Have you noticed how the cold days bring food cravings along? Finding yet another excuse to bake. Ditching meals for a cake. Curling up on the sofa with a treat. Tell me about it. Or do you know the feeling after a meal when you had quite a bit to eat but still don’t feel satisfied? A few years ago I often considered a sweet bite and espresso after lunch or dinner. I could pass on the dessert, but no meal was complete without a cup of espresso. Now with my growing awareness about how we eat I can see that I was intuitively looking for the astringent taste to finish a meal, only that I did not know better than coffee. This espresso incident still reminds me that the meals I was eating back then were not balanced enough leaving me to crave even after I ate sufficient quantities of food.
Pretty Turkish Summer Vegetable Stew (Türlü)
Here comes the Aegean fall - warm, and sunny, and romantic. However chilly mornings, strong winds and occasional shower rains don’t fail to remind of the coming winter. A month has already passed since the official closing of the season in Alaçatı. Many restaurants and hotels in the town shut down for winter and those staying open are renovating their indoor spaces or covering the garden like we do. Babushka stays open on the weekends; weekdays are by reservation only.
The month of relative freedom from the cooking and never ending market shopping did not bring the expected relief. I am nowhere close to feeling as enthusiastic as I did a year ago when we just started Babushka. The season of running the restaurant kitchen devastated me in every possible way. I am wondering how to repair what’s left of me.
