9 August 2022 Tuesday

Like a dried out Christmas tree in your fridge, days old desserts are a poignant reminder of the inevitability of decay. The end of all joy, innocence and youth. That sweet fluffy cloud of whipped cream with seasonal strawberries at the height of flower on Sunday is now deflated, craggy, withered. The berries have turned bitter and are weeping. The whipped cream is toppled rubble like a grand, old, movie palace after the wrecking ball.

Salads and desserts have the shortest shelf life of any foods. By salad I mean the typical American green salad with lettuce and chopped carrots and other crap. Salads should not be kept. I notice at meals made for family and friends there is an occasional insistence that there be “something green” on the plate. It is healthy, and it assuages any guilt caused by the other ingredients in the meal. I notice, however, that guests usually only take one or two leaves of greenery as a kind of garnish. They nibble at it, but mostly the salad is there for show. At the end of the evening, when the ritual of leftover storage takes place, some helpful person will try to store the salad because it is claimed that this salad will be delicious later on. Perhaps they don’t understand that your salad is in a state of decay and will not be desirable after tonight. A dressed salad will not last the evening, it must be thrown out. It doesn’t get better than this, friends. If you want a salad tomorrow, make it tomorrow. Tell the truth. You don’t want to eat this salad. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever.

Desserts are slightly more tricky. People don’t pretend to like desserts, they do. They think that they will want to eat it later. Sometimes, they are right. How about cake? Puddings? Hmmm…..what else? Ice Cream? There’s not much that keeps. Maybe some cookies. Most pies, pastries, and breads don’t improve at all with age. Pastry must be crisp and do her dance.

So this moment has come for our dear Strawberry Meringue Cake. There isn’t much left at all, but it is no longer worth the calories for flavor. The kitchen is emptying out. I will be away for a couple of weeks, and when I return it will be closer to fall than the beginning of summer. It is good to clean the cupboards, to reset and start over. The summer has been beautiful, and it’s getting time to move on.