I am sitting here, in a friend’s apartment in Berlin with snow falling outside and fireworks going off, thinking of an appropriate way to sum up the past year. It was hard, it was a struggle, it was difficult and heartbreaking on so many levels for so many different people. In a year of hardship there were also a lot of wonderful things that happened: I started grad school and found a career that I truly love, my boyfriend completed his Masters degree and created a beautiful thesis project and, perhaps best of all, my grandmother survived her hip replacement and a heart attack and is up and walking and laughing again. It only feels appropriate to end this year with something a tart, and a little sweet, and hope that next year (and the next decade) will be a better.
We touched down in Newark at 6:00 Saturday morning and were in our double-wide matchbox of an apartment in Brooklyn by 7:30. After a breakfast of turkey sandwiches we settled in for a long winter’s nap. . . . that lasted two hours.
I went through the rest of the day feeling like I had a hangover without having had any of the fun that usually leads to one (unless a red-eye flight from L.A. to New York is your idea of a good time). Both Amir and I agreed that we were in need of a detox.
I had bookmarked this recipe before we went away because it seemed like a perfect post-thanksgiving meal, and it was. It was worth dragging myself to the market to get kale and a big bottle of chestnuts. It was worth soaking the beans. It was worth chopping the onions that always make me cry. It is surprisingly creamy, tangy, rich, nutty and sweet. It will cure what ails you, even if it’s just too much turkey and too many tacos.
