Food Photo Extravaganza: Ramsey's, Lexington, KY

Please pardon the inclusion of approximately forty-two photos in this post.  It may seem excessive, but just assume that the number of photos is directly proportional to the absurd happiness this restaurant made me feel.

Fig. 1. Very, very happy.

Last week, I had to travel to Lexington, KY for an academic conference (Riveting! Thrilling! Hold on to your hats!) and had the distinct pleasure of my mom's and sister's company on the trip.  On our first evening in town, we debated whether we ought to try one of the yuppie/hippie/foodie restaurants in the area, but all of us agreed something slightly less fussy was in order.  So we looked around and found Ramsey's Diner, near the university.  (It turns out there are four locations of this restaurant in and around Lexington, but I'd bet good money this one was the original.)

Now, before you start thinking this was a diner diner, just hold your horses.  Ramsey's is more tenderloin sandwiches and $5 bourbon than burgers and shakes.  This was a diner specializing in Kentucky Cuisine - a.k.a. The Food of My People (nods to Blue Jean Gourmet, whose series of this name is a joy to read).  No, I didn't grow up in Kentucky, but most of my family comes from the Hills of Eastern Kentucky (a phrase so often-repeated in my youth that I sometime hear it in my sleep) and my blood runs UK blue (thanks to my grandpa for instilling in me a true and deep respect for Wildcats Basketball).  I grew up with the smell of ham hocks melting into pots of green beans, cornbread puffing up (but not sweet, Yankee style) in the oven, and fried green tomatoes dredged in cornmeal hitting pans of sizzling oil.

Fig. 2. Clockwise from Mac & Cheese: Pinto Beans, Green Beans, Fried Green Tomatoes, and Cornbread.

It's these tastes that I remember and crave when I've gone just a little too long between visits home.  So, imagine my delight when Ramsey's served up all my favorites (Green beans like my mom makes and her mom before her!) just like I like them!

Fig. 3. Clockwise from pinto beans: fried okra, collard greens, stewed tomatoes, and cornbread.

They also served me another favorite of my childhood - the great, the legendary, the incomparable, irreplaceable, so-rich-you-might-keel-over Kentucky Hot Brown.  When I was little, I occasionally went over to Henderson, just across the Ohio River from our hometown to have lunch with my dad, who was working over there in those days and we'd mostly go to Wolf's Tavern, a semi-dingy tavern whose walls were lined with portraits of the great racehorses (Secretariat, Man-O-War, Citation).  Every time I ever ate there I ordered the Hot Brown, an open-faced 'sandwich' that involved bread, ham, turkey, tomatoes, and a seriously delicious Mornay sauce.  Oh, and BACON - how could I forget?  I don't want to blow this all out of proportion, but it might just be the most delicious thing in the entire world.

Fig. 4. Kentucky Hot Brown.

Well, I ordered up one of these for dinner at Ramsey's and it blew precious Wolf's attempt clear out of the water.  It brought tears to my eyes, something that food does to me on occasion - the most memorable of which involved Blood Orange Gelato at a really sweet gelateria in Trastevere.

Fig. 5. Clockwise from Green Beans: Cornbread, Corn Oyster, Apple Fritter, Mac & Cheese.

This was almost a two-hanky situation, but I calmed myself down enough to enjoy tastes of my sister's "veggie plate" (Ramsey's is the kind of place that counts Mac & Cheese as a vegetable), which featured these ridiculously delicious apple fritters - I don't know how in the world they made the batter stick or managed to cook them so that they were crisp on the outside and the apple cooked through, but with a little crunch and not burned.  Amazing.

Fig. 6. Chicken & Dumplings, Creamed Corn, Green Beans, Cornbread.

Anyway, I could go on and on.  Suffice it to say that we went back for lunch the next day.  Chicken and Dumplings.  Creamed corn.

Fig. 7. Lemonade that was squeezed to order at the bar.  

Utterly amazing, this place.  If you find yourself in Lexington in the near future, you know what to do.  I'll be envious.

March Cake: Dan's Birthday

There's something you may not know about me. I am a very selfish sleeper. I hog the covers. I flail around and sprawl diagonally across the bed. I throw elbows and kick randomly in my sleep. Also, I snore and I drool and I sometimes talk in my sleep. I always said that if I ever got married, (which was such an improbability that surely I needn't even worry about it) I would want my own bedroom. We'd just be one of those (highly hypothetical) couples that didn't always sleep in the same bed and that would be fine!

Fast forward and suddenly I find myself married. When Dan and I began cohabiting I was very, very worried about the sleeping situation. I was horrified to discover that he's also a selfish sleeper. Nightly bouts of sleep tug-of-war over the covers and many bruised shins (and chins) ensued. I thought we'd either rip the covers in half in our sleep or inadvertently beat each other to a pulp drowsily vying for the perfect pike position. (And I'm not talking about diving - I'm talking about the most efficient way of utterly hogging the entire bed and ensuring your co-sleeper's discomfort.)But the strangest thing happened. Somehow it stopped being an issue; now we sleep in synchronized, parallel pike positions, one of us wrapped around the other. We still tug over the covers, but now I know to start the night with the covers pulled almost all the way over to my side to ensure that I'll still have some when I wake up in the morning. I still occasionally elbow him in the face and it turns out that he also occasionally talks (or grunts) in his sleep and somehow despite all this nonsense we sleep just fine, thank you very much. He must be a great guy (and handsome too!). After all, I wouldn't have adjusted my sleeping style for just anyone. I'm not that kind of girl.

Things you should know about Dan: He's a seriously talented writer, and rather fantastic at singer-song-writer-ing. Also, he has a way with finger pistols.
He's also just about the kindest, warmest, loveliest guy you could ever hope to meet. And he likes chocolate as much as I do.

When I asked Dan what kind of cake he'd like for his birthday (which was last weekend) he said "Well, probably Red Velvet or Chocolate." (A wholly unsurprising answer.) I thought and thought about which to make, knowing that Red Velvet would crop up at some point in this year's cakestravaganza. I had a crazy idea and, despite hearing my mom saying in my head (as she does every time I express incredulity at the small amount of cocoa powder in our traditional Red Velvet recipe) "People always think Red Velvet Cake is a chocolate cake, but it's not," I decided to buck tradition, to flout Red Velvet orthodoxy and make a Red Velvet Fudge Cake. I also skipped the traditional cooked frosting recipe and topped it with Cream Cheese Frosting. The result was not your everyday Red Velvet Cake, but damn, it was a good cake.

A note on recipes: There are more different recipes for Red Velvet than you can shake a stick at. I've tried a LOT of them, but honestly, none beats the one I grew up on. The cake recipe I use comes from the East Columbus United Methodist Women's Cookbook (late 70s-early 80s), which was, I believe, a gift to my mom from my dad's mom. This cookbook is full of gems, but the Red Velvet recipe is clearly the best loved. In fact, when looking for the recipe, you can actually spot the page by looking for red stains. Not blood, but food coloring.
This is, in my opinion, the Definitive Red Velvet Recipe. Others contain more butter or more flour, less salt, more vinegar, less food coloring (I actually caved to this impulse and was NOT happy with the resulting color), and (sin of sins!) more cocoa. This is not, after all, a chocolate cake. Just trust me, here. Jean Wagner (East Columbus, ca. 1970) knew what she was talking about. It's a tangy, light, airy, perfectly-crumbed beaut.

This recipe has, incidentally, been the cause of much consternation for me - once I tried to ice a warm cake with the traditional cooked icing recipe, but the frosting melted and left clumps of the flour/milk paste sticking all over the cake (my mom's generous response: "I think you've got the cake texture down, but the icing could use a little practice.") Another time, I baked one of these for a boy I was desperately infatuated with and brought it to school for his birthday. On my way from the car to our lockers, the bottom of the container caved and the whole cake slid out and squished against my belly. Our school uniforms were white shirts and khaki pants, both of which show up red food coloring spectacularly.

But I come by it honestly! On another occasion that has since gone down in the family history books, my grandma was baking a Red Velvet Cake and left the vanilla out of both the cake and the icing. It was wretched.

For Frosting, I turned to Nancie McDermott's Southern Cakes. Her Cream Cheese frosting is gorgeous and her Old-Fashioned Chocolate Fudge Frosting seemed like a good fit for the fudge filling I desired. I'll admit, I had issues with the fudge. (See recipe below.) It didn't work the way it was meant to. So I slapped in some cream cheese and that did the trick.

With no further ado, here's what you need to do next time someone near and dear has a birthday.

Red Velvet Cake

• 1/2 c. butter, softened
• 1 t cocoa (I think I put 2 t because surely, 1 can't be enough - sorry mom)
• 1 1/2 c sugar
• 1 t salt
• 1 t vinegar
• 1 t baking soda
• 2 oz. red food coloring (you can use 1 oz, but it won't be nearly bloody enough)
• 2 whole eggs
• 1 t vanilla
• 2 1/4 c sifted flour
• 1 c buttermilk

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Mix vinegar and baking soda and let settle.
3. Beat butter, cocoa, sugar, salt, and vanilla until light and fluffy.
4. Add eggs and beat until incorporated.
5. Add food coloring and mix until incorporated. (A note, if you're doing this with a mixer - either hand or stand - be VERY careful to begin mixing at a low speed. Otherwise you'll have a red-splattered everything.)
6. Add flour and buttermilk alternatively, about a third each time.
7. Fold in the baking soda and vinegar.
8. Divide between two 9" round pans and bake for 30-35 minutes.
9. Let cool in pans for about ten minutes, then invert onto racks to cool.
10. When thoroughly cooled, use a long serrated knife to divide each layer into two.
11. Assemble using desired frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting (adapted from Southern Cakes)

• 8 oz cream cheese, softened
• 1 lb powdered sugar
• 2 t vanilla

1. Beat until combined and fluffy.

Chocolate Fudge Frosting (adapted from Southern Cakes)

• 1 1/2 c sugar
• 1/4 c cocoa
• 1/4 t salt
• 1/4 c butter (1/2 stick)
• 1/2 c evaporated milk or half-and-half (I used Heavy Cream - was this my mistake?)
• 1 t vanilla extract
• ~3 oz cream cheese (my addition)

1. In a heavy saucepan, combine sugar, cocoa, and salt. Mix well.
2. Add butter and milk (cream) and heat to melt. Mix into smooth brown sauce.
3. Stir well and bring to lively boil.
4. Maintain gentle boil for five minutes. When frosting begins to thicken, remove from heat.
5. Stir in vanilla and set aside to cool for 20 minutes.
6. Beat the frosting until it thickens and looks shiny. This never happened for me - it was a little grainy. Maybe the sugar didn't completely dissolve or something?
7. I beat it until it was entirely cool and slightly bigger in volume than before. Then I beat in the cream cheese until it was fluffier and spreadable and went to town.

Cake Assembly:My cake went, from bottom to top: cake, fudge, cake, cream cheese frosting, cake, fudge, cake, cream cheese frosting on top. Top with candle, sing, and make a wish!
**The fudge did make the cake a lot uglier, but it also make it taste spectacular.

Way back: Hobo Packs

When I was little, there were a few meals that inspired dread in me like nothing else I knew - Stuffed Peppers (which I oddly now crave) and Polynesian Chicken (which I still loathe to think of) come to mind. There were other meals (Spaghetti Casserole, Chili, Pasta) that would, without fail, improve a bad mood or turn a proverbial frown, proverbially, upside-down. Another of those, one that my grandma (who was not an adventurous cook, and whom I miss every single day) made often, is very, very simple - it's the kind of dish that makes it feel wrong to write down a recipe, but it's also the kind that everyone - but everyone - should try, at least once.

I speak of hobo packs. I know, I know, how hard can it be to bang some ingredients into an envelope of aluminum foil and pop it in the oven? It's not hard at all, but the taste - oh, it's divine.

Hobo packs. I always thought my grandma's adherence to this recipe was a result of her having grown up in The Depression and I always imagined my grandpa and his friends dressed as hobos (battered trilby hats, patched clothes, a hankie tied onto a stick) poking around in the fire waiting for the meat to cook, breaking into the packets with pocket knives under a starry sky. My grandpa wasn't a hobo, but I thought it would have been so cool, if he had been.

Instead of huddling around a fire, we busted into the steamy packets while gathered around the dining room table, me always sitting next to my grandpa and waiting impatiently for one of the grown-ups to open my hobo pack since I always burned my fingers. I always ate mine with lots of ketchup.

The taste of my hobo packs wasn't the same. I don't have home-grown, home-canned green beans (with bacon in) to throw in there, and I did add some mushrooms and broccoli for good measure. The taste wasn't the same, but the spirit was. I reverse engineered my version from a rather distant memory, but a few things I remembered paid off. Most important, I remembered the bread squished into the meat, which makes for a few smooth, almost custardy bites in between meaty morsels. That's an important thing. Don't leave it out.

So, with no further ado, here's today's dinner.
Hobo Packs
(campfire optional)

• 1/4 lb ground pork
• 1/4 lb ground sirloin
• 1 T olive oil
• salt and pepper
• dash cayenne pepper
• dash garlic powder
• 1 t balsamic
• 1 piece white sandwich bread, torn into pieces
• 1 large yukon gold potato, cut lengthwise into eighths or so, steak-fry style
• 1/2 head broccoli, cut into florets
• mushrooms, cut into chunks

1. Squish meat and seasonings together with the bread and form into two patties.
2. Place meat patties, potatoes, mushrooms, and broccoli on top of large square of aluminum foil.
3. Sprinkle food with salt and pepper and drizzle with olive oil.
4. Place another piece of aluminum foil on top and roll the edges up to seal each packet.
5. Place on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 for about 40 minutes.
6. Break into aluminum foil packet with a fork and enjoy.

2010, with a bang

Bear with me, this is going to be a long one.

Another new year, and so many new projects I want to undertake. Being still in school, the January to January calendar doesn't mean a whole lot to me. However, I like the chance at a second chance, midway through the academic year. As you may have noticed, I like taking stock and making grand plans - regardless of whether I live up to them or not.

This year, I find myself in an interesting position, both professionally and personally. In my work-life, I'm at the beginning of the big crazy research phase, and am in the process of hacking, warrior-like, into that hulking monolith of work. In my free time, I have finally harnessed some excess energy to be creative again. This is a welcome change and has both lifted my mood and given me a steady sense of accomplishment I haven't had in a long time. To take nothing and make something beautiful of it is a particular kind of excitement. (If only I could muster that kind of excitement for my research!)And, as you all know, cooking holds a similar position in my life these days. I've become enamored of the ingredients, the subtle, but flexible chemistry of combining them to create fluffy, puffed, creamy, or dense textures. The play of spice against sweetness against salt and soft textures against crunchy ones. And this blog has gone from a hodge-podge of more or less private thoughts to a much more public exploration of the things that fire my passions. It's been very exciting, making this little place grow and meeting a few of you readers as a result.Anyway, enough navel gazing.

This year, I'm going to try a few new things: I'm going to bring in more non-food photography. I may write about non-food things as well, if anything moves me to. On the food side, I'm going to look in some new directions. It turns out that I'm very very interested in heritage recipes - lost recipes, old recipes, recipes that aren't written down. After all, I'm always plumbing my own personal history, looking for recipes, finding anecdotes that associate with whatever I've just cooked. Part of that impulse surely comes from a Proustian search for the half-remembered, but unnamed taste of something from childhood, but part of it comes from a more academic interest in things past. Anyway, I've started rather aggressively buying old cookbooks and while I was home I spend a few hours copying recipes out of the old church cookbooks (bless you, United Methodist Women everywhere).
The other thing I'm going to do this year is bake more. I'm mystified by the way in which flour, eggs, and butter come together and make so many different textures and flavors and shapes. As well as baking more regularly, I'm going to do a monthly cake feature with recipes new and old.

And the bang that I mentioned at the top was the first of the cakes: A Chocolate Little Layer Cake. I was inspired by the New York Times's article a few weeks ago about cake culture in Alabama. While the writer's style (as is so often the case with Yankee papers visiting the South) was a little condescending and leaning heavily on the exotic, the stuff of the article was very familiar and homey to me. I don't come from The South (or at least not that far South), but I grew up surrounded by those ladies. Granted, in my particular corner of the not-south, they all had German names and maybe made more pies than cakes, but the competition, the battle for bragging rights, the preposterous quantities of baked goods, all hit quite close to home.

And coming, as I feel like I do, from that tradition, I am not to be outdone. So I baked the biggest and most ridiculous of those cakes, the 15 layer behemoth of the Little Layer Cake.It wasn't easy. Oh, it wasn't hard to make the batter (which was airy, fluffy, soft and beautiful - easily the nicest cake batter I've ever made), bake it (though juggling the hot pans was difficult), and make the icing (oh, it almost boiled over, but that doesn't count), but assembling it (Those little layers are about 1/4 inch thick and fall apart if you LOOK at them, much less try to flip them out of the pan, move them, and ice them while they're still warm.) to be anything better than hideous took time, nerve, and a little patchwork (ten layers in I had two major craters developing around the edges of the cake and I had to sacrifice a layer in order to patch them). The end result wasn't beautiful, but it was delicious and intimidating enough to make its point. Do not mess with this baker, it growled from its cake stand, too precarious to shout. This baker has no fear. This baker will eat you for breakfast.I particularly recommend this recipe for gatherings of more than ten people. Otherwise you'll have leftovers longer than you should. I should think it would also be good if you're having a new Southern mother-in-law over to dinner or looking to deeply impress someone equally important. Or, you know, for a Tuesday, because this cake, as well as being over-the-top and showy, is delicious! The layers are spongy and not too sweet, while the icing sets up to be something resembling fudge. Slicing the cake produces a little cracking feeling not unlike cracking a creme brulee (although the icing is not nearly as strong as that caramelized crust) and I've found little that will parallel the joy of smooshing crumbs of the cake into the icing that cracks off onto the plate. Oh, yes, it's a good cake.

Tips from my experience with this recipe, which I did not adapt at all.

1. Do your best to spread the cake batter evenly on the bottom of your pans. It does not spread out and you will end up with holes in your layers if you miss spots. This becomes very difficult after you've baked one set of layers and your pans are hot.
2. Use a bigger pot than you think you'll need for the boiled icing. It expands when it's boiling and has the potential for enormous mess.
3. When assembling the layers, move quickly, with confidence, and try to line up the layers as precisely as you can.
   
4. When icing the cake, be sure to completely coat all the layers. If you use too little icing, the layers won't adhere properly and you'll end up with big gaps around the edges.
5. When icing the sides of the cake, the method I found most successful (as the edges are quite fragile) was to pour the icing over the top and drag the pools from the bottom up the sides. Don't think that you'll be able to spread icing around the sides. You won't.
6. Don't worry about the number of layers you end up with. I ended up with 13 (I think), even though the recipe supposedly produced 12. The lady who provided the recipe ends up with 15. I don't know how.

(Also, welcome to the new www.darbyoshea.com! We're all official now! Update your bookmarks! Thanks for sticking with me!)

Other resolutions this year:

• Project 365 - you can see what I'm up to every day over here.
• Also, obviously, lose thirty pounds and make a million dollars.
  

A dozen

Back in October, Dan and I took Lucy on a little road trip out to Northampton (as you know) and, for once, we got to Smith in time to see the last of the golden Valley Light flowing away over the hill. If you've been there in the late afternoon, you know the light I'm talking about - it's as bright and focused as a spotlight, but honey colored and strangely soft at the same time. It's perfect light, flattering to every face, intensifying every color, and warm even on the coldest days.

Another October day found us driving north with my family in search of the Maine coast. You've already seen a few images from this startlingly blue day (and to think it rained for fourteen hours the day before). More bright sun and clear skies made for more intense colors and sharp lines.

And then, on November first, the day after the clocks fell back, we went to the beach with our good friends Seth and Christine. We were there for the waning of the light, the first truly early evening of Fall. More blue, but tempered this time, less flamboyant, as if it knew the cold was coming.

This is just my favorite dozen images from those happy days. There are many more here. I'm embracing color film again after a long break and am oh-so-pleased with the results. 120 film was shot with my trusty brick of a Mamiya and 35mm was shot with my buddy the Canon EOS300.











1. Impression of the Smith College Boathouse. (120 Fuji Reala 100)
2. Chapin House and the Green House, Smith College. (120 Fuji Reala 100)
3. Crabapples (Liz tells me) at Smith. (120 Fuji Reala 100)
4. Boathouse reflection, Smith College. (120 Fuji Reala 100)
5. Whately Diner, interior. (120 Fuji Reala 100)
6. Sandy Lucy, Singing Beach (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)
7. Singing Beach, November, Christine in the water (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)
8. Lucy and tide patterns, Singing Beach (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)
9. Cape Neddick Lobster Pound (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)
10. Rocks at Nubble Light (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)
11. Nubble Light (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)
12. Beachy reflections, Singing Beach (35mm Kodak Ektar 100)

Back into the Archive: Rome 2005

1. Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome, 2. Cat & Car, 3. Rome, 4. Piazza Navona - Fontana dei quattro fiumi

More here. Also, more to come.

Nostalgia Trip: On growing up, growing apart, and getting back in touch

I'm realizing that a lot of the cooking I do is motivated by a desire to return (at least gastronomically) home, to an earlier time. Most of the recipes that have excited me lately are ones from my childhood, things my mom cooked when we were little and the weather was turning cold.

The funny thing is realizing that nostalgic home-time is beginning to extend to include college, a time that I did not spend at home, a time when I wasn't yet cooking and when I wasn't regularly eating my mom's food anymore. It was a magical, now very far-away time, though, with hours spent idly sitting around, never short on fodder for conversation or making mudslides in a cheap blender bought at Wal-Mart and installed in our semi-functional and always filthy house kitchenette. Oreos, peppermint ice cream, and some milk carried back from the dining hall in a coffee mug. Or coming up with ways to make the sadly deteriorating pool table more functional.

How was it that we could just be in each others' company so easily? It seems like lately we've turned to watching TV or playing games or doing things to distract from the way things have changed. Are we becoming less interesting? Less close? Less talented at friendship? Is it just a part of growing up and shifting our attentions elsewhere (marriage, homes, money, children?) or is it some natural talent that we just grow out of?
Or maybe I'm just being pessimistic and short-sighted. Maybe the only difference is that we just have less time and it's less convenient, since we don't all live under one roof together. Maybe it's just that I spend all of my time at home just hanging out with my husband. Maybe we just need to clear our schedules every once in a while and just make time to be in the same place as the people we love, doing nothing.

This is precisely what I did with my dear K on Sunday. We had brunch (oh, so grown-up), and then we hung out at my house, looking at Vogue, flipping through cookbooks, chatting about nothing in particular. Then we went to the supermarket and reminisced about making mudslides while buying the ingredients to make one of my most nostalgic treats.
My memories of these cupcakes (many childhood birthdays, random winter days, special occasions that warranted cupcakes) are densely layered on top of one another and now I'm happy to think that I've added another Black-Bottom-Cup memory to the pile. Now these are the cupcakes that I grew up on, but also the cupcakes I grew back down with. They were there as I was lunging toward adulthood, but they also accompanied me and my friend on a little trip back in time to the days when we lived together, boys took up less of our time, and just killing time was the sweetest thing we could do.
This little baking afternoon helped me reconnect with one of my dear friends and also with an earlier version of myself, but I'm dedicating this post and the recipe (thanks as ever, mom!) to all the friends I used to sit around with, go on long Mill River walks with, nap with, do homework with, and grow up with. I miss you all desperately and hope that one day we can kill time and shoot the breeze together soon. Meanwhile, bake these and think of me.

Black Bottom Cups

Filling:

• 1 8 oz package cream cheese
• 1 egg white
• 1/3 c sugar
• pinch salt
• 1 6 oz package semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1 t vanilla
• ½ t almond extract

Combine ingredients except for chocolate chips in a small bowl and mix well. Stir in chocolate chips and set mixture aside.

Batter:

• 1 c sugar
• ¼ c cocoa
• 1 t baking soda
• 1 ½ c flour, sifted
• ½ t salt
• 1/3 c vegetable oil
• 1 c water
• 1 T vinegar
• 1 t vanilla
  
• chopped nuts (optional)
  

Sift dry ingredients together. Add remaining ingredients except (optional) nuts and mix well. Fill paper muffin cups 1/3 full with chocolate batter. Top each with a heaping teaspoonful of cream cheese mixture. Sprinkle with nuts. Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes. Makes 2 dozen.

Munching on Sunshine

Yes, it's getting colder and yes, it's getting darker. I fully expect the snow to come down any minute and I fully expect to not see the sun again until April - March, if we're lucky. Last week, however, in a last-minute fit of denial, I decided to make the summeriest, most cheerful dessert I could think of: a lemon tart.

What you should know: I have a passionate love of desserts that involve lemons. On trips to southern France and the Amalfi coast in Italy, I made it a point to eat at least one, preferably two or three lemon desserts or pastries every day. There was one particular lemon tart that I ate in Nice that has stuck in my memory for lo, these many years. The tangy lemony-ness and the smooth, silky texture of the filling, the flaky, yet tender crust, the sweet note that lingered after the sour had passed - just thinking about it takes me right back.
That taste - the 7th grade poet in me would call it the taste of sunshine - is what I had a longing for. I have been sitting on a lemon tart recipe for a long time, waiting for a rainy day (I didn't intend to wait for a literal rainy day, but that's how it worked out). This one comes from a genuine Parisienne who spent a year at my lovely alma mater, and with whom one of my dearest friends and most loyal readers is still in close contact. The text of this recipe is written in somewhat eccentric English and has very little in the way of concrete instruction, but luckily my mom (my CIA-trained, kitchen-ruling mom) was on hand to help fill in the blanks, as it was the very first tart I've ever made.

The result? It was stunning. Every bite embodied that sunshiny, liquid-light, tart-yet-sweet, creamy, silky perfection I've been dreaming about since that very first day in Nice what - six years ago? (Actually, I think this tart might have been better than that tart, but nostalgia does gild that memory a bit.) No, it didn't stave off the cold, the rain, the coming three-months darkness. But it did make being alive on that one day a little more worthwhile.The Famous Fanélie's Lemon Tart
*I've adapted the recipe rather heavily and will mark my additions and changes with asterisks.

For the tart shell:

• 150 g flour
• 125 g butter
• 50 g sugar
• *dash salt

1. The original recipe called for the ingredients to be mixed by hand. *Being lazy and inclined to repetitive stress injury, I took the easy way out and used a food processor. This necessitated the addition of a couple of tablespoons of water to bring the dough together. In the future, I would not do this, as I'm afraid that step caused my crust to shrink almost beyond rescue.
2. After the dough is smooth and homogeneous, put it in the fridge for a half an hour.
3. Then, press it into a tart pan with a removable bottom.
4. Put it in the freezer for at least ten minutes.

Preheat the oven to 375.

For the lemon curd: (I've doubled this recipe, as we were afraid - and rightly so - that the original would not fill my tart shell.)

• 2 eggs, beaten
• 300 g of sugar
• the juice and zest of two lemons
• 120 g of butter
• *pinch salt

1. *The original recipe called for a pan over direct heat, but given my propensity for burning everything, my mom's suggestion to use a double-boiler (in our case, a tempered-glass bowl positioned on top of a saucepan of simmering water) sounded like a very, very good idea.
2. Melt the butter in the top bowl, very slowly.
3. When the butter is melted, keep the pan on the fire, but on low. Add the lemon juice and zest, sugar, and salt.
4. Mix the ingredients very slowly, with circular motions until the mixture is fully combined and the sugar melting.
5. Add the egg very slowly and stir constantly, but slowly.
6. Continue cooking the curd on low/medium-low heat until it thickens up and turns whitish and less transparent.
7. *While preparing the curd, remove the tart shell from the freezer and partially bake the shell (between five and ten minutes).
8. When the curd is "à point" (anyone have a good translation for this?), pour it into the pastry shell and bake the tart at 375 for about 15 minutes. The shell will hopefully brown a bit and the top of the curd may brown and begin to bubble.
9. If you can, wait until it's cooled to serve. Be very careful, and you'll get gorgeous slices of semi-transparent neon yellow on crumby, flaky, cream-colored crust.
   

Fall Break

Yesterday, Dan and I and the Little Dog took our annual Fall trip out West to Northampton and environs. We were out for a little leaf-peeping, a little escapism, and a little taste of the Autumn That I'm Having a Hard Time Getting Used To (TM).
Fig. 1. Leaves were peeped. Though I didn't get any really spectacular photos of blazing trees or impressionistic hills, I think this fall is the most spectacular I've seen in a long time. I guess that's a good reason to be thankful for the cold snaps of the last couple weeks, yes? Fall always makes me all shades of nostalgic, and never more than when I'm taking the fall drive out to Northampton. There's this one rise in the road on the Pike near Brimfield that affords an amazing sloping view down into the valley as you come over the top of it. I know I don't live out there anymore and it's likely to be some time before I live out there again, but it always feels a little bit like coming home. There's simultaneously a drop in my stomach and a bubbly feeling of excitement that never fails to make me feel choked up. The same thing happens to me after turning onto 91 North, after passing the Holyoke Mall, when it starts to look more like Northampton. The view out across South Hadley just south of Mt. Tom is another spot, as is the first view of the Connecticut river, just before Exit 18. And the whole Pioneer Valley is speckled with spots that make me catch my breath and want to cry happily, and yet out of a sense of nostalgia for lost experiences and fading, but still warm memories.
Fig 2. Cider Donuts were consumed. These were still warm when I bought them. Still warm. It was the kind of day where there was a line waiting for the donuts to come out of the kitchen. Crispy on the outside, sugar and cinnamon crackling with each bite. Little puffs of cider-y steam. Divine. If anything tastes like fall, it's these donuts. We enjoyed them with a half gallon of cider that we drank from the jug. A perfect meal, all in all.
Fig. 3. Dan ate some donuts too.
Fig. 4. We drank delicious beers at the Northampton Brewery. I had an 8 ounce (very petite) Hoover's Porter, which was one of the finest beers that has ever passed my lips. Why, oh why don't they sell it in bottles?!Fig. 5. As we hit the road back home, we made a pitstop for a strawberry shake at the Whately Diner. This was another college haunt and definitely a place I wanted to share with Dan - he's also a big diner fan. The pink neon glow and the shiny metal of the diner's exterior is frozen in time, I think. It's fabulous, but still somehow unsettling. Dan said it seemed like an X-Files episode should have been happening around us. It's true. Places that stay static while the people who inhabit them (however temporarily) are uncanny. Places that change, although we expect them to stay the same, however, moreso.

More photos here.