I come from stirring stock. That is to say, my people are stirrers. It’s how my grandmother, avó Costa, cooked. She stood facing the stove for hours in her pink housecoat and pink slippers, her tiny pink hand planted on her hip, singing in her thin, reedy voice. She stirred all kind of Portuguese comestibles: spicy stuffing with chunks of homemade chouriço sausage; her famous pink (of course) chicken, rice, and potato soup; and vats and vats of kale soup.

When she grew too old to stir her soups and stews for long, I’d do it for her. By then age had stolen a few inches from her, but she still managed to peer over the tops of the pots and instruct, “Mais devagar, queirdo, mais devagar.” Slower, sweetheart, slower.

I think it’s genetic. When the temperature nosedives, all I want to do is hover over a simmering pot and stir. And what I’ve been craving lately is a long-simmered, deeply flavored Bolognese sauce recipe. The kind that takes no prisoners. The kind that makes your guests plead for the secret. (Are you reading this, Kate Jackson?) The kind that leaves you on the couch unable to move because you didn’t have enough sense to stop after your second helping of seconds.

I’m certain if vovó had discovered ragù Bolognese in her lifetime, she would’ve petitioned the Pope to make us Italian. It’s her kind of dish.

So my hunt was on for a Portuguese-grandmother-approved Bolognese sauce–rich, meaty, slow-cooked, constantly stirred–to quench that nagging craving. This narrowed the field exponentially. Anything from a 30-minute-meal proselytizer was clearly out of contention, as were recipes from ADD TV chefs and hosts. I found–and promptly rejected–a recipe in Cook’s Illustrated that got the job done in a two hours. (Two hours? I can’t find my way out of our pantry in two hours.) Then, while sitting in front of my cookbook collection, I was reminded of another short, sturdy woman who also comes from stirring stock: L’Imperatrice–The Empress–Marcella Hazan.

I immediately downloaded The Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. (Why I didn’t already have a copy is a question for another day.) Flipping through the book revealed a woman who spoke her mind, knew right from wrong, and, if you disagreed with what she had to say, well, that was your problem. (Not unlike Momma Leite, if you ask me.) I knew The Empress wouldn’t let me down. And she didn’t. Her Bolognese sauce clocks in at a whopping six hours. That’s longer than some relationship I’ve seen.

As I leaned against the stove with my iPad in its kitchen condom, a gorgeous sauce burbling down to sweet goodness in the pot, I was connecting to my past–to my stirrers. And to a craving even deeper, to be with my avó just one more time.

Ragù Bolognese to Appease the Grandmother Within

Adapted from The Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking | Knopf, 1992 | Makes 4 cups

Marcella, in her inimitable fashion, offers the home cook plenty of suggestions to create an authentic Bolognese sauce recipe, the kind my grandmother would approve of. First, the more marbled the meat, the sweeter the ragù. The most desirable cut of beef is the neck portion of the chuck. You may have to call up and order it from your butcher. It’s also important to salt the meat as soon as it hits the pan; it extracts the juices and flavors the sauce. Last, use a heavy pot that retains heat. (I use my Le Creuset 5-quart Dutch oven.) Avoid a cast-iron pot, as the acid can interact with the metal and turn the sauce an unpleasant blech color.–David Leite

LC Time is Not of the Essence Note: Rush this recipe, and you’ll miss its most important ingredient. Time. Time to ponder. Time to make lists. Time to sing the entire soundtrack of “Evita.”

Special Equipment: Patience

Active time: 20 minutes | Total time: 6 hours, most of it unattended, except for making lazy eights with a wooden spoon

Bolognese Sauce Recipe

Directions

Want it? Click it.

I was abandoned on New Year’s Day by The One.

Yes, I was left to kick off 2012 by my lonesome. Just me and the kids. He was on his way to a five-day respite at Kripalu, a center for yoga and health in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Far be it from me to stop him from twisting himself into a human pretzel every morning at 6:30 and eating Tofu Surprise three times a day. We each have our own path to enlightenment. Mine just happens to be slicked with butter and duck fat.

His hope was to get centered, cleanse both body and mind, and sort through some things that have been weighing on him. Being the immensely insecure–and let’s just say it: self-centered–person that I am, I immediately thought it was all about me. So at the front door, I flipped up his collar, tugged him close to me, and warned, Don Corleone-style, “Don’t talk to anyone thinner, richer, or cuter than me.” He simply smiled, long ago inured to my threats, protestations, and tantrums. ”I mean it!” I added.

And I did. This idea of giving someone you love so much undisturbed time to think can be dangerous. Thinking turns into analyzing. Analyzing turns into realizing. Realizing turns into acting. Acting turns into divorce. Or something like that.

And yet at the same time I was doing a private happy dance, looking forward to being on my own. When The One’s away for a spell, I instantaneously revel in living like a bachelor. Think my Oscar Madison to his Felix Unger. Plates stack up, clothes hang from everything, almost-empty milk cartons sour on the coffee table. Sometimes I don’t even shower and shave for days. It’s only when I’m pulled away from my computer by the doorbell announcing that Sarah, our UPS driver with the gunslinger walk, is waiting that I realize with horror how hideous I must look.

This time, though, I wanted things to be different. In honor of The One, I intended to wake up early, do Rodney Yee yoga (that is, if I could find the damn DVD that I have a tendency to use as a bookmark), meditate, and eat well.

Waking early screeched to a halt the first morning when I stumbled out of bed, scratching my ass and squinting to see the clock. 9:30 a.m.

Yoga never happened. (I couldn’t find that DVD.)

Meditation lasted two days, then ended abruptly when I went from gently quieting my mind to falling asleep for the afternoon.

All I had left from my half-hearted attempt at spiritual enlightenment was eating well.

Ah, my old nemesis. Healthy eating. By now you know my philosophy about food: I worship, my double-chinned head bowed, at the altar of fatty fat fat dishes. I didn’t earn the moniker Fatty Daddy for nothing. But to commune with The One, and to do a little bit of detoxing from, shall we say, an abundant holiday season, I would embrace clean eating. Never one to rush into anything good for me, I decided I’d kick off my cleanse on the night of his return with a cozy Zen dinner for The One.

Looking for inspiration, I browsed through the hundreds of recipes on this website. Renee, ever a mindful and healthful eater, even sent me a list of Zen-ish dishes. Nothing was striking the right Kripalu chord. Then one of our regular readers raved to us about the Quick Navy Bean Stew recipe from Everyday Food that we featured early last year. I decided that would be my humble way of welcoming The One back into the world of the anxious and harried. I was certain it would be perfectly Zen-like because: a) it’s simple, and b) there wouldn’t be a drop of butter, cheese, crème frâiche, or foie gras to clog his chakras.

But I was equally certain that The One, despite his pronouncements of a near-vegetarian leaf being turned, would want something a little more substantial. (Isn’t he still the man who eats two, sometimes three, helpings at dinner? Isn’t he the same man who caves every time there’s chocolate in the house?) Oh, how terribly thin the line between sabotage and hearty cooking. I considered tossing in ham hocks or glugging in lots and lots of cream. (Hey, it’s my nature.) In the end, I added lean chicken breast, more potatoes, garlic, more herbs, and what has now become my new stealth bomber of an ingredient: demi-glace. A tablespoon or two stirred in at the end adds enough flavor to make you weep–or, at the very least, lick your bowl.

Happy to have him home that Friday, I coddled and pampered and fussed. When I placed the stew in front of him, he did a bit of a double take (after all it was I who made it). It was–I can’t believe I’m saying this–excellent. I sat through the rest of dinner attentive, although completely disinterested, as he flipped through the Kripalu cookbook he’d bought, listing all the dishes he enjoyed there and was determined to make for us: peanut butter energy bars topped with vegan (VEGAN?!) ganache; a spinach salad with blue cheese, dried blueberries, and candied hazelnuts; winter ratatouille; and greens, greens, and more fresh greens. I agreed to eat real food, but I drew the line at anything with soy milk. The last time I checked, soy beans don’t have teats.

During our second bowls of soup I grew suspicious of how fervently he was thumping the metaphorical Birkenstock Lifestyle Bible. This from the man who, when driving by the Black Angus cattle at Grey Ledge Farms on our street, waves and shouts, “Hellooooo, roast beef!” After some prodding he let slip that he lost all sense of decorum and, although downward-dogging, breathing, and journaling all week, he pigged out at mealtimes. As a result, he came home the heaviest he has ever been.

“The food was…fabulous,” he said, looking wounded and confused. ”I thought all that vegetarian and vegan stuff was supposed to be horrible and low cal.”

Determined not to gloat, at least not until the incandescence of his experience wore off, I said nothing. I still haven’t. We’ve simply gone back to eating as we always have–roast chicken, pork chops, leg of lamb, mashed potatoes, ice cream–and he’s losing weight.

In 2012, ignorance is the new enlightenment.

Loosely adapted from Fresh Food Fast | Clarkson Potter, 2010 | Serves 4

The most important part of the recipe is the seasoning. Make sure you salt it throughout the cooking process. And taste, taste, taste. Something so simple needs salt to make all the ingredients play well together.–David Leite

LC Salt of the Earth Note: For God’s sake, don’t put salt and pepper on the table. It discourages those guests who like to jiggle the shakers while chatting–before they even take a bite. Sacrilege.

Active time: 45 minutes | Total time: 60 minutes

Chicken, Navy Bean, and Spinach Stew Recipe Recipe

Directions

I don’t bother making New Year’s resolutions anymore. What’s the sense of setting myself up for failure when January is but a few hours old? Guaranteed, two weeks into the new year I’ll feel like a loser. Instead I try to quiet my mind (a hard thing to do, what with all this ADD rattling around inside) and contemplate what I learned in the dearly departed year. From that furrowed-brow cogitation I cobble together a list of personal goals. Which, as I write this, probably sounds a lot like resolutions. But to me, resolutions feel rigid. Like my second-grade  teacher, Mrs. Firs, slapping her ruler–thwack, thwack, thwack–in time to some internal clock, just waiting to whap one of us in the back of the head for misbehaving. A goal is all shiny and bright–a bauble of hope. It doesn’t have the word not in it, as in, “I will not overeat” and “I will not curse like a sailor on shore leave” and “I will not look at some twentysomething with his whole life ahead of him and who already knows as much as I do at more than twice his age and find fault with his fashion choices.” Uh, not that any of these have ever applied to me.

This year, more than ever, a great many of the lessons I learned came from fellow bloggers. As a nod of gratitude to them, and as a way of getting my dolls and dishes packed up for next year, I thought I’d share some of the more inspiring lessons. 

From Michael Procopio, I learned it takes talent to toss off Dorothy Parker-worthy bon mots. I am Grasshopper to his Master.

From Ree Drummond, I learned quiet strength. And a wicked mashed potato recipe.

From Dorie Greenspan,  l learned everyone feels inadequate no matter how accomplished he may be.

From Heidi Swanson, I learned the importance of self.

From Faith Durand, I learned joy, and the pleasures of creamy limoncello.

From Monica Bhide, I learned how to be grateful when there’s not always a lot to be grateful for.

From Sean Timberlake, I learned what it means to be committed. In the interpersonal sense, that is.

From Hank Shaw, I learned what persistence looks like.

From Dianne Jacob, I learned about reinvention. (Madonna, you have nothing on her.)

From Beth Kujawski, I learned what support feels like.

From Gail Dosik, I learned perfectionism can be a good thing–especially if you don’t obsess about it.

From Jaden Hair, I learned ambition isn’t a four-letter word.

From Katherine O’Hara, I learned how to take responsibility for your actions with class.

From Jeff Miller, I learned about generosity of spirit…and ridiculously mind-bending algorithms.

From Kate Jackson, I learned it’s good to trust your gut. Its intuition as well as its hunger pangs.

From Ethan Adeland, I learned humility is alive and well and living in Canada.

From Elise Bauer, I learned what it feels like to be on the receiving end of a river of generosity.

From Garrett McCord, I learned you’re never too old to flirt.

From Jennifer McLagan, I learned how to stand firm in your beliefs while chewing the fat (literally).

And closer to home, and office:

From Renee Schettler Rossi, I learned gentleness can lead better than fear.

From Allison Parker, I learned courage. A lot of courage.

From Julie Dreyfoos, I learned the delight of loyalty.

From Beth Price, I learned what “chop wood, carry water” means.

From Jenna Rose Levy, I learned competence.

From Dan Kraan, I learned you can rethink the unthinkable, all while grilling venison.

From Leanne Hammond, I learned that a learning curve doesn’t have to be a mountain.

From Lindsay Myers, I learned how to jump on a very fast-moving bandwagon and not fall off.

From Rachel Kaufman, I learned it’s always the quiet ones you have to watch.

From Erin Carlman Weber, I learned you can never forget your first Twitter love.

From Jared Atchison, I learned there really is a Santa Claus.

From the The One, I learned the steadfastness and resiliency of love.

And from Chloe, Rory, and Raja, I learned once again that you can’t get a cat to do your bidding. (And I have the scars from Rory to prove it.)

I hope you can take a minute from all the tippling, dipping, and dunking of the season to think about what you learned this year. In the meantime, I wish you all a Happy New Year and a prosperous, incandescent, and delicious 2012.

“Puh-lease,” I replied, even though the only experience I had cooking fowl was microwaving Swanson turkey dinners. “Plenty of times.”

“What size do you want?” he asked, obviously trying to entrap me. But I outwitted him.

“Oh, the usual.”

When I returned several days later to collect my bird, Luigi instructed me in the ways of goose cookery. While he babbled on about something to do with pricking the skin and draining the fat, I imagined myself parading into the dining room with a bird so splendiferous, my guests couldn’t help but break into a chorus of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.”

On Christmas day, I awoke early to prepare the goose. To ensure a moist bird, I tucked pats of butter under its skin, then slid it into the oven. After several hours, I checked to see if the magic thermometer had popped up, signaling the goose was done. But I couldn’t find one—anywhere. I yanked the goose out of the oven, sloshing a tsunami of fat on the floor, and turned the bird over and over looking for that confounded popper. Just then the doorbell rang, so I returned the goose to the oven and hoped for the best.

Now, back then I wasn’t the intrepid cook that I am today (minus the kitchen fire, that is), so I proudly offered my five guests Diet Coke and an artfully arranged platter of Doritos and Lipton Onion Soup Dip. I then excused myself and took the phone into the bedroom closet.

“Ma,” I whispered, “how do you know when a goose is cooked?”

“Is this a joke?” she asked.

“No, I’m serious.”

“How do I know? I never made one.”

“What do you mean? You make capons all the time. Aren’t they emasculated geese?” With that, she put my father on the line.

I returned ten minutes later, fully educated in the sex life of fowl, but alas, none the wiser about how to cook one. I steeled myself and asked my guests to be seated. I placed the goose on the table and began carving, but every time I sliced, I hit bone. No matter what angle I tried, the knife simply slid off.

“So much for ‘Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat,’” I tried to joke, as I strip-mined the bird for meat with a fork. With each slice, more and more of the mutilated carcass was exposed. In the end, the hatchet job on the platter could easily have passed as a stunt double for one of Jason’s victims in Friday the 13th. Embarrassed, I gave up and divided the two legs among six plates. My guests looked down at their pitifully small portions.

“We could always order pizza,” one guest offered. I glared at him until he withered back into his chair.

After they all left, I railed against God, Tiny Tim, and Luigi as I cleaned up. Furious, I grabbed the platter and flipped the goose into the trash. And there, staring up at me, were two perfectly plump breasts. In my frantic search for the magic thermometer, I had ended up turning the goose upside down and carving from its scrawny, meatless back.

Haunted by the memory of that bird’s mutilation and my humiliation, I chained myself to my stove, Thor, until I became a whiz at roasting fowl. Indeed, at my country home in Connecticut, I’ve cooked a barnyardful of chickens, turkeys, poussins, even guinea hens. But never, ever goose.

Then during a proper afternoon tea spent sipping Earl Grey and nibbling biscuits with Danny, a Connecticut neighbor, I told her about my debacle. “AND YOU HAVEN’T MADE A CHRISTMAS GOOSE SINCE?” she bellowed. An expat from England who’s blessed with an alto’s lungs and cursed with a hearing problem, Danny clocks in at a decibel level just below that of a Boeing 747.

“Nope.”

“WELL, NEXT WEEKEND WE’RE MARCHING INTO YOUR KITCHEN, AND I’M GOING TO SHOW YOU HOW IT’S DONE PROPERLY,” she announced.

She thrummed her fingers on the table as she dictated a shopping list. Then suddenly she thundered: “OH MY, WE’LL HAVE A THUMPINGLY GOOD TIME!” I had my doubts.

The day of our lesson, Danny burst into my kitchen with her arms filled with herbs, bottles, scraps of paper, and two roasting pans. “LOOK, ” she said, waving a carving fork that would do the Marquis de Sade proud. “FOR INFLICTING THE JABS. YOU HAVE TO PRICK THE GOOSE ALL OVER TO DRAIN THE FAT.” Drain the fat? Where had I heard that before? Suddenly, I remembered Luigi’s lecture. Maybe he wasn’t such a bad butcher after all.

I took the bird from the refrigerator, and Danny cooed, “MY, THAT IS A PROPER CHRISTMAS GOOSE, DAVID!” She took it from me, rinsed it, and lightly seasoned it with salt and pepper. Then she stood as if in a trance.

“Danny? Is something wrong?” I asked.

She put her finger to her lips, lowered her head, then said softly (well, softly for Danny), “NOW’S THE TIME TO THINK OF ALL THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE EVER BORNE A GRUDGE AGAINST YOU, AND YOU—GO FOR IT!” With that, she descended upon the bird with her carving fork. To judge from the ferocity of her stabs and the contentment on her face, my guess was she was fantasizing about Tony Blair. When the bird was sufficiently pincushioned, she leaned again the counter and trumpeted, “BOY, WAS THAT CATHARTIC!” She looked like a boxer who had just won a prize fight.

“So what’s next?” I asked, enjoying being a private to her Patton.

She slipped the bird in the oven. “WELL, YOU SIT HERE AND MIND GOOSEY, AND I’LL BE BACK IN A COUPLE OF HOURS.”

“What? Why?”

She looked at me as if I were daft. “I’M KNACKERED,” she said. And with that, she tramped out the back door. “THE DIRECTIONS ARE ON THE TABLE,” she barked from her car.

Without Danny there to guide me, I was immediately haunted by the goose of Christmas Past. I riffled through her scraps of paper, which in Danny’s world constitutes a recipe. One read that the bird needed to be turned three times. “Turned?” I said aloud. Another: “Drain the fat.” But when? Visions of snickering guests danced in my head.

Still, I knew that if I didn’t face this bête noire head on, I’d develop a severe tic every time I saw a goose or break out in hives when served foie gras. So I made some calculations and estimated when to turn the goose, poured off the fat several times lest there be another flood, and brushed on Danny’s secret mustard-and-garlic coating.

When I removed the goose, it was nothing like the catastrophe I had wrought in my youth. It was a beautiful mahogany color, and the mustard coating had formed a crackly, crisp crust. One last hurdle, though, before I could be free of my demons. I poked the top of the bird. Yes! Just as I thought: It was a lovely, juicy breast.

Twenty minutes later Danny muscled through the door. When she saw the goose, her face clouded over. She leaned in close, inspecting. She tilted the bird one way, then the other. Oh, no, I thought. I did it again. Finally, she said, “BRILLIANT, DAVID.” I beamed.

She transferred the bird to a platter and held it aloft. “BEHOLD THE GOOSE,” she crowed. Then she thrust her chin toward the dining room. “NOW, GOOD GOD LET’S EAT!”

Tiny Tim himself couldn’t have said it better.

Recipe
Danny’s Mustard and Garlic Roast Goose

Illustration © 2003 Steve Brodner. All rights reserved.

Now that the turkey leftovers are gone, the tryptophan torpor has receded, and we’ve physically and emotionally pushed away from the Thanksgiving table, I need to get something off my chest. A kitchen confessional, if you will: On the Holiest of Holy Days for culinistas all over the country, I failed miserably at the stove. Twice.

It was far and away the worst hatchet job I’ve ever committed–and it was at baking, my bailiwick. In the 20-something years that I’ve been cooking Thanksgiving dinner, yes, I’ve forgotten to take the giblets packet out of the bird; yes, I’ve both under- and overcooked the turkey; and, yes, I’ve neglected to heat the stuffing to the ideal (read: salmonella-free) temperature. But I’ve never, ever failed to whip up gasp-inducing desserts. But I can’t take full responsibility for my fumble: I mostly blame Twitter and Instagram, because if it weren’t for me snapping pictures of my marvelosity in the kitchen for public consumption, I would’ve had a relaxing holiday, and the members of the Roxbury volunteer fire department would’ve been able to finish their meal undisturbed.

Let me backtrack. Please.

The Tuesday night before Thanksgiving I was planning to make my pumpkin cake with maple-cream cheese frosting and Melissa Clark’s spiced maple pecan pie for dessert. The One is a pumpkin freak and demands the cake every year. The pie was a concession, a peace offering to those poor friends of ours who’ve been politely eating the same dessert for nearly a decade. I thought they might want need a change.

Knowing that some of my blogging brethren, among them Ree Drummond, Shauna James Ahern, David Lebovitz, Gail Dosik, Sara Kate Gillingham-Ryan, are quite adept at snapping cell phone pics of their kitchen hijinks and tweeting them while cooking, I decided I could, too. So with iPhone in hand, and iPad in its kitchen condom, I began clicking away. But instead of waiting until the cake was safely in the oven to upload the shots and check Twitter for the inevitable onslaught of kudos from you all, I decided to reply to every single response while baking.

Basking in your immediate adulation and unconditional love with one hand while meticulously dividing, weighing, and smoothing the batter with the other, I noticed something odd. As in the batter spreading as thick as spackle. I had to work it into the edges of the pan, where the sides meet the bottom. No big deal, I thought. I’ve made this a million times, and it always comes out perfectly. Must be the dry weather. With that, I slid all three pans into the oven and returned to my 4G iNeedConstantLoveMachine.

Forty minutes later, I pulled the cake layers from the oven to discover they hadn’t risen much. No big deal, I told myself again. I’m using three nine-inch pans instead of the usual two eight-inchers. They’re bound to be a little thinner.

I tipped the cakes out of the pans, and instead of steaming circles of spicy pumpkin loveliness, I was affronted by what can only be described as mutants. Each layer was riddled with worm holes. Entire sections were curdled and dry, with huge gaps in them. No big deal, that’s why God made frosting. It was while reaching for my iPhone, to see who else liked my photos on Instagram, that I spotted them sitting on the counter, mocking me: a chorus line of three cans of unopened solid-packed pumpkin. I’D FORGOTTEN TO ADD PUMPKIN TO THE PUMPKIN CAKE.

For a brief, dark moment, I contemplated passing off this castrato of a cake as the real thing. Chances are my guests wouldn’t know, and, most important, neither would you. I imagined millions of you sitting at your computers or holding your cellphones while watching “Body of Proof” just waiting for the final shot of my towering creation. Guilt, my constant sniggering companion, won out. I dumped the damn thing into a plastic trash bag like so many dead bodies on TV.

The next morning, refreshed but hours behind, I turned out what The One later called the best pumpkin cake ever. Below is its headshot, which is what I, of course, tweeted.

The cake redo slapped me all the way into the middle of Wednesday afternoon. If I worked quickly and efficiently, I could knock out the spiced maple pecan pie and prep my three side dishes: Virginia Willis’s bourbon sweet potatoes, roasted carrots with an agresto sauce (a to-die-for mix of chopped nuts, lemon juice, vinegar, wine, parsley and spices), and homemade green-bean salad. (Revel below.)

Melissa’s recipe calls for maple syrup and demerara sugar to be simmered until reduced by about a third. Being in a hurry, I calculated I could save almost 20 minutes if I let it boil down–and who the hell has demerara sugar in the middle of rural Connecticut? So I used granulated sugar instead. It was then that I walked out of the kitchen into the family room to get a recipe. I’m talking all of 60 feet, people. I was flipping through a cookbook when what sounded liked a nuclear-disaster siren went off.

I ran to the kitchen and from the pot billowed the blackest, foulest-smelling smoke I ever had the misfortune to encounter. Now, I’m good in emergencies. The One and I were like hopped-up Eagle Scouts on 9/11, filling bathtubs and sinks with water; withdrawing huge sums of cash from all of our accounts; and shopping for food, flashlights, batteries, and the current issue of People magazine. But on this day, as I ping-ponged between four fire alarms and three French doors, shooing out the smoke with my apron and a spatula (spatula?), what’s the one thing I forgot to do? Turn off the stove. So as soon as I got the air raid under control, it started again. And again. And again. Finally, I tossed the pan in the sink then thought better of it and flung it out into the yard.

With the bleating now over, the phone rang. Holy go to war, the alarm company. I smoothed my sooty apron and cleared my throat. “Hello?” I said, as if I were the top earner at a phone sex company.

“Sir, we have a report of an alarm trigger at this residence. Who am I speaking with?”

“David Leite.” My voice was all warm caramel and Cognac.

“Who else is on this account?”

“_______________,” I replied, using The One’s real name.

“What’s the passcode, sir?” Passcode? What passcode?

And as if reading a roll call, I listed every single password I could remember. (Note: None of these are real. What do you think? I’m crazy?) “Ginger, Gilligan, Miss Piggy, Marcia Brady, Julia Child, Tom and Jerry, Mr. Spock.”

“Sir…”

“Murphy Brown…”

“Sir!”

“I DON’T KNOW THE FREAKING PASSCODE, ALL RIGHT? BUT IT’S ME, DAVID LE–”

Dial tone. He’d hung up on me. Then the most sickening sound pierced the air: the wail of the town’s fire alarm. ”Noooooooooooo!” The One is going to kill me. I could see the headlines in the Litchfield County Times: “Lauded Food Writer Almost Burns Down the House.” Frantic, I called 411 and asked for the Roxbury Fire Department.

“Sir,” said the operator, “you don’t need to call the fire department. You just need to dial 911.”

“No, I don’t need to report a fire–”

“Then why are you calling the fire department?”

“Because…”

“Sir, I’m required to connect you to 911–”

I pressed “End Call” and dropped my iPhone on the couch as if I were letting go of a putrid piece of pork. Lying there, it chimed an alert: “Instagram: Talon245 liked your photo.” Oh, how sweet of him. I instinctively reached out to see what he’d written. “No!,” I shouted, shaking my head trying to gain perspective.

After a few minutes, The One and our friend Caroline, who was spending the holiday with us, came home. He looked around the kitchen and out into the backyard at the tar-colored pot, slack jawed. “Don’t ask,” I said before he could say anything. “Please, don’t ask.” As we stared at each other the whine of another siren grew louder.

“Don’t tell me…,” he said pointing over his shoulder to the sound, realizing it had my name on it. I nodded my head. “Oh, David” was all he could get out before flashing red lights splashed across the family room walls. I rose to go to the door. “Sit,” he said. “SIT!” I obeyed.

“Think this will end up in the newspaper’s police blotter?” I asked Caroline, looking for some sympathy.

Ever immune to subtle interpersonal cues, she said flatly, “Probably.”

I ran through the kitchen cutting off The One before he got to the door and opened it. A man in a flannel jacket and a bruised fire helmet poked his head in. “Um, is there a fire here?” he asked, unsure he got the right address.

Suddenly self-conscious about what I looked like–after all I was in my Warner Bros. pajamas and a sooty apron–I smoothed my hair. 

“Hi, officer,” I said, smiling. Behind him was a fire truck and several men putting on gear. “Um, is it officer,” I continued trying to sound nonchalant, “or fire marshall?”

“John. It’s John.”

“John,” I replied, emphasizing his name, “this is rather embarrassing, but I kind of messed up my Thanksgiving dessert. Just a bunch of smoke and drama, but no fire.” He looked at The One who was behind me for some kind of assurance. The One nodded.

“I hope I didn’t pull you all away from anything important.”

“Well, some of the guys were just having an early Thanksgiving at the firehouse.” It’s amazing how small a 295-pound man can feel.

“Stay away from the stove, will ya?” he said as he jumped back on the truck. “And happy Thanksgiving.”

“You, too.” I waved off my own personal fire brigade parade.

Exhausted, I curled up on the couch and fell asleep for the rest of the afternoon. I awoke after dark, shivering. The windows were still open; the kitchen still smelled acrid. I avoided The One’s gaze as I quietly made my fallback chocolate pecan pie. When I pulled it from the oven, it was a picture of baking mastery. Forgetting myself, I held it out for him. “Look!” He just nodded. Realizing that the coolness in the room wasn’t coming from just the windows, I slid the pie on a rack, and then I couldn’t help myself.

I took a picture and posted it. (See it in all is glory above.)

Every Halloween, in the elevator of my apartment building, there’s a sign-up sheet for residents willing to welcome treat-or-treaters. It’s never a long list, mostly just a few names of people pressured into opening their apartments so desperate parents have a few places their kids can beg for candy. See, in the city it’s considered poor etiquette to hit up another hi-rise for Halloween hooch–some parents would even say it’s dangerous without a background check and saliva sample of every tenant.

And each October, with all good intentions, I promise myself that this will be the year I’m one of those people every parent is grateful for and every kid loves. The one who dresses up in some whacked-out bizarre—but not child-molester bizarre—costume and hands out high-sucrose booty by the shovelful. I’ve even gone so far as to come up with schematics of how I’ll transform my apartment’s gallery into a chamber of horrors rivaled only by Dexter, with synthetic cobwebs, red Karo-syrup blood, and a severed hand or two poking out of the coat closet for added effect.

Inevitably, though, the day arrives and I’m ticked off, not to mention a touch pre-man-opausal, because once again time got away from me. The only things I have to hand out are a few fuzzy Mentos from my winter jacket and a couple of tiny bottles of vodka from a recent transatlantic flight to Paris. So there I sit, silent in my darkened apartment, slumped in the Queen Anne chair, glowering. And as the cacophony of shouts and bangs on the door crescendoes, I hurl invectives at the sugar-crazed mafia of six-year-olds in the hallway because they’re making me miss the latest episode of Modern Family. Or some years I slink out to the local diner, fearful I’ll come face to face with a co-op board member in the elevator who’ll look at the sign-up sheet bereft of my name and then skewer me with a slow-burning gaze that says, You will never be able to get a potential buyer for your apartment through the co-op interview. Ever.

But this year I’ve devised a simple way to assure that we misanthropic childless tenants will throw open our doors for the kiddies in the building—even for little Lili, the petulant six-year-old next door who I’m certain will grow up to be a leather-clad dominatrix with tattoos covering 82 percent of her body: it’s a little game of quid pro quo. I win, you win, and the kids are none the wiser. So neighbors, if you want me to give the fruits of the Fruit of your Looms a multimedia phantasmagorical display they’ll never forget, here’s what I’d like to see in my trick-or-treat bag, which will be hanging prominently from the doorknob of apartment 13G:

1. First, nix the apples—with or without razor blades. And forget anything with oats, seeds, or, god forbid, flax. Halloween isn’t, nor has it ever been, a high-fiber holiday. Just ask your kids.

2. You know me: a great, big, fat lobe of foie gras delivered Halloween afternoon. This way when the kids stop by I can shock them by eating offal.

3. A bottle of 1977 vintage Port. Warre’s will work; so will Fonseca Val de Mendiz. (A gift of my own quinta, or wine estate, in the Douro valley in Portugal will certainly earn you a platinum treat this October 31.)

4. A six-month supply of crisp-fried pommes frites tossed with white truffle oil and served with Gorgonzola cream sauce and Cabernet demi-glace from Restaurant Moosilauke in Kent, CT. Here’s the catch: The place has closed, so you’ll have to track down the chef. Think of it as trying to contact the dead. Spooky!

5. A dozen caramel macarons with sea salt from Pierre Hermé in Paris (on rue Bonaparte, naturellement). While you’re there, a box of Truffles (Chocolat au Lait & Thé Vert) couldn’t hurt.

6. A Moby-size container of Sex, Drugs, and Rocky Road rice pudding from Rice to Riches. No toppings, please. I’m a purist.

7. Suzanne Goin’s Cipollini Onion and Bleu de Gex Tart with Roasted Red Grapes, made by her at her restaurant Lucques in Los Angeles.

8. My kitchen, renovated. This is an expensive one, I know, which is why I think this should be a group effort. If all of you parents in the F, G, and J lines get together and work with the co-op board and Sam, our super, you can knock it out in time for Thanksgiving. I’ll even bake a few pumpkin pies as a thank you. (Tip: Miele, Traulsen, and Viking appliances make me very, very happy.)

9. What good is a new kitchen with a bad view? The water tower on the roof of the building next door is the only thing standing between me and a view of Central Park. Moving it about 30 feet south would do the trick.

10. My own show on the Food Network. This isn’t as hard as it seems. You know the guy in the building who wears nothing but black Dolce & Gabbana suits and black shirts? He’s in the film business. (I admit it. I read his mail over his shoulder in the elevator.) He’s got to have some pull. After all, he’s friends with some executive from one of the networks. (I heard him screaming into his cell phone one afternoon in the lobby of our building.) So, Mr. Producer, if you can snag me a show on TVFN, just wait till you see what I’ll cook up for your twins (who, by the way, are mini terrorists when you and your wife aren’t looking).

I could go on and on, but I’ll stop here. After all, there’s Hanukkah, Christmas, and Kwanzaa still to come. Hey, I’ll be your Santa bitch, as long as you keep my stocking stuffed.

This rant first appeared on The Morning News, in a slightly less vitriolic form. (Hey, cut me a little slack, I’ve had to deal with a few more Halloweens since then.)

For our anniversary two weeks ago, The One and I snuck off to Paris, gleefully ducking work and responsibilities. It was a short trip, as trips to Paris go: burst in on Saturday, mope out on Wednesday. Which in actuality equates to in Sunday and out Tuesday, because the first day I arrive anywhere in Europe is completely lost. I collapse on the bed, snore in whatever foreign language I happen to be trying to mimic, then instinctually wake up just in time for dinner. And on the last day I fret: Did I accidentally leave my passport somewhere? (A logical question, as I’ve lost it twice.) Is our luggage going to fit in the overhead compartment, even though it did coming over and we bought back nary a thing? (No, not even mousse de foie gras.)

Our favorite museum, the Musée d'Orsay, whose employees are invariably on strike when I visit.

It’s a peculiar thing, I know, but when The One and I travel–even on short jaunts like this–I always look for a theme, an overarching idea that sums up our trip and gives me an emotional latitude and longitude of our relationship. A kind of intimate pulse taking. Our first trip to Paris: giddiness. Our second: security. Rome: arguments. Lake Como: indifference. The Caribbean: renewal. Yet nothing was jostling into place for me on this trip. It was arguably the best time we’ve had to Paris, but I was still poking about when it came to us. Maybe there was nothing, no theme, this time. Maybe after 18 years, you don’t need a theme.

And why would we? Sandwiched between our Pan Am-like entree and egress were some glorious days. The weather was unseasonably warm and the Parisian light, though waning and only weeks away from turning gun-metal gray for the winter, was still beguiling.

What made this trip remarkable–yet, of all our visits to Paris, so seemingly ordinary–was our renting an apartment in the 8th arrondissement. This required that we happily fend for ourselves in ways we hadn’t before: schlep heavy bags from the market filled with roast chickens, cheese, and wine; wedge ourselves into the building’s elevator the size of a upturned casket; and even make our bed every morning. (Yes, The One made us make it even on vacation.)

But perhaps most memorable was the pleasure of dining with old friends and new acquaintances. This was different for us. We’re usually on our own when we travel–eternal outsiders looking in. We were now able to experience Paris as locals. Our only requirements for a dining spot were 1.) it be new to us, 2.) it constitute a favorite local boîte for our French and wannabe American expat friends, and 3.) our reservations must work around our visits to as many museums, monuments, and beloved spots as we could squeeze into 72 hours.

The clock that silently watches over the masterpieces at the Musée d'Orsay.

First on our agenda was meeting the charming Clotilde Dusoulier at Coinstrot Vino, hidden in the impossible-to-find Passage des Panoramas in the 2nd arrondissement. I was exhausted by the time we met up–it was our first day in a new time zone, after all–but I remember being lucid enough to be impressed by and even develop a wee bit of a crush on Clotilde. Oh, and I remember the foie de lotte, monkfish liver. Fantastic.

One of the two great, though once-reviled, pyramids at the Louvre. (Hey, recall The Da Vinci Code, anyone?)

The next day, The One and I had a lovely three-hour lunch with Dorie Greespan and her husband, Michael, at Le Marsangy, un petit bistro that welcomed only four other guests that day,  and which I forbid you–positively forbid–you to visit, as the chef enjoys what he does and doesn’t want the place to be discovered. Our lunch was foie gras, tiny fried whole fish, lieu jaune (a marvelously delicate white fillet of fish), a hachis parmentier  (a most satisfying shepherd’s pie-like dish, made with duck confit–right? Right?!), salted caramel ice cream, and fondant au chocolat. You get the picture, non?

I love how tourists pay attention to the "No Photographs" signs. (Oh, wait, I took one, too. Damn.)

Dinner that same day was with Jennifer McLagan–the Fat Lady, although she weighs less than a whippet–and her husband, Harald, at Le Severo. It’s a plus petit bistro in the 14th arrondissement, in which carnivority is on flagrant and unabashed display. A local favorite of Jennifer’s and Harald’s, Le Severo specializes in meat, meat, and more meat. Mostly red, always served bleu or saignant. (Don’t even think of ordering it more cooked.) And the offal! Let’s sing praises to the offal. The One was in a hazy thymus reverie as he rip into his ris de veau. Rarely have I seen him more content.

Sunday in the park. So Parisian.

We broke our rule of eating at unfamiliar places only when it came to our anniversary dinner. It was Le Bistrot Paul Bert or nothing. We discovered it on our last visit, and we happily traded in all the folderol and pyrotechnics of flashier Parisian spots for the clamor and simplicity of this place. Honestly, how can anyone resist the charm of  dark woods, crackled mirrors, and tattered old chalkboard menus that waiters prop up on a nearby chair for you to peruse? And was it just us, or were les garçons de café curiously nicer this trip? (I chalked it up to my newly remembered high school French–thank you Rosetta Stone–but The One reminded me he speaks an inimitable Italio-Luso-Anglo hybrid all his own, and he still was treated well.) He ordered his favorite, steak frites, and I had a stew of beef cheeks accompanied by a swanky and reasonably priced Chateau Beau Rivage 2007. For dessert, a chocolate soufflé. (I know, I know–the clichéist of all French clichés. But so few are done well, and this was spectacular. It was so good, the nearby table of Brits ordered four, after hearing some rather indecent moaning coming from our little two-top.)

The Pensive Girl of the Place des Voges. She reminded me of me. I wanted to adopt her.

The rest of our precious time in Paris was spent wandering around, agenda-less, which is odd for us. While sitting in the Place des Voges, our favorite park in the city, I asked The One, “Would you consider spending a month here next year?”

A pause. “Possibly.” Knowing how he hates to commit to anything lest he be hemmed in by plans, I took that as a yes. By the time we left the park an hour later, I had moved us into the Rue Balzac apartment, redecorated it, and filled the cave with wine from the neighborhood wine shop.

On our last day, we visited Poilâne bakery on the left bank. Dorie had told me a few years back that I had to go and just marvel at the artistry. While admiring the Poilâne miche, the iconic large crusty loaf with the perfect cursive “P” carved into its dome, it all fell into place. Or make that into peace. The letter “P,” to me, stood for peace on this trip, which is what I was feeling about my life. About our life. And that’s why my emotional GPS was broken–I’ve never really experienced it before. Ah, so that’s what peace feels like, I thought. No problems to solve, no skirmishes to win, no expectations to have dashed. Just quietness.

As The One walked over from the local square, I bumped him with my hip, smiled, and whispered, “Happy anniversary.” I tried to hold onto this feeling of peace–this absence of anxiety and drama. I was wobbly, it being so subtle and new. And it lasted most of the morning until we arrived at the metro, where we butted heads about how to get home. I got snarky, he got belligerent. The peace eventually dissipated, but, as is our way, we forgot to stay mad at each other. Even if we don’t visit for a month next year, I’ll be okay with that–and him. Because no matter what, we’ll always have Paris–and that morning of peace.

I carry a knot of sorrow in my chest. It started tightening a week or so ago, when I learned that food blogger Jennifer Perillo‘s husband, Mikey, died suddenly of a heart attack. That’s him on the right. I’ve never met Mikey, and I’m embarrassed to say I can’t remember meeting Jennie. A conference, perhaps? A party? I do know we’ve tossed a few bon mots back and forth on Twitter, but that’s about it.

Mikey leaves behind a woman too young and vivacious to be a widow; two small daughters too innocent to lose a father, a protector, a prince to their princesses. Plus bills, obligations, half-read books, good intentions, a Blackberry that needs charging–the evidence of a lived-in life.

My sadness is fed in part by my lack of connection to what appears to be, and what I’ve heard is, a loving family. Jennie, Mikey, and I could have been friends. Maybe. There were 140-character overtures blinking on my Twitter feed, but I mostly politely ignored them. Perhaps the Perillos and The One and I might have gone out to dinner, us picking apart the meal like the food savants we think we are. If we were friends, maybe I might have given their daughters an airplane ride like Mikey used to do. I never pursued it–too busy was I.

My sorrow is most palpable when I realize I make so little time for the people in my life. I’m constantly chained to my desk, to this god-forsaken computer. “Tomorrow” is my mantra. Just ask The One, who eats too many meals alone, sits by himself in the living room at night reading, goes to gallery shows and plays and musicals with friends. All because I’m working. Always working. A few friends have fallen away, I know, but I’m too preoccupied to feel the emptiness left by them.

I thought of Jennie and Mikey a lot this weekend. If The One suddenly died, what would I be left with? His Fiesta collection that threatens to overtake our kitchen, the Shaker chairs whose seats we insanely decided to weave by ourselves, the neat pile of photography books on the left side of his desk. Things. I’d be left with things. But not enough memories. Never enough memories. Not even photographs, because, since I’ve gotten fat, I stupidly forbade any pictures of us, putting an end to the visual reminders of the narrative of our life together. And the worst, if he passed there would be too few close friends to lean on.

It takes only a second for life to change irrevocably. One moment you’re a wife. The next, you were a wife. Or a husband. Or a mother, father. Or son, daughter, lover, friend.

I know I must wring dry every moment of time I spend with those I love. I must push back from my desk at 6:00 p.m. and make dinner for The One. I must refuse to work on the weekends. I must slow down. I have Jennie–a woman I don’t even know–to thank for that realization.

Love has always been on the clock, ticking down for all of us—even families like Jennie’s that clung close, played together, breathed in each other’s worlds. Some dear friends of Jennie’s have helped create “A Fund for Jennie” (#afundforjennie) to collect donations for her and her little girls, Isabella and Virginia, through the non-profit organization Bloggers Without Borders. Bills are piling up, the weight of single motherhood is pressing down.

If you’ve experienced the kind of loss Jennie has or, like me, want to cling fully to life and to those you love, won’t you please donate to A Fund for Jennie? Just click on the button below. It’ll take you straight to the secure PayPal account. Every little bit helps.

Please note: The donations are closed.

Blame it on Facebook. A few weeks ago, I posted this picture to this on my profile page. I was noodling around with the new iPhone app Instagr.am, to which I’m becoming pathologically addicted, and wanted to see if all this brouhaha over one-button photo publishing really worked. (Yes, it does, and, yes, David Lebovitz, Ree Drummond, and Deb Perelman, I’m still in the Dark Ages when it comes to mobile technology.)

These particularly sublime lovelies are gougères–small cheese puffs, my version filled with prosciutto and herbs. They’re scheduled to appear in the glossy, full-color pages of my next book–a Leite’s Culinaria cookbook–of which I’m only in the proposal-writing stage. ‘Tis true, I’m one of those writers who takes a millennium to put together a book. All I can say is bless the hearts of those writers who can knock out one terrific tome after another.

Now, what I didn’t expect from my expérience sociale was the reaction of readers. Within seconds of posting, I started getting everything from requests for the recipe (can’t give it out just yet, folks) to some serious wrist slapping for not having started the proposal sooner.

And that got me thinking. While I have my idea of what I humbly believe to be a star-studded, headliner-only cross section of recipes, you might have a very different perspective. So I’d like to hear from you: What dishes do you want to have killer, to-die-for versions of–all placed in your hot little hands as soon as the book is published? Slam-dunk shrimp and grits? Never-fail Parmesan-crusted chicken breasts? Or brownies that will once and for all shut up your cantankerous braggart of a mother-in-law? Tell me. This is your chance to write your own cookbook by proxy. Who knows, your suggestions might just be one of more than 150 recipes to grace the pages of our very first (and we hope the first of many) LC cookbook.

I’m often asked at signings or lectures what I miss most about my near-yearlong stay in Portugal while I researched my cookbook. Honestly, the answer changes. It’s not that I’m being capricious or anything (although I can be—a lot). My response is tied to the calendar.

Ask me in October, and it’s São Jorge, one of the nine Azores Islands. It was there that my friend, Portuguese food scholar Janet Boileau, and I scoured the island in search of the finest sample of its namesake cheese: queijo São Jorge.

Ask me in March, and it’ll be the still-green undulating plains of the Alentejo, the great swath of land that cuts through the midsection of the country. In spring a riot of flowers speckle the landscape, almost in defiance of the sun that will pelt all of it into a tawny brown. The One and I spent three glorious weeks there, crawling on our bellies and eating, it seems, every living creature in sight.

But ask me at this time of year, and I always miss this woman. I have no idea what her name is. (I was too self-conscious about my Portuguese to speak to her.) She owned a sliver of a store in the Alfama district, just down the street from my apartment. Outside, she methodically lined the cobblestone sidewalk, which she swept daily, with a few crates of just-delivered greens (the best of which was couves, or kale), baskets of dented cookware, which I doubt anyone ever bought, and blemished fruit. Hung above was perhaps the loudest bird in captivity on the Iberian Peninsula.

What I miss most, though, was that every day when school let out, a gaggle of kids bottlenecked at her door. She’d wait until every last one was watching, and then she’d reach into the pocket of her smock for candy. As the kids ripped into the wrappers, she’d cackle, beaming behind her crooked, half-toothless grin. If I were walking by, she’d catch my eye and nod mischievously, knowingly. (Finally, one day she relented and  tossed a candy my way: pineapple.)

Saudades. In Portuguese it means to miss something profoundly, to have a deep and unabidding longing. Today, eu tenho saudades de Portugal. I miss Portugal.

Tell us: Is there a place out there that you miss so much it makes you ache?