I have whipped cream in my coffee this morning. An unnecessary indulgence, but it's leftover from dinner that I had here with Stephanie last night. The whipped cream has a touch of Anita's Nocino in it, which really gilds the lily.
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When I was a sophomore in college, I spent a school year in Florence, Italy. Thirty of us from the same university lived and took classes together in an old Medici villa for a eight months. In a move that made a huge change in my culinary upbringing, I did my work study in the kitchen -- working alongside the Italian cooks as I earned money. One of the main cooks, Luanna, took a particular liking to me and my great friend Amy. Tuesdays, Luanna would make macedonia -- an Italian fruit salad topped with whipped cream -- for dessert. And late on Tuesday nights, after all the dishes were done, Luanna would bring Amy and I some whipped cream that she'd ferreted away for us and we would drink it on our espresso.
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"This is an espresso-free establishment" reads the sign at Bovine Bakery, the lovely bakery in Pt. Reyes Station. It's the only bakery where I will order a morning bun, with its nuts and sweetness. Normally baked sweets like that overwhelm me, but I can't resist the perfect balance of the Bovine Bakery morning bun. It had been a year and a half since I'd been to Pt. Reyes. And on a cold, damp day last week I returned. We'd had a quick and lovely lunch at Fish, and then headed out to the national seashore. I pointed the car toward Abbott's Lagoon -- a spot I had been to many many times in my past. Out past the Marin Sun Farms ranch, Abbott's Lagoon holds a special place in my heart, and I was so happy to return.
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There's just no segue for this next item, but if you haven't seen this video clip of Robin Williams on Law and Order: SVU on Tuesday, check it out. Williams is a suspect in a crime involving a fast food restaurant and he uses what I am calling "the locavore defense" as his excuse for never having been at the restaurant.
When I haven't written on this site for a while, when I've allowed it to lie fallow with only a couple of notes here or there, the blog becomes bigger than me. I'm sure if you have a blog of your own, you can relate. It becomes less of a casual, day-to-day posting thing and much more of a post-that-you-need-to-conquer-or-else-you-can't-go-on. You begin to feel guilty for not updating, and begin to feel that you must write something really great in order to make it up to your readers.
I can't promise that, but I can tell you what's been going on in my life where possible.
I've been having a lot of a-ha moments lately, and several of them have come from the amazing people who I read on the Internet. "Word Retreats," I've been calling them to myself. The stories or phrases or moments that make me take a deep breath, regroup, and see the world from a slightly new perspective.
Word Retreat #1. Opt out of the drama.
A couple of weeks ago, I took a super fast trip to Los Angeles. I had a family obligation on Saturday, and since Sunday was Easter, I stayed in town to have brunch with everyone. My sister lives over an hour from my mom's house, and we all piled into my grandparents' car to drive up to have brunch with Annie and her boyfriend.
At some point during the trip, I was telling my Aunt about some incident in my life. "It was a total drama," I told her.
"You have a lot of that?" My grandmother, who was sitting next to me in the back seat, asked.
"Drama? Yes. A lot," I told her. I'm single, and in my thirties, in the middle of San Francisco. Between friends and day-to-day life, there tends to be drama, right?
"You know," she said, "the drama is always there. And you can opt out of it at any point. You can just let it wash over you. And you know what? If you decide that you want it back, the drama will always be there."
Since that day, when she spoke those words I needed to hear, I have really been trying to "opt out of the drama" when possible -- not completely succeeding yet, but at least trying.
Word Retreat #2. You are a bad ass chick.
This one is years old, but I have been calling on it a lot recently. There was a moment, about six years ago, when I was having a particularly rough couple days. My dear friend Molly wrote me a one line e-mail. It said, "You are a bad ass chick." For years, I had it pinned to my bulletin board -- a way to remind myself that I was a strong woman who can handle whatever is coming at me. I don't have it pinned up anymore, but it's ingrained in me. And it amazes me that the one-line email had such an effect on me. Not only does it give me strength to remember that I am a bad ass chick, but it reminds me about the power of our words.
Word Retreat #3. Complicated emotions.
"Here is the truth: I have never had an uncomplicated emotion. Love + sorrow + devotion + grief arrive on my doorstep in a single package. I don't even try to untangle them any more. Today, I am grateful that I get to feel at all."
When Jennifer Jeffrey wrote this a couple of weeks ago, I let out a huge sigh of relief. In an email to her later, I wrote, "You have no idea what you did for me by writing this." Just in those words, in the fact that she admitted to emotional conflict, I felt a sort of permission to be as complicated as I tend to be.
Word Retreat #4. You are exactly where you need to be.
For about a year and a half, I have had the note pictured here taped to the inside of my bathroom cabinet. It says "Wherever I am is where I am meant to be." This morning, I logged into my computer to see the same sort of reminder from the amazing Andrea. Her post, "A love note to you", was exactly what I needed to hear this morning.
I hope this post finds you all well. Any word retreats that you've been on lately?
Thanks for hanging with me while things have been a little quiet around here. I usually work freelance doing (data) consulting projects from home. But in the past few months, I've had a project that requires me to go into an office in the East Bay several days a week. I love the project, and am thrilled for the opportunity but it's thrown my entire schedule out of whack and it's my blog and my writing that suffer.
Things are good around here -- they have been for a while, which is fun and lovely.
So this morning I woke up to go to my East Bay job. Got dressed and ready and then received a phone call from my contact there asking me to work from home. It's a good day.
Other things that are making me happy this week:
- A fantastic gin and tonic from Bix the other night: (local) 209 Gin and Fevertree tonic. Doesn't get much better than that.
- The great speech from Marketa Irglova last night at the Oscars. She is one half of the Once duo and she and Glen Hansard won for best song. She didn't get a chance to speak because the music was brought up before she spoke. In my favorite moment of the night, Jon Stewart brought her back and had her make her speech:
"The fact that we're standing here tonight, the fact that we're able to
hold this, it's just proof that no matter how far out your dreams are,
it's possible. And, you know, fair play
to those who dare to dream, and don't give up. This song was written
from the perspective of hope, and hope, at the end of the day, connects
us all, no matter how different we are."
- Hog Island Oyster Company's Happy Hour. I hadn't been there in quite a while, and it's as good as ever. $1 oysters and $3.50 beers. Monday and Thursday nights, 5pm to 7pm. We also had a delicious cooked scallop dish that's worth a try if it's still on the menu.
- Did you catch Governor Huckabee on SNL this weekend? Politics aside, it was an entertaining skit. (Sound quality on this video is terrible).
- I finally made it to Sebo. Holy delicious temple of sushi.
- This "freeze project" that took place in Grand Central Station last month and was repeated in San Francisco this weekend. I wish I would have seen it.
It's been an incredibly busy couple of work weeks. Thought you'd enjoy a glimpse into my email outbox from the past few days, as there has been a lot of food chatter among my friends and me.
------- to: AP subj: tonight
I am on BART in oakland and it's 11 pm. And I have a bag with a turkey leg and sorghum molasses sitting next to me.
What the hell is this life.
------- to: SL & JB subj: la trip
We have a reservation at Mozza. and for the record, that was like calling a radio station.
------- to: ALD subj: potstickers
I randomly bought Trader Joe's potstickers this week in a fit of "I-don't-have-time-to-cook-from-scratch". Made them today and no matter how I dress them up (side of arugula salad with soy, rice vinegar and sesame oil and topped with black sesame seeds and chili oil) they still taste exactly like they did when we were Juniors in school making them in the microwave in the dorm.
You may have noticed that over on the left-hand sidebar I have a list of blogs that I call "Inspirations." These are blogs that make me stretch my mind and imagination and expectations and I love them all for that. Via Chookooloonks* yesterday I noticed Jen Lemen's post about "25 things I never get tired of." I thought it was a perfect thing for me to consider during the first week of 2008. So without further ado:
Cracking open a brand new cookbook.
Looking at really amazing portraits.
Chapstick.
Talking to my grandmother.
Driving over the Golden Gate Bridge.
Going to farmers' markets.
KFOG Acoustic Sunrise on Sunday mornings.
Listening to my friend Anna's outgoing phone message - her daughter recorded it when she was about 2 (she's about to be 6), and I hope they keep it till she's 18.
Chatting with the people who create or grow my food.
Watching stormy days in the city from the warmth of my living room.
Filling notebooks with random thoughts, lists and notes.
Really great stationery stores.
Giggling uncontrollably with my best friend - we met over giggles in 7th grade and somehow manage to crack each other up to this day.
Eyes closed, iPod on, dancing around my bedroom alone.
Listening to people tell me how amazing my family is.
Reading my blog comments (not a ploy -- I just wanted you to know how much I appreciate them though I am atrocious at answering them).
Supermarkets in foreign countries.
The surprise of becoming dear friends with people who I have met as a result of this blog.
Reading old handwritten recipes.
The anticipatory moment when I am transferring photos from my camera to my computer.
The overwhelming feeling of realizing a dream.
Hearing a compliment from a client who is pleased with my work.
Planning & making a meal for friends who really appreciate my cooking.
Walking through the city with no real destination, camera slung on my shoulder.
Fresh figs, cherries, tangerines, and blueberries.
* Chookooloonks is an amazing photographer and all around bad-ass chick. Don't believe me? Check out her amazingshots ofher daughter. I think I'm a better person because I read her blog and look at her photos.
Stay safe out there, all of you who are experiencing storms!
Without getting too sappy about it, I'd just like to say that my heart is so full today. I am thankful for ...
my given family: you astound me with your support and teach me by example,
my chosen family: my friends who are unabashed cheerleaders, my friends who are wiser
than their years, my friends who teach me more than they know just by
living their lives, my friends who have put up with me since the beginning of time, my friends who are far away but feel very close, my friends who tend toward bossy, and my friends who hold my hand as I tread into uncharted waters,
A while back, I gathered all my catalogs and opted out of the company mailing lists one by one. The project took quite a while, as I had to find the appropriate email address or phone number, and deal with each company individually. And eventually, I made it back on to many mailing lists and hadn't yet dealt with opting out once again.
This morning, I learned about a new way to get rid of catalogs: CatalogChoice.org. This is a project being sponsored by the Berkeley Ecology Center that allows you to opt out using a web interface -- doing in minutes what once took me hours. In about 5 minutes, I signed up and opted out of 10 catalogs. The Catalog Choice folks contact the individual companies on your behalf, and even allow you to report infractions. The process takes a while -- I won't stop getting these catalogs for about 10 weeks -- but it's a great step in the right direction!
I have a bad habit of listening to music very loudly in my headphones. I know it's not good for my hearing, but every once in a while it's just something I have to do. And really, it's better than crack or heroin, right? All day, I have been listening to all of my Tegan and Sara albums on shuffle. I was introduced to this duo many years ago by the husband of one of my best friends. He and I have always meshed when it comes to music and he used to send me cassette tapes of different music before burning CDs and emailing mp3's were the norm. We all need one of those people in our lives.
If you missed this piece in the NY Times Sunday about environmentally conscious entertaining, it's a rather funny article on the thought process that many of us go through (thanks to my friend Brooke, who sent it along with a note that said "now I feel less alone".)
If you are not a Grub Report reader you should be. Stephanie just spent a few weeks working on Jacques Pepin's new show and is beginning to write about her experiences. I started reading Stephanie's writing a few years back when I came across a great piece by her called "How not to act in a cheese shop." Through a series of fortunate events, she and I have become great friends. Being as unbiased as I can be, I still consider her to be one of the best Bay Area writers we have.
The photo above has no connection to anything in this post -- it's just something that I came across in my files from the Vietnam trip. I know it was taken in Saigon, but have no memory of taking it or anything about the scene. It's always a pleasant surprise to have that happen, though I'm a bit bummed I didn't spent more time taking photos of this scene.
I woke up with my heart beating very fast this morning, and an hour later it still hasn't slowed. It's been one of those weeks that really tests my mettle. It's a great time, actually, and there is not an experience this week that I would have passed up, but it's just interesting when the universe throws it all at you at one time. The only thing I can do is take each opportunity one at a time, and keep my head above water.
Frankly, I'm happy to see October go. I don't follow planet and star alignment enough, but I have a feeling that forces much larger than me were at work in October. Most of my phone calls with friends were to discuss heavy, life-altering issues -- it seemed to be a month that we were all having to work very hard to get through. But, we all made it and now we're in November. November, with its crisp weather and pumpkins and family. November, when the farmers' markets start to quiet a bit. November, when we start to head indoors and bundle up.
One thing that crossed my desk this week was a request to write something for the PBS NOW website. NOW is a national television program with David Brancaccio that this week is focusing on the eat local movement. I wrote a piece called "10 Steps to Becoming a Locavore."
My thoughts are with all the Southern California fire victims. I am intimately familiar with the Santa Ana winds and the damage that they can do. Talking to mom the other day, we talked about that specific smell that is the Southern California combination of Santa Ana winds and fire. Even if I never smell it again, it's something I will remember all my life.
When I was young, we lived in Lake Arrowhead during a large fire and waited at an evacuation center to find out the fate of our home (it was spared). I was at Pepperdine during the 1993 fire, and spent two days in the gym while everything around the campus burned.
When the winds pickup in Southern California, my thoughts always turn to fire, and I am sure that I'm not alone in that.
A few have asked about my family and friends. Everyone is safe, and no one is in the affected areas, thank God.
(If you are reading this post on a RSS reader, you might want to click through to Life Begins @ 30 for the slideshow.
As we entered the Taco House last week, I steadied my grandfather on my arm. "The taco is $1.29," he said. "When I bought the Taco House, we sold it for 25 cents." Two women in front of the restaurant became really animated when they saw him. "You know who I just met," one exclaimed into her cell phone, "I met Bill. You know THE Bill."
My grandfather's name is Hank Silva, but in the Los Angeles community he is often known as "Bill". He bought Bill's Taco House in 1960 from the original Bill who had owned it for eleven years. Grandpa owned the restaurant for 25 years and many of his customers just assumed his name was Bill. He never corrected them.
The story that led my grandfather to own the Taco House is a real up-by-your-bootstraps, American-way story. He grew up very poor -- moving around, but mainly in the Central Valley -- and went to school very sporadically only through elementary school. During some of his youth, he picked fruit and cotton up and down the Central Valley -- figs, prunes, rhubarb, and strawberries. When the workers would break for lunch, grandpa and his best friend Tony would pretend that they were going to lunch as well. But they didn't have any money and didn't eat. When lunch was over, they would come back to the field, chewing on a toothpick and pretending that their bellies were full from the feast that they'd just eaten.
In 1939, grandpa had a small amount of money saved and felt that he was destined for something greater than ranch work. He wanted to leave the valley, but didn't know where to go. "San Francisco or Los Angeles," he told his friend Tony at the bus station. Grandpa had been waffling about which direction to go. "Just go buy me a ticket to either place." Tony chose Los Angeles. "You're going to Hollywood," Tony told grandpa, in a decision that was pivotal for grandpa's life and the future of our family.
Grandpa met my grandmother in 1945 (a great story for another day), served in the Navy in World War II, and then returned home to support his family. He held many jobs including working at a bra factory (where grandma worked as well), selling Baby Butler children's furniture, and selling tract homes in Riverside County. In the late fifties he was working at a trucking company and had an accident -- he fell from the dock and injured his elbow. The insurance company compensated him for his injury by giving him $10,000 (the equivalent of $69,000 today).
That $10,000 insurance check is the money that grandpa used to buy the Taco House. The restaurant is on Martin Luther King Blvd. in Los Angeles, about a mile east of USC. "We were open until four a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays," mom recently told me, "and there would be a line down the block after the clubs in the area let out." The taco that they were all lining up for is, what I could imagine, the perfect drunk food. It's greasy and full of spices and a fully craveable meal.
Every once in a while, someone who had just been released from jail would come into the Taco House because they'd been craving Taco House food in the slammer. Celebrities also came into the Taco House -- sometimes limos would pull up and people like Barry White and the singers of the Fifth Dimension would come in to get their taco fix. Many people who grew up in the neighborhood and became successful -- singers, boxers, politicians -- would continue to return to Bill's Taco House. "I remember when Barry White was coming in and no one knew who he was," grandpa told me recently, "and then he kept coming back when he was famous."
Recently on a trip to the Taco House alone, I tried to assess the taco. It's a seasoned hamburger patty, grilled and cut into three pieces, with a slice of cheese ("What kind of cheese, Grandpa?" "Yellow cheese."), diced tomatoes, shredded lettuce, and a spicy chili gravy all wrapped with a fried taco shell that is more soft than crunchy but with a fried flavor. Today's taco is pretty true to the original recipe, and the one that grandpa used. I laughed the other day at a user review on the Internet recently that called it "good Mexican food." I agree more with a different user who called it "good junk food."
"We would get a delivery of fresh ground beef every day," grandpa said on the drive home last week, "and on Saturdays, we would order 500 pounds of beef." Each taco uses less than a quarter of a pound of beef, so that's a heck of a lot of tacos.
Grandpa was really well known in the community. It's still a treat to run into people who went to Bill's as kids in the sixties and seventies and talk to them about what they remember. Aside from selling popular food, he provided the land for a Head Start school next door to the Taco House that is there to this day, and gave back to the community in many other ways. When the Watts riots occurred in 1965, neighbors urged grandpa to leave as the riots were breaking out, and spray painted "brother" on the wall of the Taco House. The Taco House was saved from being burned or looted while businesses all around were destroyed.
Grandpa sold the Taco House in 1985. It's still in existence, and in fact there are now one or two other "Bill's Taco Houses" around town, though I have never been to them.
It's hard to know where our family would be had grandpa not come to Los Angeles, or had he not owned the Taco House. Much of the family -- my mom, my uncle, my godmother, my grandmother and even my dad -- worked at the Taco House at one point or another and it's a major part of our family history. My grandparents have taught me so many life lessons, but grandpa's ownership of the Taco House taught me some big ones:
Make people happy by giving them good, honest food.
Treat them with respect, no matter what their background or social status.
Intuition and real world experience trump formal education.
Once you have a dream, work and work and work until you see it to fruition.
The original Bill's Taco House is located at 219 E Martin Luther King Jr Blvd., Los Angeles, 323-233-1587.
Set up a family photo for Sunday taken by a great photographer friend of mine.
It's interesting to be so busy while I am in Southern California. Often, my trips here are fairly calm and I see lots of different friends and family. This trip is the opposite -- it's busy and frenetic and full of task-filled days and evenings when I fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow*
Last night, I was in the middle of three projects, on the phone trying to work on Secret Project #1, and I got a call from my mom. I tried to ignore the answering machine as I was on the other line, but it's hard to ignore someone repeating "Pick up the phone" about 20 times in a row. I picked up the phone. "Break out the lemon and the wasabi," she said. "I was given some free, local albacore tuna from my hair dresser. He was slicing it in the back of the salon." My mother is much more cautious about sanitation and germs than I am, so I decided not to question her about the wisdom of eating raw tuna that was sliced in a hair salon. It was darn delicious, and we inhaled the whole piece.
When I am in San Francisco, my life is rather controlled. Living by myself, I'm quiet when I want to be, and social when I want to be. Being here, though, that organized quiet is thrown out the window. My days are full of happy interruptions. Mom is usually following me around the house and wanting to talk about that blog or this gossip. My aunt and I are usually giggling or rolling our eyes at something my mother is saying. When I'm not at the house, I've been hanging out at a happy local coffeehouse that is usually a scene of one sort or another.
Yesterday, I sneaked away from my computer for about an hour to check out the brand-new Bixby Knolls Farmers' Market. It's not a destination market, but it's going to be a great one for the people in that area. There are plenty of vegetables, fruits, herbs and even a balut vendor**. I picked up my first pomegranates of the season to make a cocktail syrup for the aforementioned dinner party, and then headed back to emails and projects and to do lists.
This is not a post complaining about my busy-ness. Anyone who knows me is aware of the fact that I am usually happiest when I am barely keeping all the balls in the air. And the chaos right now feels electric. I am completely out of my comfort zone with some of the projects, and I think that is when I grow the most.
** The balut vendor knows his audience. He didn't even put down his newspaper when curious Caucasians stopped by his booth. His body language said, "You don't want what I've got."
I have always been a generally happy and optimistic person. When I was a child, I was nearly annoyingly so according to my younger sister who recently told me, "The only reason I was grumpy so often is because you were so damn happy."
All that changed this year when my world turned upside down. For the first time in my life, I saw no light at the end of the tunnel. I listened to my friends who told me "you'll get through this," but I had no trust in their confidence. I smiled and thought to myself how wrong they all were.
Every day I woke up and put one foot in front of the other. I only did exactly what I felt I could handle, and did not push myself. For months and months. I bailed on friends at the last minute, ignored birthdays and holidays, and didn't return phone calls. They all sat beside me, told me that they understood and that they'd wait for me to come back. They told me that I was normal, and that I wasn't a freak for the things I said and did.
Except for my friends and family, to whom I clung for dear life, everything else I knew was up in the air.
Probably the most honest advice I got during the autumn was "It will be awful until it's not." I didn't understand the information when it was spoken -- a time when I was grasping for anything to hold on to. Knowing that things will be awful "until they're not" is nothing really firm that I can do anything about. And for a Virgo like me who likes a specific time and date on things, it wasn't the easiest thing to hear.
And through it all I learned to ask very specifically for what I needed. "I know I can get a shuttle, but I really need a ride to the airport." "I really need to you just check on me every once in a while." "I need to go out to dinner with someone tonight." "I need you to listen to me and not think I'm crazy." "I need you to go with me to the farmers' market."
I learned that standing in the middle of my apartment and saying out loud to the room, "I really need someone to call me right now," didn't work and that I had to actually pick up the phone and ask for friends to hold my hand. I had to learn to be weak in front of people -- something that I'm not always good at. I had to be ok with being vulnerable.
And eventually, I stopped my panic. I stopped worrying when I'd be "getting over this" and decided "not today". And I made a couple of important decisions. The first was that, as much as I wanted to flee the city immediately -- say good-bye to the town where nearly five of my seven years here were spent with J -- I would stay put. I would allow myself to leave as much as I needed to, and that resulted in many many flights to Southern California to see my family -- sometimes for weeks on end. But I wasn't quite ready to say good-bye to San Francisco. I feel more settled into a community here than I ever have in my life, and I don't feel like my journey here is done yet.
Secondly I decided that, even if I was in the exact same place in a year: single and still confused about my life, that I would be ok. And that it wouldn't be the end of the world. In that decision, I gave myself permission to relax -- relax about my need to constantly move forward, and to just be. To do whatever it was that I needed to do to heal and regroup.
I decided to take a trip. I decided to stay in my apartment for the moment. And I managed to step back and get some perspective. Magically, things got better. They were awful and then they weren't.
Like a good recipe, it was a lot of purposeful ingredients put together combined with a dash of this and a pinch of that which helped turn me around. And I literally feel like I was reborn. I'm back to defaulting to happiness, and it's the most amazing feeling. I have to catch myself from saying to a line up of strangers at the local coffee joint, "I'm happy -- do you understand what a miracle that is?"
I want to dance in the streets until midnight And to laugh till the dawn of the day And when they ask why I act so strange I'll reply I'm just happy, so happy this way. -- Judith Owen, Happy This Way
Every Sunday, my mom and my aunt take my grandparents out for adventures around Los Angeles. Usually they involve visiting old haunts and interesting LA places. I often get a phone call from them while on Sundays saying, "We're in ______ (insert any teeny tiny Los Angeles neighborhood here), where should we eat?"
Today, I received a different type of message from mom:
"Hi Jen, uh ... I was hoping you'd be available. We seem to be locked in a cemetery and I was wondering if you could call someone to help us ..."
I think she wanted me to Google a way to get out of the cemetery. She later said she thought I could call the non-emergency police department number for her.
Fortunately, they got out soon after when a groundskeeper found them, but that's one message from my family that I'll be happy to never receive again.
***** I know that things have hit a little lull here, and you may be seeing a couple more non-food related posts. I've been assured that this is an ok thing. If you don't agree with it, you can blame my friend who encouraged me to write about whatever I need to. Her blog rhymes with Schmood Fusings.
***** I finished "Michael Tolliver Lives." Truth be told, I finished it in about three days. It was satisfying and interesting to see Maupin's view on San Francisco in the 80's through to today. If you haven't read any Tales of the City books, definitely start with the first -- this one will only be interesting if you've read the others.
***** Does anyone have an interesting mushroom salad recipe? I was thinking of doing a salad with a variety of roasted mushrooms that can be served at room temperature. If you have a suggestion, I'd love to see it.
I have so many things to write about that I have been absolutely stunted and unable to write about anything! The Penny-Wise Eat Local Challenge has been over for several days now, and I have a post brewing on my thoughts about it. I am such an advocate for the importance of eating locally, but I don't think you'll ever hear me saying that it's an easy thing to do -- even somewhere as bountiful as Northern California. This challenge was particularly difficult for me, and I had some successes and some failures.
I am in the process of working with the people who took the challenge to get some overall results and information about the group as a whole, so keep an eye here and on the Eat Local Challenge site for more information about that.
I don't talk about my "real" work life much, but I spend most of my time working out of my home. Starting last week, however, I am now out of the house for three days a week and working in an office for at least six weeks. And while it was a great opportunity that I couldn't pass up, I'm going into an office kicking and screaming. While there are some things about working in an office and actually speaking to people during the day that are kind of nice, it's a hard adjustment, and the exhaustion I feel on a daily basis is part of the reason that you have not seen much on this blog.
Long-time readers of this site know that I usually become uber-reflective and weird during April ... it's always been a kind of big month for me. Every year around April, the stars seem to align and big changes occur. You can look back in the archives to see what I mean -- I'm not too motivated to dig up the memories and link to them right now. And this April did not disappoint. While many of my April reflections this year were super personal, I will say that I came out of last month much more optimistic and in a much better place than I have been in a long time. And that's a really amazing feeling.
So you can look forward to some more posts around here, as soon as I get my schedule a little more settled. And thanks for continuing to stick with me and continuing to read. Your support means more to me than you'll ever know.
I have been developing a few photos from my trip, trying to decide what I am going to do with them. Of the few that I printed, this one came out really nicely in 8 x 10. I took it at the Dalat airport while we were waiting for our flight to Ho Chi Minh City.
I'm back in Los Angeles this week, working and also babysitting my favorite 12 and 9-year old boys -- the sons of some lifelong friends -- for a whopping eight days. Yesterday was a banner day as I took them to the first farmers' market that they've ever been to. Mark, the youngest, was pretty interested in everything, even choosing some purple cauliflower from Weiser Family Farms, carefully inspecting about 5 booths of strawberries before settling on our purchase, and also taking home some kettle corn.
If you happen to see a copy of Time magazine this week, check out this week's cover story "Eating Better than Organic"
about the local food movement and one man's account of trying to make a
decision between local and organic. I felt like a proud parent when I
received the press release on Friday, as the Eat Local Challenge blog and the Locavores
are both mentioned in the piece. Big pat on the back to all of you who
work so hard to talk about the importance of where your food comes
from. We are being heard, and are acting as catalysts for a conversation that is now occurring throughout this country!
I was tagged for the "5 Things" meme by Mary from Jalapeno Girl. Though I am known among my friends as being the blogger who doesn't participate in memes, the stars aligned, and I decided to actually participate for once.
#1. In second grade, I was asked to stay in from recess because I'd eaten spaghetti for breakfast.
The first thing you should know is that I was a geek of a kid -- never was in trouble at school, and was pretty much a bookworm for my whole childhood. I was in second grade in Mrs. Hopkins class at Lake Arrowhead Elementary. She was teaching a nutrition segment about the importance of a good breakfast. Mom always fed us breakfast, but it was usually leftovers. She didn't buy into the sugary cereal hype, and I never liked pancakes or anything like that. So I'd eaten spaghetti with red sauce. Mrs. Hopkins asked us all to say what we'd eaten for breakfast that morning before we were dismissed for recess.
Girl 1: "Waffles." Mrs. H: "Great! You're dismissed." Girl 2: "Cereal." Mrs. H: "Good, Girl 2, you can go to recess." Me: "Spaghetti." Mrs. H: "Please stay in from recess, Jennifer."
I was humiliated as she lectured me about the importance of a good breakfast, and the fact that spaghetti was NOT a good breakfast. My mother promptly went down to the school the next day and informed the teacher that spaghetti was, in fact, a good breakfast. I was never held in from recess again, and continue to eat unorthodox breakfasts.
#2. I can't stand entrees that are sweet.
Though I have mellowed about this rule a teeny bit in the past few years, I generally hate when my entrees taste sweet or syrupy. Desserts I love. But there is nothing more irritating than biting into an entree you expect to be savory and getting a mouth full of sugar. My gradual acceptance of this lately has come from the realization that, when it is well executed, there is sometimes a reason for a bit of sugar in a dish. But sugar content in entrees is so often poorly executed that I basically have made a hard and fast rule. Teriyaki sauces? Sweet and sour? Sweet dressings? Sugary squashes or other root vegetables? Keep me away!
#3. I have convinced a legion of my friends' children that my name is "Cool Jen."
It started twelve years ago when my friend Joanne's son was an infant. I decided to do an experiment with him and would hold him on my lap and point to him and say "Jack," then point to myself and say "Cool Jen." Over and over. It worked. Even though they are both old enough to realize the truth, Jack and his brother call me Cool Jen to this day, along with many other children who I have since manipulated.
#4. My clumsinesshas beenwelldocumented, but here's something that sent me to the injury clinic last year that you don't know about:
I was getting dressed in my bedroom, my legs got tangled in my jeans, and I fell with my head against my dresser drawer! I had to go in for a gigantic bump on my head and possible concussion. I also broke my arm in eighth grade by running out of the locker room and around a corner, right into the hard stomach of one of the toughest girls in school. I knocked the wind out of her, fractured my arm, and was harassed by her and her friends for the rest of the year.
#5. I am a HUGE Bruce Springsteen fan.
Listening to Tunnel of Love as we speak. I happen to be the only person my age I know who likes Bruce Springsteen as much. In fact, when I scored tickets to a concert years ago, the only person I could find to go with me was my friend's 40-year old husband. I had a blast at the concert -- me and the baby boomers.
If you're interested in being tagged for this, email me. Otherwise I am not going to tag anyone.
Hope your 2007 is the best and most fulfilling it can be.
This is a little embarrassing for a graduate of Shuna's knife skills class to admit, but this is my thumb. With four stiches in it. From improperly cutting a lemon.
The question I have been getting the most these days, after "How are you?", is "Where are you?". You probably know through recent comments and posts that I've been spending a lot of time back and forth between Southern California and San Francisco.
As much as I love San Francisco, it seems the only way to keep my sanity lately is to be on the move - constantly busy, and constantly changing the scenery.
Though most of the time I fly Jet Blue between here and Long Beach, I take the chance whenever I can to drive up Highway 101. Those who are the pedal-to-the-metal types take Highway 5 and brag about how quickly they can get from Los Angeles to San Francisco. I, on the other hand, am a meanderer. I only drive when I have time and won't be stressing about getting home, and often split my driving over two days, as I have some great friends with two fantastic kids who live halfway up the state.
Highway 101 holds a lot of memories for me. When I was in college with a new car, friends and I would drive a couple of hours up for an adventure in Santa Barbara or Solvang or Pismo Beach. When I first moved to San Francisco from Huntington Beach, my good friend Rachel and I made the drive on 101. I used it to drive home to my family in the dark days after September 11, 2001. And I happened to drive up Highway 101 on the day that J. and I had our first date. I have driven it when I couldn't wait to get to my final location, and also when the journey was in the drive. Driving on 101 grounds me. It reminds me of where I came from and where I am trying to go.
These days, the drive can be bittersweet, but it also helps to feel comforted in the memories.
Driving through the bountiful farm land and vineyards along 101 -- in the Salinas Valley and the Central Coast -- helps center me ideologically as well. Some of my best brainstorms have come from this drive, including hashing out the "10 reasons to Eat Local" post. It also doesn't hurt that the food along Highway 101 is plentiful on each exit, and there are farmers' markets to entertain me every day of the week.
So the answer to "where are you" today is that I am home. Home with my new chair. Home with my view of the dog park. Home with my friends who keep me as occupied as I want to be. Home with my farmers' markets. Home with Rainbow Grocery. Home with Pesce and Darbar and Gourmet Carousel. Home in San Francisco.
More information about food on Hwy 101 can be found in my 2-part Bay Area Bites post:
Title from the old nursery rhyme "To market To market":
To market, to market to buy a fat pig; Home again, home again, jiggety-jig. To market, to market, to buy a fat hog; Home again, home again, jiggety-jog.
To market, to market, to buy a plum cake; Home again, home again, market is late. To market, to market, to buy a plum bun; Home again, home again, market is done.
To market, to market, a gallop a trot, To buy some meat to put in the pot; Three pence a quarter, a groat a side, If it hadn't been killed it must have died.
September is always an interesting time around here. September is my birthday month -- mom's too, as our birthdays are on the same day. And it's this blog's anniversary -- it's been three years that I've been writing for Life Begins at 30. But this year, I'd say things are a little different. They are interesting, but not in such a great way.
You may have noticed that this blog has been going in fits and starts for the summer, and it's mainly because I have been preoccupied with other things -- the biggest being that J moved out about two weeks ago. It may be a temporary thing, and I'm not really here to air our laundry on this blog, but at the same time I don't feel like I would be authentic if I didn't give you a hint into what's going on.
It's been a pretty difficult time.
And it's been a huge time of re-evaluation. Inevitably, when you've been with someone for over four years, your lives mesh to a point where you don't know where one life begins and another ends. Opinions become "our opinions" and even things like design sense, points of view, and what one eats are affected.
Food hugely enters into this equation. This week I shopped for myself for the first time. And I was stopped cold as I was in the store trying to figure out what I wanted to eat ... not what I should eat, or what I'd like that he liked, but solely what I wanted for the next week. No tofu went into my basket, no jam, no rice, and no fat-free yogurt. I found cereal and cheese and popcorn and (gasp!) boxed macaroni and cheese.
That's not to say that I did away with everything that we loved together. I bought pea shoots, figs, and great bread this week, and they are all things that the two of us loved to eat together.
When we made the decision that J was moving out, I knew that it would bring big changes to my life. But I didn't realize that it would wholly affect so many parts of my daily life. One change I didn't predict was in my photography: I am spending a lot of time re-questioning what it is that I like to shoot, and what things I find to be beautiful. I took a lot of photos before Jason was ever in my life, but my photography has been refined and solidified in the past four years.
All of a sudden, every photograph I take is a test -- why am I taking this photograph, and is it something that I really want to shoot, or is it because it's something that we as a couple found to be interesting? The photos you find spread throughout this post (and all the photos on my new flickr site) are some that I have only taken in the past three weeks or so, and are a work-in-progress developing my new design eye. I am working on using everything I've learned, but also pushing myself to evaluate how and why I take particular shots.
I am so blessed to have a really great support network of friends and family, and I have been constantly and completely overwhelmed by the support I am getting during this time. I don't have a way to express myself about this without sounding trite, but I don't think I have ever felt as completely embraced, held up, and supported by such a complete network of amazing people. I often have trouble asking for what I need, but there has not been one thing during this entire ordeal that I have asked for and not received. And that's saying something.
So what can you expect from Life Begins at 30 in the next few months? Probably a little more inward comtemplation. Most likely a few more blog posts about Southern California -- all of my immediate family, and a great cadre of old friends are there and I've been spending some time there. Hopefully, I will get back to some of the hard-hitting food industry posts that some of you come here for. But for the moment, I hope you'll forgive posts of a little more personal nature.
I don't keep a diary ... I never have had the attention span to sit down and document the ins and outs of my life day after day. But I do carry around notebooks, which I fill up with a combination of notes, grocery lists, to do lists, work notes, interviews, notes about lectures I attend, book I want to read, places I want to eat, blog ideas -- you get the picture.
About a month ago I lost one of these notebooks, so my notes for a good portion of 2006 are missing. I am disorganized enough that it was weeks before I panicked, thinking it would show up in one place or another. But now, I am convinced it's gone. I have even had a couple dreams about it over the past week and woken up sure that I would find it in the location I dreamed about, but it's never there.
So if you've by chance found a partially-full, kind of cool, pink notebook that's lost it's way, please send it on home. This blogger will be very grateful.
My favorite notebooks of the moment are shown above: They are by Mirage Paper Company, and I pick them up at Flax.
Friday night is the worst night ever to post to your blog, but I suspect that there is going to be a revolt against this site if I don't post something soon.
Things have been very busy around here. As you saw from my pictures, I spent a little over a week in Los Angeles and then meandered back on Highway 101 stopping at some of my favorite places. You can read my write-up about the drive back on KQED's Bay Area Bites (Parts One and Two).
I finally made it to the fabulous Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers' Market. It was nearly three years ago that an elderly man ran his car into this farmers' market killing 10 people. I remembered this when I was at the market and noticed an amazing amount of camaraderie between the farmers there. All markets have their close relationships, but this was a palpable feeling that the farmers at this market were family -- and I truly believe that it's because they went through that horrible tragedy together.
I grew up in Southern California, and didn't move from there until I was 27. So in many ways, it feels like home there. It was interesting being there during the Eat Local month. One of the things that we always hear about eating local is "it's easy to do if you're in California." I would revise that stereotype to say it's relatively easy to do if you are in Northern California. Southern California, to my mind, is a whole different story. I have a friend who lives in Manhattan Beach who participated in the Eat Local Challenge, and she changed her challenge from 150 miles to the entire state of California. And being down there, I can see why.
I am planning on talking about this further in the future, but for now I'd just like to give a big high five to the Southern California participants of the challenge. You really had your work cut out for you.
One reason for the quiet on this site is because a lot of my attention has been focused on the Eat Local Challenge site. I am really proud of the work that everyone has done over there. And it's getting some attention. We were the Typepad Featured Blog a couple weeks ago, and then the site was mentioned in Time magazine this past week, as a part of an article about the Locavores. It included an interview with Barbara Fisher, and was quite a thrill.
Meanwhile, spring is almost gone and summer is almost here. Our CSA box* this week was one of the best yet: strawberries, fresh lavender, cherries, dino kale, beets, and fresh potatoes. I wish that I could bottle and sell the scent that filled my car as I drove home from the pick-up site. It was the quintessential smell of spring to me. If you make it to the Saturday Ferry Plaza Farmers' Market this week or next, be sure to consider some of Eatwell's fresh lavender. It's only available for about a month a year, and is worth buying to either put in vases fresh or to dry yourself. To me, it is the yearly sign that summer is here.
* I would have taken a picture of the CSA box if my boyfriend wasn't off with BOTH cameras in the middle of the desert taking photographs. Bragging rights to you if you can figure out where he went. Bragging rights cancelled if I already told you in person where he was and you guess anyway!
You are about to find out what a procrastinator I am. You see, Jason and I did a way fun New Year's card this year. My plan was to send out the card and then do a post talking about the photos that were on the card. Most of the cards went out -- probably 90% of them -- but there were a few last ones that I had to send that never made it out the door. And then the stamp prices increased, and all of a sudden it was February. And is it too late now to send them out?
Well, I wanted all y'all to see the card because it was such a great look back at our random year, but please promise me you won't hate me if you should have received a card and you didn't. It's not you, it's me.
Row 1
1) Me and J in Pt. Reyes Station. We took this picture in the bookshop window one Saturday that we went to the Farmer's Market there. If you look closely, you can see another man inside the store who is in the reflection as well. It makes the shot very strange, but I like it nonetheless.
2) Trattoria da Gianni in Bologna. In April, we went to Venice and our only trip out of town was to take a 2.5 hour train ride to go to this restaurant in Bologna for lunch. We had gone there for the first time a few years ago. As the train approached, we both worried that Trattoria da Gianni wouldn't match our amazing memory of it. But it was really perfect -- such a great meal.
3) This is me on the vaporetto in Venice. I remember being so dang happy in this picture. Those of you who have seen my Blogger Profile or my Blogher Profile will recognize this as my new favorite picture of myself.
4) A palm tree that's in the park outside our house. We have so many pictures of this palm tree because it always looks cool against the sky.
Row 2
1) We had to put in the quintessential Venice shot - if for no other reason than to prove that we were there. This picture is of St. Mark's Square. We managed to spend a week in Venice and do very little actual sightseeing. We spent about an hour one day in the St. Mark's area, but most of the time just walked and explored the city. Everything that you know about the light in that city is true - it really is a magical place.
2) This is me holding some rocks on a beach near Abbott's Lagoon in Point Reyes. The beach there is amazing because it looks like a normal beach, but when you get up close you notice that it is tons of little pebbles that are so smooth and beautiful.
3) The weekend in September that my family was here for the birthday celebration of my mom and I, we took a bay cruise on The Adventure Cat. II highly recommend it, and I think reasonably priced. This picture is of my shoes and Jason's shoes and the bridge. This shot is a perfect example of me directing the shot and making Jaso
I was tagged for the "5 Things" meme by Mary from 
