It had to be assembled fairly fast, because we were going to be at The Kitchen earlier that night, and we expected to arrive home late, after our second experience of Varispeed’s magnificent performance of Robert Ashley’s opera, ‘Improvement (Don Leaves Linda)’.

My first choice at the Greenmarket fish stall (it was Wednesday, meaning the American Seafood Company would be there) had been tuna, because it really can make for a quick meal, but, learning that it wasn’t the season, I turned to the baby squid, which can be prepared just about as fast.

• one pound of rinsed and carefully dried baby squid from American Seafood Company, quickly arranged inside a large rectangular enameled cast iron pan that had been heated on top of the stove until hot and its the cooking surface brushed with olive oil, then, once the oil was also quite hot, immediately sprinkled with a heaping teaspoon of super-pungent dried Sicilian oregano from Buon Italia, a good section of a peperoncino Calabresi secchia from Buon Italia, and a section of light-colored home-dried habanada pepper (purchased fresh from Norwich Meadows Farm), sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, followed by a douse of 3 tablespoons of juice from an organic Whole Foods lemon, and a splash of olive oil, the pan placed inside a pre-heated 400º oven and the squid roasted for only about 5 minutes, by which time their little bodies had ballooned, removed, the squid distributed onto 2 plates and ladled with the cooking juices, once they’d been transferred to a footed glass sauce boat
• almost a pound of pinto potatoes from Norwich Meadows Farm, scrubbed, boiled unpeeled in generously-salted water until barely cooked through, drained, halved, dried in the still-warm large vintage Corning Pyrex Flameware blue-glass pot in which they had cooked, tossed with a little Trader Joe’s Italian Reserve extra virgin olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, tossed with some chopped lovage from Two Guys from Woodbridge
• sunflower sprouts, from Windfall Farms, naked
• the wine was a Portuguese (Beira) white, Vinhas Velhas Branco, Luis Pato 2016, from Astor Wines
• the music was Martin Bresnick’s ‘Opere della musica povera’, including several ensembles and soloists (we listened to both superb CDs)