"Sweet Farm of Mine" by Candace A. Hennekens

I put the roast in, with two or three bay leaves, onions, potatoes scrubbed and quartered, probably red ones while they last, Kennebec when the reds have run out, carrots cleaned with a brush and quartered and shortened to lay between the cracks, maybe a little celery overall, seasoning of salt and pepper, a few garlic cloves nestled in the tiny spaces between the roast and the vegetables, and the meal slowly cooks while we are outside working up a hunger.  Later I’ll add to the oven dinner, maybe an apple crisp, or baked apples topped with a dab of sweet butter, a generous pinch of brown sugar, maybe some raisins.  When we walk indoors after hard work out in the open air, the smells are those of a rich, layered, mouth-watering mixture of meat, vegetables, and fruit, a meal that no fine restaurant can come close to matching when hunger is sharp and present.  Hunger, real hunger, makes any meal a gourmet meal.