Pink of Perfection

It was a brutally hot day, and despite best efforts to the contrary, including a striped top and a crisp white circle skirt, our heroine was melting into the blacktop of the Brooklyn Flea. But lo, hark! Spotted in the distance was an oasis of sorts. There, tucked between the vintage tin signs and 1930s feed sacks was salvation: Brooklyn Soda Works. She felt too wilted in the punishing June heat to dilly dally with otherwise delightfully sounding flavor mash-ups like salty plum or jalapeno grapefruit. She needed pure refreshment, and fast. A cup of fizzy ginger lemonade was pulled from a rigged-up cooler keg combo (”How do they do that,” she wondered?) and placed before her. A few sweaty dollars seemed a small price to pay for such an expedient rescue mission. She sipped, she sighed, she was saved.

Continue reading “Fresh and Effervescent Mint and Ginger Lemonade” »

I had it all planned out perfectly — Lisa was coming over for a cocktail and I knew the pepper jelly she gave me at Christmas would go magically with some of Martha’s famed cheese coins. It would be one of those rare moments when all the elements come together and you have a brief turn as an exceedingly gracious hostess, shining the spotlight not only on your delicious nibbles and refreshment, but on your guest’s contribution that makes it complete. That was the idea anyway.

What happened in reality was that the so-called cheddar coins were more like…crumbly lattice wafers. The flavor was wonderful, but what good is it if you have to scrape up bits off the cookie sheet and serve them off a spatula? Not the elegant Mad Men cocktail hour I was hoping for.

Have you ever had a recipe utterly and totally fail? This hasn’t happened to me in awhile, and the devastation was crushing, not only for the occasion at hand (I was two steps away from cracking open a can of salted peanuts), but for the sheer waste. Two sticks of butter and a cup of New York sharp cheddar cheese, come to nothing. I followed the direction precisely, so what gives?

The drinks, though — the drinks did their bit. Since my friend Laureen mixed up an old-fashioned at our book club reading of 50’s novel, The Best of Everything, this has been my cocktail of choice. It’s strong and appropriately boozey (it’s Don Draper’s drink of choice, after all), but ever-so-slightly sweet. And it would have been really perfect with some spicy, cheesy nibbles. But, so it goes…

Continue reading “Happy Hour at Home: Old-Fashioneds…And The Appetizer That Wasn’t” »

Draw closer, dear readers. I’m about to share with you a gem from the recipe treasure trove.

There are some foods I make and write about on this blog that are weeknight-worthy. Simple cooking is very often the most delicious, and putting dinner on the table each night with care and consideration is, in my opinion, one of the most artful acts on earth. But every once in a while, I raise my sight line from ground level to the stars. Perhaps, let’s say, when a friend is coming over for a drink and a nibble. Then I remember something so show-stoppingly delicious, I wonder how it could have even fallen out of my repertoire for as long as it has and moreover, why I have kept it from you for all these years. Forgive me. I’m about to pay it forward, win you admirers, lovers, and friends for life, all with the following recipe.

This chicken liver paté is the reason I wanted a food processor of my own. It has accompanied me to holiday parties and book club (hi ladies!), and it is always met with delight. Perhaps those who don’t like organ meats stay quiet, as they should, frankly. People who like paté will love this. And as you know, I don’t make a lot of high-minded, definitive proclamations, but if I’m sure of anything in this world, it is how truly fabulous this paté recipe is.

As for the kir, need I mention anything more than it is a favorite of Poirot? Together, these two make for a posh happy hour, the ever-so-slightly syrupy kir a perfect match for the rounded, rich saltiness of the paté. I like to imagine MFK Fisher in the Dijon years wearing a pencil skirt and dreaming up ideas while eating sipping and eating in the company of a very good, very wise female friend.

Come to think of it, perhaps this is just what we need to get in the holiday spirit. I don’t think it could hurt.

Continue reading “Happy Hour at Home: Kirs, Chicken Liver Paté and Maple Apples” »

hot buttered rum would be right at home here
image via Retrofuture

One has to be in a particular sort of mood for hot alcoholic drinks. Usually, I’d rather pour a glass of red wine, slip off my shoes, and sit by a fire, but hot buttered rum keeps purring its siren song in my ear.

The idea first popped into my head following an afternoon in dusty bookshops. With cold fingertips, we finally pushed open the door into a tavern with Christmas lights in the window, only to discover it wasn’t a hot buttered rum-friendly establishment. Instead, we drank a Yuenglings and listened to tales of their french fries being the best in the county.

But the next day, after a long walk in the slanting light of the afternoon, geese overhead, the hot buttered rum was still tempting me. Back in my mom’s kitchen, I pulled out a stained copy of the Joy of Cooking. The recipe couldn’t be simpler or more warming. I shared a cup over four games of Pente and lost every one. And I don’t think the rum can take the fall for that.

Continue reading “Post-Thanksgiving Cure: Hot Buttered Rum” »

image via retro renovation

Something tells me you dear readers share my deep and abiding love for Thanksgiving. On Sunday, window shopping in a fancy food shop with a friend, I suddenly got an anticipatory thrill so moving I hopped a little. Not up and down, but just up, once.

Thanksgiving wasn’t always my favorite holiday, but it became so when I was about 14. The day took on a hodgepodge element that made it more unpredictable party than overstuffed family function. My sister brought seemingly-glamorous (to a 14-year-old) college friends home, cousins in their 20’s would take the bus out to the country wearing black leather jackets, carrying cheese plates, and with a friend or two in tow, a fix-up could well be in the works, and a to-the-death game of Trivial Pursuit was a sure thing.

Things have settled down a bit over the years as attendees have grown up and coupled off. Sebastian makes a mean green bean casserole, my mom’s mashed potatoes are inspired, and there’s usually almost as much stuffing on my plate as I want. This year my sister is being held hostage in Montana. For the first time, I can’t count on her bloody marys and bold accessorizing. But two of my favorite eaters are driving up to sit at the long table, and I bring with me not a boyfriend but a husband. After the fast-paced flurry of a wedding, it will be good to sit down and have long chats with friends and family over a slice of pecan pie, a midnight bowl of mashed potatoes and gravy, and a glass of wine or five.

What’s Thanksgiving at your house like? Do you host? Is it friends, family, or both? A somber affair or an event where someone always dances on a table? Music for the table dancing after the jump…

Continue reading “Countdown to Turkey” »

There comes a time in every woman’s life when the only thing that helps is a glass of champagne. –Bette Davis

If I were a magician, I would like to bring back into my fold all the friends and fellows who were in my company this past weekend. I would gather up people from all corners of the globe and country and plop them into my living room where I would play Whitney Houston, ply them with herbed goat cheese and French 75s, and encourage dancing and the telling of embarrassing stories.

There is nothing like old friends. And I can’t really think of anything to follow that sentence that doesn’t sound hopelessly trite. But here goes: The best ones can understand what’s going on with you in a near telepathic way that requires no explanation on your part. Picking up with them is to pick up right where you left off, but still somehow managing to include all the realities of now. Whatever makes you laugh in the moment contains the hysterics of something five years prior, and they have the secret, privileged knowledge of knowing you used to wear clothes from Contempo Casuals when you were “dressing up.”

None of this is meant to diminish the the wonder of new friends, which are more remarkable, in a way, for you’re having been able to find them in the real world next to the office xerox machine or at the local coffee shop. But like the Brownie song goes (and sometimes you have to resort to the Brownies to really express yourself adequately), “Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other gold.”

I’m wishing for a few more days with the golds.

Continue reading “Happy Hour at Home” »

One of my favorite outcome of the tightening of our economic belts has been an enforced return to scaled-back fun. Not scaled-back as in “less of,” but instead, a retreat from restaurants and bars and a move onto living room couches, homemade cocktails in hand. Rather than go out for a French lunch recently, for instance, my friend Kim invited me over for wine and cheese, and I have since decided that happy hours at home (as well as Saturday date nights at home, which I’ll write about soon), are my new favorites.

With happy hour at home, you can control the quality of what you’ll be munching on when the inevitable tipsy hunger strikes, you can get up and dance when your favorite song comes on the ’80s playlist, and you can lay down when you’ve had too much. I invited my dear, delightful friend Nazy to come over and celebrate the beginning of spring with gin and tonics and edamame hummus. She brought over her first experiment with no-knead bread (which was great) and some boursin. She also kindly accepted when I asked if she would play her accordion as I walked along a path or grass to get married. All in all, much better than a night on a bar stool, forking over Andrew Jacksons.

Continue reading “Happy Hour at Home” »

If I confessed to not really being in the Christmas spirit this year, would you hold it against me? Perhaps with the economy the way it is (broke), some of you are feeling the same way. In times like this, the only way to perk up my spirits is with a little funkified carol action, as well as the Mariah Carey rendition of “All I Want For Christmas Is You“–a song so good, one of my friends listens to it year round, every morning, on her way to work. So my prescription to myself to get holiday is downloading this playlist and enjoying a bit of eggnog. Refill as necessary.

Continue reading “December Mix Tape: Christmas Cocktails” »