i don't know how to tell you this,

but this might be the best breakfast i have had in years. this was last week sometime.

the egg was perfectly fried (in butter), the tomatoes were just beyond amazing (i don't know what farm grew them, but an award is warranted), and the crackers were full of seedy amazement (sunflower, sesame, poppy, maybe flax). also, cucumbers and hummus and it was just all the loveliest.

and then we talked about how much we cried in the movie.

a HUGE bag of green tomatoes this week in the CSA meant i had to fry them. i just had to do it.

alex is staying with me temporarily so we cooked up a meal centered around these fried goodies, which we batter-fried using cornmeal, flour, eggs, milk, cayenne, pepper, salt, and garlic. with a little lemon-yogurt dipping sauce. and some salad and roasted squash, because not every part of the meal can be fried.

arriabiata.

i asked michelle what to make for dinner and she suggested spaghetti so that casey and i could eat the long noodles and end up kissing like in lady and the tramp. first of all, that is ridiculous and second, i did not have the proper noodles in my house. then, she suggested vodka sauce and i didn't have any vodka and so she said arriabiata. i had no idea what she was talking about, but, as she explained, it's the spicy red sauce.

when winging it,
1. cook the pasta.
2. pour a tablespoon or so of olive oil into a pot and throw a pile of crushed red pepper into it with garlic (i used 3 cloves but i like everything garlicky) and half of a finely chopped red onion.
3. i also threw in a chopped mushroom but that's up to you.
4. when it's all soft and smells good, add a can of diced tomatoes and a few dollops of tomato paste. (i was using what was already open in my fridge for this recipe.)
5. add a bit of red wine vinegar and let it all marinate for a bit.
6. in the end, i added some oregano and more pepper.
7. top with grated parmesan. everything is even better with cheese.

and there was a little salad of spinach, radish, and yellow bell pepper.

a miniature catalog of notions.

1. i want there to be a song about abilene like maybellene. but there's not. after tracy and i returned from our texas independence day drinks, i ate this seemingly boring meal. but it was not: half fried egg sandwich (on a weeknight!) and a pile of steamed broccoli. (the broccoli, i have just learned, can be steamed in the microwave. less energy than heating on the stove.)
2. the atlantic wrote a great article comparing whole foods to wal-mart. terrifying. from all directions. mostly, i don't want to shop in either place.
3. i attended a food conference last saturday: footprint. it was overwhelmingly busy, and so i only stayed for one panel (culinary cartography). overall, it was really exciting to see that there are so many new yorkers interested in the same ideas as myself--wanting to learn more about the production and distribution, economics, social aspects, science, and policy of food and drink.
4. there's a tomato shortage (due to a frozen south) and a recall for so many random items that i do not even want to type a list.
5. tonight's dinner: spicy chickpeas, garlicky asparagus with onion and pak-choi, steamed broccoli, and a salad of carrots, tomatoes, and avocado. why is the photograph blurry? no idea, but i am not posting it.
6. yelena gave me a punch bowl with matching punch cups for my birthday. i want to make a new punch, and a smith island cake. and then have people come over. to consume both.
7. i am going to make jordan's birthday cake tomorrow. can you believe she's a year old? i am thinking vanilla cake with buttercream icing and strawberries. sounds good, right?

rotten tomatoes.

a fungus. it's highly contagious. it's out there, destroying tomatoes. this could be similar to the irish potato famine. the destruction of entire crops. higher prices at market. oh. my.

read more here.

when it's not pretty.

i was not prepared when i went to the farmers' market yesterday; i only had $10. so silly. i had to choose wisely AND i had to make something for a dinner party. damn it, janet.

i will have to go back tomorrow, but here's what i got: jersey tomatoes, broccoli, kirby cucumbers, sunflower sprouts, and a demi-baguette. (and, for the dinner party, i made a salad of red-leaf lettuce, the cucumbers and sprouts, green beans, and cherries, as well as a honey-poppy seed vineagrette.)

for breakfast, i made a fried egg sandwich with havarti cheese on toasted baguette, and ate it with the kirbies (it's an addiction) and cherries. havarti cheese is one of my favorite cheeses. i love that it's like cream. right now, we have havarti with jalapeno peppers. i wish it were spicier, but it is pretty special in general.

today, i improved on the whole meal. i fried the egg in the cast-iron skillet. and! i put the sandwich together and cooked it whole in the skillet. it was toasted in all the right ways, havarti oozing out the sides. and! there was potato salad in the fridge. liz is really into making potato salad these days; this was a spicy-thai version. yum. and! i made a salad from pesto and the tomatoes.

i started to eat before i photographed it. but i am thinking of photographing the food in its imperfect half-eaten state more often. i like the messiness. good food is often not pretty.

eggs, not elephants.

lindsey is really into poached eggs. i want to like them more. but i always think of them as food for grandmothers, even though i liked them as a kid.

so, last egg in the carton. i decided to poach it. such a disappointment. i made it in the pot with boiling water, but lindsey has explained how to do it in a cup. maybe in the future i will try this again. for now, i am sticking with fried.

luckily, there were other treats with this meal: toasted pita and hummus, sauteed green beans with lemon and parmesan, and heirloom tomato. i love when they are shades other than red. i feel like they taste better.

no one eats them?

imagine: i was sitting at dfw airport on monday, waiting for my plane, watching cnn, which was reporting on the salmonella-tomato debacle. almost 400 people were sickened in 27 states and the fda has no idea how this happened, or from where the bacteria came. and the woman sitting next to me turns to her boyfriend/husband/male person and says, "well, no one eats tomatoes anyhow." i really thought that she was making an attempt at irony, but they launched into this conversation about how it's not that many people, no one eats tomatoes, only one person is dead. blahblahblahblahblah

it's a lot of people. and we've had a variety of "tainted" foods with the bush administration. the beef and meat by-products that went to the school kids and elderly? the spinach? it's madness. how can we trust anything? and it's food. it's supposed to be safe and edible and good for you.

and the food and drug administration gives us this incredible information:

“We may not ultimately know the farm where these came from,” Dr. David Acheson, the agency’s associate commissioner for foods, told reporters in a conference call. “Some trace-backs that we thought were looking pretty good have been falling apart.”The tainted tomatoes were probably grown in Mexico or central or southern Florida, Dr. Acheson said. The agency is looking for the genetic fingerprint of the rare strain of salmonella responsible for the illnesses, tracing the tomatoes back through the supply chain.

Dr. Robert Tauxe of the disease centers said the process would require “finding someone who not only remembers what they had to eat and where they ate it, but someone who doesn’t have tomatoes more than once a day.” Dr. Tauxe added, “We do not think the outbreak is over.”

well, luckily, "no one eats tomatoes anyhow."