Too-many-plums tart

Wayne picked up a box of big purple plums at Costco last week, but they weren't quite ripe yet. Suddenly it became clear that when they did get ripe, they'd all be ready at once! Yikes...there must be 15 of them!

I'm not much for making desserts, but I do like something sweet and fruity for breakfast. So I dug through the cookbooks and came up with a blueprint for a simple plum tart. It wasn't bad for a first try. Actually it was just fabulous with a good steaming cup of coffee.

Make a single pie crust, or you could use a frozen one. It's easy to make, though, and flakier:

• Put one cup all-purpose flour in a medium bowl with 1/4 teaspoon salt. Mix it up with a fork.
• Put an ice cube into 1/2 cup cold water and set it aside till you need it.
• Cut up 6 tablespoons cold butter in little pieces.
• Cut the butter into the flour with a pastry blender until it resembles course meal. Some small pieces of butter should still be visible.
• Add some of the ice water to the flour and butter, mixing with the fork until it just holds together. You probably won't use all the water.

Gather the dough into a rough ball with your hands and wrap it tightly in cling film, pressing it down to flatten it a little. Put it in the refrigerator to rest and chill for 1 hour, or in the freezer for 20 minutes. [It could also be refrigerated overnight (not freezered!!) if you want to eat quicker in the morning. Take it out first thing in the morning, before you do the plums, if you do this.]

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Meanwhile, seed 4 large or 5 medium plums and cut them into slices. It's better if they're not quite ripe. Toss them with a little sugar and whatever else you want...I put in some chopped candied ginger and grated orange peel. You could use raisins or dried cranberries instead.

Take the dough out of the refrigerator or freezer. Put a sheet of parchment down on your rolling surface and discard the cling film. Lightly flour the parchment and the top of the disk of dough. Roll it out until it is fairly thin and more or less circular. Carefully brush off extra flour and transfer the dough-laden parchment to a big cookie sheet.

Pile the plums in the center of the crust, fanning the slices out until you have about 2 inches still free all around the edges. Fold those edges of dough back up over the plums...they'll only come up partway leaving the center beautifully plummy.

Brush the foldover dough with 2 tablespoons melted butter, dripping any remaining over the center plums. Sprinkle all with about 2 tablespoons sugar.

Bake at 400 degrees for 45 to 55 minutes, or until the tart is lightly browned. Let cool for 10 minutes or so before digging in. This is a perfect time to put the coffee on. Yum!!

Aging outrageously

I had forgotten this poem, and just came across it again while cleaning out a desk drawer. It's from Warning, by Jenny Joseph, and, oh boy, I think it's exactly how I want to be when I grow up!

When I am an old woman

I shall wear purple

With a red hat which doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.

And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves

And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.

I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired

And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells

And run my stick along the public railings

And make up for the sobriety of my youth.

I shall go out in my slippers in the rain

And pick the flowers in other people's gardens

And learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat

And eat three pounds of sausages at a go

Or only bread and a pickle for a week

And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry

And pay our rent and not swear in the street

And set a good example for the children.

We will have friends to dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practice a little now?

So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old and start to wear purple.

 

 



Another Tequila Sunrise!

I played bartender at my dear friend Jackie's birthday bash yesterday! It was great fun, of course. We had a special cocktail in her honor which was pretty popular, I have to say.

It must have reminded us all of our dreams of lying around on a beach somewhere warm and tropical, sipping . . .

A special cocktail for Jackie's birthday celebration!

Another Tequila Sunrise (please!)

Combine as much tequila as you think you can handle with orange juice over ice. Drizzle with a little grenadine if you have it. If not, don't sweat it – just drink it and enjoy!!

  

 

Catching up on promises

Hey, I promised to tell you how the bartending class went (see Imagine ME as your Christmas present!) It was SO much fun! First of all, Jess and Brian have a sweet house on a winding street up a hill overlooking all of San Francisco, so you can imagine the setting was to die for. We organized the bar in the kitchen, which had a clear view out the living room window to beauty, and went to work.

There were eleven vodka cocktails on the class outline, and we motored through all of them. I made them, explaining each one and talking about variations. Then we passed the drink around to everyone who was drinking (all except Wayne, who has a bad reaction to alcohol, and Jess, who's pregnant!). There was a lot of sippin' goin' on, believe me, plus a few people with their own straws doin' a little more than sippin'. You know who you are! Meanwhile there were snacks - artichokes and dip, veggies, crackers - to keep us upright.

Finally, after all eleven drinks had been constructed and sampled, everyone decided what their favorite drink was and Brian and I made that for them to have with Lee's wonderful salmon dinner.

What do you think the drink with the most  "favorites" was? I was pretty blown away that it was the Bloody Mary. I mean, it wasn't even morning! Nevertheless, several people wanted their very own.

Brian, the giftee, opted for the Vodka Collins, which I'll admit was good and refreshing. Lee, the giftor, went for the Cosmo. These drinks are already on this blog (look to the right under The Best Cocktails)...well, the Vodka Collins is there under Tom Collins, which is gin. Just substitute vodka, of course, if that's your preference.

A good time was had by all, especially by ME! I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

No, silly, that's not us in the photo!! We looked similar though. You know, happy.

When life gets busy. . .

LIFE has really been fun the past couple of weeks. And busy.

First my son Arthur and his family came to visit from Portland, Oregon. They were interviewing schools in Petaluma to see whether they might want to move back to northern California. YAY! I'm in favor of that! They'd be so much closer!

One day Jack, who is 10, stayed with us rather than traipsing around to schools with his mom and dad. We went to the Pacific Pinball Museum in Alameda, just a few minutes from here. Totally cool - you pay $15 for adults and $7.50 for kids and get to play as much as you want on 85-or-so antique and modern pinball machines for free!

We had a great time while they were here and, too soon, they were gone back home.

Then I got scheduled to work quite a bit slingin' drinks at the Claremont Resort. I love to work, of course :-), but it's a little unusual for February. Usually, once the holidays are over it's pretty slow for awhile. Yes(!) to money though.

This last week it was Wayne's birthday plus Valentine's Day. Wayne's daughter, The Beautiful Marja, came up from L.A. for a week to help celebrate, and her mom Mary came over from Santa Cruz for a few days too. Marja and Mary are my thrifting buddies, so we went back to the White Elephant Sale (see previous post), this time to donate and shop. This time it was so much better because, while we certainly weren't alone, there were lots fewer people there and even more WE's (White Elephants) than before. We found many bargains. Best of all, I got to clean out a whole bunch of "great stuff" from my home. I didn't want it or need it, but someone else might love it! My house feels good!

Then, Marja and I decided to paint my bathroom. Oh God, once you start it's endless. We scraped the ceiling (yuk), and the cabinets (Mary helped with this), and bought gorgeous new knobs for the drawers, and painted and painted and painted some more. Now it's beautiful and pink and new looking, but what a lot of work. So worth it, though.

As of today, everyone's gone and it's very quiet. Wayne and I are amusing ourselves by putting up towel racks and pretty shelves (see the fancy wooden supports on my Thrifting post), and soon I'll be hanging artwork back up on the walls. The bathroom will be finished. I love it.

Tomorrow we'll join our friend Rina and our friends George and Maureen at their daughter Julia's benefit party for the launch of her new company Blackbird Underpinnings. It's vintage-inspired intimate apparel and loungewear...how fun is that? And the party's at Bar 355 in Oakland, a new place to experience!

LIFE keeps on being fun! And busy.

White Elephant Hunt

My thrifting buddy Mary and I, plus my boyfriend Wayne, went to the Preview Sale of the Oakland Museum's huge White Elephant Sale a week or so ago. Last year we had gone to the actual sale, a free 2-day event held in a huge warehouse off Fruitvale Ave. here in Oakland. There was so much great stuff at such fabulous prices (I bought a beautiful wicker table for my guest room - $25!) that we resolved to go again this year. True - it was packed with hundreds of people and the line to get in was massive - the only serious drawback.

This year we decided to go to the Preview Sale and pay the advance charge of $15 each because we'd get to see everything first. Surely there would be fewer people since everyone had to pay. Not a chance! When we drove up, comfortably on-time for the opening at 10 a.m., it was obvious our optimism was unfounded. The line stretched from the warehouse door, 4 or 5 shoppers deep, down two city blocks, around a corner, down four more city blocks and out onto Fruitvale Ave, the main road going into the area. Someone said it had been like that since 6 a.m. Yikes.

We let Mary off at the door, since she has some trouble walking long distances, and went to park the car. Just up the street, neighbors had opened a little lot for $10 parking fee (which benefited local artists), so we did that and went to get in the Incredible Line, which had diminished somewhat since they had opened the doors. Soon we were all inside, separated and each of us looking for treasure.

Man, it was a crowd of people, and now there was an air of urgency about the shopping that we hadn't felt last year. Probably it was because the professionals came to the Preview Sale to get the really good stuff first - just like us, except we're not professionals. Long story short, we lasted an hour and didn't buy much because each purchase involved 45 minutes in line to pay for it. And there were just too many people.

Lesson learned: Go to the regular sale March 2nd and 3rd, which is free and not so hectic. Besides the weather is warmer and the warehouse isn't freezing cold! Enjoy ourselves and still find good stuff.

Second lesson learned, because we got new information from a savvy woman in the entrance line: Donate to the sale. People who donate at least $50 worth of goods on certain days of the week get a free Donors Pass to shop that day between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. We're going next week to both donate and shop. I've had a very productive couple of weeks cleaning out bookcases and closets with good stuff to donate. Yay!! Thank you, Savvy Woman!!

Special Bonus: The good neighbors where we parked our car (we'd do that again, it was so convenient) turned us on to a very cool local coffee shop, Kefa Coffee just up the street on 29th Avenue, where we satisfied our after-sale hunger with delicious fresh-made ham-and-egg sandwiches and even more delicious Ethiopian coffee. Hunting white elephants had left us famished!

Writing your own life into story

Book cover from Amazon.com

Today I did something I should do much more often - I took a class. It was called Writing Your Life Into Story given by Barbara Abercrombie, a writing teacher at UCLA who has written and published a gazillion books. Well, quite a few anyway; I think fourteen. She has written a new book called A Year of Writing Dangerously, and I bought it, of course. That was the price of the workshop.

It was well worth the time (3 hours) and the price ($16.95) and the effort (a drive from Oakland across the San Rafael Bridge to Corte Madera on a gorgeous sunny morning with the Bay all sparkling and blue). I've been writing pieces of my life for several years, partly for therapy and partly so the things I remember don't disappear with me, so I was especially interested in the subject. At the same time, Barbara reminded me of the joy of writing, and how it doesn't need to be a tiresome over-wrought thing. One of her mantras is: Just get out of your own way and write. Amen.

The class was held at Book Passages in Corte Madera, in Marin County. What a gorgeous bookstore! What a pleasure to be there! Of course I wanted to buy all the books, but I'm on a bit of an austerity tear at the moment, what with income and property taxes coming up, plus a bit of expensive dental surgery. Nevertheless, I feasted my eyes and perked my brain, and now I have Barbara's book to enjoy.

Barbara Abercrombie's blog site is: http://writingtime.typepad.com/.  I expect to come across more pearls of wisdom there too. She was just delightful.