Comfort Me With Chanterelles

OK. When I think about Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar facing 18 more months of house arrest…or women moldering in refugee camps all over the world…I have no complaints. Zero. Zip. Nada. I am covered with blessings.

Still, I confess, relative to my modest life in context, it has been a nasty week…nah, week-and-a-half. Of course we live in our own context, the spectre of the beautiful martyr in Myanmar is real/not real. Here sitting where we sit, we are relatively better or worse than we might be…might have been…were. Indeed, I want for nothing. I am hugely blessed. But, Pollyanna that I am, even so it has been a stressful time. (I will spare you the details.)

This afternoon I worked my usual Thursday as a volunteer at UCLA’s new hospital. I work in the surgical waiting area, helping people who sit for hours waiting for family and friends in surgery. It’s a great job, rewarding, and every week sets my world in order, particularly because there are always small children involved…today “Baby Boy Jones” wasn’t three days old. How can you come away not filled with gratitude?

But by 5:00 o’clock as I headed home, I felt in need of comfort food. What would it be? I didn’t have breakfast (had to take my panicked mother to the doctor’s early), no lunch to speak of (had to take Ma marketing before taking her home), so I could afford something frivolous with calories. I settled on it: polenta and mushrooms—not just mushrooms, chanterelles. Perfect.

I went to Ralph’s and picked out several handfuls of chanterelles, a handful of shiitake, and half a dozen crimini. Chanterelles always make me think of my cherished Susan Lescher, as I had never seen chanterelles before Gene and I went to dinner at Susan and Bob’s in Sneden’s Landing—she served us buttery pasta with chanterelles. I was agog.

I came home and put together—

Paula Wolfert’s incomparable baked polenta. For just me for two meals (or for me and a friend), I set the toaster oven to 350 degrees while, in a round 4-cup earthenware baking dish I combine 3 cups water, ¾ cup polenta, a scant tablespoon olive oil, and ¾ teaspoon salt. The oil floats on the surface, the cornmeal and water don’t mix, not to worry. I place the uncovered dish in the oven (the temp doesn’t have to have reached 350). I set the timer for an hour, at which point the polenta has a bit of a crust…I stir it with a fork, then cook it another half-hour, and serve. (For more people, I multiply the ingredients out…temperature and times are the same.)

I poured myself a glass of my Spanish red wine, watched the recording of tonight’s "Newshour"—delighted to see Renée Montagne from Afghanistan, I’m a big fan of hers on NPR’s “Morning Edition”—prepared the mushrooms. I cut the crimini into odd shapes, à la Deborah Madison, cut the delicate shiitake in half, sliced only the largest chanterelles in half. I had two heirloom tomatoes in danger of being lost, so I peeled them, pressed out seeds and juice, and roughly chopped them. When the polenta was about ready, I heated a drizzle of olive oil in a big skillet and sautéed two minced shallots and four minced garlic cloves until softened. Added a lump of butter and the crimini and shiitake, sautéed them a couple of minutes, then mixed in the chanterelles and tomatoes. Sautéed, stirring, another few minutes till the chanterelles were tender. I plopped polenta on my plate and the mushrooms over it. Sprinkled over a handful of shredded aged SarVecchio Wisconsin (pleasing stand-in for Parmigiano-Reggiano). Sat in my accustomed chair watching Jon Stewart.

Felt better.