Under a Red Roof

Toadstools and Fire

November 17, 2009 in Being, Exploring by Colleen | 3 comments

Good afternoon, gentle readers. I hope this post finds you well and that you had a weekend as lovely as mine. We had fine enough weather for a walk to the Academy to see The Informant! with Matt Damon. I must admit that, while the movie was good, as was the pizza and popcorn, it didn’t hold a candle to the walk. Though it was rather brisk out, and the skies were grey, it never rained, and the air smelled so wonderful – leaves, pine, and wood smoke. As well, we found roads we had never taken before and discovered some pretty neat houses and fine landscaping in the process.

We saw the charming toadstools painted on a telephone pole just down the street from our friend Mara’s house (at which we did not stop but waved hello). How kind and generous of the person who took the time to add this charming bit of art to our Portland streets. I love how the world is full of delights like this, just waiting for us to notice.

When we got home, it was rather chilly, so we cozied up for our first fire of the season, reading books, listening to our collection of Bob Dylan, snuggling with cats and each other, and relishing a life that couldn’t be much more perfect.

Favorite Restaurants

October 28, 2009 in Admiring, Eating, Exploring by Colleen | 1 comment

We just got our highly anticipated list of Willamette Week’s 100 favorite restaurants, their yearly focus on yummy goodness in all five quadrants and beyond (yeah, I said five – we’ve got the Keep Portland Weird bumper stickers for a reason). Of the 100, we’ve eaten at 53. Yikes! Do we really eat out that much? Yet, why haven’t we tried all of these?

In this same spirit, here is our list of favorite restaurants and some of our favorite dishes. Places we go often, places we itch to go more frequently but must restrain ourselves for fear of bankruptcy or obesity. What are your favorites?

Asian:

August Moon – Sesame Chicken and Szechuan green beans

Chaba Thai – Som Tum Salad, Pad Kee Mao, Red Curry with Pineapple

Stickers – Anything on a skewer, Scallion Cakes, and Kung Pao Chicken

Latin Flavor:

El Tapatio – Eddie is the sweetest server ever, but I would not eat him. That would be wrong.

Pambiche – Ropa Vieja, Maduros, Tostones, anything with ham.

Pata Negra – scrumptious tapas of every stripe, but go when it is warm – this place can be downright chilly.

Viva Italia!:

La Buca – Abituale (number nine, number nine…), Caesar salad, Fettuccine Alfredo with a side of red sauce.

Vincente’s

Southern:

Clay’s

Cannon’s

Screen Door – Peanut Butter Pie!

The Country Cat – The Whole Hog

Sip:

Bubble Bubble – Ginger or Coconut Bubble Tea

Bipartisan Cafe – Coffee and Pie – you can’t go wrong.

The Observatory – The food is good too. Smoked whitefish – delish.

The Maiden – Absinthe!

Very Portland:

Caldera – Stroganoff

Clyde Common

Higgins Bar

Laurelhurst Market

Navarre

Toast – Hippies Use Front Door Granola, the Burger

Bistro:

Broder – I’m a big fan of the bords.

Savoy – Fried Cheese Curds, Macaroni and Cheese. I like cheese (and Christmas).

Carafe

Everett Street Bistro

Indian:

Chennai Masala – definitely worth the drive to Hillsboro.

India Oven

Sandwich:

Pause – Reuben (house smoked meat) and the huge cheesy-beefy appetizer thingies, yowza!

Sweetness – All Day Breakfast Sandwich

Ethiopian:

Queen of Sheeba – Mushrooms

Jarra’s – Lamb shank

All American:

Burgerville

Diane’s – Biscuits and Gravy

Mike’s Drive-In – the Portobello Burger is my current fave, but nearly any burger will do.

Tabor Hill Cafe – Chicken Caesar Salad

p.s. The pizza is my own. I already order like Sally Albright. I don’t need to add picture taking of my food to the list of idiosyncrasies.

Tags: Restaurants

Bread, Soup, Eighties

October 21, 2009 in Cooking + Baking, Exploring by Colleen | 4 comments

It was a big weekend in our neck of the woods, much activity and entirely fun filled. Friday, I made soup, a variation of my draped in velvet recipe, with a swirl of olive oil on top, as well as bread. I don’t bake bread often, but every time I do, it makes me very happy. It smells so good, filling up the house with yeasty goodness, and the kneading is such a satisfying and meditative task. Push, fold, turn, push, fold turn… Maybe you’d like to make some, too. Here’s the recipe, adapted from Better Homes and Gardens 75th Anniversary Cookbook. Gosh do I love this collection of recipes. Such good basics!

Multigrain Bread

2 – 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons yeast

3/4 cup + 1 tablespoon water

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 1/2 tablespoons butter

1 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup whole wheat flour

1/3 cup wheat germ

1/3 cup rolled oats

1 tablespoon flax seeds

In a medium mixing bowl, combine 1 cup flour and the yeast; set aside. In a medium saucepan, combine water, sugar, butter, and salt, stirring until it reaches 120 degrees and butter almost melts. Add water mixture to flour mixture. Beat with a wooden spoon for about 3 minutes. It will be very creamy. Stir in the whole wheat flour, wheat germ, rolled oats, and flax seed.

Turn onto a lightly floured surface. Knead in enough of the remaining all purpose flour to make a moderately stiff dough. It should be smooth and elastic, not sticky. Shape dough into a ball, place in a lightly greased bowl, cover, and let rise until doubled in size (1 – 1 1/2 hours).

Punch dough down. Turn onto a lightly floured surface and allow to rest for 10 minutes. Grease an 8″ loaf pan. Shape the dough into a loaf to fit the pan. Place in pan and allow to rise again, until doubled (30-45 minutes).

Bake in a 375 degree oven for 35-40 minutes or until bread sounds hollow when lightly tapped. Immediately remove bread from pan and cool on a wire rack.

Enjoy!

We also went to an Eighties party fundraiser for the school that nearly all of my friends’ children attend. It was fun. I replicated, nearly to the letter, an outfit I wore in high school (though my hair did not stay big and fluffy – such is life without hairspray), and then I dressed up the hubster like some of the boys I had major crushes on way back when. He was even amenable to eyeliner, which was very cool of him. Besides, it looked good, being so handsome and all.

Here are more photos, but since my friends are generally blog shy, I’m not going to tell you who they are, just that they mean the world to me!

Don’t forget to dance!

Tags: Cooking and Baking, Friendship

October Sky

October 7, 2009 in Cooking + Baking, Decorating, Eating, Exploring, Gardening + Nature, Practicing, Shopping by Colleen | 5 comments

So, I’ve got quite the hodgepodge for you today. First off, isn’t this a gorgeous sky? It was like the heavens couldn’t make up their mind, sweet, soft, and ethereal pink or menacing grey. A bit like me, sometimes I just can’t decide.

Take, for instance, my sugar addiction. One moment I am not at all interested in eating one more bite of it, and I get a little haughty, feeling, “Oh, I’ve really licked it this time!” Then, I drive by Pix, pull over the car and eat half of a St. Honore before I am dumbstruck by what is happening. Shoot! As for this very moment, I am feeling, more than anything else, like I need to let the obsession go. I am a pretty healthy person, all things considered, knocking on wood, etcetera, etcetera. Why fret about it? My cravings ebb and flow, like a river or the sea, just let it be.

Speaking of being and the flow of the sea, today my yoga practice involved a new, and rather exciting video (at least to me – it’s been out for a while) Shiva Rea: Yoga Trance Dance. I’m pretty sure I have mentioned that I LOVE to dance, in a crazy, unscripted, primal, and occasionally, um, nutty, kind of way, really taking the rhythms to another plane, both physically and mentally (quite unlike my graceful ballerina friend Mara). Thankfully, this DVD fully embraces these qualities, really engaging the practitioner in a dynamic and energizing flow, riding the waves of grace, energy, and movement. I highly recommend it.

Now, a bit more of the sea, in a shopping and decorating note. How about this painting gracing our bedroom? There used to be a poster of an old map of Paris, but we had grown tired of it, and then I got, in a semi-paranoid state, to thinking that if the big earthquake comes while we are in bed and knocks it off the wall, we’re goners. So, the other day at the Goodwill Bins, I found this. It is an original oil painting by H. Walker. I know nothing of this person, but bless his or her heart, the sea is right, and I got a bargain that will not kill me, my precious spouse, or cats, all for $20, including the frame. Not bad, not bad at all my precious peeps. Now if I could center the bed under the painting, my anal-retentive self would be super happy. One thing at a time…

Finally, the last of the summer tomatoes. We’ve had quite the season around here – I canned nine pints, made a big batch of Spicy Tomato Chutney (Zowie – I posted this recipe one year ago TODAY!), and eaten and eaten to my heart’s content. These are the Sungold cherry variety from our rather prolific vines. I sliced them, sprayed them with olive oil (using our refillable pump – love this gadget), followed by a sprinkle of salt, and two hours at 200 degrees in the oven. With my instructions, because I didn’t want to stop watching the news and get off the couch (sometimes I refuse to budge), the hubster made this pasta dish. Easy, delicious. Why don’t you try it? This serves two and is yummy!

Pasta (we used brown rice fettuccine, as we avoid wheat when we can)

1 handful pine nuts

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon butter

3-4 fresh sage leaves, sliced fine, as in a chiffonade

1 handful raisins

1 large handful of sun or oven dried tomatoes

salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes, to taste

While your pasta is cooking, toast the pine nuts in a dry skillet until light brown, shaking the pan to evenly brown. Set aside. Add butter and olive oil to pan, bring to a slow bubble, add the sage and raisins, cooking until the raisins puff a little, add the tomatoes and gently stir, just until warmed through. Once your pasta is finished, toss everything together. Season with salt, fresh ground pepper, and red pepper flakes.

If you have some green tomatoes left in the garden, fry them up! We sliced ours to about 1/4″, dipped them in Ener-G egg replacer (regular egg will do), dredged them in brown rice flour (more crunch, but wheat will do), corn meal, salt, and pepper, and fried in enough sunflower oil to cover the bottom of the skillet. Fry until golden on each side and voila, yummy (I can’t find the photo, sorry).

What a day! Enjoy yours.

Tags: Cooking and Baking, Decorating