The Perfect Pantry

Ginger root (Recipe: steamed fish in packets)

One horribly hot and humid day last summer, I visited my friend Julia's tiny urban garden.

I didn't go for the copious quantities of iced coffee that we both love, nor for her especially good egg salad, nor even for the effortless conversation we always enjoy.

No, what I really wanted was to dig ginger.

Julia, a chef and restaurant consultant, stores her ginger in the garden during the summer months. She digs it up when she needs a bit for cooking, breaks off a piece, then plants it back in the garden, where it continues to grow.

In the photo above, that's Julia's hand holding a "hand" of ginger, which has sent out new roots. In the front are three "fingers" of new ginger growth, brighter white than the old part, and with new green shoots coming out the top.

The not-yet-perfect pantry: What's missing? (Recipe: white bean garlic dip)

My friend Bob sent me an email last week:

So...... what's going to be the 250th ingredient in your pantry?

I know what you're thinking.

The Perfect Pantry's fridge, freezer and fresh: 73 essential ingredients

Three ingredients in my refrigerator door.

As part of the celebration of the three-year anniversary of The Perfect Pantry, I've been sharing the inventory of all of the ingredients in my pantry.

We've had a good prowl through the spice rack and cupboards.

Finally, here are the pantry items I keep in my refrigerator and freezer, plus a few fresh items you'll always find sitting in bowls on the counter.

Sugar, cookies (Recipe: the world's best sugar cookie)

We interrupt our regular programming to celebrate Mothers' Day, which in my kitchen is synonymous with sugar cookies. Three hundred and fifty sugar cookies, decorated by friends in my kitchen, and donated here in Rhode Island to a shelter for homeless women, a residential program for pregnant and postpartum women with addiction issues, and six emergency shelters for women and children who are victims of domestic abuse.

Please share these cookies with someone you love, courtesy of Drop In & Decorate™ and The Perfect Pantry.

Garlic (Recipe: oven-baked tortilla española)

Adapted in part from the archives, with new photos, links, and a favorite tapas recipe.

Where will you be on July 24, 2009?

I'll be in Chicago with 1,000 bloggers at the BlogHer annual conference.

More than 100,000 people, perhaps including a blogger or two, will be in Gilroy, California, at the world's most famous garlic festival.

As interesting as it is, BlogHer's agenda can't compete with the Great Garlic Cook-off, the Miss Gilroy Garlic Festival parade, and hundreds of food vendors offering their specialties in honor of the "stinking rose".

Which, by the way, is not a rose at all; it's a lily.

Onions (Recipe: salsa and shrimp stuffed avocado)

Adapted from the archives, with new photos, recipe and links.

When I cook, I hear voices.

I hear Jacques Pepin, Diana Kennedy, Ina Garten and Martin Yan, all urging me to try, experiment, enjoy. I hear Julia Child, or Dan Aykroyd channeling Julia, encouraging me to keep going, even if what I'm creating looks like a googly mess.

When I cook Cajun, I hear Justin Wilson.

A humorist, storyteller, and talented home cook who spent the first part of his career as a safety engineer inspecting warehouses in South Louisiana, he hosted a cooking show on public television thirty years ago, long before the rest of the country had heard of etoufeé and andouille.

From Justin Wilson I learned about the Cajun trinity, the basic flavorings that start every soup and stew: celery, bell pepper, and onion. What he actually said was SEL-ray, bell PEP-pah, and un-NYUANH, way up in the nasal back of his throat, and whenever I make anything that begins with the trinity, I hear his voice.

Limes (Recipe: Mexican tortilla and lime soup)

Olé Olé Week, Day Three.

 

Ten years ago, Ted's aunt and uncle retired to a small town on the north shore of Lake Chapala, in central Mexico.

We love to visit. Great weather. Great food. Great location, in a town popular with artists and artisans, very traditional and yet just 45 minutes from Guadalajara, Mexico's second-largest city, with its four-story Mercado Central, museums, and culture.

Their house sits uphill from the center of town, where there's a small market for daily needs, and an outdoor farmers' market a few times a week. A short walk from their house, a storefront tortilleria sends the aroma of fresh corn tortillas into the neighborhood.

Even closer to home -- right out their back door, in fact -- Ted's aunt and uncle planted a couple of lime trees. When we visit, we sit outside on the patio, overlooking the lake, sipping limeade or something stronger, made with fresh lime juice.

You might be thinking, big deal, lime trees in the back yard. Believe me, when you live in New England, back yard lime trees are just a dream.

Water (Recipe: bailout bean soup)

Guest post and photos by Marcia in Rhode Island.

Times a gettin’ hard boys,
Money’s gettin’ scarce.   
                ~1930s dustbowl tune by Lee Hays

Ours is a town of rock and water. Underground streams and pockets of water secreted within granite ledges supply our wells. Our water is pure, delicious, and abundant -- a fact which is appreciated by much of urban Rhode Island.

Today, in the early morning mist, I walked along the banks of a brook until I came to the river.  This river feeds the reservoir, which in turn supplies the drinking water for much of the state, though not for our town.

The essential ingredient of my pantry is not in a cupboard; it’s stored a couple of hundred feet underground. When asked, it races to the house at a breakneck pace of 22 gallons a minute.

How to preserve the harvest, even if it comes from the grocery store (Recipe: pear chutney)

Every year in May, Candy and Dave drive down from Boston to help me prepare and plant the herb garden.

Every Monday morning in summer, before sunrise and before my first cup of coffee, I toddle out into the garden in my pajamas and cut handfuls of herbs. After I wrap the cuttings in damp paper towels, Ted delivers them to Boston in what we've come to call our very own "herb CSA."

Every September, Candy and Dave return to harvest, cook, dry and freeze the fruits (and herbs) of our summer garden into pantry items we use all winter.

This year, on harvest day, we put up two types of pesto, mint jalapeño syrup -- and the hottest chutney this side of anywhere.

Shagbark hickory nuts (Recipe: maple nut cookies)

Guest post and photos by Marcia in Rhode Island

Shiny chartreuse spheres, dropping in our woods, send the squirrels scrambling. 

Bucket in hand, I’ve joined the melee. We’re vying for the sweetest of all hickory nuts, the shagbark.