Ryan and Red McClure

My cousin Marie Louise lives near Aspen, CO. Usually I only get to see her at Christmas, so imagine my delight when my mom passed on this article from my aunt Beth. Marie Louise is featured in the Aspen Daily News for her work bringing the red McClure potato back from the brink of extinction.

*photo from the Aspen Daily News

Way to go cuz! Keep up the good work! I would ask you to send me one to taste, but that wouldn't fit well with the local, slow food movement's goals I suppose... :)

through the hoods

I read a lot of design blogs, and this poster was featured the other day. While it isn't really something that I could imagine putting up in our home, but I still love it. If I lived in Minneapolis/St. Paul I would be very tempted!

Tommy time

This past weekend my little bro came to visit me in SF. We had a great time!

When driving to the airport, I asked tommy about his favorite moments. So here they are (in no order):

• eating sandwiches in Crissy Field (see picture below)
  
• dinner at the Cuban restaurant on California Ave in Palo Alto
• dinner with my fiance's family on his dad's birthday
• dinner with my fiance's brother and sister and law
  
• walking across the Golden Gate Bridge (see picture above)
• coming to visit me at work
  

Thanks for coming to visit! Hopefully next time you come, you will bring your fiance and lovely daughter!

Friday

I'm excited for the weekend because Tommy is in town! Among other things we are going to check out the Golden Gate Bridge. I hope it isn't foggy...

service

This week at work everyone was encouraged to take some time and volunteer in the bay area. Along with most of my team, we decided to volunteer on Tuesday at the Youth Science Institute at Sanborn Skyline County Park in Saratoga. There were about 30 or so volunteers in total and together we worked on repairing an Ohlone hut, repairing a fence, and sanding and staining 13 picnic tables. It was really nice to spend time outside doing a little manual labor.

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Here is a close up of the woven reeds that make up the Ohlone hut.

The non-weathered wood in this photo is what we replaced over the course of the afternoon.

The Youth Science Institute (YSI) has a number of insects, and the volunteer guide showed us one of their biggest residents - the tarantula spider. While they are poisonous, this spider is used to people handling it and usually won't bite unless very aggitated. The YSI would be a great place to bring kids - and the park surrounding is beautiful.

*All photos from Jun Gong

today

Thinking of you! Good luck today!

blueberries and oatmeal

Thursday when I got home from work, I sat down and flipped through my new issue of Bon Appetit. They have a column called "Cooking Life" where writer Molly Wizenberg describes a delicious meal. This month's column was written about Blueberry Oat Scones from the Standard Baking Company in Maine. Given that Dave and I had a clamshell full of sweet blueberries in the fridge (from our CSA bag), I decided on a whim to bake scones instead of figure out what to eat for dinner.
Here they are just before they go into the oven.

And then just after. As a treat to myself, I bought this double devon cream half off at the grocery store. A warm scone with the wonderful cream was AMAZING. These are probably some of the best scones I have ever had - I really liked the flaky oatmeal in the batter. Is it wrong to think that blueberries are better this way?

suddenly summer

I love Fridays the most. The anticipation of the upcoming weekend is tantalizing - like noticing your delicious meal waiting on a counter at a restaurant before the waiter brings it to your table. Fridays in the summer are even better - the best in fact. There are so many more possibilities when the weather is warm and the smell of charcoal is in the air...

sweet treats

New Orleans is a city brimming with incredible food. I wish that I could promise that this was my last post about the meals I ate over Memorial day weekend - but I am not quite there yet.

In college, this email went around (several times) - "you know you're from New Orleans if..." For a bit of insight into my personality, the one that I related to the most was something like "the major topics of conversation when you go out to eat are restaurant meals that you have had in the past and restaurant meals that you plan to have in the future."

For a city known for food, beignets are probably one of the favorite desserts. In fact, my fiance's maternal grandparents came to New Orleans on their honeymoon and ate beignets. I always thought this was a nice coincidence, as my parents who took their honeymoon in San Francisco (its like they traded). While beignets are good at any time of the day, my favorite time to eat them is late at night after leaving the bars.

At our engagement party, we had cake from the Swiss Confectionery, along with 5 dozen petit fours. Petit fours from McKenzies were the best, but they went out of business long ago...

I ordered this cake because I wanted to have a wedding cake at the party for dessert (do a little taste testing). Here is a slice of almond flavored cake with white royal icing served on my parents (and grandparents) wedding china (they had the same pattern).

memorial day... a little late

As I have mentioned, over Memorial Day I was in New Orleans. While eating at Galatoire's that Saturday night, a woman struck her glass and raised a toast to all those serving in the military and all vets in honor of memorial day.

This thoughtful gesture struck a chord with me, as my brother Tommy is in the Army Reserve (with 6 years left to go). The above picture was taken the day that he graduated from intelligence training in Texas several years ago. The fact that he is looking down in this photo is a bit of a fluke - taken as part of a series where I wanted to get him smiling under a helicopter (I was working in a helicopter research lab). Althought it was a bit of an accident, it has remained one of my favorite photos of Tommy in uniform - the slight bow of his head and the stiff posture speak to me.

To all those serving in the military - past, present, and future - I bow my head to you in thanks.

cafe brulot

Cafe Brulot is a tradition in my family - we have it after big holiday meals and at special occasions. It is also served in some restaurants - like Galatoire's on Bourbon (photo below taken last weekend).

With my fiance's parents in town (and staying with my parents), we knew that cafe brulot would be a fun experience. Cafe brulo is essentially a bunch of warmed alcohol (warmed so it will catch fire) and spices that is put into a silver bowl and briefly burned. A special ladle shows off the blue flames as the liquid drips back into the bowl. For shock value, a little is dripped on the tablecloth.

At our engagement party on Sunday, my parents took out their cafe brulot set. Below are our set of diablo brulo cups which are based on an 1890's design from the restaurant Antoines (one of the locations we looked at for the rehearsal dinner).

To finish the story, here is a video of my dad working the cafe brulot last Christmas. Every year on Christmas Eve, lots of friends and family gather at our house for dinner and celebrating. Every year my mom amazes us all by cooking for a small army with grace (have I mentioned she is a superhero?) and my dad threatens to burn off all the alcohol in the cafe brulot. As you can see, it is very popular with the entire extended family.

crickets

As some of you know, we are getting married at St. John the Baptist church in New Orleans, LA next year. While in New Orleans over Memorial Day, we decided to check it out. Although my parents were married in this church 29 years ago, I had never been inside. After Katrina it was closed for everything except weddings and funerals. We decided to get married here for many reasons: the church I grew up attending has been closed (Our Lady of Good Council), my parents were married here in 1980, it is close to my home, and it was free on the day and at the time we wanted to get married. It is absolutely beautiful inside.


I knew all of these things before setting foot inside the church. However, there were many more things to learn as we wandered around that were just as magical. My fiance's nickname is cricket (given to him by his grandfather). When we entered the church, there was this seal on the floor - which has what looks like a cricket. Mary Ann (the volunteer wedding coordinator) said that after Katrina, when she came in to clean up - all she found were hundreds of dead crickets (the church hadn't flooded). She said that St. John the Baptist survived on crickets (or maybe locusts?) for a period of time, so she found it interesting. Another sign that this is the perfect place for us to get married? I don't know, but we both felt like it was a little wink in our direction.

lizard love

Every year in New Orleans, Jazz Fest spans the last weekend in April and the first weekend in May. We were all set to go this year until we realized that it conflicted with a reunion. I was heartbroken at first, because it meant another year without crawfish bread. Crawfish bread is one of the signature dishes served at Jazz Fest (along with crawfish monica, alligator pies, and fried green tomatoes - to name a few of my favorites). Elizabeth, never one to accept defeat, swung into action and brought home two pieces for us and dutifully kept them in her freezer - until this past weekend. Brought as a present to our engagement party, I could hardly keep my hands off them! Of course it would be crazy to heat them up at a party - they are too good to share!

Check out this montage to the crawfish bread that was.

Thanks Lizard for bringing crawfish bread back into my life. It was a wonderful treat and totally made my weekend.

New Orleans

I have been a delinquent blogger this week! I spent Friday through Monday last week in New Orleans, and I have had a very busy week at work. I will catch up soon I promise! In the meantime, enjoy the photo I took from the roof of the Omni Royal Orleans hotel in New Orleans. We went there to look at it as a possible location for guests to stay for the wedding. There was only one small problem - the price tag! At around $279 a night, we want to find something cheaper to recommend for our guests.

Have a great Friday and a wonderful weekend!

it's all about sharing

Once when Dave was traveling for work, I surprised him upon his return with the Bouchon cookbook and all the ingredients to make the Bouchon macaroons - a notoriously difficult (or impossible?) recipe to replicate in a normal kitchen. I think that the intimidation factor is strong, and the level of commitment required is high enough that it has been months and we have yet to even try! We have however made his simple roast chicken several times (page xii).

I bring this up now because I had the good fortune of having chef Thomas Keller (of the French Laundry) sign our copy this week. Check it out below - "it's all about sharing" is what he wrote to Dave. He's got a pretty great signature.

When talking to the crowd, Thomas Keller spoke of how he became a celebrity chef - discussing the traits he thought contributed to his sucess (ritual and repetition) and the failures that built character (his restaurant Rakel in NYC in the 1980s). He said "act like it's yours, and one day it will be" - and this struck a chord with me. I interpretted to be about taking ownership and responsibility for your work, while also showing respect. I like this perspective.

Now maybe I will finally get the courage to try to bake macaroons - and not be discouraged that while Thomas was signing the book, he said it was one of the most difficult recipes... hmmm...

happy Friday

Every Friday, the lady at work that carefully makes our coffee every morning tells me happy Friday. Today is an especially happy Friday - I am off to New Orleans (where I grew up) for the weekend! Lots of adventures are in store for us...

Happy Memorial Day weekend to you - I hope you have a wonderful 3 day weekend.

spring veggies

So I have never made lasagna before, but I have been dying to try. Since we subscribe to a CSA, we are often looking for new ways to eat what we get in our weekly bag (see our root veggie pot pie from February). After looking through a few cookbooks, I settled on a recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens red plaid cookbook because it cut the (usually very rich) ricotta cheese with cottage cheese (and the fiance likes to keep things light when it comes to cheese). I on the other hand have been known to eat nacho cheese at the Ramoni's straight from the warmer, but that is another story...

In this lasagna you will find the following ingredients (all of the veggies came from our CSA - including the mushrooms):

• 1 large onion
• 1 head of cauliflower
• 1 shredded carrot
• 1 bunch of spinach
• 2 cups sliced mushrooms
  
• 4 cloves garlic (I added extra...)
  
• non-fat ricotta cheese
• non-fat cottage cheese
• grated parmesan for flavor
• and no-boil lasagna noodles, milk, etc.
  

Pretty healthy set of ingredients for a tasty lasagna! Who knew? This single dish fed two of us through 3 or 4 meals. Pretty impressive for relatively little effort. My mom makes a killer traditional lasagna (which is next on the list), and my fiance's mom makes a delicious white lasagna. Now I just need to remember to ask her for the recipe...

playing games

Monday night I was up in the city visiting Johnny until about 11pm. By the time I rolled in through the door, I was tired! Imagine my surprise when in the dark, my fiance calls to me that there is a box on the back stoop. Inside were four antique bocce balls and a note from my dad.

What a wonderful and unusual surprise! My dad had purchased them at the Crescent City Auction House a few weeks ago - and I know that he loved them because I had heard about them many times.
Each ball is made of mahogany and has little bits of ivory to mark the number of the ball. Now I need to find a way to display them that does them justice - what do you recommend? I was thinking a shallow woven tray or bowl set on top of the piano...

Thanks again dad! I love them.

Johnny

So I have been pretty good about updating my blog every day or so lately - well that was until I learned my brother Johnny was admitted to the ER at St. Mary's in San Francisco on Saturday afternoon. Our mom flew out on Sunday (see note about her superhero status), and he has been getting better ever since. Johnny had developed some serious tonsillar abscesses and he needed several days worth of IV antibiotics and fluids to fight off the infection. So now it is Wednesday evening and he has put the worst of his illness and two final exams behind him - quite a feat for 5 days! Check him out in the hospital room above. Lookin good Johnny!

So I haven't said much about Johnny yet on the blog. He is kid #4 of 6 and a nursing student in San Francisco. Johnny and his lovely girlfriend Paola were instrumental in the creation of the lamb cakes at Easter. He is also a really good photographer - taking photos with all kinds of obscure and antique cameras. Check out his work on flickr and his self portrait below.

Glad you are feeling better little bro!

Elizabeth Gamble Garden

Now that spring is in full swing, my fiance and I have been making frequent trips to the nearby Elizabeth Gamble Garden in Palo Alto. Everything is blooming - peonies, roses, bluebells, snap dragons, poppies - everything. It has been a really nice place to spend time.


Also, today I bought www.seablueseegreen.com. I have really enjoyed writing this blog over the last few months - so I decided to fully commit and buy the URL. Now I just have to make sure that I have all the settings correct so that feed readers still work correctly. Let me know if you experience any problems!