Winging It Through Germany and France, Part I

Planning our recent trip to Germany and France was a bit of a challenge. With limited internet access from the farm and limited knowledge of the region we were targeting, we finally decided that we would just book our flights into Dusseldorf, reserve hotels for only a couple of nights along the way and then wing it. That's right, wing it. Our plan was to stop at the tourist information bureau at whatever town we arrived in and figure out what comes next, based on our rather loose itinerary. I must say our non-planning added an element of intrigue to the trip.

Our general plan was to rent a car at the Dusseldorf airport, drive over to see Jack, spend a couple of days in Cologne and then head down the Alsace region of France to Strasbourg and points south. The second half of the trip had us crossing the Rhine to Trier, Germany and then following the Moselle River Valley back up to Kolbenz before angling back to Dusseldorf for a last visit with Jack. The actual trip turned out better than I had expected. The weather, the food, the wine, the landscapes, the company – all delightful.

And I don't want to forget any of it, not the pumpkin soup in Trier, the soaring cathedral in Cologne, the geranium-filled flower boxes on every medieval house along the Alsatian Wine Road, the thrill of again watching Jack play basketball, our bike ride through the Moselle Valley, our dinner with Laura Wolff's family (see photo below). None of it. Not one single moment. One of the best things about traveling is the fun of reliving the experience. But sometimes I can't even remember what day it is, much less what how delightful a mid-afternoon coffee and kuchen can be.

So...not so much for your pleasure, but more as an aid to my memory, I'm putting down the highlights (and lowlights) and asking Ed to chime in (see italics). Then on a cold February day, I can remember back to the afternoon spent at the chocolate museum in Cologne or the Paffgen beer garden where waiters in long blue aprons brought glasses of slightly hoppy Kolsch beer, keeping track of the number of glasses we consumed with tick marks in pencil on our round coaster.

Stay tuned for Part 2.

Posing in Trier, Germany. Jack came down for the weekend to meet us.

High Cathedral of Sts. Peter and Mary in Cologne, Germany.

An afternoon bike ride along the Moselle River

Grapes. Everywhere.
Down to the edge of towns, up the steepest banks.

Laura Wolffe (far right) spent last year in Louisville, as an au pair.
Her family lives less than an hour away from Jack and has shown him great hospitality.

In Honor of Friends and Fall

Friends are coming for dinner tomorrow night and pears are perfectly in season. So in honor of friends and fall, I baked a cake tonight. This is a very big deal for me. It requires that I follow directions and measure carefully -- both cooking skills that I simply don't possess. I'm confident that tonight's cake will be delicious because, truth be told, I made this same recipe a few weeks ago. It was so good I had to send half of it home with Maggie for fear I'd eat it all myself.

Start with four perfectly ripe peeled pears...

The recipe comes from friend Lynn and includes directions for a caramel glaze
– but the cake is so good without it, and it might be pushing my luck to think I could actually ice a cake –
that I chose to leave it plain.

 

 Just in case you are inspired, here's the recipe for Lynn's Pear Cake:

THE CAKE
4 ripe Bartlett pears, peeled and diced (3 cups)
1 tablespoon sugar
3 large eggs
2 cups sugar
1.25 cups vegetable oil
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1.5 cups pecans, coarsely chopped
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Toss together pears and 1 tablespoon sugar; let stand 5 minutes. Beat eggs, 2 cups sugar and oil at medium speed with an electric mixer. Combine flour, slat and baking soda and add to egg mixture, beating at low speed until blended. Fold in pears, chopped pecans and vanilla extract. Pour batter into a greased and floured 10-inch Bundt pan. Bake at 350 for 1 hour or until a wooden pick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Remove from pan and drizzle Caramel glaze over warm cake.

CARAMEL GLAZE
1 stick margarine
1.5 cups brown sugar
1/3 cup heavy cream
2-3 cups powdered sugar

Combine margarine, brown sugar and cream in heavy saucepan. Bring to boil for 2 minutes. Watch carefully. Remove from heat and beat in about 2 cups powdered sugar. If too thick, add more cream. If too thin, add more sugar. (Remember, as icing cools it will thicken.) Ice cake while icing is still warm.

Enjoy!

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme...

Someday is not a day of the week.  – Author Unknown

Today was the day that I was going to tell you about our trip to Germany. I intended to gather all the maps, photos, mementos, etc. and recreate the highlights of our itinerary. Instead, I headed out to the garden, just to do a bit of clean up before the cold and rain come in later this week.  Three hours later, look what I created instead of a blog about our trip.

Finding Luck

One leaf is for hope, and one is for faith,
And one is for love, you know,
And God put another in for luck, -
If you search, you will find where they grow. 

- Ella Higginson

I believe in luck. I have a friend who will argue that what I call luck is just hard work and being prepared. I prefer to think of it as Divine Grace or perhaps as Blessings. Whatever one calls it, my life if full of it.

I'm keenly aware of the grace of it when I take my daily walks. The morning air, the warmth of the sun, the colors of the fields, the birds raising up from the corn stalks --  all remind me of my relationship to the world, my responsibility for it, and my gratefulness of it.

This morning as I walked my way toward the end of the gravel drive, I glanced over to the raggedy grass and a large four-leaf clover caught my eye. Rather than finding it, it seemed to find me. "Pick me. Pick me," it called out. And so I bent down and picked it.

This ability to find four-leaf clovers (or luck) has been a hidden talent of mine since I was a grade schooler. I can remember being six or seven and leaning out of a second-story window claiming that I could see a four-leaf clover from on high. My younger sister seriously doubted it and challenged me to go pick it. I jumped off the toilet seat that I was standing on, tore down the steps, slid through the kitchen and out the back door. While she waited in the window, I reached down and picked a perfect four-leaf clover, holding it up to her so she could see. Looking back on it, I doubt that I could see that clover from two stories up, but rather was bragging about my ability, and then (luckily) was able to find one once I got down to ground level.

Finding four-leaf clovers is not that hard. You just need to know where to look and how to look. Maggie's got the hang of it and claims it as her hidden talent. Mary asked me to teach her today and so I did. Within four minutes, she found four four-leaf clovers. May she be blessed with good luck!

If It's Tuesday, It Must Be Beilstein

I'm so confused. I've lost all track of the days of the week. I think it must be Tuesday, and I know I'm in Beilstein,Germany. I may be dreaming it all as it is so like a fairy tale. After a hearty German breakfast, Ed and I climbed to the top of a grape-vine laden hill (mountain) to the 1539 castle ruins of Metternich. We are renting bikes this afternoon for a ride along the Mosel River, with a stop along the way for a coffee and Kuchen. Doesn't get any better than this. More later...

Salad Bowl

A quick trip out to the garden yielded a plethora of late-season salad makings. Doesn't get any fresher than this!

Taking the Long View

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago.  The next best time is now.  

~Chinese Proverb

Ten October Glory Maple trees planted last week along the curve of our driveway...ten years from now we are hoping they will form a beautiful alleyway leading up to our house. We're taking the long view; but in the short term, we are hauling five-gallon buckets of water out to them.

Shortcomings

Please welcome my guest blogger today: Ed Galloway

“Except as a fellow handled an ax, they had no way of knowing a fool.”  

– Robert Frost, “Two Tramps in Mudtime”

I have a lot of shortcomings; just ask my wife or children.  Some of them even I recognize.

One shortcoming is being too ready to judge people based on their formal education or the way they talk – people who know how things work, who work with their hands, people who actually make things – even though, or maybe because, that’s where I came from.

Trying to learn what I need to know on Dover Road, I now know what it feels like to be on the other end of that position.  Recently, I went to a used farm equipment auction to see about buying a tractor. The auction took place in a field. There were several hundred attendees. It was hot. There was no shade. There were hundreds of items for sale, only a very limited number of which could I even identify.

“Oh, look, there’s a nice garden disk.”

“A garden disk?  No, that’s a post-hole digger lying on its side.”

There was a clean New Holland tractor about the size I wanted, even though I didn’t know how to start it, much less what all those levers and pedals were for. To prove my sense of these thing (and fortunately), the bidding on it started about where I was going to stop.
 

Anyway, my point is every one of the people there (little kids included) knew more about the equipment than I did. And everyone that I talked to was kind to me despite my abysmal ignorance (although I expect that they get a good laugh when I move on).  My esteem for these folk is great and growing. I know that if I pay attention to what I’m told I’ll learn something, and I’m learning to go easy on the prejudgments.

And so it goes.

We’ve Been Busy

It’s been nearly a year since I published my first blog post on Farm Dover – and much has happened in those 12 months. 

Ed and I have gone from a wish and a list to feeling at home here. We’ve packed up our house on Calumet and moved 30 miles to our place in the country; built a lake (twice) and stocked it with fish; planted tulips and daffodils to greet us in the Spring; harvested kale, corn, tomatoes, herbs, pepper and beans from our first garden; planted an orchard, maples, an oak, a sycamore and two willow trees; said goodbye to Aunt Gladys; learned how to chainsaw, to can to beekeep; been (continually) amazed by the critters and weeds; welcomed Maggie back to Louisville, gotten Mary settled in a first apartment and wished Jack great success with his teaching year in Germany; travelled to Madison, Baltimore, France, NYC, Montreal, Juniper and Arowhon Pines.

It’s been a good year. Good, but busy. 

Even in the midst of the busyness, we've still found time everyday to enjoy the peace, the quiet, the visits from friends, the breeze on the back porch, the sunrises, the sunsets, and especially, each other.   

Make Way for Turklings

On Friday afternoon Ed and I made our way into downtown Shelbyville for lunch and a few errands. We parked the truck on Main Street and walked up one side to the Post Office before turning around and walking down the other side to a little cafe for lunch and a strawberry shake.

Along the way we stopped in two antique shops. Now, as you must know by now, I've spent the last two years getting rid of "antiques" and trying hard to keep our new home from too much "country" clutter. Nevertheless, it was fun to poke around these shops, looking at crocks, cast iron skillets and corn bread pans, old kitchen utensils, fishing lures, and out-of-print books.

While Ed was checking out the serious fiction (coming up with a first edition of Henry Miller's Tropic of Capricorn) I gravitated to the children's books, picking up a well-worn copy of Make Way for Ducklings, a picture book written and illustrated by Robert McCloskey and winner of the 1942 Caldecott Medal. I have always loved the charcoal illustrations and the story of traffic being stopped in downtown Boston for Mama Duck and her eight ducklings to cross safely into the island lagoon, where they meet up with Papa Duck and live happily ever after.

The story's scene of the crossing of the ducks on the road was recreated for me this morning. As I walked down our drive, a Mama wild turkey and her 11 turklings crossed the road in single file and disappeared into the brush. Just as the 11th one was entering the tree line, Mama Turkey circled back out and got in line behind him/her, just to make sure they all ended up where she wanted them.

Once I got up to the place where they entered, they took flight – not exactly the most graceful thing I've seen.

I can only hope they make their home on our farm and live happily ever after.

Lonesome Dove

I wish you could see us now. It is late Monday afternoon. The temperature has dropped 35 degree since this time yesterday. The clouds are hanging dark and low across our bush hogged fields. Summer has up and disappeared.

Ed and I drove out in our Ranger (think golf cart but without the place for golf clubs). We park underneath the big old tree that we've been working around to clear the brush and briars.

We unload two canvas chairs, our books, binoculars, and a single loaded shotgun. We've come hunting for doves -- all of whom have cleared out once they saw us in our bright orange vest and caps. (I just googled "dove hunting + fashion" and found out that we are supposed to be all in camouflage.)

Yep, not a single lonesome dove in sight. But nevertheless, a pleasant way to spend the last few hours of the long weekend. And, I won't have to pluck any feathers for our dinner...

auf Wiedersehen, Jack

Ed and I dropped Jack at the Louisville airport this morning. The ride in from Shelby county was quiet -- none of us exactly felt like talking or even knew what to say.

I suspect Jack was excited to be leaving for a year in Germany and maybe a bit anxious about getting there and getting settled. I also expect he was tired of me asking if he had his passport, computer cord, boarding pass, turkey sandwich, etc.

I was excited for him but, as always when I say "goodbye" to my children, my heart was breaking. I much prefer to have my three nearby, but we have raised them to be independent, confident young adults...So Jack is off on a fine adventure: teaching English in a German high school in conjunction with an award as a Fulbright scholar.

Jack, please know that I am so proud of you. I'll miss your whistling around the house, your appetite, your piano and guitar music, and your help with all things heavy, or high up. I wish you all the best in the next year. I know you will be a terrific teacher. May you learn much, make good friends, be safe, and know that we will miss you back at home.

auf Widersehen & Ich liebe dich. mom

Jack, outside his cottage, this morning, before heading to Germany.

 

Alone

I woke up this morning. Alone. Jack and Ed had slipped out of the house before dawn to go fish the Elkhorn Creek near Frankfort -- a bit of father/son bonding before Jack leaves for Germany. The sun was up higher than usual and still I considered rolling over and going back to sleep, like some teenager who stayed up too late.

Instead I headed out for my morning ritual of walking to the end of the drive, touching the red flag on the mailbox for good luck before turning around. It's only about a mile, but every morning I see something new. It might be geese flying overhead, a green snake slithering through the weeds, or a hawk gliding through the skies. I sometimes hear a donkey braying, or a cow mooing, a horse neighing, or a quail bob-whiting. Last week it was foggy and the sun was shinning through a million spider webs strung between tall dried grass. It looked more spooky than Hillcrest Avenue in October.

After my walk, I puttered. It's my favorite way to spend a morning. I watered the bourbon-barrel planters on the back porch and each of my dozen fruit trees. I changed our sheets. I made some mint tea and some hard boiled eggs. I weed whipped around the house and cottage. It was such a pleasant morning. It was quiet, and cool, and I was alone. But it was the good kind of being alone – alone, but not lonely. 

I know my boys will come bounding in later this afternoon, hopefully with a cooler full of smallmouth bass. I also know that I better quit puttering and head into town for some groceries as there is nothing worse than a hungry Jack with no food in the house. So, I'm off....

New Beginnings

Hurricane Irene is headed for the East Coast and so I headed for home yesterday afternoon. I had been in Baltimore, getting Mary settled in her first apartment. I had planned to leave after dinner and drive partway home, but decided to get on the road a few hours early and get out ahead of the rain. I pulled into our drive at 11:59 p.m., happy to be home.

But my heart is hurting a bit. I woke up missing Mary. If only we had one more morning to snuggle together and talk about what we were going to do today....

Mary, Maggie and Jack had brunch with us last Sunday. It may be a while before we are all together again...

...But life goes on. Mary starts her junior year as a graphic design major at MICA on Monday. After living in the dorms for two years, she and roommate Hanna have moved into a third-floor apartment about a half mile from campus in the Mount Vernon cultural district. It has hardwood floors, high ceilings, and a tiny fire-escape balcony. As of yesterday, it also had a bed and mattress from IKEA, a love seat, a bookcase with baskets and red bedside table. A special thank you goes out to friends Hanna and John for putting all the parts and pieces together. (I'm hoping Mary will send a photo and blog post so all can see her new digs.)

Before Mary left for school, she googled her address to confirm the zip code and discovered that Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, grew up in her very apartment building. She took that as a good sign that her life was destined to be interesting this year. I hope it is, in all the best possible ways.

So here's to first apartments, new school years, being 20-years-old and up for grand adventures. Have fun baby. Be safe. xxx

Tornado Alley

My neighbor told me recently that our little part of Dover Road was known as Tornado Alley, not the most encouraging thought. But all in all, we survived yesterday's storm relatively unscathed. Here's the count:

Down yesterday evening:

• 12 tomato plants
• one row of late corn 
• (the only) 4 pears on our tree 
• one tin rooster.

Up this morning:

• electricity and a dry basement
• 10 tomato plants 
• and one tin rooster, relocated to our back porch

Hoping all our Louisville friends fared as well. 
 

I am Woman; Hear my Chainsaw Roar!

I don't think Helen Reddy was singing about the how great it feels to fell a tree with a brand new chainsaw, but I'm telling you, it was empowering. It was loud. It was a bit scary. But it made me feel like "I can do anything. I am strong. I am invincible. I am woman (hear me roar)."

One of the things I've experienced about moving out to the farm is a growing desire to know how to do things; to understand how things work; to not be reliant on other people to fix everything/tend to everything. I want to know how to change the furnace filter, plant my garden, unstop the disposal. The problem: these skills don't come easily to me (and to be honest, I'm not sure they come that easily to Ed either). So, when we bought our chainsaw at the Simponsville Stihl dealer, Bobby Cottrell had to show us how to start it and how to properly use it so as to not cut off a leg instead of a log. The problem was that we then didn't use it for a month and forgot all he told us. So last Saturday, we went back to Cottrell's and admitted to Bobby that we needed another lesson. It was kind of embarrassing.

This morning Ed and I headed out to clear a swath around a huge tree whose beauty was lost among vines, honeysuckle bushes, deadly briars and small locust trees. Ed did most of the chainsawing and I followed along with the garden clippers. When we got toward the end, I took over the chainsawing -- just to prove that I could do it.

In the last month, I've learned to:

• drive our zero-turn mover in a fairly straight line
• can peaches, dilly green beans and beets
• drive a manual transmission pickup truck
• weed whip without going through the whole spool of line in 5 minutes
• operate our Polaris Ranger
• change the furnace filter
• till the garden with the attachment that brother-in-law Steve gave me
• water the Maple trees out front with the rain barrel loaded on the back of the Polaris

For most of these tasks, I've had someone to teach me. For example, Maggie was at my side as we canned the dilly green beans and beets; Friends Karen and Ken provided advice and good company while we cooked up batches of peach preserves and chutney; Jeremy, our contractor, came over one morning and went over all the mechanical doings of the house; and Ed gave me a lesson on the mower. But some of the skills are only learned by trial and error and some of the errors if caught on video might make a strong entry for "Funniest Home Videos" (i.e., Mary and I trying to tilt the rain barrel to get out the last of the water for the trees).

Stay turned. For as Ms. Reddy's sings:

I am woman watch me grow

See me standing toe to toe

As I spread my lovin' arms across the land

But I'm still an embryo

With a long long way to go...

It's a Good Look, Don't You Think?

The banged up red Ford van is gone.  It was the van with redneck jumping-bass decal on the rear window, the one that Paul put on as a joke years ago and we liked it so well, we kept it. It was a little harder to see it go than we'd realized. I know that a lot of you really liked that van, and I have to admit, it had been a good car for us -- getting us (numerous times) to and from Canada, Florida, Wisconsin, Maryland and lots of points in-between. It carried memories of Juniper, camping, fishing, college moving in and out.  It had that special family smell that seems to permeate any car we get.  But for once we traded in a car while it was still running.

Anyway, I don't think we'll miss it.  Look what we have in its place: the perfect farm truck!

Mary heading to town in our new (used) Ford Ranger.

Not Very Convincing

Crows are supposedly very smart birds. I'm not sure that we will outsmart them with our new scarecrow. But it is worth a try...

Molly and Katie came to spend the night last night and brought a gift of a scarecrow with them. Quick as a bunny, Molly put it together this morning. We went upstairs and raided our old-clothes closet, finding a green checked dress that belonged to Maggie a long time ago. A straw hat completed the outfit.

What do you think? If you were a crow, would you be scared?, or would you want to join the party in the garden?

Patterns

Green zucchini, red tomato, yellow squash, pink potato, green zucchini, red tomato...

That's the pattern I was following on Friday morning as I was putting together the couscous/vegetable tian that I was taking to dinner at Lynn and Walt's. Mary was talking with me and would occasionally remind me that I had messed up the pattern by putting a pink potato after the green zucchini instead of after the yellow squash.

For me, cooking is often as much about the colors and shapes of the ingredients as it is about the flavor.

My version of Vegetable Tian, before baking.
Includes zucchini, tomatos, corn and thyme from my garden.

The tian is a summer standby for me. The vary act of chopping vegetables is as calming and satisfying to me as watching golf on TV is to Ed. The dish has evolved over the years, starting out as a recipe from Ina Garten's Barefoot in Paris cookbook. A couple of years ago, at Mary's request, I added a layer of Israeli couscous between the sweet onions on the bottom and the vegetables on the top. Even though the recipe calls for Gruyere cheese, I use whatever I have in the frige. This time it was some local sharp cheddar from Kenny's Farmhouse Cheese. I also added a sprinkling of peaches-and-cream corn, just off the shuck and just out of my garden.

Good friends, good dinner.

Vegetable Tian

(loosely adapted from Barefoot in Paris) 

Good olive oil
2 large sweet onions, cut in half and sliced

1.5 cups Israel Coucous (large pearl)
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 pound medium round potatoes, unpeeled
3/4 pound zucchini

3/4 pound summer squash
1-1/4 pound medium tomatoes
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves, plus extra springs
2 ounces Gruyere cheese, grated

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. In a medium saute pan, heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil and cook the onions over medium-low heat for 8 to 10 minutes, until translucent. Add garlic and cook for another minute. Spread the onion mixture on bottom of a 9x13 baking dish, lightly brushed with olive oil.  Bring pot of salted water to boil and cook couscous for 15 minutes. Drain. Arrange a layer of the cooked couscous on top of the onions.

Slice the potatoes, zucchini, squash, and tomatoes in 1/4-inch-thick slices. Layer them alternately in the dish on top of the onions, fitting them tightly, making only one layer. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, thyme leaves, and thyme springs and drizzle with 1 more tablespoon of olive oil. Cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until the potatoes are tender. Uncover the dish, remove the thyme springs, sprinkle the cheese on top, and cook for another 30 minutes, or until browned. Serve warm.

serves 6

Cock A Doodle Doo

The first question that people ask when they hear that we've moved to a farm is: Do you have any chickens yet? Raising chickens is definitely on my list of things I want to do; I just haven't mustered the energy to tackle it yet.

But as of this morning, there is a big rooster greeting visitors at our front door. Ed and I found him while running errands in Shelbyville and bought him, tucked him in the van and brought him home. Yes, it was an impulse buy, but he makes me smile everytime I look at him. And he is lot easier to take care of than a bunch of cackling hens!

One Thing Leads to the Next

It all started when I headed out to the garden to check on the puny cucumber plant that I had bought late in the season at the Shelbyville Farmer market. Just in the past couple of weeks, it has taken over one corner of my corn patch and is growing prolifically. Lifting up one of its many tendrilled vines, I found not one, but six! ready-to-harvest cukes. 

A bar of Philadelphia Cream Cheese, an onion and one drop of green food coloring later, I had mixed up a batch of Benedictine Cheese.  I could just hear my grandmother telling me that the pale green cucumber spread was developed by Miss Jennie Benedict sometime around the turn of the century. The way Grandmommy would talk about her, it made me think they were friends or at least acquaintances who would meet ocassionally for tea. 

My memory took me back to the many times I would be sitting in Grandmommy's tiny kitchen keeping her company; she would be grating cucumbers and mixing up the cheese, spreading it on white bread and then carefully cutting it with one of her many cookie cutters into stars, or circles or diamonds, before arranging them on a pretty tray – all for my benefit, for no special occasion. It was just how she did things.

The whole making-Benedictine-Cheese-in-my-kitchen thing, thinking of Grandmommy-in-her-kitchen thing, caused me to go up to our loft and search through Grandmommy’s old cookbooks. Sure enough, I found a well-worn version of The Blue Ribbon Cook Book by Jennie C. Benedict.  

I took it to bed that night and spent an hour reading it cover to cover. (Yes, I read cookbooks like other people read bestsellers.) The yellow-tinged, cooking-spotted pages were a blast to read. First of all, the cook book had its own index system, where pages were short cut for one of 15 different sections: Bread, Soups, Fish, Meats, Poultry and Game, etc. 

In the back of the book there was a whole section entitled: Simple Dishes for the Sick, followed by Dainty Menus for Convalescent Patients. The first recipe in this section is called Toast Water. And here it is (exactly as written). 

TOAST WATER

Toast three slices of stale bread to a dark brown,
but do not burn. Put into a pitcher,
pour over them one quart boiling water. Cover closely
and let stand on ice until cold. Strain.
If desired, wine and sugar may be added.

(Note: If you weren’t sick before you drank this, I bet you are now.)

The back section is pages of ads (paid, I suppose) for products that Miss Benedict recommends. They include everything from Calumet Baking Powder to Taylor Trunk Company, to the Fifth Avenue Fish Market. 

Can you read this copy?
I'm wondering how much times have really changed?

Now, here’s the weird part. Nowhere in the book does she provide a recipe for Benedictine Cheese. The copy that I have is actually a 4^th edition one, published in 1922. It wasn’t until the 5^th edition, published just three years ago (2008, University Press of Kentucky), that the recipe was included.

A few days later, I was trolling around on the Internet looking for the actual recipe for Benedictine Cheese and discovered all kinds of interesting things about Jennie Benedict.

One: She was born in Louisville, KY in 1860 and trained with the famous Fannie Farmer at the Boston Cooking School. She returned to Louisville and opened her catering business in 1893, working from a small kitchen in her back yard. Seven years later, she moved to a larger kitchen in downtown Louisville and later opened her own restaurant: Benedict’s. 

Two: She was an accomplished businesswoman, becoming the first woman on the Louisville Board of Trade. She also helped organize the Louisville Businesswoman’s Club in 1897. She is credited with serving the first school lunches in Louisville: chicken salad sandwiches that were sold from a handcart. 

Three: In 1925, she retired to her home “Dream Acre,” on a bluff overlooking the Ohio River and there, she wrote her autobiography: The Road to Dream Acre. The book is out of print, but I’m determined to find a copy. 

I like this woman. I like that she was an astute business woman and a wonderful cook. I like that her work defined early 20^th century middle-class cooking in Kentucky. And I like that 100 years later, I’m still using her recipe for Benedictine Cheese. 

And so from garden, to cooking, to old cookbook reading, to research: that's how one thing leads to the next.

_____________________

Here the version of Benedictine that I use. 

Benedictine spread

8 ounces of cream cheese, softened
Juice from one grated medium cucumber

Juice from one small grated onion

1 teaspoon salt
a few grains of cayenne pepper
1 drop green food coloring

To get the juice, peel and grate a cucumber, then wrap in a clean dish towel and squeeze juice into a dish. Discard pulp. Do the same for the onion. The cucumber juice together with the onion juice should measure 1/3 cup. Blend all ingredients. 

Meow. Meow.

I was tidying up the back porch this morning and reached down to pick up the canvas grill cover that had been lying in the corner all week. Much to my dismay, a mouse was inside. Even though it didn’t scare me (much) I ran inside to get my brave son to deal with it.

When Jack peeked inside he found one mad mamma mouse, a nest, and 15 brand new baby mice. He gently carried the cover down to the tree line and freed them into the woods. 

One of 15 baby mice born inside our grill cover.

No big deal, right? No harm done, right? That’s what you are thinking. But, you haven't spent the last week trying to unravel what went wrong with our van. Why were the shock plug cables cut? And who would have done such a thing? Why was the ABS light coming on? Why wouldn’t the speedometer work?

Turns out, a little mouse family – like the one Jack carried away this morning – had taken up residence under our van hood and munched on various (but important) cables and wires. Little did we know that people in the country put mouse deterrent canisters in their cars, trucks and tractors to keep such critters at bay. We are learning our lessons, but mostly the hard way and, in this case, threatening to make us as poor as church mice.

So, maybe we do need a barn cat (even though we don’t have a barn yet). If we put a bell on its collar, perhaps the songbirds can be forewarned of an imminent pounce – but the same is probably true for the mice….

Please Come for Dinner: Harvest July 8

Zinnias

Cucumbers, zucchini  and Sun Gold tomatoes

Rainbow chard

The Heat's On -- but Not in My Kitchen

I need to back up a week or so and tell you about a cooking class that I took with Maggie at Fox Hollow Farm just before we left for our Canada trip. I had won a free class at Fox Hollow’s summer kickoff event and Maggie offered to take the class with me. (Patrice will vouch for me: if you accordion fold your raffle ticket, you are sure to win every time!)

I arrived just as Maggie was getting off work. Five other women had signed up for the class. They all seemed to know each other. Jennifer, one of Maggie’s co-workers was also there to help with the prep. The class lasted from 6:00 to 8:30, but was 2-1/2 hours of sheer fun, plus we got to devour the delicious results.

Sherry Hurley, owner of Farm to Fork Catering, was the instructor. She cooks at Fox Hollow’s commercial kitchen on a regular basis and was knowledgeable and excited to be working with produce straight from the farm's garden.  She handed out printed copies of seven recipes and sure enough, she worked her way through all of them. (Disclaimer: she had already made the Carrot Ginger Cupcakes with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting that served as our dessert.)

I was especially glad that she included recipes for collard greens, beets, chard and turnips as I’m hoping all will come from my garden. Sherry teaches two classes each month: the 2^nd Wednesday of each month she focuses on Fox Hollow grass fed beef and the last Tuesday of each month is based on what’s growing in the garden. In addition, Jamie Shafer is teaching a class on canning and preserving this Saturday, July 9.  I’m planning to take more classes. I hope you will join me.

Geronimo!

Just around one corner of Joe Lake is Jump Rock. It is legendary as the place where the bravest of the brave Taylor Statten campers jump from its high perches.

Knowing how much I avoid scary heights, I couldn’t really picture Maggie, Jack or Mary actually taking the plunge.

On July 4, we had taken two canoes out for a not-so-short paddle and a not-so-easy portage over to visit Camp Wapomeo (the camp that Maggie and Mary went to for years) and Camp Ahmek (Jack’s camp). On the way back, Jack announced that he wanted to climb to the topmost rock and jump off. I didn’t know if he would do it. Mary, not wanting to be shown up, said she’d take the plunge too.

Up the cliff face they scampered. Ed and I paddled out so we could watch.

Off went Jack. Forty feet straight down into the cold clear waters. SMACK. Then nothing. Then one black, sized-15 flip-flop floated to the surface. Then nothing. I held my breath.  And then, Jack popped up.

Off went Mary. Down, down, down. SMACK. Up she popped, with a big smile on her face. One bruised hand and one very sore bottom to remember  – and, of course, the photo to prove it actually happened.

Independence Day: Back to Arowhon Pines

Since we had traveled so far to pick up Jack, it seemed a shame to turn right around and head home, so a trip to Algonquin Park, Ontario, was in order. And, since we couldn’t fit camping gear and Jack’s stuff in the Subaru, we determined that we would forgo a canoe/camping trip and just spend a couple of nights at our favorite resort: Arowhon Pines.

Mary had not been there since her last year at camp but little had changed in six years. In fact, little has changed since 1987, the summer we first visited with three-month-old Maggie in tow. The gravel road leading up to the place is still long and windy; the knotty pine cabins as old-fashioned as ever in their décor; the air – cool and clean, the lake peaceful, the sound of the loon eerie, and the food, as always, spectacular. 

Canada Day: Headed to Montreal

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With Mary’s U of L summer literature class over and Jack conceding that it was time to come home, we packed the car and headed north to Montreal. We have grown fond of the French-speaking city in the four years that Jack has called it home and looked forward to returning to some of our favorite places and exploring new ones. 

With no keyboard or guitar at hand,
Jack has taken up the harmonica.

Dad and daughter watching boats in Montreal's harbor.

Taking a break.

For Jack, I suspect it was a bittersweet time. He professed to wanting to come home to the farm, but that meant saying goodbye (at least for now) to the friends he had collected in his time there.

In his honor, we hosted a dinner at Edwardo’s, a neighborhood Italian restaurant on Duluth Street – BYOB. We stopped at the SAQ and picked up some red wine, two bottles of white and a bottle of rose. (Once we met the crowd, Ed slipped out for more red wine.) A selection of antipasto, wine, baskets of warm bread, wine, plates piled high with pasta, more wine, and a dozen recent McGill graduates (or almost graduates) combined to make for a most enjoyable and memorable evening.  

We left the group to continue their festivities at a nearby park and Jack promised to be up and ready when we called the next morning. On the way back to our hotel, Mary, Ed and I stopped to soak up the music and atmosphere of the  Montreal Jazz Fest, catching a concert by Susie Arioli – a nice way to end our last evening in Montreal.