Archives for January 2008

Last week I flew down to San Diego for the 33rd Winter Fancy Food Show. Just my luck that the year I decide to attend is the year they move the show from its customary winter venue of San Francisco (a 30-minute BART ride away) to San Diego (a 1 1/2 hour plane ride with all the accompanying hassles of parking, delays, etc.).

In any case, it was quite a scene. Picture over a thousand specialty food purveyors hawking their wares to over 11,000 ravenous attendees. These are gourmet food shop owners, restaurateurs, caterers, high-end grocery store buyers, and people like me – the press. Oh, and let us not forget the individuals who used any pretext to get into the show so they could basically hoover up enough samples to tide them over for the rest of the winter. And most of these gluttons, from my observation, didn’t need the extra calories.

My article on new chocolate creations will appear in our county paper’s Food section the week before Valentine’s Day. “Fair trade,” “premium cacao beans,” “sustainable harvesting methods,” and “artisanal” were the big buzzwords. I made the mistake of letting a couple of the chocolatiers press upon me their personal favorites to try – and found that we were seldom in agreement about what constituted “favorite.” Surprisingly, one of the most smooth, delectable and satisfying samples I tried wasn’t a chocolate at all. “Caffe Acapella” is billed as a “Gourmet Coffee Confection,” made according to the same principles as fine chocolate only using coffee beans instead of cacao beans. Mmmm…

These are the first eight of what will eventually be 24 or 25 (depending upon layout) for the Lizard Ridge blanket that will go off to college with my daughter in 2009. Just yesterday we spent some time surfing various university websites trying to decide which schools to visit in the spring. Talking about SAT scores and GPAs as much as about the distribution requirements, campus life, location, the strongest degree programs at each school.

The rain let up long enough this morning for me to run outside and pick some of the ripe citrus. We have Meyer lemons, Bearss limes (which are a funny chartreuse color when ripe and make the best limeade) and the first crop of Satsuma Mandarins, which are seedless and tart. I hope as the tree matures, the fruit will sweeten up… but even tart and tangy they’re pretty delicious!

(I confess I already ate two of the Mandarins… there are many more on the tree still green). The lemons are HUGE this year – almost the size of oranges. Divinely fragrant.

There are lemon tarts and lemon curd in my near future, and I want to try a batch of candied lemon peel…

Oh. My. God. The fountain is overflowing, and the pool is almost spilling over its edge, too. Winds up to 100 mph in any other part of the country would be considered, I am absolutely certain, a bona fide hurricane, but here in the Bay area it’s only “rainstorms with high winds.” San Francisco weather forecasters have a talent for understatement, judging from what I saw when I was out on the road today.

Wish I could have stayed inside knitting, a cup of tea at my elbow, but no such luck. I had a birthday lunch to go to, and three friends in the car with me as we splashed our way down the freeway. Quite exciting… like the amusement park rides my family has to bribe me onto.

Nothing photoworthy today, so I’ll sign off with an amazing shot of the full moon rising over the hills behind our house a couple of weeks ago:

One goal (and I’m not much for New Year’s resolutions, to be honest) is to make 2008 a better year for blogging, even though with other projects taking priority right now, there’s not much to report. I’m doing a lot of writing, which is great, but that means I’m not doing very much knitting or gardening.

I’m encouraged to see that the daphnes we planted last winter are in bud,

and the cymbidium orchids are poised to make a comeback as well. If I look back at last winter’s photos, I can see which plants/colors are putting out the most new bud stalks… it’s exciting, if excruciatingly slow, but with orchids there’s always the consolation that once they bloom, those flowers will last for months.

And finally, several weeks ago I planted new irises from Schreiners. To my amazement, a couple of them are already in bloom. This one is called “Maid of Orange.” Stunning. It’s planted by the front walk along with several others, interspersed with variegated-leaf Heucheras. I like the contrast of the sword-like iris leaves with the rounded, mottled Heucheras… gives the walk a sculptural effect even when nothing is flowering.

And, of course, I am knitting, but have absolutely nothing to show for myself right now. I’m hard at work in the evenings on a Lizard Ridge throw blanket. It’s for my daughter to take to college a year and a half from now… which gives me plenty of time to finish it in between other, more pressing projects that will surely appear. Next month, I plan to have more time for knitting.