A revival. NaBloPoMo.

So this is November the First, and I've been looking forward to this month all year long.  Maybe not literally, but I remembered how much fun National Blog Posting Month was in 2011 and how much introspective writing made its way onto FunghiFritti.  So this year, I've been jotting down ideas and thinking about what bits of my life might just be interesting enough to commit to the internet archives.

courtesy Bridget.

via.

I'd like to see November as the month when Joe springs to life, bringing vigor to his web presence where only a languishing website with sporadic posts previously existed.  Kind of like how our sourdough start sat in the fridge for 8 months completely neglected, and we had some hope of bringing it back to life.  Here's how that story goes down:

For Jen's birthday in February, she was gifted a sourdough start and a King Arthur Flour crock in which to keep it.  The sourdough start came home with us in a tupperware container, which was immediately thrown deep into the abyss of the fridge, and the crock took up residence on the counter holding our collection of ladles, whisks, a meat tenderizer, a potato masher, and our trusty ice cream scoop.

When we were in grad school, we had sourdough pancakes regularly, and were entrusted with a "secret family start" that was gifted to us with a friendship bread recipe.  It was given with great solemnity and we had accepted the responsibility to care for that branch of the family tree.  We had good success with that start for years, and even moved it across the country with us, ultimately discarding that creature after it gooed all over our fridge.

Understand that sourdough is a living, breathing organism.  Bakers and enthusiasts take great pride in cultivating their "mother."  I understand that beverage manufacturers also prize the particular flavor of their mother, as it differentiates them from their competitors.

Anyway, back to our "new" start and the crock.  After 8 months, the starter was in bad shape.  The sludge settled to the bottom, the watery sour smelling liquid was all at the top.  I was sure that the acid/yeast/bacteria levels were way out of whack.  But I was willing to nurse it back to health.  After some intense internet research (and really, is there any other kind?), I decided to clean out the crock, dump the liquid into it, and peel the pasty mass out of the suffocating tupperware and into the breathable crock.  It was more like silly putty than our previous sourdough start.  With a glimmer of hope, I poured about 3/4 cup water and 1 cup flour in the crock and stirred and stirred and stirred until the consistency was smooth.  I covered it and went to bed praying for bubbles.  Was it going to be dead?  Could it be resurrected?

Well, the next day, there were a few bubbles.  The question was, were the bubbles from life, or because when I was stirring the night before the wooden spoon punched some air into the depths of the crock?  It hadn't really grown persay, but I saw a chance of rejuvenation.  So I added another 3/4 cup water and 1 cup flour, stirring until smooth.  Surely, if there was life, I would see it soon.

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I repeated this process daily for about a week taking out a cup here or there to make bread or pancakes, and what do you know?  It now froths and bubble when I feed it and leave it over-night!  IT'S ALIVE!

So the moral of the story is this:  If you want to pick up a neglected, pasty blog and make it alive again, all you have to do is add a little flour and water (pictures and words, perhaps?) each day and it'll become a refreshed creature soon, adding some very satisfying flavor to your life.  Here's to hoping that NaBloPoMo does just that for this blog.  :)

Editor's note: It may be that the start really was dead, and I was just creating a new one from the natural yeasts and bacteria in the flour, according to this enthusiast website.  I may never know for sure, but it's nice to be back in business!

Happy Thanksgiving! Gourmet.

The other day I was reading about the word gourmet, because it seemed kind of interesting how many foreign food terms are used in regular English.  And I don't mean French fries, spaghetti, or pizza. Ha!  I meant words like hors d'oeuvres, crudite, and the like.  Yes, Julia Child taught us that there is an art to masterful French cooking.  We tend to have a general concept in America of high food and low food.  If I had to generalize, the high food requires a fork and comes in very small portions, and the low food might focus on flavor via fats and include buffet style serving.

A few hundred years ago, gourmet indicated decadent luxury, and was frowned upon as a violation of the Deadly Sin of gluttony.  By 1984, the term foodie was coined, which referred to a fan of food.

Apparently (from Wikipedia), a gourmet food movement picked up in the 1980s after a long-standing division between elitism and populist tastes, and has accelerated through the 2000s due to rising incomes, globalization, and health/nutrition craze.  With the growth in food awareness, we have seen many new cooking shows, channels, and fads.  In some cases, the high-brow version has become very commonplace (gourmet coffee for example).  With this trend, there have been attempts to spiff up low food, and give gourmet flair to your everyday dish.  You can find thousands of "foodie blogs" these days, also.

So now, the question is this:  Does the gourmet (original gluttony connotation or otherwise) apply to Thanksgiving?  I know very few people who will be eating conservative portions or their normal menu this weekend.

Thanksgiving dinner has some pretty weird foods.  Consider it.  Turkey, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, squash.  Pumpkin Pie.  This is about what our menu looked like, too, though add a couple of varieties of jello salad, heavenly sweet potatoes, and butternut squash to go with it!  And Grammy Mitchell always provides about 6 varieties of pie!

from Wikipedia.

Some of these foods are only eaten once per year, but are delicious.  Not that they are decadent, but because they are traditional, perhaps.  And we don't go for dainty portions.  I had two plates worth.

The long table of loved ones.

Papa working on the bird.

Jen did the centerpieces and place-cards this year.  Didn't she do great?

Yes, that is an edible pilgrim hat, a juicy apple votive, and a cranberry/floral/mason floaty thing.

Let the games begin!

A Fair is a Veritable Smorgasbord

This post is about a week late, but I've been sidelined for most of the last five days or so....better late than never, eh?

We went to the Topsfield Fair--and I love fairs. Like, in ways that I can't even articulate. So I absolutely cannot even begin to describe how disappointing it is to go to a fair and Not Even Be Able to Stomach The FAIR FOOD. I'm sorry, but fried dough is one of the great pleasures of life, and I nearly cried when I looked at the vendors and realized that it didn't look good.

And that, folks, was my big takeaway from the fair this year. That, and the fact that a person who is fighting second trimester morning sickness should know better than to walk into a building labeled "POULTRY BARN."

But considering the fact that I love fairs--pregnant or otherwise--I had a great time. Joe and Ian had a blast. From the cow sculpted out of butter to the pig races to Ian making his own beeswax candle, it was a fantastic evening.

Kimball's

We took my grandparents to Kimball's tonight. It was their first time. And if you're remotely familiar with Kimball's (and their obscenely huge portion sizes), you know that a first-time visit is always memorable.

This time was no different.

My grandparents do not disappoint. Ever.

EXHIBIT A:

This is Papa's banana split. We can't decide if there are 6 or 8 very large scoops of ice cream on there...but whatever it was, it required two bowls for stability and that piece of paper to keep the dripping to a minimum. (Oh, and that heaping thing behind Papa's banana split? My grandmother's SIZE SMALL dish of ice cream).


EXHIBIT B:

Yeah, so this is after he'd been working on it for a bit. Seriously. That thing could have fed all five of us with leftovers for tomorrow.

EXHIBIT C:

Then, after a good 20 minutes of sitting and shivering and eating and chatting (it was in the high-50's tonight), we decided to head back to their hotel where it's warm. That container you see there? It's a 1-QUART container. And the LEFTOVERS nearly came to the top.


EXHIBIT D:

I like to call this one "Ding! Round Two!" Papa got Ian a spoon so they could share the remaining ice cream....but the way we presented it to Ian was thusly: "Ian, do you want to help Papa finish his ice cream?" So he did. But not how we thought he would.

A half-peck

We tend to get our apples from a farm near my parents' house--they have bushels of "drops" that we cook with all winter long. But we always try to get Ian out to pick a half-peck of apples every year. Kids should know where their food comes from...

It was a gorgeous day and we had a FANTASTIC time. Bonus points to the farm for having emus, elpacas, sheep, chickens AND John Deere tractors.

Cousin Reunification

My cousins are back in town (where "town" = "my parents' house in Maine) from Phoenix this week, so we met up with them yesterday in Portsmouth, NH (or as Ian calls it, "Port Smith"). For an added bonus, my mom also came along--which was quite fortuitous (as always), because Ian likes to keep tabs of when his next "Grammy Day" will be.

[Side note: Boo and Rachel have a new baby, Sydney, who came along as well. When introducing her to Ian, the following conversation ensued:

Me: Ian, that's baby Sydney. She's Boo and Rachel's new baby!
Ian: Where's the old baby?

I thought it was a reasonable question, quite frankly. Smart kid, I tell ya.]

Portsmouth is one of our favorite towns to visit, so we're always up for a day there. (And with their parking garages all priced at $0.75/hour, it's really worth spending the whole day).

We ate at our favorite restaurant there, where Ian and cousin Noelle couldn't keep their eyes off the pastry counter....and really, neither could the rest of us....MMMMM.

After lunch was finished, we indulged in the aforementioned pastry counter....Ian and I chose the chocolate mousse cup (complete with a chocolate cup....)....and I tell you what. I'm pretty sure I got about two square bites before Ian commandeered the whole operation.

Then it was off to some uber-cute shops--one of which was a yarn store. (=HeavenOnEarth for my mama). And would you like to know how awesome the fine retailers of Portsmouth, New Hampshire are? Well, I'll tell you. We made stops in both the quilting store and the yarn store, and both had baskets of children's books and toys for their young patrons. It was amazing. Ian and Noelle both especially liked the sheep in the front garden.

Blueberries

Sometimes...

...when you live in New England.........

....your flour molds.....

......And you save what you can....and then vow to only grind wheat from now on. (We lost about 100lbs of flour.) Because who needs white flour, anyway? Right?

You must try this:

Lasagna Soup.
Courtesy of Family Fun Magazine
mmmm.

It was delicious.

Lessons Learned

1. Never, ever leave a batch of rinsed cherries sitting on the kitchen table unattended.
2. Don't assume that because you used a bowl in which to spit seeds that others will do the same.
3. Teach children to spit out seeds....and to love the process.
4. If you have neglected-in-ignorance numbers 1-3, learn to accept the "but I ate the good part, mama" answer. Cause it's the best he has. Also, he will tell you that he did spit out the seeds and drag you by the hand to show you. He will. And he will be right.