My tastes in food are pretty simple and unrefined. I read some comments posted here about our great places and you guys going off on the latest and I think how I wish I could really appreciate haute cuisine, but fact is Local 121 is as fancy feasting for me and as daring as my palette goes. What's the saying, some eat to live and others live to eat --
And food is seasonal for me -- I do not like summer's fish or some of the crazy stuff our local great chefs do with vegetables in the spring (though fresh fruit is a gift from God that I savor). But come winter, when the wind really bucks and tears and claws at one's skin, that's then I'm in my glory for everything -- exercise, sledding, skating photography, walking, and especially cooking and eating, and especially cooking and eating "comfort food."
Apparently "comfort food" isn't limited by season, nor is CF truly defined, but for purposes of this thread, let's say it is a winter culinary event and intended to bring maximum yummy during the typically least-loved season.
Why is winter CF essential? For me, it's a reward for refusing to become a winter refugee or shut-in.
You will never, ever read me whining and carping EVER about two-week long sub zero spells or impending climactic doom. I mean, I mostly walk everywhere and it does get cold descending South Court at 6am or climbing out of Meeting from Main at 11pm. I refuse, I refuse to be self imprisoned just because of a foot of snow or pelting ice rain. Indeed, it is the act of refusing to isolate that makes me a lover of that five months or so of brutality.
Given all the Ocean State has to offer, which dishes do you consider our best winter CFs, whether served at at restaurant or a traditional dish at home?
For me, it should involve cream (mac and cheese, baked potatoes with sour cream, beef stroganoff, and my favorite, Godiva's powdered hot chocolate, topped with Hood's fresh whipping cream, a nightly certainly from now until March). Or extra cheese on lasagna if I make it. It should be spicy and steaming hot. And if it was made at Blake's or by the trailer family, served amid ketchup bottles being angrily tossed around, then that is truly a comfort.
Where are your winter CF places? Where and which dishes are made at home? At a restaurant? In what way to they bring you comfort?
I see there's cable chatter of a possible dust-down during this week -- be still my beating heart! and may the leaden skies unleash the equal of a GH38!
ETA: Stoopid me -- forgot the best: grilled cheese sandwiches with fauxmatoes, and cottage cheese drenched with ketchup! Hiiiiiiiiigh living!