Snow Day Nostaglia & General Laziness.

Slightly cheating black & white post (whatever I make the rules here). 

I have a lot of paintings in progress but they are all wet (damn watercolors) & I just felt like writing. 

It's a snowy evening here in Greenfield following a snowy afternoon, & I left work around noon (I am terrified of driving in snow) just in time to see my husband for exactly one minute before he headed for work (he's a better driver than me, & works about 25 miles closer to our house).

I've been at home with the animals all day. Started paging through the old sketchbook. 

I have been changing things around here & drawing less out of my sketchbook & more on paper & shit. Like a real artist. But you'll see little pieces of randomness from sketchbook here & there for old times sake.

So here are some unpainted drawings from a Mini-Vaca taken on an extremely rainy weekend last June.

6.9&8.11: Two Cape Cod Sandwiches.

A post-driving curried chicken salad sandwich & a next afternoon linguica & mustard sandwich, grilled & eaten on the deck overlooking the pond. Then some insane encounters with huge snapping turtles ensued. Damn those things are weird & prehistoric & creepy. Try swimming with one. & huge. Did I mention huge?

6.9.11: BBQ Pork During A Late Spring Thunderstorm.

Another one of Mum's great dinners. Plus the sort of thunderstorm I'm really looking forward to as we approach the end of winter. We had some thunder & heavy rain last week & it reminded me how good that sort of weather is.

 6.10.11: Egg Salad Sandwiches & Vintage Dresses.

Typical Cape Cod Mini-Vaca Sort Of Day. Ate some tasty sandwiches, some chips, purchased one of my now all time favorite dresses at a thrift shop in Yarmouth, & saw some swans on a pond. There were dogs.

 6.10.2011: Cookout!

All Cape Cod trips should include some sort of cookout.

The next morning we ate this meal, in the pouring rain we collected buckets of seaweed for the garden, & then we drove home. 

 I'm fearing we won't have much Cape Cod Summer this year.
We really like our new house. We can grill in the yard here. We can hang out outside here. I can sit on top of the hill & enjoy the view of cornfields & the neighboring dairy farm, & draw & read there. We aren't stuck in town in Noho anymore.  We are making the kind of farming-style commitments that make travel complicated. I think we all need to recover from losing a major part of those summers.
That's all. Apologies for the lack of color. It's still snowing. I'll probably be back with more tomorrow.

Bacon Honeymoon (or bacon makes a good thing even better).

You know. It's always all about bacon around here. Even on my honeymoon, apparently.
We received, at least for us, a very fitting wedding present, which was the use of a beautiful house in a breathtaking setting in which we could spend a week with just us & our sweet hound dog. We have never lived together without at least two & sometimes four roommates. Alone time is very valuable to us. We love to cook, we love hiking & mountains, & therefore being out in the woods with a fabulous kitchen at our disposal & a fireplace & a mountain in the backyard was pretty much perfect (thanks deb & cate!).

September 2011: The Ultimate Breakfast Sandwich + Gift Lasagna. 

Some people would take their wedding cash & go out to eat, but we didn't. We were really excited about being alone in our own (temporary) house for once. Our own house is our biggest dream right now. so, yeah, cooking by ourselves! ! ! That said, we hate to waste food, so we didn't go crazy grocery shopping. Basically, we started with wedding leftovers (onions, potatoes, butternut squash, crackers, cheese, eggs, & butter) & we locally purchased really good bacon, a steak, broccoli, & bagels.
Two themes immediate emerged: the need for a serious breakfast if you begin every day hiking up a mountain with your dog, & lasagna, which a very sweet wedding guest (thanks jim!) brought us for "the cabin." (it really wasn't a cabin, it was a gorgeous six bedroom redone farmhouse that even Martha would be jealous of.)
So we, discovered bacon, parmesan, & onions on a bagels is a seriously kickass breakfast sandwich.
I consider a good breakfast sandwich a life staple. Eggs & meat & cheese on a bagel please me. 
& although we didn't actually want to bring the lasagna with us (all we wanted to do was cook) there was definitely a night (after a long adventure in New Hampshire auto mechanics & pouring rain) that we were very content to curl up by the fire & reheat that thing. Obviously, we were unable to resist making it a lot better with additional cheese, broccoli, ample garlic, & of course bacon. I really can't totally not cook.
So, yeah, our honeymoon, bacon, mountains, dogs. That happened.
Oh, did you hear we in Western Massachusetts had a serious snowstorm before Halloween & the power went out everywhere for days & days? Next: EnD cooks breakfast sandwiches on a propane burner in the snowy driveway. True story.

A Trip Down Memory Lane & More: Cape Cod, January 2010.

Late winter on this blog is traditionally when I dig back through my archives from the past year or so, aka all those unfinished drawings of things I ate & cooked, just sitting in my sketchbook waiting for me. So expect very little time continuity in posting whatsoever for the next month or so. Here comes random food moments from 2010.
Tonight I bring you a little story from last January, in fact the first trip Owen took with me to my Mom's house in Brewster, Cape Cod, Massachusetts. First of oh so many. He already knew my dear sister quite well at this point, & had met my Mom & stepmom Barb briefly over Christmas, & then of course this magical trip to New Bedford, my original hometown. It turned out New Bedford was not the only place we had in common, & that Owen's family is from very close on the Cape to mine, & essentially we grew up with the same childhood summer. This trip was full of firsts: Owen sleeping in my teenaged bedroom, Owen & I on the Cape together, & me bringing someone home who knew where they were.
I believe I had previously mentioned that my mother is an excellent cook...

Dinner With Mum: Roast Pork With Pears, Red Onions, Gorgonzola & Rosemary Still Growing In The Winter Garden, Over Rice, A Green Salad, & Apple Pecan Muffins.

The next day, a sandwiches at the beach, a Cape Cod ritual, these particular sandwiches an Italian (ham, salami & peppers) for Owen & a chicken salad with cranberries & walnuts for me, from Nauset Market, with Utz Salt n' Vinegar potato chips, eaten on a bench overlooking Marconi Beach in Wellfleet. (Owen's sandwich choice was better than mine. Somehow a year later I still remember that clearly, shows where my priorities lie, I guess). But Utz chips freaking rule & so does eating a sandwich by the ocean on Cape Cod with someone you love in January.

Sandwiches & Chips At Marconi In January.

& before we left for home back in Northampton, pizza with the family, the current favorite (circa January 2010 of course) of Spinners Pizza's Chicken BLT ranch from Ring Bros. Market in Dennis, with the constant sides on Seamans Lane, Brewster, wine & a green salad.

BLT Ranch Pizza, Salad, Wine.

So there you go, a homecoming & meeting the family & road trip (&eating) story all in one. Welcome to Archive Month. Just paging through all these sketchbooks opens up so memories, whoah, I GUESS THAT'S WHY I DRAW. Go figure.

Saint Patrick's Day, Corned Beef, Cabbage, Beer, & All That Stuff That One Does.

Happy Saint Patrick's Day from EnD. Whatever that means. On one hand, I hate fake bullshit forced holiday crap (mostly as experience at work, i.e.last Mardi Gras) but on the other hand, I love love love bullshit holiday crap too, traditions, decorations, colours & most of all foods. What can I say? I love being festive. Whatever the random holiday, I can get down with it.

& Most importantly, Stop & Shop had a really good sale on corned beef, & I scored some free cabbage & potatoes from work. CORNED BEEF & CABBAGE=SOLD. I had none of the traditional seasonings on hand, so when boiling the corned beef added to the water some dijon mustard, some wasabi paste, peppercorns, garlic, red wine & an onion. Later came the cabbage & potatoes. Worked out pretty excellent.

3.14.2010: Corned Beef & Cabbage (not St. Patrick's Day but it was a rainy Sunday & what the hell do we care). The potatoes (yellow) sat in a nest of cabbage leaves with tons of butter (Irish butter!). It was lovely.

3.15.2010. The next day happened to be my day off. Hence thinly sliced corned beef & cabbage sandwiches, with Hellman's (the only mayonnaise as far as I'm concerned) & good whole grain dijon mustard. Condiments! I love them! It rained again (hello March in Massachusetts), so a hearty sandwich in the kitchen was cozy & awesome.
still 3.15.2010. The broth created from random refrigerator contents turned out to be so good we wanted to save it. As another chilly rainy March day progressed (I love these raw New England spring days really, but they do make me want warm food) it seemed clearly soup was next. The C & B stock plus dry white beans were combined & then we searched the pantry & fridge & came up with sweet potatoes, a package of frozen mixed veggies, garlic, an onion, & white rice. To which was added more corned beef & cabbage. EXCELLENT white bean stew, some of which is now still living in the freezer. YAY LETFOVERS.
3.16.2010. One more night of leftover corned beef, in a tandoori curry sauce with a free scavenged from work red bell pepper & an eggplant, over white rice. I thought this meal was a good knod to the current U.K., myself.
What is the moral of this tale? LEFTOVERS. I am nearly one half Irish, & I can tell you being Irish is about getting drunk & making really good use of leftovers. So for St. Patrick's day, I ate a $4 cut of corned beef for four days, & ate well. oh & I think I mentioned beer in the title of this post? We did recently purchase a 30 rack of PBR, so that was indeed drunk during the creation of these meals. I'm actually too white trash Mass Irish to afford actual Guiness, you know. I work in a godamn grocery store, people (like a good Irish giorl from downtown New Bedford).

What have we learned?

Less than week until spring. I bought more seeds today...green zebra tomatoes, basil, purple beans. What do I love more than cooking & drawing food? Cooking & drawing food that I grew...look forward to Eating & Drawing & Planting in the future.

A New Car & A Series Of Sandwiches.

Three sets of sandwiches, all relating to the recent purchase of my new (to me) car, the 1989 Toyota Cressida. The LUXERY model, oh yeah. This is the first car I have purchased, & therefore kind of a milestone, & being me, I documented the occasion in a series of sandwiches.

1.13.2010. A visit to a car in Leverett, & 2 sausage, egg, & cheese sandwiches from Go Nomad in the infamous town of South Deerfield.

1.17.2010. Fried egg, cheese, & Sriracha sandwiches at our kitchen table after we drove the Cressida home for the first time.
1.22.2010. Ali's first ride in the Cressida, when we picked her up at work for our classic lunch date of sandwiches at the Black Sheep (2 Nick's Picks, aka semi-Ruebens for me & Owen, 1 Southern Comfort for Ali). Note: the semi-ruebens had coleslaw & not sauerkraut, & so were not as good as real ruebens. The Southern Comfort I did not taste, but appeared to be all bacony & chickeny so, probably the better choice.
I know, I know, I'm odd as always, but I always remember things in life most clearly by what I ate that day. Taste/smell are my strongest sense memories, I guess. So even if it's just a fried egg on toast with hot sauce, if something happened that day, what I ate was important. On an even deeper note, what to egg sandwiches have to do with the 1989 Toyota Cressida? There just must be a connection. Discuss.

Meals That Aren't Dinner.

Because there are other meals besides my regular solitary elaborate 3am dinners.
& there are the good friends you share them with. & all the places to eat late lunches & early breakfasts & post-dancing snacks in the Pioneer Valley. Such as:
Crepes with strawberries & honey & whipped creme & the MOST perfect mochas with Melissa at Mosaic.

Wednesday morning after a Tuesday night of dancing at the Basement.

There are always the meals eaten in the parking lot at the grocery store.
Some shit I ate on recent breaks.

My classic hot sauce & cheese sandwiches & instant miso soup.

yup, that's what I eat at work.

(plus a note from Cait)

Lunch with Ali at The Black Sheep.

A good sandwich really takes you far in this life.

& then, there's the TALKING over sandwiches.

With your AWESOME SISTER.

In which Local Burger saves all our lives, by way of snacks after dancing.

All fried. & dipped in something else delicious.

Where do all these drawing come from?

My typical room at right around 3am.

post-dancing, post-facebook, post texting, just me, alone, eating & drawing.

& Rin's tofu sandwich, while we were drawing/painting.

At Woodstar last week.

I can't say it enough. Food shapes all our lives.

"Of Course There's Tequila In The Cupcakes!"

Yes, as rumored, I recently celebrated my 31st birthday,
& I did it DnD style, aka with sloppy art, good food, & my incredible friends
(both absent & present)(yup, I stole that).
Some scenes from my first day of being 31:

A very late breakfast/lunch with Melissa at Woodstar = two different versions of smoked salmon on an everything bagel with coffee...

mine, (bagel sandwiches 2009 series)

& hers. (plus another birthday truth)

& a gorgeous thunderstormy dramatic sky above one of the views that makes me want to keep living here.

Then Rin, Melissa & I went on an adventure north, many very important objects were acquired from both food & thrift stores, & we unexpectedly found Ali in Greenfield.

The night concluded with a dinner party
& Rin winning the cupcake competition.
Yes, Rin officially wins at cupcakes.

These margarita cupcakes really did included tequila, & were rolled in salt, in homage to our favorite book. Wait until you try the bourbon cheese straws. An unexpectedly awesome birthday, all around. Thanks once more for all the birthday love. XOXO.

Ok, Ok, So You Really Don't Suck That Much.

Plenty Of Perfectly Fine Things DO Happen In South Deerfield, It Turns Out.

Like this breakfast sandwich, previously seen taking on a starring role in this comic, from the lovely Go Nomad Cafe.

& Then there's the beauty of a drive on 116 through Sunderland on a perfect mid-September afternoon. That's good too.

I think I'm going to be taking a bit of a break from the bar, so my content for at least foreseeable future may be a lot more of the sandwiches, coffee cups, & mountains variety & less of the PBR & dancing.
But I'll still try to keep things interesting.

As Summer Draws To A Close...

...some drawings from an early August trip to Cape Cod that never got posted due to pre-DnDnD2k09 excitement. (Family, Friends, Food, & all the complications that ensue.)

First night leftovers dinner in the guest room at my mom's house, when that sort of thing was still comforting.

The next morning, a classic trip to the sparrow & what was formerly new york bagels, followed by even more classic cape cod church thriftstoring. Oh, Joanie's.

2nd night of the visit, when the leftovers all alone in my room thing gets angry, & way too reminiscent of high school.

But then, a fabulous lunch with gramma the next day at Clancy's.
"It's too early for a martini so I guess I'll have a margarita."
Yes! & a FRIED SCALLOP PLATTER.
& then we went to job lot & the astonishingly good dennis marshall's.
heart heart heart, gramma, guess where my personality came from?
OH, RIGHT, YOU.

Followed by a much needed dinner party with jed & melissa back in noho at my then brand new apartment. First shared meal at the new apartment, in fact.
& I believe jed drew us both bending over a lot while unpacking books in short skirts, & then we all went to the 11's to dance, cause it was wednesday.

This brief moment of summer 2009, brought to you by my current need to remember the more innocent times.

Day 3, Part 1: The Best Sandwich Ever.

& it really was. In the morning (or rather late afternoon) of our first day in Asheville, NC,
we located Jed's pants, & headed out for a very late breakfast, before the drinking beer began again around 3pm. Oh this town, you're stealing my heart.

Pecan Crusted Fried Green Tomatoes with Maple Black Pepper Bacon & Goat Cheese, on a Croissant, with Chipolte Cheese Grits. Everything local.

Oh I actually cried while eating this sandwich. We really really love Asheville. & shit just keeps getting more off the hook.

"If There's a Way to Get A DUI in Mississippi, I'll Find It."
-the third member of this insane road show & our host in Asheville, said just now in the bar.