Farmer's Market haul

Organic:

Huge bag o' baby chard
2 zucchini, 2 golden zucchini
green beans
fingerling potatoes
2 pounds+ peaches
a lot of gorgeous apricots- You guys, these are the most beautiful things I've ever seen, plus as soft as clouds. Lyra can't put them down.
a quart of cherries
a pound and a half english peas
half a pound button mushrooms

Plus:
one bag of cardamom spiced almonds
one bottle local cabernet wine

I know Jen is getting tired of seeing Barack's green face on the top of my page.
;-)

big doings

This last weekend was so much fun. Our friends Andrea & Shane(who just won a big art prize. Yea, Shane!) invited us to have Saturday night dinner at their house in Denver. Also in attendance were Ked & his girlfriend Tara, and Andrea & Shane's friend Lao. The house is a cute bungalow in an old downtown neighborhood, very charming. Our dinner (delicious Pad Thai) was prepared by a friend of Andrea's who came over just to make the food, and then left. She had other plans for the evening, but sweetly offered to come cook for us. How great is that? The pad thai was awesome. I brought dessert: lemon cheesecake squares & homemade ginger ice cream. The ice cream was nice and spicy! We stayed up very late talking, drinking wine, laughing. It was wonderful. You might well wonder what the girls were doing while we were enjoying adult conversation. Shane had tuned the TV to the Cartoon network or Nick Jr. or something, and the girls watched ALOT of Spongebob Squarepants, and Ruby read an American Girls book during the commercials. They were amazingly low-maintenance and happy-go-lucky. Lucky for us!

We finally got home and put the girls to bed sometime between 11:30 and midnight. On Sunday we decided to drive up the mountains, RMNP or thereabouts. We ended up at Lily Lake.


We had packed a picnic, so we ate lunch before our hike. There were ALOT of chipmunks darting around. Their preferred spot for begging is right on top of your shoe, then they dart away super-fast.




After lunch we decided to hike up the higher-altitude trail to reach the lookout point above the lake. In the photo below, you can see (just above Lyra) some of the rock formations which look like a stack of pancakes turned on its side.


It isn't a long trail, maybe a mile and a half or so. But we had already travelled from 5k feet in Longmont to about 8.9k feet at the ground level of Lily Lake. The trail we chose went higher, rather quickly. We took it slow except for Lyra, who insisted upon racing ahead. You know, there is a thin line between fun family hike and death march and, according to Ruby, we crossed that line early on in the hike.




We reached the lookout, and the view was certainly worth the climb.






We saw tons of little flowers along the way, some growing right out of the boulders, others growing in the sandy soil and gravel along the trail, and still others growing in a marshland beside the lake.

conifer blooms

There were just a few times when Ruby decided to join in on the fun. This was especially true after I offered to pay the kids a penny a shot to let me photograph them.

a water bottle lid helps to display little bunny teeth

Apparently this lake is a great place to catch greenback cutthroat trout, which were once believed to be extinct but have returned in abundance. It is believed they may actually benefit from global warming. Go, nature!


In the end, what really served to coax Ruby out of her sour mood was an early dinner in Estes Park at Smokin' Dave's Barbeque. After my big plate of St. Louis style ribs and red beans and rice, I'm off meat for awhile. But it was awfully nice to see Junebug back to normal.

from a reporter beloved by me & Sinda

Eleanor Beardsley reports for NPR from France, this time about school lunches.

alarm bells

Two or three weeks ago I finished In Defense of Food, and now I'm finally reading this, which we thought was lost but now is found. And, while much of its message isn't new to me (eat fresh, local, seasonal. Check.), what is new is the idea that we are all, to some extent, participants in a giant experiment to see just how much of one or two foods (corn & soybeans) we can consume and still (more or less) live. Apparently, while we were asleep, there was a coup and now ADM & Cargill run our country. Ha! And you thought it was Exxon! Certainly none of it would be possible without fossil fuels, so the oil companies benefit as well. According to Pollan, one-fifth of our oil consumption is used in agriculture. I'll bet most Americans don't know that little factoid.

Anyhoo, this morning I was thinking about how well all this ties in with Wall-E. In that film, the humans have all become huge, helpless and blubberous lumps who just float around on their hover-chairs watching TV and talking on the phone all day. Meanwhile all the advertisements (for BNL Corporation: Buy-N-Large) show svelte and fit models who don't even exist anymore. Yikes! Apocalypse now, ya'll! Or soon, anyway.

this is what 45 dollars at my local Farmer's Market looks like

One dozen free-range eggs
1/2 pound of organic button mushrooms
1 pound org. asparagus
1 pint org. strawberries
1 pint org. sugar snap peas
1 pint org. snow peas
1 pint of the most phenomenally delicious honey evah!
a generous 1/2 pound org. salad mix
a generous 1/2 pound org. baby red chard
1 small bunch org. pak choy
4 ounces chevre with cranberries & walnuts

All local, all fresh, all transported home on my bike. Yum, ya'll!

getaway, part two

Friday night we ate and drank at Osteria Marco.

i love the lamps, and the green wallpaper in the loo.

more resting, then Saturday night we met up with Kris' friend Liz and ate & drank at The Ninth Door.

devils on horseback

cafe and postres

We rode the free shuttle back to the hotel.

Kris & Liz got all caught up on high school gossip

Sunday morning we ate Mother's Day Brunch at Rioja.

St. Germain cocktail complete with house-made grapefruit bitters and grapefruit gelee. Deee-lish!



and then it was time to go back to the airport. Now I'm verklempt, so talk amongst yourselves. Topic: Mother's Day getaway 2010. We're thinking a warm beach in a nation knee-deep in avocados.

Oh yeah, we also went to the Hammond Candy Factory to buy peppermint pillows, elected not to attend the Chocolate extravaganza, but did see Baby Mama. Fun!

Now go wish Sinda a belated Happy Birthday!

getaway, part one

We stayed at the Magnolia Hotel. We shopped in Boulder at Boulder Bookstore and Prana, where Kris flirted with a girl from Tyler, Texas. We ate at Centro and had a really bad server named Ashlee.

nipples!

Suddenly a stranger appeared. Poking her head out of the bathroom stall she appeared startled to see a photo session taking place.




We rested, and we read.


to be continued...

Did you know blogger will only let you use up to 200 characters worth of labels? annoying.

I'll be away this long weekend, in Downtown Denver with the 2 best friends a girl could have. Sinda & Kris are flying in tonight so we can recreate our lost weekend 3! years ago, this time without IKEA, but with the Prana Store in Boulder. Also, this time we can ALL drink, because no one has a bun in the oven. That we know of.
Loopy, I'll do my best, but you know how she is.

Try not to be too jealous, ya'll.

quickie catch-up post

Lame, I know, but maybe tomorrow I'll put up a proper post. Maybe. The important thing is that tomorrow I will get my hair cut. A girl has to prioritize.

SO since my last post, all this has happened:

Thursday, Lyra's Paternal Grandma & Uncle arrived (To be clear, they are grandma & uncle to both girls). Birthday party ensued.

Friday, Ruby's school had a field trip to the Denver Zoo, where I was a chaperone. There were so many parents there that my "group" consisted of Ruby and her friend Mackenzie. Seems easy, right? Well, Miss Mac here is fast, and harder to keep up with than she looks. Poor Ruby, in her spf 5,000 and sunhat. But at least no major burns. whew!


Mr. Man brought the rest of the fam. there so we could all soak in the sun. For some reason it didn't occur to anyone to rub sunblock onto Lyra's ass crack.


Luckily, this shoulder ride didn't last long enough to cause any damage.

Saturday we had the birthday party at Sunflower Farm. So much fun! SO much cake (chocolate w/ chocolate frosting + strawberry cupcakes w/ cream cheese frosting).


So windy, especially right before we left. Saturday was a big day, and then the MIL & BIL kidsat so Mr. Man & I could have a date. Yea! We drove to Boulder to eat sushi flown in from Tokyo that very day. Al Gore would disapprove mightily, but then he flies around everywhere, right?

Sunday we drove to the mall in Broomfield to visit the Build-a-Bear Workshop. When it was finally time to take Isy & Stephen to the airport, I took the girls to Boulder to catch the tail end of Lyra's school's big 40th anniversary/birthday bash and fundraiser. I helped clean up while Lyra watched some Senegalese dancers and Ruby played with her friends.

I'm still tired.

catching up

I've been remiss in blogging about family events of late, so I'll try and play catch-up. Here is a photo of Junebug showing all the missing teeth. She lost the other top one a couple of weeks ago, and she is growing new ones on top & bottom. Listening to her read aloud is pretty funny right now!


This week is Sugarbear's spring break, so yesterday we (and our friends Erin + Liam) drove up to Eldora to let the kids ski. More about that when I get the film back. Here is a photo of the bear to tide you over.


I also wanted to mention we woke up to beautiful sparkly snow Easter morning:

which was completely gone by early afternoon. We hid 97 eggs in our front & side yards for the girls, who found them all in no time. Easter Sunday was especially nice because we also discovered a Boulder restaurant with perfectly decent Tex-Mex: Juanita's.
And we ate way. too. much! The only thing missing was you!

banana muffins

Sounds boring, right? Been there, done all that. But I just tried a different recipe from the one I usually use, this one from Nigella Express (Thanx, Sinda!!). Of course, having the genetic defect of not being able to leave well-enough alone, I have altered it just the tiniest smidge. Here is the recipe, with my alterations highlighted. I should note that I used the goddamned Sunspire peanut butter chips which I bought at Whole Foods for $5!!! a bag (just the one bag, please) and the bag only holds 10 ounces instead of the usual 12. However, that being said, they are heavenly-tasting, maybe because they use Maranatha peanut butter.


Banana Butterscotch (or, in my case, peanut butter) muffins

1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1+2/3 cups of flour (I used 1C unbleached white + 2/3 C WW pastry)
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1+1/4 cups mashed ripe bananas
1 cup of butterscotch or chocolate chips (or, in my case, peanut butter chips)

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. and line 12-14 muffin tins with paper liners.

Break the eggs into a bowl and beat them, then stir in the oil.

Mix the flour(s), sugar, baking powder & soda together in a bowl and then add the eggy oil mixture. Mix. Stir in the mashed bananas. Mix. Stir in the chips.

Divide all this equally between the muffin cups. She says to make 12 but I got 14.
Bake for about 20 minutes. Yummy, and not at all too sweet.

Luxury

This was my lunch yesterday:

I like the reflection of the cheese on the pink bowl.

Butternut Squash soup with ciabatta slices topped with 1. raw milk Bleu D'Auvergne and 2. mashed avocado. Of course this completely violates Mighty Girl's First Rule of Blogging: No one cares what you had for lunch. But it was so good!

yesterday we made a cake

And we found out that, if it is covered in ganache, Sugarbear can fit her entire fist inside her mouth.

Day 23: now with photos!

I'm also thankful for leftover turkey, roasted carrots & parsnips, gravy, and pie crust. Because all those leftovers will soon morph into Turkey Pot Pie. Oh, and I threw together some Oatmeal Molasses Bread & rolls.

And later: Cherry Pie or Pumpkin Pie?? What the hell, a little of each. One must have one's fruits & veggies.

Day 17

I've got lots of film lines going through my head today, thanks in part to Bookhart. That one about Mildred's "people" is a gem. And I must say I have always adored Jack Carson's character (Wally) in MP. He is the perfect wolf: after her husband was gone she had to learn to defend herself from the likes of him. And then she ends up making him her patsy. Even after he bragged "With me, bein' smart's a disease. I can't help it, I see an angle and right away I start cutting myself a piece of throat." Or words to that effect. This movie has, hands down, the most quotable lines of any other film. Take Monte (Zach Scott) for instance. When he tells Eve Arden (Ada) that he wishes he could get into "that kind of work" meaning running a restaurant, Ada replies that perhaps he was frightened by a callous at an early age. I could go on and on. But I will attempt some restraint and move on to something else. First let me say to anyone out there who hasn't seen this film: see it. There isn't another film like it. It is still studied in colleges for it's combination of styles: film noir & maternal melodrama and the fact that it is such a fine example of both. Just the lighting and camera angles alone are worth watching.
God, I'm a dork.

On to something else that's been on my mind. Sweeney Todd, the finest musical ever to grace the stage, is now a film by Tim Burton. I'm a little worried about it. Johnny Depp is a tad too young and way too pretty for the title role. And Helena Bonham Carter has great acting chops but I read that they have cut down her role as Mrs. Lovett so that the film focuses more on Sweeney. That is disappointing. Mostly I hope they are able to get the feel of the piece right. It is horribly squalid and violent, while still maintaining a dark humor, melancholy sweetness and hope for some kind of future. That is a difficult balance to maintain. Plus if they change even one word in the songs I'm gonna notice and be annoyed.

Now: Thanksgiving. Is there any way I can have Uncle Tim? And his cheesecakes and pecan pie with bourbon or whatever it was? God, that's good!

day 13

Before

After

My Mommy is the awesomest! She called a couple of weeks ago to ask if we needed anything for the new house. At the time, nothing jumped right into the front of my mind besides boring old bookshelves. But then she said "How is your oven? Would you like a new oven for the Thanksgiving turkey?". See, we are entertaining our first house guests for that holiday (my Mom, Mr.Man's Mom & Brother), and this will be the first time I have ever been responsible for cooking the bird. Yikes! The oven which came with the house is a problem. It cooks just alright, but isn't very big. One turkey wouldn't leave much space for anything else. Plus, it is frigging hard to open. Like, yank with both hands hard. I regularly have to push it back three inches to the wall because I have to pull so hard to open the damned thing. I don't know what is wrong with it, but when Mom offered the dough, suddenly I didn't care anymore whether it was fixable. Yippee! I don't understand how, but even though it fits into the same space, the oven is so much larger! And the viewing window in front is HUGE! Plus it has Convection Bake and Convection Roast. 2 different convections! Thank you, Mom!!

day 10

Today, I took the girls here (which is only about 4 miles from our house) to buy some goat feta and Queso de Mano. We ended up doing alot of this:






This is the one I wanted to bring home:


It was one of two kids with intact horns who were being trained to carry packs so they could be hiking companions. But the one below would probably have made a better pet. She was insatiably curious and friendly.

You can tell by the look in this Billy's eye that he is trouble.


But creampuff here? Heaven on cloven hooves. Can I get an Amen?


Flat. Out. Adorable.

Day 6: Warning! This post may contain pornographic material. Also, this is only part 1. And I'll probably wait on the porn till part 2. So never mind.

First of all, can I just say the time change is killing me? It is dark here at like 5pm, and blazing light at about 6:15am. So that means Sugarbear sidles in to my side of the bed and asks to sleep with us. To which I always groggily and foolishly reply Yes. Then she proceeds to not sleep aggressively enough to wake even Junebug, who is still in her bed in the next room. Sleeping until 7am has become a distant, cherished memory.

Okay, now that I've gotten that out of my system, on to the real post. Last Sunday started out nicely, with some of these:

gingerbread pancakes

Then we headed out to RMNP again, this time hoping to see Bear Lake. We've heard it is a great destination but the late summer crowds had kept us away until now. This time the park was refreshingly lacking in its usually traffic. There were plenty of people there, don't get me wrong. Just not the throngs we've seen before. Also, lots of Elk, as you shall see later in this post.

By the time we got to Estes Park it was close to lunchtime, because it takes us fucking forever to gather all the crap we won't need, but must take just in case. So we stopped for lunch at Smokin' Dave's BBQ. Mr. Man had heard good things about it, and it is right on the way to the park.

Here is my plate of pork ribs, spicy red beans, and sweet potato fries

And Mr. Man's plate of pulled pork, slaw, and some other kind of pork. You know this place has to be good because there is bbq sauce splattered onto the light fixture above the table.

Here are our plates afterward. Mr. Man decided he didn't need to eat the giant slabs of white bread because they were not meat.



So we stuffed ourselves with pig. Oh, and also chicken. Junebug had chicken tenders that she said were just as good as the ones at Brentwood Tavern. High praise indeed. Sugarbear deigned to eat a few sweet potato fries and that was all. Here is what she thinks of our food:

After sedating ourselves with this, the opposite of high-energy food, we headed into the mountains. We drove to the Moraine Park museum because Junebug was gonna keep nagging us until we went. If a building has the word "museum" in its name, she can't wait to go there. Which is all well and good but this one has small, old, and decrepit written all over it. Which, now that I think about it, sounds kinda cool. But, whatever, it was closed for the season, thank God.

So we headed off to Bear Lake. We didn't have to park far away and take the shuttle, we could park right up close because there were so few cars. The Bear Lake trailhead is also the trailhead for Nymph Lake, Dream lake, Emerald Lake and some other stuff. And to end Part 1, I leave you with this photo. Check out the elevation. No wonder Sugarbear & I were were both feeling kinda pukey on the drive home.

Next time, porn. For real.

Day 5 or icumi: umami

taste bugs

In case you missed it, there was a wonderful story on Morning Edition all about science finally proving something great cooks and gourmands have known for ages. You know that wonderful synergy that happens when the flavor of a dish seems to exceed the sum of its parts? The new discovery has been named Umami, meaning "yummy" or "delicious". Otherwise know as magic. Read or listen all about it here.

food meme

Sinda tagged me for this one. You are supposed to take each letter from your blogging name and give a little food fact to go with it. Here goes.

P is for Pear. You thought I would do Pie here, right? No, it must be pears because of one of my favorite meals:

a perfectly ripe (so plump! so juicy!) Comice pear, cored and sliced into about 6 or 8 slivers

a big room-temperature hunch of blue cheese (Stilton, Gorgonzola, or something else salty & a little crumbly. The saltiness is necessary to offset the sweetness of the pear & the troisieme ingredient in this menage).

a glass of lovely Port wine. Nothing too expensive or pretentious, because you are going to have pear juice running down your sleeve. Maybe a 20 year Warre's tawny or that 10 year Otima. Good stuff. And yes, it is a meal. Okay, have some bread with it if you want. But it better be good and crusty.

E is for Eggs because you can't make a cake, or pudding, or pancakes or much else without them. I so admire and envy Jennifer for her backyard chickens. The notion of walking just outside to pluck (steal, really) a warm egg from the bosom of downy feathers just so you can crack it over a hot pan for breakfast is so primal and alluring. Someday I will have my own hens.

another E is for Eggplant. Baked with Parmesan, or in Caponata, or in Ratatouille (even though, according to Wikipedia, the original dish from Nice did not contain eggplant) or just plain grilled with a little olive oil, I love eggplant. I still remember the first time I ever ate it. It was fried, and I ate it with ketchup*. Even then I recognized how perfectly the flavor of cooked tomatoes compliments Eggplant. Yum.

V is for the velvety texture I love in foods like Panna Cotta and Point Reyes blue cheese, smooth and silky tofu or squid.

I is for Italy, whose foods are my very most favorite. Just in case you haven't guessed.

S is for Soup, so endlessly warming, satisfying, nourishing. S is also for Nigel Slater. I wish he lived next door so we could eat coffee cake together and gossip.

H is for fresh Herbs which improve the flavor of most foods, and which I'm really missing since we moved. I'm so accustomed to just walking outside to snip some fresh Rosemary, Sage, Thyme, Oregano, or Basil in the summer. There is nothing to eat in this yard. Well, perhaps the mushrooms, but none of us are willing guinea pigs. I have recently started a very small herb garden in one pot for transporting in or out depending on the weather. It has a decent-sized sage plant (though not Bergarten Sage, which is my favorite), one tiny thyme plant and one tiny rosemary plant. I can safely harvest a bit of sage, but I don't dare take any from the others for fear of endangering their wee lives. So I just caress their leaves and smell my fingers.


I'm tagging Meno, Antonia & Meg. This is a fun one!

* I was about 12 y.o.