racheld

HEY, MODERATORS!!! Somebody kill the "EDIT" button before Ling can fix this!!! She needs to see it in the light of day! I think maybe those last seven "drinsk,s" did her in.

Does the pepper come out the gargoyle's mouth? I googled "pepper grinder music box gargoyle" (getting all the details in) and found one at "RUBY LANE"---Italian, showing just the top few inches in the photo--very similar. Their price is $225.00. You're today's WINNER.

Embarrassing is one thing---inconvenient is another. We had a house once with the switch beneath the sink, but it controlled BOTH the dishwasher and the disposal. And both cords were plugged into the same outlet beneath the sink, as well. It was like some manic ballet---hit buttons on dishwasher, hear GRRRRRRR from the depths of the sink. Stand on your head and unplug one of the two cords in the dark---reach for switch and click it to see what whirred or growled. And the last person who plugged it in might have taken out both in frustration, so the tryouts began, finding which was which. I put a bit of red yarn on the disposal cord, and that was as convenient as it got. Any use of DW required bending and reaching behind the Dawn and the Electrosol bucket. Made me homesick for that screechy old broiler door.

Oh, that CAKE!! OK---I'll give you the old codger-cooks definitions: Grits is grits. Polenta is Mush. Grits is/are a soft, gentle-textured white cushion of food, made of minute sparkles of dried, ground hominy. Hominy began life as corn, but was soaked in a lye/brine to remove the husk and to swell it to popcornish proportions. Hominy is eaten WET, whole, and needs a lotta seasoning. We like it drained, sizzled in butter til golden in spots, and served up with more butter, as a vegetable with peas and cornbread and some nice sliced tomatoes. I like mine for a supper-breakfast, with a little maple syrup or honey drizzled on. The dried hominy, ground into not-quite sand, but more like little flakes of mica-shiny white, is cooked gently in salted water, just the right amount to cook into a lovely almost-mashed-potatoes consistency, depending on how gooey you like your mashed potatoes. That makes a pot of grits. You can make 'em from scratch, straight from the mill, which takes, oh, thirty minutes or so of cook-time. Or you can measure out a cup of water, a little palming of salt, and a quarter cup of grits from the old Quaker box, cover and cook on a barely-there flame for five minutes, and put it on a warm plate beside ham, two eggs fried sunny in the ham drippings, and a big ole cathead biscuit, and offer it to kings and conquerors. Mush, however, is the Grandpa-supper of the South. It's plain cornmeal, ground the same as grits, but of the pure, untreated corn. You could turn around and make a skillet of cornbread or bread some catfish, right out of the same cannister. You cook mush about the same as grits, but you stand and stir it til it's thick. You don't gussy it up much, and until somebody called it polenta, no cook South of the M/D would even admit to serving it on ANY occasion save flu season, Grandpa visits, or to those in highchairs who had no say in the matter. But grits, homely hominy, has always had a place on the table---fish and grits, cheese and grits casserole (Kraft garlic cheese in the little teensy roll), served at many a Southern brunch and wedding breakfast; and of course, shrimp and grits, surfacing at hunt clubs and receptions and anywhere that possesses four dozen martini glasses all at once. And you are certainly a G.R.I.T.S. Girl--you didn't have to ask. You could set down one of your desserts at any Garden Club, Church Supper, WMU or Eastern Star meeting, and SHINE. And anybody who has that hand with piecrust and knows eight hundred recipes for chocolate by heart, up to and including a bubblebath, has her credentials from WAY back.

Need a Roomie?

There's WAY too much beautiful to take in before I've had all my caffeine. The first courses are a definite tie, just perfect renditions of what they ARE. (Just where DOES one purchase an Altoid-Crusher? I can hear wedding registries sitting up and taking notice from here to California). Dessert definitely goes to Chef #1---personal taste, only---I'm not a foam person, and the tart is just outrageous. The ice cream could have been served in a puddle, and the tart would stand out on its own. So it comes down to the Course #2 to decide, and damn the torpedoes re that lonely sandwich. SOMEBODY knew how to serve pulled pork: SLAW ON!!! So that makes my vote a definite: Tie. Happy tie. Great job, you guys. Handshakes and bows all round.

This was just beau-ti-ful. And I wondered if anyone was gonna mention vanilla.

I think I was deconstructed by a Bellini once. Great menu!!! I KNOW who's makin' WHAA-AT!!

I just LOVE this blog---you two have enough combined energy to power a spaceship. And your cooking styles and choices mesh so well---great meals planned, I see. DD brought me my first Pocky last week from our fave Asian grocery. I just looked at the beautiful box for a couple of days--I think it's the exact brown one in the middle row. They were chocolate-dipped crunchy sticks with ground toasted almonds. Then Chris somehow set a big camera case on the box, and it got smushed---but the crumbs are delicious. Then I thought: Ling would make cheesecake crust with this!! Just a thought.

Chris just returned from our neighborhood "Yard Sale Man" sale, which goes on pretty much year-round, though you can't really tell til you drive up, cause there's so much stuff in the yard anyway. He went to reclaim my roll of bubblewrap and I made him promise not to buy anything. He came home with a package---a gift for the lend of the wrap. About eight pairs of cotton socks, and FIVE of them are argyle!!! Not foodish, but VERY funny. Can't wait to see Chris wear them. And last week I did score eighteen pink hand-blown goblets with big old leaves up the sides, very rustic and almost crude, but beautiful. Six even bigger ones to match, but both are too big for wine, I think. We're having our own sale in two weeks. Neighbor is having one as well, and we'll open up the little arbor gate and just let folks stroll through. LOTS of glass gonna go from here, I hope.

It's been a wonderful week, with all the traveling and beaching and ordering of all things from the sea and deep-fryer. And your family!! Traveling with a little one is a thing apart, and I admire all of you young folks who undertake such a pack-a-lot, stop-a-lot, can't-stop-there task. I loved the views of Cape Cod---I think you CAN be homesick for somewhere you've never been. Your PJ is quite a trouper, entering into the spirit of everything with equal aplomb and delight--to whom wet sand is Disneyland and a Wal-Mart basket the Magic Teapot ride. And MoMo---he's reminded me all week of my Grand-Dogs, both big ole Georgia boys, and both sweet and loyal friends. Thanks for letting us tag along on your travels. You and Ellen are both very lucky.

We had a very late breakfast---several cups of cap, the newspapers, and a lazy morning before we sat down to onion/green pepper extra-yolk omelets (Jumbo eggs, and three had doubles). I laid slices of Muenster atop the finished omelets in the skillet and set on a lid while the bagels finished toasting; thick maple bacon, cream cheese with chevre and dried cranberries, chunks of cantaloupe (I think the Decker season may be over---haven't seen one in the store for a couple of weeks )

You may be right. Cape Cod just may be the onion ring Mecca of the world. And the best rings of all time have to be these: They are not just rings, but strips and shreds and long curling loops of crackly-sheathed onion. And I don't think there's a ring on that plate---it's a continuous Moebius puzzle of one infinitely unscrolling, crisp-coated, golden, unforgettably perfect example of the fryer's art. No beginning and no end in sight. What if the apple in Eden had been an onion. . .

Voice from the past saying, "Swingout door, swingout door." That's what we had in the stove I grew up with---a little door the size of a book, which swung on a little pivot-hinge on the right side. The "shelf" within was a quarter-circle little flat wedge which swung out over the floor and accepted VERY small pans. In fact, NO pan that we had would fit well---we made our breakfast toast in a 9" cake pan, which would hold only one slice at a time. So for a family of four, the time spent opening and buttering and squeaking shut was enormous on school mornings. And you could toast only the top side, because my Mother's idea of buttered toast was to put little thin square pats onto the COLD slice of bread, screech it into the oven, and remove it with the bread nicely browned and crisp, except for those four or five anemic little greasy pale spots where the butter sat. So then, the idea came: Make several at once by standing them up against the sides. Which resulted in the above brown-with-white-pocked divots, only slumped into grotesque shapes by the angle of their rest. And of course, the bottom sides were naturally still soft and a mushy sweaty-white. I hated that oven---just making the morning toast (de rigueur, along with bacon and eggs, the "best" thing for growing children) made the kitchen hot until time to cook the noon dinner. I never saw or tasted flat two-sides-crisp toast til I went to college. And until this day, I still can't face bacon and eggs before noon.

Oh, Oh, IVY!!! You're back!! Glad your ribknit is all done, and your feathers unruffled. Loved the piece---the words surfeit and glut and gob kept swimming to the top of my thoughts. And glad you and cousin's car made it back uneventfully. Welcome home.

You can "toffee" the bacon, already on the sandwich---cook bacon, sprinkle on brown sugar, brulee with torch. On the other hand, perhaps that much open fire should be reserved for a better hour. Or more sober moment.

A nice creamy double-shot in a thick white mug, S&L stirred in vigorously as the streams hiss into the cup. One while contemplating the shade patterns of the grapevine cover through the haze of the kitchen window curtain. One carried out to the garden, while DS#2 tilled up several now-exhausted rows of green beans...we had fourteen quarts from two little rows, and lots of teensy ones picked out and left whole for salad. Stroll round the hostas, couple of dips into the crema for my macaw, who looks up eagerly when I emerge from the sunny door with the cup. "MMMMM! Yummy!" he says, then a tentative, "Cookie?" Into the house, caffeine-revved, to put on the first bottomless pitcher of cold, sweet tea with crunchy ice.

More. Soon.

Oh, you poor mis-colored thing!! I hope it's better soon. You think a big slice of beefsteak tomato would help?

And we went again today---we were so late arriving on Wed., I barely had time to see anything in the "Home Arts" building---what we call the "quilts and pickles" exhibits. So today, he went up to the photos, and I did the downstairs for about three hours. Case after display case of rank-on-rank of styrofoam saucers (each with the de rigueur paper doily), holding slices of pie, hunks of cake, great chunks of pumpkin loaf and banana bread and coffeecake; some with daintily-placed hand-dipped candies, pinwheels of chocolate or strawberry or green (I suppose that was mint) swirled through crisp cookie circles; neat squares of homemade fudge and nougat and brownies, made by hands ranging from kitchen pros, great-grandmothers, longtime bakers and cooks, to the newest in the line: 4-H and Girl Scout and Brownie members, setting their rice crispie squares and haystacks and roll-and-slice cookies right out there in contention for ribbons and awards. There were wedding cakes, towering masterpieces of architecture decorated in every rainbow hue, plus some jewel tones and gold-brushed highlights and pearled drops. A castle towered three tiers, with precise sugar-cube crenellations ranged just SO; gingerbread houses with their Christmas canes and pretzel woodpiles and icecream-cone shrubbery (two of the houses sadly sagged, and one completely collapsed---a discreet sign announcing that the houses were in perfect condition when they were judged) sat incongruously by market baskets filled with marzipan vegetables and fruit, pigs and chickens and ribbons of all colors, honoring the sesquicentennial anniversary of the fair. The same apologetic little signs cropped up inside several of the glass cases, since this was the final day of a ten-day run of the show. The moisture evaporating from all the cake and pie and cookies, leaving them shriveled, cracking vestiges of their former selves, their colors faded and their crusts crumbling, must have had an unhappy effect on all the toffees, the lollipops, the divinity. Little saucers held pools of caramelly brown, with errant nut bits floating lazily in the mire; puddles of red or green held little white sticks forlornly askew, and others of the dainty doilies clung wearily to clusters of slumpy meringue, testament that the divinity held up as long as it could. And jar after jar of jewelly jams and shining jellies and catsups and chowchows, carrots and pickles and green beans and the even, soldier-alert asparagus, its tips steamed into grayish clumps by the waterbath's long bubbling. There were beautiful things, and delicious-looking things and outright genius in some of those creations; there were blue-ribbon winners that shone out, true and clean, and others that I guess you just had to be there--to taste and to see on the day they were delivered. And a few that made you wonder what those judges were thinking (or drinking) at the time of the award. I look every year into those cases, and I swear that NEXT year, for sure, I'm gonna enter a loaf of my Mom's banana bread, DD's cloverleaf rolls, my green and wonderful lime pickles, their perfectly-matched slices gleaming in the gently-spiced liquid, and my picked-at-their-perfect-moment canned green beans. And every year, I leave it til too late, and then go and admire the handiwork of others. I read the names from the tags, recognize a few from days gone by or a few cases over, and admire these committed homemakers, these canners and bakers and workers of magic with the bounty of our fields. That's MY part of the Fair, more beautiful than all the shining lights.

Cabbage it is, I believe. Anyway, the purply-silver ones on the right are an exact match for the three "purple" cabbages I've been nurturing ever since we planted our garden in late May. They have good-sized, shiny REAL cabbages growing in there now, bigger than softballs, and I hate that it's about time to harvest them. What season is it now, so far away? Those look not-too-long planted. My dear Daughter-In-Law is very fond of the "blue slaw" we make with those, and of the name itself, since it's been a family name for the coleslaw since my son was about four. And I'm thinking of making stuffed cabbage with all those huge rose-petal leaves around the bottom---much easier to remove than all that unwinding from the tight ones. Thank you again for the lovely journey.

We, too, did the ISF this week. We went for a couple of hours on Wednesday night, nice cool evening which turned out to be above post #54 redux. Nice juicy cheeseburger for me, ribeye sandwich for Chris; we shared the same good beans, a plain old baked potato and a huge slice (seemed like a quarter or AT LEAST a fifth of a pie) of homemade coconut pie, not meringue, but a creamy cold topping. It was just sweet enough, with LOTS of coconut in the deep-yellow custard and a melty-tender crust with uneven, crumbly edges attesting to its being rolled-out homemade, not an assembly-line, molded-in-the-pan crust. Even had that good lardy tongue-slick feeling of a REAL handmade piecrust. And after all our walking and looking, we passed the Sati Babi stand as we strolled back toward the parking field. We asked each other if we knew what that was, and sort of murmured, "Looks good, but I'm too full." Sorry we missed it. Lovely evening. Another Summer drawing to a close.

We had a late, ordinary breakfast: Soft grits for Chris, topped with two Jumbo butterfried over easy. We shared a split baguette, skillet toasted. He likes to scumble the soft yolks into the grits, so I had the buttery pan-salted whites along with my tartine, which we spread with leftover chevre/mascarpone/dried cherry spread. Two cups of double-shot cap for me, Dr. Pepper for Chris.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!! An almost-frozen FROSH, right out of the back corner of the fridge, whissssssspped open and upturned for the throatburn of that first long swallow!!! Count me in, though I've been to Detroit only twice. I just like Faygo. And we just encountered a new breakfast food: Goetta. (Pronounced GED-a---we asked, and then when we saw it on another menu the next morning, the waiter said it exactly the same). The first time was on the placemat menu of a little diner we encountered on a highway exit (their blackberry cobbler praised ad nauseam in the "Cake or Pie?" thread). We were ordering dinner, but Chris sometimes likes breakfast at that time, so we asked about the new word. "Steel cut oats" were the first words out of the proprietress' mouth. And "ground-up sausage and bacon and ham---you know--whatever is left over in bits and pieces." It seems to be an acknowledged, well-known staple in those parts, and all over Indiana and Ohio, for all I know. I asked if it resembled scrapple (still untasted by me, but I know about it) and she said "kinda, but from here." So we passed on the goetta and eggs and had burgers. Then next morning in Cincinnati, it appeared on the menu of our favorite breakfast place: The Red Squirrel. So he DID try it this time. It came as a little square patty, thin as party rye, fried on both sides on the griddle with those heavenly potatoes. (I digress here to mention the potatoes. They are pre-baked, peeled, cut into chunks and sizzled on all sides on a griddle the size of a countertop. With the browning chunks are equal chunks of onion getting caramelly and golden, adding their own aromas and tastes to the dish. A steady hand with the salt, a patience to see the sides crusty brown before turning with the big old flipper, and a quick dash to the table while you can still hear the SIZZZZ from the plate. Never have there been such potatoes in all the history of the spud. They are what potatoes aspire to be, what they long for in all their long burial in the warm earth to resurrection into daylight and transport to market. GOOOD Potatoes). The Goetta, presumably cooked on that same Magical Grilltop, was another matter entirely. It was a nice brown, but that's where the compliments end. I took one tiny fraction of a corner, rubbing it ruminatively between tongue and mouthroof. It was porky, in a subtle way, but mostly that oatmeally slick on the tongue was off-putting. No seasonings discernible, just a thin-fried rendition of Indiana Haggis. I just Didn't. Get. It. Decker melons and Silverqueen corn. Now those are local products worth bragging on.

This is an absolutely stunning account of a life so far removed from my own, yet so kin in the everyday tasks--cooking for family and guests, breadmaking, laying the table to befit the occasion. And the markets, the bakeries, the scenery---all breathtaking in their own right, with the colours and the depths bringing out the flavour of each. The rocks of the Negev, the bottomless mirrorpool between the timeworn cleft---I did not notice the people until I had gazed for a long moment---the clouds drifting over the rock-strewn landscape---all combine to create a moment, an eon, a history of a land and a people. Just wonderful. And I do think it oddly endearing that the most repeated/quoted picture in the whole blog is of the shopworn bride in her finery reminiscent of one of those Barbie-as-she'd-look-today cakes, the too-long-in-the-sun, footless pick inserted into too-sweet ribbons of frosting made by a well-meaning Mom intent on having every party detail JUST SO for her child. You have captured a most memorable image, just in that one photo. Thank you for your time and your dedication to your task---it's been a glorious tour and an enlightening lesson. Thank you.