Last night, Callie, Emily, Trish, Maria, and I performed at the Bennington Museum, celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the North Bennington Art Park.
This was Maria and Trish’s first real performance. They both danced at a few farmers’ market gigs where people only walk by or watch for a minute or two and return to buying their produce and baked goods.
Dancing at a farmers market isn’t a “feel good” gig because people don’t expect to see belly dancers, and many are prudes who look away as they walk by. It’s not like we are strippers, for fucks sake!
Maria’s husband and my writing mentor, Jon Katz, attended the performance and was gracious enough to take photos and videos of us.
Jon, who is an award-winning writer, author, and photographer, did a fabulous job describing the event in his blog Bedlam Farm Journal. Click on the link to read what Jon had to say and see video clips and photos. I just saw Jon wrote a second blog post about the gig; here is the link to that one.
My student Maria, an artist and blogger, wrote about her first performance experience on her blog Full Moon Fiber Art. You can click on her link to read about it and see some photos.
This was our first performance in over 3 years, and it felt great. I can’t remember when we have ever had such a fun and smooth performance. The setup was easy, the dancing was seamless even though it was improv, and the audience was fantastic and appreciated what we were doing! Yay!
Photo credit Jon Katz. Callie
When we rehearsed for this gig, we danced to the music and discussed how we would start and end the two sets, but we left everything else up in the air, the beauty of dancing improv.
Photo credit Jon Katz. Emily
We all danced “in” that moment in time and were present. We were the vessels of the music, but most importantly, we had so much fun together!
Photo credit Jon Katz. Trish
We all knew we needed to remember to smile while we were performing, but after watching the video clips, the smiles were real and not phony ones pasted on our faces.
Photo credit Jon Katz. Maria
My students have improved so much in the last 2 years; their technique is getting better every week. They are dancing tighter together and learning to DANCE; not just link moves together; there is a huge difference.
Photo credit John Katz. Yours truly
I was so relaxed at the gig, something that never happens. It felt like it was everyone’s gig, and each dancer took responsibility for it, not me being the mother hen like I needed to be in the past. We were in sync, not just while dancing but as a whole.
Photo credit Jon Katz.
I am incredibly proud of everyone; the buttons are popping on my jacket, which is an old-fashioned saying. I smile when I think of the fun we had and how it really felt like we emerged, coming out from under the big black covid cloud and stepping into the bright sunshine. ☀️
Emily took some selfies before the performance.
I am truly blessed with my abilities to teach and dance with such a wonderful group of women, my dance sisters. We all have the performing bug now; we need to find more gigs to dance at; that was the only sad part of the night when I realized we don’t have another one lined up. Hint, hint…
My hair practice helps me remember what in the hell I did when I do it again for real. 🤦🏻♀️ I have to bobby-pin the flowers better today since the purple one in the back fell off right after I took this pic.
We just got done with production around 11:30 am; we kicked ass. I wanted to get it done early in the day, so I could relax, eat and start getting ready for our gig tonight at the Bennington Museum.
Our dance troupe hasn’t danced publically in three years. When the museum asked if we wanted to perform at the 25th-anniversary celebration for the North Bennington Art Park, an event we have danced at many times before, we said yes immediately.
I will be dancing with four other dancers in two 15-minute sets which is a generous amount of performance time. We’ve done shows where we drove two hours to get there for a five-minute time slot. That’s showbiz for you; you take what you can get.
Two of our dancers are experienced performers, and two are new to performing. We are performing as a multi-level troupe and our number one goal tonight is to enjoy ourselves while dancing together and having fun. Period.
Performing shows true dedication since it takes a long time to get ready for a gig. I am out of practice, so I expect it will take me between 2-3 hours to do my hair, make-up, costuming, and jewelry. I have to load the sound equipment in the car, make sure my phone is charged, and have lots of water with me.
When everything is done, I take my traditional selfie before the gig; then, I am off to see where we are dancing, set up our sound system, and do a sound check—all things I’ve done a million times.
I’m not nervous about performing; it’s in my blood which I have found out since my biological father was a performer as well; not a belly dancer, though. Lol.
All week I’ve taken small snippets of time and got out everything I am wearing, and I practiced doing my hair and make-up. I liked how my hair came out, but I hated the make-up since I tried something new.
This was not a good look for me; the super dark eye shadow and liner made my eyes look like slits, and did not open them up the way I wanted. So it’s back to what has worked for me for the last 19 years of performing. Why mess with what works?
For lunch, I will have my traditional good luck meal that I ate for 15 years before any gig; a bowl of pasta with marinara sauce, grated parmesan, and a dollop of ricotta cheese. This meal holds me over until I get home and gives me energy; plus, it’s one of my favorite meals.
Wish us luck; I can’t wait to report how well the gig went, and hopefully, I will have some photos that other people take and possibly a video if we can find someone to do it.
My French omelet with a good sprinkle of black pepper. It could look prettier, but I was happy how it came out.
I’ve been working on making a perfect French omelet for years. It’s challenging and frustrating when it doesn’t come out correctly. I don’t get as angry as I did when I was younger and threw away eggs in a fit of rage. I am calmer now, and eggs are expensive af.
There are two kinds of people in the world, one who wants the food they have thought about for days, eat or make look and taste delicious. The other doesn’t give a shit what the food looks like as long as it tastes good to them. Right?
A French omelet is not only a complicated dish to master but is used by chefs in kitchens when interviewing a chef as a job candidate. Why an omelet? It shows how organized and how neat the chef works. It offers their knowledge, expertise, and efficiency. It’s a good indicator if they are a bullshit artist or not.
If you are wondering if there is a difference between a French omelet and an American one, the answer is yes. We’ve all seen those infamous three egg omelets at diners across America overstuffed with the filling coming out the sides. The outside is the omelet is browned and dry looking.
Now, if you like these types of omelets, I say good for you, and you should enjoy them as often as you would like. I had never liked omelets until I first had a French omelet, which was life-changing.
It was exactly like the soft and creamy French scrambled eggs I have mastered and love so much. The first time people eat my scrambled eggs, they love them too. Most people think they have cheese in them because they are so creamy. My culinary students at school loved when I made and taught them how to make these eggs.
Before I attempted making French omelets, Marty and I watched many Youtube videos on how to make them. I watched the French Chef episode when Julia Child makes her omelets effortlessly. Even though her recipe for French omelets in Mastering the Art of French Cooking is eight pages long, she can bang out an omelet in 14-20 seconds. “It’s all in the wrist,” she says. Bullshit!
French omelets are made quickly, not 14-20 seconds quickly, but faster than an American omelet. The well-beaten eggs are poured into a hot pan with butter and stirred vigorously with a fork until they begin to set. Next, you shake the pan using your wrist to keep the omelet moving.
As soon as it is almost set, you remove the pan from the heat and tip the pan while rolling the omelet onto itself; then, the plate is held close to the pan as the omelet slides onto the plate. Easy peasy. Not so much.
So my instructions are a mere two short paragraphs, but that’s how it is done in a nutshell, and believe me, it’s more complicated than it sounds. Marty, that son of a bitch nailed his omelet the first time he tried making one.
We are so competitive that he paraded around the kitchen with his perfect omelet while I was swearing up a storm and had to eat my less-than-perfect, far-from-perfect omelet. That bastard! Lol.
Since I have to eat in the morning now taking this new medication, I decided to make myself a French omelet with a bagel for breakfast the other morning. And…it came out how it is supposed to be! Yay! It was just a plain omelet without any filling but tasted so luxuriously delicious.
You can see the egg rolled up properly. Yay!
It was soft, velvety, and unctuous in my mouth. Marty pretended not to notice my omelet as he ate his bagel at the other end of the kitchen island. He saw it but had no comments to make.
Marty’s big thing to say these days is to ask me while I am blabbing about something random, “and this concerns me, how?” He knows it makes me crazy, so I blurt it out before he can, and we both laugh.
Not everyone gives two shits about an omelet, but foodie people, aspiring cooks, and chefs are obsessed with making them properly. The next time I am going to add a small amount of freshly snipped chives to my omelet and then perhaps move on to a small sprinkling of Swiss cheese. It’s not about the fillings like in an American omelet; it’s about the simple perfection in which it’s made and the soft creamy texture.
If you have never had a French omelet, I urge you to seek a restaurant or a place that makes them. You may never go back to an American omelet again. Better yet, you could always try making one yourself. Here is a link to making a French omelet.
We had an awesome fire last night. No filter was used for this photo.
Two weeks ago, I went to my new doctor to talk about the numerous anxiety attacks I had almost every day. They got so bad that they were waking me up in the middle of the night.
We decided to try an anti-anxiety medicine and decrease a different one I was currently on. The thing about me is if there are side effects to any medication, I almost always experience them. It took seven different blood pressure medications until we found one I could tolerate back in 2013.
I got a headache within an hour when I started taking the new medicine. Medicine headaches aren’t relieved for me with Tylenol. The doctor warned me about the side effects and asked me to tough it out because she thought this drug would be a good fit for me. So I toughed it out.
I read that 65% of adults stop taking anxiety medication because they cannot tolerate the side effects. Most people don’t even give it a week, even though it takes at least a week or two until your body adjusts to the new medication.
I had terrible headaches and fatigue for a week; then, I figured out that if I ate a substantial meal and drank a can of coke, which I rarely do, it worked.
Then a marvelous thing happened; I slept for 9 hours twice last week. I slept for 8 hours last night. These days, the alarm didn’t wake me up at the ass crack of dawn, and I woke up naturally.
I feel like a completely different person being well rested, something I have never been before. When I get out of bed, I am not thinking about when I will be able to rest later.
I go back to the doctor for a follow-up appointment in two weeks. I need to ask about one drawback and if I need to be concerned if the medication will affect my ulcerative colitis since things have been dicey in the mornings. That’s putting it nicely.
I still need to eat and drink a little coke in the morning; too much coffee bothers my stomach, which is why I use cola for caffeine. The other issue mentioned above after taking my medication may also fix itself since it is another well know side effect. I have to wait and see.
The good news is that I have only had one anxiety attack in the first week since I started the new medication. If I continue to sleep well, that will be even more good news for me! Yay!
A person with the ability to influence potential buyers of a product or service by promoting or recommending the items on social media. Influencers can add serious credibility to a brand.
Whenever I open Amazon, I am shown the top trending picks by their influencers. The products I usually see are home and cooking items, and now and again, some fashion items. I found that Amazon had an influencer job application on its website yesterday. Who knew?
Who are these social media influencers? How do you become one? How do you get paid? Is this a career? All very good questions with some simple answers.
Influencers are people who have built a reputation on social media using their knowledge and expertise on a specific topic. Influencers make daily posts on social media about that topic and generate large followings of people who pay attention to what they have to say.
Brands love influencers because they create trends and encourage their followers to buy their products.
There are different types of influencers, and they are ranked by the number of followers they have.
~ Mega-influencers have more than 1 million followers. Celebrities such as Gordon Ramsey, Justin Bieber, Dwayne Johnson, and Christiano Ronaldo are Mega-influencers.
~ Macro-influencers are people with between 40,000 and 1 million followers. They are usually experts in their field or B-grade celebrities who haven’t made it big yet.
~Micro-influencers are regular everyday people who have become known for their knowledge about a special topic. They have between 1,000 and 40,000 followers.
~ Nano-influencers are new to the game. These people have a small number of followers in a highly specialized field. Think of being a big fish in a small pond. This type of influencer is not useful to most brands.
The bigger the influencer with the most followers attracts bigger brands and makes bigger commissions. Celebrities can make up to 1 million dollars for a single social media post! Shit!
So why in the hell am I talking about influencers anyway? The other day Marty and I were on the road after production making deliveries and needed to stop for lunch. I always check my phone for gluten-free choices, and this time something new popped up, a place called Viva Empanadas.
Before ordering any food, we spoke with a woman who was the business owner. The empanada place was in a food gallery set up like a food court with different vendors and community seating inside and outside.
Let me tell you; this young woman had me at hello. We started to ask about gluten-free and if those empanadas were fried with the wheat ones when she got a huge smile on her face and began telling us all about her business.
The food was not only safe to eat, but killer! It was delicious and made with so much love you could taste it. Marty said it was his best bite of food out so far this year. We spoke with the owner Veronica at length and told her about a Facebook group called Gluten-free Albany.
It’s a group page for people to share places, products, and food establishments that are either gluten-free safe or warn everyone to watch out for cross-contamination or a poorly trained staff.
Veronica is new to the area; she recently moved to the Albany area from Brooklyn, NY, because she couldn’t afford brick and mortar rent in NYC and outgrew her food truck. I promised her I would tell the group about her new business that opened only two months ago.
Later that night, this is what I wrote on the Gluten-free Albany page:
We had a great experience today at a new place called Viva Empanadas Latin Kitchen at Gallery 7 in Latham today. The owner Veronica is very passionate about her food and having something that everyone can eat, from gluten-free, vegetarian, vegan down to traditional varieties.
Veronica and her staff are knowledgeable and are extremely careful about cross-contamination. They have a separate dedicated fryer for all gluten-free empanadas. We tried four different kinds of empanadas, and each one was more delicious than the next. Marty said it was his best bite eaten out this year which is a big compliment.
The gluten-free empanadas are different colors to distinguish which type they are.
I told Veronica we would tell you guys about her and her new business she opened only two months ago. The prices are good, which is something that is important to her. She is super friendly, proud, and passionate about her food and is a fantastically talented cook. Tell her the spätzle people sent you. Lol.
By the next morning, over 800 group members had read the post. By that afternoon, 1,100 saw it. While Marty and I were in production, he reminded me I forgot to tell everyone the important part of her business. The thing we loved most about it. So I wrote another post:
I was so excited to tell everyone about Viva empanadas that I forgot to mention the most impressive part of her business…the time, effort, and love that goes into each of her gluten-free empanada doughs. She told us her story of how she peels the cassava or yucca root and boils it until soft, then mashes it and works it into the dough. She does the same thing with the green plantains and corn.
All of her doughs are naturally gluten-free the way they were meant to be made in Latin America. The meats are slowly braised and tender, flavorful and unctuous. All of this work is an incredible part of her whole business...
Since yesterday another 950 people saw my second post. There are only 2,000 members of the group, which meant more than half read my recommendation. I read comments on my two posts from members who either went there the next day and had a great experience or planned to go. Everyone was so excited and thanked me for telling them about this new find. This group really watches out for each other!
I got a personal message from Veronica thanking me and wanted to share with me how many new customers are coming in and saying they saw my post. Marty told me I was an influencer. How do you like that? A gluten-free food influencer. Huh.
I didn’t plan or even think I was influencing people or the brand Viva Empanadas. I wanted to help another new small business owner be successful. I also wanted the members of our group who are always looking for another safe place to eat and can trust to know about it. I achieved both!
I believe we need to support, lift up, and cheer on other amazing, hard-working small business owners. We have had many influencers post about our spätzle over the last five years; one post got as many as 10,000 likes. Social media is like a mighty freight train that can either make or break you.
If you are in Albany, gluten-free or not, I urge you to try Viva Empanadas located in the Gallery 7 Market in Latham, NY. You will not be disappointed or sick! Tell her the spätzle people sent you. 😂
Yesterday, my aunt Dee, who lives in PA in the Northern Poconos, came to visit. She and her boyfriend Ray were visiting a friend less than 2 hours away from us in Massachusetts and decided she had to go to Vermont to meet me.
That’s right, meet me for the first time in person. We have talked on the phone before, but when we met, it was like we’ve always known each other; we felt so comfortable together.
In 2014, I found my biological mother and sister, with whom I have beautiful relationships. I got my family and medical history, which was very important to me, but most of all, I could close that open circle in my heart after we hugged for the first time. It was surreal.
I never expected to find anything about my biological father’s side of the family since he didn’t even know I existed.
It was never a priority to me to look for my biological father; finding my mother was all that mattered. Meeting my sister and cousins was the cherry on top of my 48-year-old dream.
In 2018, I got an email from my sister Jennifer. I don’t like using the word half when it comes to my siblings; I love them and am so grateful we found each other.
We have the same blood running through our veins, and we have a lot of similarities; I don’t give a fuck if they are half or whole; they are my siblings, which means a lot after wishing for siblings with every birthday candle blown out while growing up.
Aunt Dee is my biological father’s youngest sister by 9 years. They never lived in the same house together. My father’s family was a tragic hot mess; after their parents split up, the kids went to live with their grandmother. Later, my grandfather met someone else, and they had a child. That child was Dee. She told me yesterday that she never felt like she fit into the family growing up.
I only knew little bits and pieces about my father. He took off on his family and went to California when my youngest brother Dan was only 6 months old. Jennifer has few memories; however, our other brother’s memories aren’t good ones. Our father never kept in touch or even saw his children; that was heartbreaking to learn about.
I have never met or spoken to my other brother since he wants nothing to do with me. I respect and accept it even though my siblings say we are the most alike out of all four of us. I keeping praying maybe someday he would come around.
Aunt Dee filled me in on what my father Tom was like as a person, not a father, husband, or brother. She said he was an entertainer and performer with a great singing voice. I have been a performer too since I was a young child.
She told me he was very funny and could light up a room. He loved to cook and was very good at it. When he moved to California, he felt like he belonged, and people loved him.
My father, Tom, died on his 50th birthday of a heart attack. Aunt Dee was the one who flew to California and took care of his memorial service in San Francisco, then arranged to have his body sent to NJ to be buried. She said she had to do it since no one else would. How tragically sad.
Getting to know Aunt Dee yesterday was something I never expected, and Marty and I enjoyed her and Ray’s company very much. The visit felt natural, and we had no trouble finding things to compare and talk about. We are both big talkers and swear like sailors. Lol!
I made some of my old stand-by dishes for lunch and mini blueberry tarts with whipped cream for dessert. Aunt Dee also loves to cook and loved my kitchen. She took inspirational photos because she wants to redo her kitchen that she hates.
Klaus and Otto have NEVER smiled and posed for a photo like this before! I guess they liked their Aunt Dee too!
I had mixed feelings when finding out more about my father, Tom. My adopted father, Russ, was my dad, who raised me and loved me. I was fortunate to have him as a dad; we were very close. I was devastated when he passed at only 61 years old of ALS in 2000.
What both of my fathers had in common was their love of cooking and good food. They were both entertaining, and my dad Russ was a funny guy and could also light up a room.
I like to think they know each other on the other side, that Tom met Russ when he got there and thanked him for being such a good dad to me.
I am a fortunate person whose adoption story has a happy ending, which is something that doesn’t always happen. I am blessed knowing my family and medical history on both sides and to have these beautiful “new” family members who came into my life. All of those birthday wishes finally came true! 🎂
Sometimes I think back to when I had that painfully broken circle in my heart, the yearning, feeling so jealous of non-adopted people and their families; I had so many unanswered questions over the years; I still can’t believe all of those feelings went away as soon as I found out where I came from, my ancestors, and my nationalities.
Well, now I finally know the answers to those questions, which is pretty amazing! You would never understand what this meant to me if you weren’t adopted. Most of the adopted people I have met over the years grew up feeling the same way I did. I hope some of them had a happy ending to their stories like I did.
Last year outdoor scenes from the HBO series The Gilded Age were filmed in Troy, NY. Hollywood turned downtown Troy into New York City during the 1880s. I walked around and took photos of the shops and their windows, meticulously done down to the most minor details.
I walked around on that wet, cold, rainy Saturday of Memorial day weekend feeling like I had traveled through time. I wrote about my experience in the Hollywood on the Hudson blog post.
We heard through the Troy Farmers Market that HBO was back to beginning the transformation and shooting of the second season of The Gilded Age on Monday.
We get to the market very early, set up by 7 am because I am married to a German who wants to be there first, and saw the painters and prop people rolling their carts down the street to a series of buildings they were transforming.
We walked around again, and I snapped shots of the already complete shops. Once the market started, I forgot all about the Gilded Age and HBO since we were busy with customers, handing out samples, and giving people our spätzle spiel.
I gave a sample to a couple who loved the spätzle when they tried it. The woman told me she had celiac disease and was always looking for things she could eat. Same here, sister! They bought one of our 2 lb family packs and left.
A few minutes later, the husband returned and told me they were in town because his wife was filming. How could they get more because she liked it so much? I gave him a business card and told him we have two farms that do shipping for us.
Actress Carrie Coon aka Bertha Russell.
It turns out his wife is Carrie Coon, who plays one of the leading roles in the series, the ruthless Bertha Russell. He was Tracy Letts, a famous Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright. They were both friendly, and I was happy another gluten-free person, famous or not, fell in love with our product. I don’t think a celebrity ever tried our spätzle before.
We don’t get HBO, so we never saw the first season of The Gilded Age, but as soon as the weather gets cold, we will sign up for a month and binge season 1 for sure.
I told our friends David and Arthur, who also walked around the transformed streets last year, about meeting Carrie Coon; they thought it was excellent even though they hate her character. LOL. Now, I definitely need to watch the series.
I don’t know how this happened. Marty is from Germany, and I am a lover of all things from France, and yet, we never heard of flammkuchen until early last year. The direct translation is “flame cake” or “pie cooked in flames.”
We have a wholesale restaurant account in Greenwich, NY, not far over the New York border. The restaurant is called Elsasser’s Beim 111. A year and a half ago, the chef & owner, Chris, contacted us and wanted to use our spätzle on his Germanic food menu.
That’s another thing we never heard of either; Germanic food. Chris’ new restaurant serves flammkuchen, many kinds of brats, and different dinner specials weekly. We have made deliveries to his place but have never eaten there since we are there at weird times of the day.
Lately, I’ve been watching a cooking and travel series on BBC television with Chef Rick Stein. I like Chef Stein’s approach to food and travel; it’s different from others I’ve watched in the past. He uses literature, history, and art to describe or tell about an area and the food.
I am watching Rick Stein’s “Secret France” series, and of course, I love it. On this food adventure, he takes you to hidden food treasure stops, not tourist trap restaurants or even places in big cities in France. These gems are where the locals eat, and the chefs cook with their souls using whatever fruits, nuts, vegetables, meats, and dairy is right around them.
When Chef Stein was in the Alsace region of France, he made flammkuchen. He called it Tarte Flambée because he was in France. The Alsace region went back and forth between Germany and France and thus created Germanic cuisine. Huh, now I know.
Flammkuchen is a German/French pizza with a very thin crust and is topped with creme frâiche, thinly sliced onions, bacon, or lardons, which are thick chunks of bacon, sometimes with Swiss or Gruyere, grated nutmeg, salt, and pepper.
How could we not of heard of this type of pizza before? Flammkuchen was originally made by German farmers who made bread once a week. To test the temperature of their wood-fired oven, they would scrap aside the embers and throw in a thin piece of dough that should be cooked in a minute or two if the temperature is correct.
The farmers later began topping their “test” dough and had themselves a nice lunch or snack. The rest is flammkuchen history, you might say.
After watching Chef Stein make his tarte flambée or flammkuchen, I knew I needed to make it too. I found his recipe online, see the link above, and decided to make the one I just watched him make. Unlike pizza crust, it is an unleavened dough that doesn’t contain yeast. Of course, I made a gluten-free version.
You must use creme frâche for flammkuchen, which cannot be substituted with sour cream because it is too sour. Creme frâiche has a less sour and almost nutty taste. I decided to make my own since it seemed easy enough.
When I looked at creme frâiche recipes, I saw it takes a minimum of 24 hours to make. Besides time, the recipe only calls for two ingredients, heavy cream, and buttermilk or sour cream.
I used a glass measuring cup and added a cup of heavy cream with three tablespoons of sour cream. I covered it with a towel and let it sit for 24 hours at room temperature.
It was like a science experiment as I kept checking the consistency and smell. As I watched it thicken, I saw the chemical reaction of the butterfat and bacterial culture turn into creme frâiche. No thickening agents are permitted in creme frâiche; this is serious business in Europe, so I used the word permitted above.
The creme frâiche had a consistency of a firmer whipped cream with a slightly tangy and nutty flavor. It was nothing like whipped cream or sour cream; it had its own flavor. This was my first time trying it.
I used regular bacon since I had no lardons on hand, which I sautéed a bit before adding to the flammkuchen. I sliced onion on my mandolin so I could get paper-thin slices. I grated some Swiss cheese and grabbed my nutmeg rasp (grater) and whole nutmeg.
I made the dough and rolled it out on parchment paper. I slathered on the creme frâiche and then topped it with the sautéed bacon pieces, thinly sliced onions, a small amount of Swiss cheese, nutmeg, salt, and pepper.
It looked weird going into the oven but immediately started smelling delicious. When I pulled the flammkuchen out of the oven, I couldn’t wait to try some.
Ok, this surprised me; it was my best bite of 2022 so far this year! It was that good. It has a different texture than pizza, and the combination of ingredients was a home run! Marty and Sam loved it as much as I did. Holy shit, it was good!
The next day, I told Marty I couldn’t stop thinking about the flammkuchen. When Sam woke up, he said the same thing to me, “I don’t know why but I keep thinking about that flammkuchen.” He loves the same type of food as I do and is also a foodie, always thinking about food.
Elsasser’s in Greenwich, NY and their flammkuchen.
I just looked at the menu at our customer’s place, Elsassers Beim 111, and the menu looked delicious and reasonably priced. It is right on Main Street in Greenwich, NY. 111 Main Street, to be exact. His flammkuchen looks delicious! Now I know how you can have an entire restaurant concept centered around flammkuchen. Chris makes a traditional flammkuchen along with several different types of toppings.
Today, I made a second batch of creme frâiche. I used a creamer warmer that I got from a couple of friends of mine, MJ and Stephanie. They didn’t know what to do with it, but now I do! It’s my new handy-dandy creme frâiche maker, and I love the look and design of it.
Flammkuchen has been requested over the weekend; they don’t care when or with what; they just want it. I do too! Trust me; it’s that good! yum!
I was making our dinner this afternoon, so it will be ready when I get home from bellydance later tonight. I made chicken marsala, mashed potatoes, and glazed carrots. Sounds yummy right?
I realized when making the carrots how I don’t cook like a home cook anymore. When I was a home cook, I would cut the carrots, put them in a pot of salted boiling water, and cook them until they were crisp-tender.
Next, I would get out a colander and drain the carrots. Then, I would take a sauté pan and melt some butter, then add the carrots, brown sugar, and salt. I would sauté until the brown sugar and butter got thick and bubbling.
What’s wrong with that? It seems correct, but it produces more dishes and takes more time to get to the same finished product, which in this case is glazed carrots.
Now, I throw carrots into one of my banged up, tried and true, restaurant-style steel frying pans and add about half a cup of water, a couple of tablespoons of butter, and brown sugar. I add a big pinch of kosher salt.
I crank the frying pan on high and cover it with another steel frying pan; I am always grateful Marty got me two of these pans instead of only one.
I let the carrots cook undisturbed for ten minutes and poked a paring knife in one of the carrots. They were crisp, tender! I took off the lid and cooked the carrots on medium for less than five minutes, and the glaze was shiny, bubbling, and thick.
What would have taken at least 25 minutes took less than 15 minutes. I don’t know about you, but ten minutes is a big deal in my world. Not having to wash another pot, lid and colander is priceless.
The glaze is bubbling away.
This is how they would do it on “the line” in a restaurant; quickly, efficiently, and most of all, delicious. I have never worked on the line in a busy restaurant, but I am training as I will someday. That is something on a to-do list of mine.
I am still struggling with fatigue and headaches from my new medicine, which could take more than two weeks to go away. I am still going to dance class tonight because I want to and won’t let a stupid headache get in the way of my joy.
Have a good night, everyone! I can’t wait to come home and eat the dinner I just made; it smells so damn good in here.🙂
Hey guys, I just wanted to let you know I am laying low right now while I am adjusting to the change in meds for my anxiety and depression.
It’s like me to worry about not posting for a few days. Besides the change in meds giving me headaches, which is normal, I don’t feel like myself, which is also normal.
Don’t worry, I am sure I will be back to my crazy, animated self in a couple of days. Until then, stay cool and hydrated the best you can in this hot weather. Hopefully, we will get some much needed rain soon as well.
