Picking Flowers on the Farm
Do you know what happens when you wake up early, drive down to Pennsylvania, take a stroll around Wegmans, drive back from Pennsylvania, stop at a local farm for a sandwich, drop in for a visit with an old friend, and manage an Official Yelp Event all in the same day?
It’s exhausting. Which means last night when I should have been writing today’s post, I just crapped out. All of this is simply an excuse for why today’s post is going up late, and invariably will be poorly edited.
But the blog is a beast, and it must be fed. Daily. Besides, I’ve got to tell you about the thing I did yesterday at Indian Ladder Farms. Because it was fantastic. In the simplest of terms, we picked flowers. However, these weren’t just ordinary flowers, and we did a little more than just pick them.
Bad Days
Bad days. We all have them. The people of Texas are going through worse days right now than I think most of us can possibly imagine. Actually, if I stop and think of the list of groups who have been having bad days recently, it’s almost a totality of the world.
My new nephew had a bad day this past weekend. I held him in my lap for his circumcision. One of the two of us will go on to forget that moment. Still, it was my honor to fulfill that role for my sister.
Food blog. Back to food.
Because yesterday, all told, was a pretty good day. At least for me and the small bubble of my existence. I woke up, did some work, had a lovely slice of avocado toast, did some more work, enjoyed some sardines with pickled onions, worked a bit more, found an unexpected bottle of Petrus aged ale with raspberries at Trader Joe’s, did even more work, and had a delicious dinner at La Mexicana with Little Miss Fussy.
It’s that last part I want to talk about, especially because I may have left out one thing.
Hurricane Memories
Houston. Holy moly. Part of me thinks that there is just so much awfulness that is going on in the world, that the awfulness of the flooding in Texas actually doesn’t seem all that bad. But it’s bad. Really really bad. And I’m concerned it’s going to get worse.
This is again, yet another time, when I can thank my lucky stars that I’m able to gripe about food on the internet. Actually, I’m going to put aside my scheduled gripe for a remembrance of the past.
Because I actually lived through a pretty major hurricane. I was in Miami when Hurricane Andrew laid waste to the area. It literally took ten years for the region to rebuild, and for the lost vegetation to grow back in. The storm was loud and pretty scary. But more than anything else, it was the aftermath that was the hardest.
Although we did manage to swing one fantastic meal amid the devastation.
Mall Walkers
Some activities just go together. I’m not entirely sure why. Like sports and beer. It doesn’t seem to matter if you’re playing the sport, or watching it on television, or attending a game at a stadium. Beer and sports go together.
Families have their own rituals too. For some people, a picnic wouldn’t be a picnic without potato salad. Or maybe it’s coleslaw. Whatever. I think you get the point.
Well, I have a rather unusual routine, that I may have shared with you in the past. Maybe I haven’t. But it’s simply that whenever the mechanic needs to do something significant to the car, I spend the day at the mall. Colonie Center, to be precise. And I could walk you through the reasons of how this came to be, but those aren’t all that interesting.
What I wanted to share was the brilliant discovery that we made at lunch yesterday.
Dr. Strangefish
Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Farmed Atlantic Salmon.
Okay, “love” is too big of a word. I got a little carried away with the title of today’s post. Let me state for the record, once again, that I do not love farmed Atlantic salmon. Actually, I try to avoid it. And just to be sure I’m doing a good job at avoiding farmed Atlantic salmon, I will avoid all salmon unless I’m reassured of its provenance.
Yes, that usually means skipping the lox, or nova, at every bagel platter I encounter. It means skipping out on salmon sushi, salmon spreads, and salmon canapes.
My fish of choice are typically lower on the food chain. “Junk fish” are also high on my list. It’s been far too long since I’ve had the fried whiting and grits with eggs at The Breakfast Spot in Albany. I’ve also just pickled some red onions to go with tinned sardines on toast.
But today is about the recent news of a farmed Atlantic salmon escape in the pacific.
Not Gazpacho
All the way back in 2012, Slate had a series called “You’re Doing It Wrong” which appeals to me immensely. One of the subjects tackled was gazpacho.
It’s short.
I’ll wait.
Because forewarned is forearmed, they say.
It has taken the tomatoes a little bit of time to show their stuff. But I just got a delivery from Roxbury Farm CSA today, and I can attest to the fact that local tomatoes are now slamming. Holy cow, we got a carton of small walnut sized tomatoes, and I’ve been eating them like candy. Bright and acidic candy, with some fat crunchy flakes of Maldon salt. What can I tell you? I don’t have much of a sweet tooth.
The point here is that it’s prime summer produce season. Tomatoes, red peppers, cucumbers, onions, and garlic. Their time is now. And that means you might see dishes like gazpacho popping up on seasonal menus.
But cold vegetable soups don’t have to be gazpacho to be delicious. Here’s a true story from my kitchen.
Going Soft on Homemade Hard Ice Cream
For those who may have missed the news, last Saturday a bunch of FLB readers headed off into the wilderness to taste homemade hard ice cream from five different places around the Capital District. Some might argue that our path took us down to the top of the Hudson Valley. I’m going to save that argument for others.
I’m just here for the food.
Every time we do one of these tours, the goal is to identify five great places to sample ostensibly the same thing. The idea is that in doing so, slight differences at each stop will become more clear, and in the process attendees will get a deeper appreciation for the range of flavors and textures inherent in the food they are evaluating.
Except sometimes, something goes wrong. And in this case it did. Our final stop was Hill-Over Healthy & Fresh. It was one of the places I was most excited about visiting. Because down in Copake they are known as much for their cows as they are for their fluid milk and the ice cream they make.
However, when we arrived, no cows. It turns out the herd had been sold off in May. There was still milk and ice cream. The milk comes from Battenkill. The ice cream was from Byrne Dairy.
Despite the disappointing ending of the tour, the rest of the day was great! And while there are good things to say about the first four stops, only one place can come out on top. So without any further ado, let me tell you how this went down.
Two Months
Panic. Don’t panic. Panic again.
I think this describes a lot of America these days. It’s a terrible cycle. Especially when the panic is combined with eating. Right now, I’m trying to reduce my panic eating. It’s the worst kind of eating. It’s joyless. It tends to happen late at night, when I’m not hungry. And then I’m bloated and still panicked.
Right now I’m in a little bit of panic mode. Mostly because I realized that my son’s bar mitzvah is going to be in two months. And even though one of the things I do for my job is throw events, it’s another thing entirely when it’s a lifecycle event for your first kid and you have friends and family coming into town from around the country.
The bar mitzvah will be fine. Everything will work out fine. But when I look at all the things that are going on in the next two months, I get a bit fluttery.
Sweet And Sour
Finally, the Tour de Homemade Hard Ice Cream 2.0 is almost here. Tomorrow is the big day, and it looks like the weather will be perfect. Warm, partly sunny, but not too hot. It’s not too late to let me know if you want to come. We’ve got a bunch of people already lined up, but the more the merrier. I just need to know how many scoresheets to bring.
Without a doubt, most of the fun about going on a Fussy Little Tour is getting to eat so many versions of a single food. How sweet is it to spend the entire afternoon eating five bowls of ice cream? It’s like a childhood dream come true.
Although some of the fun is also about camaraderie, and spending the afternoon with likeminded people.
However, these tours are also very much a learning experience, because they give attendees a chance to score five similar items, and scoring each of them against a common set of criteria. This can be challenging at first. However, like most things, the more you do it the easier it becomes. And before you know it, you’ll feel comfortable and confident sitting behind a judges table evaluating culinary competitions.
Speaking of which did I mention I would be judging the National Whiskey Sour Day Competition at Savoy next week?
Role Reversals
I’m back!
Back in the U.S.
Back in the U.S.
Back in the U.S. we are.
And as much as I’m going to miss being walking distance from so many great International cuisines, there’s a certain comfort from even the simple things. Like having speed limit signs posted in miles per hour, instead of kilometers.
But this is the end of my big summer trips. Yes, I expect there to be a few more day trips. I’ve got a new nephew in Manhattan I need to visit. Next week I’m going to drop the kids off in Scranton to see their grandparents. Then I’ll pick them back up again in Corning.
Now is the time to squeeze as much out of the remaining summer as possible. On the subject of getting every last fun out of a very short period of time, our last day in Canada was interesting for a couple of reasons.
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