Good morning. There’s a spot way up in the back of the bay where the shore splits into a creek and the water runs fresh into salt. There are blue crabs there, Callinectes sapidus, beautiful swimmers, and soon enough they’ll be big enough to trap and steam.
They aren’t yet, though, and so for a summer seafood boil on this first weekend after the nation’s 248th anniversary of its independence from Britain, I’m dependent on local clams and lobster, or on wild-caught shrimp from Louisiana.
That’s better than fine. A seafood boil’s a wonderful thing, and a Cajun shrimp boil (above) on a summer weekend is one of the great treats of the season — a road trip vacation in a pot, to serve on a table covered in newspaper (still good for something!). Serve with rémoulade and a super-basic coleslaw of shredded cabbage and carrots tossed with this excellent recipe for coleslaw dressing.
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Cajun Shrimp Boil
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Too messy? Understood! Pivot instead to this fiery hot sauce roast chicken with a tangy kale salad, or to this lovely crunchy noodle and tofu salad. I’d consider, too, lamb patties with fried onions and tahini-yogurt sauce, with baba ghanouj and hummus on the side. Or maybe chilled cucumber soup with avocado toast?
And what’s a weekend without a proper breakfast: blueberry pancakes, say, with maple sausages and fried eggs? You could follow that with a long walk — down city streets or along suburban roadways, through the woods or along a beach somewhere — exercise that works off the feed and prepares you for a luncheon of jambon beurre and an afternoon nap.
Then, for dinner, smothered pork chops with braised greens and rice, followed by cut watermelon drizzled with lime juice. You’ll be living very well if you do that, whatever your mood, whatever the weather, wherever you live.
If none of those recipes appeal, though, you can turn to New York Times Cooking for others — many thousands of them. It’s true that you need a subscription to read them. Subscriptions make this whole enterprise possible. If you haven’t already, would you consider subscribing today? Thanks.
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Now, it’s nothing to do with marjoram or the proper way to grill flounder, but Sally Rooney has a new short story in The New Yorker, “Opening Theory,” and you should read it so you can talk about it when it comes up over drinks in the next couple of days. Because it will.
Here are two new poems from John Burnside, in the London Review of Books.
There’s something fantastic about discovering a restaurant that can transport you across decades, into the past. For John Kessler, writing in the Bitter Southerner, that restaurant is Miguel’s French Continental Cuisine, in Siesta Key, Fla. Well-done duck. I’m in!
Finally, to play us off, here’s a new Towa Bird track, “Deep Cut.” Here’s the truth: “You’re a story that I’ll tell to my friends.” Enjoy that while you’re cooking and I’ll see you on Sunday.
