My uncle sent me a link to a wonderful e-zine he enjoys reading, and I’m sure many of you will love it, too. David Rosengarten’s Tastings. (I am probably the last person to know about it, as is often the case.) One recent mailing included an ode to garlic, which is definitely one of my top five favorite foods ( have lost lovers over my passion for garlic, but it seems to me to be a lack of lustiness to dislike the heady smell of garlic. Still, CR and I have a pact to eat it together.)
Thinking this cold misty day of a roasted garlic soup that I ate in New Orleans. I have been longing to reproduce it for years, and have not yet done so. (New Orleans is one of the great food cities, or was. How is it faring these days, does anyone know?) It might have been an Emeril restaurant, but time blurs these things, and at any rate, I’m betting some of you have good recipes for a roasted garlic soup. I have a pile of beautiful organic garlic and the idea of the scent of it wafting through the house while I put up the Christmas tree is richly appealing. So, recipes?
Food is such a powerful memory maker. I’m thinking of my grandmother’s recipes a lot lately. Her icebox cake. Her macaroni and cheese. Her Waldorf salad and the holiday celery, stuffed with grated cheese, Miracle Whip, and onions. I’m also shipping recipe cards to my ex so he can write out his special recipes in his handwriting for our boys, so those recipes are not lost to time. (Many of them do show up in my books, of course, but better to have them in his handwriting.)
Do you have a food memory connected to a recipe that’s lost, a recipe you haven’t been able to reproduce, or one that you finally did get right after trying for a long time?
And don’t forget to give me roasted garlic soup recipes you love!
Barbara – Oh please, oh please, oh please post your tamale recipe. I haven’t had a decent tamale, or a tamale period, since we left So.Cal almost 13 years ago now. A lady down the street from us used to make them every Christmas and I’d always send the boys down to pick up our annual order of a couple dozen. I’d love to be able to make a batch myself and surprise the DH.
You’ve got it, Jamie. I’m cooking today, but will try to post the tamale recipe later tonight or tomorrow. It is so much work to do them by yourself, but I have a blast. This afternoon: red chile pork tamales, duck and cherry mojo tamales, and chile relleno tamales with cilantro and almonds.