M. Planet has become accustomed to the fresh lettuce and herbs from Kountry Fresh Farms. Because of this, when they aren’t at the Farmers’ Market, a sort of brain-freeze happens that requires the purchasing routine to be re-evaluated. Usually a bag or two of lettuce is perfect for the week’s lunch salads. This weekend, Kountry Fresh had sold out of all of their delicious offerings during the week and was not at the market. Thankfully, Avery farms has a nice salad blend as well.
Farmer Avery: “oh! you’re back!”
M. Planet: “ah, yes. Koss Farms is not here today, so I will need to purchase more of your salad mix”.
The acquisition of purple asparagus, rhubarb, and a large quantity of salad mix had already been made from Farmer Avery that morning. We talked a little about Koss Farms (Kountry Fresh), and Farmer Avery shared that he used to have a stall next to Koss, and that they only had one type of lettuce at the time. Apparently they have really branched out, as there are frequently at least five varieties of lettuce, as well as herbs, at the Koss stand.
There was a group selling tomatoes: beautiful orange, pink, and red ones. They also had a basket of mixed ones with a sign saying “Small and Ugly tomatoes” – for 75c/pound cheaper than the others. They were neither small nor ugly, but a selection was made from these. So far, they have been sliced and eaten with a little salt, made into a tomato and red onion salad with some salt, pepper, and red wine vinegar, and eaten in salad. They aren’t as flavorful as expected, but then, these aren’t from The Great Tomato Woman’s gardens! They’ll be fried one of these days (a la Full Scottish Breakfast) as well.
Grabbed a couple bunches of herbs from Sola Gratia (dill and oregano). Will try to root the oregano; the dill will go into salads and was part of a pickling brine for the purple cauliflower obtained in an earlier trip:
Cary’s Garden of Eatin’ had quite a selection; picked up some cucumbers from them for salads and sandwiches and just plain eating.
Mostly Farmers’ Market offerings: Panang curry style Tilapia from Koss on soba noodles accompanied by Grateful Wren Eggs, Cary’s Garden of Eatin’ cucumbers, Sola Gratia pickled Daikon, and tomatoes.
A long time in a galaxy far, far, away, the CO wrote their webpages from actual CODE. HTML, Javascript, CSS. Then along came very busy times and the availability of WordPress, included with the hosting cost. At the time, it was easy to change out logos and make the WordPress site look like what the Caustic One actually wanted.
But something happened in the last … (mental math here, 2022 – 2013 …er, nine) NINE (9) years. WordPress now sucks. Looking back on this blog and on a few of the others CO maintains, the fonts have changed, spacing is not the same, and generally, the feel is not what it was before the multiple upgrades. Multiple upgrades which make it more and more difficult to get the look and feel that is desired for these blogs).
To be honest, This Time Lord has no desire to recode the entire site. But looking back, it’s just embarrassing. It’s bad enough to see all the grammatical errors made while living in a foreign country, but the format is insult to exhausted injury. It’s actually frustrating enough that there may be a time (in June or July) when current contracts are completed that the websites are all taken down for refurbishment – sans the debacle of wordpress. It’s something that this would be frustrating enough to want to hand code everything over what is now possible, it really is. Something. Something something something. Meh.
This morning, the CO woke at the usual time: 526. Why 526 is totally a mystery: when the alarm is set, it is never at 526. In order to get the best selection at the Farmers’ Market, it’s best to arrive before 8 am; closer to 730 is better, even. However, this fine morning at 526, it was raining. By 0700, it was a gale-force thunderstorm. Several things happened (or didn’t happen) as a result of these events:
Jessa von Fabaceae, Waldkönigin, was fed by 0600. As were the Sisters Negrae, Posh Pasht and Anu Vashti.
The Caustic One got a few extra hours of sleep, from 0600 to 0700 and then again from 0700 to 0856. At 0700, it was obvious that no playing with plants/beautification was going to happen this morning prior to a Farmers’ Market Run. It also seemed a fantastic day to stay indoors and do all the things the CO says they are going to do on days when being outside is just not feasible, but never seems to get to. And sleep, that marvelous entity that doesn’t seem to happen as often as needed, but hits like a Pavlovian response whenever hard rain or thunderstorms sound at the window, was engaged in. Ahhhhh who doesn’t love a good rainstorm.
At around 0900, it seemed as though the winds were down, the rain had stopped, and the temperature was comfortable. Cooler, much cooler, than the 90 degrees of the previous days. Marvelous, very marvelous. So instead of staying home and doing nothing, it was off to the Farmers Market, if only to buy some lettuce from Koss Farms and chat with the Farmer for a while.
Arriving at the Farmers’ Market this morning, the parking lots were full and people were milling about in good measure. However, the day’s takings turned out to be plentiful, as the storms had kept people away just long enough that product was still available to be had. Here is the list (also pictured above):
Rhubarb (Avery)
Asparagus (Avery)
Mixed Greens (Avery)
Purple Basil (Koss Kountry Fresh)
Summer Crisp Lettuce (Koss Kountry Fresh)
Cilantro (Sola Gratia)
Dillweed (Sola Gratia)
Daikon Radish (Twin Acre)
Scallions (Twin Acre)
Purple and Gold Cauliflower (Cary’s Garden of Eatin’)
Spring Onions (Ochoa)
Chestnut Mushrooms (Flyaway)
The plans for this week’s stash include:
Rhubarb soup. The CO’s stomach has been bothering them quite a bit of late. Last week, the Rhubarb soup actually settled it quite a bit. Served slightly warmed or at room temperature, this week a larger batch is The Plan, for “medicinal purposes”. It’s actually quite nice that CO loves the flavor. Last week, the CO was talking with Amazing about this, and Amazing asked if there was cinnamon in the soup. Now, that’s an idea….
The concept of a rhubarb pie still exists, but the craving has faded, so maybe if there is still rhubarb to be had next week, that might be a thing. Or not.
Mongolian Beef Stir Fry for the Sunday Meal. This will use the mushrooms, along with beef from Triple S farms procured at a previous jaunt to the FM. Since the CO loves cauliflower and onions in their stir fry, this is exciting. And it will be pretty. A few scallions or spring onions as well as some asparagus will be tossed in as well.
Cilantro soup!! The Mexican Food Journal has a lovely recipe for Creme of Cilantro Soup. Cooked cilantro changes flavor and is really wonderful. The CO also loves a Cilantro Onion soup but has been thinking a lot about a cream soup, served cold (maybe). Here is the recipe, compliments of Douglas (https://mexicanfoodjournal.com/cream-of-cilantro-soup/):
Ingredients
1 large bunch cilantro
½ white onion (CO will use a sweet Vidalia-type onion, as that’s what available)
1 clove garlic (CO will use Shallots)
¾ cup Mexican cream not sour cream (CO will use boring American Cream)
1 cup low salt chicken broth (CO will use whatever chicken broth is handy)
4 cups water
¼ tsp. black pepper
1 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. cooking oil
Instructions
Roughly chop the onions and garlic and fry them in 2 tablespoons of cooking oil until they start to soften and turn translucent.
Add the bunch of cilantro and sauté over medium heat until the cilantro has wilted.
Add 2 cups of water and black pepper to the pan and simmer for 5 minutes.
Blend the sauteed onions, garlic, and cilantro and cooking liquid with 2 cups of water until smooth, about 1 minute.
Strain the mixture into a mixing bowl. Press firmly on the pulp to extract as much flavor as possible.
Allow the cream to come to room temperature and allow the blended cilantro base to cool for 10 minutes before adding to the cream.
Add a few tablespoons of soup base into the cream and gently stir to incorporate.
Continue adding a few tablespoons of base at a time while continually stirring.
Once you have added all of the soup base add 2 cups of water and stir for 30 seconds to ensure that all of the soup base and water are incorporated into the cream and there are no lumps in the cream.
Warm 1 cup of chicken broth in a pot but don’t bring the broth to a boil because if the broth is boiling the cream will clump when you pour the mixture into it. Slowly pour the soup base into the broth.
Very gently simmer the soup for about 15 minutes. Over this time the soup will thicken. Do not allow it to come to a boil or the soup may clump.
Serve immediately.
This could be pretty wonderful, even if it is putzy.
Greens from Avery and Koss: Mostly, these end up in weekday lunchboxes. Summer crisp stays crisp in the fridge after cutting and washing, so this will be five lunches, easily. Some fresh minced dill in one along with some soft weiskäse makes a Greek-style influence.
It’s been mentioned before that the Caustic One likes soup for breakfast. Lately, substituting steel cut oats for rice or orzo has been both delicious and a good way to get the oatmeal into the body. With the purchase of the (stuffing the face into the dill and inhaling deeply) dill, it seems a good time for an Avgolemono Breakfast soup! Since Avgolemono is really about the lemon and egg, one could conceivably use a non-meat broth base and leave out the chicken, since the herbs and spices make up the flavor palette. For a breakfast soup, this would be fine. However, there is some chicken in the freezer that has to be cooked, so a nice broth made from the bones and leftover stuck-to-the-bones meat will be the basis for the soup. This is helpful for two reasons: the chicken will be roasted “Athenian Style”, so the spices and flavors will be already present, making the broth easier to make. Secondly, all the onions that the chicken roasts on, can be added to the broth and not wasted (after Alpha refuses to eat any).
Daikon radish and greens: This is up for debate. Not sure about the greens at all. Might just dry them and delay any decisions for the moment. As far as the actual roots, in the past, the CO has pickled Daikon for later use. At the moment, there are two versions of this in the pantry that haven’t been eaten yet. One possibility is to open one of the versions, and if it is wonderful, make more with the new Daikon. That would make the most sense, since, if it is NOT wonderful, why make more. This would, of course, demand that the second version would need to be opened and tasted, and if it is wonderful, make more of it.. but if neither of them are wonderful, then, well, a quandary has been reached. Hm. Well. Stay tuned ….
Last week’s haul resulted in over a week’s worth of meals, when coupled with some staples and odds and ends around the house – and leftovers from previous weeks’ hauls. Pickling or brining can make a simple meal look and taste as though it was at a fancy restaurant. One of the reasons the Caustic One does not eat out as much as many of their colleagues/associates/age cohort members is that the food tends to disappoint. It’s no secret that the CO is all about the food.
Lest the reader think that some special talent for making things look nice is part of the story, be reassured that it is not the case. In fact, while the CO is capable of making a delicious cake, it is well known that any non-abstract decorations generally look as though someone handed a toddler an icing bag and said ‘have at it, mate’. Making something look pretty on the plate is more about balancing colors and flavors, and we all know what we, personally, like. It’s nice when the people being served the meal enjoy various items on the plate, but let’s be honest: when Caustic cooks for Alpha Slacker, the color palette is just not as exciting, as Alpha is interested in a very narrow band of non-meat/non-starch offerings. Case in point: here is the picture of the two meals, personalized for each diner:
Not everyone likes pickled veg…
Back to the meal in question: Soba noodles are available at Asian markets for a reasonable price. Aldi has smoked lauchs (lox, salmon) for about $5 (US). Having a generous friend with chickens is also quite wonderful. Ponzu sauce has a nice snap and accents the dish for a light, refreshing, and filling protein-rich meal.
While CO tends to buy Ponzu (Japanese Citrus sauce) at the Asian grocer these days, making it oneself is not difficult if one can find the ingredients (basic recipe from J. Kenji Lopez-Alt at Serious Eats (https://www.seriouseats.com/ponzu-sauce-recipe)):
1/2 cup yuzu juice, or equal parts lemon and lime juice (4 ounces; 120ml)
1/2 cup light soy sauce (4 ounces; 120ml) – CO uses Tamari, which is made without wheat.
Combine vinegar, mirin, and kombu in a small saucepan. Bring to a simmer. Remove from heat and stir in katsuobushi. Cover and let steep for 10 minutes. Strain through a fine-mesh strainer and discard solids (or reserve to make a second batch, using some additional katsuobushi in the second batch). Allow liquid to cool completely.
Combine steeped mirin, citrus juice, and soy sauce. Ponzu will keep in a sealed container in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
We have the following goodies to work with this week:
Italian sausage, ground
Italian sausage, links
asparagus
english cucumbers
cilantro
parsley
buttercrisp lettuce
garlic that looks like leek (when it’s small, it looks like scallions) – very long
rhubarb
tiny red onions
shallots
basil
Because the Caustic one has too much time on their hands these days, the weekly farmers’ market trip makes for, easily, two days of cooking and prep. Case in point – the mounds of carrots over the winter that were frozen, dried, pureed, pickled… etc. We are bit done with the carrots for the time being.
Now that Spring has sprung, the Market has moved back outdoors. The overwhelming offerings are… asparagus. These asparagus came from Meyer Produce in Camargo, IL. The CO likes to spread out their purchases among various vendors, so Meyer’s asparagus, available in both green and purple, were an easy sell. The purple vanishes when the asparagus is heated (steamed, fried, etc).
A few farmers had zucchini. The Caustic One does not do zucchini. That’s a whole ‘nother post for possibly a whole ‘nother blog, but after eating them dozens of different ways, nothing changes the fact that they are, indeed, zucchini. When the CO was small, their mother made apple sheet pie with zucchini. We were all tricked, it was delicious. Until the extra pans were frozen; upon thawing the truth came out – and the taste.
Koss Kountry Fresh farms is an aquaculture farm. Their tilapia is amazing and fresh, and their lettuces are great. The CO loves them because they are not bitter – after living in Deutschland, where the bitter lettuces are popular, all lettuce is suspect. Koss’ is wonderful. These make great lunches – and helps the CO get enough water in their diet. Most weeks there is also purple basil available, but this week only green basil was to be had. A small bouquet of parsley was added to the mix.
Not too far from the Living Compound is a Lutheran Church. They have quite a bit of property, and use it to farm under the auspices of Sola Gratia Farm. At least 10% of their produce goes to food kitchens and programs to help people eat. They were the ones that provided the very large garlic stalks and the cilantro. They also have marvelous purple potatoes, which we’ve decided make great fries, roasted disks, and mash, but not baked.
The shallots and tiny red onions came from Green G farm; their prices are really great but does involve some work. The CO suspects the onions are meant for sets, and picked out the ones with lovely shoots to plant (somewhere).
The Moore Family farm provided the pork sausage. For a brief time, the CO worked with a Puerto Rican Vet who confided in the CO that this farm really treated their animals well and did “farming right”. The Moore Family farm claims to have converted their operations to a permaculture-based system. They are very nice people to talk to as well.
On that note, it should be made clear that going to the farmers’ market is really more about talking to the vendors than anything else. As mentioned earlier, the CO has too much time on their hands, and conversations involving other adults are pretty sparse.
Avery Farms provided the rhubarb. Rhubarb was the driving force behind this trip to the Market, actually. When in Iceland, the CO was taught by a friend how to make rhubarb soup. Yum. The farmer was also really interesting to talk to – thankfully the trip was made quite early so as not to interrupt the lines. The CO thinks that the mini Long Island Cheese Pumpkin came from Avery last year, but can’t be sure.
And finally, Cary’s Garden of Eatin provided the English cucumbers.
So! What to do with all of this stuff?
Firstly, the Very Long Garlic Leek thingies were cut down to a foot from the roots. The tops were washed, snipped of brown edges at the very top, and cut into three – four inch pieces. These were put into a 3 quart stock pot and filled with water, brought to a boil, and simmered until the water was halved. The greens were removed. Dried celery and ginger slices were added to the garlic stock, and simmered until the ginger was reconstituted and the flavor was in the stock. These were removed, and steel cut oatmeal was added to the pot, simmered until done, and salt added. This is the Caustic One’s ‘breakfast gruel’ for the week.
A few shallots were peeled and sliced thinly, along with a couple of tiny red onions. The basil was washed, stems removed, and minced along with the red onions, shallots, a few red baby tomatoes, a tablespoon of capers, some vinegar and olive oil. Everything was cut together using a rocking knive and placed in a jar in the refrigerator to allow the flavors to meld. This bruschetta is great on Knekkebrød, or over poached tilapia. Or out of the jar, with a spoon.
The asparagus was steamed lightly, and tossed with a mixture of minced scallions, vinegar, salt, and olive oil. This was also chilled.
The tiny red onions – wow. After picking out the ones that seemed to be best for the patio garden, about a cup’s worth of them were peeled. These were sliced the long way and added to hot vinegar, salt, minced Mexican oregano, and chilled for use in tacos or Gỏi cuốn/Nem cuốn. The peelings were put into a pot and covered with about 1500 ml / quart and a half of water. After simmering and cooling, vinegar and salt were mixed in. This dye is great for coloring hard boiled egg shells.
About a quarter of the cilantro was minced with Mexican oregano (about a quarter cup leaves); more shallots were minced. These became part of the seasoning for shredded pork (purchased at last week’s FM from That Little Farm in the Country and cooked in a pressure cooker). In a hot cast iron pan, olive oil was added, heated, and a chile arbol was allowed to cook, adding flavor to the oil. Cumin was added to this as well. After the chile turned black, it was removed from the pan, and the seasoning and a little pork stock was added to the pan along with the shredded pork.
The pork sausage links are browned in a pot, and then removed. Some of the garlic sticks were minced and added to the pot with some oil until soft and aromatic; the sausages were returned to the pot along with pork stock to become soft and tender. This becomes Sunday Dinner – along with pan roasted potatoes and veggies.
The parsley and the remainder of the garlic sticks were minced and sauteed in a stock pot. Pork stock (leftover from the sausage links) was added along with any extra to bring the volume up to a decent quantity, and brought to a simmer. The pork sausage was rolled into tiny meatballs and dropped into the simmering stock; once they had cooked for a while, orzo was added to the soup and cooked. This was then stored in the refrigerator to allow the flavors to ‘marry’ overnight – a la Italian Wedding Soup, or, as the Alpha Slacker calls it, “meatball soup”.
The cucumbers will be sliced on top of salads, as well as making a pickled cucumber salad, Japanese style – scallions or garlic leek things sliced quite thinly, salt, some cold water, rice wine vinegar, and the juice of a lime.
Rhubarb soup! is on the agenda. Some will also be dried for later use in teas or as garnishes.
A cold soup will be prepared with the rest of the cilantro and garlic, at the moment, the CO is thinking – cream soup. Like a thin smoothie, full of savory flavors. Not sure what that will look like, but it’s possible that the end product will end up posted here.
Now that it has gotten Too Warm for the CO (that means, over 75 F or over 27 C), having these little salads and pieces in the fridge for tapas-style meals, soups/gruels just needed to reheat and serve – or have cold.
In any event, many things have happened between the last blog post and this one. Four years of stuff and distraction and stress to the point where this blog has been ignored.
The jury is still out as to what to do with this thing.
Today is May 5th. This year, in Germany, it is also Christihimmelfahrt, which translates to, roughly, Christ’s trip to heaven – aka Ascension Day. It is also Vatertag, a very secular tradition in which men load up carts of booze and head to the woods, or the mountains, or the river, or the ocean, and drink themselves into a stupor. For this reason, even though the day is a National Holiday, the Caustic One isn’t keen on taking a nice bike ride on a beautiful day – it’s just exhausting to deal with the overload of folks hanging out in what would normally be quiet places of beauty.
So it’s just been a bit of a lazy day, although there is a “gegen Burschis” party in the Marktplatz, with great drumming from some of the African community, and a lot of the hippy-white-folk-in-dreds hanging out with their kids and dancing and hula-hooping. Lots of folks passing through on bikes, in groups; lots of people taking walks. It’s a beautiful day around 16 C, full sun.
So after washing all the dishes (this way CO has a sense of accomplishment), and playing with some crochet (Winky and Goldi need new clothes…)the CO took some time to walk over to the Markt, see the sights (read: watch the protest people play), buy a piece of cake or ice cream. Well, it was interesting but some days, a person doesn’t want to sit down by themselves in a crowd and watch. So instead, it seemed logical to visit the black swan and the new ducklings. One of the newest residents is a female duck with a very pale color. On the river, where the white swans live, there is a white duck with a splash of black on her head. The lake/pond duck is not quite white but more cream. The ducklings are pale like chicken chicks, for the most part, with a few light brown with dark brown markings. Today the ducklings were zooming around the pond as Ms Caustic approached.
They are so quick! The little ones zoomed over to the Black Swan, and then back to the corner where the Mama ducks were watching from the grass embankment on the pond side of the fence. The fence bars are wide enough for the ducks to slide through but not anything bigger; the swan would have to fly over if he wanted to leave the area. Dogs are too big (bigger dogs) but smaller dogs or cats could get through. Anyway, it was such a beautiful day. The little ducklings have a little chirp-chirp that intensifies at times. At one point, the mama ducks and one male stood up and started to cluck. The babies swam over to the embankment cement area and climbed up at the one spot which was conducive to little creatures getting to the grass from the embankment. They all ran up to the adults, and then past them, and out onto the path through the fence. The adults followed them, encouraging them in Ducksprache. Except — one. As the Caustic One looked back over towards the far end of the pond, the Black Swan swam over to her. One remaining baby duckling, a pretty yellow fluffball, came with. It was twitting quite loudly… looking over, it became evident that all the other ducklings and ducks had crossed the path and were already under a tree on the other side of the path. Oh, no! What will happen to the little one? They have left him/her behind! She chirped more loudly, and zipped past the corner, up the wall, over the grass, through the wall, over the path, and up the knoll, meeting her group as they slowly headed away from the pond. A sigh of relief from the Caustic One, but then – reflection. She obviously was able to catch up – was this because the rest of the family was waiting? No one came back to get her, they just expected she would get to where she needed on her own time, and it would be in time.
Maybe humans could learn from ducks.
Sadly, none of this was captured on film (or bits) because, as is always the case, no recording equipment was brought along for this outing.
After watching this, the Caustic One bade farewell to the Black Swan, and took a less traveled route back to the apartment. There is a little path behind the Old Chapel, and one of the ladies from Kantorei was sitting in the back yard, enjoying the sunny warm weather, and waved. CO waved back in response, smiling out of reflex. What a nice thing a wave and a smile can be! The birds were singing as the path led alongside the small river in town. Another pair of ducks lazily relaxed in the shade of a large tree whose roots sank into the river bank and into the river itself.
Caustic found herself thinking about homesickness, and friendship, and how, even though Witz has been “home” for almost three years, three years is not much time for a person such as CO to make real friends. While there are certainly lovely people in her life, on a national holiday when people are out and about, not one person emailed or called to coordinate a meeting. That led to a bit of homesickness, but the reality of it is, that the Heimweh is not for a real place, but an idea. A thought of being somewhere with loved ones, good friends, enjoying the day, some tea, music, cake, dinner – what have you. While it is certain that “home” will reassert itself once things are settled again after the Long Move Back, right now that concept is not a reality. This, of course, led to the realization that perhaps the reason the CO has spent much more time on social media than usual (and necessary), the faint touch of folks that are important to her, that speak the same language, that can (and will) discuss things in that language, is, at this time in the process of this thing called “finishing a PhD”, extraordinarily important.
As the flat neared, a glint from the sky caught CO’s attention. There, up in the sky, a bird… a plane… no! a glider! Gliders frequently fly over Witz; the Witz airport is actually a glider field, but today, although warm, was not a very cumulo-kind of day. The glider was lower than CO had ever seen one get; if field glasses had been available, the registration number would have been discernible. Something about watching a glider nose up to what seems an impossible angle is addictive. Finding a spot against an old stone building out of the sun, Caustic watched the glider cross to the other side of the horizon, wondering if it would make it back to Witz airport or land on the hill across from the Werra….
Some mornings a person just has to write. And not the writing that one is being paid to do, no, rather the writing that is necessary to purge the mind of the many thoughts swirling around, colors and shapes and foggy ideas just outside of the scope of consciousness, a nebula of dreams or ideas or, in the case of the Caustic One this grey cold morning in Central Germany, just too many things the Mind has decided are worth more than the quest to be sitting at a desk in twenty minutes.
The week in review. An interesting title, as it really does not encompass the week, or even most of the activities, but a select sampling of things that really really really (and really) form the basis for the swirling star trek brain effect. Each item could form the basis for its very own blog post, but the likelihood of that happening is expected to be quite low, possibly approaching zero, and standardized to the normal distribution (see what she did there? Stats references in the middle of a non-stats post).
The week in review – in reverse. This morning, as with the last two weeks, the CO awoke quite happily at 520. 520. 05:20. Not with the sun, as the sunrise is closer to 07.48 these days in this sleepy little burg, but with some other clock. This morning, she decided to be lazy and try to sleep some more; Ms Purraliscious had taken up the entire center of the bed and this was an opportunity reclaim that territory and ease the aching bones. At 630 she decided to prolong the luxurious, marvelous time sleeping as she woke to find — no pain. No pain. NO PAIN. No twinges, not a single one, escaped from back or legs or even that tiny spot on the bottom of her foot where a miniscule piece of glass has stubbornly lodged itself. It was wonderful. Marvelous. Something to celebrate and so, she did, by acknowledging the presence of … normality. Health. Sweet, and almost tangible.
Kalamata olives. There are people in the world who have never tasted a kalamata olive. While this may not seem like much, this morning, as the CO ate her breakfast, which consisted of Grossblatt Hafe (oatmeal) with feta cheese, kalamata olives, red/white onions chopped finely, a bit of 8-kräuter, and a nice fresh fried egg from the chickens of Helmut the Entomologist, this realization came to her. Kalamata olives, the taste on her mouth, rolling the stone around until it was clean, coupled with the fresh delicious taste of the egg and the feta cheese, speaking to her and saying “we *are* marvelous, aren’t we”. She feels quite blessed, fortunate, and privileged to be able to enjoy them.
0520. Yesterday morning, 0520, an email came in which the CO did not see. Much later in the day, upon reading the missive, she made a call to the US. Peanut answered, sounding weak and sleepy — and it turned out that she was having four transfusions. Four. F. O. U. R. !!! It seems as thought the loss of blood which affected the CO a few years ago had taken hostage her dear friend Peanut as well… and with only four liters of blood in her body, the fact that she is alive is a miracle. Our generation of sturdy women ignore our symptoms, carrying on in spite of a problem which might be an actual “thing”; the irony of the situation is that most of us are medically trained in some way and really should be better at self diagnosis. The CO suspects that Peanut’s unwillingness to look into her symptoms earlier have much to do with the responsibilities which we take so seriously – family, work, household. They say that the first heart attack a woman of our and the previous generations suffers is the last. Obviously an easy thing to believe.
Thankfully the next generation has a little more smarts – Echo, suffering from chest unease and tingling arm, managed to rouse herself from this “oh, maybe it is nothing” syndrome we have and spent a night/day at the Emergency Room. Thankfully Gameboy is a supportive hubby – “You get better!” instead of “oh, I’m sure it’s nothing” which so often is the mantra of the men in our lives. We and only we know when our bodies are revolting and in need of a little TLC. Of course, if we spent more time on self maintenance we might be better served – prevention is nine tenths of the cure?
Which means that the Caustic One is overdue for a spa day a the salt baths. Hm.
Yesterday. Sunday. Caustic One wanted to See People. There are a lot of very nice People at the Liebfrauenkirch on Sunday mornings, so she decided to make the attempt to understand the service and off she went. There was a baptism, and the brass choir was playing – along with two very accomplished guest musicians; a woman adept at straight horn, trumpet, that little tiny trumpet (can’t remember what it is called) and the most amazing trombone player of all time. Wow. CO has never heard talent and beauty of this sort come from a trombone before; classical – baroque-ish- too-many-notes type amazingness. And of course, seeing some of the Nice People, although it was disappointing that there was no kaffee/tee klatsch afterwards, which is when generally the chatting and catching up happens. In the time that CO has been in this little town, there has never been a lack of klatschtime after the service.
It seems as though CO has been spending a lot of time in the Liebfrauenkirch of late – aha. She has. Saturday evening the most amazing sextet of men from Russia sang for Witzenhausen. The first half was “sacred music” and the second was folk songs and traditional songs of Russia. One of the members, calling himself second tenor (although hearing him sing, he had the range of a male alto), provided insights into each piece before its performance: the title, the composer, the soloists. He would then describe the words in German, in very slow, deliberate, with-a-Russian-accent German that the CO appreciated, as it made it possible for her to understand. Occasionally a word was not translatable to German, and he used the Russian word. For some reason this was no problem for the CO. And the music. The harmonies were very tight. The sacred part was thought provoking, deep, dark at times; a piece about waiting for God as one is dying was heavy but passionate and touching. The folk part was fun. As in, laugh out loud fun! One piece, about a young man who falls in love with a young woman whose father has promised her to another, was exceptionally hilarious – the men acted out the parts as they sang. The young woman, played by a young tenor with an amazing voice, cries and cries and in the end, the father relents and gives his blessing to the young couple.
Friday night, that night of relaxation after a long week of work, accompanied by going out or hitting the town, was also an evening of pure bliss. One of her friends, a woman who paints and then makes greeting cards from her paintings, invited her over for an informal evening of relaxation. The two women began by climbing the mountain behind Mahlerin’s house and picking quince. Smacking the branches and trying to catch them before they rolled down the mountain; the houses are built into the rock but the ‘backyard’ is often a steep incline; not so steep that the grass does not grow but steep enough that the CO could easily trip and kill herself rolling down the mountainside. After quince-gathering, a nice herbal tea next to the wood oven, looking over the street, watching the sun go down, breathing in Mango Peach Salsa candle scent and burning wood wafts during which mingled German and English conversation ensued. Dinner was spaghetti – with meat, just a little, made the way my mom used to serve it when I was a child, all mixed together noodles and sauce. And big thinly sliced carrots, which of course reminded the Caustic One of her beloved friends in Iowa, Pig Man and Physics Woman: Pig Man also put carrots into his spaghetti sauce. Afterwards, a tribute to a fairy tale: Hirse (millet) cream pudding with sugar and cinnamon to shake on top, along with hot pan cooked apple and quince, big chunks of sweet/sour loveliness to go atop the Hirse. The tale is that the mother used to have a magic pot, and she would command the pot to make the Hirse. The child saw this, and one day when the mother was out, commanded the pot as well. The pot obliged, but the child did not know how to make the pot stop, and the entire town was engulfed in Hirse pudding and people had to eat their way in and out of town. Obviously Disney knew this tale, as the Magician’s Nephew with the water adventure attests. After such a nice evening, it was topped off by Mahlerin’s husband driving the Caustic One home – normally she would have returned via bike or foot, but the bike is currently kaputt and this annoying piece of glass was causing havoc with the foot.
Last night, back to Sunday, after the news of Echo and Peanut, the CO attended Taize Gebet. Taize Gebet is a prayerful hour of retrospective singing and meditation; a chance to worship without a sermon (helpful when the language is an issue); small readings from various sources are coupled with intimate songs that are easily harmonized. There were eleven or twelve participants last night and the music was uplifting with so many voices harmonizing. Afterwards, the cares and worries of the previous days had been addressed and no longer pressed hard against the psyche.
And now, this morning, with this outpouring of words, it is time to carry on and go to work.
** ed note: this post was actually written in October 2014 but was unpublished. One year later…
Since arriving in DE, the Caustic One has been exposed to more than her share of breads. Good crusty European breads, soft in the middle, crusty on the outside. Rolls covered with seeds of various sorts, soft in the middle, not too hard on the outside. Dense high fibre breads with nuts throughout.
The German bread obsession is more than an obsession: it is a lifestyle. Breakfast: Bread and something: cheese, egg salad, shrimp salad, wurst/met, quark, cheese with “marmalade”, cucumbers, tomatoes. Warm oatmeal is a rarity – but mueslix is common, with yogurt. Possibly some fruit. Lunch: Yah. Many people have bread with something, although a nice ‘MalZeit’ is preferred – a warm meal, with ‘Nachtisch’ – something sweet, maybe pudding or kuchen or what we would call in the US “jello”. Yeah, Jello. With cream. It was a shock! Dinner — light, soup and bread oftentimes. At a recent Choir retreat, we were treated to Bread and Rolls and Muslix for breakfast, a warm curry or soup with rice or potatoes for lunch and Nachtisch, and evening meal of bread (not rolls, sliced rye) and cheese, various sliced meats, Met (with raw onions, yum yum), and cream herring salad (once with a lovely apple cream). LaFerg’s consumption of bread at this retreat was greater than that consumed during the six months prior.
Which is not to say that laFerg does not like bread. On the contrary, this stuff is amazing and delicious. It is just that, the bread does not like laFerg’s body. It is basically glue. Drinking a beer (bread in a glass) is easier on the ol’ digestive tract.
Of course, one cannot be in Europe and never eat bread. But purchasing bread for one person is a bit silly, and generally, LaFerg prefers not to have a bread dinner, and oatmeal over bread in the morning. So twice a month, she treats herself to homemade bread. Mostly this has been rye/wheat, but a spelt/rye bread was also delicious.
Now, it is currently Kurbis time in Central DE. With seven squash in her kitchen, laFerg has decided to honor the Great Pumpkin by making a pumpkin-spelt bread. There are two reasons for this, but one is — well, there’s a lot of pumpkin in the house, and there will be more, as the CSA share is twice a week and laFerg is sure that more pumpkins will be available in a few short days. Secondly, she has been invited to breakfast, and what nicer gift than a small loaf of homemade pumpkin bread? Well, if it tastes good, that is…
As this entry is typed, the oven is roasting some pumpkins. From there, an overnight long proof dough will be created, for early morning baking. Whee!!!
