298 replies to this topic

[balmagowry]

Oooooh, Lucy, you little devil.

[Carolyn Tillie]

Congratulations... couldn't have happened to a nicer person!!! I'm sure your blog will be full of your inimitable wit and erudite references (at least that is what I am hoping for)!!!!

Also, can't wait to see your picture of...


ta - da !!!!




Coffee Milk!!!!

[johnnyd]

Does this mean I get my sleep rhythms back to normal???

Edited by johnnyd, 23 April 2004 - 09:06 AM.

[balmagowry]

Does this mean I get my sleep rhythms back to normal???

Funny you should ask. Not entirely.

I keep somewhat peculiar hours these days - I will explain more about this later - so although it is now noonish, EDT, my day has just begun.

Before any food is seen, I must walk my faithful dog, Luke.



Then he and Murphy



must be fed.

And then I embark on the business of the day, starting with yogurt and coffee. There will probably be a bit of a time lag between meals and postings. We shall see, when I'm more awake....

Edited by balmagowry, 23 April 2004 - 07:08 PM.

[bleudauvergne]

Murphy looks like one cool cat. What flavor cat food does he eat? :opens bag of cheetoes: Ahhhhhh.

Edited by bleudauvergne, 23 April 2004 - 09:34 AM.

[hathor]

Blog on!! And, we get pets too!! Wonderful. Looking forward to the coming week.

[SobaAddict70]

Could you please post a bit of an introduction -- to those of us who are joining you for the first time?

May the Schwartz be with you.

Soba

[JosephB]

Can Luke come over to play with Eubie (Hubie)?

[bleudauvergne]

Save us Soba pan cannoli, you're our only hope!

Edited by bleudauvergne, 23 April 2004 - 11:07 AM.

[balmagowry]

Could you please post a bit of an introduction -- to those of us who are joining you for the first time? 

May the Schwartz be with you.

Soba

Soba, dear, by the time I'm done with this you will know more about me than decent people oughta know! I still have to drag it from the pea brain to the keyboard, but what's writing itself in my head makes me feel like - was it Jules Feiffer who wrote "My World and Welcome to it"? I'm only sorry I didn't get it together to start a bio thread before embarking on this adventure....

Actually, I'm caught just slightly off guard. I have to admit I did have an inkling that I'd be up next... but for some reason I was convinced I was starting tomorrow, not today, so I'm trying to clear my decks in a hurry, the better to devote myself to blogification (blogifaction?).

Here are some extremely bare bones to start with (I've dropped 700-plus posts' worth of hints and details all over this place, but have yet to index links to them!). My Actual Name is Lisa Grossman, and I am a hopeless food- and food-history nut. I live, garden, sail, cook and write on the South Shore of Long Island - mostly by the shores of Babylon (where we sat down and wept for thee, Zion) on the Great South Bay, but also at West Gilgo Beach, which is part of the Atlantic barrier beach, about half-way between Jones Beach and Fire Island. You may start the Pity Party any time you like. People ask me why I never go away and take a vacation, and I answer that it's because I live in a place where other people would go for their vacations.

It's a little early in the season yet, but in the course of the coming week I will try to show you something of the local goodies that fall to our share because we are so lucky as to live here. That's one reason I've subtitled this blog "Back to the Future": to give you the full picture I may have to indulge in a little time travel, because right now the water is still a little cold for clamming, the crabs aren't running yet, the wild blackberries aren't ripening yet, the garden is only just waking from its winter sleep. Since it's in a good cause, I hope I may be indulged thus far. In fact, I hope I may be indulged farther than that - but of that more anon. (Sorry for the highfalutin lingo; it is Shakespeare's birthday, after all. Actually, though... I really do write like that. Oh well.)

The work which I ought to be clearing from my decks right now instead of enjoying myself telling you about me me me me me... happens at the moment to be the re-design of a web site for a company in Mallorca (another long story). This is the vestigial remnant of my day job as owner/operator/chief cook and bottle-washer of a tiny computer consulting company called Gordian Knot Services, Inc. Kept me in shoe-leather for about 15 years, but I gradually strangled most of it because Bill Gates was spoiling my fun to an increasingly infuriating degree. So here I am working from home, and trying to figure out which book proposal to develop next. (This reminds me of something from Lewis Carroll, but I will NOT digress now.)

As some of you know, my first book proposal met with an extraordinary and unprecedented fate, and led exactly where we wanted it to: Lobscouse & Spotted Dog. It was a wild and marvelous ride, and my mother and I had more fun doing it than anyone can possibly imagine. And once the book was published there was the lecture-and-tasting circuit, mostly for maritime museums and groups of culinary historians. That, in fact, is how we became culinary historians, and acknowledged experts in our one peculiar niche. Who knew? In the Patrick O'Brian world we were known as The Amiable Sluts; Clarissa Dickson-Wright dubbed us The Two Rat Ladies. From L&SD, then, we branched out, farther into the past and the world, seeking the esoteric and the quirky, writing and lecturing about it. It's during this time that I developed my obsession with Careme; I am still hoping, before I die, to finish translating his L'Art de la cuisine francaise au XIXeme siecle (I feel very weird eschewing diacriticals, but I gather that's policy here - and it do make things go faster). Be it understood that before "finish" comes "continue" - haven't done much, yet. But there's time - I hope.

Not all that much more to tell, really. My co-author/colleague/twin/buddy/mother died a year and a half ago, and I am gradually putting some of the pieces back together and figuring out what most writers already know: that writing is essentially a solitary act. It wasn't news to me; but knowing it is one thing, living it another. The first fruit of this discovery is the article about the Borgias that I have been plugging so relentlessly; it was originally my mother's idea, but I ended up writing it without her, a sacred trust of sorts. The garden in which I grow herbs and vegetables and (edible) flowers is also hers, another sacred trust.

So much for "extremely bare bones." Be warned now: whenever I say (sincerely!) I'm going to be brief... I end up running on at length. I love to paraphrase Pascal: I'm sorry I wrote you such a long letter; if I had had the time I could have made it a shorter one.

Let me go clear my decks. I've already photographed the whole breakfast routine in exhaustive detail; shall be back a little later and post same.

Thanks for the Schwartz, Soba. Remind me to tell you about Paul Monette.

[balmagowry]

Can Luke come over to play with Eubie (Hubie)?

He'd love to. His, um, summer haircut yesterday was rather more drastic than I wanted it to be - from looking like a bear-cub in his woolly winter coat he became an almost bald dog in a trice, and I think he's a bit self-conscious about it, even though he's the least vain cocker I've ever met. But he'll be presentable again soon....

[balmagowry]

And oy, where are my manners? Thank you, Carolyn, Hathor, Joe, for your kind welcomes and encouragement.

And Lucy... !

Edited by balmagowry, 23 April 2004 - 07:11 PM.

[Jensen]

He'd love to. His, um, summer haircut yesterday was rather more drastic than I wanted it to be - from looking like a bear-cub in his woolly winter coat he became an almost bald dog in a trice, and I think he's a bit self-conscious about it, even though he's the least vain cocker I've ever met. But he'll be presentable again soon....

In the meantime, Luke can come and play with Streaka and Dayton. They both have "bald thigh syndrome" to a certain degree (Streaka more than Dayton) and so an "almost bald dog" would fit right in. To give fair warning though, Tighe and Rogie do tend to flaunt their furriness to the others...

I'm quite looking forward to peering in on your life in the coming week (especially the yogurt aspects of it ). I think a week at the shore is just what we need after our time in France.

[docsconz]

Fantastic choice, Lucy!

The things one learns about people! I'm very excited to be conversing online with another Patrick O'Brien nut, especially a published expert in the culinaria of that epoch.

Lisa, my sincerest and deepest condolences on your loss. I have lost both my parents and while life goes on, I will always miss them.

Lisa, You have a lot to live up to after Lucy (Lord knows I couldn't), but somehow I suspect that you will do it with flying colors.

All the best,
John

[johnnyd]

Joined: 13-February 04

I recall that this particular 13th was a Friday!

To your fellow eGulleteers pay you pennance for so lucky a choice!

Blog on!

PS: No clamming? Any oysters from the Sound yet?

[SobaAddict70]

You know, for some reason I thought you lived in either England or France. Or maybe someplace on the West Coast. Must be your avatar. heheh.

Good to know you're local.

I've only been to Fire Island once. It was a weekend of cooking food brought over from NYC -- along with locally grown tomatoes and peppers. My boyfriend at the time had a vegetable garden in his bungalow in Cherry Grove.

Soba

[Jake]

Lisa, I am really looking forward to your blog as I have enjoyed MANY of your posts I've come across! Besides any dog-lover/owner has to have a sense of humour. (We have 3)

Looking forward to a week at the shore....

[Carolyn Tillie]

As some of you know, my first book proposal met with an extraordinary and unprecedented fate, and led exactly where we wanted it to: Lobscouse & Spotted Dog.

That is YOU????? OHMYGOD! A treasured book on shelf, tobesure!

I had no idea...

[GG Mora]

I anticipate with 'bated breath. And I'm fastening my seatbelt as I type. Go, girl. :wheee:

[ruthcooks]

Hello, Lisa,

May I take this opportunity to tell you how many snickers, chortles, "oh, no"s and downright entertaining moments I've had reading your posts since you joined e-Gullet? Don't apologize for the length of your posts, they're wonderful. From the more esoteric of your historical ponderings to your irreverent humor (my highest compliment), I enjoy it all. Looking forward to your blog.

[GG Mora]

Oh, and though 1st place is yet to be announced, should we assume you'll soon have a Golden Gully with which to accessorize your blog?

[bleudauvergne]

Hello, Lisa,

May I take this opportunity to tell you how many snickers, chortles, "oh, no"s and downright entertaining moments I've had reading your posts since you joined e-Gullet? Don't apologize for the length of your posts, they're wonderful. From the more esoteric of your historical ponderings to your irreverent humor (my highest compliment), I enjoy it all. Looking forward to your blog.

I second that!

[jayhay]

Congratulations Lisa!

I have your book on my shelf.....& now really must try your recipes for:

DROWNED (BOILED) BABY
DOG'S BODY
SOUSED HOG'S FACE

Yum!

Edited by jayhay, 23 April 2004 - 01:02 PM.

[ms. victoria]

Yay, Lisa! I am very much looking forward to this week. Your book got me through an awful winter (and not just the weather) in Washington State. I saw it at the library and kept renewing it for weeks.

[GG Mora]

Aha!

She shoots...she scores!

Congratulations!

[StInGeR]

After reading the beginning of this blog and bleudauvergne's, I think I'm going to rename my foodblog "inept and inadequate" either that or race out today and buy a digital camera for next time . Seriously though I'm really looking forward to reading this.
Cheers
Tom

[balmagowry]

Aha!

She shoots...she scores!

Congratulations!

Um... Zowie... thank you! Whoa - this one is a surprise. I have to admit I thought my entry for the 20th Smackdown was a pretty decent contender, but... I'd, um, forgotten all about this one. Wow. (I am not kidding, BTW - false modesty is not by any means among my traits, I'm afraid. This knocks some wind out of me.)

COOL!

[balmagowry]

Hoo boy, I can see it now - this is going to be one of those cathartic things, isn't it. Dang.

Well, first of all, gotta thank you again for such warm welcomes and for saying such nice things about L&SD. Yeah, I'm proud of it - and I gotta say, whether you cook from it or not, you should only enjoy it even a fraction as much as we did researching and writing it. So it warms the cockles to know people do.

Docsconz - I knew there had to be some other PO'Bians around here somewhere. A glass of wine with you, sir! And with yez all - bumpers all round, and no heel taps.

Jensen, you're in luck - today was a yogurt day. Pictures follow as soon as I get 'em uploaded.

JohnnyD, for the sake of the Gullet I will dare all and try for a few clams this week, even at the risk of frostbite. I also have some pictures from seasons past, including demonstrations of the use of a toilet plunger for getting steamers, and perhaps even some stuff about the MusselMatic™ that I kept mentioning on the Mussels thread but never got around to describing in detail. Oysters from the Sound - I dunno, though I can inquire. That's the North Shore, don'tcha know, and this is the South Shore. You'd be surprised how fa-a-a-a-a-ar apart they are, ideologically and stylistically!

Soba - Fire Island is lovely - I have cousins, and family history, there. One of my more idyllic memories is a summer afternoon spent visiting friends who had a back yard overgrown with blueberries. One of my ideas of heaven.

Yup, Carolyn, that's me - thought you knew. Figured it'd be up your alley...

Hmmm, jayhay, I'm delighted you have the book but I have to admit that you've chosen some of my least favorite recipes from it, though the names of course make up for a lot. Will be happy to recommend favorites if you're interested. In fact, one of the... no, I'll get to that below.

Blessings on you, Ms. Victoria. That means a lot to me.

StInGeR, I'm not sure what to say. I'm a little embarrassed that Bleu's is the first food blog I've really followed and read - catching up on some of the others is a pleasure I've been promising myself as I sink deeper into the Gullet, but I hadn't gotten to it yet. The thing is, there isn't any rule about washing all one's personal linen, clean or otherwise, in public - I'm a little suprised to be doing so much of it myself, but I think Lucy's blog somehow put me into semi-confessional mood. My life is pretty weird right now, not that it's ever been what you could call normal (whatever that is), and you guys just happen to be on the receiving end. But I refuse to believe that that in any way affects the value of other blogs that have been done from a different perspective. So there. It's already wordier and more maudlin than most, and that ain't for everyone; there've got to be those around here who are merely too polite to say, shut up already with the personal stuff - show us some FOOD.

Which, without further ado, I will.

Weird hours, as I said. Just got back from the gym, and am thinking about lunch; there are a lot of small artichokes downstairs. I'm not very good about lunch. I tend to get focused on what I'm doing, and forget, and the next thing I know, damn, it's at least time for High Tea. That's OK, especially today, because I have no idea when dinner will be. Mr. Boy™ isn't home yet and I don't know when he will be. Dinner may or may not wait until he gets here - we shall see. (And, um, it may or may not end up being Chinese take-out, given my state of unreadiness. ) But I'm getting ahead of myself. Gimme a few minutes to upload some pictures, and I'll show you my "morning" - if you can call it that.

Edited by balmagowry, 23 April 2004 - 07:15 PM.

[John Whiting]

. . . was it Jules Feiffer who wrote "My World and Welcome to it"?

Welcome to Blogland! As one pedant to another, I'm sure you'll forgive me if I point out that it was James Thurber.

[balmagowry]

OK, here goes, then. First of all, to orient you a little more. Here's where I live:

.

In a fit of gimmickiness I took this picture from my boat, because I had promised bleu a picture of said boat. So that's the house shot from the boat, and this



is the boat, shot from the house. (You can start hating me now. It will save time later.) The house is not named. The boat is named Pauline, after my grandmother. A Southcoast 23, 1969 - Alberg design. This is taken from the porch outside my study; those little branches in the lower right corner are part of my white dogwood (the pink one's on the other side). I was going to crop this closer, but then I decided it'd be nice to show you this stretch of the Sumpawam Creek.

I don't miss commuting....

Also, here's what I'm working with. Actually, I'm doing all this graphical stuff at my desktop computer, which is solid and unremarkable - but this



is Shtinky, my faithful vademecum notebook computer, which follows me just about everywhere, though more sedately than Luke. Shtinky ain't the fastest horse out of the gate, but he's compact as hell:



(the blue item on the left is a VHS videocassette, for size comparison) so with a WiFi card he's the perfect writing machine. Can't photograph the camera at the moment, so you can take my word for it: Canon S-20.

Enough of this technical hoo-ha.

To answer Bleu's question, Murphy and Luke have a most un-exciting diet.

When I got Luke two years ago (he's a Rescue cocker spaniel), I learned a lot about animal food and the chemicals in most of the commercial brands, and started giving serious thought to what I was feeding my animals. Apparently there is an extremely high incidence of cancer among pets, and studies suggest... well, you know. Luke is benefiting from this knowledge. Murphy, at 14-1/2, is too old a cat to learn new tricks, I think; but his contemporary Flanagan having died of lymphoma a couple of years ago, I could wish it otherwise. Anyway, Murphy still gets Purina One in the morning, in whatever formula is most fattening. In the evening he gets canned food; the choices here are less exotic than Sissy's, but there is still a certain amount of variety. In fact, I vary the flavor as much as I can from day to day, but I never give him fish. I think this started out being some sort of dietary thingy, but now it's because of his breath. I live here too, you know. So here's Murphy at breakfast:




Luke, as I said, benefits from my newly-rasied consciousness about health and nutrition, so he eats Wellness Super5Mix, which fortunately agrees with him very well. Cockers have particularly delicate digestion, so having found something that works for him I don't vary it at all. Mr. Boy™ laughs at this food because it contains, oy, baby carrots and blueberries. I think it's a little innerness-of-the-outerness myself, but since I'm the one wielding the pooper-scooper I have to keep my priorities straight! I know from experience what happens when Luke manages to get hold of, say, an entire stick of butter. I'm happy with what works, baby carrots or not. So happy that I buy 30-lb. bags



which I then decant into these former-cat-litter-bottles.



This, in my family, is what we call "a Brilliance," and in fact I also use these bottles for storing flour, corn meal, garden supplies, etc. - no limit to their uses. But the real Brilliance, in my view, is the decanting funnel:



Clever, no? Most fortuitously the two bottles snap together - they're a perfect fit. I must have done something right to deserve this! Luke loves it when I decant dog food - every now and then my hand slips and he gets a bonus.

The other thing he loves is the rare occasion when I give him an extra-curricular treat. I make these myself, and keep them in the freezer.



Appetizing, aren't they.... The little round ones are dried slices of Hebrew National hot dogs - answering to a higher authority means no chemicals or preservatives. The others are my own mix of liver, cheese (cheddar), whole wheat flour, ground flax seed, and... I forget. Some egg, I think, and some mint. Can look up the recipe if anyone is dying to emulate - but I warn you they smell pretty vile while baking. Luke, of course, adores them. (Somewhere around here are some others I made for him - peanut butter, oats, flax, etc. Those may be in Gilgo.)

He's a cocker. We called our last cocker "the vacuum cleaner," because they'll eat ANYTHING.

Have just heard from Mr. Boy™ - he should be home fairly soon, whereupon the Dinner Debate will ensue. I shall of course report. Meanwhile, having got some exposition and livestock out of the way, I'm off to prep the breakfast and yogurt-making post.

Edited by balmagowry, 23 April 2004 - 07:18 PM.