On the Farm

Tadaaki Hachisu piqued my interest with his unusual, “Call me Rodrigo” self-introduction.  Tadaaki had spent a year in Brazil as a cowboy, hence the “Rodrigo” handle.   I was his teacher in Japan and had come to learn Japanese because I love sushi and always wanted to know what they were screaming about.  Tadaaki sometimes wore geeky farm boy clothes, but looked great in jeans.  I wondered if he were a little “too organic” for me, a Northern California native who still liked nice clothes and going out to dinner.  Tadaaki’s ideal was a life without electricity, but Tracy Chapman and something called a “red string” drew us together.  Exactly what we call fate.

When he asked me if I wanted to be a “Japanese farmer’s wife,” I said I’d have to think about it.  Twenty years later, we have 3 teenaged sons, are still married, and are still on the farm.

I’ve been cooking since I was 13.  As a small child, I spent hours perched on a stool next to my mother as she cooked one of her typical Sunset meals.  I still remember the salty wild taste of the raw beef or the crunch of the vegetables she was chopping.  In high school I worked for a woman who had studied at the Cordon Bleu.  She taught me how to make puff pastry and vanilla sugar.  As an exchange student in Belgium, my host mother cooked earthy country food from the twice a week local market. I ate my way through some of the best restaurants in San Francisco and Berkeley, I shopped at Delices de France, Oakville Grocery and Real Foods.  I loved good food and sought it out. 

But I never really knew about seasons.  Until I moved to Japan.

I couldn’t understand why Tadaaki would bring me so many of one kind of vegetable when he came to visit.  Later, I found out why.  When you have a lot of something, you eat it every meal.  You don’t choose the vegetables, they choose you.  In the middle of summer you can’t give away the slender cucumbers and eggplants.  Everyone grows them, so the summer is all about eating eggplant and cucumbers.  They’re said in the same breath:  nasu/kyuri.  I used to stop my mother-in-law at the door when she tried to drop off big bags of each.  Somehow I thought of the field as my own private vegetable shop.  I could saunter over and pluck a bit of this or that for any meal.  In those days, I didn’t know that you have to pick the whole row every two days.  Otherwise, the plants stop producing.

My education was a slow process and I was typically stubborn.  It took me many years to wean myself of planning the meal around recipes.  Or even from planning meals ahead.  I learned to be flexible and I learned to listen to the vegetables.

As my sons got older and my husband got busier, I started picking the vegetables.  Walking among the rows, I would stroke them and feel their energy course through me.  Touching vegetables while they are living is something every cook should do.  And you have to accept them, not force your will on them.

A huge turning point in my cooking came the day I really began to listen to the vegetables.

It was late September.  Our organic grower friend, Suga-san, dropped by bearing a few haphazardly picked turnips from the field.  At the time, I was standing in the kitchen wondering what I would make for dinner.  He left and I still stood there, looking at the turnips lying on my counter.  Suga-san’s vegetables are like none you’ve ever tasted and each bite reveals the 40 years his family has been growing organically.  These vegetables deserve to be eaten fresh picked, at their peak of flavor, so the idea for a gratin started to emerge.  I looked beyond the turnips and found some late summer tomatoes in a basket…also some summer onions and potatoes.  I snipped some thyme from the garden and pulled out a bottle of thick cream skimmed from the milk of grass-fed cows.  And for the very first time I listened to a feeling coming from the spot where my neck meets my torso.  I don’t know what that little hollow spot is called, but I could “taste” the gratin from there and I passively followed the pull of the vegetables.  Talking me through that first “new” gratin.  Now one of many. 

Early Fall Gratin:  Prepare boiling salt water.  Having first cut a handful of turnips into wedges (like for apple pie), boil them quickly—about 3 minutes.  Scoop the turnips out with a strainer and set them aside in a medium-sized bowl.  Meanwhile, cut some potatoes (skins and all) into thick rounds and boil them in the turnip water until al denté.  Sauté some onion slices in olive oil until no longer raw, but still slightly crunchy.  Right before taking these off the flame, added some chopped thyme, salt and pepper.  Tuck this mixture alongside the turnips.  Next, sauté a few chopped garden tomatoes in olive oil until they released their juices.  Toss them in with the turnips and onions.  Cut the turnip greens into 2-inch segments (stems—1 ½-inch) and dunk them in cold water to rinse off any dirt.  Sauté the dripping greens briefly in hot olive oil with a little salt—until just wilted.  Lay the greens on top of the onions and tomatoes.  Heat a generous amount of cream with some squeezed summer garlic, salt & pepper.  Dump half the potatoes into a gratin dish and toss with half the warm cream mixture.  They should be a little drippy.  Even the slices out so that the bottom is covered.  Gently turn the turnips, onion, tomato and greens mixture with your fingers.  Spread this evenly on top of the creamy potatoes.  Add the rest of the cream to the remaining potatoes, then layer evenly over the vegetables.  The gratin ingredients should not be too deep.  Sprinkle with grated Gruyère cheese and bake for about 10-12 minutes in a 500 degree oven.  If the cheese isn’t browned, broil quickly.

Early Fall Gratin (variation):  Peel potatoes, slice into thick rounds and bring to boil in cold salted water.  Boil until done but not falling apart.  Drain.  Sauté quickly in good olive and sea salt (separately) and reserve in different bowls:  1-inch rounds of okra, 1-inch lengths of green beans, sliced vertically if thick and heirloom cherry tomatoes, halved.  Gently warm thick cream and a generous amount of garlic muddled with sea salt.  Film gratin pan with good olive oil for flavor balance.  Add half the cooked potatoes and pour over half the garlic cream (scoop out some of the garlic with your hands and distribute it evenly).  

Strew each of the reserved three quick sautéed vegetables over the potatoes (substitute at will here, though tomatoes are really needed for the acid they bring to the cream).  Top with the remaining potatoes and garlic cream.  Ladle over a small amount of herb vegetable broth if you have some handy.  Sprinkle with excellent Gruyère and cook for about 30 minutes at 450F or so.  The cream should be bubbling up but not completely absorbed and the cheese should be melting and golden in places. 

Comments

[laura]

That's really beautiful, Nancy--I love the phrase "listening to the vegetables." What a great love story!

[joanne godley]

Your writing is musical and is clearly powered by the subject matter. Your passion for food and listening to its source sings through the page! Don't stop writing, Nancy. Although I have never been to Japan, I can imagine through reading this blog.

Joanne

[Karen McCann]

What a delight! Reading your lyrical descriptions, I can almost hear and taste the vegetables, and feel their weight in my hand. I lived in the country for many years, raising much of the food we ate, and your words brought back the sheer delight of giving myself over to the rhythms of the earth rather than what is on sale at the supermarket. I loved this glimpse into your world. Keep writing! Keep sending me stuff! Thanks!

Karen

[sharon jones]

Inspiring piece, Nancy. Loved the way you wrote up the "recipe". Am off to the Tuesday market to buy gratin ingredients--whatever they may be.
Sharon

[Sylee]

I'm so glad that you've taken the plunge and begun a blog. I can't wait to try this!

[Fred Bierman]

What a lovely piece. Thanks Nancy.

[Malena Watrous]

I love your blog, from the name (Indigo Days--perfect--touch of Japanese but not an unfamiliar word) to the photo (if only I could reach into the screen to eat one of those carrots--no flaccidity there) to the writing, of course, of course. Keep it coming!

[Yu-Ting Onozawa]

Nancy, thanks for sharing me your blog. When I was reading this, my heart is getting warmer and warmer. Maybe it is because our families know well with eachother. Our husbands are very Japanese and organic lovers and our kids (3) are growing too.
"Listening to the vegetables" is really great phrase. This is Nasu/Kyuri season in Japan, I have to listening to them and think more different ways to eat them with appreciation.
Keeping writing, please.

[Kathy]

I, also, knew nothing about the seasons until I came to Japan.
That was and has continued to be the greatest satisfaction of
living in Japan--living with the seasons.
I'll never forget eating this gratin at your place a few years ago,
Nancy, and trying to imitate it at home.
Of course I failed. Now I can actually attempt to make it as you
do. Your writing is eloquent; I'm really looking forward to the next
posting.

[Isobel]

A joy to read Nancy!

[Rodney Fong]

I never thought I would be fascinated in reading about vegetables. It's funny how, except for the references to nasu and kyuri(not my favorite vegetables, especially turnip... But I digress.), that it almost has a European feel to what you were writing, down to the preparation of the gratin. This style of cooking, especially since the use of cheese in Japan is not common must have seemed different to your husband compared to what he may have experienced growing up. And no references about Los Arcos cooking? OK, I guess that was slightly below gourmet standards.

A great piece Nance. Thanks for sharing it with me.

[Nancy Hachisu]

Thank you all for your comments. They keep me going. It's amazing the energy I get from just seeing names from all of my lives: Stanford, writing groups, new friends, old friends. And by the way Rodney, I thought we were pretty "gourmet" in Los Arcos when Johnnie Mae was sick for a month. Cooking for 80 at Los Arcos didn't help my grades that quarter, but certainly was good practice for some of our larger Slow Food & Kindergarten events.

By the way tomorrow's menu at the Kindergarten BBQ: fresh coarse ground Japanese beef slapped into hamburgers, homemade buns from homegrown wheat, homemade ketchup, homemade mayonnaise from house raised eggs, Fukuda-san's onion, SSU! school garden lettuce...anyone coming?

Oh, and Iwata-san's edamame on the stalk. He'll pick them, then run them over to the school for everyone to strip. I'll boil them in batches for 3 minutes and toss them with sea salt. There may be a little beer involved as well. We're not the usual kindergarten.

[Nancy Hachisu]

...forgot to mention the homemade pickles

[Nancy Hachisu]

...and the homemade chocolate chip ice cream made from grass-fed cow's cream & milk, Tadaaki's eggs, organic sugar, Penzey's vanilla beans and Vahlrona chocolate

[Sam Levin]

What a beautiful story! Your connection to the land and to food pours out of your words- it's wonderful to read a tale about the love of edible things and their preparations. Thank you for writing this!

[Olga Singleton]

you have a simple, direct way of stating the beautiul. I would love to read the "complete book!

[preeva tramiel]

This is great! keep it up!
--Preeva