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Lights and ribbons. Chocolate and eggnog. Late nights. Cookies, gazillions of them. Wine and cheeses. Crumpled wrapping paper and missing scotch tape. Brookshire Brothers and Best Buy and Central Market and bookstores and late nights. Christmas lists. Revised Christmas lists. Revised revised Christmas lists. Dirty dishes followed by dirty dishes. Spiral Cut hams and roasted turkeys. Clean platters stacked on clean bowls stacked on clean platters. Phone calls. Questions. Late nights. Dried out Christmas trees and too many ornaments. Hugs on the run. Late nights. Family circling the Christmas table. Roast beef and winter squash and sweet potatoes and persimmon pudding. Laughter. Willie Wonka. Late night. Sleep. It’s been like that, the blur of Christmas into the New Year, a surreal fortnight of work and play and family. Always, when it ends, I feel a profound sense of the need for simplicity, the need to hibernate, the need for silence. Dreams of food scale down to comfort levels—one-dish meals or hearty soups. Keep it simple. Keep it good. One of my favorite soup recipes, gleaned from a newspaper more than 20 years ago, has its roots in Cuba. The first time I served it, I must have misread the recipe, or perhaps there was a typo (it happens to the best of us.) I put the soup together mid-day, including the ¼ pound of Serrano peppers it called for. More of a novice cook then, I followed recipes diligently and afforded myself the luxury of not thinking too much about what I was doing.
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A quarter pound of Serrano peppers is a lot of heat, as you may have surmised, but I sautéed them blithely, and, floating on the dense, earthy perfume of the simmering soup, invited some family over to share it with me. Now, we like things spicy, my family and I, but this covered the ground from spicy to incendiary. Noses were flowing. Eyes were weeping. Napkins were mopping foreheads. And still, we made our way through that soup. Some even had seconds. Eating that soup became a kind of rite of passage that evening. I tried to apologize, but they waved me aside. “It’s great, Linda,” they assured me. “A little on the spicy side. Maybe a little too spicy for the average joe. But the flavor is great.” Another bite. More sniffling. “Just great. A little spicy.” And it was. Both too spicy and great. So I’ve toned it down. And I’ve learned about heat. Add it gradually. You can always add more, but you can’t make it go away once it’s invited to the party. Try this with a leafy green salad tossed in a garlicky vinaigrette, a loaf of crusty peasant bread and a glass of sturdy red wine. Turn the lights to mellow and fill the background with the strains of The Buena Vista Social Club. Lean back. Relax. Enjoy! |
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CUBAN BLACK BEAN SOUP 1 lb black beans 2 qts. chicken stock 1 smoked ham hock or ½ lb. finely chopped bacon salt to taste 2 Serrano peppers (or more or less, see above), diced ½ lb. chopped onion 5 oz. olive oil 1 ½ t. ground cumin oregano and garlic to taste 1 oz. red wine vinegar marinated rice marinated onions
A little postscript to last month’s recipe: It’s bad enough to have to deal with computer glitches, but when the brain begins to contribute, life can seem unfair. Those of you who tried the persimmon pudding recipe, may have noticed that I left out the lines instructing you to add the persimmon puree and remaining spices, raisins and nuts to the pudding before steaming it. I trust you figured that out on your own, given the name of the recipe and the list of ingredients. If not, you probably had a bland pudding and wondered what to do with the persimmon puree. I hope that was not the case. Happy New Year!
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