In my previous apartment, on one of many nights when I clattered through the door with a reusable canvas grocery tote swinging off my shoulder, my former roommate asked reproachfully “do you go food shopping every day?” Presently, the answer to that is no. In a perfect world, yes, I would go food shopping every day. Would I go to Stop & Shop every day? Hell no. In our culture, food shopping is a chore, and often a particularly odious one. As someone who spends eight hours a day in a kitchen for my job, cooking is not always the first thing on my agenda when I arrive home, but when the mood does strike me, it’s usually the direct result of a foodie inspiration. Whether this means seeing a picture or reading a recipe of a dish I just have to make, or perusing local produce and finding the perfect tomatoes that just must find their destiny in a caprese salad, both scenarios are born of spontaneity, and therefore not conducive to using whatever was purchased at the supermarket on Sunday and now languishes in the back of the fridge. For this reason, I do find myself taking multiple trips to various culinary purveyors in a given week- if I can afford it, that is. This style of food shopping may seem impractical and laborious to the American sensibility, but there are still places where it’s the modus operandi for segments- albeit dwindling segments- of the population. It’s that whole European thing where you go from butcher, to baker, to green grocer, to fishmonger, gathering from each one component of your meal. Of course you could visit a store and gather the majority of items on your list under one roof, but won’t you get fresher fish from the guy who saw the nets being pulled up? Better baguette from the woman who starts kneading and shaping at four o’clock every morning? Better peas from man who trained the vines along a trellis he built with his own hands? I know I’m romanticizing this concept (not to mention applying gender stereotypes with abandon), but I truly believe that we respect our food more when we are held accountable to another human being who put their everything into producing it. Yes, chemically that pea is just like a pea that comes in a shrink-wrapped Styrofoam tray for $3.99 at Whole Foods, but as true foodies know, a meal is so much more than science.
My most recent inspiration came from the pages of Evan Goldstein’s Daring Pairings, a book in which dishes are matched up with a certain wine grape. When I came across the carignan pairing, my culinary juices began to roil, and I decided the first order of business was a long overdue trip to South End Formaggio in search of Roncal cheese and slab bacon. After failing to find parking in the pouring rain, I pulled into an illegal spot, turned my hazards on, and said a silent prayer to the towing gods….then I entered paradise. I have never been in the presence of so much cheese in such a small place. I could have spent hours there, but in the interest of avoiding a trip to the impound, I shared my goals with the purveyor and put on my blinders. While Roncal was not on offer, it happens to be very close to the Spanish sheep’s milk cheese Manchego, and after sampling a few viable options, I selected a raw milk farmhouse cheese, aged 18 months, and full of pungent yet mellow nuttiness, a caramelized note, and an animal flavor undeniably reminiscent of a sheep herd. Bacon was to be in the form of a smoky, Berkshire pork slab, sliced thick on the spot, and so fragrant that it perfumed my car (which was, thankfully, right where I left it) even through the plastic bag. The next day proved to be one of those incredible fall days, almost sybaritic in its sun-drenched perfection, and poignant in its acknowledgement of the encroaching winter. The crates at the farmers market overflowed with previously unheard of apple varieties, potatoes hooked and knobbed in every direction, shiny purple onions on the end of two-foot-long shoots, and winter squashes, their skin streaked with fiery orange and tan. I selected a rotund kabocha squash, deep green in color, woody stalks of aromatic thyme, and a handful of shallots, amethyst beneath papery brown sheaths with earth still clinging to them. And then- I cannot deny- I went to Whole Foods, because there are some ingredients that you just can’t get elsewhere. I scooped organic pecans from the bulk bins, selected a smooth, pale little head of endive, and- because it was on sale- a vibrantly green bunch of hydroponic watercress, each little leaf like a perky lily pad. At last, it was time to assemble. The squash was unburdened of its knobby skin (no small feat), coated with oil, salt, pepper, and thyme, and roasted in a hot oven until tender and caramelized. The pecans were toasted to deepen their flavor and then received just a sprinkle of salt. The bacon was sliced into meaty lardons and sautéed in a skillet to coax out the fat (not to mention what is probably the most besotting aroma in the culinary realm, and sends me into a fervor akin to a feline catching a whiff of catnip). Thinly sliced shallots joined the sizzling bacon, and acquired a glistening coat of flavor before a mixture of sherry vinegar, fresh pepper, and olive oil was swirled in. This warm concoction was then tossed with endive and cress leaves, plated beside wedges of squash, and topped with crumbled nuts and shavings of cheese…perfection. How daring the wine pairing was I cannot say, but it worked; a L’Arbossar Priorat was deep and intense, with dark fruit flavors, liquorice, and violets all delivered in a mouthful so creamy and lush that swallowing almost seemed a shame. Overall, the meal was simple: a salad, and a beautiful wine. But when each component is sought out, and each ingredient carefully chosen for its quality, even a simple thing can truly be more than the sum of its parts, and even a salad takes a village. Or maybe a few villages- South End, Brookline, Newton- but hey, the adage is open to interpretation.
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