Anticiplate

The bookshelf sat in the kitchen, in a sunny nook where the four person table and the golden retriever also shared it’s space. It was black metal, with inclining shelves that got shorter has they got further from the floor. Those shelves were packed with books. So, packed, in fact, that you would almost pull it over when you pried one out of its home.

This was my Mama’s cookbook collection. I was intimidated by the accumulation from an early age, and I generally stuck with flipping cross-legged through the pages of the cookbooks on the lower shelf because, to be quite honest, I didn’t want the bookshelf to topple me over. I was in luck, though, because most of those cookbooks were from “The Beautiful Cookbook” series. France, China, Italy, Provence, and Southwest were the ones in her collection and each large enough to be considered a coffee table book. The pages were flooded with bright pictures of delicious food and the native country-side. Instantly, I fell in to a trance. Ironically, this made me want to travel but never made me want to cook, and come to think of it, my Mother never cooked out of cookbooks except for baking. So, why did she have them?

My mother read cookbooks, and these were not the days of The Zuni Cafe Cookbook and Momofuku. These were solely recipe based.  She would stack them next to her bed, as I often do, and flip through the bright photographs and skim the recipes, learning new methods and tricks to try the next time she cooked. As I look at my bedside right now, I also have a pile of cookbooks, stacked high, that I read like novels as well. Like mother, like daughter, I guess.

And, today, as she came over for Christmas Eve dinner, she rolled a dolly cart into my loft with three large brown boxes. She smiled with her bright hazel eyes, and wished me “Merry Christmas” with a tight hug and a kiss on the cheek. I asked her, “What’s in the boxes?”

She paused, opened her eyes wide and said, “My cookbooks, of course.”

Because, you see, my Mama doesn’t cook anymore. Maybe it is because she is about to retire after being a doctor for twenty-seven years, maybe because she is tired at the end of the night and prefers to eat a bowl of “corn bran” over seared scallops with roasted beet puree, or it could also be because she likes me to cook for her now. Whatever the case, she wanted me to have her cookbooks. All two hundred of them.

Some are new, like the food encyclopedia called “Gastronomique” published in 2001. And, some. Well, some are ridiculously old! There is “The American Woman’s Cook Book” from my Grandma Marty that was first published in 1938. My mom has the 1968 edition, which is still forty one years old, people! As I flip through that book, I am reminded of my late Grandma’s simple cooking: ambrosia, green jello salad, and sausage breakfast casserole.

She also has about one-and-a-half decades of “The Best of Gourmet” series which is so relevant right now, after Gourmet shut its doors a couple of months back. And of course she has “The Silver Palate” cookbook which was published twenty seven years ago, the same year as my birth.

And, if there could actually be more that she could do, my Mama also taught me her method to making her pie dough today. The irony here is that I have seen the method my. entire. life, but have never done it all myself, with her walking me through ever detail. Our crust on our apple cranberry pie was flaky and tender with a slight balance of salty and sweet. I was in heaven.

But, this post isn’t about the pie dough. It’s about simplicity in cooking. A recipe that my Mama, the cook who doesn’t cook anymore, might actually make for herself. Erik even asked me to teach him how to make it. This was huge! We have been together for seven (and some change) years, and he has never taken an interest in cooking.

The key here is quality of ingredients. I’ll say it again, quality. This is not a Country Crock, pepper shaker, and the green Kraft parmesan bottle kind of dish. Homemade pasta would be ideal. But, because I have no attachment for my Kitchen-aide, I just buy the ridiculously expensive six-dollar pasta from Whole Foods. Those pasta people are making a killing. And you need to use Plugra, because, well, it is just better. Parmigiano Reggiano is also recommended, but Grana Padano would work too. Also, when I say “Cracked black pepper”…..

It’s four ingredients, friends. Well maybe five, if you include a glass of Bordeaux! Make ‘em count. Merry Christmas!

Serving size 2

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 10 minutes, or until pasta is al dente

*This is more of a method, than a recipe. Just make it taste good.

8 oz. thin pasta, (angel hair, linguine, tagliarini, capellini, spaghetti)

Kosher salt

4-6 tbsp. salted Plugra, or any European Style butter

Cracked black peppercorns

1/2 c. grated parmigiano reggiano

Bring a large pot of water to boil. Once it is boiling, heavily salt the water, so it tastes like the sea, and dump the pasta in, swirling it around with a spoon so that it is separate and fully submerged.

Meanwhile, heat the butter in a sauce pan over medium heat until melted. Crack some black pepper into the butter to heat the peppercorns. When the pasta is al dente, or just has a bite to it (it will continue to cook), drain and reserve some pasta water.

Pour the pasta into the butter, and loosen the sauce with the reserved pasta water so that the noodles slip over themselves and do not clump. Add half of the grated cheese and toss with tongs. Season to taste for salt and more pepper.

Serve in deep bowls with more cracked pepper, the leftover cheese, and a dab of butter, if you are like me and can never get enough.