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’  

The meat was a leftover, from a roast, but everyone should have such leftovers! The green vegetable would have been at its best had I moved it from the crisper to the oven a number of days sooner, so, not as spectacular as it should have been, but I did manage to roast the root vegetable at just the right moment, and the chutney was better than it was the first time around.

• two ribs from a large smoked pork rib roast we had enjoyed with friends on New Years Day, heated for a few minutes in a little butter inside a large antique copper pot with some sliced Japanese scallion from Norwich Meadows Farm, covered, arranged on the plates, the little bit of the juices produced, plus some more scallion sprinkled on top
• more of the really good chutney prepared for the first appearance of the Kassler (quince, fig, shallot, garlic, cherries, brown sugar, apple cider vinegar, cardamon, peppercorns, candied ginger, and cinnamon stick)
• medium sized parsnips from Norwich Meadows Farm, sliced as French fries, tossed with olive oil, salt, pepper, and a bit of crushed dried habanada pepper, roasted for about 25 minutes at 400º inside 2 Pampered Chef unglazed seasoned oven pans, one large and one small, to avoid crowding them, arranged on the plates and sprinkled with chopped lovage from Two Guys from Woodbridge
• a number of quite small Brussels sprouts from Migliorelli Farm I had purchased a full week earlier, when I was afraid I wouldn’t find a green vegetable to serve over the holiday, washed, trimmed and dried, tossed inside a bowl with a little olive oil, salt, and black pepper, plus a bit of dried peperoncino Calabresi secchi, then roasted inside another  unglazed seasoned Pampered Chef pan, a medium size this time, until the sprouts were partly brown and crisp on the outside
• the wine was a French (Touraine/Loire) white, Vignoble Dinocheau, Pineau d’Aunis 2017, from Flatiron Wines, it was excellent, and an excelllent pairing; more about this interesting AOP here]
• the music was Rossini’s wonderful opera buffa, ‘Il Barbiere Di Siviglia’: Great fun, it was a 1989 recording with Giuseppe Patanè conducting the Orchestra e coro del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, with Leo Nucci, Cecilia Bartoli, William Matteuzzi, Paata Burchuladze, Enrico Fissore, and others

Almost a day off.

This was a casual meal slipped in between some more ambitious holiday season dinners, and it was pretty much improvised; the idea was to give the cook a cook’s holiday, and to include elements or ingredients that had been inside the apartment for a while before they came close to the end of their useful life.

It could also be described as the impecunious diner’s surf & turf, turf here meaning vegetables.

• two crab cakes from PE & DD Seafood (crab, egg, flour, red & green peppers, garlic, salt, pepper, breadcrumbs, mayonnaise, milk, celery, and parsley), from the older of the 2 packages in the freezer at the time, made by Dolores Karlin, the wife of Karl Karlin, the fisherman, defrosted the night before, brought to room temperature and heated up with a drizzle of olive oil inside a small, heavy vintage, well-seasoned cast iron pan, 3 to 4 minutes to each side, served on a salsa composed of 6 quite ripe Backyard Farms Maine ‘cocktail tomatoes’ from Whole Foods that were quartered and combined with sea salt, freshly-ground black pepper, a small bit of dried peperoncino Calabresi secchi from Buon Italia, chopped Salinas, California parsley from Eataly, dried Sicilian oregano from Buon Italia, and a few cut-up sections of Berried Treasures Farm garlic scapes (the last of the season) that had first been softened by warming them up in a little olive oil over a gentle flame, the salsa in turn had itself been arranged on a shallow bed of wild cress from Lani’s Farm, the whole assembly garnished with some remarkably long-surviving pea shoots purchased from Echo Creek Farm in the Saturday Chelsea Farmers Market very early in December
• twelve small Brussels sprouts from Lani’s Farm, the last from a quantity that I had also purchased over 3 weeks earlier, washed, trimmed and dried, tossed inside a bowl with a little olive oil, sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, plus more of the dried peperoncino Calabresi secchi roasted inside a medium size unglazed seasoned Pampered Chef pan until the sprouts were partly brown and crisp on the outside
• the wine was an Italian (Veronese) white, Corte Quaiara, Garganega Campo al Salice 2016, from Flatiron Wines
• the music was again live streaming of the awesome octonary WKCR Bachfest 2018

Winter fish.

Although I’m the one who cooked this meal, I’m going to try to leave myself out of it as much as I can, because, while I’ve now prepared it 3 times, it’s not my own recipe (it’s Mark Bittman’s, and I simply clipped it from the Times 10 years ago).

There, now I feel that I can say this dinner was close to sublime.

The Brussels sprouts are of course very easy to prepare, but both the squash and the cod would also be very simple for anyone to reproduce, as they too involve very few ingredients, and require almost no skills other than the ability to judge when the fish has been cooked through.

• one black futsu squash from Norwich Meadows Farm, 5 or 6-inches in diameter, the outside crevices scrubbed with a brush, cut into 1/4″ slices, or segments that were arranged inside a large Pampered Chef ceramic oven pan on a couple tablespoons of melted butter, then almost as much more butter brushed over the top, baked at 400º without turning for about 30 minutes, or until tender, removed from the oven, placed on 2 serving plates and kept warm on top of the oven until finishing cooking the cod, for which the squash would serve as a base
• one 18-ounce cod fillet from P.E. & D.D. Seafood Company, cut into 2 pieces, dredged lightly in a local Union Square Greenmarket-purchased whole wheat flour from The Blew family of Oak Grove Plantation in Pittstown, N.J., sprinkled with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, quickly sautéed in a tablespoon and a half of butter inside a large heavy copper skillet over a pretty high flame, turning only once, until nicely browned on both sides and cooked through (the recipe suggests checking by inserting a thin-bladed knife, which should meet little or no resistance when the fish is done) removed and placed on the serving plates on top of the squash while another tablespoon and a half of butter was added to the pan, plus, once it had sizzled and browned, a little more than a tablespoon of decent sherry vinegar (I used a chianti vinegar last night), the sauce cooked for only 10 or 20 seconds more before it was poured over both the fish and the squash, both garnished with chopped parsley from from Paffenroth Farm
• ten or eleven ounces of Brussels sprouts from Lani’s Farm, washed and trimmed and dried, tossed inside a bowl with a little olive oil, sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, plus 2 whole hot dried Sicilian peperoncini from Buon Italia (one can be seen on the top of the sprouts in the picture at the top), roasted inside a medium size unglazed seasoned Pampered Chef pan until the sprouts were partly brown and crisp on the outside
• the wine was a Portuguese (Lisbon) white, Dory Branco 2016, from Garnet Wines
• the music was Vivaldi’s 1683 opera, ‘Il Giustino’, in a 2018 recording of Ottavio Dantone directing Accademia Bizantina and an amazing cast

No micro greens of any kind were harmed in bringing this dinner to the table.

It was a pretty simple meal. I wanted to make it so because I didn’t feel up to any challenges last night, and because, having decided the centerpiece on the plate would be a terrific small beef steak and, after that, that the principle vegetable would be Brussels sprouts, I knew there wouldn’t be any need for contrivances or adornments.

But the steak was a very special steak; the sprouts, while perhaps not out of the ordinary otherwise, were accompanied this time by one complex dried chili pepper; and the tomatoes, included mostly for their color, happened to be “the best cherry tomatoes”, by both the farmer’s testimony and my own.

• a single small (eleven and a half-ounce) grass-fed, grain finished culotte, or picayna steak from Sun Fed Beef in the Union Square Greenmarket, brought to room temperature, halved crosswise, seasoned on all sides with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, seared briefly on the top, or thick, fat-covered side inside an oval enameled heavy cast iron pan, the other, long sides cooked for 2 or 3minutes each, then the ends and the narrow bottom side seared, each very briefly, the steaks removed from the pan, perfectly medium-rare, arranged on 2 warm plates, each topped with a pat of defrosted ramp butter that I had made last April using some small, first-of-the-season woodland ramps from Lucky Dog Organic, a bit of juice from an organic lemon from Whole Foods Market, and some Organic Valley ‘Cultured Pasture Butter’, the steaks then allowed to rest for about 4 minutes
• a couple dozen Brussels sprouts from Lani’s Farm, the little cabbages liberated from their stalk moments before, tossed inside a bowl with olive oil, sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, plus one whole hot dried Sicilian peperoncino from Buon Italia (it can be seen at 12:30 in the picture at the top), roasted inside a medium size unglazed seasoned Pampered Chef pan until the sprouts were partly brown and crisp on the outside (at which time they taste surprisingly sweet and somewhat nutty)

• eight of “The Best Cherry Tomatoes” from Stokes Farm, each punctured once with a trussing needle, rolled around in a little olive boil inside a small Pyrex skillet until they were a little more than warm, seasoned with sea salt and black pepper, mixed with some torn leaves of basil (Gotham Greens Rooftop, from Whole Foods, arranged on the plates, where some more basil was scattered on the top
• the wine was a Spanish (Rioja) red, Bodegas de la Real Divisa Marqués de Legarda Crianza 2013
• the music was the album, ‘Johanna Beyer: Sticky Melodies’