[Tea and cake, March 2010.]

Suddenly, it’s raining and I am drinking an americano (Blue Bottle, double shot, with cream and sugar); two things that have not occurred in awhile, March being so full lately of sun and wind. I feel my right hip aching a little as it does sometimes (an old hiking injury) when it rains but the forecast this weekend is for clear skies and I plan to throw myself out into it as much as possible. I am thinking of story ideas and upcoming spring trips to the East Coast. I am thinking about photo excursions. I am thinking about the vegetables I will roast for dinner tonight (a motley assortment of: turnips, brussels sprouts, a few potatoes, maybe something else). And I am also thinking about my friend Jessie, in England, because today is her birthday.

Jessie’s sort of the sister I never had — or at least the sister I always wished I had (with apologies to my brother; I wouldn’t trade him for anything but there is always a little wistful wondering that lingers, a secret what would it have been like, to have another girl in the family?). We met ages ago in college and became family very quickly; I was her maid of honor when she married one of my best friends a few years (!) back and we’ve visited each other in California, Florida, and the U.K., too. We’ve taken the Greyhound from New York to DC together and little road trips to Yosemite and Cambridge besides, and used to live within walking distance of each other when we all lived in Washington (oh, those halcyon days of impromptu bbqs and Sunday night ‘Sopranos’-watching and lasanga dinners and late-night drinks at that funny basement sports bar place!). We’ve also spent countless hours drinking wine or coffee or green tea or or or in our various places of residence and never, ever tire of each other’s company.

That’s a really good friend, I think.

I used to record the dinner parties I cooked (and in fact am trying to revive this little tradition) and have just found the writing-up I did for her birthday party five years ago today:

Last night: huge, gorgeous birthday dinner for wonderful friend J. 10 people for food, and I of course made so much, but, surprisingly, there were not too many leftovers. After the standard apps [note, 2010: I would guess this was hummus, a cheese plate, probably olives], there was: sweet potato soup, garnished with lemon, bien sur; black lentils with garlic, carrots, red pepper, tomato and pearl onions; tuna steak (just a pound) with tomato basil sauce; roasted curried cauliflower; steamed asparagus with lemon; hummus and pita; spinach salad with almonds and a yummy, simple lemon dressing. The cake wasn’t as good as other times, but there was ice cream, too, and champagne and wine.

I wish I could see her today — I’d definitely cook dinner again (although this time I might roast, rather than steam, the asparagus. It’s much better that way.) Instead, given that whole many-thousands-of-miles thing between San Francisco, Calif. and Beckenham, U.K., I can only offer a piece of virtual cake.

However, it’s very good piece of cake.

Now: this cake. I baked it the other night for a dinner party; as sometimes happens, I got it into my head that a cornmeal-based cake would be just the thing. No matter that I love chocolate with a true and steady heart — I guess I felt like a change from my standard (if delicious) rotation of chocolate cakes, brownies, and cookies. Plus, a cornmeal cake with whipped cream and fruit seems to signal spring, no matter I seriously considered wearing my winter coat on the walk over to my friend’s apartment because it was so chilly (instead: a fleece + down vest did the trick, and nicely).

I’ve certainly made cornmeal-based cakes before, mostly in the form of shortcakes served with fresh berries picked from the blackberry bush in my parents’ backyard or sliced strawberries in season, always with lots of whipped cream, and I’ve definitely baked my fair share of cornbread for muffins and stuffing. But I’ve never hit on the perfect cornmeal-cake recipe until now.

I think the secret here is in the sour cream, and the crunchy crust of caramelized sugar. My tried-and-true cornbread recipe calls for buttermilk but I think if you’re going for a richer, more dessert-y flavor, the sour cream (and butter) is what you need. I didn’t, after all, want this cake to taste too much like cornbread — a hint of cornbread was more like it — as I wanted it to be a proper dessert (the vanilla helps with this, too). As is usual when I try a new recipe I was tentative about the results — nothing like blindly trusting things will come out to rights — especially because the cake, to be honest, emerges from the oven a bit homely and plain. But it smelled delicious nevertheless from the butter and vanilla, and I picked up some heavy cream and strawberries to go alongside (and err, to pretty it up a little bit).

And, you know, sometimes blindly trusting is not so bad at all. We all devoured this cake (generously swiping the strawberries through that pile of delicious whipped cream) and some of us even had seconds (some of us even ate a piece for pre-breakfast the next morning). It was perfect for March: sweet but not-too, with that crunchy cap of sugar on top, slightly gritty from the cornmeal but not in an unpleasant way, run through with good butter and vanilla, tender from the sour cream. Definitely a recipe for the ’save for many future references’ files.

This cake may not be fancy — it’s not chocolate after all, which always seems to me the only thing for a proper celebration — but it’s a lot like Jessie: straighforward, unexpectedly delicious, sweet, and true. I’d serve it to her or any March baby with absolute confidence. Of course, it’s a lovely pre-breakfast snack as well (or so I’ve, um, heard).

Happy birthday, dearest friend. I miss you.

Sour Cream-Cornmeal Cake, adapted from epicurious.com

1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tablespoons finely grated orange peel
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 tablespoons sugar (I used organic sugar I buy in bulk from my organic market; I think turbinado would also work well)

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 9-inch cake pan with 2-inch-high sides (I used a springform cake pan). Dust pan with cornmeal, tapping out excess.

Sift flour, 1/2 cup cornmeal, baking powder, and salt into medium bowl. Using electric mixer, beat butter in large bowl until smooth and fluffy. Beat in orange peel. Gradually add one cup sugar and beat until light and fluffy, occasionally scraping sides of bowl. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in sour cream and vanilla. Fold in dry ingredients in three additions until just incorporated.

Transfer batter to pan; smooth top. Sprinkle with crushed sugar.

Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pan on rack 10 minutes. Run knife around pan sides to loosen. Turn cake out onto plate, then invert, crushed sugar side up, onto rack. Cool completely.

Serve with freshly whipped cream and fruit.

[Alice Waters' Chocolate Cake, and my mom's birthday cake.]

[Mustard greens from the market, March 2010.]

Never let it be said that I’m not stubborn. I’m the girl who will, if you offer to pay for dinner, cheerfully (but cheerfully!) fight with you over the bill (just ask my best friend). I’ll finish books I’m not enjoying all that much (see: that Dylan Thomas biography I was so looking forward to but which turned out to be disappointingly not written too well) because, darn it, I started it and I will make it to the bitter end even if I’m gnashing my teeth the whole time. I’ll go out even when it’s raining if I’ve slated myself to run that day (anyway, running in the rain is refreshing – right?!) because, see, I have to. I’ll stay up late doing dishes because I can’t stand to leave them in the sink ’til the next morning, no matter what anyone says about taking it easy. And even when I’m nursing a 10-day cold, I’ll avoid going to the doctor because I believe in the power of herbal tea and sleep (also, I’ll rarely take over-the-counter stuff because it makes me feel high, and not in a good way).

All this to say that yes: I’ve been sick, and I’ve been stubborn about it. I haven’t been take-to-my-bed-for-days sick, but a more general under-the-weather sick in a way that makes coffee taste unappetizing (though a soy latte the other day really hit the spot) — so you know it’s serious — and leaves me rather woebegone at the whole situation. Still, I have high hopes I’ll feel better soon — in fact, am already getting there — partially thanks to a strange, spicy, wholly nutritious soup made from mustard greens.

I was whinging on to my favorite farmer at the Saturday market about having a cold and he said, Here, take this, on me, and make a soup with a lot of garlic and you’ll feel better. Honestly, I was a bit skeptical though I do trust this guy implicitly and his produce is unfailingly gorgeous and delicious. Then as I made my sniffly exit a nicely-dressed older gentleman caught my eye and exclaimed Mustard! quite approvingly and I felt rather proud of myself. It was worth a try at any rate.

I’d not cooked with mustard greens before, though they are quite lovely (see above), with their prettily curling leaves and bright green hue. But, mustard? Really? I’ll take chard, and quite happily thanks, or kale, or spinach, or or or. Mustard is fine on bread in a sandwich, but in a soup? That sounded a bit strange. Still, farmers just always know about vegetables and he’s never, ever steered me wrong.

So I came home and did this: sliced up a lot of garlic and peeled and grated some fresh ginger and washed and roughly chopped the mustard greens. I put all this in a big pot with a lot of water and brought it to a boil. I crumbled in a little bit of vegetable boullion and reduced to a simmer, and I let it go on like that for a good half hour or so until the garlic was soft and disintegrating and the greens were thoroughly wilted. I added a good heap of black pepper and a splash or two of soy sauce and poured heaping ladles-full over some brown rice I had leftover in the fridge — and that was dinner.

And … it was fine. I’m a believer in the power of vegetables to heal and soothe, and this soup certainly did taste healing in a way, the mustard and ginger spicy enough to make my nose run, the broth hot and nourishing, the brown rice just chewy enough to give the bowl some heft. I still felt pretty not-great when I went to sleep that night but in the morning things had definitely taken a turn for the better. Can I blame the soup? Or maybe it was the whole wheat oatmeal chocolate chip cookies I baked for an upcoming story? No matter! Whatever it takes — as long as I don’t have to go to the doctor. I mentioned I’m stubborn?

(Mustard greens, for your knowledge, provide a lot of vitamins A, B6, C, and E, as well as magnesium, folic acid, and calcium. Eating these greens is recommended for people with athsma as a way to promote lung health. So perhaps that was why I felt so much better Sunday morning?)

[Medicinal soup, March 2010.]

I don’t know if I’d make this soup necessarily for pleasure, if you know what I mean (c’mon — it’s no udon with mushrooms or couscous with vegetables) but given the results I’ll certainly make it again (and will finish off the pot). It was surprisingly pretty OK. And if I can take the more natural route to feeling better, well, I shall.

Meanwhile, I’m still experiencing a big crush on March and it has responded in kind — we San Franciscans were just treated a spectacular weekend and I did not take it for granted one bit. It was sunny nearly the days-long, all the clouds blown out to sea, the wind scouring the streets and pushing clean, pure air throughout my apartment. Before my medicinal soup-eating I sat in the park in the sun for an hour and read and nibbled on bits of delicious milk chocolate and a banana. It was grand.

Yesterday afternoon I ran a lot of miles and as sometimes happens after long runs it’s hard to sleep; I lay in bed feeling my muscles still humming from the day’s exertions and listening to the windows rattle in their frames. I’ve mentioned before my apartment often feels like a ship at sea, and it particularly feels as such during a wind storm. I pulled the blankets up and burrowed into my clean sheets (Sunday is laundry day) and drifted off thinking of the clear blue Mediterranean and a rocky beach at which to put in. It was the perfect way to end a few days of gusty sun and blue skies — spring, so soon, I can feel it on my skin.

A few more weekends like this and a few more bowls of mustard greens soup and I’ll be back to rights in no time. Take note of this prescription for the next time you, too, find yourself a bit under the weather.

Near Sebastopol, Calif.

[Mustard grass near Sebastopol, February 2010.]

March, lovely March, here you are at last. You are one my favorite months — with polite apologies to sweet April with her sun showers, smoky blue June tossing her still-green branches against a summer sky, quiet, still August, and white-gold October; these I love truly and look forward to — and so I must be honest and admit I was ticking off the last rainy days of February a bit eagerly. There is just something about March, you see.

March is the in-between month. It bridges the gap between winter and spring (which arrives mid-month and it is so close I can almost feel it). It is the work-horse, the alarm clock of the calendar, entreating the earth to emerge from its long rest with strong winds and bright sun, but happily, mind. March calls, Look! The sea is blue again and under it there are secret treasures and the whales still making their way South. The birds are coming back to town and are already singing their busy summer songs. There is so much to do; let us get started!

At the markets there are lots of root vegetables still to be had but there are also tender arugula and new potatoes. You can almost let yourself imagine mid-July and picking blackberries and going for a swim in the river to wash your dusty toes and one of those hot-hot summer weekends when all you want to eat are sliced tomatoes with feta and chunks of good bread. You can almost see sweet September when the apples are back in season and taste better, sharper, than they have in months. You can almost feel the way the sun settles after burning away the long afternoons, slipping down the horizon well past 8 pm and no fog in sight.

So I guess you could say March is about the possibility.

Not to mention there is the time change tucked in there about half-way through the month (this year, March 14; and of course, please, do not forget the 15th, and the Ides of March) — I wait impatiently for it every day following the Winter Solstice. Wake up, the March wind whispers to the earth, sweeping away the snow and puddles. And thus the ground rouses itself to put forth daffodils, new grass, a faint greening all over the trees. March blows out the cobwebs and scours the air clean; it tidies away the detritus still lingering from the holidays and pushes us out firmly into the year. It is literally a deep breath.

It has rained on-and-off for days here in this western state but there have been periods of bright sun — Sunday, for a birthday walk in Sonoma County the fields were that vivid green of late winter, threaded with the beginnings of the mustard grass, and there were even a few blossoms on the trees; tentative though they may have been, they were there — and blue sky and drifting clouds. Today I woke to hard rain but it eased off and now a light breeze (a March-like breeze) is rustling the curtains.

Though I’m never really sorry to see winter fade away, this one has been particularly kind to me in terms of learning to love certain vegetables previously unexplored — not to mention I swear I’ve eaten my weight in tiny, delicious citrus fruits — which include turnips, red cabbage, celery root. I’d always meant to further explore these hidden gems but somehow didn’t get around to it … until this year. And, lucky lucky me, I did do.

The first revelation was the turnips I picked up at my usual Saturday market. They were so cute, was the thing, and my guy was raving about them. I know I’ve eaten turnips before, and perhaps have even cooked with them on occasion, but for some reason they never really made much of an impression. Enter 2010, and a mild turnip obsession. I’ve cooked and mashed them with potatoes, sliced them thinly to pan-fry with bok choy, roasted them within an inch of their lives and gobbled them up in seconds. (It will probably come as no surprise I like them best this way: just baked until crispy and sweet with olive oil and dusted with salt. Miam miam.) One day I threw a few turnips into a pan with a bunch of other winter vegetables to roast, and then I made soup.

I’m so happy with this little soup. It’s crammed with my favorite things — cauliflower, potatoes, garlic — and though it’s nothing fancy it’s so satisfying. All you do really is to roast a bunch of vegetables and then cook them in some vegetable broth and puree until creamy. No milk either; this is pure, untouched vegetable, and how glad you are for it. The turnips are what make it and save it from being too sweet; that sharpness sings through against the cauliflower and onions making it earthy, promising, spring.

Well, I feel like I’m eating March a bit when I eat this soup. And on a gusty, nearly sunny day like today when I’m home sick with a cold it’s just the thing to have for lunch (dish of potato chips recommended but not required). Spring, soon.

March

Dear March, come in!
How glad I am!
I looked for you before.
Put down your hat-
You must have walked-
How out of breath you are!
Dear March, how are you?
And the rest?
Did you leave Nature well?
Oh, March, come right upstairs with me,
I have so much to tell.

-Emily Dickinson

Roasted Turnip and Cauliflower Soup

1 cauliflower, broken into florets
2 red russet potatoes, peeled and quarterered
1 bunch turnips peeled and quartered
1 small yellow onion, quartered, or three leeks, sliced
few garlic cloves, peeled
olive oil
3 cups vegetable broth
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 375 F. Arrange the vegetables in an oven-proof roasting pan, drizzle with the olive oil, and sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste. Roast the vegetables until fork-tender, about 45 minutes.

Dump the vegetables into a large pot and add the vegetable broth plus 3 cups of water. Bring to a boil, then simmer until vegetables are very tender. Remove from heat and, using a stick blender or in a food processor, puree until smooth but still textured. Add salt and pepper to taste.