The Wordsworth Effect

Is when you return to a place
and it's not nearly as amazing
as you once thought it was,

or when you remember how you felt
about something (or someone) but you know
you'll never feel that way again.

It's when you notice someone has turned
down the volume, and you realize
it was you; when you have the

suspicion that you've met the enemy
and you are it, or when you get
your best ideas from your sister's journal.

Is also-to be fair-the thing that enables
you to walk for miles and miles chanting to
yourself in iambic pentameter

and to travel through Europe with
only a clean shirt, a change of
underwear, a notebook and a pen.

And yes: is when you stretch out
on your couch and summon up ten thousand
daffodils, all dancing in the breeze.

by Joyce Sutphen

Blah-Blah-Blahg: Food For Nought

Brrrr-mont exposed me as the California raisin that I am. I was there shooting a cooking show and had the opportunity to stargaze far from city lights and other modern- day amenities like television, telephones, and internet service. For all of this state’s natural beauty, my favorite thing about it came in the form of a commercial drink. It’s an awesome Maple Seltzer that I found at a General Country Store. It’s pure, distilled maple sap – not sweet ‘t’all like a soda and perfect for sipping on the picturesque rocking chairs of my porch. Drinking it kind of made me want to fire walk and do jazz hands simultaneously – and no I am not a masochistic gay man. I don’t think that would have gone over too well with the locals.

My friend's spoof of our TV show is a wonderfully exaggerated representation of (mis)adventures in Rupert, Vermont.

Carrot-Ginger Soup

Serves 6
INGREDIENTS:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 medium onion, minced
table salt
2 tablespoons fresh, grated ginger
3 cups low sodium chicken broth
1 ½ pounds carrots, peeled and coarsely chopped (about 5 cups)
¾ cup whole milk
¼ cup orange juice (fresh squeezed is preferable)
ground black pepper
1 tablespoon minced fresh chives

DIRECTIONS:
1. Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add onion and ½ teaspoon of salt. Cook until the onion softens, about 3 – 5 minutes.
2. Stir in the ginger and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.
3. Now stir in the carrots and broth. Bring to a simmer and cook until the carrots become tender, about 10 – 13 minutes.
4. Puree the soup in batches in a blender until smooth. Do not fill the blender past the halfway mark or the heat will cause the soup to explode through the top. (Alternatively, you could puree the soup using an immersion blender.)
5. Return the pureed soup to the pot and stir in the milk and orange juice. Bring to a simmer but do not boil because high heat can cause curdling. Remove from heat and season to taste with salt and pepper. Sprinkle with chives immediately before serving. This soup can be refrigerated up to three days and gently reheated in a saucepan.

***You may substitute fresh thyme, sorrel, marjoram, or sweet basil for the chives. This soup is also nice if topped with toasted marcona almonds, pistachios, pepitas, nasturtiums, or drizzled with an infused oil. This soup pairs very nicely with the wheat berry salad from the week of September 24 – 31.

**Ginger is sometimes very tricky to peel. In this recipe, the ginger should be fresh. Often you can freeze ginger and then grate it quite easily while frozen. To peel the fresh ginger for this recipe, however, try using a spoon to scrape off the skin from the knob of ginger. A spoon navigates the curves of a knob of ginger much more readily than a knife so that you waste less of this spicy rhizome.

Recipe from a secret source

Ticket

I have a ticket in my pocket that will take me from Lynchburg
to New York in nine hours, from the Blue Ridge to Stuy Town,

from blue jays wrangling over sunflower seeds to my alarm
clock and startled pigeons. If I had a daughter I'd take her

with me. She'd sit by the window wearing the blue dress
with the stars and sickle moons, counting houses and cemeteries,

watching the knotted rope of fence posts slip by while I sat
beside her pretending to read, but unable to stop studying

her in disbelief. Her name would tell her that she's beautiful.
Belle. Or something strong, biblical. Sarah. She would tolerate

the blue jay and weep for the pigeon; she would have all the music
she wanted and always the seat by the window. If I had a daughter

she would know who her father is and he would be home writing letters
or playing the banjo, waiting for us, and I would be her mother.

We'd have a dog, a mutt, a stray we took in from the rain one night
in November, the only stray we ever had to take in, one night in our

cabin in the Catskills. It would be impossibly simple: two train tickets;
a man, a dog, waiting; and a girl with her nose pressed to the window.

by Meg Kearney

Brown Butter Fennel Cookies

-because we’re all just grown up kids or kids growing up





The best way to bake these cookies is to divide and bake the dough in two batches. While the first batch is in the oven, prepare the remaining dough for baking. Do not use a nonstick skillet to brown the butter. The dark color of nonstick coating makes it difficult to see when the butter begins to brown.

Makes about 26 cookies

INGREDIENTS:
14 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
¼ cup granulated or superfine sugar
2 cups packed dark brown sugar, divided
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour plus 2 tablespoons
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS:
1. Heat 10 tablespoons butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat until melted, about 2 minutes. Continue to cook while swirling the pan until butter is dark golden brown and has a nutty aroma, 1 to 3 minutes. Off the heat and transfer browned butter to a large heat-safe bowl. Stir in the remaining 4 tablespoons of butter to melt. Let the butter cool for 15 minutes.
2. While butter cools, adjust the oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper. In a shallow dish, mix granulated sugar and 1/4 cup packed dark brown sugar, until well combined; set aside. Whisk flour, baking soda, baking powder, and fennel seeds together in a medium bowl; set aside.
3. Add the remaining 1 3/4 cups dark brown sugar and salt to the bowl with cooled butter; mix until no lumps remain, about 30 seconds. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula; add egg, yolk, and vanilla and mix until well incorporated, about 30 seconds. Scrape down bowl. Add flour mixture and mix until just combined, about 1 minute. To be sure that no flour pockets remain and the ingredients are evenly distributed, stir the dough once again.
4. Divide the dough into two batches. Then make each cookie about 2 tablespoons in size, rolling the dough between hands into balls about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Roll the first batch of cookie dough balls in reserved sugar mixture and set on a prepared baking sheet, spacing them about 2 inches apart.
5. Only bake one sheet at a time until cookies are browned and still puffy and the edges begin to set but the centers still look raw (the cookies will seem underdone), 12 to 14 minutes, rotating baking sheet halfway through baking. Make no mistake - do not over bake!
6. Cool cookies on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. Then, transfer the cookies to a wire rack and cool to room temperature.

* The French have been browning butter since medieval times to add a nutty complexity to fish, vegetables, and many other dishes. Beurre noisette (say this instead of brown butter if you’d like to annoy the plebes) is made when butter is heated to about 250 degrees, the water boils off, and milk sugar and protein react with each other turning brown and releasing new flavors and aromas.

Recipe adapted by Cristina Paul

Blah-Blah-Blahg: Food For Nought

Unseasonably and unreasonably cold here on the East coast, I have taken to wearing these dazzling booties. Not even the cats will be seen with me. Where, you may wonder, did I find these treasures? They were in my Nana's closet, still wrapped in the produce bags that she uses to suffocate and preserve all of her unused oldies but goodies. She thought they might be nice for the cold inside my aunt and uncles' house, since I don't believe in heat. I mean, I know it exists, I just don't think it's good for the sinuses. May have to change my ways... Perhaps I will return to L.A. a completely different animal. I get out here and start doing hot yoga, stop driving my car, purchase an iPhone and incessantly sweep my fingers across its screen, start eating pork regularly (the Jews are right about this one - it's a doozy to digest) and doing all sorts of previously unthinkable things - like wearing this highly flammable and extremely reproachable foot gear.

Trees

(an excerpt)

I am looking at trees
they may be one of the things I will miss
most from the earth
though many of the ones I have seen
already I cannot remember
and though I seldom embrace the ones I see
and have never been able to speak
with one
I listen to them tenderly
their names have never touched them
they have stood round my sleep
and when it was forbidden to climb them
they have carried me in their branches


by W. S. Merwin from The Compass Flower