This Month's Recipes
Smarta' than Mart'a
It is famously misunderstood that there are no seasons in California other than summer and rain. But as native Californians know, fall is a subtle pleasure that disdains the gaudy arboreal show of cooler climates, revealing itself selectively in a few imported maples and in the overall gold richness of the light as it slips closer to the horizon. On these days, when it's still perfectly warm and the kitchen is fabulously empty of school-aged progeny, when the skinny nekkid foods of summer have given way to the slow-cooking, slow-stirring butterfats of autumn, some of us choose to play hooky and cook all day.This isn't some Martha Stewart nightmare of handspinning sugared violets, laying out the cheese platter so that it spells your lover's name, or squeezing custard from your cat, but rather an employment that requires a zenlike commitment to touch, smell, taste, and task. Reader Rebecca Clear provides the main course here; we've worked the rest around her, deciding on a spinach risotto, sugared carrots, pear salad, and a blackberry-peach cobbler to complement her offering of Cornish game hens. Sinful, rich, time-consuming, fattening, and soul-sating? Duh. So call in a mental health day, get barefoot and short sleeved, put on the kettle and some music (we're listening to anything by the Divine Comedy or Prince, as well as The Juliet Letters by Elvis Costello and the Brodsky Quartet, B.B. King's Deuce's Wild, and scratchy old Steely Dan discs these days) and make a day of a meal. Here is the suggested order of preparation: 1) make the dessert and refrigerate uncooked; bake while dinner is being eaten 2) prep the carrots and chill; cook while the hens and risotto are agog with heat 3) make the viniagrette and assemble the salad undressed; chill 4) prep everything for the risotto and put aside for cooking while the hens are roasting 5) prepare the hens and get them in the oven
Aries-Virgo Rising Cornish Hens
INGREDIENTS:
Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Toss out bag of hens' guts, if included. Liberally season inside the birds with salt and pepper. Place one bay leaf inside each hen's cavity. Place the hens together in a small roasting pan. Pour butter over them and season to taste with salt, pepper, paprika, and a little thyme.
Roast breast-side up 30 to 40 minutes, basting every 10 minutes with pan juices. To test, puncture the thickest part of the thigh. When juices run clear, the birds are done. Remove to a warmed platter and cover loosely in foil.
Place the roasting pan on top of the stove on medium heat and add onions, chives, and garlic; cook three minutes. Add white wine; cook two minutes. Turn heat down to simmer. Add chicken stock; simmer four minutes. Add parsley.
Dissolve cornstarch in water (swoosh it in a clean jar), then add gradually to roasting pan with a wisk, stirring up all the lovely bits of joy.
Serve hens with whatever you like, there will be plenty of sauce/gravy for them, and for your joyous meals ahead. If you're vegetarian or vegan, I am filled with remorse and horror that you will never enjoy this.
More for me.
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