philadelphia.

there are no tastykakes in the south. in fact, there are few philly delicacies. as a child, when we went to visit my family in philadelphia, there would be treats of hoagies and cheesesteaks and italian ice and, then, down the shore, salt water taffy. i love salt water taffy.

i was visiting my grandparents for their 60th anniversary a couple of weeks ago. as usual, we had breakfast in a place that serves scrapple, which i will never truly understand. but that is neither here nor there.

something happened to tina in the grocery store; she's usually into healthy snacks, like cottage cheese. she returned to the car with a bagful of tastykakes. a bagful! butterscotch AND jelly krimpets, chocolate cupcakes. i always liked the pies. thank goodness she did not bring any pies.

i might have eaten all of them. they are not even food. really just a pile of processed something or another. it's hard not to read the packages. don't get me wrong; i ate a butterscotch krimpet. it just wasn't as wonderful as i remember.

tina seems pleased, though.

shroom, again.

i think i have a little crush on the guy who sells the mushrooms. this week, i got shitake. and a million other things.

fancy.

i am unsure of when i became so fancy. or dainty.

i started off the day with sandwiches of watercress, oyster mushrooms, and a dab of mayonnaise. two times this week.

4th.

i think it was the same year they built the log cabin. yes, a log cabin at my alma mater, kolter elementary.

i am not really sure i will ever understand why an urban elementary school needs a log cabin. it was apparently constructed with grant money secured by the pta, but it's weird. we spent a year studying americana and actually learned to quilt. yes, skills i never obtained. i can square dance, though. thank you, louis rossito.

but, i digress.

one year, we had a community garden. there were wild promises of salad. we watered this garden with some sort of regularity; i only vaguely remember walking to the street side of the school to work in it. (not to be compared with the other side of the school, which was "the big lap" and the "blacktop.")

the garden never produced the wonderous treats i had hoped, but when we ate it, i tasted radish for the first time. and did not like it.

i think the kids at ps6 are going to have more than we ever did; their school is spending well over a million dollars. farming is so trendy now; we were ahead of the curve.

an edit.
upon further searching, i learned that there is still a garden at kolter. holy moly.

peaches for my peach.

i went back to harlem for the first time since i moved away. i love it there. michelle and alex live just blocks from my previous apartment, which is just poetic justice. they moved there almost immediately after i jumped ship.

of course, i could not show up empty-handed. i had some ripe peaches laying around, and decided to make scones. scones do not take much sugar, and i accidentally poured in a little too much, which i attempted to scoop out of the bowl. i forgot i was only making a half-batch. when this happens, the scones spread out and turn into cake. blake calls them scookies. yes, i have done this before.
this time, they were a little extra sugary, but michelle ate two. i guess that means they were good. she's pregnant, you know, so it's unsure. i am convinced that her taste buds are off ever since she went to the aquarium and wanted to eat the specimen.

shroom.

the fancy mushroom that looks like a sea creature from saturday has a short life. i had to use it fast.

last night, i chopped and cooked it with a little olive oil and garlic salt in a pan. i toasted a baguette and sliced some raw cheddar and fresh basil onto it, and topped it with the mushroom. delicious.

the big salad.

a salad-loving child, i longed for the nights of "big salad." this meant the wooden bowls, which were wide and shallow, as well as many, many tiny bowls of options. included was always "square meat" and bacon bits. i can't remember what kind of meat was "sqaure," but i want to say ham. we did not really eat a lot of pork products growing up, not at least until blake started asking for pork chops, and by then, i was a vegetarian.

ray and elizabeth had plans for a salad night, and i got to join in the fun. we practically put everything in the kitchen into this salad: spinach and carrots, mozzarella cheese, peaches, pinenuts. i steamed beets, grilled asparagus, onion, and mushroom. we heated some leftover brown rice, and boiled eggs. spectacular. i wish the photograph allowed you to know the scrumptiousness.