A Few Favorites

A bright blue linen dress from a thrift store and a new striped Echo scarf, just a few things I've been enjoying now that summer has begun. The list below has also given extra sunshine to my days:

- This Ice Cream Book
- Coldplay's new single
- Whole Living Magazine
- Local beer with frozen peas as impromptu ice cubes. (The beer was warm and I wouldn't have any of that! The peas were great to nibble in between sips.)
- This Book
- Finding Nelly Furtado in the deep grooves of my iTunes library
- Finding a compact version of the Fannie Farmer Cookbook for $7

It Should Be

Today felt like June should. Warm air, flip flops, fresh fruit, sun dress, wine, nap under a tree. The air smelled of smiles, if you can imagine it.




It didn't come easy. Unimpressed with Seattle's June weekend clouds, we packed a lunch and headed east to the heart of Washington's wine country- Yakima. An icy bottle of Pinot Gris welcomed us, along with soft grass, and a shade-offering tree.




I got to spend time with this guy, my best friend and husband come September. No amount of sun dresses or fresh fruit can top spending time with him. He's my personal encyclopedia, is quick to vacuum, appreciates good tea, and makes me feel very pretty. Just how it should be.

Chocolate Caramel Tart

I wish I could sit here, on the brink of summer berry season, and wax on about the jams, pies, and tarts that will soon be finding their way to us. Truth is, I'd much rather have an apple than a piece of apple pie. A good bowl of blueberries splashed with cream can't be beat (especially when you smash the berries with the back of your spoon and infuse the cream with berry juice).

But when it comes to dessert, I go for the chocolate.




Which is why, on the last weekend of May, when the local rhubarb could have been transformed into any number of things, I decided to make Amanda Hesser's chocolate caramel tart. You wouldn't believe, but the showstopper here is neither the chocolate or the caramel. It's the sea salt--those flecks of goodness you see sprinkled above. I would even argue it makes chocolate a bit more summery, brightening up the flavor and adding some life.


Life-enhancing salt aside, below is what I got for taking these photos too close to my fiances desk, who looked over and noticed the tart had a 'smile' and proceeded to poke his finger in two times so 'it' could have eyes too.

Boys.



We were high on sunshine; I guess I don't blame him. (If you scroll back up to the first photo, you'll likely see the cracking smile that he saw, too.) Here's to a summer full of smiles--and chocolate!

Yes (!)

Andrei proposed last Sunday, and I said yes. It really does call for an exclamation point, which is normally used judiciously around here. But I think we can make an exception this time, so let's try it again.

I said yes!




What else can I say except that I'm blissfully happy with the lot life has handed me. Especially since that lot currently involves rhubarb (and obvs the aforementioned engagement). Since an engagement can last half a year and rhubarb season a brief month, I made a tart from Florence Fabricant's New York Times Dessert Cookbook, which also contains wickedly good boozy cakes that have proven to be great conversation starters at office parties.





As is true with relationships, jobs, and even tarts--nothing happens overnight and the things that are really worth the effort certainly take more of it than we sometimes thought ourselves capable of. But then we find ourselves capable and are reminded of the strength in ourselves and others.

Our Tea Time

I don't have a recipe for these cookies that I made with Andrei's mom in Belarus, as I was too busy deciphering Russian--trying to decide if she was talking about child-rearing or a visit to the dentist. Nonetheless, they were delicious and gave us a reason to tinker in the kitchen together. What I can say is that they contain flour, margarine (I think?), a pinch of salt, and tvorg (Russian cottage cheese). They're light and tasty, especially with tea and a bit of jam.

I wasn't having tea with the Queen, but I was having tea with a woman who comes from a line of Russian aristocracy, and who gave Andrei and I two silver spoons for our apartment--with strict orders to use them every day because "every day is a celebration."

These cookies are the perfect thing to have with this sort of woman, while she tells you why "we" is the best word, why a woman needs to take good care of herself first before she can take good care of her family, and why Jackie O. is her favorite American. A pair of gloves she gave me (roughly this color) sealed the deal. This is a start to a long (and colorful!) friendship.




So here's to Belarus--its thick dairy, bountiful sunflowers, gentle sunlight, and for being a place to look forward to visiting often.

From (Bela)Russia With Love

After many sleepless hours and declining several glasses (5!) of complimentary wine on our Luftansa flight, we arrived to Belarus--only a train ride away from finally laying our heads down in a room that one of us called home. And a flower from a father who was awaiting our arrival.




Belarus won't be found on the list of the world's top places to visit, but it's truly a charming city in its own regard. A best-kept secret as I like to think of it. Oddly bright-colored houses dotting the countryside, old babushkas that give a long cold stare before it melts into a warm smile, Soviet-style buildings that demand attention, stern taxi drivers that listen to Eurotrash and probably don't give correct change but nobody cares, and of course the many various delicacies of the table.




My boyfriend's father grew up in a small village outside of Brest and is a master of all things pickled, fermented, forraged, and homemade. One of these gems I can't believe it took flying across the world to learn. It's called compote. It's dead simple and incredibly tasty--qualities that are reflective of almost anything you'll find on the Eastern European table. Compote, in essence, is homemade juice made from boiled apples and whatever spices or sweeteners you'd like.




Make sure the apples are sliced thinly (fresh or dehydrated), pour in the desired amount of water (less for a stronger flavor), give the mixture a squeeze of lemon and drop in any spices or herbs you'd like--maybe cloves, anise, or even thyme. Boil gently until the flavor is to your liking and keep the apples in the mixture while you store it. The flavor only gets better. You can drink this hot or cold, before or after a meal. Sweeten to taste with honey or sugar. Here, they usually drink it after a meal, in-lieu of tea or coffee in the middle of the day.

Compote barely scratches the surface of all that I've experienced and learned so far--like 'Russian Wassabi', pelmini, marinated mushrooms, pickled cabbage, poppy seed cheesecake, halvah, golden-yolked eggs, and not to mention the Cuban treats (honey, guavas, or rum, anyone?) that my boyfriend's mother brought back with her from a recent trip. But I'll leave all this for another time, until then-- "Dasvedanya"!

Buckwheat Loves Chocolate

In honor of our upcoming trip to Belarus (i.e. Meeting The Boyfriend's Family For The First Time) my attention for all-things baking has centered around buckwheat. (Eastern Europeans eat buckwheat like Americans eat Cheerios.) If there's one book on my shelf that saves the day when a random sack of flour (buckwheat, teff, spelt) is found in the cupboard, its Kim Boyce's Good to the Grain. And she had just the thing - Chocolate Buckwheat Muffins.




Boyce's recipe actually calls for persimmons, but that is not in on the regular rotation of our fruit bowl, so it got left out of the fun. The muffins were delicious nonetheless. Every time a baking recipe works out for me, I have to say I'm a bit shocked. I'm not a baker by nature. I like to improvise, I'm okay with ambiguity, and I can be found to have little patience in the kitchen. But my ever-piqued curiosity wouldn't let me take another pass at the bag of buckwheat without giving this recipe a shot.

And I'm telling you, buckwheat loves chocolate. Both are sweet yet bitter, and something about the depth of the chocolate made buckwheat immensely interesting, giving it almost a nutty quality.

Now that I know how nicely these once-miscellaneous bags of random flours play with the more extolled items in my larder, I'll be grabbing for them more often. (Recipe can be found here.)