#pomegranates are beautiful in a writers aspect

[mytummy-hurts]

i want to rip a pomegranate open with my bare hands. Pull apart its flesh and give you a spoon so that you'd never have to stain your own hands.

[cocoa-rococo]

Koopaling Headcanons: Wendy

Larry | Morton | Wendy | Iggy | Roy | Lemmy | Ludwig

The bold beauty of Bowser's army and queen of our hearts, Wendy! Truly an icon for us all.

Right-handed.

All her clothes have pockets in them. She sewed them on herself, and after much pestering, she taught Roy how to do it as well.

A superb figure skater and rollerblader. She likes practicing on her own time and going out to a rink with Lemmy and Larry to have fun. Her coordination for moves is perfect.

She is one of the most organized generals out of all of them, and one of the most well-liked among the troops. Also they have some of the best color coordination.

She keeps a self-care journal. She originally did it out of spite, but now genuinely likes the thoughtfulness it provides.

She's allergic to nickel, so she's been finding a lot of her jewelry in titanium or gold.

Likes to bake! She has Iggy help her in the kitchen and has Larry as her taste tester, and often likes bribing exchanging favors with her brothers for their favorite treats. It partially paved the way for her donut business, too.

Speaking of which, HUGE sweet tooth, and likes all kinds of desserts, but little pastries are her favorite. Lemmy once made her macaroons after she had a bad day, and she was so touched she cried, and now the two of them make them together.

Favorite fruit is watermelon. Roy taught her how to spit the seeds out at people (much to Kamek’s disapproval), and now everyone stays a good ten feet away from her when she's eating them. Pomegranate and grapefruit are close behind.

Looooves the beach. Would spend all day there if she had the chance.

Runs a side hobby of trying and reviewing different beauty products, and when she got frustrated on how a lot of them are aimed at skin and not scales, launched her own line of cosmetics. She spearheaded quite a movement in the industry because of this.

She's a big seafood fan! Especially stuff you have to crack open, like shellfish, crabs, and clams. Free stress therapy.

Favorite candy is life savers, but she loves a lot of different kinds, particularly chocolate candies with fillings.

No one knows what her phone password is, not even her siblings. Attempts have been made to discover it. Those attempts have not ended well.

She's not what you would call a professional sketcher, but she's still a pretty decent fashion artist. She keeps a few sketchbooks in her room for designing new outfit ideas.

She swims whenever she needs to think or contemplate something; she says it's relaxing and helps her focus. If she's ever lost or can't be found, the first place her brothers check is a pool.

While not as involved with her siblings in the 'engineering' aspect of kart-making, when they started making their own businesses, she did want to do something related to it with design. After a bit of debate, she decided to focus on making the car look nice, not just run nice. And so, Wendy's Car Interiors was created.

She is allowed to tease her siblings and rough them up, because she has to stand the nonsense these boys put her through all day, every day. Other people do not have that privilege. She will make sure anyone who thinks otherwise is aware that they do not have that privilege.

Has two styles of handwriting: one that's cursive and sweeping for her own diary, and one that's a type of short-hand for when she needs to take notes.

She also happens to be the fastest writer of the seven. Ludwig is a little awed by it.

While her favorite way to spend time is through shopping, she's a surprisingly responsible credit card owner, balancing several at a time and always paying in-full on time. Her reward points amount is in the hundred-thousands.

Likes beach-reads! She goes through a lot of romance novels, but she can enjoy a good cozy mystery or contemporary at times. She likes reading before she goes to bed, too.

She’s fond of a lot of flowers, and certainly won’t say no to some unusually colored roses, but her absolute favorites are plumerias.

She doesn't play an instrument, but if she did, she'd pick either flute or harp.

Aside from Roy and Ludwig, one of her other siblings she's close with is Morton. He lets her practice different makeup color palettes on him, and they like to bond by getting skin treatments and having spa days together.

Not that she would tell anyone, but she does hold both a rivalry and begrudging admiration for Princess Peach and Princess Daisy.

Loves dragging the hell out of reality TV shows with Ludwig, but prefers to listen to talk-shows or beauty videos; they let her have something to listen to while she works on her designs, bakes, or does her routines.

She likes doing yoga as a way to relax, especially with Pom-Pom.

She's a schemer. All her siblings are, but, apart from Ludwig, she might be the most dangerous one out of all of them; she's not gonna stop at one prank. She's in it for the long-haul.

She doesn't remember it much, but apparently she had a very intense phase of bedazzling and glitter-ifying things when she was younger. Larry remembers this especially well because she somehow managed to bedazzle all of his game controllers in the span of one night. He's still not entirely sure how she did it.

When she was younger, she really wanted to be a ballerina, and took classes for it. It's become less of a dream now, but she still likes doing it. Lemmy likes to join her sometimes.

Likes keeping a to-do list, something she picked up from Ludwig. Only difference is that everything’s on her phone, since she always has it with her.

The best, perhaps out of all of them, at portal / teleportation magic, given her rings, as well as enchantment spells. She's also not too shabby at illusions, though hers are more focused on herself (rather than tricks and performances like Lemmy).

Her social media accounts are f l o u r i s h i n g, and swoon-worthy. Lots of beautiful pictures and her living her best life, along with promos for her businesses.

[vriskarlmarx]

this past year i sort of unexpectedly ended up writing regularly again, for the first time in years. i blame cassian andor's big wet baby cow eyes, but overall it's been a really fun hobby to take up again. i'm gonna do a little reflection on what i wrote in 2023 (fanfic-wise, i wrote some other stuff too but won't talk about it here).

putting this under a read more since it's mostly just for me to talk to myself, pulling a few questions i found interesting from other writers i follow who are doing this sort of thing (feel free to take the questions for yourself too!)

how many fics did you write in 2023? how many total words?

as it turns out, a total of 16, and it totaled out to 45.578 words. which is kind of lot considering that the last time i wrote fanfic was in 2019 and all 1000ish words felt like pulling teeth, and the time before that had been 2013. so i'm very happy with it!

what are you most proud of, fic-writing-wise in 2023?

a few different things:

being able to maintain a consistent rhythm and interest in writing

being able to connect my own feelings and experiences to those of different characters, which i think gave my writing some additional layers

experimenting with a few different structures (i get bored just writing a standard linear narrative sometimes, i think)

putting more actual thought into character/plot/theme analysis. i think writing fanfic made me engage with the things i was watching/reading in a different way

what fic meant the most to you to write?

definitely No Return Address. it was a pinch hit for yuletide but it hit me like a baseball bat, it ended up being crazy personal and the feedback has been better than anything i could've hoped for. i could talk for a very long time about everything that fic means to me personally, but i think it might honestly come through in the fic itself.

what is a fic you didn't expect to write?

so either Bitter Fruits or Hostia, but for different reasons.

with Bitter Fruits, i was just suddenly and unexpectedly overcome with inspiration from a fanart that is honestly completely unrelated to the premise i ended up going with, and i wrote it in like 2 or 3 days like a daze. and it was sooo much fun to write, honestly.

with Hostia, it is what happens when you sign up to an exchange, see a ship in the tagset that you find kind of curious so you put it in your offers and unexpectedly match on it, so you gotta step up to it. i definitely did not really expect for it to end with oral sex on a pomegranate but hey when life gives you lemons. or pomegranates. whatever.

what is something you learned about yourself while writing this year?

that deadlines are sooo magical, even if they're mostly in my head. exchanges were super helpful to keep me writing, because i knew they had a time and date to be done by! Late Harvest 100% only got finished and posted because of WDLF.

the other thing is that changing the place/mode of writing really helps me. i found out that switching between handwriting in a notebook and then copying that into a google doc, then continuing to write on the doc was the best way to keep myself going and unblock my head whenever i felt stuck. ditto going to write in different places, like coffee shops or other spots.

and lastly, having written fanfiction really helped my other writing in some other aspects. i think other things i've written are more creative, flow better and are more literary/beautiful/interating to read than before, and i love that it's had that effect on my other writing.

what fic was the most difficult to write?

Conventional Weapons, which i ended up really liking in the end. but i had to fully re-start that one, because a few different things happened in my life that ended up making it a much more personal fic to write than i had anticpated, so i had to switch POV characters at one point because i wasn't going to be able to do it from Roy's POV anymore. it's an interesting pairing to begin with, with a ton of baggage, and at times i felt like i had written myself into a corner, or had to put it down because i was thinking about personal stuff and getting really upset. still, i'm happy with how it turned out!

what fic was the most fun to write?

petite mort. writing L as a weird necro freak who gets turned on by dying was hilarious and incredibly fun.

what are you looking forward to in 2024, in terms of fanfic writing?

i look forward to continuing to write consistently, and am thinking about a couple of ideas that i want to get around to writing! i think i will also try to write things without deadlines and see if i can get them done anyways, now that i have more of a rhythm going :) but there are also a few exchanges i'm excited to do.

[spinayarnindia]

"SaY" it with a Mission: Securing our Heritage

Spin A Yarn India is on a mammoth cultural mission to preserve the magical fairytales, folklore and fables of India.

We have all grown up on stories narrated to us by our grandparents, parents and other elders in the family. Those were the good old days when we would lie beside our aajis and azoba, daadis or naanis, as they took us on fantasy journeys with their tales — from turtles who talk too much, jackals and mangos, to tigers and laughing fish, folk tales delighted people of all ages with beautiful narratives on friendship, morality and philosophy. Clever tricksters, nefarious villains and brave heroes made up the compelling and enduring folk history of India.

The rich culture and vast landscape of India come alive in our ancient folk tales and folklore. Indian folklore and fairy tales have entertained and enlightened generations, since the dawn of language to modern time, with ballads of heroes, so beloved, they are deified and worshiped around the continent, and with epic poetry that strengthens and heralds a community’s shared values.

The oral folktales of the Indian sub-continent are a remarkable blend of storytelling motifs and traditions, influenced by Hinduism, Indian folk tales are robust with central religious figures and moral lessons; they were used to preserve history, important people and places, as well as the religious rites and ceremonies of various Indian regions. Most Sanskrit fables were written as children’s stories to teach youth important life philosophies, so they would grow up to be wise and responsible adults. This was especially true for the Hitopadesha stories written by Narayana, whose title literally translates as “to counsel or advise with benevolence.”

At Spin A Yarn India we worried that the steady creep of modernisation – particularly the modern digital age – will erode and wipe out India's cultural heritage. So we have set out on this mammoth academic project called Stories from India and Around The World to collecting and index stories to preserve for future generations.

Members of the public and academics from university literature departments around the country can submit a fairytale to Spin A Yarn India's online portal, where it is then examined, categorised and archived for future generations.

The stories are indexed according to which regions they are from and which of five different types of stories: animal tales, magical or extraordinary tales, realistic tales and humorous tales.

There are often several different variants of one story, requiring painstaking cross-referencing to figure out how a tale can differ over time from one region to another. For example, there are over 20 different versions of Chal re Bhoplya Tunuk Tunuk!

If a submitted tale is approved it becomes part of Spin A Yarn India's online database, which will eventually be available to the public. More than 3,300 tales have been collected from 77 different areas to date.  We are hoping that the the corpus will be completed by February 2022.

Motifs such as magic carpets, animals and birds gifted with speech and enchanted mirrors, apples and pomegranates echo throughout the canon. Characters who brave the dragons and giants serpents or survive a trek across the desert are rewarded with marriage proposals in beautiful gardens, and the magical animals are always on hand to help a hero out of a tight spot.

“Fairytales teach us to wonder, to use reason, to be patient, to dream, to overcome obstacles, not to be intimidated, to struggle, to be good people, to fight against evil, to tell the truth, to detect lies and deceit, to resist, and to listen. These values are universal human values: times change, people don’t”, says Madhurata Deshmukh, the Storyteller-in-Chief who hopes that academics, writers and artists will be able to draw on the project’s database of stories for generations and generations to come.

Who We Are:

At Spin A Yarn India: our mission is to become the primary outlet of children focused content by encouraging the participation of India’s latent indigenous story telling creativity, knowledge, and culture.    

It is through stories that we define our identity, express our history and culture, learn and engage in all aspects of society. Stories are not only the first medium for communication, education and social integration, but are also at the heart of each person’s unique identity, cultural history and memory.  

Spin A Yarn India has created a platform to enable “Storytellers” to come together to discover and share their passion for stories. A community of creators, dreamers and explorers united by their love for great stories.  

Spin A Yarn India is a partner of the United Nations Indigenous Language and the Bhasha Sangam programs. Spin A Yarn India runs as a social enterprise. Profit is reinvested to support children from underprivileged backgrounds to gain access to books, education and in general to improve the literacy of families across India.

[deborahaphillips54303]

Alice Waters' Fascinating and Infuriating Quest for Perfection

Earlier this month, I spent 15 whole minutes watching Alice Waters talk in extraordinary detail about how to put together the perfect bowl of fruit. No chopping, no sugar, no squeeze of lemon or orange juice to try to brighten the taste of the thing—just a plain old bowl of fruit, curated to highlight whatever is perfectly in season on the particular day on which it is served, which is every day at her decades-spanning farm-to-table Berkeley restaurant, Chez Panisse. "It's a way of being in time and place," she says.

In the video—lesson 12 of the American slow food activist and celebrity chef's course on MasterClass—the season is autumn. Today, the butcher-block island at the center of her home kitchen is covered in persimmons. She mentions that she picks them from the trees in her garden; sometimes, she says, the leaves will "become part of the fruit bowl," too. She grasps one juicy orange orb, cuts a perfect wedge, then brings it to her mouth to taste—batting her lashes at the camera as if to underscore the importance of tasting, that the taste of the fruit changes every day.

"Ooo, definitely, I want to put this on the fruit bowl," she says. Later, after placing a few persimmons and a couple curling leaves in the bowl, she glances forlornly at a bunch of plump, burgundy-colored grapes. "Even though it's a beautiful organic fruit, it doesn't look alive to me," she says. "I'll taste it just to make sure it's not worthy of the fruit bowl."

On the off-chance that quarantine-induced anxiety and incessant targeted advertising ended up convincing you that it was a good idea to shell out for a MasterClass membership this spring, you might have found the most striking thing about this sequence to be the visual aspect: Between the persimmons, pomegranates, and dates of her finished fruit bowl and the cookware on display throughout her kitchen (only wood, iron, and copper, as a rule), you've got a near-complete spectrum of the colors of fall. Or, perhaps, it was Alice Waters' voice that transfixed you: crystalline, drawling, and vaguely mid-Atlantic, like that of women whom you might imagine Kelsey Grammar meeting at the wine club on Frasier, albeit with a noticeable predilection for using the American-English version of words that food people usually say in French, like "rocket" instead of "roquette." (Alice Waters is famous for importing a distinctly French culinary sensibility and re-imagining it as the basis for a new "California cuisine," one that celebrates the links between the food you eat and the soil and the farmers that cultivated it, so this kind of makes sense.)

But for me, it was something else that made this moment indescribably absorbing at a time when I couldn't stop ruminating about lost income and how I was going to find time to clean the house. Like Frasier, which for years has been my go-to sitcom during the moments just before falling asleep, there is something charmingly sedative about these Alice Waters videos—and also absurd, in the way that the customs of coastal white liberals are always pretty ridiculous when you hold them up to scrutiny. Who besides Alice Waters, who has written entire books about fruit, has the luxury of spending a quarter-of-an-hour deciding whether a single Bosc pear proffers just the right ratio of juiciness to crispness, even in the name of her so-called "delicious revolution"? And who—especially right now—has the combined mental bandwidth and reliable produce access to think of fruit not just as something you eat, but a matter of monumental importance?

That disjunct—between the impractibly slow, organic-everything, back-to-the-land lifestyle that Alice Waters has elevated to a gospel, and the material and temporal limits of contemporary life—has made her, as one chef put it to the LA Times, "a kind of lightning rod for Berkeley liberal elitism," while also sparking dialogue about misogynist double standards in the food world, such as in the case of the famous 60 Minutes egg spoon incident. Somewhat winningly, it's a recurring theme in her daughter Fanny Singers' new memoir, Always Home, which compiles recipes from her childhood and teenage years while painting a loving but unsparing picture of what it might actually be like to grow up with Alice Waters as your mom.

Image via Pixabay user DarkWorkX

Though the book could be read as a 300-page tribute to her mother's unyielding passion for nature and aesthetics, the 30-something writer and curator is quick to point out the ways in which Waters' dogmatic approach could render her "disproportionately blinkered, even insensitive to the widely held belief that hers is an unachievable romantic existence." In chapter one, she tells us that the Edible Schoolyard Project, the farming and food education non-profit Waters founded in partnership with the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, was born after the "school's principal called out my mom for publicly maligning its quasi-derelict appearance." She goes on to share an anecdote that pretty perfectly illustrates the tenacity of her mother's obsession: When a preliminary edible schoolyard classroom was erected in a trailer, she was unable to tolerate the "industrial taupe of the prefab kitchen building," and reportedly dipped into her personal savings in order to have it painted aubergine.

Ultimately, though, Always Home is a book that approaches its subject with the same tenderness and curiosity with which her mother inspects the permissions. There's an entire chapter devoted to the smells she associates with her mother: woodsmoke and beeswax candles and the smell of "garlic warming but never burning on a stove"—but also, for the first 25 years of Singer's life, a "hippy drugstore formulation" of almond oil and collagen that she wore in lieu of perfume. And another dedicated to her hands: small and surprisingly soft for a chef, but with a nimbleness that Singer reads as a "mirror of her determination."

As bewitching as these images are, it can be a bit hard to relate to an author whose mother stocked home-made chicken paillard sandwiches and fruit macédoine from the garden in her lunch box and whose childhood adventures in France were turned into an actual children's book called Fanny in France. But if you spend enough time with the book, you start to understand Waters' over-the-topness both as a source of perpetual frustration for those around her and the thing that makes the world of Alice Waters so magnetic. Ultimately, Singer says, her mother's obsessive attention to the color, texture, fragrance, and an elusive ideal of "perfect ripeness" is little more than her own complicated way of expressing love: love for the person she is cooking for (in this case, Singer), and love for the world of farmers and organic vegetables and wild backyard gardens she has spent a career celebrating as both the beginning and end-point of good food. The perfectly in-season fruit bowl emerges as the logical conclusion of that philosophy, its simplicity reminding you that the natural world is the star of the show; the chef is just the person who selects the frame through which you behold it.

Since the coronavirus prompted restaurants throughout the Bay Area to put dine-in service on hold, Waters has been running a CSA subscription program straight out of Chez Panisse, furnishing customers with boxes of organic produce from local farmers suddenly unable to sell their harvest. (After protests against systemic racism erupted across the country following the killing of George Floyd, the restaurant also pledged to expand its network of suppliers to include more Black farmers and "foster relationships with more Black-owned businesses, chefs, and organizations.) She's also also been making occasional appearances in the press, encouraging people to start their own victory garden—a throwback to the World War II tradition she remembers her mother growing when she was a child, and a way to supplement one's pantry with fresh grown things at a time when quality produce can be hard to come by.

It's a sweet idea, if not the most realistic or time-efficient in a year when Americans are poised to experience record levels of food insecurity (though the Edible Schoolyard Project has demonstrated that there is some potential there, donating all its produce to families in the Berkeley area in need). And though I have had the privilege of being able to get a hold of fresh greens most weeks during quarantine—and even to indulge in preparing them according to Waters' instructions, using fresh-cut garlic and oil and a little bit of red pepper—picking at their droopy, past-prime leaves and trying to figure out of which of them are salvageable will always be a reminder of the impossibility of the Alice Waters ideal.

Still, I can't keep coming back to the thought that there is something immensely reassuring about the fruit bowl video, even as someone who is not particularly fond of fruit. On one hand, it feels completely out of step with the reality of most people's experiences; on the other, perhaps because I discovered the video when I did, it feels oddly emblematic of this protracted disruption of life-as-usual, a time when every day feels a little unreal.

Maybe doing something as ridiculously impractical as taking 15 minutes out of your day to build a bowl with the best pieces of fruit you are able to find—or pausing mid-walk to contemplate the way that the trees and the critters that populate them seem to be enjoying this moment without us—can be a way of embracing all that surrealness. And maybe if we're lucky, we'll be able find something enjoyable within it, too.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

[cyberpoetryballoon]

Alice Waters' Fascinating and Infuriating Quest for Perfection

Earlier this month, I spent 15 whole minutes watching Alice Waters talk in extraordinary detail about how to put together the perfect bowl of fruit. No chopping, no sugar, no squeeze of lemon or orange juice to try to brighten the taste of the thing—just a plain old bowl of fruit, curated to highlight whatever is perfectly in season on the particular day on which it is served, which is every day at her decades-spanning farm-to-table Berkeley restaurant, Chez Panisse. "It's a way of being in time and place," she says.

In the video—lesson 12 of the American slow food activist and celebrity chef's course on MasterClass—the season is autumn. Today, the butcher-block island at the center of her home kitchen is covered in persimmons. She mentions that she picks them from the trees in her garden; sometimes, she says, the leaves will "become part of the fruit bowl," too. She grasps one juicy orange orb, cuts a perfect wedge, then brings it to her mouth to taste—batting her lashes at the camera as if to underscore the importance of tasting, that the taste of the fruit changes every day.

"Ooo, definitely, I want to put this on the fruit bowl," she says. Later, after placing a few persimmons and a couple curling leaves in the bowl, she glances forlornly at a bunch of plump, burgundy-colored grapes. "Even though it's a beautiful organic fruit, it doesn't look alive to me," she says. "I'll taste it just to make sure it's not worthy of the fruit bowl."

On the off-chance that quarantine-induced anxiety and incessant targeted advertising ended up convincing you that it was a good idea to shell out for a MasterClass membership this spring, you might have found the most striking thing about this sequence to be the visual aspect: Between the persimmons, pomegranates, and dates of her finished fruit bowl and the cookware on display throughout her kitchen (only wood, iron, and copper, as a rule), you've got a near-complete spectrum of the colors of fall. Or, perhaps, it was Alice Waters' voice that transfixed you: crystalline, drawling, and vaguely mid-Atlantic, like that of women whom you might imagine Kelsey Grammar meeting at the wine club on Frasier, albeit with a noticeable predilection for using the American-English version of words that food people usually say in French, like "rocket" instead of "roquette." (Alice Waters is famous for importing a distinctly French culinary sensibility and re-imagining it as the basis for a new "California cuisine," one that celebrates the links between the food you eat and the soil and the farmers that cultivated it, so this kind of makes sense.)

But for me, it was something else that made this moment indescribably absorbing at a time when I couldn't stop ruminating about lost income and how I was going to find time to clean the house. Like Frasier, which for years has been my go-to sitcom during the moments just before falling asleep, there is something charmingly sedative about these Alice Waters videos—and also absurd, in the way that the customs of coastal white liberals are always pretty ridiculous when you hold them up to scrutiny. Who besides Alice Waters, who has written entire books about fruit, has the luxury of spending a quarter-of-an-hour deciding whether a single Bosc pear proffers just the right ratio of juiciness to crispness, even in the name of her so-called "delicious revolution"? And who—especially right now—has the combined mental bandwidth and reliable produce access to think of fruit not just as something you eat, but a matter of monumental importance?

That disjunct—between the impractibly slow, organic-everything, back-to-the-land lifestyle that Alice Waters has elevated to a gospel, and the material and temporal limits of contemporary life—has made her, as one chef put it to the LA Times, "a kind of lightning rod for Berkeley liberal elitism," while also sparking dialogue about misogynist double standards in the food world, such as in the case of the famous 60 Minutes egg spoon incident. Somewhat winningly, it's a recurring theme in her daughter Fanny Singers' new memoir, Always Home, which compiles recipes from her childhood and teenage years while painting a loving but unsparing picture of what it might actually be like to grow up with Alice Waters as your mom.

Image via Pixabay user DarkWorkX

Though the book could be read as a 300-page tribute to her mother's unyielding passion for nature and aesthetics, the 30-something writer and curator is quick to point out the ways in which Waters' dogmatic approach could render her "disproportionately blinkered, even insensitive to the widely held belief that hers is an unachievable romantic existence." In chapter one, she tells us that the Edible Schoolyard Project, the farming and food education non-profit Waters founded in partnership with the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, was born after the "school's principal called out my mom for publicly maligning its quasi-derelict appearance." She goes on to share an anecdote that pretty perfectly illustrates the tenacity of her mother's obsession: When a preliminary edible schoolyard classroom was erected in a trailer, she was unable to tolerate the "industrial taupe of the prefab kitchen building," and reportedly dipped into her personal savings in order to have it painted aubergine.

Ultimately, though, Always Home is a book that approaches its subject with the same tenderness and curiosity with which her mother inspects the permissions. There's an entire chapter devoted to the smells she associates with her mother: woodsmoke and beeswax candles and the smell of "garlic warming but never burning on a stove"—but also, for the first 25 years of Singer's life, a "hippy drugstore formulation" of almond oil and collagen that she wore in lieu of perfume. And another dedicated to her hands: small and surprisingly soft for a chef, but with a nimbleness that Singer reads as a "mirror of her determination."

As bewitching as these images are, it can be a bit hard to relate to an author whose mother stocked home-made chicken paillard sandwiches and fruit macédoine from the garden in her lunch box and whose childhood adventures in France were turned into an actual children's book called Fanny in France. But if you spend enough time with the book, you start to understand Waters' over-the-topness both as a source of perpetual frustration for those around her and the thing that makes the world of Alice Waters so magnetic. Ultimately, Singer says, her mother's obsessive attention to the color, texture, fragrance, and an elusive ideal of "perfect ripeness" is little more than her own complicated way of expressing love: love for the person she is cooking for (in this case, Singer), and love for the world of farmers and organic vegetables and wild backyard gardens she has spent a career celebrating as both the beginning and end-point of good food. The perfectly in-season fruit bowl emerges as the logical conclusion of that philosophy, its simplicity reminding you that the natural world is the star of the show; the chef is just the person who selects the frame through which you behold it.

Since the coronavirus prompted restaurants throughout the Bay Area to put dine-in service on hold, Waters has been running a CSA subscription program straight out of Chez Panisse, furnishing customers with boxes of organic produce from local farmers suddenly unable to sell their harvest. (After protests against systemic racism erupted across the country following the killing of George Floyd, the restaurant also pledged to expand its network of suppliers to include more Black farmers and "foster relationships with more Black-owned businesses, chefs, and organizations.) She's also also been making occasional appearances in the press, encouraging people to start their own victory garden—a throwback to the World War II tradition she remembers her mother growing when she was a child, and a way to supplement one's pantry with fresh grown things at a time when quality produce can be hard to come by.

It's a sweet idea, if not the most realistic or time-efficient in a year when Americans are poised to experience record levels of food insecurity (though the Edible Schoolyard Project has demonstrated that there is some potential there, donating all its produce to families in the Berkeley area in need). And though I have had the privilege of being able to get a hold of fresh greens most weeks during quarantine—and even to indulge in preparing them according to Waters' instructions, using fresh-cut garlic and oil and a little bit of red pepper—picking at their droopy, past-prime leaves and trying to figure out of which of them are salvageable will always be a reminder of the impossibility of the Alice Waters ideal.

Still, I can't keep coming back to the thought that there is something immensely reassuring about the fruit bowl video, even as someone who is not particularly fond of fruit. On one hand, it feels completely out of step with the reality of most people's experiences; on the other, perhaps because I discovered the video when I did, it feels oddly emblematic of this protracted disruption of life-as-usual, a time when every day feels a little unreal.

Maybe doing something as ridiculously impractical as taking 15 minutes out of your day to build a bowl with the best pieces of fruit you are able to find—or pausing mid-walk to contemplate the way that the trees and the critters that populate them seem to be enjoying this moment without us—can be a way of embracing all that surrealness. And maybe if we're lucky, we'll be able find something enjoyable within it, too.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

[carolrhackett85282]

Alice Waters' Fascinating and Infuriating Quest for Perfection

Earlier this month, I spent 15 whole minutes watching Alice Waters talk in extraordinary detail about how to put together the perfect bowl of fruit. No chopping, no sugar, no squeeze of lemon or orange juice to try to brighten the taste of the thing—just a plain old bowl of fruit, curated to highlight whatever is perfectly in season on the particular day on which it is served, which is every day at her decades-spanning farm-to-table Berkeley restaurant, Chez Panisse. "It's a way of being in time and place," she says.

In the video—lesson 12 of the American slow food activist and celebrity chef's course on MasterClass—the season is autumn. Today, the butcher-block island at the center of her home kitchen is covered in persimmons. She mentions that she picks them from the trees in her garden; sometimes, she says, the leaves will "become part of the fruit bowl," too. She grasps one juicy orange orb, cuts a perfect wedge, then brings it to her mouth to taste—batting her lashes at the camera as if to underscore the importance of tasting, that the taste of the fruit changes every day.

"Ooo, definitely, I want to put this on the fruit bowl," she says. Later, after placing a few persimmons and a couple curling leaves in the bowl, she glances forlornly at a bunch of plump, burgundy-colored grapes. "Even though it's a beautiful organic fruit, it doesn't look alive to me," she says. "I'll taste it just to make sure it's not worthy of the fruit bowl."

On the off-chance that quarantine-induced anxiety and incessant targeted advertising ended up convincing you that it was a good idea to shell out for a MasterClass membership this spring, you might have found the most striking thing about this sequence to be the visual aspect: Between the persimmons, pomegranates, and dates of her finished fruit bowl and the cookware on display throughout her kitchen (only wood, iron, and copper, as a rule), you've got a near-complete spectrum of the colors of fall. Or, perhaps, it was Alice Waters' voice that transfixed you: crystalline, drawling, and vaguely mid-Atlantic, like that of women whom you might imagine Kelsey Grammar meeting at the wine club on Frasier, albeit with a noticeable predilection for using the American-English version of words that food people usually say in French, like "rocket" instead of "roquette." (Alice Waters is famous for importing a distinctly French culinary sensibility and re-imagining it as the basis for a new "California cuisine," one that celebrates the links between the food you eat and the soil and the farmers that cultivated it, so this kind of makes sense.)

But for me, it was something else that made this moment indescribably absorbing at a time when I couldn't stop ruminating about lost income and how I was going to find time to clean the house. Like Frasier, which for years has been my go-to sitcom during the moments just before falling asleep, there is something charmingly sedative about these Alice Waters videos—and also absurd, in the way that the customs of coastal white liberals are always pretty ridiculous when you hold them up to scrutiny. Who besides Alice Waters, who has written entire books about fruit, has the luxury of spending a quarter-of-an-hour deciding whether a single Bosc pear proffers just the right ratio of juiciness to crispness, even in the name of her so-called "delicious revolution"? And who—especially right now—has the combined mental bandwidth and reliable produce access to think of fruit not just as something you eat, but a matter of monumental importance?

That disjunct—between the impractibly slow, organic-everything, back-to-the-land lifestyle that Alice Waters has elevated to a gospel, and the material and temporal limits of contemporary life—has made her, as one chef put it to the LA Times, "a kind of lightning rod for Berkeley liberal elitism," while also sparking dialogue about misogynist double standards in the food world, such as in the case of the famous 60 Minutes egg spoon incident. Somewhat winningly, it's a recurring theme in her daughter Fanny Singers' new memoir, Always Home, which compiles recipes from her childhood and teenage years while painting a loving but unsparing picture of what it might actually be like to grow up with Alice Waters as your mom.

Image via Pixabay user DarkWorkX

Though the book could be read as a 300-page tribute to her mother's unyielding passion for nature and aesthetics, the 30-something writer and curator is quick to point out the ways in which Waters' dogmatic approach could render her "disproportionately blinkered, even insensitive to the widely held belief that hers is an unachievable romantic existence." In chapter one, she tells us that the Edible Schoolyard Project, the farming and food education non-profit Waters founded in partnership with the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, was born after the "school's principal called out my mom for publicly maligning its quasi-derelict appearance." She goes on to share an anecdote that pretty perfectly illustrates the tenacity of her mother's obsession: When a preliminary edible schoolyard classroom was erected in a trailer, she was unable to tolerate the "industrial taupe of the prefab kitchen building," and reportedly dipped into her personal savings in order to have it painted aubergine.

Ultimately, though, Always Home is a book that approaches its subject with the same tenderness and curiosity with which her mother inspects the permissions. There's an entire chapter devoted to the smells she associates with her mother: woodsmoke and beeswax candles and the smell of "garlic warming but never burning on a stove"—but also, for the first 25 years of Singer's life, a "hippy drugstore formulation" of almond oil and collagen that she wore in lieu of perfume. And another dedicated to her hands: small and surprisingly soft for a chef, but with a nimbleness that Singer reads as a "mirror of her determination."

As bewitching as these images are, it can be a bit hard to relate to an author whose mother stocked home-made chicken paillard sandwiches and fruit macédoine from the garden in her lunch box and whose childhood adventures in France were turned into an actual children's book called Fanny in France. But if you spend enough time with the book, you start to understand Waters' over-the-topness both as a source of perpetual frustration for those around her and the thing that makes the world of Alice Waters so magnetic. Ultimately, Singer says, her mother's obsessive attention to the color, texture, fragrance, and an elusive ideal of "perfect ripeness" is little more than her own complicated way of expressing love: love for the person she is cooking for (in this case, Singer), and love for the world of farmers and organic vegetables and wild backyard gardens she has spent a career celebrating as both the beginning and end-point of good food. The perfectly in-season fruit bowl emerges as the logical conclusion of that philosophy, its simplicity reminding you that the natural world is the star of the show; the chef is just the person who selects the frame through which you behold it.

Since the coronavirus prompted restaurants throughout the Bay Area to put dine-in service on hold, Waters has been running a CSA subscription program straight out of Chez Panisse, furnishing customers with boxes of organic produce from local farmers suddenly unable to sell their harvest. (After protests against systemic racism erupted across the country following the killing of George Floyd, the restaurant also pledged to expand its network of suppliers to include more Black farmers and "foster relationships with more Black-owned businesses, chefs, and organizations.) She's also also been making occasional appearances in the press, encouraging people to start their own victory garden—a throwback to the World War II tradition she remembers her mother growing when she was a child, and a way to supplement one's pantry with fresh grown things at a time when quality produce can be hard to come by.

It's a sweet idea, if not the most realistic or time-efficient in a year when Americans are poised to experience record levels of food insecurity (though the Edible Schoolyard Project has demonstrated that there is some potential there, donating all its produce to families in the Berkeley area in need). And though I have had the privilege of being able to get a hold of fresh greens most weeks during quarantine—and even to indulge in preparing them according to Waters' instructions, using fresh-cut garlic and oil and a little bit of red pepper—picking at their droopy, past-prime leaves and trying to figure out of which of them are salvageable will always be a reminder of the impossibility of the Alice Waters ideal.

Still, I can't keep coming back to the thought that there is something immensely reassuring about the fruit bowl video, even as someone who is not particularly fond of fruit. On one hand, it feels completely out of step with the reality of most people's experiences; on the other, perhaps because I discovered the video when I did, it feels oddly emblematic of this protracted disruption of life-as-usual, a time when every day feels a little unreal.

Maybe doing something as ridiculously impractical as taking 15 minutes out of your day to build a bowl with the best pieces of fruit you are able to find—or pausing mid-walk to contemplate the way that the trees and the critters that populate them seem to be enjoying this moment without us—can be a way of embracing all that surrealness. And maybe if we're lucky, we'll be able find something enjoyable within it, too.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

[melodymgill49801]

Alice Waters' Fascinating and Infuriating Quest for Perfection

Earlier this month, I spent 15 whole minutes watching Alice Waters talk in extraordinary detail about how to put together the perfect bowl of fruit. No chopping, no sugar, no squeeze of lemon or orange juice to try to brighten the taste of the thing—just a plain old bowl of fruit, curated to highlight whatever is perfectly in season on the particular day on which it is served, which is every day at her decades-spanning farm-to-table Berkeley restaurant, Chez Panisse. "It's a way of being in time and place," she says.

In the video—lesson 12 of the American slow food activist and celebrity chef's course on MasterClass—the season is autumn. Today, the butcher-block island at the center of her home kitchen is covered in persimmons. She mentions that she picks them from the trees in her garden; sometimes, she says, the leaves will "become part of the fruit bowl," too. She grasps one juicy orange orb, cuts a perfect wedge, then brings it to her mouth to taste—batting her lashes at the camera as if to underscore the importance of tasting, that the taste of the fruit changes every day.

"Ooo, definitely, I want to put this on the fruit bowl," she says. Later, after placing a few persimmons and a couple curling leaves in the bowl, she glances forlornly at a bunch of plump, burgundy-colored grapes. "Even though it's a beautiful organic fruit, it doesn't look alive to me," she says. "I'll taste it just to make sure it's not worthy of the fruit bowl."

On the off-chance that quarantine-induced anxiety and incessant targeted advertising ended up convincing you that it was a good idea to shell out for a MasterClass membership this spring, you might have found the most striking thing about this sequence to be the visual aspect: Between the persimmons, pomegranates, and dates of her finished fruit bowl and the cookware on display throughout her kitchen (only wood, iron, and copper, as a rule), you've got a near-complete spectrum of the colors of fall. Or, perhaps, it was Alice Waters' voice that transfixed you: crystalline, drawling, and vaguely mid-Atlantic, like that of women whom you might imagine Kelsey Grammar meeting at the wine club on Frasier, albeit with a noticeable predilection for using the American-English version of words that food people usually say in French, like "rocket" instead of "roquette." (Alice Waters is famous for importing a distinctly French culinary sensibility and re-imagining it as the basis for a new "California cuisine," one that celebrates the links between the food you eat and the soil and the farmers that cultivated it, so this kind of makes sense.)

But for me, it was something else that made this moment indescribably absorbing at a time when I couldn't stop ruminating about lost income and how I was going to find time to clean the house. Like Frasier, which for years has been my go-to sitcom during the moments just before falling asleep, there is something charmingly sedative about these Alice Waters videos—and also absurd, in the way that the customs of coastal white liberals are always pretty ridiculous when you hold them up to scrutiny. Who besides Alice Waters, who has written entire books about fruit, has the luxury of spending a quarter-of-an-hour deciding whether a single Bosc pear proffers just the right ratio of juiciness to crispness, even in the name of her so-called "delicious revolution"? And who—especially right now—has the combined mental bandwidth and reliable produce access to think of fruit not just as something you eat, but a matter of monumental importance?

That disjunct—between the impractibly slow, organic-everything, back-to-the-land lifestyle that Alice Waters has elevated to a gospel, and the material and temporal limits of contemporary life—has made her, as one chef put it to the LA Times, "a kind of lightning rod for Berkeley liberal elitism," while also sparking dialogue about misogynist double standards in the food world, such as in the case of the famous 60 Minutes egg spoon incident. Somewhat winningly, it's a recurring theme in her daughter Fanny Singers' new memoir, Always Home, which compiles recipes from her childhood and teenage years while painting a loving but unsparing picture of what it might actually be like to grow up with Alice Waters as your mom.

Image via Pixabay user DarkWorkX

Though the book could be read as a 300-page tribute to her mother's unyielding passion for nature and aesthetics, the 30-something writer and curator is quick to point out the ways in which Waters' dogmatic approach could render her "disproportionately blinkered, even insensitive to the widely held belief that hers is an unachievable romantic existence." In chapter one, she tells us that the Edible Schoolyard Project, the farming and food education non-profit Waters founded in partnership with the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, was born after the "school's principal called out my mom for publicly maligning its quasi-derelict appearance." She goes on to share an anecdote that pretty perfectly illustrates the tenacity of her mother's obsession: When a preliminary edible schoolyard classroom was erected in a trailer, she was unable to tolerate the "industrial taupe of the prefab kitchen building," and reportedly dipped into her personal savings in order to have it painted aubergine.

Ultimately, though, Always Home is a book that approaches its subject with the same tenderness and curiosity with which her mother inspects the permissions. There's an entire chapter devoted to the smells she associates with her mother: woodsmoke and beeswax candles and the smell of "garlic warming but never burning on a stove"—but also, for the first 25 years of Singer's life, a "hippy drugstore formulation" of almond oil and collagen that she wore in lieu of perfume. And another dedicated to her hands: small and surprisingly soft for a chef, but with a nimbleness that Singer reads as a "mirror of her determination."

As bewitching as these images are, it can be a bit hard to relate to an author whose mother stocked home-made chicken paillard sandwiches and fruit macédoine from the garden in her lunch box and whose childhood adventures in France were turned into an actual children's book called Fanny in France. But if you spend enough time with the book, you start to understand Waters' over-the-topness both as a source of perpetual frustration for those around her and the thing that makes the world of Alice Waters so magnetic. Ultimately, Singer says, her mother's obsessive attention to the color, texture, fragrance, and an elusive ideal of "perfect ripeness" is little more than her own complicated way of expressing love: love for the person she is cooking for (in this case, Singer), and love for the world of farmers and organic vegetables and wild backyard gardens she has spent a career celebrating as both the beginning and end-point of good food. The perfectly in-season fruit bowl emerges as the logical conclusion of that philosophy, its simplicity reminding you that the natural world is the star of the show; the chef is just the person who selects the frame through which you behold it.

Since the coronavirus prompted restaurants throughout the Bay Area to put dine-in service on hold, Waters has been running a CSA subscription program straight out of Chez Panisse, furnishing customers with boxes of organic produce from local farmers suddenly unable to sell their harvest. (After protests against systemic racism erupted across the country following the killing of George Floyd, the restaurant also pledged to expand its network of suppliers to include more Black farmers and "foster relationships with more Black-owned businesses, chefs, and organizations.) She's also also been making occasional appearances in the press, encouraging people to start their own victory garden—a throwback to the World War II tradition she remembers her mother growing when she was a child, and a way to supplement one's pantry with fresh grown things at a time when quality produce can be hard to come by.

It's a sweet idea, if not the most realistic or time-efficient in a year when Americans are poised to experience record levels of food insecurity (though the Edible Schoolyard Project has demonstrated that there is some potential there, donating all its produce to families in the Berkeley area in need). And though I have had the privilege of being able to get a hold of fresh greens most weeks during quarantine—and even to indulge in preparing them according to Waters' instructions, using fresh-cut garlic and oil and a little bit of red pepper—picking at their droopy, past-prime leaves and trying to figure out of which of them are salvageable will always be a reminder of the impossibility of the Alice Waters ideal.

Still, I can't keep coming back to the thought that there is something immensely reassuring about the fruit bowl video, even as someone who is not particularly fond of fruit. On one hand, it feels completely out of step with the reality of most people's experiences; on the other, perhaps because I discovered the video when I did, it feels oddly emblematic of this protracted disruption of life-as-usual, a time when every day feels a little unreal.

Maybe doing something as ridiculously impractical as taking 15 minutes out of your day to build a bowl with the best pieces of fruit you are able to find—or pausing mid-walk to contemplate the way that the trees and the critters that populate them seem to be enjoying this moment without us—can be a way of embracing all that surrealness. And maybe if we're lucky, we'll be able find something enjoyable within it, too.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

[carolinechanson97838]

Alice Waters' Fascinating and Infuriating Quest for Perfection

Earlier this month, I spent 15 whole minutes watching Alice Waters talk in extraordinary detail about how to put together the perfect bowl of fruit. No chopping, no sugar, no squeeze of lemon or orange juice to try to brighten the taste of the thing—just a plain old bowl of fruit, curated to highlight whatever is perfectly in season on the particular day on which it is served, which is every day at her decades-spanning farm-to-table Berkeley restaurant, Chez Panisse. "It's a way of being in time and place," she says.

In the video—lesson 12 of the American slow food activist and celebrity chef's course on MasterClass—the season is autumn. Today, the butcher-block island at the center of her home kitchen is covered in persimmons. She mentions that she picks them from the trees in her garden; sometimes, she says, the leaves will "become part of the fruit bowl," too. She grasps one juicy orange orb, cuts a perfect wedge, then brings it to her mouth to taste—batting her lashes at the camera as if to underscore the importance of tasting, that the taste of the fruit changes every day.

"Ooo, definitely, I want to put this on the fruit bowl," she says. Later, after placing a few persimmons and a couple curling leaves in the bowl, she glances forlornly at a bunch of plump, burgundy-colored grapes. "Even though it's a beautiful organic fruit, it doesn't look alive to me," she says. "I'll taste it just to make sure it's not worthy of the fruit bowl."

On the off-chance that quarantine-induced anxiety and incessant targeted advertising ended up convincing you that it was a good idea to shell out for a MasterClass membership this spring, you might have found the most striking thing about this sequence to be the visual aspect: Between the persimmons, pomegranates, and dates of her finished fruit bowl and the cookware on display throughout her kitchen (only wood, iron, and copper, as a rule), you've got a near-complete spectrum of the colors of fall. Or, perhaps, it was Alice Waters' voice that transfixed you: crystalline, drawling, and vaguely mid-Atlantic, like that of women whom you might imagine Kelsey Grammar meeting at the wine club on Frasier, albeit with a noticeable predilection for using the American-English version of words that food people usually say in French, like "rocket" instead of "roquette." (Alice Waters is famous for importing a distinctly French culinary sensibility and re-imagining it as the basis for a new "California cuisine," one that celebrates the links between the food you eat and the soil and the farmers that cultivated it, so this kind of makes sense.)

But for me, it was something else that made this moment indescribably absorbing at a time when I couldn't stop ruminating about lost income and how I was going to find time to clean the house. Like Frasier, which for years has been my go-to sitcom during the moments just before falling asleep, there is something charmingly sedative about these Alice Waters videos—and also absurd, in the way that the customs of coastal white liberals are always pretty ridiculous when you hold them up to scrutiny. Who besides Alice Waters, who has written entire books about fruit, has the luxury of spending a quarter-of-an-hour deciding whether a single Bosc pear proffers just the right ratio of juiciness to crispness, even in the name of her so-called "delicious revolution"? And who—especially right now—has the combined mental bandwidth and reliable produce access to think of fruit not just as something you eat, but a matter of monumental importance?

That disjunct—between the impractibly slow, organic-everything, back-to-the-land lifestyle that Alice Waters has elevated to a gospel, and the material and temporal limits of contemporary life—has made her, as one chef put it to the LA Times, "a kind of lightning rod for Berkeley liberal elitism," while also sparking dialogue about misogynist double standards in the food world, such as in the case of the famous 60 Minutes egg spoon incident. Somewhat winningly, it's a recurring theme in her daughter Fanny Singers' new memoir, Always Home, which compiles recipes from her childhood and teenage years while painting a loving but unsparing picture of what it might actually be like to grow up with Alice Waters as your mom.

Image via Pixabay user DarkWorkX

Though the book could be read as a 300-page tribute to her mother's unyielding passion for nature and aesthetics, the 30-something writer and curator is quick to point out the ways in which Waters' dogmatic approach could render her "disproportionately blinkered, even insensitive to the widely held belief that hers is an unachievable romantic existence." In chapter one, she tells us that the Edible Schoolyard Project, the farming and food education non-profit Waters founded in partnership with the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, was born after the "school's principal called out my mom for publicly maligning its quasi-derelict appearance." She goes on to share an anecdote that pretty perfectly illustrates the tenacity of her mother's obsession: When a preliminary edible schoolyard classroom was erected in a trailer, she was unable to tolerate the "industrial taupe of the prefab kitchen building," and reportedly dipped into her personal savings in order to have it painted aubergine.

Ultimately, though, Always Home is a book that approaches its subject with the same tenderness and curiosity with which her mother inspects the permissions. There's an entire chapter devoted to the smells she associates with her mother: woodsmoke and beeswax candles and the smell of "garlic warming but never burning on a stove"—but also, for the first 25 years of Singer's life, a "hippy drugstore formulation" of almond oil and collagen that she wore in lieu of perfume. And another dedicated to her hands: small and surprisingly soft for a chef, but with a nimbleness that Singer reads as a "mirror of her determination."

As bewitching as these images are, it can be a bit hard to relate to an author whose mother stocked home-made chicken paillard sandwiches and fruit macédoine from the garden in her lunch box and whose childhood adventures in France were turned into an actual children's book called Fanny in France. But if you spend enough time with the book, you start to understand Waters' over-the-topness both as a source of perpetual frustration for those around her and the thing that makes the world of Alice Waters so magnetic. Ultimately, Singer says, her mother's obsessive attention to the color, texture, fragrance, and an elusive ideal of "perfect ripeness" is little more than her own complicated way of expressing love: love for the person she is cooking for (in this case, Singer), and love for the world of farmers and organic vegetables and wild backyard gardens she has spent a career celebrating as both the beginning and end-point of good food. The perfectly in-season fruit bowl emerges as the logical conclusion of that philosophy, its simplicity reminding you that the natural world is the star of the show; the chef is just the person who selects the frame through which you behold it.

Since the coronavirus prompted restaurants throughout the Bay Area to put dine-in service on hold, Waters has been running a CSA subscription program straight out of Chez Panisse, furnishing customers with boxes of organic produce from local farmers suddenly unable to sell their harvest. (After protests against systemic racism erupted across the country following the killing of George Floyd, the restaurant also pledged to expand its network of suppliers to include more Black farmers and "foster relationships with more Black-owned businesses, chefs, and organizations.) She's also also been making occasional appearances in the press, encouraging people to start their own victory garden—a throwback to the World War II tradition she remembers her mother growing when she was a child, and a way to supplement one's pantry with fresh grown things at a time when quality produce can be hard to come by.

It's a sweet idea, if not the most realistic or time-efficient in a year when Americans are poised to experience record levels of food insecurity (though the Edible Schoolyard Project has demonstrated that there is some potential there, donating all its produce to families in the Berkeley area in need). And though I have had the privilege of being able to get a hold of fresh greens most weeks during quarantine—and even to indulge in preparing them according to Waters' instructions, using fresh-cut garlic and oil and a little bit of red pepper—picking at their droopy, past-prime leaves and trying to figure out of which of them are salvageable will always be a reminder of the impossibility of the Alice Waters ideal.

Still, I can't keep coming back to the thought that there is something immensely reassuring about the fruit bowl video, even as someone who is not particularly fond of fruit. On one hand, it feels completely out of step with the reality of most people's experiences; on the other, perhaps because I discovered the video when I did, it feels oddly emblematic of this protracted disruption of life-as-usual, a time when every day feels a little unreal.

Maybe doing something as ridiculously impractical as taking 15 minutes out of your day to build a bowl with the best pieces of fruit you are able to find—or pausing mid-walk to contemplate the way that the trees and the critters that populate them seem to be enjoying this moment without us—can be a way of embracing all that surrealness. And maybe if we're lucky, we'll be able find something enjoyable within it, too.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

[latoyajkelson70506]

Alice Waters' Fascinating and Infuriating Quest for Perfection

Earlier this month, I spent 15 whole minutes watching Alice Waters talk in extraordinary detail about how to put together the perfect bowl of fruit. No chopping, no sugar, no squeeze of lemon or orange juice to try to brighten the taste of the thing—just a plain old bowl of fruit, curated to highlight whatever is perfectly in season on the particular day on which it is served, which is every day at her decades-spanning farm-to-table Berkeley restaurant, Chez Panisse. "It's a way of being in time and place," she says.

In the video—lesson 12 of the American slow food activist and celebrity chef's course on MasterClass—the season is autumn. Today, the butcher-block island at the center of her home kitchen is covered in persimmons. She mentions that she picks them from the trees in her garden; sometimes, she says, the leaves will "become part of the fruit bowl," too. She grasps one juicy orange orb, cuts a perfect wedge, then brings it to her mouth to taste—batting her lashes at the camera as if to underscore the importance of tasting, that the taste of the fruit changes every day.

"Ooo, definitely, I want to put this on the fruit bowl," she says. Later, after placing a few persimmons and a couple curling leaves in the bowl, she glances forlornly at a bunch of plump, burgundy-colored grapes. "Even though it's a beautiful organic fruit, it doesn't look alive to me," she says. "I'll taste it just to make sure it's not worthy of the fruit bowl."

On the off-chance that quarantine-induced anxiety and incessant targeted advertising ended up convincing you that it was a good idea to shell out for a MasterClass membership this spring, you might have found the most striking thing about this sequence to be the visual aspect: Between the persimmons, pomegranates, and dates of her finished fruit bowl and the cookware on display throughout her kitchen (only wood, iron, and copper, as a rule), you've got a near-complete spectrum of the colors of fall. Or, perhaps, it was Alice Waters' voice that transfixed you: crystalline, drawling, and vaguely mid-Atlantic, like that of women whom you might imagine Kelsey Grammar meeting at the wine club on Frasier, albeit with a noticeable predilection for using the American-English version of words that food people usually say in French, like "rocket" instead of "roquette." (Alice Waters is famous for importing a distinctly French culinary sensibility and re-imagining it as the basis for a new "California cuisine," one that celebrates the links between the food you eat and the soil and the farmers that cultivated it, so this kind of makes sense.)

But for me, it was something else that made this moment indescribably absorbing at a time when I couldn't stop ruminating about lost income and how I was going to find time to clean the house. Like Frasier, which for years has been my go-to sitcom during the moments just before falling asleep, there is something charmingly sedative about these Alice Waters videos—and also absurd, in the way that the customs of coastal white liberals are always pretty ridiculous when you hold them up to scrutiny. Who besides Alice Waters, who has written entire books about fruit, has the luxury of spending a quarter-of-an-hour deciding whether a single Bosc pear proffers just the right ratio of juiciness to crispness, even in the name of her so-called "delicious revolution"? And who—especially right now—has the combined mental bandwidth and reliable produce access to think of fruit not just as something you eat, but a matter of monumental importance?

That disjunct—between the impractibly slow, organic-everything, back-to-the-land lifestyle that Alice Waters has elevated to a gospel, and the material and temporal limits of contemporary life—has made her, as one chef put it to the LA Times, "a kind of lightning rod for Berkeley liberal elitism," while also sparking dialogue about misogynist double standards in the food world, such as in the case of the famous 60 Minutes egg spoon incident. Somewhat winningly, it's a recurring theme in her daughter Fanny Singers' new memoir, Always Home, which compiles recipes from her childhood and teenage years while painting a loving but unsparing picture of what it might actually be like to grow up with Alice Waters as your mom.

Image via Pixabay user DarkWorkX

Though the book could be read as a 300-page tribute to her mother's unyielding passion for nature and aesthetics, the 30-something writer and curator is quick to point out the ways in which Waters' dogmatic approach could render her "disproportionately blinkered, even insensitive to the widely held belief that hers is an unachievable romantic existence." In chapter one, she tells us that the Edible Schoolyard Project, the farming and food education non-profit Waters founded in partnership with the Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, was born after the "school's principal called out my mom for publicly maligning its quasi-derelict appearance." She goes on to share an anecdote that pretty perfectly illustrates the tenacity of her mother's obsession: When a preliminary edible schoolyard classroom was erected in a trailer, she was unable to tolerate the "industrial taupe of the prefab kitchen building," and reportedly dipped into her personal savings in order to have it painted aubergine.

Ultimately, though, Always Home is a book that approaches its subject with the same tenderness and curiosity with which her mother inspects the permissions. There's an entire chapter devoted to the smells she associates with her mother: woodsmoke and beeswax candles and the smell of "garlic warming but never burning on a stove"—but also, for the first 25 years of Singer's life, a "hippy drugstore formulation" of almond oil and collagen that she wore in lieu of perfume. And another dedicated to her hands: small and surprisingly soft for a chef, but with a nimbleness that Singer reads as a "mirror of her determination."

As bewitching as these images are, it can be a bit hard to relate to an author whose mother stocked home-made chicken paillard sandwiches and fruit macédoine from the garden in her lunch box and whose childhood adventures in France were turned into an actual children's book called Fanny in France. But if you spend enough time with the book, you start to understand Waters' over-the-topness both as a source of perpetual frustration for those around her and the thing that makes the world of Alice Waters so magnetic. Ultimately, Singer says, her mother's obsessive attention to the color, texture, fragrance, and an elusive ideal of "perfect ripeness" is little more than her own complicated way of expressing love: love for the person she is cooking for (in this case, Singer), and love for the world of farmers and organic vegetables and wild backyard gardens she has spent a career celebrating as both the beginning and end-point of good food. The perfectly in-season fruit bowl emerges as the logical conclusion of that philosophy, its simplicity reminding you that the natural world is the star of the show; the chef is just the person who selects the frame through which you behold it.

Since the coronavirus prompted restaurants throughout the Bay Area to put dine-in service on hold, Waters has been running a CSA subscription program straight out of Chez Panisse, furnishing customers with boxes of organic produce from local farmers suddenly unable to sell their harvest. (After protests against systemic racism erupted across the country following the killing of George Floyd, the restaurant also pledged to expand its network of suppliers to include more Black farmers and "foster relationships with more Black-owned businesses, chefs, and organizations.) She's also also been making occasional appearances in the press, encouraging people to start their own victory garden—a throwback to the World War II tradition she remembers her mother growing when she was a child, and a way to supplement one's pantry with fresh grown things at a time when quality produce can be hard to come by.

It's a sweet idea, if not the most realistic or time-efficient in a year when Americans are poised to experience record levels of food insecurity (though the Edible Schoolyard Project has demonstrated that there is some potential there, donating all its produce to families in the Berkeley area in need). And though I have had the privilege of being able to get a hold of fresh greens most weeks during quarantine—and even to indulge in preparing them according to Waters' instructions, using fresh-cut garlic and oil and a little bit of red pepper—picking at their droopy, past-prime leaves and trying to figure out of which of them are salvageable will always be a reminder of the impossibility of the Alice Waters ideal.

Still, I can't keep coming back to the thought that there is something immensely reassuring about the fruit bowl video, even as someone who is not particularly fond of fruit. On one hand, it feels completely out of step with the reality of most people's experiences; on the other, perhaps because I discovered the video when I did, it feels oddly emblematic of this protracted disruption of life-as-usual, a time when every day feels a little unreal.

Maybe doing something as ridiculously impractical as taking 15 minutes out of your day to build a bowl with the best pieces of fruit you are able to find—or pausing mid-walk to contemplate the way that the trees and the critters that populate them seem to be enjoying this moment without us—can be a way of embracing all that surrealness. And maybe if we're lucky, we'll be able find something enjoyable within it, too.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

[ragnell]

Laura Palmer in the Lodge, Persephone in the Underworld

So, today Twin Peaks season three is coming out and in preparation I've been watching the old show and the movie, and thinking about Laura.

Also there's this post going around Tumblr claiming that the original Eleusis tradition is that Persephone ran off with Hades and so on.. and other ones fighting over Hades and Persephone and the wokeness of the couple and so on... and just about all of them miss a fundamental truth about both deities, which is that there's a certain amount of metaphor involved in each story. (I say this as someone particularly defensive of Hades in pop culture, I think using him as a villain is usually a sign the writer can't reconcile their own fear of death with the pantheon they're pulling from, and it almost always involves graphing an unsuitable personality onto him.)

And however you tell it, to preserve the power of Persephone's story her entrance to the Underworld must be a sudden, terrifying, violent experience. It is a metaphor for death but also for the traumatic, lifechanging experiences that damage a person's outlook to the point it feels like they've died and started a new, dark, hopeless existence.

Persephone's story always involves an element of choice, but that choice is made within the Underworld. She chooses to eat the pomegranate seeds. She, after weeks of refusing the food of the dead for fear she can't return to Earth and regain her own life, accepts that she's died. Accepts that this trauma has happened to her and there's no going back. And in some tellings she tries to hide it, because she does get a chance to return, but in the end she ends up bound to the Underworld for at least part of the time.

However... there's a difference. Her time there, until she ate the seeds, was as a prisoner. When she returns she's the Queen. She's always there, and she becomes an advocate and ally for the heroes who take the Underworld quest.

People read this story and come up with the impression that it's a grand injustice, and that's another thing I hate about pop culture writers. Thgey like to portray her as a prisoner forever at times. But the story itself is not just a metaphor for the seasons, its a metaphor for undergoing trauma. She is a prisoner after the event, until she accepts that it's happened. She returns home, but she's forever changed. Part of her belongs in that dark world, and the experience gives her wisdom and allows her to help others through the same situation. From accepting the truth of her life, she takes a position of power and authority.

(There are more scholarly books on the subject if you'd like a more detailed and better presented argument.)

Not accusing everybody of missing this aspect, just noticing that it's not present in the Persephone posts I've seen floating by.

But what does this have to do with Laura Palmer and Twin Peaks? Its spoilery, so I'll tell you below the cut.

When we first see Laura in Twin Peaks, she's obviously the deceased flower maiden. Everyone remembers how beautiful and full of life she was, they all loved her and she was stolen from them. But that's not how we meet her. When we first meet Laura in Twin Peaks, she is in the Red Room, in Cooper's Dream. Instead of being a dead girl with whitish plastic framing her still face, she's a smiling woman in a regal black robe.

Later we learn that the Red Room is the waiting room for the Black and/or White Lodge(s), and part of the Otherworld/Underworld in the Twin Peaks universee. Laura is introduced by the Man From Another Place as his cousin, and she offers Cooper clues about her last night alive as well as telling him who killed her.

The Man From Another Place (MFAP) is consistently presented as the highest authority in the Lodge that we've met. In FWWM, he is of equal rank with a grievance against or outright outranking Killer BOB. He introduces Laura as a cousin, probably as a hint about Madeline Ferguson but it also gives the impression she is a member of the MFAP's household.

During the season two finale, during Cooper's challenge, Laura is one of the spirits who arrives to offer him guidance. She gives him the infamous "Meanwhile" gesture, which some fans have identified as the "Fear Not" mudra (which would ahve meaning to Cooper, given his preoccupation with Tibetan religion) and would be the most helpful advice for getting out of the Black Lodge.

Laura, in the physical world, is a cold corpse, the woman in the refrigerator, the object that starts the investigation, causes angst to the whole town and brings the hero into the story. She had a secret life, went through pure hell and trauma before her violent, horrific, torturous death. But Laura in the spirit world is at peace, and more than that active in the aftermath of her death by offering clues, advice and guidance to the man there to solve it.

Furthermore, the element of choice in Persephone's story is also there in FWWM, as is the marriage aspect. The Owl Cave Ring that appears to be associated with death, that she's warned not to take. The Owl Cave Ring that MFAP holds up saying "With This Ring, I Thee Wed" during the convenience store meeting. The trauma of Laura's existence, the hell that she is trapped in reaches a climax and threatens to strip her of all free will so she accepts the ring. She accepts this metaphorical marriage to MFAP, and death, is murdered by Killer BOB. and afterwards, she is in the Lodge, in that black robe, looking like a grown woman and not a girl on the cusp of womanhood, at peace, comforted, and laughing with joy at her angel.

Effectively, Laura Palmer is a modern American Persephone. She is dragged through trauma and death, warred over by two different spirits, she makes the final choice and accepts what she's been through as a part of her, and lives on in the Underworld to guide other heroes through these trials.

This is reinforced by the fact that living (or spirit) Laura is also the most intense presence of the series. She's introduced as a being of pure, peaceful stillness, which is reinforced with her picture on the end credits of every show, which allows every scene she's actually in to take on a power and passion by contrast. Cuts of Sheryl Lee screaming in Ronnette's flashbacks and during Cooper's trial have a power beyond that of normal scream queen because we are so used to her frozen, tranquil face during the closing credits.

This, as well as other aspects of Laura's story (being worthy of an angel and a place in heaven even if you are a "fallen woman"; loss of innocence spreading from person to person; darkness and light being integral parts of being a whole person) is part of what makes her so iconic. Laura's never been just a corpse on the screen, she's been a supernatural force and the spirit of her town. She's the goddess of Twin Peaks, embodying that marriage of opposing forces that made the series so special.

[phynxrizng]

7 BAD - ASS CHICKS OF MYTHOLOGY

LIFESTYLE 7 BAD-ASS CHICKS OF MYTHOLOGY.

FIGHTING A BATTLE? HOOK UP WITH A WARRIOR GODDESS LIFESTYLE

WITCH APRIL 20, 2016

   by Renée Damoiselle

Sometimes in life it feels like we can use a little support!  We fight battles every day, don’t we?

Some of them are quite literal battles and some are more metaphorical.  Whatever you’re struggling with, working on, fearing or reaching for, there is a Goddess who can help.

Set forth below are brief descriptions of 7 Warrior Goddesses and the reasons you might want to work with them.   If you can’t seem to find your own power in any given situation, borrow a bit from one of these amazing Ladies.  I’ll give you some tips on how to do that.

But first, let’s get down a few basics.

When I say “working with a goddess” (or working with any deity for that matter), what I’m talking about is building a relationship with that entity.

Whether you believe the gods and goddesses to be actual autonomous supernatural entities or simply believe these mythologies represent psychological archetypes, they can be extremely useful to you in your endeavors.

Alright.  If you’re going to do battle, you need a few rules of engagement.

The first thing I’m going to lay on you, my witchy friends, is some really powerful shit.  Magic Words.  Yup,  You need some specific Magic Words to deal with deity.

When I teach this subject in person, I usually put the question out to the crowd.  “What are the Magic Words?”  … Usually the response is … crickets.

If there is an audience member under the age of 10 and if I prod enough, generally that child will eventually raise her hand and say… “um… Please and Thank You?”     YES Little magical child!  Yes!  Please and Thank You!

The point is, we approach deity with respect and gratitude.  We are building relationships here, asking favors.  It’s a little different from what most Americans normally think of as prayer.  It’s not one-sided.  Remember that and you’ll be alright.

Also, the Goddesses set forth below all have very rich mythologies and there are differing opinions on what mythologies apply to them and what may have been more recently made up or blended with other deities.  PLEASE, do some research!

This quick overview is intended to give you some idea of which goddesses you may want to work with.

It is not intended as the final word.  If you find yourself attracted to a particular warrior based on these descriptions, then get more information on her. Do your research with a sincere desire to get to know her in your heart.  This will move you forward in your relationship.

I’m going to give you some basic ideas about offerings, altar spaces and ritual practice.  Experiment with these things.  There is no hard and fast right or wrong in these practices.  You will slowly get to know these entities and how they communicate with you!  If you approach with respect and sincerity you will be well received.

And before we get into the goddess stories, I want to offer you one more word about requesting the presence of the goddess for your ritual, prayer, meditation or offering.

You can invoke a deity by requesting its presence and lighting a candle and paying attention to the energies around you.  This implies inviting the goddess IN from somewhere else (her own realm, I guess).  And this is fine.

But you’d do well – and, I believe, find yourself much more empowered in the long run, to EVOKE the goddess.  This is the practice of bringing her into your presence from where she truly resides…. Inside of you!

“If that which thou seekest, thou findest not within thee, thou wilt never find it without.”  ~ Doreen Valiente.

If you’re not familiar with that quote… please – do yourself a huge favor and Google it.  You will not be disappointed.

And now… on to our Goddesses!

1. Athena

Do you need a great strategy for your battle?  An intellectual approach?  Do you need to curb those emotions?  Athena might be the Lady for you. I think she’s perfect for someone going through a divorce or other court battle.

The Greek goddess, Athena, is usually portrayed as one of the most benevolent goddesses.  “Athena – Goddess of Wisdom” is known for her superb logic and intellect.

A supreme strategist, She helped Perseus defeat the Gorgon.  She is always on the side of the Hero trying to accomplish the impossible.

If Athena were to wear a button on her …. well, her breast-plate, it would read “Keep Calm and Reason On!”

If you are on a hero’s quest or in need of cool-headed assessment of a battle …. Athena is the lady to call upon.  Honor her with images of owls, shields and spears, also with artisanal creations including writing, weaving and metal-craft.  Her candle should be royal blue or gold.

2. The Morrigan

While Athena keeps us detached and calculating, there is no doubt that sometimes a bit of a fierce, powerful, passionate rage is what is called for.

Are you a bit “Goth”?  Do images of ravens appeal to you.  Do you LOOOOVE to wear all black?   This Celtic goddess might be for you.  The Morrigan is definitely a witch’s goddess.  She’s all about magic and spell-craft and getting what you want.

She’s been known by many names including (but not limited to)  Morrigu, Morgain, Morgan,  Lady of the Lake.

Our dear Morrigan embodies the phrase, “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” She is known for endurance and fierceness in battle.  Among her magical talents are shape-shifting and prophecy.

If the Morrigan were to wear a button on her breastplate it would read, “Quoth the Raven, Nevermore.”

If you are drawn to the Morrigan’s power, honor her with images of crows, ravens, bones and blood.   Her candle should be black or red.

3. Brigid

There are so many issues that this goddess can help with, it’s difficult to boil them down.  Are you an activist?  A medical professional? A poet? A blacksmith? A mother who has suffered the loss of a child?

See what I mean?  Brigid’s mythology covers such a broad spectrum of life experiences that she can almost suit anyone at any time in their lives.

Brigid, sometimes called Brighd, Bride, Brid, is the Celtic Lady of the Flames: As the warrior she embodies the concept of Fire in so many ways encompassing the other elements as well.

She is often associated with the Forge and metal-craft (Fire meets earth).  In this aspect, she can help with the process of the “Self-forge”.  This concept compares the trials and difficulties of life with the smithing of weaponry.

The blade of a sword is repeatedly plunged into the fire and heated almost to the point of destruction and then plunged into water to cool.  This process is called tempering and it strengthens the blade.  Call upon Brigid if you’re going through the fire.

Brigid is also seen as a compassionate healer (Fire meets water). She was said to have talent with herbal healing.

In her aspect as inspiration for poets and writers (Fire meets air) she can help you finish a book or give you inspiration for the lyrics for your next hit song.

In any endeavor Brigid can provide the passion to remain steadfast and perseverant in your quest.

If Brigid were to wear a button on her breastplate it would read, “All Fired Up!”

To honor her, use poetry or anything hand crafted. Images of serpents, calves and ewes are also appropriate.  Her candle should be purple.

To help with your research, I highly recommend this wonderful, in-depth book about Brigid, if you are interested in working with her:   Brigid: History, Mystery and Magick of the Celtic Goddess by Courtney Weber

4. Sekhmet

Do you fear the label, “bitch”, so often applied to feminists and strong women?  Do you need to be more assertive?  Or, alternatively, do you claim that persona and wear it proudly? Are you on the battlefield of today’s feminist movement?

Sekhmet, the Egyptian lioness goddess might just be for you.  Her name means “Powerful”.  Fierce and gracious, regal and deadly, She embodies the traits of instinct, temper, death & destruction.  Sekhmet’s breath represented a hot desert wind, and her body was the glare of the midday sun.

She was called “The Great Harlot” in the Book Of Revelations because she represents that aspect of the limitless power in women that terrifies patriarchy!  She is the bitch to embrace!  Don’t deny her or her aspect of yourself.

If Sekhmet were to wear a button on her breastplate, it would read, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of my desert!”

If you recognize something of yourself in this goddess, honor her with images of Lions, the sun,  blood and pomegranate flavored beer.  Her candle should be golden/tan (like the color of a lion or the golden desert) or blood red.

5. Durga

Are you battling something that appears to be insurmountable?  Have you already approached the enemy from a variety of angles to no avail?  You may want to call on Durga.

One of my students recently pointed out that Durga is the goddess of the right tool for the job.  And she is!  With a thousand arms and a different weapon in each, Durga can vanquish any demon, even a shape-shifting one!

Her mythology puts her at the very height of the Hindu pantheon.

Durga was formed by the concentrated will of all the existing gods.  They created her in response to a demon they could not destroy, which threatened their utter destruction… so naturally, they created a GoddESS to take care of it! She cannot be defeated.

If Durga were to wear a button on her breastplate, it would read, “Whatever Doesn’t Kill Me Better Run!”

Honor her with images of lotus flowers, lions or tigers, anything golden, bright and reflective.  Her candle should be white and multiple wicked!

6. Freya

Teachers, witches learning spell-craft, would be seductresses, you may hear the call of the lovely Freya.

Freya, sometimes Freyja, is the Norse Queen of The Valkyries – entitled to half of the fallen heroes on the battlefield.

She taught the spell-craft of the Runes to the Gods, including Odin.  Freya’s mythology includes tales of her irresistible beauty.  Her mythology includes tales of unbridled sexuality and even stories which depict her trading sexual favors for a particularly powerful talisman.

The goddess Freya reminds us to explore and acknowledge all of our emotions, longings, and traits, even those we wish we didn’t possess.  If you love Aphrodite and/or Venus – but want a strong warrior essence along with the love aspect…Freya is a great choice.

If Freya wore a button on her breastplate, it would read, “No Regrets!”

She follows heart… who cares what others think? Do you need this? Honor her with Flowers and Music (as she SO values beauty!) Amber and Gold, images of falcons or cats … (a pair of blue lynx drew her chariot!)  Her candle should be the color of passion!  Red!

7. Kali

Are you ready to get real with yourself?  Doing some Shadow work, or simply trying to uncover some deep truth in your own nature?  If you are NOT into coddling, Kali may be your lady.

Kali is equated with the eternal night, as the transcendent power of time, so named because she devours kala (time) and then resumes her own dark formlessness. Kali represents the “enfolded order” in modern physics.  She is the formless void, yet full of potential.

Her frightening depictions are misleading, because she brings liberation from shadow, which is the highest form of compassion. The goddess of tough love, Kali is in your face, but on your side. She can provide you with courage to face the truth and also to release yourself from the false self  – the ego.

If Kali wore a button on her breastplate (well.. actually, on her necklace of skulls) – it would read, “The truth shall set you free; but first, it will piss you off!”

Honor her with images of skulls, swords or dance in her honor (a frenzied, ecstatic type of dance). Her candle and altar should be black.

There you have it, warriors of the world!  Now go forth and be Bad-Ass, with a little help from the Ladies here!

Source About the Author:

Renée Damoiselle is a Worldly Wise Crone Witch with personal ties to warrior deities. Her “raised eyebrow” style of Truth-Telling enables her clients to face the realities of their challenges and triumphs with confidence and humor (each when necessary). Renée offers divination and coaching combining Cartomancy, Reiki, Skrying, Mediumship and a healthy dose of good old common sense. She also offers many workshops and talks and facilitates women’s spiritual retreats. Friend her on Facebook.

The next Goddess Retreat will take place in Sedona, AZ in May 2016! It’s going to be awesome! E-mail AffordableSedonaRetreat@gmail.com for more information and a FREE GIFT! For more about Renée, read her blog.

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WITCH exists to nourish magic in the world through shadow integration and shamelessness done with an awareness of “as within, so without - as above, so below."rnrnTo write for us and reach an audience of thousands, please send submissions to assistant editor Karolina Boldt at badwitcheseditor@gmail.com. rnrn

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[shivu14]

The Colour of Pomegranates by Peter Balakian- a short review

Here is my poetry review of the Colour of Pomegranates, by award- winning poet Peter Balakian, the winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for poetry. This is shaping out to be one of my favourite poems of 2017. 

Pomegranates are a mix of the colours garnet and currant. Its not a traditional brighter and lighter crimson or scarlet colour, like we perceive. Peter Balakian uses this chromatic imagery to bring out the darkness of the colour of Pomegranates. The poem alludes to a similar type of symbolism as Balakian commences by evocatively describing the tranquility and the beauty of the nature around him in a place called Capuya. The poem may even be allegorical to Armenian culture at that point of time as there was a controversial soviet movie that was released in 1969 with the same name. That aside, the main objective of the poet is to draw a line of demarkation between the natural world he sees around him and what he witnesses on the streets and sees in the people. Not very surprisingly, there is a striking difference between these two aspects. The poet remarks on the mountains, the skies, the hills and the wind, each aspect a verse of two lines in the 17-line long poem. The recurring chromatic imagery throughout the poem serves to reaffirm the beauty and glory of the atmosphere around him. Some examples are ‘brown river’ ‘rouge on a women’s cheek’, ‘pink and blue bed sheets’ etc. The personification that is furthermore, employed in each of these beautifully crafted expressions makes the poem come alive and exacerbates the comparison that the writer is striving to make throughout the course of the poem. He ends his gushing of the natural surroundings around him with a celebratory note in the phrase,’if one could  etch in wine’, The second half of the poem then goes on to reflect on the grimy and almost ghastly streets. The intensity of his description and his writing seems to wane, with the mood of the personna in the poem. The goats seem to be surrounded by rubbish, a symbol of the hate, malice and polluted world in the wider spectrum. The ‘sand leaves’ emphasise the unhealthy and thin leaves that have grown weak and feeble owing to the burden of human influence. In the wider sense, the leaves and garbage are metaphors for the cruel world where vulnerable people are crippled and harmed. The hate in the world has left them weak and unguarded. After being dazzled and ensnared by the beauty of nature and the dynamism and forces of nature, the poet is saddened and heart broken by what he sees in the land inhabited by man and what it has been reduced to. The hills he only saw a short while back seem ‘distant’. He has to live with his people, amidst the dirty streets, grief and plague. Don’t we all? 

[topbeautifulwomens]

#The #Passion #of #Pomegranates #bfirstapparel #farmasi #fashionblog #girlfriend #instamakeup #instapic #makeover #modelling #pled #water

Why are we so enthusiasmate concerning Pomegranates? They are bizarre searching, pricey, difficult to spell, difficult to eat and messy; the juice will stain almost everything aspherical you; particularly your mouth, your fingers and your cwhole lothes. But, much of the inhabitants seems to be to be ingesting in, decorating with, smearing on and salivating earlier mentioned this peculiar fruit in one way or an additional. If ever there ended up this kind of a thing as a designer fruit, the Pomegranate would be it. No fruit has completed far more to substitute the planet of produce than the Pomegranate and even more amazing is its far-obtaining approval.

A native of Persia, the Pomegranate is one of the oldest end result acknowledged to man and its origins can be traced back again to almost 4000 B.C. Due to the fact its humble beginnings, this historical fruit has been shrouded in controversy, intrigue and imageism. Historians feel the Pomegrante, not the apple, was the forbidden fruit that tempted Eve on that fateful working day in the Backyard of Eden. During its hitale, the Pomegranate has experienced a significant influence on faith, mythology, art and literature and it has influenced a lot of poets, composers, painters and sculptors to create amazing operates. The title “Pomegranate” is derived from the Heart French phrases, pomme and garnete, which interprets to seeded apple, and owing its’ over abundance of seeds, and rounded form, the Pomegranate has lengthy been a symbol of fertility and new existence.

These days the Pomegranate is symbolic of good flavor and good health. Whilst it is currently making the most of a super-meal superstar popularity, after it originally resurfaced, and was nominated as “fruit of the yr” in The Top American Recipes 1999; most assumed it was absolutely nothing more than a passing trend however in accordance to the Countrywide Cafe Affiliation, Pomegranates are nonetheless a sizzling food vogue for 2007. “There is certainly no denying that the pomegranate has designed a replaceation for currently being elegant,” mentioned Pam Holmgren, Boss of Company Communications at Pom Fantastic in Los Angeles. “The Pomegranate is highly regarded not entirely for its taste but for its many health positive aspects, which helps make it not only trendy, but a rediscovery that is here to remain.”

Just before Pom Wonderful’s launching of its intense market placeing marketing campaign in 2002, most People in america had minor body of reference with the elusive Pomegranate. It had been significantly underutilized and was most frequently viewed as a garnish, centerpiece or table accessory. But thanks to POM’s thorough exposure on the candy-tart essence and dietary benefit of Pomegranates, Americans are embracing this now popular fruit and integrating it into their resides. The Pomegranate has become the most functional produce on the planet; lending its unique taste, beautiful coloration and luscious scent to everything from burritos to human body butter. Its uniqueness and independence makes it fun to experiment with, and because of its brilliant shade of red, crunchy texture and intense flavor, anything manufactured with Pomegranate makes a assertion which is why arbiters of taste like Starbucks and Oprah, and cooks and residence cooks include additional this vibrant and curious fruit to their culinary repertoires.

Barbara Hulick CEC, Director of Functions for Clean Cuts at Purchase Fresh Income in Las Vegas, grew up on Pomegranates. “I was excited when Pomegranates made a comeback, not only as a produce seller but because they taste so good and they are so good for you. Pomegranates are the new ‘cranberry’. Many years back, cranberries and cranberry juice were all the rage because of the taste and wholesome qualities, and now, with all the buzz about anti-oxidants, the Pomegranate is the ‘prince among produce’. During period, we’ve a substantial call for them from the Accommodations for their dining establishments and banquet centers, and as well from a lot of neighborhood locations about city, and because you can freeze them clean, you can enjoy the seeds and the juice year round”.

With the greater commonity of the Pomegranate, it is regrettable that they’ve such a brief shelf. Dependent on in which you live, this “Jewel of Winter season”, is cultivated in hotter climates globally and is only obtainable fresh about 6 months out of the year; from August to November or Oct to January but for the duration of that time you can uncover them in appetizers to desserts and everything in in between. “I love cooking with fresh Pomegranates”, said Chef Mark Hopper, Chef de Delicacies, from Bouchon; Chef Thomas Keller’s award-successful Bistro in the Venetian Hotel. “They are extremely healthier and versatile, and they provide added dimension to any dish. Fresh Pomegranates are a labor of love but well worth the energy. After they’re in season, I use them in assorted dishes, especially in our house made Duck Prosciutto made with Marshall Farms Honey Roasted Quince. Luckily, the juice can be appreciated year round in such savory liquids as marinades, dressings, glazes and sauces. The Pomegranate has done much to change the world of cooking; it has an outstanding flavor mix and it enables chefs like me to create new dishes with great preferences and beautiful shows”.

Aside from its taste, vibrant color and health-protective outcomes, men and women are romantic about the Pomegranate for its aphrodisiacs properties. Meal and sexual intercourse often go hand-in-hand and taking in a succulent Pomegranate in the uncooked or introducing it to foodstuff and beverages can be a recipe for romance. Depending on the dimensions, this apple look-alike, with its leathery pores and skin and distinctive crown, can hang up to 800 seeds; the heavier it is, the more juice it consists of and as this juice oozes out; the sweet and tangy flavor combination will explode in your mouth and wake up your taste buds. “The pomegranate is one of the sexiest foods on earth”, said Amy Reiley, Learn of Gastronomy from Le Cordon Bleu and the writer of Daily life of Reiley. “Its crimson shade is the color of prefer. They’re messy and sticky, and because there is certainly no other way to eat a pomegranate than with your fingers, the act of consuming the juicy little seeds gets a sensuous act of perform”.

In purchase to attract the calls for of the more subtle, urbane and health-mindful consumer, food manureal truthurers need to continually develop new and innovative goods. Present day complicated consumers are looking to whet their appetites with a little of the unique, erotic and imprecise, and they are strenuous liquid libations that are aesthetically tasty, refreshing and “healthy”. The Pomegranate is all of people stuff combined and that heightens its appeal. As this “hot food trend” proceeds to effect the beverage industry, bartenders throughout the place are mixing, shaking and stirring up an assortment of innovative cocktails with the hugely mixable and extremely versatile Pomegranate juice.

Its sweet taste with a tangy kick infuses well with a range of spirits, delicate beverages and other juices. “There are a couple of factors why the use of Pomegranates have become so popular in drinks”, said Chef Matthew Silverman of Agave; the wonderfully modern day and first Mexican Restaurant in Summerlin. “The 1st is the fact that they are perceived as being healthy, even though most are combined with sugar and alcoholic beverages. The belief of drinking anything that is good for you whilst still getting to drink your alcoholic beverage is the main reason that it has become popular. The moment reason is that there has been a growth in products that have been revealed in the previous handful of many years in which a tremendous sum of selling pounds have been put guiding them. They’ve sold these drinks productively with that information and now they are all the rage largely with the youthful/hip crowds”.

Julia Infant said, “Discover something you happen to be passionate about and maintain tremendously intrigued in it”. It truly is interesting to find people who are interested in Pomegranates, it evokes great cooks and results in fantastic dining activities, and it also offers people like me an likelihood to write about them because people who are passionate about things usually has a story notify. I requested Cheryl Panariello, Exclusive Functions Director of TAO Asian Bistro New York and Las Vegas, if they are employing Pomegranates in their foods or beverages. “We never use it for anything as of now, not even cocktails, but because it is “all the rage” I believe that will change. Individually, I have loved pomegranates since I was a baby. I utilized to call them Chinese apples and I always made a mess when eating them, staining my clothing, carpets, furnishings; you name it, I stained it! My mom stopped getting them for me and I turned very frustrated, it was so, so unfortunate. Then one day I observed them when I was at the market with my Father. I said, ‘Mother will not likely buy them for me any longer’ and I advised him why. He said “that’s preposterous” and he purchased me one. Against that day in advance, me and the pomegranate were reunited and to this day, we never told my mom”.

There is cosmetic in passion, and people are passionate about the Pomegranate. Probably this undying and powerfully healthy fruit shouldn’t be judged by its cover since it’s what is inside that counts. Even with the fact that it’s messy and a little weird looking, because of its variety, recipe probabilities and unsurpassed taste, the Pomegranate has a vivid and delicious foreseeable future.

The post The Passion of Pomegranates appeared first on Beautiful Women.

source http://topbeautifulwomen.com/the-passion-of-pomegranates/

[corneliussteinbeck]

Make-Ahead Thanksgiving Panzanella

We now have a three- and a one-year-old in the house as of a week ago. Two toddlers…OMG, save me. It’s loud, and crazy, and some nights cereal or smoothies for dinner feels like a major culinary accomplishment.

But, oh, do I adore my little monsters and this crazy family.

Lately, these are some of the questions I ask when I attempt to cook:

Can I cut out an ingredient (or four) while still enjoying the dish? Is this step absolutely necessary to the overall dish? Why is there so much screaming going on? If I do something the night before, will it save time the next day? Adriana, can you please stop tackling your brother like a football!? Lol. 

And probably one of the questions I ask the most: Why is there no OSG delivery service yet, damnit!?

Goals ;)

I’m learning more often than not that the answer to my “can I save time” question is a resounding YES. I’m learning tricks along the way. I’m cutting corners. And you know what? Almost always, the food still tastes great. (And if it doesn’t, Arlo will eat anything.)

If you follow me on Insta Stories, you may have seen how excited I was to dig into Laura’s beautiful plant-based cookbook, The First Mess Cookbook, this past spring. I’ve been following Laura for years (#TFMfangurrrrrl); she’s a seriously talented writer, photographer, and cook. I’m constantly amazed by the beauty she captures in her food, and the warmth and passion with which she shares it. Laura is one of those cooks who seems to truly adore the process of cooking. I personally don’t always enjoy the process (real talk: sometimes I loathe cooking), and often don’t slow down enough to find it uber-relaxing, but Laura has a way of inspiring a certain intention and gratitude for the process. I love that. Her plant-based recipes and photographs are truly works of art, and I’m so glad she shares them with us all. Her cookbook would be a delicious addition to your collection if you don’t have it already!

Months ago, I made a mental note to make the Thanksgiving Panzanella, and I couldn’t wait to make it once the cooler temperatures had set in. Because the recipe has quite a few steps, I started it the day before, and ended up creating a fun, make-ahead version. As you can tell, I’m all about make-ahead situations these days! By doing most of the prep work in advance, it became a practical option for our Thanksgiving meal. The prep work the day before is a half hour (and it’s a bit kitchen-destroying, tbh), but the next day, the effortless prep will only set you back a mere 10 minutes. Pretty sweet, huh?!

Oh, and it’s a looker. And tasty…duh. As my hilarious recipe tester, Nicole, wrote, “Yield: 6 side servings or one big serving for me ha ha ha!” LOL! Love her.

Make-Ahead Thanksgiving Panzanella

Vegan, nut-free, refined sugar-free, soy-free

Since this is quite an involved recipe, I like to prepare a few aspects of this panzanella the day before to save time and mess on the day of a special event, such as Thanksgiving. By doing a bit of advance prep (about 30 minutes the day before), all you have to do on the day is bake the squash and bread, then toss it all together just before serving. I like to serve this recipe warm, so I time the cooking so that the squash and bread come out of the oven just before our planned mealtime. This recipe is adapted from The First Mess Cookbook (2017) by Laura Wright. Reprinted by permission of Penguin Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited.

Yield 6 side servings

Prep Time 40 Minutes

Cook time 35 Minutes

Total Time 1 Hour, 15 Minutes

Ingredients:

For the dressing:

2 tablespoons (30 mL) balsamic vinegar

1 small garlic clove, minced

2 teaspoons (10 mL) pure maple syrup

1 teaspoon (5 mL) Dijon mustard

1/4 cup (60 mL) extra-virgin olive oil

Generous pinch of fine sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

For the salad:

4 cups (175 grams) cubed sourdough bread (about 1/2 a loaf)

2 medium (800 g) delicata squash

1 tablespoon (15 mL) minced fresh rosemary

2 teaspoons (10 mL) minced fresh thyme leaves

2 cups (40 g) stemmed and sliced lacinato kale

2 medium/large celery stalks (210 g), thinly sliced (1 1/4 cups)

1/3 cup (80 mL) pomegranate seeds

1 tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons (25 mL) extra-virgin olive oil, divided

Handful of celery leaves or fresh parsley leaves, for garnish

Directions:

The day before (steps 1-4): Make the dressing: In a small jar, place the balsamic vinegar, minced garlic, maple syrup, Dijon mustard, olive oil, salt, and pepper. Screw on the lid and shake to combine. Chill in the fridge.

Slice the sourdough bread into 1-inch cubes until you have 4 cups. Place into a large bag or container and leave it on the counter.

Slice each squash down the middle, lengthwise. With a spoon, scrape out all of the seeds and discard them. Slice the squash into 1/4-inch “half-moon” slices, and place them into a large zip bag, bowl, or container. Mince the rosemary and thyme and add it to the squash. Chill the squash and herbs in the fridge (covering, if necessary).

In a separate zip bag or container, place the sliced kale, chopped celery, and pomegranate seeds. Chill in the fridge (covering, if necessary).

The next day (steps 5-8): About 15 minutes before you begin, remove the dressing and squash from the fridge and place them on the counter so that they can come to room temperature. Position two racks near the centre of the oven. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C), and line two extra-large baking sheets with parchment paper.

Spoon the squash and herbs onto one of the baking sheets. Add a tablespoon of oil and toss until the squash is thoroughly coated. Sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Roast the squash for about 30 to 38 minutes, until nicely brown on the bottoms. (There’s no need to flip halfway through baking unless you want them evenly browned.)

While the squash is roasting, spread the cubed sourdough onto the remaining baking sheet and toss it in a couple teaspoons of oil. When you have 10 to 15 minutes left of the squash’s roasting time, place the sourdough in the oven with the squash and continue roasting for 10 to 15 minutes. The bread should feel lightly toasted when it’s ready, but it shouldn’t look brown.

While the squash and sourdough are roasting, place the kale, celery, pomegranate seeds, and dressing into a large serving bowl. When the squash and bread are finished cooking, add them into the bowl, and toss well, until combined. Season the panzanella with more salt, to taste, if desired. Serve warm with a garnish of celery or parsley leaves scattered on top. This recipe is best enjoyed immediately, or within a couple of hours of preparing.

Below is a photo of what the prep looks like the day before! On day 2, all you do is roast the squash and bread, and then mix it all together. *slow clap*

On the cusp of our Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, THANK YOU for your amazing love and support, even when this blog is a virtual ghost town. I’ve been chipping away at some big behind-the-scenes blog changes and can’t wait to share more. Also, Eric recently started a new career venture, which has been wild. I’m thrilled for him, and grateful to be able to return the support and encouragement that he’s given me all these years. But, holy hell have we been struggling to stay afloat. The juggle of parenthood and “careerhood” is no easy feat. I’ve been trying to make it work with a lot more on my plate. Some days I feel like I’m doing a crappy job at everything, and other days, I feel like I’m killing it. We’ll get into a groove…it just takes some trial and error. Just know that I love and appreciate your support more than you know.

I hope my fellow Canadians have a relaxing and delicious Thanksgiving weekend with loved ones, and if you try out this recipe, I hope you enjoy it—and my make-ahead tricks—as much as we do. I’ve also added this recipe to The Oh She Glows Recipe App, so keep your eyes peeled for it on there.

Last but not least, I’d like to pass along Arlo’s nursery tour over on HGTV! It was so much fun (and such an honour) to be featured. (Just know that the nursery never looks this put together in real life….it actually looks like a tornado blew through it most days.) A special thanks to the lovely Brittany Devenyi for the feature!

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[gardencityvegans]

Make-Ahead Thanksgiving Panzanella

http://ohsheglows.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/065A8272.jpg

We now have a three- and a one-year-old in the house as of a week ago. Two toddlers…OMG, save me. It’s loud, and crazy, and some nights cereal or smoothies for dinner feels like a major culinary accomplishment.

But, oh, do I adore my little monsters and this crazy family.

Lately, these are some of the questions I ask when I attempt to cook:

Can I cut out an ingredient (or four) while still enjoying the dish? Is this step absolutely necessary to the overall dish? Why is there so much screaming going on? If I do something the night before, will it save time the next day? Adriana, can you please stop tackling your brother like a football!? Lol. 

And probably one of the questions I ask the most: Why is there no OSG delivery service yet, damnit!?

Goals ;)

I’m learning more often than not that the answer to my “can I save time” question is a resounding YES. I’m learning tricks along the way. I’m cutting corners. And you know what? Almost always, the food still tastes great. (And if it doesn’t, Arlo will eat anything.)

If you follow me on Insta Stories, you may have seen how excited I was to dig into Laura’s beautiful plant-based cookbook, The First Mess Cookbook, this past spring. I’ve been following Laura for years (#TFMfangurrrrrl); she’s a seriously talented writer, photographer, and cook. I’m constantly amazed by the beauty she captures in her food, and the warmth and passion with which she shares it. Laura is one of those cooks who seems to truly adore the process of cooking. I personally don’t always enjoy the process (real talk: sometimes I loathe cooking), and often don’t slow down enough to find it uber-relaxing, but Laura has a way of inspiring a certain intention and gratitude for the process. I love that. Her plant-based recipes and photographs are truly works of art, and I’m so glad she shares them with us all. Her cookbook would be a delicious addition to your collection if you don’t have it already!

Months ago, I made a mental note to make the Thanksgiving Panzanella, and I couldn’t wait to make it once the cooler temperatures had set in. Because the recipe has quite a few steps, I started it the day before, and ended up creating a fun, make-ahead version. As you can tell, I’m all about make-ahead situations these days! By doing most of the prep work in advance, it became a practical option for our Thanksgiving meal. The prep work the day before is a half hour (and it’s a bit kitchen-destroying, tbh), but the next day, the effortless prep will only set you back a mere 10 minutes. Pretty sweet, huh?!

Oh, and it’s a looker. And tasty…duh. As my hilarious recipe tester, Nicole, wrote, “Yield: 6 side servings or one big serving for me ha ha ha!” LOL! Love her.

Make-Ahead Thanksgiving Panzanella

Vegan, nut-free, refined sugar-free, soy-free

Since this is quite an involved recipe, I like to prepare a few aspects of this panzanella the day before to save time and mess on the day of a special event, such as Thanksgiving. By doing a bit of advance prep (about 30 minutes the day before), all you have to do on the day is bake the squash and bread, then toss it all together just before serving. I like to serve this recipe warm, so I time the cooking so that the squash and bread come out of the oven just before our planned mealtime. This recipe is adapted from The First Mess Cookbook (2017) by Laura Wright. Reprinted by permission of Penguin Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited.

Yield 6 side servings

Prep Time 40 Minutes

Cook time 35 Minutes

Total Time 1 Hour, 15 Minutes

Ingredients:

For the dressing:

2 tablespoons (30 mL) balsamic vinegar

1 small garlic clove, minced

2 teaspoons (10 mL) pure maple syrup

1 teaspoon (5 mL) Dijon mustard

1/4 cup (60 mL) extra-virgin olive oil

Generous pinch of fine sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

For the salad:

4 cups (175 grams) cubed sourdough bread (about 1/2 a loaf)

2 medium (800 g) delicata squash

1 tablespoon (15 mL) minced fresh rosemary

2 teaspoons (10 mL) minced fresh thyme leaves

2 cups (40 g) stemmed and sliced lacinato kale

2 medium/large celery stalks (210 g), thinly sliced (1 1/4 cups)

1/3 cup (80 mL) pomegranate seeds

1 tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons (25 mL) extra-virgin olive oil, divided

Handful of celery leaves or fresh parsley leaves, for garnish

Directions:

The day before (steps 1-4): Make the dressing: In a small jar, place the balsamic vinegar, minced garlic, maple syrup, Dijon mustard, olive oil, salt, and pepper. Screw on the lid and shake to combine. Chill in the fridge.

Slice the sourdough bread into 1-inch cubes until you have 4 cups. Place into a large bag or container and leave it on the counter.

Slice each squash down the middle, lengthwise. With a spoon, scrape out all of the seeds and discard them. Slice the squash into 1/4-inch “half-moon” slices, and place them into a large zip bag, bowl, or container. Mince the rosemary and thyme and add it to the squash. Chill the squash and herbs in the fridge (covering, if necessary).

In a separate zip bag or container, place the sliced kale, chopped celery, and pomegranate seeds. Chill in the fridge (covering, if necessary).

The next day (steps 5-8): About 15 minutes before you begin, remove the dressing and squash from the fridge and place them on the counter so that they can come to room temperature. Position two racks near the centre of the oven. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C), and line two extra-large baking sheets with parchment paper.

Spoon the squash and herbs onto one of the baking sheets. Add a tablespoon of oil and toss until the squash is thoroughly coated. Sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Roast the squash for about 30 to 38 minutes, until nicely brown on the bottoms. (There’s no need to flip halfway through baking unless you want them evenly browned.)

While the squash is roasting, spread the cubed sourdough onto the remaining baking sheet and toss it in a couple teaspoons of oil. When you have 10 to 15 minutes left of the squash’s roasting time, place the sourdough in the oven with the squash and continue roasting for 10 to 15 minutes. The bread should feel lightly toasted when it’s ready, but it shouldn’t look brown.

While the squash and sourdough are roasting, place the kale, celery, pomegranate seeds, and dressing into a large serving bowl. When the squash and bread are finished cooking, add them into the bowl, and toss well, until combined. Season the panzanella with more salt, to taste, if desired. Serve warm with a garnish of celery or parsley leaves scattered on top. This recipe is best enjoyed immediately, or within a couple of hours of preparing.

Below is a photo of what the prep looks like the day before! On day 2, all you do is roast the squash and bread, and then mix it all together. *slow clap*

On the cusp of our Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, THANK YOU for your amazing love and support, even when this blog is a virtual ghost town. I’ve been chipping away at some big behind-the-scenes blog changes and can’t wait to share more. Also, Eric recently started a new career venture, which has been wild. I’m thrilled for him, and grateful to be able to return the support and encouragement that he’s given me all these years. But, holy hell have we been struggling to stay afloat. The juggle of parenthood and “careerhood” is no easy feat. I’ve been trying to make it work with a lot more on my plate. Some days I feel like I’m doing a crappy job at everything, and other days, I feel like I’m killing it. We’ll get into a groove…it just takes some trial and error. Just know that I love and appreciate your support more than you know.

I hope my fellow Canadians have a relaxing and delicious Thanksgiving weekend with loved ones, and if you try out this recipe, I hope you enjoy it—and my make-ahead tricks—as much as we do. I’ve also added this recipe to The Oh She Glows Recipe App, so keep your eyes peeled for it on there.

Last but not least, I’d like to pass along Arlo’s nursery tour over on HGTV! It was so much fun (and such an honour) to be featured. (Just know that the nursery never looks this put together in real life….it actually looks like a tornado blew through it most days.) A special thanks to the lovely Brittany Devenyi for the feature!

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