Stories

I never expected to visit Dijon. But on my first trip to France, I asked my Parisian friends for suggestions for where to go and they said Dijon and nearby Beaune, so off I went. The historic capital of Burgundy, Dijon is a dramatic looking city with lots to do and see. It has many museums, churches, medieval buildings with gargoyles and stunning geometrically patterned roofs of green, white, yellow, black and terra cotta ceramic tiles.

When most people think Dijon, they think mustard. But Dijon is in wine country, home of Coq au Vin, Boeuf Bourguinon and lots of other rich and rustic dishes including the classic preparation of Escargot in garlic, butter and parsley. In addition to Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Gamay and Aligoté, the region is also known for Cremant de Bourgogne and cassis. It's worth noting that you can get to Dijon in under 2 hours from Paris if you take the TGV.

Buying fish used to be easy. You'd go to the seafood store, look in the case, select your fish, and go home to cook. Nowadays, it's a lot more complicated. If you're pregnant, you need to avoid mercury-rich fish; farm-raised fish are good, except for when they're bad; some species which are endangered still show up on the menus of restaurants. All of this leads to confusion and often frustration on the part of many consumers.

What should you do? Visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch website. The Seafood Watch program "helps consumers and businesses make healthy choices for healthy oceans" by guiding you through these murky waters.

The folks at Seafood Watch share their "seafood recommendations" which are organized by geographic region, teach you about pressing ocean issues, provide sustainable seafood recipes, and even show you how to get involved in the cause. Best of all, you can acquire an app that will help you when you're in the market shopping for fish.

From the LA Times

I ate my share of lobsters while spending summers in Rhode Island. My family still talks about the 10-pounder we bought from a shop in Galilee. We spent an hour scouring the neighborhood looking for someone who owned a pot big enough to cook it. Lobster is still one of my favorite foods of summer — that's when it is the cheapest, when they move closer to shore and the fishing conditions are better.

A good lobster is something to be relished, eaten with your hands, the buttery juices wiped from your chin and licked from your fingers.

The easiest way to cook lobster is simply boiled and then served on a picnic table spread with newspaper. Select a pot that is large enough to accommodate all the lobsters. Add enough salt to the water to approximate the salinity of the sea, about 3.5%. Add enough vinegar that the water tastes slightly acidic.

Bring the water to a boil, add the lobsters and cover the pot. The water should maintain a simmer but no more — that makes more tender meat. The general rule for cooking lobster is to allow 7 to 8 minutes per pound. I think lobster tends to be better when slightly less than fully cooked, but most people want their shellfish well done. This is totally understandable, but a hint of translucence in the flesh is not a bad thing. 

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The weeks of soaking rain we had recently in LA were wonderful for people’s gardens, with the depressing drawback of the continued, surreal-seeming announcements, on radio and in the newspapers, that the rain was having no effect whatsoever on the drought.

In those circumstances, there was nothing more cheering to gaze upon indoors than parrot tulips. Even after they’ve been cut and put in an arrangement, these flowers continue to stretch and grow and open, with their vivid, striated colorations continuing to develop and intensify. Here, “Salmon Parrot,” “Orange Favorite” and “Libretto” tulips share space with “Climbing Joseph’s Coat”, a rose that has more than enough wattage to stand up to them, along with another rose, “Climbing Herbert Hoover,” which, although not widely grown (it dates from 1937), has the appearance and the scent of a peach, and a single specimen of the rose “Oklahoma”, which picks up the very darkest tones in all the other flowers.