The kitchen (cooking blog) is still open, but operating under more limited hours

I haven't been posting once a week, as I promise I will in the "Frequency of Posts" section on the right of this blog.  That's because I am in a cooking rut. This occurs almost every year, somewhere between the last basil harvest and Thanksgiving, kick-started by the lifting of daylight savings time and the earlier darkness that ensues.

As long as I could make fresh pesto (and this year's final harvest was only four weeks ago), I could prolong the idea that the kitchen was operating under summer conditions—which means more fresh food, less time spent in the kitchen and a greater likelihood of  throw-together meals. Only in the summer can some version of salad be dinner.

On many dark winter afternoons, when the temperature is dipping below freezing, I've said wistfully to anyone who will listen, "Why if it was July we might be leaving for the pool right now, and we'd still have the afternoon ahead of us."

A kind of desperate feeling sets in for me when the days get suddenly shorter and I realize a whole winter of staying in—with serious cooking and baking—looms ahead.  Once winter gets going (kick-started by Thanksgiving dinner making), I'm usually at peace with it. In fact, I really do like to bake bread and make stews. 

But I cling to the idea of summer long after my summer swimsuit and SPF 45 sunscreen have been put away. I only seem to be able to face winter by continuing to look back at summer, backing ungracefully into the long, cold nights ahead.