The plan is that I make every single one of the NYT 100 Easy Dinner Recipes For Right Now. The plan is that somehow helps me riddle out the right now.
Last night I made Eric Kim’s “garlicky, buttery noodles” which I didn’t mean to make for a dinner party, but a dinner party called. Additionally: I chilled a few dozen giant shrimp in a last minute “let’s wing it” marinade of garlic, grated ginger, soy, sesame oil, a little of the gochujang paste, honey and a little lemon juice for a few hours and then threw them on the grill while the noodles boiled. I served the noodles topped with a few shrimp and some thinly sliced scallions. This turned out deliciously, even if the shoddy, poorly-lit picture does not fully communicate
Starters/Salad/Dessert: Because this was a dinner party. It was a rare (for me) multi-course situation. Zero thematic link and taste profile was all over the place.
Starter, I did a cheapskate smoked salmon plate with with french bread rounds, capers, chopped shallots, and a little spin on a Beneditctine Spread I whipped up for my nephew’s first birthday a few weeks back (cream cheese, tablespoon of sour cream, grated cucumber, grated garlic, a tiny bit of chopped onion, chives, fresh dill, grated lemon rind, salt, pepper, pinchiest pinch of Old Bay, all run through the food processor because I’m lazy).
Salad was the Broccoli, Orange, Pistachio salad from Magnolia’s in Charleston. It’s absolutely one of my favorite salads (even if it costs a small fortune in pistachios) and almost the whole reason I bought the cookbook. I can’t even find a decent dupe online (this comes closest). Will I get sued if I put the recipe on the internet? Is this cookbook still even in print? I have no idea. I don’t want to tangle with Charleston. Historically, they’re quick to interpret things as acts of aggression.
Dessert: I’ve promised these particular friends this Peach and Chile Galette for the last two times they’ve come to dinner. I have failed to even start the project every time. Honestly, it’s for the best. Sometimes it’‘s important to accept the things we are less good at. I am less good at desserts, especially if the dessert is expected to look even remotely pretty. This is okay with me, as I m not so much troubled by a sweet tooth (my achilles heel tends to be found on the the savory, buttery, salty, tangy, spicy, bitter side of the table). My favorite desserts tend to be literally fruity and a little savory, so I went with a store-bought apple pie, served ala mode with vanilla caramel ice cream because I am not yet completely evil.
Beverage: My friends brought an absolutely killer bottle of dry orange wine—Bikicki Uncensored 2021— that tasted exactly like sitting in rose garden by a crashing sea on a sunny, but breezy afternoon.
Accompanying Soundtrack: I let my unorganized General 2023 New Release playlist shuffle in the background. I’ll start to whittle it down into a year end list in about 8-10 weeks (and I’ll share it) but for now it’s a delightful jumble. I had the volume down pretty low, so I barely noticed what was playing except for that newish Caroline Polachek song that sounds like the Gerudo Valley theme from Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time” (you’re welcome, nerds). And at some point, the Misfits’ “Astro Zombies” came up. It had ended up on the playlist by accident. I’m not sure if anyone else noticed. I let the conversation pause for a moment or two and felt a pang of nostalgia for the period of my young life when the things that seemed the most cool always felt like they were a little bit scary and a whole lot absurd. There was a whole vibe in those days that usually involved disco balls and art projects involving doll heads. I remember feeling, at the time, always a bit uncomfortable, but in a good way. I remember feeling like, in those days, the coolest places were always the ones that left the door open for me to explore even if they didn’t explicitly invite me in.
The Night: We talked about family. Reward and challenges. We talked about jobs. Rewards and challenges. I’ve had a very stressful day at work for the last month or so. All of us had received a Covid booster and flu shot at the same CVS location the Friday before with various flavors of side effects. Mine weren’t so bad this time around. It’s wild that we’re about six months out from four years of Covid. That seems impossible to me. Some days I feel like it’s been a decade since 2019. Some day I feel like it was an hour ago.
When I went for the vaccine, I was one of three people waiting who brought not only a hardcover book to fill the time, but the same hardcover book. Zadie Smith’s The Fraud. I’m not quite finished with it (I’m reading it in a round of three with Cookie Mueller’s Collected Works and V.V. Ganeshananthan’s Brotherless Night) but it’s a lot of fun so far.
Zadie Smith and I are the same age. I’m a huge fan, natch. And I’ve also spent of most of my adult life jealous of her for being pretty close to exactly the kind of writer than I’ve always wanted to be. You know, so many people you look up when you’re young end up disappointing you. I think the best compliment I can pay Zadie Smith is that I’m still a little jealous of her even now.
Next up: Vegetable Pulao. And perhaps, handsy ghosts.
Tiny Commotions 