she craves

Dinner, Courtesy of the Cooler

Simplicity breeds virtue. A well-stocked cooler is a godsend when you find yourself in a town where restaurants close at 9pm.

In this one: baked sweet potatoes, lamb feta burgers, dill coleslaw and fruit.

Midnight Feast at Honey Pig in Vegas

Searing pork belly, kim chi and bean sprouts flanked by an army of ban chan (side dishes).

Midnight, midday, whenever. I'll take it.

FLASHBACK: Creminelli Sausage, Kale and Cannelini Bean Soup

Leave it to the weather to reveal our most fickle natures. Marinating in 99 degree weather, eating, cooking and food shopping is mostly a cooling affair -- melon and cured meats, refreshing salads, and maybe the purple raspberries dribbling with a bit of heavy cream for dessert.

Then, the clouds swept in. I had forgotten that a sky even existed within the small walls of my "cubice" (neither cubicle nor office, rather an office constructed from cubicle walls) when my friend Jesse beckoned me. "You have to look at this," he said facing out the window.

Before him the technicolor summer had dissipated into a gray gradient. Huge trees swayed like kelp in a strong sea current with the violent wind. Overhead, the clouds stampeded, one on top of another, toward some eastward destination to deliver a thunderous blow of piercing rain. We took this all in for a few moments, our eyes thankful for the reprieve from computer monitors. Even with the shelter of the office, I felt the raw power of the summer storm and it infused me with an energy no vitamins or cups of coffee could've provided.

I drove home with the windows down, letting the post-storm air flush through my car. For once in a long time, I felt like I needed a sweater. By the time I stood in my kitchen, the lights were on. The clouds covered the late sumer sun and even though I knew my calendar read "August," it could've been November for all I cared.

I stared at the melons in my fridge, but even their alluring scent couldn't convince me to do something with them. Salad greens seemed anemic. Even the artisan salami couldn't lift my spirits into motivation.

In the freezer I saw one solitary sausage link. This was made by the same group of artisans that crafted the salami in the compartment below. The sweet, fatty heft, even in little amounts would be good. Then I remembered the half open container of vegetable stock in the fridge.

And so it was that in the middle of summer, I cooked up a heavy, filling soup. With less liquid it could've been a stew. But I say in my defense that cooking was nominal. Weekday cooking can sometimes contribute to the daily drain one can feel. But this was more the meeting of a few good tasty morsels than preparation of any sort. Like all soups, it's even better the next day, diluted with a little water or stock.

Kale Sausage & Cannelini Bean Soup

Water is fine to replace the stock. Either way, it never hurts to add a nubbin of Parmigiano-Reggiano rind or the "butt" end of a prosciutto leg. It goes a long way to deepend the flavors of any liquid. You can obtain those from a very nice cheesemonger or specialty grocer who understands your soup-needs. Frugal cooks and Italian grandmothers keep a stash of their own in the freezer. I wrap mine in plastic and throw it straight in frozen.

1/4 pound sausage or 1 Creminelli link * olive oil for sauteeing * 2 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed * 5 big leaves of chard, kale, etc. * 1 teaspoon toasted fennel seeds * 1 dried red chili * 1 quart of vegetable or chicken stock * 1 can of Cannelini beans, drained

Heat a soup pot over medium heat and the sausage and oil. If the meat is in link form, release it from the casing with a twist and squeeze, the way kids like to dispense of toothpaste. Dispose the skin. Saute and stir with a wooden spoon to break up the sausage into miniscule particles. Add the garlic - peel and crush it in one go with the flat side of your knife placed on top of them on a cutting board. Give it a good thwack with your fist and you'll find smashed cloves with skins barely hanging on. Cook for two minutes being careful  not to let it brown.

Meanwhile, rinse the leaves and cut or tear off the tender leafy sections from the center stalk. Chop the stalk as finely as you can and it to the pot. Tear in the leaves. Grind the fennel seeds add this to the pot along with the dried chili, crumbled between keyboard-weary fingers. Stir to combine.

If you have some booze to spare - a glug of ale, a glass of white wine, some dry sherry - pour it in and amplify the aromatherapy before you. Then add the broth (water is fine, too) and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer let it cook until the greens are tender, about 12 to 15 minutes in my case, but it will depend on how big your greens are cut.

When tender, add the cannelini beans. Purists can also add their soaked and boiled dried beans instead of the convenient canned variety. Smugness is not desired. Cook for another five minutes and season it with as much salt and pepper as you (I find sausage salt content varies, so really do taste it before adding salt so you don't overdo it with the sodium).

To serve, drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil and top with grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. Eat in huge bowls standing by the windows.

Hurray for Lazy Sundays: An Omelet and a Stack of Pancakes

It's a bittersweet thought. The sheer pleasure of lazy Sunday mornings. So lazy that the morning seeps into the afternoon. Pajamas are suitable all-day attire. The paper or an unfinished book must be finished, with each page savored. There's always a pot of coffee or tea ready to be poured. And perhaps most importantly, breakfast can be served at any time of the day.

It's a bittersweet thought, that this feast of an omelet and a stack of homemade pancakes, this joy (like so many other sources of joy) is a luxury nowadays. It is rare, which makes its occurrence so sweet, like the appearance of the first strawberry blossoms on a long-given up plant or finding or the weekday cocktail before you even think about dinner.

FLASHBACK: Kabocha Squash Risotto

For a shitty week: Kabocha squash risotto with crispy sage, guanciale, and kabocha seeds.

[Blogger's Note:  Cycles rule the universe.  The seasons, good weeks, bad weeks.  This recipe is both salve and sustenance.  An oldie but a goodie.  It's also a good excuse to use the kabocha squash you find in Asian markets and specialty stores.  Just as most people don't touch pumpkins other than Halloween, kabocha doesn't make contact with my knife until the weather turns cold and suddenly, I feel the need for that funky sweetness and the soft silky flesh.  The crunchy topping is essential here.  As comforting as the soft creamy rice can be, a bit of contrast never hurt.  No need to wallow in nursery food.  A bit of salty bite is a good reminder that there's more to life than feeling down.]

I've done it. I've drained myself of words. Or rather, the will to write words for a paycheck; to even string together a thought. As I sit here writing this now, I stop every two words to gather my thoughts for the rest of the sentence. It isn't that I'm completely vacant. Rather the opposite. About a thousand ideas are percolating in this noggin' of mine. Mostly they swim. Sometimes they churn. Other times they collide like tectonic plates, the likes of which have not been seen since Pangea was sick of being one huge chunk of rock.

---

Result of repetitive motion The source of these ideas: work. I make it a point not to dwell in too much detail about the day job. I like it that way—that's the whole point of this blog. I get to write about what I want to write about. Gives me another focus than what I didn't get done in the workday... Without going into it too much (this would require a bottle of wine and a lot of time, which I don't have), the upswing of the deadline curve leaves me with little time and a lot of stress. Not just the chronological sort. There's plenty of the emotional baggage like self-doubt, suspicion, and good old job insecurity to make a girl lose sleep. Even her appetite. This, ladies and gentleman, has never happened before. It partly has to do with the supremely bad meals I've had in town lately and that thanks to roommates with an apparent dishwasher-phobia I can't even cook in my own goddamn kitchen. So everything swims, bounces off of each other, and they are just noisy. Not the thing you need when you're dying to finish draft three of a piece you have completely no faith in. Or do you? Oh the indecision! The cacophony got to be a bit too much when my friend Amber called. "Do you have dinner plans?" I asked. She answered. "No, I'm just staying home." "Good," I replied. "I'm coming over for dinner. I want to make you something. Well, us." So with that, Friday evening turned into The Therapy Kitchen Sessions. It turns out that we were both having supremely shitty weeks. We each took our turns at bitching, just letting a lot of verbal steam that's buit up pressure within our little diaphragms. Such release is so much more effective when you punctuate points with the chop of a chef's knife and throwing bits of aromatics into a pot. Before you know it, you've disemboweled and prepped an entire Kabocha squash and started a batch of some badly needed risotto. When we were discussing what to make earlier Amber, who's a wonderful pastry chef at a restaurant in town, read my mind. "We need comfort food." The creamy rice was a no brainer. But to coddle such stress and fragile egos, there needed to be something else. Slightly sweet. The presence of which would immediately uplift our spirits. Kabocha squash, baked and mashed, stirred in moments before you spike the pot with a chunk of butter and a blizzard of parmesan. The color alone hinted at sunshine and warmth. But we were grown women. Adventurous, sophisticated, beautiful, cool, intelligent, talented, passionate—it's all part of the pep-talk, you see—women. So, there's gotta be something extra to sex it up lest we risk creating a big heap of baby food. Albeit, delicious baby food. A chunk of guanciale caught my eye at the market. Blessed pig. It gives me bacon. Pork chops. Ham. Sausages. Pork cheek sandwiches at Salumi. Hell, even chittlins on an adventurous day. But thank you, thank you, you porcine God-send for your jowls. Cured with salt and spices, it's the most revered part of the pig in Lazio, around Rome. Mostly fat, it's used like pancetta in just about everything. I cubed my stash and tossed it with whole fresh sage leaves, the seeds from the disemboweled Kabocha (time FLIES when you're recounting painful details of the week!), and a little olive oil to get it going. Then you roast the whole thing in a hot oven and hear it sizzle so that it practically talks to you. It sounds angry. It sounds bitchy, what with that constant sizzling and occasional pop from a seed. But the mixture crisps up, cubes of bacon fat, sage leaves, roasting seeds and all. The result is a crunchy aromatic confetti to top the risotto, tableside, with lots more parmesan. Because it's been that kind of week. By the time we were ready to eat, Amber's son, Nick was starving and lamenting that it was 9 p.m. Yeah, I totally believe the emotional osmosis stuff. I worried that all of our stress may have melted into our food and the dish would taste, well, worried. But that intense turmeric yellow pool of silky rice on the tongue was like a hug. The crunchy bits you got every so often on a forkful snapped you back into a here and now only conjured by smoky bacon fat and the oddly medicinal sage leaves. "If you can craft a dish like this," I thought to myself. "Then you can do anything." Yes, ladies and gents, it was a risotto meditation. Kabocha Squash Risotto with Crispy Sage, Guanciale, and Kabocha Seeds I don't remember where I came across this recipe. I didn't find it in any of my cookbooks at home. I suspect it came about during a previous job, also extremely stressful, but luckily supplied with an arsenal of cookbooks that I could bury myself in. There's some charm in using just about every bit of the squash. If you compost the peel, then hey, big karma points to you. You can sub a small pumpkin if kabocha isn't available. And those of you overachievers who have pureed squash or pumpkin lying around, this is SO the dish to put it in. 1 Kabocha squash or small pumpkin * 1/4 pound guanciale or pancetta, diced * a generous handful of fresh sage leaves * olive oil * 1 small yellow onion, chopped * 1 clove garlic, minced * 2 cups carnaroli or arborio rice * a glass of white wine * 6 cups of simmering chicken or vegetable stock * dab or slab of butter * pinch of grated nutmeg * LOTS of parmesan You can prepare the squash ahead, use squash you've got, or prepare it all in go. To do the latter: Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Start with the squash. Cut it in half, scrape out the seeds (save these) and then cut into eights. Using a knife peel the skin from the flesh. Cut the flesh into cubes and place in a roasting dish or aluminum packet, sealed. Place in the hot oven and make sure the stock is still simmering. Now with the lovely crunchy stuff. Combine the guanciale, sage, and seeds in a roasting dish and sprinkle with just a touch of olive oil. Place this in the oven next to the squash and let it do its thing. When you start to smell the guanciale mingling with the sage, check on it and give it a stir. Leave the squash alone. Keep an eye on the crunchy confetti as you tend to the rice. When the bacon's done (about 15 to 20 minutes later) retrieve the chunks out with a slotted spoon and place it all on a paper towel to drain and cool. Let it hang out there until you're done with the rest of the dish. Saute the onion in a bit of olive oil over medium heat. When it's translucent (you're not browning anything here) add the rice and stir to coat each grain with a slick of olive oil. Add a little more if you need to here. When the rice is shiny and warmed from two minutes in the pan add the glass of wine. Stir and keep stirring until the wine dissolves. Now it's time to use that stock. Add a ladleful and stir. At this point, everyone has their theories on when to add the next bit of stock and what to do in between. My way—just don't let anything scorch or the starch stick to the pan. I give it a few stirs, but the risotto is very forgiving when you need to talk with a friend about mean bosses, weird office dynamics, and her crazy work load. Repeat this cycle (conversation optional) until you're out of stock. If you get to this point and the rice isn't quite done just add hot water. It won't kill it. Promise. Have a friend (or you can do this during one of those rounds where you don't stir the rice) mash the now baked squash until it's smooth. Don't bother with the food processor. A fork works wonders. Add this mashed goodness to the rice after the last of the liquids. Grate in some nutmeg just until you smell it and start to feel better. Add the butter and as much parmesan as you'd like. Give it a stir. Cover and just leave it alone for a second. Now's a good time to set the table and open another bottle of wine. To serve, spoon as much of the risotto as you'd like onto your plate. Sprinkle a handful of the crisped sage, guanciale, and seeds. Add more parmesan. NOTE: If you don't want to bother with the seeds you can leave them out. But we're talking bacon fat roasted seeds. Why the hell not?

Melon Salad with Herbed Goat Cheese and Fried Olives

My father used to call me "melon head" (rather its Korean equivalent). To this day, I'm not sure if it's because of the sheer size of my noggin or my intense love of the ripe juicy fruit. One of the few photos of me as a kid shows me in a cotton summer dress, fat rolls bulging out the bodice seam, with my hair pulled back after a day playing with the hose. I'm sitting atop the small dark wood dining table, my feet facing my paternal grandmother who under normal circumstances I was dreadfully afraid of. But I called a truce on my fear because we were both feasting on fat slices of juicy watermleon.

FLASHBACK: Spring (or Early Summer) Green Pasta

 
An oldie, but a goodie. In honor of those of us in less-blessed and more earnest climates, I offer something to use up the proliferation of greens. As much as one enjoys sauteeing, sometimes, a bit of creamy texture is necessary to break up all that roughage-monotony. A food processor is your friend here - one of the few gadgets I will forever and ever extoll. - Vanessa

The solution for professed vegetable-haters is to make something vegetal appear distinctly not. Case in point, a sauce of broccoli and spinach for a jumble of linguine. Not that I have issues eating any matter of vitamin-suffused roughage, but there's only so much steaming and sauteeing a girl can take on the plate. And given the blossoms on the branches, the warmer temperatures and sporadic rain, it's a nice dish to make on a quiet night-in, to thank the stars it's finally spring.

Lentil Lamb Soup

The lentil and the lamb. The humble and the meek. Or at least, that's what they have supposedly represented. But to me, the lentil has long been the stuff of easy luxury. Hearty, filling, but a lot more elegant than boiled potatoes. Likewise, lamb has a distinctive gait across my tongue. The good stuff has trodden green, green pastures under the sun or trampled the cold-packed dirt of a milder winter pasture. It tastes of the earth in cycle and I love any cut of it. The obvious loin chops, shoulders for sauteeing or braising. But I have a soft spot for the shank.

This is a cavegirl's cut (they had to eat, too, right?). The centerpiece being a sturdy leg bone fat with marrow that along with the meat around it can be coaxed into the most unctuous tenderness.

Often, I do just that. Lentils and lamb shank into a pot. Add water and simmer. It is a lazy means to a luxurious result. And it is ideal for weather that straddles the line between heavy wool sweater and light pink cardigan/

I make this with Laurie Colwin in mind. How many times she literally made her beloved lentil soup. Always with onion. Sometimes with bacon. But yes, she, like me, extolls the addition of lamb. It is because of her I have no problem sousing my soup right before serving with a good glug of cognac, brandy and even dry sherry. It is because of her I have tried this soup at all.

The most appealing virtue about it is that it is entirely personalized according to your mood, pantry and disposition. Add some tzatziki (cucumbers shredded into thick yogurt), pita and perhaps a plate of fresh radishes with crazy good butter, and well, I call that my Monday night feast. Mondays are days where I often make the time to spend at home at my table. Usually there's the Voracious One and a good friend or two (they always show up at dinner time). The friends are even better when they arrive with a bottle of wine.

The Promise of Sunshine

I know. The title sounds like a bad '70s easy listening hit. But even now with bouts of sun and cloud duking it out for seasonal dominance, I'm rooting for the sun, betting every single metaphorical and metaphysical buck I have on the warmth and the life giving, soul-drenching sunlight.

My argument:  Sunlight brings me fresh chili peppers from small pots on a patio. Little lightning strikes of fiery reds, yellows and oranges. Some are as hot on the tongue. Others wonderfully mild and perfect for dipping like a carrot stick in something as simple as olive oil and salt or my mom's favorite, a paste of Korean miso paste, Korean chili paste, rice vinegar, sugar and salt.

Sunglight also brings me a basil plant. Strike that. A basil tree. From one lowly plant that managed to outlive the once thriving tomato, it gave me bushels and bushels of fragrant greenery. Some I plucked as I needed for the lazy summer cooking (assembly is more like it) for a salad here and there. Maybe some goat cheese.

When the sunlight started to fade, I rushed all the tender leaves inside for one last good-bye with the help of my food processor and some ice cube trays. Fresh pesto is simple enough -- take basil by the handful (the way Scrooge McDuck would grasp handfuls of his cash), wads and wads of it, stuff it into a food processor bowl that has already in it some fresh garlic cloves, pine nuts and salt already pulverized.

Pulse until the leaves are no longer leaves, but confetti. Slowly stream in a waterfall of extra-virgin olive oil. Something sweet and mild like almonds, versus punchy like a radish and cut grass. Stir in some grated pecorino cheese (I love Fiore Sardo). Season to taste. I kept one jar in the fridge. The rest in tupperware or ice cube trays to deliver some warmer memory in the depths of winter.

 
Sunlight also allows me big ripe tomatoes from friends and neighbors (I am not a good gardener. Thankfully, my friends are) that I stuffed with goat cheese, chopped basil or whatever other fresh herb was abundant. Sometimes I added in some fresh corn kernels to pop like sweet candy with the soft fresh tomato. Olive oil and some sliced zucchini into the same pan before going into a hot oven. To be flashy, I finish it off under the broiler until the cheese reaches this gorgeous cosmetic flourish. It tastes good, too.

I look out my window and imagine these flavors the moment I tasted them. The pesto is almost gone. The chili peppers in my fridge from some other place. And tomatoes? The ones I've come across are more appropriate as blunt force weapons as opposed to seasonal bliss. 

But even as the memories fade like the morning fog, the sunlight usually shows up just in time. I no longer have to rely on memories for the promise of sunshine because it will be here.

I'm not a religious person in any sense. But I can see how people for generations on end prayed for and to the sun. We might not have temples for it or ceremonies to exalt it, but as I look around me the throng of responsible adults look out their own windows and long for the same thing the ancients did.

Bring us light.
 

Fondue

Spring has sprung. A major leak. Though I could frolic among the green and lush life awakening around me my heels would be ruined, my feet absolutely soaked. Foremost, I would be so bloody cold I would surely come down with some sort of ailment. Oh, wait. I already did.

In such times, there's no need for the vegetal lightness we savor in summer. No sunshine in juicy bites. Rather, the heft is still in order. Particularly if you have cold feet.

One such remedy is fondue. Retro if you have the set. Resourceful if you have nothing but a simple little saucepot. You know the reason why there is no gooey photo heading this post? It's because we ate the whole lot before you could say "April showers bring May flowers." We'll probably be eating another batch by the time the flowers bloom under the sun.

Pork Belly Redux (AKA That Rocked My World)

 

My beloved pork belly was reincarnated thanks to a mixture of my laziness and curiosity. The gargantuan pork roast we made one weekend was still lingering in the fridge a couple of days later, albeit in a smaller but no less formidable chunk. Hesitant to just slice and re-heat I opted to test my ingenuity and exhaust other leftover bits and bobs.

The result was superb. Cooking like this makes me think sometimes we take recipes and our attitudes in the kitchen way too seriously. Don't misunderstand, this isn't about not thinking about the food -- quite the contrary. You think and care so much about the time you took into it, you feel obligated to respect it to the very last morsel. This is serious passion. Worrying is an optional addition. Gratuitious waste is an all too accepted sin.

Most talented cooks I know stand out for two reasons: 1.) They usually don't cook with recipes. And 2.) They are sorceresses with leftovers.

But the true success of this recipe -- and a certain degree of vindication -- only comes when The Voracious One actually eats the damn thing. He-who-normally-eschews-and-curses-leftovers downed every shred of braised pork LEFTOVERS.

He even ate the leftovers of this reincarnated leftover. Victory. It tastes mighty fine.

Braised Left-Over Pork Belly in a Cupboard Sauce

Thankfully, this is the type of dish that really doesn't - shouldn't - come with a recipe. The name doesn't allude to the taste of the dish, rather the contents of. I literally looked in my fridge and added it to my chunk of pork belly I placed into my enameled cast iron pot:

approx. 2/3 cup stale Virgil's Root Beer * 1 cup of cold black coffee from earlier that morning * the last bit of life squeezed out from a tube of tomato pasta * a lone yellow onion peeled and cut in half * a tablespoon each of Domori Apurimac cocoa powder and ground almonds * a teaspoon each of ground cumin, coriander seed, sichuan peppercorn and a touch of ground cinnamon * a bay leaf from my little potted tree * and some of the remnants of the packaged chicken stock sitting for God knows how long in my fridge (it passed the smell test)

I mixed it up as it came to a boil so that the liquid was somewhat uniform, reduced the heat and covered it to let it do it's thing for about three hours. Then I forgot about it for another hour. And when I remember it again, I uncovered the pot and used a fork to flake away the tender strands of meat into the deep, earthy sauce.

The moral of my leftover story:  Every little bit can contribute flavor, especially in a braise. I have a feeling that what we know as mole (forgive me, but I cannot figure out how to get the accent over the "e" on my new keyboard) is a result of frugality, an interesting pantry and a love of flavor.

The ingredients are only OPTIONS, not the rule. Play around with some liquid, some seasoning, maybe something for texture. Have it swim up half way up a piece of meat, bring it to a boil, cover and give it a steam room treatment. The aromatic bubbles should appear only once in a while -- no vigorous boiling however small the bubbles.

I've had great luck with a small hunk of beef, onions I caramelized and some veg broth mixed with water to create enough volume in the pot. After a few hours, I had what I can only call French Only Pot Roast. Heavenly with buttered noodles. Remind me to tell you about that one ...

So, tell me. What are some of your leftover tricks?

Roast Pork Belly

For as much pork belly I eat, I've cooked very little of it. Partly because up until recently, finding pork belly at the store was just as likely as finding a genuinely ripe avocado. But the bulk of my avoidance was purposeful. Pork belly is a sublime thing. How could I, an imprecise kitchen being, ever come close to achieving the same level of mouth-watering greatness that made me love it in the first place? How could I dare to come so close to perfection, like reaching out your fingers to the most supreme of beings in your mind without the faintest trembling, nevermind controlling the drooling.

My knees shook. My palms sweat. But reality trumped hesitance and fear. The freezer was crammed with things intended. Pie crusts. Sunday roasts. But mostly the huge piece of pork belly supplied by a fellow pig lover who thought I would enjoy a bit of play. If Ben and Jerry were to cohabitate in the new freezer (or anything new for that matter), I would have to cook the damn/blessed thing.

So I did.

How To: Make Creme Fraiche and Use It

There are some things on market shelves that confuse me. The other day, at an upscale cooking supply store, I noticed a bottle of "ready made" simple syrup. For about $10, you could buy something you could've made for pennies. Some sugar. The same amount of water. And a pot. You could even spruce it up with herbs and the like.

What confused me more was that people (who apparently have more money than they know what to do with) were actually buying it, totally stoked to see it there in a pretty bottle with cool font, ready to go for their cocktail party.

Creme fraiche is another one of these things. Literally, it means "fresh cream." My disclaimer is that I don't live down the street from a dairy, I live in a country that legally mandates pasteurized milk and cream and what I make at home probably doesn't have the same flavor Julia Child experienced whenever she went to her grocer's to buy it by the small bucketful.

What I've come across in the stores and markets are usually mighty fine specimens. They are worth the $5.95 and up price tag but a few years ago, I came across a way to make my own. Jacques Pepin or Julia Child herself -- they invoke the qualities of creme fraiche and the virtues of making it yourself. It requires heavy cream, buttermilk and a jar with a lid you can securely fasten.

I won't give measurements here -- I prefer to think of it as four parts cream to one part buttermilk. I eyeball the amount according to the container. In this case it was a 1 pint Mason Jar. First the cream. Then the buttermilk. Screw on the lid and give it a good shake. Buttermilk I get in the tiny cartons for about $0.49. That's more than enough for a pint of cream.

Here's the crucial part: Let it hang out room temperature, even a little bit warmer, for a couple of days. I know in our hyper-hygenic culture leaving these two mixed dairy products is a form of dangerous sacrilege, against everything we've learned from food safety and handling classes.

But really, this is what sour cream, creme fraiche and cheese each are. Controlled spoilage. These natural enzymes and bacteria do their thing, transforming this liquid substance into something thicker, a bit more complex and luxurious.

So, leave the jar, tightly fastened out. I like to put mine on top of the fridge or by the stove. Warmth is nice. Once a day, I pick up the jar to shake it and notice the difference in sound. First, it's a slurpy noise, like when you shake a carton of orange juice. Then, the next day, it's a lot heavier, more viscous, almost like I was shaking a jar of caramel. Open the lid and give it a stir. It's denser than most sour creams we've come to know in our earlier potato salad days. Its thick and emits a subtle, funk as a backbone, a richness that covers the tongue and ends on a top note of tang. In other words, it's not just sour. It's complex.

Store it in the refrigerator. To make another batch, I use the last 1/2 inch of creme fraiche in a jar as the starter for another fresh pouring of heavy cream. You can start from scratch with a washed out container, buttermilk and cream. But I prefer this self-contained ecosystem that already is familiar with creme fraiche. Bread artisans know the power of a sourdough starter that's been kept from previous batches.

I use creme fraiche with many things. I top fresh berries with it and sprinkle on muscovado (the deep, earthy sugar). I like it instead of whipped cream with cakes, like the Cherry Almond one I  made last week. I like it in baked potatoes, mashed potatoes and anything where sour cream is required. Come winter, I'll dollop it generously on top of sweetened chestnut cream spiked with brandy. A shower of shaved chocolate is all this dessert needs. 

One of my favorite ways to use creme fraiche is as an easy sauce for long strands of hot pasta. It was a revelation when I first read it in The River Cafe Cookbook, where Jamie Oliver got his start and where two very savvy and talented women showed London how to eat. For anyone who has an excess of arugula, this make a nice change of pace from a salad.

Creme Fraiche Arugula Pasta

1 cup creme fraiche * zest and juice of 1 lemon (2 if they're small or not particularly juicy) * a big handful of fresh arugula, roughly torn * 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese, plus more for serving * salt and pepper to taste * 1/2 pound of pasta like linguine, spaghetti OR 1 pound of fresh linguine, fettuccine OR parpadalle

If you've got dried pasta, get a huge pot of water boiling, salt it with a good dash of kosher salt and then cook the pasta before anything else.

If you're working with fresh pasta, make the sauce first, have it sit tight for a five minutes while you get the fresh pasta cooked and ready to go.

For the sauce: In a large mixing bowl stir together the creme fraiche, lemon zest and juice, the arugula, cheese, salt and pepper.

As soon as the pasta is done, strain the noodles in a colander. When I say "reserving some pasta cooking water" you can go one of two ways. First method, actually scoop out about a cup's worth of pasta water before you strain the pasta. Or second, you can strain the pasta into the colander and while the noodles are still dripping, place the colander over the now empty boiling pot. Whatever you've harvested below is what you can use to thin out the creme fraiche sauce.

Toss to coat each strand. Serve immediately with plenty of grated parmesan cheese.

Crab Linguine with a Bite

Certain recipes are versatile in that they adapt themselves to life. Mood dictates everything. At least for me, it influences my cravings and what I choose to tinker with in the kitchen. These recipes aren't long, sordid affairs. On the contrary, it's usually a flash of activity to clear the mind or work out the latest bout of angst.

The motions of chopping, pounding, sauteeing, stirring help; but it's also the scents working up your nose and the prospect of seeing something through to the end, at which point, it's time to feed yourself something good. The fruits of your labor also serve as the consolation prize or a friendly offering to a lover, friends and guests.

This is such a recipe.

Minty Chicken "Slaw"

"Cooking" requires a degree of heat that isn't appealing at the height of summer. Without air-conditioning. Little wonder then that Mother Nature made it so that the food emerging from the soil and pops up in markets Farmer and Super particularly good. The point being, you don't really need to do anything to it.

My sort of summer cooking is more assembly than anything. Despite the allure of pies, I try to keep baking to a minimum. The less time with heat the better for me — and the food.

In that list of assembly-friendly food, of course, is the salad. Its attained an iconic status, synonymous (with bottled water) with the ascetically healthy, the Sizzlers of the world and their buffets. The salad is almost regarded as a punishment for past gluttony which is a shame considering how it's best suited to the bountiful part of the year.

So why the hell am I using cabbage? Simple. Ever heard of coleslaw?