A "Lowe's" Kind of Saturday

This Saturday was one of the best Saturdays in a long while.

I woke up entirely too late but, when I did, it was to a room suffused with bright sunshine and a breeze blowing the scent of warm grass and peonies in through my windows. Bali, my tortoiseshell cat was languishing next to me, eyes closed against the light, breathing tiny puffs of air onto my cheek.

Bali really enjoys lounging in the sink if you're taking a bath

It was the kind of day you want to bottle so that you can take it out of the closet in the winter to be reminded that, yes! there are better days ahead. I am grateful for such days in the Northeast as we have had great amounts of rain lately and our summers are usually characterized by sleep-inducing heat and humidity.

I felt bouyant and energized. Strangely, those Lowe's and Home Depot commericals that try to motivate you to get out and re-landscape your yard or build a treehouse make me feel the same way, so I told my mom that it felt like a "Lowe's" kind of day.

I pulled out two bunches of kale from the latest CSA delivery that I had stashed in the fridge and set to work making kale chips. I completely forgot that I am not quite to the "eating kale chips" part of the post-surgery diet. I had perused several recipes from the Food Network and Smitten Kitchen and others before deciding to combine a few ideas.

Kale chips are unbelievably easy. Fool-proof even. Here are the guidelines that I followed:

• Procure kale - wash - dry thoroughly
• Remove stems and spines (I used a knife for this so as not to end up with lots of stringy bits)
• Tear kale into large pieces (they really shrink in the oven)
• Toss with enough oilve oil to coat but do not saturate
• Toss in a few pinches of salt (I used grey sea salt)
• Arrange on a cookie sheet
• Sprinkle with freshly grated parmesean cheese (easy on the salt if you add cheese or you might end up with some very salty snacks)
• Bake at 300 degrees for 10 minutes.

You want the chips to be good and dry when you remove them from the oven so that they are flaky like dried seaweed. Otherwise, they become a soggy mess when you store them. I stored mine in an airtight container and others in the house have been happily snacking.

Into the oven they go!

Feeling confident, I decided that the rhubarb in the fridge wasn't going to become a pie due to my current dietary restrictions. I flipped through my brand new copy of Food in Jars by Philadelphia native Marisa McClellan and set about making her Rhubarb-Vanilla Jam with Earl Grey.

I love this new preserving book because it focuses on small-batch canning. I do not have a 40-acre farm nor do I need to put up dozens of jars to weather a lean winter on the prairie. I am often frustrated wtih recipes that call for pounds upon pounds of fruit. Marisa's recipes tend to make 4-5 pints which is perfect for a modern gal.

{I LOVE rhubarb. And as Molly Wizenberg of Orangette and the Spilled Milk Podcast will tell you - it is fun to learn to tame the "wild rhubarb stallion". It's a tart, intimidating vegetable for some. }

The Rhubarb-Vanilla jam receipe was easy, fairly quick, and an interesting twist on the conventional jam. I do recommend peeling the rhubarb as it is just easier to chop into small pieces that way. The earl grey tea really does add a little something unqiue to the flavor composition of the jam. I topped my greek yogurt this morning with the bit I had left in the pan after filling my jars (I actually got 4 jars just as Marisa denotes in the recipe!). If you attempt this recipe, trust yourself. You're going to want to cook the jam a bit longer than 4 minutes because it will appear to be very drippy when you implement the "sheet test", but take heart! the jam firms up very nicely as it cools in the jars. I wouldn't go much longer than 6 minutes or you might end up with a brick of jam.

I LOVE this Mauviel copper preserving pan. It has enough surface area to allow the water to evaporate quickly. It's definitely an investment, though.

As my jars were cooling I attacked two items on my "to do" list that have been bugging me for months. This is primarily because I like to keep my "to do" list prominently displayed as a digital "sticky note" on my iMac where it is often added to and not subtracted from.

1. Clean out a particular kitchen cabinet that has been home to an ancient ice cream maker, two coffee grinders, and other doo-dads that are useless in 2012. Now I am able to store the pannini press, the electric tea kettle, food processor, coffee machine and other things to free up valuable counter space!
2. Get rid of any number of the dozens of vases, collected over the years, that are cluttering the shelves of our back porch. Now my mom can see what she has on hand when we bring flowers into the house AND the shelves can be utilized for other storage needs, too!

It was wodnerful to go to sleep feeling utterly content, productive, and ready to greet another day.

27

"I woke up once in the middle of the night, and Buckminster's paws were on my eyelids. He must have been feeling my nightmares." Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Johnathan Safran Foer

I have read a great many books since my childhood but there are very few that linger within me the way this one does. I think of the way my own cat, Bali, will sleep upon my chest - sniffing my eyelids and laying a cool paw on my lips when my breathing blows through her fur, something she finds supremely annoying. She knows when I have awful dreams because she will sleep a good distance away to avoid my tossing and turning.

Tomorrow is my birthday. 27. Which means that it is almost 3 years since the worst day. Somehow, things seem unrecognizable since then. Even so, I find myself looking forward to each new year as an opportunity to put more distance between myself and 24. Time doesn't really heal all wounds so much as it profoundly dulls them from a sharp stab to an underlying ache. A new year, a birthday, is yet another opportunity to peel away the next layer in the quest to discover all that life has to offer. What adventures are in store? What changes will occur? There is always the promise that what lies ahead will be infinitely better than what lies behind.

Just 3 years ago, Bali was a scrawny kitten whose face was oddly distorted by the bold orange and white patch above her eye. My mother professed that this was the ugliest cat she had ever laid eyes on. Now she is a hefty creature of 10lbs and the orange and white patch has seemingly shrunk to nothing but a daub upon her fur. Dad used to sit in his chair and call to her from across the dining room, "hey, Ballsy...come here". He knew it was a ridiculous nickname but I always hear him in my head when she comes running to me, chattering in her cheerful mew.

So now I am 27 and Bali is almost 4 but the more things change, the more they seem to stay the same in this old house. I am curious to see what will be different about this year and what will remain as it is. I never really thought about coming this far before.