All Activity

(Purely a joke, I'm basically a non-drinker at this point...)

Seems germane... (Cal-Maine is the largest of the five companies that control the US egg market, and makes a useful proxy for the industry at large) https://fortune.com/2025/04/10/egg-prices-profits-cal-maine-bird-flu/

Yikes :

Why is this tiny bag thing giving me Beanie Baby vibes?

plenty of dinky bags @ TJ's this AM. about a gazillion. all colors. No activity @ the table.

And drink as well... The Absinthe Drinker...(many artists depicted absinthe drinkers)...https://www.pablo-ruiz-picasso.net/work-2.php As well as the absinthe glass: https://www.moma.org/collection/works/81307

Picasso was very interested in food and even published recipes in Vogue. He also created many food artworks in paintings but also in ceramics and other media. Here is an article from the BBC on that very subject. BBC Arts - BBC Arts - A feast for the eyes: What Picasso's Kitchen reveals about his art and a couple of recipes from Vogue Haute Cuisine: Picasso’s Recipes from the Pages of Vogue | Vogue

I planted some seeds of some dried chillies I brought back from Malaysia recently. These are locally called cabe keriting - which means curly chilli - they're long and skinny and medium heat. I have no idea what they'd be called here. Every seed I tried germinated! I picked the two best ones and set them here. Hopefully it'll be warm enough inside that I get fruit set. If not, I'm thinking about putting a heat mat under it. On the right is a rhizome - sand ginger, or kencur in Indonesian. I harvested all of my previous crop and then replanted just one of the rhizomes.

We haven't been to Asheville since Helene but wanted to second your recommendation of OWL Bakery. For years, we have been buying their products at the North Asheville Tailgate Market on Saturday mornings. They have two retail shops, as well, and are a must stop for visitors to Asheville.

No, I'm tired of my own stuff, but I'll try a couple of local Maui chocolates. Got a couple of nice bonbons from Surfing Goat Dairy - one honey and one salted pistachio, both good. We didn't love the Manoa bars we got yesterday (too raisin-y) so I picked up a few from Valley Isle today.

Qi Baishi 齐白石 (qí bái shí) (1864-1957) was a Chinese artist from my beloved Hunan. He specialised in the natural, including seafood. Born into a poor family, he trained as a carpenter but privately studied art. When he was around 40 years old, he went travelling around China, finally ending up in Beijing where he died. He also managed to find time to breed, having five children with his wife and seven with his concubine. He was the first Chinese artist to sell an artwork for more than 100 million US dollars, joining the likes of Picasso and Van Gogh. Unfortunately, long after he died. In 2008 a crater on Mercury was named after him, not that there is any evidence he ever travelled there! Today, I took possession of a print of one of his many shrimp paintings. Slightly less than 100 million. More like $7.35 USD, although I could have had it unframed for $1.15. Sorry., it was difficult to get a straight on picture without reflections. I do find it difficult sometimes to ‘get’ Chinese art but Chinese people have the same feeling about western art. Picasso baffles them. However, this one (unnamed) I do like. It is now hanging in my kitchen.

He'll always have something to do. Screw around in the garden until the ball game comes on.😃

My dental hygienist was telling me that her husband planted at least 65 tomato plants last year and she was freezing, canning and dehydrating them up until November. She said she BEGGED him to plant less this year, she took a peek and he's started about 60. So I guess that is less, but still.... 🙂

I completely understand the fear. I have a little too.

Right???!! It gives him something to do in the cold months before fishing .....I think he worries that some won't come up. We can give some away to family members. And there are years that we don't get a ton of tomatoes no matter how many we plant. We so enjoy fresh tomatoes. I dunno. I'm scared lol.

I use a bi-metal blade listed for use with wood, plastic and soft metal. Any bone meal can be removed with a knife or damp cloth as you would if the meat was sliced with a meat saw.

Lamb vindaloo: Brown-fry onions, add pulverized garlic, and then mix in a paste of grainy mustard, vinegar, cumin, turmeric, and cayenne. Brown stewing lamb, add coconut milk and water, then braise for an hour or so. Stir-fried cabbage with fennel seeds: We make this frequently, it is a favorite. Microwave cilantro rice to go with. Vindaloo was also really good mixed with the gorgonzola dip we made for wings last night (not pictured). I can't imagine that vindaloo with creamy gorgonzola sauce has been served too many times in human history.

Yes, we made a reservation, because we are a larger party, but I imagine they take walk ins as well.

Did you take any with you?

@liamsaunt that looks wonderful. Tea at F&M looks great - did you have to book?

Sad to leave Asheville. Next time we will stay longer. We stopped off on the way out of town at Hole Doughnuts, which are, I'm sure, the best doughnuts on earth. There's inside and outside seating. This time it was gloomy and chilly, so we ate inside. All doughnuts are fried to order, and you can watch them behind the counter rolling the dough and frying your doughnuts. The menu has not changed. All are yeasted. There's vanilla glazed, cinnamon sugar, and my go-to: the toasted almond sesame. There is a fourth one that varies weekly. This time it was blueberry. I'm not a person who ordinarily eats doughnuts but if this place existed at home I would weigh 400 lbs. We arrived at our daughter's with an obscene number of doughnuts and two enormous loaves of Owl Bakery bread. If I had my life to live over again I would go to Black Mountain College, which of course is no more, although there is a wonderful museum dedicated to the artists who taught there and their students. That museum is not in Black Mountain, but in downtown Asheville. The current show is lovely.

Holy cow! I could never use that many tomatoes and one radish would be a year's consumption for us I figure to plant one or two Celebrity tomatoes and a Sweet 100. Basil, parsley, dill, rosemary and thyme.

My copy is also falling apart, despite somewhat less heavy use. Might just be a poor binding. My notes by that recipe state, "Excellent! Family loves!"

Ronnie has tons going in the greenhouse. 60 tomatoes are up and I don't know how many peppers. Hopefully not as many jalapeños as last year. I still have a lot in the freezer. Yesterday I planted 300 onion sets--100 each of yellow, white and red. And 3 rows of radishes. I did very little today. I am sore lol.

Beautiful!