Getting around town

We decided that Sunday was a good time for a fieldtrip into town… Ashland is feeling a little small, so Scott and I went downtown with Kathy and Vance to see some new sites.  We did the canal walk, which is a long meandering trail through downtown Richmond along the Haxall Canal and the James River.  I held us up with my camera as I took about 150 pictures, to end up with a couple that I liked, including the one that I turned into the new banner above.

Near the end of the Canal Walk, we came upon the Civil War museum, and near there, a foot bridge over the river that had quotes from the three days in 1865 when Richmond fell to the Union Army.  It’s an interesting place to observe the tensions of commemoration in the South (a topic on which Kathy is much more of an expert).  The quotes included those of Confederate leaders and freed slaves, as though the city is still not sure how it feels about its own history.

Or, to quote Drive By Truckers, “Such is the duality of the Southern thing.”

 

Back to the food

Now that I’ve wooed Scott with artwork, I’m back to cooking again.  It is really nice to have someone to cook with and for.  It’s one of the fun things we do together.

Last night, I tried recreating a meal that I had at a now-defunct Richmond German-Italian Restaurant. It had a long German name, which I will translate as “pork chop with apples, onions, and blue cheese.”

I got the pork chops at the local farmers market from a new vendor from the county.  I pan-sauteed them in a bit of olive oil, just to brown them, and then added some minced shallots and white wine until that was evaporated.  Then I added some water just to braise it for about 10 minutes until they were cooked.  Then, they came out of the pan and onto a plate, and I threw apple slices and red onions into the pan juices and cooked those until tender.

Then I spooned the apple/onion mixture on top of the pork chops and crumbled some blue cheese on top.

It turned out pretty good, but then how can you go wrong with those ingredients?

 

The gift

Scott liked his welcome home present – he even posted a picture of it on his blog today.

 

Home sweet home

Today’s an exciting day, as I’m waiting for Scott to trek from Baltimore to here in his well-aged truck. He’s looking forward to being a couch potato for a few days to recover from his adventures.  I’ve got a pretty neat welcome home present for him (that I’ll post about it after he’s here).

In the meantime, let me catch up. My trip up north was fantastic and included the following activities:

-Chili’s with Brianna, yippee!
-A day long work meeting (yeah, not so exciting) on Long Island
-The post-nuptials celebration for Kristen and Matt
-and lots of hanging out with people I love and miss a lot.

I even took out my camera for the picnic and for a brief photo sojourn around Northampton. My favorite set of pics was at the picnic. Kelly arranged a photo of a bunch of us all jumping, and this got my dear friends Maddy and Morgan into jumping mood. I set my camera on burst shooting and let them fly. Here are my favorites:

 

Between travels

I’m still in the middle of a crazy couple of weeks – home for three days between two trips of almost a week each.  Didn’t even really have time for groceries, which is why the only food news I have is that I found the perfect frozen pizza. Palermo’s Primo Thin Crust.  Don’t judge me.

Last week, I had the opportunity to enjoy Baltimore again with Scott. We went to a couple of our favorite restaurants, hung out on land and boat, watched the Ravens beat the Patriots (ah, the pre-season), rescued Scott’s pickup truck (twice!), and found a tenant for one of his apartments.  I recommend seeing his blog for the full story, since he tells it better.  Whew.

And when I returned to Virginia, I met another neighbor who introduced himself and said, “So, you moved here from New York?”  And I’ve had Virginia plates on my car for the last three weeks.  I think my mailman is spreading the news.

Okay, I have to finish laundry now so I can leave town again tomorrow.  More after I get back!

 

Like I said, it’s a small town.

This morning, I ran some errands, including stopping at the grocery. I went to the office in the back to get a credit slip for my groceries, and was greeted by name by the store owner. My postal carrier was standing next to her and he said, “Hey, I’ve got some mail for you today!” And proceeded to tell me that my neighbor two doors down was moving. (This, I knew already from the neighbor.)

I feel like I’m living in a Thornton Wilder play.  Still finding it charming, though it may soon border on creepy.

 

Slacker

I know, I haven’t posted in a while. I’ve been settling in here in the house and in my new office, and getting back to work big-time. So, not much to write about lately. I still need to go on a photo safari of my new town, and I also need to work on finding some good hot weather recipes. (And, yes, I need a new picture for the blog banner.)

In the meantime, I’ve been settling into Southern small town life. It’s a pretty big change from Northern big city life, only I can never be sure which changes are Southern and which are small town.

For example, the friendliness. As Kathy advised me on my first day here, it is customary to greet people when you walk past them. Having grown up in the midwest, I’m finding the friendliness pretty easy to slip back into, even after several years of learning not to make eye contact with others. I’ve also met more of my neighbors and local shop owners in the last few weeks than I did in three years in Queens.

All in all, I’m finding the town pretty charming. The small downtown has most of what I need, including a family owned grocery that lets me buy on account (seriously), a fancy wine and cheese shop for when I’m feeling bourgeois, and an awesome public library. There are a couple of supermarkets on the edge of town when I need them, and a mall several miles down the road. I’m mostly biking places, and it seems that a lot of other people do this too.

I’m sure I’ll miss some things. There is one nice restaurant in town, and otherwise, it’s mostly chain restaurants near the highway. But, Richmond is only 20 minutes away, and that should be enough city for me.

 

Accomplishments

I’m feeling pretty self-satisfied this weekend, mostly because I did three things:

1. I mowed the lawn. For the first time ever. I haven’t had a lawn since I lived with my parents, and luckily I also had a brother, and that’s what brothers do. But in this new place, without Scott here yet, I managed to figure it out. Yay me. (Very lucky for me, the lawnmower that the landlord provided has an electric starter, because I already know I can’t pull start an engine to save my life.)

2. I innovated. I like to make my coffee at home in the morning and bring it to work with me. Now that I’m biking to the office, I wasn’t sure what to do. I can’t hold my travel mug. I tried to get up earlier and have my coffee at home but then I got to work and wanted to drink coffee while I was checking email. (There is a coffee maker, but I’m a coffee snob and like to drink my own brew.) So, instead, I fashioned my own cup holder for the basket of my bike. I knew I needed to keep the cup upright, and I figure some sort of shock absorption would be good. So I carved a big divot in a sponge and rigged a couple of bungee cords to do this:
(top view)

(side view)

I’ll see how it works on Monday!

3. Baking. Kathy and Vance are having some people over tonight for their Grizzly marathon. They’re showing Grizzly Man and The Grizzly Project. Grizzly Man is legendary with them. When they went to see it in the theater without knowing much about it, Vance thought it was a mock-umentary, and laughed his way through it. Anyway, we are having bear-themed food, and I decided to make Cub-cakes.

Get it?

Cub-cakes.

It’s a yellow cake cupcake, with strawberry buttercream frosting, chopped up trail mix, and a Teddy Graham.

 

My first Virginia dinner party

Last Friday, I had Kathy and Vance over for dinner in the new place. I don’t have chairs yet, so we moved the coffee table into the dining room and sat on the floor around it.

Chicken livers had been a topic of conversation earlier in the week, so I looked for a good recipe and found a bacon-wrapped chicken liver appetizer recipe. Easy and very delicious (assuming you like liver): Dip the livers in bread crumbs, wrap in half of a slice of bacon, and secure with a toothpick. Bake on a roasting pan on at 350 until the bacon is done how you like it (45 minutes for medium cripsy worked for us). When they come out of the oven, sprinkle with grated parmesan.

For the main course, I made the Ligurian Chicken recipe that I got from Rachel a few years ago. I loved it when she made it for me, and it has become a good recipe for me to use for company, since it’s pretty hard for me to screw up.

Here’s the recipe (from the NYTimes, adapted by Rachel):

2 Tblsp. flour, mixed on a plate with salt and pepper
1 four pound chicken, cut into 8 pieces (bone-in)
[I usually use a mix of legs and thighs, since I like them better]
2 Tblsp. olive oil
4 fresh rosemary sprigs
6 thinly sliced garlic cloves
1 1/2 cups white wine
1/2 cup Kalamata olives, with or without pits
3 ripe plum tomatoes, halved, seeded, and coarsely chopped

Dredge the pieces in 2 Tblsp. flour, mixed with salt and pepper, then saute them in olive oil over medium-high heat. Don’t be tempted to touch them until they develop a golden crust and the juices are sealed in. Turn them over, adding four little branches of rosemary and 6 cloves of garlic, peeled and thinly sliced. When garlic softens but does not color, add 1 1/2 cups white wine and bring to a boil. Then add 1/2 cup kalamata olives, and 3 ripe plum tomatoes, seeded and coarsely chopped. Simmer partially covered until chicken is cooked and broth is reduced and tastes savory.

I served the chicken with oven roasted potatoes.

And we finished the evening with the peach blueberry crisp and Reese’s Klondike Bars. A winning combination if I’ve ever had one.

 

Local produce fix

I spent nearly a decade living in Western Massachusetts where there were tons of farms and farm stands, and I didn’t really take advantage of them. It’s nice to be back in an area like that, now that I am learning what to do with vegetables. At the end of my moving day, Kathy asked me whether there was anywhere I wanted to go before she dropped me at home (me being without a car for the week), and I said no, too tired. But she decided on the best possible stop over on the way back – her favorite produce stand. It turned out to be a fantastic idea. I got a bunch of local produce, including beets, the tomatoes that are famous in this area, and peaches (from Georgia, but they smelled so good when I walked past that I couldn’t resist).

Some of the things I made this week (sorry, I only have a picture of one):

• Beet salad with goat cheese, crumbled bacon, balsamic vinegar and oil.
• Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato sandwiches
• Peach blueberry crisp (the only dish I couldn’t figure out a use for bacon in.)

I missed this week’s Farmers Market in the center of town, but will go next week and see what I can find there.

Today I’m doing some shopping with Kathy, including finally buying a food processor with a gift card I got from my coworkers. This will open up a whole world of recipes…