Zucchini, Fava and Goat Cheese Salad

July 16

Make this salad now with the tiny yellow zucchini squash of early summer. It is a fresh, unique way to experience a tender, precious moment of the season.

We first read of this salad in David Tanis's "a platter of figs." The only thing you really have to do is respect the tenderness of the young zucchini, cut or shave it very thin and handle it gently. After that, it is prime for a myriad of variations.

Favas or fresh peas, basil or mint, mild or slightly stronger crumbly cheeses. Young, sweet red onions, or small, mild white ones.

Fresh favas are worth the effort. Their texture, taste, smell, the brightness of their green, they are a potent and generous bean. You will probably be competing with the local chefs for the fava supply, make a deal with your vendor to at least save you a pint!

Soon the zucchini will all be large, every gardener drumming up ways to use them and people to give them too. Before the larger ones become zucchini bread and the Ratatouille of late summer, early fall, seize this tiny window, of the tiny squash.

Young Yellow Summer Squash Salad, as pictured here

4 or 7 small yellow zucchini
a handful of squash blossoms
about 1/2 cup of fava beans (cleaned, quickly blanched and skin around bean removed)
1 small new sweet red onion, sliced
1 lemon
sea salt and black pepper
some ricotta salata or mild feta or other crumbly goat cheese
a bit of basil or mint sliced into extremely thin ribbons (optional)
some really good olive oil

Wash and wipe the zucchini squash. Cut off the ends. Using a sharp knife, a mandoline or a vegetable peeler, shave each into thin ribbons (lengthwise) and set aside. Prep the favas by removing the beans from their pods, then blanching the beans in boiling water for a few seconds. Dunk the beans in ice water. Remove beans from their skins by pinching a tiny bit of skin off the end and gently (but firmly) squeezing the bright green fava out.
Just before serving season the zucchini with salt and pepper to taste, toss in the favas and, if using, basil and onion. Splash with olive oil and mix. squeeze in the juice from about 1/2 lemon (check for taste) and adjust seasoning to taste.
Heap onto a platter. Tear the petals of the blossoms over the salad and crumble the cheese of your choice on top. If using a harder feta, you can shave ribbons of cheese, using that handy vegetable peeler again, which looks very pretty with the ribbons of squash and blossoms.

Red Oak Leaf, Cucumber, Blueberry Salad

July 15
When Craig served this salad, I had not been paying attention to the kitchen at all. I was juggling the girls, feeding them little snacks after a long day of school and play, hanging the laundry out to dry instantly in the summer heat, and sipping at a rose wine with "Jewel" black raspberries, floating like deep purple clouds, in the glass.

The Oak Leaf from Red Tail Farm was heaped in the salad bowl. Craig tossed the salad and served it, filling the plates to their outermost edge. I noticed the cucumber, the first we'd had, bought from a table outside a house along the lake, with an honor box, seventy five cents. And then, tucked into the dark green and red edges of the lettuce, blueberries.

The combination of the texture and flavor: crunchy, slightly bitter lettuce; crisp, watery, mild cucumber; bright, sweet blueberry; balanced oil and vinegar dressing with a not too acidic vinegar. The sizes of things mattered too: the slender, elegant lettuce was not chopped, it was torn in half, or thirds so it filled your mouth, the slices of peeled cucumber gave a broad, fresh splash of water, and the whole blueberries a small, delightful pop of sweet in the bite.

It is very fun to be surprised. It does not take much to bring your senses fully in to the moment. A sweet berry hidden in the folds of crisp earthy lettuce brought such a feeling of fun, of playful levity to the table. This combination is not one of the recipes that was an evolution of another recipe. This was all Craig. That is one of the things that saves us, his ability to be present, to look with an open mind at what is before him, which in this case was a the seasonal excitement of the first beautiful cucumber, a handful of berries, our friends' lettuce.

Part of the fun deliciousness of this salad was the surprise of the blueberry. But then we had it the next night, I knew full well what to expect, and it was just as good as the night before.

Red Oak Leaf, Cucumber, Blueberry Salad

from the freshest available...
Oak Leaf lettuce
some blueberries
2 or 3 slender scallions sliced
Japanese cucumber peeled and sliced
juice of 1/2 meyer lemon
splash of champagne or chardonnay vinegar
fine olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Combine all ingredients except lettuce in the bottom of a large salad bowl. After a bit of marinating add the lettuce, but do not mix. Just prior to eating, mix well and serve.

Eggs and Pancakes with the Cousins

July 12
My brother Rich drove down from Vermont with three of the four kids he and his wife Emily have. A house full of kids and cousins is a dream come true for Rich and I. We grew up without knowing our one cousin, and we yearned for the familial, non-sibling bond we saw our friends and their cousins share. It was with real joy that we planned to get all our kids together. We made one whole room into a room of beds in case of rain, and set up a tent under the apple tree in the pasture. I got out the tall stack of enamel plates, all the tiny spoons and forks and unbreakable glasses. Rich brought eggs from their chickens, we stocked up on bread, berries, milk.

Richmond has raised, is raising, a lot of kids. When Jay and Maddie were little they went through the predictable, "I don't like that!" phase for everything you put in front of them, even if they had eaten a mountain of it the day before. Rich is Gandhi like in many ways, very good at finding a path of least resistance and saving himself some aggravation. He decided that it was not going to do any one any good to get into a dynamic of anxiety about food. The kids were toddlers and far from "failure to thrive" so he decided, that they would eat when they were hungry.

He continued on his mealtime routine, presenting the kids with nutritious options at regular intervals throughout the day and left it at that. Sure enough, they would eat like little curly headed birds for a day or two, and then eat everything put before them for a stretch.

Rich's choice was very refreshing to witness. He followed his gut and found a path that worked for him and his kids. It has helped me a lot with my own kids. Colby can be hard to feed, there are textural, sensory issues and resistances to eating that are still a mystery to us. It takes a lot of persistence and patience, but sometimes, she, like all of us, just isn't that hungry.

Rich's wisdom sets a healthy, open field for food in his family: food is for when you are hungry and it is a communal experience. Come sit at the table, be together, eat what your body says it needs.

The cousins together at the table, five plates of fried eggs and a platter of pancakes. They ate their fill, and bounded off, into the yard, into the day, with all the fuel for play they needed.

Craig's Pancakes

Ingredients:
7 or 8 tablespoons butter
1 1/3 cups whole milk
3 large eggs
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tbs plus 1 tsp sugar
1 tbs plus 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

In a sauce pan over low heat combine the butter and milk. Heat until the butter melts and set aside. Beat the eggs in a medium sized bowl. When the milk/butter blend is lukewarm, slowly pour it into the eggs while stirring.

In a large bowl, wisk the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together. Pour the egg mixture into the flour. go slow barley mixing. the batter should be lumpy with dry patches here and there. Do not over mix.

Heat a cast iron skillet or griddle over medium-low heat. Wipe with a bit of butter, vegetable oil or bacon fat. When hot to touch, ladle in about 1/2 cup batter for each pancake. When they begin to bubble and are a deep, golden brown on the pan side, flip and cook until done. if you wish to add anything...sliced apples (try a sprinkle of sugar and a splash of lemon juice on those slices!), berries...candied bacon (!) do so when the first side is cooking, then flip.

Serve with whatever you like, jam, maple syrup, honey, yogurt. And for sure, an egg on the side.

Kenny Shopsin and Happiness

July 5

Kenny Shopsin, the strange and brilliant chef, not known for his social graces, gave me one of the most helpful ideas for parenting. He said that to find work that has meaning for you is the best example you can set, and that the best thing you can do for your kids is be happy yourself.

I held Colby, then a tiny newborn, in my lap and listened as he expounded, sitting across the table from us, exhausted from a day of cooking and yelling at his four kids, all at the time working to some degree in the restaurant. When Kenny does anything but rant and curse, you listen. He has an exceedingly rough personae, but under that is a compassion and an intelligence far stronger than his roaring expletives.

Contemplating his words now, from way inside the path of parenting and family life, they look different than when I first heard them. When I first heard, "Be happy yourself," it sounded obvious and easy, as easy as happiness ever is. Now, there is a larger family, work, and the thousand tiny shirts and shorts and socks that need folding. How to find happiness and do good work when you feel life is pulling you in a thousand directions, all of them important?

By making choices, and, the ever famous key to marital bliss, compromise. Make the beds but let the floors go. Write for an hour in the morning and accept the longing for a day. Make a dinner reservation.

What Kenny did not say was how in family life the happiness of the couple, individually and together becomes so linked.

Children are an astonishing amount of work. Their demands are tireless, their needs absolute. Meanwhile the rest of life clamors for attention. And, then there is each other. For us, that is the easiest one to lose track of. We operate for long periods under the illusion that we, the couple, can wait. That we come after kids, dishes, tractors, work.

We must take care of ourselves and our love the way we care for all the other aspects of a full life. To not let the inertia of distance between us become a habit, we need a moment together, to just gaze, and be.

We made plans for dinner out together and as I got ready I thought about all the small fissures between us, major and minor emotional infractions, moments of bad communication. I felt how that was not what I wanted dinner to be about, I did not want to talk, work, process. I wanted to be together, in the moment.

At dinner we laughed, we talked with our neighboring table, we caught up on the funny moments, profound work conversations, all the persistent beauty that occurred in the week. We invested in our happiness, the cornerstone of a loving, functional life, together. Thanks Kenny.

More Kenny wisdom, culinary and philosophical, can be found in his excellent cook book, pictured here. The essay on eggs is a revelation.

Simplicity, Lettuce

June 23
Colby Rose has been in a seizure cluster for nearly two weeks. Today she went into the bathroom, got Craig's attention, and had her third seizure of the morning. Craig caught her as she fell. Coral put her black dog under Colby's head as she laid on the cool tile floor.
Coral asked, again, "What happen?"
"She had a seizure."
"Why she has them?"
Craig ventured into more detail, "She has epilepsy."
"Epepsy? What's that?"
"It is just the way she is made, honey."
"She has a boo boo, maybe we can go back to New York City and the doctors can take it off, again."
I hear the room go quiet. Craig, like me, absorbing the knowledge and care in Coral's words and suggestions. She completely understands, in her own way, that Colby had brain surgery, and that the doctors were trying to help the seizures. I think again about how to do this, to parent these two girls, together. Coral has been asked to understand, to accept situations beyond her years. Another mom wrote about balancing the needs of a family when one child has "legitimately higher needs." That phrase has brought a feeling of freedom, it is straightforward, and true.
Given the reality of our family, two parents, one high need child, one rapidly developing two and half year old, there are many demands, and simplifying is not so much a choice as a necessity.
Eating dinner, Craig has made a simple green salad. Lettuce, radish, scallion, vinegar, oil, salt, pepper. The summer lettuce has been crisp and nuanced in flavor, growing well in the warm, bright days and cool evenings.
Paring down to the essentials while still achieving the fullest expression of each ingredient; that is the beauty of this salad.
Given that Colby has "legitimately higher needs" I often worry about each of us reaching our potential. Craig and I defer our work to Colby's needs, Coral is asked over and over again to wait. But maybe it is possible to pare down the extraneous activities and expectations in a family and still reach our individual and collective potential, reach our fullest expression.

Simplest of Green Salads

In a bowl place sliced scallions and radishes. Cover lightly with vinegar. Let sit while prepping lettuce. Sprinkle olive oil over lettuce in bowl. Sprinkle salt and pepper. Toss when ready to serve. Coating the radish and scallion with vinegar both softens their texture and infuses the vinegar with their flavor. Olive oil over the lettuce leaves coats it lightly and makes it shinier, and gives a silkier "mouthfeel."

Last Day of Spring Feast

June 20

Craig and I have been craving lamb, perhaps an ancient craving, in our dna, since lamb has been a part of nearly every Spring Feast food tradition the world over, through the ages. Northland Sheep Dairy in nearby Marathon, NY has beautiful lamb. Actually they have beautiful products from all parts of the lamb to sheep life cycle: sumptuous sheepskins; earthy, soft yarn; aromatic, finely textured cheese; and meat in sensible, refined cuts. One hundred percent grass fed and sustainable farm practices. It seems that nothing is wasted and the animals are fully appreciated.

And, like every food writer before and after me will proclaim, you can taste the difference! Maybe that is why the food movement and what it could mean for environmental evolution holds such promise: the rewards are physically pleasing and immediately obvious. Simply put, this lamb tastes like an animal that lived a life of movement, fresh air and seasons, and ate what it should.

On the last day of spring, June 20, we got to our spring feast. The day was warm, everything green and bursting with life, with a cool breeze coming off the lake. We grilled lamb chops over a hardwood fire. Craig made flageolet beans from David Tanis's "a platter of figs and other recipes." A green salad of Romaine and Oak Leaf lettuces. Bowls of radishes and tiny, new carrots. The fire was going so nicely we rummaged around for more to grill: a single andouille sausage from the Piggery, and a stack of sliced peasant bread. Il Buco olive oil and salt over the grilled, smokey bread.

For the kids, a cold pitcher of water infused with fresh, crushed cherries, thyme, mint and lavender, and for us, a bright, soft red wine. We raised our glasses to Father's Day, to this glorious spring of flowers, baby birds and fruit, to each other, and to our family and friends, always in our hearts. Happy Summer Solstice.

www.northlandsheepdairy.com

Asparagus

June 14

A particular guilt is sweeping over me: I may have waited too long to post a recipe. Asparagus is a short, glorious season. If the season is already over in your area, put this recipe in your pocket for next year. It is simple and truly beautiful on the plate.

This year an Amish farmer at the market had asparagus with slender purple tips and a sweet, nutty flavor. He told us his plants were happiest, tasted best, when left rather wild in their fields with no chemical fertilizers or pesticides. A half wild, half cultivated crop.

Watching Coral eat asparagus, clutching it by its verdant green stem, olive oil dripping down her fingers to her wrist. I think of the farmer and the asparagus before us and decide that we too are at our best when we are a little wild, and a little cultivated. So the olive oil drips, Coral rubs it into her skin, and grabs for another stalk.

Best with asparagus that is very, very fresh. Preferably local and picked that day or the day before.

Break or cut off the wooden ends. For thicker asparagus, peel the stalks. Heat a large cast iron skillet over high heat. Add a couple glugs of olive oil. Toss in the asparagus and shake pan to coat. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Shake pan again, reduce heat to low, and cover. Occasionally shake the pan. Cook until just barely tender. Arrange on a platter and serve as is, or drizzle with a mix of lemon juice and finely minced shallots. It is good warm, at room temperature or lightly chilled.