Rad Summer Part 4: Break Themes

Its nearing mid August and still wet in New York City. The temperature is holding at 89 sharp. I’ve earned a whole-summer sweet burn meringue brown, and we slipped out this Monday to Rockaway to try and get a last layer of sun kissed before this idea of ‘fall’ actualizes.

It’s not yet cool enough to start back sleeping under the covers.

But I have been avoiding my bed well since returning from Seattle/Oregon/California two months ago, and hitting lots of temperature zones traveling up and down the seaboard and around town. Now I’m stationed for some foreseeable time before an apartment move at the end of the month, but its difficult from here to report on all of the eating that’s happened.

TOAST

One of the first things I did when I got back from vacation proper was enlist in Fresh Direct, only to order a case of orange seltzer. After so much wide open space, my apartment felt hostile upon re-entry. Planning to leave, anyway, I couldn’t bare the idea of pan cooking or grocery shopping. So I blazed through the spritzers  and bought a loaf of ezekiel bread to soak them up.  I had dreamed of a melted cheese and Kale sandwich, and figured I could handle of a week of modular open-faced, crunchy meals. There were some real winners!

The aged cheddar left over from my Kale grilled cheese, plus avocado, green apple, and lettuce.

My go at shakshuka, an Israeli breakfast/lunch of eggs poached in spicy stewed tomatoes. Mine were plums and I added some purple kale then landed it on a crisped shingle. Just a pity party really, a love letter, to the shakshuka Maya and I split at brunch with Alison at Tasty N’ Sons in Portland. Mine was good, but missing the perfect lamb and time put in to theirs.

NOODLE SOUP

I went down to Baltimore to hold and kiss my hometown best girls in the flesh. Maya came and we both brought our one best black denim party outfit. The megabus dropped us off behind an Ikea about 30 miles out of town and we wandered, near blinded by the suns glare against the megamall white sidewalk and barren marsh it was built upon, into a TGIFridays to wait out the city bus that would take us downtown. The bartender agreed to fix my bloody mary with just some mix, filled out by seltzer like I like it.

We lost of a lot of body salt in Baltimore. Sweat through my party overalls til they were soaked more than once. We dried out on the bus back, which took many more hours than anticipated, as they sometimes do. This was the bowl of electrolytes that we deemed more necessary than a shower after we got flushed out onto the street outside Penn Station.

Shoyu ramen with chicken from Minca in the east village. I’m pro their bean noodles, which they call “low calorie, small” and are a no-cost option in any soup. I’ve never seen these at the store but I’m sure they’re a dime a dozen in Flushing.

Souen shoyu on  lunch special after yoga. Good portion size and soba noodles but the broth, meatless, was nasty salted. I live, though, for Souen’s little hunks of steamed kobucha, which I can make for no money no problem at home. But! They are  just the kind of thing I wish I could go home to make when I simply cannot. I’d rather eat un-embellished soggy  kale/kobucha/carrot at Souen’s original 13th street spot. The Souen noodle place is pricey and small, and I miss, badly!, the scones and lunch crowd at union square. Guess its my back-to-school season wish that they’ll re-open on schedule, but that seems unlikely.

At Taro sushi in park slope, my favorite bowl. A no-bloat portion as minimalist exercise. Perfectly cooked soba, clean no-oil broth, and no frill save for a generous portion of green bleeding spinach and meaty seaweed.

TREATS

Real coffee and real cream, frozen! The cover art is sort of misleading; they come wrapped in non functional plastic pouches labeled “coffee” and are made in Australia. Which is fine!

At some point on the west coast Maya mentioned that our friend Gina was ampd on drinking pineapple juice vodka’s with a salted rim. Maya called this a Salty Dog, and the sound of it drove me wild for about a month. After some tough research, I found that a salty dog is in fact just a greyhound, vodka and grapefruit, with a salted rim. But whatever! I don’t know what Gina is actually drinking, but here I muddled fresh pineapple with vodka and then poured lemon seltzer over it, salted the rim, and threw some salt inside, too. In my mind, this is some kind of exquisite Sri Lankan secret/vacation. Does it need a name?  Andrea and I drank them on the roof, between brief rains. Anastasia made them for me all night at work, thanks!, but it doesn’t seem worth the struggle to explain this to a bartender, or trust them with its private allure.

Strawberries, pineapple, mango, passionfruit, and shredded coconut filling the whole in my heart left when TJ’s stopped selling frozen papaya chunks.

Coffee’s kind of harshing my mellow, you know? I’m not a quitter, but its not easy to hop off a bike into the subway, or run between meetings, or endure a long distance bus or train trip while sweating out good toddy coffee or hot milk of any kind. I drank through a case of seltzer at home, where the bottles are still being refilled and refrigerated on rotation. When I spent a week working in Boston I found  my office had collectively quit diet coke and turned on to stevia-sweetened Sobe Life Water together. The peach-mango flavor of that was pretty good and got me juiced on vitamin enriched artificially sweetened liquids, which is embarrassing. After surveying Vitamin Water Zero and Skinny Water and who knows, I think I can say I’m really most into the blue-purple range of  flavors, specifically the blueberry Fruit20, which I bought at Boston’s Southstation during a long long delay and have not found stocked anywhere else after, which is likely a blessing. Aside from the volume of bottles I’ve amassed, I’m less ashamed of my rapid grown brand loyalty to Ito En and any unsweetened tea beverage they produce. Ideal at the end or between meals, they’re astringent and palette cleansing and still caffeine packed enough to balm my coffee withdrawal and/or help me remain reliably brisk.

Fast and alert in a swamp. It’s been a series of battles, a war with lots of victories and froyo so far. A long stretch of filthy moments but without doubt I’ll have a sense of loss when I put back on my pants and have to create space in my day pack for layers. Not to mention the tears that will accompany the terror of eventually surrendering my bicycle to winter weather. I’m hydrating now, to abate them.

RAD SUMMER PT 3: SF

We split two cocktails then at least two good coffees and Dre got a bagel. Threw a bag of nantes carrots and some cashews in the car.

Three chicks in a Kia! Listened to Greenday ‘Dookie’ more than once and other, lesser shit. Stopped a lot, of course, here.

Crossed the bay bridge before midnight, KMEL playing Floetry “Say Yes”. $1 Tecate’s for everyone!

We split to sleep, had sunbath cherries for breakfast in Orinda. Dre and JP and Jesse brined chicken and prepped sides while I glimpsed Matthews basement bungalow life and got stuck on a conference call. We met midday in the mission, split burrito’s then took the almost two hour “20 minute” drive in rush to Point Reyes.

Pure hostility magic! So windy that each bit of sand hit our legs and faces like glass shards. But we were brave! And once we crossed the threshold, it was all dinosaur landscape, beauty cows, huge deer. The wild life.

We didn’t get home by dinner call-time, didn’t adjourn at all till 9 at least. So eventually we were lots of guests, but not a one hungry.

So the leftovers plate was for a giant.

It all tasted better in the morning for a brunch reconvene. Do it all again! Dre’s perfect tater salad, full bacon greens not too sweet, mac n cheese, corn, the most perfect just salt n pepper fired chicken, and a chilled off apple, radish, greens and avocado salad, cool as cactus.

RAD SUMMER PT 2: Portland

When I wake up in Portland, I barely know what to do with myself. I roll over and tell Maya that here, it is hard to know whether or not you are alive, really, or just making shit up. Inside joking. A day, a year in Portland has a deep, wholly overcoming sense of stasis, harmony, okayness. The air is refrigerator chilled, dry but still some breath in it, and everything is alive but graywashed still.

When I was in school, I had a lot of my favorite things that I did all the time plus a lot of deadlines, and that is how I, we, filled this space with an urgency that is simply not in its nature. But its not been hard to kill a day in my non and post academic Portland. Its the easiest breeziest thing in the world to do, and if you don’t actively try not to notice, killing time seems like what everyone is doing.

So we woke up on Foster in Portland’s most never-coming-up neighborhood and stared at the Taco Bell across the street for awhile. We talked about how drunk we were/are/were going to be, ate some fibrous cereal. Went over to get that clutch smiley face paper you gotta carry across a country at the best art store that exists anywhere, I’ve Been Framed on Foster, the place that I think about when I think about missing places, lacking things.

Went to the Reed gym where the bouncer is the dude who was in my hip hop dance class and the people on the free weights and the elliptical are the same guys and girl who were always fucking there. Kill it for 60 minutes solid, meaning we were totally ready to house my all-time best option besides groceries meal: the New Seasons hotwok. I once lived a roll out the doorstep walk from this one duper yuppie market that I’m very mood-ring about. To shop there for things with regularity was unnecessary, foolish! Why buy  audaciously overpriced  basics, and shop among folks who dig on that? But still, all the best meat cuts, artisan froyo’s, and all this food, anyway you like it, for 7 bucks plus you get to read Oprah magazine (or whatever!) in great light while you do it and decide what fruit samples or unwarranted mid day wine bottle you’ll choose for dessert.

Artichokes, edamame, cherry tomatoes, celery, teeny chicken, all tossed up with just Braggs and hot peppers with sesame on top.

So whatever, we’re full. Ditched the car and kept walking. Hit the goodwill on 6th, the best one. Drop west to the Hawthorne bridge, grab the esplanade, meet Hana for a couple cigarettes, walk the river. Make pilgrimage to the Rose Quarter Transit Center, a good bus hub, even a great one! Make sure to pay my respects to the boys who gave me a spirit where I had none so many winters, even this last one in New York. These boys, that give this whole town a soul.

Ride a good ol TriMet number 4 straight back to the market, get some beers and a melon to bring to Emma’s party, where there’s a wealth of not-photographed great party food: grilled veggies and a spicy quinoa and corn salad and some blue chips and fresh salsa. Word on the street is she won’t visit New York for awhile because she bought a new saddle for her horse, instead. This house she just moved in to is a mansion, her 22nd year will be a good one, for sure.

RAD SUMMER: PT 1 Brooklyn> Seattle

Over the last while, I was back-tracking around  my past life on the West Coast.

I left on the last Saturday of June, just before New York got hit with its first all-the-way proper heat wave of the summer. By good fortune,  I intercepted Jarth and Zo at coffee time on their way back from picking up the out-of-towner’s farm share.

JP did it up real-good. I didn’t touch a thing!

Egg fried over some crispy scapes, cider vinegar greens, roasted nibbles of fennel, turnip. The stuff!

Things got sort of ambitious after. We went out for the last USA World Cup match, but two drinks in at half time, I realized my plane-out was hours earlier than I had imagined, perhaps in my own defense. So I missed our (inevitable?) loss, in the end, and biked home quick to shower, pack, and find something, anything, to eat before planting myself in Jet Blue direct TV blissout for 5-6 hours.

At home, there wasn’t much for choices, and I focused my fuzzy beer tummy towards eliminating anything organic that wouldn’t last my absence.

Knocked out a chunk of cabbage, cauliflower end, and remaining kidney beans, in ribbons dashed with braggs. Then, a quarter Kobucha wedged and just a little too toasted, plus Kale in the oven, one string cheese melted over. At Terminal 5, sobering up, I contemplated lots of tempting crispy rice/nut/chocolate snacks but ended up with none.

One diet coke and many hours later, I woke up in Seattle, where the air was evergreen and river chilled. Late in to the night by my bodies clock, the journey to the remote location where I would eventually be granted a candy-lapiz Kia was plenty surreal, invigorating, culture shocked. I drove, for the first time since the holidays, to Tosh’s family home in Madrona. Tosh, my assigned freshman room mate from my first year at school, was away, to return from Canada the following morning, so I was thankful, relieved to effortlessly let myself in with a key hidden in a gardening glove, and to experience no shame while I took, quietly, a large bowl of cherries from the whale of a fridge. I savored each, these just one among millions of perfectly ripe Washington fruits, before joining completely with her cavern of a bed, convincingly one of the softest places on our earth.

When she arrived with Maya in the afternoon, we did the Goddwill,  got Pedicures, drank coffee. The air of this place still shocking my lungs, the comfort of our union getting me so-juiced. To be with the ones you love!

Tosh’s block is surrounded by Ethiopian home cooking on all sides. Injera and its accessories,  unthinkable to eat in heat or humidity, sat well between us three.

A typical veggie sampler, plus lamb, but it would be unfair not to acknowledge it as better than most.We drank three whole pitchers of water with three whole lemons, and then were just two on a night-drive south to Portland. In a sweater for this first time in months, and chilled as we stopped for rests, the idea of pants having been long inconceivable until here and now.

Sun Day Chickens

My mom’s mom was a twin.

In the picture she’s at center, and now, she’s not alive. But, one of the absolute greatest things about leaving the b/west coast was regaining proximity to my mother’s family, and (one of!) its greatest spirit guides, my grandmothers sister Hedda.

Hedda cooks big, artful, not always precious things. Most of the many family meals I’ve enjoyed this year have been in her tone, choruses of nutrient and pleasure heavy dishes that combine mid century modern-housewife know how and recipes with the knowledge from her decades long career as a clinical dietitian.

So, I looked forward all week to joining Hedda at her daughter’s house to celebrate fathers day. And I was more pleased, upon arrival, to enjoy the collaborative efforts of the kitchen, which today, appropriately, embraced a more-masculine vibe.

My uncle Gene and cousin Jake took charge of these chickens. They sat them on to cans of lemon seltzer and ginger ale, stuffed them with rubs, and threw bacon all over one’s shoulders.

We ate outside. Grilled bell peppers, zucchini, and squash. A raw kale salad with lemon, pine nuts, raisins, and parmesan. Two perfect chickens.

Salad with carrots, cucumber, tomatoes, and a blood orange vinaigrette. Grilled onions, pasta with fresh pesto.

Hedda and Gene shared the last word. Her chocolate panna cotta cake was a new recipe, on which she spent 5 hours some time in the middle of the night, before hitting the gym for three hours this morning! It’s ganache border was a little much, but the frozen pudding/airy brownie situation was bittersweet, cold, and velvety, a thankfully unheavy-handed end to the meal and a huge hit. The crowd also went wild, on purpose or not, for and after generous shots of candy-anise sambuca from Gene.

Half Marathon

Went and stayed out Friday without planting my bicycle somewhere close-in, so spent Saturday morning on a too slow trek home by bus. By grace, Zoe was in the same boat and we ended up in last nights outfits headed towards Bed Stuy on the same B43.

Then we teased the chance encounter into an endurance-hang: we tanned and jammed on the stoop, worked on the pinata, did the gym, convinced Jarthur and Chris into the fray, and took Zo’s hair up short.

Some folks are out of town, where its likely less filthy. But we took advantage, here and foul together, and combo-ed their farmshare with the last of my fridge’s contents and some of Zoe’s Trader Joe’s dumpster stash from last week to make a standout dinner for four.

We threw my broccoli and TJ’s blister peanuts into a wok with Bok Choi and garlic scapes from the farm. An old kobucha squash became alarmingly delicious after about 40 minutes in the oven, oiled salted and peppered with a dumpster onion and almost candy baby-beets from the farm box.

Not pictured is the pre-game salsa we pulped out of farm radishes, salvage celery, two tomatoes, half an onion and a lime.

In the morning, the pinata still wasn’t done and the fridge was bare. To power my commute to Harlem, this was the best I could do.

From Nothing

Next Monday, we’re having an anniversary party. A one year, paper anniversary, because we’ve been New Yorkers for one year. Now, more than! We’re making a pinata of the B43 bus, which will take you from Greenpoint through Bed Stuy to Flatbush and back, in honor.

Here we were, last June.

Since then it’s been fast, especially the last few months. Things are steady; I’ve only moved once, maintain a regular work schedule, and get my nails, groceries, and laundry done when I  have to. Recently, the things that felt insane about living here at first, like commuting 2 hours to work, spending days in multiple boroughs or rush hour on the bus, planning well ahead to meet up, biking to the subway, or across large distances in Brooklyn, still feel abnormal, or particular, but also more simple. Here you are surrounded, always, and cannot always have or transport what you need when you need it.  This is just the way it is.

But we are so lucky that it is the same for our friendships, the ones that traveled here from the west coast and stayed. They just are. All my anniversary friends have developed in this year, taken on new responsibilities, goals, lifestyles, and partners, but are loyal to one another in a plain way, offering each other support in the form of supplies and time and practical criticism like travelers do when they are camping, or climbing. It’s possible that living here now, in this way, seems do-able at all because we have become more accustomed to sharing resources and space in a manner that doesn’t require generosity, or effort at all.

I worked late last night then went to go pick up the paper mache bus at Jarthur’s, to take it home to be finished. Like you do! I’d been  chewing a piece of grayed bubblegum for hours. I bought a pineapple on my way to the subway, because it felt like the right thing, some thing, to bring. Jarthur matched my token with a sweet and hearty dinner, the kind you make for family and not company, when you are hungry but must keep going, still.

He said he didn’t have anything and I said I knew we could make it work anyway. So, we cut the mold off the bottom of the broccoli sprouts, used the last of the greens, and oven roasted a just okay tomato to make a salad, then opened a can of beans and quick cooked some quinoa. To those, Jarthur added some harissa and masala, which, along with the sticky savory roasted tomatoes coating the greens, made this plain appearing plate of food both surprising, optimistic if not particularly ingenious or inventive, and satisfying, anyway.

With fuel enough, we ate some chopped, demi frozen pineapple from the freezer and started home with the to-be-bus box crowding the subway car. The Lakers won the NBA finals, and then a nap later, at 5:45 am, I woke up in Brooklyn, thank god!, again.

Babba Eggplant

I grew up in Athens, Georgia, which is where my father made himself the same lunch every day, the main attraction of which is hummus on bread. My dad, my Abba, grew up in Ramat Gan, a smallish place within the greater Tel Aviv situation.

Being born there in 1944 and living, if comfortably, as something of a pioneer, may be why the hummus he makes from scratch is the best I’ve ever tasted, the only I really love. It is possible, though, that Israel has nothing to do with it, and that this hummus is just the kind of thing that a man who is reasonable, humble, and pleasure loving would chose to eat over and over.  Its lemon and garlic are bold and bright but it is profoundly simple, plainly rich and satisfying and not creamy or dense.

But! His baba ghanoush is better! Better than anybody’s, he’ll tell you. The hummus is honest and articulates all its flavors clearly, but the baba is rare, accomplished, seductive! It’s tediously smoky but fresh and immediate with herbs, light on the stomach and smooth in the mouth and still decadent, fatty.

I’ve never tried to recreate either dish, and haven’t ever habitually bought them, either. Why, when the real thing is at home, safe and repeating, forever?

Still, earlier this month, sick with Strep and only wanting for pureed foods, I reconsidered. When I called from the store with a fever, staring into the nightshades, Abba obliged my inquiry generously. “All you do is grill the eggplant, some garlic, some lemon, t’hina, olive oil, and parsley. Not too much.” This list is obvious and not very helpful.  I asked him to clarify the eggplant; without a grill, should I sear, or roast it? In chunks or slices? He laughed and said even thinking of slicing was unnecessary, the eggplant should simply live in heat, one piece and skin too, until point of collapse. This tip aside, it became evident that my father makes baba perfectly because he knows, exactly, what is and is not ‘too much’.

It will take me time to learn. My first baba was this; divine eggplant mush extracted, but then confused with a couple cloves of garlic, a whole lemon, skimp olive oil, roasted and salted pepitas in place of t’hina I didn’t have, some paprika, and half a head of parsley, all into the food processor. It was okay, but hasty and not elegant.

Today, health regained and looking for something cheap and special, I went back in, this time hoping to cook like Abba, with intention, care, and calm.

I cranked the oven when I walked in the door, and left the eggplant I bought for 75 cents inside, first at 500 then lower, for well over an hour. I took it out and let it sit on a plate, diminished, till cool enough to handle. I chopped off the top and held it over a bowl inverted, just peeling off the skin, which was delicious and not bitter to eat, until only molten fruit remained.

Also in to the hot oven, for less time, went a dish of barely salted sliced tomatoes, some cherry, and one near-expired plum from the back of the fridge. These were chewy flavor packed and delicious.

I bottomed a pan with olive oil and added two cloves of garlic and dry oregano. Before the garlic burned, I lowered the heat and added the eggplant, and let them simmer together for about half an hour, stirring every once in a while. While everything gooed into brown gold, I added a sneak of balsamic vinegar and made some quinoa.

I kept the quinoa chewy and not too cooked, so that it would stay nutty and complement, not rival, the luxurious pudding on top of it. Adding some fresh tomatoes and parsley helped complicate the bowls slippery, unlovely appearance.

This was delicious, and good like Abba’s hummus and baba:  Sweet, savory, filling, essentially easy to make and still reassuring, affirming, to eat. No tricks! Just let the eggplant collapse.