A bumper crop of summer vegetables, fruits and herbs might well take us into early October this year, and there is no more inspiring guide for enjoying it than Canal House Cooking Volume N°4
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canal house cooking Vol. 4 for summer’s bumper crop
4th of july reprise: warm fresh cherries (with leaves)
Sally Schneider
Since it’s high cherry season, we thought we’d reprise last years recipe for Warm Fresh Cherries (with Leaves), in honor of the Fourth of July. Too lazy to pit and stem some fresh cherries, a friend and I tried quickly sauteeing them as-is with butter and sugar, to discover the the stems and leaves provided unexpected delights:
“You picked a cherry up by the stem with your fingers, dunked it in crème fraiche and popped it in your mouth, working the fragrant flesh off the pit and stem; we dropped the spent leaves, pits and stems into little bowls set around the table, as you would olives pits or mussel shells. We ate the sublimely messy, almost primal dessert like children, savoring the cherries one-by-one and licking our fingers.”
It is the perfect dessert for however-many-people you may have to serve: easy to make, with a summery hang-out-and-spit-cherry-(or watermelon)-pit thing going on. Here’s the recipe, with our wishes for a wonderful Fourth of July:
we are 1!
July 3rd a year ago, we decided to take our own advice and “forgo the idea of being ‘done’, ‘ready’, or ‘perfect’: we launched ‘the improvised life’. It is still a work-in-progress, as improvisations can be, one thing leading to another to another…surprising us daily. The best part has been the community that’s grown up around it, checking in daily, sending emails and comments: you are some kind of amazing fuel that makes us search out daily posts and hatch plots for the future . We thank you, deeply!
Now we are going to disappear for a few days, and celebrate July 4th, and a million blessings. See you on Wednesday (though we might slip in a post or two before!)
ww2-inspired energy strategy: think twice
Since we posted The Oil Spill: What You Can Do, we’ve seen lots of websites offering solutions that echo a common sentiment: whether we like it or not, we are all in this together; the risky actions of oil companies are fueled by demand, which we all contribute to. That reminded J.P. Townley of the World War II strategy of conservation in a time of crisis, when EVERYONE had to pitch in, cut back, live with less. Posters asked “Is your trip necessary? Needless travel interferes with the war effort.” “Is your trip necessary” applies now more than ever, so Townley designed an updated poster..
We view “Is your trip necessary” as code words for an even bigger question: read more…
how to serve fresh cherries…
Maria Robledo sent this photo from her iPhone with a short, expressive email: “Holton served these cheeries w the empty glass for the pits . Liked the improvised moment”
We like the improvised moment, too and the fun, useful little solutions that mysteriously come…
We’ve noticed that once we started thinking about the idea of improvising, we began to see it happening all around us; we began to DO it ourselves a lot more. Just a slight shift in view, really, turns it into a practice…
We discovered that improvising is really about following ideas as they connect one to another, even with the most ordinary things…like a blog post pointing in many directions – to a recipe for warm fresh cherries, or where to buy the glass, or Holton’s or Maria’s artwork, OR maybe your own brilliant, unexpected idea…
(BTW, you can click here to find out where to buy the swell, thin $3 glass that Holton used for cherry pits; it is useful for many things…we often use it as a vase for a small bunch of flowers, and for individual rice puddings…and Amontillado milkshakes…)
Related posts: The Perfect Glass: Thin, Cheap, Well-Designed
Warm Fresh Cherries with Leaves
Thanks Maria and Holton!
strategies: fresh fava beans (or soy beans or peas) + recipe
Although we’d tasted many wondrous dishes in restaurant-going lives, there is only one that we felt compelled to order three times during the same meal, eating it as appetizer, main course, dessert. Fresh fava beans, dressed with extra-virgin olive oil and a fine dice of young Pecorino cheese, were offered as a “special appetizer” one warm spring night at a Tuscan-style restaurant in New York City. We knew that such a dish is a rarity on restaurant menus because fava beans are work to prepare in quantity; they require both shucking and peeling.”We’ll start with the favas” we said, “and then figure out the rest.”
We were stunned by that first simple dish of beans with their buttery, slightly bitter, “green” pea-like taste. So we ordered it for the next course, and then the next, without restraint or care for propriety. THAT was the dinner we needed. (When we returned the following evening hungering for more, we were told by our waiter that the favas were no longer available: “They were a losing proposition; the staff kept eating them…”)
This is the season for favas and it’s worth the effort to mine yourself and your loved ones a plateful. A fine solution to their laborious-in-quantity prep is read more…
alt-gift for mother’s (and other) days
The sentiment around Mother’s Day is a nice one but we’ve never been crazy about all the marketing of flowers, cards, candy that can go with it; they often seem in contradiction to the gist – of honoring and thanking your mother – by blending in the desperate shelling out of $$ to buy a token, fueled by guilt and/or obligation (We’re talking about grown-up kids, here; the little ones seem to delight in making breakfast-in-bed and homemade cards and gifts…)
We were delighted to see The Robin Hood Foundation‘s great idea for an alt-Mother’s Day gift that is easy-to-send, personal, and speaks volumes: a beautiful card telling your mama that you’ve given a donation in her name to a charity. read more…
clipped-together shelving pt. 1: wood (help needed)
We are always amazed by how we’ll have an idea and start thinking about it, trying to figure it out, and then start to stumble on echoes and iterations of it. We’ve been thinking about modular shelving that looks good and sleek and is sturdy but do-able, not too expensive…Why not stack boxes in various ways, we wondered, why not CLIP them together? In the course of a week, we came across some interesting versions of the idea, from chic http://muuto.com/##mce_temp_url#‘s architect-designed – and expensive – shelving to shelving units made with clipped-together crates, and even cardboard boxes (see pt 2). What figure we can find the box pretty easy to find or make; what we want is the clip so we do this our own way, on-the-cheap.
The problem with this great idea is that we haven’t been able to find affordable clips – or any that would work on 1/2 or 3/4-inch thick boards (two put together). So we’re calling on you to help us find them, by expertly or uniquely googling, or keeping eyes peeled in hardware stores or websites that might sell clips for a totally other use that would work here. We’re asking for HELP…
green chickpeas (produce as house gift) + recipe
One of my favorite house gifts (to give or to get) is an of-the-season treasure from a good local market, like perfect cherries in early summer, or a bunches of lemon verbena for tea in August, or Meyer Lemons in late winter… These gifts require an eye on the market and a bit of luck, which is part of their great charm to people who like to cook. Recently, I discovered an unlikely treasure in Whole Foods’ normally risk-averse produce section: fresh chickpeas, for a few bucks a pound. They look like a cross between a fat, blunted pea and an edamame (soybean in its shell). Standing in the aisle, I shucked one and ate it, to discover its vegetal pea-like flavor and crunchy texture. I realized that I never considered what the fresh form of a dried chickpea might be.
I scooped some into a bag and took them to a friends’ dinner party. read more…
leaving secret (or surprise) presents
Sally Schneider
Outside my apartment door recently, I found a glass plate covered by an inverted pyrex bowl; inside was a slice of a four layer torte, with a little fork. The card read “It’s probably better thawed out. (me too…).”
It was from my neighbor Matthew Sporzynski, a paper artist whom we’ve blogged; he likes to leave surprises for his friends, and has left quite a few for me: huge bouquets of flowers (a moment-past-their-prime, rescued from a florist friend), a little plastic box of hilarious labels (below), the amazing “hope you feel better” gift of a couple of months ago, and the torte, made by his mom: layers of complex flavors: nuts, coffee, apricot jam, cocoa, with an underlacing of a liqueur.
I’ve left Matthew things too, in a shopping bag right outside his door to reciprocate the gesture: some excellent extra-virgin olive oil, a book of type faces I thought he’d like, a little jar of Apricots in Cardamom Syrup held back from a batch I made for a dinner party. Another neighbor, who lived in the top floor penthouse where he kept a rose garden, occasionally left me a vase with fragrant heirloom roses.
The premise of a little gift left secretly outside of the door or on a porch of a friend is a great one. read more…
valiant make-shift (and spirit) in haiti + a cool way to help
Lawrence Downes
- A couple of weeks ago in the New York Times, Lawrence Downes wrote a beautiful report from Haiti called The Kite Makers that painted a vivid picture of the devastated country in a few short paragraphs. He described the resourcefulness at play everywhere for those “with skills, strength and luck”. At the Petionville Club camp – donated tarps forged into houses – someone made an ingenious door hinge from the torn sole of a plastic sandal, fastened by nails hammered through bottle caps, which act as washers to prevent sandal from tearing. “Making do with next to nothing is the way of life in Haiti”.
Haitian children make small kites out of whatever they can find – twigs, dry cleaning bags, thread spooled on a can or bottle . Flying homemade kites is relief from their harsh reality. read more…
sing LOUD! like they do in sardinia
Peggy Markel, an intrepid and inspired seeker (and facilitator) of culinary and cultural adventures, recently sent us this one-minute video. She was on a scouting trip at San Francesco di Lula in Sardinia and followed the singing she heard coming from the church rectory’s kitchen. Local women were washing dishes and one was singing in dialect, refusing to be shushed even when admonished NOT to sing while Peggy was filming. Without a trace of embarrassment, she continued to sing, LOUD, as though the singing fueled her work.
Here’s what Peggy wrote on her blog: read more…
what to do when someone’s in trouble
The other day, I ran into my neighbor Matthew Sporzynski in the elevator. When he asked how I was doing, I let slip that I was on my way to way to have a scary test to check out my heart. “I’m sure it’ll be fine” I said, betraying my nervousness.
After several hours of Fringe-like tests involving isotopes in a freezing room, I wobbled home to find a white cardboard take-out container outside my apartment door. Inside was a cobalt-blue lens box that said SCHNEIDER (my name). Four key rings were nestled in it, each with a tag printed in French: APPARTEMENT, ATELIER, LETTRES, and RESIDENCE SECONDAIRE. There was a red leather cat collar with a bell – an unexpected bracelet – and an orange business card said “Couturier de Cardboard”, which meant the gift was from Matthew, who is an amazing paper artist with a rare sensibility.
Matthew’s gift had the effect of taking me out of my worried, tired head in an instant (while inspiring a sweet, momentary fantasy of an atelier and a residence secondaire.) It said, in the most un-Hallmark way possible: ”Someone is thinking about you and hopes you feel better.” And sure enough, I did feel better.
It reminded me of the times when I wasn’t sure how to respond to the dire need of another: a friend dealing with cancer or a loved-one dying. And I remembered a little book I saw recently called Do Good: 201 Ways to Lend a Hand
haiti in mind (kindergarten)
A friend emailed this cell-phone photo of a kindergarten room. HLP HATE is not a strange coded statement about “hate” as it might seem at first glance, but a child’s spelling of “HELP HAITI”: a thoughtful attempt to help, in whatever way possible …pennies, nickles, dimes, quarters…
These little kids are envisioning…
…the world beyond themselves…
…they are imagining…
…how to help…
With thanks to Sally Swift!
haiti: when there is nothing, there is something
The past few days, we’ve received emails and phone calls from friends recounting news reports from Haiti of solutions improvised in the most impossible of circumstances. A New York City search-and-rescue team used ceiling tiles to splint a broken leg. An Israeli surgeon used a ballpoint pen to perform a tracheotomy. A nurse at the airport treated a seriously injured man with what she scrounged: clothing to improvise a bandage; rum to cleanse the wound, a bystander’s Vicodin to quell his pain. Surgeons work by flashlight and camping headlamps, without running water; a team of seven performed 75 operations over three days…
It is all so valiant and amazing, but the horror of what is happening in Haiti seems at times too much to bear, as though no act of hope or courage could matter amidst the relentless darkness and despair. I heard some people say “That country has always been doomed. And now, perhaps we should just leave them to their lot…”
But, light keeps breaking through: evidence of a fierce and generous spirit in people so stripped bare. It’s there read more…
