In my most recent article, featuring a side dish made with zucchini, tomatoes and carrots (“Summer on the Plate,” Aug. 5), I wrote that ripe tomatoes mark the official beginning of summer for me and I scoop up old favorites and unfamiliar varieties whenever I see them at the farmers market. My love story with […]
Simona Carini
Posted inLife + Outdoors
Get Out into the Fog
If someone had told me 20 years ago that I would come to love fog, to find solace in its soft and moist embrace, I would have dismissed the prediction. As a young adult, for 10 years I lived in Milan, which is located in the Po River Valley, land of impenetrable fog. During the […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Summer on the Plate
I did it again: In the spring, blinded by dreams of zucchini and their golden blossoms, I planted two seedlings in my raised bed (the land of experiments, I call it). As I write, I have harvested two small zucchini from one plant. And my dream is destined to end there. Fortunately, the zucchini harvest […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Breakfast with the Season’s Fruit
During the recent 15 months of isolation, outdoor physical exercise helped me manage my anxiety. I am deeply grateful that I could spend time in the forest, on the beach, on the water. My family in Italy, locked inside their apartment, provided me with a comparison that magnified my gratitude. Usually, I exercise early in […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Left Last
“Captains, form your teams!” the teacher called, “First, Maria!” She was my friend, but liked to win, so chose the tallest child, who ran so fast. The other captain went for someone thin. Then they took turns, and every time they named ‘not me’. The smallest girl, the least desired, the slowest runner, not fierce […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Spread the Beans
We made it to April and to the 2021 edition of the Arcata Plaza Farmers Market’s main season, which started the first Saturday of this month. This is always a festive event for me, and this year was no different. While summer produce is not exactly around the corner, I can start dreaming of strawberries, […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Cabbage for Comfort
Varieties of the species Brassica oleracea are exuberant plants — it’s a pity we don’t often see them in their glory. Broccoli, the various cultivars of cabbage and cauliflower all produce abundant leaves crowning the head. They sort of show off, profuse in their physical presence. Brassicas are generous and it seems to me fitting […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Thanksgiving in December
I started writing this article to submit it well before Thanksgiving, but life had other plans and I had to abandon my original plan. What I wanted to say, however, is still relevant and the recipe still in season, so I picked up where I left off and finished it. My big heartfelt thanks to […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Peppers Make Summer Last Longer
As long as there are peppers at the farmers market, I can still believe in summer. I sort of understand how, come September, some people start feeling the pull of fall: bowls of steaming soup, glowing persimmons, roasted chestnuts. I love the warm colors of fall and my yearly pumpkin patch pilgrimage; I jump at […]
Posted inLife + Outdoors
A Bicycle Ride Among the Giants
At 7 a.m. on Sunday, the forest is quiet, the temperature cool, the road sparsely used by cars. This is an ideal time to ride my bicycle on the Avenue of the Giants. Once sunlight starts filtering through the canopy, the asphalt and I are dappled with light. Although I have lived in Humboldt County […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Green or Purple, They All Snap
Snap beans, green beans, string beans and wax beans all refer to the same vegetable: Phaseolus vulgaris. I find the name green beans limiting, since the pods also come in beautiful dark purple and wax beans are yellow. Hence, I prefer to call them snap beans, a name that refers to the sound made by […]
Posted inEat + Drink
Wolves During Wartime
Editor’s note: As we shelter in place during a global pandemic, it seems like a good time to revisit Simona Carini’s take on M.F.K. Fisher’s wartime rationing recipes and reflections, first printed here July 3, 2008. Of the books penned by legendary food writer M.F.K. Fisher (1908-1992) that I have so far read, my favorite […]