Cutting Board Lunch
How A Century-Old Cutting Board Inspired Time Travel Kitchen. Plus: The Ladies Who Lunch
Last week I talked about my “cutting board lunch” and several readers left comments saying they liked the sound of that and wanted to know more.
In a corner of my kitchen (above) I have an almost 100-year-old cutting board — it’s actually a breadboard —that I took with me from my last apartment with the blessing of the landlord.
My former apartment was in a converted residential hotel and the original 1927 kitchen was intact (photo below - I just added the wallpaper). The breadboard pulled out from the work station on the right and I’d originally planned to take the whole station, but in the end just the board came with me.
Why was it so important to me to bring the board to my new apartment? Because it inspired this newsletter.
A century of cooking happened at that breadboard. I was so moved by the marks made on it by the generations who’d used it before me that the idea for Time Travel Kitchen was born almost immediately.
In my current apartment kitchen, I love having lunch on it — something about it is so pleasing and a lot of times new ideas for this newsletter are hatched while I’m just sitting there on a kitchen stool, eating lunch. It’s a little sanctuary.
My cutting board lunches can be simple but they have to look nice and taste good. One lunch this week was the easiest— Tuna salad on a Bay’s English Muffin. I never heard of Bay’s till I moved to Chicago and they’re great. I just wing it when I make tuna salad, tasting as I go. This day it was a can of tuna in water, red onion, celery, parsley, Hellman’s mayo, a little Dijon mustard, squeeze of lemon, salt and pepper and a bed of Bibb lettuce on the muffin.
I’ve included a link to Julia Child’s tuna salad recipe from the NYT adapted by
— Julia insisted on tuna in oil — but she liked Bay’s English muffins, too. The link is HERE.If you’d like to learn more about my former 1927 kitchen, here’s a post from 2022 just before I moved. Click “Read Full Story” below.
The Ladies Who Lunch
Decidedly not having lunch at their cutting boards were Truman Capote’s “Swans”, the society women, “the ladies who lunched” in the 1960’s and 70’s who are the subject of the latest FX series FEUD: Capote vs. The Swans.
Capote’s exposé, La Côte Basque, 1965 was published in Esquire in November, 1975. Friendships were irreparably broken when he dished all the dirt the women had so willingly confided in him.
Besides sharing their darkest secrets, I wondered what they were all eating at those lunches. I found this 1972 lunch menu in the book Menu Design in America by TASCHEN.
The note that accompanies the menu in the TASCHEN book says the following:
Henri Soulé opened La Côte Basque as a “bargain priced” Le Pavillion, but it attracted much the same wealthy clientele and had a very similar menu.
Everybody likes a deal!
I love French food, but it occurred to me that part of the reason the Swans may have been so miserable was because they were faced with dishes like Oeuf en Gelée every day.
In 1970, Stephen Sondheim’s brilliant song The Ladies Who Lunch from the show Company has Elaine Stritch belting out an anthem savagely mocking herself and the other wealthy, world-weary ladies who lunch, and I was reminded of Capote’s Swans.
The Guardian reviewed Stritch and the song saying this:
…no matter how many Vodka Stingers she downs — her character can’t escape failure, boredom and loss.
Here is the great Elaine Stritch, raging.
Vodka Stinger
I invited a friend over to try a Vodka Stinger with me because even though I was curious, I knew I’d probably hate it. I wanted to give it a fair shake with a second opinion.
I had one sip and handed it off — my friend thought it was “ok”. I’d tried to find white crème de menthe which is the preferred version I’m told, but I was only able to find the green variety at a local convenience store. If you’re game, it’s simple enough to make:
2 oz. Vodka
1 oz. Crème de Menthe
Add to cocktail shaker filled with ice. Shake, strain, pour into a chilled glass.
If you like a lot of minty flavor, you may like this. It’s the equivalent of a very strong after dinner mint, but with a kick. Posh!
In next Friday’s newsletter, Faith Ringgold takes us to Dinner at Aunt Connie’s House. I love this book so much and I’m inviting a special guest to join me at Aunt Connie’s. See you then.
Have a great weekend and Happy Lunar New Year!🧧
Jolene
P.S. — Happy Valentine’s Day! I continue a tradition my mother started when we were kids of having Cherry Jell-O with whipped cream on Valentine’s Day. Retro delicious nostalgia in a bowl. ❤️
Love the story of the board. My house growing up had 3 stations like that and I wish I had thought to grab the board!
Love that retro glass! And... if one grew up with Cool Whip Non-Dairy Topping instead of real whipped cream on their red Jell-O, could they admit that here? Asking for a friend.