Stirring It Up with Molly Ivins by Ellen Sweets Page B

photograph in the magazine looked appetizing enough, and Molly was never above trying new flavors. Although Thai remains one of my favorite ethnic cuisines, it was not Molly’s—then or ever. She never liked collard greens either, although she could lay into their cousins, Swiss chard and kale. I filed that under “go figure.”
    The other side of the cabinet housed wheat flour, white flour, rice flour, organic raw sugar, light brown sugar, dark brown sugar, turbinado sugar, and honey—orange blossom, raw, and wild. Canned goods consisted mainly of artichoke hearts, hearts of palm, anchovies, large capers, small capers, capers rolled in anchovies, Italian tuna packed in olive oil, and those remarkable San Marzano tomatoes.
    Until I met Molly I had never heard of San Marzano tomatoes or, for that matter, of Campania, Italy—which, I learned, is in southern Italy and was for the longest time the only place these exquisite tomatoes grew. Flourishing there had something to do with a perfect confluence of sun, soil, and precipitation.
    By the time we finished talking about tomatoes I was ready to dust off my passport and head for the Amalficoast. Call it a food-pantry-as-geography lesson. The kitchen cabinet’s odds and ends of canned goods also reflected her propensity for impulse shopping, such as an escargot kit replete with snails packaged with shells and a recipe for assembly. Maybe she made them, but not with me.
    Increasingly frequent forays to Austin assured respite in Molly’s kitchen. Whether we barbecued shrimp, roasted hot dogs, or baked meat loaf, the therapeutic value of cooking was immeasurable, especially when I could sit at the kitchen counter and look out over a stone patio surrounded by live oaks and see the sky change color at sunset—all the while squishing together ingredients that anchored one of my favorite birthday meals.
    February 1, 2003. The date and year are, as they say, indelibly etched in the old memory bank. I had only recently left the
Dallas Morning News
to join the
Denver Post
, but I returned to Texas on January 31. John and Susan Albach had organized a birthday dinner for me the next day, my real birthday. We were going to rendezvous at Javier’s, a lovely Mexican restaurant. It was not to be.
    Early on the morning of February 1 NASA’s Columbia shuttle exploded minutes after takeoff, and the resulting debris field covered parts of Central Texas. The
Denver Post
found me and I was dispatched to Amarillo to assist with coverage. I had been at the paper barely five months, so I answered duty’s call, flew to Amarillo, covered my piece of the story, attended the church service where shuttle commander Rick Husband was eulogized, and returned to Dallas thirty-six hours later.
    I had known that my daughter, the chef, wouldn’t be able to attend the dinner, but her husband at the time assured me he would go in her stead, convey apologies, and explain on my behalf. At the last minute, for reasons unknown to this day, he decided not to go. I had no idea that they never knew what had happened until I returned from Amarillo to find a series of telephone messages trying to find me, escalating from concern to annoyance to alarm. Molly had not felt able to make the drive to Dallas, which was just as well. The party proceeded without either of us, much to my everlasting chagrin.
    With many apologies and considerable embarrassment behind me, I now headed to Austin and the house in Travis Heights to continue my birthday celebration—or more accurately, to begin it. When I arrived, Molly was scrubbing big fat Idahos. One of her favorite vegetables, haricot verts—what the rest of us call baby green beans—were rinsed and ready to go. At the last minute they would be steamed and buttered and Molly would make the dressing for the Caesar salad.
    I settled into my favorite perch at the kitchen window, smushing together milk-soaked bread, beef, pork,