I have a little of this and a little of that to say… still just plain wiped out, but happy.

Music and a Date
Brian and I played at Foods for Living tonight. We were all dressed up so we went out to dinner afterward. Well, after going grocery shopping at the store.

Quality Food & a Big Treat

Wowie, they have great foods there. I got all sorts of specialties including maple sugar and organic chocolate ice cream. Talk about luxury.

You see, for about 7 years I did not eat any dairy products other than butter. Now I am able to eat a little of it. Some of my food issues are unresolved after all these years, but apparently dairy in small doses is working out OK for me.

I also have had no reaction to chocolate… so today even though it was really cold outside, I got home, put on sweaters and wool socks/legwarmers… and sat on the heat vent, and ate a small bit of organic chocolate ice cream. Trust me, it was spectacular. Anything you have had to refrain from eating can become bigger than life. This is a wonderful treat.

Knitting Victory

Another wonderful little bit… some knitting content. I finally finished my super-warm/super-tall legwarmers. I did not get any photographs, because off of me they look like long tubes and are not at all beautiful. When I can model, I’ll show them off.

The first of those took 1 week, the second leg took nearly 2 weeks. That’s how it goes. However, I got to start a new project today, a gift but not one for Christmas. Just a gift. We will see how that goes, too, since I have a gift to whip out in a few days here. I just felt that if I could cast on for that project I could make it my traveling project. So far, so good.

Winners

The contest? I was gone a lot and I didn’t do my tally/matching up. My Saturday class did not materialize so I will be home working Saturday. I will make my awards then.

Gratitude

As it is, I fell asleep yet again at the keyboard, and woke up at 3:30 to write this in a fog. I will return with a full brain tomorrow.

Thanks so much for being part of my life.

I am overwhelmed with the wonderful week I have had. You guys made it so, all those comments were just wonderful.

I’m once more falling asleep at the keyboard and I have to give in. I will figure out who gets which prizes on Friday when I’m not working during the day. (Friday 4-6 Brian and I are singing at Foods For Living in East Lansing, MI if anyone is inclined to come out.)

Since you all seem to love recipes, and since Diana posted a comment this week about her soup which is good for whatever ails you… I’m going to encourage you to visit her blog to get that recipe which she posted very recently. Do check it out.

Image: picture I drew perhaps 45+ years ago. Magenta and purple(!). Thanks to Mom for saving it this long.

These photos are late chronologically. However, they fit in this blog based on my assertion that food can be art, either to look at or to the taste buds, even both on the right day.

On Thanksgiving morning, I had plans. I made my semi-famous “brown pancakes” which are wonderful (and gluten/wheat/corn/egg free, etc… recipe here).

I even had a very special treat lined up. I found frozen organic strawberries and organic egg-free, corn-syrup-free vanilla ice cream, the day before, at Foods for Living. I thawed the berries and added some brown sugar. I put strawberries and a small amount of ice cream on the pancakes, and we enjoyed them thoroughly.

I had not eaten any strawberries since spring, after an allergic reaction to peaches and advice to consider giving up fruit if I was experiencing hives. Well, I probably will not be eating peaches again but after some tests at a new allergist a few weeks back I was given permission for cherries and strawberries. Woohoo! My favorites are peaches and raspberries, but any fruit is a real gift at this point…

Also, I had not had even soy/artificial ice cream in months. To discover that milk/cream are OK for me (when yogurt and cheese are not) was another gift. I was truly Thankful. Yum!

But that was only one brunch meal, and we would need more food sometime. We had eaten our takeout on Wednesday Night… I’d planned it for Thursday but we changed our plans. So I looked in the freezer.

The week previous, Brian had cooked Cornish game hens in the crockpot as a gift to me (any time he cooks instead of me, I really appreciate fully). We had eaten one but frozen the other.

So I thawed that tiny bird and we made spinach salads. I found a beautiful red bell pepper and some very nice olive oil as salad dressing, and some coarsely-ground black pepper. It made a refreshing Thanksgiving dinner.

Brian likes pie and I did not feel like making any… but I had purchased all the ingredients to make them. I showed him where I put my own personal no-egg, no-milk pumpkin pie recipe. I dug out the few odd ingredients he would have had trouble finding, and he made pumpkin pie. What a partner he is to me!

Then when I pulled the pies out after the buzzer sounded, I got a surprise. He put faces on the pies before baking them. I think they look a lot like “Tubby Toast” in the TV show Teletubbies. I may be the only person over 2 years old who loves this show, but Brian gets it that I do, so he gave me a smiley face. Also I always can use a reminder to smile, I can get SO intense sometimes.

I have so many things to be thankful for every day. Brian is at the top of the list, by far. I have not always been this happy and he is like the whipped cream on top of my otherwise good life, making it even better.

And the internet? I love all of you reading this, and the relationships we can build here even without meeting physically in the same building. How cool is that? My relationships, with Brian and my family, my loved ones not in my family… well, that is the best wealth of all. Thank you for being part of my life.

Sometimes at the ballet, at the beginning of the show they will announce that a different dancer will be playing this or that role instead of the one listed in the program. This is my version of that announcement.

Mike Ross regrets that he will not be able to join the Altu’s 10+1 Year Anniversary festivities today. We will miss him, he has been such an enthusiastic part of our musical family. In fact, usually when I need a last-minute sub, Mike is the first one to say yes.

However, we have exciting news… Drew Howard (AKA Captain Midnite) will fill in, from 1pm to 1:35. We are more than delighted that Drew is able to be with us. This will be his first show at Altu’s (unless he sat in with someone), though he’s been in the music biz for a really long time.

Drew & I are about the same age but I’m a definite newbie next to this veteran. He was probably born with an instrument in his hands. This substitute is no slouch. And let me tell you, he wasted no time getting back to me to say that yes, he could help out.

I love being in Lansing. This town is full of artful friends, and I am really feeling the love right now. I had a few other possible replacements in the wings, but Drew called me back first… We would not have been left stranded under any circumstances.

Get well, Mike. We’ll sing a few for you. (Mike is now scheduled for a 6:30-8:30 slot on Sat., December 29, don’t miss it.)

Photo: Drew at right, backing up none other than our evening performer, Jen Sygit. Photo was taken at the RicStar Music Camp Benefit in late September of this year.

My friend Altu’s restaurant is celebrating the 10+1 year Anniversary of the restaurant Saturday Nov. 24. I am very excited because we have a full day of events, including music from seven acts including The Fabulous Heftones (me and hubby Brian).

She also will be repeating an Ethiopian Coffee Ceremony from 11:30-4pm. In addition, there will be special snack foods available at no cost. If you are more hungry than that, the regular menu will be available all day long.

There will be a short lull from 4pm to dinnertime. Then at 6:30-8:30 we will have none other but the incredible Jen Sygit as our musical headliner.

Jen just got back from a tour out to Boston, she’s a big name even though she’s a Lansing resident. Do not take this talent for granted!

I am very excited to have Jen at Altu’s this weekend!

Here is the musical lineup:

• 11:30 Doug Berch
• 12:15 The Fabulous Heftones
• 1:00 Mike Ross
• 1:45 Phil Wintermute
• 2:30 Measured Dose
• 3:15 Hall and Morgan

And from 6:30-8:30,

Jen Sygit!

If you are out and about at all in the Lansing, Michigan area on Saturday, November 24, please take the time to stop by and say hello. I will be there the entire time we have musicians in the house.

If you have not been to Altu’s before, it is on Michigan Avenue (click for map), the last building in East Lansing. Facing it from the street, it is on the right side of The Dollar, tucked back behind a small parking lot.

At Altu’s, the food is great, the welcome warm, the music lively. Please join us in this celebration.

Disclaimer: Altu is my dear, dear friend. She took me to Africa three years ago this week. I took the photo of the coffee ceremony in December of 2004, in Gondar, northern Ethiopia. It’s the real thing, folks.

I line up the music at Altu’s restaurant and I do her website/publicity and her menus. Not on payroll, for hugs and food and occasional chances to perform there myself. The only real economic gain I might have from this announcement is possible tips if you came while I was singing.

So do humor me, come on by, and have a great time while I know I spent my time well… see you then!

Today (Thanksgiving Day) I awoke to a small dusting of snow here, just enough to cover the blah gray colors of the last several days. The sun has managed to get some light through the cloudcover, and with the snow on the ground there is much light reflecting through the air today. The lack of light this week has rendered me grumpy and I am grateful for light this Thanksgiving day.

I’m sitting in the living room with laptop on my lap. There are windows on my left and right, and straight ahead. In this small room there are five old-fashioned, tall windows and a door with eight small panes of glass in it. I am more aware than usual of how I live in a sort of climate bubble, protected from the elements by a few thin walls and a good furnace. I’m grateful.

I am still waking up. I have a different schedule than the rest of the world (I am awake approximately 10:30am to 2:30am) and I do not jump start quickly when I get vertical first thing. Brian can wake up and run a sprint the next minute, but I barely know my name for a couple of hours. A cup of tea and some internet reading is the right way to start slowly, when at all possible.

I am drinking in this reflected sunlight… no sunbeams but real light just the same. Brian is playing ukulele in the chair across from me and I’m alternately knitting on my legwarmer and typing (sometimes my computer stops responding to even mouse clicks until I wait 10 seconds, it is so frustrating that I knit before trying again).

But I thought I’d give you a recipe for Thanksgiving. These are very pleasing to me. They are not standard-issue pancakes at all, but they have a lovely texture.

Depending on which spices you choose, they can have a different character. If you use orange juice to make the baking soda rise, try nutmeg and allspice. if no juice, consider cinnamon and cloves. Or try a combination I have not suggested, if it sounds good to you.

I like whole grain foods and have not had white bread or standard all-purpose wheat flour for several years. These pancakes have a strong, pleasant, sort of caramel flavor if you ask me. Brian swears that buckwheat tastes a bit like chocolate, but I can not quite understand that assertion. It could be a good thing, if you agreed!

One note… Teff grain is eaten in Ethiopia and nearly nowhere else, from what I can determine. It is a tiny grain with little room for starch… it’s very high in protein and fiber. If your area has an African grocery you can try there, but Africa is a huge place with many cultures and you still may come up empty handed. In my city we have an amazing asian market which also has African foods, and I can get Teff flour there in larger bags. I also can get the Bob’s Red Mill brand in smaller bags at the two health food grocery stores. If you want to try the pancakes right away and have no teff flour, try some rice flour instead, which works but is a second choice for texture and flavor, as well as nutrition. Buckwheat does not work well alone.

Tasty Brown Pancakes by LynnH

Vegan
Celiac-Friendly
No gluten
No wheat
No dairy
No egg
No soy
No peanuts/tree nuts
No potato
No corn
No yeast
Yummy!

1 cup Whole-grain buckwheat flour (I use Arrowhead Mills, some other brands require less water)

1/2 c Teff flour (not teff grain, get from Bob’s Red Mill if not avail. locally) Sub brown rice flour in a pinch

3 Tbsp Brown sugar (or maple sugar, or white sugar in a pinch)

1/2 tsp cinnamon if tolerated

dash Nutmeg and/or
dash Allspice and/or
dash Cloves if tolerated

1 tsp Baking soda

1 package Emergen-C -OR-
1 tsp Cream of tartar -OR-
1/2 tsp Powdered vitamin c (corn free) -OR-
1 Tbsp Citrus juice

3 Tbsp Oil (I use olive oil, use your favorite)

1-3/4c Water (slightly less if you used citrus juice)

Preheat griddle on low before starting to mix ingredients.

Place all dry ingredients in mixing bowl and blend with wire whisk. Add wet ingredients and blend again with whisk, only until dry ingredients are wet. Let sit for at least 2 minutes while you turn up the heat on your griddle to medum-high. These pancakes require a slightly lower temperature than standard wheat pancakes.

Stir lightly one last time before cooking. Make relatively small pancakes, about 4″/10cm across, using a small measuring cup to pour onto the griddle. Turn when edges start to look a bit dry. Remove when browned on second side.

Serve hot off the griddle with real maple syrup or your favorite topping. I have enjoyed hot applesauce with cinnamon, or try spiced pumpkin butter for an autumn treat.

Makes approx. 2 dozen pancakes.

Enjoy, and be Thankful for whatever good you’ve got. Some years are easy, some harder, but being alive is a wonderful thing.

Three Holidays in One

A few weeks ago my family had what we call Thanks-Christmas. We gathered at my mom’s home for a simple rhubarb crisp dessert and the company of one another. Actually we also celebrated my birthday early.

This year we finally said that gifts are absolutely optional. Mom and Fred, Brian and I did not do gifts other than hugs.

Eric and Diana chose to give small food gifts. They gave Brian a small pie from a well-regarded bakery in Ann Arbor, I got some very nice tea, Fred got some nuts, and I don’t remember what Mom got. I think it’s particularly wonderful that some gave and some didn’t and it was just plain right, just the way it was.

I think that in our family we have been through so much loss, that we are really clear about what matters to us (and it isn’t stuff, though we all have plenty). We love the fact that we are still together and that we enjoy one another so much.

Mom was widowed at 38, Eric at 30. Fred has also been widowed. Diana and I have been through difficult marriages with subsequent divorces. Brian is the only one who has not had a significant loss yet.

So on a holiday when we all can be in the same house, all pretty darned happy and relatively on the healthy scale, we celebrate our togetherness. This is as it should be. Gratitude and relationship are what the winter holidays mean to me.

This Week’s Holiday

This week for Thanksgiving, I had planned to get food at Altu’s Restaurant on Wednesday Night. Then I’d take it home to the refrigerator and heat it up the next day, for just the two of us. I figured I would be thankful for not having to cook.

Well, when I ordered the food over the phone I was not very clear that I wanted all the different foods in separate containers for reheating later. When I got there, the dinners were ready to go, hot and ready to eat right then.

This initiated a change in plans. I went home and made a big pot of organic green tea, and Brian and I ate our Thanksgiving Dinner. On Wednesday night at about 8:30pm.

We had spicy chicken, mild split yellow peas and creamy mild lima beans. After all, it was ready to go and it would not have been quite as nice the next day (the Ethiopian sourdough flat bread doesn’t heat up that well after being refrigerated, though it does well on the counter).

A Big Treat

I don’t know right now what we’ll have for dinner on Thanksgiving day. I know we will have pancakes and strawberries for brunch. This will be enough for me to be thankful for a while.

I had a bunch more allergy tests Tuesday and they pronounced me not allergic to strawberries (strawberries are a difficult food for a lot of food-allergic folks). I have been avoiding all fruit after bad experiences with bananas and peaches. I bought some organic frozen berries today, and we will put those on pancakes.

A few weeks ago the allergist also declared that I was not allergic to milk itself. I am having trouble with yogurt and cheese (cultured foods are generally a problem). I have not tested this theory yet, but Thanksgiving seemed a good time for it.

I found some ice cream that didn’t have any ingredients I can’t eat, a small miracle. I will cook pancakes, and put strawberries and ice cream on them, and it will be a VERY. BIG. DEAL. Enough to be thankful for, for sure!

We’ll see if I do well in reality… tests can be off, but it is exciting to have the permission to try. If I slow down to a crawl after eating the ice cream, I will just take a nap and not worry about it for one day. I do not have to work for 24 hours.

Let Us Hear it for the Freezer!

We have some food in the freezer that is very tasty and we may thaw that, so we won’t have to cook much tomorrow. I do not like making dinner-type foods, though I don’t mind baking or breakfast.

Less is more. Maybe oven-roasted root veggies (we have rutabagas and sweet potatoes). Those are a big treat, because they take preparation time and “babysitting.” That sort of attention and time to cooking normally is too much bother when I get home after 8pm and still need to make dinner.

Oh, Yeah… this is an Art Blog

Knitting? I’m working on the super-tall ribbed legwarmers I started a few days ago. Though the colors are very muted, they are absolutetly gorgeous. It will take a LOT of yarn and a LOT of stitches to finish these, but with bulky yarn it’s going faster than if it were thinner yarn.

I am really enjoying the yarn I’m using. It is very wooly, very springy and traditional, a little scratchy but just plain perfect for ribbed legwarmers that should not fall down. They will be very warm. And the colors are so good… a purple-blue, a plum, grape, and dark teal green. Really subtle but sort of like light reflecting on  a rippled pond, lots of colors in small bits.

These will be very usable legwarmers. Not flashy or super-colored like the ones I talked about yesterday, but I bet I will wear these ten times for every one time I wear the extra-colorful ones.

I had the fortune today of running into the knit friend who gave me the yarn. I showed her my project and that felt great. The yarn has been waiting for over a year, for me to figure out what it wanted to be. This is truly a perfect project for it.

And I really hope I get out the sewing needle to finish a few wool knit items tomorrow. Wish me well.

Photos? Well, one is clearly my pseudo-famous “brown pancakes” made with buckwheat and teff flour (sans strawberries).

Two are some yarn choices made in my Kristi Wrap/Party Stole class at Rae’s last Saturday, and last is a baby-sized Fast Florida Footie (without purled stitches on the sole) from Sunday’s class also at Rae’s.

The yarn choices were made after we had a color discussion something like yesterday’s post. Then we piled so many yarns on the table it almost would not hold them, and switched yarns in and out to choose. Between two students we ended up with three projects planned out. (Can you see that I can help with colors even when they are not those I wear personally?) We had a wonderful time!

I’m not sure the official name of Pablo’s Mexican restaurant in Old Town, though it does start with the word Pablo’s. It’s right on the main drag of Grand River between Turner and Cedar/Larch, in the space that was once the Brick House restaurant. It is just east of the brand-new Robert Busby Memorial Bridge over the Grand River.

The restaurant has been there a while now, and the food is authentic and tasty. Brian likes to go there for lunch sometimes, since it is walking distance from his work.

Brian is sharing Flickr photos with this blog again today. He has always been good at photography, since he was a teen. He’s a good observer, he notices things I don’t because I’m busy interacting with people and he’s watching. (I can not tell you how much I admire and value my husband, let me count the ways…)

So here he took a few photos of the restaurant, and the food up close. It makes me wish I could go over there right now and have some of the best orange juice I know… fresh squeezed and very sweet, from Pablo’s. I have had breakfast there and it is incredible.

Local folks, consider this spot for a brunch on a weekend sometime. Not only is it a locally owned place where you know who is benefiting from your purchases, but the food is just plain better than that which comes from a foodservice truck in a can. This is the real thing. Mmmm…

Sometimes life takes a U-turn when we look the other way. It turns out that registrations worked out not as planned… I won’t be teaching at Rhinebeck next weekend as I had expected. We’ll do it another time, instead.

I found out about my schedule change while I was in DC. The truth is, I would not have gone to Stitches East/ Baltimore/ DC if I’d not expected to go to New York. I’m very glad I had the Stitches/Alison adventure and then a full lovely day with friends/family on Sunday.

The trip east was work-related but felt a lot like a vacation. (Food in any city makes me very, very happy… this time I had Chinese, Ethiopian and mideastern meals.) I slept like a baby Sunday night, found myself some great lunch on Jenny’s street Monday, and then turned my car toward home.

You know, I’m self employed. This means that I don’t get time off, I don’t get vacation time, it’s just go-go-go for the most part. Now I have 7 days where nobody expects me to do anything, no appointments at all. I’ll probably go to lunch with Altu on Thursday as we do whenever we can.

Other than that, I get to actually catch up on things I normally do not get time to do. I hope I can make myself mostly just stay locked in at home for a week and see what I can accomplish. I have felt so behind lately (especially in the pattern-writing realm) that a week is a real gift.

And I will definitely be dyeing yarn this week. Yeah! Look for details soon on that.

I will also be running a comment contest with my own handpainted yarn as the prize. More on that when I figure out exactly what the terms/prize will be. Please stay tuned!

There is a lovely locally-owned healthy food store at the very east edge of East Lansing, named Foods for Living. The folks who own it seem very fine and the people who work there seem rather happy to be there. (A good number of the folks working there are musicians.)

The store is well-organized, people smile and they have items I can not get elsewhere (pumpkin seed butter, whole grain teff, white buckwheat grains and a kind of cracker made with brown rice and nothing else, boring but useful on the road).

This month is the 10th anniversary of this store. They are having a lot of music this month because of it. Brian and I played there last Friday 4-6 and will be doing it again this week. Last week we got there a little early and got to hear Jen Sygit play banjo before we went on for our set. Jen always makes me smile (see photo).

If you are in the Lansing area and inclined to find some very nice organic produce (they have some gorgeous root veggies right now), unusual healthy foods, and take-out from some of the finest restaurants in town (including New Aladdins and Altu’s Ethiopian Cuisine)… well, consider coming out this weekend. We are on Friday, but if you can’t make it then, you’ll find other good musicians filling the other slots all weekend.

For the record, Brian’s band Scarlet Runner Stringband is playing at Woldumar Nature Center for their fall public event on Sunday starting at 11. I’m not sure how long that goes. Then after that, Brian and I are playing for the RicStar Music Camp benefit at VanAtta’s Greenhouse in Haslett. There are a good number of acts playing Saturday and Sunday for that event. We are looking forward to that (we play just after Jen Sygit there, too). On Sunday we play at 2:30pm. I hope you can come out.

Diana told me about something called Dragon Fruit. It’s decidedly ColorJoy on the outside, a wonderful hot fuschia with hot green leaves or bits sticking out. The one she had looked like a fish to me, shape wise. It was goooorgeous!

She ate one. She took a photo before and after and goes into detail on how it tastes, texture, you name it. The look of its inside is an absolute surprise.

You guys seem to love it when I write about food. I figure some of you will want to check out Diana’s post on her fruity adventure.

I got those peaches Saturday and couldn’t stand to waste them. If I eat them fresh, I get hives. Brian can eat them, and I want him to do it just on my behalf… but this is a LOT of peaches even for someone like Brian who often eats a few pieces of fruit a day.

I had to go back in my mind for things I used to do with fresh peaches. They have always been my favorite fruit, assuming they were grown so close to home and grown on the tree until so ripe that they can get slightly squished on the way home. I love them sliced on oatmeal with a tiny bit of dark brown sugar. What else?

I really wanted to think of cooked peach goodies. I know folks make peach butter but that doesn’t excite me like baked goods can. Then I remembered! I used to make upside-down-gingerbread with peaches. Find any gingerbread recipe that fits a square or round pan, basically enough for one layer of a two-layer cake.

Then cut relatively thin slices of peach, the cake does not need all the fruit from one large peach so enjoy the leftovers fresh right there. Don’t bother peeling the fruit, as it is unnoticeable after baking.

Then put the thin slices on towels and dry out the fruit, top and bottom, so that it’s not running with juice. I like white woven dish towels with smooth texture, but even paper toweling can work. If you skip this, the bottom layer of the cake batter will stay like batter after baking.

Oil or grease your pan. If you use a stick of butter or margarine and smear it rather generously on the bottom, this will interact with the brown sugar and make a sort of caramel which is lovely and much better than sprayed-on oil. (Oil the sides, too, because you will turn the cake out of the pan after baking.)

Arrange slices of peach, and sprinkle with dark brown sugar if you have it, or maple sugar (not syrup), or any other sugar. Again, it is there to make a bit of a caramel next to the peaches.

Pour the batter on the fruit and sugar, distribute properly. Bake as directed (it may take an extra 5 minutes with the extra moisture on the bottom. Cool a short while, 5-10 minutes until it’s more firm but not totally cool. Place a cake plate on top of baking pan and invert. Hope that the baking luck is with you and it stays together well. It’s Soooooooooo Good!

Mom’s family had a farm when she was growing up. We had a garden a few years, and we always had fruit trees (apple, pear and cherry… most notably more pie cherries than we could pick). Sometimes we had strawberries. Most of the time we seemed far too busy doing other life tasks to garden, and honestly it was easy to buy it at the store rather than grow it.

But when we had food from our yard, dad would repeat the words of my Mom’s father, who would say “It was grown on our own farm!” And last week I said the same thing.

My garden is teeny-tiny, and relatively wild as gardens go. Food shares space with myrtle and grass from the yard trying to take over, and a rosebush that is winning the battle for land, both at left in this photo and just above the top edge of the photo. You can see the myrtle at least at top right, and grass at bottom. The thin tiny bits in the dirt are mostly supposed to be there, my tiny and struggling herbs.

It is not all of a yard squared (which is smaller than a meter squared). I have one clump of Swiss Chard (very tasty greens, in this case with beautiful red stems), and herbs: parsley, dill, cilantro and chives. I tried to plant a little bit of spinach but I planted it too late (spinach likes cool weather).

I also have one large potted tomato bush, which is mostly for decoration. It lives in a beautiful blue-glazed pot on the top landing of our back steps, right where we pass it in and out of the house each day. This helps remind me to water it even when I get home after dark. Tomatoes really thrive on attention so this is a good strategy.

Last week I decided to dive in and make some food from the tiny bit of produce growing in my yard. There were two small tomatoes ready to pluck, and I had to do something with them. I don’t really like fresh tomatoes much (though I remember how much I liked them on a whole-grain cheddar grilled cheese with some vidalia onion back in the day when I could eat such things). So cooking the greens with the tomatoes was a perfect solution.

I cut up both the greens and the tomatoes in half-inch bits (just smaller than a centimeter). I had a leek (related to onion but milder) so I sliced some of that really tiny. I sauteed the leek in olive oil, and when it started to soften I added the greens until they wilted. Then I added the tomato. No, I didn’t measure. I used the amount of greens and tomatoes that I had been able to harvest. The tomatoes looked smaller before cutting but bigger after cooking, given the tendency of greens to wilt and compress in the heat.

I let that mixture cook on low until the tomato smelled sweet rather than acid. Tomatoes will actually caramelize a bit if you give them the chance, and at that point I like them much better. I did not add any salt or pepper or other seasoning during cooking, though sometimes I enjoy some black pepper in the mix. After it was all cooked, I chopped up some of our cilantro from the garden into tiny bits, and garnished the serving plate full of greens with that.

I am starting to “get it,” I think. These were positively the best greens I’ve had in a very long time. I’ll need to do this at least one more time before growing season ends.

Oh, and the bowl the cooked greens are in? It was made by my friend Maureen O. Ryan, of Working Women Artists and the Potters Guild of Lansing.

What a crazy-busy few weeks I have had! Sunday night I got home around 6:00pm and actually had some time where I could choose what to do. I picked swiss chard and tomatoes from the garden and made a pleasant dinner, Brian and I took a walk in the neighborhood, and I fussed more with getting my “new” laptop to function right. Also, Brian and I rehearsed a little, and I chatted by phone with my friend April who no longer lives across the street.

Now I’m at it again, on the couch with laptop on my lap well after midnight, falling asleep at the keyboard. I’ve taken photos in the last few days but my Adobe PhotoShop had gone buggy and would not start up. I un-installed it yesterday but then my CD player did not work (did not even show up in the “my computer” screen) so then I could not reinstall it. Fortunately after 2 days of flaky CD player, it is miraculously working again for no apparent reason. I reinstalled it but have had no time to edit anything yet.

Tomorrow/Monday i see my brother Eric. I have a scheduled class around dinnertime in Lansing but I’ll get several hours in with my brother. We often drive to Brighton, a town about halfway between our homes, and talk forever. There is a wonderful metropark there and we’ll meet there.

I am looking forward to most of a day without work tomorrow. For now, I need to be somewhat boring and just sign off. Thanks for sticking with me.