Sharing stories of food stories we love.
On the subject of comfort food, my mother is really an expert. Sure, I'm biased, but I think anyone who took a bite of her creamy broccoli pasta or had a slice of her potato bread, warm from the oven with a pat of fresh raw milk butter melting on top, would agree. But beyond the broad strokes genre, the real definition of comfort food is unique to each of us—specific and tied to our own particular memories and experiences and places.
It's been a little quiet around here. I'll be remedying that soon! I have so many excellent recipes to share with you guys. Sometimes the heat of the summer sends me running from the oven (and there have been plenty of those days), but I've had some great successes lately with new recipes and also tried-and-true favorites.
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Sometimes the best-laid plans go awry. You set out to make a classic banana bread, methodically measuring your flour and sugar. You thoughtfully soften your butter ahead of time (oh wait, it's summertime in New York and nearly 110% humidity outside, so you actually just take it out of the fridge and minutes later it's soft but listen, you give yourself credit anyway). You triumphantly dig out the last of the frozen bananas from the freezer, thinking it's high time they got used for something, and you've been extra-creative with your smoothies lately so the frozen bananas have been relegated to a corner underneath the peas and chocolate chips.
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You don’t need me to remind you that being stuck in an airport for over 6 hours is not a desirable way to spend a day, but I’m here to tell you anyway. I’ve been in Portland, Maine for the past two days; instead of flying out as planned, thunderstorms kept us from leaving. I waited patiently as they cancelled flights, one by one, to nearby destinations. The blinking notice board at my gate kept refreshing: 30 minutes late, one hour late, two, two and a half, back to one, back to two, and so on. At each update, I clutched my crumpled boarding pass, debating whether to cut my losses and at least make something of the day. The flight attendants swore our flight would leave, and promising signs kept happening (bags loading, an order for jet fuel placed, pilots entering the cockpit). Finally—nearly 7 hours after I got to the airport—we started boarding, only to see the sign at the gate suddenly flash with red CANCELLED letters halfway through zone 1 boarding.
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When we were little, we used to go to Nantucket to stay with my grandparents in the summer. I remember some details so vividly: the smell of the salt water, the tangle of low blueberry bushes edging the sandy driveway, the sticky feeling on my fingers after eating bags of penny candy from the fudge shop.
On bright Nantucket mornings, we'd pack up for a day of swimming. That, too, I remember in flashes: the beach was hot, the sand baked under the midday sun. My bare feet would burn as we'd walk to stake out a spot and settle down, beach chairs and towels and plastic buckets and all. Then my sisters (and cousins and parents and aunts and uncles and whatever family friends were there that week, too) and I would energetically and enthusiastically throw ourselves into the business of beach-going: swimming and building sand castles and boogie-boarding.
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