The perfect fit.

My goodness. I go away for two weeks, for no really good reason, and it turns to spring, all fluttery pink and cream breezes and melting ice cream cones. This spring has a special tang for me, and I'm not sure why. I have slowed down. I don't trot across the footbridge on the way home anymore, and I meander everywhere, even to the mailroom at work. It is a pace that seems out of touch with this hustly-bustly city of mine, but I like it. It's nice to ride the tide, rather than trying to beat it.

I'm home alone this week, my betrothed being ensconced in an Alabama cabin with a stack of books, a bottle of bourbon, and his father. Over a patchy roaming connection, he's been relaying stories of old damned dogs wandering onto their porch and older men reminding him to celebrate Confederate Memorial Day. We both have deep roots in the south, and it's still easy to slip into the rhythms of a spring day down there. Even though he's not here, maybe I'm keeping company with him, trading a caffeinated strut down Broadway for a honeyed ramble through the fields. I can feel my voice relaxing into its old -- original? -- drawl, even just while on the phone at work. I am grateful for the comfort of our two worlds, even as they pose a constant quandary for us.

Maybe I miss the south, and him being in it this week makes me ache for it even more. Or maybe it's the spring winds buffeting my skirts as I walk to the subway. Whatever it is, I feel very slow right now, like molasses scootching into a gingerbread batter. 

Tonight, I came back from a slow run in the park (where a bug flew right down my gullet, the fool) just in time for our grocery delivery. I tore open the boxes, shoving cans of beans here and there, until I smelled what I was looking for: my strawberries. It's still too early for them yet, really, but I couldn't resist; they beckoned from Fresh Direct like twinkly diamonds. These were a luxurious red, and they even smelled red. I don't know how berries do that. I really do think that a blackberry -- a good, ripe one that explodes in your mouth -- smells like its own dusky deep color, and a good ripe strawberry smells like a strawberry color. And these, oh thank goodness, did. 

I washed some and cut their tops off, and curled up on the couch with a bowl of Greek yogurt, a big glass of water, and my berries, and ate it all very slowly, winding my tongue around the spoon to get every smidge of yogurt. I ate the strawberries like I ate cookies as a child -- bit by bit, one small bite at a time until there was nothing left but a few scattered seeds in the bowl. There is some food that is riotous, like a sizzling fajita or a tower of chocolate mousse, and there is some food that is sort of jokey, like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with the crusts cut off, or maybe a bowl of cherry Jell-O. But my dinner was quiet food, suited to this particular slowness that I've been simmering in for the past few weeks. It was perfect.

I'll be concocting a dark chocolate and Chambord torte for the Bake for the Cure next week, and I hope it's good enough to share with you. In the middle of that, though, I'm heading south to look at some wedding locations, and I hope to bring back some more ideas for you, and some more grits for me. In the meantime, find the food that fits you right now. It is a blessing.

 

A brave taste

I might as well just jump into this: I don't like green peas. Never have. It started, I am sure, during some traumatic meal when I was four, a prolonged affair that ended in a stare-down between my parents and myself, the offending peas growing ever colder as I pushed them around the plate like marbles. I am sure I got up to some caper like spitting them all into my napkin and spiriting it to the kitchen, where I dumped them into the trash can. And I am sure that, as an unpracticed miscreant, I neglected to cover them up, leaving a bemused parent to yank me into the kitchen and demand some sort of reason for why my peas were perched on top of the banana peels and coffee grounds like scattershot on tree bark. I am also sure that I received some sort of punishment for that particular transgression, and I am sure that that punishment involved eating more peas.

I really don't like peas. One night last month on our Grand Irish Family Adventure, Michael's mother ordered fish and chips with a side of "mushy peas" -- chunky green goop, steaming in a metal gravy boat next to her fried cod. Michael force-fed me a taste as my own mother sat next to me, laughing so hard that she could barely eat her meal. I think he might have seen his future: a brown-haired child with a snub nose and round cheeks, zipping her little mouth shut at his efforts to feed her peas. In that future stand-off, I'm not sure whose side I'll be on.

Disregarding the Irish pea incident, I really have tried to come to terms with them as an adult. There are other foods that I avoid, and I've developed decent reasons -- to my mind -- for most of them. Jell-O: the texture and I are not friends. Hot dogs: I read the labels, and no thank you. But peas? I just don't have a good reason, except to say that I do not like them. I feel like I should be put in the corner just for saying that, as if I'd just stamped my feet and kicked the door.

So why, may you ask, am I rambling on about a dislike of peas? Why am I burdening you with this? Why are you still reading?

This is why: I think I've found a way in which peas and I can come to a detente of sorts, and for those of you who already have a friendly relationship with peas, this might even make it better. It is green pea soup, a springtime concoction with roasted garlic, onion and a wave of dill that ties the whole thing together with an unexpected twinkle. I'd been thinking of such a dish over the weekend, wondering how to make do with what was in my kitchen (I'm horribly lazy about going to the grocery store.) We'd reached the end of the good frozen vegetables and were left with a bag of green peppers from our CSA, another of brussels sprouts, and two bags of organic green peas. I buy them to throw into tuna casserole and other warming winter comfort dishes, and I always have more than I'll ever use. 

So, staring at the freezer door, I started thinking -- what could make green peas taste better? Roasted garlic is always a good start, and a little salt and pepper, and what else tastes good? Dill, of course....and so it went. And then Google told me that Nigella Lawson had already made a form of this soup, which was a little disheartening, but I ultimately took it as a good sign, and very good footsteps to follow. The roasted garlic gives the sweet peas a blast of warmth, and the dill helps the whole thing out with a little fresh spring-ness. Sprinkled with pepper and fresh grated Parmesan, it's not certainly not the worst thing in the world, as if anything with fresh grated Parmesan and roasted garlic could be.

I feel like maybe -- just maybe, and give us some time -- peas and I are going to be friends after all.

Green Pea and Roasted Garlic Soup

Adapted from Nigella Lawson and a hundred other variations

This soup is extremely easy and cheap. Just make sure your garlic is fresh and your stock is good. If you can't make your own or get your hands on some good store-bought stock, use water instead. Bad stock makes for bad soup, in my experience.

2 full heads of garlic

12 oz. frozen green peas (I used Cascadian Farms, but Birds Eye or your store brand is just fine)

1 onion, chopped 

a generous glug of olive oil

2 cups chicken or vegetable stock (pork stock might make for an interesting twist as well)

1/2 cup, give or take, of milk (if you're feeling luxurious, cut back the amount and use cream or half-and-half)

1/2 tsp. dill, or to taste

salt and pepper to taste

2 tbsp. fresh grated Parmesan

Chop the top off the heads of garlic, making sure each clove is exposed. Drizzle a little olive oil over both, and wrap in aluminum foil. Roast at 350 degrees in the oven until the cloves are golden and tender but not burned. This can happen more quickly than you think, so keep an eye on them. I'd give them about 25 minutes, and then check on them. Pull out from the oven and let them cool so as to avoid burned fingertips.

Give an onion a medium chop. Saute in olive oil -- enough to cover the bottom of a heavy-bottomed pan or Dutch oven -- over medium heat until softened, but not completely translucent. Add the green peas, still frozen, and the two cups of stock. Bring to a strong simmer, and cook for about 15 minutes, or until the peas are cooked through. Add the garlic and combine completely. 

In a blender, pulse the whole mixture, adding the dill and salt and pepper, until it's finely pureed. Be careful with the salt, because the Parmesan will add some on its own. If the soup is too thick here, start adding the milk until you achieve the texture and consistency you want. Serve in individual bowls, sprinkled with Parmesan and a little pepper. This would go well with a crusty bread, a green salad and a glass of dry white wine.

Punch-Drunk Love.

Well, then. After two blessed weeks of being betrothed, my brain has turned into something resembling pineapple-flavored mush. I say pineapple because I love punch, and I think I'm the only person who still does, but I am a total sucker for frozen pineapple rings and 7-Up swirled together in a big silver bowl, and would it be OK to have that at my wedding even if no one drinks it but my grandmother, my cousin's two-year-old and me?

I hear that my brain will calm down eventually -- that after the first few exhilarating weeks of being engaged, the march of Champagne and toasts will end, and I'll be left with a stack of wedding magazines and an actual event to plan. Last Saturday afternoon, we hunkered down in a bar with a couple of drinks and tried to figure out what was what. We know we want good food, trees and a lovely spring breeze. We want a dear friend to lead us into marriage, rather than a person of a faith that we don't adhere to. We want bourbon and lots of dancing, and a place where people can take their shoes off, loosen their ties, and talk and laugh until the wee sma's.

Then we went home and watched the Carolina game, and pretty much forgot everything we'd decided upon.

I am not forgetting that we're getting married, and that we'll have a marriage, not just a wedding. But you can't plan a marriage. I am thrilled to the tips of my toes for the surprises of our life to come, and I don't want to know any of it. I have no idea where we'll live in five years, or what our child's name will be, or if we'll be able to have a child. I don't know what will devastate us, or when. I don't know who will wreck the car first, or which puppy will tear up the living room carpet, or what job will take us someplace we'd never considered. This, I think, is the central tenet of a marriage -- the not knowing, and the willingness to keep going, hand in hand. To keep saying yes, as Shauna says.

However, you can plan the unholy hell out of a wedding. And so, for the last week, my subway time has been filled with thoughts of bridesmaid dresses, and Champagne vs. Prosecco, and a barn in the Catskills or a hilltop in the Appalachians. It's not like I was solving the global financial crisis before we got engaged. But hoo-eee, has my brain gone soft, just like a big bowl of buttercream icing.

This is the sort of cake I won't be having.

All this is to say: I haven't got much for you today, and I am sorry. In fact, last night was the first time since we returned from vacation that I cooked a full meal for just the two of us. But the good news is, I made a discovery.

Last April, my mom and I rented a little apartment between Pisa and Florence and wandered the Italian countryside by day, exploring Siena and Lucca and eating way too much gelato. On the way home each night, we stopped at the local Coop and picked up bits and bobs for dinner. One night we steamed the prettiest petite purple artichokes and dipped their leaves into a heavenly garlic aioli; the next, we sliced up a couple of blood oranges and ate them with half a bag of Pernigotti chocolates and some salami. This is exactly why I love traveling with my mom. She likes roaming a grocery store just as much as she likes roaming an art museum.

Anyway, it was at the Coop deli counter, in my idiotic attempts at Italian ("bene? bene! si bene!") that I found the greatest roast chicken of my life. I pointed to it, and the deli lady threw it unceremoniously into an aluminum bag, as if she had no idea what she'd just given me. Back in our little apartment, my mom and I cut into this chicken, took one bite each, and put our forks down in awe. The skin was perfect -- thin enough to maintain a light crispiness, but still substantial and savory. The little breast -- so unlike an American chicken, with its overfed bustiness -- was expertly salted, juicy with a strong chicken-ness. And I can't even talk about the dark meat. We spent the next half hour trying to figure out how a grocery store deli chicken could be one of the tastiest things we'd ever eaten.

I think I got it last night, and the answer is "pollo buono," which is the name of this Italian heritage chicken I'd ordered from Fresh Direct and had been defrosting for the past couple of days. I didn't think much of it when I unwrapped and washed this chicken, although I did notice how very thin the skin was, and how the chicken's thighs dwarfed its breast. In my haste to get dinner started, I salted it well, dumped some olive oil all over it and threw it in the oven at 400 degrees. And then I looked at Wedding Crap online for an hour.

But when I pulled our pollo buono out of the oven, I saw the deli lady's face, vaguely annoyed by me and her blue paper hat, and I smelled the spring air floating into our kitchen in Tuscany. This is it, I thought. We ate it with some roasted carrots and parsnips and watched UNC decimate Michigan State, whose very depressed bench, during the last few minutes, made me truly sad.

Yes, I just rhapsodized over a chicken that I want you to try (seriously: Fresh Direct "pollo buono," or try to find a local Italian heritage chicken at your butcher). Yes, I just expressed feeling for the opposing team. As my grandmother said, it takes all kinds.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a new Martha Stewart Weddings to attend to.