Relationships — and not just romantic ones, but with our friends, too — open us up to all sorts of delights we might not have known otherwise. Take me, for example: Before Sebastian and I started dating, I thought I didn’t like Chinese food, had never listened to David Bowie, and thought the internet was for buying shoes. And now look at me — it’s a rare fortnight that doesn’t see me ordering fried pork dumplings to my door, I listen to Ziggy Stardust when I’m washing the dishes and folding laundry, and I don’t think we need to go to into how much the internet has shaped the trajectory of my little life.

Also B.S. (Before Sebastian) I had never heard of poutine, but he talked about it like it was the holy grail of foods. (Perhaps it was made more fantastic by its relative unavailability to us.) So, when work took me to Montreal several years ago, my beloved came with me. While I sat at a book conference, he stay locked in our hotel room and built the original Pink of Perfection and dreamed about eating poutine for dinner. Finally, one night, I rescued him from his hard work and we took the metro to another part of town. We found ourselves at a diner and, intimidated by the locals, managed to choke out an order for poutine and two Molsons. The poutine was just as so-wrong-it’s-right delicious as Sebastian had led me believe. And now, if you can believe it, there’s a burger joint a mere 10 blocks away that serves up this Quebecois delicacy.

But to learn the ropes of the real deal, I figured we needed a bona fide Montrealer to give us the scoop. Cat Taylor from Montreal is Chic tells us everything you ever wanted to know:

Back in the late 1950s when poutine is said to have been conceived in Quebec, no one could foresee the foray this unique product would make into some of the most sought-after dining establishments worldwide. The trend has spread past the North American shores to Europe and the myths and legend of the poutine story continue to grow.

But I’m here to give the facts.

The two most documented claims place the origin of poutine in the Victoriaville area of Quebec, about one hour outside Montreal. Existing evidence points to the restaurant Roy le Jucep in Drummondville as the self-proclaimed inventor of poutine. The story goes that back in the early 1960s patrons of the restaurant were mixing the cheese curds, which were sold as a handy snack (they still appear everywhere even the corner store), with the gravy and fries. The restaurant made it a regular item on his menu.

During the late 1970s, “disco fries” emerged in New York and New Jersey states for the club set – which were an altered version of poutine using shredded cheese. Today, ingredients like truffles and fois gras are being used in this simple and humble Quebec dish, but if you’re a purist, you’ll want the true recipe for traditional poutine, bien sur.

First, cheese curds. The truth of the matter is, no matter how expensive or delicious the cheese is –- to get the essence of the dish you must use real cheese curds. If you live in Quebec you can buy these anywhere –- and I mean anywhere. More and more specialty shops, particularly cheese and gourmet shopsm in a major cities throughout North America now stock them due to the poutine craze, but you can also find them online. If you’re adventurous you can make your own cheese curds. Cheese curds for poutine must be made out of cheddar, not mozzarella. Often referred to as “squeaky cheese,” they have a unique texture and saltiness that regular cheese can’t imitate.

The classic sauce for traditional poutine is based on chicken velouté and should not be confused with gravy. Velouté has chicken stock as the primary base, while gravy has milk or cream and is much denser in texture. Today, for the non-traditional recipes, anything goes, including marinara sauce and duck velouté.

Next, the fries: There are many arguments as to which type of fries are best. A fry that works best to hold the sauce and curds is not too thin and very crisp. For the crispiest homemade fries, use white potatoes; cut them as evenly as possible; use olive oil for 1/3 of your total frying oil; sea salt instead of table salt; and blot the fries on sheets of paper towels before serving them and adding poutine ingredients.

The simple things I like to add as a twist — while still preserving the traditional taste — are crumbled bacon or a little dusting of truffle salt. Drink with a cold beer or Pepsi to be traditional or a nice Pinot Noir — which you could chill for 30 minutes before serving — or a buttery Chardonnay.

Read more from Cat on Montreal is Chic. If you’re interested in writing a guest post, email me!

I have long thought that one of the biggest obstacles to making a house feel like a home is all those blank walls. That’s why we made this giant horse silhouette way back when, why I hang album art, and why I frame vintage sewing patterns. But there’s a project I did awhile back that I never told you about, and it’s the kind of crafting I love: pretty fabric + junk you have laying around the house = something pretty to hang on the walls. Instead of framing fabric, which is a lovely idea, I wrapped box lids with fabric (as you would a present) and hung it right on the wall. This was originally conceived as a grouping of box lids in complementary fabrics (kind of like a quilt for your wall). I can’t quite remember how I ended up with just the pink birds, but either as a solo piece or a grouping, the project is equally successful — it’s just another way for me to great colorful, cheery fabrics into my home without having to haul out the sewing machine.

What You’ll Need

3-5 fabrics that look nice together, about 1/4-1/2 yard of each
shoebox lids and/or box flaps
tape
scissors
iron
nails and a hammer
mounting squares or heavy duty tape

Arrange your box lids on the floor in a pattern that appeals to your eye.  Think Mondrian.  Then wrap the fabric over each box lid to see which fabric should go where, thinking about proportion, balance, and which fabric you want to be the focal point.

Iron your fabric while listening to something really great.  Then, as if you were wrapping a present, wrap each box lid or flap in fabric, taping it down tight on the underside.

When all the box pieces have been wrapped, transfer your arrangement to a wall, hanging the lids on nails and adhering the flat box flap pieces to the wall with heavy duty tape or mounting squares.  Admire the pretty wrapping that no one will ever have to tear into.

When we were still in the darkest days of February, Sebastian and I threw a Scandinavian-themed dinner party. Ever since I read this this, I’ve been wishing I were born Danish. Perhaps this would mean I were tall, effortlessly cool, and blond, but it would certainly mean my home was a white canvas of zero clutter punctuated by bright bursts of color. Without a plane ticket to take me to Copenhagen or a time machine to travel back and screw with the family tree, the only way I know how to access the culture of another place is to eat their food. And what more visceral method is there, really?

Our dinner party didn’t give grant me blondness, but it was a chance to drink Aquavit with some of our dearest friends, eat smoked salmon, and revel in one of my favorite dinner party dishes of roast pork with apples and prunes in a mustard cream sauce. My clutter problems didn’t magically evaporate, but we did have a good laugh at the pictures of Max von Sydow demonstrating a skoal in my fantastically musty-smelling copy of The Cooking of Scandinavia procured in a church basement (along with the rest of the complete Time Life cooking series — the find of a lifetime). What more can one really ask from a dinner with friends?

Pork Loin with Apples, Prunes, and Mustard Cream Sauce
from Gourmet
Serves 8

1 (4-lb) boneless pork loin roast
1 3/4 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 teaspoons black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 Granny Smith apples
1 large onion, chopped
1/2 cup packed dried pitted prunes, quartered
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
3/4 cup water
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons coarse-grain mustard
1/2 cup dry white wine

Put oven rack in lower third of oven and preheat oven to 375°F.

Pat pork dry and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon salt and 3/4 teaspoon pepper. Heat oil in a very large heavy skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking, then brown pork, turning occasionally, 6 to 8 (you may need to cut pork in half crosswise and do this in batches if you don’t have a large enough skillet). Transfer to a small flameproof roasting pan (do not clean skillet) and roast pork until no pink remains, about 40 to 50 minutes. If you have one, an instant read thermometer inserted diagonally at least 2 inches into meat should register 150°F.

While pork roasts, peel, quarter, and core apples, then cut into 1/4-inch-thick wedges. Pour off all but 1 tablespoon fat from skillet, then cook onion in skillet over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until softened, 3 to 5 minutes. Add apples, prunes, broth, and water and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until apples are tender, 10 to 12 minutes. Stir in cream and mustard and simmer until sauce is slightly thickened, 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from heat and keep sauce warm, partially covered.

Transfer pork to a cutting board and let stand 10 minutes. Add wine to roasting pan and boil over high heat, stirring and scraping up brown bits, until reduced to about 1/4 cup, 2 to 3 minutes. Stir pan juices into cream sauce along with remaining 3/4 teaspoon salt and remaining 3/4 teaspoon pepper and heat sauce over moderate heat, stirring, until hot. Slice pork and serve with sauce.

Chantelle Nicole Designs is offering a $40 gift certificate to one lucky Pink of Perfection reader to use in their shop of of sweet and lovely hand-stamped silver jewelry.  Enter to win by leaving a comment about what makes you feel your prettiest by Sunday, March 14, 12 midnight EST. One winner will be selected at random, but everyone else is free to use this 10% of coupon: POP10

If the weather’s going to warm up and get all spring-y, I better hurry up and tell you about the last lingering hearty cold-weather recipes before it’s too late. Which leads me, with no ado at all, to a no-holds-barred chilly night dinner of bolognese.

Do you have a restaurant that is your go-to for all sorts of occasions, be it a celebration, lazy brunch, or candlelit dinner? Ours is a little Italian brasserie (is that an oxymoron?) a few blocks down the street. The prices are reasonable enough that we can swing in for lunch or dinner, but the atmosphere is sexy enough to feel like a treat. They have ridonkulously good fries (not quite shoe string, but skinnier than most), a steak that can bring tears to your eyes, and a burger that will make you forget the worst hangover. But for a cold weather lunch, I can’t resist their bolognese served with thick paparadelle. With a glass of wine and a seat on the black banquet across from my husband, I’m in heaven.

There are few things more comforting than shuffling around the house on a weekend with a pot of ragu simmering on the stove. It is the same sensation as puttering around the house with a roast chicken in the oven. The fragrance of a wholesome, sustaining dinner fills the air and fills you with a historic, elemental sense of satisfaction: I have put together this and that and now it cooks away while I sit here and read, you think. How glorious! And it is glorious. Even more so when you spoon out some of the rich sauce on top of a bowl of noodles, and settle down on the couch for a movie (thanks, Margaret!). This is the type of cooking and eating that ranks sky high in the book of satisfaction: nominal effort, slow-cooking, and a deeply luxurious result.

Bolognese
from How to Cook Everything
makes a little more than 1 quart

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, minced
1 carrot, peeled and minced
1 celery stalk, minced
1/4 cup minced bacon
1/2 pound lean ground pork
1/2 pound lean ground beef (or use all beef)
3/4 cup dry white wine (or juice from the tomatoes)
1 28- or 35-ounce can while plum tomatoes, drained
1 cup beef or chicken stock
1 cup cream, half and half or milk

Pour the olive oil in a large, deep saucepan. Turn the heat to medium-low, and a minute later, add the onion, carrot, celery, and bacon. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are tender, about 10 minutes. Add the ground meat and cook, stirring and breaking up any clumps, until all traces of red are gone, about 5 minutes. Add the wine or tomato juice, raise the heat a bit, and cook, stirring occasionally, until most the liquid is evaporated, about 5 minutes.

Crush the tomatoes with a fork or your hands and add them to the pan; stir, then add the stock. Turn the heat to low and cook at a slow simmer, stirring occasionally and breaking up the tomatoes and any clumps of meat that remain. After an hour or so, add salt and pepper, Cook for at least another hour, until much of the liquid has evaporated and the sauce is very thick.

Add the cream, half and half, or milk and cook for another 15 to 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, taste and add more salt and pepper as needed. Serve with any dried or fresh pasta.

image via muffet

Last week was not the stuff the good life is made of. Bogged down with melting snow and a bout of laryngitis that went from bearable to bad, I somehow lost my way. And I know you know what I mean: the days when everything loses its luster. Sadly, all the stuff that got you fired up about life is still there, it’s just not resonating with you in the same way. You slog through each day with no spark.

Well, I spent the weekend petting puppies and getting pep talks from a close friend, going to bed early, and drinking lots of Throat Comfort tea. And now Monday feels like a real fresh start. I’m not saying that I woke up feeling that the world was fresh and new and full of potential, but I’m actively reminding myself that it is.

And that’s what’s so glorious about spring. Just as you are starting to lose hope, the sunlight starts stretching past 5pm and the air warms up enough that you open the windows. It’s the natural cycle of things to at times have to turn it and rebuild before you can be renewed. I see a bouquet of daffodils in my future.

What’s your favorite thing about spring? Do you feel yourself wanting to take on shelved projects with a renewed sense of vigor? Do you, too, find yourself wanting a puppy?

I’ve been having one of those blah weeks. Know that feeling? There’s nothing actually wrong — in fact, besides a scratchy throat that makes me sound at turns like Kathleen Turner, everything’s going quite well — but there’s something that I just can’t put my finger on. Maybe it’s this last leg of winter gray or that I need a shot in the arm of get-out-of-town or learn-something-new excitement. Whatever it is, there it is. In fact, just saying it out loud feels like I’ve thrown the ballasts overboard. It’s out there now, hopefully sinking to the bottom of the dark oceanic depths from which it came. Now maybe something fabulous can come and take its place.

This isn’t the kind of psychic ennui that can be undone with a fantastic dinner, but if it were, this recipe would be the cure. I’m filing this one away in the “quick and easy but in line with my fantasy vision of myself” folder. I have always thought of the recipes in How to Cook Everything as little more than utilitarian; this, however, is simple but otherworldly. You pop the sliced potatoes and onions in the oven with nothing more than a bit of olive oil, turning them every 10 minutes until the onions turn languorous and the potatoes become golden and crisp in patches. They you lay the fish on top, drizzle a bit of olive oil over the fillets, and in 8-12 more minutes you have a supper that is wonderously simple but perfect in every way: lush with flavor, and easy but refined, like a woman with a very expensive haircut who wears it in a just-rolled-out-of-bed sort of fashion.

Roast Cod with Potatoes and Onions
adapted from How to Cook Everything
Serves 2

2 tablespoons, plus 1 teaspoon olive oil
1-1 1/2 pounds creamy, gold-fleshed potatoes (such as Yukon Gold)
1 cup sliced onions (about 1 large onion)
2 6-ounce cod fillets

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Pour 2 tablespoon olive oil into a baking dish. Place the dish in the oven while it preheats to heat the olive oil. Meanwhile, peel the potatoes and slice them about 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch thick. Remove the pan from the oven, and stir potatoes and sliced onions into the oil. Return dish to oven. Every 10 minutes, turn the potatoes and onions with a spatula. When the potatoes are beginning to brown — after about 30 to 40 minutes — place the cod fillets on top and drizzle with remaining teaspoon oil. Roast the cod for 8-12 minutes. Cod is done when it is opaque throughout and offers no resistance to a thin-bladed knife.

Can I tell you a secret? This winter I made a discovery born completely out of pure, unadulterated laziness. One of my most abhorred kitchen tasks is peeling butternut squash. I hate the thick skin, the irregular shape. Just writing about it my nose has assumed a position of crinkled-up-in-annoyance. See, I don’t even like to think about it. Which is a shame, really, because I love the stuff once the hard work is done. That is why, when I once saw butternut squash already peeled and chopped in the grocery store, it was the kind of convenience food I could really get behind. When I didn’t see it again, though, I decided to just stop peeling. That’s right. Whether roasting (which Sara Rose convinced me was a-ok) or chopping up for a soup, I just left the skin on. What’s a little bit of extra fiber?

And that, my friends, is the only way I could bring myself to make this vegetarian winter stew. And it’s a good thing I found a work-around, because I really loved this, rich as it is with red lentils and topped with a smattering of chopped peanuts, yogurt, and cilantro. It’s the sort of decadent yet basically healthy food that gets me through winter without consuming a truckload of extra sharp New York State cheddar cheese and 40 gallons of tea.

Come to think of it — holy hey, it’s March! Did you read your Astrologyzone horoscope? Are you hanging in, or so deeply sick of winter that if you have to pull on your tights once more you just might yip?

Winter Squash, Red Lentil, and Chickpea Stew
adapted from Better Homes and Gardens
Serves 4-6

1 tablespoon olive oil
3 medium carrots, sliced 1/2 inch thick
1 cup chopped onion (1 large)
1 pound pumpkin or winter squash, peeled (or not), seeded, and cut into 1-inch cubes
1 15-ounce can chickpeas (garbanzo beans), rinsed and drained
1 cup red lentils, rinsed and drained
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
1 tablespoon lime juice
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
4 cups chicken or vegetable broth
1/4 cup chopped peanuts (optional)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
plain nonfat yogurt

In a large Dutch oven or soup pot, heat oil over moderately-high heat. Add onions and carrots and cook until beginning to soften. Stir in broth, winter squash, lentils, chickpeas, tomato paste, ginger, cumin, salt, turmeric, and pepper. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until squash is tender and lentils are beginning to fall apart, about 15 minutes. Stir in lime juice, and ladle into bowls, topped with cilantro, yogurt and peanuts.

image via glennwilliamspdx

Happiness

There’s just no accounting for happiness,
or the way it turns up like a prodigal
who comes back to the dust at your feet
having squandered a fortune far away.

And how can you not forgive?
You make a feast in honor of what
was lost, and take from its place the finest
garment, which you saved for an occasion
you could not imagine, and you weep night and day
to know that you were not abandoned,
that happiness saved its most extreme form
for you alone.

No, happiness is the uncle you never
knew about, who flies a single-engine plane
onto the grassy landing strip, hitchhikes
into town, and inquires at every door
until he finds you asleep midafternoon
as you so often are during the unmerciful
hours of your despair.

It comes to the monk in his cell.
It comes to the woman sweeping the street
with a birch broom, to the child
whose mother has passed out from drink.
It comes to the lover, to the dog chewing
a sock, to the pusher, to the basket maker,
and to the clerk stacking cans of carrots
in the night.
It even comes to the boulder
in the perpetual shade of pine barrens,
to rain falling on the open sea,
to the wineglass, weary of holding wine.

–Jane Kenyon

The other night I enjoyed one of Whit Stillman’s talkfests, The Last Days of Disco, and I couldn’t get over Chloe Sevigny’s costumes. Not the one-shouldered spangly disco dresses (how au courant!) or sequin tube tops, and certainly not the high-waisted jeans and crop-top t-shirts, but the classic preppy chic that thirty years later, actually looked really cool. The crisp blouses, the a-line shirt-dresses, the smart blazers all seemed timeless. Not in a dowdy Talbots way, just in a cool, unfussy way. Here, an affordable look book of movie style inspiration. Happy (snowy!) weekend!