Spinach Frittata -- The Kitchen Holds What the Hands Remember

Sven and I made our morning circuit — kitchen, back hallway, front porch, lakefront walk, kitchen again, breakfast for both of us. The same circuit every day for years. The repetition is its own grace. There are people who would find such a routine unbearable, and there are people who would find it salvific. I am the second kind. The routine is the rope I hold in the dark, and the rope is what gets me from one end of a day to the other. Mamma's hands shake more than they did last month. I do not point it out. I notice. I notice everything. The shake is small — barely visible when she is at rest, more visible when she lifts her coffee cup, most visible when she is trying to thread a needle. She still threads needles. She still bakes. She still calls me on Tuesdays at 10. The hands shake. The shaking does not stop the doing. The doing is what Mamma is. Karin and I talked Sunday. Stockholm in winter is dark. Duluth in winter is dark. We compared darknesses. We laughed. Karin said: "Linda, do you remember the time Pappa drove us to Two Harbors in a blizzard because Mamma wanted lutefisk?" I said yes. The story unspooled across the phone for twenty minutes. I had forgotten half of it. Karin remembered all of it. The memory was, briefly, complete between us. I cooked Spinach quiche this week. Pie crust, eggs, cream, sautéed spinach, gruyère, nutmeg. Baked until just set. Served warm or room-temperature with a green salad. Spring lunch. The Damiano Center: the regular Thursday. The soup is the soup. The conversations are the conversations. The week is held by the Thursday. I do not know what I would do without the Thursday. The Thursday is the structural element of the week. The structural element does not collapse if the rest of the week goes sideways. The Thursday holds. The lake was iron gray. The kind of gray Paul loved. He used to say: "That is the gray that means weather is coming." He was always right. I miss being told. I miss being told what the lake means by a man who knew what the lake meant. I have learned to read the lake on my own. I am, at this point, an adequate reader. I am not as good as Paul was. I am better than I would have been if I had not had to learn. It is enough. Paul is not here. Mamma is not here. Pappa is not here. Erik is not here. They are all here in the kitchen, in the smell, in the taste, in the wooden spoon and the bread pans and the marble slab. The dead are not where the body went. The dead are in the kitchen. The phone rings less than it used to. Not because fewer people are calling, but because the people who call are mostly the family, and the family has settled into a rhythm — Peter daily, Anna twice a week, Sophie weekly, Elsa biweekly, Karin Sundays, Astrid Sundays. The phone rings predictably. I pick up predictably. The predictability is the love at this stage of life. It is enough.

I had planned a quiche — the full architecture of it, the crust pressed into the pan, the cream measured out — and then Thursday came and went, and by Friday morning what I wanted was something simpler, something that did not require so many steps between me and the eating. A frittata is a quiche that has decided not to perform. The spinach is the same, the eggs are the same, the cheese is the same; only the ceremony is less. Some weeks that is exactly right. This was one of those weeks.

Spinach Frittata

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 20 minutes | Total Time: 30 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 8 large eggs
• 1/4 cup whole milk or cream
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 small yellow onion, thinly sliced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 5 ounces fresh baby spinach (about 5 packed cups)
• 3/4 cup shredded Gruyère or sharp white cheddar
• 2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan

Instructions

1. Heat the oven. Preheat your oven to 375°F (190°C) with a rack positioned in the center.
2. Whisk the eggs. In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk or cream, salt, pepper, and nutmeg until well combined and slightly frothy. Set aside.
3. Sauté the aromatics. Heat the olive oil in a 10-inch oven-safe skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened and lightly golden, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook 1 minute more.
4. Wilt the spinach. Add the spinach to the skillet in batches, turning with tongs until fully wilted and any released liquid has evaporated, about 3 minutes. Spread the vegetables evenly across the bottom of the pan.
5. Add the cheese and eggs. Scatter the Gruyère evenly over the spinach mixture. Pour the egg mixture over the top and gently shake the pan to settle everything. Sprinkle the Parmesan over the surface.
6. Cook on the stovetop. Let the frittata cook undisturbed on the stovetop over medium-low heat until the edges are just beginning to set, about 3 to 4 minutes.
7. Finish in the oven. Transfer the skillet to the preheated oven and bake until the center is just set and the top is lightly golden, 10 to 12 minutes. A knife inserted in the center should come out clean.
8. Rest and serve. Let the frittata rest in the pan for 5 minutes before slicing. Serve warm or at room temperature with a simple green salad.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 290 | Protein: 21g | Fat: 20g | Carbs: 5g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 480mg