MY HANDY-DANDY PANTRY

My "pantry" is large~It includes spring flowers, fanciful tableware & stemware~But also a grill, copper pans, my fridge-freezer~Then, of course, food such as balsamic, Le Sueur peas et al . . . .

Since morels are the namesake of this newsletter, it seemed fitting to showcase this pantry allstar. These beauties cost about $50 a pound at my favorite local grocery.

Granted, a pantry can be nothing more than a shelf in a kitchen cabinet with a couple cans of beans, Spam, and green beans. A proper pantry has more in it. And my pantry is grand in my definition, with a modern refrigerator ice maker that turns out circles of ice rather than half moons, with an ancestor’s heirloom tableware, with a goodly amount of copper pots and pans, and with exotics such as fresh morels. My pantry is also something like an emergency tool kit, at the ready to satisfy everything from an urge for a snack to a compulsion to make some fancy dinner. It must be prepared for any eventuality that strikes my fancy. Sometimes, it can really more than just stuff. Sometimes items in it are packed with history, tell a story, represent a memory of childhood, resurrect a special memory from a long-ago holiday like a first one Michelin star restaurant meal or a visit to a Italian Parmesan farm or a balsamic producer or a cherry orchard in rural northern Wisconsin. Other times it’s where you wander to for a midnight snack.

1. Almonds 2.5 pounds of Kirkland Signature brand Roasted Almonds With Sea Salt from Costco (about $11) sit in a bowl in my kitchen near my pantry into which I dip a dozen times daily for a quick hit from one to a half dozen of these nuts. Dry Roasted Almonds are kicky, too. Besides being tasty, they’re low in carbs and high in protein and fiber.

2. Avocados My wife is the CEO of the “alligator pear” in our home. Oh, you didn’t know that was another name for these delightfully healthy fruit-vegetables? She makes a simple guacamole with mashed avocados, chopped onions, and sea salt. She serves me my portion to which I doctor up with Tabasco.

3. Bacon Vande Rose Farms produces the finest bacon I’ve ever tasted. It’s sold in Iowa supermarkets, but you can get online (only with a humongous order). This bacon comes from family farmers who raise Duroc pigs, a 175-year-old American heritage breed known for its rich red color and celebrated for its juicy, tender, flavorful succulent, rich meat. The meat's balanced marbling says, Vande Rose, contributes to a robust and complex taste. This bacon was voted “America’s Best Uncured Bacon, smoked over real Applewood chips,” according to the company’s web site, in Cook’s Illustrated.

4. Baguette A baguette is a long, thin bread loaf that is distinguishable by its length, crisp crust on the outside and soft inner core. It has a magical taste on day one, begins to dry out on day two, and is hard as a rock not long later. So eat it the day you buy it.

5. Balsamic In 1046, the Holy Roman Emperor Henry III was given a silver bottle containing this celebrated vinegar while passing through a town on his way to his coronation. The record of this visit is thought to be the first written reference to balsamic, a condiment once known only to those in the Emilia-Romagna region of what is now modern Italy, and produced only in the provinces of Reggio Emilia—where Henry III was visiting—and neighboring Modena. It’s an aged vinegar so prized that back in the Middle Ages a diminutive bottle may have been given as a wedding present, used sparingly during decades of that married life, given to the children of that marriage as their own wedding gift, and repeated again the next generation. The rich, complex sweet brew explodes in the mouth with notes of fig, molasses, cherry, chocolate, or prune. The best balsamic also picks up flavors of the wood—oak, chestnut, ash and cherry—barrels it’s matured in which offers a mellow tartness rather than a strong acidity. An “Extra Vechio” is traditionally aged for 25 years. Online it fetches $285 for a 100 ml Belazu.

6. Bananas For me, first came peanut butter and sliced banana sandwiches when I was young. Fast forward many decades to these times, then came David Leite’s Notes on a Banana, a memoir from the founder of the James Beard Award-winning website Leite’s Culinaria—a candid and laugh-out-loud funny story of family, food, and mental illness—which I read for inspiration when I started this newsletter two years ago. Then there was last night. I got hungry about 4 a.m., marched to the kitchen to snatch a banana from the banana bowl, took a bite or two and then placed it strategically near my bed. Today, they may well be a central ingredient in the fruit smoothies that my wife and I make this time of year with various berries, yogurt, and orange juice.

7. Beans B&M Original Baked Beans are required in my house to make a hamburger-bean dish in our cast iron frying pan, a year round go-to dish for us. It’s as simple and satisfying as any weeknight dinner dish can be. The other bean in our bean bag is flageolet, required ingredient in my house to make a braised lamb shanks dish. The bean is small, light green, and kidney-shaped. The texture is firm and super creamy when shelled and cooked. They are similar to white navy beans or cannellini beans. This mild bean is also good with roasted tomatoes and garlic, topped with a drizzle of your very best olive oil. Our best pal in the heirloom bean business is Rancho Gordo, in Napa Valley, California.

8. Cheese Velveeta surely must be America’s cheese. I grew up on greasy, cheesy, soul-warming grilled-cheese sandwiches, often served with tomato soup, that can be toasted quickly in a frying pan and served after being cut diagonally into triangles or cut twice diagonally into tiny triangles. A blog for The Committed Pig tells us this sammie was born into our culture a century ago and became the comfort food children preferred most. I still crave them every once in a while. For cheese geeks, Delish takes you back through its history. I gug even deeper into the Google machine for more serious V-cheese geeks and found an article in The Smithsonian Magazine from 10 years ago. Gruyère is a nutty hard cheese I love beyond words. While others Alpine cheeses may be similar—Comté, Jarlsberg, Emmental, or Fontina—Gruyère’s my choice for charcuterie boards for dinners with friends or just a big hunk for Sunday dinner with just me. The Spruce Eats offers plenty of ideas about how to cook with it. Blocks or wedges of Parmigiano-Reggiano, a hard, granular cheese, is made from cow's milk and is aged for a minimum of 12 months, with some varieties being aged for up to 36 months or more. In Europe it's not impossible to find cheese that is up to 48 months old. A 21-year-old wheel is very, very rare. I found a 5-year-old at Murray’s but for older ones, have fun looking! A tip: I find bags of this cheese, shaved or grated, much less flavorful.

9. Cherries Seaquist Orchards in Sister Bay, Wisconsin, is a major grower and processor of cherries for pies or for dried treats. I have family that visits there so my thoughts about their trips aren’t complete unless they send me some.

10. Chocolate Two questions. Want to be happy? What’s not to love about Boulder, Colorado? You must add to your list of earthly delights Chololove XOXOX. It’s made by a company that makes chocolates a gazillion ways, although none better than bars with raspberry bits or orange peel encased in 55% cocoa dark chocolate. For me, it’s three pieces of either after every lunch, come rain or shine or spring or summer or fall or winter.

11. Clams One regular dinner I make often is spaghetti alle vongole, or spaghetti with chopped or minced clams with a white wine-garlic sauce. Some purists insist on fresh clams. Being no purist I settle for Snow’s although there are dozens of brands in the marketplace. Make a big batch with a box of angel hair pasta and four cans of clams so you have leftovers, as good a leftover as there is.

12. Copper Pans I’ve been to Paris a handful of times in a handful of decades. Each time I’ve visited a dazzling two-centuries old “specialist of professional-quality cookware and kitchenware,” E. Dehillerin, 18-20 Rue Coquillière, 75001 Paris. I’ve always grabbed another copper pan to haul home to my pantry. Headed to the Summer Olympic Games in Paris? Why not stop and shop for a copper pot, too? They’re only a 20-minute walk from Île de la Cité.

13. Corn Cutter Every sweet-corn-lovin’ kitchen must have Lee’s Wooden Corn Cutter & Creamer even though alternative new-fangled gadgets will do the same job. This one’s just fine for turning late summer sweet corn into creamed corn.

14. Eggs Most Sunday mornings I like mine poached and served on an English muffin. My second favorite dish is a simple egg salad with fresh chives.

15. English Muffins They’re splendid with poached eggs. Make your own? Here’s Michael Ruhlman’s recipe. Buy them? He strongly prefers Bay’s over Thomas’s.

16. Flowers Yes, I think of flowers as pantry items. A meal without them on the table is like a day without the sun.

    

17. Garlic Whole or minced garlic in jars. It’s an ingredient that finds its way into many a dish. See goodFOOD to learn about it.

18. Grey Poupon I keep it handy to mix with fresh rosemary to top pork tenderloin or lamb chops headed for the grill. This combo of this condiment and this herb is magical. Grey Poupon has been around since 1777!

19. Harry Potter™ Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Jelly Beans Being introduced to these as a geezer probably makes me one of a kind. I understand they’re featured in a game called BeanBoozled, which pairs two jelly beans that look exactly alike but could not taste more different. You could get one of the most popular flavors such as “juicy pear” or one disgusting one called “booger.” I was introduced to the delightful “cherry” and the revolting “vomit,” which I was forbidden from spitting out. Why do I have these on this list? I’m still wondering . . . .

20. Ice Cream Dove Ice Cream Minis is a treat, either a vanilla or chocolate ice cream made with silky Dove dark chocolate. It’s virtually the size of one bite, enough to light up my taste buds but easy on the waistline because its only 60 calories a bar.

21. Ice Water Since I drink it all day from my 20-oz. charcoal Yeti tumbler, I’m grateful for both the ice maker and the cooled water dispenser in my frig.

22. Lemons. Meyer lemons grow on a tree in front of my home here in northern California. That’s something I could have never dreamed of while living in Knoxville, Tennessee. This is our second summer living next to that tree and I’m going to take full advantage of its fruit this year. But still on the hunt for ideas. Gonna check out the kitchn.

23. Liver Pâté Chicken-liver pâté is a special occasion dish I rarely make but like a ton. It’s easy to prepare, delicious, and rewards cooks with much of the bang of goose- or duck-liver pâté plus it rewards cooks with much more bank for the buck than those do. Here’s a Michael Ruhlman recipe.

24. Miso I can’t count the number of containers of miso I’ve bought over the years and just left in my frig too long. My heart is willing but my will isn’t. Its flavor can be compared the flavor of a rich soy sauce. It's salty and concentrated with fermented hints of tanginess. Just maybe I’ll read this tip sheet from Epicurious right along with you, dear reader, and get over my cooking block!

25. Morels In the 1970s, I foraged morels for the first time. I found them by crawling on my knees, in bushes, around Lake Harriet near downtown Minneapolis. I cooked up some of these rarities, that can only be found in the wild to date, and saved the rest. I recently removed the lid of the container they have been aging for half a century, and took a sniff of what, by now, surely have qualified to be called “vintage morels.” There was still a heady aroma there, albeit diminished from their youth. Allrecipes offers a guide to cooking with them.

26. PB&J I said all I have to say about one of my top sandwiches in the February 2022 issue of Vintage Morels.  

27. Pancetta It goes with many of the pasta dishes I make all the time. Among my favorites is fresh ricotta-and-lemon-stuffed ravioli with sage brown-butter topped off with sautéed pancetta, freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano and crushed red peppers. Here’s another kicky pancetta recipe from the Buona Domenica substack for double carbonara that creator Domenica Marchetti calls “a heretical recipe that unabashedly breaks the rules.”

28. Peas My love affair with Very Young Small Sweet Le Sueur brand peas in a can began when I worked for Green Giant right out of college. Those peas are grown near Le Sueur, Minnesota, a valley named in honor of the French explorer Pierre-Charles Le Sueur. These peas are carefully harvested at a specific time when gauges in the field report the number of heat units the peas have absorbed reaches the magic number for them to be ready—right now!— for harvesting. It’s precisely then that they’re at their most delicate sweetest. Back then peas were trucked to the cannery, dumped on a concrete slab, nudged onto a conveyor belt, and whisked into cans on the production line. Those were sold to the public right off that slab for perhaps pennies for a small bushel of them. They were as fresh as some I could have eaten right out of my own garden at the time. In 1990, The New York Times extolled their virtues.

29. Pasta There’s something about the combination of flavors and textures that’s truly mesmerizing about pasta. My current all star team includes De Cecco brand Spinach Penne Rigate no. 41 with pesto. Here is a recipe where The Washington Post uses spinach pesto. I vastly prefer the classic basil pesto. Here’s a basil pesto recipe from Love & Lemons.

30. Peanut Butter I said all I have to say about PB in February 2022 issue of Vintage Morels.  

31. Pepper I cotton to crushed red-pepper on pizza and also on almost all of my pasta dishes. They’re often a blend of dried hot chiles. Their seeds are processed into uniform flakes and may be the quickest way to add heat to a dish. In Alexa Weibel’s simple recipe arrabbiata sauce, one or two teaspoons of the stuff builds the fiery foundation of the classic tomato sauce.

32. Pickled Herring It’s a 4 p.m snack many days of the week. My ancestry is Danish and Swedish so I got introduced to pickled herring as a kid. I’ve kept the habit—always in wine sauce by the way—because it tastes so fine. Make your own with the help of MasterClass. My brand is Ocean Beauty, which even claims it makes a good breakfast.

33. Pistachios They’re on my list because I have good memories of pistachios. Just why, I’m not sure.

34. Polenta Having lived decades in the Southeast, I’ve come to classify grits, polenta, and cornmeal under the same rubric. They do have a similar taste and texture. But southern grits are generally made with white corn, while Italian-style polenta is made from yellow corn. Cornmeal is similar to polenta, but rather than being turned into a rich, savory side dish, it's used as an ingredient for baked goods like cornbread and corn muffins. Eater tells the story. One charming use of polenta in my repertoire is to dry it overnight in a pan in a 1-inch layer. It can then be cut into triangles or other shapes and grilled, resulting in one big crouton.

35. Popcorn My popcorn of choice—two cups every weekday before dinner, with olive oil and sea salt— is a Safeway house brand named Organics. There are gazillions of flavors and brands if you don’t want to make your own. Happy hunting!

36. Rosemary Its clean vibrant taste marries well with pork and lamb dishes. I often combine it with Grey Poupon.

37. Sage Fresh sage is essential to sage brown butter dressing for pasta. The Spruce Eats offers this recipe.

38. Salt I once bought a block pink Himalayan salt. It’s pink and is mined near the Himalayas in Pakistan. Folks claim that it's loaded with minerals and provides incredible health benefits. That block was pretty but was ho hum in its ability to add flavor to foods I grilled. Maldon is a finishing salt with distinction and loved by chefs since 1882, so it says about itself.

39. Scallions My best paring of scallions is with Ventresca tuna.

40. Soy Sauce Bourbon Barrel Foods, a Kentucky maker, creates an exquisite soy absolutely worth seeking out.

41. Squash Honeynut is a hidden gem. Again the case for which duly is laid out in the October 2022 issue of Vintage Morels.

42. Tuna Ventresca tuna in oil with scallions and mayo on the side can’t be beat. My go-to is Tonnino brand yellowfin pole and line caught from Costa Rica. This is unusually rich tuna belly.

43. Vinegar Homemade with herbs and aged a year or two. I start with a champagne vinegar and regularly add leftover herbs to the vinegar I’ve put in a coolio bottle.

44. Wild Rice Wild rice is a hearty and nourishing alternative to white rice or brown rice. Each features a long grain that takes longer to cook than most other varieties. It’s best served with a gentle, toothsome crunch. Wild rice is technically a grass seed, but considered a whole grain—one that can be tossed in soups and salads or served warm with any of your favorite add-ins. Looking for a few recipes that highlight this hearty grain? You'll love this wild rice dish that's bursting with umami flavor thanks to shitake mushrooms, white button mushrooms, onion and garlic. Parsley and thyme adds fresh, herbal flavor and butter adds creamy richness. Serve as an easy side dish, with pork chops or grilled chicken.

45. Wine The San Francisco Chronicle recently ran an article offering this assessment. “California wine is in serious trouble. For 25 years, the wine industry boomed. There are too many wineries in California, too many grape vines planted, too much wine being bottled for the market to bear. This is an industry that grew complacent, so accustomed to its baby boomer-dominant customer base and its old way of doing things that it hasn’t been forced to meaningfully innovate in a long time.” Well, now. I do like my wine but I’m sure not happy about this development. My drinking cellar is mostly whites, with the occasional pinot noir. I sold my aging cellar a decade ago when my palate told me cabs, even first growths, weren’t my cup of tea anymore. Of late, I have sought out wines from wineries so small their annual production may be fewer than 1,000 cases. That means they simply can’t fill up all the local shelves of grocery stores and wine shops with product. So they sell from their winery. Since wine is produced in all 50 states in the U.S., try checking out something in your neck of the woods. You may well find something you’ll like.