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The boys and I went on nearly the perfect end-of-summer vacation last weekend. A cabin on a lake, a run through vineyards and orchards, wine tasting, good food, gorgeous sunny weather, no bugs, a hammock, a fire pit, early morning coffee in the hot tub watching the mist roll in over the lake. I’m tellin’ ya, it was over-the-top, ridiculously, stereotypically, cheesily grand. Just like the video, which is the sappiest thing in the world and which I will watch all winter whenever I’m feeling blue. Here are a few more photos, too (click to enlarge).

Baby beets after steaming and peeling.

Aw, man, how can these little babies be so flippin’ gorgeous and tasty, too!  Honestly I was just cooking, on a holiday, in my pajamas, and my salad made me clamber outside to the deck and pray for the thunderstorm to hold off so I could photograph my food.  I mean, come ON.  Lovely, lovely creatures, beets.

Nestled in their steamed greens.

Topped with lightly pickled red onion, blue cheese and ground pepper.

We’ve had a rather cool summer, but things are now starting to grow in earnest. (Click to enlarge, if you dare.)

Baby corn. The plant is about two feet high.

A pole bean. The plant is about 6 feet high. It would be higher if I let it climb the garage wall.

Bean flower. Nothing there one day, a dozen flowers the next.

My tomato plant is about 7 feet high. Tomatoes have been green for ages. Not a lot of sun lately. They're organic brandywines from my CSA.

Outgrowing my tomato cage and headed for the roof of the garage.

I have mint in a pot on the porch.

Basil, too.

garlic pulled and waiting to be loaded in the bin

Jim and I went to pick garlic at my farm today.  Came back with sunburn, gifts of zucchini and garlic, and bellies full of hamburgers (with roasted garlic).  Danny used the plastic lifter to uproot the rows of garlic, and we just had to pull them out and clean them up.  Lifter broke on the last row, though, so I attempted to wield the pitchfork.  Not my strong suit.  Still, with a dozen or more volunteers we managed to harvest 120 bushels!  The small bouquet in my kitchen smells divine.

(And no, the rip in my jeans was not because of mishandling the fork.  Instead I caught them on a wire on a greenhouse table, about thirty seconds after Michelle warned me about the wires on the greenhouse tables…)

See also: my previous trip to Maple Creek Farm and what I did with their strawberries.

stacey's ventilated jeans and the pitchfork

"farmer" jim

stacey's bouquet

The glorious fruit! (Click to enlarge.)

I love strawberries!  But before this summer, I don’t think I’d had good ones since we used to have a big ol’ strawberry patch when I was growing up.  I had a love/hate relationship with it, as I despised the chore of picking, but, even in my crazy picky-eater childhood, I always liked strawberries!  Now, a blessing of living in Michigan, I can get them fresh in the beginning of summer.  My farm even grows them, so after sampling them in my weekly share, I had to dash off to the Royal Oak Farmers’ Market to buy myself a whole flat of them.  I made ice cream, a tart and a cobbler.  I ate them sliced and in yogurt and in salads.  I froze some for later.  And I made jam.

My flat of fresh, organic berries.

Ooh, strawberry jam on a scone with a cuppa…nothing finer.  Strawberry jam proved to be slightly trickier than I had imagined, though.  Ain’t no pectin in strawberries, see?  You know, the substance in fruit that makes jams and jellies gel?  One generally compensates for this by adding some other fruits that are high in pectin – lemon, apples.  My recipe called for lemon juice.  I followed it to the letter, except that I cut it in half (and thank goodness, because I don’t know anyone with a pot large enough to accommodate the whole recipe).  I dutifully measured my sugar (the other component that makes jams set) and added my lemon and I sliced and boiled and skimmed and sterilized and sealed and got…strawberry syrup.  I let it cool completely.  I waited a day.  Runny as a melted popsicle.

Juuuust fits in the pot.

Grocery-store pectin to the rescue!  For emergencies such as these (or for starting out with a more foolproof recipe) pectin comes in powdered forms, derived by chemical processes from various citrus fruits.  I opened my eight jars of jam, poured their contents into a pot, cleaned and sterilized all the jars, boiled up my jam again with a bit of pectin, potted, sealed, reprocessed and waited for the moment of truth.  They set.  Not firmly, mind you, but enough to be spreadable and sit atop my bread, rather than soaking into it.  I lost a jarful in the process, but, nevertheless, I am the proud mother of seven half-pints of delicious, homemade, strawberry jam, and if you come visit me I’ll make scones and tea to accompany it!

Bubble, bubble.

The jars process in a water bath.

A cobbler diversion

The moment of truth.

Like summer in a jar.

Died and gone to heaven.

So, I’m trying to learn to draw.  Seems like a valuable skill for someone who tries to design things for part of her living.  So I thought I’d post a drawing or two here.  Nothing like those real artists who post a sketch a day or anything.  Just the occasional…whatever.  I don’t have a scanner, so forgive my point and shoot pictures.  If it’s a really good drawing, I’ll pull out the good camera, how’s that.

This is one of my copies of Cyrano de Bergerac.  An exercise in value.

Oh, science  is fun.  I have been craving pretzel bread lately, but had yet to look for a recipe, when, lo, this recipe appeared in my Twittersphere.  The former journalist turned blogger-baker had done my work for me, researched recipes, and come up with one of her own she liked better! I had some smoked salt (brought back from Italy for me by John and Michael many moons ago) and the basic ingredients so I went to town.

Here’s the science bit.  The pretzel rolls are like bagels, you boil them and then bake them, to give them that chewy exterior.  Flour Girl’s recipe has you boil them in water with sugar and baking soda.  I suspected, but was unsure, that it was for color (something about acid levels and sugar means browning).  My accidental experiment proved the hypothesis.  I forgot the baking soda when I boiled the first two rolls.  Then added it after they came out, before I boiled the rest.  Presto!  Parti-colored pretzel rolls.

And they taste mighty good, too.

From my morning at the Eastern Market.  Flower Day comes but once a year!  I, alas, have no wagon, so I just kept returning to my car, over and over again.  The kid in the final shot carried impatiens to my car, too!  He was shocked I asked to take his picture.  “That’s a first,” he said.  I’ll post pictures of my yard when things have grown in a bit.  Happy Spring!

Welcome to the Vinsetta Garage on Woodward, where they love their old time look just as much as I do.  (Click to enlarge any of these photos.)

It’s a real working garage that’s been there since 1919, though they no longer sell gas from these old pumps.  Did you catch the license plate displayed in the window?

And does that really say 33 gallons of gas for $2.22?

Maybe it’s 3.3 gallons.  Where would one put 33 gallons of gas?

More from Woodward this afternoon below.

Kicking off the my Detroit signs project with this gem. (Click to enlarge any of these.)

I wanted this in my portfolio the first moment I drove past the sign last week on the way to my new job!  In a startling coincidence, later today at work, I read this facebook update from Laurel:

Laurel Taylor salivates at the thought of the 53 pounds of grass-fed beef that Evan is going to be bringing home tonight.

While not salivating, the beefcarver looks pretty pleased with himself.  Perhaps that’s what inspired his generosity, if it was he who left this little gift on the wall…

Take a closer look and you’ll see…it’s a coupon for dinner!

I just took this for a bit of perspective.  It wasn’t until I looked at it later that I began to find it hilarious.  “Mommy?  What happens to Bessy when…”