Pretty simple.

• thirteen Hampton Bays sea scallops (15 ounces total) from American Seafood Company, rinsed, dried very thoroughly with paper towels then placed in a paper plate to prevent condensation, seasoned with local Long Island sea salt from P.E. & D.D. Seafood and freshly-ground black pepper, grilled briefly (90 seconds on each side) in a very hot enameled cast iron pan, finished with a squeeze of juice from a Gristedes Supermarket Mexican lemon and a drizzle of Cretan olive oil, Renieris Estate ‘Divina’ (Koroneiki varietal), of Hania, from Whole Foods Market, arranged on the plates with a sprinkling of some very special slightly peppery parsley, chopped, torn from a few stems that JoAnna of the Windfall Farms stand had shared with me that day at the Union Square Greenmarket

• the thinly sliced pink/white and lighter green parts of 2 red spring onions from Norwich Meadows Farm heated, along with a tablespoon of dried Semi di Finocchietto Ibleo (a wild Sicilian fennel seed harvested in the Iblei Mountains in the southeast), in one tablespoon of olive oil inside a small antique heavy tin-lined copper pot until the onion had softened and the fennel had become quite pungent, then set aside, while another tablespoon of oil, or a little more, was heated inside a much larger copper pot of the same description, and 2 beautiful small heads (11 ounces) of a hybrid Napa cabbage, called ‘Red Dragon‘, from northern Vermont’s Tamarack Hollow Farm, roughly chopped, was gradually added and stirred until all of it was slightly wilted, the pot removed from the heat, the reserved scallion-fennel seed mixture, some sea salt, and a little freshly-ground black pepper added to its contents, and the cabbage stirred some more, finished by tossing on some more chopped spring onion

• slices from a loaf of ‘Seedy Grains’ from Philadelphia’s Lost Bread Co., purchased at the Union Square Greenmarket
• the wine was an Oregon (Willamette Valley) white, Scott Kelley Oregon Pinot Gris 2018, from Naked Wines
• the music was Christopher Tignor’s album, ‘A Light Below’

Food is often about color, even when it’s not really about color.

But food photography, even casual food photography, is always about color.

Sometimes the colors change along the way, but that’s part of the story too.

This time it was the mushrooms that gave a show.

• five ounces of some very definitely pink oyster mushrooms (which change to a gold yellow when they begin sautéing, through to an orange brown or copper color once cooked) from Joe Rizzo of Blue Oyster Cultivation in the Union Square Greenmarket, sliced somewhat roughly, added to a heavy antique copper skillet in which one sliced red spring onion from Norwich Meadows Farm had first been softened in a tablespoon or so of butter, the mushrooms immediately salted, to encourage their moisture escaping, and gently sautéed for several minutes until brown, a splash of Lustau dry (fino) sherry from Philippe Wines stirred in, the mushrooms seasoned with freshly ground black pepper and kept warm while the fish, whose cooking process had just begun, was finished
• one very fresh 14 ounce flounder fillet from P.E. & D.D. Seafood Company (where I heard it also described as a winter fluke), carefully halved lengthwise, seasoned on both sides with the fisherman’s own local sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, sautéed fairly gently in a tablespoons and a half of butter inside a large (13-inch), thick-walled antique tin-lined copper pan, flesh side first, turned after about 2 minutes and the second side cooked for about the same length of time before the fish was removed and arranged on 2 plates, the mushrooms spooned onto the edge of and next to the fillets, micro kale from Norwich Meadows Farm strewn between fish and mushrooms

• small, sweet, late season yellow ‘filet beans’ (small yellow pole beans, or Haricots Jaunes) from Norwich Meadows Farm, trimmed, left whole, blanched, drained and dried, then reheated in a little olive oil inside a heavy well seasoned cast iron pan, finished with salt, pepper, and more olive oil, arranged on the plates and garnished with some fennel fronds from small bulbs purchased from Quarton Farm a while back
• the wine was a French (Burgundy) white, Joseph Droouhin Laforêt Bourgogne Chardonnay 2018, from Philippe Wines
• the music was a brilliant album, ‘Silencio’, Gidon Kremer and his ensemble Kremerata Baltica, performing music by Philip Glass, Arvo Pärt, and Vladimir Martynov

The chops end up looking very different whenever I revisit this recipe, one of my favorites, period. This time it looks like they were trying to emulate a tomato that couldn’t decide what color it wanted to be.

• two 8-ounce boneless pork chops from Flying Pigs Farm, rinsed, thoroughly dried, seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, before being seared quickly (above a medium high flame) in a heavy enameled cast-iron pan, after which half of a Chelsea Gristedes Supermarket Mexican lemon was squeezed over the top (the lemon then left in the pan between them, cut side down), the chops placed in a 400º oven for about 13 minutes altogether, flipped halfway through, when most of one finely chopped aji dulce pepper (heatless) was scattered on top and the lemon squeezed over the pork again before being replaced on the bottom of the pan, which was returned to the oven, but 3 minutes before the chops were finished, one halved medium red and orange striped heirloom tomato from Jersey Farm Produce Inc. in the Saturday 23rd Street farmers market, the cut sides seasoned with salt and pepper, was also placed on the bottom, until the chops were done, chops and tomato removed from the oven and arranged on 2 plates, some of the juices that remained in the pan (there were very few this time) poured over them, chopped garlic chive seed from Space on Ryder Farm sprinkled on top
• nine ounces of medium size Brussels sprouts  from Alex’s Tomato Farm in the Saturday Chelsea Farmers Market tossed with a little olive oil, salt and pepper, then roasted in a 400º oven until browned and crisp on the outside, or roughly 20 minutes (when they will taste surprisingly sweet and a bit nutty)
• the wine was a South African (Western Cape Province/Robertson Valley) white, Arabella Chenin Blanc 2018, from Naked Wines
• the music was Christopher Tignor‘s album, ‘Thunder Lay Down In The Heart’  

‘Morgenblätter‘.

As someone keen on both journalism and food, I often think of that beautiful 19th century waltz at breakfast time, especially on Sundays. I don’t actually hum it, but I enjoy all the pleasant associations of the word, with the usual exception of the contents of the news itself.

Well, it wasn’t our usual morning papers-with-[b̶r̶e̶a̶k̶f̶a̶s̶t̶]-lunch Sunday: This one was attended by some Zhug.

As the citizen of a great European imperial capitol whose territories extended into the Balkans and nearly all the way to the Black Sea, Johann Strauss Jr. was able to know and appreciate more dishes than those we think of as belonging to German cuisine, but he may never have had Zhug.

I first found out about it last week.

Maybe it’s just me, and my basically Eurocentric kitchen orientation (which is driven by time and space considerations more than any immovable preference), but most of the time I find I can ignore the recipe pages of the New York Times Magazine. It seems like the editors’ choices are mostly about courting points, wherever, for their eccentricity or sensationalism, sometimes with a side trip to silly. Also for the parties.

The recipe featured this past week was an exception. The subject was Zhug, a rich green sauce from Yemen, and it included a recipe with a loving description of the somewhat laborious process involved in making it.

I don’t know what it was that kept me lingering on the pages of the article this time. It may have been the photograph that showed a rich sauce getting friendly with, among other delicacies, a simple fried egg (Barry and I both love fried eggs). In any event, when I remembered Sunday was almost upon us, and once I realized I already had or could quickly gather together all of the ingredients (note: they aren’t really exotic at all), I was on my way.

But that would be only after a quick stop to search on line whether the sauce could be stored for any length of time, since it didn’t seem worth the trouble to make some if it wasn’t to be in the quantity described by the recipe: The answer was a definite yes, and one account, spotted on Serious Eats, was pretty specific: “It should last a few weeks in the fridge (though I’ve never had a jar linger long enough to actually find out)”.

Another reason for my interest in the recipe: I can spend a lot of time (and go through a lot of little bowls) assembling a lot of condiments for our traditional Sunday bacon and eggs early afternoon meals, and I thought this rich spicy sauce could be an interesting, if probably only occasional, alternative, and a big time saver too (as if that should ever be an operating principal for such meals).

The bottom line: The sauce is pretty complex, and really delicious, and a little goes a long way. It’s also really beautiful, if you’ve managed to include some red peppers. It would be a significant addition, more than just an accent, and just very comfortable with virtually any kind or form of Mediterranean dish. The world surrounding the Mediterranean on all side is one whose cultures were birthed in the civilizations of the Middle East, and Yemen’s is one of the richest of those.  It’s that Mediterranean that describes much of the eating preferences of Barry and myself.

In my own cooking I’ve hosted more extreme deviations from the European kitchen than that represented by this sauce, and increasingly so as the years go by and I become more comfortable in my skills and my tastes, but also as our local suppliers introduce us to more and more interesting alternatives to traditional European preparations.

Did I mention that I tweaked the recipe published in the Times, even on this, my first outing? It was mostly about playing with the kinds of chilis used, because of what I had on hand, because I wanted color, and because I was looking for as much complexity of flavor as possible. Also, I didn’t have the amounts of parsley and cilantro prescribed (so much!); I used only about half the volume, but some of my mix of chilis had no heat at all, so it may have evened out in the end.

Is it European?

Gabrielle Hamilton, the author of the article in which the Zhug recipe appears, and the chef/owner of New York’s Prune restaurant, includes this paragraph in her introduction:

For the entirety of Prune’s 20 years, I’ve confined myself — with pretty strict discipline — to cooking within a European-and-Mediterranean idiom. It has been two decades of salsa verde, gremolata, sauce gribiche and maître d’hôtel butter, with all the rest doused in olive oil. Of course, giving yourself the entire European-and-Mediterranean pantry is hardly a confinement. Somehow it has never even proved to be a monotony. It has just been a nonnegotiable outline of territory on a map, so that we all know how far we can go and what we are meant to be doing as we cook menu after menu after menu, season after season, six new menus a year, 20 solid years in a row. And that’s not counting desserts.

I think this is a fair evaluation of the material many Western cooks have to work with, although we are now blessed with farmers and fishers and bakers who encourage us to expand our comfort zones. Interestingly, in her next paragraph Hamilton goes on to add that, away from the restaurant, when cooking at home, she works with no such constraints.

Sigh. With more space, and more skill, and more self-confidence, I can imagine going there too.

One thing I am proud to say about my excursion into Yemen is that I prepared my Zhug entirely by hand, working with a wonderful antique vessel, an almost 12-pound, 6″ x 6″ cast iron mortar and its original pestle, with no discernible  maker’s mark, that I had long ago spent a week rescuing from its mid-career role, which was probably that of performing inside a machine shop.

• there were 6 fresh eggs from pastured chickens and 4 slices of bacon from pastured pigs, all from Pennsylvania’s Millport Dairy Farm in the Union Square Greenmarket, the eggs, while they were being fried, seasoned with a local Long Island sea salt (P.E. & D.D. Seafood/Phil Karlin’s own), freshly ground black pepper, a pinch of dried fenugreek from Bombay Emerald Chutney Company (purchased at the Saturday Chelsea Farmers Market), and accompanied by a dollop of Zhug, for which I had followed the recipe, and as I recall, virtually to the letter, with the exception of the makeup of the capsicum element (I used 4 kinds of peppers), and the addition of a few tablespoons of lemon juice stirred in at the very end; the sources of the fresh ingredients were: 6 cloves of ‘Chesnok Red’ garlic from Alewife Farm; 2 jalapeño peppers, one red, one green, from Alex’s Tomato Farm in the Saturday Chelsea’s Down to Earth Farmers Market; 1 habanada pepper from Campo Rosso Farm; 2 tiny Brazil wax peppers (very hot) and 2 aji dulce peppers (no real heat), both from Eckerton Hill Farm; fresh parsley and coriander from Jersey Farm Produce Inc. in the Saturday 23rd Street farmers market; several tablespoons of juice of a Mexican lemon from the Chelsea Gristedes Supermarket; leaves from a head of a mini speckled romaine lettuce from Quarton Farm. dressed with good Cretan olive oil, Renieris Estate ‘Divina’ (Koroneiki varietal), Hania, Crete, from Whole Foods Market, salt, and pepper, and some torn leaves from a branch of peppermint from Keith’s Farm; everything accompanied by slices (some toasted, some not) from a quarter of a 6-pound loaf of Orwashers Levin Locale (locally grown and milled wheat, 100% natural fermentation, durum flour, wheat bran, biga, malt), also from the Saturday Chelsea Market
• the Sunday music was Messiaen’s ‘Vingt regards sur l’enfant Jésus‘, performed by Joanna MacGregor

I was still recovering from a bug, and hadn’t been doing much real cooking for a few days. Although during that period we had only ordered one Mexican takeout and one pizza (both really good), by Saturday I was more interested in preparing a real grownup meal myself than coming up with another food delivery choice, no matter how basic the preparation would be or how good the takeout could be.

I walked one block west to the 23rd Street greenmarket that afternoon and selected what was probably the most easily prepared entrée, and a vegetable that would be even more easy to put on the table.

• one modest 11.5-ounce tuna steak from American Seafood Company in the Saturday Chelsea’s Down to Earth Farmers Market on 23rd Street, rinsed, dried, halved, tops and bottoms seasoned with local P.E. & D.D. Seafood Company, sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, ‘paved’ with almost 2 tablespoons of a mix of some incredibly pungent dried Semi di Finocchietto Ibleo [wild Sicilian fennel seed], harvested in the Iblei Mountains, from Eataly Flatiron and a little dried peperoncino Calabresi secchi from Buon Italia in the Chelsea Market [both first crushed together in a porcelain mortar and pestle], plus one finely chopped small aji dulce seasoning  pepper (no real heat) from Eckerton Hill Farm, the steaks pan-grilled above a medium-high flame for little more than a minute or so on each side, finished on the plates with a good squeeze of the juice of an organic lemon from Chelsea Whole Foods Market, scissored garlic chive seeds from Space on Ryder Farm, and a drizzle of Chelsea Whole Foods Market Portuguese house olive oil
• one medium red/orange-veined/striped heirloom tomato from Jersey Farm Produce Inc. in the same Saturday market, halved crosswise, the cut sides seasoned with salt and pepper, placed inside a small copper skillet in a little olive oil over a medium flame until softened, arranged on the plates and sprinkled with some chopped green sections of baby French leeks from Mountain Sweet Berry Farm in the Union Square Greenmarket, drizzled with a small amount of olive oil
• one large bunch of cavolo nero (aka lacinato, Tuscan kale, or black kale, among other names as well) from Alex’s Tomato Farm, also in the Saturday Market, the leaves stripped from their stems, wilted briefly inside a large heavy antique tin-lined copper pot in a tablespoon or so of olive oil after several cloves of ‘Chesnok Red’ garlic from Alewife Farm had first been heated inside it until fragrant and softened, the greens seasoned with salt and pepper and drizzled with a little more oil
• the wine was a French/Touraine/Loire) white, Francois Chidaine Clos de la Grange Touraine Sauvignon 2018, from Chambers Street Wines
• the music was the Neos label album, ‘Musica viva, Vol. 33: Peter Ruzicka’, with works performed by the Symphonie-Orchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks and the Vocalconsort Berlin

We were trying for seriousness here, even if both plates ended up looking a little frivolous.

A strong-flavored salumi, together with a dark bread, then an earthy pasta, with a sauce that could communicate with it.

Not a meal for a July evening, but just right for mid-October.

• And one that was more about assembling than preparation.three ounces of an (almost local) Fairway Market-purchased salumi, a capocollo produced by Daniele Inc. in north central Rhode Island [I have a soft spot for anything Rhode Island, so this Providence TED conference video by a member of the family business’ third generation got to me] arranged on t plates on top of a few large leaves of arugula from Windfall Farms, seasoned with local P.E. & D.D. Seafood sea salt, freshly ground black pepper, and both the green and the capocollo drizzled with some good olive oil (Renieris Estate ‘Divina’ (a Koroneiki varietal) from Hania, Crete, purchased at Whole Foods Market
• slices of ‘Whole wheat Redeemer Bread’ (wheat, water, salt) from Lost Bread Co.

Except for the time it took to boil the pasta, the second course took only a few minutes to complete.

• a few tablespoons of a rich butter, Vermont Creamery Butter (total fat 12g, 83% butter fat), from Whole Foods Market (unfortunately they don’t stock the producer’s unsalted version), melted slowly inside a large antique copper pot before a small handful of fresh whole sage leaves from Keith’s Farm, one finely sliced fresh habanada pepper from Campo Rosso Farm, and a pinch of hickory smoked Scotch Bonnet pepper from Eckerton Hill Farm were stirred in, the mix seasoned with local P.E. & D.D. Seafood sea salt and some freshly ground black pepper, and, as soon as it had finished cooking to al dente, 8 ounces from a one-pound box of Sfoglini Einkorn Macaroni, together with a cup of the cooking water, stirred in, the heat under the pan pushed to high and the mix cooked, stirring, until the liquid had emulsified, a little olive oil then drizzled around the edges and some Parmigiano Reggiano (aged 24 months) from Whole Foods Market shaved on top, garnished with micro red amaranth from Windfall Farms 

 

• the wine for both courses was a Spanish (Catalonia/Tarragona/Monsant) white, Franck Massard Herbis Verdejo 2018, from Naked Wines
• the music throughout was Mendelssohn’s wonderful 1832 secular cantata on Druidic themes, ‘Die Erste Walpurgisnacht‘, based on the poem by Goethe, Kurt Mazur conducting  the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra in the Studio Versöhnungskirche; we followed that with other pieces by Mendelssohn

Lots of things going on here.

We had bacon and eggs early Sunday afternoon, as we usually do. Also as we usually do, we invited a lot of things to join us. In fact there were so many things, and they all jumped onto the table so fast, I’m not sure I can give an account of each one, nor do I think I should, since no one, including myself, is ever going to repeat it.

The best I can do, and I’m doing it mostly in order to provide the credits, is to report who were the farmers, bakers, and other producers who got them to us.

And include one other picture, of a section of the Lost Bread Co. stand in the Union Square Greenmarket.

To be truthful, I have to add that a good number of these ingredients were items already prepared for or remaining from very recent earlier meals and not used.

• 6 fresh eggs from pastured chickens, John Stoltzfoos’ Millport Dairy Farm in the Union Square Greenmarket
• 3 slices of bacon from pastured pigs, John Stoltzfoos’ Millport Dairy Farm in the Union Square Greenmarket
• Renieris Estate ‘Divina’ (Koroneiki varietal) olive oil, Hania, Crete, from Whole Foods Market
• chives from Stokes Farm
• pericón (Mexican Tarragon) from Quarton Farm
• local sea salt from P.E. & D.D. Seafood
• freshly ground black pepper from Whole Food’s store brand
• Brazil wax pepper-infused olive oil (the peppers from Eckerton Hill Farm, the infusion done at home)
• sunflower sprouts from Space on Ryder Farm (formerly Betsy Ryder’s Ryder Farm)
• finely chopped red jalapeño pepper, from a friend’s garden
• one small shallot from Alex’s Tomato Farm in the Saturday Chelsea’s Down to Earth Farmers Market
• chopped upper stem section of a red spring onion from Norwich Meadows Farm
• a very light ‘Delitia’ Burro di Bufala, Caserta, Campania (total fat 12g, 83% butter fat), from Eataly
• a rich Vermont Creamery Butter (total fat 12g, 83% butter fat), from Eataly
• bits of baby celery stem and leaves from Norwich Meadows Farm
• dried wild Sicilian (Ibleo Mountains) fennel seed from Eataly Flatiron
• Homadama bread (wheat, corn, water, maple syrup, salt, slaked lime) from Lost Bread Co.
• Buck Honey Rye (rye, malted buckwheat groats, honey, water, salt) from Lost Bread Co.
• ‘Whole wheat Redeemer Bread’ (wheat, water, salt) from Lost Bread Co.

 

• the music was Wagner’s first success, the 5-act opera, ‘Rienzi, der letzte der Tribunen‘, composed between 1838 and 1840, premiered in 1842, and heard on Sunday streaming from Finland’s Yle Klassinen in a mid-70s recording with  Heinrich Hollreiser conducting the Dresden Staatskapelle, the  Leipzig Radio Chorus, and the Dresden State Opera Chorus, with amazing soloists: Peter Schreier, Siv Wennberg, René Kollo, Janis Martin, Nikolaus Hillebrand, Theo Adam, Siegfried Vogel, Günther Leib, and Ingeborg Springer

I suppose it was surf and turf last night, but I can never forget that in the middle ages some ecclesiastical authorities considered some waterfowl to be fish, when it came to observing some religious fasts.

• six smoked scallops from Pura Vida Seafood Company in the Union Square Greenmarket, brought fully to room temperature, arranged on a bed of large arugula from Windfall Farms, with the addition of some finely chopped baby celery stems and leaves from Norwich Meadows Farm, drizzled with a good olive oil from Whole Foods Market, Renieris Estate ‘Divina’ (Koroneiki varietal olives), from Hania, Crete, seasoned with local sea salt from P.E & D.D. Seafood and freshly ground black pepper, a squeeze of an organic lemon from Westside Market, a bit of scissored bronze fennel from Rise & Root Farm scattered on top

• slices of ‘Whole wheat Redeemer’ bread (Redeemer Wheat, water, salt) from Lost Bread Co.
• the wine for the first course was a French (Loire) white, Patrice Grasset Loire Valley Chenin Blanc 2018, from Naked Wines 

Since there had been a fairly rich first course, the entrée could be kept pretty simple. I did have a relatively extravagant amount of treviso radicchio on hand, but then we love chicory of any kind.

• one 14-ounce duck breast from Hudson River Duck Farm, the fatty side scored in tight cross hatching with a very sharp knife, after which the entire breast rubbed, top and bottom, with a mixture of local sea salt, fresh black pepper, and a little turbinado sugar, and left standing on the counter for about 45 minutes to an hour before being pan-fried, fatty side down first, inside a small oval enameled cast iron pan over medium heat for a total of about 9 or 10 minutes, draining the oil after the first few minutes (the fat strained can be used in cooking at another time, if desired), and turning over once, removed when medium rare, cut crosswise into 2 portions and checked for the right doneness in the center, which means definitely no more than medium rare, and maybe even a bit less (the tenderloin had been removed at the beginning of the preparation, but seasoned like the rest of the breast, then fried very briefly near the end of the time the larger section was cooking, the tenderloin then halved), left to sit for several minutes before drizzled with a little juice from an organic Westside Market lemon and some olive oil, transferred to the 2 warm plates that had been sitting on top of the oven where the vegetable had been roasting, dusted on top with a small amount of garlic chive seed from Space on Ryder Farm (Betsy Ryder’s old farm), micro red amaranth from Two Guys from Woodbridge arranged on the side

• one (11 or 12 ounce?) head of treviso from Campo Rosso Farm, rinsed, drained and wiped off, cut lengthwise into 6 sections, arranged one cut side up on a Pampered Chef unglazed ceramic oven pan (after securing the leaves of each with a toothpick, covered with thyme branches from Phillips Farms, seasoned generously with sea salt and black pepper, drizzled with 2 tablespoons of olive oil, baked in a pre-heated 400º oven for 18 minutes or so, turned over more than halfway through onto the other cut side, arranged on the plates and drizzled with a very small amount of balsamic vinegar
• the wine for the second course was a South African (Swartland) red, Carmen Stevens Angel’s Reserve Shiraz 2018, also from Naked Wines 

 

• the music throughout the meal was Hillary Hahn performing ‘6 Partitas’ by Antón García Abril

Since Thursday is not a Union Square Greenmarket day, it was one of our between-fish-meals meals.

We always have a variety of dried pastas in the apartment, and one of them is very often the fallback for these nights; this time I decided to use half of one of the two packages of croxetti I had in the larder.

It would also be a dinner that would include many ingredients, then at their peak, that I’d have difficulty incorporating into other meals in time: some small heirloom tomatoes, a wonderful local chèvre, some very modern very American bread, a handful of red-vein sorrel, and the heel of a Parmesan cheese wheel segment.

• six or eight different kinds of small heirloom tomatoes from Rise & Root Farm, sliced, arranged overlapping on top of a few very large leaves of arugula from Windfall Farms that had been drizzled with a little good olive oil, Renieris Estate ‘Divina’ (Koroneiki varietal olives), from Hania, Crete, purchased at Whole Foods Market, a small amount of Consider Bardwell Farm chèvre, ‘Mettawee’ crumbled over the tomatoes, sprinkled with torn peppermint from Keith’s Farm, more olive oil added on the top

• slices of Lost Bread Co.‘s awesome New England-style(?) Homadama (wheat, corn, water, maple syrup, salt, slaked lime)

The tomato salad functioned as an antipasto, and there actually was a primi this time, but no secundo.

• three or four ounces of butter melted over medium heat inside a large antique copper pot, introducing one crushed  golden orange dried habanada pepper and one chopped shallot from Alex’s Tomato Farm (in the Saturday Chelsea’s Down to Earth Farmers Market on West 23rd Street), heating the pan for a while, adding about half a teaspoon of sea salt, a bit of freshly-ground black pepper, and some chopped parsley from Phillips Farms before 8 or 9 ounces of a package of Genovese Alta Valle Scrivia Croxetti, which I believe came from Eataly, cooked al dente, was tossed in and everything stirred over a medium to high flame with some reserved pasta water until the liquid had emulsified, some roughly chopped red-vein sorrel from Norwich Meadows Farm slipped in and stirred with the pasta, which was then arranged inside 2 shallow bowls, a bit of olive oil drizzled around the edges, topped with a shaved Parmigiano-Reggiano Vache Rosse from Eataly
• the wine was an Italian (Piedmont/Cortese di Gavi) white, Lombardo Giordano 2018 Gavi di Gavi Vigna San Martino, from Chambers Street Wines
• the music was the ECM album, ‘PRISM I’, the Danish String Quartet performing works by Beethoven, Bach, Shostakovich

Before I started cooking, I wasn’t expecting much from this meal, mostly because it took me too long to determine much of what I would serve, and I wasn’t excited about what the decision.

For our table at least, this plate was pretty straightforward, with few excursions into the exotic.

It was delicious.

• one 14-ounce swordfish steak from American Seafood Company in the Union Square Greenmarket, marinated for more than half an hour in a mixture of one thinly sliced red spring onion from Norwich Meadows Farm, some chopped garlic chive seeds from Space on Ryder Farm, a bit of chopped fresh pericón (Mexican tarragon) from Quarton Farm, little more than a pinch of dried Itria-Sirissi chili (peperoncino di Sardegna intero) from Buon Italia, and less than a couple tablespoons of olive oil, after which the steaks were drained and covered on both sides with a coating of homemade dried breadcrumbs (to help retain the moisture, and keep it from drying out) and pan-grilled over medium-high heat for 4 minutes on each side, or until barely cooked all of the way through, removed, arranged on the plates, seasoned with a little local salt, Phil Karlin’s P.E. & D.D. Seafood Long Island Sound sea salt, a good amount of juice from an organic lemon from Westside Market squeezed on top, drizzled with olive oil, and garnished with micro chervil from Two Guys from Woodbridge
• two small ripe heirloom tomatoes from Rise & Root Farm, halved, sprinkled with sea salt and black pepper, placed face down on the same grill as the swordfish near the end of its cooking time, turned once, then arranged on the plates, topped with chopped lovage from Quarton Farm and drizzled with a little olive oil
• a modest bunch of sweet broccoli rabe from Keith’s Farm, washed and drained 3 times, braised inside a large, heavy antique copper pot in which two crushed ‘Chesnok Red’ garlic from Alewife Farm had been allowed to sweat in some heated olive oil, the dish finished with salt, black pepper, and a drizzle of olive oil
• the wine was an Italian (Sicily/Terre Siciliane) white, Defino 2016 IGT Terre Siciliane Catarratto, from Chambers Street Wines
• the music was a recording of an opera I’ve wanted to hear for decades, Daniel-François Auber and Eugène Scribe‘s 1828 grand opera, ‘La Muette De Portici’, dealing with a seventeenth century Neapolitan revolt that was sadly less than successful than the one it triggered at its 1830 Brussels premier, in what was then the Southern Provinces of the Netherlands: it ignited a successful revolution and a war of independence that resulted in the creation of Belgium, a spectacular, extended performance which was unlikely to have dismayed its creators; we heard it in a performance with Antony Hermus conducting the Anhaltische Philharmonie Dessau and the Anhaltische Theater Opera Chorus (we were both delighted to find it was a delight; here is a Guardian review of the recording)

What fun:

The opera was chosen for a performance at the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels on 25 August 1830, as part of King William I’s festival in celebration of the 15th year of his reign.The opera would cap the three-day festival of fireworks, feasts, and processions.

Posters were put up around Brussels that advertised, “Monday, the 23rd, fireworks; Tuesday, the 24th, illuminations; Wednesday, the 25th, revolution.” However, the King’s only concession to public safety was to cancel the fireworks and procession on the final night, which left Auber’s opera as the last public event in the king’s honor.

 

[the text above is excerpted from the WIkipedia entry for the composer]