A Soupy and Savory Summer, The Recipe

This is about as easy and delicious of a soup that you will ever find in the vast pages of the interweb. Simple and accentuated with the flavor of curry and the bite of sour cream, it is a perfect summer dish.

Jeanne Hodesh's Simple Zucchini Soup
5 medium sized zucchini
3/4 cup water
1 vegetable bullion cube
1 T curry powder
1/2 cup sour cream (or creme fraiche)

Cut zucchini into 1" discs. Place in pan with water and bullion and bring to a boil. Reduce to simmer and add curry powder. Cook zucchini until it almost has a melted texture - about 20 minutes.

Once zucchini is sufficiently cooked, dump contents into a blender (or use a hand blender) to puree until smooth. Return soup to pan and add 1/2 cup sour cream. Over a low flame, heat until warm. Do not bring back to a boil.

May be served hot or cold (if serving cold, do not reheat soup after adding the dairy).

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A Soupy and Savory Summer, Part II

As we waited, Jeanne recited the different dishes that she had considered making me – roasted potato salad, ice cream, lentils – before she had settled on soup. I told her that I had no problem returning to her place for another meal, if she wanted to try out the others. She laughed, and said “anytime!”

Jeanne got up and looked at the now mushy zucchini and stated “This looks pretty done!”


She picked up the pot and scraped its bright yellow-green contents into a blender that looked like it had been found in a thrift store or been handed down to her from her parents. She pressed the on button and, over the loud buzz, told me that she wished that she had “one of those wands” – meaning a hand blender – and that the food mill that her father had given her wasn’t great for big jobs.


Once the zucchini was blended, Jeanne turned off the machine. “When I was in college, I had a group of friends that I used to like to cook with and I kind of became known as the soup queen.” When I told her that I held a similar title amongst my friends, we commenced talking about our best soups and, admittedly, there might have been a little one-upping going on (chilled corn soup and spicy quinoa soup were our most extravagant). "I always liked being known as the girl who could make good soup. It's a great title to have!" I agreed with this assesment - being known as the kid who can cook had its perks.


As Jeanne poured the contents of the blender back into the pot, she explained that one could use crème fraiche in the soup, but that she liked to use sour cream for its bite. With a large spoon, Jeanne dolloped the thickened liquid into the stew and stirred. She returned the flame to low, and heated the mixture until it was heated through.

Jeanne is an effortless chef. She made me feel that she was completely focused on our conversation while she moved gingerly around the kitchen and negotiated knives, cutting boards, bowls, and awkward counterspace. While I pondered aloud the declination of The Hungarian Pastry Shop on the Upper West Side, I realized that Jeanne - with the grace of a ballerina and the sleight of a magician - had placed a bowl of soup in front of me. I had barely noticed that she had even finished cooking!

The soup was brightly colored and smelled heavily of curry. Jeanne dug out a spoon from her full dish drying rack and handed it to me. I dug in, happy that someone had decided to make me something vegetarian (there is so much meat on this blog!). Scrumptious. It was the kind of food that tasted like the season – summery and light, but still thick and flavorful. I loved it and noted that it was the kind of dish that I usually make for myself.


“I almost canceled on you again tonight… but I’m glad I didn’t! The summer is crazy. But things will calm down again in September,” Jeanne said as she took a bite of the still-steaming puree.


Ah, September, how I cannot await for you to arrive! For the entire summer my Google calendar has been a rainbowed patchwork of engagements - some fun, some laborious - and I cannot wait for an evening for my own. As my friend, Sue, once told me - being busy is the sign of becoming a true New Yorker. We were both quiet for a few moments as we savored our bowls of steaming soup.

“When I was at Saveur they were starting to do research on their butter issue, and I feel like it gave me free license to eat as much butter as I wanted to, which I really haven’t gotten over since,” Jeanne laughed, “But Ronnybrook makes amazing butter… so the guy who owns Colson [a patisserie in Park Slope where Jeanne once worked] and I were talking about it and I told him that I had an idea for ice cream and he loaned me his ice cream maker, which I still have.” I didn’t know where Jeanne was going with this conversation thread. She continued, “I made a sweet potato ice cream last winter…with buckwheat honey and it tasted so good with the sweet potato puree. Anyway," she got up and went to the freezer, "I made us apricot ice cream for tonight...” she said and pulled out a tupperware. Ah, that’s where it was going. Not only had Jeanne fed me cheese, crackers, and olives, not only had she with a minimal amount of time made me a delicious soup, but now she was scooping out a large amount of homemade ice cream for me into a dainty green glass. What a perfect dinner!

While we ate the slightly sweet and fruity frozen dessert that was spiked with a hint of cardamom, Jeanne and I commiserated over our problems making a good ice cream with the right consistency, texture, and proper balance of sweet and flavor (it’s not as easy as it seems!). We agreed to enroll together a class at The Brooklyn Kitchen that was to be led by the Van Leeuwen brothers of Brooklyn ice cream fame (alas the class ended up being sold out) to figure out where our faults lie.

We talked more about ice cream (The Bent Spoon in Princeton, we agreed, scoops up some of the best) then continued onto the divergent flavors of cinnamon and of honey from different regions, and the pleasures of cardamom in stone fruit pie. As I finished the last bit of melty goodness at the bottom on my dish, I realized that Jeanne and I had spent the entire evening talking about food – rarely did we deviate from the subject and we both clearly relished it. Jeanne and I, I thought, as I walked home feeling as stuffed as a fattened goose, are going to be good friends.

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A Soupy and Savory Summer

Jeanne Hodesh and I canceled our cooking lesson on each other five, maybe six times. Finally, when the time came for her to teach me a recipe (which she also changed five, maybe six times), I was fifteen minutes late and Jeanne was in a rush because she had an assignment due the next day for her summer journalism class.

When I walked into Jeanne’s shockingly large apartment in Park Slope, she told me that she was tempted to cancel on me again because she had had a beg bug scare (turns out an apartment that she visited earlier in the day had them and she was paranoid that she may have brought them home). Jeanne – Sarah Lawrence graduate, lover of food, and food journalist who runs a newsletter called “Local Gourmands” and a blog called “Jeanne Cooks: Tales from a Yellow Kitchen” – saw the look of horror in my eyes (bed bugs are one of my number one fears) and quickly reassured me that I had nothing to worry. She already had scoured her room for the blood-sucking critters and, luckily, she encountered none.

This brings me to yet another aside about New York apartments. Yes – we’ve all had to handle the occasional rodent and cockroach. But bed bugs! Those horrific hemoglobin-hungry hobgoblins! THAT is where I draw the line. Damn, I love this city, but why, why, why must its denizens suffer through such ridiculous infestations? Can anyone else explain this? I’ve lived in places across the United States and Europe and in none of them do I know people who have experienced such devastatingly gross apartment rankness as my friends and colleagues here the Big Apple. The first person to fully explain this conundrum wins some cookies.

On to the story...

Jeanne had asked me to bring over some Yukon gold potatoes, which I did, but it turned out that she decided to make me a very simple provincial vegetable stew instead. “I had a little bit of stage fright and didn’t know what to cook for you, and I thought ‘potato salad!’ But then today I thought about this simple and fast zucchini soup,” Jeanne told me as she removed squashes from a bag, washed them, and began chopping them into large and fat discs.

“So, how do you do this? Do you want to interview me while I cook?” I responded with, “Sure! That’s how I usually do it.” However, I really was thinking, “You mean I’m supposed to have a process for this?” Clearly I am not as organized or as detailed as Jeanne…or as most people. Typically, I just walk into my subjects’ houses or them into mine and start asking them questions that range from the mundane, to the pointed, to the nosey. Pretty much whatever crosses my mind. Maybe I should rethink my journalistic approach; rather, maybe I should actually have a journalistic approach.

Putting on my best interviewer voice I asked Jeanne where she had learned to make the zucchini soup. Turns out she lived in Toulouse, France with an ex-pat ceramicist who made this dish. The woman loved to play hostess and there was a constant stream of people passing through the woman’s home while Jeanne spent her summer there. Jeanne told me that the experience was like living in an inn; Jeanne did most of the cooking, but the woman had perfected this simple and delicious dish. Jeanne’s experience eating, cooking, and learning in southern France sounded very appealing.

In fact, Jeanne’s whole life seems rather romantic. She was raised for most of her childhood in coastal Maine, where here parents ran bed and breakfast (they even published their own cookbook). Her childhood was spent in the kitchen with the chefs that her father imported from various parts of the world to work for him. Dreamily, I imagined what it would be like to grow up in that gorgeous part of New England, waking up daily to the smell of fresh pastries and the aroma of brewing coffee. Many of the recipes that they made there, Jeanne told me, were from her French grandmother who was a “legendary” cook.

Jeanne produced the cookbook for me and handed it over. “Most of the time, if I follow a recipe it’s from this,” she said as I fingered through the crumpled pages. Recipes from a Down East Inn had an off-white cover and its insides were illustrated with depictions of food (even one of young Jeanne in the kitchen); it was dog-eared and stained with oil and other food stuffs – clearly, a well-loved and highly utilized kitchen favorite. The recipes it contained were mostly French-inspired, simple, and provincial – potato salad, fruit compote, chicken pot pie – but made with good, fresh ingredients.



At 15, her parents sold the inn and relocated to Ann Arbor, where they opened a garden and kitchen store. Jeanne told me she had the best-stocked kitchen of her friends in college. Can you imagine a twenty-year-old with global knives and enameled cookware?

Jeanne took the zucchini and dumped them into a mid-sized stock pot and added a ¼ cup of water. “I’m actually not sure how much water to add here…” She added one vegetable bouillon cube and turned the flame on medium-low.


As Jeanne seasoned, and stewed, she told me how she became interested in food writing. “Where should I start with this long explanation? So, I did this internship at Saveur, where I worked as a fact-checker...”

“Did you know Katie Cancila?” I asked

“What? Are you friends with her? I know her well!”

As turns out, Jeanne worked with my friend. The world is small folks, very, very small.

“Well, so, my friend, Georgia, is now their managing editor…” Jeanne continued, “And she offered me an internship for a few months before I headed to Africa.”

First a summer cooking in France, then an internship at one of the best cooking magazines in the country, and then an opportunity to travel around Africa?! In her 24 years, Jeanne clearly has led an amazingly rich and colorful life. A little pang of jealousy nipped at my insides, but Jeanne is such a humble and likable person, that the feeling quickly passed.

Jeanne stirred the zucchini in the pot as she finished the story of the development of her food career. “While I was at [Saveur] I had to find heirloom watermelons for this year’s summer issue… and it changed my life!” As Jeanne was chasing down different varieties of the juicy, summer fruit for the cover of the magazine, she conversed with farmers from across the country and, in the process, read much on slow and local food movements. By the time she had finished her assignment, she had felt like she had found her calling and had befriended many writers, farmers, and foodies along the way.

After her internship at Saveur and after her trip to Africa, Jeanne found herself jobless back in New York. One day, as she sat at her computer researching the exciting food-based activities going on around the city, she decided to compile a list of events and send them to her friends. Voila! Local Gourmands was born – a comprehensive and well-written, weekly newsletter of all of the food happenings around New York City. In fact – if you’re interested in joining the list, you can email Jeanne at localgourmands@gmail.com.

The hunt for beautiful melons also ultimately led Jeanne to Gabrielle Langholtz, spokeswoman for New York's Green Markets, who she immediately befriended and who helped Jeanne land a job assisting Anna Lappe and writing for the quarterly magazine, Edible Brooklyn. She is one active young woman.

At this point, Jeanne, looked in the pot and added a tablespoon of curry powder and more water to the stew, “I’ve barely been doing any cooking lately because I’ve been running around all over, and now I’m going to be even busier because I’ll be blogging about Slow Food Nation.” She returned the lid, and then plated some olives, crackers, and cheese for us to snack on while we waited for dinner.


We commiserated about our busy lives and about meals that too often consisted of rice cakes and peanut butter – a sad state of affairs for epicures like us, but the reality of living in the bustling and ever exciting Big Apple. While I pondered our full lives, Jeanne got up to check on the soup. She lifted the lid and I could hear the stock bubble; I grew excited to sink my teeth into that summer-inspired dish...

For part two of this story, click here.

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Double the Meat, Hold the Shame - The Recipe

I woke up the day after Scott and I had cooked together excited to have some goat for lunch. To my disdain, when I went to pack up my lunch bag, the large dish that contained the leftovers was not to be found in my refrigerator. I ventured into the living room, and there sat Mayme, my roommate, eating the cold stew with a spoon. "This makes a delicious breakfast!" she exclaimed. I gave her a sidelong glance and said, "If there's not enough of that left for me, I'll kill you." Visions of Roald Dahl's "Lamb to the Slaughter" passed through my mind. Mayme, realizing how serious I was, took a few more bites and handed the bowl over. Nothing comes between me and my goat.

Scott Gold's Goat Stew
2 pounds boneless goat, cubed, silver skin removed, but some fat intact
2 medium onions, chopped
3 tablespoons butter
1 garlic clove, minced
1 tablespoon chopped parsley and rosemary
1 can tomato paste (6 ounce)
1 cup white wine
The juice of two lemons
2 T bourbon
salt and pepper

Melt butter in stew pan or Dutch oven; add meat, onion, garlic, parsley, rosemary, salt and pepper; brown over medium fire, stirring constantly. The gentle braising of the meat is the secret to success with this recipe.

When all of the ingredients are delicately browned, add tomato paste diluted in 2 cups water; add wine, lemon juice and bourbon; stir; lower fire and simmer for about 1 and 1/2 hours.

This goat stew is the basis for a wide variety of combinations with fresh or frozen vegetables and various spices.

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Double the Meat, Hold the Shame - Part Deux

While we alternately drank beers and ate appetizers on the roof and checked on the stew, I asked Scott what was his favorite meat that he had tried while writing his book.

“Llama!” Scott had ordered this traditionally South American animal from Exotic Meats USA, but that he had not prepared it in any traditional way. He told me of the pleasures of that wild game and continued on to about his love of hot dogs, chili, and his mom’s cooking. Then, suddenly Scott stopped his monologue, and looked at me quizzically. There was an awkward pause. “Are you related to Mandy Patinkin?” I nodded. Scott enthusiastically exclaimed, “That is the coolest thing EVER!”

Again?! He’s not even that famous, people! Here it is world: MANDY PATINKIN IS MY FIRST COUSIN TWICE REMOVED.

Some facts you should know:

• The last time I saw Mandy was in the early 1990s.
• Mandy is not my father, my grandfather, my brother or my uncle.
• I cannot convince Mandy to come have a casual cup of coffee with you, to sing songs at your Shabbat dinner, to sign your latest DVD set of Criminal Minds, or to record your voice message with “Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die!”
• If you are really curious about who else I am related to, you can click here.

Now, back to the story.

Of course, Scott had no idea that I am asked about Mandy with irritating regularity, so I smiled and said, “Yes. The whole Patinkin family is related... mostly the cause of a made up name when we all came over in the boat.”

“Ah, similar stock to the Gold family.”

“Jewish?” I asked.

"Affirmative."

Why has almost everyone on this blog been Jewish? I think that I am subconsciously trying to bring out my Semitic roots through cooking…or maybe this is just New York. As my boss tells me, everyone in the Big Apple is at least a little Jewish.

I continued, “I’ve randomly met a lot of southern Jews lately.”

“Really, that’s funny because I know all six of them." Scott joked. "Though I do know a lot of them because of the whole summer camp thing…the Henry S. Jacobs Camp for Living Judaism in Utica Mississippi. The Uticans refer to it as the Jew camp”

“Do you think it’s safe isolate all Jewish kids in Utica like that?” We both laughed and Scott then told me about the Museum of the Southern Jewish Experience. Who knew? We were back in the kitchen now checking on the stew’s progress and filling our plates with appetizers. Scott disappeared into my living room and reemerged with a digital SLR camera and began taking shots of the cooking stew. “I don’t know why I do this. I have so many pictures of things simmering and I do nothing with them. Oh well.” He took a few more shots and then set down the camera. The meat juices and tomato paste had mixed to turn the stew into an appetizing orangey-red color. I was getting seriously hungry - a little bit longer and we could stuff our faces. I decided to make some Israeli couscous to accompany the stew. Looking back, I wonder if all that talk about being Jewish influenced that decision.

We headed back up to the roof and continued talking about food and life while we munched on roasted artichokes with aioli and an eggplant with polenta. I heard all about Scott’s experiences eating those deep-fried balls (completely inoffensive) and the bull’s penis (not recommended – Scott describes the texture of cooked cock as a “ball of solid grizzle.” Barf.), about his participation on Feed Me: The Brooklyn Dating Show, his ascension from being a bad cook to an able cook, about his love for Back to the Future (Marty McFly inspired him to play the guitar), and about the changing perception of taste as one grows older. In turn I told him about the loss of my entire music collection to my ex (Scott kindly offered to have his parents pick it up for me in New Orleans), what makes a tagine a tagine, my time as the nanny for Harry Waters Jr.’s kids (Marvin Berry from Back to the Future), and my love for a good fried oyster po’ boy, which Scott sadly told me was one authentic food stuff not to be found in New York.

Sitting on my roof, while I gazed out at the Williamsburg Bridge, it dawned on me – what Brooklyn needed was a po’ boy shop! Scott is the type of person who is very passionate about life and its possibilities, so he was very titillated by the idea. All those Pratt kids living on their parents’ dime! They’d take a few bong rips and then flock to our restaurant. Can't you imagine all those stoned 18 year-old art students fighting each other in line to be the first to get a steak fry po’ boy drenched in roast beef au jus?! We’d have to bar the doors from the local pregnant ladies with a craving for mayonnaise and fried meats! We would be rich! Scott and I spent almost a half an hour talking about po' boy possibilities - specifically, the kinds of sandwiches we would offer.

All this talk of bread, fried things, and general deliciousness reminded us that we had a stew cooking in the kitchen. We bounded down the stairs and Scott lifted the lid to the pot and the smell of the cooking meat filled the kitchen. He dipped in a spoon, took a bite, and closed his eyes. "Oh yea, that's really good... I'm kind of shocked at how lamby it tastes." Scott handed me the spoon; I dipped it in the bubbling stew, removed a chunk of goat, and took a bite - it was almost there. We both agreed that it needed another 15-20 minutes before it reached the appropriate tenderness.


As I replaced the lid to the pot, the house suddenly shook accompanied by a large boom. Scott ran to the living room window and reported that there was a fireworks show happening somewhere in the distance. The glare of the exploding lights reflected in the building across the street. Neither of us knew what mid-week holiday could possibly beget such a large fanfare. According to our calendars, it was not the 4th of July, it was not Bastille Day, it was not even Cinco de Mayo. I did a quick Google search and they only possible thing that came up was National Lasagna Day. Food-inspired fireworks seemed especially fitting for an evening dedicated to cooking.

Finally, when fifteen minutes had passed, we tested the stew again. It was done. I spooned it into bowls and topped it with parsley - there was so much that even after dishing out two servings, Scott and I barely made a dent. Even before eating dinner, I was excited to have leftovers.


We headed back to the roof and sat down at my dingy plastic table. I sat down and immediately dug into the goaty goodness. Scott and I ate in silence for several minutes. "Well," I said between chews, "this is really good." The stew was very simple, but the complex flavor of the goat imbued the stock with a deep, gamey goodness. I was surprised at how similar goat tasted to lamb, but noted that it still possessed a distinctive flavor. That easily-identifiable lamby flavor - that tangy, gamey spiciness - is more intense in goat, which also has a more dense mouth feel than lamb. Overall, the stew made was a sort of delicious, deconstructed peasant fare.

After we had seconds, Scott proclaimed, "Nap time! Go goat!" We raised our glasses to the goat and drank. As Scott was leaving my house, he turned to me and said, "I know, next time I'll make you rattle snake!" In another life Scott, in another life.

For the goat stew recipe, click here.

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Double the Meat, Hold the Shame

Scott Gold just adores meat. He loves to eat it, prepare it, learn about it, talk about it, conceptualize it, ponder its significance, and - naturally - he loves to write about it. In fact, Scott's adoration for cooked flesh is so unflagging and so deep that he decided to dedicate an entire book to it. The Shameless Carnivore: A Manifesto for Meat Lovers is Scott's first published work and narrates his adventure eating through 31 different hides in as many days.

Knowing the premise of Shameless and the varied palette of animal carcass that Scott had consumed during his research and since, I was not sure what to expect when I requested that he teach me a recipe using an unusual meat. As I have newly re-entered the world of carnivorism, I was a bit nervous - terrified really - that Scott was going to show up at my door with one of the more exotic cuts that he had tried. Frankly, I completely lack both the culinary daring and the steely bowels to attempt a meal of offal, bull's penis, or deep-fried balls as Scott so courageously has done. To my relief, he did not choose to make me sheep's eyes or butchered squirrel, instead Scott chose to make me one of his favorite animals: goat.

Scott arrived at my door fifteen minutes late, flustered, and with just over four pounds of freshly butchered goat in tow. A native New Orleanian and resident of Greenpoint, Brooklyn, his studio lacked the proper amenities (like a kitchen) to cook such a hunk of meat, so it was necessary to do the cooking lesson at my house.

As I opened the door to my apartment building, Scott followed me hurriedly up the stairs saying repeatedly that we had to get started right away. When we reached the kitchen, Scott threw the bag of bloody meat onto the counter. It landed with a heavy and fleshy thud that made me cringe. Every time I eat animal, I have to forcibly prevent myself from dwelling on the fact that I am eating something that was once alive, and I feel pangs of nausea and guilt when I think about it too much. Eying the bag of meat on the counter, I couldn't help but remember the many hours I spent in Mississippi petting my ex-boyfriend's parents' goats. My hesitance toward the impending meal only increased when Scott produced a bag of hacked-up bones and held it in my face. "Look at this!" He said excitedly, "Maybe if we have time we can cook these down and suck out the marrow!" I wondered if Scott noticed my face whiten. Scott put the bones in my refrigerator and said, “Or maybe I’ll just keep those for stock.” My heart lightened.

Removing an assortment of ingredients from his backpack, Scott – in Bill Piersol style – disclaimed the meal he was about to make, “I wish we had a long time to cook, especially because Frank said this meat came from an older goat." The Frank Scott was referring to is Frank Ottomanelli of Ottomanelli & Sons Prime Meat Market - a venerable butcher in the West Village. Scott had called Frank the day before we cooked to order the goat. At least it was fresh and local.

Scott produced a large knife housed in a special plastic case from his bag. “I brought my knife just in case.” I was glad he did – I just moved and right now only have one knife that can barely cut through the flesh of a tomato. “I love this knife. It’s a Shun. Eight inch.” As Scott handed me an onion to chop, I asked him if the utensil had been a gift. “In fact, it was, but I picked it out. Why?” “Well,” I said, “I find that almost every kitchen accessory that I own was given to me by my mom… she figured out a long time ago not to buy me clothing or, really, anything else. That’s how I’ve ended up with things like a ravioli cutter, a hand blender, Le Creuset pots, and that whistling ceramic bird that let’s me know when my pies are done. Some are more useful than others…”

Scott was so concentrated on getting the dish going that he only responded with a distracted “Oh.” No chit chat. After a minute or two of silence I asked Scott when had first tried goat. “Have you checked out the book?” He asked. Guiltily, I shook my head no. He continued, “The first time I had goat was when I first got started on the book,” he said as he heated butter and olive oil a large pot. As he spoke, I made quick work of three garlic cloves. “I was on my way to a barbecue and I just happened to see goat being sold at a stand and I decided to buy some; it was great! Why aren’t people more gaga over goat? It’s every bit as delicious as lamb.”


Scott added the onions to the heated fat and stirred them with a large wooden spoon. The kitchen began to fill with the appetizing aroma of the cooking vegetable. After a few minutes he added the minced garlic and previously prepped and chopped rosemary and parsley. He removed the goat from its plastic sack and cleaved it in two, returning one half to the bag and sticking it in my refrigerator. “Wow, this looks really nice! It’s lovely, rosy, lamb-like… Mmmm!” Scott exclaimed as he began removing the silver skin from the meat. He cut the meat again in two, and passed me a half. As we worked to remove the tough fascia from the meat, I asked Scott if food had always been a passion for him.


“Always, always,” he replied, “I’m a New Orleanian, darling! Food is the passion of the city. A very big part of my life growing up. I didn’t even notice until I left!” Before Shameless, Scott explained to me that he never really cooked much, but that researching for the book was like a culinary awakening for him – one in which he relied heavily on his mother’s extensive knowledge of food to make successful recipes.

Scott stirred the onions and then added the meat. The goat smelled almost identically to lamb, but slightly more pungent. Leaning his head near the top of the pot, Scott took giant whiff of the rising steam. “Smells good!” I walked over to the stove, looked in the pan, and took a deep breath. That lamby gamey aroma reminded me of the meal that I had made with Michele Amar (who, incidentally introduced me to Scott), and it indeed smelled delicious. Like a yoga exercise, my meat-eating-induced guilt dissipated as I exhaled.


“Have you had goat before?” Scott asked. When I replied no, his face lit up. “Great! Goat virgin! You’re going to LOVE it!” Scott not only was about to be present for my first bite of goat, but he also happened to have the luck to watch me eat my first burger - cooked medium rare and smothered in Gruyere and sauteed wild mushrooms - in over a decade (at DuMont Burger and it was, put simply, fucking awesome). He told me he was proud to be a part of my meat-eating history.

We talked family while we waited for the meat to sufficiently braise. Interestingly, Scott has a brother who is a devout Buddhist, and, as you can imagine, he does not much appreciate Scott's carnivorous pursuits. Contrarily, the opposite has ocurred in my family - when I told my mom that I was eating meat again, I could practically hear her smiling on the other end of the phone. No more searching for vegetarian turkey substitutes and meat-free recipes at holiday dinners.

After about 10 minutes, the meat was a deep beige-brown color and highly odorous – signs that the meat was done braising. Scott poured a cup of water and a dash of wine into the pot and then glooped in some tomato paste. Since he is also a self-proclaimed “acid freak” he also added the juice of two lemons and a dash of bourbon (I guess that's the New Orleanian in him). I commented to Scott that the name of this dish should be lemon-bourbon goat. Writing it now, that sounds like something TGI Fridays would make up to attract local populations in the Caribbean or Central America or in another goat-loving nation.


Looking at his watch, Scott said, “Ok, so now it’s about 10 to 8, at about 9:15 this will be done.” He laughed nervously – he seemed very concerned to be taking up so much of my time. “Do you have somewhere to go?” I asked him and he shook his head. “Then let’s drink some beers and hang out on the roof – I’m not going anywhere either.” As soon as I said the word “beer,” Scott seemed to relax. I produced a couple of brews from the fridge and we headed up to the outdoors while we waited for the stew to stew.

For part two, click here.

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