11 January Saturday

In these strange and surreal, hold-your-breath, is this really happening, hellshit nightmare of bleak mid-winter, let’s pretend that we are not horribly distracted and exhausted by the realities of the world fresh in 2025. Some enthusiasms may need to be manufactured. Now, I will tell you, I’ve made some lovely things since last I wrote, but nothing of note. Until the other day.

Little dramas like this, I can handle. While at a friend’s for dinner recently, we all went down a YouTube hole of beef. Steaks, chucks, marbled, butchered, cuts of all kinds and shapes and preparations. Bloody aprons, sinew, fat, and bones flying through the air. It was wonderful. I don’t know, it put us in the mood for beef. And for me, far preferable than steak, is stew, or today, pot roast.

Now there are two types of beef stew I may get a hankerin’ for, when I get a hankerin’ for beef stew. The first is the French daube type, usually made with wine and thickened with Beurre Manie, or Old Fashioned All American Beef Stew, made with Beef, water, salt, carrots, potatoes, and that’s it. OK, maybe a little more fancy. Green Peas. Pearl Onions. And Parsnips.

Parsnips! Think of them as white, sweet carrots with a slight anise sort of flavor. You can do so many fun things with these little guys. They make good “fries”, soup, purees, and are great roasted with their friends, the carrot, turnip, and potato.

Parsnips! I exclaimed as we strolled through Whole Foods on that Tuesday mid-morning. “Parsnips are essential. Nature’s candy.” I said. “Really? Who is going to notice parsnips, and then appreciate them after noticing?” Well. We did find parsnips. They were tiny, withered, wobbly and miserable. I wondered if we happened upon a pod of partially decayed alien babies. I grabbed a giant handful, and threw them into the basket. There is no way I am making a beef stew this week without these little horrors. And what a cool funky taste that goes so well with beef, especially beefy beef. I love a good Beefy piece of beef. I cook that baby low and slow. Low and slow, for say, 5 hours, at 300F. I know it sounds nuts, but I think you can’t go wrong with low and slow. That is! if you love your beef absolutely fork tender beyond beyond. When you pull the lid off the pot, we beheld the beef undulating like jello, that’s just how tender it was. The knife slid effortlessly through the meat, which melted away in tender slices.

The guests assembled at the table. The dish of rich, sumptuous meat, surrounded by the noble sentry of vegetables, and enrobed in hearty jus was set forth to oohs and ahhs. The plates were passed, the cutlery clicking, and the wine glasses clanking. The knife tapping against the plate while the drink is slurped. Someone, swallowing, clearing the throat, made a HMM sound and asked, “Is there cinnamon in this?” I could have giggled with delight. “No,” I said. “But you have detected the magic ingredient.”

Parsnips! Parsnips! Everyone shouted in unison, and we all had a jolly laugh, raised a toast to the parsnip, grabbed the hands of the people next to us, and danced around the table till we all fell to the floor in a heap of rags!

Well, it didn’t really happen that way. I said “Oh, that’s parsnips” and everyone said “Oh.”

“Parsnips are good, you don’t always get them in things. They’re nice.”

And so, our year begins.