Kitchen Fable

viv | thirty something | northwest us aries ☼ libra ↑ libra ☾ food historian and home cook sapphic and witchy and dorky

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Solstice strawberries 🍓

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This gorgeous lil green guy said hi when I was watering the flowers.

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When the menu said “we use margarine as butter” I knew better than to order. And yet order I did.

Well we tried something new! And we will be sticking with our tried and true local seafood boils. This was not it.

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Cleaning and organizing The Lair- the room in our house dedicated to our two largest collections - books and craft supplies- and was delighted to discover that these batteries are still alive when the light flickered in my hand.

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Breakfast for dinner! Is this an open faced sammy? Bagels with eggs? Toast? I’m sure there’s an actual name for this dish.

And can I just say fresh chives from the garden on top of everything goes harder than it should?

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I’ve been reading about planting protective plants near the door, things like lavender and mint, that have an added bonus of keeping some of the bugs away.

So I decided to plant element themed baskets under my windows this year to have a better connection with the elements- and the water basket is thriving! This tall black salvia is my new favorite plant.

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Picked up a skull mold for frying eggs at the thrift store this weekend, the perfect accompaniment to these pale pizza skulls.

And now I’m posing the question: when does a skull transition from terrifying to silly ? Because these are very silly little guys. The walnut cake in the same pan had a bit more edge.

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Turns out my balcony railing is exactly the right height for legs up the wall pose.

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The current cookbook stack in my kitchen- a lovely mix of history, camp, irony, folklore, and dough.

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The chives are about to bloom!

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Mother’s Day breakfast on the porch. Oldest kiddo made oeufs en cocotte, a new family favorite.

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I’ve been putting off grocery shopping for a bit, so we ended up with cheesy pasta (not to be confused with Mac and cheese, noodles are a different shape) made with all the ends of cheese in the drawer, green beans, and cheese sausage for dinner.

As a kid, I hated Mac and cheese from a box. To be honest, I still do. And it was even worse when chopped up hotdogs were mixed in. I liked hotdogs, but was told I needed to eat the pasta as well. So my mom started cooking noodles and mixing in cream cheese as the sauce for me.

When I was in college as a single mom, cream cheese was slightly too expensive, but I could do cheap shredded cheese mixed with … mayo…. On the noodles and make a delightfully creamy sauce that became a staple for me and the kids.

Now that my college education has led to more lucrative employment, I’m delighted to discover that I spend my expendable income primarily on cheese and books. So the cheese ends that made it into this pasta include Boursin, a red dragon cheddar, some muenster slices, and mozzarella. But truth be told, I like the mayo and shredded cheese version better. But it definitely needs the fried shallots on the top either way for texture.

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The sun was shining all weekend- perfect weather for an impromptu picnic.

Pesto + rosemary ham + presliced cheese on sourdough are deliciously easy to make sandwiches that can be assembled at the park.

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Looking up in the Avenue of the Giants

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Wild honeysuckle and snowdrops growing in an alleyway in Ferndale

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Spending spring break driving around the west coast looking for the strange and unexpected. Favorite sections of road (so far)