The Hobbs Digest

Cold Comfort

Oh, the weather outside is frightful, and pretty much everything we hear about the economy points to bleak, hardscrabble times ahead. Noted Great Simplifer Thomas Friedman was on Fareed Zakaria's show on CNN today, where he pronounced, "I go into restaurants and I look around... I want to come up to people and say, 'You shouldn't be here. You should be home having tuna sandwiches. What are you doing here? Don't you understand?'" (His expenditures going out to eat are implicitly acceptable, unless he just walks into restaurants to tsk-tsk and march right back out the front door, but that point was not raised.) His provocative statement brought to mind two things for me: a) restaurants shouldn't necessarily be singled out as unworthy recipients of our discretionary spending, and b) yes, cooking at home makes so much sense for so many reasons, including thrift.

The most indomitable advocate of home cooking today has just come out with an updated edition of the best cookbook out there, How to Cook Everything. Mark Bittman, a New York Times colleague of Mr. Friedman, is a longtime champion of home cooks and believes passionately that everyone can use their kitchens--even tiny Manhattan versions, like his own--to produce healthful, delicious food to really be proud of.

On chilly days when leaving the cozy sanctuary of home to brave the outside world is just too intimidating, there are many simple, quick treats one can whip up in no time. Today I craved chocolate, and I craved creamy, and I realized that chocolate pudding could become reality with very little effort. I had just received my copy of HTCE and sought out the recipe for pudding, p. 950. Using gorgeous Guittard Nocturne (91%) chocolate I had received in a goodie bag from a pastry chef event, I invested approximately $0.85 of ingredients and 15 minutes, plus chilling time, to make a luxuriously silky chocolate pudding that would stomp all over some wretched instant version from a box.

There is ample comfort in knowing that the simple pleasures of life will consistently make us happiest, so if winter blues or financial woes have got you down, nourish your belly and soul with homemade food, the best kind there is.

Planning Thanksgiving

Our crowd keeps growing for Thanksgiving, and that is wonderful. I adore this holiday, with its focus on food and loved ones. There is no emphasis on gift-giving and its inevitably crass commercialism (I'm lookin' at you, Christmas!) and any conflict among participants is rather minor, at least in my experience. Of course, the cook is usually overwhelmed, there may be restless children, some may drink to vociferous excess, but first and foremost, Thanksgiving is a pretext to throw a pleasurable feast. I think it's a marvelous opportunity to showcase and celebrate foods from the New World. Isn't it jarring to think that chilies, tomatoes, potatoes, and papaya were introduced to the whole planet only a handful of centuries ago?

Turkey is, of course, the centerpiece of any traditional Thanksgiving, so it's important to roast the bird with care. I am investigating different techniques, but it looks like brining and a foil tent will be involved. Details to follow.

To accompany the turkey, there must be an embarrassingly copious display of side dishes. There must be mashed potatoes and some riff on cranberries. Sweet potatoes and at least one green vegetable in a creamy sauce are expected, too. Wines must be selected to accompany the wide breadth of flavors from the take-your-coat-off-and-nibble-on-something stage to the very end, when dessert is forced down sluggish throats. As for dessert, what kind of pie? How many pies? What about pies and a frozen dessert?

The concerns go on and on, and all home cooks have a lot of planning to do in the days ahead. As my own plans coalesce, I'll try to find a few minutes to rationalize them here.