The Edible Valley

The Santa Ynez Valley - Intimate, still unspoiled (despite the movie Sideways). Check out Longoria and Alma Rosa for wines made with great attention and some unusual grapes (and yes they still make your old favorites, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay).  Rick Longoria makes a great Albarino and a Tempranillo from the Clover Creek Vineyard and they are incredible. Albarino is like a cross between Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc, Tempranillo is a strong dose of Spain. Red.

Went for a hike thru the vineyard with Mr and Mrs Clover Creek...

...and up the hill behind. 

There are not many places in the world I could live happily - this is one of them.  I was talking to my mom about this today - your heart has to feel at home or you never will. When I come over the hill to my house I feel peace settle on me like a blanket. I feel it here too.

There is a great new restaurant, Root 246. Bradley Ogden was there taking a victory lap in the very urbane dining room. There is a huge covered patio with a fireplace, heaters and inviting chairs, just perfect for an after dinner curl-up with a brandy and a good friend.

I was surprised by the amount of food in the landscape. This is a dry area but there were pomegranates - 

and olives. Lisa's dad, Renzo has promised to teach me how to make home-made olives. His were the best I have ever tasted and I am an olive hound. (I even wanted to name our new dog Olive after the book Olive The Other Reindeer but I was overruled).

One of the pomegranates was even smiling...

...in an I need an Orthodontist sort of way.

And of course the grapes. Bread may be the staff of life but you need something to wash it down with. Of course you could always try this instead - recommended by Ellen's Danish Pancake House in Buellton. 

Flower Market

Long before dawn we were at the San Francisco Flower Market, my neighbor Leslie, one of the Pinks (thing one) and I. 

It is one of only 5 grower owned flower markets in the US. It is ginormous. It is fragrant, frenetic, breathtakingly beautiful and occasionally strange. Worth getting up at O-dark-hundred? Leslie probably has something to say about it on her blog, The Three Pinks. Take a look below - you be the judge.

Thing one fell in love with these cockscomb.

We looked at baskets and vases, ribbons and huge packs of tissue - a lifetime supply for any normal person. It feels a bit like being in a kid's storybook. Long musty aisles in dimly lit stores full of antlers and ostrich eggs. Next door are brightly lit cages stuffed with branches and blossoms. 

Thing one was thrilled with her loot.

The gorgeous pink and green bag did not come from the Flower Market, it is from Mixed Bag Designs. The best thing about them? They stay open when they're empty, so you can load them without a fight. If you've ever tried to hold a bag open with one hand while trying to wrestle your purchases into it with the other you know what I'm talking about. I use them at the grocery store, at the farmer's market, at the department stores when I remember. And at the Flower Market.

Wrapped up our treasures... 

Left the weird and wonderful behind...

And came out of the huge warehouses just as the sun was coming. up. I don't know about The Pinks, but I had a blast.

Tarantella

Things are bigger in Ventura. This cactus, for example -  it's thirty feet tall.

This giant Bird of Paradise dwarfs its owner...

...and this spider that almost ended up in my hair was huge!

A good part of her web did end up in my hair - she was not amused. "Pregnant and I still have to rebuild my web - really!" 

I rescue snakes, I love that we have a king snake in our yard - very shy, but sometimes we see him sliding smoothly along the base of a step, or around the bbq. I find garter snakes under rocks and boards and carefully put them in a safe place, away from the birds and the little boys.But I'm not a spider fan. In fact I wrote a story...

Tarantella

I had my arms full of the groceries I was bringing in from my car when I saw him - a big hairy black tarantula, waving his legs in distinctive creepy tarantula fashion.  He was on the back door mat, heading for the kitchen door. I expect he would have knocked politely if I had not screamed. I don’t know if spiders have acute hearing, but my scream shook the walls and vibrated down the street.

From the safety of the street I called my mom - not home. Rats. She is tarantula fearless. She hangs her bath towels outside to dry and frequently has an eight-legged hairy hitchhiker on her bed when she's folding the dry towels. She scoops them up and gently sets them outside. But she wasn’t home.

I called Wally. He was at lunch with a friend, and was unsympathetic. 

“Just pick up the doormat and drag it outside.” Ah, but that would mean being in the same county - the same room -with the hairy beast.

“He won’t hurt you.” Yeah, but I might hurt myself trying to get away if he so much as twitched.

He refused to come home from his lunch date to rescue me. In normal circumstances I am a most capable person - we were all girls; we learned to install garbage grinders (when we  were expecting dinner guests in an hour, but that is another story.) We learned to hang drywall, and to paint, to rewire lamps and light switches, to move furniture and catch mice. But this was too much. Even for me. Drag the mat? Is he kidding?

“Just leave it until I get home.”

Yeah, and wonder for the rest of my life every time I go into the garage if the hairy beast was about to drop from the rafters down the back of my neck. Nope. I did what any self-respecting capable woman would do.

“Honey, I’m checking in to the Lafayette Park Hotel. A suite. And I’m calling a realtor - the house will be on the market by the time you get home.”

Mornings

We changed Ally's life by rescuing her, but she has changed our lives more. Besides the morning wiggles and kisses we now walk after breakfast, and the mornings are astonishingly beautiful. We walk through Diablo...

...down deserted streets. We see deer, squirrels, turkeys, owl pellets, and the most beautiful skies...

Happy Halloween from Ally - and her grateful new family.

Grapes!

We harvested our grapes today. Steve, our vineyard manager, came at dawn. I joined him after I woke up enough not to stumble - a big cup of hot tea helped.  We picked before the sun was up...

The grapes are all along the bottom of the vine...

...and of course being grapes they're all twisted up in the vines and twizzled around the wires...

Eventually we got them all picked.

Steve picked about twice as fast as I did. I bet he can stand up today, too. Dorothy Parker was right - getting old is not for sissies. But we had a good crop...

...and eventually I will be able to walk upright again. Isn't wine an ancient painkiller? 

Ron Morgan and Loot

I took two friends and went to a class at Loot in Lafayette. Ron Morgan, author, lecturer, storyteller, flower arranger, decorator, genius and one of the funniest guys around gives Monday classes. Sign up - they sell out in a heartbeat. From a pile of sticks and seeds...

He creates the most beautiful things. He will change the way you look at flowers, at your garden, at your neighbor's garden (his stories about cutting from other peoples' gardens will have you holding your sides). This was his contemporary class, and while I prefer big jumbled mixed up bouquets I came home inspired. A few of his creations...

he recommends placing these facing into a mirror. Who'd think of that?

The pile of sunflowers becomes this - 

This rather hideous vase is transformed...

...into this.

into this.

Apples and amaryllis (and red twig dogwood)

Two fig leaves and a few green calla lilies

Start with some cranberries

and add a few flowers - add candles if you like. Instant Holiday.

His shop is full of wondrous things

displayed in color-coordinated vignettes.

I have a thing for this color green

and when I got home I found a huge praying mantis (very pregnant) exactly this shade of green on the leg of my ladder. I moved her to the garden - I hope her babies will be happy in my garden and stay.

Ron tells the story of going to lecture somewhere in the south. He had agreed the ladies would bring their own containers and he would tell them how to arrange in their containers. One sweet little old lady in a Chanel suit and Ferragamo pumps came up with a container dripping with brightly colored ceramic fruit and cherubs. She said "Mistuh Morgan, this has been in my family foah generations.  What should I do with it?" 

Ron took one look and said "Just drop it and break it, honey. That is the ugliest thing I have ever seen!"

Go see Ron Morgan.  Take a friend. Prepare to laugh. Take your checkbook, for there will be something you will want to take home (besides the charming and adorable Mr Morgan). 

Where else can you get up close and personal with a world class talent?

Tasting Things

Leslie brought me some Lucini olive oil that was too green and strong for her tastes. I gave her some McEvoy in exchange. We both have a new favorite olive oil, and they're not the same. I prefer the Lucini; she prefers the McEvoy. 

I started thinking about tasting notes. I cancelled my subscription to Cook's Magazine when they said they tasted no difference between real vanilla and the fake stuff made with vanillin. I taste a bitterness in the fake stuff, and it is a simpler composition. It lacks the deep notes, the grace notes, the unfolding fleeting flavors that are almost identifiable then gone. No difference? We differ. My friend Des makes vanilla and it is heavenly. Even the gossip girls notice the difference in the fragrance, and ask about it. They'd like to drink it. Maybe Des will teach us to make it. 

Wine tasters make judgements - wine drinkers slavishly follow them. If you know anything about wine you know who Robert Parker is - a good rating from Robert Parker can make a wine; a bad rating can be devastating. 

Years ago I belonged to the San Francisco Professional Food Society and we tasted things (before tasting was the rage) - tomatoes, coffee, caviar, vodka, champagne...and salt. Salt has changed a lot since then. The French Laundry and Per Se have served plates with 8 or 9 little piles of salt served with a history and geography lesson for each, and pairing recommendations. Eye opening.

 I have more than a dozen kinds of salt in my cupboard. Some of my favorites...

are from Williams Sonoma. Their red salt is great on pork, I love the black on grilled steak, and the chardonnay smoked salt means I can do ribs in the oven and they taste like they've been smoked. I plan to try it on pork chops next.

Some were gifts and I have no idea what's in them...besides salt. 

One of my favorites is the Herb Rub (with lots of salt)  from David Lebovitz. If you don't follow his blog you are in for a treat - he is funny, dry, wry, and doesn't take anything too seriously. I've never met him but he's on the list of people I'd like to have dinner with. Along with Winston Churchill and Eleanor of Acquitaine.

But my favorite - the one I reach for again and again - is this.

If you've been reading my blog for a while you know I went to the Ile de Re this summer and fell in love with the place. I get this salt at WIlliams Sonoma. I brought some back from the Ile de Re - if you come for dinner we can taste it. And you do know to sprinkle it over the finished dish, right? Don't waste it in the soup, you will lose the big flakes and the subtle flavor. Sprinkle a few grains on a finished dish and dig in.