The Barefoot Kitchen Witch

Making Camembert

Here’s where it began.

Two gallons of fresh-from-the-Jersey-cow milk.

See the cream line?  That kind of milk.  The kind where the cream rises to the top.

From this, I am making camembert.

As I Brush Damp Tendrils of Blond Hair from My Weary Brow

Okay, a bit dramatic.

I’ve been busy – work-busy and home-busy.  But it’s all good busy.  I love my job, so I’m perfectly happy when I’m there, and at home I’ve been canning up a storm, which isn’t always fun, but it’s satisfying and rewarding to look at the jars and jars of food on my pantry shelves.

Productive Chaos

My dining room, right this very minute.  And probably into tomorrow.

Those jars – marinara.  Two kinds – one with a lot of basil and oregano, one with a lot of garlic.  The rest of the table?  All sorts of stuff, most of it food related.  Scratch that – all of it food related.

Still Life with Softie

“See?  I can pose with vegetables just as well as that slacker brother of mine can.  And I’ve got pumpkins!  Take my picture!”

Feline sibling rivalry.  It’s exhausting.

Taking Matters into His Own Paws

I was working the latter half of a double when Bill texted me to say that Scratchy’s tube was out. 

Feeding tube…out. 

No one took it out, mind you.  At least, none of us humans.  We were all at work or at school, so somehow…the tube came out.  It had been stitched in place where it went in through his throat, mind you.  Stitched in place; it wasn’t just free-floating like some sort of flexible drinking straw.

Scratchy’s been eating like his old self for a while now.  We stopped feeding him through the tube days ago and just continued to flush it with water as instructed back at the beginning of this saga.  Scratchy had grown impatient with the whole feeding tube nonsense, too.  He’d suddenly dart away while we were trying to feed him, leaving us holding the syringe and his uncrimped tube flapping in the breeze.

And he’s grown pinker and pinker in the tell-tale spots:  inside his ears, his eyes, his gums, and his shorn (for the ultrasound) belly.

He’s been quite himself lately.

Anyway, Bill ended up bringing Scratchy to the animal hospital so they could make sure the tube was entirely out (it was) and to take his stitches out.  Turns out there was no need for that – the stitches were gone, too.  Apparently Scratchy borrowed some scissors and snipped them himself.

The final word?  The holes in his neck will heal on their own, he looks great, and there is no need for another visit.

That huge hurricane-force gust of wind that rattled your house earlier this evening?  That was Bill and I breathing a collective sigh of relief. 

At this point, we just need to make sure the healing hole in his neck doesn’t get infected (he’s got a much smaller bandage thingy around his neck now – and he’s already chewing on it, trying to get rid of it) and to make sure he keeps eating.

I think we can handle that.

Still Life with Scratchy

Just moments before I took this picture, Scratchy was chewing on the garlic stalks to the right of the above picture.

He’s also been chewing on plastic bags and wrappers when the opportunity presents itself.

Definitely getting back to his old self.

Butternut Molasses Oatmeal Cookies

I made these the other day and if I don’t make them again my family will kick me out.

Well, okay, full disclosure, Julia won’t kick me out.  She didn’t like them.  But Bill and Alex?  Oh yeah.

And they really should be called “Because I need to go to the grocery store” cookies.  Why?  I was out of several things in the original recipe, so I just subbed this and that and ended up with something unexpectedly fabulous.

Red Flower Eye

*Out of respect for my friends who are easily freaked out by eyes and eyeballs (Hi Beth J, I’m talking to you), I have posted the picture for this post well below the fold and the text.*

Actually, there’s not much text for this post.

Alex came home from playing the other day and I noticed something on his eye.

Progressing Nicely

The kids holler for me any time Scratchy is spotted exhibiting normal, aka pre-Scary Sickness, behavior.

“Mom!  Scratchy’s eating!”

“Mom, come quick!  Scratchy’s drinking water!  Out of his bowl!”

“Mom!  I saw Scratchy use the litterbox!  He pooped!”

There is no privacy here.

Citrus

I was making a marmalade the other day…

Hide and Seek

I had a message on the answering machine this afternoon from Scratchy’s veterinarian – his blood work came back and while he’s not back to normal, his numbers have improved remarkably (the Dr’s word). 

I’d had a long day, I was tired, headachy, and verging on weepy-for-no-reason.  Then I got that message and suddenly I felt better about things.

Spelly Putty

That’s Julia’s work.

She’s got this hideous blob of silly putty that she’s had for I don’t know how long, and lately I’ve been finding it wrapped around plastic tigers on the small table in the living room, or in a blob on my kitchen work table, or – the other day – right there on the arm of a chair.

I’m a terrible housekeeper – I left it there.  And I took a picture.

Yesterday morning when Alex came downstairs, he sat in that chair and put his arm on the silly putty.  “Julia’s silly putty!” he announced with an older brother sigh.

“I wrote your name!”  Julia told him.  “It was for you!”

“Oh!” he said, in a much kinder voice.

And Then I Went Back to Bed

Found this in my drafts folder.  I’d written it on August 10th, but never posted it.  Don’t know why.  Anyway, figured I’d share….

I haven’t been sleeping well. 

There’s a lot on my mind, and it gets kind of hushed during the day when I’m busy with other, more immediate things, but then at night it senses the silence, the lack of motion, and, like a baby in my belly, it starts kicking.  Hard.

So I woke up sometime after three this morning.  Couldn’t get back to sleep, so I got up in a feeble attempt to flee the babble in my brain.

I didn’t escape them, of course.  They came along for the ride.

I went downstairs and switched on the tv more as an aural distraction than because there was anything to watch…and I puttered.  I folded laundry, started another load, wished my cousin a happy birthday on facebook, read stuff online, added a rosary posting to my etsy store, and tried to feel like I was accomplishing something good.  Something to make getting up worth it.  Not sure if I accomplished that or not.

I did get drowsy again, though, and at about quarter to six, when I couldn’t form intelligent sentences for another etsy upload, I figured I could go back to sleep for an hour or so.

So up I went.  I fell asleep, wrapped in a blanket (the fan was on in the room because Bill and I have different air temperature requirements to sleep well, at least in the summer), and dropped deeply into a dream.

Bill and I had gone…somewhere.  To something festive, it seemed…a wedding, a party…somewhere away.  And during the course of the festivities, whatever they were, Bill ended up hanging out with a bunch of guys that were there and I ended up heading back to whatever room we were staying in that night.  The next morning, I texted him because I didn’t know where he was, and then somehow I was home, in the basement, and I found his cell phone there, plugged into the charger.

So he didn’t even have it with him.  And I didn’t know how to get in touch with him, or where he was, or anything.  I worry all the time.  Even in dreams, apparently.

And then, I heard his voice.

It was saying “Jayne!  Jayne!  It’s trash day!”

I swam up, up, up through my unconsciousness and emerged, still wrapped in a blanket, still foggy-brained.  I opened an eye and looked at him.

“I heard the trucks,” he said urgently.

So my body rolled out of bed, dragging my sluggish brain with it, and we hurried downstairs to get our trash and recycle bins to the curb so we wouldn’t be stuck with smelly garbage fermenting in the sun for the next week. 

I tilted the gray garbage bin back on its wheels and started rolling it toward the street.  Bill was behind me, hopefully planning to carry the lawn bags, which were still wet from recent rain.  I hate carrying wet lawn bags – I’m always expecting them to break, and I really don’t want to have to deal with that.

Anyway, I’m also thinking, which week is it, green or blue?  Green is paper recyclables, blue is bottles and cans and metal things.  I’m pretty sure last week was green, but I scan the street to see what the other, more organized, neighbors have done.

Hmmm.

I see one gray bin over there.  But nothing else anywhere. 

It crosses my mind that everyone else on our street is SO efficient that not only did they put their bins out the night before, but they also ran outside IMMEDIATELY after the trucks ZIPPED THROUGH and returned the bins to wherever they keep them the rest of the week.

But that made no sense.  More foggy thinking…it IS Wednesday, right?

And then just as the dim bulb in my brain was starting to glow a bit, Bill said “Monday holiday!”

Rhode Island is the only state still observing “Victory Day.”  It used to be VJ day – Victory over Japan – but then a lot of states stopped celebrating it and then I guess the name got changed to sound more PC. 

Anyway.  Aha.  Monday holiday.  That meant our trash pickup would be…tomorrow.

I just looked at Bill, who kind of smiled and said “Sorry.”

I wanted to glare, but I laughed instead and headed back inside, up the stairs, and back into my blanket cocoon. 

I figured it might make for a good story later.

Feeling Strong Now

You know all those jokes about how many (insert group/religion/occupation/nationality/gender/etc. of your choice here) it takes to change a light bulb?

I’ve got my own version now. 

But you need to read the other stuff first.  (Or you could skip ahead, but that would lead me to believe you’re the kind of person who reads the end of a book first, just to see how it all turns out.  Tsk tsk.)

Nibbling

He had a few bites of food this morning.

Did the same thing yesterday morning.

Alex got him to eat a little bit of canned food the evening before that.

So that’s progress.

Squash Harvest

Just keep scrolling…

Surprises in the Backyard

It’s starting to look like Autumn. 

Getting Back to His Old Self

This morning when I opened the bedroom door I was greeted by a white and gray cat who meowed cheerfully at me before brushing past my legs to inspect the premises.

I was so surprised I knocked on the bathroom door and hissed at Bill to open the door.  He came out, brushing his teeth, and I pointed delightedly at Scratchy, who was meandering around the laundry baskets.

“He hasn’t done this in so long!”  I said happily.

It’s a good sign.

Bandage Change

Last night after work I brought Scratchy to the animal hospital again so they could test his blood and check his liver levels and change his bandage.

I sat in the waiting room for a few minutes, then the tech came over with a clipboard and confirmed what Scratchy was there for.  He started to take the carrier and said he’d be back in a bit after the bloodwork and the bandage change, and I said something like “So I’m not allowed to watch the bandage change?”  I said a bit wistfully, not in a snotty way.  In case you were wondering.

And he said there was no reason I couldn’t, it would just take longer because some reason I didn’t exactly understand but I said “okay” politely and resumed the magazine page-flipping I’d begun moments ago.

Within a minute or two, the door to one of the exam rooms opened, the tech guy came out and beckoned me over. 

“We’ll take his blood sample and then the Dr. will do the bandage change in here.”  I thanked him.

I sat in the room and waited, my thoughts drifting through various other animal/medical events in my life.  And I thought, for a moment, that maybe I should have gone to veterinary school…I think I’d have done well, frankly.

But, it didn’t happen, no sense in regrets.

Soon I heard a familiar meow outside the room.  The tech guy opened the door, Scratchy in one arm and the carrier in the next.  Scratchy had a purple pressure bandage around his back left leg and the little closure at the tip of his feeding tube had been changed to a different style.  (Bill said it had come out a couple times during the earlier feeding.)

I scratched Scratchy around the edges of his bandage and soon he was purring loudly and fairly relaxed.

The Dr. came in with bandaging materials.  We chatted about Scratchy – she said he definitely seemed spunkier than the last time.  I told her how he’d been doing, that little by little he seemed to be acting more like himself (but it’s VERY little by little), and that Softie is still not sure what to say to him, so she just stares and occasionally hisses.

Soon the various layers of bandage and tape were peeled away and I could see Scratchy’s shorn neck.  With a tube sticking out of it.  The tube, which is about the diameter of a pencil, maybe a hair smaller, is sutured in place on the left side of his neck, toward the front.  The opening looked good – no swelling or discharge or anything like that.  The Dr put a new absorbent square of something around the tube, then re-wrapped everything and taped the end of the tube back against Scratchy’s neck. 

They’ll have the results of the blood work some time today.  He’s still jaundiced, so his numbers won’t be down all that much yet, but just like it took a while for him to get so sick, it’ll take time for him to get better.

As I was leaving – hanging around at the front desk while someone went to get more of Scratchy’s high-cal food – I got to meet the three cats that live at the hospital.

They spend their days in what seems to be a couple of rooms connected by a tunnel just below the ceiling.  The whole thing is glassed-in, and they have one of those huge carpeted cat tree-house things or whatever they’re called (obviously we don’t have one). 

There are three of them – all males.  And when Scratchy and I came out of the exam room late last night, the three cats were out and about in the reception area, prowling around, eating their dinner, walking across the desks and paperwork and receiving lots of love from the staff on duty.

I asked where they had come from.  All three had had urinary tract blockages (something that happened to one of my male cats years ago) and their owners couldn’t pay for their treatment.  So they turned the cats over to the hospital, the staff took care of the blockage problems, and now these three gentleman felines live like furry royalty.

I brought Scratchy home, let him get settled, and then gave him his final feeding of the day.

And that’s the update. 

Scratchy Update and Other Catching Up Stuff

Look at that face.

Granted, it’s not a good picture – lighting is bad because of where he was when I took it a few minutes ago, but I didn’t want to force him out just to take a better-lit image.

Anyway. 

The feeding tube.

Sneakers

Like ‘em?

They’re Alex’s.

On my feet.

There’s something terribly wrong with that.

Tubes and Syringes and Scratchy

He’s home.

I don’t have a picture because it’s night time and too dark to get a decent shot unless I use the flash, so you’ll just have to wait til tomorrow to see him in his lovely blue ascot with the feeding tube sprouting from his neck.

I picked him up after work tonight and was given food, syringes, meds, and instructions.  A bit later this evening (like in fifteen minutes) I’ll blend his high-calorie food with water so it’s the proper consistency for the tube…then I’ll flush the tube with a small amount of lukewarm water and feed him gradually, over about half an hour…plus his evening dose of antibiotic…then flush with a bit of water after all that.

There’s a lot of stuff to pay attention to, and I’ll be showing Bill and the kids what needs to be done so they can do it if I’m at work. 

I am already planning to make a chart with dosages and meds and places to check off what’s been done.

I love charts.  And this seems like the perfect opportunity to make a really BIG chart.

Forgive me – it’s past my bedtime, and it’s been a strange, worrisome bunch of days.

And in the midst of all that, my kids went back to school – something that sort of ranked second, far below the Scratchy And His Fatty Liver Crisis.

Scratchy, for his part, was very happy to see me and didn’t complain too much on the ride home (he does not like riding in the car).  And when I got home, most of the lights in the house were off, but – no surprise here – I heard small feet padding quickly down the stairs, and as I let Scratchy out of his carrier, Alex appeared. 

Smiling.  So happy.  So relieved.

That’s the best part.

Scratchy Update

So at this point it’s looking like Scratchy has Feline Hepatic Lipidosis, or Fatty Liver Disease, which is kind of what I was thinking, based on what I’d read online.

So what that means is he’d stopped eating, or stopped eating the usual amount of food, and then his liver started shutting down or malfunctioning.  Which made him jaundiced, and made him feel sick, and not want to eat.

So the main thing is to get him to eat, and since food isn’t all that appealing, he’s been fitted with a feeding tube.  I haven’t seen it yet, but I believe it’s inserted in the back of his neck and goes into his belly or throat.  We will have to feed him about four times a day through the tube, and each session will take about fifteen to twenty minutes.

They’ve also aspirated his liver, which is kind of like a biopsy only smaller – they stick a needle into his liver to get a small sample and then have it tested for other things like hepatitis and leukemia.  That was done yesterday and we should have at least some results today.

I’ll be getting a phone call later this morning, and if all is going well, I’ll be able to pick up scratchy on my way home from work.  I’ll also learn to feed him through the tube, and then I’ll teach Bill and the kids as well.

One thing I discovered, while I’ve been doing my research on the internet, is that there are quite a number of blogs devoted solely to people’s cats with Fatty Liver Disease.

I suppose that shouldn’t have surprised me, as there are blogs devoted to anything and everything.  I don’t think I’ll go that far – but I’ll probably be posting Scratchy updates from time to time.  I’ll most likely write a post (with pictures) about how we feed him through the tube. 

I’m being cautiously optimistic.  Still don’t have the results from the liver aspiration yet, so I don’t want to turn cartwheels (not that I could do that anyway), but I am fingers-crossed hopeful.

So is Alex, as you can imagine.

Fur

He’s not feeling too good.

Something’s going on with his liver. 

Not sure what yet. 

Brought him to the vet Monday. 

Thought he was improving Tuesday.

Brought him to the animal hospital (24 hr care) early this morning.

He’s only four. 

Keeping fingers crossed that it’s one of the fixable things and not something bleaker. 

He’s Alex’s cat.

I really want everything to turn out okay.

Meanwhile, one of my sister’s cats has been missing for about a week. 

His name is Ozzy. 

Keeping fingers crossed that he comes home soon and well.

I’ve never considered myself the parent of a pet.  I’m the parent of my children, pets are pets.

But pets – especially furry ones – take up residence in our hearts, and they give us cause to worry and lose sleep at times.

So I’m hoping for happy news in both houses.

Damn cats.

Hooking their claws into us like that.

BLT with Basil Mayo on a Claffle

On a what? 

I’ll get to that in a minute.

But first, the innards of the BLT:

Homemade Bacon

Home grown Lettuce

Home grown Tomatoes

The basil-mayo is made with home grown basil.  No, I didn’t make the mayo.

And, finally,

the Claffle.

More Pictures and Little Text

First – a minor tragedy.  Bill had noticed that one of the smaller galeux felt kind of lighter weight and hollow, so we cut it open.  Half the innards were liquid.  We figure one of the EVIL squash vine borers dug his grubby little way in and had a feast.  Bill hacked this pumpkin to bits with a hatchet but couldn’t find the grub. 

We found a grub just under the surface in another of the galeux.  I let out a little shriek of disgust and Bill fed the grub to our lizard, who gobbled it up in a split second.  She prefers the creamy filling of grubs to the crunch of crickets. I know.  Ick.  The rest of the pumpkin was fine, so after trimming away any part the icky grub had come in contact with, I roasted the rest of it.

That’s it for the sad pictures, though.  The rest of the pictures are of a happier nature.

Galeux Harvest

We picked our beloved galeux d’eysines the other morning.  It was time.  Their stalks were all dead, and the one in the bikini sling remained hanging from the fence thanks only to the help of lycra, good sewing, and a strong knot.

Painted Lady

FisherMan

Bill took the kids with him while he dug for clams today.  Julia was content to just float around in the water near where Bill was digging.

Alex fished.

Stealth Mama

Remember our corn with the pink hair?  Part of the 3 Sisters gardens?  Yeah.

Well, we picked a couple of ears a little while ago and though they looked fully matured on the outside, the kernels were still small and flavorless.

Ah well, lesson learned.

So we waited a bit longer, and watched, happily, as more ears grew to full size.

Earlier this week, on one of our morning meanderings through the yard, Bill decided to check an ear to see if the kernels were mature enough (you know, they cleaned their rooms without being asked, didn’t roll their eyes when we said stuff, made sound financial decisions) to be harvested.  He peeled back the husk and pressed against one of the kernels with his thumb nail.  It was not milky yet – the innards of the kernel – so the corn wasn’t ready.  Oh well, what’s another day or two?

And then he noticed this:

Moth

After today’s rain Bill and I went outside and took a look around the jungle garden.  I took the usual pictures of vegetables and water droplets on leaves, and then, while prowling through the Squash Forest, I saw this little guy. 

He didn’t mind at all as I moved the camera closer and closer.  I took several pictures, and then left him to finish drying off.

Becoming a Man

Alex and Bill went skipjack fishing the other day.  They brought home 12 nice-sized fish. 

Alex has become a good little fisherman.  Bill said he waded out up to his chest (Alex did) to be able to cast into the school of fish as they moved farther away from shore. 

When they returned home, Bill gave Alex a lesson in filleting a fish.

Just before the lesson, Alex said, with a bit of a swagger, “Yep, I’m a man now.”

When he says things like that, I have to chase him around the house for a bit.  Man or no, he’s a very ticklish little boy.  Reminding him of that is my job.

Anyway, I was going to share all the pictures I took during the fillet lesson…but I like the one above the best, and I think it says everything that needs saying.

Julia Child

It’s Julia Child’s birthday today.  She’d have been 100.

I wanted to write…something…marking this date…but I don’t have anything really eye-opening or profound to say.

Her voice was, at times, the background music of my childhood. 

I have a memory of standing in my parents’ bedroom, my mother ironing, and the little black and white portable tv tuned to channel 2, WGBH in Boston.  I can hear the jaunty theme music play, I can see a miniature Julia on that tiny screen, and I can hear her unmistakable voice.

“Welcome to The French Chef.  I’m Julia Child.”

I’ve mentioned before that in some little corner of my mind I thought my mother and Julia Child were sisters.  Or at least cousins.  They just hadn’t met yet.  My mother was, like Julia, fearless in the kitchen.  Adventurous.  At home.

Julia showed American women (and men) that good cooking is not difficult.  That you didn’t have to be born in Paris to cook well.  All you needed, as she said in her famous omelet episode, was the courage of your convictions.

That’s how my mother always seemed to me when I was growing up.  In the kitchen she had that courage.  She baked bread.  Made pie dough.  Canned and preserved.  Made soups from scratch.  Tried out recipes from different countries.  Made us eat salads.  Well, okay, that only stands out in my mind because we hated salads when we were kids, my sister and me.  I think it’s because Mom put chopped fresh herbs in them, and she dressed the salad before serving it and I didn’t like whatever that dressing was that she used most of the time.  Or made, perhaps.  I don’t know.  My taste buds were immature.  I didn’t like the salads.

But she cooked.  And she hung out with small black-and-white Julia when she could.

Julia was confident and human and humorous.  She made her audience feel (I am guessing) that if she could do it, they could, too.  It wasn’t really that hard or mysterious, that cooking thing.  So pick up a knife and a pan and get to work.

I think that’s how my mother made me feel in the kitchen when I was young.  That there were no big secrets, no big mysteries.  And no reason not to try something out just because you’d never made it before.  And that mistakes didn’t mean you had to throw it all in the trash.

I remember one busy evening around dinner time…my mother was roasting chicken wings, I think, and making a sauce for them on top of the stove – something dark, I know it had soy sauce in it, but I don’t remember what else. 

At the same time, my sister (if I remember this correctly) was making chocolate pudding on top of the stove as well.

Someone stopped by – a friend of my mom’s – and with all the talking going on – you can see where this is going, or maybe I’ve told this story before – the chocolate mixture was poured over the chicken wings.

Chicken wings in mole sauce!  It tasted a little different, but we laughed about the mix-up and enjoyed dinner anyway.

There was no soy sauce pudding, however.

I know – I keep sliding back and forth from Julia to my mother.  I can’t help it.  They are woven together somehow in my mind.

I own several of Julia’s cookbooks; my mom owns some of the same ones and some different ones.  I don’t use them all the time, but they are there.

I think what I  use, which I absorbed from those first cooking shows and Julia’s boundless enthusiasm and from watching my mother in the kitchen for many years, is the attitude.  The sense of adventure in the kitchen.  The care about freshness and quality ingredients, good tools, and technique.  The fun of creating.  The joy of sharing that creation with family and friends, even if it’s something simple like a roasted chicken.  And that mistakes aren’t the end of the world, or the meal.

Sometimes I get away from that last lesson.  I have a hard time with my own mistakes, and I inflate them so much in my own mind that they truly seem to be one step away from the end of the world and any future meals and everything else. 

I’m working on fixing that.

I’m working on lots of things lately.  Things I learned or absorbed over the years that haven’t done me any good.  I’ve been learning that things I’ve thought for years aren’t really thoughts at all any more – they’re just habits.  Bad habits.  Bad thoughts in response to situations that are new or stressful.  Bad thoughts with no basis in reality.  They just show up.  Bad old inaccurate thoughts.  I’m so tired of all this old stuff in my head.  Time to replace bad habits and bad thoughts with better ones.  While I still can.  Before they get what’s left of the best of me.

What’s that got to do with Julia Child or my mom or cooking or anything?

Nothing, and everything.

Crazy Patch

This is some of the squash we have taking over growing in our garden. 

Our yard actually.

We planted winter squashes in the two 4’ x 4’ raised beds.  Our “Three Sisters” gardens – squash, corn and beans.  Everything’s growing, so we’re happy.

The thing is, not only do we have squash plants from those two gardens, but we’ve also got countless rogue hybrid squash plants that sprouted from various spots near the compost bins and the back garden. 

And in case you didn’t know it, squash plants are restless.  They don’t sit still, even though they may appear to be just sitting there.  They run, they roam, they invite themselves into your kitchen and pour themselves coffee.  They open the cookie jar and the fridge and the cupboards, looking for snacks.  They climb the stairs, use your toothbrush, and curl up in your bed.

They take over.

Wildlife

We went camping for a few days last week – nearby; no big distant trips for us this summer – and Julia spotted this little guy while she and Alex were walking back from the port-a-johns.  Alex carried it back to our camp site and Bill identified it as an Eastern Box Turtle, which is actually a tortoise – a land animal – so it has claws instead of flippers.

Pink Hair

We have corn!  And it’s got pink hair!

We were walking around the garden yesterday morning, as we are wont to do of a morning, and suddenly my eyes were distracted from all the lush greenness by this curly pink stuff on one of the corn stalks!  I actually screeched something like “LOOK! LOOK!” at Bill, before carefully placing my coffee mug on home plate and racing inside for my camera.  You know, in case the baby ear of corn hopped off the stalk and ran away.

Lazy Little Lobster Soufflés

July is the month of Visiting Family Members From Outside New England, which means, in addition to Alex and Julia having to share a bed, lobster.

Now, there are several types of lobster eaters.  There are the Big Claws and Tail Only people.  There are the I’ll Eat Other Parts of the Lobster As Long As I Don’t Have to Pick Through All The Body and Squeeze Out All The Meat in Those Skinny Legs Myself people.  There are the ICK, What’s That??? people.  And there are the people who will eat every last scrap of edible lobster – meat, fat, coral (roe) and tomalley (liver) – and will suck all of this down faster than the Big Claw and Tail people can get their crackers and picks going. 

I belong to the latter group. 

But.

There are times when I curb my impulses and leave the body and little skinny claws alone, just so we have meat to do something with the next day.

This post is about one of those times.

A Bunch of Close Up Pictures Because I Can Finally Again

A while back the camera doctors told me, regretfully, that the 18-55mm kit lens that came with my Canon Rebel XT had gone to that great darkroom in the sky.

Okay, they didn’t say that.  It would have sounded really odd coming from them, or pretty much anyone.

They just told me the lens aperture wasn’t reading right any more and that’s why the camera kept not working, and that rather than spend the money to fix it, I’d be better off replacing it with something better.

Yippee!  A reason to shop for a Newer! Better! Lens!

The Heart of Boris

You may or may not remember me mentioning Boris earlier this year.  If you are unfamiliar with Boris, you can read about him in this post.

Much of Boris was ill-suited to simple cooking – he was an older pig, well past the usual butchering age, and his meat was tougher than something you might buy in the store.

Part of our portion, which consisted of things like the head, the liver, bones (for stock), a few cuts of meat, some of the belly, also included the heart.  I’ve had it in the freezer in a vacuum-sealed bag for months now, and the other day, I decided to thaw it and cook it.

Now, this post will contain pictures of said heart.  No gratuitous blood or gore – just a simple – and simply beautiful – heart.

I will tell you, also, that, as I have with all of our Boris-processing projects, I felt…reverence.

Okay, if you are squeamish and don’t want to see a heart, click away and read something else.  Otherwise, come along.

Garden Pictures from This Morning

Most mornings when I’m not working really early Bill and I take our coffee and walk around the yard looking at the gardens.  It’s my favorite part of the day.  Here’s some of what we looked at this morning.

First up – tomatillos!  Yay!  It’ll be a while before the fruit is big enough to pick – you can’t even feel them inside their papery lantern-like cocoons, but just seeing them makes me happy. 

Over the Shoulder Galeux d’Eysines Holders

Well not exactly.

There are no shoulders involved.

Just the picket fence.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Caramelized Eggplant and Balsamic Shrimp Wrap with LAND O’LAKES 4 Cheese Italian Blend

I was quite surprised and delighted when Kitchen PLAY invited me to participate in their “30 Days of Outdoor Dining” event, which is running from June 25th through July 24th. 

Once I’d agreed to the posting date, I was given the “secret ingredient” info:  LAND O’ LAKES 4 Cheese Italian Blend.  

The Garden This Morning

First, there’s kale.  This one is close to the house, just inside the gate.  Presumably so we don’t have to travel so far in the cold weather to harvest the leaves.  When we finally have cold weather.  Two hundred years from now.  Or so it seems…

I took a solo walk around the gardens this morning.  Bill had gone fishing, Julia was asleep and Alex was inside eating breakfast. 

These are the pictures I took.  (And wait til you see how the 3 sisters are doing!)

Recent Pictures

This is from one night when I was flying around in my space ship….

A Summertime Post

This one’s an oldie, but a goodie:

"I Didn't Do It"

The Goings on ‘Round Here

Well, there’s been cleaning.  Rearranging.  Cleaning out.  Deciding what to put in a yard sale in August (postponed from the one we never got around to having LAST summer), what to recycle in some way, and what to throw out.

Julia and I spent one morning – the hottest day of the year at that point – cleaning out and rearranging her room.  It looks pretty good now, most of the time.  But then, it’s only been a week or two….

Three Sisters Update

No, this slightly crooked picture has nothing to do with the garden.  I’ll show you those pictures in a moment.  I couldn’t decide if I wanted to put the most recent “Three Sisters” picture up first, or the one from the week prior.  So, since trying to decide would have taken forever, I put up this picture instead.  It’s part of the view from one corner of my kitchen after I’d rearranged those three pieces of furniture there – the pie safe (you can only see the back; the pegboard is the back of the pie safe), and two work table/island things.  Before, the pie safe would have been facing you (if you are the one looking through the lens in the image above).  The other day I rearranged them.

Cooking with My Kids: Empanadas

Before I get started, no, Julia is not as tall as Alex – she’s standing on a stool.  Here’s a scary thing – if Alex were to stand on that same stool, he’d be eye level with me.  He’s not allowed to stand on the stool any more.

There, now that I’ve got that cleared up for you, we can talk about food.

Sports Photographer

Julia’s gymnastics end of the year demonstration was the other night. 

Of course there are pictures.

Sports Photographer

Julia’s gymnastics end of the year demonstration was the other night. 

Of course there are pictures.