tulipomania

Slate has an article this week about the "heartbreak of tulips" - you plant them, they get eaten, they grow, they get stolen, they don't come back the next year, they come back the next year with no blooms, yadda yadda. last summer i learned all about the heartbreak of gardening - apparently, plants need a little more than a blazing hot backyard and absolutely no water to thrive. who knew?

i've been assuming i'll get planting again this spring, but our backyard has turned into a rat-o-rama, thanks to our next-door neighbor's charming method of trash disposal ("fling it out the back door and hope for the best!"). maybe i'll just read about gardening this year.

yum

thanks to this recipe and our nascent plans for a trip to andalucia, i have a new object of cooking desire - a tagine. no WAY do i need one of these, nor do we have room for one. but so gorgeous.

so, speaking of yum: say you have a thousand-gram block of feta, plus two avocados, a bagful of parsley and a bunch of roma tomatoes your mom gave you because she was going to arizona for five days and they wouldn't let her bring alien produce into the state, and you're in charge of the appetizer at your next potluck. the obvious next step is to make avocado feta salsa, as adapted from allrecipes.com:

in a bowl, gently stir together 3-4 chopped plum tomatoes, 2 peeled, pitted and chopped avocados, 1/4-1/2 c. finely chopped red onion, and 2 cloves minced garlic.

mix in 2 tbsp. snipped fresh parsley and 1 tbsp. dried oregano.

gently stir in 1-2 tbsp. red wine vinegar.

stir in 4 oz. crumbled feta. add sea salt and fresh cracked pepper to taste.

cover, and chill for 2 to 6 hours.

serve with pita, sliced and baked at 350 degrees until toasty.

as a relation of mine once wrote, "wala!"

water closet visionary

for a really, really long time, my mother has dreamed of creating a comprehensive guide to the best (i.e. cleanest) public restrooms in america. and probably, eventually, the world. she figures it would be an indispensable tool for every road warrior. (and she should know, having spent 2+ months driving around the continental U.S. with my grandmother a couple of years ago.)

now, technology is coming to her aid. according to this article in this week's new yorker (don't know how long that link will last), an adjunct professor at Rutgers has embarked on the creation of a comprehensive map of public restrooms in manhattan, using Google Maps. looks like it will also be annotated, which is key, because you just don't want any bathroom; you want one with toilet paper AND soap.

oh - i finally finished my paper. i thought it was pretty good until i got to class last night. now i'm pretty sure it's dreadful. oh well. i will console myself with the following website, specifically the "pups" category: http://www.cuteoverload.com/ yes, i am hopeless. in thirty years i will no doubt be wearing kitten sweatshirts.

if only speed were legal. and/or safe

ok, so i know i ought to be writing my paper. but last night i went on a blog-reading binge. specifically, i read
every crafty blog i could find.*
and, man, are people doing some cool things out there. i notice that most of them are stay-at-home-mothers. which means i need either to bag all of my gigs post haste, or cease and desist sleeping if i'm ever going to get around to making the bunny who is earnest or cunning onesies for my wee friends. of course, i haven't even had a chance to take the stained glass-making class that d gave me for my birthday last june. argh.

*because i am only a recently reformed luddite, i will just point out that you can click on any colored text throughout this site to visit other sites i mention. recent experience has suggested that this might be a useful tip.

also, i think i've found b's soulmate.

in other news, here is what she is doing today while i write:

she also sent an s.o.s email to d, because i didn't get around to taking her for a walk 'till noon:

he sent one back and said that if she was a really good girl and rather patient, there would be some major stick-fetching in it for her.

pause

well, i'm in the process of writing - verrrryyy sloooowwwwly - a paper on *i think* hegel and kant, so i'm not s'posed to be writing anything else. instead i will share this pic of bea, surveying her domain, somewhere in the wilds of southern virginia. carry on.

and now for something completely different

a new study reveals that those "drug-free school zones" don't protect kids from drugs and boost the already disproportionate rate of incarceration of certain ethnic populations (sentences for crimes committed within the zones are more rigorous). every time i drive by one of those green and white signs i think how emblematic they are of the hopeless naiveté of the "war on drugs." and now to learn that they are both naive AND destructive of the communities they are meant to serve? wow.

destructive? yep. jailing an addict - which the majority of those involved with the drug trade are - instead of offering him treatment is a sure-fire way to ensure that as soon as he’s back on the streets, he’ll be buying and selling, and getting arrested, again. kids who grow up in communities where the adults are constantly in and out of prison obviously lack the supervision, role models and support they need to thrive later on. in this scenario, every child gets left behind.

yeah, it's naive to think that treatment alone is enough to solve urban drug problems and break the cycle of incarceration. but we've got to start somewhere. stepping off the old soapbox now...

and lastly

just one more thing about fish: this morning npr had a story on sustainable fish farming - international waters are sorely over-fished and if we're to get all our omega 3 fatty acids, we had better figure out a better way to farm-raise fish.

one option is to raise them in deep-water net enclosures, although environmental experts worry that fish can escape these (or any) nets and mingle with the wild population, to the detriment of both. don't know how what the fish are actually FED might change, however.

conscientiousness is such a drag. you do the right thing from one perspective (say, health or environmental purity) and the wrong from another (species conservation). grr.

just wild

well, friday night's meal went very well. the company was wonderful and i actually made it to midnight despite having had almost no sleep the night before - but, oh my, the house looked good, as long as you avoided the basement and back bedroom.

i'd adapted a bon appetit recipe from epicurious.com for the main course. our guests, a quartet of die-hard foodies, seemed to really enjoy it and i think it's worth sharing (see below). also think, after a bit of research, that the "wild" aspect of "wild salmon in saffron sauce" is key. thanks to what they are fed, farm-raised salmon harbor dramatically more toxins than wild, which may also be lower in fat. i don't know when i started to get concerned about stuff like this, but thanks to trader joe's frozen wild salmon, i can afford to be.

can also now recommend roasting asparagus, because unlike steamed asparagus, roast asparagus kind of takes care of itself. just cut off the woody ends, load them in a single layer on a rimmed cookie sheet, drizzle with a bit of olive oil (i had some orange champagne muscat vinegar on hand that i added as well), add salt and pepper and a handful of sliced almonds, and roast at 450 degrees until tender, about 20-30 minutes. yum.

Wild Salmon in Saffron Sauce

1/2 cup dry white wine
1/2 teaspoon saffron threads, crushed
3/4 cup (about) half and half
1/2 - 1 cup canned crushed tomatoes with added puree
1 garlic clove, minced
1 bay leaf
salt, black pepper and cayenne pepper to taste
4 4- to 6-ounce skinless wild salmon fillets
1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice

In microwave or on stovetop, heat wine to boiling. Pour liquid into 2-cup measuring cup. Stir in saffron. Let stand 15 minutes.
Add enough half and half to cooking liquid to measure 1 1/3 cups. Transfer to large saucepan. Stir in tomatoes, garlic, bay leaf, and cayenne. Simmer over medium heat until sauce thickens slightly, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. (Half and half may initially separate but will recombine as it simmers.)
Heat oil in large nonstick skillet over high heat. Add salmon, rounded side down. Cook until bottom is golden, about 3 minutes. Turn salmon over. Reduce heat to low; cover and cook until salmon is opaque in center, about 4 minutes longer. Remove from heat. Leave covered to keep warm.
Stir lemon juice into sauce.
Place 1 salmon fillet on each of 4 plates and spoon sauce over salmon.

Makes 4 servings.

let them eat salmon

last night my mother and i went to a lecture on herbal remedies and allergy prevention. i learned that everything i eat is wrong for me. oh, really?

as a seasonal allergy sufferer, i would be wise to build my immunity by eating omega 3 fatty acids and avoiding sugar. instead, i eat sugar like it's my job and i have fish four times a month if i'm lucky. this week in particular has really taken the cake (literally).

so tomorrow night a few friends are coming over and the meal is going to be like an omega 3 and antioxidant blowout, in a probably misguided attempt to remedy the situation in just one evening. salmon* in a saffron sauce, beet and feta salad, asparagus, and homemade strawberry sorbet.

in the meantime, i'm resisting the urge to perform a wholesale renovation on our place before tomorrow. i'm the kind of person who would stay up all night painting one insignificant wall a different color in anticipation of company coming, and then forget to clean the bathroom for them.

* the fish in this image is obviously not salmon. it is tuna that d and i bought off of a fisherman and grilled with fresh rosemary from "our" garden on the greek island of hydra last fall.

i am mine

last night i had class so d was left to his own devices while my classmates and i considered hegel's notion of freedom. he concludes that freedom is "self-contained existence" (Bei-sich-selbst-seyn). in other words, for one to be free, one must recognize one's own existence as completely independent from that of others. this seems to mean that rather than saying, "i am somebody's wife/daughter/mother/son/teacher/boss/pupil/employee, etc." the free person must say, first and foremost, "i am mine."

what a conundrum. for what are we if not in total relation to others? i am a woman because there are others who aren't; i am a writer because somebody reads my writing; i am smart because there are others who are less so; i am stupid because there are others who are brilliant; and so on.

i know of a woman who was killed in a plane crash, together with her children and mother-in-law. i have since occasionally thought of her husband, a man who lost all of his familial identifiers in one moment: no longer a husband, no longer a father, no longer a son. in his case, being able to say "i am mine" is no accomplishment.

a friend asked me why i started this blog - she wasn't the only one - and i had a hard time coming up with an answer that wasn't totally pathetic ("because if i'm going to lead a pointless life i might as well write about it"). i think hegel would find it slavish to muse on one's private life in the public domain - talk about lack of self-containment! but i find myself looking forward to writing for an audience, no matter how infinitesimal or even imaginary.

even if i cannot say truthfully that i am mine - and i can't - i have something that is mine to share.

chicken with lemon and caper sauce

this morning i said a quiet but heartfelt "f*** you" to a hairbrush that rolled off the sink and onto my toe. i took that as a sign that i was not thrilled to be back to my chaotic daily existence after nine glorious days on the road.

we had quite an adventure, including camping in 20 degree weather and hiking in 80 degree weather, a trip to the pet ER and a wonderful octogenarian wedding. one of the highlights was going to your dekalb farmers market in atlanta with d's sister and her husband, where we found dried rosemary and sage for a steal and a thousand-gram hunk of greek feta for $2.69.

another was having a meal cooked by my lovely and talented almost-sixteen-year-old sister, m. she gently pan-fried chicken breasts and then layered them with a gorgeous, rich and brightly flavored sauce of lemon, butter and capers. no recipe - she cooks from the hip. very, very cool, and fun to hang out with her and our younger sister, l, who sets a mean table and is a connoisseur of fine cheese (we'd brought a hunk of sage derby from atlanta, and she pronounced it very good).

more sausage, and a visit del sud

last night's dinner literally was leftovers - d was being wined and dined by a vendor at the capital grille, the city's new old boys club, so i just reheated the pasta with an extra sprinkle of parmesan in the toaster oven. was marginally better about dessert - no peanut butter or frosting, but instead a handful of the new peanut-butter-filled hershey's kisses, which are ok but no peanut butter cups, and a finger of sheridan's "layered coffee liquer" which we got in a duty-free shop on our way back from the british virgin islands or somewhere and has been languishing in the fridge ever since.

tonight we leave for a week-long road tour of the south: atlanta to see d's sister and a college friend of his; savannah to see my dad; and then charlotte, where my 84-year-old grandmother is getting married (to a man, she's dismayed to report, of the advanced age of 85). we'll be camping much of the time, and i'm in charge of provisioning our camp foods. bring on the smoked sausage!

isn't there something uniquely repugnant about sausage? even the lower-fat turkey variety? how profoundly horrifying is it that we grind up the least attractive parts of animals and then stuff them into a casing made of their own viscera - or, perhaps even worse, that of some other species? i try not to think about this too much, because i am unfortunately an adamant, jane-come-lately member of the sausage fan club. as my most hilarious friend once said, "how can anyone be anorexic where there's sausage in this world?" and she's right; sausage is - while not an absolute good - a very tasty, fat- cholesterol- and preservative-riddled good. and to think i grew up in a vegetarian home.

besides, the dog really likes it when i give her morsels of sausage when i'm using it in a recipe. i'm one of those pet owners who's constantly concerned that my dog hates me, or at least couldn't give a flying %&*@ whether i'm around or not, so i gotta remind her occasionally that i can be the source of all that is good and meaty. and that "mom" can be just as fun as "dad". like this morning, when we went running together? wasn't THAT fun? huh? huh? huh?

that was my first run since, i think, thanksgiving day. i'm expecting my knees to lodge a formal protest any minute now.

back in a week...

baked pasta with turkey kielbasa and a side of pb and vanilla frosting, straight up

last night we were supposed to go out for wings and beer with some of d's teammates before their 9 pm volleyball game - he plays a LOT of recreational sports - and at the last minute they decided not to get together. i always feel like i've gotten a stay of execution when social plans fall through. not because i don't know that it will be much more entertaining to go out and spend time with others - even folks i don't really know, with whom i have not much in common (i do NOT play a lot, or even a little, of sports) - but because (apparently) i'd rather sit at home and watch crap television while eating an array of inappropriate foods straight from the container. hence the title of this post.

my assumption on these nights is that i will (a) finish reading one or two books, or (b) clean the house, or (c) begin some vaguely creative endeavor with my new-found free time. and then, inevitably, it is 11 pm and i've done nothing but watch three successive episodes of "project runway" or something. ugh. not a complaint unique to me, but a complaint nonetheless.

well, anyway, with the prospect of a wing-free night stretching in front of us (i'm really not that big on wings, frankly), i figured i ought to rustle up some grub for the fam - that would be me, d and our little dog, too.

a recipe for baked pasta with sausage had conveniently found its way into my inbox in the morning - convenient, because all i had in the house was a length of turkey kielbasa and some rotini. i had to improvise a bit, per usual. the recipe called for making a quite delectable-sounding sauce of tomatoes, vodka and cream, but i used jarred tomato sauce because it was already open and would go off before i'd have another chance to use it. newman's own sockarooni, if you want to get specific about it. and i only had fresh parmesan and pecorino romano, not fontina, and frozen whole-leaf spinach not fresh. and the recipe called for rigatoni, not rotini.

but, all in all, it was yum. boiled the pasta and the spinach, tossed it with the sauce and the cheese, divided it between two baking dishes - one to freeze and one (gorgeous, white, curvy porcelain, wedding present) to throw into the oven for 30 min. at 400 degrees. i served it with a fresh romaine salad with apples.

then d went to his game. and i sat down to finish reading julie powell's "julie and julia" and polish off an extremely icky tub of dollar store vanilla frosting ("artificially flavored!") washed down with natural peanut butter - i understand the inherent conflict there - straight from the jar. and then i watched "project runway" with a chaser of some abominable Lifetime movie starring jenna elfman. what a wretch i am.