A sixty-five-foot long bed of asparagus out behind the house is blasting out spears as we speak. This is its third year, and, after waiting fairly patiently for the requisite two years, during which we allow the plants to get well-established, we are really enjoying the crop. I don’t remember the variety names any more, but one is purple and one is green. The purples turn greenish when I cook them, as many of these purple vegetables do, especially green beans. (Purple cauliflower, which looks so beautiful in the garden, turns a yucky blue-gray after cooking. Too bad.)

A fair number of the asparagus stalks are really big and fat, practically like cigars, and Toby adores those. The challenge is to separate them into piles of similarly-sized stalks so that I can cook them evenly; a small effort considering the reward of stunningly fresh asparagus flavor. I gave up eating off-season asparagus years ago, because it never tasted as good as my own fresh stuff. The flavor of January asparagus resembles the real thing, but is pretty unsatisfactory overall. Same goes for strawberries and melons, by the way. And green beans and broccoli, and…oh, never mind.

Lots of times here in this column, I have said something like, “When in doubt, roast it.” I don’t remember my mother ever roasting vegetables when I was growing up in the 1950s or ‘60s. Or ever, for that matter. My Aunt Marian roasted potatoes with chicken, and I thought that was wonderful. Why my mom didn’t, I’m not sure. Come to think of it, she didn’t use the oven much for fixing dinner; the oven seems to have been largely a storage place for her baking pans which she removed on ceremonial occasions for baking cakes, cookies, and the occasional roast.

There are a few vegetables that don’t roast well. Lettuce, for instance. (Though, I hear, one can grill a whole head of romaine!) Roasting vegetables is terrifically easy and effective. Vegetable flavor intensifies, and you don’t drain away nutrients. Roasted asparagus, as the instructions below show, qualifies as fast food: five to ten minutes.

You can use any olive oil that you like. We splurged a few months ago on lemon-flavored olive oil. It has been worth every cent. A little dribble of that on salad with seasoned rice vinegar takes the old oil-and-vinegar gambit to a whole new place. One set of online instructions I saw for roasting asparagus called for a little sprinkle of lemon zest on the finished spears plus a grating of nutmeg. So the other evening, when we roasted asparagus for guests, Toby said, “How about using the lemon olive oil on this?” I agreed instantly, and was that ever good! I never got around to the nutmeg, so that will be for another time.

Basic roasting instructions follow. If you want, after the roasting step, add some garnish to punch up the flavor a bit. Use lemon zest and/or juice, a dribble of balsamic vinegar, sprinkle of nutmeg, paprika, celery salt, coarse salt, or parmesan.

Roasted Asparagus

Asparagus spears, similarly-sized, woody ends trimmed

Olive oil

Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Lightly oil a baking pan, and arrange the spears in a single layer. Brush the spears lightly with oil. Roast for five minutes. Remove the pan, lightly turn the spears, and replace in the oven for three minutes, or until the asparagus is as tender as you like. Sprinkle with salt and pepper to serve, or garnish to taste.

Two lemons, zest and juice, are what you need to set your sour tooth a-tingling. Plus, of course, just the right proportion of egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch, and flour.

What a lovely bunch of lemon meringue pie recipes readers sent. There were seven, plus or minus, of the classic lemon filling with meringue on top. Then there were some variations which sounded really wonderful, a chiffon-y sort, and one made with sour cream, and “lemon cake pie.” I will hang onto those and give them a try later to share with you here.

Lemon meringue was my dad’s favorite pie, and my mom used to make it with the packaged mix. I remember a little gelatin-like capsule containing the lemon flavoring that dissolved in the pan as you cooked the mix. At the time, I liked the resulting pie well enough, but when I encountered from-scratch lemon meringues, I figured out what the fuss was all about.

I’ll bet my dad would’ve liked to do as Dot Mead’s husband did at age sixty, and ask for lemon meringue as a birthday treat in lieu of cake. Dot, who lives in Southwest Harbor, sent along the Good Housekeeping recipe she always used.

Ruth Thurston, in Machias, wrote to say, “The first time I visited my husband-to-be’s family, his mother made this pie. I asked for the recipe then and it is still my favorite.” That was a good strategy.

Lemon pies with meringue toppings have been around quite a while. Wearing my other hat as food historian, I bumped into them in the late 1800s, and Dick McLaughlin in Machias sent one entitled “Fresh Lemon Pie” from Farmer Country Kitchen Cookbook, first published in 1894. He wrote, “Here’s a recipe that we have used over the years with good success. Enjoy.”

Maureen Calder, from Canaan, sent her favorite recipe that, she said, “…comes from a tattered, well used Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook on page 235. I’ve been using it for 40 years and, although I’ve added many more cookbooks over these years, this one is still my favorite.”

Marjorie Bray uses a lemon meringue recipe from Farm Journal’s Country Cookbook published in 1959.  A version she also sent, named Black Bottom Lemon Pie, calls for melted chocolate spread on the pie crust before adding the filling. Mmmm. Toby says he can’t wait for me to make that one.

Mary Ulrich in Blue Hill found her recipe in Tea Time at the Masters, published in 1977. While most of the recipes called for spoon or cup measurements of lemon juice, Mary’s called for two lemons, so, following my own principle of rounding up or down to the nearest whole fruit (or vegetable), I squeezed two lemons and found out that they came to a third of a cup, which at least three of the recipes called for. Evelyn Kallock, in Camden, sent a clutch of recipes from a 1955 Modern Encyclopedia of Cooking. One of those recipes called for “1/3 cup or two lemons.” Bingo, two lemons it is.

Thanks, also, to Penny Kneeland in Burlington, and Deborah Oliver (no relation) in Camden, who sent along other lemon pie variations that I will try anon, after I have recovered from my most recent lemon meringue binge.

Now let’s have a quick conversation on assembling this pie. If you have a gluten allergy in your house, you will have to use all cornstarch in the filling. Five to seven tablespoons should do the trick, and it wouldn’t hurt to stick another egg yolk in there. I advocate two whole lemons plus grated rind of both. Because I really like an intense lemony sourness in the pie filling, I routinely drop the sugar amount at least a little. You’ll need to suit yourself on that.

Ruth’s recipe calls for a quarter teaspoon of lemon rind in the meringue, too, a splendid idea. Otherwise you can flavor it with a half teaspoon or so of vanilla, though several recipes called for no flavoring in the meringue. Don’t forget a hearty pinch of cream of tartar to help the meringue firm up.

The pie sets up nicely if you let it cool thoroughly. The pie in the picture shows a bit of sagging, but that was because I served it for dessert about two hours after I made it. Next day, I could cut it with no oozing going on. But who would want to wait that long?

Lemon Meringue Pie

Filling

1 ½ cups sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
3 tablespoons flour
dash salt
1 ½ cups hot water
3 egg yolks
2 tablespoons butter
juice of 2 lemons
grated lemon peel of 2 lemons
9 inch baked pie shell

In a heavy bottomed saucepan, mix sugar, cornstarch, flour and salt. Gradually add the hot water, stirring constantly. Cook and stir over high heat until mixture comes to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer, cook and stir two minutes longer. Remove from heat.

Slightly beat the egg yolks in a small bowl. Stir a small amount of the hot water and cornstarch mixture into egg yolks, then add that to the rest of the hot mixture. Bring to a boil again and cook two more minutes, stirring constantly. Add butter and lemon peel. Slowly add lemon juice, mixing well. Pour into pie shell. Make the meringue.

Meringue recipe
3 egg whites
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
6 Tablespoons sugar

Beat egg whites with vanilla and cream of tartar, until soft peaks form. Gradually add sugar, beating until stiff and glossy peaks form and all sugar is dissolved. Spread meringue over filling; seal to edge. Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes. Cool before cutting.

Makes 1 nine-inch pie

I like almost any one of the orange squashes—butternut, buttercup, Kabocha, Hubbard—alone, or cooked and mashed together with carrots, a kind of feast on Vitamin A. If I had sweet potatoes around, I’d include them, too. I am happy to wallow in all this good orange stuff, with maybe just a bit of brown sugar stirred in–not much, just a touch–then butter, salt, and pepper on it. Mmmm.

For some reason or other, though, a week or so ago, I had an urge to go a savory route. I sautéed a little garlic, added the squash, then made a mixture of onions, black olives, and capers, sautéed in olive oil to put on top of the squash. Toby and I liked it well enough that he said, “This is good enough to put in Tastebuds.”

Though I used squash alone, you can use other sweetish orange vegetables by themselves or in combination. I’m pretty sure they’d benefit from this treatment. Start with the recommended amount of olive oil, but add more if your mixture looks a little dry. It ought to slip smoothly off a spoon. Use real Kalamata olives or any other tender and flavorful pitted ripe olives, preferably not canned black olives.

I served the savory mixture on top of the squash because it looked better than it would if it were all stirred in, which is what I did as I ate it.

Many thanks for all the lemon pie recipes. I have quite a few, and so it will take a bit of time for me to work through them and report. Stay tuned.

Squash with Savory Sauce

2-3 tablespoons olive oil
1 large onion, chopped coarsely
½ to ¾ cup of black olives, coarsely chopped
2-3 tablespoons capers, drained
2 to 3 servings of cooked winter squash
Put the oil in a heavy pan, and cook the onions in it over a medium low heat until they are very soft. Add the olives and capers, and more oil if the mixture is a bit dry or stiff. Cook altogether for at least five minutes, or cook ahead and re-warm as needed. Spoon some of the mixture over the heated squash before serving.

Makes a scant cup of sauce.

Looking for…..LeonNa Gilbert, who reads Tastebuds from down South, wrote to ask “Have you ever come across a recipe for Tuscan bread? I’ve been searching for one and have yet to find one.” LeonNa makes bread and told me about a Swiss loaf she makes and beer bread. She’d like to add rustic-sounding Tuscan loaf to her collection. Anyone have such a thing?

All the essential elements of greens and beans.Out-of-the-Lawn Greens, with Beans

One way to get rid of dandelions is to eat them. Some people are busy right now, rooting them out of lawns and gardens, myself included. My mom used to dig a mess each spring, and boil them. On the grounds that they were supposed to be good for us, we ate them with butter, salt, and pepper, and I can’t truthfully say I liked it then. Another time-honored way to cook them is to heave in a chunk of salt pork with them, and let it simmer a good long while, but most of us can’t get away with that sort of thing anymore.

In fact, I can’t think of any traditional Maine dish that combines greens with beans, so the following comes from a Mediterranean source, and I have to say I like this a good deal better than the old Yankee way. I even offered it up to dinner guests recently, and they liked it a great deal, too.

Garlic and olive oil can make almost anything taste better. To the dandelions, I added spinach and scallions, which I wintered over in the garden. I let the dandelions account for about a quarter of the total amount of greens. I had some frozen arugula that I added, too. Finally I boiled white Cannellini beans, that I grew myself, until they were tender, though canned ones would work perfectly, too, and make for quick preparation. Actually, overall, this vegetable side dish is very speedy.

The rule I heard from old timers is, gather the dandelions before they bloom, or before May 10. I went after the ones that planted themselves in the vegetable garden, because that way I didn’t have to deal with grassy bits in them. Dandelions benefit from being soaked in water and rinsed thoroughly before using. I can’t say exactly why I think it is necessary, but I picked out any emerging buds. Something about bitterness perhaps.

The wok worked perfectly for sautéing the greens. They wilted right down, became tender, and did not collect a lot of liquid along the way. At the very end I tossed in the beans, whirled everything around a few times, flavored it with some rice vinegar, and it was good to go. Really tasty. Wholesome, too, though I am not a believer in eating food simply because it is good for you.

We hear a lot about the Mediterranean diet and how healthful it is, but in my kitchen, this Mediterranean dish had a lot of Maine in it.

Greens and Beans

2-4 tablespoons of olive oil
1-2 large onions, chopped
2 to 3 cloves of garlic, minced
One gallon-sized container of dandelions, washed and coarsely chopped
Two gallon-sized containers, or a large package, of spinach, torn up or coarsely chopped
One gallon container of some other greens (arugula, beet greens, chard, baby kale, collards, turnip greens, or even a lettuce mix) torn up or coarsely chopped
2 cups of cannellini beans, or white bean of your choice
Balsamic vinegar, rice vinegar, or lemon juice
Salt and pepper

Heat the oil in a wok or large heavy-bottomed cook pot. Add the onions and cook over a medium temperature until they begin to soften, then add the garlic. As soon as you can smell the garlic cooking, add the greens, raise the temperature to medium high, and cook and stir the greens until they are thoroughly wilted and tender. Add the beans, and mix them in. Add the vinegar or lemon juice to taste, and add salt and pepper to taste.

Makes four to six servings.

Dates stuffed witht, from left to right, cream cheese and smoked almonds, peanut butter and bacon, and cream cheese with chopped crystallized ginger.

If it is hollow (or if it only has a dent), stuff it: chickens, peppers, turkeys, whole fish, mushroom caps. If it isn’t hollow, empty it out; then stuff it: tomatoes, potatoes, squash, clams. So it goes. Dates have a big pit; remove the pit, and what do you have? A candidate for stuffing.

We had a great discussion about stuffed dates recently at the Blue Hill Library during Brooke Dojny’s Down East Colloquy called “Chowders, Baked Beans, and Blueberry Pie: A historical and contemporary look at setting the Maine table.” Brooke assembled an interesting and curious group of people, which included readers of this very column, to explore Maine food, and she asked me to come and speak, too. We got onto the topic of dates via a date-nut bread which Brooke served, made from a recipe in my new book, Maine Home Cooking, and Castine food writer Harry Kaisarian said he liked to stuff dates with a mixture of cream cheese and chopped crystallized ginger. That got us started.

Finely chopped crystallized ginger to add to cream cheese for stuffed dates.

I remember my mom stuffing dates with a piece of walnut or pecan, then rolling them in coconut. That was a Christmas treat, which, at the time I did not particularly enjoy, and I suspect Mom, who loved them, made them as much for herself as anyone else. A nut-stuffed date is good rolled in sugar, too. These would be confections, in my book.

For the more savory side, as an appetizer, dates stuffed with a soft cheese plus a garnish of a nut or some other tidbit is pretty tasty. I used smoked almonds in mine; very good. Someone suggested peanut butter stuffed dates, and is that ever delicious! Blue cheese like gorgonzola works with or without a nut. Garnish with a bit of parsley or chopped chives. Wrap bacon around the date after you stuff it and bake it until the bacon is crisp. Or chop the bacon up and add it to the peanut butter.

I used Medjool dates, which I found in the bulk food section of the supermarket. Compared with a lot of what we can eat, dates are reasonably wholesome. They have a bunch of minerals and make manganese, copper, potassium, magnesium, and calcium taste pretty good. Decent fiber content and low sodium are the upside; carbohydrates are the downside. They have zero fat until you add cheese or peanut butter. Apparently one pitted date weighing twenty-four grams has sixty-six calories, so it isn’t like you can eat a half dozen with impunity, and with peanut butter or cream cheese added, believe me, you will want to.

P.S. Reader LeonNa Gilbert passed along a great idea after reading about smoked paprika in last week’s chicken paprikash recipe. She adds smoked paprika to roasted potatoes! Yum. And Julia Hathaway in Veazie thinks she might substitute veggie burger for chicken in the paprikash recipe for the vegetarians in her household. Why not.

Savory Stuffed Dates

Whole Medjool dates

Your choice of

     Cream cheese

     Blue Cheese

     Goat cheese

     Peanut butter

Your choice of

        Bacon

        Pecans

 Almonds

Walnuts

Crystallized ginger, chopped finely

Your choice of garnish

   More bacon

  Chopped parsley

  Chopped chives

  Alfalfa, pea, or other sprouts

Slice the date lengthwise and remove the pitted. Fill the space with your filling of choice, add cooked bacon, chopped ginger either mixed into the cheese or added as garnish, or nuts.

If you wish, wrap a half slice of bacon around the date, and bake for about 15 to 20 minutes at 375 degrees until the bacon is crisp. You may want to brush a little maple syrup on the bacon wrapped date before baking.

Makes a variable number of servings.

Paprikash bubbling in the pan.

This is fast food, really, but it tastes slow. We all need a few thirty-minute recipes like this in our respective repertoires to get ourselves through the daily “what to make for dinner” dilemma. It probably is a travesty of some sort to call this a real paprikash, which usually calls for slow braising of bone-in chicken pieces. Still it is flavorful, and something you can do with boneless, skinless chicken breasts which too often come off hard and dry.

Somewhere a few months ago, I was reading about paprika, and the foodwriter suggested acquiring some smoked paprika. So, the next time I went to the Belfast Coop I spotted it among the herbs and spices and thought, why not. Every once in a while I add to my supply something I have never used, in what is occasionally a feeble attempt to jolt myself out of a rut.

I have not taken paprika very seriously. I suspect the garden variety paprika most of us acquire tastes good enough, and fulfills the need for color on potato salad, or deviled eggs, or otherwise beige dishes. Paprika deserves more credit than that. This smoked stuff is really terrific and combined with chicken, tomatoes, and sour cream it is stellar.

The recipe could be extended to use pork or turkey. If there is a vegetarian in your midst, I bet you could make a tasty version with cauliflower or tofu. If you want, try using Greek-style yogurt in place of the sour cream.

Chicken Paprikash

Noodles

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

2 tablespoons paprika, smoked or not

2 cups of whole canned tomatoes

½ cup sour cream

2 halves boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into bite-sized pieces

Start the noodles by heating cooking water.  Put the olive oil in a large sauté pan and begin to cook the onions. As soon as the water is hot, cook the noodles according to instructions on the package. Add the paprika and the tomatoes to the sautéed onion, cook briefly to heat through, then add the chicken pieces. It will take only five to ten minutes for the chicken to be cooked through. Drain the noodles and butter them lightly to keep them from becoming sticky. Arrange noodles on a platter. Stir the sour cream into the chicken and pour the chicken and sauce over the noodles and serve.

Makes two to three servings.

Looking for….A good lemon meringue pie recipe. Not too much cornstarch, please, and from scratch with lemons I squeeze myself. Anyone?

Jars of biscotti sitting on the counters of coffee shops always, always tempt me. I love biscotti and I always say to myself, “for the amount of money you want to spend on those you could make your own and lots more of them.” Of course, getting around to doing that is whole other matter.

This recipe might make it seem a little easier to do. Very simple, really. Plus it has the added virtue of being tasty but not so wildly delicious that you’ll want to sit down and eat the whole batch. A few years ago I offered up a chocolate biscotti recipe I picked up from an island neighbor, but those little buggers, dipped in melted chocolate and studded with chocolate chips, are way too scrumptious to keep in the same house I am living in.(Though, of course, Toby disagrees.) I’m sure you know what I mean.

These biscotti went to weekly Sewing Circle with me on Tuesday, and I unloaded a bunch on the group, and they seemed to enjoy them. We always have coffee or tea before our president begins the business part of the meeting and what we call “show and tell” when we view the finished projects that will be offered at the annual fair. We all enjoy it when someone brings a little something to go with.

A classic biscotti is flavored with anise. I didn’t have anise, so I used vanilla. And the original recipe called for more sugar, which I reduced. Neither did the recipe mention add-ins like nuts, but I dropped in a handful each of slivered almonds and dried cranberries, and I like the result very much. I bet the recipe is actually pretty adaptable and you can tinker with it as your creativity moves you.

Basic Biscotti

½ cup vegetable oil

¾ to 1 cup sugar (to taste)

3 eggs

3 ¼ cups flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 tablespoon anise (or other) extract

1/3 cup each nuts, raisins or dried cranberries (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a baking sheet or cover with parchment paper.  Beat together the oil and sugar, then beat in the eggs. Mix in the extract. Sift the flour and baking powder together and mix until the dough is quite stiff and all the flour is absorbed. Fold in the optional nuts and fruit. Divide the dough, and form two logs about half an inch thick. Bake for twenty-five to thirty minutes, until golden. Remove from the oven and let cool enough to handle.

Then slice the logs into bars about a half inch thick or as thick as you prefer. Put them back on the baking sheet and return them to the oven for about five minutes. Turn each bar over and bake another five minutes until dry and toasted a little. Let cool and store.

Makes about 36 slices of biscotti.

It must be the cinnamon sugar that makes this a snickerdoodle relative. We offered up snickerdoodles, the cookie, about a month ago, and that prompted Ruth Thurston in Machias, who often shares her recipes here, to send along a currant-studded cake-like bar with a topping of cinnamon sugar baked into a buttery glaze. Some good. And it makes a generous amount, too, unfortunately for me who can’t indulge as I used to; I took a plateful to Selectman’s meeting last evening and unloaded them on a fellow board member who has kids.

Ruth’s recipe suggested adding chopped walnuts to the topping, and I did that, but I don’t think I would again. I really prefer that plain hit of sugar and cinnamon. The recipe also suggested that either currants or raisins would work, but in a bar like this, I think the smaller currants are a better idea. A plump raisin is too much of a lump in the middle of everything for me, though you might like that. I certainly wouldn’t go out and buy currants on purpose only for this recipe, because all you need is a half a cup, though I think next time I might sneak a few more in.

Currants are part of my regular pantry supply, along with raisins. Historically, currants were used in savory dishes, and I add them to curries, braised chicken, and grain salads like rice, quinoa, or wheat berry. I enjoy the tiny little burst of sweetness they add.

Ruth’s directions called for a jelly roll pan. I don’t have an official jelly roll pan, so I baked my bars in a roasting pan about ten by thirteen inches, and the bars turned out an inch thick. If you use a nine by twelve pan you’ll get a thicker bar, and it might take a few minutes longer to bake. Cut them maybe an inch square, and if someone really likes them, they can take two.

Snickerdoodle Bars

Cake Layer

½ to 1/3 cup currants or raisins

1 cup water

½ cup butter

¾ cups sugar

1 egg

Currant liquid plus milk to make 1 cup

2 ¼ cups flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

Topping

½ cup sugar

1 ½ teaspoons cinnamon

7 tablespoons butter, melted

Finely chopped walnuts (optional)

Simmer the currants in the water until they plump up. Drain, reserve the water and allow it to cool, and spread the currants in a pan to allow them to cool, too. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and grease and flour the baking pan. Cream the butter and sugar together.  Beat in the egg. Add milk to the currant liquid until you have one cup; then add that to the egg, butter and sugar mixture. Whisk or sift the flour, baking powder, and salt together and add them and beat; then add the currants. Spread evenly in the pan.

Mix the sugar and cinnamon together. Pour the melted butter over the surface of the cake, and then sprinkle the cinnamon sugar evenly over it. Add the optional nuts. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until the center is set and a tester inserted comes out clean

Makes up to two dozen servings.

Pea soup and the sweet and sour onions on cheese just before I added the top slice of bread.

The onions from last year’s harvest are keeping very well in the cellar way, and among them a couple of reds.  I favor a sort called Copra, a golden-skinned little number which seems to like growing here, and keeps well for me. The reds are the rosy pink Rossa Di Milano. I expect reds to get soft this time of year, and so it was helpful that my island neighbor Linda Gillies brought by a jar with sweet and sour red onions in it, along with the recipe.

The recipe’s original writer intended that you add the onions to grilled cheese sandwiches. I did that, but I kept thinking how these onions would go really well with sautéed chicken, or as a garnish for cream soup, or added to sautéed greens. Or, piled on cream cheese for cheese and crackers. The list goes on.

I served a homemade pea soup with the grilled cheese and onion sandwiches. Now, this is the time of year when I look in the freezer and think, I’d better eat that because I will have new stuff coming in. Since I am four months away from a new crop of peas, the frozen ones, now about eight months old, need to be dinner and lunch pretty darn soon. As it happened, a couple evenings ago I made scalloped potatoes, and I steamed up some peas to go with a piece of pork we had. There were a couple of tablespoons of peas left over, and I added them to the pan that had the potatoes in them to store overnight.

Next morning, I spooned some the potatoes out of the pan and fried them as home fries. That still left leftovers with a few peas rolling around. A trip to the freezer revealed a pint of peas that I had actually labeled as best for soup; took them out and heated them, and had the sudden idea of tossing the potatoes in, too, and the stray peas, then heaving it all into the food processor to make a kind of cream of pea soup. I added a little broth, some grated onion, and a sprinkle of cumin and red pepper flakes. Pretty tasty. Just don’t ask for a recipe.

Here, however, is how to do the onions. P.S. I don’t see why you can’t use yellow onions for this.

Sweet and Sour Onions

1 large onion or 2 medium red or yellow onions

1 tablespoon butter

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon brown sugar

salt

1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

pepper

Slice the onions thinly. Melt the butter together with the oil in a heavy skillet over medium heat. Add the onions and cook them for about five minutes until they soften. Add the brown sugar and salt and continue to cook, stirring occasionally for another five to ten minutes until the onions are completely softened. They will darken somewhat. Add the balsamic vinegar and cook briefly until the onions are reduced in quantity and glossy. Cool and store until you serve them.

Makes about three-quarters to one cup.

Soon, soon we will be awash in hardboiled eggs. Up to our elbows in pink, green, blue, purple, yellow eggs, if the Easter Bunny has anything to say about it. I’ve never regarded a pile of boiled eggs as a problem, because I am exceedingly fond of egg salad sandwiches and deviled eggs. And I like to bash them up a bit and sprinkle them on salads. Hard-boiled eggs broken up and put into a cream sauce, flavored or not with curry, served on toast is a great lunch, or supper, or breakfast. In fact, I boil eggs just for the heck of it in order to have them on hand.

A couple of weeks ago my niece Sarah, who lives in Belfast, came for a visit to the island, bearing as a gift, a container of the ugliest eggs I’ve seen in a while. They looked as if someone had soaked them for a week in March mud. We quartered one on the spot and ate it, and I thought, what fun: these are delicious.

Sarah explained they are brown from being soaked in tamari or soy sauce. You’ve seen brilliant pink eggs soaked in beet juice to make pickled beets, right? This is a variation on that kind of process.

I served the ugly eggs on a bed of claytonia, also known as miner’s lettuce, a very succulent little cold-tolerant green growing like mad in the hoop house right now. Lightly dressed with oil and vinegar, it tastes very good to a winter-weary palate. I had a little leftover tortellini salad that I heaved onto the plate as well. It was all very tasty.

I’m sure you’ll figure out what to do with the ugly eggs to suit yourself and your households. I’ve advised this before and will again: if they look really bad to you, close your eyes while eating.

A couple of words on tamari: it is very like soy sauce, and you can use soy sauce in place of it. I like to buy tamari in a largish bottle, a pint or more. Soy sauce too often comes in tiny little bottles for sprinkling, unsuited for cooking in any quantity. My niece also thought that perhaps eggs boiled until they could be peeled but are still a little soft might prevent eggs that get too hard. Up to you. Obviously, if you use leftover Easter eggs, that is not an option.

Tamari Eggs

6 boiled eggs, peeled

1/3 to 1/2 cup tamari

Put the tamari in a large sauce pan over medium to low heat. Add eggs. In Sarah’s words, “Stir, shuffle, cajole and poke eggs almost constantly to make sure all surfaces get covered with the simmering/gently boiling and evaporating tamari. Do this until you fear scorching…then stop.” The eggs should be a deep mahogany color. Let cool before serving.

Makes six eggs.