Quieting Life

The Greens of Winter

One thinks of winter here as comprising every shade of brown and grey and little else, and although it's not technically winter until next week, prevailing temperatures are a good enough measure for me. Failing snow cover, the woods are yet astonishingly verdant. I could almost confuse it with early spring (and some mornings are so gentle, the air rich with the smell of earth...).

My mind is so restless these days, hard to say quite why. Sleep is a welcome relief, but hard-won – dependent on careful doses of bourbon, boring late-night reads, and focused meditative eyelid watching. My finest remedy is my daily wander in the woods, turning my attention to every little wonder. So much activity out there; I'll welcome a healthy dumping of snow when (if?) it comes, but for now all that lively beauty keeps the crazy world-out-there at a manageable distance.

Mosses abound.

Wintergreen, Foamflower foliage, lichen, and a tiny fern.

The spectrum on an old stump.

The brilliant blue sky reflected in ice.

Fresh fungus even this late in the season.

Viburnum (left) and blackberry already budded out for the spring.

And my indoor hedge against the impending bleakness: paperwhite narcissus, which will probably bloom on the day the snow flies.

Quick Preserved Lemons

When I hosted my book group here last month I decided to make a chicken tagine to serve the girls, but lacking a supply of preserved lemons, I had to improvise. It's possible to substitute sliced fresh lemons – I've done it – but the result just isn't the same. Here's my ad hoc remedy.

Select 2 lemons with nice shiny skins and scrub them clean with a paste of warm water and baking soda. This is a trick my brother's wife hipped me to years ago – nothing fancy, just dump a spoonful of baking soda in your hand, add a little water, and use both hands and a little firm pressure to scour the fruit all over, then give them a thorough rinsing. I do this whenever I'll be using the peel of any citrus (even when it's organic) – for marmalade, candied peel, whole preserved fruit.

(The French have a great little word for kitchen tricks like this: a 'truc' is any little thingie or whatsit or trick. We all have them, and sometimes they can be a revelation to others. I'm happy to share mine, and just added 'Truc' as a category. More to follow.)

Slice the lemons thinly, a little less than an eighth of an inch thick (make sure your knife is wickedly sharp).

Prick out the seeds and arrange the slices in a single layer on a flat plate. Sprinkle with about 2 teaspoons of kosher salt and half a teaspoon of sugar. (Sugar isn't generally used for long-preserved lemons, but I thought it might help with mellowing them on a tight schedule.) Add another layer of sliced lemons, then sprinkle with more salt and sugar.

Once all the slices have been arranged and sprinkled, place another plate on top, weight it, and leave to stand at room temperature for about 3 hours. Mine didn't give up enough liquid to run over, but if that's a concern, you can put the whole thing in the sink.

Before using, give them a quick cold-water rinse and drain them (or pat them lightly with a paper towel). Slice, dice, or quarter them to use in your recipe.

Duly chastened for my failure to have any of the 'real' thing on hand, I will now set about packing a jar full for future use.

A Damn Long 16 Days

Deer season (var: rifle) opened 2 weeks ago, half an hour before sunrise on Saturday the 10th. Because the woods behind our place are ample and amply populated with deer, they make for a popular hunting spot. And while most hunters are well-trained and conscientious, the thought of wandering out there with a sprightly dog (even blazed in fluorescent orange) is not terribly appealing. So for the 16 days of deer season, me and the dog have to go elsewhere to stretch our legs. It defeats the purpose, somewhat, to have to drive to take a walk, but it's just a part of the cycle of things. And there's a really cool place to go walking when our woods aren't an option (mud season is another time to avoid them).

Seven or eight miles south of here, the river that runs past our door (the West River) is choked in spectacular fashion by the Ball Mountain Dam, built and maintained by the Army Corps of Engineers. There's a mile and a half of road in to it from Route 30, also the work of the ACoE. Maintained to high standards for constant access to the dam – routinely paved, always plowed in winter – with convenient parking, very limited traffic, and otherwise pristine exposure to the elements, it's a pretty swell spot to take a walk. And popular because of it (especially when the woods are off limits).

A Few Good Recipes for Thanksgiving

I won't be hosting Thanksgiving this year. We'll be joining friends at their house, with an assortment of other folk. Of course I'll cook a thing or four to contribute, whatever I'm assigned. But I thought I'd offer up these few recipes, for three elements that have become as essential to Thanksgiving dinner as the turkey itself when I do host: Creamed Onions, Cranberry Chutney, and Buttermilk Pie. These recipes were all posted previously on my cooking blog – A Cooking Life – which I have let go dormant in favor of this here blog.

The creamed onions are a departure from the bland white dreadfuls of my youth, made eminently edible with pan-roasted onions and a sauce spiked with wine, cheese, and chicken stock. The upgrade has apparently been well-received, as I keep finding my recipe (and the accompanying photo) swiped and claimed as someone else's all around the internet. You know what they say about plagiarism. 

The Gleaners

A friend spread the word that there were potatoes left for the taking at her fella's farm. Yesterday was a fine Indian Summer kind of day, perfect for digging taters. Most of what remained were rose fingerlings, with some red-skinned beauties scattered randomly in the rows. I didn't do anything so compulsive as weigh our haul, but I'd guess we got off with about 50 pounds. Joan, my partner in gleaning, took a small bag full for short term use, and the rest went right into the root cellar. This spared us trying to divvy them up, and she can stop by any time and retrieve them from their safe storage.

With gratitude to the farmer and the earth: