LIKE MOST EVERYONE ELSE WITH A WORKING BRAIN, I became a homebody the minute the pandemic started. Or an even bigger one. I was already living hermetically, in rural North Carolina—something I have mentioned many times here, because it had a powerful impact on me. Once I had permission from the CDC to shelter in place, I found I absolutely excelled at never leaving my house, unless I needed groceries.
And despite the fact that I have since returned to life in a major metropolitan area I’m still extremely good at it. I fly my homebody flag as if I were a newly emerged nation-state.
But I’ve been wondering lately if this is anything to crow about. Especially since I love to travel and have stored away so many of my fondest memories while doing so. In fact, early in my career, I worked at a travel magazine, where my boss (who had a fake British accent from living in London for a year, even though he grew up in Queens), would come into my cubicle and say: Go to Amsterdam tomorrow—and I would. If that happened to me today, I’d have to hide or quit my job. I haven’t gotten on a plane in years, not just for such reasons as a lack of time or money or because of my demeanor but because I’d have to wear a mask the entire time and I already have dreams about smothering.
Anyway, for a long time, my homebody-ness felt completely natural. This is the way it was when Laura Ingalls was living in the woods, I told myself. You didn’t go zipping off to a store miles away just because you needed aspirin or shampoo or fun snacks or medical advice. You made do.
And you certainly didn’t board an airplane just because you wanted to go to Spain.
But since my big dream is to live in Spain when I retire someday (which, from the looks of it could be in the year 2000-never), it’s time to shake off the convenient excuses, start making some plans, and take some trips.
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In this reawakened state of mind, there is an odd mix of urgency (You’re not going to live forever, Emily Nunn!) and cozy nostalgia (for trips dating back to my first transatlantic flight at 14, when my grandmother took me to England and Scotland, and a woman a few rows up cried loudly during takeoff) that washes over me and then recedes, in waves both invigorating and lulling.
There I am, visiting the house where Shakespeare allegedly grew up—marveling at the idea of the small playwright walking the same rustic floorboards I stood on, but later being more impressed that the macrobiotic restaurant where I had vegetarian shepherd’s pie for lunch seemed okay with serving kids my age hard cider. And by my delicious dinner of fish and chips, wrapped in actual newspaper (which apparently they stopped doing in the 1980s). And by the plate after plate of haddock in cream sauce I was plied with at the cold inns and hotels of Scotland, which initially seemed rich and fabulous until it began to feel mean.
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Or I’m in my early thirties on a press trip somewhere in the South of France, pointing at things I wanted to taste from the most elaborate cheese cart I’d ever seen, mainly because I’d never seen a cheese cart at all. Or having céleri rémoulade for the first time, along with too much rosé, in Nice. Suddenly, another first—fresh anchovies!— at a tiny (of course) cafe near Portofino shows up in my mind, and I can taste and see them: How were these anchovies? Why was I not informed about this? And now: I can smell the rich scent of roasted chestnuts sold on the street in Florence.
I recall the pasta with lobster and the oysters that I ate at Joe Beef in Montreal, in my forties, almost as clearly as I can my first-grade teacher’s face. And also the delicious razor clams and grilled wild mushrooms that I ate alone at the bar at Kiosko Universal in la Boqueria, while my then fiancé, on the last days of a birthday trip to Barcelona, instead ate awful-looking Paella at a nearby cafe (another nail in that already sealed coffin).
Obviously, like a lot of people, whenever I fall into travel reveries, the clarity of my memories is almost always triggered—or, at the very least, fleshed out— by food.
And who isn’t happy eating food?
So travel is happy; our long-distance views of far-away places and our distant memories of leisure time there tend to omit the missed trains, snarled reservations, stolen backpacks, miserable wine hangovers, broken bones (really), arguments, or very bad news from home.
The mind chooses charming cobblestone streets over the insane roundabout where the man who hit your car from behind screamed at you for 20 minutes in Italian. The insanely beautiful neighborhoods are beautiful not because the people who live there are filthy rich but because London is a beautiful city! The food is always better. The people are so friendly. Everyone is interesting in another country.
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Unless someone falls into the sea never to be found, it seems that no one returns home with bad news of their vacations abroad. Except the worst kinds of whiners or proud snobs who come back after two weeks and announce: Frankly, we thought the food in Paris was overrated and the service is terrible. And even then, they’ll still tell you about an out of the way cafe they “discovered.”
Our objective thinking leaves us in the loveliest way when we travel—because we want it to. And because otherwise: Haven’t we wasted our money or our time?
I, for one, love the unrealistic, romantic way going far away makes me feel: curious, surprised, enlightened, tender toward my most annoying fellow man. And so I want to travel again.
But in those awful years when any kind of travel—much less going abroad—was unthinkable, I really can’t imagine how I would have felt, stuck at home, without the solace of my cookbooks featuring the cuisines of other countries. And I imagine that cookbooks have soothed the frustration of thwarted wanderlust since the beginning of cookbooks, which allow you to be in Korea one day, France a week later, and Morocco next month, without ever losing your passport in a hotel bar.
So while I’ve never been to Mexico, until I get there I can pretend I’m there with my recently purchased copy of The Mexican Vegetarian Cookbook. I’ve never been to Thailand, but I do have the wonderful cookbook Kiin: Recipes and Stories from Northern Thailand (from which I have a terrific recipe to share, below).
Do I still wake up in my own boring stupid house after I take these imaginary culinary tours? Yes. But like actual travel, there is truly something magical about my cookbooks. And for now, they’ll more than do.
I hope you enjoy some of my favorite, and absolutely delicious, salad recipes from my recent travels (in my mind, in my kitchen, aboard my cookbooks). Bon voyage, y’all.
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*RECIPE: Antalya-Style Piyaz (Turkish White Bean Salad with Lemon Tahini Sauce)
Serves 3 or 4
Salad is an inexact art, but Turkish white bean salad, or Piyaz, is an especially willy-nilly affair. It’s most often a straightforward combination of white beans, parsley, tomatoes, and onions, with a lemon or vinegar dressing. Sometimes you massage sumac into the onions or add chili peppers. But in Antalya, they’re known for turning the simple dish into a rich, soupy extravaganza, dressing it luxuriously in tahini sauce and garnishing it with hard-cooked eggs and a generous drizzle of olive oil. It’s like a white bean sundae. I created the recipe below using the overlapping elements of many versions I’ve come across, but the lemon tahini sauce is just my regular lemon tahini sauce. It makes enough for one batch of salad. In a lot of versions I’ve come across, cooks add a few tablespoons of the white beans to the blender when making their sauce; I’m assuming that’s to cut the richness, but I have no intention of doing that. If you want to use warm beans, go ahead. Just don’t use them straight from the fridge.
3 cups cooked white beans (I used Rancho Gordo Marcella beans; I think canned might be too mushy), drained
Lemon Tahini Sauce (method below)
½ small white onion, thinly sliced into half-moons (more if you like)
1 large ripe tomato, cubed or chopped
1 big handful roughly chopped flat-leaf parsley, about 1½ cups
1 or 2 hard-cooked eggs, peeled and quartered or roughly chopped
Olive oil, for drizzling
Spread out your beans on a plate with a lip or a shallow bowl. Pour the tahini sauce all over to create a thick blanket through which a stranger to this salad would not be able to discern the presence of beans. Now layer on, as attractively as possible, your onions, tomato, and parsley. To serve, decorate with the hard cooked egg and drizzle it all with a few tablespoons of olive oil; don’t hold back. If you want to bring a dish of flakey sea salt to the table, do so, but I think the tahini is sufficient.
Lemon Tahini Sauce
½ cup tahini (shake or stir it well before measuring)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 clove garlic, cut into pieces
Grated zest of ½ lemon
Juice of 1 lemon (you may use more or less; I like a lot)
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
½ teaspoon salt
4 to 6 tablespoons warm water, enough make it pourable/drizzle-able
In a mini food processor, combine the tahini, olive oil, garlic, lemon zest, lemon juice, vinegar, and salt and process for 15 seconds or so. It will be lumpy. Add the warm water a tablespoon at a time (this will smooth it out), until you get the dressing to a pourable consistency, but not a super thin or watery one. Taste for salt and lemon. (If you want to make this in a bowl using a whisk, grate your garlic. I like the fluffier texture I get using my food processor.)
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*RECIPE: Red Lentil Salad with Pomegranate Molasses (Salatet Addas wa Dibs Rumman), from Forever Beirut: Recipes & Stories from the Heart of Beirut, by Barbara Abdeni Massaad
Serves 4 to 6
I’ve been eating lentil salads for as long as I can remember, but they’ve tended to be Frenchified versions with mustardy dressings. This one is such a refreshing, delicious change for me. I usually raise my eyebrows at allspice unless it’s in baking, but here it adds a small but alluring note that I just love. And I’ve recently fallen hard for pomegranate molasses in vinaigrettes, thanks to the Lemon Pomegranate Molasses Dressing in Reem Assil’s California Fattoush Salad, which we featured in this issue
Barbara Massaad stresses in the recipe headnote of her book that you should not use red lentils here, because they will be too mushy, so I am assuming it’s called a red lentil salad because of the tomatoes or because the dressing is red. Speaking of which: you really want to drench the lentil salad in this dressing, but the recipe makes enough for at least two salads; you might want to cut it in half.
IMPORTANT NOTE: I’m always mystified by the long cooking times instructed in cookbooks and on package cooking directions. I always end up with falling-apart mush when I obey. The only way I’ve ever been able to cook lentils for salad is to bring them to a simmer, then immediately turn the heat down to low, which barely produces a bubble. Then I check them every three or four minutes until they are cooked through but still firm. It’s worth the effort to get the glossy, intact lentils you see in my photos.
1¼ cups small brown lentils (do not use red)
½ teaspoon ground allspice
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon Aleppo pepper or cayenne
2 medium tomatoes, finely chopped
1 small onion, or 2 to 3 scallions, finely chopped
1 small bunch cilantro leaves, finely chopped (I used the tender stems, too; discard the tough ones)
Dressing
1½ teaspoons salt
¼ cup pomegranate molasses
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Spread the lentils on a tray and pick through them to remove any small stones or impurities. Rinse under cold running water and drain.
Place the lentils in a pot with enough water to cover them. Bring to a boil then reduce the heat and simmer for 20 to 25 minutes until tender but still holding their shape. Drain the lentils and rinse them under cold water. Drain well and put them in a large serving bowl. Set aside to cool completely. NOTE FROM EMILY: See my note above about cooking lentils.
Meanwhile, whisk together the ingredients for the dressing and set aside.
Once the lentils are cool, add the spices, tomatoes, onion or scallions, and cilantro and toss well. Gently mix in the dressing, taste for seasoning, and serve, or cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.
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*RECIPE: Rice Vermicelli Noodle Salad (Yum Kanom Jin), very slightly adapted from Kiin: Recipes and Stories from Northern Thailand, by Nuit Regular
Serves 4
Chef Nuit Regular grew up cooking with her mother in Northern Thailand, and she was working as a nurse when she opened her first restaurant in the tiny town of Pai. But today she owns several acclaimed restaurants in Toronto, which are credited with transforming the Thai food scene there.
She writes in her note: “When I was working as a nurse during the night shift and everything was calm and quiet, my friend and I would make this dish on our short break. We made this salad because it was quick and easy to make, and it was so delicious and satisfying.” I love that even though it’s a distinctly Thai recipe (it’s very similar to larb/laab, but with noodles), it also reflects everyday life all over the world, where all of us must feed ourselves and go back to work.
NOTE FROM EMILY: My experience with rice vermicelli noodles is that the package instructions way overestimate how long it takes to soften them. I pour boiling water over them in a big bowl and check them every few minutes.
10 ounces dried rice vermicelli noodles (NOTE FROM EMILY: That’s a lot of noodles; I used 7 ounces and it was still plenty)
¼ cup water
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 pound ground pork
⅓ cup canola oil
4 or 5 large garlic cloves, peeled and minced
¼ cup fresh lime juice (I used ⅓ cup)
1 tablespoon Thai cane sugar (I substituted 1 tablespoon light brown sugar)
¼ cup Thai fish sauce
1 tablespoon chili powder (I substituted 1 ½ teaspoons cayenne)
½ cup finely chopped fresh cilantro leaves and tender stems
2 big scallions, thinly sliced (include some of the green tops)
YET ANOTHER NOTE FROM EMILY: This dish is also very good with chopped mint and lots more cilantro.
Cook the rice vermicelli according to package instructions Drain and set aside in the strainer to ensure all the excess water is drained.
In a large saucepan over high heat, bring them water and salt to a boil. When the water is boiling add the ground pork and cook, stirring occasionally, until there is no longer any visible pink in the meat. Drain and set aside in a medium bowl.
Meanwhile, in a large skillet over medium heat, heat the sunflower oil. Add the garlic and cook, stirring constantly, until the garlic is yellow, about one minute. Remove the pan from the heat.
Stir in the fish sauce and sugar until the sugar is fully dissolved. Add the lime juice and chili powder or cayenne and stir well.
Add the noodles and ground pork. Toss well to combine. Sprinkle cilantro and green onions on top and serve immediately.
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RECIPE: Shaved Fennel, Celery, and Red Onion Salad with Salami (Insalata di Finocchio, Sedano, Cipolla e Salame), slightly adapted from Lidia’s Mastering the Art of Italian Cuisine, by Lidia Bastianich
Serves 4 to 6
One of the things I love about certain modern Italian cookbooks is the utter dedication to simplicity. Bastianich doesn’t even include recipe headnotes in this cookbook. So I won’t go on and on, either (at least, not this time).
1 large fennel bulb, trimmed and thinly sliced crosswise (about four cups), plus ½ cup chopped fronds (use a mandoline, if you have one, to shave the fennel)
3 large celery stalks, trimmed, peeled, and thinly sliced on the bias (NOTE FROM EMILY: I have never and will never peel celery, but you go ahead)
½ medium red onion, thinly sliced
4 ounces salami, thickly sliced and julienned
4 ounces caciocavallo or smoked mozzarella cheese, julienned (NOTE FROM EMILY: I used a good provolone here, and it was a very good substitute)
Juice of one large lemon, freshly squeezed
Zest of ½ large lemon
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
In a large bowl, combine the fennel (but not the fronds), celery, red onion, salami, and cheese.
Drizzle with the lemon juice and olive oil, and season with the salt and some pepper. Toss well to coat all of the ingredients with the dressing. Sprinkle with the chopped fennel fronds and toss lightly. Let sit about 10 minutes before serving, to combine the flavors. (NOTE FROM EMILY: You can also sprinkle the pretty fronds on top of the salad before serving.
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🥬 🥬🥬 🥬That’s It! We’re done here! We’ll see you soon with a recipe for roast leg of lamb with rosemary. I’m kidding—it’s going to be salad.
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Beautiful essay, beautiful food and I love the “traveling aboard cookbooks” 😊
Love this! Your writing is so beautiful and evocative.