A View from the New Year Window
plus: recipe resolutions and your official recipe index!
From Karyl’s Cook & Tell Column (January 1, 1981)
The beginning of a new year, like a window, is an opening through which to view what lies beyond its frame.
The view from the new year’s window may be faint or incomplete but windows in walls frame their pictures all year long in three dimensions and full perspective. They let the outside in, inviting light every day of every season and fresh air when warmer weather coaxes them open. A window is often called a light, and the word derives from “wind” and “eye.”
We sit at the dining room table by the mill window that looks onto the cove and rejoice over the simple beauty of the scene. Turning 90 degrees, we capture the view through the south living room window: dense woods. The land and seascape framed by the north light, a rising and falling of tides, is dynamic. In contrast, the woods to the south neither come nor go. Changes there are gentle and imperceptible.
Wherever there’s a window, there’s a world beyond. In kitchens especially, what worlds a window holds! Over or near the sink where dishes are dealt with, a window is a virtual necessity, an opportunity to look beyond the menial chore at hand. Plants on the sill can be talked to, birds admired, while Lemon Joy renders the crockery squeaky clean. Down the road past the beach, the window in a friend’s tiny kitchen is a most suitable aperture for the lighthouse where she lives. It’s a genuine ship’s porthole, trained on the Sheepscot River. Who wouldn’t sign up for K.P. in such a setting?
Restaurant-goers choose a window table if one is available. We want to see beyond the immediate, even if we’re looking at the parking lot. Jack the dog has the same idea. He keeps in touch with the outside world during inside times, by resting his chin on the windowsill so he can comfortably survey the flight of gulls and passing of cars.
The new year, letting in new light, encourages higher aspirations. It offers views of new possibilities, even while these may be partially obscured as by frost flowers* etched in ice on the storm windows of January. Plans, promises and resolutions are made as part of the New Year’s Day ritual. No matter that these lofty goals may never be remembered, let alone reached, a year hence. In the writing of them, we meet ourselves face to face. It is always good to renew acquaintances.
In such a spirit, I pledge the following in 1981:
To determine what the little jar in the back of the second shelf of the refrigerator contains. By now, it is the senior citizen of the fridge and I’m not about to throw it out. I’d just like to know what it is.
To find out how a jar can wind up coverless, and a cover jarless, when only the complete set is saved in the first place. When I figure that one out, my research will probably be of inestimable value to all who have ever puzzled over the phenomenon of single socks after only pairs went into the laundry.
To decide once and for all which is the better system for organizing recipe clippings: by category (soups, casseroles) or alphabetically in general and all together (Black bean soup, Brambles, Bread and Butter pickles). My indecision on this vital point is responsible for the bloated file folders and overstuffed mushroom baskets full to overflowing with scraps of newspaper and magazine clippings awaiting disposition. On the other hand, this indecision has forced me to develop a sharply honed memory that almost never fails. I know, for instance, that the recipe for blue cheese burgers is wedged in a pile on the living room bookshelf; that the edges of the clipping are raggedy; and that there’s a photo of an airplane on the back of it.
To return, finally, Whitney Wright’s Tonkin Gulf cookbook, a great collection of recipes from his ship’s chef. But not before I copy down this one.
FRIED NOODLES WITH PORK SHREDS
½ lb. thin spaghetti
½ lb. boneless pork (chicken, shrimp, beef or tofu can be subbed)
1 lb. Chinese cabbage
2 oz. fresh mushrooms, sliced
2 eggs
1 t. sugar
3 T. soy sauce
1/2 t. salt
2 T. water
6 T. peanut or corn oil
Cut pork into shreds (2” x ¼” x ¼”), more easily done when meat has been frozen slightly. Pork chops work well. Cut cabbage into similar shreds. Wash and slice mushrooms.
Beat eggs. Heat 1 T. oil in heavy saucepan, pour in eggs and cook over high heat without stirring, until set, like a big pancake. When cool, cut into Julienne strips.
Cook spaghetti for 8 mins, drain, and run under cold water until thoroughly cold. Drain again and mix with 2 T. oil, setting aside until ready for frying.
Heat 1 T. oil in frying pan or wok over high heat, add pork and stir for one minute, until all shreds turn white. Add soy sauce and sugar and stir briefly. Add mushrooms and cabbage, mix well. Add 2 T. water, reduce heat, cover and cook 8-10 min.
For noodles: in another frying pan, heat 2 T. oil over high heat and add spaghetti. Spread it evenly and cook about 2 min, then turn, mix and cook another 2-3 min. (Only part of the spaghetti will be fried; this is okay).
Sprinkle ½ t. salt over spaghetti and mix lightly. Pour in about 4/5 of the pork mixture and mix well. Turn onto a platter and top with remaining pork mixture and egg strips.
The spaghetti part can be made ahead and warmed before mixing with the pork and the whole dish can be cooked and frozen.
Amie’s Endnotes
I’m writing this in my kitchen studio during the final week of 2023, and like my mom, gazing out the window, as the midnight blue sky melts into the dawn’s pink streaks above a sea of terra-cotta tiled roofs. There are no frost flowers on my window, but on this cold desert morning, a sprinkling of white frost lightly sugars the lawn. If I close my eyes, I can almost hear the ice cracking on the cove three thousand miles away.
The inside view of my kitchen is somewhat disorganized. Like Mom’s, my recipe collection resides in every corner—a stack in a recipe journal; clippings on the fridge; sticky notes on cookbook pages; the expanding electronic stash in my Paprika app and digital folders.
As a New Year’s Resolution to you, I’ve created the official Cook & Tell Recipe Index. Bookmark it! I’ll be updating the list throughout the coming year.
*For a sparkly look at frost flowers, check out the stunning photography from
.
Your mother offers so many truths. I always pick a window spot, even in my Pilates class, and I am forever missing socks! The recipe looks easy and tasty. Always love your mom's use of line.
So smart with the index, it looks great! It was such a delightful surprise and a uniquely special connection to read your mom's reference to frost flowers - thank you so much for linking me in! 💕