There are still occasionally good things, even this year

Like music and food and books

Friends — I feel like every week I start this newsletter with some variant of “We made it to another Friday!” but that’s how I feel these days, like every time we make it through a week it’s something to celebrate, even a little bit. I know this week was full of ups and downs for me — the downs mostly about noticing how much earlier sunset is getting, and dreading the end of Daylight Savings Time in a few weeks, but I’m trying to figure out some plans for how to still spend time outside as much as possible even when it gets darker earlier and colder out there. I think I need to find some Christmas lights for my backyard, maybe. But one happy thing this week is that I have an essay in the November Bon Appetit, and it’s out online now! It’s about Thanksgiving and my favorite Thanksgiving food — my grandmother’s cornbread dressing — and cooking for family and so many other things. I can’t wait to see it in print; my mom has been reading Bon Appetit since I was little, so it’s very exciting for me to have this piece in there.

One small bit of goodness for me this year has been my friend Margaret H. Willison’s group curated Instagram playlists, where she posts on some Sunday nights a music prompt and then people give her songs to fit the prompt, and then she pulls together a Spotify playlist for every prompt. She’s done many great ones of these, but my absolute favorite was her Black Joy prompt and the accompanying playlist, which I’ve listened to a ton since she posted it in June. There was a bunch of music I already loved on it, but I also discovered a ton of new to me songs. If you need a little joy, give it a listen.

One of my favorite books of the year comes out next week, and it was also a real reminder to me to step outside my comfort zone, at least occasionally. Because when the publisher sent me an advance copy of this book for a potential blurb, I was like “…literary fiction, by a MAN? Are you…familiar with my work???” But then I started it, and I couldn’t stop reading it, and the times when I had to stop reading it, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. That book is Memorial, by Bryan Washington, and I can’t wait for you all to read it and love it as much as I did. It’s about love and relationships of all kinds and how hard and essential they are, and family and food (there is a lot of delicious food in this book, so…okay, the publisher was familiar with my work) and it grabbed me right away. It comes out Tuesday!

My mom called me a few weeks ago to rave about an Ina Garten recipe, which isn’t all that rare, because Ina recipes are often excellent. But they’re often for big crowds, and so hard to make for just a handful of people, which is what we’re all often doing now. But this one is smaller, and easy to adapt, and when I made it myself I was blown away. It’s this Caesar Roasted Fish, which I did with swordfish, but would work with any thick, white fish. This is maybe one of the best at home recipes for fish I’ve ever made — it was so so delicious, and also very easy to put together. All you do is make a fast Caesar dressing (but with already prepared mayo), smear it over the fish, let the fish sit for ten minutes, roast it for ten minutes, and then you’re done. I cut the recipe down so I could just make one piece of fish, and I was honestly angry at myself for not making more; I can’t wait to make it again. I had it with kale salad, but this would be great with broccoli — and I haven’t tried this yet, but I think it could make a very easy sheet pan meal with broccoli and pour the dressing over the broccoli too and let it all roast together. The recipe and my notes are below!

Caesar Roasted Swordfish

Ingredients:
2-4 large garlic cloves (Ina calls for two but I cut this recipe down a lot and still used two so…use what works for you)
1/4 cup fresh parsley (I didn’t use this when I made it, it was still great!)
1 tablespoon anchovy paste, or 3-4 anchovies (the latter is my addition, I used anchovies)
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
3 tablespoons lemon juice
Kosher salt and black pepper
3 pounds swordfish steaks, or any thick white fish, cut into 6 portions
1/2 cup chopped scallions (I also didn’t use this when I made it and it was still great!)
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons drained capers
lemon wedges, for serving

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees F. Line a sheet pan with aluminum foil or parchment (I used the latter). If you have a food processor, put the garlic, parsley, anchovy paste or anchovies, and mustard in it and pulse until everything is blended. Then add the mayo, lemon zest and lemon juice, 1 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper and pulse to make a smooth sauce. If you don’t have a food processor, this is pretty easy without it — just finely mince or press the garlic and put in a big bowl, and do the same with the anchovy and parsley, whisk together with the mustard, then add everything else in and whisk until blended.

Put the fish on your prepared pan and season both sides with salt and pepper. Set aside about a third of the sauce to serve with the cooked fish, and then spread the sauce on both sides of the fish. Sprinkle with the chopped scallions and let it sit for 10 minutes (it comes together so quickly that my oven wasn’t even heated yet by the time I’d gotten to this step, so the waiting time was built in).

Roast the fish for 10-12 minutes (mine was ready at just about exactly 11 minutes). Take it out of the oven and let it sit while you make the capers: heat the olive oil in a small pan on high heat, and fry the capers for about 30-60 seconds until they pop and are crunchy. (Ina said to let the fish rest after the oven for 10 minutes but I was impatient, it was still delicious!). Put the fish on plates and sprinkle the fried capers on top, and serve with the lemon wedges and any extra sauce. Enjoy!

Hang in there, everyone. I hope you find some joy this weekend,

Jasmine

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