Best Food Writing 2013

by Holly Hughes

  As I silently mourned the soggy ruins on my plate, Margaret washed hers down with plenty of white wine and began telling marvelous stories. She’d been coming to Nantucket since the 1920s and told of riding her bicycle as a girl to fetch ice for her mother’s icebox, five miles each way. On sunny days, the ice would start to melt and drip from the basket down her legs and between her toes. She told of the winter when the kitchen—an old farmer’s shed—had been drawn by sled all the way across a frozen Sesachacha Pond and attached to the cottage. She told of volunteering in London during the Blitz, when food was rationed, and of the magical day a friend brought a dozen fresh eggs to her as a rare gift. So rare that all her friends and neighbors showed up for a spontaneous “fresh eggs party.” As Margaret scrambled them over a makeshift stove, an air-raid siren wailed, but no one left to take shelter. Not before savoring a taste of peace. Not before remembering a better time.

  Now, more than fifty years later, at the end of our dinner, Margaret dabbed her lips dry, set down her checkered napkin, and heartily proclaimed: “These lobsters are the best I’ve ever had.” Cheeks rosy from the sun, a glass of wine in hand, her merry blue eyes full of wonder, she seemed impossibly young—and I was smitten.

  The thought of those scrambled eggs kept me awake that night. For fifty years, Margaret had held their taste in her memory. Clearly she had an appetite for something beyond her boiled regimen. I decided to feed that hunger and, the very next day, took over the kitchen.

  If my plan was to work, I reasoned, I needed to find inspiration, rather than dread, in Margaret’s usual fare of milk, tuna, and a narrow range of boiled things. That first night, I simmered a loin of pork in milk with a few sage leaves, a little lemon zest, and a hidden clove of garlic: A dish so comforting and mild, it tasted of childhood. Margaret was transfixed by the golden curdles of milk in the sauce and seemed to suspect me of alchemy. I said nothing to dissuade her of this lovely hypothesis. Vitello tonnato for lunch the next day satisfied her need for her daily ration of tuna and begged for a bottle of rosé and a sleepy afternoon. Vacation had finally begun. Boeuf a la ficelle had us discussing the health virtues of boiling, and John watched in disbelief as Margaret took, with an enthusiasm bordering on compulsion, to the cornichons I’d set out.

  Dinner by dinner, I moved slowly through the classics, rewriting the parameters of Margaret’s diet. And while it was sometimes a burden to cook for her, it was also a joy. She responded to good food with an appetite some eighty years in the making but still girlish in its pleasure. I had, it seemed, opened a Pandora’s box of tastes.

  The following summer, an actual box arrived from Margaret’s office the day before her arrival—this one sent via FedEx and containing dozens of recipes that Margaret had clipped from newspapers and magazines throughout the winter months. A short note was attached, in which she expressed her hope that I’d want to take a crack at all of them. With no fancy appliances, no gadgets, a single sharp knife, and a colander with only one remaining leg, I cooked every single dish. It was the stuff of fantasy—asparagus flan and summer pudding, oyster chowder and strawberry soup. Margaret kept religious track of them all, noting the ones she particularly liked and filing them away for future summers. It never occurred to her that she might take a recipe home to New York and try it over the winter. Habits might be broken on holiday, but Labor Day returned life to its proper austerity. Still, the thought of Margaret clipping away—dreaming, really—through the long, cold months conjured the irrepressible hope of a love affair.

  The years went by and Margaret’s age finally took its long-delayed toll. There was the first summer she could no longer walk the fifty feet to the beach. She’d sit on the porch steps staring at that small, insurmountable distance. And then the summer when her hands were no longer strong enough to crack a lobster shell. John tenderly took the lobster from her, cracked it, and gave it back, continuing the conversation all the while. At the end of dinner, with undiminished fervor, she declared it the best lobster she’d had yet. By then, I’d learned that she graced every lobster dinner with those same words.

  Margaret’s impatience with her weakening body inevitably turned outward. At five o’clock sharp, she would stomp her cane and call out from the porch: “It’s time for a drink!” John and I would scurry, leaving computers, work, sentences half-written—John to get white wine from the fridge, me to get the requisite peanuts. We were older, our obligations had multiplied, summers no longer stretched into fall. Our own frustrations occasionally began to simmer.

  One night in particular has stayed with me. Margaret had just arrived, and we were to have our annual lobster feast. It had taken me ten years to scale the boiling time down to a palatable twelve or thirteen minutes, and I’d permanently replaced the dreaded margarine with actual butter. But change is not always a friend. John was in the throes of finishing a new novel and had been at his desk, writing, a solid ten hours by the time he broke for the day. Showered, eager for a glass of wine, he’d already put on fresh khakis, uncorked a good bottle, and settled into the Kennedy Rocker when Margaret appeared with the lobster pot.

  The wind was up and we could all hear the ocean roaring on the beach. John asked if this once we might use salted tap water. Margaret’s response was a simple enough “No,” but the indignation in her voice was unmistakable. John was silent—and as angry as I’d ever seen him. “It just won’t do,” added Margaret, impatiently tapping her cane on the floor. But John was already rolling up his pants to perform his time-honored chore.

  The water was freezing and the sky steel-gray that evening. Margaret sat down on the porch steps and watched John disappear over the dune. I observed her from a few feet away. Far from victorious, she seemed to be questioning herself, wondering, no doubt, if time had made her ways too fixed, irrelevant. I took a seat next to her. Stupidly, I tried to tell her that she was right, even Jasper White, the great New England chef, called for cooking lobsters in ocean water. But that was hardly the point. It was, of course, the ritual, in all its effort, that mattered. It set the meal squarely in her history, some ninety years of it by then, and set it apart from other days and other meals.

  John came up the porch steps, bent over his burden. Margaret, surprising us mightily, conceded that next time we might try tap water, but John shook his head. It wouldn’t be the same. And seeing him standing there, soaking wet but smiling, his arms trembling under the weight of the huge lobster pot filled with fresh seawater from the Atlantic Ocean, I couldn’t help but agree. At the end of dinner, Margaret, true to herself, rose to the occasion—she declared her lobster the very best she’d ever eaten.

  This summer Margaret will be ninety-seven. She’ll come to Nantucket with a caretaker, an oxygen tank, and a wheelchair. Her short-term memory is under assault, but the past she remembers with intense feeling. Traditions are more important to her than ever. They connect our family. John and I now have a little boy and a large dog. When it’s time to collect the ocean water, I imagine I’ll give our son a bucket and Margaret and I will watch him traipse after his father, learning the way we have always cooked lobsters.

  Pork Cooked in Milk

  This is a tasty dish but not a pretty one. Garnish as you see fit with additional lemon zest and sage leaves. Serve with egg noodles or rice.

  Serves 6

  3 pounds pork loin, tied by butcher

  2 teaspoons ground sage

  2 teaspoons sea salt, preferably Maldon

  Freshly ground pepper

  1 tablespoon grapeseed or olive oil

  6 sprigs of fresh sage

  1 to 5 cloves garlic

  2 cups heavy cream

  1 cup full-fat organic milk

  Grated zest of 1 lemon

  Rub the ground sage, salt and pepper into the pork loin and leave to absorb the flavors overnight in the fridge in a large zip-top bag, with the air squeezed out.

  Heat a large oval Dutch oven over medium-high heat for 1 minute. Add the oil and tilt the pot so that th
e oil forms a thin layer over the bottom. Heat another minute, then add the pork, fat side down, and brown. This should take about 20 minutes, estimating about 4 to 5 minutes per side and ends. When the pork is crusted in a rich gold, remove it. Discard the fat from the pot.

  Return the pot to the heat and add the fresh sage, garlic, cream, milk and lemon zest. Bring to a simmer. Return the pork to the pot and return to a simmer. Partially cover and cook until the pork reaches 145°F. This should take about an hour and 15 minutes.

  Resist the urge to touch the pork while it’s cooking. As I mentioned, this is not a pretty dish. The milk curdles, but once those curdles thicken, they turn to a blissful custard. If the curdles have not thickened to your liking by the time the pork has cooked, simply remove the pork and continue cooking the liquid.

  Serve with custard in a gravy boat.

  A BOUNTIFUL SHORE: CELEBRATING THANKSGIVING ON THE CHESAPEAKE BAY

  By Bernard L. Herman

  From Saveur

  Family traditions cling fast to Thanksgiving feasts. As an American Studies professor at the University of North Carolina, Bernard L. Herman can be forgiven for obsessing a bit about the Chesapeake Bay terroir of his family’s time-honored Thanksgiving dinner menu.

  Just before dawn on Thanksgiving morning, I pull on my waders, grab a basket, and splash my way to the oyster cages that lie a hundred or so yards from our house on the banks of Westerhouse Creek, not far from the shore of Chesapeake Bay. Light from the kitchen windows flickers across the water. The first winter jellyfish pulse in the flowing tide. Hauling one of the cages onto the lip of a sandbar, I brush away seaweed, unhook the lid, and peer at the oysters inside. Silvery grass shrimp somersault across the shells. Mud crabs skitter to the cage’s bottom. A drowsy oyster toad squirms in a corner. Into my basket, I toss big handfuls of oysters—a favorite delicacy at the Thanksgiving meal my family hosts every year on Virginia’s Eastern Shore, the long, narrow peninsula that forms the eastern boundary of the lower Chesapeake Bay.

  I have loved this place since I was a child growing up here in the 1950s. Even after I moved away, I stayed connected to the Eastern Shore. Over the years, I looked for ways to return to the place, visiting often, and writing academic papers on the peninsula’s food and folk traditions, old and new—from the annual October snapping-turtle feast to the everyday life of the Eastern Shore’s early settlers and native communities. About ten years ago my wife, Becky, and I bought a second home here, a 1720s brick house south of the village of Bayford, about 20 miles from the peninsula’s southern tip. It has become my family’s favorite place to spend Thanksgiving.

  The company isn’t huge by holiday standards: This year it’s just me and Becky; my mother, Lucy; my sister, Fredrika (who goes by “Freddie”), and her husband, Paul; their daughter, Jessica, and her six-year-old son, Peter; and our daughter, Lania, who’s brought her friend Samantha, whom everyone calls Sam. As for the meal, it tends to be a bit over the top. For me, it’s a coming together of all my favorite Eastern Shore traditions, and a celebration of the local foods that have fed the people of this peninsula for generations—all of it combined with the favorite holiday dishes of the rest of my family.

  The Eastern Shore is 70 miles of sandy, fertile land abutting the country’s best clamming and oyster-growing waters. The climate is Mediterranean, and home gardens here yield figs, peaches, and even pomegranates. No matter what time of year it is, when I’m on the Eastern Shore, I always seem to be thinking about provisioning our Thanksgiving meal. Becky and I start our preparations early, in July and August, when we and our friends put up fruit preserves, and savory pickles made from the tomatoes and okra that the area produces so abundantly.

  Throughout the fall, our neighbors who hunt and fish make their contributions, too, though what gets to the table depends on luck and weather. Our neighbor Jon Moore presents us with six venison roasts, and another friend, ace oyster grower Tom Gallivan, drops off a 25-pound bluefish. I rub the venison in black pepper and cayenne, and cure it in the smoker in our backyard, then fillet and smoke the bluefish, before storing both away until November.

  As the holiday draws near, our preparations intensify, peaking two days before Thanksgiving, when I embark on the annual “big loop,” an epic, daylong drive to visit purveyor friends along the shore. It’s my version of the Thanksgiving harvest. The trip ranges from one end of Northampton County to the other, along back roads bracketed by creek and marsh, field and woodland.

  This year, Sam accompanies me. Our first stop is Pickett’s Harbor Farms, at the southern tip of the peninsula, where W. T. and Tammie Nottingham live on land W. T.’s family has farmed for generations.

  They grow heirloom sweet potatoes, including a variety called Hayman that is virtually unique to this area and prized for its dense white flesh and intense sweetness. We pick up a couple dozen of them, plus a medley of other kinds for cooking into casseroles. Next, we drive north to visit James Elliott, the co-owner of A. & J.’s Fresh Meat Market, in the little railroad town of Cheriton. A. & J.’s is where we get our turkey, always naturally raised. James also makes a sage pork sausage that really sings. This year I buy some for our hominy and oyster stuffing, and, as I do every year, I ask him what goes into the sausage. He gives me the same wry answer he always does: “That is something I’m not telling.”

  After that, we head to JC Walker Brothers Inc. clam house in Willis Wharf. “These just came off the grounds this morning,” Hank Arnold, the owner, says as he hands me a 250-count bag of littlenecks. Finally, before heading home, we make a return visit to Tom Gallivan, our oysterman friend, who owns Shooting Point Oyster Company in Bayford, to retrieve two mesh bags of Shooting Point and Nassawadox Salt oysters, to supplement the haul from my own oyster cages.

  The next day, Wednesday, preparations really shift into high gear. While I brown the sage sausage in a cast-iron skillet for the stuffing, Becky makes a couple of sweet potato casseroles and a pumpkin cheesecake. I turn next to the smoked bluefish, making a creamy, brandy-spiked pâté. Finally, Lania and Sam prepare an old family standby, juicing lemons and chopping oranges and apples for a cranberry relish that’s based on a recipe my mother, a retired elementary school teacher, coaxed from a lunchroom cook in the 1960s. Once our two refrigerators are full, Becky and I tidy the kitchen and turn in for the night.

  On Thanksgiving Day, by seven o’clock, I’ve returned from my oyster beds with a hundred or so Westerhouse Pinks, as I like to call the mollusks native to our creek. I take them over to an old workbench, which will serve as an outdoor buffet table that we’ve set up in the yard. I lay out a couple dozen of my oysters on ice-filled wooden trays, alongside the ones from Tom Gallivan, then light the propane burner on the pot steamer that I’ll be using to steam the littlenecks. Sam and Lania bring out some pickled okra and pickled figs, the bluefish pâté, and the cured, smoked venison, sliced paper-thin and served with rounds of crusty bread and coarse brown mustard. At our home, the eating on Thanksgiving starts outdoors, and it starts early.

  By ten o’clock, almost everyone has arrived, and the festivities officially commence. In the middle of the yard stands a towering pyre of branches, driftwood, and old stumps, fuel for the bonfire that we always light on Thanksgiving morning and keep burning into the night. This year, Sam does the honors, touching a match to the pile. Flames erupt high in the air, and everyone cheers.

  The bonfire lit, it’s time to shuck the first oysters. I pop open one of my Westerhouse Pinks; it’s fat and sweet. Then I taste a Shooting Point Salt, which has a briny, mineral tang. My brother-in-law, Paul, the family’s Thanksgiving sommelier, shows up with a case of domestic bottles from his cellar. For the oysters, we open a chardonnay crafted by Chatham Vineyards just up the road.

  As morning turns to afternoon, guests beat a path between the roaring bonfire and the steamy warmth of the kitchen. The turkey—stuffed with the sage sausage and hominy, rubbed with olive oil, and seasoned with fresh parsley, salt, and black pepp
er—has been roasting for a couple of hours already, and it’s filling the room with its aroma. Various family members pursue culinary tasks under Becky’s gentle direction. Freddie and Jessica plate creamed spinach and a layered vegetable terrine. Becky pulls a pan of roasted oysters from the oven and sets them out with one relish of pickled green tomatoes and another of horseradish, beets, and cranberries. The cooks snatch the oysters right off the baking tray, and in minutes, they’re gone. Just before dinner is served, Becky improvises a last-minute dessert of roasted pears stuffed with minced pear, almonds, dried currants, and raisins.

  Finally, by midafternoon, all the dishes are ready, arrayed on our kitchen table. In the dining room, my late father’s huge, three-by-eight-foot writing desk has been put into service as our dinner table. I head outside to throw a few more branches on the fire and then come in to grab a plate along with everyone else. It is a sumptuous spread: the freshly carved turkey; a platter of thin-sliced aged country ham; the baked Hayman sweet potatoes, incomparably luscious; the Brussels sprouts and rosemary potatoes; plus the pumpkin cheesecake, an apple pie, a boozy rum Bundt cake, and Becky’s sugar-glazed roasted pears, which are destined to become a regular addition to the holiday menu. There is no order to serving. Everyone just descends on a favorite dish.

  At last, seated, glasses raised, we toast the day, and then we toast the cooks. Becky, looking tired and elated at the same time, clinks her glass with Lania’s and says, “Aren’t we lucky?” In no time, guests are heading back into the kitchen for seconds. Before dessert, I read aloud from The Sot-Weed Factor, John Barth’s great novel, written in 1960, about life in the Chesapeake Bay country of the late 1600s. I select a passage that describes an imagined eating contest between the English explorers and the Ahatchwhoop Indians to choose a king: