Strawberry fields forever (not): a recipe for strawberries Romanoff

Did you blink? I hope not. You might have missed strawberry season. That’s the way it goes. A few perfect summer days squashed between rainy spells provide a very skimpy opportunity for strawberry picking.

One really shouldn’t complain about the weather.  There’s no future in it. You can’t do anything about it anyway.  And as I often say, there’s always an upside to a downside. You just have to look around a little to find it. My garden, for instance, was gloriously happy with a few weeks of rain in the middle of June.

A few years ago, I tore out some unfortunate run-of-the-mill hostas that lined our patio. I swear there were at least five hundred of them, giving me yet another insight into the minds of the former custodians of my back yard. What a bargain! Let’s buy a thousand of them! Put five hundred in the back and another five hundred in the front! Now don’t get me wrong, I have gained an appreciation for this often-maligned plant, but enough is enough. I have narrowed them down to two.  I replaced them with herbs a few years ago and lo! They are coming into their own. The sage is winning the power struggle with the thyme, the lady’s mantle is showing off like a strumpet, and the lavender has painted the view from my kitchen purple. Thank you cool June rain.

As for the strawberry fields, well, maybe not so much thank you in the cool June rain department. Finally, a nice day, so I found myself driving to Verrrill Farm to pick some strawberries. It was past 11:00 when I got there. Note to self: when picking strawberries on a Saturday morning, arrive early. Though the rows were picked over, they were not picked out and there were still plenty of small berries, perfect for preserves. I got the jam underway as soon as I came home.

Sunday was another glorious day, so off I went again, greedy strawberry picker that I am.  This time the allotted rows were bursting with berries of all sizes and I picked a quart in five minutes flat. Home again, home again to make strawberry rhubarb jam (I must make a lot, there is jam thief in my house.)

Then I made sorbet for dessert from Alice Medrich’s cookbook Pure Dessert. I’m just going to tease you with that. I can’t tell you everything! It takes the adventure out. If you love desserts, you should at least get the book out of the library and look up the recipe. You will probably want to buy it since Alice Medrich’s sensibilities are very refined and you can learn a lot from her books. While you’re at it, take a look at David Liebovitz’s Perfect Scoop. You’ll want that, too so you can try out lots of ice cream recipes this summer.

What’s left after strawberry jam, strawberry sorbet and strawberry ice cream? Strawberry tarts, of course. Here is my recipe from the Boston Globe.

And another thing: here’s a recipe for Strawberries Romanoff. See, I’m not that stingy. It’s a rather fancified way of eating strawberries and cream. It is pretty, and simple, and with the sweetest berries of the season. Life is unpredictable. Things change. Carpe diem. Those berries, like everything else, will not be around forever, as it turns out.

Strawberries Romanoff

Serves 4

1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar (granulated or natural cane)

1/4 cup Grand Marnier (orange flavored brandy)

1 quart strawberries

1 cup heavy cream

1/4 teaspoon orange flower water (if you have it), or vanilla extract

Candied violets or lavender flowers, for garnish

1. Combine 1/2 cup of the sugar and 1/2 cup of water in a small saucepan and stir over medium heat until sugar is dissolved. (Alternatively, combine in a Pyrex measuring cup and heat in the microwave for 1 minute) Stir in the Grand Marnier. Cool in the refrigerator until chilled.

2. Wash, hull and quarter or halve the strawberries. Combine them in a bowl with the Grand Marnier syrup refrigerate for up to one hour, until ready to serve.  Spoon the berries and their syrup into pretty stem glasses.

3. Whip the cream with 1tablespoon sugar and the orange flower water or vanilla until it forms soft peaks.  Spoon some whipped cream on top of each dessert glass. Garnish with candied violets or lavender flowers.

More stories and recipes you might like from around the web


Strawberry picking from La Tartine Gourmande
Strawberry update from Tea and Cookies
Strawberry Rhubarb Crumb Bars from White on Rice Couple
Strawberry Shortcakes from Simply Recipes
Alice Medrich's Buckwheat Strawberry Shortcakes
Old-fashioned strawberry shortcakes from Fresh New England

Pickled beets and onions

My grandmother always kept a jar of pickled cucumbers and onions in the back of her fridge.

Now Grandmother wasn’t what you would call the cuddly type. For instance, at Sunday mass, when it came time for the ‘peace-be-with-you-shake-hands’ part, she would tilt her head skyward and study the stained glass windows with arms glued to her sides. Grandmother preferred to receive her peace directly from above if you don’t mind. Touchy-feely she was not.

Never mind. God bless her, Grandmother knew her way around food. You could gaze into her empty refrigerator despairing of a meal, yet in a few minutes she would, tah dah!, set out a humble plate worthy of an honored guest: A few odd cold cuts, some liverwurst, stale rye bread resurrected in the toaster, maybe a bit of cheese and some fresh butter. And, of course, pickles from the deepest recesses of the icebox.

I wondered how she made those pickles, but don’t think for a moment I could stand next to her in her kitchen hoping to learn something. Children nearby made Grandmother nervous. Too close for comfort. Anyway, for much of the time her own children were growing up, Grandmother had a cook, to whom she gave strict, rigid and arbitrary weekly menu instructions that varied only with the seasons. For someone who had such a magical way with ingredients that seemed like a terrible waste.

When she was older, after her children were grown and my grandfather died, Grandmother fended for herself. She was a petite, pretty woman, with enough vanity and self-respect to take care of her looks and watch her weight well into her nineties. On her eighty-eighth birthday she quipped, “ugh, so many wrinkles.” In fact she looked seventy-seven if a day. Her refrigerator was barer than ever by then, yet in her hands, a plate of something tantalizing would still emerge as if it were Aladdin’s cave. I attribute it to the pickles.

I finally was able to prise the secret of Grandmother’s famous pickles: Shake together 1/3 cup water, 1/3 cup sugar, 1/3 cup white vinegar in a large jar. Fill it with sliced cucumbers and onions and leave for a day or so in the refrigerator. It seems as if it should have been more complex than that.

I have followed my grandmother’s pickle habit, but changed it a bit. Sometimes I use both sweet and red onions, and I always tame their harshness with boiling water before adding them to the brine. Or maybe I’ll use beets, as I do here. Ah, the younger generation! They just can’t leave well enough alone.

Still, I think you will enjoy these and certainly they are easy to make. (I confess that my absolute favorite pickled onion recipe comes from Judy Rogers’ Zuni Café Cookbook—a must have for your library—but they require a bit more time and members of my household complain of the reek of vinegar steam that clouds the windows.) I’ve devised a way to make the brine without cooking it on the stove to avoid filling the house with the offending parfum de vinaigre.

Pickled beets and onions

Makes 2 quarts

You can vary the proportions here. Sometimes I use cucumbers, or add more onions than beets, depending on what I have around. The older the beets, the longer they take to roast. If you buy them with the tops on, they will probably take an hour in the oven. I found out the hard way, trying to roast some old topless specimens: it took an hour and a half, and in the end I finished them in the microwave with a little water in the bottom of the pan. You can always nuke them for a minute if they cool too much and the skins prove difficult to slip off.

I guarantee these will disappear quickly. They’re good alongside a sandwich, on top of a burger (onions only, but hey, maybe the beets would be good too), in a salad with some goat cheese, or even all by themselves on a piece of really good buttered rye bread for a snack. A jar of these would be welcome at a friend’s barbecue, too.

3 pounds beets (about 12 medium), tops removed

1 tablespoon olive oil

Herb sprigs like thyme or savory, optional

2 Vidalia onions (about 1 1/4 pounds), sliced into 1/4-inch thick rounds

2/3 cup natural cane sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup white wine vinegar

1/4 teaspoon black peppercorns

6 whole cloves

6 whole allspice berries

2 wide strips lemon zest made with a vegetable peeler

2 sprigs fresh dill

1. Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking dish with a large enough piece of foil to enclose the beets. Place the beets in the dish and drizzle them with olive oil. Top with herb sprigs if you happen to have some. Fold and crimp the foil to make a packet.  Roast for 1 to 1&1/2 hours, or until the beets are tender (pierce them with a sharp knife to test.) The older the beets, the longer they take to cook. Remove from the oven, open the packet and cool to lukewarm. They are easier to peel while still warm. Slip the skins off the warm beets and slice them in 3/8-inch thick rounds or wedges.

2. Bring a kettle of water to a boil. Separate the onions into rings and place them in a bowl. Cover them with boiling water.  Let stand for 10 minutes; drain and cool to room temperature.

3. Stir the sugar, salt and 2 cups of boiling water together in a large measuring cup until the sugar dissolves. Stir in the vinegar, peppercorns, cloves, allspice, and lemon zest.

4. Layer the beets and onions into two 1-quart jars. Pour the brine over the pickles, top each jar with a sprig of dill, cover and refrigerate. Leave for a day before eating. They seem to last forever, though I haven’t tested that.

More pickled beets and onions: 


Pickled Beets from Simply Recipes
Pickled Red Onions from Simply Recipes
Pickled Beets with Feta from A Thought for Food 
Pickled Red Onions from David Lebovitz 
More pickles (Vietnamese style) from Simply Recipes 
Sugar Free Pickles from Recipe Renovator

Rhubarb crumble

How to take a “stay-cation”:

Make a really good summer dessert.

Invite a friend to share it.

Sit under a tree on a pleasant afternoon.

Savor the sweetness without a whisper of guilt, preferably with vanilla ice cream.

Rhubarb crumble

May be humble

Yet it suits me

I won’t grumble

Give me tea

A chair outside

No need to travel

Far and wide

For the recipe and more summer vacation musings by moi, go to THE MAGAZINE OF YOGA


Around the web, try 
Mrs. Wheelbarrow's many recipes for rhubarb
Red-wine poached rhubarb from David Lebovitz
Strawberry rhubarb cobbler from Elise Bauer at Simply Recipes 
Rhubarb fool with gingersnaps from Cookin' Canuck

Really good oatmeal waffles

I could tell you how these waffles created a firestorm in the Boston Globe and almost gave me a nervous breakdown, but I don’t want to ruin them for you. They are light, they are delicious, they don’t sink like a stone and make you want to lie down and ask yourself why, oh why, did I do that? Why did I eat so many waffles for breakfast?