Miscellany

Four Elements: Earth. Joachim Beuckelaer

Yet another Flemish genre painting this week.  And it's Joachim Beuckelaer again -- the guy who blends religious sentiment with cabbage.  Lots and lots of cabbage.  This painting celebrates the fecundity of the earth, and in the background we can see Joseph leading a donkey bearing the pregnant Mary towards Bethlehem.  Symbolism is left as an exercise for the reader.  Meanwhile a man sitting by a well is apparently sad because no matter how many times he lowers the bucket, all he draws up is vegetables.  At least, that's the way it looks to me.  Possibly because I'm feverish. 

Yes, I am sick again.  I even stayed home from school in the hope that a break and sleep will mean that I arise tomorrow ready to take on the world.  I'm still hopeful, but the headache and fever routine are old.   And I'm trying to do homework anyway, so I don't get totally behind.  It's really hard to think straight when you have a fever.

I know most of you are nodding and saying, "Yeah, Sarah, duh."  But really, really hard, and then you start thinking about enchanted wells the only yield cabbage and discussing what passes for high fashion* this season with totally uninterested male friends who happen to be online in the wrong place at the wrong time.**

So all that being said have a couple of links that are vaguely food related, and I'll go take more advil before attempting to think more about logo design.

1) When I'm well enough to be trusted with experimental cooking again, rather than merely heating things up, I am making GINGER ALE.

2) Kevin and Ursula Eat Cheap Reviews of strange premade food.  Mostly things that I would never buy, but frequently funny enough to keep me working on school projects despite the variants on lousy my body keeps devising.

With that, I'm off to take the aforementioned advil, because it's eighty degrees in here and I'm cold. 
  
 *Booooooring.  I suspect that articles about the "new refinement" and the "new romanticism" are just around the corner, and that they will be approximately the same articles that they wrote in 2002.   Except with maxidresses and eighties shoulder pads.  I live in one of the cooler enclaves on the West Coast, and everyone always looks amazing here, and almost nothing like anything in the rag I was reading.  Also, Michael Kors, I know it's a runway show, but not even that can explain slouchy hiking socks with platform sandals. Actually it can, but it's still hideous. 

**But not in anyway that actually makes sense (I'd been perusing a recent issue of Harper's Bazaar for research purposes).  me: Conclusion on fashion magazines-- high fashion models exist to provide a scaffold to turn fancy clothes into interesting planar geometric propositions. The Tall Guy: like, 2-dimensionality is important?
 me: Apparently clothes look better that way. It certainly does nothing for the models, who look terrible.

Thanksgiving

I'm just home from a long weekend of festivating in a kitchen orientated fashion. Hence the painting. Some people may not see a kitchen's worth of chaos as festive, but trust me when I say that it's one of my favorite forms of fun. Although my faithful readers might not actually be all that surprised.

The painting is Christ in the House of Martha and Mary by Joachim Beuckelaer. This worthy Flemish master took great delight in mounding his paintings with foodstuffs. This panoply of roasts and fowl is rather restrained. I cannot remember the name for the genre of painting that has a scene of ordinary life in the foreground, and a scene from the Bible as a vignette in the background. There is such a word. I wish I could remember it. At any rate, this is one of them, and one of Beuckelaer's favorite subjects, since it gives him an excuse to show the uproar in the kitchen that prepares to feast an unexpected guest.*

But enough self-indulgent noodling about art, lets talk about food. Thanks to the magic of some really sharp scheduling, I managed to attend three Thanksgiving dinners taking in both sides of my family as well as my friends' families. My weekend did not feature enough snoozing in a turkey induced coma, but it had laughter, fat babies, happy toddlers, and enough good food that I don't think I actually need to eat again until I fly home to Alaska for the holidays. Not that I am going to let that stop me.

Despite the good times, I did miss my immediate family fiercely. At home Mom and I collaborate on Thanksgiving dinner. I usually make the sides, and Mom deals with the turkey, the stuffing and the gravy. Dad gets the short straw and potato mashing duty. It's chaotic, loud, and the Ervine family kitchen can't actually comfortably hold four full sized adults (my brother may or may not cook anything but he definitely wanders through to snitch tastes). Then the guests start arriving.

I usually end by making elaborate plans for how it is all going to be different and sane next year.

This year I wanted the crazy, the off-key singing, and the squabbling over oven space. To say nothing of Mom's stuffing. Mom makes the best stuffing, and I don't have her recipe. However I think I have figured out the secret to the excellence of her stuffing and consequently her gravy. Judging from the evidence before me, most people do not cook the stuffing in the turkey. An understandable choice-- turkey cooks faster and theoretically more thoroughly without stuffing. The secret to Mom's stuffing is a bunch of fruit, and apple juice to moisten the bread crumbs before it goes in the bird. The stuffing is good whether it was the in-bird stuffing or the large casserole that is cooked on the side to meet demand. However, the in-bird stuffing flavors the juices from the bird. Hence the best gravy ever.

Gravy is extremely important. The entire Thanksgiving meal is an excuse for the gravy. You may ask my grandmother if my word is in doubt.

Without my mom's stuffing recipe, you and I have no hope of making a truly superb gravy, but despite this good gravy is within easy reach.

The secret is making a proper roux**.

Turkey Gravy

Take all the rendered juices from the turkey and pour them in a glass container. A Pyrex measuring cup of appropriate size is dandy. This is a tricky operation, if you're a klutz like me, you may want to get someone else to do this for you.

When the liquid separates, you should have at least a couple of tablespoons of fat floating on top. Pour the fat carefully into either the pan you roasted the turkey in (if it's suitable for stove top use), or a shallow, not non-stick skillet. Reserve the rest of the turkey juices.

Place the pan over medium heat and add an equal volume of flour. Stir constantly with a fork or a spring whisk as the paste forms. Attempt to squash out all the lumps. Keep stirring as the paste turns golden and begins to smell of toasted grain. It's not an altogether bad thing if the roux gets a bit burned. This takes five -ten minutes depending on your burner temperature.

Pour in the turkey juices. If the result is too thick, add some water, wine, or broth. The result should be fairly thin. Continue stirring and bring the proto-gravy to a boil. Allow it to reduce to the desired consistency. Check the seasonings. If it's too salty add more water, wine, or broth (assuming that the broth is low or no sodium). Resist the urge to get fancy. Keep it simple. Good gravy is zen gravy.

Pour it into a pitcher, a gravy boat, or -- if all other containers are in use -- a candy dish. Pour it on everything and jealously guard it from all comers.

Bonus Casserole

One might also make chicken gravy and pour it over a casserole dish of leftovers, and bake for half an hour at 350. Serve it with lingonberry jam if you've already run out of cranberry sauce.


*The story is here: Luke 10:38-42. It's one of those stories that makes you wonder about how the Puritans came up with their famed work ethic.

**a cooked paste of fat and flour. The language of cooking is often French and "roux" sounds better than fat and flour paste.