Party Time!

A new podcast. A vintage menu. Remembering a restaurant great. Plus a strange recipe you won't find anywhere else.

Do you know about Three Ingredients, the podcast Nancy Silverton, Laurie Ochoa and I have just launched? Come join us as we discuss everything under the sun. Here’s a little snippet.

This week’s episode explores our ideas of what makes a great dinner party.The truth is, we are deeply divided on that subject. We can’t even agree on the timing of the cooking or the best way to set the table. But one thing is certain: by the end of this conversation, you’ll know exactly whose house you’d rather be invited to.

As we spoke I thought about an article I wrote almost 40 years ago. Rereading it, I was fascinated to find how little my feelings on the subject have changed. (I’m also cheered by the fact that these days you can find dendé oil that hasn’t turned rancid.)

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A few days ago I learned that one of my favorite people in the restaurant business has passed away. When I was the restaurant critic of the New York Times Tony Fortuna seemed to be everywhere. Handsome and endlessly gracious, he was one of those front of the house people who always made you feel you had come to the right place. I smiled each time he welcomed me to a restaurant, instantly convinced that the meal was going to be good.

People all across the restaurant industry mourned his death. Here’s the Eater obituary; it made me remember the lunch Tony threw at his T Bar Steak and Lounge just after Dorothy Cann Hamilton (founder of The French Culinary Institute), passed away in a tragic accident.

Speaking of party food….

You know how sad clementines can be when you bring them home?  You’re looking for something juicy, bright, fresh –  but they’re just kind of hard and miserable?

Contemplating an entire bag of the things, it hit me that I should try roasting them.  All fruits and vegetables get better when they’re blasted with heat.  So I peeled the clementines, separated them into sections and removed as much of the white strings as I could. I slicked a cast iron pan with olive oil, cranked up the heat and roasted the sections for a couple minutes a side until they were slightly charred.

But then what? It wasn’t quite enough. So I heated a bit of olive oil, tossed in some red pepper flakes and a few sprigs of the rosemary plant that lives in my kitchen. I added a couple drops of cider syrup (anything sweet would do), and a splash of vinegar, and let that sit on the stove for a few minutes. Then I poured it over the tangerine slices and let them marinate all day.

I served them, sprinkled with salt and a few grindings of  kampot pepper, on crackers spread with ricotta.  They’re also great with sliced  prosciutto. But I can think of lots of other ways to use these little bites of citrus. Think of them kind of like marmalade in the rough- and let your imagination run wild.