Category — Random

Three Years and Exactly 1000 posts!

Wow, time flies when you’re doing what you love to do! I didn’t realize until I began planning for this post, that I started my blog the day after Julia Child’s birthday.  It is appropriate though, especially if you read my very first entry HERE!

As I’m traveling through Alaska on this momentous day, I want to thank each and every one of you who read what I write and cook the recipes that I create. Whether you check in every day and are a treasured loyal follower, or just stop by every now and then… I appreciate you more than you know!

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American legend, Julia Child, would have turned 100 today. Julia died two days shy of her 92nd birthday in 2004.

Photo by Hans Namuth
Gelatin silver print, 1977
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution

In 2001, Julia Child donated the kitchen from her Cambridge, Massachusetts home to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, in Washington, D.C.  It includes the cabinets, appliances, cookbooks, pegboard, kitchen table, and hundreds of her kitchen utensils and gadgets.

Julia’s turquoise kitchen had been on display from 2002 until this past January.  The National Museum of American History will temporarily reopen the exhibit today through September 3, 2012, in honor of her birthday. It will be open again permanently in November 2012 and will anchor an expanded food exhibit.

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Additionally, 100 restaurant chefs across the country have been firing up their ovens all week to honor Julia’s amazing culinary legacy. Four of our own Valley chefs are participating. CLICK HERE to read about some of their fond and funny memories of Julia and then drool over their menus, especially the one at Quiessence at the Farm at South Mountain. The tribute dinner there has been organized and will be hosted by our Phoenix Chapter of Les Dames d’Escoffier International, the chapter of that I am a founding member.  So sorry to be missing it!

As I’ve mentioned before, I too, had the pleasure of meeting and later working with the incomparable Mrs. Child.

1994 in San Francisco

2001 in Minneapolis

Believe me, I know how very blessed I am to have had that honor.

Here are two photos from the IACP Culinary Concerts from when I was the producer.

Julia Child, Emeril Lagasse, Shirley Corriher, and Martin Yan on stage in Providence, Rhode Island on March 29, 2000

In this photo, the chefs were choosing ingredients for a signature dish they were going to make together. Martin had pulled out a bunch of cilantro and handed it to Emeril. Emeril showed it to Julia and she matter-of-factly said, “I don’t like cilantro.” Emeril said, “No cilantro, then!” as he tossed it back into the basket in front of Martin. Martin made some comment and tossed the cilantro into the audience and obviously, it struck Emeril’s funny bone!

Martin Yan, Mary Sue Milliken, Emeril Lagasse, Jacques Pépin, and Susan Feniger in San Diego on April 18, 2002

Julia was scheduled to perform with these great chefs, but wound up with a bout of bronchitis. Here the chefs are making a birthday cake (a few months early) in her honor.

I am also privileged to own an autographed first edition of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, an amazing treasure. 

I have brought along the new Julia Child biography, Bob Spitz’s “Dearie:  The Remarkable Life of Julia Child” to read on my Alaskan trip. Can’t wait to dive into it.

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All summer, I’ve been snapping photos of miscellaneous happenings around the house. I thought I’d share a few of them with you today. Nothing major, just silly little things that make me make me , say “wow”, a bit disgusted, or just plain happy.

The first is Arizona summer monsoons. Although they can bring awful dust storms, they also produce the most beautiful clouds, as in the photo above, taken with my iPhone on July 23rd, while in my car. Don’t fret, I was stopped at a red light. 🙂

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And when they result in a monstrous booming thunderstorm, well that’s the best of all!

Another simple joy in life is cleaning out the kitchen junk drawer. Exactly why it’s so satisfying, I don’t really know. Especially with the knowledge that it’ll be a mess again all too soon. I failed to take a before picture, but rest assured, the rubber bands in the left corner were spread from end to end! As were the stamps. Have you ever noticed how many envelopes are delivered with uncancelled stamps?  I always cut them off and use them again.

So many! About $15 dollars worth! No wonder the USPS has financial troubles.

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By the time you read this, Dave and I will be on our way to Alaska for a trek through quintessential Alaska wilderness – Denali National Park & Preserve, and then an Alaskan cruise. Not sure if I am the cruising type or not, but I am super excited to go to Alaska, one of the only states I’ve not yet been to. And there is the added bonus of escaping the Arizona heat, the expected high temperature for Scottsdale today is 113 degrees. Bring on the cooler temps!

I recently read in Sunset Magazine that the state has 100,000 glaciers, thousands of brown and black bears (in parts of Alaska, bears outnumber people by a large margin), and 586,412 square miles—bigger than Arizona, California, Montana, and Oregon combined.

The excursion that I am most looking forward to is zip-lining in Klondike Adventure Park!

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And, we are guaranteed to see whales on the whale watching excursion … now that will be worth the trip!

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There is something super special, never attempted before, a first time ever – thing at the end of this blog. Be patient and read through to the end. Hopefully, it will be worth the wait!

This, the seventh post about our trip to San Francisco, is the last. We were only there for 4 nights and 3 days, but we packed in quite a lot. So, this is a continuation and conclusion to Sunday.

After dinner at Boudin Bakery at the Wharf, we walked a short distance west to Pier 45, Shed A.  It is there that you will find the well-known and dearly-loved city treasure, Musée Mécanique, an antique coin-operated arcade.

Admission is free…but bring plenty of quarters. Or just plenty of cash, they provide the change machines. The four of us went through more than $30 in about 1 hour. But what FUN!

The Musée Mécanique is a for-profit museum and is owned and managed by Dan Zelinsky. It attacks more than 100,000 visitors each year. In 2011, U.S. News & World Report called the Musée Mécanique one of the top three “Things to Do in San Francisco”.  The SF Weekly called it the “Best Old-School Arcade” for 2011.

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This day was all about spoiling my kids. After our world-class breakfast at Outerlands, we drove downtown for a day of shopping and luxurious spa treatments.

Check out Marissa glaring at me in the rear-view mirror. I guess I was irritating her from the back seat. Hmm, a mother irritating a daughter, now that’s new!

Be sure and stick with me through this rather lengthy post. It was a big day so there is a lot to share, but you have to read the end and check out our spa time and our dinner choice… even if you just scroll down and skip the shopping parts. :-

First, we ducked into the Apple store because I wanted Connor to see the awesome theater-style classroom. I know, how much Apple can one person do in a long weekend?! Even our newest store in Scottsdale has nothing like this.

As we walked by we noticed they were demonstrating exactly how to use iMovie. We sat in on the class and learned so much that the rest of the weekend I was taking videos so that I can test my newfound knowledge. And guess what? I’m working on it, and there will be an iMovie on this very blog, very soon.

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Last Saturday started out so very yummy!  Only a few blocks from Marissa’s house is what is said to be one of the top 10 best places for brunch in the entire city. I hardily and happily agree! It is Outerlands, located in Outer Sunset at 4001 Judah Street. Although we could not make the brunch on Sunday, we did go there for breakfast on Saturday, and my oh my, if breakfast is this good, I can not imagine what brunch must be like!

Additionally, it is rustically beautiful inside. You must get there at least 30 minutes before they open and write your name on the list that hangs on a clipboard outside the door. We did, so we were fifth on the list.  By the time they opened, the list was three pages long and the outside sidewalk was packed. Marissa says it’s like that all time; morning, noon, and night.

The bread is what really sends this place into the stratosphere. If I could bake bread like this, I would have more friends than I’d know what to do with!

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For most people, Lombard Street would probably make the #1 spot on their list of  “The Top 5 Streets I love in San Francisco.”  For me, the top spot goes to the Great Highway. It forms the city’s western edge along the Pacific coast.  It was on our way home from our Apple, shopping, and VW repair adventure, just as we were about to get onto the Great Highway, that Connor and I decided to stop for lunch at Java Beach Cafe. And it was here that we spotted this San Francisco landmark.

Do you see it? There is the Java Beach Cafe on the far right. And a green-roofed building in the center (from here on out referred to as the “Evil Nursery”) and there on the left, above the dark SUV – yeah, that is the landmark.  Official Landmark as of 2006, no less, number 254 on THIS LIST.

He stands tall on the median strip, at the corner of Sloat and 45th Avenue. On the opposite side of the street from the Evil Nursery and the Cafe, is the entrance to the San Francisco Zoo.

I’m sure you can easily see what attracted me to him. The toque (chef’s hat). The chef’s coat. And that adorable blue polka dot bow tie! Too darn kitschy and cute!

This final photo is from Flickr and gives you the best view of the handsome fellow. So how on earth did this get to be a beloved landmark?  This first quote is from the Flickr photo site.

“The 700-pound, seven foot fiberglass dachshund head at the median strip on Sloat Boulevard at 45th Avenue has reason to smile. Thanks to Diana Scott and Joel Schechter of Ocean Beach Historical Society and other concerned citizens, the Doggie Diner head, nicknamed DD, is back on its pole after going through repairs and a paint job following a hard fall during an April 2001 storm.

Doggie Diner was a local hamburger and hot dog chain that opened in 1949. To the regret of many locals, the chain closed in 1986, but the legend lived on. Nostalgic San Francisco residents visit DD regularly and tell their children about the good old days at the burger joint, which was originally located at Sloat Boulevard at 46th Avenue.

Illustrator Harold Bachman designed the doggie head in the 1960’s and says he is still surprised that people are enamored with DD. He designed it simply because he thought it would help sell hamburgers. Although DD is officially known to be the last doggie standing, rumor has it that doggie siblings are spotted around the Bay Area from time to time.”

…and from [Tim Timberlake, 07/16/2001]

“The Doggie Diner opposite the San Francisco Zoo on Sloat Avenue has been a favorite eating and Dog Head viewing place for years (since the 1960’s). Recently this last remaining Dog Head has been under threat. The nursery next door bought the site and wanted to remove the Dog Head. Dog Head lovers from all over protested and the Dog Head was saved. Mother Nature then took action and toppled the Dog Head on its fiberglass nose during a windstorm.

The City of San Francisco went to work using other salvaged (saved) Dog Heads, owned by a fellow in Emeryville, as patterns. The Sloat Avenue Dog Head has been restored and placed back on his pedestal across from the zoo and next to the evil nursery.”

You can check out THIS, or THIS, or THIS to learn even more. And there you go, more than you ever wanted or needed to know about The Doggie Diner head. Oh, and by the way, the sandwiches at Java Beach Cafe were excellent.

After lunch, we took the Great Highway back to Marissa’s house and I fixed the toilet and did a few other things around the house. Then we hopped back in the car and drove back to San Mateo to pick her up from work.

How cute is she??!!

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In yesterday’s post, I purposely left out something that we did on our way to Santa Cruz. About halfway between San Mateo and Santa Cruz sits the city of Cupertino. If you have an Apple product, you’ve heard of Cupertino. It is the time zone setting on every Apple device; from the iPhone, and the MacBooks, to the iPad. I know this because I’ve reset it on every Apple item I own.  Let’s see – Marissa and I are both on our second MacBooks, Connor has one, I asked for and received an iPad for Christmas and then didn’t use it much, so it now belongs to Connor, and each of the three of us has an iPhone and we all, of course, (including Dave)  have iPods. Once we get rid of Dave’s stupid Blackberry and his horrid PC and buy him an iPhone and a big old desktop Mac, our transition will be complete to a true Apple-only family!

Yes, I happily guzzle the Kool-Aid, in fact, give me some more! I’m thinking that Apple TV maybe my next move. Besides all of the Apple stuff we have, I’ve been a bit obsessed with the subject because I’ve been reading Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. It is the authorized biography that was released soon after Jobs’s death in October 2011. What a complicated, brilliant, narcissistic ass he was! I started the book the Tuesday before we left and finished on the plane, on our way home. I highly recommend it if you like biographies, Apple, tech stuff, Steve Jobs, or just want to learn about the impact on our culture and way of life that Jobs most certainly made. Whether you own an Apple product or not!

Cupertino is mentioned on about every page, so a stop there was a must. I had no idea where we were going, so we drove into town and started to look for Apple.  It didn’t take more than a minute before we saw buildings with the Apple logo on the signs.

I knew there had to be a bigger grander place than these little buildings, so I asked Siri (on my iPhone 4s) to direct me to Apple headquarters. She came through with flying colors. I have a love/hate relationship with Siri.

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… in San Francisco. That’s how I always feel when I board the plane and leave my girl behind. It helps to have dates on the calendar marking when I’ll see her again… Labor Day weekend and Thanksgiving, but it still leaves a tiny little hole each time.

Then again, what a joy it is to be able to go to such a great city to visit her. So much better than if she lived in Podunk, Nowhere Special, USA! Plus there is the fact that she is adorable and sent Connor and I an itinerary, ahead of time, filled with fun things she had lined up for us to do. Love her!!!

We arrived at 7:30 PM on Thursday night. When we landed, I sent Marissa a text at work saying, “the eagle has landed,” and she pulled up just as we were walking out the doors from baggage claim, what timing! It helps that Connor and I travel extra-lite and had no baggage to claim, we shared one carry-on. As you’ve seen from my refrigerator, I am a super-duper packer!

We drove toward Marissa’s home and stopped at San Tung Chinese Restaurant, 1031 Irving Street, located in the Inner Sunset neighborhood. We went specifically for their famous dry fried chicken wings. Wow, they did not disappoint!

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