How bright and sunny! So befitting the start of adulthood. When I
first moved in there was nothing there and my heart sank. Now what
do I do? I called up Anne Strasbourg and she offered to take me to
Cost Plus to buy basics. We must have gone the next day or shortly
thereafter because I had nothing to cook with at all. These were
days before le toute monde had camping gear.
It was later in the afternoon or early evening as we walked through
the aisles of mass produced household products, Anne picking out what
I would need. I don't recall all of what we got, although I remember
her handing me a green colander and some spices. I'm pretty sure I
got my wood salad bowl at this time. It saw much use in the ensuing
years and was nicely cured when it was ultimately sold at a garage
sale before heading off to Quantico.
Anne must have driven me back because I had no transportation and at,
by then dark, there was no hope of hitching a ride back over the
bridge. I had no furniture either, but at the corner opposite the
dish rack, the apartment came with two chairs and a red formica steel
table adjacent to the window that opened onto the porch. We sat
down and talked for a while, Anne assuring me that everything would
come into place and fill out soon.
I don't recall whether I got my 8” cast iron skillet at Cost Plus
or at Mill Valley Hardware around the corner. These were the days
for making basic fundamental decisions about things; in particular,
how, precisely I would cook. Would I use steel, aluminum, teflon
or glass? Nein! It seemed to me that all serious cooking was done
on cast iron. Shortly after, I bought a medium sized cast iron
dutch oven as well. Italy was still in my veins and it was beyond
question that I also needed a little octagonal aluminum espresso
maker which I must have purchased somewhere in North Beach.
After the trip to Cost Plus, most of this initial provisioning was
done on my first free Saturday after moving in. It seemed to me
that, as essential as a cast iron skillet, was a book on what to put
in it and how. Didn't mother have a book on this? I recalled that
she did, and so I walked up to the village bookstore on West
Blythedale and asked the silver-haired lady at the counter if she had
a Joy of Cooking. Of course she did, as she smiled beningly.
I hardly needed to tell her why I needed the book but I took it upon
myself to say so anyways. “Oh, I'm sure you will find this very
helpful,” she said. It cost a whopping 10 or 12 dollars, which on
60.00 a week was a lot of money but I figured it would be worth it.
In fact it wasn't! I used it very little, preferring instead to cook
by instinct and memory of what I had seen. But in all event, book,
pot and pan I was ready.
-o0o-
These were the days before micro-waves existed. Even if they had,
they would have cost me more than I had; and, even if I had the
money, I probably would not purchased one. These were also the days
before organic foods became a cult obsession, although there was a
spirit of back to pioneer basics in the air. But in truth neither
of these considerations operated much on my decisions on what to eat
and how to cook. The simple truth is that this clean, bright and
spacious kitchen just invited me to “take charge of my own
cooking.” And that is what I did.
Mill Valley had a rather up-scale market, known not surprisingly as
Mill Valley Market. It advertised “fine quality meats” and the
general idea was a better cut of everything, although today one would
be scandalized at how they made their meats and tomatoes so red.
There was no question of my going to a cheaper market like Safeway
because I did not have a car. MVM was right around the corner and
convenient or not, upscale or not, that was what I was stuck with.
I stared down at the butter section. Butter or margarine? I picked
up a stick of margarine. Ten cents. I put it down. My eye was
caught by an interesting picture of a moose, standing by a lake at
the base of some mountain peak. Challenge Butter. The
package said “fine quality butter” ... literally, although the
moose said it adequately enough. One stick, 25 cents. Butter.
I also recall staring down at a package of bacon and deciding, No
pork. I don't know why I made this decision. It had nothing to do
with religion or believing any superstitious drivel. I loved the taste
of pork and breakfast had always meant bacon. Even so, I ruled it out
without further thought. I am glad I did because as we have all
since learned what we do to sensitive intelligent animals is a
reprehensible sadistic barbarity.
That much, at least, was known at the time about veal. At least, I
had read an article about how calves were kept immobilized in dark
cages for the duration of the short suffering lives. I resolved
then, at Mill Valley Market, never, ever to eat veal; and, although
I have from time to time violated my rule on pork, veal has never
crossed my lips.
But I was hardly a vegan! My standard breakfast was fried eggs and
toast or chewy grouts, peanuts, raisins and honey. My standard
dinner was either steak or baked chicken, a huge salad of romaine
lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, hearts of palm, olives, cucumbers, salt,
pepper, oregano, parsley, thyme all tossed in olive oil and cut with
lime, instead of vinegar -- a Mexican touch. To round it all off, a
glass of wine and at least half a loaf of French bread and most of a
stick of Challenge butter.
Jim, my later law school roommate, used to make fun of my prodigious
butter consumption. “Here,” he said, as he handed me a slice of
bread with a stick of butter on it, “have some bread with your butter,
why don't you.” He, by contrast, was niggardly with the butter.
You'd think it was wartime the way he spread it so light and thin.
But we were both the same weight and I never developed “cholesterol”
problems. I think the key to a healthy diet is to burn whatever you
eat, off.
Although Jim's cooking had a preference for caseroles and
jumbo-mixes, he likewise preferred ingredients that did not come in a
can or box and which he had to cook, as opposed to just heat. He
was also fastidious with cleaning up. This bright sunny kitchen saw
a lot of use and was in its cheerfully, inviting way a stimulus to
eat well.
