Usually my reading pace is a book (or two or three) a week, but I’ve been starting too many lately and putting them down before I can make headway. I picked up nearly a dozen like this, until I finally found myself with food writer Peter Kaminsky‘s Culinary Intelligence: The Art of Eating Healthy (and Really Well) and I felt compelled to read it straight through. It wasn’t until I got half way through that I realized that it might be considered a “diet book”– I hadn’t actually read the subtitle – but this isn’t what I’d call it. I’d shelve it next to my copy of say, Tamar Adler’s An Everlasting Meal, or Deborah Madison and Patrick McFarlin’s What We Eat When We Eat Alone. It’s a book about eating style. 

Kaminsky’s sell is “FPC” or “flavor per calorie” emphasizing that when food tastes great – and isn’t made of white flour or sugar, or processed – you will enjoy it more and eat less. He re-iterates simplicity. He suggests varying your meals, and planning. For convenience, he proposes an 11-day week of at-home meals supplemented by lots of vegetables: meat one night, poultry another, fish, pasta, whole-grain risotto, beans made with vegetables, sausage or bacon, salad, an omelet or fritatta, soup, or leftovers (touched-up). These are not groundbreaking ideas, but I found the book to be a nice reminder. I also quite enjoyed the moments of memoir – hobnobbing with Francis Mallmann (with whom he co-wrote Seven Fires), or being served fish by Laurent Gras. (The recipe is in the book.)

I really enjoy reading about how people eat on a regular basis, particularly those who work in the industry in some way. When your life revolves around food, it’s all too easy to talk about the grand meals, rather than the small ones that sustain us. Maybe I just like reading about little habits that justify my own odd ones– such as my bi-weekly sardine fixes.

This morning we both woke up a little bit under the weather. (Devon had it bad, I was just sleep deprived.) So I set about doing what I know works to ward off the sickness:

1. Nutrient dense foods. It helps that this might be one of my favorite foods on the planet: a roasted lamb’s liver with roasted parsnip, topped with a parsley sherry vinaigrette.

2. Tea. When I’m not feeling well, I usually drink plain hot water, or use one tea bag and re-steep it all day long until it’s hot water that tastes a little bit like something. This was one of my special bags of Turkish black tea that I’m very fond of. The brand is called Çaykur, and the tea is labeled “Altın Süzen Poşet Çay” the gold variety of black tea.

3. Stock. Two days ago I made chicken stock after roasting a plump bird. Today, it’s some beef stock with marrow bones. I added in some vinegar, salt, bay leaves and the top of a parsnip for good measure.

In the early evening, I headed to the gym for some non-cardio-based exercise, which always seems more prudent when I’m worried that I’m coming down with something but still want to get a workout in. Unlike my normal routine, I swung by the local Y to check it out during their open house week. The weight room, to my disappointment was crawling with teenage boys. This became much more entertaining when I started warming up with heavier weights than they were working towards. Snicker.

Afterwards, I headed downtown to meet a friend at Trident. Iced tea!

While at Trident, I found myself at the Back Bay Trader Joe’s for the first time ever. It’s a hidden Trader Joe’s down an escalator! I picked up a few necessities (Devon requested orange juice) and headed home.

Yesterday I roasted this chicken with lemon, olive oil, salt, pepper and thyme :

And today I used some of the meat to make my dinner.

I’m a big fan of these pre-cooked beets. They taste much better than canned beets, but provide significant convenience if you are the only beet eater in the house and want to put together a quick meal.

I popped the beets in a bowl and dressed them with cumin, salt, some sherry vinegar and chile powder. Then I tossed in some chopped chicken breast. And topped it all with salsa and guacamole. This makes total sense in my mind, but looking back, it may be one of the odder combinations you’ve seen here.