Pampers and Paklava

The heart of food

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Only the pure in heart can make a good soup.

– Ludwig van Beethoven

Food and love. For me the two go hand in hand. And, no, this isn’t a post about romantic moonlit dinners.

With many of my close friendships and family members, I have a clear memory of a dish, a drink, a meal or a restaurant that comes to mind whenever I think of them. There’s my friend Alice and Thanksgiving (oh that mouth-watering turkey), my college housemates and artichokes (what a big deal they made about me being “an artichoke virgin”), my Aunt Sue and her amazing paella (the woodsy Cape Cod backdrop didn’t hurt either), my father with his pickles and kraut, Big Papa and Shepherd’s Pie (looking forward to setting off the smoke alarm for the eighth year running). And then there’s Dee and Moosewood’s Mushroom Barley Soup.

There is so much wrapped up in that savory bowl of soup. Memories from my college days and my first taste of independence, a time in food history when being a “vegetarian” was still considered trendy, even revolutionary (Moosewood Cookbook really broke new ground), and how the loss of those most close to us remains deeply embedded in our hearts (the last time Dee cooked Mushroom Barley Soup for Big Papa and me was the last time I saw her).

Holidays hold especially keen food memories for most of us: the almond-spritz cookies we made with our mom at Christmas, Easter egg chocolates hiding under backyard bushes, a recipe for eggnog or crown roast that distinguishes your family from any other. We are indeed what we eat…and who we eat it with.

So this Friday, December 20, I’ll be filling my belly with Mushroom Barley Soup. And filling my heart with love for my friend, who passed away five years ago on that day.

Mushroom Barley Soup

Mushroom Barley Soup from the Moosewood Cookbook

Serves 8

Ingredients

1/2 cup uncooked pearl barley
3 tablespoons butter
1/2-1 teaspoon salt
3-4 tablespoons tamari  or soy sauce
4 tablespoons dry sherry
6-1/2 cups stock or water
1 medium onion, chopped
2 medium cloves garlic, minced
1 lb fresh mushrooms, sliced
fresh ground black pepper

Preparation
Cook barley in 1-1/2 cups of the stock or water in a large saucepan or Dutch oven. Bring to a boil, cover and simmer until barley is tender (20-30 minutes). Add remaining stock or water, tamari and sherry.

Meanwhile, melt the butter in a skillet. Add the onions and garlic. Sauté for about 5 minutes over medium heat. Add mushrooms, and salt. Cover and cook, stirring occasionally, until everything is very tender (about 10-12 minutes).

Add the sauté with all its liquid to the cooked barley. Add fresh ground black pepper to taste and simmer, partially covered, for another 20 minutes. Serve with a slice of hearty bread.

Take the road less traveled, Beth

Warm your heart with more foodie posts. Check out Wanderfood Wednesday!

Comfort food: A bowl of soup to honor the memory of a friend

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Mushroom Barley SoupToday marks the third anniversary of my friend Dee’s passing, and tonight Joel and I will sit down to enjoy a bowl Moosewood Mushroom Barley Soup in her memory, just as we did last year and the year before that. Making this soup—which Dee and I enjoyed together on many occasions–is my way of honoring our friendship, a friendship which spanned four decades.  For me, keeping up this tradition is a source of comfort.

I miss Dee and think about her a lot. In the three years since she died, there have been many days when I’ve wished I could call and hear the sound of her voice, and when I wrestle with challenges that life sends my way, I sometimes wonder what words of wisdom she might have shared.

Living life without loss isn’t possible–I know that. Granted, some encounter more than others, but loss is something we all must face: loss of those we care about, loss of dreams, even the loss of our own abilities as we age. So the more important question is how do we comfort ourselves? Prayer, meditation, time spent alone or in the company of family and friends, getting away from it all, solace from being in nature or getting lost in the hum of urban life, working out, doing yoga, gardening, walking the dog. Each of us has our own unique way of seeking comfort.

And then there’s comfort food. Whenever I hear those two words rich, hearty fare springs to mind: Mac ‘n cheese, meatloaf, mashed potatoes or apple pie and a bowl of ice cream, or a bowl of steamy soup.

Everything about Moosewood’s Mushroom Barley Soup reminds me of Dee, from the earthy smell of mushrooms which conjures up memories of playing in the woods behind our houses, just across the street from each other– to sharing a meal at Moosewood Restaurant whenever we could scrape up enough change, as Cornell undergraduate students, living in a house together in Ithaca, New York.

But mostly my heart remembers the many times Dee and I made this soup for each other: she for me, me for her, and occasionally side by side. So today I toast to you, my friend—the friendship we had, and everything you brought to the table.

Dee and BethRemember Me

Do not shed tears when I have gone
but smile instead because I have lived.

Do not shut your eyes and pray to God that I’ll come back
but open your eyes and see all that I have left behind.

I know your heart will be empty because you cannot see me
but still I want you to be full of the love we shared.

You can turn your back on tomorrow and live only for yesterday
or you can be happy for tomorrow because of what happened
between us yesterday.

You can remember me and grieve that I have gone
or you can cherish my memory and let it live on.

You can cry and lose yourself become distraught
and turn your back on the world
or you can do what I want – smile, wipe away the tears,
learn to love again and go on.

~David Harkins, British poet

Mushroom Barley Soup from the Moosewood Cookbook

Serves 8

Ingredients

1/2 cup uncooked pearl barley
3 tablespoons butter
1/2-1 teaspoon salt
3-4 tablespoons tamari  or soy sauce
4 tablespoons dry sherry
6-1/2 cups stock or water
1 medium onion, chopped
2 medium cloves garlic, minced
1 lb fresh mushrooms, sliced
fresh ground black pepper

Preparation
Cook barley in 1-1/2 cups of the stock or water in a large saucepan or Dutch oven. Bring to a boil, cover and simmer until barley is tender (20-30 minutes). Add remaining stock or water, tamari and sherry.

Meanwhile, melt the butter in a skillet. Add the onions and garlic. Sauté for about 5 minutes over medium heat. Add mushrooms, and salt. Cover and cook, stirring occasionally, until everything is very tender (about 10-12 minutes).

Add the sauté with all its liquid to the cooked barley. Add fresh ground black pepper to taste and simmer, partially covered, for another 20 minutes. Serve with a slice of hearty bread.

Searching for more comfort?  Check out Wanderfood Wednesday.

Here comes the sun

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As a child, we often grew a row of sunflowers across our front lawn during the summer. They stood proudly, happy yellow faces full of cheer and life. Our yard was filled with flowers. The sweet smell of Lily-of-the-Valley wafted through my window each spring, followed by luscious, prolific lilac bushes and sensuous climbing roses that crept up the trellis on the side of our house.

I love flowers, all kinds of flowers, but these fifty years later I’m hard-pressed to find a flower that puts a smile on my face quite like a sunflower.

Sunflowers

Directly across the busy road from our house, was the Wood’s house, where my friend Dee lived. I know that when the Wood kids came out their front door and walked down their steps, our sunflowers were waving across the street.

Over the years, both Dee and I moved on to different states, me to California and then Washington, and Dee to Vermont, Maine, Minnesota and finally Massachusetts. This past decade, as she battled breast cancer, I occasionally sent her sunflowers to celebrate a birthday or brighten her day. Toward the end of her illness, I know she enjoyed sitting in the sunroom at the back of her home, a lovely space lined with windows and painted a delicious shade of sunflower yellow. I would imagine those flowers sitting beside her as she read a book and it warmed my heart. I couldn’t be there, but I felt as if I was watching over her shoulder.

For Dee’s 50th birthday, last October, I sent sunflowers and by some miraculous slip, the florist delivered two bundles. Dee called us, concerned that we’d been double-billed. We hadn’t been but even if we had, I was thrilled to know two bunches of yellow blooms were sharing her day.

Dee died shortly before Christmas. I traveled to Maine to attend her memorial. It was a sobering trip with heavy gray skies on both ends of the journey. Her husband and family chose to have her ashes rest at three meaningful sites, a beach on the coast of Maine where Dee’s brother Mark’s ashes were also scattered, a lake in Minnesota by the college Dee’s husband, Gaylen, attended and where he asked for her hand in marriage, and a family plot near Syracuse, New York where Dee grew up.

Today is the day Dee’s remaining ashes are being interred in upstate New York. I wasn’t able to make the trip but tomorrow, a bouquet of sunflowers will arrive at her parents’ home.

In Seattle, the sky is as blue as the ocean in York, Maine on a sunny afternoon some twenty-one years ago to the day, when she and Gaylen said their vows. The sun shines brightly and warms my shoulders, as I sit on the back deck of the Urban Cabin, writing these words and remembering my friend. In a vase, just beside me, are sunflowers.