Is this a Food Blog?

No, but the content is mainly driven by what's in my notebook and my camera, and the one thing I consistently photograph is food.

In non food news, a few weeks ago Mrguy transformed the dining room into a recording booth so that he could record Wubbie and I doing a version of Walking On Sunshine for a co-worker who was having a birthday.

This week we took a co-worker out for her last hippie meal on the west coast. It may be the finest one I have had at the Zen restaurant. The purple sauce is made of beets and shiitake mushrooms.

The outright healthfulness of that meal was offset the following day, when I had the fabulous fish below, half a cheese plate, and a cheese plate as dessert (to go).


The fish was really yummy, and I applaud anybody who is willing to invest the time it takes to prepare fava beans. Hats off to you, chef.


After lunch I had a massage and an herbal wrap and came home sooo relaxed. Karmically this was necessary, because I came home to a mini-disaster of cat barf that the ants had swarmed on. Did I mention that this unholy concoction was found in our bed?

I just laughed and cleaned it up.

Now *that's* relaxed.

Aloha Festival 2009

What a lovely Aloha Festival. Our slot was early, so it was cold. In the photo below you can just make out the teri smoke rising in the background. That sight, seen from the stage, is one of my favorite moments of the festival (as you can see from last year).



The performance went surprisingly well, but as usual I couldn't feel my fingertips.

After we took pictures, mrguy, mr finn, ms scandiwaiian and I high-tailed it over to the food booths and ate two bags of malasadas (breakfast) and then some teriyaki marlin (lunch). I just realized there was no mac salad!



Lunch was followed by shopping, an hour or so of kanikapila with people from different ukulele classes and a hot clear drive home.


How can you start out the day with numb fingers and end it with a sunburn?

Chicken-flavored Prozac

The cat-lovers' email list at work is usually like a sleepy, two stoplight town. Not much happens.

Within the last few weeks, however, it's really picked up. First, our factory cat had kittens, and then someone brought up the subject of declawing and a very long discussion ensued. As you can imagine, people are pretty passionate about this topic.

Yesterday someone mentioned that as an alternative to declawing, her vet has prescribed chicken-flavored Prozac for her cat. I like the spirit of this approach. And People...there is CHICKEN-FLAVORED PROZAC. What a wonderful world.

Reminds me of the best cat in the world. When she got older and required heart medicine, we had to go to the compounding pharmacy, and they would make us chicken and herb flavored medicine in a cod liver base. Very stinky.

My favorite part of the process involved visiting the pharmacy. I never got tired of reading the article that they proudly displayed at the counter, about how they'd been commissioned to create elephant suppositories. I link to it here because it gives me so much pleasure to share it.

Do you think they make Cheez-it flavored Prozac? I'll take it orally, thanks.

A Lovely Day

This weekend has been tremendous.


Yesterday I had a singing lesson, which tested out the acoustics in the dining room. Then I lounged around.

I made a pilgrimage to Ranch 98 (not its name). It's like Ranch 99 but smaller, and shopping there is like visiting many Asian and South Asian countries simultaneously, except for the half aisle of chicharrons, which seems a little incongruous. Anyway, for the international supermarket music alone I'd go there. Yesterday, apropos of nothing, they played a song by Francoise Hardy. I'm sure that even in the 1960's in France you didn't hear Francoise Hardy at the supermarket. Fabulous!

I came home and got to work. Baked a chicken, made winter squash risotto with edamame, and then made a pie.

It started with these:
Then I vamped. I chopped up nectarines, white peaches and plums, then I tossed in some plum jam from ms scandiwaiian, a touch of chayawanprash, some rose hip jam and a little poi to thicken. Learned a little late in the program that all of my pie pans are still in the garage.

But darn if that didn't turn out tasty.