First Gingerbread House

Caroline Wise decorated her first gingerbread house

Go ahead, Caroline, overthink things, build up a bunch of stress, and convince yourself that this was a bad decision, but then finally accept that you committed to something and get on with it. And so it was with the first ever gingerbread house my wife decorated. What compelled her to do such a thing? A competition at work to celebrate Christmas cheer. Aside from minor engineering issues surrounding the effectiveness of using icing to glue the walls together, she ultimately had fun and was proud of her creation. And although she didn’t win, I believe she looks forward to potentially decorating another gingerbread house in the future. [I did get compliments for the roof because I added frosted shredded wheat cereal pieces – Caroline]

Big Sur Eucalyptus Soap

Big Sur Eucalyptus Soap

It’s likely somewhere around 20 years now that we’ve been using Big Sur Soap and specifically: its eucalyptus scent. We’ve tried other fragrances from them, but this one is a great reminder of all our moments driving along the Pacific Coast on Highway 1, admiring the towering eucalyptus trees, and basking in their beautiful aroma, ensuring that they are never far. Sheila Hillman, the proprietor of this brand, can’t always predict the popularity of the various scents in her repertoire, and it has often happened that while in the Big Sur area, the shops we relied on were out of eucalyptus, and we’ve come rely on ordering directly from Sheila. Even then, it’s not uncommon that she’s sold out until the next batches are done, so this time, I put in an early order for ten bars. Upon their arrival, I stored them in vacuum-sealed bags to prevent further curing and evaporation. Depending on how well this works, I might buy another ten bars to ensure we have the wonderful scent of the Central California Coast for many years to come.

Kraut

Homemade Sauerkraut

Back on January 3rd, I stopped in at my local Whole Foods to buy 22 pounds of organic cabbage. In the days prior, it began to look as if the weather might be cooperative this year; it can’t be too hot or too cold, or the project I wanted to embark on wouldn’t work. I had to acquire a new mandoline slicer as our old mandoline was no longer with us. I tried one time to shred this much cabbage by hand, but that is a horrible task. Another reason why I haven’t done this in a while, the lid of our 10-liter ceramic crock had first cracked and then broke in two after something fell on it off the kitchen counter. Caroline since then glued the pieces back together with an adhesive that was not food grade, but my feeling was that the lid never comes into contact with any of the contents of the crock.

So, with about 10 heads of cabbage cored and quartered into 40 pieces, I started slicing and stuffing the cabbage into the crock. After every six quarters added, I threw a tablespoon of salt on top, mixed it with my hand, and pressed it down. And this is what I did for the next couple of hours. The added salt breaks down the cells of the cabbage, and putting pressure on the shredded pieces allows me to fit it all in the crock. By the time I’m reaching the end of the slicing and I’ve made a huge mess of the counter and floor, the compressed cabbage has given up so much fluid that I have a good 2 inches of brine sitting atop the cabbage. All that is left is to put on the lid, fill the V-shaped rim with water, write the date on a piece of tape on the lid and wait.

Homemade Sauerkraut

Thirty-six days later it’s time to empty the crock. I’d wanted to wait until the 42nd day, but the temperatures are going up here in Phoenix, Arizona, and at a certain point the fermenting cabbage will turn soft and maybe even develop a strong alcoholic taste, which I don’t want. With that in mind, I pull the crock that’s been turning cabbage into sauerkraut up off the floor in the corner and get ready to start packing kraut into jars, 8 of them as it turns out. With 2 gallons or 7.5 liters of this German superfood, we lose a bit of refrigerator space but gain at least 8 months of fresh homemade sauerkraut. If you should think this isn’t as sexy as visiting the Grand Canyon, you’d be seriously wrong, but then again, how many people out there are able to indulge in such luxuries?

Traveling Socks

Socks being made by Caroline Wise in Phoenix, Arizona

While the story’s been told before, it bears repeating: yarn destined to become a pair of socks for me is collected while the two of us are out exploring our world. After entering a yarn store, I head directly to the fingering weight section and begin looking for appealing colors made with a natural fiber such as wool and at least some synthetic material, else they are too fragile. Then, once home when Caroline is looking for her next knitting project, she’ll pick a random skein of the many I’ve selected over the years and her loving hands transforms it into socks. This particular yarn is called Blazing Fibers. The colorway is Pineapple Express. The yarn was dyed in the same state we bought it: Oregon. This past November, as we entered Brookings in Southern Oregon, the first yarn store we stopped in was By My Hand Fabric and Yarn Store which is also where I chose this to be one of my new pairs in the future. Well, that future is happening pretty quickly as Caroline will finish them this evening. If you think the heel is a different color, that wouldn’t be exactly right, as Caroline has knitted in reinforcement yarn in order to make it more durable but the main yarn is the same as the rest of the sock. So why am I posting these before they’re done? I find it interesting that my finished socks look like they were made in a factory because they are so perfect but this is proof of them on their way to completion. My intention is to wear them on my next flight, the first since before the pandemic. When that is isn’t exactly certain yet but it could be sooner rather than later. Details to follow as certainty becomes a thing.

Speaking of Cleaning

JR Watkins Dish Soap

This is about as mundane a blog entry as it gets: a report on our usage of dish soap during the pandemic. Last night I opened our 19th bottle of J.R. Watkins Dish Soap since the pandemic began. No, this isn’t an ad for J.R. Watkins although we are in love with their grapefruit-scented soap, this is a reminder to ourselves about the year when we used 18 bottles of dish soap. In all likelihood, we didn’t use that many bottles of soap during the previous 20 years. In part because we weren’t doing the dishes all that often because we ate out a lot, and then there were those years we’d use our dishwasher, but as time has gone by we never really got along with that infernal machine running for an hour and then having dishes come out not absolutely spotless. So, we wash all of our dishes by hand and have done so for years now. Still, it’s been more common for a bottle of soap to last so long that as we approach the bottom of a bottle that it’s a thickened goo from all of the moisture that evaporated. For all I know, a bottle of dish soap previously might have lasted for years. I mean, who tracks this type of consumption?

Well that’s a contradiction, John, as you are reporting here the opening of the 19th bottle, so you obviously are tracking it. Not really, it’s about the convenience of Amazon, their order history, and my realization that we appear to use a lot of this stuff.

Have I ever shared with my readers that I recently calculated how much toothpaste I’ve used in my lifetime? I think I missed that, so here it is. Over the previous 21,170 days using 0.5 grams of toothpaste per day, I estimate that I’ve used more than 23 pounds or 10 kilos of the minty stuff.

Cleaning Out

Navajo Loom in Phoenix, Arizona

What is it about springtime that kicks in the need to deep clean our nest? So it was once more as Caroline and I dug into the deepest recesses of our place and went to work in the closet. Consolidation and donation were this year’s theme as we organized Caroline’s extensive yarn and fiber stash and brought about 25 pounds of clothing and a bunch of other things to Goodwill. As for the loom above, it will be offered to the lady who taught us the techniques of Navajo weaving for her to sell or donate to someone who might benefit from it. The rug that still sits on the loom was one of my efforts from maybe ten years ago. Since I abandoned it, it has gathered dust.

The imperative to reorganize from time to time is essential as we are in a relatively small space. We have an outdoor storage space that is a small 40″ x 40″ in size, while our closet is probably about 6′ x 7′. So, within those confines are the things that might need to be accessed only a few times a year, such as empty suitcases, camping gear, and Caroline’s yarn supply, along with some dumb things like VHS tapes, cassettes, and CDs we are not ready to part with. Some of the yarn and fiber are stashed in our bookshelves that were bought with the intention of them acting exactly in that capacity, hence why some sections have doors for yarn storage while others don’t, allowing direct and immediate access to our on-paper artifacts.

We do not have a rented storage space or a garage; I’m pointing this out because we know people who have all of the above and a couple who are renting two garages. For the life of us, we cannot fathom what might be stored in a garage that’s worth $1200 a year in rental fees, while nearby storage units seem to cost about the same or more. Then, on our morning walks, we always pass garages stuffed to the rafters with a narrow path cut through the hoarded junk. The funny thing is that Caroline and I feel like we’ve fallen victim to excess consumption, and yet we are in a small apartment of a mere 874 square feet or 81 square meters. Should we ever move back to Europe, there’s a good chance we’ll be in something closer to 650 square feet, which means we’ll have to shrink our footprint even more.

Maybe spring cleaning should be a twice-yearly event in which “consolidate and donate” is always the theme.

Not Gonna Spill ‘Ma Beans

Rancho Gordo Beans

Oh my god, I had a wickedly brilliant idea: Seeing we can’t travel and I can’t share photos and blog posts detailing our incredible travels I’m going to switch things up a bit. Coming soon, I’m going to start writing about our experiences with BEANS! It won’t always be about beans but the first series will. This is really about starting a new category on my blog that will have a focus on food.

By the end of the week, Caroline and I should have a total of 31 35 36 varieties of beans on hand and while I can’t promise a blog entry a day for an entire month, I am committing to a thorough overview including photos of dry, cooking, and finished beans as we travel through the largest selection of beans we’ve ever collected. With hearts racing, I think I can hear you begging to be let in on just where I’ll be taking you; well, get ready as the list is long and magnificent.

From the photo you can see that I’m including; Yellow Eye, Marcella, Flageolet, Cassoulet, Moro, and Ayocote Blanco. We also already have the following on hand; Corona, Black Eyed, Kidney, Garbanzo, Peruano, White Tepary, Mung, Black, White, Broad, Lady Cream, and Lima del Papa. On the way to us as I just ordered these today; Mayflower, Horticulture, Spanish Tolosana, Marrow, Christmas Lima, Feijao, Lupini, Scarlet Runner, Yellow Indian Woman, Butterbean, Pigeon Pea, Turkey Craw, and Lina Sisco’s Bird Egg.

When you start looking for bean recipes you find little coming from China and Japan although adzuki or small red beans are common in desserts, while mung beans are used as bean sprouts and of course the soybean is ubiquitous. So I’m training my searches on places like Appalachia, Spain, Portugal, Africa, India to Pakistan, and of course South America.

For some of the recipes under consideration, it’s impossible to get the ingredients in Arizona, forcing me to order a number of items from D’Artagnan in New Jersey who specialize in gourmet meats of all kinds. Making something like a French cassoulet with saucisses de Toulouse (garlic sausage), duck confit, ventrèche (French pancetta), prosciutto, duck fat, or an African marrow bean dish that asks for merguez sausage (lamb) might leave you in the cold depending on where you live. I have a Spanish recipe lined up for the Tolosana beans that ask for Tocino which is Spanish bacon, that seems easy enough to make at home along with morcilla or blood sausage. Lucky us that a local German sausage company carries such a product but I’m afraid it might not be similar enough to the Spanish version that features a ton of paprika, oregano, and onion. There is an online shop called La Tienda that carries morcilla but they are currently sold out.

Food takes us places and if we were traveling to any of these locations from where I’ll be gathering recipes, we would certainly exercise our enthusiasm to sample the flavors that are not easy to find in the United States, aside from places like San Francisco, New York City and maybe a couple of others such as Los Angeles and Chicago.

Regarding this category that will become available on the side column under “View By Topic,” I’ll be posting recipes such as the sprouted dehydrated granola I shared some days ago or the ginger preparation for a Burmese salad I posted at the beginning of the month in addition to other recipes that languish on paper and various notes strewn about. Recently I made my first preparation of the Korean dish known as sundubu-jjigae or tofu soup, I didn’t capture anything about it as I wasn’t sure how Caroline and I would enjoy it, but it was so terrific we went out afterward to collect more ingredients to make sundubu part of our repertoire of dishes. Over the years we’ve experimented in making panipuri from India, Indo-Chinese dishes, African food, Peruvian pumpkin recipes, Mexican-inspired casseroles, not to forget mentioning all the recipes that have been handed down from German and Croatian relatives.

Update 1: I found a recipe from the Bolivian Andes based on peeled fava beans and so I ordered just that at Purcell Mountain Farms where they are listed as “Haba” beans.

Update 2: While looking for recipes this afternoon I came across some interesting stuff and found myself adding to my order which hadn’t shipped yet and Purcell Mountain Farms was able to add to. They are Cranberry, Cannellini, and Mortgage Lifter.

Update 3: No, I’m not ordering more beans yet but I did find this list of 14,000 bean varieties that the French recognize: https://localfoodconnect.org.au/community-gardening/list-of-french-bean-varieties/

Update 4: Okay so I just had to order these Aloyin beans aka Honey beans used in a Nigerian bean porridge. Sadly, I also have to order rainforest destroying palm oil. Maybe I can absolve my guilt knowing I’m not flying or driving anywhere so my footprint of destruction is relatively small right now….says the man sitting in an air-conditioned apartment in Arizona.