Just a few pictures of what’s left from last year, what’s coming out of the garden right now – that’s the ides of March, folks – and what we can look forward to. I love this time of year! Is it spring? Is it winter? (more…)
Some time ago, Dave and I took a fascinating tour of the Oneida Community Mansion House and there discovered a restaurant tucked into a wing of the building: Zabroso Restaurant & Lounge. Alas, it was closed that day and pressing our noses longingly against the glass didn’t get it to open. So we returned home, to spend many months saying, “You know, we have to get out to Zabroso.” (more…)
It’s March, which means it’s that magical time when we can start harvesting one of my favorite vegetables: parsnips. They’re sweet now, having been through the winter, and so aromatic. But mostly they’re a vegetable fresh from the garden, something we haven’t seen for a few months. (more…)
We use funnels fairly regularly. This morning, as I used the white enamel one with the royal blue trim to get oil from a gallon tin into a glass bottle, I wondered how many other people use funnels any more. Ever since we stopped storing food in plastic, we’ve found it useful and economical to buy foodstuffs in bulk and then transfer them to smaller containers. (more…)
The Post-Standard already did a nice job of writing about the Rise N Shine diner, but I just have to add my three cents’ worth. Dave and I have decided it’s our new “our diner” for a number of reasons:
We’re musicians. While the style of music we currently make, flamenco, has little in common with the music you hear at this diner, we just love all the pictures of Syracuse-area bands from decades ago that are hung on just about every available bit of wall space (see pictures here). Some of you may know that Dave has been playing in bands of various styles for many many years: (more…)
My dad is an excellent gardener – of flowers. To my knowledge, he has never grown a single thing that one can actually eat, but I learned a heap about plants while taking care of those childhood flower gardens. Dad’s a designer, of interior spaces and exterior gardens. He’s also a product of a 200-year-old lawn culture. So he couldn’t help himself when, in an otherwise sweet and charming email, he reacted thus to my statement that I was thinking of putting buckwheat in the front lawn: (more…)
One of the sweetest things about living in Eastwood is living so close to Cafe Kubal, which occasionally means smelling the coffee roasting when we step out our back door. We’re so grateful to Matt and Rachel and all the staff who have made this tiny cafe a huge success. To add frosting to the cake, you’ll find master barista Chris Deferio behind the counter these days. Chris was the fourth-place finalist in the 2007 US Barista Competition. Eastwood once again attracts great people: Chris and his wife have moved here. (more…)
A lot of snow fell over the past four days – like about 43 inches of it. No big deal for Syracuse. I like the nice thick blanket that now covers my garden, so full of food still. (more…)
A friend who has listened to me expound on the joys of vacpot coffee sent me this New York Times article, which of course I read with interest:
Loving Coffee Without Being a Drip
I just re-read that headline, after reading the author’s conclusion that automatic drip coffee, ground even days ahead of time, is just fine. He’s right, if you agree with him that coffee is a caffeine delivery system. But if you actually value the taste of the coffee and are willing to spend an extra five minutes a day to prepare something that delights you and the other lucky person you serve it to, why then, you just might be a drip! (more…)
We went to the Pride of New York Harvest Fest with a chef friend and his family. We actually ended up enjoying ourselves more than we expected, in part because New York is producing a lot of stuff! There was a serious abundance of wine and beer, to be sure. But as much as we love both of those, we’re really foodies. So we went there to eat.
Without a doubt, the “best in show” was (more…)
Dear Readers, our first-ever contest, sponsored by Pride of New York, has concluded and we do have a winner. But first let me say, this was one of the most difficult decisions we’ve made in a long time. We ended up sending the stories out to a select group of our more literate friends, and thankfully they did the choosing for us. Over the next few days we’ll post the three top stories, starting with the winning story by Michael Sweetman. He first sent us the 500-word limited story, the one we sent out for judging, but later contacted us with the longer version. It is so charming, we’re including it here:
How I Became a Butcher
Giving thought to my most memorable food moment, I can’t help thinking about the countless times I have been in the kitchen getting ready to make dinner and (more…)
We think there are some great food stories out there just aching to be told. And we’d like to publish them right here. This is a simple, down-home contest, meaning we’re not paying some independent company to look at your stories. We’re just gonna sit down with a nice cup of coffee, read ‘em over and, between the two of us, decide “Yep, that’s the one.” Fair enough? (more…)
We’re going to check out the Pride of New York Harvest Fest this year and we’re thinking maybe some of you will want to, also. We’re whipping up a sort of a contest for two free tickets to the Harvest Fest… give us a couple days to put the refinements on it. In the meantime, read up on the Harvest Fest itself: (more…)
We just found one of the very best food values anywhere: the New Taj India Cuisine Restaurant in the historic Corn Hill neighborhood of Rochester, NY. There are actually several new restaurants here, and we will get to all of them eventually. But we knew about this area from our several visits to Tony D’s. Just a week before we arrived in Rochester for a few get-away days, this Indian restaurant opened. It’s a 3-minute drive from the heart of downtown Rochester yet has free parking and is right on the Genesee River. (more…)
Dr. Mercola has the most popular natural health website. His articles sometimes seem alarmist, but too often they’re just telling the pretty awful truth. Just ran into this interesting article about Dr. Shiv Chopra, a whistle blower fired from inside Health Canada (the Canadian counterpart to the FDA):
My garden progress:
