Hello. It’s been one of those weeks where all I’d like to do is get off a dock in Everglades City and slip into the Florida backcountry...
Hello. It’s been one of those weeks where all I’d like to do is get off a dock in Everglades City and slip into the Florida backcountry, maybe find a tarpon or a foot of nose, but no people, no businesses, no phone service, no news alerts, no existential fear. It would be nice to get lost a bit. I was able to enjoy the beauty and the adrenaline, the adventure and the escape.
This does not happen, however. Travis McGee was a fictional character. When the world is awful, there’s no percentage to ignore it.
So I’m going to seek escape and some respite in the kitchen today instead. My guide: The writer Jim Harrison, died in 2016. I would like to make his recipe for Caribbean Stew (above). It may not be so much the Caribbean — although I had similar preparations in the Bahamas — like it’s a Key West fever dream, a kind of foodie casserole made up of ribs, chicken thighs and sausages nestled in a tomato sauce spiced with hot Scotch bonnet pepper sauce so that it’s fiery and floral at the same time, and that it tastes a bit of the tropical sun.
And then the rest of the week…
Monday
Ali Slagle’s recipe for pasta and lenticchiepasta and lentils, is a classic Neapolitan dish in the same category as pasta and this and pasta and fagiolilegumes simmering with the pasta so the starches thicken the cooking liquid into something creamy and rich.
Tuesday
This stir-fried tofu with cumin, which Margaux Laskey adapted from Hetty McKinnon, is a vegan version of the signature lamb dish served at Xi’an Famous Foods, the New York restaurant chain. There, the meat is dry-fried. Here it is replaced by tofu and cauliflower.
Thursday
At Kay Chun’s amatriciana pasta is the classic preparation based on guanciale or pancetta, tomatoes, red pepper flakes, pecorino and bucatini pasta. The tunnel in the noodles helps capture the sauce, but if you can’t find bucatini (remember the shortage?), spaghetti does the job.
Friday
And then you can glide into the weekend with a silky, salty-sweet skillet full of pork chops with onion sauce. This powerfully benefits from using a heavy hand with Lawry’s seasoned salt, although Old Bay seasoning works quite well. (Just like a combination of kosher salt, ground black pepper, smoked paprika and red pepper flakes.)
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Now, it’s hard to sledge something to do with basil or burrata, but I enjoyed looking at the weaves by artist Diedrick Brackens,”the sky is a muddy river bed.” The actual works are on display at the Craft Contemporary in Los Angeles.
For the era, Alexandra Jacobs reviews The New Memoirs of Harvey Fierstein, “I was better last night.” Click on!
Michael Idov, one of the few screenwriters who can write dialogues fluently in Russian and English, taken at Vanity Fair to explain why he won’t write in Russian as long as Vladimir Putin is in power. Maybe it’s just, as he puts it, “selfish self-care.” But it’s a fascinating argument all the same.
Finally, here’s Samantha Fish to play us,”twisted ambition”, lives in Lincoln City, Ind., last year. Listen to this while the stew cooks. And I’ll be back on Monday.
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