp when they had to thresh wheat in the hottest part of summer. It must have been hell on earth. That’s how Madson describes it, anyway.



Madson called this beverage “stichel,” but from what I can see online, it’s more commonly called switchel, switzel, swizzle, ginger-water, haymaker’s punch, or switchy. It’s an incredibly old concoction, a centuries-old thirst-quencher, an antique equivalent to today’s “energy drinks” or “electrolyte beverages.”

Wikipedia’s entry on “Switchel” notes that the beverage is also mentioned by Laura Ingalls Wilder in her book The Long Winter. In it, Laura’s mom tells her to make up a bunch of the stuff to take to the laboring men, explaining that cold well water, alone, would make the overheated men feel sick, while the ginger-beverage would quench their thirst better.

Today it’s a super-trendy hipster beverage! Who knew? All the cool kids are drinking it!

You can find plenty of different recipes online, but here’s the one I tried. It seemed simple, basic, and it seemed to fit what Madson described Iowa farmers drinking “by the gallon.” (Sorry, but I can’t remember where I got this particular recipe.)

Use this recipe as an idea starter, and mess around with it until you get it just right: try pure maple syrup instead of brown sugar, as they do in Vermont, here and here. Molasses and honey were probably popular in some areas, too. Or try using the juice from fresh ginger instead of powdered.

---------------------------

Stichel

3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp. ginger (powdered)
1/2 cup cider vinegar
1 quart cold water

Dissolve together the first three ingredients, then shake with the cold water. Serve chilled.

The recipe, wherever I got it from, also suggested you could mix it with equal quantities of ginger ale. Or, I would suggest, mix in some club soda or seltzer, if you wanted it bubbly and less strong.



How does it taste? Well—Sue and I think it’s actually pretty darned tasty! The hardest part is the first sip, because you can smell the vinegar, and the immediate thought is: This is going to taste like something you’d dip Easter eggs into. Or: “Ugh! pickle juice!”

But despite that initial panicked thought, it really does taste very good, and it goes down easy, and I’ll probably be making it again. The vinegar does the same thing that lemons do in lemonade. (Hey, remember the Greek lemonade recipe I shared with you a while back?)

I hope you’ll give switchel a try! When you do, let me know what you think of the flavor. Bonus points if you report on its efficacy as a thirst-quencher during these beastly hot days!

Peach Lassi

Today was Clara Day—my maternal grandmother was born September 17, 1897. I usually try to commemorate my grandmas’ birthdays somehow—in some kind of small, but privately meaningful way.

Last year, we had a dinner of some of Grandma Renner’s favorite foods.

This year, I spent most of the day cooking (which was rather commemorative in itself, given the amount of cooking she did in her life). I made several batches of pesto, cleaning out some of the herb garden. And I fussed over a grape tart (more on that soon). And more; a terrific dessert calls for a special dinner. This activity wasn’t consciously part of Clara Day, but in retrospect, it does kind of fit.

But I did find time to make a couple big glasses of peach lassi, and Sue and I tipped them in honor of Clara—who was so fond of peaches.

Granted, the lassi was kind of a stretch—it’s like a Punjabi milkshake made with yogurt and pureed fruit—but I think Grandma would have enjoyed trying it. Peaches are great in almost anything. And Grandma loved peaches.

Here’s the formula I used. Quick and easy.





Peach Lassi

Take 2 nice big juicy ripe peaches, peel and stone them, and puree them, with a small pinch of ground cloves, in a blender or food processor.

Add about 16 oz. of vanilla yogurt. (This is about half of a 32-oz. tub of Dannon. I didn’t have any plain around. It’s what I had on hand. And this way, I didn’t need to add much sugar. And the Dannon isn’t very thick, so I didn’t need to add milk or water.) Blend and blend.

Okay, taste some: sweet enough? I added about 1/8 cup sugar, and a small pinch of salt, blended again.

Take two pint glasses and half-fill with crushed ice. Pour in the lassi and stir well.

Garnish with ground unsalted pistachios.

My Favorite Juicer Juice

As a general rule, I’m skeptical of cooking gadgets. My knife, my cutting board, a favorite pot or two, and hey—most of that other stuff is just another scheme to part you from your hard-earned money.

But I have a few countertop appliances that I appreciate and actually do keep in the kitchen. You already know about my ice cream maker. And the food processor makes short work of pesto-making.

I guess my most indulgent countertop kitchen appliance is my “Juiceman Professional Series 210” juicer.




Here’s a link to something pretty close to the model I have; here’s a link to the same company’s current, similar model.

I won’t go into how useful a juicer can be; I’ll let you visit the Juiceman website on your own. But before you think I’m off my nut for having such a large, overly specific gadget in my kitchen, remember: It can be used for more than just beverages—think about its applications for frozen desserts, gelatins, soups, or for adding liquid to, say, muffins or quick breads. Does a recipe call for tomato juice, and all you have is fresh or canned? Ta-dahh!

I should also point out that I’m a huge, huge fan of Main Squeeze, Columbia’s juice bar and organic cafe. If you’re unfamiliar with the whole “juicing scene,” I encourage you to go there and learn how delicious fresh juices can be. Ultra-healthy stuff; and it tastes great! Sign me up!

When I first got my juicer several years ago, I started with the recipes that came in the instructions. For instance, did you know you can make super-healthy lemonade by juicing whole chunks of lemon (yes, with the rind) and apple? No sugar required. Just “chop-chop, whirr-whirr, splash-splash,” and you’ve got this smooth, super-lemony elixir of life.

Then I started looking around. In Kansas City, the Nutty Girl (now closed), and Main Squeeze, too, were creating juices with some leafy vegetables—such as wheatgrass, spinach, or parsley (Main Squeeze has a great drink called “Elvis Parsley” which is to V-8 what Elvis was to . . . Lawrence Welk).

And since I love my herb garden, I started thinking: why not add a little fresh basil to add some nuance to my tomato juice? Everyone knows tomato and basil love each other from the time they are sprouts in the garden all the way to the autumnal compost heap. (And yes, that juice combination is pretty good!)

But here’s my favorite of these juice/fresh-herb combinations. As far as I know, I’ve completely invented it.

At Main Squeeze, the orange/carrot juice combination is called a “Sunny Bunny.” (What a fun name!) So my concoction is basically a “Sunny Bunny” plus mint. The Sunny Bunny went hippity-hop through the mint patch.




Relative quantities can vary however you want, but I think the largest portion should be of orange and not carrot—and I don’t recommend going overboard with the mint. Here you go.


ORANGE-CARROT-MINT JUICE

2–3 oranges or other citrus fruit, peeled and cut into chunks to fit your juicer’s feed tube. (I like to combine oranges and grapefruit.) (By the way, juicers vary, but the instructions on mine say to peel all citrus except for lemons—the peels can make the juice taste bitter.) (Meanwhile, my juicer says to leave the “white” part of the orange on—supposedly it packs lots of nutrients—and it provides a pleasant, non-acidic creaminess to the juice that is sadly lost when people simply “squeeze” citrus.)

2–3 carrots, washed if organic, pared if not organic; cut into chunks to fit your juicer. (I like to cut the carrot the night before and soak it in a bowl of water overnight in the fridge—it makes more juice that way.)

A small handful of fresh mint—4 or 5 good sprigs—rinsed.

Feed everything through the juicer according to the appliance’s directions. Stir juice, pour into glasses, and enjoy. Makes at least enough to share with a friend—depending on size and juiciness of oranges and carrots . . . and how thirsty you are.

Mrs. A’s Lemonade, in the Greek Style!

Warm weather! Summer is almost here. So this is a good time to tell you about this lemonade recipe, which is an heirloom as well as “the best ever.”

My dear friend Mrs. A, who hails from Greece via Lebanon, taught me this recipe. This is the way her grandmother, Yaya Petrina, taught her to make lemonade!




Here’s why we love it: First, it’s delicious, and it’s full of vitamin C. Second, it’s an heirloom recipe, and therefore holy. Third, it uses alllll of the lemon fruit, including the peel, so it’s flavored with the sweet oils from the skin as well as the juice from the pulp. Fourth, it has a secret ingredient, which gives it a certain je ne sais quoi, or as the Greeks say, Apithano! Fifth, it softens your hands! —Read on.




Here’s how you do it.

Wash your hands. Take four or five large lemons, wash the outsides, and slice them as thinly as possible. Use a sharp knife. Put the slices into a large bowl.




Add sugar—about 1/2 or 3/4 of a cup. Use your best judgment. Just dump it on top.




Then, using your hands, begin massaging the lemons. Mash them with your hands, pummel it with your knuckles, rub the peels well, and squeeze and squish the pulp through your fingers. Immediately, juice will start coming out of the lemon slices!




Hey! This is fun! Plus, it’s good exercise to counter that carpel-tunnel you worry about, and it softens the skin on your hands. It’s also a good way to release your anger or anxiety.

The goal is to squish all the juice, the oils, the living daylights out of those lemon slices. Believe it or not, a great deal of flavor and aroma comes from the peels. Your job is to make the peels get translucent. Indeed, try to make them wilt or even dissolve.

Use a sieve or colander to squish the juices out into another bowl. Pour a little water over the mashed-up, wilted lemons, and squeeze that moisture into the bowl, too.




Then repeat the process, adding some more sugar each time. The sugar is important, as it acts as an abrasive, and it draws the liquids out of the lemon tissues via osmosis. (Remember your biology class? The high concentration of sugars outside the fruit cells creates an osmotic gradient, and . . . oh never mind—just call it “maceration.”)

Keep rubbing and squishing, straining and rinsing and straining again, until you’ve extracted all the goodness out of those poor old lemon slices. When you’re done, the lemon fragments should be looking something like sauerkraut!




(Mrs. A notes that the leftover pulp makes a fine facial treatment mask: Put the exhausted peels in a blender with a teaspoon of glycerin, whirl it up, and put the resulting glop on your face: “It is the best facial treatment, believe me! It cleanses, tones, is an astringent, and leaves your skin soft like satin, once you rinse it off your face. Try it. It beats the best commercial facial treatment, guaranteed!”)

Getting back to the lemonade—Once you’ve pressed all the juice and flavor out of the lemons, pour the precious lemony elixir of happiness into a pitcher. From five large lemons, I got about a quart of concentrated juice. Then, you add water and possibly more sugar to taste. But you’re not done yet!




Next you get to add the secret ingredient! —Orange blossom water. Anthonero! You’ll only need about a teaspoonful. Or heck, a little drizzle of it. You know—just to give it that little something extra. This, Mrs. A. told me, is what really magnifies the lemon flavor.


If you’re not familiar with orange flower water, I encourage you to get some to play with—put it in scones, cakes, and cocktails! You can find it at “ethnic” or international grocery stores. In my experience, the most common brand seems to be A. Monteux, from France. It comes in a little blue bottle. This is an essential water that is perfumed with orange blossoms—not oranges, but orange blossoms.

Mrs. A uses an orange blossom water from Lebanon, made by the Cortas company. If you’re in Central Missouri, you can find this product at World Harvest and at Middle Eastern Foods (next to the Islamic Center of Central Missouri) (the mosque), both in Columbia.

And that’s basically it—to recap: Using some sugar to help draw out the juices, and rinsing occasionally with water and repeating the maceration, rubbing, and rinsing, you literally wring out every last bit of goodness from those lemons and make a concentrate; then you dilute it however you want and adjust for sweetness. And don’t forget the orange flower water!

(Oooh, I love heirloom recipes!)




I offer my heartfelt thanks to Alexandra Athanassiou for sharing her dear grandmother’s recipe with me, and for letting me put this on my blog. It was a true honor to receive this recipe—and it was even better to sip lemonade with her!

Beatrice Stephens and Her Mint Recipes

Recently I purchased a copy of an old, used cookbook. Remember how I was crowing on and on about the Good Housekeeping Cook Book of 1949? Well, soon after writing that earlier post, I found a copy of the first edition of that book, copyright 1933, and the nice people at Eureka! Books in Mount Vernon, Maine (selling via Alibris), sent it to me without delay. (And yes, they were indeed nice!)

As soon as the package arrived, I grabbed it and an O’Doull’s, carried them out to the backyard, and plopped down in one of our big Adirondack chairs to give my lovely new/old book a nice once-over.

And if you’ve had much experience looking at used cookbooks, you know that they often include bonus treasuries of handwritten recipes and notes by the previous owner. And my copy of the 1933 Good Housekeeping Cook Book is no exception! What a treat!

First off, in the front endpapers is the name of the cookbook’s first owner:

Beatrice E. P. Stephens
21 Academy St.
Auburn, Maine

February 12, 1934
2 years to G.H.

Yeah . . . I Google-mapped the street address, and according to the “street view,” it looks like Beatrice’s house is no longer standing (unless they’ve renumbered the addresses on that block). There is a convenience store on the corner, and next to that is a large patch of big trees, including some Norway spruces among some deciduous species, and a place in the sidewalk curb where a walkway to a house must have been. The “academy” is apparently still there, down the street, but I guess her home is gone.

Shoot. Sometimes, a little Internet sleuthing yields some intriguing information, but no, I wasn’t able to find anything on Beatrice herself. And I have no idea if “Stephens” would have been a maiden or married name, of course, either. So who knows.

I did find one possibly interesting link, where a guy named David Stephens claimed to be abducted by aliens in 1975 near Oxford, Maine. His hypnosis sessions wherein he described the incident were witnessed by his father and mother, Gene and Beatrice. How about that! Wonder if it’s the same people. Oxford isn’t very far away from Auburn—ten miles, maybe.

However, David was twenty-two at the time of his abduction, meaning that Beatrice would have given birth to him ca. 1953, and if our Beatrice was starting to get Good Housekeeping in about 1932, that’s a long time between young adulthood and having a kid. Oh well. Probably different people.

Anyway, the Beatrice Stephens who owned this cookbook left several Depression-era recipes of her own in her clean, cursive fountain pen and in pencil, including: French Dressing; Sour Cream Dressing (“on a cucumber & scallion salad!”); Fish Chowder; outlines for four different salads; a list of spices to use when boiling smoked shoulder or ham; a list of sandwich fillings; and a recipe for donuts.

But she must have loved mint the best, because she wrote down several recipes for mint sauce, mint vinegar, mint punch, etc. I transcribe these for you now.

(I wonder: If you were to go to the location of 21 Academy Street in Auburn, Maine, and look around in that overgrown, foresty patch of land, do you suppose you would find a nice patch of spearmint persisting after all these years? I wonder.)

Mint Punch
Crush 12 sprigs fresh mint
add: 1 c. sugar
---- 6 oranges
---- 3 lemons, & stir well
Set 2 hours, pour over ice in bowl. Add 2 qts. ginger ale.

Mint Punch #2
4 Tbspn. fresh mint, chopped
2 " sugar syrup
2 " lemon juice
1 " orange juice, and set 2 hrs.
Strain; add 1 qt. ginger ale.

Mint Punch #3
Boil together for 8 min.
1/2 c. water, 1/2 c. sugar. Cool.
Mix 1 c. fresh mint, cho.—
juice of 2 lemons
-------- 3 oranges
1 pt. pineapple juice
1 qt. weak tea
1/2 t. to 1 c. bo. water (add water to make 1 qt.)
Stand cold place 4 hours or overnight.
Strain—add 2 qts. ginger ale
Makes about 1 gallon.

Mint Sauce #1
Chop 1/4 c. mint leaves & add to 1/2 c. hot vinegar with a little (1 T) sugar.

Mint Sauce #2
1 c. currant jelly, 2 t. mint, finely chopped, 1 t. grated orange rind. Break jelly with fork. Lamb.

Green Mint Vinegar
Bring to boil 1 qt. pure cider vinegar.
Add 1 c. gran. sugar &
1 pt. of spearmint leaves & young tips
Stir & crush
boil a few minutes.
Strain & bottle hot in glass jars.
For Iced Tea & Fruit Punches, basis for Mint Sauce, sparingly in lettuce & cress salads.

Minted Iced Tea
1 1/2 t. tea for ea. c. freshly boiling water.
Steep 5 min.—add a few crushed mint leaves.
Strain cool & chill in ref.
Cracked ice—lemon slice & mint sprig.

So this seemed a fitting post for today, since they’re predicting our weather will soon become more seasonal (which is to say, roastingly, braisingly hot), and mint has the marvelous property of making your mouth feel cool.

Also, mint has long been used as a mild remedy for digestive upsets, and since my dad is recovering from an acute and completely uncalled-for compulsory gastroenterology seminar this week, I’m prescribing mint tea for his tummy.

(One final note, an interesting connection: Beatrice Stephens acquired her cookbook in 1934, the year my dad was born. That summer was one of the hottest on record in North America. No wonder Beatrice was scribbling down recipes for mint tea and mint punch!)

Positive Reinforcement

Sue and I spent a good deal of time this past weekend preparing our tax information for our accountant, and we got our materials sent off this afternoon. Hooray! The annual dreaded chore is done. And it isn’t even April!

I’ve been the worst kind of procrastinator when it comes to taxes, but this year I decided it was important for me to get my act together, especially now that I’m a freelancer and I need to start paying estimated, quarterly taxes. (“Estimated” here equals “stab in the dark.”)

So to reward myself for good behavior, tonight I finally opened that tin of foie gras we bought in Paris. To be specific, it was a bloc de foie gras d’oie trufflé (according to the packaging)—a small loaf of goose liver foie gras with truffles. Oh, man, was it delicious. Vaguely like a braunschweiger . . . one that’s graduated from divinity school. Or no: It is to braunschweiger as fresh butter is to hamburger grease.

Okay, yes, I know how they make foie gras. But I’m willing to enjoy it once in a while, giving thanks for the birds that suffered for my pleasure. And I hope that Tyson never, ever gets into the foie gras–making business, because then the perversion would truly begin, and it would be time to riot in the streets on behalf of duck and goose rights.

It was nice and warm today, sunny, but it was quite windy—gusts in the 40 mph range—and it made our windows rattle. We would have opened the windows a little bit, but we didn’t want our stuff blowing around inside the house like a snow globe. (Taxes, remember?)

So we took our foie gras dinner out on the sun porch, since it’s drafty and sunny out there, enough to make us feel like we were having an outdoor picnic. Or, un pique-nique, en français. Fresh and dried fruits, some plain crackers, some taramosalata, and a small sampling of really special cheeses: Parrano Uniekaas Dutch cheese, which we found at Whole Foods; a seeming cross between an aged parmesan and a fine gouda. A seductive sweet, salty, nutty blend. Then also, two flavored cheeses we got recently from the World Harvest international grocery in Columbia: One with cumin seeds, the other with green peppercorns.

It was all so very good, to sit there on the comfy old sofa next to Sue, as the sun was getting low in the sky, as we nibbled on all this delectable fare. Even the “Fre” wine we were sharing seemed okay. (Nonalcoholic wines have a long way to go to catch up with the flavor of n/a beers. But until they do, the “Chardonnay” by Fre is about the best of the bunch. Drink it out of a nice glass. That improves the flavor. It really does.)

Well, there’s not a lot to report, other than the taxes being sent off to our accountant ahead of the very last minute, and that’s good reason to celebrate.