smitten kitchen

I hadn’t intended to audition any new rhubarb recipes this year. Between last year’s cobbler and previous seasons’ filled crumb coffee cake, strawberry rhubarb crumble, strawberry rhubarb pie, loaf cake and even compote, I was pretty sure I had the rhubarb terrain well-covered. But then I walked through the Union Square Greenmarket two weeks ago with Adam and we were both lured in by the bundled stalks. Because they’re shiny and pretty and pearly and pink and I cannot speak for Adam but I am incapable of resisting shiny pretty pearly pink things, nor do I wish to.

I also hadn’t intended to bake another recipe from my new cookbook obsession, Good to the Grain, just yet. For the sake of my hips. For the sake of repetition, given that I already cannot stop talking about it (“The photos!” “The fresh ideas!” “Those danish, aaah!”). I needed to put it on a top shelf and come back to it with some willpower. Problem was, in the process of putting it away, those free-form rhubarb tarts on the cover taunted me once again, “Don’t you have rhubarb to use up? You know you wanna!”

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I never had a Pop-Tart until college. I realize that for some people this may cause a shocked reaction on par with my husband’s the time I told him I’ve never watched Goonies before (or Jacob’s, upon discovering the internet). Obviously I grew up under a rock, right? Thus, given my proximity to concrete-like materials you’d think I have been better prepared for the texture of the one I purchased from the vending machine in the basement of my freshman dorm (not at 4 a.m. or anything, either, nope, not this angel!). But I was not. It was like particle board, but even particle board has a fresher aroma. It took two hands to break off a piece. I choked down my first bite, then chugged some water, convinced bits were stuck in my throat. Don’t you hate that?

I understand that if I had toasted it, my experience might have been better. And maybe the brown sugar cinnamon variety isn’t exactly the most vibrant. Also, it is entirely possible that a dusty dormitory basement doesn’t have, say, the packaged pastry turnover a large grocery store chain. But even at its most ideal, it could never be anything but a compromise for me: a dry, flavorless, glycerin, high fructose corn syrup, “artificial strawberry flavor”-ed version of what could be homemade and flawless.

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From what I read, those of you on the opposite side of the country are reveling in the season’s first artichokes, asparagus and favas. You’re gushing over rhubarb and your new favorite way to cook it. You’re rejoicing over how good in-season strawberries taste when you’ve been deprived of them for the better part of a year.

Please stop.

I am small and petty and the Greenmarket is so devoid of anything but root vegetables — and also vegetables that grow in the ground — would you like some potatoes? We have crates and crates; I’m incapable of being happy for you. I was so eager to believe that I’d find anything but the same old things that have been out for the last four months when I was at the market this weekend that I rushed at a sign that said “Apricots and Nectarines” even though I knew it would have been impossible that the crate could have contained them, only to find that it had been scrawled on the back of the announcement of more “Cold Storage Apples”. (Sorry kid, looks like another week of applesauce for you!)

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I confessed some wanderlust a few weeks ago, though “some” is a bit of an understatement. See, parents get paralyzed a bit in the beginning — in the early days, just getting a cup of coffee in the morning is kind of a triumph — thus even when the kid hits a half year old (which once-Wee Jacob did this week, sniffle) and you’ve got a good routine down, you still know you’re not ready to pack everything the three of you will need for one week into suitcases and then willingly relocate to a 180 square foot stateroom for a so-called vacation.

But we’re doing it anyway and I cannot wait. The prospect of “whee! vacation!” is officially less terrifying than the number of diapers, burp cloths, types of infant first aid, teething rings and onesies we are packing into suitcases, thus, it is now or never: we’re getting on a boat. And guess who is coming with us?

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As many of you have figured out, I’ve got a megawatt crush on Southern food. It comes out with a vengeance all summer when I want nothing more than to dry-rub ribs, make corn bread and buttermilk dressing salads, dive headfirst into tomato pie and douse pretty much everything in bourbon then usually goes into a soft hibernation over the winter save a fried chicken or chicken and dumplings run-in or two.

Given this infatuation, it seems only right and proper that I’d get in a recipe for sweet potato pie at a time of year when sweet potatoes are exactly everywhere. But while I do love me some sweet potato pie, there’s a heaviness about it that is exactly what some people like about it but leaves me feeling kind of lukewarm. So you can imagine when I spied this fluffier, tangier and [here's the part I think you're really going to remember] almost cheesecake-like version of it a cookbook written by and I’d like to believe for Manhattanites with a thing for Southern home cooking, I bookmarked it instantaneously and then sat on my hands/tapped my feet impatiently until sweet potato season came around.

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