The Day After

Lucky us. When we had eaten all of our wedding picnic basket that we could hold, there was still half of five kinds of cheeses left over, along with some fruit, pickles and crackers. We packed the leftovers back into the basket and, when the picnic dinner was over, brought them home.

I offered to pack sumptuous travel lunches for the three family members who are flying back home to the East coast today, but they all demurred, so we will enjoy them for days to come.

Lunch today, after dropping the last relative off at the airport. Grilled cheese sandwich made with wonderful cheeses, a slice of Swiss plus some Bellwether pepato and a bit of St. Bees from North Bay Curds and Whey. The mixture is da bomb, all melty and nutty when we take a bite that's mainly Swiss, then tangy and savory when the bite is mostly pepato or St. Bees.

Top it off with a few piercingly sweet cherries, shockingly tart kumquats, a sticky plum with a tongue-tingling skin and a mellow apricot from the same picnic basket, and you've got a feast for the Father of the Bride and his Bride (that would be me).

Dutch Masters

When My Beloved and I got the call from the masters of Dutch oven cooking, you can bet we got our buns over there in short order! We hastily mixed up some guacamole to take along as an offering to the DOG gods.

These guys are amazing. Black iron pans predominated, although there was a gorgeous dark red one, too, and the food that emerged a short time later was wonderful. We oohed and aahed over Guy's chile verde, Cameron's rabbit stew, Chilebrown's spatchcocked chicken and veggies, and Abram's smoked tri-tip. Those meaty men can really dish up some serious eats.

Although I sampled and approved in a deeply personal way all the meats, for me the standouts were the breads. Cam made a wheat bread that kicked a** and took numbers - crusty and crisp on the outside, with an airy crumb as light as foam and deep flavor from long rising. All it needed was some butter to make it perfect.

But the big winner in my opinion (and I'm not just saying this because he paid me to) was CB's signature Jalapeño Cheese Bread. I approached it with caution, knowing that CB loves spicy food and being a spice wimp myself, but I needn't have worried. Hearty and moist, with little pockets of melted cheese and chiles throughout, it was crusty and rich with flavors without being scorching hot.

The day was gloriously sunny but cool enough not to mind having several charcoal fires going at once. The company was convivial and the conversation almost entirely of barbecuing. My Beloved and I drove home to serious food coma - no dinner that night and I wasn't even hungry the next morning. I can't think of anything better.

Taxing Lunch

We put aside an entire Saturday for this chore. As I write, we are assembling the annual information for our accountant to do our taxes. Ugh. For all-out boredom punctuated by chills of fear, I can't think of a rival for filling out tax forms. Neither My Beloved nor I are any good at math, or keeping records, or anything requiring diligence, so this yearly event is our nadir.

When one is struggling and swearing one's way through the tax form nightmare, spectacularly tasty lunches are in order to keep spirits and energy high. Luckily, ingredients for just such a lunch were in the house.

A Della Fattoria campagne loaf, Bellwether Farms farmer's cheese and Jeanne's Mom's unbelievably good avocado. Toast the bread, spread the cheese, slice the avo, drizzle a little EVOO, sprinkle with freshly ground pepper and a tiny spritz of Hawaiian red salt and you've got lunch that will sustain calculations throughout a long, taxing afternoon.

Southern Newbie

The daughter to two Yankees, a mother who was born in New York City and a father who was born at the Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, I'm a newbie to Southern cooking. After my trip to North Carolina and Virginia, however, I am inspired to try some Southern specialties.

To that end, I bought a bag of water stone ground grits from a little shop in Elkin, a tiny hill town in northwestern North Carolina where my nephew has settled. It's a lovely town, a slice of America a few decades ago - and that's a good thing. There is only one elementary, one middle and one high school (the football team is called the Bucking Elks - you can imagine what more jaded kids would make of that) and all the kids pile into the local soda shop on Friday afternoons after school for some ice cream and socializing. Lots of giggling and flirting, pranks and laughter. Their parents stand around chatting, too, but the true supervision is provided by the owners of the soda shop who love the kids but tolerate no nonsense on their premises. It takes a village.

My mother had a Southern friend, Maria Hart, who made cheesy grits that Mom, who never loved grits in any other form, heartily approved of. That recipe came to me via my sister, who has lived in the South all her adult life and used this recipe successfully at many a dinner party. After forty years of living in Virginia, she may still be "Tom's Yankee wife" to the folks down there but she can cook like she was born south of the Mason-Dixon line. Now you know the pedigree of this particular recipe for Cheesy Grits.

This dish is insanely rich, no two ways about it. I think the dairy industry must have invented it. If you ate this frequently, you would be a serious candidate for bypass surgery; nevertheless, it is so delicious that it will have you singing "Dixie."

1 quart milk
1/2 cup butter (This seems excessive but I have it on good authority that it is necessary)
1 cup grits (I used fairly coarsely ground grits) (Quick grits will work but don't use instant grits)
Salt and pepper to taste
1 cup shredded gruyere or Swiss cheese (I used gruyere)
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese (I used Parmesano Reggiano)
1 additional Tablespoon of butter for the top

Boil milk, add 1/2 cup butter. When butter has melted, stir in 1 cup grits and cook until thickened, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes. Add salt to taste (I omit this step as the cheeses are both salty and we liked it without additional salt) and pepper. Off the heat, beat with a hand mixer for five full minutes until creamy (don't fret, it will still have texture). Mix in the two cheeses while beating. Pour into casserole and top with the additional tablespoon or two of butter. Bake at 400 degrees for 30-35 minutes.

It emerges from the oven hotter than a nuclear meltdown; it stayed very warm in my Corning ware casserole for 45 minutes after removal from the oven. That can be a bonus if you are making other dishes to go with it - keeping it warm is not a problem.

Serves 8.

Cheese Paring

There's an old epithet, "cheese-paring," which means being cheap. I'll admit it, I'm frugal. Sparing. Thrifty. Economical. Okay, cheap.

As I was cutting the rind off the raclette cheese prior to melting, I found myself wondering what one could do with it, rather than simply discard it. There wasn't much left, just a few thin wafers, but I somehow knew that a frugal Swiss housewife would have saved it for another meal.

So, here's my question: what would you do with the rind of a fairly soft cheese like this? Anything? Or am I being too cheeseparing?

Beemster Winner

I promised a few days ago to let you know how the Beemster cheese worked out in my mac and cheese dish; here's the review.

Note that I didn't have any elbow macaroni in the house so made do with this farfalle pasta. As the pasta cooked, I sauteed a chopped onion in a knob of butter until soft, then added about two tablespoons of flour, cooking it briefly to make the flour buttery, then gradually added about 1-1/2 cups milk and whisked to remove any lumps. To that white sauce, I added about 1/2 pound of shredded aged Beemster gouda cheese, stirring until it incorporated into the sauce. Draining the pasta briefly in a colander, I added it to the hot sauce, stirring to coat all the pasta. Let it cool; reheated before serving. For some reason, cooling it first really improves the flavor of mac and cheese.

And the Beemster? A complete and total success! It was rich, deep and cheesy, really tasty and satisfying, even better than cheddar. The heat mellowed the cheese a bit from its sharp and salty original state, and really brought out the aged flavor of the cheese. It didn't melt as easily as cheddar does but the extra stirring is well worth it when you enjoy the Beemster winner!