The pasta was a local rye grain trumpets, (‘Campanelle (little bells) in Italian) made by Sfoglini, and were two kinds of radishes, plus the greens of one kind, also spring garlic, dried smoked serrano pepper, olive oil, lemon juice, chopped baby fennel fronds, and some breadcrumbs (taken from a very sturdy loaf of bread) toasted along with a little lemon zest.

• the wine was a 2018 Villa Antinori Bianco IGT Toscana
• the music was Bruckner’s Symphony No. 8 performed by the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, directed by Yannick Nézet-Séguin

I’m writing shorter posts here, at least for a while, since I had neglected publishing anything at all for weeks. I may later go back and resurrect a few of the more interesting meals that never made it in print here in February and March, but I’m making no promises to myself that I will take the time to do it.

This meal was unusual, not just because it involved smoked scallops (although these are not unfamiliar inside our kitchen), but because this time I had ‘cooked’ the bivalves (lightly) and served them with a bit of a sauce. In fact this was the second time I had done this, but the first time had been during the Food Blog ‘blackout’).

As always, almost every part of the meal came from local producers selling in the Union Square Greenmarket.

• only about 9 ounces of smoked scallops from Pura Vida Seafood, warmed inside a heavy copper pot in a bitof utter, heated through, briefly, removed and kept warm, replaced by about 4 ounces of white wine, half an ounce of fresh lemon juice, a bit of chopped thyme, and a teaspoon of chopped garlic, the flame turned up and the liquid reduced until almost gone, 3 tablespoons of cold butter added, one at a time, and swirled in until melted, and just before the last one was introduced, some finely sliced green sections of spring garlic, and a bit of chopped peppermint mixed in, the scallops returned to the pan, tossed to coat, served immediately on a bed of wild baby dandelion, including some tight buds (they looked and crunched like fresh capers), the sauce spooned over them
• a few Peter Wilcox potatoes, from Windfall Farms, boiled, halved, tossed with a little butter, garnished with chopped baby fennel fronds
• two Italian heirloom tomatoes from Shushan Farm, halved, seasoned with salt, pepper, and a pinch of dried aji dulce pepper, heated in a little olive oil
• the wine was a Basa Rueda blanco 2017, from North Village Wine
• the music was  Beethoven’s 1st string quartet, and his 1st and 2nd piano sonatas, the quartet performed by the Miró Quartet, and the sonatas by Igor Levitt

This was really superb pork, but then so was everything else on the plate. And yet this was still March, and we were in the midst of a pandemic.

Barry and I live very well, with the help of others, and we will survive, with the help of others, even in the midst of our current deep, physical social isolation

• two bone-in pork chops from Flying Pigs Farm, seared, squeezed with lemon, roasted, garnished with micro celery
• four baby fennel bulbs from Norwich Meadows Farm, tossed with olive oil, balsamic, roasted, arranged with softened chopped spring garlic, black olives, fennel fronds
• two Italian heirloom tomatoes from Shushan Farm, halved, placed inside the pan with the chops near the end of their cooking, sprinkled with chopped thyme
• I didn’t record the wine or the music

Pretty standard, although not easily identifiable, are the Aleppo pepper, the Baden seasoning salt (the gift of a friend who had been given the recipe, whose ingredients included sea salt, 5 different seasoning peppers, plus dehydrated vanilla, lemon and lime, by a chef in Baden-Baden), plus the basil on the tomato and the thyme on the eggs. And the toast was Buck Honey Rye (rye, malted buckwheat groats, honey, water, salt) from Lost Bread Co.