When Deirdre and John were here this weekend and telling us about Paris, I was remembering times I spent in Europe, back when mothers went to the market for the day's food, carrying a straw bag and bringing home enough for the meals and a little more. My aunt actually married a German man and lived this life.
Marketing in the morning, large meal at midday, light "collation" in the evening, warm rolls delivered early to the doorstep, eaten for breakfast with unsalted butter and coffee (although I personally don't like coffee. I know).
We were thinking about how, if the mother is the manager of her home, the family eats simply but well.
I don't know why being the manager of the home (leaving aside being its heart, and just purely looking at things job-wise) is considered... nothing.
Have you been to a hotel recently? Maybe to stay, or for a reception? Can you imagine even thinking, "This hotel is great. It's comfortable, welcoming, clean, and refreshing. The food tastes homemade. It's wonderful that this hotel has no manager."
The amazing thing about being the manager of your own home is that it's just such a pleasure. Listen, everything has its downside; nothing is perfect. But the freedom to decide when, where, and how to do things, taking into consideration only the opinions of those you love, why, that's a pleasure.
Well, it can be!
One thing I'm worried about is that if we are always trying to get out of the very things that go into managing a home, we will be missing the point.
I'm all for being efficient. You can read about "Save-A-Step" cooking right on this blog. Please do, because I tell you all about how you can make your steps in the kitchen pay off for you, so that once you hit your stride, you are often only cooking one item per meal, using other things previously cooked to round out the plate. Also, look on the sidebar to understand how menu planning really works -- how it frees your time.
However, I caution against getting caught up in the idea that you can put in a mighty effort once in a while and then just not cook at all for, say, a month.
First, really? I'm not sure I would enjoy eating a completely defrosted and re-heated dish every day, and I am quite sure that the leftovers of such a meal would not be palatable. And you need good leftovers for lunch the next day (I'm assuming that we Americans are just not going to eat that European way, more's the pity). Throwing food away is an admission of defeat.
In terms of the tastiness of food, it's usually the case that freshly cooked is better than defrosted/reheated, although I will not begrudge anyone the occasional emergency casserole tucked away in there.
{Rosie made a truly epic batch of chicken enchiladas that were much enjoyed by moi just before one of the weddings. There were enough people there so that none was left. Chili freezes well (and that was a good menu -- chicken enchiladas, chili, cornbread, salad, guacamole -- the hordes left satisfied). We'll have to get the recipe. They froze well.}
But I am not convinced about a lot of things, especially things that are meant to be à la minute: Stir fry, e. g. Stir fry is fast. Stir fry is meant to be sort of crispy in the veggies, super light and fresh. What are we saving when we freeze stir fry? I posit that we are wasting, as the mush will have to be chucked.
But, second, what is it that you are rushing to do? Sometimes there are weeks of day camp or crazy practice evenings. I get that. A well stocked freezer, as I describe in the Save-A-Step style of cooking, will help. But even if you could conjure up edible meals every day from the freezer, which I doubt, why would you want to do that? So that you could be... where?
The pleasure is in the process, my friend. Embrace it, and your whole life will slow down admirably. The rhythm of each day is where we find our peace. When we rush, we lose a lot. For instance, children need the time when they have finished their dinner-readying chores (cleaning up their toys, unloading the dishwasher for you, setting the table, taking out the trash, making sure the animals are fed) either to run out and play or to relax with a book.
It makes them feel secure to have you puttering around in the kitchen, calmly getting things ready. It makes them feel loved. And you yourself love your life more when you are working deliberately, without booming and busting. You love your life more when you are competent at what you do!
Okay, now for the promised secret to wonderful summer salads.
The secret is the platter!
A Salade Composée is a wonderful French invention. It takes previously cooked foods -- a starch, such as rice or potatoes, a protein, such as chicken or fish, and vegetables, and offers them in the form of a salad.
But you need the platter to get your creativity flowing.
Let's think about it a little.
Let's say that one night this summer (Sunday, maybe) you grilled a big batch of chicken. With that you served some zucchini, green beans, asparagus, beets, greens, or just about anything you can think of, cooked just right with butter and lemon or olive oil and rosemary. You made all the veggies you had. On the side were lovely boiled red potatoes, skin still on, maybe tossed with parsley and butter as well. With foresight, you boiled up twice as many potatoes as necessary. You also had a green salad, so there is only about half a head of lettuce left in your fridge.
Well, on Tuesday you could make a different kind of salad dish, perfectly suited to summer, even with that little bit of lettuce, if you have the proper plate to serve it on.
That is where this platter comes in. It's 20 1/2" X 14 1/2" -- the size that caterers use. I got mine, almost on a whim, because you know that I'm not the kind of person to think that a platter will necessarily solve my issues, at the now sadly bygone Linens N Things. This is the one I could find now, and it's a lot pricier, sad to say:
It's really big. Here it is with my big cake platter for scale:
That cake platter is what I made my Salade Niçoise on. (That is the best known of these types of salads, and it's just so good.) Until the wedding season, I kept forgetting about my big white platter, which is stowed away in the china closet.
The beauty of the big platter is that you can truly Compose your Salade, as opposed to piling it in a deep bowl and ending up with undifferentiated mix. This allows you to make the most of your ingredients, for when things are arranged beautifully, they are appealing to the appetite.
If you happen to have a lot of lettuce, why, then, first fill your platter with that. In the photo with the chicken, I did have lots of lettuce and it was one of those incredibly hot days when you can't eat any starch other than some crispy pita triangles. But if, as in my chicken dinner hypothetical, you only have a small amount, use it on the edges. Put your starch in the center. Shred your chicken around that.
You know how to make a salad fun already. Rummage around your fridge and pantry for these things, any or all:
Dried fruit (such as cranberries)
Fresh fruit (such as thinly sliced apples)
Crumbled bacon (I try to squirrel away two pieces at Sunday breakfast for just such things during the week)
Thinly sliced red onion or green onion
Sundried tomatoes
Chopped nuts -- my preferred are almonds, pecans, and, voluptuously, pistachios
Hard boiled eggs, sliced
Leftover corn kernels
Crumbled tortilla chips
Shredded cheese -- my preferred are cheddar, feta, or blue (and I really do prefer a tangy, vs. oozy, American buttermilk blue, and it's cheaper than French)
For the starch, you can use anything like:
Potatoes
Rice
Bulgur
Couscous
Pasta, although I think I would only like pasta tossed with pesto for this type of thing.
Whatever it is, it needs to be room temp. Rice needs to be reheated and then cooled down, but not served straight out of the fridge, which is not tasty. At. All.
For your protein, you can use any meat or fish, and you don't need much for this to feel like a full meal. Leftover grilled steak, yummy! You can supplement with lentils, chickpeas, or black beans. Of course, any beans would work, but those would be my faves.
The secondary secret, known to the French but not so much to Americans, is to add those cooked vegetables. As long as you cooked them properly to start with, so that they are done through but not mushy, they will be fabulous with a salad dressing on top.
Rosie took this photo of a shrimp Salad Composée that I pulled together another night when we were in the throes of wedding prep and suddenly I realize that many more people would be home for dinner than I had exactly thought through. We were so busy -- she just pulled out her phone at the last minute:
All I had was a 2-pound bag of shrimp in the freezer and literally half a head of lettuce (I was really caught off guard somehow, despite all my planning!). To feed about 8 hungry adults? Can you imagine if I had given each person their own few pieces of shrimp and one shred of lettuce? That's what it would have looked like on the plate, although somehow, we ended up with leftovers after this! And, fortunately, one of the guests, dear Lauren, was on a gluten-free diet, so we lucked out with the choice of starch.
I made zucchini fritters to round things out, and I think you can see zucchini in the salad as well.
Anyway, top everything off with a liberal dousing of homemade vinaigrette. Match the type to your food. For a light seafood Salade Composée, try one with lemon added to the vinegar. If it's leftover grilled steak, use balsamic vinegar and lots of mustard. A good cookbook (such as The Way to Cook
) will explain exactly what to do, but here is a little recipe for you to get started with:Vinaigrette Like Mother, Like Daughter
3 parts Extra Virgin Olive Oil (in this case, about 1 cup)
1 part vinegar (in this case, 1/3 cup of red wine vinegar and lemon juice mixed together -- just lemon alone is often not quite acidic enough)
1 clove garlic
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon dried mustard powder
I used my immersion blender (hence my choice of wide-mouth jar, which allows the blender to just fit right in there). It emulsifies the mixture to the point that it seems downright creamy. By the way, mustard helps with emulsion as well. However, a vigorous shake of the jar works fine if you don't have a blender.
Taste this and see if it's to your liking. It should be rather more acidic than for a green salad, since you have the starchy and cooked things sort of counteracting the brightness.
There is no reason ever ever ever to buy salad dressing. And that is the final secret of the salad! Mwah!
