How to Cook a Moose by Kate Christensen Page B

oil
    salt to taste
    Cut 1 lb. of haddock fillets into bite-size chunks and put them in a bowl with the juice of 1 lemon and harissa spices. Stir well and leave on the counter to marinate.
    According to the directions on the bag, simmer a cup of well-rinsed red rice (I rinse it in a mesh strainer under the faucet for a minute or two) in 1 3/4 cups chicken broth with 1 T butter.
    Slit the chorizo sausages down the middle and remove the casings so you’re left with just the innards. Discard the casings or feed them to the dog sitting avidly at your knee. In a big cast-iron skillet, heat the olive oil, then add the chopped leeks and chorizo sausage innards. Stir well, chopping the chorizo with the edge of the spatula or wooden spoon to break it up. Add the white wine. Sauté for about 10 minutes, till the leeks are soft and the sausage is cooked through.
    Add the harissa haddock with all the lemon juice to the leeks and chorizo. Cover the pan and gently poach for 7 to 10 minutes. Stir well.
    Meanwhile, chop 8 cloves of garlic and add to 1 cup chicken broth and 1 T olive oil in a huge pot. Steam the chard, covered, for about 5 minutes, or until limp. Stir well, salt to taste.
    Serve the haddock on top of the rice with the chard alongside. Serves 4.

    The next Thursday at the soup kitchen, Monica asked me to make an applesauce to go alongside some pork chops for a later dinner. Ifilled a small plastic crate with a variety of red and green apples from the big fridge in the pantry, washed them in the small sink, took off the little stickers, then set up a big cutting board with a wet cloth underneath to keep it from slipping. All through my shift, whenever I had a spare several minutes, I stood at my little workstation, happily and steadily reducing that big box of apples to a smallish dice. I prefer to leave the peels on for texture; that’s how my mother always made applesauce. Cutting them small makes the applesauce smooth and palatable. I also like dicing; I’ll take any excuse to do it.
    By the time my shift was almost over, I had filled a deep steam-table pan. I added a big handful of brown sugar, three bay leaves, some minced fresh rosemary from the plant in Monica’s office, a good pouring of cinnamon, and another of salt. After I mixed it all together, I poured two cups of water over the pan, covered it in parchment paper and then foil, and stuck it into a moderately hot oven to bake for the next hour or two.
    I left not knowing how it turned out; it didn’t matter. I was so soothed and refreshed by chopping all those apples over the past couple of hours, I came home energized, smiling, almost euphoric.
    The next week, I walked into the soup kitchen to find that I was the only volunteer that day for lunch, and Monica was on vacation. Her substitute, Jordan, ran the teen center. He had two premade chowders heating in the oven when I arrived—one corn, the other, fish.
    â€œHow do you feel about making biscuits?” he asked when I came in.
    â€œI feel fine about making biscuits,” I said, with private misgivings, which I kept to myself. I’ve known I was gluten-intolerant since I did an elimination diet in 2002 to determine why I felt so terrible all the time: depressed, bloated, foggy-brained, crabby. Since then, I’ve been rigorously gluten-free and no longer depressed or bloated. It’s been worth it. But the machismo of the professional kitchen, even a merciful, charitable soup kitchen, does not allow for fear of wheat.You have to cook what needs cooking. I resolved to keep my mouth closed while I made them, try not to breathe the flour dust, scrub my hands and sponge off my clothing afterwards, and hope for the best.
    Jordan handed me a handwritten recipe he’d copied off the Internet for a large-enough quantity of biscuits for the day’s lunch: 8 cups flour, 1/4 cup baking powder, 2 cups oil, 4 cups milk, but only 1 teaspoon salt. He went back into the office, where