Stories

jd_salinger1.jpgYesterday, my favorite author died. He was not exactly plucked in the flower of youth, being 91 and all. He also hadn’t published anything since shortly after my third birthday. Well, he didn’t ever publish a whole lot of anything, at least not anything I could easily get my hands on. He wrote three books, a collection of short stories, and a novella which appeared in “The New Yorker,” but which I have never found in buyable form. I have been trying really hard not to read anything being written about him right now, not blog posts, not opinion pieces, not even obituaries, because this is a private thing for me. I need a little time to think my own thoughts before I open myself up to a flood of writing about how Catcher in the Rye wasn’t really that great, how Salinger was not really very nice to his wives or his children, or how he was (pick one) overrated, underrated, wrong to become a recluse, right to become a recluse, etc. ad nauseum.

His is the voice I hear in my head when I write, and always has been. Mostly, that’s between him and me.

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veggies-for-bbq.jpgIn the summer, people tend to fall in around here, sometimes when we least expect it. Spontaneous plans get made in the morning or a minute before because the weather’s nice and Alan’s almost always game for a barbecue (though he has been known to get cranky when the dishes pile up.)

He is constitutionally “allergic” to making salad and the appetizers and the sides (unless we’re talking grilled vegetables and the occasional amazing polenta) generally fall on my shoulders. But, since the side dishes and appetizers often define a meal, give it its flourish so to speak, it could be viewed as a tiny opportunity, to show off.

So here are a couple of my favorites, that involve a minimum of effort, the next time there are hot dogs on or burgers or Alaskan salmon on the grill and you just have to rustle something up to go along with them.

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saf chefsDreaming of a cooking school offering hand made craft based courses? Yearning for more flavor and personality in your meal? Believe that artisan food skills are important?

Then The School of Artisan Food, a tipping point for the newest trend in food preparation in the heart of rural England, is the pace and place for you!

AND you’re in luck. Summer 2013 offers a new six-day intensive (Aug 12-17). Students will join a team of British food stars for six days of bread making, cheese making and charcuterie. And enjoy tasting local beers and farmhouse cheeses; the very model of major English food traditions made new again.

buildingLocated on the gorgeous Welbeck Estate in romantic Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire, the school is housed in the Estate’s former Victorian fire station around a cobbled courtyard, converted into state-of-the-art training rooms in 2009.

Co-Founder/Director Alison Swan Parente, talented educator, foodie, force of nature (and dear friend) is a great believer in the ‘special relationship’ between the US and UK.

She’s made trips to California and New York to “learn from all these influences as well, but we specialize in British breads, farmhouse cheeses and smoked and cured meats…from the gooseberries in the vegetable plot to the cheese made on the Estate, SAF is a very British experience.”

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ImageThe “Sunday Styles” Section of The New York Times recently ran a front page story on the evolution of the noun Charlie Sheen into a verb, as in sheened and sheening, meaning, among other things, partying or making bad decisions (Laura M. Holson, “When Your Life Becomes a Verb,” March 6, 2011). Apparently the first cited/sited reference appeared in Urban Dictionary, and more recently posters on Twitter have offered their definitions.

In the meantime, we’ve all been sheened: to be exposed to far too many stories and interviews involving Sheen. A dangerous side effect of this phenomenon may be an uncontrollable desire to turn all names into verbs, as in

To franco is to multitask, then fall asleep in all the wrong places, like classrooms and award-show stages.

To juliachild is to whip up a French dinner for 8, while laughing.

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turkey-guy.jpgOn Sundays, we stroll over to the farmers’ market along Columbus Avenue. It starts around the Museum of Natural History and meanders south a few blocks. The farmers set their stalls up on the sidewalk with their trucks parked along the avenue behind them.

It’s nice. All the healthy people are out shopping. I thought I’d pick up something fresh and farmy for dinner – maybe some turkey burgers from the turkey guy, some greens from the greens guy, some mushrooms from the mushroom guy – that kind of thing. Guy, by the way, being an all-encompassing term meaning human.

There are girl guys at the market, as well. The greens person had some bins on the table filled with various micro-greens that looked, frankly, fantastic. I asked for a taste of the sunflower and he fished out a single little sprout with his tongs and dropped it in my hand – delicious, as fresh as spring, succulent and sassy. I stuffed a couple of handfuls into a bag and a couple handfuls of the micro-buckwheat into another and handed them to the guy to weigh.

“That’ll be twenty-seven dollars.”

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