Lori in PA

I've much enjoyed your informative blog, Bryan. Thank you.

Ah, thank you for the follow-up report. It sounds like all had a lovely time. I miss France...

What a terrific question! I think the answer for all of is: LESS THAN WE THINK! Like your toaster/fruit for breakfast example, it is a matter of focusing on what is possible.

Thanks so much for the peek into your grand experiment. I love your list of what you learned last week. And for your nephew? Maybe you could continue the local food sourcing with one big exception -- get about 20 big boxes of cereal and let him eat that at will. It should last at least 3 days.

I'm looking forward to the week -- I have a feeling I'll learn a lot, not being molecularly inclined myself.

I think I must be doing this already, in one way, with the kids' cooking classes I teach. Yesterday I attended the bridal shower of a dear friend who started taking my classes when she was about 12. I mentioned in passing that I don't have any classes scheduled for this week so was planning to do other things and she exclaimed, "Oh, I just found my cooking class notebooks last week!" I joked that she must be decluttering and she said, "Oh no, I'd never get rid of those! They're too important." That makes me happy.

My "iced" coffee: I make two 2-cup size mugs of coffee in the Senseo and pour them into a glass. I add two spoons of sugar and a big splash of half and half. I stir with an iced tea spoon and carefully put the whole thing on the bottom shelf of the fridge's freezer door. Ideally, I give it a quick stir every half-hour to 1 hour until it is slushy, but it almost never works out that way. I always manage to get busy and forget about it and it freezes more or less solid. Then I wrestle with the frozen-in-place iced tea spoon and try to break up the mixture. If it isn't frozen solid, I chip away at it and usually plunge through the ice and splash coffee all over. Then I have to let it sit at room temperature for awhile until it is thawed enough to stir and drink. Anyway, it is a good way to have undiluted icy coffee: Yesterday, probably thinking of something I read on this thread, I used my giraffe to whiz up a couple of scoops of dulce de leche ice cream, milk, chocolate syrup, and coffee. The coffee was hot, so I added ice and swished it around in the glass between sips to make it cold. Not bad at all.

Here, here! I feel sad when I read again and again, "Family meals are my favorite memory from my growing up years... ...long description inserted here... ...but my own family in this generation never does this." Um, there is something really wrong with that. It does take effort to make this family-centered life work, but the rewards are there for the taking for those willing to do it.

Ah, nice, nice. Have you read the book, The Long Ago Lake, a book of nature and crafts, by Marne Wilkins? I think some of the people in your clan might enjoy it -- it is a combination of stories about the author's family's annual visits to a lake in northern Wisconsin and charmingly illustrated directions about how to make lots of fun nature-y things. Very low-key stuff. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/087701632...6212857?ie=UTF8 Is this food related? It includes directions for: How to Make a Lashed Table and How to Make a Wooden Spoon

Oh, please tell more about concrete countertops -- what you love, hate, and how it was done. I long for a kitchen remodel and this idea is intriguing to me because I understand it is inexpensive and durable. I want personal anecdotes, though.

For me, I think it is this: can the cook take the ingredients available and produce something which both sustains and satisfies the eaters. The reason I choose this definition is because it encompasses the preparation of food in all cultures and at all times. Sometimes we narrowly think only of someone cooking with abundant food/equipment at his disposal, which of course has not been the case for the majority of people throughout history. This definition allows the villager in a hut to be a cook as well as the chef in a starred restaurant.

Lovely, lovely meal. And the berry dessert! Is a fool a mixture of sweetened berries and whipped cream? Or is it meringue? Or? My memory tells me it is an "old-fashioned" quickie fruit dessert.

Melissa, I'm so pleased for you that everything is coming together. I haven't read every word, but I've followed you with interest. How long has the project lasted, start until almost-finished?

I think any major diet change is hardest in the beginning. I've spent weeks or months on food elimination diets a few times (trying to find allergen culprits) and the beginning of each was so difficult. As I collected a repertoir and mental catalog of what was "allowed" -- in your case what's local -- that energy-draining constant internal quizzing and scrutiny of every single ingredient or dish diminished dramatically. And that is a very good thing. I imagine it will get much simpler, time-wise, after this week when you are no longer blogging. My hat's off to you for taking on this challenge!

I did it with cole slaw for our daughter's grad party weekend before last, but I blame it on my dad. I was rushed off my feet with it and several other projects and my folks offered to shop for me at Sam's Club. I'd never bought any before, but I thought Sam's had bags of pre-shredded cole slaw mix. I didn't know exactly how big they were, but I thought maybe bigger than the ones at a regular grocery. NEEDING to save time, I asked them to get a couple of bags of that. Dad got FOUR BIG bags. I made three of them into slaw, which made two Big Orange Bowls packed full. At the party, we ate maybe half of one bowl. The next day for a get-together/shower, I brought leftovers (this was vinegar/oil slaw, so leftovers are good) and we ate maybe another half bowl. I ate slaw for days and barely made a dent. I finally enriched the compost heap. Blech!

Oh my! You made me hungry for the real thing, guys! One of these days I'm going to overcome my fear of the grill and come here, butt in hand, begging for you all to walk me through the process.

What a terrific blog theme, phlawless! I can't wait to hear more. I pass on to you these virtual blogging necessities: a camera battery (fully charged) and an extra dose of energy. Have a great week!

Lori, I have very much enjoyed your blog.... it has been extremely fascinating to get a glimpse of your daily life. You have described your days so eloquently. I have one quick question.... what is going on, on the wall behind everyone at your dinner table? It looks like a chart of some kind and I am most curious to know what it represents. ← It is another bow to the demands of home education. It is a timeline going from pre-2000 BC to 2000 AD. (We need to catch up and add a decade or two.) We attached cork-like (but not cork -- it's some kind of cheap building material a little like insulation, but not insulation -- I don't know what it is), felt-wrapped panels to our wall, and we velcroed on the date strips and the figures representing different historical people and events. A few years ago, it occurred to me that Samuel was so little when we started working on it that he'd never had the chance to "grow" it from scratch so we took off all the figures and he's been adding them back as he learns about each one. It isn't really what I'd pick to have in my kitchen, but that is the only wall in the house with a large enough expanse to hold it, so there it is. I'm sure this is the single obstacle to my never having received a request from House Beautiful to allow them to do a feature on our home. Anyway, it has been a useful tool -- it is great for understanding things like this: if Louis Braille hadn't lived before Helen Keller, she might never have made the strides she made or become the person she became. It gives us all a big picture in our heads and a place to "hang" new people and events we learn about into that larger view of time.

I actually have two big orange bowls now, also. When my mil moved into a much smaller apartment 4 years ago, she had a lot of stuff she asked us to dispose of in some way. I kept almost nothing for us -- I hate clutter -- but she had a big bowl just like mine. It has joined the nest of Tupperware bowls in the cupboard and I haven't regretted giving it the space at all. It's amazing how often both are in use at once. And, I'm sorry about all the garden tomato references. Sort of. Still friends?

I didin't make the vinaigrette yet -- sorry for the confusing reply. I intend to make it as soon as possible, but when I spoke of the vanilla flavor I was referring to the dressing I had at Restaurant Sydney. I think we are much alike about being frugal in some ways and extravagant in others. I love luxury ingredients like good cheese and chocolate and have spent money on them. I try to get items like that at better prices -- candy at BB's, grey sea salt at TJ Maxx -- and control the frequency and amount of things I can't get any other way than paying a high price.

Before I go to bed, let me tell all of you who have interacted with me this week via this blog or private message how much I thank you -- for encouragement, technical help, sharing your own stories and recipes and the things you find similar and different in my life and yours, and most of all for the kind words. The week ends. I have enjoyed myself so much -- everyone should carry a camera around with them for several days and write about what they see and do because it opens one's eyes to the small beauties, treasures, and important people they are blessed to have in their surroundings. Now I will go back to doing less talking and more listening on eGullet for awhile. I'll say goodnight with a little piece that's been rolling around in my head for the last few days: The Big Orange Bowl: an appreciation I’ve been looking at an awful lot of pictures of my kitchen this week. I noticed something that recurred again and again in those photos, whether we were having a cooking class or making ham loaf or even in my folks’ kitchen when I snapped the photo of the squash blossoms: our big orange bowl. I got mine as a wedding shower gift twenty-one years ago, although then it was all glossy newness and the day-glo color was hip and happening. In the intervening years, it has been filled with cookie dough, just-made applesauce, marinating meat, watermelon wedges, and cooling chicken stock. I make granola in it and it can double as a dishpan. Paired with a wooden spoon, it has entertained all of my babies and some visiting ones, too. When the children were a bit older, it became a pool, a lake, or an ocean on our front porch – many a toy figure was “rescued” from its vast depths. When I run out to the vegetable garden to get lettuce or asparagus or tomatoes, I don’t reach for a fancy “harvesting” basket like the ones seen in women’s magazine photo essays – no, I grab the big orange bowl, because no harm comes to it from being set down in the wet grass or on the garden soil – a quick wash and it’s as good as new. It has even been lined with plastic grocery bags and kept by the bed of a queasy child, just in case. It accompanies us to nearly every pot-luck we attend, filled with potato or rice or pasta salad, but like a less-attractive sister it hangs out in the background while a more beautiful pottery bowl receives its bounties and takes a place on the food table for serving. The same thing happens at home: I toss the lettuce salad in the big orange bowl because its generous size makes that job easy, but then I transfer the dressed salad to my gorgeous hand-painted bowl from Greece before heading to the table. It is such a part of my life in the kitchen that, in spite of its outdated hue and dull-with-age looks, I’m fairly sure I couldn’t cook without it. Everybody should have a Big Orange Bowl if they can possibly manage it. If you’ve been limping along without one, making do with a stainless steel Williams Sonoma mixing bowl or a gasp-at-the-price Polish pottery number, it isn’t too late. Find a Tupperware party lady and get the biggest plastic bowl in the catalog. Take whatever is the color of the season. In only twenty years or so, you too will have your very own Big Lime Green (or Lilac or Screamin’ Magenta) Bowl, filled with memories and none the worse for wear.

Well, the week is winding down. I think we are "open" until sometime tomorrow, but I'll finish my thoughts shortly. Edited to add: I'm eating some cold salmon with leftover cherry salsa for my supper. It tastes great together, but, um, let's just say the cherry salsa suffers in its presentation if made too far ahead.

Great idea about the hairpin, Ruth! I think ham loaf is one of those forgiving recipes where most anything goes, don't you? About loose skin: Well, I look better dressed than undressed, but then, don't most of us? Some people have severe, health-threatening problems with excess skin after losing large amounts of weight, but both of us were fortunate that way. I didn't have surgery in order to look good in a bikini, and The Husband is happy, so it's fine. That is strange because Canoe's website includes their dessert menu. ← So I guess maybe the pastry chef quit in a rage? Let me say thanks publicly to you for sending that recipe. I loved how the vanilla flavor sort of waltzed in at the end of each taste. I have been known to go all the way back to the other end of the store to put an item back on the shelf when I find a lower-priced version that just happens to be hiding in an entirely different department--heh, or sometimes I just abandon the first item right there, as sort of a penalty on the store for trying to "hide" the cheaper item from me. ←

Sunday dinner just feels like it should be a little bit special to me. We often have company and periodically we host what we call Open House. We worship with many families who travel long distances (more than an hour), so some of the more local families take turns inviting those folks to come to their homes for the afternoon. Everyone brings food, so it makes for a nice afternoon. Today, we invited my mom and dad to be with us. Mom brought her homemade French bread, which is one of my favorite tastes. It isn't like the artisinal bread so popular now; rather it is yeasty and closer-grained and, oh, I know you'd like it. And, I know you'd like her (and Dad) too: On this day, we often give up the pleasure of eating over a map in favor of a real tablecloth. This one was a gift from Provence from Mom and Dad after one of their trips: The menu: Starter: Squash Blossoms Stuffed with Goat Cheeese and Fresh Thyme in Tomato Basil Sauce Grilled Salmon Steaks Baked Cucumbers (Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. I) with Cream French-style Green Beans French Bread Dessert: Shoofly Pie with Vanilla Ice Cream We got started immediately on the squash blossoms. The ones I harvested yesterday weren't too great today, so Mom brought some fresh ones. She had to bring them into the church building to keep them out of the hot car, which caused a few funny looks -- not the most beautiful bouquet in the world. They are washed, de-stemmed and de-pistil-ed, and stuffed with a mix of goat cheese, chopped thyme, a smidge of salt, and pepper. They are arranged on a bed of thick tomato sauce, which I think is more properly called a concasse?, and baked until heated through. This is a great favorite of The Husband's, so he was thrilled to see it in the works. The salmon was done simply -- oiled with olive oil and salted and peppered: The green beans were prepped and blanched yesterday and just needed re-heating with some butter, which became browned butter while I was distracted, so we simply changed the name to Green Beans with Browned Butter. The plate: Dessert:

Sunday mornings are hectic around here. We leave for Bible class and worship services at nine, so everybody is eating and showering and gathering things together. I'm currently teaching a Bible class for ladies about the time of the Israelites' exodus and the wandering in the wilderness, so I ask everyone to leave me alone as much as possible so I can go over all of my notes and lesson plans again and feel prepared. This morning, I realized I hadn't made a dessert for our meal. I don't make desserts all the time, but somehow today I felt like I wanted one, so I tried to think of what I had on hand and could do quickly. Shoofly pie was the answer, even though this is something I tend to make most often in the cool months because during the growing season I want to use as much fresh produce as I can. Shoofly Pie is molasses-based. The filling is somewhat like pecan pie filling without the nuts, but not exactly. In fact, I don't know any other recipe that compares to it really well -- it is itself, which is to say it is quick, made with staple ingredients, gooey (if you make the wet bottom kind like I do), and tooth-achingly sweet. It can be an acquired taste, but once people learn to like it, they go on to love it, it seems to me. Here is the recipe: Wet Bottom Shoofly Pie 1 c. all-purpose flour 3/4 c. brown sugar 2 T. shortening Cut ingredients together until it resembles crumbs. Take out 3/4 c. and set aside for topping. Add to remaining topping in order listed and stir well after each addition: 1 egg 3/4 c. King Syrup 1/4 c. molasses 1 t. baking soda 1 c. boiling water (This mixture will look like it can't possibly be right, but it is fine.) Pour into an unbaked 10" pie shell. Spoon reserved crumbs evenly over the top. Bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake 20 minutes longer (for glass pie plate) or add 5-10 minutes (for metal pie plate). Serve plain or warm with vanilla ice cream. I know someone is going to ask about King Syrup. I don't know if it is available everywhere. You can try substituting dark Karo corn syrup or Lyle's Golden Syrup or something similar, but of course the flavor probably will be different. The person who gave me the recipe specifies Brer Rabbit molasses for the 1/4 c. molasses, but it is even better made with a really good southern molasses. I don't have good pictures of the process, because I was alone and FLYING through it: You didn't see that refrigerated pie crust, did you? Let's just pretend it's a yummy homemade one. Actually, I told my mom I would say I knew she was coming for lunch and since my pie crust, good as it may be, will never approach hers, I just decided to not even try. Into the oven: And, cooled and ready to serve: Many of the ladies in our congregation draw names each year at a slumber party we have at my mom's house. For the following year, we get each other little surprises as secret pals. I recycled a little patriotic pail I received at some point from someone to fix up a Fourth of July gift for my current pal. Dark cherries would have "matched" better, but somebody (could it have been me???) ate them last night: