Food and possibility

For the record, there was a bit more drama about the subjects raised in the last post that lasted throughout much of last night and which (coupled with a marked slowdown of my internet speed which makes it difficult to watch tv online) made me even more wretched--and not insignificantly, more angry--than I was in the afternoon. But this post isn't about that. This post is about food.

The one thing that has given me consistent and reliable pleasure in this already-tumultuous summer is going to the Greenmarket at Grand Army Plaza on Saturdays. In fact, the one Saturday this month where I've been the most wretched is the one when I didn't go to the Greenmarket. I don't think those things are entirely unrelated. I mean, granted, it isn't really about the shopping experience per se. I do tend to hurry a little bit, being one of the only people there alone, not really interested in dodging bikes, strollers, and couples. But there are moments of joy even here--seeing what fruits and vegetables are in season, daring myself to take new things home and see what I can do with them, and getting different "treats" to take back. It's of course a little bit on the expensive side, but I've been doing a better job of actually cooking balanced meals for myself, and it means I can skip some of the more cringe-worthy sections of my Key Food. I'm not disciplined enough to eat entirely at the Greenmarket--as a single person, that would be especially hard, and I admit to liking to have certain vegetables (peppers, brussels sprouts, spinach) around even when they are not in season. I also can't really afford to buy everything local / organic, as I'm living on basically "nothing a year" (as they say in Vanity Fair) at the moment. But I do think it's worth it, especially for things like meat and bread, and as one result I've ended up eating slightly less meat but more interesting kinds of meat when I do, cutting out chicken breasts (not intentionally, but there are more interesting things to spend money on and I've never liked the ones at my grocery store), and only really eating processed food when it comes from Target. Of course, this also sometimes means that I run out of food that can be easily prepared by the end of the week. Last night for dinner I basically had a granola bar and a handful of dried fruit. Granted, I had a big lunch, but still...

Anyway. The real Greenmarket happiness comes when I get home and can survey the week's takings. And, of course, the cooking. The high point of this week was the night I made a pork chop from the Flying Pigs Farm, following the simple instructions they provided. It was the.most.amazing.pork.chop I have ever eaten. Incredibly flavorful and juicy, nothing akin to the dried out kind of cardboardy chops I remember from my childhood. I have a second one in my freezer for when I want a treat again. As sides for this meal, I made some oven-roasted asparagus, sauteed spinach with red pepper, and potato pancakes but with shredded zucchini instead of potatoes. The rest of the week was downhill from there. I wish I'd thought to take a picture of it. Actually, maybe I should start doing that--but it would require having actual batteries for my digital camera.

I do think I like the sense of possibility that going to the Greenmarket provides. I've never really liked Fridays, and I've had a vexed relationship to the weekends. Given the state of my life right now, Friday afternoon brings not relief but a sense of all the work that I didn't get done during the week, a kind of lethargy that isn't relaxation, the sense of falling back into invisibility. Sometimes it's not always this bad, but that feeling is always there around the edges.

And I think this is why, even before I broke up with the Ex, even before I discovered the joys of the greenmarket, I would often find myself cooking semi-complicated meals and listening to the radio on Saturday nights.

This week's possibilities from the Greenmarket are as follows:
cherries
blueberries (some of which I plan to freeze)
peaches
kale
young onions (one of my earliest and most favorite greenmarket discoveries)
garlic scapes
a loaf of sourdough (usually I'm much better about getting something in the multigrain family, but every now and then....)
a grass-fed eye steak
turkey sausage
a garlic, goat cheese, and rosemary foccacia

Plus, I still have snap peas left over from last week. Lunch was a bit of turkey sausage, about half the foccacia, and a peach. Dinner (before I, most likely, go into Manhattan to see the second episode of "Hospital" at the Axis Company), I think, is going to be a bit of the steak, some kale, and some of the garlic scapes. So, yay.

Other good things: someone came to fix my soap dish, it's not so hot that I have to have the air conditioner on, and the slowness of my internet connection makes it more likely that I will do work than watch television. I'm trying to be grateful for small things.