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Monthly Archives: October 2009

Refrigerator poem

A company named Fridge Fun in Santa Rosa, California, makes magnetic poetry kits for refrigerator doors. One such kit includes 240 words taken from Shakespeare. One arranges the magnetic words to make one’s own poems. I had one of these kits on my refrigerator door in San Francisco, and a friend had written a 15-line […]

Pumpkin

Pumpkin curry I am shocked how many people tell me that they buy only canned pumpkin and never cook pumpkin fresh. It’s easy to cook pumpkin in the oven. Just cut the pumpkin in half, scrape the center clean of seeds and strings, and bake the pumpkin on a cookie sheet until it’s tender. A […]

Sunday drive

Today’s Sunday drive went past RagApple Lassie Vineyards near Rockford in Yadkin County. The vines were looking really good…

Biscuit quest, continued…

Over many months, I have continued to experiment with biscuits. The objective is to make a great biscuit, reasonably true to the Southern standard for good biscuits, but as low-carb as possible, with the lowest possible glycemic index. Flax seed, with which I started experimenting well over a year ago, is only part of the […]

Barley burgers

The barley experiments continue. Barley has a chewiness and heartiness that works nicely in fried patties. The barley burgers above are simple: cooked pearl barley, bound with an egg and whole-wheat bread crumbs and seasoned with chopped onions. I think they’d make a nice breakfast patty if they were seasoned like sausage. That will be […]

Tragedy and pathos

Reading up on the news this morning, as usual, I read that people by the millions spent much of the afternoon yesterday watching a balloon chase, thinking that a little boy was inside the balloon. Later they learned that there was really no drama at all, and that it might have been a hoax. I […]

More on thickening soups

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned barley as a nice way to thicken soups. An even easier way, because it’s something most of us have in our kitchens, is to use a handful of oatmeal. The soup in the photo is a cream of onion soup, made with soy milk. I threw in some […]

A new heirloom

It was not easy to figure out what sort of tables I needed for the main room of my little gothic cottage. Most of the tables one sees in antique stores — at least any table that I stood a chance of affording — were just too spindly and too fancy. I wanted a table […]

Over the river and through the woods

Round trip — more than 100 miles I drove to Yadkin County today to visit family. It was good weather for photography, and the leaves were just beginning to turn, so I figured it was a good day to document the route from northern Stokes County, where I live, to the Yadkin Valley, where most […]

Persimmons

The diameter of this persimmon is a little bigger than a quarter. Persimmon trees can hide at the edge of the woods during the spring and summer. But in the fall when they’re loaded with fruit, they might as well be flashing with Christmas tree lights. I discovered this persimmon tree on the edge of […]