Hungry in America

Whenever I make a meal for a gathering, I love to lay out all the plates and platters on the table and assign a dish to each one. I think it is the serenity of it that appeals to me—all these plates sitting there so peaceful and pretty before they’re filled with heaps and mounds of food.


But there’s nothing pretty at all about dishes that stand empty for one, two or even three meals a day. And there is no serenity in lying awake at night wondering how in the world you’re going to feed your child.

That is the reality of 49 million Americans who struggle with hunger. That’s 1 in 8 American families; 1 in 4 children.


In 1968, CBS aired a one-hour documentary that shocked the country with its report that 10 million Americans were facing hunger. Congressmen George McGovern and Bob Dole responded by creating legislation to form programs like WIC, a supplemental nutrition program for women, infants and children, modern day food stamps and school feeding programs. Much of it worked.


But somehow hunger became a lost priority. With each passing decade, the number of hungry families in our own country climbed, from 10 million to 30 million to a staggering 49 million in 2008. That’s five times the population of Hungary, and almost the entire population of France.


What’s shocking is that most of these families have at least one adult who works full time. And none of these families goes lacks food because our country lacks the resources to grow enough. This isn’t a famine. This is an outrage.

The United States is the only wealthy, industrialized nation with a massive hunger crisis. Why?

That is exactly the question the filmmakers behind the documentary Hungry in America seek to answer.

Private food banks, pantries and other feeding programs financed through charity seek to address hunger, but the need is too great. The problems causing hunger need to be addressed on a bigger scale. We need to ask questions like why ten percent of America’s largest and richest corporate farms collect almost 75% of federal farm subsidies; and why are many of these the same farms that grow corn to produce foods sweetened with corn syrup and sold cheaply to low-income Americans.

Good Food is everyone's right.

That is a belief I share with organizations like FEED projects, Good Food Gardens, Share our Strength and Hungry in America. Last night, at Colicchio and Sons restaurant in Manhattan, Tom Colicchio {of Top Chef fame} joined FEED foundation and Vanity Fair to raise funds to finish the film that will be a game changer in the fight against hunger, and to help launch FEED USA. Many generous New Yorker’s including Natalie Portman, Katie Couric, and Jake Gyllenhal gathered to lend their support, their celebrity, or their sense of responsibility to the filmmakers.

After we all ate rounds of carefully crafted potato gnocchi with braised brussel sprouts, tuna sashimi, lamb loin with lentils, and steamed oysters with celeriac slaw, we paused to try to imagine what it would feel like to have an empty belly as we listened to the voices of hunger as filmed by Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush, the women behind  Hungry in America.

It’s a difficult thing to imagine, an empty fridge, an empty pantry, an empty plate. But it exists. In this country. No one can turn away from the true stories of those who live in that nightmare every day.

When the film is finished and shown across the country, the hope is that we can count on the passion and empathy of the American people to demand national change. In the meantime, the film, and the feeding, requires individual change and the generosity of sponsors like you. If you can, please support the film here. And you can help FEED a child here. 

Mad Hungry {books}

“Men eat differently than women—they eat more, they eat constantly, and they eat passionately.”  ~Lucinda Scala Quinn

I always thought I had the man food thing down pretty well. It was with food that I first lured András to my side, and he’s cleaned his plate during every meal since, praising my culinary prowess. But my focus has always been on quality over quantity—small amounts of exceptionally raised, lovingly braised bits of goodness that just fill us up.

Recently I learned that I’ve been going about the whole thing all wrong. Quality is key, but a hearty helping counts for an awful lot. My wake up call came when András came to pick me up at work for date night one recent Friday.  My colleague and friend Claudia, wife, and mother of two half-grown men, had just cooked up an oversized portion of pasta. She offered András a little taste before we headed to our concert, and before I knew it he was pulled up to the bar opposite her cook top, polishing off his second plate. It was more than I had ever seen him eat at home.

I’ve since learned that as intuitive as it is to cook for anyone we love, there really is an art to feeding the men and boys in our lives—be it boyfriend, brother, best buddy or little boy. No one knows this better than Lucinda Scala Quinn, author of the playful new book Mad Hungry : Feeding Men & Boys. You may recognize her name and face from the pages of Martha Stewart Living, where she is the Executive Food Director, but her shining role is that of wife, and mother to three active boys whom she feeds with the spirited recipes she’s created and gathered cooking her way through life.

I sent a copy of this book to my sister Jenny in San Diego, who has the joyous job of feeding her hubby and my nephew Benjamin, both excellent eaters. Last week she added one more man to that list, my dad, while my parents were out there visiting.

Tonight, upon their return, I called Mom and Dad to hear about the trip and Dad’s report centered firmly around Jenny’s chicken parmesan dinner, which came from the pages of this book.

“Where can I get mother a copy of that Man Hunger book?” Dad asked.

Right here. 

Date Night {Roman's}

ft. greene, brooklyn

Last night we had dinner with our friends Katie and Parker at their new neighborhood restaurant,  Roman's.  The meal was simple, satisfying, actually kind of perfect. Romans serves like kind of food that you could make at home but tastes especially good when someone else has done the work for you—things like stretched mozzarella on toasted bread, hen of the woods mushroom toasts with telleggio fonduta, and tagliatelle in a light rabbit ragu. It all adds up to a belly that’s not overly full, but incredibly satisfied.  And they have a pretty savory beer list too. Try the Aventiunus Doppelbock.

Between the four of us, we don’t each much meat, but we share a philosophy on eating humanely raised meats sold directly to the consumer.  Roman’s is the kind of place that celebrates that too, so go ahead and order the beef rib agnolotti {if it’s still there, the menu changes daily}. It helps to have your very own butcher, as Roman's does {Marlow and Daughters} but we won’t begrudge their good fortune since they’re not greedy with their resources. You can get quality meats from their butcher too, just down the road apiece.

Romans

243 Dekalb Avenue

Ft. Greene, NY

718-622-5300

Marlow & Daughters

95 Broadway

Williamsburg, Brooklyn

718-388-5700

Liège Waffles {a love offering}

Today when I was reading through the Saveur 100 {February + March issue} I got stuck on no. 92, submitted by Isabelle Zgonc of Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania. Her ode to the Chicken Paprikash her mother used to make began like this...

"In the minds of some of their Eastern European immigrant neighbors, my parents, Lester and Olga Kolozy, had a mixed marriage: he was Hungarian and she was Slovenian. It didn't get in the way too much, though; they were married for 60 years. They fell in love after my father spotted my mother at a Valentine's Day dance in Cleveland, Ohio; her parents told her not to marry a Hungarian, because all they think about is their next meal." 

I was not given such similar warnings before marrying András, who is also Hungarian, but if I had, like Olga, I doubt I would have listened. I read on to learn that Olga became an accomplished Hungarian cook and made her husband's mouth water for the flavors of home. Like Olga, I learned quickly that sometimes the best way to show a Hungarian man, or any man for that matter that you love him is with a plate full of his favorite food. This is true on any day, but especially on Valentine's Day.

Though András loves the food of his homeland and seems to feel extra loved when I sprinkle paprika on anything from fried eggs to fish, his favorite food as of late hails from Belgium —Gaufres de Liège, or Liège style waffles.

Gaufres de Liege are the crisp, sweet, dense and chewy waffles you find in the street stands in Brussels, Brugge or the city of Liège. There they are served simply with a dusting of powdered sugar,  a far different thing than the oversized, airy waffles we see on breakfast menus here at home.  According to legend, Liege waffles were brought to New York via The Waffle Guy, by appointment of the Belgian Ministry of Culinary Affairs. András fell in love with "the chewy ones" as he calls them, at the hands of the Wafels and Dinges truck who serve them at his cycling races, and has been asking me to make them ever since. 

We make standard Belgian waffles regularly, but the two of the three ingredients that give Liège waffles their distinctive texture—bread flour, large amounts of butter kneaded into a yeasted dough {like brioche} and pearl sugar that caramelizes on the hot iron—aren't things I always have on hand. But thanks to the internet and a little advance planning, I was in the running for wife if the year. 

After the dough was made, butter and pearl sugar kneaded in, and iron pre-heated, I set a simple table with the tulips he'd brought me and useless forks, and cooked up batch after batch of hot "chewy ones." {recipe here} We ate them by hand, one after another, first with sugar then Nutella, as I pulled them hot from the iron. András lapped me several times, rubbed his belly, kissed my hand and retired to the couch where he seemed contended for about a half hour before he asked, 

"Are there any more?" 

In a world of glass slippers and glittering castles, a question like that might make a girl feel forlorn. In the world of Lesters and Olgas, the world to which I belong, that's a question that sounds a lot like love.

Sweet Nothings {chocolate}

"Love is a canvas furnished by nature and embroidered by imagination."
~Voltaire

It seems that chocolate for Valentine's day never goes out of style.  A well-dressed bar from Mast Brother's Chocolate, the Brooklyn chocolatiers whose chocolates come hand-wrapped in vintage paper, would certainly make a suitable offering for your beloved. But why should they have all the fun? Hand-wrap your own, as I have, in one of the pretty papers you saved from your last paper spree {my favorites come from here}. A handmade sweet nothing that speaks volumes in love.

Pulpo

{a love letter}

A few years ago, I wrote an ode to an old love that was picked up by Chow as their favorite love letter of the season {flattering!}. When I ran across it the other day, I found it still stirred feelings for a flavor that's gone remiss on my table; I thought it worth reprinting here in honor of rekindled flames and the coming of cupid. 

~

There is something about Octopus that always makes me feel like love. It wouldn’t have seemed so when I first tasted the eight-armed creature back in the second grade when my classmate brought in cold Korean-style octopus for show and tell. I stepped right up to taste, but the texture was foreign, and the flavor did nothing to quiet my concerns that the suctions would stick to the insides of my cheek. The experience was memorable, but not in the way a food wants to be remembered. It wasn't exactly love at first bite.

Years later, at a dinner with Japanese delegates from the UN, my hosts insisted I’d find love in a bowl of baby octopi, heads and all. Like an ill-matched pair on a blind date, we sat at an awkward distance, the octopi and I, until etiquette necessitated I eat them in their entirety, with nary a lick of sauce or soy. It seemed there just was no chemistry. 

Several years later, the cephalopod waived its flirtatious arms my way again, this time more successfully, at a dinner prepared for me by my dear Valentine. An adventurous eater who’d spent several years near the sea in Spain, my Valentine and I shared a deep affection for foods that swim. When he placed the octopus before me, its skin glistened through the generous layers of olive oil, lemon juice and parsley; I couldn’t resist. It was delicious— tender, juicy, and meaty in a way I’d never thought seafood could be. 

Though I had never cooked octopus myself, I'd heard storied techniques for tenderizing that ranged from beating it with a rolling pin to cooking it with a cork. I saw my Valentine’s success as valiant, like wrestling a bear in the wild. So infatuated was I that I didn’t think to ask for details about how he’d prepared it (beaten and bruised?), where he had bought it (Chinatown?), or why he had gone to all of that work for just two itty bitty portions. I was in love.

Several months later, during a Central Park picnic, this Valentine produced a Spanish tin of Pulpo in Olio (Octopus in Olive Oil), a lemon, and a set of toothpicks. He pulled the tin back the pop-top handle, halved the lemon with his well-worn Opinel knife and squeezed the juice that quickened into the oil as an impromptu dressing. Having not the habit of eating foods from a can, I was skeptical but still amorous, so I partook. With one bite I knew I’d been blinded by love—the canned octopus had the same succulent tenderness as the one I’d tasted at his house. I should have known that my Valentine had more suave than skill.

That’s how I got stuck on octopus. Like every good love affair, it’s had its ups and downs, but there is always something new to discover. I’ve had octopus in paella and ala plancha, hot and sizzling, grilled and charred, sushi style, Spanish style, simple and sublime— always at the hands of a trusted chef, but never in my own kitchen.  Many things deterred me from trying it at home, the hours of beating and braising, seasoning and saucing that are required, the posture of the octopi lining the streets of Chinatown.

Last week, in a fit of Valentine’s nostalgia, I ordered Grilled Octopus with Fagioli Diavoli Beans and Cavolo Nero at Del Posto, across the street from my kitchen at work. It was captivating—skillfully charred and curled on top of earthy braised greens and buttery beans. Leave it to Mark Ladner, the man behind the menu of Mario Batali's Del Posto to create such simple goodness. I've rubbed elbows with Mark enough during the taping of Iron Chef {where he's Batali's sous chef} to peek into the kitchen and ask him his secret, inspiration to try it at home. But then again, I could cross the street, a far simpler proposition.


And then, there is always the tin can.


Recently, dear friends moved from Madrid to New York. As a token of love, I made them a meal with flavors from home—sardines, Branzino, braised lamb in Tempranillo, Manchego cheese, and pulpo.

They praised all, but best of all the pulpo. They didn’t ask how I’d made it so tender, where I’d hid the remains, or which local fishmonger I preferred. And like my old valentine, I didn’t tell.

Maybe that’s the secret to love.

~

lazy lady churros {donuts}

l.i.c., ny

For the first time in my six years working at Food Network, the office is closed today for snow. Hooray for Snow Days! They’re a perfect excuse to take good care of yourself— soak in the tub, boil up a pot of water to steam your face, and make good use of your leftover churro batter. If you’re feeling lazy, like me, forgo the piping bag and lower little spoonfuls of batter into the hot oil to fry up little donut holes. Smother them in a blizzard of cinnamon sugar and snuggle in. Skip the guilt; I’m sure you’ll work it off with some vigorous play in the snow later today. 

Igloo making anyone? 

Postcards from El Morro

mexico city, mexico

I can’t quite recall exactly how András and I chose Mexico City as the starting point for our honeymoon, but I can recall the thing that made it hard to leave— hot chocolate and churros from Churreria El Morro. It could be argued by locals that these are actually the second best churros in Mexico City, but nothing could match the atmosphere in this 1930’s institution. There we could sit for hours, waiting for our churros and hot chocolate {Spanish, French, or Mexican style}, watching waitresses come and go in pink pinafores and pearly white loafers as gentleman snapped sections from ring upon ring of freshly fried churros.  Soaked in cinnamon sugar, each stack lasted only half as long as we hoped and seconds were a sure thing.

We’ve have been talking about those churros so much lately that one day recently when we were pedaling back from Brooklyn on a too-cold day, András pulled into the parking lot of Costo to share a dirty little secret with me—$1 a bag churros in the Costco cafeteria.

I’d like you tell you that I slapped his wrist and steered him in a different direction, and that absolutely everything we eat is always and forever more hand made by me. That’s only about 85 % true. The truth is, my lame attempts at a protest weren’t successful. I was too frozen stiff to argue, and besides, have you ever tried to take a toy from a toddler?

Costco’s churros have nothing on the crispy columns with melting interiors we experienced in Mexico. Not even $1 worth. So tonight, while the rest of the world was immersed in the superbowl, I set out to do some quality rewiring on András taste buds with a fresh batch of my own.  

{click recipe to enlarge}

Barbacoa

mexico city, mexico

There seems to be an unwritten law that going on honeymoons is like joining the Masons... secret and mysterious, and the fewer questions asked the less embarrassing for everybody. ~Martha Byrd Porter, Straight Down a Crooked Lane

This time last year, András I were on a plane bound for Mexico City, en route to our honeymoon. When we arrived, we checked in here, in a plain but perfect room flooded in light with an old footed tub in the middle.

The next day, our friend Nick had arranged for his cousins {and now our friends} Mary and Ro to take us for a day of authentic eating, starting with barbacoa at 8 o'clock am Sunday morning. From what I had read, barbacoa was something like barbecue, though that description hardly does the trick. Mary and Ro took us on a drive 30 minutes to the far side of the city {which side I couldn’t tell you} through unkept residential roads and alleys far from chic Condessa. Soon we were standing before the scene above ordering steamed, simmered hunks of meat lifted from a maguey leaf-lined pit, chopped on a smoothed old wood stump, weighed and served by the pound.

We hadn’t told them András is a vegetarian, though it didn’t matter. Barbarcoa is served with dozens of hot corn tortillas made by the magic of young hands that move like a dance over hot cast iron barrels, releasing the steamy golden disks into stacks.  Our appetite for masa awakened ravenous gratitude for their craft. We returned to their barrels over and over to watch and to refill our emptied basket, washing it all down with salsa, cerveza and hot-sweetened coffee. 

The moment was as unfortgetable as the meal, an ancient tradition seeped in the colors of Diego Rivera’s Mexico, the steam that soaked the air with stewed meat and the painterly quality of it all that appeared on film through the old camera I’d taken with us, leaving us with a longing for Mexico, with all its secrets and mysteries.

B is for Brooklyn {and beer}

brooklyn, ny

Last night, on north 11th street in Brooklyn, Brooklyn Brewery released the latest in their Brooklyn Brewmasters Reserve Series, Cookie Jar Porter, a smooth malty brew rich with the familiar flavors of oats and raisin. I'm not sure what I enjoyed more, the taste on tap or the actual cookies they were inspired by {from Feed Your Soul Bakery}. Both were DE-licious. The truth is I never met an oat I didn't like. If you're not careful, I'm likely to put oats into parts of your meal you never dreamed possible. But I still believe they they are most at home on the sweet side. Last month I dreamed up an oatmeal bark with a dark chocolate coating, layered it with bananas and an oatmeal-infused cream fool-style and called it Fool of Oats. Get it? Full of Oats? Anyway, the Food Network Magazine, where it appeared in the current issue, called it a parfait. Call it what you like, you can get the recipe here.

Oats aside, my favorite part of the the Brooklyn Brewery is their collectables -- bottles that date back to when Brooklyn brewed the world. Brooklyn was once home to almost 50 breweries, the first of which made its home there in 1822. Sadly, the industry went flat by 1976, when every brewery, including the 11 on a 12-stretch block from Bushwick to Williamsburg called Brewer's Row, had closed. But local brewers like Brooklyn Brewery, Six Point Craft Ales and Kelso of Brooklyn are giving the borough and its beer culture a welcome revival. And with all those grains {oats, wheat, barley}, that's a revival even the most health conscious among us can get behind.

{icebox}

porva, hungary

So about those csirke….

After our lagzi, when we had hand-washed all of the dishes, eaten the last of the goulash, simmered the remaining sour cherries and said our goodbyes, we prepared to close up the house for the summer. Just before we left, I went to pull the plug on the refrigerator, but realized there was still some fagyi {ice cream} left in the freezer.

“We should empty this, save energy while we’re gone,” I said.

But András, knowing his parents would be coming and going as guardians of the house while we were away, convinced me to leave it running.

A few months later, I headed back to Hungary to begin working on my citizenship, and check in on the house. After a day’s work in the yard, planting cherry trees and trimming the windows in paint, I headed into the kitchen for a snack. I opened the freezer door, hoping to find some leftover fagyi, but found instead a dozen little frozen, pale pink packets in a shape I couldn’t quite make out. I reached in, and my hand made a quick recognition of a little backbone. Mon Dieu, the csirke! I shut the freezer, swallowed hard and forced a smiled at András mother who was looking on; then returned to the yard where the csirke once roamed to find pulyka {turkey} prancing in their place.

Such is farm life.

Country Chicks, City Chick

porva, hungary

Csirke, which means chicken, was the very first word I learned in Hungarian. I'm not sure how or why, since between András and I, we eat chicken rarely to never, but by the time I made my first trip to Hungary with him, this word was planted firmly in my vocabulary.

On that first trip, we visited András’ nagymama {grandmother}, or Mamma, on her farm in Porva, next door to the tiny house that would become ours. I fell in love with her, her strudel, her land which she farmed by hand in the late afternoons, and the csirke that ran around her backyard showing off their clean coats like pompous city pups. Their presence gave this land that to me seemed to me more fairy tale than working farm an unmistakable authenticity.

Since that first trip, I always visit the hens, happy as larks laying their eggs for our table, and whisper them thanks. We owe much to them.

Nine months after our wedding in Virginia, András, his parents and I hosted a Lakodalom {wedding party} or Lagzi in our backyard in Porva just yards from the little chapel where we laid Mamma to rest earlier that week. At dinner, her csirke ran around clucking beneath our wedding table of kolbász and parikas, Tokaji and goulash ladled from the family bogrács that bubbled over a live fire. Just before dessert, I picked up one of her csirke and tucked it into the silk of my dress, now well worn from two of the happiest days of my life. András' father snapped this photo, which turned out to be one of my favorites of the day, which nods at the dichotomy between the city and country life we both adore, and our shared love for those who cultivate life on the land, including Mamma, whom we dearly miss.

Some of our other favorite photos from this day are featured today on The Brides Guide, the Martha Stewart Wedding blog, and we're deeply honored. And I’m sure from time to time, you’ll hear more about that day here too.

As for the csirke, stay tuned.

le menu {esküvő}

{click menu to enlarge}

Like every bride who loves food, I put a tremendous amount of thought into the meal that would become our first supper as husband and wife. Each recipe had a meaning –Baba Ganoush and labne for the first meal András and I shared; radishes with Kerrygold butter, for my love of France and Ireland; leg of lamb, Dad's favorite on visits to NYC; Potatoes Anya {mother's potatoes} for the meal we eat every time we go home to Hungary; and old-fashioned chocolate layer cake, a nod to Mom's famous birthday cake.

But, no one put more thought into the details of our wedding than my sister, Jenny Goddard, designer, curator of style and creator of Sponge Cake Press, who styled our wedding to a tea. She beautifully crafted our custom {esküvő} logo, our webpage, invitations and these menus which are one of my treasured mementos from this day. One day soon, I'll share these recipes with you. Until I do, may these serve as an amuse bouche.

I do {the first supper}

, Ta

If I could eat every meal in a popular grove in Virginia on a warm October night, sitting at a single table under a canopy of lights with everyone I’ve ever loved, I would. If the table were lit with candlelight and lined with vintage napkins, little boxes of whoopie pies and pleasantries, even better. If could drink champagne and eat stuffed artic char and artisan cheeses and charcuterie and simmered carrots with caraway and chocolate cake with chamomile cream, I would do that too. And if I could sit and talk with András, my siblings, our parents and our dearest friends as the sun fell out of the sky, I would be the happiest girl on earth. But it happened only once. This was our wedding day.

There are dozens of treasured moments and memories tied into every detail of our wedding, from the minute we arrived at the Berry Hill Estate, to the moment we stole away after our last goodbyes to eat our leftover cheese and cake on a blanket somewhere deep on Berry Hill's back 40.

When I think back on that day now, I taste the blackberry cobbler and pickled peaches of our rehearsal dinner that we ate under the sky watching A Knight’s Tale in a courtyard full of boxwoods; I hear dad counting “one, two, rockstep” as we practiced our dance up in a grand old room just hours before he led me down the aisle;

I see the blur of the sparklers that spun in circles in the giddy hands of my nieces and nephew who twirled and whirled barefoot in the dance floor; I feel the world swirl to a stop at the sound of András’ voice telling me “I András, take you Sarah…”

But it is at the table that our life truly began.

One hot summer Saturday in August just a few years ago, András showed up at the front door of my apartment on 21^st street. When I called looking for someone to come have a look at the piano I’d been given, I expected someone forgettable. What I got was quite the opposite, a man who before long was sitting across from me at my table eating my homemade babganoush and labne, laughing and lighting up my little world, sending a wash of peace over my bachelorette’s abode. But that is a story for another day.

The proposal happened deep in a forest full of ferns on a Sunday afternoon in May, high in the Hungarian hills near Porva where András spent his summers as a little boy. We celebrated, around his mother’s table, where for the next 6 days the planning began.

In those first days, we didn’t think to much about where we would say I do {Hungary, Illinois, New York?} only about a table, long and loving enough for all of our nearest and dearest to sit side by side as we had our first meal together as husband and wife. It seemed symbolic—the first supper. We talked about what we would serve and why, about who we would want to be there, and mostly about the importance of breaking bread with the people who would come as a show of support for our vow to love, honor and cherish each other.

It’s impossible to get a girl to sum up her wedding day in just a few words. To me, a wedding is made of up many small, magical moments pieced together by minutes and hours that past far too fast and are held dear by the grace of friends and family who humor you when you’re still talking about it a year later. They are preserved by the generosity of curators like Martha Stewart Weddings, who is honoring us today by including our wedding in their Real Weddings gallery.

A wedding is, at the end of the day, a perfect memory. The marriage, on the other hand, we hope goes on on on, moment upon moment, dream upon dream, meal upon meal, starting with this, our first supper.

P.S. I believe in giving credit where credit is due. Like so many details of our wedding that were created or borrowed from someone we love, we got the idea for the table from our friends Josh and Doris, who wed the summer before us, and have since moved on to other things {baby}. And, the vintage napkins and candlesticks came from them too. How wonderful to have friends who share.

P.S.S. This is our first dance.

{wedding logos and styling by Sponge Cake Press. images by James Bowman and Nick Pironio.}

Twelve Grapes {Nochevieja}

hunter, new york

In Spain, revelers bring in the New Year by stuffing 12 grapes into their mouth, one for each of the 12 chimes that sound at midnight from the bell in the town square as the next year begins. It’s folklore that either started as a way to boost grape sales in the bountiful harvest year of 1909, or a way to mock the nobles who consumed their grapes as cava. The gut-laughter it induces is followed by chubby cheeked kisses, bidding the previous year adios. The custom is topped only by the feasts of fish and seafood, capon or lamb for which a Spanish family will spare no expense to mark the year’s end.

In the village of Hunter, New York, two Spaniards, two Americans, one Hungarian and a baby {half Spanish, half American} brought in the New Year with 12 grapes, bad champagne and Martinelli’s sparkling cider around a roaring fireplace at the local inn. Our feast was a mix of Turrón blando {Spanish almond candy} and home-cured pork lomo, courtesy of the Spaniards’ abuela {grandmother}, and Peanut Butter Pandemonium ice cream picked up at the Stewart’s where we made a pit stop on our way into town.

In Spain, families dress to the nines in their own home, sparing no detail of their lavish celebration. At the Hunter Inn, where we hosted our fiesta after a roll in the snow and dunk in the hot tub, attire was pj’s and pearls, inspired by the last minute whimsy of one American who never travels without cocktail jewels and faux furs.

One day, I would love to spend New Year’s in Spain. Until I do, I want to spend every New Years from here to eternity in pearls and pajamas, drinking Martinelli’s cider, stuffing my face with grapes and getting ridiculous with friends whose love knows no pretense.

By the way, that is the baby, Lola, who only looks like her cheeks are stuffed with grapes. She was asleep for the grape stuffing, pjs and pearls, but I'm pretty sure she's cuter than the rest of us. Plus, András says my pj pictures are too skimpy to post here.

A Truly Happy New Year

new york, new york

Since before I can remember, I wanted to be a doctor, just like my Dad. It turns out I just wanted to be like my Dad, whose manner, and therefore his profession, from my standpoint, was synonymous with delivering joy and good news, news like, “It’s a big, fat, bouncing baby boy!” to new parents.

In the years before I discovered that there was occasionally bad news involved with being a doctor {tumors, warts in unseemly places}, I spent Sundays at his side on his hospital rounds, shadowed him at the office and begged him to be bedside when he delivered babies, which I thought was the most exciting thing imaginable {and still do, if not for the fear that it could one day happen to me}. Once or twice he let me join him in the delivery room, and I twice got a look at one of these big fat bouncing baby boys myself. To my untrained eye these babies, who weighed in around 7 pounds, looked like the teeny-tiniest little things I’d ever seen, except for grandma’s newborn kittens. But he assured me that the babies were robust and healthy and would fatten up as soon as they got on mother’s milk.

On the eve of a New Year, I can think of no greater news than that of a birth of a baby that fit’s Dad’s description to a tea. Big boy William Spencer Motland hit the scene this morning at 9 pounds, 3 ounces. András and I are big fans of his Mamma, Nikki, who taught me how good Fluff and peanut butter is spread between two Famous Wafers in our earliest days together in the Food Network Kitchens. {Today, she’s the gal behind all of the gorgeous food you see on the Martha Stewart Show}. This is a photo from the meal we shared the day we met Will’s Papa, Kent, who we happen to be rather fond of too. The meal was brunch at Landmarc, which I highly recommend, and I think the consumption of sugary stuff {note the cotton candy}, bodes well for a sweet life for one baby boy, and a big, fat, bouncing New Year for the rest of us!

Happy New Year!

Guilt, Glee and Christmas Trees

I am one of those rare New Yorkers that absolutely loves going home for the Holidays. Although my siblings might disagree, the minute I get home, I loose all contact with my picky preferences and accept our holiday habits, meals, and mayhem as a temporary version of bliss.

For about a week, I revert to a pre-1999-state, when I left the Midwest for city slicker life, slip into bulky old sweaters and sit at my spot at the family table to eat whatever meal is placed before me. I forget that I once said the best meal I ever ate was linguine with caviar and sea urchin at Le Bernadin, and suddenly it’s Mom’s mashed potatoes, Mom’s turkey noodle soup, Mom’s shrimp cocktail and prime rib dinner on Christmas Eve.

Today, when I got back to the city, I listened as my friends and colleagues reported back about their visits to in-laws in the Midwest. There were storied back-of-the-soup-can green been casseroles, jiggly Jell-O molds with Cool Whip, sickly sweet sweet potatoes, blue-cheese balls with holiday cracker medleys – all the things we love to hate about our humble culinary beginnings. We all had a good laugh at these institutions of American culture, but I felt secretly grateful that my family had somehow escaped them. Sure, I had experienced all of these fine foods at some point in my upbringing, but rarely at home, and certainly not at the holiday table.

I hate to brag, but my mom makes a mighty fine Christmas meal. It’s not to say our family is above condensed canned soup casseroles. We had them on occasion. But our holiday table has always had some version of a fresh vegetable {this year, asparagus}, a wonderfully roast meat {turkey, plumped with plenty of real butter}, smashed sweet potatoes, homemade cranberry relish, Waldorf salad, pecan pie from scratch with real whipped cream…

I was having this thought, feeling rather proud of my mom, when it occurred to me that Waldorf salad has both mini marshmallows and mayonnaise. Just then the conversation turned to miniature Christmas villages, Christmas plates, tiny tree earrings, and {aghast!} Christmas salt-and-pepper shakers. My mind flashed to a mental snapshot I’d taken of our Christmas Eve table, complete with Christmas imprinted s & p shakers, and I felt both guilt and glee.

Although I may never have a set of Christmas dishes of my own, I have to admit I love, no adore, eating off of them exclusively from the minute we arrive home until the day we head back east. They speak to me of a time and place where the world revolves around the changing of seasons and holiday flourish, instead of stock prices. Like appliquéd Christmas sweaters, faded felt stockings and cream-of-mushroom casseroles, they serve as humility touchstones that insure that I shall never be too cool for a cup of Christmas cheer.