Farm to Fork

These are a few of my favorite things (wk7)

This week has been filled with lots of releases after too much tension this month.

Here are a few of my favorites:

What I cherish this week:

Is the communication my partner and I have now. A wise woman suggested to me years ago that we should negotiate what would happen on holidays so that we weren’t setting each other up for problems.

It was one of the best things I’ve learned, and having a partner that will participate is a solid win.

Because of this, we had a lovely Valentine’s Day without drama and lots of love.

Thanks, handsome 😉

What I am listening to:

I decided to go back to the basics. I’m listening to This American Life and Marc Maron. Many consider them to be the masters of podcasts. I’m gonna decide for myself.

What I am reading:

Belong by Radha Agrawal – my review is on GoodReads.

The quote that sums it up for me in the now:

“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.” – Harriet Tubman

These are a few of my favorite things (wk6)

Here are a few of my favorites right now:

What I added this week:

I am officially recommending the Oura ring over other tracking tools, including FitBit. I’ve used a UP from Jawbone, a Fitbit HR, and moved to the Oura in December. I ordered it online and it arrived in less than 4 weeks (I’ve seen some reviews that said it took longer.)

I miss the watch-like function of them, but the trade-off is that I forget I’m wearing a device. I can wear it in the shower or doing dishes. And it’s tracking is more accurate than either of the devices I wore before. It only tracks HR during sleep, and that’s part of the philosophy of the Oura. The ring, its app, and the analytics available on the Cloud all believe that the best day starts last night and give you plenty of tools to track. So far, it’s known when I am getting sick, and when I needed additional support due to stress.

Does it track steps? Yes, accurately and lets you add activities too. I’m happy with my choice.

What I am listening to:

Nothing specific this week, just lots of acoustic music with some female singers: Lavigne, Morrissette, Parx. It’s been a nice week.

What I am reading:

Legends of Gods and Ghosts (Hawaiian Mythology): Collected and Translated from the Hawaiian

The quote that sums it up for me in the now:

“If you just set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.” – Margaret Thatcher

These are a few of my favorite things (wk5)

Here are a few of my favorites right now:

What I cherish this week:

Family. Had a lovely meal with the closest members of the tribe at one of our favorite restaurants as a belated birthday present to me. It’s a treasured day every year, and this one was great. Thank you.

What I am listening to:

One of my go-to playlists: French Jazz, it soothes my soul and helps me feel centered during the day.

What I am reading:

World Enough & Time: On Creativity and Slowing Down by Christian McEwen – this is a lovely book, meant to be read in fits and starts. Taking pieces of wisdom from artists, scholars, and writers, each section allows you time to contemplate how to be slower in this crazy world. The title is also a line known from a 17th-century poem by Andrew Marvell

The quote that sums it up for me in the now:

“To achieve, you need thought. You have to know what you are doing and that’s real power.” — Ayn Rand

These are a few of my favorite things (wk4)

Here are a few of my favorites right now:

What I appreciate this week:

Umcka Cold Care – almost everyone I know has been or is sick right now. As soon as I feel the first bits of a sore throat or such, I start up with it and about 80% of the time it keeps the cold from coming on. Once again it is saving me from feeling horrible.

What I am listening to:

I’m working on an Autumn playlist and what I keep on replay this week is 85 by Andy Grammar. It reminds me that today is not just another day. It is the day.

What I am reading:

Catching up on New York Times magazines. I keep them in a stack for rainy weeks like this one, and while one or the other can be a bit more political and depressing, there is usually something uplifting.

The quote that sums it up for me in the now:

“Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.” — Simone Weil

These are a few of my favorite things (wk3)

This week has been a bit of a struggle. I didn’t feel well at the beginning of the week and have been slow to recover. So this week’s theme is mostly self care.

Here are a few of my favorites right now:

What I (appreciate / cherish / miss / added) this week:

I used to have this amazing white jacket. It was made of cotton and was given to me by a wonderful friend. I used to wear it whenever I was sick. When I felt poorly this week, I went to find it and it was gone.

I have the memory of it but I miss the physical comfort of the warm soft cotton wrapped around me from neck to thigh keeping me warm while I heal.

What I am listening to:

Bird and the Bee – just lovely. Different, upbeat and helps me wake up in the morning when I’d rather stay in bed.

What I am reading:

Part of sustainability, to me, is local resources. Losing local bookstores has been a horror for me. The closest “complete” bookstore I adore is Bookshop Santa Cruz and they have a lovely Winter Reading program that I am participating in. I’ve picked four books and will be reading them for the next two and a half months.

The quote that sums it up for me in the now:

“Sometimes you are sick, just because you are sick” — my therapist, lovingly reminding me that not everything in life is a lesson. Sometimes it’s just what happens.

These are a few of my favorite things (wk2)

This week has been a lovely one. Lots of winter rain but without harsh flooding. Great meals cooked in the kitchen.

I wanted to start off the first full week of the new year by sharing with you all where I am today. So here are a few of my favorites right now:

What I (appreciate / cherish / miss / added) this week:

A new pair of clogs for my kitchen work. K logs, with a K, to be exact.

I found these to be comfortable, fit both my custom and otc orthotics and make me that 1 1/2 inches taller that makes most counters friendly to my 5’1″ stature.

What I am inspired by:

Believe it or not, some darned cool vinyl paper. I wanted a cabinet to have a new look and found this lovely tile pattern with Mediterranean colors and had a fun time tacking it up and trimming it to look close to the real thing.

What I am listening to:

It’s not playing music, per se, but Noislii is an app I was turned on to by the fun folks over at Project EVO – they send out a monthly newsletter with cool things that satisfy my “Alchemist” personality. And this app is a winner, it gives me control to create white noise from a variety of sources with a timer so that I can have concentrated time blocks to focus and work. The timer was a bit hard for me to figure out for the first 20 seconds, but after that, it was a breeze and comes with a cool fade out feature.

What I am reading:

I think Betty Friedan wrote “The Fountain of Age” while in her 60s – it was published it in 1993. It’s very relevant today for the more mature person and the people that want to understand them. So far, it is an intimate and encouraging look at how to evolve while your body ages.

Quote that sums it up for me in the now:

“Get up and move.” — attributed to… well, lots of people from Richard Simmons to me, when the kids were on the couch too long. But it is true. Moving, whether slowly or quickly, with some purpose or intentionally having no purpose is one of the best things we can do. Moving every day keeps us going and maybe even living longer.

Here we are again

So some of you may have found your way here from one of our old sites and be surprised by the content.

While times change, we do want to house the old cooking, whiskey and cocktail articles as well as our homage to Native Bear and Nibblers.

What you all don’t know is that four years ago, I (Trace) was seriously injured while traveling out of state. The injury affected all aspects of our lives for quite some time and it is only now that I feel comfortable enough to start sharing our stories again.

I may choose to go into more detail in the future, but for now… the synopsis is that I sustained damage to my primary hand and had to deal with the trauma from the injury. I’m much better now but don’t foresee taking on commercial cooking or baking again any time soon.

So it is with great happiness and joy that I am able to relaunch this site and this new(Er) blog with my current exploits. As time permits, I will add in older posts and articles; I may even have a go at framing in some of our experiences from the past few years.

For those of you looking for whiskey or cooking content, I can only as for your patience as I regroup.

Best health to you all,

Trace

Spring Saturday Brunch

I’ve been blessed the past couple of weeks with getting Spring brought home.

In the “old days” of a few years ago, it would have been me up at the crack of dawn to get to a market to pick the best of Zuckerman’s asparagus and sneak over to see if Berkeley Bowl had ramps or morels. Since starting to truly cook seasonally, those are the signs of when Spring has sprung. Already the spring onions will have arrived and the tiniest, sweetest radishes are around and soon there will be rhubarb from many vendors (my favorite from Happy Quail farm) and then some Eclair strawberries from Yerena and Tomatero will finally surface.

But for now it’s glorious asparagus both pencil thin and fat and sassy. The latter of which today got served steamed over whole grain English muffins with two plump Glaum eggs on top and a hollandaise that handsome put together for us.

The side there are apples stewed with rum and saffron and some allspice which was just fine with a bit of the hollandaise, indeed, it was an all together scrumptious meal washed down with coffee from Alchemy Collective.

And since you asked, our eclectic table is a 1880s parlor table desperately in need of a refinish topped with Chilewich mats and adorned with Bodrum linens. The mugs are unique, turned for us at Lightwave pottery studio on Kauai.

Spring dinner for one

Game hen, soup and bread slice Given the differences in my schedule and handsome’s, I eat alone a few times a week. As a cook, this is a challenge as it is for anyone that cooks for one. Either too much effort or too much product makes it a challenge.

This meal is a simple one. Leftover green garlic and asparagus from our Sunday meal, made a lovely green garlic confit and a Spring Soup, if you will.

The Cornish game hen, was roasted til lightly cooked and then halved and frozen. I pulled it out of the freezer this morning to thaw in the fridge and then popped in the overnight for a final roast too give crispy skin and heat throughout. At the last minute a slice of homemade Amish loaf adorned the plate.

A nice glass of 2015 California Pinot Noir and the evening was well made.

Healthy Blondies?

Growing up, my mother followed a dietary line of “sugar=bad” which seems to be making a comeback. I’ve adapted a recipe of Adelle Davis’ that I’ve been using for years. It has wheat germ, molasses, sugar and powdered milk and it’s not just for dessert. I actually like it for breakfast. 2018-03-31 20.42.54

So a few years ago, when I was running the bakery booth at the farmers’ market, I marketed it as a “Breakfast Bar”.

These days, I’m trying to get more protein in my diet so I thought this might be the way. I’m perfecting the recipe and then I may add additional protein sources to beef up a quick way to get some solid protein into a portable square.

(If you notice the color difference, these are two batches. I’m playing with the ingredient mix as well as my new oven to see what I like best. )

Post a comment if you are interested in the the recipe.