Bonfire of the Sanities - Friday 6/19/2009

My sister feeds me weeds! And she always has.

She used to make a violet and nasturtium salad for me when I had a cold. The photos I took of the wild sorrel frittata she whipped up for breakfast didn't come out, but here are the original herbs as picked from Mom's yard. Served alongside freshly picked strawberries and chai. Mmm.



I met up with Mom after her line dance club and we went to visit Aunt Gertie. She'll be 100 years old in 4 months! She's delightful and interesting. I'm related to her both by blood (Dad's side) and marriage (Mom's side).

And they wonder why all us kids married people from out of state. Gotta dilute that gene pool a little every so often.


Lunch at The Nook in downtown Columbia City. Mom and I split a Coney Dog basket. Had chocolate Cokes to go with it. Used to get vanilla Sprites, but they haven't carried an uncola for decades now, they say.


Cool mural on the wall at The Nook. Painted by Kenny Allen in the early 80s.



The picnic table awaits our family and friends get together. Bonfires are our traditional way to celebrate, and it was wonderful to see a bunch of my cousins and their kids. Some friends from elementary and high school came too, so we got a jump on tomorrow night's reunion.

The un-flat version of Flat Brayden was there, and we had a group photo taken... Brayden, Flat Brayden, me, and the copy of Flat Stanley they brought for me!

The weather kept toying with us all night long. It finally really started raining around 10 pm, which broke it up. Except a couple cousins and I stood around talking in the soft warm rain. Guess we never did have enough sense to come in out of it, even as kids.

South Bend Chocolate Company - Monday 6/15/2009

My brother Brain maintains his dignity throughout our tour of the South Bend Chocolate Company!


Wow, it really is a lot like the scene from I Love Lucy! Love that it's such a small, simple operation.

We had samples from the box of imperfects. I chose yummy vanilla cream.



That's a lot of love in those boxes.


Arispa demonstrates the proper method for making chocolate dipped spoons. It's a skill we've been lacking in our family up until now.

The chocolate is really good. If you're in South Bend, you should check it out. We took the extended 45-minute tour, which is $4.00. The 25-minute tour is free.

Our guide forgot to give us our goodie-bags at the end, which Arispa realized after we'd left. Boo hoo!

Dinner, Again - Monday 6/1/2009

Cooked up the last of the garbanzo beans. Steamed them and added a little very good olive oil. Wonderful farmer's market tomatoes and fresh basil. Fresh baby artichokes sauteed with onions and garlic and topped with a little Parmesan cheese.

I found the recipe for the baby artichokes at Simply Recipes. I'd never used fresh baby artichokes before. It does take a while to clean these, but they don't have well-developed chokes, so you can just eat the whole trimmed artichokes.

I love artichokes, really I do.

Hydra's Heights and Fresh Garbanzos. - Sunday 5/31/2009

So of course, the first time I decide not to accompany Hydra on his hike, he goes and scales his mountain! That's him waving his crutch above his head after calling me on the cell phone to alert me to his feat.

Boys cannot be trusted!



Tomato and artichoke progress, just so you know.


I just heard Evan Kleiman sing the praises of fresh garbanzo beans on Good Food recently, and what should I find at my local Vallarta market?

The very thing I was looking for!



There are 1-2 beans per pod. Usually one.

They aren't beige. They're green!


See them in there? They're yummy fresh or steamed and drizzled with some good olive oil. On the radio, they said that people roast them over grills.

The pods are fairly tender, but not tender enough to eat. Not bad shelling... I pressed on them till they popped open like little balloons and then took out the beans.

Hydra Hits the Trail! - Thursday 5/28/2009

Look at that intrepid explorer! Just 10 days after surgery to repair that meniscus tear (Ooh! Look, ma! No spellchecker!), he's on the trail again. They write songs about stuff like this!


Admittedly, the going was about half of our usual pace, but really really good for a guy who had a camera and a knife in his knee joint so recently! Beautiful day for it.


Around the far side of the neighborhood... Is that fire road looking a little long to anyone else?



As I was taking photos of these cactus flowers, bees kept diving into them and burying their faces in the middle. Can you see the one that took a header into this bloom?


Oleanders down by the mailboxes.


The neighbor's coreopsis. The neighborhood is lit up with flowers these days!


We arrived home to discover ground squirrels nibbling on the tender cucumber sprouts I planted. And this container has herbs in it that I started from seed. Herb soup. Sigh. Hopefully I saved some of them.



Found about six ounces of beef in the freezer and used up the carrots, celery and some of the red potatoes making this soup. Also called in the help of Better Than Boullion to flesh out the soup, so to speak. Used fresh thyme and mint for seasoning.

Hint: When using fresh herbs that have stems in soups and stews, don't bother nipping off all the leaves. Just put the whole sprig in the soup. The leaves will cook off and you can easily pull out the stems before serving.

Field Trip to San Gabriel - Wednesday 5/27/2009

Oh, the things I do in service of my writing. I mean, really, it takes a lot of commitment and research to write a blog. This is part of the wonderful Vietnamese meal Braveheart, Antipasta and I shared today. We wrapped these meats and veggies in rice paper and dipped them in various dips. Yummy!

Wish I knew what the name of the restaurant was. It was on Valley Boulevard in San Gabriel and "pho" was part of it. If you've been to San Gabriel, you'll know that this doesn't help much.

Before this, Braveheart and Antipasta introduced me to Chinese-Style Herbal Foot Soak! I'd never even heard of this, but Valley Boulevard in San Gabriel is packed with foot soak/massage places... and noodle houses. A little bit of heaven!

We went to a place called China Tibet Foot Soak, where we sat in big reclyners. The attendents brought out big wooden buckets filled with very hot water laced with fragrent herbs. I put my feet on a little platform in the bucket, the massuesse put a towel over my legs and the bucket, and I steamed for a while. Really hot!

Then cold water was poured into the hot water until it was tolerable to soak in and I soaked a while. Although Antipasta said last time she was there, the television was on, it was nice and quiet today.

I had my first professional reflexology foot massage. (I think my brother, Texaco, tried to give me one a long time ago after he came home to Indiana from Vietnam or California, but I'm pretty sure it tickled too much to be effective.)

When my massuesse started pounding on my legs but Antipasta and Braveheart's weren't doing it yet, I almost laughed out loud. It just seemed too funny that one person could get really rough treatment and the others not. But sure enough, they both got a drubbing too!

It was really really intense, but I decided to let her do it as vigorously as she wanted to, to see what the experience would be like, and to let the reflexology work if it works. It wasn't very relaxing because it was pretty much painful. Next time I'll forgo the intensity and just get a nice wimpy foot rub.

Next was the neck and back rub, which was terrific. A person can really whale on my back and I love it.

All this took about an hour and 45 minutes and cost only $35.

Braveheart pointed out a place where you can get the same treatment for $15!



This one's for you Boise. Even though it's blurry, it's the best shot I could get of an L.A. kook on the move. Can you see this?

It's a guy riding his motorcycle on the transition from the 5 to the 14 at sundown, wearing a leather top hat and carrying a big white German shepherd on his lap.

Yeah, that's right, a big white dog. Who didn't look very comfortable, and who kept shifting back and forth, making the bike wobble beneath them both.

I was about to call the police on them when they exited the freeway. It's really not fair to the dog or to the people that might have the terrible experience of running over either of these fellows.

Do You Frittata? - Friday 5/22/2009

I've been making what I called frittatas for a while, but they were just basically open-faced omelets. What's the difference? You actually finish a frittata in the oven.

Wow, was this easy and delicious! Five eggs scrambled in a cast iron skillet started on the stove top and cooked until almost done but still a little runny on top. I had a mixture of tomatoes, artichoke hearts and garlic leftover from last night's pasta, so I topped it with that and some string cheese (the only mild cheese I had on hand) and Parmesan cheese. Popped it under the broiler for a few minutes until the eggs set.

Served with fresh coffee, toast and the rhubarb preserves I made yesterday.

Mmm, it's nice to have time off during the week!

Lunch at Malbec - Wednesday 5/20/2009

What am I doing eating lunch out at a not particularly inexpensive new restaurant near work, you might ask. Well, meeting up with the lovely Chatty, who I met last week at the Got Milk/Estilo Salon event.

It was great having more time to talk, and she's a pretty inspiring entrepreneur. She keeps a couple of blogs, teaches advanced computing at UCLA Extension and does consultations on using social networking to promote one's business.

She's offering a free "Ask the Experts" teleclass through CoachToolsToGo next Tuesday. I can't be on the call, but I signed up to have the recording emailed to me. Sweet! Click on that link and you can too.

Oh, and the food at Malbec? Ah. Only okay. We both had Milanesa sandwiches. I have to say mine was completely underwhelming. The meat was clearly from the freezer...way too uniform to have been made fresh. Why even offer that? Don't they know we watch Gordon Ramsey and we know better?

The fries were perfect. The chimichurra was fine, but not really as good as we used to get at The Gaucho Grill.

Romi's, Palmdale - Saturday 5/16/2009

This wild mushroom & chicken linguine looks really good, doesn't it?

Sadly, that's about as far as it goes. Chicken was dry and wasn't the highest quality. It was like those weird cuts they often serve you in cheap Chinese restaurants--where lunch comboes are still $5.95.

You know what I'm talking about. The chicken knuckles.

They offered no freshly ground pepper, which I think sets off pasta so nicely, and no Parmesan.

When we first visited Romi's right after it opened last summer, we were excited that someone was trying to up the level of dining in Palmdale. We were impressed with our first meal here. We've been here three or four times since then, and each experience has been less satisfying than the last.

Service is consistently below par, with a great deal of inattention even though the dining room has never been anything near full on any of our visits. This time, they brought Hydra's large over-dressed Cesar salad first. That's fine, even though I think they would have been far wiser to offer each of us a smaller salad with our $12.95 lunches.

My entree came about ten minutes later. Then we waited another 5-10 minutes for Hydra's entree. Hydra saw our server stop and talk with another employee as she carried his Cajun Meatloaf to the table. (Please, there was nothing discernibly Cajun about the spices...it was barbecue sauce if you ask me.)

The best part of the meal was when the server came to the table with water and had her eye on the elderly man making strange gestures in the air at the table behind me. We'd just come from seeing Angels and Demons and I was about to make a comment on the classic Italian decor of the dining room.

"We just saw Angels and Demons," I said to the server, smiling.

She blanched and her eyes widened. "What!?"

"Um...Angels and Demons? The movie."

"Oh! That's such a relief! I was watching that old guy and I thought--"

She really should go see the movie, if she's that willing to believe in the supernatural!

I'm not saying anyone else should see it, unless you're willing to leave your logic and your sense of time at the door. Tom! Ron! What are you, thinking with your dwindling investments in mind?

Innocents Lost - Thursday 5/14/2009

Yes, in a few minutes, these innocent vegetables will be chopped and blended into an inedible batch of gazpacho.

First off, there was too much onion, so I added some canned tomatoes in an attempt to fix it. But I think the cucumbers might have been bitter.

Lesson : taste the ingredients.

Sigh.

You Can Forget All Your Cares and Go Downtown - Monday 5/11/2009

Antipasta, Braveheart and I ventured into downtown Los Angeles for the day to visit some museums and soak in the atmosphere. Central Los Angeles doesn't have the kind of street culture that other major cities do, but it's still pretty wonderful.

I'd driven by the new(ish) Walt Disney Concert Hall but I hadn't been up close or inside. It seemed rather sharp to me, but it's quite sensuous when you see it up close. As Braveheart said, the building itself evokes the movement of music. I really wanted to put my hands on those walls. And maybe even try sliding down them!

We went inside and there were tours offered, but they didn't offer a viewing of the auditorium. Antipasta and Braveheart were mildly shocked that I haven't been there yet. There they go, setting the cultural bar a little higher again.


Above the entrance to Our Lady of Los Angeles Cathedral. I love that her toes stick over the edge of the platform.

Oddly, I didn't take a photograph of the outside of the cathedral. You can get an idea of it from the church's architecture page. It felt very uninviting to me. Layers of shingled concrete give the impression that it's like an armadillo ready to roll up at the slightest provocation.

Maybe this armored effect is a symptom of the struggles the Catholic Church faced during the time when this structure was designed and built, as it was under siege of so many accusations of sexual abuse by its priests.


A noon mass began as we stepped inside the gigantic sanctuary. See the three-dimensional cross in the window?

The windows were probably my favorite part of the cathedral. The thinly cut natural alabaster lets in a most benign light.

I happened to take a shot almost identical to the cathedral's own representation.


One of the small chapels that line the corridor outside the sanctuary. The Cathedral commissioned some truly lovely artwork.

All in all, though, the cathedral feels like a mausoleum. Cold and impersonal. I wonder if it will resonate for people in a hundred years when it has had time to absorb the hopes and fears of those who worship here.


It was just a little misty up at elevation. This building is on 4th Street near Olive.


Our next stop was MOCA [Museum of Contemporary Art], where it's okay to photograph exhibits from the permanent collection.

I like the sculpture on the left. It's called "Soft Scissors."

See it now?

I like art that doesn't take itself too darned seriously.



Number 1, 1949 by Jackson Pollack surprised me. When you are in the room with this piece, you can follow all the different colors and layers in succession and see so much.

It struck me that it's like looking out at the whole amazing universe and simultaneously inward into the heart of the atom.


We explored the performance room part of the Dan Graham exhibit.

Braveheart's response to most creative challenges is to remove her shirt.

Me?

I take pictures or notes. Or both.


Well-walked and hungry, we arrive at Grand Central Market to seek out lunch. It was after 2 p.m. by then and some of the stuff on the steamer tables honestly looked a little crusty. But we scoped it all out and came up with a shared lunch of teriyaki chicken, ceviche tostada, scallop burrito, and tilapia.




The tilapia plate, served with rice, beans, shredded lettuce and corn tortillas. Mmm.



And we're off to Los Angeles Public Library's Central Library. This building and the services it provides along with all it's branch libraries are one of the truly great things about this city. I use it all the time.
Along with books, interesting architecture and literary events, it houses a gallery on the 2nd floor and an exhibition space on the 1st floor.

This is a self-portrait of Richard Neutra, a California architect whose designs had a great impact on California. I have to say that I am not a huge fan of the sharpness of his building designs, but I was very impressed with his artwork.

Antipasta pointed out that there were early 1930s style cars parked in front of his futuristic looking buildings in many of his renderings. Interesting!



Stairs up from 5th Street to 4th, across from the library. There's usually water running through the rocks on top of the bannister.



These kids aren't fooling around. They know how to get around downtown.


We search in vain for a Pinkberry...


Yes, my toes are a little tired. After yesterday's calf-stretching climb up and around Vasquez Rocks, they've had a bit of a workout.

Blackberry Compote - Saturday 5/9/2009

I've been getting tasty blackberries from Costco recently, and wondering what to do with them other than enjoy them fresh. Our friends BikerChick and Capo are going to stay over with us tonight after going to a hoot together and we'll have pancakes with blackberry compote for breakfast tomorrow.

I went online and looked at a bunch of recipes and then made up my own. I made a double batch, but here are the basics. You could do this with different berries, and adjust the amount of water and cornstarch depending on how juicy the berries are.

2 cups berries.
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
2 Tablespoons cold water
1/4-1/2 cup sugar (to taste, and depending on how tart the berries are)
1/4-1/2 cup water (like I said, depending on the juiciness of the berries)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
a few shakes of powdered cinnamon

Mix the corn starch and the 2 Tbs of cold water. (Preferably in the same pink melamine cup your mom used to mix up corn starch in when you were a kid.)


Put the berries, sugar and fresh water in a non-reactive pan and heat them to a boil. Reduce to a simmer for about 5 minutes or until the berries seem cooked to you. In this case, they seemed to become redder as they cooked. I wanted to leave mine with a little body.

Stir in vanilla extract and cinnamon. (This pairing is my twist on the recipe.)

Keeping the mixture bubbling, slowly stir in the cornstarch mixture until you reach your desired consistency. Mine was about as thick as pie filling. You may not use all the cornstarch...sort of depends on how much liquid you have. If you want it to be more saucy, you can add more water before stirring in the cornstarch mixture.

Tip: I made space in the middle of the berries with my spoon and poured the cornstarch into that. It will thicken a lot in that area, but before it gets lumpy you stir in the thinner juice from amongst the berries. Repeat that several times so you can control how thick the sauce is.



The finished product, ready to cool and pop into the fridge to await breakfast.

I have to say, this was really good on the pancakes.

Which was a relief, since I burnt some of the pancakes, undercooked some and flipped one down between the stove and the counter. We ended up with just barely enough good ones to fill us up, along with some scrambled eggs. I guess I got cocky with my cast iron cooking skills and didn't really pay enough attention to the temperature of the pan. Sheesh!

I told BikerChick and Capo that they have to come back so I can make them a frittata or an omelet. I'm better at that.

Accept No Substitution - Thursday 5/7/2009

'Cause you know that imitators are popping up all I over the place.... Huh? Stopped by the Newhall Farmer's Market to pick up some tomatoes. One day I will get some corn on the cob here, but I was on my way to the gym to a spinning class and didn't need any more food.

The class went better than I expected, since I hadn't been for about 5 weeks, since before the most recent bout of bronchitis. I coughed afterward, but not during and really worked hard hard hard for an hour. Whoo!


Liiiiiiight. Pleeeease.