save it for later

the joy of fresh pasta, a peach cobbler, and the last of the grilling season

A stat holiday always throws off the rest of the week, which seems unfair: instead of feeling rested on Tuesday after an extra day off, you’re confronted by the work you need to catch up on, and your days feel out of whack. I missed a meeting on Thursday because I thought it was Wednesday! And it’s been a busy week on the personal front as well— the unofficial end of summer seems to have spurred on a level of socialization that’s felt foreign to me for some time. We attended a backyard barbecue and acoustic jam (featuring multiple guitars, a banjo, a saxophone, and the loveliest rendition of INXS you ever heard), visited a gallery for a friend’s art opening, and went with two other friends for brunch and ice cream in Port Moody.

The weather doesn’t believe summer is over, though, even if school has started again, which gives me some hope that all the green tomatoes still on the vines may yet ripen, and I might get one single beach day in before the solstice. I enjoy this time of year, where we get the anticipation of fall in warm days and cool nights, before the chill and dark sets in. Savour it.

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The brunch at Hard Bean Brunch Co. was a little underwhelming for the price, but not bad. I liked the skinny fries, and the mimosa flights are a fun novelty. The best part of our trip to Port Moody was me losing my shit after my friend informed me that the Canteen in Rocky Point Park sells Dole whips at their soft serve takeout window. Dole whips are a perfect treat that I had accepted I would never be able to enjoy outside of a Disney park unless I made one myself, but the universe bestowed upon me this joy. It’s a soft serve-esque mix of pineapple juice and coconut milk and it is so, so delicious and refreshing (and naturally dairy-free, which makes Jeff happy). Go grab one if you have the ability to do so, and you love yourself.

My friend Amanda’s artwork is being shown in the gallery space at Strange Fellows this month, and we visited there for the opening on Wednesday night. Please check it out if you have the time (especially if you can buy her work)! It was so nice to see some friends who also came by to support her. Jeff and I both came straight from work, so it’s nice that the brewery now serves pizza (frozen from Nicli Antica’s commissary). The capricciosa is really good. The day was extremely windy and it made my ears hurt on the bike ride home, but it was worth it.

Because of how busy the week has been, I didn’t get a lot of time to cook at home (and I have a lot of produce to deal with right now, so it’s going to be a busy weekend in the kitchen). I grilled a couple of skinny eggplants in smoked paprika, crushed hot chili powder, and cumin to make sandwiches on a fresh loaf of sourdough. We had some hummus to spread on the bread, I also made a garlic and basil mayo for the other side— this makes a great dip for roasted potatoes if you have any left over.

The key to an eggplant sandwich that isn’t a slimy pile of disappointment is grilling it at a high temperature so the outside is nicely charred and crispy in spots, and the inside is soft and melty. The thin Asian type of eggplant is great for this because you can just halve them and they’ll cook fairly quickly, but with Italian/globe eggplants, slice them into thick rounds instead. And don’t skimp on the pickles when you’re assembling your sandwich.

I’m sure I’ve mentioned the absolute forest of kale growing in our garden right now, and I happened to stumble upon a recipe for mushroom and kale lasagna while flipping through Six Seasons. It’s more of a fall dish, definitely, but kale and mushrooms go great together and Jeff has been itching to make pasta from scratch, so we seized the opportunity anyway. This uses a velouté sauce instead of red sauce (I used oat milk to make mine), making it more delicate in flavour. The filling is a layer of chopped kale and mushrooms cooked down in the pan, and another layer of ricotta (we used crumbles of feta— it’s what we had), and then parmesan on the top.

Making lasagna is a bit of a production, of course, especially as you’re also making the noodles from scratch, but it’s never as much work as I always imagine it’ll be. And you get a lot of bang for your buck, too— we each had a big slice the day we made it and now we have several meals in the freezer for days when I can’t be bothered to expend precious energy making dinner in the dark days of November or January.

I neglected to take a photo once it was cut. Casseroles are not photogenic.

The pasta dough recipe made more than we needed, so we cut the rest of the lasagne noodles into thick slices for pappardelle, and the next day I made a pomodoro sauce with the first of the Roma and San Marzano tomatoes from our garden. (There is a loose method for making this sauce in last week’s newsletter.) I also added the last of the grilled eggplant, chopped up and warmed in the sauce once it was ready. This was perfectly delicious; something about fresh noodles makes a fairly standard meal into the ultimate luxury.

We also got some really lovely fresh local corn, and ate it grilled on the side of some hot dogs for a quick dinner. To grill corn, I usually remove just some of the outer husks‚ which will shrink as they cook and blacken, so that some of the kernels will char but most just become bright and juicy. I mixed some Old Bay seasoning, hot chili powder, and lemon into the butter to put on it, which was delicious.

Jeff spent some extra time in the kitchen this past weekend, making the most of our surplus of fruit. He poached apples from the tree out back in a too-old bottle of peach wine and some simple syrup, and made the remains of the poaching liquid into a caramel sauce. I plan to use both in a cake sometime soon.

And for the barbecue, he put together a peach and apple cobbler with bourbon; I love the biscuit-like topping on this. He made an all-peach version for me shortly after we got together, effectively solidifying himself as an ideal partner. I forgot to take a photo, but this is easily assembled and served in a cast iron pan, so it feels less intimidating than pie, but is no less delicious. I’ve shared his recipe below.

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BOURBON PEACH COBBLER
8 peaches (about 2 pounds), pitted and sliced
2 fluid ounces bourbon
¾ cup sugar, divided
2 tbsp corn starch
1 tsp cinnamon
1½ cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
¾ tsp salt (use ¾ of Diamond Kosher)
¾ cup cold unsalted butter, plus 2 tbsp for the pan
heavy cream (optional)

Preheat the oven to 375°F. In a large bowl, mix together the peaches with ¼ cup of the sugar and the other ingredients up to the cinnamon and set aside.

In a food processor, pulse together the flour, salt, baking powder, and the remaining ½ cup of sugar. Cut the ¾ cup butter into small pieces and pulse into the flour mixture until it looks like wet sand. Continue mixing just until it comes together and don’t overwork it; it should be slightly sticky.

In a 10” cast iron pan over medium-low heat, melt the remaining butter, and add the peach mixture. Cook gently until slightly softened, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and drop the dough overtop of the peaches (it will spread as it bakes, so don’t worry if it’s a little uneven). Brush with cream if using, then bake 40-45 minutes, until the top has browned and the fruit juices have started to bubble and caramelize at the edges of the pan.

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Thanks for reading— if you enjoyed this newsletter, please smash that like button below, or share it with someone new! I like providing this to you for free, but it does still involve time and effort, so donations I can use towards cookbooks or future treats are much appreciated. Anyway, yesterday was an amazing day online (she was 96 and a colonialist, we are allowed to laugh)— here’s one more post for the books.