![]() As time passes and more seasonal vegetables become available, you can add asparagus tips, zucchini, or summer squash to this dish. This is a creamy mushroom sauce to go over your choice of ravioli, tortellini, or any other kind of pasta. Serves 2 people who have been shoveling snow all winter, 3 people who live someplace where they don’t have to do that. It was worth every shovel! Pasta Pre-Primavera I figured I burned off enough calories shoveling snow, though, so I ate it with a clear conscience. There’s only one slight drawback to this mushroom sauce recipe: it is very, very rich. (Not that we ever have F & L oranges here in Boston!) That way I get a little hit of fruit even though there’s none that’s F & L in the market. (Presumably a bracelet or something and not, say, your pants or bra.)įor dessert with an early spring dinner, I like to serve vanilla ice cream or - better still - gelato with a chocolate sauce to which I add a tablespoon of organic orange marmalade and one of organic strawberry jam. The advice was to dress in such a way that you feel that you have accessorized your outfit completely and successfully, and then, just as you are about to walk out the door, take one thing off. (Was it Diana Vreeland? Brooke Astor? Babe Paley? Coco Chanel? I don’t recall … ). It made me think of a classic piece of fashion advice from one of the famous style icons. Sometimes the key to success (in many endeavors, actually) is knowing when enough is enough. Her verdict: “Stop! Stop! It’s perfect just as it is! Unhand those capers! Put that jar of olives down!” ![]() But when I made it last night, I got it to the stage where I taste the basic sauce before adding any “frills,” then asked my friend to taste it as well. I sometimes add green olives, capers, lemon juice, tarragon vinegar, or roasted red pepper. The sauce is made from butter, shallots, mushrooms, cream, mustard, brandy or vermouth, and a pinch of salt. I call my not-quite-spring ravioli in creamy mushroom sauce “Pasta Pre-Primavera.” ( Primavera is the Italian word for spring.) There’s not much that’s F & L (fresh and local) in New England at this time of year, so I depend on things that can be grown indoors (mushrooms) and things that can be grown in a flowerpot on a windowsill, like parsley. This put me in the frame of mind to make an “it’s not quite spring yet” dinner. They’re there, but we don’t know they’re there until we see them. ![]() ![]() But when she describes them I say, “Oh, yeah, that does sound familiar!” I guess all that stuff is tucked somewhere deep inside our long-term memories, like snowdrops deep beneath the snow. She remembers all sorts of things that have happened to me that I no longer recall. Toward the end of a long, dark, difficult winter, my friend saw a surprising sign of life amid the medieval gloom: a crocus blooming in the courtyard garden. As we walked past what we fervently hoped would be the last pile of snow this winter, I reminded her of how she once told me about a visit to the Cloisters, New York City’s monument to medieval European architecture. I got together with a close friend last week, someone I’ve known long enough that her biography can be traced through all the old, crossed-out addresses I have for her in my Rolodex. Crocuses are next, colorfully declaring, “We’re here, we’re spring - get used to it!” I am always amazed that something that looks so delicate and fragile braves the cold to emerge through the remaining snowbanks. It’s around this time that I start looking for snowdrops, the earliest of early-spring flowers. ![]() The quality and the angle of the sunlight changes, and there’s a sense that something’s stirring just beneath the surface of the soil. Once March arrives, winter loses its edge. To support our nonprofit environmental journalism, please consider disabling your ad-blocker to allow ads on Grist. ![]()
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