One of the effects of working from home and living alone is the time you have for cooking and the control you have over your kitchen. I’ve fallen into certain patterns, certain regular activities that keep my kitchen going:
Brown butter. Simmer ten sticks of cheap butter — about six bucks — in a pan until the water has cooked off and the dairy solids have browned. Use a mesh strainer to divide the results into shelf-stable clarified butter, which you can use in place of other cooking fats, and brown butter solids. Brown butter solids are a great addition to both sweet and savory sauces, in addition to other uses. (They go well with duck and root vegetables, so they’re a good winter thing.) “Ten sticks” isn’t the most convenient unit — if you buy three pounds of butter you’ll have two sticks left — but it creates just the right amount of clarified butter to fill a plastic Fluff container.
Duck confit.
In sour cherry season, pit sour cherries, freeze a bunch of them, candy a bunch of them.
In citrus season, make marmalade, make candied lemons and other citrus, make citrus-infused sugar (sometimes with cinnamon, vanilla, or Szechuan peppercorn), freeze sour oranges, and make infusions.
Fill ice cube trays with lemon and sour orange juices; store the cubes in freezer bags.
Cure ham in January, hang it at the start of spring, until the end of the year.
When in season, freeze fresh and roasted tomato purees, lima beans, fava beans, fresh corn, black-eyed peas, ramps, and okra. I always freeze too little tomato puree, though freezer space is a factor.
Make pectin-free strawberry preserves when in season. Nothing but strawberries, sugar, lemon juice, and time.
Pickle ramps when in season.
Make stock with roasted bones, with at least two days of simmering. Reduce stock to very very strong demiglace and it’ll keep forever.
Make greens, with smoked pork stock and at least a full day of simmering.
Make pimento cheese, which has actually become pimento beer cheese: shred sharp Cheddar in Cuisinart, then replace grating disc with blade. Process shredded Cheddar with just the right amount of beer, before adding pimientos (jarred or home-grown and roasted), ramps (pickled or fresh), Louisiana hot sauce, a bit of mustard (prepared or powder), and mayonnaise (preferably homemade, yes).
Strain yogurt. Start with a quart of unsweetened unflavored yogurt with active cultures, and dump it into a strainer lined with cheesecloth (or a clean kitchen towel), over a big bowl. Leave overnight. You can call this yogurt or labneh, doesn’t matter. I like it for breakfast with fruit or any of the aforementioned jams or marmalades.