Media Love

It's been crazy the last few weeks. I'm not complaining though -- quite the opposite. Beyond all of the book events the amount of media coverage that's been showered on my book pre- and post-launch has been fantastic. I am extremely grateful. I knew that Portland would welcome this book but I didn't realize how much.

All of these radio and TV interviews in the past few weeks make me happy that I successfully eliminated the filler word "like" from my vocabulary at the end of high school and beginning of college. My filler now -- I didn't realize it was so pronounced -- is "um." I had no idea how many times I say that until I heard myself on various programs for the book. Any suggestions for quitting "um" are much appreciated. Um, what else...

A featured book at my favorite bookstore Powell's and next to one of my favorite national food folks. Doesn't get much better than that...

I'm going to do a post devoted to Powell's Books soon here but until then I'd just like you all to know that the book is a New Favorites at the moment there which means it's heavily placed in all stores and is also 30% off. I don't know you Ted at Powell's but I love you and owe you a drink. I feel so honored with the placement and push my book has gotten from Powell's. I'm also really looking forward to my August 2nd event there.

If you watch the boob tube I'll be on KOIN news tonight live at some point between 4-5pm. And then after that I'll be at the Friends of Family Farmers InFARMation at Roots Brewery from 5:30-8:30pm. Tonight's topic: Eaters' Bill of Rights. Roots Organic Brewing Company closed its doors yesterday. I don't have any details just that sad news. Tonight's InFARMation is canceled and FOFF is looking for a new venue.

On the KBOO Food Show with Laura McCandlish and Delores Custer.

View from my mic...Devlyn Swenson host of Savor PDX on PDX FM.

Here's some of the media coverage so far:

The Oregonian FOODday, June 2010

Willamette Week, June 2010

KBOO Food Show, June 2010

Fox 12 Better Portland Show, June 2010

Rose City Reader, June 2010

Reading Local Portland, June 2010

PDX.FM Savor Portland, July 2010

Lemonbasil blog, July 2010

Julia's Omelette

This is a short and sweet post just to let you know how lucky I am. My boyfriend Tyler has perfected Julia Child's omelette. He's been making them for months and honestly his first try with her technique -- high heat, flash in the pan, minimal ingredients -- was a hit. He used chives from the yard in this one and a bit of asiago and tomato. See for yourself...

Yard Fresh Pt. 5

It's summer! I know it was officially summer a couple weeks ago but it finally feels like it. The sun is shining, summer blossoms opening, tomato plants growing. Feels pretty dang good. I haven't been cooking as much as usual lately because I've been pretty busy with things such as this and this but I've still managed to put some good food on the table. Here's a bit of what's been good and yard/home fresh in recent weeks...

Garlic scape pesto with White Pine candied almonds.

Summer salad with stuffed/fried hardboiled egg, anchovies, olives and a lemony mustard vin.

Feta stuffed beef sliders on kalamata buns.

Yard Fresh Pt. 4Yard Fresh Pt. 3Yard Fresh Pt. 2Yard Fresh Pt. 1

Thank You Portland! Food Lover's Guide to Portland Book Launch Party

So much has happened since I last posted. I really don't know where to begin so I think I'll start with what's consuming my thoughts just 100 percent today -- my book launch party last night for Food Lover's Guide to Portland at Fortune Tattoo. I know it's probably dorky to say but last night was one of the best nights of my life. I'm beyond happy that so many friends, fellow food folks and complete strangers came out last night to celebrate. It was magic. Loving life right now.

((ATTENTION: My ex-boyfriend, Tyler Adams, no longer co-owns Fortune Tattoo. Visit his North Portland shop -- Grizzly Tattoo -- which opened June, 2011.))

I'm overwhelmed by the thought of describing the evening so I'm just going to post a bunch of photos for those of you who were there and those who couldn't make it. It was a blast and couldn't have happened without the overly generous food and drink donations as well as awesome help of my friends, boyfriend, Fortune Tattoo and of my publishing house Sasquatch Books. Thank you Portland. I love you more than ever!

And then it was on...

And on...

My friend Rale Sidebottom rocking it in the loft for the party...

They got the Fortune Tattoo sign up just in time!

Tyler eating the Newman's Fish Co. smoked black cod...

The savory side...

Good mugs in food coma.

Before the perfect storm. Cheers to you! Thank you Portland!

A Week Away...

Food Lover's Guide to Portland Book Launch Party Invite - A week from today on Thursday, July 1st, from 6-9pm at Fortune Tattoo I hope that you'll join me in celebrating the launch of my book Food Lover's Guide to Portland! It's been a long time coming and I'm more than ready to celebrate with friends and fellow Portlanders. It's First Thursday after all so if you're hitting up the galleries head across the river for a bit and celebrate PDX food and drink.

((ATTENTION: My ex-boyfriend, Tyler Adams, no longer co-owns Fortune Tattoo. Visit his North Portland shop -- Grizzly Tattoo -- which opened June, 2011! For more info. visit www.grizzlytattoo.com, 503.265.8146.))

If you scroll down on the invite above you'll see some of the fine food and drink folks donating incredible stuff for the party. These are some of my favorite Portland people and I'm so happy that they're helping me out in this way.

I'm also grateful to my boyfriend Tyler Adams and his business partner Ms. Mikki for hosting the party at their open-since-April-1st tattoo shop -- Fortune Tattoo. THANK YOU guys! Toward the end of the night I'll be giving away a prize to one lucky book buyer that involves needles and ink. I wonder what it is...

Food Lover's Guide to Portland -- Book Launch Party Fortune Tattoo, 1716 East Burnside St., Portland, OR Thursday, July 1st -- 6-9pm Food. Drink. Music. Books.

Friends in Green Places

I'm lucky to have friends like my friend Karen enrolled in the horticulture program at Clackamas Community College and doing all sorts of amazing garden and landscape design projects around town. Last year Karen gave me A LOT of garden starts for my veggie garden and this year she did the same. She has a beautiful, inspiring and enormous garden and cultivates various seeds for her program.

This year it was a lifesaver for my garden. Especially since it's buy no seeds year...

Cheers to Karen Schwartz!

And there's still all of these left...

Bring on the sunshine! NOW!

The Cheese Bar Spectacular -- Monday, June 21st 6-9pm!

I don't think that the fact that I LOVE cheese is a secret to anyone who reads this blog. The thought of a cheese-less existence sends shivers down my back. It would be a bleak, cold, tasteless world were there no cheese in it.

Next Monday night Portland's cheese haven, Cheese Bar, is hosting a rare, wonderful cheese event. From 6-9pm at Steve Jones' Cheese Bar you can try 101 of Steve's favorite cheeses. I did not mistype. That is 101. No, not 10.

Steve has partnered up with Adam Berger of Ten 01 to host this awesome event. Along with 101 of Steve's favorite cheeses you can saddle up with wine selections from Ten 01's sommelier Jeff Groh, cocktails by Kelley Swenson, and local beers on tap. Tickets are $39 in advance or $49 at the door and include all the cheese you can taste, two drink tickets for draft beer or wine by the glass, and a $5 voucher for Cheese Bar. There be six wines at $5/glass and local draft beer at $3/glass.

Get your ticket while you still can because they're going fast at www.brownpapertickets.com. If you want a more exclusive experience, 50 VIP tickets at $59 a pop are available. That gets you a 5-6pm more intimate tasting with sparkling wine and champagne.

If you want to read more about Cheese Bar check this out.

Eat cheese!

Cheese Bar 6031 SE Belmont St. 503.222.6014 www.cheese-bar.com Tuesday-Sunday 11am-11pm

Jacques Pepin and Les Ouefs Jeannette

*****First off I just want to let you all know that I'll be on the KBOO FOOD SHOW tomorrow WEDNESDAY, JUNE 16th at 11am talking about PDX food and drink and my book. So if you're able to tune in please do. If you don't catch it and want to listen after the fact there's a handy dandy audio file you can catch here. Onto les ouefs...*****

There's more than one way to fry an egg. And there's more than one way to fry a hard boiled egg. We've been watching the late-90s television series Julia and Jacques Cooking at Home the past few weeks. I never saw this program when it originally aired and I'm really enjoying it.

Unlike most current TV food shows this one allows you to be in the kitchen (Julia's home kitchen) and see entire processes and dishes through. In other words, the only music is at the beginning end, there are no crazy extreme close-ups or frenetic shots. It's the real deal and who better to learn kitchen wisdom from than Jacques Pepin and Julia Child. Charmed.

I've read all sorts of Julia Child books and articles but I'd never read anything by Jacques Pepin so I decided to pick up his 2003 memoir The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen a couple weekends ago at Powell's Books for Home and Garden. I ran into a couple fellow food folks while there, one of which recommended picking up a Grace Young book. Next time.

I'm really enjoying Pepin's memoir. So much so that I recently prepared a recipe from the book for a lazy and lucky weekend breakfast -- Les Ouefs Jeannette. Jeannette was Pepin's mom and this delicious hard boiled egg dish is a complete original.

For it I whipped hard boiled egg yolks with chopped garlic, milk, chives from the garden and then some, returned the blend to the halved eggs, and reserved a bit of the filling for the dressing.

Then I fried the eggs stuffed-side-down while making a warm dressing with the remaining filling whisked with olive oil and Dijon-style mustard. We plated the eggs, drizzled them with the dressing and ate them up with some buttery toasted baguette and andouille sausage. Mmm.

Although I haven't given you the complete recipe I think you can take it from here and be creative. It's a great book and I hope to one day own the TV series so I can turn to it like a cookbook. Two big thumbs for both. Two big thumbs UP for both.

Oeufsfrying

Julia and Jacques Cooking at Home, 22 episodes www.julia.cookstr.com

The Apprentice: My Life in the Kitchen by Jacques Pepin 2003, Houghton Mifflin

Clackamas Master Gardeners Spring Garden Fair

It seems kind of funny to post about an event so after the fact but the annual Clackamas County Master Gardeners Spring Garden Fair in Canby in early May was a good one and there's always next year. Besides, it might give you a little push in the right direction in the midst of this rainy, grey spring. Any garden inspiration is golden at the moment when so many of us are cursing the soggy ground we walk on.

LaAnn Locher of Lelo in Nopo, aka the Sassy Gardener, clued me in to this fantastic plant sale. I'm not sure if I read about it on her blog or heard about it on her radio show but one way or another she planted the seed. A few days later I found out that my friend Karen would be there. What really sealed the deal was going with my friend to Woodburn the same day to visit a very special dog at Project Pooch. All signs pointed to this year's Spring Garden Fair.

I walked around the many outdoor, and a few indoor, booths and even though I paid the cursed $4 add-on fee of the precious on-site ATM I only bought one thing -- some Lucifer Crocosmia bulbs for my mom for mother's day. Not that I didn't see A LOT that I wanted. I just tried to keep it to inspiration and ideas. It worked.

Here's some of what I saw...

Lots of pretty plants...

My friend Karen (on the right) of Ferguson's Fragrant Nursery.

Ferguson's booth...

More than just plants. My friend Alison (in the photo) and I dream of one day owning some Red Pig Garden Tools.

Clackamas Master Gardener Spring Garden Fair www.clackamascountymastergardeners.org/SpringGardenFair

Linda Ziedrich's The Joy of Jams, Jellies, and Other Sweet Preserves

I think it's supposed to be sunny and warm sometime soon. That's what I've always experienced in Portland since moving here in 2002 at least. Since our summer growing season is so short here I feel ripped off when fall rain and grey overstays its welcome into spring, now verging on summer. I recently looked at some photos from last season's garden and this early June one made me particularly sad...

Some of my from seed plants this time last year.

Alas, alas summer will be here at some point and my seedlings will take off and all of those fruits on the vine and trees will ripen up for picking. We have quite a lot of fruit in our yard -- plums, pears, blueberries, raspberries, honeyberries, seaberries, kiwi, pineapple guava and then some. Usually we eat most of it fresh but as the trees mature and the berry bushes get bigger the yield spills over and we make things to carry through the season and into the fall and winter like plum and cherry wine, kiwi preserves and fruit spiked hot sauces and salsas.

I'm really looking forward to reaching for that book in the photo above -- Linda Ziedrich's The Joy of Jams, Jellies, and Other Sweet Preserves this summer and fall when the harvest basket is full. In its pages are 200 recipes divided into various fruit chapters ranging from apple, blackberry, cherry and grape to gooseberry, medlar, papaya, pomegranate and kumquat.

None of Ziedrich's recipes call for commercial pectin. The only pectin Ziedrich uses is the natural kind, the kind already present in the fruit. Here are a few recipes in the book -- coconut caramel jam, rose hip butter, lemon curd, cataloupe jam with mint, cider syrup and raspberry vinegar.

Linda Ziedrich is one of my favorite Oregon food writers and I've written about her a bunch. She's responsible for one of my favorite and most used cookbooks after all -- The Joy of Pickling.

All of our conversations had been over the phone (she lives on a farm near Scio) until earlier this spring when I finally got to meet her in Portland at the IACP Culinary Book Fair. We talked for awhile and she was kind enough to sign her newest book which I bought there...

Thank you Linda Ziedrich.

The Joy of Jams, Jellies, and Other Sweet Preserves by Linda Ziedrich 2009, Harvard Common Press Paperback $17.95