Old Friends and Mashed Potatoes
Old Friends and Mashed Potatoes
Plus,The 20th Anniversary Edition of Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook
My friend Adrianne came for a visit last weekend and she arrived at lunchtime, so the first thing we needed to do was go to the store to buy Bologna, rye bread, cheese and potato chips.
We’ve been friends since the first grade and there are certain food rituals that must be honored. They have the effect of flinging us back to our six-year-old selves. Pro tip: put the potato chips directly ON the sandwich.
Our sandwiches were essential in setting the tone for a weekend of guffawing. Laughing with an old and true friend, about everything and nothing, is one of the best feelings in this world.
We could spend a whole weekend howling just on the topic of our treatment at the hands of a few angry nuns.
At one point over the weekend we were talking about our mothers and the dinners they made for us when we were growing up on Long Island in the ‘60s
The holy trinity of the mid-century home menu was a protein, a vegetable and a starch. We agreed that mashed potatoes were the heroes of the dinner table.
I can see my mother draining the pot of boiled, floury potatoes, mashing them up, adding lumps of butter, some milk and salt, then back on the stove to keep warm — she insisted food be served hot.
My mom also employed a “NEVER MARGARINE!” policy and that was just fine with me and my four brothers.
Luxurious Mashed Potatoes and Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook, 20th Anniversary Edition
I like butter. I like a lot of butter.
— Anthony Bourdain
A man who surely agreed with my mother on the glory of butter was the late, and much missed, Anthony Bourdain.
The just released 20th Anniversary Edition of Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook (Bloomsbury Publishing, link: here) is another kind of visit with an old friend, one you’ve never met.
There’s a beautiful new forward by acclaimed chef and author Gabrielle Hamilton (link:here) who was a friend of Chef Bourdain’s. When she agrees to write the forward, she worries that maybe the work hadn’t “aged well.” To her relief, she finds it “dated” in only one, wonderful way:
Twenty years ago he blew open the doors of the hushed temple of professional cooking — an intimidating, mythical white-tocqued corner of the world — strolled on in, and then held the door open for us to follow. I am certain that Tony would be genuinely pleased that his own steadfast work, generously shared over the years, has made this one single aspect of his cookbook feel dated.
Today’s reader is no amateur.
— Gabrielle Hamilton, from the forward to Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook, 20th Anniversary Edition, 2024
This is a really gorgeous book and it’s so nice to “hear” Anthony Bourdain’s unmistakable voice again in the text.
Luxurious Mashed Potatoes
With all the talk about mashed potatoes, I decided to make a truly luxurious version of the staple as a practice run for the holidays.
The recipe involves heavy cream, salt, butter (I used Kerrygold) and Yukon Gold potatoes. Four ingredients, that’s it. The finished dish is the color of a buttercup, the flavor of the potatoes comes through and they are creamy and luscious. I garnished with garlic chives from the farmer’s market which is a good cheat if somebody at the table likes garlic mashed, just snip some garlic chives over their portion.
The recipe is a version of the mashed potatoes made famous by Chef Jöel Robuchon, adapted by Anthony Bourdain. It requires a ricer, but if you don’t have one you can press the potatoes with a wooden spoon through a colander. The smooth texture of the finished dish makes it worth the effort. I halved this recipe and it is most definitely worthy of holiday tables.
Find the recipe, published in Food & Wine: Here
Meeting a Substack Friend IRL
It was such a treat to spend some time with
who was in Chicago doing research for a book she’s writing about her fascinating great-grandfather, Victor Falkenau, a building contractor who was deeply involved in the rebuilding of this city after The Great Chicago Fire of 1871.Andrea, who has lived in Madrid for the past three years, writes two terrific Substack newsletters:
, where she shares moments from her life there, including treks and hikes around Europe; and that follows her progress as she tracks the influence her great-grandfather had on the architecture and infrastructure of Chicago. I could have spoken with Andrea for hours more than we did! Definitely visit her Substacks.Save the Date
On Thursday, October 24th at 5pm CT, paid subscribers to Time Travel Kitchen are invited to a virtual cocktail-mocktail party on Zoom, our first ever “Snacky-Drinky” event.
I’ll be sending a Zoom link to TTK premium subscribers early the week of the event, along with a recipe for one of the snacks I’m bringing to the party: Cheese Straws from
’s spectacular new bestselling book, Baking In The American South (link). Thank you, Anne for allowing me to share this recipe.I’ll also be sending you the recipes for the canapés I made last year and a cocktail and mocktail recipe. I’m looking forward to this event!
If you’d like to upgrade to a paid subscription you can click the link below —it would be so appreciated.
To old friends and new friends, thanks for being here. Have a good week, everyone, and see you soon.
Jolene
Happy to be a new friend soon-to-be old friend. Long Island 4ever….your canapés are 👑👑👑👑
Fabulous, evocative post, as always, Jolene! How wonderful to be in touch with a friend from so long ago, to have that great class photo, to meet again and eat bologna, cheese and potato chip sandwiches! And those mashed potatoes—I’m afraid my mother used margarine, and it wasn’t her best dish!Bourdain’s book sounds like a must-have, and I hope to attend your “snacky-drinky” zoom party! I’ll bring some virtual snacks from wherever I happen to be—New Mexico, I think. Maybe something à la Georgia O’Keeffe!