Comfort

The mushrooms at the grocer's are big this year, perfect for stuffing if you are so inclined, but the stems are too thick and tough for the delicate risottos and duxelles I have been leaning to these dark, cold evenings. Taking the knife to the fungi takes me back to when I first brought my first knife home and spent hours patiently practicing slicing and dicing. Snapping the stems from the cups, a blade to halve the circle, turning the cut edge down. It is all familiar and comforting.

The same knife and nimble fingers make short order of the crimini this evening, destined for a humble pizza. But just as the tops of onions and odd bits cut off carrots and parsley find their way into the stockpot, so these stems sit by my cutting board awaiting a similar fate. They go into their own dedicated pot, a bit of salted water and today's onion discards, to make mushroom stock, for I am reminded of the need for comfort, and not just in our home.

Little One's class is having a hard week, it seems, with book-ended traffic accidents leaving two parents laid up with fractures and bruises, and their families asking for help in the form of dinners and carpools. We are grateful we are not polishing shoes for a funeral, but it is hard to see the silver lining when the sun is so dim.

And so the simmering stock will be thickened, and cream added. Noodles will be boiled--a few more than usual. I will open two jars of tuna this evening, and fill twin casserole dishes with food designed to be reheated and to comfort the soul.