Leftover Love

Thanksgiving was more than a week ago, so technically, any remaining leftovers probably should have gone into the worm bin or the trash long ago. But the bread has been in the fridge and, while it's dry, its still usable, as far as I'm concerned.

On Thanksgiving morning, I made Deborah Madison's Classic Sandwich Bread from her Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. This is a wonderful book - possibly my most frequently visited. Her recipes are just right - the right amount of salt, the right baking time. Considering the variables in ingredients and environment, I don't know how she hits it so spot-on every time, but she does. I've never been disappointed.

This particular recipe makes two loaves. My twist was to make one sweet and one savory. I rolled the dough for each loaf into rectangles. On one, I spread a filling of almond paste mixed with apricot preserves and sprinkled over with finely chopped almonds. The other dough rectangle was spread with a filling of sauteed garlic, some finely chopped fresh rosemary and sage, and grated parmesan cheese.

Both doughs were rolled up and placed into loaf pans. After their last rise, they each got an egg wash and the sweet loaf was dusted with more chopped almonds and the savory, with cheese. They turned out well and made wonderful toast the next day. But the day after, and the day after that, even homemade bread starts to lose its appeal.

So what did I find in the refridge today, but some leftover Thanksgiving bread. There was only a heel of the savory, so small cubes of that went onto my lunchtime tomato bisque. There was more of the apricoty-almondy sweet bread though, and that has now become bread pudding. I had enough bread cubes to comfortably fill 3 1-cup ramikans. Tossed in with the cubes are some chopped dried apricots and even more finely chopped almonds. In a separate bowl, I mixed 2 slightly beaten eggs and 2 cups of milk. To this I added about a teaspoon of vanilla, 1/4 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg, and 1/2 cup of brown sugar. This custard was poured over the bread cubes in the ramekins to cover them. And because I still had the smell in my nose from buying it yesterday, I dusted a tiny bit of ground cardamom over top of each one.

The ramekins went into a baking pan and hot water was poured into the baking dish to make a bain marie. Baked for about 45 minutes at 350 degrees, slightly puffed, beautifully scented, these overlooked leftovers, which were on the verge of being tossed, have been resurrected.

I don't know how it is in your household, but here it is dangerously easy to waste. So we make an effort to avoid this and we try to reuse or use up. I am a spicy, savory breakfast lover. (You all know about my thing with frying an egg and putting it on leftovers of every sort.) I take my lunch to work - another great way to use up; and at least one night a week, Kurt and I have some incredibly disjointed meal of leftover this with leftover that. Worst case scenerio, my pet worms (I keep thousands of the little darlings in a bin out by the garden) will get what we just plain don't want to eat or shouldn't.

Don't get me wrong: I don't advocate eating anything that would no longer taste good or would be unhealthy to eat. And I am not likely to care too much about the occasional prepared food leftover. But that which I cook or bake, if it was good to start out, may well have a second life as a leftover.

Know what else I have left from Thanksgiving? Whipping cream. Just enough to whip and top that bread pudding! Cheers!

Been Around the Block

Its a good guess that anyone who started cooking and baking in the mid to late 60's will recognize the book in the picture above and will relate to the condition that its in. I looked all over the book and there's no indication of the edition number or the date of publication; but a little research shows me that it is likely the 1968 edition because it includes recipes with an International flare to meet the demands of the cooks of that time who were becoming more sophisticated. In my book, you'll find Chicken Kiev, Chicken Cacciatore, Chicken Parisienne, and Island Broiled Chicken. All so tres chic and exotic!

We are having our Thanksgiving meal today, the Friday after, because Kurt had to work yesterday and the roads have been just a bit snowy and icy for me to get to the store, and for our son to get here from the other side of the Big Water. This is fine with me. We buck tradition anyway since this is a vegetarian house that's populated by folk who love the smell and taste of a Thanksgiving dinner. I'll explain our menu later.

The first thing I always do on Thanksgiving morning is bake the pie. (Tradition is tradition and this one is nearly 40 years old, so I feel completely comfortable using the word "always"!) The pie is always pumpkin, and always the recipe from the back of whatever can of pumpkin puree I am using. Oh sure, I've been through my phase of using pumpkin that I have roasted and pureed myself, but when the reults from the canned pumpkin are so good, and time is so short, this is a "quick and easy thing" of which I willingly take advantage.

The crust is always the recipe from the Better Homes and Garden Cookbook. I think that pies are the second baked good that I attempted in my youth, choux pastry being the first. I guess I must have been more motivated to eat eclairs than pie. I have tried many recipes for pie dough - the ones with egg, with milk, with whole wheat flour (in those hippie health food days!) - but I always come back to the simple, basic recipe in BH&G. The only difference today is that it is all butter for me. And because it seems a very good part of the plan when using butter, I chill the dough before rolling it out, a step that isn't part of the recipe in the book.

I don't care for a deep brown on my pie crust, so I watch it like a hawk as it bakes and as soon as it reaches the point where I know I will be happy with it, I cloak the edges of the crust with foil. This is especially important when using butter. I wonder how many pumpkin pies I've made in my life. It has become a fool proof, never-fail thing for me. While some might say this is reason enough to try a new recipe or a different method, I think it is the comfort of knowing that I have been here so many times before that leads me to get up out of bed early on Thanksgiving morning and reach for the rolling pin.

Our meal? Gravy with sauteed meatless ground turkey (The brand is Yves and yes, it's tasty and yes, it tastes like turkey), carmelized onions, and mushroom broth. There will be mashed potatoes, dressing (always, ALWAYS the same dressing that I've been making forever, only because my husband and son demand it. This is one place where I have tried to spread my cooking wings and fly to new places, only to find that there's a rope tied to my ankle and they're pulling me back to that same old dish!). Cranberry sauce cooked down with the juice and flesh of some Satsuma oranges, some home baked bread and the reqisite relishes (in our case the dilled green beans that I put up this summer) round out the main meal. And then there's that pie and the whipped cream that will top it. There's a bottle of Spanish Cava in the fridge and some wonderful Pinot Gris from Lost River Winery in Winthrop, Washington.

The rolling pin that I use is likely as old as the book. Both were wedding presents. Same with the pastry cutter and the crystal dish in which I serve the cranberry sauce. The wine glasses came from a great aunt and we get them out of the cupboard only once or twice a year. The dishes were my great grandmother's on the other side of the family. These well-loved items are part of what makes this annual feast so special. Only my husband, our son and I will sit down at the table to eat, but many "old friends" will have taken part in the preparing and serving of the food.

It Feels Like Family

Its 6:30 in the morning on a Sunday. No one is out of bed but my husband and me. Its not Thanksgiving for another five days, yet this moment has the feel of "Holiday". There's a feast in the making!

I'll explain: My parents, asleep in the guest room upstairs, are nearing the end of their two week visit from Ohio. This afternoon, my sister who lives about twenty minutes away, will come over with her husband and two daughters. Our own son is asleep on the couch in the family room. As soon as I can start making noise in the kitchen, I'll bake a chocolate layer cake to put on lavish display on the cake stand that my dear mate bought for me yesterday. One dish of lasagna is in the refrigerator and the other will be pulled together while the cake is baking. We're having a cold snap outside, but the house will be blessed by the warm oven nearly all day.

Of the assembling group of nine, one has a some dietary needs so there can be no hidden seeds or nuts; three are vegetarians (including the cook so you can guess that the menu will not include meat); one is at the beginning of her teens and is reputed to be a bit of a discriminating eater; several are dedicated athletes and will be hungry by supper. I just plain like to eat.

The main dishes will be two lasagnas: One will be red with a sauce milled free of tomato seeds to velvety-smooth. Added in are onions, garlic, herbs and the deep red flavor that comes from the addition of a nice bit of the organic red wine that one of my nieces brought from her "neighborhood winery" in Missoula, Montana. The other will be white with a bechamel that I'll make some time this morning. Both will have fillings of fresh ricotta and mozarella. There's lovely fresh basil chopped into the ricotta in the red pan. The white dish's ricotta filling will hold pieces of sauteed Chanterelles gathered by Kurt last week and a sprinkling of nutmeg. Good golly. Is it time to eat yet?

Dessert will be the chocolate cake from the recipe that Hershey has on the back of their can of unsweetened cocoa. Their "Perfect" chocolate cake really is. Its one of the easiest cakes that I make and it does wonderfully in layers, sheet, or cupcakes. I have recently decided that I am going to return the layer cake to the spotlight which has so recently been hogged by the cupcake. I like cupcakes, but there is a beautiful formality to a filled and iced layer cake that makes cupcakes look like little girls playing dress up. For us, for this gathering of family, dessert will be perched like a queen on her pedestal.

Some time this early evening, people will pick up plates and fill them. Some will sit at tables and other will balance on laps. Food will be eaten. The piano will be played. Pictures will be taken. Laughter will happen. Except for a few missing members of the family, the menu and the day should be satisfying and complete.

Cleaning Up

Its a hard truth that I make a MESS in the kitchen! I'm not one of those neatnik, sensible kind of cooks who washes up her dishes as she goes along. I'm more like the out of control drummer who starts riffing in the middle of a song and just can't be stopped for anything. The picture above is the result of a quiche I made for dinner last night. What you don't see is the egg that cracked up on the counter, the flour on the floor, and the cheese and milk still waiting to be put back into the fridge.

While it hasn't always been the case, I have come to love cleaning up in the kitchen. I feel a comfortable satisfaction at taking a scene like the one above and taming it back to clean. As a kid, my four siblings and I were responsible for washing the dishes after supper. We grumbled and argued, but we also had some great fun. I became the world's best towel snapper in those years. I could raise a welt! And Mom, remember how we used to lock the door behind you when you would go out into the freezing winter weather to take out the trash? We were hilarious!

Now, in my more mature years (yeah, that's a laugh), I mostly enjoy just dipping my arthritic old hands into the hot, soapy water. But I also love looking out the window that you see below, often steamed up just as it is in the picture. The sill is covered with little found and precious items including the amazing bones that seem to appear on the forest floor everytime we go mushroom hunting. Outside the window are some of the hundreds of trees that Kurt has planted on our property in the 16 years that we've lived here.

And that quiche? That's something that you can make with almost anything you have in the house. Find a good recipe, but don't be bound by it. My crust was made with a local hard wheat flour that gave it some tooth. I didn't have the classic Swiss or Gruyere, but I did have cheddar and feta. Four eggs, 2 cups of milk, pepper, some thin-sliced tomatoes on top, and a finish with smoked black sea salt; baked about 40 minutes at 375. It was delicious.

And Mom, when you and Dad come to visit next month, I think I'm going to need some help with taking out the trash. . . !

She's Back and She's Hungry

Hi! Did you miss me? Okay, maybe not; but I missed you and I missed writing to you about the food that I'm making and the meals that I'm eating. Where have I been? Have I been okay? Well, yes. Thanks for asking. I've been fine, but busy. Happily, part of what has kept me so busy has been cooking for people that I care about; and nothing boosts my bliss better than time spent cooking, baking, chopping and stirring.

In mid-September, we hosted a picnic for some friends from the Seattle Tibetan community. I began cooking and baking for that event a couple of weeks in advance. I'll admit that I was a little nervous. These are new friends and this was the first time we had invited them to our home. And this was the biggest crowd that I've cooked for in a number of years. Although our lovely guests offered to bring food, I was determined to do all of the cooking. We have been fed and cared for at many of their social functions and I wanted to pay back. In the end, the food was fine and the event was great fun. Remind me to tell you more about it later - especially the Monkey Bread! Monkey Bread, oh how I love you!

We also had a wonderful visit from our dear friend, Jimi. Jimi "gets" food and foodiness. Put a plate in front of him and he will probably eat all of whatever is on it. He graciously put up with a week of vegetarian food and I got the joy of some time off from work to visit and try out some new recipes. Don't let me forget to tell you about the lasagna!

Last weekend, our son came by for a visit and I made some homemade pizzas with a new crust recipe. It was the best ever and the technique for baking it was interesting. I REALLY have to tell you about it sometime! Seems like I have some blogging in my future.

And WHAT is that bowl of gruel at the top of this post? And just WHAT does it have to do with anything? Why, that's my supper and it has absolutely nothing to do with anything except that its food and I enjoyed eating it. It was all I needed after a lovely lunch at a fave spot, the 74th Street Ale House. The homey surroundings, satisfying food, and good pints made for a nice break. I'll fill you in on the details later!

Shroomin' on a Summer Afternoon

We have been out with our friend, Lynette, to hunt the wild chanterelle on three occasions now. No guns. No bows and arrows. All you need to bag these babies is a pair of rain pants and a fairly decent sense of direction. WHERE we hunt them is a major secret, so don't ask. I am allowed to tell you why we hunt them. They are DELICIOUS! And free!

Foraging is, in many ways, more rewarding than growing. It is, of course, our ancestral aspiration to find or hunt our food rather than to pop a seed into tilled earth and nurture it into sustenance. Without really thinking about the difference between the two acts, when we are out gathering mushrooms, I can feel that distinction keenly. What I hunt to eat is meant to be there. It is of that place. It is mine because I find it and harvest it. It tastes like the soil and the air and the trees that grow nearby. I have to work to find the food, but the work is done almost as much with my eyes as with my back or my legs. I have to see it before I can gather it. If you've ever picked a bowl of wild blackberries, or if you have thrown a line in water to catch a fish, or even found an egg hidden in a secret corner of the barn, you may know what I'm talking about.

I honor the growing of food, too, but as often as not, what I plant results in failure due to slugs, a tomato that never ripens, or a $10 bowl of salad (if you put a value on my time spent weeding and watering). While pulling a ripe carrot out of the ground is wondrous, finding a mushroom nestled and nearly hidden in moss on the forest floor is magic.

Chanterelles are the only mushroom that I have ever hunted. I feel comfortable with them because they are distinctive in appearance and there are few mimics that would be dangerous to eat. And to be sure, I have always had someone knowledgeable looking through my basket at the end of the search to make sure I haven't been fooled by a look alike. Chanterelles are a natural companion to eggs and cream which, if this isn't the first time you've read my blog, you know are ingredients that are always near at hand for me.

When we went out most recently, it had been too dry and was perhaps a bit too early. What mushrooms we found were small and there weren't many of them; but we managed to find enough to perfectly fill a quiche. Their compactness actually made them a bit more substantial and denser in texture than the hand-sized chanterelles that we found last fall. When I sauteed them before throwing them in the crust, I only softened them enough to leave them with a bit of tooth. With the cream, the Swiss cheese, the grate of nutmeg, it was a delight to behold and even better to taste. And maybe best just to realize that what we ate that night, we foraged that day.

Aftermarket

Most summer weekends, if you're looking for me, check in the kitchen. Specifically, check in the vicinity of the stove where I'll likely be canning, jamming, pickling or otherwise preserving that which I can buy at the farmer's market, grow or forage. I dry things. I freeze things. Its hard work. It makes me sweat and it makes my back hurt. It has been known to make me cranky.

This summer for a variety of reasons, I've done none of that, and I have, in fact, missed it. So today, with summer nearly over, I got a late start. So far today, I've pickled beets from the garden, made and frozen several freezer trays of basil pesto, and slow-roasted the tomatoes that you see above. These tomatoes are something I've done for a couple of years now and I know that I would miss them terribly come February if I don't get them done this year, too.

The recipe is simple: Get your hands on as many meaty Roma tomatoes as you can. I bought a nice large bagful from one of my favorite market veggie vendors, Ken. Wash and core them. Cut them in half length-wise and seed them. Lay them on cookie sheets that have been rubbed with olive oil. Drizzle more oil over them and then sprinkle them with sugar. For two cookie sheets of cheek-to-jowl tomatoes I used about 2 tablespoons of sugar. Avoid the temptation to salt them as that will draw out too much moisture. Crack some pepper over them and pop them in a 250 degree oven for about 3 hours.

You'll know when they're done when you can no longer resist taking a taste. The smell of sweet roasted tomatoes will fill your house and make you crazy. They are delicious on a slice of fresh bread, chopped into pasta or, as I enjoyed some today, eaten out of hand while standing over the kitchen sink. They are moist and get slightly chewy and even a bit crunchy on the edges. Divine. The pan you see in the photo above is now in my freezer. I like to freeze them individually and then bag them up for throwing in with roasted root vegetables during the dark heart of winter.

There's much that I didn't get done today that I meant to - there are blackberries to pick and can and green beans to pickle with garlic and dill. But of course, I'm tired and my back hurts and I'm a bit cranky and there's always tomorrow. . .

Blackberry Bobby

Anyone who has spent any amount of time in the Pacific Northwest probably knows that we are cursed and blessed by an abundance of wild blackberries. Not the tiny, tart native blackberries, which on our property are sparse, but the introduced Himalayan Blackberries. We are almost as famous for our blackberries and our Rent-A-Goat schemes for getting rid of them as we are for our rain. The Himalayan Blackberries are large and juicy, sweet when they are ripe, and flavored like the sun, the air, and the soil of this place. For me, nothing that grows here is as demonstrative of terroir as blackberries. Their taste speaks to me of August and September on our little farm. This time of year in the region is special for a number of reasons: these are the warmest and driest months and, for reasons I don't completely understand, there are sunsets and sunrises that are without comparison. I can taste all of that in our blackberries.

Now all that being said, the truth is that long before I ever considered growing up and moving here, I fell in love with the flavor of these fruits. As a kid in Ohio, I don't remember being viciously scratched by blackberry brambles. I don't remember the vines coming up in any patch of ground left untended for 5 minutes. I can't recall people bringing in trailer loads of goats to clear abandoned property. But I do remember Blackberry Bobby.

Grandma Wilhelm made Blackberry Bobby and while I don't think I ever talked to her about it even once, I make it too. It is simple, peasant, pioneer food. It is something you make to use up leftover bread and a free crop that you can forage without much effort. It is a sweet, All American version of the Italian dish, Panzanella. Here's how I make it based on my observations of how it tasted when Grandma made it:

In a frying pan, melt a good size piece of butter. For two of us, I might use 2 tablespoons. (My Dad swears that his Mom made it with bacon grease and that's the only way to do. I believe him, but I really can't recall ever tasting bacon in this simple dish.) Throw in some cubed white bread. Tonight it was three slices. In my opinion, the denser and sweeter the bread, the better. Airy sourdough would not cut it in this dish. Give the bread a little fry and then add blackberries, making sure there are enough of them to release juice adequate to soak into and not quite be contained by the bread. For the two of us, I used about a pint of berries. Then sugar. I'm not even going to tell you how much sugar to use. Just keep adding it and tasting until you can imagine being about 10 years old and thinking that this is the BEST dessert ever invented. Cook it long enough to liberate the juices and then serve it hot out of the pan.

In our family, we would eat this with milk poured over. It was probably whole milk until sometime in the 60s when some yahoo convinced the moms of the country that full fat milk was some kind of communist plot and that we all needed an immediate intervention with the skimmed version. Tonight, on our steaming dishes of purple pudding, it was heavy cream. (Its okay, Mom. It wasn't a lot of cream. Just enough to mellow the flavor and cool things off.) It was a clear, crisp memory in a bowl. It was 50 years ago in Grandma's kitchen on a Sunday evening in late summer. Like yesterday.

Just who this Bobby character was is a mystery, but he inspired a fine dessert and a good reason to keep the goats out of the blackberries.

Eggs in Nests

We have kept chickens for going on 15 years now. They amuse and entertain us. Even better, they give us some of the most perfect food imaginable. What better to gently fry up and slip over leftover pasta or Matter Paneer or pizza? Eggs are the perfect solution to getting home late from work and needing something quick and delicious. And breakfast without eggs?? Forget about it. A quiche, a scramble, frittata, or flan.

Eggs are the foundation for many of my favorite eats. If you have eggs, some butter or oil, a little salt, maybe some pepper - you have a meal. If you also happen to have some goat cheese, maybe some spinach, some cooked potatoes, some roasted peppers - you have a feast. With some sugar and cream, creme brulee can be your next dessert. There really is nothing in my cooking repetoire that can't be mixed into or go under an egg. Egg - I sing your praises!

We collect the eggs each evening when we shut down the barn. In the summer there are usually between two and six to bring in. I can carry four eggs in the palm of my hand and if I balance one more, I can usually manage the evening's take and still have one hand free to slide the barn door closed. The dogs, ever vigilant, are always nearby to deal with disaster clean up should I ever drop one. In the event that I'm feeling particularly clumsy or the egg count should exceed the one hand limit, there's always a shirt front into which I can tuck the delicate globes for the trip to the fridge.

Even beyond eating them, the finding the of eggs is most pleasing to me. After all these years, it never fails to bring on a childish sense of delight when I look into the corner of the hay room and see a stash of lovely, pearly eggs. Our different breeds of chickens lay either tan, brown, blue or green-shelled eggs. Its an Easter egg fantasy carried all the way into mid-life. If they have just been laid, they are warm - a special pleasure to cradle on a cold evening. They look like poetry rolled together into the low spot of a nest. When I see them, I am not thinking food or ingredients. I am thinking perfection of structure, color, and design. Somewhere, buried deep in my genetic code, I'm probably also aware of the essence of continuity that is represented in the sight.

And nests. I collect them out of trees in the fall when they're no longer needed for raising the babies. I buy them made out of pine needles and put them on a shelf to hold stones and beach glass. My friend, Lauren, recently gifted me with the one in the picture below which she crocheted out of strips of quilt fabric. It holds an intact robin's egg that I found fallen to the moss below a fir tree in the back yard and some finch eggs from another friend's caged pets. I am pretty sure I love nests because they represent what I most desire from my own home life: comfort, warmth and a low spot that I can roll into and where I can come to rest.

Bits of Bright Colors

My friend Karen had the most beautiful and skilled hands. From the time I met her when I was a teenager and she was just graduated from college and newly married, Karen was keenly interested in making things with her hands. She was particularly comfortable with a needle and thread as her instruments, although she could whip out knitting needles and crochet hooks with equal ease. She was drawn to color and texture the way I might be drawn to sweetness and salt. They were the elements with which she played.

When Karen became sick about a year and a half ago, her ability to speak was compromised, she developed double vision, and walking became difficult. However, on one visit some 9 or 10 months back, I found her knitting a complicated cabled sweater pattern in a gorgeous Chinese red color. She was knitting more slowly than usual, but she was doing something that I would not have been able to do on my best day. The desire to create hadn't diminished.

Karen would always find the tiniest spot of color in my outfit or jewelry and want to check it out. I wear a blessing cord on my wrist. Its a piece of shiny string knotted by a Buddhist monk and imbued with his blessings. Karen's eyes and hands would wander to that spot of red or yellow and she would rub it between her fingers checking for fiber content and feel. It was a routine with us.

This past week, I made my final trip to spend time with my darling friend. When I arrived, she was in the hospital, no longer able to speak or move under her own strength. As I leaned on the rail of her bed, I watched once as her eyes went to the yellow cord on my wrist and her hand moved just a tiny bit. I put my wrist down near her hand and lifted her fingers to the cord. There was a touch, ever so slight. In my heart, I felt that at that moment, she was both blessing and blessed.

The end of Karen's journey began on Wednesday evening shortly after moving to a hospice facility. For a few hours in the late evening, she was surrounded by the women who had loved her for years and had provided sweet care and protection to both Karen and Jimi throughout her illness. Her quilting friends. Women who had become friends sitting and sewing together, now encircled one of their own, massaging her arms and legs and singing quietly in sweet high voices. There would be times with hushed chatting, even soft laughter, but always hands that stroked her arms and legs and kisses that brushed her forehead and cheeks.

My sweet sister/friend, my executive chef, my mentor and confidant has gone on, but look at how much beauty she has left in legacy. While I was away, Kurt obtained many strings of Tibetan prayer flags to place outside in the sun and wind. They are made up of squares of red, blue, yellow, green and white cloth that are imprinted with text and images meant to spread goodness into the wind as they break down. I smiled as I opened the packages of brightly colored, stiff, gauzy new fabric. I imagined that beautiful, skilled hand reaching over to rub the cloth between her fingers to check for texture and drape.

Yes, just look at how much beauty our Karen has left us.

Happiness

This time of year, I love to load the kitchen table with ingredients. I am joyfully overwhelmed to see bowls of strawberries and bunches of herbs pulled from our garden, eggs from the henhouse, bundles of greens from the Farmers Market, even hothouse tomatoes from California. Seeing the groaning board covered with the fruits and vegetables of spring and summer, I have a refreshed enthusiasm for trying all of the wonderful possibilities for meals based on these treasures.

Included on my list of things to try is Ema Datshi, the "National Dish of Bhutan". You know. . . Bhutan! The country that tracks its population's Gross National Happiness. The index is based on the Bhutanese peoples' wellness: physical, mental, environmental, social, economic, political and vocational. Looking at my table and its contents, my Gross Personal Happiness soars.

The new abundance of harvested goods, and my love of old bowls (attended to by our wonderful friend, Matt, owner of Mr Johnson's Antiques in Seattle), go beautifully hand in hand. The Poblano and Jalapeno peppers in the picture above are in a sweet old bowl I got from his store. I bought the peppers with the intention of making my first batch of Ema Datshi.

It is a chili-cheese stew that looks a lot like chili con queso - but chilier. You can adjust the heat of the dish by using milder chilis, thus the Poblanos. It is traditionally made with yak cheese (and yes, it is actually nak cheese, naks being the female of that critter) but since that isn't readily available here, most recipes substitute Danish Feta. I tasted nak milk, cheese, and yogurt in Nepal several years ago and it is delicious - creamy and rich with a mild flavor. How sad that I can't have a nak in my backyard. I ate Ema Datshi prepared by a wonderful Tibetan cook a couple of weeks ago and she included mushrooms. I have seen recipes that call for tomatoes and some that contain potatoes. As with so many traditional dishes, what goes in is what one has on their table.

The strawberries in the picture below came from our garden and they were part of breakfast this morning alongside French toast made with some splendid Cinnamon Bread from Morningside Bakery in Port Orchard, Washington. Delicious! French toast with strawberries for breakfast. Ema Datshi for dinner: Happy, Happy, Happy!

Red Stuff

Enough with the sweets, already. Let's talk savory. And spicy!

In our house, in our fridge, there are places of high honor accorded the Red Roosters. Garlicky, smooth Sriracha and her more vinegary, pasty, and hotter big brother, Sambal Oelek, live there. To me, breakfast isn't worth getting up for unless there is an egg involved. And an egg doesn't sit on my plate unless one of the Huy Fong kids is close at hand.

You can buy these two condiments at most groceries in our area. And while they seem, at first blush, to be exotic and imported, they are actually made in California. I started with Sriracha. It was probably an innocent substitution for ketchup set on a breakfast table at some Seattle restaurant. Considering how I feel about Sriracha now, it MUST have been love at first bite.

But Sriracha was nothing but a gateway drug for me. While I was scared of it, I was also strangely drawn to Sambal Oelek. Like something the naughty girls would brag about, secretly knowing full-well that they were too naive for this bad boy. Even the tiniest dab seemed overwhelming.

Yeah. . . You should see how I pile it on now! By the soup spoonful. If I wasn't enjoying myself and my breakfast and the quinoa that I made for dinner tonight and the bean burger that I might have tomorrow - all slathered in Mr. Oelek - I might even feel a little embarrassed by my behavior.

The next step is sure to be Ema Datshi, the fiery hot national dish of Bhutan. Rumor has it that its chili heat will make you weep the entire time you're eating it, and its too good to stop. I'm ready. I've trained with the Roosters.

Happy Father's Day, Pop

Hi Dad! As usual, I waited too long to put a card in the mail. But this year, instead of my usual last-second computer card, I decided to do something different. I baked you a pie! This pie, and this blog post, are my Father's Day greeting to you.

The pie is apple and it has grated sharp cheddar cheese rolled into the top crust. Yeah. . . I thought you might like that. I used a couple of different kinds of apples - Granny Smiths, Cameos, and Galas - because they all bake down differently. I like that partly mushy, partly well-formed apple thing. The filling is apples, sugar, a bit of flour, some cinnamon, some nutmeg and a dash of salt.

For this crust, I used all butter. That's the only thing that I do differently from Mom, because I know she's a Crisco gal. She makes great pie crust, so I learned from the best; but as you know, I'm a little ornery and I have to do things my way! I cut the cold butter (including that extra glob beyond what the recipe calls for) into the flour and used a fork to mix in the water to make the dough. I rolled out the two crusts with the precious old wooden rolling pin that I got as a wedding present so many years ago.

(My goodness, Dad. Do you remember how you and I waited in that back room of the church to walk down the aisle together at Kurt's and my wedding? I was so nervous! I never stopped to wonder until now if you were nervous, too. I was, after all, the first daughter that you had to "give away"!)

Once the filling was in the pan, I grated that cheese and rolled it into the top crust so it was pressed in. Then I laid the top crust over the apples with the cheese side up, sealed it, and baked it. IT SMELLED SO GOOD! And it didn't taste half-bad either!

So consider this your coupon - your chit - your ticket. Next time I come to visit you and Mom, I will bake this apple pie with cheddar cheese in the crust for you. I will do this because you deserve it for putting up with me through all of my goofy, sullen, cranky, bossy, weepy, argumentative years. And I will do this for you because you are a good and generous man and a wonderful Dad. Thanks, Pop. With love, your Rascal.

We *Heart* Smoothies!

I work both in an office in the big city of Seattle and also at home. Because my employer of 20 years is generous and lovely, and because it is a 2 hour commute from my front door to my desk in Seattle, I have the good fortune to regularly telecommute.

For me, the absolutely BEST thing about working from home is being able to make smoothies. Nothing - - really nothing - - beats a smoothie for lunch. It has to be lunch. For me, a smoothie doesn't quite cut it as a breakfast. I must have an egg for breakfast, preferably draped over some leftover from the night before. And dinner has to be cooked or at least chopped. After all, those leftovers that are going under that egg the next morning have to come from somewhere.

My dear friend and food maker extraordinaire, Jean, told me that she and Charlie are smoothie fans; and listening to her, I knew that I wanted to be one, too. I dug around in the cupboard and found my blender. I'm sure it must be nearly 30 years old. Isn't that about 130 in blender years? Happily, I determined that the machine worked, and I enthusiastically set out making my own cold, milkshaky happiness.

If you haven't made a smoothie since the 70s, let me remind you that the most essential ingredient for flavor, thickness, and smoothiness is frozen fruit. I buy the bags of fruit from Remlinger Farms that are labeled "Too Good to Hide" because they are packaged in clear bags. This is a local product for me, I can see the fruit that I'm buying, and it is darned good tasting. I try to always have some strawberries, blue berries or peaches on hand.

After the frozen fruit, its all improv. Most often, I will toss in a small handful of nuts, sometimes a banana, pretty regularly a dollop of plain yogurt, from time to time a spoonful of oat bran or wheat germ, occasionally a tiny bit of jam, rarely a drizzle of maple syrup, and frequently a substantial squirt of honey. Applesauce, cooked rhubarb, watermelon, toasted coconut or a chunk of fresh ginger are all delicious additions. My Mom, who I've recently enticed into my smoothie cult, likes to use sherbet. For liquid, I usually use milk, but just think of the possibilities: juice, coffee, chai tea, soda water. Go crazy - use what ya' got.

So far, the only thing I've tried in a smoothie that was a failure was peanut butter. It gave the smoothie a slick consistency that just wasn't appealing. Better to stick with whole peanuts if you want that flavor.

We slurp our smoothies out of quart canning jars - the largest drinking receptacles in the house. I wrap the jars in a cloth napkins, knotted like the scarves of tidy Boy Scouts, and stick straws in them. Nirvana. Bliss. Lunch.

It Must Be Magic

How do they do it? How do Joy the Baker and Heidi from 101 Cookbooks, and for cryin' out loud, Molly of Orangette, do it??? Those are all fabulous food blogs, that are well-written, with creative, thoughtful recipes and they seem to be newly posted almost daily.

How do they do it?

They are Martha Stewart to my Erma Bombeck. (Sorry, Erma.) They are Frank Shorter to my Rosie Ruiz (okay, that's too esoteric); they are the Duke of Wellington to my little, short Napoleon. They look so, so good and I look, well, not so good.

I even have a professional photographer on staff who insists that I not worry my pretty little head over taking pictures for my old food blog. Kurt would take pictures of every pot of water I ever boiled if I asked him to - bless him; but when the glisten is on the roasted garlic and the steam is rising off the pasta, I want to eat, not run around the house looking for the best light.

So tonight, with a tummy full of good food from Luna Bella, the pizza joint that we enjoy so much in our little town, I will post this writing and a photo that has mostly nothing to do with food. These are our resident dogs, Minnie and Buddha, who work with me in the kitchen while I cook - always on alert for dropped tidbits in need of cleaning up (read: always under foot). They are wearing flowers to honor the birthday last July of the Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism.

Life is short. Live, smile, breathe, cook, eat, scratch some dog ears, tell someone every single day that you love them and really mean it. And, if you're a food blogger, don't forget to do a new post every so often, or else your Mom's first words to you on the phone might be, "When are you going to write again?"

Bacon Bits

No photo to go with this post as we have just returned from a week long trip to the Midwest and Washington DC area where we visited with parents and friends.

Usually, when I eat in a restaurant, I have no problem with my vegetarian issues. Salads, some soups, an occassional bean burger, all make it possible to eat well in most any place.

After sitting down for a late dinner (or supper, as its called there) in an Ohio chain restaurant, I asked if they could make me a Cobb Salad without meat. "Sure. No problem." the 18 or 19 year old waitperson said.

When she brought my salad to the table, it was heaped in a bowl and covered with chopped bacon. I figured that the word just hadn't made it from the waiter to the kitchen to hold the animal protein. "Oh, I thought you were going to make me a salad without any meat." I whimpered.

The server looked at me, then at the salad, then back at me with the kind of withering and incredulous look that only someone her age can manage without even the smallest shred of self-doubt and said, "Its just bacon." Touche. I quit whining and ate. Dad got the bacon.

JELLY ROLL JIVE

This weekend, a few of our wonderful neighbors had a locally grown tapas night. If you follow my husband's blog, you know by now that we really like our neighbors. We are the oldest among them, but possibly the least mature. Kurt has been known to don a knight's helmet and shield to do battle with the young son of one of the families. Its a tough job, but he's happy to do it.

Among the glorious items brought to the table by the different families, was asparagus from Eastern Washington, local salad greens, a quinoa salad with home grown and dried black beans, several home-baked breads, and a potato frittata (or tortilla, as we were in a Spanish tapas mode).

The only things local about the cake that I took were the eggs. Our hens are old and cranky, but they each manage to give us an egg every couple of days. The cake those eggs helped leaven was a Jelly Roll or Roulade. I haven't made a sponge cake in ages. The recipe I used is from the Better Homes and Garden Cook Book. You know the one - the 3-ring binder with the cheery red and white checked cover. Any self-respecting woman born in the 50's and married off in the 70's knows the one I'm talking about.

What got me thinking about the cake was a walk that I was taking through food blog world one day when I ran across a Mascarpone cheese frosting recipe. The only revision I made to Ms. Stewart's Mascarpone icing recipe is that I added some of my own strawberry jam for a little more flavor and a sweet pink color. After the final roll up, I frosted the cake with a thin chocolate gloss and piped some of the leftover filling over the top. One of the more excitable neighbors exclaimed, "Its a giant Ding Dong!"

For the kids (and Kurt!) I made Peanut Butter and Jam Thumbprint Cookies. In these, I used the wonderful local soft white wheat pastry flour from Nash Organic Produce and more of my strawberry jam. I bought the flour at our Saturday Farmer's Market, a treasured part of where we live. The chewiness and the nutty flavor of the flour was great in these cookies.

We ate a lot and laughed even more. We talked about the food, where it came from, and how we prepared it. It was a fun and tasty evening full of good lessons and more.

LETTUCE PRAY

Did I tell you that I'm a vegetarian? (Since only a few friends and family members are reading this, I know there won't be many gasps of surprise.) I have been several kinds of vegetarians in my life. When Kurt and I were young and invulnerable, we were the kind of vegetarians that would share a large platter of pasta, an entire loaf of home baked bread, and an apple pie at one sitting. We both grew to realize our highest body weights ever as that kind of vegetarians. Frankly, I just don't get it. Pasta sauce and apples are vegetables and fruit, no?

Now we are the kind of vegetarians who eat vegetables. We haunt the Farmer's Market and the outside aisles of the grocery store. We grow what we can and buy what we can't. Salads! We love salads! To keep you from imagining that I think that I'm holier than thou art, just let me tell you that we also love cream and butter and eggs and anything made with cream and butter and eggs. And wine and beer and the homemade flour tortillas from the local grocery. . . See how this happens? If you're not careful, even a vegetarian can end up as a little fatty.

As we speak, there is a tray of veggies roasting in the oven. Red potatoes, a chopped up garnet yam, some radishes and some darling baby turnips. (And yes, I saved those darling baby turnip greens for another meal.) The veggies were washed, dried on a towel, put into a plenty-large bowl and drizzled liberally with olive oil. Sprinkled with some rather extravagant smoked salt and the classic white, black and green pepper blend with allspice, it was mixed together and spread, not too crowded, on a sheet pan. The oven is 350 degrees. The cook is hungry.

When all is fork tender and lovely, it will go on a bed of mostaciolli with a ladylike crumble of goat cheese over top. If the spirit moves me, there may be some toasted pine nuts in the picture. I love veggies! If this was smell-o-blog and you could have what I have right now, you would say the same. Wait! You can have what I have. Get roasting!

p.s. While leaving a bit of the stems on the darling baby turnips looks chic, be aware that this creates a hiding space for sand. If you don't like that abrasive crunch with your upscale, fork-tender veggies, be sure to rinse well!

A GIRL NAMED SOUS CHEF

I have known Karen since before I was twenty, before I was married, and before I became a mother - all very informative parts of my life. She has been a constant presence in my life through all the decades since we first met. Karen, her husband Jimi, my husband Kurt and I started socializing and quickly became best friends. In the years since Kurt and I moved to the West Coast, they've faithfully made the 3,000 mile trek to see us nearly yearly.

We two couple also traveled together - mostly to the Southwest, where we would rent wonderful houses with stucco walls and tiles floors cool under our bare feet - or to the mountains of the Pacific Northwest where we would stay in rustic log cabins. Most significant, though, is that Karen and I would COOK. In my kitchen, in her kitchen, and in the strange kitchens of all those rented houses, we would cook, and at all times, I was happily and ever, her sous chef.

Karen and I are so different in the kitchen, that it would seem amazing to an outsider that we could even get along. She follows recipes carefully; I tend to think recipes are for wimps. She loves kitchen gadgets; I finally got a Kitchenaid mixer in my mid-50s and still don't own a food processor. She likes her eggs cooked very dry; I like mine just barely warmed through. She is deeply creative where I just muddle along in that arena.

And yet in the kitchen, while we laughed to tears, fought, made up, drained countless bottles of wine, shared our secrets and whispered our fears, we moved past friendship and straight into sisterhood. We became the fully-formed adults that we are today because of each other. While we were teaching ourselves how to make tamales and sushi, we were also learning how to be strong and confident women.

One of the last times we cooked together, the four of us had rented a cabin in the mountains. I made a pizza that was a complete mess. Had it been just a bit worse, it would have gone into the trash and we would have gone looking for a restaurant. But people were either polite or hungry enough to eat it without complaining. This weekend, I made the pizza below. It turned out better than that pizza of last year and Karen, the flour for this dough was a local organic soft wheat pastry flour. Pretty cool, huh? How I would have loved to have you and Jimi here eating it with us!

Today Karen has a disease that keeps her in a wheelchair. She has difficulty communicating and can no longer cook. Now, when I make the trip to her house, I cook for Karen in her beautiful kitchen tricked out with her beloved gadgets. I do my best to make food that I know she will enjoy eating and that will fill her up and bring her contentment. As I poke around in her cupboards looking at the amazing bunch of ingredients she has accumulated, I realize that being the sous chef to my dear, dear sister-friend has been a privilege and a pleasure that sustains me and keeps me growing.

Karen, I think about you at all times of the day, but most especially when I walk into my kitchen to start a meal. There, you are my muse.

Snickerdoodles

Honestly? Some of my first memories - the first events that I can recall - took place in the kitchen. My Mom taught me how to make Thanksgiving turkey stuffing when I was probably 8 or 9 years old. Each time since, as I take cheap white bread and celery in hand to chop into stuffing ingredients, I return to that old kitchen with its enameled metal table and linoleum floor. I am again tasked with something so important that it is almost too hard to bear for someone so young. What is Thanksgiving without dressing, after all? I could ruin the entire day!

Maybe it was that early trial by fire that has led me to continue making stuffing pretty much exactly as I did when I first learned how. Even considering the slightest change can cause a twitch of anxiety. Thoughts of cornbread or oysters in the stuffing can lead to a cold, shivery sweat.

Our son turned 34 this weekend and when I asked him what I could bake for him, he said cookies. Snickerdoodles, of all things. (What?! No chocolate? Was he really switched at birth?) It turns out that it was a great choice. They were delicious and fun to make after probably decades since the last time that I rolled the soft dough into balls between my hands and then shooshed them in cinnamon sugar.

Never let it be said that I am stuck in the past. I am pleased to say that, in my adult life, I've grown to love some foods that I had never heard of or imagined when I was growing up; but there are things like Mom's Thanksgiving stuffing and Snickerdoodles baked for a loved one, that simply cannot be improved upon. Go bake some. Feel good.

SNICKERDOODLES

1 cup softened butter

1 1/2 cups of sugar

2 large eggs

2 3/4 cups of flour

2 teaspoons of cream of tarter

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

3 tablesppons sugar

3 teaspoons cinnamon

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cream the butter and sugar well and beat in the eggs, one at a time. Whisk together the dry ingredients and then mix that into the butter mixture. Mix it all together well.

Scoop up spoonfuls and roll them into balls roughly the size of a small apricot or a really colossal olive and roll them in the combined 3 tablesoons of sugar and the cinnamon.

Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet for 10 or 11 minutes. When they're done, the tops of the cookies will still be a bit soft to the touch, but will no longer look wet. Remove from the cookie sheet right away and cool on a rack.

Why another food blog?

As if the chopping, cooking, baking and eating of food isn't enough, why do so many of us feel so compelled to write about food and photograph it, too? I don't have an answer for that. I only know that given the opportunity, I would lie on the couch all day watching people cook on TV. Or I would wander, undetected, from one food blog to the next - that endless chain of links that are like stepping stones across a wide river of information that I'll quickly forget and never use.

I love to cook. I love to eat. I love to talk about cooking and eating. I am married to an artist. I'm the mother of an artist. They get to create stuff and I want to, too. So, in addition to the chopping, cooking, baking and eating, I'm going to write about and photograph food because I know that somewhere out there, there's another food blog junkie looking for her next fix and she needs me.

The title of this blog come from something an acupuncturist said to me when I went to her for my middle-aged aches and pains. She asked me about my diet and when I told her about my typical day's food, she hesitantly asked, "Don't you think it might be time you started thinking about eating like, well like. . . "

"An adult?" I asked. Her look said "Unh huh."

I could do that. So now I, a born and bred Midwestern lover of food in large quantities of varying quality, am now eating like a bona fide grown up and enjoying the chopping, cooking, baking and eating more than ever. Stay tuned.

Tomorrow will be soon enough

Its late. I'm tired. We had a lovely time at dinner out at the local pizza joint/bistro, attended to by the wonderful Esperanza. Salad so chilled and crisp it almost hurt my teeth. A thin crust Greek pizza with the best olives ever and even dessert of creme Brule and port. Now sleep.