Summer

Summer is usually associated with outdoor cooking which is a perfectly reasonable association. But standing over a hot grill or smoker when the mercury is rising is not the most pleasant of activities. Whatever you are cooking becomes seasoned with droplets of sweat. Another oft-overlooked issue, particularly when it comes to smoking meats, is that temperature regulation of the cooking apparatus can be difficult when the ambient heat surrounding it is working in synergy with the heat inside it. While I have a friend who does competition cooking and isn’t a stranger to winning (he pushes his smoker up to 300°F) most of us lack the requisite skill for smoking a pork shoulder or brisket at that heat and pulling out a tender product at the end.

July, and the morning sun blazes over fields of pick-your-own strawberries. The black bears scope out the blueberry patches in the national parks. Skin-destroying raspberry canes trail across the path, ready to spring out and scratch the faces of passers-by. The berrying season is upon us: scratched faces and stained clothing are on the cards. Have you ever seen a child pack a handful of wild raspberries away into a shirt pocket for safe keeping? I hope so. It’s one of the joys of life. Their faces, on seeing the inevitable results, are completely worth the ruined outfit. However, if you don’t have any young relatives to cheer you up with their berrying misadventures, pick-your-own farms aren’t just pick-your-owns but pick-me-ups.

There isn’t a lot for a kid in Montana to do in summer. School’s out and the heat is relentless – so stifling that the only real escape is the cool embrace of the fruit and vegetable aisle at Albertsons. By July, my hometown’s lone waterpark was overrun with feral, overweight preteens, their bellies jiggling as they stampeded across the scorching cement. After an overpriced afternoon at the waterpark, many of these kids would head to McDonald’s for dinner. The more upmarket option was to try to exploit a family with a country club membership. The fast food there is classy; quick but not greasy – think mini tacos and peppery chicken strips served with a petite white cup of ranch on the side. But down the highway are the real fast-food joints.

Clafoutis. Difficult to pronounce. But oh-so divine and easy to make. Originating in the Limousin region in south-central France, its name comes from the Provençal clafir, “to fill.” So popular was it “to fill” a dish with fruit and batter, that by the nineteenth century, the renown of clafoutis had spread from the Limousin to other regions of France and bordering countries. This classic and elegant summer dessert is usually made with cherries, among the first fruits to ripen, but also with other stone fruit as they appear — apricots, plums, berries and on into the fall with pears.

Does anything say “June” quite like strawberries and cream? The sweetness of sun-ripened strawberries allowed to remain on the plant until peak maturity, pairs exquisitely with the velvety, ever-so-slightly tart, richness of cream. Taste-wise, it’s a perfect match — and looks-wise, strawberries and cream are one of the prettiest dishes of summer. Some things are just meant to be. But life isn’t all strawberries and cream. Sometimes you have to shake things up with a lively new take: Gorgonzola and white chocolate cheesecake, for instance, or lamb with anchovy, garlic and rosemary. Love it or hate it, at least you’ll have your diners sitting up and paying attention. And sometimes a bit of experimentation can lead to a new favorite. That’s the story behind salt and caramel.

Pennsylvania experienced a heat wave last week, with temperatures soaring into the mid-80s. It was not to last. This morning it was a balmy 33°F, with that bone-chilling dampness and threat of snow showers that can only mean one thing: spring! When friends and family who live in warm places send me photos of the beach and brag about taking long walks in the sunshine, I block out their bragging with a defiant flip of my hood and insist that people who live in cold places are tougher. We have more character. True grit. And it turns out that may actually be true. "Cold temperature extends longevity and prevents disease-related protein aggregation," according to a new peer-reviewed study from Germany's University of Cologne. Longevity, i.e.

Summer comes early to San Antonio. I moved here in January, dodging the worst excesses of the northeastern winter, but by March, the temperature had already reached into the nineties. By the time you read this column, summer will be approaching the rest of the country as well. It’s no-bake dessert season. I’ve always been intrigued by this genre of dessert recipe, which involves a vast spectrum of quality. The worst can be appalling — think of gelatin salads, gloppy pudding pies, packets of flavored powders and demeaning names like “mess” and “fool.” On the other hand, some no-bake desserts are transcendent: for example, panna cotta and the Magnolia Bakery banana pudding.

A few days before Labor Day I tend to get nostalgic for the sixty-five summers I spent in Chatham on Cape Cod. The feeling starts slowly, especially during our after-dinner, three-generation family strolls around the Chatham Lighthouse in the charming Old Village. If it is our last evening before returning to Europe, my father would be broiling the last steak. The stroll begins with a nip in the air and the gently falling, silver leaves from the trees that line small streets. There isn’t any traffic; residents of the Old Village walk. Later, when my mother had two bionic knees, she was still lovingly called the “fastest woman in town.” Now she strolls with the rest of us. We are savoring another tradition, after a summer filled with golf, tennis, swimming, boating and feasts.

I grew up in a northeastern state, and when I moved to Washington, there were plenty of culture shocks I had to get used to. The Metro seemed like a revelation, a magical train that whisked you under the White House and the National Mall (this was back when DC public transportation actually worked). Less appealing were the crime notices slapped about my neighborhood: I saw one once — I'm not making this up — that reported a real-life nunchuck attack. But the biggest shock of all was, and still is, the heat. Where I grew up, a 100-degree day was an event. That's all the more so because my parents didn't have so much as a window air conditioner until I was around ten years old. In the frozen reaches of Up North, this was a perfectly normal way to live.

"Gelati, sorbetti e granite,” it said on the cover. We were in a little bookshop off the Piazza Duomo in Verona. Days of consuming Italian gelato in the hot afternoons had worked so wonderfully upon our imaginations that here we were purchasing a recipe book in a language we didn’t even understand, trying to capture a little of the magical glitter of the Italian summer before it slipped through our fingers. I still have the book — and I still don’t understand enough Italian to follow a recipe. But the pictures convey some of the original magic. Gelato al limone peers creamily out of a yellow bowl, garnished with bristling strips of lemon peel. Gelato allo Champagne is pink and melting, snuggled up to a strawberry. Sorbetto d’arancia is spooned into a hollowed-out orange.