I thought of my father as we sat down to breakfast today.

Although his given names were Clarence Henry, everyone outside of his huge family, which knew him as Clarence, called him ‘Wags’.  He loved bacon and eggs, generally preferring them raw, whipped and sprinkled with salt and pepper (at least at home). He had grown up on a large dairy farm in Wisconsin among 14 siblings, and there were often others who had been taken in by his parents. We always imagined he had decided early on that he didn’t want to wait for cooked eggs to arrive at the table, but that was only a guess.

Family and friends in need were his priorities.  He arranged his life to share breakfast, lunch (driving home from the office), and dinner with us every day until the one on which he died in 1958, at 51.

Clarence would have turned 110 this year.

I would like to think he would have been pleased by the meal (this one of cooked eggs) which we enjoyed today while thinking of him.  Because we ate at what would be lunch time for decent folks, he would probably have taken a short nap afterward, as he did every day after the midday meal.

 

looking into the gardens, from the breakfast room

 

• four thick slices of bacon from Millport Dairy Farm, very slowly fried in a large, seasoned cast iron pan, then drained on paper towels
• a section of one stem from a young red onion from Bodhitree Farm, thinly-sliced, lightly-sautéed in the fat rendered by the bacon, plus a tablespoon or so of ‘Kerrygold Pure Irish Butter‘, then 6 Araucana chicken eggs, also from Millport Dairy Farm, added to the pan fried gently until the whites were barely opaque, sprinkled near the end with sea salt, freshly-ground Telicherry pepper, chopped lovage from Bodhitree Farm and chopped summer savory from Stokes Farm
• wild arugula from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm, washed, rinsed, dried under a gooseneck lamp on the kitchen counter (my normal techinque), dressed only with some really excellent Campania olive oil, Syrenum D.O.P. Penisola Sorrentina, sea salt, and freshly-ground Telicherry pepper
• toasts from She Wolf Bakery’s polenta sourdough bread

When I saw ‘Mahi-mahi‘ posted on the board of Paul’s stand in the Greenmarket I immediately knew what we were going to have for dinner.  When it came to my turn in line, I stepped right up and asked for ‘Dolphin’.  Paul registered a little mock horror, since there were probably people within earshot of my voice, and even today many associate the word, ‘dolphin’ with Flipper.

I had already come to appreciate the flavor of this fish, and last night it was pretty extraordinary, with flavors and textures far more complex than I had reason to expect, and yet still retaining the character of the fish itself.  To the skeptical:  No, all white-flesh fish do not taste the same.

Also, and not at all incidentally, the Greenmarket vegetables were totally up to the challenge of accompanying a good fish.

 

 

• one Dolphin fillet, about 13 ounces, from Pura Vida Fisheries, dry-marinated with more than half a tablespoon of organic lemon zest, an equal amount of chopped thyme leaves from Bodhitree Farm, salt, and pepper, set aside for 20 minutes or so, after which it was seared in a hot copper fish pan for about 3 minutes, skin side up, then turned over and that side seared for the same length of time, the heat lowered and the pan loosely covered for a very few minutes with aluminum foil, during which time some thin-ish slices of stems one stem of a young red onion from Bodhitree Farm were introduced and briefly sautéed with the fish before it itself was divided into 2 pieces, removed and put onto plates, alliums and pan juices poured over the top
• small organic Butterball potatoes from Norwich Meadows Farm boiled in salted water until just tender, drained, halved, dried in the pan, rolled in olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, some chopped lovage added before they were served (I added more after taking the picture above)
• small ‘Royal Snow Peas’ from Alewife Farm, the stems removed, sautéed in olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, sprinkled with chopped summer savory from Stokes Farm
• the wine was an Oregon (Willamette) white, Montinore Estate Pinot Gris 2015
• the music was Q2 Music, streaming

I was ready for a very simple pasta dish. I had bought some fresh summer savory the day before and I was perfectly willing to leave it at that, as an excellent artisanal pasta dressed with oil, good dried pepper, and that pungent seasonal herb.

I hadn’t expected there might be some tuna left over from the meal the night before, but the coincidence was responsible for an inspired (well, more like serendipitous) entrée.  The fish was not fully cooked in the center, so, in order to preserve and appreciate its delicate freshness, I sliced the little 2-ounce chunk of fillet very thinly and added it to the zito only after the sauced pasta had been divided into the 2 bowls.

• ten ounces of Afeltra Zito Corto Rigato, cooked al dente, drained and tossed into a heavy pan in which one sliced/chopped young red onion from Bodhitree Farm had been sautéed in a little olive oil until softened, a teaspoon or so of dried Itria-Sirissi chilis, peperoncino di Sardegna intero from Buon Italia stirred in, then, the pasta still in the pan, some of its cooking water added and stirred until emulsified, finally some chopped summer savory from Stokes Farm mixed in and the pasta transferred to 2 bowls, where it was scattered with thinly-sliced pieces of pan-grilled tuna remaining from a meal prepared the night before, and a little olive oil poured over the top
• the wine was a Spanish (Rioja) white, Sierra Cantabria 2015
• the music was Yle streaming

A dear friend I’d known for almost 60 years was visiting New York from Miami Beach this week. We had originally planned to go out to dinner, but then I thought, while he had strayed south a number of years ago, he knows this city very well, having moved here directly after college; he might actually prefer a meal at our apartment, if only for an expanded opportunity for the extended conversation we were all looking forward to.

The only other consideration was whether I could put together something which would not divert me from that conversation, and yet would still be delicious (and at least a little special). The meal we would share with an old friend had to be something of an old friend itself.

The plan moved toward execution when I was able to locate three beautiful tuna steaks on my visit to the Union Square Greenmarket that morning. Each of the 4 courses I decided to serve (in the end there were only 3) was familiar to Barry and myself, and last night they almost assembled themselves (the symposium itself is all I can remember today).

I can recommend the basic outlines of this meal to anyone with similar entertainment considerations. Unfortunately I had to go with 8-ounce pieces of tuna, because that is what was available yesterday, but steaks of 5 or 6 ounces each would be a very reasonable, abstemious option.

Many of the elements in each of the three courses was of local origin, although in the case of the Speck, ‘local’ meant only that it was produced in this country, not northern Italy.

• La Quercia Speck Americano, described as ‘applewood-smoked prosciuto’ (3 ounces), from Whole Foods, drizzled with a little bit of good Umbrian olive oil (Luciana Cerbini Casa Gola) from Buon Italia, served with wild arugula from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm, and slices of a polenta sourdough from She Wolf Bakery
• the wine was a California (Napa) sparkling white, Keith Hock Exit 43 California Bollicine in Bianco 2014

 

• three half-pound tuna steaks from Blue Moon Fish Company, rubbed top and bottom with a mixture of dry Italian fennel seed and one and a half dried Itria-Sirissi chilis, peperoncino di Sardegna intero from Buon Italia, ground together in a mortar-and-pestle, additionally seasoned with salt and pepper, then pan-grilled for only a little more than a minute or so on each side, finished with a good squeeze of lemon and a drizzle of olive oil
• cavolo nero, lacinato, or black kale, from from Eckerton Hill Farm, wilted in a little olive oil in which several bruised organic garlic cloves from Trader Joe’s had first been heated/sweated in the oil
• the wines were an Italian (Tuscany) rosé, Il Rose di Casanova 2015; and a French (Ventoux) rosé, Domaine de la Verrière Rosé 2015
• the music was our conversation, and the birds in the garden

I was prepared to serve a cheese course of five local (Consider Bardwell) cheeses and thin polenta sourdough toasts, but we moved straight into sharing a basket of sweet cherries from Kernan Farms.

We were back from Germany but a day or two, and I was already homesick for a German meal. Not quite echt German, what I put together was more like ‘creative German’.

 

• one young, or spring, red onion from Bodhitree Farm, white portion only (some of the better green leaves reserved), chopped and swirled around for a minute in a small amount of equal parts of bacon fat, duck fat, and butter which had been heated inside an oval copper au gratin before adding 2 smoked loin pork chops [‘Kassler‘], from the Amish family farm in Pennsylvania which offers excellent produce at the Union Square Greenmarket under the name Millport Dairy, a Pyrex glass cover added immediately, the chops kept above a very low flame (just enough to warm them, as they were already fully-cooked), turning the meat once, and, near the end of the cooking time, the green parts of the onion set aside earlier added and stirred about, the pork removed, plated, brushed with a horseradish jelly from Berkshire Berries, the pork then sprinkled with both the white and green onion segments
• two handfuls of washed red amaranth from Bodhitree Farm, wilted in a little olive oil in which 6 tiny organic garlic cloves from Trader Joe’s had slowly cooked until they were beginning to brown
• small purple-top turnips from Norwich Meadows Farm, cooked along the lines of this simple and delicious recipe, using local honey (the extraordinarily rich Apple State Hilltop Family Farm pure buckwheat honey) and dill from Bodhitree Farm rather than the chives specified in the recipe
• the wine was a German (Mosel) white, Urban Riesling 2011 from das Weingut St. Urbans-Hof
• the music was Phillip Glass, ‘In the Summer House’ and ‘Mad Rush’, and Nico Muhly, ‘4 Studies’ and ‘Honest Music’