forgive me, but i need to take a little break from all of my iranicizing. not because i'm not aware of what's going on, but because i'm too aware. it's overwhelming.

i want to catch you all up on what's been going on here for the past couple of weeks:

there were 700 or so jars of apricot preserves at yes we can, which we made at la cocina, whilst ryan farr taught handfuls of laypeople how to make emulsified sausages.


there was the couscous royale at asiya's goodbye party, where i finally met jessica, the woman behind rabbits and wrinkles.

a week later, there was an educational day of canning cherries and cherry jam for green string farm, wherein i realized that cherry jam could never be a money-making enterprise. fifty pounds of pitted cherries yielded 46 8-oz jars of jam. i don't even want to think about the math involved in that.

there was the day we went over to veller's house to kill four rabbits for our dinner celebrating the release of her book. this is the least graphic photo i had. notice the fraying nylon string veller saved from her hay bales and rigged up to the tree for hanging the rabbits to skin.


but as one might imagine, the cage the rabbits were in wasn't the most secure apparatus, so one bunny had escaped two nights before the big day. he was last seen at the liquor store down the street. we searched for him for 20 minutes to no avail, so we made do with three bunnies. as soon as we left, veller said, the smart guy showed up but she couldn't catch him.

there was my lunatic idea to cook a dinner using as many backyard and urban farmed and foraged ingredients as possible to celebrate the release of novella's book, which meant that i somehow had to find dozens of backyard farmers, figure out what and how much they'd have available the week of the dinner, set up drop-off times and make time to forage and harvest, and somehow write a coherent menu around it all. it was the most involved, challenging, invigorating and fruitful experience of my cooking career.

the dinner couldn't have been more lovely:

chris cutting into the prosciutto made with novella's pigs

novella's olives (which we served with the prosciutto)

cucu sabzi, a persian frittata (my mom's is better) i made with all of the leftover foraged herbs and greens

the second prosciutto (CL got a little carried away)


CL slicing prosciutto on the beautiful berkel slicer emilio lent us for the night


the experience of seeing those rabbits on the farm over the past several months, killing, skinning and cleaning them up, then cooking with them was something i hope all cooks have at some point in their lives. chris and cedric did a fantastic job with them. we dried sunny slopes farm apricots and made a moroccan-inspired stuffing. those are little heirloom carrots from novella's farm on the outside, with fresh chickpeas from catalan farm.


all in all, it was a fantastic night, with so many of our friends and neighbors present. the sense of community was so strong that night, with nearly every table scouring the menu for the ingredients that had come from their own yards. perhaps the most special contribution was the incredible sack of mulberries from suzanne's neighbor's yard in south berkeley. thank you, everyone, for filling that night with such authenticity and love.

and finally, yesterday there was the discovery of lola's ice creams & sundaes (via aaron), a sort of beautiful ice cream version of the moro books (not much of a surprise since they come from the same publisher). i might just have to get that for myself.

coming back to life


Thistles, originally uploaded by karin eriksson.




well, it wasn't the worst illness i've ever had, but this bout with the flu definitely ranks up there. only now, after a full week of being sick, can i really imagine ever feeling fully human again.

things that have made me really happy this week:

a few new books, including the principles of uncertainty, secret ingredients (thanks, alice!), made in italy, and the oxford companion to italian food. there is a really beautiful story in the nyer book by mfk fisher called "the trouble with tripe." she really is one of the most talented people to ever write about food.

after thirteen painful months of crashing, my computer finally kicked the bucket, and miraculously, apple (perhaps just sick of my endless, nagging phone calls) gave me a brand new one. but since they don't make ibooks anymore, and the macbooks only come with 13" screens and my ibook had a 14" screen, they felt it necessary to give me a 15" macbook pro. and they refunded my applecare.

the science of sleep--perhaps my favorite movie, ever.

i've been eating lots of cara cara and blood oranges.

wait wait and nyer podcasts

december polls: at the market


radicchio, originally uploaded by ciaosamin.






annabelle's puntarelle and crazy sqaush

terra firma and riverdog carrots

full belly chocolate persimmons

full belly spinach

star route fennel

star route nettles

catalan cauliflower

dirty girl speckled romaine

riverdog red kabocha squash

woodleaf satsumas

flatland flower farm red roma apples

riverdog chard

get well soon


Soupe de poulet? (préparation), originally uploaded by Christophe Mendes.

i love this photo, with all of the fixins for a big, beautiful pot of chicken soup. look at those chicken legs wrapped with leek tops! so lovely.

everyone i know is ill right now--i've been narrowly avoiding getting sick by eating about five thousand mandarins a day. the best ones i've had have been from riverdog, monterey market, and woodleaf farm. i can't believe citrus is so sweet already.

a friend who claims to be clairevoyant (and another who claims not to be) both told me this week that they think my big project is going to pay off big time next year. i'm trying not to think about it. (my friends are on crack, by the way).



i had the best dinner (with the sweetest of my friends) at nopa last night. gosh, it was so good. everything was seasoned so perfectly. i only wish the broccoli had been cooked a little more slowly in the wood oven, but even as it was, it was delicious. and the mural by brian barneclo is bright and blocky--i could look at it for hours. if i lived nearby (and didn't work in a restaurant), i'd probably eat there at least once a week. so, so good.

sorry for the randomness....