Living on Borrowed Corn

It’s the Fourth of July, and we are beside ourselves here in Little Compton. Yes,there is finally some sun among the clouds today, at least this morning; storms are predicted for later. But it feels and looks like a blustery fall day; the wind is literally whistling around the house. Still, that is only the source, not the manifest consequences, of our distress. It’s the Fourth of July, and there is no corn.

Perhaps we’re spoiled—OK, we are—but one of the things in life you always look forward to seeing is that corn sign, up at the local stands, almost like clockwork on the 4^th. Not that we can’t still, and won’t, look forward to it. But it will not be the same, like being told on December 25th that you have to wait to celebrate Christmas until sometime in February. It's not that there’s no corn at all, of course; there is. It’s just that it’s not from here, and no self-respecting farmer would ever put his corn sign up for that.

So far this year I’ve only seen my own farmer-purveyor from a distance, and from the back, passing his tractor on the road with a wave, catching a glimpse of him carrying things into the barns or moving equipment. Even from afar, I think I can see the anxiety in his shoulders. But I don’t need to ask what’s wrong, and why there’s no corn. And I don’t need to ask why the fields out back, which normally would have knee-high corn by now, sit still untilled. We all know. Rain. A stunning 6" in one day this week alone.

So this Fourth of July we are celebrating our independence with dependence, and it sticks in our craw. We are eating corn from —the hushed response to my question about where the corn was from, as only local produce carries the farm’s own sign—Delaware. Not even New Jersey, which would have still brought shame but that we all secretly know is almost as good as ours. (Having been raised in New Jersey, I do not say that lightly). But Delaware? It’s not like it’s Florida—we would never eat that--but this is a new low. On this day of all days, we know that not all corns are created equal.

Still, it’s the Fourth: as Americans, we must soldier on. We will make do. Even though the corn looks quite presentable—I’m guessing it had been picked within two days—there is no question about eating it on the cob. We measure corn freshness in hours, even minutes, not days. Although of course I tried the smallest of the already small ears. No go.

So while we are living on borrowed corn, do something to cosmetic it up, and conceal its age. Appropriately dressed, it will be good, even very good—and pass for much younger. And have a Happy Fourth of July, knowing that we will, yet again, soon be free of foreign invaders.

Oysters On A Bed of Seaweed

Not really oysters, not really seaweed. A simulacrum, like the corn. This is one of many kinds of corn fritters, of different styles, that I make. I love them all. Serves 4 as an appetizer or first course.

2 medium ears corn, shucked
1 small ear corn, shucked
1 large egg
1 T butter
½ tea Dijon mustard
½ tea salt
freshly ground pepper
4 large scallions

½ tea baking powder
½- ¾ cup flour, preferably bread flour

corn oil

Using a small, very sharp knife (I use my beak parer), slit the kernels of the two medium ears lengthwise down the rows, and scrape the milk into a medium bowl; cut the kernels from the smaller ear into the bowl. Melt the butter with the mustard in the microwave; stir into corn with the egg, the salt, and a few twists of the pepper mill.

Trim the outer membrane from the scallions and cut the white parts neatly into 1/8” rounds; add to the corn. Reserve the green tops. Sift the flour and baking powder into the corn mixture, starting with the ½ cup and gradually adding additional flour until it has enough body that it won’t spread in the pan, but is still very moist.

With your sharp knife, cut/slit the scallion greens finely, so that they curl. Blanch for about 30 seconds in boiling water and drain/dry completely. Dress with enough oil to look glossy; if you want to eat it (it’s really just for show), dress it with a light vinaigrette. (You could skip the blanching if you want.) Set aside.

Heat about ¼ inch of oil in a skillet until moderately hot. With a tablespoon from the silverware drawer, drop ovals of batter into the pan. Cook until they are nicely browned, turning once and tipping up on their sides if needed. They will only take a minute or two. Drain briefly, salt, and serve on the bed of scallion greens. These need no adornment, other than a glass of wine. If you serve them as a first course with knife and fork, a little simple tomato coulis would be good.

A Rhode Island Pizza

   

Between growing up in New Jersey and living in Rhode Island, the states with, respectively, the largest number and percentage of Italians, I have eaten a lot of very, very good pizza. Truly fine thin-crust pizza can only be gotten in such Italian strongholds—New York City, Philadelphia, Boston, New Haven—as anyone who has had to, say, move to the middle of the country, knows. Pizza dreams always come back to that one little place that is pizza perfection for you: the right amount of black on the bottom of the thin crust, the subtle slick of oil on the top, the moderate smear of properly salted, unsweetened sauce, the restrained yet optimum amount of good cheese, browned here and there to perfection.

For as long as I can remember, Friday night was pizza night at my house: first, in New Jersey, the order of four large pizzas from a local pizzeria for our family of eight; then, in college in Rhode Island, going out for pizza on a Friday night off-campus; later, making my own every single week, a Friday night ritual. I don’t make it every Friday anymore. But I make it a lot. And lately, I’ve been making it frequently, because for the first time ever I don’t feel as if I absolutely must make my own crust or forego pizza altogether. Now in Rhode Island, pizza can be a simple matter of assembly.

A lot of good impromptu food is about assembly of great purchased products—think antipasto platters—and most dishes, including pizza, are the result of assembly of various components in the end. But first you usually have to make or cook them. Now in Rhode Island, with the exception of the truly simple and lightning-quick matter of the sauce, you don’t. You can make a true Rhode Island pizza—indeed, a more-Rhode Island-than-ever pizza—with some special products from our local producers of artisan food products.

The foundation, literally, of this Rhode Island pizza is the fresh, thin, oval pizza shells from Olga’s Cup and Saucer, now available in some local markets. Though Olga started out in Little Compton, it was not until she moved to Providence and put together a professional operation that the food began to meet my food-snob standard; with the offering of this pizza crust, I would have to say that I am now impressed. Pizza every day! Thank you, Olga.

But that is just the bottom line, or at least, the bottom. Now we also have a very good, properly salted, creamy mozzarella from Narragansett Creamery, also now available at a market near you (Thank you, Louella). And we’ve always had chouriço. So in making my Rhode Island pizza, I thought: why not substitute a good handmade chouriço for pepperoni? Not that you can’t get terrific pepperoni here, but why not push the envelope on the Rhode Island theme?

This turned out to be a very good thought. Here is how to assemble your very own Rhode Island pizza. And if you don’t live or summer here, as always, I’m sorry. But do come visit.

A Rhode Island Pizza

Partially cooked, the Olga’s shells already have a generous amount of cornmeal on the bottom; they come in packages of 2 and freeze beautifully. Commercial chouriço will yield more oil than handmade, similar to commercial pepperoni. Serves 1 as a meal, 2-3 as appetizer.

For the sauce

1 15-oz can imported Italian tomatoes, preferably Pastene™
1 T olive oil
salt

In a medium skillet, heat the oil. If the tomatoes look watery on opening the can, drain them; if not (Pastene’s usually do not), put them right into the hot oil. Likewise, if the tomatoes seem hard (Pastene’s usually are not), cover the pan for a minute to soften them. Cook the tomatoes over moderately high heat for 2-3 minutes, chopping them with the edge of a wooden spoon, until they are broken down and a sauce begins to form. Lower the heat and cook at a moderately low simmer for anywhere from from 2-3 to 10 minutes more, depending on the tomatoes, until you can drag the spoon across the center of the pan and create a liquid-free tunnel. The sauce should be completely cohesive but not dry; be careful not to overcook, as the sauce will continue to lose some moisture on cooling. Near the end of cooking, add salt very gradually, just enough to take any acidic edge off to yield a true, sweet, round tomato flavor; again, this will depend on the tomatoes. Do not muck it up with a lot of dried herbs. Remove from the heat. Let the sauce come to room temperature before using.

For assembly

1 Olga’s pizza shell
1 8-oz Narragansett Creamery mozzarella
2-3 T freshly grated parmaggiano reggiano
¼ lb (about ½ link) hot chouriço, skin removed, sliced very thin
1 tea oregano (optional)
extra-virgin olive oil for drizzling (optional)

Preheat oven to at least 450 F, 500 F if your oven will go there.

Place the shell on a baking sheet or peel (if using a pizza stone); you can sprinkle it lightly with cornmeal, but it’s not absolutely necessary. Spread it thinly with  sauce; if you make the above amount, you will have 3 or 4 tablespoons left over, which you can refrigerate for another use. Slice the mozzarella thinly while cold (a wire cheese cutter is good for this), and arrange around the shell on top of the sauce; follow with the thinly sliced chouriço. Sprinkle with the parmesan cheese and the oregano if using. Bake until the cheese is lightly browned and gently bubbling, the crust is golden-edged, and you smell pizza. Home ovens vary widely; if you can get your oven hot, this will take 5-8 minutes, so start checking after 5. If not, it may take as long as 15 minutes. You want to remove your pizza before the bottom gets too dark or the cheese and sauce lose too much moisture; it should still have a gloss.

Remove from the oven and, if you wish, drizzle-sprinkle a tiny bit of extra-virgin olive oil on top. Transfer to a board and let sit for a minute or two; using a pizza cutter or very sharp knife, cut it into pieces and serve, with hot pepper if you like. Enjoy the real thing.

 

                                            

Apologies—and an Offering

    

I’m sorry. I truly am. I really am a loyal correspondent, proud of my record of prompt response to emails, calls, and yes, comments on my blog. I thought it was just that you’d gone silent on me, sort of hibernating for the winter (and horrible spring) or something. Most of my readers email rather than post, so I didn’t think a whole lot of the fact that there was no one commenting on the blog, and I could see that it was still being read from the stats. Then, the other day, I noticed a typo in my blog and tried to get into the site to try to fix it; strangely, Little Compton Mornings was not showing up on my blog list. And I couldn’t log in.

I soon figured out that, despite a prior effort to change the email address associated with LCM, it hadn’t worked. And I still haven’t figured out why, and still can’t engineer the change. But I was able to log in with my old email address. And there, to my horror, I found nearly 30 unmoderated comments—i.e., messages from you that had gone unposted, and unanswered. They have now been published, and I am in the process of responding to them. So particularly if you asked a question, look for a belated answer in the old posts where you originally made your comment.

So I’m sorry, and wish I could make it up to you. Bring you some food to ask for forgiveness. I thought what that might be, if I really could. Some sort of simple, honest penance, I thought, like a loaf of plain, wholesome bread. So here is a virtual offering, of white bread and strawberry jam. Will you forgive me?

Rich White Bread

This bread is enriched with egg, butter, sugar, and milk. It has a nice crust and soft, flavorful crumb. It makes really good toast, and can also be used to make hamburger or other rolls. Makes 2 loaves. 

For the sponge:

2 ¼ cups unbleached bread flour
¼ cup buttermilk powder
2 tea instant yeast (or 1 ½ pkg dry yeast, dissolved in ½ cup of the water)
1 ½ cups warm water

Mix together in a large bowl until well combined. Cover and let rise until very puffy and foamy, 45 minutes to an hour.

For the dough:

1 ½ cups unbleached bread flour
1 ½ tea salt
1 T sugar
1 T honey
3T butter, melted
1 large egg
½ cup additional flour or more

2 tea melted butter for brushing loaves

To the sponge, add the 1 ½ cups flour, the salt, and the sugar and honey. Stir well until it forms a sticky dough. Beat the egg into the butter (be sure it’s not too warm), and add to the dough, stirring with a wooden spoon until most of the liquid is incorporated. Using your hand, and turning the bowl with the other, work the dough in the bowl, adding the additional flour only as needed, until it has come together well into a ball. Flour the counter and turn out the dough; it will be very soft and still rather sticky. Knead it, adding as little flour as possible, until it is smooth and you can pull the dough in a solid mass up off the counter without it sticking. The dough should still be very soft. Place the ball of dough into a lightly oiled bowl, turning it once to coat. Cover, and let rise until double; this will take about 1 ½ -2 hours.

Turn the dough out without punching it down. With a lightly floured knife, divide it in two. To make loaves, flatten each piece of dough gently into an oblong the length of your bread pan and about three times its width; fold it lengthwise into three sections, like a letter, and rock it gently on the counter to form an even loaf with squared ends. Place into oiled bread pans, cover, and let rise until the dough comes up beyond the top of the pan, about 1 ½ hours. Bake the loaves for about 35-40 minutes, until nicely golden and hollow-sounding when you tap the bottom. Immediately brush with the melted butter; remove from the pans, and let cool completely before slicing.

Never refrigerate homemade bread; freeze it, or leave it on the counter, wrapped in a clean dishtowel, for up to 2 days—it will be gone. 

I made rolls with half the dough; bake them at 375 F for about 12-15 minutes . See the photo at right? Note the surface of the roll—a bit bubbly and somewhat flat: they were slightly over-risen. Important lesson!: Do not get into a long conversation with your particularly talkative friends (we all have them) and forget about your dough! (Still good, of course.)

Strawberry Jam

Following up on last week's post, I did make one small batch of jam when I was told by one of the local strawberry growers that he thought the berries were going to completely rot if the rain did not end soon. Which of course it hasn’t (there is even an article on the nonstop rain in today's NYT), and I had already noticed they were getting a little waterlogged. So no time to lose. Makes about 1 1/2 pints.

1 quart perfect strawberries
2 ½ cups sugar
juice of ½ lime or lemon

Remove the crowns and stems from the berries; wipe any dirt off with a paper towel. Leave smaller berries whole; slice large berries in half or, if very large,  quarters. You will have about 3 ½ cups after you have eaten your share as you work. Add the juice and sugar and  very gently turn the berries and sugar over until it is combined. Cover and leave out on the counter overnight, stirring occasionally (not in the middle of the night, of course).

In a 4-qt pan, bring the berries to a boil and cook at a moderately high boil, skimming the foam into a cup, until the jam has set, about 10-11 minutes; it will sheet from the spoon or form a soft gel on a cold saucer; see previous post on preserving for general guidance on cooking and storing.

I “skim the skim” near the end of cooking, as there is often some good, flavorful syrup at the bottom of the cup; I pour it back into the pot.

 

Surprise! Strawberries

I wasn’t really expecting them. Not yet. It wasn’t just that it had been so cold and rainy for so long, although that was a big part of it. It was more that it was only the first days of June. It seemed so early. But there they were, along with that other eagerly awaited assurance, beautiful and flavorful lettuce, that the summer growing season is, after all, coming to come again this year: strawberries. Surprise!

Of course, they are not cheap. Yet. Maybe never this year unless it stops raining and warms up some more. But at $5.50 a quart, worth every penny.

Not that you’re going to make a kettle full of preserves at this price. For that, we’ll wait to see what happens with the weather and the crop—meaning, to see if the price of that quart drops to $3.00 like, happily, last year. Or even $4.00. For now, there are other delights for a single quart, including that essential for the first-of-season, eating them out-of-hand. The old standby, strawberry shortcake. Strawberry ice cream, should we get the elusive hot day (we can dream, can’t we?). Or something as simple as a strawberry syrup for plain vanilla ice cream or pound cake, or an intense strawberry butter for slathering on biscuits or thick white toast, both started by simply pushing ripe strawberries through a sieve. Biscuits and strawberry butter are, in fact, just a deconstructed version of strawberry shortcake, a variation on the theme of simple biscuit dough, fruit, and cream—in this case churned beyond the whipping stage to fresh unsalted butter. It makes for a nice, quick, springtime breakfast or afternoon treat with lemonade or iced tea.

But confronted with strawberries and lettuce, an embarrassment of June riches, what else is there to do but join them—it is June, after all—in wholly flavorful matrimony. Sitting down to these first gifts of summer is as sentimental and life affirming as eating cake at a June wedding—preferably one held, and eaten, out on a Little Compton lawn. Pour the champagne, and say a toast to a new beginning. Summer, or life. They’re both the same.

Red June Wedding Salad

This is very pretty, and very good. I like to use the Boston red leaf lettuce from Coll Walker’s farm to complement the intensely pink strawberry dressing. Serves 4.

3 T extra-virgin olive oil, preferably organic, unfiltered (see Note)
1 T half-and-half or light cream
3 medium-large strawberries, trimmed of stems and crown
½ tea aged balsamic vinegar (see Note)
½ tea white balsamic vinegar (see Note)
¼ tea salt
6-8 twists of the pepper mill

1 head red Boston lettuce or other red leaf lettuce, washed and dried

In a small bowl. whisk the cream into the olive oil with a small whisk until combined. Slice the strawberries in half or quarters; you should not need to core them, as those awful white cores are virtually nonexistent in local berries, which are, deliciously, red right through. Using your little whisk, press down on the berries—local berries are soft—and whisk them into the oil/cream mixture until they have almost disappeared, turning the mixture an intense pink with a few flecks of red. If you want bigger pieces of berry in your dressing, stop when it is as you like. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Tear the lettuce into big pieces and place in a bowl. Pour about half the dressing in and toss; add more dressing gradually until the lettuce is nicely coated, with little red bits clinging to the leaves, but not saturated. The dressing will keep well in the refrigerator for several days; it will thicken, but may be used as is, or thin it a little by whisking in a few drops of warm water.

Note: Both organic olive oil and old balsamic are quite viscous—my balsamic, brought back from a trip to Italy, is like a thick syrup. If you do not have either, use regular extra-virgin olive oil, and you will likely need to use more vinegar (either regular balsamic and white balsamic or all balsamic) than is called for in the recipe—maybe 2 teaspoons total. Taste as you go. I am very fond of the Casa Pareja olive oil from Spain (where all the best olive oils hail from, in my opinion); I discovered this outstanding value oil while living in Philadelphia; you can mail order it from DiBruno’s if you cannot find it where you live.

Drawing Down Inventory II—Blueberries for LCM Anniversary

No, it’s not blueberry season, not here. Normally it might be getting close, another two months or so, but with winter the way it was, even that is looking doubtful. Although I heard a bizarre prediction based on slug behavior that suggests summer is going to be hot and dry (we can only hope that slugs have, if not brains, good vibrations), so perhaps berries will be here by the end of June after all.
Still, it is time to be using up the remains of last summer’s day that we have in the freezer, to make room for this year’s bounty. There’s an optimism about this annual ritual of drawing down inventory that suits spring—even though spring this year has only grudgingly started to arrive. Using up frozen berries is as much about anticipation as it about the product, or the weather, at hand.

It is the second anniversary of LCM this weekend. So what better way to celebrate it than with an old-fashioned recipe that showcases the frugality of husbanding food over the winter. Here is a plain bread, with a texture much like a good muffin, that is a good use for frozen berries.



Blueberry Bread
As with muffins, this is best served warm with butter. The batter will be thick. Makes 2 loaves.

2 large eggs
1 cup sugar
¼ cup unsalted butter, melted
1/3 cup half-and-half
2/3 cup 2% milk
3 cups a-p flour, sifted
1 tea salt
4 tea baking powder
grated rind of 1 lemon
2 cups blueberries, frozen or fresh
pinch flour
Butter 2 standard (8 ½ x 4 ½) bread pans. Preheat the oven to 350F.
Using a whisk, beat the eggs well, and beat in the sugar gradually until relatively smooth. Whish in the butter, then the half-and-half and milk. Switch to a wooden spoon and stir in, just 'til blended, the flour, salt, and baking powder.
In a small bowl, toss the blueberries with a big pinch of flour and the lemon rind. Fold into the batter. Drop the batter, which will be rough and relatively heavy, into the pans. Bake until a skewer in the center comes out clean, 45-50 minutes. Let cool in the pans on a rack for a few minutes; turn out or serve from the pans.
                                                                   

Chicken: Soup

The virtues of the chicken are many, but none is so great at its near-mystical malleability. While I respect the chicken’s plain economy, and admire the cleverness of nature in making every part from the feet to the blood to the livers (even the tongues) truly useful, these are, in fact, just examples of the chicken as transformational shape-shifter: feet into luxuriously gelatinous fat; blood into a deep, rich sauce; liver into a silky mousse. And oh yes, the meat itself, which we tear up and loosely bind for one of the world’s great simple dishes, chicken salad; simply slice for the world’s finest sandwich; mince and mix for homey croquettes, sausages, raviolis of every culture, or meatballs; puree for elegant aspic or quenelles; crumble for robust chili or tacos; dust and plunge intact into hot lard for the inimitable fried chicken. Roast, boil, sauté, or fry, chicken doesn’t mind, and rewards both your choice of method and choice of other ingredients with an earnest desire to please that exceeds that of even the most docile and self-subjugating “I’ll be whatever you want me to be” person you’ve ever encountered. Its willingness to change at your beck and call is so great that we might be tempted to say it had low self-esteem. But is, rather, that rare thing: genuinely generous, a kind of mundane miracle.

One of the most miraculous transformations it makes is from carcass to consommé—from bones into that rich, soothing, fortifying, universal broth-based cure: chicken soup. Chicken soup has been considered a treatment for colds and flus for so long, and in so many regions in the world, that its restorative powers are unquestionably prescribed as the cure for what ails you. And, indeed, there is some recent research evidence that chicken soup acts in an anti-inflammatory or even antibiotic capacity. Not that we needed scientists to tell us what grandmothers have for generations: we know without such evidence that it makes us feel better.

I’m making chicken soup today because I am recovering from pneumonia. I have no grandmother to make it for me, so I must do for myself. This might be sad were I not so happy to be out of bed, feeling not only well enough to stand, but to stand at the stove, for the first time in two weeks. As my disappeared appetite (that is how sick I was) has slowly returned, there is nothing I’ve wanted so much as some homemade chicken soup. My course of meds is about to end, but I am not quite all well, I know. My body speaks, and I listen: make yourself a little chicken soup.

 

Some general guidelines for making chicken stock and chicken soup

Old hens are hard to find in markets, so if you don’t live in an area where you can readily get one, use the largest roasting chicken you can find or, if you want to make a relatively small amount, a broiler. I don’t use the giblets, as they make the stock murky.

Start the stock in cold water to cover the chicken—about 5 quarts for a 5-6 lb bird. Season with a large onion, skin on and cut up; a carrot or two, scraped but  with the tops on, cut in chunks; a large stalk of celery, leaves on, broken into pieces; 2 cloves garlic, skin on but bruised; 2 medium-size bay leaves; 6-8 sprigs of fresh parsley; and 8-10 whole peppercorns. Do not overcomplicate the seasonings, and do not salt yet.

Cook chicken stocks for a maximum of 3 hours; two hours is often enough. Pull the breast meat off after one-half hour of cooking, or when just cooked through. Reserve for another use, including to garnish the soup.

Cook at a low, not rolling boil, lid slightly ajar.

Salt only near the end of the cooking, in the last 15 minutes or so, adding a ½ teaspoon at a time. Taste first; you may find you do not need any salt at all.

Strain the stock well, pressing down very lightly on the solids. You do not need to clarify the stock unless you are making consommé.

Cool stock in the refrigerator. You can skim the fat when the stock is cold if you wish, reserving it for cooking; it is excellent for sautéing vegetables, tossing with plain egg noodles, or as the fat in making empanada dough. However, leaving at least part of the fat in the stock makes your soup rich and nutritious, so I always do. Bring stock that has been refrigerated more than 2 days to a full boil for 1-2 minutes before using.

Freeze chicken stock for up to 6 months; leave at least 1” head space in glass jars or they will crack when the stock expands; leave space in plastic as well or the lids will pop off. If you’ve made a lot of stock, it’s useful to freeze some in 1- or 2-quart containers for soup, and some in 1- to 2-cup containers for use in sauces. Always freeze stock that you do not intend to use within a few days.

For your soup, cook vegetables and noodles, if using, separately, and add only as much as needed to your stock for immediate consumption. I like to sauté vegetables lightly, in a little of the chicken fat, cover them with a little of the stock, and cook only until they are crisp-tender. Again, stick to the basics: onions, carrots, celery, perhaps a few mushrooms; chopped tomato is also nice. Also add reserved chicken meat, if using, at the last minute, just in time to heat it up but not cook it further.

Freshly grated parmesan cheese, borrowing from the Italians, is a superb garnish for chicken soup, topped with cracked pepper. And sticking with the Italian theme, I am partial to the addition of a few tiny meatballs if I have a little ground beef around.

Feel better.  

                                         

The Best Leftover

 

When I put his dinner down on his highchair tray, my son used to ask me, with a piercing look and a note of stern warning in his voice—as if to say, don’t lie to me—“Is it fresh?” I would look at this 2-year-old child, sitting there in diapers and a bib, and wonder where in the world this suspicion that maybe I’d sneaked something out of the back of the refrigerator and scraped off the mold off before palming it off on him came from. I never figured it out—I had cooked “fresh” every night since he was born—or even how so tiny a child could think to ask such a thing. But one thing was sure, my son had no appreciation for leftovers.

Most of us do. Growing up, my brother’s favorite was cold spaghetti. Nearly everyone (and now even my son, who is 22 and began to give in to leftovers a year or so ago) likes leftover pizza. Stews, of course. Turkey, for sandwiches. Cold steak. But the really best leftovers, in my mind, are those you can do something with. Leftover rice, for fried rice or rice balls, or eating as cereal with cream and brown sugar. Leftover potatoes, for home fries or potato cakes. But the best leftover of all, for me, is bread. When it is in that transitory state between soft and fresh—when you just want to eat it—and hard and stale—when you just want to throw it out—it is something altogether new: a great ingredient. And it finds its highest calling in the lowly bread pudding.

New Englanders didn’t invent bread pudding, but Englanders may have, and brought it over to us here, where we eat it all the time; it is often even referred to as “New England Bread Pudding.” Its popularity is unsurprising: bread pudding is a brilliant resolution to the New Englander’s paradoxical combination of frugality and love of sweet indulgence, killing two birds with one stone. We love finding the luxurious in the practical.

Bread pudding is comforting winter food, can be thrown together quickly from those four great staples, bread, eggs, sugar, and milk, then made your own with whatever else you have on hand. There are versions too numerous to mention, because there are very few things that don’t find themselves at home with a little bread and custard. Fresh fruits like bananas and apples, dried fruits ranging from the traditional raisins to cranberries and tropical varieties, nuts of all kinds, and of course chocolate, are all welcome. Even the bread is malleable. French, Italian, challah, brioche, pannetone, plain old white or whole wheat, or the cinnamon bread from my last post. I love bread pudding warm from the oven. But it is also great cold. Leftover.

Cinnamon Bread Pudding

Second only to apple pie in being just as divine for breakfast as for dessert. It is a brunch favorite in New England. Serves 6.

About 6 ¾ “slices cinnamon bread (about 3 cups torn)
3 T soft butter
1/3 cup large raisins, such as red flame

3 eggs
3 cups milk (2%is fine)
½ cup sugar
¼ cup bourbon, such as Jack Daniels
1 tea vanilla
½ tea salt
¼ tea freshly grated nutmeg

Heat the oven to 350F. Place a large lasagna pan, about 1/3 filled with water, in the oven while it heats. Butter a smaller baking dish, about 11x7x1.5".

Butter the bread and tear it into pieces to make about 3 cups, pressed down. Place the bread into the buttered dish and scatter the raisins on top. Beat the eggs, then beat in the milk, sugar, bourbon, vanilla, salt, and nutmeg. Pour it over the bread, and let it sit for about 20 minutes.

Place the dish into the pan of water in the oven. Bake for are 45-50 minutes, until puffed, lightly colored, and a knife placed in the center comes out clean. Remove to a rack for just a few minutes and serve warm, plain or with cream, ice cream, or a sauce such as chocolate or caramel.