peas, please

I'm happy to see this letter about my real introduction to French food. I'll never be able to figure out exactly how they made the wonderful vinaigrette that they served with cold artichokes. What I still quote about the soufflées is how we'd ask the serving girls for more after they'd given us what seemed like a small blob. "Mademoiselle, c'est deux oeufs!!" Two eggs didn't seem like enough, though. And then there was what we called "scrambled egg pie." I didn't learn the word quiche until after I was married and found it in the Joy of Cooking. I probably didn't start making them until the Julia Child era, though. But that food was probably one of the things that got me started being interested in serious cooking.

As far as my classmates went, it was very hard to live with them, in general. I was the only one who'd been to a public high school. They were all very rich, fairly snobby, had all "come out," etc. The ones I finally became friends with (both named Marty) were quite nice, though.

I must make this brief, since peas cry out to be picked, then shelled, then frozen. So far we have fifteen new packages in the freezer (and have eaten them several times, too, of course). Need at least twenty more. Last year we froze 35 packages, but I didn't serve them as often as I could have, since it seemed that there weren't very many. We still have six of the old ones left. If we get enough new ones, the old ones will be doled out to family members. Even a year old, they're way better than anything from the store.

The garden grows apace. We've eaten our first cabbage (delicious!) and are awaiting the broccoli. Onions will come full circle. There are still a few viable ones in the basement, but the ones in the garden are now getting big enough to use, too. Some concern about the Kentucky blue string beans, which, despite what it says on the package, do not seem to show any interest in climbing our poles. If they are only bush beans, we won't have planted enough. We'll see. Maybe they're late climbers.

On the cooking front. I've now cooked the pasta on the back of FC 79, to rave reviews from both Charlie and DO. On Sunday when Mom was here I made the beer-brined butterflied chicken. Used two bottles of Corona. Charlie was very skeptical (as was I, really), but it was very good. Got pretty black in the barbecue, but stayed moist. I've been butterflying chickens for years, but most often cut them in half --after butterflying -- and freeze and cook them that way. I recommend this for two people. I also made the tiny stuffed tomatoes in the basil section. These are extremely wonderful, seeing how simple they are. I took most of them to a cocktail party on Sunday and brought the rest to Marty's when Wayne was there (also Sunday, on our way to said cocktail party). Use good olive oil. For mozzarella, I used the little ones that come swimming in water, since they were a little firmer than the shrink-wrapped balls that I use for a lot of things. These will reappear when our cherry tomatoes are ripe. This is the dumb time of year when one buys the items that will, in a month or so, appear as surplus. We never come close to eating our cherry tomatoes (two plants this year, but I don't know why -- usually we have only one) because by the time they are abundant, the other tomatoes are in and keeping us busy.

I shall do some quick answering of blogs since I wrote. I should have known that your OCLC game was based on Adventure. It now makes perfect sense to me. As far as earth-shredders goes: Charlie popped the mantis into the back of my car last week to see how it would work. He'd never really given one a try. This one is electric, and required running some 300 feet of extension cord to the garden. It didn't want to run, but after he tapped on the switch a couple of times, it started. And actually, it didn't do a bad job on small weeds in an area that had been tilled twice in the last month. He tilled in the trenches beside the potatoes to scrabble up the weeds before putting down heavy hay mulch. It worked fine for that. It won't break ground, however. I didn't realize he'd borrowed it, and he will bring it back to RF soon.

The only Costello album I know is "King of America," the title song of which contains that quote. I like your quote, too, Suze (just googled it); it's more useful than mine.

I really want to see the Eroica thing (a movie?). I think about that symphony a lot, particularly how revolutionary it was. I once saw the Chi symphony play the Beethoven 2nd and 3rd as a concert program (went alone, pregnant with Marty, I believe). What an amazing contrast.

I have much more to say and to answer, but I really have to go to the garden. Will add a couple of photos, though!

But before that, one more thing. A cry of anguish rose when you (Suzy) mentioned the "Summer on the Side" section of FC 79! I'm so close to having made everything in the magazine (desserts will come soon; I'm waiting for blueberries and raspberries, and still putting off the brownies), but I'd forgotten about that part! Oh well, I've made a few of those things before, since they're from old magazines. The wheatberry salad is particularly good, but it makes an awful lot.


This is a salad from Mario Batali's book, made with roasted romas from our garden last year. These are the mozzarella blobs I was talking about.


Mom will probably kill me for this, but I think it's a cute photo and makes her look very animated and lively. Which she is!


Charlie and the potatoes. This is about a week old, but they've not grown much since then. They're busy underground, we hope and assume. The mantis is on the ground next to him, and the scrabbled weeds in the trench are what the mantis was able to do. Peas on the right, tiny edamame on the left, photographer in the foreground.