Throwback

It is time to reclaim the jelled dessert. And while I believe that there is a certain retro charm to the orange mold made with sherbet or the magical layered stripes of a rainbow slice, I’m thinking a little more elegant. Not a neon-colored watch-it-wiggle concoction, but a sophisticated chilled dessert with just the barest wobble.

There are not nearly enough pyrotechnics taking place at breakfast. There's a dearth at dinner, sure, but at least then the occasional Bananas Foster or Cherries Jubilee

As a teenage girl in '90s New York City, I spent an inordinate amount of time skulking in the dark corner booths of diners. Though people such as I were part and parcel of those roach motels of yesteryear, they staff still expected us to order something; those bottomless cups of black coffee didn’t pay the bills.

I’ve written here before about the morning sex that is a breakfast cheese plate, and the alarming absence of cheese in the typical American breakfast.

When I visited my hometown near Poughkeepsie, New York, I used to get twitchy over the things that were different. Wasn’t that an Italian restaurant? When did they rename the school? But, at a certain point, I found the changes enhanced my nostalgia. The sandblasted spit-shine on the train station evokes its days of particle-boarded windows and birds in the waiting room. Seeing the buildings of the old mental hospital falling into decrepitude makes me remember their Victorian wedding-cake glory more fondly.