Nettle & Quince in September
On cookbooks and seeing children off and the promise of new things
When I last wrote in July I couldn’t summon much enthusiasm for cooking, even for those friends whom we were finally able to see again. But after spending a few weeks away in France, with new horizons — and markets! — I began cooking, and enjoying cooking, again, much helped by delving into cookbooks. There is solace in faithfully following someone else’s guiding hand and expertise. At the same time I wanted to do justice to the growing pile of books I had started buying again. First steps. On our return I spent an afternoon with Bitter Honey: Recipes and Stories from the Island of Sardinia by Letitia Clark. More than just a compendium of recipes, it became the way to conjure summer heat and the Mediterranean, in a year that seemed to have wanted for both.
In French, the term for the return to life in September after the summer break is ‘la rentrée.’ The coming in, the coming back, or coming home. It feels this way. It’s a new beginning and also a grounding in the everyday, after a few months of a less rigid lifestyle, whether one left or stayed — in summer, the days, outstretched, amorphous around the edges, become limber, invite the unexpected.
Coming home is good. In our family life this autumn there were a number of changes, most notably with our eldest leaving the house. We have been told to [fear / hope] — delete as appropriate! — that this may just be temporary. Either way, we were looking forward to this refashioning of family dynamics. And surprised to feel the pangs of that separation so much more sharply. And then there were three…
With the move in mind, Leo asked me at the beginning of the summer to show him how to make tuna salad. Here it is, hopefully the first in a series of easy recipes to help a student survive beyond pot noodles and granola.
In the midst of the September whirlwind of work and schools and friends, and art, and theatre, there is all the produce that begs to be bought (or foraged and picked) and cooked and canned and preserved. I am sometimes left dizzy by the vertiginous array of possibilities, and manage only part of what I intend, but in the storm, this is the eye, the quiet, the grounding of September.
There is so much to look forward to now. The deepening light, the changing palette, the subtle shades of ochres and blues and pear greens.
Happy fall!
// Things to make and cook //
There are two types of jam I am implicitly committed to making every year: in winter, orange marmalade (see Letter from N&Q in March), and, now, green tomato jam [N&Q]. The first is a recent obsession, the second pulls on deep childhood strings. Both have become indispensable.
Sometimes I invite friends over just because I happen to have baked a cake, and in autumn the temptation is bottomless. — Cakes with plums, cakes with pears, this irresistible French apple cake with rum.[All N&Q]
When we gather at my sister’s in the summer there is always an enormous stash of mysterious bottles gathering dust in the cellar. As evenings linger we bring them out, half empty and labels peeling off, and taste our way around these — sometimes borderline suspicious — alcoholised expriments. This time I tried the hawthorn cordial that my mother had prepared last year and it was so good! Hawthorn is everywhere and I intend to make it this year. Here is a recipe. [LearningHerbs.com]
// Things to read //
There was a lovely piece in the Guardian recently about separation, cooking, retrieving (and safekeeping) memory, in this unusual time, across continents and over Whatsapp. Worth a read.[Guardian]
I tremendously enjoyed Kim Severson’s portrait of ‘Food Scholar, Folk Singer, Blunt Speaker’ Leni Sorensen. There are few food historians I would rather meet! [NYT]
This week also welcomes the launch of Yewande Komolafe’s new monthly column in the New York Times. Very much looking forward to it. [NYT]
Signing off, that’s it for September!