Food

I don’t think I’d ever had anything but canned spinach growing up, and it was pretty bad stuff. Nowadays, frozen spinach has taken over from the canned, and fresh leafy green spinach is still not an everyday commodity. The reason for this, besides perishability, is that not many people think that swishing spinach through three changes of water constitutes a fun time.

Weakfish, a.k.a. squeteague or sea trout, has begun its annual migration in large schools up the Atlantic coast. . . . The name, weakfish, is no slur on its character; it refers to the delicate mouth of this fish, which is easily torn by a hook. Otherwise the weak has a lean and flaky white flesh that is delicious when very freshly caught. It tends to become soft and flabby if not cooked right away and its blandness needs some exciting flavor accents to be interesting.

Ham is to Easter what turkey is to Thanksgiving and it’s best not to tamper too much with tradition. Of course, lamb is traditional if you happen to be Greek, but ham for Easter has come to be the unshakable custom in most American households.

Flowers, with their sweet fragrances and riotous color, are balm for the senses and for the eye. Of late, nouvelle-trendy watering spots have introduced them as stylish garnish and amusing nibbles. Less known is the fact that flowers were a common and popular ingredient in recipes in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.

That comforting line about Christmas coming “but once a year” might ring hollow in your ears, with Christmas parties and Christmas drop-ins to be dealt with by the genial host. To be always at the ready, there are fortunately some delicious things that can be made in advance and refrigerated and served on several occasions.

Here's a French version of apple pie alleged to have been invented by two spinsters who ran a rustic restaurant in Lamotte-Beauvron, a hamlet not far from Paris.

"Hermits" are chewy, spice-laden cookies that date back to early 19th-century cookery in America, and there are many variations on the basic recipe.

“Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese." — G.K. Chesterton

Upon reading this, a poet friend of mine, William Cole, sat down and composed a nine-stanza ode to cheese called “What a Friend We Have in Cheeses!” subtitled “Sing a Song of Liederkranz.” But neither he nor anyone else seems to have gotten around to penning a single line to meat loaf, a subject that sends perfectly rational people into raptures.

Most of the pumpkins dotting the fields with the brilliant orange will get their 15 minutes of celebrity on Halloween night. For although this hardy member of the squash-gourd family grows ubiquitously both in this hemisphere and in Europe, there are few recipes for its use. Too bad, be­cause the pumpkin’s hard rind keeps it usable for many months past the Thanksgiving pie season.

Eggplant seems to be available the year around nowadays, but is more than usually plentiful during the last warm days of September.

There are lots of party foods that can be made in advance at no great expense. The money saved can be used to hire the bartenders and waiters that are essential if the hosts are to have any fun at all and remain on speaking terms with each other.

Florence Fabricant decided to take advantage of the lush peaches and excellent blueberries that will be at their zenith in flavor during late July. There are already fine peaches and berries in the market so you can make this right away.

Mary Emmerling has elected to serve a menu from her newly pub­lished book, “American Country Cooking.” This hors d’oeuvre will lead things off at her dress-in-white summer dinner for ten.

I don't know if herbs have ever before crossed national boundaries in such a massive immigration as they are invading American cookery of the ’80s. Dill used to be Scandinavian; oregano Italian, and the less common anise-flavored tarragon, strictly French. The English were sage; Mexican, coriander, and I don’t know what we were — parsley, maybe. Now they’ve come to an enthusiastic melting pot and American cookery really sings with all these different accents.

All this lamb talk is because we are smack-dab in the middle of “spring lamb season,” which is largely myth nowadays because lambs are born all year round in different parts of the country.

Except for Easter basket bunnies, white chocolate used to be relatively difficult to find, but the Nestle Com­pany produces a “baking bar” carried in most supermarkets.

“True genius always looks simple, and the best of creations are 'obvious.'" — Rudolph Chelminski, “The French at Table.”

Although it’s always been my credo to try to live by the seasons in the Long Island Larder, there are times when the seasons need a little forcing — like dreary February.

Souffles have magic and mystery — they’re always box office even though their simple trickery has long been familiar. This is great for the January blahs when we all need some different, innovative, out-of-the-rut food.

This is a thick version of summer’s soupe au pistou, changed to make use of vegetables available locally in winter. Fresh basil grows in my greenhouse, but as it isn’t usually buyable in winter, use bottled pesto sauce, which can be bought in specialty food shops to provide the finishing earthy flavor of this soul and belly-warming stew.

Although this recipe appeared in a Larder column several years ago, I heard that several people had loved it but lost it, so here it is again. Choose a plain or fancy fluted mold of two-quart capacity (or a bundt cake pan). Oil it lightly and chill it before you start. Another advantage of this dessert is that it can, and should be, made at least 24 hours in advance — even two days is fine. The flavor and firmness develop and the mousse is easier to unmold after this time. Unmolded before dinner, covered with plastic wrap, and replaced in the refrigerator, this is a fairly carefree finale to dinner. Serve with clouds of real whipped cream only barely sweetened.

Sherbet can be frozen in a bowl in the freezer of your refrigerator, then aerated with a food processor or electric mixer when it is semi-frozen, then refrozen.

“All that glitters is not gold” . . . and all that is gold does not glitter. The pig, that estimable creature, while no thing of beauty and generally not highly regarded as to character, nevertheless supplies some of the world’s best fare. The porker, from snout to tail, is perhaps the most utilitarian of all our domestic animals and yet is perhaps the least treasured of meats.

Broccoli and other cruciferous vegetables were common on Colonial tables, but somehow got lost by their descendants. Although such truck, as broccoli, kale, chard, and a green known confusingly to Italians and precious few others as broccoli rabe and broccoli rapa, have been around for centuries, many cooks still have no idea of what to do with them.

Homing in on which crop is fleeing fastest, I've had lush, fragile, irrevocable peaches on my mind. But then I often do. Native South Carolinians and Georgians, of course, have a near obsession with this fruit: Peach ice cream is the only flavor, peach cobbler the only pie, peach butter and never apple on biscuits and toast. Peaches in winter were the prerogative of royalty until recent times. . . . Now we can freeze up a big batch fairly effortlessly and decide in the calm of late autumn just what to do with them – jam, chutney, ice cream, pie, or simply a luxurious dish of peaches and heavy cream.

A “chicken in every pot” is one political promise that has come all too true, at least in the United States, where chicken is about the cheapest protein going except for eggs. Chicken, achingly available in every place and season, is no longer universally regarded as a treat. To many, it’s more of a duty — either to waistline or bottom line.

Mussels are another local glory found on local menus. At Bobby Van’s, they are served “mariniere” (simply steamed in wine and herbs) year-round. But there are so many ways to serve these cheap, easily cooked shellfish: cold as a first course with various sauces or in soups or hot entrees.

The Neapolitan pie, hardly known in this country before the 1930s, must certainly have overtaken the hot dog as the nation’s number one favorite snack food. According to scholarly research conducted in the ’50s by the lat Richard Gehman, one Frank Mastro from Bari (not Naples) is credited with popularizing pizza outside the Italian neighborhoods in New York.

This recipe is for fresh, and only fresh, pasta. All herbs used must be fresh as well or this dish is hardly worth making. It is so very simple, you can’t cheat.

Either cod or flounder are good local choices for the fish mousse — almost any firm, fresh white fish will do. Naturally one would not choose expensive striped bass; that would be like making hamburgers out of ground filet mignon.