NOT INTENDING BLASPHEMY, I am nevertheless pretty sure that when the words “It is more blessed to give than to receive” were set down in scripture, Saint Luke (or whoever wrote the book of Acts) did not have two pints of perfectly ripe, fresh figs next to him on the table. If he had, I suspect that one of our most popular biblical citations might well have been lost to the seduction of this purple fruit, so delicate in the hand yet so heavy with anticipatory pleasure. What better gift is there than this to receive?
It’s true that gifts reveal much about the giver. Before going further, I will gratefully acknowledge that unlike prior years (I actually won a prize in a “bad gift” contest recently), every birthday gift I received this year was spot on. A few of them involved food, one being a culinary outing to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, site of the fabulous Sunday Suppers cooking class and dinner party. But it’s also true that this happy gift phenomenon was in large part due to not-so-subtle hints telegraphed to otherwise uncertain family and friends. I say this not as critique—only to point out that the element of surprise was mostly lacking.
Except for the figs.
The figs were completely unexpected, reminding me that sometimes the best gifts—the most intimate and perfect proof of how well a person knows you—can be the simplest and can come from unexpected quarters. After an ill-fated breakfast date, where a friend and I both stupidly gave up after waiting for about twenty minutes just around a glass brick divider from each other (hey, I admitted it was stupid), I stood in the lobby of my apartment building and received from her, in a thin white plastic sack, two pints of Black Mission figs.
Upstairs, the dilemma began immediately: not whether to sample them, but how many; how to make them last. What, I wondered, eyeing the figs’ regal color, their matte and mottled skin stretched tightly over what I knew was a complex network of seeds and soft flesh, do you do with a bounty of fresh figs?
First photograph them, I thought. They won’t last. Fig season is fleeting. It seemed important to capture an image to remind myself, in the dead of winter, when this fruit in its fresh state would be no more than a craving impossible to satisfy, that they had been here, pendulous and perfect, all mine. Photograph them, and then eat them. Slowly.
Have you ever taken the time to savor a fresh fig? I will admit that until these birthday figs, I’d always been too impatient to observe them in any detail. I just rushed them into my mouth, hungry for the crunch of tiny seeds. Spend some time with the color, weight, and shape of them, though, and your mind can easily turn to metaphysics. I don’t wonder that Aristotle ate figs, so plentiful in his native Greece. Figs, ripe seed sacs that they are, are catalysts for thoughts about fertility, creation, origins. Fitting for a birthday, now that I consider it.
I picked up a fig, managed to slow myself down. That fruit I said was “purple”? It’s more than that. Purple, yes, but with hints of cool indigo and warmer mauve; it bleeds into a thin-skin shade of green near the top. Tugging up on the stem, some skin peels away, revealing a pale, downy layer underneath. Fibrous white strings cling to the loose skin, leaving striations on the soft inner pulp. When you roll a ripe fig between thumb and forefinger, it pushes back against gentle pressure, taut with secrets ready to spill. For an almost imperceptible moment the fig will resist the bite, and then—total submission as you pierce the skin to expose glistening ribbons of seeds coursing through jammy, bruise-red flesh. The scent is deep, earthy. Why had I never noticed before that fresh figs look and smell like procreation?
[Now I am embarrassing my friend. She's no doubt reading this, mortified, having had no intention of anything so intimate, so suggestive. Only a token birthday gift.]
That fig I was taking such time with? Suddenly—bite, chew, swallow—gone before I could register anything about its taste. What happened to mindfulness? Once in my mouth, compulsion took over; all I wanted was to absorb the fruit into my body, to own it. I’d have to eat another. With the second fig, I let textures and flavors play longer on my tongue: rough, smooth, chewy, crunchy, the skin slightly bitter, but so thin it ceded to a pure hit of natural sweetness. The fig tasted like the best kind of spicy, cooked sugar: a caramel taste, enriched with vanilla. A single fruit but complex—like a fine wine or tobacco. I proceeded to consume half a basket out of hand, then forced the remaining figs into the refrigerator, out of sight.
But, of course, they were never really out of mind. The figs didn’t last long, and I’m glad I had the foresight to photograph them. I originally intended to use some in a recipe I could post here. Alas, that will have to wait until next year: a couple of seeded flatbreads with ricotta and split figs later, and not a decent fig remains in my neighborhood. As soon as the birthday figs disappeared, I rushed out to replicate the joy of eating them; it was hopeless. Another birthday, another fig season—gone.
Knowing they were mine for a while, though—and that I have a friend perceptive and generous enough to have offered them to me—that’s plenty to keep me warm through winter. And maybe, just maybe, when next season rolls around, I’ll manage to see eye to eye with good Saint Luke and get behind giving some figs away.
