yummers

I’m eating well. Both healthfully and not.

 

the sociology of cookbooks

I started a new project with a family member.

We're both interested in cookbooks. Me from the sociology aspect (well, and of course eating), her from the recipe-testing, technical aspect. We ordered a batch of six community cookbooks from Kansas in the 1970s, 1980s and one from the '90s. The community cookbooks interested us because they are created by home cooks in a particular area. 

There's so much to explore. The way the writers talk about food--baking soda is sometimes just called soda, which can be confusing when a surprise ingredient is Coca Cola or soda. Mexican food is mislabeled as Native American cuisine in one. There's the submission names: in one 1970's cookbook, the women are identified by their husband's names. So it might be Dorothy submitting, but she's identified as Mrs. Wizard Oz. This means we will never know for sure who submitted the Tomato Soup Cake recipe!

Our first project: attempt a coffee cake recipe from the same region (western Kansas) and the same decade (1970's) but different cookbooks. More to come.

a most happy veg: an origin story

I've been a pretty happy vegetarian for the past seven or so years.
Hey! Calm yourselves! I'm not about to embark on a lecture.
But I do want to say something about why.
The original decision was made gradually, evolving concerns over health risks (after my Mom passed) and the inhumane treatment of innocent animals. Not to mention the environmental impacts of factory farms.
I started eating only humanely raised meat, and let me tell you, my meat consumption--amount and frequency--plummeted. That sh*t is expensive!
And I realized, I didn't really miss meat all that much.
And, I honestly haven't missed it much since.
What I have developed is a taste for vegetables.
Wow, are vegetables good. (Except for onions. Onions are Satan's stink bombs.) Vegetables are amazing, especially in season. I mean, really really so good.
For me, farmer's market or farmstand veg is the best--it smells fresh, of the earth, and needs only the gentlest of preparations to make it delicious. But a close second is veg from your local grocery store, the more local the better.
Summer in the 206 was a riot of greens, tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, and of course fruit: melons and berries and peaches. I like to think my body thanked me every day for the deliciousness and the nutrition.
This week, as fall deepens and chills, I am fortunate enough to scored some cauliflower--both purple and yellow--as well as rainbow carrots and Yukon Gold potatoes. I can't wait to toss it all in some olive oil and salt, and let the oven do the rest.

choco holick

Perugina Luisa.
Heard of it? Better yet, tasted it?
This was my absolute favorite chocolate bar when I was a teenager. And I ate a lot of chocolate. The word chocoholic does not even come close. My sister and I were legit connoisseurs. We bought imported bars, mostly, tasted and wrote notes and kept a folder holding the wrappers. I re-discovered the folder this week, as I was cleaning out a closet.
Noted in pencil on the front: 107. We sampled 107 bars of chocolate!
And I'm not talking Hershey's, or any other American chocolate, although there are some vintage Ghirardelli wrappers in there, the label funky and with a 70's vibe, complete with phonetic pronunciation.
Perugina Luisa, tho.
Italian chocolate, smooth and round in flavor, with notes of vanilla and barky darkness. It was a thicker bar, too, a real chunk. I don't think they make it anymore (although maybe?).
I leafed through the stack and found other gems--tiny wrappers of German chocolates, telling the story of Rotkäppchen (Red Riding Hood). One from Expo '86 in Vancouver, made in Israel. Several from Callebaut, still a favorite. Droste bars, labeled in determined fonts. I've dallied with other chocolatiers--La Maison du Chocolat, notably. A particularly luscious French bar made by Bonnat. Theo's, from just down the street, is admirable.
Chocolate was my passion, back then. A hobby that combined treats and imagination and travel. A way to escape an anxious life, to go somewhere else, if only via my tastebuds.

80/20

At work we frequently use the "80/20" rule, which means that you can't fix everything and sometimes you have to focus on a solution that resolves 80% of the problem and not waste all your time on the 20%.
The world seems to have gone mad, or maybe we are getting what we deserve, I don't really know, but today I want to focus on the good stuff.
*
I was lucky enough to get to a couple of farmer's markets this week. It's been a mild summer and we are beyond fortunate to enjoy scrumptious vegetables and fruit--I scooped up Nash's first carrots of the summer, along with plump cauliflower heads and a big bag of broccoli, amazing garlic from Jarvis (Spanish Roja and Polish Hardneck), lovely fresh-picked peaches, green beans, zucchini, corn, and a big box of Mutiny Bay blueberries.

Yesterday I bused over to the Seafair Pow Wow at Discovery Park (at the Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center). All around, people greeted friends, an SPD officer mingled with the crowd and got in line with us for frybread with honey, a giggling couple let me help with their frybread selfie, vendors sold drums and bundled herbs and t-shirts and the line for plank-grilled salmon stretched dozens long. At 7pm the Coastal Grand Entry began, dancers and performers in their tribal regalia proceeded into the big grassy circle, in front of elders and drummers and hundreds of viewers. I wept a little. Despite the mass murder and deprivations we've inflicted upon our tribes for centuries, they persist, they thrive, and this weekend, they celebrate.

And in music: a couple of weeks ago I went to a show at High Dive with some friends. Ever So Android was the headliner and they slayed (and I realized the female half of the duo works at one of my favorite coffee shops!). The second opener tho--Monsterwatch--wow. I wouldn't identify myself as a metalhead but I heart these kids. There was crowdsurfing, a smallish mosh pit, and at one point, the lead singer flung himself to the floor between me and one of my buddies, continuing to play guitar and sing as he lay there. I lost half my whiskey when he wrenched himself back to the stage, but it was a fun night of abandon and a great show.