Bountiful Gardens

Weekends make it hard to write. The thoughts still swirl around my head, but Sue's not working and we get caught up in weekend chores and events, and just reveling in the time we can spend together. She's my best friend, pure and simple, and I love that I can write those words. Just like I always sign my email to her or to Allison and Kathryn with the word, love, because for me, it's such a gift that I have people who I deeply love and can say that.

Maybe that's what's on my mind this weekend. Gifts, and things that we should be thankful for.

Tomatoes from our garden becoming pasta sauce. 

Kathryn and I were talking about food and cooking yesterday. I was making sauce from the tons of tomatoes our garden has been yielding this summer. Enough for big batches of sauce, while at the same time we can give some more away. Amazing what the earth will give you. But at the same time I thought what a privilege it is that we can talk about food in the way we do, what we like, how we like to cook it, and the intricacies of cooking and eating. Like Eskimos have all those names for snow, which I don't know if that's true or not, but it's like that. That is the privilege of a privileged society, and while I don't have any money, I do have that in my life. I have food and plenty of it; so much of it, in fact, that it is no longer simply sustenance, but it's some higher thing. I was telling Kathryn about a professor I had at Ohio University. The university, when I was there, had a program where the students could vote for their favorite professor, and that professor could teach a course in whatever they wanted. David Hostetler, who probably has no idea the impact he had on me or my growth, taught a course called, Art And Your Life. All it was about was making art everyday in your life. We studied motorcycle gas tanks and bread, and he said that in everything we do we should think about elevating it to art. Yes, if you think I'm crazy, you have David to thank for it. I mentioned how much I love grocery shopping, and that when I do, I consider every food item closely (another extraordinary privilege that we should all be aware of) to the point where I will pick up an onion, look at it, and think, this is going inside Sue or Kathryn, and does it measure up. Trust me, when you view ingredients in this way, you will look at them differently.

I wasn't around much when Kathryn and Allison were little. Their mother and I divorced when they were little, and I wasn't around to pass down things like the wisdom of David Hostetler to them. That happens to a lot of men in our society. Now, when I can sit with Kathryn and talk, talk about making everything in the world a work of art, or talk about our individual paths, comparing and contrasting them, she being gracious and listening to and taking in what I pass along as wisdom, is another great gift in my life. It's a second chance and while I don't have the memories of a traditional family life with them, I have this life with them now, and to me it is as bountiful as any garden.

John, who works at the meat counter at Stop 'n Shop in Quincy, rocks

John, who works at the Stop 'n Shop in Quincy on Newport Avenue, truly rocks.

Kathryn is coming over tomorrow, and I wanted to make something special for her. I love cooking, I love taking care of people, I love watching people enjoy my cooking. So I decided to make lamb stew, but yesterday when I went grocery shopping, there was only one package of lamb for stewing.

I stopped someone wearing a bloody apron and asked if he was getting more in the next day (today.) He said, maybe, but if he didn't he'd cut me some when I came in.

Okay, so today I stop in, thinking, maybe he'll remember, maybe he won't, maybe he won't be there and no one will know what I'm talking about, or maybe they'll be too busy and just tell me to pound sand.

I go to the meat section, and no lamb. So I stopped some guy, and lo and behold, it's the same, guy. His name is John and he remembers me. I start talking and he cuts me off and says, oh yeah, I remember you. I mean, I didn't even remember him, and he remembers me out of how many customers does he see in a day? The guy truly rocks.

So he bones some lamb for me, and I'm all set.

You know, in this day and age, you don't see stuff like this very often anymore. We lead our hectic lives and things don't go very well most of the time for us and then we want to do something as simple as make a lamb stew for someone we love, and we seem to get thwarted every way we turn.

But not this time.

And for anyone who's interested in a really simple but awesome meal, here's the recipe. I usually make rice in chicken broth, but for this it's simply white boiled rice in a cooker. And I also use some lamb on the bone for the flavor. So you have to pick the bones with your hands, big deal.

Serve over rice and some Middle Eastern bread to sop up the juices.

Moroccan Lamb Stew

Serves 4.

Preparation time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons oil
28 oz / 800 g lean lamb, diced
17 fl oz / 500 ml beef or chicken stock
1 medium onion, chopped
4 oz / 100 g pitted prunes
4 oz / 100 g dried apricots
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Freshly ground pepper

Preparation:

Heat the oil on a medium heat in a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan. Add half the meat and cook until brown. Remove from the pan and place on kitchen towel (lamb can be quite fatty), and cook the rest of the meat.

Put all the meat in the pan, add all the other ingredients and season with pepper to taste. You shouldn’t need to add salt, as stock tends to be quite salty.
Bring gently to the boil, lower the heat and simmer with the lid on for about 1 hour or until the meat is tender. Stir 2-3 times during this time to avoid sticking.

Serve with boiled rice or couscous.