Food

Is there a better East End summer dish than chilled fish or seafood? And think of the possibilities! With a big advance from your publisher or the profit from that lot you sold in Sagaponack you could buy a few shrimp.

The time of year for lighter food is rapidly approaching. Quick sautés because you don't want to spend hours in the kitchen, lemony flavors to entice warm weather appetites, and bright green garnishes for visual allure are what dinner need most. Food like this offers an attractive alternative to the inevitable barbecue grill or platter of cold poached fish.

There is no better fish to exemplify maritime territoriality than the cod, sought after and fought over by fleets of many nations. Sacred cod.

I believe my earliest contact with sesame seeds was in the crunchy honey and sesame seed candy that I am still partial to. Or halvah.

Although every self-respecting supermarket stocks zucchini at this time of year, now is really root vegetable season, coming to the "six weeks' want" of bygone eras when the root cellar was empty and the first wild greens of springtime had not yet pushed through the thawing soil. Potatoes, onions, parsnips, turnips, carrots. Carrots!

Homemade pasta is both a challenge and a glory. There are machines to help you cut it but mixing the dough requires a “feel,” that sense of knowing when it is right. Otherwise your result may be permanently al dente to an unpleasant degree.

As has been my habit in the Thanksgiving issue of the Star, I am again offering a suggestion for the remains of the big bird. Chances are, by the time you read this, much of the white meat, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, and pumpkin, mince, or apple pies will have been consumed and you will be contemplating some sort of tetrazzini or a la king.

This is still pumpkin time, so it’s not too late to call your attention to a recipe recommended by Howard and Isot Weissberg of East Hampton.

What does pumpkin taste like? The flavor commonly associated with the flesh of autumn’s orange globe is actually that of the spices traditionally used with it. Ginger is the most noticeable, with heavy helpings of cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and allspice. Pumpkin alone is quite bland. Moreover, it can be cast in various other directions.

Fluke are flatfish, a species of Atlantic flounder, also called “summer flounder.” They can weigh in at a pound or so or be heaved aboard in seven to ten-pound sizes. For some reason, fluke were scarce for a few years but that has changed. Fluke fillets may be cooked like sole or flounder. The flesh is moist and sweet. From the larger fish, crosswise slices or steaks, much like halibut, lend themselves to various broilings, bakings and sauteings.

We are not devotees of strawberry ice cream—except when it is freshly made from freshly gathered strawberries. Several years ago I bought one of those small Salton ice cream makers. The idea of not having to fuss with rock salt and ice, of being able to tuck it into the freezer to do its work, appealed to me. A roast or two has to be removed to make room for it but that is not a problem—we're talking about two hours at the most. 

Salads are for globetrotters. Start with the dressings—"French,” “Italian," "Russian,” “Thousand Islands,” even "Roquefort.” The salads themselves are a Baedeker, not a menu. “Nicoise,” fragrant, herbed, to be enjoyed in the summer sunshine.