Full and happy

Los Angeleno by birth, Northwesterner by choice, Second-hander by nature. Librarian, housebound chef, father, and lowly subject ruled over by the needs and whims of a very old house.
Partial to Mexican, Italian and Vietnamese cookery but will eat damn near anything. Collector of many strange things..the result is chaos and anarchy and a very pleasant place to live.
There is pleasure in accumulation, not just "collecting": music, books and film, in all their multi-formated glory. Outsider artists and those kinds of prints you would recognize if you took liberal studies classes in college. Cooking implements and gadgets for recipes still untried or those ventured. Glasses for most types of libations. Flowers in the garden, herbs in the pot.
It's a life of the senses and a good home life reflects that. Walking helps take in all the rest. Requires no special equipment, opens up the pores, brightens the taste buds, clears the decks for further adventures, puts on the miles, widens the eyes and helps fuel the imagination.

Live boldly, play graciously and love with all your heart knowing that true love comes only once or twice in this lifetime. Speaking of which..donde estas, Empress of my Heart?

Salud!

"Lack imagination and miss the better story" Yann Martel

"Life is a great adventure and I want to say to you, accept it in such spirit. I want to see you face it ready to do the best that lies in you to win out. To go down without complaining and abiding by the result....the worst of all fears is the fear of living." Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.

"Not I - not anyone else, can travel that road for you
You must travel it for yourself" Walt Whitman


And above all, friends should possess the rare gift of sitting. They should be able, no, eager, to sit for hours-three, four, six-over a meal of soup and wine and cheese, as well as one of twenty fabulous courses.

Then, with good friends of such attributes, and good food on the board, and good wine in the pitcher, we may well ask,

When shall we live if not now?

-From Serve it Forth,
M.F.K. Fisher


Saturday, September 19, 2009

Simple things, media style

Okay, know that my entertainment budget has been wacked hard, but this week I went out and about like I still had it all out in front. It about attitude, not about what you buy. This week I fell upon a really fantastic Thai film, Bang Rajan, a sort of Seven Samurai/Braveheart epic about a band of Siamese warriors back around 1765 that held off a superior Burmese force much to the distress of the Burmese. Great action flick, highest grossing film in Thai film history. Check it out! Otherwise I fell upon a copy of Wages of Fear today. How wonderful is that? Earlier this week there was this incredible stash of movies donated from some old codger (like me?) that put labels on all his films, when he had watched them, his ratings, all that. Grand. Had to buy a few. Desperate Hours with Bogie, Black Pearl with Tyrone Power and Maureen O'Hara and a breakthrough film for Robert Mitchum Blood on the Moon. Oh, and I also found a three album set of Spike Jones recordings. Pristine. All for the big price of a buck.

And, finally, cookbooks. Really, didn't have the budget for this at all but found a nice stack at Goodwill today, including Bernard Clayton's Small Breads,a nice University of Carolina Press book on Southern baking (Biscuits, Spoonbread and Sweet Potato Pie), two Chronicle pieces (always pretty those Chronicle books!) on holiday and chocolate baking and finally a nice compact title on tapas by that big box store favorite Parragon. Who can ever get enough tapa titles in their collection, now tell me?!

Okay, off the the kitchen. Taquitos tonight with refried beans, Monterrey Jack (that they used to use a real jack to make that cheese is a story in itself!) and a big mess of quacamole (Sav-a-lot two avocados for a buck, 15 (!!) limes for a buck and two heads of cilantro for a buck..go now!). Oh, and head over to Saars if you are up that way, they have a really grand South African wine(Golden Kaan label) in right now at three bucks a bottle. Truly great stuff.

It's a good life, my friends, no worries for now...

Salud!
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1 comment:

Thaydra said...

Your post reminded me that some of Dustin's family gave me a collection (bag full!) of old cookbooks that his great aunt had before she passed. Some of them are even authored by an even greater aunt of his! I have not yet looked through them, but now maybe I'll have to go peruse through them and see what little tidbits of kitchen magic I can find!

September 20, 2009 at 9:20 AM

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