Busy day coming up

Well, only two things were checked off of yesterday's list.  But, there was an impromptu lunch with Cap (the $10 lunch buffet at Mausam, their nan is baked on the premises and, oh, the butter nan is divine).  And, we were very close to one of the yarn shops in town so I popped in and found the "just right" yarn for Sag's hat.  And, our town being its righteous, delightful self, we found Finn's bully sticks "low odor" and "free range".

And this happened:

No more snack-sized ziplocs for my candied pecans!

Peace and love.

P.S.  I have added a third Christmas cookie to my list...

Whole30 :: Day 13

After quite a productive morning and early afternoon, I am hitting a wall of pooped.  Good thing I have some slow cooker goodness in the making and some Sunday night tv to catch up on.

Sag has been craving slow braised meat.  Our farmer's market meat connection, Anthony, doesn't, as it turned out, carry much in the way of stew meats during the summer.  He offered up lamb shoulder chops, so that's what went into the slow cooker this morning with onion, garlic, vegetable broth, rosemary, thyme and some grinds of black pepper.  It's my first time making this recipe and I dug how simple it was to put together...especially, not having to brown anything before putting it in the cooker.

Once the lamb got going and the kids and I breakfasted, I began "processing" veg and fruit.  A lovely organic watermelon (from Whole Paycheck) was cut up, strawberries were washed (also from the store, Gem loves strawberries), and I sauté-steamed a head of cabbage from the farm (with shallot and a half a pepper from the farm).  

I then plucked the bowl of peaches from the fridge.  They had been ripening and ripening and hit that point of just before no return yesterday.  I was too tired to cook, though, so I stuck them in the fridge and hoped for the best.  After some google research, I decided to brush these with coconut oil and grilled them using our cast iron grill pan (an outlet find).  I waited till the pan was very hot and then cooked them on medium-high heat for about three to four minutes on each side, with a lid on the pan.  They looked so pretty, but I was not hungry, so I stuck them back in the fridge.  I am going to serve them with the lamb tonight.  Should be tasty!

This just made me sigh and smile.  Gem came it at some point while I was cooking and spotted half a peach that wasn't going to fit into the pan.  He asked for it and I handed it right over, delighted, because he doesn't often eat peaches.  We chatted and he wandered back to his work and I kept going.  Later, I noticed the pit he'd left right in the middle of the table.  Gem definitely has "absent minded professor" in him.  Some very seemingly simple and practical things just don't click in his brain.  He's also the one who consistently leaves his clothes right where they were stepped out of.

Here is my lunch plate.  Dinner leftovers and the braised cabbage.  I adore the flavor of cabbage, so naturally sweet and earthy.  The flavors are heightened and deepened when the cabbage comes from a local organic farm.  No seasoning necessary, just Spanish olive oil, cabbage, shallot and a bit of green pepper (and a splash of water for the steaming).

Peace and love.

P.S.  My internet awesome of the day.  A fan-made mashup of Breaking Bad and Weird Al:

Stuff

I have slept better for three nights in a row (between 5-8 hours/night).  My body is more leaden today than yesterday and the day before.  My head feels like it's made of papier-mâché.  Not even going to try to understand it.

When in doubt, pretty pictures:

I love our Hario coffee grinder.  It's a perfect little gadget.  The confluence of sensory experience it invites is heavenly: a little muscle, the scent released by fresh ground beans, the shiny dark orbs disappearing out of sight...
 

The Wii U has been very entertaining.  Cool technology.

An example of what happens when the kids and I sleep together.  Three bodies squished together at one end of a vast king-size bed.  That cream colored pillow is mine.  I took this shot after getting out of bed unable to fall asleep one night...from under Sag's leg.

Sis and bro-in-law came over for the start of Gem's birthday season.  I love a special occasion which calls for the making of homemade ranch dip.

Nephew dog Finn is gorgeous inside and out.

Kousa Dogwood.

Late spring canopy.  So grateful the heat wave has been followed by sunny and dry and wonderfully seasonal temps.

Pippa's ruby slippers.

Handmade pappardelle pasta with an organic mushroom medley, micro greens, caramelized onion, black Hawaiian sea salt and quail egg.  At Le Salbuen Cafe.  Yum.

Brioche bread pudding which instantly became my favorite local bite.  Inspired by my Vinny session, I followed my desire to grab some time with my honey and invited him out to a rare weeknight dinner out.  Our intention was to go to the Red Eye (easier on the wallet) but they were closed due to an electrical issue so we wandered across the street to Le Salbuen Cafe.  Yum, yum, yum.

Local architecture.

Evening swinging.

Play ball.

A morning after a night we slept apart.

Gem's breakfast yesterday.  A duo of potatoes.

My loot from Cap's trip to Chicago.  He went to Quimby's and loved it.  In another life we likely could have been very happy living in Chicago.

I baked another pound cake.  Gluten-free and butter-ific.  The littlest common meal-er remarked upon tucking into it: "no, it's not good...it's excellent!"

Our driveway has been ripped up, old pipe being replaced after sewage backed up into the basement one too many times (because ONCE WAS NOT ENOUGH).  Despite its issues, we remain fond of this apartment and are crossing our fingers that we will have another year here.

I love colored glass.  I love old glass.  Kelly was giving away a bunch of old Mason jars and I snagged this beauty.  (Thanks, friend!)

A Facebook friend from high school said these are anniversary jars and pricey.  They are beautiful, either way.

Peace and love.

Out like a lamb

Sheesh.  Nearly a week since my last post.  Clearly, something has got to give.  Stay tuned?

Many of these photos are from walks I've taken with Gem or time spent with Leo.  With the usual suspects of food, drink and home thrown in.  And my new old glasses.

We have a holiday weekend upon us.  If you are/will be celebrating, wishing you lots of love and joy.  Actually, I wish you that whether you are celebrating or not.

I'll be back.  Not to terminate, if you get that reference.

Peace.

Why yes, yes you are chopped liver

Yipee!  The chopped liver is delicious.  It is flavorful, tender and packed with goodness.  The alchemy is stunning.

After I made it yesterday, I was resigned to having made some rookie mistakes and determined that the next batch would be better.  It was too salty, tasted more of ghee than liver, and my preparation of the livers themselves had not been pristine.  I almost followed the instructions in the recipe to a "T" but at the last second decided to follow my instinct and finish mashing with a potato masher rather than just a fork.

Early this morning a thought flickered: perhaps the chopped liver would not be awful.  The ghee would have solidified some, saving the texture which was plain weird yesterday.  Maybe the saltiness would be remedied by "rest".  Magic can happen with a night of refrigeration, this I know.

Wow.  So glad I gave it space and that I didn't spend a night fretting about what I perceived as a "fail".

Happy and grateful today for a local farmer who sells fresh livers from his truly free ranging chickens, for my cultural roots within Jewish foods, and for having a life where I can nourish my body with healthful and tasty sustenance.

Peace and love and warm fuzzies.

What it is...at least in this tiny little corner of it

The opposite of eloquent is what I am.  The opposite of elegant is what I feel.  (Though, come to think of it, have I ever felt elegant?  Not sure...)

So, we have had our closest known encounter with head lice.  It happened last Thursday evening and drama ensued.  This Friday, on the advice our family doctor, we'll all go in and get our heads checked. 

It turns out what do to in the interim depends on who you are.  I have received lots of personally truthful experience- and evidence-based advice.  And not only have these stories been all over the treatment map, some of them have diametrically opposed each other.

I have been grateful for the tips and advice, nonetheless.  We didn't have internet the first couple of days after exposure and we felt very much in the dark.  We picked up a special lice comb and some tea tree oil, but I haven't actually done any combing.  (For those of you who don't know me, at my best...which I have not been lately...I am extremely reluctant to perform tasks which my brain red flags as "tedious".  Prophylactic combing was setting off all sorts of tedium alarms.)

For now, I am sitting tight on the lice.  Hoping that we have been spared.  Trying not to let my itchy scalp drive me crazy.  (The mere mention of the word lice is enough to get my scalp going.)  I have a tendency to pull my hair out anyway (googled it last night and it turns out to be a thing) and there has been a spike in that behavior.

Oy.

Sag still doesn't feel great.  We think he may have a cold on top of the strep.  And the antibiotic wouldn't vanquish the cold.  I seem to have a cold, too.  Or, we're just more externally symptomatic of being run down.  I am not sure.

It's hard to post, to share, to reach out, when there are still thousands of households right in our small town who remain powerless.  Temps have really dipped and people are cold and in the dark.  Some are friends, some are elderly, some are mentally ill, some are homeless. Expand the circle outward and there are people in our county and state who have lost homes and loved ones because of the storm.  Our community is small and I feel confident that no one is falling through the cracks.  But, it's a much bigger world out there, even right next door in Newark.  Cory Booker is truly a superhero.  He is working his ass off trying to make sure everyone in his city is safe and warm.

It's all hard to reconcile.

Halloween, which had been "rescheduled" for this afternoon has not happened.  Sag was not well enough to go out (he cried), Gem decided he didn't want to go out once he realized his brother and usual trick-or-treating partner, Owen, could not go.  Gem has been more sensitive to the de-occasioning of the holiday by the change of date and the state mandated trick-or-treating curfew of noon to 5pm.

Schools in town have not re-opened.  You can imagine the mass confused energy.  That's a lot of kids home for a week with no regularly scheduled activity built into their days.  In direct and more subtle ways, routines have been broken.  We are lucky to be maintaining some of ours, yet the undercurrent of chaos is strong.

I don't even know what I am saying here.  This cold is reverting my brain back to a shell shocked state...or maybe I never quite left it.  Cap did make me laugh earlier today which felt like a burst of light.  Holding that memory like a precious ephemeral thing.

Peace and love.

Equinox hike

I seem to have sprained my thumb and it hurts to use the laptop, so here are some pics of our traditional walk around the pond...without words.

Here we are on our first hike (Summer Solstice 2007).  Here we are on our second hike (Summer Solstice 2008).   Here the third (Vernal Equinox 2008).  The fourth (Spring Equinox 2009).  The fifth (Summer Solstice 2009).  You get the picture :-)