Back in Connecticut

A lot has happened in the seven years or so since I last signed in! After my mom died in 2014 and my two daughters had babies a year later, we decided to move back to Connecticut, rather than make quarterly cross country trips. So here we are, in the northwest corner of Connecticut, a few miles up the road from our daughter's weekend house. We are living in the village of New Preston, in the town of Washington, less than two hours from New York City, where we still have a small apartment in Jackson Heights (Queens). But for now, with New York ravaged by this terrible virus, we are here--as is our daughter and her family. With not much to do, and no one to see, I am spending a lot of time thinking about food, and making some too. Yesterday, it was baguettes--I am experimenting with how much non-white flour I can use--and Pasta and Bean soup. I basically modified a Williams Sonoma recipe I found on line, using ingredients at hand. I am trying to shop only every two weeks, though I usually do it at least twice a week. So I am using my freezer and getting creative when it comes to salad, which normally we would have every day. Escarole anyone? Adding to my current culinary restrictions is that both of my daughters have decided not to eat meat or poultry, though fortunately they are still eating fish. So I had been doing a lot of experimentation with fish and seafood for awhile, with some positive results (which I frequently try out on my neighbor Diana, who also does not eat meat). Right now, after a conversation with my sister-in-law Beth, I am trying to make a sourdough starter from the air, using directions from the Greens cookbook. Basically just mix flour and water and leave it out for a couple days. I'll let you know how that works! For stocking your pantry in these trying times, I highly recommend Melissa Clark's suggestions in the New York Times. I have just about everything she recommends, though not as much frozen spinach as I would like, since my store was out of it last week) and probable not quite as much canned fish, though an almost full 24-ounce jar of anchovies from my last trip to Arthur Avenue in the Bronx. While there, I also bought a pound of dried mushrooms, exceedingly helpful since fresh ones don't last too long. But I've also used some frozen ones, and they're not too bad. I'm not sure what she said about canned tomatoes, but I also have a lot of those, diced, whole, fire-roasted, plain. Davis, California, was a wonderful place to live for many reasons, but especially the food. We had an amazing farmers' market that was open year-round (here they are only seasonal), a fabulous food coop, and two branches of the small Nugget food market chain, along with Trader Joe's and Costco (in Woodland). Here I do most of my shopping at two small connected grocery stores, which have a lot of organic products, and the larger of the two a good fish counter. There's also a great natural foods store in Woodbury, about 25 minutes away, though I tend to shop closer to home. And of course there's a Costco, but about a half hour so we only get there every six weeks or so (or when we run out of toilet paper). Sadly, no Trader Joe's! So that's it for now. I still haven't figured out what to cook for dinner. Maybe a stir-fry with some left over pork tenderloin? Or some swordfish, which I have in the freezer? I think Tim is getting sick of my cooking, as he passed on the bean soup last night, and it was pretty good. I froze the rest, minus any pasta, for another time. So stay tuned...